jeffrey + upstairsloft

Now the tough part. Adjusting to life without visitors. My parents moved to their 2nd home in Sac, just a few minutes away from where Kate and I live. We had 10 visitors– 4 friends, 3 cousins a brother and my parents. I always feel empty at times like these. Life was rich this weekend. No extravagant event just chillin and making our rounds of fun.

What’s crazy is, I am witnesseing a blog in progress. I read about 3-4 blogs like a daily newspaper. If I ever had any business on the internet, that would primarily be it–on a normal daily basis. I glanced over Mary’s screen and saw her typing in that familiar Blogger interface. In a monotone voice she told me “I’m blogging.” So I have seen the Mary-Blog-Face and she is all business. She’s concentrating, meticulously choosing words to best describe her experience. 2 feet away from me is a girl I read about when she is 500 miles away. I have a bit of stalkerness to me. Tim’s niece reads his blog and thinks he is boring. Mary can’t tell whether she is lying or not. Krystle’s pee burns. Yep. Stalker I tell you.

There’s this girl I know from the internet. Her name is Mary. She’s at our place. I must say, the Mary I’m used to is a fellow blogger. To have her spending a couple of days with us is weird but a good weird. New experiences always teach us about people and about ourselves. Paul met her over the internet and something about Michael Jackson tapes. That was 2002. Strange huh?

While daydreaming at the gas station, I started a dialogue in my head about why rappers embellish the hell out of their cars. This guy had a new benz, about 100+ grand. It was bright shiny red. And if looking at it didn’t get your attention, I’m sure the heart-pounding bass would. This guy was all about attention. His car was ‘decked’ out with an overdone bodykit, SPINNNAHZ, the whole bang.

Well, this guy captured my attention beyond any other guy with a pimp’d out ride. As he drove off, windows down, bass thumping, one of the Chevron workers ran across the street while he was stopped at a light and I was pondering why. Within that 3-5 seconds, I came up with a couple of theories. The most reasonable one, perhaps he dropped his credit card. Seemed reasonable. But like I said, this guy was all about attention. And nothing grabs my attention like a 100+ grand Red Benz with a gas pump/hose hanging out of its fuel tank. Sacramento can be fun sometimes.

Those pinstripe chucks are pretty hot.

So… I know a guy. He said. “What the fuck is the point of working for these people when my professional opinion isn’t applied? I work with monkeys. All I get when I explain my well-thought out rationale is a scoff or an “I see.” Thing is, these people would choose to use Arial instead of Univers. Informing them about any type history. They have no interest of its implications. They’re closed-minded. My opinion doesn’t matter. They endear shitty graphics. I’ve become a desktop publisher at most. An office secretary designer if anything. This place makes me miserable. But, $$$. I’d rather be paid to typeset in Hebrew in 6pt type. At least I’d develop some sort of skill.”

Yo. Pics from this weekend.

>>> Dungeons & Dragons Tourney

Go to www.mozilla.com and download Firefox. It makes a big difference. IE is really not up to standards. Remember Windows 98? Yeah. It’s like that. It doesn’t even display PNG transparency correctly, for those who do not find that GIFs work well enough. Plus, something about no CSS support. Nerd talk. I still see Mac users at school launch IE. Sad. Safari is way better than that. It’s like imitation horsemeat. Yeah! Who wants fake horsemeat?!

I’ve noticed that many couples’ exchange of hostilities occur when they are in public with their friends. Kate and I are one of them. Kate and I get on each other’s nerves when other people are around, even the friend who has seen us at our best and worst. We get along when we’re by ourselves, for the most part. Because I am an ass in general, I turn out looking like an ass in these hostile disputes with Kate. Kate likes to emphasize the fact that I am an ass around our friends and it always seems that I give up on patience too easily. Generally, I am an impatient person but I have become rather desensitized to female “bantering” when they’re on that monthly cycle.

There comes a point where I become too weary to put up with it and I end up being hostile, wanting to be alone, and just constantly muttering nonsense and curse words.

Coming from a guy who appreciates what women go through sociologically and biologically, the Pregnancy Card is becoming as abused as the dreaded Race Card. Women, inevitable, go through their monthly cycles because somehow they were chosen to bear children. Many asshole men have failed to fully appreciate women for their hard work. Though women go through their cycle month after month and endure 9+ months of pain and hormone imbalances, a man who truly loves you is as deeply affected when the woman isn’t as sensitive to the man as a good man is as sensitive to his woman.

I joke around about hittin’ up the titty bars with my pal Jun and, you know, that playful crap men do just because somehow culture has passed down this neanderthal-like gene to even the greatest of citizens, but I have been to the titty bar once in Hawaii in 2001, which was disgusting. Yeah..I remember you Aurora… Aurora the she-man. But please, ladies, you endure the agony and hormone imbalances, and men like me who truly care for our partners endure these moodswings. Please. Please. I beg for you to take it easy on us. Not all of us our pig-headed men, though Jesse Spano has kind of taught our generationt hat we all are. Zack Morris said it himself. Don’t just us men by our worst specimen.

I got a new toy with my prospective student loan, an Epson 4180 scanner. I love Epson’s drivers. It’s the main reason I made the purchase. Anyhow, seeing as I had some time today to test out the new machine, I scanned 5 sets of Lomos I’ve been meaning to post. They’re at the “Lomographs” section.

I highly recommend the Epson 4180. It scans photos, negatives, slides and medium format film to accomodate my standards. The Canon Lide30 was alright but it was due time for a major upgrade.

I have an arsenal of ploys I use towards telemarketers. Most of the time I activate my old asian woman voice [many friends and family have experienced this in bewilderment when calling the Sac landline] and pretend as if I cannot speak any word of english besides “ooo.. ohoooo.. no speek a engrish.” Sometimes the asses ask if there is anybody else in the house who does. Sometimes they ask if I speak Spanish [wtf?!] For those who don’t know, my Asian voice is pretty damn convincing; I sound like Mrs. Swann.

Sometimes I just answer the phone breathing really heavy like I’m some kid messing with the phone. Sometimes I’m an ass to them and ask if they want to refinance their house because I know a person. Well, today, I was nice and polite. I used the words, “I appreciate,” and “I admire.” Hell, I told the guy I admire his persistence but I am just not interested. Besides its irrelevent benefits for me, I just don’t want to deal with anything more than whatever plans I have right now.

I was calm, centered and extremely polite with no hint of sarcasm in my voice. He was still an asshole. I hope he calls back next time so I can unleash all of my ploys against him. I will use a heavy-breathing, asian lady voice who is trying to convince him to refinance his home–you know, turn the tables. I love being an ass.