catching up, sorta

yeah, people are strange, that's the only constant I've found to be constant in this life... and you don't even have to be a stranger, it's just as constant when you are a friend... but Jim Morrison references aside, and before we step into the slide zone with the Moody Blues (cuz isn't life strange, after all), let's catch up on the RealTime™ for a change...

so work work work is mostly what I do lately... and watch some TV and browse the web and not much focusing of mind... college football takes up much time this time of year as it's almost always on TV... and a few other shows get my attention... and life is lazy, mostly, though there have been signs of waking up again this week... October is going to be a whole lot busier what with eight or more concerts and a few shows and

just returning from another run (does that make three this week?... well, getting there), right exhausted as I've not been getting any extended sleep and the metabolism has slowed in the past month and today started some eighteen hours ago... it's coming up on 2am in these parts and the world is kind of foggy on both sides of my eyes...

once again, my belly full but me hungry... but since curling up alone isn't appealing at the moment and there's no one to cuddle up with and trust with my dreams as I fall asleep in their arms (how romantic, or child-like, depending on points of view), I come here to babble a bit...

I mean catch up in RealTime™...

I've been shopping craigslist for computer for the past two weeks and I'm not finding much responsiveness to my offers as I am offering less than asking prices because the prices are rather high... a few guys wrote me back explaining that they are not pricing or building machines for geeks, but rather for a target market of mostly computer illiterate people don't really know prices or components... I may get one of them to help me build the super machine I might talk myself into building, but then, I might build a cheaper machine too... and then there's the laptop idea... if I can find a decent used on I'll grab it, but people seem to be asking a lot for old crap that I used to find at computer shows for less than half what people are asking...

whatever happened to those computer shows...

ok, I drifted away to craigslist and I just found one, October 6 & 7, right on time for me to pick up a decent used laptop for my big one night stay in Oklahoma City (surprisingly, not one fan has has called yet, don't they have phones in Oklahoma?)...

when did I become such a cheap tightwad?...

oh yeah, that homeless time... somewhere back in my memory I remember the 80's when I was earning more than I earn these days and had a nice stock portfolio and simply bought whatever I wanted... ah, the good old days of the Atari ST1040... I hope it still works when I unpack it someday... and I found a C-64 on craigslist, by the way...

I think RealTime™ is slipping away again, so I'll call this entry over and out and get to writing the previous one that I forgot to write yesterday cuz I thought it was Wednesday (what, me tired?)...

don't forget to frolick!

roller coaster ride #72649

(you flash brilliance here)

it was just after midnight when I looked down and noticed I had a cut on my finger... it wasn't fresh, it stung and had the thin rid rim of slight infection, but I had no idea when or how it got there... I brushed my thumb over it to be sure and yes, it stung, it was there all right...

the clock on the wall shouted out nothing, as if time stood still... the breeze agreed, for there was none... no movement at all in the world outside the window, a still life painting of treetops and dark sky with a few faint stars scratched in it... paint chips falling from a ceiling...

I went out for a run wondering if I would ever return...

fifty-eight minutes and forty-three point seventy-one seconds later, I died... no wait, that's another story... in this story, I returned from a run mostly intact, but burning with fatigue and puffy from bloat... there I was, finishing up a report no one asked me to write because we were ranked sixth out of ninety in the state for the fiscal year in percentage of patients who made progress and I stayed two hours late to finish up a justification for an improvement plan that sets a goal to do better in this coming fiscal year and I grab my salad and head home just as Precious calls suggesting Kentucky Fried chicken...

I hem and haw, pick and ponder, and finally saw, "naaa, I don't think so..." truer words were never spoken because I sure don't think, so... I saw them pulling into KFC just as I was approaching and so I stopped and met them and made an entirely too self-indulgent a pig of myself... ever so bloated later, I wandered over to myspace to catch up on a bit of reading while nodding in and out of Carborado (the El Dorado of carbohydrates) and was inspired by a few of my favorite distractions (and I use the term quite endearingly, most sincerely, and much appreciatively) to pick myself up and head out the door in spite of being in a dragging bloated zombie state... thanks Jenny and Sharon and Cali, even if you don't know I thank you here...

of course you guys help enormously too cuz you keep me grounded cuz I know you'll be here to pick me up if I pass out, laugh it I don't (but fall over anyway), and you'll dance if I die... good morning, good morning, yeah...

and was this the night I was to get to bed early and sleep long and deep?... instead, I picked myself up just after midnight and dragged my heavy feet around the neighborhood four times... a mediocre almost fifteen minutes a lap when some voice in my head is laughing at the tears my heart sheds for knowing I should be doing the four laps in twenty five minutes, maybe less... I shudder to think how many miles the course I run really is and forget to clock it on the odometer as I park my car after work each evening... please let it be more than four miles or I am beyond pathetic... but nevertheless, even at this body's advanced years, I will not be satisfied until I am running six minute miles again... and perhaps I will never again be satisfied in that way in this life... tell me there are other ways and I might believe again, someday...

and then, I wrote in a comment somewhere:

perhaps it is as simple as understanding that life is a journey that ends in death and doing nothing leads more directly to death, while doing something, making choices, grabbing the steering wheel of your life and turning in the directions you want to explore slows the process of dying and that is what we call living...

fill that glass of life and when it gets half full, ignore those who claim it is half empty and rejoice in the awareness that it is it's simply time to fill it again :)

and the roller coaster ride just keeps on rolling...

it was some time back in the late eighties that I corresponded with a great big gay guy from Oklahoma City named Tristan McCauley... I'll let you wonder if that was his real name, or if he was ever real himself, but in fact he eventually moved San Francisco to find bliss, or nirvana, or something, and then got lost during my mid-nineties disappearance (when I put Toronto and love and family ahead of everything else, including myself, and we all know how that turned out... or at least some of you do) along with hundreds of others I loved exchanging words with... he was one of the longest and closest pen pal friends I ever had... addresses, if they are still valid (like who lives at the same address for twenty years anymore?), are lost in Toronto (and possibly packed in one of many hundreds of boxes in storage just north of Niagara Falls...

Niagara Falls!...

slowly I turn...

Well, I used to have a lover once, I used to have a friend
How in the hell you ever find one?
My song is almost over now, my story's at an end
You lived yourself a good life but a blind one.

Well I've hidden there up on the shelf
And it's funny how you've kept it all for yourself
Hey honey, could there ever be,
Should there ever be,
Could there ever be something else?

thank you, Harry

for the reminder... and I wonder if I will ever be able to access the many thousands of letters and rhymes I wrote and stored on Atari floppy disks way back then... alas, sigh, and more alas, when I think about the loss of the potential that might have come from all those words had I not buried them... up on the shelf...

I am such a creative genius, after all...

yeah, so what else is new?... I get home from work and sit back in the big green chair and can nod off till morning if I'm not interrupted, but I haven't had an evening (or night) without interruption in weeks, at least... like Monday night... and I could have joined the local movie meetup just twenty or so minutes down the road in watching Jodie Foster's new movie and snacking at The Cheesecake Factory afterwards... sure, I don't need the expense or the calories (or the temptation), but I sure could enjoy the potential of finding friends who share more of my interests and activities and energy levels...

writing about it is a step towards getting back to doing it, or so the theory goes... after all, I might actually run yesterday (figure that sentence out and you may actually start understanding me and my writing process a bit better)...

maybe I should just head over to myspace and distract myself with hopes and dreams of stumbling across the one again...

or more likely, I sit and wait for a site to load that never loads and forces me to shut down and restart the computer... these are the nights (and evenings) of the times of the life these days... which is exactly what just happened...

I think I'll eat some worms...

aren't I worth knowing?
aren't I worth loving?
aren't I worth introducing to your friends?
or not
maybe you're ashamed of me
maybe I'm not good enough
for your company
or your sister
what if I kissed her?

aren't I worth meeting?
aren't I worth reading?
aren't I someone to tell your friends about?
oh why
am I not finding more
sharing that I'm looking for
what's wrong with me
can you tell me
why won't you sell me?

people tell me life is all about networking
so I put myself out there, right here, here I am
and I leave you all messages wishing you well
I read you, I listen and respond cuz I care
can't you tell?
doesn't it matter?
there, that feels better... nothing like a little pity party to get the stupid out and get me back to laughing confidence and not feeling like I need something outside of myself so much... so the pendulum swings back to fuck 'em if they can't take a joke" and "it's their loss" and I go back to happily frolicking in the fields of my dreams with or without you... not you personally, mind you, cuz I know you're there and you care and I appreciate you... self-pathetic poor me crap comes from the generic me to the generic you, if you know what I mean...

I appreciate me... you do too... so if the other seven billion people on the planet don't, oh well, their loss... the opportunity to add one or some new friends in Oklahoma City still remains anyway, so don't forget to call everyone you know in the mid-west (or is that the great plains?) and tell them I'm coming... preferably somebody who isn’t afraid of roller coasters, ya know?... and then if they don't show up at the airport with seventy six trombones and a big parade, their loss... yup, there's just not enough of me to go around sometimes...

when did humans forget how to have fun, anyway?...

the party of the part part

part three, which is really part two, but was written third, so being part three came naturally if we consider time linear and label the parts chronologically, but in essence and, in fact, in order of entries uploaded tonight, this will be part two, even if we call it part three...

I am listening to music at myspace because the myspace music player is working for me for a change... it's moody, this old computer... sometimes it lets the music play and sometimes the memory runs out and everything moves in slow motion and audio and video come to a sudden, but quite silent halt...

I miss music so much, it hurts... in fact, I miss music more than I miss sex... I mean, I can have sex with myself, great sex, in fact, but I am in no position (no equipment, no space, no ka) to make music by myself... no wonder I am not falling in love more often (or more seriously than a child's fantasy in Brooklyn, or maybe Long Island or Orange County or Venice... anywhere but here (who sang that, anywhere buy here it was a song or album or both...

there's a stupid self-righteous voice inside wanting to scream in outrage, "what the fuck happened to my mojo?"... of course using the Austin powers word does put the giggles in the mix and kind of deflates the outrage and exposes the stupidity behind the self-righteous ire (fake, no doubt)...

so being this is the third day of the three missing dates, it reflects the current moment most currently even though it is the second part of the three-part entry even though it was written third, part...

I quite suddenly went out and ran four laps in 54:43.69 with lap times of 11:47.93, 13:21.21, 16:15.51, and 13:20.03, respectively... actually not bad for laying off since 8/23... yeah, almost an entire month according to my trusty chronometer (stopwatch to the old folk at home)... I did 54:08.40 for the four laps then with a best lap of 12:29.63 and an average 13:32.10 for the four laps... my previous best recorded lap time was 11:47.16 and second best was 11:47.93, but that was just for two laps... I've only been recording thrice, or three times, or parts, if we must... so maintaining conditioning in spite of the pathetic effort of the past month and the resulting flabbiness and lethargy and probable increase in weight is a pleasant surprise, but nothing to write home about...

luckily, I am not writing home...

and on that note I shall present these three entries to you as if the first two were there all along (which would be this one and the one before) and if I didn't mention it here, you might not ever have known if you didn't come by and notice each of the last three days, so disregard this paragraph if you've been absent and feel duly guilty for your non-transgressing of trespass...

move along now to part three, or one, actually, but who's counting anyway...

he's got legs!

and he knows how to use them

ZZ Top, eat your heart out :)

hello and welcome to an introspective entry... you've been warned :)

if you are looking for a more selfless, mature, sensible, or inspirational entry or even more of a lighter distraction, try the previous entries (please, they miss you if you missed them) or visit myspace where I went and plagiarized myself again this weekend... this bit of whining pathos will be here when you get back, promise...

my legs were crying out for sustenance after just one lap of the four I jogged last night... it could be because I've not slept much this weekend... I thought I slept, really I did, but when I counted up the hours as best as I could, I probably only slept about seven or eight hours all weekend and only about three or four by the time I went out running at 6AM Sunday morning... hey, I was engrossed in putting entries together for myspace, vital to universal security and stuff, ya know?...

there's also the imbalance factor in my exercising... the upper body and arms are being neglected, growing flabby and fatter, even as the legs are screaming out for a morsel of food... I probably have 15% or more body fat above the waste and less than 1% below... that's because the only exercise I've been doing in recent weeks (months?... no, weeks since I went to the gym where I'd at least do the elliptical that got my arms and chest somewhat involved) is jogging... I'm lacking in external inspiration, swimming up a waterfall in overall influences, and my internal motivation, which is mostly all I've lived on for most of this life, is at a less than half full level these days... it ebbs and flows, so I'm not concerned with my recent laziness... I'm out running lightly at least once a week, so I'm not back to the vegetative state I slipped into last year, but I am noticing my direction changing and pointing this out to myself here is one way I am trying to get myself back on track (so to speak)...

my upper body laziness is definitely vegetative... I could blame it on the desk job, and certainly there's an extremely lazy and poor diet influence in my face all the time here, but it's more my own personal psychological mindset... sexuality plays a factor (or lack of it), as does lack of opportunity to play interactive sports... but it's rooted deeper and I'll just have to have a talk with myself one of these days before I get too old to actually workout to my standards and run another marathon...

and the sleeplessness is one aspect of the imbalance going on inside these days... too much lazy poor-diet uncreative spectator sedentary growing old lack of social life, conscience, or activity... not enough me... so I wander the web more than I usually do because I am searching for change, searching for someone to play with, searching for creative inspiration, stimulation, engagement, activity, interaction, invigoration... something other than watching other people on the TV...

alas, I've been wandering this world alone all through this life, even during my years of being part of a couple, there was too much compromise and not enough relating to the stuff that makes me alive in this life... so my legs were probably complaining about my upper body (and mental) procrastination... my legs can be a pain, but painfully smart... they are asking what's the point of all this running around if we're going nowhere we want to be and not finding anyone with whom to go anywhere, or even nowhere... sharing the journey is easy if you don't want to share the whole journey... I no longer want to share like that...

my legs used to do this a lot when I was a smaller child... I'd do sit ups in bed until I could no longer sit up, thousands of them each night... some people count sheep, they tell me... I felt muscle burn... it kept me in touch with the body I as learning to live in... and burned off the extra energy I always seem to be producing long around the lights go out and everybody else falls asleep... it's not insomnia, cuz I really don't want to sleep... for me, it's just it's being alive...

so I hold out (ah, remembering Jackson Browne... where are the mix tapes I used to call my psyche, my autobiography, my philosophy, my reminders or who I am... some in storage, most lost in Toronto... life is a tricky proposition to be real in when you've lost yourself, ya know?... ah, but how much of this is emo-drama play and how much of this is serious help-me therapy?... only my headshrinker knows and since I don't have one, nobody knows... I'd even settle for a hair-dresser, giggles and all)...

the never ending banality of watching TV, eating meat, ice cream, soda, and sitting around every moment except when at work is not as amusing as it usually is tonight... a good sign... I mean, I could amuse myself to death, literally, with irreverent ambivalence and carefree apathy... yeah, I am that good at it... luckily, I am also good at putting my nose in my shit...

so I'm gonna skip the run tonight and ponder my navel... taking a few days or week off work would be wise, especially if I took off somewhere and spent some time alone, but that's not practical or professionally responsible at the moment since I agreed to do two time-sensitive jobs until we figure out how to find a part time data entry person with sufficient clinical skills to do enough of the data job for me to be able to organize the department and give myself some time off...

I could just crawl around a lot, but that's not as much fun as it used to be, especially with no one to crawl around with... I do mean literally crawl around... it's quite literally the first baby steps back to waking up the upper body and arms as the knees demand less pressure and the arms must take more and more weight with every step, or crawl... of course returning to that stage of infancy also brings the vulnerability of wanting to curl up and cuddle with someone... and then, the sensuality of cuddling can easily become sensual and in tern, sexual exploration... but we don't have to go into my nursery school sex tapes just now...

what?... when was your first sexual experience?...

yeah, ok, so perhaps we are now distracted from the malaise that infected this entry for a while (mock malaise, perhaps, but then, nobody knows, remember?... and z0tl's not around to remind us about the waitress at the bar on the beach, so there)... maybe I'm malaising cuz I know I could be in Cancun right about now and I tripped myself up by going corporate on myself again... adjusting to the corporate mindset is causing some indigestion and leg pains, naturally (makes sense to me)...

so feel free to read the previous entries that you missed if you want positivity and fun and frolic and inspiration and all that good stuff that pours out of me most of the time (I will beg for attention, ya know... especially when I am in the curled up crawling near fetal stages of the roller coaster... I mean, it's not fair that only girls can have that time of the month, really... us boys deserve some sort of poor-me self-nurturing time too, right?... pamper me, why dontcha, I'll be all sorts of appreciative when I come back to my egocentric confident secure self...

and now, it's not that I'm just horny or lonely or any such simple answer... not to say that hormones are not involved, but it's a long deep psychological sigh that comes around every now and then when I realize I just sold my soul to the devil one more time and it might be a couple of years before I can renegotiate the contract and trick the horned angel that I am really way too high maintenance and not worth the trouble... metaphorically speaking (or writing), of course...

of course I am amused, where've you been?... this is why I write, to amuse myself... the fact that you come along for the ride inspires me to want to love you and inspire you and amuse you most of the time because usually I am easily amused and do not require nearly this much self-pampering and whining-time... it's nothing that could not be cured by finding a fit adorable roommate who wants to put cushy mats down all over the place so we can crawl around for hours and hours and days or however long it takes to collapse in infantile bliss (the trick is to find someone who won't collapse days before I do, which is where the fitness comes in... the infantile honesty is just as much a prerequisite, so I'm kinda stuck cuz I don't think any grown people still care to be in touch with that part of themselves... oh the agony of defeat... knowing CPR would help too, I mean, just in case one of us have a heart attack trying to return these bodies to their child-like energy levels)...

but I am serious... why is everybody laughing? (will it help if I stop batting my eyelashes?... or start?)... ah, here we go again, rambling on and on too much... once again singing, will no one stay awake with me... dedicated to this daily writing (and I actually do mean daily, cuz I am alive and hoping to share everyday, even when everybody else is otherwise occupied, lost in solitary distraction, or asleep) my heart out to keep in touch with my imaginary soulmate who may not exist in this lifetime, but the hope that posterity will bring the words to her eyes and mind someday keeps me flowing right along... I think I am more ready and hungry for than ever to actually connect, commit, and share a daily life relationship that is not superficial... and in the meantime, here we are and there you are and if I could, I'd hug you big right now... the squishy kind of hugs only three year olds are allowed to do because they do not trigger insecurities like grown-up hugs do...

people are just such scaredy-cat stuffed shirts... dumb humans (oh dear, mustn't bite the hands that feed us now, be a good boy and run along and play now)...

hello, hi, how are you?... welcome to by blog... I write to keep myself company when I am alone, to hear (see) myself think so I know I'm still somewhere in my head, to express my feelings to know my heart is still beating even when I am the only one with my head on my chest, to remind myself of who I am cuz I have a tendency to forget when I am alone too long or with others not much like me (it's the chameleon in me), and to keep hope alive for interaction and loving others in this world... and finding the one... thank you for coming and I hope you find something worth your time and some reason to return and maybe even respond to something... you are more appreciated than you know, especially when I don't tell you...

I hope you are sharing the smile (and maybe even some of the giggles scattered through this entry... and maybe even some of the tears too, but it's ok if we ignore those, I'm used to that too... shhhh, I wasn't supposed to say that)... honesty is just so much more fun than anything else, even when it seems embarrassing or somehow impolite... I hope you understand some of this... and now, it's time to put the kid to bed...

nite nite :)

August reminds me of childhood

my first childhood, that is... I've have many and have no intention of stopping for life is all about childhood and pity the fools who don't know that...

it was August in the city when the ground was too hot to walk on barefoot and the long lazy days never seemed to end... the sweltering sunshine seemed to slow everything down... the heat made the air feel thicker, so thick, you could see it rise in waves from the blistering streets...

and I would play baseball and stickball and punchball and paddleball and basketball and football with friends, though the latter two were usually reserved for the fall and cooler weather, especially football because I loved to dive to catch the ball and wearing jeans and a sweatshirt protected the skin better, allowing for much more reckless diving catches... baseball was always better in the spring for the same reasons...

and some afternoons were so silent it felt like there was nobody else on the planet...

and the evenings, hot, sticky, as the sun went down the ground swelled with the day's heat and kept the air from cooling as if we were in a huge oven... twilight would bring out imaginations and the elevator that would take us anywhere, anytime... that was one of my favorites... it may have looked like an ordinary under-the-stairs shed to most people, but to me and a few of my friends it was the elevator (maybe magic, but what's magic when it real to us?)... I was lucky to have friends who would come along... we'd step in and tell it where we wanted to go (and when) and the door would open and there we were...

and then, as we explored the adventure we created, as if a blanket was pulled over the sky, night would welcome us with it's sweet darkness... the stars, for what the city air would let us see of them, seemed to blur as if their crystal light could not shine through the dense night air...

everyone went home and I wandered, alone again, into the night...

after midnight, when when little cooling would come in the form of a light breeze, I would head out for my daily run around the nightborhood... fifteen miles, sometimes more, past friends houses as they slept, as the night wrapped me in silence leaving only the drumbeat of my footfalls to keep rhythm with the night's music...

August days, August nights, August in the city, remembering the Augusts of my first two decades on this planet... warm mmemories, in so many ways...

did I mention my tooth is all better?...

yeah, I lucked out... called the dentist recommended by one of my co-workers and he saw me immediately and fixed the tooth and all is well and the insurance covered it... next week I have an appointment for a full check-up... so I ate a lot of chocolate and nuts this week... yum...

and the new data specialist started today, so I started her training and officially became Candor, PI... for a while I'll be doing some of both jobs somehow as I train (I'll have to give her a blog name, aye?... I'll think about it), umm, her...

I've starting running at night instead of going to the gym lately... so far, three nights... I don't know the distance, I'll have to drive it to find out, but I am sort of keeping track of time (just glancing at the clock, not using a chronograph... first time, two laps, 14 and 16 minutes, respectively... second time, 3 laps, 14, 14, and 16 minutes, respectively... third time, four laps, 13, 13, 16, and 17 minutes, respectively... hopefully the distance is more than a mile, but running is a whole lot different from the eliptical machine so I don't expect to maintain the same pace right off the bat... figures I'd start running outdoors at the hottest time of the year, aye?...

that reminds me of childhood too...

it's wonderful to have warm, fuzzy, endearing memories... summer wakes some of the dearest... many of my best memories are of solitary, peaceful times... but memories are of sharing times with friends... those are the best memories... I'd really love to make some more of them...

well it's just that I have this routine these days, ya see... I get up, go to work (the happy idiot, ya know), come home, eat a bit, vege a bit, maybe nap, head to the gym (though tonight the gym was full so i ran for a half hour), shower, and then I sit down at the computer and put the day (and whatever else crosses my mind) into words... usually, at least a few times a week (when i don't give into sleep), with a little help from my friends (that would be you) as I wander over to your web spaces and see what you're up to...

few of us can afford the time to be online every day long enough to visit and it's only some of us who have time to spit out a daily entry... so the entries flow and pass into the archives before most can read them... there's something very sad about that, but that is the way it is online... and in life too, but that's something I will never accept - the compromise of detaching and settling for superficiality in a relationship just because the world is set up to keep partners and mates apart or unconscious many more hours of the day than awake and together (and why I remain alone until someone as stubborn as me comes along... and compatible, compatible would be good)...

along the way I keep track of the days by putting the memories into words... a personal diary-type blog, RealTime™ (while waiting for the RealSharing™ to begin)... enjoying the day to day tasks and stuff is the most fun I can have until the right one comes along (thank you Art Garfunkel)...

so I woke early this morning and wandered online a bit and put together the previous entry (in case you missed it) inspired by the wandering and then showered and headed to work... work was slow today... the changes are distracting and probably will be for a while as there's no real organization to the organization so I'm interviewing and have to talk to everyone about office space (cuz there is none) and see who is more willing to move and propose the changes in space and convince people and then... the new person won't have a desk or computer, so I've got to push corporate to authorize expenditures in a week or two rather than the usual months they prefer taking... and then there's the pressure to start doing the new job so that person can go to her new job and help the people she's going to help cuz their workload is overloaded (and somehow still doing my old job until the new person finally gets on board and has workspace and equipment)...

anyway, I got bits of everything done, but fall behind on the data work... corporate america, no doubt... home to do the usual, relax, eat, nap, watch Eureka then head to the gym (isn't this where we can in?) and the rest and here we are...

not wasn't yesterday's entry more interesting?... see, that's what happens... the good ones get away cuz the timing is random... some entries only a devoted mother could love (and I don't have one of those)... some are more fun or entertaining (I hope)... hopefully you find the fun amongst the drivel...

and have fun :)