Showing posts tagged depressing

When We’re Done, I’m Done

When we’re done, I’m done —
Giving up won’t be fun,
But it’s easier than convincing myself that you’re not the one.
There’ll be nothing left for you but breaking into a run,
So stick a fork in me, dear, ‘cause when we’re done, I’m done.

When you’re gone, I’m gone —
I’ve been hanging upon
Someone little bit committal and a little bit non.
There’ll be nothing left of me to look nostalgically on,
So don’t look back when you go, ‘cause when you go, I’m gone.

When we’re through, I’m through —
For I haven’t a clue
How I’d cast you from my mind and look for somebody new.
But there’s something tells us both that day is long overdue…
Just call a hearse when you’re through, ‘cause when we’re through, I’m through.

Played 21 times
[Flash 9 is required to listen to audio.]

Tell Me Pretty Things

I’m just a little lonesome —
Tell me pretty things.
Tell me that you’ve missed me
Through all my wanderings,
Say you loved my roses,
Say you had them dried,
Say you couldn’t leave me
If you tried.

I don’t know where I’m headed —
Tell me pretty things.
Sigh them sostenuto
Like a lover sings,
Say the spreading sunset
Darkened like the day
You said, “I’ll never leave you,
Come what may.”

Don’t make this any harder —
Tell me pretty things.
Tell me what the past holds
Is what the future brings,
Swear that you’ll be faithless,
Swear you won’t be true,
Swear to me you’ll leave him
Lonesome too.

(audio: as read by the author)

Tell Me Pretty Things

I’m just a little lonesome —
Tell me pretty things.
Tell me that you’ve missed me
Through all my wanderings,
Say you loved my roses,
Say you had them dried,
Say you couldn’t leave me
If you tried.

I don’t know where I’m headed —
Tell me pretty things.
Sigh them sostenuto
Like a lover sings,
Say the spreading sunset
Darkened like the day
You said, “I’ll never leave you,
Come what may.”

Don’t make this any harder —
Tell me pretty things.
Tell me what the past holds
Is what the future brings,
Swear that you’ll be faithless,
Swear you won’t be true,
Swear to me you’ll leave him
Lonesome too.

I really should not have gone to the library before getting my eyes dilated.

(Video: a 2-minute reconstruction of the classic Twilight Zone episode Time Enough at Last. I really did spend much of the afternoon staring at a stack of books I couldn’t read.)

Hey, wow, I’m finally done with college! Awesome! Now I’m the smartest I will ever be. It’s all downhill from here.

…is throwing in the towel. Stupid Pop China.

(I had a Pop China exam Friday afternoon, and then Math 21b in the morning Saturday.)

Airplane Standard Time

          Flew from Honolulu to the US mainland,
          Jolted from my slumbers when I feel the plane land,
Can’t remember if I’m stopped at LAX or SFO.
          Stumbling off the skybridge and I check the screen,
          Tells me my connecting flight’s at 5:15,
Don’t know if that’s now or in an hour or an hour ago.
You know why I’m disoriented?

                                                          I’m all
Set to Airplane Standard Time, all
Done with stupid stuff from SkyMall,
Looking for a way back home —
There’s got to be a way back home.

          Flew from Hartsfield-Jackson through O’Hare to Sea-Tac,
          Guy behind me grumbles as I shove my seat back,
So exhausted I don’t really give a damn for etiquette.
          Overcrowded flight gets me a free hotel,
          Going straight to voicemail on my girlfriend’s cell:
“Baby, where I’m calling from, your birthday isn’t over yet.
I’ll see you in the morning. (Won’t I?)”

                                                                 I’m all
Tuned to Airplane Standard Time, all
Done with Hemispheres and SkyMall,
Looking for a place called home —
It’s in my contacts under “Home”.

          Flew in from Miami Beach B.O.A.C.,
          Had too much to drink but it was duty-free,
Said some things I won’t regret to people I won’t meet again.
          Red-eye, but I’m too awake to shut my eyes,
          Looking over spreadsheets ‘til my laptop dies,
Everybody in the world except for me’s asleep by then.
(Well, maybe the first officer.)

                                                     But I’m all —
Lord, how I’ve meandered! — I’m all
Stuck on Airplane Standard Time, all
Looking for a place to call home —
There’s no place like a place like home.

(Cf. this status.)

Oh, Christ!

Oh, Christ,
Everyone’s so underdressed and overpriced.
So what’s the use of struggling,
Oh, Christ?

Oh, hell,
Everyone’s all dressed to kill and priced to sell.
So what’s the use of struggling?
Oh, hell!

Oh, damn,
They’re upon me now like slaughter to a lamb.
So what’s the use of struggling?
Oh, damn!

I love challenges! There’s nothing else in my life that makes me move or think or react, but challenges — challenges give me something to run from.

Most of all I am thankful for the holiday. If there were more holidays, I would be more thankful.

No, I got sleep! I got two whole hours of sleep! So the eye twitch must be something else entirely.

(Embarrassingly large amounts of this status are true.)

Lying helplessly awake at seven-thirty, one finds the strangest things going through one’s mind — thoughts tending to absurdity, as thus: “My roommate, whose thesis is due today, has slept longer tonight than me.”

(True story. The phrasing happens to be a reference to Richard II 5.5, but that’s incidental.)

♫ My socks are soaking, my socks are soaking,
They’re wet, they’re wet, they’re totally wet;
My socks are soaking, I’m hardly joking,
I’m slightly more than mildly upset.
I’ll stay inside
Until they’ve dried… ♫

(Video: Beethoven’s Violin Concerto, 3rd mvt Rondo, the main theme of which provides the setting for these lyrics)

Waiting in a subway tunnel in the dark with thirty people who don’t have any idea what’s going on either, overhearing occasional vague and incoherent announcements from on high that say nothing, getting led blindly through an interminable sequence of stuffy cars like prisoners going to judgment — the subway breakdown / evacuation was not the closest I’ve come to dying, but it’s the closest I’ve come to feeling like I’m dead.
(I was on the “train stopped between the Charles/MGH and Park Street stations” described here, which is why I missed this.)

“Walking to Maxwell Dworkin for sun and air and exercise” sounds so much better than “walking to Maxwell Dworkin to save five cents printing”