Saturday, January 17, 2004

I'm on a highway to hell

Nyahaha. I got completely NOTHING done this winter break. I was supposed to get about 10 pages of a comic finished, in hopes that I can print out a mini-comic by APE. BUUUT, it doesn't look like I'll be making that dealine. Although I'm pretty fucked there, I do have some good news to report. I've turned in my introductory freelance commission, and I should be thrown about three more gigs soon. Which meansssss, I'll be paid up-front for the upcoming merc werk. At about $50 a pop, that comes out to a cool $150 in the bag. I don't know what you might be thinking, but I'm thinking: NEW WEBSITE biyatches. Once I get that moolah to the bank, and I friggin replace my lost credit card (it's been lost since I got back from SDCC), I will more than likely purchase a new domain to replace the one I lost (http://riotform.net). Whooooooos coming WITH ME??? I'll essentially be some kind of headmaster at an orphanage, because I have a duty to accomodate the former riotform kids, as well as pick up the other children who've come to me begging for shelter. LET THE GOOD TIMES ROLLLL. Since I am oh so generous to my friends WHENEVER possible, I openly invite Jaime and Ron to hoard some space on here if they'd like. Yep, how would you like your own little slice of internet homepie, niggahz?

Oh, and it was Geno's birthday this past day, and we kicked it old school at his place. Several Warheadz breaking crew homies packed in his small ass room, it was great. Geno and I played Soul Calibur 2 for the longest time on his PS2, while the other cats were jammin on his MIDI piano and fiddling with Reason on his computer and freestyle flowing. 93 til, 93 til infinity.

P.S. My uncle just handed me a flyer about an open position for student assistants at the DOJ, upon my request a while ago. Hopefully I'll be able to land that job and/or keep the FTB spot. That would ROCK. But then again, getting the DOJ job might fuck up my school schedule royale with cheese. Gah.

Friday, January 16, 2004

Life Lessons In Deceit and Hospitality

I know this already. I've known this for a long while. But, let's be redundant and act like everyone else doesn't realize this. Everyone is fake. Facades of amicability and condescension rolled into one. We are all Roman gods playing our parts in a grand play, as if our individual lives warranted such drama. I am the avenging Neptune, who's wrath is as deep as the oceans. She is proud Juno, who's ire is unabatable. He is Janus, the two-faced deity of beginnings and ends. FUCK THAT. We only have this one life of ours to live, and we are given no second chances. Why waste it ruining your sensibilities and berating others? Just because a person is not likable to YOU, does not mean that you should carry such ill will and condescension towards this fellow human. Such an act is more heinous when it is someone you can readily come in contact with. THERE IS ALWAYS A MIDDLE-GROUND. Don't hide the fact that you cannot get along with a person, and don't rub it in their face as if they're the Anti-Christ. A genuine person with a true soul would use their empathic ability to reason and give a person the right to know why they aren't liked. Those who perpetrate these facades are no better than the tyrants that monger for conflict in this world.
Now, you may see this shpiel as a bit of hypocracy on my part. Granted, it may as well be. But who isn't a hypocrite, please tell me. You sir/ma'am would be shot on sight for fear you would incite a rebellion of do-gooding. True, I am a bit two-faced, I treat one gender far differently than the other, thusly, certain assumptions can be made about me. I can be known to be unfair and cruel to the female side. I can be just as evil towards my own kind. I mean, I can hold a grudge against just about anyone, but I know that I can't hold them indefinitely. I eventually realize how childish it is to blindly hate someone over some kind of silly or contrived notion I have about them. That's called prejudice, folks. But whatever. When it comes to either side, I won't be deceitful, only in the most playful of manners. As far as I can tell, I've told both men and women the most blunt truths when necessary. Give or take situations when such truths would possibly demoralize them, I will go out of my way to tell the truth. Why mire yourself in a net of lies when it will only entrap you the more you pile on? So corrupt and bleak is this world that deceit is the law of the land, where to advance in life you must build your strength through lies and half-truths. Must you empower yourself through other peoples' downfall? Surely, the lion would rather call upon the help of other lions to take down the wildebeest rather than KILL another lion so it can feast on a larger portion. I can honestly say this, if I were to see that you can easily don a mask of deceit rather than lower the veil of insecurity, I WILL HATE YOU. You should not be fit for evolution's grace. Much like Love, Providence is BLIND. We will all survive and benefit by unconditional support, don't forget that. Don't be elitist, that is what being deceitful truly is. You are striking down others who do not fit into your perceived mold of decency. You are not the One and Most High Emperor/Empress of all Men. C'mon now, have a little bit of common wisdom here.
Now, this kind of view can easily turn militant, and thus ELITIST, but no, I could never strike down that path fully. Live and Let Die, I believe. Fate's greater scheme will be realized, and people will eventually gain a degree of empathy to learn how wrong they have been. Oh well.
Just go about and beat each other about the heads with blunt weapons. I care not. Continue the way of the primitives, and you will 'prosper' as they have. Let the sensible inherit the positions you have wrongly abused.

Thursday, January 15, 2004

So Yeah...
...lot's of thinking, too much of it. It's like I'm afraid of those 'elevators' again. But no matter, this is just me over-thinking things again. I suppose that's a genuine character trait of mine: Methodicality. I usually have to think and re-think a given scenario to figure out how to pull it off with the least amount of failure. Overthinking AND overcompensating. Hah.
Thus, I sit here, listening to an odd collection of 80's music that come straight out of movie soundtracks, and nearly in the full swing of ANGST. I did a bit of mental spring cleaning today, i.e. baggage check, y'know, little things that fool you into thinking you're setting past things right. Sometimes I would do something as inane as go through my phone list and change the settings and numbers in there. See, my phone has this neat little feature, where I designate the specific phone ring for a certain amount of people. Caller Groups. Generally, I would shift the names of girls around, so that one will be demoted to the generic 'girls' category, or one would be promoted to the 'VIP girls' category. I dunno, it doesn't really solve anything, but it somehow soothes the ego to hear and NOT hear Usher's "U Remind Me" ringtone sound off.
But I digress. Today, I went through a bit of straightening out of my laptop and internet affairs. Certain documents I wrote for particularly emotional moments have been erased, chat logs deleted, calendar markings removed. For the extreme purpose of eradicating all references to things and people that would further cause me to loathe and regret.
I even went so far as to get on this retarded Friendster thing and go delete-happy. Now, I am no real fan of this system, but it still gets to me. Delete Friend here, Delete Testemonial there. All of it felt and looked useless. And because of this reverie, this emotional roller coaster I've ridden this past week, I'm nearly ready to either vent/spill as much as I can here or in that troublesome little journal I once kept.

BUTWHATEVER. This swing into the 'emo' kind of built up since the cabin trip not one week ago, where I was in the closest proximity to some of my most favored people in the world. You see, not only was an old old old love in the same house with me for a week, but also a past crush (more like crash) and the current object of my affection. Now, none of this should be secret to those that I occupied that cabin with. I mean, we're all part of the same social crowd, graduates of the same high school. But THAT is where everything goes completely wrong. I like this girl, I genuinely do. She's got all the right things that I admire most in these pitiful human beings: artistic/creative, tolerant, playful/outgoing, overall a BOMBSHELL. Which also makes it a painful thing for me, she's everyone's bombshell. How am I supposed to act when just about everyone else would take their shot at her if they could? For instance, one night, she (in her usual awestrikingness) was clearly the center of attention of a group of guys. I, stoned off my ass, could do nothing but feel a bit of jealousy and pass out. With her allegiance nowhere, where do I stand? I know for a fact that I am no team player; either I work solo or I don't work at all. Competition for one woman is almost beyond my scope of comprehension.
Ok, so I already feel a phantom bout of burnage from a girl I am hardly around, and whom I have growing feelings of both eros and agape. What else could go wrong. I'll tell you. Throughout the cabin, she and I barely exchange conversation for more than 2 minutes. How odd is that. When it's just her and I in private company, our conversations surely last longer than that. So what was missing? I dont know, I think I did something wrong; subtly offended her in some way. Is that even possible?
Alright, keep going, you might say.
Will things pick up like normal once this cabin trip is over? Was it just a bit of a shell-shock in being intimate with someone? Not ready for that kind of a jump in an ambiguous friend/relationship? Either way, I have the feeling that things might get worse before it gets better.
See, I have this awful habit of deserting a girl for a certain amount of time, abandoning conventional means of communication, an experiment in the old addage that 'absence makes the heart grow fonder.' Half the time, this practice bears positive results, where the girl will seek me out as I had hoped. The other time, the girl will just as clearly desert me as I had deserted her, neutralizing the entire effect. Last time, I had talked to her and apologized for something I had done, which had obviously made her uncomfortable. She gave it to me straight: platonic friendship (or so I understood). I laid low, to get the feeling of such a blunt rejection out of my mind. Weeks pass, and I receive a morning call from her, waking me from my hung-over slumber. I had to decline her offer of lunch for obvious reasons. From that moment, things started to pick up again; I would call to see if she's up for a date the coming weekend, she'd call to suggest something we could do together. I played it cool, knowing that I had to respect her wishes to keep this straight & narrow. But little things keep slipping in, those pragmatic gestures that could be attributed to feelings other than platonic. Wrapping of the hand around the arm, a slight tug here and there, a tightening hug on occasion, locking of the hands unexpectedly. Like this one time, I insisted on saying good-bye with a friendly handshake/"daps," she smiled/laughed and refused the gesture. but she instead offered a hug/hand-hold.
Ok, so a couple of dates down the line, its comes to that inevitable 'friend zone,' this god-awful neutral state of courtship that I abhor. My early initiatives were nullified, but my current down-played attempts are accepted, implying that we're at a level of comfortability. Do I go aggressive and swoop in, fueled by passion? Or do I securely build the foundation, but also risk a permanent state of platonicity?
Sadly, this quandary is not unfamiliar to me. DEJA-fuckin-VU. A year ago, I had to make a similar decision as to whether I were to keep a relationship moving with a girl that could thoroughly bash my emotions, or cut my losses. I surmised to have Valentines Day be my final stand. And once again, that dreaded day is coming back around, presenting the same kind of ultimatum.
In the past scenario, I had the element of time on my agenda; I had the option to wait her out, let her drama cool down, and patch things up a year or so later. Now, that same option is not available. I am determined to leave this town in a year's time, and that doesn't leave me much space to nurture a potentially great relationship.
So, either I work this problem out soon, while my agenda allows, or I will lose out on a girl that's possibly greater than any I have met in Sacramento. No joke, people. The girl of last year was one thing, this is a whole lot more steps above.

Then, I keep thinking, how am I supposed to win in this scenario? It's so goddamned fucked up. How am I to date a girl that holds previous ties to just about everyone in my social crowd? The outer disguise is to seem that we are nothing more than friends, but that kind of information easily becomes distorted by the ceaseless rumors of the constituents in this social crowd. And how are we supposed to get along as a group anyway? This situation in itself is like diplomacy, like drafting a treaty between several volatile factions. We are no happy crowd of friends. We are a gossipy and polar set of people, who hold facades of amicability. The interconnectivity between all of us undoubtedly leads to volatility. Elissa and Ryan don't like Cindy, (as well as other people) but I, as well as Diana and Bryan, like her. Orlando's girlfriend Sherly doesn't like Cindy, Diana, and probably Elissa. Nolan probably still likes Diana, and Rob and Nolan don't always get along too keen. Rob and I get along fine, same with Jen and I, but she and I have some history. Same goes for me and Cindy, a brief history. Ryan and Cindy used to be together. I can't put too much faith into Ron. Sometimes I still want to violently harm Jaime. Ryan and Orlando are way too caught up in their own relationships that they are no longer the same as they once were (you can imagine how this kind of a situation can end up). We're something of a powder-keg waiting to be ignited. I have this distinct feeling that some day I will be that match.
The interactions between all of us are deep, and to somehow complicate the intricate web of friendship and deceit would be akin to acid desolving molecular bonds. I have a hunch that pursuing this will probably destroy my perception of balance in the grand scheme of this social circle. What if we got together, would I become the same as Ryan and Orlando? Would the hidden resentment for either one of us surface in subconscious ways, slowly deteriorating the original foundation of friendship? Will some people start to become awkward around either one of us? Would our break-up bar my friendship to those that allied themselves with her? She's a very likable person, would people swing to her defense? Would I become so distraught as to become disillusioned in the support of everyone else?
Gah, too much thinking.

Wednesday, January 14, 2004

HIGHLIGHTS and REFLECTIONS of EL CABINO 2004

-Booze Central. There was a large supply of liquor at the cabin every day... it was insane...each day, it seemed like a new bottle of liquor magically appeared. Well, I was too drunk to realize that people kept making booze runs whenever it was necessary. Y'know... I swear my piss turned into a very unsettling color most of the week.

-Video gaming. It kept me from truly being bored before the the weekend came. Soul Calibur 2, anyone?

-Monday night/early Tuesday morning. Let's just say that this particular night shall be forever etched into my memory. January 6th, 2004 will be added to the growing list of "Defining Moments" of my young life, where it will join the ranks of August 13th, 2003 and December 27th, 2002, February 14th, 2003, etc., etc. Essentially, the entire cabin trip to the Lake Tahoe became COMPLETELY worth it on account of that night, although the rest of the week paled in comparison. Shit, I'd probably smile some kind of goofy grin if I were to recall that night step by step. Awwwwww.

-Tuesday's snowboard session. It was coo, especially since I believe it will be the only time I will board this year. The entire moment that I coasted down the mountain watching Ron do spirals (and fall), watching Ryan fall, seeing Anthony do the spirals AND hit a small kicker in the mini-terrain park. Not to mention seeing Diana improve in snowboarding (no matter whether it was little by little) made my heart soar. Oh gawd, I want to snowboard so bad.

-Tuesday night. Another fragmented memory to add to my lexicon of records, where this night shall earn the, "Most HAMMERED" privilege. After upping the stakes to the last draw of a crazy game of 'Kings,' (in which I raised the ante with Anthony, saying that loser empties out every drink on the table that was not bottled), I downed nearly 10 half-finished drinks, not to mention the 'waterfall.' 10 drinks, 10 pukes. I'd say that works out just about right.

-Friday night. A new category to add to my database of experiences, where...let's see...you can say that I was seriously afraid of ELEVATORS. Paranoia, near-schizophrenic, overall psychologic hell.

-Fighting the urge to kill my cabin-mates and guests. Yeah, I'm semi-serious. The previously mentioned experience could have nearly made me briefly go insane. Emotions run high when your own sense of reality is out of control. Yeah, scary shit.

-Plague is a Horseman of the Apocalypse. Really though, it was pretty scary how many people got sick in that cabin. Hell, Van couldn't even go because he got pretty sick the day before. Orlando carried a slight cold with him to the cabin, and I think one of the Gali's might have harbored a vile sickness with them as well. Nolan and Anthony came down with really bad fever/flu's half-way through the week, which put them out of commission the rest of the trip. Rob ended up getting sick the very last days, and Jaime was fighting infection the whole time. Eventually, the Anthony/Orlando room became dubbed as the "Quarantine Room," because most of the sick kids would end up in there sooner or later. Thank goodness I didn't show any symptoms of sickness...only in the OTHER ways. Alas, Fate has a wicked sense of irony, because I'm fighting a bit of the cold as I write this.

-Sunrise at the Lake. That was great, smoking a Cohiba while chilling in the morning cold and shootin the breeze...as well as other things. They say the Eskimos have plenty of ways to say, "snow."

-Toboggan! That was the fun part of staying at the cabin, especially after all the work I had put into molding and icing down the snow mounds in the front of the cabin. I'm glad Nick and Jon actually took the effort to toboggan at least once. The rest of yalls was pussy.

-FRANK THE TANK. Orlando Barcena, Jr., you sir, impressed me immensely at the cabin. Not only did you outdrink me most of the time and NOT yak (that I can attest to), but you epitomized the whole concept of a week away from home in a cabin at Lake Tahoe. It was great that somehow, the whole lot of us started drunkily chanting his new 'nickname' in the middle of a drinking game. Not only that, but he beat the shit out of us at Omaha, Manhattan, Heaven & Hell, Anaconda, and Cowboys. That's quite the feat.

-The Screamer. Even though we never did get to do much as a group (other than get faded), I had hoped we could all go to the casino just to have everyone do what Anthony did an try out the "Seat of Terror," a chair that sends intense electrical pulses through you. Brief torture for $1.00... GENIUS!

-Sailing on the Friend-Ship. Awww. In truth, the cabin became a place where my relations with the people there became more clarified and defined. I could go off on how much some people there let me down or disappointed my expectations of them, but I'd rather realize how much more cool I became with Nick, Kiel, and Anthony.

-Dippin the 'cha. HAHAH.

-The Sunday Morning Buzz. 10 am and already buzzed? Whaaaaa? That was GRRRREAT.

-DRAMA. Oh man, that cabin had its fair share of drama. Too bad I had passed out for most of it. Fights, scuffles, jealousy, secrets, confessions, lust, it was nearly a soap opera in that house. Come to think of it, Jen brought up the idea that the next cabin could be filmed in as much of it's entirety as possible, so that we could pull off some kind of reality TV episode. I had also thought of this concept, but now the idea of pulling it off has taken precedence.

-We MUST finish all the Liquor! Gold Rum, Jack Daniels, Butternips, Baja Rosa, 'Irish Cream', 'Caramel Temptation,' we decided not to bring any booze back home, to finish as much as we can Sunday night and that night alone. Too bad Nick and Eli took the brunt of it.

-The ride home. It was ONE BIG TRIP. Serious. I was fighting sleep, but everytime I slipped into a quick nap, I went through a vividly wild delusion. CRAZY.

Monday, January 12, 2004

ROCK the CASBAH
So yeah. For 7 days, a large group of friends (including myself) rocked the FUCK out of this two-story cabin in South Lake Tahoe. I try to recollect the entire experience, but it never really forms a very cohesive timeline of events in my mind. Thank goodness for the wonders of modern technology and the usefulness of these things called digital cameras. Several of us at the cabin had digital cameras, namely myself, Ryan, and Jennifer. Out of the three of us, Jen probably had the best opportunities to steal goldenly candid moments throughout the week. I, not being one to be outdone, handled the business of filming some of the moments during the week with my Sony DSC-P32 digital camera. Ok, so, I think the week went like this:

-Day 01 (1/05): Ron, Anthony, and I arrive at the cabin around noon, and unload our gear along with Ryan, Orlando, and Jaime (who had arrived first). Eventually, Nolan, Jen, Robert, and Nick arrived, followed by Diana and Roberta last. We got our things unpacked, and claimed our rooms. That night, some of the group went on a 'run' to acquire the booze, which would fuel our drunkeness. We played a drinking game, I think, which caused most of us to promptly crash one by one.

-Day 02 (1/06): Ron, Anthony, Ryan, Orlando, Diana, and I rolled out to Sierra-at-Tahoe to snowboard. Alas, that was the only day I could afford to ride (which would be my only day to ride this season). It was Diana's first time, so Ron taught her some of the basics, while the rest of us tore up the bunny slope. Ron eventually went to ride the blue/black runs on the mountain, while Orlando went off on his own. Anthony, Ryan, and I stuck with the greens for the most part. While Anthony and Ryan were off, I spent the better half of my session coaching/supervising Diana in her practice of heel-side braking i.e. "falling leaf." This gave me the opportunity to work my toe and heel-side skillz, and also inadverdently forced me to ride switch on several occasions down the slope. She and I hit the rabbit hill about 3-4 times, and soon met up with the rest of the crew. Ron and I met up with Orlando and proceeded to take a lift that would bring us to the 3 mile "Sugar and Spice" run. PAIN.
When we got back to the cabin, we chilled until night came, and soon, the entire cabin was involved in a maddening drinking game called "Kings." It was probably around this time that we, as a group, dubbed Orlando, "Frank the Tank" (and oddly, we all chanted that moniker simultaneously at one point). Needless to say, I puked a sum total of 9 times that night. Fun times.

-Day 03 (1/07): I can only remember as much as my fierce hangover allowed me. When night fell, I was nearly ready to engage in more fun, but swore not to over-do it again. I do remember that Anthony and Robert went at it and had a friendly round of wrestling in lieu of a challenge issued the night before (when nearly EVERYONE was blitzed). Although I stayed completely sober, I was still unable to sleep at all that night.
=Edit: It is understood now that the "Team Arena" tournament that we had (where the cabin-mates were split into two teams and put through a gauntlet of 3 different games to determine an overall winner) had indeed taken place on this night.=

-Day 04 (1/08): Since I could not sleep the night prior, I am still unsure of the events that took place this day. The only way I am sure something happened is because I filmed our (Ron, Ryan, Anthony, Jen and I) visit to Caesar's and Harrah's casinos. After that, I'm pretty sure we all got quite drunk and/or high. I'm guessing that it was one of these nights that Orlando, Diana, Anthony, Ron, Robert, and I played poker/hold 'em and lost a lot of money to Orlando (who was SHITFACED. forrealz.)

-Day 05 (1/09): I have no idea. I think we (Ryan, Orlando, Jaime, Diana, Roberta, and I) went to see Peter Pan at the Horizon theater? Oh well, more drunkeness/smoking. Uh, from this point on, I have NO CLUE as to what really happened at night, other than that which I record here. I was extremely wasted from that day onward. Kiel and Jasmine arrived sometime that day, along with Patrick. We ate a nice filipino dinner thanks to Jasmine. Unfortunately, a certain Alex Galaviz was expected to arrive with them, but could not make it. Fucker.
Tammy, Lance, and Elissa arrived, too, as well as late additions Phillip and Nicole. Also, Maggit and his friend dropped by, followed by Ryan and Ron's co-workers from DMV. After a rather large hotbox session, the night goes quite haywire, and I eventually pass out on the couch really early. Particularly large gaps of memory are missing from that night. Hahaha.

-Day 06 (1/11): Orlando and Anthony leave early because they were both too sick to stay any longer. Maggit and his friend leave that morning as well. Roberta's brother Eli (sp?) and his girlfriend Nicole (sp?) arrive, and later that day Bryan, Cindy, and Big Jon Estrada make it up to the cabin. Jon, Bryan, Cindy, and I visited the casino strip and wandered about the area. One of the more fun nights that I can actually remember. A 14-man Soul Calibur 2 tournament went underway, in which I (who was quite faded) won it all.

-Day 07 (1/12): Bryan, Jon, Cindy, and I wake up before dawn to walk to the lake and watch the sun rise. We (excluding Cindy) smoke a nice Cohiba that morning, take some pictures, and head back to the cabin. I try to sleep, but am unable to once more. I eventually get up an hour or two before noon and proceed to get buzzed again. This course of action proved quite helpful, as I was easily able to go back to sleep an hour or two after I hit a few shots. After Bryan and Jon head back to Sacramento, I pass out for a few hours, only to wake up to restart the process once more. Jasmine, Kiel, and Patrick leave as Ron, Ryan, Elissa, Jaime, and I head out to eat dinner at a cheap (but good) chinese spot up the street and return home for our last night at the cabin. Nick, Jaime, Jen, Eli, Nicole, and I play several drinking games, determined to finish the rest of the booze left in the cabin. Suffice it to say, the task was completed.

-Day 08 (1/12): The last survivors of the cabin (Ron, Ryan, Jaime, me, Elissa, Jen, Rob, Nick, Nolan) get our last affairs in order, which meant packing and cleaning up the mess we made of the cabin. Eli and Nicole leave that morning, just as I wake up from a night of restless sleep.
And thus, with a memory riddled with holes and a slight hangover, I was finally able to escape from a week-long marathon of VICE and WICKEDNESS. It was grand.

Sadly, this account of "El Cabino 2004" is nowhere near complete or factual, thus I refer you to Jaime's blog, or Diana's site, and maybe even Ryan's site (assuming he ever updates) in hopes that more information can be gleaned on what happened while I was too hammered to notice. If I am able to gain a copy of Jen and Bryan's pictures, I'll try and find a way to post it up. Until then, PUSH IT TO THE LIMIT.
Gah. The minute I get back home from a week in the mountains, I bust out a really bad stuffy nose. I need to recollect my thoughts (as well as capture my pics) on the cabin trip. I'll get back to this later.