LiveJournal Project - December 2002

One year down, six to go.

Date: 2002-12-01 17:19
Subject: back again
well, my first attempt at djing at a party was one hell of a clusterfuck, but i had a good time, so in the end it doesn't matter. where to begin... well, the turntables were messed up, one of the slipmats had a huge hole in it and didn't really grab the vinyl... no monitors, since they didn't have the right cable. the needles were fucked up, too, so thankfully one of the other DJs brought his needles or it'd have really sucked. oh yeah, and i was told that there'd be a couple hundred people at this party -- ha! try 20, and only about 4 of those were actual paying kids. the dude throwing the party fucked up the directions; had he gotten them right, then we might've had 30 or 40 people. =/ my set didn't go off too well - i had one serious trainwreck, a few really good mixes, and then the rest were just sorta there. the funny thing is, i had a great time. i think because i decided early on that i wasn't going to give a shit what happened my nerves didn't kick in and i just said "to hell with it, let's see what happens." as far as the mistakes i made in mixing, i'm going to blame the equipment. =) i'll post a picture or two later once i'm on the other computer.

ok, update... if anyone wants to see them, some pictures are available here: Editor's note - here are two pictures. The guy in the red hair is the one who threw the event, and the girl in the bunny ears is chantal.

in other news... well, my roommate moved out this weekend while i was gone - no, not like a surprise vacating of the premises or anything, but it was the end of the month and he has new opportunities awaiting him. kinda sucks, since we became pretty good friends over the last year and he was definitely an excellent roommate in terms of quietness and compatibility and shit of that sort. so it's just going to be me and the cats for awhile, probably until march, at which time i might be having another roommate move in. we'll see. anyway, ben, good luck in your new adventures, don't do anything stupid, and if i don't see you before then, bring on the vegas mayhem in january! =)
Music: Conjure One - Sleep (original mix)
Mood: content

Date: 2002-12-08 19:06
Subject: quote of the day
"las vegas is not a place, it is a state of mind."
Mood: awake

Date: 2002-12-12 15:58
Subject: hmm
well, for the next 10 days, life is going to be rather interesting. chantal's going to be here. please, save me the "dude, what the fuck are you smoking?!" and other such comments - i understand that this may turn into a royal clusterfuck, but i guess i'm hoping that we can just hang out, have a good time, and be friends and not have to deal with any bullshit, drama, or other sorts of discombobulation.

for those of you that don't know the story, well, maybe it's better that way. anyway, i'll post updates as time permits over the next few days so you can all get a glimpse of the insanity. but here's a good start:

when she moved back to canada, i sold her car. well, technically it was never her car, since my name was on the title and i'd owned it since 96. anyway, i sold it to a friend of hers for $1500. said friend only has paid me $500 so far, obviously still owing me $1000 which she's owed for almost a year now. sure, i probably should call the girl up and say something to the effect of "yo, bitch, where's my money?!" but honestly, i really don't want to deal with it. the money isn't an issue, i don't care about the car, and the girl is supremely annoying that it's probably worth the cost of my sanity to not have to talk to her. anyway... chantal sends me an email saying that she's going to try to get her car back while she's here. get her car back?? how, exactly, is this supposed to happen? she doesn't have any money, so she can't BUY it back, and i really don't think that her friend is just going to GIVE it back, given that the title and insurance and all that shit is now in her name. i asked chantal about that, but she didn't have any answer - but she said that if she did get the car back, she's going to keep it in my garage for use on a future trip. excuse me?? since when did my house become vehicle storage without my knowing about it?!! so upon further prodding, chantal says that we (note the use of the collective here) might have to take her friend to small claims court. hmm... with no receipt, no contract, and one party (namely me) who doesn't give a shit, how, exactly did i get dragged into this? fuckin' christ.

i dunno, at the time i agreed to this i thought it would be a good idea, or at least it'd be a fun way to pass a few days during the otherwise lonely and boring holiday reason, but as the day approaches when i must trek to the airport, i can't help but grow uneasy. set your phasers on kill, gentlemen.

i've already decided that i'm setting my bullshit tolerance to zero, and if she starts any drama, i'm going to go buy a fucking plane ticket and ship her ass out of here. yeah. more updates to follow.
Mood: anxious

Date: 2002-12-14 13:14
Subject: day 1..
well, so far we've had no drama. this is good. but here's the absolute most ridiculous thing i've heard in a long time.

according to chantal, the immigration officer in calgary told her that all the visa paperwork that we and i were going through over the last year was completely unnecessary. it'd still be necessary if she were going to MOVE here, but for her to just pop in and visit, as long as she didn't stay longer than six months, well, she could've done that at any time. so all this time we're thinking that she's stuck in canada, when in fact that's totally untrue.

hahahaha!!!! see, if i still cared, i'd probably be really upset with all of this, but as it stands i just think it's funny.
Mood: amused

Date: 2002-12-18 10:32
Subject: not a happy ravyn
well, this sucks. yesterday was the tuition payment deadline for spring classes at ASU. and yours truly forgot to pay his tuition. or, more appropriately, he thought about it at 4am after climbing into bed after the first showing of the new LotR movie (which was pretty damn cool). so this means now that i'm going to lose my classes unless somehow i can be lucky enough to be awake at exactly 7am on friday to try to re-register for them and then pay my tuition. it's not looking too promising at this point, unless maybe some other poor schmucks did the same thing, thus creating multiple openings in the classes that i've been trying to get. i will be kicking myself all semester if i don't get into that magic, metaphor, and mind class.

in other news, yeah, saw LotR last night at 12:01am... it was quite good, but i think in some ways i liked the first movie better. maybe because this is the middle of the story and there's no real clear beginning or end, i don't know.

Date: 2002-12-19 14:45
Subject: random insights
this is a quote from luminosity that i couldn't help but laugh at the absurd truth of.

"every person that you ever thought of screwing gave some one a problem at some time or another."

how true, how true....

Time: 15:32
Subject: asu math professors are s-l-o-w.
first, an update from an earlier rant... it looks like i'm going to get my classes for the spring after all. i called the registrar's office on wednesday and they said that i could come down and pay my tuition in person, they'd charge me a $35 late fee, and all would be right with the world. so that's been done, much to my relief. and, like _purpleglitter_ i've been a bit obsessed with checking my grades these past few days. i don't know why i really care, except perhaps to say that it might be my curiosity getting the better of me. so far i'm on pace to get exactly what i'm expecting - one A and one B. got the A in my women's studies class, but then again, i think almost everyone got an A in that class, and those who didn't were probably brain dead. as for the math class, we'll see....

Date: 2002-12-20 10:20
Subject: first the iranians, now the photographers?
recently, a story appeared about middle eastern men being detained by the INS simply because they went to register (as per a new federal mandate).

it gets better.

http://www.2600.org/news/display/display.shtml?id=1441

PHOTOGRAPHER ARRESTED FOR TAKING PICTURES OF VICE PRESIDENT'S HOTEL
Posted 5 Dec 2002 06:03:48 UTC
An amateur photographer named Mike Maginnis was arrested on Tuesday in his home city of Denver - for simply taking pictures of buildings in an area where Vice President Cheney was residing. Maginnis told his story on Wednesday's edition of Off The Hook.

Maginnis's morning commute took him past the Adams Mark Hotel on Court Place. Maginnis, who says he always carried his camera wherever he went, snapped about 30 pictures of the hotel and the surrounding area - which included Denver police, Army rangers, and rooftop snipers. Maginnis, who works in information technology, frequently photographs such subjects as corporate buildings and communications equipment....

Date: 2002-12-22 03:39
Subject: damn fuck shit piss. (not really relevant to the content of this entry(
i just got home from mary x-mas 4, a rather poor excuse for a rave. i dunno, maybe i'm getting old, but i had absolutely zero fun at this thing, except for the five minutes or so i spent getting pushed around by wellregulated. ethan, if you don't want me to grab your nuts, don't put me in a headlock. =/ yeah, anyway... the music sucked, there was no vibe to speak of, but in an attempt to say something nice about it, i can at least say that the venue was kinda nifty. skott, sorry i didn't stick around for your set, but by 2:30 my ears were bleeding from all the vile hardcore. at least now i can say, too, that i've met xianaz, so he's no longer just a faceless entry on my LJ friends list.

in other news, chantal's leaving tomorrow (monday), and overall i'd have to say that her time here went a lot more smoothly than i was expecting it to. we had fun, we didn't argue, no drama, no bullshit, etc, etc. in some ways i wish we had gotten in a huge fight or something, because then it'd be easy to simply say "fuck off, good-bye, get the hell out of here, blah blah blah." anyway, when she leaves on monday it's quite possible that we'll never see each other again, which is a bit of a hard proposition to accept considering that we still care about each other. the whole thing seems to boil down to "right person, wrong time," and the unpleasant reality that she just can't give me everything that i need in a relationship nor can i be everything that she needs. there are, i suppose, a ton of "what ifs" that i could sit here pondering for hours on end, but it wouldn't really solve anything or change the final outcome.

and as the year comes to a close, i can only wonder what 2003 has in store. i'm sure the US will be marching off to another pointless war in iraq sometime in january or february, and at home we'll march closer and closer to a fascist police state. yay us. but what does the upcoming year have in store for me? i haven't the slightest idea. right now i'm trying to look at it from the point of view that i'm going to get off my ass and start doing a lot of the things i've been saying that i'm going to do for the last several years. the list is full of all kinds of shit... work towards my blackbelt, lose those last 40 pounds, get scuba certified, etc, etc, etc... because if i do know one thing, it's that if the boredom which has overtaken me over the last few months doesn't go away, i'll be hard pressed to make it to 30. the boring life is not really worth living.

maybe there's no point to life, maybe there is, but until i figure out the answer one way or another, at least i should try to make things interesting.
Music: Zorak - The Raven
Mood: contemplative

Date: 2002-12-24 17:22
Subject: dammit dammit sonofabitch, dammit dammit sonofabitch
note: this is not exactly a "friends only" entry - there are a few people on my friends list who won't be able to see it, and for those of you that can, you'll understand why as you read further. oh yeah, and probably for only a few of you will any of this make sense, too - but anyone's welcome to comment if you have any useful advice or just want to agree that i've created a clusterfuck. anyway....

in my large but not quite infinite stupidity, i seem to find myself in a situation which i really wasn't expecting and don't really know what to do about. the last couple years of my relationship with chantal have really sucked - hell, outside of the first few months, most of it hasn't been that great. and this year, with her up in canada waiting for her visa (which, as you might've seen in a previous entry, wasn't even necessary for her to come visit) hasn't been any different. every time i'd go up there for a weekend to see her, we really wouldn't have a good time, we'd get in a pissy fight about something or other, and i'd sit there waiting for the weekend to end so i could go home. fuck, even when we went to ibiza there was a bit of stomping drama in which she got pissed off at me for something stupid. so i added all of this up about two months ago and decided that it just wasn't worth it anymore and that it was time to file for divorce and be done with it. so i went down to a lawyer's office, paid my money, and started the process. started shipping chantal her stuff back, and thus it went. ok, so far, no problem, right?

ah, but it starts to get complicated, because over the last year (and those of you who are regular readers of this drivel i call LJ will recall) my best friend and i have started developing feelings for each other and stuff has started to happen. (and in case anyone was wondering or cares, this said friend is female.)

so about a month ago, my mind was saying something like this: well, it's over with chantal from a mental and emotional point of view - i'd made up my mind that i was getting out, so there really wasn't a whole lot of mental opposition to the idea of seeing where things were going to go with cory. we were already best friends, and there was definitely something there of a more-than-friend nature, and over the months of november/december, we talked about it quite a bit. since we were both still technically in relationships, we'd decided that we weren't going to do anything rash or speedy, that we weren't going to make the other person feel like they were a backup plan, and try not to let things get weird. then we had sex and i think the possibility of non-weirdness probably went out the window.

ok, let's recap.... in the process of leaving failed relationship, new one seems to be slowly brewing. now let's fuck up the mix... chantal's been here for the last 11 days, and i'm really wondering if i made a huge mistake in letting her come down here. see, the idea (in my head, anyway) was that she'd pick up the rest of her stuff, we'd hang out for a few days, try to have some fun, and part company on a good note. part of me also thought that she'd probably start some drama within three days of being here and i'd get totally pissed off and kick her ass out -- either way, things would be over, i could close the door on that part of my life and see where the new world leads, both from a relationship perspective (or even if i decided to be single for awhile) as well as everything else.

well, it didn't go that way. having her here for this past week and a half reminded me a lot of what our relationship was like in the beginning, back when things were good. sure, it started off a little strange, but as the time went on it actually got substantially better. no drama, no bullshit, none of the crap that i was expecting. so that means we'd be able to just have a good time and then part on a pleasant note, right? not exactly. up until this last week i'd really felt that i didn't have much left in the way of feelings for chantal - that things had just faded out through all the unpleasantness and the separation and so on. but i then discovered that i was wrong, as i mentioned in a previous entry. there's just one problem - one really, really big problem. chantal has an almost-5-year-old kid from a previous relationship. i don't like kids, and while i might decide someday that i'm ready for a gremlin in my life, that day is not now nor will it come anytime soon.

so the answer to "what should the resolution of things be with chantal and i" should be pretty straightforward, shouldn't it? i mean, hell, you can compromise on many things in a relationship, but this isn't really one of them. it's an all-or-nothing package deal, and i feel like i'm being both selfish and stupid in letting anything continue on with her, regardless of how i feel or don't feel about her, because i just don't have any desire to deal with the kid. it doesn't make things any better that chantal has this incredible knack for not seeing the whole picture either - she'd said something before she left about coming back down here by herself until june, when cloud's out of kindergarten, and then we'd see what happens. ok, now, maybe i don't really like the kid all that much, but that just doesn't seem right to me to leave him up there for 6 months (again - she's already done something similar twice before, once for 6 weeks and once for about 4 months) with his grandmother while she comes down here and whatever happens. but it also seems to me that she's more than ready to do it, too.

and now we add more weirdness to the mix. i made a post a few days ago talking about some of what i'd been feeling recently with chantal, and the reaction i got in an email from cory (she's back east visiting her family) made my stomach turn. cory's upset (she says that she's not, but that's not the feeling i get, especially given one of her more recent LJ posts) that the thing with chantal is still going on, and she mentioned to me over AIM a bit of jealousy. and it's certainly understandable, given the way things have been with her and i recently, and the things we've talked about and whatnot. chantal, of course, doesn't know anything about anything that has or hasn't happened with cory, and it doesn't help matters that chantal and cory were friends while she (chantal) was living here.

so it doesn't take much brainpower to look at this and go "fuckin' christ, mr. ravyn, what the hell have you done here?!" at least that's what i'm asking myself. it looks to me almost certain that people are going to get hurt, and that was the last thing i wanted. and it's pretty much going to be all my fault, too.

so what are my options and how do i feel about them?

• say "fuck relationships" and don't try to rebuild my relationship with chantal or pursue anything with cory beyond just being friends (assuming that we can prevent things from getting too weird). make 2003 the year as i said earlier, when i just work on my own shit, concentrate on trying to be that idealized person that i think i am, and hopefully come out older, wiser, and better (smarter, thinner, richer, etc, etc, too). in some ways i think that this might be the best solution, but i also feel like if i take this route that i'm really just doing nothing but running away from the situation and not actually dealing with anything. but is it running away or just realigning one's focus?

• proceed on the path that i thought i was already on, continuing with the divorce paperwork and then seeing how things unfold with cory from a relationship point of view. i don't really like this option, because i don't want cory to feel in any way like she was a second choice or a backup plan. she really is an amazing and totally cool person and that isn't fair to her at all. had chantal not come down, or had we a miserable time, then this might be an ok option, but now i have new feelings for chantal (or rediscovered ones, anyway) that i need to sort out / resolve / whatever, and it isn't so black-and-white like it used to be.

• don't let things go any farther with cory and see if chantal and i have any way of making our relationship work. this is probably the option that i'm most dubious of, simply because of the fact that it involves more than just her and i. yeah, if cloud wasn't a factor in the equation, i think i might go this way - decide that there's just too much time and energy and emotion invested in things with chantal to throw it all down the shitter and give it one last try and hope that we can put our various dramas and bullshits behind us. however, it isn't like that - there is a 3rd party involved, and his interests have to be considered. and because of that, i don't think this is really an option at all.

and there it is. one royal clusterfuck, unplanned and unforseen, but now staring me squarely in the face, and it's all of my own creation. anyone have any thoughts, other than "hey, you're a dumbass?" are there options that i'm missing that might be better or more attractive than any of the above 3? i suppose there's always an option 4 --- do absolutely nothing and proceed as if nothing were wrong and wait until it all REALLY blows up. =/ i guess my end goal in determining an optimal solution is to see who gets screwed and who doesn't. i'll take it up the ass (figuratively speaking) if that means the situation can end without cory or chantal getting hurt. i'm not sure if there's any way i can pull that off, though.

one last thing - this is a semi-private entry for a reason. if you know any of the people involved, i'd appreciate it greatly if you'd just keep quiet. post whatever comments you'd like to post, or bug me online, but this doesn't need to be leaking out anywhere. thanks.
Mood: cynical

Date: 2002-12-25 01:58
Subject: oh, the humanity...
not yet sleepy, i've been watching the discovery civilization channel for the last couple hours while i use the WiFi interface in my laptop to sit out in the living room and work on some web projects. during this last program i've been watching, they've been talking about secret societies - and thus far it's been a rather interesting mix - skull and bones, earth first, the KKK, and the national alliance. it looks like for their final expose, they're going to cover ravers.

yup... "a youth movement based on music, glowsticks, and an illegal drug known as "ecstasy". put it all together and you've got a secret party known as a rave." let's see if this turns out to be a balanced portrayal or not. so far we've got a doctor who says that raves are nothing but music and drugs. and the promoters and ravers say that it's all about acceptance and community - here's some volunteer from dancesafe saying that "nobody's criticized because of what they wear and how they dance."

from my own personal experience, that's a crock of shit. but anyway, back to the show....

they just said that ketamine is a designer drug. no it isn't - it's a fucking cat tranquilizer. and now they're talking about the inevitable onslaught of ecstasy overdoses. and now this guy from dancesafe is saying that they test pills for purity... you can't test a fucking pill for purity with a drop of liquid from a bottle. fuckin' christ, everybody who's ever used a testing kit knows that all you can get from the reagent is whether or not you have some E-like substance in your pill or not. that's really disappointing that someone from dancesafe would make a comment like this.

ok, i think i've seen enough. at least it's on a cable channel that most people probably don't even get on their TVs. why can't i just watch some supposedly-educational TV shows and learn something, rather than getting sensationalized crap just like what i've come to expect from the evening news?
Mood: annoyed

Time: 03:04
Subject: weeee!!
something to cheer about...
the space ghost christmas show is on the cartoon network.

=)
Mood: happy

Date: 2002-12-28 10:37
Subject: blah!
ya know, it really sucks ass when you think of an idea for a piece of software and a website, you spend a few thousand dollars and a bunch of time getting it all built, then you launch it, only to find out a couple days later that someone else has already done the same thing, their stuff looks a shitload better than what you've got, and they already have a significant user base. not to mention that your site isn't getting shit for traffic, despite signing up for several pay-per-click search services, and that the traffic you are getting hasn't generated a single sale.

so it looks like deadbunny enterprises is going to get a tax writeoff for a failed business project. woo. yay. weee. at least the data that was gathered over the course of the development can be put to use somewhere else.

one idea bulb burns out and another one comes on.
Mood: disappointed

Time: 12:21
Subject: thoughts
i've often said that the chief cause of stress in the universe is created by the difference between the way something is and the way that it thinks it is. in other words, for a person, internal angst and anxiety is the result of the person's assumed path being different from the person's real path. yes, i know, this presupposes the idea that each person has a "real" path, but i tend to believe that each thing in this universe, regardless of what it is, has an intrinsic nature to it. for humans, maybe that's a purpose, maybe it's a destiny, i don't know - i hesitate to use those words because i really don't believe in fate, karma, or destiny. perhaps a better way to put it is that stress is reduced and/or eliminated when things act in accordance with themselves. humor me here, it makes sense in my head.

so the struggle, then, becomes for a person (we might as well stick to people in this example, since that's what it all comes back to) to determine what his/her true nature is, and then to act in accordance with that (assuming of course, that once one figures out what one IS, one can figure out what one DOES), and actions that don't fall along the correct path will create stress and anxiety. and yes, this is, in case you were thinking it, a very taoist perspective.

i've been thinking recently (over the last several months but more recently within the last hour) about what my nature is, what sort of thing i am and what comes along with that territory. sure, this can be abstracted to all sorts of philosophical levels and personality and worldview and feelings on all manner of subjects, but today's topic is that of strengths and weaknesses. everyone's got both, and we often misjudge both, thinking that we're better (or worse) at something than we actually are. people often say that if you work hard at a task, or at learning a skill, no matter how much you suck, eventually you'll become good at it. they're not content to say that you'll get better, but that you'll actually become good. and you know, i think this is a crock of shit. sometimes, with a given area, no matter how much effort and energy we put into it, there is no improvement to be had. a sort of asymptotic case of the law of diminishing returns, you might say.

so the point of all this, i suppose, is that i think i've finally come to the realization that certain pursuits i engage in from time to time are simply wasted effort. and that might be interpreted as "giving up" by some people, but really, i think it allows me to free up energy and mindcycles to think about other things, try new ideas in different areas - after all, how can you figure out who you are and what you are if you don't do these things until you find something that fits?

anyway, it's almost 12:30, time for bed. yay for vampire time. woo.
Mood: contemplative

Time: 12:25
Subject: one more that i couldn't resist.
this was posted as a comment in debate and i couldn't help but get a good laugh out of it.

"Feminists are difficult-to-utilize penis recepticles." --tbonestg

now i sleep.

Date: 2002-12-31 08:12
Subject: purloined from xianaz who ripped it off barbles who probably stole it from someone else...
this list was a hell of a lot harder to compile than i had first thought it'd be.

Five things that 2002 taught me:

1. at the core, we all know who we are and what we want, it's just a matter of dumping the bullshit.
2. there are millions of people in this world with more money than brains.
3. boredom is the root of all evil.
4. it's good to have cats.
5. we live in interesting times.

Five personally significant events of 2002:

1. the bet (sometime in february) - _purpleglitter_ will know what i'm talking about.
2. the trip to ibiza!! (september)
3. vegas - three straight weekends in november
4. DJing at nutropic (november)
5. filing for divorce.

Five things I want to do in 2003:

1. get my black belt in kung fu. dammit, i AM going to do this.
2. drop about 30-40 pounds of extraneous organic insulation (thanks to psylence for the term)
3. get off the continent a few times and see more of the world.
4. learn how to ski.
5. get scuba-certified and go diving in australia

Five things I don't want to do in 2003:

1. become a cripple or a vegetable
2. piss off people that don't deserve it (the ones that do, no problem there)
3. get blown up by osama bin laden =)
4. think too much.
5. think too little.

Five people who I'd like to know better in 2003:

1. i don't know that many people to begin with.
2. so how 'bout just meeting 5 people that won't
3. turn into assholes, miscreants, or in
4. some other way try to
5. screw me over. =)