Sometimes Frank can be so on the mark.
An example from tonight:
Mike (talking to Frank and I): You two have gotten creepy since you started sharing a room.
Me (extending hand to Frank for some skin): Yeah..Frank, give it up.
Frank: Is that the hand you masturbate me with?
SOOO freaking hilarious 
You know what? I’ve been enjoying biking around Santa Clara so much that I’ve decided to create a category just for biking around. Hell, I’ve been talking about biking and my bike enough anyway; now you people who don’t give a shit can just ignore those posts
I need to find a website that will give directions to places for bicycles. No freeways and won’t assume I’m behind an IC (internal combustion) engine when calculating travel time. Once I have one of those I’m going to bike to an Asian market and get some decent soy mild 
My brother’s girlfriend Catherine and I went for a great bike ride around Santa Clara today (we may have even strayed into part of San Jose). I was hoping to find a nice Asian grocery store within easy biking distance; none yet. But we did find a nice little fruit stand. We also found a bike store (good timing since one of my bike’s pedals had broken), and a few interesting stores and restaurants. We found a Ross that’s not too far; good for me since I need a decent knife in this house if I’m going to do some real cooking .
With the fruits and veggies and pita that Cath and I got from the market we were able to make a nice (and very healthy) late lunch of caramelized onions and yams with lemon served next to pita bread for less than $10 AND we still have a bunch of oranges and pita and yam left over! A great deal. And a healthy lunch never did anyone wrong….and it combats scurvy…arrrgh 
For more than a week now my bed has been the floor of Frank’s room. It’s not nearly as uncomfortable as it sounds. It’s carpeted and I’ve got a pillow and a comforter. I’ve gotten so used to it that Friday when I spent the night at Lisa’s place after shabbat dinner I was more comfortable sleeping on the floor of their living room than on the couch .
Monday’s tomorrow. That means that by way of my homework, I’ve got about forty pages of reading and 3.5 more pages of writing to get done. Not bad at all, really…I just have to plug those headphones in, drown out the world, and dive in.
I’ve found an absolutely wonderful essay on the unification of China written in Shanghai in the 1970’s. It’s sooooo laced with dogma it makes me smile. The author dismisses any personal traits that Qin Shi Huangdi may have had like charisma or ruthlessness and instead dismissed him as a person who was in the right place at the right time to represent the growing landlord class who wanted a united, feudal China to emerge for economic reasons.
I wonder if the author realizes how much his writing was influenced by his environment. I wonder if we realize the extent to which our writing is colored. Is it one of those things that you only see when you have the proper perspective of being outside of that world? Hmmmmm…
It’s been less than a week since I’ve moved down to Manchester (the street I’m living on) in Santa Clara but I’m already feeling so closely connected to the community we’ve formed here. Not only within the house, but with other students, especially the cadre in Park Central. It’s nice to be able to form closer friendships than I would have been able to if I’d had to commute to every event/gathering. Celebrity Jeopardy hasn’t been so much fun since I left the ASFC.
I’ve finally gotten a bike set up down here and it’s cutting down my travel time between places. I can get to Park Central in several minutes where before it would be a twenty minute walk one way. I need to get back in shape on the bike though (back in shape *scoff*). Still need to figure out a good way to get to an Asian market.
My classes are getting exciting. Well…not the classes themselves, but I’m able to work closer with my teachers on projects such as setting up Angel (online line class supplements) and my senior thesis. I’ve tweaked my thesis so I’ll be able to bring in more contemporary sources. I’m going to try to look at the way China’s first emperor 秦始皇帝 (Qin Shi Huang Di) has been portrayed following the rise of Communist China. Which means I get to watch Hero .
After weeks of negotiations with various parties involved I have secured living close to SCU’s campus. I’ll be bunking with my dear Cpt. Wu and become his and Mike’s roommate. My apologies to Catherine, Em, and Lisa for leaving their closet lonely, I’m sure they would be happy to have put a straight guy in the closet for the next two quarters . Tonight I moved some essentials down from Los Altos. Things like clothes, computer, quilt, vegan foods and cooking supplies. Next on my to-do list, a bicycle. After that, a desk and bed, in no particular order (probably desk first).
Frank and I get along pretty well in general so I’m not thinking there’ll be much tension between us. Most of the problems will probably Mike getting pissed off at my and Frank’s antics. haha.. Now to find a place in the kitchen for the hot water pot
How in the world can it be January 14th already?
So much reading for school. I’ve got to stop worrying about it and start thinking about what I write that gets graded.
Went to a very nice Shabbat service last night with Lisa and Katie. They made a wonderful dinner that went well with some vegan wine (so happy to have found a good wine that’s vegan). After dinner I got to play security at a thrash concert and idled away most of the later night. I’d never been asked more about my golf game than I was last night. I don’t think people understood my answer that my mahjong was better than my golf. *shrug*
I feel like I’ve spent most of the week squatting on Mike and Frank’s couch. I think I’m close to getting a living arrangement worked out though. I’ll need to get a bike.
Got together the night before last with my good buddy Danh. We were walking down Stevens Creek when we passed a car lot. We were more than a bit surprised to find that one of that cars was running. Keys were in the ignition, doors unlocked, chain down. Car was all warmed up and could have been snatched in about two seconds (four if I had to adjust the position of the seat). Lucky for the owner of the dealership Danh and I are of upstanding moral character.
We took the keys, locked the car up, and I brought reported the episode to the owner the next day. I’m sure he was thrilled to not have to report a theft to his insurance. Best case he would have been out a few grand through higher insurance rates and deductible. Worst case he’s negligent, doesn’t get the value of the car covered and still has to pay higher insurance rates and is out tens of thousands of dollars.
His lucky day
How reliant we have become on the internet to transport information. With the media blocks in China, what will historians deduce thirty years from now when they look back on this period? Because there were no bulletin board posts challenging gov’t position on Taiwan no body within China objected to the policies?
I suppose it’s the same problem we have now when we look at the past. Those who have had the skill to write have usually been the wealthy and educated. Those who would want to support the government of their nation. Now, though, the skill to write has been spread to dissenters so the opportunity to write is being removed. Is the spread of ideas, even dissenting ones, a right to be protected or a privilege that can be suspended?
If we say we respect the right for a government to act in what it sees as the best interests of its citizens by censoring an ‘outspoken minority,’ what about when this censorship becomes part of the classroom curriculum HERE? I was in a Chinese history class where the instructor (American, Caucasian, b/c it matters on cultural context) said that you CANNOT meet a Chinese person who doesn’t have a strong opinion Taiwan. Usually, she said, that opinion is that if China has to lose so many millions of lives to take that island, it would be justified. I know this isn’t true. On a common sense level it’s ridiculous to say that EVERYONE has a strong position on this subject. Second, I’ve spoke to people who’ve lived their entire lives in China who say that Taiwan isn’t an issue to them or their friends. LOTS of people care far more about the Chinese economy than relations with Taiwan. It seems to me that this instructor came to this view because the people she spoke with in China were either coached or selected by people with government interests (or she was horribly exaggerating).
If we accept foreign censorship, we end up censoring our selves and our youth.
So, my New Years Resolution: be more actively honest with my friends. I don’t lie to my friends, but I’m still harboring that artifact of an introvert that keeps me from saying or doing things that expose my feelings, even with friends whom I have a great deal of care for and trust in. I’ve resolved to overcome that. To not hold things in or worry if it’s the “right thing to say.” To move forward. I’ve been blessed with many great and dear friends, I should trust them with my feelings more.
Had a great time last night. Picked up a couple of friends from San Jose’s Mineta airport. Best thing was Danh saying “Marc, all you have to do is stay on First, it’ll turn into the airport.” So I stay on First. I stay and I stay. I pass Montague, I pass hw-237, I eventually reach a T junction with myself on the stem. First had ended; the airport wasn’t there. So I head back, I follow the plains landing and taking off. I find the airport.
So great so see friends tonight and get the chance to practice my NY’s resolution to open up more to them.
EVERYMAN:
I had thought so.
GOODS:
Ney, Everyman, I say no:
As for a while I was lent thee;
A season thou hast had me in prosperity;
My condition is man's soul to kill,
If I save one, a thousand I do spill:
Believest thou that I will follow thee?
Nay, from this world not verily.
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