Backhand

I was going to call this post "War Journal" because yesterday felt like I was dug into a trench taking grenades all god damn day. Before my classes began I walked myself over to Mando Books to pick up a copy of Write Away which Dr. Franke had assigned. I passed my poor little silver Saturn along the way.

Two new parking tickets. I have a parking permit, which I paid 60 dollars for. I was in a section with absolutely no signs, no postings, no indication that it was any sort of special short or even/odd term area. So the city will get yet another 60 out of me. I've already paid 3 tickets this semester. All totalled I'd say that's two hundred dollars Cortland's managed to get out of me. It really seems to me that there's some sort of punishment being doled out for owning a car in this area.

Anyway.

I went to Philosophy and French. Earlier that week I had given a presentation on the Death Penalty in Philosophy and had used my flash drive to upload the graphics. It dawned on me as I left the room that I had never taken my drive out of the USB port. So I rushed back in, only to find it missing. No one had seen it. Now most people have their files on their computer anyway, which I normally do- I am very safe about these things. However, I just got a brand new computer (which promptly crashed and had to be replaced under warranty) so my drive was completely clean. Which means...Everything I have ever written is gone.

So I figured I'd take me gloom with me to the Red Jug and play Trivia Night. The fucking idiot DJ does trivia night as category lists for some reason, rather than actual questions. For example, he will say "cigarettes," and each team must list all relevant brands of cigarettes. There is a limited number of answers per question, so sometimes one must guess as to what brands the DJ might be picking as answers. Seems straightforward, but each category is worth a different number of points, and some answers are randomly selected for triple or quadruple points. The second to last category was "Dead Male Singers." We were in Third place I believe, not very far behind. We filled the list. We were incredible. We even threw in obscure dead men like the singer from Joy Division. I threw in Big Bopper, Buddy Holly, and Frankie Valens.

Which was supposed to be Ritchie Valens. Which, of course, was the 9,000 point bonus answer. I put my forehead into my hand, stared at my Guinness, and considered for the first time having a fit in public. But instead I just kicked the shit out fo Patrick at 8-ball. Our record for the semester thus far is 11-8 in my favor. At the end of the semester the loser pays the winner ten dollars for each game in the difference of scores. In addition, side bets are welcome: for instance, Patrick now has to do all the dishes since he lost 2 out of 3 last night.

Hardly compensation for my stupidity and misfortune, but I'll fuckin take it.

Monday

Last Wednesday I took my first French 202 test of the semester. I studied for about four horus before the test, which is ou of the ordinary for me. I rarely study, and haven't since taking Statistics which was Sophomore year. Most of my classes are writing, and if they aren't they're at least writing intensive. I rarely have to study. I'm not claiming to be a genius, I think I just test well. Despite having stared at the book for quite some time, I felt very confused on the test and scattered. I couldn't remember if I was doing one of the vebr tenses right and I faked the culture section. Frustration set in and I was the last person finished with the test, which has never happened. So when I got the test back today and saw I had received an 87, I was more than surprised.

That's really the only good news of the day. I have 20 dollars until Friday. I drove home Friday afternoon, spent the majority of the weekend arguing with my mother over things as trivial as whether or not I had darkened my hair (no I did not.) I drove home Saturday night to hang out with Ray, which went rather well, but driving took a lot out of my mood. I am trying to get into Second Life for class but they refuse to send me my confirmation e-mail.

In somewhat decent news, I bought myself a Fonseca Vintage on Saturday while grabbign Ray a James Joyce, so if I get over this cold soon I will have that to look forward to. (That's a cigar, btw.)

Plans

Hey there, Blogosphere.

So, I have a lot more to do this semester than I thought I would. I'm working on a few writing projects, all at the same time. Normally this would have me very scattered, but the projects I'm working on are things I've given a lot of thought to. One of them I've been planning for at least a few years, but never had the patience or peace of mind to deal with. Since I know where they're going, I'm not having too difficult a time moving through them.

A paper for Creative Nonfiction was supposed to be a "Walking" essay. That is, it's based around moving through the community, making observations. Obviously papers like this have a main object (a physical setting or topic) and an under-topic (the actual meaning and point of the essay). However, I really hate walking around with no aim. When I'm going somewhere I'm focused on my objective and rarely have time to make relevant observations; unless something extreme happens like a car accident or a nearly naked woman. I noticed that the only time I really pay attention to the things around me is when I'm sitting outside for a cigar. So I've decided to make a Journal of sorts. Most hobbyists keep a journal of their favorite experiences, whether it is wine or scotch or cigars or model railroads. I haven't figured out the under-topic yet, but the format should lend itself to a lot of different things.

I'm also working on another CNF piece (both are for Franke oddly enough) about my father's job. The assignment was to learn about a community that is completely foreign to us, and I'd say I'm rather unfamiliar with the world of Nuclear engineering. I'm trying to steer away from the "my dad can beat your dad up" schoolyard bullshit.

By the way no one reads this blog. Anyway. I'm going to finally start work on my fantasy story. I'm not going to write straight genre fiction because there's so much trash out there and I don't need to add to it. There's absolutely no blood in those books (figuratively speaking). I'm going to throw a lot of experimental things into the book, or rather experimental for that genre. Writing CNF should help my fiction, which sounds odd, but a lot of the techniques can be applied: if you read war books, there's often a lot of different accounts of the same events, letters and correspondence, etc. It's rare to see that in fantasy so I'm really excited about getting to work on this one.

I'll keep you (blog) posted with upates on how this stuff works out.

Asian Cowboy Movies

Well, I haven't written here in a while. I haven't actually written anything in a long time, but I don't actually have a problem with that. I've been filling my time with watching obscure asian westerns, playing xbox, reading, going out, etc.

I'm looking forward to PWR209 Round 2, even if the reading materials are things I've looked at before. I obviously didn't follow them closely enough last semester, so it isn't as if I'll be boring myself to death with redundancies.

Pretty boring post so far, right? Good!