Wednesday, December 29, 2010

Question #2

Question #2
To Pleat Or Not To Pleat

Are pleated pants ugly? I kind of like them, but Sassy Gay Friend (0:49) disapproves. WHAT AM I SUPPOSED TO DO WITH MYSELF?

Question #3
Oh, Those Stinky Romans

This question comes from my brother John. Do you think the ancient Romans (or whoever) thought farts and fart jokes were funny? I mean really, what're funnier than farts? Farts will always be funny, and if you don't think so, I don't think we should be friends. Seriously--to this day, I often laugh when I fart in the bathroom.

Tuesday, December 28, 2010

Recipe #4

Yeah, I'm writing three posts in a row. Just pretend I wrote these over the course of the last year when I didn't write anything.

Recipe #4
Panini the Great

I made these for lunch today. Kaitlin and Claire are their creator, or at least, they showed me how to make them.

Get a ciabatta or any kind of tasty bread. Slice it so that it's like a sandwich but with nothing in the middle. Duh.

Get some prosciutto (it's this really thinly sliced meat that's salty) and put it on a hot pan so that it fries a little bit. Put some oil on the pan if you're afraid it will stick. It's pretty oily already, though, so you might not need more.

Put the prosciutto on one of the ciabatta slices. Put cream cheese on the other ciabatta slice and then put a little bit of sliced tomato on top of the cream cheese and then put a little bit of fresh basil on top of the tomato.

Close the panini. Panini is the plural and panino is technically the singular. It's Italian. Other examples of this is biscotti/biscotto and gelati/gelato. I thought cappuccino/cappuccini would be one too, but I can't confirm this on the Internet. This is List #6.5 Italian Bologna. Apparently, panino is just sandwich, generally, in Italian. I guess this food isn't necessarily a panino. It could just be a sandwich. Also, panino sounds pretentious.

Put some oil on the pan, heat it, and then put the panini on the hot oil to toast it. Flip it over when it's toasted to toast the other side.

Then, throw it in the garbage. You shouldn't be consuming that many calories.

Thoughts #5

Thoughts #5
Everything Stints

Damn, stuff just isn't as cool the longer it exists. Okay, I guess that's not completely true, but it is a lot of the time. The exception, of course, is cheese, which I've never actually experienced first hand. How do I know that I will like cheese more when it is aged?

This blog is a perfect example of what I mean. First posts: Great. Now posts: Too refined and overworked. I feel like a stinky adult trying to draw little kid pictures. You know that they're supposed to look like little kid pictures, but they don't. They just look stupid.

Also, Christmas. I used to love Christmas. Now, I hate it. ELVES ARE SLAVES! FREE THE ELVES!

In fact, I'll make a

List #7
Moldy Cheese and Exceptions

(-) means worse, (+) means better; w.r.t. time

-blogs and journals (as above)
+cheese (as above)
-Christmas (as above)
-my cat Rhinoceros
+gummy candy
+my family and friends (AWWWW, HOW CUTE)
-jokes and stories
+acne
-/+memories
-/+games
-our country (but, actually, this is probably a +)
-important things
+the little things
-moldy cheese
-imagination
+science

Actually, there are a lot more (+) than I thought. Like, a lot more. I guess I'm just full of shit sometimes.

Really, I guess, it depends on your aim. Remakes of games (e.g. Bioshock 2 vs Bioshock) often have more refined game play (a +), which is great. However, the quality of the story and feel generally decreases (a -). Spin offs are another big no.

Question #1

Question #1
Your Hair Is Everywhere

Why am I so drawn to cutting hair? There's little I like more than sinking a slightly dulled paired of scissors into my luscious locks. I'm having an affair, and it is with all the Mr. Baldies in my life. The patches on my head where I cut off a little too much. You've seen them: the clump of bang on the right side of my head that's half an inch shorter than the rest of my hair, the spot behind my head where you can see some scalp. There have never been finer beings.

This degree of pleasure I get from this doesn't surprise me one bit. It's just so refreshing--having hair, deciding it needs to be cut, and then having it all gone half an hour later. There have been times in my life where, in the middle of having guest over, I excuse myself to the bathroom and cut off all my hair.

It's immensely satisfying to clean up all the bits of hair on the sink and floor. It's fun to see how differently it styles depending on its length, though slightly frustrating how fickle it is as it grows. Once it's grown out a little and all the bald spots disappear, there is usually a two week period where it looks just divine. Then, have the urge to get out the scissors and chop it off again.

Really, it's a pretty big decision, cutting your hair. Hair, in my opinion, completely changes a person's look. However, it's one thing that I can be impulsive about but easily recover from when things go poorly. If you know me, you know I love the impulses: $80 on fancy underwear, tattooing myself, switching majors to computer science, getting an exotic piercing, pursuing game design, pushing tourists down wells. These are all probably things I should think about for longer than 5 minutes, but I usually don't.

It gives me the same satisfaction as picking a scab. The more I touch it, the worse it will be and the longer I will take to recover it, but I just can't stop. Maybe there's some decay in my brain that causes it. Let's hope so.

Wednesday, December 22, 2010

Thoughts #4

Thoughts #4
RTFM, Pavlov

Okay, first, I hate when pop culture references things. Things like psychology and science. I especially hate it when the common stuff is used. I've heard "Pavlov's dog" used way too many times outside a psychology classroom. I'm all for the general public learning about science, I just hate all those clichéd analogies and half understood theories used to explain bogus philosophical claims. Oh, and stop talking about evolution like it's a person. Evolution doesn't "want" anything, it just happens. Learn science; it's actually pretty neat.

Really though, I want to talk about The Reward System and Me. Namely, I don't think have a reward system in my brain anymore. Some people are all, "I'll eat a chocolate if I finish reading 10 pages," or "If I do NaNoWriMo, I'll buy myself these really cool quartz eyelets," but me, I'm like, "No, I want everything right now, and I'm going to give it to myself." I think it's because I stopped having goals. Or because I get everything I want.

If you stop reading there, I probs sound like a spoiled brat. And maybe I am. I get everything I want because I don't want a lot. And if at first I want something, and realize I can't have it (because he's straight, or it's too expensive, or my getting it would hurt someone else), then I convince myself I don't really want it any more.

But yeah, how do I fix this? I feel like it's cramping my style.

Sunday, December 19, 2010

Recently #4

Recently #4
Too Looooooooooong

Ugh, I hate long posts. Mostly because I know that if I came across a post like that, I would never read it. The thing is, I never mean for them to be long. And really, they aren't that long. They just seem like they are.

So anyway, here is a shorty:

PAHLO IS CARVED ON CAMPUS SOMEWERE PERMENANTLY -- FIND IT!!!!

One of my favorite bodily sensations is the feeling of earwax falling out of my ear.

When I installed the newest version of Ubuntu, it disabled by touchpad configuration for some reason, and now I can't turn off the tap-to-click function. This is super annoying, because it always moves my cursor when I'm typing or doing whatever because I accidentally touch the pad with my palm. So annoying!

Also recently, I took Benadryl because I'm allergic to something and I went CRAZY. I felt like I was David at the dentist (which, incidentally, is a video I hate). Thanks Samantha.

Dream #2

Dream #2
Felt Owls

Recently, I've been having a lot of really fantastic dreams. Like, literally, I'll have several every night and they're all really good. I had three last night, and one of them I like in particular, so I'll summarize the bits I can remember. I've added a few details to make it a better story and make more sense. Take note that are no words in this dream; the characters speak in pantomime.

The dream starts out following a felt owl that lives in the sea. We'll call him Mowl. He's a little lonely, even though he's surrounded by other felt owls in his community. One day, overcome by loneliness, he takes a walk and comes upon a junkyard. Wandering the isles of junk, he finds another felt owl, sitting against a pile or trash, who we'll call Kowl. This felt owl looks tired, worn down, and just about lifeless, holding on to a single piece of candy. Mowl, seeing this as an opportunity for a new friend and approaches. He leads Kowl back into town, yet after a few days, there is still no light in Kowl's eyes. Remembering the piece of candy Kowl held on the day they met, Mowl builds Kowl a candy factory in hopes to give his life new purpose.

This restores Kowl, and he takes up well to the factory, but he soon becomes obsessed with his work. Mowl comes to visit him one day, but Kowl barely raises his head from his work, his mind entirely consumed and his body running through precise, calculated motions. All he can do is offer Mowl a small piece of candy, which Mowl drops by mistake. Kowl becomes irrationally upset by this, so Mowl leaves. However, on his way out, he sees another owl watching from a nearby window overlooking the factory floor. It is a female owl that we will call Yowl.

Though she is completely rigid and motionless, it is her eyes that disturb Mowl the most. They seem blank, as though she is nothing but an empty shell of an owl that has taken on an infatuation to Kowl. Mowl decides to investigate and finds his suspicions are true. She is completely unaware by Mowl's presence, staring unwaveringly at Kowl. He notices a piece of candy in her hand, and takes it in hopes that it will bring her to her senses. However, as he does this, both Kowl and Yowl turn to him, rage in their eyes. They begin to chase him, their minds lost.

Fleeing, Mowl knows he cannot yield to them. Something is terribly sinister abound, and he cannot let it continue. By handing over the candy, Kowl would continue to slave away without pause, consumed by his work, and Yowl would stand forever lifeless at the window, watching Kowl. He had to fix what he had created. So he ran and ran, and they chased and chased. All across the city, through the coral and across the rocks. They climbed ledges and floated across kelp until finally, they came upon a cliff. Nowhere else to run, Mowl jumps off the cliff and uses his wings to slow his fall. Kowl and Yowl follow, but in their distorted states, they are unable to use their wings and fall to their death. Mowl soon reaches the sea floor where the two other felt owls lay and looks at them. His eyes incredibly sad, he drops the piece of candy by their feet and returns home.

The dream ends with complete darkness. Painted images flash into view, depicting what their lives could have been. A song plays over the pictures, a sweet female voice narrating this sentiment. About what was lost and the wonderful life that could have been lived instead. About a friendship and a romance and happy endings. And then I wake up.

And to conclude, I just wanted to point out a few things. First, I think this all occurred underwater because I'm playing World of Warcraft: Cataclysm, and the area I'm currently in is all underwater. Second, I seem to have a lot of dreams involving junkyards (a lot meaning more than one) and they are based off the junkyard in Legend of Mana. Third, I apparently can compose fantastic, emotional music in my sleep.

Monday, December 13, 2010

Yesterday #4

Yesterday #4
Zoobies

Yesterday, I flew into Seattle from Chicago. The flight was 4 hours and 11 minutes. On the plane, they played an episode of The Office, and then Eat, Pray, Love, and then an episode of House. Interestingly, I had seen both the TV episodes they showed, even though I rarely watch the shows. In fact, I have probably seen fewer than 10 episodes each.

Samantha/Amanda Shamanga/Panamuia picked me up form the aero-port. What a sweetie. We then went to Patrick's house for a holiday party. At the holiday party there were many delicious edible food substances, including Buttery/Cocoa Whatevers that were DELICIOUS! I plan on submitting them to WikiLeaks (which, incidentally, is my favorite thing on the planet).

There was a baby with as at the party and I called it Zabia. It's pronounced zu-BEE-uh, so I guess it's spelled Zabía. "Baby be judging." It's the truth, babies judge you all the time. They just sit there and stare and point and think judgmental things in their little heads. Baby sees what you are doing and does not approve.

We also made a toast to zoobies. However, I accidentally tipped Amanda's cup, and she choked, so I laughed and the liquid went down the wrong tube and it hurt very much. I'm not sure whether to now love zoobies or hate them. Turns out, zoobies are actually something. The Internet says, "Zoobies are award-winning plush animals that turn into pillows and blankets". I WANT ONE. But those aren't the zoobies we toasted to. The zoobies we toasted to are separate.

We made up a game that I want to play. Eavesdrop on people's conversations, and then answer all their rhetorical questions in secret and respond do their statements, also in secret (ideally with a friend).

Cheers.