Friday, December 02, 2005

Thanksgivings-"people's co-op" (Part 2)

Before I continue on my friends, I want to further talk about me. So here is the delimma. When my life is a piece of shit, my blog shines. When my life gets back to track, my blog stinks. I do not know which situation I want more. When I am down, I definitely wish for happier days. But when I am "feliz", I surely miss the time that I was mentally and emotionally challenged, as if life is more colorful that way. Well, I surely cannot choose on this level, but ain't I making the choice every day?

My week went by fast, and I did not even have time for running this week until Satureday. No good. On a bright sight, I find myself gaining confidence in the path I am about to take. You know, I am applying for assistant professor, post-doc, consulting firms and law schools at the same time. Usually, I was very shy when people asked, "what do you want to do?" Well, now I am confident enough to believe that there is no right or wrong answers and to claim, "I do not know, but I will be the one to find out!" Well done. Also, the newly-gained confidence allows me to admit that I hated some boring people all along and believes in my own judgments, some of which stereotypical. I guess that confidence and arrogance really comes hand in hand, and I hope I am not turning a bad person because of that. Good or bad, at least I am more sincere now than ever before.

Today I had the 100th run on campus drive. It is about the distance between SF and LA. I will probably keeps running. What's the next goal? Las Vegas? Pheonix? It sounds really exciting, but I guess I have to take one step at a time on the ground. Running has become such an integral part of my life, now for no reasons. Pure and simple, breathing in cold air, feeling the leg muscle become heavier and heavier, in the sun or in the rain, feeling sweaty or feeling sick and weak, chasing other runners or passed by them. Just run. I am already planning a 101st run on Wednesday.

Then 100th marks give me some bragging points, as now I can legitimately put my last year behind, and look forward to something even better. To be honest, the past year was weird. I still do not understand that I totally lost control over myself and had to deal with a lot of issues. The good part is that I found a lot of new friendship when I showed my vulnerability. I also had some good stories to remember, no matter how these experiences had impacted me. Had girl problem twice. First time it was a failed pursuit that went nowhere, and I still believe that she and I will make a nice couple. I am still quite confused with the second time with D. Probably from the day one I already got the message that it had no future, but still I was blindfoldedly drove to a dead corner until I realized it was in vain. She later asked me whether she had took advantage of me. Of course yes, but on the other hand, I also took advantage of the situation and escaped from my own loneliness and from dealing with my own issues. Well, I guess it made it even.

Ok, now the real heros of this blog: my friends as "people's co-op"

The third kitchen manager is a guy. He is doing a good job, but not under my stanrdard though. Well, not a single kitchen manager is doing a good enough job to pass my test. I am a bad-ass. He is responsible for dairy, and there is just not enough whole milk for me. He also likes to order expensive orange juice, probable just because he likes it. Well, he is a great person, but I do not believe he is a good manager. However, the beauty of my job is to work with all kinds of managers. I believe I haven't let my dissatisfaction shown in a visible way.

The RCC is good and bad at the same time. I spent Thanksgiving with him and his friends and had a lot of run. We had grilled steaks. We burnt a lot of things: charcoals, marshmellows, donuts, sticks, CDS. Then some stupid tennis video game with Mario Brothers. He also introduced me to a game called "world of warcraft" and gave a free referral. And then I spent the day after thanksgiving for 14 hours playing that game. I was exhausted at 4am, and decided to delete the game for good.... To be honest, RCC does not have a lot of responsibilities to begin with, so he is doing just fine.

Finally, there is my roommate, the FM for the house. I will have a seperate post for blog for him very soon, but here is a brief sketch. His working style is similar to me, so I feel very comfortable working with him. He probably does not have too much creativity (except that he is a musician), but he did all the solit work for the financial situation. Certainty guaranteed if you work with him. He kindly invited me to his house on Dec 17-19, two days when I do not have any housing. Giant kudos to him.

Overall, this team is great. Although I tend to be picky on each individual, I love them as a team. Each one of us has our strength and weakness. i am a boring person, but i get jobs done. Other people sometimes slack off, but they are really fun to be with to cheer everything up. So one word to summarize it all: Love.