jamie nguyen le

Black Men Chronicles: While I Hold a Knife to His Throat

Wed, 28 Jul 2010 14:54:14 -0700

Black Man: So where's your boyfriend at?
Jamie: I don't have a boyfriend. Boys don't really like me.
Black Man: What? Why don't guys like you?
Jamie: I don't know. They seem to find me intimidating or something.

Photo

Sat, 17 Jul 2010 22:59:53 -0700

NO BITCH I CAN DRIVE

Fri, 16 Jul 2010 19:46:00 -0700

It never ceases to annoy me to the very core of my being when my monthly orthodontist check-up arises once again. No, it’s not the pain subsequent to the tightening. No, it’s not that I don’t eat for about three days after every visit, because, well, it simply hurts too much. No, it’s not the fact that I’m a nineteen-year-old with braces. (I got over that one a while ago.)

It’s because every damn time I go, the dental assistant comes out to greet me and asks if “Mommy or Daddy” brought me today.

NO BITCH I CAN DRIVE.

Ignore the most prominent evidence: that I’m clearly sitting alone, as I always am. Ignore the college-type texts I bring with me to read in the waiting room. Ignore my genuine Chanel that I pet on my lap while I read. (Yes, I do exploit every opportunity to bring up that I do, in fact, own a genuine Chanel purse.) Ignore the heels that I sport to compliment that type of clothes I wear — the clothes that, in the past, people have described using the term “Senior Citizen-chic”.

But don’t ignore that, despite the ongoing corrective dental procedure in my mouth, I still look my age.

“And what grade are you in?” she says with a Splenda-sweet voice.

THE 14TH GRADE.

Yelle - Ce Jeu Jhed Flores asked me a question as I was making...

Wed, 14 Jul 2010 19:55:00 -0700

Yelle - Ce Jeu

Jhed Flores asked me a question as I was making my exit out of a room last week. “Hey Jamie, do you listen to Yelle?”

I didn’t then, but I do now.

Over It Over and Over Again

Wed, 14 Jul 2010 13:58:00 -0700

I had a hysteria-fueled sobbing fest the other day. It was awesome. That is, if awesome is defined as: ‘Driving despite blurring vision due to an extravagant amount of tears being conjured up by one’s unstable emotions’.

At every stoplight that — unfortunately for the cars around me — turned red, I got extremely awkward stares from the people in their surrounding vehicles. In their defense, I don’t think they were actively trying to watch the show put on by the (obviously) disturbed girl in the convertible ferociously slamming on her steering wheel and screaming at the sky, “WHY, GOD?! WHY?!” I mean, I can imagine it would be pretty difficult to look away.

I was kidding about the whole loudly addressing God thing. I really was, however, uncontrollably crying in my convertible on a road that, while usually predominately green, decidedly turned every stoplight red as I approached it.

That night my best friend’s boyfriend, Paul, filled a bucket with ice and beer. He met me on the shores of the bay with this bucket, where he kept me company as we watched fireworks sprouting across the water from Seaworld.

And then I felt better.

Don’t get me wrong, beer and fireworks do have their own somewhat effective healing properties, but it wasn’t just that that made the heartache dissipate.

In between my personal brand of dehydration (crying) and Paul’s (alcohol consumption), I finally came across the solution to all of my problems — I can’t continue to let someone else decide for me whether I’m going to be happy or sad.

I gave someone else the reins to my emotions a few months ago without being the least bit aware of it. Like a dog, I fed off attention and (metaphorical) treats, and whimpered for days when he decided to take it away without warning.

So, that night, I decided to take that shit back. And it was as simple as that.

I’m over it.

Little & Ashley - Stole My Heart I had made a note in my...

Mon, 12 Jul 2010 13:37:33 -0700

Little & Ashley - Stole My Heart

I had made a note in my head to Google “Kindle commercial song” while I folded the laundry with the television on as background noise. When I finally remembered to do it, Little & Ashley’s Stole My Heart came up. I’m not entirely sure if this is actually the song I was looking for, but it’s catchy all the same.

Regret

Mon, 12 Jul 2010 01:52:00 -0700

I made a mistake.

I went against all my instincts and the advice of, well, everyone, and went through with it anyway. Regret — it’s not a feeling I encounter often, but tonight, it’s the very air I breathe.

I watched M. Night Shamalamadingdong’s The Last Airbender.

Holy shit fuck. I have never seen a larger piece of absolute and utter poppycock than this mess of wasted film. I could feel M. Night’s grammar mistakes corroding my soul as my eyes twitched while I used all I had to keep my head facing the screen. Damn you Shamalama. You had the backbone of an outrageously popular animated series, dehydrated it of all its appeal, clothed it with a shit ton of Indians, and made me pay $10.50 for this (curry-based) creature you’ve created to torture me for one hour and forty-three minutes.

Why is the whole damn Fire Nation Indian and the poor, lowly Earth Kingdom Asian?

And why did Aang (I apologize, I meant “Ong”) flare his nose all the damn time?

And, when Ong flew from village to village to inform the people of said villages that they could bend elements (because, of course, they had no way of knowing until the Avatar told them) why, at one point, did he help a village of orange-adorned Africans? Oh, I know. Because in Shamalama’s version of Avatar, there are five nations: Air, Water, Earth, Fire, and Black People.

But regardless of the twisted plot lines and heinously mispronounced names, the acting was nothing short of disturbingly terrible.

Nice try, M. Night. Now I have to watch the entire series (again) just to clear my mind of those two painful hours I spent in the movie theater.

"When I wake up in the morning, I feel just like any other insecure 24-year-old girl. Then I say,..."

Tue, 06 Jul 2010 11:24:00 -0700

“When I wake up in the morning, I feel just like any other insecure 24-year-old girl. Then I say, ‘Bitch, you’re Lady Gaga, you get up and walk the walk today.’”

- Lady Gaga (via theviesociety)

What a coincidence! I do the same thing! My Dad doesn’t know who Lady Gaga is, so he just thinks I’ve come up with a really strange nickname for myself.

Just kidding. But, I really do say to myself every morning, “Today’s going to be a good day.”

I cry later at night, before I go to bed, while trying to ignore the fact that I lie to myself every morning.

My plans of the past two days and continuing into the next week.

Tue, 06 Jul 2010 01:37:13 -0700

My plans of the past two days and continuing into the next week.

Meiko - Piano Song

Tue, 06 Jul 2010 01:29:58 -0700

Meiko - Piano Song

20 Things I Wish I Knew When I Was 20

Sat, 03 Jul 2010 19:59:15 -0700

20 Things I Wish I Knew When I Was 20 :

(via oxyjenn)

Have you guys seen this? Could the solution to the oil clean up really be as simple as...hay?

Sat, 03 Jul 2010 19:06:00 -0700

Have you guys seen this? Could the solution to the oil clean up really be as simple as...hay? :

apsies:

(via mandigray)

That’s some redneck ingenuity right there.

"When I was 5 years old, my mother always told me that happiness was the key to life. When I went to..."

Tue, 29 Jun 2010 13:06:37 -0700

““When I was 5 years old, my mother always told me that happiness was the key to life. When I went to school, they asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up. I wrote down ‘happy’. They told me I didn’t understand the assignment, and I told them they didn’t understand life.””

- John Lennon (via gwenmccartney)

Does my 'Ask' button work? Did I really just message myself a question? Am I that pathetic? What actor played the school principal in E.T., only to have his scene cut when Spielberg decided that his presence would be too distracting?

Tue, 29 Jun 2010 01:59:25 -0700

Yes. Yes. Yes. Harrison Ford.

Sleep Apnea

Tue, 29 Jun 2010 01:42:00 -0700

is not the sleeping disorder that I have. Because, well, I don’t have a sleeping disorder. Not a diagnosed one anyway. It was just the first sleeping related affliction that my brain thought to reference (which, I now realize, was my brain’s slow excavation process to try to reach the word “Insomnia” filed deep down there between ‘How to Flip a Fried Egg Without Breaking the Yolk’ and ‘The Lyrics to Every Britney Spears Song’). Moving on… I’m awake when I really should be asleep in preparation for the approaching strenuous day at the ol’ coal mine.

Did I say coal mine? I meant yogurt shop. Did I say strenuous? I apologize, I meant undemanding, child’s play of a “job” where I catch up on my soaps.

I don’t watch soap operas.

I watch self-produced marathons of Friends.

But this isn’t the point of my insomnia-induced decision to publicly ramble.

I had one of those days. Women know what I’m talking about. Or, maybe they don’t. Maybe this is just another one of my delusions to convince myself that aside from the gut-wrenching daily reminder of my complete isolation from the physical world, I have a kinship with other people through a common but undisclosed ordeal that we all, at one time or another, experience.

Maybe it’s just me that occasionally have those days where I completely loathe myself, the skin I’m in, and the person that looks at me disapprovingly when I specifically avoid making eye contact as I’m making my way past the mirror, towards the toilet.

Well, alone in this or not, I had one of those days.

It may or may not have to do with the production I put up last night (and the embarrassment… and guilt) after hugging an entire bottle of wine between my bladder and my corporeal abilities, physically and mentally leaning my entire life’s weight on Greg and friends (again). And while that looks and screams, “The culprit of your unhappiness!” at me, I still don’t feel that that’s the entire reason.

There’s something off with me.

Something that I hope sleep and time can cure. But if not, I shall return shortly to update you and whine about life’s misgivings.

Until then, I’ll leave you this little bit of life lesson gold: PMSing — not fun.

oxyjenn: The Weepies - Gotta Have You

Tue, 29 Jun 2010 00:32:07 -0700

oxyjenn:

The Weepies - Gotta Have You

Jackass

Thu, 24 Jun 2010 16:58:43 -0700

I work at a frozen yogurt shop. I leave my store every night smelling of bleach (from doing the dishes) and putrid dairy products, holding on my hips those few extra pounds — a result of hunger, boredom, theft, and experimentation.

I play my music at a piercing volume at home, in my car, at work. Not because I’m one of those teenagers who have no respect for their surrounding neighbors, but because I’m pretty sure my hearing is deteriorating as we speak (erm, as I type and as you read). As a kid, I sat too close to the television and wanted my episode of Rugrats to completely blare through the speakers. Which also explains the severity of my eyeglass prescription.

I was pitter-pattering in the kitchen completing my daily duties when the owner of the Mexican restaurant next door walked in and proclaimed that my music was seeping through the walls. It was entirely way too loud and needed to be turned down.

I stared at her blankly and said, “Excuse me?”

She repeated her request again.

And again, “Excuse me? I’m so sorry. I’m partially deaf.”

Okay, I’m probably going to go to hell for lying to her about being deaf. But then again, it isn’t an entirely gross exaggeration, I don’t hear as well as I probably should. But she made me feel like a jackass for playing my music at a normal volume — a normal one for me, at least — so I, in turn, made her feel like a jackass for being rude to a “deaf” person.

World statistics in real time.

Wed, 23 Jun 2010 22:15:00 -0700

World statistics in real time.:

(via idledrearydays)

Jason Mraz - Prettiest Friend Happy Birthday Jason Mraz. You...

Wed, 23 Jun 2010 20:57:00 -0700

Jason Mraz - Prettiest Friend

Happy Birthday Jason Mraz. You would be my prettiest friend, if we were friends.

Well we are.

Spiritually.

Shut up. I’m not crazy.

He feels it too. I just know it.

Suffice It to Say

Wed, 23 Jun 2010 14:25:00 -0700

Last week, I was walking through Ralph’s buying hot dogs (which, by the way, are remarkably overpriced — at least, more expensive than I had earlier thought when I volunteered to buy what I assumed was the cheapest thing on the list) for Emmeline’s Birthday Barbecue Bonanza. She didn’t name it that. My fingers sometimes type without my brain’s endorsement.

I made my way down the refrigerated deli meats aisle at a brisk pace towards what I could plainly see was their expansive hot dog section. But something stopped me. I felt it. There is was. Pulling me back. Something akin to a your soul’s other half, longing to forever conjoin. When you feel it, you feel it.

So, I slowly backed up. Step, step, step. And my intuition felt it. “Turn to your right,” it said. And I did.

There it was.

The honey mustard bottle.

If my three best friends are reading this, they’re probably choking with laughter. I have a strange and unnatural obsession with honey mustard. So sweet, so tart, so delectably delicious in every way. It compliments most everything that it has graced as THE condiment. The only one that satisfies my heart’s every desire. “You have a boyfriend?” No. I have honey mustard. And that’s all I need.

A few years ago, while riding down the Boulevard in Stacy’s car, I was looking out the window when I felt the urge to announce to my three friends, “You know what I love? Honey mustard.” And from that day on, at any mention of this yellow paste, my friends would burst in what can only be described as laughter of the mockery brand.

For the last week, I’ve carried this bottle of mustard with me in my purse, eating everything with a dollop atop it.

I stepped on my scale this morning.

Suffice it to say, I don’t like honey mustard anymore.