Crushing Krisis

The Newest Oldest Blog In New Zealand

Archives for July 2004

Caffinated Brain Disco

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No time to edit, just free-writing today.

They kept on feeding me coffee, even though they know what a bad idea it is. Caffeine hits me in pulses, strobes, contractions of my brain, spasmically birthing new thoughts. Like cocaine through a straw, I whispered to my co-worker, the next idea strobing through my brain that I might be giving her the wrong impression.

I’ve talked about caffiene before.

Today one of my projects was going well, and I broke into the twist in the middle of the aisle, a perfect combination of Travola/Thurman slow-grace/sexual-tension (with a dash of mad watusi), singing “firing on all pistons, firing on all pistons.”

I never before realized how hard this job is, until this weekend a friend of Elise’s asked me what I do, and when I told her she made a little “oh” with her mouth and asked – “Are you on the good side or the evil side?” And, it just made me think, god, all we do all day is try to make our communications come out on the good side, arguing with senior management and tweaking every sentence until I think my head will explode from the twenty drafts and two reams of paper I have gone through in the past week.

Sometimes I think everyone should have Elise’s friend ask them that question once a year. Are you a good witch, or a bad witch? Which one are you? Are you being good to yourself and evil to everyone else? The reverse? The inverse?

Sometimes I wonder if we make our own futures through the process of elimination, discarding the best fantasies we have because they might offset that good/evil balance too much.

Sometimes I close my eyes and see myself, lids as mirrors, and sometimes I see nothing.

Sometimes I really have to fucking pee after I drink so much coffee.

Self Control

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I imagine that most people, including myself on occasion, have a reflex to tell them to stop eating something before they’ve had to much, other than a gag reflex. Maybe you sense that you’ve been through a serving size. Maybe your taste-buds are feeling worn out. Maybe you just don’t want any more.

There are many foods that I have eaten too much of. I am a fan of ice cream. I eat sushi with delight. My love for scappels knows no bounds. However, at some point, I can stop eating all of these foods. However, I cannot conjure any of these reactions when it comes to popcorn. You could literally strap a feed bag of popcorn around my neck, and I would probably continue to eat it until my stomach could not contain any more.

Plain, lightly salted, heavily buttered or carmelled, I don’t know what it is, really. I can eat it at movies even after having a full dinner. At home, I occasionally eat it in lieu of dinner. When my coworkers (not realizing the inherent danger of such a purchase) goaded me into buying a bag as big as my entire torso to snack from at work, I finished it in under 48-hours.

Is this just an indication of larger impulse-control issues? Or, is popcorn my dietary kryptonite, the one food that evades all of my defenses? Do you have a food like this, or does this revelation just confirm that I am a total mutant?

Fashionista

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I am a fashionista.

Perhaps this requires some explanation.

Often I know, without even thinking about it, what trends are worth engaging in and what will seem ridiculous in just a year’s time. Furthermore, I can spot a lamentable fashion option at fifty paces. It’s not a queer eye for a straight guy so much as a wary eye for the well-dressed man.

It’s a power that I cannot explain. Well over a year ago, i was touched by a nearly-physical urge to own brown and orange clothing. I spent months culling brown dress shirts from thrift stores and orange t-shirts from speciality shops; I beefed up my earth-toned repetoire. And then, suddenly, this fall brought as many pieces of clothing in those colors as it did leaves. I haven’t bought a single piece of this new, Post-Fall raft of clothing; my collection was established even before the colors were launched.

My innate fashionista radar sometimes picks up trends passively, leaving me unaware that my tacit endorsement could be akin to a butterfly in Africa — creating a fashion hurricane in the greater Philadelphia area months later. Last summer in a hip village thrift store i became obsessed with their retro ties, and after much deliberation Rabi and i decided that they could be used as belts. I purchased two (one was brown), and trotted them out on several occasions with jeans, to the bewilderment of my classmates and co-workers. Imagine my shock and horror to walk into the dreaded Gap this past weekend to find a near-fascimile of my brown tie being sold as a… get this… BELT. Yes, a fucking belt.

No, I’m not bitter. Just a little bitter.

The whole motivation behind this tirade is a current trend that my Spidey-like Fashionista-Sense has let me down on: pink.

As far as I was ever concerned, Pink was for distinguished men, men who golfed and wear polo shirts on Friday. I thought of it as a good’ol’boy-badge. Suddenly, it is everywhere. Pink shirts. Pink ties. Yahoo dating aids proclaiming “He looks good in pink,” as if to infer the superior quality of their pink-wearing catches.

You want some pink, the world is telling me. Have some pink.

The thing is, I’m not getting a read on the pinkage. I’ve seen a couple men look very sharp with pink-dotted ties or dusty-rose colored shirts. However, I’ve also seen some hideous pink-on-pink ensembles that leave me wondering if we’re headed in the regrettable direction of pink denim in the near future.

Given the subjectivity of this this particular trend, I think I will pass, but I’m not sure if I’m making that choice as a Fashionist or a trend-hater. In my mind, just as both turquoise and lime green seemed like a super idea at certain points in the 1980s but dated about as well as reruns of The Facts of Life, I think the people who could wear pink to begin with are the only ones who are going to escape this unscathed. Yes, a pink and grey tie is a lively accent to wear on Monday’s, when everyone needs some accenting, or on Fridays, when you’re headed out for cocktails afterwards. Otherwise, I think all of the early adopters will be limping back to their closets to find a conservative blue shirt within the span of a few months.

Unfortunately, that opinion is not fueled by my wary-eye sense, as far as I can tell, so I can’t really speak to its ultimate veracity. However, I do know that the “Look at me, I’m metrosexual” rating of this trend is through the roof, and that all us real metros are not going to let it get out of hand by offering our endorsement.

In closing, just remember: say no to your bourough as a mispelled designer name, say probably not to pink, and don’t wear your first initial as a monogram unless you are Madonna or have a name starting with E.

Also, keep your eye out for dark purple. Maybe. We’ll see.

Disuse, Misuse, and Abuse

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Lindsay and I sat at her high kitchen table, comparing calluses. Hers, she said, had faded from disuse. “But,” she sighed, “I guess you wouldn’t know about that.”

I don’t, and was shocked to hear that Anthony, a particular six-string-slinging idol of mine, had similary forsaken his instrument for the better part of a year.

What is it about stupid me, who can’t reproduce four distinct lines of underneath harmony after a month of practice, who still can’t play the solo in “Say It Ain’t So” even with my spiffy new guitar, who has the least performance experience out of everyone who touched one of the five guitars we had with us on Sunday, that keeps me plucking and strumming away, while others with more talent have set their habits aside? Why do I care so much about something I’m not particularly good at doing? And, why don’t I have more new Trios to show for it?

In other news, my name is 796, “intuitive” edges “crushing” by 198, and “crisis” is only a hair more common than “conflict.” Not that there’s anything intuitive about any of these conflicts. All I know is, at the point tipsy is only electrolytes away from shogun blondes, we need to do something…

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Note to the one person on my team that i don’t like that will never get sent:

You need to spend more time thinking and less time opening your mouth. Also, “irregardless” is not a real word, and when you use it to start every one of your sentences it makes you look like more of a big fucking idiot than you actually are. pls improve, tnx.-p

https://www.crushingkrisis.com/2004/07/108999707841577458/

Getting Cozy

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By the end of yesterday i was under the impression that i was being paid thousands of dollars to walk up and down the hallway every five minutes in the most uncomfortable pair of shoes that i own.

That illusion was dispelled today, as i have received every indication that i will continue to receive compensation even though my footwear is significantly more comfortable.

It wasn’t as if i was being an unmitigated slave of beauty. I knew the shoes were uncomfortable for walking. I would never wear them to give a campus tour, or even to race through a train station. I was comfortable with my choice because i spend my days in the corporate world, where everyone is either an email or an elevator away.

Everyone, that is, with the exception of my manager, who is too busy to reply to the constant stream of email our department generates and on the same floor as me. This is because my cubicle is stationed in what i lovingly refer to as East Jibip (just south of Siberia, where Henna sits). This puts me roughly a quarter of a city block from my managers office, where i tend to wind up at least twice an hour (not counting times i stop by to find the door closed). Additionally, i am significantly father than i can throw a stapler away from both of the printers to which my computer is mapped.

It’s bad for my shiny Florsheim shoes, but it’s good exercise. In fact, it’s great exercise. By the end of the day yesterday i think i had completed over a mile’s worth of shuttle runs to my manager’s office and back. Today i easily logged half a mile of printer sprints.

Knowing me, you’d think i’d have a pedometer already.