humanity leaves a bad taste in my mouth

what is it about humanity that leaves a bad taste in my mouth? oh wait, that's the acrid coffee i'm drinking. or a distasteful mixture of the two. sometimes i like to communicate with others, and sometimes i find myself scrutinizing the conversations around me and cringing with agony at what i hear. this often happens in cafes in which i perpetually decide to drink coffee and putz around on my laptop. naturally, i have the most noble of intentions before entering -- advancing my creative works -- when i am sitting at home thinking about my future literary exploits in a romanticized and hopelessly idealistic way. but what is life in a world of such heartlessness and severely unfunny human hardship without a dash of idealism to help one choke down the day? if i were to dwell over all the current international turmoil and bloodshed every second of every day, i would most certainly be responsible for more of the same bloodshed. in other words, the stress would compel me to bash in my fellow man's head. and because i am a peaceful lifeform that feels nausea at the sight of blood, i'd rather go about my daily life in a sort of self-medicated ignorance. but even then, in my forced state of happy stupefaction, other nonviolent humans have the power to aggravate me and remind me that, as a fellow human, my mind has a tendency to lean towards the bash-in-head mode of thought.
but please, don't think i'd ever do it! i barely have the stomach to even think the whole thing through. the tendency is simply a vestige of our barbarous blood-thirsty past, riddled with -- in order of soil stratification -- the bodies of mostly incinerated and indistinguishable humans, humans with guns, humans with swords, humans with spears, humans with clubs, humans with stones, humans with bite and claw marks, hairy ape-men with bite and claw marks, and finally just apes that died of natural causes. but didn't tool use define the evolutionary step in the right direction that the greatest of the hairy apes made so long ago in our past as a recognizable species? but even if i had a stone to throw at these cafe-experience-ruiners, i might elect to employ my teeth and nails anyway, because the injuries inflicted would be all the more personal, would they not?

the manifold layers of personality

i cannot properly explain what i am feeling right now, but the closest thing would be loneliness. what stands in contradiction to the usual desire that this feeling produces is that i am most comfortable being alone. so why am i discomforted and anxious when i am utterly alone in my room, despite the overwhelming attention given me by my little kitten? i believe i require someone to be physically close to, someone to experience with all my senses; but i find it nearly impossible to find her. there is always some peculiarity or idiosyncrasy that i stumble upon, infecting me with disinterest or aversion. am i being too particular, or simply impractical? i have developed an apprehension for anything hinting of dependence, but i know that if i absolutely fell for a girl (which used to be a usual occurrence of mine), i would want nothing more than to submit myself to her entirely. i know how dangerous this is, but after spending such a long time alone, it is unequivocally attractive. i am tired of feeling lonely, but i also have so much trouble expressing myself, and linked to this, really doing anything about it. in some ways i am scared of opening up too much, but in others i often reveal much too much before i barely know the listener. predictably, this initially straightforward entry has spiraled into chaos.
what i really need right now is the chance for a meaningful relationship with a girl who has no illusions about fantastical romance or harbors threatening expectations. there really must be someone out there who is willing to try to understand me and accept me for who i am, who will not criticize my eccentricities, and who is willing to let me learn about her.

crunch time

I am sitting in the computer lab of the Duke University Nicholas School pondering the mysteries of the universe. It is all i can do to hold insanity at bay. The only other option is to watch the slow but steady progression of blue bars on my ERDAS Imagine "Modeler" window as they crawl eastward at tortoise-pace. Soon they will reach the end of their march, and "Percent Done" will read "100". Then we can all rejoice and throw our hands in the air, for the time will have come to subset yet another remote sensing image. I may write bitterly of this repetitive task, but the truth is that when this series is complete, the real work begins. Almost like struggling to get on your tight bodysuit and assemble the scuba gear only to finally dread the final plunge into the black unknown, swimming with giant squids snapping their sharp beaks.
The fact of the matter is, I am learning an entirely new program, complete with foreign interface and alien functions, much too late. Admittedly, my Master's Project is all over the place, and everything needs to come together pretty soon. Unfortunately this "soon" is all too soon, namely, a matter of a week or two. If I continue with unwavering determination and submit myself to all the horrors of late-night computer labbery, I might just pull out an impressive product. But I also must take into account all the other work I need to do for my other classes, two of which are unrelated to my future career goals. But who's to say that giving a presentation on the globalization of Pokemon won't help the environment?

the perfection of Ten Ren bubble tea

Like many with refined culinary tastes, I am a self-proclaimed bubble tea connoisseur. I have scoured the streets of numerous cities and sampled the selections of countless establishments purporting to sell the finest bubble tea in all the land, but I have come to the conclusion that only one deserves such venerable praise. Ten Ren, an international tea company with branches in all your favorite states (NY, CA, TX, MA, and even unlikely IL), features a bubble tea so magnificent it deserves an entire blog written about it.
Now, I am well aware that there do exist certain "authentic" bubble tea vendors (most likely focused in Chinatown, NY) that use real mashed fruits and brewed tea instead of colorful powders, but these places are either so shrouded in collective secrecy that no one outside of specific insular communities can find them, or so steeped in legend that their very existence is in fact questionable.
Ten Ren does use powder to create their tea, but can we blame them? Who has the time to slice, boil, and mash pounds upon pounds of taro root every day for the ingredients for but one flavor of tea? And along the same lines, what bizarre customer will find the slightly brownish off-white of this tea preferable to the intense and attractive bright purple of the taro flavor powder? I am a stickler for taste, but nevertheless I would prefer not to die choking on chunks of thick pasty taro root while trying to enjoy my bubble tea.
Ten Ren's Tea Time in Chinatown (79 Mott Street) offers a wide selection of flavors, including a number of interesting Chinese and Japanese teas that depart from the usual fruit flavors. Their specialty, as far as I'm concerned, is their tapioca. No bubble tea is complete without the bubbles, and Ten Ren delights even the most skeptically squeemish tea drinker with small, delicately sweet black pearls that positively delight the tongue. They boast a perfect consistency--melting slowly in the mouth and being chewy and soft through and through. Their size is also par to none--small enough to allow the mastication of more than a few at once, yet large enough to ensure the impossibility of accidental swallowing.
I first became aware of Ten Ren's unmatched superiority after finishing my jasmine bubble tea just two days ago. Normally, and other bubble tea fanatics may also attest, one finishes the tea before the tapioca, and then must irritatingly hunt down the bubbles amidst a regular quarry of ice cubes. Upon sucking up the last of my jasmine tea, I realized that I had finished the bubbles before the tea, and hence experienced a resounding exaltation. It was then that I finally understood the perfection of Ten Ren bubble tea.
A Flushing location exists too (135-18 Roosevelt Ave.) which has less flavors but the same great tea, along with a Brooklyn one I am not familiar with (5817 8th Ave.).
My suggestions are the taro, King's Tea 913, or jasmine. If you prefer very sweet tea, then try the lychee.