myself explained

Lately I have found myself in discussions relating to relations of the romantic sort. A few of them have resilted from my acceptance as of late that I will more than likely remain single for some time to come as the result of girls my age still being rather, well, naive when it comes to guys -- and their abilities to "change" or "tame" them by wrapping a wedding band 'round their finger. In a few places I have commented on this to some degree or another -- whether on the web or in face to face conversations. Personally, I think it's a huge stepping stone in my accepting myself and being cool with who I am, but other people, I think, see it as some sort of cop out or something.

More specifically, in the new "stats" page that I linked to my redone homepage I wrote "I’ve accepted the fact that nice guys don’t get the girl until the girl has figured out through trial and error that jerks might make good boyfriends but they make lousy husbands. I figure I have a few years to wait." This seems to be a somewhat contentious statement, or at least one that people want to talk about...so I'm going to elaborate a bit here.

Actually, I don't know if I really can. I feel that this blog from its infancy has lead to that statement -- at least when it comes to relationships, sex, and all that crap. It's sort of the thesis statement, the focal point, the essence wrapped up in a few words. I've talked of girls putting up with utter shit by their boyfriends and or husbands and how in talking with them, I have found that they stick around because it's easier than finding a new guy, they for some reason think they can radically change a "bad boy" to a nice guy, they fear being alone, or just (and I love this reason) "because". Notice how nowhere in that list to I say that girls ever say that they stick by their men because "he treats me right" or "because I love him" or any such thing...I know a few girls who will say that, and to a large extent they convince me...but they always tack on qualifiers like "he's cute" or "I won't find anyone better" and that's just not right. That's not the reason to get into a relationship.

And that's what it comes down to. I know what sorts of things make for good relationships. Most people my age don't. I know that nice knockers, fastastic kissing abilities, fancy get-ups, money, and all those other things that just tend to be exhaulted in the world of twenty-something dating are utter and complete bullshit. The breasts will sag, the kissing will become mundane, and the clothing will go out of style...and then what do you have? Yeah, that's right, a breakup (or divorce). I know that what's more important is how two people connect -- how they think alike, how they dream alike, how they interrelate. None of that has anything to do with outer beauty. Nothing. At. All. I've come to realize another important thing too -- the ability of two people to resolve their differences quickly. Being able to set aside petty differences, and know their other well enough to not have to carry out any of the arguments that do and will arise in life beyond the night. That's key I think. To find someone that you can relate to, understand, and KNOW well enough to know what they are thinking without having to tell you. That too has nothing to do with oral sex abilities.

I don't know, I know all of this and I don't think that anyone else doesn't. But people my age, girls my age, don't act on it. They say "you're absolutely right, Kyle" and then go off on dates with guys who have no positive qualities aside from their pecs and little boy haircuts. I need to wait for them to start acting on their agreement with me. For them to see that what's important is that a guy's faithful and honest, sincere and true, sensitive and caring, providing and supporting, and otherwise the type that would make a good husband and father...or more or less a guy like me.

I'm waiting for that day to come, but I have come to realize that bitching and moaning about it doesn't speed things along. It will, someday. When it does I will be happy, the happiest guy in the world even. In the meantime, however, I just accept that that's the way the cookie crumbles and wait idly by waiting for girls to come to their senses.

if you own an almanac or some other sorta reference book...you may be a terrorist

The FBI is warning police nationwide to be alert for people carrying almanacs, cautioning that the popular reference books covering everything from abbreviations to weather trends could be used for terrorist planning.

In a bulletin sent Christmas Eve to about 18,000 police organizations, the FBI said terrorists may use almanacs "to assist with target selection and pre-operational planning."

It urged officers to watch during searches, traffic stops and other investigations for anyone carrying almanacs, especially if the books are annotated in suspicious ways.

...

The FBI noted that use of almanacs or maps may be innocent, "the product of legitimate recreational or commercial activities." But it warned that when combined with suspicious behavior -- such as apparent surveillance -- a person with an almanac "may point to possible terrorist planning."

"I don't think anyone would consider us a harmful entity," said Kevin Seabrooke, senior editor of The World Almanac. He said the reference book includes about a dozen pages out of its 1,000 pages total listing the world's tallest buildings and bridges but includes no diagrams or architectural schematics. "It's stuff that's widely available on the Internet," he said.

The San Francisco Gate

Almanacs? Really? Man, I gotta tell you -- there's a terrorsit training ground a block to the East of me then. It's called a fucking elementary school. I gotta admit too, I must be a terrorist because I too own an almanac.

If you're thinking to yourself "why am I in this handbasket, and where am I going?" I think you're on the right track.

the people that watch over our money, the keepers of our society

I just got a call from a credit card company to which I owe a rather substantial amount of money to. They wanted me to pay off a good 6th of my debt to them. "I'm unemployed" I tell them. "Oh" they replied, as if I haven't explained this to them about 28 times in the last two months or so wince I tripped up and got behind. "Well, could we have your home phone number?" The woman asked. "This is it," I reply. "Oh, this isn't your work number?"

"Um, no," I tell her, "I'm unemployed."

Seriously, why am I not able to find a job when people that are this insanely stupid are able to find work and maintain work? Everything is backwards...the creeps get the girl, the stupidos get the job, the patriots unravel the fabric of a nation. Hopefully gravity will reverse sometime soon and we'll all be shot off this rock.

white russia is on guard

MINSK (Reuters) - President Alexander Lukashenko, isolated by the West for his lack of political and economic reforms, said on Friday Belarus must be prepared to defend itself against U.S. attack.

Lukashenko, once called Europe's last dictator by U.S. officials, has criticized Washington's military campaign against Iraq, saying it had created a precedent whereby undesirable leaders could be unseated with military force.

"Belarus has to be vigilant and pay particular attention to strengthening its fighting efficiency. The world has returned to times when war and brute force were real instruments of foreign policy," Official news agency BelTA quoted him as saying.

The Washington Post

I think it's wonderful that our foreign policy creates these sorts of reactions. That's truly a sign of a world-leading class act...when small countries that have no beef with us have to ruffle their feathers and declare to the world that they are ready. Man I love the sanity of this world we live in. You know?

and the award for worst money management in the world goes to...

*****INAPPROPRIATE RANT ALERT!!!!*****


So I'm just sitting in the living room trying to enjoy the Simpsons and my roommate comes in. "Um, are you going to be able to give me that $175 you owe me?" he asks, referencing the second half of my security deposit that I didn't pay, hiom having money at the time and me not, "I kinda need it to pay rent."

???!!!???!!!

This is funny to me. I'm unemployed, having a horrible time finding any kind of work (and absolutely no opportunity to find one right now given the placement of holidays and most offices are operating at 50% or less right now), and flat broke aside for a hundred or two bucks and whatever I can get from ebay that must last me until I get some sort of job lest I need to borrow MORE money from my parents (my dad being unemployed as well -- God Bless George W).

Anyway, my roommate has a job, he brings in $300 a week or so. He also sold his car a few months back, for $5000 and collected around $1000 from cashing in his 401k. Needless to say, between making $1200 a month for three months and selling his car and cashing in his 401k his being broke has meant he's gone through almost $10,000 in four months. FOUR MONTHS. I've been living off of about $800 a month -- it's been pretty tight -- but if I had $10,000 I could live off of it for a full year...and still have $400 to boot. I don't get it.

Seriously, if you can be single and can't live off of $1200 a month when other people obviously can (me) there's something wrong with you. He goes to the bar every night and has two or three drinks at $5 a pop...that and smokes a pack or two of cigarettes...that comes to, what? $20 a day on average...$600 a month. You would think if money was so tight, he'd cut back a little. But no, ask Mr. unemployed roommate for a callback on his loan. Never mind I paid the $85 electric bill for his old place when we first moved in together. Sure I paid the phone bill one month so it didn't get turned off (the phone bill he couldn't pay while making $12 an hour 50-55 hours a week). Sure it was pretty much a weekly ritual for him to borrow $40 the Tuesday before he received his paycheck so he could go to the bar...even while working said job. Sure he often didn't pay his half of rent until the middle of the month. But oh my bloody goodness if I try to rely on him for less than he relied on me on multiple occasions. Pffft.

Anyway, I'm just pissed. There's no need for advice or anything. I'm pretty sure that I'm kicking him out when the lease is up. Especially if I go back to school...I can't put up with these minor stresses while dealing with school...and I certainly can't bail him out...and considering he's "out of money" I think we all know that come this time next month he's going to be way behind....

Heck, I might have to boot him even sooner. If he can't make it through 4 months on $10000, how's he gonna make it through January on $1200? And there ain't a way I can help...at this point I don't think I would even if I could.

the fruits of shutting up and thinking

Over the last two or three weeks or so I have been in one of my more introspective moods. Most of my time has been spent at home, not doing much of anything which lends itself to lots and lots of thinking. I have been going out though -- not very often, but some -- and even then I find myself sitting back a ways, listening more than speaking, and paying close attention to the experience rather than experience the attention. It has lead me to some self-discoveries, and I thought I'd share:

1. When I am with one person, I talk. When I am with more than one person, I dive into the shadows. It's weird but what I'll say to one person face to face is so much more than what I'll say to two people face to face to face. What's weirder is that this isn't just stuff that I'd say to person A and not person B (and C and D and whoever else might be there)...but anything, even those things which I want badly to tell person A and B. But especially those things that I want to tell one person and I care not whether anyone else hears it. I don't know why this is exactly. Perhaps it's the audience thing -- when talking to more than one person, I feel like I'm performing in some regard, that I have an audience, and I find that unnerving. Perhaps it's that I know I'm moderately ADD or whatever and that if both responded, I'd get lost. Or maybe it's that I'm not as self-confident as I think I am and I fear being seen as being lame or whatever by a majority of the group. I don't know, I really don't. huh. In any case, I do know that I feel infinitely more comfortable one on one than in a group...which itself is not a sign of any defect or anything, and may very well just be the cause of my problem...shyness, timidity, and all around introvertedness.

2. I've been thinking a lot lately about why I have more female friends than male. A lot more. I only really have a couple close male friends, and they don't even live round here so much (and as any guy knows, close male friends that live cross country can have their friendships go in and out of dormancy with no problem...these friendships pretty much being there). In any case. it's been on my nerves a little bit...but it occurred to me why this might be: Guys, typically (and I mean these as broad-based stereotypes, there are obviously exceptions to these "rules"...that's why there's a comment box and a forum people), have inflated egos...they think they're better than they really are and they think they're better than everyone else, and they have a need to ruffle their feathers a lot just to show it. I mean, I say "ruffle their feathers" and it's true in a lot of cases, as that tends to be the norm in most of the animal kingdom...birds too. Anyway, guys tend to err on the side of being over-confident and inflated egos while girls tend to err on the other side --- often times being too hard on themselves. While most guys can rebound from their failures and pretend like they never occurred, while they can deny to themselves their faults and see only their strengths when they look into a mirror, wheras they can pretend that everyone else sees them for how they see themselves, girls are often times the opposite. They tend to be drawn more to their own flaws and tend to think that others see them for their flaws. When they look into a mirror, they don't see those things that make them beautiful, admirable, wonderful, they only see those things that, taken alone without balance, might make them wretched.

Sound like anyone whose blog you're reading right now? :P

It's not that thats an outright good thing, being impossibly hard on yourself, but I think of it as being less of an evil than the opposite. It at least shows honesty and a desire to improve. It takes a big person to see what's wrong with oneself and if a person can keep that in moderation, it's the best a person really can be...and girls are closer to that than guys. And I'd like to think that I am too.

When it comes to friendships (and anything more for that matter) then, I see all of these things as silver lining on clouds. When a girl confesses to me that she's done something wrong or evil or there's something not perfect about her I see it not for the imperfection, but for the honesty and inner-beauty it takes for her to admit that she's not perfect and even moreso for her desire to change and be better. I see negatives as positives with girls as much as I see positives as negatives as guys.

...though that may not be cohesive or anything (had a phone call in the middle of that), I think it gets to my point.

administrative crap

Okay, this is the last post that I will make in this blog about this blog or my website in general. In the future, all other announcements will be made on the forum which is linked to above or from my brand new front page. Too many posts lately have been about this stuff and it's taken something away from this blog, in my opinion. By doing this, I still can brag or shill or whatever without breaking the continuity of this blog as I have...many times. :D

In any case, yeah. Just another blogrule post. ;)

the house of the mouse is not safe

Or at least one of the houses of one of the mouses is not...

More than 40 times this year, police have been called to investigate incidents at a Blue Mound Road establishment, but it's not your ordinary problem-plagued gin mill.

It's Chuck E. Cheese, the pizza, game and birthday party paradise adored by children.

Unruly children are expected amid the euphoria of a singing mouse and the Whack-a-Mole. But Chuck E. Cheese has become, at least for some adults, a place where the frenzy of Skee Ball, pizza, alcohol and manic children translates into emotional overload.

The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

Sorry...I just had to post this article because it mentioned Skeeball, the official sport of Heaven.

oh happy day!

It's free listing day on e-bay today and so I'm spending agonizingly huge chunks of time putting stuff up for sale (actually, I've just begun but needed a break). Right now it's mostly CDs up, but I may or may not get some books up for sale there too. Check it out if you'd like. Things will be up for sale until next Friday.

as an added bonus to signing up for the forum...

I linked to the first uploaded site of the new version of pquesnet that I've been working on the last couple of days. It's under the "pquesnet" board if you want to see it. I know, I know, it's not all that exciting, but I'd really like it if some of you regulars hung out once in and awhile in the forum. It offers a chance for all of us to meet.

new stuff

Looking at the stats from my visitors, it appears that there are five or more people that come visit this blog on a regular basis. That in mind, and a desire to have more people come here more often, I've set up a discussion board. It's nothing formal or anything, but a way for us all to interact a little better than through the comments buttons. I don't really have any ultimate goal for the thing, but it could be cool to chat with you people, and also for us to form a bit of a community or something. I don't know, I'm probably smoking crack or something, but I figured it'd be cool. So go on and rock yourselves over there, at least to check it out and drop a line in the welcome room to say something about yourselves...

See ya.

merry early christmas

Just in case any of you read this at work and won't be in on Wednesday, I want to wish you a Merry Christmas before the fact. Right now, actually I just stopped for the night, I am working on everyone's Christmas present...a revamped front page to this site. I know I've been promising for awhile, but it's getting there now. It looks pretty damn cool if you ask me, which I'm sure you would if you had the chance.

I would have gotten y'all a trinket or something, but I didn't want to go back out to the mall again...I did that today. Boy, did I.

It was funny to me. I took the bus as I always do, with two other people this time. A big ol' bus with three passengers. Fantastic. We didn't move much though. No, the parking lot of one of the malls the route passes was packed full of cars. We had to sit in line for fifteen minutes or so just to get to the light so that we could cross the street. It seemed like such a waste.

Most of those cars probably had one person in them, that's it. A thousand cars each carrying a single person trying to siphon through a two lane exit onto a road already overflowing with cars. All the while I'm sitting in a bus that could seat thirty and stand another fifteen and I'm thinking how much smoother the whole experience would flow if those seats were filled. I wanted to get off the bus, tap on a window, and tell the person inside the car that things would've been so much better had she taken the bus. It would have been pointless, yeah, but I still wanted to.

I don't know. I'm getting to this point where I don't even really want a car. Or maybe I do, but I really think that I'd rather take the bus from place to place. I don't know. I'm tired, my brain is fried, and I'm babbling without any sort of point. :D

Merry Christmas anyway...

men without hats

Ever wonder what the safety dance is all about? Well now you know, and knowing is half the battle. Go Joe!

Man, I need to go karaoke...gotta sing the safety dance. Anyone out there up for it?

merger

The past week has been pretty hectic in relation to the last five months or so of my life. I've had a couple of interviews, gotten some stuff done, was able to finally read a book (Return of the King...so I could see the movie without guilt yesterday...and it was AWESOME), and lots of little boring things...

But what gets me is that in the grand scheme of things, in terms of my life past and future, I did nothing at all really. I spent maybe twenty hours or so being honestly productive. But I suppose twenty hours is about fifteen or so more hours than I have been able to get mysel doing something. In terms of baby steps, that's a pretty good sized one I suppose...but the timing is pretty dreadful. Yeah, I've had interviews and I've applied for jobs and the like, but really none of those things will produce fruit for at least another couple weeks due to the holidays. No one starts a job between Christmas and New Years, very few people even bother interviewing. Too many current workers are out of the office on holiday, and with days off here and there, there's absolutely no continuity.

That's not bad or anything, I guess in the whole forest view, because it may very well mean a very fast-paced start to the new year for me...with more interviews and maybe some sort of new job. That is good. But that is weeks out and it's sort of numbing to feel joy for that. But even though joy lacks, my hope is renewed. Hope is something that's been sort of diminished in my life as of late.

That's not true. I suppose in a sense all I've had to hold onto is hope. But not the immediate kind. The long-term stuff. Everything is long-term. What I'm going to have next summer, where I'm going to go next fall, what I'll be doing five years from now...and there's something good about that. I wonder, however, how the timing of all this is creating a bridge for me...the two week pause in life that begins now and runs through the first of the year creating a focal point that unites the long-term hope that has been flowing over my inner brim and the short-term hope that's been bone dry for months now. Anyway, I'm sorta happy right now, though moderately numb.

whew

So I got another interview tomorrow with a different place -- not some shady coupon salesman place either, but AAA. That's a good thing. Good, because the place I interviewed with yesterday called me for a "second interview"...and by "second interview" they mean an unpaid eight-hour shift where you follow someone around selling coupons door to door. Man, that place is just lousy. But I told myself that I'd go back if they called, lest something else presented itself which it has and so I am very, very happy...

Now I have to call the original place back and "reschedule" which I hope is far enough in the future that I can get a different job before then. If believe in God people, pray for me. If you don't believe in God, at least cross your fingers and hope really really hard for me. I could use the mojo.

Better yet, it's been awhile since I've invoked the Tinkerbell rule...clap your hands people! CLAP! CLAP!

an important anniversary

One hundred years ago today, mankind first took to the skies in a controlled flight at the Kill Devil Dunes, just south of Kitty-Hawk in a flimsy looking craft desigened and built by the Wright Brothers of Dayton, OH. There is much to be celebrated here. Flight has allowed us, as the human race, to expand our horizons and traverse the wide distances that seperate us on this planet. It has allowed us to come closer as a people and learn more about each other than could have been dreamed possible without the technology of flight.

What's most incredible, to me, about this day is that even though it is one-hundred years later, our airplanes of today are not much different than that first plane that flew a short 40 yards in 12 seconds. The aerodynamics are the same, more or less, with the use of wings desinged to move air underneath thereby keeping the plane aloft. The idea of a verticle stabilizer fin too is still in use, though in today's planes it is more often located in the rear of the plane.

Overall, really, planes of today are modifcations of the Wright Flyer and little else. Yeah, they are smoother and sleeker, faster and capable of much greater distances, and much, much more comfortable, but the design is the same. That by itself is something to be awed at...the brilliance and genius of two guys from the Midwest that, in a time of horse-drawn buggies and oil-lit lamps anywhere but in the cities, they were able to design a system that is still in use during an age of super-computers, space-flight, and fast food.

We should all hope to leave such a legacy.

karmic restitution

Remember how a few months back I lost my mobile phone and get pissed off to then be overjoyed to have someone turn it in? Yeah, I returned the favor today. It really isn't that hard people.. I was walking down the street and saw a mobile phone lying in the sidewalk. At first I walked right by needing to catch the bus, but I turned around and picked it up, brought it acorss the street to see if the 7-11 would pass it to the owner and then called her (always have "home" listed in the directory, or at least "dad", "mom", or "work" or something that a stranger could call) to tell her. She was very glad I did it. Very. It's nice to make someone feel that way, and it's really all not that hard when life present such an opportunity to do so. Unfortunately, she probably should be glad too...I don't think many people would have done what I did (or the kind person that did it for me). After all, I lost my new phone a month or two after losing it the first time and no one turned it in, so I'm batting .500

i have an interview

I know I am probably jinxing myself by mentioning this, but I don't care. It's for some crappy advertising place that'll probably work itself out to be more of a telemarketing place...but the ad on monster.com says the pay ranges from $25,000-$35,000 a year which is $400-$500 a week after taxes which is $400-$500 more per week than I am currently bringing in. Not that it would solve my financial worries (the first month or so would be supportng myself and paying back those gracious souls who have helped support me this last month), but it's something. And I can always quit in February (when my yearly Spring/Summer job starts back up), so it's not like it'll be eternal hell if it turns out to be hell. We'll see. I'm update tomorrow on that.

for the birds

There is something majestic about flocks of birds. Right now there is a huge flock of crows parked in trees around my house and they are making a racket. But for some reason, the cawing is not that upsetting. I sat outside and watched them, nestled in the treetops, every now and then all leaping at once and circling through the air in unison. Like a black wave through the sky, like the anti-stars of some Van Gogh painting. It's peaceful somehow, reassuring, though I'm not really sure howso.

I don't know, I just thought I'd share.

yay

For the first time in months, I have multiple job leadS. That's with an 'S'...plural. And "lead" as in I'm actually qualified, in theory, for the job. Tomorrow shall be a busy day, but hopefully it will get me somewhere.

saddam captured

Well, according to his blog and news reports, Saddam Hussein was captured yesterday afternoon. This is a good thing, for the Iraqi people at least. This must be a heavy burdan off of their backs and may bring finality to the last few decades of tyrranical rule by a monster. It's also a good day for US troops who have spent the last months being demoralized by pentagon policies keeping them in Iraq for much longer than they had been told they would be (a couple of times, having renegged on promises for rotations a couple of times now). It must be a huge morale boost.

Just as when the statue in downtown Baghdad was toppled and the people celebrated, slapping their shoes on his face, the images of this day bring a tear to my eye. The news conference held in Iraq to announce the capture was interupted when pictures were shown by Iraqi press members standing up and shouting "death to Saddam!" for minutes on end (until some woman made them sit down). I can see the release of tension and worry in sights like that. I am happy for the Iraqi people.

That said, I am saddened. The best indications are that the military will eventually turn him over to the Iraqi people for "justice" rather than the international war crimes tribunal in the Hague. Saddam Hussein was not only a bad man to his fellow countrymen, remember, but he has killed Kuwaitis, Iranians, and Israelis throughout his years in power. He has broken international law and as such should be brought before an international body. He won't, however, primarily because we have him and we want to see him die...the Hague would most likely not impose a death sentence (I do not believe that's even an option). How sad that we would let our simple vengence dictate such a matter as justice.

what assholes...

So you know that publicity stunt that the president pulled by flying over to Iraq on Thanksgiving to have turkey dinner with the troops? Well it turns out that in doing so, Bush denied many, MANY troops the ability to celebrate Thanksgiving dinner themselves. At least according to Stars and Stripes, the military newspaper.

Because of the top secret nature of the trip, and obvious security concerns, the mess hall was shut down for all those that weren't pre-screened to dine with the president. The thing is, alternative arrangements were not made for those that weren't invited. This meant that many a soldier went to the mess hall on Thanksgiving expecting a treat but were turned away, given the option of waiting until 9pm to eat Thanksgiving dinner or settle for an MRE...many choosing the MREs. Here's some of the story:

The newspaper, quoting two officials with the Army's 1st Armored Division in an article last week, reported that "for security reasons, only those preselected got into the facility during Bush's visit. . . . The soldiers who dined while the president visited were selected by their chain of command, and were notified a short time before the visit."

The paper also published a letter to the editor from Sgt. Loren Russell, who wrote of the heroism of his soldiers and then added: "[I]magine their dismay when they walked 15 minutes to the Bob Hope Dining Facility, only to find that they were turned away from their evening meal because they were in the wrong unit. . . . They understand that President Bush ate there and that upgraded security was required. But why were only certain units turned away?"

Russell added that his soldiers "chose to complain amongst themselves and eat MREs, even after the chow hall was reopened for 'usual business' at 9 p.m. As a leader myself, I'd guess that other measures could have been taken to allow for proper security and still let the soldiers have their meal."

-The Washington Post

It's so sad that the President would allow this to happen. Or, if not him, then at least his spindoctors which planned the whole thing. It's just another act of insensitivty on the behalf of this administration that not only shows a disregard for the health, security, and worth of America's soldiers, but is responsible for unbelievable morale issues that are developing.

beauraucrats

It's ridiculous. I sent out my protest form for my unemployment dealy on MONDAY and today already received a ltter saying that they aren't going to turn around on the matter. I can, of course, appeal this and bring it before a real live person (something that hasn't existed yet in my dealings with unemployment), but the point of the matter is this:

When they want to screw me out of money, they're lightning fast. When it comes to handing out money, they move slower than an unconscious sloth. Gosh, ain't government grand?

sorry i've been gone

I know, I know, for most people and their blogs, a couple days without posting is absolutely nothing. But lately I've been in one of posting frenzies and it just feels odd to me that I haven't. I mean, I've been doing a lot of thinking. Too much thinking, about too many things...and I don't think anything would come out right if I were to have tried to post. You know the feeling?

But yeah, I've been trying to figure out my job situation and it isn't good. It's hard to look for a job when you know that you'll be going back to work in two months -- you can't take a day job because you'd feel bad quitting, but at the same time you have to look. Night jobs, well, I really want to get into a bar or at the very least a restaurant where I can make good money in a very short time. But that takes away from the job search because right now isn't the best time to be looking for one of those...employers are too busy with Christmas to worry about hiring anyone. *sigh*

I really wish I would have known that the unemployment office was going to try and screw me over. The plan all along had been to look for some sort of "real job" while I had some sort of net beneath me, and to look for some crappy minimum wage job before it ran out. But that didn't work out so well. It was really bloody horrible for the state to handle it the way they have -- no notice for me, and a week before Thanksgiving when I couldn't do anything about it. I really want to write about it, about the system, in some sort of article or book form, but I can't really because that takes up so much time and energy that I need to use in scrounging up enough to pay rent and bills and buy food and stuff. ugh.

Anyway, I just needed to rant I guess. I wasn't even planning on writing about that but it just sort of came out that way. Sorry.

"We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars."
-Oscar Wilde

it's endorsement time

Well, I guess if Al Gore's going to come out and endorse Howard Dean's candidacy for president of the United States, it's about time that I, being as of high a stature of Al Gore maybe even higher, announce my endorsement. I mean, really, with Al Gore and most of the unions being out of the way, you just know the media's going to be looking my way for the next big endorsement. But I'm not ready yet. I'm just not. Besides, I could use some of the media spotlight for awhile -- Wolf Blitzer prodding me in interviews fr a slip up or something, Bill O'Reily trying to spin it out of me, Chris Matthews playing hardball with me.

Yeah, sorry guys, I'm just not ready to endorse anyone.

:)

haha

Okay, want some cyber fun?

Go to google and type "miserable failure" into the search box and press the "I'm feeling lucky" button.

fly me to the moon, let me sing among those stars...

That last post reminded me of a story that I wanted to comment on, and that is George W. Bush's supposed plan to propose America's return to the moon. As a dreamer, I so hope he does this, and I hope that any such proposal fares better than those touting a battle on AIDS in Africa and rebuilding Afghanistan. I think it's a wonderful idea that could bring this nation together through a means that doesn't involve the death and destruction of people in far-flung places, but through peace.

As a left-leaning libertarian, there are few things outside of the role of protecting its citizens that I believe a government should take. Science and exploration are one of those exceptions. We as a human race will never get to the moon, mars, or to the stars without the government taking an active role and doing it itself. There is no profit in the early stages of such endeavors and so little chance of the private sector ever doing much to make the attempt. But there is potential for so much to be gained once a foothold is made outside of our atmosphere for everyone -- new technologies that bring us cheaper and cleaner energy, new and more efficient means of feeding the 6 billion of us left here on earth, and a host of technological surprises that we may not even be dreaming of. And that is more than enough reason to plant ourselves somewhere else.

But the biggest reason that I support this possible proposal and hope that Bush at least takes this promise seriously is that it will give us, not just our nation, but the world, a rallying point for pride. To look up at the moon on a night such as tonight and know that one or some of us are up there, living, breathing, and working for the betterment of humanity. It's a source of pride that need not balance on nationalism and war...but rather in tranquility and peace.

tonight

Tonight is one of those early winter nights when the ground is barren but for unraked leaves of the last two months canopied by a sky lit up by a full moon trying to break through high clouds pouring across the sky from the west, creating a soft dark-gray glow across the heavens. It's one of those nights where the air is still, but dry enough and cold enough to have a bite that creates the feeling of your lungs being dry-cleaned with every breath. It's one of those nights where there are barely any noises but for the occasional passing car racing down pavement of the street half a block away and the even rarer plane flying overhead. It's one of those nights where the world is at peace and there's no sense of worry or harshness or trouble. It's one of those nights that I live for and would love to have visit upon me every night, for it is the perfect night to just sit outside and enjoy life at itsleast threatening and most beautiful.

oy vay

If no one buy anything from my online shop in the next six days, it is going offline since I can't afford to be paying for the priviledge for nothing (and the first fifteen days have been free). If that happens, where's Irish going to live? This will mean having to rewrite my own page which be be a hellish task. grrrrr

holy crap i love my brain

Okay, so I got myself all worked up about my unemployment benefit troubles before going to bed tonight and so I can't sleep. While lying there, staring at the ceiling through closed eyelids I remember reading something about working off my disqualification by going back to work and earning a certain amount of money...

I turn on the light and grab the paperwork and see that I need to earn 12 times my weekly benefit ($222) to work off a voluntary quit and 17 times for a firing...I think I fall under the voluntary, but really it doesn't matter because the job that I am no longer working is a delivery job...with tips. What if I borrow money to buy a cheap car -- something in the neighborhood of $500-$1000 that looks like crap but runs well enough to last at least a month or two -- and go back to work, claiming excessive amounts of tips? This time of year, $100 a week is next to nothing to make in an eight hour shift, and $200 is not that hard to make during a closing shift. What would happen if I made that much and claimed $150 or $250 a shift and tacked on the amount I earned per hour? Five days a week and I could claim (and pay taxes on) $1000-$1500 a week, which would pay off my 12x amount in a measly two or three weeks...leaving me to have my restitution wiped clean off the table and my backlogged unemployment benefits of $1500 or so for these weeks that I haven't been able to work sent to me in one big check. At which point I'd have enough money to pay off the money I've borrowed to buy the car, the money I've borrowed to live these last few weeks, and enough to get me through til February when I can start making $15 an hour again and no longer need unemployment and just flip off the pizza place, telling them to fuck themselves, and walking out...losing my unemployment benefits with pride and not an ounce of fear!!! And then, if I wanted to, I could look for a bartending job to just earn a little extra pocket money or just cope with the couple thousand in tips I've made in my blitz.

How brilliant is that!

My only fear is that there's a catch, that maybe I'd still have to pay back the $3300 the state wants back. But I've read the rules over and over again and it just seems like I'd be completely in the clear. It might raise suspicions of the government that I'm suddenly earning much more than I was at the same job, but really who's to say? That's just another hurdle I'd have to jump later, and frankly one that I'm not too afraid of having no idea how much I've made in tips and so not sure how well they'd be able to prove how much I've made (which they would have to) either. But it just seems too easy nonetheless.

blech

Friday night, I'm home and no one's called. The usual. Anyway, I'm finally finishing up a project I began a couple of weeks ago and that is re-inserting most of the posts that I have deleted over the past year and a half. Not all of them, just most of them (some of them were just dumb and deserved to be deleted..lol). Most of them have to deal with my little quarter-life crisis that played out so dramatically on this blog and also with feelings with this person and that...blah blah blah. Nothing provacative really, just honest.

After reading and then posting that Onion story a couple weeks back about the mom finding the blog thing I started thinking about it. And really, there's no reason that I should be ashamed of anything that I posted here. Yeah, some of it is embarrassing for me (and probably even for readers), but I think that there's more to gain from them putting them back up than keeping them off in my "offline journal of shameful and embarrassing posts". In looking at the stats of this site, I've found that there are people going back and reading the archives...and the fact of the matter is that there can be a lot learned back there. I went through some really horrible times back then and I think it's good that people can read them and see how bad it was for me and how well I came back to be the charming and dashing young stud that I am right now. *snicker* But seriously, I think it's good to present all that, well, *shit* honestly...even if it makes me look like I was losing my mind or a horrible person or whatever (and for the most part, I probably was from time to time). *sigh*

I also want this blog to act as my journal of sorts. A historical journal of this time in my life from July of 2002 to now to some future time when I pull the plug. I con't want a censored history of myself. I want to be able to look back at some of those times and see how much better I am now, or at least be able to say when I'm down "gee, I've been through worse..." Of course, not every post that I'm returning to the blog is about my episode or whatever, some are just moments where I said too much or whatever...but, frankly, there's nothing that I've felt in those regards that I feel ashamed of or regret, so with the re-emergence of the bad come the saucy or whatever. hehe..not saucy. My life is by NO MEANS saucy. ;)

I do want to say something that embarrasses me a lot...I swore an awful lot back then. I don't think I really realized it. Holy crap. I mean, I still do sometimes when I'm mad about stuff, but it's a little over the top. I guess the fact that the people I talk to the most these days don't swear has really helped me out with that. That's a good thing.

will people finally listen?

I was watching ABC Nightly News last night and they ran a story about the possibility that FAO Schwarz, THE New York City toy story, may have to shut it's doors before or shortly after Christmas because they just aren't making money. This is sad. I've never been to New York City, but I know the store from a lifetime of movies and shows where kids in New York either went to FAO Schwarz or some made-up store modeled on it and entered a sort of children's Nirvana. Floor upon floor of every toy imaginable, displays on top of displays, and so much to put one's hands on...like the scene in Tom Hanks' movie Big where he plays chopsticks on the foot keyboard...at FAO Schwarz.

But they just can't compete. They don't sell enough. It lead to their declaration of bankruptcy a year or two ago, and this year it may very well lead to the doors being locked for good. It was nothing that they did that caused this either, that's what has me upset. They haven't taken to huge mark-ups in the price of their toys. The business-usual single-digit percentages are what they make their profits off of. There's no shame in that, nothing evil about it, it is capitalism at it's most fair.

No, the problem is in other stores dropping prices. Stores that can sell toys at or below wholesale cost -- thereby breaking even or even losing money on the sale of each toy -- knowing that people will come in and buy the cheap toys and then buy other stuff on which the store can make up it's loss. The toys fly off the shelf, no problem. People go to FAO Schwarz to gape in awe at the majesty of the place, get ideas for what they want, then go off to the suburbs to buy the toy somewhere cheaper. Somewhere like WalMart.

And that's what I'm getting at here, WalMart. In the past, WalMart has been convicted of predatory pricing (the act of selling products below wholesale cost as to put competition out of business) in courts of law and forced to pay fines in the hundreds of thousands of dollars. In Washington State a few years back, it was their pharmacy and beauty aids that they priced below cost in an effort to put area mom and pop pharmacies out of business...and it worked. All WalMart had to do was pay a fine in the quarter-million dollar range and they were free from competition in the area. I'm sure by now the fine has paid itself off through the monopoly that it resulted from.

They have done the same with small communities throughout the last couple of decades. Their practices of moving into small towns, driving down costs, thereby putting local stores (and, in some cases, the entire downtown business districts of those towns) out of business is well documented by groups such as WalMart Watch, PBS (this is a really good documentary if you ever get a chance to view it -- unfortunately, it costs $85 to rent), and others. This practice isn't just an accident of their gargantuan size, it is in large part their corporate policy.

But now it's toys that they seem to be trying to corner the market on. At least at Christmas time. And they're changing the landscape of toy shopping in the process. Toys R Us is being forced by WalMart to reduce it's prices to sliver-margins over wholesale in order to "compete". Instead of making a healthy one or two dollar profit off of every doll sold, let's say, it must make due with a nickel or dime. Toys R Us can manage, barely, because they have an empire of toys -- stores throughout this country and 27 others...A nickel or dime on every purchase adding up when multiplied by it's 1600 stores. FAO Schwarz is much smaller, a couple dozen in the United States alone. They just can't nickel and dime enough to stay afloat. And so they're very likely closing their doors.

I hear friends tell me all the time "Oh I went to WalMart and bought..." or "I need to go to WalMart and get..." and I always tell them how wrong it is for them to do so. I guess they don't care that WalMart puts moms and pops out of business in some small town in nowhere America...it's nothing tangible to them. It's sad. Maybe with a store like FAO Schwarz going under it will start to click in their heads. Probably not.

WalMart is, in one four letter word, EVIL and it's destroying so much about what is America. They are destroying the entrepreneurial spirit of capitalism and therefore capitalism itself by making it impossible for starter companies to compete and likely that establish niche companies will fail. They are rewriting the economy on their own without concern to anyone but their investors. They are ruining traditionalism by paving it over and putting up yet another supercenter.

...And this is just the tip of the iceberg. I could write a book on WalMart's wickedness. Just exploring their treatment of their employees (paying them just enough to still qualify for government-funded Medicaid instead of offering insurance itself, paying low enough so that many workers still qualify for food-stamps, and of course their infamous union-busting practices for starters) itself I could write a hundred pages. The effects of their demands on suppliers, thereby putting them under or running them out of the country, another hundred or so. And then of course there are their phony "Buy American" ads and "Wal-Mart Good. Works." campaign... But that is neither here nor there. Besides, much has been written and I will post a few links at the end of this post. I just wish people would listen and realize that whenever they buy anything from WalMart, they are partaking in a sham that is slowly unraveling the American Dream and all that is fair and good in the capitalist system (and yes, there are some things fair and good in the capitalist system). *sigh*

Anyway, a few things to check out:

The Wal-Mart You Don't know -- a nice long article exploring the global economic impacts of Wal-Mart's insistence of ever-lower prices on the products it sells. Suppliers, in order to sell their products through the largest retailer in the world must ever-reduce their costs of supplying...often leading to lay-offs and expatriation.

Sprawl Busters -- I actually worked with this group for a short time because CVS Pharmacy was ranging on their promises for a store they put up locally, surprising everyone involved by "preserving" an historical building as was required, but only by gutting it and leaving the facade. Anyway, they played a large role in the Store Wars movie linked to above and are one of the large players in the anti-Wal-Mart movement.

Nickel and Dimed, by Barbara Ehrenreich -- Ms. Ehrenreich explores the world of the working poor and in so doing, finds herself working for Wal-Mart in Minneapolis, MN. There she finds a corporation that imposes itself into its employee's downtime, disciplining "time-theft" (have to go to the bathroom? Don't you dare not wait until your break), and the extraordinary efforts of the company to keep unions out of it's business plans.


How Wal-Mart is Destroying America and The World and What You Can Do About It by Bill Quinn -- I haven't read the book personally, but want to. As Amazon writes: "An updated and expanded continuation of detailed accounts of Wal-Mart's questionable business practices, their not-so-ethical tactics, and their expansion into the global market. Shows concerned citizens how to fight to keep Wal-Mart from invading their towns."

press release ala rush limbaugh

Roy Black, attorney for Rush Limbaugh, released the following statement today:

"We have been informed that this afternoon the Palm Beach State Attorney's Office will announce that it has seized the medical records of four doctors who treated Rush Limbaugh for serious medical conditions and the pain resulting from them.

"In fact, what these records show is that Mr. Limbaugh suffered extreme pain and had legitimate reasons for taking pain medication. Unfortunately, because of Mr. Limbaugh's prominence and well-known political opinions, he is being subjected to an invasion of privacy no citizen of this republic should endure.

"Let us make our position clear: Rush Limbaugh is not part of a drug ring. He was never a target of a drug investigation. He became addicted to a prescription drug during legitimate medical treatment. He has publicly admitted this problem and has successfully sought treatment which continues today.

"We won't speculate on why the State Attorney's Office is handling Mr. Limbaugh's case the way it is. But what should be a responsible investigation is looking more and more like a fishing expedition."

From the Horse's mouth

Okay, I don't get it. Now Rush is saying that because he had at one time been using pain medication and that at that time had become addicted to them, that that legitimately absolves him from the criminal blame of having then shopped for doctors to get more of the drugs that he had found himself addicted to... Am I getting that right? How does that clear him of the fact that he was doing something illegal? Because whether or not you become "accidentally" addicted through legitimate treatment doesn't mean that you're suddenly in the clear for then feeding your addiction through illegal means.

When Rush went on the air and announced that he had a problem, he said that he wasn't going to make excuses for himself. This sure sounds like one to me...

there..

I'm not being such a greedy bastard anymore and have taken off some of the banners (since my ads on Google are starting to bring money in, yay!) and instead will now leave this blog with a few options for things that I need/want from time to time myself and therefore things I assume some of you want/need from time to time...like books, plane tickets, magazine subscriptions, and flowers. There's really nothing else that I think I'd buy online myself anyway.

huh, maybe I want to change my career plans...

Prosecutor found dead in Pa.
Associated Press
Maryland's top federal prosecutor vowed today to track down those responsible for the death of a prosecutor whose body was found stabbed and shot in Pennsylvania on the same day he was to conclude a drug case against a rap musician.

The body of Jonathan P. Luna was found in Lancaster County, Pa., said U.S. District Judge William D. Quarles Jr., before whom the prosecutor was to appear today.

"At this time the evidence indicates that he was murdered," U.S. Attorney Thomas DiBiagio said.

ahhh...the spirit of humanity!

I'm just going to quote the article. I don't feel that I really have to say anything. Anyone that reads this or knows my cynicism at all probably knows what I would say anyway...in this case I think (and hope) that most people feel the same way. Because, well...no, see, I almost said something:

A McDonald's customer who flew into a violent rage when she was denied mayonnaise on her cheeseburger got 10 years in prison today for running over the restaurant's manager.

Waynetta Nolan, 37, could have received as much as 20 years in prison for hitting Sherry Allen Jenkins with her car, dragging the employee across the parking lot and breaking her pelvis at the McDonald's in southwest Houston.

Nolan showed little emotion this afternoon when the jury came back with the punishment after four hours of deliberation. Earlier this morning, however, as the jury heard testimony in the punishment phase of Nolan's trial, her 43-year-old victim tearfully said she couldn't pick up her grandchildren because of the injuries she suffered in the incident.

The Houston Chronicle

See, I'm not saying anything at all. Nothing. Nothing at all. Mum's the word. Not gonna do it. Gotta push the post button before I do though...

today's adventures...

So I finally get off my arse and go apply at some of the local bars that I wouldn't mind bartending at. The first one I go to I walk in the door and the girl behind the bar smiles and says "hey Kyle!" and my vague familiarity is confirmed as I realize it was this girl that I knew a few years back and had gone out with a few times. What a small friggen world. We chatted a little bit, not like catching up sorta stuff, but just a bit and she told me that a bartender had just quit which is a good thing...she'd give my application to the manager. Only problem is, this is a girl that I had gone out with a couple times only to realize that I was only wanting to be around her because she was hot...upon realizing this, I just stopped calling her. I had run into her again and she had given me her number and told me to call, which I didn't because, well, I didn't. So I guess if she's mad at me, which she didn't seem to be, she could hold it against me and throw the application away...screwing me over. I can't say I'd be mad at her I suppose, not after me being a dickhead and all. But I don't think she's mad. And if she's not, then i's just a better chance of me getting a job...and working with a hot girl no less. :)

The next thing was the busride I took out to a shopping area (Alpine for those in the know)...it was sad. Normally I like the bus just because of the assortment of different people that ride it...people like me that don't drive (or, in my case, fix up their car or buy a new one) to be more socially and environmentally responsible, elderly people, poor people, and kids and the like...but today it was full of kids. Stupid kids. It really bothers me the way that kids these days butcher, absolutely BUTCHER the English language, and it was really raking my skin on there today. But another that I just don't get is people that take the bus for two blocks...why? There were people that I was waiting with at the station for fifteen minutes or so only to get on the bus to go a few blocks and then get off. They could have easily walked it, and they probably could have used the exercise. People are jsut so lazy...it's always bothered me too when I've driven to the store and gotten caught behind one of those people who sit there for five or ten minutes sometimes with their blinker on waiting for someoe else to finish loading their groceries and leave so they can get their spot....all the time a spot being open four or five cars down. What is with people?

Oh, and I almost rode my bike back from Alpine (about seven or eight miles or so) but then I relized that I was tired and it was cold, so why bother? See, I'm lazy too.

i would like to thank mr. bono

Just like the other day when I head the song I needed to hear in Fake Plastic Trees right when I needed to hear it, so too did the same sort of thing happen to me just now. Of course, I'm the one that actually put the CD in this time, but it had the same effect: Stuck in moment.

I'm not afraid
Of anything in this world
There's nothing you can throw at me
That I haven't already heard

I'm just trying to find
A decent melody
A song that I can sing
In my own company

I never thought you were a fool
But darling look at you
You gotta stand up straight
Carry your own weight
These tears are going nowhere baby

You've got to get yourself together
You've got stuck in a moment
And now you can't get out of it

And now I'm going out to hit the pavement, trying to find one of those job things that I've heard so much about. Get myself out of this stupid moment I'm in,

update

I'm feeling much better today and yesterday was much better than the day before. I think it's because I've been keeping myself rather occupied through whatever means possible. It helps a lot. And so does alcohol I must say...hehe. Okay, maybe not so much, but I have had wine the last two nights -- not enough to be drunk, but enough to just relax and stop thinking. That's a good thing (and good for my heart!). I don't know. A couple good conversations though today was good for me, and just a game plan for tomorrow in looking for a job -- I heard a local bookstore (Schuler's for anyone in the GR know) is hiring which is fantastic. I miss being around books full time...heck, I miss reading them. Haven't even been able to do that with this attention span problem I've been having with the complete and utter boredom. Oh well. c'est la vie and all that crap.

I don't know what that means, maybe I've had a little more wine than I thought.

sigh

So, in Louisiana there's this school where a teacher punished a kid for telling another kid that his mom was gay, then explaining that "gay" means that a "girl loving a girl". The teacher wrote a letter home to the mother, and also a note that the child had filled in with his explanation of things. It is here (a .pdf file, if you don't have adobe whatever software you'll just have to get it).

It brought tears to my eyes. First off that a 2nd grader is being told that callng his mom what she is is wrong, which to a second grader is telling him that the mother he loves is bad in some regard. That infuriates me. I don't care if homosexuality is right or wrong in your book, you don't tell a kid that his mother is a bad person. Period. That goes for even the most cracked-out, slutty, or downright abusive moms in the world. NEVER tell a kid that she is a bad mom. This teacher is solucky I'm not in Louisiana to "talk" with her.

Secondly, just the way the kid explained it. Man. The innocence of youth. It's just so. fucking. beautiful.

What I did: "I sed bad wurds."
What happened because I did what I did: "Lineing up fur riyses."
What I should have done: "cep my mouf shut." <---- that's what got me
What would have happened if I had done what I should have done: "I wud be at riyses"

It kills me because the writing is so cute, so adorable, so child-like and I can only imagine that the kid was crying as he wrote it, scared and confused that he had done something wrong when all he did was tell some other kid about his mom, a woman I'm sure he loves with all of his heart.

Stuff like this makes me even more certain about my law school decisions. I want to help kids like this...I want to save kids like this from a world that just seems to sometimes go out of its way to ruin...no, destroy their innocence. *sigh*

I'm sorry...this probably makes me sound like a wuss or whatever, but there is very little that gets me riled up like this.

ridiculous

Remember how a couple days ago I said that people would just adore Bush for pulling his top secret photo op while risking throwing this country into chaos? Well, I was right. Not that that should surprise anyone.

I think I have ESP or something...

"it was like building sand castles"

I know that by now even the partisans are starting to hush up about the WMD claims that we held against Iraq as it becomes more and more evident that no evidence is to be found, but the picture is still coming into clearer focus just how wrong we were:

Iraqi scientists never revived their long-dead nuclear bomb program, and in fact lied to Saddam Hussein about how much progress they were making before U.S.-led attacks shut the operation down for good in 1991, Iraqi physicists say.

Before that first Gulf War, the chief of the weapons program resorted to "blatant exaggeration" in telling Iraq's president how much bomb material was being produced, scientist Imad Khadduri writes in a new book.

Other leading physicists, in Baghdad interviews, said the hope for an Iraqi atomic bomb was never realistic. "It was all like building sand castles," said Abdel Mehdi Talib, Baghdad University's dean of sciences.

--The good ol' Billings Gazette (my only source of news for three long months while in Yellowstone)

We will never, of course, hear Mr. Bush acknowledge this news...just as we will never see him attend a soldier's funeral after having died "defending" us against those things that this news suggests never exists. But it is out there. People aren't really paying attention, but it's out there. *sigh* I'm done bashing Bush, I'm done hating this administration. It's beyond all of that now. Any more of that will just ruin a sense of patriotism that has been welling inside me as of late...I just wish I had something positive to have that patriotism develop into national pride.

the prefect song

There is nothing quite like turning on the radio and having the first song you hear being that song which you NEED to hear at that moment. Nothing like it all. I just turned on my launch radio and the very first song was "Fake Plastic Trees." I pumped up the volume and put my head back, mouthing the words to myself, closing my eyes. It's the best feeling that I've had in days. It was wicked awesome.

you should try it!

Commenting is fun and EASY...just click the little label thingy and typ to your heart's content!

Okay, I'll stop being an ass now. :)

oh yeah, and more additions to the laminated list:

I watched the Wedding Singer tonight and couldn't believe I had forgotten to add Drew Barrymore to it...and Julia Stiles...and Winona Ryder...and and and...

I'm too fucking horny lately. You know that?

a plea for soma

Tonight I was going to sit down and write. Poetry, a short story, an essay or whatever...I need to do something at least half-way productive. I can't though. I have way too much going through my head -- way too many ideas, way too many fears, way too many emotions to even list.

I need focus, I need some sort of mental prism to take this mental energy burst from my heart and mind and break it into its parts so that I pick and choose and do what needs to be done. But I can't. I mean, I could get some ritilin or pot or something, I suppose, but that is not a good idea for many reasons. I need some sort of focal point to aim at, or some sort of rallying point. I need something...but I don't know what it is. I wish I did, because I hate being in this place.

I can't even keep a thought going for more than five minites without my brain just jumping to something else.

mixed disc in my mind

I don't have a cd burner being on a laptop and all...but if I did, the following would be the disc that would come out right now:

1. "Wrong Child" -- R.E.M.
2. "You're Nobody 'Til Somebody Loves You" -- Dean Martin
3. "Heart of Gold" -- Neil Young
4. "Somebody" -- Depeche Mode
5. "Sick of Myself" -- Matthew Sweet
6. "Fake Plastic Trees" -- Radiohead
7. "Peace the Fuck Out" -- Travis
8. "Ring the Bells" -- James
9. "One" -- u2
10. "Bizarre Love Triangle" -- New Order
11. "El Scorcho" -- Weezer
12. "This is Hardcore" -- Pulp

Kinda all over the map, I know. I'm having an ADD sorta day.

blech

My spirit is boken. That's not to say that I'm depressed or anything of the sort, just that I have no motivation or desire to do anything. It sucks, because I really need to get off my arse and do something with my life...but it all feels like it's on pause or something. Every job I apply to turns up nothing. Everything I put up for sale online remains unsold, except CDs that sell for barely enough to cover the costs of sending them. Friends don't call me. Girls don't find me attractive. Even my cat is pissy with me lately.

It's as if my life is caught in some dense fog...I know where I have to go, and I know how to get there, but the fact that I can't see anything and so I don't see any of the progress that I am making with my life, and therefore can't be sure if I am even making any leaves me second-guessing everything including my self-worth and direction. I guess I know that I'm not depressed in that I believe that I am moving forward with my life, I have hope, but that doesn't really help much when you really have nothing.

What I need is a good stiff breeze...something to wash away the miasma...a job or a phonecall or some girl wanting more from me than stupid friendship. I need something to make things clear to me.

...but like I said, I am unmotivated at this time and none of it is going to just cross my path now is it? A catch-22 if ever I saw one.

blech.