the Night is Young

Ok. So I'm doing it. Blogging. And semi-publicizing it. A big leap. For a big foot. Which, apparently (according to CNN) is real. ! Right.

So, generally speaking, I keep my hassles, etc. to myself when I'm in it, saved like steam for a later time to vent and release. Explode. But its a year of new things so I'm gonna try something new. Well, somewhat. I believe the right to privacy is guaranteed and I aim on holding them to their warranty. This also means that I'm killing my old entries. (They weren't THAT interesting anyway) Plus, I figures, you'll read if you want. Me bitching, whining, emo-ing, being excited, etc. etc. And I probably won't keep regular at this because...well yeah. You've been disclaimed.

So to date, I've managed a position at Linyi and one possible in Changchun. For something wrangled in 2 weeks time, I'm fairly content. But the one in Linyi seems sketchy, so I'm treading softly here, carrying a 2x4. My contact, a HR, is attempting to seduce me with pleasantries and, from what I gather, BS threats into accepting this gig as is. As soon as I mentioned that I wanted to see a signed copy of the amended contract, she "advises" me to start looking for tickets. Also, originally, girl (the HR) wanted me to go there sans contract. Right. Supposedly, I've gotten a few of the amendments I wanted to this contract. I'll believe it when I see it. And I suppose they're petty things really. Like a working visa, a paydate, contractual provisions so that I'm not exploited/fucked over. You know, the little things. I suppose I'm greedy. The loopholes are the size of your mom's....well, we won't go there. Anyway, with a little pressure, a little skill and tons of luck, I'll be able to get a few more of those little things I want. Survival's a bitch.

Don't mind you me. I'm shaking the 8-ball and signs say yes. Leaving on a jet plane...super excited. Super.

Plans, if this cat happens to fall on its feet - figure out the teaching thing. Locals. Stuff. Start looking for a volunteerin' gig there at the med university. Learn survival Mandarin. LIVE. Plan to visit Anhui Province and perhaps get a temp gig there for a week or so. (See this or this) CHILL. Possibly visit Mt. Tai and Shanghai. Visit the old roomie (Wei ? That's you, Eric! *evil snicker*) uhhh, thats all I have for now.

I think that a year away from the conditions here set by the baby-boomers, corporate American and post-immigrant/minority blues will do me good. Breaking borders, lacking benjamins. Fuck.

I still gotta hunt for an apt. for the 'rents. It looks like it might not happen 'cuz my arms are stretched thin and they reaaaaally are not motivated, but who knows. Worth a try and a piece of my back.

LORs. Still need those.

A double stack. Mmm, I could use those.

What else...ug. This is gettin' to be a problem. I suppose I'll remember eventually. I need sleep.

So here I am on Eric and Shane's couch at 5 a.m., eating ice cream. Chess. Negotiating with Linyi. Waiting on Changchun. Coolin' out to Halou and the Howling Bells. Sleeping on pins and cushions. Listening to things that go bump in the night. All under the moonlight.

And I suppose that this is gonna be something or a whole lotta nothin'.

Peace.

BTW

Poverty sucks. Well, relative poverty. At least I still have places where I can crash, a few material things (fairly useful things too!), and plans and back ups to those plans incubating. Hopefully, the block won't experience a power shortage.

PS

I gotta write about the last few nights out. MIND FUCK ! I'm beginning to feel like a stranger in the city. Or maybe too connected. Who knows.
Breaking out the notepad. On the to-do list.

Telepopmusik - Breathe

People...well, I get it, but it kind of sucks.

Its Tuesday. Still no stable ground. This is hell on my head- the inability to make any sort of commitment, compounded by my disdain for releasing words (said and unsaid) that have little to no chance of becoming flesh. Though hypocrisy is inevitable by virtue of being human, I'd still like to strive. And since word is bond, I'm not gonna make any promises, both said and unsaid, that have little chance of happening. At least, not any that I'm not gonna try for. Without stable ground, its just hard to realistically start building. Start planning. I believe it was Churchill that said that plans are, by large, useless, but planning is indispensable. Ug. It's a sure recipe for headaches, but I buy it. On credit.

Ok. So I have immunization shots on Thurs. I have a one way ticket. I have a passport. All for a gig that may or may not happen. I may just be fREAKING oUTTT!, but hell. 12 days til departure...I think it's due.

Saw Tony 'n the gang yesterday. They seem to be on shaky ground themselves, but have each other. So that's good. Wish I could stay, but I've changed. Grown ? Devolved ? Puzzle pieces that no longer have that snug fit, it seems. Bleh. Now's not the time, I suppose. HE'S GETTING FUCKING MARRIED. To the sugar mama (haha). And I gotta start building some sort of foundations for this thing called life. Rambling's fun and fun is important, but its not the only thing. (I dig this term [fucking Psych]-) Necessary, but not sufficient. Blerg. My head hurts from thinking. On the fun side, they live by a dominatrix house. Jay, the quasi-manager there, is pretty cool shit.

Girl - I dig her and I think we can be good for each other, especially with the upcoming times, but I just wonder if it'll require too much energy for the both of us. Energy that we can't spare. If we bring each other to some height without ground, then a fall's inevitable. And my bones are tired. My muscles already bruised. It may make one or the other afraid of heights (again). But I dig heights. Heights are great. You can see things and the air is so fuckin' crisp. So....yeah. Arg. Even communication can be a bitch. My phone sucks and I've burned through pages, trying to cram ideas and me into letters, but...I wonder if that's even possible. Maybe I'm just too much of a closet perfectionist. Or just too woogly.

Good news- I got my MCAT scores back. I could've done better, but hell - I guess I'm just too much a fan of fun. It is above the national average, so yeah ! Take that. MM!

Sun-Shaped Spirals, Cake-Colored Moons/Welcome Back, Mr. Kotter !

August has been one hell of a month. July too, but in a chill fun way (well, the last week was an exception to the rule) There's a lot I'd like to say, but there's too much. Or perhaps I'm just too lazy to write it all down. I'll most likely end up doing that thing where I not-so-subtly reference the events of the previous action-packed month(s) in future posts, thus informing you without you even knowing it. Yeah - I AM that f'in good. Or am I ? who knows.

Anyway, this is a blog and I suppose I gotta write something substantial. But what to write? ....hmmm.... wait. I know.

So I just bought my ONE FUCKING WAY TICKET to Changchun, China. Without the official job offer. Like, I KNOW this is a fairly poor idea, BUT. but the going rates for the other tickets were in the area of 300-1000$ more expensive and the cancellation fee is only $150. Only $150....arg, I don't have this cash to be gambling, but relatively, its good. And I suppose I'm a bit of a gambler. God help me the day I grab a revolver, loaded with that one lonely bullet looking to make friends. And its not that I'm opposed to making friends. I mean, I consider myself a fairly friendly person, generally, but bullets and I are like apples and orangutans.

Anyway, looking at trends, if I bought the ticket for the date later, the nice cheap price wouldn't be available, and if I waited, it'd probably be booked by some other .... I'll refrain from swearing. So yeah. I have a set departure date. Wow.

So yeah. China. A first-time international shindig. First-time overseas. First commercial air travel thing since...6th grade ? Pretty much all being arranged in 2 weeks time. w. t. f. I gotta stop doing that last minute thing. Its fun and the conquer aspect is cool, but man - anxiety city. Worse than a manic phase in Vegas with ATM cards in hand. Not that I'd know....[cue nervous laughter]

So why China, people constantly ask me. I could give the semi-humorous, sarcastic caustic shield answer. It'd draw a laugh or a perplexed stare which's make me laugh on the inside. But really, I just use the sarcastic thing as a defense mech. (as I often do) Mainly due in part to the multitude of answers and explainations that any meaningful and accurate answer would require, resulting in
A. a headache for me
B. a headache for you
C. your eyes glazing over after a minute
D. All of the above

(Choose D)

So I'll do the cop out thing and paraphrase Murakami - sometime, you need to get away to see things clearly. sometimes you need to go down to the bottom of a well.
And not to say that China's a well (because I know some people'd start flaming me/giving me evil-ish glances over that statement), but yeah. Plus, all the dim sum you could handle ? Hello ?

I get my MCAT scores in 2 days. Doctoring. A huge commitment. That I want. But there's so much more I want. And I have some time now. So for now....well, CHINA!

And perhaps I need it. Some days, it seems to have grown into that. Like that day you go to the store because what you already have just doesn't do it for you. Or perhaps because you have so little and now can afford to go. Or because you finally got off of your lazy ass and made the venture. Either way, you browse through the aisles and see some cool shit. But your pockets only go so far and you can only carry so much. Its a long trip back back, you see. So go through the aisles and carry various items in your cart. But now its checkout time. And you can't get everything. So you weigh the pros and cons of your prospective buys. But there's that one object with a little more luster than the others, with a little more potential use, with a little more gravity. Maybe you just like shiny things. But anyway, you decide on it and place it at the beginning of conveyor belt, slowly (and ever so) carrying it down to the check out lady. She looks like death and smells of stored moth balls, but is pleasant enough. You carry it and your shoulders slump a bit. Its a long walk. You need something for the walk back and, though in your mind, you love this thing, you cannot use it yet. It requires assembly and care. You think of the tools needed, the color you want it to be, the paint you'll need to buy, its location, on what occasions it'll be used, how much it'll be used. And the list goes on.

And maybe I need it.

But maybe I need you.

"Said the shotgun to the head."

So I thought that I should do this blog thing ferrealz because I will (fingers crossed) be overseas and poor and international calls generally cost a lot, at least to my knowledge. WELCOME TO MY CRAZED BRAIN RAMBLINGS! Perhaps I'll have the cajones enough to post this on my FB so people actually have a chance to read this. One day. Not today.

And I hope that you read.

Maybe "Lay Ter"

But probably not.

But May Bee.

characterized by his "whispery, spiderweb-thin delivery"

I'm listening to Clementine and Elliot's voice is that soft, lonely glimmer of sun caught in a spiral of threads and webs. It's surrounded by shadow canopies and becomes your sole light source. In pain, you start to quint. But in this beauty, you gotta stare. Of course, you forget about that poor fly shadowed by the widow.
I've force myself to write again (or been forced is more like it) and my mouth's started to form words I've forgotten. My fingers start to weave again. And I speak.
As a consequence, a torrent of thoughts have recently wracked my mind. The old building had foundations that were starting to rumble you see and I need to renovate, you see. In part, I guess, this in particular was the consequence of the last day or two. I guess I'll have to get you into the gist of things since YOU seem to be so interested.
I saw her tonight. After the long shift, we glided through ideas and aisles, and saw LOST her parent's house. She fed me baklava and I kept her warm. She steamed and I fed and cooled. I liked it. Said with a stretching lip. She thanked me and I told her to shut up. I wanted to kiss her and I feel everything's all right. Thank you.
The past year has been like nothing yet known- rebirth, perhaps ? I could see the lines when they converged and trace the back to their separate roots. At time, I can't help questioning how the fuck I got through as I now am. Writing my personal statement for med school only exacerbates it. Damn you med school.
I know- I'm random. This is how my brain works. It drifts in and out of tangents and weave worlds, but I'm tired or lazy and just wanna write the chunks of meat without the soft fat. Really, I'm doing you the favor. This is an action movie without the shitty pretext of a plot. Maybe I'm just being beneficent.
Reading again about Elliott Smith, one snip from an interview stood out.
The way I think about it is... I don't really think about it in terms of language, I think about it more like shapes. That's an interesting thing to talk about but it's difficult. I'm really into chord changes. That was the thing that I liked when I was a kid. So, I'm not like a... I don't make up "a riff" really. It's usually like... that sequence that has some implied melody in it or something like that.
Music isn't my forte, but I think I get what he's saying. A good friend's father told me once (while selling him knives of all things) that I learn spatially while I told him how I remember phone numbers by the lines and shapes the form. I think I definitely see some truth in that.
I was called a "child of the night today." I've been called a lot of things before, but never that as said. I thought of a howl in the full moon light. I've been called interesting, although I don't think I'm that interesting. I've also been called crazy. hm.

Words I hope never to forget - Every breath is a gift.
Ok. Ummm, listen to The Biggest Lie and Good to Go by Mr Smith. elliott smith
PEACE!