xy

I resent the expression ‘9-5.’ It’s a myth, so stop perpetuating it, please. kthx.

There’s this pretentious, self-righteous kid who posted on the UCLA LJ community a few days asking for people’s journals. I really don’t think this is the right way to approach the situation. The general consensus was that it was a creepy request. The kid responds to my post about his creepy profile saying, “I take it you’re a perfect human being?” I laughed and also died a little inside…

Mainly because of his LJ post that followed the whole ordeal. He calls us, the people who responded, a bunch of self-absorbed, immature, shallow as a pool of piss, brainwashed conformists. Whoa, whoa there. Where did this reaction come from? Talk about overreacting. I’m willing to bet he’s a pariah, an outcast throughout all of school, who ironically claims that he’s somehow superior and more open-minded than everyone at UCLA. I don’t entirely blame him. I remember being a naive kid in college who thought my worldviews were the only right ones and that I was somehow better than a lot of other people. And I find that people who for some reason feel wronged by their peers, whether or not they’re right, seem to subscribe to this view.

One thing’s for certain: He apparently hasn’t yet gone through the humbling experience that ookla has to offer.

I’m not really offended or angry, but I do have half a mind to post an extremely snarky response to his personal LJ post. And in fact, I hope he reads this entry, so he knows that while he can put on snooty and self-righteous airs in front of his friends, he’s really just another insignificant teen who has yet to undergo life’s true rigors. He believes we’re trying to censor him, when all we would like is a little tact.

And we, the alums, are the sad ones who represent the dregs of society huh. Try being productive, not whiny. You’ll never expand your mind if you wallow in self-pity instead of being open to others. Learn it now, or learn it a much harder way later.

To view my previous entry, enter as the password the city I was born in.

On Monday, some idiot decided to crash into my still-newish car and run off without leaving a note. There’s a moderate amount of damage to my rear driver-side bumper, but it looks like whoever decided to hit me lost his side rearview mirror. Good. I kept the debris as evidence, although the police don’t seem to care. Apparently, nothing can be done without a license plate number or a witness description.

Jaymie kindly took me to the police station to file a report, and of course, they couldn’t do anything aside from filling out the paperwork, since there were no witnesses and no possible way to identify the moron. We did see a sleazy-looking guy while we were there who was begging the lady at the desk for his car keys, having recently been arrested for a DUI. We were a bit disgusted, though, when he said he worked for the LAUSD. As if anyone needs another reason to not send their kids to Los Angeles public schools…

So I feel pretty downtrodden right now. Not only do I have to pay out of pocket for an accident that’s not my fault — I need to haul my rear over to the repair shop and a rental car place sometime soon. I know it shouldn’t be a big deal, but I hate wasting my time doing things that aren’t absolutely necessary. Moreso than that, I feel 찝찝해. According to Naver, there’s no English equivalent for that word. I’m generally not a materialistic person and lucky for me, I don’t fawn or obsess over my car. Still, it gets to me that someone just violated my property and now I have to go through these next few days with an unneeded sense of urgency about getting it to the shop and worrying about the fact that my bumper is partially detached and that the plastic guard in my wheel well has fallen off.

And so yesterday, with all this stress, I couldn’t contain my passive aggressive rage when I came out of work to see that another judiciously challenged person had parked their car at a 45 degree angle to mine. Even better, I had an existing vendetta against this person for speeding dangerously in the parking structure at my expense. The last time, I left an empty water bottle under the person’s front tire so that when they backed out, it would crack and, ideally, startle the driver. This time I just left a note, written on a torn envelope, with the ever-so-eloquent ‘LEARN 2 PARK PLS.’

As for my car, I think I’ll put off the repairs and rental car business until the weekend. I simply don’t feel like dealing with this right now. I’ve begun feeling sick the last few days, physically.

I hate people.

I really miss living in L.A. We had a press release come in last week about a company moving its headquarters from Westwood to Century City. Insignificant news, really. But after reading that, I couldn’t help but get a rush of nostalgia (happens to me a lot). I lived and breathed Westwood for so long, and even worked for a few months in Century.

I was telling Jaymie a few weeks ago that even though I’m employed full-time and finally out of school, I don’t feel like an adult; I don’t feel independent; There’s this certain unquantifiable feeling I know but currently lack — and it has nothing to do with age or maturity. Even when I worked non-paying ‘jobs’ like my position at DB, I would come home with a sense of fulfillment and satisfaction, even though I was still a student. I know it’s a vague notion I’m getting at, but bear with me. It’s as if my day is a long draw of breath, and getting home at night is that sigh of relief. It’s the rush of endorphins you get after a nice workout. It’s feeling like you can give yourself a pat on the back for doing something worthwhile, even if takes you all day and leaves you little free time.

I don’t know if I should attribute that elusive sense of satisfaction to the type of work that I was doing in those various positions. Probably not, considering that even though journalism and writing crap content I couldn’t care less about are pretty disparate pursuits, in both cases I felt pretty satisfied once all was said and done. Though I can say without pause that my feelings during the actual respective work differed quite drastically.

I came to the conclusion that my environment had something, maybe everything, to do with it, whether it was living on my own (not forgetting my roommates of course), or just being in the city. Strange proposition perhaps, for someone who isn’t the most social or extroverted person in the world. But there’s nothing wrong with wanting more options at your disposal. People, restaurants, entertainment… they’re all closer to home, more concentrated, more plentiful. Even if it is Los Angeles sprawl. But I don’t think this is it either.

I was driving home one night last week down Western before I began this entry and a thought hit me. I feel as if part of what motivates my desire to be in the city is want of a sense of importance. There is a strangely lethargic atmosphere that goes along with going about your business in the suburbs, even if it is a major one like El Segundo (I still love you for employing me, twice) or the South Bay as a whole. How different would I feel if instead of driving down Western, I were on a train back home after a long day’s work in NYC? This little thought experiment was what made me realize that what I want is feeling like I’m part of something more significant. Some might have a contention with this statement over what significance comprises, but few can deny that there’s a certain appeal to being part of a community that has a great deal of impact on worldly affairs, whether it be political, economic, or cultural.

Perhaps the description applies more to NY than it does to LA. Or it definitely does. Either way, it’s bad. Jk. Either way, I’d like to be in a place where more is happening. Even if I stupidly don’t take advantage of it.

And it looks like a write up on LA would be the natural follow up to this… Excuse the horrible entry. I’ve been having a lot of trouble expressing myself lately.

In sum, I guess what makes this feeling so troubling is the knowledge that if I didn’t have school in my plans for the future, this would really be it: My career, my life, everything. It’s a bit disturbing to think that upon finishing school I’m feeling like more of a lost kid than I did as a student… and that if this were really it, all I would have to look forward to every day is this sense of lacking and stagnation.

some people’s stupidity is astounding: “Volcanoes put much more CO2 into the atmosphere than humans ever could.”

annual C02 emissions from volcanic sources: 200 million tonnes
2003 C02 emissions from fossil fuel emissions: 26.8 billion tonnes

Sources: Carbon Dioxide Information Analysis Center and the U.S. Geological Survey

And a billion is a thousand millions by the way. I actually wrote this up a few weeks ago so I forgot what the source of the inane comment is.

I know this blog has the been the object of some undeserved neglect lately, so expect some love later this week, or even today.

Click at your own risk. Do not click if you have anything important open or if your computer is running slow. Hah. Still, you should give it a try at some point.

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