i woke up & remembered i had a blog, or, "i am not a happy camper."

it's the middle of the damn night & i can't sleep. i picked up a journal...one of many that i keep lying around just in case some brilliant f-ing idea enters my brain, but they're mostly used for to-do lists and random crap that needs writing down.

so i opened a journal & started writing, "i am not a happy camper."

i thought it was a catchy title for a journal posting until i realized i'd never actually been camping a day in my life, and have no idea what might cause a camper to become unhappy. whatever causes this camper unhappiness must be pretty damn bad because the phrase wouldn't be so catchy if it weren't.

anyway, as my hand began to cramp because i do so little writing by hand anymore, i remembered i had a blog.

i know it's been almost a year since i've posted anything (as i've been reminded). and i'm back in the middle of the night (with a half-broken "Y" on my keyboard, mind you) trying to think of what else to say other than "i am not a happy camper."

maybe i should go camping.

and i didn't even barf

i knew a little more than a year ago that i had to write a speech for the graduation ceremony at the college i work at. it's not because i hold a position of any importance, but i do hold a position that has write a speech for graduation.

so i thought about it for, oh, about a year.

and started to give it some serious thought about a month ago.

strangely enough, i've not blogged for the same amount of time.

and i didn't type out my speech until last night.

(the night before graduation.)

so tonight, i gave my graduation speech.

and it was, without doubt, one of the coolest fucking things i've ever done in my life.

even cooler was the fact that, although the college i work at lies directly under a major flight pattern in & out of SFO and our graduation exercises are held outdoors, no planes flew by while i did my speech.

okay, the coolest part was that i didn't barf immediately after addressing a group of 3,000 people.

YAY ME.

rock the casbah

rach: blah blee blah blah blah blah blay...
rock the casbah, rock the casbah

K: are you feeling ok?

rach: i'm listening to alice
rach: blah blee blah blah blah blah blay

K: i'm glad someone's in a good mood today

rach: i love that song

K: are there supposed to be words there?
K: or is it instrumental?

rach: they're words
rach: and they sound like blah blee blah blah blah blah blay
rach: rock the casbah, rock the casbah
rach: i don't think i knew the words to any of the songs i listened to in the 80s

K: now i can't think of what [the real words to that song] are!!!

rach: i never knew what they were

K: you blah-ed them out of my brain!

rach: yay me

K: you're just goofy

speaking of being grown-up

i'm afraid of the dark.

but not as afraid as i used to be, when i was, say...4, or 14, or 24...or, well, 30. i'm definitely not AS afraid of the dark since i turned 30. but, still.

with earth day nearly upon us (and in northern california, we should just hurry up and make it a holiday already since i never seem to get cesar chavez day off), i feel compelled to turn off the lights when i leave a room to conserve energy.

(if you're filipino & you don't know the meaning of "turn off the lights," i really mean "close the lights." these americans speak weird english, i know. they also don't tabo in the banyo, so go figure.)

when i was but a wee lass of four (occasionally the irish filipino in me slips out), my cousin joseph had me convinced that the boogey man lived upstairs in his house and it was dark up there because they didn't want to wake him up. actually, his whole family played along because they didn't want people wandering in & out of their bedrooms. eventually, i figured out the boogey man was just joseph hiding under a bedsheet shooting paper airplanes at me, but i couldn't get past being afraid of the dark.

now that i'm a wee bit older than four & a few decades, i still turn on (open) every light i pass when i enter my home, and they generally stay on (open) until i go to bed, at which point i turn off (close) the lights, having already plugged in & turned on (opened) the nite lites in the bathrooms & hallways, and run up the stairs with a quickness, hoping the real boogey man doesn't catch my feet and drag me back down the stairs into the fucking dark where paper airplanes will be shot at me from all angles and i'll pee my pants. not that it's happened...yet. i'm just sayin'.

i hate the fucking dark.

in my defense, i conserve water, i recycle, & i try to buy as many recycled goods as i can. the earth day gods up above will probably forgive me for leaving a light or two on (open) until i'm good & ready to sprint up the stairs and jump into bed. besides, i only use energy-saving light bulbs, so it's really like i'm saving the environment by leaving the lights on (open).

fuck it. i'll just send some extra money to the sierra club.

grown-up car

{read with whiny undertone} i wanna buy a new car. i wanna, i wanna, i wanna.

a new, shiny car with all sorts of gadgety, electronic crap.

a grown-up car.

my friend K bought a new acura RSX (of the brand-spankin' variety) a few weekends ago and she asked me to tag along with her to the dealership knowing full well i'd be drooling over my current grown-up car of choice (and wanton need), the acura TL.

the TL's got a shitload of cool, gadgety electronic crap and it's a real looker, too. but i just can't see myself paying $40,000 (msrp + shitload of cool, gadgety electronic crap & v6 trim level w/ nav) for a car.

and the entire time i was at the dealership with K, leaving smudged noseprints on every TL they had out on the lot, NOT ONE SALESPERSON asked if i needed help or even asked if i maybe just wanted to take a closer look at one. THE BASTARDS. perhaps it's a sign that i'm still not grown-up enough for my grown-up car of choice.

{again, read with whiny undertone...and this time, picture me stomping my foot down a few times} but i AM grown-up. i am, i am, i am.

yeah.

anyway, not really sure how to proceed. the TL is a little out of my price range to keep car payments close to what i've been paying on my nearly paid off '01 accord v6, given its trade-in value & the amount of money i feel comfortable putting down for a new car. i've decided my other options are to look at:

• the accord ex v6 with navigation,
  
• the accord hybrid with navigation,
  
• or a pre-owned TL (with navigation, of course).
  

unfortunately, i don't like the body style of the current accords and i don't like knowing that someone else's ass has broken in the seat of my grown-up car of choice. (and no, i'm not giving up the navigation system.) i'm picky, i know. but i want what i want.

so somebody tell me what to do. and if i don't like your advice, i'll ignore it, because that's the grown-up thing to do. (you might also call it being passive-agressive. whatever. same difference.)

job fairs are where you get free stuff

i wandered through a job fair today that was being held at the college where i work and i was transported back in time one decade to my senior year in college (or at least one of my senior years in college) when we were encouraged to go to job fairs and seek out careers "in the real world." at the time i was a business major with a CIS option at the university formerly known as csu hayward.

they told us in our program that we were highly marketable, and with silicon valley just down the freeway, we would have no problems finding jobs. i had plenty of practice doing on-campus interviews and figured job fairs would be no big deal.

so i wandered into my first job fair thinking all i needed to do was throw my resume at people and i'd get a signing bonus on-the-spot. unfortunately, i treated the whole experience like i was going to the mall, and sought out retailers (apparently blocking from memory the quarter i spent sleeping through sales management), hoping that if i landed a job someplace where i like to shop, i'd get a totally sweet employee discount.

so i was totally distraught when the rejection letters came in the mail from the gap and macy's and i couldn't give a flying fuck that oracle wanted to interview me at their corporate office.

if you couldn't tell, i was a real shithead in college.

eventually i found a job in education & technology, and aside from the fact that i'm a state employee with a governor who doesn't support educational initiatives and yet can't pronounce "california" without halfway sounding out the word "cauliflower," i'm happy.

so when i stopped at the table for target and let the nice lady tell me about the all their lovely opportunities for employment, i thanked her for her time and told her i was just there to get a free pen.

(and it's a damn good pen, too. i should've taken two.)

turn your children into stamps

i received an invitation to a baptism the other day from that chick i don't really know whose baby shower i ended up going to last february at the behest of my mother and golly jeepers, did i have a keen time that day!

anyway, it was a nice gesture for her (whose name i still don't know as the inkjet-printed return address label got fucked up in the rain) to send me an invitation, although i must say i found her choice of postage interesting:



i just don't know if i like the idea of my child's face getting postmarked. and i don't even have children.

stamps.com offers a service called photostamps where you can upload an image and then order postage by the sheet, 20 stamps per page. it's a great idea in theory, but the sample postage on their website doesn't show what any of these stamps would look like after they've been run though a postal meter and canceled with huge streaks of black ink that mar a substantial portion of the image.

i'd suggest this to dave to go with his custom checks, but i don't like how these stamps get totally ruined by going through the mail.

so i'm thinking, wouldn't you be better off taking that same image--or maybe one where the baby didn't look like she was scared half to death, but again, not my kid so whatever--and making return address labels instead? you can order some decent-quality address labels (that won't wash off in case your mail gets rained on) from iprint for a lot less and save from having mean people like me blog about your weird baby stamps.

i took the liberty of mocking up a sample label for our friend thor over at danes' dyke. women aren't welcome there, but maybe he'll find a nice lady penpal if this thing with raine doesn't work out. (he is inscrutable, after all.) and address labels always come in handy. they're cheap enough that he can even label his entire 8-track collection.



no, i really haven't thought it out much farther than that. shut up.

sunday reading

woo hoo! my taxes are done. irs agents be damned.

on the way home from my target therapy session (a remedy for the undue stress caused by several failed attempts to complete my crapping taxes), i stopped at the library to pick up a book i had on hold and found this literary gem, shining like the north star on the used book carousel. i knew immediately that i had to have it.

the title says it all:

i let out a big "HA!" and went to the reference desk to give them a quarter for the previously owned 1976 harlequin romance.

you can't go wrong with a book whose back cover reads:

"'Women aren't welcome at Danes' Dyke,' the inscrutable Thor Halden told Raine; nevertheless circumstances forced him to take her under his roof and to persuade her to masquerade as his wife for a time. Even before she found herself falling in love with him, it was a difficult situation for Raine. Would she ever be able to make him trust her?"

the guy on the cover who looks like a cross between the construction worker from the village people & the brawny lumberjack's scottish cousin twice-removed is named THOR and he's described as being "inscrutable." the chick's name is RAINE. they're at a place called DANES' [freakin'] DYKE.

and the first page alone makes references to tattoos, pylons and sheep shelters.

it's bound to be a classic.

it's a good thing

...that i have 2 extra days to figure out where all my crap is so i can do my taxes.

i'm sitting on the floor in the middle of my living room surrounded by a small sea of paper and apparently i'm missing a few pieces of vital information. now, i could either a) make [scientific] guesses about the stuff that i need to report based on what i do have or b) go on a mad search through house for what i actually need or c) just don't report it at all and claim ignorance.
i guess i'll be turning my house upside down. did morgan stanley even send me a statement of what turbo tax is asking for? what did i put on my returns last year? fuck all if i can remember.

i hate doing my taxes.

i'm going to target. i always feel better after going to target.

what to do, what to do

i took a vacation day today because, you know, it's a holy day & all for us catholics (well, that was the reason i gave at work, anyway)...and dammit if there isn't anything good to watch on tv.

i did happen to catch the end of jakers! (gotta love kid's shows about talking irish farm animals) and i would've seen the entire episode had it not been for the book i picked up and tried to read.

i could've actually gotten farther in the book if i hadn't kept picturing one of the characters as the guy that shrek turned into when he took the 'happily ever after' potion that he stole from the fairy godmother in shrek 2. it was sorta difficult to concentrate on the story after that. i kept waiting for donkey & puss in boots to show up, and well...damn.

and the andy griffith show doesn't start until noon.

barney fife is my idol. well, him & darth vader.

good friday mass isn't until 7:30 tonight.

what to do, what to do...

speaking of mass, i feel compelled to share the horrors of my holy thursday experience with you. this mass involves a ritualistic tradition of washing of the feet, and i've never taken part in this ritual--for good reason. so last night, stations were set up all over the church and altar servers were charged with hauling pitchers of tepid water back and forth, as well as bowls for the "used" water. bowl after bowl of dirty, cloudy, murky, used water was trucked to the back of the church to be poured out in the kitchen area immediately behind where i was sitting. it's a wonder i didn't barf all over the people around me (which was probably due to some type of divine intervention, because i was pretty damned nauseous).

well, that's all i had to share.

i guess i'll have an early lunch.