ramblings Tag

  Record 3: Scottsdale, Friday, July 5th, 2013. Day. I’m sitting on the leather in my family’s center room, which is made for living, as some say. My father, who wears his mustache thin and wire-like, is staring out of our smudged window, contemplating something that is now, I’m afraid, causing him to shake his head to and fro in a ‘this-will-just-not-do’ manner that makes me anxious. I ask him a question with words about his unusual new physicality. He rambles and putters with letters and such, and I think,Read More

When I first entered the bar scene at the ripe age of 21, I was a nervous wreck. For one, I may have been 21, but I looked about 12 (or so I was harshly told) …so I had this unfounded paranoia that I just didn’t really belong and would subsequently be stuffed in trash cans or kicked out and have cheap liquor thrown in my face if I even attempted to order a drink. Furthermore, my only experience with alcohol up until that point had been whatever horrid concoctionsRead More

Thanks to Instagram and Facebook, we all have “friends” who we aren’t really friends with but who we think we know anyway.  We choose to frown upon or look up to someone based on photos and status-updates.  That girl who only posts pictures of mayonnaise and her cross-eyed cat?   Clearly she’s going to die alone.  We also think we know celebrities.  “Beyonce’s life must be perfect.”  Or, for The Bachelor critics: “Juan Pablo didn’t tell Nikki he loved her on national television so their relationship is doooooomed!”  We presume.Read More

Continued from 5/19   Record 2: Koreatown, Los Angeles, Thursday, July 5th, 2010. Night. No one wants to get into a fight sober. No one. This leaves me with two options: 1. ask Hea Woo for a Jameson double and assume she’ll put it on my tab, which I’m hoping she’s lost track of, or 2. fight sober. I signal for Hea Woo. Catch her periphery. She cranes her neck just far enough left so as not to leave the eye line of her dead faced man of the hour,Read More

This morning, I left my beautiful, intelligent, Android (we’re in a committed relationship) on the counter of a public restroom. Just five minutes later, when I panicked at the emptiness of my pockets, I Usain Bolted back, only to find my phone no longer there. COMMENCE PHYSICAL SPASMS OF TERROR, PROFUSE BACK SWEAT, AND INTERNAL WATERFALL OF TEARS. For the rest of the day, I was forced to go about my daily schedule while feeling completely disconnected from the rest of the world. At one point, I probably convinced myselfRead More

This is a period of time many “experts” like to classify as “emerging adulthood.” It sounds more glorious than it actually is. Unfortunately, “well adjusted” is a label we like to give ourselves for a few years of happy delusion. As young adults, we still feel everything (those teen hormones still need a Xanax), but now, we’re forcing ourselves to deal with situations in a “grown-up” manner. The Kübler-Ross model describes the 5 steps of loss and grief to be denial, anger, bargaining, depression, then acceptance. But we’re young adults, soRead More

Boarding the flight you already have a good idea of your seat, hopefully you didn’t score the middle. But on a 747 there are not two middle seats, but 6 middle seats. Your chances are high. Find your seat and immediately make your first enemies in the battle for space in the overhead compartment for your carry-on. As the loser, you retreat further toward the back of the plane searching for space. Then, like a salmon swimming upstream, you fight the hoard of people back to your seat, and sit,Read More

I think I finally understand how the Trix Rabbit feels. Earlier today I was peeling a mandarin orange–otherwise known as a Cutie–and I noticed a little sticker that read, “Cuties are for kids!” So, is that a requirement? Are some angry children going to run after me demanding I hand over the Cuties? I find myself asking the same questions that poor rabbit asked regarding his colorful bowl of Trix. Why can’t I have a Cutie? Why do only kids get to indulge in their juicy deliciousness? Little a$$holes, nobodyRead More

Hello, everyone. I’d like to take this time to formally introduce myself to you – yes, you – on the other side of my laptop. My name is Will, and for the sake of my attention span and your sanity, I will conclude any further introductory pretension here. There will be no need for punctilious handshakery or bro-huggery. Our time together will be brief, albeit rewarding, should you find yourself as keen on grammatically particular text and Facebook messages as I am. If you’re not, I implore you not toRead More

So like usual I’m thinking about how terrible this Batman/Superman movie is going to be, and something hit me just now that made it even more depressing. Young people that watch this as their first Batman or Superman movie are going to walk away with their perspectives of these characters forever cemented in their minds. There will be children who in 15-20 years will say “Ben Affleck’s portrayal of Batman is the only true Batman”. It’s like we have a chance to stop young Hitler, and we’re just sitting hereRead More

I firmly believe that when it comes to dating, texting is the actual devil. It is the demise of dozens of relationships and one text can be a game changer for countless others. One text can keep someone up all night in a ball of anxiety, and one vibration of a phone can send someone into a nervous tizzy. If it were up to me, texting would be strictly for use between friends. And not the, “Oh my god, I’m so not into him at all,” friends, I mean actualRead More

Sensory deprivation tanks are old, but newly-popular items used to deprive oneself of sensory stimuli for the purposes of relaxation, stress relief, extra-sensory perception, or enhanced creativity. They are lightproof, soundproof tanks filled with extremely buoyant saltwater that is kept at exactly skin temperature. When one floats in one of these tanks for an extended period, he is supposed to be relieved of all light, sound, and tactile feeling, and experience relaxation and bliss. If you live in a city/town that has an “up and coming” district where hip, affluent,Read More