Designed to Fuck you Over.

I'm back in Holland. Lovely weather. No seriously. Sunny and cool. The air feels cleaner already. Dani threw a whiskey tasting thing last night, which was lovely. An eclectic collection of guests showed up, and there was plenty of swapping of war stories admits the indulgence. Like M, for example, who was caught at the border while trying to escape Iraq a total of 11 times. You know all those stories you read in books like Persepolis, it's actually worse in real life. He hid in a mountain hut somewhere in Bulgaria, in the middle of winter, with 34 other men, for days. I don't think I could ever imagine that of him if he never told me. I don't think I'm still comprehending any of it as having been a reality of any of the people I've met that have told me such stories. 

Victor reminded me of the existence of The Consumerist. Read it an learn. I've just started an annoying back and forth with getting my gym to cancel my membership because I'm no longer in Singers. Fun times. I know now when I have a gut feeling that I'm being coerced, I should listen to that gut feeling and act on it. Anyway, get this. The whole system is designed to FUCK YOU OVER.

Everything is designed to make you feel like you don't have enough. That you don't earn enough and that external forces require you to spend more than you make just to reach up to some sickening, wasteful ideal to imply that you do (make a lot of money).

I've spent a lot of time letting guys spend their money on me. I'd say it's given me lots of great experiences, and I really appreciate them for it. And hopefully it's not wasted and one day I'll be an awesome artist, or something. But looking back on it, I'm just realising that most of them didn't really have all that much. If you get a lot, you spend a lot, and in the end it's all designed so you end up having nothing. Of course you only live once, and you can't take it with you. But that's not the point I'm trying to make. The point is that the system is really trying to screw you over. That somehow we've created a world in which we are compelled to milk everything we have at our disposal, in return for negative value. 

We are pathetic.