I've spent the last few days trying to maximize my time before returning to the world of office drudgery on Monday Morning. After almost two months of unemployment, I begin a job tomorrow. It's essentially the same job I had two summers ago, where James works. It'll suck and be boring and everything you'd expect, but hey I need a job. So enough about that. The worst part is really that I'm keeping my night job, and I'm working the next four nights. Bollocks!On Thursday night I went over to Matt's and then we walked down to Long Tan, the bar/restaurant on 5th Avenue and Union street. After several stiff drinks, we eventually got to talking about our collective futures. Matt is certain that we're somehow better than most people. I, of course, had long thought this, and even went so far once as to make a brief list. Anyway, I'd made a bet with matt a few years ago about how long he would be a lawyer. He said not a day over two years. I said he was full of feces. So I made a bet with him that if after two years he was still a lawyer, I'd get a week of his salary. And he wasn't, he'd get a week of mine. A pretty good bet, i thought, and worth the risk, considering what I'm sure will be an obscene gap between our respective salaries. Anyway, he gave me the chance to call off the bet, telling me how much he already hates his new job and how he won't be there for more than a year. After some deliberation, I had to accept his offer. It's to the point right now where I probably couldn't afford to lose a week of whatever meager amount I'll be making in two years.
Here's something I just thought of, but then thought again and realized it wasn't true, but seemed interesting to me nonetheless: My dissatisfaction with my current situation in life stems from my love affair with myself. I love myself so much, that it really really bothers me when other people don't. All this time, I've been asking myself what my problem is, when really I should've just realized it's everybody else who has the problem. Of course, as soon as I thought this, I then realized that this is probably just another way to justify inaction. Though I must admit, there's a certain attractive logic behind it. Now i'm rambling, so let's move on.
On friday, I met Caryn for lunch, up at the Spin office, since it was the last chance we'll have in a while to lunch together. We each had a personal pizza from Domino's. Then in the evening, we gathered the troops to see the new Richard Linklater movie Waking Life. Jed, Dylan, Matt, James and I trekked over to the UA theatre in Union Square. After the movie, opinions were split and passions ran high. Jed and Matt had to give it the thumbs down, while Dylan and I gave it the ups. Dylan was somewhat reluctant, and only gave it a positive review because he admired Linklater's effort. But he spent more time criticizing what didn't work than praising what did. Anyway, I thought it was great. I think Jed took some of the monologues too literally. Dylan was unwilling to accept the structure of the story and lack of overall plot. I thought there were some pretty unbearable moments, but on the whole, when taken together, the scenes really worked for me. A lot of stupid shit is in the dialogue, but I think a lot of it was sort of the point. Anyway, you can go on and on about it without getting anywhere. So I'll just leave it by saying I liked it overall, and it was extremely thought provoking, as well as visually astounding.After the movie, we walked toward the subway, and somehow managed to get into yet another epic debate, this time on the logistical problems of quantifying fun. What started out as a joke- wherein Jed said we should come up with a number to represent "Ultimate Fun," a level of fun that is basically unattainable- quickly turned into a heated and impassioned argument over whether or not you could have "negative fun." "Ultimate Fun," by the way, was set at the number 495. Anyway, Jed thought that since Ultimate Fun was 495, then the scale should run from 495 to negative 495. Dylan and I argued that you couldn't have negative fun, that "fun" can only go down to zero, or the complete absence of fun. I tried to liken fun and no fun to speed and velocity. You can't have negative speed. You just change directions. So "fun" essentially is one direction, and something else, call it "no fun" is another direction. They didn't buy it. Then we tried to absolute zero argument, or zero degrees on the Kelvin scale, where you find a total lack of molecular movement, or heat. We said it was the same with fun. Once you have no fun, you can't go any lower. Anyway, this went on for a long time. We were in Taco Bell when it started, and at one point Matt had to usher us out before we started to make a scene. The whole thing got ugly quick. So I split and the rest of them went back to Brooklyn. Then I met Caryn back on the Lower East Side, at the bar at Arlene Grocery. I had one beer, and then we, along with her friend Susan, wandered north for a while, looking for a place to eat. After an exhaustive search, we ended up at the Yaffa cafe on St. Marks. Once there, for some reason we thought it'd be a really good idea to get a bottle of red wine. So we split some wine and some bread and cheese and sat there at 3 in the morning eating it all. The place was pretty crowded for that time of night. And the food was probably the least necessary thing out of the whole weekend. But i wasn't ready to go home after the movie, and woulda been sitting at home in a bad mood if I'd gone home with the rest of the guys.
So on Saturday, around 3, I met Caryn in the city and we went up to Central Park. It was positively perfect weather, and we figured it'd be the last chance we had to enjoy the Park. So we sat around and threw the frisbee and listened to music in the clearing around 66th Street. A very pleasant afternoon, made even more pleasant by the PBJ sandwiches Caryn had prepared especially for the occasion. I ended up hitting some woman in the face with the frisbee. It was an accident, but a beautiful shot nonetheless. She was about 90 feet away, behind Caryn, and I overthrew Caryn and watched the bee slowly curve toward this woman. I was too far away to yell any warning, and I expected Caryn to yell "Heads up!" or something. But all she did was turn and watch the flight. The woman was facing toward my right, and the frisbee was actually to her right, but it arced away from her, the back toward her, so when it reached her it hit her square in the face. She was on her cell phone, wearing sunglasses, and not only managed to hit her in the face, but also hit her sunglasses and phone. caryn told me this later. When it happened, I thought the impact sounded to plastic-y. And it turned out that I was right. The whole thing was horribly amusing. Then some trendy looking Asian woman with a British accent asked caryn if we could move away from her a little bit, because it was "really scary." I don't know what kind of sheltered life you're living, but if a small plastic disc is what you term "really scary," then you've got big problems. I told caryn she shoulda just yelled something nonsensical, like "Shut the fuck up, Yoko!" or "stop trying to break up the Beatles!" For some reason, i found that really funny. Simply because she was an Asian woman. Then again, I was finding a lot of things really funny, like the frisbee. For some reason, while we were throwing, just watching that thing float toward me and spin amused me to no end. I couldn't contain my laughter.
While I was in the Park, I got a call on my phone. It was a girl I'd met in San Francisco back in April, the night of Dan's wedding. I'd been talking her up outside the Boom Boom Room, where we were hanging out after the reception, still in our tuxedos. She said if I was serious I should call her tomorrow, and I was like, fine, and she gave me her number. When she got halfway down the block, still well within sight, I called her and said "So are you coming back with me or what?" This was of course after many, many hours of drinking. Anyway, she sounded surprisingly interested, which kind of scared me a little bit. Since then, on a few drunken nights, her number has been dialed on my phone. The last time, it was by Nora and her friends, who took my phone and started dialing the numbers of everyone in my little phonebook. She'd mentioned to me that night that she was thinking of moving to New York. So when she called yesterday, where was she but the Upper West Side. After a few minutes, she said something like "This is the first time I've ever talked to you that you've been sober." And I said "Am I less amusing sober?" and she said "No. But you're less offensive." Which leads me to believe that I can be actually quite charming while drunk and offensive. She did call me, after all. Anyway, the funny part was that I was not sober at all. But I kept that to myself. Anyway, there were some awkward silences, which you might expect from talking to someone with whom you've had exactly three drunken conversations. I think she was waiting for me to say something like we should get together sometime, since I'd kind of alluded to that when last we spoke. But I didn't. The most I offered was to ask her if her cell phone number was the same since she'd moved from San Jose, so i could bother her again. Anyway, I was just impressed with the level of conversation I was able to maintain. And then that was that.So here're some pictures of the afternoon, taken in less than ideal lighting, with a low quality camera.
Me, looking very dark.
The sun setting behind a tall building to the southwest
Anyway, soon after the above picture was taken, Caryn had to go to the bathroom. So I called Geoff's apartment, conveniently located just outside the Park on 65th Street. On one picked up the first two times I tried, and I figured Geoff was at work anyway. Poor guy. But I thought there was a pretty good chance his girlfriend Elizabeth was there, and on the third try she picked up. She sounded a little annoyed. But we went over and Caryn relieved herself and all was well. Geoff's girlfriend had a new kitten, and I amused myself for a while playing with the cat, who seemed much more interested in playing with a piece of paper than paying attention to me. When I grabbed the piece of paper away from the cat, it turned its attention to a little piece of packing foam. Bastard. So then we left, and a short time after that we found ourselves sitting in the middle of Broadway, at 75th street, on the little benches in the island that separates to two lanes of traffic on Broadway in the Upper West Side. Caryn was listening to Radiohead's The Bends. I was eating some chile and garlic flavored olives that I'd bought at Fairway. After a few minutes of sitting there in silence, Caryn asked "Why are we still uptown?" I had no idea. We were just sitting there literally in the middle of the street. And eating olives. I was actually the only one eating, and the olives made caryn sort of sick. So she had to use the bathroom again. So we walked a block and a half over to Jen's house so she could use the bathroom again. I guess this was the first time I'd been at Jen's place since matt and I helped her move some stuff in late August. She was offended by my apparent lack of interest in the decoration of her apartment, since I hadn't seen it in its current state. And I did feel bad that I didn't comment on it. I even thought to, but for some reason I didn't say anything. But it was a pleasant visit, and nice to see Jen and Bobby as always. They have a dog though, and apparently i'm fairly allergic to it.
Then caryn and I returned downtown. She was still feeling sick but I really wanted to eat, so we ended up at Momma's on 3rd street and Ave. B. You get a lot of food at Mommas. It's kind of homestyle comfort food. So I ate greasy room temperature fried chicken and mac and cheese and bowtie pasta. caryn nibbled here and there. Then I came back to brooklyn. Around midnight I met Matt and Jed down at Long Tan. They were with Matt's friend Aisha, as well as the female Susanah, whom we went to college with and who we've run into a few times at Long Tan. We enjoy her company. She's a fairly laid back girl and easy to get along with. With her was this girl Erica, from Houston, who is in Susanah's American Studies program at Columbia. She seemed nice. I didn't really talk to her until we went to Great Lakes later. Susanah was adamant about not really wanting to go to Great Lakes, saying it was too dirty and dive bar-y. Which is why we like it. It's not even dirty, really, just not uppity. I like Long Tan, but I don't like it as a final destination for the evening. It's too sterile and nice and hip. Anyway, i talked to Erica for a while about music. I haven't played the "what do you listen to" game in a while. Because I hate those conversations. They just annoy me. But we had several areas of mutual interests, particularly about specific points on Radiohead's The Bends. Particularly the song "Black Star." By the end of the night, Jed and Dylan had gone, and I think it was just me and the two girls and Jed's friend Marc, who we also went to school with. And I found ten bucks on the floor. So that was a nice bonus. Then in bed by shortly before 5:30. A long, long day.
Matt woke me up this morning around 11:30, asking if either Jed or I could accompany him to Ikea. I didn't go. instead, I went into the city again and met caryn in Tompkins Square Park. Walked around aimlessly, then came back home. Going through my wbelogs, I found an interesting little journal today, apparently inspired by my own. I wouldn't ever make that claim if it didn't say soomething to that effect in the link to my page on hers. It also said something about being afraid to talk to me. That amused me. Anyway, it was interesting to note the similarities. Especially since in a lot of ways my own page was created with the Musings of the Gus in mind. Anyway, it pleased me to read the page. Though I am not familiar with the term "blog" that apparently means journal. Canadians...
Or is it "Canadiens..."?