Wednesday, November 27, 2002, 04:46 a.m.

Walking down the hall of death

It's been another slow night at work (thankfully) and aside from the few admissions i've had to see, most of my night has been spent sitting on my butt in front of the computer, and a book propped in my lap when websurfing loses its appeal. After taking a short nap i decided to sneak into storeroom by the CCU to use the lone computer in there to check e-mail. Its a closed room and private so usually i don't get bothered unless someone came in to get office supplies. Aside from that and the copy machine they also keep the 'body carts'. I'm not sure what the official term is but basically these are the carts they use when someone dies in the hospital, and they are carted down to the morgue. While i was checking my mail, a couple hospital transporters wheeled the cart back in the room (empty thank god) but it stopped to make me think about the 'code blue' that was called on the overhead PA system 30 min before. I guess that didn't turn out well.

This rather blase disconnected look at death made me remember last night when i had to go down to the medical ICU's on the 2nd floor where i had to see someone else's patient in consultation. I was walking past all the sections of the ICU towards the one at the very end (go figure) and remembered what someone told me. That person called the ICUs 'the land of the dead and dying' which is a pretty horrible name, but in a lot of ways true. You have two kinds of patients who reside there; those who are sick and get into a rough spot needed a little extra care, and those who are so sick, broken and have more concurrent illnesses than not, that you know they are doomed to spend their final days there and not leave the hospital alive. Truly depressing way to end, and its something i don't wish to have happen to me. With all this exposure to old age, death, and dying, i've developed this pretty wrong notion that by age 70, everyone is a freakin mess and has so many health problems that they lose the will to live. I know thats not true and that i'm only seeing a select unlucky group of people. Still, it doesn't really give me that urge to live long as possible. I think its a wrong notion that a long life (never mind the quality) equates a *good* life. This same super-size mentality of 'quantity over quality' bothers me a lot, and only angers/saddens me when applied to health and life. I for one, would rather experience, joy, pain, love, loss, fufillment and disgrace and die leaving my footprint on the earth after a few glorious short years, rather than go into a 'Michael Jordan refusing to stay retired' twilight of my life. Hmm, i believe someone wrote a poem about this very thing, but i didn't get the idea from that, i swear.

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Tuesday, November 26, 2002, 04:33 a.m.

What is up with some people?

I know i drive a car that attracts a lot of attention, and much like other things in life, sometimes its a good thing, and other times its not. In this case, attracting the attention of a bored idiot doesn't amuse me, and reminds me how there are some things in life on which i shouldn't waste my time. I pulled up to a red light in Chicago's chinatown and the only other car at the light was a beat up pizza delivery truck. Not paying attention to anything in particular aside from waiting for the red to go green, as soon as i pulled up to the light, i heard the revving of an engine. I thought 'great, another stupid ricer wanting to race me, no thanks'. I look behind me and didn't see anyone, and then looked behind the truck in the other lane, still no one. I kept hearing the revving wondering where the hell it was coming from and then it dawned on me that the POS pizza truck was making the noise. I finally noticed the pizza guy looking in my direction and frankly, it would have been pathetically funny if it wasn't so creepy. It was a good thing i was turning right and he was going straight ahead. I think i would have lost brain cells dealing with him at all. Even if we were going the same direction, i probably wouldn't have even moved until he pulled ahead, mainly so i wouldn't have to look at him. Yeah, i may be acting snotty but i think i can choose with whom to waste my time.

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Sunday, November 24, 2002, 02:39 p.m.

Beware koreans bearing gifts...

While i was getting dressed today to step out, i caught the Joy Luck Club on tv and even tho i've seen the movie before, before i knew it, my ass was plopped on the sofa and i must have watched over half the movie before i could get up again. I remember we always used to make jokes about the 'asian female empowerment movie' and how it basically trashed the asian male as the most evil creature on earth. I guess i should really credit the book for that, which i've never read. Still i guess the joke still ran that a young asian male like myself wouldn't be caught dead watching the movie or worse yet, admitting he likes it. Honestly, i don't really like it all that much and found much of it to be overblown, dramatic and written in a way to push as many buttons as possible. Still i guess what got me stuck on the sofa for over an hour was the fact that it happened to push some of my buttons too.

What grabbed my attention was the third part of the movie where the one daughter who married the rich good looking white guy basically lost his love and their marriage, all because she was too eager to please, too submissive, and too ready to devalue herself and her dignity, thinking that her love for him was less than his for her. It was the constant unappreciated shower of gifts that got to me, and it made me think of someone who i have a strained relationship with even now. We haven't spoken for some time and yet i wanted to send a little thing for christmas, just to let her know that i'm around and still thinking about her from time to time, without expressing desire for reciprocation or even response. It sounds like a nice gesture, right? I guess what took me aback was this; while i think i am doing it selflessly, as an expression of pure unadulterated friendship or something, was it really that? Rather, am i making yet another desperate and undignifying attempt to grasp something thats not meant to be in my reach? Sometimes, silence, time and distance are the only things that can happen and its hard to accept that. Maybe saying and doing nothing at this point is the best thing for both of us. Its almost 3 pm now and i'm running late, i should get going. Damn tv movies...

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Friday, November 22, 2002, 06:49 p.m.

Living with the Sopranos...

Having really bad cabin fever this week, i'm almost relieved to be going back to work tommorow night. Yesterday i had to get out of town and drove back up to Chicago to hang out with Lee and folks to celebrate his 21st. Unfortunately we couldn't stuff drinks down his throat because he was driving, but he will get his...

I get home about 4:30 pm today only to find a couple msgs on my machine, one coming from those automated morons at MCI who still keep thinking i have an account with them, and then another message from a med school in New Jersey, sounding like they were interested in offering me an interview for allergy/immunology fellowship. Unfortunately it was 4:30 pm and the office was closed, which meant can't get back to them until Monday! Hopefully, this is the start of something positive, especially when i got two letters of declination for interviews earlier this week which put me in an bad mood. To make things worse, i found that my crucial letters of recommendation had not even been finished and sent out yet, especially after all the trouble i went through to get my applications in early. After a lot of fussing and screaming this week, i finally managed to get most of those letters faxed to their destinations, and hopefully with this message, i'll be getting more good phone calls.

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Wednesday, November 20, 2002, 08:07 p.m.

Welcome to the ladder

I just read this site which for those who don't know, is a theory cooked up, providing an illustrative model for the relationships between men and women, covering most of the important aspects. I read throught the whole thing pretty quickly, and as bitter and cynical as it sounds, much of it rings true. Given some of the personal awkwardness and drama i've experienced lately, i can see how i fit into this model and in a way, i almost feel better rather than bitter. Still, i don't feel like assigning blame anywhere, because like the model states, thats just the way it is...deal with it. I'm going to deal with it my own way, but at least i feel like i have a better idea of what i'm dealing with.

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Sunday, November 17, 2002, 02:27 p.m.

I think playtime might be over

Winter is coming and i can feel it all the time. Its cold in the morning, its cold when i start up my car and the chill is noticable before i go to sleep. Throw some emotional tension and drama into the mix and its been a very chilly time for me. After spending time with a friend last week, i took it as a sign that i should move on with my life and grasp an opportunity to do something else, move elsewhere. After talking to my younger sister, with whom i've grown much closer to over the years, i decided to look at moving out towards the east coast. She's planning on moving out that way because her bf is currently there and i wouldn't mind spending a few years out there until i get my future plans more in order. Plus moving out to a big city will be fun and a nice change from my purgatory in the midwest. Frankly, i'm feeling alone here and much of it was my choice, but i don't think i can do this anymore.

As i mentioned before, i've been suffering thru a bit of personal drama and allowing that needy part of myself to come through, perhaps at a wrong time and wrong place. Its been tough since i've had difficulty talking to this one friend because of that. It's something that should get better with time and patience and i think i can summon both, but in the meantime, i just feel tired, stressed and lonely, and it doesn't help when i have been sharing my problems with this friend lately.

On top of all this i joined a group of people to do a fun drive down in south Indiana, and then afterwards meet up at someone's house in Bloomington and hang out for the day. We took some pretty fast and twisty country roads and i ended up briefly losing control of my car only to get back on the road, but when i looked back, i saw my good friend in his WRX wagon spin out of control and total his car in someone's front yard. His car was a mess and probably not salvageable. It brought back bad memories of my accident and i felt horrible for him, esp since he's only had it for a year or so. I know his wife is not very happy about it either. I ended up picking him up and driving him back home as his car was being towed as well, about a 90 minute drive. During the whole drive up i tried to keep him company and cheer him up cause i knew he felt about as low as anyone could be, but strangely, i was feeling bad as well. It wasn't until i dropped him off that i almost had a break down in the car while driving back home and i was at least able to get ahold of someone who could talk a little reassurance and sense back into me. I still feel rotten right now and probably will for a little while.

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Thursday, November 14, 2002, 05:42 p.m.

"Daddy why are those people standing in that line over there?"

I heard this question as i was rushing to catch my return flight home at the airport. As always, i purchased an e-ticket online and luckily the airline provided nice e-ticket self-check in terminals where all i had to do was stick in a credit card. I was glad too because i was running close to my departure after making an unforseen detour and saw a HUGE line at the regular ticket counter. Some kid and his dad standing at the e-ticket kiosk next to me pointed out this line and asked his dad why they didn't have to stand with them. His father explained how those people didn't buy their plane tickets online and had regular 'paper tickets' which just made the kid, probably no older than 5 or 6, look even more confused. I saw this and had to laugh. I mentioned to the father that he'll probably grow up not knowing what a 'travel agent' is either.

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Monday, November 11, 2002, 05:58 p.m.

Happy Veteran's Day

Ok, i really don't give a crap about the fact that its a national holiday today but i thought it was a nice title. I just got back from a weekend trip out east to visit a friend, which was inadvertently extended by a day because of the nasty tornado storms in the midwest that cancelled my return flight. I got to spend an extra day and miss work on Monday to boot, i couldn't really complain about either, especially since it was totally beyond my control. I had a great weekend and all i can really say for now is that i might put my car project on hold indefinitely. I don't think i'm going to spend much more in mods because now i think i've found something more important to work on.

I feel if i don't grab that chance at this now, i'll regret it for the rest of my life.

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Sunday, November 3, 2002, 10:28 p.m.

Do i sound starved for something?

I had the strangest series of dreams when i slept today, and they all invovled girls, different girls. When i think about it, there was nothing really kinky, really wild, no outright sex that i can remember. But if my dreams were a tv show, they would be a multiparter. I'm already starting to forget most of the details but the first part i was at a school or museum or something and there were a whole group of people gathered. For some odd reason they were all japanese, or asian at least, i am just assuming that, dont ask me why. One girl in the group gets my attn and she had this resemblance to the japanese actress who played tomoko in the GTO live action drama. Somehow i get her attention because i'm standing behind her and then we start to make out furiously right there in front of everyone but no one acts like they notice, all looking at the big dinosaur exhibit or whatever it was. Next thing i know, apparently we already know each other and she even considers herself my girlfriend, even though it turns out that shes also dating some guy that i know in real life who happens to live in florida. I act kind of surprised but once i get over it, i don't really care. Maybe because it was my dream and he wasn't in it.'

Later on in the night i then dreamt about someone whom i only spoken to online and have never met, and in my dreams she turned out to be short, blonde and cute, but in a dorky computer nerd sort of way. Whats strange about this is that i know her real physical description doesn't even come close but we ended up spending a lot of time together, doing i don't know what, a lot of cuddling, chatting, nothing too exciting. Funny thing is i have no interest for this person in real life. Then later on i am staying at yet another girls place visiting, come in real late and this friend happens to be already asleep in her own bedroom, i go to crash in the living room and find someone had taken my spot. I had no idea who it was and it happened to be the little blonde again. She wakes up because of the noise i made entering and then i start to forget what happened after that because i was getting close to waking up. I guess most people who analyze this and say its a no brainer saying i need to find someone but its something i have been avoiding, mainly because i haven't been interested in seeking people out to just casually date and waste a lot of my time and money. I look at it more as i have this need to feel emotionally connected to someone rather than be sexually satisfied, for the most part, i think. Strange tho, i haven't had this vivid a series of dreams for a long time, months i think.

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