0414_02.page

14 apr 2002

yup. it's sunday. i'm at the office because i was an idiot friday and forgot to take my jury duty info home with me. i just checked on the website, and according to my jury number i don't have to report in tomorrow. but i do have to check the website again at 10am tomorrow. damn. i really hope i don't have to go to court. i have a shitload of work to do.

but anyways, this has been probably the best weekend i've had in a long time. it all started friday when alan drove down. we had nauseating amounts of indian food at sneha (there was even blazing red chicken pakora nuggets). it was funny when i got up to leave, and alan told me to sit my ass down again because he needed to recover.

after that, we stopped by jeremy and kate's place, where the two of them and their friend annie were cleaning up the place for saturday's inspection. we caught them right as they were leaving for dinner. i handed over two cd's i burned for them, which was a welcome gift because they will be driving for days and days across the country. jeremy even got a cd player installed in the silver bullet (the name of his car), so i was glad to hear that. otherwise, cd's would have been a lame gift, huh.

we followed the three of them to in 'n out where we watched them eat. you know, i haven't craved in 'n out at all this year. i used to drive by and get wafting aromas from the place, and i'd start drooling and stuff, but even when i'm really hungry these days, i really don't feel like eating in 'n out burgers at all. maybe i just got sick of them.

i brought up my fascination with fetishes and the recent renaissance in that topic because of the whole lesbian sisters thing. i kind of wish that i could study this stuff some more and somehow make a career out of it. it's fascinating stuff!

alan was driving crazy that night. he kept on flooring his integra and peeling around corners. i dunno. i'm just not into speed. it actually scares me. there's no excitement for me. alan keeps on telling me to just drive to highway 1 and zip around the coast on a therapeutic ride. but i don't really enjoy driving (i'll get into more of this later). it just seems like a means to simply get from one place to another. the actual journey is kind of boring if i'm by myself, you know?

we hit tower records, and i picked up the michelle branch cd as well as the cowboy junkies' latest album (thanks to enjelani for indirectly informing me of that). and when we got back, it was already midnight. alan wanted to watch some dvd's he had from netflix, but we played with my computer instead. i showed him how to rip songs from cd's and how to burn a cd, and he got all excited over it. basically he had all these cd singles in his car, and he made a cd that consolidated all of that stuff along with some songs from my collection.

i felt fine about him "taking" my music. yes, there was a time when i wouldn't have been fine with it. back when i was going out with k1 and k2, they would sometimes make mix tapes out of songs from my collection. and i would literally start feeling sick when they did it. it's because i was very protective of "my" music back then, and when they created something of their own from my stuff, i felt like i was being invaded. i worked hard to accumulate all these cd's, and it just felt like they were reaching into my world and taking something private from me for free.

and then... there was saturday. a day of intense pain and hardship.

yup. first, we had brunch with jay, alan, peter and his friend ting. that was ok. the place we went to was this greek-themed diner (complete with a white statue of some random greek god with a javelin) where we were the only non-caucasian patrons. plus, they were old, too. for those and other reasons (like the interior decoration), i had this strong feeling that it was like we were in vegas. the place, by the way, is called "goodies II." why they have the roman numeral is beyond me. and also, do NOT get the chicken fried steak. it's gross.

yeah, we were supposed to go to great america, but that fell through, so we decided to do this biking tour.

a biking tour. so the gist is that we rented bikes at fisherman's wharf, biked all the way to the golden gate bridge, across the bridge, through sausalito, through old mill (or whatever that town is called, and finished up at tiburon, where we caught the ferry and returned to the wharf.

it was a long fucking ride. they said it was 14 miles, but it felt like 20 at least. i mean, you have to understand that i do NOT use my legs like that in my day-to-day life, and biking 14 miles up and down hills just killed me.

the first two hills before the bridge, i took it like a man (with some cursing and swearing and wheezing). but after we got to sausalito, i was expecting that we'd take the 5:30 ferry across and call it a day. but the others wanted to ride some more, and i just shut up and went along. but by then, my legs were already spent, and no matter how hard i tried, i just kept falling behind. and then the hills kept coming and coming.

i mean, there was one place where we crossed 101, and after the onramp, there was this hispanic paraplegic on crutches standing by the road. and he was laughing at me when i was struggling up the hill. i mean, this guy can't even fucking walk, and he was laughing at ME. imagine how low that feels. and other times, i would be bikingly barely faster than the joggers out there.

i was pissed from the ride from sausalito to tiburon. i mean, PISSED. not at my friends, but at the situation and at the fact that i had no option but to continue. going back was not an option. and it's not like i could have just jumped in a cab or taken another ferry.

alan and ting would ask me how i was doing, and i just grunted rudely. they were like, "come on, you'll be proud of doing this!" and i retorted, "you know, i really don't care." i was hating life at that point.

we got to this one mini park by the bay, and by the time i arrived, the other four had already gotten off their bikes and were playing with these monkey bars. they were doing these self-ordained "feats of stupidity" and having a great time, but i hit my lowest point at that place. i huffed and puffed, dismounted my bike, picked it up, and hurled it to the ground. later, i found out that my throwing the bike knocked off the chain.

the guys looked at me and didn't say anything. i think they knew that it was best to avoid me. i stalked off and had a smoke by myself. yup. that was the low point.

but anyways, after that it was only a short way to the tiburon ferry station, and i started to feel better. my legs, on the other hand, were so worn out that i had a really hard time getting up off of a chair. the muscles simply didn't want to actuate any more.

also, i had a chafing sore in my chode, and as i sat on the bike seat again, i found out that i had long bruises along both sides of my inner ass. PAINFUL ass bruises.

so that was it. yes, i made it. but no, i'm not proud of the accomplishment. because nobody else struggled with it. i can't be proud of doing something that was supposed to be easy.

oh, and i was very impressed with ting. i mean, here you have a 22-year-old girl hanging out with a clique of 4 older guys. i mean, i would be so intimidated if i had to hang out with 4 close-knit friends, 3 of which i was meeting for the first time.

on to sunday. (you might want to take a short break)

i was supposed to go on this crystal springs hike with mike and his friends, but i was really concerned that my legs would be really sore. well, i woke up this morning (with a huge boner, by the way), and found that i could walk just fine. it's just that my ass hurt a little bit when i did. so i grabbed some breakfast at mcdonald's and headed up to millbrae to pick up mallory, who wanted to come along on the hike.

dude. the place was so fucking hard to find. it's basically the intersection of canada road and 92 west, but for whatever reason, i just couldn't get there. i wound up almost going to half moon bay, and then i turned around and went all the way up to redwood city to find that the south end of canada road was blocked off, and then i went back to 92 and blah blah blah. fucking bitch.

the other hikers were like all hard core and stuff. they were all strapped to backpacks, and geoff had this whole navy seal getup. walter even had this gadget that sprayed a mist so he could get some refreshing moisture when tired. and this other dude had a gps tracker thing.

but anyways, the trail didn't show much scenery; mallory said that the other trail further down 92 west was prettier. *shrug*

i have finally discovered another person who is in even worse shape than i am. and what's more, i have found another person who loves being lazy and physical exertion-averse! it's great. i mean, most of my friends like alan and jay are all about *doing* things and being active and stuff (which is a good thing, by the way). but mallory's the first person who is not ashamed to extol the virtues of doing nothing. (well, maybe mike... but he's been doing more stuff these days now that he's with rita.) but anyways, it was kind of neat to be with someone who loved lounging around as much as i do.

mallory gave me a hard-limit quota of 6 miles. so when the gps dude told us that we had gone 3 miles, we simply waved goodbye and turned around while the others went on their quest for the pulgas water temple. on the way back, mallory and talked about random stuff like the value of having a job and whether sex is a viable form of strenuous exercise.

after a brief stop at her place where we watched cnn while she scarfed down some korean ramen, we headed over to whipple to watch _high crimes_. not a bad movie. but not great. plot holes loomed all over the place. after the movie, we grabbed some pho (where i got an expensive $6.50 bowl that was the largest i've ever tackled), and i dropped her off. and now i'm here at the office, typing away.

back to the driving thing. from the drive to mallory's place down 101 south, i had a rare moment of contentment and happiness. the sun was shining (but not too bright), i was listening to some good music, and i just felt... warm. and for a few minutes, the world seemed to be a kind and loving place. it lasted for the length of a song, and that song was sarah mclachlan's "fear."

so maybe it is possible that i would enjoy having a solitary drive some place. if the conditions are right.

and while i should be grateful that the cloud that has loomed in my head completely lifted for a few minutes, it really bothers me because i only got a taste, a little *tease*, of what most people take for granted: the idea that life is good.

i have a lot of reading to do tonight. i haven't even glanced at this week's _time_ except for the ozzy osbourne article. get flipping through an issue of _entertainment weekly_, i started thinking that i should get a subscription to a lighter magazine. so my choice has come down to either _maxim_ or porn. any suggestions?

ok. this is probably the longest entry i've written. sorry for the length.

one last thought... the bike seats we got had this slit near the front tip. yup. they were like vaginas.

butterface!