A Friend In Need...

When my life fell to shit around me, and I was too lost in the questioning why, the one guy who was really there to help me pick up the pieces and figure out where their new place would be was Jay (not his real name). Two or three times a week, Jay was 'round my tiny cell-block apartment, helping me hang pictures, taking my mind off of things, telling me to quit overthinking shit, and when he noticed I was drinking my evenings away, offering other solutions.

There was no kidding one evening where Jay brought over his acoustic bass, a bunch of sketch pads and pens and pencils, a big CD binder full of his movies, and I can't even tell you what all else to keep me occupied for a time without the added enhancer of alcohol.

A few months later, while I was alone, and feeling low, I watched Reign Over Me. An amazing movie, Adam Sandler's best ever. Something clicked in me in the course of the movie, and I realized that Jay was my Don Cheadle. The guy who was always there to stop me from being self destructive.

And because I am at the point in my life, O my beloved non-existent reader (only because Google says you are, mind you) where I say what I mean without worrying too much about how it will be taken, I tell Jay, "You are my Don Cheadle."

And because his is, in fact, my Don Cheadle, he knows what I am talking about.

There's been a few situations, as you can imagine, where reminding him in public that he is my Don Cheadle might come across as gay. And I feel bad. Cause the dude is just making sure I am ok, and shouldn't be thought of as homosexual as a result. He's just my best friend. (Which brings up a topic to be addressed in a post for another time, O my beloveds.)

So I see an advertisement for the latest Iron Man movie, and I get reminded that Don Cheadle plays Robert Downey Jr's sidekick.

So I tell him, as we walk down the beach, that I have a new meaning for Don Cheadle:  Iron Man's sidekick (not, btw, that Jay is a sidekick by any means, and also I am so fucking far removed from anything remotely resembling a superhero that the idea is completely absurd!), and fuck me gently with a chainsaw if Jay doesn't turn to me and casually say:

"I'm Ok with the Reign Over Me Don Cheadle reference."

I pray that all of you who stumble across this bit of shit tangled in the world wide web are as lucky with your friends as I am.

Thanks for playing along,

Darth Sardonic

PS-I want all my exes to quit fucking telling me how proud of me they are.  You know who's proud of me? Me!! That's fucking who's proud. You guys are just hangers on! Maybe someday I will see myself clear to explain what has happened and where all this vitriol comes from, but don't hold your breath O my droogs and only friends.

There is another world There is a better world...

as promised, life is back to as normal as life can be, and i am done being morose for the time-being. i guess i didn't really have much else to say at this juncture except that the funk that was clouding my post about my graduation is gone.

in a completely unrelated topic, why is it that a woman who could easily be my daughter (street-legal, as it were, but still in the late teens/early twenties and therefore young enough to be the firstborn of a dude who is going to be 40 (yes! 40! (?!?)) next month) make coquettish eyes at me and flirt? and no! no, no, no. saying something like, "you're hot" et al is not really answering the question for me. i am curious as to what the driving attraction for her would be, not necessarily to me specifically, but to a man who is obviously older. as a writer, i feel i need to at least have a basic understanding of what is going on in her head.

and yes, a young blonde with a lip piercing who was graduating with me was doing exactly this before the crowd expanded and she was pushed away to find some other guy to flirt with. i was simply being polite back, o my beloved non-existent readers, lest ye think in some way my heart is straying from my lovely wife. but in all honesty it is a weird combination of emotions involved for me: i am flattered (i mean, after all, i am a dude. a dude who doesn't really think of himself as sexy. or hot. and everyone wants to feel attractive. this is completely set apart from my feelings for my wife.), and at the same time, i automatically think, why the fuck is she flirting with me as i am obviously much older and there are at least 50 hotter younger buffer guys nearby?

my wife simply says (as she does, matter-of-factly, as if it should've been so clear to me) "it's cause you're sexy." i sure do love her.

and when i pose the same concern about what is going on in a woman's head to my wife, she just as matter-of-factly says, "security."

can the woman's thought process really be boiled down to one word? was this lady thinking that by making eyes at me we would have a long conversation, fall in love, and i would take care of her till i grow old and die and then leave her to pine for another 20 years until she herself is finally old too?

somehow i doubt that.

comments from anyone (but especially women) as to what sorts of thoughts, however random, back this action are most welcome. it is not necessary to make confessions, i am not asking anyone for their sordid past. generalities are sufficient. i would just like to approximate an understanding of the woman's mind on this. thanks.

darth sardonic

lying through my teeth...

it's not really a lie. but it isn't the whole truth.

life is a rollercoaster, with its ups and downs; its highs and lows. the only sure thing is that the biggest highs are precedent to the massive lows.

not that lows are always bad. in fact, in a rollercoaster, the lows are the part that gives us the greatest exhiliration, ripping the screams from our mouths, tossing us into loopty loops and twists and turns that cause us to laugh out loud. the highs lure us into the complacency that make the lows twice as exciting. or twice as agonizing.

to say that my wife and i are perpetually happy isn't really a lie. but it isn't the whole truth.

sometimes our relationship is one of complacency. the day to day takes hold, the classes, the job, the doctor's appointments for the boys, homework and parent/teacher conferences. this is not unhappiness, it is mundanity. it is life.

to confuse my analogy a bit, i consider these the lows in the rollercoaster of our existence together; my wife and me.

these lows generally coincide with highs in another part of my life. in this case, the band, big dumb animal. in the somewhere near 8 original songs we have mastered and perfected. in the hours spent with s the drummer and s the guitarist in the garage drinking and playing through our setlist and laughing and the euphoria that follows a rollicking rock song performed to perfection when three distinct individuals read each other's signals exactly and the song thrums to its climax in such a way that makes the heart beat faster and the fist pump involuntarily, ending in a steady hum of that final guitar chord that wrapped everything up so magnificently.

even the momentary lows of a pourly-performed song are their own version of highs, punctuated with humorous and harmless ribbing: "i fucked that one up." "yes, yes you did. have another gin and tonic, lush."

and without instruments in our hands, these highs are continued in conversations only found amongst those select few who are truly kindred spirits that fate or god or the universe has inexorably pulled together to be present in each other's lives at this time.

and this is how guitarist s and i found ourselves having a drunken conversation at a cuban sandwich joint in downtown ybor city on a random tuesday night as we waited for it to be time to watch roger waters perform his legendary "wall" concert.

this is how s told me he had been talking to this old friend of his for some time, how he felt connected to her, and she to him, which was really saying something considering what they had both been through individually prior to the moment they began talking again. and he isn't just whistling dixie. i can't speak for her, but personally, i have watched s battle with himself over the loss of his wife to another man, the woman he expected to be with forever. the woman he would pine over (until this sainted friend reentered his life) and with whom he would share custody of his daughter, the apple of his perhaps tainted eye. i know how huge this confession is. i know how hard; how tentative and unsure and yet needing-to-be-there-so-badly it all is for guitarist s. i also know how much i have moved into his inner circle of closest friends as he shyly, watching closely for my reaction, admits they sleep together--

"till our phone batteries die."

in the back of my head, i hear the death knell. not of my dearest friend and kindred spirit, s. but of something that i selfishly think of as all mine, even though it involves two other individuals.

the woman who has made s believe in love again is some 3000 miles away, in arizona.

and i know that big dumb animal is terminal.

what i didn't know is that the doctors would give it such little time.

it's been months since we have met in my garage with drinks and a plan for wowing audiences. life for one or another always gets in the way. we were on the verge of playing our first gig of all originals complete the three of us on our own instruments in front of a real (and not culled from friends and acquaintances) audience.

but chances seem good that s will be in arizona, perhaps for good, the end of this month.

this low in big dumb animal's rollercoaster coincides with the high; the rekindled spark, i think is the popular phrase, between my wife and i.

when s breaks the news, i am all for it. through our many and varied (and often inebriated and uncensored) conversations, i know this is something he must do. and i want him to. and i am always a proponent of love.

i tell him, "dude, this is your fucking happiness. if you don't play this hand out, you will regret it the rest of your life."

it's not really a lie. but it isn't the whole truth.

because i am happy for him, and i really want him to go, and see where this fork of his road takes him. but in the same breath, this fork takes him away from me. and i wrestle between the selfish desire to have this friend who actually gets so many aspects of myself that no one else would, and whom i get in kind be truly happy, and the selfishness of having him here, and available, and in my garage helping me see through the boring patches of my own life with a placebo excitement that can be derived from a small group of like-minded individuals playing music together in a way that most bands only dream of.

i pass a couple days being sad to the point of tears on the inside, and smiling on the outside.

until my wife asks me about something seemingly innocuous. at ten thirty at night. as we lay in the dark bedroom, my fingers against the skin she feels is "too fat" but which my body only registers as electric and smooth and pleasurable and i laughingly say a sentence that is light and airy. that leads to a comment about s' impending move. that leads to a half-hour discussion of how happy i am for him and at the same time so unhappy for myselfish self.

it's not really a lie. but it isn't the whole truth.

and she laughs when i say that i would be lying through my teeth if i didn't say that it just plain sucks ass that he is moving, for me. but she also knows it's the truth when i say that i am happy as can be for s.

and in that simple unplanned spontaneous shared conversation when both of us should've by rights been sleeping, i worked out my issues with the demise of something that was beautiful and as ephemeral as the final big plummet/loopty loop/twisting spiral that precedes the braking, clicking entrance back into the terminal of the rollercoaster, followed by the laughing, adrenaline-fueled conversations of the individual experiences that brought the different riders to that spot at that moment.

thanks for playing along.

darth sardonic

and o thou beloved non-existent readers, thou stalwart though silent few who continue supporting me even as i myself only pass by this rusty nail in the sandlot of the world wide web on occasions when i am seeking answers only i can give, should you seek to see big dumb animal at the height of their career, performing their greatest hits as if there were no tomorrow, ask me how, and i will point you in the right direction.

epilogue, epitaph, epithet

ultimately, i am a big fucking asshole.

the car formerly known as the interceptor now resides at a junkyard. n my neighbor was right. (though he was completely sorry, refused to say "i told you so" (despite me saying he could, as i was man enough to take it) and said he says that stuff and then hopes for the best because he knows i love the car.)

but let's be honest, o thou droogs and only friends, the beloved non-existent readers who have truly (apparently) become non-existent, when the shop called, the repair was much more expensive than expected, and would take four times as long as expected, and hey you know what? i like to think i am man enough to admit when i have had it; when my number is up.

going car shopping tomorrow, and no, i will not be looking at lincolns.

and furthermore, a simple little tagline: i'm a dick. well, sometimes. i try not to be, but like every other fucking homo sapien on the planet, i have my moments. i try to own em when i cotton to it. so this is your opportunity to say "fuck you, darth, ya cunt!"

thanks for playing along.

darth sardonic

it couldn't really be helped, but that doesn't make it suck any less...

this is not fiction, though i wish to god it was, o my beloved non-existent readers...

i wasn't speeding. i wasn't talking on the cell, or texting. i wasn't even distracted by any number of things that might distract a driver as he travels at 35 down a road.

which means i saw the black and white streak with plenty of time to brake hard.

but not quite enough time to prevent myself from hitting it with the opposite-side back tire.

"oh, fuck. fuck fuck fuck." i exclaim as i pull the car off ten feet further, throw my door wide, and leap out, heedless of traffic.

"oh, goddamn it. no no no! calm calm, stop." i yell at the cat as it tries vainly to run away from its own pain, the parts of its body that have become enemies and are attacking it. a disconnected and analytical part of me admires it for its fighting spirit. the rest of me goes sick to the stomach to see it spinning on its side, droplets of blood spattering across the blacktop, the grass, two trash cans that it ended up between; frantically thrashing its legs in rythmic running cycles that would carry it far away were it not for the damage to its skull.

"oh, shit. shit fuck shit. no no, calm now, calm." i place a hand on its side and it relaxes some, gasping breaths.

i should've known that even as my hand rested on its side, the cat's spirit was wending its way to warm angel arms and happy mousehunting amongst cotton-tufts of clouds, but some panicky chunk of me was playing manic optimist like nero sawing his fiddle as rome turned into an inferno around him:

"fuck fuck, who do i call. where is the nearest vet? shit, why didn't anyone stop?"

i waffle between the cat, who is renewing its efforts to escape on foot, and a nearby house.

i should've known that all the cat wanted was a warm, loving, calming touch as it expired on the side of the road. i should've known that no owner would want to see their pet in this state. i should've known the dice had already been thrown and had come up snake eyes for me and this ill-fated feline and done what i could to ease its passing. i should've known. i should've fucking known.

i went to knock on the door. no one answers. i run back to the cat, who is still but breathing, albeit increasingly shallower; staring blankly with one sunken eye and one bulging. the red blood pooling in one ear makes me dash to another house. no answer.

dammit dammit dammit. i check on the cat again, and this time i know it is no longer fighting, not even in spirit.

i want to puke, or cry; as if the ache and agony i feel is a tangible object and doing one or the other could excorcise all the bad feelings like so much bile and salt.

i still feel as if the owners of the cat should know what has become of their loved one. there is no collar. i knock another door, and an old gentleman with a refined kentucky accent and a waxed mustache answers the door. i ask him if he owns a black and white cat, or knows who might. he replies that he believes it might belong to one of the houses i have already knocked. he goes on to say he has seen it dashing across the highway many times, as if knowing this self-destructive behavior on the cat's part will ease my own anguish at having hit it.

"i can tell you're very upset about it, young man. but if you have to choose between having an automobile accident or hitting a cat, well, i think you have to go with hitting the cat."

the analytical part of me knows that this is his attempt to make me feel better about it without really knowing me or how i think or feel. the analytical part of me quietly says, "thank you for that." while the rest of me fights to not feel indignant at his words.

i thank him, and go back to the cat. there is only one final act of futility to accomplish in this, a series of futile acts: i lift the lid to one of the trash cans that will be picked up in another hour or so, lift the limp body while repeating "sorry sorry sorry sorry" like all my higher brain functions have been shut down, and gently place the cat inside.

thanks for playing along.

darth sardonic

You just keep me hanging on...

there are moments, o my beloveds, my tried and trues, my droogs and only friends, o thou faithful who keep stumbling back to this sodden, neglected little spitwad on the world wide web; when the wife is in l.a. for work, and the content of gin and dry vermouth in my blood is overshadowed by the ability of the extra cocktail onion to absorb it; when mark renton is dying on the screen to the dulcet strains of the velvet underground's "perfect day"; there are moments, o my beloved non-existent readers, when i aproximate what might be a rock bottom, and the tears swell, and in this moment of anguish and emptiness i free myself from the shackles of the cares of the day, and i put myself in god's hands, and my eyes open up like broken faucets and all the demons poor out of me like a wash of the soul in a backyard tub, and i am pinned to a line to dry in the sun.

i wish only the best and most beautiful for all of you out there.

oh, and better news and laughter tomorrow, my friends, si o si, come hell or high water.

darth sardonic

* the doorbell rings.

"shit, fuck." i curse, palming the tears out of my sockets with the heels of my hands, encouraging my face into a facsimile of something that belies a bawling, woe-is-me session seated lonely in front of the computer.

i believe in god, o my beloved non-existents. cause at 9 o'clock at night on a wednesday, in the dark, there on my porch, are some friends i haven't talked to nearly all summer.

and cause god knows i am a stupid cunt, and won't reach a hand out to pull myself out of my funk.

so he drops the perfect distraction on me at the very fucking instant i needed it. and now, instead of trainspotting, i find myself watching fanboys and every trace of that "rock bottom" i was empathetically touching a moment ago is all gone, and renton has gone off to die on someone else's tv for the evening, and i can honestly text back to my wonderful wife:

"yeah baby i am ok actually"

and you were here with me the whole time.

thanks*

I pulled off your wings...

Then I laughed

i should be cleaning house, and folding laundry right now.

well, actually, i should be working, earning a paycheck, but since that isn't gonna happen this week, my alternative is to straighten out my abode.

i should be pouring out page after page of my new manuscript like a man possessed, but alas. i'm just not feeling it right now. this might be a big indication as to why it took me ten years to complete The Unfinished Work. apparently, it is gonna take another ten fucking years for the godforsaken publishers to get it done. i kinda wish they would just email me and say, "we cannae publish this tripe, what t'e fuck's wrong wit' yeh?"

at least then i would know.

i probably shouldn't be such a fucking whiner. and i don't really mean this to be whiney, but no doubt it is sounding like that.

i just kinda feel blah.

n it's not that i haven't thought of clever things to blog about, o ye beloved and long-suffering non-existant readers, who have, no doubt, moved on to greener pastures where decent writers regularly spin tales of sun and heroism and beautiful lust and clever characters who ever do the noble thing, but every time i want to sit down to capture these clever bits and perceptions, some other thing looms, daunting, hanging over my shoulder like a spectre of a mountainous(and i have changed and retyped that word about 5 times because the spelling just looks horribly wrong to me. looked it up in the dictionary and it does, in fact, have both a u and an i. huh. interesting) pile of unfolded, and yet clean, laundry that threatens to engulf me.

in the past, my writer's blocks have been like short stabs. a day or two of not being inspired and/or not having the energy to capture the thoughts. this time round, it appears they have been happening in rapid succession, mini-strokes that threaten to build into a massive explosion that will, once and for all, rob me completely of any talent i might've been harboring like a stowaway.

life, in and of itself, is good. things are well. as i might've alluded previously, amid the economic slump, we find ourselves with more expendable funds than we have ever had, and are (wisely, we like to think) using them (mostly) to pay off bills in a timely fashion.

nos. 1 and 2 are well, and progress in leaps in bounds, though i have to say, no. 2 has taken to watching the indiana jones movies in french or spanish and then attempting, (rather poorly, i might add) to mimic them: walking up to me while i wrestle with autocad homework, and saying, "gallump badump gump." to which i am forced to reply: "que joda de bromiado me haces, che!" and he fires back with "dododo magoodoo." after which, i tell him, "your english is still desperately lacking, let's take it one language at a time, yeah?"

my fucking italics button is bollocking me bad this entire post, which is, as you can imagine, frustrating the sweet bejesus out of me.

hence, i am just gonna wrap this little shitball of a post up right here rather than drag it out painfully to some bitter and disappointing end.

more soon, i hope. and in a happier vein.

darth sardonic

Place a curse on the hearse we're driving...

Cut the brake lines, end up dying

soon i will get to find out which one of the less-than-stellar choices gets to fuck up my life for the next four years.

we had a union meeting today, the subject of which was johnny-come-lately, the new assistant superintendant. lo and behold, corners were cut, rules were bent, protocols were skipped, and comme ce, comme ca, o my beloved non-existant readers, o thou patient and long-suffering hepcats and kittens, it is likely that johnny c. l. will soon find himself back to being a flunky lawnmower man like the rest of us. (we're actually hoping he will get frustrated and quit, because he has proven himself to be a roundmouth and untrustworthy, as well as never having bothered to learn to properly use much of equipment we utilize on a daily basis, and therefore making him a danger to himself and others) as for the boss (recipient of implied bj's and arrogant prick, as well as clearly perpetrator of cronyism), at the very least he will get reprimanded and hopefully knocked off his high horse. it is even possible he could find himself shitcanned. which wouldn't bother any of us (except johnny c. l. perhaps) in the least. the superintendant, who we all dig, and who we figure has found himself uncomfortably lodged betwixt igneous and hardpan in this situation, will escape unscathed.

no. 2 recently had eye surgery to correct a strabismus (opthalmologist-speak for lazy eye), and it was a smashing success. i could see a notable difference the very first time he opened his eyes, and now that the bruising is gone, he looks rather dashing.

i myself will be going in soon for a same-day surgery to fix the hearing in my left ear. yours truly, your humble narrator, has had a fairly significant hearing loss in his left ear for as long as he can remember. since we work for the military around noisy machinery all day, they require regular hearing checks. this led to me being referred to see what can be done. turns out, the bones in my inner ear aren't functioning properly, and a little snip, snap, paste, n duct tape, and i will be able to hear again. at least a 90% chance of success. i am excited, and trying to imagine what it is going to be like to not say, "huh? what?" all the time.

no. 1 is getting assessed for adhd. like he has so much trouble focusing in school that it is actually causing him to fall behind. his teacher is quick to reiterate over and over that he is not dumb, or lacking in any kind of mental capacity. he is just so rambunctious and unable to concentrate. so he will probably be on meds to help settle him a bit.

i just feel, lately anyhow, that we get one thing out of the way (no. 2's eye) and something new and equally, or even more, aggravating pops up. can i just get a year or two where things just get better, without having to trade some other thing in?

anyhow, i wasn't really necessarily headed anywhere with all this, just getting the latest out there to keep you, the beloved non-existants, the alphas and omegas, abreast of the current events in the sardonic household.

darth sardonic

You spit-shined my corroded halo,

Then left it to decay.

sometimes when i say, "i don't want to be here" i don't just mean the place i am in, but this whole fucking planet.

i get a burning urge to scream, punch someone, break something expensive, kick an endangered (and preferably cute) animal, burn a rainforest to the ground, press THE button.

as luck would have it (and this is the big reason i believe in higher powers), i was tasked to do things today that allowed me to listen to my ipod loud enough to be annoying to anyone who might get close, by myself, with the sun beating on my back and the sweat in my eyes.

i can ride my bike with no handlebars...

and:

we rise together, we rise together, we rise together.

back soon when i ain't such an ass, o my beloved non-existant readers.

darth sardonic

i hope...

o my beloved, empassioned, patient non-existant readers, i am tired, and in a weird mood.

this is not the post i wanted to post, but this is the post you get; because sometimes i don't get to choose:

i hope my kids will forgive me. i hope my kids will still love me when i am 99. i hope they will look back on the happy times and laugh, and forget about the not-so-happy times. i hope there will be so many happy times that this will be easy for them. i hope that when we need to cry, we will cry together rather than seperately. i hope that as i lay on my death bed (and i hope to god it is a death bed, with this kind of time!) i will be surrounded by my family, and we will laugh through the tears as is the sardonic way, and has been for generations. i hope they will ask me whatever questions they have on their mind for as long as they have me to answer. i hope i will answer them as truthfully as humanly possible. i hope none of them will feel alienated from the family by me or anyone else. i hope i am the dad i wish i was, at least 60% of the time.

i hope persepolis will crack my ass up, because right now i am fucking bawling my eyes out.

darth sardonic

i wish this would be your color...

the day dawns cold and gray. the air is chilly with misty rain, but will later be muggy, despite the clouds and lack of sun.

i go on my run. for the third day in a row, as i pass the pond (the sign refers to it as a lake, but it is barely a pond, almost a swamp, actually), birds dive-bomb me, chirping angrily. they are getting more aggressive, and today i actually cover my head with one arm, just in case.

i need to change my route.

fucking birds and their over-developed sense of danger. any animal with half a brain would wait to see if i was even headed towards their nest, posing a real threat, before going on the defensive. winged motherfuckers.

i have a general underlying malaise. i am forcing myself to do the things i would normally, run, work out, do the bills, clean the house. i am missing my wife a little extra for some inexplicable reason, and everything seems to have an odd sad undertone.

then the kids come home from school, and it is off to grammy's. only when i call to tell her we are leaving the driveway she says she has to run into town fast and help a friend who is in a nursing home. no problem.

we can get lunch.

i attempt to fanagle the kids into wanting lunch where i want, someplace we can sit down and kill an hour or two. someplace where i can stick to my newer, healthier diet. i try to bribe them with mango lahsis or pancakes, but i should've known better:

"we want fwenss fwies!"

sighing heavily in exasperation (stephen king says writers tend to overuse adverbs: i know i do), i pull out of the driveway.

why is it i love the sad songs about breaking up? alkaline trio improves my mood some, by juxtaposing catchy tunes with depressing lyrics, and i buy a mocha at a local pull-up coffee hut where the baristas are all women and nearly always extremely scantily-clad (during the week, they have theme days: today's was "fantasy" (read: lingerie). my barista was wearing a brocade corset with matching panties, long, curly hair, a smile, and nothing else.), and head out for the evil golden arches, followed by my mom's unlocked but empty front door.

i hope this is good-bye, i hope this is good-bye.

if i ever make writing my full-time job, my kids simply won't allow it: no. 1 wants me to set up the game, that i told him i would do when i was done posting, and now runs in every five minutes to see if i am "done yet", to which i reply, "when i am done, you will be the first to know." which is actually a lie, because i will be first to know, and it is possible that one of my non-existants might log in before i make it into the living room to let my oldest know i will set his game up, and then he would fall a lame third. no. 2 says, "i wan' a sit on ya yap."

my mother's keyboard is so old that some of the letters are completely rubbed off. i never realized just how much i look down when i write until doing this post in the empty office, the kids enmeshed in star trek: first contact (which i would have thought would be too scary, but they love it. i tried to play them the wrath of khan the other day, and they were bored. no. 1 kept asking where the robots were. they didn't get interested in the movie until ricardo montalban blew up the genesis device and the whole fucking planet goes up in flames. should i be worried?), the air conditioner humming loudly throughout the house like a spirit caught between worlds.

tonight, it is out again with my oldest remaining buddy, s, for drinks and silliness and long talks about then and now and the upcoming, and flirting with brooke, our regular cocktail waitress. maybe today i will figure out if her breasts and blue eyes are really real. maybe not.

i guess i am horny. i'm too lazy to care, or even do anything about it. not that you wanted to know, but there you have it.

my kid just set the timer (the method we use for letting him know that it is time to put the video games away) on me. when it went off, he said, "ok, daddy, it's time to stop on the computer and get my games!"

i guess i am done.

darth sardonic