together

i happen to be a big fan of fashion, but maybe in a self-destructive way. it's hard a lot of the time to maintain any particular look, which of course means that i have a sort of undefinable personal style that trumps most of the disguises i tend to choose for myself. a good chunk of high school was given over to a pair of boat shoes and tucked in shirts so i could be 'preppy seth,' but for most of my recent life it's been tough to purposefully maintain any particular guise. it's easier for me to be 'something trying to be something else' than any particular pure archetype. however, maybe if i exercised a little restraint when it came to clothing purchases, i wouldn't have these dilemmas in the first place. case in point: letting a friend talk me into buying a pair of bumblebee-inspired shorts.

what exactly does one wear with a pair of yellow and black checked shorts? sometimes i go with the untucked short-sleeve shirt and a necktie i wouldn't actually wear on a sunday. i often feel like i'm being a bit obvious when i pull out the purple and grey xs rugby shirt, but it does look decent with the shorts. shoes are easy for the moment, because i still have my yellow/blue/red ones. eventually it'll have to be all white or the slip ons with the little zebras all over them. a big problem for me is that i like sneakers so much that, despite my extremely particular taste, i tend to acquire them at a rate that's a little faster than is strictly necessary. the problem with shoes is that unlike, say, granola, abundance of new stock leads to greater longevity of each individual item. i guess i could get away with just my running shoes and the slip ons, but that would eliminate a lot of flexibility in the types of outfits i can put together with the unknowably large collection of footwear actually in my possession. thus, i think i will just keep on until i am forced to stop. you just have to know when you're on to a good thing.

ranch hands

do you ever feel ten years older than the calendar states, or four years into a bad thing? is it worth choosing your place in the world if you don't know what you actually want? much can be made about the power of choice, but most people have a limited range of options that are even conceivable. how does one say that an opportunity has been realized or missed when so many are out there unknown? there is no point in arguing with yourself, and little reason to question many of the decisions that seem important in life. i tell myself these things on nights when the noise in my own head drowns out all possible distractions. i read to myself, in my head, leave the light on in the hall, and tell myself it's all right. occasional thoughts creep out of bed and up through that lit hall to join me at the dining room table over a magazine. nighttime can be the best time to read as so little is happening that everything takes on temporary meanings that offer clues to knowledge that stretches beyond the bounds of rational thought. the colors seep from the page to stain my fingers, and words echo softly in my own head. never give up on an experience that offers irreplaceable lessons. turn the pages until all logic has fled, the ink burning your fingers as it fades to nothing before your eyes. all that remains is you and a blank page, your nose a dancer that cuts mountains of parchment into pastures for a new frontier. you could stop any second, but the weight of the hours pushes you ever onward.

cleaning the fridge

how do you make 3/4 of a pound of butter disappear in one evening? one way is to make two separate brownie recipes for your roommates, which was incredibly fun. i had been thinking about making brownies for a few days, and it was easy to find recipes i liked. i guess i wanted to challenge myself a bit, so i had the idea to make two separate recipes back to back. i originally thought i should try two very similar ones, but instead i made a cake brownie and a more fudgelike brownie recipe. both were cocoa powder-based, so my pound of dark chocolate is still available for future use.

i made the cake brownies first, and quickly realized that recipe was much easier to make than the second one. while, i melted my butter in the microwave for the cake brownie recipe, the second recipe had me stirring it with the cocoa powder and sugar over a double boiler. i was supposed to use my finger to test the temperature, and take it off the heat when it was so hot i could barely stand it. i eyeballed it instead, and i would prefer to see temperatures listed, since i'm not experienced enough to estimate what temperature they're indicating.

one roommate ate so many of the cake brownies that he had to consider his health and declined to try the second batch. since the sugar and butter content is similar and the cake-like recipe produces 2x the volume of brownies, he isn't as bad off as he could have been. in the end, i think the two recipes are so different that it's tough to vote for one. it is now up to the roommates to decide.

so long

i hate confronting my destiny, because it requires too much effort. for one thing, i do not like shaking hands with abstract concepts, significant as they may be. i have also found that my destiny is not a good companion at the ballgame, on a scenic cruise, or even when devouring a twenty-dollar ice cream sundae. in fact, the only times i enjoy with my destiny are when we take quiet time alone to walk on the beach. in opposite directions.

quotation marks

for a long time, i have failed to provide updates regarding certain things i have done.

foods eaten:
chocolate macadamia things
pizza i made, in two varieties
leftover pizza i made
store-brand frosted wheat bundles
delicious pasta dish

books read:
acceptance
something i don't care to mention

movies viewed:
my super ex-girlfriend
the fast and the furious: tokyo drift
(i realize it makes no sense that i watched this and not the one in theaters, but it was free)
rumor has it
(has anyone seen this? please provide a review)
the king of california
henry poole is here
(a real luke wilson trend going on)

television finales skipped, ignored, or delayed viewing:
prison break
(ok i watched half but it was last wk)
terminator: tscc
(i'll be angry if the last few episodes aren't online any longer)
lie to me
24
heroes
(this was a show i mostly watched when i ran out of other shows to catch up on; clearly i have a long ways to go before i get back to it)
30 rock

items purchased that had to be returned due to defects:
awesome shorts
bag of carrots
cell phone
(imagine going a week and a half with no phone, receiving your phone in the mail, and finding the delete key doesn't work. i tried five times to write a one-sentence text and couldn't without making mistakes, which were uncorrectable)
*laptop (purchased 'as is,' which means i get to acquire more computer repair experience)

watery locales visited:
asateague isle-and
ocean city
gravelly point

music acquired:
jenny owen youngs
tara jane o'neil
st. vincent
calexico
metric

bags of flour used:
1 and counting

i don't expect you to return

i've been going through your letters one by one, and i can't figure it out. there was something, way back when we were talking more, that possibly gave an indication of ideas entering your head that i know i had not put there. i think that the main problem is, you've always been resistant to my way of doing things. it may have been three, four, or any number of years back that you started on this path. you may like where you're headed. i cannot control that, and you know that i wish i could. i've always had this idea in my head, sort of an overarching theory of how things are supposed to be. life isn't always about journeys or possibilities or achievements or even about wanting to get up in the morning. yes, if those were the things by which you measured your life, i'm sure you would have left me some time ago. what you have to remember is that part of the glory in all this is the ability to say, to know, that you have your ducks in a row. you need to be out there, you have to breathe the same air with the rest of us and walk in our shoes, you have to believe that there's nothing you'll find alone that i wouldn't have been able to give you if you'd fallen in.

so, while you're away, i hope you discover something, and maybe i can even pray a little that you'll bring it back. do you have a new color, a leaf, or some particularly interesting rock that you might be able to add to the body of knowledge you've obtained under my care? were you expecting smells that could take you away from this life? i wouldn't begin to attempt to expound upon the many ways in which you could have deluded yourself, but i can tell you this: i don't expect your return. no, we've got things pretty well in order even without you. in fact, don't be surprised one morning if you wake up and find us outside your door. yeah, that one is coming. so's the other hundred or so you can almost picture in your dreams. all of them. a little scratch at night, a flickering from just outside your range of vision. someone stumbles in the alley. smoke seems to mark the limits of your imagination, hanging over the city as your mind grows blank. we don't have to go get you, because we're already everywhere.

summer of yikes

at this point, almost everything electronic of mine has broken in the past three months. i guess i need to start taking more pictures so my camera can break, completing the cycle. is this going to turn me into a one-person equivalent of some lost civilization that loses advanced technology over the years? three years from now, i will be communicating solely via the mail.

i blame the cookies

i've decided to do something that an old friend told me to do in a dream. not because i think my friend actually wants me to do it, but because clearly i want myself to - hence the dream. i can't say that dreams are usually a part of my decision making process, but i do think they are indicators of things that are bothering me deeply enough for them to pop out of my subconscious.

i also ate cookies today, which - along with some overly sweet pudding - ruined my appetite for the rest of the evening.

home from the snowstorm

in the past two days, i have lost my keys, a strawberry eating contest, and seven friends. i thought i knocked a tooth out on the lamp, but that was a dream. fortunately. i've come to call this week the week of lost and found. i expect i will discover something amazing as a karmic payback for all the annoyances of the past few days. one thing that keeps coming back to me is the conversation i had with my mom, who assured me that everything important would work out. she left me with the impression that friends aren't as big of a concern as, say, whether the roof over your bedroom leaks or if you can find soap that doesn't turn your skin raw in the winter. other things have gone well; i had a soda yesterday and my friends split the check evenly despite the fact that my bill was technically three dollars more than theirs. small victories.

take it

After a long time in New York, it takes a while to get used to living somewhere else. I feel bad for everyone who is stuck thinking they'll never live anywhere as amazing again; they deserve to stay where they're happy. I found it odd tonight to realize how a quiet still moment in an urban setting is possible. Truthfully, there are parts of Manhattan with parks that empty out at night and provide opportunities for a meandering late night run or walk, but I didn't live in those areas most of my time there. Since I live in a primarily commercial neighborhood now, the emptiness after dark is remarkable. There's plenty of grass in the further reaches of the biggest street, and no one around to enjoy it. It's like staying in one of those hotels that's part of a strip mall and nothing around it is open at night, only I live here. Yes, boring has its advantages.

foiled by randomness

it is definitely not my ambition in life to take things back to stores on a regular basis. unfortunately, it seems like i keep buying things that are totally ruined either the first day i own them or even before i even picked them up in the store. am i just not paying attention any longer? i used to think it was crazy that someone could mistakenly purchase diet soda, for example. it's been a long time since i decided that was not the case.

economies of style: hatwear

before i would start, i would like to thank the makers of my mail-order 2.5lb PC for including a utility that always turns on the built-in firewall after i have waited an unnecessarily long time for my wireless to connect. they must have thought 'hey, i know people like you are going to shell out $69 for a virus/evil/spyware protection utility to keep your machines out of trouble, but in case you're idiots, here's a function you won't be able to figure out how to disable that will protect you.' fellas, believe me, if it wasn't for the fact that you hit the price/tininess/shrunken screen coefficient right on the nail, i wouldn't be using your product in the first place.

it has come to my attention, upon reading my past few credit card statements, that even frugal individuals such as myself are effected by spending habits that veer out of control when brothers-in-law call requesting we purchase eight tickets for the game or when we mysteriously destroy our reliable 5lb miracle laptops, purchase ridicu-cheap aged replacements off ebay, purchase accessories for said replacements, and return from two-day trips to new york city to discover that we now own $100 coasters with $80 worth of brand new accessories. let me tell you, coasters need neither li-ion batteries nor power adapters, but apparently they can drain said batteries when inadvertently left sleeping in an effort to preserve my work in an operating system they will hardly ever be able to boot. in shorts, even the best of us have been known to fail.

this brings me to today's topic, or instead to an apology to actual new york-based readers of my blog. you may be disappointed or perplexed by the fact that you did not see me during my two-day stay in your fine city, so let me offer the following disclaimer. unless you fall into one of two categories: people who asked me to kill mice at their apts or former sunday school teachers i ran into on the street, i didn't see you while i was in the city. ok, i guess, i also saw one fellow virginian's older brother, but only because he was visiting the apartment with the mice. also, if i only saw one of my former sunday school teachers on the street, then i smiled at a random woman who smiled at me for pretty much the only time in my life; it can be hard to tell people's identity for certain when they are on their mobile phones. i figure at this point it is safe to offer that if you live in new york city and are still reading this, i would be happy to visit you if you only reach out to arrange for my arrival at a time that is convenient to you. with that, i will fail to discuss anything related to economies of style.

time is a luxury you can forget

he got back late. the lights were on. no one was home. several items on the floor were screaming at him though. there was a deafening ache in his head from too many distractions all day. order was impossible. sanity left me early in the day. prioritization wasn't really going to happen either. i thought about making copies for a few hours just to get away from my computer. nothing was solved, decided, or ruled out. i left a little after eight, knowing i'd be back tomorrow.

colored boxes

sometimes i feel iike i'm stuck in a movie. everyone shouting and staring at me. the floor seems to tremble under my hurried feet.i can't remember the last time i blinked when something hasn't changed drastically. streets crossed. buildings leveled. animals stuffed into cages and rushed away. now no one is left who believes me. the neighbors are closing in. each second my life collapses a little more. bright spots bloom before my eyes, blinking blindingly. all these medicines, always in little boxes.

signs of something

spoon concert today, which was perfect yet cause for reflection. without looking, i can't remember any 'best of the year so far' experiences. pretty sure there's been at least one.

i bought a used laptop recently, which has been a bit of a drain on my resources. not financially so much as temporally, or just mentally. there are at least three more issues i should address. so yes, i could have saved a lot of effort by spending more for something new. on the other hand, i need projects right now.

more than a day late

hmmm files:

voxtrot, somewhat reinvented and ramping up the hype once again.

build something

birdhouse
remote-control waffle iron
sawmill
bamboo hula hoop
plastic log cabin
graduate english department
flying flyswatter
cement lacrosse stick
sleeping bag recording studio
waterproof notepad

isn't it better to make something you can't explain than nothing at all?

yogurt cheddar potatoes

i made these up, so the recipe is sketchy at the moment

ingredients:
3 medium potatoes
8-12 oz sharp cheddar cheese
10 oz nonfat plain yogurt*
sea salt
black pepper
red pepper

directions:
preheat oven to 350**
cube the potatoes and boil them
whisk together cheese and yogurt

when the potatoes are ready, stick them in an (approx) 9"x12" pan
sprinkle with salt and black pepper***
cover evenly with yogurt-cheese mixture
sprinkle with black pepper and salt
add small amount of red pepper

bake 40 mins or until topping browns as desired

this is a slight twist on a very familiar dish, but the yogurt provides a surprisingly refreshing taste. the red pepper should be just enough to enhance the flavor subtly; it is not intended to provide noticeable heat.

notes:
*i'm guessing on the amount at this point, but you need enough to create a sauce once the cheese has been mixed in. it would be easy to add a lot more cheese than i did, but that would make this less healthy in comparison to more familiar cheese and potato recipes

**a higher temp might be more ideal; i used this b/c i was baking whole potatoes simultaneously and had read that 350 would work for that task

***i forgot to do this before adding the topping, but i think it's the right way to go. i was also liberal in adding additional pepper after baking.

now in rotation

music is tricky; it seems like the songs that are most promising initially can turn on you quickly. to be more accurate, the stuff that's catchy right off the bat grows tiring quickly. here are some of the albums that have crossed in and out of favor with me lately:

beirut - march of the zapotec/realpeople holland

so far, i love the way all the pieces are falling together as a beirut sound seems to endure through all the disparate styles. the vocals seem to tie it all together effortlessly

sin fang bous - clangour

don't have an opinion yet, but there seems to be some substance. sort of an architecture in helsinki feel, and i've never been particularly into them.

the postmarks - by the numbers

haven't heard the entire album, actually, but tracks 1-5 are great. 'you only live twice' is, naturally, a standout. the postmarks are a band i believe has more going for them than i personally can detect.

m. ward - post war

yes, he has a new album out; this is the previous one. despite a longtime feeling of respect for matt's stature as artist, i hadn't bothered to listen to his solo stuff until quite recently. i love that he doesn't just show off his guitar skills; the songwriting, vocals, and sonic textures make this a complete album rather than an instrumental showcase.

time of the signs

the mobile web doesn't really do april fool's day.

just an observation.