Right. I better start watching some movies again soon, or I'll have to change the name of this blog to Dax Writes an Awful Lot About His Unexciting Personal Life and Watches a Movie... Occasionally. To that end, I planned to rent Running Scared starring Paul Walker, a film I briefly noted in a previous post but it took so long to finally hit theatres and then was gone so quickly that I never got the chance. Well, guess what popped up on a list of "Customer Recommendations" at that charming little video shop I often visit? Yeah. A friend said "It's kinda like Pulp Fiction, Dude" At which point I had to choke down the bile and bits of pear, and titter (straight guys can titter), and reply "Don't you wanna sell me on this film?" In fairness, looking at it from an unbiased point of view, I'd have to say that Pulp Fiction was, for whatever it was, well done. I really didn't like it, like Ali doesn't like insects, the first time I saw it because I didn't understand it, and more accurately didn't want to believe that Hollywood would pay money to make this type of film. I still don't really understand it, but I accept that some people, like (big fat) Sissy, find this movie funny. Did I mention that I'm gonna be an uncle? I'm trying my best to find a good mohel, but in this city everyone knows a good mohel. That's why Sissy is fat, I'm not saying it to be mean, it's a fact. The whole bris thing has given me a great idea for a t-shirt, but Looch says that it's too niche. In her words, "Only the finocchios would buy that one. The set up costs would kill my profits."
I resent it, just a little bit that Ali can take a week and a half off from her job, while I have to sit in a warehouse stuffing boxes. I often wonder why employers encourage their employees to come up with new business ideas. It might not be completely accurate, but I kinda get the impression that Looch is using my business acumen against me.
This week has been kinda tough. Classes started again and I missed my usual lecture because I was too busy working on a paper. I ended up attending Wednesday's lecture. Never again! The lecturer is the same dude, but the facilities are totally different. On Wednesday, he ends up hand writing everything and standing in front of the overhead half the time so you can't read what he wrote. And then there was the overly chatty guy who decided to sit right next to me and chit chat the whole first half - and various other people who thought the lecture was just another version of dinner theatre. People, I know the lectures are technically not mandatory and your money makes the course happen, but at least have the decency not to slurp your sodas while the rest of us are trying to learn and ignore the smell of onions on your double cheeseburger at the same time. A coffee and a nosh - fine, but one must draw the line. Dax, you can't change the world - you can only change yourself. Sure, so I'm gonna forget Wednesday's lecture - the lecture I walked out of at the break.
On the way home, my stomach was wanting a little attention so the closest place between campus and my flat was a place I used to hang out at after work. Everything was cool - a few familiar faces all remembering me, no angry Filipinos repeatedly threatening to kill me, so it was okay. I had my usual, House Burger - no onion, not toasted with a pint of lager and a shot of Jagermeister. I sent the burger back because the bun was in fact toasted. When the bartender returned it, I examined it for spittle and then determined that perhaps the first bun had not been toasted, instead it may have been a very thick type of quality bread.
And then, my old boss walked in - not the old guy whom I tore a strip off when I quit, but his boss, the boss of bosses. The really straight-laced type who always looks at you like he's got a terrifying secret that you mustn't find out, and also an oddly placed moustache that makes it all that much easier to imagine that perhaps his terrifying secret is that he's into leather and that he prefers bottom. Well, the moustache is gone now, but he always sits away from everyone else with his soup (who the hell goes to a sports bar to have soup?) which makes me think he's trying to hide his secret even more. I don't think he recognized me at first, but as I left I looked back and he was looking up from his evening paper and I waved. He peered down through his reading glasses and gave me a perfectly English smile - the smile that says that one is not necessarily happy to see someone or that one isn't quite sure why a really fit guy listening to the Arctic Monkeys on the iPod is waving to him from halfway across the bar, but nevertheless must smile to be polite.
That's when I remembered why I stopped going to that bar - I have a way of overhearing other conversations and it's not like I'm trying, really I'm not - but it occurred to me that the guy sitting to my immediate left was trying to steal the guy sitting to his left away from my former employer which would have been really, really stupid considering that my former employer was sitting at the back of the bar and could surveil the situation quite easily. The thing that made it difficult was that the guy to the left of the guy to my left was unknown to me. It's quite possible that he started at the firm sometime after I left, but the other difficulty was that I couldn't really tell who was trying to steal whom. I determined that the guy to my left was the actor in that situation and that the guy to the far left was the agent. Wait - that's confusing unless you've studied syntax. The guy to my immediate left was doing the stealing - he had a southern accent and kept talking about Texas like that was where he was recruiting from, and besides he wasn't my former employer's usual, overly-priced-for-what-you-get, extremely hands-off recruiter. And the guy on the far end looked like the young, go-getter type that my former employer would normally employ, but who really had to put himself first in every situation and would jump at a better chance if he felt it would get him further ahead. Eventually, I decided that my sense of agency did not extend to my former employer and that I owed him no such duty and left.
Where was I? Oh yeah, I wanted to get Running Scared, but I ended up going to the lecture instead and then leaving half way through. I'm pretty sure that because of my actions this evening, I'm going to be hooped when it comes time to write the next paper but its been weird without Ali around. Three more days...
Thursday, September 28, 2006
Thursday, September 21, 2006
... And Then She Was Gone
Yeah, this Prison Break thing is starting to get out of hand. Ali woke me up Saturday morning holding a broken light bulb over my left eye. That was about the right time, I reckoned, to let her know that that stuff doesn't happen in my house. Big mistake, but that's all I'm gonna say about that. She put the lightbulb in the trash and told me I had no sense of humour. Somehow, I was in the doghouse when really all I wanted to do was save my eye ball.
The doghouse - a familiar milieu for me. Sunday morning Ali blared into my ear a nice Japanese jingle Ii kata aru zo... Misuta Do-onatsu. I didn't even ask, I just pulled on my jeans and stuff and shlepped around the block looking for a Dunkin Donuts. I came back with two fritters and a coffee (for me, stupidly) and crawled back into bed.
This whole roommate thing has its advantages, its disadvantages, but better still, its humourous moments. I am lucky enough to have a dishwasher in my flat, but Ali insists upon washing the dishes by hand - where she learned that I'll never know - and then using the dishwasher effectively as a drying rack. Sissy used to think I was weird because I would rinse, or soak the tough grime before loading the washer, but this takes the cake. Ali actually washes the dishes before putting them in the washer, but she doesn't turn the washer on. I giggle.
Another fun time was teaching Ali how to use the clothes washer - I have one of those in my flat too with a dryer even. I left for work one morning and asked Ali to do the washing and when I came home I noticed that there was nothing to be washed. Instinctively, I went to the dryer and looked for things to fold. There was nothing. The following conversation ensued:
Me: Did you do the washing?
Ali: Yeah.
Me: Where is it?
Ali: It's out.
Me: Out?
Ali: Yeah!
Me: Out where?
Ali: At the cleaners. I called the service.
Me: Oh. You know, you can do the washing here (gesturing to the washer and drying stack).
Ali: Oh, I thought that was a coat closet... You do laundry?
Me: Yes, famously. Come here - I'll show you how to operate the machines.
Well, I nearly had a heart attack a few days later when I saw her doing a load of "whites" and then she slipped off her pyjama bottoms - her bright red pyjama bottoms - and tossed them in the wash. "Awwww SNAP! What are you DOING?", I asked incredulously. "What's your fucking problem? Maid always washed our pyjamas with the whites". I steadied myself and then took a deep breath, remembering an e-mail that Sissy had sent me a few days earlier:
Washing Clothes Recipe
Never thought of a "washer" in this light before... what a blessing!
'Washing Clothes Recipe' -- imagine having a recipe for this!!!
Years ago an Alabama grandmother gave the new bride the following recipe:
This is an exact copy as written and found in an old scrapbook - with spelling errors and all.
WASHING CLOTHES
Build fire in backyard to heat kettle of rain water. Set tubs so smoke wont blow in eyes if wind is pert. Shave one hole cake of lie soap in boilin water.
Sort things, make 3 piles
1 pile white,
1 pile colored,
1 pile work britches and rags.
To make starch, stir flour in cool water to smooth, then thin down with boiling water.
Take white things, rub dirty spots on board, scrub hard, and boil, then rub colored don't boil just wrench and starch.
Take things out of kettle with broom stick handle, then wrench, and starch.
Hang old rags on fence.
Spread tea towels on grass.
Pore wrench water in flower bed. Scrub porch with hot soapy water. Turn tubs upside down.
Go put on clean dress, smooth hair with hair combs. Brew cup of tea, sit and rock a spell and count your blessings.
================================================
Paste this over your washer and dryer. Next time when you think things are bleak, read it again, kiss that washing machine and dryer, and give thanks. First thing each morning you should run and hug your washer and dryer, also your toilet---those two-holers used to get mighty cold!
For you non-southerners -wrench means rinse. ;)
For the record, I know what wrench water is - not because I'm from the South, which I'm not - but because I spent more than a few Saturdays as a kid at Gran's house (helping) do(ing) the washing in a similar fashion.
After the whole doughnut incident, I decided that I needed to watch a sporting event. I bought a couple tickets to a Jets game. We lost, but Ali enjoyed it - I think. I spent half of the first quarter in the beer queue and spent a bargain $7.50 for a regular size serving. Eeee! When I got back to the seats Ali was checking out the free Jets shirt she got from a vendor. I smiled because it wasn't red - fucking red. Ali said she would have enjoyed it more if she knew the rules, but I couldn't give a damn about the rules. I care about the objective, and the objective couldn't be simpler.
So I haven't seen any movies lately, though I was tempted to rent Layer Cake again but instead spent last Friday evening trying to collect Ali's vitamin supplements in Newark. She hummed Lalo Schifrin's Mission Impossible the whole time. Delighted. That's another thing I love about Ali - she has a real talent for music. She studied the bassoon, but she doesn't call it that. Apparently, in Japanese they use the italian fagotto, but I can't use that word. It's not practical. Imagine me trying to introduce Ali to some friends in a café:
Abe: So, this shiksa - What does she do?
Me: Not much, I guess. A little hostessing, and she's learning English at school.
Moshe: Well, what did she do before?
Me: Finance, I think. I'm not too sure.
Wayne the Goy: Any hobbies?
Me: Uhhh, she used to play the faggoto. I mean --
[cup flies across the café just missing my precious eye]
Michael, the Easily Offended Homosexual with a Knee-jerk Response: WHAT? What did you just call me?
Me: Whoa whoa whoa, dude. I was merely using the Italian for the tenor woodwind, a bassoon. Surely, you're familiar...
Michael: You just, you just shut it. I'm proud of who I am, and I don't need to hear your negativity.
Me: Dude.
[end imaginary conversation]
I wanted to rent the movie because one of my recent converts saw it and had a few questions that I couldn't answer. I needed to watch it again. I will not rest until the entire world sees Layer Cake.
Not seeing any movies, but having a lot of fun planning parties. Get this, two of Ali's friends are taking some ridiculous speed holiday and they have a 2 day stopover which happens to coincide with one's birthday. One of these new roommate things is that you have to be ready to open your home to strangers, partiers and other revelers at any time. I'm getting used to it quite quickly because well, I don't really have a choice. Until now, the only party I've ever hosted was a lukewarm birthday party for Bobby and myself a few years ago. Never again... maybe. Okay, so the party sucked, but the food and alcohol - oy!
I raced home after work to get some nosh started because Ali was too busy showing her friends the sights. When they arrived home, they were too full to enjoy my lobster/crab canapés and weren't too interested in the sake. Ali didn't tell me that her friends don't drink. Oh well, at least they had room later on for the cake. Chocolate mousse over caramelized bananas with crème brulée filling on a financier crust. We bought it, but it was still good. We had a great time afterall, but seeing these two chicks leave only brought home the fact that Ali was leaving two days after. Right now she's having a nice little holiday in Miami, probably enjoying her favourite drink, a tequila dacquiri - sounds disgusting I know, but it's actually quite good - and grooving to those latin rhythms. Eeeee! The next time I see her will be in Newark. Hopefully that won't be a mission impossible.
By the way -- Layer Cake!
The doghouse - a familiar milieu for me. Sunday morning Ali blared into my ear a nice Japanese jingle Ii kata aru zo... Misuta Do-onatsu. I didn't even ask, I just pulled on my jeans and stuff and shlepped around the block looking for a Dunkin Donuts. I came back with two fritters and a coffee (for me, stupidly) and crawled back into bed.
This whole roommate thing has its advantages, its disadvantages, but better still, its humourous moments. I am lucky enough to have a dishwasher in my flat, but Ali insists upon washing the dishes by hand - where she learned that I'll never know - and then using the dishwasher effectively as a drying rack. Sissy used to think I was weird because I would rinse, or soak the tough grime before loading the washer, but this takes the cake. Ali actually washes the dishes before putting them in the washer, but she doesn't turn the washer on. I giggle.
Another fun time was teaching Ali how to use the clothes washer - I have one of those in my flat too with a dryer even. I left for work one morning and asked Ali to do the washing and when I came home I noticed that there was nothing to be washed. Instinctively, I went to the dryer and looked for things to fold. There was nothing. The following conversation ensued:
Me: Did you do the washing?
Ali: Yeah.
Me: Where is it?
Ali: It's out.
Me: Out?
Ali: Yeah!
Me: Out where?
Ali: At the cleaners. I called the service.
Me: Oh. You know, you can do the washing here (gesturing to the washer and drying stack).
Ali: Oh, I thought that was a coat closet... You do laundry?
Me: Yes, famously. Come here - I'll show you how to operate the machines.
Well, I nearly had a heart attack a few days later when I saw her doing a load of "whites" and then she slipped off her pyjama bottoms - her bright red pyjama bottoms - and tossed them in the wash. "Awwww SNAP! What are you DOING?", I asked incredulously. "What's your fucking problem? Maid always washed our pyjamas with the whites". I steadied myself and then took a deep breath, remembering an e-mail that Sissy had sent me a few days earlier:
Washing Clothes Recipe
Never thought of a "washer" in this light before... what a blessing!
'Washing Clothes Recipe' -- imagine having a recipe for this!!!
Years ago an Alabama grandmother gave the new bride the following recipe:
This is an exact copy as written and found in an old scrapbook - with spelling errors and all.
WASHING CLOTHES
Build fire in backyard to heat kettle of rain water. Set tubs so smoke wont blow in eyes if wind is pert. Shave one hole cake of lie soap in boilin water.
Sort things, make 3 piles
1 pile white,
1 pile colored,
1 pile work britches and rags.
To make starch, stir flour in cool water to smooth, then thin down with boiling water.
Take white things, rub dirty spots on board, scrub hard, and boil, then rub colored don't boil just wrench and starch.
Take things out of kettle with broom stick handle, then wrench, and starch.
Hang old rags on fence.
Spread tea towels on grass.
Pore wrench water in flower bed. Scrub porch with hot soapy water. Turn tubs upside down.
Go put on clean dress, smooth hair with hair combs. Brew cup of tea, sit and rock a spell and count your blessings.
================================================
Paste this over your washer and dryer. Next time when you think things are bleak, read it again, kiss that washing machine and dryer, and give thanks. First thing each morning you should run and hug your washer and dryer, also your toilet---those two-holers used to get mighty cold!
For you non-southerners -wrench means rinse. ;)
For the record, I know what wrench water is - not because I'm from the South, which I'm not - but because I spent more than a few Saturdays as a kid at Gran's house (helping) do(ing) the washing in a similar fashion.
After the whole doughnut incident, I decided that I needed to watch a sporting event. I bought a couple tickets to a Jets game. We lost, but Ali enjoyed it - I think. I spent half of the first quarter in the beer queue and spent a bargain $7.50 for a regular size serving. Eeee! When I got back to the seats Ali was checking out the free Jets shirt she got from a vendor. I smiled because it wasn't red - fucking red. Ali said she would have enjoyed it more if she knew the rules, but I couldn't give a damn about the rules. I care about the objective, and the objective couldn't be simpler.
So I haven't seen any movies lately, though I was tempted to rent Layer Cake again but instead spent last Friday evening trying to collect Ali's vitamin supplements in Newark. She hummed Lalo Schifrin's Mission Impossible the whole time. Delighted. That's another thing I love about Ali - she has a real talent for music. She studied the bassoon, but she doesn't call it that. Apparently, in Japanese they use the italian fagotto, but I can't use that word. It's not practical. Imagine me trying to introduce Ali to some friends in a café:
Abe: So, this shiksa - What does she do?
Me: Not much, I guess. A little hostessing, and she's learning English at school.
Moshe: Well, what did she do before?
Me: Finance, I think. I'm not too sure.
Wayne the Goy: Any hobbies?
Me: Uhhh, she used to play the faggoto. I mean --
[cup flies across the café just missing my precious eye]
Michael, the Easily Offended Homosexual with a Knee-jerk Response: WHAT? What did you just call me?
Me: Whoa whoa whoa, dude. I was merely using the Italian for the tenor woodwind, a bassoon. Surely, you're familiar...
Michael: You just, you just shut it. I'm proud of who I am, and I don't need to hear your negativity.
Me: Dude.
[end imaginary conversation]
I wanted to rent the movie because one of my recent converts saw it and had a few questions that I couldn't answer. I needed to watch it again. I will not rest until the entire world sees Layer Cake.
Not seeing any movies, but having a lot of fun planning parties. Get this, two of Ali's friends are taking some ridiculous speed holiday and they have a 2 day stopover which happens to coincide with one's birthday. One of these new roommate things is that you have to be ready to open your home to strangers, partiers and other revelers at any time. I'm getting used to it quite quickly because well, I don't really have a choice. Until now, the only party I've ever hosted was a lukewarm birthday party for Bobby and myself a few years ago. Never again... maybe. Okay, so the party sucked, but the food and alcohol - oy!
I raced home after work to get some nosh started because Ali was too busy showing her friends the sights. When they arrived home, they were too full to enjoy my lobster/crab canapés and weren't too interested in the sake. Ali didn't tell me that her friends don't drink. Oh well, at least they had room later on for the cake. Chocolate mousse over caramelized bananas with crème brulée filling on a financier crust. We bought it, but it was still good. We had a great time afterall, but seeing these two chicks leave only brought home the fact that Ali was leaving two days after. Right now she's having a nice little holiday in Miami, probably enjoying her favourite drink, a tequila dacquiri - sounds disgusting I know, but it's actually quite good - and grooving to those latin rhythms. Eeeee! The next time I see her will be in Newark. Hopefully that won't be a mission impossible.
By the way -- Layer Cake!
Friday, September 08, 2006
Date sugoi jori jori nandemo
I've done it! I've learned a pivotal word in Japanese, and have finally unlocked the cause~effect relationship. Before, I could only say simple little phrases which even a kid in kindergarten would consider pedestrian, but now I've hooked the word for because, at least one of the words for because because there are probably more than one. Sure, I could have just asked how to say because but I prefer a more organic learning process. Baby steps, people. Just like a first language, only I took some pretty big baby steps with English. Instead of receiving a blank stare from Ali after telling her 'My foot hurts', the next time it happens I will be able to say without fail 'My foot hurts because the taxi has just mashed it into the street' all in one instead of two separate sentences. Baby steps.
I learned the word date, or at least what it meant Monday morning. I was sleeping late, enjoying my long weekend when I felt Ali tugging at my facial hair. Not like a few bits at the same time - she would single out one follicle and tug hard on it. She might as well have been shoving needles in my face. I asked her why she was doing that, and she said Date sugoi jori jori nandemo which meant something along the lines of 'because (your beard) is getting really stubbly'. The jori jori part is meant to be an onomatopoeic referring to the sound the beard makes when stroked. Ali has got a million phrases like that, that's just one of the cool things about her. To hammer the point home, she began polishing her nails against my chin like an Emory board and then used another one of those cool phrases to show how they sparkled kira kira kira.
Another really cool thing about her is this - I arrived home after a tasking day of stocking orders and calling couriers - only to confront a very pleasant aroma wafting through the flat. Ali's gone, but she has left a large plate of chijimi (Korean okonomiaki) and some onigiri on the counter. People say that threesomes are every man's fantasy, but not this everyman. A nice supper waiting for me is my fantasy. Threesomes are overrated - take it from me. This food thing is making it really difficult to diet, but when Ali cooks it means something important.
I've been kept on for another month at Looch's. She reckons the weather is really good and sales have never been better so she can make more profit by staying open until October. Well, me and my big mouth have gotten me in trouble as usual. Looch, Ali and I went for lunch, not Greek afterall, but whatever. As I thought, Looch loved my idea about adjusting the product delivery cycle, and appointed me in charge of making it happen. In my mind, that meant making a few calls to couriers to get information and hiring someone to set up proper documentation at the warehouse. But what Looch heard was that I was applying for a job at the warehouse to get things in order. She tried to make that steak sizzle by telling me that it would help with the inventory audit and all that. I guess I could have told Looch to fuck off, but my sense of agency caught me again and I accepted the change.
Also at the lunch meeting, Ali accepted an offer to begin selling tees. I figured she would say no, but money is money and let's be frank, it's not like we're really working. I was a little pissed though when Looch offered Ali a cool $100 more per week than she offered me for the same position. I laughed to myself because I knew that Ali would never sell as many tees as I did because she didn't like tanning and would avoid the beach like she avoids Walmart. She started hanging out at the public library and made more orders in one week than I made in three, mostly from guys. I never had that idea, and I'm not sure it would work for a dude, but it worked for her.
A small victory for me I guess, I've cut the delivery cycle down to 1 day for some areas, and 2 days for others. It's going to cost Looch up to 50 cents more per order, and I've had to contract with a company that specializes in overnighting but I'm all about the streamlining, and the increased revenue from repeat orders will generate a net increase in profits.
I learned the word date, or at least what it meant Monday morning. I was sleeping late, enjoying my long weekend when I felt Ali tugging at my facial hair. Not like a few bits at the same time - she would single out one follicle and tug hard on it. She might as well have been shoving needles in my face. I asked her why she was doing that, and she said Date sugoi jori jori nandemo which meant something along the lines of 'because (your beard) is getting really stubbly'. The jori jori part is meant to be an onomatopoeic referring to the sound the beard makes when stroked. Ali has got a million phrases like that, that's just one of the cool things about her. To hammer the point home, she began polishing her nails against my chin like an Emory board and then used another one of those cool phrases to show how they sparkled kira kira kira.
Another really cool thing about her is this - I arrived home after a tasking day of stocking orders and calling couriers - only to confront a very pleasant aroma wafting through the flat. Ali's gone, but she has left a large plate of chijimi (Korean okonomiaki) and some onigiri on the counter. People say that threesomes are every man's fantasy, but not this everyman. A nice supper waiting for me is my fantasy. Threesomes are overrated - take it from me. This food thing is making it really difficult to diet, but when Ali cooks it means something important.
I've been kept on for another month at Looch's. She reckons the weather is really good and sales have never been better so she can make more profit by staying open until October. Well, me and my big mouth have gotten me in trouble as usual. Looch, Ali and I went for lunch, not Greek afterall, but whatever. As I thought, Looch loved my idea about adjusting the product delivery cycle, and appointed me in charge of making it happen. In my mind, that meant making a few calls to couriers to get information and hiring someone to set up proper documentation at the warehouse. But what Looch heard was that I was applying for a job at the warehouse to get things in order. She tried to make that steak sizzle by telling me that it would help with the inventory audit and all that. I guess I could have told Looch to fuck off, but my sense of agency caught me again and I accepted the change.
Also at the lunch meeting, Ali accepted an offer to begin selling tees. I figured she would say no, but money is money and let's be frank, it's not like we're really working. I was a little pissed though when Looch offered Ali a cool $100 more per week than she offered me for the same position. I laughed to myself because I knew that Ali would never sell as many tees as I did because she didn't like tanning and would avoid the beach like she avoids Walmart. She started hanging out at the public library and made more orders in one week than I made in three, mostly from guys. I never had that idea, and I'm not sure it would work for a dude, but it worked for her.
A small victory for me I guess, I've cut the delivery cycle down to 1 day for some areas, and 2 days for others. It's going to cost Looch up to 50 cents more per order, and I've had to contract with a company that specializes in overnighting but I'm all about the streamlining, and the increased revenue from repeat orders will generate a net increase in profits.
Monday, September 04, 2006
Saturday Eggs
The medium is McDonald's ketchup on omelette, more specifically omu raisu or rice omelette. For those who don't read Japanese, it reads baka which can be translated many ways, but the sentiment here was "asshole".
Barely 24 hours into the new living situation, and we'd already had a fight - well more of a misunderstanding. In the wise words of Trey, my wax guy, the key to a successful relationship is communication. Sounds easy enough, right? I came home Friday night, moments after being given choice advice from Trey, with my knuckles looking like this, only with a lot more blood leaving a nice little trail through the lobby and into the lift.
No sweat - Danny, a bottle blond 50-something and his partner Piet, a 6-foot 5 Dutch dude of similar age offered to clean up the blood. They were in the lift, and noticed the blood in the first place. I was trying to hide it from Ali, but not after the fuss Danny made. As you can see, I'm a Southpaw. Looks fine now, but the camera doesn't show the internal bruising.
I'm not exactly sure why, maybe it was because of something I said when I was trying to fix a plaster, but Ali started sobbing. I knew her rules - no fighting in front of her, no raising my voice, etc. which is why I tried to hide the blood in the first place - but she had never seen me throw the punch and I spoke calmly the entire time after we left the lift, so as far as I was concerned, she really had nothing to worry about. Well, I spent the rest of the night apologizing and trying to get her to say SOMETHING. The next morning, I was reminded of the other, very new rule. Only normal violence, idiot! Whatever that means. I guess what she was trying to say was that I can only fight if someone hits me first or if I'm trying to remove her from imminent danger, or if we happen to be at a WTO protest and somebody lobs in some CS gas because they think it might make things more fun. Effectively, she was telling (by not telling me, but otherwise communicating to) me that no violence would be tolerated because the chances of our being in the proximity of any civil unrest are negligible.
I guess we're back to normal now because she woke me up with a bit of pressure on my left hand and a very loud, clearly enunciated "Nutella! I want Nutella for breakfast, Snowflake - no crusts!"
Friday, September 01, 2006
Crank - 70% Pure
It's been a busy couple of weeks, fraught with late night panic-driven phone calls from Tokyo, and threatening e-mails from some guy named Genya, but more on that in a bit.
I won free movie passes to Jason Statham's new film called Crank. A few months back, some friends from the ad agency came back from lunch all giddy because Statham came into the restaurant where they had eaten. He was filming in my city and I reckoned Crank was the one he was doing here, but imdb says that Crank was filmed entirely in L.A. Anyway, I wanted the passes because of the local connection, but I had to fork them over to Ali because I had to study for a brutal final exam the next day. It was rough, and I'll probably have to retake the course - at least it's not statistics. I see that Statham is reprising his role of Handsome Rob in a sequel to the remake of The Italian Job, called The Brazilian Job. That might sound like a film about a really fun salon, but it's more likely about a bank heist.
So Ali and her friend Mariko went to the cinema and got to enjoy a film I'll probably never see. Her review is as follows:
Me: So, how was it?
Ali: I nearly barfed, man...
Me: It was that bad, huh?
Ali: No, I just felt sick the whole time, and Mariko was ill too.
Me: Did you sit in the front row again?
Ali: No.
Me: Okay, gimme the qualitative analysis.
Ali: Uhhh, it was so-so. It had a fair bit of action, and the car chases you'd like.
Me: Any romance?
Ali: More comedy.
Me: Like 2LDK?
Ali: Different.
Me: Out of 5 stars?
Ali: Three point half.
So that's it - Statham gets 70% for Crank, which is what I could only hope for on my final. Who knows? Let the nail biting begin. All that studying and it might end up being for nothing.
One of Ali's classmates told her about this "really cute actor" named Wentworth Miller. Ever since, Miss "I don't like violence" Ali has been itching to watch Prison Break. I took a break from studying and hooked up the aerial so she could watch the premiere of Season 2. Of course, I've been watching since Episode 1, but I could tell she wasn't enjoying it. She said that she needed to get the background of the story, so last Saturday I got her Season 1 on DVD. All of a sudden, the telly is more interesting than I. For the past week, she's been calling me Snowflake or Fish and even splashed a bucket of cold water in my face as I slept Tuesday morning. That stopped as soon as she realized that the bed doesn't dry right away. Now, she just wakes me up by yelling "You're late Snowflake!" in my ear.
And so that brings me to Genya. For a while now, Ali has been looking for a place to live, and it would seem obvious that she should move in with me, but we both like a lot of space. I wasn't sure she'd go for it, but it's official. Ali has moved in as of last night. In the last couple days of August, Ali had to deal with annoying calls from her mother -- annoying in the sense that the calls came at about 3:00 a.m. All of a sudden, I was a thing from erstwhile planet Pluto with tentacles growing out of its back or something and no longer the guy who only weeks before had Ali's mother laughing her ass off and wiping away the tears because me so funny. It's quite an accomplishment to use the only two words one knows of a foreign language and mispronounce them at the very exact time that the two completely different words could be their most hilarious -- by accident. But I did it, and I'll probably never do it again. Now, her mum was freaking about all the things that could happen when a decent Japanese girl moves in with a hakujin. Ali got the calls, and I got the e-mails. The title line of the first one was 'We are friends of Ayako' I nearly deleted them until I remembered that I did in fact know someone named Ayako. Ayako is Ali's real name, so I opened the e-mail which came from someone calling himself Genya. I asked Ali about this guy, and it turns out this guy is real. She seemed concerned that Genya should e-mail me personally. She said it was serious for him to do that because he's really supposed to work for Ali's dad as like a driver/caddy/bodyguard/general bad ass and that if he e-mailed me, it's because her dad told him to. The mails weren't too specific, but I do recall that Genya offered to break my arms in such a way that "If they are reset, it will be very painful that you can hope that the doctors to slice them down". I asked Ali to clarify the message, but I basically already understood it to mean that my arms would be broken so that they will never heal properly and the pain would be so great that I would regret that the surgeon just didn't amputate my limbs. Ali got on the phone and called her mum and said that this was going too far. There were more, better written e-mails after that, but they were relatively pleasant.
I may be late to the party on this one, and there's no big Youtube critique about it, but as a tribute to Fuckstress, a former blogger whose writing I really enjoyed reading, and to Fireangel who, if I'm right, started the whole thing in the first place - Here's a snap of me enjoying a very large Hoegaarden (billed at 22 ounces, but more like 20 ounces with 2 ounces of foam in a fuck-off size glass). There would have been more photos, but Ali doesn't want people to see her drinking, and really who needs more than one photo to get the idea? As you can see, I've been hanging out at the beach trying to get a great tan, but nobody told my melanocytes and I've ended up getting a gentle burn.
I won free movie passes to Jason Statham's new film called Crank. A few months back, some friends from the ad agency came back from lunch all giddy because Statham came into the restaurant where they had eaten. He was filming in my city and I reckoned Crank was the one he was doing here, but imdb says that Crank was filmed entirely in L.A. Anyway, I wanted the passes because of the local connection, but I had to fork them over to Ali because I had to study for a brutal final exam the next day. It was rough, and I'll probably have to retake the course - at least it's not statistics. I see that Statham is reprising his role of Handsome Rob in a sequel to the remake of The Italian Job, called The Brazilian Job. That might sound like a film about a really fun salon, but it's more likely about a bank heist.
So Ali and her friend Mariko went to the cinema and got to enjoy a film I'll probably never see. Her review is as follows:
Me: So, how was it?
Ali: I nearly barfed, man...
Me: It was that bad, huh?
Ali: No, I just felt sick the whole time, and Mariko was ill too.
Me: Did you sit in the front row again?
Ali: No.
Me: Okay, gimme the qualitative analysis.
Ali: Uhhh, it was so-so. It had a fair bit of action, and the car chases you'd like.
Me: Any romance?
Ali: More comedy.
Me: Like 2LDK?
Ali: Different.
Me: Out of 5 stars?
Ali: Three point half.
So that's it - Statham gets 70% for Crank, which is what I could only hope for on my final. Who knows? Let the nail biting begin. All that studying and it might end up being for nothing.
One of Ali's classmates told her about this "really cute actor" named Wentworth Miller. Ever since, Miss "I don't like violence" Ali has been itching to watch Prison Break. I took a break from studying and hooked up the aerial so she could watch the premiere of Season 2. Of course, I've been watching since Episode 1, but I could tell she wasn't enjoying it. She said that she needed to get the background of the story, so last Saturday I got her Season 1 on DVD. All of a sudden, the telly is more interesting than I. For the past week, she's been calling me Snowflake or Fish and even splashed a bucket of cold water in my face as I slept Tuesday morning. That stopped as soon as she realized that the bed doesn't dry right away. Now, she just wakes me up by yelling "You're late Snowflake!" in my ear.
And so that brings me to Genya. For a while now, Ali has been looking for a place to live, and it would seem obvious that she should move in with me, but we both like a lot of space. I wasn't sure she'd go for it, but it's official. Ali has moved in as of last night. In the last couple days of August, Ali had to deal with annoying calls from her mother -- annoying in the sense that the calls came at about 3:00 a.m. All of a sudden, I was a thing from erstwhile planet Pluto with tentacles growing out of its back or something and no longer the guy who only weeks before had Ali's mother laughing her ass off and wiping away the tears because me so funny. It's quite an accomplishment to use the only two words one knows of a foreign language and mispronounce them at the very exact time that the two completely different words could be their most hilarious -- by accident. But I did it, and I'll probably never do it again. Now, her mum was freaking about all the things that could happen when a decent Japanese girl moves in with a hakujin. Ali got the calls, and I got the e-mails. The title line of the first one was 'We are friends of Ayako' I nearly deleted them until I remembered that I did in fact know someone named Ayako. Ayako is Ali's real name, so I opened the e-mail which came from someone calling himself Genya. I asked Ali about this guy, and it turns out this guy is real. She seemed concerned that Genya should e-mail me personally. She said it was serious for him to do that because he's really supposed to work for Ali's dad as like a driver/caddy/bodyguard/general bad ass and that if he e-mailed me, it's because her dad told him to. The mails weren't too specific, but I do recall that Genya offered to break my arms in such a way that "If they are reset, it will be very painful that you can hope that the doctors to slice them down". I asked Ali to clarify the message, but I basically already understood it to mean that my arms would be broken so that they will never heal properly and the pain would be so great that I would regret that the surgeon just didn't amputate my limbs. Ali got on the phone and called her mum and said that this was going too far. There were more, better written e-mails after that, but they were relatively pleasant.
I may be late to the party on this one, and there's no big Youtube critique about it, but as a tribute to Fuckstress, a former blogger whose writing I really enjoyed reading, and to Fireangel who, if I'm right, started the whole thing in the first place - Here's a snap of me enjoying a very large Hoegaarden (billed at 22 ounces, but more like 20 ounces with 2 ounces of foam in a fuck-off size glass). There would have been more photos, but Ali doesn't want people to see her drinking, and really who needs more than one photo to get the idea? As you can see, I've been hanging out at the beach trying to get a great tan, but nobody told my melanocytes and I've ended up getting a gentle burn.
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