well, tomorrow’s the start of a new year. another 366 days of fun.

ARE YOU EXCITED?!

i’m not.

it is rumored that crabs were first eaten in China a few thousand years ago.

they were once the pests of the ocean. scaring little children and pinching unsuspecting bystanders. then one day, a brave man decided that he would rid the beach of these insect-like crustaceans once and for all. he devised a plan in which he dug a large pit and pushed in all the crabs. then he set them ablaze.

truly an unsung hero of oriental cuisine.

do yourself a favor and don’t watch Cold Mountain.

HORRIBLE.

no plot. no point.

hicks EVERYWHERE.

ivan: i went and saw Cold Mountain

ivan: and…it had its moments…as most movies do

ivan: but overall, i’d have to say that it was quite possibly the worst movie i have ever seen

Tai: LOL

Tai: wtf

Tai: didnt i tell you NOT to???

sorry, Tai. i have failed you.

i used to hate going to Chinatown when i was a kid. to me, Chinatown was nothing more than dirty streets and funky-smelling basement-level supermarkets…you know, the kind your parents dragged you into to help them pick out gnarled ginger roots from a cardboard box. and don’t forget the bucket of live eels or the river turtle aching to escape its styrofoam prison.

when eating at restaurants, i found the lack of ice water appalling. what am i supposed to do? chug scalding tea? the lazy susan frustrated me to no end and the food–though just as good as it is now or ever was–failed to spark my interest further than the distance from bowl to mouth. in fact, i considered eating in Chinatown a chore.

past self, i scoff at you.

i have some good news and some bad news.

good news: my contact solution contains neither sorbic acid nor thimerosal.

bad news: an earthquake in iran just claimed the lives of about 20,000 people.

let’s do that moment-of-silence thing, eh?

so apparently i really really REALLY suck at this “solitaire” game. i spent more than half an hour playing a dozen or so rounds and i didn’t win ONE…SINGLE…FREAKING…TIME.

how hard is it to win in a game where you have no opponents?!

oh solitaire, how i curse thee.

what he said. ^

a few decorated houses in the surrounding area.

i wonder where they keep their cars.

the freshly lynched gingerbread men are a nice touch.
there’s also a scary looking santa in the center window.

i like the green trim. you should too.

wow…so close to Christmas already. scary.

got a cousin flying in from OC wednesday night. he’s bringing me a new wireless card (he works for d-link) for my laptop since my current card is a SMC POS.

anyway…my mind has been on Christmas songs today. i’ve been listening to everything from relient-K’s “the twelve days of Christmas” to my newly acquired reggae version of “deck the halls.”

went to steve’s place last night for a Christmas party. finally met lundy’s wife. jeez…i still can’t believe he’s married. it seems like just yesterday my brother and i were at his house playing “ice climber” on oldschool famicom.

man…that was a fun game. i enjoyed hitting the baby seals and watching them waddle across the screen in a disoriented stupor. hahaha…baby seals.

this post is directed towards “import tuners” and stupid idiots who can’t think for themselves. skip this post if you are neither…read this if you are either.

hey guys! don’t you just LOVE “fast and furious” films? they’re such an accurate depiction of the “import scene,” don’t you think? yeah bro! i love my motec exhaust and i just swapped an sr20det into my acura integra. cool! i’m a pansy whiteboy that likes cars coated with double their body weight in vinyl! oh yeah, did i mention that i also love JDM? JDM rocks! JDM-land is the COOLEST PLACE ON EARTH, BRO!

STUPID RETARDS. you guys make me sick. now excuse me as i rant about a few things.

“FAST” AND/OR FURIOUS: paul walker should burn in hell for…well, being his incompetent self. but whatever…i’m not going to talk anymore about the movie itself.

things haven’t quite been the same since the first movie reared its ugly head in 2001. nonfunctional flame kits are cool. stickers add horsepower. neon lights should be placed in every conceivable vehicular crevice. good for making money…bad for everything else. i’m not saying that stickers and neon lights are necessarily BAD (like nonfunctional flame kits), i’m just saying that one must use them TASTEFULLY. again, the keyword is TASTE.

i’d have to say that these movies more or less single-handedly brought down the “import scene” in flames. it’s way too commercial now…way too mainstream. and you know what happens when things go mainstream, don’t you? that’s right…they attract the mindless admiration of fools.

THE MINDLESS ADMIRATION OF FOOLS: this obviously isn’t exclusive to the world of cars, but i’m going to use it as an example because cars are what i’m talking about. duh. anyway, this subject has been the cause of many a headache and clenched fist for the last year or so. i kept on thinking to myself “are peoples’ minds REALLY this easy to manipulate?” so far, the answer is a very big and very sad “YES.”

if you start ANY car trend, you can pretty much expect people to follow suit with little–if any–prior consideration. examples: altezza taillights, aluminum wings, underbody neons. these are all older trends, so let’s move on to something more current: the “JDM” craze.

THE RISE OF JDM: for those of you who disregarded my suggestion and therefore shouldn’t be reading, JDM stands for “Japanese domestic market”…basically anything car-related from Japan. this is a HUGE trend right now…making your car as “JDM” as possible. people are replacing windshields, climate-control consoles, headlights…just about every little item you can think of with their respective Japanese counterparts.

while the style itself may not be horrible, the massive following it’s generated sure is. everything is JDM JDM JDM now. do you have a JDM shift knob? no? well you SHOULD. how about JDM floormats? no?! have you been living under a JDM rock? get with the JDM times, bro. which brings us to my next and final topic.

GRATUITOUS MISUSE OF THE WORD “BRO”: i know this really has nothing to do with cars, but it’s been getting on my nerves a lot and i thought it would be a good way to end this angry post. just kidding, i just wanted to get it off my chest.

i HATE it when people call me “bro.” in fact, i cringe every single time i hear that awful abbreviation misused towards ANYONE. i’m not your freaking “bro,” okay? bros are man-bras that frank costanza invented during an episode of “seinfeld”…NOT your goofy friends. i rest my case.

ah…i feel much better now.