I am now officially Yelp Elite!

Now to figure out what that really means…

Today, I said to Joe, “My phone battery never dies. Unlike some people…”

I was alluding to the fact that I always kept my phone charged and diligently used the phone so that I never got the “battery dead” message.

As I said that, I wanted to say “knock on wood”, but thought I was getting superstitious in my pretentious moment. How could I jinx my phone?

Well apparently I did.

I was talking to my sister on the phone walking along Valencia. I hung up as I crossed the side street and dropped my phone in the process. The back of the phone and the battery popped out. I thought cheap phones just can’t stick together and promptly put the phone together, expecting that it will work.

Unfortunately it did not.

Everything was fine. Except the screen. It lit up, but nothing displayed. Just a white empty screen. I figured out that I could call people by using my speed dial, but nothing more.

I thanked my luck stars that I was incredibly anal about copying my phone numbers to my digital address book.

So now, I will carry a screenless phone…like before the days of caller id. Feel free to call me, because I won’t know it’s you. In fact, telemarketers can also call me, because I won’t know it’s you.

“Hello?” I’ll answer instead of the cherry “Hi [insert name here]”.

“He’s dead,” a friend imed me.

Then a few minutes later, another friend imed me “Did you know that Heath Ledger died?” and provided a link to a news article.

In my email, I got an email with only the subject sad and a link to the news on Defamer.

And then another im with the same news.

Chris at first thought it was a piece of viral marketing for the Dark Knight.

He was great in Brokeback Mountain and should have received the Oscar.

“Excuse me, if you don’t mind me asking, are you going to use your transfer later tonight?” the guy with tight jeans asked as he held onto the pole on the 14. He looked at us innocently.

I stared at him with growing reluctance, but we gave him the transfer anyway. Then I whispered, “why does he need a transfer if he got on the bus.”

“Maybe it’s for a friend at the next stop.”

But the thing was…it was a simple innocous question from someone who almost seemed trustworthy.

I remember a time I was walking to the grocery store. A pair of girls stopped us and asked us for change for the pay phone. They said they needed to make a call. Without thinking, I just gave them the change and saw them walk right past the pay phone.

Am I pansy? Can I not see through deception? Do I have trouble seeing past face value?

How do we say no to something we almost find fundamentally wrong? We were going to toss the transfer into the trash the moment we got off the bus. We weren’t going to use it. But it was so easy. A fellow person asks you for a simple favor. The time. Pick up that piece of paper for me. And suddenly, you can’t help but say yes.

I am a pansy as would the author of Influence say.

And about two days later as we were standing on Market waiting for the F line, a guy with a scruffy beard showed us the transfers he had and said, “Want one?”

We looked at him in confusion as he pushed one into our hands. “It’s a dollar,” he added.

And sometimes I thought the day would never arrive.

The movie will have your head spinning. Figuratively and literally.

But I would label my tapes with an address so that my tapes wouldn’t be classified under the US Government.

It was a War of the Worlds, Godzilla, The Blair Witch Project, The Host, Felicity…all in one, but better.

As we walked along the Embarcadero, we suddenly heard a loud noise.

Something falling and crashing, I thought.

But then it happened again.

Echoing against the tall buildings of downtown San Francisco. I was frightened and looked at my friend as we walked. Everything kept going normally—the cars kept driving, the street cars kept moving. The lights seem to shudder, but everything was as if nothing had happened.

And it happened a few more times. Echoing loudly against the buildings as if a bomb was landing.

But as we turned around the corner of the Ferry Building, we spotted people looking out into the Bay.

There it was.

Fireworks exploding upwards from a ship. A cruise ship? Of bright colors and light, thundering against the buildings of downtown San Francisco.

I felt old as my discomfort grew, disliking the noise as it echoed. With my friend, we ran into the restaurant we were heading toward…and stayed inside even when the restaurant staff ran outside in glee to watch an old-fashioned unexpected fireworks display.

Dearest Air,

When I first saw you, I was in love. You were going to be my next love after my baby powerbook.

You see, my baby powerbook was everything I wanted. Lightweight. Thin and small. Eye-dazzling. Sexy. And the this powerbook is with me and not you bragging rights. Unfortunately years passed (almost 4) and my baby powerbook is becoming slower and slower. And gaining all this unnecessary bangs and marks.

The baby powerbook is still chugging.

But I laid eyes on you. Thin. Dazzling. Light. So many fans. And you were going to be mine for a tiny price of $1799.

Then I realized you had no disc drive and you stole drives from others.

That’s like borrowing toilet paper from your next door neighbor every single time, because you couldn’t afford to get your own.

Um…so…ok bye!

Jenn

“The Kobe prime rib?” she said. “I’ll have that.”

I sucked in a breath as I realized a friend for her birthday (in a dinner with only 3 of us) ordered the most expensive item on the menu.

Plus a salad.

And a drink.

For the rest of the week, I was feeling oddly resentful. It wasn’t that she wasn’t a good friend. Or that she didn’t deserve it. But something just felt wrong when I decided that I’ll ignore my reluctance and drop a few hundreds.

Then I realized. It was this thing called the generosity budget.

Every person in your own social network. Friends and family included each individually have a generosity budget. Granted I think in 1s or 2s (and perhaps video games). That the budget expands and contracts based on events that occur.

Perhaps it was someone who helped you find a new job. Or when you went out for ice cream, he says, “I got it” and swats you away when you try to pay in vain. Or someone who drove you all the way back home even though it was more than 20 minutes away. And most of all, the someone who doesn’t judge or criticize in your moments of weakness.

Then there’s the other events. People who don’t returns emails, phone calls, or ims. The one who stares at you in blankness when you need help and you change subject to what they want to hear and they suddenly become animated. Or the one who appears at your parties simply to drink the alcohol, but to talk with you, it’s one word sentences.

It’s funny how we choose our friends. But it’s rather startling to realize this generosity budget.

I am trying not to be a pushover and try not to do the same to others.

Generosity is self-sacrifice. But to sacrifice for what end…for true altruism? I once remember paying for everything. Almost in spite. In the idea that “you’re not worthy to be paying”. Is that generosity? When the gift comes out of hatred but some may view it’s from the heart?

True generosity is to give what they need, not what they want.

Laundry that I have to pay for.

In coins.

$2/wash

and

$1.50/dry

All with just one setting each.

Because I have a few products that I helped out with demoing at CES, I have been following news about it.

Always interesting news. The biggest TV. The next big download tv/movies center. And other shiny gadgets that most of us won’t see.

But then there was the prank by Gizmodo. Dubbed, the meanest thing that Gizmodo did at CES.

Sure, it’s funny that you got a remote to turn off TVs on the wall of display. And another to turn off the TVs during a gaming session while players look at their own screen. But it’s not funny to do it during an important presentation demoing a new product.

It’s really not funny to be suddenly experience problems during a presentation. And having been a presenter myself…when the slides go down, it’s not cool. Especially when it’s something that’s caused by an audience member.