Sometimes, usually, I think about things that I'm not supposed to think about. I feel guilty when this happens, but I don't feel that guilty. Because it's not like I really have a choice. Nope, all choices were stripped from me a long time ago. I do what I do. I muddle through.

But anyway, I spend a lot of time feeling a little bit guilty, because of these tracks that my trains of thought like to follow. Often, I almost manage to convince myself that I'm a bad person, because of these thoughts of mine. These hopes of mine. These dreams of mine.

Selfish.

But sometimes, sometimes I manage to do something decent, say something decent. And I surprise myself, because I didn't think that I had any decency left in me.

It's nice to be wrong, sometimes.

---

Beauty is fleeting, or so they say.

But I don't believe them, not even for a second.

I think they're doing it wrong. I think they're using their eyes.

Close their eyes, and they will see the truth.

Beauty is eternal.

This morning, just now actually, I was reminded of something that bugs me.

Let's say I write this in my blog:

It was freakin' cold this morning. Nine whole degrees when I woke up at the crack of 10:00. And yes, I know it's a lot colder than that in other places.

I'm annoyed by this use of the "and yes" segue. It just rubs me the wrong way. It patronizingly presumes that the writer knows what the reader is thinking, then it casually dismisses the reader's thought. It's a little argumentative, yet the reader never gets his say. The reader loses an argument that he was never really in to begin with.

Another annoying use of the same segue is here, paraphrased from Slashdot:

It seems that the New Year's Eve fireworks show in Seattle had to be fired manually, because the software that was supposed to run things crashed. And yes, that software runs on Windows.

Anyway, that's my little rant for now. And yes, I know this was a silly entry.

I was just sitting here at my desk, thinking that I should probably write something tonight. Because I've got all this beer in me and I'd hate for it to go to waste.

I was drawing a blank, though. I'd kinda thought about this one thing, but that subject is off-limits for me, plus it's kinda R-rated. Maybe X-Rated. Then, I thought of this other topic, but I really don't know what the facts are, and I don't want to write about my guesses.

So, like I said, I was drawing a bit of a blank. I decided to give up for the night. I tapped out a quick email to RockGirl and, right in the middle of the tapping, I thought of something.

The year 2007 was a pretty fucked-up year for me, if I look at it objectively. It was, despite the one incredibly wonderful thing that happened and which continues to happen, the year 2007 was a huge net loss for me, overall. As far as relationships go, I mean.

I can think of only one relationship that's better off now than it was at the beginning of 2007.

A few have stayed the same, but several have deteriorated or completely gone to shit. One ascended to new heights and then crashed spectacularly over a few short months.

Most of the time, I feel like I don't care nearly as much as I should. Oh, every now and then I'll catch myself missing a relationship that's either gone sour or faded away completely. But it doesn't happen very often, that I feel this way. Probably not as often as it should, should I ever wish to appear normal to those people who know me.

Good thing I don't care about appearing to be normal.

I forget where I was going with this. I think that I wanted to say that I do miss certain people, and that I am sorry for whatever fault I might have had in the ever-increasing distance between us, but that I don't care as much as I should. And that bothers me at least as much as the original stuff does.

I think, I think that if I were a total asshole, as certain people are so wont to proclaim, then my apathy wouldn't bother me at all. But it does. So maybe I'm not that bad after all. Maybe there's hope for me after all. Maybe there's hope for us after all.

It's not like I'm hiding, I just haven't felt like doing much seeking lately.

In the year 2008, I resolve to...

...drink more beer than is probably healthy for me, but it will only be good beer, so my snobbish ways can continue.

...not lose even an ounce of weight. And, even if I do manage to lower the scale because of illness or some such, I resolve to immediately gain it all back, and then add a few extra pounds just to teach myself a lesson.

...blow minor things way out of proportion, lose sight of what's really important, and just generally make a ass out of myself over trivial bullshit.

...ignore anything that might be considered encouraging. Not that I expect anything encouraging to ever happen, but I resolve to ignore such things, just in case. It's preemptive and stuff.

...automatically assume that most people are idiots or assholes or whores or sluts until they prove otherwise. And, furthermore, I resolve to immediately revert to my initial assessment the first time anyone does something I don't like.

I was about 40 minutes late, but I did have my little year-end ceremony séance tonight. It took place in my garage, because standing outside in that damn wind would have been suicide.

This year, I wasn't nearly as eloquent as I've been in the past. This year, it was too fucking cold, and I was too fucking pissed.

So I basically griped for eight minutes or so before I finally got to the good stuff. The relevant stuff. And, by then, my adrenaline was flowing too strongly for me to speak coherently. So I quit.

Oh, well. Maybe next year.

I was in such a dangerous mood tonight. A stupid mood.

But now, now it's later. I'm more sober than I was back then, at like 10:00 PM.

Sometimes I lose sight of this one particular very important fact. The most important fact.

At times like that, times like 10:00 PM tonight, I can sometimes feel that fact slipping away. And all I can do is get a tight grip on it, and hope that my grip is strong enough. So that, while I might forget from time to time, the truth will always be there with me, in case I need it.

And I pretty much always need it.

I think I got lucky tonight. I loosened my grip, and the truth fell into my lap.

I'm real. She's real. It's real. This is not some game, or some movie drama, or some story told to little girls while they sit wide-eyed and imagine the stories that might be told about them someday, maybe, if they're lucky.

---

I think that this could all be boiled down to a couple of simple questions. One from each of us. With a corresponding answer from each of us.

My answer is, "Yes."

Everyone knows my answer. It's no surprise to anyone. The only surprise may be that I've waited so long for the question to be asked. The only surprise may be that I'm still waiting, my answer pressed against my lips, ready to burst forth at the proper moment.

It will be explosive, I think, when I give my answer.

It may be my dying word. I certainly hope not, but I'm ready, just in case.

I was doing just fine, for probably twenty years. I forgot the damn song even existed.

Then they played it on the stupid radio last night, and now I can't get it out of my stupid head.

And I can't even say the title of the stupid song, because the title is fucking everything, and it would expose everything that I've, for some stupid reason, kept hidden away inside me.

But the title isn't the real problem I'm having with this song, this song for which I just scoured the Internet for a copy. The real problem is the damn lyrics.

The point of the lyrics, as near as I can tell, is to make me want to kill myself with their mocking.

See, the entire song is about saying things that I'll never say, and doing things I'll never do. I can't even mouth the words to myself as the song plays, because every vow, when it leaves my lips, becomes a broken promise.

Stupid song.

I didn't write about this before, mainly because I feared that the mounds of colorful panties thrown into my yard by passing groupies would detract from my neighbors' fancy Christmas displays, but I have an electric guitar now.

I've actually had it for over a month. Back before I went to Las Vegas, I went to a music store. I needed to buy a new beginner's book. So, of course, I walked out of that store with a new beginner's book, a new guitar, amp, cord, gig bag, stand, strap, tuner thingy, and a bunch of picks. Good thing the place didn't have a tattoo artist on-staff, or I'd probably have gotten one of those, too. Maybe a demon wailing away on a flaming guitar, or something like that.

Anyway, I bought all this stuff, and right from the start I could tell that something was horribly wrong. The amp would constantly emit a loud buzz - so loud that it would drown out most notes. Every note on the guitar also tended to sound exactly the same, because of having to merge with that damn buzzing.

So I've been nagging my friend MusicalYuppieDude to check out my stuff and see if he can figure out what the problem is. Because he's been busy, raking up panties from his own groupies no doubt, we didn't get together until yesterday afternoon.

I packed up my guitar and my amp and went over to his house. I successfully negotiated the Stairs Of Death and made it into his basement.

The first thing he tried was his own fancy "V" guitar plugged into my el-cheapo amplifier. Everything sounded great. There was no buzzing, just sweet music.

Next, he plugged my guitar into my amp. Same thing, no buzzing. He said it sounded good, and I believed him. I was right there, after all.

The only thing left to try was my cord, so we tried that. Still, no buzzing. Still, just sweet music.

By this time a new theory had started to develop in my head. The new theory being that the buzzing might be caused by the electricity in my house.

So we dicked around for a few more minutes, while I marveled that my guitar and amp were capable of producing distinctly different sounds, depending on which strings I strummed and which chords I formed, and then I brought all of my shit back home. I was excited by the chance to finally be a rock god.

My amp had only been plugged into two different outlets. One in my basement and one in my living room. I started trying different outlets.

One on the other side of the living room? The buzz was there.

One in my office? Buzzzzzz.

My bedroom? Buzzzzz.

I took everything down to my basement, and tried an outlet on the opposite side of the house from where I'd tried before.

No buzz. Just a very slight hum, hinting at the awesome rock fury straining to be unleashed.

Yay!

So now I have an electric guitar and amp that are actually useful to me, instead of just looking cool. I've only got a few little things to work on:

1. I cannot pick.
2. I cannot strum.
3. I cannot change chords.
4. I cannot count to four.

And then, then once I get those trivial problems solved, I need to figure out what's the deal with notes.

I don't understand how there can be two strings on the guitar that allegedly play an E note. They don't sound even remotely similar to me. One is low, and one is high. But people tell me that they're the same note. I don't understand, and I fear that the rain of panties will never happen until I do understand.

1. Trevor
2. Cocksucker
3. Cumguzzler
4. Hogarth
5. Blaine
6. Buttpirate
7. Lance
8. Anything with an apostrophe in it - i.e. J'on
9. Anything intentionally misspelled - i.e. Travys
10. Englebert

Keep this handy guide with you at all times.