schwag.

The Los Angeles Marathon took place recently on Sunday, March 18, 2012. It consisted of 26 miles and 385 yards (42.195 kilometers for you Europeans out there) of beautiful Los Angeles asphaltic concrete, with a start point at Dodger Stadium and the end point in Santa Monica. Many of my friends ran and finished the grueling race, a feat that I definitely respect. It’s hard enough for me to run 2 miles consecutively (unless I’m chasing a Frisbee) let alone 26 and change. Which is why the Wolfpack Hustle Marathon Crash Race was so appealing.

What little I knew of this (super hip) event came from a friend’s e-mail and the race’s official website (wolfpackhustle.com). As you navigate the website notice how it reads more like an invitation to one of those parties you never went to in college (or maybe you did, I was too busy tossing the ole disc around) or better yet one of those postcards that random people put on your windshield when you’re shopping at the mall (you know, the kind  that advertise car insurance, accident lawyers, full-body condoms, whatever). Basically the Wolfpack Hustle is one of those used-to-be underground things that is now extremely popular, and the original attendees are all like, “what the feck, what’s up with these feckin’ hipsters on their feckin’ fixies. I can’t believe this fecker is riding next to me with his goddamn skinny jeans on. FECK.”

WHAT? YOU’RE TOO LAZY TO GO THROUGH THE WEBSITE AND FIND OUT WHAT THE FECK IT IS? FECKKKKKKK….

The basic idea is this: at 3AM before the marathon starts, everyone congregates near the start point and bikes the route. It’s an actual race, and the winner gets schwag.

Yes, that’s it.

As I fairly recently got a new bike I decided that this could be quite a fun adventure! I mean, the idea of biking through the streets of LA without having to worry about getting creamed by an SUV seemed very appealing. Plus the registration was completely optional and free as well. HOW COULD I LOSE? So I ended up registering and paying (hey, I wanted a shirt OHK?). I was told that I could pick up my race number and shirt the afternoon before the race. This meant going to a random art gallery at 1PM on Melrose on Saturday, which seemed reasonable mainly because I had no idea what to expect. Little did I know what I was about to get myself into…

I didn’t really think too much of the race as it approached due to my short attention span (not to mention studying for engineering exams and new job and laziness), but soon enough the day came to pick up my schwag. The fact that I had already committed money was a good motivator to actually go through with the madness. I put down my books and took a drive down to Melrose. After dealing with the obnoxious Hollywood traffic, I parked my car and put an hour of time into the meter thinking that I was being overly-conservative, but hey, parking tickets suck (especially in LA). The large group of obnoxious (more obnoxious than the traffic) teenagers riding fixies storming down Melrose like some uber-fluorescent army of goobers should have tipped me off into what exactly the Wolfpack Hustle would be like. I actually didn’t think too much about the kids until I found the line to pick up schwag. As I had gotten there at 12:45 PM, and the line technically wasn’t supposed to open until 1:00 PM, I thought I had a good spot (I was about 30th in line). “Sweet,” I thought to myself, “I totally put enough time in the meter. I’m so smart. WHOA WHAT THE FUUUUUUUU?” To my surprise another group of highschoolers had arrived, led by a short and stocky asian hipster man with a bad peach fuzz going on. The reason for my surprise was that he was SCREAMING at his companion. I believe the argument had to do with someone leaving someone else behind, and the second someone had a flat, and HEY YOU’RE A B*TCH FOR LEAVING ME, I WOULD HAVE STAYED FOR YOU (real mature, I know).

This slap fight went on for a while until some scrawny awkward kid put a stop to it but uttering non-sensical babble and splitting the two apart. I was relieved to be in silence, and surprised that 50 people had lined up behind me. I was even more surprised when the high school kids in front of me pulled out a pipe and started smoking marijuana. Now don’t get me wrong, I wasn’t judging them or anything. I think it’s perfectly fine to do that sort of thing in the privacy of your own home. I even think it’s fine to do it discretely in public. I DO find it annoying when the kids made a big show of it, pretending to want to hide it from the rest of the line, and doing that thing that kids do when they want attention, but also want to seem like the don’t want the attention. I made awkward eye contact with the middle aged asian lady behind me in line (she was accompanying her son) and gave a slight shrug. I resigned myself to the fate of standing behind 15 or so goober kids for a bit. I mean, I was a kid too once, I guess.

Registration

HOURS PASSED BY. Yes, hours. Well, more like 2.5 hours. My main concern was the potential ticket that I would find on my car when I got back. There was a point when I considered ditching the line and running back to my car, but I was too proud. I had already put up with these stupid kids and I wanted my time there to mean something, ANYTHING. Finally at 330PM the door opened and they started letting people in, 5 at a time. I was ecstatic to actually be moving, and even more happy when I was at the front of the line. I swiftly ran to the available helper lady, gave her my e-mail, and picked up my schwag. As I ran out of the room I looked at my number and shirt, grateful to myself that I had perservered through the THC-ridden masses, but also mortified that I may have to pay the city for the parking ticket that may or may not be on my car. I power-walked the block and half back to my car, taking care to analyze the demographic of the line (there were 250 people in line!) and to my (not so) surprise it included a fair amount of annoying looking high school kids, but a lot of normal people too. What is normal anyway?

About 20 yards from my car my heart rejoiced, NO TICKET! I unlocked my car and jumped in, happy that I had cheated the system and happy that I had my schwag. I also was a little dizzy. And hungry. MMmmmm snacks…I immediately instagrammed my schwag to let the world know that I too was cool. I, too, stood among the smelly and acne-ridden masses. I, too, would get up at 2 in the morning to bike the LA marathon path. It’s a good thing my bike had gears (plural).

to be continued…

I promise not to lead off with a long-winded rooster backstory.

So, I got a new job in Downtown LA! It was sad to leave the office where I spent 4 years of my adult life, but I really felt it was a good time to move on. I worked (probably) harder in the last two weeks because I wanted to leave on a good note and not burn any bridges (*wink). The final week at this company is where I begin my story…

Wednesday, February 29. You may know that this date held special significance, and I’m not just talking about all that Leap Year madness. By the way, if you’re one of those people who thinks that it’s cute to pretend that you’re 6 when you’re actually 24 or something, let it be known that I think you’re a goober. A huge goober. Anyway, Disneyland had its own way to celebrate this somewhat special (but not really) holiday. They decided to keep the park open for 24 straight hours, from 6AM to 6AM. Just to clarify, 6AM on Wednesday is when it opened, to be closed 6AM Thursday morning.

As a season pass owner (what can I say, I’m all about nostalgia) the idea of being at the park for 24 straight hours was somewhat appealing at first. You can probably imagine my thought process: “WHAT A BLOG POST THAT’LL BE! and PEOPLE WILL THINK THAT IT’S CRAZY AND I ENJOY BEING FAIRLY CRAZY!” (Un)fortunately I still had job responsibilities so I couldn’t spend all day at Disneyland, but my boss (we’ll call him Mo) and my roommate (let’s call him Stig) decided to go Wednesday night after work. Being the cynical person that I am I immediately started complaining about how crowded the damn park would be at 7PM. Well, we decided it would be ohk since our main objective wasn’t to ride the rides but to eat the delicious barbeque at the Big Thunder Ranch BBQ restaurant. IT’LL ALL BE FINE, RIGHT? or so we thought.

Driving down the accursed 5 freeway to the park, we could already tell that it was going to be anarchy. Well actually we couldn’t since the 5 is always so jam packed anyway, but I guess there was just something in the air that suggested that we were about to get pwned. We arrived at the park and as I had assumed, it was F*CKING crowded, like not crowded in a “I can tolerate this because I spent hundreds of dollars on my whole family’s tickets and let’s make the best of it” sort of way, but rather in a “I cannot believe I got married and had kids and now I have to go through this I wish I could go back in time and start a rock band instead” sort of way. Well I decided to keep hope alive in my heart, hope that I would get to taste the delicious bbq to save me from the misery of taking 4 inch steps everywhere to avoid stepping on goober high school kids’ ironically colored Chuck’s.

I cannot even begin to express the disappointment I felt when, upon arriving at Big Thunder BBQ, I saw a line of a bajillion people sitting outside. “No. No. This can’t be happening” I thought to myself. Lo and behold, when we walked up to the hostesses we were told that they were not accepting new guests because the wait in line was 2 hours long, and the restaurant supposedly closed in 1.5 hours. As I walked away from them I felt my spirit sink into the ground, the hollow hollow ground. BBQ NOOOOOO…

We decided to make the best of it and got some food at another restaurant. After walking around and determining that every line was several hours long we decided to just leave. That’s when the bet was born. Basically I was convinced that A) Stig would not want to return to Disneyland at 4AM and B) if we did return, it would still be uber crowded. The smack talk continued until we got home and immediately went to sleep (this was around 10PM). The plan was to sleep for 4 hours until 2AM or so, then go back to Disneyland until it closed at 6AM, then go straight to work. CRAZY? Perhaps. So after rapidly falling asleep I woke up to my alarm at 2:30 AM. I heard a knock on the door and Stig asked if I still wanted to go. HELL YEAHHHH! A quick shower, then dappering up for work, then driving at freakin’ 3AM to Disneyland. We arrived around 4AM or so and guess what, it was still freakin’ crowded, although not as badly as it was 8 hours earlier. We rode Buzz Lightyear (15 minute wait) and Star Tours (60 minute wait). Here’s a picture of us on Buzz Lightyear. Look how happy we are!

Please take note of the score. Thank you.

After Star Tours it was pretty much 6AM so it was time to leave. The drive to the office was terrible, as I remember staring blankly out the window and wondering WHYYYYYY. Meh it was worth it. It was worth it until that night (Thursday Night). I had previously coordinated an outing with the office since it was my last week there. I couldn’t go out on Friday night with them because of something I will talk about later. So you can probably guess that Thursday I felt like a zombie but still had craploads to do. After powering through the night began at the Griffin in hipsterville Atwater Village. Still reeling from my Disney experience I thought that I would try my best to not pass out. Well, the one thing you should know is that when you’re with a large group of men, and the group exists because you are leaving the company, you are going to drink a lot of shots. I don’t remember how many drinks I had exactly, nor do I remember how I got home that night. Well I do know, you know, but not many specific details pop up in my head about it. I woke up in the middle of the night alone in my bed and I remember thinking: “Crap, I have to drive to Vegas tonight,” which brings me to the next part of the story.

So this weekend happened to be Trouble in Vegas, an ultimate frisbee tournament I’ve been going to every year for a while. This year our team was a Co-Ed team called Uber Goober, and I would be driving to Vegas with 4 other teammates. Luckily in the middle of the night I had pounded a can or two of V8, which to me is the ultimate hangover cure. I remember walking into the office Friday morning and hearing, “Oh hey! You’re alive!” and “Whoooaa look who it is!” The last day there was definitely a sad one. I had so many memories (both happy and sad) and learned so much (about work and not about work) and I truly was sad to leave. My parting gift to the office was a round of McDonald’s breakfast. And then, goodbyes.

The drive to Vegas was long, but fun, with stops at Baker for Alien Jerky (of course). I had my heart set on getting Earl of Sandwich in Planet Hollywood (where our team was strategically staying) but we ended up getting buffet on the first night. As this blog post is pretty long, I’ll end it here and just say that partying and playing ultimate for two days after the whole Disneyland thing and passing out thing was pretty brutal but worthwhile.

Thanks to everyone at VCA for making my last days there memorable and exciting. Thanks to Uber Goober for being awesome. Thanks to MMRG for getting me home safely. Thanks to BN and EH for being great friends. Thanks Mom & Dad & Len for being awesome.

Whoa when did this post get so sentimental?

Ohk last thing: I look at the middle initial on my e-mail signatures and business cards and I will always think of you. Thanks,

Once upon a time there was a rooster. This particular rooster (who shall remain nameless for now) came from a rough background. Growing up, he was teased by the other roosters. Mostly they called him a goober and made fun of his general n00bishness. Around the mid-90s he got fed up with this lifestyle of constant harassment and decided to make a run for it. “Los Angeles,” he thought, “that’s where I’ll make a stand. That’s where I’ll be able to live a new life!”

After saving up money working at his job at the local Krispy Kreme the rooster packed up his belongings in one of those cliche sacks made out of a broom handle and a large handkerchief and hitchhiked his way across the country until he made his way to LA.

The rooster was right about living a new life. Unfortunately that life consisted of drugs, alcohol, and (consensual) sex. Months and months passed by, until one day the rooster woke up next to a really ugly chicken next to needles filled with HGH. This is when he realized that despite his new surroundings he did not have a better life. He decided to take a stroll around LA to work out what to do next. His musings led him to Atwater Village (coincidentally where I grew up!)

OHK, at this point you may be thinking to yourself: Ed, WTF. WTF is this dumb-ass BS. Well I’m about to tell you about a rooster that my dad found in our backyard and I wanted to make up a backstory for him OK?? Geez, now is it making sense? I SURE HOPE SO.

So my dad found a rooster in the backyard one day. Weird right? I thought so too at the time (I think I was 12 or something). My cousins were around too, and little did we know that the rooster was about to lead my dad on a merry chase. Reminiscent of that Rocky scene where Rocky is chasing the chickens to train for Apollo Creed, my dad was chasing this stupid rooster around our backyard. I distinctly remember when my dad climbed the five foot tall CMU (concrete masonry unit, yay Civil Engineering!) wall to reach the rooster who had glided up there. Eventually after some chasing time my dad finally caught this bad boy. I was ecstatic! Why was I so happy? ‘Cause I wanted to keep this little guy as a pet, obvs.

My cousin’s decided to name him Yakko (or Wakko? I actually don’t really remember.) We kept him in my garage so that he wouldn’t get back into the drug habit. Guess what we fed him? The obvious answer is Captain Crunch because that stuff is mostly corn, right? Being a child I was pretty stupid, and I remember thinking that I couldn’t wait for it to have kids. Maybe I didn’t think that actually, but it’s pretty to funny to think that a 12 year old boy would believe in asexual roosters.

After a couple of weeks the rooster had crapped all over the place, and throwing Captain Crunch at it had lost its appeal (apparently). I think what happened to Yakko/Wakko was that my parents gave it to some old Filipino lady who lived nearby. FOR WHAT PURPOSE you ask? Well I would like to think that as a child I imagined that Yakko/Wakko would be living a better life, one devoid of any negative influences so that he could grow up to become one of those mature fighting roosters that weird people meet in back alleys to gamble and get caught by the police. No, this lady actually ate him. SO SAD.

So now every time I see a completely random rooster in my backyard I think of my rooster and how he’s in a better place. Ohk fine, I’ve never seen another rooster in a non-farm environment, but to this day I still sometimes sit and think about how the hell this silly rooster got in my backyard.

First of all, Happy New Year! 2012′s looking to be pretty sweet, judging from the amount of baking and crocheting i’ve been doing…i mean hunting and uh…yeah. manly.

Moving on, something i also want to announce is that my dear friend and cousin Lorenz got engaged to his girlfriend of 923404123 years! This event is something that the whole family has been looking forward to, and I’ve been wondering for a while when it would happen. So this leads me to Thanksgiving 2010:

Every Thanksgiving my family meets up at one of the uncle’s houses for food, socializing, and gambling (mah jong). It’s one of those typical family traditions that has evolved (at least for the kids) from shooting each other with nerf guns while hiding behind forts made out of couch cushions (when I was a young) to taking shots of Jack Daniels and playing beer pong (present day). In spite of these changes, there are some things that will never change.

I have a certain uncle who’s family is perpetually living in what is commonly known as “Filipino time”, which is actually also blatantly similar to “ultimate frisbee time”. In a nutshell, if someone who lives in this alternate time reality is told to show up to a social gathering at 3PM, it is almost certain that this person will show up at 4, or even 5PM. In most cases this isn’t a super big deal, but when certain announcements pertaining to certain relationships need to be addressed it becomes an issue.

Remember that right now I’m talking about Thanksgiving 2010, two years ago. The Thanksgiving feast was to be at Lorenz’s place. Luckily for me that’s not too far, but for (we’ll call him Uncle Harry) Uncle Harry and his family it’s a bit far, but not too far. I had committed to showing up around noon, and I usually make an effort to be punctual, especially when there’s delicious food on the line. I arrived at Lorenz’s a little bit earlier in order to survey the food and map out a plan of attack (lumpia first? or maybe pancit? OR BOTH?!). I like joking around with members of my family about other members of my family (sounds like gossiping but it really isn’t) and I took no exception this time. I remember joking about how Uncle Harry would probably be several hours late since of the whole time paradox thing. Lorenz informed me of his ingenious scheme to get them to come on time. This plan involved the exploitation of his relationship with his girlfriend, and the family’s expectations regarding this relationship. He basically told Uncle Harry that he wanted to “make an announcement” at noon, so it would be favorable if the family arrived to the Thanksgiving meal on time. Lo and behold, Uncle Harry and family come strolling in, several minutes early! Surprise, surprise! I don’t remember if Lorenz actually had an announcement or what, but hey, it worked, didn’t it?

OK, fast forward to Thanksgiving 2011. This time the feast would take place at Uncle Harry’s house, which is as I mentioned earlier a little far away. I was driving solo (a couple of minutes late, woops) and I started getting many calls from various family members. I hastily checked them as I was driving (safely, of course) and everyone was asking where i was. (“Edgaaaard? Where are you????”) I didn’t think too much of it at first until I had gotten several stressful messages. I didn’t think too much of it and pressed on, a little anxious but not concerned.

When I opened the doors to Uncle Harry’s house I noticed that there was a large group of people there I didn’t recognize at first. What? Lorenz’s girlfriend’s family? That’s odd. I walked into the kitchen and was greeted with many a “Oh there you are!”, “Finally!”, and “Where have you been?” I was a bit confused but grateful that SO MANY PEOPLE were glad to see me…yeah. I figured everyone was hungry or something, so I was happy to see that the blessing of the food was about to start.

After a long prayer (my uncle Harry is known for his well-thought out and uhhh…lengthy prayers) Lorenz stepped forward and called everyone’s attention. He then announced that he PROPOSED THAT MORNING! Are you kidding me? Of course everyone burst out into exclamations of CONGRATS and WAY TO GO, and I was ecstatic. Seriously, I’ve been waiting for it for a while. I then called everyone’s attention to myself and talked about how Lorenz, his brother, and I have been in a “race” to see who would get married first, and I was glad to lose. Funny right? HAHA. Well I thought it was, but the rest of the day led me to believe that my family took it another way.

And here’s where more expectation leads to hilarity. Basically for the rest of my time at Uncle Harry’s certain family members would approach me, take me aside, and give me life advice regarding relationships. Here’s an example conversation with my aunt. We’ll call her Auntie A:

Auntie A: Hey Edgard! How’s everything?
Ed: I’m good. (I’m munching on some lumpia) I’m just glad to be eating something that isn’t dog food.
Auntie A: Ay! Don’t say that!
Ed: Seriously. Well no, not seriously, but yeah, this food is good!
Auntie A: So Lorenz is finally engaged huh?
Ed: Yep. (I know where this is going)
Auntie A: I wonder who’s next (she mentally nudges me on the side with her elbow)
Ed: I’m not sure, but I can tell you one thing, it’s not going to be me! Never ever ever. I think i’m going to become a hermit. Like a mountain hermit. In the mountains.
Auntie A: Ay! Don’t say that!
Ed: ::chewing on food::
Auntie A: Well Edgard, let me tell you something. You can’t rush these things. Seriously! One day it will happen, you just need to let it happen. Don’t worry!
Ed: (I nearly spit my food all over her) Uhh…wait. Are you telling me not to worry? I’m not worried, it seems like YOU’RE WORRIED!
Auntie A: Well, just remember what I said. You don’t want to grow up to be an old maid.
Ed: ……

So I had this type of conversation a lot that day. I wasn’t annoyed or anything, I was amused for the most part. Although I did have to go back in my mind to Lorenz’s announcement. I mean, did my face contort in such a way to indicated worry? Or was my family just assuming they would know how I felt? Anyway, I love my family and I’m glad that they care about my marital status (or lack thereof).

Oh, and all of this madness made Christmas that much more exciting.

Seriously though, congratulations to Lorenz and Kat! Good luck with everything, I’ll be here for you guys always! Unless I’m in my hermit cave.

As I sit  on the edge of my couch, leaning on the piano seat that I’m currently using as a desk/keyboard holder, I’m thinking about the silly things that I’ve noticed recently about people just asking as…people. Here’s a silly one:

Guys peeing in public restrooms/places:
There’s an unspoken but widely understood rule amongst dudes in public restrooms that if there’s a whole row of stalls and there happens to be one guy doing his business, you aren’t allowed to use either adjacent stall. It’s just not cool. I can’t tell you why it’s not but it just is. I also feel like the furthest available stall from the guy already peeing is also off-limits because you don’t want him to know that you’re trying to avoid him. I mean, you don’t want to hurt his feelings or anything. But hey, I don’t make the rules. Here’s a diagram to help explain:

 

Anyway the main reason I brought all this up in the first place is because I remembered a certain hilarious occurrence during a party. This was last January during an ultimate frisbee party in Hawai’i (wow it’s been almost a year already!). So the party was taking place on the edge of the fields under a very large tent. The porta-potties were quite a distance away (a whole 2 minute walk!) so most guys were just walking up an adjacent hill to pee in the bushes while shrouded in the darkness, with only the moonlight to use to make sure you weren’t peeing on a coconut or something.

Throughout the night I had to pee like 12 times because my bladder sucks, so I made the mini-hike up the pee hill quite a bit. The 13th time I noticed my friend laughing at the urinators. At this particular time there were 7 guys peeing at once into this damn bush. Here’s another diagram illustrating why my friend and I burst into laughter: