Salad Day

Kevin — Thu, 12 Apr 2012 06:04:02 +0000

I‘m back from Japan; it’s a wonderland. Like every time I travel, it was a blur and I remember only impressions and small details. A few days here, a few days there, it was too fast for anything to really sink in. If I wanted to gain worldliness and all the coveted traits of a well-traveled person, I’d need to actually be there—a month, a year, a while—long enough to simmer with the people and get grounding of the place. Anything less, I feel I don’t get to say I’ve really been there at all.

I can say I had a good time!

Kevin — Mon, 26 Dec 2011 10:36:27 +0000

Merry Christmas everyone. It’s a few hours after the fact, yeah. It still feels very much like it. It’s snowing somewhere.

I just woke up from a nap, had some soup, and am planning to stay up for a while. Winter is such a reflective season with the cold, the ending of the year and start of the next, the time off. Favorite season by far. I can see myself migrating north for the summer.

Coldplay’s Christmas Lights instantly feels and sounds like a Christmas song; I don’t know how they did it.

Those Christmas lights, light up the street
Down where the sea and city meet
May all your troubles soon be gone
Oh, Christmas lights, keep shining on

Kevin — Sun, 20 Nov 2011 00:39:55 +0000

I have taken an extremely hedonistic tack lately. I don’t mean like rock stars and orgies. It’s more me obeying my whims at a particular moment, apropos of nothing. It’s very indulgent. This also includes not doing anything I don’t want to do, even if it’s good for me.

I feel no guilt doing this, as I used to. I trust myself, by now, to have internalized a good set of basic instincts and boundaries. I will not end up in ditch.

Time is the only precious thing and I don’t want to waste any more of it not enjoying myself.

I just found out WordPress has this cool fullscreen mode. Everything fades and you just see a cursor and your words.

I decided to use NaNoWriMo this year to make myself write. It sort of worked. I wrote about 4,000 words so far, over several sessions at the Blue Danube and a few times during the hour before bed. It feels awesome to pound down whatever I’m thinking without editing onto the page and to just keep on going without looking back. The hardest part has always been getting started, to actually stop whatever I’m doing and to shift my brain over to writing. That problem will always be there. Now, though, I don’t have to worry whether I’ll produce any words. You know how it’s impossible to tell your brain to stop thinking? I just wait for thoughts to materialize and write those down. It’s a fountain!

That’s Amanda Palmer playing the ukulele.

I had the easiest, fastest time at the Comcast store this afternoon. It was incredible. I had been dreading going there and dealing with the customer service. It has a horrendous rep. But it was OK! I needed to exchange a broken cable box for another one; I thought I would have to drive back and get the remote and the coaxial cable that originally came with the box; it seemed like something bad customer service people will nitpick about and demand before they would help you. I also braced myself for having to explain that I wasn’t the person on the bill and was trying to think of ways to prove that I hadn’t stolen the cable box and was trying to scam them. In the end, the guy scanned the box, drew up my dad’s records, asked what was wrong, and went in the back and got me another box. That just rocked.

Last night at Kevin’s Noodle House, during one of the best pho experiences in my life, we talked about how someone we knew was stable enough in life that even if a baby suddenly appears in their life, they would be able to handle it. That really stuck with me. Having a kid is the most disruptive, expensive, life-changing thing that can possibly happen to you. To be able to withstand and take in stride that immense shock to your system, that’s just wow. That will be my high water mark. I will aim to have all my emotional and financial shit so together that nothing, not even a baby, can assail my life.

Victoria is back SF for a week! This is going to be so fun.

I learned a new word. It’s lagniappe. It’s the little extra something a storekeeper gives you for good measure when you buy something. That’s a really cool practice and I’d like to see that happen more often. Like haggling.

Kevin — Sun, 23 Oct 2011 00:11:27 +0000

I picked up Lawrence and Gordon at midnight and headed south. The Orionids were peaking and we needed to get away from the city. Gordon brought along chicken and sugar cookies.

I had Coyote Lake in mind if we couldn’t find anywhere closer to watch the meteors, but there was really no destination in particular. I was trying to make a point of it, of course, I would. A few minutes after the buzzing dome of light that was San Jose, I turned off onto a likely seeming exit and made for the low hills to the east of 101. It was hella dark.

After squiggling up a few narrow winding miles, we parked, got out, and looked up. Holy shit. I don’t remember ever seeing the sky like that. There were the usual constellations, but among them and all over, there was this absolute smear of fainter stars in gauzy clusters. Whether I saw any meteors or not, that first look was pretty much all I needed from the trip. I knew those stars and planets were always there and knew what I was missing, everyone did, we who lived in light-polluted places. It didn’t lessen the impact. It was pure objectivity.

We saw the advertised shower, more like drizzle, pointing out the quick streaks of brightness every few minutes while Lawrence said where. I got up on the windshield. Ate cheese. Peed in the dark. We saw Orion’s penis.

You can’t just ask anyone to go look for meteors with you. There is a lot of quiet and darkness in between the flashes of light, and they might feel compelled to point out how small the universe makes them feel or ask what it all means. In some significantly hushed profound-voice, they will bust out their epiphanies to share. There would be no penises or chicken, only halting attempts at funless meaning.

Kevin — Mon, 03 Oct 2011 07:08:55 +0000

I was thinking about death, because you tend to, some nights, when you want something big to dilute all the small petty things, and I was thinking specifically about the dying part, and how it was like being born. You don’t know what’s going on and then suddenly you’re alive. You’re alive and then suddenly you don’t know what’s going on. What are these huge blacknesses flanking our slivers of life?

I had this great idea for a science fiction story where people use time as currency and would work to add minutes and hours to their lifespans. Then I found out a movie was coming out with the exact same premise! With Justin Timberlake! Goddamn it, I’ve been scooped. THEN I found out Harlan Ellison was suing the movie for ripping off his short story with the same premise, which he wrote in 19 effing 65. GODDAMN IT.

Kevin — Sun, 25 Sep 2011 06:47:51 +0000

The bridge, please,” she said, as she got in.

The cabbie glanced at her and pulled out into the empty streets. The headlights swept through a churning wall of fog.

After a few minutes she said, “Don’t worry, I’m not going to go jump off or anything, if that’s what you’re thinking, which I think you are. Naturally you would. It’s three in the morning for crying out loud!” She laughed. The cabbie slowed down as the fog got denser.

She was silent for a couple more minutes, then said, “I’m meeting someone there. A friend. An old friend I haven’t seen for a long time.” Suddenly she broke off and laughed again. “That’s so morose. I’m not talking about Death, or being metaphorical or anything! It sure sounds like that though. Oh man.” She turned away from the window and looked at the rearview to check that he understood. “Don’t want you to misunderstand, and lock the doors and take me to the police station or something. Can you lock the doors from the inside? Like in a police car? I’ve never been in one, just picked that up from TV and such.”

She turned back to the window and gazed out at the white fog turned dark yellow under the sodium streetlights. The cabbie turned on the heat and defroster.

“That’s nice, thank you. I was getting a little chilly.” She kept her eyes on the window. Darkness shrouded with white, made soft. There was nothing clear outside.

The cabbie slowed down more as they neared the water. He turned on the wipers.

The bridge appeared around the bend, and loomed, lit from below by floodlights. The lights didn’t reach all the way up; the tops of the towers were lost in the dark and haze and seemed to extend high forever.

The cabbie stopped in the parking lot. She hesitated, then leaned over and said, “Hey, do you mind waiting here for me? I won’t be long. I’ll be back.” She hesitated again, then, “Please wait for me, it’s important. I don’t—I don’t want—” She looked away, blinking. She paid the fare and said, “Keep the change,” and rushed out.

The cabbie watched the fog swallow her.

Kevin — Sat, 10 Sep 2011 08:51:28 +0000

Just saw Contagion with the big cast. It was really down to earth; there are no gimmicks, everyone behaved as you would expect normal people to behave in those situations. The ending was natural. Though it didn’t have any explosions or flash, it kept my attention pretty much throughout. I’d want to read the book if it had been based on a novel, which I don’t think it is, just to see more of how an epidemic would disrupt the everyday.

Victoria’s in Chicago; I miss her. It’s a brave thing to do, to trek out on your own to another city and make a new home there. Just like that. Inspiring.

Today was extremely piecemeal. Nothing really cohered. It was like lumps in your oatmeal that weren’t mixed in properly. Events didn’t chain together well and ends dangled loose. What a mess. I’m not gelling. Sleep will fix it, the great gellifier.

Kevin — Sun, 31 Jul 2011 05:56:27 +0000

One night, I was so lost in a dream, I jotted awake in a raw blue dawn not knowing where I was. I looked around slowly, stricken, without recognition at the surreal scene that was my apartment. My eyes jerked around, and at last alighted on my poster of the Great Wave off Kanagawa. It anchored me then, and I felt so safe. I lay back and slept.

Kevin — Sun, 10 Jul 2011 07:29:16 +0000

Laundry takes forever to do. If I start loading the washer at 8, I can expect to finish folding at midnight. This doesn’t even include the ironing, the endless ironing. The building’s dryer is hella weak; it takes two full cycles to dry my clothes, so two hours. Maybe my load is too big.

Twitter is awesome, it is known. If anything, anywhere, happens, you can search for it. Information gets to you faster than a web page can pop up in Google’s search results. This is omniscience.

I had a dream the other day that produced a perfect phrase to describe some of the fantasy I’ve been reading. My subconscious rocks!

I dreamt I was at Comic-Con, wandering around. Someone mentioned the epic fantasy panel was going on RIGHT NOW and I had totally messed up the date and time or whatever and panicked and ran for it. I arrived at this stage with surprisingly few people in the audience. Relieved, I found a spot on the floor and sat. They were just beginning. J.K. Rowling was there. She started talking about something, and I had a sudden feeling I wasn’t at the right place. I didn’t recognize anyone else on the panel onstage and looked around. The person next to me must have sensed my confusion and said this:

“Fantasy accounting is the panel across the hall.”

Writer-consciousness is my biggest problem with stories. In lots of the epic fantasy I read, the story and characters, the plot, everything the reader cares about, all take backseat to the author stumbling over themselves showing off their thoroughly thought-out worlds, profound philosophies, magic systems, well-researched societies, alien biology, and on and on. This is accounting. I can literally see the splay of spreadsheets and flowcharts and outlines overflowing with minutia.

I like to be immersed in the story as much as the next fantasy fan, and the creation of a believable and detailed secondary world is the whole point; it’s the stumbling-over-themselves-showing-off part that I’m taking issue with. It’s the urge to use their books as some poster board to exhibit every clever thing they’ve ever imagined that I can’t stand.

Authors, be invisible. I command it!

Kevin — Thu, 23 Jun 2011 07:21:57 +0000

July is going to be amazing. A Dance with Dragons comes out. Then Harry Potter. Then Comic Con. And then my sister will be back from Japan for her summer break. Connie’s birthday. Lu’s going-away picnic. Rocky Mountain Oysters right! Whoo.

Time is passing by like faces in a crowd.