Really, don’t read further if you value, uh, not being bored out of your skull, I guess.

Okay. Anyone still here needs a cure for insomnia, and I aim to please! Frankly, I just wanted to write. Write about myself, I guess, because sometimes I feel the need to do that. To vent. About the good and the bad and the middling in my life.

First off, it’s been about a year since I started my new job with SAIC at NASA Goddard. Much like all things in life, it’s been a combination of good and bad. Now, if I went off the last few weeks, it’d probably seem quite bad. My guess is is that at higher levels, things are getting near end dates or something, because the pressure on Matt? It has been being applied.

Hmm. I’m not too sure about that last verb tense, but it’s the combination that seems to work in my head. But maybe I’ve just watched too much Futurama with time travel and all. But I digress…

I’ve been working my…rear end off the last few weeks. Some days, the pressure gets to me, I admit it. I don’t think I’ve felt this pressured, this driven to complete work since the bad days of grad school.  I work 10-, 12-hour days, slump on home, and then can barely function and remember what I’ve done until I hit the bed and wake up the next day. I know, I know. I’m not the only person ever who has long, hard days at work. But it’s just been a bit constant for a while now.

Plus, I often feel afraid that I’m not doing well enough at my job. That the successes I feel I’ve achieved don’t live up to what expectations the bosses have for me. I report what I think is a stellar result, and I sometimes get this “yeah, yeah, now what” feeling back. Of course, that sort of is the purpose of a boss. They expect results because I’m paid for results and results are expected by higher-ups of them.

I…I just hope I am doing well. I make mistakes. Made a doozie this week. Handed off some code I thought was good, but in the end turns out I was breaking the Fortran standard. Well, maybe not the standard, but I was assuming something that a conservative reading of the standard would not. One compiler allowed for the lazy thinking I was doing, but another didn’t. Weirdly, the latter compiler sometimes worked, sometimes didn’t. I imagine the optimizer sometimes managed to code around the bug or something.

Wow. I am boring.

I know, I know. Complain complain complain. But you know what? On the whole, though, my job isn’t bad. I like the co-workers I’ve gotten to know. I find my work interesting. I’m learning new things about a subject, meteorology and modeling it,  I know little about. And even the things I know a little about, I’m challenging myself every day. While that’s often frustrating, if I’m able to fix something, learn something…I like that.

Now for the more maudlin portion of our evening: Matt’s personal life! And, BONUS!, this section will probably be shorter that the above. Why? Because my personal life is, well, nigh-non-existent.

First and foremost, I’m alone. No, not alone, I guess. I’m lonely. I have friends, dear friends, on the internet, but it seems as if I’m destined to lose the ones I form here in DC, in real life. I find some, but they seem to drift away. Perhaps I’m too invested in the friendship and thus too “into” it. Or maybe not enough and they think I think they’re not worth my time. I don’t know.  I try and be a good friend, a good person. I can only be me. I still go to bed every night alone, wake up alone, go through the day alone. Gets to you, you know?

As for the more-than-friends part of life. Think, hmm, Washington Generals. I’ve had a few dates in the last few months and each was a disaster on a bad-Hollywood-sitcom level. One I got stood up. One, I’m pretty sure, just used me for the dinner. Another, I think she was visibly disgusted by me. Or something…I dunno.

I know those reactions are my fault. I’m not that attractive, I’m not all that fun and interesting. And, I suppose, I should just give up. But, well, they thought at least enough of me to want to meet in person. I guess I suppose at least virtually, I’m not a bad guy.

And I like me, ya know?  And I know from past experience that at least one woman seemed to like me too, maybe even love me. Sure, I managed to screw everything up with Jay somehow, yeah, but, you know what, for a while there, things were good and I guess that glimpse of something better, that feeling of belonging to something greater than me, of things being just right, it hooked me. I was genuinely happy in those days. I want that back again.

So I soldier on. I get insta-rejected on OKCupid now and then and now and then (a lot, okay?), rejected in real life. But I try, try again thinking someone out there might see more of me than the surface.

What’s that adage about insanity? Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. Guess I’m a bit insane when it comes to relationships, eh?

Ah well, I suppose that’s enough rambling for now. Guess I had to get some stuff off of my mind.

Onward and upward. Tomorrow’s another day. And all that jazz.

So, I said yes and was seated next to the apheresis machine and, after much whining and cowardice on the author’s part, I am now two red blood cell units down. Eep. All in all, not a bad experience for two reasons. One, I decided to use my right arm this time. Sure, it’s my dominant arm, so it’s annoying to be bandaged up right now, but it also has a beautiful vein.  The second reason was the amazing Ama (perhaps Amma?). She was my vampire today and she was patient with scaredy-cat Matt and just great all around. And, I got a cool sticker:

After that, did some errands, hit the library, and got some Ethiopian. Figured some lentils and collard greens would help restore some lost iron (which I need to do).

Of course, it didn’t help last time that I had a blood taker that was, well, not quite as good as one would hope. (I’m being *very* diplomatic.) That was also my first time doing double red blood cells. Not sure I’ll do that again.

Well, maybe if blood taker lady isn’t there.

No matter what, though, GIVE BLOOD EVERYONE!

On Firefox, I am able to use Tab Mix Plus so that when I press “v” in Google Reader, the item will open in a background tab. I’m the sort of bloke who likes to open a lot of tabs before reading them.

Now, however, I found this extension: Google Reader Open entry in background tab

With this extension, hmm, Chrome might just win.

To that end, I decided that I should go get some dim sum at the newly reopened Hollywood East Cafe. Normally I’d go with the foodies of DonRockwell.com (who introduced me to their dim sum back when it was on University Blvd), and they are going tomorrow afternoon, but Sunday didn’t quite work out for me this weekend (other plans). So, I thought, go this morning, you deserve it! And here are the dishes I got. (Sorry for the photo quality. iPhone + restaurant lighting…)

First up is one of my favorites from visits past, Assorted Meat with Sweet Rice in Lotus Leaves:

Yummy glutinous rice filled with Chinese sausage, pork, some other meat, nuts(?), all wrapped up in lotus leaves and steamed. Mmm.

Next, Pork and Shrimp Steamed Bean Curd Skin Rolls:

Not sure I ever had these, but they were much better than I was expecting.

Next up the char siu bao, roasted pork buns, in their two classic varieties, steamed and baked:

I got both types because while I’ve always been a baked bun fan, some I know love the steamed and I thought I’d see if I’d changed. I haven’t, those baked buns are as good as they look, but I’ll eat either.

Next up was a revelation for me, Vegetables in Fried Bean Curd Skin:

These were great, a dish I’m pretty sure I’ve never had there. Stuffed with black mushroom for sure and maybe bamboo shoot? Not sure, but all yummy!

Finally, the dish that I have been anticipating the return of most of all, the Carrot Dessert:

These are fried, sweet desserts in the shape and color of carrots. They don’t contain carrot and they don’t taste like carrots…they are just yummy.

And I’d like to say I appreciate the patience and understanding of the nice man at Hollywood East who, I have no doubt, helped spur the kitchen on to get the Carrots made a bit faster than usual (I was at the place when they opened, not exactly the lunch rush yet).

Good start to a less-stress weekend.

I woke up this morning at 5 am, got down to the Basin around 6:30 am…and it was crowded!  Looks like I wasn’t the only one thinking of this.  I finally left around 9:30 so I got in a good 3-hour, 5-mile walk.  Wow, 0.6 mph. BLISTERING SPEED!

Hmm…ya know, getting up voluntarily at 5 am on a Saturday…gee…why *am* I single?

Hall and Oates. “Private Eyes”

Why? Find out below the cut…

So, why is “Private Eyes” so dangerous? First have a listen…

Now, when they got to the chorus singing:

Private Eyes

They’re watching you

They see your every move

you tell me, when you were singing along (and you were, admit it), did you sing that or did you sing:

Private Eyes *CLAP*

They’re watching you *CLAP CLAP*

They see your every move

Yep. You clapped. Now, think about driving along the Capital Beltway at the speed limit (never more!) and that chorus comes along. It’s impossible not to clap!

Dangerous.

I hope everyone likes them…because they are staying! (Read, pricey.)

I apologize that there aren’t any pictures, but, well, FOOOOOOD. However, I hope to below list the order of food with my impressions of it. The “names” of the dishes are what I can either glean from the menu or remember from my head. There is also a chance I’ve missed a dish, but I think I got them all. Now, the food:

1. Three BBQ Meats/Marinated Delight/Platter: A platter of mystery meats. Our guesses were roast pork, roast chicken, and intestine/stomach/something. All quite good and yummy.
2. Watercress with Clam Soup: A soup chock full of clams and watercress. The broth was very good as was the watercress. The clams? Well, I’m not the biggest fan, but I was told these were good.
3. ByBa Duck (aka Pipa Duck): Perhaps the best roasted duck I’ve ever had. So good.
4. Fried Sliced Fish, Salt and Pepper Style: Slices of a white fish, coated with a crispy breading and fried. The breading itself had salty, spicy kick to it. In fact, it was probably the hottest dish of the day, spice-wise. Served with some preserved anchovies and jalapenos.
5. Oyster with Ginger & Scallion Roast Pig in Casserole: The first casserole of the day. Again, not the biggest shellfish fan, but the oysters I tried were yummy. The best part of this dish were the onions at the bottom. They had absorbed all the sauce and flavor…mmm.
6. Sauteed Abalone with Chinese Vegetables and Chinese Mushrooms: I really liked the veggies (mustard greens?) and mushrooms. The abalone? Eh. Still not a fan of its weird texture.
7. Braised Eel with Roast Pig Garlic Sauce: This too was very good. One issue I had was that the eel was not boneless or bone-cut, but rather just chopped. The eel had great flavor, but the picking the meat from the bones (the many, many bones) was annoying. However, see that “garlic” up there? In this dish were the most flavorful garlic cloves ever. I kept picking them out, perhaps to the consternation of my tablemates.
8. Salted Fish, Diced Chicken, and Eggplant Casserole: A classic of Cantonese casseroles. I’m a big fan of all the ingredients, add them together and you get a happy Matt.
9. Sauteed Kingdom Mushroom, Braised Tofu, and Snow Pea Shoots: The final dish of the day was a “on the board” special. It’s about what it sounds like, except the mushrooms were…odd. I have *no* idea what species they are, but the whole mushroom must be enormous. The slices of mushrooms were bigger than an Ike dollar. Still, a very good dish.

All in all, an amazing feast. The cost, while not cheap, was still a great bargain for the variety of dishes. In fact, the whole meal per person was probably about the same cost as one order of that abalone dish. And the kids held their own, let me tell you. They had their own table with, while not all this food, not exactly just a few dishes.

Now? Now I’m going to sit like a bump on a log and try and digest the feast.

My next question for you, the friendly masses, is what color to get? The frames above are the black version, but, I believe, they also come in gunmetal gray, blue, and satin brown.  If you’d like to see views of these colors, if I’m right, this is a link to the frames in question. If you select the colors down below the main picture changes to reflect your choice, so you get a good look.

I’m pretty sure I can’t pull off the blue ones, so those aren’t really on my radar. I suppose then the focus is on the brown frames.  Now, it’s hard to see in the pics I presented earlier, but the Guess frames are actually a brown/bronze/copper color, and Lady Optician of The Infinite Patience who helped me this morn seemed to think that the color suited my color better, and I think I agreed…but that could just be me agreeing with an expert.

Thus, I open the floor to the rest of my pool of experts. What say you?