Friday, October 9, 2009

Supernuts

I recently and embarrassingly got my haircut at...(swallows pride)...Supercuts. In the hair salon business, Supercuts is the equivalent of eating at a McDonalds. Despite the popularity and negative image of this place, I'm usually pretty happy with my haircuts, unlike the feeling I get after eating a Big Mac.

This last time was different. I knew it before it happened, I sensed it. It was something in the air, the flow of the day, and the characters I came across, something was definitely off. I'm sitting in the waiting area and a father and his pissed off son come in for a haircut too and after putting their name down, the son's like, "I'm gonna go to the Halloween store next door" and right when that happened I thought, "I'm going to get a bad haircut!".

Turns out that the haircut wasn't too bad, but not awesome either. The part that was off was the lady cutting my hair. I don't know if she's a character or she just lacks character.

It started when the receptionist walked by and my haircut lady said to the receptionist, "Oh yeah, I need to talk to you, I have stories to tell".

The kiss ass that I am to people making me food, washing my car, or in this case, cutting my hair, I decide to be funny and say, "I want to hear the stories too!". That's when the receptionist walked by again, placed her hand on my shoulder, and whispered, "trust me, she has a lot of stories" in a, "you're a fucking idiot, good luck digging yourself out of this hole" way.

So haircut lady is in her mid to late 40s, black poofy hair, and can pass as a fish. Her first story starts off with a night out at Acapulco for margaritas.

Haircut Lady: So I was having margaritas with some friends and then they (Acapulco workers) come out with a cake singing "Happy Birthday" to me and it's not even my birthday. I told them as a joke, but they believed me.

I thought the story was going somewhere, but I should expect less from fish lady.

Haircut Lady: I like Acapulco, it's a nice place. I can always go there. The bartender always gets happy when I show up. One time I asked for ten Coronas and he started to actually take ten out and I was like, "No, I was just kidding". It was so funny that he believed me.

Oh my GOD!! Why are you creating these boring visuals in my head!? You're rotting my brain more than tv.

Haircut Lady: Acapulco usually closes at ten and one night I told the bartender that we're going to stay till midnight and his face looked like, how do you say, pooped in his clothes?

Me: ...shit his pants??

Haircut Lady: Yeah, like he shit his pants, but I was kidding.

Instead of band camp, it was Acapulco for this lady. It was sad and it was painful to listen to. Next time I'm going to shut my mouth so whoever's cutting my hair can concentrate on my hair and not daydream about cute bartenders and remembering just-kidding moments gone wrong in their life.

If she reads this blog, she'll think, "This haircut lady sounds awesome, I should go have margaritas with her at Acapulco!".

Saturday, September 26, 2009

San Francisco Trippin'



I'm sitting in front of my laptop on a fold out bed, in Newark, CA, where I just paid $5.95 to access the internet for 24 hours (about 25 cents an hour). To make the situation slightly uncomfortable, I am tonguing the loose tissue from the roof of my mouth as I had just burnt it earlier.

My morning started at 6:45am as my brain decided to wake me up 15 minutes before my alarm (stupid brain!). I finished packing and got ready, then picked up our rental car for our family trip out to Northern California. My parents had to go for a wedding in Hayward and so my brother and I decided to join them, but instead of the wedding, my brother and I decided to go to San Francisco. We decided to take the longer, yet well-worth scenic route, and planned a stop in Solvang. Solvang was very nice and clean, all that was missing was some snow. We stopped by a jewelry shop so that my mom can look at their selection. The lady-worker kept mentioning that the jewelry's expensive because they're hand-crafted by Native Americans! So can you imagine how expensive they'd be if they were hand-crafted out of Native Americnas? Cha-ching!!!



We were on a time crunch, so we had to eat and leave as soon as possible. We went to a popular breakfast/brunch place there called "Paula's Pancake House". Their food was great and good enough for my picky parents to eat.

My Omelette


Everyone's Food


About two hours away from our destination, we had to stop for gas, and while waiting I saw a great opportunity for a picture of my parents, so I ran to the car and busted out my flash unit and umbrella.



My brother and I dropped off our parents at the wedding and we headed to San Francisco. We were pretty hungry and walked around a lot looking for somewhere to eat, but most of the places were closed and if it was open, it didn't look too appetizing. We gave up and got back in the car and headed to the banquet hall of the wedding and saw a Jack in the Box a few hundred feet away. We ordered our long-awaited food and as soon as my teeth bit into that stuffed jalapeño, the fire temperature of the jalapeño burnt the roof of my mouth.

Thanks for reading and if you're reading this through your email, please click on the "Cloud Cuckoo" link to see the full content with the pictures I've added.

Friday, September 25, 2009

The Lonely Lady

It was winter last year when I first encountered the lonely lady and I've had two additional sightings since.

I met up with a group of friends last year at BJ's restaurant for appetizers and beer, so we sat at the high tables of the bar. Across from me were the booths and that's when I saw one of the saddest sights I've ever seen. There was this old lady hunched over her food, sitting alone in the booth, asleep. I felt bad catching other people staring at her, but I was obviously guilty of this as well. I don't know how else to explain it, but it was absolutely depressing on so many levels. I had a billion thoughts simultaneously pass through my mind trying to figure out what led her here, alone and asleep.

I imagined the lonely lady when she was first brought into the world, her parents at the hospital as her mother is holding her newborn baby daughter, smiling, envisioning a bright future, a great life. She learns to walk, learns to speak, goes to school, plays tag, makes friends, vacations with the family, graduates, falls in love, and fast forward all that to this very moment, where she's sitting alone and asleep. I could be wrong or right about her past, but I'll never know, and I'll always wonder.

I saw her at In-N-Out once before and I saw her again tonight and again, she was sleeping both times. I glanced at her table and saw an empty tray with scraps, a newspaper, a ziplock bag full of items, and hand sanitizer. I'm happy to know she eats, that she can afford to eat, and that she keeps herself busy reading. On my way out she was awake, packing up, and cleaning the table, so she's either considerate or has o.c.d. or both.

Now I know I can be totally wrong about everything and that I shouldn't even pity her, because she could be absolutely happy the way she is, but again, I don't know if she is or isn't. Even though she seemed like the loneliest person there, in a crowd full of teenagers and adults lost in life, the lonely lady was definitely not the loneliest.

Saturday, September 19, 2009

I Know, Right?!?!

Anybody else notice the uprising popularity of the phrase, "I know, right?". It's so subtle and contains everyday words, that it can easily swoosh over your head, but once you start noticing it, you start looking at these people differently and think, "are you a zombie cult member!?". I want to grab these people by their shoulders and start shaking them, yelling, "WAKE UP! IT'S ME, MUSTAFA!!! STOP SAYING THIS SHIT!" (slappy slap across the face for you zombie cult member).

If you use this phrase, it doesn't mean that I don't like you, but I do wonder about the day you caught the I-Know-Right?-Disease (IKRD). It's usually said with a smile and it has the same arrangement of musical notes.

Such a random blog...
...I know right?

Thursday, September 17, 2009

A Love Lost

I’m back on the market ladies, yay! (Sarcastic twirl with my index finger followed by a roll of the eyes). The way I feel right now is the way the lady with the sideburns, and basically everybody at table nine felt when Adam Sandler sang, “Love Stinks” in the Wedding Singer.




My heart aches throughout the day, but peaks before I sleep and when I first wake up. I’ve dealt with physical loneliness the last two years being in a long distance relationship (thank you for being there, right hand) and now I’m dealing with mental loneliness.


I decided to share this with you all, because in some form or other, you know how I feel. It sucks doesn’t it? I’ll be fine in the end, it’ll be a learning experience, mountains will collide, birds will poop out rainbows, blah blah blah, I know.


I was totally one of those people in a relationship that looked at a struggling couple and thought, “Must suck for them, they need to be more like us, right honey? Honey? Where are you!???” Now I’m one of those that I criticized, shit!


I’m staying positive and I’m not beating myself up over it, I’m just beating up other people over it, so it works out perfectly. The hardest part are the little associations that remind you of them. True story, I got really sad putting on my shorts this morning, like super duper sad, because I remembered when I went shopping with her to buy those shorts, so here I am standing in my room with my shorts half way up to my knees being really sad and in my head I’m thinking, “I should be laughing right now”, but instead I just stood there looking like a rape victim (that’s a messed up metaphor).


Joking aside, I am already learning a lot from this break-up and I’m learning to put myself first before anything else. I don’t know what the future will hold for me and Lara, but I know we will be in each other’s lives for sure.

Wednesday, August 12, 2009

Some Thoughts...

It's 3:38am right now and I'm in a sleepy, delusional mood, so I decided to write.

I don't know if my tolerance for people have lowered or that people are just becoming more choke-able. My brother often wishes he was superman (not because he's mentally retarded), but so that he can pick up the useless people in the world and chuck them out of this planet. Although I strongly agree with this fantasy, I think there are better ways to deal with these dead-weights. I can't really think of anything funny to add, so I'm going to stop trying and discontinue the negativity.

I'm super starving right now. I want a sandwich with a fuckfull amount of avocado and cheese in it. I can't really satisfy that craving because it's late and I don't have convenience access to it. I will try my best to dream up that sandwich.

Speaking of dreams, I usually have to wake up around 7am to pee, it sucks! It's really common for me to dream that I used the bathroom, but then a minute later, realize that I haven't gone yet and then I have a second dream that I used the bathroom, and again, realize that I haven't gone yet. When I finally wake up, I'm flooded in my own pee........but when I finally do wake up and go, it's such a wonderful feeling, especially when you have more time to sleep.

The worst though is when your bladder wakes you between that 10-20 minute time frame before your alarm, I think, "I could have been sleeping those extra twelve minutes!!! I know, I'll quickly go pee, go back to bed, and sleep for the remaining 11 minutes". Then 10 minutes later I finally fall asleep and a minute later, stupid alarm goes off being the stupid alarm that it is.

After all that sleep talk, I am now ready to sleep.

Tuesday, July 21, 2009

Look Ma! I'm flying! Weeeeee

I am waiting to get picked up to get dropped off at LAX for my flight to Virginia. This will be the very first time that I'll be flying with someone I know (my gf) and not alone (like a loser!). I am more excited about the flight than anything else, strange.

"What are you so darn excited about?" you ask?

I'm excited to chat, to have her nap with her head on my shoulder. I am excited to share my trail mix and beef jerky (wooo!). I brought a two-way splitter so we can use two earphones in one jack to watch a movie together. I'm excited to watch a movie together and listen to music.

My sleep schedule's already pretty messed up, but after this flight to VA, it's going to be so out of whack, that I'm going to use the phrase, "out of whack".

I'm starting to feel really good and confident about the near future. My friend just offered me a sales position at her work, I'm getting asked by different people for paid photo gigs, and I'm feeling healthier than ever.

I feel like life is waves after waves of filtering out friends and it never stops; you never know which friend will turn out to be the next jerk-face or which weirdo will turn out to be your best friend. Although you lose friends in the process, it's nice to make new friends, it's like washing out the brown stain from your underwear.

Okay, my ride's almost here :)

BYE!!!

Saturday, July 11, 2009

Damn Drivers!!!


I had a terrible driving day today. I was seconds away from becoming the Incredible Hulk (I wish). I experienced two of the three different types of bad drivers: First was the super duper slow lady. I experienced the stupid slow lady three times in one trip (each a different stupid lady). I try not to honk, but by the time I was stuck behind the third lady, I slammed my palm against the steering wheel, which unfortunately made no noise; perfect opportunity missed! argh!!

Then earlier tonight, one of those, who think they're professional nascar racing, Fast and Furious imitating, fuck faces, zoomed in and out of my lane in front of me, trying to race his way home before his parents beat the living shit out of him for borrowing their car.

There must be some personality test taken along with the driving test. There are so many incapable, cuntable, and irresponsible drivers out there. I want to rip their hearts out and wash their windshield by using their heart as a sponge.

The third type that I cannot stand are the bad left turn makers. I'd be in the left lane and the street perpendicular to where I'm at have left turn makers coming inches away from hitting my car, because they don't have to stay within the lines.

So frustrating!

Friday, May 29, 2009

Goodbye and Hello


Goodbye
It's been a while. I've been hiding. I've been hiding in shame. "Why?" you ask? I got myself and others excited about the kitten, you know, the one I blogged about, the one I had people take a poll to decide his name.

It was Friday last week and I had all my cat necessities, ready to welcome him to his new home. I picked the kitty up from my friend, Amy, who works at a pet hospital and was taking care of four stray kittens at her own home. She helped me so much through the whole process and I'm very thankful for everything she's done. When I drove back home, I let Yoshi (I settled with that name) out of the carrier and into the kitchen. He slowly crept out, smelling every inch of the floor, wondering what is this middle-eastern smelling place.

Long story short: he was adorable, he was friendly, and he was a kitten. I don't think I was ready to take care of kitten, nor were my parents. I was too eager to have a pet that I didn't think of the responsibilities that it came with. It didn't help that it shot out diarrhea everywhere in the house. It also didn't help that his diarrhea smelled a million times worse than human diarrhea. Even when he'd rarely walk to the litter box, he'd settle in the litter, then stick his butt outside of the litter box and literally shoot diarrhea everywhere, shoot! I was trying to adjust to the new change in the house, but my mom wasn't having it, at all. It was ultimately her decision on rather he stays or he goes and away he went. I felt bad, I missed him, but no one was ready for him and for some reason, we thought we were.

Hello
On a brighter note, my girlfriend is finally coming home from Virginia for the summer and I'm super duper, diarrhea pooper, excited!!! Being in a long distance relationship is like visiting the food sampler lady every weekend at the market. Not only do you have to wait every weekend for her, but when she's finally there, she gives you so little. Lara's my food sampler lady. Sorry for the most retarded analogy in the world. With video chat and constant communication on the phone, it really helps with the distance. What does suck is that our time together always has a beginning and end. Like, yeah she's coming today, but I'm already dreading when she has to leave; bye bye food sampler lady lara :(

"Good morning, and in case I don't see ya, good afternoon, good evening, and good night!"
- Truman Burbank

Sunday, May 17, 2009

Magic Bathrooms and Kitty Cats

My peak of creativity takes place either on the toilet or in the shower. On the toilet, it's like I'm shitting out life's worries and flushing them away, and in the shower, I'm in absolute peace. The water from the shower head acts as this warm protective armor, making me feel safe and at my maximum pure-tential (purity+potential). I really begin to figure out life, but as soon as all the soap's washed off, I'm like, "ehhhh, life's answer can wait. Back to the crazy world" (as I tie my cape around my neck).

Seriously though, if you need epiphanies, take a long ass shower. Maybe you'll have an epiphany on how to conserve water by not taking long ass showers.

So I'll be adopting a kitten this week (about 7 weeks old) and I'm super excited (and I just can't hide it). I'm having great difficulty coming up with a name for him, but it's also fun that I get to name him. So far, these are the options:

- Simba (because my name sounds like "Mufasa")
- Butters - South Park
- Spaghetti - from ATHF
- Yoda - Star Wars
- Yoshi - Super Mario Brothers
- Bjork - Bjork

You're probably thinking "WTF?", right? I'm trying not to give it a generic cat name or a human name and yes, "Bjork" is not a human name, she's not human, but she is an amazing artist. Help me out with this one; what do you guys prefer or suggest? Hopefully these picture help.


Wednesday, May 13, 2009

The Best Damn Sauce in the World


Another Trader Joe's plug, but I can't help it, they're amazing! I was at Trader Joe's about two weeks ago shopping for the usual: avocado, cheese, milk, and I also decided to pick up a bag of sweet potato fries. I got everything I intended to buy, but then I thought, "I can't have sweet potato fries with plain ol' ketchup or hot sauce, I need something that won't dominate in flavor, but instead compliment the fries", and that's when I came to the column of sauces and saw the stir fry sauce and I knew...I knew, that this was the one. I stood there staring at it, awing at it's beauty, daring myself to touch it as if it was some fragile historical artifact. The very moment my finger tips made contact with the bottle, I envisioned my many delicious moments with this sauce.


Were my preconceived assumptions correct? Hell freaking yes they were. You can practically have this with anything: Chicken, fries, fish, vegetables, rice, beef, and yes, even ice cream. Do yourself, family, and friends a favor and pick up this amazing sauce from Trader Joe's.

Tuesday, May 5, 2009

The Mysterious Shirt

It was many months ago when I saw my mom's new black shirt for the first time. I thought, "neat-o, cool shirt mom, but what does the Arabic writing mean?". So I asked and she answered, "I have no clue". She's cool like that, she buys whatever she thinks will look good on her. She has this one gray sweater with a black skull and bones design all over it, what a freakin' bad-ass.

Back to the shirt. This is how I perceived it...



Weeks and months went by where I would occasionally see the shirt and was left to wonder..."what the heck does it say!?!?". Then one day, one magical day, where she was standing in the right spot, with the right amount and angle of light entering the house, that I finally noticed, that I, Mustafa Sayed, have been looking at this mysterious shirt the wrong way, the whole time! It's like when you draw a cube and you can look at it as if it's coming down to the left or going up to the right, but turns out that you're really looking at a circle! The writing wasn't even in Arabic, it was in English. When I finally read it, oh the rarest of joyous moments in life occurred. I had way too much trouble stopping myself from laughing. She was so confused, repeatedly asking, "what? what's so funny?", but I was laughing so much that every time I tried to answer, I laughed even harder trying to explain it.

The actual shirt.



Next time you see my mom, please ask her out :)

Happy Early Mother's Day, Mom!

Friday, May 1, 2009

Are You High?

While I was in the middle of my transaction inside Washington Mutual today, the teller to my right called the next person in line and made a "I don't need this right now" face. Out of curiosity, I turned around to see an old man with a shoebox sized container full of coins slowly walking towards the teller. Although she seemed like she didn't want to deal with counting pennies, she smiled and was jokingly friendly with the old man.

Wamu Girl: Hello
Old Guy: How is your day?
Wamu Girl: It was good (giggles)
Old Guy: It "was" good? (doesn't giggle)
Wamu Girl: Yeah, until now (giggles again with a hint of regret).
Old Guy: Why? (still not giggling)
Wamu Girl: Because of this (taps on coin box)
Old Guy: Don't worry, it's exactly $50 (in a very anal retentive manner)
***42 second pause***
Old Guy: Are you high?
Wamu Girl: Excuse me? (totally thrown off by the question)
Old Guy: Are you high?
Wamu Girl: Am I...high?
Old Guy: Yeah, are you high?
Wamu Girl: I don't understand

Then I had this instantaneous thought process...
He asks, "are you high?"
-> her eyes must be red
-> I look at her eyes, not red
-> he asks again
-> he slightly sounds offended by her, "it was good", comment
-> but he doesn't look offended and he's too old to use that expression
-> he asks again................and then it hits me!
-> holy shit! I'm in Glendale, she's Armenian, and I
finally picked up on his accent.
-> the dude-man's Armenian!!! asking if she's
Hye, as in Hayastan, a type of Armenian.

Right after I made my delayed conclusion, dude-man asked, "are you Armenian?", she goes "ohhhhhh", and I tuned out satisfied.

On the way out, I passed him and tickled him real quickly to finally hear him "giggle", but he just turned around stern-faced and asked, "are you high?" and I said, "as a kite", we high-fived and made out. The End.

Random unrelated to the topic picture of the day

Thursday, April 30, 2009

WTF? $1.75 KERN'S

So I paid $1.75 for a can of Kern's today ..........................................(tumbleweed even stops from shock). I think this calls for an appropriate and exclusive use of, "I know, right?". So I checked to see if there was anything special about the can, answers to my math test inside, transforms into a kaleidoscope, but nothing! Turns out that the prices of goods have gone up if they are Swine Flu free! just kidding, that would suck.

Lately, my backyard gate has been highly entertaining. It started to learn English and only speaks when I let it swing shut. Instead of going back and deleting what I wrote, I'm going to acknowledge that I said "started to learn English" as if it speaks other languages; I guess it did sound French before that, "oh-hoh-hoh". Every time I walk through it, it says "Shortieeee" in the manner of a rapper hollering at a big booty girl (http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=shortie). Maybe it's calling me short, but it can't be, because I'm taller than the gate, so it has to have heard the rap music blasting from the neighbor across the street.

I am currently at the library right now and on the rare occassions that I am at one, I like to play the, where's-that-strange-sound-coming-from, game. I often hear someone sleeping and so I purposely get up to confirm it, only to find out it's some Korean guy with a breathing problem, damn.

I've been running a lot lately. My favorite types of runs are Trader Joe's runs............(tumbleweed's shaking his head). Last time I was at TJ's, I was very excited to re-experience the white cheddar Unburied Treasure corn puffs, only to find a Korean guy with a breathing problem, but seriously, they were sold out! I first tasted the White Cheddar puffs with the corn puff hogging sisters in Virginia, Lara and Rana.

Side Note: They call their dad, "Baba", and mom, "Mama"; noticing the "_a_a" trend going?

Anyways, the eating rate with those things are uncontrallable, so becareful. I settled with their Sour Cream and Caca version, which wasn't as good (too much caca).

I'm off to Trader Joe's!
----------------
(one hour later)



Guitar Queer-o

I know I'm going end up sounding like the many who complain about crappy music, but I'd rather complain about it than listen to it. Rap is too easy to make fun of, country obviously blows, but it's the guitar playing pop dudes that somehow go unnoticed.

They all sound the same. They all use that "cute" raspy voice that doesn't require any vocal talent. The guitar playing is simple, yet effective amongst weak minds, and they're all dressed by the same wardrobe lady. As soon as one of these whiny guitar songs come on, I think, "this is either Jason Mraz, John Mayer, Jack Johnson, David Cook, Dashboard Confessionals or Russel Crow getting his nuts stuck on his zipper".

Jazon Mraz, John Mayer, Jack Johnson, David Cook, Dashboard, Russel Crow's nuts all learned how to make it from this video:


*blog title taken from a south park episode title

Tuesday, April 28, 2009

The Perfect Boyfriend

When it comes to relationships and finding a good match, there are always expected essential qualities needed in that person you're looking for, like they must have a sense of humor, be smart, be polite, etc., but what about the specific qualities that you're not prepared for?

I started my relationship with Lara unaware that there were some distinct expectations that I had to meet to be her perfect match and luckily I was able to unknowingly fulfill them.

Distinct Expectation #1 - Ability to handle raw meat with my bare hands.



Yuck!!! Ewwwwww!!!


Distinct Expectation #2 - Killing insects for her

I CRUSH THEM!!!


Hurry insect! Run before Lara sees you alive. RUN!!!



Normal Expectation #3 - Always willing to listen

No problemo


That's so bullshit! I shot him first!


hmm...maybe I shouldn't have posted every picture.

Ninja Turtles vs. The Terminator


I was about nine and I remember hiding under the dinner table with the over-sized tablecloth that was long enough to shut me out from the adults so I can play with my toys. I felt safe, invincible, and for some reason, inaudible. I'm sure my parents snickered every time they heard my awesome explosion sounds emulated by my lips and saliva bubbles. What I heard was completely different; I heard strong heavy punches and kicks, glass shattering, bones breaking, lava oozing with bursting bubbles of fire, and the manliest voices for all my characters. My characters had to be from a different planet, for I did not have a consistent line of toys; A typical battle would consist of a mutated turtle and a robotic terminator from the year 2029.

I tried to look for a photo of one of my favorite He-Man toys that I "borrowed" from my older brother, but had no luck finding it. A word of advice, don't google image search "he-man blue", because you'll end up seeing a picture of skeletor boning he-man.

I never got tired of creating new storylines, placing the characters in new settings (ie backyard, parents' room, bathtub with WATER!), and my favorite, switching a character from good to evil and vice versa. My childhood was simple and as I like to believe, imaginative.

Oh the memories :)

[Star Wars figures provided by Mandy Wong as a birthday gift :) ]

Sunday, April 26, 2009

Thank You for Yawning


Too many times have I started to write my initial blog post only to end up napping in bed. Hmm...I actually got sleepy there. This will be my introduction post and hopefully it will encourage me to write more, since starting is the hardest part.

(20 minutes later after waking up from my nap)

I just made some Vietnamese styled coffee to wake my Vietnamese ass up...wait, I'm not Vietnamese.

I'm not sure how to build an audience outside of my friends on facebook and myspace, so if you know, please leave me my very first comment :)

I will leave you with a picture of me yawning and hopefully in return, you will yawn. thank you for yawning.