Oh my goodness, i haven't updated you, LJ, in such a long time, and so so so much has happened.

I've decided that staying out of dad's place is best for me, even though my stuff is still there, which it won't be for long. I'm crashing at the Geary Suite, the Fencing co-op, and maybe some other minor life-characters' dwellings, here in the big city.

I just started a new job thanks to the great nativa La Croix. A great, impressive, chain cafe/bakery. Good food, fun coworkers, lots of chances to advance in the company, what more could i ask for.

Today was the 1st day. Lots of it remind me of the T.O., lots just confuse me, but it's all just a learning process. Just doing it, not going against it. The have a catering lead position opening up in August, and they're tagged me for that. Go with the flow, and i'll have lots of bonuses. High end fashion stores, here i come!

Tags: job

Today was a very interesting day.

I start off excited to go out and try to find a job. Walking through Haight, then Divis, then Japantown/Fillmore, i see all of 3 for hire signs: a women's vintage clothing, a goth/punk/leather store, and a cute li'l cafe. Pretty good, but i kinda think i can do better.

As I talked to alice (new roomie) this evening over making and eating cinnamon molasses cookies and pomelo, we notice that today is very weird. Normally I can walk around for upwards towards 4 hours before feeling really tired and depressed, but today, after only 2.5 hours, I really wanted food and just to sit, because i felt like my search was leading me to nothing. Turns out, the gunshots heard on saturday did lead to a death, and tonight's a full moon. great.....

seth leads me to a pretty interesting path of thought/action on New Experiences and Dopamine, which sets me on a short-lived research project on dopamine production, the substantia nigra and ventral tegmentus regions of the brain, and their association with happiness/dopamine, motivation, and maybe something with short-term-memory. New experiences trigger memory retention with old and new information, as well as releases dopamine, and i was wondering how buddhism's "non-attachment to the past, present, and future" play a role in it. The research brought a pretty good high to me, thinking and looking for new information that i could relate to (again, the merging of new and old information, although not really cohesively). I was kinda considering, very briefly, that it could be a term of study, neuroscience and religion/philosophy. but then the high fell, not as low as it's been, but interestingly related to the thought of "possible waste of time".....

Then irwin invites me to a free concert at amoeba in haigh on the 14th, the Master Musicians of Jajouka performing. I've been listening to their music online, and i'm pretty sure their sound creates more of an impact when performed live. or maybe i'm in the wrong mental state.

Of course, i meant to say a lot more, but my eyes are dried as raisins now. I"ll try for more dopamine-prescribed motivation tmrw. maybe ue is my source of high? or one of, it shouldn't be the only. that would go against all i believe in.

Tags: depression, job, music, science
Current Mood: blah

today was my first day at work with the bbff. work was easy, cause somehow there weren't many phone calls today. after work we joined up with santi and rhonda, who were literally drunk out of their minds. santi sobered up a little bit by the time we got him home, but rhonda was really really out of it. preston and i were talking about it at dinner, after we had gotten both of them home/in bed.

rhonda is completely at peace with herself, where she is in life, who she is. normally, when someone becomes drunk, there's a crapload of emotional baggage that reveals itself. but she was just this big ball of giggles, laughing about everything and nothing. she's really at peace and loves herself, the pure embodiment of most faiths.

santi was a dancing mess. really, he was wall-eyed most of the night, half the time we couldn't talk to him, he couldn't comprehend what we were saying. and also, to my discomfort, he was all over me: talking about how fucking sexy i was, how beautiful my hair was. thankfully i managed to sidestep some of his kissing attacks, but it was tough. i really don't want to go through that again. preston said that is the exact reason dimi doesn't get shit-faced drunk, to save santi face and pain (they both get really really flirty and courageous when they're shitfaced). gosh they're both sweethearts.

at dinner, i was getting through many realizations: fear of intimacy, fear of revealing my imperfections, fear of being perfect and simultaneously being imperfect. i was trying to narrow down the feeling to childhood experiences, but couldn't get very far. i think i'm repressing a lot of old memories. i had a lot of other realizations as well through the dinner at moshi-moshi in dogpatch. they have delic! veggie rolls.

after dinner, we drove back to castro, but because of our heart to heart conversation, opening ourselves to empathy, we felt the unique energies of the places we drove through:

dogpatch was very artistic, creative, true and "itself". it didn't put up any facades, made up for inadequacies. it was just IT, itself, nothing else - that's what makes it beautiful, it just is.

potrero hill was very warm, homey, rich and family-like. like everyone knows each other. the energy was just..... warm! welcoming. the warmth just really ensconces you. we recollected earlier the previous year when he just moved here, and we were both jobless and going all over the place and eating out. such great time. chez maman is still there.

then the transition area between potrero hill and the mission came up: i can't remember what we felt.

the mission was eclectic, older but refreshed (antique stores i think brought most of that energy). it's like the dream feel of mexico, late night when everyone's still partying but with family/neighbors, intimate and lively at the same time. tango.

we come up to church street, and the energy immediately changes: cold. skin-deep. unwelcoming. very uncomfortable.

because we still had a little more time, i asked we drive through to haight-ashbury to see what it's like.

one block up twin peaks past divisadero and we feel..... stale. i don't know how else to describe it. like it's just been there too long.

when we get to haight-ashbury, i feel sharpness. the energy is kinda digging, sharp metalic energy, heavy but not like stone, more like cold-steel/iron. not very pleasant. like fear, p said, maybe apprehension.

we go up towards cole valley and feel tired, worn out. secluded it was, and it was past it's prime. it was reminiscing towards it's glory days, and couldn't get past that and into the now.

turning up 17th, at the crest of cole and castro, i feel the same staleness of twin peaks, but mixed with the bitterness of haight. up the hill, westward from castro, the energy is striving to be with castro. like the bitter high school in-popular trying to fit in with the prom-queens.

back into castro we go, after parking the car, where we feel castro's not going to last much longer. it's energy is almost spent, but it's too drugged to know it's time is past. preston put it well: the immature stay in castro, the mature move on to noe. maybe that's why i've almost always felt uncomfortable walking around here?

preston is and always will be my best friend. forever.

Tags: empathy, energy, job, neighborhood
Current Location: zipcooper
Current Mood: contemplative

those are possible jobs for me, considering what i've learned in today's meet. there's so much to update on my life that i don't know where to start.

Today i've considered/dreamed what it'll be like to network people with a common cause. also i've considered how much work it takes to consult with someone. If i could get my networking skills to it's maximum, utilizing the buddhist knowledge, i could go anywhere. I could get so many people to join the ZC. it's a possibility, and i'm kinda glad i didn't write about it more, what i've experienced through T and N, because it seems a bit far fetched.

But i did have a realization the other day that Buddhism needs to be updated, literally. It's terms and translations are old, they don't apply now that American English is updating it's dictionary every year. My Career Success and Life Planning class teacher has this set of words that she considers punitive, that they give off a bad feeling. It's true, even if she is only talking from the career counseling perspective.

Tags: job, language, networking
Current Location: work
Current Mood: contemplative

i've been sleeping over at andee's for so much, yet gramma hasn't really noticed. the place is getting better, his friend gloria came over this last weekend and we reorganized and got a shelf up, but i don't think the floor has gotten much cleaner. oh well, most important is the bed ;)
this is my last week at work :( i'll miss it, wonderful friend, coworkers, owner is so cool. he's willing to buy me orthopedic stuff for my flat feet. i just can't deal with the dry heat, low pay, yelling, poor management. he'll be a good reference, and possibly 2 other coworkers. i'm sending out resumes now. i'll be bringing my resume to a school department for review and revamp.
i think i'll be dropping 2 more classes, because i've skipped all of last week and probably all of this week too...... oh well

Tags: education, job, resumes

andee finally moved to his friend's place in berk. one block from bart, as convenient as ever can be. reconstruction still going on, but it's nice and quiet. there's only one bath on the bedroom floor, that kinda worries me a bit, but can't complain. i stayed there last night, didn't get any homework done.... i was falling asleep. 10 minutes staring at my textbook and i couldn't remember the last sentence i wrote.

fri was dharma youth. karen n kevin were there. we played pingpong and i was having such a blast, tho really really crazy. i laughed so often i was red as a beet (which i have been so craving for the longest time. firewood beets stirfried with orange peel just didn't satisfy.) walking meditation was almost as good as zhongtai. still missing something.

saturday night we were at ston's for his "2 weeks notice" party. he's getting a better job that goes 24 an hour! that's right, i have to send someone my resume, his old work place. he said, and hopefully it holds, that i won't be working under the same bitch he was working for. cross my firngers.

today the owner of the place was there, and everything seems fine. there are just 3 people there that i just don't work well with. i have to give my 2 weeks notice soon, otherwise i won't be going anywhere. i feel kinda odd saying i'm gonna leave tho, because they all kinda like me. i get things done, i'm always smiles. the checklists never get done without a few of us there. sigh. what can i do? i've also decided to drop my choir/oratorio class cuz that just cuts more time out of my week. i wanna try just doing part-time everything: at most 8 units, 20-30 hours workweek, and enough time for homework and friend and leisure time. or i just need to learn more concentration and doing things without personal attachment (doing things that are shitty)

sunday nite i helped andee move in. took us an hour and a half to drill a deadbolt into the door. hahaha how butch. then we headed to antonio's for oscar night. i got a little confused, because the official title is "academy awards". i just looked it up, and it's academy of motion picture arts and sciences. no wonder they had a lifetime achievement award for someone in cinematography and production. andee and juan are both very unstill people, maybe just easily bored. it was great tho. ant said i look better with hair down, not pushed to one side. i'll try this look for a while, see how it flows.

looks like i'll be sleeping at andee's a few days a week. i'll need another wardrobe there t'hee. we need to get in shape. we've eaten out so much, i'm almost as "fluffy" as his arms :S

Tags: job, moving, oscars
Current Mood: anxious

i forgot to say Ike n Dee n my bro Ris had dinner last night at a japanese place. all really crazy. a certain level of immaturity in conversations, but fun either way. now tonight it was just me n Ike n Dee n his cous Ace. really good food at Tangerine in castro. I kinda got a little lost about where it was, but Seath saved the night. it was really good. a little more expensive than our usual, but worth it. then we went to target n got some stuff. dee helped me fill the coolant that had it's light blinking for such a long time. next is the lights and wipers, that squeak n squeal like no other, as well as the squirt-nozzle for the windshield wiper liquid.
meanwhile i get to worry about having enough money for school books. i did some job hunting, but with the new semester starting, i don't think i can handle so much stress, with new classes and different teachers. with that, i don't think i could really handle a whole new work environment, as i'm just getting used to my current.... after almost 6 months.... omg 6 months. wow.

Tags: crazy, dinner, family, job, money
Current Mood: jubilant

as i think of my life career half-mindedly, i'm realizing that anything will actually do, because i have this meditative ability to hypnotize myself and enjoy whatever i get myself into. just last week, and fyi i hate speaking in front of crowds (who doesn't), i tried out being the rover, calling the sandwiches as they came out of the oven, fixing mistakes, etc. it was only about 30 or 40 minutes of it when i moved on, but it was interesting. i got into some sort of zone that just smiled and projected customer service love, though i'm sure i made a few mistakes. this ability is not very healthy, because i never really find my innate joys in life, find out just exactly what i represent and more of my talents. my aunt just recommend that i don't spread myself too thin in finding a line of study, and i agree with that. maybe later in life when i'm financially set and have time to really explore the world. right now i need to test some of the waters and try out lines of work that i can enjoy.

Tags: job, joy, trial
Current Mood: accomplished