Band Wagon?

I guess that's the best way to put it.

I've decided to sign up for a last.fm account. I really don't know why I hadn't done it before, to be completely honest. It was always one of those things on the back of my mind to do, but I just forgot every time I sat down in front of my laptop and proceeded to melt my eyes and back away for the next several hours.

Music is important to me. It can be a very binding thing. I feel a strange connection to those who I can trade music talk with. Or maybe our musical tastes just start to mingle because of the other aspects of our personalities that correspond so well? I cannot say. I haven't payed enough attention in psychology to be able to say anything with any confidence.

And so, I find it a little eerie when this internet-thingy is able to give me the exact recommendations for little know 1990's Trip-Hop as a friend.

Or that it's able to predict the rest of the artists on my good side that haven't quite made their ways into my library.

Is my personality that easy to read?

Converse Inverse Traverse

As a child, I always thought that chucks looked so cool. I had a pair of plaid ones. I vaguely remember them, but if you pull out pictures from when I was about six, sure enough, there they are, on my little feet.

Sophomore year in high school I bought another pair. All-Star lo-tops Black with grey stripe up the back and grey tongues. A couple friends even signed the toe area. My mother had me throw them away a year after that, with promises of a new pair. If I can see your toes, your shoes need to be replaced.

Junior year I bought hi-tops. Green hi-tops while on an orchestra trip. Messages on those toes, too.

Orange lo-tops. University Village. Children's shoe store.

White/Yellow hi-tops. Look like eggs on my feet. 

Brown hi-tops. Outlet Mall near the Casino while visiting home.

I like sneakers. I've been feeling drawn toward the idea of changing my overall image lately, but I don't think that giving up my chucks is an option that I'll explore. Sometimes I'll see a woman on a train rocking what I hope to achieve. So... it's possible, in theory, at least.

Mistaken Identity

It turns out that I was wrong about my neighbor. I still have no idea what she looks like. I saw the girl who I thought lived next door to me in the cafeteria today, after my portion of practice ended. I decided to try to be friendly. But, as it turned out, I was wrong.

It's really awkward trying to talk yourself out of a situation like that.

Too Many F's

After practice, I ended up in Shibuya. I met with some friends... from somewhere and sometime. A train ride later, and I was looking at the last train going in the opposite direction. Just in time for a few moments in a booth with familiar faces.

And then we walked home.

Packing Tape or Duct Tape?

Is packing tape the local equivalent of duct tape? I can't say that I've run into duct tape here. Yet somehow, I have packing tape hanging off of the would-be headboard of my bed. I've been attempting to use it in the same way as I would duct tape, read: for everything, but have been failing.

First thing I noticed: packing tape does not work as well as push-pins when used to hang up CD wallpaper on concrete walls. Four of my ten sheets fell. They all happened to be near my head. I'm afraid that some of the old ID cards and received postcards fell out in the process, and are now somewhere between my bed and the wall. I will have to go on a mission to dig them out before moving out a year and a half from now. I don't want to lose them to this monster room, but it's such a pain to get them out.

I guess what I'm saying is that packing tape isn't as versatile as duct tape. Maybe that's why the office gave it to us all for free.

Nearly Always Sick

I stayed home today.

I suppose this is home now. Over half a year has passed since I moved into this room, so I have some claim to the dings on the floor and stains on the walls. I'll be the responsible one when I leave, and someone notices the imprint of a map of the area sealed into the paint by nights of wet hair rubbing it against the wall. Even the cockroaches which may or may not still be living here with me are somewhat products of my habitation.

My earlier claims of having never seen the face of the girl living in the room to the side of mine, as I am the last in the hall, are no longer valid. A few days ago, as I was biking to the nearest, and sadly not so near train station, I followed a girl for most of the way. I thought there was a good chance that she lived at the same complex as I, but didn't give it much thought. This is a large facility. There should be around 600 people here. That evening, as I was heading up the stairs and through the coded door, I saw her again. She and I walked down the same hall for nearly the same time. She opened the door to the left of my room and swept herself in before I could muster any sort of greeting. Good evening? Is my music too loud? Where are you from? What are you studying? Another time, I suppose. Or maybe not.

This really is proving itself to be a year of varying ailments, though. I've been sick before, sure. But I'm beginning to feel like I spend more time sniffling into the tissues I pick up on the street from part-timers at the local host and hostess clubs than i do healthy. But what's healthy? Physical health, I guess. At least, that's the angle I'm working for this particular moment.

Before this year, I would have thought it mad to think that I could get whooping cough. I thought that my mother was going overboard with vaccinations when she told me to get another pertussis shot in early 2007, along with some other oddball vaccinations, like Japanese encephalitis, before I left that home. In the end, I guess it didn't really matter that I went ahead and was immunized for pertussis. It was more of just another chance to say goodbye to the nurses working in the immunization clinic who I had grown to know and love through a couple years of frequent visits for allergy immunotherapy. Whooping cough still took me out of commission for a few weeks, even with heavy dosages of antibiotics.

Just as I recovered from one thing, there would be about a week of calm before the next strike.

I'm out again. Hopefully just a cold. But I'm overdoing it again, and it won't get better if I keep at it.