I realized a little while ago, as I sat smiling about the fourteen most beautiful words I've seen in a long time and emailing RockGirl, I realized that I'd better write something. Because it's been a while. And, honestly, it's been a nice little break. But I fear that if I don't write something quickly then I might never bother to write anything again.

And that bleak future scares me, so here I am.

Anyway, I'm back home. Got back Friday afternoon. The trip sucked, as I'd known it would. I scribbled a few notes, so I might write up a Philly Trip Report eventually. But I might not. Ditto for a Friday Beer Report about last night.

I think I need to ease back into this blogging stuff.

Thanks to everyone who noticed that I was gone.

Okay, I'm leaving now. Going to have lunch with NotHideousGirl, then go to the airport for my fun-filled Philly week.

I might not post for a while.

It's kind of interesting, in a sick and twisted way, to see just how much bullshit I can put up with. To see what, if anything, it might take to wipe this smile from my face. This happiness from my soul.

Trivial and ostensibly non-trivial bullshit keeps trying to knock me down. But I'm still standing.

The latest round of bullshit, the one I've been thinking about tonight, is all coming from myself. Outside forces are trying to bother me, but they're not having any success, and I'm a little annoyed by that fact.

I mean, there are things that I should be concerned about. There are things that I should be pissed about. But, I'm neither of those things. Not very much, anyway. Certainly not as much as a normal person would be. And that's what bothers me even more than those things that aren't bothering me.

The best I can come up with is a bit of mild irritation, and maybe some slightly more than passing interest.

Anyway, everybody has been lying to me. For days now. Maybe weeks. Well, everybody except for a couple of people. Gotta be careful with that everybody word - it's loaded.

(Deleted several examples of the aforementioned lies.)

I really should be sick and tired of all of this bullshit. But I'm not.

It's even kinda fun, in a sick and twisted way.

I forgot about this. When I got home I had an email from NotHideousGirl in which she said that I'd called her several times, but not said anything when she answered. I was pretty sure that I'd remember something like that, but I checked my phone anyway.

Sure enough, right after midnight I'd called her five times. All of the calls were less than a minute. See, I seem to have misplaced the holster thingy for my phone, so my phone was in my front pocket. Those calls went out at about the time I was driving home, so the pressure from the seatbelt must have caused the calls. Either that, or my dick really wanted to talk to NotHideousGirl. But that wouldn't make any sense, because they've never met. Maybe my dick was trying to call WeirdGirl and kept misdialing. Stupid dick.

I'm a little hung-over this morning. I don't think it's that I drank too much. It's just that I didn't eat anything all day yesterday except a pack of crackers. I don't know why I didn't stop and eat something either before Rich O's or after. Probably because I'm stupid.

Anyway, I got to Rich O's a little after 8:00, and sat in the throne, and had a Rogue Chocolate Stout (1856). Then I don't think I did anything of import for a couple of hours except text NotHideousGirl a couple of times. I was getting pretty bored, but then HatGirl texted me that she was on her way. That perked me right up. I texted NotHideousGirl that HatGirl was coming, but she was busy.

After a few minutes HatGirl and LuckyFucker arrived. By that time I'd managed to run everyone away from the sofa and loveseat, so those two sat on the sofa and we talked for an hour or so, mostly about hookers I think. This was about when I ordered my second Rogue Chocolate Stout (1876). TremensGirl was there at some point.

HatGirl has apparently been taking night classes on drinking or something. She actually finished her Chimay. LuckyFucker had a Rogue Imperial Porter, and I tried to smell it to see if I wanted one of those next, but the Chocolate Stouts I was drinking had deadened my olfactory nerves, and I didn't smell a thing.

Oh yeah, they were having a 20th anniversary party for Sportstime Pizza in the special people room. I walked through there once but I didn't stay.

The whole damn night was really subdued. After HatGirl and LuckyFucker left I had another Chocolate Stout (1896) and a Diet Coke. I talked to MusicalYuppieDude and WomanRepellant for a while, then I came home.

Okay, there was a time, at first, when I honestly didn't know the truth of the situation.

Then, many weeks later, when I finally did know the truth, it was too late to do anything about it. Inertia demanded that action be taken. So I took action. We took action.

And that was, as they say, that.

Then the world around us found a new equilibrium, and it's been in balance ever since. More or less. Mostly more, except from my perspective, where it's been less. But I don't really count, so more is what we'll go with.

Here's the thing. I will try. Because how many people get the chance to witness their own funeral?

This is way too melodramatic. And, hopefully, just cryptic enough that nobody but the two of us will know what the fuck I'm rambling about.

I suppose this makes it official. I've lost my mind.

It started the second I woke up this morning. It continued throughout the day. Through taking a shower and shooting pool and reading and watching The Black Knight and emailing RockGirl and NotHideousGirl. It mercifully stopped during my nap, but now it's started up again.

I'm singing to my cat, Nugget.

And, as if that wasn't strange enough, I'm singing the same stupid verse over and over and over and over.

Lord, I was born a ramblin' man, Nugget,
Tryin' to make a livin' and doin' the best I can, Nugget.
And when it's time for leavin, I hope you'll understand, Nugget,
That I was born a ramblin' man, Nugget.

I was thinking this morning about what I might have said, back then, if I'd been asked. What I might say if I'm asked tomorrow, or next week, or next year.

Because it would be really important to say the right things, you know?

I'm not sure that the actual words would really matter all that much. Not as long as the meaning and the passion behind those words was readily apparent. The words wouldn't need to really mean anything. Like a fist pounding on a podium, the words would only serve to add emphasis to the underlying meaning.

But still, emphasis has its place, I suppose. So I was thinking about what I might have said, and what I still might have the chance to say someday.

I should think about it some more, because so far the meaning is all that I have. It's always been enough for me, but for her I'll probably need some emphasis.

After a quick meal at Wendy's, I got to Rich O's at 8:45 or so. The place was packed. Seemed to be an even mix of regulars and strangers.

Oh yeah, they finally got their order of Schlenkerla beers in. This was good news, but it caused me a bit of a problem right off the bat.

See, Rogue Chocolate Stout was still on tap. And I have a contractual obligation with my liver to drink Rogue Chocolate Stout whenever it's available. But I really wanted to have a couple of Schlenkerlas at the end of the night, and I knew that there'd be much clashing of flavors if I had the Rogue first.

So I broke my contract, and I had a couple Dirty Helens (202). I sat at the bar and talked to some dude who should probably get a nickname, I got a text message from NotHideousGirl featuring the drunk womanese word wrAnfo and deciphering that word occupied a good part of my brain for the rest of the night. I still haven't figured it out.

I talked to MusicalYuppieDude and TremensGirl for a bit, and some people cleared out from the sofa so I moved over there. I talked with a chick who I shall call FirstGirl. Not, as one might suspect, because she was my first girl, but rather because she was the first person to ever talk to me at Rich O's after I started hanging out there. Anyway, FirstGirl was puzzling over her own little mystery.

She'd found this napkin on the table, and her brain was about to explode from trying to figure out its meaning. We spent some time trying to figure out the napkin, and we spent some time trying to figure out NotHideousGirl's wrAnfo, but we never did decipher either one of them.

My next beer was a Schlenkerla Weizen (222), and I overlapped the last part of that with a Schlenkerla Marzen (547). I wanted to do a side-by-side comparison of the two. I don't think that I can really declare a winner. The Weizen is certainly lighter, and it would make a better session beer than the Marzen. But the Marzen is flat-out yummy.

Even though the Marzen was flat-out yummy, I only drank about 8 ounces of it before I cut myself off and then snuck out and came home. I don't think I missed much, because they'd declared last call at 11:30 even though the place was still totally packed.

I was at Rich O's.

The place was much larger and more elaborate than in real life. I went to go to the men's room, and it was (a) huge, and (b) packed with people of all genders. I went over to a urinal and did my thing. While I was doing my thing a big giant fat dude stood at the urinal next to me and did his thing. Except he was so big and giant and fat that he was basically leaning against me and causing me to miss my urinal about half the time.

When I went up to the sink, there was a girl there that I was supposed to know. She clearly knew me, at least from the past. All I knew was that she (a) was hot, and (b) looked familiar. Even now, wide awake, I have the feeling that I should know who that girl was.

Anyway, she wanted me. She wanted me bad. But she was working at the door to the men's room, and she didn't have a break coming for at least an hour. So she flirted with me, and stroked me, and kissed me several times. I got a little hot and bothered, and I was going to splash some cold water on my face, but there was a little girl taking a bubble bath in the sink. The little girl saw my dilemma and scooped up some water from her bath into her hands. She then poured that water into my hands so I could splash my face. It was quite a touching gesture, and several people said, "Awwwwwww."

Then the hot girl had to go direct some people to the back of the men's room. It turned out that all the hubbub was because there was some cult guy in town, and he was getting a ceremonial bath in one of the back stalls. That's why they were letting everyone into the men's room, so they could see the cult guy.

Since the hot girl was busy all of a sudden, I decided to go back to my waiting beer. But first I wanted to show everyone a trick. At first I was going to walk through the closed door, because I can do that in my dreams, but they had the door propped open so the throng outside might catch a glimpse of the cult guy. So, instead of walking completely through the wooden door, I figured I'd just stick my hand through it. It would still be impressive, just not as impressive.

I stuck my hand through the door, almost up to the elbow, and everyone gasped. Then I tried to pull my hand back but GlassesGirl had grabbed it from the other side and I was stuck.

Then I woke up.

---

We were at a drive-in theater.

I don't know if it had been built on top of a volcano, or if it was a new volcano springing up. But, regardless, there was lava erupting from several holes in the ground. Everyone around me just kept watching the movie, so I decided to watch it too. Then this little girl, the same one who'd been taking a sink bath earlier, said she couldn't see the screen so I put her on my shoulders.

Then the big giant fat guy from the urinal tried to take the heavy cooler from the back of my truck. The exertion was too much for him, and he had a heart attack and died.

Then I woke up again.