Karate Curse

Karate ruins a person's feet.

You aren't allowed to wear shoes in karate. And so, over the years of doing karate, sliding my feet along cracked gymnasium floors, I have got some nasty callouses. My heels are cracked. I have a callous on the side of my one baby toe that is starting to grow over the nail. (I know. It's disgusting).

I've had two pedicures since I've been doing karate. But when you remove the callouses, doing karate hurts, and the callouses come back thicker than ever.

Aside from the callouses, I've lost a toenail and cracked many others.

I've seen pictures of dancers' feet, and they are even worse than mine.

It's amazing what we do to our bodies in the name of sport.

Keep it to yourself...

There are some conversations you shouldn't have in public.

I was out at a restaurant once and was seated beside a mother who was loudly lecturing her 15-year-old daughter about the hazards of premarital sex.

Talk about ruining the innocent bystanders' appetites.

I was almost tempted to ask to be moved to another table, because I didn't really want to listen in, but couldn't help it. It was like I was unwillingly transplanted into this family's living room.

Awkward conversations are better kept at home, or at least kept to a low whisper.

On the lot...

Has anyone been watching the new show On The Lot?

Aspiring filmmakers air their short films each week and America votes on the best. A few of the earlier episodes followed the filmmakers as they made their films, but making films is actually more boring than it sounds. It's actors doing the same scene over and over again and long hours spent putting sound and picture together in an editing suite. It's only slightly more exciting than watching someone write a book. And it's a surprise On The Lot has low ratings?

Films, like writing, are about finished product. The process is quite dry and a bit of a slog. It's not like So You Think You Can Dance, where dancers put their bodies to the test and face injury in rehearsal.

Short films are not popular with the masses either. They are like the poetry of the film industry. They have a limited market.

That said, maybe there should be a So You Think You Can Write Poetry show. They have everything else. And are ratings really that important? Really?

Just not that into you...

Social situations can already be awkward and complicated enough in real life, but taking them into the virtual world makes them even more so.

Take Facebook for instance. You write a question on someone's wall and, through the "news feed," all your shared friends can see you wrote that question. Then that question just hangs there unanswered. The friend, you wrote the question to, has logged on since. You know this because you can see they've commented on other people's walls. You, however, are being ignored by them.

Do you take this personally? Are they deliberately snubbing you? Do they not feel your question relevant? Do they just not have the time to answer? They've had the time to write back to other friends and maybe even upload photos onto the site.

They wouldn't have ignored you if you had asked the question in person. That's just plain rude.

Do social networking sites, which are supposed to bring people closer together, encourage rudeness, given the impersonal nature of such sites?

Given that you're snubbed on Facebook by a friend, what does that mean for your friendship with that person? If they can't make time to answer your question, maybe they're just not that into you, because your true friends will write back right away.

And what to do with those friends who are not that into you? Do you just not bother to make time for them. Certainly, you won't be asking them any more questions on Facebook, because it's no fun being ignored.

Bringing friendships into the virtual world is complicated.

Rude, much?

Today, I got the most insulting piece of spam. It said: "Loose weight, fatty," or something to that effect.

Now, I can see why it would be funny to call a million random strangers fat via e-mail, but it's also incredibly cruel. Weight is a very sensitive issue for a lot of people.

There were definitely some people crying this morning when they saw that e-mail. Ouch.

Reality TV

I'm one of those sad people who is a reality TV addict. And let me say, it takes some serious commitment to keep up with them all. That's why I'm thankful for VCRs. (I haven't caught up to the 21st century, which means I don't have a digital recorder. I wish).

Watching reality TV is tough, because you get attached to certain people and then they get the boot and you have to keep watching anyway... even if it means watching someone you totally hate take the prize. Like I said, it takes commitment.

The meaning of life.

I've been thinking about living life to the fullest lately and what that really means. To live a full life, do you have to live to the extreme--travel the world, sky dive, bungee jump, cure AIDS, and I don't know what else?

How much do we let fear rule our life and prevent us from following our dreams? How many artists are just hobbyists because they are scared to take the plunge into their craft professionally? "That's just not practical," some would say. How many people are government paper pushers, begrudgingly? For what, a large paycheck? Does money really mean anything if you're chained to a desk your whole life?

How am I holding myself back? That's the question I'm asking myself these days. What is it that I really want to do with my life?

The Real Environmentalists.

There is such a stigma against dumpster divers--the people who dig the pop cans and scrap metal out of back alley garbage bins. But these people are another one of society's unsung heroes.

Dumpster divers reuse and recycle for lazy people who can't be bothered. I think such lazy people should be paying the dumpster divers more than the 10 cents deposit for each bottle. It's a lot of work to sort through the trash to reduce the amount of waste someone else is sending to the dump.

On backwards and inside out...

"Only your real friends will tell you when your face is dirty." - Sicilian Proverb

I once went a whole day wearing a shirt inside out, and it was on backwards. It was the kind of shirt where it would have been pretty obvious to anyone I met. Yet, no one, not even my friends, told me. When I got home and saw how I was dressed, I was completely embarrassed I had been out in public looking that way. (Sometimes, if I'm running late, I don't have time to look in the mirror before I step out the door).

According to the Sicilian proverb, does this mean I have no "real" friends?

A league of one's own

Have you ever seen the movie Shallow Hal?

It's about a superficial ugly man who only wants to date pretty women. Eventually, he learns that beauty is more than skin deep and falls in love with an obese woman because of her personality.

Sure, looks aren't everything, but I think this movie is saying more: that ugly people should date within their own league. To go after good looking people will only lead to rejection and disappointment. It shows good looking people as shallow and only able to love other good looking people. According to the movie, only ugly people have depth.

By trying to break down stereotypes, as this movie claims to do, it only enforced more stereotypes. The movie would have been more challenging to our societal views if Brad Pitt had the lead instead of Jack Black, I think.

Unforgettable poetry

I am reading an old Harper's Magazine from 1999. There's an article in it where five well-established American poets talk about poetry.

According to these poets, (Donald Hall, Cynthia Huntington, Paul Muldoon, Heather McHugh and Charles Simic) a poem is considered great if, once you are finished reading it, you want to go back and read it again.

A good poem should be disappointing, or deflect one's expectations, says Huntington.

"If a poem has no obvious destination, there's a chance that we'll all be setting off on an interesting ride," said Muldoon.

"I think one of poetry's functions is not to give us what we want," said McHugh.

To me then, poetry is like Joss Whedon's Buffy the Vampire Slayer. There are so many unexpected plot twists in that show, and characters you least expect die.

The trick is to be able to think differently than your audience. Become a mind reader and anticipate their thoughts. It's tough.

Driving, Ms. K.A.

I didn't have a car until I was 24-years-old, which means I had to mooch a lot of rides.

I always figured when I finally did get a car, I would offer rides to any friend in need. But now that I have a car, I realize how annoying it can be to drive other passengers around.

People are inconsiderate. They leave garbage in my car--pop cans, used tissues and a number of other disgusting items. If my car were messy, maybe this would be allowable, since I likely wouldn't notice. But my car is ridiculously clean, so it actually drives me nuts.

To be polite, I keep my music turned off when I have a passenger, since I can appreciate that not everyone likes the Beastie Boys. However, some passengers feel the need to turn on my stereo, unasked, and then dig through my glove compartment, also unasked, and flip through my CDs and complain about my taste in music. I think this is outrageous.

I also hate it when people invite you somewhere and then expect you to drive. My rule is: if you invite someone, you drive. Agreeing to meet at a location is also acceptable. I hate it when I get invitations like this: "Are you going to the rock concert? If so, it would work really good for me if I could get a ride with you?" Way to make a person feel used.

Trends

“Great things are not accomplished by those who yield to trends and fads and popular opinion.” - Jack Kerouac

That's not funny.

There's a video going around of a toddler who runs on stage during a break dancing show.

Long story short, the break dancer accidentally kicks the child in the head while doing a back flip. The child is knocked unconscious as a result.

The message on the subject heading of the e-mail I got read "funny." At first, I wanted to laugh, but then I was like: "No, that's not actually funny. That's a real person that got hurt."

It's interesting that we, as a society, find accidents funny. Talk about adding insult to injury. So remember, the next time you slip on ice and break your wrist, you might end up as an Internet joke, thanks to some jerk with a camera.

Life is funny.

It's interesting where life takes us. What we never thought would happen to us in a million years sometimes randomly happens.

Like last year, I watched a few shows referring to the Napa Valley--Sideways and Sex and the City. Then, one day, I accidentally ended up there on an unplanned trip. (It's a long and uninteresting story).

Or I recently started watching The Amazing Race and then one day I inadvertently meet the show's host. (It's a long and uninteresting story).

Of course, there are bad things that you never thought would happen to you in a million years too, like when I did some damage to my car by hitting a water-filled pot hole. (It's a long and uninteresting story).

Life is funny.

Doom and gloom

"Like the frog swimming in water that starts to boil, drip by drip, we get used to it," said author Joy Kogawa about how Earth is dying without causing alarm to the human race.

I think we have the "can't happen to us" disease. Sure, there's global warming, but it won't wipe out the human race. We're invincible.

I'm sure the dinosaurs didn't see it coming either.

Knees

Occasionally you meet a guy who makes your knees weak. He distracts you with his presence. And you always have to watch him out of the corner of your eye.

He, of course, seems to take no interest in you at all.

I hate that.

The drunken cat.

I took my cat to get her teeth cleaned today.

Although she tends to get gingivitas, I sometimes wonder if getting her teeth cleaned is worth the trouble.

For one, animals don't have their teeth cleaned in the wild.

And two, after my cat's teeth cleaning, she is so doped up, it's unsettling. She stumbles around my apartment, bumping into furniture, before finally hiding under the bed. I feel bad for putting her through that.

Right now, I'm just waiting for my cat to return back to normal.

Thinking it out.

It’s always good to step back from your crushes for a brief moment.

Sometimes it turns out you don’t really like the person. It is just there have been so few options in your life lately that you’re practically ready to jump on any new eligible male who comes into your life, even if he is dull and boring or a total jerk. You can blind yourself to his flaws just so you can keep an open option for yourself, which is the only option you might have at the moment.

An awkward moment.

I was in the bathroom today (what are the odds?) when the woman in the stall next to me had her cellphone go off.

To my surprise, she answered it. From what I could gather, it was a business call from her boss.

The bathroom had one of those automatic flush toilets, so I was like should I get up and reveal to her boss her location? Would that be considered poor bathroom/cellphone etiquette?

But when she started going through her agenda and scheduling meetings, I was like, I can't sit here forever. So I got up, let the toilet flush and blew her cover.