I can't stop listening to this song.
Sunday, January 23, 2011
Saturday, January 22, 2011
It's been 12 hours...
...since I deleted my Facebook account. Not just deactivated, but deleted. It's "deactivated" for 14 days and then if I can fight the temptation to log in until then once the 14 days are up they erase everything. Permanently. I'm not sure how much of that is true—they probably keep your stuff hidden away on some server for an indefinite amount of time—but it feels good to know I've gotten rid of my largest internet time-consumer.
I first went through all ~950 tagged pictures of myself and saved the ones I liked, then went through my ~350 friends and made note of e-mail addresses and contact info for the people I actually care about. Unsurprisingly, there were only 30 people. So either a) I'm a douchebag, or b) my distaste for the intense amount of insincerity that exists on Facebook is justified. Or c) both.
What will I do with all this time? It's going to take a while to get rid of this habit of rapidly typing Command-T (to open a new tab in Google Chrome) and then typing "f-a-c-e down-arrow enter" whenever I'm bored...
I first went through all ~950 tagged pictures of myself and saved the ones I liked, then went through my ~350 friends and made note of e-mail addresses and contact info for the people I actually care about. Unsurprisingly, there were only 30 people. So either a) I'm a douchebag, or b) my distaste for the intense amount of insincerity that exists on Facebook is justified. Or c) both.
What will I do with all this time? It's going to take a while to get rid of this habit of rapidly typing Command-T (to open a new tab in Google Chrome) and then typing "f-a-c-e down-arrow enter" whenever I'm bored...
Wednesday, January 19, 2011
hi.
Keeping up with this blog has been a difficult task for me for a while now.
Today I went home for lunch. I had leftover ravioli from the night before that I made with (among other things) Smart Ground Original veggie protein crumbles. They resemble ground beef, but they're made from soy and wheat (and are therefore meatless). Every once in a while I like to please the part of myself that was a vegetarian for six years. I always wonder when I'll make the switch again and stop eating meat.
Anyway, the point I was trying to make was that I had lunch at home. Sitting on the balcony and eating by myself was really relaxing. I was alone with my thoughts, which is a luxury I don't get to enjoy too often these days. I started thinking about how much I miss my parents, how strange it is that they're in Peru and how they've been there for almost four months. I talk to them almost every day, thanks to Skype and cheap long distance phone plans. Our relationship has changed so much with them being over 2,500 miles away.
On the surface, I think my mom is more relaxed. She would always worry about me and, to a lesser extent, my older brother. I don't know if this perspective is ridiculous or not, but I feel like my presence was a constant reminder to her that I don't live my life the way she wants me to. The thing is, she has no idea. She doesn't know how often I smoke weed, or how much sex I've had in the past, or how much I enjoy going out and drinking with my friends, or how much I dislike religion, or how little faith I have in the idea of a "supreme being."
On way too many occasions, I felt like the mere mentioning of my friends would remind her that she had no idea what I would do when I wasn't with the fam. It was an ever-present pressure, only a portion of which was lifted when I moved out two years ago. Another, slightly larger chunk was lifted when they moved to Peru. But I still have a lot of guilt. I definitely feel like I have a lot of morals(?), but a large part of those "morals" are based in guilt. Is this a good thing? Is this normal? I may never know.
What I do know is that I had no intention of developing so much on this subject. I actually sat down to type a brief summary of what I've been up to the past six months and to discuss my goals for 2011.
I guess what I'm trying to say is that without seeing them face-to-face or interacting with them on a regular basis, I think about my parents a lot. Today was one of those days. I had so many flashbacks from the past 21 years, birthdays from my childhood, family trips, weekends on the beach, piano concerts of mine that they attended without skipping a beat, deep conversations we had about human nature and societies across the globe, that time my dad paid me $100 to throw away my bud/bowl/Zippo, the day I decided I was going to try LSD for the first time and the day my parents "discovered" my sexuality (they were the same day, although the latter happened first), the day I graduated high school, the night I got broken up with for the first time (8th grade—no big deal in retrospect but disastrous at the time) which was also the first time they found me crying and I couldn't/didn't tell them why…
It's funny how I wrote that I "think about them" a lot, but everything I just described above is a moment from my life. I guess those were moments in their lives, too.
Well, this is my blog after all…so I guess it's OK that I write about me a lot.
This is getting really long and I feel like I'm weaving through topics like…okay, I was about to make a joke about Peruvian drivers. The stories my 'rents tell me are scary. Four cars side-by-side on a two-lane road, all trying to get in front of each other. No llamas on the street, though that would probably make the constant near-death-experiences worth enduring.
I still don't know what I want to do with my life or what path I'm on at the moment. I'm doing what I do as best as I can and figuring it out one learning experience at a time. On an unrelated note, I need to go to sleep. So I'm going to make a list of what I meant to write about today and what I'll write about in my next post.
New year's resolutions for 2011, in no order whatsoever: go back to being a vegetarian, stop burning bridges and attempt to fix a couple of them, save money, get some exercise, always be on the hunt for new music, find a place in which I can comfortably and happily live on my own.*
Good night.
--
*Okay, I need to expand on that last one. My brother has decided that he's joining my parents in Lima in a few months. Could be as early as May but more likely towards the end of the summer. Regardless, I AM SCARED SHITLESS. A little. Moving in with my 32-year-old brother after not having lived together for several years was a great help in the transition to having my parents on another continent.
I still have time to make a choice between moving out of this apartment and getting my own place (ideally a studio in Coral Gables or Midtown/Wynwood) OR finding a roommate to take my brother's room (our apartment is in South Miami). But since I'm crazy and like to plan everything centuries before it's necessary, I can't stop thinking about it. I'm sure I'll get over it eventually. Maybe if I focus on those resolutions I'll relax a bit.
--
Oh, and this.
Today I went home for lunch. I had leftover ravioli from the night before that I made with (among other things) Smart Ground Original veggie protein crumbles. They resemble ground beef, but they're made from soy and wheat (and are therefore meatless). Every once in a while I like to please the part of myself that was a vegetarian for six years. I always wonder when I'll make the switch again and stop eating meat.
Anyway, the point I was trying to make was that I had lunch at home. Sitting on the balcony and eating by myself was really relaxing. I was alone with my thoughts, which is a luxury I don't get to enjoy too often these days. I started thinking about how much I miss my parents, how strange it is that they're in Peru and how they've been there for almost four months. I talk to them almost every day, thanks to Skype and cheap long distance phone plans. Our relationship has changed so much with them being over 2,500 miles away.
On the surface, I think my mom is more relaxed. She would always worry about me and, to a lesser extent, my older brother. I don't know if this perspective is ridiculous or not, but I feel like my presence was a constant reminder to her that I don't live my life the way she wants me to. The thing is, she has no idea. She doesn't know how often I smoke weed, or how much sex I've had in the past, or how much I enjoy going out and drinking with my friends, or how much I dislike religion, or how little faith I have in the idea of a "supreme being."
On way too many occasions, I felt like the mere mentioning of my friends would remind her that she had no idea what I would do when I wasn't with the fam. It was an ever-present pressure, only a portion of which was lifted when I moved out two years ago. Another, slightly larger chunk was lifted when they moved to Peru. But I still have a lot of guilt. I definitely feel like I have a lot of morals(?), but a large part of those "morals" are based in guilt. Is this a good thing? Is this normal? I may never know.
What I do know is that I had no intention of developing so much on this subject. I actually sat down to type a brief summary of what I've been up to the past six months and to discuss my goals for 2011.
I guess what I'm trying to say is that without seeing them face-to-face or interacting with them on a regular basis, I think about my parents a lot. Today was one of those days. I had so many flashbacks from the past 21 years, birthdays from my childhood, family trips, weekends on the beach, piano concerts of mine that they attended without skipping a beat, deep conversations we had about human nature and societies across the globe, that time my dad paid me $100 to throw away my bud/bowl/Zippo, the day I decided I was going to try LSD for the first time and the day my parents "discovered" my sexuality (they were the same day, although the latter happened first), the day I graduated high school, the night I got broken up with for the first time (8th grade—no big deal in retrospect but disastrous at the time) which was also the first time they found me crying and I couldn't/didn't tell them why…
It's funny how I wrote that I "think about them" a lot, but everything I just described above is a moment from my life. I guess those were moments in their lives, too.
Well, this is my blog after all…so I guess it's OK that I write about me a lot.
This is getting really long and I feel like I'm weaving through topics like…okay, I was about to make a joke about Peruvian drivers. The stories my 'rents tell me are scary. Four cars side-by-side on a two-lane road, all trying to get in front of each other. No llamas on the street, though that would probably make the constant near-death-experiences worth enduring.
I still don't know what I want to do with my life or what path I'm on at the moment. I'm doing what I do as best as I can and figuring it out one learning experience at a time. On an unrelated note, I need to go to sleep. So I'm going to make a list of what I meant to write about today and what I'll write about in my next post.
New year's resolutions for 2011, in no order whatsoever: go back to being a vegetarian, stop burning bridges and attempt to fix a couple of them, save money, get some exercise, always be on the hunt for new music, find a place in which I can comfortably and happily live on my own.*
Good night.
--
*Okay, I need to expand on that last one. My brother has decided that he's joining my parents in Lima in a few months. Could be as early as May but more likely towards the end of the summer. Regardless, I AM SCARED SHITLESS. A little. Moving in with my 32-year-old brother after not having lived together for several years was a great help in the transition to having my parents on another continent.
I still have time to make a choice between moving out of this apartment and getting my own place (ideally a studio in Coral Gables or Midtown/Wynwood) OR finding a roommate to take my brother's room (our apartment is in South Miami). But since I'm crazy and like to plan everything centuries before it's necessary, I can't stop thinking about it. I'm sure I'll get over it eventually. Maybe if I focus on those resolutions I'll relax a bit.
--
Oh, and this.
Wednesday, August 25, 2010
so I realized...
"Wisdom comes with age" is something I will never doubt after knowing my grandma.
That's all for now.
That's all for now.
Thursday, July 22, 2010
new trend
What? Blogging again? That's right.
Maybe this is the best place to blab about what's going on in my mind in terms of my parents moving away. Without further ado...
I'm scared. When I moved out of my parents' place, it was because my mom and I weren't getting along with each other. I left, we had our ignoring-each-other phase, and then our relationship improved a bunch. We both put a lot of effort into trying to accept one another and put our roles (mother/son) first. From that point forward, I always knew I had my parents to look towards for anything I needed. They live like 20 blocks north of my apartment. In a few months they'll be in another country. Clearly living with my brother is in the best interest for us both, but it'll still be weird not having our parents around.
Ever since I started cooking (a little over a year ago), I never actually made a meal for my family. One time I brought over chicken curry leftovers, but just so they could taste a bit of Indian cuisine. Baking, on the other hand, was something they almost expected; back then I felt like I was spoiling them with how many times I brought over banana bread or brownies, but now I feel like I didn't do it enough and have to make up for it. Anyway, tonight I decided to cook for the fam.
I had to pick a recipe that would go a long way (since my dad and brother are human garbage disposals, not to mention how much I can eat if I try hard enough), and something that they don't eat often (Peruvian recipes are 50% of my kitchen repertoire) but nothing too crazy (no curried lentils or mushroom risotto)...so I decided on baked ziti a-la-Mark-Bittman, columnist for the New York Times and national foodie. (Apparently he's won several "Julia Child" awards...what the hell does that even mean?)
The recipe is pretty basic and leaves a lot of room for creativity. I added minced carrots, zucchini and mushrooms, along with Italian seasoning for the meat. Making sure the pasta and the sauce mix well is essential. Ignore the part about letting the meat sit and cook "untouched," as you may end up burning part of it (like I almost did). And I've learned that, with this recipe, the more cheese the better.
I haven't been cooking as much as I used to, and I've decided that needs to change. Also going to make sure I get as many recipes out of my mom's mind as I can over the next couple of months.
Maybe this is the best place to blab about what's going on in my mind in terms of my parents moving away. Without further ado...
I'm scared. When I moved out of my parents' place, it was because my mom and I weren't getting along with each other. I left, we had our ignoring-each-other phase, and then our relationship improved a bunch. We both put a lot of effort into trying to accept one another and put our roles (mother/son) first. From that point forward, I always knew I had my parents to look towards for anything I needed. They live like 20 blocks north of my apartment. In a few months they'll be in another country. Clearly living with my brother is in the best interest for us both, but it'll still be weird not having our parents around.
Ever since I started cooking (a little over a year ago), I never actually made a meal for my family. One time I brought over chicken curry leftovers, but just so they could taste a bit of Indian cuisine. Baking, on the other hand, was something they almost expected; back then I felt like I was spoiling them with how many times I brought over banana bread or brownies, but now I feel like I didn't do it enough and have to make up for it. Anyway, tonight I decided to cook for the fam.
I had to pick a recipe that would go a long way (since my dad and brother are human garbage disposals, not to mention how much I can eat if I try hard enough), and something that they don't eat often (Peruvian recipes are 50% of my kitchen repertoire) but nothing too crazy (no curried lentils or mushroom risotto)...so I decided on baked ziti a-la-Mark-Bittman, columnist for the New York Times and national foodie. (Apparently he's won several "Julia Child" awards...what the hell does that even mean?)
The recipe is pretty basic and leaves a lot of room for creativity. I added minced carrots, zucchini and mushrooms, along with Italian seasoning for the meat. Making sure the pasta and the sauce mix well is essential. Ignore the part about letting the meat sit and cook "untouched," as you may end up burning part of it (like I almost did). And I've learned that, with this recipe, the more cheese the better.
I haven't been cooking as much as I used to, and I've decided that needs to change. Also going to make sure I get as many recipes out of my mom's mind as I can over the next couple of months.
Sunday, July 18, 2010
15th
Epiphany: after spending years of high school thinking that every word that came out of my mouth and made its way into someone's ear or onto some piece of paper or internet page was worth gold, I've become almost afraid of blogging or writing. I've always been a compulsive over-thinker about my writing, but now instead of thinking about how many funny quips I can fit into a LiveJournal post, I question if it's my place to crowd the world wide web with my ramblings. I blame that on pausing my education.
Not being in school is tough. I want to keep learning but right now is not the time. I need patience. I've found purpose in what I do—helping my boss be a kick-ass lawyer and preparing high school kids for useless but unfortunately important college admissions tests—but every day seems like a variation of the same thing. I'm growing but not as fast as I could be if I were studying. The funny thing is that I know what I need to do so I can have less difficulty focusing on both the importance of what I'm doing now and how it's contributing to my long-term goals.
Change is coming. My parents are planning on going back to Peru in October, while my brother and I are going to start living together. It would seem that the time to leave Kibbutz Aish has come. I have so many memories from this apartment, both good and bad, so the change will be bittersweet. Living with my brother will definitely be different, but I know we're going to get along. The quest for a place begins August 1.
I think it's funny that I only blogged twice last year. This is my first post of 2010. So much has happened since December 3, 2009. I took my first mostly-on-my-own trip (went to NYC the week of New Year's Eve) and had an amazing time. I ended the first and only serious relationship I've ever had. I started working full-time. (note: more responsibility is worth being on salary - paid vacation days, paid sick days, paid holidays…it's awesome.) I saw Sound Tribe Sector 9 live. I turned 21.
I learned what it was like to live on your own and be single. I rolled at Ultra. I went to Bonnaroo for the third time and had an amazing experience as always. (Everyone should try 2C-I at least once.) I traveled quite a bit (Sarasota twice, Gainesville five times, Atlanta right before Bonnaroo, New Haven and NYC last weekend) and committed to doing more of it (going to St. Louis, MO next month to visit a friend at WashU and see Broken Social Scene).
Progress.
P.S. This random post was inspired by the soundtrack from A Single Man. If you haven't seen that film already, watch it. ASAP.
Not being in school is tough. I want to keep learning but right now is not the time. I need patience. I've found purpose in what I do—helping my boss be a kick-ass lawyer and preparing high school kids for useless but unfortunately important college admissions tests—but every day seems like a variation of the same thing. I'm growing but not as fast as I could be if I were studying. The funny thing is that I know what I need to do so I can have less difficulty focusing on both the importance of what I'm doing now and how it's contributing to my long-term goals.
Change is coming. My parents are planning on going back to Peru in October, while my brother and I are going to start living together. It would seem that the time to leave Kibbutz Aish has come. I have so many memories from this apartment, both good and bad, so the change will be bittersweet. Living with my brother will definitely be different, but I know we're going to get along. The quest for a place begins August 1.
I think it's funny that I only blogged twice last year. This is my first post of 2010. So much has happened since December 3, 2009. I took my first mostly-on-my-own trip (went to NYC the week of New Year's Eve) and had an amazing time. I ended the first and only serious relationship I've ever had. I started working full-time. (note: more responsibility is worth being on salary - paid vacation days, paid sick days, paid holidays…it's awesome.) I saw Sound Tribe Sector 9 live. I turned 21.
I learned what it was like to live on your own and be single. I rolled at Ultra. I went to Bonnaroo for the third time and had an amazing experience as always. (Everyone should try 2C-I at least once.) I traveled quite a bit (Sarasota twice, Gainesville five times, Atlanta right before Bonnaroo, New Haven and NYC last weekend) and committed to doing more of it (going to St. Louis, MO next month to visit a friend at WashU and see Broken Social Scene).
Progress.
P.S. This random post was inspired by the soundtrack from A Single Man. If you haven't seen that film already, watch it. ASAP.
Thursday, December 3, 2009
past due
Need to start blogging again! I've been procrastinating for too long and thinking too much about starting to write again. I need to just sit down and type away whatever's on my mind—isn't that the nature of blogging anyway?
Currently at work with no boss in the office. Then at 2pm I get to leave to go tutor spoiled private school students so that they don't fail the quarter. After that it looks like I'll be coming back home to pack (light), then picking up my aunt and heading to South Beach for the night. Looking forward to this impromptu family hangout!
OK, at this point I feel like I sound like a moron.
Holidays! I find it hard to explain how much or why I love this time of year. Everything slows down, most people seem to be in a good mood, and most people come home, which means they get to spend time with me--err, I get to see my close friends who've gone away to college. The only downside is the consistently dedicated airtime that Christmas melodies receive in December, because my coworkers like to listen to the radio and no station plays "Mi Burrito Sabanero" or any other non-American tune, for which I'd have slightly more tolerance.
Finally checking this off my to-do list...hopefully a more coherent, if not mentally stimulating, blog post is on the way.
Currently at work with no boss in the office. Then at 2pm I get to leave to go tutor spoiled private school students so that they don't fail the quarter. After that it looks like I'll be coming back home to pack (light), then picking up my aunt and heading to South Beach for the night. Looking forward to this impromptu family hangout!
OK, at this point I feel like I sound like a moron.
Holidays! I find it hard to explain how much or why I love this time of year. Everything slows down, most people seem to be in a good mood, and most people come home, which means they get to spend time with me--err, I get to see my close friends who've gone away to college. The only downside is the consistently dedicated airtime that Christmas melodies receive in December, because my coworkers like to listen to the radio and no station plays "Mi Burrito Sabanero" or any other non-American tune, for which I'd have slightly more tolerance.
Finally checking this off my to-do list...hopefully a more coherent, if not mentally stimulating, blog post is on the way.
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