Monthly Archives: October 2004

pete’s peeves vol. 1

just a few things that did not make me too happy to think about on this beautiful autumn monday.

exhibit a
starbucks raises its prices
you’d think that after paying premium prices the past two years for this particular brand, it would somehow reward you with discounts or some sort of frequent-buyer card, but nope – starbucks flexes its muscular brand and raises it prices. grande coffee in nyc is now $2.01 after taxes, up from $1.90. 11 cents! i drink around 10 coffees a week, so that comes to more than a dollar per week, four bucks a month, almost $50 a year! not cool. i could have used that to buy myself a muffin every two weeks. ugh.

exhibit b
inability to stay awake during film theory screenings
i took a film noir class my sophomore year and i remember staying awake and even being enthralled for most of the films we watched. the same for script analysis and even the international film history class. but film theory films (and films from the silent screen class i took last year) have the uncanny ability to knock me out in my seat. i tried my best today to watch vertov’s man with a movie camera and while i tried to stay interested for the first 10 minutes, the other 58 minutes were added to the running total of hours-slept-during-film-class-in-the-past-three-years. the worst is when i sleep through movies and have to sit another hour while the professor fields questions and comments from the students about the movie we just watched. it becomes a total waste of time, and it’s a shame that i wake up in time for this painful portion of my 4-hour film theory class. am i unfit for such rigorous intellectual study of my chosen discipline?

you see it all in a day

i’m with my friend nigi and we’re just chilling in a living room. i hear a constant sound of something clanging against a metal pipe and it makes my head ring. we look for it everywhere but it’s nowhere to be found. then i wake up. it’s 10:50am. shit, late for a meeting.

i learn that teaching should be an option for someone so utterly confused about the future as myself. what about wall street dreams and big money? discouraged perhaps, and maybe looking for something more refreshing as well.

a quick 1-hour workout makes me feel just that much better – i do the clean press a bunch of times and try 2100s with 25lbs. it’s harder when you hold the bar on the outside. i think biceps that are too big makes the arm look too short. i’ll keep mine lean.

shun lee cafe again and it’s with ms. hyun, the one person who really makes me talk excitedly about the stuff i study in film and whatever artsy stuff i’ve gathered from here and there… i love how it’s a lot less awkward, and her face is a lot brighter because she doesn’t have the stresses of school weighing her down anymore. the new york film festival is definitely worth the extra $5 per ticket because it comes with a short – this time it’s a hungarian movie about three fishermen and a blonde whore-girl who has a different experience with each… my guess is that she is some kind of angel and the one that treats her the best ends up catching a boatload of fish. and for the feature, we had “woman is the future of man” which was a series of mise-en-scene shots linked together… absolutely beautiful and the subject matter was naturalistic, brutally real, and, to be pretentious-sounding, very poetic. yes, women are the new men if they become aware of their sexual powers — i wasn’t too sure, but i think it’s something about women no longer trusting men and using them just like the men have used them for a long long time. bleak, sad, but in a way, true.

which brings me back to my dorm and a few minutes’ walk to the dorm i stayed at over the summer. it’s always great spending time with her and yes it’s because i’m highly infatuated. but i must know my station in this life in relation to her, and that is… friend. i am sorry for having thought i had a chance and i cringe at myself for having such hopes. i am not disappointed at you because you were honest and that’s all i really wanted. you want to be friends, and sure, why not? but i promised myself never again to be that presumptuous creep, so say hello to me – the old/new me. i should have known the prevalent logic – why give it a chance, when it’s not going to work out? or maybe i should have read between the lines: not. interested.

yes i walk back humming john mayer tunes because once you live life one track after another – some sad, some not-so-sad – then it’s not such a bad feeling. you don’t need to skip tracks cuz they all sound just so damn good. right?

across from my door flat on the hallway is a good friend who makes my night-time rejection seem trivial… 3 years of solid relationship forever gone… a cup of water, a sleeping bag, a sad sad walk downstairs… rivers flowing and i want to join, too…. i hope he sleeps alright.

all i can wish is for someone to tell me that i did the right thing tonight. i’ve become the all-too-dispensible human waste floundering in self-perpetuated dramas…..must…. stop.

yearning for some more interesting

Applying for jobs these days – and without much success – has taken a toll on me. That is why i found it refreshing when i read an article in The New York Post – ok, we get it at the NFL HR office – about a freelance photo assisant working on a Crate&Barrel catalog who, as a joke, put a sign up on one of the panels of the Hideaway Home Office Armoire ($1,799 in case you want one) with writing that reads “Dinner w/Marc” and his phone number below it. The article said that in the month after the Fall 2004 catalog was sent out, he received over 500 phone calls for dates all around the country. While the dude, Marc, is skeptical about finding love or romance, he is going to go on a tour of all these dates and meet new people. I guess his key draw was that 1) the idea was pretty slick and ingenious and 2) it was pretty bold. And while I heard C&B wasn’t too happy about it, they’ve “loosened up.” I think – and I say this as a loyal C&B customer – that such publicity is great for the company and maybe they’ll sell a few of these expensive armoires.

I think a fun, clever, and gutsy thing like that definitely makes life a lot more interesting. Will I ever have the will power to do something fun and cool? Or will I resort to the regimented life of pay checks and excite myself from time to time with expensive purchases from Crate&Barrel? Who cares about jobs and such… just go on some interesting dates, right?