i went out to dinner with james tonight and had heated discussions about A) affirmative action B) giving your credit card number to amazon and C) something else that i can’t quite remember right now. i don’t even know why i mentioned that, because i don’t think any of it is that interesting. oh no, i’ve falledn once again into the trap of posting without anything to say. i won’t do it again. promise.

here’s an emotionally charged (and filled with profanity) post that i tried posting earlier:

this morning i woke up to kplu. damn the kube, because whenever i wake up in the morning, kcmu is drowned out by the kube playing i’m sorry ms. jackson. i decided last night that i’d wake up to something just as bad, but different.

well, what i woke up to was a report saying that amazon is laying off 1,300 people and closing the seattle dc and call center. when i worked there, they asked us to work 50-60 hours a week during christmas, mandatory overtime was enforced, and morale was going down the drain. i haven’t been there for a while, which i am very glad of, but i can’t but help remember how much we were shit on while i was there. like any customer service center, we were the janitorial staff for the rest of the company, cleaning up their messes. as morale atrophied and people became disgruntled, service within customer service started to dwindle. when they opened up the call center in india, i felt like my workload doubled because of the atrocious mistakes they made over there didn’t stop until someone over here solved the problem. the management threw money at whatever problems they encountered, and all we could do was bitch and moan about it.

well, a while ago there were plans of attempting to unionize here in seattle. plans are no more now that the lay-offs are coming round. here’s the report, complete with my good punk rock buddy dustin in the picture smoking a cigarette. well, if you had any doubts that amazon was an evil corporate giant, you can forget your qualms.

goddamn those fuckers. i remember one of the biggest worries we had while i was working there was that this would happen. management was so hush-hush about it, and no one wanted to believe that jeff would let something like that happen. i knew it was over when they brought that fuck joe galli in. i went to a meeting where he was preaching the new company mantra of profitablity like he was jerry falwell. no, i know they need to make money, but i didn’t believe in by whatever means necessary.

no, i’m glad i’m not part of that stupid faux-hippie culture of .com bullshit anymore.

like i said: goddamn those fuckers.

at night, you sneak out the window:

there i was, essentially by myself. in the middle of the floor at the croc waiting for someone to come talk to me. i was standing under the heater, and becoming uncomfortable from the warm air blowing down on me from above. it was rainer maria, cinerama, and versus. i hadn’t exactly come to see all the bands, i was only really interested in seeing the marias, but that all changed quickly as Gedge took the stage.

i sat through both cinerama and rainer maria, remembering how bored i was last time i saw versus (illegally at that, one of the few times i wasn’t thrown out at the door) and got ready to leave again as they took the stage.

they started playing. damn my memory. if i was mistaken about the last time i saw versus, what the hell else was i forgetting? versus was amazing, and i remembered more clearly that i wasn’t bored last time i saw them. no, i wasn’t bored, that’s not the right adjective. i was anxious, and was dissolved into someone else the entire time. i spent way too much time ignoring my own feelings about things, and simply filtered them through someone else.

no, this time i came to the show alone, and i enjoyed it. much in the same way i enjoy seeing movies by myself a lot these days, and much in the same way i like driving by myself.

i was just upstairs listening to a tape i had been given (or had been willed as my property, as the owner took her leave of me), and dumb fun came on, and no matter how many times i censure my memory, it still won’t listen to me. i had forgotten all about the band, all about that song, and all about that fucking show. again.

i stood there in a haze of smoke and alcohol, bad breath and sweat, and i squinted to see the Baluyut’s play their rock. a girl next to me asked if i was the lead singer’s cousin, and if she had met me before.

“no,” i replied, “but we’re both filipino, if that’s any consolation.”

“Il est idiot, mais je t’aime. J’ai voulu vous voir, pour voir si je voudrais vous voir.”:

i’m compelled to write something, but i don’t know what. it feels late, but it’s only 1030. james called me to see if i was feeling any better, which was nice.

i don’t feel all that much better. sometimes i worry that there’s something more to my whole stomach pain thing than simply gastritis, like maybe a full blown ulcer. last night i ate a lot of salty food, which was probably bad news, and probably what caused the relapse. i really have to start paying more attention to my health, i’m sure.

i sit by this girl in my cinema class who i’ve sort of developed a crush on, regardless of the fact that i’ve never had a conversation with her (aside from her asking how much longer the movie is and me asking if we had homework). she laughs a lot, snickers and giggles, which i find rather endearing. she’s quiet other than that, unless her friend is in class talking to her, in which case i hear them gossiping about people. i don’t mind all that all that much, but i certainly don’t condone it. what, me, gossip? never.

but this crush is only 1 of 5 i’ve inflicted upon myself. i don’t know whether it’s just a filling of some kind of void that i’ve been working on for a long time, or if i’m genuinely attracted to them.

nah, fuck that. i’m attracted to them. there’s another girl in my philosophy class who asks intelligent questions and wears thrift store clothes and smiles a lot and….yeah. anyways. nevermind.

i think i’ve decided that breathless is one of my all-time favorite movies.

talking how the group had begun to splinter, i could taste your lipstick on the filter:

last night i tried to sleep at 1. i woke up at 230 with a piercing ache in my stomach. i stayed awake for the next few hours, trying to watch tv and sooth my stomach. it wasn’t working, so i went downstairs and puked for a little while. i took a tagamet, and lie awake in my bed falling in and out of consciousness until about 630, when the pain went away and i actually got some real sleep. needless to say, i missed my class in the morning (again), and even my philosophy class came and went without my attendance. i did, however, go to my film class, where again i started feeling a little sour stomach coming on again. i don’t know what the deal is. a bus sideswiped my car on my way home. hooray for mondays.

my car’s fine, and i’m feeling better. saturday night i went down to pioneer square and hung out at J & M’s with a bunch of friends. it was actually really fun, and i got a little drunker than i expected. it was really good to spend time with my brother and my friends, whom he doesn’t usually hang out with. thing was, it was a seamless transition, we went out, talked, drank, laughed, and had a really, really good time. i was thinking about going to portland but deemed it too long a drive to go by myself (and knowing that i’d probably be spending way too much money down there), and opted to stay in seattle instead.

nanette’s story about spinning around in a car in the snow reminds of mine:

driving home from highschool in a desert winter, snow thinly layering the suburban streets, josh and glenn where in the car with me. everyone was driving slow, very slow, and i, being an impatient and foolish high-schooler, decided that i’d try and pass a few cars up. i mean, the road was wide as football field, and it wasn’t wreckless driving. i just handled it the wrong way.

my car skid, and remember my driver’s ed class, i turned into the skid. well, i overcorrected. i tried again, and did the same thing. by this time, 15 other cars scattered about in front and behind me were just staring as i spun out completely, into oncoming traffic. i remember panicking like hell, but as quietly as a the snow falling onto the ground sitting behind the steering wheel.

glenn on the other hand, thinks this is hilarious, like a rodeo ride. so he’s sitting there in the passenger seat screaming his ass off and laughing maniacally. meanwhile, we’ve spun 580 and fortunately there’s no other cars on the other side of the road. i’m facing the correct direction on the road, and we’ve basically done a 580 powerslide and flipped directions. i pulled into a turn about 50 feet away, and tried to forget anything had happened.

the next day, i get insulted at school about my poor driving skills.

in any case, glad to hear that nannette’s okay. and it’s also good to hear that there are still plenty of nice people out there to help others.

now that brings me to hobbesian cynicism that everyone’s actions are purely self-regarding. if everyone was so self-regarding, then why the hell would they stop to help someone out on the side of the road? ’cause it makes them feel good? yeah, possibly - hobbes’ perception of pity is simply a reminder that any tragedy that befalls another can also happen to you. meaning there is no truly other-regarding action.

butler doesn’t think so. benevolence exists in that the action is truly other-regarding, because the action is deliberated upon with the intention of helping others. if there were in actuality no other-regarding emotion, why do we still tend to distinguish between the two (selfishness and selflessness)? reverting to empiricism, mandeville says the only reason we distinguish between the two, is because we’re raised to do so, we are created with delusions that benevolence exists.

anyone buy any of that?

don’t get me wrong, it doesn’t bother me at all, but just having this many dreams and remembering them all is strange. it happened again last night, but i don’t remember them all completely.

there is one where i’m actually sitting down in this room which is metallic and has some sort of movie projector there. there’s quite a few, actually, and they look like the radar maps they used on empire strikes back. guess what was playing on the screens?

yes, one of my dreams. and i was watching it.

this site is beautiful:  Once Upon a Forest 

can’t…stop…posting…..

happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you, happy birthday dear sonya, happy birthday to you.

and since i’ve become the sole updater around here, i’ve decided to post excerpts of something an email from brandon:

i have so much planned for next school year, including a hell of a lot of math and physics classes, learning russian, taking poetry and linguistics classes, squeezing in music practice sessions, drinking beer, eating potato burritos, hanging out a hell of a lot more often with bellingham friends i’ve sort of shrugged off,coming down to seattle more often, getting more into the music scene, doing math/physics research…damn. as it turns out, i probably won’t be able to finish my undergraduate work by the end of next year, so eventually i’ll be a super-super senior. so it goes.

and one from josh:

i really need to learn how to do things on time. i haven’t played guitar in a while, i went to a bar with a dj this past weekend and danced the night away. that was rad. I’ve got to register for classes tomorrow arrgh! I really should take a shower.

that is all.

you can’t buy cigarettes or get a room here in green river:

i just jotted down some notes quickly about the dreams i had last night, but still refuse to get into the details. does anyone have any insight as to why i keep having these weird dreams? is it some deep rooted psychological scar that’s emerging through my subconscious while i sleep? or is it just random synapse firing?

okay, okay, i have to tell you about the weirdest of the three last night, all they were all pretty disturbing. here’s “summer of the setting sun”:

i’m sitting in a big field of grass, near a hotel, in what seems like las vegas, because everything else around me is desert. there’s a huge rollercoaster moving around above me, and i lie on my back and stare at it, because there’s this one point where it shoots down and looks like it’s going to fall on me. it doesn’t, and i continue to watch it do crazy loops and drops and i hear people scream. i think, “oh, they’re having fun.” that doesn’t last long though, because i can hear someone on the ride throwing up, and i’m a bit concerned that the puke will hit me. but i’m not as concerned with that as i am about that person. why don’t they stop that damn thing? it looked crazy, and i thought i’d probably be chundering all over the place too if i were in her (i knew it was a girl somehow) position too.

there’s something weird and alien about the whole place, and all of the sudden, i see dust and microbes floating in the air, and panic spreads over something i have absolutely no idea about. someone runs out and yells, “the summer of the setting sun is coming!” and everyone rushes inside. i end up sitting at a table with my mom, who is a type of hero here, and she’s asking another filipino lady if she could use some of that ointment to help with her arthritis. the reply is, “oh, that stuff we use to fill holes in pillows?” and my mom say, “yeah, that.” we then sit and talk about the summer of the setting sun. it’s a storm, or a plague, or possibly a yearly or centennial thing, i’m not sure.

the only way to be safe from it is to kill certain toys. i look down at a piece of laminated paper with pictures of the creatures/toys on it, and i wonder what the s.o.t.s.s. has to do with toys?

and then i wake up.

there you have it. the blair witch project one and me killing this guy that kills a fisherman is kind of weird too. perhaps another time.

i just got out of my midterm, and was amazed at the amount of bullshit i wrote down. i really don’t like my prof now, she’s anal and ridiculous and inane (in a bad way) and terrible. i wanted to just throw up on the paper and hand it in.