I think that things went pretty well. Not as well as I'd dared to hope, but much better than they could have gone.

It could have been disastrous, but it wasn't. It could have been fantastic, but it wasn't.

It was normal. I was normal. Maybe even better than normal.

Imagine that. Me, normal.

I'll admit that this being normal crap is, and always has been, Plan B. But I've got to pick from the choices made available to me. So Plan B it is. Plan A would be seen as an act of sheer desperation, and so I'm thankful that it's never come to that.

Quite.

Yet.

Also, I'm in a good mood now.

Imagine that. Me, in a good mood. For a real reason instead of some trumped-up bullshit.

Wow.

Tonight I looked through my photo album for a certain picture. I never did find it, and so I fear that it's in South Dakota, but I did find a few that were worth posting. So long as I don't care about the things I post being interesting. Plus, this counts as an entry for today. So, ha ha!.

I took that picture in the cafeteria at school, in 7th grade. On the left was FoxyGirl, my first love. Her friends were quite cute, too.

In the 8th grade, I'd completely gotten over FoxyGirl, and UFOGirl was my new obsession. She's the one on the left.

This picture has nothing to do with the previous two pictures. I've just always thought it was funny. That's my sister Dina. I still think of her with huge 80s hair like that. Also, when I was a kid, I didn't think that gay guys really existed. I thought they were just something that adults made up to scare little children. Like the boogie-man and Jesus. By the time I'd reached adulthood, I'd begun to suspect that gay men might actually exist. This picture provided absolute proof.

I really wish I could take credit for the title of this entry. But I can't. I got it from my sister Neisha. It's really quite a clever word though. And it describes me much more effectively than musically challenged. That term being all my brain could come up with.

Anyway, I've got this guitar. It used to belong to SassyGirl, and before she moved away she gave it to me. The theory being that I'd pick it up every now and then. As opposed to what I actually did, which was lean it against a wall for a year.

I guess that after my nephew was killed, that's when I became more interested in the guitar. Cory's friends included a lot of musicians, and between the funeral and the couple of benefit performances I've heard his friends give, I've heard more acoustic guitar playing over the last three months than I'd heard in my entire life before the accident.

Plus, I got some of Cory's guitar picks. And what else do you need besides a guitar and a pick?

That's where the word guitarded becomes relevant.

I think I might be tone deaf or something. I tune that stupid guitar and then, 10 seconds later, it sounds out of tune again. Sometimes I just cannot tell if a tone is higher or lower than the one I'm comparing it to. I have to think that this type of tonal perception would be a handy thing to have, if a person wanted to do anything with a guitar besides scare cats.

I've been plowing forward anyway. I had Neisha loan me some of Cory's old beginner books. Waaaaaay too advanced for me, I soon found out. So I went to this music store in Clarksville and asked the dude for the most basic guitar book he had. He recommended one that came with a companion DVD. I've been messing around with the book and the DVD for a week or so now, and I've only reinforced my opinion that I'm guitarded.

I can't seem to get the strumming right. My downstrokes are okay I suppose. I hit the strings I'm aiming at, and sometimes I hit a bonus string or two. So that's cool, maybe. My upstrokes suck though. I get my pick snagged on the bottom string, and then I kind of jump over the next string or two on the way up.

I asked MusicalYuppieDude about this today. He suggested that I try turning my wrist counter-clockwise as I strum upwards. Then turn it clockwise as I strum downwards. Sounds like a lot of work to me.

But strumming isn't my biggest problem. Nope, my biggest problem is trying to contort the fingers of my left hand into the various claws needed to make the chords that the books tell me to make. I'm pretty sure that I'm doing something wrong at the most basic level. I can't even get close to most of the finger positions diagrammed. And then, even if I do, actually applying pressure to the strings? Ha, very funny.

And then there's that whole counting to four thing. Don't even get me started on that.

A while back I wrote about random hot girls. And how much I like them. How they're my favorites.

Well, today I have a new favorite kind of girl. This group is not really a replacement for the random hot girl group, more like a specific subset.

See, today it's been raining. I guess that this rain caught a lot of people off-guard. I, for one, was lucky brilliant enough to be prepared. My umbrella was in my laptop bag.

Anyway, this rain caught people unprepared.

So people got wet.

Random hot girls got wet.

People have been running down the sidewalks. To their cars, to their places of work, to restaurants, wherever.

People are running.

And they're wet.

Random hot girls are running. And they're wet.

Random wet hot running girls are my new favorites.

You know what would have been really cool, back when I was about 14?

If aliens would have came and beamed me up to their spaceship.

I used to daydream about that, back in junior high. The aliens would come and kidnap me and this one cute girl I had a major crush on. Then they'd make us have sex so they could study us.

Of course I'd pretend that I was against the whole thing. But secretly I'd be grateful for the aliens and their twisted obsession with watching teenaged humans have sex. I'd be grateful, of course, because it would mean that I got to have sex with that cute girl.

And, if she didn't like that we had to have sex, I could just say, "Sorry, it's not my idea. It's these damn aliens. Take your pants off."

And then, after a while, she'd come to love me and actually look forward to all the sex. Then we'd somehow kill the aliens and steal their spaceship and explore the universe together. And have lots of sex, of course.

I know, this is a weird entry.

The other day in an email, I wrote or at least implied that things are worse now than they were before.

I didn't mean to imply that.

Things are not worse. They're just different.

Incredibly different.

What used to be an unrelenting ache has been replaced by something else. By two different things, actually.

Palpable potential for incredible joy followed, almost inevitably, by nearly unbearable disappointment.

I got used to that old life. It took a while, but I eventually learned to accept it.

This new life? It will also take time for me to adjust.

I'm trying to be patient about this. I really am.

1. The phone rings. What's your ring tone?
Depends on who's calling. Either the phone sound from the show 24 or a Homer Simpson WooHoo.

2. If you HAD to kiss the last person you kissed, would you?
Absolutely.

3. Has your life been going the way you want it to lately?
Things are turning back to the better, but I'm not taking full advantage.

5. Does the person you like know that you like them?
Either that or she's stupid.

6. What's the first thing you notice about the opposite sex?
This question keeps coming up. Eyes, general shape, lips.

7. Where are you right now?
Lost somewhere in thought.

8. Did you go anywhere today?
To work.

9. When was the last time you cried?
Me strong man. Me no cry.

11. Ever liked someone who treated you like crap?
I usually stop liking them when they start treating me like crap.

12. Where's the last place you walked to?
Besides just to and from the car, yesterday I walked from work to The Pub to see BikerGirl.

13. Last time you had a sleepover?
The last time I stayed at WeirdGirl's house. It's been a while.

15. Who made you smile today?
Nobody yet.

17. What is the last thing you said out loud?
"No, Evangeline Lilly, I will not have sex with you right now. I'll call you after work."

18. Who's the 1st person on your missed calls list?
My phone got totally reset the other day. So my missed calls list is empty. Before that, I think it was Dina.

19. Who was the last text message you received from?
MusicalYuppieDude, wondering if I was alive.

20. plans for tomorrow?
After work, I hope to just stay home.

21. story behind your myspace song?
I like that song. David Gray is one of my favorites.

22. Whats bothering you right now?
A million things, most of which are irrelevant. And one relevant thing which I'm trying to be more patient about.

23. Where do you live?
In my house.

24. Wallet?
No thanks, I already have one.

25. Where was your default picture taken?
This varies. At JournalSpace, it's a picture of me with a beer bottle when I was a baby. I used to have that same picture at MySpace, but I got yelled at, so I made a new picture at some Simpsons site. At barenada.com it's just a picture of my eyes.

26. Eyes:
Two blue ones.

WHAT ARE YOU:

Doing this weekend?
I really should just stay home.

Wearing?
Work clothes. Tan Dockers and a blue shirt.

Wanting?
Progress would be nice, but I'd also accept closure.

Listening to?
Nothing.

Something you're afraid of?
I'm pretty sure that I'd be afraid of sharks and jellyfish if I ever went in the ocean.

Eating?
Nothing. I'll probably have some cereal when I get home.

Do you believe in soul mates?
Yes.

Do you remember your dreams?
Usually I do. Especially the vivid ones.

Do you speak another language other than English?
I can manage some conversational Spanish.

What's something you wish you could understand better?
Women.

What did you do last weekend?
Had a really shitty weekend and probably alienated everyone who saw me.

Have you ever been in a beauty pageant?
No.

Who were the last people you went out to lunch with?
BikerGirl. Or maybe NotHideousGirl. I don't remember for sure.

The most annoying sound in the world?
When my cats Buddy and Nugget get into a fight, their wails cut right through my skull. Also, my alarm clock.

Last person you hugged?
Probably NotHideousGirl.

Who do you hate right now?
The person I used to be.

Well, that didn't work very well. Not that I really expected it to, but I'd have taken it anyway. It would have been a nice surprise, if it had worked.

---

All of the chickens are dead. I'm not really sure, exactly, what happened to them, but if I had to guess I'd say that they starved to death.

Who knew you had to feed even imaginary chickens?

---

This most recent incarnation of my mood, it's certainly my fault. I expected the impossible. I dared to have hope, of all things. You'd think I would have learned by now.

---

I had a dream last night, during one of my two-hour naps. I don't remember many of the details of the dream, and I don't even remember the exact words spoken, but I do remember the gist.

"What is it that you want with me?" she asked, her voice managing to convey both fear and hope.

"My wants vary widely," I answered. "But right now, I want to use my tongue on you, until you're nothing more than a quivering puddle sprawled atop your bed. I want to make your body vibrate with the anticipation of ecstasy, so that my most gentle kiss, the lightest graze of my fingers, even the softest sound of my whispered voice, sets you off all over again. I want to melt you."

"That sounds fun," she said. "Do that, please."

I don't know if this, right here, is going to work.

I've got about five minutes worth of beer left in my glass. I have to pee really badly. But I thought I'd give this entry a shot anyway.

What's the worst that could happen?

That I'd write a shit entry?

I do that anyway.

Anyway, I've been kicking myself in the ass lately because I felt that I'd been fooled. That I'd been just incredibly wrong about something. Someone. Whatever.

But the thought just entered my head, or the thought just rose to my consciousness, that maybe I wasn't wrong at all. Maybe I wasn't fooled at all.

Maybe, just maybe.

Because see, people do change. I know this for an absolute fact. I know this from personal experience. People can change. Become a new person.

But, and this is the kicker, not always a better person.

Sometimes, sometimes they change into someone worse. Someone cruel and insensitive, perhaps.

I think that it would be cool, if I found that I hadn't been stupid all this time. It would still suck that I'd lost a friend, but at least I wouldn't feel stupid. About this.

Damn, I've really got to pee now.

I suppose it's pretty funny, if I think about it. As long as I don't think about for too long, or with too much intensity.

So about a half a second and with passing interest is about right. Any more is fraught with peril.

It's like I was given the keys to my very own time machine. I eagerly jumped in and slammed the lever to the past, as far as it would go. Reality shifted all around me, and *whoosh* back I went.

95,551,200 seconds. That was its limit. What a cheap piece of shit time machine. No wonder it was free.

Fuck!

There I go again. Thinking about it with too much intensity. I hate it when I do that.

Anyway.

I remember being here before. Almost drowning. The pressure. The cold. The almost overwhelming desire to just breathe in these depths and get it all over with. But I also remember that I managed to save myself. I remember how I did it. My feet unexpectedly touched bottom, and I instinctively jumped. Each and every time that I sank so far that I nearly gave up, so far that I would have surely and gladly died, each and every time I instead felt the ground beneath my feet, and I jumped with all my might.

And, eventually, I breathed safely, and I made my way to a paradise of sorts.

Now, suddenly, I find myself back here. Struggling. Drowning again. Pretty funny, like I said.

The water seems deeper, this time. That's probably just my imagination.

But the drowning, that's not all that's funny. Or even most of what's funny.

The really funny part is that far is now near, and near is now far.

It's fucking hilarious, actually. As long as I don't think about it for too long, or with too much intensity. And as long as I don't think about how the surface might be frozen over, so that my jumps might be in vain.