right on bro!

So I’m feeling a little better already after drinking a lot of water, so this sick day is turning into an errand and general maintenance day. I cleaned my apartment, and then I went out and bought some groceries.

Shopping on the weekday here is so much better than on the weekends. There aren’t nearly as many fools out there, less lines, and more inventory. Unlike the weekends, where people who slave away in the New World of Labor in America flock to retail establishments in highly compressed timeframes.

Maybe it would make sense to rotate people’s work weeks, just so retail and service establishments (which will be the only thing left after all of our jobs get shipped to Third World countries) can establish some sort of regularity, and people wouldn’t have to wait so much in line and for good service.

Worked. Staying home today, feeling jacked.

I swabbed my keyboard with alcohol to get the crap off of it. Somebody needs to invent a washable keyboard.

I watched a fistfight yesterday afternoon that occured at Figaro Cafe across the street. Heard shouting, went to the window, and saw some waiter who worked there was scrapping with some dude off the street whose shirt was all ripped up.

Stay out of Los Feliz, kids! It’s not safe! Even the restaurants will brawl with you! And it would be easier for me to get a parking spot!

Spent the day jamming with this band. Not quite ready to do the shows this week yet, but it looks like we’re not rehearsing again, so I’m pretty much gonna wing it after two rehearsals (one of which was spent hearing the songs for the first time). Should be okay.

I’m actually looking foward to a bunch of shit this week. Those shows, plus “Las Vegas” on Monday and “CSI” on Thursday.

Oh, I found my GameStop game credit. To all those who were worried about that, thanks for your concern.

How come when I want to order cable TV, it takes two weeks and two appointments (the first one being a no-show), but when I call and cancel my subscription to the STARZ channel, it’s done within 4 hours?

Ok, so, my friend brought over the “Biggie & Tupac” documentary last night, and we watched it. Pretty amazing.

Weekend’s here. I’m about to run out to the ‘dena for the 3rd time in 3 weeks, the part for my web camera is finally available. Now if I can just figure out how to solder it, you’ll end up seeing more than just postal vans and the Griffith Observatory.

Oh, and now that I traded in my games last week and got a $20 credit for it, I lost the credit. Nice work!

Just in case I failed to mention it, this week sucked.

Even when I went to Chan Dara this week, the waitresses were B Squad, possibly even C Squad.

And lots of high-profile people have seem to have died lately. Robert Palmer, that chick from Sweden, and some other people. What’s up with that?

Today I got in a massive argument with the product manager in charge of the sales side of our company, because I sent out an idea for an ad product without “going through him.” I didn’t point out to him that if I actually “went through him,” it would probably be like 3 weeks before I got any kind of response to my idea, and that he was being stupid for trying to insert himself between me and the sales team for something as trivial as asking people’s opinions, and that this kind of bureaucracy was something that was wrong with our company in the first place.

The odd thing is that I always thought this dude was one of the most smart people at my workplace, who always just kind of worked and never had to protect their territory in a fucked-up kind of way because they did good work.

So, here are two of my rules for working:

• Never insert yourself into a process just because you think you ought to know about something, if you are just going to end up creating bureacracy and get in the way of getting shit done.
• Nobody - I repeat, nobody - in this world is irreplaceable. That is the New World of Labor in America. What problems that may cause for your own well-being, is your concern. Please act accordingly.

So, in accordance with Rule #2….I am thinking seriously about cashing out and just calling it a day with this place, as I usually think seriously every Friday about this time. Try to get laid off, collect funemployment, sell off the few stock options I have, and then go reinvent myself. Start a new company (well, a very very very small company), a new band, drive cross-country, do whatever. There are so many other things I want to do, and as I approach 30, I ain’t getting any younger.

What I’ve never been able to overcome is actually fear of not knowing where I’m going. This job is really safe and routine. Lots of people think highly (or at least well) of me and my work at my workplace. I’ve always had some of the highest employee review marks in the history of the company. The fools at my company are like my co-stars in a permanent sitcom that never gets canceled.

I work, and sometimes I goof off, and every two weeks, I get a pretty nice amount of money deposited in my checking account. That regularity has recently allowed me the freedom to reasonably buy whatever I want. New Playstation 2 game? Sure. Trip to Vegas at the last minute? Bust. Buy a house? Well, not in L.A. Even if I could afford it, shit’s way too expensive for what you get.

There are probably about 10,000 people who would gladly have the job that I have now, and would do it with a daily smile and without bitching in their blog. Probably a few of them can do it way better than I can, and a lot more can do at least the same as I. And after that, there are a lot of people I know who are unemployed and struggling to get by, or some who are working a lot harder in jobs that pay a lot less than mine.

My parents have always valued having steady employment. I think they may actually be pretty proud of me, even though I don’t think they understand exactly what it is that I do. If I took a leap off into the unknown, I’m not sure they’d understand, and that would suck.

I’ve been broke before, and I resolved to myself that I’d never want to be in that situation again. But, despite the fact that I have a lot less real-world problems, I can’t say that I’m any happier now than I was before. Besides the fact that I can pseudo-buy myself to happiness, which I actually do not do all that much.

Bitch, bitch, bitch. I should just shut up and be thankful for what I have, no?

All of this reminds me of one of my ex-girlfriends, who said to me, “You pretty much just need a little cocksucking now and then, don’t you?” She was probably more right than anyone’s ever been about me, and it’s pretty painful to admit it.

I have the official CSI: Crime Scene Investigation screensaver installed on my email PC. It has a countdown to the first eposide.

I wonder what happens to the screensaver after the first episode airs tonight.

Managed to work myself into a day-long headache by drinking 3 cups of coffee before I went to work, and then a venti-sized iced cofee from Starbucks. Nice work!

My fingers hurt. I went to my cousin’s house to play in his Halo festival. Twelve fools, three XBoxes and two TVs, including two big-ass-mofo projection TVs. This is the second time I’ve ever played Halo before. Managed to work fools pretty well - in deathmatch in Blood Gulch, I actually came out in second place the first time, and first place the second time. So, my right index fingers is especially worked from repeatedly hitting the firing button for the stupid plasma gun.

Halo’s pretty dope - I think I’m getting the PC version when it comes out in a week or so.

I also jammed with my friend’s band, the one that I’m filling in for awhile to play shows they’ve had booked while they search for a new guitar player. I managed to bust out the rock-n-roll pretty well, for not having barely touched my six-string over the past three years. Especially this kind of rock - kind of bar-room three-chords-and-some-blues-scales type stuff, which I’m competent at but by no means am great. The stuff I’d worked on beforehand came out ready-to-go. I have to learn, and write parts for (since their other guitarist never did much beyond double the singer’s chords), seven songs by next Sunday, and then go through one more rehearsal, and then I have the first show two weeks from now. Should be fun.

The lead singer lent me his Fender Blues DeVille 4×12 to play through while I get my amp cleaned up and retubed. Ran a my Strat with a Rat through the clean channel ‘cos I couldn’t figure out where to stick the delay pedal in the effects loop. Jesus, that combination sounds really good. I’ve had that Rat for five years and have never really used it.

It was weird playing with a different drummer other than my friend Steve, who I’ve been playing with for the last four years.

Wanted to go see Mogwai tonight (forgot about it and forgot to buy tickets), but they were sold out. Worked.