The value of education

Do you know what I miss? I miss school. I never thought I would say it, but I miss it a hell of a lot. I loved the late night cramming and the constant learning. So why don't I go back?

I don't know why. Well, actually I do know. I'm afraid of the cost. To get my masters, I would be in some major debt. It has taken me several years to get a handle on my debt. A little over six years ago, I had several credit cards and didn't pay jack shit on any of them. Not a dime. I would tell the debt collectors, "I'm not paying jack shit and so stop calling."

Yeah, real mature of me. My credit was obviously worthless. It was so bad, I had to pay a $500 deposit on a cell phone plan. I don't know why I did it. Actually I do know why. I had perfect credit when I was in college. I mean really, really good credit. I have a baby and get married and then my amount of debt grows fast.

Then the divorce happens. And I was a stupid idiot and took most of the debt in the divorce. I could have probably handled the debt, but I think I was bitter because it was associated to the failed marriage. I was mad because we BOTH accumulated the debt, but I alone was paying it off. So, I did what any idiot would do and stopped paying it.

I wanted to get a house about five years ago, so then I had to really start looking into my debt problem. I did the usual debt consolidation thing and actually managed to fix my credit. I have decent credit again, not as good as before, but not bad either.

So for me to take on so much debt again, it feels painful. I know it sounds stupid, but is a Masters degree worth thousands of dollars? I know the answer to that question, but I refuse to believe it.

Anyway, I think I will start working toward some more certifications and try to take some language classes. Then I can determine if I want to go back to school. I wish I were one of those minorities that qualify for grants... oh wait a second...

Boot thoughts

What is the ultimate question in life? Do I get it now or wait for something better. I found some boots that are ok looking and can't decide if I should get them or keep looking for a better pair. At what point should I just stop looking and just buy them? Can't the same question be applied to anything in my life? This thought hit me so hard, I just had to stop and capture this thought in the middle of a shoe store.

And the award for waking up on time, goes to...

I actually woke up on time. Shocking. I only had three hours of sleep, but I did it. Now I must dodge those flying pigs and all that freakin snow on the way to the airport because I achieved the impossible. In fact, I was a little too organized. Hence, the time to write this entry. I'm sitting here and early on my schedule.

Lord, I want some sleep right now. Nothing my friend Senior Torro del Rojo can't fix.

I would like to thank God, becuase without him all of this would not be possible. And my mom, "Hi Mom!". And my homie from 7th street, yeah boy!, and my fellow early wakers. Yeah, yeah, you know wat I'm talkin 'bout. And my pops, cuz he's the reason to make this all happen. And my peeps at the 7-11. They just keeping it real. And Adrian, for keeping this stupid idea in my head for the last few days. And all the little people that I stepped on to make this a reality. And to all the playa hatas that helped give me the drive to actually wake up on time.

How to waste five minutes of your life

So, I have a plane to catch in nine hours. I have to wake up at 4:30AM to get ready and leave by 5:30. I don't have a good feeling about this. I have not fallen asleep before 1:00AM in a long, long time. Well, other than Sunday, but that was a Malaria induced fever day (so it doesn't count).

I still need to pack and prepare for this trip. I can officially say that I'm sick of travelling this year. I think I have done my fair share of trips and just want to sit at home and veg (as if I don't do that daily).

I'm in a funk again. I feel it sneaking up on me like a ninja stalking his victim. Ninjas are bad ass. Did I ever mention that I wanted to be a ninja when I grew up? Of course, how many boys didn't want to be ninjas when they grew up? But I was different. I wanted to REALLY be a ninja. I had all the equipment. We would sneak out at night and climb trees and houses. We would throw our throwing stars at everything. I even bought all the books and practiced flipping onto rooftops and jumping from the roof of the house to the fence. Now that I think about it, I was a stupid kid. The kind that you know one day will get himself killed because my favorite words were "watch this" or "I bet you I can". Looking back, I couldn't. And I would get hurt.

I don't know where that came from. I had this sudden urge to rant all of a sudden. I guess that's why it was a "sudden" urge. I could have just backspaced and erased that line, but I didn't. Okay, now I'm really digressing.

I think that is my favorite part of the Monty Python movies. They just go into these random side rants that have nothing to do with the plot. "Is it an African swallow or a European swallow?" All time favourite movie.

Anyway, I guess I'll start packing now and see what happens. I'm so screwed and you just wasted five minutes of your day.

OMG

Malaria causes a flu-like illness and these would include:

fever
rigors
headaches
sweating
tiredness
myalgia (limbs and back)
abdominal pain
diarrhea
loss of appetite
orthostatic hypotension
nausea
slight jaundice
cough
enlarged liver and spleen (sometimes not palpable)
vomiting

HOLY SHIT --- I have the fever, headaches, sweating, and tiredness symptoms. This is not looking good.

Death by a stupid flying insect

Can you die from too many mosquito bites? Would my chances of catching Malaria proportionally increase based on the number of mosquitos that bite me? I really, really need to know the answers to these questions.

I went paint balling this past weekend. Yeah, that's just how I roll. You know, me and the guys shooting at each other like some wild human hunt. Whatever... I was a freakin big ol' kid running around with the other big ol' kids shooting at anything that moved. I have to say, it was very addicting. It's like playing a video game in real life. Is it wrong of me to feel all warm and squishy inside whenever I got a head shot on another player? What if the other player was a twelve year old boy? It was either me or him and Darwin obviously wanted me to continue.

So now I have bruises all over me and I was feeling really shitty yesterday. I had this low grade fever that I just couldn't shake. I was also so sleepy and just couldn't stay awake for more than a couple of hours at a time.

Did I also mention that I was the only fool at the WHOLE place that was wearing shorts and a t-shirt. Uhm... yeah. I didn't get that memo. So I have at least a hundred mosquito bites all over my body. The picture above is only part of my leg. They are like that all over me. Why the hell won't this fuckin itching stop. Yeah, I could take some Benedril and make the itching stop, but I don't have any at home. Did I mention how lazy I am and refuse to go to the store to buy some more. I know I have a big ass bottle of it around here somewhere and refuse to buy more. I just can't find it.

Man, do I like to suffer. Maybe the Malaria has spread to my brain and I can't think straight. What the hell are the symptoms of Malaria anyway? I need to end this post and hit Google to find out how much time I have before it gets worse.

Loud people suck

You know what really bothers me? Loud people that are loud for no apparent reason. Do you really need to smack your lips as you eat that muffin? Why the hell do you make a slight noise as you eat? Do you not realize that you are making that humming noise?

We are in the middle of a training session and you decide to open a carbonated drink and have it spill all over the place. Then you get up and make all this noise as you get napkins to clean the mess. Rude people really piss me off.

Then you have the nerve to sit there and talk to the person next to you like there is not a training session going on around you. Why are you even here?

Just go away and be loud somewhere else.

Ok, I feel better for now. Even though I will have to face this same rude lady tomorrow, I will muster up my strength to sit there and just get through this stupid training session.

Just another day at work

I thought my day was bad...

Home

Some people live in a house on a hill
And they wish they were someplace else
There's nobody there when the evening is still
Secrets with no one to tell

And some I have known
Have a ship where they sleep
With sounds of rocks on the coast
They sail over oceans five fathoms deep
They can't find what they want the most

- Vanessa Carlton

Song of expression

Why do I post part of song lyrics?

This thought popped into my head after hitting submit to the last post. I don't know what made me start doing this, but I would think it has something to do with my love of music. I use music as a sort of therapy to help me express my emotions at that moment in time. Any words that I put down will never quite capture my feelings as well as those certain lyrics.

I think a big part of it is also my interpretation of the lyric. Sometimes I pull out parts of a song and tweak them to fit my current state of mind. I know that the song is really expressing a certain analogy, but I alter the lyrics to fit my analogy. I don't know if I am making sense, but it's kind of hard for me to explain.

The other part that is missing is actually pretty important. The singer's voice, emotions, and the music is missing when I pull out the lyric. Those different characteristics of the song all make up my choice of song lyric. Unfortunately, I can not put all of that down in my posts, so I make do with what I have. To get an example, listen to "Turpentine" by Brandi Carlile. She has a very powerful voice that fits my feelings very well. My simple post does not do her song justice.

On occassion, I do use poetry or some other method of expression whenever possible. I think I want to start using photos as another method of expressing my current state of mind. I'm strongly fighting the urge to purchase a digital SLR camera, because my point-and-shoot camera does not capture my vision of a moment like an SLR camera would.

Anyway, I digress (again). I always seem to find a way to wander around in my posts. So, I'll leave you with more lyrics.

Well I feel like I'm lost in time
Watching the world go by
Everything looks the same
Tired of playing games

California Sun - Jem

Turpentine

I watch you grow away from me in photographs
And memories like spies
And salt betrays my eyes again
I started losing sleep and gaining weight
And wishing I was was ten again
So I could be your friend again

- Brandi Carlile

Please Stand By

Daniel's brain is experiencing technical difficulties... Once it is reloaded with sugar and caffeine, we will continue with our normal insane programming.

My chicken sacrifice must have worked

I am so glad that the Yankees were eliminated in the playoffs. Perhaps they will fire Torre and we can entice Pettite back next season. We really need a solid #2 pitcher next season.

Nothing lasts forever

How does a professional athelete know when to retire? Biggio did it the right way and retired when he was on top, but what if he did still have a couple of years in him? Roger Clemens has been on the verge of retiring for the past four years, but look at how good he has been the last four years.

I just wonder if I will know when to stop certain things in my life. When will I be too old to go out partying anymore? When will I just start to look like the old creepy man at the clubs instead of mixing in with the rest of the crowd? When will I have nothing left to say for this site?

There are plenty of days I have things I want to add, but I don't take the time out at that second and write them down. I forget what I wanted to express later that day, so I just create new content that is on my mind at that moment.

I was watching this live video feed on the Internet yesterday of a guy playing a video game for 72 hours straight (yeah, that's how dorky my life is right now). Well, he was supposed to be playing for 72 hours straight and he would win an Xbox 360 and a video game. He was 26 hours into the contest and just gave up. He wasn't tired, but he said he mentally could not play the game anymore. He was burnt out 26 hours into the game and could not go any further. He probably could have gone another 12 hours easily, but he made the decision to stop playing. Why did he quit instead of playing until he couldn't stay awake any longer?

I think you have to know yourself very well to be at that level. To know when you just don't want to do something anymore and decide to stop. Since I can not imagine myself doing something like that, I have realized that I barely know myself. Something as simple as stopping when you don't feel like it is foreign to me. I can only hope that one day I will retire this site when I'm on top. I dont' think that will be any time soon though because I have so much more to say and so little time to say it.

Free has it's price

If you had a chance to get a beer and not have to pay for it would you take it? Notice how I did not mention a "free" beer. Nothing in life is free. This exact same scenario happened to me tonight.

I went out for sushi and it was extremely crowded so I had to wait for the sushi bar to free a spot. In the mean time, I sat at the regular bar and ordered a beer. The bartender did not ask me to pay ahead of time or take any credit cards from me. As my spot opened at the sushi bar, the host said I could just transfer my tab to the meal ticket. I followed him to my spot and ordered my meal. After I was done, I noticed the bill only had one beer on the ticket and I had two (including the one at the bar earlier). I did not say anything and closed out the ticket. I was thinking, "Hell yeah, I got a free beer". Then I started to think some more. Karma would not be happy with this situation.

As I was leaving, I went to the bar and asked the bartender if she had transferred my beer to my ticket. Knowing full well that she did not. She said she forgot to even ring it up, but thanked me for being so honest. I paid her cash for the drink and left. Damn it, it truly could have been free and no one would have known. That is not an entirely true statement. No one would have known except me. And that's where my conscious kicked in. Since I was knowingly trying to scam them, karma would have kicked my ass for it somehow.

Why do I think this? Because I did this exact same thing last week. AT THE SAME RESTAURANT. They forgot to put my drinks on the tab and I paid thinking I was lucky. I had a shitty week and I think karma had something to do with it. Well, shitty in a karma sense at least. I was not going to let that happen this week.

I don't know if karma really exists or if it is my subconscious sabotaging me in some way. Either way, it affects my life directly and I don't like it when it kicks me in the ass. I have always believed in the philosophy of "what comes around goes around". It always happens. Sometimes we witness the results, sometimes we don't get to see the results. But they always happen none the less.

Well, I have a full week to put it to the test.

You might be a codependent

Here's a quick test to see if you're codependent.

If you spent the whole day doing all kinds of things, come home exhausted, but none of the things you did today were for you.

Then you might be a codependent.

No forks now, only forward motion

I'm very fortunate to be at a point in my life where I can evaluate who I am as a person and who do I want to be as a person. It was a long and painful process to get me this far. My evaluation is not complete yet, but I do have some small goals set for myself that will help me grow as an individual.

I like my life right now. It's not the happiest I have ever been, but I've definitely not the worst. I recently attended an event that helped me confirm who I was as a person. I have no doubts about my personal beliefs and what I want out of life.

So now, it's on to the next step. How do I accomplish all the tasks I want in life? Standing still and waiting for things to fall into my lap does not appear to be working. As much as I have tried this method, the results always end up the same. I have to go out and be aggressive with my life. The greater the risk, the greater the reward.

Wandering Thoughts

Sooo... how about this weather? Um... yeah. I've come to realize that most of my posts lately have been light and fluffy without much substance. I don't intentionally create entries like that, it just seems to happen every now and then. I think tonight is going to be one of those inner looking moments and bearing of the soul posts. Doesn't that sound so dramatic?

It shouldn't sound so drastic, but for me it feels that way. I have come a long, long way towards expressing my emotions in the last couple of years. Did I ever mention that at one point in my life I was seeing a therapist? During the really bad moments, I would see him twice a week. It's been a while since I've seen him, but just looking back I can remember how bad everything felt at that time. It always appears worse when you are going through those moments. Looking back, it really wasn't that bad. That's the difference between the me now and the me then. I still have those moments of doubt within myself, but I have come to realize that I think everyone has those moments. One way or another we all share that feeling from time to time. The important part is how we deal with those emotions when we are going through them. Dealing with those feelings in the present.

I had someone tell me a story recently of how a friend was toxic in this person's life. And this person had to tell the friend to stay away because that friend was only causing grief in that person's life. Do I have toxic people in my life? This was the question posed to me after the story.

Wow, that is a really serious question to consider. I know I have had some seriously toxic people in my past life. My present life, I'm not so sure. Without the ability to see my life from an outside perspective, it's really hard to distinguish the toxic people from the non-toxic people. Of course after saying all that junk, I should mention that I am aware of certain toxic people from my past that I have sent on their merry way.

On a completely unrelated note... Have you ever noticed that life has a way of working itself out. It also has a way of surprising me when I least expect it. For example, this past weekend I was sitting in Hooter's having a philosophical debate concerning the belief in destiny versus fate. That is not that unusual except that I was having this debate with the waitress. Not to stereotype anyone, but this is not the place one would expect to have this type of discussion.

I was very impressed with her arguments. They did not change my opinion, but I did respect her view none the less. I have noticed that I have become more skeptical regarding the terms fate and destiny. I was watching the movie Serendipity recently and found myself telling the TV how much all of this was a bunch of crock. Our fate is not predetermined and we can not just sit and wait for it to guide us in our life. Our actions influence our life and I believe that our life changes daily.

I remember when I was a kid, I had this fantasy that I would fall madly in love with some woman and fate would have us meet. Isn't that strange? Not the story book fairy tale stuff, but the fact that a boy would think like this. Isn't this usually what girls dream of when they are little? I really think my childhood parent pressure thing screwed me up mentally when it comes to relationships.

Anyway, I digress. It's not that I don't believe in fate or destiny. I just think that it is not static. It is dynamic and constantly changing. This is where I lose most people. The dictionary defines destiny as "the events that will necessarily happen to a particular person or thing in the future". My belief is that these events change based on our constant actions throughout the day. If I have two paths to choose in my daily decision, my future will change depending on my choice of the left path versus the right path.

This is where I come into conflict at times. What if I made the wrong choice somewhere along the way? What if I was meant to be in a certain relationship, but made some choice and now it is all messed up? There is no "undo" button in life. I guess the tragic part in all of this is the fact that I may never know. I must continue to move forward then and not second guess all my past decisions. This is tough. Really tough.

So the waitress then throws this curveball into my belief system. "You can't change your destiny. Even though you may pick one path versus the other, the destiny does change. The difference is that it changes to have you come back to your original selection." Kind of like it is an auto-undo and it corrects my path to lead it back on track. That is an interesting theory.

Kind of like Heroes. No matter what Hiro tries to do to change the future, it always ends up the same. Is this my life? If that is the case, then where is my life heading? There are certain directions that I seem to always be heading toward and have resisted that path far too many times.

I'm sure I lost most people by the third paragraph. For those remaining, I'll leave you with a Jason Mraz lyric.

Climb up over the top
Survey the state of the soul
You’ve got to find out for yourself whether or not you’re truly trying
Why not give it a shot?
Shake it, Take control and inevitably wind up
Finding for yourself all the strengths that you have inside of you

These are not the droids you are looking for...

Sometimes I wonder if my dog has psychic powers and I'm just not receptive to her abilities. Every day she just sits in front of me and stares at me. STARES hard. No blinking, no noise, just a blank stare.

What the hell is she trying to tell me? Why can I not read her mind? She is obviously sending me some psychic thought and I can not pick up her brain waves for some reason.

In the past, this would frustrate me to no end. "Why the hell are you staring at me???" I would actually shout this at her. No response. Only more blank stares.

Now, I just stare back. I don't say anything, I don't do anything, I just stare. This must mean something because now she gets frustrated and jumps around in a circle when I do this. What this means, I have no idea. It's a start. Now If I could only figure out what the whole jumping and spinning things means...