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“Damnit I’m Mad” by Demetri Martin. (How the F did he do this!!!!! It’s the same, backwards as forwards.)

Dammit I’m mad. Evil is a deed as I live. God, am I reviled? I rise, my bed on a sun, I melt. To be not one man emanating is sad. I piss. Alas, it is so late. Who stops to help? Man, it is hot. I’m in it. I tell. I am not a devil. I level “Mad Dog”. Ah, say burning is, as a deified gulp, In my halo of a mired rum tin. I erase many men. Oh, to be man, a sin. Is evil in a clam? In a trap? No. It is open. On it I was stuck. Rats peed on hope. Elsewhere dips a web. Be still if I fill its ebb. Ew, a spider… eh? We sleep. Oh no! Deep, stark cuts saw it in one position. Part animal, can I live? Sin is a name. Both, one… my names are in it. Murder? I’m a fool. A hymn I plug, deified as a sign in ruby ash. A Goddam level I lived at. On mail let it in. I’m it. Oh, sit in ample hot spots. Oh wet! A loss it is alas (sip). I’d assign it a name. Name not one bottle minus an ode by me: “Sir, I deliver. I’m a dog” Evil is a deed as I live. Dammit I'm mad.

[kevinlulee-blog]

Letter to a Friend

A lot of our friendship revolves around the idea of improvement and achievement. I have stopped ascribing myself value based on success. Perhaps I am giving up or lowering my standards. I was so judgmental before. I was so judgmental up to even yesterday. I looked at people. I looked at how they betrayed themselves. I looked at how they don't honor their own values. I looked at the lies they seem to believe. I looked at their superficiality. I looked at their bullshit. I looked at their incorrect logic. I looked at their inconsistencies. I looked at their callousness. I looked at their delusions. And I said to myself. Disappointing. They disappoint me. **BUT I AM WRONG. BECAUSE LOOK AT ME. I have not worked a real job since January 2016. It is about to be January 2018. 2 Whole Years. I might be "TRUE" or whatever that means ... but look at me from the outside. This person has not had meaningful work for 2 entire years ... everyone else is doing their best. And I am coasting.** I prided myself on self-awareness. I always thought I was so clear in my head. But where is all of this coming from? I'm writing this at 4AM. Why am I still awake at 4AM? I have been going to sleep at 4AM or 5AM or 6AM for the past 2 week or 3 weeks. I've been waking up between 10AM and 2PM. **My goals have changed. I want to be there for my friends and family. I want to support the people I can support. I want to make a difference. The bigger. The better. But if it's small? I'll take that too. And that's about it.** My personal ambitions. What were they before? To become an awesome writer? To run a KevinLeeAcademy? I needed these things as protection. People sometimes see me as perfect. I wanted to give them perfect. **We all need to protect ourselves. Everyone has a mechanism. I have decided my mechanism is Truth.** I will not hide who I am and what my failings are. I will not bullshit my resume, to make up for the empty 2 years. I will just explain. If they don't hire me. Oh well. I will stick to my guns. Life is painful. I HAVE NOT BEEN FEELING TRUE PAIN. For these past 2 years, I have been in my own bubble. I have felt pain, but I felt the pain on my terms. I never let the world displace its pain, onto me. Anytime that happened, I removed myself. I ran away. Just like Lambdas. I never allowed myself in. I never gave it a chance. I believe in myself as much as I believe in you. It is this self-belief that lets me confront my failures with an open eye. I believe that I will do better in the future. When I said I believe in you. It means I believe in you as a person. If we meet up in the future and you're not where you want to be, that does not lower my opinion of you. I will just be happy to have a beer with an old friend. When we talk in the future, on the phone, or whatever, let's not talk about what we always talk about. **I don't want to have those conversations anymore. I don't want to judge you if you're doing good or bad, or judge myself if I'm doing good or bad. I don't want to make promises or impressions or oaths for future improvement. I don't want to prove myself to you or have you feel the need to prove yourself to me.** I do however, agree with you about going with the flow. Do not go down easy streams, motherfucker take the stream less traveled. ONE LAST THING. SHIKAI AND BANKAI. THEY ARE REAL I'M EXPERIENCING a SHIKAI IN SELF-AWARENESS RIGHT NOW.

[kevinlulee-blog]

C+

All my life I’ve been C+. Chinese C+. Chess C+. Brood War C+. Writing C+. Math C+. Basketball C+. Soccer C+. Everything C+. C+ is better than the average person. Like 80 to 85th percentile. But against people who devote to it or have god given talent, or slowly improve, C+ is nothing. There’s Class B, and Class A, and S Class. I’m a jack of all trades, instead of a specialist. I’m 27 years old and I’m so fucking tired, of being C+.

[kevinlulee-blog]

beef stroganoff

A few years ago, I asked a friend what's his go-to meal and he recommended beef stroganoff. At last, I've tried it out. The recipe I used is: https://www.bettycrocker.com/recipes/classic-beef-stroganoff/c17a904f-a8f6-48ae-bedb-5b301a8ea317. The recipe is basically 3 parts: Cooking the noodles, cooking the meat, and cooking the sauce. I waited until after the noodles were finished to do the rest. A time saver would be to do the 3 parts simultaneously. By the time I was done cooking the sauce, my noodles were basically at room temperature, instead of nicely piping hot. The sauce: I used red onions, but I think white onions might be better. Cut them so that the onions are not little pieces, but rather long and stringy. Next, cut up some mushrooms and mince some garlic. Saute them in butter over medium heat. The goal I believe, is to cook them until they're mushy and soft. However, you still want the onions to have a little bit of a crunch to them. I wasn't able to achieve this. Why? Perhaps not enough butter, or not enough heat or too much heat, or didn't cook it for long enough or maybe I should've sliced the vegies more thinly. Next time, I'll try cutting more thinly, greasing the pan a bit more, and maybe a low-medium heat. The sauce part two: Set aside what was just in the pan, and don't wash the pan so as to retain the nice aromas, add some oil, and start browning the strips of beef. Once browned, on both sides, add a cup of meat broth and simmer for 15 minutes. I didn't measure this part out, merely going with an eyeball range to submerge about 30% of the meat. I forgot while cooking and I forgot now as well: Also add a spoon of worchester sauce. I drizzled it around the pan. After simmering, add in the onions/mushrooms that were previously cooked, add in some flour dissolved in a little bit of broth, and add in the most powerful ingredient: Sour cream. Again, I didn't follow the measurements, just went with a dose that didn't seem too heavy, but still conveyed the flavor. It's important to dissolve the flour into a gooey paste. I didn't do this, I just straight up dumped the flour into the pan and what happened was the flour started clumping up which then took a lot more effort stirring around, to dissolve all of it. After the sour cream is added, the brown mixture goes through a transformation and suddenly, actually looks like beef stroganoff sauce. Pour it over your noodles, which next time, I'm going to try and time perfectly, so that right when this finishes, the noodles also finish. All in all, a pretty easy meal to make. It took about 30 minutes. I think if I improve my multitasking, I can get it down to around 15 minutes. I think doing the meat and vegies first together may also make it quicker. Next Time: [1] Wash Vegies, mince garlic, set aside. [2] Prepare meat, set aside. [3] Cook in pan 1 & pan 2. [4] Transfer contents from pan 1 to pan 2 and cook noodles in pan 1.

[kevinlulee-blog]

August 19th 2017: Hiking Adventure

Mailbox Peak is 4 miles to the top clearing. There are 2 trails to reach this top clearing: The new trail and the old one. The new trail is paved and pretty smooth. Pretty much just walking upwards. The old trail is harder. Nothing is smooth. Most of it is dirt and rocks, dirt and rocks, and pulling yourself up, using the tree and branches on the side. I took the old trail. I brought a big pepsi bottle filled with water, 2 small bottles of water, sunscreen, and a huge packed dinner of quinoa, beans, and chicken. It is very lucky, that I brought this large meal. I also brought a little bit of toilet paper. It is also very lucky, that I brought this toilet paper. Finally, I also brought my iPhone, and my iPhone portable battery. I knew my iPhone would die, hence I had charged my portable battery to 100%, which is equivalent to 4 full recharges of an iPhone. As for my attire, I wore shorts, a black T-shirt, and sandals. I did not bring a sweater because generally, whenever I have gone hiking before, I never wear it. I wore sandals because a hiker told me previously, it is impossible to climb the old trail without good climbing shoes. Hearing him say this, I decided he was wrong. Thus, I wore wear sandals. I began the hike at 5PM. I reached the top clearing at 7:50PM. For 2 hours and 50 minutes, it was rock, dirt and trees, and shimmering slices of sun light, coming in through the trees in the dense forest of the mountain. I took breaks every 10 to 15 minutes. It wasn’t easy climbing in sandals. Around 6:30PM, I found a large stick. I used it as a walking stick and the climb became considerably easier. Instead of pushing off the ground with my sandals, I could transfer the force, to pushing off from the stick. Much less strain on my feet. Around 7PM, I found another stick. Now, I had 2 sticks! From 7PM to 7:50PM, my pace dramatically increased. At 7:50, I reached the top clearing. No more rocks and dirt, and finally, there is a beautiful view. I am on the side of the mountain, and I can see all the way down to the bottom. In the distance, is the sun, a slow orange glow. This top clearing, is where the old trail path and the new trail path converge. However, this is not the top of the mountain. We're not at the mailbox yet. The top clearing simply means, we're no longer inside the mountain. There is now 960 more feet of elevation to go. Mailbox Peak a hiker told me before, is a training mountain for climbing Mount Raineer. It is one of the hardest mountains in Washington. The next 960 feet of elevation, which is about half a mile, is mostly rocks. Large rocks, the size of books and bigger. However, it's not impossible. There is a path to follow, of rocks that are placed together, so they kind of look like steps. The view here is beautiful. I am a little worried though. The sun is dropping rapidly. I want to reach the Mailbox before the sun goes down, so I can take a picture. As I get closer and closer to the summit, which is where the mailbox is, the sun has almost dipped beneath the horizon line, and the temperature is really cold. The winds are fierce. There is no one else. I am all alone. I guess there is nobody else crazy enough to start a 7 hour hike at 5PM in the afternoon. 200 feet from the summit, I am still on this upward path of rocks, I suddenly notice a person behind me. To estimate how far behind me he is, I would say 4 stories of an apartment building. I notice he's not wearing a big backpack. Which to me, seem strange. Who goes hiking, without proper supplies? He is making extreme speed up the mountain. It is almost astonishing. A thought enters my head. I have to be prepared incase I have to fight him. I wanted to enjoy my meal at the top of the mountain. Instead, I feel it is necessary to take some calories incase I have a confrontation with this mystery person. It makes me sad to feel this fear. I do not like my actions being dictated by fear. The reason I am eating, is due to fear, and thus, I do not like this. I sit down and begin eating my packed meal. There is no flavor and it is all cold, but it tastes delicious. I feel energy coursing through my blood with each bite. The mystery person, I will find out his name is Brendan soon passes by me with his remarkable speed, as I eat my dinner, 200 feet from the summit. He nods at me and I nod at him. "Sandals?" he asks. "Yeah," I say. And then I say, "See you at the top." Brendan appears young, between the ages of 22 and 30, and he is extremely muscular. He has in his hand a water bottle, and on his back, a very small bag. He has spiked red hair, and sharp eyes. His tone of voice is hard to describe. I reach the top of the mountain. We chat a little bit. I find out his name is Brendan. He tells me he started at 6:15PM. He also did the old trail. Right now, it's approximately 8:20PM. It's incredible how fast he climbed, basically 2 hours. For some reason, as I talk to him, I get a bad feeling. Perhaps, it’s the feeling, that he is stronger than me. We had shook hands, when he introduced himself as Brendan, and myself as Kevin. His grip was like a grip of iron. Most of all, I felt it was strange, that he didn’t take a picture. When I got to the top, I took a picture with my phone. Who gets to the top of the mountain, and doesn’t take a picture? We say bye after a few minutes, and he heads down, and I stay, and eat my dinner. But I don't eat too much. Still thinking just in case there is a confrontation, I can't be too bloated. Also, the sun has set by now, and the sky is turning dark by the minute. As I make my way back down the rocks, the thought occurs to me, no one knows, I’m on this mountain. I didn’t tell anyone. I had told Maylynn, I was going to climb a mountain, but not which one. In fact, the only person who knows I’m on this mountain is Brendan. My imagination starts to go wild. What if “Brendan” always goes climbing late at night, to see if there are any dumb climbers. If the climbers he meets are in a group, he lets them be. But if those climbers are by themselves, maybe he tells his friends who all live nearby the mountain, and at the bottom of the mountain, they kidnap the person, and torture them for awhile, or something. What if … many people go missing? All these weird thoughts started entering my head. At the same time, the wind is really getting cold, and the mountain, is really getting dark. Luckily, I have my phone at 40%. Luckily, I have a charger at 100%. I text Maylynn, “I’m at Mailbox Peak.” I need to tell someone where I am, just incase something bad happens. I’m still descending the mountain. Strange thoughts and strange scenarios are still going through my head. And then, a sad thought. It’s the thought: I am weak. I have always prided myself on self-reliance. And yet here I am, fearful of a stranger. I feel scared. I text dad. 9:10PM “Dad. Can you help me. I am at mailbox peak in north bend i90 exit 34. There is a strange man on the trail infront of me. I am a litle scared. I am coming down the mountain, estimate 1.5 hours.” I continue walking. I am recieving text messages but I cannot send text messages. If I send a message, it takes like 30 minutes for dad or mom to recieve it. Mom tells me dad has called the police. Again, I feel weak. I always want to do things by myself. I do not like asking for help. But look Kevin. When things matter the most, you are weak. I text mom that I am okay. I do not like feeling weak. As I walk, I realize, weakness is normal. I realize always being self-dependent … not relying on other people … this is not realistic. All of these thoughts started to pour into my head, walking down the mountain. Where am I? I am still on the rocks. Not yet at the top clearing. I thought about relationships with mom, dad, and Maylynn and mistakes I’ve made and why we are who we are, and why we’ve become who we’ve become. Our family is strange, but I suppose, every family is strange. I suppose that is simply the nature, of a family. To accept the other’s weakness or shortcomings. I thought maybe it is good that this happened. It is good to see, that by myself, I am not enough. Many more thoughts went through my head. One thing I felt, was relieved. No matter what happened, at least, I had told the family, where I was. At this point, I realize, my fear over Brendan, maybe is a little bit crazy. But at this point, a new fear enters my head: Did I bring my battery? My phone is at 30% after all the texting, and for some reason, it’s not going beneath 30%. I have started to use the flash light, and still, the phone is at 30%, which doesn’t make sense, it should be dropping. I feel my backpack and yes, my battery is there, my wallet is there, and the car keys are there. At 9:50PM, I reach the top top clearing. This is where, the mountain splits into two paths: The old trail, from where I came, and the new trail. I decided to head towards the new trail because I know it has a smooth path. Around this time, a surprising text comes in. 9:50PM - Police - Kevin this is 911. Are you okay??? Do you need help? This is 911. We have an officer looking for you. Do you need help? I reply, but it doesn’t get sent until 10:03PM. 10:03PM: Kevin - Thank you. I am making my way down the mountain. I am not hurt. I simply saw a suspicious person infront of me and overreacted. My recepton is bad. 10:03PM: Police - Ok … so you don’t need search and rescue? Are you able to call 911 or do you not have service? 10:03PM - Police - Ok, we will cancel our call. Thank you very much and hope you have a good night. And right after recieving this text, at 10:03PM, I turn on my flashlight again from my phone, and my phone goes from 30% to 0%, and dies. At this point, it’s pitch dark. It’s as dark as if you close your eyes, or open your eyes, you cannot tell the difference. It’s as dark as you cannot see your own hand, if you put your hand infront of your nose. You cannot see your feet, or your shoes, or anything. I am, a little scared, because for awhile now, the thought has been ringing through my head: I brought my battery. But did I bring the connecting cable to connect my battery to my phone? After recieving the final message from the police, I rummaged all through my backpack, methodically, one compartment to the next, feeling everything slowly. No connecting cable. “Oh boy.” I said this. It was 10PM. Pitch dark. And my phone was irreversibly dead. My connecting cable, I must have left in the car at the bottom of the mountain. And it was cold. And all I had was a T-shirt. And I was wearing sandals. Oh boy. I walk a few more meters on the new trail. The problem is I did not take the new trail on my way upwards so I have no idea what it looks like. I threw away one of the walking sticks, because it didn’t make sense to have 2 of them in the dark. I use one of them, like a blind person does, slowly, measuring the path infront of me, to see if it is a solid and smooth trail. I am relatively certain, as long as the trail is smooth and solid, that I am on the trail. I take a few more meters, and I stop. I realize, absolutely cannot see anything. And eventually, I know there are going to be twists and turns and one wrong turn, and I could be lost and two wrong turns, and I could really really be lost. There is about 3 to 4 miles to the bottom of the mountain and even more, I did not take this trail on my way up, so I have no frame of reference. For me to turn back and take the old trail, I thought that would be even more suicidal. Therefore, I continue slowly, on the new trail, using my stick, to verify the path. Earlier, Dad had texted me: "Stay somewhere safe." This text started flashing in my head. If I continued walking, I might get lost. I might take a bad problem, being on the mountain in the middle of the night, and turn it into a horrible problem: Being lost on the mountain. At least, right now I was still on the trail. All I have to do, is wait till morning. And so it was decided. Around 10:15 PM, I decided I was going to have a sleepover on the mountain. But how? I did not want to sit on the ground. I felt like all of my heat would seep through the cold hard path. I also didn’t want to bounce up and down or do jumping jacks or push ups in fear that this would needlessly burn energy. I decided to lean against a tree, so that the tree would block the wind. I had my backpack on my back, which also blocked some wind. As for my feet, I would bounce up and down at my knees. I was really scared about my feet. Why did I wear sandals? I started thinking about chemistry. Eating food is an exothermic metabolic reaction. Thus, this will generate heat. I always have the option to convert protein and carbohydrate into heat energy. This thought, provided some comfort. However, I already eaten quite a lot, and I was getting hungry again. I would need to ration the food until morning arrived. Every so often, leaning against the tree, I would think, maybe I should try to go down the mountain. I am freezing, standing here. And I would pack up my stuff, and take a few steps, and then decide it’s impossible. I simply could not see anything. It was as black as the blackest night. There were no stars, there was no moon, and even if there was, I was surrounded by tall trees, blocking it all out of sight. And then I would trudge back to my tree, and lean against it. Soon, my feet started to get really really cold. I stuffed the tissue paper I brought into my sandals, to serve as buffers. I also took everything out of my backpack, and stuck my feet covered in tissue paper and sandals, into the backpack. This helped a little bit. Meanwhile, I had pulled my shirt up over my head, and withdrawn my arms inside the shirt, and was breathing into the shirt, my breath serving as a minature furnace. Every so often, I would rub my hands together, and bounce up and down a little bit. I wanted to sleep, but I also knew, I should not sleep. I knew that I needed to keep circulation in my body and if I feel asleep, my body parts might go numb, and if they go numb, they might go numb for too long, cutting off blood supply, and something bad might happen. So I would continually, squeeze, and bounce, and breath warm air. Every while or so, when I felt myself getting considerably colder, I would eat a few bites of my packed dinner. Prior Preparation Prevents Poor Performance. This is a slogan from the army. I felt so lucky, I had prepared such a big dinner. I also felt lucky, to still have water, about 25% of the 2 liter pepsi bottle. I also felt really stupid for wearing sandals. I continued leaning against the tree, and then, I don’t know when it happened, but at a certain point, I bounced up and down, and I could not feel my left small toe. The smallest toe on my left foot had gone numb. Had it actually gone numb? Was I hallucinating? I took my feet out of the backpack and started jumping up and down. I couldn’t feel anything. I sat down and started sucking on my toe. I started slapping my foot as hard as I could, and yanked the toe left and right. The reason I feared this loss of circulation so much was in college, I had read a story by Jack London, called “To buil a Fire.” The story is about a man in the winter, who tries to build a fire, but he fails, and instead, freezes to death. Part of the story, explained in detail, how he slowly lost circulation in his hands, when he lost his mittens. I thought to myself: My toe is not thawing. If I stay here, it will just get worse. I have to go. I can’t stay here any longer. So that’s what happened. I cannot stand here any longer. I grab all my things, and put them back into the backpack and take a deep breath and like a blind man, with a walking stick, I poked my way slowly forward. There was a drop in front. It was a steep drop, about two feet, and this seemed strange. This seemed like the old trail. The new trail, shouldn't have these drops. I didn’t know what to do. I thought maybe I should go back. But at the same time, it was too cold where I was standing, and my toe was reallying worrying me. At the same time, I was scared to go forwards. However, If this was not the trail, and I continue forwards, then I will be completely lost in the forest. I still needed to see though. I felt it was imperative due to the condition of my toe, which had now been numb for about 10 minutes. I took out some of the toliet paper I brought, and crumple it up, and drop it on the ground. This would help me find my way back, just incase. I continued downwards a little bit more, and still the path was soft. It felt like dirt. At this point, I decided, I cannot go further. I simply have no idea, whether or not I am on the trail. At the location where I decided I can go no further, I sit down. The soil is soft here. Surprisingly, it’s not as cold as when I was higher up. My toe is still causing me panic, but I reason out, worst comes to worst, I can always bite my toe off. At least, this will save the rest of my foot from any possible infection. I sit, in a huddled position, with my feet in the backpack, with my hands massing my left foot, and in particular, the toe. A tingle. It’s like the feeling when your foot or leg falls asleep, and then it wakes up and the whole part that fell asleep feels prickly sensitive to the touch. At last, I felt that in my toe. A huge wave of relief washed over me. I wanted to absolutely make sure, nothing on my body went numb. Squeeze, curl, wiggle. conditioned myself, that these three actions must happen in this order, and if one happens, then all three needs to happen. Squeeze, curl, wiggle. Over and over again. The moment I squeezed my fingers into a fist, that is the trigger to curl my toes, and then wiggle my butt. I wasn’t going to let anything else go numb. How much time had passed? I had no idea. One hour? Two hours? Each minute, felt like an eternity. When was the sun ever going to rise? It felt like it would stay dark forever. At this point, I was still huddled, but I had stretched my T-shirt all the way out. My arms were withdrawn, like a turtle, inside the shirt, and the shirt was pulled all the way over my knees. Because there was strain on my back by huddling forwards, every so often, after squeeze, curl, wiggle, I would also thrust my pelvis forward, while keeping my butt on the ground, in order to stretch my lower back. Sometimes, when I am taking a walk, I like to think about ideas. These ideas enter my head, and look at them from different angles. It's rather peaceful. I tried to think about some ideas as I sat there, but it was impossible. My brain refused to think about anything except squeeze, curl, wiggle. Squeeze my hands into a fist. Curl my toes into a ball. Wiggle my butt. Repeat and repeat and repeat. Occassionally, I would take a sip of water, and eat a portion of my packed meal. I had drank the 2 small water bottles and as for my big 2 liter pepsi bottle, the water inside was only about 1/6th of the bottle left. I occasionally thought about biochemical reactions. I knew long as I maintained a consistent internal body temperature, as long as my entire body has circulation, as long as my mitochondria have water, as long as long as I don’t feel any headaches, I should be fine. People in the past have survived things far worse than what I’m experiencing. I wanted to sleep. I wanted to escape the cold. My lower thighs were exposed to the dirt ground. My feet were inside the backpack, they had circulation, but they were really cold. I do not know what time it is and I have no way to measure time. I haven't squeezed in awhile. And then that thought, prompts the SCW (Squeeze, Curl, Wiggle) cycle. At certain points, I would wonder, how much time has passed? What if only one hour has passed? I have to endure about 6 more hours. This thought would repeat in my head. For some reason, I had zero sense of time. SCW. Over and over. At least every 10 or 15 seconds, I would do a SCW. I had nothing else to do. By this point, I was relatively sure I was going to be fine. The worst had passed. Morning was going to come. My internal temperature was staying consistent, and judging from the weight of my tupper ware container, there was still a bit of food left over and I still had water in my pepsi bottle as well. There had been various strange sounds during the night, of leaves and sticks rustling. At this point, if no wolves or bears had eaten me, I didn’t think I was going to be eaten by any of them. As for the stranger Brendan, even if he was a bad guy, waiting for me at the bottom of the mountain, by now, he would’ve probably gone home. Squeeze, curl, wiggle. And then it happened. It wasn’t pitch dark anymore. It was only 99% pitch dark. I could see the faint outlines of trees. A feeling of relief. More than an hour had passed. One of my big fears, was only like 30 minutes had passed or something and I still had many more hours to endure, but the sign that I was slowly starting to see things meant, the sun was slowly rising. I have never seen a sunrise before, from the very beginning, to the very end, in full view of the sun, as it dips from below, and rises up. Sitting there on the mountain, was no different. There were too many trees in the way. What I did see, was the sky change color. It from pitch black, to slightly black, and then to dark blue. From dark blue, it stayed at dark blue, and didn’t get any lighter, although the strange thing was in the far distance, I could see the horizon getting lighter. I determined it must be 5 or 530AM. At this point, I could finally see. Squeeze, curl, wiggle. I saw around me, I was on some weird downward slope. And it seemed, there was a path in front of me. Was it time to go? I decided to weight awhile longer. It was still pretty dark, with the dark blue sky, maybe, it would get better. After about 15 more minutes, with nothing changing, I realized, it’s going to stay like this until like noon time, probably because all the trees are blocking the light. It’s time to go. I took a bite of my food, and sip of water, and packed everything up. Put my sandals on, got my walking stick and put my backpack on. Should I continue downwards? I wasn’t positive. What I was positive of, was that I had started originally, on a very hard surface and that, was the trail, 100%. I decided to go back to where I had started from, the original tree, I had leaned against, when my left smallest toe, went numb. I started climbing back up the slope. It was scary because everything looked unfamiliar. Looking to the left, looking to the right, everything also looked identical. Dirt, rocks, and trees. I could see no path. There was a tinge of panic and I remembered: Look for my toliet paper. I had dropped toilet paper a few times, to mark where I was. I continued upwards, no toilet paper. Where is my toilet paper! It must be in the vincinity. I had definitely not gone too far. My heart is pumping pretty wildly, as I scramble along the slope, to the left, and then to the right. I can’t find the toilet paper. I look to my left, and there it is. Not the toilet paper, but a hard, smooth surface. I was back on the trail. I felt like a little kid, getting his favorite birthday gift. I was safe. And now, I just continued walking, and as I walked, the sun came out more and more, and soon it was pretty bright, with the sun shining nicely, perhaps around 7AM. At around 830AM, I finally reach the bottom. On the way down, I passed by many people. In total, I think passed about 10 groups, each group consisting of 1 person, 2 people, 3 people, or 4 people. The first thing I did when I get to the car was find the charger. I connected everything together, waited for my phone to turn on and texted dad that I am okay. 8:27AM Sunday August 20: Kevin - Driving home. Everything is fine. Down at the mountain’s base, the reception was good. 8:28AM - Dad: Thanks Lord. Drive safely. In the car, I had brought a complete change of clothes: jacket, jeans, underwear, T-shirt, socks, and I changed into everything. I had also an extra 1 liter bottle of water, and another packed meal, except for this one time, there was only chicken and quinoa, no beans. This meal became my breakfast. I didn't finish all of it. I have been eating quinoa and chicken, almost every hour, for the past 12 hours, and I was kind of sick of the taste. I was wide awake. Completely awake. I felt like there was a lot of energy inside of my body. However, as I drove back to the main town of North Bend, a wave of drowsiness hit me out of nowhere. I didn’t think I could drive anymore. I feared falling asleep at the wheel, and crashing the car. I needed to sleep. I stopped by a gas station and there was a small mini-mart. I parked in the parking lot, extended the driver chair backwards, and lay down. It was so warm from the sun shining outside, and also from my jacket on. After being frozen for about 8 hours, I loved the heat. I slept for about three hours, dozing in and out of wakefulness. Around noon, I went into the mini-mart, bought a bag of chips, sour gummy strips, and a Twinkies bar. It was one of the most delicious lunches I had in my life. I got back into the car, and drove home. I learned a few lessons from this mountain experience.

[kevinlulee-blog]

“Nobody tells this to people who are beginners, I wish someone told me. All of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste. But there is this gap. For the first couple years you make stuff, it’s just not that good. It’s trying to be good, it has potential, but it’s not. But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, is still killer. And your taste is why your work disappoints you. A lot of people never get past this phase, they quit. Most people I know who do interesting, creative work went through years of this. We know our work doesn’t have this special thing that we want it to have. We all go through this. And if you are just starting out or you are still in this phase, you gotta know its normal and the most important thing you can do is do a lot of work. Put yourself on a deadline so that every week you will finish one story. It is only by going through a volume of work that you will close that gap, and your work will be as good as your ambitions. And I took longer to figure out how to do this than anyone I’ve ever met. It’s gonna take awhile. It’s normal to take awhile. You’ve just gotta fight your way through.

Ira Glass

[kevinlulee-blog]

Pale Blue Dot

Look again at that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar," every "supreme leader," every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there -- on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam. The Earth is a very small stage in a vast cosmic arena. Think of the rivers of blood spilled by all those generals and emperors so that, in glory and triumph, they could become the momentary masters of a fraction of a dot. Think of the endless cruelties visited by the inhabitants of one corner of this pixel on the scarcely distinguishable inhabitants of some other corner, how frequent their misunderstandings, how eager they are to kill one another, how fervent their hatreds. Our posturings, our imagined self-importance, the delusion that we have some privileged position in the Universe, are challenged by this point of pale light. Our planet is a lonely speck in the great enveloping cosmic dark. In our obscurity, in all this vastness, there is no hint that help will come from elsewhere to save us from ourselves. The Earth is the only world known so far to harbor life. There is nowhere else, at least in the near future, to which our species could migrate. Visit, yes. Settle, not yet. Like it or not, for the moment the Earth is where we make our stand. It has been said that astronomy is a humbling and character-building experience. There is perhaps no better demonstration of the folly of human conceits than this distant image of our tiny world. To me, it underscores our responsibility to deal more kindly with one another, and to preserve and cherish the pale blue dot, the only home we've ever known. Writing Credit: Carl Sagan

[kevinlulee-blog]

Armed with an endless supply of high-quality paper and pencils, the children drew constantly.

In his autobiography, Chuck Amuck, Jones credits his artistic bent to circumstances surrounding his father, who was an unsuccessful businessman in California in the 1920s. His father, Jones recounts, would start every new business venture by purchasing new stationery and new pencils with the company name on them. When the business failed, his father would quietly turn the huge stacks of useless stationery and pencils over to his children, requiring them to use up all the material as fast as possible. Armed with an endless supply of high-quality paper and pencils, the children drew constantly. Later, in one art school class, the professor gravely informed the students that they each had 100,000 bad drawings in them that they must first get past before they could possibly draw anything worthwhile. Jones recounted years later that this pronouncement came as a great relief to him, as he was well past the 200,000 mark, having used up all that stationery. Jones and several of his siblings went on to artistic careers. 

During his artistic education, he worked part-time as a janitor. After graduating from Chouinard Art Institute, Jones got a phone call from a friend named Fred Kopietz, who had been hired by the Ub Iwerks studio and offered him a job. He worked his way up in the animation industry, starting as a cell washer; "then I moved up to become a painter in black and white, some color. Then I went on to take animator's drawings and traced them onto the celluloid. Then I became what they call an in-betweener, which is the guy that does the drawing between the drawings the animator makes."

Writing Credit: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chuck_Jones

[kevinlulee-blog]