October 24, 2002

How many people do you think have been eaten by Crocodiles in the last ten years? In Australia that is.

I reckon 90% of them must be tourists.

Why do they not believe the signs? Why do they think that the large crocs they see sunning themselves or swimming in waterholes would be fun to swim with? How do they not think of themselves as Hors D'oevres?

Which person in their right mind actually says "Hey, its midnight, its a beautiful night, lets go swimming"? And what is going through the mind of the other person(s) who say "Yeah, OK - Last one in is a rotten egg!"?

I think its unjust that the company who took them out on the jaunt are now going to be held responsible.
Caveat emptor baby.

Or Caveat Eater in this case.

http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2002/10/23/1034561549695.html

While Jennifer was sleeping, I watched her, and I felt so scared. I was so scared of not being realized - not being attained. I feel so deeply and badly for those who go through life, only not to have soared, not to have experienced fully the wonder of one's own existance. I hope and pray that she does - and I hope and pray that I do. I do the same for everyone - all of you, even if I may not like who you are.

I am so sad.

just another love node, like so many before and so many to come. a daylog of rapturous romanticism...

nahhhh, im sick of that shit...lets talk about monkeys. google eyed, mite picking, flaming assed baboons. yeah man....it's all about the baboons. now theres a party animal. if a baboon were a rock star who would he be? methinks george clinton, perhaps. he rocks and flails like the jiggiest of primates.

another day, another dollar, oh wait, nooooo, just another day since i am still unemployed. this is crazy, i'm good, baby. ive walked into dozens of restaurants and been hired on the spot. hey, it ain't programming or rocket science, but i'm a damn good waitress. and its not easy, despite what so many of you think. it takes highly developed focus and efficiency. i get your refills before you even know you need one, i can carry a ten table station and help out the new girl who's about to cry because her steaks all came out overdone, the guy working the fry station keeps looking at her like he knows what she looks like nekkid and she accidentally closed out a credit card slip to cash. after all, its just a show. and if youre having a good time then joe schmoe at table 214 is having a good time. well he will be when i upsell that third grey goose martini he didnt even know he wanted....

my point is this: i need a job, so if anyone is in the los angeles area and knows of any restaurants that are hiring (preferably ones with entrees starting at around $12), feel free to message me...

Did I mention that my apartment is attached to the Jewish Resource Center at the University of Michigan? It is a fabulous gray-blue old Victorian house near central campus. I am the only non-Jewish tenant, and am therefore recruited to shut off the fire alarm on Saturdays when the tiny naughty Jewish children pull bright red levers to sound the siren (turning electricity on and off is similar to lighting a fire, which is not allowed on the holy day. That's why I get to shut stuff off.).

I am in the middle of midterms, and have a Japanese exam tomorrow morning at ten sharp. I need to memorize one hundred ninety three kanji before then. I am procrastinating, as I have far too much time in which to accomplish this task at present. I work best under pressure, and there is not enough of it yet.

I went to my first support group meeting today, which I am not at liberty to talk about in agreement with the rules it is run with. However, I believe it is safe to speak of what I talked about, as I would have done so here anyway, regardless of what was dragged out of me in front of strangers sitting around an antique table in a musty old room. I reluctantly spoke of my above mentioned roommate, and how she tends to take up all four shelves in the refrigerator and leaves none for me to put my meager rations upon. When I say take up, I mean stuff full, with no room left for anything. She is training for the New York marathon and thus eats like a horse, and rightly so. And yet I waste away by a steady two or three pounds a week, devoid of space to even attempt to fill with the nourishment I need to be buying at the store. At present I have some Motts apple juice, three fat free Yoplait yogurts (raspberry, Boston Cream Pie, and strawberry), two single-serving cartons of Egg Beaters, three bottles of Perrier, three pounds of leftover apples, a bag of baby carrots, and eight plastic cups of sugar-free Jello. All I want is half a shelf. Is that unreasonable?

It was kind of nice to be back in the support group therapy atmosphere again, as much as I hate to admit that. I was the thinnest there, which worried me. I was hoping to see girls worse off than me, as horrible as that makes me sound, in order to encourage me to be thinner yet. Now I have no one to compete with. Sick sick sick, I can see this in my thinking patterns without the help of anyone. I am still supposed to set up an appointment with a real counselor at the request of my physician, but that is not going to happen unless I get below one hundred ten pounds. I am not sure I will, as I have been doing remarkably well these past two weeks - I am eating at or above normal most days, and even incorporating such damning food as oatmeal raisin cookies (my absolute favorite) and Skittles. My mother is still threatening to send me back to Iowa, where I learned that being healthy is better than being subjected to endless needles and doctors poking at my bones saying"gain weight or die!" in their cheerful, no-nonsense voices while sticking me in a wheelchair. Makes me want to eat one more bowl of oatmeal in the morning instead of feeling the utter satisfaction of an empty tummy, as the second will certainly lead to months of forced oatmeal and a vacation to the ugliest state in this country. What a nightmare.

A snippet from today's news from the Netherlands..

Venlo, October 24 2002

The 22 year old man that was assaulted on Tuesday by two 18 year olds died this morning around 2:20. The student suffered a severe beating after he addressed the two boys on their reckless driving. Apparently, the boys nearly ran over an elderly lady in the parking lot of a local supermarket. Mr. Steegmans then told the boys to have some respect for the elderly. After bludgeoning Mr. Steegmans, the two boys went into the supermarket to do their shopping. They were arrested moments later.

Source: NOS news: www.omroep.nl/nos/nieuws/index.html

I got beat up once for no apparent reason, almost two years ago. Me and two of my flatmates were out in Delft, where we live. Delft is a small, but not tiny city according to Dutch standards. It has a population of about one hundred thousand people. About one fifth of these are students, including me and my friends. That night, we had been drinking. Badly. We don't get drunk regularly really, we are not frat boys, but for some reason the three of us felt frustrated with one thing or another and we went out and tried to forget about it.

Around 4 a.m. we wandered into a local grill to get something to eat. The owner told us that he was officially closed and that he would only serve us if we stayed outside. There were more people eating outside, so we agreed. At some point a guy walked into the street. He was completely wasted and unlike ourselves, he didn't hold up very well. He tried to pick a fight with .. well, with anyone who would really. With us not being the fighting type, we ignored him.

Some of the other customers did not. They could not take his racist remarks ("Go home! You people are eating Jewish food!", it wasn't even an Israeli grill, but what the hell did he know!). At first, I asked the grill owner to call the police, but he refused. Afraid as he was to get into trouble for serving customers at this hour. Eventually somebody, not me or my friends, chased him out of the street. There was no fight.

A few moments later we walked home. We were so out of it that we had to carry one another. As I said, this was one of those rare occasions when we really had a lot to drink. Once we were around the corner, we walked right into the guy who had been bugging us earlier. This time, he brought friends. Big friends. There was really nothing to do for us but run, or at least try. We were mildly successful: my two flatmates got away. I was the slowest runner and I got tripped. My friends never noticed. You can hardly blame them. I didn't anyway.

The kicking didn't hurt me much. I remember thinking that it was quite bearable. At one point I felt it had been enough and I got up and ran away. They let me go. I noticed a slight pain in my wrist, but apart from that I felt fine at first. One of my friends took me to the hospital and they X-rayed me. I had a broken scaphoid. I am a musician and a computer science student. Needless to say, I was not happy with a broken wrist. The next day I woke up with a very painful shoulder. Apparently it had been dislocated and now it started to hurt. After about a week, I started to notice the background headache that had been with me since it happened. I hadn't noticed it at first, but at one point I picked up the bus schedule booklet and I couldn't make sense of the tables in it. I just didn't understand. Then it struck me that I felt 'different' since it all happened.

To cut a long story short, I had suffered a severe concussion. I had to stop studying for six months on doctor's order. Those were the most excruciatingly boring six months of my life. I couln't read, I couldn't watch t.v., I couldn't have a conversation with any depth for an extended period of time, I sure as hell could not play any musical instruments with one hand. In fact, I couldn't even cut cheese to put on my bread with one hand. I was forced to just sit. Like a vegetable, only with the burden of conciousness.

Perhaps I should add, as a little background information, that 2000 wasn't exactly my lucky year to begin with. At the end of 1999, a man had beaten my 77 year old grandmother to death during an argument in her own home. Granted, my grandmother could be an unreasonable pain, especially during arguments, but this was clearly unnecessary. Two days later, he did about the same thing with his own mother. He plead insanity and was acuitted. They told us that he would spend the rest of his days in a mental institution. The last thing I heard was that he was elligible for a weekend leave a few months ago. My grandmother is still dead. She never gets a weekend leave. As if this wasn't enough, in the months between these two events, my stepfather's brother died of unnatural causes (on which I do not care to elaborate) and my two year old niece was diagnosed wit leucaemia. Luckily, she has been declared 'cured' now, to the extent possible.

My point. Well, I guess the point is that my guess is as good as yours. I find it increaslingly difficult to cope with all this. I am a nihilist. Not the belly staring, black dressing "life sucks and then you die" stereotype, just somebody who doesn't believe in an afterlife, a raison d'etre or a governing force. I am an optimist, although I really know better. I enjoy life and all and I am surely not the quitting kind, but I carry a knot in my stomach about all of this.

I used to believe that all people had at least a sense of justice in them. I used to think that respect was just a matter of common sense, of "I won't bug you if you don't bug me". But it isn't so. Apparently, some people find it very reasonable to beat other people to death over a petty argument or to just shoot at random people from a hidden location without any particular reason, really. Of course, I have always known about this, but it seems I have never fully realised that we are really confronted with these people everyday. They are around us and amongst us and even if we can catch them, there is no appropriate form of retribution imaginable. Perhaps this is the hardest thing to accept in a person's life. I am talking about the fact that justice does not really exist. It is just a very good idea, but nothing more than that.

I understand you religious folks. To an extent I even envy you. I just wished it were that simple..

Slowly one by one and sometimes even in pairs they enter the corridor, gliding awkwardly scanning the doors and walls searching for clues as to where they are headed. They stop at the end of the corridor where all the others who came before had stood to a halt. There are no seats some slump against the walls others just collapse on the floor as if standing was too much of an effort. They wait in silence.

Some bored already, after a few minutes, rummage through their bags desperately seeking refuge from the uneasiness of being surrounded by complete strangers. Many have a book at hand for such situations, others find entertainment in their mobile phones whilst the rest choose to stare at the walls avoiding eye contact.

Whether they are "reading", sending an SMS or staring at nothing they are all fully aware of what's happening around them yet they try and seem as uninterested as possible. Whenever somebody walks up the corridor heads turn, and the victim knows they are being judged.

The sound of footsteps comes from the stairs a young man appears at the opposite end of the corridor. Heads turn slowly as they hear him coming. He is wearing trousers several sizes too big, his hair in blond dreadlocks. However unlike many of the others he seems confident, he walks casually up the corridor hands in pockets and as if time did not exist. When he reaches the end of the corridor he leans against the wall and smiles to himself for he knows he has fooled everyone. He knows he's made an impression the others think he's laid back and more importantly not intimidated by the others and maybe even think he's cool and all he's done is walk in.

The next person was a woman she walked in but stopped casually to glance at a sign on the wall. Her stride more relaxed and slower than some of the others rather like that of a woman in her forties. Her long coat and shoes like that of a mature woman but; when she turns; her face shows something different, there are no signs of ageing as you'd expect from seeing her fuller figure in those clothes. Her complexion is that of woman no older than 25. But in the corridor of this establishment she seems out of place. Out of place when compared to the other skinny girls in their tight bootleg denim trousers, tailored jackets and chunky boots. She is aware of the icy glares from the other women yet they don't seem to bother her, she knows she's different but she accepts it.

A few minutes later the door opens a dozen young people walk out. Those already in the corridor stay hovering whilst the others rush out. Slowly they make their way in carefully selecting who to sit by. Those already seated make an effort to seem friendly hoping somebody sits beside them so they don't end up looking like a looser.

Once the door closes everything seems different. The people seem much more at ease. They've all been brought together by this common goal. Now they have accepted each other and their differences. Now the first lecture of term can start.

One of the cases Michael Moore makes in his film "Bowling for Columbine" is that America is a violent society because the news media creates a culture of fear. There's no greater example of that than how the local media here in D.C. has treated the sniper case. The general message has been: "There's a sniper out there folks, and he's after you and your children."

But the reality of it is that more people in the D.C. area die a month from things like cancer and traffic accidents than they did from the sniper attacks. One woman came into my office yesterday saying she thought she personally was going to get killed -- or our boss's child. I tried to calm her down and explain that she has a better chance of dying from being hit by a drunk driver, or having breast cancer than she does being killed by the sniper, but she wouldn't back down.

"There aren't people in cars trying to hunt me down," she said. "But there is a sniper hunting me down. It could be anyone he gets!"

"But anyone could also die in a traffic accident," I replied. "I could walk outside for lunch, and someone could hit me in an intersection. It happens all the time."

(As an aside, just two months ago I was walking back to work from lunch, when I saw a car turn a corner and flip upside down, crashing into a parked truck. If I'd been in the intersection where it happened, and they'd hit me, I could have very well been dead -- I thought about bringing this up to my coworker, but I doubt she'd get the point I was trying to make.)

After about a half hour of arguing she was getting progressively angry with me, and I could see I wasn't getting anywhere. It's terrible how the news can generate such terror in people -- they're really irresponsible in how they report these things. The implication is always that you, the viewer, are destined to be a victim. If it's not the sniper that gets you, then you'll die in a terrorist attack. Maybe al Qaeda has a dirty bomb they're prepared to set off on K Street during rush hour?

It all reminds me of a great skit on Saturday Night Live a few years back -- Jerry Seinfeld was the host. They spoofed a local news program, and the headline was "Your furniture may kill you -- find out how!" Of course, they held back the "headline" until the end, when it turned out to be of little importance. But watching the local news, you can tell that fear is what gives them their ratings.

"Do you know where your children are? They may be at the local `rave' danceclub Buzz -- doing drugs and having wild homosexual sex. Find out more tonight on Fox News!"

That's a real headline -- though I'm paraphrasing. The sniper reports were like that, too, only they gave updates every fifteen minutes or so -- even when there wasn't any news to update. "The sniper is still out there, Bob. And he's hungry for blood!" It's ridiculous. I really hope it's over. I'm sorry those people died, and I'm also sorry that so many others (including myself) have lived in terror for the past few weeks. But the news media could have been more responsible about how they reported it -- caution is one thing, but selling people fear is quite another.

The most recent case is my 20th high school reunion this weekend. I attended a small private high school in my hometown where many of the children of wealthy, upwardly mobile families attended. It was the early 80's so there were Polo shirts, Bass Weeguns, and khaki pants as far as the eye could see. There were new cars that were replaced by newer cars when Biff or Muffy got tired of the old one or wrecked it.

I came from a less moneyed family than most of my classmates, although I had the brains to hold my own. I always felt like the red-headed stepchild at my high school because I drove an old VW and none of my clothes were designer made. Also, the fact that I was painfully shy and had the social graces of a wounded cape buffalo makes me remember the whole four years as a painful blur.

So it is twenty years later and a lot of things have changed. My complexion has cleared up. I can talk with women without trying to impress them with my charm, wit, and good manners. (Now it just happens naturally, I don't have to try.) I have had sex. I have a good job, a loving wife, and friends who care about me. I live a comfortable life and make a difference in the lives of others through the work I do with my church.

So, why in the world do I feel like I am fifteen years old who has just been called on to stand up in front of the class and give a book report with a raging erection and tight pants? I know that these people's opinion only has as much weight in my life as I give it but I am still quite nervous about the whole thing.

Life is weird like that.