things I want to get this weekend:

a get-well card for my grandmother, who slipped and fell, breaking a finger or other bone in her hand...

an oil change for my poor neglected car.

easter candy on sale at target.

A shaver for my scalp. (also, probably, from target)

I know there was more, but I can't remember. Today is another boring addition to my existence in Plymouth, MN. I'm considering writing a novel while at work. I could just write a sentence or two in between every menial task I perform, and I'm sure a few weeks later I'd have hundreds of pages.

Henry's Diary is one of the coolest things I've ever read. Maybe I'm getting soft in my old age.

Last night Laura and I found Ocean's Eleven on DVD (the old one) at Target, so we bought it for Jason, then watched it. It was ok. nothing too special, but certainly not bad. Jason lied though--both Sammy Davis Jr. and Dean Martin sing in it.

I'm trying to decide if I should go to unicycling tonight, even though laura probably isn't going to go, and I'm suppoise to hang out with Travis. (he wanted to go, but he's not home...)

OK, now he's home, and we're going to go.

a week in this hell-of-an-office.

an email list that was formerly limmited pretty much to porn and dirty jokes has now been the main avenue for discussion of this news. None of us even have real details on this thing, but we all have opinions!

Chris--one of my favorite coworkers--has posted several cries for peace, including the full lyrics to "you are my sunshine"... Isn't internet debate great!?!

I got an email from alex, who is in Japan. Apparently he's taken it over. I wouldn't schedule any vacations for there in the near future.

Tonight I'm suppose to see the original "Ocean's Eleven" with Jason, who is thinks my preference of color movies over B&W is a crime of some sort.

that's all the news that's fit to blog. Or rather, all of it I'm bored enough to type...

we are sweet nothings

sealed in our boxes of humanity
taped up and mixed, melted together
you never know what you're going to get
a live one or dead one,
happy or sad.

we can be the whispered kind too
a word on the morning breeze
a meaning left to be imagined
our lives are like this
implied on a lover's lips.

I've already spent a large chunk of my time at work today logging my hours for the last two weeks. We're suppose to log hours daily, but I'm far too busy to spend an extra five to ten minutes a day trying to figure out what I've been doing all day. I was just thinking, what if I had to do this with my weekend?

• 12 hours playing Tetris Worlds
  
• 17 hours sleeping (not including last night)
  
• 3 hours having sex
  
• 3 hours unicycling on friday
  
• 3 hours playing Tetrisphere
  
• 2 hours doing internet research on Tetris variations, and Neil Voss, who did the soundtrack for Tetrisphere and The New Tetris (both for N64)
  
• 2 or 3 hours reading my new book, The Eyre Affair
  
• 1 hr compiling and then packing my laundry to go to the laundrymat
  
• 1 hr driving to/from laura's place on the way to the laundrymat
  
• 1/2 hr spent in line to get my oil changed at Valvoline (and leaving because it looked like another 1/2 hr would pass before I got in!

there's at least two hours unaccounted for. I'm not sure where those went. Maybe staring off into space. Maybe eating? Probably eating.

ode to my moronity

alas! the long island
slithering snake of a drink
sweet potato I
sip and gulp guiltily
she is a camera shudder
eyes closed, lips pucker'd
*urp*

ok, I skipped a day, but it's day four now. Yesterday we had lunch from this tiny hole-in-the-wall chinese place in the strip mall by my work. I have a window now, which is a big improvement over straits at the warehouse, but it overlooks the aforementioned strip mall, so it's not terribly exciting. I'm off now to go pick up my copy of tetris worlds from funcoland. W00T.

second day in the new office. I don't mind it so much right now, but I do feel a bit like an outsider. I'm trying to get over my drunken crush on a co-worker, and it's not helping that I have to work fairly closely with her for the next couple of weeks. (I got seriously plastered last friday and found out she has either had a crush on me, or just thought I was attractive--I'm not sure which--anyway, I was hitting on her pretty badly, and I think she's since reversed her opinion.)

I have been buying CDs like crazy this last week. I picked up a copy of Ben Fold's latest, which I think is fabulous. But before that there were like six that I found used and should have been in my collection already.

Right now I'm listening to Etienne Daho, who is a sort of french pop star. It's pretty good stuff.. The album is called Corps & Arms. I have another of his as well, but I'm spacing on the name. A co-worker hooked me up with these.

It's the first day out in the new offices. We're located in Plymouth now, no longer the sweet and sexy downtown warehouse district suite. I'm so excited I can hardly stand it.

Actually, things aren't all that bad. Despite the florescent(sp?) lights, the carpeting doesn't slow up the rollers on our chairs that much, and I've got a new PC to play with. Here's a nice little anecdote. When I first logged into my new (windows 2000) machine, it told me my password had expired, and gave me a nice little dialog box to change it. Then, I found, amazingly, that I didn't have permissions to change my own password! How is that even possible? You can have passwords, you yourself are not allowed to change? Crazy.

I haven't done any work yet though. I'm saving that for later.

Well, I have a new business idea. I'm not sure what the reaction is going to be amongst bloggers, but I'm hoping it'll be a positive one. I've registered www.googlebombsquad.com. I stole the idea from this article:http://www.corante.com/microcontent/articles/googlebombs.shtml

I'm hoping it'll take off, and I'll have at least a few hundred sign ups (once I start promoting it, of course). I'm going to start the programming this weekend, but I want to get a FAQ and some other pages up before that happens (perhaps a preliminary signup form too...) Anyway, it's no worse than having one of those blogsnob links on your site, and hey, you may get paid! (of course, there is the moral dillema of altering the sacred google--selling out, etc.)

The Register finally has a US version, although I'm not really sure if there's a difference, as the article I've linked appears on both.

Also, speaking of love... isn't Jesus all about love? (Needless to say, I really like the folks over at BBspot.)

woah, looks like love transcends all boundaries. When is a book going to be written about all the internet/networking marriages?

ok, a few comments, since I'm up at 8:00AM to update a client's site... which is, i have to say, complete bullshit.

Somehow, after more than 9 months living in bachelor-pad heaven, the insects have finally caught on. For some reason, there is now a cricket in my room. The damn thing is faster and smarter than me, and I'll never catch it.

Also, my room-mate, whome none of you were probably aware was out of town, is now back. I awoke this morning to find my room a frozen arctic again, since appartently the heat was far too great when he (I should say they, since his g/f is with him) got home at whatever time last night. Now, there's an underlying issue here. The thermostat is only in the living room. Yet my room is BY FAR the coldest room in the appartment. We do not pay for heat. Nate and his g/f can open a fucking window. My room does not need to be twenty degrees.

Finally, there is a new Mozilla build out. Get it!

christy asked if this is like a diary. I guess.

I worked from home today, and had to use that shit-program ICQ. After about twenty minutes I was fed up, so I went searching for a nice clone. Not only does Trillian take its name from Douglas Adams, but it's a great ICQ, yahoo messenger, AIM client. It supports a couple of others too, including IRC, but I haven't tried that. I would say it's even a tad better than Fire, which I use at work.

last night laura and I finished reading High Fidelity. I checked amazon and bestbuy.com, and it was just as cheap at my local blockbuster, so we're going to watch it tonight. I'm all excited cause it's so great.

I'm currently reading Permutation City, by Greg Egan. It's awesome. Some of the best narative around the premise of mind uploading that I've ever read. The link is a great site for information, although I think I dissagree with some of the premises in the "Handy Neuroscience Facts" page. It's getting added to my transhumanism links.

here's my link for the day: Looks like someone had a nasty run-in with those sneeze fetishists. There is also a great (read: irreverent) jesus comic linked from the root. Very funny stuff.

I've got Kylie Minogue (Can't get you out of my head) stuck in my head. A co-worker made me watch the video, and DAMN.

I have no links for today. Mondays are good-for-nothing. I'm waiting for my software update (osx improves itself!) before I get myself off to juggling.

I think nate's girlfriend thinks I hate her. What's more, I'm not discouraging her. Today she actually appologized for calling. I said "OK, bye." and hung up. It was in the space after you say "no, he's not home right now," when a sane person would usually say "could you tell him..." or "just have him call me back then." or "I'll call back later, thanks." I'm probably not one to talk. Here's my social life: juggling in a gym full of nearly-strangers.

ok, so I've always kinda thought people who post their search engine results referrals are a little weird, but now I TOTALY see the attraction.

I come up first on google for the term sexsweat.

oh yeah baby. Plus, at some point I misspelled cocaine "cocane", and if you search for "how to make crack cocane" (without the quotes) I come up first. It's a funny misspelling, because--even though I know I'm a poor speller--I do know how to spell cocaine. I also show up when you search for "excitement machine" and strangely enough, blog + newbie does it too.

today's link, a site full of flash games... they're awesome: http://www.ferryhalim.com/orisinal/

I went to see a sneak preview of 40 days and 40 nights tonight, it's a romantic comedy about this guy who is still in love with his x-girlfriend, and decides to go without sex for forty days and forty nights. It would have been a good date movie, but I went to see it with my roomate. At least he bought me dinner before hand. (Two-cheeseburger meal at McDonalds, with orange soda. I know you care.)

We wanted to try and remember to look up the female lead, Shannyn Sossamon, who is HOT. I wanted to know what else she's been in, and Nate remembered a Knight's Tale, but I thought she'd been something else. I guess not.

So, it's movie night, cause now we're going to watch Kiss of the Dragon.

today's link is this amazing music video I stumbled into: http://www.tobyslater.com/consumption/

My roommate just tried to start his own blog, and got it all set up and stuff, then proceeded to write for twenty minutes. (or maybe more like 45) His session had expired (since when does blogger use session timeouts?) and he lost all of what he had just written. (Which was probably quite a bit after 45 minutes--and judging from his bitching afterwards.) Needless to say he was pissed. I told him how I've made it routine to copy text out of the main text field if I've worked on an email or an update for more than 20 seconds. I do this even in Eudora, but especially in any sort of webmail. When Eudora crashes on me at work it's always frustrating as hell. (I only use it for my work mail because I can sort the emails into project folders so easily.)

I originally set down to write about how shitty I'm feeling. I just got back from reading a book to Laura, who stayed home from work today, and is misserable, and sick. I read more to her from High Fidelity. It's not that I feel terribly sick, although I do feel as though I'm starting to get a headache, but I think just being around her--so misserable, so weak and helpless seeming--caused some sympathy gene to kick into overdrive, and I'm having sympathy headaches, and sympathy dizziness.

I got an email today from John, my younger brother, who is in the next few days going to be starting on a three month walk. He is in California right now, I'm not sure where, (I think San Fran--which I'd always thought, until looking at a map just now, to be south of LA--I am so dumb.) He's going to walk at the very least to Portland, and if they get ambitious, to Seatle. He's walking with three other people, and I can't imagine it really. When I think about that kind of freedom, that kind of carelessness, I feel constrained by my job, by my debts, by my possesions... it's a fantastic idea, really, and he's doing it.

I finished A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius yesterday, and it was good. I felt thrown for a loop. It was as if the whole book was a discussion about the idea of self-obsession from this guy who is terribly self-obsessed, ridiculously so, and he's not even trying to hide the fact that it's all a joke in poor taste. Fabulous. Someday I'll have such a great idea, and I'll write it, and I'll be famous. Just wait.

Matt Wilson lent me the book originally, and I meant to give it back to him today. He is in a new band with this guy he used to play with who is now in Semisonic. They're called The Flops, and I just have to mention the site, because Matt is putting so much into it, it's really turning out great. He's writing all the copy, and it's just chalk full of this crazy stuff. I hope he doesn't get mad at me for mentioning it. I know they're already getting signups and stuff, so it's not like it's some big secret. I dig the car--nuff said.

link of the day http://www.liquidgeneration.com/poptoons/britney_breasts.asp

This last weekend was MONDO, the local juggling fest. It was probably the best mondo ever, and I learned a ton of stuff, got a new set of props (zuni's--poi) and otherwise enjoyed the hell out of the weekend.

Last night I took a shower, and finally unlocked the last character in DW3. I was up far too late doing it, but it was great. More playing tonight, if all goes well. Laura is sick, and I want to visit her, but I already have plans for group PS2... so... I hope she doesn't hate me for not making her ckicken noodle soup.

I got an email from a once aformentioned old friend (peter) today. He says I "LIED" before when I mentioned him. I guess it's only been a couple of months since he wrote last, not six. Sorry peter.

Back to the grind (for a half hour) before I head off.

morning is dismal. Outside raindrops on little stretchers are being carted to raindrop-morgues, dead before they hit the street. I woke up to the annoyingly perpetual dawn-hue from my window, sunlight filtered through cloud-layer after sadistic cloud-layer.

now I'm trying to psych myself up for going to work. This is much like ten minutes ago (showers are short now...) when I was trying to get myself up out of bed... thinking the door is so close, it's not that far, and taking a shower isn't so bad for at least five, maybe ten minutes--felt more like an eternity in that half-awake, almost-dreaming state just before the snooze kicks off, and my alarm continues its auditory barrage.

I can't decide what kind of art car I'm going to turn my beat up old geo-prism into. I would like to do some kind of collage, but I'd have to use some kind of varnish, so the first rain wouldn't just wash away the whole thing. I like this idea, because I could just carry around two tubs--one of adhesive, and one of varnish--and paste up anything anytime. It'd be dense, fun to look at...

I'd better get going. I need to work on finding a way not to work.

We're living in this incredible flux. This book I read, some really dumbass science-fiction psychology focused book--Cyteen--was constantly talking about how we live in flux. How our minds are full of contradictions, and that causes us to "flux" which really just meant let our emotions control our actions. I don't think lack of thought automatically means we're acting based on our emotions. I'm not even sure the book meant this. I'm getting what the book was saying and what I'm trying to say all mixed up. It's not important about the book. It's one of those epic things that's far too long to forget. I wish it had been much shorter (like 400 pages shorter) and I'd have already forgotten all about it.

Anyway, I feel moody today. In flux. Maybe it's the moon. Maybe it's the stars. Probably it's just my weird sleep patterns that end up getting in the way of work and my schedule for the day.

I bought the new Freddy Fresh album. It's grand. Good-ole techno. Hard beats and catchy loops that go on for probably too long. It's his first american release, and I've got one of his imports (the one with the fatboy slim remix on it) and I think this is better.

I'm gonna go take a shower, and wash away the moody sleep-eye residue. Water falls different on my head now. It doesn't run down my hair. If there's anything I miss about my hair, it was the way the hot water sorta soked into it slowly, moving it's way down my back like a snake or something. Now the water is just there, instantly, and it slides off my head just as fast, heating my scalp for only so long.

I reccomend everyone go from having really long hair to shaving their head once in their life. It's like you're a new person, only you're still the same. And everyone comments about it, even people you don't talk to that often. (or, as was the case yesterday, people you never talk to--a waitress at a bar I go to two or three times a month with co-workers came up to me and made some comment.)

The response to the change so far has been very positive. I don't have any weird lumps on my head or anything. I look tougher now, I guess, and my ear-rings stick out more, which I think is good. I've always wanted to look more punk, without actually doing anything terribly darastic. OK, so I guess shaving my head is kinda darastic. Maybe. Really, I'm just affraid Yami is going to never speak to me now. (And, as predicted--not here--she hasn't really been writing me since she got back to caltech. So I wouldn't even notice a difference... not that I'm bitter. ;)

another thing that has changed is that now I have a car. It's alex's old car.

Laura played a dirty little trick on Jason by telling him that she had a new boyfriend (because when she got back, I was a new man, no hair, and a car!) anyway, he was amused when we showed up at his party together.

OK, it's been eleven days. A lot has changed. (I cut my hair.)

I don't know what finally pushed me over the edge. Maybe if I hadn't been working 13 or 14 hour days for the week before it wouldn't have happened. Laura was out of town visiting her parents in Texas. Now she's back, and things are finally settling down after a nice four day weekend. Work is far less stressful.

The site I was working on is live, and has several thousand signups already. (duh.) We just didn't get the project until a week before it was due, so that was the issue, really. That, and poor project management. (we were still getting changes from the client even as the site went live, so development was all fucked up.)

In case I haven't already said this, Final Fantasy X kicks all kinds of ass. The book I'm reading is really good right now too. (yes, still the same one.)

I don't know, maybe it's because I was up till 4 AM playing FFX, but I feel like I'm swimming today. Everything is slow and water-like. Also, when I'm sitting still it seems like I'm still moving.

I had this image as I was walking into work of air completely surrounding me, drowning me.

Any minute now I'm leaving to drive Laura to the airport. She's going to Texas for a week to visit her parents. I'm working on this amazingly retarded website for virgin atlantic. But it's all about discounted fairs to london, supposedly $200! I'm tempted, actually. None of that Texas crap for me. ;)

I got my rollerblade cyotes today! (got 'em on ebay for $60)

today is a dust mop afternoon
my delicious morals are degrading by design
my hair is standing on end and inside out
my stomach is turning summersaults
from too little water, and too much sugar

I've been reading about fucking hearts and babies born on the internet.

My desert-island, all-time, top-five most memorable breakups a la Nick Hornby, in chronological order:

1. Kaia
2. Emily Mohowald
3. Megan Opp
4. Kate Christensen
5. Annie Baril

I don't know whether Kaia or Emily Mohowald deserve to be on the list. I don't really even know if that's how you spell Kaia's name. It's pronounced like kayak but without the last k, and with an 'a' at the end. Anyway, she was the first person I'd ever slept with, and there's a nice funny story to go along with it--one that I'll spare you, for now. I spent months afterward hoping to see her downtown. Run into her at a show, or a coffee shop. When I finally did, she ignored me, and pretended she didn't know who I was. Hell, maybe she didn't know who I was. We were drunk and stoned. The lights were off...

Emily I broke up with. Actually, that goes for at least three, maybe four out of the five above. I don't know, I guess I regret the most the relationships I know I could have held on to. With emily, it was a lot like Hornby's second relationship. I just wanted to feel her breasts. Only, with her, I got to. We spent this totally memorable day at home, "sick" from school, at her house, and I remember taking a bath with her, then making out for hours on her futon. I told myself I was in love with this other girl, a girl I knew better from my school, and one who I considered more up to par in the intelligence department. Truth is, I didn't know Emily at all. She could have been einstein for all I knew. I also talk about how she told me after our day home from school together that I was the first person she'd ever fucked around with. And I didn't want to be her first. I was scared to death of taking her verginity, and I knew she wanted me to.

There are a couple of people who didn't make the list who probably should have. Lia, and probably Heidi. Strangely, they're both of them girls I now despise. OK, I don't despise Heidi. I don't want to talk about her, or to her, or around her. Maybe it's too soon. She was only a year ago. Lia I don't even want to think about, I still see her occasionally around town, and she always walks by with her nose pointed in the air like she's obviously far too good to talk to me. Heh.

I've started reading High Fidelity to Laura. She'd never heard of it, never seen the movie. It's so good, every other paragraph or so makes me tingle.

I've also been reading my old journal far too often recently. The document (which I've relatively recently converted to a largish 350k text file) is really fascinating. I wish I'd written in it more often at times, and yet there is so much! Every third or fourth entry reminds me of some forgotten moment, some element of my past so powerful, so crystal, that bringing it to mind causes all kinds of emotional knee jerks.

I've been surfing for web community links all day. I wanted to include a blog link or two, but I realized that blog communities are really weird. It seems like they're all super specialized small intense bursts of social activity. This versus a site like Mac Fix It or something where they have hundreds upon hundreds of users that show up every day or so, log in, and help other people.

Web communities are the bomb.

oh yeah, check out my sister (second from the right) on the cover of last sunday's Star Tribune.

I find ordinary fiction relatively boring. That is, unless it brings something else to the table. Probably the most common "other" thing a book can bring to me is beautiful prose. Poetic prose even. The one I'm reading now does this well. It's funny even. Funny is good too.

When I write, I should think about this issue more. Not when I write here. That's not what I mean. This is more of a journal really. I mean when I write stories and stuff. When I write boring prose, it should be poetic. Or funny. It can be funny too.

I'd rather write science fiction.

Last friday I saw William Shatner right here in Minnesota. He was promoting the release of his movie (he directed and starred it in) called "Shoot or be shot." I didn't see the movie, in fact, we didn't even know he was going to be there. It was weird. He seems nice. He's short. I didn't shake hands with him or anything, just watched from 10 feet for a few minutes.

it has just struck me as extremely unlikely that anything as sophisticated as a CD player would ever get invented. I am amazed. Dumbstruck even. How is it possible? How is this awe possible? Am I crazy? Is it really amazing, or what?

The wonders of modern technology.

caviar on crackerjacks.

I'm inflated and frozen today. Work is a steaming pile of horse dongle, complete with tapeworms.

Now I will go juggle until my arms are sore and my legs numb from bending to pick up clubs. DAMNIT! I forgot a t-shirt today. I'll be juggling bare-chested. I'm so hot.

ugh. I'm a lizard in the sunlight
dreaming about crack cocane and mescalin
robe hanging off my shoulder
tying knots in my brain with video games
playing chopsticks on the player piano
we're fermented and moldy
green fuzz on my skin--alchohol content 98%
out to lunch
burp

well, I haven't had a googlewhacking post yet, mostly because I haven't had anything really exciting to post. Now a friend of mine here at work has got 166,110,000,000 points, with the two words
u n u n h e x i u m  &  j o n e s.

Hehe.

It doesn't beat out some of the best scores over at JOHO, but it's still pretty damn good.

My personal best was
p u s s y  &  t h y r o t r o p i n
with 29,440,000,000.

It's fun as hell, and I'm not getting any work done today. :P

I just found out a good friend lost his job. I keep saying I want another job. At one point I would have been happy to be fired. Now I'm not so sure. It sucks out there! I'm sure he'll find something.

I was thinking--on the walk from my bus to work this morning--about how boring my life is... then I thought about it some more and realized that it really shouldn't feel boring. I mean, there are so many things I do. I'm a FRIGGIN EXCITEMENT MACHINE!!!

I mean, for pete's sake, I've got a girlfriend who doesn't mind if I look for other girlfriends. I juggle two, sometimes three, times a week, I watch far too many movies, read incredibly good books, play amazing video games... I live a life of fucking leisure!

Laura says I write my blog like I'm lonely. I'm not sure why. Maybe she just means I don't mention her enough. If any attractive females between 21 and 29 are reading this, we're looking for potential 3-somes...

Here's a great quote from despair.com: "Sometimes the best solution to morale problems is just to fire all the unhappy people."

UPDATE: If your screen name is Yami, and I already know you, it doesn't matter how old you are, get your butt to Minneapolis, and I can guarantee at least one night of hot steamy sex, quite possibly much, much more.

I just had this incredible eye-moment with a sexy-red-lipstick-wearing-girl on the bus.

I was standing in front of her about to get off the bus. She looked at me, I looked at her. We locked eyes. She licked her lips like she was going to say something. I bit my lip. The drunk in front of me stumbled getting off the bus. I grinned at her, she grinned at me. I got off the bus. I turned around, and she was still looking at me out the window of the bus. I made sure she knew I was looking at her, then I turned and walked up the street toward my appartment.

I suppose at this point I thought I was waiting for her to make some move--get off the bus behind me or something. I fantasized about the evening we'd have, getting to know one another... drinking heavily, smearing her gorgeous red lipstick.

Of course I'd already blown it. The moment was gone.

As I walked into my appartment, I fantasized about taking my flatmate's car and chasing down the bus to ask her out. Then I laughed at myself.

This kind of thing happens frequently enough that I'm always thinking about it... On the bus in the morning I'll fantasize about moments like this with every girl my momentary glance around the bus deems worthy of fantasizing about. In fact, as I got on the bus today, I began to fantasize about this kind of thing happening with this very girl, and I stopped myself, read my book instead. I never do anything when stuff like this happens. I'm totally and completely incapable of actually saying anything to a stranger.

I should have asked her out for a drink. I should have said "Hello," or "Goodnight," or "Hi, what's your name?" or ANYTHING. I'm a moron.

Not that I'm saying I really need to meet someone or anything. I'm just a moron.

Crazy factor #3: I like to bite butts. I don't know why. I really like sinking my teeth into a good ass. It's one of life's little pleasures.

Tonight I had a little adventure. I've decided I'm going to do more filming. Juggling movies are the way to go... I made that one of my brother Dan, and I've taken lots of other footage, but haven't put anything together since then. (There have been a few false starts, but nothing finished, yet.)

Anyway, I came up with this idea to walk around downtown juggling for something like 30 min, then speed the video up so it's like 4 or 5 minutes of fast-forward juggling. Easy, right? Well, I convinced Nate to do the filming, and we even looked up the exact time of sunset, so we'd hit it right in the middle. The plan was to film until the digital camera's battery gave out, which is normally something like 30 min. Anyway, just as we were starting, I realized that I was still wearing a coat, and not only is it hard to juggle in a coat, but I knew I was going to get hot. We were something like20 feet from Nate's car... and I wanted to go back and put it in there, but he said "no, I'll carry it." and off we went.

It went great. After the camera gave out (at 45 minutes!) I was super exhausted, and we'd had a lot of fun. Nate handed me my coat, and I checked my pockets. No wallet. Shit.

So we retraced our steps, squinting into every dark little puddle and snowbank looking for the damn thing. No dice. another 45 minutes later, I walked back into work (we did the whole thing downtown) to check my messages and grab my backpack before leaving. There were like 3 messages on my work phone, and as I was checking them, Nate checked the answering machine at home. Some lady had already found my wallet!

So we ran over there, and this lady (who seemed like she probably thought I was a moron for loosing it in the first place) handed over the thing without saying 3 words. She maybe said "you're welcome." maybe.

So that was my evening. I left the batery charger at work--I'd been in such a hurry to get my wallet back--so no video editing tonight. I'll do it tomorrow.

I'm going to write an autobiography titled All this Work for Nothing: the story of my life. Or perhaps, All this Work for Nothing: A Martin Grider case study.

(Oh oh, now I've done it. I've posted my name. No end of troubles now!)

Anyway, I think all this work for nothing is a catchy title. I'd like to repeat it a few more times--All this Work for Nothing. Or perhaps, All This Work For Nothing. Which capitalization scheme? You see the perplexing decisions I'm faced with each and every day! All this work... for nothing.

So much of what we do can be, (and is!) interpreted as "crazy" by other individuals. Exhibit A: How many times a year/month/week do you hear this phrase: "It would have worked out, except for the fact that... he/she was CRAZY."

I realize that this probably applies to myself even more so than other individuals. Perhaps I am crazy. I will begin a trend here of posting things about me that are often percieved as crazy by other people.

Crazy factor 1: I will not enter a monogamous relationship.

I feel that monogamy is yet another social convention accepted by the masses out of sheer convenience. We are not monogamous animals. There are actually human sperm that have evolved for the sole purpose of attacking other human sperm! That proves that biologically we are not monogamous.

I have relented a bit in my stance that nobody is meant to be monogamous. I have had convincing conversations with a suficient numbers of people over the years who feel that they are soley monogamous creatures, and could not bear for themselves the idea of attraction to more than one individual. This is simmilar to my former opinion that everyone is merely shades of bisexual. I realize now that there are individuals so far off the "scale" that there is nothing left to do but call them fully homosexual or heterosexual.

Maybe someday soon I'll post about crazy factor #2: I cannot abide the word "faith", and I have a strong disapproval of religious institutions of all kinds.

well, here I am, back at work. The entire day, pretty much wasted trying to get a simple page to layout correctly with CSS positioning. I don't know what the deal is, because I basically cut and paste from a page that looks the same in IE5.5 and mozilla, but mine doesn't. Frustrating as hell.

Not that it's work related.

I really want to start a business of some kind. Or maybe just do more stuff that's not work and video games. I'm not sure. But I really feel like I could find some other way to make a living. I know so many people who just juggle, or sell juggling stuff, or perform.

Bleh. I really just want to sit at home and never deal with people ever again.

I'm going to Madfest juggling festival this weekend. So I won't be posting. I'll be completely unplugged. I made my first favicon today. It probably won't go live until later next week, but it's pretty exciting. I can't believe photoshop won't save in .ICO format though.

Back in the day, I made a few levels for Marathon, this great Mac game that was basically the Mac's Doom equivelent. (better than doom, IMHO). Of course, when quake came out, Marathon was dust in it's tracks, but Bungie went on to make some other kick ass shit--but all that's beside the point.

This is what I meant to link. Funny as hell, and themushroom.com is well worth checking out, even if the design sucks ass. (their "Apple releases iLamp" article is also quite humorous.)

Nate and I had a smallish party. Nate is my roommate (a word which doesn't seem to apply, because we have a two-bedroom appartment). Now we have lots of leftover junkfood, because we both ingeniously bought quite enough for everyone who was going to be there.

Now, a story:

Once, there were two guys living in a small appartment. If the guys hadn't known each other since kindergarden, and already worked out all the differences they may have once had--including one fall the stealing of one's girlfriend and the subsequent three months of silence that followed--they would perhaps be at each other's throats with switchblades and flamethrowers. Fortunately, such is not the case, and these two guys get along great. Thus, there is no reason for this story. The End.

If Nate and I ever live appart from one another, we're going to have a hell of a time sorting out who owns which DVDs and/or Playstation games.

I dedicate this late-night post to Nate. He's my roommate. A great guy. He plays Comedy Sportz.

Now, the meaning of life.

I just can't seem to get started today. Everything feels like too much work. I was spoiled those days I spent at home last week, sick like child-pornography, and now I don't want to do anything. Ever again.

OMG. I'm "working" from home today, and I just now felt compelled to try the salt licorice that Yami sent me from Denmark ... (It's been sitting on my desk while I was basically too sick to really taste it.) Let me repeat. OMG. I can't decide whether I like it or not, but I think it's akin to sourpatchkids, only without being sweet.

OK, there is a little sweet, but it's FAR more salty, and then underneath somewhere there's this hint of licorice flavor.

Now, don't get me wrong. I'm a HUGE fan of black licorice. I love good licorice. But this is just wrong.

Woah. Crazy.

I find myself obsessively compelled to watch a friend of mine at work because she has a webcam. This isn't even someone I talk to regularly, or see on any kind of regular basis. In fact, usually our social interactions will be months at a time between chance encounters that go something like this: "Hey, good to see you!" "yeah, what've you been up to?" "not terribly much, and you?" "More of the same. Good to see you though" "Yeah, you too." Not even the sometimes obligatory "we should hang out sometime!" or "we really must do this more often".

But my watching her has sparked more than one day where we exchanged emails all day... maybe it helps that she's single and attractive, but it's a really odd thing to just watch her at various times throughout the day.

morning is a shadow on a fly's back. I'm sick of mornings... can't we just be rid of them entirely? Maybe it's sleeping through them that I'm sick of. It seems like I never get enough sleep...

Today I woke up just before I should be at work. So I elected to work from home today. (Milk it while I can.)

I've discovered a new way to think about my job. It's all just free money from here on in. I don't really feel like they need me where I work, so anything they pay me is (for as long as they keep paying me) pretty much like winning the lotery. Every day I'm winning at least a hundred bucks! It's crazy money, handed down from above!

Well, I think it's time to get to the miniscule amount of actual work I have to do before I slack off for the rest of the day...

Last night continued the trend of dreaming about living in a video game. I think I was running around beating up people as if Dynasty Warriors were real. I was a "stalwart hero", and remember just slaughtering hundreds upon hundreds of warriors.

It's a rather disturbing way to wake up, actually.

At the bus stop, I saw an old friend in his car, and he waved me in. I haven't seen him for at least six months, but we were close for awhile. I blame his grad-school, and the fact that he's got a new girlfriend--doubtless leaving him less time for old friends. He was driving home (blocks away) but drove me to work instead, while I told him about various happenings and events in my life. I felt rather distracted talking to him, and wasn't able to think very clearly or quickly (as is often the case in the morning). I was conscious of how little he would say about himself, and his own life. Is he happy? who knows.

Then, upon checking my email, I discovered I had an email from another good friend I haven't heard from in quite awhile. (not quite six months, but almost!) Peter is quite the world traveler, and is vacationing in Australia (his home turf). His home is in the netherlands. Last year we met in Las Vegas, (for quite the memorable trip), and it's always good to hear from him, even if it was just a short email...

Work is fairly boring today, and I've been surfing blogs again. I've added quite the list to my bookmarks.

well, the weekend swung by while nobody was looking. I watched a movie or two, and played more video games. I took an adventurous journey to pick up my sister on friday, and on saturday I went to uncle hugo's--a science fiction bookstore... one of the last independent sci-fi bookstores. Sunday was uneventful.

Now, even though I'm not exactly feeling 100%, I find myself without excuses, and I'll be returning to work again today to face the near-zero workload that will be waiting for me.

I'm midway through A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius, which is thoroughly great and wonderful. I knew this going into it, but I had forgotten or something when I mentioned it here, but it's by the guy who edits McSweeney's, which is also quite wonderful.

I've noticed a disturbing trend today. I'm taking sudafed (with pseudoephedrine) for my virus or whatever it is. The box says I can take it safely every four hours. Today, like clockwork, I start to feel like absolute shit about every 3 and a half hours. What gives? Did I get the batch they skimped on, or is my body just eating the shit up? Or are the viruses (plural of virus? viri?) just stronger than anticipated by ye-ol-pharmaceutical company?

any way you look at it I'm getting the short end of the stick.

Big news today: I bought a humidifier. It glows in the dark!

The doctor said I have an "upper respiratory viral infection." and that he can do nothing for me. I'm suppose to drink lots of fluids.

I'm finding more faults with Mozilla. There are weird form posting problems. Simmilar problems to the ones IE has on OSX, actually (and this is Mozilla for Win98)

I can't think about anything for very long. I've been playing lots of Final Fantasy X and Dynasty Warrriors 3. Also, today I bought Tony Hawk 3, for only $25 at blockbuster (previously viewed). I was pretty excited about that. Well, as excited as I can be when it hurts to just exist.

OK, enough self-pitty.

wow. I hadn't thought it was possible to write such drivel! I have soared to another literary plane with that jumbled account of nothingness. I'll blame the fever. I've been terribly terribly sick these last three days or so (isn't everyone). I haven't puked yet, but I've done the whole standing in the bathroom looking at the toilet like its filth-ridden bowl might suddenly be your best friend thing. I hate that. But it hasn't really been a "puking sort" of flu. It's more sinus related, I think. I may or may not have an infection. I'm going to try and squeeze myself into some clinic tomorrow when I wake up.

Just about all I've done the last two days is play video games, read this (so far) awesome book, and occasionally check my email. Occasionally is one of those words I seem to always misspell. I never know wheether there are two 'c's, or two 's's. Speaking of misspellings, I thought for a second there that I was misspelling "misspell" because it just looks wrong to me for some reason with those two 's'es in there. so I looked it up, and it seems webster's has both spellings. Of course, mispell (one s) is just a refference to misspell with two. Fascinating.

ok, I'm going to try and sleep now. It's been almost pointless these last two days, but maybe I'll be able to get a few good hours in...

Midnight houses all mannor of thoughts
creeping like edgy spiders into the whitespaces of your mind.
Sleep, the white web's tickling tendril--
a trailing edge of symetrical dream-apocalypses.

Every night I fail to sleep a little longer
breathing life into darkened bedroom corners,
wearing covers and insomnia.

This page cannot be fucking displayed.

of course, I found this (again) on blogdex, so I'm just echo-ing another popular link...

more poetry, less trite bullshit. Who cares that I bought groceries today?

=========
Gnawing on a string of midnight;
anger is omniverous.

I'll grease metal silver-cloud-linings, trying
to slide down some unsuspecting constelation;
a star-spangled banister-rider,
banging eye-sores with tear-drips from the sky's lips.
Luna never sang so sweet
her concave crater-stains smiling sweetly at me
or grinning greedily at me.
Is the moon fuzzy like a peach?

Trying to turn over a new emotion-leaf.

Rubbing brain-elbows with eucalyptus leaves;
soaking myself in the star-light's-echinacea-tea.
=========

I didn't even look out the window. I'd probably only see light polution anyway.

oh wow. I forgot I posted that. rather disgusting, isn't it?

Final Fantasy X is not only beautiful, but it's terribly addicting too... I've found myself talking strategy over ICQ with friends while I'm at work, then leaving early just to play... (ok, so work is slow, and it was only an hour early.)

I bought groceries today. Then I tried to sign up for SimonDelivers.com but they're not accepting customers in appartment buildings. Typical.

I've been meaning to start posting pictures. I have this nice digital camera, and I do use it... on occasion.



So I snapped this low contrast image of my scrotum in the hopes that it will help you get to know me better.

Why does fifteen minutes reading blogs seem like at least an hour? Yesterday was perhaps the longest seeming day at work for me, ever. I remember thinking at one point, it had to be time to go, and I was evne mentally getting ready, and I looked at the clock and it was only 2:30. I don't suppose it helps that with my recent OS upgrade to 10.1.2 there is no option to choose between 12 hour time, and 24 hour time. This is true even on my ibook, where I don't have the problem that I'm stuck in 24 hour time. (for some reason, I look at 14:38 and it looks much later than 2:30, ya know?)

I'm going home to play some Final Fantasy X.

I have discovered the plan to have a blogcon in August in Las Vegas... It's absolutely crazy.

I feel not at all a part of any sort of blog community. at least, not yet. The weird thing is that I kinda want to feel that way. It's like a nagging social itch. People I want to meet, or email, or feel close to...

It's rather strange, actually, because what I really used to crave was online colaboration. I remember doing various online projects with people, usually people I knew, but didn't hang out with that much, or see that often.

I wonder how many blogs I can find from minneapolis or minnesota.

I have done very little at work lately asside from test out the new build of Mozilla, which kicks ass. There are three reasons I think it's great. First, you can now use tabs to keep track of your open sessions (instead of windows). I'd change a couple of things abou this (for instance, you can't right click on a tab and move it to a new window...) and I'd also like to be able to have a nice list of open tabs _and_ windows somewhere. Right now it's just keeping track of windows under the "tasks" menu.

Second reason it's great: You can dissable javascript popups. It must be dissabling "onload" popups, because javascript open new window scripts seem to work fine. Porn will never be so innocuous.

Finally, the last reason Mozilla is great is that you can now right click on banner ads and "Block images from this server". Banner ads begone! I just feel kinda weird about it, because I really want to support some sites, by viewing their ads, or whatever it takes. So I hope I don't accidentally block servers that also happen to serve ads to sites I like. (oh well if I do. ;)

There are some other things I don't like so much about it (my mouse scroll-wheel doesn't work with frames), but the typical complaints, (slow load times, bad rendering) seem like they've pretty much been taken care of. I did have it crash on me once in about 8 hours of use. Probably about as often as IE crashes... I can't wait till there are hundreds of skins too!

*sigh*

sex post will have to wait. I have no time for anything really, and I've put off doing a little update like this because I wanted to sit and immerse myself in sex-tension-esque-apades for awhile. (How's that for a word that'll never catch on?)

I finished Cyteen, by CJ Cheryth last night, and my official opinion is that it sucked ass. If someone reading this loved the book, I'd really like to know why. It won the hugo, so a bunch of people must have, but I really just thought it was far too long, far too drawn out, and far too stupid for the length. I could maybe see if it had been really easy to read, really compelling, but I never felt that way about it, with the possible exception of the first twenty pages.

I'm moving on to a non-sci-fi book... probably the first I've read in at least a year. (fictional, that is.) It's called "A Heartbreaking work of staggering genius." or perhaps, "a staggering work of heartbreaking genius." something like that. you get the idea. I'm probably not even getting the words right.

I'm going home now. work sucked, but I did very little but install Mozilla on my mac. It's beautiful, by the way--mozilla is. really breaks new grounds. Tabs were a stroke of genius, and the fact that I can dissable pop-ups is enough to make me install it on my box when I get home. Blogger doesn't really look that great in it though...

I think it's time for a good sex post. I don't know if I've even had a sex post before, much less a "good" sex post, which probably just implies "dirty" sex post, Awe, screw it. I'm too tired.

well, it's new year's eve. parties are like assholes.

I want to go and "kiss the girls".

Other than google's nice little logo-festivity, I wonder what other parts of the web change for new year's. I'd be willing to bet not many. I like the fact that google changes appearances on the holidays. It reminds you that it's there underneath everything, working full time, indexing it's little ass off.

I paged through their job openings today. Nothing I qualify for. Looks like they're pretty attached to their diplomas over there. I suppose I should finish that off someday. I'm hoping the new benefits (which actually include tuition reimbercement) will help out with that...

oh yeah, remember that raise I was getting? not anymore. I'm getting a fraction of it. (It's still a raise, though any enthusiasm I'd felt for it is now obliterated by the fact that I'm not getting nearly as much.)

yeah, I'm cranky.

every year before christmas, I think to myself, I'll buy some christmas lights for my room as soon as christmas is over, because they're always on sale then!, and every year, when christmas is over, I'm sick of christmas lights.

morning is obnoxious.

blogger has been down and up and hacked and back... I changed my pw, even though I use blogspot. It's interesting to note which sites think something happening to blogger is newsworthy. (ok, I could only find one, and admitedly, it was before I made this post!)

I just discovered blogdex. It's fascinating. Many of the currently "most popular" are things I've seen before, but some not. A simmilar discoverty to The Internet Archive, which has a cheezy name for their coolest feature (The WayBackMachine) which allows you to view webpages as they once were... There is so much there to digest! (but I've found it's often busy.)

This is something I've noticed lately. It used to be that there was always too much science fiction to read. Far too much to get through. Now I still feel that way, (I can think of three or four books scratching holes in the back of my brain--where the 'unread list' hides) but there is a new list too, a "to read/view online" list, and it's been growing steadily as I blog more often. Partly, this list was always there... I mean, there are a hundred thousand script sites, and tutorials that I want to get to, and I have a list of regular news sources that I get too far less regularly than I'd like... but the list has grown... or rather, there are new subsets or something. the "from blogging" category is threatening to take over. I've started to read blogs before bedtime. (a period normally notable for my lack of coherance as I stumble from the livingroom couch to my bed, fumbling at the power button on my PS2 in between.)

Maybe I've just been hungry for a new passion and I'm hoping this will satiate some of that desire. I don't know. I do know I haven't been writing as much, and Laura blames my recent gaming adiction on the fact that work has been stressful. I think she's partly right, but partly I've been bored. I need passion! I need something to get fired up about. Blogging has nothing to do with it, but maybe reading blogs does... maybe not. But maybe, just maybe, blogging will get me interested in the internet again. There was this article on slashdot linking a relatively dumb apnews story about the commericalization of the internet, and just how much of it is owned by corperations, (and fewer corporations than in past years). Strangely, this article just made me thankful for the server space I have, knowing that even though hardly anyone reads it, it's still there... that's the difference between the internet and, say... TV... when corporations took over TV, they pushed out the little guys. with the internet, (sure some toes get squashed) but for the most part the little guys can still be there! The actual article does cite some pretty large toe-squashings though.

how do you find time to blog? I never seem to. I have to snatch it from the edges of my day, fitting it in the cracks unevenly, like poorly matched puzzle pieces.

do you listen to the songs stuck in your head? Hum along? Or do you try and get rid of them, as I do. Sometimes listening to them works, sometimes you have to listen to another annoying song.

I was going to write some stupid little blurb about introspection, and how often I feel like I'm just staring off into space at parties, wondering what I look like to other people, but I decided that's stupid. (not the staring off into space, or even the wondering what other people think of me, but the little blurb about introspection.) Except now that I've mentioned it, the blurb is probably over, and I've done it, stupid or not.

I could spout on about Final Fantasy X. That's what's kept me from sleep all night. It's actualy going to be nine thirty in the AM any minute now, and I haven't slept since about 11:00AM yesterday. Well, I did nod off for about an hour durring this one particularly puzzling part in a temple where I was suppose to move these stones around and open the door... (but the camera angle didn't make it obvious there was a whole staircase I could use... and I didn't figure it out until I made a trip to gamefaqs, and read ahead a bit in one of their walkthroughs.

Dynasty Warriors 3 had almost taken Grand Theft Auto 3's place as my current favorite game. But I have to admit FFX is amazing from an aesthetic standpoint. It's simply beautiful.

I have only one christmas present left to purchase for my family gifts to be complete. I should also try and get something for Laura before tuesday, and if I were really on the ball, I'd have something for a couple of other friends as well. I was thinking about getting her a palm pilot (she has mentioned interest in that area), but that's what I got for my girlfriend last year at christmas, and I think there's something about that situation that's just wrong...

my entire life in blog. I've never wanted fame. Maybe a recognition from peers I admire. An "oh, I know who THAT guy is!" every once in awhile might be cool, but otherwise, who cares who knows you?

I've been cultivating the concept that there are two states of self awareness. (with infinite shades between, of course) The first is an inner understanding of the workings. The details, knowing why you do things, and how you make the decisions you make. The second state is merely being aware of the things as they happen. Suprising yourself at times, living life more fully perhaps, or at least more passionately. Maybe I'm just re-inventing the extrovert/introvert dichotomy, but I don't think so because it seems like a person can be an entirely introverted person and still life life for the experience, and care nothing for the why.

This is of course related to blogging. I ask myself repeatedly why I blog. In fact, I probably ask myself that far more often than I actually do it! I ask the same question of everything I do... and I usually have good answers for myself. (now, as to whether I'm rationalizing, or actually discovering those answers, I'm not sure even I can know.)

At the same time, I've been loosing that sense of wonder when I ask. More often as of late, the answer is "who cares?". Perhaps the biggest why question recently has been why do I play video games. I'll fully acknowledge that I have an addiction. It's pretty severe even. I've skipped work to play. Sometimes, the why question is entirely absent. I don't even care. I just want to play this game, or go see this movie, or go have sex, or go do THAT.

I think my poetry is somehow deeply tied to the root of the why question. I used to think I was manic depressive, and I'd only really write when I was at the low and high ends. The best stuff was when I was manic, and the worst when I was depressed. But there were "sane" stretches in between where I wouldn't really do anything at all, and I wondered if that's what it was suppose to feel like... just living. Not really doing anything special or particular. I feel that way more and more. Just eeking out an existence. The worst part is that it's really not disturbing. In fact, I feel no remorse, or I'd change things. If I really wanted to be a famous writer (as I secretly wish everytime I see the clock at 11:11), I'd just fucking write. I wouldn't play video games, and I wouldn't juggle three times a week.

Juggling is very much on the "who cares" end of the spectrum, I think.

I wonder if you can read someone's blog, and make a judgement about where on the scale they fall. I wonder if this even makes sense to anyone but me.

Comments should be working in the next fifteen minutes or so. Tell me what you think?

Today was decent.. involved. a good day. a meaningful day. I said goodbye to those aforementioned co-workers, and we all went out for lunch and drinks. Drinks evolved into drunken discussions, which are sometimes (seldom, I've found, but were today) the best kind of discussions, because they are open and uninhibited.

I also found out I've got a raise. This from our new boss... who did not attend the goodbye party. This spoke much about her, I think, and, at least for now, I've a newfound respect. Perhaps, she was not invited.

This was mentioned on blogger (itself!) but I'll reproduce the link because I found it fascinating. Keep Trying is a blog seemingly devoted to blogging about blogging. Meta blogging? It's a popular discussion topic. Someone mentioned it's really something only newbie bloggers do, but I'm not so sure. If you don't keep examining yourself, how do you know who you are? Do those who no longer blog about blogging no longer realize they are blogging? Is it merely something they "do" as habbit, as ritual, as instinct? (Yes, instinct can be learned.)

I suddenly had an epiphany... I can host my comments script on livingtech.net, and still keep my blog on blogspot. I don't know why this didn't occur to me before. I'm probably just an idiot.

We'll see if I can get that done tonight, but I'm still drunk. Thousands of open source programmers can't be wrong though, and I'll probably do a better job while I'm drunk.

I've decided to make a commitment to longer and more meaningful posts. Less crap, less random jibberish, innane observation, etc... You may or may not have noticed, but unfortunately, so far at least, this has meant fewer posts as well.

At the moment, I'm sitting at work, watching two of my former co-workers pack up and leave the building. They were both above me, the president and creative director (of the company before the merger), and now they're leaving because that's what everyone here would do, given a choice. I really have no choice. My choice is this: how much money should I borrow to buy a car so I can get to work every day after it moves? I'm thinking two or three grand at most. I have a list of things I'd like in a car, but unfortunately, I can't really afford to adhere to it. In fact, it yet remains to be seen whether I'll be able to afford anything.

You might have thought, erroniously, that my lack of regular updates would mean I've been busy trying to move the blog somewhere else. No. I have made no progress. My life is lack of progress, sharply contrasted by my existence in video games, which is only measured by progress. Perhaps this lack of ready objectives in reality is what causes me to believe that I am more likely failing at it.

I like that: failing reality.

Reality Upstarts, a sasquach band of trumpeting rhino-riders. No random here!

There is some kind of link between creativity and sleep deprivation. This much seems painfully obvious. Synapses jump faster, or more eratically, or something. At the same time, other cognitive functions suffer... I never quite know whether I'm doing a good job, or whether it merely seems like I am. Is this RuPaul weblog really as interesting as I think it is? Or am I just terribly woefully tired?

Naked is fun. Unfortunately, when you're in a relationship, I think there is this tendency for nakedness to get routine and, well, not boring, but just not as interesting anymore either. I wonder why this is. My room mate and I were speculating about the instinct for after-sex-talk. If all we (as males of the species) were interested in was progenation, then we'd probably never stick around for the after-sex-talk. Slam-bam-thank-you-mam... yet, it had to have been somehow advantageous for the man to get to know the woman, find out everything about her... from her eating habbits to her favorite hangouts just about any other nearly-useless detail we can wring from her.

I think that instinct may be a bit too strong in me. I've always found the first few weeks of the relationship to be the most intense.

Don't get me wrong, I think there's plenty to be said about stability and commitment. I just want very little to do with them.

observations from my bed:

light is often yellow, especially when filtered through a lampshade which is light brown, and probably also especially when it's from a lightbulb.

my ceiling is speckled.

chaos needs no prompting.

doors are particularly useless when one doesn't care if one's roommates can see one naked. however, doors have the suprise ability to function as things to hang other things from. This is espeically easy to facilitate when one owns a door-hanger-thingy, which hooks over the door, and offers many hooks from which to hang other things.

I wish my wardrobe had a desaturate feature.

keys are an interesting phenomenon of modern culture. what is the importance of keys, and what does it say about a person who never looses their keys verses a person who frequently finds himself without them? I am of the former persuasion, (I don't remember ever loosing my keys,) and I wonder if as such a person, I am missing out on exciting adventures I would otherwise be enjoying if I lost them more often.

water is heavy.

the space shuttle can't launch in rain. This is because the special heat-resistent tiles are somehow not water resistant. (or perhaps--here comes the observation part, I thought of this myself--perhaps at the speeds the space shuttle achieves in it's short flight out of earth's orbit the raindrops are like tiny bullets. I wonder what the speed of a bullet is compared to the speed of the space shuttle. I also wonder what is the speed of your average falling raindrop.

last observation: there are many types of hinge. hinges are a crutial part of modern society. without hinges we are lost (or unhinged). open and close, all day long, only here and there a tiny hinge protest... fixed quickly with WD40. all hail our mighty friend the hinge.

blogs are a trap for the self-obsessed.

Not only that, but I think they foster a self-obsession. It's easy to get into reading blogs, (they're the "real TV" of the internet). And of course anything you read gets internalized to some degree, and then you start to think like a blogger, which then causes you to want a blog... and become self-obsessed.

Look at me! I'm a blogger! W00T!

um, fortunately, I didn't need to start reading blogs to have this sad self-obsession. Here's my favorite poem, (by Frank O'Hara)

=======================

AUTOBIOGRAPHIA LITERARIA

When I was a child
I played by myself in a
corner of the schoolyard
all alone.

I hated dolls and I
hated games, animals were
not friendly and birds
flew away.

If anyone was looking
for me I hid behind a
tree and cried out "I am
an orphan."

And here I am, the
center of all beauty!
writing these poems!
Imagine!

=====================

I think this proves my point.

this game is probably the coolest and most addictive web based game I've played since bejewled. Replay value is zero though, so I won't post my password.

speaking of time... imagine 16 hours in a Home Depot. I read through that this afternoon, and it was somehow extremely heartening. I don't know why, but I really decided life is better knowing that I would not (now) undertake 16 hours in any store. Ever.

had an interesting conversation about time today. I realized that I was absolutely right when I was a kid, wanting to never "grow up" so that time stayed slow, the way it was suppose to be. Now it feels like so little time has passed since I started the job I'm at now, or since I was in college, or since I've been dating laura... all these things seem like yesterday, and when I try to recall all the multitudes of days between those events and now, I fade out somewhere around a week or two. I know things happened in between, and if they were anything like the past few weeks, too much happened, probably, but I can't hardly remember but scattered events.

I'll probably end up one of those old men who tells you the same stories over and over again.

I have karma police stuck in my head.

my new favorite band of the week: The Weakerthans. they're absolutely amazing. And better lyrics by far than my last favorite band of the week, The Strokes. The strokes don't have terrible lyrics, but they're deffinetly not up to par with the weakerthans. I must buy their CDs posthaste.

Jolly good. Bugger me, I'm off.

Winter has arrived, like a long lost friend, and snow has sprung up covering everything like green grass in spring. I felt a weird sense of nostalgia when I got out of the shower this morning and it was so cold. The white blankets and sense of urgency remind me somehow of my junior year in HS, which was probably the last time I had to really struggle to make it to class regularly so early, and so cold.

I've sunk to the lowest depths! I actually used my laptop to surf for porn. It's not that porn is the bottom of the barrel... I suppose I should look at it on the bright side.. Hmm. what's the bright side of pr0n again? Um.

Yeah, no real post here. Nothing to see. Move along now.

Right then, cheerio.

oh! I thought for sure I'd already posted from the holliday. *sigh* such slack.

I'm in one of those future-reflective moods, thinking about my girl, how she's all primed up for grad school, and I'm still wondering if I'll ever get around to paying off the 2 grand I owe for my last semester at the university, (which somehow slipped past financial aid--those bastards). And she'll probably want to move... something I'm not exactly ready/prepared to do. I sometimes fantasize about certain individuals having a more active role in my life... Twists of circumstance putting distance between potential romance. And then there's the thought of a fresh start. A new job, home, city, that kind of thing. Whether I follow Laura to her city of grad school choice, or whether I stake out on my own, (I've been contemplating NY for longer than I've known her), it's all just so mysterious and far off.

I don't really know what I would do without minneapolis. I don't really have that many people I consider friends I can't live without, but at the same time there is quite the base of friends who I see infrequently, but regularly.

this is going nowhere. I don't want to move. but it's a feeling akin to nostalgia when you're deep in fantasyland.

blogs I liked:
http://www.blackrobot.com/
http://www.instantenemy.com/
http://www.yeahtotally.net/
http://www.textism.com/

who knows why? not I. I think an interesting phenomenon is how bloggers link to one another, and how certain social circles of bloggers exist. I am such a newbie. I post with false english as second language to disguise how bad I really post.

Who cares? not I.

I'm constantly wondering why anyone would read this. I read it and it's worse than any journal I've ever written before. I'm terribly dissapointed in myself. Maybe I'll improve. Maybe I should care more. blogger is too easy.

vacation looms... thanksgiving with dad's side of the family. witty banter, putting up with bratty cousins... video games... movies maybe. Christmas presents on friday.dry turkey, dry duck (? can't remember what we eat for christmas...just as dry though.) good mashed potatos, yams, pudding...

yay for black and white design... even if it's a template ripoff.

it's been awhile... I put in my app today with gameinformer... (er, yesterday now.)

I've had this strange peace-less feeling lately, like everything is on edge. I think it's partly lack of sleep, and partly just stress about work and finding a new job. It's hard enough living with the knowledge that I now have real financial commitments in my life, like rent and various credit card payments I have to make. Piled on top of that is the fear that I suddenly won't be able to make them. Yeesh. I hate sounding grown up.

I think I'll take the day off tomorrow, it'll be good because I'm already taking wed off for vacation, and thursday and friday are holliday, so that means the rest of the week is mine.

But on the other hand, I should really... yeah, right. more video games, less worry... maybe more job searching though. more thanksgiving this weekend...

thanksmas rant forthcoming.

I saw a midnight screening of Harry Potter. I'd heard rumor (false) that the new Eppisode II trailer (the full version, not that "breathing" teaser) would show, but alas, such was not the case. The movie, however, (after fifteen minutes of previews) was pretty damn awesome. Not as good as the book, they never are, but it was fun. Seeing a quidich match has to be the highlight, (at least for me) but there were lots of good parts.

the way that these damn archives work is a mystery to me... email me if you read this... maybe it'll chear me up... this page design looks like absolute shit in IE for mac... (on < 9.x OS) I need to fix that soonish.

Earth will crumble. *floop*

yesterday I made an appearance at game informer's offices... this is a gaming mag, for those uninformed. (ha!)

um, yeah, wouldn't it be cool to work there?

We won some awards for webdesign, (the place I work now...) I went searching the other winner's homepages for job openings...

I've been down. I have no time to write.

*glug*

today is link day:

photoshop tennis--oh MAN!

a cool blog (yes, this is my first blog link other than yami, who doesn't count... then again, she linked it first, and I guess that may mean this one doesn't count...) but it's cool, and better than that, it links to other cool blogs. Someday, I'll be a cool blog. ;) damnit, I just realized my first link was also from this one... which means I'm nobody, I've found nothing on my own, I'm just a dirty link clicker!

it's about time I linked livingtech.net, my own site... I just today updated the black and white world wide web page. Some new cool stuff...

oh, and probably my only legitimate link of the day (which of course I got from a friend) The Dialectizer which made me laugh for hours while I read my employer's website in hacker speak.

It doesn't get much better than discussing video games and the feasibility of full consciousness uploading over good Chinese food with coworkers you actually enjoy hanging out with. Too bad the rest of the day seems shot in terms of getting actual work done. Two hour lunches do that.

I have no remorse. I've taken the day off for absolutely no reason whatsoever. Yeesh!

I could be doing something productive, but I think instead I'll play video games. (I don't count this, it'll only take a few minutes, and it's almost like checking my email, at least, I'm trying to think of it that way, it'll encourage me to do it more often.) Hmmm. I think I need comments. Is it even possible to have comments on a blogspot hosted blog? (why am I asking you, you have no forum to respond!?)

ugh. *insert comments here about neverending cycles of depression and boredom*

*insert comments here about last night's dreams*

*insert further comments here about blog technology and blogging in general*

*insert more wit and humor*

*insert foot...

fever ringing a blow-torch's song
I'm stuck in mindnumb
head like a semi in mid-america
plodding on incessantly...

my convention was a great time. I actually _walked_ on the slackrope. (managed to overcome some weird hurdle, and I even took four steps forward, and four back!) I didn't really learn much in terms of juggling, but I won combat several times.

I honestly don't understand how so many blogs are simply filled with links. I just spent a good fifteen minutes trying to find a link for combat (rules, or pictures, or some such) and everything sucked. Maybe I should have a more common passtime to link...

Grrrrrm. I'm thinking of cutting my hair. the forehead is threatening to take over...