Thursday = Revenge

I should probably explain why I hang out with Dustin so much. First, I've known him since I was 10; second, he lives in Oklahoma City, but he still works here in Stillwater, so he stays with me two or three nights per week to save on gass and his sanity--because no one wants to spend three hours per day on the road.

Dustin called me late in the afternoon and asked me if I wanted to go Christmas shopping with him. He knows I hate shopping, but just in case he forgot, I reminded him.

"I hate shopping, too and that's why I want some company," Dustin said.

So I agreed to go, not so much to be nice but because if a friend asks me to do something and if I'm able to do it, I feel obligated. Damn friends. And keep that to yourself if you read this!! But I had a plan. Yes, I did. I would find a way to embarrass him, since the bastard was going to drag me around shopping. I wasn't too sure how I was going to do it, but I knew I'd think of something. That's the price you pay when I feel forced to do something I don't want to do. I'll do it. Sure. But there will be some sort of rebellion--because I enjoy being a pain in the ass and because it gives me something else to think about other than "the retail world sucks ass." Also, I still had some indigestion from the Italian we ate last night. So I wasn't in the best of moods. (I took upwards of 10 chewable antacids and a couple of tablespoons of Pepto, but nothing was working. When I burped, it felt like a little bit of lava hitting my throat. Whole wheat pasta, dammit! No other pasta is acceptable.)

So Dustin came over and the first thing he did was pour himself a glass of wine. "You should have some, too," he said. "Shopping won't be so annoying."

"My stomach is pissed," I said. "It's the last thing I want."

So we shot the shit for a little while and then we were off to the land where people go to buy too much shit on credit. Suprisingly, the first place he stopped was BigLots, a bargain center I've never been in. Air Supply was playing on the intercomm system. I cringed and thought that this might be worse than I ever imagined. Dustin found a couple of framed mirrors for his wife to put up at their new place, and then he looked around the toy section for some fun things for his nephews and nieces. I helped pick out some sort of Superman action figure because there were so many different ones. Ah, good times! I don't mind toy sections. :)

We went to the counter to check out, and as the lady, a girl in her early 20s, was ringing the stuff up, I asked, "I didn't see any porn. Where's your porn? Is it by the dolls?" Dustin's eyes got big, real BIG, and then he just laughed.

Obviously, I'm transparent. The clerk said, "I've been suggesting porn here for a long time, but no one will listen to me. Don't you think it would be better near the diapers?" as if what I asked was, "Do you carry multivitamins?" Grrrrrrr! Why won't anyone believe me when I try to act like a perverted bastard? I must be a poor actor.

Shit! No embarrassing Dustin on that one. But I'll give myself an A- for effort.

We stopped at two shoe places next, both of them exclusively for women. Shelley wanted a pair of boots much like the ones she had seen on "Serenity", a movie I had loaned to Dustin and her. The first place didn't have them, and the service there kind of sucked; no one even asked us if we needed help . . . .

Wednesday = Heartburn

I might just use this little blog as motivation to ensure I do something interesting everyday. I don't like logging on when I feel as if I haven't done anything worthwhile, nothing worth writing about, just staring at the link "New Post" as if it's laughing at me in challenge--and then I think, "Just about anything can be interesting if I feel it's interesting." Damn feelings. They can either be more true than any physics equation or more illusory and uncontrollable than mercury flowing through a gloved hand.

Wednesday evening: Dustin and I went out to eat at a little Italian place a few blocks from campus, a somewhat nice place, still homey and yet a little trendy, since it caters college students AND their parents. (If it were marketed to cater college students only, it would most likely be a dive, but that's an entirely different blog in which it would lead me to jump on a soapbox, then preach about how the community subjugates the poor students around here to low paying jobs and over-priced, run down rental property.) We had what you usually have to begin the meal at an Italian restuarant: fresh bread with oil and balsamic vinegar. Dustin ordered a bottle of Pinot Grigio, a good white wine I'm slowing beginning to appreciate more and more. I ordered a coke, and Dustin gave me a strange look because I almost always have a drink with a meal.

"You feeling all right?" Dustin asked.

"Yup. I'm just getting bored with drinking," I said. "I haven't had anything harder than beer in almost a week. I was drinking too much rum."

"Well, I can't drink the entire bottle myself."

"That's okay. It's legal to take it home with you."

"Wouldn't that be considered open container?" He asked.

"Nope. Not with the cork in it."

"Huh. An opened whiskey bottle would be an open container. I know that. Even with the cap screwed on tight, it's still open if you've opened it."

"Yeah, I know. It's Oklahoma. It's not supposed to make sense."

"I'll drink to that." Dustin stopped the waiter. "Excuse me. You only brought one glass. Could you please bring another?"

"You don't want to drink alone, do you?" I asked.

"No."

"Pansy."

"Who's the pansy? The guy who says 'No' and then has a drink anyway or the guy who doesn't have a problem with it in the first place?"

"Becoming a wine pusher, huh?"

(The conversation isn't exact, but it's close.)

So I had a glass of pinot, and it went okay with the shrimp pesto linguini I had. Dustin had the grilled salmon with some sort of pasta (I don't have a keen eye for the differences in pasta) and white sauce. It wasn't a bad meal, and during the rest of it Dustin talked about his job and how his research on K39 growth hormone (???) in cattle was going. I didn't understand much, but he seemed to enjoy talking about it.

But a word of advice: make sure that a decent Italian place serves whole wheat pasta. This place didn't, and my stomach was pissed off for almost 24 hours--a constant little ache of heartburn that Pepto couldn't solve.

Screw It

Alrighty. I'm done writing about that weekend, mostly because I obviously don't have the discipline to write about anything in a timely manner. I think I'll now make it a rule that I can't blog about anything that's older than two weeks, kind of like it's spoiled milk; no one would drink that (unless you have a cold so bad that you don't notice the smell) just as no one would read this crap unless you're so freakin' starved for written nourishment that you can't notice the difference between fresh milk and something so spoiled you need a strainer in order to notice that it, in fact, still contains some liquid. Mmmmm. Milk.

I just wanted to remember that weekend because life has been, more or less, kind of crappy since September, and I thought it would be a good idea to remember it during this three month long shit storm--one good memory surrounded by a ton of disappointments while I live a dissipated lifestyle in which I see no way to form the detritus into something cohesive and coherent. And I've written enough about it that I will remember it without having to write about the entire weekend. So, fuck it. Besides, I can't stand it when I have diarrhea of the word processor. I don't think anyone likes the drizzles.

That's all I've been feeling like, though: one long didactic drizzle of bullshit. Yay! What a happy blog!

Blow me! :)

I think I just told myself to fuck off. Interesting. Anybody else ever told themselves to fuck off?

Land of "Shit! It's Too Bright!"

Last Saturday (12/09) I woke up pretty early because of a hangover. Don't you hate that? Ya know, you get such a bad hangover that it knocks from the inside of your head and yells, "Hey! Wake the eff up? Get some water, some food, some aspirin." Ever experienced it? If not, I don't wanna hear about it. Nothing's worse than a healthy bastard spouting about how much he or she can drink without feeling anything the next day.

Dustin and Shelley weren't up yet, so I made coffee, drank a ton of water, nibbled on some bread, and read "A Scanner Darkly," a great book by the way, until the coffee maker was done dripping, gurgling, coughing. The smell of coffee woke both Dustin and Shelley. Goofy people. Shelley, in her I'm-happy-to-be-awake-and-alive attitude, walked out and said, "Coffee, coffee, coffee," then sang "COFFEEEEEEE!"

I grunted. Dustin walked outside to get the paper.

I felt like crap, like I said earlier, so I just sat there, reading and drinking my coffee, while Shelley worked on her crossword puzzles. She's always working on some sort of puzzle, most of which I don't understand. She's obssessive-compulsive as well as bi-polar. She takes meds, and for the most part she's one hell of a healthy individual, usually upbeat and silly. She's damned intelligent. But never ever, and I mean EVER, leave her without some sort of puzzle to work on while she's just sitting around. She can't handle it. She must have something to do no matter what; otherwise she'll panic, and it is no fun to watch her panic and shake and yell about how she can't find her puzzles. That's too bad. I sometimes like to sit and do nothing--no stereo, no TV, no book; just me and my thoughts. I find it relaxing.

Dustin made breakfast, and what a breakfast it was! Each of us had a three egg omlette with sausage, cheese, tomato, green pepper, onion, and jalepeno. And bacon on the side. Oh, it was good. And after I was done eating, my hangover was gone. I finished A Scanner Darkly (read this book!!), Shelley grew frustrated with her crossword puzzle, and Dustin read the paper until his mind was satiated with local news. We decided to take a walk.

Dustin and I had already been over most of the 40 acres, but Shelley hadn't yet. It was a moderate day, not too cold, but not exactly warm either. We took Bailey and Phoenix with us, and I think they had a better time than all of us. We may have walked a lot that morning, but the dogs ran and walked four to five times the amount we did, both Phoenix and Bailey always infront of us, acting as if we needed protection. And what was weird was that they got along great. Wherever one went, the other followed, both of them together, changing directions at the same time, sniffing the same things, ears perking at the same sounds. They really acted like a small pack. There was no posturing, no growling, no barking. They were just two dogs on the same mission: don't let anything near the two-legs.

I've already described the land, so I won't go into it again, but it is worth mentioning that Bailey and Phoenix had a great time in the creek. Both of them jumped in and ran back and forth in the water, splashing and growling playfully, and getting themselves smelly and filthy--a favorite past time of just about any dog. Phoenix has long hair, and her coat is mostly white, so she looked awful, red mud everywhere; Bailey has a black short coat, so it's difficult to tell when she's wet or when she's dirty, but she does have one small white stripe on her chest, and it was dark, a tell-tale sign of how much fun she had. But yeah, she was filthy. She brushed up against me after playing in the creek, and she left mud along my jeans. I'm sure she wanted to share that wonderul creek smell with me. We walked around for about two and half to three hours, and about an hour into I had to take off my coat and hat because my blood was flowing and it didn't matter whether it was a warm day or not. It was a good walk.

That afternoon we watched V for Vendetta, a film I have already seen four times and Dustin had seen twice, but Shelley hadn't seen it yet. I enjoyed it almost as much as watching it the first time. If you haven't seen it, you should.

We peetered around the rest of the afternoon, just doing whatever. I wandered around some outside, Dustin worked on god knows what, and Shelley spent some time in her bedroom working on puzzles. It was a bit of down time before Adrian, Darcy, and Chrissy would come over.

And come they did.

More Land of Sunshine

Yeah, I sure did write more the next day, didn't I? Anyways, to continue on with my weekend during which I had a good time. Most people will find it boring, but oh well.

I left Bailey, my dog, in Dustin's jeep while I carried my things into the house. I left her there because Dustin's dog, Phoenix, and Bailey don't get along well. Both bitches think they should be in charge, although Bailey is half Phoenix's size. But my bitch sure is spunky, and she won't take crap from any mere dog. She only takes crap from humans. So I walk in, and Phoenix is all over me, rubbing against me kind of like a cat--well, about as well as an overweight 100 pound dog can rub like a cat--and whining like I'm her long lost sister; yet, I'm a male human being and she's a picky-ass, sensitive female dog. (Yeah, pay no attention to my half-assed similes. I'm not writing fiction, so who gives a shit? I know I don't.) Shelley says Hi and I say Hi, how ya doing? back to her. We hug and then she gives me the obligatory tour of her new home.

I gotta admit: mobile homes are a lot nicer than what they used to be. The ceiling isn't flat like the older ones are, so you don't have this cramped in feeling of a low ceiling, as if you're in a can that might be crushed at any moment. Nope. It was steepled in the middle and looked rather nice. The entire structure was bigger than I thought, and its insulation was great. I couldn't feel any air coming from the window sills, and when you spoke, it didn't seem obnoxiously loud--the sounds pinging and panging off the walls and ceiling--like other mobile homes I'd been in. All in all it's not a bad place. A living room, dining room, kitchen, breakfast nook, three bedrooms, and two bathrooms.

I remembered Bailey 20 minutes later. Oops. But I think that was a good thing that I left in the jeep because Phoenix had settled down. So I brought Bailey in and kept the two mutts separate.

And the drinking began . . . because that's what we do when we haven't hung out in a while. Oh yes, they fed me too, sort of. Shelley said, "I thought you guys would be here sooner"--because it was close to 9--"so I ate. Quinn, anything we have here is up for grabs. If you want it, eat it." Mmmmmm. That's dangerous when someone says that. I found the leftover fixings for tacos and went apeshit, while drinking rum.

Exciting evening, yes? Wait! It gets even more exciting! We played drunken Scrabble!! My god, we were hedonistic bastards in the middle of nowhere, spelling such nasty things such as "lux" and "forlorn" and "halo" and even "tits" when we got good and drunk, our lesser selves--our mean egos--imagining all sorts of crazy things we could do while out in the country; such as building a bonfire and dancing around it naked, while whooping and hollering, shooting our guns, baying at the moon, pouring wine on ourselves . . . but, yeah, we just played Scrabble. It was cold outside, and even a man's nipples may have frozen and fallen off if he stayed outside long enough. But, hey! I enjoy Scrabble!

I forgot to mention that, during our game of Scrabble, Bailey and Phoenix got into a fight and scared the piss out of us. (Fine. You caught me. But I did have to pee at the time.) Those two bitches snarled and growled and wouldn't give it up for a few minutes--until I finally said to hell with it and smacked the both of them and growled and yelled back at them. Dogs never know what to think when someone does that. Maybe they think, "That's one crazy two-legs. What the fuck? Run for cover!" I was pretty mad. And you'd be mad, too. As a matter of fact, you'd be really pissed off if you were stuck with a Z, Q, V, and an X while playing Scrabble, and then two dumb bitches get into an argument over which part of the carpet they want to claim as their own. It just puts you in a bad mood. Fuckin' Scrabble!

So that was Friday night.

Next post will be about last Saturday.

Oh yeah. I lost the game by four points. I blame the damn dogs who broke my concentration. I maintain that, given enough time of uninterrupted thought, I would've thought of something to spell with those damn letters.

Land of Sunshine

I had a damn fun weekend. One of my best friends, Dustin, invited me over to his new place, a mobile home which sits on 40 acres, where he will most likely, in the next five to seven years, build a house, raise some kids, work, eat, shit, have fun, screw his wife, and then die. He's a good bastard. I hope, when he dies, he does so during his sleep after having a good time in bed, old enough that sex is athletic and causes a bit of pain even when it's not a marathonic encounter.

He knows I'm close to broke, so we drove down together in his jeep, listening to Faith No More's album Angel Dust, which I hadn't heard since sometime in the mid 90s. That in itself was nostalgic because, when I was 18 or 19, Dustin and I would drive around, stoned, listening to that album. If you've never heard it before, then I suggest you don't go out and buy it. It's disturbing, sarcastic, painful, downright spooky--but Dustin and I could always laugh at it; we didn't understand the pain or psychosis of the music, but we could certainly understand the angst, since we were young, hated authority (the hate now having simmered to a general distaste) and leaned toward the ways of stupidity, even though both us of are and were bright individuals. So we listened. And remembered. Sang along. Screamed. And laughed. Geez. He really can't sing worth a shit, but he is fun to listen to; his energy is infectious. You feel it when he tries to sing, his face scrunched together, the veins in his throat popping out, his arms, sometimes not even on the wheel, pumping to the beat. The freakin' weirdo.

Dustin and his wife, Shelley, a fun woman three inches taller than her husband with sandy blonde hair, and a willowy body, live on the southeast side of Oklahoma City, barely within the city limits. There isn't much around the place within four miles. No grocery stores, gas stations, fast food joints. Nada. And they prefer it that way. I had only been there once previously, and even though it was dark, I remembered exactly where it was without looking at street signs: pass four hills after the left turn at Royal Bavaria, a great German resturaunt where they brew their own beer, and then a right turn, pass two more hills, and at the bottom, after climbing the second hill, is the gravel entrance to their 40 acres. And their was a brand new mobile home I hadn't seen before. The first time I was there Dustin and I simply walked the acreage. Beautiful land. Oak trees, pecans, cedars, walnuts, dogwood, shrubs, tall grass, thorn bushes, brambles, a creek that split the acreage, parts of it open land, and other parts dense with wood. All it lacked was a home. And there it sat, almost as if it had always been there, except the eight feet of packed dirt on all sides of it where there used to be tall grass that hadn't been cut in nearly 30 years. It still hadn't been cut. It was cleared and uprooted by violent machinery.

I'll write more tomorrow. I'm tired.

Catching a Web--Hatchoooo!

Since I've been online, I've made a number of friends. Most of them come and go, and a few stick around. That's expected. One of the strangest things on the net, however, is how quickly two people can get personal and tell you about things they normally wouldn't in such a short amount of time. It's as if some people want a faceless confessor; someone who can know your thoughts without any real interaction or consequences taking place. It feels safe. And here I've given people crap about not getting personal--and keeping people at an arm's length. Well, it depends upon what you're looking for, but I'm going to explore this a little.

Over the past couple of months, I haven't had much to do because I'm currently jobless. I don't go out much because all of my friends are married, some with children, some not. So while I was working, I never really went out during the week, but waited until the weekend when my friends had time to have a few drinks and some laughs. Well, no job now. All of my ex co-workers are doing other things, and since I don't have much money to play with--and I haven't had much for a while--I don't really get out at all anymore.

Because of this I'm seeking psuedo-friendships elsewhere--i.e. online friendships. And I'm beginning to think I'm doing this for the exact reasons I have criticized others. It's easier and emotionally safer. But it certainly isn't as fulfilling as being able to reach across a table and shake someone's hand, see a smile, hear a laugh, clap someone on the back, wink, share a game of pool--or whatever.

This chica contacted me a few weeks ago on POF, IM'ng me every now and then, telling me a bit of her life story, but mostly just shooting the shit. Her story is pretty damn sad, and I'm not going to get into it because it's not my story to tell. Anyways, during one of our IM sessions, she got pretty upset, gave me her number, and asked me to call. So I did--because I already knew what she was going through, didn't give her any crap about any of it, and knew that she had to talk to somebody about it. (Yes, Sarah, I'm sure you find that difficult to believe that I didn't give her crap. ;) We talked for close to five hours two nights ago and she told me pretty much her entire life story, and her life has been pretty fucked up for more than 50% of it. The thing is, she isn't fucked up. Her situation was. She handled it better than I ever would have if put into that position. I did a fair job of putting everything into perspective for her, and letting her know that she is indeed okay--a hell of a lot healthier than most people who had never been through what she had been through. But again, it comes back to this: she had to feel safe in order to tell me these things; and online friendships are anything but safe on an emotional level. They aren't as personal, even though you might discuss personal subjects. I think they can be quite dangerous because you should save these types of things for real friends who can give you real comfort right then and there. You have history, comraderie, a better understanding of each other. Trust. And you know they have your best interests in mind. Do online friends? Crap. If she had known me in person, it would've been months before she told me about all the important things that have happened in her life. It's just plain weird. Why trust the faceless?

I said some good things to her. I think I helped. But what happens if she starts leaning on me, when she should be leaning on someone else? What happens if I start leaning on my online friends more (and I might already be doing this) for social interaction since I haven't had a whole lot of interaction face to face since I was laid off? None of this is healthy. It's not terrible either. It's like iceberg lettuce. It's neutral. And you can't live on iceberg lettuce, and this is why having these online friendships is dangerous. You will begin to feel a sense of lack, that something is missed and missing. I really need to re-think what I'm doing and why I'm doing it--and possibly what I'm avoiding. Many of these relationships (friendships or romantic interests) I've had since I've been online lack the kind of meaning a person needs.

All of us deserve more than what online friendships offer.

Or maybe I'm over-analyzing and I need to find cheap ways of getting out and doing things with people I can interact with in person. What a fucking concept. I guess those mental gymnastics were all for-fucking-naught.

Crappy Saturday

I feel like crap. Again. I was really sick about 10 days ago, and I can't seem to get rid of the congestion. I've cut way back on the smokes. Heck, I've had only two today. I'm simply pissed off that unless I'm taking some form of decongestant, I feel shitty. Obviously, I'm stressed out about something; otherwise, I'd feel just fine, but I have no idea what the hell I'm stressed about. There really hasn't been anything for me to be stressed.

I did hear something I didn't particularly like on Wednesday from a friend--whom I wanted to be more--and whom I've known for a few months. Did she call? No. Did she IM? No. She sent me an email, and I must admit that the emotional maturity of this woman is suspect since she didn't even have the courage to pick up the phone. Nope. Just your run-of-the-mill "It's not you; it's me" email that I could've received from a 22 year old chatterbox (who says nothing of meaning) with big, fake ta-tas, purple nails, shorts that have "pink" written on the ass and nothing upstairs. To receive that from a college professor was laughable. :)

But that's the same shit I've heard from everyone else, this mentality of "I can't give you what you deserve" or "Your emotions are so strong" or "I have trouble relating to you because you're a guy who actually knows how to think on an emotional level" or the question "How can you be so sure of what you believe?" and a real kicker of a statement "I just don't understand why you think I'm so great". What bullshit copouts. I've heard these statements way too often--even from my ex-wife, who always thought that she never deserved me, which--after she told me that--I pretty much felt like she had three heads.

Oh, fuck the bozos! Writing this isn't helping my mood.