Unabashed honesty would be ideal....

I have been south lately, and sans PC, so I have not had the chance to spew my insipid anecdotes. On Wednesday, I went to Music Maxx with my dad to get my acoustic guitar fixed. Scott picked it up, inspected the action, and said "I can't believe you can play this." After leaving my precious cargo behind for repairs, we headed to the mall to get a new ink cartridge. I hate the mall with utmost passion. This may be due to the fact that I'm broke. We walked around and got ice cream and absorbed the sights and smells of a commercially irritating mecca and it's elaborate displays of pushy advertisements. Feeling overwhelmed and raped of financial self-control; we picked up our faulty ink cartridge and entered hell on earth, I mean Wal-Mart. Even more than the mall; I despise Wal-Mart. I would much rather sit at home and pull my eyelashes out one by one, than set foot in that smile-ridden sewage plant of try-hard fake employees and third-world-manufactured product. We picked up a ridiculously-priced ink cartridge, (eat my shit, Lexmark, you fucking fascist bastards), and went home. I ended up going to the mall again that day; later, with Jason. We played in Toys-R-Us. God damn, toys suck these days. No wonder kids are such obnoxious little extroverts. My generation hit the entertainment jackpot. Kids these days are getting our left-overs: cheaply-made, unimaginative sludge; made by some corporate slack-jaw with no concept of genuine 'fun'. Later that night, I went to an information session at the college to reassure myself that I'm on the right track to doing something worthwile.
Thursday morning, I woke up early and walked to the Youth Centre. I sat down to type up my resume, and some guy next to me asked what was in my cd player. "Mars Volta, ever heard of them?" He hadn't, and the small-talk dwindled to nothing at all. At least he meant well. What's wrong with me? I can't even keep conversation with an attractive guy who shows honest interest in me. I walked to the bulletin board while my resume printed, and he followed, scanning the job opportunities as well as the side of my face. I turned, collected my paper, and left without so much as a smile. I went to Kwik Kopy, got 50 identical prayers-for-employment, and walked home. Later on, I jammed for a bit at Trevor's house, and ended up getting in an argument with him over his 'attitude' with people. I left frustrated and close to crying, which is unnatural; I haven't cried in months. I walked along Victoria Crescent, cursing the sky and generally anyone I could set my anger-narrowed eyes on. I contemplated how shitty the rest of my day was going to be, when suddenly, a vaguely-familiar guy walked out of the cambie. I slowed my march to imply recognition, and he said, "Hey, how's it going?" I took a headphone out of my ear and shyly admitted I didn't remember him.
"The show at the school; I was the drummer for Jay's band."
"Oh yeah!" Now I felt like a real asshole, because I remembered having a conversation with this guy at the show, and now I couldn't even recall his name.
"You don't remember my name, do you?"
"Hah.... um, no. Wait, Brady?"
"Nope."
Brady was a different guy I had met that night.
"It's Patrick. Why are you blushing?"
I hate when people ask that question because it only makes you blush more. I laughed nervously and told him I felt like an idiot. I changed the subject by asking him where he was headed.
"Actually, I was just about to sit here in front of the Cambie, wanna join me?"
So I did. We chatted about how he just got evicted by his crack-whore landlord, and how we're both unemployed, and what kind of music we liked.
"Have you ever heard of the Mars Volta?" he asked at one point. I laughed; their cd was in my discman at that moment. I ended up inviting him to jam on Friday with the un-named band, so we made plans to meet at 11:30.
I went home feeling about ten times better. After dinner, I called Jason to say goodbye (he's going to Kelowna for a few days), and then I planned on retiring for the night, but Trevor called me. He came over and we hung out and talked about our childhoods; you know, that kind of crap. We both fell asleep and he was still there in the morning. Nothing happened, and I was glad. It felt just like one of my girl friends had spent the night. He left around 10:30, and I had a bath while listening to Rock 101. I then met Patrick and his friend Chris outside the cambie. Chris was a very eccentric fellow; very high-energy.
"Hey, I'm going to sell my friend a shirt for $20," was one of the first things he said to me.
"Oh. What's your friend's name?"
"Carly. She works at MmmMuffins."
"I know her. I went to school with her."
"Is she single?"
"As far as I know, she's not."
"Fuck. Maybe she'll still buy my shirt. I really want to go out with her."
So we took a small detour from Trevor's to visit MmmMuffins, but sadly, Carly wasn't there. We left the mall to walk to Trevor's, and Chris tagged along until New York Pizza. Practice was fun, even though Peter couldn't make it. Patrick's a really good drummer, but I think we might get him to play bass for us. After jamming, I decided to make my way home, and Pat came along. We caught a bus and he got off near the car dealerships to hand out resume's or something. I shook his hand goodbye, and said I'd call him next time we had a practice.
I'm at my dad's now. Tracey and I are supposedly going to a beach party tonight, so depending on how things go, I may or may not write again later.




"What's to stop us pretty baby, but what is and what should never be?"
Led Zeppelin