The Death of TaT

I've recently gotten to thinking I ought to write about topics other than myself in this blog. However, despite that initial statement, this post is about me. Particularly it is about my nickname: TaT. I suppose it's only fair I explain the origin of TaT for what to me appears the millionth time. Of course, as this is not casual conversation I can actually take my time and give a fuller, more detailed account.

What normally occurs when people ask me about the peculiar name I give is as follows. There's a chance people will begin by asking if it's because I have tattoos. Upon learning that I don't, I generally begin by explaining that TaT is a shortened version of Tatito, "which is my nickname back home." People then invariably ask me what Tatito means, or where that came from. To this I reply explaining that Tatito is the minuscule of Tato, which is, apparently, the nickname naturally given to Emilio's the way Roberts become Bobs and Richards become Dicks, though there may be other reasons certain Richards become dicks :P. The whole Emilio -> Tato thing I only came to know fairly recently. I back that up by relating that my father's name is Emilio and as it's the same as mine, we are both Tato but I am little Tato, thus Tatito.

The next logical link in the chain is how Tatito became TaT. Simply put, I dropped the -ito, and while normally that would revert it to Tato, I liked the ring - and particularly the symmetry, or perhaps balance - of TaT. Now for shortness' sake I often leave it there and people are commonly content with that explanation, as it is already rather lengthy. However, there is more to the story. You see, this change isn't recent. I've been using the TaT moniker since high school. Initially it was the most recent of a string of screen names I used in the MSN Messenger instant messaging client. Previous examples include, much to my dismay ( though I can chalk it off as junior high awkwardness), DragonScythe (as the earliest I can remember and which inspired a short-lived and never finished fantasy novel I had begun to write) and CookySpooky (as the weirdest I can remember), which incidentally has made a comeback as my user name for youtube.

For quite a while, TaT remained as nothing more than my MSN nickname since I didn't have many friends outside of school and I had been Emilio to the ones I had for far too long for them to call me anything else. It wasn't until I started going to youth group at a new church that I was able to give naming myself a go. This was the first time in my life I was introducing myself with no one to recant my claim, which, mind you, makes all the difference. And so, I called myself TaT and somehow it just stuck and people actually called me by it. A comical side effect of said quasi-truthful introduction was that it was several months before many people at that church came to know my real name. Needless to say, I was greatly amused. Ultimately I got so used to be called TaT by English speakers (the youth group was of an American-style church) that when I went to college in the US using TaT to introduce myself was nothing less than a no-brainer. And that's about as much as you could ever hope to know about "TaT".

So back to the point of the post. The other day I was driving and thinking to myself, as I often do when I drive, that the number of people who still call me TaT are people whom I am not in contact with on a very regular basis. In coming to the Bay Area to work at Tiny Prints, I have unconsciously - or so I tell myself - left TaT out of most of my introductions. It goes without saying that for the past month or so I've been meeting a great deal of people.

Probably the strangest part of it all is the fact that I think I might be ok with not being called TaT. It's partially linked to the fact that I've always kept TaT out of my professional life. As an aside, I'll add that "TaT Gandara" is one of my biggest pet peeves. TaT is strictly and exclusively a stand-alone title. Like I mentioned earlier, in school I was always Emilio and even in college, I was only TaT outside of the classroom. In fact, this came to cause some confusion when I shared friends whom I had met within and outside the classroom so that one knew me by TaT and the other by Emilio.

In any case, said confusions have never bothered me. Yet now as the numbers stagnate and even dwindle, I wonder if TaT is beginning to take part in my permanent history and strictly inhabiting my past. I've even gone as far as to wonder 'have I outgrown it?' but the very thought frightens me. I need no further reminder that I'm not getting any younger, even at such an early age. And then I ponder if I, in fact, wish to continue to be called TaT.

For better or worse, there have been recent developments leading to a prolongation of TaT's livelihood. At Eric's (my sempai* at work) church one of the members came to know of TaT during our conversation and in a move very much like how Osaka from Azumanga Daioh got her nick name,

announced to the congregation that I shall henceforth be known as TaT instead of Emilio. I could naught but acquiesce though I can't say I have any true complaints :). Meanwhile at the church in Redwood City, it's rather a mess with me sort of going back and forth adding the TaT part of my introduction only half the time. I suppose I should just pick one, but I am inclined to use Emilio as there isn't that much youth in that congregation. ...Perhaps, seeing as how my litmus test has become there "being much youth", I really might be outgrowing TaT.

So for now, at least, TaT still is alive and kicking. I do believe, however, that so long as I keep in touch with my Rochester, Cleveland or Rocklin friends (and particularly my family, as my nephews are growing up getting to know me as TioTaT), I shall be TaT. Or Tatticus, TaT the rat, Tatterclese, Rattatat-tat...

*sempai (先輩）is Japanese for superior/senior often used in school or work settings.

Gar

At the risk of getting sucked into it and not going to sleep until much later, I feel a sudden urge to write... which I will not listen to! Honestly there is a lot to say but at the same time that feeling is overwhelming me and it'd take way too long to write out everything I want to. So, this quick note is for the sake of populating my blog even a tiny bit. And, while not an apology, perhaps this intent will eventually turn into a huge long post in the future with everything that's been this past month. Then again, maybe not.

I'll stop now before I keep going!!!

I'm back!

Gah! After calling last wednesday - although really I should've called the previous Saturday - and setting up the earliest appointment they could arrange for me, which happened to be the following Monday(!!!), I now have internet at home. It took me all of Monday night just to catch up with everything but now I'm able to relax and had a good hour long kanji practice. It took that long because I settled a little issue I had with Bank of America, or rather logging into my online banking with them.

That's pretty much all I really wanted to say so I'll just stop it here but leave you all with a most amusing link:

Body Paint*

*Don't worry, no nudity ;)

Interval

This morning I officially had my application for the apartment denied. This afternoon I officially signed the lease and paid for and got the keys for the apartment. It's been a long day. Now let me go over the journey between the A and B I just disclosed.

It's important to note that the apartment in question is actually different for each statement. The apartment I checked out last Tuesday is the one that I got denied, the one in Palo Alto. The second one is the one in Sunnyvale. After last Tuesday I left the leasing office with high hopes for the apartment I'd seen and had done the application for. It would only be like 2 days before they approved the application and sent me the lease to sign and then I'd be moving in today. On Thursday, however, I call up and they tell me the application was denied. I'm really surprised but apparently it's because I subleased at Park Point and so they didn't have some sort of record of me living there. I told them about my subleasing there and gave them my Crittenden Court address and they said they'd check again and it probably wouldn't be a problem. They told me to call back the next day and so I did.

Ring.... Ring... Ring... And it goes to the answering machine! I tried a few times and eventually left a message to give it some time. Later that day I still hadn't heard back so I figured I'd try again on Saturday. I ended up not calling on Saturday since it was a pretty busy day (see previous post) and a lot of it I spent on the road so I didn't want to use the phone. I tried calling again on Sunday and still couldn't get through so I left another message. I believe it was on monday that they told me their phone system was down all weekend. Figures! Finally, it wasn't until this morning that I got an e-mail back saying my application was denied and that I would be called by a guy to be told why. At this point I wasn't sure what to do but I figured I had to try to find a new apartment somehow. I couldn't bear to try to once more push back my starting date at Tiny Prints so I could only try as hard as I could to find a new place quickly. Coppelia said I should try to appeal the denial somehow when I get a call from the guy. I didn't want to bank on that though and so I got on Rent.com and sent out a bunch of requests. Well I got an e-mail from one of the places before the call came and I called them and set up an appointment for today. Rent.com didn't have pictures of the apartments themselves or even floor plans so I figured I had to go check it out. I eventually got the call from the guy and turns out they hadn't done the second check with the new information yet. The guy said he'd try it out and call me back in a half hour. A half hour passed and he hadn't called yet so I decided to just head down to Sunnyvale and check out the apartment I made an appointment for.

Suffice to say, the call from the guy never came. On the way to Sunnyvale another of the apartments called but I couldn't even see those because they were 'affordable housing', which you don't qualify to live in if your AGI (adjusted gross income), if I'm not mistaken, is higher than a certain number; and mine was. In either case, I got to the apartments with no problem and proceeded to check it out. It was bigger than the one I'd seen with pretty much the same amenities. Only 20 bucks more per month but for almost 200 sq. ft. of extra space!

The landlady was going crazy trying to be at 10 places at once on top of trying to deal with me. There was a bit of hubbub going around in the place because they were installing new toilets on the entire complex. After the little tour, I decide to seize the opportunity and seal the deal. The landlady and I went to the office to go through the application and do all the paper work. After we had it all done she gives me the total I have to pay to finalize the process. I was ready to pay up with a personal check but apparently they don't take them so I have to go to a bank and get a cashier's check or money order. She says that's fine and tells me how to get to a Bank of America.

I get to the bank and realize I don't have enough money in my BoA account to get the money order. I try to take what I need from the Key bank account but it won't let me take out all I need at once and that any more exceeds the maximum I can take out in one day. After trying several things and nothing working out I eventually give up and call the landlady again to tell her I guess I'll just have to come back some other time and pay up and sign the lease. Note this would have to be a day separate from the move in day and I was very unhappy with having to do that. Surprisingly she says the application already got through and the lease is ready for me to sign it. Furthermore, upon hearing that I can't come up with the full deposit she shows an unnatural amount of generosity dropping the deposit's amount to half of what it originally was and saying that would be fine. God's favor for sure! So I happily go back into the bank (for the 3rd time) and get the cashier's check and head back to the apartments. I signed the lease and gave her the deposit and she gave me the keys. Just like that! I couldn't believe it. I wouldn't have to come back for anything before moving. Next time I go back to Sunnyvale to that apartment it'll be with all my stuff :D.

So in less than 24 hours I went from having no apartment and no leads to signing the lease on a completely new apartment and being completely set to move in! And not only that, it's bigger and closer than the one I'd look at previously. Now I'm really excited to move and start my new job. That'll be a whole 'nother adventure to look forward to, I guess.

Wicked

Coppe, Adam and I went to see the play Wicked yesterday and let me just say, I was blown away. The music was excellent, the scenography was unbelievable and the acting and singing was top-notch. Now, I don't really go to musicals a lot so I'm not a good judge/critic but I was really impressed and just instantly loved it. I now want the soundtrack and I'm longing for there to be a movie made of it, which, by the way, I checked and there does seem to be a movie in development so... yay!

For the record, I've never seen Wizard of Oz but I know the general story so I hope I didn't miss much from the musical because of it but even if I did, I loved it. Even halfway through it as it went into the intermission, I felt as though the $40 tickets were already worth it. I could've left happy at that point and there was still over an hour of play left! Thinking about it, the only drawback about the movie is that it's going to have to be shorter and I'm already dreading what they'll cut out of it.

After the play, we left San Fran and were gonna go have dinner and get some chairs at IKEA so we decided to go to the one near San Fran. Well it turns out it was my first time at IKEA and I thought it was great. Everything is surprisingly cheap, and also, one thing that amused me was that all of the designs had names. Even a plates and cups each had their own design and name. That and just about everything was pretty cheap. So now I'm pretty psyched that there's an IKEA across the street from where I'll be living, if I do, in fact, end up living there.

And so, here's a video of a performance from the Tony awards of a song in Wicked.

Transitioning

Job? Check.
Car? Check.
Apartment? Pending.
Two out of three's not so bad :D The apartment application is going through a bit of a bump but I'll just do what I can do and trust God with the rest! Tomorrow's officially my last day working for Sherwin-Williams. It sure feels weird thinking that chapter in my life is drawing to a close, and so unassumingly. It almost feels like after I left in November of last year the chapter indeed came to a close and up until now has just been some sort of epilogue. I'll be mailing the work computer back tomorrow and saying good bye to the people at Sherwin.

Speaking of connections in Cleveland, yesterday I got to see Dillon and Kathy who are on their uber awesome road trip honeymoon! We caught up over dinner and dessert and I'm super glad Rocklin was on their way down to San Franciso, where it just so happens I'll be going with Coppelia and Adam (sis and her hubs) to see Wicked on Saturday.

Speaking of San Fran, I'm so excited to be moving down to the Bay Area. I'll be moderately close enough to San Fran to visit it on a regular basis, which I plan to do to hit up Japan Town :D I seriously gotta check out Kinokuniya (japanese book store in Japan Town)! If I move in next Tuesday that week will be a sort of Vacation for me as I won't actually start working at Tiny Prints until the 8th. So I even get a long weekend out of it! :D I'm pretty excited about the apartment though, it's only about 10 mins from work and it's across the street from an Ikea and a Best Buy! Plus, it's got a trendy fireplace. TRENDY. FIREPLACE. Haha, granted that's not really that big a deal to me but it's funny. I do wish I had a dishwasher but I guess I shouldn't be such a lazy bum. Living with my sis sure spoiled me in that sense.

Speaking of dishwashers... just kidding. I've been listening to Ellipse by Imogen Heap (see previous post) a whole lot. Actually, I'm listening to it right now! I love it. It seems I'm having a bit of writers block today so I'll quit at this point and blab about something else at some other point. My mind feels extremely busy lately and right now it's not really helping to write so yeah, gonna step off for a while. Till next time readers :) jaa, ne!

Ellipse

To those of you waiting as expectantly as I:

Work Ethic

This one might be a bit of a long one since I'm going to philosophize some. Tonight on the way back from getting some Baskin Robbins Adam, Coppelia and I had a conversation that was very controversial amongst ourselves. It started with me harping on about how I delight in being given sign duty when setting up for Origin. You see, sign duty includes putting up the signs on both sides of the street right next to the church, obviously pointing to the coffee shop (where Origin takes place). Now, when most other people do sign duty, they put the first one on the closer side of the street and then jay-walk to the other side. My method includes putting the sign on the closer side of the street and then going all the way around through the traffic lights like a good pedestrian. I could excuse myself saying the reason I do this is to follow the law and to not get hit by a car, if at all possible. However, I practically boast when I say that the real reason I go around is so that I take longer doing the task, which pulls me away from doing other tasks during set-up. I refuse to do work begrudgingly so instead I find sneaky ways such as this one to, in a sense, minimize my work. In most areas of my work ethic, as I am partially of phlegmatic temperament, I tend to seek appearing busy with menial or unnecessary tasks (or just standing around) until being given an actual task; usually this task is given me by somebody with a choleric temperament.

What's this I speak of temperaments? I'll digress here for the sake of fleshing this out and I believe it'll help the point. According to (correct me if I'm wrong) the classic greek scholars, there are four temperaments: choleric, phlegmatic, sanguine and melancholic. In a short, catchy nutshell, the four temperaments follow these stereotypes:
choleric: if you wanna do it right you've gotta do it yourself
phlegmatic: I'll just wait here till somebody tells me what to do
sanguine: classic type a personality (talkative, social people)
melancholic: classic type b personality (introverted geniuses)
As I mentioned earlier, I tend to let the phlegmatic side of me control my work ethic. So I generally don't take initiative on things waiting for the choleric people to give me tasks and instructions because, frankly, I am certain that upon taking initiative to do a task, the choleric would scold me for doing it a way different from how they would've done it, despite it having been done correctly.

The reason I'm even blogging about this is because it makes me feel guilty to look at things this way. Going into a full-time job soon, I definitely want to do my best, excel and be a good employer. Now, my personal experience has been that, in spite of my general attitude towards things, when it comes down to it, I focus and get things done as quickly as I can and to the best of my abilities. In retrospect, it feels like even though I say all these things about being a lazy bum and having no initiative, I'm a good employee who is really good at following directions and generally getting things done. Of course, there are certain aspects of my work habits that I've worked on, such as making more calls on my own when I'm not sure how to do something, rather than just ask a superior at every step of the way. Perhaps this is because I have spent more than a year working at Sherwin (can hardly believe it's been that much already). Maybe it's something I've been able to improve in general.

Another thing that bothers me is when people tell you 'oh, you have to give 110%'. Other than the fact that that's impossible because 100% is the same as all you have and you certainly can't give what you don't have, it bothers me that in this capitalist world where you build empires with your own two hands, every employer expects you to give 110%, 100% of the time. This is asking you to give more than you have and thus more than you can give - at all times. If this is not the ultimate recipe for burnout, I don't know what is. I even question the notion of giving all you have at all times. Prioritizing is key in the work world. Even on a race, isn't pacing yourself one of the most important things? Why should it be different in your work life? You run harder and faster in the moments when you know you have to. You push yourself up to 100% when you need to. However, why shouldn't you pace yourself when doing tasks at lower priority? Don't get me wrong here though, I'm not saying half-a** it! I think mediocrity is unacceptable if have the ability to perform.

Going back to the deal with the Origin sign, sure, I could very cautiously jay-walk to save time with the second sign so I can sooner get back to helping, thus increasing my effectivity. However, on any given night, Origin set-up doesn't lack enough hands that we fall back on schedule far enough to merit cutting those minutes out of 'my' helpful activity. To illustrate the point from the last paragraph in this example, if jay-walking to get the signs up as fast as possible is giving 100% and walking around to get them up is 70%, while the case for giving 100% exists (desperately needing the time I would save), the merit for breaking the jay-walking law is rarely in effect.

Ultimately, this is my inspected method of thought and task handling and, to be sure, it is not some new work psychology and is not how all work should be observed. [Is this a disclaimer? haha] Making efforts to answer my own question, that of whether I am wrong in thinking this way and that regardless of how my personality is I should strive whole-heartedly to burn myself out by attempting to give more than I can for everything (skewed point of view), I lean towards saying that if it's not broken, I shouldn't try to fix it. Of course, this does not mean I will not attempt to be excellent in my work or that I will refuse constructive criticism and that I'll purposefully sabotage my motivation to improve. I strongly believe this can all be achieved within the boundaries of my method. For example, there have been many times where I am given busy work at Sherwin. Normally, my approach towards it is to assess several aspects of the task, such as difficulty and time required for completion, and, according to my other priorities, tune my effort to complete the task in a timely, effective manner. So on a particularly slow day where I expect no other work, I would take all the time necessary to do the task in a calm, effective manner (go around the street through the traffic lights). If something unexpected happened such as getting an important or urgent task all of a sudden, again depending on the priorities, I would drop the current task and work on the pressing one or work harder to complete the current one in a timelier manner to get started on the new one. This would then be akin to us being short-handed at Origin and needing me to get back quickly from setting up the signs. Perhaps these situations wouldn't turn out or work exactly this same way in real cases but I do believe my method has some merit.

If you will, it would be good to know what you have to say. It would be fun to start a conversation in the comments. I absolutely do not expect everybody to agree with me and I fully expect people to find loopholes, incongruences and the like in my method and question me to no end, but, like I said, this is how I currently see my work ethic. This new job is sure to stretch me and I'm looking forward to seeing how it will prepare me for the work I will do in Japan when the time comes.

Offer

Sitting on the futon couch I call my bed while I watch Advent Children in Japanese (with Japanese subtitles, fortunately) I multi-task enough to IM with some friends and write a blog. I feel pretty much obligated to write this blog because of what happened today. If you're one of the people who read this blog you might already know the news. To keep it short, today I got an e-mail with a job offer from Tiny Prints! Looks like what I came to California to do has finally happened; or at least an important part of the chain. In the coming weeks I'll be working hard to figure all the logistics out. Finding housing, getting a car, figuring out what to do about the payments and occupation of my previous apartment in Rochester... all that good stuff. It'll be an interesting few weeks leading up and a whole lot of transitioning. I like changes like these, exasperating and daunting as they may be but I know God's got my back. I don't know if this job is a step in the direction of my mission to Japan but I'm not even a quarter of a hundred years old. I still have a lot of time to do what I can do. I just gotta keep moving forward and let the Lord lead my steps.

Decision

Yesterday I was talking to Coppelia before setting up for Origin (night church). I was telling her that I'm just not feeling it about the interview this week. I remember saying 'I don't know what I want' and feeling tired. Later that day, after a very powerful and challenging message from pastor Mark we went home. In bed I began to have a 1 on 1 with God. I don't exactly remember if it was at this point or a little earlier at night that I realized I knew what I wanted all along. I want to do God's will. It's that simple. My decision is that I'm going to do God's will. The more I thought about it the less I could sleep and it was about an hour later that I was still stoked, thanking God and having an unbridled joy within me as I felt my life have a strong purpose for the first time in - possibly - all my life.

In the words of Phil Whickam, 'I have decided to follow Jesus. No turning back.'