a lot to talk about. really? yeah, it's unusual.

I wrote these ideas in my backyard while working out.

Creeping on instagram. i didn't have anything better to do today, so I decided to see some of my friends photos on instagram. i don't have instagram, but it's easy to see public profiles. is that creepy? i don't know how to judge anymore. whatever, I don't care. anyway, i was moving from profile to profile, and i came across one profile which i looked at for a while. it was a guy i knew back in high school, who is currently in Boston or somewhere for what i assume is graduate school. and looking at that just made me feel like shit.

Don't like the term creepy. people overuse it. if i were called creepy, it would hurt a lot. i don't even know what the boundaries of creepy are. it seems dismissive though. like, if you're creepy, you're also these other things in a list of 'Bad Things For A Human Being To Be.'

Hard to like myself when I haven't accomplished much. Don't have a career, a girlfriend, or a college degree. I barely have friends. Back to the instgram thing. I felt like shit because I saw these pictures of this guy who is doing something great with his life, and i'm just here wasting my time. I haven't accomplished anything, and it makes me feel regret and sadness. It's hard to like yourself when you don't feel like you've done anything with your life.

Comparing yourself to other people is bad. My dad was talking about this two weeks ago. He grew up on a ranch in mexico until 14 or 15, then he traveled to the united states. in his mind, he doesn't judge people based on their social standings. if, for example, someone is a doctor and has lots of money, my dad will look at this person the same as if they were a barber or something. he says that he determines what kind of person they are based on their integrity, their kindness, their blah, blah, stuff like that. You know, stuff we think makes a person good. that's how i want to see people. you'll never be happy if you compare yourself to other people.

Old asian man driving a coffee. that's self-explanatory. no it's not. okay, all it is is this incident last week, I think, when I was sitting in McDonald's somewhere in Los Angeles looking out the window. I see this old asian man backing out of a parking spot. he's old, so he's backing out realllly slowly, like err -stop - err-err - stop. Stop. STOP! err-err. Like that. what the old guy doesn't notice as he's backing out is that he left his cup of coffee on the roof of his car. i'm like, uh, will he notice? will he notice? will he. . .ah, he's not gonna notice. i jump out of my seat and run outside. imagine some mexican guy, patchy facial hair, dirty clothes, crazy look in his eye, leap out of McDonald's and run straight at you as you're sitting in your car. i'm pretty sure i terrified him when i reached his window. i kept pointing above the car, and because he had the windows rolled up, i couldn't shout at him, "YOU GOT COFFEE ON TOP OF YOUR CAR, OLD MAN!!!" he panicked, and started looking behind his car, interpreting my wild hand motions as, "Oh my God, you're about to hit someone - Look ouuuuuuuuuuuuuut - " so i just grabbed the coffee from the top of his car and held it out for him to see. he went, ohh, now i understand, and when he rolled down his window he said, "ah, thank you, thank you." i couldn't help it: i gave him the biggest, most genuine smile i could give; i felt sorry for the guy because i knew something like that could happen - and does happen - to me all the time. i just smiled big and gladly at him and said, "no problem," and walked back inside.

Sadness leaks out of me. still, it's hard to like myself when i haven't accomplished anything.

Imagine winning lottery. Invite my friends with message: "It'd mean a lot to me." If they show, give them $20,000. oh yeah, this is some daydream i was thinking about today. i imagined winning like a 260 million dollar lottery, and let's say, after taxes, i'd have 114 million dollars left. that's still a lot of money. so i though, well, if i did have 114 million dollars, i'd probably give some to my friends. one of my friends needs like 10, 000 for a paramedic class, so i thought that would be nice to give him money. but then i thought, well, i heard that when people find out you've won the lottery, all the want is to be pals with you so you'd give them money. i thought i'd find a way around this. and by the way, if i ever did win the lottery, i'd keep it a secret my entire life. maybe i'd tell my parents. maybe. anyway, back to the way around moochers. what i'd do is wait for a special occasion, say my birthday or something, and a month before, send out invites to people. I'd say something like, "Hey, guys. I'm having a birthday party next month on the 17 [not actually my birth date] at around 8 pm. I'd really appreciate it if you'd come; it would mean a real lot to me. If possible, I'd appreciate it if you got the day off work to come." it would go like that. then, when the day came, i'd wait about an hour after the party starts, then i'd say, "everyone, i'd like to thank you for coming. it means a lot to me. and because it means a lot, i have something special to announce." I would lie, most definitely. "You see, recently i've received an inheritance from a wealthy relative of quite a bit of money. not millions of dollars exactly, but enough for me to live off of for a few years very comfortably. so, in the spirit of giving, i though i'd share some of this good fortune with you - or, rather, to give some to you." and then i'd take out these backpacks from somewhere, and give one to each person. inside would be $20,000 in cash. I was also thinking something like a money belt, but i guess it doesn't matter. everyone would be in disbelief. "What?" "What's going on?" "Are you really giving us this money?" "You're joking, right? This is a joke. It's gotta be a joke." "Dude, I can't accept all this money." Etc, etc. Then I'd say, "Guys, this is my gift to you. However, it does come with the condition that you never expect to receive any more money from me ever again. Not even presents. This is all that I'll ever give any of you." I'd have some lawyers draft some contract that state the money is a gift and will never have to be repaid. the contracts would also have something in there about how i'm not responsible for any loses incurred by the receiving of the money, nor are they ever entitled to any more money. stuff like that, so that in the future, if i'm like ever invited to one of their weddings, they won't expect a new house as a wedding gift or something. They'd be all like, "Yeah! Woo" "Thanks, man!" "Dude, I can't believe it!" and i'd say, "Don't mention it. now, let's party!" and we'd all get drunk in my backyard, and i might even get a blowjob from a girl.

of course, i'd give some money to my parents. i still wouldn't tell them i won the lottery though.

Sometimes I don't feel like I deserve to be sad or miserable. I say to myself, Some people have real problems to be sad about. I'm sad because my laziness, social anxiety, and lack of motivation have resulted in a lame life. What a cry baby I am.

I like to be alone, but I need contact with people from time to time. i realize that my contact with other people is limited. and that's because i limited it myself. one of the main sources of contact with other people is here.

Driving to Colton to see meteors. And a girl. not exactly. okay, tell me if this is creepy (i don't like that word.) i think back in my second year of college, so like 3 years ago. to condense a very meticulous story short, some girl i liked in middle school, who was a year younger than me, and I had encountered each other one day at my house, because my sister was friends with her, and we spent some time together - with my sister and another one of her friends, too. well, it turned out that i still liked her. i find out that she's moving away from the city i live in, to another city called Colton about a lot of miles away - it's right next to Riverside, which is quite a bit of a drive. ( i still find it funny that you know about Riverside, because it's not a very hip, trendy city. anyway - ) so i'm like, "Dammit, how can i talk to this girl more face-to-face if she lives an hour away. i don't even know if she likes me back. Dang, what am i going to do?" Well, it turns out i'm going to do nothing. not entirely true, actually. she did give me a phone number when she left that day when i met her again. however, it turned out to be like her cousin's phone number or something, and when i texted it, i never got a reply. okay, that may be creepy, but that's not what i was referring to in the beginning of the story. i don't remember when this happened, you can look it up if you want, but around this time when i fell for this middle school crush again there was going to be a meteor shower for a few days. it was probably a month or two after she moved cities, to colton, so she was still alive in my mind, and i still had hopes that we'd end up liking each other somehow. seriously, it never occurs to me how it would happen; only that, by some miraculous coincidence, we'd end up in a relationship. i think it was the last night of the meteor showers, and i really wanted to see them. unfortunately, i live in a light polluted area, and the only way to actually see the sky would be to drive a number of miles away from the city lights into the canyons and/or mountains - which, on the night of the last meteor show, didn't seem worth the effort to me. so instead, i hung out with my friends. i forget what we do, but it's around 10:30 or 11 o'clock at night when I decide to go home. i'm on my way home, still thinking about this girl, when i decide that i want doughnuts. i go by myself to this doughnut place and get a couple - just, you know, to tide me over before i go to sleep. as i'm back inside my car, staring down these empty city streets because it's like a Wednesday at 11 o'clock at night, i start to feel lonely, and i get this restless feeling inside me. i'd just started driving for a year, i hadn't really taken my car any where far - only around my house and around town a bit - and i felt like exploring just a bit. i decide to do this on my way home. when i'm literally a block away from my house, i decide to keep going and make a turn onto a main street. for some reason, maybe it's because i don't know the area and i want to explore it, or because - secretly, deep down in my mind - i know it's the direction she's in, but i start to drive east. the night is warm, there's no moon and it's black outside. i have my windows down with my favorite cassette in the tape deck. (no, this isn't 1989; my car is old and doesn't have a CD player). i'm rocking, I'm jamming at the top of my lungs. i'm heading in a new direction i've never been before. the wide streets are completely empty of cars, but they're lit up just like it's only for me. the main street i'm on passes through numerous cities. at some point it's name changes, then changes again. soon that street ends, and i start to drive onto smaller, less well lit streets. i see the time on my dashboard and it begins to get later and later. soon an hour passes and i'm still driving east - taking whatever road i can find as long as i head east. i take surface streets, and quiet residential streets, and shitty pot hole streets that pass by abandoned-looking railroad crossing. I even take a dirt road once or twice, and pretty soon the street lights are gone and the only way to see is by headlight. it never occurred to me to ask myself, "Where the hell are you going?" never occurred to me to say, "okay, this is far enough. let's go home; it's already midnight and you're tired." I kept driving, always on surface streets and never entering the freeways. a weird thought began to form in my head: "this is where she lives; i'm getting closer to where she lives." i didn't know where she lives, because we hadn't spoke since that day, but just getting closer to her city was a comfort for me. And at the same time, it wasn't as if I was doing this all for her. in reality, she was a strict after thought after I had finally found myself in the city of Redlands - pretty much where city meets desert.

(i also remember driving through the University of California, Riverside for some reason - i think because i was recently rejected from there, and it was a sort of romantic midnight meeting of sorts - a soft, nostalgic goodbye, even though i'd never been there before. Totally didn't know where i was going, passed through like three little streets, about fifteen speed bumps, and some people coming out of a building looked at me funny as i drove by. not exactly a memorable, romantic experience.)

in redlands, i remember turning into this community of houses near the mountains. i remember driving around in loops and coming back down to a deserted street with houses on one side and an empty field on the other. i remember the rows of street lamps glowing yellow as i listened to my favorite cassette flip sides for the twentieth time in the past hour and a half. i remember thinking, "What the hell am I doing out here all by myself, man? I don't know where I am. What should I do now?" as was driving, i saw a sign on the road near the mountains: city of BIG BEAR - (some number) MILES. I though, shit,  am i close to big bear? from the little i knew of it, i knew it was a resort city in the high mountains, and that it snowed there. and i also knew that if i got caught in a snowstorm up there, i'd probably die. but then this final idea occurred to me, which intrigued me so much that i couldn't resist doing it. "big bear is in the mountains," i thought. "there's supposed to be a meteor shower tonight, the final day i think, and i think if i drive far enough into the mountains, i'd be able to see more than 20 stars in the sky at once." so i started to drive to Big Bear on the 330 - entirely unplanned, not even knowing which roads to take but rather following dark signs only illuminated by my dim headlights. in my ignorance, i was thinking, "Am i gonna need snow tires or something? should i have brought chains in case it snows?" I drive about five to ten miles into the dark mountains north of Colton and Redlands. the air is starting to chill a little bit. i've turned my music down, and now i'm listening with my head out the window to the immense emptiness of a mountain road at night. all of a sudden i'm hearing nature: not just crickets, but strange bird sounds, and wet river sounds, and weird screeching cicada sounds, and a thousand other sounds at once which i've never heard in my entire life, and which suddenly take up the whole space of the trees and cliffs on the sides of the road. i'm deep in the mountains now, really far away from the cities, and i'm getting pretty scared i might fall off the edge of the road and die. and then in the solid chilly darkness, i look up to see any meteors or stars, and for the first time ever in my life, i see the sky. i see millions of stars glowing brightly in the dark at once. i see milky ways, and venus' and mars'. i see colors which don't exist here on earth. i see shapes and patterns in the stars' alignments. i see everything which i'd never seen at home. then i see something streak across the sky. then immediately another. then another. and another. and the meteors i see are not only streaks of white light; they're purple and green and orange too. and i'm like, "Wow, why didn't anyone tell me this? I never knew meteor's could be differently colors. I never realized there were so many stars in the sky. it's all so much." i've stopped thinking about big bear, i've stopped thinking about Riverside or Redlands, i've stopped thinking about Colton and a girl who is probably asleep in her house dreaming of some other boy that's not me. all i'm thinking is: I have to stop and enjoy this sight right now. so i pull over to some dirt embankment on the side of the road, i get out of my car, in the pitch black, don't even have a flashlight with me. i try sitting on the hood of my car, but the engine is still hot and the heat burns my butt and back through my t-shirt and jeans. so instead, i think, i get on the trunk and back windshield of my car, and stare up at the meteors falling. alone in the complete darkness, with a jungle full of sounds coming from the mountain around me, i feel a bit afraid and vulnerable. but soon watching the meteors shooting across the stars and falling to the horizon calms me down, and i grab the uneaten doughnut i still have in my car, and sit in wonder. strangely enough, and this is totally true, a truck full of dudes - like college frat boys, I remember them being - pulls up to the same dirt embankment i'm on, after i'm there about ten minutes, and they shut off their truck and lay out sleeping bags and fold-out camping chairs, and just sit and watch the meteor shower too, with me being about 100 feet away from them by myself in the dark. and, for some reason, we just sit there and watch it together - 100 feet apart - and don't say a single word to each other. and it's lovely. after about an hour, an hour and a half, the frat boys leave. forty-five minutes later, i start to head back home, too. it's about 3 in the morning, and i'm all wondered out - i want to get home to bed. after a bit of searching, i find the right freeway, and from there it's a half hour eventless drive back home. and i didn't think about that girl again that night, or about what could have been. i thought about the great time i had had up in the mountains on the way to Big Bear with a bunch of college dudes i didn't know. that's what i thought about as i feel asleep that night.

i've don't think i've told anyone that story before.

I feel like I've been cold lately.

I don't even know what creepy is. I have my own set of social standards that may or may not overlap with "normal" society.