Pure Vanity.
Voilá!
I am forever reminded of the French section of my Latin I class when reading the first lesson, J— pronounced this “Vee-O-La!”
If it isn’t obvious from the repeated mentions of me almost failing French I, I’m glad J— was called to read that day.
Me: I’m an innocent.
Mager: I believe you are secretly not innocent.
Me: I have gaps.
Me: Hmm… I should blog that.
…
Maybe I should have saved this for a Seven Things post, but my first R-rated movie was Quest for Fire. I saw it with my mom.
Here’s what happened.
My dad felt that it would be okay if my brother saw an R-rated movie for his birthday party, but there was no way C—’s mom would allow C— to see Porky’s. But, somehow Quest for Fire was okay because it was “an art film.” My mom had to chaperone my-brother’s-friends-whose parents-weren’t-cool-enough-to-let-them-see-Porky’s… and me.
…
My brother finally did catch my first R-rated movie in cable when he was in college. Of course he was shocked because Quest for Fire puts Porky’s to shame.
When he recounted that observation to my parents, I added, “I remember seeing that. I hated it because there was no speaking, only grunting.”
“Haha! You were like nine!”
“That was a horrible movie!” Mom rejoined, “I had to put my hand in front of Terry’s eyes for nearly thing. And he kept shouting, ‘Mommy, mommy are they done pumping yet?’ The whole theatre could hear it. I was so embarrassed.”
Ahh! Quest for Fire—one of those movies that makes you wonder What the fuck was MPAA ratings board was smoking at that night?
My car got another flat, and that’s probably going to cost me. I drive it so little that I’m seriously wondering why I own it. After all, paying for the carport costs me almost half what my car payment used to be.
How did I get here?
E-mail from a high school classmate:
Pretty crazy that our class has gotten it together enough to navigate through facebook. But something tells me you’d run circles around us all!
I doubt I’d run circles around anyone.
I probably could if you young ‘uns in the tech world didn’t keep stealing my walker. Did you know when I was a kid, I had to dial a phone to use the internet? And I had to push my bits through the line static uphill both ways.
Bah!
Even though it’s been a month, I still have yet to write down my New Year’s resolutions. I think that’s because last year I only completed one of four, after being three for three in 2007, I’m demoralized.
If I were to write one, the resolution would center around becoming a person more honest with myself and, by extension, with others. So far, I’ve found it relatively easy to do the physical aspects like “workout” but rather hard to do emotional ones like “letting go.” This is compounded by the fact that it is relatively easy to write achievable goals for the former, but not so easy to for the latter.
I stumbled across an application this morning after working out. It’s selling for 99 cents on iTunes.
The idea is to write five things a day you are thankful for. Every so often (every day?) after writing in the journal it gives you an inspirational quote. I guess the idea is that if you focus on the positive you can create an abundance mindset and thus be happier. As for me, I just think that we don’t focus on our inner selves enough.
We cannot exercise the physical heart directly, so we do so indirectly with large muscles moving. Perhaps we cannot exercise the emotional heart directly, so we do so indirectly with small gratitudes giving.
Maybe it’ll help, and, if you’re in the same boat, maybe it’ll help you too. The nice thing is, you can even do this without an iPhone.
Because it is the 25th anniversary of the Macintosh, there is twitter meme going on where you talk about your first mac.
Reading the headlines on Microsoft, Sony, and Nokia, I’m struck with just how impressive Apple’s quarterly’s are. Yesterday, I noticed that Apple’s front page was bragging that they have had over 300 million iPhone AppStore downloads since its launch.
Instead of going back 25 years, I’d rather go back seven when, in October 2001, Apple released the iPod. Now most of us don’t have to eat as much crow as Slashdot did—I purchased my first iPod one month after the release. However when Steve Jobs said then that the iPod was “the 21st-century Walkman” who didn’t think it was laced with more than a little hubris? And yet, now, we’d probably think that the iPod which reenergized the Macintosh, changed the music industry, and was parlayed into the “it” smartphone was the Walkman and much more.
Sony missed the iPod market because its acquisition of Columbia made the huge technology company a victim of the requests of its media division. Instead of learning from this mistake and moving forward, in 2005, this Japanese engineering company appointed an American entertainment executive to lead their company.
“If you look backward in this business, you’ll be crushed. You have to look forward.”
—Steve Jobs, on the 25th Anniversary of the Macintosh
My #firstmac? Well that was just under 25 years ago. I can still remember making Dungeons and Dragons maps with it in MacPaint at my best friend’s house—that computer changed my life. I went home and begged my parents to buy one and I’ve used sixteen macs since that day—I can name every one.
That moment also marked one of the last times I’d spend with my friend—the years play-acting fantasy books in the junkyard behind his house giving way to separate schooling and separate lives. That computer also changed some others lives. It was purchased with the same drug money that would later kill 18 people.
For different reasons than Steve Jobs, I can’t look back, I’d be crushed. I can only look forward.
Lunch and dinner are brought in every day at work. It is a wasteful affair in both cost and utility that, because of its quotidian nature, breeds laziness to a high order at the price of spontaneity and camaraderie that is often associated with eating meals.
Every week, a different group of three employees is assigned to clean up the lunch mess. It takes about thirty man-minutes to accomplish this. This week it happens to be me. Today the other two forgot so it was only me.
Thirty minutes of busy work is a long thinking time.
This is part one of a seven part Seven Things post. (I’ll explain later.) This first one was inspired by Andrei’s affinity for languages.
#1. I once peed in the women’s bathroom.
At work, a blue trash can reads “SAVE. Recycleable cans and bottles. Custodians do not throw out.”
Then, it “helpfully” adds: “NOT BASURA.” Basura being the Spanish word for trash.
I walk by amused.
Continue reading about Linguistics isn’t logical after the jump
Sometimes I think that people write this stuff because they know I have a vanity feed:
Happy 2009!
