cubicle


i know have my spot in a corner office. on the second floor. overlooking a shady forest.
but the forest used to be a homeless brothel.
and its only for a few hours a week.
but im very happy.

what is the what



can someone please read this so we can talk. and then we can plan our trip to sudan.

twenty twelve



seriously, what are your thoughts on this logo for the olympics in london. i am sure the world hates it for being too extreme and too complicated and too non-london. but i love it. not for the sake of being an opposition and loving what the world hates. but for the sake of how london-esque this is. look at album art by Hot Chip:

look at the fashion that is spanning the world today:


i will be the only person to fully back this design because of how right it is with everything. but please, i want everyone who reads this to comment with your thoughts, except for that guy who leaves comments about all those prescription drugs.

clark and michael



i think this might change my life

adding to that

i bought tickets to these events:

june 13:

helvetica the film @ landmark embarcadero theaters
july 7:

sherwood @ great american music hall
july 11:

klaxons @ great american music hall

sometimes things just add up


God just kicked me in the ass, basically.
San Jose State lied to me.

six more months of school

four more units

where did this come from?

I guess I cant live on a farm in spain
I guess I cant work at a job that requires my degree
I guess my perfect life, once again, gets impurities
I guess I might not be able to go to the wedding in England.

Everything adds up, all these blogs ive written, all the words ive said, all the talk of me not fitting in with anyone at my graduation. Or the fact that I read all of this information just ten minutes before my graduation party began. It all makes sense. My life foreshadowed without anyone seeing it.

Right now I know that there will be something happening, a reason for this, a reason for my extra time at the place I was over two years ago. Its hard to accept. I yelled, I cried, because honestly, this could be the worst news ive heard. But that shows me how much I care about myself, my needs, my wants, my will.

Everything seriously adds up. Im uncomfortable. Everything that was planned is now gone. Everything that looked hopeful has ended. I am frustrated. I am losing what I want. And this is what we talked about in church. Sometimes I hate (in a loving way) how god does stuff like this.

This is what I need though. Because honestly the only things right now that have been good to me, and bring peace are god and Africa. that could sound very weird. God wins of course, but Africa, oh Africa, its your lack of knowledge which kills me. Its your tribes that dance and thank god for the sunlight, its your comfort in the thousands of ways that I view said comfort uncomforting. Its your music which speaks millions of thoughts.

i know that in turbulent times there are certain albums i cannot listen to, because i will instantly associate those albums with those turbulent times. so driving back to campbell last night i decided to listen to something that i couldnt sing along to, something that would keep me sane on my drive, and something that would coincide with the prayers and thoughts that were leaving my mind. i turned to konono no1. listen to Paradiso (live).

basically after that, things fell together. im going to accept a lot of hell that i dont want to. i need this, and it sucks.

i kindof feel that god just gave me a new car. told me to get in, and right before i get in, he takes the car away from me. and i can see him hiding it. its all crazy.

This blog makes sense to me. To you guys probably not so much.

some experience with horses required

my search for a job is similar to jon's search. except me and the teaching thing dont go together well. but i carry my continual dream of living overseas selling flowers or something simple. to learn the culture. to learn the life that i can only dream of. this failed quest quickly became a "im going to take a trip in the next few weeks" (dont be surprised if i am gone for a week). this failed quest quickly brought me to this website. people who need help gardening or painting or learning japanese or taking care of children can post on this and let their needs be seen. i believe these are all unpaid, but they cover your expenses for when you are there. i believe they provide a place to live as well. one post stood out to me, in grenada spain:
We are looking for a reliable person with initiative to stay & look after our property for 2 weeks during june or july(dates flexible) whilst we are away. We have 3 horses & 4 cats. Some experience with horses required (although we do not want them to be ridden when we are away) There are some other jobs to do watering plants etc but our main concern is that the animals are well fed & happy.


this is amazing.

life/sleep


i am going to watch the science of sleep for the rest of my life.

character

i'm pretty sure that in the last three or four weeks i have gained a greater sense of awareness. i have gained more knowledge on who i am. i am beginning to look at myself from the perspective of the bystander. three or four weeks ago i was content. three or four weeks ago i was brian. today i am still brian. but i can also see brian. i can see what three or four weeks of thoughts and drives and rides and walks and talks and prayers could do to that guy.

what's crazy are the words that have been exposed from my mouth. words i did not know because they knew me so well.
escapism, numb, immune.
what is also strange to me is that at times i have been more interested in how sentences are formed versus what they are expressing. this had caused me to love dave eggers whilst forgetting story-lines.

this has caused me to realize that i have been a jerk to people. i have ended friendships because i was too cool for them. i have hurt people. i did not realize any of this prior to three or four weeks ago because myself and my group of friends have not brought it up. we hid it. we buried it. we lied to ourselves and said it was ok, because we are comfortable now. we lied to ourselves and said that we could get away with this. we are jerks (i really do not want to offend anyone with this. i really want to make sure we are on the same page).

i am so glad that people care.
i am so glad that people pried into my mind.
i am so glad that this world is not about my level of comfort.
i am so glad that these thoughts happened.
i am so glad that people said what was right, even if they didnt know.
i am so glad that i found issues.
i am so sorry to everyone at the same time.

non-books

right now, at this exact moment, i would say my non books would be these that i will list below. for those that do not understand the concept of non-books, here you go:
I now propose a new tag: Things which one has read and has been influenced by which are not confined to those paper-bound vessels of the printed word we refer to as books. Let's call these Non-Books. Or maybe Impossible Books. Or Limen Books? It's up to you. List five.
1. dessert music
dessert is not consumed daily, dessert is a treat, a reward, a thing we crave, a thing to be treated with respect and taken in moderation. dessert music are amazing albums that become simply the best thing in the world. years after originally hearing it, it can be reheard and the taste of it is amazing. my favorite dessert albums are:

Wilco - Yankee Hotel Foxtrot
the number one album of all time in my mind. even the great color / photograph / century gothic cover art is amazing.

Death Cab For Cutie - We Have The Facts And We're Voting Yes

Jimmy Eat World - Clarity


2. typography
i truly dont know if this is legit. books equal large selection of type, whereas typography contains much more than books. there is something truly sexy about certain letters (the gill sans "g" / ligatures)


3. being lost
before lost in translation hit theaters i rode in a taxi from one end of beijing to a mall in the city centre with two chinese girls and an older chinese taxi driver. for forty minutes i had to trust everything: god, the driver, these girls, everything. i was in a different world. i spoke like three lines of mandarin. the driver spoke no english. the girls spoke conersational english. we were going shopping. we get out of the taxi and there were crowds everywhere. i did not understand any word. i couldnt tell if people were happy or mad. i do not know the world. i do not know the people. i do not know everything. in usa i felt comfort because i know everything. comfort does not stretch us. comfort is our dream. i love not knowing my surroundings. i just have to trust and adapt.


4. outside
i have fallen in love with being outside. probably from travelling. i love rolling up my pant legs and riding my bike around town. i love walking to campbell. i love laying on the grass at the park. i love the breeze. i love reasoning with god when the heat is too much or the wind is too strong. i love not being inside.




5. a nice pint
i truly love a nice cold pint of beer. it has nothing to do with getting drunk or hyphy. its all about the actual enjoyment of the beer. it has that dessert aspect to it. different pints for different moods. i dont have "my beer" anywhere. its always dependent upon many things that go on around that time. this also feeds into my love for finding the best pub. these are mood-dependent as well. sometimes i prefer the quieter ones. sometime i like the loud places. sometimes i like sitting outside in the afternoon with one.

shropshire





this is where i will be in november. along with a flurry of friends and english-coutry-folk.

hallelujah

killing of time

deal with the footnotes. just pretend klosterman wrote this.

moving out last summer, mixed with not having television or internet made me appreciate life more. the influence may have come from the trip to europe that i had just been on and the idea that "i spent all this money to go here, and i am not going to waste time" [1]. so i would walk around campbell, ride my bike, become a part of the community instead of being a tenant of the city. one of my highlights still is walking into town with my laptop to do what i need to do on the internet. no surfing really. im not saying i am greater than that. its more of the thought that "i dont spend money at this coffeeshop and i just sit here and use their internet, let me get out of here as soon as i can".

i feel like ive been embracing life more, based around the fact that i dont feel like im wasting time.
maybe this could do with everything that i take on, all these roles i have put myself into[2].

but somehow i feel fully responsible [3] for people who dont enjoy life. i am also totally looking into this from my own perspective, assuming that everyone wants to not kill their days with video games/internets/televisions.

at the same time, life is amazing. im 24. a large chunk of my life has been used already. that gives me subtle motivation to do something. to go climb and run and see and hear and to experience.

it basically just kills me to walk through the library at school and see so many people sitting at their same computer each day [4] playing online poker. or kristin can attest to this one man whom i witnessed playing a few different online games all at the same time. there would be so much more to everything if these people were to actually play with other people in a real game, to verbalize, to laugh, to experience.

i feel like im just hitting the gamers.

i dont even know my motivation for this. i just get stressed out when people stay inside all day long. and it doesnt even concern me. its not my issue.

[1]: i did not view reading books or relaxing as wasting time. staying at the hostel/train station/airport/___________ would not compare to going out into the town whether it was to grab a drink/watch boats pass/go to a market/___________. the alternate was always better in my mind.
[2]: im not saying these roles are bad. i love all of them. i may have originally "taken" them because they were an escape from this evil killing of time.
[3]: slight exaggeration.
[4]: multiple times a day for some

books



"The human race publishes a book every 30 seconds. If current trends continue, by 2052 the number of people writing and publishing a book in a given year will exceed the number of people who will read one."
-Gabriel Zaid

werewolf

get up on that horse and ride into the sunset

im ready to be done. i know ive counted down. and ive filled you in on my final moments.

but i went through this sadness (mild) that had me wishing that my graduation would coalesce with me finishing 7 tests and 3 papers all in one day, just so i could throw the pencil down and walk out with a smile. meanwhile the whole school would greet me on my walk from the art building to the light rail station, with high fives and handshakes.

but i am finishing my final tomorrow. and i dont graduate until the 26th.

so there are these vague "in betweens" until then. these are the opposite of high fives and handshakes.

but i do have a bit of stress (mild) that is ok with me. i work well like this. i have this and this and those to do and this place to go (de young museum in sf). and i feel that i only have two free days to accomplish these, if only i could say im done at that point.

in other news, starbucks/customer service has killed my empathy. the opposite of high fives and handshakes. but the good from this is that it is coming back. with handshakes (high fives are overused, unless its graduation) and hugs and talks and eyesight and time.

this is my informal thank you to everyone ive talked to in the last month or so about anything basically. i think only 4 people read this anyways. thank you to you 4. [high five].

valentino achak deng

"...there were things I wondered about seeing. I had heard of rivers so wide that birds could not fly across; the birds would drop midway and be subsumed by the limitless water. I had heard of land that rose so high that it was as if the earth was tilted on its side; land that was shaped like the contours of a sleeping person. I wanted to see these things and then to return to my parents, to tell them about my journey. It was when i imagined doing so that the strings inside me felt taut again, and I had to breathe heavily to loosen them."

high fiving teddybears



i gave one of these guys a high five the other night. and it was truly awesome.

Teddybears - Yours To Keep

lent

its been a few weeks since lent has ended and i still plan on sleeping in someday. like today wouldve been an opportune time. and i work up at 830. i feel that its just making me fall asleep earlier. but at the same time, i do enjoy this routine im in.

and for the biggest excitement of all:
friday will be 99°
saturday will be 98°
sunday will be 96°
i will have a gross farmers tan.

if you all get bored over the next few days you should go here and try to figure out what stage of heat exhaustion i am in and which artist i am watching.

one hundred and fifty

this is my 150th post. maybe it should be special. maybe it should serve as a recap. maybe ill just tell you guys about the coolest thing ever.

or ill just talk in headlines because sometimes its easier to sum things up like that.

ennui is my new favorite word.
i am going to get more paint soon, and i have the canvases (or canvi).
teske's with the boys last night was the best.
one week from tonight ill see bjork.
i dont know if my body is ready to handle 15 bottles of water a day.
life is good right now.
someday ill find another job.