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| message board October 2006
All Hallow E'en is no more the Devil's day than any other (Republicans and evangelicals have effectively spread the devil throughout the year quite successfully at this point). Sadly, this interesting holiday has, like virtually every other holiday in the U.S., descended into something with no resemblance to its origins. This is not a holiday about getting candy. It's not even a holiday about wearing costumes. You'd never know that anywhere in this country, though. The only point for holidays in the U.S. anymore, it seems, is to further entrench capitalism and to promote corporate profits. That hardly seems worthy of even a single holiday, let alone every national holiday in a whole country. I used to enjoy Halloween, and I enjoyed it for more than candy and costumes. I wonder if kids still get any of that kind of thoughtfulness or enjoyment: the thought of the possibility of the supernatural, the celebration and honoring of the dead, the celebration of the harvest, the honoring of the giving of life as part of the cycle of life, and the whole history of Halloween in a wide variety of religions throughout human history and through societal traditions. And does anybody even do "tricks" as part of Halloween anymore? Something important has been lost here, and sadly I don't think that a whole lot of people even realize that. Posted at 11:07 PM
It's Devil's Night; knock yourselves out, folks. I'm quite certain there are plenty of people deserving pranks at the least ... Posted at 10:18 PM
I wonder if I ever really believed ... Posted at 10:34 PM
My tummy don't feel no good. Wah! Posted at 12:49 AM
It occurred to me today that each of the different sexes can be represented by parts of speech: straight men predominantly use and are thus represented by verbs, straight women by nouns, gay men by adjectives, lesbians by adverbs, and bisexual people by pronouns. It sounds crazy at first, but once you think about it then it actually holds true almost all the time. Posted at 12:15 AM
I quit. Posted at 12:30 AM
I'll be the first to admit I have always been a huge fan of Cheerios since I was a kid (not that I had much choice since my mom would rarely buy what I wanted for cereal). I also was very pleased with Frosted Cheerios when they debuted a few years ago. They didn't get soggy like Frosted Flakes (which are otherwise Grrreat!), and they didn't require the spoons full of sugar I liked on Cheerios (although both Cheerios and the Frosted Cheerios are great as dry snacks each in their own way). Now, however, there are Fruity Cheerios, and while I write this without having tasted this new variety, I can't help but say that there is simply no way they can compare with Fruit Loops. Flavor issues aside, Fruit Loops have a history, a legacy even, and they have a beloved mascot who's better known and more enduring than many major actors and most politicians. Heck, even the website for Fruit Loops is more expansive, hip, and fun. There's just no competition here - Toucan Sam rules, and nobody can touch that. The best I can say for Fruity Cheerios is that imitations is the finest form of flattery. It just proves exactly what I'm saying. Posted at 12:54 AM
Well, that overwhelming depressive malaise is back in full force. I wonder if I'll ever feel like doing anything again? And if so, how far into the future will that be? At least now I won't try and fail - I just won't try at all ... at least for a while. Posted at 12:01 AM
Fuck - I can't even keep straight what day is what. My grandma must be rubbing off on me. Posted at 12:09 AM
Posted at 3:23 AM
Okay - chalk up another completely shitty day. You'd think that after a week of things going progressively more fucked up and ruinous that it couldn't get much worse. Well, maybe you wouldn't think that, but I, misguided fool and dreamer that I am, thought that, and while I had no illusions that things would get any better, I felt that probably things couldn't drop any lower. Clearly I was wrong. Today ranks at a near-all-time-low on the scales of quality, enjoyment, benefit, usefulness, and humor. It ranks at a near-all-time-high of days that point clearly to suicide as the best option - and the sooner the better. The high point of my day has been realizing that the chest pains I've been having from stress and anxiety might mean that a heart attack is not that far away, and heck, then I wouldn't even have to worry about suicide! Yes, I'm being sarcastic and dramatic, but not really so much as it really would seem. Today was indeed for shit, there's no getting around that. And while I'm quite unlikely to commit suicide, I don't see where death could be any worse than this kind of life. Oh, and the chest pain thing is no joke. The repeated negative stresses I had throughout the day have left me feeling physically horrible, and I seriously have been having chest pains throughout the day. If it really is heart problems then it'll play out however it will. I have no medical coverage and have no intentions of doing anything more to grow my debt (such as visiting the emergency room). With my luck I'll have a stroke or something and be left with two fingers working properly and nothing else. Anything that can keep the downward spiral going, you know ... that's what's sure to happen. Hurray. Posted at 3:44 AM
Eek! Real Monsters! (I saw Bush and Cheney on TV). Posted at 11:55 PM
I watched Tim Burton's Corpse Bride on ABC Family channel tonight. I'd been looking forward to it when I'd seen the ads during the past week. I'd actually wanted to see it in the theatre (which would have meant <gasp!> spending money), but it was gone by the time I tried. So I was pleased to now have a chance, and particularly not so long after it was actually first released. As usual with any Tim Burton film, the lighting and angles and overall cinematography were amazingly beautiful, the entire visual experience like a stunning lucid dream - and the musical score, as often is the case in Tim Burton films, was produced by Danny Elfman and was his usual genius, dark and brooding at the appropriate times, sparkly and fun at others, all in the perfect flavor for the movie. But even with all of that and more, I just didn't get drawn into the story or the characters. Two big things threw me off. One was the dominance of musical numbers instead of a balanced mix of musical and direct dialogue to propel the story. While I generally enjoy musicals most of the time, somehow there seemed to be just too much of one number after another, to the point that it drew away from the telling of the story. Too much of the story was trying to be conveyed in one musical piece after another, and I just got tired of it - fast. The other big thing that I think hurt the film was that the two leading women, Victoria (the living bride) and the Corpse Bride herself were both cast as likeable characters you wanted to root for. Unfortunately only one could ever really "win" based on the storyline they found themselves in, and while you came to really like both brides, you had to accept that one of them was going to get the short end of the stick. A part of me hoped beyond hope that somehow that wouldn't be the case, but by the end of the movie it was right there in your face, and what you had expected all along came to be, and even with the expectation it was still disappointing and hardly a happy ending (or even an ending with a fulfilling resolution). So I liked watching and listening to the movie, but it was a real let-down, probably the first Tim Burton movie that's left me so unmoved and uninspired. It was certainly worth watching, but I'm glad I didn't spend money to watch it at the theatre. I do love the style of it though, made with the same process and look of Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas, and I hope that Tim Burton does more things in this mold in the future, because there really is a wonderful quality to the whole thing, a quality that can and should be used to tell great stories. This just wasn't one of those times. Posted at 11:35 PM
I hate yardwork in general, and I certainly hate raking leaves, but I have a special derision for the little whirly-bird seed pods that fall from Maple trees by the thousands at this time of year. They have an incredible ability to seat themselves deep into the grass, between the blades and stuck to them, and able to slip through the tines of the rake with an uncanny ease. My back and shoulders hate those damn things more than anything else at the moment, and the worst part is that I'll surely have to do this same painful raking routine a number of times more yet this year. Posted at 12:49 AM
I'm really trying to make get things done, and I'm trying to do everything with a lot of forethought and preparation, yet things just turn out for shit time and again. This is all seriously depressing, and any lift in spirits I had a week or so ago from breaking past my year-long malaise has been completely stifled by the shitty returns I've faced from the vast majority of things I've worked at. WIth rare exceptions I'd have been better off doing nothing at all, and right now I'm struggling with continuing to try or just giving up everything all together. It's all pretty hopeless one way or another, but part of me stupidly still wants to make an effort at a variety of things, even with the way things keep going. I'm very close to completely shutting down, quite honestly, because having so much go so wrong and turn out so bad, leaving me so disappointed and so distraught - I just want to give up and curl into a ball on my bed and never get up again. I've hit this low point before and the results weren't pretty. I don't feel that sense of impending doom that I felt back then, but it may not be far away. There's only so much more that can go wrong. Posted at 1:13 AM
I wish I could blame feeling this crappy on a cold, but that doesn't seem to be it. It really just seems like the physical manifestations of my depression, and that sucks. At least the cold would have gone away after a week or so ... Posted at 12:19 AM
I'm not at all pleased with having this continual exhaustion, stiffness, achiness, and headache. Haven't I had enough yet? Posted at 9:21 PM
I've been incredibly tired all day and have had an stubbornly enduring headache. The fun never ends here in Sandusky, as you can see. Let's hope tomorrow is a better day for me. Posted at 11:54 PM
It's Friday the 13th. Does anything more need to be said? Posted at 12:12 AM
Ice T's Rap School. This may be the only thing that's more lame and laughable than the Republican cover-up and defense of the Foley scandal ... and sadly in both cases kids are victims and the American public is hopelessly disappointed. Posted at 11:55 PM
Posted at 10:22 PM
Oh bother ... Posted at 12:49 AM
Well that was short-lived. Posted at 12:13 AM
Who else paid attention to the fact that Nicholas Flammel was 665 years old when Dumbledore made him realize that the Sorcerer's Stone was too dangerous and had to be destroyed? That wasn't in the book was it? And why that specific number? Posted at 11:48 PM
Keith Olberman is my new hero. Why can't any of the Democrats give a speech like this:
Posted at 11:09 PM
Four hours of sleep is not remotely enough to get by, but I have somehow managed to survive all day on just that. I had to get up early to take out the trash and get my grandma driven out to the YMCA for her aqua-arobics class for seniors. I've been tired all day, but I have done a whole bunch of things. I'm fuckin' tired as hell, though, and I have no idea how I've stayed awake this long. It's after Midnight now, and I'm ready to sleep any time. I'd like to sleep in as long as I like tomorrow, and I have no place I have to go for either me or my grandma. It's these times that my grandma always wakes me early for some reason, and I'm sure that will be, as always, unavoidable. For now, though, I'm falling asleep at the keys as I type, so I'll end this now before I just leave a stream of sssssssss from drifting off too soon. Posted at 12:11 AM
I am long overdue for sleep, having just gotten back from Perrysburg less than a half hour ago (after 4 AM), but strangely I'm wide awake and mentally feeling pretty 'up'. On the downside, my voice is strained, my arms and back ache, I feel sort of hungry and sort of queasy, my neck is stiff - all of which are signs that my nearly-40-year-old body is rebelling and telling me "fuck you" for staying up so long without even a break to lay back on a couch or something. I had a full day - more successful than I'd expected in fact - starting with running my grandma around on a bunch of errands, finishing up a few tasks myself, and then making a mad drive to Toledo so I could arrive before 5 PM to get my electric razor (which is finally fixed). The very long and completely unexpected detour on State Route 2, my regular path to Toledo, panicked me quite a bit, but I still did make it before the shop closed. I even had a few minutes to spare, and it was a good thing because after a quick test, a couple more tweaks needed to be made to the razor to make it as good as new. From there I headed to Best Buy for some window shopping, then to run some other quick errands, and finally over to Steffen's place in Perrysburg for dinner and a late night of D&D with me DMing the fun. And it was fun, although I clearly had Steve,Mark, and Steffen panicked for hours that they would never survive (and while that is still in question, they did very well and are in a much better position now than ever before to not only make it out alive but possibly even defeat all of the current opponents (and there are many). It was actually really a good time, and the guys were fairly determined to get to the end of a major combat, but we finally just had to quit and go home. It was after 2:30 AM when we finally packed up, and that was with some reluctance from most everyone. So the night was good, I'm still in a decent mood (which is a vast improvement), but I'm exhausted. I imagine that I'll fall asleep right here, lying on the bed typing on the laptop and surfing the web to wind down, and I won't probably even see it coming. It's overdue, I know, and I'll be happy for the rest once I get it, I'm sure.
After yesterday's shit-fest, paying $630 + for repairs to my car was pretty much expected. It's been a roller coaster of luck the past few days with some things working out, more things demanding more time to complete or fix (or demanding second or third or fifth attempts), and more than enough things having just gone completely for shit. I'd say on average I have a poor balance of positive versus negative. But why this would be a surprise I have no idea - this is, after all, how my life works, and thinking otherwise is ridiculous. I'm reminded of the words of Homer Simpson when he said, "You tried your best and you failed miserably. The lesson is 'never try'." Posted at 11:58 PM
I'm an idiot. ... Oh yes, and the Fates are a bunch of fucking bitches. Posted at 11:49 PM
Well, the magic is dying. I'm not sure what I'll be able to get done now. Posted at 10:28 PM
We got together a little later today at Steffen's house, but even with a shorter time together we had a good time tonight. We played a solid run of D&D, and I think everybody was interested. I've been DMing the current storyline, and the guys are doing well against strong opposition, but they are clearly being very challenged to survive. They've slowly been gathering bits and pieces of information, too, and they're getting much closer to piecing things together and seeing full parts of the puzzle that's here and there around them. I feel like I'm doing a good job so far (not that I haven't learned to do some things a bit differently or prep things in a different way, things I've learned through trial and error), and the big things is that I think all three of my friends are enjoying the play of things and are intrigued. Things are going to be getting increasingly more complicated for them in the next few weeks of gaming, so we'll see if things continue to be so well appreciated on both sides, but I have some degree of hope that things will go fairly smoothly. As long as we can keep getting together, spend time together, share jokes and jibes, even if the game were to fall to the wayside, that would be fine. It's the camaraderie more than anything, and while I've enjoyed how well the game is playing out, it's the human connection with the guys that is truly important and sustaining to me. These times away from the house, the once every one or two (or four) weeks we get together like this, mean a lot to me, and they keep me sane. Sanity is actually all it's cracked up to be, too, and considering the alternative I'll think I'll keep striving to keep my mental and emotional balance, and these guys are the best help of all for doing that. They're good friends, and that means all there is, and that's for real. Posted at 2:45 AM
Journal, by Paul Cales, © October 2006
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October 31, 2006
