I have a Couple Rhetorical Questions.

The first being, Is it wrong that I find women’s curling mildly erotic? Strange I know, maybe it’s just pornography escalation coming full circle back to the mundane.

This has by far been the worst month leading up to my birthday ever. It hasn’t been all bad I admit, but the highlights have just been muted, like my promotion. I’ve only had it dangled in front of me for like 6 months, so getting it wasn’t full of elation, it was just a well yeah, I’ve deserved that for way longer than this.

Just people dying, relationships fracturing, frustration escalating, and fear rising.

The only thing I can think of to make things better is to make detailed plans to make things better, which in some cases I have.

As a birthday/promotion/make me feel better present to myself I think I’m going to buy some new hockey pants, Warrior brand of course. With gift money from my parents, remaining fun tax money left over after buying my new shin guards, and money from selling my old shin guards, they’ll only cost $29 of real money. I think I deserve that. I’m such a whore for Warrior gear. I think that’s about all the Warrior stuff I could buy other than shoulder pads, but they would be so overkill for a no check league it would be ridiculous. (Some dudes don’t even wear them, and I cut off the hard plastic pads on mine anyway.)

Looks like I’m going to make it. One more post tomorrow on my birthday and I’ll have done it. It wasn’t as hard as I thought, maybe I’ll be able to keep it up, maybe not once a day, but I’ve been able to see the anecdotes in daily life now again.

Second question: Am I less of a man for really, really liking show tunes?



Substitute Peoria for skid-row and downtown, too many syllables I know.

The Dreams in Which I'm Dying are the Best I've Ever Had

I'm having a hard time keeping this up.

I finished my paper review so I can get my raise. I did it in 2 hours. Makes sense though, it takes most engineers weeks to do their reviews. Writing papers on time got me my raise. It's what I can hang my hat on.

I also get to have a one on one with my bosses boss on my birthday. Hopefully I get a big pat on the back since that's the last day I'll just be an Engineer, and I'll be reborn as a Senior Engineer.

I fell asleep putting the kids to bed tonight thinking about dying. It was kind of funny, it was kind of depressing, but no fear.

Waves of Emotion

So that tingling feeling of something going to happen, happened, as it were.

My boss instant messages me and tells me he set up a one on one with me the next day early in the morning and wants to make sure I can make it.

My brain immediately recoils in horror thinking that I’ve been caught using the interweb too much, or that fact that I’m at work for exactly 8 hours a day now, not a minute more.

I try to feel out the situation so I don’t spend the evening throwing up in anticipation.

I message back, sure no problem. Do I need to have some yearly goals put together to discuss or something like that?

He messages back, Well, I wanted to tell you in person… Oh shit … that your promotion went through.

Cooling calm and joy fill my heart. All my finishing reports on time has paid off. I tell him that’s awesome and thank him for working it on his end.

So I get 5%, and now I’m a Senior Gonzo Engineer. Maybe the Gonzo won’t be listed, but we all know the truth. I guess the grays in my beard are deserved now. It will look nice on a resume too, puts me in a different category and bargaining position.

This morning the kids don’t wake up at some point from 5-7. Seriously, the day I need to get in by 7:30 and they don’t make a sound. On top of that we find out my wife’s friend’s mom died this morning. I’m full of panic, self worth, and sadness. I need to get to this meeting so I get out the door buy 7:08. Luckily Peoria did a halfway decent job clearing the streets after 3 inches of snow.

I tear up a bit as I climb the hill to work. It’s a combination of relief of getting this promotion they’ve dangled in front of me for so long, and the loss my wife’s friend has to deal with. I remember her wedding and talking to her mom, this kind, lovely, gracious woman, nevermore. I try to pull my shit together and navigate the country road without killing myself.

I make it to work 5 minutes late, no big deal, everyone is 5 minutes late to every meeting they go to.

I sit down after the meeting, which is really nothing groundbreaking after finding out the high point the day before, and I am able to breath and let my head stop swimming.

That's Your Theory?

It's amazing how things go downhill so fast. The desperate fight against the mass disorder and unraveling of the universe is impossible to hold off for any amount of time.

I wasn't even feeling that great, maybe kind of zen after that kid spared me.

Then a little bit of this, some of that and then it looks like you have an internal water leak in your wall. I think it's not quite that bad, but my spigot is all fucked up. The freeze cover didn't work. The plastic cover I had burst when it froze and water started leaking back into the wall. Not cool.

What a shitty freeze cover. I need to rebuild the internal shutoff and the outside spigot itself, as long as I haven't actually created a leak inside the wall due to freezing. Then I'd have to replace it all with a freeze proof silcock. He he he silcock.

I don't know. I really want some company to call me and tell me I can leave here. I'm don't feel like I have a purpose at work. I'm getting jerked around on this promotion. It's not doing it for me.

Ordered my lusted over shin guards. They came down $20 so I snapped them up. One bright point, although they will probably not have them in stock or some bullshit.

That's the way things are going. Higher and higher levels of entropy.

20 days... really?

That's really too long in between blog posts. One of my old friends called me out on it via a facebook message a few days ago.

I could say I have excuses, work and family and all that.

Truth is I've hit some sort of low point so this seems like as good an idea as any other. It's helped in the past right?

It doesn't feel as bad as times before, yet, at the same time it is.

I nearly punched a 2 inch thick piece of steel today I was so overwhelmed. I would have broken my hand.

At the time it didn't seem like a bad idea. I'd get to leave work, have minimal tasks after. I'd get sympathy, mind numbing pain and mind numbing endorphins and mind numbing pain killers.

He who makes a beast of himself, gets rid of the pain of being a man.

All these Nihilistic and generally depressing quotes and phrases have been bombarding me all day. Thinking about all the bad things that have happened and that could happen, and wondering if my children's smiles make up for all of them.

Is it ironic or not that it's been raining all day today and still is... no you'd expect that. Bad weather to match a bad mood, too predictable.

I can only hope that hockey makes me feel better tonight. That's a true sign of depression, not enjoying what you've found pleasure in in the past.

Perhaps this will be like a steep economic recovery. A V not a U. Maybe I'll score like 3 goals tonight, and then come home and have great sex with my wife, and then sleep soundly till morning, and then maybe the sun will come out, and my machine's software will not act like mentally retarded monkeys wrote it, and maybe they'll say they are reinstating raises at work, and my kids won't be so exhausted when I come home after work that they only want to test the limits of my patience, and everything, every little thing will be all-right.

Three Little Birds and Redemption Song always make me sad in that music is so beautiful my heart aches kind of way. Bob Marley as well as David Bowie have that affect on me. I'll make sure to que that up in the MP3 player tomorrow.