Touring/tasting at Hendry Ranch Winery next Monday. From what I've read, it's a free 2 hour tour and George Hendry personally conducts it. I'm looking forward to an educational approach to the conception of wine and the inception of a very drunk me.

Went to Frog's Leap last week. $15 for 4 tastings of MEH. Beautiful grounds, though. Worth a visit. I'll make sure it's free next time-- they offer tours 2x a day, but fill up fast. Tours include tastings.

In living alone, I've realized how lackadasical my eating habits have become. On the flight home yesterday evening (an hour delayed), I practically inhaled all the peanuts and pretzels offered, knowing damn well by the time I got home I would not want to cook dinner. For "lunch" today, I had an exquisite bowl of General Mills' finest Honey Nut Cheerios.

Grocery shopping MUST be done...although I do have plenty of stuff waiting to be thawed and eaten from the freezer.

Oh, and this happened yesterday. Not too far from my place. A little too close for comfort. Call me a snob, but this specific region of Pleasant Hill is a tad trashy since it hangs on the precipice of Concord. I smell a move to Walnut Creek or to the less controversial side of Pleasant Hill when my lease is up.

Life, lately:

1. Torts
2. Contracts
3. Civil Procedure (so help me god)

I'm convinced the water gushing out of the kitchen faucet is NOT fit for consumption, even after a filtering courtesy of Brita. The H20 reeks of chlorine. In the meantime, as much as I hate to, I'm hunkering down and buying gallon jugs of water. I refuse to drink diluated chlorine. Brita is weak. I'll have to look into something more aggressive, like the PUR filteration systems they have on sale at Target.

Living alone means that I have a lot of free time on my hands. I think I have the Target aisles memorized. Sad.

Living alone also means that I have even more time to focus on the annoying aspects of having to live in a building with parachute kids. A recap of the phenomenon: East Asian children, dumped in the States by wealthy parents, given a bank account, car, apartment, in hopes that said children will accquire an excellent American education at an excellent institution. Too bad parachute kids don't land with ANY MANNERS. At least the ones on my floor didn't.

Living alone also means I make a lot of weird, half-assed meals to eat. I threw some tofu, green bell pepper, bean sprouts into a pan. Dribbled soy sauce on it. Called it a "meal." In my previous civilian life, I would've called it inedible.

Yesterday, I landed in Oakland around 1PM, anticipating an afternoon of case briefing and furniture-putting-together (yes, the couch and dining room set are still in respective boxes). But-- GENIUS ALERT-- upon touchdown, I realized that I left my keys in Jon's car. Where is Jon's car, you ask? Jon's car is in LA.

Fuck, right? Fuck me to hell and back. Do I book a roundtrip ticket immediately? FREAK OUT?

It's good to have friends. The ex-boyfriend of your close girl friend sort but cool and on good terms with you type. Friends that happen to live 5 minutes down the street you do. So yes, Eric landed at 845PM. Until then, I spent the afternoon entertaining myself with free Oakland Int'l wi-fi and my contracts case book, along with $25 worth of overpriced, shitty airport food and a sore ass.

But wait, my geniusness isn't over. I bought a few cans of organic black bean soup today (lowfat), hoping to indulge myself in a luxurious canned meal after my contracts class let out at 10pm.

GENIUS ALERT. I don't have a can opener.

"I'm trying to be a singer, not a civil rights leader."

Gay. Now what?

To my understanding, Adam Lambert kept his sexuality under wraps for the duration of the show (possibly due to AI contract?) and while many-- if not most-- assumed him to be gay, he kept mum and disclosed nothing until this week's Rolling Stone issue. Some say that Lambert was "obviously" gay and no declaration had ever need be made about it. Others were clearly ruffled that the contestant stopped short of "officially" coming out.

For a gay celebrity, there are two scenarios that he/she can embrace: the first, being to deny or to choose not to address the issue of his/her sexuality and the second being to announce it and go from there. The latter practice is generally seen as the protocol, the "right thing to do." The former will get you nasty posts and Tweets from celeb blogger Perez Hilton along with loud headlines splayed all over checkout stand weeklies. Is there a right way to come out?

Do we blame society for being so fixated on labeling everything and everybody for stifling any intentions for gay celebrities and everyday gays alike to come out? Does it matter if being gay has an official label? Or, is it a disservice to the LGBT community when a gay individual makes a choice to keep their sexuality to themselves (or simply to disclose it to few)?

I've never had to face a firing squad of speculation or assumption when it came to my own sexuality and it is unfortunate that the LGBT family has to. It would be flippant to lay claim that we live in a time and place where labels, especially those regarding gender and sexuality, don't matter.

Being a minority is ABOUT CIVIL RIGHTS! It is ABOUT the process of unification and going about striving to change the treatment of the individual and collective by the majority. With that, I find Lambert fascinatingly ignorant when he says, "I'm trying to be a singer, not a civil rights leader." As a figure in the public eye, shouldn't he feel more responsible for setting an example? To use his fame as a platform for reform?

Does he really expect that he can continue to be a performer while being detached from the urgency that surrounds the gay community?

As a celebrity, do your obligations differ from that of the average civilian?