You know that feeling you get when you look at an old photograph and you think to yourself: "What the hell was I wearing?" That's what I feel like everyday when I look in the mirror before I go out.

I give Memories four stars. However, if I could rate each of the three vignettes separately, I would single out Cannon Fodder with five. The first short, Magnetic Rose, is a pretty straightforward ghost story in space. Directed by Koji Morimoto (Animatrix: Beyond), it is perhaps the most feature-film-like of the three. With all of its visual flair and futuristic melodrama this piece is perhaps the most accessible to Otomo fans from Akira…however, in my opinion the least noteworthy, mainly because it relies too much on the special effects and out-dated CG to carry the story. Stink Bomb is a slapstick comedy about a man with an accidental gas problem. Its humor depends not on the typical exaggerated anime humor (think Slayers, urgh) but on the ludicrousness of the situation. If you are familiar with the political tension between Japan and US you could in fact view this as a political satire: all the fuss and finger-pointing and power-jostling between Japanese and American parties over what else, a cloud of stench. In terms of graphics, Cannon Fodder is the most stylistic of the three—it looks European rather than anime. An art -buff friend of mine pointed out that the style of Cannon Fodder is very reminiscent of German Expressionism, as for me the style resembles the children’s book Where The Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak. All the characters have grotesque features without looking grotesque, which humanizes them and make them look silly and pitiful at the same time. The premise about a day in the life of a city that’s built around firing immense cannon balls at imaginary enemies has anti-war allegory written all over it. A great anime short in a collection of top-notch anime shorts.

Yes indeed we are all on the path to sal-VATION!. Surely this knowledge cannot be denied. There’s no need to alla-analize. Oh my god I’m treading on thin ice here—your politically correct brain portion speaking of the mis-spelling. If, perchance, even so very slightly for a nanosecond of the emotionally content insert here. What I was saying was this: if you're PC complex also has activated from the first three sentences of this paragraph, then you're missing the point. The Southern Baptist's way of celebrating their faith is somehow, at some level, sacriligious, the mere mentioning of this very idea mentioned thusly, is in fact sacriligious in itself. If meanings can be distilled from the symbolic meaning of

Sometimes, if you think about it, the only reason to enter academia, medicine, law, or otherwise equally or surpassingly esteemed professions, is to have colleagues around, collegue as in "I am about to meet my collegue."
"That's depressing."
"That's why I didn't want to do it."
"Oh. So what are you doing?"
"Nothing. Living in constant fear of the moment when having colleagues might not sound so bad to me."
- tribute to clerks

Dad and Mom flew in Friday. My free reign over the house was finally over.

Plan tomorrow? Wake up before 10am. Work on Japanese homework, I think. Go to class, come home, do the writing class reading and then play some pool.

Had a dream last night that I was reading the acceptance letter to JET. I like that feeling that everything was alright. Can't really imagine the alternative.

Popped in Before Sunrise two hours ago. Just came back home, back from getting a pack of American Spirits after the movie.
It reminded me of Heidi, and the way I was a little boy in love.

I had always viewed Heidi as a full grown woman, even when we were both fifteen. She was that personal angel for me, telling me that everything is going to be alright. Which was probably the reason why I haven't spoken to her in half a year. Partly because I did not want to be the one who always calls, partly because I didn't want to share how depressed and sick of being with myself twenty-four hours a day, but really it was because every time we talk, she makes me feel like a little boy. I don't want to be a twenty-four-years-old little boy.

Mark finally asked Christy from writing class for her number. Even though he acted like he wasn't sure about the whole thing, deep down both of us knew that this time it'll work out for him. Didn't want to tell him how alone that makes me feel, as his hetero lifemate, probably the only other functionally virginal twenty-four-years-old in this land.

This time, it really was quite a few days

Rented ESPN Basketball Friday morning. I didn't get a good feeling with it the first few times I've played, but now I think it is way superior than the NBA Live series. The movements of the players feel more real, and the gameplay has the pace of a real NBA game and you have to move the ball and use the players and really play good basketball in a NBA way in order to win.

Got a call from Ed Friday morning for a house poker game in Balboa. Between the call and the eventual game was more ESPN baksetball. Drove to Ed's place round 8 and we're off to Balboa. The conversation in the car felt good.

Let's see. There was Dan, the sixty-something landlord; Isa, the resident; Ed and I, and that fat Hispanic/Asian dude whose name I can't remember. I lost $90 in that game. True, I played badly, $60 out of $90 was mostly money tossed in after bad money when I should've folded. The $20 buy-in Ed said was (minimum) which I did not know. The ante (what!? ante in hold'em? oh but it was dealer's choice) was $1 every hand and the price was probably why I played on tilt, that and the unfamiliar games (like baseball, in which I lost hands with four 8's and another with four queens showing). It's a lesson then, for future reference.

It was good to hang out with Ed regardless. I think the easy pleasantry was mutual. The many cigarettes and beers probably had something to do with it.

And then, of course, came Saturday morning, when Stanford lost to Bama!? Somehow someway I knew that the Cardinal wouldn't make good on their media-hyped promises.

That, combined with the bad poker beats and the completion of the nug and the Saturday night ESPN basketball all-nighter were definitely an omen for another beginning if I've ever had one. A bloody Sunday followed by a new Monday.

Also finished American Gods tonight. Gave ideas for new stories and urge to scrap old ones. I don't think the Dick/Dawn story was very good. The characters were too shallow. Although I did intend them to be shallow gender stereotypes now I think that rather hurts the irony of the point. I liked the Black Crow girl in American Gods. Maybe I can use her in the pool story. gravity can definitely use some idealism.

March Madness began today

And I was right in front of the TV to witness the tip-off...if I had woken up in time. Caught the second half of the MD/UTEP game in which MD squeaked by. Syracuse played well against BYU, which I tought would be a 5/12 upset. It certainly looked that way in the first half. BYU was just posting-up and back-dooring and 3-balling Syracuse's 2-3 zone to death.

Speaking of March Madness, I declined to fill out a bracket this year. Ironically it was a decision made half out of laziness and half out of unwillingness to procrastinate. I really ought to begin doing something productive. Like filling out the NOVA application, study for GRE, story writing, meditating, or working on my jump-shot, 2-rail follow, or 12-bar blues. Funny how the latter 3 activities made it in to the WORK category! Man I been slipping.

Relapse stops today. That's what I decided. On selection Sunday. It seems that I have this tendency to plan my life around parallel events outside. Yes you can definitely say that. Guess you oughtta look for omens where you can't find answers.

The muse to the way I dance: Bill Cosby.

The kind of woman that attracts me: the teasy kind.

This is shaping up to a confession. Two nights ago (I had meant to write this down) I had this dream. Dreamt that I was climbing a wet gray hill in rain, wearing shiny neon yellow jacket much like the kind traffic cops wear, climbing on my bike. Not the gasoline kind, the glucose-consuming ATP-making man-powered kind. Which was the problem, the hill was getting tougher and tougher. Every little bump on the road felt like gigantic mountains on their own, I was unable to keep my steering straight to get into a rhythm and the top seemed like so far away. In real life as opposed to in dreams, this sort of feeling of dispair would never grip me the way it is gripping me right now--which tipped me off that this was a dream and, once you realize that you're in a dream without waking up, the state of what, or where, or when you are is what, where, or when we call a Lucent Dream. I became the all-powerful being of that little realm. I am physics, I am cause-and-effect, I am the all-sayer of what is to be and what is not. And in that instant my man-powered bike turned into a Yamaha chopper (even in that realm I'm not the harley kind of guy). And I chopped my way ahead and above and joined these other harley kind of guys. One of Whom told me that it's going to be alright, referring to the vertical drop up 1/300th of a second ahead. A vertical drop that will get you screaming and white-knuckling the safety bars on roller coasters. I look down and it's the same piece of Yamaha chopper, suddenly seem less potent and safe. The harley-guy says, it's gonna be alright. And it was, the most absolutely amazing near-flying experiences I've ever had since that time I floated 3 inches above the geometric ground (until I had the sense to dissolve the ground and thus my one and only full-blown flying dream experience).

Sounds kind of like a dream that is sexually stemmed. But then again, isn't everything?

I do treat this blog thing a little too indiscretely. But then again it's the kind of stories I would like to tell someone if they listened anyway, so what's the worry?

Come to think of it, the first time with the busted tire was after the JET interview, which I bombed.

What did I bomb today?

I suppose the relapse into smoking/drinking/non-meditating/non-progress.

I don't fucking believe it Second busted tire in what, like 3 weeks? Last time got my tire fixed I went to, uh, Venice with Mark. That was, let me check, 2/28. Yeah, about a week and a half. I don't fucking believe it.

Mark's grandma died and the funeral is Wednesday and he's gone for 10 days until next (not this coming) sunday. raishuu no nichiyoobi.

Tonight talked to the ex-goth couple of girls in writing class. in fact, talked to them INSTEAD of half of the class. Mark better do something about the cop's daughter before it's too late.

Last night I lost to Annie? Alice that was her name, the Asian almost-grandma. Had to give her a game plus call 7, couldn't pull it out in the end. Smart play though, percisely the kind of smart play Doug gave pointers about before the match. 8 was hanging by the pocket and I had a long kick at the four. Potted the 8 and conceded the ball in hand, still comboed the 8 in regardless, that ASian garndma did. I don't fucking believe it.

I don't fucking believe it, that seemed to be the motto of the day. Show'em my motto!

Tomorrow's Memory

5.5 in 72.

That's the ratio of the amount of hours slep versus the amount of hours awake for the past three days. Mark came by Thursday and we played NBA2K3 until 3am. After which I was unable to get to sleep, and ended up playing the damn game till the next day. I figured, since my biorhythm is out of wack, it might as well be time to buckle down and set it straight.

Then Friday night Eric and Mark and Ed came over to play 4 handed poker. It was a good game: $10 entry fee, split $30/$10 between the last two finishers. Eric went out first on like the 3rd hand, I busted him with an ace high flush against a queen high (ridiculous hand, 3 clubs showing, Eric, Ed, AND myself all had flushes). Can't remember precisely how Ed went out, I don't think it was me, but I did remember taking a big chunk of it on one of Ed's big bluffs. I had nothing but the absolutely lowest pair on board which I made on the turn, and Ed betted big, looked me up challengingly but over-sold the bluff with a raised eyebrow. I caught it and called immediately and it turned out to be right. I don't think Ed's play had been on tilt since that one. I had a commanding lead against Mark (come to think of it, maybe I did bust Ed too) but he made it respectable by winning a couple of big hands. Then he went all in: I had a pair of sixes, the flop came 2 and 3 and king, 6 on the turn, ace on the river. I had 3 6s and because Mark didn't bet aggressively after the flop (my mistake: I should have considered the straight possibility) I call and lost my 3 6s and all but maybe 20-30 chips to his straight. Went all in immediately later with a queen 2, mark called with a queen 3 but I caught a 2 on the river. Won another huge pot by pairing a 4 on the river (bluffed with nothing, betting big every round, Mark played the hand perfectly with a king high). Last hand: drew king jack suited, raised on the blind and Mark limped in, flop comes some connected suit and a king. Mark went all in and I called: he had an open ended straight and a two card flush draw. One flush card came on the turn but the other didn't on the river, neither did the card that made the straight. Jeff Cho is the winner of $30! And I went to bed at around 1:30am.

And woke up at 7am the next morning, hearing my phone blowing up downstairs and Shit it must be Eric who's calling me to wake my ass up to go snowboarding. Up, at his house at 7:40. Left at 8. Came back around 7pm. It was fun, snowboarding was, but I'm too tired and sunburnt and sleepy and because everything right now appears to me like unlived Tomoroow's memory I must go to bed now and sleep forever and ever and snore the roof off.

Weekend in SF did not happen until 6pm Saturday night, when I decided to make the 6 hour drive right after the phone call with the mates. I figured, the idea will seem less impulsive and less stupid the closer I get to SF.

The party rocked. Evan was right when he said that it seemed like everyone came determined to get wasted. I showed up and so many people were already so slushed I couldn't really carry on conversation of any sort with anybody...until I caught up. Talked with Mimi briefly, more on that later when Parth returns my email.

Tried to pass out in Kayvon's room when he stumbled in with that girl whom I met at Bohemia last time in SF. They probably didn't realize that Ryan and I were there...and I just pounced on top of the sheets with them underneath (as a joke, but in retrospect, probably not so funny). Can't remember a thing after that. Remember vaguely of walking down 16th Ave barefooted lamenting (perhaps even tearing) about something or other (probably about not hooking up, as usual). Apparently I jumped onto the couch with Chris (O'steen's roommate in Austin) and kicked him out of the couch sometime in the AM... Apparently Jon tucked me in at around 8am. I blacked out for that long!?

Had a funny feeling that I blacked out solely as a self-defense mechanism, defending myself from unpleasant self-loathing. I suppose it's better this way?