Powered By Apathy

I have church at 12:30PM. I have been late a lot lately for various reasons (none of them valid in the end). Today I thought I would make it. No NFL playoff game to distract me and feel bad about later. I thought I'd better eat something before I went so I put a Totino’s Party Pizza in the oven. I like them. They are total crap but if you take them as they are without reference to Plato's form of pizza then they are satisfying in their own way.

I ate the one and needed to hurry and get ready for church but I was still hungry and craving another Totino’s. I put it in the oven because, "I've been late for two months straight at least" so I figured it wouldn't hurt this time either since it was all in one string that could be compartmentalized and called a "phase" later. You grow out of phases but habits are much more work to deal with. So, anyhow the pizza finished baking, I was already destined to be late and I sat down to eat the same thing all over again. I began to feel that this was overkill even before taking my first bite of my second pizza. I kept on till my plate was clean. Then something magical happened. I was overcome with depression. I was sluggish and full of food that I had come to despise and it turned itself on me. It was pretty weird. Don't fool around with that stuff. One Totino’s pizza is always enough , but if you do ever over indulge just remember that life gets better you just need to ride it out and let the pizza run its course.

Posted by poweredbyapathy at 09:58 PM | Permalink | Comments (4)

Today I was a tourist. You know, when you live in a place you don't see all the things there are to see there cause you can do it some other time and because you don't like feeling like a tourist at home. Well, my girlfriend lives in San Jose and isn't from the area (although she actually lived here a little while when she was a kid and probably spent more actual time living here than I have) and we decided to see some sights.

First stop: 826 Valencia

This is not so much a tourist stop, it's actually just down the street from me but it's awesome. It's a pirate themed storefront that serves to support Dave Eggars' youth writing workshops for underprivileged kids in the area.

(Also Paxton Gate which is a really cool store of random things and garden items)

Next: Coit Tower

A girl I go to church with told me that it was secretly a monument to the phallice of the fireman with whom the Lillie Coit (the rich woman who donated the money to build the tower) was having an affair. She pointed to the shape of the tower as evidence to the truthfulness of the story. Then again, all towers are phallic and there isn't anything about this tower that is particularly penile. I do like calling it coitus tower, though. (Also, it's got a pretty good view of the city)

Next: Fisherman's Wharf, but just to eat at in-n-out.

Next: Lombard street

It's still curvy. Rumor has it one of the guys from 3rd eye blind lives there. Also, MTV's real world had a house there. So, you could move there and have some pretty lame neighbors.

Next: Haight Street but it was really just to go to Amoeba records.

Standing in front of amoeba was Ben Gibbard talking to "some guy." I decided to say hi since we have a couple of mutual friends (Jared Hess and Rob Nyland). Then I went and asked him about his benefit show the night before that I "wasn't able to make it" to. I'm a bit retarded, but he was quite amiable. Three cheers for that.

Next: Twin Peaks not to be confused with Twin Peaks

It was cold up there. Really cold (it was not Park City cold but then I was not prepared for it so damn you for belittling my coldness). It was also beautiful. I'm not kidding.

All in all a good day to be a tourist. Prolly the most clear beautiful day we've had in San Francisco in a month or two.

Posted by poweredbyapathy at 08:10 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

Today I didn't want to get out of bed. It was terribly cold outside of my blankets and terribly warm and comfortable inside of them. I woke up at the very last minute to be able to get ready and get to work on time. I didn't have time to shower but then I didn't really do anything to soil myself the day before so I felt fresh enough to get by on the previous days shower. So, heres the thing, my underwear was not riding up yesterday as I walked to and from work. They did not ride up at all yesterday but today, walking to work, they were cramming themselves between my manly back cheeks in a most uncomfortable way. It's dificult to know exactly how to dislodge cotton from one's crack in public. I'm sure that anyone who saw my antics knew, in spite of my attempts at tact and stealth, that I was pulling my underwear out of my buttocks. The question I want to ask regards damage control. Is it more helpful to clench your buttocks so that you limit the amount of cloth that can occupy that sunblocked real estate or should you just relax so that the cloth has nothing to hold it in place and falls out with the help of gravity?

Posted by poweredbyapathy at 11:13 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Every now and then I get this anxiety and I want to start over again. I want to move somewhere new where I know no one and never see anyone I ever knew ever again. It has nothing to do with my friends. I have great friends and my family borders amazing sometimes. I'm a bit a perfectionist but I'm also an underachiever and a pleaser. Soooo, I occasionally get these surges of anxiety where I feel like a total failure and waste and I get scared that everyone is going to find out that I'm a total sham and be disappointed in me. It's not a very helpful feeling and though it is also irrational it is powerfully present and real when I feel it. I've been under this over a series of recent days. Sometimes it is preceded by an event or events that cause me to withdraw and sometimes it just comes on me. I'm generally a likeable person who likes nearly everyone for one reason or another. I'm almost a humanist at times. However I become somewhat of a misanthrope during these periods and I generally subtract myself from the world as much as I can and draw into myself and my thoughts.

When these moods come on i find myself even more irritated with the crap on TV and the stupid way McDonald's etc. try to sell me crappy things. I still don't think McGriddles are going to make my life more fun, they'll just disapoint me with their oil soaked limpness and flavor my day with their unsatisfying aftertaste. Anyways, suffice it to say I am more irritable and less personable than my usual self.

So, I was walking around with my headphones on, ignoring the world. When I came upon the intersection of Divisadero and Haight street I saw an old bag lady stumbling through the middle of the intersection betwixt the passing cars on each side of her. Homeless people dart into traffic all the time but then she came towards my corner holding out something in her hand and smiling with her two teeth muttering something. I pulled out my headphones and noticed that she was talking to the girl next to me on the sidewalk who was holdin a small dog. The old lady was saying, "he's gotta have his ball, can't lose that." She handed the girl the red toy ball and stumbled off still smiling with every glimmer left in her remaining teeth. I felt like a bastard. I was one. I didn't want to be bothered by the existence of anyone else in the world and here was this homeless woman running into traffic to grab something that someone else dropped and she wasn't trying to keep it or get a hand out. That was a good and nice thing to do. I did nothing good or nice at all today.

The second event that ocurred today was just around the corner from my house about 15 minutes after the preceding event. Walking home in my warantless depression I passed a young man not much older than I who wore a terribly sad mask of a face. His face was drawn in deep lines and his eyes semed pulled down by unfathomable despair. I walked right past him but I felt like giving the man a hug and giving him some moment of hope or relief. I doubt I could have accomplished that desire. He probably would've run away from me after hitting and kicking me repeatedly. Maybe not but I thought to myself, "I still have some good in me. Maybe I'm not a bastard after all."

These things didn't take me completely out of my mood but they gave me things to think about and next time I hit my cycle of misanthropy I can learn the same lessons all over again. Namely, I'm a selfish bastard but not totally.

Posted by poweredbyapathy at 11:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (3)

My roommate Casey is getting his masters in fine art here in San Francisco. He's loaded with talent and I really like his drawings/paintings. If you're reading this, you probably already know him but, perhaps you don't. Well, check out his website: Casey Jex Smith

Posted by poweredbyapathy at 06:22 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

In case you’re waiting for a report, I'm getting better. I don't think it's mono; I'm just bored. My tonsils are shrinking back down to a manageable size and my body is less achy and tired. I'm almost cured. So there's that.

I have a nice laptop. It's an apple. I enjoy it. Such a small package with so many awesome features, including a 60-gigabyte hard drive. That hard drive is full of music, photos, movies, papers and applications. Literally full. Well, I had about 2 gigs empty after deleting some of my music files to make space. Anyhow, I like to use pro tools to record music with (a free version I downloaded from PRO TOOLS) but it won't work without a significant amount of free space available on the hard drive. So I decided a while ago that I was going to have to get an external hard drive to store some things on so I could free up space on my laptop. Yesterday I bought one.

Here's the thing, the hard drive is great, it does everything I want it to but that's all it does. I'm not disappointed in the hard drive I'm just disappointed. The thing is, I get excited about gadgets and technology. This is my newest gadget so I had a little spring in my step coming home last night. I plug it in, it works, I copy some files over to it and clear space on my computer and KAPOW! it's all over. As it turns out, that's all the fun you can have with a hard drive.

Posted by poweredbyapathy at 10:31 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Anybody out there ever had mono? Anyone know anyone that's had it twice? . . . in two years?

Well, I don't know if I have it but I had it two years ago. It was bad. Worse than anyone I've ever known. My tonsils swelled up so much I could barely speak, eat or sleep for more than two weeks. It came very close to ruining my life. In fact, there have been more than a few times when I thought that it had. Luckily, I'm still alive and able to experience my tonsils swelling up once again. The feeling of overwhelming fatigue and the constant, whole body tingle of pain; all mine again. Tommorrow I will call the doctor and see if it is mono or some new kind of torture. Just when things are starting to come together everything goes back to normal and I have some new crap to deal with.

Posted by poweredbyapathy at 08:39 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Allright folks, here's the newest of cool. If your down with what I'm putting out you'll be totally cool.

First, refer to groups of people as folks. For example, "Allright folks, here's the newest of cool." Also, refer to you parent as "my folks" or "the folks."

Second, Banana Republic is out. J-Crew is out. Diesel is way out. Anything you c an buy at urban outfitters is totally played out (I guess I'm mostly not really joking about that) and thrift stores? . . . Please! The new cool place to buy your clothes is the Old Navy. Seriously, just ask Dave Dayton, or if you don't know him ask Jimson Weed. If you don't know Jimson Weed it's going to be pretty hard to be very cool so just go here: THE HOUSE OF LEAF AND LIME
If anyone asks why your suddenly really into Old Navy just tell them, "cause those commercials are just damb awesome!" If they don't understand that then you don't need their friendship.

Third, when someone tells you something awesome or amazing just feign disinterest and dryly reply, "I know." Don't say anything else. You may choose to follow this by staring at them waiting for them to try and tell you something truly interesting or you may ignore them and look around vacantly with your ennui on your sleeve. If they do try and top their first story in an attempt to actully impress you, you respond the same way. It might help if you keep telling yourself that you would have said something much more interesting if you cared to. You will never care to say whatever more meaningful thing you are referring too and this silence and lack of reaction will convince others that are really smarter and more perceptive than they are. Others will hate you for this. This is only jealousy however and it will make those people want to be your friend even more. Now they are in your control because they are certain that you are much cooler than they. This is actually an age old cool rather than a new cool but some of you seem totally unaware of this procedure or lifestyle rather. This is, with persistence, a surefire strategy to be adored and envied and that is cool.

Fourth, not having damb ants in your kitchen.

Fif, saying "fif" whilst meaning "fifth." This one is kind of obvious; of course it's cool to say fif.

Last, quitting your job so you can have more time to teach your dog English. So damb cool!

Cheers,

Pampered by Atrophy

Posted by poweredbyapathy at 01:07 AM | Permalink | Comments (6)