A Few Minutes at Vons

Occasionally, when you’re very very scatterbrained and thoughts are playing ping pong in your head, simple things become extra hard tasks. Like your dad calls and wants you to pick up some parmesan cheese, and it takes you a while to say you’ll do it because you’re not sure it’s actually feasible at first. So you head to the store and dart for the cheese section. That area you remember choosing Lunchables in when you were little, and you see cheeses and cheeses but parmesan is absent. You think to yourself, people still use parmesan cheese. How can they not have it? This is Vons for crying out loud. They’re supposed to have things for typical family dinners. 

Then you spot a bag of freshly grated parmesan cheese. Suddenly it hits you: there are three kinds of parmesan cheese. There’s freshly grated, there’s the powdery kind in the canister and there’s the cheese block. What kind did dad want? He didn’t say. You have an inkling he wants the powdery kind, but think what he’d say if that wasn’t right. He would say he wanted the other kind but then brush it off like it’s no big deal, and that would make you feel like a pile of dog crap even though you had no way of knowing  and he wasn’t trying to make you feel bad. You decide calling him is the best bet. You knew it: powdery canister. Yet this food item is nowhere to be seen in this section. 

Why wouldn’t they put all the cheeses together, in one place? Nothing makes sense these days. You think of Diggory, the Pevensie kids’ uncle from The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. He said something in that book about people having sense. You thought it was funny then, you remember it registered. It registers now as you saunter through aisles of cereal and kleenex. Something about people learning sense in school. “What do they teach in these schools, if not sense?” Something like that. 

Finally, you reach the pasta aisle. You suppose it took seeing the boxes of dry pasta to realize it almost makes sense to have Kraft powdery parmesan in this aisle. You reach for it and glance at the price tag: $8.99 for a canister. Since when did fake-ish cheese items become so expensive? They’ve changed the bottle. It’s see-through now. When you were a kid it was an opaque green canister, with a little sheen to it like a spearmint gum wrapper. You almost grab the cheaper imitation bottle for $6.99. In the end you choose Kraft brand for two more dollars, for old time’s sake. 

In line, it takes the clerk at 4 a couple tries to tell you she can ring you up at her register. You were busy staring at the chubby girl in San Diego Padres logo pajama pants, high as a kite. Someone says they like your umbrella. Did you say thanks? You have no idea. 

Walking out, you feel semi useful picking this item up. “They’ll have something to put on the pasta now,” you think, “because of me”. When you get into your car you burst into tears. You don’t feel useful anyway. 

Things can be tough when you’re scatterbrained.

Janzy Observes Japan

Hey people. Lots of things have been happening lately. I should stop using the word "lately" to describe as far as like, an entire year. But I like the word lately.
Around mid September, I got to visit Tokyo, Japan! It was the best vacation ever. The supernice boyfriend and I have both always wanted to go there! Not just together, but before we even met. It's just always been a magical place in each of our heads, and fortunately we were both right.

This restaurant had tiny Keroppi cups! 

This is me sipping a boxed drink called 'Chelsea'. Underneath 'Chelsea' it said 'Yogurt Scotch Drink'. So that sounded good enough for me.

The best part of vending machines all over the place. You can get anything from a packaged banana to your favorite beverage: royal milk tea. (PS people wear socks with sandals in Japan, too. Yet their aim is probably cleanliness instead of idiocy.)

Here are the things I now know about Japan:

1.) No one is a creeper. If they are, they keep it within their level heads. They don't stare at you with rapist eyes like the creepers in America. 

2.) Everyone included in the population, young and old, businessman and grandmother, has at least one charm hanging from their phone. Since I already had some asian bling on my phone, I felt up to par. But I brought home plenty more charms so I wouldn't run out. 

3.) Everyone has cool shoes. Everyone. 

4.) About 4 in 5 girls wear stirrup leggings. Not the skinny stirrup, but a thicker one that goes down to the middle top of your foot. They wear them with heels or flats, but mostly heels because everyone wears heels no matter how far they have to walk underground to get to the next subway. 

5.) The subways are pay for distance, not pay a flat fee to get into the station. It's not simple, like NY. It's gloriously complicated and wonderful. Because if you buy a Suica card, which is more or less like a metro card, you just stick it in your wallet somewhere, and then hit your wallet on the sensor as you walk into the station. It's extremely high tech and secret agenty. Though I felt a little bit like Mr. Weasley going to the subway every morning because in Order of the Phoenix he just taps the sensor with his hand cause he doesn't know how to use the London Underground. All you have to do is swap the hand for a wallet and throw a red wig on me. Then I'm Mr. Weasley. I got so far off subject.

6.) You're not supposed to tip in restaurants. It's rude. 

7.) No one is allowed to smoke in public. No smoking tiles litter the pavement and walls everywhere you look; and, incidentally, there is no actual litter anywhere. It's odd, too, because you wonder where people put their trash, as trash bins seem to be scarce. 

8.) Their toilets have a keypad to the side, like a game console controller. You can adjust water pressure for bidet, water temperature, and seat warming. You can push assorted buttons to make "flushing sounds" so no one can hear you pee. You can even release a "powerful deodorizer". All the trouble for public restrooms is odd, yet gratifying. I love the fuss involved in being discreet, because it's the norm there. 

9.) Many food joints have a vending machine out front where you insert yen, push a button, and collect the ticket it spits at you. Then you give the ticket to the workers and they bring your food out. Yet the food they present is not greasy and full of a heart attack waiting to happen. It's genius, really. 

10.) Politeness. If you go to Japan and don't heart the phrase 'sumimasen' 50 times every time you walk down the street, I will be surprised. That's the phrase for "excuse me, sorry." People say it even if you didn't feel them bump you. Because their bump is like 1/8 the bump of an obese American. They're like a pack of smooth little foxes.

11.) Green tea is free in a number of restaurants. It's like water. 

I rather liked it there! 

A Few Disconnected Introspections

It's one of those rare days where you decide to reward yourself with starbucks for waking up at 6am, then you try to steal half 'n half from the creamer bar and you pour it all over the counter. You wipe it up and that takes an extra 5 minutes. You wipe it up because you hate it when people don't wipe up their spilt milk. You shouldn't steal I guess when the drink you order doesn't require half 'n half. When all you drink from starbucks is chai tea lattes or tazo earl greys. But for some reason you still want that plastic bottle of half 'n half. To keep for later, to store in the work fridge. You think ahead. 

There are some real saucy things flowing naturally out of my mouth lately, and I don't know whether I'm proud or ashamed about the fact that I'm not ashamed of any of them. It's a separated fact, yet ingrained where I know it won't leave and I won't try to dismiss it. 

The longer I work in this place, the more I realize that you have to know what you want to be where you want. There are people here who've had the same dreaded monotonous job for 40 years, and yet they're still here complaining that they're here doing their job, when this job is all they know. What did they think about 40 years ago, or 20? Did they plan on being here still, getting paid the same amount of money and mumbling as they sidle around? I always picture myself as someone with a secret. Someone with a plan that'll eventually lead me elsewhere, to someplace that doesn't reek of gloomy and unchanging grind. I'm the one with the secret plan. Did they think the same all those years ago? Or were their minds as empty back then as they appear now in the blinding flourescent light? Empty birdcages with hardly a tiny feather left, squeaking from lack of oil and sometimes swaying woefully. 

I often take pictures of my shoes while I'm wearing them.

Janzy the Geriatric

My harry potter desktop calender stares at me intermittently throughout the day. On this particular one I began getting a little worried at the thought of not having one next year. There won't get a new movie scene each day to stare at when I'm incapable of doing anything else. When my brain has already fried itself like the hairdo of one of those middle school girls who is overzealous with salon heating tools. It's understood that it's easy to look up screenshots from the movie, more than once a day, even, but that's not the same as each picture being dated, as though destined for that particular day. On friday, May 28th I was destined to sit at my desk staring at Draco being dragged out of Slughorn's christmas party by Argus Filch.
I don't remember if i was always this paranoid. I realize, though, that I'm becoming more paranoid, eccentric and shameless the more days go by. I'm just gonna start admitting things now.

I'm not afraid to admit the things I google sometimes, like what the health benefits of certain vegetables are or the 10 smartest people in the world or details on first wizarding war, and I'm not ashamed anymore that I do old people things. Exhibit A: This morning as my feet found the floor, a rush of cold air enveloped me. After the resulting shivers, I felt around for my towel and stumbled down the hall to the bathroom, thinking it curious that my parents were watching a movie in the living room so early in the morning. Once there, I began removing my clothes and turned on the shower.
It was only when I stared at the bathroom window for longer than a glance, at the black sky behind it, that I realized it wasn't this morning. It was still last night.
Exhibit B in this startlingly pitiful series is my contact lense situation. Today, I went to a party to paint faces and make balloons in a costume, inwardly panicking the entire time about why I felt cross eyed and half blind. I was, in fact, wearing my contact lenses in the opposite eyes, each of which has a different prescription.
The question on my mind is: am i becoming a geriatric? Does this happen to other 22 year olds who also don't do drugs or drink very much? I'd love your feedback. Missed you guys.
PS: Here's a picture of me, my little brother and my dad at Disneyland for your viewing pleasure.

Generic Mermaid Princess/Cousins

Is it just me or does monday give everyone a mysterious yearning to stab people uncontrollably? Anyone that gets in the way, at least. That said, the weekend fared better than most. But it wasn't without the help of my giant filipino-mutt family and the cornucopia of asian inspired activities we're all equally interested in.

On friday I went to see Kick-ass. Let's just say that seeing an eleven year old girl call a room of gangsters "cunts" and then proceed to spear them all while wearing a purple wig was an absolute treat. 

Saturday I had a mermaid party for a little girl who reminded me of a spider monkey (and even sat like one). So as I sang of the land above water in a dreamy voice, she crawled about behind me sniffing flowers and picking things off her skin and eating a handful of sweaty skittles after examining them one by one as though they were her only means of nourishment. Kids! 

It's good to confuse people in other cars on the way there. They see your hair and they wonder why you look so fake. They stare a lot, and I just wave. 

That night, I went to Domo Sushi with cousins, not dressed as a generic mermaid, followed by one of those asian karaoke bars where you can rent your own booth for all your friends. My little cousin Britt was turning 21, so her night of embarrassment began here. As a surfeit of cousins (plus the supernice boyfriend) sang song after kitsch song, britt's non speaking friends stared expressionless from the booth, sipping water and eating these sharp little french fries. I was a tired baby after that and went home, but not without receiving a number of text messages from Brittani, all having to do with not being able to stand up.
The next morning I went to the Broken Yoke with my cousin The Chi.

We ate a bountiful breakfast that I felt only faintly guilty about, on account of reading The Road right now in which all characters are emaciated and consider a can of beans a feast beyond measure. And here I am sipping cream off a ho-cho like some overlarge toddler. BUT SERIOUSLY WHO CAN LIVE WITHOUT HOT CHOCOLATE C'MON!

And after that we did a bunch of other cool things that I'm too tired to talk about, but they included summer hats on sale, frozen yogurt with mochi in a calm and secluded yogurt spot, comic book meetups, and chewbaca photo shoots with professional cameras. How was your weekend?

Goth Clubs, Sandwiches, Parents

Goth clubs are sincerely hilarious places. I've been to this one a few times, and it's always a riot. You should see the people who go. Flashing lights target select portions of the floor and give you unsustained images that seem frozen between the darkness. I like to dance to the beat of music that is not contemporary r&b once in a while. I like to look at these people and wonder what they do in their daily lives. Do they wear cat suits or leather corsets to work or school? Full body fishnet outfits and cherry red eyeshadow? Or do they keep this life a secret and fool their coworkers with beige pantsuits? My favorite part of the entire thing is that no one even dances together. Each person dances within a concrete bubble, closing their eyes and saying goodbye to stress. Waving their arms in fluid motions and twisting their hips to the beat of Don't You Want Me by Human League, praising the condensed air with their flailing limbs. I love this.

These are my parental units. It was my uncle's 40th birthday last weekend, so the theme was 1970's. Are they a couple o' kids or what? Do you think I look like them? I've received mixed comments. People always say I look like my dad, especially because my mother has pale skin and hair. But occasionally I'll get the "mother's eyes" or "mother's smile" comment. My dad is, indeed, grabbing his crotch in this photo. My mum kept slapping it away. Just so all of you know.

And this is a sandwich I ate recently. Simple, yet scrumptious. I have this dire need to take pictures of food I'm about to eat. It's like I'm giving it a permanent place in history before I nom it right up. I know I make a lot of allusions to myself killing things, but this kind of photography is similar to a serial killer keepsake. 

Janzy Opens Up, Finally

I'd never been in a crash till today. I had driven for 6 years without doing it, and although it wasn't severe, I feel I ought to have a time out or something, since it was my fault. There was no texting or calling or loud music involved, but there was a moderate dose of spaciness on hand. That's all it takes to rear end someone, of course.

On the way to work - my mother drove me - we stopped at starbucks and along with my chai, I helped myself to a decent portion of half n half by pouring it in a handy water bottle. I'm not sure why I do things like that. I could easily buy my own half n half. I guess it's just comical holding a water bottle a fourth of the way full of half n half. It's one of those "clothes on my cat" situations. Pair two things that don't go and it makes a joke. Half n half + water bottles. Clothes + cats. Bro hoes + books.

What's sweet though is my new nail color. It's a charcoal colored China Glaze that I renamed Dumbly's Crispy Hand Takes a Crunchy Swipe. It's implicative of the moment in Half Blood Prince where Dumbledore has to wipe his blackened hand across that dark cave wall, offering his blood so it'll open up into the cavern with the lake. Its original name was Black Diamond, but that's not exciting nor implicative of anything. I like to personalize my possessions. That's the reason my phone's name is Jarvis, my computer's name is Chauncey, my car's name is Scout Finch, and my razor scooter's name is Penny. It's why I have a nickname for most of the people I know that is, most of the time, an offensive way to tease them.

Also brightening my spirits is my recent tea shopping trip. I picked up my normal earl grey, some jasmine green, some regular ole mint, and some peach black. My beautiful tea boxes are adorning my desk in the following manner, with mother honey bear, tea shepherd.