I'm writing this Saturday morning. This will test my memory.

I guess a lot of people must get Good Friday off work, because Rich O's was looking more like a Friday than a Thursday. The place was packed with strangers. I ended up sitting on the loveseat drinking a couple BBC Jefferson's Reserve Bourbon Barrel Stouts (144) for the first hour or so. There were some idiots sitting on the sofa and the throne. I didn't talk to them because they were idiots and I didn't want to be associated with them.

I was quite bored. I tried, for about the millionth time, to call SassyGirl. It went straight to voicemail. Again.

After a long time, some strangers all got up from the island and left, So I bolted over there. For about .0003 seconds I had the island to myself. CoffeeDude ruined that by sitting across from me and attempting to start a conversation. A conversation which I quickly squelched by grunting a lot. For about 2 minutes CoffeeDude and I had the island to ourselves. But then about 8000 PBDs came in. They'd been having a brew club meeting out front and as soon as that was over they stampeded into Rich O's proper because people don't like to sit out front - it's cold and impersonal out there.

So for a while I was pretty irritated, mostly because this one PDB lady kept fanning herself with a menu and the menu kept smacking me in the ear. Right at about the time I was trying to decide between (a) moving elsewhere and (b) murdering the PBD lady, two cool things happened.

First, the PBD lady left and went to go assault somebody else.

Second, DooRagGirl came in and sat beside me.

A bonus cool thing was that I recognized her right away - first time that's happened since she got her hair cut.

So the rest of the night was pretty good. The crowd there at the island dwindled to a reasonable number, and we all sat around bullshitting.

I had myself a Weihenstephaner (850).

I think that just about the only other thing of note was that HotEuchreGirl was there and one of the PBDs that I was sitting with decided that he was going to help me pick HotEuchreGirl up. There were several things wrong with this plan, not the least of which was that her boyfriend was already standing right there talking to us.

Not cool, dude.

Now I've got a lot of catching up to do with my email and other messages. Then I've got a lot of shit to type. Then I've got to catch up on all the journals I've missed.

Man, after all this I'm going to need a vacation.

My hotel supposedly has Internet access in all the rooms, but it's wireless access and I've got no signal in my room.

I'm sitting down in the lobby typing this so my readers don't think I'm dead or anything.

I probably won't do any more updates until I get home tomorrow.

Bye!

Right now, I'm supposed to be writing my Thursday beer report. But instead I'm going to go to St. Louis.

I might write my Thursday beer report later today, or sometime this weekend. I might write an entry or two sometime between now and Sunday when I get back home.

But I'm not making any promises.

I'm taking my laptop with me. This is the first time I've bothered to take it on one of my Easter trips. But that doesn't guarantee that I'll be writing anything.

I may have fun instead.

At least three different women will read the title of this entry and assume that I'm writing about them.

Only one of them is right, though.

Just to ease some concerns and lessen some confusion: If I know your last name, then this is not about you.

Now that I've cleared that up, I thought that I'd say that there's this chick that I want to lick from head to toe, but she's got a boyfriend...

...and he seems to be kind of a dick...

...and he's taking her for granted...

...she could definitely do better...

...and I would love the opportunity to make her scream in ecstasy...

...but she's got a boyfriend, so I will do nothing.

This morning on the way to work I passed a car on the side of the road. The hood was up, and the elderly black lady standing beside was it doing the phone signal to the cars passing her. You know, with her thumb and her pinkie extended?

Genius that I am, I figured that she was wanting to know if anyone had a phone to she could call for help with her car.

Nice guy that I am, I pulled over at the first opportunity.

I walked back to the lady.

"Ma'am," I asked. "Would you like to use my phone?"

The lady looked at me, sneered a little, and said, "I'll get my own phone, Whitey."

As I walked back to my truck, I directed some thoughts at the lady. The most relevant was probably this one:

Please die, you racist bitch. The world will be better off when you, and people like you, are no longer a part of it.

I know this one chick, she's the maestro of the metaphor and the sultan of the simile.

Me, I'm neither. The best I can come up with is that tired old cliché phantom pubic hairs equal feelings.

Confused? It probably won't become any clearer.

Sometimes, I sit at Rich O's after work, and everything is almost perfect. The place is empty enough that I feel like I'm the only one there. My mood is decent but not good, subdued but not sad, alert but not anxious. The music is at a comfortable level, and it's not fucking Johnny Cash. The beer is yummy.

Almost perfect.

After work today I sat in the throne, drinking a pint of Spezial Rauchbier (1190), and it was as close to perfect as it's been in a very long time.

Too fucking close.

I found myself getting irritated because I'm not supposed to be content in that place. There are reasons that I go there, and those reasons do not include beer or conversation or music or any of that crap. That crap I can get anywhere, and that crap is not why I go to Rich O's.

I go to Rich O's because that's where it all happened. Because that was the scene of my crime. Because that's where the ghost is. Because I know without a doubt that Rich O's is the place where, if I have any chance at all of resurrecting anything even remotely resembling actual human emotion - it will be there.

So I go.

I sit in the throne or at the bar or at the island and I grasp at gossamer wisps of emotion, but they evaporate when I touch them.

I tug, ever so gently, on threads tied to memories of that place from so long ago, but those threads break with the slightest tension.

I pull phantom hairs out of my mouth, but I can never quite get a grip, and my fingers emerge from my lips with nothing on them but moisture.

A tickle in my throat, a quiet voice in my head, a tiny and brief rush of adrenaline when someone walks in the door. These are the new highlights of my life.

I am not heartbroken, though I should be. I am not happy, though I long to be. I am not sad, though I deserve to be. I'm finding, more and more lately, that I'm simply content.

Fucking content. What a load of crap that is.

A wise man once wrote:

I'm not really sure where I'm going with this - it just doesn't seem right to let things fade away. Some things deserve a grand exit. Some things deserve closure. Some things do not deserve to be pushed aside so they can fade over time and eventually be forgotten completely.

That is my fear. That the time for love is behind me forever. That I've missed my exit, and that I'll never pass this way again.

I just had to go and write about how my sleep was back to normal.

So, just to teach me a lesson for being too satisfied with my life, the universe decided to knock me out at 7:30 and not let me wake up until 12:30.

So now I'm sort of upside-down again, at least for tonight.

That'll teach me.

Now, now I'm going to drink a beer. A good one, but not the Alaskan Smoked Porter. Not yet. I'm going to drink a beer and then I'm going to try to write a decent entry.

I still haven't been able to get close to the new black cat that lives under my deck, but the neighbors who had their house burn down have a cat, and he's been coming over to see me lately. So that's cool. I like cats.

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It's supposed to be 90 degrees in St. Louis this Friday. I guess I'll be wearing shorts and blinding everyone.

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It's been almost 14 years since I've explored the area around Scott AFB Illinois. I'll probably get totally lost.

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I think I'm taking Thursday off too. That would mean that tomorrow will be virtual Friday, so yay!

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I've got one bottle of Alaskan Smoked Porter left in my fridge. I really really really want to drink it, but it's the last one, and hhere probably won't be any more until the Fall, so I have to wait. Waiting sucks. ANd don't give me that good things come... bullshit either. I'm not in the mood.

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This time of year is that annoying season when I still need to have the heat on at night, but if I forget to set it to A/C before I leave in the mornings I roast to death when I get home.

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I used to have this friend named SassyGirl, but I'm pretty sure she must have died in the storms last week because she hasn't fucking called me back to let me know she's alive.

She was cool. I'll miss her.

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HatGirl told me that she's got some classes or something coming up so she's basically never going to Rich O's again in her life. I'm thinking that this doesn't change much.

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My sleep schedule is totally back to normal now.

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People are PMing me to yell at me for not updating my pool 'blog very often. I wonder how come nobody yells at me about the cat 'blog. That damn thing hasn't been updated since like last Summer.

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If I were truly the stat whore that some people think I am then I'd have posted each one of these tidbits as a separate entry.

I wonder why it is that the only people you see eating Lean Cuisine are fat people. Shouldn't there be some skinny people eating it if it's such a great product?

I also wonder if fat people are ever embarrassed to buy the stuff. It seems to me that when you're loading your shopping cart up with Lean Cuisine you might as well wear a t-shirt that says Danger, wide load or something.

Or maybe it could be one of those shirts with the arrows that points to the side but instead of I'm with stupid or whatever it could say I was with somebody. He was delicious.

I think that Lean Cuisine should be sold in plain brown wrappers so fat people aren't forced to call any extra attention to themselves.

And don't even get me started on those adult diaper things.