2-0, Twenty, Viginti anni, Ich bin zwanzig Jahre alt.

I've been kind of incapacitated the past couple of days. Last week I noticed that I was scheduled for 13 hours this week, so I acts for some more and someone penned me into for three 3 AM shifts this week. SOooo, I worked Saturday night, 8-4.30 on Sunday, and 3 AM - 11 today, and will do 3-11 again tomorrow... in 2.5 hours...from now.

Oh yeah, shoot, I was supposed to start in on that FSView article today.

So the 3 AM shift today wasn't that bad at all. I went in with 4 women and changed locations of makeup in cosmetics. Insomnia and working isn't so bad as long as you eat a lot of food and kept well-hydrated. I'm pretty sure I downed a gallon of apple juice the other day. Man, apple juice is so good.

Now, I'm no woman, but as I was "flexing" some make-up today, I realized that no one was going to buy what I was putting up. I figured out what "flexing" meant today. The other day I was looking at the garbage cans on an end-cap, and I checked them, and none of them belonged there. So, I went to Vincent, who was in that dept. and asked "So, what's with these garbage cans" and he said "You know, just flex them out". And then I said, "What about those on the shelf?" ... "You know, just flex them out". Okay. So, from what I gather, "flex" means push that crap into whatever space it fits regardless of location, label, or price.

As I was flexing these different hues of make-up (because we didn't have time to organize them and Steve didn't want empty shelves), I realized that no one was going to buy them and my job was basically useless. Then I stopped caring. Well, I had stopped caring before, but then was when I realized that I really stopped caring. Women aren't going to look through thirty different hanging creams and foundations to find their specific hue if they're not organized and in order, right? Right?

Nevertheless, I still just do what people tell me to, and lately they've been saying "You're doing a really good job!" Really? Cause I don't really care.

And then Mike picked out a skateboard for me and it's pretty sweet. Good bearings and... trucks and all that. It's pretty loose too, and I'm learning to control it pretty well. Just can't do an ollie. Yet. And I haven't falled down. Yet.

I've written two new songs. I compiled a list of all the completed songs I've ever had; I was slightly irked because both my memory and my notes cannot tell me in what order I wrote them, because I wanted to list them chronologically. Now, I'm up to 31. Sweeet.

Stream of Consciousness Post

We watched Closer today. When I got home from zoning at Target tonight, I popped in Franz Ferdinand and then it cycled to The Streets. I feel like immersing myself in UK media and culture. Listen to The Clash and Bloc Party, watch Trainspotting, read... Dickens?

Everything's scattered about in most aspects of my life. I just gutted one of the closets in one of these bedrooms and found a lot of stuff: old t-shirts of junior beta clubs, marching bands, old jobs, latin club, and that one denison marrs shirt that was always a size too small. I found my old essays from high school and beamed for a while, making sure to read over that one essay (which I realized was really awful) that earned me a 10 out of 9 grade. Now most of the contents of the closet are strewn about the room in very unorganized piles.
Music is scattered a bit. I have that programming/loop program that I wanted to work on for phat beatz, I sit down and play piano scales every so often, and I'm trying to hone my guitar/lyrical writing skills to surpass the same standard chords and tired outlooks.
Work at Target is scattered. I only have 11 hours this week, and they didn't even really train me. I'm just in there figuring it all out myself. Which is, okay, I guess.
My memory's getting a bit scattered. When I read through Sedaris's latest book, I went back and flipped through Me talk pretty one day, read through one of the essays, and didn't recall a single thing about the whole book. Like I hadn't even read it before. And I'd read it within the past two years. Sheesh.

Man, this big 2-0 coming up has gotten me thinking about a lot of things that have happened in 20 years. I think back and think many things I've done have been silly and/or a waste of time. But what is a waste of time, really? I'm still living, aren't I? Makes me think of all those old ladies that have worked for Walmart for longer than I've lived. Or all those people in bands (the latest one I can think of is Agnostic Front) who've been playing music together for longer than I've lived. That's a really weird feeling. For all the time I've existed, those guys have been making songs together.

Then, I still have that big chunk of material coming up in life that just has those "???"s labeled on it. I'm taking to this philosophy of just keep doing what I'm doing and letting things fall into place, but I'm afraid I might have to put a limit on the time I spend doing that, and, say, if things haven't fallen into place in 10 years, I should get down to business and make up my mind of what's going on.

Meanwhile, I've really been enjoying Joseph Heller's writing lately. I started in on Closing Time and really like the way he makes characters. Just so amazing. Thinking back to Catch-22, it's stupefying how someone could compose such a work. It's like on the level of a Mozart opera or something. Just sitting there saying "How on Earth?" over and over again. But, for Closing Time Heller traded in all the crazy adventures and quick pace for extended periods of reflections and deep moments, and wonderful characters... just highlighting some of the great things he did with Catch-22 and focusing on different things. So wonderful.

Anywho, that's quite enough personal internet spillage for one night. *Tips hat*

SWE3RotS

I was all ready to give Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith my official B+ rating until the part where (not a big spoiler) Darth Vader steps off his platform, and in a poorly-executed appeal to Frankstein, puts his arms out and "Arrghhhh"s. Now it's just a "B".

Which means it was better than the Exorcist, which I saw coupla nights ago (B-).

I appreciated Cannibal the Musical a lot more after watching the opening sequence of the Oklahoma! movie today. Yeah, that's good stuff.

***

Target is a quality discount retailer with hundreds of stores from coast-to-coast. We offer fashion-forward, trend-right merchandise to our guests at great prices. But what makes Target different from all other retailers is our Fast, Fun & Friendly attitude. No other company is Fast, Fun & Friendly. It's a part of who we are. And it's a part of you, too.

Amazing how they manage to get those always-perky, upbeat slightly-older-than-middle-age women as HR exec.s at retail companies.

Snapshot.

Latest activities: Job-hunting, attending a high school band concert (featuring that Gandalf movement that we played when I was in 9th grade... ahh the memories), eating Green Curry at Thai Thai.
Latest album quasi-obsessed over: Who will cut our hair when we're gone?, The Unicorns.
Latest re-obsessed album: Original Pirate Material, The Streets.
Latest most-hated album: Make Believe, Weezer
Latest tidbit of glorious excitement despite latest most-hated album: Seeing an Orlando Weezer show posted for the Hard Rock Live, ... for only $12!!!
Current reads: Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim, David Sedaris; Closing Time, Joseph Heller.
Latest Favorite Quote: "The past was far too complicated to put into French, so instead I envisioned a perfect future, and attributed the root canal to a little misunderstanding between friends." --David Sedaris
Current video games: Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty (PS2), Mortal Kombat 3 (SNES)
Last movies seen: Friday the 13th Part IV: The Final Chapter; Friday the 13th Part V: A New Beginning.
Near future plan: Start skateboarding / falling on my face again.

Job apps.

I really do like filling out job applications with 40-minute long personality questionnaires with some questions where all the answers are wrong. One of them looked like "Which of the following qualities would be LEAST important for this job: 1) Being able to calm down angry customers. 2) Thinking of different and new ways to improve the job. 3) Having a good relationship with your supervisor. 4) Being able to express yourself clearly." Another one "Which of the following three words best describes you: Reliable, Socialable, Happy."

Although I don't like to admit it, my psychology classes did help me a bit. We went over a lot of different personality assessments and what people are looking for in responses. But I still basically answered them honestly. Basically.

Then again, there were some where it was pretty obvious: "How much trouble did you cause in high school: 1) None 2) Very little trouble 3) Moderate trouble 4) Intense trouble 5) All you did was get drunk, get into fights, talk back, and make trouble all the time". Well, it wasn't that exaggerated, but it was still pretty obvious. Oh yeah, and the classic: "If you got this job, how successful do you think you would be with it? 1) Much more successful than others 2) A little more successful than most others 3) Just about as successful as others 4) Not as successful as others 5) Don't know."

Well

CLP4143-02 ABNORMAL PSYCHOLOGY A
EXP3000-01 APPROCH STUDY BEHAVR A
EXP3000-02 APPR STUDY BEHAV LAB A
LAT2230-01 INTRO TO LATIN LIT A
PPE3004-02 PSYCH OF PERSONALITY A
PSY4920-07 LANGUAGE&PRECEPTION S

Except for the Latin class and the Lab, I was surprised by these grades. I know for a fact I should have gotten 'A-'s in two classes, but I'm not complaining.

GPA
FSU: 4.00
Term: 4.00

Just goes to show- even if you hate your major, hate most of your classes, and put in about half the work you should be putting in, you can still succeed. Most excellent.

It's him!

Whoa. I just had a weird, though probably unexciting-to-most-of-you experience.

So, I got this press release for The Firebird Band about three weeks ago because I was assigned the article. Last week I emailed the guy at the record label who sent out the press release and asked for an interview with the band. I got a response that said something weird:

"Sure thing, just let me know what's best for you. Do you want a phone interview or an email?"

What's best for me? What?

Being naturally lazy, I opted for the email interview and he responded with "Thanks, talk to you soon". When I finished writing the questions (just a little while ago), I went back to look up the address for the guy at the record label. But it turns out the response I got was from a "Christopher Broach," from a different email address than the record label one. Yeah, it was the lead dude from the band! Direct contact! And I suppose he has the "chris" address at the label too. This is all very exciting to me for some reason now, even though I could have had the opportunity to talk to him on the phone, which would have been more exciting, but I didn't feel like preparing, recording, typing up the responses, etc.

Yeah, and when I responded to what I thought was the publicist, I wrote "I'll send you questions for the band" even though it really did have his name in his email "Chris, THE FIREBIRD BAND". What-a-dope.

Rediscovering DNA

Rediscovering DNA.

Whether or not the film "does justice" to the Hitchhiker's series is immeasurable and irrelevant. Immeasurable because the story itself has changed with every medium its been presented in, and will likely do so once more (Adams himself stated that the screenplay would definitely include things not found in the books). Besides which, given the fact that Adams chronically hated most of what he'd written as soon as it was finished, he likely would have had some dissatisfaction with the film regardless of the result. But more importantly, it's an irrelevant question because the film affords a much greater opportunity to revisit the works and life of Douglas Adams and discover him anew.

...okay.

and

h2g2

Enact the unfunnyability drive

I found out who's playing SNL this week (this weekend is the one where I won tickets to see the dress rehearsal for snl, but they're not really tickets, just my name on a list. So, I can't, for instance, sell them on ebay):

Host: Johnny Knoxville
Music: System of a Down

I'm not a fan of the host, but SOAD is alright. Too bad I'm poor. And in debt.

And I spent $5.50 to see Hitchhiker's Guide to the Craplaxy.

Home is where...

Everything seems to be just as I left it here in Melbourne. I made it home with a literal $19 cash to my name and an empty gas tank. I spent $9 to get barely over a quarter tank so I could go out today to look for a full-time job.

Mom bought me a book of Federal Jobs that are available and asked what my next major would be. "Undecided 2."

While I was applying at Barnes and Noble (not hiring), I figured I'd walk over to the Burger King next door. I entered its doors for the first time in three years, having worked there full time for three months straight one summer. It was quite an experience- hard to explain, not quite like the strange familiarity found driving back into the hometown. Not exactly comforting, but somewhat nostalgic. Yeah, I guess that's the word. Nostalgic.

Everyone's responding to my short, short hair. I think it's the first time I've had it this short since 2nd grade or so. I don't really miss having to comb and gel it, but I did miss it a bit when LTTE were practicing and I tried to headbang a bit, but there was no hair whipping around.

Magazine writing? I don't want to do journalism, but writing for a magazine could be cool...

Shadow got frickkin' big! 85 pounds, man!