Friday, August 28, 2009

Some of my favorite crazies

1) The goth dyke that pukes in her (incongruently) sequined purse on the midnight CalTrain. Seen her twice so far, usually this happens on a Tuesday or Wednesday. You go gurl!

Is the purse a remnant from her life before she became a goth? Did she steal it from a sorostitute for the sole purpose of holding her vomit on the ride home? Cause that would make her my hero.

2) The cougar I keep running into at Safeway at 1AM. She is often dressed like she just got off work at the strip club, I swear to god I didn't know anyone could pair dayglow spandex miniskirts and various animal print (zebra, leopard, dalmation?!) hooker heels on a regular basis. Tonight she was painfully hitting on (like usual) the poorMexi-checker: "...That's what I tell my son. Who's in college. Goodnight Darlin'. "

At least she's owning it. Next time I promise photo documentation.

3) In my apartment complex, the yuppie dad who is father to "the screamer". A child who I thought was being bludgeoned with a wasp nest full of rusty nails, but apparently "just doesn't like riding in the car". Seriously, I have never heard a kid scream like that, the first couple times I thought about calling the police.

The same drama has unfolded multiple times: the father carries the screaming child towards the minivan. The child screams. The father tries to reason with said child for various amounts of time. Child still screams. Repeat ad naseum.

I hope the kid is autistic or has some nerve disorder. I've contemplated leaving a note on the winshield imploring them to seek counseling. Or maybe quit sodomizing their child in the minivan? I haven't decided yet.

4) Lenny, our upstairs neighbor from the house on Crestmere. World champion kickboxer (seriously), personal trainer, salsa dance instructor, loud porn enthusiast. Every day the salsa music would play for hours. Then quiet for a few moments. Cue the loud porn for about 5 minutes. Lather, rinse, repeat.

5) No one can top the crazy that lived next door at U-Place in CoMO. We called him the mathematician. He was a conspiracy theorist and watched FOX news and argued loudly with the TV every night. And he was a big crazy face mathematician. John Nash style, but on meth.

All of these crazy faces: "puking dyke", "Safeway cougar", "yuppie dad/screamer", Lenny, and the "mathematician" have made my life more interesting in their own way.

And for that I would like to say thank you.

Wednesday, August 26, 2009

I just found out that RepBase, a service of Genetic Information Research Institute, which I have been using for the past few months, is based in Mountain View.

A mile from my house off of Rengstorff, actually right next to Google.

RepBase is some bizarre database of repetitive elements, seemingly curated for free.

WTF.

Update: Agilent moved out of their office in Palo Alto, so Facebook moved in. I live within 5 miles of Google, Yahoo, Facebook, Pacific Biosciences, Affymetrix, and Roche.

Oh, and NASA's just down the street.

Wednesday, August 19, 2009

New kicks

Here is a list of the new things I'm obsessed with:

1) Madonna vs Lady Gaga vs Pitbull triple mashup. Epic.

2) Being at work for 24 hours straight, and then sleeping during the daylight.

3) These shoes:



Which are the blue version of these (which I have worn to tattered shreds):



Normally I try to avoid consumerism in all forms, but Gola knows my weak spot: shiny, bright-colored weapons of awesomeness.

4) Viruses that infected a wasp, have inserted themselves into the wasp nuclear genome, but then the wasp hijacked the viral protein for packaging of its own DNA which it injects into caterpillars to suppress the caterpillar's immune system so the wasp larvae can eat the host alive from the inside out. Also picking out completely unfeasible qualifying exam topics.

5) Verdi's Macbeth. Either the 1952 Callas La Scala or the 1976 Verrett La Scala version.

6) Visiting Mike and Jennifer in the city and then looking at Craigslist apartments in the Sunset and pretending that I am living there.

Friday, August 14, 2009

Went over to Jay and Lia's house with Diane tonight to help put together a rough sketch of a garden plan for their new backyard..while sipping a chardonnay. She knows how to make a gay happy!

Since everyone my age is a heathen, that eliminates religion from the politics-and-religion bipartite of impolite dinner conversation. Recently, it seems like I've been having the same conversation over and over. Namely, the definition of libertarianism. Words are words, but Jesus tap-dancing Christ. People might have more of a clue I said I am a closet Royalist (which I am). I concede to an extent terms like conservative, progressive, or reformist are all meaningless without a reference point. I think my commie hero Pete Seeger said it best:

"I like to say I'm more conservative than Goldwater. He just wanted to turn the clock back to when there was no income tax. I want to turn the clock back to when people lived in small villages and took care of each other."

Words are words, right? I'm trying to come up with a succinct one-liner that describes my fringe camp. It used to be "the party Party: you know, for legalization of drugs and elimination of taxes". I'm realizing it boils down to something less tangible: the dismantling of the nanny-state and the overthrow of American empiricism.

Two weeks from now marks the anniversary of my moving to NorCal. Until the day that I can live in NYC, I'll have to make do with San Fran...or 30 miles south of it...sigh. A west coast version of:

My little town blues are melting away, I'll make a brand new start of it, in old New York. If I can make it there, I'll make it anywhere!

Is my self satisfied delusion of grandeur vomit-inducing, or what?

Will my life be shaped by the rebellion against those little town blues? Will I never stop until I have a morphed into some pathetic hipster with super low V-necks, a fedora, squarish 80s sunglasses, who walks my dog in the Castro while holding hands with my boyfriend?

Actually, that doesn't sound that bad. Just no double stroller filled with ethnic babies bought with ipod bribes like in Bruno.