Awkward thing no. 242112392 I dream of saying

Random salesgirl at store: Can I help you?
Andy: I'm lonely.

I'm just a boy with a new haircut and that's a pretty nice haircut

When I get a haircut, I always say, "Do whatever you want," and I always get a similar haircut.

And what is it with hipster girls and mullets?

Appreciation Inflation

Every morning, when I get off the bus, I say thank you to the bus driver. I do this because everyone else does it and I don't want to seem rude, but I am not going to do it anymore; not because I want to be rude, but because it is inaccurate and a degradation of language.
We've become overly polite and thank people for doing things they're supposed to do. Like thanking the postman when he brings you mail. It's his job to bring you mail and he gets paid to do it! And these are good jobs. It's not like they're doing us a favor, or performing a job that is difficult/underpaid/or doing something no one else wants to do. From now on, I might say Good Morning or Good Afternoon, but I'm not thanking them anymore. I'm not apologizing to the homeless anymore, either. When they ask me if I can spare any change, I am going to say no.

Do Not Pass Go.

New five dollar bills with more color were introduced recently:



Apparently, the US Dollar has become so worthless that the Treasury decided to just go ahead and make it interchangeable with Monopoly money.

Put your clothes back on young lady!

A friend once said to me, with some disgust, that many of the girls I pointed out as being attractive while we were walking around were slutty looking. I denied this at first (vehemently), but then realized it is absolutely true. Slutty girls ARE attractive. That's the whole point. If slutty girls weren't trying to attract men (if not specifically me) with their provocative clothes and pouty looks, then they wouldn't dress that way at all. Who am I to deny them success after all the trouble they went to?

My most awesome dream.

In the hour between after being briefly woken up by my roommates being loud getting up and when I actually got up, I had the most narratively cohesive dream I have ever had. It is like a mish-mash of various folk and fairy tales and flowers for algernon, and someone should tell me if it is lifted entirely out of something. But anyway:

By some scientific process, which involved cells or sperm or something, I invented a half animal that could speak. This part of the dream I forget a little, but I am sure it is scientifically sound. I paraded my new pet to my friends and we drove around, and it was pretty cool. She started growing and looking more and more like a girl, though I knew she was still part animal, and we hung out a lot because she had no one else. She had shoulder length dark hair, cut at a severe angle rising towards the back, and was easy to take around because she was unfamiliar with everything. I didn't quite trust her though, and by the time she was my height, she was growing at such a fantastically fast rate, I began to get scared that she'd become much larger and then eat me.

Because of my fear, and my innate greed, I resolved to take her to the zoo and sell her for a lot of money. So I told her we'd go for a walk, and she trusted me of course, and somehow this was a really really long walk to the zoo. She continued to age, but without getting taller or bigger, and halfway to the zoo her hair had gone gray and she had become tired from the walking, and I had become guilt-ridden about my awful plan to sell her to the zoo, so I brought her back home.

I realized I loved her, and we had a brief moment as she was lying in bed, and then she died of old age.

And then I woke up and I was sad because it seems inevitable that I am going to lose anything good that might ever happen to me.

Giving Bush the finger

I should really take my economic stimulus tax rebate and donate it to the Democratic presidential nominee.

Speaking of Lint

Am I the only person who finds it immensely satisfying to clean the lint filter in the dryer?

bulletin to self

HOLY SHIT I'M 28 YEARS OLD WHAT THE FUCK AM I DOING WITH MYSELF

Some speech some guy made a hundred and fifty years ago

I decided to rewrite the Gettysburg Address to see if it was any good without the fancy language:

87 years ago, a bunch of guys made a new country on this land. They thought that independence was a good idea and that people were all basically the same.

Now there’s a bunch of people fighting because not everyone agrees with that. Some of them died here so let’s just bury them here.

We can’t make this land sacred, though, because the fighters already did it. Even if everyone forgets what we say here, they’ll see all the tombs and remember the big fight. So let’s remember why they fought: a) independence is a good idea worth revisiting, and b) our government that we all contribute to should continue to exist.

A misreading of personal ad cliches.

Why are single girls single? They do not know. They think they are "awesome." I am going to examine this issue by attempting to find a common thread among personal ads. After all, girls who post personal ads are single, and if we can find traits that unite them, then we will have found our answer. My research yields:

Hypothesis no. 1: Girls who are single are not very bright and/or are boring.
Evidence: Girls who are single often claim, in personal ads, to like "the simple things in life." The simple things in life are boring and lack entirely in sophistication. There is little respect for simplicity
Solution: Doing nothing is the simplest thing in life. Doing everything would be the opposite. At the very least, express interest in the complex, show some passion for the complicated and extraordinary.

Hypothesis no. 2: Girls who are single are criminals.
Evidence: Single girls are constantly looking for a partner in crime.
Solution: Give up the life of crime and find interesting, legal things to do. Legal doesn't have to mean boring or simple. In fact, there are many wonderful legal things to do: like dancing or sports or spelunking.

Hypothesis no. 3: Girls who are single are not fun.
Evidence: "Not into games" the ad proudly declares.
Solution: Not into board games? Fun games? Olympic games? Any games? Games are fun. Learn to have some fun; guys like fun girls.

Hypothesis no. 4: Girls who are single are unable to write well.
Evidence: Single girls write ads that claim to like the simple things in life, are looking for a partner in crime, and are not into games. (Also they like long walks on the beach.)
Solution: No clue.

Hey Andy Lint. You're a piece of lint.

Hillary will never escape Clinton. Her biggest political mistake was taking her husband's last name. Take that, feminism!

Sadly, Barack Saddam Hussein Osama Bin Laden's going to lose the general election because of his name, too.

The incorrect mix cd to give a girl you like

1. Morrissey - You’re the one for me, fatty.
2. Radiohead – Creep
3. Mr. T Experience – Even Hitler had a girlfriend
4. Moldy Peaches – Downloading porn with dave-o
5. Faith No More – Naked in front of the computer
6. Cherry Poppin’ Daddies – Here comes the snake
7. Sufjan Stevens – Size too small
8. Selecter – Three minute hero
9. Magnetic Fields – I don’t really love you anymore
10. Squeeze – goodbye girl
11. Mariah Carey – Hero
12. Abba – gimme gimme gimme (a man after midnight)

(there's a narrative here, honestly)

The deflationary pressures of idiotic peers

I caucused yesterday for the first time in my life (New York and Boston, the two places I've voted before, both hold primaries and not caucuses) and it was an interesting experience; you and all the people in your district meet in this big room and it's like this big party, with (mostly) similar political viewpoints, and no punch or pie. I got a good look at my neighbors, and realized I not only knew none of them, I never even paid enough attention while walking around to recognize anyone.

Anyway, I signed in and wrote down Obama. I was pulled by opposing peer pressures: as a young person, I was supposed to vote for Obama, as an Asian person, I was supposed to vote for Clinton. I actually don't have a strong preference either way; I think they'd both be good nominees and I was there to observe the process more than anything else. In the end, I guess I thought the country was broken in a fundamentally cultural way that couldn't be fixed by policy but might be fixed by Obama's secular preaching. Or maybe I just felt a bit more misogynist than I did racist.

But then I went to the big party room, and there's a debate that goes on where the supporters of any candidate could speak for a minute and explain why they thought their candidate was better and try to convince people to change their vote. My god, the Clinton supporters were much more intelligent and articulate. The Obama supporters were idiots. One guy actually said, "In my gut, I just know Obama's the right guy," and people applauded???? I almost spoke up and said, "No one gives a shit about your gut." I had a real sense of anti-peer pressure. Were these my peers? If so, I wanted to reject them. They made me feel stupid. I thought, maybe I am looking at it all wrong because how could the two of us have come to the same conclusion? Is your gut really some oracle?

So I got upset and left without changing my vote. I had some Kentucky Fried Chicken and felt sick the rest of the day.

Times New Romanoff

California was so much fun! I went to a strange wedding, and I ate lots of great food, and I hung out with my friends and family. It reminded me again how things have not gone quite as I'd expected or hoped in Seattle, but that's probably my fault for being Seattle-resistant. So I am shifting strategies. I am going to embrace Seattle more, and I will do so by walking right out there in the rain, unumbrellad and unhooded, and take everything it's got.

Then I will catch a cold, and be bedridden for a week.

California here I come.

Yes sir!

Meat pie, please.

As I sit at my desk at work, it occurs to me that the only reason I do not have today off is that there are no black people at my office. If there were even one, I'd be home right now. As the lone representative of colored people here, I really ought to pipe up. Piping up is how holidays happen.

I finally saw Juno and it is great. A friend said she was slightly annoyed that it seemed like a big ad for American Apparel but I didn't notice that. I was slightly distracted by all the Moldy Peaches. But all in all, it is the best movie I've seen in a long time, and even slides in under a hundred minutes like all great movies do. I have a huge crush on Ellen Page. I'm pretty sure she is a lot smarter than me, though, and she wouldn't stand for my idiocy.

If I were on double-dare, I'd take the physical challenge every time

Adventures are one of my favorite things. When Karl asked me to ride the Burke-Gilman trail so he could write about it for his magazine, I obliged and so this report is for Karl to pilfer as he sees fit.

Karl's suggested story angle was that I ride the trail as someone new to Seattle. This is true but I am not only new to Seattle, I am also new to urban trails and, frankly, new to biking in general.

On consecutive weekends, I carried out the riding of the Burke-Gilman. Last Saturday, I rode the first "half" from the U-District to Ballard.

It was not much fun. Admittedly, part of it could've been the cold drizzly weather. But the trail was undergoing renovation here and there, and there were parts that were unintuitive; I even lost the trail a couple times.

I was unfamiliar with the idea of urban trails entirely, but they seem useful. There was no sharing the road with cars:

Only cyclists and pedestrians are allowed, each having their own side of the road to prevent tragic fatalities. As the name of Karl's magazine (Rails to Trails Conservancy) would tell you, the Burke-Gilman was originally a railroad that was abandoned and converted into a trail. This first half between the University District and Ballard runs along the Lake Washington Ship Canal. Across the canal is downtown, and the ride afforded decent views of this:

It is often cloudy in Seattle, as you have heard and can clearly see.

Fortunately for me, the Burke-Gilman is a Drug-Free Zone. Thank god I was off the regular streets that are rampant with recreational drug use. The trail has a very impressive flatness despite the topographical eccentricities of Seattle:

There were not too many people out that Saturday, I imagine because of the weather and the day. It seemed to me that this part of the trail was mostly useful for commuters -- students and professors and staff that needed to get to and from the University of Washington. The trail runs through two trendy and residential neighborhoods, Fremont and Ballard, with a stop at Gasworks Park in between.

As I made my way along, I was reminded of New Years Eve, when Andres and I were stranded in Fremont and ended up spending New Years with random frat boys and sorority girls at assorted bars. Then we walked home, and I didn't realize we were on the Burke-Gilman, but I remembered the exact spot I spoke to the 18 year old girl, and also the other spot where I stopped to pee.

By the time I reached Hale's Brew Pub, I was nearing the end.

And here is Mile 0. I half expected to see the thing measured in smoots. Alas.

I turned around and went back to the U-District. This took twenty minutes, including one part where I got lost near the Fremont bridge. The whole trip was generally disappointing. I could not see how it differed much from riding streets, except it lacks the whole excitement factor that goes with possibly being run over by a car.

A week later...

This past Sunday, on a balmy 50-degree, clear and sunny day, I rode the other "half" and my general feelings about it could not be any more different. Still, there were no cars, and still it was generally flat, but what ended up being an approximately twenty-two mile ride (40 miles round trip!) from urbia to suburbia, I saw more of Seattle than I ever had, and began to understand this strange love of the "outdoors" everyone keeps writing about in, among other places, myspace profiles and personal ads, that I had hitherto shrugged at.

Here is a map of the route I took, including from my house to the trail itself:

Notice I end in Hollywood. Fame and fortune did not await me there.

Again I began at the University. This part of the trail was smoke-free, to prevent lung cancer, but not drug-free, to promote creative thinking.

The skies were clear except for a few of those blob-like water-vapor thingies. This first mile or so, alongside the university, felt mostly like being on a suburban campus. Around me were mostly young kids, pursuing knowledge, or something.

As the school faded behind me, the stream of students peeled off and the trail settled into its natural state. That is, it looks exactly like what I pictured a trail (or maybe even path) to look like, except with concrete:

It was often shaded, clearly marked, and just wide enough that there were no problems when I had to pass walkers and runners, or when every other bicyclist had to pass me.

On the trail, a cross section of Seattle could be observed: here we had the competitive runners and healthy joggers, elderly couples walking, families on an outing, couples bicycling side by side, couples tandem bicycling, runners pushing along a stroller, bicycles with a back toddler seat, the overweight doing their best, the rare hippie (or lumbar disadvantaged) on a recumbent, dorks in full cycling gear, rollerbladers, and me, in my ridiculously heavy but superawesome cruiser.

The scenic view was mostly beautiful and slightly obscured, interspersed with repetitive foliage, and the slightly less beautiful and even more obscured. The trail runs northeast along the periphery of Lake Washington and on a clear day like Sunday, the mountains come out and the bustle of the city recedes the further out you get on the trail.

One of my complaints of the U-District to Ballard part is its grit, its indistinguishability from riding on a city street, save for the cars. On this second half, owing possibly to the pleasant weather, and probably to the fact that I did leave the city, I experienced a noticeably distinct calm coming over me. I wouldn't say I felt one with nature, but I felt its embrace, and it was a calming and welcoming one. I perambulated at my leisurely pace with little mind (or ability) to go faster. A couple passed me and I shouted out "everybody is faster than me," and they started laughing allowing me to take the lead until they repassed me ten feet later.

I cannot remember exactly what I thought about, but it was a juxtaposed excitement and calm. I smelled the air a few times to see if it was really different, or if it was just me. I wasn't more than fifteen miles from home, but it felt much further than that. I do not know suburbs well. But as the trail briefly ran alongside a main street, I noticed its strip-mally nature, and I looked at the road signs that exited to towns like Everett, and I knew this was not Seattle. (And I often complain about how suburby Seattle is!)

The Burke-Gilman ends, according to King County, in Kenmore. I was unaware as the trail simply turns into the Sammamish River Trail, and when I saw the sign for a new trail, I had flashbacks of the week before when I got lost.

I stopped a father and son walking on the trail to ask if I had lost the Burke-Gilman somehow, and the father replied that I had not, that it became the Sammamish River Trail, extends another ten miles, and that everyone calls it the Burke-Gilman, anyway. Then the young son chimed in and said, "Daddy, can we go yet?"

I had neither map, nor odometer. I had a bagel with cream cheese earlier for breakfast, and ReeseSticks in my pocket; my fuel efficiency was off the charts. I kept going and kept my eye on the sun while it did its thing. Eventually I reached a rest area, five miles later, where there was a volume of people resting.

It seemed a good place to end the adventure. I was ridiculously tired. I used the restroom, and ate my ReeseSticks, with its four grams of protein. People told me how awesome my bike was. It was around three; I had left my house at twelve-thirty. I texted Emily and let her know I was all the way in Woodinville, and she said I should at least go to the wineries. Making inquiries, I was but a mile away from them. Additionally, I was told, I wasn't too far from the Red Hook Brewery. Remembering Hale's Brew Pub from a week ago, I realized I had no choice but to finish at Red Hook, for symmetry's sake.

I enjoyed a nice ale (and felt it on my empty stomach):

I left the brewery in good spirits at around three fourty-five. At three fourty-eight, I realized my legs were dead. I always seem to forget that the out-and-back trip requires the foresight that wherever you end is only halfway there. But I was already done!

On the way back, I made careful note of where the Burke-Gilman starts. It starts here:

The darkness came quickly, along with its chill, and I labored back the twenty miles. To my left, a sunset:

And then it got dark, and if there is one real complaint about the trail, it is that it is not lit. Disregarding the fact that I really should have my light fixed, I still think there should be some lights, for safety's sake. There were few people left; everyone had gone home. Other bicyclists passed me. Blinking lights came the other way. Joggers here and there. To let people know I was there, and because I had such a fun day, I rang my bell the entire way home.

beat movement

This article talks about the science of choosing the right workout music. I have tried a myriad of playlists for when I (rarely) run. The article is probably right that something fast paced is your best bet. However, I have come to really enjoy running to classical music. The songs are really long, so I've gone much farther after listening to a single song. But what I really like about classical music is conducting while I'm running. Everyone on the road seems to think I'm crazy, though.

Hillary's Catch-23

Karl commented to me that Hillary, too, should fall under "Barack's Paradox" (described in the blog post below) because she is a woman. There are three reasons why she does not: a) Hillary's Paradox does not have the same ring to it, b) Hillary is a Clinton and her relation to Bill means she isn't an underdog, c) Hillary has not acted like a woman, dressed like a woman, etc. I think her little meltdown was the best thing that could've happened to her campaign. It makes her more of a woman, more human, and less of a Clinton. It made her more likeable. It's probably why she won New Hampshire. Obama's appeal for change is really just an appeal against the favorites, the frontrunners, the Clintons, the Bushes. It is an underdog's rally cry. If I am Hillary Clinton's strategist, I would tell her to wear a skirt and show some skin. I would tell her to be a woman.