Saturday, Sept. 11, 2004 - 10:54 p.m.

A triple journal entry day. Can you tell I am officially unemployed now? lol.

There is some heated discussion going on on Forumosa.com about Lonely Planet's new Taiwan edition (out later this year), and the "letting go" of Robert Storey. Check it out:

http://forumosa.com/taiwan/viewtopic.php?t=22402

As for me, what a day!

I keep buying more and more tiny souvenirs, at this point I think I will have 10 times the amount of souvenirs than I do actual friends. lol. But this is the first time since I started this travel thing again 3 years ago where I am coming home with more money than when I left AND I thus wont have to mooch and crash on a couch while I look for work. So, I wanna spoil my friends who have taken so great care of me the other times I came home broke as well as their online support this time.

But being Debra and stubborn about not carrying around a lot of stuff, all my souvenirs are tiny and useful! How boring. I would tell you what they are, but enough of the people getting em read this thing. So, nah nah, you'll just have to wait:)

When I was workin at a hostel near SF it was just after working and living overseas 3 years ago. I had just started writing JUST TRAVELING a few months before, and with a working computer in my room with internet acccess, I was bursting with fruit flavors on the research, sharing and promotional opportunities that were instantly available.

I would literally come home (a 1 minute walk from the hostel office, lol) after an 8 hour shift and work on JUST TRAVELING for another 8 hours. Minus potty breaks. I was excited! Since we were nestled in the hills known as the Marin Headlands-there werent any city distractions that would have made it a slower process. I was going crazy being that isolated then, but this project would have consumed me no matter where I was really.

My housemates were really social and I think my overzealous attitude towards getting somewhere with this web writing thing was a thorn in their side. One co-worker would repeatedly call me a "webhead" and mean it as the worst insult possible. Strange. I was excited, stimulated and productive, but they were not happy with me.

Why am I bringing this up now? I am reading this book called GEEKS by Jon Katz. The book follows these two teenage guys from bum fuck, small town America into exciting lives that the web opened up for them.

I am barely into the first chapter of the book, but already I am in love. The authors intro is long and clarifies A LOT about those of us excited about the webs existence that needed to be said. Validation for me. I am sort of in this web enthusiast grey area. I am not network or technically inclined when it comes to this fabulous medium, just use it to its full extent.

I just cringe when people tell me they dont want email and think that people who spend a lot of time online are "weird." Are people who read a lot weird? I am both and consider both hobbies more of attributes to what make me interesting, not "weird."

okokok. So, here are a few sections of the book that really resonate with me so far:

(from page xxx, where he is beginning to define what the word "geek" means in modern times)
" You are online a good part of the time. You feel a personal connection with technology, less its mechanics than its applications and consequences....You are obsessed with pop culture, which is what you talk about with your friends or coworkers every Monday.

You dont like being told what to do, authority being a force you see as not generally on your side. Life began for you when you got out of high school, which, more likely than not, was a profoundly painful experience. ...

Now, you zone out on your work. You solve problems and puzzles. You love to create things just for the kick of it. You may have power of your own now-a family, money-yet you see yourself as one who never quite fits in. In many ways, geekdom, is a state of mind, a sense of yourself in relation to the world thats not easily rewritten."