I am the hokage.

somewhere in between 4 and 5 am the once distinct line between the viscosity of reality and calm waters of dreams merge into something I can't quite explain. I guess you could just call it drowsiness, but it's something more to me. It's a special time. I don't get to watch Naruto anymore but on a random Sunday night I found myself in front of a projector TV (strange because I never watch shows let alone in front of a TV) witnessing an episode with my younger brother. You know how some animes can be, sometimes it takes two to three episodes to give the back story behind why a character acts a certain way when in the actual scope of the show the only thing that has actually chronologically occurred is that the protagonist has picked her/his nose one tyme. it could be for a lot of reasons, maybe this was purposely done by the creators of the show because they felt it was something important they wanted to emphasize for the plot line, or maybe the writers are stalling to catch up to the manga and thought that they would create an episode about why the character likes picking their nose and how picking their nose reminds them of their childhood when they used to go to the Cherry Blossom Festival with their grandmother who was very dear to them and interestingly had an affinity for collecting rocks that struck resemblances to past emperors of the Meiji Era. Anyways, back to the episode. It was about Rock Lee, a cat who I really admire. I mean, the dude has heart. I never saw myself as someone who was ever exceptionally gifted at anything. When I was younger I never was really particularly good at anything academically, I was horrible at practically every sport I tried to play (unless you count bottlecap soccer which I was aiight at, or pogs (which I'm still currently petitioning for to be recognized at the upcoming London Olympics...), and overall I was just a super clumsy kid. Maybe it was because I was never passionate about many of the things I tried, maybe it was because I was lazy, or maybe I just overall sucked, who knows, but regardless I never recall ever saying to myself, "oh hey Francis you know there's an accordian sitting there next to that Eastern European man, why don't you pick it up and start jammin'" and then proceeded to try it like two times and then be the next Pavarotti of accordians. I've always had to work for everything I have come to know or be somewhat proficient at. I used to envy other folks for their ability to pick up things so easily, the folks who had all the support from a young age, the resources, the princeton review SAT prep courses, the parents who made it to all their basketball games. My life wasn't any of those things. Nothing about me or my family fit that archetype. at this point in my life I've come to accept, nourish, and even love this aspect of my being, and I've come to understand myself and the fact that I wouldn't have the drive that I do now if I had the talent that others possess. Rock Lee didn't possess natural gifts that many other ninjas were born with to practice a diverse array of ninja techniques, so he dedicated himself to using solely taijutsu, something unheard of because of the vulnerability that it could cause for a ninja in battle. He trained countless minutes, hours, days, nights, weeks on end, all with a dream to realize his dreams, to show himself that he was just as adept and powerful as anyone else, to become something worthy of calling a legend. I wonder if Rock Lee ever had issues with chronic bags under his eyes. These days I see myself in Rock Lee more than ever, trying to make it in this post-baccalaureate program despite all the problems I'm having, trying to balance work and extracurriculars, maintain the relationships I have with the friends and family I love, keep improving in Spanish and Thai, commuting back and forth on the weekly, contributing to the art form of dance, and most of all, sleep. There's a lot we can learn from anime, we just have to keep our eyes, ears, and most of all our minds open to the possibility...

yesz.

~two neutrino particles smash into one another at a speed faster than light, ricocheting outwards into the vast universe.

listening to: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ub8sCqQJUu4

I sometimes feel like the water in the stream flowing with the pebbles underneath, with the flowing sediments. then I find myself in the stagnant tributary, realizing just how much more learning I need to do.

this was a tough week, and there'll be many more to come. I'm thankful for the things I fear the most, and appreciate the most adverse circumstances. I went through call intimidated by genetics, was ridiculed by my lab PI at CHORI for knowing close to nothing about chemical assays, serial dilutions, or how to convert from grams to milligrams (DAMN F'REAL) and here I am wrestling with professor Curr and his psycho expectations. and I'm learning. I can't believe I'm writing a blog about a fcuken class. good thing I can turn the most seemingly non interesting things into stories. for me our immune system's like different infantry divisions from different nation states that were all teleported to an island by an unknown entity (normally deez nation states have hella beef because of a history of 54897438973589 yearz of war with one another) and all they know when they simultaneously arrive together on the moonlit beach shore is that they must work together and protect the island for an indefinite amount of time if they are ever to make it back to their homelands. I know the difference between transfection and transformation. I know the different blotting techniques, their steps, and their purpose. Western Blots are for protein assays, Northern are for RNA, and Southern are for DNA. word word I'm coo. I dont really care much for tha mechanizms but I do appreciate the benefits that these studies can have for the larger society.

On another note I was in a parking lot in hayward about to go meet two classmates to study for that dayum immunology midterm when I was listening to KALX and this one dj named citizen zane who's pretty illin' was interviewing this cat named Zion Train, a dub legend who was of african descent, from the uk, but living in and calling from cologne, germany, at 1 am. for some reason Ipictured him in one of those red telephone booths on a london street corner head pressed against the phone box drowsy and somehow still sputtering out bits and pieces of knowledge. he was talking about why he does music and his philosophies regarding it. He talked about how dub was a reflection of those specific times, how the machinists behind the music would crank up the drums and bass to make them the centerpiece and mess with the vocals, he talked about how music that is created is a representation of the condition of life one is living. I thought that that was beautiful. it makes me remember why music is such a centerpiece in my life and why I find myself always gravitating towards it even when I'm in life's trance, and it is in that moment I snap out of autopilot and open my eyes, I'm on my back floating on the surface tension of music, marinating my periphery, all for me to melt into.

Letrera a profesor Fleming.

Dear Professor,

I was taking a break from work today when I was on my old blog just
going through old entries. I stumbled upon this and felt very blessed:

“Why do you want to help others?”
Prof. says that the recurring theme that he says that we want the truth.

"One of the secrets to school is to enjoy it, when you enjoy it you do
better at it. The reason why I’m putting this up there is because I
want to challenge you all to see what defines you. It’s 6:41 PM, at
6:45, "you can redefine yourself." You can say that you felt this way,
saw something, and say that this is who I want to be. One thing that
is inconspicuously absent is money, I grew up poor and that’s what I
always wanted. The Nissan Z was big when I said that when I grew up I
was gonna buy one and I did buy a 350 Z. I do public interest work and
get paid pretty well, I’m not going to say that it’s not a part of
everything, it’s a part of it as well. You can ask yourself, who am I?
Do any of these apply to me, or you can choose to not care about none
of that as well? "

"In 7th grade I always ate lunch with two of my friends. My friend
Chris had two divorced parents. Chris’ family owned the only Chinese
grocery store in town. Chris would get fantastic food from the
cafeteria. Mike would have ding dongs, great stuff and never share
with anyone. I would have a sandwich of some sort. Chris would always
get French fries (which were really good). Every single day for a
year, I would ask Chris for French fries and he would always say no,
finally he gave in once and let me get two leftover fries. I always
told myself that I’d never grow up having to ask anyone for French
fries. People always ask how can you want to help communities and still drive
a sports car? (His experiences show that he wants to work for those
communities but it’s still ok to have some things that you like,
sheeit, you did happen to bust your butt to get to where you wanted to
be in your life!)"

I've been doing that post-baccalaureate program at CSU East Bay that I
told you about a few months back and honestly I have forgotten about
enjoying it. Honestly it's very difficult to for a few reasons. First
off, I feel that I'm in some strange purgatory-like state taking
classes at another school for something that will not confer me any
kind of degree and is more of a way to atone for my academic sins in
science classes at UC Berkeley. Secondly, I'm not very interested in
most of the classes that I have been forced to take, which mostly
consist of upper division science courses which mostly discuss very
specific molecular mechanisms describing how certain processes
function in nature. Thirdly, I feel disconnected from the bigger
picture and the people and communities I want to serve. Most of my
time is spent studying and trying to improve my GPA. At the same time
I feel that I need this discipline, to improve my study skills, and
drill the idea into my brain that sometimes you have to make
sacrifices like this in order to get to where you want to be and work
with the community you want to work with some day. It would have been
great to have some humanities classes integrated into the curriculum,
but then again that means even more money for tuition and
post-baccalaureate students get terrible financial aid.

I hope that I haven't rambled too much professor, I just had a feeling
that you might appreciate some aspect of my ramblings. I also just
wanted to let this blog entry that I recorded serve as a reminder to
you of the students' lives that you are impacting through your
teaching. It's much appreciated and I thank you again for the time I
had to take your course and dialogue with you. I hope all is well and
that you're taking care of yourself and finding peace and fulfilliment
with each day. Take care of yourself!

Sincerely,
Francis

A. H. YEZ.

I love the fact that my part time job serves a doper bigger picture benefit to the greater community but also doesn't need me to utilize 100% of my mental capacity. T minus 7 horas hasta que puedo empezar estudiando para que puedo sacar una nota buena en mi examen este sabado. holla.

CAFFEINE IS A HEYL OF A DROOG

WIRED AS FACK on some kind of mocha beverage from tha FSM. I never drink coffeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee so I'm loooppppppppppeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeh as fack trying to draw out mechanisms of the innate and adaptive immune system and break down the specific molecules that're turned on or off that work together to elicit the things we observe externally such as inflammation swelling and redness (oh wait swelling and redness are parts of inflammation BLABLABLA IM WIRED)
OK BYE

prioridades.

'tengo tanto que decirte...pero donde empezar...'

ahora escuela esta matandome...
la cosa es que es mas de solo que tengo un clase mas dificile de todos los clases que haz tomado en el programa. Pienso que todavia no estoy enfocado, y aveces regrese a los malos habitos que tengo con estudiando y enfocando. Espere que hubiera haber ido a tomar ese examen de ADD. Cada dia cuando trato a leer, siempre oye sonados de los cancionces de salsa, funk, o cualquiera tipo musica que esta atascado en mi cabeza. Cada dia pienso de una cosa con que estoy preocupado, de mi familia, de mis temores...Cada dia pienso de ella.

Tengo que majorar mi mente y enfocarme. tengo que ser una persona equalibrada que quiero ser en el futuro.

sin pelo.

usted podría ser calvo y yo todavía te amo igual. .

espía encubierto

espere que era una espía encubierto, disfrazado de una mujer normal, pero en actualidad era una mujer real. no me intereso. sigh.