will power

at this very moment, i'm having a contest of will power with my brother. i hear the doorbell ringing rapidly. it must be my mom out front. it must be that my brother locked the front door on the way in. i hear him in his room playing guitar and i know he can hear the doorbell too. if i stay quiet, i can pretend i'm asleep and he'll naturally have to stop what he's doing and open the door.

...

score one point for me.

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it is crazy hot outside which means there's no point in going out unless i intend to drive my car somewhere. if you wait until the evening to go out walking, you get mauled by mosquitoes. i've spent the last few days hiding from all of this in my room and when i haven't been napping or reading or otherwise neglecting some matter of importance, i've been digging up my old pictures and making digital copies of them so that i'll be able to see them when i'm in taiwan. i don't have a scanner so i've resorted to using my digital camera to take pictures of the prints with some interesting results.

the original pictures were taken with a cheap disposable film camera and printed on the cheapest photo paper. there are few pictures where anything is in focus and where any colors look remotely natural. taking a picture of the prints didn't do much to help the focus or tint, but the pictures came out with a nice flat quality reminding me of old posters or 1950s ads. it was a tedious process, but at least i have some copies of my old photos.

i got a call from one of my recruiters this week about a job in the bay area for which i'm not even remotely qualified for. i gave it a try though just to so i could say with a clear conscience that i haven't been dodging responsible work on purpose and got a rejection letter within two days. all in all, i've been contacted for three jobs in 2009 which have come to naught. i haven't been looking myself, but i figure if the professional job hunters can't find any job leads for me, then it's a safe conclusion that jobs are just hard to come by this year.

while packing, i've also dug out a bunch of textbooks that have been sitting in boxes since i've been moving so much this year. i was even able to sell one within a week on amazon. my first income since february! hopefully i can sell a few more before i leave.