Tenebrous Rex: 2005

27 December 2005

Niagara falls Frankie angel

Mark this event, write it down. I need to remember when it all started. This was the first Christmas that slipped through my fingers. The first Christmas I never got the full-on, "It's FUSKING Christmas!" feeling -- Santa, Jesus, goodwill toward men and all that. Mark it down so when I'm visited by three ghosts I have a place to trace it all back.

Wrapping presents at my mom's house and watching a little bit of A Christmas Story I thought I felt something, but nothing came to fruition. Don't get me wrong, I have plenty to be happy about. I know that. And it wasn't so much that I was unhappy as much as I felt like something was missing. Something's not the same.

There it is again, that abstract term I've come to know so well. Something.

About a week before holiday ground-zero -- as a last ditch attempt to clasp on to some festive feeling -- I tried to go buy my favorite Christmas movie, Scrooged but I couldn't find it at any of the local stores. It's been a couple of years since I've seen it and most of the time it's my holiday pick-me-up. My Christmas Viagra, if you will. Christmas movies on TNT or USA. That usually does it for me. Queue the warm and fuzzy.

Maybe a winged Carol Kane needed to hit me in the face with a toaster. I could have used that this year.

Christmas day was good. All the pieces were in place. Everything played out as planned, as it always does. Food, family, presents. We ate Turducken, which I don't know how I feel about. A chicken inside of a duck inside of a turkey. It sounded more like a dare than actual cuisine. It was good, I guess, but I still felt nothing. No Christmas glow.

I even got to see the abomination of a house on the way back to Grandma's. The house you can see from space. Every neighborhood has one. It stands tall with a blinking light covering every inch. The one that looks like it's on fire. On fire with Christmas.

Seeing this should have done it, it's a tradition after all. It should have struck that dormant Christmas nerve. It should have started my heart growing three times it's size, but somehow, it wasn't the same. Like looking at a bicycle when you're all grown up. It's not as big as when you were seven. It serves a different purpose now.

I remember things being larger. Bigger than I could ever surmount.

I feel like I just rubbed my eyes and rubbed away the magic.

Menstrual cycles of exgirlfriends

Someone from work just put a bag full of Lindt Chocolates on my desk. They just left it there as a holiday gift. Here, eat all you want, you know you want to. Like the apparition of peer pressure it doth call to me.

You can't know how opportune it is for just such things. And yeah, I've had three chocolates so far. I know it won't only be three that I have all day. I know it as well as I know my soul.

I'm weak, and because of Kelly, this time of the month I always crave chocolate. It's the residual left-over of our relationship. This time of the month was always her time if the month, and so she always craved chocolates or sweets. And through sympathy pain, I was always her partner in crime. So yeah, I can't get enough chocolate right now.

Just like everything else that's leaving me about her, I know this too will fade. But right now, at my desk, in front of the great expanse of the internet -- my confessional -- I feel like eating more candy.

:)

Make that four I've had all day.

Transubstantiate

I open my eyes into a maw of burning light. A morning of revelations. Like going to bed on earth and waking up on the sun. Refreshed. Reformed. Reconciled. Laying in the bed next to me is a burned-off, dead, calloused layer of skin. Next to me the old me is sleeping. A new and different day indeed.

It's eight a.m. and I forgot to close the blinds last night. It's bright in here. The only thing I can think is: it's been a while. Like Melvin Udall in As Good As It Gets, I forgot to lock the door.

Maybe I didn't say that with enough bravado. This deserves another avowal. This weekend I forgot to lock the door.

Not everything went right. I was a complete fifth wheel on Friday. Club Sonar and dancing with friends who seem to be finding themselves with strange attractors. Pulled in directions opposite me. I see what it must have been like for them when I wasn't around. When I was lost to the ether of a long-term relationship. I'm happy for them. I'm happy for me too. I'm happy I can handle it.

Saturday I attended Michele's birthday party. Good food, good peoples, good times. There was talk of pretzels making us thirsty, scissor fighting and Dr. Tran's hickory smoked horse butt-holes. Sometime during the night Duncan the dog got a wild hair with a squeeze-toy hotdog and decided to run laps around the living room. "That's how Dennis eats hotdogs," I exclaimed. We all got a laugh. Sorry Dennis.

Old friends I hadn't seen in years, we made small talk and smiled, bringing back times before people moved away. Before all the distance. The theme of Saturday was catching up and for the first time this year I started to get into the spirit of the season. After everyone left, Michele and I sat in the aftermath looking through the evening's pictures. I drove home shortly after.

Sunday morning came bright and early. I woke up, grabbed a shower, threw on some clothes and headed out to nab breakfast. I came home, knocked on Dennis' door and woke him up with the King. We were eating sausage egg and cheese sandwiches in the kitchen at ten in the morning, cracking jokes about something or another when I suddenly came to -- on present course -- one day, him and I, we're going to be common law married. Indeed a scary thought. Then the gay jokes will seem founded. One of us needs to get hitched and quick.

At the mall the parking wasn't as bad as we had expected. We found a place with relative ease. Inside the crowds were dense and we weaved in and out of packs of people like a school of fish through the thickness of water. Dennis and I were drinking and shopping, Sean was driving.

Before you think us alcoholics this is not something we normally do. It's just that it's the only thing that makes the mall remotely bearable this time of the year. We were the Dan Akroid santa from Trading Places. I spilled vodka down the inside of my coat pocket and it soaked through to the outside. All I needed was a salmon sticking to the white synthetic hairs of the santa beard I wasn't wearing. It was great.

It's Christmas and just like the holiday tunes they pump out over the audio system in every store you walk into, we danced the line between endearing and annoying. In the end I think we were more the latter.

I got stuff done this weekend. There's still more to do but I'm getting there. It's a whisper in my ear telling me I'll be fine, that I'll get there. And when I do, parking won't be as bad as I thought.

My new favorite

Driving in Baltimore to get tacos. Sometimes I love this city.

Refraction

Touch the mirror, break the surface tension. Watch the friction ripple off into infinity. A million reflections stretch out like a paper-doll. Your shades of gray. Your selves. Each one different, separate from the beginning. Like the rings in a recently sawed tree-stump, this is where you've been. The things you've lived through, each one written on your image.

You're as easy to steal as a car with an open window. You're an unlocked door. A safe the combination has been entered. Too easy to know. People get the full story just by looking at you. No mystery, no secret to your ticking. Nothing to unwrap.

You're disarming. You follow the rules. People can be themselves around you. Inside of minutes they feel they've known you their entire life. You have the same conversations with strangers you always have. You hear the same things. Nice words falling from their lips on familiar ears.

Yesterday I wrote down my birth-date on a form at the doctors office. Instead of 1977 I accidentally wrote 2977. Funny how something as small as a typo can make you think about so much. The weight of a date. Knowing at some point that day will exist. It's out there and you'll never see it. In the span of seconds you think about where you've been, where you're going. Time. The arbitrary nature of things like dates, plans, concepts of future.

I've fallen into the fold of my life. Putting things down on paper always helps me with perspective.

Snow in New York

I'm a building scheduled to be demolished. I'm emptied, a house with nothing in it. Vacant. I have been for sometime now. Likewise, I'm to be rebuilt.

The wrecking ball crashed into my facade at approximately 3:30am Sunday morning. Exiting a bar in NY and finding it snowing, a kiss out of left field from a total stranger. Pulled aside into dark corners. She said, it's snowing, and before I'd even realized she slammed into me with all the force of something that changes everything.

Her name was Elizabeth, I think. We spent some time talking at the bar, we all did. Her, Jon, Nick and I. I doubt I'll ever see her again. Not said like that's a bad or good thing.

Scarves, Nick throwing a menu in a Korean restaurant after we were ignored for twenty minutes, the browbeating cold, the snow, warm gloves from your pockets, the subway, the picture Jon took of Kevin and I where we look like secret agents, pizza as a substitute for sushi at 4:00am, pictures in elevator mirrors, three guys singing "Let it Snow" in the middle of the street, a toilet that flushed like you were at thirty-thousand feet, a twenty-six dollar round of shots, hot-dogs, coy glances, unexpected street bazaars, feeling completely interesting, using a cute girl's favorite word by accident -- I like New York more than all of these things. It's greater than the sum of it's parts.

Snow in New York, there's nothing like it.

EDIT: Jon's pics are up.

Send it Up

Going through doing some hard drive cleaning and I found a video. This is where I was about 6 years ago. A party at my friend Stubby's house while his parents were away. I'm having trouble dealing with how alien it feels. I dont really see any of these kids anymore.

Anyways, I uploaded it to the intarwebs via a new PutFile account. Just a warning, it's total cheese, and I'm at my heaviest, 220. The quality sucks, and it's in Windows Media 9 format, so my appologies.

Here you go: Send it Up

Oh and, I also found this one of me and dennis about 3 years ago working a security gig his dad hooked us with. This is what we got paid 30 dollars an hour to do. What can I say, we're retards.

Here you go: Security Gig

I like New York in June

I like a Gershwin tune. How about you?

This weekend we fly, or drive rather. Drive like the wind. And like a whale suddenly winked into existence 100 miles above the earth's crust -- we wont have a lot of time -- we'll need to live while we can.

I'm getting out of MD. Jon and I will spend a couple of days up in NY rippin' it up BSF style. A much needed escape from life, and really, there is nothing more beautiful than New York this time of year.

We have no plan, no schedule, no map, this is all last minute. I've spent the last two days calling just about every hotel in the city and nothing, everyone's booked up. Do I care? No. We'll figure something out. We'll find somewhere to sleep.

Printed on the back of the guide in nice big friendly letters it says "Don't Panic." Words to live by indeed.

I'll come back better for it, better for letting go, better for leaving.

This is the first in a long string of adventures. You can take that to the bank.

Who wants .giffy?!?!

I plan on uploading a metric fuck-ton of images to the photo.bin tonight. Let's hope I follow through.

Yeah, so I had a great weekend. Total madness.

Here are some animated gifs to tide you over.

Air Guitar HERO represent!

EDIT:
Photo.bin updated with two new bins. Moved the gifs to a seperate page, they were giving me a headache.

Oh and: Jon's Pictures.

The Secret Room

Almost two years ago I wrote a short story called Nutshell which later evolved into The Secret Room. Me and a couple of friends -- Dennis and Jeff -- made it into a short film. We entered it into Project Greenlight but only made it to the top 50.

For whatever reason kbryna here on blogger has taken a fancy for my artwork. I don't know, she must be crazy. ;) She's a total stranger in every sense of the expression. I've never met her and can hardly say I know anything about her at all. Anyways, she expressed an interest in any more work I had on offer and I obliged. I thought I'd share this film we made.

She liked it so much she was speechless, which I can tell you -- if you read her blog -- is no small feat.

Honestly, I hadn't really thought about it in a long time. I forgot what this film even meant to me.

..........:::::::::DISCLAIMER:::::::::..........

If you click the link below please be mindful that I have limited bandwidth. Please don't load it up 50 times or send it to all your friends or you will surely send the film and most of this blog to a dark, lonely corner of the internet -- lost for a month -- forcing me to pay more in hosting fees than I already am.

..........:::END OF DISCLAIMER:::..........

You can watch it here: The Secret Room

That's not the final product either. I had a friend do some serious sound work on it and what came out was something not short of amazing. To me anyways.

I never released it. I wasn't allowed to enter it into any other festivals either. I ran into a problem with the girl playing the deal girl. She refused to sign an actors release form but that's a whole story unto itself. We won't go there.

So here it sits, in limbo. We have plans to someday remake it using someone else as the girl. In fact my friend Jon has taken it upon himself to do a rewrite. Adding in some other plot twists and characters. All in all, beefing it up and making it longer. I've read the preliminary script he has and what's in there I like, but it's changed. It's different now. My original vision is still there but it's buried.

Recently I've honestly kinda forgot about The Secret Room. About why I wrote it in the first place. At the heart it's about loneliness, that much is obvious. But it's more than just that. I didn't tell many people about the real reason I wrote it. About what it really means to me. I'm gonna get all art-fag on you now.

I wrote it as a metaphor for a dead-end relationship. A one-sided relationship. About one person contributing everything and the other person contributing nothing. About suddenly coming to terms with giving your everything to someone who is incapable of doing the same. It's about the opposite of sharing. The Secret Room.

It's about the things a relationship loses, or maybe never even had. It's about death, and having to die yourself if you want to stay in that relationship.

There is some innate pain about keeping a secret. About not being able to say something you really want to say. About a secret love only you feel. About hiding. It's funny in a not so funny way and in the end you'll do anything to keep that pain because you mistake it for what you think you want or need. Again, dying in the process.

Maybe all that doesn't come through in the film. Maybe I didn't want it to. But now, it seems more than ever, I need to remember these things.

My Metal Emotions

Scott just sent me this very serious article about metal sign abuse. God I love The Onion.

Here's a taste:

"The metal sign, or 'sign of the goat,' has all but lost its impact as a token of respectful recognition for something truly 'rocking' or 'metal,'" SMC president Terence "Geezer" Butler said. According to Butler, members are upset that their sacred gesture is being used to acknowledge and celebrate "favorable but clearly non-metal events."

Full article here:
Metal Council Convenes To Discuss 'Metal Hand Sign' Abuse

Sadly I am a chronic offender of said frowned upon pratices. Notice my flagrant show of disrespect for the sign in even my profile picture. I have brought much shame on the metal community. My metal emoticons are so not metal...

\m/ 0_o \m/

The Wind-Up Bird

These days it seems I can't escape my subconscious. Every night I go to sleep and have dreams of her and I getting back together. And every morning I awake only to be left in her absence, her imaginary impression in the left side of the bed. Her smile still burned in my eyes, her voice still ringing in my ears, her words in my heart. People talk about lucid dreaming, about being able to control things but it's something I've never been able to do.

I finished a book last night. A book that was hard to pick up after she left. A book that was both the best book I've ever read and the most difficult. This book, The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle, it was mirroring my life. It just got too bizarre and when she left, so did my desire to finish it.

Yesterday I picked it up again.

There's a quote in there toward the end that left me eviscerated. It tore me open when I read it. There was no precision as if it had taken care and cut me open with a scalpel. No, this had all the care and comfort of a shotgun blast aimed at my chest.

"People were no more than dolls set on tabletops, the springs in their backs wound up tight, dolls set to move in ways they could not choose, moving in directions they could not choose. Nearly all within range of the wind-up bird's cry were ruined, lost. Most of them died, plunging over the edge of the table."

If you think of the bird as fate, you get the metaphor. These people were made for ruin.

I talked to a friend last night. She told me that one of her friends has this dad and every weekend she goes over for dinner. Well, her dad has taken to making salads before the main course. In regards to lettuce he always asks her, "iceburg or Dole?" The thing is, they're both the same. There is no choice. So what he's saying is, you better just accept it, cause it's coming anyways.

These days I have to give myself over to the flow. There's an ocean of people out there who all share my fate. There's no lucid dreaming, no fighting it, no changing it. Not for me.

Amelie has stopped running to the door everytime she hears the honk of a car alarm being armed. Maybe it's time I should too.

I just have to let go and hope I don't fall off the edge.

Friday outings

I had fun Friday. I like getting out early and starting the night as soon as possible. Cheap drinks at happy hour are a definite plus.

Here comes another list.

Things that made Friday a good night in no rational order:

01.) Kevin trying to do a southern accent but falling into a mix between Sean Connery and Christopher Walken.
02.) Southern Accent Hero!
03.) "just givin' em out!"
04.) The Mount Nacho pyramid at Duclaw.
05.) Unexpected marching bands.
06.) Kevin buying me another donut that turned out to be no less than a week old.
07.) The picture I took of Michele where she's trying to flip me off.
08.) Guitar Hero till 3am.
09.) Jen and I laughing on the couch about Michele's God given gift for Guitar Hero.
10.) Caricatures!

11.) The look on Michele's face while the guy drew mine.
12.) Michele giving me the idea for mine. (I'm dumb and can't think of the obvious.)
13.) Jon taking pictures of Jon and I.
14.) Walking into Jen and Kevin's house with Kevin at 4:00pm and finding Jon already there playing Guitar Hero on Kevin's Ps2 that he had dragged from Kevin's room and hooked up downstairs.
15.) Being told about www.ninjai.com
16.) The fact that the guy drawing caricatures could spell "caricature" but needed help spelling "guitar."
17.) "Bits"
18.) Handlebar mustaches.
19.) A stranger's remark about eating pies.
20.) Unintentional creepiness.
21.) Jen eating her words and playing Guitar Hero for the first time and actually liking it.

Anyways, if you don't believe me that all this wonderfulness took place in the span of one evening, well, Jen took pictures. See for yourself!

My Follow Suit

I'm following Jon's lead and making a mixed CD. I used to do this a lot durring the days of napster but I find that I don't do it much anymore. I was always making soundtracks for my life. Here's mine now:

Moved Out

01. Longwave - There's A Fire
02. Mike Doughty - I Hear The Bells
03. Alkaline Trio - Warbrain
04. Relient K - Be My Escape
05. Devin Davis - Iron Woman
06. Coparck - Surfing on the Rainbow
07. The Bens - Bruised
08. The Weakerthans - Aside
09. The Wedding Present - Always The Quiet One
10. Sage Francis - Message Sent
11. Madeleine Peyroux - Don't Wait Too Long
12. The Honorary Title - Bridge and Tunnel
13. Death Cab For Cutie - World Shut Your Mouth
14. They Might Be Giants - Experimental Film
15. The Rosebuds - Boxcar
16. Pinback - Seville
17. Giant Sand - Bottom Line Man
18. Eels - Living Life

We need a heRO!!

The top twenty reasons why this past weekend was the fusking shit in no particular order:

01.) Playing Guitar Hero for the first time at Scott's.
02.) Free drinks in Fed Hill via Nick Mutha-Fuckin' Kelly.
03.) Kevin and I playing Guitar Hero while Jen laughed at us.
04.) Four guys in a car screaming Alkaline Trio lyrics driving through Baltimore.
05.) Scott's gaming party.
06.) Jon turning around in his car seat to sing Cake's rendition of "Strangers In The Night" to us in the back.
07.) Chinese Food at Jen's.
08.) When Kevin bought me a Krispy Kreme donut at the gas station.
09.) Some cute girl at the bar who every time I looked at her she was looking at me.
10.) Jon and I out at bars playing Guitar Hero in our heads to every song we heard.
11.) Corinne doing the 'Corinne Dance' while she played Guitar Hero.
12.) Good takeout pizza in Fredneck.
13.) The word: Fusking.
14.) Going undefeated at Soul Calibur 3.
15.) Pissing off Jon cause I was undefeated at Soul Calibur 3.
16.) Dennis and I eating fifty-cent hotdogs at Ikea and buying bomb-ass chairs.
17.) "YOU GOT ANOTHER THING COMIN'!"
18.) Getting home at two-ish in the morning on Saturday night, jumping up on my bed and playing Guitar Hero loud enough to wake the neighbors, and Dennis.
19.) Planting the travel seed in the minds of friends at Brewer's Art.
20.) Peeing outside.

See a pattern there?
Yeah, this game is ruling me right now:

And here's proof:

Yeah, that's me, on my bed, with a toy guitar, rocking out, playing a friggin' video game! And I wonder why I'm single... Well, at least I'm not in my underwear with a tie around my head.

But really, I don't need no INSTRUCTIONS to know how to ROCK! That shit is FUN, I dare anyone to play it and say it aint.

StarScream and Hutch

I used to write rap songs, well, Dennis and I. Our rap names were StarScream and Hutch, I'm Hutch, he's StarScream. We even had aliases for our aliases.

Hutch: Big Bully Bullocks, Squint Eastwood, Sparkamus Prime

StarScream: Scooty Puff Jr.

With song titles like :
01. Two Scoops A-Blazin'
02. Gi Joe’s one known foe, your mama’s toe.
03. Teddy Ruxpin’s got crazy rhyme bustin.
04. They call me Mr. Sarcastic...Shaggy Fan-Tas-Tic!
05. Bearded Mother of the Smothers Brothers
06. On golden Showers with Super powers.
07. I said "that chick's lazy", not "Patrick Swayze..."
08. Magic missiles and girly cat-whistles.
09. Santa Claus and Boss Hog's balls.
10. Lock, stock and two smoked out crazies, pushin' up daises.
11. Toe-tappin', fool-slappin' mischief.
12. Beatles songs about all-wool thongs

They made me laugh. They still do. They were so bad, but so good at the same time. Here's a highlight from one I wrote. I might post more if I feel like it, they tend to get a little graphic though.

Magic missiles and girly cat-whistles.

StarScream, StarScream, tsk tsk tsk / Why these kids think they can mess with this? / cleanin' up their style like our name was wisk / goin' on for miles like our christmas lists / We're the evil corporation for two-thousand-four / forget Enron we're harder core / the axis of evil is knockin' down your door / and sellin' your grandmother into slave labor / don't even think about savin’ her / we kept your lightsaber / I'm like the evil yoda except taller / and cuter / stealin' your shit like a rioting looter / using my force to run off on your scooter / cloggin’ up your brains like roto-router / cause I’m puttin’ on my cloak and wizard hat / servin’ up fools with my wiffleball bat / and killin’ off all your level nine mages / you think you can stop us? / we been here for ages / murderin’ dudes just like you / I’m level ninety / StarScream’s ninety-two / don’t test me kid I’ll summon magic-missile / makin’ all the ladies howl and whistle / burnin’ up your crew like a pile of thistle / cause we’re runnin’ things like Spacely Sprockets / lettin’ loose with our magic rhyme rockets / This is the norm for two-thousand plus four / runnin’ up in you like a high-priced whore / sellin’ out in the record store / makin’ all the kiddies foam for more / StarScream and Hutch are on the scene / out for hire like Hannibal’s A-Team / and B.A. Baracus / and that fool named Face / even that crazy ass Murdock couldn’t rock this place / not like us and that’s a fact / so step to this if you wanna get jacked / but otherwise you best keep your distance / we’re runnin’ full force like the Jedi resistance.

In Stitches

Somewhere around the vicinity of about three-hundred or so, whatever that means. IN MY FUCKING HEAD MAN!! And for what? Well, for a good cause actually, for me. For the only one I'm always gonna have to live with. Really, this is about survival, and betterment. This is something that had to be done. So I did it.

Let the healing begin right?

Right?

It's been said that if you sit in one place long enough you'll see everyone you've ever met in your entire life. Up until recently I thought that was a pretty cool insight, until I really thought about how sad it was. If you stay in one place long enough -- maybe your entire life -- of course you'll see everyone you've ever met, you've never moved from your spot. Never grown. People come and go, some come back, some don't, but if you never move... blah, blah, blah.

What measures a person? Experiences? Life?

I've never left this country I was born in. I talk to people everyday who's lives are so incredibly small, but compared to what? Mine? I am surely not the stick to measure by. Not in the slightest. Something in the coming year and years I will rectify. Words have been marked.

I'll go it alone if I have to but I'm leaving, maybe on a jet-plane, maybe not. The only thing for certain is that I'm going and when I come back, the person who left wont be with me.

I understand now that sometimes -- even when things are perfect, or seem so -- those are the things you have to walk away from the fastest.

May I never be content.

The undead of fashion

Every three or four years it comes back. Stories of old tell the tale of a fashion fop who one day -- on the night of a full moon -- gave birth to a woeful style. He strolled into town, the whisp-whisp of his thighs unbeknownced to him carrying the tune of forever damnation.

This cadaverous craze, this deceased dernier cri, this rigor mortis rage -- it's come back to life once again and I feel it's my job to send it packing to the abhorrent realm from which it spawned.

I'm speaking of course of corduroy.

I'm out shopping and I'll see it on a shelf, or on a rack, hanging there, mocking good taste and common sense. No, it won't look good on you. Yes, your friends will laugh. You'll never pass ninja school if everyone can hear you coming. What are you thinking?

You kill it and it only comes back stronger, more potent.

It's as if someone says, "you know what I haven't heard in a while? Corduroy." And like all abominations, as these words are spoken -- as if some kind of demonic decree proclaimed -- the being's rotting corpse is reanimated to plague Gaps and Old Navys everywhere.

Not on my watch sister.

*the SHUCK-SHUCK pump of a shotgun*

Not on my watch.

Lollypops

There's a woman in my office who has a wooden pumpkin on her desk filled with tootsie-pops. I can't stop eating them. They're the only thing keeping me sane today.

In every sense of the expression, I'm maxed out. I've hit my limit of things I can deal with at one time.

Tootsie-pops are making it better.

With all the happenings lately I almost forgot, tonight is anime and video game night with Bone. I can't wait.

It'll probably be the last one for a couple of weeks while I recover from the surgery I go in for next week. We're gonna make this one count. This weekend's gotta count too. I don't think I'll be going out for a while. I can't imagine I'll feel too "pretty" anytime soon.

Milestones in the fold

These days my entire life unfolds like an origami crane. It all started with a plain sheet of rice paper, and now, even though the material is the same, it's something much more complex. These days it seems I'm forced to examine each fold, each step that brought me closer to what I now resemble. This is about deconstructing. This is about things that happened a long time ago.

In the ocean, a shark has to be constantly moving in order to stay alive. I have to remember that. I have to keep moving.

The last couple of weeks, it's like someone upstairs pushed the fuck-his-shit-up button. The range of emotions I've gone through have completely run the gamut. Black, white, shades of gray, you name it, chances are I've felt it and dealt with it. My life wasn't perfect, don't get me wrong, but things were going, smoothly. I was forgetting what I learned a long time ago.

Don't ever get too comfortable.

They say: that which does not kill you, only makes you stronger. Well, I should be approaching critical-mass sometime soon. On present course I'll be getting super powers next week. I can't fucking wait.

I say: that thing, the one that makes you stronger, it usually does get you in the end. It rings true about your past, it's never completely gone.

I think by now everyone knows what happened between Kelly and I. I'll spare you all the re-cap, I'm sure I'll be blogging about it for a good while anyways. This isn't about that. This is about the past, remember? It's only because these things all happened in the same week that they're being lumped together.

They also say: when a door closes, a window opens. Well, I wasn't expecting this window to open. This fourteen year old window I apparently forgot to lock.

So what happens when someone you've hated for fourteen years pops back into your life and apologizes? Someone who was your best friend for a long time, who just up and vanished one day. Taking with him an assortment from your mother's jewelry box. And what happens if you had that person wrongfully accused the entire time? For fourteen years! This person has been the beneficiary of most of your anger and hurt. This person who was your best friend and one day up and vanished, taking with him everything you ever trusted or thought was sacred. Friendship, honesty, truth, they're all just words. What if -- come to find out -- you've been hating the wrong person all along?

Well, this happens. It starts about 13 posts down and just gets deeper and deeper.

Yesterday, everyone who checked those comments had a front row seat in the theater of my past. This is shit I haven't thought about for years. A wound that was sutured a long time ago only to be rent open again. Made fresh.

Don't get me wrong, we were kids, we all were. Kids do stupid shit, I know that. But this is an event that haunted me my entire life. I never stopped thinking about it. A milestone. If someone I called friend -- a friend above all other friends -- could do this to me, then what's the world worth?

That was the day I grew up, and for a time, I stopped trusting everyone. Don't ever get too comfortable, I'd always say.

After that -- for what seemed like forever to a fourteen year old -- I didn't have friends. I didn't go out of my way to even make new friends. Sometimes its a dangerous thing to be left alone with only your subconscious to guide you. Your mind can wander, you can get caught up in thoughts of revenge. I was really hurt.

It's funny, we had this great friendship, him and I, but now I strain to remember anything but him leaving and the events that lead up to that departure. I can't for the life of me remember the good times. They're just not there. I'm sure at one point they existed but I just can't recall them with any solidity. They're overshadowed, shaded out.

It looks like he's got some kids now and is into all the same things I am. It's funny how fourteen years can go by with great distance between two people and somehow -- through experiences they shared together -- they come out alike. I just wish I could remember some of the good ones.

I really want to forgive him now, I do. I really want to like him, but I know I can never trust him, ever. It's just not in me to do so. I know my limits and I'll never set myself up for that fall ever again.

I have to keep moving.

These are the folds that shape us into who we are. The things under our skin no one sees, forming us. We're malleable under the pressure of our own experiences. We're folded. We all are.

Throwing matchsticks at the sun

I had a really great weekend and a not so great this morning.

God, this weekend was so awesome! I went into Baltimore on Friday night and rampaged with Jon, Kevin and Scott. It was great, so great in fact that I ended up crashing up there. Good times equals not driving, not thinking, and just cutting loose. I felt like I was really falling back into the single life with relative ease. The transition was going smoothly. After all, it's been almost three weeks now, and if you want to count the tail end of the relationship where I could feel her gone already, it's been way longer than that.

Saturday was kinda botched from the start but everything was salvaged and went well. Corinne came down to my neck of the woods and her, Dennis and I kicked it up in Annapolis. I vaguely remember someone trying to paper, rock, scissors her away from us. The creep factor was high. It was a good night but I still don't like Tsunami. Sorry Dennis, I never will.

Sunday I went to the Renaissance Festival with all the guys. Drinking two dollar beers. Being subjected to the horrifying reality that most of the people who dress up should not be dressed in anything except a burlap bag. These aren't so much costumes as they are anatomy lessons. Some of these people have elbows one would mistake for knees in a blind taste test. The anomaly known only as the shelf-boob might be the most disgusting thing I've ever seen, next to watching Jon eat a turkey leg, at which I almost honked. Really... really.

So yeah, a good weekend. This morning, not so good.

I guess I'm still dealing with things. Part of me thinks she's gonna come walking through that door anytime now, but obviously she's not. I woke up two times during the night last night from dreams where her and I were still together. One was so vivid I actually reached over and felt the emptiness of the bed next to me. It's been three weeks since we've shared a bed but this morning it really hit home. She's gone, really, really gone. But in my dreams, we were happy and still, one.

This is Phantom Limb Syndrome where an amputee who has lost an arm or a leg can still feel his or her fingers or toes. Residual feeling still haunting them long after the use of that limb is gone. It still itches, it still tickles and even though it's not there physically, it still has feeling.

It's not ever completely gone and maybe it never will be.

Two things that are great

The first is a comic my friend Jon found.

Dr. McNinja
Go there, read it, pee yourself.

The second is an album called The Mouse and the Mask by Danger Doom, a collaboration between Danger Mouse and MF Doom.

It's teh aw3s0m3. I am sofa king we todd did.
Love the Master Shake voicemail messages.

This is making friday totally worth it.

This is too great not to share! Sorry, I promise to get back to my usual dour posts in due time. This is really making me laugh though. Thanks Dennis!

http://thecasualfriday.blogspot.com/

Walls

It's done. Time to put the walls back up. I haven't seen em in a while, I'm sure they could use some dusting. Gotta clean up the china in the china shop too.

Talked to D a lot tonight.

Honestly, I'm fine. As weird as it sounds I know everything is gonna turn out for the better, whatever that might be. People are people, you can't blame them for doing what they feel in their heart is right, no matter how much it hurts or doesn't make sense to you.

I wish her luck in finding what is missing.

I will miss her.

Analogies

You hear a song and immediately you’re in love. You play it constantly, and every time you do it gives you goose bumps. You can’t get enough. You sing it at the top of your lungs. It might make you laugh. It might make you cry. You feel alive when you hear it. You tell other people how much you love it. It’s perfect. By you, it can do no wrong.

Then you start hearing it on the radio, in TV commercials. Pretty soon it’s everywhere and at first you like it, though you can’t get away from it. You tell people this is your song, but saying this loses meaning. Now, it’s everyone’s song. People on the street, babies in commercials, at the sports arena, they’re all singing along and it’s overwhelming. You take hearing it for granted. The goose bumps are gone, it’s not special anymore.

Then one day it just happens, first you hate the melody, then you hate the lyrics. Pretty soon hearing the first few chords is enough to send you into a rage. Every time you hear it you immediately change the station or turn it off. You can’t even remember why you liked it in the first place. You don’t know what you ever saw in it. You tell other people how much you hate that song. By you, it can do no right.

You’re burned out.

It takes time but after the hype has died down -- and this is years I’m talking about here, long after no one plays it anymore -- you’ll hear it again and remember why you loved it. How it made you feel the first time you heard it. When and where you were, how much it meant to you. Then the memories come rushing over you like a burst dam.

Love might bend and sway the way a tree branch does in a thunderstorm, but it never breaks. It never goes away.

Of course, it’s easy to reconnect with a song.
All you have to do is listen.

Ellipsis...

That curious punctuation of which I am so fond. Those three little periods that tell you things aren't over. That there is a chance to continue where you left off. It's a pause... A break... A place to rest and think about the meaning of the sentence before.

Sometimes we all need an ellipsis.

This week my life changed in a way I never thought possible. So this weekend, unlike last weekend, I got out of the house. I had to. During the entire three days -- and not counting sleeping -- I may have been alone for only two hours. I surrounded myself with great people and it has helped me so much.

Friday I saw Serenity at the West Nursery theater with Scott and Kevin. After, we caught some tacos at a place by BWI I never knew existed. The menu was exactly the same as a place in Annapolis called El Toro Bravo. A combination number 10 -- two tacos, rice and beans -- is the same as a combination number 10 at El Toro. It was mildly bizarre since they are in no way related.

After we ate we ended up in Fells Point. Trying to get into a place called Max's we decided it was too crowded and headed over to a place called Friends. It was a good night. Drinking, playing pool, reflecting. The movie was good. The tacos were good. It was a good night.

Saturday Jon took his LSAT. He called me when he was done and we spent the entire day hanging out. He picked up the Capcom Greatest Hits Collection for Xbox and we played some of the classics for a while. It felt good to zone out to some good ole' fashioned mayhem. I however, still suck at Street Fighter. Some things never change.

We decided to grab some dinner in Annapolis at El Toro Bravo. Yeah, two nights in a row for me. This was around 4:00pm. We sat and ordered a pitcher of margarita, a pitcher we would soon realize we couldn't finish. I got my usual, a number 10, two tacos, rice and beans. Much like the evening prior, I was only able to eat one taco.

We spent an hour just catching up and trying to get our moneys worth out of the pitcher we were so eager to order. Later we decided to walk around and found a little shop I'd never noticed before, we spent some time in there and then went back to the appartment to wait for Dennis to get home.

Dennis strolled in around 9:30pm and after some deciding about where the night was to take us we headed off to Baltimore. We were meeting Kevin at Brewer's Art which later changed to Club Charles about half way there.

It all started out normal enough, drinking, talking, bar-hoping, but it was the end of the night that proved to be the most, different.

We closed a bar called The 13th Floor at the Belvedere Hotel. It's, get this, on the 13th floor, clever I know. They were playing some great Latin music and a Scottish wedding party was there dancing it up. Not something you see everyday, men in kilts dancing, doing the merengue.

That's not the odd part though.

After we left we were walking back to the car and I remembered there was a late night sushi place right around the corner. I had been there once before a long time ago. It's just a nice place to put an end to the evening. It's chill, they play techno and you can relax. Anyways, I felt like something was pulling me there. That there was something there I needed to do or see. So, I made the suggestion that we go and we did.

Now, I'm not a sushi eater but it's been something Kelly has always wanted me to try. She told me that I'd like a spicy tuna roll and when I saw it on the menu I ordered it right away. This weekend was not about forgetting.

So there we were, me, Dennis and Jon, ordering sushi at 2:30am and sitting at the bar when suddenly I look up and on this little 24 inch TV right in-front of us is the tail end of a movie called Garden State.

This movie holds more meaning for me than anyone knows. In this movie is a song that I will only associate with one person for the rest of my life. If there was a movie that was 'our' movie, this would be it. And I came in right at the end, during the speech about the ellipsis. About how people need space and time to think, to reflect. About how lives have been changed in such a short period of time that it becomes too scary to bear but if you can face it, things can only get better. Roll credits.

Why this movie? Of all movies, and of all parts to come in on, why here? Why now? I couldn't help the feeling that I needed to see this again. That I needed to be told this, to be reminded.

Saturday night -- enjoying a spicy tuna roll at a late night sushi bar in the middle of Baltimore -- I was reminded of something greater than myself. That something is going on, there are things in this world that don't just happen. Things that are to be, will be, and vice versa. It was somewhat of a comfort.

The ride home was quiet. Dennis drove and I peered out the passenger window. It was foggy and just above us the street lights reflected what I could only describe as an ocean. It's waves rolled over our heads and for a moment I lost myself to it. It's upside-down world reminded me of my own. The mist had turned into a phantom blanket that covered our little town with an iridescent, undulating calm.

What will happen, will happen. And that's okay.

This weekend was not about forgetting, sometimes we all need an ellipsis.

Harbinger of the Apocalypse perhaps?

Lately a lot of strangers have told me that I look familiar. They ask me if I know them. They ask me two or three times. People I've never seen in my entire life.

The last occurrence was just yesterday. A young man walked slowly past me, the entire time staring me in the face. He didn't even blink.

It happens a lot.

Sometimes when I'm out at a bar, it'll happen a couple of times a night. It happens more in the city, a city I don't live in.

I guess I just have one of those faces. That's my response every time, only to cover up the fact that I don't know what to say.

I can't help but shake the feeling that there is another me out there somewhere meeting all these people and having all this fun. My more fun, more charming doppleganger. Me in the bizzarro universe. Maybe I'm really my shadow, stretching and deforming over the landscape behind me as I walk perfectly into the sunset.

That's ridiculous though. It sounds like something someone who majored in philosophy would say. Their failing grasp to use a very expensive and worthless degree.

When I was little I used to think my life was being broadcast on TV, on some channel I never saw or wasn't allowed to see. This is long before The Truman Show or even the Twilight Zone episode The Truman Show ripped off. Anyways, I'd always think I was being watched and I'd never want to slip up or look stupid because then everyone would know. I felt like weird things would only happen because they were supposed to. Maybe this was just a very uneducated belief in God.

I think most kids who grew up in the TV generation think like this. It's a false sense of notoriety. It makes you feel like you matter. Like you're not just living and nobody cares.

It's all scripted, this is supposed to happen. This is just the episode where Dad takes me to a bar and I sit and watch him drink all day. This is the episode where I do math homework and feel stupid and not good enough.

It's not really happening if it's not happening to you.

Maybe the reason people think they know me is just this residual faux-fame from back then, when I thought I was on TV. The once child star, now has-been of my subconscious.

Maybe it's the internet. Maybe these strangers have seen me on myspace or stumbled onto my website. Maybe that's it. Honestly though, the numbers just don't add up. Nobody goes to those pages.

But these people, they never tell me where they think they met me and I never ask. They simply feel I should know them. As if my face is familiar to them and they can't explain why.

Searching my memory banks for anything only brings up cobwebs in forgotten corners. Sorry people -- it's not that I don't know you -- it's that I never knew you.

You've been drinking and you have me mixed up with someone else.

but it's all better now...

Know why?
Cause the framing is done.

Be jealous!

>:)

Signed and errythang.
Big ups to Shaz/x for hookin' it up on the real. He's a fine chap.

@#$%&@%#$&!!!!!!!!!!!!!

FUCK!! Now I'm staying late to edit fucking EXCEL FILES????
I'm surrounded by fucking retards!!!!

AARRRGHHHHH!!!!

ANYONE ELSE IN THIS WHOLE FUCKING BUILDING SHOULD BE ABLE TO DO THIS!!!!

Nothing at all.

So I called out of work on Friday and during the entire course of my weekend I only left the apartment maybe twice. I say twice because the third time I left the apartment was only to walk down to another apartment and supervise my roommate help a friend move in.

So, for three days, I did next to nothing. I didn't see anyone, I didn't call anyone and nobody called me. Well, Kevin called and I called him back, plus my mom called, so I guess there was that. Still though, it was pretty quiet all weekend.

It started when I woke up Friday morning, I felt as if someone had been hammering nails into my jaw all night. This resulted in a mild headache that I could feel becoming worse if I pressed it. I was going to call out anyways and now I had my excuse.

Later a phone call to Kelly turned up that I had probably been grinding my teeth in my sleep. She said during school she used to do the same thing, that it was stress. This was over the phone, I maybe saw her in person for a grand total of six hours all weekend.

Friday we all went out to dinner, Kelly, Dennis and I, then we grabbed some beer from the local liquor store and went home. We decided to watch The Jerk with Steve Martin. Kelly and Dennis had never seen it. It was a good night even if the new phonebooks were not here.

All and all Kelly and I have been seeing less of each other over the course of the last month or two. I think this is a study to find out who each other is without one another. To get reacquainted with ourselves. She wants to go back to school, get into a good regiment at the gym, and is starting to find her own again. We do spend a lot of time together and maybe it's time we relax and figure out direction.

I thought it best to do nothing for a while. I had been exerting myself worrying about things that I had no control over and I could use three days underground. And during the daylight hours, for three days, that's exactly what I did.

I decided to read. I drew the blinds closed. The weather all weekend was nice but that didn't concern me, I was inside, buried in a book and my thoughts. A funny thing about this book I'm reading, I think it's making me crazy. Things all around me have been out of whack as of late. I'm worrying about things I wouldn't normally pay any mind to. I'm conscious of things that I'd normally not think about. Everything has taken this kind of surreal semi-gloss coating. This is how I spent all day Saturday and at 10:00pm I decided I should get out.

Dennis and I decided to forego plans of going to Baltimore. It was a long drive that neither of us felt up to that late in the game. We ended up at a pub in Annapolis. The pub we always go to in Annapolis. Nothing unusual ever happens there.

At this pub the back area is outside and you can sit down, have something to drink and hear yourself speak. Neither of us had eaten and so we got a couple of menus on top of our beer order. It was the same waitress we always have, her name is Amanda. She's nice and is always good to us.

I couldn't shake the feeling that something was different about the night air. Even though it had been a bright, clear day, the evening sky held no stars. Not one.

As we sat there, out back, under the empty sky, we ate and drank. Later a man would come out of the bar, sit down in our vicinity and take off his shirt. He'd move chairs around in a ritualistic manner, finally sitting down by himself to smoke a cigarette.

Later still, on the other side of the wood fence that backed up to the rear of our chairs a man would pee a foot from where Dennis was sitting. This kind of stuff never happens here.

It was after that when we met a man who could run one-hundred and fifty-five miles an hour. He was not joking. A black man, he wore a yellow hat and pants up past where his waist should be. His eyes were constantly looking upwards and every now and again they'd roll around when he got excited about something. He asked us if we thought he was a fool. We replied that he was nobody's fool.

He talked about his 'condition' and about how he knew his place. His lot in life. How someone on the bus had put hands on him and how he was not a violent person but if he was provoked, then you better watch out.

He was mentally handicapped and later we were told that he was a regular, that he would come in three times a week or so, order some food and just talk to people. He was a nice guy but it all just seemed rather odd for a Saturday night. That surreal semi-gloss coating our little world. After all, it's not every day that you meet a man who can run one-hundred and fifty-five miles an hour.

I woke up on Sunday around 9:00am. Dennis and I cooked waffles -- well actually -- Dennis cooked and I ate. He did a new trick with the waffles though. He sprinkled cinnamon on them. Something he'd never done before. They were excellent, the cinnamon brought the maple taste right up to the surface. He'd truly perfected the artform.

After that he went down the street to help his friend Sean move in to the new apartment. Again, I was alone and with my book I spent almost my entire Sunday reading. Every now and again I'd fall asleep and have a dream that someone was chasing me. I'd wake up every time I turned this one corner down an alley. I don't know what was in the alley.

Later I walked down to Sean's to see how things were going. I stole some pizza and helped put together a television stand, after which I went home again.

That night I stayed in and caught the new episode of Family Guy, Dennis was still down the street. I went to bed somewhere around 11:00pm after I had finished a couple more chapters and couldn't hold my eyes open anymore.

This morning it took everything in my power to drag myself to work. I actually contemplated calling out again but I knew that it just wouldn't be in the cards to take that long of a weekend during the busy season.

It's funny how doing nothing can get into your system so quickly that once it's time to actually do something you don't even remember if you know how.

I want to play truant tomorrow.

Who's with me? Actually, I want to play truant today, right now. This week has been pretty hard and I feel like I deserve it. Like somehow it's owed to me though I know any angle of that thought is absurd.

Still, though.

All I want to do is go home, work-out for a little bit, throw some weights around, then play Ninja Gaiden until my eyes bleed. Or at least until I've dried my infinite well of profanity.

That game pisses me off, but I love it, but it pisses me off.

We <3 Katamari is also great but sadly it doesn't run in progressive scan and thus looks one notch above dog-shit on my projector. Oh well. I just wish the PS2 had the foresight to include progressive scan and make developers utilize it like the Xbox did.

While I was picking up Katamari I also grabbed another wireless PS2 controller. Mainly because the co-op mode in there is supposed to be real fun and I need more co-op games and thus more controllers.

Buying this controller, holding it, I no longer feel tethered by the shackles of my youth. The many years of having to sit four to six feet from my televison deliquesce away like an ice cube in the amazon. (not Icecube in the amazon, that wasn't an Anaconda reference... Now I've gone and done it. No, NO, there are NOT snakes out deer' dis big. NO.)

But I digress.

I bought my first wireless Xbox controller some many moons ago. I have since wondered how man -- in his highly evolved state -- lived with these 'wires' for so long. I feel as if I've broken free from my strait-jacket and am now running freely through the looney bin ensuing hijinx one could only refer to as mad-cap.

The analogy kinda breaks down there but what I'm trying to say is: If I want to play the console of my choice from the toilet, I can now do so. I don't know why I waited so long to be free.

All the controllers in my possession are now wireless with the exception of those blasted Konga drums and trust me, if they sold wireless ones I'd own them.

Sorry, got a little off topic there.

But really, who wants to call out sick tomorrow? I may just go it alone, play Gaiden all day or something.

Working late

I'm stuck here late today, and by late I mean 5:00 or 6:00 pm. I would usually be leaving about now, 2:30-3:00ish but the president needs me to do some powerpoint stuff.

Yeah, you just read that correctly. Powerpoint.

I'm a graphic designer.

It appears that I have failed in my many attempts to dethrone myself as the sole person in this company that knows how to unlock the mysteries of Microsoft Powerpoint. I guess I know too many of it's arduous secrets.

Marvel at how I am able to make corrections in type! Be amazed at how deftly I can copy and paste! My ability to make a rectangle -- then put text in that rectangle, then add a background color of your choice to that rectangle -- I'm sure it will be revered for generations to come.

And on a day that two games came out! Two games that I've been waiting months for! Ninja Gaiden Black and We <3 Katamari! DAMN!

And just to let you in a little furhter on the ongoing joke that is my bussiness. The people I'm dealing with here? Yeah, some of them think the 'internet' is 'inside' my computer.

Honestly, really. Are these people able to operate light switches? How do they go on breathing?

A word for today.

If I had to sum up the way I've felt about the last couple of days at work in one word, that word would be: immure.

To enclose within walls, or as if within walls; hence, to shut up; to imprison; to incarcerate.

This isn't the kind of place that brings one great joy, this is the kind of place that breaks one's spirits. Mad and cackling, riding your back into the distance of some desolate landscape. No end in sight.

When you explain to a man that in order to design the page he wants, you need product shots and graphics of the stuff he's selling, and when this man looks at you blankly -- as a child would if you tried to describe to them thermo dynamics -- and expresses to you that it's your job, that you should 'make' them, it takes every ounce of your being not to scream obscenities in his face.

How am I supposed to 'make' a bottle of Martell Cognac? Especially with nothing to go on.

Maybe his childlike wisdom was lost on me. Maybe he was indeed suggesting that I 'make' one. Literally. With hops and barley and age it in oak casks for 12 years until one would describe it as sweet perfection. At which point I could photograph it and drink from it's contents until I was surely dead of alcohol poisoning.

Ah, sweet, sweet poison.

Driving Blind

Every morning in the early fall there is a strech of road I drive made of pure light. It's there, waiting, just around the corner from my house. Every morning is a test.

For ten seconds my windshield might as well be my tunnel to the afterlife. The sun reflects in such a way and at such an angle that it makes it impossible to see a foot in front of my car. I'm completely blind. Wipers? They only make it worse.

I simply want to get to work.

Every morning in the early fall it's my ten second leap of faith. My silent prayer that today wont be the day that changes the rest of my life. My test.

Today I passed.

It's official

I've gone full blown nerd. I just crossed that line and jumped out of my casual nerd dolor and right into the throes of full-on-mega-nerd.

I just got in my first argument over anime.

Do I get a fucking medal now? Maybe I transform into a car or some shit.

Please, someone, ANYONE, break this curse!

PBF in case you didn't know

This is the Perry Bible Fellowship, a comic that I check daily, even though it only gets updated on sundays. I get bored sometimes... Anyway, it's great. It's so twisted. Maybe people dont know about it? Bookmark it, love it:

Medium me

You could say at any given time during the day at any given time during the week things are going about average. I'm not happy, I'm not sad, I'm just existing. I'm there and not there at the same time. If I was in the DSM-V, I would be categorized as having Dysthymic Disorder.

My Jeopardy dream categories are:

Future Technology.
Video games from the 1980s to now.
Photoshop.
Ninjas.
Film techniques.
The history of art in Mesopotamia.
The Princess Bride.
How to organize a music server file system.
PSP Hacking.
The Information Super Highway.

I'm well versed in things that don't matter. I'm a very medium person.

I lead a pretty medium life. I have a medium car, a medium residence, make a medium salary. I have a medium body type, not skinny, not fat. A medium attitude. Medium taste in just about everything from clothing to food to movies. If I had to turn in a summation of myself in one word or less, that word would be medium.

Nothing about me really stands out. I just fold along the dotted line, down the center of life.

It wasn't always like this. I was the kid who could draw just about anything, I was into photography and making movies. Creativity man, that was my bag.

I have to get out of the medium rut. I need to, for the betterment of my being.

I'm Downloading these language CDs and I'm going to learn Japanese if it kills me. I've always wanted to learn another language and falling back on the excuse that my brain doesn't work that way is getting old. I'm going to start a web comic, I'm around far too many funny people to not. Plus I can draw. I'm looking into taking A+ classes. I need to start learning again. I'm getting back into the gym.

Hopefully I'll have some more categories added to that list very soon.

It's about time

It only took almost three years of me bitching and complaining, but finally, my job as outfitted me with a new computer. It's GLORIOUS!! For real, bigups to them for hookin' it proper.

This marks the first time I have a better computer at work/school than I have at home. I'm gonna have to deal with that.

For a frame of reference I was working with a Pentium II 800mhz with 512mb of ram, a 40gb Hard Drive and two crappy eye straining 19inch CRT Monitors. Yeah, they thought I could graphic design on that. I'm now on a Pentium IV 3.4Ghz with 2gigs of ram and a 350gb Hard Drive. Not to mention an Nvidia 128 Quatro card and enough bells and whistles to choke a large animal.

My soul is finally at rest.

the blog of yore

I wrote this durring my stint on myspace. I'd like to bring all those writings over here eventually. I'm an organizer. Sue me.

Originally posted: Friday, July 09, 2004

_________________________________________________

Hey, remember that Final Fantasy game?
Yeah, that’s all I remember.

“Yeah man, so then I went into that room full of those reds and wasted every single one of em. Then I took the flag and ran it all the way back to my base with guys on my tail. Rockets whizzing past my ears, jumping and strafing past enemy spawn points. Yeah, I remember that. Best day of my life!”

I grow increasingly aware that I am running low on real memories. The biggies stick out. The day I got my learners permit, first girl, first videogame console, that time I, um, I, ahhhh. God, what did I do with my life?

See this is what I mean. I am cognizant of the fact that, for me, digital memories are clearer in my mind than actual real life experiences. I remember the exact time of day I beat Chrono-Trigger for the first time. 5:25pm, after school, 12th grade, April and rainy. The cat was staring at me, looking to get on my lap. Sorry puss, I gotta fight Lavos and he’s a mean motherfucker! You know he destroyed the planet in 2300AD right? Back up off me! Gimme some space!

I could even tell you what I had for lunch that day. Leftover, microwave-heated, pizza. Pepperoni, sausage. I know because it gave me heartburn but I wouldn’t have gotten up if there were a BFG pointed at my head.

Oh and don’t get me started on Ninja Gaiden or Strider, Bionic Commando, or Duck Tales. I’m actually certifiable.

I still remember the death of Aeris at the hand of Sephiroth in Final Fantasy VII. I remember that pain like it eviscerated me yesterday.

Okay now ask me about something in real life that should have some significance. Like when, say, I got my first car. That’s a biggie right? Yeah, it’s not there. At least not in that kind of detail. I remember it was black, and I wanted to tint the windows. I think it was a Ply? Mouth? Something like that, whatever, it’s long gone, and the only thing in its place is a brain full of time-trial races, frags, and jumping puzzles.

This is your life and its ending one checkpoint at a time.

I guess the right thing to do would be to sue game companies for the loss of my memory. I have Pixilated Alzheimer's. Techno Amnesia. Digital Dementia. Watch, I bet it’ll be in the medical books soon enough.

No really, who wants to bet?

OMG!

VG Cats is friggin' hilarious today! Poor Shredder why people always gotta hate?

If you are into videogames and nerdiness but don't read webcomics, you should probably start. :)

Click for the larger size or just go to the site.

Weakerthans

I'd never heard of this band until a week ago but I can safely say they have escalated to my top 25. The only way I can describe them is to say they sound like a more melodic and mellow Decemberists, but not really.
________________________________

The driver checks the mirror seven minutes late
The crowded rider's restlessness enunciates
The Guess Who sucked, the Jets were lousy anyway
The same route everyday
And in the turning lane
Someone'’s stalled again
He'’s talking to himself
And here'’s the price of gas, repeat his phrase

I hate Winnipeg
________________________________

- The Weakerthans, One Great City! -Reconstruction Site

I'm such a sucker for folk music it's not even funny.

Crashing

I went out on a date with Kelly last night. We ate at Big Fish and went to see The Wedding Crashers.

****** Very Mild Spoilers Ahead ******

Leave it to Vince Vaughn to have me almost falling out of my theater seat laughing within the first two minutes he's on screen. Really, he might be the fastest talking, comedic actor in Hollywood right now. And it's funny, when you think of comedic actors Vince Vaughn isn't a name that directly pops into your head. It should though, he's been great since Swingers.

Needless to say the movie is great. Yeah, it's the same story that's been told before. Funny con-man cons lots of girls then finds one he loves, girl loves him back, guy gets caught in con, girl is hurt, girl is set to marry asshole but all ends well. Awww. Thanks Hollywood.

So yeah, the vacation might be the same, with the same destination but it's the actual voyage and the stops along the way that make this movie so great. Well, that and Vince Vaughn.

****** Very Mild Spoilers Over ******

I mentioned that Kelly and I went on a date. We've been seeing each other for close to a year and a half now and it feels like things have kinda slumped a bit. The new has worn off. We got comfortable. We don't call each other as much, though we still do so everyday. Things are different now though. There isn't that rush to see the other person. Though when I haven't seen her for a couple of days I still get that need to hug her and hold her. I probably don't express that need enough. I don't know if that works both ways.

This happens to every relationship I guess, and like anything else, it just needs a bit of polishing to get that shine back up to the surface. We've talked about it. We can't really imagine not having one another in our respective lives. We do love each other, I just think there's a lot of pressure from outside forces.

We're at that age when a lot of our friends are getting married and I think it weighs heavy on our minds. I'm in no rush and neither is she, but this pressure, it gets overwhelming sometimes. We both don't want to "waste each other's time." As if either of us could. We have fun together.

But still. There is that nagging pressure. "You're 28, you should find the person you're going to settle down with and if this person doesn't want to settle down with you then just cut ties." I don't want to be with anyone else, and as far as I know, neither does she. But like I said, we're in no rush. So where does that put us? Growing older together with no plans for the future? Living in the now?

I talked about it the other day with a third party and came to the conclusion that it's the nature of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder. Kelly and I both have it. O.C.D. is about having order, and categorizing things, keeping things straight and neat. Tidy. Above all else though O.C.D. is about not making mistakes. It's about planning and leaving as little room for error as possible.

So here we are, the great big unknown. This could just be one giant mistake, who knows? Should we stay and walk into it together? Or should we part ways not knowing if things will be better on the other side without one another?

I wanna let it ride, stay together, see how things turn out down the line.

I know, I know

I gotta post a major update to the photo.bin. I can hear the villagers outside the gate lighting their torches. I promise I'll get to it this week.

So yeah, Otakon was fun, but it touched on something deeper for me than just anime and video games. It afforded me perspective.

I'm going to be 29 next year and I don't know if I have it in me to do it again. I don't want to be the 35 year-old man-boy with a gut and a bald spot still showing up to pre-register wearing an Otogi Zoshi t-shirt.

This doesn't mean I'm going to stop watching anime or playing video games, I enjoy those things. It's just, maybe I should enjoy those things in the comfort of my home, or at a friend's home. I don't think I need a convention to make me feel like I'm really part of something. This isn't the kind of place that gives your life purpose.

I'll probably go next year but maybe just for one day. To hit the dealer room and hang out with my friends. It just seems like 3 days is overkill. After a while it just becomes like everything else. Routine.

Don't read this the wrong way. I had fun. Friday was a blast but I just couldn't shake the feeling that there was something intrinsically unheathy about the whole thing.

Anyways, here are some of the highlights, not in any particular order:

Our new friend from Tokyo, Kouto.
"I LOVE YOUR MULLET!"
The floor headband.
"You boys got that MAN-JAH I been hearin' bout?"
Super.
Monkey.
Ball.
OtaJon dry-humping Jengo's leg.
Being unable to read the subtitles.
But still being able to follow along.
"... stuPID biTCH!"
OTABURGER!
Throwing up the horns in every picture.
Why our anime is teh sux0rz. News at 11:00.
A kid spending his entire life savings on Katamari Damacy.
Being really, really, really, annoying.
Finding out a stranger's secret hobby over a beer.
The Mr. T flyer I got.
The look on Kevin's face after Tentacle Hentai.
"_____want some Miwk?"
Snake-Eyes is fucking METAL!
Jon buying everything from Japan that's under 5 bucks.
"I'MMMMM COMMMMMMMMING!!!"
Ctrl-Alt-Del signing posters with his sunglasses on.
Ctrl-Alt-Del thinking he's hot shit.
Buying some good anime.
Laughing so hard it gives you a headache.

That's pretty much the recap.
See you next time space cowboy.

...

Every now and again a song comes along that reminds you why you listen to music in the first place.

___________________________________________

You may tire of me
as our December sun is setting
'cause I’m not who I used to be.
No longer easy on the eyes
but these wrinkles masterfully disguise
the youthful boy below.
Who turned your way and saw
something he was not looking for
both a beginning and an end.
Now he lives inside
someone he does not recognize
when he catches his reflection on
accident.

On the back of a motor bike
with your arms outstretched
trying to take flight
leaving everything behind.
But even at our swiftest speed
we couldn’t break from the concrete
in the city where we still reside.
And I have learned
that even landlocked lovers yearn
for the sea like navy men.
'Cause now we say goodnight
from our own separate sides
like brothers on a hotel bed.

You may tire of me
as our December sun is setting
cause I’m not who I used to be.

___________________________________________

- Death Cab For Cutie, Brothers on a Hotel Bed, Plans, 2005

...

Nothing quite like...

a night of Burgers from 5 Guys Burgers and Fries, anime and videogames to get you back on track. Tonight is gonna be super cool, can't wait. Thursdays are the best!

Oh and I almost forgot, D and I are getting super good at Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory Co-op, and this is on Elite (no bullets) and Expert (really freaking hard) mode mind you. And yeah, about the one body that was found, D says some of those poses are just too funny to hide.

:)

UPDATE: (!!!)

And BTW, our TV p0wNZ0rZ your TV.

Collision

The equation for panic: Mom + Car + Accident.

I heard that equation through my voicemail on Sunday. Let me first say this, everything is fine, everything except the car, but really, that was the last thing on my mind.

As cliché as it sounds now, I need to spend more time with her. I need to spend more time with all of my family.

Standby Flight

Lately I've had way too much on my mind to even think about being here. I've got pictures to post from Jersey and other places, new bands I've been listening to, things to complain about, cool links/downloads and all other things self serving.

I'm just too tired.

I've been on this plane before. The red-eye flight from here to oblivion. Sitting in this window-seat electric chair. And every time it crashes, and every time it burns, my deep-seeded fear of flying grows.

Martian Pushovers

When Orson Welles made his infamous radio broadcast on Halloween night in 1938 there was literally panic in the streets. You have to remember, it was a different era. Nobody really had television yet. No DVD's with special features. No Tivo. There wasn't the inlux of media bombarding you from every angle. Only radio.

So when you hear on your one and only connection to the outside world that Martians are attacking, you tend to think it's not a joke.

It's for this reason that the new film hits a wall. It never feels like it's really happening. Yes it's a movie and everyone knows that going in, but I'm the type of guy who likes to suspend belief. I go to movies to put myself in the shoes of the main character. The problem with this film is that the director keeps pulling me out of those shoes.

For a dock worker/deadbeat dad Tom Cruise sure notices a lot. He notices how the wind is moving toward the storm, how wind generally blows away from storms. He notices a lot of random things throughout the film that a dock worker, just trying to survive, probably wouldn't notice.

My other problem is there isn't any sense of overwhelming terror. The fear Welles conveyed so convincingly over the radio is gone, replaced with special effects and people evaporating. Yes the aliens wipe out our communication, but really, this doesn't have the claustrophobic feeling it should.

Spielberg tries desperately to get you involved with the characters. He's trying to humanize the situation he's setting up but he's not doing it right. You can see the seams. You can see how the director is crafting the thing. He's almost telling you what's going to happen next.

For all intents and purposes this is a road movie and even from the very beginning everything feels like it's on rails. It never once deviates from its track.

Maybe it's because the story doesn't hold up in these days of technology and biological weaponry. Because really, if aliens were going to invade and exterminate the human race they'd do it like we do it, with pesticide. Why use laser beams and thousands of giant robots when you can lay down a blanket of neurotoxin and wipe up the mess? I'll tell you why, because then we wouldn't get to see that dreamy Tom Cruise running around.

I mean, the overhead on those 15 story Martian deathbots has got to be through the roof.

It just feels like ever since Jurassic Park Spielberg has been doing the same thing over and over. He tries to go for the same moments of tension. Actually I dare anyone to not see the parallels between the two films. Especially when the Martians send a search probe into a house where Cruise is hiding. I felt like I was watching the kitchen scene with the raptors, right down to a trick involving a mirror.

I'm sorry to say but it all just seems rehashed, cheaply. But I guess if there was ever a real movie about the end of the world it would be very short and everyone would demand their money back.

Memories

When you bring up the subject of ghosts my friend Jon will talk about how a couple of years ago he went out with some ghost hunters. He'll tell you about how he learned that ghosts are actually just memories absorbed by the environment. Emotionally charged into our surroundings. He'll go on about how wood is better for absorbing memories than concrete because of it's fibrous nature. He'll say every human being has it's own electromagnetic field and these fields are what trigger the memories dormant in the environment. That if someone with the right frequency field were to walk into the right place it would be like pressing 'play' on the past.

And if you think about it, he's right.

______________________________________________

It's noon by the time Tom, Katie and I make it into Philadelphia and take the first steps into Eastern State Penitentiary. It's been about five years since I was last here. A lot has changed. Areas have been cleaned up and restored. There is a big production audio tour now and the once abandoned prison is again full of people.

We had to sign waivers in the gift shop next to where they sell DVD's and t-shirts. Five years ago where they're selling pens and pencils used to be carcasses of dead birds, lead paint flakes, broken glass, and enough dust, dirt and asbestos to last your entire life.

Now they have a full-time staff and pictures on the walls.

It used to be my photo instructor Tom was one of the only people to have access to this place. He knew the crazy old grounds keeper and could get us in on the down low. Back when there was no tour, no signs, no people. Back when it was just you, the prison, and the memories.

It was Tom who brought me here 5 years ago and it's Tom who I'm with today.

After we've signed our waivers and gone to the bathroom Tom shows us the combinations to some of the locks. This is so we can go into some of the places where the general public can't. It wasn't full access but it was better than nothing.

We split up. I headed toward one of my favorite cell blocks only to find it's been renovated. People are walking up and down the corridors with headphones, they're traipsing in and out of cells talking to each other, snapping pictures with cell phones. It used to be if you heard voices you had something to be alarmed about. Not now, not in this section at least.

After about an hour of taking pictures around the people on tour I went looking for Tom and Kate. I wanted to get into some of the really locked places, the places with locks that needed keys, not combinations.

I met up with them in the main Rotunda area, Tom was just about to head up to one of the guard towers to get some shots of the courtyard. I was eager to tag along. I missed my old prison, the one only me and a couple other people knew about. I wanted to get off the Disney tour and on to something a little more real.

We unlocked the door that took us up to the tower. The darkness was blinding. I could just barely see a spiral staircase in the center of the room. It stretched like a spine out of the shadows up to an open maw of faint daylight. Outside you could see the entire grounds. We must have been 200 feet up.

After getting some shots I stepped back down into the dark.

Yes, the darkness, I had forgotten about it. In this place the dark is it's own thing entirely. It's so thick it's almost tangible. Murky, and in some places you can't see your hand two inches from your face. It's oppressive and once you're inside, it suffocates you.

After shooting for another hour or so in Cell Block 3, the infirmary block and "non-tour" area, I got a phone call from Scott. He wanted advice on getting a PSP. I talked to him for a couple of minutes and when I came back Tom and Kate said they were going into another cell block. I told them I wanted to get one more shot here and I'd meet them over there. By the time I was done, I turned around and they were gone. I didn't see which way they went.

I called out for Tom. No answer. They couldn't have gone far, it had only been a minute. I called out again. Dead silence.

I decided I'd get some more shots while I was here and in a couple of minutes, when they realized I wasn't behind them, they'd come back.

Ten minutes passed and nobody showed. Silence. I paced up and down the cell block trying to find where they had gone. Suddenly the hair on the back of my neck was standing straight up and out of no where I got chills. I called out for Tom again. I heard someone walking around and some faint voices. I called out again. Nothing.

Then something. A very loud, pronounced voice. One that didn't sound like anyone I know. Coming from down the empty corridor it said, "Here's Johnny."

I shit you not.

I ran through one of the locked doors we had come through and saw Kate down the hall on the complete opposite side of where I had just been. I called to them and they showed me how to get over to where they were.

Later, I told Tom about what happened. I told him to stop fucking with me, it had to be him playing a joke. He said he was no where near me when it happened and that I was no where even near the tour. He was right, I wasn't.

At about 4:00pm we all entered Cell Block 12, said to be the more violent of the cell blocks. These were not solitary confinement cells like in the rest of the prison. Steel rods span each floor level, which were installed to discourage inmates from throwing each other from the catwalk.

Kate decided to go upstairs alone while Tom and I took a picture of a door that had been rent from it's hinges. A minute later she came down white as a sheet.

At first she wouldn't talk about it but finally we got it out of her. She told us she was upstairs taking a picture of one of the cells when she felt wind on the back of her neck. Like someone was standing behind her, breathing, heavily.

Around 5:30 we wrapped up, put away our gear and headed next door to a BBQ place for some dinner. Oddly enough it was an old firehouse that had been converted into a restaurant. The whole time I was eating I was thinking about the Ghostbusters headquarters. There is indeed something strange in your neighborhood.

The car ride home seemed longer than the car ride up. We talked about what happened. About ghosts and strange things that we had heard and seen before within the walls of that prison. I told them about Jon's theory. About how they're just memories.

From there on the car ride was pretty quiet.

E.S.P.

Eastern State Penitentiary. Check the photo.bin. I'll blog about the weird shit that happened to me while I was there later. For now I must go to bed.

sleeeeppppp.

The Misfits of Science

It was long past dark outside by the time we got started. A late night it was going to be for sure. Driving into the city, the street lights shot laser beams across the night sky. It was after 10:30 but we indeed made it out on Friday night.

Let me say this, it's been a while since I've gone out. I've missed it.

My head was already reeling from what we had at Scott's house. Conversation mixed rum and diet coke with lime. Jon was pouring and by the time I got in the car I knew I was already halfway there. I must remember to never drink anything Jon makes on an empty stomach.

Baltimore in a flash, we're out and it's the best weather we've had in weeks. Stars flickered between broken leaves in tree branches, clouds were transparent vapor mist. Not too cold, not too hot.

We would hang around Brewers Art for a while and wait for Kevin to show. The art college crew was out for the semester and in it's place was a fair share of would-be hipsters and jocks. An eclectic mix to say the least. Studded belts, emo hair and football jerseys. This is the fashion Twilight Zone submitted for your approval.

And there we were in the middle, Baltimore City's lunar mare. Not fitting in with either side. We go against the grain, wear our geek on the outside. We stick out. Well, Jon and I do anyways. Though admittedly, neither of us were dressed nerdy tonight. A twisted 2 Live Crew song in the making: Nerdy As We Wanna Be.

Sometimes we wear it with pride, other times we tuck it in, it all depends on the setting. Tonight, for the most part, we were tucked in. Still though, I didn't feel we fit. I don't really feel we fit anywhere.

We settled in at Dionysus, a little hole-in-the-wall bar down the street. It was quiet and had places to sit. Digable Planets was playing over the speakers while a heavily tattooed girl tended bar. We all grabbed some drinks, sat and proceeded to talk for a while. About what, I honestly couldn't tell you. I was pretty wrecked and trying to sober up.

I remember in a haze Jon wrote some funny stuff on the bathroom chalkboard. Yes, the walls were made out of slate. The bathroom was a chalkboard. A novel idea as I'm sure it saves them from having to paint every Monday.

The trip home was quiet. We parted ways with Kevin on the way back to the car, Scott passed out in the back seat and Jon and I tuned out to some music. The road in front of us was damp and everything had that newborn shine.

Back at the house Scott and I cooked up some mini eggos and stuffed our faces while Jon retreated to his gaming den upstairs. I drove home shortly after.

Friday was good, it was a good time, though I still haven't found where in Baltimore I fit exactly.

27 December 2005

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