Part Duex

America is off teaching (what a cutie) and I guess I fell asleep on the bed for like an hour while watching a 40 minute video (I think I got like 6 or 7 minutes into it) about how to make music videos. This is mostly the result from waking up at 7:30 am after having gone to sleep at 3:30.

Last night was essentially part 2 of Valentine's Day. On Tuesday, Iron Maiden's Somewhere in Time was rereleased on vinyl, so we passed by Amoeba to buy it and by a total miracle from a place not to far away below the ground, I found Mastodon's Leviathan on vinyl :3 Aside from it being my favorite Mastodon album, it's my favorite album in general and great to finally have in my collection. America got an Eluvaite (?) album and even though we heard like 2 songs in the car (not including the intro), I liked what I heard. From there we drove to the House of Blues to finally see Brujeria. I've been listening to them since middle school and for Valentine's Day, I bought tickets to go see them. We thought we were a bit late to the venue but it turned out we were just in time to watch every band play. Strangely enough, even though none of the opening bands flowed, they all sounded really good with Sangre sounding a bit like The Black Dahlia Murder and Pinata Protest kicking ass with their heavily Mexican influenced music. Their bassist looked like John, which was hilarious. Brujeria got on stage sometime between 10:15 and 10:30 and played until 12:30, with no encore, which meant more time for more songs :D "Matando Gueros" sounds so sick live but they played "La Migra," which is my favorite song, as is for many other people. I hope they tour again soon in LA, they're pretty awesome live. After the show was over, we still went to eat at Dennys. Got a grand slam at 2 in the morning with some coffee and America got some chili bean dip with coffee hahaha. Both my arms and back hurt from defending America at the front of the stage, but it was totally worth it as it was a great night <3

Ra-Ra-Rasputin

Wow what a weekend. On Friday I went to see Russian Circles, Between the Buried and Me, and Coheed & Cambria with America, Kim and Dennis at The Wiltern. It was so awesome. Russian Circles is a hard rock instrumental band with hints of heavy metal and when those little parts come out, damn do they sound good. The drummer is really good too. Very clean drumming. Between the Buried and Me, man what to so say. They played my favorite song "Ants of the Sky" which completely caught me off guard since they're currently touring to promote their newest album but I'm not complaining. There was this really weird pit of like maybe 10 people max (I want to estimate more around like 7 or 8) and we all started dancing around for the Western breakdown at the end of the song and looking hilarious, which was just great. America broke her nose (at least we think she did) and I dislocated my shoulder, but to hear "Ants of the Sky," totally worth it. Plus they played it back to back with "Prequel to the Sequel" just like on the album. For Coheed & Cambria, America and I stayed for about five or six songs, and which they played "A Favor House Atlantic," which was enough for us. We left a bit early to go grab some coffee at Tom N Toms and wait for the show to end and meet up with Kim and Dennis. America got the Peacon something and I got Cinnamon Chocolate I think, and we mixed them together to make a really good frapp.

On Saturday we drove all the way to Santa Ana to go see Firewind and Turisas. Doors opened at 8 p.m. which was really weird, so we killed time at IKEA America, Kim, Britney and I. Good mix of actually looking at furniture and completely messing around. The venue we went to had two different shows going on which was pretty weird. In one room, there was a hip hop type dj and in the other a bunch of metal heads waiting to get their mosh on (at least that's what we thought. Boy were we wrong). Even though there were only two bands on the bill, Helsott came and opened. We missed them at Paganfest last year so it was nice actually seeing them play a full set. Good band even though there were a lot of technical mishaps. Firewind was good too, but I just got tired of their solos after a while. They played the only I know by them "Head Up High," which was cool, but for every other song, it was like a solo every other word. Turisas was awesome and ripped it on stage. It was my third time seeing them and it feels like the crowds have gotten better every I've seen them. Still have to love the guy who plays the violin, he's super awesome. America and I were a few feet form the stage and got separated at the very end. I ended up in the back from all the movement and jumped into the pit. Pretty fun even though there was a lot of conflict with the trashers and pagans moshing. Regardless, the show still kicked some serious ass. The drive back was a little over an hour and we passed by to get some soda and shakes before leaving as our form of rehydration haha. It was cute having small talk with America, as our voices were partially missing. Hehe :)

Oh starless night sky, good to see you again

No Signs Of A New Season

In Flames is easily one of my favorite bands and I personally believe that their discography can be split into two sections: pre-Colony and post-Colony. Pre-Colony is their more melodic death metal stuff and post is not really as guitary but still fast and in-your-face. This song is called "The New World" and easily of the best In Flames songs in general (and they have a lot of great songs). Check it out because it's really good.

Blue Moon

I don't really like to talk about my birthday or mention it on my own will as it really annoys me when people go "you know my birthday is coming up" and pester you with countdown reminders. When it comes, it comes, and when it passes, it passes. But this is one of the few times (if the only) that I speak about it on this blog and that's because it is the same day as the Wolfpack Hustle Midnight Crash Race, which is a bicycle race on the LA marathon track at something like 4 a.m. So I'm going to do the race with a couple of friends from the bike collective and hopefully Jaime and Jeremy too. I'm really excited for the race and working on improving my uphill climbs as par of a kind of endurance training. I don't think I could ever really train for winning the thing since I really enjoy riding my bike recreationally and for transportation purposes, but competing and finishing is going to be loads of fun.

Lately since no one is ever really home anymore (and usually go through a full 24 hour cycle before I even see someone again), I've started this habit of looking into the mirror and telling myself "good night" as if someone else were here too in the house. It's definitely a bit comforting and helps deal with being home alone all the time.

Bleh. Ran out of things to do so many hours ago

Another day home alone. I hate that my window faces the east, the heat on a daily basis is ridiculous in here

Two Legged Massacre

So here' part two to Cattle Decapitation. This is "A Living, Breathing Piece of Defecating Meat." This was the first song I fell in love with on the album and for good reason. It's seriously great stuff. Check that shit out. Adios.

Thoughts of a Friday Urban Studies Class

• I really like my Friday Urban Studies class. It's very informative and very philosophical in a way. Our professor teaches 98% the class through pictures and detailed information. But what's great about the information is that he likes to get into the influences of many movements and landscape choices. My class is how ideologically a college course should be: mostly lecture with focusing on comprehension of the material rather than memorizing and regurgitation. Throughout the entire 3 hour class, our professor writes about 5 words on the board. 
• There is a guy in my class who literally sat in his chair and was on Facebook for three hours straight. I'm sorry man, but you sadden me. If the class was boring, I'd completely understand (besides the fact that I have no idea how people don't get tired of Facebook after at most 15 minutes) but the class is super duper interesting
• Apparently regular green grass that is used on lawns is harmful to the environment because of how much water is used up (grass isn't even really suppose to exist in Southern California). More than that, the major of the types of trees planted around Los Angeles are also very water demanding and is playing a significant part in our high water usage as a city. People used to get fined for having desert like front lawns (as in just dirt with shrubs and cactus, etc.) because many people in LA thought they weren't taking of their front lawns, even though the desert plants are native to Los Angeles and Southern California in general. The reason why most of LA has grass planted and trees is because there was a movement to build a Eden looking kind of environment, even though it forced the city to bring even more water from farther away just to keep it green year round.
• Since LA was originally a farm city, the major boulevards we know now only existed to put boundaries on farms and back then, the city streets were made for bicycles. In 1915, the LA Times had a bicycle club. How cool is that?
• My professor likes to pick a lot on Catholicism and the Bible. How awesome is that :)

Fountain of Carnage

I haven't dedicated a song post in a really long time. So let's do this bad boy. Like two weeks ago I bought the newest Cattle Decapitation album, Monolith of Inhumanity, and it's a really great album, but above the rest two stood out to me the most. Today I'm going to post just one of them, and that is "Your Disposal." There is just something about the high pitch growls that the band does, that I just think is spectacular. Check out the song below:

Valentine's Day is tomorrow. Going to be exciting. Making dinner together and going to watch a horror movie(s). Counting down the hours already :3

Venturing Into The Unknown

As we slowly reach the middle of the Spring semester, it slowly begins to dawn all the work I've done in preparation to graduate. This is going to be my sixth semester of working my ass of to get the grades I need and the classes in order to graduate on time. The crazy part is that it all seems to be paying off. For a little over the past year and a half, America and I have had periodic talks about school progress and things we needed to plan on doing, like taking the UDWPE and the GRE. Almost a year ago, Irving, America and I all took the UDWPE and passed. It didn't really kick in until recently that we were ahead of the game. America's and I's road leads to a Spring 2014 graduation (on top of the fact that it means we were able to successfully graduate in four years, an occurrence that is slowly diminishing in the higher education world) and because we're part of the same college system, we'll be able to graduate together, which is awesome and cute simultaneously. She's helped me push through certain difficult times and been my motivation to finish those last few five and fifteen page papers. But even on top of all of that, we are about to begin our graduation applications, which are due mid-summer. I'm pretty excited for it. Need to make an appointment with my counselor soon to get his approval and stuff, which shouldn't be hard because the guy is pretty unhelpful anyways.

Your voice is soothing and works wonders. Even though I can't necessarily see you, that voice of yours always has a way of making me smile, regardless if you're talking to me or not. So sweet and gentle :)

Don't get fucking mad at me mom. I said I don't know and it means I don't fucking know. Too fucking pissed to be civilized today

I'm in the middle of completely rearranging my room and posters but I think I've done a lot more self harm than good. I keep constantly hitting my toes, feet, knees and arms on something and leaving me in excruciating pain. Sure it's starting to look a little better, but the pain that comes along with it doesn't seem worth it at times. It doesn't help that I bet myself really well this morning and was bleeding for a good while. Ugh. I'm just fucking annoyed right now. Dropped my bed on my fucking foot too. Felt just splendid.

It is days like today that sometimes I think of quitting cycling. Some drivers in Los Angeles are too reckless, dangerous and selfish on the road. There are days when I feel that my life is at risk more than it should be. My own split decisions are beginning to keep me alive and that's not the way it should be.

Dance Til The Break of Dawn

America is stressed out for an exam today (and she has all the reason to be, it's an exam). She spent some time last night and this morning reviewing the book, notes and powerpoint slides. I think she's going to do excellent ([insert Bill & Ted sound here]) and I have no doubt about it. She's also underestimating herself a bit here since she also takes notes for some disabled people in the class, so without really thinking about it, she takes her notes with a little more precaution and is a little more tentative of the information. I still believe her, like I always have, even when she might not.

America's also going to be a Godmother, which is pretty funny since she's not religious, but it's family so it's a bit hard to say no. As cheesy as it is, I'm happy for her (and even if she doesn't really show it, she's a bit excited. I can tell from her voice when she talks about it.). We're cheesy breadsticks :)

And Fuck You Too: School Choices

I've never hidden my love for MetalSucks just because of how ridiculous the website is. Anyways, every article has a little meaningless tag thingy at the top left hand corner (shown below) and my favorite has always been:

So I think I'm going to use it myself as a post title for anything subject, thing or moment that is currently pissing me off from now on.

I don't know what's been up with my mom these last few days, but whatever. I wake up this morning and my mom starts pretty much interrogating me if there is a job market out there. I've lost count of how many times I've had to put up with this crap, especially since she does it every couple of months. It doesn't help that 9/10ths of the people I meet or people who are friends of my parents have never heard of Anthropology and I have to give them the quick rundown of what it is, and then they begin with their shit of: "Are you sure you can get a job studying that?" and "why don't you study to be a doctor?" Because I don't fucking want to be a doctor. I think learning about why we as humans are so culturally different is fucking amazing, amusing and exceptional. I want to get my Ph. D. in Anthropology and if that bugs you well too fucking bad people. Thankfully I've at least got one person who supports my ambitions.

Right now I'm just looking forward to having lunch with my baby and cooling my head off a bit. Also the song below came up in my iTunes (as I'm in the middle of writing a 3 page paper) and I forgot how catchy it was, plus the video is a funny one. Adioso blog

baby, you got me all wrong
and maybe I'm not at all down and out
I'm high and I'm in
don't you know who I am?
I'm the jaded one with pop insensitivity
and when I finish struggling
we can make our way to the dance floor and stand like strangers in an elevator stuck between stories
I always find myself in the middle of your stories
with the camera as a witness I will suffer [x2]
if everything I do is wrong
then by god I'll do it right [x4]
we don't dance, no no no
we got class
no we don't have any fun at all
it's the new style and we know it
we're not stunning
we're just stunned
and we're lying for a living
we're lying for a living[x2]
don't you know who I am?
I'm the real thing with low-key sensibilities
I don't need what I got half as much as everyone covets it
well if loving me is wrong, then god damn you do it right [x2]
it turns us on to turn you down
we're turned on to turn you down

Super tired as I only got a little more than 4 hours of sleep. Calling it a night soon and going to put up a nice post tomorrow about Friday night's Bicycle Collective ride over the mountains. Adios

I still find it a bit funny that 98% of my content on Tumblr is stuff I have to seek out myself. In a way it makes Tumblr more time consuming and not as enjoyable. Most of stuff that my girlfriend and Dennis post is really cool, but besides that, it's just me and the search bar.

Little Things

People always say to enjoy the little things in life. So I am, and yesterday was just another thing to have enjoyed.

Yesterday America and I went to go eat at a buffet since we were both really hungry. It was primarily a Chinese food buffet with other stuff thrown in there (like cheese spinach, which was super delicious). I believe it was half way through our meal (or before but it escapes me at the moment) we decided to go to the "I hate myself" limit and oh man was that shit hilarious. We each had a good five or six plates of food but I remember towards the very end, I was eating cottage cheese and it felt like it no longer fit inside my stomach and the cottage cheese was just stuck in my esophagus. I had to do the unbuckle my belt and the top of my pants hahaha. We went back home and watched Ghost Town during which she fell asleep on my lap :)

Dead Space 3 comes out next week and I can't wait to play it with America. Should be loads of fun since A) I'm going to make her play at night, and B) this is going to be a lot of fun doing co-op.


On a side note, I'm super happy to have gotten Iron Maiden's Powerslave and The Number of the Beast on vinyl :D Somewhere In Time comes out later this month. Can't wait.