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| Friday, March 16th, 2012 | | 1:40 pm |
Eels - End Times - listen to this album, it's godly
Ugh. Ugh, ugh, ugh, ugh. 193 lbs again, having once reached 185, and I need to loosen my belt a notch for the first time in a while. Fuck. Time to get serious about not overeating/stress-eating. 180 is a reasonable, healthy goal. I WILL get there. Off to work, where there will be entirely too much free food available. Stupid-ass job. | | Tuesday, March 13th, 2012 | | 6:37 am |
| | 4:29 am |
| | Tuesday, February 7th, 2012 | | 1:56 am |
queztlcoatl
Dinner tonight: Baked potatoes Sauteed spinach with garlic Stir-fried broccoli Roast tenderloin of pork Peas It was pretty tasty I have to say. Today was a pretty good day. Woke up a bit too late (because I got to bed too late last night) but other than that, productive. Hung out with Jared. Didn't do enough exercising. Meant to write so much more but got distracted. And now I'm exhausted, too exhausted to write. | | Saturday, February 4th, 2012 | | 2:10 am |
Idea for a book title: Everyday Occultism For the Busy Apostate. Maybe sub in Atheist for Apostate. Atheists would be a larger market, but I love the sound of the word apostate SO MUCH. | | Tuesday, January 31st, 2012 | | 11:34 am |
dreams
Themes from last nights sleep: child-tending, people driving, other than that, it's all starting to slip away. A part of the dream did involve me discovering that I had an okcupid profile that I had made and then forgot about, and discovering it now, I realized it had a red dot on it (meaning does not reply to messages often) because after all that time of forgetting about it, eventually people had messaged me. It's a bit interesting that of all the times for me to have a dream which references okcupid, I get one know, when I'm taking a bit of a break from it. I think I was starting to feel like I was spending a bit too much time on it, over investing in it to one degree or another. Now that it's been a few days since I've been on the website, it actually feels pretty good. Knowing that I have a profile up, but I'm spending less time with it. Feels comfortable. Meant to write more but I foolishly wasted my time watching online videos rather than journaling, and now I have to go shave for work. F urshlugginer! | | Friday, January 27th, 2012 | | 3:20 am |
| | Wednesday, January 25th, 2012 | | 2:28 am |
| | Friday, January 20th, 2012 | | 11:15 pm |
| | Wednesday, January 18th, 2012 | | 5:05 pm |
New year's resolutions
So, on New Year's Eve, I forgot to come up with resolutions. I got drunk, had some fun with friends, met some cool people. Is it too late? No. Resolutions: Work out a few times per week AT LEAST Get a better job. When I do, leave the one I have on the best terms possible. Continue reaching out and being more social with people. I've been doing fairly well, reconnecting with Corey, Jared, Dave, Kyle, etc. Could do better though. Find my special purpose. Related to that last one, continue writing. Continue writing lots and lots. Where will I find time for it all??? Well, it's been a few weeks (several?) now since I've videogamed. That's certainly helping. ^^ Alright, off to shower. Hungry. Maybe a snack before dinner. | | Monday, January 9th, 2012 | | 1:12 pm |
Three worlds
I was watching an online review of Melancholia, which is a film I wish I had gotten a chance to see when it was in theaters. As I was watching it, I thought about the movie, and a thought occurred to me. In the film, there's this parallel planet, called Melancholia, which apparently shows up near Earth. Apparently it's supposed to be a metaphor for depression or something. I started to think about how, when we adopt an attitude that is very depressed, or alternatively exceedingly, perhaps unrealistically optimistic, it's like we're imagining in our heads a whole different world than the one we live in. Basically, then, our minds are a story of three different planets: planet X, planet Y, and planet Z. On planet X, you can't trust anyone. Everyone lives for selfish reasons, and a person's worth is only determined by how much they can gain for themselves. Planet X is dangerous: earthquakes, murderers, rapists, arson, hurricanes, and on and on. When you live on Planet X, it feels like you can't get out: escape is hopeless. The days are either too hot or too cold. On Planet X, when you go to a job interview, they always assume the worst from you, and you never feel completely at ease. You can't find happiness on Planet X because there's something in the water that makes it hard for you to focus on how to get there. Planet Z, on the other hand, is brilliant. The sun shines in a way that lets you see every little detail of everything worth seeing. People are working on projects that matter to them, and people are socializing with each other in ways in which everyone feels easy and comfortable. No one is ever awkward, and if they are, it is a funny awkward that is joked about and leads to a better understanding. The weather of Planet Z is most characterized by a cool, fresh-smelling breeze. One feels absolute freedom of movement, and the energy to take advantage of it. On one horizon are the mountains, promising adventure; on the other horizon is the Ocean, beguiling in its sights and its smells. The problem is that we live on planet Y. As creatures of dichotomies, we find either Planet X or Z understandable, so we're constantly tempted to believe that we live in or the other. But no, we live in Planet Y, and we'll never live anywhere else. --- Sometimes it pisses me off that I only have this one life to live. It was easier when I believed in reincarnation. At the time it made sense: matter can neither be created nor destroyed, so on some level shouldn't that apply to my consciousness as well? But no, that was an error. It pisses me off that I can only see the world through my own eyes. I want to live a thousand different lives. But I'll only ever have this one. I know I should feel lucky to have just this one, because I could far more easily have had none, but I don't care, I fucking want more life, MORE LIFE! Current Mood:  pensive | | Tuesday, January 3rd, 2012 | | 2:58 pm |
| | Wednesday, December 28th, 2011 | | 2:06 am |
A cheery quote
For the holiday season: “we are all alone, born alone, die alone, and — in spite of true romance magazines — we shall all someday look back on our lives and see that, in spite of our company, we were alone the whole way. i do not say lonely — at least, not all the time — but essentially, and finally, alone. this is what makes your self-respect so important, and i don’t see how you can respect yourself if you must look in the hearts and minds of others for your happiness” ― William S. Burroughs | | Monday, December 26th, 2011 | | 9:21 am |
a series
a series of four interweaving dreams, the common thread being a girl, who I'll call Ria (romantic interest archetype). 1. I'm at a seacoast home with Ria and a female friend of hers. We're having a meal, and exchanging stories. Ria tells us a story about how once, when she was a teacher at a particular school, there was this situation where people suspected a female teacher in a school she was in of carrying on an inappropriate relationship with a student who had downs. 2. I'm a teacher at the school during the time of the suspicion. I'm in a classroom with the HR, principal, school psychologist, etc., of the school. Why am I there? First we call in the teacher and conduct an interview. Then she leaves. Then we call in the down's girl. A second interview. She is high-functioning down's syndrome, with only some of the typical down syndrome traits. From each of the interviews, clearly inappropriate things have been happening, including the girl going to the teacher's house alone after school, but they're both women, and it's impossible to have any evidence that anything sexual went on. Clearly the teacher is attracted to this girl, and the feelings of the girl are hard to gauge. It's a tough judgement call. I feel out of my element, feel inadequate to come to terms with the situation. 1.a. I'm back at the summerhome with Ria and her friend. What sort of gathering is this? It is a barbeque. The summer home rests near the ocean, near a sort of cliff. Imagine the white cliffs of Dover, only not quite so tall or steep. I tell Ria that it was an interesting story, very interesting. We have a connection. 3. Ria and I are at an African restaurant with her two children and someone else who I can't remember. The food is pretty good, the event rather unremarkable though. Save for the fact that, when the bill comes, it's for about two-thousand dollars. We keep going through the check at the end, trying to figure out how we could have possibly spent that much, looking for mistakes, but we can't find any. I come to terms with the fact that I'm going to have to pay off a restaurant bill on an installment plan, which depresses me, but we head out. On the way out, we pass by a group of people talking about what kind of indian food they typically order when they go out, and I call out to them after they've passed us to avoid that stupid high-priced african restaurant. 4. I'm at Ria's apartment, we're sitting on a couch next to each other, her kids on either side of us. Four on the couch. I'm distracted by my smart-phone, looking through images I have on it. I come across one which depicts a spooky painting from the movie "The Ring." I say ooooh, I bet you'll find this image scary, and show it to her, she sees it, turns away in annoyance, and says that yes, I was right to think that she'd find it scary. She tells me, come on, put that away and focus on the movie with the rest of us. I do so. We're sitting next to each other. I look at her, and she's turned towards the screen. Her hand is close to mine, and I can see it starting to move towards my hand. I move mine towards hers, and when they meet, her hand feels warm and comforting and it's freaking awesome. I'm glad she realizes that I didn't mean to annoy her, that I'm only human and just made a stupid decision. I think about how I should be less addicted to my phone. Warm feelings deep down inside permeate me. I think about how remarkable it is that simple hand-holding can be so exciting, so powerful. | | Thursday, December 15th, 2011 | | 3:30 am |
| | Sunday, December 11th, 2011 | | 9:15 pm |
Meaning to do...
So recently I finished The Count of Monte Cristo... unabridged. It was quite the journey. Affecting, very affecting at times. I think I even cried, once. Where was it that I cried? I can pinpoint with 100% accuracy where I cried when I read "The End of the Affair," but with this 1,000+ page brick I find I'm having a hard time remembering exactly where I was so moved. I think it was probably in one of the scenes where Mercedes, bless her dear heart, talks with the "count" aka her former fiancee. The story is called the count of monte cristo, but what I found interesting about it was that, as much as Edmond Dantes creates a new persona, he never really stops being Edmond Dantes. He changes outwardly, but inwardly he's still hurting. He wants to act removed, a "person for whom the heart holds no secrets" and yet at the same time he's a terrible sap. Anyways, throughout my reading, I'd put earmark pages with passages that I really liked or found interesting. The book has to go back to the library so it's now or never. #1 'Ah, duelling!' exclaimed the count. 'There's a fine way, I must say, to achieve one's end, when the end is vengeance! A man has stolen your mistress, a man has seduced your wife, a man has dishonoured your daughter. He has taken an entire life, a life that had the right to expect from God the share of happiness that He promises to every human being in creating us, and turned it into a mere existence of pain, misery and infamy; and you consider yourself revenged because you have run this man through with your sword or put a bullet in his head, after he has turned your mind to delirium and your heart to despair? Come, come! Even without considering that he is often the one who comes out of this contest on top, purged in the eyes of the world and in some respect pardoned by God... No, no.' the count went on, 'if I ever had to take my revenge, that is not how I should do it.' #2 Villefort gave a bitter smile and said, in response more to his own thoughts than to Mme Danglars' words: 'So it is true that every one of our actions leaves some trace on our past, either dark or bright. So it is true that every step we take is more like a reptile's progress on the sand, leaving a track behind it. And often, alas, the track is the mark of our tears!' #3 (oh yeah, this might be the passage...) 'How can you live like that, with nothing attaching you to life?' 'It is not my fault, Madame. In Malta I loved a girl and was going to marry her, when the war came and swept me away from her like a whirlwind. I thought that she loved me enough to wait for me, even to remain faithful to my tomb. When I came back, she was married. This is the story of every man who is aged over twenty. Perhaps my heart was weaker than that of others and I suffered more than they would in my place, that's all.' The countess stopped for a moment, as if needing to recover her breath. 'Yes,' she said, 'and that love has remained in your heart. One is only really in love once. . . Did you ever see her again?' 'Never.' 'Never?' 'I did not go back to the country where she lived.' 'To Malta?' 'Yes, to Malta.' 'So she is in Malta, then?' 'I think so.' 'And have you forgiven her what she made you suffer?" 'Her I have forgiven, yes.' 'But only her. You still hate those who separated you?' The countess stood in front of Monte Cristo, still holding part of the bunch of grapes in her hand. 'Take it,' she said. Great use of dramatic irony in that passage. No one is able to recognize the Count, years later as Edmond Dantes, save for Mercedes. She knows who he is and says nothing. He knows that she knows. In public they act out not knowing each other. When she's asking him if he forgives the woman, she's asking him if he forgives her and it breaks my fucking heart just thinking about it. #3 'Listen to me, my dear, my beloved Valentine,' he said in his low, melodious voice. 'People like us, who have never had a thought that would have made them blush before others, before their parents or before God, people like us can read one another's hearts like an open book. I have never been a character in a novel, I am not a melancholy hero, I have no pretensions to be Manfred or Antony. But without words, without oaths and protestations, I entrusted my life to you. You are failing me and you are right to do what you are doing, I told you so and I repeat it. But you are failing me and my life is lost. If you go away from me, Valentine, I shall be alone in the world. My sister is happy with her husband, and her husband is only my brother-in-law, that is to say a man who is attached to me by social convention alone; hence, no one on earth has any need of me and my existence is useless. This is what I shall do: I shall wait until the last second before you are married, because I do not wish to lose even the faintest shadow of one of those unexpected twists of fate that chance sometimes has in store for us: between now and then, Franz d'Epinay may die; or, just as you are approaching it, a bolt of lightning may strike the alter. To a condemned man, everything is credible, and, when his life itself is at stake, miracles may be counted possible events. So, as I say, I shall wait until the final moment and when my misfortune, without any hope or remedy, I shall write a confidential letter to my brother-in-law and another to the prefect of police to inform him of my intention, and in the corner of some wood, beside some ditch or on the bank of some river, I shall blow out my brains, as surely as I am the son of the most honest man who has ever lived in France.' Maximilien, you're kind of being a douchebag in that scene. But you know what? I can relate. In italics is the section that grabbed my attention most firmly. #4 Moral wounds have the peculiarity that they are invisible, but do not close; always painful, always ready to bleed when touched, they remain tender and open in the heart. #5 (we're up to page 1007, by the way) In the first moments after this return which she had awaited with such impatience, Haydee experienced all the emotion of a daughter reunited with a dear father, and all the delirium of a mistress greeting an adored lover. And Monte Cristo's joy, though less expansive, was no less great. For hearts which have long suffered, happiness is like dew on soil parched by the sun: both heart and earth absorb this beneficial rain as it falls on them, and nothing appears on the surface. For some days, Monte Cristo had realized something that for a long time he had not dared to believe, which is that there were two Mercedes in the world, and he could once more be happy. #6 'I once knew a man who was more unhappy than you, Morrel.' 'Impossible!' 'Alas,' said Monte Cristo, 'our poor species can pride itself on the fact that every man thinks himself unhappier than another unfortunate, weeping and moaning beside him.' 'What can be more unhappy than a man who had lost the only thing in the world that he loved and desired?' 'Listen, Morrel,' Monte Cristo said, 'and concentrate for a moment on what I am about to tell you. I knew a man who, like you, placed all his expectations of happiness in a woman. He was young and had an old father whom he loved and a fiancee whom he adored. He was about to marry her when suddenly one of those twists of fate - which would make us doubt the existence of God if God did not reveal himself later by demonstrating that everything is to Him a means by which to lead us to His infinite oneness... when suddenly a twist of fate took away his freedom, his fiancee, and the future he dreamed of, which he believed was his (blind as he was, he could only read the here-and-now), and threw him in the depths of a dungeon.' 'Oh, yes,' Morrel said. 'But people come out of dungeons - after a week, or a month, or a year.' 'He stayed there for fourteen years, Morrel,' the count said, putting his hand on the young man's shoulder. Maximilien shuddered. 'Fourteen years!' he murmured. 'Fourteen years.' the count repeated. 'And he too, in those fourteen years, had many moments of despair. He too, like you, Morrel, thinking himself the most unhappy of men, wanted to kill himself.' 'And?' Morrel asked. 'And at the very last moment God revealed himself to him by human means; because God no longer performs miracles. Perhaps at first (because eyes clouded by tears need some time to clear entirely), he did not understand the infinite mercy of the Lord. But he was patient and waited. One day he miraculously emerged from the tomb, transfigured, rich, powerful, almost a god. His first thought was for his father, but his father was dead.' The conversation continues on, but the gist of it is basically, "suck it up buddy, I gots worse pain than you can imagine and I made it! The last earmark, on page 1241, merely consists of Haydee confessing her love for Dantes, and him finally accepting that she could love him (he has some issues regarding self-worth, it seems). I earmarked it more for myself; it's not quite interesting enough for me to take the time to put it on here. While I was doing all this, I had the pleasure of listening to "Sunday in the Park With George." God bless youtube. "But most of all, But most of all, I love your painting. I think I'm fainting..." | | Wednesday, December 7th, 2011 | | 8:53 pm |
great moments in literature
I wonder how many of them we owe to Gene Wolfe? Finished reading On Blue's Waters today. It was very, very good. I feel like I won't really be able to grasp its mysteries until I finish the trilogy, though. A passage that I found moving: Let me say this. Once when I was swimming underwater in imitation of her, I saw her swimming towards me, and she was swift and graceful beyond all telling. There are no words for that, as there are none for her beauty. She caught my hand, and we broke the surface, up from the divine radiance of the sea into the blinding glare of the Short Sun, and the droplets on her eyelashes were diamonds.
You that read of all this in a year that I will never see will think me wretched, perhaps - certainly I was wretched enough fighting the inhumi and their slaves on Green, fighting the settlers, and before the end fighting my own son.
Or possibly you may envy me this big white house that we in Gaon are pleased to call a palace, my gems and gold and racks of arms, and my dozen-odd wives.
But know this: The best and happiest of my hours you know nothing about. And I have seen days like gold.*swoon* | | Monday, December 5th, 2011 | | 9:56 pm |
life changes
Sunday: went on first okcupid date. It was nothing to be scared of! She looked better, not worse, than her online pics. Of course, the fact that she had a sense of humor helped. We're thinking about trying to hang out this Saturday, maybe? Monday: sent an email about a potential roommate opportunity in Peabody. Deep breath, deep breath. I feel like I have enough saved up now to do this. Ah, life. What would I do without you. | | Thursday, November 24th, 2011 | | 2:02 pm |
Mon dieu! Five drinks in two days, what am I turning into, a drunkard? Today is a holiday, though, so I can excuse myself. Today, I feel like I can be proud of myself. Proud of the things that I've done, proud of the things that I've said, proud of the thoughts that I've thought. And all of those things that I've done, and said, and thought that I regret? Well, those were me, but they shan't be anymore. Is this just the hefeweizen talking? Perhaps. If I were feeling this feeling a year ago, I'd call it a spiritual experience. Now, I know that it's simply neuro-chemical. Does that make it any less real? Any less authentic? Any less meaningful? Yesterday, I'd say yes to all of those questions. But now, with the healing poison all a-flowing through my veins, I'm less inclined to be so firm and unyielding in my philosophy... | | Monday, October 10th, 2011 | | 10:57 am |
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