what else did i expect?

i wikipedia-d, truthout-ed, sheworshiped, and popsugared it out today at work. what's left but the greatest invention in the 21st century to ease communication, create huge networks of ambiguous friends, make-liquid identity, and be recognized. facebook. so i go on facebook. do the stalker thing. get sick of it. change my profile picture to fantastic mr fox because i love that book. then out of the corner of my eye, i catch a leftover graffiti drawn by the person who destroyed me. his profile picture icon looked like a giant white lung and i simply had to give into that impulse to click it.

out pops his wall and the first thing i notice is dang. the white lung is really a sketch of a man riding a winged horse into the sky. it's so beautiful. the next thing i notice is, dang. he friken flew to maryland to perform some of his pieces at some API conference this past week. the next thing i notice is dang. his wall is packed to the brim with girls telling him how cool he is. girls telling him how excited they are about some aspect of him. posts acknowledging that he is some kind of player.

i was never one to do like these girls did and never really acted excited to see him. i barely smiled and one time he even pushed my cheeks up so that i would. what kept me coming back was just to have someone to do things with like climb on top of buildings, skate in underhill, explore the city at night, watch films and listen to new sounds. typical bro things done out of convenience.

but i think inside, i regarded him similarly to how those girls posting all up on his wall did. however, rather than this producing a desire to be with him, it produced in me a mother effin desire to BE him. idolatry-gone-wrong much?

there. i said it. that's the whole truth and nothing but the whole truth so help me God. it feels great to write it out bare, ugly, and naked. and no, i can't handle it at all, tom cruise.

malady #1

I was inspired to write a poem last night after reading some blogs of strangers and came up with: "The city dons the cloak of night". I thought for some reason that I came up with the cloak of night business, but I did a quick google search and found out that nope. World of Warcraft was most definitely one step ahead. speaking of google. i don't like the new toolbar set up on the left because it makes me think that I've just accidentally hit "history" and "show history in side toolbar". and now i'm reminded of all those times I do that and see how i've wasted so much time on ridiculous sites.

In other news, overturn prop 13. In other news, prayer is so awesome. I mean, to think that this insignificant and needy little poop like myself is 1) given access to the King of kings 2) made worthy and holy and 3) listened to by God! (Can someone give me an Amen sister?) In short, if I could give people the time of day to express themselves and actually listen too--not just listen for the sake of finding a platform so as to impress them with something I know--things would be so different. If I could care to listen or if I had a heart for other people, my life would be transformed.

here is a poem i wrote about myself. since i cannot free-form it, nor sonnet-ize it, I will use this format that was discovered first by a child under 6:

m-isanthrope
e-vil
l-eery
o-dious
d-isillusioned
y-es man

I pray that I could listen as God listens and seek out the broken as He does.

another weird moment

this is the second time within a one week span in which someone projected in image of me on me that wasn't true. and of course, i thought about it later and realized that dang i'm so much more lame than i thought. if only their perception of me were true!

my dad called me at around 5 and told me that i better not be in wheeler because he'd get really mad if i got arrested. he was half joking but also kind of worried, because i also told him about how awesome it was during the first strike when we took over sproul plaza and later also the intersection of telegraph and bancroft. it's fun to dissent with a group of people. i mean, everyone already has this implanted urge to blow up parliament or destroy congress. everyone has an anarchist inside them who would pounce on authority the moment the chance arose. it's called sinful nature. and obeying it naturally would mean to revolt against the beast. the man. whatever you want to call it. anyways, i told him not to worry because i was going to see a big fire instead for a rally. he said ok and passed the phone to my mom, who asked if i was to come home for dinner.

end of conversation. do i regret going to the big game rally? nah. i've never seen a fire so close and so big and doubt i ever will. unless maybe one day, we all conspired to blow up the state legislature in sacramento. i'm just kidding. man i want to do public policy so bad to change the education/welfare/prison system and reduce the size of bureaucracy.

i ran into a friend while walking back from the rally and she showed me pictures she took of cops making a human barricade around the entrance of wheeler. it was epic. imagine a row of cops. legs apart. wielding batons and guns. with a shield over their face. a mask? i dont know what you call it. but it was scary. something that would belong in a dystopia. my housemate said it reminded him of Equilibrium(low budget epic film starring the one the only bad boy mother effer. Christian Bale). imagine faceless authority figures who are replicas of one another. anyways, i did get to catch them as they were leaving. a hoard of them. and we saw some more cops on bancroft. my housemate asked them what this huge blue bus was for. the cop said: "we used them to bring people over. but we also use them to transport prisoners". the van was empty so that was that.

i feel bad for missing the wheeler hold up, but i'm not sure if I more so wanted to do it to be a part of a movement or do it because i care about having reasonable tuition at a public college.

probably the former.

el biblioteca

me gusta el biblioteca. la vida moverse muy despacio. el tiempo se para. well, don't know how that turned out or where that urge to write in spanish came from. anyways, i love the main stacks so much. there's something great about being underground, buried with shelves and shelves of old reference books and other students who i have no obligation to talk to. Both the books, shelves, and students are positive externalities because i benefit from their mere presence.

over pho: on the budget issue

wa-dude: i just dont see what other options the regents have besides increasing fees. the state isn't giving us the money. what other alternative is there?

me: well. we can call for transparency between the regents and us so that they reduce their salaries and dont give themselves bonuses. that frees up some money.

wa-dude: ok. all the regent's hoarding money aside, what can we actually accomplish by protesting.

me: we need to send a message to the state that their priorities are wack. (i bring up the bit on us overspending on prison, etc)

cassidy: 3 strikes needs to go.

me: we need to change the system. we need to realign our priorities so that more of the budget goes to public education. we need to fix our prisons.

wa-dude: oh melody. you are so hopeful.

me: i mean. come on. this is a democracy.

wa=dude: oh melody. you are so naive. a tear just fell out of my eye.

doing this helps me a lot

Bentham: a happy man

People seeking to maximize their pleasures might not be the best way to maximize society's utility. Thus, we need government to step it up. Through the felicific calculus, the Gov will achieve a harmony of interests. (Individuals also should felicifically calculate so that they won't do things that screw other people up. Fellow feeling much?) To get the most bang for your buck, it's best to focus on security, subsistence, abundance, and something else.

Mill: can't touch me

government intervention screws stuff up. government's role is to allow individuals to achieve their own ends. this is important because individuals who are unhampered in thought can come up with crazy ideas that advance society and enhance the overall social good. tyranny of majority bad. government needs to break that shiz up. universal suffrage somehow contributes to tyranny of majority. and that is bad.

Toqueville: consumption

everyone works to have money to buy stuff. we like stuff and we dont care about participating in politics. there becomes a tyranny of the minority and we dont give a shiz bc we're too busy consuming

Veblen: the rapper's life

the wealthy who dont have to work engage in conspicuous consumption of escalades and diamond studded platinum chains with yo name on it. the poor engage in invidious comparison and work as hard as they can to emulate those rappers. the goal is to work to reach a point where you can stop working and simply consume

Hegel: i like to dabble in everything

civil society has nothing to do with the state. the individual finds relief in the family. the family seeks civil society to mediate stuff. in civil society, everyone has competing interests and the state will mediate. all are subject to the state. i am missing a lot of info. in my brain.

List: German power!

gots to raise tariffs and shut down foreign competitors because we need to focus on rebuilding Germany's economy after the fall of the 3rd Reich. if we had free trade, great britain would dominate the market and we'd never get anywhere. also, there is a scale of developing economies and nations at different levels can't really work well together.

Marx: working men of the world unite!

two classes of people: capitalists and laborers. laborers must sell their labor to buy food to live. labor as commodity and bourgeoisie as buyers of labor. they buy labor/commodities to have stuff to sell at a higher price. money in circulation is capital. and capital is the end goal. something about use values and exchange values. capitalists pay subsistence wage to laborers to work for more hours than is required for subsistence pay. difference = profit = surplus value. workers dont unite because they are engaging in competition with each other too. this system is unsustainable, as competing interests and onset of machinery will drive it to the grave.

i am leaving out so much stuff it's ridiculous. in other news, there's a new chain taking over the globe from mongolia by way of the pacific. and that chain is a restaurant chain by the name of "little fat sheep". anyways, it's pretty friggin delicious. i went to one in fremont with my family. we got there at 5:30. started loading up the hot pot and finished eating at around 8ish. it was insane. hot pot is great for prolonging the eating process because you've got to wait for the water to boil, then you've got to cook all that stuff. and take it out and eat it. if you start feeling full, it's probably from the soup. dont let that deceive you into stopping. the carbs are few so that it is possible to eat for 2 hours straight because you're just eating veggies and protein. it's so good!

my aunt who i stayed with in shanghai two summers ago was telling me about how shabu shabu has seaweed in it or something like that. but she translated "hai dai" into sea-belt. which is the literal word for word translation. i thought that was pretty funny. my uncle was also sharing about how Sean (my cousin/his son) started reading these books of a simple story line. one had the following dialogue:

"hi"
"hi. i like your hat"

he said their housekeeper once said hi to Sean and he repeated that same dialogue because the structure was ingrained into his memory. and the housekeeper was confused.

why i do not belong in the co-ops: a rant

tonight was strange. i went to two different co-ops and felt entirely out of place. i mean, i was with a whole different population that i had always thought existed solely as a stereotype but not in the flesh. this is especially weird because i went to CZ sophomore year once before and enjoyed it. there was a huge kitchen and rooftop garden and someone had put a sofa on top of a raised part of the roof (that was large enough to fit a sofa and not much else). i remember digging the art and random pictures that people put up because the walls were for the taking. people seemed friendly but maybe that was because i was with someone from CZ. i mean, that's when i really started digging co-ops and compulsively went on the website to read about all the different houses. i even went to the office and applied to live in one of the all girls ones.

things ended up taking a different course for the better but i always wondered what it'd be like to live in a co-op. a week ago, my housemate ronen told me that he saw me as being someone that would live in a co-op. i guess i was flattered.

so today, i was really excited to go see max's brother perform in cloyne. i stood in front of what i thought was cloyne for a couple minutes. some dudes were playing pool and saw me but didnt open the door for me. sign one that i don't belong. after finally getting in, i walked down the hallway looking for this comedy show. no luck. asked the dudes playing pool but one of them looked repulsed by my question and the other told me ask the social events planner person and gave me a name. that was it. i walked around and asked people and they thought i was crazy. so i left.

turns out i was in the wrong co-op. i end up walking to the right one and find the room where the show is happening. the first thing i notice is the smell of weed. the second thing i notice is that i'm about to step in a huge puddle of beer next to a giant keg. i find a spot to stand pretty close to the stage. next, i notice the entire row of guys next to me. they're all wearing alpaca sweaters with stripes on them of different colors. they are also passing around a glass bong and drinking out of a plastic yogurt container full of beer. most everyone is white, just something i observed. nothing i'm bothered by, it just made me feel even more out of place because i was already not drunk, stoned, a resident of the co-ops, and looking like a hippie.

so..out..of..place. weird because i thought this was a culture/group that i would have identified with.

guess not. there's nothing left to say. this rant is now over.

good bye.

and good bye mr. illusion that the co-ops are the place for me. i enjoyed you very much while you lasted.