154: The snowman, symbol of the beauty of life and the cruelty of existence

January 19, 2012

Dear everyone,

I returned from a one-week trip in LA, where it was 70 degrees and sunny. The flowers were blooming, and people in LA seemed to be better-looking and better-dressed. Heck, even the hoodlum teenagers who bounced around the Santa Monica boardwalk looked like Gap kids. I was sad to have to come back to wintry Seattle, which was just hit with a snowstorm. Every year Seattle gets into a tizzy about the snow. Due to our steep and numerous hills, whenever snow is in the forecast, everyone screams “Snowpocalypse” and rush out to get groceries and sand. Most years, we’re disappointed. This year, we got some snowfall, and I stayed inside to get some work done.

Then, it hit me. I had gotten old. We got three inches and I was working. That’s just nuts. How many people in Vietnam wish they could in their life see snow. “What is it like?” they would ask when I come to visit, their eyes gleaming. They eat their pho and spring rolls, imagining the fields of white we take for granted. Most are resigned to the fact that they will never, ever get to experience it. I am lucky that I can, and even though I’m getting older, I can sometimes recall the magic of that first snow I experienced at the age of 8 in Philadelphia.

So when a friend called asking to go outside and play, I said hell yeah. We went sledding. We had a snowball fight with people in the neighborhood. And we made snowmen. This piece above, “The Happy Snowman,” is a visceral representation of the joy of childhood, of a snow day. The snowman, childlike, raises its arms and head to the sky in an obvious expression of complete happiness. This piece  is made poignant by the fact that within hours, the snow will melt, and the snowman will no longer exist. His unequivocal contentment, then, is either tied to his acceptance of the inevitable, or else to his utter ignorance of existential inevitability. The Happy Snowman is a reminder of both the beauty of life, and of the cruelty of existence. It is a reminder that our time is short, and we should learn to prioritize the important things.

And this piece can be yours for only $500.

2 Comments | childhood, existence | Tagged: , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Huy Le

Why I’m no longer watching Law and Order: SVU, Criminal Minds, Bones, or other crime procedurals

January 2, 2012

The main purpose of TV, I would say, is to help us escape from our daily lives. I come home exhausted after hours of telling people what to do and taking credit for their work, so an outlet for escapism is much needed. So I started watching Law and Order and other shows that are known as “crime procedurals.” These shows tend to start with a dead body being discovered, or someone getting killed. Then, for an hour, a team of investigators and scientists work together to find the killer, usually succeeding by the end of the episode.

These shows are extremely addictive, which is why there are dozens of them, some with several variations: CSI, NCIS, Law and Order, Numb3rs, Bones, Criminal Minds, etc. They are well-written and well-acted, with interesting stories and good pacing. Besides those factors, though, there are two elements of these shows that make them compelling. First is the fact that we are all wired to be problem-solvers. We like puzzles. Each show is a jig-saw puzzle, and we get to go along on the ride as the professionals find the pieces and put everything together. Secondly, we are attracted to the sense of justice that the shows impart. At the end of each episode, usually the killer is caught, his motives are explained, and there is some sort of justice delivered.

I spent a lot of 2011 watching these shows. On New Year’s Eve, I caught a glimpse of an episode of Criminal Minds where children’s bodies were discovered, and at the end, they realized the killer was a kid who just enjoyed going around killing other kids. It made me sick. It made me even sicker to realize that I had not gotten sick earlier. This is horrible stuff and yet it was just another hour of entertainment and everyone could just get back to having dinner or whatever.

It is alarming there are so many of these shows out there. If TV is a necessary form of escapism, then what exactly are we escaping into? We escape the real world, where horrible things happen and we read about them, to TV world, where similary awful things happen and we get to see the gory details. In “Bones,” for example, the bodies are displayed in all their mutilated, decomposing glory. They spend a lot of time on these fake cadavers. The results are so gruesome that in the past, I had to look away. Now, they barely bother me.

That’s the thing, these shows desensitize us to violence and murders, even as they make us feel reassured that there is justice at the end. I’m not saying they cause people to be more violent. I haven’t been inclined to go around killing people in creative ways that the shows depict. Apologists for crime procedurals might even say they have a role in providing an outlet, a vicarious sort of catharsis. But I’m sure watching this much violence and depravity day after day doesn’t really help things.

At the least, it doesn’t help me. So for 2012, I’m going to try not to watch any more of these shows. Escapism, healthy escapism, should nourish the mind and soul, or at the very least, be neutral. It should not force us to see, in brutal details, the ugliness of the world that we’re trying to escape from.

Of course, this is not to say that I am against the depiction of violence and murders. These last few months, I’ve discovered some great and very violent shows. “The Walking Dead” portrays a post-apocalyptic world where a disease has wiped out most of mankind. Survivors have to make tough choices as they face zombies, including killing each other to stay alive. “The Game of Thrones” depicts a medieval-like fantasy land where warring clans do not hesitate to behead one another. And “Battlestar Galactica,” a sci-fi also set in a post-apocalyptic world where intelligent robots look and behave like humans even as they try to destroy us. Lots of violence everywhere. But at the least, the characters change and grow, and there are moments of humanity and lessons that we can learn in these characters’ choices and actions.

Not that we actually learn anything from shows in general. However, I think good shows deeply explore the worst and the best in humans and in humanity, not just the worst.

8 Comments | Depressing reflections, existence, rants | Tagged: , , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Huy Le

JN152: Last chance to enjoy these sexy eyeballs

December 29, 2011

My friends,

For the last several months, I’ve been enjoying the Lasik, which Jameelah and I both got on a whim while in Vietnam. That’s right, we passed by an eye hospital, saw the sign that said “Lasik surgerie, much cheap,” and went inside, and after a barrage of tests and cultural hijinx, we got the procedure done. And neither one of us went blind, which is really great. In fact, for several weeks, my vision was perfect. I would walk down the streets of Saigon, pointing out the smallest letters I could see. The world was open to me. “Adult Karaoke,” I would read, “Goat hot pot,” it was great. Completely free of the shackles of glasses for the first time in 17 years, I was ecstatic, and opened my eyes real wide, so that others may see how big and pretty they are. These sexy vegan eyes, obscurred nearly two decades by half-inch-thick lenses.

Well, that was months ago. Vision got gradually worse as we got back to the States. I can see things much better than before and can drive without glasses, but things far away have definitely gotten blurrier. Watching our giant TV eight feet away is fine, but the words on the screen can be hard to make out.

Worse, however, all the straining and squinting has changed my appearance. A friend stared at me a while, speechless. “Ah,” I thought, “she must be entranced by my big, beautiful eyes in all their naked glory. I better remind her that I’m married.”

“Yeah,” I said, “so Jameelah and I got Lasik in Vietnam. Cool, huh?”

“Oh,” she said, relieved, “I thought something was different. You have this kind of dazed look, kind of like you’re high.”

A couple of other people also said similar things: “You look high,” “You look really, really tired,” and “I never noticed how many weird little things are floating around the whites of your eyes. You might want to get that checked out.”

Anyway, today, I went to the optometrist, a jovial man who did not reprimand me for getting “much cheap” Lasik in Vietnam. “All the equipments are pretty much the same everywhere,” he said. I asked him if I should get more Lasik. He peered into my eyeballs. “Yup,” he said, ”they definitely shaved aways some layers of your corneas. Unfortunately, so much so that more Lasik might be risky. You could get 20/20 vision with a second round. Or, it could fail, and your corneas will be so weak that if someone punches you in the eye, it could rupture your corneas and you would need a transplant to see again.”

I left his office after placing an order for glasses. That’s right, I am back to glasses. “You don’t need to wear them all the time,” said the eye doctor, “just when you drive, or watch a movie, or when it’s cloudy or rainy, or when you wake up.”

“But don’t worry,” he added, “in a few years, you’ll be old, and then you’ll be far-sighted, aha haha.”

My new glasses will arrive next week. They will be significantly lighter than my old ones, and you know what, I kind of miss wearing glasses. You know, glasses…people with them are perceived to be smarter, studies show. Glasses…are cool…I’ll probably wear them all the time, because they’re so…cool. So if you see me this week, try to gaze into these sexy peepers one last time before they’re gone.

And if you say I look high, I will punch you.

If I can see you…

2 Comments | existence, high on something, Vietnam | Tagged: , , | Permalink
Posted by Huy Le

JN151: The annual guide to gift giving

December 18, 2011

The season of giving stuff to other people is upon us. Sure, it’s been upon us since Halloween was over, but if you’re like me, you haven’t done your gift shopping yet. In fact, according to statistics that I made up, 75% of people do their shopping on Christmas Eve, and 100% of humor columnists. Now, every year my friends ask me for tips on what they should get for various people in their lives. And I always tell them to same thing: The most thoughtful gift for Christmas, and any other occasion, is cash. Give the gift of options, cash.

Apparently, however, this doesn’t work, because of two reasons: First, cash is expensive, costing money. People think if you’re going to give cash, it needs to be a significant amount (except grandparents, who are exempt from this rule). People tend to look more favorably on a gift worth $5, rather than a $5 bill, namely because we traditionally obscure the price tags of gifts (thank God, or my wife would be very upset at the “Guccie” bag that I gave her). Second, the stress and opportunity costs associated with the purchasing of gifts are included as part of the gift: “I care about you so much that I wasted a bunch of my time and stressed myself out at the mall buying this pomegranate-persimmon-scented candle for you.”

The point is, we can’t avoid giving gifts. So to make it easier on you, I’ve compiled a list of what to give those special people in your life, based on my observations. While stress and waste of time is an intrinsic part of gift-giving, like the price, the recipients need not know how much you spent in procuring their gifts.

Co-workers: These are people you spend more time with than even your own family, so you should know them very well. Give them nothing. They’re not giving you anything either.

Boss: If you give your boss something too expensive, you’ll seem like a suck-up. If it’s something cheap, it’ll be disrespectful. If you give anything at all, and no one else does, that’s just as bad as if you didn’t, and everyone else did. The solution is to bake some cookies with macadamia nuts.

Boyfriend/brothers/uncles/guys in general: Anything from one of the four categories is good: electronic gadgets, pocket tools, DVD collection of his favorite show, video games.

Girlfriend: Think of a happy memory from your courtship, identify a symbol from that memory, and figure out a way to crystalize that into an object. “Look, babe, remember when I rollerbladed down Alki, and I tripped and fell and crashed into you and made you spill your Sprite, and that’s how we met? Well, here’s a bottle of Sprite, and a cup of sand from Alki. Merry Christmas.”

Wife/husband: Give the gift of relieve by making a deal to buy each other nothing and do something stress-free as a couple instead. Or, agree to buy a joint gift that could be enjoyed by both, such as a Leatherman Micra pocket tool.

Sisters/aunts/grandmothers: Scented candles or lotions that smell like a combination of fruit and spices, like “vanilla-apple” or “pear-tarragon.”

Grandfathers: A thick book on some obscure topic, such as “Salt: A World History”

Parents: Usually tools are good for Dads. It makes them feel manly, even if they never use it. Moms usually don’t care what you give them, they’ll love it regardless. However, I find that the best gifts for them are expensive stuff such as electronic gadgets, a massage chair, stuff that they would never buy for themselves.

Small children: Holiday-themed socks.

Older kids: Kids have come to associate Christmas with presents. This is no way to celebrate the birth of Jesus. Make them focus on the true meaning of Christmas, buy getting something from the World Vision catalog, such as a chicken to help a poor family in a third-world country.

In-laws: Plants.

May you have a wonderful, warm holiday filled with all the things that make life worth living, such as the Leatherman Micra pocket tool.

4 Comments | Brilliant ideas | Tagged: , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Huy Le

JN150: How to amuse yourself at a high-school reunion

December 1, 2011

Last week, someone called me a “mensch” over email. I was about to write back and say, “Oh yeah? Well, your face looks like a butcher’s apron,” but I Wikipediaed it, and apparently a mensch is a “person of integrity and honor.” There are just some words that do not sound like what they mean. Like “rolfing.” It’s just some form of deep-tissue massage or something, but it just sounds dirty, like “Did you hear? John and Emma engage in rolfing every weekend.”

Anyway, last weekend, Jameelah and I attended her 10-year high school reunion, held at a bar in Seattle’s hipster neighborhood, Capitol Hill. She didn’t really want to go, but I wanted to, since I didn’t go to mine, and high-school reunions, from what we’ve seen in the media are supposed to be interesting, a cathartic experience that validates the choices you made in life, unblocks psychological barriers that stem from traumatic high school experience, or ideally both. And there’s usually free food and booze and you can see who got fat.

It was ridiculously awkward. People put on name tags, then glanced around, nervously, hoping someone would recognize them and come over to talk. The evening was young, meaning no one was drunk yet. The awkwardness was palpable. I ordered a Long-Island Iced Tea.

It was even more awkward when you didn’t go to the school but are rather the spouse of someone who did. You’re reduced to a prop. A sexy, vegan prop. I decided to have my own fun by pretending I was one of the students. With over 400 people in the class of 2001, it was not difficult. While Jameelah stood in the corner scoping out people, chugging her cranberry-vodka, I went around the room and yelled, “Anna?! Anna Martinez?!” at random women. People were very nice, and so nervous that they were glad anyone is approaching them at all. “Oh, I’m so sorry,” I said, “you looked like Anna. Whatever happened to her?” Then I’d move on.

More and more people arrived. Several of Jameelah’s friends came and they all fell into patterns of hugging, observing, pointing, and making comments. “Look at that guy over there,” one of them said, “his name is Toby. Poor guy, no one’s talking to him. He was a nerd in high school.” I grabbed my drink and went over to him. “Toby?” I said, “Is that you? It’s Huy! Remember? Huy, from Mr. Sherman’s class!”

Toby looked horrified and embarrassed. “I’m so sorry,” he stammered. “It’s OK,” I said, “we had a large class. No way you can remember everyone.” We talked for a little bit. “Come on,” I said, “let me introduce you to some people.” I pulled him over and introduced him to Jameelah and her friends. Poor Toby didn’t know what to say. I talked to him about videogames for a while before he awkwardly wandered off to talk to no one.

Throughout the evening, people got more relaxed as the alcohol kicked in, thank God. I was hoping for a cathartic showdown, but no such luck. The closest was one of Jameelah’s friend, Katie, who pointed out a guy who used to torment her in elementary school. The guy seemed like a jerk, bouncing around in khaki pants, a blazer, and a tie. “You should go over and tell him off,” I recommended. “Yeah, I should,” she said. Then we both stood still and drank.

Overall, it was incredibly boring for me. Which was why I stood in the corner with my drink and yelled, “Boring! Borrrrrriiiinng!” Eventually, however, we spotted a woman that Jameelah and her friends knew. “That’s Hannah,” they said, “she got kind of fat.” Hannah came over, and she was not fat, but actually attractive and a fascinating person. She holds parties for adult toys. “They’re like Tupperware parties,” she said. We had a great conversation about the correlation between the ubiquity of online adult material and its impact on the perceptions and manifestations of physical intimacy, very profound.

Jameelah, who was nervous, becomes exceptionally social, usually charming, after her fifth or sixth cranberry-vodka. She was talking to people, laughing and joking with them. I had to drag her away. At this point, I should make some sort of pointed observation about how the real world is like high-school. But I can’t clear my mind of the image of a  Tupperware/Rolfing party…Overall, Jameelah had a good time and probably felt validated for the choices she made in life. Apparently she was a punk who beat up people and instilled fear in the masses; now she’s a well-regarded teacher. Me, it unblocked some psychological barriers that stemmed from my experience with high school. Namely, I missed out on the joys of drinking.

1 Comment | existence, high on something | Tagged: , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Huy Le

JN149: Your place looks like crap; my place looks like crap

November 12, 2011

My friends, we have reached a point of what I will now call “social siloism,” mainly because it makes me sound very smart.  Basically, despite being more connected than ever through technology, or perhaps in spite of it, as individual units we are now very isolated from our friends and neighbors. We have become a collection of silos, instead of a genuinely connected community.

I really miss the college days, when it was perfectly acceptable, even encouraged, to drop by unannounced. Our rooms usually looked like crap with dirty laundry and trash everywhere. We also looked like crap in flip-flops and sweat pants. And everyone was happy, discussing how to solve global problems or the ontology of Jell-O or whatever. Spontaneously we would go out for ice cream or fries, recruiting whoever we encountered, and more often than not, they would drop their books and come along, and we’d be an army of scroungy, disheveled, cheap, and very happy people.

Now, out in the real world, no one drops by to visit unannounced any more. Only in TV shows do friends drop by without warning. The protocol is to send a Facebook message or email several days, preferably weeks, in advance to ask if it’s OK to schedule a visit.  In fact, when people drop by unannounced, we are offended. “How DARE they visit me!” we think, scrambling to gather up all our stuff from the couch and throw it rapidly into the bedroom.

The reality is that everyone’s place looks like crap. That’s the natural state of most people’s dwellings. Dishes are piling up, bathroom sinks and mirrors are full of toothpaste spots and random strands of hair, and there is usually some sort of weird smell, either from the garbage or compost that should have been taken out earlier, or some pot of food on the stove that has gone sour. Really, the only time any of us clean is when we have people over, or when we’ve reached our personal threshold of squalor where even we are disgusted with ourselves.

But we believe other people’s places are spotless, and we perpetuate this misconception by rarely visiting anyone, and by giving people enough notice to tidy up. We have become obsessed with people’s image and less on the people themselves, turning social visits into a series of rituals that includes giving notice, apologizing for the state of our dwelling, complimenting the host on their wall art, sending thank-you notes, etc. When we do visit people, it is stressful, as we now have to make sure to look presentable, and the choice of wine to bring must be appropriate. Once I accidentally bought what I thought was a classy wine for $17, only to be horrified to find out that it had a twist-off cap! We might as well have asked the host to drink a bottle of sulfuric acid.

We can live for years in an apartment without knowing our neighbors’ names. Most of us naturally drive to the store instead of borrowing a cup of sugar from our next-door neighbors. And our friends rarely drop by. All of this will have consequences on communities, which are formed to protect their members and to conserve scarce resources. A collection of silos is not a community!

I propose we bring back community, college-style. Let’s make a pact. We can agree that everyone’s place generally looks like crap. We can visit each other at any time without notice. On the flip side, the host can kick people out at any time. We do not stress out about stupid stuff like the tidiness of the place. We can be blunt without placing judgment: “Dude, your kitchen smells like my gym socks,” “Really? I’ll get the air freshener. Want a beer?”

Let’s bring back the no-stress environment that once existed, when we only cared about spending time with our friends, not how their apartment or house looks. We must cut the crap by not focusing on the crap. How else are we going to solve global problems?

15 Comments | Brilliant ideas | Tagged: , , , | Permalink
Posted by Huy Le

JN148: Asian Dude’s Experience with Black Culture, Episode 3: Collard Greens and High-Fives

October 31, 2011

Welcome to another episode of “An Asian Dude’s Experience with Black Culture,” aka, “How I Torpedoed My Political Career before it Ever Got Started.” This week, Jameelah’s family from Louisiana came to visit, which I was genuinely excited about, and by that, I meant I was hoping to be afflicted with some sort of debilitating tropical disease.

When you marry someone, you marry their entire extended family. Not literally, mind you, else it would make the honeymoon very awkward. Still, it is important to get to know them. After all, they are now family. And more importantly, they might have a mansion or one of those ancient Chinese vases that are worth hundreds of thousands.

All week, Jameelah had been prepping me, giving footnotes for every relative. The description of cousin Joe’s wife, Addie, was terrifying: “She doesn’t talk; when she does, it’s just mean. She’s also much older than Joe. Last night, she stormed off because someone thought she was his mom, so she turned into a vampire-werewolf and attacked a bus full of school children.” (OK, I exaggerated a little bit). My strategy was clear: If I won over Addie, I’d impress all the relatives, which would save me from having to impress them one at a time.

We invited them to dinner at a Thai restaurant. All 10 of the in-laws arrived, including Jameelah’s parents. Addie looked mean, like she wanted to stab someone. Joe did kind of look like her son. The room was tense. We started sitting down.  “Ms. Addie,” I said, “do you mind if I sit next to you?” She nodded. The others were shocked, wondering if I had lost my Asian mind.

Throughout the rest of the evening, I worked hard to impress Ms. Addie, including, I realized, unconsciously adopting some sort of Southern accent. Luckily, there are a couple of topics of conversations that are guaranteed to get people from Louisiana to open up. One is Bobby Jindal and how horrible he is as a governor. The other: collard greens. “Ms. Addie,” I said, “I bought some collard greens the other day, and I tried to cook ‘em, and they tasted plain awful.” “I make the best collard greens,” she said, launching into how she prepared them.

“What do you think of Bobby Jindal?” I asked. “He’s terrible,” she said. “Yeah,” I said, “I bet he hates collard greens!” We laughed. This whole time, the others were watching, completely perplexed that this mean woman was talking to me. I found out she was a social worker. “Whoa, you also a social worker, Ms. Addie?” I said, “Give me five!” She slapped my hand. Jameelah’s mom nearly fell off her chair.

“Ms. Addie,” I asked, “you and Joe look like a happy couple. What’s your secret?” She smiled. “The secret is to do whatever your woman says. And don’t complain about her shopping.” For the next hour, we laughed, we joked, we complained about the social welfare system. They showed us a picture of their house, and I nearly wet my pants. They had a mansion!  We talked some more, on occasion high-fiving.

At the end of the night, everyone said goodbye. She told me to come visit any time. “I’d love to, Ms. Addie.” She looked me straight in the eyes, deadly serious. “Stop calling me Ms. Addie. You don’t call Joe ‘Mr. Joe.’” I was starting to sweat. I was so close! So close! Every time I called her Ms. Addie, it was probably a stab to her heart, reminding her of the vast age difference.

“That’s because ‘Mr. Joe’ sounds horrible,” I said. She paused for a second, frowning. We stared at each other. Then she burst out laughing. “Give me a hug,” I said, and we hugged. The other relatives stood and watched, astounded.

I learned a valuable lesson from all this. With people, especially distant relatives, we often create self-fulfilling prophecies. We think they’re mean, so we are cold to them, causing them to be mean. Or we think they’re pleasant, so we treat them nicely, and they become pleasant. Although I was trying to impress Ms. Addie by pretending to enjoy her company, at the end, I really did enjoy her company. She was nothing like her reputation. The point is, I think I’ll start thinking she has a mansion and is extremely generous.

2 Comments | Black Culture, family, Interracial Relationship | Tagged: , , | Permalink
Posted by Huy Le

JN147: What the hell is a spring roll exactly?!!!! (Vote now!)

October 25, 2011

Hi everyone,

A kind blogger reviewed Jagged Noodles and said some very nice things, and of course, being addicted to TV, I forgot to post the review. Here it is. Thanks, Julie, for the great review http://nguj.blogspot.com/2011/08/jagged-noodles.html

If you’re too lazy to click on the link, here’s an excerpt: “It’s a humor column, yes, and it makes me laugh madly sometimes, but ultimately I find it calming. It’s a kind of healing space. Plus, Le projects an aura of undeniable vegan sexiness the likes of which have never before been experienced by the world.” OK, I made that last sentence up.

Now, Jameelah and I have been arguing incessantly about something, and I need your opinions to objectively settle the debate, i.e., confirm that I’m right. What is a spring roll? One of us thinks the spring roll refers primarily to a fresh salad roll, while the other one thinks the spring roll is fundamentally a fried roll while a a fresh salad roll should be called a summer roll. Take a minute to do this exercise. Close your eyes and think of “spring roll.” What image does it conjure up? Please send in your thoughts, or you can choose one of the following below. Please send in your response. Gloating rights ride on this.

A. Spring rolls are fresh rolls, never fried, because the season Spring is about life and freshness and rainbows and flowers

B. Fried rolls are called Egg Rolls, even if they’re not made of eggs

C. Nuh uh! Fried rolls are called “Spring rolls” or “crispy spring rolls!”

D. BOTH fried and fresh are spring rolls. One is called “fresh spring rolls” and the other “fried spring rolls”

E. You fool! Spring rolls are always fried! Fresh rolls are called summer rolls!

F. Spring rolls are basically Asian, and since you’re Asian, I’ll go with whatever you think spring rolls are

G. “Summer rolls”? Really, “summer rolls”? There are two restaurants on earth that use the term “summer rolls.” They also have “winter rolls,” which are rolls that are frozen solid, and “autumn rolls,” made with dried leaves….

H. Both A and B

I. All of the above

J. I don’t care. You two are annoying, and your constant bickering is why we’ll never invite you to stay with us in Portland again.

14 Comments | food, vote now! | Tagged: , , , | Permalink
Posted by Huy Le

JN146: Portland, natural habitat of the hipsters

October 24, 2011

My friends,

You’ll be proud of me. After watching on average four hours of TV each day, Jameelah and I have taken the first steps to doing more self-actualizing hobbies, i.e., we ordered a bunch of art supplies from Amazon. Before I became addicted to Netflix and reruns of Friends, I drew crap, wrote a lot, and took pictures of stuff. Now, it’s been endless slogs through the 11-hour work day, followed by watching other people do stuff. Sure, it was stress-free, but life is not about relaxation. It’s about the struggles to create! To express! To livvvvve, livvvvve….

And there is no better place to do all the above than Portland, Oregon, one of the most interesting cities we’ve been to. We went there to visit our friends, Brandi and Candy, who are not strippers, I don’t think. Portland is an awesome vortex of weirdness and kick-assery. Sure, we were only there for a day and a night, but it’s enough to get a good sense of the city, which is beautiful place, very clean.

50% of the people there are hipsters. Hipsters are wackos who wear horrible clothing, including impossibly skinny jeans, stupid hats and scarves, lens-less glasses, have asymmetric hair, one or more piercings, don’t bathe for days, and project an aura that make you want to throw bars of soap at them. Portland seems to be their natural habitat, so it was fascinating watching them. At one point, one of them passed by. He was wearing tight blue spandex shorts, a button-down yellow shirt with a black vest, a pink hat, and his lips and brows were pierced. On his back, I swear, was a wooden sword!! Seconds later, a goth hipster waddled by with her equally bizarre-looking hipster boyfriend. I didn’t notice the boyfriend much, since I was distracted by the girl’s yellow and black Batman underwear, which was showing because her extra skinny black jeans were sagging. The courtship habbits of hipsters is something that would make an interesting research dissertation topic.

The rest of the city comprises hippies, yuppies, and homeless people. We had never seen so many homeless people in the US. On every street corner were homeless kids begging for change or some Voodoo Donuts, which is a famous donut joint in Portland. They are famous, by the way, partly because of the phallic shape of one of their pastries, which they subtly call “cock-and-balls.” The line wrapped halfway down the block, past an adult video store/movie theater. We were happy that they had vegan donuts.

So there we were, waiting in line for our donuts, observing the hipsters as they socialized, hunted for food, and avoided natural predators (which is almost everyone). Jameelah was ordering for me, but she can be excessively indecisive when the stakes are low. “Get the maple bar and the vegan C and B,” I said. “What’s C and B,” she asked. “Cock-and-Balls,” I whispered. “OK,” she said, though it was obvious she was distracted. Five minutes later she asked, “What did you want again?” “The C and B,” I said. “What’s C and B again?” she said. “Cock and Balls,” Brandi and Candy said. Five minutes later: “OK,” she said, “I’m getting anxious. There are so many options! What do you want?” “C and B,” I said. “What’s C and B?” she asked. “COCK AND BALLS!” we screamed in unison, drawing the attention of several people.

The donuts were delicious, even better with the dirty jokes we made while eating them, which I won’t repeat here, but suffice to say, the jokes involved C and B.

At night, we ventured out to observe the nocturnal hipsters, hitting a dance club, where a dozen or so Yager Bombs later, we were bouncing along with the music and the scantily-clad women on the platform overlooking the dance floor. I noticed something. There were no hipsters in the club! Hipsters, apparently, are averse to dancing. At 1:30am, we left, because, as Candy put it, “we’re too old for this $#!%.”

Overall, I was quite fond of Portland. The combo of hipsters, yuppies, hippies, and homeless and how they interact is fascinating. Kind of like a movie or a tv show, actually. The night scene is also pretty nice, seeming to be livelier than Seattle. And there are quite a huge population of vegans, so there was vegan food everywhere. And all sorts of art and handmade jewelry and crap like that. Hipster lifestyle is the opposite of ours right now, and I can’t help but envy it a little. To live without caring that you look like you were dressed by color-blind monkeys, to be free of societal rules of normal behavior, to wear a wooden sword on your back for no reason, to be free, free…

Jameelah and I are inspired. We’re going to watch less TV and do more art stuff. But first, we have to polish off our C and B.

4 Comments | rants, Travel | Tagged: , , , | Permalink
Posted by Huy Le

JN145: Multivitamins and other scary things

October 16, 2011

Every Halloween Jameelah tries to drag me to do something scary. Last year, it was a haunted maze, where actors dressed as serial killers ran at us with chainsaws while strobe lights flashed in the background. It was really frightening—that we paid $25 each and waited for an hour in line. “You’re no fun,” she complained. “Don’t you ever like being scared once in a while?”

Like being scared? Why would anyone like that? Has society reached a point where we must manufacture fear in order to entertain ourselves? I say, if you’re not scared about what’s out there, then you’re not paying attention:

Office mugs: One in five of them contain fecal bacteria and/or E. Coli. That’s right, fecal bacteria! Apparently, about 60% of men and 40% of women don’t wash their hands after using the toilet. Luckily, most of the germs are probably scalded to death by hot coffee. Still, fecal bacteria!

Desks and keyboards: Computer keyboards have over 60 times more bacteria than most toilets, while desks contain 400 times more bacteria than toilets. Your desk has 21,000 germs per square inch. A toilet, about 49.

Multivitamins: Some studies say they’re good for your health. Others say they may shorten your lifespan. If you don’t take them, you may lack nutrients you need. But if you take them, you might get cancer. However, chances are very low that they’ll harm you. But they could kill you.

Ball-point pens: On average, 100 people choke to death on them each year.

Brain cells: We lose on average 85,000 brain cells a day, while regenerating only 50 or so.

Red coloring: If you see “cochineal extract” or “carmine” as an ingredient on a bottle of your favorite juice, then you’re drinking powdered insect shells. What kind of a scary, sick world do we live in where we use insects to color fruit juices?

Michele Bachmann: Sure, she’s running behind right now, but politics is so unpredictable. She may just vault ahead of “The Black Walnut” Herman Cain and assume the presidency, and the ground will open, unleashing the Four Horsemen and ushering in an age of darkness and despair.

Literally: So many idiots are using it incorrectly that it might lead to a changing of its definition, because English is a living language, meaning it changes all the time! Eeek! If this happens, it will literally make my head explode.

Greece: If it fails to address its fiscal problems, it could destabilize the Euro, setting off another global economic crisis, worsening the current economic conditions, leading to a complete collapse of everything, increasing the likelihood of famines, wars, and pestilences. And terrible hummus, falafel, and dolmades.

Dust mites: Your bed mattress has 100,000 to ten million tiny insects that live on the dead skin cells you shed every day. Females lay about 80 eggs in their lifetime. In other words, while you’re feeling all comfy and snuggly, millions of six-legged bugs are feeding, going to the bathroom, mating, and hatching out of eggs and entering your lungs. You’re probably inhaling hundreds of them right now!

That’s just the short list. Other things that should keep you up at night are global warming, our failing education system, sponges, obesity, unemployment, North Korea, solipsism, the expanding universe, the unraveling of Einstein’s Theory of Relativity thanks to the discovery of neutrinos that could travel faster than the speed of light, Google+ not catching on, bunnies, bird flu, plastic bottles, Saturday Night Live continuing to run for years despite being painfully unfunny, salmonella, and paper cuts.

So skip paying the $25 and just stay home and surf the internet if you need an adrenaline rush. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have to work on my dust mite costume.

8 Comments | Depressing reflections | Tagged: , , , , , | Permalink
Posted by Huy Le

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