saw prostitute for the first time walking to the parking lot after work today.

every time i'm in the security line at the airport i think "THEY are winning the war on terror."
THEY have us so terrorized that we are paying money for TSA posters and informational videos, and extra staff and imaging machines, and extra protocols and policies, not to mention people to research these protocols and policies and then evaluate them, and then consultants to make pretty powerpoint presentations about them.

anyway, i refuse to be terrorized. and i will spitefully say that i like this - travelling light, having clothes and toothbrush waiting for me wherever i go, and not having a lot of


baggage.

drove through hunting park on saturday morning for the first time. starting to get to know north philly a little better. thankfully roberto and lauren are taking care of my car this week while i'm in michigan.

went to guh's graduation this afternoon. the speaker was the surgeon general - dr. benjamin. i had read about her in reader's digest a few years ago. i was hoping to be very inspired. she wasn't a very engaging speaker. but it's nice to hear all these people say things like, 'give back to the community' and 'think about the people'. so hope i can go back to work on friday a little more motivated, almost typed mortivated - like mortified and motivated, or something - and a little more compassionate.

murder around nolibs/fishtown yesterday. makes people a little more antsy and on edge. people recommend i carry around some mace or other defense. when i witnessed the live fight on monday, it was pretty nauseating. ufc on tv doesn't quite give me that same visceral feeling.

koolae 2

went to koolae again for lunch, and ordered the same exact thing coz nothing else seemed all that appealing. stuck around to talk to soo, and introduced myself, so now we can be friends. learned why no one sits in there and goes back to work. because i smelled of greasy diner food the entire afternoon.

koolae

koolae is the diner across the street from work. it's run by a korean lady named Soo or Sue. dunno how she spells it. i went over for lunch today and while i was waiting the non-korean man next to me finished up his food and then on his way out exclaimed "kam sah ham nee dah!" i was impressed.

and chuckled to myself.

coz i remembered how a lot of koreans like to teach non-koreans how to speak korean even if no one asks them.

eventful weekend:

-friday went to julie's. she made chili and corn bread. she has two kittens so kinda had a sniffly visit. julie, rachel, katie, susie, kelly and i watched 'the blind side'. it's my 2nd time this month. first time i watched while snoozing in and out on a plane, with no audio. then the first real time was with roger and pauline, and all three of us are talkers. so we had lots of commentary. these girls were not talkers, so i felt awkward if i ever said anything during the movie. i guess it was good to process things in my head and catch some subtleties that i didn't catch the previous times.

-saturday went to play in nyc with joanna and we walked the bklyn bridge. arrived in the morning and had my quiet time at dunkin donuts. met up w/ jo and ate at grey dog's cafe for lunch. it's run by michigan folks. i was wearing a michigan shirt and hoped to get a discount. i sort of did. we caught up w/ funglin and frank for a brief moment at shake shack. then went to bklyn for this flea market in williamsburg. sat around the bklyn public library, people-watched at a park, then fish for dinner. 6 fresh oysters and a glass of house wine for $8. sante! then ran to the bus back to philly.

-sunday church at liberti. talked about... this is taking me a second to recall... healing the blind man on a sabbath! we need spiritual healing. had to think about jesus' statement "if you are blind then you will have life" or something along those lines. took me a while to GET IT. still dunno if i REALLY get it yet. basically i must acknowledge my blindness in order to be saved. because i need to acknowledge my need for a saviour.

-sunday afternoon sort of got more packing done.

-sunday evening i went to OCTO with alice and met her friend aphrodite but sounds like efrediti, as they were visiting their peeps clay and lisa, which turned into a large party w/ rob, henry, kobe, catherine and another dude whose name i didn't catch. anyway, it was awesome coz it was right on the water (delaware river) near the ben franklin bridge. so you can say hello to new jersey. and all the boats. but it was cool because i hadn't seen alice in 5 years. so we got to catch up now that she's a lawyer and working for the state department in d.c. travelling the world. and people call me doctor sometimes. lots of changes in 5 years! the 2nd best part was that it was a dance party with house music (a little funk music) and there were bboys and dancing babies.

-monday morning finished packing. had my quiet time at caffeination. said goodbye to rittenhouse. said goodbye to mimi and walter. moved to chinatown. went to penn's treaty park for a picnic w/ rachel, katie, melanie, scott, john, julie, shea, erica, aaron. got way too much sun.

-got back to chinatown and parked in the catholic school/church parking lot. i got out of my car. there was a latino man and a black man arguing. it looked like the latino man was there with some of his family selling produce out of a van. the black man was really angry and then punched the other guy in the face, who fell down, and then he started kicking him. out of, like, nowhere, three latino men came running and chased the assaulter away. he walked away and cussed at them for a while. i was assessing the situation, as to whether or not i should call the cops. but then the guy on the ground got up. i started walking back home and talked to one of the dudes and asked if they needed any help. he said, 'nah, he's straight'. so that was that.

-the reason why i had gotten way too much sun was because i went back to new apartment, picked up some food around the corner, ate a little and then vomited. not like food poisoning, i don't think. but prolly heat stroke or some kind of sun exertion. it was one of those keeling over/fetal position nights where ya just want to crawl into a hole and disappear. i thought i would have called in sick the next day for work, but woke up in time to move the car and felt okay.

-tried the closest chinese bakery this morning. she asked me if i just wanted ONE bun. and i said yes. somehow i ended up with THREE. my plan is to learn enough mandarin and canto in order to order food. maybe i can practice spanish with all the cooks. -_-

-went to work. was queasy all day. felt better after dinner. stomach problems, go away!

-this post is way too long.