A few weeks ago while waiting for a ride to go to a new job I saw pulling up to the corner, a black version of the car I drive, which is an older red Honda Civic Wagovan named Sammy. It was Black Sammy! Maybe the driver in it is my archnemesis. It was good he didn’t recognize me without my car. Who knows what chaos would have ensued. He drove away unaware, and all was right with the world. Today I passed by Blue Sammy, which would make a good sidekick for my Red Sammy. I guess I could play his sidekick some days.

Today I fell down playing soccer. I played for about five minutes until I ran out of energy and just, well, fell down. I usually don’t fall down when I run out of energy but I was still moving. I scraped my knees. A few months ago I was running against my roommate in the parking lot behind work when I also fell down and scraped my forearm. In 6th grade I was running the 100 meter dash when I fell down at the start and scraped my hands. I always fall down! I think it’s because I imagine I can go faster than I really can and do things I really can’t. Like sometimes when I’m driving on the freeway I think of my car going up ramps and doing flips and drifting around tight turns while chasing a runaway car and dodging 18 wheelers which turn over and jackknife and the wheels come flying off and my heads out the window and I duck and the wheel just barely misses me but, well, I probably couldn’t do that at all.

There’s this person at work who says “exactly” a lot. I feel good hearing this after saying something to him. It makes me feel like I have precision.

After watching Back to the Future Part III I have decided that one day in my life I would like to experience what it is like to earnestly slide across the roof of my car to get in the front seat. I think if I were to do it on my own I would probably feel like a fool. I’d need to be in a situation where I was dodging bullets or rescuing the world from a timebomb or something. One day…

I’ve been getting more into chess since I’ve had a roommate. He’s a pretty good player and has a good number of books on the subject. We both got Chessmaster Tenth edition and I’ve liked going through its “Josh Waitzkin’s Chessmaster Academy.” Josh Waitzkin was the subject of the movie Searching for Bobby Fischer, which I saw a couple months ago (with my roommate). I liked the scene where the chess coach goes, “let me make this easier on you,” and clears the board with his arm, knocking all the chess pieces to the ground. Man, what if I did that in real life! At the dinner table: “Let me make this easier on you!” Food goes flying. At the office: “Let me make this easier on you!”  A 600 page manuscript goes flying out the window. OK, maybe that’s not such a good idea. What’s cool about the Josh Waitzkin academy is how he talks about chess in his annotated games. There seems to be a lot of drama: fianchettoed bishops which slice through the board, rooks and queens which serve as a battering ram on open files. Sometimes there’s a lot of tension that builds up on a square and you have to maintain that tension. Sometime you have to make the quiet move, waiting to see what his opponent does to take up the space he left behind. He talks about setting up outposts for the bishop and knight, about not rushing in even though you have a winning game, about making these small prophylactic moves. He mentions that sometimes you get in these deep endgame calculations of what may or may not happen, but needing to return to the surface and just play chess. Anyway, it’s all really neat to me.

Over coffee yesterday, we were discussing what kind of animal we all were. Some people were snow leopards, some people were buffalo. Me? I was thought to be an armadillo.  Or a badger. Or a porcupine.  Some kind of small animal that burrows or chips away at stuff. That sounds about right for some reason. Another person thought I was a goat. With horns. Do all these things mean I’m defensive? I totally don’t think I’m defensive. I mean, I’m not defensive at all! If you think I’m defensive, you’re totally wrong. I mean, why would I be defensive? That’s totally ludicrous! Obviously, I’m not a very defensive person. Nor do I have spikes. I think maybe that might be accurate because all of those animals are relatively small and like to dig and stuff. Like they spend all their day digging and are somewhat diligent in that. I think I could be diligent in doing menial tasks like digging. As for the spikes, or the armor, or the horns — I know some people might take that to mean that I’m a defensive person, but I’m totally not defensive at all!

I decided to make congee. This was my second time trying to make congee. I tried to do it by the book, and even made my own chicken stock. Added the chicken, ginger, egg, salt, and mushrooms. This took over four hours to make (including the chicken stock). It turned out pretty bland. Since this is my second attempt, I thought I was experienced enough to make a whole batch of congee for all my meals this week. Now I have to eat bland congee for all my meals this week. Oh yeah I also burned the rice so it has that flavorful burned rice aftertaste.

At my new job, a satisfied client yesterday sent everyone at my company a big batch of Isabella’s Cookies.  This thing is like a small olympic discus. They’re quite good but after having one for lunch yesterday (still warm from the oven) I got a tummy ache. My stomach is getting weaker, I think, and I’ve been having trouble eating my omelets and mashed potatoes which probably accounts for 60% of my diet. I thought I was getting lactose intolerant, but I seem to be able to eat cottage cheese alright. Maybe it’s the fact I’ve been making all my meals for the week on Sunday and end up eating food which is already a few days old. Well, whatever the case, the monster cookie sure tasted good.

It took me a little while to decide to leave my old QA job. I liked the people, the job was pretty easy, and after all, I was playing games all day. Well, I was playing a game all day but during our regularly scheduled breaks we could always fit in a couple Halo games. Anyway, I said my goodbyes and while I was heading to my car, Abe aka “Dragga” aka “Ramboner” came out to say goodbye. We chatted a bit about my new job and stuff and we both got in our cars. I saw him drive a bit further down the parking lot, stop, and get out with something in his hand. He flagged me down as I was driving and gave me this cool Halo Warthog model, still new in its package.  I thought that was really cool and I didn’t really know what to say.

When someone offers that slightly raised open palm to one side, am I supposed to know which handshake to give? Is it the slap-wipe-and-punch combo? Or the thumbs crossed grab and shake (with optional light finger brushing)? Or the traditional firm shake with optional curled finger tug or finger tug and punch combo finish? I’ve had a few of those slap-punch combos but I was unsure whether it’s supposed to be a slap or a grab (and whether the thumbs should be crossed or not) so I’ve been doing a hesitant, in between variation of these to cover all the bases. And I keep forgetting that third punch and leave him hangin’. I never had to worry about this stuff in elementary school. Or even high school. I think I started shaking hands in college.