So there's this great commercial for FedEx during playoff football with these two jackasses in the mail room acting Zombie-esque and saying, "If we don't get this package off we're Doomed." "Doomed" "Doomed." Then a lady comes in is like, "No we're not, we have Fedex." Their reaction - "She's brainwashed." "Yes, brainwashed." "We're Doomed." "Yes. Doomed."

Quite amusing, but also how I feel about the world these days. We're about to start 508 - the second semester production class in which we shoot a 5 min movie in 16MM and all everyone says is, "You're Doomed. Doomed" Like it'll be so hard. Here's a quote from my TA, "Hope you’ve all had a relaxing break, cause you’re gonna need it." Here's a quote from my cinematography prof, "I don’t mean to sound threatening or anything, but we’ve had experience in the past where students missed class, and then their film dailies did not turn out well" Here's my sound prof on the syllabus, "Attendance and punctuality are extremely important and are incorporated into your grade. You should consider this class a job. On a film shoot, if you are late, you are docked pay, and if you do not show up, you are fired. On this job, you are paid with your grade."

I can hear them, zombie-esque, "Doomed. Doomed." Why are people like this? I suppose the film people have an excuse because maybe film students are notoriously flakey. Who knows? But the little day to day shit in life is tough. I've been having this insane back and forth with my car insurance company about how much I should pay. It's a ridiculous amount of money. Like most students, I wanted to keep my insurance at home - in SF, where it is considerably cheaper than LA. LA is freaking joke. I couldn't afford to pay LA rates - there's no way a male under 30 could afford car insurance in LA if he had normal coverage and was attending school full time. It's simply impossible. It costs nearly $4000 a year....and I've had 1 accident in 9 years of driving. The only way to do it is to keep a family plan, which I've been off since I started working a couple years ago. I don't think my parents want me back on, so I'm on my own and trying to register at their house. Well, Geico is sort of wise to my gig and are charging me extra money for bullshit related to my mail getting forwarded and it's really pissing me off. Money, money, money. And I don't have time to go through all the hoops to get it back. Plus, I'm not even in a legitimate position to do so. I'm Doomed, Doomed.

I think people get married just to share the burdens of everyday life - I could use a wife to help me out with all this crap - like picking up groceries and dry cleaning at the very least. What I really want, though, is an intern. Preferably a hot girl.

This lady at my work is a freak show, she's about 65 years old and is a total stress ball. The phone starts ringing and she goes crazy trying to make reservations and answering multiple phone calls, thinking we're Doomed. Doomed. Just relax, let the machine get it, or I'll take a message. Learn how to use the technology, then it won't be so hard. It's gotta suck being old, though, and unable and unwilling to learn all this crap that comes second nature to anyone under 30, like using Windows.

I was talking to my friend Sarah on the phone, bitching really, about why just the little shit in life is so fucking hard. I was saying to her that I've gotta be in the 90th percentile of intelligence, capability, emotional stability, physical shape, etc, all the shit they tell you you need, and somehow I'm just barely holding shit together. I'm forgetting parking tickets, late to work, late to my tutoring sessions, misreading and remembering instructions for my film, untrustworthy in the eyes of my car insurance company, incapable of getting a date with an attractive women (boyfriends, boyfriends, boyfriends, what's up with that shit? You're young - be available), I could go on, but it's too depressing.

I don't know how I got here from the FedEx commercial, but I feel like in some sense, the world makes things unnecessarily difficult on people. On a political level, we have issues with health insurance, we can't travel cause we need to rifle through everyone's bags and finger print anyone from the 3rd world. Traffic. Fucking traffic. What's up with that? Which reminds me, how fucking pissed off did my dentist get when I broke an appointment? He doesn't have another for 3 months? What the fuck is that? Hire another dentist, for chrissake. Or maybe I go somewhere else, but it's so annoying to go somewhere else. I just want to be able to have the things I feel as though anyone ought to be able to have, a car with insurance, a dentist appointment, an MFA if I'm willing to work for it without going into tons of freaking debt, a safe and comfortable apartment. Why is this so hard? And we're the richest, most privileged country in the whole world...imagine the rest of the world. I read somewhere, I think it might have been Neal Stephanson, wrote that being born American in the past 30 years is like winning the lottery of human existence. We've got it all, but somehow I'm incapable of getting my shit together. Things just seem harder than they need to be. And people seem to like to make things harder than they need to be. And then they don't feel comfortable with someone who says, relax, "We can use FedEx." It perpetuates the shit. We're Doomed. Doomed.