I don't know where you suckers were Tuesday night, but I was here:
((stupid blank space))
Okay, if I'm going to copy (aka homage) my previous post of Sept 2007, I should have pictures... but I don't. So I'll let my words paint them for you.
On what would have been pretty close to a one year anniversary with Megadeth girl (aka Greta), I returned to the Moore to see Lindsey Buckingham and it ruled. I caught no guitar picks, he's too fast for that, got no fucking idiot's blood smeared on my arm (there are no fights at Lindsey Buckingham), and drank no scotch. However, I was with a cute girly girl (who, I guess by precedent becomes Buckingham girl) and we had her uncle's spicy home made sausages before we journeyed out. It wasn't her suggestion, or a first date. She didn't have a picture taking cell phone.
I guess the venue was about the only thing that was the same.
Lindsey Buckingham is the ex-lead guitarist for Fleetwood Mac. Now, some of you might be thinking "what the fuck?" and I couldn't blame you. Here's the deal: Lindsey Buckingham is one of the top 5 most underrated rock guitarists on the planet. Lindsey Buckingham uses a finger picking style and a normal rock and roll style, effortlessly. He is mighty and he is fast. Go youTube his acoustic version of "Big Love" if you doubt me. I'll wait.
He came out with three other guys and they did a rock set which wound up to the most kick-ass version of Fleetwood Mac's "Tusk" I had ever heard. It ruled. He then did an acoustic set including the aforementioned "Big Love" and my favorite song off the old Rumors album, "Never Going Back Again. Okay, maybe second favorite after "Chain."
It also ruled.
They finished with a rock set and tacked on a three song encore. Then Buckingham came back out and did a one song, acoustic encore. Which was okay.
This summer I saw Mark Knopfler. Formally of Dire Straits, Mark Knopfler is also a kick-ass, underrated guitarist. One of my favs and a great concert. Buckingham put on a better show. Knopfler had one super-deluxe masterpiece, which was an extended version of "Speedway at Nazareth." Point Knopfler. Knopfler, however, felt a little short and was a little sloppy with his finger work here and there.
Both concerts were highlights of the year, however. I have to say, as delicately as possible, that Knopfler was really the last fun time that Megadeth girl and I had; it holds a special place as an experience. We had a great picnic; it rained a wonderful light, warm rain; and the night ended with that spectacular lightning storm. Not to be too maudlin, it basically boils down to whatever she may have already plotting, it was the last time I felt secure and wanted in the relationship.
Buckingham will be remembered, too, for a wonderful not quite first date with Buckingham girl. And those fast, fast, picking fingers.
In case you think it's all rock concerts, scotch, and porn (or in this case, rock concerts and porn), I did spend the previous weekend playing in a D&D adventure, super hero adventure, poker tourney, board games, rpg Lost adventure, sang "Black Hole Sun" on Rock Band, and went to a tango lession with Buckingham girl (before she became Buckingham girl... but calling her Korean bbq girl would sound kind of weird. As would most of the other things we did up until that point (although Tropic Thunder girl actually sounds okay).) Sunday I watched the Seahawks and did not practice with my flag football team, as I did not join one this year.
Until tonight, when one called me out of the blue.
So, for the second year in a row: fuck you, presumptions. Fuck you right in the ear.
((stupid blank space))
Okay, if I'm going to copy (aka homage) my previous post of Sept 2007, I should have pictures... but I don't. So I'll let my words paint them for you.
On what would have been pretty close to a one year anniversary with Megadeth girl (aka Greta), I returned to the Moore to see Lindsey Buckingham and it ruled. I caught no guitar picks, he's too fast for that, got no fucking idiot's blood smeared on my arm (there are no fights at Lindsey Buckingham), and drank no scotch. However, I was with a cute girly girl (who, I guess by precedent becomes Buckingham girl) and we had her uncle's spicy home made sausages before we journeyed out. It wasn't her suggestion, or a first date. She didn't have a picture taking cell phone.
I guess the venue was about the only thing that was the same.
Lindsey Buckingham is the ex-lead guitarist for Fleetwood Mac. Now, some of you might be thinking "what the fuck?" and I couldn't blame you. Here's the deal: Lindsey Buckingham is one of the top 5 most underrated rock guitarists on the planet. Lindsey Buckingham uses a finger picking style and a normal rock and roll style, effortlessly. He is mighty and he is fast. Go youTube his acoustic version of "Big Love" if you doubt me. I'll wait.
He came out with three other guys and they did a rock set which wound up to the most kick-ass version of Fleetwood Mac's "Tusk" I had ever heard. It ruled. He then did an acoustic set including the aforementioned "Big Love" and my favorite song off the old Rumors album, "Never Going Back Again. Okay, maybe second favorite after "Chain."
It also ruled.
They finished with a rock set and tacked on a three song encore. Then Buckingham came back out and did a one song, acoustic encore. Which was okay.
This summer I saw Mark Knopfler. Formally of Dire Straits, Mark Knopfler is also a kick-ass, underrated guitarist. One of my favs and a great concert. Buckingham put on a better show. Knopfler had one super-deluxe masterpiece, which was an extended version of "Speedway at Nazareth." Point Knopfler. Knopfler, however, felt a little short and was a little sloppy with his finger work here and there.
Both concerts were highlights of the year, however. I have to say, as delicately as possible, that Knopfler was really the last fun time that Megadeth girl and I had; it holds a special place as an experience. We had a great picnic; it rained a wonderful light, warm rain; and the night ended with that spectacular lightning storm. Not to be too maudlin, it basically boils down to whatever she may have already plotting, it was the last time I felt secure and wanted in the relationship.
Buckingham will be remembered, too, for a wonderful not quite first date with Buckingham girl. And those fast, fast, picking fingers.
In case you think it's all rock concerts, scotch, and porn (or in this case, rock concerts and porn), I did spend the previous weekend playing in a D&D adventure, super hero adventure, poker tourney, board games, rpg Lost adventure, sang "Black Hole Sun" on Rock Band, and went to a tango lession with Buckingham girl (before she became Buckingham girl... but calling her Korean bbq girl would sound kind of weird. As would most of the other things we did up until that point (although Tropic Thunder girl actually sounds okay).) Sunday I watched the Seahawks and did not practice with my flag football team, as I did not join one this year.
Until tonight, when one called me out of the blue.
So, for the second year in a row: fuck you, presumptions. Fuck you right in the ear.
If there's one thing I write less about online than my relationships, it's follow-ups to events I write about online. That said, context is one entry back.
When I was younger there were a lot of things that made me cranky; like most guys, I guess. As I've gotten older, many of the old passions have faded or been accepted and the list of what really gets under my skin gets shorter. Unfortunately, most of the list revolves around ways I deal with relationship issues, friends, girlfriends, that kind of thing, but the overall picture is usually pretty good.
Did I mention how much I hate waiting?
When I was young, nine or ten, seven or eight, my mom announced she was taking me and my younger sister to Disneyland. We lived in Washington State and the last time I had been to Disneyland was when I was in my mother's womb, right before I was born in Santa Cruz. Going to Disneyland was a BIG DEAL back then. This was the early 70s, before super-hype and package deals on television and Pirates moves and all that other crap that came post Star Wars.
We were poor. Not the cute kind of sir may I have another poor or living in a shelter poor, but that kind of lower class working poor that means you have somewhere warm to sleep and a TV, but, out of necessity your mom keeps a garden, your dad keeps rabbits (the kind you don't grow attached to) and occasionally you eat pancakes for dinner because all that's left in the cupboard before Friday is Bisquick and an old crusty bottle of Log Cabin.
We were riding a jet plane to California to go to Disneyland. And it was a month or so away.
After the first couple nights of breathless anticipation, I did at nine, seven, or eight, something that would affect my life in a profound and permanent way; I stopped being excited. The anticipation was so great I made a willing and conscious decision to stuff the excitement back into me, pretend nothing unusual was going on, and deal with it the day of the trip (at the earliest.)
Now, fortunately, this odd little habit, while it did continue until, well, now, didn't do too much damage to my psyche; but what damage it did was sharp, acute, and cannot be ignored. I opened up on the plane and had a great and wonderful time, fully basking in the glory of the Pirates ride, hotel hedge animals, and the awesome Haunted Mansion.
Let me be clear, about the words I'm using, the semantics, of what I mean here. Anticipation, (thanks to that night, that shining beacon of reason) for me, is a great and glorious thing; it is attached to a positive force or event, something I want and look forward to, that I have a specific time-frame of reference. Anticipating is a great movie, dinner, or roller-coaster ride that you know you're taking, eating, watching, and the worst that can reasonably happen is it not living up to your expectations. You can choose when to become excited, and, to a degree, how excited you get.
I still measure my anticipation, still make sure I'm closer to the event before I let it escape... but I still get excited about things and still love anticipating.
Waiting is everything else. Waiting is the two weeks before, when you don't the means to speed up time and something could go wrong. Waiting is also being in a situation where the pace or control or even ultimate resolution, is out of your hands.
If I was in the trenches, World War I style, waiting to jump up into Turkish gattling gun batteries or German mustard gas clouds, I would not be anticipating the charge; the run to death. I would be waiting for it.
Waiting, is the most and awfulist destructive force in my universe; in a world where anticipation is G*d, waiting is the beast with a thousand faces, the fallen angel named Lucifer, a gigantic waste of fucking time and the aforementioned G*d's gift of precious life.
Did I mention that Robert E. Lee (who I may be distantly related to) had a general, named Longstreet; a great bearded man. Longstreet created trench warfare, during the Civil War, if I remember correctly, and it was still considered modern 40 odd years later when the Great War happened. People disconnect the two wars, maybe just because of the mark of the turn of the century; but, in reality, the wars were pretty closely linked in a day where we didn't have 200 channels and the internet to occupy our (short) attention spans.
Anticipation is a gift, a spectacular present. Few things live up to the anticipation, but occasionally, something surpassed it. And while failed expectations can leave me a little bitter or sad, I take heart in knowing that the anticipation was part of the fun, leading up to whatever it was I was anticipating.
Waiting is to anticipation, as depression is to love's first kiss.
Waiting is what we do in banks, and DMV lines, in traffic, on roads. Waiting is what's attached to test results, operations, autopsy findings. Waiting perches on your shoulder, hind claws sunk in, while it slowly picks at that scab on your spine until your vision blurs and your fingers feel fat and tingly.
I stand by the road, waiting.
Waiting clouds judgment, revels in, breeds, feeds, and grows destructiveness. Waiting forces hands, that are rationally trying to anticipate something, anything, to get to sleep at night, to try and wake up with a positive spin, as if nothing is happening; it forces hands to choke the life out of causes, to reach a quick... any... conclusion, or resolution, no matter how thoughtless or damaging in "the overall picture". It's a matter of self-preservation.
Waiting is what you do in bed, alone at night, for someone to come home or when you're nine and you can't fly a plane or really even tell time very well and every hour feels like two weeks and two weeks is so unimaginable that you think it hasn't been invented yet. Waiting creates hands on her body a thousand miles away, hot breath in her ear powered from unfaithful hearts.
Anticipation is what you do on the plane, moments before the wheels lift off and you rise into the sky for the first time in your life, three hours away from the happiest place on earth.
Waiting is walking into a cold basement hoping that you can grab a jar of pickles or peaches before whoever it is standing in the cobwebs and shadows, pulls free with a rasping chuckle.
Trying to destroy waiting is like taking anger by the lapels and kicking it square in the nuts. Anger likes that, because anger wears a cup and kicking anger in the balls just makes it more angry. Once waiting perches, once it starts scratching, all you can do is try not to think about the warm blood running down the curve of your tightened spine and hope it finishes before you go blind. The only thing that kills waiting is resolution and waiting's sole, soul sucking ass-fuck is to push resolution back down the stairs and often and as long as possible.
No part of waiting is constructive. Waiting is selfish, waiting is power run amuck. Waiting is what happens when careful thought meets with self-absorption. The most positive thing you can say about waiting is it is a result of either incompetence or revenge. When Tom Sizemore stands ground in Blackhawk Down as bullets bounce around him and says "Nothing takes five minutes", waiting says "fuck you, I determine what takes five minutes... actually, fuck you, I determine how long five minutes is."
He wasn't anticipating being shot. He was waiting for it.
While waiting can produce positive news, a good grade, forward movement, it comes only as a relief or in reflection of the darkest alternative not met. Waiting produces the kind of happiness that's really just mislabeled ease at something not being as painful as you thought. Waiting rooms are places where people go to learn if someone has died, either by accident, murder, or the very risky proposition of childbirth.
Take heart, I really hate being late, too, though I have been guilty of it.
I'll let you figure out how patience works into all this. But when the problems of two people are waiting on one of them, patience can go fuck itself. You know what else can go fuck itself? The argument of personal choice. And, don't get me wrong, I'm a firm believer in personal choice. That's one of the paramount goals of being a grown-up. I chose bad behavior that was based on bad behavior. I own that, with big open eyes. I chose to walk the lower path, hand in hand, instead of climbing to a higher place and pulling her up into warm, loving arms, anticipating love's first kiss.
But, you know what? Fuck personal choice. Only two people can resolve the problems between two people. One person thinking they can resolve the problem themselves is as fucked as the other person making the choice to quit waiting and walk away. Cowards all, and that's not a lower path I'm as comfortable on.
Waiting is primal, waiting is a wolf howl at the moon, the belief in a made-up G*d or a mouse with big ears and a cartoon laugh. It's punching a sleeping dog. It's one person telling another that I can make life or death decisions in moments every day of the week, but for you, I'm going to take my time; for you, I'm going to extract a little flesh, a little blood. For you, I'm going to pretend the extra time is a measure of importance... but don't worry, you still won't have to worry about participation.
Waiting wears me down, day after day, even though I try to be distracted by sunshine and life. Eventually, waiting makes me want to write follow-ups at 1 o'clock in the morning. It makes me hope someone reads it, and I hate it when people write things hoping someone will see it. It makes me want to purge, not more physical vomit because there's none of that left, but mental anguish for no good cause, no good result. It makes me hope I'll feel right in the morning, but deep down I know I won't. I don't anticipate the morning.
Now you know my dilemma, the one I've had since nine, or eight or seven. I wasn't mad at Disneyland for taking so long to get there, I wasn't mad at my mother for telling me so far in advance.
But the road to resolution was clear, there, then. I wasn't waiting on it as much as I was anticipating where it lead.
When I was younger there were a lot of things that made me cranky; like most guys, I guess. As I've gotten older, many of the old passions have faded or been accepted and the list of what really gets under my skin gets shorter. Unfortunately, most of the list revolves around ways I deal with relationship issues, friends, girlfriends, that kind of thing, but the overall picture is usually pretty good.
Did I mention how much I hate waiting?
When I was young, nine or ten, seven or eight, my mom announced she was taking me and my younger sister to Disneyland. We lived in Washington State and the last time I had been to Disneyland was when I was in my mother's womb, right before I was born in Santa Cruz. Going to Disneyland was a BIG DEAL back then. This was the early 70s, before super-hype and package deals on television and Pirates moves and all that other crap that came post Star Wars.
We were poor. Not the cute kind of sir may I have another poor or living in a shelter poor, but that kind of lower class working poor that means you have somewhere warm to sleep and a TV, but, out of necessity your mom keeps a garden, your dad keeps rabbits (the kind you don't grow attached to) and occasionally you eat pancakes for dinner because all that's left in the cupboard before Friday is Bisquick and an old crusty bottle of Log Cabin.
We were riding a jet plane to California to go to Disneyland. And it was a month or so away.
After the first couple nights of breathless anticipation, I did at nine, seven, or eight, something that would affect my life in a profound and permanent way; I stopped being excited. The anticipation was so great I made a willing and conscious decision to stuff the excitement back into me, pretend nothing unusual was going on, and deal with it the day of the trip (at the earliest.)
Now, fortunately, this odd little habit, while it did continue until, well, now, didn't do too much damage to my psyche; but what damage it did was sharp, acute, and cannot be ignored. I opened up on the plane and had a great and wonderful time, fully basking in the glory of the Pirates ride, hotel hedge animals, and the awesome Haunted Mansion.
Let me be clear, about the words I'm using, the semantics, of what I mean here. Anticipation, (thanks to that night, that shining beacon of reason) for me, is a great and glorious thing; it is attached to a positive force or event, something I want and look forward to, that I have a specific time-frame of reference. Anticipating is a great movie, dinner, or roller-coaster ride that you know you're taking, eating, watching, and the worst that can reasonably happen is it not living up to your expectations. You can choose when to become excited, and, to a degree, how excited you get.
I still measure my anticipation, still make sure I'm closer to the event before I let it escape... but I still get excited about things and still love anticipating.
Waiting is everything else. Waiting is the two weeks before, when you don't the means to speed up time and something could go wrong. Waiting is also being in a situation where the pace or control or even ultimate resolution, is out of your hands.
If I was in the trenches, World War I style, waiting to jump up into Turkish gattling gun batteries or German mustard gas clouds, I would not be anticipating the charge; the run to death. I would be waiting for it.
Waiting, is the most and awfulist destructive force in my universe; in a world where anticipation is G*d, waiting is the beast with a thousand faces, the fallen angel named Lucifer, a gigantic waste of fucking time and the aforementioned G*d's gift of precious life.
Did I mention that Robert E. Lee (who I may be distantly related to) had a general, named Longstreet; a great bearded man. Longstreet created trench warfare, during the Civil War, if I remember correctly, and it was still considered modern 40 odd years later when the Great War happened. People disconnect the two wars, maybe just because of the mark of the turn of the century; but, in reality, the wars were pretty closely linked in a day where we didn't have 200 channels and the internet to occupy our (short) attention spans.
Anticipation is a gift, a spectacular present. Few things live up to the anticipation, but occasionally, something surpassed it. And while failed expectations can leave me a little bitter or sad, I take heart in knowing that the anticipation was part of the fun, leading up to whatever it was I was anticipating.
Waiting is to anticipation, as depression is to love's first kiss.
Waiting is what we do in banks, and DMV lines, in traffic, on roads. Waiting is what's attached to test results, operations, autopsy findings. Waiting perches on your shoulder, hind claws sunk in, while it slowly picks at that scab on your spine until your vision blurs and your fingers feel fat and tingly.
I stand by the road, waiting.
Waiting clouds judgment, revels in, breeds, feeds, and grows destructiveness. Waiting forces hands, that are rationally trying to anticipate something, anything, to get to sleep at night, to try and wake up with a positive spin, as if nothing is happening; it forces hands to choke the life out of causes, to reach a quick... any... conclusion, or resolution, no matter how thoughtless or damaging in "the overall picture". It's a matter of self-preservation.
Waiting is what you do in bed, alone at night, for someone to come home or when you're nine and you can't fly a plane or really even tell time very well and every hour feels like two weeks and two weeks is so unimaginable that you think it hasn't been invented yet. Waiting creates hands on her body a thousand miles away, hot breath in her ear powered from unfaithful hearts.
Anticipation is what you do on the plane, moments before the wheels lift off and you rise into the sky for the first time in your life, three hours away from the happiest place on earth.
Waiting is walking into a cold basement hoping that you can grab a jar of pickles or peaches before whoever it is standing in the cobwebs and shadows, pulls free with a rasping chuckle.
Trying to destroy waiting is like taking anger by the lapels and kicking it square in the nuts. Anger likes that, because anger wears a cup and kicking anger in the balls just makes it more angry. Once waiting perches, once it starts scratching, all you can do is try not to think about the warm blood running down the curve of your tightened spine and hope it finishes before you go blind. The only thing that kills waiting is resolution and waiting's sole, soul sucking ass-fuck is to push resolution back down the stairs and often and as long as possible.
No part of waiting is constructive. Waiting is selfish, waiting is power run amuck. Waiting is what happens when careful thought meets with self-absorption. The most positive thing you can say about waiting is it is a result of either incompetence or revenge. When Tom Sizemore stands ground in Blackhawk Down as bullets bounce around him and says "Nothing takes five minutes", waiting says "fuck you, I determine what takes five minutes... actually, fuck you, I determine how long five minutes is."
He wasn't anticipating being shot. He was waiting for it.
While waiting can produce positive news, a good grade, forward movement, it comes only as a relief or in reflection of the darkest alternative not met. Waiting produces the kind of happiness that's really just mislabeled ease at something not being as painful as you thought. Waiting rooms are places where people go to learn if someone has died, either by accident, murder, or the very risky proposition of childbirth.
Take heart, I really hate being late, too, though I have been guilty of it.
I'll let you figure out how patience works into all this. But when the problems of two people are waiting on one of them, patience can go fuck itself. You know what else can go fuck itself? The argument of personal choice. And, don't get me wrong, I'm a firm believer in personal choice. That's one of the paramount goals of being a grown-up. I chose bad behavior that was based on bad behavior. I own that, with big open eyes. I chose to walk the lower path, hand in hand, instead of climbing to a higher place and pulling her up into warm, loving arms, anticipating love's first kiss.
But, you know what? Fuck personal choice. Only two people can resolve the problems between two people. One person thinking they can resolve the problem themselves is as fucked as the other person making the choice to quit waiting and walk away. Cowards all, and that's not a lower path I'm as comfortable on.
Waiting is primal, waiting is a wolf howl at the moon, the belief in a made-up G*d or a mouse with big ears and a cartoon laugh. It's punching a sleeping dog. It's one person telling another that I can make life or death decisions in moments every day of the week, but for you, I'm going to take my time; for you, I'm going to extract a little flesh, a little blood. For you, I'm going to pretend the extra time is a measure of importance... but don't worry, you still won't have to worry about participation.
Waiting wears me down, day after day, even though I try to be distracted by sunshine and life. Eventually, waiting makes me want to write follow-ups at 1 o'clock in the morning. It makes me hope someone reads it, and I hate it when people write things hoping someone will see it. It makes me want to purge, not more physical vomit because there's none of that left, but mental anguish for no good cause, no good result. It makes me hope I'll feel right in the morning, but deep down I know I won't. I don't anticipate the morning.
Now you know my dilemma, the one I've had since nine, or eight or seven. I wasn't mad at Disneyland for taking so long to get there, I wasn't mad at my mother for telling me so far in advance.
But the road to resolution was clear, there, then. I wasn't waiting on it as much as I was anticipating where it lead.
I don't write about my dating life that much. It's a combination of not wanting to sound like every other whiner on the net, but, in reality, I don't really date that much. I don't date because I'm not really a master pick-up artist, and I don't get out enough to meet people the un-pick-up way. Getting older doesn't help, of course, as most of my friends are married, etc.
I met a very nice girl (woman) sometime last fall, and, like usual, I did find a way to mess things up. Oh, don't worry, I know how ... this isn't some random teen angst filled lecture on how women don't understand them or they don't understand women or wondering what they did wrong or blah, blah, blah. We broke up because I broke up with her.
Greta (not her real name ... while most people write revealing relationship blogs in hopes their jilted lover will read them and it leads to reconciliation, I'm man enough to say these things directly to her ... though a little more diplomatically, of course. So, if she does stumble across this, hopefully any embarrassment she might feel is tempered by a pseudonym. Yes, I know without a last name or my full name or whatever it would be really, really hard to know who I'm talking about, but just in case, Greta it is.) has a great sense of humor, plus a good heart. She is smart, cute, giving. She is one of, if not the most, easiest girl to get along with I've ever dated. A lot of very nice things; let that not be understated.
Oh, don't worry, I know the bad, too.
Our income levels are very, very different (she's quite well off.) This, I admit, bothers me a little; I'm a little old-fashioned. It bothers her, too. She's also a little old fashioned. This spills over into some related categories that make us both have trouble picturing the long term (for example, she wouldn't ever move out of her very nice house and I don't know how I would feel a sense of ownership in her and her ex-husband's very nice house.)
Speaking of spill over, she values career as much as personal relationships (in the past, more.) I've lived my whole life looking out for friends and family, sometimes over career. Of my core group of friends and family, no career I could ever love would be worth any one of them. Careers are something you do to get money and the only reason you need money is to buy food and shelter and a bunch of other useless crap you think you need. Like nice houses. But that stuff is important to her and I am not exactly a up trending asset, financial-wise.
As an aside, my friends Steve and Mary actually have a matriarchal household. She makes fat bank, he stays home and cooks, makes homemade bacon, grows fruit, teaches his dog to hunt, all of that. Not a bit old-fashioned. But they are the only friends I have and people I know that work that way.
Greta doesn't ever want another child. That's kind of a wash, as I'm not sure I ever want a child. But that would definitely cinch my decision.
Oh, and of course, there's sex stuff. In totality, I love being naked with her. Touching her, cuddling, sleeping, showering; all that stuff. But, she's pretty conservative, I get bored easy, and, on top of all that, I hadn't had sex in over three years. While my mind is always willing, my up and go isn't so great anymore. Maybe it'll come back, but I am older and I don't want to become reliant on pills (blue or otherwise.) Plus, when I'm over thinking relationships (more on that in a minute), it's hard to muster the proper enthusiasm. I know that has to disappoint her, no matter how many times I can make her orgasm in other non-intercoursey ways. It disappoints me. Ah, sweet shame spiral.
I just realized I'm kind of talking in the present tense, like we're still going out. More on that in a minute, too.
One of the oddest differences, which has been responsible for way more discussion time that it deserves, is that she is a very outgoing, social kind of person. I'm a very homebody, relaxing with friends and watching movies or TV kind of person. We've made this into a big deal and it's not, really. My parents take separate vacations, for example, and have been married for 42 years.
I don't mind going out or being social, usually. I just won't ever decide to do that on my own. Plus, her ex-husband was completely co-dependent (no friends, clingy, the whole bit.) While she's worried about how we'll spend our free time (in the long term), she's hitting me on the other side about being worried we'll spend too much time together or I'll be clingy. In truth, I would be okay with two or three nights a week of mutual activities even if we lived together, provided I got to cuddle up to her soft, sexy self every night. It's up to her to figure out how many of these so called social activities she wants me at and how many episodes of Lost she's willing to watch; but I'm about done dealing with it in the abstract. She might also want to not anticipate what I do and don't like, but we all do a little of that.
Did I mention she kind of sucks at this, too? Relationships, I mean. Did I mention the co-dependent ex-husband, who, whether she believes it or not, must have cheated on her during the last part of their (long) marriage, with a certainly that approaches scientific fact. Absolute fact emotionally, And no man with that much emotional attachment to someone can resist trying to fuck them. She put a lot of work into a lost cause, while he set the groundwork for his next marriage. Now, she had a clue, as he left a previous relationship to go directing into hers, so I can't feel completely bad; but it still sucks.
Anyway.
Her next boyfriend (the one before me) also pretty much cheated on her, but he had the decency to tell her as he was doing it. She slipped into stupid vulnerable girl mode (very, very rare for her, trust me) and excused his behavior for way too long. Along with a couple of other decisions I won't go into (even vaguely), her skills at this kinda worries me. I've made bad decisions, too, (more on that in a minute), but she doesn't seem to be aware of them, much less own them.
Anyway.
Then there's me. My main crime was being further along, emotional-wise, than her (which drove me to a greater crime, which I'll get to in a minute.) Further along means, say, if we were walking along a road .. not a post-meteor strike road like the one in Cormac McCarthy's The Road (though, I guess they're both love stories) .. but some kind of nice country road with lots of cool scenery; if we were walking along that road, through that country ... I'm about a mile out ahead. She's sort of meandering (which is a euphemism for her not being sure what she wants in a relationship/has set her standards unrealistically).
This isn't an aside about how I should treat her worse, like her ex's did, so she'll love me more. You outgrow that bullshit when you start dating women who have spines and are confident in their (well-paying) careers. The meanest thing I've ever done to her is doubt her.
Our lists of things we want in a relationship don't match up (they never do, perfectly) but I can't help that. To her credit, she's been re-examining her list, based on how I've treated her and what she likes about us; that, in turn, has helped my loosen up my list in ways I didn't know was tight. But, like all guys, no matter how patient, I'm impatient.
We've come to the crux. Greta is secretive. Actually, secretive is a little strong. But private isn't strong enough. She does little, fairly harmless things such as "I need to go a store and see if they have something and if they don't, I need to go somewhere else." (a nearly verbatim quote), instead of just saying "I need to get a handbag at Pennys. If they don't have one I like, I need to go to Macys."
Seems harmless, but it's not, in two ways. One, she's (by her own admittance) deciding what I think will be boring or not and what I thinks is important or not. All it really does is make me ask her more specific details (since I'm the only one that can determine what I think is boring or important), thus doubling the length of day to day filler chatter or making something important seem like she's hiding something.
Secondly, and more importantly, she uses one of my pet peeve concepts: she is willing to answer any questions I ask. Sounds great on first glance, right? It's not. It's a free pass to not tell me something, then fall back on "you should have asked me about that" or "you never asked." It's the concept of people either unwilling to unable to use simple common sense to determine what might be important to a relationship or conversation ... worst case, to hide things in their past that they are embarrassed about (such as an aforementioned unmentioned bad decisions, which I had to drag out of her and still haven't gotten the whole story ... "Was it orange?" "Yes." "Did it have claws?" "Yes." "Does it bark?" "No." "Is it a cat?" "Yes." "What was its name?" "First or last?") See how tedious that gets?
I am not a jealous guy, seriously. I do, however, need to think I know the truth. Yes, I used the word think on purpose. I don't really care if it is the truth, I just need to think it is.
I have been out with enough women to know what kind of communication doesn't make me crazy and "you can ask me anything", makes me crazy. If I can count on being told in a prompt manner and we had set the rules up in advance (yes, I'm a rules guy, too), she could be getting into all kinds of shenanigans that would drive most other guy's nuts.
So, with this looming secretive posture creeping into my subconscious, I committed a grievous and potentially fatal single sin: I doubted her.
Instead of going through the torturous process of asking her every little detail about my doubts or having her clarify a chunk of things we had argued about and almost broken up over a couple weeks ago… instead of finding creative ways to pull information out or put information in, I doubted.
And stewed.
And over thought.
I imagined, speculated. I took the coward's way out and in a fit of morning sleepiness and thick doubt, I looked in something I shouldn't have. I broke a trust, thus losing my ability to call the kettle black.
On top of that stupidity, I did it badly. I used the information incorrectly, I misunderstood it. It set fire to the fears that were already there, causing a quick, burning anger. That lead to a hastily planned break-up (sorry, I don't have the energy to come up with a fire related break-up analogy), which was executed clumsily. Even as we talked about some of the things we should have been talking about, I was still convinced I was doing the right thing.
I also made another decision ... I didn't fess up what instigated my anger. After all, the ideas where already in my head, the new information (I thought) confirmed them, and that was that. Discussing the source of the information would have turned the discussion into the source of the information, instead of the core problems already floating around.
Obviously that was another layer of dishonesty on my part, which I had no intention of trying to cover up further past the point of her asking me about it. "Did you get this information from 'X'?" "Yes." I fessed up immediately.
Ironically, I just realized I (unintentionally) used her own philosophy against her. She had to ask anything she wanted and then I told her. She was pretty pissed, though, so I guess I don't fully understand the core concept.
That snide aside isn't trying to deflect what I did. I did something wrong. I felt bad, and on top of that, as I felt bad, as I realized I had overreacted, as she informed me of how wrongly I had interpreted the information I stole, as all that happened ... I came to the conclusion I had made a mistake. I'm way up the road, remember ... what the fuck am I doing running off to hide in the grass? If she doesn't want to catch-up eventually, then she needs to pull the plug (also not interested in finding a proper road ending analogy). Yeah, it means I'll be further up the road and it will be really, really painful when she does it ... but maybe she'll catch up or maybe I'll slow down or maybe the things that bother me will slow me up enough for her to meet me on equal ground, and maybe, maybe the road will end naturally, at a cute little (very nice) B&B, with tasty waffles and home smoked bacon.
But I broke up with her.
And, despite sending a well-crafted, clever and humble email asking for forgiveness, it's in her hands now. As I knew it would be, the source of the information is now the issue, not the underlying problems (which does not fill me with a happy "I told you so" feeling.) Don't get me wrong, the problems are still there. They aren't going to magically disappear if she decides to get back together ... but they can be dealt with, as they come up.
The mistrust issues have to go away, obviously, on both sides. It is a cancer (a road cancer, fuck you, analogies) that leads back to her mistrust, or my doubt. And, being a grown-up, I can't use her secretive nature as my excuse. I can't compare myself to her past relationships and try to point out the ways I didn't cheat on her or treat her badly.
I just have to wait. In the road.
And two-thousand and four hundred words later, you realize why I don't write about dating very often.
I met a very nice girl (woman) sometime last fall, and, like usual, I did find a way to mess things up. Oh, don't worry, I know how ... this isn't some random teen angst filled lecture on how women don't understand them or they don't understand women or wondering what they did wrong or blah, blah, blah. We broke up because I broke up with her.
Greta (not her real name ... while most people write revealing relationship blogs in hopes their jilted lover will read them and it leads to reconciliation, I'm man enough to say these things directly to her ... though a little more diplomatically, of course. So, if she does stumble across this, hopefully any embarrassment she might feel is tempered by a pseudonym. Yes, I know without a last name or my full name or whatever it would be really, really hard to know who I'm talking about, but just in case, Greta it is.) has a great sense of humor, plus a good heart. She is smart, cute, giving. She is one of, if not the most, easiest girl to get along with I've ever dated. A lot of very nice things; let that not be understated.
Oh, don't worry, I know the bad, too.
Our income levels are very, very different (she's quite well off.) This, I admit, bothers me a little; I'm a little old-fashioned. It bothers her, too. She's also a little old fashioned. This spills over into some related categories that make us both have trouble picturing the long term (for example, she wouldn't ever move out of her very nice house and I don't know how I would feel a sense of ownership in her and her ex-husband's very nice house.)
Speaking of spill over, she values career as much as personal relationships (in the past, more.) I've lived my whole life looking out for friends and family, sometimes over career. Of my core group of friends and family, no career I could ever love would be worth any one of them. Careers are something you do to get money and the only reason you need money is to buy food and shelter and a bunch of other useless crap you think you need. Like nice houses. But that stuff is important to her and I am not exactly a up trending asset, financial-wise.
As an aside, my friends Steve and Mary actually have a matriarchal household. She makes fat bank, he stays home and cooks, makes homemade bacon, grows fruit, teaches his dog to hunt, all of that. Not a bit old-fashioned. But they are the only friends I have and people I know that work that way.
Greta doesn't ever want another child. That's kind of a wash, as I'm not sure I ever want a child. But that would definitely cinch my decision.
Oh, and of course, there's sex stuff. In totality, I love being naked with her. Touching her, cuddling, sleeping, showering; all that stuff. But, she's pretty conservative, I get bored easy, and, on top of all that, I hadn't had sex in over three years. While my mind is always willing, my up and go isn't so great anymore. Maybe it'll come back, but I am older and I don't want to become reliant on pills (blue or otherwise.) Plus, when I'm over thinking relationships (more on that in a minute), it's hard to muster the proper enthusiasm. I know that has to disappoint her, no matter how many times I can make her orgasm in other non-intercoursey ways. It disappoints me. Ah, sweet shame spiral.
I just realized I'm kind of talking in the present tense, like we're still going out. More on that in a minute, too.
One of the oddest differences, which has been responsible for way more discussion time that it deserves, is that she is a very outgoing, social kind of person. I'm a very homebody, relaxing with friends and watching movies or TV kind of person. We've made this into a big deal and it's not, really. My parents take separate vacations, for example, and have been married for 42 years.
I don't mind going out or being social, usually. I just won't ever decide to do that on my own. Plus, her ex-husband was completely co-dependent (no friends, clingy, the whole bit.) While she's worried about how we'll spend our free time (in the long term), she's hitting me on the other side about being worried we'll spend too much time together or I'll be clingy. In truth, I would be okay with two or three nights a week of mutual activities even if we lived together, provided I got to cuddle up to her soft, sexy self every night. It's up to her to figure out how many of these so called social activities she wants me at and how many episodes of Lost she's willing to watch; but I'm about done dealing with it in the abstract. She might also want to not anticipate what I do and don't like, but we all do a little of that.
Did I mention she kind of sucks at this, too? Relationships, I mean. Did I mention the co-dependent ex-husband, who, whether she believes it or not, must have cheated on her during the last part of their (long) marriage, with a certainly that approaches scientific fact. Absolute fact emotionally, And no man with that much emotional attachment to someone can resist trying to fuck them. She put a lot of work into a lost cause, while he set the groundwork for his next marriage. Now, she had a clue, as he left a previous relationship to go directing into hers, so I can't feel completely bad; but it still sucks.
Anyway.
Her next boyfriend (the one before me) also pretty much cheated on her, but he had the decency to tell her as he was doing it. She slipped into stupid vulnerable girl mode (very, very rare for her, trust me) and excused his behavior for way too long. Along with a couple of other decisions I won't go into (even vaguely), her skills at this kinda worries me. I've made bad decisions, too, (more on that in a minute), but she doesn't seem to be aware of them, much less own them.
Anyway.
Then there's me. My main crime was being further along, emotional-wise, than her (which drove me to a greater crime, which I'll get to in a minute.) Further along means, say, if we were walking along a road .. not a post-meteor strike road like the one in Cormac McCarthy's The Road (though, I guess they're both love stories) .. but some kind of nice country road with lots of cool scenery; if we were walking along that road, through that country ... I'm about a mile out ahead. She's sort of meandering (which is a euphemism for her not being sure what she wants in a relationship/has set her standards unrealistically).
This isn't an aside about how I should treat her worse, like her ex's did, so she'll love me more. You outgrow that bullshit when you start dating women who have spines and are confident in their (well-paying) careers. The meanest thing I've ever done to her is doubt her.
Our lists of things we want in a relationship don't match up (they never do, perfectly) but I can't help that. To her credit, she's been re-examining her list, based on how I've treated her and what she likes about us; that, in turn, has helped my loosen up my list in ways I didn't know was tight. But, like all guys, no matter how patient, I'm impatient.
We've come to the crux. Greta is secretive. Actually, secretive is a little strong. But private isn't strong enough. She does little, fairly harmless things such as "I need to go a store and see if they have something and if they don't, I need to go somewhere else." (a nearly verbatim quote), instead of just saying "I need to get a handbag at Pennys. If they don't have one I like, I need to go to Macys."
Seems harmless, but it's not, in two ways. One, she's (by her own admittance) deciding what I think will be boring or not and what I thinks is important or not. All it really does is make me ask her more specific details (since I'm the only one that can determine what I think is boring or important), thus doubling the length of day to day filler chatter or making something important seem like she's hiding something.
Secondly, and more importantly, she uses one of my pet peeve concepts: she is willing to answer any questions I ask. Sounds great on first glance, right? It's not. It's a free pass to not tell me something, then fall back on "you should have asked me about that" or "you never asked." It's the concept of people either unwilling to unable to use simple common sense to determine what might be important to a relationship or conversation ... worst case, to hide things in their past that they are embarrassed about (such as an aforementioned unmentioned bad decisions, which I had to drag out of her and still haven't gotten the whole story ... "Was it orange?" "Yes." "Did it have claws?" "Yes." "Does it bark?" "No." "Is it a cat?" "Yes." "What was its name?" "First or last?") See how tedious that gets?
I am not a jealous guy, seriously. I do, however, need to think I know the truth. Yes, I used the word think on purpose. I don't really care if it is the truth, I just need to think it is.
I have been out with enough women to know what kind of communication doesn't make me crazy and "you can ask me anything", makes me crazy. If I can count on being told in a prompt manner and we had set the rules up in advance (yes, I'm a rules guy, too), she could be getting into all kinds of shenanigans that would drive most other guy's nuts.
So, with this looming secretive posture creeping into my subconscious, I committed a grievous and potentially fatal single sin: I doubted her.
Instead of going through the torturous process of asking her every little detail about my doubts or having her clarify a chunk of things we had argued about and almost broken up over a couple weeks ago… instead of finding creative ways to pull information out or put information in, I doubted.
And stewed.
And over thought.
I imagined, speculated. I took the coward's way out and in a fit of morning sleepiness and thick doubt, I looked in something I shouldn't have. I broke a trust, thus losing my ability to call the kettle black.
On top of that stupidity, I did it badly. I used the information incorrectly, I misunderstood it. It set fire to the fears that were already there, causing a quick, burning anger. That lead to a hastily planned break-up (sorry, I don't have the energy to come up with a fire related break-up analogy), which was executed clumsily. Even as we talked about some of the things we should have been talking about, I was still convinced I was doing the right thing.
I also made another decision ... I didn't fess up what instigated my anger. After all, the ideas where already in my head, the new information (I thought) confirmed them, and that was that. Discussing the source of the information would have turned the discussion into the source of the information, instead of the core problems already floating around.
Obviously that was another layer of dishonesty on my part, which I had no intention of trying to cover up further past the point of her asking me about it. "Did you get this information from 'X'?" "Yes." I fessed up immediately.
Ironically, I just realized I (unintentionally) used her own philosophy against her. She had to ask anything she wanted and then I told her. She was pretty pissed, though, so I guess I don't fully understand the core concept.
That snide aside isn't trying to deflect what I did. I did something wrong. I felt bad, and on top of that, as I felt bad, as I realized I had overreacted, as she informed me of how wrongly I had interpreted the information I stole, as all that happened ... I came to the conclusion I had made a mistake. I'm way up the road, remember ... what the fuck am I doing running off to hide in the grass? If she doesn't want to catch-up eventually, then she needs to pull the plug (also not interested in finding a proper road ending analogy). Yeah, it means I'll be further up the road and it will be really, really painful when she does it ... but maybe she'll catch up or maybe I'll slow down or maybe the things that bother me will slow me up enough for her to meet me on equal ground, and maybe, maybe the road will end naturally, at a cute little (very nice) B&B, with tasty waffles and home smoked bacon.
But I broke up with her.
And, despite sending a well-crafted, clever and humble email asking for forgiveness, it's in her hands now. As I knew it would be, the source of the information is now the issue, not the underlying problems (which does not fill me with a happy "I told you so" feeling.) Don't get me wrong, the problems are still there. They aren't going to magically disappear if she decides to get back together ... but they can be dealt with, as they come up.
The mistrust issues have to go away, obviously, on both sides. It is a cancer (a road cancer, fuck you, analogies) that leads back to her mistrust, or my doubt. And, being a grown-up, I can't use her secretive nature as my excuse. I can't compare myself to her past relationships and try to point out the ways I didn't cheat on her or treat her badly.
I just have to wait. In the road.
And two-thousand and four hundred words later, you realize why I don't write about dating very often.
The last couple of weeks have piled up and spilled over. I had gotten sick, had some rough patches at work, with a freelance project, my roommate got sick, my car engine died and I'm going to be out 2500 bucks, and various other minor calamities. But, then my best friend and his wife lost their unborn baby, trumping all the other bullshit.
Now, I want to say, that normally I don't like it when people use the word baby to refer to a fetus. Though I'm pro-choice, my personal cut-off line is whether the fetus would be viable outside the womb. Then it becomes baby.
This isn't an abortion story, by the way.
I understand that viability is a tricky issue. I'd rather deal with that issue, though, than trying to cloud things up with a religious argument that can't be proven either way. Maybe it would be viable with reasonable care, then we could argue about reasonable. Maybe it's no significant care and we could argue about significant.
This isn't an abortion story, I swear. What this is, is a feeble attempt at terminology, in this case baby.
My best friend's wife went into the doctor for a routine check-up and to meet the last of her mid-wives. I guess she had six total, something to do with the hospital. She had felt kicking in the morning, but the mid-wife couldn't find a heart-beat and they did some tests and the baby was dead.
When things are viable, baby is okay. When babies die, in womb, you get to carry them a day or two more, then give birth. To a dead baby. Yes, it's horrible. It's in fact, more horrible than you can imagine. Or, I, for that matter. Cleaning out baby clothes from the nursery, horrible. Arranging for cremation, holding a service, having pictures taken, discovering cause of death. All horrible. Out of each horrible thing, a tiny little perverse glimmer of optimism. Cause of death, cord tied in knot. Easily seen, mystery solved. No harm to the mother, physically, a trade-off for having to give birth to a dead baby instead of having a surgical removal. Over 40 friends and family showing up for the service. Morbid portraits that seem completely unimaginable for you and I, yet facilitate healing. The couple, against all statistical odds, have rallied around their only living child, a 9 year old son, and grown stronger as a family.
Little things.
Some might say it's been g*d's love that brought them together, but that same g*d must have killed that baby, and there is no sane person on this earth that would think there is anything on this retched, stupid planet that would be worth the life of an unborn baby.
Terminology again.
There is no lesson learned or greater good served by making someone who worships you with the ignorant love of the uneducated, carry her dead daughter in what would be considered your holy womb, and give birth to a dead pile of flesh, shaped like a baby.
I am Jack's Wrath at an unfeeling g*d.
We find good in this the same way we vote, the same way we date, fuck, eat, and shop; with the stupid, stubborn, moronic belief that things that are bad, are balanced with things that are good. That it will all work out in the long run. That this moment of despair will lead to something learned and something better. That we can turn lemons into lemonade.
Good for us.
When things are viable, when things could breathe, could see, make noises, clench with tiny little fingers; when things could learn to find the good, worship g*d, grow up and fight the good fight... when things are 8 1/2 months from conception... when each birthday would have been an Easter egg hunt and a chocolate bunny if only your stupid, made-up, g*d would have let you live 2 more stupid fucking weeks... then you get to be baby, baby. Then you get to have a name, Morgan, and a gravestone and a tiny little morbid portrait and all the things we see fit to assign to people who have "contributed" to this shitty, made-up world.
Because we are selfish and because you are dead, I am sorry, little Morgan Lee, that all I can think about is my best friend's voice when he called me on the phone and my best friend's wife pushing out your gray little shape, and how they will never be the same way they were, because of you. And I know it's not your fault and I know it's not anyone's fault, and I know that the same people that think g*d took you to heaven, think my roommate's wheelchair is a blessing.
It's just life and sometimes it's fucking horrible.
Rest in peace, dead baby Lee.
Now, I want to say, that normally I don't like it when people use the word baby to refer to a fetus. Though I'm pro-choice, my personal cut-off line is whether the fetus would be viable outside the womb. Then it becomes baby.
This isn't an abortion story, by the way.
I understand that viability is a tricky issue. I'd rather deal with that issue, though, than trying to cloud things up with a religious argument that can't be proven either way. Maybe it would be viable with reasonable care, then we could argue about reasonable. Maybe it's no significant care and we could argue about significant.
This isn't an abortion story, I swear. What this is, is a feeble attempt at terminology, in this case baby.
My best friend's wife went into the doctor for a routine check-up and to meet the last of her mid-wives. I guess she had six total, something to do with the hospital. She had felt kicking in the morning, but the mid-wife couldn't find a heart-beat and they did some tests and the baby was dead.
When things are viable, baby is okay. When babies die, in womb, you get to carry them a day or two more, then give birth. To a dead baby. Yes, it's horrible. It's in fact, more horrible than you can imagine. Or, I, for that matter. Cleaning out baby clothes from the nursery, horrible. Arranging for cremation, holding a service, having pictures taken, discovering cause of death. All horrible. Out of each horrible thing, a tiny little perverse glimmer of optimism. Cause of death, cord tied in knot. Easily seen, mystery solved. No harm to the mother, physically, a trade-off for having to give birth to a dead baby instead of having a surgical removal. Over 40 friends and family showing up for the service. Morbid portraits that seem completely unimaginable for you and I, yet facilitate healing. The couple, against all statistical odds, have rallied around their only living child, a 9 year old son, and grown stronger as a family.
Little things.
Some might say it's been g*d's love that brought them together, but that same g*d must have killed that baby, and there is no sane person on this earth that would think there is anything on this retched, stupid planet that would be worth the life of an unborn baby.
Terminology again.
There is no lesson learned or greater good served by making someone who worships you with the ignorant love of the uneducated, carry her dead daughter in what would be considered your holy womb, and give birth to a dead pile of flesh, shaped like a baby.
I am Jack's Wrath at an unfeeling g*d.
We find good in this the same way we vote, the same way we date, fuck, eat, and shop; with the stupid, stubborn, moronic belief that things that are bad, are balanced with things that are good. That it will all work out in the long run. That this moment of despair will lead to something learned and something better. That we can turn lemons into lemonade.
Good for us.
When things are viable, when things could breathe, could see, make noises, clench with tiny little fingers; when things could learn to find the good, worship g*d, grow up and fight the good fight... when things are 8 1/2 months from conception... when each birthday would have been an Easter egg hunt and a chocolate bunny if only your stupid, made-up, g*d would have let you live 2 more stupid fucking weeks... then you get to be baby, baby. Then you get to have a name, Morgan, and a gravestone and a tiny little morbid portrait and all the things we see fit to assign to people who have "contributed" to this shitty, made-up world.
Because we are selfish and because you are dead, I am sorry, little Morgan Lee, that all I can think about is my best friend's voice when he called me on the phone and my best friend's wife pushing out your gray little shape, and how they will never be the same way they were, because of you. And I know it's not your fault and I know it's not anyone's fault, and I know that the same people that think g*d took you to heaven, think my roommate's wheelchair is a blessing.
It's just life and sometimes it's fucking horrible.
Rest in peace, dead baby Lee.
Was my last entry really in October? I'm not usually one of those goddamn slackers that wait 4 months to let you know what kind of boring crap I've been up to.
So, currently Christmas went okay, as did New Years. My birthday featured home-made batter and deep fried corn dogs, on wooden skewers. As with all my birthday dinners, I practiced a couple times before hand, to shaky success. Upon the day, however, the dogs ended up about the diameter of a normal-sized squeeze bottle of Gatorade; they were thick, yo. Thick, corn meal batter, golden fried in peanut oil. No one, not even by buddy Brian, could eat more than one.
For dessert, we had home made cherry pie. I mean the filling, the crust, every damn thing. There was ice cream, too, but I didn't make that.
We played poker, smoked cigars, drank scotch; then a couple buddies stayed the weekend to play PC games.
The rest of the time in between then and now has been pretty sucky overall, with a generally happy ending. I volunteered to do a program for a local sci-fi convention. They are the largest one around here and the programs have always been a labor of love; meaning generally crappy from a design point of view. I thought I would give something back, since I've been going there since 1985, but it's been constantly sucking my creative evening time and going on waaaay too long. Add that with a boring job that has a shitty commute, and I haven't felt creative in a while. And that's bad.
I have been continuing to date Megadeth girl, but my ex-girlfriend current roommate super good friend... um... Nazca girl, has been having trouble dealing with this new wrinkle. On a quick aside, I haven't seriously gone out with anyone in about 3 years while I was going to school and getting my career on track.
So, it was basically like having two girlfriends, and not in whatever the good way is. They've both been nice and all, it was mostly my problem for not being firm enough about my free time. I suddenly felt like I hadn't had a moments peace in months and kinda snapped.
Luckily, Megadeth girl went to Spain and Nazca girl and I got in a huge fight that cleared everything out, then she went to her mom's for a few days (pre-planned.) I had three or four days to relax, play Rome Total War, and leave my bedroom door open for the cat.
So, for about a week now, I've been feeling pretty good (thus, here I am.) I still have the program project over my head, but it's almost done. Work is better, though still not creative, and I'm trying to relax during the shitty commute. Oh, and I had a six-course, top-notch French meal, my first, and got amazingly drunk off of fat, sauce, wine, and yummy, yummy rabbit.
Oh, and I went Caucusing. It ruled. The weirdest thing about it was I suddenly realized the 82 other people in the room (from my district) all lived within a couple blocks of me. Seems pretty obvious, but it was good once it sunk in.
Oh, and I have some movie reviews and other crap to write down soon.
Alright, back to work.
So, currently Christmas went okay, as did New Years. My birthday featured home-made batter and deep fried corn dogs, on wooden skewers. As with all my birthday dinners, I practiced a couple times before hand, to shaky success. Upon the day, however, the dogs ended up about the diameter of a normal-sized squeeze bottle of Gatorade; they were thick, yo. Thick, corn meal batter, golden fried in peanut oil. No one, not even by buddy Brian, could eat more than one.
For dessert, we had home made cherry pie. I mean the filling, the crust, every damn thing. There was ice cream, too, but I didn't make that.
We played poker, smoked cigars, drank scotch; then a couple buddies stayed the weekend to play PC games.
The rest of the time in between then and now has been pretty sucky overall, with a generally happy ending. I volunteered to do a program for a local sci-fi convention. They are the largest one around here and the programs have always been a labor of love; meaning generally crappy from a design point of view. I thought I would give something back, since I've been going there since 1985, but it's been constantly sucking my creative evening time and going on waaaay too long. Add that with a boring job that has a shitty commute, and I haven't felt creative in a while. And that's bad.
I have been continuing to date Megadeth girl, but my ex-girlfriend current roommate super good friend... um... Nazca girl, has been having trouble dealing with this new wrinkle. On a quick aside, I haven't seriously gone out with anyone in about 3 years while I was going to school and getting my career on track.
So, it was basically like having two girlfriends, and not in whatever the good way is. They've both been nice and all, it was mostly my problem for not being firm enough about my free time. I suddenly felt like I hadn't had a moments peace in months and kinda snapped.
Luckily, Megadeth girl went to Spain and Nazca girl and I got in a huge fight that cleared everything out, then she went to her mom's for a few days (pre-planned.) I had three or four days to relax, play Rome Total War, and leave my bedroom door open for the cat.
So, for about a week now, I've been feeling pretty good (thus, here I am.) I still have the program project over my head, but it's almost done. Work is better, though still not creative, and I'm trying to relax during the shitty commute. Oh, and I had a six-course, top-notch French meal, my first, and got amazingly drunk off of fat, sauce, wine, and yummy, yummy rabbit.
Oh, and I went Caucusing. It ruled. The weirdest thing about it was I suddenly realized the 82 other people in the room (from my district) all lived within a couple blocks of me. Seems pretty obvious, but it was good once it sunk in.
Oh, and I have some movie reviews and other crap to write down soon.
Alright, back to work.
My knees have been pretty bad. To be accurate, my thighs, then my knees. Something happened with those knee pads (last entry)... too tight. Both thighs have the same pulled muscle or tendon, running down the outside to the side of the knees. My lower sartorius maybe.
I couldn't squat, could barely walk. There were these two indentations at the bottom of my out thigh muscle (vastus lateralis) that weren't there before. I'm sure my patellas were messed up, too.
Iced me knees for a while. Took some hot baths for the muscles. Stretched as best as able. I had to walk stairs 6 or 7 times a day at work.
My worked finally moved. Many less stairs. More stretching. Still playing football, but with icy-hot pads under my Underarmor tights.
They're getting better. Knees still make a little noise. I can walk fine, but running is hampered. Can't backpedal, which sucks for a linebacker. Can't cut very well. Lots of pass-rushing instead. One more game left, then some heal time. Then Thanksgiving tackle, which you should all know will lead to pictures of bruises and maybe some new cuts.
Dating a girl. Same girl from the Megadeth story. The Megadeth girl. Actually, she works pretty high up at a pretty huge company. And listens to Megadeth.
I had a double feature of Saving Private Ryan and Full Metal Jacket. I was amazed how accurately each movie reflected the time they were made and the war they took place in. Ryan was striving for bloody realism, but heroic, sweeping. Was it all worth it, it asks, and yes, it was.
FMJ was cynical, darkly amusing, soulless. The violence was nearly meaningless, meant more for shock value.
I amend the above statement; each film reflects what most people think each war was like. By the end of WWII, you could buy an hour with a German or English girl for a candy bar... about the same as the 5 dollar Vietnamese prostitutes shown in FMJ. Good men doing good things, good men doing bad things, and bad men doing bad things, across the board.
There are much more eloquent writings on both wars... the real wars. My point is, I was just impressed by the reflections in each fictional story, is all.
Life is my favorite new show this season. 30 Rock is awesome as always.
That is all.
I couldn't squat, could barely walk. There were these two indentations at the bottom of my out thigh muscle (vastus lateralis) that weren't there before. I'm sure my patellas were messed up, too.
Iced me knees for a while. Took some hot baths for the muscles. Stretched as best as able. I had to walk stairs 6 or 7 times a day at work.
My worked finally moved. Many less stairs. More stretching. Still playing football, but with icy-hot pads under my Underarmor tights.
They're getting better. Knees still make a little noise. I can walk fine, but running is hampered. Can't backpedal, which sucks for a linebacker. Can't cut very well. Lots of pass-rushing instead. One more game left, then some heal time. Then Thanksgiving tackle, which you should all know will lead to pictures of bruises and maybe some new cuts.
Dating a girl. Same girl from the Megadeth story. The Megadeth girl. Actually, she works pretty high up at a pretty huge company. And listens to Megadeth.
I had a double feature of Saving Private Ryan and Full Metal Jacket. I was amazed how accurately each movie reflected the time they were made and the war they took place in. Ryan was striving for bloody realism, but heroic, sweeping. Was it all worth it, it asks, and yes, it was.
FMJ was cynical, darkly amusing, soulless. The violence was nearly meaningless, meant more for shock value.
I amend the above statement; each film reflects what most people think each war was like. By the end of WWII, you could buy an hour with a German or English girl for a candy bar... about the same as the 5 dollar Vietnamese prostitutes shown in FMJ. Good men doing good things, good men doing bad things, and bad men doing bad things, across the board.
There are much more eloquent writings on both wars... the real wars. My point is, I was just impressed by the reflections in each fictional story, is all.
Life is my favorite new show this season. 30 Rock is awesome as always.
That is all.
This is a rather mundane entry, I'm afraid.
I like to play football, though as the older I get, the harder it becomes. Football, which I have mentioned before is an art to me. Also a release. A high. One of my favorite ones, in fact. I often say to my roommate (one of my best friends), who uses a wheelchair, travels, and won't ever walk again as long as Bush keeps vetoing stem cell research; I often tell her I would switch with her, if I could. It's true. I read, write, design, draw. My legs are wasted, really. She would travel, dance, play, all the things G*d intended upright gaits for. I would trade, instantly, but I would cry over one thing and that would be playing football.
It's hard when you suddenly can put a number on something that before seemed limitless. For example, I play tackle football every Thanksgiving. It's been a singular joy each year, to the extent that some years I would work out for months in advance for only that reason.
I'm currently 42 and if I'm lucky enough to play until I'm 50 (a reasonable goal, as last year there was a guy playing who was that old), that gives me roughly 8 more times before I'm done.
Last year I joined a contact flag football league. It was in Tacoma, a 45 minute drive each way, but I couldn't find a contact league in Seattle. Non-Contact flag is the kind you usually see, where there isn't really a pass rush, no blocking, and it's usually 5 on 5 or maybe 7 on 7. It's the most common youth flag type. Non-contact flag is a general waste of time; a half-step above playing catch with some buddies or a game of Ultimate with some pot-smoking hippies.
Contact flag is pretty much tackle football without pads, only you pull a flag at the end instead of tackling. Full pass rush, full blocking, and since this is South Tacoma, it can get pretty rough. I got my first black eye ever last year, because I had my head down too low and caught an elbow. I learned not to put my head down, much like another guy I'll tell you about in a minute.
Last year the team I played on didn't start me for three games and in two of those I didn't play at all. Once I got in I lead the team in tackles (by a fair margin.) But it was annoying, knowing I only have a few seasons left.
So, when this year rolled around, I plunked down the league fee myself (a fat $750) and organized a team on my own. I found out all the usual things about organizing stuff like this: people sign up, don't show up, don't pay on time, don't show up for practice.
When all is said in done, including myself, I had 8 guys show up for the first game last Sunday. Out of 15 that signed up. We play 8 on 8. We got pretty tired. In all of that tiredness and newness of being an actual player and coach, I didn't do a couple of things I could have to make it easier on us. I had plenty of time to re-examine those things, since we were getting blown out 37 to 0 halfway through the second half and they invoked the mercy rule. Game over. We didn't even get a first down.
Over last week I figured out how manage things better. I knew I was going to call more time-outs, if only to get a breather. I knew I wasn't going to let the opposing team return our punts (the first team ran three back for touchdowns and we got really, really tired chasing them.) I knew I was going to be the center (the guy who gamely tried to do it so I could play HB/TE put the ball on the ground three times and kind of floated them back to the QB.)
Well, this week the day started with 7. You can play with 6, but I wouldn't recommend 6 on 8. As I sat there a hour before the game, wondering what I was going to do, a couple guys came up and asked if we needed players. That gave us nine. And, one guy said he could throw. He backed it up when he pulled out a velco wrist band with plays written on it, in laminated pages. That's prepared.
It's amazing what 9 guys mean over 8. Having one extra guy to rotate in a get a rest for a couple of plays. I called a couple time-outs here and there. The QB took charge of the offense, which let me relax and concentrate on defense. I didn't botch any snaps to him.
At halftime it was 0-0. We had gotten some first downs, even. Then, in the second half, I got an interception, stopping one of their drives. We scored. 7-0. They came back to score, but they tried to go for 2 for some reason. No respect, I guess. We intercepted the attempt, ran it back, and got their two points. 9-6.
We drove down the field on the next possession. I fucking blasted a guy that had his head down too low. My forearm, aimed for his chest, glanced off his collar bone and into his jaw. He cried out a little and landed like a turtle on its back. He rolled over to his hands and knees, then left the field for a couple plays. I caught a third down pass to keep the drive alive. I blocked out a linebacker (who I'd played with the year before and gotten no respect from) that allowed our QB to run in a score. I caught the extra point (no real kicking in this league, you just try and run it in from the 3 for 1, 10 for 2.) 16-6. That was a good drive.
With a little over a minute left, they drove down the field. I made a tackle on a long QB scramble that kept them out of the end-zome, thus keeping the clock running. With 27 seconds left, I let a guy get past me and he scored. They tried to go for 2 again, but we stopped them. 16-12.
Since there aren't kick-offs (you start on the 20 after a score), we took the ball and kneeled down. Game over.
We're now 1-1. somehow. Next week most of the guys that claimed they would show up, then had things happen, are supposedly going to show up. I'd love to have 10 or 12 guys.
I wore knee pads that were too tight the first game. My knees are already arthritic. They hurt a lot after the first game and started making grinding noises. It really is like having RIce Krispies in them. When I move them, krish, krish. I tried to rehab them during the week and they felt okay during the second game. I didn't wear the knee pads, of course.
This week they hurt, but in a different way. The muscles are super tight and I think when they relax in a day or two, the knees will be okay (relatively speaking.) No quick steps, no stairs if possible, ice, some pain killers. Stretching. They still make noise.
I have 6 more game left, this season. Then Thanksgiving. 8 More of those. If I get 8 more seasons of flag, that's 56 more of those games. 64 total. Win or loose, knees or no knees. 64 is the top end, the dream.
That's my mundane life.
I like to play football, though as the older I get, the harder it becomes. Football, which I have mentioned before is an art to me. Also a release. A high. One of my favorite ones, in fact. I often say to my roommate (one of my best friends), who uses a wheelchair, travels, and won't ever walk again as long as Bush keeps vetoing stem cell research; I often tell her I would switch with her, if I could. It's true. I read, write, design, draw. My legs are wasted, really. She would travel, dance, play, all the things G*d intended upright gaits for. I would trade, instantly, but I would cry over one thing and that would be playing football.
It's hard when you suddenly can put a number on something that before seemed limitless. For example, I play tackle football every Thanksgiving. It's been a singular joy each year, to the extent that some years I would work out for months in advance for only that reason.
I'm currently 42 and if I'm lucky enough to play until I'm 50 (a reasonable goal, as last year there was a guy playing who was that old), that gives me roughly 8 more times before I'm done.
Last year I joined a contact flag football league. It was in Tacoma, a 45 minute drive each way, but I couldn't find a contact league in Seattle. Non-Contact flag is the kind you usually see, where there isn't really a pass rush, no blocking, and it's usually 5 on 5 or maybe 7 on 7. It's the most common youth flag type. Non-contact flag is a general waste of time; a half-step above playing catch with some buddies or a game of Ultimate with some pot-smoking hippies.
Contact flag is pretty much tackle football without pads, only you pull a flag at the end instead of tackling. Full pass rush, full blocking, and since this is South Tacoma, it can get pretty rough. I got my first black eye ever last year, because I had my head down too low and caught an elbow. I learned not to put my head down, much like another guy I'll tell you about in a minute.
Last year the team I played on didn't start me for three games and in two of those I didn't play at all. Once I got in I lead the team in tackles (by a fair margin.) But it was annoying, knowing I only have a few seasons left.
So, when this year rolled around, I plunked down the league fee myself (a fat $750) and organized a team on my own. I found out all the usual things about organizing stuff like this: people sign up, don't show up, don't pay on time, don't show up for practice.
When all is said in done, including myself, I had 8 guys show up for the first game last Sunday. Out of 15 that signed up. We play 8 on 8. We got pretty tired. In all of that tiredness and newness of being an actual player and coach, I didn't do a couple of things I could have to make it easier on us. I had plenty of time to re-examine those things, since we were getting blown out 37 to 0 halfway through the second half and they invoked the mercy rule. Game over. We didn't even get a first down.
Over last week I figured out how manage things better. I knew I was going to call more time-outs, if only to get a breather. I knew I wasn't going to let the opposing team return our punts (the first team ran three back for touchdowns and we got really, really tired chasing them.) I knew I was going to be the center (the guy who gamely tried to do it so I could play HB/TE put the ball on the ground three times and kind of floated them back to the QB.)
Well, this week the day started with 7. You can play with 6, but I wouldn't recommend 6 on 8. As I sat there a hour before the game, wondering what I was going to do, a couple guys came up and asked if we needed players. That gave us nine. And, one guy said he could throw. He backed it up when he pulled out a velco wrist band with plays written on it, in laminated pages. That's prepared.
It's amazing what 9 guys mean over 8. Having one extra guy to rotate in a get a rest for a couple of plays. I called a couple time-outs here and there. The QB took charge of the offense, which let me relax and concentrate on defense. I didn't botch any snaps to him.
At halftime it was 0-0. We had gotten some first downs, even. Then, in the second half, I got an interception, stopping one of their drives. We scored. 7-0. They came back to score, but they tried to go for 2 for some reason. No respect, I guess. We intercepted the attempt, ran it back, and got their two points. 9-6.
We drove down the field on the next possession. I fucking blasted a guy that had his head down too low. My forearm, aimed for his chest, glanced off his collar bone and into his jaw. He cried out a little and landed like a turtle on its back. He rolled over to his hands and knees, then left the field for a couple plays. I caught a third down pass to keep the drive alive. I blocked out a linebacker (who I'd played with the year before and gotten no respect from) that allowed our QB to run in a score. I caught the extra point (no real kicking in this league, you just try and run it in from the 3 for 1, 10 for 2.) 16-6. That was a good drive.
With a little over a minute left, they drove down the field. I made a tackle on a long QB scramble that kept them out of the end-zome, thus keeping the clock running. With 27 seconds left, I let a guy get past me and he scored. They tried to go for 2 again, but we stopped them. 16-12.
Since there aren't kick-offs (you start on the 20 after a score), we took the ball and kneeled down. Game over.
We're now 1-1. somehow. Next week most of the guys that claimed they would show up, then had things happen, are supposedly going to show up. I'd love to have 10 or 12 guys.
I wore knee pads that were too tight the first game. My knees are already arthritic. They hurt a lot after the first game and started making grinding noises. It really is like having RIce Krispies in them. When I move them, krish, krish. I tried to rehab them during the week and they felt okay during the second game. I didn't wear the knee pads, of course.
This week they hurt, but in a different way. The muscles are super tight and I think when they relax in a day or two, the knees will be okay (relatively speaking.) No quick steps, no stairs if possible, ice, some pain killers. Stretching. They still make noise.
I have 6 more game left, this season. Then Thanksgiving. 8 More of those. If I get 8 more seasons of flag, that's 56 more of those games. 64 total. Win or loose, knees or no knees. 64 is the top end, the dream.
That's my mundane life.
Go back and read my previous blog, cause I thought it was lost in the internet and it wasn't, so I tried to do it again and the previous one is better.
