"Time you enjoy wasting, was not wasted."

- John Lennon

through caffeine I realized...

I guess I'm frittering more hours with my friends compared to my folks at home. I feel I'm comfortably schmaltzier to these guys. We’ve known each other for years now. An average of 10 hours a day is foolishly spent together apart from of the working time that we make for school deadlines.

Two of my friends, a young lad and lass recently had an undesirable fight. Out of stress and anxiety they fell into an awful argument. It was over insensitivity and some other personal blemishes exhausting their strapping patience. The entire mount-up flaws that they had been holding was brought up stabbing themselves with disparaging battering.

The hard thing about being with people (especially friends) battering around you is that you’re hypothetically the umpire. You’re supposed to judge the players’ thump whether considered or below the belt. You’re supposed to say when to stop. You’re supposed to say when to get to their separate corners. But I did not. No one did. I thought it’s time to put it all up and purge all their decaying aggravation.

It just bothers me that for months we’ve been getting ourselves into this black hole of friendship mess. Four or five unpleasant brawl within a year.. quite awful. In this kind of battling situation someone usually gets hurt. Both did and people close to them did. They haven’t talked since the awful argument. As a result, guilt enters the ring. Guilt like at least you could have done a bit.

I used to think people who sat alone at Starbucks sipping coffees and staring blank were potential emo posers. Perhaps I was wrong. They are really gloomy people with bothering thoughts. I asked myself: Are they sad being the umpire or for being the players? What should we grasp in this battle field of puzzling friendship? As I sip my coffee I realized something: It just seems like the closer people get, the clearer the differences that are hanging between them.

babysitting my music.

Will cupid loom over the unromantic single guy? It’s Feb 14th. My plans? Babysitting my cd collection. Obviously I’ll be staying away from the sappy, cheesy, pathetic tracks that’ll just remind me of anything. Track 10 of John Mayer’s Continuum Album is an example. Whether it pertains about depression, anger, denial or even acceptance. I’ll put it all away and listen to cds that’ll wipe out the bulk out of my heart. I need something exciting, stirring, an anti-maudlin emotion that’ll definitely clobber a running mood.

Perhaps everyone’s idea of Valentine’s Day is either chocolates, twin lattes, long-stemmed flowers, Elvis Costello, or Burt Bacharach. However Valentine’s Day is not only suited for the amorous couples believing in destiny or soulmates. Dateless people could as well play a role in such momentous day.

How? Single guys become the friendly Feb 14th consultant. Why do the not-so-single ones ask the single guys like me? Somehow it’s getting annoying. I wish to walk to school shrouded or something to keep myself from the hysterical battering of dating questions.

I keep getting questions like what to do, where to go, what to eat, what to give. What am I to them? But this morning, things unfurled the other way. A friend asked.. (wait one this morning and another just this afternoon so...) Two friends asked: Don’t you miss enjoying valentine’s day?

I received this certain pity-look injecting sympathy over my romantic condition. It seems like single ones has always been subliminally discriminated on this supposedly warm occasion. At times by a strange fate, why do singles get even singled out?

a new obsession

My friend’s birthday is in two days. She’s artsy and smart, classy and a little cuckoo. She collects classic letter stamps, and strange porcelain chopsticks. I stood by the aisle of stamps with my glittering eyes and hastily took whatever. She’ll like it anyway... it’s a stamp!

I was standing in line at Fully Booked in Rockwell, waiting to pay for a fancy eerie stamp. As I was holding this tiny lavish gift, I glanced at my right and caught myself hinged on this shelf of author’s journal. I’ve been drooling to buy that pricy leather notebook but hesitation wouldn’t let me. I fell for its masculine appeal bulked with sheets of off-white pages and wrapped with reliable brown leather. It’s a little costly but utterly nice and classy.

I grabbed the pocket small leather journal and walked back to the cashier. As I was walking, my eyes were shifted to this stack of Moleskines. I heard about this famous artsy Italian notebook. It’s trendy, sleek and lean and legendary. I read Picasso was a moleskine fan. I took a fleeting look and it’s bloody expensive. The leather notebook is twice thicker and few bucks cheaper than moleskines.

I had this wow and ooh face from friends when I pulled it out of the bag. I know it’s a little pricey for a fucking notebook but it’s gratifying to write on such classy, handy and leathery journal. My journal is an old-fashioned outlet of thoughts and doodlings. It’s a journal, a sketchbook, and a canvass all fitted to one. Some never thought that I could never keep a journal, but hey my blog’s been running for roughly a year now!

just spitting it out

From the retreat I learned the importance of friendship. I appreciate and value every surrounding friend that I have now. Sensitivity, understanding and fidelity are somewhat the qualities that will craft relationships to last for decades. We all have the desire to have good friends to keep for like gazillion years more.

I’ve written about a friend who was nearly spattered against the wall after an unintended schoolwork-peril. Perhaps it’s time to drop that noxious discernment that he may have injected in our heads. It’s time to move on. The guy had reconciled. He had experienced the consequences fair enough to realize the weight of his thoughtless actions.

A couple of people are somehow closing their eyes to fidelity and understanding. Everyone was pressuring me but I hate leaving someone behind. Have you experience being trapped in the middle? Like you have to choose side but both are too risky carrying almost the same load as the other. I stayed up all night thinking about this shit.

I chose the friend who is currently climbing the Everest after falling several times bloodily hitting himself. He needs someone whom he could throw all his anger and frustrations without receiving any judgment in his character. If we run off and leave him behind he could fall back and give up. He needs to recognize our company as real and trustworthy. We can’t let him drown with paranoia and suspicion doubting every friend that he has now.

He may be laughing with our silliest moods and cracking the stupidest jokes but somehow I still feel this doubtful air. I guess it’s time to spit out all the toxicity left in our heads. Let us move on. Be his friend without carrying our worries and uncertainties. Be understanding, be sensitive, be loyal.

It’s just that simple and I’m having a hard time explaining to everyone about it.

half-empty

I’m taking advantage of my free time. Invitations were everywhere lately. Look, no major plate for the next 7 days which means no deadlines to catch and no pressure to complain about. Going out really helps me to escape from my life for a while. We hardly had fun since we took Architecture. Last night I thought of getting drunk. I was hungry for the feeling of being in a daze. My head was indeed whispering for numbing alcohol.

Since we’re just planning to get drunk, we got some beers first then stayed at a friend’s house in White Plains. My friends and I were savoring every sip of the icy beers. We had the usual outlandish beer talk. We were all drinking and amusingly trying to get our asses wasted again. The drinking was own to seven guys. Everyone was just bloodily cracking the stupidest jokes and the stupidest stuff.

I always get tipsy a lot faster than the rest, it’s just that no one notices it. After who-knows-how-many beers, everyone was just laughing, cussing, swaying, and frolicking. No one’s going home dude. Our conversation was going nowhere. No one was making any sense and that contributed to the fun. We were like wilted idiots clattering the most nonsensical things in the world.

Few hours and more beers later, I felt this heavy slump weighing on my head and my body begins to numb a little. I was such an ass making a reckless mess of myself. I was saying and doing things to my friends that I would be regretting in the morning. I was pushing a friend to be drunk though I know he’s allergic to alcohol. I’m sorry for the persistent offering of beer to another friend knowing that he’ll drive home that night. I was such an ass.

The alcohol made me do it. It was replacing my blood down my body, controlling every stroke of idiocy that I do. I was slurring and laughing with few beer bottles left to finish. My friends left one by one retiring in the guest rooms. After minutes more, I got off and had enough. A half-finished beer was left on the table and no one could take another drop of it.

I thought that I’ll pass out on the bed and dream about marshmallows and candies. Minutes later, I felt like my body couldn’t handle the amount of alcohol in my system. I was sure that I’m going to lose it. I already knew what was up. I got up and stood by the toilet. Then I found myself facing and clasping the toilet seat. I was throwing up so much. I couldn’t believe that I was really doing it. It was sick. I’ve been drinking for six or seven years now and I have not experienced throwing up.

I headed back to the guest room for a lavishly earned rest. I got to sleep an hour after since my head was killing me. I missed my English class after excessively sleeping trying to sober from an insufferable hangover. I know we somehow deserve that kind of fun. Everything was just fuckingly good. It felt really really good. We drunk with all our frustrations and I feel absobloodilutely refreshed.