Friday, December 26, 2003

I stole this from Jaclyn:

I am not easily offended.

I hurt, but that doesn't bother me as much as the cold.

I love most things about you.

I hate when people threaten me physically because I don't like to hurt people.

I fear a cage. Oh, and zombies.

I hope despite myself.

I hear some things that you thought I didn't.

I crave strawberry milkshakes sometimes.

I regret only one thing, and I'm not going to talk about it here.

I cry in my sleep, apparently.

I care. It may seem like I don't, but I do.

I always leave.

I long to test my mettle.

I feel alone dancing after a few drinks under dizzying lights to some good, loud music.

I listen, but I don't always remember.

I hide in my stories.

I drive the way a one-armed monkey swings through the trees. (Decently, but if the monkey tries to change the radio station...)

I sing songs just to get them stuck in people's heads. ("And I need you now tonight, and I need you more than ever...")

I dance better when I've had a drink.

I write a lot of crap. But some of it floats to the top.

I play well with others.

I miss spending my lunch hours in the middle school library,
and then staying after to use the computer and write stories about a chihuahua and an iguana, or my superhero, "Jim Reaper."

I search for things but I don't really look for them.

I learn from reading stories.

I feel like I've been drunk. (Ask a glass of water.)

I know how to get water from a cactus and how to be a good companion.

I say what I think is funny. Of course, every good joke contains a grain of truth, so I also say what I think is true.

I succeed in surprising myself.

I fail to try.

I dream.

I sleep at odd times.

I wonder what people want from me.

I want to tell a good story.

I worry that I'll die of something lame, like tripping over a kitten.

I have to learn how to stay.

I give my companionship.

I fight when I can win, and when it's worth winning.

I wait for myself to get fed up.

I need to be alone.

I am frustrating to some people.

I think that there doesn't seem to me a middle ground for me.

I can't help the fact that I find most things very, very, funny.

I sit in silence because I have nothing that makes music for me anymore.

Thursday, December 25, 2003

Then I flung open the shutters of my second-story window and shouted at the nearest icon I could see.

"You there! Site Meter!"

The site meter looked up from where it sat crammed in the bottom corner of my blog. "Yes?"

"What day is it?!"

"Today? Why today is the day that you reach 10,000 hits!"

"Really? No, no you fool! It's Christmas Day!"

"What do you care? You're not religious."

"But I love to yell out of my second-story window, and this is the only day I can do it without the neighbors calling the police on me!"

"And God bless us, everyone."

"Are you being sarcastic, Site Meter? Sarcasm is very unbecoming of an icon."

Wednesday, December 24, 2003

"No, don't move," [said Ford Prefect] "You'd better be prepared for the jump into hyperspace. It's unpleasantly like being drunk."

"What's so unpleasant about being drunk?" [Arthur Dent asked.]

"You ask a glass of water."


-The Hithchiker's Guide to the Galaxy
by Douglas Adams

Monday, December 22, 2003

How Did Doing Laundry Come To This?

up all night, only Emma is awake, you're drinking, then you go and read Muscle68's post and get all thoughtful

I have discovered Amazon.com.

I just purchased a book that Neil Gaiman recommended, The Child That Books Built : A Life in Reading [Paperback] by
Spufford, Francis. No wonder that boy had nothing to do but read; with a name like Francis Spufford.

That semi-colon reminds me that I need to take some more English courses. I have serious technical problems with writing.

Like when I start writing an event that happened in the past, and it's all in past tense, but then I get excited about it and start writing in present tense like it's happening right now.

Then Emma signs off Instant Messenger and you're unexcusably an alcoholic, drinking alone, doing laundry, and writing.

Life is so hard.

Then Lauren H. comes back online after being "away" and you're demoted from alcoholic to back to just being drunk.

Then she's gone again. Her last IM said, "goodnight puppet".

"I'll show you puppet!" I thought, and then proceeded to do The Robot. (It works, since a robot is really just a puppet with very elaborate strings.)

By the way, the unpuncuated first line at the very beginning is my notes. The lesson here is that sometimes things don't go as planned.

But yes, Muscle68's post: Questioning purpose again, and life in general. But now I know what my purpose is.

I have to get the practically full beer keg in my backyard into the freezer somehow.

As if I didn't already have enough to do at 3 am on a Sunday night.

But I'd like to think that I'm doing it for the children.

Eh...I'll go now.

UPDATE:

I have done it.

There was much sorting of ice, Hot Pockets, and frozen waffles, and some shelving, but I managed to clear the bottom half of the big freezer we have in our house. (It's a bit bigger than a large stand-up fridge.) I also had to move some frozen sushi. I didn't think you could freeze sushi. I still don't think you can freeze sushi.

Then I grabbed the 120 pound keg by the handles and waddled it all the way from the backyard to the freezer.

How do I know it's 120 pounds, you ask?

Well, I weighed it.

(My laundry still isn't dry.)

But regardless of how much it weighed, it fit perfectly into the little nook I had made for it.

I am proud of myself, the keg, and the people that designed the freezer.

But my triumph is bittersweet. I am purposeless once again.

But I know it won't last.

After all, someone has to return the tap.

Sunday, December 21, 2003

Death, Taxes, and Blogging

I've been turning over a rather morbid thought in my head for a few weeks.

Some people blog. All people die.

It must be the case that some people that will die have blogged.

So what happens then?

It is not uncommon for a blog to be abandoned; left on the doorstep of the World Wide Web while it's creator rings the doorbell and then ambles off nonchalantly.

Most are never heard from again. Well, except for Brian H., he came back.

If someone were to die, the readers may never know. "Oh, so-and-so hasn't blogged since he/she mentioned that he/she was going skydiving/mountain climbing/turning 21."

Some time ago, Blogger announced that it is now possible to pre-date a post that will then be published in the future. Sort of preemptive blogging. You'd be able to write a post wishing someone a happy birthday, for instance, and then have it automatically post the day of.

I read about this, and a few flakes of rust tumbled down as the gears in my head began to turn.

In theory, I could pre-blog a final post that would publish itself after I die. All I would have to do is write it, set it to post at the first of the month, and then forget about it. Of course, in the event that I make it to the end of the month, I would then change the post date to the first of the next month. And so on, and so on, and so on, until I die.

Or completely forget about the damn thing and be stupefied/mortified/horrified/embarrassed when all the stuff I wrote that was never meant to be heard until I was dead appears when I load up my blog on the 1st.

But that's a risk I think I'm willing to take.

I don't often get to say this, but the worst thing that could possibly happen in that scenario is that I don't die.

I doubt it will be an legally binding contract or anything, but if I decide that I want my body to be used in some sort of grand practical joke, you all had better do it. Come on, how often will you get the chance to prop me up in a booth at McDonald's, place a half-eaten burger in front of me, and then run off to a safe distance to watch the hilarity that will ensue?!

Or, put me in the trunk of the car that belongs to that co-worker you hate and then the let all the air out of one of the tires. When they go to the trunk for the spare tire, be sure to have a camera to capture their look of horror. (You get first dibs on that one, Andrew S.)

Oh, and everyone is going to get ridiculously trashed at my wake. I want everyone to wake up the next day with a hangover so bad that they actually envy me.

Maybe that's a bad idea, come to think of it.

Wait until I'm buried before you all break out the alcohol.

When I say that I'll be cold in my grave before I'm the only person not drinking, I absolutely fucking mean it.