Screen Names

Isn't it weird that when we were young all our screen names had azn or lil or swt in them? Like every guy was lilgangstah17 or azianboi8 and every girl was aznbaby6 or swtdoll414? Despite Asians being the most populous people on the planet we somehow all managed to have unique screen names that sounded and looked exactly the same. Scrolling thru my old buddylist (I was aznknite24) I realized that if I sorted them all alphabetically (shout out to excel for training me to automatically sort everything) they would all start with 'A', 'L', 'S', or 'X'. The 'X' were for those that couldn't get the 'AzN' screen name that they wanted and all the subsequent variations of pager code substitutions were taken, so they just added more and more X's at the ends. ie. 'xXAzNBoIXx' or 'xoxoStaRgu12Lxoxo'.

Also, I guess we were all a lot more trusting back then because the numbers at the end of our screen names were without fail, our birthdays. Because face it, at age 13 our birthday was the most important number in our lives. We didn't have anniversaries or deaths of loved ones to worry about, and mom's phone number was just too long to tack onto the end of our screen name. BabYcaKes4438035 just didn't quite flow. Hence I now only remember my friends' birthdays through their screen names. swtdoll414? E-card sent on April 14th. lilmel56? text message sent at midnight May 6th. Count on it. But to the friends that I've made since high school I apologize. I'll never be able to wish you a happy birthday because of our transformation from our baggy pants wearing, Marvel vs. Capcom playing selves to the express 1MX shirt wearing, happy hour going yuppies we are now. Gchat just doesn't quite encourage anything less than our given names. Instead of choosing between 'AzN' and 'swT' it's a '.' or '_'. Even our AIM profiles have been limited to gchat statuses. So as homage to our yesteryears I shall sport 'AzNKniTe24' as my gchat status. At least until it once again reverts to 'Ugh.. need coffee.. hungover...'

Working out

So there's this new craze that’s catching on like wildfire. Half my friends are either on it or talking about getting into it. P90x. Funny thing is… it actually came out a while ago, but didn’t hit my social circle until somebody uploaded it onto the web. I guess we still haven’t abandoned the poor college student mentality of ‘why pay for it when someday it'll be uploaded and you can download it for free?’ (along those lines my own personal culinary maxim still stands strong, ‘the best food is free food.’)

So back to P90x where the ‘X’ stands for extreme! What's the deal with this? Is it really that effective? What makes it so different from all the other "8 Minute Buns of Steel" or “Billy’s Tai Bo to the Max Bootcamp” dvd's? So I checked it out for all of 10 minutes. This includes the stretching and stirring the pot exercises where I thought, ‘Man… I’m like almost halfway done and I haven’t even broken a sweat. My friends are all pansies for saying that this workout is intense!’ Then about 6-7 minutes later the real work out started. Needless to say I didn’t make it all the way through. Sidebar, is it just me or does friggin Tony piss you off? He starts off telling everyone to do some extravagant weight or number of reps and then does two and, ‘gotta check out what everyone’s doing’ and friggin just talks for the rest of the time! Honestly, channeling my anger towards him actually helps me finish the set of 25 that he tells me I should do.

My typical workout:

I’m the kind of guy that goes to work out at the gym and tells himself, ‘I’m gonna do 3 sets of 10’ and about 2/3 of the way thru the second set, decides he’s gonna have to take a 10 min water break before he can finish the last set, knowing full well that as a member of the ADD infused generation born in the eighties, our threshold for walking away from something and actually coming back… all of 2 minutes.

It’s not like I’m lazy in terms of my work out. I just get a little overzealous with what I think I’m capable of. It's probably a result of our Asian mom's brainwashing us to score higher, study harder, and generally be better than we can. Besides, it’s not like any Asian male really works out to get strong. There's always gonna be a black guy that can lift twice as much as you... with one hand. Our muscles are purely for show. Ladies, take heed. We'll open that jar for you no problem (just heat the cap over a stove, and it'll pop right off) But if u need a car pushed outta a ditch. I hope you're a AAA member.

Also, half the time I’m working out I’m just admiring myself in the mirror. Guys, there’s no need to hide it. No need to sneak furtive glances at yourself or pretend to lift up your shirt to wipe your brow when you and everyone around you knows your checking out how your keg->six pack is coming along. I know we’re all ingrained from a young age to be modest but hey. If I’m gonna take time away from watching reruns of Entourage and How I Met Your Mother, I’m gonna be watching something equally as satisfying. Me. Muscles bulging, veins popping, sweat glistening… lifting that awesome 15 pounder as I watch myself in the mirror. Sometimes I pretend like I’m Mr. Incredible and curling a locomotive in each arm. Trust me it helps. So does counting out the number that it actually feels like you’re doing... softly of course... ‘1,240… 5,022… 1,800,003..’

Intro

This blog will be a collection of anecdotes derived from the lives of the people around me and myself. Shenanigans that the boys and I somehow find ourselves in. Some might have a moral... a lesson learned... others.. just plain hilarious. It'll also be a collection of observations and ponderings of the world that we twentysomethings live in. Occasionally I might even dabble in providing advice, but be forewarned, it will probably get you into more trouble than it's worth.