I mentioned a few weeks ago that I had discovered that the last few months of my life would make a good book. Well, I've been spending the last few weeks trying to figure out just how exactly to start that book. Well, I'm happy to report that it dawned on me at work the other day and I finally have the first thousand words or so of it punched into my computer. I realize that maybe no one out there cares, but I have tried to start a novel so many times, always not getting the first few hundreds words close enough to right to make me motivated at all to continue on the project. This is as far as I've ever gotten into the actual writing of a novel before (I have several planned out).

So, now I can say that I'm working on two books again and be completely honest. One is my travelogue that is about one-third done, and now this. It makes me feel good.

Of course, there is that book of poetry that I promised back in December or January though...that's done, all the work is there, I just need to get off my lazy ass and find a publisher.

Status of my online fund-drive (now to be known as my garage sale): I can't get rid of any of my books. My library is my preciousssssss.

I have decided though that I am going to be putting a lot of stuff up for sale. I have a lot of stuff that I don't really need and I might as well make money off of it, you know? So anyway, the plan is this: Soon, within the next couple of weeks, I will be creating a website at my angelfire domain and will be letting people buy stuff that I will send out to them. I will leave it all there for two or three weeks, at which time I will be putting the stuff up at ebay.

I really have no idea if anyone that reads this or any of the boards that I frequent will want to buy any of my stuff, but I figure it's easier to sell it all myself without middlemen like ebay and secondspin to take a chunk out.

This is what's making me feel like crap right now...

Oh shit, does this mean we have to drop cluster bombs all over DC and NYC neighborhoods now?

US finds evidence of WMD at last...buried in a field near Maryland -- The good news for the Pentagon yesterday was that its investigators had finally unearthed evidence of weapons of mass destruction, including 100 vials of anthrax and other dangerous bacteria. The bad news was that the stash was found, not in Iraq, but fewer than 50 miles from Washington, near Fort Detrick in the Maryland countryside.

Dammit, there's nothing quite as good as a little irony to kick your cynical ass into gear, is there? That is hilarious. But wait, the article (and the hilariousness) goes on:

Even more embarrassing for the Pentagon, there was no documentation about the various biological agents disposed of at the US bio-defence centre at Fort Detrick. Iraq's failure to come up with paperwork proving the destruction of its biological arsenal was portrayed by the US as evidence of deception in the run-up to the war.

that's rich.

Status of my online fund drive: Working on it. Thirty CDs found that I can part with (some good, others probably going to the used CD shop...).

Tomorrow night's job: Books.

It's almost getting to the point where comparisons of America 2000 to Germany 1930 are not all that fanatically crazy anymore. The following, and the story of our not allowing the Red Cross to visit Iraqi PoWs in accordance with international law, several stories of abuse by soldiers on Iraqi citizens, plus the fact that our foriegn policy is now completely pre-emptive and based on lies and faulty intelligence ala the Belgrade Chinese embassy bombing is really starting to rag on me. I feel the outrage overload building up...

truthout reports:

US Plans Death Camp -- The US has floated plans to turn Guantanamo Bay into a death camp, with its own death row and execution chamber. Prisoners would be tried, convicted and executed without leaving its boundaries, without a jury and without right of appeal, The Mail on Sunday newspaper reported yesterday. The plans were revealed by Major-General Geoffrey Miller, who is in charge of 680 suspects from 43 countries...

Yes, Yes, Yes!!!! It's fucking Voltron!!!!!!

get your voltron on

Seriously, this is a hilarious anti-war comic book, featuring, of all people, Voltron. The first time I saw this cartoon I laughed so hard I started sweating perfusely. Ask Tiger Lily.

Check this out and find out what google knows about you, I have learned things I never knew about myself. I'm fascinated by it:

googlism

My name came up with this, among other things:

kyle is eating squid right now
kyle is that guy that sits in back in the dark that some people see at scout finch shows
kyle is damnfine
kyle is da man
kyle is blessed with 1940s matinee idol looks
kyle is wearing black leather pants and boots
kyle is a bold talent who can weave a spell of danger or delight with equal skill
kyle is as wild a performer as there is in porn
kyle is the fit expert so many pros and amateurs turn to

Sometimes I don't need to say very many words about an article I link to on this here blog. The story says enough for itself. But I want to add two words to this one:

HOLY SHIT.

Iraqi man ends 20 years in hiding

Just read it. It ain't long.

Yay! I'm a...

27.41617% - Total Geek

If nothing, nothing else, about our handling of the Iraqi war has pissed you off, our handling of Iraqi PoWs should. This story in the Observer. We are denying Iraqis visitation by the International Red Cross/Red Crescent to check on thier status and make sure that they're are being treated humanely. This is in direct violation of the Geneva conventions and would be more than enough to send us into some third world nation to blow them back to the fourth world if this was being done to our troops/people/citizens/whatever. It makes me sick, honest to God SICK, that we -- the government that "represents" me, represents YOU -- would even THINK of behaving this way. I have said it before, and I will say it again: Our country is heading into a very bad place indeed, pretty soon I fear it will become something that none of us would recognize...

From the article:

The International Committee of the Red Cross so far has been denied access to what the organisation believes could be as many as 3,000 prisoners held in searing heat. All other requests to inspect conditions under which prisoners are being held have been met with silence or been turned down.

Okay, so anyway...blogspot is really not working very well at putting the information that I type here into a place where it can be read by people out there. I have ben updating rather regularly all weekend, so if you haven't been here for a little while and want to read what I have written...you may want to check out the archive for this month. It may work better (not that I can check it right now since all that's coming up for me is the banner ad on top)....

Allergies suck.

I just found this, the IMDb list of the worst 100 movies of all time. I got some new flicks to watch...

While you're looking to the left, please note that now the high estimate of civilians killed in Iraq is over 7000 -- almost twice the number of innocent people killed on Sep. 11. When is this going to end?

I was talking tonight with a friend about some of the stuff I posted last night and I think I may just be wierd. See, the thing that really throws me about relationships is how so many people are so willing to throw themselves so completely at the other person. I see people all the time do so so seriously that they lose their own identity and become little more than a lapdog to the object of their affection.

I don't get that.

I could never do that, never in a million years. I didn't when I was in love the one time I was ever in love and I have never been tempted to since. I fear, honest to God fear doing so. I never want to change for anybody, I never want to submit myself entirely to anybody. I want to be me, for good or bad, forever and ever amen. I might change, certainly -- I have constantly over my entire lifespan and plan on doing so until I die, such is the nature of human existence -- but I don't want to change for anyone else...just for me. Only me. I am the only person that I need to please, for I am the only person destined to be around me every moment of my life, and I see it as silly and foolish to even think of maybe doing so for anone else.

I mean, cutting back on the swearing, drinking a little less, and that sort of thing is one thing...don't get me wrong. But those are just petty hobbies and mannerisms. I am talking the big stuff -- religion, friends, belief systems, self-image, etc. To sacrifice those things is to sacrifice your soul and there isn't a single thing that's worth sacrificing your soul for -- even love and acceptance. There is no one person on this planet worth doing that for.

What I look for is someone that can accept me at face value -- accept that I have interests outside of her, accept that I am not perfect, accept that I am my own person and in so being cannot always be there for her. Someone that can love me for who I am instead of what I'm willing to do for her. Someone that does so in spite of the fact that I am not perfect and am my own person. Someone that can respect me for what I am and appreciate the fact that I'm giving her all that I feel comfortable giving her. Someone that I can feel the same way for.

I have never thought that I was wierd in thinking this way, but others have told me that they "do and don't" understand. When I point out people at the bar they say "oh, I've been there" and try to dismiss it as love-sick tomfoolery. I cannot. I just can't. And I am coming to think that maybe this is the reason that I have never been in a long-term relationship of any sort. I've talked to a few people about this lately and only one, one, person feels the same way about relationships. She also sees the way people throw themselves at others and is physically sickened by it. And that is how I am.

There are many things that I am that make me worthy of love -- committed, caring, compassionate, loving, loyal, honest, and the list goes on and on -- but I am not a sycophant for love...and I am beginning to think that that is the most important thing in the eyes of the many.

There's this girl that I work with (and who's blog I secretly read) that's bothering the hell out of me. Basically, she is always going on about this guy she's been dating for about a months now...maybe five or six weeks. Anyway, she's always talking about how she needs to spend all of this time with him, that she "wants" to spend all this time with him, at the same time complaining that there's no time in her life anymore for anything else. She gets up in the morning (usually late for work) then leaves afterward to spend time with him...any spare time that they mutually have off is spent together. She talks about how "silly" it is, how she needs to stop, how she doesn't know why she always does it. "I just don't want to not be with him" she says in a million different ways...

...and all I want to do is tell her what's up. Because I know. I always know. For 26 years I have sat at the sidelines and watched people, studied them, listened to them, and in those 26 years I have come to know people better than almost anyone else I know. Almost as pertinent as that, I have studied people, through philosophy and religion and come to understand as much as I could possibly expect myself to be able to how we as human beings think, feel, and love. I have studied epistemology and existentialism. I have read the great works on love. I have come to grips with the deep meanings of the great religions and what they teach their followers. I know what goes on in peoples' minds.

I'm not psychic or anything, it's just that we people are pretty damn predictable. We all fall into stereotypes whether we want to admit it or not. To some thinkers, there are four personality types, for other six, eight, or up to sixteen. I have never seen anyone suggest that there are more "types" than that. Granted, we have all lead individual lives that have lead us down individual roads and those individual roads will lead us all to individual places...but the number of decisions that we make, the turns if you will, are extremely finite. There are an infinite number of decisions that we can make from the moment that we step off the curb to cross the street to the type of toast we order for breakfast, to the television show we watch to unwind, to what we do with our free time -- over the course of our lifetimes we must make a billion and a half such decisions. But each one, each and every decision is one made between a few -- one or two, ten or twelve -- choices...and it is at that level that we become predictable. I don't need to know someone very well to be able to guess what they'll choose whenever the opportunity arises. It's a skill gained through lonely people-watching.

That said, I know exactly why this girl is in the position that she is in. And I don't know if I should tell her -- because I don't think I have the right. In the past, perhaps I would have. If I gave a damn about her maybe I would then as well...but I don't. So there.

But it troubles me because so many people suffer the same way. It is fear that drives her, fear that she'll lose her boyfriend if she doesn't throw herself so completely at him. Fear that he will give up if she doesn't give him all the attention that she can, fear that he will see any desire on her part to be away from him as a desire on her part to be not with him. Fear that she will lose him if she doesn't hold on for dear life. She is afraid to let go and trust that everything will be alright.

It's been often said that if you love someone, you will let them leave. If it is truly love, they will not leave once given the opportunity. This is a lesson lost on her. Trust is lost on her. Love, after all, is all about trust. Love is empty without trust. She does not have trust -- and without it, she cannot love...

Ask her and she will say that she's in love, but she is not. She may feel it, she may feel it deeply, but it is not love that she feels. Not true love anyway. For she does not trust. What she feels is the warm glow of a a new toy, the proud ownership of something shiny and new, the happiness of feeling wanted. That is not love. That is something else, something internal. Love, after all, is external.

But I can not tell her that for it would break her heart...and I would feel guilty for doing so. That, and I really don't care.

Of course, I find myself in the same position, but not...maybe in that exactly opposite way that leads to the same conclusion -- maybe in the same way that leads to the opposite conclusion. I do not know. But it is freaking me out.

I am very happy today. Things are going very, very well in my life even though I there are some very significant barriers to things being perfect. I'm dealing as well as I possibly could and things are going as well as they possibly can.

I can't say more without breaking the rule that I set for myself last week. Not that anything I might say would be anything but gushing...

Hell yeah...

What shall go down in history as the Sprague senior stripper sojourn.

My goodness do I love alliteration...

stupid job of mine...they ran out of work for us almost two weeks ago and so I've had the last eight working days off which left me able to go to bed at three or so and wake up at eleven or so -- my "natural" sleep pattern. So then we have to go back to work this morning and I decide that I should go to bed at 12:30 in order to get a good night's sleep. I then wake up at 2:00 and have been up ever since.

I hate when that happens.

I guess tonight I'll be hitting the hay at 11:00 and hoping to sleep til noon on Saturday...

This is incredible. I don't even know if I believe it. But there's a company that has developed a process that can turn any carbon-based waste (animal parts, human waste, tires, plastic, etc) into oil, gas, minerals, and water. If this is for real, it's really damn cool: Anything into Oil

Dammit. I was bragging last night about how I had been threatening to move out of this country for, like, a whole week. We, as a nation, haven't been doing anything currently that makes me sick to my stomach. THen this comes along:

Congress moves to back tactical nukes The US House of Representatives looks set to approve funds for the research and development of a new generation of small tactical nuclear weapons which could be used to attack deep bunkers holding weapons of mass destruction.

Doesn't anyone else out there feeling like they want to puke because of this. Seriously, are we honestly this fucking retarded?

Some Audience Members Told Not to Wear Ties for Bush Speech “When you see somebody who is in coat an tie, then not in coat and tie, then in coat and tie, it sort of reveals that this is about stagecraft rather than statecraft,” said [Bill] Bloomquist, [political scientist].

Okay, for eight years Republicans complained that Clinton was all about show and not at all about substance. Then the Prince of Thieves comes to power and within the last month has had the Navy postpone the return of an aircraft carrier at the estimated expense of $1 million (not to mention the day delay on thousands of soldiers seeing their families for the first time in months), but now he's telling his audiences what to wear in the attempt to delude the public into thinking that his policies are not directed towards the rich, but to "ordinary folk" or whatever.

A government that tries to deceive the people or create optical illusions is not a representative one. Representative governments represent the PEOPLE....the people are not tried to be made to represent the government.

no idea how this is going to work...less optimism that I'm going to like it so much this next go-around. The first show was good, why do they need to try to make more money repeating the same thing?

Fox Brings Back 'Joe Millionaire' in Fall Beyond saying the butler will be back, Fox executives would reveal little about a second season of "Joe Millionaire." It leaves open the question of whether women can be fooled a second time into dating an average guy they think is rich. The show will compete with NBC's "Fear Factor" on Mondays at 8 p.m.

My guess is that the show is going to take place in the Western provinces of China where no one saw the original and all women are attracted to western men...but mostly because they just want to get the hell out of china. And they won't give a shit that this Joe is broke because they're getitng a one way ticket out of there.

Just my humble opinion....

I just got back from seeing the Matrix: Reloaded...I'm not going to offer any spoilers or anything, but I do need to comment on people that try to make themselves sound more profound than they are.

I was a philosophy major in college and during my time there and talking to different people since then, I have come across many of those really annoying people that say very elementary things but do so in a way that makes them sound brilliant...people that will throw in big words when little ones will do. People that will complicate the simplest idea in order to build themselves up to be more intelligent than they are. People that prize style over substance. I liken it to a restaurant menu that creates images of granduer for the hamburger but when it gets delivered to your table it's nothing more than a piece of dried-out medium grade meat, a tomato slice, and a leaf or two of lettuce in between two dried out, day old hunks of bread...

That's what this movie was...in between a lot of show was a lot of mindless babble dressed up in fancy words and the like. It was the same idea stated in thirty different ways by twenty different people. But the idea wasn't profound, combine the first Matrix and the one hour look at the free will/determinism debate from a Philosophy 101 class and snazz it up with words like the latin "ergo" and it sounds like it's more important than it is. That pisses me off...in the same way that much of pop-psychology does. It's like the nerdy show off kid sitting at the front of the class raising his hand to answer every question in some attempt to be become the object of intellectual envy of everyone sitting behind him...Man I always wanted to beat that kid up...

But anyway, I just wanted to rant a bit.

Be excellent to each other.

I am sorry if this blog has been unavailable and resulting in the good all "cannot find server" error message when you try to visit. It is not my fault. It is the fault of blogspot or someone else. I have not been able to check for comments or anything, or check any formatting or whatever for like two days. my blog is always that unavilable. I don't know what's up...

Sometimes truth is stranger than fiction:

Texas Democrats Flee State, Paralyze Legislature

...I guess, according to the house speaker in Texas, they all left their Holiday Inn rooms and went out to eat together at Denny's...

...seriously, if this was a plot in a movie, I would leave the theater because it's that retarded. Hmph. I don't know what else to say. Really, how can you make a joke about something this crazily ridiculous?

I had some brilliant thoughts tonight, but rather than write them down I played Civilization which is a damn fine game but not condusive to writing stuff down since it doesn't have a word processing portion to it...so the thoughts were lost. Probably until I turn my computer off for the night (morning? It's 4am) at which point I will debate whether or not I should turn it back on...and I probably won't because I'm pretty damn tired and that would take energy, and especially not if I've already turned the lights off long enough my for eyes to adjust to the darkness...because it takes too long and I don't like the feeling of squinting at bright light. But anyway, yeah, I wanted to post that I almost posted something (brilliant even) but didn't because I'm a geek that plays video games...

I just noticed that the Iraq Body Count (link to the left) is up to around 4000 at the lowest estimate. This means that more innocent Iraqi civilians died as a direct result of our "war" than innocent people died on Sept 11, 2001...which means that we killed more of "them" in order to prevent fewer deaths of "us". Pre-emptively. I'm shaking my head right now.

What makes things even worse in my mind is that these are just "civilian" deaths. They do not take into account that 3/4 of Saddam's army didn't want to fight -- but did so to the death because of the fact that officers (literally) had a gun to the back of their heads (and their families' heads) and ordered them to fight lest the trigger be pulled. Aren't the men that found themselves in that position innocent too? Really? They wouldn't have fought and died by their own volition, it was forced upon them. They were given the opportunity to fight and possibly die or not fight and definitely die...it was a choice that most of us would probably have made. No? But it was still seems as though many of Iraq's soldiers died needlessly and against their own wishes. I don't know. I'm tired...and now, pissed off too.

I did some house-cleaning with my blog...you might notice it in the archives. It is freaky to be posting stuff about people that read this. I ran into this problem in the past (It's been a while since I'm given you a shout-out hasn't it Tiger Lily? okay, here it goes -- whoop! whoop! Tiger Lily's in da house!) and it really made things uncomfortable for me. I mean, this is my place to think out loud and have others hear that, and that's something we all need (I don't get too much of that in real life)...but I have found other places to do some of it -- secret places (shhhhh!). Okay, not so secret, but places that don't archive every damn word I write going back months and months and months. And it offers me the same release. But anyway, besides it being my place to think out loud, the idea that people reading this might come to believe is that I'm writing about them even when I'm not. That happened on several occasions, and not intentionally. Shit happens in my life sometimes and it makes me think...and then I post. Sometimes the "shit" that brought me to post is directly related to one person, and that one person might read this, and that person might think that they are the shit (and not "the shit" in the good way)...that's not right. And I don't want people to feel that way. It's not right. I've always been the kind of guy that confronts my problems head on (though very, very, insanely shyly), not use subversive tactics or whatever.

In any case, I don't like writing about people specifically, at least not ones that might read what I have to say about them. So I've erased posts that were blatently about one person or another that I know and would probably realize that I am talking about them. Ain't I nice?

The only other option is to never allow the people that I know in real life (aside from the ones that already do) find about this blog, but I don't want to do that. I don't want to hide the fact that I have this blog, or prevent certain someones from finding it and reading it, so I have gone back and deleted certain posts that were a little personal and blah blah blah...in case certain people ask me the url to this little slice of kyledom, then I don't have to "um, um.." my way through an excuse.

Yeah, I know there's some redundancy in this post, it's edited and I'm tired and slightly tipsy... :P

I found this very interesting: "Marijuana, pornography and illegal labour have created a hidden market in the United States which now accounts for as much as 10% of the American economy, according to a study."

Link courtesy of Wil Wheaton's soapbox.

During the last month or two I have learned a lot about me in relation to girls and all that happy stuff I just wanna share:

1. I am, have always been, and probably always will be the kind of guy that makes friends with a girl before I get myself into a relationship with them. I have found that this is not uncommon amongst geeks, nerds, and other shy peoples of the world and I've come to accept that it's cool. Or at least that I'm cool with that. I always run the risk of entering the dreaded "friend zone" by doing it, but that's alright because if I don't end up there it probably means that she's the same way as me and we're more meant for each other. For me, it's a matter of wanting to know a girl quite well before I invest myself emotionally or share myself physically with someone. It prevents me from collecting unnecessary emotional baggage, getting into situations that will ultimately break me down, and, most importantly, finding myself in a relationship where physical attraction is draw and not emotional or spiritual attraction. That's important to me and I've wrestled with that aspect of my sexuality for a long time, but am now finding myself comfortable with it.

2. I am hot as hell...I'm by far not the prettiest face in the room, but I have more than enough personality to make up for it. Girls dig personality. I can tell jokes, make up stories, and say stupid cheesey shit and there are girls out there that like that. In fact, the kind of girls that I like like that sort of thing in a guy so it means I'm pretty lucky.

3. Related to two, in a lot of ways, but I see it as different. I have been trying for years to alter myself in order to attract different girls -- throwing myself at them, putting myself at their mercy, revolving my life around them. That's ridiculous. I can be myself and be with someone at the same time. I don't have to worry that my being with someone would make me not me but one half of some couple. I don't have to change my life around for some stupid girl -- giving up my soul so that I can be with her night and day, day and night. I don't have to change for anyone. And I won't. And I have found that I've been rather silly in my thoughts that that would happen to me and I think I've been fearing ever getting close to someone for that reason. Lately, and especially with this girl that I've been "seeing" (in my own special geek way), I've found that I can be extremely attracted to a girl and still hang out with other friends for days on end and even when she calls and I say "Oh, I'm busy already" I don't have to apologize or anything...I don't have to make it up to her. That's sweet. And whether things work out and this girl becomes my "girlfriend" or not, I will carry that lesson with me.

4. I do not have to feel so ashamed to feel alone. Everyone wants to be with someone and be loved. I do not have to feel deficient if I have no one. I needn't see that as some deficiency or something...everyone that is single feels that way from time to time and even a lot of people that are with someone. It goes with the territory of being a human being.

I know, I know, I'm a lame-ass for being 26 and just now figuring out some of this stuff, but it has all just now hit me. I guess some of us take longer to learn life lessons than others. It's probably taken this long because they don't make questions about this stuff for Trivial Persuit or Jeopardy...or something...whatever, it's late and this has been a re-hashing of a post I accidently erased anyway. Oh well.

This story is almost too amazing to be true:

Mountaineer Broke His Bones Before Amputating Arm GRAND JUNCTION, Colo. (Reuters) - A mountaineer facing death after being pinned by an 800-pound boulder in the Utah desert said on Thursday he had to break his arm bone before he could cut the limb off with a dull knife.

I can't even begin to imagine how he did this...I wouldn't be able to. It was bad enough -- no, excrutiating -- to hear that he had cut off his arm by himself, but to find out that he was made to break both bones in his wrist and then saw away at it with a dull knife, all after having had to stand for the better part of three days with no sleep...shit man, shit.

Seriously, how is that that we human beings can do this sort of thing when we're in a pinch? I'm sure that this man, had he been in my place and me in his, would be saying the same thing on his blog...I don't think anyone can imagine doing this. Everyone I know cringes at the idea that mice will sometimes chew off their own leg if stuck on a sticky-trap. Man. This guy is my hero.

I saw a dead man today. He was breathing and walking and otherwise alive...but he won't be for long.

I was delivering to a hospital, standing at the front desk, waiting for people to come down and pick up their food when a man that seemed like he might be homeless came up and mentioned to the receptionist that he had "what they call" cancer. "Excuse me?" the receptionist replied. "From the second-hand smoke, cancer. I was wondering if I could get some of that radiation therapy?"

It was sad.

The fact that he was approaching the information lady at the hospital and the way he stated his concerns about something like that told me that his faculties weren't all there. And the way he was dressed -- too many layers of dirty clothes on a relatively warm day -- brought me to the conclusion that he was probably homeless. At the very least he was extremely poor. I'm sure he doesn't have any sort of health insurance.

He will be dead in a year or two.

That is all I could think about while I'm standing there, watching him and wondering what must be going through his mind right now. He has to know to that there is little hope for him, that he is doomed. He wouldn't be walking into a hospital asking for treatment if he didn't. And there's nothing that anyone is going to be willing to do for him...cancer treatment is just too expensive to be given out for free. They may ease his suffering for free when it has become terminal, causing him pain, but not now, not there...............

Fuck. Everytime that I think life is being unfair to me, I think of people like that man and how much he must be dealing with right now. I have reasonable assurance that I'll be alive in five or ten years yet, he has reasonable assurance that he will be dead in a year or two. He must know that there is hope for him out there somewhere, but whether he knows it's more than likely out of his reach I don't know. Either way, whether he knows it or not, he will spend the last of his days searching out his salvation and will probably never succeed.

Fuck me for even thinking that my life has ever approached that sort of unfairness.

God bless Senator Byrd: "President Bush's address to the American people announcing combat victory in Iraq deserved to be marked with solemnity, not extravagance; with gratitude to God, not self-congratulatory gestures. American blood has been shed on foreign soil in defense of the President's policies. This is not some made-for-TV backdrop for a campaign commercial. This is real life, and real lives have been lost. To me, it is an affront to the Americans killed or injured in Iraq for the President to exploit the trappings of war for the momentary spectacle of a speech. I do not begrudge his salute to America's warriors aboard the carrier Lincoln, for they have performed bravely and skillfully, as have their countrymen still in Iraq, but I do question the motives of a deskbound President who assumes the garb of a warrior for the purposes of a speech."

Almost better is this statement of the Democrats of the House Appropriations Committee. I hope that those little bastards have grown balls big enough to take Bush on a little more fully. This is a good first step. I'm really getting sick of their pussy-footing.

I had met this amazing girl a few weeks ago. Okay, it was longer ago than that but we hadn't talked really. In any case, she's amazing. So amazing, in fact, that I would have asked her out...which isn't something I do very frequently. But I didn't. I didn't because she was leaving to go away for a long, long time. Til December...maybe May...maybe longer so she says. I can't deal with that sort of thing in a girl. I can't deal with a long-distance relationship. Stuff like that is impossible. It doesn't work. An ocean is too far a empty plain for anything but the deepest, truest love. And we didn't have time to even think about getting to that point. It was only a couple weeks. So in my mind she is a friend and the possibility of even trying anything not on the table. It's hard though. It is so rare for me to find someone that I connect with and with her it seems almost natural. As if we were meant to be in each others' lives in some capacity.

Well, she left yesterday. So it is done anyway, I should just stop thinking about it. Another case of bad luck for Kyle. Perhaps we will write each other on occassion (I feel as though this is very possible), and I will try and visit her at some point. But as for anything but friendship, it's off the table I guess.

Anaheim lost today...shit. I'm rooting for those kids. Oh well, as long as Dallas doesn't pull off a win in the next two games I'll be happy. I believe the next game is at the Pond though, which will help.

Okay, I can't keep quiet anymore about this...I gotta talk...even though I'm barely sober.

So many girls lately have told me about how "romantic" or at least "great" their boyfriends are because of the things they do. Like sending flowers to them or openning doors or letting them walk ahead of them when necessary. Not that that isn't cool or anything, but it's what I have always done. Fuck it all, that sort of "romaticism" is standard issue shit that I do for even my female friends. Why is it that that sort of thing gets other guys laid but me it gets nothing...not even a thank you really. Geez.

I mean, I'm the sort of guy that will open doors and bend over backwards for a girl. I am a chivalrous mother-fuck extraodinaire. My God, sending flowers is nothing...I'd deliver them myself and serenade the girl if it was at all appropriate. But no one wants that...they want the bad boy that can do romantic things sometimes after their friends told them or they read about how girls like that sort of thing. My mom taught me that sort of shit since I was five. It gets me nowhere. Fuck.

I'm sorry for all the cursing, it's just that I've taken too much of this sort of "my boyfriend is so wonderful" gushing lately and it's seriously giving me an anuerism or something. For crying out loud, what does it take for me to get noticed by girls? Geez.

Then again, maybe it's just the frustration of being in the position that I'm in...so many times in the past I have been passed up and maybe had I not been one of those times I wouldn't be where I am right now. But that would mean that I wouldn't have what I have (whatever that is I do not really know) and I think what I may have in this one girl is pretty fucking sweet...even if it is to consist of e-mails and phone calls, if anything, for the next few months.

Oh well.

Jean-Sebastien Giguere -- wow. I am in awe of this man and his goaltending abilities. The Ducks are about to oust Dallas now...that's Detroit AND Dallas, all because of this man. Sheesh.

Man. I am emotionless. I have been for weeks now. It is driving me nuts. I would almost rather be depressed. Time moves so slowly. I almost do not feel as though I'm alive, or at least awake.

Oh well.