2006

Going out to the village for a drink or two.

Happy New Year everybody.

I should've had some resolutions all set to go. I might have to make them up tomorrow. But I've got one for now. Have more fun. I'll start on that one tonight.

Escape

One day two weeks ago I worked late. That's not very unusual. At my internship there were many days where I would work late. Nine, 10, 11pm. Once or twice until early in the morning. This particular day I had gotten off at around 4:30am. I was tired and all I wanted to do was go home and forget about having spent my night not in bed, but at the office, while the art directors on the projects had gone home a long time ago. So I left in after work mode. I didn't think of calling a cab. I walked the empty streets to Market Street where I normally catch the train - which has now stopped running. I'm almost at Market Street, halfway down the block when I hear a loud thud and the high pitched tension snap of the steel bus power lines. As I look 40-50 feet behind me I see a big lump that looks like an oversized duffle bag. I couldn't quite make it out (I didn't have my glasses) but in the back of my mind the truth raced. I slowed and stared. No possible way. Seriously, who dropped the duffle bag? A few cabs sped by and almost ran him over. No duffle bag. A man. He jumped or fell or was pushed from the 12+ story building under construction. I couldn't stop thinking about him. But there was no mention of him in the news. No blurb in the papers. I found nothing. Who are you? What happened?

I have to be honest, I have thought about it before. They say everyone has. A solution, an escape, an answered prayer. Flight. A flight to take us away. I remember moments in my past riddled with helplessness and hatred and confusion. I remember wanting it so badly but being too scared. All I could think now is was he helpless and hateful and confused? What was he getting away from?

Home again

I always forget what it's like to come back to my parents' house.
And it's funny because new jersey is not a forgettable place. But it seems that each time I leave (even though I promise myself to not return for too long a period) I come back thinking it won't be so bad. Sure thinking about sitting on my parent's couch, watching free DirecTV, and eating like a pregnant whale (no really, a whale – from the ocean) seems like a good idea. It'll be a nice break, I say. But the anal-retentive control freak in me comes out. Not slowly. Not just a little. But in a walloping explosion of i hate this i hate that blah blah blah. BOOM. Yes, stupid. Yes, selfish. But after not living anywhere near mom and pop for so long, adjusting to those old ways is hard.

I also forget how much my mom likes to feed us. Right now in my house there are so many tempting things to eat. Maybe tempting is the wrong word. It suggests the uncertain outcome of provocation or attraction. Maybe I should say in my house there are so many things I have eaten. Yes, as in they tempted and succeeded and there's no going back. The custard cups, creme-filled donut, cheeses, prosciutto, breads, guacamole, candies, plus all the Christmas leftovers. I've lost all will-power.

Greener. Much greener.

I've always been a person who believes that the grass is always greener. I always think there is better out there than what I've got. And I'm trying to hunt it down. After seven years I'm still roaming because something always seems to try to guide me to this greener grass.

For the past seven years I've been moving an average of twice a year – and I'm not just talking apartment numbers here, sometimes states, sometimes coasts. Thirteen addresses. Yes, I counted and I've had 13 addresses since I was eighteen. Plus all the in-between times I've had to move back to my parent's house, this time being the 4th. Where am I going? And what the hell am I looking for? It's no longer wanderlust. One thing is for certain, I'm getting tired.

This makes me wonder if I'm just too picky. Do most people settle? Settle with their jobs. Settle with life. Do they know something I don't? Like the perfect job doesn't exist, never will – neither will the perfect life. But I'm not even looking for perfect. Just something non-depressing.

...........

I've been sitting here for the past twenty minutes trying to figure out where to go from here. What to write, how to tidily sum up this post. And I have nothing. Maybe this is a cop-out, but I guess I can't make sense of everything until I know what new direction I'm taking. Maybe I'll figure it out from my next address. Who knows, perhaps it will have a backyard with much greener grass.

Thanks for the pigeon

I sent in my petitions to reverse the charges from the fine city of San Francisco Department of Parking and Traffic. You see, I got 3 parking tickets and had my car towed. What did the citations say? Resident complaint: blocked driveway.
Was my car blocking the driveway? No. Some angry bitch decided every time she got in and out of her garage, that my car was too close to her ugly face. She called DPT and had my car towed.

When I spoke with her on the phone she proceeded to lecture me and rambled about how nice she's been about it and how she did everything she could to notify me. Oops, i must have missed the carrier pigeon she sent with a note.

She was able to get in and out of her driveway...she said so. And she still had my car towed. I'm so angry. I'm going to the junkyard, paying $100 for some rusted piece of junk and parking it early in the morning before she heads out for work. I'll show her a blocked driveway.

X3

So they have finally released some pics for the X3 movie. And there's a trailer. And Halle Berry has decided to return to the third installment. Yes, she won an Oscar and is now a legit actress. Yes, she's been bitching about how she didn't want to return to X-Men because her roles in the first two movies weren't big enough. And after such success and of course spectacular acting skills seen in Catwoman it must've been very difficult to return. Welcome back.

The Carver is back on Nip/Tuck. About time.

Rolling

Thanksgiving was delicious. Except that upon parking on a lovely San Francisco hill, my car jumped back, hit the car behind me which caused that car's brake to disengage, making it propel backwards in a semi-circle, jumping the curb and driving itself across the street to finally come to a lovely, um, stop against another car on the other side.

The best part was all the kind area residents stopping to say "Quite a way to start Thanksgiving."

Ha ha ho.

I drive my car once I week to move it for the weekly street cleaning. That is all. And I take it grocery shopping this one time... Surprisingly, the damage was minimal. And no bystanders (there was an extended family standing at the corner) were killed. Car number 3 is kind enough to not pursue it any further. Luckily it was just a dent against the door. His car was old already so he didn't seem very concerned. Plus he was a nice man. Car number 2 seems to want to pursue this. The damage was a few scratches to his bumper and a dented light but he wants to get a quote.

Can someone steal my car and rid me of it? My car company won't allow me to break my lease. Unless of course I pay a penalty equivalent to the remaining payments. (There are 13 months left on the lease).

I should move to Arkansas just to have a reason to have the car. Or better yet, New Jersey.

Friends of mine

I'm walking to the train to get to work (already late). I see a cracked out homeless lady walking to me, swerving madly like a drunk driver behind a car. So I swerve in the other direction to avoid the crash. Oh but wait, I see her scratch her greasy head, inspect her fingers and dash towards me, arm outstretched, with a slurred "Excuse me sir" as she purposely wipes her fingers on my arm and walks away.

Hello, caller.

I was recently flipping through the channels. I flip fast and even faster through those middle Local access, Home shopping channels. But for some reason I stopped and landed on QVC. The well-kept host with her perfect Texas Beauty Queen hair and florescent smile was selling some lovely necklaces. They were made of small silver hoops interlocking to form the spectacle displayed on a mannequin neck. The Beauty Queen was speaking about the beauty of the necklace with a caller who recently purchased one. You see, the caller liked it so much she was about to buy another (they came in three different sizes). The caller sounded delicate. Alone.

The host propped the necklace in front of different colored cloths to demonstrate how well it complemented any color (especially blue, the caller's favorite). As the host displayed the shiny necklace around her perfectly manicured nails, she asked who this necklace was for. The caller said it was for herself.

"Thanks for loving yourself," beamed the host, condescendingly.

Immediately, sadness emanated from the screen. The fake set, the fake jewelry, the fake host.

"Nobody else does–" replied the caller.

The statement, registering before the caller finished prompted the host to ignore it. But more than that. Almost interjecting. As if embarrassed or annoyed. This caller will not ruin my show. On she went dismissing life going on around her and focused back on the beautifully fake necklace being sold for $29.99 plus S&H.

Thanks for calling. Click

Toyota Pulls Ads From FX's Nip/Tuck

According to Mediaweek, Toyota, along with other sponsors, have pulled their ads from Nip/Tuck. Too much sex they say. Hello, it's cable TV. And have they seen The Real World? There's some real freaky deaky going on there.

On a slightly different note, what happened to The Carver on Nip/Tuck? I don't care about the damn new after surgery spa...where's the Carver?

To the Brazilians, who don't speak Brazilian

I spent my weekend at work my internship doing something that should have taken just a few hours. But people can't seem to make up their minds so it took all weekend.

I did get to go out with friends on Friday night. Dinner was delicious at a Chinese place on Polk Street. Probably the best Chinese I've had. I can't say the same for the few Bud Lights I had after – I may have to give it up. But the company was amazing. The Brazilians, whom I met in school, have left and gone back to the motherland. They've become some of my favorite people and the few friends I had in San Francisco. Unless of course you count itchy crotch boy and one of the blonde Trifecta from school. Cause I don't.

I'm sad. But hopeful I hear from them again.
"Whatever. Chill out dude."

Links

I've added a links section to other blogs!

I hate Makras Real Estate, 1193 Church Street, in San Francisco.

They're rude, unhappy people. I went to pick up keys for the new front door. There are two of us in the apartment but they would only give me one key. They checked my ID and verified my identity in their computer system. Saw that there are two of us in the apartment but refused to give both keys for security purposes. Like I'm going to take the second key to my apartment and give it to the random guy on the corner who makes non-stop moaning sounds. I'd love him dropping by unexpectedly.
Regardless of their policies, they were assho*** about the whole thing. Never do business with these people.

Post-its

I'm 25 years old. I'm well educated. I have a nifty little degree and after an additional two years, a decent creative portfolio. (Perfect for working in a creative ad agency). But apparently, I'm a complete idiot. You see, the fact that I did go to school and oh, I don't know, I'm a human and not a rock, is not enough for simple instructions.

The far superior non-rocks who work here seem to disagree. I love post-its. They're amazing. You can put 23,000 of them in a book and give one simple instruction and somehow, magically, have that instruction apply to every post-it.

But since I am a dumb rock, I really don't understand that the little yellow sticky tab on a page means I should scan that page. I thought it meant scan the page that's four away. I'm so glad someone sat me down and showed me the 28 different pages with post-its and one by one told me which ones to scan.

He left a business card, it must be legit.

The US Census Bureau has randomly selected my apartment to include me in an employment survey. Are they hoping I'm unemployed? The lovely field rep, Dan, has stopped by several times last week (during the day. You know, the time most people are at work) and once he even left me a $5 Starbucks gift card. Can't they leave a survey under the door? Why must he talk to me? It seems quite obsessive. He even stopped by Saturday and Sunday but I was away. I'm worried one day he'll really find me at home.

Lemonade 25¢

When I was 10, I worked at my parents' New Jersey grocery store Rosa Maria Food Center (named after my older sister). I worked as the cashier. Yes, I often manned the register on my own while my father was way in the back butchering, or doing whatever it is that butchers do. Cutting meat.

I was in 5th grade, hardly able to reach the Marlboro Lights and Parliaments stacked high on the shelves but I was able to sell them. I managed frequent customer's credits in a rinky dink 3 ring binder (not everyone could pay so my parent's gave customer's a tab allowing them to pay later...a very noble but very foolish gesture on my parents' part.) I bagged, I stocked, I served as loss prevention specialist and did 'busts' during busy after-school times. I did everything but cut the meat.

And this didn't phase most people. Adults treated me as an adult. A little 10 year old adult who could sell them smokes and who knew the characteristics of more odd vegetables than an average American male. I didn't really enjoy it, especially because I couldn't go out and play as much. But I hated it because of the teenagers.

I hated when the high school kids would come in. Yes, I'm ten fucking years old. And yes I work in a fucking grocery store. And of course I love getting fucking made fun of because of it. And remember the whole Give me five, but woah, I'm taking my hand out when you go give me five trick that was so fucking cool. Yeah, they liked to do that. This is when I would bitch to my parents and tell them I was going to call social services because forcing your underage kid to work in a damn grocery store was illegal. And then they would laugh at me finding it cute that I would threaten to call the cops.

I think my past grocery store clerk experience has established the dysfunctional path of all my future employment. Like there's something restless or rebellious in me that refuses to stay at one place too long. Since I had no choice as a child, I'm using my choice wildly and carelessly as an adult. Most people stick at their jobs even if they're unhappy until something 'better' comes along. At the first sign of unhappiness I get out.

Some of my glorious short-lived experience includes dry cleaners - I rubbed chemicals onto the yellowed underarms and necks of men's dress shirts. I lasted one afternoon. Accounting services in college, office assistant for psychologists- I hated the stupid receptionists I worked with so I cut my weekly hours from 20 to 6, computer lab monitor, weed-puller, bulk concert ticket buyer for company that would then sell them at twice the price to hardcore fans, ostrich-poop picker upper and highway garbage cleaner (enforced by the state of Massachusetts), Royal Caribbean cruise checking-in agent, horrendous server at gay steak and burger restaurant, data entry for Gap, Inc., assistant at the national headquarters for some big church establishment where I saw parishoner's kind donations going into extravagant meals and fancy hotels for the religious heads, Donna Karan financing department in which I misspelled Donna Karan in every fax I sent, receptionist at a construction site, marketing assistant at online dating site with asshole boss who would sexually harass the female interns, housekeeper for business convention dorms and for the special olympic atheletes, art director at an ad agency with too many unhappy people. Oh and I did have a lemonade stand once. I may have missed some but none lasted very long.

Now I'm interning at another ad agency as a creative assistant. I'm feeling restless.

I work in porn

Just out of school and determined to live anywhere besides my parents' new bunk bed guest room, I took the first job that came to me in San Francisco. It's just freelance and all I do is look at nudie pictures and color correct them but still I can say I work in porn. For eight hours every day, I sit in front of 27 inch monitors with gay porn magnified 28 million times before me. Honestly, I felt uneasy at first – like I would be punished for doing something very wrong every time someone walked by. I had an instinctive panicked reaction to want to immediately close any window called B.ig B.ang or Cow.boy J.acks. But as I looked around in twilight-zone confusion everyone else was looking at gay porn on the job.

Unfortunately after just 3 weeks, today is my last day. And not because of some sort of work related accident. I was offered an internship at an ad agency. It's just an internship and the pay sucks but it's one step closer to what I really want to do. And I don't have the, um – height – for the one step closer the porn job would get me.

I'll honestly miss it a little. The stocky middle-aged, self-proclaimed "queen" that only speaks broken Spanish to me, giggles uncontrollably, and says, "I so bad" whenever he refers to something that seems dirty...yet I never quite understand.

The very shy customer service rep with shaped eyebrows who I'm positive turns into someone fabulous like Simone or Vanessa on Friday nights.

And the sassy production guy who talks to himself all day in his corner and sounds exactly like Coco Peru.

Goodbye porn job. I only hope advertising will be as entertaining as you.

Top ten reasons why things aren't going so bad (in no particular order):

1. I live in a fun neighborhood.

2. I can find the cheapest vegetables and fruits ever in the Mission.

3. Even though looking for a job sucks, the few people who have seen my book have liked it. It always makes me feel good to know others really like my work.

4. Each time I show my work I am reminded that I've never stabbed anyone in the back nor do I have to lie about the work I've put into my book-it's all mine.

5. Christine and I are lucky enough to speak on a regular basis again.

6. I'm reading a good book. Running with Scissors.

7. I have a new bedspread which I enjoy very much.

8. Every morning in my bathroom I smell the onions being chopped at the Mexican place downstairs-quite a wakeup.

9. I have like 80,000 personalized notepads from my old job. So good cause I haven't had to buy paper.

10. I don't mind taking risks.

HEAD WEST YOUNG MAN – AGAIN

I'm sitting in a coffee shop looking out to the street. Slightly dreary yet for this instant – so small, so specific I can almost grab it – everything seems new and exciting. The stress over my recently quit job subsides. The stress over looking for a new job burries itself within the damp earth of the tree looking at me from the window. I'm a nomad. My life never taking up more room than can fit into my tiny Civic. I'm irrational and travel to where it feels right. Careers and decisions fork in my head as frequently as the pavement cracks before me.

This one crack has led me to San Francisco. Yes the promise of a great start somewhere else was faulty. A place full of unhappy people that have settled on mediocrity. Before I settled I had to leave. Even though it may have been foolish, I had to find out for myself.

So here I am, starting over – again. Waiting to see where the next crack leads.

SPICY CHICKEN

The only way I can do work while at work is to leave work. I go to a coffee shop down the street and that's where I do my concepting. For some reason, sitting in a cubicle with flourescenty lights all around me and account managers talking about sp.icy ch.icken this spi.cy chi.cken that is too distracting.

So during my morning in Caribou coffee some lady walked in...with her own lawn chair. And a butt pillow was taped to it. She put it down, went to the bathroom and walked back out onto the Chicago streets with her green plastic lawnchair. She had mad frizzy hair and was wearing two serongs. One tucked into the back of her pants and the other wrapped around her head. I'm going to put her in an ad.

LOOK AT ME, I'M A REAL LIFE BOY

So I'm all grown up now. Graduated again finally to this exciting world of real work. I'm doing what I've spent all these years working on – something I knew I'd love. Only it doesn't work out so perfectly. There is nothing romantic about work. Even in my profession. A profession that people get into because it's fun. It's fun! I hear all the time. I'm not sure if it's truth slapping me in the face or if it's just a bad first job. Never did I imagine that the creative world of advertising would resemble corporate Cubicle Hell. But it does...all too closely.

But yes, I was naive for expecting anything less. I work for a worldwide company who's more interested in money than creative success. Handjob anyone?

I've lost a little faith and passion for what I do in this short time. I need to get out of here before I start resembling the zombie-like former creatives who walk around with furled-lips and bitterness on their faces.

I'm working on it.

I haven't blogged in ages. In the time since my last blog I've been busy with school. Slightly overwhelmed. Questioning myself. Not that questioning oneself isn't healthy. I believe it is. I guess I've been going in and out of depression. But not real depression. More like a sadness. One that can't be pin-pointed or blamed or defined.

I guess everyone feels this way from time to time.