Coats

I have been at the receiving end of many a criticism regarding my choice of outer garment on days of questionable weather. Namely, I have been given incredulous looks when I wear coats on warm days. When I say warm, or when others think it's warm, I usually get these looks around 75 degrees Fahrenheit, when shorts and a t-shirt would more than suffice.

But I think that if the weather is below the 80 mark, a jacket or a long-sleeved article of clothing should at least be brought just in case you go somewhere cold. This has rarely failed me. Not since I was much younger did I find carrying a jacket or coat too inconvenient as to demerit a moment when I actually needed it. Many times I have been comfortable in colder-than-assumed conditions when others shiver.

A few months ago in Stockton, when the sun was happily shining around 75, I walked to the dining hall to eat with Sean and Eric (who happen to criticize me the most on this and give me often-to-the-point-of-you-should-know-me-by-now looks of question). I sit down and put my coat on the chair, Sean in a black tank top and Eric in a t-shirt. Well, soon after Eric left, it seemed to get a bit colder, so I put on my coat.

As I put it on, Sean says, "I'm cold too but I won't admit it because that would mean you're right."


Yesterday, on my way out of the house, I get in the car to go to church with my mom.

Says she, "Andrew, do you know how hot it is? Why are you wearing a jacket?"

"If you're shivering in church, mom," I replied, closing the door before we backed out of the driveway, "I'm not letting you borrow my jacket. You can freeze, and I'll be warm."

Sure enough, the fans of St. John the Baptist Church made it colder than usual and when my mom asked to borrow my jacket, chuckling as she did so, I chuckled with equal hilarity and shook my head while pretending to pray.

To those of you who argue that it's not worth carrying around, I have only to tell you that a jacket can easily be left in a car or hung on a chair, and it's worth it to have in case of those moments when you wish you had brought it.

Just a tip in case summer isn't as hot as you thought it would be, as is sometimes the case in the sun-kissed Santa Clara Valley.

Happy beaching!

Memories Consume, Like Opening the Wound

I'm picking me apart again.

I was reading over some of my older posts. I realized that I've grown more self-conscious in my writing. I used to update less frequently, and I think I'm falling into that old habit again.

Or am I breaking the habit of blogging? idecay. Via Eric Woo.

It's difficult to blog in the summer because for me, blogging is something I do when I have things to say, when the gritty gears of my mind are turning. Since summer began, even though I study most days, I don't seem to have as much on my mind. It's possibly the result of summer, or maybe I just don't have as much on my mind like I pretend to have.

I would say that I blog less often because I enjoy my life more now, but I don't think that's true. I don't really feel any happier now than I have before. My life is just bland right now.

A bland life doesn't necessarily imply an unhappy life either. People associate blandness and the neutrality of life with stagnance, like still water that collects debris and mud. I don't think it works like that. Life doesn't need to be exciting all the time. It doesn't need to be brimming with adventure or teeming with activity. Life just needs to be purposeful.

So I guess I'm okay with the way things are for me right now. There isn't the hullabaloo of college life or living with my friends, but as much as I love that, I've come to terms with living in whatever situation I happen to occupy.

I blog less because maybe I'm living more. I'm not necessarily doing more things, just things I didn't think I'd be doing.

Like playing Settlers of Catan.

Or SimCity.

Or eating at Red Robin twice a week. (Actually, not anymore. It's not easy on the wallet.)

This wasn't my vision of my summer, but it's better that I don't know all the details of my future, even though I think about those details frequently. It adds a flavor to my life that makes it a bit more daring, but not in a bad way. Like a new sauce you've never tried but know you could learn to enjoy.

I remember when I was in elementary school, probably in the second or third grade, and I was learning about the inequality signs, "<" and ">". I remember being so confused, so befuddled as to the reasoning or method to discern between the two. I think it took me weeks to figure it out. They told us something stupid to help us remember it, something to do with alligators eating each other.

Really? You're trying to teach simple arithmetic to 8-year-olds using cannibalistic reptiles as an analogy?

Needless to say even then I thought it was a stupid way to remember it. I thought the kids who drew teeth on the signs were idiots, but I never said anything because I didn't fully understand the signs themselves. I eventually figured out that the side that's bigger faces the quantity that's bigger. That's how I think about it in my head to this day. It's childish, but it works for me.

No goddamn reptiles are eating each other on my binder paper.

"But It's Summer"

This one's for Steph.

I know a few of my friends have been going through tough times. I've said what I can to quell the storm that is their emotions and their lives, but in the end, my words can only help so much.

I'm not trying to say that my words should be the cure to their problems or anything, far from it. I just try to do what I can, because it's sometimes just as difficult to see a friend or friends go through difficult times without being able to change anything directly.

All I can really say is that for me, patience usually wins out. Waiting for the pain and difficulty to subside is my favorite tactic.

No matter how shitty and shoddy things can get, things can get better. They also might get worse before they get better, but lives tend to be a combination of ups and downs, not just downs.

Life is, as Stephanie and I discussed, bittersweet.

So no matter how stormy things get, the rains and hurricanes that brew before you will weather down. No matter how horrid the flurries and blizzards may seem, the hardships of winter once seemingly insurmountable will be behind, and summer will arrive.

Life may hand you dirt on a platter, but it's summer.

Your friends may be deserting you, by their choice or not, but it's summer.

They may not be as attentive to you as you they, but it's summer.

Your lover may be gone forever, but it's summer. (He wasn't good enough for you anyways.)

Your confidence may not be always there, or you may feel like you're not the person people see you as. You may feel like there's a part of you that's missing, and you may not be able to figure it out. But it's summer.

Life is bittersweet like that.

Now someone, please help me fix my sticky "w" key. LASKDFJAL;SDKFJLASDFALSDFJ!

A Road Trip Later (cont'd)

When we passed the border, everything was so different.

Actually, the only things that were different were the units, i.e. km/h and cents/litre. Everything else was the same.

My first Canadian meal was at Milestone's, where our waitress was good-looking and gave us free a free spinach-dip with nachos. That was awesome. We also had a waitress ask us randomly how our food was, but in the end, we decided she wasn't a waitress at all, but someone posing as one to decide what to order...It was kind of weird.

The next day (Saturday) saw us wake up to get Sean signed up for the gym and run a few other errands. For dinner we went downtown to Calgary Tower.

"Hi," I said, addressing the waitress smilingly. I was ready to order. "I'd like the Fresh Fish of the Day, but please, please don't tell me the fish. I want it to be a surprise."
Without skipping a beat she said, "It's halibut."

Wtf? She caught herself right away, but still. How daft can you get? I wasn't angry since the halibut was exquisite, but it was still rather funny.

Afterwards, we walked a bit downtown to look at some of the avenues. We saw a few homeless people. We saw what we thought was a homeless couple.

"Excuse me, sir," one of them said, smiling toothily. He smelled of liquor. "Can you spare us a few dollars for our pursuit of hard liquor?"
I was caught off-guard, but before I could react, the indigenous lady said to me, "We can give you this shirt, if you'd like!"
She showed me a shirt from Spencer's displaying a cannabis leaf insignia. Below it read, "I'D HIT THAT," and below that was a large joint underlining the caption.

At first I was tempted, but we walked away, the three of us, brusquely. Two steps out, we stopped.

"Do you want a souvenir of your trip to Calgary?" asked Claire-Lise, Sean's sister.
"Yeah!" Sean interjected. "It would make for a great memory!"

So we turned around, and I gave them some change. And I got the shirt in return.

What impressed me most was how honest the homeless in Calgary were. In America you hear things like, "can you spare some change? I'm trying to catch the bus" or "Do you think you could help me out? I want to make a phone call."

But no, these bums were honest as hell. No lying or deception for Calgarians, homed or homeless, no. If they want money for liquor, that's bloody what they'll tell you. Anything else is just crass.

We also met Dave, who was very homeless. He had tried numerous shelters to no avail. He is one of the only Canadians I've heard use "eh?" in conversation, but he made up for the lack of it, using it at an average rate of .75 eh/ss (spoken second), a number not to be taken lightly.

Put it like this, .75 eh/ss is the same as 750 meh/ss.

And the three of us have some harsh words for Dave. His hygiene is just despicable. As his friends, we have decided to talk to him about it. I think Sean should, but we'll see. Dave just has to change. He can't go on living like this.

Anyways, The rest of the trip was fun. I bought some Canadian beer that night, and had to drink it all alone, since Sean is allergic, and Claire-Lise decided not to like beer. Canadian beer is a bit stronger, but hey, I liked it a lot. Plus, I was legal, so it made it even tastier.

That's it for my trip, really. The rest is rather ho-hum. I met Sean's friend Ashwin, who was hilarious. We somehow got him to leave his number for the waitress at Earls, who was very pretty.

Actually, Canadian girls are generally prettier than American girls, as I found out. They're nicer too.

I leave you, then, with a quotation that best represents the general attitude of our conversations for the weekend.

I was talking to Ashwin, "Are all your friends in the medical field somehow?"
"Almost, I think," he replied, thinking, as we were about to part our ways outside at earls's parking lot.
"Sean's going dentistry," he started. "Declan's medical, I think. I'm medical..."
"Oh, Tyler!" Sean said.
"What's he doing?" I asked.
"He's doing business with my sister," was Sean's accidentally genius reply.

A Road Trip Later

Finals were over, and I had smelled the spicy scent of freedom in the air, like the chili you know you will not be able to handle but still enjoy smelling regardless. Sure, I had started a Restaurant City account (more on that tragedy later). Sure, I was still at school days after my last final. Sure, I had only a week before summer school started and grades would (unfortunately) be out. Yeah, I had failed a final or two, but at the very, very least, I was finished with the semester.

I hung around Pacific for a day or two before taking the last of my stuff home on the immediate Sunday following my Friday final. On Thursday after everyone's last final, I planned to drive up to Canada with my good friend Sean (not Eric). But for a few days at least, I was free, free at last. (Actually, I ended up writing an essay or two before Wednesday, but it was still awesome the lack of responsibility.)

I think I overuse parentheses.

Thursday morning rolled around. My week was finally over. Seven straight sunrises I had seen and gleaned, and I knew Wednesday night had to change. So Thursday morning rolled around, finding me woken up at 7:45AM simply by the sheer excitement of leaving Stockton, officially ending the months of existence that I thought akin to prison but must concede to label "school."

Oh, I know why the caged bird sings, alright.

Yes, I just compared the life of the average college student to the plight of pre-Civil Rights Era blacks. I am indeed a Renaissance man.

We dropped Eric off at Sacramento Airport, about an hour north of Stockton. I was forced into the cubbyhole backseat, not unlike the ones my father used to describe to me when he was escaping the warfare in Vietnam.

Yes, I just compared sitting in the a cramped back seat to the struggles of Vietnamese refugees escaping a war-torn country, harrowingly haunted by the napalm and smell of burning flesh that followed them until they left in the barren waters that still held no promises.

But Eric left, and gave me a hug. I say this because his goddamn cologne (perfume) stuck on my collar for about 10 hours. It's like he never left at all.

As Sean and I drove past Truckee, we noticed the Sierra Nevada hills, and we agreed that a camera would have been nice. Man, those hills scream vista and beauty.

We stopped at Reno for lunch, at a place called the "Wild River Grille." According to Sean, they had the best bread, at least for a (turkey) burger. I had a salmon wrap that was superb. We continued to trek across the Nevada desert, rarely stopping and using smallish towns as milestones to mark our travel. In the process, we came to the conclusion that Sean's car should be named Jenna. It has something to do with Moses. Ask me if you're really curious.

We also started calling each other S-Man and A-Dawg. It had something to do with the town of Elko, NV ("The Heart of Northeast Nevada"). The website says to "take a moment to explore the "City" of Elko and all it has to offer!" because it really only takes a moment to explore all Elko has to offer.

But take it from S-Man and A-Dawg. That moment may be one of the greatest moments you'll ever have while exploring. Elko has loads to offer. Like the Fire Science Academy. And Metro Gasoline...

Both were lame. One was defunct and decrepit.

In Elko, we had a chat about whether to take a different route or not. It would be about the same distance as the previous one, but would cut through Utah, which I wanted to do, just to say we went through Utah. However, we agreed to stay on course and just take the original route to be safe.

Instead we missed the exits to both routes and ended up in Utah regardless of our intentions. West Wendover, NV-UT was our destination, to be precise.

We only crossed the border of Utah for about 50 yards, but we stopped at a gas station 50 yards in Utah, realizing that Utah was definitely NOT a part of our road plans. Sean got an apple and a coffee, and I bought a hot dog.

As we drove back into Nevada (which took about a minute since we were so close to the NV-UT border), we both agreed: Utah has the best apples, coffees and hot dogs. Damn that hot dog was good. I got one in Idaho, and it wasn't even CLOSE to the quality of dog I experienced in Utah.

Anyways, we drove up to Idaho and believe me you, Idaho is by far the WORST state. It's so bland and boring.

I swear, when we got to Montana, everything was just so much better. I recommend that everyone experience a Montana sunrise. Since it was so early, few cars were on the road. Thus, I was "allowed" to go 100-115 on the highway uncontested. Those damn mountains were so goddamn beautiful I have to swear to describe them.

Actually, Sean described them best when he said that Canadian mountains were better.

Said Sean, "These snow-capped mountains look like they're wearing a yarmulke while the Canadian mountains are wearing KKK hoods."

True dat.



vs.




When we were driving in Montana, a tantalizing 60 miles south of the border (it's weird from that perspective, isn't it?), Sean was pulled over for going 90 miles on a 75mph stretch. The fine was $40, which had to be paid right there. The cop was nice, but he would have been nicer if he let us go. So close. I actually thought it would be a good revenge idea to go outside and take a dump in the grass while the cop was looking up the information. Sean was against it.

Anyways, we stopped by Helena, Montana for some breakfast. By breakfast I mean Sean and I both had burgers. Eric called shortly thereafter, as he does twice daily to see how Sean is doing, and when I told him we were in Montana, well, it was funny.

"Where are you guys right now?" Eric asked through the reception-seeking phone.
"We're in Helena," I replied. I fielded a look from Sean, shaking his head.
There was a silence in the car magnified to me by the silence on the phone.
"...Is that in North Dakota or South Dakota?" Eric asked hesitantly.

I laughed, but Sean said he didn't know it either. He said he doubted most people knew...which makes me the abnormal one.

Dammit. Talk about story of my life.

I'll have more to come later!