I think I'm going to respond to the ca. 118 comments I got on my last journal entry with a new journal entry. I'm going to quote from certain comments that I got, but I'm leaving off names, mostly because I'm lazy. If you really want to know who said it, you can search like the dedicated person you are.

First, I NEVER said this. What I said is that I'm not going to date a guy because he thinks I'm pretty. Obviously I won't date a guy who doesn't think I'm pretty (like he's going to date me anyway) but it takes more than a guy thinking I'm pretty for me to want to date him. That was my point. That was the whole point of that entry. Just because a guy thinks I'm really awesome does not mean it's going to get him into my pants.

I don't have a damn checklist. It's not like I keep tabs on our conversation and think, "okay, now I have to ask him this to make sure he has this specific trait." I know when he does things I like, and I know when he does things I don't like. These automagically change my opinion of the person, I don't make a conscious decision to like them or not. It just happens.

Do I have a bad attitude about dating? I don't think it's too much to ask for everything I want in a person. Why settle?

Exactly. Why be with someone who isn't what you want? Frankly I would rather die cold and alone than live my life with someone who doesn't fulfill me. I'd be constantly irritated and wishing I had something better. If I'm alone, all I have to deal with is myself, and I like myself.

Um, yes. One person's hot is another person's fugly. Is this news to anyone?

Now that's something I'd like to see. That sounds like a lot of fun. I bet you'd meet a lot of rad people there. Let's do it.

Like... I don't even care. Am I somehow required to pander to all members, making them feel good about themselves and telling them I think they're wonderful and attractive people? I had no idea I wasn't allowed to, you know, say what I look for in a man because I might *gasp* hurt someone's feelings. I'm not going to want to date everyone I meet. It's just the way things are. That doesn't mean I don't like you, I just don't want to date you. Is that so bad?

As for the second part of that quote, the question was for everyone who wants to read my journal. If I only wanted responses from my friends, I would have started a friends thread.

Onward to something mostly unrelated.

Seriously! If you want to entice me to converse with you, you're going to have to be at least a little bit engaging, verbally. I do NOT want to chat with someone who can't (or won't) take the time to spell properly or write in complete sentences. It's called "chatting", you know, like "talking", and when you talk you don't sound like a tard who can barely spit out a sentence, do you? Obviously when people talk they use colloquialisms and such that wouldn't be used when writing a paper or something, but when I write the way I speak I still don't come off as being as unable to formulate thoughts as many of the people who try to get me to "chat" do. Please, I'm begging you: if you want an email back from me, don't write like a child. Thank you.

Well, I'm moving out of my apartment at the end of August. The owner of the building wants to keep my apartment vacant for "personal reasons" and I have to be out by September 8th. Fine. Whatever. I might move in with dunx for September, but I don't know yet. If I'm going to be moving and having to drive in a car without air conditioning, I'd rather do it at the end of September than at the end of August. Life is a little bit up in the air. I haven't heard back from the NSA and that makes me sad. Oh well. If anyone knows of any places I can apply that hire mathematicians who don't have a graduate degree, please let me know.

I'm going to be selling some of my stuff because I'm moving, some of it to make room and some of it to raise some more dough so I can afford to move, so if you're interested in owning some of my items, keep watch here and in the SG sales group. Want to own the sunglasses or undies that I wore in my Princess set? Now's your chance. How about the pink wig I wore in Bathtub? I might just sell that too. You want a purple and black dress that'll make you look like you play Vampire? I've got one of those. Anyway, watch this space for links.

Catch you guys later.

It just occurred to me that I get email of a certain variety on a fairly regular basis (I'm pretty sure it's because I have a dating profile up and people take it seriously). Just because I have singled out this particular email in no way means I'm trying to single out the sender as being any certain type of person; in other words, I'm not trying to be insulting to the writer. This email just happened to be really up front about the whole thing:

Don't get me wrong, it's awfully flattering to have people say things like this, but do they really realize what they're saying? I'm sure there are plenty of guys out there who would be willing to date me because they think I'm pretty, but... but what about me? I mean, I'm not going to date a guy just because he comes along and thinks I'm pretty, or even if he thinks I'm pretty AND smart. What's that going to get me other than a self-esteem boost and (I hope!) some good head? Unfortunately, there's more to dating (for me) than just picking out the best looking guy who will go home with me. Yeah, it totally sucks. I'm so fucking picky! It's such a fucking trial, and I'm getting a little sick of it.

"You're single? But you're so pretty!"

"Okay, point me towards the next guy you see that's as pretty as I am and I'll see how he is..."

So that's the first of many retardedly hard steps to getting me a boyfriend: finding a guy to whom I'm physically attracted. That might sound shallow, but honestly, do you want to sleep with someone you don't think is hot? Okay, that mission is accomplished.

Next, after I find this ultra-hot guy, he's going to turn out to have a girlfriend, or maybe even a wife. If I'm lucky, she's hot too and they're into threesomes, and then the following steps have to be taken separately for the two of them, but since there are two of them and I'm a lot more stoked about two than one, I'm a bit more lax with my reqirements. But say he doesn't have an SO; now I have to be able to have a conversation with him about something vaguely interesting. Weather is not interesting unless a tornado/hurricane/<insert crazy weather pattern here> has done extra super wacky shit, or is in an area wreaking havoc on someone you know, and they've given you a first-hand account. That's rad.

Now that it's been established that he isn't dull as a bag full of hammer-shaped rocks and is at least mildly intelligent and has his own opinions aside from the ones generally shown on MTV's Spring Break, I have to make sure he's not racist, homophobic, sexist or a bigot in general, that he doesn't believe in astrology, scientology, ghosts, fairies, magic(k), etc, that he tends to be socially liberal, though his politial leanings may be in another direction; I don't necessarily care where he is politically, just as long as his views lie somewhere.

Wow, this guy is starting to seem really cool. He warrents more indepth conversation, for sure, and I hope I get to talk to him again. At this point, I cross my fingers that phone numbers are exchanged. Now, there are still more questions I have to start asking myself about him before anything starts to get too serious. Does he have manners? Does me make me laugh? Is he well-read? Does he follow the news? Is he a quick thinker? Can he go punch for punch with me in the insult department? Can he beat me at pool? Does he dress well? etc... there are many things I wonder about him and these things will reveal themselves as we go on more dates.

You know what I forgot to mention in there? The question for the ages: is he interested in me? I think it gets answered in the phone number exchange part of the conversation. If he doesn't want to give me his number I can just tell myself that it's because I got drunk and embarrassed myself. It's probably not far from the truth.

I just noticed that I really am rambling right now which I chock up to it being 5 in the morning and me being tired as fuck. I don't know what got into me just then. I can't keep my eyes open and should have gone to bed an hour ago. Eh, oh well. You know what I should have done is tried to snag dunx back when he was single instead of just getting him to be the best friend I've ever had in my life. That boy is sex on legs; sometimes I think it shouldn't be legal for him to walk around with his shirt off in those green cut-off shorts he has. It's almost pornographic, the way he stands with his weight on one leg and his hip out to the side, water from his hair dripping down onto his back, glistening on his well-defined muscles... er, I mean... what was I saying? Oh yeah, dunx is really beautiful. I'm so glad my best friend is a fuckin' hottie. It makes my life a lot better because I get to look at a hot person a lot rather than a just so-so person. I'd still like him just as much were he not as hot, but I'm glad he is as hot as he is because man, is he nice to look at. But back to our imaginary relationship that would have happened like a year and a half ago. We probably would have had a really ugly breakup, and never spoken to each other again, but at least I would have gotten to tap that fine ass of his, like, every day. You know, though, I'm glad things turned out this way because I really wouldn't trade his friendship or any fraction thereof for the world. If you see him, pass on a kiss from me.

What a weird journal entry. I'm going to bed now, dammit. My eyes are going to close and stay closed, and it's going to feel like sex.

Here's my question for you guys: who is the hottest person you've ever had a sexual experiecnce with? By this I mean makeouts, oral, intercourse, etc... You get the idea.

This is to complement my last entry. If you want to know what I did this last weekend, go look at Luminaire's entry about it.

So I saw Batman Begins, right? I saw it a couple of times. Ever since seeing American Psycho so long ago I've wanted to do Christian Bale hard. Batman only served to reinforce my desire. This isn't some sort of intimacy thing. This is me seeing someone (um, Bruce Wayne, not really Christian Bale {per say, so to speak}) who is hot, rich, smart, strong, powerful, caring and compassionate and a very primative part of my brain going, "THIS MAN HOLDS WITHIN HIM SUPERIOR GENETIC STOCK. HE IS A PRIME CANDIDATE FOR REPRODUCTION. IF YOU WISH TO ENSURE THE SURVIVAL OF YOUR OWN DNA YOU MUST GET HIM TO FATHER AS MANY OF YOUR OFFSPRING AS POSSIBLE. MATE WITH HIM NOW." It's actually a very nice feeling. Christian Bale's Bruce Wayne could buy a hotel and do me in the heart-shaped hot tub in the honeymoon suite any time he wanted. And then we'd get room service. And he would bring me ice for the bruises on my face. And he would apologize for squeezing my wrists so hard. And he would cuddle with me and kiss my head and feed me whatever we got from room service. There would also be cocktail sauce.

It's been a strange couple of weeks. Things are changing. I want to get out of Portland. I want to get a job with benefits and where I get to do something that interests me, not just something that's convenient. I applied to work at the NSA doing cryptanalysis or math, but I don't think they'll hire me to do math because I haven't gone to graduate school. I want to work for the NSA so hard. I don't care if I'd have to move to MD. I'd get to work for the NSA, and it would be worth it. Knowing my luck they probably won't want to hire me, though.

Eh, such is life.

My brother wants me to move to NC with him, but I don't know. It'd be fun to live with him but then I'd be living in NC and I don't know how much I'd like that. He says Durham is cool, but I'd probably be just as miserable there as here.

I wanted to be a historian. It's funny how things work out.

I can't sleep again.

I think I've written about this before.

I think it's strange how once you start having sex with someone, there are things you can't talk about to them. We think it doesn't happen, but it does. Certain things become taboo. I can't put my finger on what they are, but fucking someone definitely creates some sort of divide between the two of you. I guess it's weird to me, especially because... well... I don't fuck on the first date. That's not to say I won't. It's not like it's some set in stone rule I have for myself, but frankly, if all we've done is had a first date, I'm probably just not interested in fucking you. It's not that you're not physically attractive, but until I know you I probably will not want to fuck you. A person isn't fuck-worthy to me until I get to know them a bit. If I want physical pleasure I can get that from myself. For me, fucking isn't just about physical pleasure. It's about intimacy, it's about being close to someone, physically and mentally. Haha, no, I'm not really one of those jr.-high-dance-make-sweet-love type of people, if that's what you're thinking. It's that being physically close to someone is not interesting or very pleasurable for me unless I'm close to them mentally, and that's not exactly something that happens that often. So like I said, maybe I'd fuck on the first date, but you'd have to be goddamn charming and reveal a lot about yourself and have me like it to get me to want to open up to you. It's happened before. This is why it's weird to me that fucking someone creates separation.

If ever I find a man with whom this doesn't happen, that will be the man I want to marry. I just hope he wants to marry me back, and isn't one of those "confirmed bachelors" or something.

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Unrelatedly and somewhat confidentially: next time, I swear.

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and: it's okay, do what you need to do.

Anyone with prescription pain killers, please send them my way.

I'm so sick of everything.

I think I'm just going to sleep today.

I don't know if I have it in me to be friends with anyone who breaks my best friend's heart. If his heart breaks, my heart breaks. There's no way around it. When I look at you, all I can see is his sadness, and all I think about is how his sadness is because of you and you alone. It's your fault he hurts, and when he hurts, I hurt.

Life is pain, highness.

So, these last few days haven't been quite as exciting as the last time dunx's girlfriend left town, but last night was pretty fun. Dunx and I went to the bar twice, the second time meeting up with soph and playing some pool over some drinks. The rest of the night is kind of a blur, but I think there was a drunken physical altercation that resulted in my neck turning into a giant bruise due to an extended headlock. But I don't know. It could have been anything, really. Aliens, maybe.

Speaking of aliens, I think I really want to work for DARPA but I think I would have had to go into the military right after high school (yeah, I thought about it for a while...) and I'm really glad I didn't because about a year after I would have started this whole "Iraq" thing happened, and I'd probably be dead by now. So. Now comes the part where I try to figure out how to get a job with DARPA without having been in the military. I'll probably have better luck getting a job with someone who just does contracts for them, I suppose. My dad is always trying to get me to work for the government for some reason. I should tell him that if he can figure out a way I can work for the DoD with just a BA in math, I'll do it.

I'm tired.

While I wait for the shower to get warm, I thought I'd share something with you.

I've watched a lot of X-Files. There's an episode in season 7 called Hollywood A.D. that's particularly good, and there's a part of it that's about zombies. At once point, Mulder espouses a theory he has about zombies to Scully, which goes a little something like this:

When they come back from the dead, the undead just want to do everything that they loved to do while they were alive. This is why zombies are always trying to eat people, but they have other plans too, we just kill them before they can move on.

First they're going to eat, then they're going to drink, then they're going to dance, and then they're going to make love.

The same can be said for any time you come back from a period of extreme dispair. Except replace "dance" with "play pool" and that's more like what happens to me.