dang, i scratched my laptop screen!!

who's got new year's resolutions?

i have, courtesy of my mom, a three year all-club pass to 24-hour fitness. so guess what my new years resolutions for the next three years will be?

hopefully by the end of these three years, i'll have the body of a guy who looks like he's been at the gym for at least three years.

i also hope to eat better, all the time. maybe i'll start by reading fastfood nation, even though that's not really eating.

also, i'm gonna play hecka more video games, dammit. i've had my wii for a year now, and i haven't even beaten zelda yet!

and i'mma need a job hopefully by the end of february.

SO LET'S DO THIS THING!

goodbye 2007

there's a lot of things that happened in the past year, to me, but i don't really like talking too much about myself on this thing.
but at the same time, it's not like i wanna wrap up everything that has happened that i felt was pretty relevant, everything is relevant!

anyways, i love things that wrap up the year.

- sfgate has a day in pictures for the year.
- vh1's best year ever.
- all the sports channels usually have the top plays of the year, which is always pretty cool.
- ANNNNDD, skillz does his yearly rap up, here's one of my favorite lines from this year's song:

"soulja boy hit the scene
and i don't wanna see
YOUUU
doin that
unless
YOUUU
under eighteen"

you can check out that song at okayplayer.com
or the video at soveryfresh.com (nice name)

i must admit, i was pretty late to discovering what "crank dat" meant, and by the time i had hit the scene, i was like, that dance is kinna whack. but i grew attached, for like a day. now i'm ready to let it go.

what happened to dancing?
i remember being at a club, and i went up to these two girls, and was like, "is it ok if i dance with you two?" and first they were like "is that your game?" and i was like "game? why do i need game? i just wanna dance." but game is another story. anyways, after like 30 seconds of dancing, one girl was like "you wanna dance with her, she's the better dancer" and then the other girl starts doing these moves, like the ones you see in music videos. and i mean it look cool and all, but it don't even go with the song, and i'm like "oh is that dancing?" and they both laugh and about 2 and a half minutes later, they both leave.
what happened to dancing?

anyways, here's to another year.

word, mom

every year, all the little kids, and some big kids, would ask my mom why she doesn't buy a christmas tree for christmas. and why i knew they we stopped buying christmas trees awhile ago because she would get allergies with christmas trees, i always just wanted to tell folks to shut up and quit questioning my mom, dammit. but i knew better.

however, my mom is pretty religious, and she has a ceramic nativity set that she has taken good care of for awhile now, and she religiously puts this set out every christmas. and now when folks ask why she don't put up a tree, she just says "cuz i put out a nativity, and that's all you really need for Christmas."

word, mom. preach.

well i guess that's it

maybe i'm wrong

but going to college at berkeley (or any other college, i guess) is kinna like losing your virginity to a hooker (not that i've ever solicited one, but just stay with me for a second). i mean, for one, you're paying for something that you feel that if you tried hard enough, you could get for free (except without the degree). and you go into it on your own, intimidated, but excited, and not really knowing what you're doing. once you're in, you have to learn new things at a really fast pace, and have to improvise and learn how you like to do things, what works for you. once it's done, you're like "wow that was fast" and then you're spit out back into the real world, supposedly now, you're a real man, but you don't really feel like it. all you can say is "well i guess that's it"

wandbagon fans

i don't consider myself a bandwagon fan, but i also can't say that when a bay team loses, that i watch the game to the bitter end(unless i'm at the game). but seriously, it's not easy when you see your team on tilt during a game, you just wanna scream and throw stuff and run on the court and kick kobe/tom brady/alex smith/nate longshore in the face!!

i'm glad that this year, 2007, was when the warriors became the team in the bay to watch. cuz dang, ain't no other team around here to watch anymore, i have something to look forward to every couple of days.

a couple of thoughts on the lakers(106) vs. warriors(108 bitches!) game
- derek fischer deserves an oscar for some of the calls he gets. good thing he's made some incredibly clutch shots in his career, cuz i would hate to be known as a really good flop artist. even when he was a warrior i didn't like derek fischer, he never made those clutch shots for us! little punk.
- you have to live and die by the way steven jack plays.
- monta deserves more shine. sure it was baron that made all those clutch shots, but it was monta that kept them in the game with his hustle and consistent shooting.
- actually i take that back, i hope monta gets his shine on a bigger stage, like during the playoffs, so that he can be basketball's version of andruw jones, minus the overrated-ness.
- yes i said it. andruw jones is OVERRATED! i'm glad we got rowand, even though rowand made the last out of the allstar game.
- the bay area is a place where professional sports "media jerks" are loved. bonds, owens, davis, jackson, will clark anyone?

christmas(time) is here

OMG I CAN'T WAIT
TO GET


some
normal
sleeping
hours

paula "the devil" deen

oh you know it.
at first, paula was cool. i mean, her recipes looked tasty, and she wasn't afraid to use butter. she gave us all her classics, everything she learned how to make on her own. it was all very nice in the beginning.

but then, she infected us all with her overly southern charm, y'all, and now she cannot be stopped. she's out to kill us, people. she's infiltrating our homes and our arteries. she won't stop til our blood won't flow anymore, only butter and bacon fat and velveeta cheese.

don't believe me? fine then.
go ahead and try some deep fried butter
or how about some bacon wrapped mac and cheese

she's even sneakily attacking our children.
how?

she married santa claus himself.

bah humbug bit(e) me

i don't hate christmas. actually, i'm almost indifferent to christmas. i'm glad i get to see family and friends and folks more during the season, but it's not like i wouldn't be happy if it weren't christmas time. i trys to do my best to "make it feel like christmas" all the time, you know, i trys to be happy just to be happy.

maybe it's because the holiday season has now collided with finals season for 5 straight years, but i don't really like the whole holiday season thingy. the holiday season thingy is not happy. especially when i have to wait almost a WHOLE FRICKIN HOUR to get onto the bridge. and forreal, shopping during the holiday sale season is close to the least jolliest thing ever, especially when beezies are out there trying anything to get a parking spot.

and now, especially in the mass media market, christmas completely overshadows thanksgiving! they start advertising for christmas in the beginning of november now! how come thanksgiving don't get no shine!?! forreal though, thanksgiving is a way better than christmas anyway. *gasp* yes i said it. cuz thanksgiving is a day devoted to food and giving thanks. that's it, that's all you have to do, just give thanks and eat. you don't have to worry about getting presents, or giving presents, or if santa knows to give presents to filipinos too, or whatever. all you gotta worry about how big your tummy is gonna get, which is pretty minor, if you REALLY think about it.

my parents and other related old people tell me that christmas at Home is a very fun ordeal because it's not marred by all these commercials and stuff. i've always wanted to spend a Christmas there.



anyways, here at work, miracles happen. really.
MEMS were first fabricated here, email was invented here, we create new technology every day, and even pigs fly..
really.

why you ain't gon ever see me in a texas suburb

via poplicks

JOE HORN: NEIGHBOR OF THE YEAR?

Do not rob these people or their neighbors

In the town of Pasadena, Texas, Joe Horn saw two men -- Miguel Dejesus, 38, and Diego Ortiz, 30 -- break into his neighbor’s house. Horn called 911 and eventually stated that he intended to shoot the men, despite the dispatch operator's attempt to dissuade him from doing so.

Horn went outside and fatally shot the two men.

You can listen to the eerie 911 call by watching this clip:

While there is no evidence (yet) of racial motivations, the protests have quickly divided along color lines. Dejesus and Ortiz, the deceased, are black and, from what I can tell from photos, Horn appears to be white.

As you can see from the photo of the protest/counter-protest below, white men with confederate flag tattoos confronted and attempted to drown out Black Panther Party leader Quanell X and a group of largely black protesters. Some national reactions have also veered in similar directions, with Horn supporters praising him for taking on "hoodlums."

Quanell X believes Horn should be charged with murder. Horn's supporters are praising him as the neighbor of the year.

There's obviously a big moral debate over whether Horn was right to shoot the two alleged burglars. There's also the legal question of whether Horn would be protected from civil and criminal action by claiming self-defense. I'm going to leave those aside from now.

Here's the real kicker: According to my basic legal research of Texas criminal laws, there would be absolutely no criminal case against Horn ... had the burglary taken place at night.

(Thanks to Kristen for pointing out that the shooting took place at 2 pm.)

Here are the relevant passages of the Texas Penal Code:

§ 9.43. Protection of Third Person's Property

A person is justified in using force or deadly force against another to protect land or tangible, movable property of a third person if, under the circumstances as he reasonably believes them to be, the actor would be justified under Section 9.41 or 9.42 in using force or deadly force to protect his own land or property and:

(1) the actor reasonably believes the unlawful interference constitutes attempted or consummated theft of or criminal mischief to the tangible, movable property; or

(2) the actor reasonably believes that:

(A) the third person has requested his protection of the land or property;

(B) he has a legal duty to protect the third person's land or property; or

(C) the third person whose land or property he uses force or deadly force to protect is the actor's spouse, parent, or child, resides with the actor, or is under the actor's care.

*

§ 9.42. Deadly Force to Protect Property

A person is justified in using deadly force against another to protect land or
tangible, movable property:

(1) if he would be justified in using force against the
other under Section 9.41; and

(2) when and to the degree he reasonably believes the
deadly force is immediately necessary:

(A) to prevent the other's imminent commission of
arson, burglary, robbery, aggravated robbery, theft during the
nighttime, or criminal mischief during the nighttime; or

(B) to prevent the other who is fleeing
immediately after committing burglary, robbery, aggravated
robbery, or theft during the nighttime from escaping with the
property; and

(3) he reasonably believes that:

(A) the land or property cannot be protected or
recovered by any other means; or

(B) the use of force other than deadly force to
protect or recover the land or property would expose the actor or
another to a substantial risk of death or serious bodily injury.

Horn clearly saw two men taking property from his neighbor. He believed deadly force was necessary to prevent them from fleeing after immediately committing burglary. He didn't have other means to stop them. Depending on his relationship with the neighbor, he probably can successfully claim that he had the duty to protect his neighbor's property.

Thus, Horn was legally justified in fatally shooting the next-door burglars except for the fact that the alleged crime took place in the middle of the day. Had the alleged crime and shooting taken place several hours later, there would be no debate as to Horn's legal innocence.

In my opinion, that's the craziest part of this whole story.

It seems that those who are outraged at Horn should really be angry at the Texas legislature for empowering Horn (and future neighbors) to serve as judge, jury, and executioner.

--Junichi

josh says: WORD?!? RIDONKULOUS! i don't even know what to say. i wonder what the other Joe Horn thinks of this, cuz this white dude is giving a bad rap to the very recognizable name, "Joe Horn".

a little rap in the middle

when i was little, and was listening to mason betha, dmx, and the like, i used to dream about being a rap superstar. i loved the art of storytelling through rhythm and rhyme, so much so that right around 6th or 7th grade, i even started to right my own raps on sheets of paper, just like eminem in "8 mile". they were about how i was so better than you, and about every line used the word "like", and i had pictured it perfectly. for a 11 or 12-year-old, i had some pretty good wit and a pretty good vocabulary, i was on my way to stardom. now isn't that little dream of mine just precious?

i learned soon enough that my hardly-urban neighborhood in pacifica would not give me enough street-cred to be a rap superstar in amurrica and that i would have to restrain myself from writing anymore rap sheets in order to prevent any embarrassment if i were to run for office later in my life. i would also learn later in life that i would never survive a freestyle battle, or even a casual cipher, as i discovered that my mind and my mouth aren't always together on the same page as each other. rap was never meant to be and my outlet for expression would have to be of a different medium.

enter poetry.

poetry is nice because in a lot of ways, it can be very similar to rap, but at the same time it can have nothing in common in rap. i can write with or without rhythm, with or without rhyme, with our without fries on the side, it doesn't matter! i do prefer, however, to try and incorporate rhyme and rhythm into my poems whenever possible, just for fun.

maybe for about a year now i've been wanting to write a poem about myself. kinna a self-affirmation poem and kinna i'm better than you poem, you know, cuz poems like that are cool and make people in cafes snap their fingers and "mmMm!" when you get it just right. the problem i've been having is that every line i think of has that generic artsy BS feel to it, which i hate. kinna like "i am a swirling thunderstorm/i am an peaceful river". i also want to have it so i don't use the phrase "i am" in the poem, ever, which is pretty hard when you're trying to write a poem about yourself. go ahead, try it.

anyways, as ashamed as i am, i must admit that i've resorted to attaching some sort of media to my blogs, because i learned somewhere that that's just what good bloggers do. also, because nicky told me that sometimes he doesn't read the blog, he just looks at the pictures or watches the video. and really, most of the time the media attached has nothing to do with what i'm blogging about, it's just there so at least you have something to look at if you don't wanna read my blog. most of the time it's prolly just some picture or video i took note of sometime in the past week.

here's a picture of something i wish i was better at.
no, not being a skinny white dude. drawing/sketching.
even though you can see where the corner is and this dude has the absolute blankest look on his face and his hair slopes down to the left quite a bit, it still makes a pretty good myspace picture.