new article up here.

link to my site on your site and increase my google rating!

http://macabasco.com

more birthday pics
and the many, many lap dances...

my problem is my inability to be independent of people who are utterly undependable.

playboy bunny

"make them look like deer."

top sign i don't love christmas - i had to hold myself back from saying: "there's not even any evidence jesus christ was born today!"

instead of christmas cheer, i've been catching up on months of lucky magazine, drinking ghiradelli mocha-hot chocolate, and listening to kazuo ishiguro's never let me go on CD. also been catching up on my project runway - i love daniel v. (be still my hipster heart) and tim gunn, of course.

i got some great gifts this year, including a featherbed and cashmere hoodie from mom, the marc jacobs perfume set and a single-serving coffee pot from italy from laurie, a soft non-snap bathrobe from my aunt, and a really nice tan-colored portfolio for my clips from steve.

we had our mwdc christmas party on wednesday at mr. smith's, which was pretty swanky. it used to be this bar called heaven and hell or something, and upstairs it was all white (heaven) and downstairs it was all red (hell). it's pretty yuppie, but on wednesdays, it's $5 all martinis, so i had something called a "christmas joy" - kahlua, amaretto, and egg nog, with a cinammon rim. there was another party there too, and part of the promotion involved two topless women wearing white antlers with silver body paint in a design on their chests and serving cardboard-tasting cookies. i tried to take one furthest from the nipples.

i only took a few pics at my birthday. i know more are floating out there somewhere, but i probably won't see them for six more months.

BAH HUMBUG
i'm a scrooge every year - big shocker, i know. i've been in a pissy mood all damn weekend. last night eug's birthday was so sf azn5000 - gross. total azn meat market. i need to go be with white people to balance. to fillmore it is!

cutest little bunny

my gift to you this season: ricky gervais podcast (number one on iTunes podcasts)

O.
M.
G.
!!!!!!!

new caption contest


whiteface?

"riding with my bitch in my escalade - whaaaat."

there are some interesting race/gender things happening here, especially with that little black girl wearing chinese pajamas. i'll let you come to your own conclusions. or maybe i'll have a caption contest for this - post in comments!

*from the ny times children's gift ideas

new article in this week's asianweek

also, i totally saw lyrics b0rn last night at the MF D00M show! in the stairway! and he checked margot out! there were like five guys for every one girl at that show. and all those five guys were white. i love the SF underground hip hop scene.


"first rule of margot - you do not touch margot."

spike jonze, i love you.

laurie: "well, the thing is that i think we'll need more than one person to play the music for our wedding."
dad: (snickers)
me: "what's so funny?"
dad: "well, i can play the harmonica."

birthday info:

Lisa's Macabirthday

Medjool
2522 Mission Street at 21st Street
San Francisco
Saturday, December 17, 10:00pm

feel free to bring yer friends!

guess who has a new razr!...also, saw "rent" last night. steve fell asleep and i was ready to leave after an hour. bo-ring.

slate's photo essay on inner-city youth in london - well worth checking out

the woody breakdown

Four masterpieces, six near-great films, 11 flat-out good films, eight flawed but worthy films and six contemptible bombs:

For the sake of this discussion, I'm defining masterpiece as a movie that either could not be better or has no need to be better. That is not merely satisfying but somehow transcends its surface meaning and lingers in a way that suggests a deeper wisdom and significance. Into that category, I'd put "Annie Hall," "Manhattan," "Hannah and Her Sisters" and "Crimes and Misdemeanors."

I'm defining near-great as a movie that's completely successful and satisfying but lacks that elusive extra something that makes for a masterpiece. Into this category I'm placing "Play It Again, Sam" (which he wrote but didn't direct), "Zelig," "The Purple Rose of Cairo," "Radio Days," "Bullets Over Broadway" and "Match Point," his latest, which is being released in January. Even then, aside from "Bullets Over Broadway" and "Match Point," I'm not completely sure these titles belong here. They may be masterpieces that haven't completely ripened over time.

I'm defining flat-out good those films that are undeniably enjoyable and successful. Into this category I'm placing "Take the Money and Run," "Sleeper," "Love and Death," "Interiors," "Stardust Memories," "Broadway Danny Rose," "September," "Another Woman," "Manhattan Murder Mystery," "Mighty Aphrodite" and "Deconstructing Harry." Again, I'm trying to grade a little tough, in that I'm not all that sure that "Love and Death" and "Broadway Danny Rose" don't belong in the near-great category.

Flawed but worthy movies are ones that don't quite work and yet they're either amusing or intelligent enough to be satisfying. Into this category, I'd put "Bananas," "Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Sex ... ," "A Midsummer Night's Sex Comedy," "Husbands and Wives," "Sweet and Lowdown," "Small-Time Crooks," "Hollywood Ending" and "Melinda and Melinda."

Finally, bombs need no definition. Allen's bombs, by my account, are "Alice," "Shadows and Fog," "Everyone Says I Love You," "Celebrity," "Curse of the Jade Scorpion" and "Anything Else." Give the man credit. He has a range. His bad movies are as awful as any ever made.

note: i don't agree with all of this - i think "deconstructing harry," "love and death," "everything you ever wanted to know about sex," and some others deserve to be bumped up a category or two.

THIS IS SO HILARIOUS - read it outloud to someone near you. even if they are sleeping.

treated myself to mcdonald's fries after the gym yesterday. here's what the young black guy behind the register said when i rolled up to the window:

"you know what i'm gonna do one day? i'm gonna order a medium fries, no salt, with caramel dipping sauce."

---
currently watching: "la dolce vita," fellini and "curb your enthusiasm" season 1

---
i finally finished reading "slouching towards bethlehem" and now i know why all the teachers at the j-school recommended the book. i love joan didion - she is my writing idol. my favorite pieces from this book were "some dreamers of the american dream," "life styles in the golden land," and "goodbye to all that."

I am not sure that it is possible for anyone brought up in the East to appreciate what New York, the idea of New York, means to those of us who came out of the West and the South. To an Eastern child, particularly a child who has always had an uncle on Wall Street and who has spent several hundred Saturdays first at F.A.O. Schwartz and being fitted for shoes at Best's and then waiting under the Biltmore clock and dancing to Lester Lanin, New York is just a city, albeit the city, a plausible place for people to live. But to those of us who came from places where no one had heard of Lester Lanin and Grand Central Station was a Saturday radio program, where Wall Street and Fifth Avenue and Madison Avenue were not places at all but abstractions ("Money," and "High Fashion," and "The Hucksters"), New York was no mere city. It was instead an infinitely romantic notion, the mysterious nexus of all love and money and power, the shining and perishable dream itself. To think of "living" there was to reduce the miraculous to the mundane; one does not "live" at Xanadu.

i highly, highly recommend you read the final chapter, about living in new york. maybe i will scan it up here (screw you copyrights).

things that make me angry
1. people who call me between 5 pm and 8 pm - i'm either still at work, on my way home, or winding down from work. i usually just don't pick up, but sometimes people trick me with blocked numbers or home numbers. to me, that is the number-one rudest time of the day to call someone.
2. runner-up bad time to call me: after 11 pm. i'm in bed, and my phone is on my desk, rattling around. we're not in college anymore; people sleep early.
3. people who can't even make the effort to reply to emails i send them asking them if they want to do someting. a simple "i can't" or "i'm not sure" is fine. if not, i don't know if you're in or not or whether to follow up or if you somehow missed the email.
4. people who ask me about details to something that i've already given them details to. people need to write stuff down or get a planner or a palm or something.
5. people who call me at work to ask me about frivolous things that have nothing to do with me and could easily be communicated in an email at my leisure.
6. actually, change that - people who call me at work, period.
7. having to celebrate people's birthdays for more than two days - i can handle the day of someone's birthday PLUS one weekend day. anything more is really ridiculous. and i totally expect the same for my own birthday.
8. people who, when two people can't decide on something, suggest a third option which is totally not favorable to the first two options.
9. people who change plans at the last minute!!!!!!

h&m san francisco review
post street is better for ladies.
i love you, stella.
i now own a hot pink zebra printed article of clothing. and you may or may not see it someday.

and if you think i'm lame, let me leave you with a sign i spotted at best buy tonight around 6 pm - "line for xbox 360 forms here."

and there were four dudes in line already.

for every woman who's been harassed on the street

currently watching
(while blazed and eating chips)

also, here's a scan of the filipinas article

(fixed it, minnie)

new interview up on the front page of the website

top reasons i feel like i work at wernham-hogg
1) the day the publisher announced there would be layoffs happened to be halloween. of course, some people were dressed up, including my co-fellow, who was dressed as a troubled teen. while everyone sat there somberly in shock, he sat there with blue runny eyeliner, slicked back hair and baggy clothes.
2) "we have a problem with the VIP mugs." there are these mugs that are kept in the office kitchen that are for guests, but they're also available for everyone to use. however apparently they're never there when guests visit, so every time that happens, the HR person sends out a very serious staffwide email with the above line. she sounded so exasperated in the last email that she called for suggestions about what to do about The Problem. TPS reports, anyone?
3) other reports of missing items sent to the entire staff include a missing bowl ("please return it - no questions asked") and a missing coat hanger ("why is this OK?" he wrote).
4) the online editor is paying me a decent hourly rate to transcribe some of his interviews. i'm working on one between him (a brit) and an international law expert (another brit). they're using some phrases i don't understand ("cottoning on," "whistlestop tour," etc.), which is fine, but this is the kicker: in asking a question, he actually said, "what sayeth you?"

WHAT SAYETH YOU.

make no mistake - i listened to it three times. maybe he was saying, "what do you think?" or "what's your opinion?" NO. he said WHAT SAYETH YOU. and he did NOT say "what say you?" because that shit's ungrammatical.

so the question is: do i write "what say you?" and risk him catching me trying to correct his odd british foppery? or do i transcibe it faithfully and risk looking like a total asshole about it?

why is life so difficult?

my birthday wish list

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I'M GOING TO BE A MAID OF HONOR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

HILARIOUS column about coldplay

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a moving story by another of my favorite writers

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skinny fucking jeans

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why are there so many journalists with adopted asian children?

"kanye was right" tee shirts

if anyone really wants one, let me know and we can order together.

---

also bored of the beckhams: aburrida de las beckham (the yellow women's one) is my favorite

---

l.a. times on laguna beach

---
also check out the november issue of filipinas at your local borders (in the international section probably) - i've got a feature story in there. i'll post it if it ever comes online.

laurie's engaged!

---

balance ball chair, i love you!

---
people who post pics of their new haircuts - hate it or love it? anyways, mine is rockin, so i have a good excuse.



trying out my top model looks...jules is awesome!

stella mccartney, i'm counting the days.

---
fill in the blank

Steve is troubled by a lot of things. He is twenty-three, was raised in Virginia, and has the idea that California is the beginning of the end. "I feel it's insane," he says, and his voice drops. "This chick tells me there's no meaning to life but it doesn't matter, we'll just flow right out. There've been times I felt like packing up and taking off for the East Coast again, at least there I had a target. At least there you expect that it's going to happen." He lights a cigarette for me and his hands shake. "Here you know it's not going to."

I ask what it is that is supposed to happen.

"I don't know," he says. "Something. Anything."

california special election: "nix the first six!"
NO on Props. 73-78
YES on Props. 79-80

baby's first halloween


(click me for more)

---

enough said.

laguna beach yearbook!
---
judge a guy by what he drinks!...but he will judge you more.

---

great, great analysis (by one of my favorite columnists) of the new nba rules about what players can wear off the court.

Few phrases offer more mixed messages or feel more inherently contradictory than the term "ghetto fabulous." Though meant to be more insouciant and somewhat distinct from the dreary thug/gang/prison wear the NBA is taking to task, the "ghetto fabulous" aesthetic is black cultural appropriation of the worst kind, primarily because it believes it is the best kind. It believes that flaunting riotous color, fake nails, weaves and bling jewelry, or flaunting some versions thereof, pays homage to black people rather than insulting them. It openly fetishizes the ghetto as a fashion trend, a boutique to be browsed through and picked over rather than a real place that nobody ever wants to visit, let alone live in.

---

how many features are written by women in major magazines

snippets from today
tan: "this guy jamie had a thing with was at the party."
me: "who was he?"
tan: "the hamburglar."

---

mamabasco: "hey, where are you going to dinner tonight?"
me, suspicious: "why?"
mamabasco: "what neighborhood?"
me: "why?"
mamabasco: "are you going anywhere near the mall?"
me: "yeah."
mb: "oh yeah? any chance you could get me something?"
me: "just tell me what you want and i'll decide whether or not i want to get it!!"
mb: "gummy spiders."

jack o'pics
from the weekend. spoooky! also, some of jamie's here.

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jenny is in this month's cosmogirl!

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also, a plug:

email of the day, courtesy of steve

oh please, you know its H-O-T. woo hoo.ruff ruff. ee ee oo oo. reaaarrrrrr.

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awesome: hair in the shape of a hat

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save the hoodie!

uh huh!
before

after


finally, one that's frameworthy

two stories
also, see the newest issue of hardboiled here

Rebuilding the Big Easy

Latinos confront strained resources and tense race relations as they help clean up New Orleans and other hurricane-ravaged cities.

By Roberto Lovato

Oct. 19, 2005 | While Mayor Ray Nagin trumpets the return of lights, power and tourists to the French Quarter, Ruben Lopez of Fresno, Calif., and his roommate Myron Moran, a Guatemalan immigrant, rest in the pitch-black room of an abandoned hotel on Canal Street. They've just finished another sultry 14-hour day rebuilding the Big Easy.

"The rats here are the size of rabbits," says Moran, whose teeth glow white in the dark as he describes his temporary home. "We're paying $60 a night to this guy Eddie for a room with no AC, no lights, no electricity, no water and a bed that stinks," says Lopez, a California native who drove with his father to New Orleans after hearing about construction and cleanup work at a job fair in Fresno.

Lopez and Moran are part of a little-understood army of "aliens" (or, among the more politically correct, "out-of-state workers") drawn to the new New Orleans, a city on the verge of a radical Latinization that is also transforming other urban landscapes in the country.

"How do I ensure that New Orleans is not overrun by Mexican workers?" Mayor Nagin asked at a meeting with local business leaders last week. The fact that Moran, an almond-eyed, Maya-faced, 4-foot-2-inch undocumented immigrant from Guatemala, and Lopez, a shaven-headed, tattooed, 6-foot-3-inch U.S. citizen and former Chicano gang member are described as "Mexicans" reflects a profound lack of understanding in this city about its new population. U.S.-born and foreign-born workers are coming to the Gulf Coast from the Southwest, Florida, the Carolinas, Mexico and Latin America, swelling the numbers of Hispanics in Louisiana beyond the mere 3 percent recorded in the 2001 U.S. Census.

Malik Rahim, a former City Council candidate and head of Common Ground, a multiethnic advocacy group in the Algiers neighborhood, calls the mayor's remarks "the kind of scapegoating that only worsens an already difficult situation." Rahim, a former Black Panther, says he and other community activists are challenged enough by police brutality, Louisiana's historic racism and natural disasters. City leaders and the news media lack the resources and cultural knowledge to deal with the latest influx of workers to New Orleans, which historically has seen several waves of migrant workers, brought in by the French, Spanish and British empires.

Lopez, Moran and thousands of other immigrant and U.S.-born Latinos are cleaning debris, putting up drywall and restoring the ornate iron balconies of historic buildings on Canal Street and other streets in the French Quarter. Local Hondurans, who comprise the city's largest Latino population, report being the object of anger from blacks and whites who fear losing their livelihoods to low-wage Latino workers. Zapotec-speaking Oaxacan Indians walk the streets of New Orleans and elsewhere in Louisiana and in Mississippi after being threatened with deportation and kicked off local military bases, where they worked for local contractors without getting paid.

Latinos in the Gulf region are being racially profiled by local and federal authorities, says Victoria Cintra of the Mississippi Immigrant Rights Alliance, one of the only organizations addressing Latino immigrant concerns in the region. Cintra believes the Bush administration's suspension of the Davis-Bacon Act, which requires payment of prevailing wages, along with its temporary removal of documentation requirements on I-9 forms, has strained race relations by lowering wages and fostering competition between groups.

"The Bush administration is inviting Latino workers to New Orleans and the South without creating conditions to protect them," says Cintra, who recently provided a tent to more than a dozen unpaid Oaxacan worker in New Orleans. "These workers are extremely vulnerable."

Walking down Bourbon Street in search of cheap eats, Lopez and Moran feel the effects of their vulnerable position in the heart of the Big Easy's tourist economy. "I walked up and asked this white guy if he knew where we could get some food," Lopez says, "and he said, 'I don't know a place where you can eat, wetback.' I almost hit him. But I held back because it isn't going to do anything. There's lots of racism here: white people, black people, even some Latinos."

Lopez says his current boss, who is black, "treats me really good, adding that a previous local contractor still owes him $1,200 for house-gutting and debris-cleanup work.

Having survived wars, hurricanes, earthquakes and poverty in Guatemala, Moran keeps his smile and sense of mission. In indigenous-inflected Guatemalan Spanish, Moran, who works long hours despite a leg injury from a previous job, has a message for his new neighbors: "I came to work. I came to make money so I can feed my children," he says. "These people don't know what I'm made of -- but they will."

-----

When Only Slabs of Pink, Jellied Byproduct Will Do

---
two songs
"lighters up," lil kim
"shake it off," mariah!

do you have a dirty mind?

i want to see your face in the reflection of my bedroom stereo

vegas


w/laurie + mikey


that's how we roll! with aliwong


classic marg0t


my one true love...

where da ballers at?
the guy at my gym said "sup, ma" to me today as he scanned my card. i snickered, but i liked it.

---

a profile of the angry asian one in the washington post (via julie)

i have a mentee at the j-sch00l. crazy!

---

marg0t and i did improv last night in front of an audience.

---

"i mean, cmon, she's wearing a SWEATSHIRT!" - me @ madrone

two pics from last night
the rest are on marg0t's camera, which means we'll see them next summer


jamie (who talked the bouncer into letting marg0t back into the bar) and the birthday biatch


bot, rj, and me - two people in this photo threw up that night

steve: "i gotta get me some sexy underwear."
me: "what? sexy underwear?? like what?"
steve: "i dunno - something that doesn't have a golf course on it?"

party on

mishmash

-CUNNILINGUS IN N0RTH K0REA (YOUNG-HAE CHANG HEAVY INDUSTRIES)

-viktor & rolf's spring 2006 ready-to-wear

-breakfast by steve:


-my newest insane purchase (the skirt):


zadie reading from on beauty:


zadie signing my book!


-my next insane purchase

weekend recap in food
zachary's stuffed chicken pizza
ramen and steak at casa choi
a sourdough jack on my bed
tofu-kimchi-sausage omlette and hash brown melt at art's cafe
stick of gum from laurie's tube top
steve's specialty bell pepper-green onion-cilantro scramble and potatoes
homemade ceviche and mocha chip ice cream at laurie's
brie and crackers at crissy field
roast beef at popo's

thanks for another great weekend, little mug (aka papa bear).

i found the h&m flash model!!! go here and then click on "h&m denim - romeo & juliet" then you want to look for something that says "dressing room". from what i can tell, you can only try on different types of jeans, but you get to put in your weight and hair style and it's kinda fun.

oh, where to begin?
so many fucking things wrong with this article, and to top it off, of course it's written by a columbia j-schooler who graduated just before me and had the same RW1 prof.
-[Pi Alpha Phi president] Chang said he doesn’t 'really see the point' of having clubs that are exclusively Asian...
-“Everyone tries to assimilate,” he said. “I don’t think there’s a future here in trying to hold on to [exclusively Asian] tradition.”
- Last year, Thomas took part in a “Black Out” protest, where black students dressed in black and silently blocked hallways as their way of protesting their lack of a voice on campus. “Caucasian students were more vocal against us,” Thomas said. “Like the Berkeley Republicans, they’re a strong group, but it’s all Caucasian. It’s easier to cope [as a black student], the Asians are more apathetic, less hostile.”
- Albert Wu, president of the Asian Political Association, hopes to change that, at least the apathetic part. Wu agreed that Asian students are less likely than others to be politically involved on campus. “There’s a strong culture from immigrant families of not wanting to be involved in politics,” Wu said. “They want sciences, to get economically stable.” About half of all Berkeley’s Asian students are of Chinese ancestry. “In China, politicians aren’t very well respected. Doctors and scientists are revered. That’s why I’m named ‘Albert.’ ”

yawn. well i'm glad he broke so many preconceptions of asian ams at berkeley with that article and really furthered the debate on the issue. thanks. this is why white people should not write about communities of color.

QOTD

complete text of email from bot:

did i hear bff or fb?

new podcast obsession: answer bitch

status aint hood
does anyone know what that means? or are we all too indie rock to understand? i've been cleaning my room in anticipation of the arrival of both steve and minnay (aka my topshop dealer aka alan cumming, wtf?), and i found a copy of laurie's destiny's child cd, and I AM SO ROCKING THAT SHIT 24/7 SUCKAZ. seriously there are some good songs on there. my favorite is "soldier." i must go to claire's now and buy some hoop earrings.

hilarious.

so i saw a rehearsal for my play - i couldn't stop smiling for the first ten minutes i was watching them rehearse. i felt like a proud parent. then i remembered i was supposed to be the mysterious playwright, shrouded in intrigue, and quickly assumed that pose.

also, for anyone interested in going to the show that i'm going to, i am going THIS FRIDAY NIGHT. i am also planning to go to the last show. you MUST make reservations for the show (b/c the theatre is so small, they want to make sure they can accomodate everyone) at 415-255-0440. let me know if you're going friday, although i'm sure i will see you there if you go.

the body is a strange crazy thing
the body is strange in the amount of alcohol it can contain, the amount of sleep it needs and the amount of food it can ingest. this has been week of food, and yet each time i wake up, i'm hungry.

week in recap
-the 1nvisible cities lunchtime concert @ 101 california - marg0t got a shout-out for her blue hair!
-a good night of crossfading on tuesday - complete with live video game component and the best sourdough jack i have ever eaten. ever.
-laguna beach marathon w/laurie @ her new place
-alpha bar - tokyo ice tea and new orleans ice tea ("isn't this a little insensitive?") night of the "milquetoast"
-apature comedy night - best stand-up show i have seen this year. he is hilahhrious.
---
"these words," natasha bedingfield
"sweet troubled soul," stellastarr
"comrades & friends (loquat remix)," from monument to masses

san francisco vs. new york: settled, once and for all

minnie?



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why i must return to new york

---

obviously gawker gets four LOLs from me today. also see their look book critique, made all the more hilarious because i just learned what bukkake is (yeah, i know, sheltered).

---
WHO ARE YOU, BOT? WHO ARE YOU??
sam and i have been following the movements of one steve a0ki, and in the proces have learned way more about marg0t than i ever wanted to know.

Me:
http://p099.ezboard.com/fjjboardfrm12.showMessage?topicID=89966.topic

and it looks like the asian pharrell was there too

Marg0t:
AAHAHAHA. did ydou read the commetns below the post...

ok laugh but i think benji is actually pretty hot. hillary duff is dating joel madden? wtf is going on? i still don't really get your two's obsession w/steve aoki and stalking pics of him on the internet but i laugh anyway.

Me:
OMG I JUST THREW UP IN MY MOUTH. FULL THROW UP. NOT A LITTLE. YOU THINK BENJI IS CUTE?!??!?!?! YOU ARE SO HOT TOPIC OMG.

Marg0t
damn you. but i dig eyeliner on guys. what can i say. i just gotta be me. just b/c i think he's hot won't prevent me from making fun of him and good charlotte.

what the...heather graham?
firecrotch should be paid more. anyone who whacks at a drum and tamborine with that much gusto AND plays the accordion deserves a raise. but i guess his enthusiasm can be attributed to the fact that he is ten feet away from the thin white duke. oh, david bowie - why must everything you touch turn to gold?

“Don’t be rude! Rise to the fashion occasion!”
..and that poor editor's sweater was "destroyed"!

fruitfucker
rj: i find the word "factchecker" to be vulgar when glanced at very quickly
me: what does it look like? is it the f c and k in succession?
rj: something along the lines of
rj: "fruitfucker" or something

---
ma seeto
ma seeto: when did marg0t leave her phone in your car?
me: last night.
ma seeto: oh. what did you do last night?
me, thinking to myself: well, first we went with about 20 guys (including one of marg0t's former FBs) to a club in the tenderloin where they had an open bar, and where we drank adios muthafuckas and tried to pick off unsuspecting younger guys. after we got pretty faded, we moved to another club where your daughter got bumped n' grinded by a guy she went on a date with last week. oh, and she smoked a j outside the club with this guy's dealer later that night. damn, your daughter is so crazay!
me, outloud: um, we just went to a friend's birthday party.

labor day photos from hi-fi

---

CFW log, stardate 9/11/2005

me: "ok, see that picture with alice and jaime in it, the one where they're on the dance floor?"
minnie: "yeah..."
me: "see that white guy dancing in the background behind them?"
minnie: "yeah..."
me: "yeah, he was like that."

new california media has a good roundup of asian communities hit by the hurricane that we haven't heard about.

It's one thing to be horrified by the suffering in New Orleans and send off a check to the Red Cross (Americans are not ungenerous, especially in a crisis), but quite another to recognize that many of the causes of the catastrophe — the existence of a huge permanent underclass, the ongoing degradation of our coastlines, the choice to cut taxes rather than maintain our nation's infrastructure — are a widely accepted part of life in today's United States. They've become normal.

about saturday night
three-day rule NEVER LIES.

sam: easiest hookup ever?
me: it would have been...
me: if he was her type
sam: is cute not a type?
sam: was he not riot grrrrrrl enough for her?
sam: did he not like meat?

pentagon press transcripts can be good sources of dialogue
regarding a massive student database for military recruiters that was made public two years after it was created.

Media: What do you say to privacy advocates who view this as government intrusion into the privacy of citizens and that this is a big brother situation?

Chu: I don't think so. We're only using it to mail stuff to people.

Media: You're not calling recruits?

Chu: I don't think this contains telephone numbers.

Media: Yeah, it does.

Media: It certainly does.

Carr: One portion is --

Chu: Oh, okay.

Media: And the data that's collected from No Child Left Behind is included in this database, is that right?

Chu: No, no. It's not. This has no connection to No Child Left Behind.

Media: Why wouldn't that be included if you're going to be --

Chu: I think it was included, if I may say so, only in your article. Let me put on the record. It has no connection to No Child Left Behind. We do not merge this with No Child Left Behind --

Media: I was told that you do merge it with the opt outs from No Child Left Behind.

Chu: You can under the Privacy Act write in and say I don't want to be on your list and we then take you out of the list.

Media: How can anyone have opted out if they didn't know the program existed?

Chu: That's why we have a notice in the Federal Register.

Media: [Laughter].

woo

click to zoom

the self-fulfilling prophecy
so last night baby cuddles and the gotbot gave me a impromptu preview of what my scene is going to look like on stage. i started it off by saying, "let's be real - how many white guys DON'T have an asian fetish?" cuddles begrudingly agreed with me, and then then told a story about a white girl who was complaining that asian women area taking all the white men: "isn't there another part of the equation missing??!" he said dramatically. marg0t had been doing the dishes while this debate was raging. cuddles told her to stop doing the dishes. she kept doing them. at this point, i screamed.

"damn, that aint even dark"
the scene i wrote for my playwriting class was chosen to be performed next month!!! the show will be three weekends starting sept. 22. details to come, but save the dates.

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just another monday in san francisco

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finally, i got blog tagged by boba fett - i mean, minnie ("an Asian American woman in her mid-20s")

1. i don't like food that much. i eat for sustenance, not enjoyment.
2. i think my hands are one of my best-looking body parts.
3. i think my sister is HOT (girl crush!)
4. i hate HATE hate cali style on men and women - wifebeaters, flip flops, hoodies.
5. once when i was a little twerp, i painted white-out on parts of my dad's paintings and some of my mom's plants.

the month in acronyms
TC
BTW
WTF
FB
TMI
OMG
FYI
DL
HM
DTR
RTFM
CFW (eyes)

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an oh-my-god-is-summer-really-over-it-was-never-even-here mix
"girls just wanna have fun," death cab for cutie
1909 and hijacked songs, scrabbel
schools of thought contend, from monument to masses
"earthquake of '73," fruit bats
"i do dream you," jennifer gentle
"tear you apart," she wants revenge (interpol part 2, joy division part 3?)

swoon
FMTM: any band that the bot gives a three-heart review and makes ali w. want to date-rape herself AND throw her vagina at is worth checking out, at least. as for me, the drummer has my dream hair. sigh, straight perm...

ninjas were also rockin' (rawkin?).

must revise script by tomorrow noon, so trying to get it done tonight. send me good writing vibes.

no wonder i stopped dating guys from the bay area.

actual conversation from the lunch room just now:

C: Who's the girl on 60 minutes?
G: Lesley Stahl?
C: No, Lesley Stahl's the guy...

fin.

this is bot:

this is me:

this is party choi:


last night ali called me michael jackson (thriller-era) b/c of my flashy white blazer. i also found $13 in the bathroom at hobson's choice, and treated party choi and bot to pizza and soda. bot and i also gave party choi a lesson on "body language for dummies."

it's friday, which means, blow up the ralph lauren store, down the block from my office!



my boss joked that it was the work of tommy hilfiger. YOU'RE out of style!

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everyone thinks i'm just complaining about the weather, but DUDE:

On Wednesday, San Francisco was colder than Anchorage, Alaska.

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from sam: waste ten minutes playing the Friend Zone Game, aka how much game do emo hipsters (not) have? cmon, it's friday afternoon.

the racial deconstruction of shakira
or, why "the embodiment of globalization" is not a compliment

top 2 moments from last night
-boss snugglez being called "norman" by strange advice-giving, guitar-playing woman at madrone
-the bot thinking i came up with “rock it don’t stop it”

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by the way, i keep forgetting: i got offered a promotion of sorts, a fellowship at the mag, so i will be here until january at least. and i'll be getting paid more, so more rounds on me, as eric says. also, i might get something published in the next issue! a very small something.

also: there is someone from stanfurd.edu who reads this daily. i don't know anyone at the 'furd anymore, so hello to you.

newsflash: sgt. meat just asked me for a threesome!: "or how about, wanna have a threesome?"

i'll take my horse and i'll ride the northern plain
call off the dogs - i found my horse, my trusty steed, broken but still kicking.

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"my father's gun," elton john
"sunday bloody sunday," u2

I LOST MY GOLD HORSE PIN SOMEWHERE!!! WOE IS ME!

"le string"!

while i don't completely understand all of it, this guy's blog is fucking hilaaahr.

early- to mid-week drinking club - REUNITED!

dear comrades -
i just sent this to many of you, but for those whose emails i don't have...

i know it's a little early, but i just wanted to put something on your
radar for the november 8 special election.

proposition 73 would make it mandatory for doctors to notify the
parents of teenage women seeking abortions. no matter what your stance
on abortion is, you should VOTE NO on this proposition. it has been
shown many times that parents' notification laws like this one DO NOT
LOWER TEEN PREGNANCY OR TEEN ABORTION RATES. these laws will not put a
stop teen pregnancy. they only create one more obstacle for teen women
who want an abortion, thereby delaying the abortion or forcing women
to seek illegal abortions. THIS PUTS WOMEN'S HEALTH AT RISK.

it's so important to educate your friends and family about this
proposition so it will be roundly defeated in november. and if you
think there is no way something like this could pass in our great
liberal state, i have one word for you - schwarzenegger.

lisa

What is Prop 73?

Proposition 73 would amend the state constitution to require health
care providers to notify the parents of young women under the age of
18 before providing abortion services. Once a parent has been
notified, a mandatory waiting period of 48 hours is required before
the doctor can provide an abortion. Only those teens faced with a
medical emergency or those who obtain a "judicial bypass" are exempt
from the parental notification requirement.

More info:
http://www.ppaction.org/campaign/protectteens/explanation
http://www.noprop73.org/

corrected: PHOTO OF THE WEEK

Look -- even Orlando Bloom is wiping the tears of aggravation from his eyes. He's all, "Yeah, Kate, um... I already dated Sienna Miller once. Don't put me through it again."

the intelligent design theory of kells

photo of the week

friendster party, u street house, july 2003

who wants to join our reading club? to entice you in, we're reading jhumpa lahiri's "interpreter of maladies," one of my all-time favorite books. you should really read it, and what better excuse than a bookclub xanga? we'll read the book, then post on the blog. comment here if you want in.

i was bit by a big dog when i was about 5 years old. the dog my auntie was dog-sitting seemed gigantic at the time, but in reality, it might have been just a mid-size (compact?) dog. it had been friendly to me until that point, but having not grown up around pets (like many of you, it seems), i didn't know some key rules about interacting with domesticated animals. the foremost being do not bother something while it is eating.

it was eating something from its dish, and i was petting it gently. unfortunately, i started petting it on its head, perhaps a little too close to its face. it snapped at me and put a three-inch gash in the meaty part of my left hand. my mom had a hissy because she feared i had contracted rabies and made several worried phone calls to my dad back in sf (we were in seattle at the time) to consult the time-worn children's illnesses reference book. i'm sure my mom tried to explain to me why the dog had bitten me, but i didn't fully understand the lesson until years later, when, as i tried to annoy her while she was tiredly eating dinner, she too snapped at me. "stop it! didn't you learn when you got bit by the dog? people don't like to be bothered when they're eating!"

since then, eating meals has been a sort of sacred event, where i understood all too well the delicate equilibrium between calm and chaos. the ultimate sacrilege was disturbing the peace of a meal by any kind of bad news or argument. arguing over a meal can literally ruin the meal - it makes the food taste horrible. you cannot physically enjoy the taste. after the past few weeks, i've made it my new mission to spread the word of my new gospel - don't bring up bad news or anything that might provoke an argument over a meal. please, for me. i have such a bad relationship with food that i really don't need another thing to put me off eating.

in related news, i've decided to go on a health kick (my sister says "diet" is too severe). i'm going to start eating right and exercising more. the reason is that i've seen a bunch of DC folks in the past few weeks, and they've all either experienced extreme weight loss or maintained their 2003 weight. i, on the other hand, "look healthier," according to cherry, who assures me it's a good thing. apparently round faces are out. :( do not try to talk me out of it. i will not be dissuaded. i went running the past two days AND have been eating salad (and enjoying it!).

anyways. my scene for my playwriting class is due this week. god, help me write fast and not suck.

i vaguely remember a period of life when i was obsessed with turning collars up while drunk. can anyone out there verify this?

it's friday, which means - annoyingly catchy french high-NRG dance music day!

S-O-U-N-D-S
i've been getting into this podcasting thing, but only because now you can get KCRW's morning becomes eclectic through iTunes. i actually don't like most of the songs they play on a daily basis, but the in-studio band sets are pretty rockin'. one of the more recent podcasts featured a SF-based band (no, not a typo there) called every move a picture. i dig em! they are dance-y. whoo!

related: if you have nexis, there was a recent ny times magazine piece on morning becomes eclectic.

blue suede shoes
omg someone take away my credit card. i bought a pair of shoes on my lunch break - dkny blue suede wedges for $40 (60% off!). these are the perils of working across from loehmann's.

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i watched a little bit of blow on usa last night - man, i love that movie. i cried the first time i saw it (on my flight to study abroad in england), and ever since, it has always moved me to tears. don't know why exactly. something to do with the daughter-father relationship. one of my journ. school profs first wrote that story. new life goal: to write a story that becomes a johnny deppy movie.

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maruchan vs. ichiban - discuss.

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since watching jules et jim, i've been totally obsessed with the song "le tourbillon" for the past few days. it's a really pretty song, even though i don't know french.

well when you put it that way...

i haven't traveled anywhere!

My personal world map

visited 11 countries-

Create your own world map

lots of vegas pics

a photo tribute to the birthday boy:
u street house, 2003
lin's ass

and my all-time favorite lin pic:



happy birthday lin!

The "Pimp my..." formula is set to soon take on toilets, little brothers, and even a German hot-dog stand.