Tuesday, October 28, 2008

Yay!

I'm in my twenties! Since thursday, and for the forseeable future.

Saturday, October 18, 2008

Fitness

I am not that out of shape. I exercise a lot. Usually things like dancing and biking and crunches during television and low impact things. Because I have no endurance and no ability to get oxygen from the wide world into my muscles when I need it. Today I ran under the only circumstance that can get me to run- desperately needing to be someplace much faster than brisk walking would do.

I have been dreading the hostel lately, and so when my 6:30 alarm went off I turned it off and fell back asleep. Unfortunately when I woke up again at 7:30 (and just ran out of the house grabbing my keys and making sure I had on shoes) I had narrowly missed the one bus that has even a remote chance of getting me to work at 8:00 am. (The weekend bus is very limited) Unfortunately I spent 8 minutes verifying this fact reading the bus schedule on the bus shelter over and over again, making sure the monday-friday schedule definitely didn't apply to Saturday, and that the 7:45 bus won't get downtown until 8:25, and so on. This left me with 22 minutes to travel the two and a half miles to work. And it was all downhill and right when I was tiring I ran up to a big helpful sign proclaiming "Beach Boardwalk- 1 1/2 miles" and so I ran on, and got to work 4 minutes late.

I was shocked. That is a ten and a half minute mile, in crap shoes carrying a bag and a coat, first thing in the morning. That is how fast I could run when running was a daily school task. (I am not a fast person. I look a lot like a My Little Pony but mysteriously that does not make me fast.)

Have I mentioned my addictive personality? (It's mitigated by my short attention span.) I am taking up running.

Friday, October 17, 2008

Hell and More

I have had a number of very similar conversations with people, along the lines of:
them: Isn't (the afterlife/humans' existence/patriarchal morality/having 16 children/et cetera) bizarre?
me: Well, I'm Catholic*.
them: I was raised Christian, but I can't believe in a loving God who would then send his children to eternal damnation.
me: There's always repenting- that's my plan. And you only have to do your best. You don't have to be perfect, because Jesus died for your sins.

But enough people have said that to me that I started thinking about it. And it seems like, why wouldn't there be hell? You're not the center of everything (remember when I said I'm impressionable? People must have said that to me five times daily for 10 years.). It's not unthinkable that you might be punished- yes, forever and ever- for wrongdoing. Your life and soul aren't the only thing ever, they are a tiny part of the tapestry. Why exactly does it seem more likely that just because you've been phenomenally lucky in this life, you can do what you like without consequences? My roommate thinks I'm thoroughly brainwashed, and I see her point but I don't really care. I'm not scared of hell, even though I have sins, because all you have to do (according to my brainwashing, I mean) is 1. be sorry and 2. try to not do it any more. That sounds right to me. How could you go on to eternal bliss still being petty and doing wrong on purpose without wanting to change?

I believe in Catholicism but much of it doesn't resonate with me. Here is a breakdown of it (in a more dignified time it was known as "The Apostles' Creed" rather than a "breakdown")
1. I believe in God, the Father almighty, creator of heaven and earth. Y (need to look into maleness of that though)
2. I believe in Jesus Christ, his only Son, our Lord. Y
3. He was conceived by the power of the Holy Spirit and born of the Virgin Mary. Y
4. He suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died, and was buried. Y
5. He descended into hell. On the third day he rose again. Y
6. He ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father. Y (again, literalness?)
7. He will come again to judge the living and the dead. ?
8. I believe in the Holy Spirit, Y
9. the holy catholic Church, the communion of saints, Y (this part I am quite taken with)
10. the forgiveness of sins, Y (that's the main selling point)
11. the resurrection of the body, Y (depending on what that means)
12. and the life everlasting. Y (100%)
Amen.
So actually it looks like I entirely agree with all of it. But I don't think the commandments are any good. Why are those the important 10? I think the beatitudes are ten times as important. The commandments are just like "play nice" but there's nothing transcendent there.

*no disclaimer or explanation, just the simple fact, which is much harder to question that way.

Stealing Content

I am very impressionable, so when for 19 years (especially in the first 5) everyone says to not steal, but now it is okay to steal music from online because you are essentially Robin Hood... I'm not convinced. I think if it was really all right we would have legislation to that effect. But I am boycotting apple (since last month when I bought my 4th gen purple nano) so I can't buy music from itunes, except the three dollars I still have from a gift card.

In favor of stealing: Some people think when you buy a thing, you should get to use that thing, indefinitely and without restrictions. Which is definitely not true of, say, knitting patterns or a drawing. But also itunes charges like $15 to download a movie, which is a mark up of like ten thousand percent (I assume, not having looked into it at all). I think I would pay $5 for a movie (My screen is an inch wide! And if I was at my computer I would just go to nbc.com or netflix watch instantly), and about $.30 for a song. And I already payed 162.00 for my ipod.

Against: I can already watch music videos all the time at youtube. And listen to the radio and pandora.com. And I can afford to pay a dollar for songs. And you can't just do things because you want to. It is up to artists whether they want to offer their work for sale or for free.

So for now I have settled on free podcasts, which are like the radio but I have to manually add it to my ipod and can fast forward it and rewind. And they have financial advice podcasts, and wired podcast, and CELTIC MUSIC PODCAST!

oint.

Tuesday, October 14, 2008

knitting's back!

I haven't knit anything in 7 or 8 months, but it's cold in santa cruz so I started some socks, and then it's van de walle birthday season so I have to make mom and nana and maybe dad something, and it is fun! My fingers feel very weird knitting on the socks again after wrestling Nick's bulky homespun around the needles for an hour. I feel like I can barely sense the presence of the thin sock yarn so I have to keep checking that I'm actually knitting.

Mom has requested socks. I have made about 10 pairs of socks for myself. I almost always use wool, because it is springy and holds its shape and if the stitches are a little uneven you can stretch it (called blocking) into perfection. Also they are tremendously warm. However, mom is very allergic to wool so she wants cotton socks. I made cotton socks for her mother (same allergy) and my fingers were very sore. I took Mom yarn shopping so I could explain the guidelines about what makes a good sock and a good yarn to knit with. It was good because she picked a gorgeous soft purple, 50% cotton and 50% acrylic. It's much thicker than sock yarn, but that just means it will be squashy and soft. If I had gone shopping alone I probably would have come up with self striping yarn in a blue palette but the purple is awesome, a dusky violet. It hurts my hands like knitting with rope so I'm going to do her a painting for Christmas, not anything knit.

Friday, October 3, 2008

Quitting @ EPL

It's totally time to quit EPL, because I have school and other work and if it comes down to it I will just get a private loan. I like my friends there a lot, but it is so awkwardly managed. And I hate selling people things I wish they wouldn't buy. I've started going to work without any money or my cards because even though I definitely don't want fast food, I get really hungry by the end of my shift at 10 pm.

Trying to quit at EPL is like breaking up with someone who is terribly passive aggressive. I basically gave them one month notice 2 weeks ago, and they've responded (well, no, not really on purpose, but there's the language barrier and there are about 6 managers altogether so you see how it can happen) by scheduling me for days I thought I had off but not telling me, taking me off days (one day, so far) I was scheduled to work without telling me and sending me away when I arrive, and then telling me that I have to call for my schedule because the office is locked and no one has the key to it. So I might have work today, and I might not, and I have been getting a busy signal every half hour, and just now it went through but no one picked up. And they have caller id but I'm sure that's not why they haven't answered. Maybe the office is locked.