The List

- She almost has to be a brunette, though lately blondes have been making a comeback in my book. Redheads just remind me of sophmore year, though. Sorry.

- She has to be witty.

- She has to love movies (or else who's going to watch random stuff with me?)

- Must be a dog person, and not just the yappy kind. Otherwise it would just be awkward when my bulldog keeps chasing her lap-cat out of the room, and who really wants to have that fight?

- The eyes: I've had a history of girls with green eyes, always alluring, but the door is still wide open for any color. The key is that the eyes have to belie an intelligence and compassion and verve for life that can't be hidden.

- The Olive Theory. I hate them, she can have them all

- She should like helping the environment. I mean, I'm not asking for any kind of hippy-conservation expert, but interest in sustainability and changing your own life to reduce waste is key. Plus, do I really want a woman who doesn't care what kind of world we leave to our chalupas?

- She needs to appreciate, or at least tolerate, my random word uses, such as calling our future children "chalupas"

- Non-smoker, of course. And yes, sneaking out to smoke while I'm asleep is still a deal-breaker.

- To be continued....

News from Mars

Earth-shattering, breaking new from Mars.... It's still a desert there.

Yep.

If you happened to catch the landing on CNN, the Phoenix Lander touched down in Mars over the weekend, taking "first-ever" pictures of Mars. Big whoop, it's still a bunch of rocks and no water...

The best part of me: Even though Science is cool and sometimes fun, this shot of a room full of nerds is hilarious!

Duality of Desire

I was scrolling through the channels earlier and saw that Trust the Man was coming on. Debating watching it for the four time this year, and even, maybe, seeing the full film for the first time ever, I was reminded of how strikingly pretty Maggie Gyllenhall is.

But see, here's the problem. Seeing her look like she does below, make me imagine the exact type of girl that should have my children and spoil me far to much, but then....



















...seeing her like the picture below, reminds me of exactly the kind of unspeakably private things we would do to conceive said children...


















...and that's exactly where reality creeps in. Perhaps I have just been surrounded by one-sided women, perhaps I have the general malaise of not being happy, or worst of all, perhaps I have met the woman that perfectly embodies this, and I have failed to grasp it.

Not the happiest of posts today, but at least there are some great pictures to go with it.

What I've Learned: An Excerpt

I had originally imagined making this all one posts, but perhaps a serial will work better. So, here we go.

What I've Learned: An Excerpt

- Random awkwardness makes me laugh.

- Abrupt honesty angers people more than almost anything.

- The words "zombie apocalypse survival plan" tend to make a woman instantly hotter in my opinion.

Bocelli

So I just got done watching a movie and, as always happens when the score of a film is very operatic, I found myself wanting to enjoy some classic italian right away. On the right of the page you'll find a short music player with a couple tracks I uploaded tonight. Though not part of any opera, "Con Te Partiro / Time To Say Goodbye" by Bocelli is probably my favorite work, either as a duet or in an aria-like tradition. I included the Sarah Brightman duet because the London Symphony does something amazing between the words, and gives the piece almost an entirely different narrative. Below are the words in

Sarah:
Quando sono sola
sogno all'orizzonte
e mancan le parole,
si lo so che non c'è luce
in una stanza quando manca il sole,
se non ci sei tu con me, con me.
Su le finestre
mostra a tutti il mio cuore
che hai accesso,
chiudi dentro me
la luce che
hai incontrato per strada.

Time to say goodbye.
Paesi che non ho mai
veduto e vissuto con te,
adesso sì li vivrò.
Con te partirò
su navi per mari
che, io lo so,
no, no, non esistono più,
it's time to say goodbye.

Andrea:
Quando sei lontana
sogno all'orizzonte
e mancan le parole,
e io si lo so
che sei con me, con me,
tu mia luna tu sei qui con me,
mio sole tu sei qui con me,
con me, con me, con me.

Time to say goodbye.
Paesi che non ho mai
veduto e vissuto con te,
adesso sì li vivrò.
Con te partirò
su navi per mari
che, io lo so,
no, no, non esistono più,

Both:
con te io li rivivrò.
Con te partirò
su navi per mari
che, io lo so,
no, no, non esistono più,
con te io li rivivrò.
Con te partirò

Io con te.


Translation:

Sarah
When I'm alone
I dream of the horizon
and words fail;
yes, I know there is no light
in a room where the sun is absent,
if you are not here with me.
At the windows
show everyone my heart
which you set alight;
enclose within me
the light you
encountered on the street.

Time to say goodbye.
to countries I never
saw and shared with you,
now, yes, I shall experience them.
I'll go with you
on ships across seas
which, I know,
no, no, exist no longer;
it's time to say goodbye.

Andrea
When you are far away
I dream of the horizon
and words fail,
and, yes, I know
that you are with me;
you, my moon, are here with me,
my sun, you are here with me
with me, with me, with me.

Time to say goodbye.
to countries I never
saw and shared with you,
now, yes, I shall experience them.
I'll go with you
on ships across seas
which, I know,
no, no, exist no longer,

Both
with you I shall experience them again.
I'll go with you
on ships across seas
which, I know,
no, no, exist no longer,
with you I shall experience them again.
I'll go with you.

You and me.

Quick Shots

So yesterday I was at the library (had to return some movies I checked out about a year ago), and I had nothing else to do, so I went upstairs to actually read while still at the library. Well, being the way I am, I did more scanning than reading, but I couldn't much help it. When the raid stopped and the late afternoon light started making the clouds translucent, I found myself in front of the huge windows on the fifth floor of the library, admiring the buildings downtown, some of which I had never really paid attention to. Here are three quick shots I took with my cell phone. I wish I'd taken a real camera, but I don't know how much better the shots would have been because of all the sunshades and the three layers of glass on those windows....

In the first picture, you can see the front of my new apartments. It's good to sometimes gain a sense of scale and the part we play in the bigger picture.

GG Man U

How could I forget to mention, two days ago, might Manchester United pulled off the double and won the UEFA Champion's League Cup, defeating Chelsea in the shoot-out. Yes, after watching 120 minutes of the best club football in the world, it had to go to a shoot-out to decide the winner.

By the way, nice job John Terry. Way to show off your Captai arm-band trying to pschye out the keeper, then slip and fall when you had the chance to win the cup for your team. Lolz.

Also, as far as relentless Chelsea bashing goes, I'm not sure which of these is funnier:

Now, at least, it should be clear that the Premier League is the best league in euro club football, with three of the top 4 teams coming from Premier League. Hopefully the English national team can keep it up once Euro 2008 starts in a couple weeks. Damn you Ronaldo, why are you from Portugal!

CCTV

While trying to find the Banky image for the post below, I ran across this image from an unknown source.

I'm not sure if I like it most because it 1.) looks like an old Russian Propaganda, 2.) reminds me of 8-Bit technology, or 3.) reminds me of my favorite Alan Moore novel, The Watchmen. As Moore quote from Juvenal, "Quis custodiet ipsos custodes", or "Who will Watch the Watchmen"?

By the way, while you're at it, I recommend reading The Watchmen. Even if you aren't a fan of comic books or superhero's in general, the themes and the narrative both speak directly to dark place in everyone's hopes and fears, and the conclusion is the pen-ultimate moral connundrum.

Recent Topics from the Old (not Olde) Blog

Previously I did all my blogging on myspace. It was cool for the time being, but I think I'll enjoy this site much more. Nonetheless, I didn't want to lose the messages I had put up over there, so here's a link and a summary of the good stuff from the recent past.

Title: Radical Thought

Posted: 5/22

You know what would be an awesome tradition to start? On my birthday (such as today), all the women on my friends list should send me pictures of themselves in their birthday suits. Radical, I know, but hear me out. This tradition would ROCK!

Note: this was not as successful as hoped. I received only joke images and promises of genuine images yet to be recieved.

Title: New Career

Posted: 4/21

Today I officially decided to become a Black-Tie Ninja.

Beware my Middle-Management Technique!

You have been warned.

Note: the tie was later usurped by my brother in an attempt to conceal his Overly-Wrinkled Shirt Style. This attempt was met with success and I have yet to get my tie back.

Title: When Subtlety's Lost It's Edge...

Posted: 4/18

Or...Sometimes You Have to Smack Them in the Face.

New Banksy, his largest piece yet, a clear objection to limitations on freedom. If you think we have it bad here because of Bush, read up on how Britain has been transformed into a Big Brother-society. I hate to leap to conclusions, but it seems to me to be only a few steps and one charissmatic leader short of what Alan Moore showed us in "V for Vendetta"; but I digress. On to the art.

When I first saw this piece, I thought it was odd that Banksy spelled out his message. Even in Israel/Palestine, he let the viewer come to their own conclusion about the message. Then I presumed the Secruity Guard watching the boy was a tongue-in-cheek reference to his own new fame. The most hilarious part was when I saw the full view of the wall on which the piece was placed and read about how he erected a three-story scaffolding without being caught.

Note: I could not find the second, wider image to go with this, but just a few feet to the right of this piece is a cctv camera. This entire piece was done in direct sight of the enemy.

Title: Five Things: Quotes from my Playlist

Posted: Leap Day, 2/29

I've just been rocking out a lot lately, so I thought I'd share some. Here below are my favorite lines from the first five songs in my playlist.

Rest My Chemistry by Interpol

"And I've made stairways/ such scenes for things to regret/ oh, those days in the sun/ they bring a tear to my eye/"

While My Guitar Gently Weeps by The Beatles

"With every mistake we must surely be learning/ still my guitar gently weeps/"

Martyr for My Love for You by The White Stripes

"And I bet we could build a home/ but I know the right things for me to do is to leave you alone/"

Tear You Apart by She Wants Revenge

"It's only a crush, it'll go away/ it's just like the others, it'll go away/ or maybe this is danger and he just don't know/ you pray it all away but it continues to grow/"

I Saw Her Standing There by The Beatles

"Well she/ looked at me/ and I could see/ that before too long/ I'd fall in love with her/"

While often times my fews on the viability of love and it's further institutions can easily be contrued as "cynical" or "anti-", I think the songs above illustrate that even when we tell ourselves we are stepping back and resolving our own demons, we cannot help but encounter unknown possibilities. Maybe there is truth to the old maxim "it'll come along as soon as you stop looking for it". Or perhaps it's just obsession. Certainly we all know people who are addicted to one behaviour or another. I'd hate to think of someone as "my new drug", but in hind-sight, I think we can all easily call to mind at least one person from our pasts who would fit that describtion. Sometimes a fling is just a fling, but sometimes a fling is a fucking harsh life lesson. In fact, I will venture the following hypothestis; it is easier to stand tall and firm in the snarling face of adversity than in the comforting warmth of awful embrace.
When it's all said and done, I wonder who will think of me as their "Best Mistake".
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By the way, the rest of the songs follow a vague narrative arc. I don't think this applies to any one person so much as the natural cycle of my own love-life.
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Then again, it could all be "true love" and I haven't realized it yet.....

First Try, Second Guess?

I am compelled to start my first blog with the traditional:

Hello World!

Well, now that we've been formally introduced, why not take your coat off and stay a while? Sorry about the no-coat rack thing; just moved, haven't finished decking the place out.

Alright, so, though I suppose if anyone reads this they will likely already know me, I figure I should get some basics down on paper here. That is what you do in beginings, right?

- Yesterday was my 26th birthday. Overall it was pretty slow and chill. Not sure how much you can do on a Thursday night when friends that somehow seem to have all become sober. By the way, yes, that means I'm a Gemini and I think it's pretty fitting.

- I'm 5'10", I definately need to get in shape, but I can still give you tickets to the gun show.

- I'm probably more proud of my calves that I should be. Wanna take a look?

- I live and work in Central Phoenix. I lived in Midtown for almost 5 years, just moved down to Central & Roosevelt 8 days ago. So far it's wicked awesome. Just driving around the neighborhood and figuring out which routes to take to avoid traffic and one-ways; still doesn't relaly seem like I "live" here.

- Sometimes my hair looks like Collossus from the X-Men. I'm actually rather proud of this somedays.

- I am Catholic, though I've gone to church less than 5 times in the last year, and maybe twice in the decade before that. Last time I went to church, I took the girl I was seeing at the time and during the whole "peace be with you" part, I totally grabbed her butt out of habit. I like to think JC gave me a big thumbs-up on that one.

- I've had a few different jobs in my lifetime (landscaper, errand-boy, ball-boy, burger-flipper, cashier, etc), but I've worked for U-Haul now since I was a Senior in High School. Never thought that I'd still be there. Honestly, sometimes I still wonder what it is I "want to do when I grow up", but for now, this job pays the bills and give me minimal stress.

- Just typing about work right now made me log in to my e-mail to see how things are going on my day off.

- A couple years ago I would have said that Hip-Hop was the love of my life. Now, I'm not sure if it's just that I'm getting old, or that Hip-Hop has let me down, but my playlist is almost entirely rock these days.

- I have a rule to never drink alone. I've given up alcohol for Lent twice already. The second time was much easier than the first, though it's still tough to say no to cute girls with tequila and surprizingly deep navels.

- I can be totally random and yet somehow still think what I'm saying is totally related. Nothing like existensialism for you, eh?

By the way, here's a pic I took of myself yesterday. I was at the library and somebody sent me an urgent request to see what I looked like at exactly that minute. Not the greatest of grins, but on short notice it works.