15 September 2010

What I've Learned 005: A Bad Form Of Information Overload.

Continuing an ongoing series of creative writing exercises inspired by Esquire's "What I've Learned" articles. I used Luis Guzman's interview for my template this time. The first few words of each paragraph of the feature (in italics below) serve as prompts for my own answers. Enjoy!


near midnight, St. Louis
  • Fourteen years now. We threw our first party at the condo we just moved into and it was the start of a beautiful thing. We had a guest list to make sure the guy:girl ratio was favorable, a keg, Jell-O shots and charged a cover. I made like four mixtapes (and they really were on cassettes) so I didn't have to worry about the music. I view our parties as instrumental in drawing me out of my shell 'cause back in the day I was a pretty shy dude. I definitely don't think I am now.

  • Wicked cold. I'm sick of it ... I'd rather it rain and be gloomy all day than dump a foot of snow overnight. If I had my way the temperature would fluctuate between 55 and 70 all year, so I can rock my fall gear. Hahah.

  • I became involved with rhyming as an art form fairly early on. I'd start writing on the bus to and from school, using the daily schoolkid drama as my source material. I wish I'd had the sense to record my early verses on my parents' old Japanese karaoke machine, but I'm pretty sure I would've erased them anyway after listening to them. I'm used to the sound of my own voice now, but like other people I don't think I would've liked it back then.

  • The people who looked down on me because I was a Filipino junior high school student in the Midwest, completely immersed in the culture of hip-hop when I should be listening to "classical music," can kiss my ass.

  • I went to an awesome movie theater in downtown Kansas City this past weekend. It's an AMC Cinema Suite, where the price of the ticket includes food, drinks and dessert. You get to sit in a leather recliner with a call button, order off a menu and get to munch popcorn and drink your poison of choice during the movie. This is how it should be done. The pecan pie wasn't bad either.

  • I did this Cabo vacation for a week by myself last month. Yeah lots of times I wish I had some friends with me to share in the experience, but I didn't let that take away any of the fun. Sometimes I even liked the fact that I was the only one on the beach at six in the morning. I felt like I owned the world.

  • I like doing stuff that's more and more out of my comfort zone. I'm pretty tired of missing out on things, and regret will no longer be part of my vocabulary.

  • I make a trip to the Asian grocery every once in a while to grab essential snack food items. There's something about the aromas of the food and the spices floating around in the store that is nostalgic and reassuring to me. Or maybe it's only 'cause I'm hungry. Anyway, Asian snacks are the SHIT. Plus I love the packaging they come in. Shrimp chips? Pass them to me now.

  • I love getting recommendations for restaurants. But at the same time, if I don't know exactly what I want to eat, I'll drive around town until I see a place that looks interesting and try it. I haven't done this much this summer due to time and budget constraints, but you can bet I'll start this back up in the autumn.

  • You mow the lawn, I'll trim the hedges. I'll even clean the bathrooms. But you mow the lawn.

  • I usually get up between 8:30 and 9:30 on weekends now, even if I've stayed up late the night before. I don't get roaring drunk anymore so I haven't had a hangover in years -- that probably helps. Nowadays it's hard for me to fall back asleep after I've woken up. This is probably a good thing 'cause I love eating breakfast.

  • One thing about music is that there's more of it being created than I have time to listen to. I have too much new stuff sitting around waiting to be appreciated, and it's just being neglected. I remember when I could sit and really absorb literally all of the tracks on an album (and even remember the song titles). Now I can barely recall the title of the freaking album. It's a bad form of information overload, yet I can't stop.

  • I don't trust cats. I don't hate 'em, I just don't trust 'em. It's the look in their eyes.

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