The time that nearly broke my mind
[Recent Entries][Archive][Friends][User Info]
Below are the 20 most recent journal entries recorded in the "opened_eyes" journal:[<< Previous 20 entries]
|
02:14 am
[Link] |
Gold (Draft 1)
I want to give you gold
Piles and piles, skyscraper size and mountain-heavy
Give it to your friends, your friends' friends,
The heartless bitch who dumped you in ninth grade,
Husseins and Teresas.
Load it into dump trucks,
Crack the roads and collapse the stairs.
Bury Houston in gold-drifts,
Re-wall Berlin (Ich bin ein Croesus!),
Confuse the hell out of New Delhi.
Wouldn't it be funny to dance in Fort Knox,
You and me,
Digesting the meat of the metaphor before we flush it.
Rich people would piss in porcelain again;
"It's a nice place, although the toilets are only gold,"
the real estate agent said;
He used to be in commodities, the best,
But the markets fell, and the floor of his apartment
When they finally delivered the gold he bought in futures.
I'd give you an aluminum ring
(bought before when it was cheap)
or maybe one of those little plastic things-
you know, when we walked into that store,
the one with the glistening pineapple,
and we had a quarter left
and I told you laughing
"We'll trade up when we have money."
But we didn't get the money
And I'm not Midas
And you don't have friends anymore
to upend the world with.
You have the weight of the gold in your heart
But you have none of the shine.
Neither do I.
Current Mood:  creative
Current Music: Joan Osborne - "One of Us" (sorry, it was just on iTunes)
Tags: terrible poetry
|
|
11:54 am
[Link] | It's really soul-crushing to realize that you're going to be in desperate poverty until you're about 60.
|
|
02:19 am
[Link] |
Magnetic monopoly
Magnetic monopoles have been detected, according to two new peer-reviewed papers in Science. Using dysprosium titanate crystals, the researchers were able to create magnetic structures with magnetic fields that behave as Dirac strings.
This overturns the world of physics, because it appears to confirm some of the most troublesome areas of the Standard Model. The Standard Model is a complete kludge of a theory; this is one of the areas where it should not work. And yet it does.
Current Mood:  excited
|
|
05:10 am
[Link] |
Back in Florida on Friday
Subject line says it all. I'll be there for a week with family at the beach, and also to get some of my stuff that's still over at Jennifer's. The plan is to do it Friday night, but Jennifer's back to her "Oh hey I'm not going to talk to you because I'm playing WoW and busy with school" thing, so I don't know. I guess if she or her mom isn't there to do the handoff, I'll just tell her to ship it or something.
In other news, I'm horribly screwing up the Fallout game, still no luck with getting a job (me and about fifty million other Americans), and Hunter is giving me fits. No idea how I'm going to deal with it. Also burnt cinnamon rolls. On the bright side, I apparently make extraordinary shredded/pulled slow-cooked BBQ pork.
Current Mood:  stressed
|
|
03:12 pm
[Link] |
It's been over a year...
and everything is different. Everything that was a hallmark of my life, besides personality traits and most of my memories, is now completely out the window.
First, my relationship with Jennifer is over, for a lot of completely terrible reasons and a handful good ones. She ended it in May during finals week. I still managed to get As, but I put in some truly terrible work by my standards. At this point, she's generally avoiding me and doesn't seem willing to even speak to me. She doesn't love me, she doesn't like me, and she doesn't want me to be her friend, even as she bemoans her inability to make friends/spend time with the friends she has. The sense of loss and grieving I have is impossible for me to express, but I have too much to do to let myself fall apart.
I'm also back in school, finishing up my B.A. in politics at Hunter. If everything goes right, I should actually be done by next May. My solid job offer with Target fell apart, so I was unemployed last fall; however, by November I had a job with Champion Learning, which had me tutoring children who were suffering from being in failing schools. I don't lie when I say it was the single most rewarding job I've ever had; I will never forget getting one child to read at above grade level when he started as functionally illiterate. I'm damned good at being a tutor, actually. Unfortunately, that job has ended; I'm looking for summer employment at the moment, although in the fall I have a very solid job offer that should help me next semester.
I'm currently living up in Washington Heights with Kalman, who is kind enough to let me be his couch cat. He's released his first comic, City of Fever, which is a fantastic film noir science fiction detective story. There are about 5000 of them sitting in boxes in our front hallway, and he ships them out to people that order them off of his website. He's breaking even or making a slight profit, which is outright amazing for a first-time, self-published author trying to break into the comic book industry. We have Nerf battles and make peach cobbler when we're having welp days.
I had a... date? ish? yesterday. All hail Anonidate. Girl I met through there was having a really bad day and wanted to come up here to clean. And clean she did, even the stovetop. Then there was much discussing of webcomics and awesome music and venting. She's a hot barely legal Catholic schoolgirl, too. Absolutely nothing will come of it other than friendship - I'm quite convinced that I'm not her type - but it was nice to know that I'm not toxic to women.
Speaking of women, Katie broke things off with George :-(. It had been, what, three, four years? I couldn't imagine them splitting up, and then all of a sudden they did. I wish I knew what happened; George is apparently in the dark, and I haven't talked with Katie much about it yet.
In terms of gaming, I let my WoW subscription expire, and instead I'm playing EVE. EVE lets you play for free if you get enough of the in-game currency, so financially it makes more sense. I'll resubscribe to WoW periodically so I can do the in-game events, but otherwise... I don't really see the point. Nobody else I know plays on our server except Kalman's roommate Chris, and we don't really hang out in game. And then there's Jennifer... I don't really like the idea of running into her in-game. At least I have tabletop games; I'm running a Fallout game, and I'm playing in an In Nomine game, a GURPS cyberfantasy game, and soon enough a Runequest game run by Ben EhrenerenenrenenreichstagIhavenocluehowtospellit. Plus Emerson will probably run a D&D game so the aforementioned barely legal Catholic schoolgirl can get a taste of roleplaying.
Other stuff has happened, but I've already written far more than I wanted to in this journal. Guess I'll see you all next year.
Current Mood:  sad
Current Music: Iron Maiden - The Clairvoyant
Tags: jennifer !engagement breakup school gami
|
|
06:26 am
[Link] | Can't sleep. Must sleep, but can't. For some reason people don't seem to get that I cannot force myself to go to bed early, because when I do I end up lying awake with my thoughts. And when I lie awake with my thoughts I go to very dangerous places.
To wit:
I have now realized that there are very few things I will not now do for money, because I am that absolutely desperate. Life-changing things. Things that shock the conscience.
This is not a good place to be and I need to figure out a way out of it before I lose everything I ever valued about myself to try to get rid of this debt and try to survive. The only thing they can't do to me is throw me in jail, but they can and will go after my family and that's something I can't allow.
It's one thing to sit in abstract judgment over people who do terrible things for money. It's an entirely different thing to witness the change in yourself that makes you no better than them.
|
|
12:24 am
[Link] | I guess that's it. I'm not coming back to New York. Dad has now seen my transcript and it's over.
Yay. Now the laptop dies and I go back to hating myself to sleep.
Current Mood: What do you think my mood is?
|
|
04:14 am
[Link] | It's 4:00 A.M. I'm sitting here with a half-healed thumb laceration. Got my stitches out Tuesday. The rain is coming down, and Jennifer visited today. Not as long as I might have wished, but we shared mint chocolate ice cream cake, and many laughs. I miss her.
Life is.
|
|
12:50 am
[Link] |
Here's something sick for today
Important events on Monday, April 16:
7.15am - Virginia Tech Police Department receives an emergency call to go to a dormitory room at West Ambler Johnston Residence Hall at the Virginia Tech University.
Officers and members of the Virginia Tech rescue squad arrive to find two people, a man and a woman, have been shot dead in a dormitory.
The hall is closed off, students are asked to remain in their rooms and police begin collecting evidence and identifying witnesses.
The university authorities believe the deaths are "an isolated incident, domestic in nature."
7.30am - Officers begin following leads about a "person of interest" regarding the double murder.
8.25am - The Virginia Tech Leadership Team, including the University president, meet to assess the situation and to decide how to notify students of what has happened.
9am - The Leadership Team is briefed by Virginia Tech police chief Wendell Flinchum on the ongoing investigation.
9.26am - All university staff and students are sent an email informing them of the murders and asking them to report any suspicious activity. An emergency recording and a telephone message are also transmitted.
9.45am - The police receive a second emergency call to go to Norris Hall, an engineering building containing faculty offices, classrooms and laboratories.
Officers arrive to find the front doors chained shut from the inside. They break down the barricades and hear gunshots as they enter the building.
They follow the sounds to the second floor. As they reach it, the gunshots stop. Officers then discover the gunman, who has taken his own life.
9.55am - Staff and students are notified by email again about the second shootings.
12:30pm - George W. Bush accepts a Purple Heart for getting his feelings hurt from sycophantic supporter.
....
*throws things*
Current Mood: lonely
|
|
04:54 am
[Link] |
On mono and things
The acute phase of the mono is in abeyance. The lymph nodes in the back of my neck are only slightly swollen, and the ring of fire in my throat is gone. My tonsils are back to normal size; my diet is back to normal.
In its place is the chronic phase of the disease. My liver and spleen are swollen and compressing my stomach, leading to reduced appetite and near-constant nausea and heartburn. The fatigue is extreme - out of the last 24 hours, I have spent 15 of them sleeping. Walking from West 4th and 6th Avenue to West 8th and Broadway, at leisurely pace, caused my heartrate to spike to 129 for almost half an hour; with the possibility of sudden heart failure during recovery from mono, that's a terrible thing. I also am barred - epidemiologically - from any intimate contact. No kissing for eighteen months, unless my lovely has been exposed to Epstein-Barr before or is willing to go through two months of hell.
So... I'm sitting in the basement, terrifically alone. I haven't seen another human being save my doctor(s), Joyce, and the Andys for weeks. It's really getting to me. The depression was actually sort of staved off by the mono - I had immediate concerns of pain and survival to deal with, even though the pain was so horrendous that I wanted to die. Now, though, the fatigue is enhancing the depression, which is coming back and making my thinking fuzzy. I'm kind of sitting here in black desperation. Some people have said they'd visit but haven't. Kind of expected that, to be honest.
Yay. My life is kind of collapsing about me right now. I may not graduate, period.
Oh, yeah, happy birthday (in advance) to Jeni.
|
|
04:40 pm
[Link] | Turns out I have some minor (probably repairable) liver damage. Given that I don't smoke, drink, do drugs, engage in risky sexual practices, or take prescription drugs for anything, this confused me. Turns out I have mono.
I WILL KILL THE MOTHERFARKER WHO GAVE ME MONO.
KILL.
I have now woken up screaming multiple times because of the pain in my throat.
KILL.
Apparently the depression has been magnified by the mono. This also explains the dysfunction in my libido and in my appetite.
Did I mention that I will hunt down my infecter and kill him or her?
SO MUCH PAIN.
|
|
02:21 am
[Link] |
On the war
I haven't commented much of late. The trip to Florida was good; I miss Jennifer already.
I had the opportunity to talk to a young man whose brother died in Iraq in December. His brother was 47, called up because the military is running low on troops. The man had three children, two of whom are younger than my sister. His grief and rage was making him lash out at everyone, especially Republicans. I calmed him down some, but it made me think about the costs of war and of the role of the military in civilian life.
I don't believe in fetishizing the military. There is nothing inherently glorious or honorable about raining a hail of gunfire onto the ground from an A-10 warthog. Cool, but not glorious. There is nothing inherently glorious or honorable about an M-16, nor is there anything inherently glorious or honorable about an F-22 Raptor or F/A-18 E/F Hornet firing missiles or dropping JDAM munitions. All of these things are tools, imbued with no morality or purpose.
There is, however, something glorious and honorable about a member of the military. Our military is drawn from all walks of life - rich, poor, young, old, dark-skinned, light-skinned. It is representative of our nation, warts and all, in ways that few other institutions are. Where it differs and where it ceases to be representative is in its mission. The members of the American military are charged with preserving the following, in order: The freedoms and civil liberties of the American people. The lives of the American people. The government of the American people. They swear a solemn oath to preserve and defend these things, at the very cost of their lives, if need be. Inherent in this oath is a recognition that there are those who cannot defend themselves, and a recognition that there is a need for some who are willing to take up the burden for these people. There is a recognition that while killing is evil, it is a greater evil to allow an innocent to come to harm.
By accepting this oath and this responsibility, even if he does not fully comprehend it, a servicemember becomes an avatar of the honor of the United States. The civilians - especially the children - are our hope; they are the repository of our dreams and our future. The military is where our national honor is incarnated.
To misuse the military - to call upon the responsibilities inherent within the oath without a pure and necessary reason - is to stain our national honor and degrade our national purpose. To inflict upon our nation's soldiers, marines, sailors, and airmen the grievous loss of friends, colleagues, family members, and fellow countrymen without a clear, defined, and necessary national purpose is an insult to all who have ever served.
There is no longer a clear, defined, and necessary purpose to our presence in Iraq. The endless bloodshed on the streets of Iraq, consisting of average civilians who have learned to hate and fear us, is proof enough of this. Our presence now engenders, in balance, only misery for the Iraqis. And what is the cost? Over 3,000 brothers, sisters, fathers, mothers, cousins, aunts, uncles, friends, colleagues, and fellow countrymen, on top of tens of thousands of Iraqis.
Over 3,000 black holes of misery and despair opened up in the hearts of Americans. Over 3,000 American lives lost in a mission with no end or defined purpose. Over 3,000 abrogations of our responsibility to our nation's heroes.
It is time for it to end. It is time to return our soldiers to the United States and begin to heal our wounded national honor.
It is time to end the suffering.
|
|
06:38 am
[Link] |
Life kinda sucks
"Metro" by the Vincent Black Shadow is an unusually energetic and *good* song. My ears look forward to it like a chocoholic looks forward to a good Belgian chocolate bar. I've been rationing it, so it doesn't wear out.
In other news, I am *not* behind in only one class. I am late with papers in everything but my Elections class. I am going to have another psychotic break between now and Thursday; I know it. I know it for certain.
|
|
05:37 pm
[Link] |
On Warnock's Dilemma
Warnock's Dilemma states that a lack of responses to a post does not necessarily mean that nobody is interested in a topic. The post can be so well-written that there's nothing to say beyond "Yeah, what he said." It can be complete and utter nonsense, not even worth pointing out. It might be that people missed it and didn't read it. It could be that nobody understood, but didn't ask for clarification. And, finally, it might be that nobody cares.
I think people need to stop caring about whether they get responses or not in their journals, and just write as they feel appropriate. LJ is not a place to be an attention whore.
In other news, psychosis passed after I got sleep. I'm mostly okay now.
Current Music: Godsmack - Serenity
|
|
09:04 am
[Link] | I'm studying for my elections final/midterm (which is in three hours and thirty minutes) to the tune of American Idiot, having just turned off Lou Dobbs. Perfect.
Current Mood: jittery
Current Music: Green Day - American Idiot
Tags: elections, green day, lou dobbs, politics
|
|
04:04 am
[Link] |
A list for the holidays
So... I've been asked to indicate what I want for Christmas. I'll split it into things I'm vaguely interested in and things I'm not interested in.
Things I might like
1) Gift cards for pants. I am running out of pants. Alternatively, spending time, effort, and buttons to fix some of my pants that are unusable due to lack of button.
2) Gift cards for books. I could use books.
3) Anything from the following:
(update it if you pull anything from it. Don't worry, I can't see anything bought from it)
4) An extra Gamecube controller. I only have one that works all the time.
Things not to get me
1) Firefly or Serenity. Got it already.
2) Cowboy Bebop. Got that too.
3) Practical gifts that I haven't expressed a need for. My living conditions are a little unique; I can cover practical stuff with work funds.
4) Calendar or clock. Got that already now.
5) Anything by Richard Dawkins (The God Delusion). The man annoys me.
6) Random books. There's a high probability that I've either already read it or don't want to read it.
7) PS2 or XBOX games. Won't do me any good without a PS2 or an XBOX.
8) Random PC games. I have a lot, and there are a lot that are too expensive for me to feel good about accepting (also, I can't run them, because my computer sucks)
Oh, yeah... it would help if I got ideas of what other people want.
|
|
06:49 am
[Link] |
Sandman
The Sandman is finished.
The story has been started, told, and ended, and the loose ends, if not wrapped up, at least tied with a bow so we know where to find them later. Drips and drabs and little bits of story lay scattered around the mythscape, and I am sure that I will read, and I will enjoy, for a few scattered moments.
But the story itself has ended, and the dream is done. Now (though I am off to sleep) I must awaken and carry about with my life, content to pursue such dreams as I may glean from elsewhere.
Good art touches the heart. Great art touches the soul, and for the first time in my life, my soul has been touched by art not crafted by God's hand alone. And now that I have been moved and rocked from my foundation, and resettling in a new place, I remain in a sense of disquiet, for the magic is gone.
I suppose that what I must do now is make my own magic.
Current Mood:  pensive
|
|
06:34 am
[Link] |
Ganked by Leah
My top 10 things that start with A:
1) American Idiot (the Green Day album - if you haven't heard it, you're missing a huge chunk of life)
2) Angry Republicans
3) Apple Pie
4) Avenged Sevenfold's new song "Seize the Day"
5) AC/DC
6) Annemarie (my sister)
7) Animaniacs
8) Australia
9) Alternative Rock
10) Asiancat
A was hard. Very hard.
Current Mood:  sick
Current Music: Avenged Sevenfold - Seize the Day
|
|
07:28 am
[Link] |
So... a little thing on heroism
So... apparently, the Senator-Elect from Virginia, James "Jim Webb," is a total and complete badass, of the highest caliber. Read the following:
"The Navy Cross is presented to James H. Webb, Jr., First Lieutenant, U.S. Marine Corps, for extraordinary heroism while serving as a Platoon Commander with Company D, First Battalion, Fifth Marines, First Marine Division (Reinforced), Fleet Marine Force, in connection with combat operations against the enemy in the Republic of Vietnam. On 10 July 1969, while participating in a company-sized search and destroy operation deep in hostile territory, First Lieutenant Webb's platoon discovered a well-camouflaged bunker complex which appeared to be unoccupied. Deploying his men into defensive positions, First Lieutenant Webb was advancing to the first bunker when three enemy soldiers armed with hand grenades jumped out. Reacting instantly, he grabbed the closest man and, brandishing his .45 caliber pistol at the others, apprehended all three of the soldiers. Accompanied by one of his men, he then approached the second bunker and called for the enemy to surrender. When the hostile soldiers failed to answer him and threw a grenade which detonated dangerously close to him, First Lieutenant Webb detonated a claymore mine in the bunker aperture, accounting for two enemy casualties and disclosing the entrance to a tunnel. Despite the smoke and debris from the explosion and the possibility of enemy soldiers hiding in the tunnel, he then conducted a thorough search which yielded several items of equipment and numerous documents containing valuable intelligence data. Continuing the assault, he approached a third bunker and was preparing to fire into it when the enemy threw another grenade. Observing the grenade land dangerously close to his companion, First Lieutenant Webb simultaneously fired his weapon at the enemy, pushed the Marine away from the grenade, and shielded him from the explosion with his own body. Although sustaining painful fragmentation wounds from the explosion, he managed to throw a grenade into the aperture and completely destroy the remaining bunker. By his courage, aggressive leadership, and selfless devotion to duty, First Lieutenant Webb upheld the highest traditions of the Marine Corps and of the United States Naval Service.[1]"
From Wikipedia
That man must have been a freaking tank. Read that (and the linked article) and tell me you aren't impressed. I'd vote for him in a heartbeat.
What I'm curious about is why anybody in Virginia would vote for a former football star over this dude. The fact that the margin of votes for him was so narrow surprises me.
Dude's got a Marine son in Iraq. If his son dies in the line of duty, there will be headlines. Oh yes. There will be headlines.
Current Mood: busy
|
|
06:18 am
[Link] | This is the happy
|
[<< Previous 20 entries] |
![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small}
opened_eyes's journal