Top Thirteen

Not that anybody cares, but here are the top thirteen albums that I think are great all the way around.

We Are Pilots (Shiny Toy Guns)

Give Up (The Postal Service)

Wonderland (Rubikon)

No Silence (ATB)

Time Frame (First State)

Intuition (DJ Encore)

Addicted to Music (ATB)

Oh, Inverted World (The Shins)

Disc One: All Their Greatest Hits (The Barenaked Ladies)

Discovery (Daft Punk)

The Madding Crowd (Nine Days)

Sarina Paris (Sarina Paris)

Trance Party Volume 3 (various)

You Know You've Had Too Much Chemistry When...

-They mention a compound on TV and you picture its Lewis structure.

-The infinite sign on your doctor's business card reminds you of a p orbital.

-They mention diamagnetism dealing with UFOs and you think of a molecular orbital model.

-You Google for fun chemical formulas and read up on them on Wikipedia.

I could go on. This is just off the top of my head spur of right now.

And hence the need for a semester away from chem. I should be seeing bio stuff everywhere.

My Year in Review: Personal

Things I did/bought and stuff that happened to me.

January: I call in sick for the first time at work. It wasn't as hard as I thought it would be, and I don't regret why I did.

February: I get a job at Target and keep my other one, too. I manage both for three weeks before I quit because they keep messing with my school schedule.

May: I am finally and officially promoted at work.

June: I turn 21 and see Pirates of the Caribbean 3 with my family.

July: I work my butt off for most of the summer but mostly this month because we all take our vacations now. I see a movie every week.

August: I go on vacation and go hiking, bowling, and spend the night in Monrovia with m friends. I start my first "real" semester with hardcore classes. My car is broken into and my stereo is stolen. I buy a black Nintendo DS.

September: I have my wisdom teeth pulled and take five lovely days off work to recover. It was nice.

October: My car window is broken while in the parking lot at work. I have to pay $200 to fix it, and there are huge fires and bad winds for three days in So Cal.

November: I consider dropping chem but don't because of the effort I have put in so far. This would have been the first time since 2004 I dropped a class. We release my dad's ashes near Calico, a place we visited as a family when I was about three. For the first time it felt like I was finally ready to let go.

December: I buy an Xbox 360 and end up being successful in my classes. I decide once and for all to be a biology teacher and am motivated to reach that goal.

My Year in Review: Music

New or released in previous years, these albums and songs shaped my year musically

Albums/Maxi Singles
ATB – Trilogy
Amy Studt – False Smiles
Rubikon – Wonderland
Vanessa Carlton – Heroes & Thieves
Daft Punk – Alive
Avril Lavigne – The Best Damn Thing
Shiny Toy Guns – We Are Pilots
Fischerspooner – Odyssey
First State – Time Frame
ATB - Justify
Headstrong ft. Tiff Lacey - The Truth

Singles
CSS – Music is My Hot, Hot Sex
Pizzicato Five – Baby Love Child
The Killers – Read My Mind (original and Gabriel & Dresden Unplugged Mix)
Natasha Bedingfield – Unwritten
Keenan & Anderson – Runaway (Mat Zo Vocal Remix)
Matt Darey ft. Tiff Lacey – Sum of All Fears (Allende Remix)
Kylie Minogue – Come Into My World (Fischerspooner Remix)
Cascada – Everytime We Touch
Tiesto ft. Christian Burns – In the Dark
Fergie – Fergalious
Jonas Brothers – Hold On
Adam Nickey – Letting Go
Snow Patrol – Chasing Cars (original and Blake Jarell Remix)
First State – Where Do We Go
ATB – Renegade
Shiny Toy Guns – Le Disko (Tommie Sunshine's Brooklyn Fire Retouch)

Makings of a Good Day

First of all, today was my last final, and all I have to get is 109 points to get a B in chem. I know I got that at least. Also, it has been cloudy and raining all day. I was leaving school, and for a moment the clouds parted and the sun shone through. It was so predictably symbolic it was ridiculous. Even I can't make an image that cliche. I came home, checked up on the internet, and posted a blog. Then I decided I wanted tacos, so I went to Ralphs and bought meat, shredded lettuce, and some meat. We have meat, but I said I wouldn't use it so my mom froze it. Like I thought I would actually cook, but I did, and it was pretty good. I'd seen her enough times to know how to do everything. So then it was time for a walk with the dog while it was still sprinkling. We went down the new walking path to halfway between Daycreek and Rochester, then up a dirt path to Victoria. I decided to follow the storm drain up to Highland, and it got windy and the rain got harder. I had to take my glasses off because I could no longer see through them. Finally we walked back down Rochester, and Mom called so we talked until some dogs on the path made Ruby go nuts. She loves other dogs and just wants to play, but she barks and acts like she is aggressive. People get scared, man. I try explaining, but I would tend to believe the snarling dog over the one holding the leash.

Wow, is it ever raining. At least, it's raining well for this area.

So I browsed the web again and listened to a great podcast/radio show behind the lyrics of vocal EDM. I wish it was more than once a month, and the hostess has such a nice voice for singing and for, well, hosting. I never heard of her before, but I was missing out. I opened the waste of money that is the Xbox 360 and found out I have to have the original to play Fable. Backwards compatible but only if you buy everything else. The Wii will play Gamecube games no prob. I played Viva Pinata instead, which is fun so far, but I was looking forward to Fable. I think my grandma still has the Xbox she bought for her house. Maybe I can borrow it or something.

I need to make coconut balls still. Maybe tomorrow night when I get home from work I can do the mix and let it sit over night. Since I'm off Saturday, I can dip them then. This weekend will be so much fun with everyone shopping last minute. The gift card system went down completely for two hours yesterday. Yay. Nothing can beat my first one there, though. I had two different infections and had to drive home late smelling like booze because I had to clean up beer and red wine. Then I had to open the day after Christmas. Not a pleasant memory.

That's all. My hand is cold, and typing with two gloves is too hard.

Personal Timeline, part three

1999/2000: I become obsessed with everything Pokemon, even trading great cards for a five dollar magazine. I also let Jon rip me off in trades a few times and lose my Zelda figures. Our friends Zuhay and Zuleyma move back to Mexico, and we never hear from them again. On spring break, we find a tree with the face of Dampe and thus begins HR. We also befriend Jeanine and Jose and make our own little group. Jon and I rig the voting for eighth grade favorites in newspaper, but the issue never gets published. He and I start writing Zelda/Pokemon crossover stories. We all graduate to high school.

2000/01: We continue with HR and the four or us. One day when I was mad at Jon I started a massive everything crossover from the Powerpuff Girls to DBZ to Zelda and Tenchi Muyo. It will eventually become more than eight hundred pages long. Jeanine also tries to get us together, which fails miserably. I take Latin and meet Christine, and she and Jeanine become best friends. We become friends with Wyatt, too. That summer we all hang out everyday and make a movie that is Jon and Christine's collaborative vision. It sucks, but it's fun. We become the bike gang with messenger bags and are jumped by the VPC, a lame gang from our suburban neighborhood. They steal our red stuff.

2001/02: Christine and I compete for the smartest in our science class, even though she never does the homework and still does as well as me. My dad goes into the hospital for eight months, and my half sister gets married. The group grows in members but is broken by the end of the school year. I meet Andrea in my Latin class, and she likes anime and electronic music the same as me. I get into trance via Best of Trance Volume 2 and ATB. My family moves to our new house about a mile away, but I choose to stay at Etiwanda because they have Latin and my friends are there. Christine moves away.


2002/03: My dad moves in with us when he gets out of the hospital, but all I do is fight with him. I also almost fail my first class ever (pre-calculus) and drop it and take nothing instead. Tuesday through Thursday I scooter to Wyatt's house in the mornings and walk with him to school. The other two days my mom doesn't have work and drives me. He ditches class one day, and we walk home "hobo style" with a shopping cart full of junk from the "forest."Jon goes to Vally View, and we see each other less. My dad moves out into his own place before Christmas. Zelda: Windwaker comes out, and I preorder it to get the special edition disc. Jon and I try dating for a month, but it fails because it felt like friendship still. Wyatt and Amanda go out for three months. That summer I try pot for the first time, and I get drunk for the first time on 03/03/03.

Home

Standing on the edge at the point of no return
The crimson sky bleeds out into the horizon
As dusk slowly slips away into the night
Many a deep question have been asked here
So far none have been answered
The meaning of life, the right path to walk
Adds up to nothing in the end
The past is gone and the future is cloudy
Hope touches for a second, then flies away
Alone and off into the blue
Shrouded in darkness, dreams are no comfort
And yet it is still an intriguing thought
This far off place we call home

Personal Timeline, part two

1992: I make my first best friend (Nancy Wu). I also have public bathroom issues and have an accident that got me sent to the nurse for a call home and new shorts.

1994/95: In third grade I lie to my teacher quite brazenly and am almost caught. I also semi-meet the boy who would become my best friend when the third grade part of my combo class switched teachers after recess time.

1995/96: I compete with the other kids for the most creative and gory journal every day until our teacher bans us killing each other. I also come up with a zookeeper and animal game that enthralls my whole class, and I wish I could remember more about it now. Our teacher also divides us into basketball teams, and mine comes in third out of four places.

1996/97: I gain the nickname Rambo because I rammed my friend in a race to the drinking fountain. I also have a whole week where all I do is cause accidents for my friends, and I start to drift away from my group. Thinking about this now I see what this leads to only a few years later. This is the year I have more girl friends than guys since I started school.

1997/98: I start middle school and start to become less of a tomboy, wearing more girl clothes. My language arts and social studies likes when I read the text aloud because I'm clear and quick. I leave my group at the end of the year and end with no real place. This was a very awkward year for me.

1998/99: That boy and I are in the same class. We become friends over Zelda: Ocarina of Time, and I am the walking players guide for my class. After my newest group kicks me out (they were the sixth one that year) Jon leads me around until I found a new one. He comes to join me a week later. I convince him to join newspaper with me for eighth grade.

Closer

It was the silence and the stillness that had always been a bother. Humans by nature prefer to live in groups. At one time it was for survival, but for most it had become a psychological need as we evolved into more complex animals. Silence then means loneliness to some or at certain times, and much of that school year I had felt very alone. I suppose now that it was my own doing, but they say hindsight is always 20/20.

To remedy this, I often would simply turn the television on. Sound helped melt away the choking solitude, even if it was an artificial substitute for companionship. O this particular day, our house was still with no way to fix it. In preparation for the change of moving, painters had covered our walls in a new shade, helping erase the mark we left on the house. The TV was unplugged and stored under a plastic sheet. My portable CD player had died the day previous, and my mom and brother were out for some errands. This time I truly was alone.

As a last escape, I turned to my science textbook, more specifically to the chapter on human reproduction in females. Quickly this disinterested me, and in frustration I closed it instead stare at the ceiling. The feeling was so oppressive it was almost too much to stand. WIth my arm over my eyes, I tried to slip away from it all then.

An eternity of a few minutes passed in this fashion when suddenly a knock came at the door. Startled, I sat up and went to see who could have pierced that silence. Standing there with his scooter and a joke about the red mark on my forehead was Wyatt. He came to hang out, but without meaning to, he saved me from that moment. Instantly the oppression was gone, and we went out to play like the kids we still were. As we scootered to the park, the wind felt relieving, and the speed was freeing. I never told him that day, and I probably never will about my gratitude. We were never as close as he and Jon or me and Jon, but we were friends, no matter how imperfect. That was all I needed that day, and that friendship is what we have now five years later. It has survived longer than that silence, and it is what matters most.

Readability

Personal Timeline, part one

1986: I'm born three weeks early on my grandma's birthday while she is visiting my three-month old cousin in Massachusetts. She joked and told my mom to either wait until she came home or have me on her birthday. She got what she asked for.

1987: While staying with my grandparents, I break open some glass liquor bottles and have to get stitches on my left hand, which I still have a scar from. My parents are at a concert but come home for this. From then on my grandpa locks the cabinet.

1989: I have my third and final eye surgery to tighten a muscle in my left eye. My mom buys me a troll doll dressed as a nurse. I throw up all over the car and my yellow sweater on the way home that night.

1990: My brother and I get chicken pox from a boy our mom is babysitting. We take baking soda baths and are constantly swatted at and told to stop scratching. On the bright side we both get through it before we reach school age.

1991: I start kindergarten just fine, but half way through the year, I cry one morning when my dad goes to leave me. He goes anyway. Also that year I am late one morning to class because I am so caught up in feeding the springy riding horse sand with a sifter that I miss the bell.

Rainy Monday

I tried to keep up
Really I did
But I tripped, I stumbled
And the world kept moving
Time still flowed, the endless river
Sol replaced, Luna, Luna replaced Sol
The pattern infinite as space itself
The same black darkness
That now consumes my being
Eating away at me slowly
Each day, a new lost part
Squinting to see those so far ahead
Losing myself in the underbrush
Of the dark path
There is no escape
The cycle, the path
As everlasting as the darkness
That haunts me still

2/10/05

If Only

We take comfort in the past when our present is boring and our future is cloudy. The more we tether ourselves to those memories, the more shackled we become in our present with the inability to move on. What was will never be again, and letting go of that is the key to clearing up the path to what is next. Time moves on in its never ending flow, and people need to move on with it.

“So how long will it be ‘til I can let go?”

The Walk

It was a spring evening that, for all appearances, seemed like any other. The sun had all but disappeared on the horizon, its pink hues mixing in the baby blue sky. It was so simple, but yet it was still a most amazing sight. Voices from the park were carried on the gentle breeze as children laughed and played joyfully, knowing that the school year was coming to a close. Their elementary school was to the west, just beneath the glowing ball. At one time it was my school as well, and there had begun the journey of academia. It had been five years since the promotion to the awkward transitional stage of intermediate school, and already I was half way through high school. Not much had changed in that time save for the company I kept. Through all the fighting that year, we all stuck together, trying as desperately as everyone else to figure out life. We all thought we were different, even chosen as we dubbed ourselves. None of this would matter. The school year was not the only thing coming to an end. As strong as our bonds were, they had suffered the strains and been fractured just enough to release easily. The ravaging of time could not have compared with what we did to ourselves. New bonds were forming. Comrades were leaving. And in the midst of this change, a curious urging compelled me to grab my scooter that afternoon and take off. The spot I stood in as I watched the sunset, felt the wind, and heard the kids playing was the point at which four paths diverged. That chapter of my life was over at that moment, and I knew that never again would I look at the park the same way. At the same time, there were new ways to go, a new phase to embrace. Instead of longing for what was coming to a close, it was something to stride forth into. About to turn sixteen and lose much of what had become important, I took the path I used least, knowing I never again would. Somehow in that moment I realized everything had changed. Everything was as mutable as the wind, and actually, it felt okay.

And I Miss You

I've been missing my dad a lot lately. I see little kids with their fathers, and I miss those days. I miss talking to him, going to his house, just whatever. Next weekend we're going to finally release his ashes. My mom doesn't like them here, but my brother has seemed reluctant in letting go. But I think I'm finally ready.I don't know why it took so long for me to really miss him. Maybe my grieving process has just been really slow. I don't even really want to talk about it too much. I just wanted to get that part out in the open somewhere. I acted like a brat for so long to him. He wasn't the best dad ever sometimes, but he was my dad. He was my only dad. I wish he was still here so much it makes me sadder than anything, even last August when he died. That was more than a year ago now, and sometimes I even picture how I found him. Then I push it out of my mind. That wasn't the dad I knew, and he wouldn't want me to remember him like that. He was fun. He took us cool places, bought us cool things, and was there for the important stuff. When my parents got divorced, the only real change was that he lived in a different house. I remember lying at the park with him and Andrew, and we all played 20 Questions. I remember when I graduated fifth grade, and that night he took my to his job to lock up and they were paving the parking lot. I remember him coming to the awards for track and field when I was on the team in sixth grade. I remember the flowers he gave me at my eighth grade promotion, and I remember him dropping me off early after I spent the night at his house for the field trip to Dana Point. I rememeber all of these small things that meant so much, and I miss him. I miss him more than I've ever said aloud. I reread the blog I wrote last December about it, and it made me feel worse. That's why I'm writing now. I only want to remember the good guy he was, even though it makes me want to cry. I really don't want to cry tonight. If his energy is still floating around the universe, I hope he knows how much I mean that, how much I still think about him and how much I love him.