2 out of 5 boroughs ain't bad

I've come to the conclusion that, for now, 48 hours in New York City is the proper amount of time. This isn't a complaint; indeed, I very much enjoyed my visit there. Hot dogs at 3am. Last call at 4am. The subway system that allows for the complete avoidance of taxi cabs of you're willing to hoof it.

Seeing my latest film screened and having actual audience members whom I didn't know attend was my favorite moment, as lowkey as the actual event was. Screened in the conference room of a Holiday Inn, it shouted "film festival" about as much as deaf mute could, but it worked. For sixteen minutes while my film played out, projected on a smallish screen, the assembled becaume an audience. People laughed where I hoped they would, the applauded truthfully, not politely, and one guy even gave me his business card. Granted, he could have been hitting on me. I am devastatingly good-looking.

What was probably my second favorite moment occured the morning Nate and I arrived. Landed at 5am, check in not until noon, we killed time by heading into Manhattan. Jesus, the wind was blowing. Dirt got in my eye, Nate was sans jacket and therefore freezing. But what made it worthwhile was seeing New York go to work. Times Square was strangely empty, the only pedestrians scurrying to work; it was, after all, just another Thursday. There is work to be done, by God, time to get indoors and crunch the numbers. And much like school hallways after the tardy bell has rung, by 10am the streets were devoid of proper citizens, leaving the tourists and unfortunates out in the cold. We finally

-- Post script: This is what remains of a rather lengthy blog post I wrote as I waited for my plane to take off from JFK. The wonderfully little shitty app I was using (the name of which escapes me presently) decided to only send what you read above. Let this post stand as a monument to those times where technology stifles or kills creativity by buggin' out.

Ah, the fog of Sudafed

So last Friday I got sick, as in throat scratchy, head pounding, snot simultaneously running out my nose and clogging it sick. Thankfully it's not the flu, or H1N1 for that matter. But I felt shitty enough to take the day off from work and not get out of bed until 7 at night. Which leads me to the wonders of modern pharmacology. Man I love using science to make me feel better a couple of pills and a few hours at a time. In those moments of only being about 75% in reality, I find my mind wandering, not staying put unless I put a little extra effort into it, and half the time it doesn't listen to me anyways. So here's a list of stuff I discovered while hopped up on Sudafed:

1) American Apparel only makes men's pants to size 34 - fat hipsters need not apply.
2) Blade Runner can induce Zen-like calmness when coupled with cold medication.
3) Driving a car becomes a fun, unpredictable experiance again.
4) Math is not your friend.
5) One's ability to empathize with that homeless person asking for change is directly proportional to how much snot it feels like is inside your skull.
6) On the subject of homelessness, I'm pretty sure that crazy woman with the beard yelling at invisible monsters has the power to drag you to Hell, so be nice to her.

I'm going to bed now.

Strange Dreams

I have strange dreams. I know everyone views their dreams as strange, but we are only privvy to our own, and to me my subconscious comes up with some bizarre shit.

Last night I remember being at a house party where one of my exes arrived, and unlike the last time I saw her in real life, we were actually cordial and, dare I say it, affectionate. This was a woman I haven't thought of in years, and I mean YEARS. Why my brain decided to dredge her up I'll never figure out. The only part that was like reality was where she making out with another guy mere moments after professing her love for me.

My second dream was much more interesting - it was an episode of Mad Men that seemed like what the last episode would be. Both Don Draper and Pete Campbell left Sterling Cooper to work in much lower paying jobs, and they were cool with it. Then Don and Pete actually became friends. Best part? Don actually leaves Betty. That chick is crazy, yo.

Next time I wake up after sleeping for only five hours (which I do every night now) I'm just gonna get up. I can't take much more of this madness.

I am not one of the beautiful people

It isn't the obvious that I'm referring to, nor is this some depressing emo shit. I look around where I live, that bastion of the uberfabulous. The young and fashionable shop Melrose at 2:30 on a Tuesday, spending money and I with no idea on how they get it. Do they work at night, have an odd schedule where Tuesdays and Wednesdays are their weekends? How many of the beautiful people are there like this? It confuses me to no end.

I had Subway for dinner, stopping on my way home after another day at work. Front of me stood a tall fit couple, their affection (more likely uninformed lust) clogging the air like Cairo smog. The non-ironic multiple use of the word "bro" when addressing the guy behind the counter. The 5th grade humor of the woman, thinking she's more clever than she'll ever be. The attractive becoming ever more repulsive. These Eloi, these beneficiaries of God's lottery, flittering away their existence on counting carbs and cracking jokes about "breastesises". Never leaving the shallow end of the pool, not afraid but simply unaware of deeper waters.

Los Angeles is a town of many faces, with bodies to match. A jagged mosaic where the seeds are sown for what Wells' Time Traveller witnessed. Not yet prey, these beautiful people have already turned into cattle. Call it Grass Is Always Greener, say there is nothing perfect in this world, but in the choice between beauty and truth, I choose truth every time.

It is the ones who escape Plato's cave that become the Morlocks, for they have seen the world and found it real.

(This is what happens when I listen to the new Muse album on the way home from work).

Recap of the last six weeks.

- I got laid off.

- I went back home to Alaska, where I saw old friends, tackled a chore list for the folks and grandfolks, drank some very good beer, had my first ever visitor from college, and generally pushed the RESET button on the ol' grey NES that is my life.

- I came back to SoCal, in the midst of enjoying my temporary retirement, my meager savings dwindling but I didn't really care. I played a lot of video games, went out with friends, and relaxed.

- I got a new job. Beginning of this month, I started work. Dumped into the deep end, and it's either sink or swim. I am dog-paddling at the moment, still learning the ropes but succeeding. Busy work makes the days go by faster, and thank Jebus I have normal fucking hours again.

- I went to Las Vegas over Labor Day weekend. Funny thing that Labor Day - holiday invented to encourage people to work now inspires people to be as lazy as possible. Anywho, I gambled, came up, got a bunch of shit for free, and had the cheapest Vegas excursion ever without ever a reduction in the amount of good times.

- I saw AC/DC on Tuesday. They fucking rock. Awesome awesome awesome.

- I got my first paycheck from the new job today. Gainful employment, meet Cory. Cory, meet gainful employment.

-This weekend I'm off to the AZ to visit my parents who just bought a little house there for wintering purposes. A quick trip, but a hell of a lot closer than Alaska.

So why did I write this list down? Well, during my temporary retirement I purposely changed up my routine. To take the metaphor further, I took Super Mario Bros. 2 out of the NES, grabbed Ducktales, blew the dust out of the end, and restarted my life. I was ready for a change, and I got it.

Minus Gizmoduck (unfortunately).

Catch-up is not a fun game to play

Sorry it's been so long since my thoughts last graced your eyeballs, but I'm back with a quick update. I'm writing this sitting in my favorite chair back home in Alaska, a brown Lay-Z-Boy recliner that is as old as I am (if not older). It matches absolutely nothing in the living room and feels amazing. It has been raining off and on every day since I've repatriated myself back home (albiet temporarily), which I wouldn't mind if I didn't have this damnable urge to ride my bike everyday.

Bottom line is, I want to get out and exercise. Now that my job with the shitty hours is over, I want to live a normal schedule of getting up, working out, jetting off to work 9-6, coming home and eating dinner at dinnertime, and enjoy my evenings not running around dropping off tapes or waiting for producers to stop fucking with their show so I can go home, but going out with friends or God forbid, watching television shows when they actually air.

As you can tell, I'm still getting employment out of my system.

MOVING ON, since coming home I have been tackling my parents to-do list. I do not mind doing this at all. I actually enjoy it. It does however, have the unfortunate side effect of keeping me away from my writing, which takes some time and a few old-fashioneds to get into. Oh well. I'll find the time. To date, I have assembled Dad's new BBQ, taken donations to goodwill, drove three bikes to the shop to be fixed (two flat tires and a tune up), worked on cleaning up the house, and generally been attending what needs to be attended to.

Actually, I feel more productive these last few days than I did the last couple months at my job. Here I have variety, something my brain craves like a fucking drug. For those who don't know me that well, I can and do get bored rather easily. Most of the time it occurs in the course of work, or falling into a routine at home. Once I've figured out how to do something, if it isn't something I really enjoy doing, I get bored, and I quickly figure out a way to do it in the shortest amount of time and the least effort.

But not now. Now the world is wide open, full of possibilities again. While in Alaska, I have a varied to-do list, filled with chores and parties and meetings with friends. And that's just what I needed. Who knows what I'll do once I go back to Los Angeles, but I bet that it won't just be one thing.

Before I go, two quick things. One, in the Seattle airport I saw a rip in a hot girl's jeans on her ass that inspired me to write half a page in my novel. Two, I Mad Men'd myself. I always did want to pal around with Sterling and Draper.

Second-to-last day cause holes in spacetime

Second-to-last days are strange wee beasties, they have this uncanny effect of taking that march towards the final day of whatever you're counting down to and either making the day go by super fast, or excruciatingly slow.

Well, it's my second-to-last day at my current job, and the latter is in effect. So...slow...can't...stand...it. Tomorrow I know will go by super quickly, since I have a plane to catch and have to leave around 2:30pm. And I'm sure I'll write something about last days tomorrow, so I'll keep this short. I'll instead talk about physics.

I know that much of what we perceive of spacetime (so-called because both space and time are the same thing - read a book about it if you don't get it) is based on our observational biases. The saying "A watched pot never boils" comes from when we are waiting for something to happen, and solely concentrate on that event, time appears to slow down because there are no distractions. If you instead read a book and suddenly find out that an hour has passed that feels like ten minutes, that again is your observational bias getting in the way.

Time is fixed and solid, except when it's not. At first glance my previous statement makes no sense, but when you think about it the statement is true. Weird shit has to occur in order to make time swerve from its steady march forward, and I would like to add second-to-last days as one force that caused weird shit to occur to the very fabric of spacetime.

In other news I am going to Mars! Well, my name is on the next Martian rover NASA sends over, so that's fucking awesome.