sex warehouse

I spent a few days before New Year's Day at Rehoboth Beach with several friends and had a great time. I was taking a picture of the ocean when this couple walked in front of me to become my new subjects. I loved the fur coat she was wearing (although I had to supress my desire to yell, "Fur is murder!"), and he looked like he was straight out of "The Sopranos." Happy New Year!!!

My friend Mike found these beans in his parents' kitchen. It made me laugh.

Bimbo enough or not!!!

I had on these super long acrylic nails that were super hard, and Mike tossed me on the bed (he insist that I clarify he was not being violent but just fun-loving) and I had my hands underneath me, so the nail was bent inwards and since it was so hard, it didn't break at the white part, but cracked neatly down the middle of the PINK part!!!

Damn fucking painful la!!!

Mike kept apologizing and telling me it's not a permanent damage because he had his own fingernails torn off before numerous times...

Eh, apparently he worked at this factory or something where he had to carry super heavy cardboard boxes and whenever his grip slipped and the boxes dropped, his whole fingernails would come right off.

NASTY!!!!

Damn gross la!!!

So anyway, I cut off the acrylic tips and so now, I still have two parts of a fingernail on my nail bed!!!

I DON'T UNDERSTAND!!

What's going to happen? Is the top pink nail part going to eventually grow out and drop out?

How come when a nail grows out it gets STUCK to your nail bed until it decides not to, and becomes white? When a fingernail gets completely torn out, how does the nail bed that's normally covered feel like?

WHAT WILL HAPPEN IF YOU PUT A PIECE OF SCOTCHTAPE ON TOP OF THE PLUSHY PINK FLESH WHILE THE NAIL GROWS OUT?? Then the pink part will be very small??

It's all very confusing to me!!!

Anyway, it's freezing cold here in Dallas!! It was minus zero last night!!! It seems inconceivable to me how heat can escape so damn fast.... I've haven't felt hot in 3 weeks lor! Well except when I shower.

But it's really nice that for a change, there are COMPLETELY ZERO insects (feels almost orgasmic to not have cockroaches and lizards - fucking hate them), and chips don't go soft after half an hour of being left open.

I'm coming back to Singapore on the 2nd though!

I'm gonna eat... Ding tai feng's crab roe xiao long baos, and sambal kangkong... lots of veggies (my shit's very hard here coz people don't eat so much fibre), and also crates and crates of Heaven and Earth Gui Hua tea (OSMANTHUS!! Or however it is spelt!!) and Pokka Green tea!!

I also bought a shitload of sleeping pills and appetite suppressants!! Need to get prescriptions for those in Singapore... Woooo!!!

I AM GOING TO BE A SKINNY SKINNY BLOGGER!! I'm gonna be SO skinny, instead of calling me, "You know, Xiaxue, the rude/short/controversial/funny blogger", I'd be known as That Skinny Blogger. AWESOME!

I'm super going to miss US shopping lor!! Things are really cheap here (in Texas - apparently in NYC it's damn ex. Stupid), especially considering the quality and trendiness of stuff... For example, I bought a pair of chunky Steve Madden heels that's fuckkkkkkkking chio on 80% discount... $12 USD!! ($16.80 Sing)

Unfortunately they only came in size 7 and above, so I bought a pair for Shuyin and a size 7 one for me (normally I wear 4/5). I don't care if it's damn big lor I'm going to stuff tissue at the front! Well if I can't wear them I'd give them to a delighted Qihua.

In fact, I bought so much stuff that I had to buy an extra suitcase for them!! The "extra suitcase" is SATIN PINK WITH BROWN POLKA DOTS... for $29.90 USD! Freaking cheap lor for such a chio suitcase!

I can't care if nobody cares about my shopping, this is my blog and I wanna record my thoughts and my thoughts right now is about shopping! Well, besides the OTHER thought which is a sense of resentment towards irritating blog readers.

People are fucking annoying lor, people are constantly telling me that I am not as interesting anymore - which would only serve to make me very wary and obviously even less interesting.

So, I've decided I'd stop reading/allowing comments until I feel like my blog readers are all nice and approving people again! Sounds good? Yeah? Yeah??! I did think so!

Back to shopping! I spent maybe a grand total of like 6 hours (over 3 days) scouring through the SALE section of Forever 21, where all the summer clothes were piled, unwanted and unloved, into discount racks - $2.99 and up, $3.99 and up, $7.99 and up.

I had so much clothes in my arms that I had to toss them on the floor while I search for more!! The very sad thing is, the sucky Forever 21 in Singapore is CONSTANTLY sold out on SMALL and XS sizes, so sometimes I end up buying Mediums and wearing them loose... AND I SAW THE CLOTHES I BOUGHT IN SINGAPORE, SIZE S, SELLING FOR $3.99!! Super angry lor!!

In US, the least popular size is S! Bu hui happy!

If you are the Singapore Forever 21 owner, CAN YOU PLEASE TAKE IN MORE S SIZES AND NOT SO MANY OF Ls??! For goodness sake! You can't do this to your loyal customers! You make us see a nice design, and then we fucking can't wear it! What's your problem!!? (Also if you could sponsor me clothes, I'd be happy to wear them on this blog for you. *winks* :D)

I'm going to take photos of all my shopping when I reach home, and hao lian in them in minute detailS to everyone. MUAHAHAHA!!!

Ok I shall end this boring blog entry now and go watch US TV. Cable here is awesome! They are showing this show called A Shot At Love With Tila Tequila.



It's apparently this show about Tila Tequila, the most popular Myspace user, and her quest to find love.

But this is not your usual Bachelorette show... BECAUSE TILA IS BISEXUAL!!

Get to see lesbian action on TV lor! I don't think it'd be approved on Singapore TV, EVER.

But I just like the show coz Tila wears the chioest slutty clothes!! And I don't get how Tila can get blonde hair as an Asian (she's Vietnamese and stayed in Singapore till she was 1!) and still look so good! (although sometimes I think she looks like an alien).

Oh well. Love ya all!!! BYYEEE!

This guy is one of my favorite regulars on 14th Street in DC. I am still trying to figure him out and could use some help with the caption. Any ideas?

More pictures from Mike and Chris in the Middle East. This time from Jordan and Turkey. These pictures make me want to go there soon.

My friend Daren saw this Hummer while driving in South Carolina. It was decorated with Christmas lights, and if you look closely, you can see a full nativity scene attached to the bumper on the back. I think it has to be the most ridiculous thing I have ever seen.

I think they should ship these kids to the Middle East and have them sing on the border between Israel and the occupied territories and I bet you we would have peace in a hurry. But only if they bring the beach balls.

I felt horrible after my first night in my old bedroom at my parent's house. My head was completely clogged, my eyes were itchy and dry, I was sneezing, and had trouble breathing. I thought I was coming down with the flu until I looked up at the ceiling and saw two small patches of black mold growing. Great. The next night, I slept in the mildew-ridden basement with my old stuffed animals at the foot of the bed.

To my left was my mother's rollator that she used to get around the house after breaking her back following knee replacement surgery (she is doing much better and has lost several pounds). I gave it a spin around the basement a few times and was impressed that you can use it as a chair and/or a walker.

To my right was the stuffed chicken hawk that my Dad shot in Wyoming. That bird used to scare me to death when I was a kid. I thought the thing was going to come back to life and attack me like in an episode of Scooby Doo. You can also see one of my mom's creepy dolls, sitting on a white pillow and the unstable shelf hanging on the wall that I made in my high school shop class, holding her bell collection. She collects everything, nothing has been thrown away in that house for 50 years. Even things that don't work anymore and clothes she doesn't wear.

This is a relatively new addition in the last few years, and I don't understand it at all. A bird cage made of yarn with a fake bird hanging upside down like it is dead. Are you kidding me?

But the piece de resistance in the basement has got to be my Dad's trap shoot trophies. He used to be on a team at his factory and they would shoot every Sunday afternoon, sometimes to practice and sometimes for competitions. I would anxiously await his return home after competitions to see what design, color, and size trophy would be placed on the shelf. Now they sit in a dark, smelly, wet basement.

I was shocked to see how grown up my nephew looked this year at Christmas. He was much taller and his voice had changed. It is an amazing transition, having not seen him since February. He reminds me physically of my brother, but with my sense of showmanship.

Wow. The amazing Jeffro Smull of the amazing Missile Toe (see them Friday at the Davenport in Parma, Ohio) and the even more amazing CD TRUTH (see them again... when, Jeffro?) and, of course, 0DFx just sent me an MP3 of a rough mix of one of the songs 0DFx recorded in November. And here it is:

Go Blue Go Die!

For the story of how this song came into being lookee here:



The song was first performed by 0DFx when Johnny Phlegm played bass and then ownership was transfered to Agitated when Johnny joined that band. I don't think we did this song in 0DFx when I was in the band. But, as you can see in the video, I served as bassist for Agitated in 2005. The hardcore punk scene in Akron was a very incestuous place.

The new version, by the way, is the very first instance of a hardcore band ever having a modulation in a song. We're hoping to get this out on a CD next year along with several new 0DFx songs and remakes of all your old favorites.

Gosh dang, but there's some activity going on in the comments section of my latest Suicide Girls article. Here I go insulting Christians and Jews and Jolly Old Saint Nick*, yet who pipes in loudest to defend their faith but the atheists! It's pretty funny.

I have some thoughts on the subject and maybe I'll write them down one of these days. But I really feel like atheists behave in exactly the same way as any other religion. Sure there's no church of atheism and there's no agreed upon set of dogma or holy books (though there does seem to be an emerging general consensus on those matters) but when you see folks rushing to defend their faith the moment it even appears to have been insulted you know you're dealing with a religion. To me, religion is a state of mind that includes, among other things, the impulse to attack anyone who questions your faith.

Anyway, whatever. Like I give a shit.

Oh! My sister wanted me to point out that it was she who gave me the KISS DVD and not Santa (although the tag on the present said "from Donner") and that Skylar only just gave up on her belief in Santa this year.

Peace out!


* Actually, I don't think I insulted any of these things or even insulted atheists. Which makes me feel even more strongly about the knee-jerk reaction certain atheists had to the piece.

This is how I remember my father growing up. Always outside in his garden, burning something; sticks, trash, cardboard boxes, (etc.) Whenever I wanted something from him, I would usually wait until he went to his garden to ask. My odds of getting what I wanted shot up dramatically. He is always in a better mood in his garden, away from the rest of the world.

Happy Christmas, everybody! Today's musical offering is a number I like to call:

Snow Is Falling

This was Dimentia 13's contribution to Midnight Records' annual Christmas album in 1987. I think it was '87. That's the cover there to your left. I did another one of these the year before called "Christmas Comes to Those Who Wait." This song (Snow is Falling) is pretty cheezy, actually. The idea was for each band's contribution to act as a demonstration of what was on the band's records. So this song attempts to mash together all the various psychedelic stylings on offer on the first two Dimentia 13 LPs.

The Sanskrit section is an invocation for opening the Bhagavad Gita. I found it in a Hare Krishna book. The lyrics are supposed to be self-parody, but they're still embarrassing. I like the ending, though. Nice fake raga guitar.

We're all supposed to go out and see Alien Vs. Predator this afternoon. Woo-hoo! And I'm supposed to cook the traditional Warner Family Christmas Tempura. We'll see how that turns out.

Got a new article up on Suicide Girls yesterday. This will be my final bi-weekly article, it seems. From January they're making all the columnists once-a-month. Like the cramps. So any of you who want me to contribute excess writings to your blogs and suchlike, let me know. Especially if it pays.

I got the new KISS DVD, by the way. Thank you Santa!

Merry Christmas from the Eby's. Although the picture kinda looks Rockwellian, believe me, the atmosphere is not. Christmas lunch consisted of ham, mashed potatoes and gravy, and green bean casserole. But the way my mother acted all morning, huffing and puffing, talking about how exhausting cooking Christmas "supper" was, you would have thought the menu would have been more extensive.

Becca did not really care about Christmas lunch. All she wanted to do was play games and open her presents. I have a special bond with Becca, because I understand the way she thinks.

Adam and Carmen are the oldest and are polar opposites. Adam is loud, social, and a ham, while Carmen is quiet, introspective, and does anything to avoid the spotlight. They balance each other nicely.

Then, there is my mom and dad, or as I like to call them, Ken and Shirl. They are a piece of work. For example, when I came home, there was a huge floral centerpiece on the dining room table. I thought it was odd, because my dad would never spend money on something like that. I looked at the card, and it was addressed to the neighbors across the street. Apparently, the neighbors were not home when the UPS truck came, so my mom yelled to the driver that she would take it for them. When the "neighbor boy" called that he was coming over to take the centerpiece, my mom jumped up off her chair and grabbed the flowers, wrapped them in plastic, and stuffed them back in the box while my dad "distracted" the neighbor boy. Happy Holidays!!!

I have been back in Wakarusa for all of ten minutes for the holidays and my parents are already driving me crazy. There are so many stories to share but no Internet connection to share them so I am typing this from my IPhone and it is not fun. But, I did want to share that they have a new dog named Babe that hates me. She won't let me near her, she hides under the car, and when I tried to give her a treat, she refused. Every time I went to grab her, my dad said, "Quick as a cricket that one is," which I found charming. I am here for another 24 hours and I will win Babe over if it is the last thing I do.

Admit it. This is how we all deal, being home with our parents for the holidays.

Huckabee scares the bejesus out of me because of his beliefs, but man he is a brilliant politician. His latest coup, going pheasant hunting in Iowa and threatening to shoot any caucus-goer who doesn't vote for him.

I absolutely loved this movie. If you don't like musicals in general, then you will probably not enjoy Sweeney Todd. But if you want to hear the best music written in the past 40 years, and see some of the best art direction ever captured on film, and watch two amazing performances from Johnny Depp and Helena Bonham Carter, then you must see this film. Even if you typical don't like musicals, but love horror films (blood and gore shooting all over the place) you should give Sweeney Todd a try. It is simply the best musical ever written.

I'm down here in Knoxville now where I recently starred on an episode of my niece's YouTube TV show. Here it is:



And here's an outtake:



Her name is Skylar and she's 11. You can find more episodes of Skylar's show at her website. It's freaky to see an 11 year old doing stuff on her website that I can't figure out. We didn't have no websites when I was that age. She wrote the script for this, by the way. I just read what she wrote for me. Pretty good, I think. Note the you-really-are-an-idiot look she gives me at the end.

Ryan Lochte is working his way up to be my new favorite US swimmer. He and Michael Phelps are neck and neck for Gold Medals and my affection. Either will do nicely.

Watching this made me wonder how many Disney characters might have started as a penis or vagina. Pretty amazing...

Xiaxue's Guide to Life

I'm sitting here next to the men's room at the Las Vegas airport enjoying their free, but pretty sluggish Internet service. I may be too far from the hub to pick up the signal well. But this was the nearest place to my gate where I could find an electrical outlet. The Internet service at LAX is one of those you gotta pay $10 to use, so I never do. I suppose Las Vegas supports their free Internets with gambling and prostitution. But it's not like LA doesn't have plenty of money.

I'm waiting here to take a plane to Dallas, where my dad lives and then, from there drive with him to Knoxville where my sister lives. I'll be in Knoxville for about a week, then back to Dallas for a night, to LA for another night and then up to Tassajara for a few days R & R. Since none of the people who begged me to stay in LA offered me a place to crash while I'll be homeless for several days in between moves, I may stay up in San Francisco for the first week of Twenty-ought-eight.

Does anyone out there know Macs well? Since two days ago, my "Mail" program refuses to pick up about 90% of my mail. Not all of it, mind you. Just most of it. If I go to my .mac account on-line I'll have, say 12 messages. When I go to "Mail" I have, like 3 messages. The 3 that appear in "Mail" do not appear on-line, while the 12 that appear on-line do not show up in "Mail." This is becoming a huge problem. Guess I'll have to try one of them Apple Stores, but I doubt they have 'em in Knoxville. I tried checking my Preferences to see what's up there. But I didn't see anything wrong.

Also, thanks for the Bukowski poems. I'd never read him. He's pretty great, though. I'll have to read some more of his stuff. Plus he lived in Southern California. Maybe sane people do live there after all. Maybe I won't regret sticking around a little longer.

As for the vows of poverty taken by Buddhist monks, God I hate to burst people's bubbles (actually I love to), but here's what I've seen of this. Yes it's true that if you enter a Zen monastery in Japan you are allowed only the clothes you wear plus what you can fit in two back-pack sized things that are strapped to your shoulders, one hanging in front of your chest and the other on your back. The things inside these are strictly regulated. You can't just choose what you want. I don't know the list, but I know you get your three bowls, a razor, some underwear, maybe a toothbrush, your bedding and that's about it.

While you're at the monastery these are all you're allowed to possess. And you live on a square of tatami mat. All true. But, see, the thing is nobody lives their whole life like this anymore. It's like boot camp. You endure this for a period of several months and then go back home where your TV and DVD player, your PS3, your black leather pants and all the rest of it have been lovingly stored by mom and dad. Plus I have never been to a temple that didn't have all that kinda stuff and more for the monks and caretakers who lived there.

There may be countries where the poverty vows are taken more strictly than they are in Japan. But I kinda doubt it. My understanding of what goes on in Thailand, Tibet, China and Korea is that it's pretty much the same deal.

The training I had from Tim and from Nishijima Sensei just ignored the whole boot camp stuff and tried to instill a more evenly spread out habit of living less extravagantly. Still, as you've seen from my eBay auctions, I managed to amass a nice collection of junk. But, again, I don't know of a single Buddhist monk who doesn't have some similar vice. The difference is that their vices tend to be pretty modest. Tim's was a big collection of horror movies on VHS (don't know if he still has those). Nishijima lives amazingly modestly but he has a fairly extensive library of philosophy both Western and Eastern. Apparently Shunryu Suzuki had lots of pottery stuff.

In moving house recently I had to discard a whole lot of junk. It's absolutely incredible how much a person can acquire in a short time. But we live in a capitalist consumer-based economy. It is part of our duty to society, I think, to participate in a certain degree of consumption. This is not a bad thing in and of itself. But it can go too far very easily.

I think they might be calling my flight, so I'm signing off here. Bye!

My friend Luis has a video of the 1978 "The Star Wars Holiday Special," which is a 2-hour crapfest that ran on CBS. It was one of the worst things I have ever seen. It has most of the cast from the original Star Wars movies and includes random special guests like Bea Arthur, Art Carney, and Jefferson Starship. I swear whoever wrote this special was mentally unbalanced as the story centers around trying to get Chewbacca back to his home planet to celebrate "Life Day" with his family. It is truly awful. If you don't believe me, watch the 2-hour special that some talented person out there edited down to 5 minutes above and tell me what you think.

While walking through the Cleveland airport, I saw this woman propped up against the wall, waiting for her flight. The side of her pants are not a stripe, it is skin. It was 17 degrees outside. What was she thinking???

My friend Marcia sent around a bunch of really bad album covers that came from the website, The Worst Album Covers of All Time. The following were a few of my favorites:

This morning I was listening to the never-to-be-released Dimentia 13 album "Don't Give It To The Cat." We recorded it in 1992 and before it could be properly finished, Midnight Records pulled out of financing the sessions. I didn't have enough money to finish it myself and was pretty fed up with the entire enterprise by then. All I have left is a tape of the incomplete mixes.

I still can't listen to most of the songs without remembering how awful of a time that was. But I did come across the following song, which I still think is good and whose mix doesn't sound completely disgusting:

Anjalina

This song is actually not about a girl as it seems to imply, but about my friend Jim Bradler, who died in his mid-20's of some kind of weird lung ailment that I never did find out much about. He was from New Jersey and had such a strong Jersey accent it sounded almost like a parody of a Jersey accent. He loved to imitate the vendors at baseball stadiums back east, "Bee-ah Hee-yah!!" (trans. "Beer here") Whenever he saw or even heard mention of some hot chick he'd say, "Gimme 'er numbah!" (trans. "Give me her [telephone] number") Hence the lyrics to the bridge of the song.

He used to have pages of Penthouse magazine plastered all over his dorm room. I remember one girl-on-girl shoot that had the caption under one photo "the scents that mingled with their sighs." That line found its way into the song. He also had striking blue eyes. It was easier somehow to cast it as a song of lost love than to come right out and express what I really wanted to say.

This is for anyone who lost someone dear this year.

It's me on guitars, vocals and one-note organ; Joe Nofziger plays bass and sings harmonies, and Steve McKee is on drums.

OK. Enough of that.

Since a lot of people have written with questions, I think I ought to explain my attitude towards making money as a Zen teacher. Nishijima Sensei has always been adamant that Zen teaching should not be done for making money. I agree. If the motivation for teaching Zen is profit, that's no good. There's really not much money to be made in this line of work unless you cheat people anyway.

However, that's not to say that nobody should make their living as a Zen teacher. Both Kobun Chino and Shunryu Suzuki made their livings as Zen teachers, and I would never have come across this stuff had they not done so. It is possible to make an honest living in this business if you're both lucky and content with not being very rich.

I, personally, tend to skirt the issue by dividing what I do into two categories 1) my work as a writer, public speaker, film-maker and musician and 2) my work as a Zen teacher. I'm quite happy to take as much money as the market will bear for category #1 and to spend that money supporting what I do in category #2. I freely admit that since I tend to write and speak mainly about Buddhism, there is a lot of overlap between the categories. But that doesn't worry me a whole lot.

Some Zen teachers are supported by a congregation and that's nice. I have no quarrels with that and wouldn't mind terribly if I could make my way towards something like that without feeling like I'm ripping anyone off. But to quote Jiyu Kennet, Zen teaching is like "selling water by the river." You really do feel like you're standing right next to the mighty Mississippi charging thirsty people $10 a pop to have you point at the big giant raging river right in front of them and go, "You can drink that stuff, you know." But some folks need that. I know I needed it. Still do.

People gotta make their way in this world somehow, and the work of a Zen teacher is very definitely work. Hard work. And it's hard to do that hard work while simultaneously doing some other job. So more power to the people who manage to do it full time without another side gig.

And actually I am kinda bugged by people who think all spiritual teaching stuff should be free. Some dude complained at our last retreat in Shizuoka that he paid me $250 and could therefore expect some kind of service for his money. The truth of the matter, though, was that not a cent of his $250 went to me. In fact, I paid the same fee to attend the retreat as anyone else, plus I pitched in another $200 or so of my own cash to cover the shortfall that the standard fee per person didn't cover. Retreats cost money, friends. Tell me where else you can spend four days with three meals included and professional training for $250.

I have no quarrel with teachers who charge money for retreats or classes. I only expect them to be honest with students about what they're getting for their money.

Also it's important that profit is not the motivation. If you can make money in spite of not being driven to do so, great. That's all.

My friend Jeff just updated his Friendster page with new photos of himself. He is one of those guys who is both attractive and incredibly bright, with an amazing sense of humor. I see big things for this talented boy in the future, although it will be hard to top his apperances on "The Sally Jessy Raphael Show" and HGTV's "Curb Appeal."