stranded and shorn

Somehow, by the hand of some perverse little god who doesn't have much to do with himself besides driving me slowly insane, I've been stranded out here in Redwood City, waiting for a shuttle to the CalTrain which I've already missed twice by the margin of a glance and desperate holler -- too late! -- after a deaf driver. At least my laptop is with me, and this is therefore time spent well, if not necessarily wisely. I have a paper and a database modeling assignment, both due within the next week, plus a C++ project that I could (admittedly) whip off in the space of an hour or two, with corresponding documentation that would probably take longer than all the coding put together. I could spend my waiting time doing those things, instead. It occurs to me, though, that I'll be in Japan for a week starting Sunday, and I've not done proper penance for not doing any journal entries, and so...

...well. Everything needs an excuse. And I don't feel like doing my paper, anyway.

It's 8:35 pm, and the next CalTrain to San Francisco leaves at 8:40. It takes 30 minutes to get to the station by foot. 15 minutes by shuttle. The shuttle probably won't come back for another five, ten minutes.

Can anybody do the math on this?

I have a college degree. I swear.

My hair, as threatened, is once more trimmed close to my head, and I've found (in conjunction) a pair of fat headbands straight from the days of Leave It To Beaver. The happy little Chinese man -- note how I've renamed him, at least in my mind -- welcomed me with a cluck of pleasure and stuffed me in a chair to wait. He was busy doing some obscurely smelly thing to some other woman's head; a woman materialized out of nowhere and claimed my jacket with a charmingly solicitous care. I, solaced with the company of an Orson Scott Card book I'd never read, settled down in my cushions and entertained myself quite cheerfully for the half hour it took him to finish.

Then it was my turn.

"How you doing?" he wanted to know. He beamed happily. "You need shampoo, eh? Okay. I shampoo. You come here, please, and I do shampoo."

I submitted meekly to the process of wrapping the rest of me in swaddling cloth -- mustn't let water touch the precious clothes -- and luxuriated for a little while under determined little fingers (massage massage massage) and hot water.

There was another hair stylist in the shop, who was busily sweeping up after the previous customer. She and my hairstylist were engaging in an enthusiastic argument of some sort. Chinese was exploding in little fits and spurts above me. When one's head is being kneaded, one lets little things like that slide by without comment.

The customary procedure for my hairdresser is as follows:

1. Strangle fat-necked client in plastic.
2. Wash fat-necked client's head.
3. Rub fat-necked client's ears dry. Pat pat, scrub. Swoosh.
4. Put fat-necked client in adjustable chair.
5. Put magazines in front of fat-necked client.
6. Urge fat-necked client to read magazines.
7. Start cutting hair.
8. Ask about the upcoming vacation: what will fat-necked client be doing?
9. Where will fat-necked client be going?
10. Finish cutting. Ask fat-necked client how fat-necked client would like her hair to be cut.
11. Offer pictures of starving Bosnian refugee models to pick from.
12. Listen gravely to fat-necked client's decision.
13. Ignore fat-necked client's choice.
14. Cut fat-necked client's hair.

Some things don't change. I do my hairdresser an injustice, of course; no matter how he chooses to clip my hair, I've never gotten any complaints about the way I look afterwards. Usually, I receive compliments. This could be because I'm so scary nobody has the guts to tell me to my face how awful I look, or -- which is more likely, if less satisfactory -- everybody's too polite to say so. I suppose the third possibility would be that I actually do look good, and for the hairdresser's sake, I'm hoping that's the case. I don't care how I look, myself; not, that is, beyond the vaguely unformed female fashion which is more biologically hard-wired -- prospective mates and the attraction thereof -- than consciously aimed at. I only look at myself for five minutes out of every day: passing glimpses in store windows, or bathroom mirrors when I'm checking myself for invisible, paranoia-induced pimples or warts. It's everybody else who's inflicted with my round face and new haircut; for their sake, (because I'm a selfless person, as I'm willing to tell anybody who asks), I always aim to have a good haircut.

Too, and this is another point I need to make in order to give my hairdresser the credit that's really due to him, I've only twice attempted to give him any sort of coherent guidance in the styling or cutting of my hair. It's true that he's ignored me with blithe unconcern, both times. I've long since given up, and now he knows to smile kindly and benevolently at any suggestions I might make, thus supplying me with the illusion of control when in reality he'll do what he knows is what's best for me. Parents do as much for their children; could he do any less for his poor, misguided little fat-necked client?

My roommate came home to my newly shorn head and rewarded my efforts with chirpy congratulations. My sister arrived shortly after, and seconded the compliments when cued.

"We like Yuhri's new haircut, don't we?" Smurfette prompted.

"Hm. Yeah. You're cute, Yuhri." She took a second look, hugged my head, and made a mess of my hair. The light of speculation was a threatening thing in her eyes.

"So....you want to have dinner with [insert male name here]?"

The math, it turned out, proved unsatisfactory after all, and I was left to wait for the next train at 9:40. The time was spent productively, however. There was one other person in the shuttle to CalTrain with me, who I discovered was named 'Vic'; there was, moreover, an older woman wandering the platform with the gloomy satisfaction of one who has actually watched the train pass by and been on the wrong platform for boarding.

I offered to buy them both dinner, and here we see how my character has evolved into a beautiful thing over the last few months. Even so far back as the beginning of July, I would never have done anything of the sort. I would have been too shy, too embarrassed, too concerned with how these complete strangers would think of me, not to mention too poor. I lacked self-confidence. Behold me as I am today: garrulous, inquisitive, friendly; I interviewed, with a shiny-eyed interest in the lives of perfect strangers, people I will never meet again.

I wandered home in sandals at 11:00 pm in the pouring rain, pretty well satisfied with myself. I have blossomed.

gibbers

Two good things in the mail, lately: one from Flamingo, who sent me a sweet card that maked me sniffle, and the other a set of CDs put out by my aunt. The CDs were great -- I listen to them from time to time, and feel nostalgic for the days when I was as good -- and the card now holds a place of honor on top of one of the many newly clean surfaces in my room.

The Sun people are going to finish putting patches on their lab machines, and then they're going to rip out some disk arrays so we can test our software. How exciting is that? I want to watch the ripping out part. Constructive, sanctioned destruction. Yum.

Everybody else in my group now has a little box of cereal by their desk. They bought their own, see? They want to be like me. I'd mock them about it, except for the fact that they won't let me live down the day when I brought four boxes in to work.

A gift of a link from Jazz, who never ever ever sends voluntary email; it all goes to show you what her priorities are, that the one thing she sends me via email is this. Not that I'm complaining, mind you. Cupid! Hurrah! And Sports Night! Hurrah! Die, you Network bastards. A few more conversions like this and I'll never watch another network show again.

And on my last television note, I'd like to point out that Ice-T is now on Law & Order: SVU, and that his only two lines in the very last two minutes of the show were great. Ow. What a note to end an episode on; how marvelously Dick Wolf.

I watched movies this weekend. Stir of Echoes. (Bah.) Stigmata. (Okay.) Mansfield Park (Pissed me off, sort of. I think it was good. I'm not sure. I might have liked it, but I'm not positive. What a strange, twisted story-- ) and Blade. (Bah.)

So many bad movies. So little time.

In the meantime, I'm going to Korea. I received an enigmatic email from my friend The Eye, with the comment: "You didn't tell me you were going to Korea." As far as I was aware, I wasn't. Having received no notification, no contract, no offer letter from them, I was rather under the impression that nothing was actually going to happen on that front.

A few days later, my mother called.

"I just got the brochure for Korea," she announced, happily. "Look, there's your aunt's name, and then there're other names, other names, other names, and then here, your name."

"Son of a --"

...and so I'm going to Korea after all. My aunt called a short while later and told me they were going to send me a contract, soon.

And that reminds me that I need to give her my fax number. Oy.

dating

Well, that's one hurdle down.

With the urgent pushing and pulling of my sister, who kept swatting me under the dinner table last night for unknown reasons, I ventured forth into the world of First Dates, New People, and Life as a Single 20-something.

I already hate it, and I'm barely in the water.

Insofar as first dates go, I'm told, it wasn't that bad. The guy was nice enough, I suppose, though he didn't have much to say for himself; it was frustratingly hard to get him into conversation, as he seemed extremely loathe to participate in what was being tossed around the table.

"He's quiet," my sister said weakly, while we were stalking our ways to his apartment to have dessert.

"Hm."

She thwarted my every attempt to go home early; I had stuff to do, and little time to do it -- homework kept intruding in on every thought I was having -- and pretty much forced me to go with them to get dessert at his apartment.

I was bored. I was. That is, I like hanging out with my sister and her boyfriend, but in all other respects, bleh. I would've had a more enjoyable time hanging out with my roommate and Vacuum Man, though I hadn't managed to get back home in time to meet up at the bar with them. Smurfette, eyes bright with interest, was waiting for us when we got back. She listened to my sister's raving excitement, -- which seemed a little more enthusiastic than was really called for; one would think that I'd swum across the English Channel using an ice-cream spoon, or bought back Tibet -- and congratulated her. Congratulated her. Ptooey.

So now I've tried dating, found it shallow and dull, and am ready to learn contact juggling.

I have to find a new apartment before the end of November.

The word is official, as of today; my roommate says she can no longer afford to live in San Francisco. Who can, really? I'm wondering if she'll be able to find a cheaper rent in Silicon Valley, which is where she's headed. It doesn't matter; our roommate-ship is over, insofar as I'm aware, so it's time for me to pack my bags and head for southern hills. She left a message on my phone machine to tell me that she'd looked at the lease, and that if we give our thirty-day notice at the end of October, we've already paid our last month's rent so we'll be okay for another month, at least. That gives me 45 days. Surely that's enough time, isn't it?

I've done some exploring on rent.net already, and hit up several people at work for leads. They're now required to help me find an apartment; if they don't, I've threatened to drive them insane. They know I can do it, too. This is not an idle threat.

I'll call Tara tonight and see if she's willing to drive me around at some point during the weekend. Ho hum. There are better ways to spend one's weekends, that's for sure. Has to be done. C'est la vie.

shoe

I've gone and lost my shoe.

Not both. That would make sense. I lose my shoes from time to time, simply by taking them off in one part of the building I'm in, and then walking off without them. I've done that since college. I even had a reputation for it.

One morning I woke up at an ungodly hour (8:20 am. -- oh, for those long lost days of golden youth!) -- in order to get to an 8:30 class on time. Bleary-eyed, not quite focused, definitely not awake enough to give a damn, I padded to the elevator and leaned my head against the wall with my eyes closed, stabbing at the button in a desultory fashion.

The door behind me opened.

"Hey, Yuhri." It was the harp player who lived in one of the turret rooms. I mumbled something at her without looking, eyes still closed.

"Like your shoes," she offered, as she passed.

I woke up enough to track her compliment to its source, and looked down at my stockinged feet. I'd forgotten my shoes. Probably a bad thing, considering the Rochester winter; it had snowed the night before, and snowdrifts outside the front door were well over my head.

"Oh," I sighed, and started wandering back to the room. The elevator doors opened, perversely on cue, and pinged behind me.

"Oh my God," the Harpist carolled, joyfully. "You forgot your shoes. I have to tell him about this---"

She reversed course and dove back into her room; I dug under my bed and heard shrieks of hilarity coming through the walls.

And so it goes.

I found my shoe. It was hiding under a map of the US in an empty cubicle around the corner. I'm unwilling to accuse it of running away; nevertheless, because awareness is prickling under my skin in a most uncomfortable manner, I tied it to my filing cabinet with a set of headphones and a cable cord.

Some stranger from upstairs paused to read the Etch-A-Sketch outside my cubicle -- "The day Microsoft makes something that doesn't suck is probably the day they start making vacuum cleaners." (compliments of Arien) -- and stayed a little longer to watch me engaging in shoe bondage.

"Kinky," he commented, and wandered on. I heard him a few minutes later in another bank of cubicles further down.

"You know there's a girl over there tying her shoes to her walls--?"

toot

National Discount Brokers
• 1. dial 1-800-888-3999 (it's free)
• 2. listen to the options
• 3. when you hear what number 7 is press number 7
• (WAIT FOR IT, don't jump right to 7)

I'm back on CalTrain again, this time on my way to work. Somehow I always end up on the train; I don't mind, particularly. Insofar as my various commuting means go, the Caltrain is actually one of the most comfortable. This way I can pick and choose the exact time that I want to be at work, and can even sleep in -- a miracle of convenience for me, these days. Last night, for instance, I actually got almost eight hours of sleep. This entire past week has been spent wallowing in such luxury.

This week I'm back on the workwagon, but I needed that time. I've been feeling nauseous and queasy for the last week or so, and better that I'm a little late to work now and then than missing an entire week or so by getting sick.

Oh, here we go. The train is moving. I do so enjoy train travel.

Chug-a-chug-a-chug-a-chug-a-choooo! chooooo!

Once more into the fray. My sister has announced that she's going to pick me up at eight o'clock with her boyfriend and, yes, yet again, that blind date that I managed to get out of the first time by a pure coincidence that had nothing to do with me. She's determined. Fine. Let's get it over with, and we'll move on with our lives.

Every morning on my way to work, no matter what the time, the bus I ride takes me through the heart of Chinatown, where we pass an open white truck filled with stack upon stack of dead pig carcasses. Besides the obvious, there's something quite unsettling about the sight of all those gaping pink mouths, and the fat, meaty bodies. Their rumps have tattoos on them in a dark blue color. This little truck of death drives up and down the Chinatown streets, dropping off bodies at a great many of the stores that it passes. That's another unnerving sight; the Chinese deliveryman, who can't be more than 5 foot 2 inches, stomping his way down the sidewalk with a pig hooked over his shoulder. Did I mention they use hooks? One unfortunate morning when the bus stopped right by the truck, I watched while this guy used a massive fishhook at least the size of my head to stab pig heads and drag their bodies out of the truck.

The body was cold and old enough that there wasn't any blood. I watched it sink in and come out of the eyeball; the deliveryman, I think, was swearing. I suppose it wasn't supposed to do that. Imagining that giant iron Thing slice in under the jaw and squish its way through the throat, slicing past the skull to savage the brain, then impale and burst an eyeball like an olive on a toothpick--

I haven't eaten pork in almost a year.

I've been working on finding a new apartment, one down in the Redwood City area. The weather is nicer there, and the city is quieter; I'll have to commute from time to time back up to San Francisco for classes, but that isn't any more of a burden than the daily commute that I have right now. Limiting it to one or two days a week would certainly be an improvement. San Francisco is wasted on me: the life, the activity, the events; I never get out of the apartment because the commute is so long, by the time I get back home, I'm exhausted and fretful, and still have homework to go.

Ignore other people's complaints about high rent; I'm looking for something under $1200 a month, and if I find it, I'll probably grab it. Damn the consequences. That's cheap.

I think one of the Chicken Family has lung cancer.

I sit in my room late at night, doing whatever it is that I do, and I hear him, hacking, coughing, phlegm rattling in his throat. It's an irritating sound, and it's consistent; every night, starting at eight, he starts. I can actually hear bubbles of pus rattling in his throat.

San Francisco. That lovely city. It's like fingernails scratching down the chalkboard of life.

(toooot! Toooooot!)

My sister! Oh, my sister. She gave me a present.

A very, very cool present.

She gave me a lucite ball. A lucite ball, in case anybody's wondering, is way, way cooler than a crystal ball. It doesn't chip so easily, for one thing. It's durable. It's reflective.

And, you can use it to do that thing that David Bowie did in Labyrinth, with the balls and the bubbles and the hands and the ... you know. That. "Contact Juggling," according to the book that she gave me together with the ball. I spent the entire first night practicing catching the ball on the back of my hand, while my sister crashed in a sleeping bag on the floor. I almost brained her a couple of times. It was a quiet night, interspersed with the "thunk, thunk" of the ball hitting my fingers, and the occasional "Thud. 'Ow.' 'Sorry.'" of my mistakes.

The train stopped. Why did the train stop, dammit? I'm going to be late. Later. Late. Crap.

(Toooooooooooooooot!)

Time to backtrack a little, I suppose. Time for a different entry. I'm tired of this one; I need another one, and it's only two more weeks until Japan. Need a new entry. Need a new title. Need a new picture to go with the new title. I'll call it....

westech

Westech, for those of you who don't know, is a massive job fair sponsored by brassring.com. Down in Silicon Valley, it's held in the Santa Clara Convention Center, and offers a selection of over 800 employers. Over 20,000 job-seeking participants show up, I was told. It was a ravenous pool of sharks -- good gods, how huge a pool! -- and most of the participants who wandered glazed-eyed and booty-laden through the aisles displayed obvious signs of sensory overload.

The manager of our documentation team and I popped up only a few minutes late, and found our booth in a distant, remote, less-traveled portion of the floor. I was looking decent, which meant I'd foolishly decided to wear a heavy chenille sweater in response to the weather up in San Francisco and Redwood City. As it turned out, the weather in Santa Clara was perversely nice and warm, and by the time we'd marched through the ranks of booths and located our homestead, I was flushed and frustrated.

Doc Man, -- oh, hurrah! Another new nickname! that works for him -- was wearing a turtleneck and a company t-shirt, and he still managed to look cheerfully comfortable. I pondered harboring deep hatred for him, but discarded it because he's just too easy to like, and it was too much trouble, anyway.

It was a frenzy. Our company's name is well-known and stable, inasmuch as anything is, these days. We handed out toys like all the other vendors did: keychains and pens, the former of which I required assistance in figuring out. This was occasion for much mirth among passers-by. Some of the job-seekers had gotten bags to keep their goodies in. I saw one man marionette walking a flourescent green alien doll around the Novell booth.

I schmoozed and sparkled and fizzed at people; I made determined eye-contact, chatted up some folks, accepted a million and one resumes, did a surprising amount of career counseling, and found a few possible candidates for my group.

"What's it like working there?" one asked. I told him the rosy picture, then plugged in a few of the negatives, and he gave me his resume anyway. Sys Admin. Awesome. We need those.

"What's going on with your stock?" asked another. I laughed with him, made rueful, wildly speculative comments about butterfly wings in Shanghai and the price of wheat, and got his resume. Java programmer. Cool.

"What does your company do, exactly?" asked yet another. I gave him the overview of the company, narrowed it down to what my group specifically was looking for, and helped him identify what he might be best suited for in our ranks and what department to apply to.

I was working that crowd. I was jamming. I was on a roll. I was there, yo, and moths danced, burning, in my light. I even got compliments from the people I helped.

"You've got a real talent for this," one marketing executive said admiringly, after I looked over his resume.

"Are you an HR person?" another asked. I'm taking that as a compliment, because I know she meant it as one.

"Oh my God. Do all engineers have to be like you?" another college grad asked, stricken. He was shy and awkward. That one, I have to admit, didn't spring to the ear as a compliment, though he assured me hastily that it actually was, "--because we don't learn people skills in college."

When did I turn into the great people person? When did everybody start assuming I'm an extrovert? And all that smiling I did that day, it was all sincere. I enjoyed it. I had fun. Was I born this way? Was Chrissy from Love Boat always lurking somewhere in the dark shadows of my personality?

Eventually I started to lose steam, of course. My mind started to wander; we were there three hours and then some, and I spoke to at least a hundred fifty people. Near the end, I was speaking to one young woman who was interested in Network Engineering.

"...because this company is a great place for hardware, hands-on experience," I told her.

I meant to tell her.

What actually came out: "...because this company is a great place for a hard-on."

Her eyes got a little rounder, but she remained silent. Perhaps she was worried that this was some tech term that she hadn't learned in college.

It took me a few moments, too.

I covered my face with my hands and thought about laughing.

"Boy," said an older man, standing nearby and listening. "You've sold me."

other stuff...

Birthday present! Hurray! The little Filipino man who runs our mail service came drifting by my cubicle, looking worried. He stopped and stared at me for a solid minute before disappearing; then he reappeared five minutes later, still carrying his little package. He stared at me, then disappeared again. And then, thirty minutes later, reappeared.

"Is this you?" he finally asked, and thrust his delivery at me.

It was. Relieved, he trotted off, no doubt to make other speedy deliveries. (He's a cool guy, our mailman.) Neither rain nor snow, nor complete ignorance...

It was a book of Sexy Haikus from Ki. Thank you, Ki! The card adorns my wall, and the book adorns my bookshelf, next to the ... hm. Two boxes of cereal that are left from the original four. I'm looooooved.

mornings

It's Monday again, and I dressed for San Francisco weather. That is to say, I dressed for the weather it should have been in San Francisco, only to discover when I left the apartment that it was reversed; Redwood City is displaying all the gloominess of a typical San Francisco winter day, whereas the City itself is muggy and warm. Earthquake weather, they call it.

At least I'm dressed reasonably for one of the two.

When last we met...

I was scheduled to go on a blind date with one of my sister's boyfriend's friends. I didn't. Not my fault, I might add; he ended up having to work, and I've never gone so far as to reschedule. My sister, on the other hand, has an entire agenda planned. There's a note of discouragement in her voice when she talks about these sorts of things nowadays, however; I can hear it under the hard note of fanaticism that otherwise blankets all statements regarding my love life.

"Don't be discouraged," I said to her, kindly. "I'm living in San Francisco. What do you expect me to do? Meet some straight male?"

"I did," she retorted, glowering and sullen.

"That's different. You're you. I'm me."

A weak argument, but certainly unarguable. She lapsed into gloomy silence.

When last we met...

Our stock, slipping like all stock, is now down to -- what is it now? Ah. -- 9.68.

Last Friday, Eddie Cheever, Jr, and his race cars and racing team came by the campus to tour and give demonstrations and inspirational talks to small children gnawing on sandwiches. All part of the perk to living and working for Excite@Home. It was actually quite interesting, (Eddie Cheever, Jr, that is; not the small children). The man is an entertaining and articulate speaker. They did a full pit stop in the parking lot in front of one of the buildings, and passed out earplugs and t-shirts. Many of the neighbors stopped by to watch, bearing infants in arms. Excite apparently sponsors the team, and so most of their apparel was coated in Excite emblems.

I got a free T-shirt. It's ugly. I wore it as a nightshirt for the entire weekend. It was fun, though, the entire thing.

But our stock is still at 9.68.

When last we met...

...oh, and now it's up to 10.68. They're such weird things, stocks are.

The Norwegian has gone back to Norway, which is where all good Norwegians go when they can't be in the US or Japan. "I was sad," the Marshmallow Peep confessed. "I dressed all in black and I sat on my bed and sniffled. It was pathetic. I said, 'What's wrong with me? He's only been on the plane two hours. He was at Macy's for four.' And you know that old fleece sweatshirt I have? I got it from someone a long time ago and it was old even when I got it, so it's super old, that one. He was wearing it, and I could smell his cologne on it, so I saw it there, and I picked it up and smelled it, and then I had to put it on so I could wrap myself up in it...."

All the world's a bad Pern game, and there's no way out. I could feel my eyes glazing over. Relationship talk always baffles me; I sit and wag my head like a little spring-necked Made In Taiwan dashboard toy, and make commiserating sounds that don't really mean anything, because try though I might, I simply cannot make myself listen to it for any length of time.

On the Saturday before, Smurfette was in a royal mood about the Norwegian, and bitched bitterly the entire way from the apartment to the Dojo. That's an hour train ride.

"I'm not the bad guy here," she insisted angrily, from time to time. "He's the one who did this and that and the other thing. Not me. I'm the one who's being patient and understanding."

"Uh huh," I said, agreeably. "Okay."

"And another thing--"

I wagged my head and thought about tulips. Just thinking about the deep Where Is Our Relationship Going And What Does It Mean To Us talks that those two engage in for fun makes my brain hurt. I can feel little blood vessels popping in my eyeballs.

I know why Jesus cries blood. It's because he has to listen to this stuff 24/7.

Perverse thing is up to 10.9375 now. What gives?

Today, for whatever reason, I'll be down in Santa Clara manning the Excite@Home booth at the Westech Job Fair. It's quite a switch, isn't it? It's the position that I've always wanted to be in: the one where you get to offer people jobs, as opposed to asking for one. It's not the feeling of power -- ahem -- but the fact that I like helping

I just saw the preview for Lord Of The Rings for the first time. This is when having a direct broadband access really comes in handy. There's no way this would have been a good idea if I'd been at my regular faux 56k dial-up modem.

But I wasn't. And all I have to say is this.

Wow.

And now, moving on to something else...