Patrick

There was this waiter in my dream this evening. He had only ever worked in the classiest of big city restaurants, where he was comfortable in his place as a subordinate serving people. It was, I suppose, all he knew of how to engage with customers, possibly people altogether, and understood that relationship as necessary and familiar.

Now, he found himself in some hole-in-the-wall in Eureka. The customers made small talk with him, and he had a variety of duties to perform in front of customers which would never be done anywhere he worked. Wipe off a table with a rag? Good god.

So he nervously made small talk, being new to all of this. His way of engaging with this drastic shift in his behavior was to make the small talk about his nervousness. It was thoroughly endearing. He smiled at my guest and I more nervous than that guy I was hitting on earlier today, expressed his need to go move tables around for a large unannounced party that just came in, had a brief vision of his glory days serving the rich and well-known, and pulled some tables together.

My dream characters are awful one-dimensional.

"It was Ikea Blue... more commonly known as blue."

I was having lunch in Tranquili-Tea yesterday (a vegan/vegetarian restaurant in northtown Arcata) and my friend asked for some hot sauce. They brought us some and as I looked at the bottle, I realized it is hot sauce made by the Black Panther Party. It was called "Burn Baby Burn" and had a little history of the Black Panthers on the side. It was also pretty delicious.

Someday I'll attend a rehearsal dinner for a wedding and not be hit on by a drunk bridesmaid

but not today!

"The 1950s were all about seeing how many different foods you could put on top of a single cracker and still have it taste bland."

Kerry

I'm baffled why people from my brother's high school class keep friending me on the Facebook. I mean, I remember who you are, but really? We've never spoken. That I remember. I last saw you when I was twelve.

Additionally, Facebook asked me this

Which example applies to you?

Right now your Mini-Feed may be confusing. Please choose how we should refer to you.
Please select either Male or Female

* Patrick edited her profile.
* Patrick edited his profile.

which is silly. I mean, hey, I dislike their poor use of "their" as a gender-neutral pronoun (since it is, well, not a singular pronoun), but this is silly.

I'm thinking of deleting my account there. It's too ridiculous.

This entry was not suppose to be about Facebook. Sorry.

Rogues do it from behind

Linux users do it in the open
Linux users do it mounted
Linux users do it with wine

I got a B- in a class I thought I failed the final for.

A C in a class I missed almost half of and did half the homework for.

A credit in a workshop I didn't show up to.

I'm a little confused. This only justified my being unmotivated. Especially that B-, I mean, I got a C- on the midterm. What?

The other day I went into Humboldt Herbals to buy some peppermint tea, which I have been out of since June. I was browsing their teas, and I saw one labeled, "Polari Tea," and I though to myself, what the hell? Polari Tea? I proceeded to ask the lady working about it, and she pointed out that it was a pun (polarity, polari-ty, polari-tea, get it? herbalists are hilarious) because the tea helps your balance. I then proceeded to explain to her what I thought it meant. Amusement was had.

sometimes when I turn on my computer, the theme and style of the windows and desktop are completely different than when I turned it off.

Today I got into my car to drive to the cobbler when I noticed a sign duct taped to the front windshield. It read, "my drinking team has a racing problem. nascar4lif"

Stress relief and memory building exercise which is fun and amusing

I made a comprehensive list of ever person I have ever been attracted to, had a crush on, been on a date with, or asked out.

I'm up to 65 people and have been working on it since Thursday night.

Only counting people I know in real life and know the names of.

I feel like a lot of bullshit has been required of me the last few days. Maybe it was writing that cover letter or petitioning the Religious Studies professors to let me take senior seminar (you're four units short, thus you may not graduate for another year!).

But I have sourdough starter and a workshop proposal for the social justice summit, so I'm pretty happy.

A few years back, I went on a trip to the UCLGBTIA Western Regional Conference with several people. When we arrived at the hotel rooms and it came time to divvy up the beds, someone suggested the classic method of boys in one room and girl in the other. It was pointed out that the nature of the group negated the traditional reasoning behind that method. We slept with whom we wanted.

But I was thinking about that today, since the part that was pointed out is rather comical to me, and I thought about how there are high schools for the gays, and how do they handle those situations? Do the dichotomous essentialist schools always pair a gay boy with a lesbian, do the radically liberal school say you can be with whoever, or do the schools where everyone knows everyone put people together on an individual basis with an understanding that nothing will happen between these two particular people. Perhaps some trust their students enough to not mess around, since some scandal would certainly greatly damage the school.

I'd like the know the policies, and moreover, how they came to those policies.

I was just talking with (at) Anthony last night about how class privilege is the acceptable one to talk about. I mean, among liberals. Naturally it should go without saying, but any jackass reading this needs me to say it, it's a very real system of privilege and oppression.


The list is based on an exercise developed by Will Barratt, Meagan Cahill, Angie Carlen, Minnette Huck, Drew Lurker, Stacy Ploskonka at Illinois State University. The exercise developers ask that if you participate in this blog game, you acknowledge their copyright.

If you post this in your blog, please leave a comment on this post. To participate in this blog game, copy and paste the below list into your blog, and bold the items that are true for you. If you don't have a blog, feel free to post your responses in the comments.

Father went to college
Father finished college
Mother went to college
Mother finished college
Have any relative who is an attorney, physician, or professor
Were the same or higher class than your high school teachers
Had more than 50 books in your childhood home
Had more than 500 books in your childhood home
Were read children's books by a parent
Had lessons of any kind before you turned 18
Had more than two kinds of lessons before you turned 18
The people in the media who dress and talk like me are portrayed positively
Had a credit card with your name on it before you turned 18
Went to a private high school
Went to summer camp
Had a private tutor before you turned 18
Family vacations involved staying at hotels
Your clothing was all bought new before you turned 18
Your parents bought you a car that was not a hand-me-down from them
There was original art in your house when you were a child
Had a phone in your room before you turned 18
You and your family lived in a single family house
Your parent(s) owned their own house or apartment before you left home
You had your own room as a child
Participated in an SAT/ACT prep course
Had your own TV in your room in High School
Owned a mutual fund or IRA in High School or College
Flew anywhere on a commercial airline before you turned 16
Went on a cruise with your family
Went on more than one cruise with your family
Your parents took you to museums and art galleries as you grew up
You were unaware of how much heating bills were for your family

I felt the need to justify many of those, but I didn't. Only to say, single family home (hai2u, heterosexism) wasn't always the case, since many extended family members and friends lived here while I was growing up, but it was the case the majority of the time.

I read over the list a few times. I appreciated its inclusion of economic and social class distinctions. First I noted which ones I would want my children to say (ewe, why?), which lead me to realize it is obviously intended for college-aged students to note the classism in their raising. Then I noted the limited scope, only briefly before connecting how class privilege is connected to heterosexual privilege: the meme assumed the parents aren't divorced, the child didn't have two homes (and more importantly: two very differently classed homes). It also assumed (with the first four) knowing both parents.

Oh crap, I just remembered: I owe Anja a drink. I don't think she'll be getting that out of me, living in Germany and all.

All the more reason for an impromptu trip to Germany some day.

To top it off, she made me a farewell dinner tonight, it was all the European girls in our building and me. We watched the Sound of Music. It was silly.

I said goodbye to most people last night, since a group headed off to Prague for the week.


I have been shopping these last few days, since I realized I basically bought nothing my entire time here besides food. Now I have half my Christmas shopping done and a new hat.

I taxi will be here in three hours to take me to a bus. That bus will take me to an airport. An airplane will take me to Dublin then Chicago. Then another airplane will take me to Hartford. Then Anthony will take me wherever Anthony is going to take me.

It may be 4:15 in the foredawn, but for the first time in about three months I'm not regretting coming to Ireland.

Sure is too bad I'm leaving in 54 hours.

Cabaret always leaves me feeling so depressed.

I woke up to the building-wide smoke alarm.

Must be Thanksgiving.

I don't understand Lacan.

There, I said it.