Fine. I'll just buy it back.

So that rant about junky shit I wrote last night? I got instant karma.

I bought a beautiful ring of quality today, all sparkles and black crystal and promptly lost it at the Rose Bowl about 3 hours later. Never take your ring off when you wash your hands I guess. I feel like I should punish myself by not re-purchasing it... its the principle... and I need to be taught a lesson...

But you know how I am about lost items. I have to get it back or I'll go crazy thinking about it. I'll just build it up until it turns into the holy grail.

I'm a little embarrassed to go back to the store to re-buy it though. I know the guy is going to ask me what I did with the one I just bought. "you again?" ugh, I'll pin my bangs back and pretend I don't know what he's talking about. I swear its the easiest way to throw people off.

Shitatious Junk

It drives me crazy when I see stuff produced that is shoddily made with cheap parts. There is so much junk in the world already. I hate seeing mass produced crap that continuously litters our lives. When I walk into a Forever 21 I'm overcome with this feeling. The scarier thing is.. we cannot begin to comprehend the sweatshop madness that is behind that corporation that produces bile.

When I see a junky pair of Prada knock off earrings at a Forever 21, I know that behind those 20 pairs that I see hanging, theres probably 20,000 of them produced for distribution to the other stores. Multiply that by 1000 of different styles of earrings available at those stores, 97% of them junk, my head is about to explode.

Its not mass produced goods that I'm complaining about I think its the fact that despite being crummy, energy is still used to produce it. I imagine gears turning at a million rotations a second churning out bullshit and then my mind shuts down.

There was this going away gift I bought a friend when he went away to grad school. I'd seen this cool looking, colorful multi-USB hub featured on blogs everywhere and decided it was perfect to gift a fellow designer, because not only was it aesthetically pleasing to look at on the desk, it was functional too. I was very pleased with myself for having discovered this thing...

Imagine my surprise when I get this gadget in the mail and it weights about as much as a paperclip. When something doesn't have a substantially luxe and expensive weight to it, its a dead giveaway that it is junk in my book. Its quality was akin to something you'd find in the 99 cent aisle at Target (...pseudo USB hub for ages 3+!!!)

Photographed well it looked fantastic but in reality it was a piece of S-H-I-T. Did I mention I plugged it in to see how fast the transfer rate was and two of the five hubs were so weak they were seemingly dead? I mean how dare you? Do you know who I am!?

Nevertheless I wrapped it up as flamboyantly as I could to compensate for the travesty within and gifted it to him the next day because I had no back up gift. I turned red as he turned it over in his hands. In retrospect I probably should have tossed the thing down the garbage chute to save my gift giving reputation.

But this is what I'm talking about. I would have spent an extra $20 on the thing for it to be made better you know? Would you rather toss $40 to the wind or spend $60 for something that will last?

I really hate it when the idea is there, but its executed poorly so that in the end its just wildly offensive.

Coral

I had these coral pieces hidden in my cupboards forever so I decided to make use of them as little vases. It looks kind of underwater, no? Michi is always interested in stuff of nature cause shes stuck indoors with only things like a powerbook G4 and endless cords and chargers to keep her company.

Paul Banks

{image from rollingstones.com}

How does that voice come out of this baby face? But I like it.

Fringe

I made earrings for Korissa.

I don't

Weddings are so stressful. There are so many variables that get in the way of successfully attending a wedding without any mishaps. First off there is the issue of getting dressed up which comes as a huge problem to some people, guys especially. Lets never forget the time AJ impulsively decided to hand wash his dress shirt out of nowhere 20 minutes before we were supposed to be out the door. o-m-g

Then theres the issue of getting to the ceremony on time and in one piece, without getting lost, being stuck in traffic or suffering an early stroke.Bridezillas, please include a visual map of what cathedral you are getting married in if it happens to be nestled amongst several churchy looking buildings. And I'll never forget the time I got so trapped inside a parking garage while the minutes were ticking by, that I almost threw my hands in the air and crawled back in my car to go home. Running around in heels is strangely humiliating and disgraceful.

And finally, once at the wedding, committing to your new environment for the day and having to be on your best behavior in public. This long stretch of time is where alot of drama unfolds. Feeling neglected, I passive aggressively slapped a boyfriend's hand away once and started WW III. But lets face it. Everyone fights at weddings.

Nonetheless, I was happy to attend my friend Florence's wedding last weekend. Unfortunetly, we missed out on the ceremony part cause of a shut down of one very important road in Berkeley due to a Cal football game going on simultaneously but I got to witness what I didn't miss out on while going to art school...frat houses and team sports.

Genius Barf

Ugh, sometimes I really regret buying my mom a laptop. The last few years its become the bane of my existence.. I've become her personal genius bar 24/7. I get irate calls as early as 8AM sometimes, asking (no, demanding) how to get back on the wireless network.. how to back up photos on to an external harddrive, I've even had to talk to the real genius bar on the phone as she was in a mac store getting her OS updated. Wah!! !! !!

And to add to this, now my dad introduces a new PC laptop to the mix and now I'm having to troubleshoot both Mac and PC problems. How the hell am I supposed to know how to help you over the phone regarding a PC interface I have no reference to in front of my own screen? Seriously I'm dying here!

My mom takes it as a very personal offense when the network kicks her offline while she's surfing the web and I have to coddle and assure her that shoddy wireless reception happens to everyone, and that the networks isn't discriminating just her.