So I was at the post office mailing my state tax form. As I exited the building, there’s this woman, an african-american maybe in her late teens or early 20’s, walking up the stairs towards the entrance. (The entrance/exit is maybe 10 feet from the top of the stairs, and there are maybe 8 -10 steps on the stairs.) I’ve already gone through the doors and she’s maybe on the second step. As I pass her at the top of the stairs, with smug look on her face, she sarcastically says “Thanks for holding the door for me, you’re SUCH as gentlemen”. I was caught off-guard, thinking “is she forreals?!?!”, and only came back with an equally sarcastic “you’re welcome”. I thought of it later in the car, but I should’ve tacked on a “, your highness” to the end of that, and then bowed.

Then I started to think about it more, and it really fucking pissed me off. Actually, I’m still mad about it. I have never been accused of not being a gentlemen or anything like that. I have mostly been good about holding doors for anyone, not just women, in any situation. But this ONE time......this b!tch had to be rude about it. "F@ck her!! She don’t even know me!" is what I thought. And I don't even think I was in wrong, cause check this:

1. she was HELLA far still.....had I held the door for her, I would’ve waited there for maybe 5 secs, which doesn’t seem too long, but to was to me and would've been a total inconvenience since I had places to go,
2. her hands weren’t full, she wasn't carrying/pushing/pulling anything, and there no other indications that she needed assistance with the door,
3. she didn’t appear to be rushing or in a hurry,
4. it was a very light door (not heavy at all), and the slight breeze was actually pushing it open a bit,
5. if she really wanted me to hold the door, she could’ve simply just asked,
6. she's a grown-ass woman, she can open the door herself

After thinking about it, I should’ve went off on her and told her the origin of men holding doors open for women: way back when (think Camelot days), doors were made to be ram-proof: big, tall, & very heavy, and women couldn’t open them themselves, so men would open them & hold them open for the women.

It’s not so much what she said, but the way she said it that actually bothers me. Had she been polite, I would’ve felt kinda bad (not fully all-the-way bad, for the reasons I numbered above), but I would’ve at least apologized. But no, she was rude, sarcastic, and even possibly condescending as if she was better than everyone else and rightfully deserved the door be held open for her everywhere she went. Funny thing is, had she been someone even remotely attractive (oooh, burn!!! ya sarcastic b!tch, f@ck you!), I would’ve held the door open, no hesitation, without thinking twice about it.

Kind of really proud of this:

I saved 67%!! I paid around $18 for about $54 in groceries. I generally try to buy stuff that's either on sale or has a coupon, and I usually save around 10-20%, but I guess this time around I got all the right deals.

So I've officially been working for the State for 3 years now. And I've been officially in Sac longer than I was in Fresno (19 months vs 17 months). WHAT!! It doesn't even seem that long ago that I was still living with Chris in Merced Mersad. Time sure does fly.

I totally built this:

I know it kind of looks like a vanity table, but I assure you, it's not. The mirror was already there and I didn't want to take it down.

And I'd like to point out this beautiful piece of work:

45° angles, WHAT!! I may have forgotten most of my high school & college math, but I will ALWAYS remember the good ol' Pythagorean Theorem, thanks to my high school geometry teacher, Mr. McMahon. And who thought that I would actually use that stuff in a real-world application.

So, I volunteered at the SF Food Bank for the 1st time in a long while, since OneBrick hasn't had any on the weekends for that long. Last time we bagged rice. This time, we boxed up squash. Fun.

The bins of squash, maybe 12-15 total:

They broke down the labor into three parts:

1.) The box makers:

2.) The box fillers:

3.) The back breakers pallet stackers:

Make box, fill box with squash, stack full box of squash onto pallet nicely. And repeat.

Of course they chose me to literally do the heavy lifting. I would take the full box, close the top, then stack it on the pallet. The nice people would close the top of the box when they were done. The nicer people would do that AND carry the full box over to me. I'll just say there weren't a lot of nice people there today.

And then there was this one lady who was just a pain and I swear, she didn't get that the box had to close so that it would stack properly on the pallets. Just about each one of her boxes, I had to take 2 or 3 squash out to close the box. But she was probably the fastest one to fill the box, though. Then we had her exact opposite, who was really slow, lining up the squash into rows so they're all nice, and then making sure that the box would actually close.

We boxed 17,000 pounds of squash. I lifted maybe half of it. I am still sore. I will never complain about the rice bagging again (I do the heavy lifting there too, but it's still way less than this stupid squash).

Volunteered at Glide again. This time, I worked the food assembly line, putting steamed carrots onto the food trays. It was ok, better than last time when I had to work the seating area clearing tables. And I think the local chinese foreign exchange student program has a deal with OneBrick or something, because the last couple of times that I've volunteered, I met someone who just moved from China to study here. Not complaining, just saying. It's kind of interesting to hear what they think and how they feel about living in the bay area.

I had signed up a month ahead, so I had no idea that the Niners would be playing at the same time (shift is from 11:15am - 1:30pm, Niner game at 12pm). So around 12:30-12:45 we ask someone to give us an update on the game. None of us could check for ourselves cause we were wearing gloves & serving hot food. When they said it was 17-0 Falcons, everyone got hella dejected. Right when our shift ended, I walked over to the Union Square Sports Bar just in time to see the Niners give up another touchdown right before halftime to make it 24-14. The bar was at full capacity, so there was a big crowd outside the (open double-door) watching the game. Since we can't drink (alcohol) outside, I walked over to the 4th St Bar & Grill. There were hella people there too, but at least they were letting people in still, and I didn't mind the standing room only as long as I had a beer. Soo, soo, soo many Niner fans. The chefs in the kitchen area would start the chants/cheering by banging metal pans together. Kinda crazy. The last couple of minutes were nail-biting, but the Niners pulled out the victory, and the place went nuts. I think that one guy in the bottom picture is crying.

Helping feed the hungry and watching the Niners advance to the Super Bowl. It was a good Sunday.

Watched the Niner / Packer playoff game in a sports bar in the city. There were 3 on the Haight Street, but we ended up at Mad Dog in the Fog cause they looked like the biggest place and had more TVs than the other places. It was my 1st time watching a Niner game in the city, and it was pretty awesome. It was hella packed, standing room only, but there were TVs every direction you looked. Getting to the bar to get beer was a pain, getting to the restrooms at the back of the bar was an adventure, and we couldn't order any food cause we didn't have a table. But it was all worth it and I'd totally do it again.

After the game, we were lucky enough to get a table at Suppenküche. 3rd time's a charm I guess, as we weren't able to get in the last 2 times we went. Hella German everything. They had the different size boots (0.5 - 2 liter), like Schroeders, but they also had an insane looking 5 liter stein, and we saw one guy drinking from one. And their menu was hella German, and a bit pricey. It was cool, though. I think I prefer Schroeders, though, cause they're a lil bit cheaper and they have TVs to watch sporting events. Suppenküche is more of a restaurant than a bar. But I still likey.

I know this'll sound hella conceited, but I think I'm pretty fucking awesome when I actually try. I'm especially proud of:

• the origami gift boxes that I handmade and gave to the all the cousins as Christmas gifts a few year back. They turned out better than I thought, but it took hella long to make all 18 of them.

• basically all the repairs & upgrades that I've done to the mini and all the other cars that I've ever worked on. Saved a ton on labor. In another life, I think I would've been a mechanic.

• the Christmas movie voting app that I wrote on Android. It wasn't perfect....the style could be better, but I'm a programmer, not a graphic artist. Let me see your app....

(I could go on, but I won't because........)
If I weren't so goddamn lazy for about 90% of the time, who knows where I'd be right now. I've been more or less coasting at 10%, taking the "path of least resistance" (like electricity!), and it's gotten me this far. I really should try more often, but as with anything, trying takes effort, and effort is tiring. Doing nothing is soooo incredibly easy, but as Bob Kelso said on Scrubs, paraphrasing Teddy Roosevelt, "Nothing in life worth having or doing comes easy".

Sushi Zone in SF is the shit and hella worth the wait! Last time I was there was December 2009, right before I gave up sushi for a year. Definitely will not wait that long to go back again.

This year, we took our FamBam Fantasy Football League a little more seriously, with all 8 of us putting in $20 towards a championship belt, a la The Shiva trophy from The League. It's a pretty legit belt. It's not the fanciest one out there, which go for $1000+, but it's also not the el cheapo plasticy type of belts, it's the in-between. It has 4 blank plates, to engrave the winner's name, so in theory, we'll use this belt for 4 years, then get a new belt.

There's 8 of us in the league: me, Cliff, Elway, J, Shann, Gabe, & Tj. Here's a pic of the league, minus Gabe cause he was in the Philippines:

Cliff won it this year. I ended up in 6th place. Don't know why Jaymi's smiling....maybe cause she's the only girl in the league? J's smiling cause he finished last and won the Sacko, but we didn't make one this year. We are soo making one next year. The others suggested this:

or this:

but I want to make something like this:

I'd call it "The Derpy" for the famous My Little Pony character. We'd add the engraving plates on the bottom, and then decorate it with glitter & sparkles and have it spell out "I suck at fantasy football". We'd make the loser hang this up somewhere hella visible in their house. I think this would be more embarrassing than the other two trophies above.