Bitter PIE

What Direction Really Means

2012-01-30T06:43:00.002-05:00

Note: There are situations where an actor just sucks, but your sign that's what's happening is when you have to do 47 takes. Then there are cases where a Director is just an asshole. Again, that's usually obvious. The scope of this post doesn't encompass either of these situations.

Over the weekend I had three different conversations with different actors about getting direction. They went like this:

1) After an actress kept saying "I'm sorry" every time I gave Direction, I threatened to fine her $1 every time those words came out of her mouth from that point forward.

2) An actress asked me for feedback, anything I could tell her about anything she does. I told her that the only thing I could think of is she always seems irritated when I give her Direction. This led to a long conversation about how she always feels like crap when getting Direction.

3) An actress' mother wrote me yesterday expressing appreciation for the opportunity (always a good idea for the actor, manager, or mother to do after a first gig) and mentioned some Direction I'd had to to give the actress about picking up her energy level for the next take.

All three of these conversations implied one thing: If somebody has to give you Direction, YOU SUCK. That is NOT what Direction means in 95% of the cases. Direction is either offering the editor choices or it's fine tuning a performance.

Choices
You can deliver a perfect performance in a take but we still want to offer the editor choices because maybe a different choice will end up fitting the overall feel or theme of the project. For instance, maybe in 4 other scenes we have people getting irritated with Rob. So you just gave us the perfect irritated take, but when we get into the editing room we discover that EVERYBODY's irritated with Rob in EVERY scene. That's boring and repetitive. If Director was a moron and didn't ask every actor for other choices, we'd be stuck with that and the project would suck. That's why we need other choices.

Think about it like this. Let's say you're going to a party and you know everybody's going to be wearing a tie, so you put on a red tie, but you stick a blue tie in your pocket just in case. You get to the party and most other people are wearing a red tie, so you look stupid being another red tie. So you take it off and put on the blue one. An actor apologizing when you give Direction is like that red tie being all like "I'm sorry I'm red instead of blue!" Dude, you were the perfect red tie, you just didn't fit the situation so we went a different way. That's all.

Veteran actors will automatically give the Director different choices with each take because they understand this, but some Directors don't want that so if you wait for them to ask for different choices that's fine. Just understand what that means, which is NOT "you suck."

Fine Tuning
Sometimes you're almost there, we just need to fine tune your performance to get the rest of the way there. You're not a mind reader, and also sometimes we need to experience the performance once or twice to even realize exactly what we want, then we fine tune from there. But we'd never get there if you sucked. You were good, we just needed that before we could fine tune it to what specifically we need. Again, this has nothing to do with a bad take and is nothing to be ashamed of.

This would be like turning on a radio and it'd drifted to 92.7 instead of the actual channel 92.3, and when you tune it back to where it should be, the radio is all like "OMG! I wasn't where I was supposed to be!" and throws itself off a ledge. That's as silly as stressing over a simple fine tuning Direction. Like the actress above going home and mentioning to her mother that I had to tell her to pick up her energy level. That's not a noteworthy event. I needed to hear her do it once before knowing what energy level was needed. It would be like going home and telling people your boss needed you to move your car a spot over so the sunlight didn't reflect off the windshield into the office windows, creating a painful glare. There was no way for you know that would happen until you parked there, and it's not very noteworthy.

Stress
Acting is an extremely stressful occupation. And in a lot of ways there's no way around that. But one thing you should NEVER stress about is taking Direction. And yet its extremely common for actors to obsess over every Direction they get, take it personally, and take it in a negative way. But its a silly worry because that's almost never why you're getting Direction.

So chill, yo. It's all good.

The "Importance" of Acting

2012-01-11T13:34:00.002-05:00

One actress I know started going to nursing school because, as she put it, "I want to do something important with my life." She's going to keep acting, but that feels trivial to her so she's becoming a nurse as well. That's admirable and I'm not knocking that at all.

Another actress I know makes sure all the short films she writes and produces herself are about "important" topics like bullying, anorexia, etc. Those are important topics and, again, I'm not knocking that. Those issues need to be addressed.

What I don't like is the subtext that escapist films aren't important at all, or are even something to be ashamed of. Look, sometimes we just need to escape from this sorry effing world for a couple hours. Life can suck. The economy sucks. Our relationships (or lack thereof) can suck. Sometimes we just want to get away from all that and enjoy some light entertainment. In that situation we're not looking for some deep important study on school bullying, we want a damned vampire ripping a mofo's throat out. We want a face hugging alien going upside somebody's face. We want the bad guy to be comic book evil and smirk and quip and then get gunned down by the hero. We want to ESCAPE.

Now tell me that isn't important. Tell me actors and filmmakers creating light escapism aren't performing a valuable service for thousands of people going through rough times who just need a couple hours vacation from all the crap in their lives?

It IS important, and it is a valuable service. Is it rescuing kittens from a burning building? Of course not. But it IS a valuable service we provide.

Pretty Balloon

2012-01-11T05:27:00.002-05:00

In the second grade I had a big crush on this pretty little blonde girl in my class. But every time I tried to talk to her, she blew me off. She wasn't mean about it, and she could have been, but she just wasn't interested.

One day I won a contest and the prize was this pretty red balloon. I don't know what it was about this balloon (perhaps it was just the fact this was before video games and 900 channels) but we'd ALL wanted this balloon. So when I won it I was the envy of the whole class.

When school was over for the day, the pretty little blonde girl came up to me and asked if she could have the balloon. Obviously I gave it to her and was glad to do so. She smiled and thanked me.

The next day she went right back to ignoring me.

You know what I've learned in all the years between then and now? Absolutely nothing. I still find myself giving away my pretty red balloons to pretty smiles and am glad to do so despite knowing in the back of my mind I'm about to get screwed.

You can't teach some people.

Dusting this off

2011-11-27T23:50:00.003-05:00

I've decided to start blogging again. Twitter has been fun, a lot more fun than blogging ever was, but it does have it's limitations so this will be a good avenue explore some topics at a greater length.

We'll see how long this urge lasts, though. LOL

I heard mice playing chess last night

2010-09-16T11:13:00.002-04:00

I woke up in the middle of the night to an incessant clicking sound. It sounded for all the world to be chess pieces clicking on a chess board. The noises were random, steady, and coming FROM INSIDE MY HOUSE. So I grabbed Mr. Crippler (my trusty minibaseball bat) and investigated. I found nothing, no sign of people or mice or anything. But THE NOISES STOPPED as I left my bedroom with my baseball bat.

Finally, I went back to bed and back to sleep. And proceeded to have a series of really horrible nightmares, my worst in a long time. Of course, I don't usually remember my dreams so I don't know how they compare.

I woke this morning with my upper back in a lot of pain. At some point in the night I did something to twist or hurt my back. Badly.

So what's the sum total of all this? I haven't a fucking clue. The best I can come up with is a voodoo witch was in my house casting a spell to throw out by back and give me bad dreams. Maybe the noise I heard was her human finger bones rattling against her spell plate. Or whatever it is voodoo witches do to cast spells.

Weird night.

Genre Bashing

2010-07-06T01:19:00.002-04:00

I made a reply to somebody yesterday and said "I wouldn't read Young Adult lit at gunpoint" and since then several people have emailed me asking why I'm bashing the genre.

I'm actually not. It's just a matter of personal taste.

Let's say you and I are eating out. For dessert you order strawberry pie and I order pecan pie.

"Why didn't you order strawberry pie?" You ask.

"I don't like strawberry pie." I reply.

In this scenario, has anybody ever in the history of the world said "WHY ARE YOU BASHING STRAWBERRY PIE?!?!?"

No, they haven't. They instantly realize it's a matter of personal taste.

So why do we do this all the time when it's about novels, movies, or TV shows?

I'll go further. Why do we need a reason to not like something when it's TV shows, movies, or novels when we never ask for a reason if somebody doesn't like a type of food? Seriously, why is that? I talk online a lot about shows and movies and books and I keep running into the same bizarre thing: people who would never consider asking why you don't like liver and onions are demanding to know why you don't like Twilight or The Office or a certain genre of fiction.

So getting back to Young Adult fiction, nothing against it at all. I just prefer pecan pie to strawberry pie. And no, I don't know why.

May I help you, Mr. Thief?

2010-06-11T06:01:00.000-04:00

I've gotten used to being treated like a common criminal when out shopping. Yeah, it's tedious when the woman at Wal Mart insinuates I'm willing to go to prison for using a stolen credit card to pay for $9 in Cheetoes and Diet Pepsi, but whatever. Just rolls off my back. Most times.

The other day I was running around, scrambling the find supplies for the SF convention this weekend. I was working on 3 hours sleep, had a crapton of stuff to do, and very little time to do it in. So I was in a bad way when I rushed into an office supply store, we'll call them "Moffice Mepo", snatched up a spindle of blank DVDs, and ran back to my car. It wasn't until I got back to the car and was getting the keys out of my pocket that I realized I'd walked out of there without paying the $30 for the blank DVDs. I looked around, expecting a horde of Moffice Mepo workers to be descending upon me to arrest me. All was quiet. Apparently nobody had noticed and there sure as hell hadn't been any alarm going off from the security things they have at the door.

I walked back in to pay for the DVDs. The checkout clerk closest to the door noticed me coming in with them so when it was my turn she asked what was going on. I explained what'd happened and added "You need to turn on your alarm things for dumbasses like me." She giggled at that and explained the blank DVDs were too inexpensive an item to wire with alarms.

I swiped my card. She asked to see it. Thinking she needed the last four numbers of it, I handed it over. She asked for my photo ID.

...

"Excuse me?"

"I need to see your photo ID to check it against your credit card."

This exchange is burned into my memory so here's what I said pretty much word for word. "Okay, so let me get this straight. I'm a criminal mastermind so here's my nefarious plan. I'm going to grab these blank DVDs, stride right out of your store without paying for them, get them all the way to my car without anyone noticing, and then, to cap off my masterpiece criminal scam, I'm going to walk back into the store and risk 10 years in prison by paying for them with a stolen fucking credit card. Yeah. that's right, Lex Luthor's my bitch because I'm the criminal genius! Here, here's my fucking photo ID."

Now, in the interest of full disclosure, I lifted a lot of that from a comedy short film I did a few years back that dealt with having to sign the back of your credit card before anyone will let you use it. (my theory is, all signing the back does is let the criminal practice your handwriting over and over until the get it perfect. Whereas, if the criminal had no idea how you sign your name, theirs would be drastically different than yours so it would be obvious what you didn't buy and what the criminal did) So I didn't come up with all that on the spot, but my delivery was pretty good if I do say so myself. And she got pretty red in the face so that made my black heart feel a little better.

Fucking dumbass.

Twitter Rocks

2010-05-26T20:59:00.003-04:00

I love that it allows me to hear from Claire again and I'm able to follow all kinds of cool people like Kevin Pollack. And you, Gatorbelle. Heh.

Also, I'm hitting the road again tomorrow. Meetings in Ohio then fun in Michigan. WOO HOO! Ren Fairs rawk too!

I'm now on Twitter

2010-05-19T23:38:00.002-04:00

It's strictly a business account though, so for all the juicy personal stuff that never happens to me, you can still only get that here. Heh.

Airports are memory time capsules

2010-05-19T08:07:00.002-04:00

I picked someone up at the local airport yesterday and as I walked through the place I remembered every other time I'd been there. They were almost exclusively good memories. Business trips (I like my job so they were good memories), vacations, going with an old girlfriend to visit her hometown. Some of these memories go back 15-20 years, and the place hasn't changed much so it could have all happened yesterday or last week. I've changed cars, changed clothes, changed houses a couple times. I have very little that I had a decade ago. But entering the airport was like stepping back in time.

Right here, this wall was where Victoria and I sat on the floor with our luggage and waited a couple hours because our flight to San Francisco was delayed. If I could step through the veil and go back in time to that moment, I would never stop kissing her. Fuck the flight.

Here's where Victoria and I waited for her mother to join us for Christmas, the first and only Christmas I shared with a completely different family than the one I grew up with.

Over here, this ticket counter is where four business associates and I collected our tickets. It was the largest group of friends I ever flew with. It's a lot of fun (and was very foreign to me) to fly with an entire row of people I knew. We laughed and talked the entire trip to LA.

Here, this information counter, this is where I waited before flying out to Chicago for the first time. It was a wonderful week long vacation.

Outgoing flights are almost always fun and adventurous. Coming back you're usually tired and burned out and not looking forward to getting back to work. But the times I remembered last night were all those moments just before setting out to a strange place for a fun adventure.

I saw another crazy person yesterday.

2010-05-15T11:23:00.003-04:00

Man, they REALLY look like they're having fun. I wish I could have that much fun without, you know, having to go shit smearing nuts. LMFAO

This one tried to convince me there were aliens living in his hair. At least, I think that's what he was saying. It was hard to make out with me hauling ass away from him as soon as I realized he was crazy.

I like it when people break up

2010-04-26T01:57:00.003-04:00

I mean, this is the one place in the world I can be completely honest, right? Which, if I admit it, is probably why I don't post more often. LOL

But it's the truth, I like it when couples who were so in my face with how much they loved each other break up. It totally validates my dim world view. Of course, it also piles up a LOT bad karma for the next time I get into a relationship. LMFAO Which could be why I'm not in any hurry to do THAT.

I was reminded of this relationship aimed schadenfreude streak of mine when visited a blog I hadn't visited in two years. I had to stop going there because it was making me sick how absolutely in love with her man this woman was. She LOVED him. Absolutely, without question. He was living perfection incarnate and he had the love of a of this bright, witty, charming blogger. I couldn't stomach it so I bailed.

Tonight, after two years, I decided to see if they'd moved from the sickening perfect bliss into the comfortable acceptance most people do after a couple years. Come to find out, not only were they not together anymore, he was now the Antichrist. Apparently he'd turned out to be such an asshole she has to conceal her current location from him.

Wow. That's a complete 180. And I felt bad for her. Hey, I just wanted her to take it down a damned notch, not have him turn into Sean Penn.

I know, I know, if I ever date again, Karma is really going to punch me in the nuts hard.

10 Reasons To Want The World To End In 2012

2010-04-14T22:14:00.002-04:00

You know how those nuts think the world is going to end in two years? If it does, it's not ALL bad news!

1) Won't have to watch the hideous Spiderman "reimagining" movie.

2) Won't have to hear about that stupid fucking show "Glee" anymore.

3) No more Miley Cyrus songs. EVER. WOO HOO!!!

4) No more running out of the house and twisting an ankle because I'm trying to beat the McDonald's breakfast cutoff deadline.

5) Won't have to watch The Hobbit sequel movie. (I know, they're planning the sequel even though the first movie isn't out yet.

6) The Family Circus (which hasn't been funny once in the last 30 years) will FINALLY END.

7) No more waiting for morons scared to death to turn right on red even though the closest car is 2000 feet away.

8) No more CSI spinoffs!!!!!!!

9) Won't have to ever think about the Star Wars Holiday Special again.

10) Prince Charles will FINALLY get to see his mother kick the bucket so he can take over as King. Too bad his reign will only last seconds.

Dear Spamming Dumbass,

2010-03-09T02:01:00.002-05:00

I notice you've been spamming my comments for the past month. There's three things you should realize before you continue:

1) Spamming posts from six months ago is fucking stupid because nobody's going to see it.

2) Only about three people read this blog so shouldn't you be hitting a blog that's actually got a chance of generating traffic for you?

3) Spamming posts from six months ago is fucking stupid because nobody's going to see it.

I realize that's actually only two things you should realize, but given the enormity of your gaffe I thought it worth mentioning twice. Dumbass.

Love,
ShadowDog

Something random

2010-03-07T12:58:00.003-05:00

Just something I did while trying to learn some new comic making software.

We need new ways to talk to dead people!

2010-03-04T16:04:00.002-05:00

10,000 years of superstition and all you ever see in movies are Ouija boards and seances. That's it! That's all we have after this much time and this many people who believe in stupid shit?

There HAS to be some other way that's less of a cliche.

PS. Speaking of cliches, I was at the grocery store last night and all I got was a loaf of bread and a half gallon of milk. So I said to the clerk "I'm a walking cliche. I came to the store for only milk and bread."

I got nothing back. I wasn't looking for a belly laugh, it was a weak attempt at humor at best, but I didn't even get a smile. >:-(

There's more than one fan website devoted to Shiri Appleby

2010-03-02T20:21:00.003-05:00

Um, yeah, I think we all have a little too much time on our hands.

Don't get me wrong, she's smoking hawt, but if more than 0.001% of the world has ever heard of her, I'll shave my head.

Plus she dates a freaking hockey player for crissakes.

Denial would be AWESOME

2010-03-01T10:42:00.002-05:00

Kinda going along with my "crazy people have all the fun" mention last week, don't people in denial seem to enjoy life a hell of a lot more?

For instance, it's been over three years since I broke up with my last girlfriend. If I could live in sweet, sweet denial and just blame her for it blowing up, I'd already be on my next girl. But I can't. It was mostly my fault and I know it. Not in that "oh woe is me, nail me to the cross" boolsheet way, but in the logical "the sky is blue" kinda way. It just ... was my fault. Simple as that. No getting around it.

But I'm so pissed to have thrown away the love of my life that I just can't move on. It's not even that I'm afraid I'll fuck it up again next time. That's not a problem because this sucked so badly I'll NEVER go down this road again. I've learned my lesson. No, it's more that I'm still pissed at myself.

These are the cases I think denial exists for. It's for the survival of the species. Denial rolls up in these situations, puts on a sexy dress, runs her fingers through your hair, and whispers in your ear, "it's okay, baby. It's wasn't really your fault. It's on her." Then I could be all like "Oh. Sweet! Time to move on!"

I keep checking the door but Denial hasn't shown up to do me this solid yet. >:-(

Flaming cars and no breakfast

2010-02-28T12:25:00.002-05:00

Here were some of the rejected headlines for my last post:

"Memo to self, NEVER use the hood of your car as a table when mixing Mentos and Diet Pepsi."

"Always check the references of someone you hire to paint flames on your car."

"Always make sure the person you hire to paint flames on your car speaks very good English."

"So! How was your day?"

"The celebrations around here when the local youth soccer teams win the championship can get a little out of hand."

Here's the real story, LMFAO. I was driving to Golden Coral to pick up breakfast. It started smoking as I neared the parking lot, so I parked in an isolated corner away from everything else in case I needed it towed. The smoking got worse, and then it started flaming out. So I cancelled my call to AAA and called 911 instead. By the time the fire trucks arrived it was fucking totaled, man. Engine all burned to shit, windshield melted in. They put it out and reckoned it was something to do with the fuel injection or whatever. That and old age. It had 186,000 miles on it.

What really pisses me off is by the time this was all over, Golden Coral's breakfast hours were over. GODDAMMIT!!!

Something tells me I drank too much last night!

2010-02-25T05:29:00.002-05:00

I'm the tallest midget in the room

2010-02-23T02:44:00.000-05:00

Is it just me or are the crazy people in this world having all the fun?

I mean, the dude I saw today having a conversation with a telephone poll was giggling and having the time of his life. That pole must have had a wicked sense of humor.

The people you see spreading their own waste on a wall with their bare hands seem to be enjoying themselves very much.

And the most insane people of all, fans of The Office, seem to laugh a LOT.

It makes me wish I could go crazy. Damn my stupid sanity!

Hold Grudges To Build A Better World

2010-01-01T11:33:00.002-05:00

If more people would hold grudges, hard and long, the world would be a better place. Think about it. If your friend was absolutely sure that you would hold a grudge about it forever if he or she fucked you over in some way ... the friend would be less likely to do it right?

Let's give a more specific example. I did some freelance work in an office earlier this year. On my first day two coworkers had a loud screaming match. Using fake names, Randy had taken a call from Charles' client while Charles was out to lunch. Randy charmed the client, convinced the client that Charles was about to take some time off and the client would be better off working with Randy from now on. The client officially notified the big boss that he wanted to work with Randy from now on, which meant Randy would get all the commissions. From what I heard this was a five figure boon.

So my first day at work Charles was screaming at Randy about this and ready to fight. Charles refused to speak to Randy after that and Randy was given a verbal reprimand.

I worked there off and on, and one day months later I came in to a get a check and noticed Charles and Randy laughing and joking in a corner. I took Charles aside and asked him if Randy had paid him back or something.

"No, but what is done is done. Randy will never do something like that again."

Well, maybe. Not to you, probably. But why wouldn't he do it to someone else because HE GOT AWAY WITH IT! He has everything he had before, especially your friendship, and all that money he made. There was an uncomfortable month or two but no lasting consequences.

Now, if Randy knew for sure that he'd lose Charles' friendship forever if he did this, would he have still done it? Maybe. But maybe not.

This is what I mean about making the world a better place. If more people would hold a grudge longer, there would be higher consequences for rude and evil behavior. But rude and evil people know one thing for sure: "time heals all wounds." If you're willing to wait long enough, you can pretty much get away with anything below the level of serious injury and murder. I mean, waiting even works with cheating on a spouse in a lot of cases. It may take a year, but a lot of time even that is forgiven. Think about that, you can cheat on your wife or husband and in the unlikely event you get caught, all you have to do is spend a year in the doghouse and you're scot free! Why wouldn't you cheat?

Fortunately there are exceptions there, but not enough. And once we get below that level of sin, pretty much everything is forgiven.

So hold your grudges and hold them hard. Fuck all this Christian forgiveness shit.

47 Posts?

2009-12-31T16:42:00.001-05:00

Counting this one? Screw that. My New Year's Resolution is to triple that next year. And they're all going to be good ones too!

Happy New Year!

Apparently a whore wants to have sex with Thanksgiving!

2009-12-12T11:08:00.002-05:00

I deleted the comment, but a UK based escort service was attracted to my "Fuck Thanksgiving" post and said the following:

123 123 said...
Nice post as for me. I'd like to read something more concerning that matter. Thank you for sharing this material.
Sexy Lady
(link to stupid UK prostitute website)

Dear 123 123,

Nice comment as for me. I expressed myself quite clearly so I'm afraid I have nothing more concerning the matter of having intercourse with Thanksgiving. Thank you for sharing your request for this material.
Fat Bitter PIE Lover

PS. Say hello to your brother 456 456 for me.

Fuck Thanksgiving!

2009-11-25T19:03:00.001-05:00

...

Well, I'm just saying what we're all thinking, right?

...

RIGHT?!?!?

Ode To Claire

2009-11-20T09:21:00.003-05:00

As anyone who checks in here regularly knows, this has been the busiest half year of my life, and that's fucking saying something, yo. LMFAO. So, sadly, I missed the closing of the first blog love of my life, Lilium Inter Spinas. This was the first blog I ever started following, and I think it's fair to say that without this blog I wouldn't have stayed in the blogworld off and on all this time since.

I still remember the first ever post, the one that got me hooked. It was about her walking into an office in DC and letting some tard taste hell. It was AWESOME. I love rage and she expressed it well. I was so hooked that if I was a fish I'd be mounted on the wall.

Since then I've been a bad follower, drifting in and out of her bloglife at regular intervals, seeming always to miss the big events in her life. So I'm not going to sit here and say I showed as much appreciation for her blog while it was around as I should have. Nor have I learned anything from this as I regularly diss my current favorite blog, Nothing and Everything in much the same way. But that's life, isn't it? You spend so much time staring hard at your past that you never realize you're doing the exact same stupid shit in the here and now.

But back to Claire Belle. How about a haiku to finish this blog tribute?

You wrote truth with style.
You left HNT with grace,
You do all with class.

Punching Leo

2009-11-12T10:16:00.002-05:00

You ever just want to punch Leonardo DiCaprio in his fucking face?

I do. A LOT.

About a week out ...

2009-10-29T10:30:00.002-04:00

I'm about a week away from going to LA to make my fortune ... or fail miserably. I can't remember the last time I haven't had the pressure of this trip weighing down on me so I'm not even going to know how to act when it's over. Work, i guess. LMFAO

I have a secret way I've been motivating myself but it's been a pretty douchebaggy thing to do so I don't know if I'll admit it when this is all over or not. But hey, you do what you gotta do, right?

Oh, and thank God for Monster drink right now. LMFAO

Too much information

2009-10-22T14:51:00.002-04:00

I've been spending most of today looking online for certain human related sound effects. Stuff like heavy breathing and gasping and the sound a head makes when it bounces of a wooden table. Stuff like that.

In the process, I've learned a couple things:

1) It's really hard to find the sound of a human head bouncing of a wooden table.

2) There are way, way, WAY too many different farting sounds available online. If I wanted that, my search would have been over hours ago. Why in the hell do we need that much variety of that sound?

PS. Only a couple more weeks before my LA trip and then I'll have a lot more time to blog.

Bless you, caffeine!

2009-10-01T16:26:00.002-04:00

Dear Caffeine,

Help me to spread your energy everywhere I go, flood my soul with your spirit and life. Penetrate and possess my whole being so utterly that my life may only be a radiance of finished household tasks and work. Shine through me and be so in me that every soul I come in contact with may feel your presence in my soul. Let them look up and see no longer me but only sweet, sweet caffeine. Stay with me and then I shall begin to shine as you shine, so to shine as to be light to others. The light, O caffeine, will be all from you. None of it will be mine. It will be your finishing all my household tasks and work through me. Let me thus praise you in the way you love best by shining on those around me. Let me preach you without preaching by words, but by my example of completing all this tedious work by these crushing deadlines, which I can only do through the evident fullness of the love my heart bears for you.

Oh, and bless you the most when you come in the form of Diet Pepsi. >:-P~~~~~~~~~~~~

One more day ...

2009-09-24T11:13:00.002-04:00

Man, if I can just get through tomorrow's movie premiere I might actually have time to sleep, holy crap.

If I had a time machine, TV version ...

2009-09-08T10:50:00.002-04:00

I wouldn't use a time machine for anythings as retarded as shooting my own grandfather or warning the makers of New Coke to No, Just NO. I'd use it to make TV less annoying!

1) What five month wait until the final season of Lost? What week long delay between episodes? MWA-HA-HA-HA-HA!!!!

2) I'd shoot forward five years and go ahead and find out if House and Cuddy ever get it on cuz ... dayum. Either quit boolsheeting or do it already!

3) I'd check out the reviews of the upcoming season of 24 to find out if it continues the trend of even numbered seasons sucking tons of ASS.

4) I'd shoot forward three years to see if Fringe is suffering from the Chris Carter effect.

5) But, most importantly, I'd go to the end of the season every year to find out which shows get retardedly cancelled after just six episodes because networks are run by scared morons and thus preventing my heart from getting broke AGAIN. Because, as you know, TV does NOT cause violence. Canceling TV shows causes violence!

Time travel would be a HUGE time saver when it comes to watching TV because you could avoid the suck and the pain!

A point to ponder ...

2009-09-02T23:36:00.002-04:00

While listening to too much Ingrid Michaelson (if such a thing is possible, her new album is fucking awesome) a question came to my mind.

We like to think we break up with people because of high minded ideals like "you're not my soulmate" or "I can't imagine spending the rest of my life with you" or "a relationship has to be going somewhere or it's going nowhere". But I think in reality we break up with people because we just don't feel like putting up with their shit anymore.

Not that there's anything wrong with that.

Lucky Shelia

2009-08-04T10:20:00.002-04:00

On my way down to Charlotte last night, I stopped for gas. The place sold lottery tickets, so they have wall filled with photos of grinning winners. There was a line in front of the counter so I stood there scanning the wall, trying to wrap my mind around people who buy lottery tickets. (because the wall filled with losers would be a million times bigger than this wall)

And then I noticed that the same woman was in about a third of the photos. You heard me, a third. And not nickel and dime amounts either like the little woman who won $23 or the man splitting his face to grin about his $20 win. No, almost all of her wins were at least four figures and a couple were five figures. The largest win was $23,000 and the next biggest I remember was $11,000. No wins big enough for state or national attention, but a shitload of four figures wins.

I turned to the clerk. "Is this same woman?" I pointed to a bunch of photos of her.

Without looking up, she must get asked this a lot, she said "That's Lucky Shelia. She wins so much we don't even bother taking her photo half the time."

The other people in line got interested and the questions started flying. Lucky Shelia came in "every time she needed money." She'd been checked out by local and state gaming authorities, all the clerks at this station had been checked out and a couple even fired but she kept winning. Not that there's a good way to cheat the scratch and sniff lottery tickets. If one has been opened without the money paid for it that's going to get noticed sooner or later, especially the amount you'd have to check to find a winner.

It so small time in the grand scheme of things that the press apparently doesn't give a crap. Or if they did do a story it was half an inch because I can't find any stories on it.

I wonder if this is the only gas station she's hitting? If not, she has to be pulling in some big bucks.

But more importantly, I wonder how in the hell she's doing this? It makes me want to go down there with a camera crew and try to get an interview. I'd bet anything she'd refuse though. I suspect the last thing she wants is a lot of attention. She probably only submits to the photos because to not do so would be suspicious.

Very interesting.

Logging In

2009-07-23T11:02:00.002-04:00

I needed to update my filmmaking blog, so I had to log into that, which required me to sign out of gmail. I needed one of my youtube videos, so I had to sign into youtube to find the specific video. I needed a link I only had in my att.net email address, so I had to sign into that webmail. I needed a graphic file that was in my gmail so I had to resign into that, which signed me out of my other blog, so then I had to resign into my other blog when I was done with Gmail. I needed a synopsis from WithoutABox so I had to sign into that website.

Then I had to sign into this blog to post.

When I leave here, I'm going to visit three message boards, all of which require me to log in.

FUCK logging in!

More Old photos ...

2009-07-20T02:27:00.004-04:00

(HEY HEATHER! I've lost your email address so I can't send you the link you asked for. Can you hook a brother up? Thanks!)

Found some more old photos:

ShadowDog in shadow. Heh.

I ... don't have any fucking idea what the hell this photo is about. LOL

It's possible that I've had a bigger nerd moment than this ... but I doubt it.

Starting a new blog ...

2009-07-16T23:17:00.002-04:00

I've decided to start putting my vast accumulation of filmmaking knowledge, behind the scenes videos and photos, old scripts, etc to use by starting a new filmmaking focused blog. It won't have any of the hate you've come to associate with this blog, and will pretty much just be about the business. So it's not for everyone. If all you want is my hate and comedy and personal details on my life (the rare times I share those) then do nothing. This blog will remain for that stuff. However, if you're interested in the new blog then drop me an email and I'll send you a link. I'm not posting the link here because I want the two blogs to have separate identities and exist in separate universes. I don't mind some crossover from those especially cool people who follow this blog, but I don't want random assholes I hate stumbling across the link here and following me to ruin the coolness of the new blog. Chances are, if you write me I'll send the link. Or at least you'll find out that I've been secretly hating you for a long time! Either way, it'll be interesting. >:-P~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Old Photos

2009-07-14T10:40:00.005-04:00

I've been cleaning up my office and I discovered a CD of photos from a trip I took four years ago. Here are some of my faves:

Me and my exgirlfriend chilling at a museum on Pier 39 in San Francisco.

Why the hell did I take a photo of a stupid fucking cat?

Okay, that's the scariest expression I have EVER had on my face!

I have no idea where this was. Somewhere in SF, I guess.

Here I am with my arm around ... something. What the hell is that, a bear?

Whoa

2009-07-06T16:24:00.002-04:00

The known universe is 13.7 billion years old and has been expanding all that time from a central origin point.

Nothing can travel faster than the speed of light. Nothing.

And yet the known universe is 93 billion light years across.

...

What the FUCK?!?!?

Hell is other people

2009-07-04T18:09:00.004-04:00

And here are some of the people I'll be seeing when I finally make it down to hell:

1) Pretentious assholes who "go by their middle names". You have a first name for a reason, asshole!

2) People who ask if I've been "working hard or hardly working."

3) People who try to convince me that I'm not fat. Dude, get your fucking eyes checked!

4) People who shoot off fireworks the whole week before and for two whole weeks after the 4th of July.

5) People who like mayonnaise. Taste bud transplant operations are getting pretty cheap, ya know.

6) People who insist on waving at me every fucking time I drive past them on the way home despite the fact that I pointedly ignore them every time.

7) Patriots fans.

Happy 4th everybody! Heh.

Don't worry, be happy

2009-07-03T21:40:00.002-04:00

I recently got back from a visit with my best friend. He is one of those rare people in this world who is truly happy. This is awesome because I knew him for a long time when he wasn't happy. And, if he was the type of person who let society, religion, friends, or family tell him what to do ... he still wouldn't be happy. Think about that for a minute, don't let it just slip past you. There are people in this world who have happiness within their grasp and they turn away from it because of what other people might think.

They'd rather be miserable than buck the system. They'd rather be miserable than have people judge them. They'd rather be miserable than have a few losers laugh at them.

Is it just me or is that completely fucking insane?

We're all guilty of this at one time or another, especially in high school. But left this insanity behind a long time ago and it was good to see proof again last week that I was right to do so.

My rejected blog titles

2009-06-28T03:42:00.002-04:00

Costume makes the the clown

One fat fuck

Well done anger with a side of stupid

Hump and eat

Fuck you, sleep!

Fat hundred

I'm getting the last laugh world, cuz it's gonna take TWELVE pall bearers to carry my fat ass to the grave! AH HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!!!!!!

Long long LONG assed month!

2009-06-23T03:41:00.002-04:00

This has been one long, hard assed month. Lots of work, lots of traveling, lots of stress. My back finally twinged from stress tonight (and I'm still traveling so I can't even curl up at home) and it was the most excruciating pain I've ever felt. To top it off, I've caught a cold. Traveling is really fun when you have a cold and have back pain on top of it.

On the plus side I rewatched the series Dexter on Itunes and it was fucking awesome. Great TV shows always pick me up when I'm feeling like crap.

Semi regular posting will resume when I get home in a couple more days.

What does a stray cat need?

2009-05-30T08:11:00.002-04:00

Over the past couple months, I've slowly become aware that I'm being stalked by a stray cat. I like cats because they remind me of my mother, who was a massive cat lover. But I'd never own one for the same reason. They make me sad because they remind me that she's dead. So for me they represent the best (her kind heartedness) and the worst (her death) of her for me. Plus cats are a lot colder than dogs.

This cat is mostly black with some brown spots and a white spot over one eye. He or she is pretty cute. The Cat is in my yard a lot and whenever I come or go to my car it watches me from a safe distance. Lately it's started coming up on my porch and when I open the door it'll leap off and sit at a safe distance to watch me.

I've never fed it of course, because once you start that's your job. But it has to be getting food from somewhere because it's still alive after a couple months. So why is it hanging out around me, the most antisocial fat bastard on the planet, instead of in it's food source?

Maybe, like guys do with women, it's just trying to work future sources while still with it's current source ... "just in case?" So is this cat like the guy who does enough calling and emailing to keep his backup girl on the string while still with his girlfriend? IT'S NOT GONNA WORK, player! I'm no cat's Back Pocket Girlfriend!

Why?!?

2009-05-28T08:41:00.002-04:00

I finished an 88 page script last night. It took me 3 days to write it from start to finish. And it's good, if I do say so myself. Hell, I even have a kick ass tagline for once in my life (those are always hard for me).

So why, then, has this other script been kicking my ass for an entire fucking YEAR? In fact, several scripts have been taking forever to write.

The way my mind works really really annoys me.

Getting around

2009-05-27T20:00:00.003-04:00

Holy crap, I just realized I'm going to be in Denver, Chicago, AND LA all within the next three weeks. If I don't get the swine flu out of all this traveling then I'm NEVER going to get it! Hey, but at least it's going to be very expensive! WOO HOO!!

"I want to change the world ...

2009-05-16T07:41:00.001-04:00

... Instead I sleep."

~ Ingrid Michaelson

That's fucked up. LOL

Out of the Ordinary list!

2009-05-11T14:01:00.004-04:00

We were having lunch yesterday and a girlfriend of mine challenged me to name ten things I'd done in my life that are out of the ordinary. Things that less than one out of ten people have probably ever done. She said, "if you can't think of ten, you need to be doing more living."

Here's what I came out with:

1) Wrote, produced, and directed my own movie.

2) Wrote and produced my own feature film length rifftrax, which is kinda like MST3K. This is very obscure so I'm sure not many people have done it.

3) Worked at a furniture market setting up showrooms ... a job 99 out of 100 people have never even HEARD of.

4) Wrote an 80,000 word novel. It hasn't been published, but it's still an accomplishment.

5) Conceived and (put together from start to finish) a convention that 75 people paid from $25-$85 to attend. The convention itself ran near flawlessly and all ticket buyers were very happy after the fact.

6) Gave a speech at my high school graduation.

7) Ridden a horse in the open woods. (I have no clue how many people have ever done this. Maybe more than one in ten, so this is a question mark)

8) Saved a person's life.

That's all I can think of right now. I don't have ten, but I feel pretty good about this list so far. There's a lot of other really cool things I've done that don't qualify that I also feel really good about. For instance, I can honestly say that I've felt True Love. I don't know how many people can honestly say that.

I feel pretty good about where I'm at in my life given my age, so this was worth doing.

Zoom zoom zoom in your boom boom boom!

2009-05-05T08:28:00.002-04:00

My father has finished his radiation treatments! It's actually been a couple weeks since he finished, but he's still recovering and very tired and feeling like crap so I've been trying to help him as much as possible.

Been a very busy month! I've been hired to Executive Produce a feature film and a documentary. I didn't write or find the financing for either, so that's new for me. But it's huge because I can use the money and the opportunity to get the hell out of my head. Which is my biggest problem, getting the hell out of my head. It's not good in here and I shouldn't be in here any more than is absolutely necessary.

About a month or two ago, I can't remember exactly when now, a guy (We'll call him Shithead) I thought I was friends with tipped his hand and revealed how he really felt about me, which is very badly. Some of it had to do with this blog, the post I made about the stoner loser I talked crap to. In talking to other people we both knew, Shithead repeated what I'd blogged about but conveniently left out anything that would make me look good and only repeated what would make me look bad. And then went from there to call me all kinds of names and say all this other crap about me.

I don't care about the namecalling, my older brother and all my stepfather's said and did far worse to me. There is nothing anyone can say or do to me today to exceed what was said and done to me as a kid. I know for a fact that spineless punk wouldn't have lasted ten minutes in my childhood.

No, two other things bothered me.

1) Intentionally taking my shit out of context just to make me look bad. Oh yeah, be sure to forget to mention that the entire point of the post was that I felt horrible about what I did. Make it sound like I was proud. I hate crap like this. I say and do enough horrible shit to make any reasonable person dislike me if they want to, so you really don't need to distort the facts. Reality's good enough in my case.

2) The fact that for one of the few times in my life, I completely misread someone. Plenty of people dislike or outright hate me. That's cool. I honestly don't get a crap. As long as I'm not forced to live in the same house as someone who dislikes me, as I did as a kid, then I really don't give a fuck. There's NOTHING worse than living with someone you don't like. Nothing. That's hell for me. I did that all through childhood and again towards the end of my marriage and I'll NEVER do it again. So anything less than that is all good.

But, I almost always know. I can almost always tell. Shithead snowed me because he was always friendly and joking to my face. Completely fooled me. It all makes sense now though because what I thought all along were friendly teasings and jokes were actual insults intended to score points. So since my discovery a month ago I've refused to take any of this crap from him and we're just staying out of each other's way these days. Which is all I care about. Fuck grudges or hating on people. Just stay out of my face, don't say nothing to or about me, and we're cool.

I'm just pissed at myself that I let him in without realizing he was just a childish phony only pretending to be my friend. This is why I always try to make it clear to someone when I don't like them so there's no misunderstandings.

Oh, and finally, my title refers to the fact that weeks are passing like days to me. Time is just ZOOMING past me right now. I can't BELIEVE it's already May! Holy crap!

Shameless self promotion!

2009-04-09T10:34:00.002-04:00

Finished a project this week that's selling on a national comedy website called Rifftrax. Rifftrax is run by the guys behind that old Mystery Science Theater 3000 TV show. This new website is the same principal, you make fun of movies.

In this case I mocked of the first short film I ever made. I didn't know what the hell I was doing so the film turned out pretty bad. For instance, I retardedly made the location an office building and shot there during the day ... when it was supposed to set on a space station. Um, yeah, I was a tard.

But at least now I can make a dollar off it hopefully. Or, 99 cents specifically.

http://www.rifftrax.com/iriffs/final-archive

Here's a sample to whet your appetite:

Since this is a website backed by a major company (Legend Films) they only host product pages if people actually buy the products so if nobody buys this it'll get taken down eventually. So you can really help me out by picking this up. >:-P

Parent Issues

2009-04-07T11:57:00.002-04:00

I think that if ever child was raised in a communal environment, kinda like an orphanage but with more care and money poured into it, we'd have a lot less hate and violence in this world. Our parents, even the best of them, fuck us up. And the worst parents out there REALLY fuck us up. So the only way to solve that is to get rid of the parent concept all together and go with a large group of adults raising you so that no matter how messed up one adult is, he or she can only have a marginal effect on your overall wellbeing.

That's my idea for solving all the world's problems, anyway. >:-P~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Maybe Modern Marriage Isn't So Bad!

2009-04-04T22:04:00.002-04:00

I took my father to have breakfast with his brother this morning. it was rough going for me because I had to get up at the ass crack of dawn because it's an hour drive and breakfast at my cousin's restaurant ends at 9am. But it was fun as always.

But the most interesting thing to come out of it was the news article my uncle gave us. It told the story of one of our great uncles, named Rob. Rob was born in the 1840s, served in the War Between The States, and ended up living to his early 70s. He married his first wife in 1865 and was with her until she died in 1877. So they were married for 22 years. In those 22 years, they had ELEVEN fucking kids. Eleven! Two were born in the first year they were married so I assume those were twins, but the rest were one at a fucking time. 9 kids over the final 21 years of marriage. So I take it her job in life was to spread her legs and get fucked and then spread her legs and give out babies.

What makes this worse is that she died giving birth to their last baby, who also died. Two years later Rob was married again. He had no more children, so I assume it was so she could care for the 7 youngest kids still living with him at that point.

This was pretty typical for the time, especially here in the South. So I'm feeling a little bit better about modern marriage. At least when people get married today it's because they think they love each other and because they actually want to spend time together ... not because they want 11 kids or because they need someone to take care of all of them.

Oh, one final note, 4 of these children lived to see the 1950s, one of them lived until 1961, and one of them was born in 1878 and lived until 1975. Man, can you imagine being born before flight or even cars, seeing the turn of the century, two world wars, the first 3 decades of the Cold War, and even the entire Viet Nam war and the rise and fall of Richard Nixon? She goes from the horse and buggy to seeing a man walk on the moon! That might just be the most eventful 97 years in human history!

Letting People Believe Bullshit

2009-04-03T22:31:00.004-04:00

I found out a little over a week ago about some hateful things people I'd considered my friends had been saying about me behind my back. It all stemmed from a misunderstanding. They didn't understand my behavior and so were speculating about why I'd done some things recently. As often happens in these cases, the most unflattering motive was seized upon. From there a couple people went even darker and more hateful with their comments, but what interested me the most about it all was the misunderstanding of motives and how they didn't even attempt to look at the obvious.

A friend of mind, Alexa, doesn't understand why I don't clear everything up with a simple explanation. The reason is that it's a lot less work to let people believe bullshit, especially since the end result is exactly the same. I learned this from my father.

My father is the most cynical person I've ever met. He doesn't believe anything about anything. For instance, according to my father no actor EVER leaves a TV because their character dying or leaving served the story, it's because that actor demanded more money. Period. You can argue with him until you're blue in the face but that's the only reason ever in all the TV shows produced in all of human history.

That's just one example, there are many more. Whatever the stated reason an actor, politician, or other celebrity gives for anything, it's always a lie. I used to argue these things with him all the time. I'd get really worked up and pissed off and be steaming for hours. It got so bad that I seriously considered moving out of state.

And then I saw a commercial about AOL and that changed my entire relationship with my father. You heard me, LOL. You see, back in the old days, companies used to charge you for every minute you were online. It was like cell phone minutes. You'd get X number of minutes for free and then every minute after that was something like ten cents per. It used to be a real issue, especially since pages took forever to load. But then I saw a commercial for AOL announcing that they were moving to a system of one monthly fee would pay for all your minutes, no matter how long you used the internet. It was revolutionary. So the next time I saw my father I told him about this commercial. He didn't believe me. "But Dad, I SAW and HEARD the commercial myself." "Well, you must be mistaken. They'd never do that. They'd lose their asses." "BUT I SAW AND HEARD IT myself!" "You must have heard it wrong." I got so angry. He was flat out saying that I was such a fucking moron that I couldn't see and listen to a TV commercial and come away with the right info. But the bottom line is that unless Dad sees something for himself, he doesn't believe it. Period.

The conversation was getting uglier and uglier (you know how you get pulled into this stupid shit) when it suddenly occurred to me that I KNEW what the truth was, so what the fuck difference did it make whether or not Dad believed me? Why did it matter? He'd see for himself sooner or later. So I said "okay" in a very final way and left the room.

And that was it. I went on with my life and he with his. A week later he came to me said he'd seen the commercial for himself and that I'd been right. I usually don't even get that from him, so I thought that was pretty big of him. (as an aside, while AOL was proven correct about this transformation in operating practices in the long run, it was a short run disaster. People would log online and just stay online forever, hogging up the available lines so that no one new could log onto AOL, not even to cancel their service because it was useless since they couldn't ever get online. Eventually this problem was solved by having it hang up on users if there was no activity for 15 minutes and even more eventually the hardware caught up with the new user demand.)

But this incident changed things. I realized that as long as I knew I what the truth was, it didn't matter what my Dad, or anyone, believed. It has no impact on my life whatsoever. I'll tell my father something twice and, if he doesn't believe me after the second time, I drop it by saying "okay" in a very final way. As in. "okay, believe whatever the fuck you want to believe, but I know what the truth is and that's all I need."

And it is. I can't even begin to describe how much better my relationship is with my father now that I've changed my mindset. We never fight like we used to and barely even raise our voices against each other. Which is awesome because I've been able to be there for him during his bout with cancer without there being tension under the surface.

This has since worked for me in larger ways outside my relationship with my father because while people aren't going to be as hardcore in their stances as my father, at the end of the day people are going to believe whatever the fuck they want to believe. It doesn't matter what I have to say on the subject, they're going to believe what they want to believe. So why fight it? It has zero impact on my life.

We come into this world alone and we're going to leave it alone. To paraphrase the fantastic Life On Mars finale, "all we can really hope for in between is to find a couple people who can help make our time on this sorry shithole of a world a little less fucking horrible than it can be." Everyone else, who's not those couple people, can believe the bullshit for all I care.

I'll say THIS about THAT

2009-03-25T12:21:00.002-04:00

If the Lost series finale is as completely horrible as the BSG finale just was, I might just throw myself out of a fucking window. It was The X-Files ALL OVER AGAIN! >:-#

On the other hand, maybe I SHOULD be a dick!

2009-03-19T10:55:00.002-04:00

So I'm at the grocery store yesterday buying stuff for my father. He saw that the generic ice cream was two for the price of one so that was one of the things I was supposed to get. In fact, it was the food my father was most excited about. So no way in hell I was leaving without that ice cream.

When I get to that aisle, the ice cream in question was not marked as two for one. Now, I'm talking about Food Lion, that would be the worst grocery store chain on the planet ... if it wasn't for all the other grocery store chains. In short, they fucking SUCK. And I've been fucked by them before. Something will be marked as on sale but when they ring it up they charge you full price. When called on it, they always say "Oh, I guess we forgot to put it in the computer." It makes you wonder how many people get fucked before someone notices. Things that make you go hmmmmmmm.

So anyway, I take no chances there. So I turn to the man stocking cheese behind me and ask him "Hey, this ice cream was listed as on sale in the paper but I don't see any marking here."

The man is fat and has all the appearance of being lazy. He is stocking the stuff really slow and was also talking on the cell phone for most of my time in that aisle. So I had my doubts about him before I spoke to him.

He looked towards me in a dazed way and said "huh?" So I repeated my question.

He turns away and heads toward the back. "I'll find out."

He's gone a long time, so I start looking around. Finally I notice a tiny sign way up at the top of the freezers indicating that this ice cream is, indeed, on sale. I scoop them up and cart them, and it crosses my mind to just leave. Dude's been gone a long fucking time. Sure, we had kind of a contract because I asked him a question and he's been in the back a long time looking for the answer. If he goes through a lot of shit to find the answer and then I'm gone when he comes back he's going to be pissed off. But on the other hand he really acted like he didn't give a fuck. And I had shit to do. I didn't have time to just stand here and wait for him.

So I decided to look for him in the back. At this store, you have to walk through part of their storage area in the back to get to the men's bathroom. I'd been there many times so I knew the layout which is how I knew where he'd gone.

So I went back there.

Two large double doors with large windows lead to this back area. So as soon as I turned the corner I could see my guy through the door windows. He was standing with six other workers, leaning on a handcart, and all of them were laughing loudly. I couldn't catch everything they were saying but it sounded like they were talking about March Madness from what I did catch. As I watched, one of them turned to my guy and said something like "think it's been long enough?"

My guy looked at his watch and said "naw, I'll give him five more minutes." Everyone laughed loud.

What a fucking douchebag.

I wasn't angry. Especially after I took the grocery cart full of new cheese stock that he'd been using and hid it back in a corner of the store behind some pallets of bottled water. But I guess I was disappointed. It's just so ... lame. All you have to say is you don't know. That's it. And I'm sure some asshole customers refuse to take that for an answer so maybe this is how he deals. Things are tough all over. It's just fucking stupid.

But I do feel a little bit better now about being a dick myself. >:-P

Change

2009-03-18T15:01:00.002-04:00

Do you think people can ever really change? I used to believe this. I really used to believe anyone could change, especially when confronted with their biggest weakness or flaw.

And yet I've known my biggest weakness for twenty years and I've never been able to stop doing it. Maybe it's the lightening never strikes twice philosophy. "Oh, well, that burned me in the ass twenty years ago but that could never happen again, right?"

My problem is that when I get mad enough, I turn my back on people, even loved ones. Worse, I never give them a chance to tell their side of the story. Letters (and later emails) get ignored. Phone calls get ignored, voice mail deleted without being listened to. I'm GONE. And I stay gone. It's like a switch goes off and I just suddenly don't give a fuck anymore.

The first time this happened was when I was 15 years old. I was fucked up. Pretty much living on my own. I made one of the best friends of my life. A couple years later I turned my back on her over a stupid fight. She thought I was lying about something I wasn't. Trouble was, she'd caught me in some lies before, so the trust wasn't there. But, because I wasn't lying this time, I couldn't get beyond being falsely accused. So I was GONE. This was before email and cell phones, so our only contact was snail mail. She sent me six letters over a couple months trying to beg forgiveness and I just threw them in a sock drawer.

A year later my mother called me and said that Bev was dead of an aneurysm. It was only then that I went back and read her letters. They were some of the most awesome and humble letters I'd ever read. I fucked myself out of a year of awesome friendship with her because I was too much of a dick to forgive her and just move on.

That's a lesson of a lifetime, right? I STILL feel like shit for this, so that should let me change, right?

Fuck no. I still find myself doing this shit twenty years later. I can't let shit go. I can't forgive (most of all myself). I can't change.

I should be able to. I want to. I try do. But I just don't.

Nothing ever changes.

On Being a Dick

2009-03-17T11:19:00.004-04:00

Those of you who know me happen to know that I'm something of an asshole. This has been exacerbated lately by what my father is going through and the fact that I just can't fucking sleep. But that stuff just puts a coat of polish on my innate dickness.

Anyway, yesterday I was at an office dropping off some freelance work and the owner's son, Felix, was hanging out there. Felix is 24 years old, a hardcore gamer and anime watcher, and doesn't work at this office. He just hangs out there a couple times a week, sitting for hours playing some kind of handheld game. A couple weeks ago I finally asked the office manager what the deal with Felix was. "Oh, he's never been able to keep a job and still lives with his parents. He shows up here and hangs out whenever he needs money from his father. His father finally gets irritated enough to pay him off and then Felix leaves. I think it really hurts morale but what can you do?"

I kinda like Felix. He and I have talked about Lost and Heroes and BSG a couple times and he's actually pretty smart. He made a point about BSG a couple weeks ago that I'd totally missed. Sure, seeing the subtleties of a TV doesn't make you a rocket scientist but you know what I mean.

So yesterday I set my laptop bag on a desk and start towards the owner's office. Felix comes out of the bathroom and says "hey man, I was sitting there." And points at my laptop bag on the desk.

"I'll just be a minute." I say.

"Move your goddamn bag, man." Felix growls. He seemed in a really bad mood but even so I've never met a more harmless person so I ignored him and went in to talk to the owner.

The meeting took a half hour so I forgot all about Felix. But Felix hadn't forgotten. When I came back out he was standing there waiting for me. He got right in my face and blocked my way and said "why you disrespecting me, man? The next time I tell you to move your bag, you DO IT."

Now, you have to understand something. Felix is a really skinny, small, completely harmless person. I'm tall and fat. I seriously doubt Felix has ever been in a fight before. I've had my ass whipped by the best (a Navy Seal once). I'm not about fighting anymore, but I used to be so I can size up someone in a second. Felix was never going to swing on me and he was absolutely no threat to me even if he did.

So all I had to do was walk around him, grab my bag, and leave. That was all that was necessary.

But I'm a dick and I was in a bad mood. So I went straight for the jugular.

I said, "the day I let a stoner loser half my age who still lives with his parents and can't keep a job because he sucks at life tell me what to do, is the day I blow my fucking brains out. Get your funky nasty greasy bitch ass out of my face before I shove that gameboy up your cunt."

Unfortunately, Felix was standing so close to him that I could see the pain every one of these verbal blows landed. In one stroke I'd nailed every one of his insecurities.

But the worst part is that there were at least ten people in the office and every one of them laughed. And I could see how much more that destroyed him.

He stepped away from me and just collapsed into his chair. At the same moment the laughter stopped so I looked around to see the boss, Felix's father, gaping at me like I'd just punched him in the nuts.

I raised my hands in surrender and said "no need to fire me, I quit." and grabbed my laptop bag and left.

I feel terrible. It was like drop kicking a kitten because it claws one microinch of my skin. It's not the worst thing I've ever done, by far, but it's the most recent.

Why can't I ever do or say just enough to get the job done? Why do I always have to go straight to DEFCON 1? *sigh*

"Nothing cures insomnia like the realization that it's time to get up."

2009-03-16T22:41:00.002-04:00

My conscious and sleeping minds have been waging a Cold War the past couple months but the Hot War was declared last week. Some War Stats so far:

Average time I fall asleep each night over the last week: 4am, with a high of 6am and a low of 2:30am.

Average time I wake up in the morning: 9am, with a high of 7am and a low of 10:30am.

Number of times I've managed to get back to sleep: 0

Approximate Number of attempted naps during the day: 5,000

Number of successful naps: 0

Approximate number of bullshit sleep remedies, gimmicks, exercises, etc attempted: 5,000

Number of bullshit attempts that worked: 0

Predicted days left before insanity kicks in: 7

Scale of 1-10, how tired I am right now: 5 million

FUCK.

Chess With Death: UPDATE

2009-03-12T11:25:00.002-04:00

Oh, I beat Death's ass in 9 moves. HA! Take THAT, Death! INYOASS! AH HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!!!

...

Should I really be talking this much smack to Death? It makes me a little uncomfortable, to be honest.

Naw, screw that. HA HA Death! INYOASS!!!

I can't find my fucking book!

2009-03-12T11:14:00.002-04:00

It's really good, too. But I've looked everywhere and I

CAN'T

FUCKING

FIND

IT!!

Arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrgh!

Boy do I hate not being able to find something! But even more than that I hate the compulsion to look AGAIN in the same place I just checked five minutes ago!

Arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrgh!

No other book will do now, even though I have many. Nothing will sate my book lust until I find this wonderful, sweet book. I've never wanted a book so badly in my life.

Arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrgh!!!!

Friends

2009-03-11T01:57:00.002-04:00

Just fucking around. I don't take my poetry too seriously. LOL

Hair
I love it when women run their hands through their locks.
It just drives me wild when they play with their long hair.
Blonde, brown, black, pink, neon, even gray, it all rocks.
As long as she has a lot of it, I'm so there!

Control
Wanting to control everything you see,
shows you have an incredible lack of class.
If you think that shit could ever fly with me,
you can bend down and gently kiss my fat ass!

Friends
Like that old TV show sang, we used to be friends,
oh so very long ago, but now we are not.
Sometimes I wish there was some way to make amends,
then I remember you're an insufferable snot.

Online chess

2009-03-10T13:02:00.003-04:00

I'm playing someone simply called "Death" on online chess right now. Come to find out Death REALLY sucks at chess.

Huh.

I would have thought Death would be a badass at any game, but especially chess.

Music to kill yourself by!

2009-03-09T09:49:00.002-04:00

Don't get me wrong, these are mostly all good singers, but goddamn are they depressing to listen to, especially if you're already depressed!

1) Norah Jones. Super hawt and with a super silky smooth voice, but six of her songs in a row and your soul starts floating up towards the ceiling all by itself.

2) Bob Dylan. Dude, we get it! Life sucks! Couldn't you at least throw a cover of "Don't Worry, Be Happy" on one of your albums?

3) Tracy Chapman. More her early work than her later stuff.

4) John Melloncamp. Probably my favorite artist of all time. But I dare ANYone to roll through Beige to Beige, The Breakout, Jackie Brown, Mansions In Heaven, Mean, and County Fair without praying for the sweet, sweet release of self immolation.

5) Miley Cyrus. Her music is actually pretty peppy. The depressing thing is the fact that someone who hasn't even lived 1/6th of an average life span felt the need to write a biography.

Favorite New Blogs (updated!)

2009-03-08T03:58:00.003-04:00

During my constant search for new blogs I ran across the best photography blog I've ever seen. There are a LOT of photography blogs out there. I don't know what it is about blogs that make every person with a camera want to start a photo blog, but most of them suck.

But not Katie Barnes Photography. You need only check out the sunset photos she just put up to see that.

But beyond her awesome photos, she also freelances for a newspaper, so she sometimes writes interesting or heartbreaking entries about that work as well. So it's definitely worth checking out.

Update:

I found another wonderful blog. Hoody Doodling. The dude has the kind of quirky sense of humor I love and his drawing style is original and charming. If you want to burn five minutes and maybe get a smile or chuckle, this is the blog for you!

Today's Headlines

2009-03-07T07:50:00.003-05:00

(wakes up way too early. stumbles to computer)

(gazes at headlines)

Bad marriage bad for women's hearts.

Pffft. Not a woman, not married, don't care.

Is Julia Roberts' box-office reign over?

She's still alive? Huh.

Police charge driver who sat through 6 lights.

Heh. My dad would have been pissed if they sat through one light! Six and that driver would have needed police protection! Still, not very interesting. Isn't there any interesting news this morning?

Bosses who deliver bad news are stressed, too.

Well, boo fucking hoo! Cry me a river, Fire Boy!

'Invisibility cloak' directs light away from eye.

...

Wait a minute, what? An invisibility cloak?

WOO HOO!!! Women's locker room HERE I COME! YEAH!! Hey, I wonder if the cloak comes in triple plus size?

"Practical uses for the nanoantenna go beyond hiding things."

Yeah, maybe so, but while you're doing all that I'm going to be over here in the women's locker room! WOO HOO!!!!

Heh.

I was WRONG

2009-03-06T07:58:00.002-05:00

I used to think Jean-Claude Van Damme was a sweaty meathead moron not even on the same level as his main rival, Steven Seagal. It was nothing personal, I just didn't take the time to think there was anything more to the 80s and 90s action movie hero.

But then I saw the movie JCVD.

In a word: fucking BRILLIANT.

In two words: really fucking BRILLIANT.

And I don't even like subtitled movies. That's how good this one was.

Hilarious, real, down to earth, emotional, well shot, and perfectly edited. Jean-Claude's six minute long 1-take monologue towards the end of the movie is the dramatic climax (and JC's best performance ever) but the writing and the acting hits every note perfectly all the way though.

If you like comedy movies that are way WAY outside the box, or if you ever watched JCVD in those cheesy old action movies and never thought there was any more to him, you MUST watch this movie. In a word: it's fucking AWESOME.

Scary Assed CL Ads!

2009-03-05T10:59:00.002-05:00

These are all real ads. Truth is scarier than fiction!

I have been ordered to deliver my 5 year old son to his father on alternate weekends. I need help!!!!! I am asking a responsible person with reliable transportation to meet me in Greensboro at 6:15 pm and drive my son to his dad's house in Raleigh. He has to be dropped of promptly at 8 PM in Raleigh on alternate Fridays and picked up at the same location the following Sunday at 5 PM. I will meet you Greensboro at 6:15pm.

If interested please respond with your compensation requirements, a personal description, and why you feel you should be considered.

Um. Ooooookay. Assuming this is actually legit and not some kind of civil suit scam ("I hired Joe to drive my kid around and JOE TOUCHED THE BOY IN HIS HAPPY PLACE! I want 5 million dollars!), what kind of psycho mother posts a general ad for strangers to drive around her kid by themselves? The insanity possibilities of this one are endless.

Can't believe it's come to this! I thought you were different....Should of known that your all the same! One thing I know for sure is that you've taught me the walls we put up are there for a reason....to protect us from the very thing I'm going through with you! FRIENDS huh?....Sure! I know i've got issues but so do you...I've got a past but so do you! GOODBYE MR.MEBANE! Thanks for the Lesson...It's been Learned!

This was posted under "missed connections"

Gee, I can't figure out why any dude wouldn't want to stay with her, huh?

And here's my favorite even though I'm sure it's on the up and up:

i have a room for rent for 175 a month plus 1/3 of utilites . this is a 1400 square ft house and u will have 2 roomates to share it with u do have your own bathroom a kitchen n living room . it also has a pretty big back yard and is a very nice neighborhood. its located of of horsepen creek near harris teeter on the new garden rd side. if u have any question u can email me

That all sounds fine, right? But what struck me as funny as this dude's email address! lunatic_2008@

Oh. Okay. Your email handle is "lunatic" but you want me to live with you? LMFAO! If I ever rent out a room I'm going to sign up for a special email address just for that occasion! redneckassraper@ or axemurdering4fun@ or maybe playswithfireaftermidnight@

Heh.

Awesome quote and riding the ocean

2009-03-05T08:06:00.002-05:00

Ran across a really awesome quote online this morning. It was unattributed so I don't know who originated it, but I really like it:

"The most successful tyranny is not the one that uses force to assure uniformity but the one that removes the awareness of other possibilities."

How about that, huh? That's like three kinds of mindfuck in one sentence. And it goes with my state of mind right now.

My father is a couple weeks into his prostate cancer radiation treatment now. It's going well, beyond how much it tires him out and puts him in a bad mood. He has no appetite right now so he's started ragging me hardcore on my eating habits. This is new. I know where it's coming from from so I don't let it get to me. But I have decided to start taking my meals at my house instead of eating with him anymore until he's off the radiation.

In addition to his prostate cancer his doctors found out last week that he has asbestosits or however it's spelled. Basically it's a lung disease caused by twenty years of riding navy ships filled with asbestos. We won't know how bad it is for a couple more weeks because their testing process is so long and tedious. Every time you go in for an appointment that you think will GIVE YOU ALL THE ANSWERS it turns out to just be the "getting to know you" appointment before the test appointment which is before the "letting you know the results" appointment. Meanwhile they get paid for every appointment. I'm not saying it's a scam but it sure as fuck feels like one. But whenever we find out, it could be really bad. Like need new heart and lungs bad. Which is impossible in his case because he's 71 and already has cancer. He'd never make it up the transplant list.

Needless to say Death has been on my mind a lot lately. It's hard for it not to be with my father going through this. Especially since he and are share the same name, the same looks, and the same personality so it's like watching my own death through a mirror. It's really fucking with me.

Which is probably why that story about the four men lost in the ocean (one of whom was finally recovered Monday) had me obsessed since Sat. The boat capsized before the men could get their life vests on. One of the men dove down under the boat, recovered three vests for his friends, couldn't find a fourth, so took a cushion for himself. He was one of the three who eventually lost hold of the boat and was pulled away to his death before rescuers could find him. Only the man who stayed with the boat was rescued, after 46 hours in the water.

What a horrible way to die. And such a senseless way. Not that there are many "good" ways to go. But the bravery of the man who put his friends first has been blowing my mind. He was an NFL player, was young, rich, and healthy. He had a wife and a young daughter. He had everything to live for. But I presume he did the diving because he was the best swimmer and could hold his breath the longest.

At any rate, it's sad and inspiring at the same time.

Brand New Year

2009-01-02T12:21:00.003-05:00

My father has prostate cancer. There's a lot of colorful and poetic ways I could have revealed that here but I don't really feel colorful or poetic. Which is why I haven't been posting here lately.

They caught it early, though, so as long as it's not in his lungs (the test will reveal this one way or the other next Monday) then he should be fine. But it's still fucking with me. I lost my mother to cancer and now my father has it. So it's been fucking with me a LOT. I'll post more about it after next Monday's appointment. I've known for some time, which is why I've been so scarce here, but I finally feel ready to talk about it and step back into the world.

365 Series

One of the ways I wanted to step back out into the world was to do something to force myself to blog every single day for an entire year. For that to happen I needed something to talk about. It couldn't be fiction because I've already done that. It had to be something that I could knock out in an hour tops so I could make it through the busy days. And I had to allow myself to do two a day sometimes so I can get ahead for those days when I'm too busy to do it.

So I got the idea to talk about a different TV series every single day for a year. Specifically, an episode from a TV series because I doubt that I've seen enough of 365 different TV series to talk intelligently about them over the course of a year. Plus it would take more than an hour a day to do a lot of them justice. So, a single episode it is, with overarching series comments when I know enough about a series to make them.

Anyway, check it out: http://seriesaday.blogspot.com/

I'll still post here about my life, but this blog will force me to stay connected all year in at least a frivolous way, huh?

Singles

2008-11-16T09:05:00.002-05:00

Why is there only one connotation of that word? If you google the word singles right now, the first thing that pops up is an online dating site. (The second thing is that stupid movie, but never mind that) After that are a multitude of other dating websites. Christian singles dating. Old people singles dating. Pet owners singles dating. Nazi/Waitress BDSM singles dating ... and etc.

Why is it assumed that because someone is single they're automatically looking for a relationship? Maybe singles just want to get together because hanging out with people in relationships is nauseating. Maybe single people get tired of hearing about how wonderful and handsome and sexy the coupled up person's partner is and just how fucking happy the other person makes them and how so wonderfully in love they are with the other person. Gag me with a fucking engagement ring!

(Hey, the name of this blog is Bitter PIE, you knew what this was)

Now, don't get me wrong. I've not sworn my life to celibacy. I sometimes see a pretty girl and think about approaching her. In rare cases I actually have the sack to do so. If a girl approached me I wouldn't be a House ass and immediately blow her off despite just how fucking hawt Cameron was in season one and House is a total fucking moron! ...

I digress.

The point is, I'm not opposed to relationships in general or in specific when it comes to me. But the grim reality is that I'm not IN a relationship now so I just get sick and tired of hearing about people who are in one.

Which brings me back to how perverted the word "singles" has become. These days it only means "people not currently attached who are desperate to hook up" and not "people too busy or too fat or too bitter to be in a relationship right now but who want friends currently not attached so they can hang out and have dinner with someone without wanting to slit their wrists with a salad fork after the fifth story of how much the friend's girlfriend loves him."

Say WHAT?

2008-11-12T03:23:00.002-05:00

I got a new microphone so I'm going to attempt some audio blogging. So far it's been a real pain in the ass because the only recording program I have is some crappy assed windows recording that has a limit of 60 seconds per recording. LAME. So I had to record this in stages and then PIEce it together after the fact.

But so far so good. It sounds pretty good to me, but any feedback would be awesome.

The sample itself is about the show Heroes. If you're a fan, you won't like what I have to say. If you believe, as I do, that the show has gone to hell, then you're more likely to enjoy this.

WARNING: Not safe for work due to swearing.

http://shadowdogproductions.com/surant_1-2.aif

(I can't figure out yet how to embed this audio so you can play it directly from this page. I've done everything the help page told me to do and it's not working so far. But the link is there so you can play it the old fashioned way if you want.)

"Female freelance writer wanted for story on nude pics"

2008-11-03T17:29:00.002-05:00

Found this on Craig's List:

I am a male and am interested in hiring a female writer to write a story about what happened when some nude photos of me that I had let be posted on the internet were found by co-workers of mine when I worked for a major soft drink company. I envision it as a helpful warning to others about what can happen when private activities become public.

I would be willing to pay you $100 to write the story and you would be free to keep all royalties and rights to it.

Dear Delusional Moron,

I just have a few followup questions for you:

1) Why does the writer have to be female?

2) How hard can it be to write such a lame story anyway?

3) How sweet that she can keep all the rights and royalties to this story on top of you shelling out a hundred bucks for her to write it. What would YOU be getting out of this?

And last but not least, 4) JUST HOW FUCKING STUPID DO YOU THINK PEOPLE ARE?!??!?!

Wait, you've already answered THAT particular question.

Shopping for new blogs

2008-11-01T16:38:00.002-04:00

In the past three months I've lost two of the four blogs I regularly read. By lost I mean, of course, the bloggers have announced their resignations from the blogsphere. Not only was this crushing news (I'm one more such announcement away from flinging myself out a window and I have a very bad feeling it's coming soon) but it means I have less to read these days. I'm an extremely picky blog reader, it takes a lot to earn my reading loyalty. But once a blogger has it, they have it for life. But this also means that 99% of the blogs I check out suck ass for me and I never return. So it's hard to find new blogs I stick with, though I'm always looking.

Some blog pet peeves (none of these are dealbreakers by themselves, a new blogger has to hit a lot of these to completely turn me off) in no particular order:

1) Spam filters. I get why people engage this feature. Spam is annoying. But as a consumer, what else is even more annoying is having to type in that bullshit random letter combination just to get my comment posted. I think these combinations work on a timer, that the text no longer applies after a set period of time (a couple minutes I think) because if I take a really long time with my reply then the spam filter combination NEVER works and I have to try a second time. In addition, some of them are really hard to make out (is it an L or an I? Is it a D or an O?) and I probably put some in wrong so it's nothing for me to have to try it three times or more before it finally lets me post my fucking comment. Which is a LOT of work to give a comment that's usually pretty retarded on my part.

2) Too much sex talk or bathroom humor. The sex talk think is all about context. FreshAirLover could talk about sex all day long and it's all good because I believe in my heart she's not doing it to increase ratings. If I feel like people are just talking about sex to merely get ratings then I pull the ripcord. Nothing worse than a fake blog. Blogs can be fake in a lot of different ways but forcing the sex talk is one of the worst ways to be fake because it's an insult to the reader's intelligence.

As for the bathroom humor, a little bit of that goes a really long way for me. 95% of all shit and fart jokes/stories aren't funny and are merely gross to me personally.

3) Too much happy relationship talk. Look, I'm elated that you're in a happy relationship. Yay for you! But it's not really where my head is at right now because I'm not in a relationship of any kind, happy or otherwise. So a whole lot of "he was so cute when he smiled at me" and "I love her so much that birds sing in my head when I look at her" and I want to throw up. Sorry if this makes me a dick, it's just a grim reality. I want what I want and I don't want what I don't want. There are plenty of other people looking for that Disney crap so these bloggers don't miss me, believe that.

4) Racists, homophobes, bigots, etc. This goes without saying, and is a deal breaker all by itself.

5) All pictures, few if any words. Boring!

6) Too many readers. I hate crowds, even on a blog. If you're getting 100 replies per post, then you're never going to notice anything I have to say and you're sure as hell not going to miss me. Plus, and this is just personal opinion, once a blogger gets that many readers it starts going to his or her head. It's just human nature.

So anyway, if any of you like some blogs I might not know about, hit me up. I need to fill a few holes now. :-(

The most beautiful woman in the world is sitting ten feet in front of me.

2008-10-29T16:57:00.002-04:00

She is just incredible. Physically she's a checkmark in all the things I love in woman, but what really sold me was when she sat down at the table in front of me just now, she glanced back and our eyes met and she gave me the most gorgeous smile. I've said it here before, there really is NOTHING in this world more beautiful than a person's genuine, real smile. Every smile is perfect if it's honest.

So there she sits, absolutely gorgeous and adorable. No wedding ring on her finger. Eating a sandwich at a Barnes and Nobles cafe for dinner and writing in a journal ... so chances are at least 50-50 that she's single.

So here I sit, fat as HELL. But worse than that, I haven't shaved in about two weeks because of my hand injury. And I'm wearing my Hooters shirt because I haven't done laundry in that amount of time either. My hair is windswept. And I'm wearing my rattiest shoes because of the hand thing again (they're easy to slip on).

She's rocking class that would make Catherine Deneuve blush and run screaming from the room.

I'm rocking class that couldn't get me in the door of a monster truck rally.

Oh, and there's also the small barrier that I'm completely gutless when it comes to asking women out. Somehow in my old age I've lost all ability to make the first move.

I should probably leave before I start feeling like Creepy Stalker Guy. ShadowDog's Rule For Asking Woman Out: Either make a move in the first ten minutes or you're just a loser stalker.

Grrrrr. Life's so hard when you're a gutless pussy.

Miserable People Stats

2008-10-24T10:51:00.002-04:00

I finally got over my hand injury enough to start converting the online story into a novel. Here are some stats on just the portion that was posted online (which doesn't count the passages and notes I'd compiled for the final 11 chapters):

1,262 pages in Word for Windows 2007! (for comparison, most novels you see in stores run between 4-600 pages in most word processing programs)

473,198 words! (for comparison, most novels run from 80-120,000 words. Most publishers won't even look at a first novel that exceeds 100,000 words.

Holy shit I have my work cut out for me!

Hand hurts like hell ...

2008-10-20T15:03:00.002-04:00

In a really bad mood ...

Ready to just drive away, leave everything behind, and become a psychotic hobo ...

Wishing I drank or abused drugs so I'd have something to quit ...

So yeah, nothing to see here. Grrrr

Things I've Never Said In My Life

2008-10-16T00:37:00.000-04:00

1) "Say my name, bitch!" NO. Just no.

2) "I know you are but what am I?" If you're much younger than me then you're probably not going to get that.

3) "Why yes, I have had enough PIE."

4) "Give me the remote, Dancing With The Stars is on!"

5) "You're a real pain in the ass, be my friend!"

6) "HA HA HA! That Howard Stern sure is funny!"

7) "Boy am I HAPPY! Life is fucking AWESOME!"

8) "I do!" Okay, okay, I said it once. But NEVER again!

Sniff

2008-10-13T11:41:00.004-04:00

I hurt my hand, my PIE eating hand no less, so I'm going to be out of writing action for a bit. Grrr.

How did I hurt it? Well, let me just say that when you're eating pecan PIE in a park by yourself and a gang of squirrels surround you and demand the rest of your PIE ... just hand it over. It's not worth it, man! :'-(

Vote Time!

2008-10-08T00:23:00.003-04:00

It's time once again for you, gentle readers, to vote on which extremely personal, painful story from my past that I'll talk about next here. You can vote with a reply or an email. Here are your choices:

1) The time I got busted for skipping 40 days of school in one semester. You heard me, one semester.

2) My ill fated first face to face meeting with an internet girlfriend named Stephanie.

3) One of many gutwrenching stories about She Who Must Not Be Named, my last girlfriend.

Miserable People

2008-10-04T16:18:00.002-04:00

For those of you who don't know, I broke into the blogging world with the ambitious idea of writing a fictional story over 365 straight days, posting a chapter a day for a full year straight. Even worse, I tried to do it from an outline only. In other words, I wouldn't begin actually writing each chapter until midnight had come on that day. So during each 24 hour period I had to write 1-3 thousand words and post it before the next midnight.

Absolutely INSANE. It sounded good on paper, and I didn't miss my first day for almost two months, which boggles my mind now. But there was no way it was ever going to happen as I planned because work and personal issues began to kick my ass. I broke up for good with my last girlfriend. A business partner and longtime friend screwed me over, costing me thousands of dollars. I had to move, I had to travel, and work really kicked my ass. It was just one thing after the next, leading to long breaks that destroyed the pretty good fanbase following I once had for the story. And once the fanbase was gone (except for the exceptionally loyal and awesome Claire), so was any motivation I had to finish the story.

Any time I thought about the story I felt like a failure, so working on it was out of the question for a long time.

But lately I've decided the time has come to finish it, and in fact to turn it into a conventional novel. I'll edit what I have so far, finish the ending, and submit it to publishers along with a copy of the short film I produced of it during the initial run. My hope is that the short film will motivate the publishers to at least give it a fair reading. So I think it has an actual shot at getting published.

Of course, this means I'm taking down the blog because no company would ever publish something that can be found (even in a different form) for free online. So! Your last chance to EVER read the original version of Miserable People is NOW. Within one week I'm nuking the entire blog. YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED, CLAIRE!! :-)

Now, obviously, Claire and any other loyal fans who contact me will be getting free copies of the book if and when it ever gets published. You can even read it once I have it ready for publishers, in fact.

5 Reasons I'm Pissed Off

2008-10-04T00:20:00.002-04:00

1) Beverly Hills Chihuahua opened today. Holy fucking SHIT! And I'm betting right now that it does monster bank! Monster! Ugh ...

Just

Shoot

Me!!!

2) Rosie O'Donnell is about to return to TV. Which increases how much my TV weighs by approximately five thousand pounds. Ugh. Can you imagine the kind of nightmares the crew of her show will be having? No, I mean that literally, at least according to this article and how I imagine she must smell.

3) Piers Anthony just won't stop publishing books. Dude! There's no money left! For the love of GOD would you please stop writing shitty novels already?!?!?

4) Heather Locklear was arrested! Naw, just kidding. Not only does this not upset me, I didn't even know she was still alive until this happened.

5) Pink Floyd announced they're still not getting back together. Selfish fuckers! I guess there's still too much dope in the world waiting to be consumed for them to get back to work making me happy with more tripped out music. Selfish fuckers!

Bizarre Assed Blogs

2008-10-02T20:01:00.003-04:00

There are some bizarre assed blogs out there, yo! Just take a look around and you'll see some really weird shit in the blogsphere. Let's take a look, shall we?

http://nocjcvfcf.blogspot.com/

Who the fuck are "Dylan and Cole" and why should I care about them? How hard would it have been to mix in a couple lines of description especially some form of what the hell is going on? Nope, all we get are photos and more photos of fugly assed kids.

http://davidapril.blogspot.com/

This one actually contains some pretty cool photos and they actually took the time to mix in some text. But I defy anyone to actually READ that text because it's purple text on a purple background! Are they colorblind? Do they ever look at their blog beyond the "compose" screen? Totally bizarre.

http://neilymobile.blogspot.com/

If anyone can figure out what's going on here, clue me in. Cuz ... damn.

http://pen-gwin.blogspot.com/

And finally, not bizarre but cool. Dude went to the fucking Antarctic and is blogging about it! And here I am blogging about people I hate and my miserable past relationships.

In times like these I feel small.

Very very small.

But then I look down at my massive gut, realize I'm anything BUT small, and feel better! WOO HOO!!!

The Storyteller

2008-09-29T16:42:00.003-04:00

My father is a Storyteller, and he passed that on to me. You know how it is if you have a large enough family. There is that one or more person who loves telling stories and they're usually very good at making them entertaining. They are the modern day historians. Say what you want about this videographer age we live in now, but the shit you shoot is rarely entertaining. It's a better record of the complete truth of what happened, unvarnished by age and embellishment, but it's rarely entertaining unless the movie shooting really knows what he or she is doing and actually, oh I don't know, EDITS that shit before burning the DVD. LMFAO

Storytelling is fast becoming a lost art. But then I'm preaching to the choir here because people who write blogs and read other blogs are Storytellers themselves and/or love to listen to the Stories. I try to keep this in mind every time some media moron points to blogs and bloggers as one of the telltale signposts for the coming apocalypse. Shut the fuck up! We're keeping that Story Fire alive, bay-bee! >:-P~~~~~~~~~~~~~

People I'm going to miss

2008-09-28T14:35:00.002-04:00

With the death of Paul Newman we have yet another year where many famous and influential people are gone for good. That sounds a little stupid since such people die every year, but this year seems to have been especially big with that so far. Here are some of the people, big and small, who I'm going to miss.

Paul Newman: One of the last of the classy, private superstar actors. His buddy Tom Cruise could learn a few dozen things from the way Newman chose to live his life.

James Crumley: A crime author. Never as huge as the big guns (to pun a little) in his genre but you could do a lot worse than his Milo series.

Jerry Reed: Sure, music and acting had passed him by long ago but I grew up with him and still held a fondness for him.

Don S. Davis: One of my favorite character actors. I met him in person at a couple DragonCons and he was a really really nice guy. Very down to Earth.

George Carlin: And so the last of the holy trinity of comedy fell. The world will never be quite as funny again.

Bo Diddley: OLD school rock and roll singer. I remember being 5 years old and seeing him play live on the streets at a fall festival in Greensboro. Another down to earth person through and through.

Harvey Korman: The kids these days wouldn't have thought he was funny at all but he killed on the Carol Burnett show. Watching him try to keep it together and not ruin the skit was always awesome.

Tim Russert: He revolutionized the concept of tough but fair interviewing. We sorely need him for this election and the ones to come but there will never be another person who gets it right as often as he did.

My memory/brain is fried!

2008-09-26T09:18:00.003-04:00

Okay, so remember that thrilling sink cleaning story yesterday? A couple days ago I was brushing my teeth and I looked down in the sink and thought to myself "wow. That's pretty fucking nasty. I should get some heavy duty cleaner at the store today and knock that out." So I while I was grocery shopping that night I wandered around looking for bathroom cleaners. I finally found the aisle and was confronted with a dozen different brands that looked equally powerful. I wanted something strong as hell that'd also fight mildew and that you spray, walk away to let it work, then come back in five minutes and bust it's ass. I love that shit.

I finally ended up holding up two brands and comparing them. After about five full minutes of debate, I finally decided on a white bottle of Tilex.

I went home, busted its ass the next morning, then blogged about how it made me feel.

Later that day I was over at my father's house asking him if he wanted me to clean his nasty assed sinks. He's not in the greatest health so he can't do stuff like that anymore. I was bragging about how great this cleaner shit I'd found was. He said yeah, so when I got home I went into the bathroom to get the cleaner.

A small aside. My memory is so bad that if I don't set things I need to take with me the next day in front of the front door when I remember them, I invariably leave the house without them the next day. Big stuff waits on the floor in front of the door, smaller things hang out in a plastic grocery bag from the doorknob. I can be sitting there watching the TV, suddenly remember a movie that a friend I'm having lunch with tomorrow wants to borrow, and I hop up, put the DVD in the grocery bag and hang it from the doorknob.

I know this is stupid but it works.

So anyway, I went into the bathroom to get the cleaner and set it in front of the door so I'd remember it when it came time to take my father breakfast this morning. I looked around, saw the white bottle of cleaner, and picked it up.

I was like, Holy Shit this thing is fucking dusty! How the hell did this get so much dust on it in two days? I turned it over, yeah it was Tilex alright. So what the hell with the dust?

Then I looked at the shelf above the toilet and saw a clean nondusty bottle of Tilex.

Other than the dust, the bottles were identical (though Tilex has apparently changed their labels a little in the past couple years since I bought this other bottle of cleaner).

So, what's more freaky?

1) The fact that I used this bathroom every single day and never noticed this old dusty assed bottle of cleaner sitting ON THE SINK TO MY LEFT AGAINST THE WALL?

2) The fact that after much debate, I purchased the exact same brand, bottle size, and bottle color of clean as I already had at home? Bear in mind now that I STILL have no memory of ever buying the original bottle. And it's not like I have a Tilex fan website, I couldn't have picked that brand name out of a lineup three days ago. I could give a rats ass about the Tilex company. So this was either random coincidence or something deeply buried in my subconscious.

3) The fact that I still didn't notice the old bottle EVEN AS I USED THE NEW BOTTLE TO CLEAN THE SINK?

Totally fucking bizarre. Also, I hate wasting money because I'm retarded.

Sign #345,854 that I need to get outside the house more!

2008-09-25T11:18:00.002-04:00

I got emotional about cleaning my sink this morning. Seriously. I got it as clean as it'd been in years and I actually felt a surge of pride and accomplishment in my breast. I was so fucking happy about this clean sink for several minutes.

And then I thought, "dude, it's a fucking SINK? What in the hell is wrong with you?"

I've been cooped up too many days in a row doing wall to wall work. Time to get the fuck out of this out and go do something. Catch a movie or something even though I don't have time to. I hear Nic Cage is blanding it up with scary assed hair in some new movie. Maybe that one.

Goodnight, my Miss Missy

2008-09-23T01:32:00.002-04:00

Sometimes I wish I weren't so sane. I know that's retarded because there are thousands of people in this world with serious, crushing, life altering mental problems who only wish they were normal. So it's easy for me sitting all normal on my fat ass to be glib about mental illness.

But it's true. I'm so sane that I see life with no delusion. I see my many and varied faults without the benefit of the kind of awesome self delusion I see in other people. (you know them: the 500 pound whale who wears a bikini at the beach and really believes she's hawt, the office douchebag who really believes there's a soul in the building who can stand him or her, the short stinky balding abject loser who hits on every woman in the bar only to fail utterly but who still walks out of there with his head held high and believing its their loss. No, you irrational dumbass, you had more of a chance licking a lightening bolt or painting a fart than you had of one of your brain splittingly retarded one liners actually getting you a date. (Ladies, if a guy ever says to you "I wish I were a tear so i could start in your eyes, live on your face, and die on your lips." please promise me you'll shoot him in the fucking face)

But I digress.

My point is that these people are insane with self delusion. But at least they're happy in their delusion. Me? I gotta deal with reality with no aids and it sucks ass.

Another great benefit of being insane is that you can have company over without them drinking all your Diet Pepsi or eating the last brownie because they're all in your head. See, if I were insane I'd have ALL the hot imaginary babes in my house. They'd be smoking hot, they'd have actually read a book, they'd want to join in when I make fun of movies, TV shows, and the news without whining that I'm negative about everything. But best of all, when it got late they'd say goodnight and get the fuck out. Goodnight Dancia Hawkins, who loves Dresden Files novels and the Buffy Season 8 comic books. Goodnight Evette Morgan, who lives to read the next Alan Dean Foster "Flinx" novels. (ROWL!) Goodnight Miss Missy, who adores John Mellencamp songs and Stephen King novels.

Stupid sanity! We could've have fun!

People keep scaring me about lack of sleep!

2008-09-16T17:22:00.002-04:00

Every time I turn around I hear about lack of sleep:

1) Making you gain weight.

2) Causing serious health problems when you get older.

3) Making you retain water.

4) Slowing down the healing of injuries.

5) Increasing the chances of stroke.

6) Increasing irritability and lack of patience.

And on and on and FUCKING on!

Look! I get it! I should be getting more than 4 hours of sleep a night! But I ain't about the turning to drugs to solve my problems and none of the home remedies have worked for me so I am hearby sending out the world in general my acknowledgment that yes, I know it's bad for me and if I could sleep more I would so you can now SHUT THE FUCK UP about how bad it is for me and people like me! Grrrrr!

Just fucking shoot me!

2008-09-10T20:22:00.002-04:00

Goddamn this week has sucked! I don't even have the energy to go into it, it's just sucked complete and total ASS! >:-#

I mean, we're talking clown slapping bad mood right now. It's a good thing I live alone or there'd be one of those fights that's not her fault even though you act like it is because you're a jerkass in a bad mood. One of those.

It's also a good thing no clowns live in the neighborhood.

Childhood Photos

2008-09-07T10:59:00.003-04:00

Here are a couple photos from my childhood. I'll be uploading more throughout this week. These two were taken in 1976 after my parents' divorce. My father is in one and my mother is in the other. I'm the kid to the right. The taller kid to the left is my older brother Kenny, and the other is my younger brother Brad.

If you look really hard at the photo with my father in it, you'll notice the cast on my thumb. So this was taken shortly after a moron slammed the door on my left thumb, crushing it. I was sitting in the front passenger seat of a church van in the church parking lot, waiting for the other kids to get in so we could all be taken home. My door was sitting open and I curiously leaned forward and examined what the inside of the door jamb looked like. I remember thinking, "cool, looks like some black rubber in there." So I stuck my thumb in that gap to feel it. At that moment, one of the redneck moron kids who were running around and around the van like dumb assed monkeys with their tails on fire slammed my door shut. I guess it was in his way or something.

I sat there, in shock I guess because I didn't scream, and cried really big fat tears of pain. It wasn't until the driver started to get in that he noticed what was going on and screamed for someone to open the door. I remember clearly that the moron redneck kid was really shaken up about what he'd done and said he was sorry and he didn't know and all that so I guess I should cut him a break. But it fucking HURT so I won't.

The thumbnail ended up falling off and it took a long time to grow a new one. My left thumb is still deformed, but not so that you would notice unless you compare the two of them. The left one is longer and thinner now like a roll of toothpaste that's been squashed.

I think about this incident sometimes, especially when my deformed thumb catches my eye, but it wasn't until I noticed the cast when scanning these photos in this week that it all really came back to me.

Damn the dreams!

2008-09-07T10:43:00.002-04:00

I've been getting plagued just about every night by horrible assed nightmares. Really really awful shit and I'm starting to get tired of it. It's affecting my ability to go to sleep. The night before last I kept getting waken by dreams of being eaten alive by spiders. That sucked, so last night I had a lot of trouble getting to sleep.

I'd lay there like a moron in the dark for about a half hour of nothing. Then I'd get up like you're supposed to, do something, then try to go back to sleep again. This went on until about 3:30am when I finally fell asleep.

In my dream there was a really loud crashing sound as someone smashed down my door and this was followed by the most horrible and loud laughing I've ever heard. In my dream I lay there in complete darkness, terrified and shivering.

And then I woke up. It wasn't completely dark in reality because there was some light coming from under the door but otherwise I was laying in the exact position as my dream. I got up, grabbed my miniature baseball bat, and checked the house but of course the door was intact and no one was there.

What's most irritating about this dream is that I was laying there terrified. I'm a lot of things, and I admit them all, but I'm not a coward. I grew up in a tough neighborhood, got into my share of fights, and got my ass whipped many times. You find out real quick if you're a coward in those situations and I'm not. Getting my ass whipped means nothing to me. And, unlike then, I'm tall and really fat so people don't start any trouble now anyway. And for home defense I have my bat and also an asp. Plus there is a police station literally a two minute drive from my house. So if someone's beating down my door I'm not going to be shivering in my fucking bed. I'm calling the cops and then holding down the fort for the 3-5 minutes until they get here. So it's irritating.

After checking the house I looked at the time. 4:10. I'd been asleep, at best, about a half hour. Awesome. To make matters worse, every time I tried to go back to sleep I heard that awful laughter so I finally had to put a DVD on low volume for some background noise and company in order to get back to sleep around 5am. I woke up this morning at 9:30. Yea. I'm going to be in a GREAT mood today! WOO HOO!!

Fucking retarded assed dreams! Grrrrr!

Spam and Spyware

2008-09-05T01:33:00.002-04:00

Have you EVER purchased ANYTHING advertised through spam or spyware? EVER? Yeah, me neither. Who the fuck does? I want to meet the slobbering moron who needed a good or service and was just sitting there like Forrest Gump going "gee, I wish I knew where to find a good foreignmade anti-ass-itch cream!" Then, bingo, they get a poorly worded email with six links to anti-ass-itch cream websites. Problem solved!

Who in the HELL does this? WHO?!? Nofuckingbody!

Who thinks this is a good way to advertise their hideous products? When has annoying the ever living shit out of someone helped motivate a consumer to buy a product? It kinda has the opposite effect, right?

Dig, if you will, a picture:

You're walking from your office to your car. I step out in front of you and block your way. "Hey, do you suffer from nipple fungus?"

You: "Excuse me?"

Me: "You should try my new anti nipple fungus powder!"

You (walking around me): "No thanks. Maybe if I ever get nipple fungus I'll keep you in mind."

I block your way again. "But this has an extra powerful antifungal agent that is proven to not be harsh on nipples when tested on rat nipples."

You: "Look, I just want to get to my car. I've had a long day. Do you mind moving?"

Me (not getting out of your way): "Just hear me out! I have some testimonials from people who are very satisfied with their nipples now!"

You push me out of your way. "Get the fuck outta my way!"

As you try to pass by me, I trip you. You slam down face first into the concrete, busting your nose, lips, and knocking out three teeth. As you lay there writhing in pain and reaching for the taser in your belt, I stand over you. "It comes in vanilla, cherry, and ... if you're feeling extra freaky ... sausage gravy flavors!"

Now, tell me, just how inclined would you be to EVER purchase my product, no matter how good it is? When people have shit to do they don't really appreciate time wasting morons or slowed down computers or lotsa aggravation. So, I ask again, WHY IN THE HELL DOES SPAM AND SPYWARE EXIST?!?!? Nobody's buying shit as a result of it and no advertiser in his or her right mind should ever think it'd work to move their hideous product! WTF?!?

Looking for feedback!

2008-09-03T09:46:00.003-04:00

My company is currently working on an audio comedy series involving making fun of books. But it's in an intelligent way so the writer's we're using have to have actually read the books and have something intelligent and interesting to make fun of it about. It helps if the audience has read the books in question but it's not necessary to find it funny (we hope!) But that's what we want to find out! So, if you read a lot and want to help us out with some feedback on the first couple episodes drop me an email or leave a comment (but I'll need your email address to share it with you if I don't already have it).

We're also looking for more writers for this gig. It pays $30 each accepted submission or a percentage of sales. Each submission is usually 500 words or less. The catch is you have to be funny and you have to have read the book in question. LOL

Anyway, lemme know and in the meantime I'll be ranting about my life again tomorrow. Grrrrr.

Till I Find You (2)

2008-08-30T00:10:00.002-04:00

I'm still looking for someone.

Not just anyone.

I'm looking for someone who doesn't take the complete stranger's side when I tell a story about a douchebag I encountered. This is my fucking story, you know me and you don't know the stranger, so let's just assume I wasn't the villain of the story, can we do that you douchetard?

I'm looking for someone who can take a fucking compliment. Is it really so hard to just say "thanks, I appreciate you saying that?" When you deny the compliment you're calling me a moron for saying it.

I'm looking for someone who doesn't mysteriously think that Stephen Colbert is funny. And who doesn't assume I watch FOX news just because I think he's the dumbest, unfunniest, bastard ever born.

I'm looking for someone who doesn't take two fucking years to return the movie or book I've loaned them. As a matter of fact, I ain't loaning SHIT to anyone anymore! Don't ask!

I'm looking for someone who won't risk everyone's life within a mile radius by speeding up when they see the light change to yellow.

I'm looking for someone, ANYone, to agree with me that any dog under 40 pounds is really just a glorified barking rat.

Until I find you, I guess I'll just be a rude bitter fat bastard too.

FINE!!! I miss ONE THING about dating!

2008-08-26T12:01:00.002-04:00

As most of you know, I'm pretty happy to be single. Loving the freedom, not missing the drama, and just generally having a good time in life during the ten seconds that insane drivers aren't pissing me the fuck off.

But I DO miss one thing, and that's good home cooking. That sounds a little sexist, but I only mean that my cooking generally sucks except for Mexican and Chili. Other than that, naw. Not happening. So I mostly eat out.

But there are times, like today, when I really really miss a great home cooked meal. :-(

There, world! I miss dating sometimes! Are you happy that your brainwashing concept that people can't be happy unless they're in a relationship has been validated once again?!?

You'll pay for this, world. Grrrrr.

I haven't seen The Ring in over a year.

2008-08-25T15:40:00.005-04:00

So why did I dream about that creepy assed bitch last night?

It was actually kind of a mix between that bitch and whatever the hell that thing was in The Grudge, which I also haven't seen in a long time. I dreamed I was sleeping in my bed in the middle of the night, lying on my left side facing that end table (which is how I fell asleep last night) and the entity or whatever came right at my face. So I screamed and rolled on to my back. Then I saw it crawling on the bedroom ceiling right towards me. I screamed again and woke up lying on my back looking at the exact spot on my ceiling where the creature had been in my dream.

I had to turn the light on to fall back asleep. LOL

That's IT! I've had it!!!

2008-08-22T09:06:00.002-04:00

I put up with the rising cost of gas. I didn't bitch about that here.

I put up with the rising cost of airplane tickets, even though that directly affects me.

I put up with the rising costs of restaurant food, even though I eat out about 90% of the time.

Milk and bread cost more. I rolled with it.

Movie tickets have even gone up in some theaters. I go out to watch movies a LOT, but I kept a stiff upper lip.

But this ... NO, I can't quietly put up with this! HELL NO, WE WON'T GO! We're not gonna take it, NO, we ain't gonna make it!!!!

It's been announced this morning that they're raising the price of Snickers and M&Ms.

NOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!

You bastards!!!!

It Happened Again

2008-08-19T02:05:00.002-04:00

"You're so sweet!"

Oh God, not the S word. Well, I guess it could be worse ...

"You're a really great guy."

Great guy. Yeah, thanks a million.

"I just love you."

What's that in her eyes now? Blind panic as she realizes that I could take that the wrong way? Uh-oh. HERE IT COMES!

"You're like a brother to me!"

NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!

You just had to go there, didn't you? And so unnecessary too because, no, I didn't harbor any feeble illusions that you'd actually think of me as anything other than a sweet, nice guy. I know my place, thank you very much. This isn't my first barbecue, so to speak.

Oh, and just to make sure, I did a visual examination just now and yes, my penis does still exist. So it's not THAT.

The Rules

2008-08-17T10:03:00.002-04:00

Oh. Hi there!

Welcome to the world. I know you've just been born and all but we have some rules you're going to have to live by all your life.

Learn these rules and learn them good!

1) You have to look, dress, talk, act, and think like everyone else. If you don't you will be punished.

2) You have to find a companion by a certain age or people will think something is wrong with you. If this means you get stuck with an asshole ... well then at least people won't think something is wrong with you.

3) If you do not have a companion at any point after the age of 24 then you WILL feel lonely. It's the law. You're not allowed to feel happy and content if you don't have someone.

4) You must want children of your own, and lots of them. This world isn't going to overpopulate itself!

5) Despite the fact that we are only here once and that being happy sucks less than anything else ... if you make any decision solely because it will make you happy then you must feel guilty and selfish to the point your happiness is ruined.

6) Bad, evil, nasty people will always win. It's the fucking law. (if it's any consolation they will die lonely and miserable)

7) Life sucks, love loses, and nice people finish last.

8) But when it all gets to be too much we do have lots of PIE. WOO HOO!!!!

Strangers

2008-08-16T02:47:00.004-04:00

I passed you on the street today.

You were walking from your car to your office. Or maybe you were walking to or from lunch. Perhaps you were going into the grocery store as I was leaving.

At any rate, I was within your notice for only 20 seconds or so. Maybe our eyes met. Maybe I was talking on the cell phone so you heard my voice and maybe you heard a snatch of my conversation.

And then I was gone. Your day moved on without me. We'll never see each other again. I will live out the rest of my life ... laugh and cry, live and love, grieve and rejoice, wither and die ... all without you. I will inspire and doom, prosper and suffer, hurt and be hurt ... all without you.

During your brief snapshot of my life you took in very little of me. What I was wearing. How I comb my hair. What jewelry, if any, I like. But you know nothing else about me. Did I have a happy childhood? Am I in love? Has my heart ever been broken? Did I ever know my mother's love or did she pass away in childbirth? Do I have living parents or dead children? Would I kill to protect my family? Am I a thief or a saint?

Are we so right for each other that we would have loved each other with all our hearts? Maybe we have the same dreams and goals, the same loves and hates, the sames tastes and passions. Or maybe we'd despise each other and never get past a first date. Maybe I would have hit you and you would have cheated on me. Maybe I'd be a terrible parent and you one who played favorites.

But we'll never know because we're strangers. So we pass each other and go on about our lives, never to meet again.

How many soulmates and lifelong friends like me do you rush past each day?