a description of the amazing and exciting adventures i have here in baltimore--- and other lies.

 
I often save the fortunes of fortune cookies in my wallet. I place them in the part of my wallet which also holds my JHU ID card, my bank card, my health card, and others. While taking out my video card, I noticed that one of the fortunes had been shoved down in the pocket. I dug it out, and in the process of doing so, found others which had made their way down to the bottom.

They are, in no particular order:


-The architecht fo your destiny is yourself.

-Share your happiness with others today.

-A quiet evening with friends is the best tonic for a long day.

-Keep on charging the enemy so long as there is life.

-A good time to finish up old tasks.


These pithy aleuromantic suggestions have no common thread that I can see.
Maybe like googlisms you have to pick what you like and run with it, as the first suggests. In bed.
posted by gregorio at 5:27 PM

 
According to Germatriculator, we are:





which seems about right. A little bit country, a little bit rock and roll.
posted by gregorio at 3:09 PM

 
At one point, I had this ridiculous fantasy that I could try to learn Chinese by first learning a few key words. One hundred of them, to be exact, because by learning the most common of words, I could build a basis of the rest of the language.
Of all the people I thought would help me with this, R. was the last person many would ordinarily think, because most folks believed him to be particularly self-centered (which I donot believe to be true, myself ), but he voluntarily introduced me to a person he thought would help me out with my endeavor, and set me up simotaneously.

My instructor in this venture was a wonderful lassie who R. knew because he and she were teaching assistants for the same class. He knew of my desire to learn Chinese, and told me to call L, and have her help me out. She did her best, but, as she has no real experience or love of teaching language, our sessions were short, and, while informative, I thought, not productive at all in the long run. All these meetings did were to make me like her as a person. At the time, my head was at learning Chinese, not meeting anyone. Still, she was a pretty girl, and even for me that makes a difference; so, when she told me she had to study for her comprehensive exams, and could not help me anymore, I understood, even though I was going to be left without an instructor.

As we know, my interests have shifted a little eastwards even of that, but I still would think of L and how she was doing in her life. I went out and bought her a copy of a book I thought she would like to read: "The Founding Brothers" by Joseph Ellis. It lay fallow on my shelf (hell, still does) because as I was about to give it to her as a combination thank you for helping me---if even in a cursory way--- and congratulations for passing your comps, she trips off to New York to be a speech-writer at the UN for an internship job in November of 2004.

I heard her say it would be for two months, but by the first week of February had not heard from her at all. Not even one lousy email. So, I emailed her, and asked if she were still alive. And, for weeks, heard nothing; although, at the time I thought this nothing strange.

Two weeks later, I get a response. "Hi, how are you, do you want to go food shopping with me?"
---sure, why not?
"How about we cook Italian at my apartment?"

You better believe I said yes.

So, we cooked; I thought we had a fine time, drank some good Chianti; and she drove me home. I gave her a kiss. A nice, sloppy one, albeit on the cheek. We ate the next week too. Now, both times we met were punctuated by flirty emails, and nice words.
I had the impression that she was hot for more, but, hey, every time I have made a fast move in the past, it has backfired on me. I kept it cool. All my female friends said that I was doing the right thing all the time I was doing it: Asian and European alike. My instinct was to make a move, to jump on her, but, oh, no, the conservative gentleman in me said, "don't push it, you will lose."

And, so, I treat her respectfully, and she friends me anyway. I see her intermittently in the next few weeks; email her a lot, but still, when I say to her I would like to see more of her, she says she would be more comfortable if we were just friends.

There must be a lot going on in her head. I was angry at myself for not jumping her, when I had the instinct that she would have liked it. I could have had sex, I think, with precisely my fetish: a gorgeous Chinese girl. Instead, I get nothing. But, maybe I eluded yet another emotional minefield? She dumped me, and I felt bad for a week, and then made a promise to myself to get back on the horse, and not beat myself up again and again, which I would have done even six months ago.

However, who is the girl I can bounce back with? Where is she? It was hard enough to find someone to begin with.

Going to Japan is not the answer to my relationship woes. A lot of people have said to me, "oh, when you go to Japan, you will have so many girlfriends!"
I disagree, because I think that every country has the same proportion of fuck-ups to good people, and the latter are seriously in the minority. You cannot run away from yourself, you can only leave your surroundings. I am not someone who goes around and looks looks looks for a girlfriend. I would be nice to go out with a nice person every once in a while, but I get uncomfortable with being with someone for longer than a day or so. How do married people do it?

So I get dropped by a person who herself is super scared of her own feelings anyway, so what? I am not dead.

Quite the contrary. Terribly alive. Terribly alive.
posted by gregorio at 10:40 PM

 
Ok, so following the trend, I embark on my googlism enterprize. Now, we have a choice of two ways to do this. If we follow the path suggested by "Gregorio is",
we get 861 hits, and a lot of them are not pure Gregorio. Sample:

Gregorio is an uncommonly effective (and affective) musician
Gregorio is reviewing police bulletins
Gregorio is born as the second son of a plantation owner of Portuguese origin
Gregorio is saved from certain death by a Jesuit priest, Father Prado
Gregorio is a highly respected and feared
witch doctor.
Gregorio is dying.
Gregorio is the right man for the job
At 36, Gregorio is the youngest president of a hotel chain in the country.
Gregorio is the president of Waterfront Phils Inc.
Gregorio is an enthusiast, a marveller, someone with the ability to find beauty everywhere
Gregorio is a Lao Tse who speaks of particles, neutrinos, quarks


But if we go for what is on my birth certificate, these are what we get:

Greg is a member of the American Bar Association
Greg is feeling OK, but tired.
Greg is delightful
Greg is involved with Steinberg internationally
Greg is working on Jackson Browne's Running On Empty DVD
Greg is out there with his Evolution album
Greg is at heart a Midwestern boy
Greg is happily married to Veronica, a California native.
Greg is a camera Ninja!
Greg is safe and back on US soil!
Greg is actively involved in the budgie fancy.
Greg is competing as a Champion with some reservation.
Greg is the lead vocalist, and enjoys singing and dancing because it makes
him happy. He is also a magician and performs many amazing tricks.
Greg is a framework for testing other programs and libraries.


Well there are 166,000 or so of these, we can stop here.
So, what is the correct me, the first or the second?
posted by gregorio at 6:11 PM

 
I think it ought to be a law, that if someone friends you, then they must automatically have someone else they can set you up with. Or they go to jail for a night.

"whaddya in here for?"
murder. you?
"didn't set the guy I friended up with someone else."
--- and all the girls slide away from her, because she is just that mean.
posted by gregorio at 4:49 PM