Today’s soundtrack: and now it’s six months older
and everything you want and everything you see...
Today at 11:32am: Trying to touch my toes.


The latest auto theft trend: Motherfuckers take your headlights. Apparently the xenon kind, featured in the stripped Audi S4 you see above, fetch top dollar underground. More proof that the thieves in this city will steal the milk out of your coffee. And while you look around for the thief I’ll get into your sugar.

Jenny came over this morning and we did our martial arts stretching. We’ve been shooting to do it every Sunday and so far we’ve succeeded, but I’m headed out to Wisconsin next weekend so there goes the rhythm. She’s crazy flexible whereas I’m very similar to an iron rod. My hamstrings in particular are tighter than...you know what, never mind. Why am I talking about my hamstrings.

Last night was good, it was a first meeting of the “NY Panel.”

The deal is this: I’m doing a workshop for some AsAm conference up at the University of Wisconsin. I wanted to discuss “Alternative Careers for Asian-Americans” so I assembled a six-person panel I’ll be bringing up there.

Anyways while I know all of the other five, they don’t all know each other, so I wanted to get everyone in the same room. (The same room in my apartment so I wouldn’t have to go far.)

Everyone hit it off and the conversation was lively. My friends know I’m a misanthrope that hates a good many things but paradoxically, I enjoy bringing people together. (Certain people anyways, I mean you’re not going to see me throwing a party for neo-nazis, internet stalkers and Al-Qaeda.)

Afterwards we went out to a Shanghainese restaurant, had chow and some laughs. I felt proud, like I did a good thing. I am doing a good thing. I’m not all bad. I’m normal.

I hope the conference goes well, although I have absolutely no idea what to expect of Madison, Wisconsin. We’ve got a day after the conference to check the town out. I picture us walking into a bar and it’s just filled with actual cows, standing and talking like in “The Far Side.”

Friday night I was at Hapkido with Chun-Li (not her real name, you fools) and afterwards we went out to get something to eat.

Post-chow we headed to her neighborhood (the East Village) in search of a decent cup of coffee. We couldn’t find a café to our liking and the Cooper (an E.V. standby diner) was closed for renovations so we ended up going back to her place.

It’s been so long since I hung out in the East Village, or even at a girl’s apartment. East Village apartments are amazing things, tiny rabbit hutches brimming with multicolored and supercompressed lives of urban vitality. I’d forgotten the whole vibe, the steep staircases, the narrow hallways, the intimate bedrooms.

I sat on the floor, in the tiny space between her bed and the wall while she broke out some tea. Chun-Li’s got a pretty good CD collection so we rifled through it and shit-shot while the clock went through several revolutions.

Dinah Washington, Ibrahim Ferrer, Ella Fitzgerald, Sade. We talked late into the night while outside, down in the city, traffic moved past and people headed in and out of bars, unaware of us and us unaware of them.

Today was Sunday, sorry for jumping around so much but wait a second fuck that, I’m not sorry. After Jenny left I had breakfast with Seiji down at the diner. Post-chow we headed into Chinatown in search of Korean bootlegs for me and cleaning supplies for Seiji. His new apartment is two blocks away from me.

Sunday afternoon Logan stops by with his girlfriend, K.

Both Logan and K do tai chi (slightly different styles though). We ended up on my roof so we could check each other’s styles out. I suppose if it was 200 years ago one of use would have had to fight another to the death. K showed us a beautiful tai chi sword form. She had to use an umbrella because I don’t have any Chinese swords lying around the apartment, and Shady’s sword is the Japanese kind.

Then Logan did an empty-handed tai chi form and no lie, the shit was like fifteen minutes long. I couldn’t fucking believe it. If I had to do a form that long I would stop in the middle to use the bathroom. I also couldn’t believe how good Logan is, his shit is tight, this motherfucker should be on a mountain somewhere while disciples fetch him tea.

Lastly I demonstrated a hapkido form that was pretty Yang (as opposed to Yin). My whole life I’ve been a pretty Yang kinda guy so I’m trying to get Yin. Anyways in the middle of the form I lost some focus and suddenly hoped there weren’t neighbors watching the three of us Asians up on this rooftop, spinning and kicking air.

The above paragraph just made me think of Margaret Yang from Rushmore. I think I wouldn’t mind having a Margaret Yanglike girlfriend.

We hit a Vietnamese restaurant for dinner, then afterwards Shady and I headed over to Joanne’s place in deep Chinatown. Her apartment is small, tidy but comfortable, a girl’s apartment. I read about the war on her laptop and felt sick while she and Shady watched the conclusion of some Japanese movie.

Jo wanted to come over to get some software from me, so the three of us headed back together. Jo brought a movie with her, Shaolin Soccer.

I got this sudden craving for fortune cookies, so I stopped at a Chinese bakery to get a whole bag, roughly the size of my head.

“How much?” Jo asked the woman, in Chinese.

“$1.50,” the woman replied, also in Chinese. After I’d paid we saw a smaller bag of fortune cookies that was labeled $2.25. Guess I got the Chinese price! Psyched. Then Jo stopped off at a restaurant and picked up some chow for her and Seiji.

The four of us watched Shaolin Soccer which is a fucking bizarre movie with some extremely weird humor. I liked it because it made me laugh out loud, the real kind of belly laugh where snot will fly out of your nose and onto your friend’s shoulder and you hope they don’t notice.

Something bizarre happened with the fortune cookies. Every time I reached into the bag and grabbed a cookie, I would break it open to find it empty and fortuneless. Seiji too! But whenever Jo or Shady pulled out a cookie it always had a fortune. “I guess the fortunes are only for Chinese people,” said Jo, laughing.

At the end of the bag I finally did get a fortune. You know what that shit said? It said

God has made you a face but you made another for yourself.

The fuck is that supposed to mean? What are they trying to say? And how the fuck did this bag of fortune cookies get a Korean/Japanese/Irish detector for Seiji and I?

I had a good weekend. I saw friends and did things that interested me and felt free. Tomorrow I have to go back to the savage hellhole of work and kill my passions for five consecutive days, eight hours at a time. Looking forward to the next weekend though.