Blogdiaryjournal

If all goes right

2011-09-21T17:18:00.000-07:00

I'm discovering that work, while an obvious necessity, has the potential to be a huge pain-in-the-ass at the most inconvenient of times. Haley and Owen are on Long Island, but back at home, 2 hungry cats and a hungry dog are waiting for me. And I'm stuck here at work for God knows how long, waiting for 2 jobs that don't appear to be any closer to my desk than they were 3 hours ago.

I've had to stay late a few days this week because our night editor, an ordinarily reliable fellow, has gone MIA. Well, not exactly MIA, but he's been absent for the last 3 weeks with self-diagnosed insomnia. Each time he's called out—which has been almost every day this week—he informs my boss that he has a "call-in with my doctor," which is antithetical to common sense and completely ignores modern medical conveniences such as hospitals and walk-in clinics. This man is not stupid, but maybe he thinks we are.

Wonky work schedule aside, I'm really happy with how things are going. Owen is just the most amazing baby. Every day he shows us a new side of his personality. Whether it's a laugh, a smile, or a facial reaction to gas, he's just providing Haley and me with so much joy and happiness. I also can't forget that as hard as it is to work late at my job, Haley is always fully engaged in her job as the best mommy in the world. I'm grateful to her for all she does.

Right now, I'm going to check out the Rutgers course catalog and see if there are any nondegree classes I can take in preparation for applying to their MA-English program.

2011-06-27T09:22:00.000-07:00

This morning, I saw a TV ad for the diabetes drug my company creates advertisements for. It didn't really hit me at first, but I later realized that I edited the copy for that ad. In my 10+ year work history, I had so little to be proud of, so little to show for my hard work. Well, sometimes I didn't work very hard at all, which is probably why those jobs fall under the category of "former employment." Maybe it's time I did a series of blogs about my past jobs. Hmmm.

Went to the park in Brooklyn yesterday with wife, baby, sister, and niece. Other niece did not show up, opting instead to flake at the last minute. I love my niece and I try to be patient with her, but she's very prone to throwing a wrench into everyone's plans by foregoing her social obligations, with nary a phone call or email to give a heads-up. Love her to death, but she drives me fucking insane.

In other news, WE HAVE BED BUGS. Oh no!!!! Actually, it turns out that bed bugs aren't quite the skin-piercing, blood sucking scourge the media make them out to be. They're also not impossible to kill. If you have or suspect you have bed bugs, you need to hire a good exterminator who deals with bed bugs, not just roaches and other lovelies. Peace of mind comes at a cost, but it's well worth it. Pursuant to the exterminator's directives, we're currently living out of giant zip lock bags, a direct consequence of our "issue." We look a bit like hoarders, but well-organized hoarders at that!

Money for nothing

2011-06-22T09:16:00.000-07:00

Speaking with the best friend on the phone last night, I lamented that while unemployment liberates one from the ball and chain of corporate tyranny, it ain't all it's cracked up to be. My friend is currently living in Colombia with his wife, trying hard to get his import/export business up and running. All kinds of obstacles such as free trade agreements, hostile locals, and lack of capital are conspiring to prevent this venture from seeing the light of day. Having suffered through many subpar jobs in my lifetime, I can honestly say that I'm grateful to have the job I have today. Still, I get a little green with envy when I encounter people who are unemployed and NOT dead broke. A little sound financial planning allows for such an arrangement. Sadly, I suck at financial planning.

On the subject of work, my annual review is coming up very soon. I haven't had an actual review in almost 2 years because my last boss (HR job) booked it for Texas right before I was to begin the review process. If I learned one thing in HR it's that recognition is paramount to nurturing and retaining good employees. Here's to hoping that I can continue down the path toward becoming a better editor—and a well-compensated one at that!

Out to lunch

2011-06-07T12:30:00.000-07:00

I spent nearly 4 hours at work yesterday revising a copywriter's botched reference citations. I'd be less bothered by it if the copywriter in question wasn't a bitch to me on a few different occasions. She definitely outdid herself last week when she showed up at my desk looking for me. I was seated a few cubicles away, doing a spellcheck. I overheard her ask my colleague if she knew where I was. My colleague told her that I was around, just not at my desk. Then, the copywriter said to no one in particular, "He's the only editor I know who's never at his desk."

Really?

I mean, exactly how many times has she visited my desk to draw such a conclusion? Anyway, you gotta love people who deflect their own personal frustrations and try and turn shit around on you. The way I see it, if you're going to lie, at least try and be somewhat believable and fib within reason. Even if I was never at my desk EVERY TIME she walked by, it's foolish fer her to assume that I'm "never" there. You know when I was at my desk, though? The 4 hours I spent yesterday fixing up her mess.

Where my bloggers at?

2011-05-13T13:29:00.000-07:00

Back when DiaryLand ruled the blogging landscape—I doubt if the word "blog" had been popularized as of yet—it wasn't uncommon to receive random plaudits from complete strangers who just happened to stumble upon your diary. The praise was usually short and sweet, but it reaffirmed my belief that blogs could cast a wide a net and capture an audience previously limited to those with published works in book and journals. There was even a diary-rating website that accepted submissions, reviewed blog samples and provided critical feedback. Today, I can't imagine anyone having the time to undertake such a project.

These days, most people are far too self-involved to read words written by someone else. If you charted the trajectory of blogging popularity, you'd probably see a peak in 2003, right before Myspace got REALLY popular. Pre-Myspace, blogs were the primary avenue for peers, friends, and strangers to exchange creative ideas and daily musings. Shit always gets messy when money is involved, and so I felt that blogging took a turn for the worst when it crossed the threshold from recreational activity to profession. Blogs lost their charm and became judged by not their critical and creative contribution but their ability to turn a profit. My wife, a recent mother, is an avid reader of Dooce.com, a blog written by a regular gal cum professional blogger. Dooce writes mostly about her daily trials and tribulations as a mother—and she makes a pretty penny doing so. Everyone needs a hustle, so I can't fault Dooce for taking advantage of an opportunity that allows her to be a stay-at-home mom and get paid to write. Maybe I'm just bitter because it isn't me getting paid to do what I love.

Nowadays, it's exceedingly difficult to get paid for blogging. The all of cyberspace is saturated with blogs, blogs, and more blogs. Blogging celebrities, like Dooce, have convinced everyone that they have what it takes to be a paid, professional writer. Huffington Post, Jezebel and scores of other websites offer free blogging on their sites; very few, if any, actually pay their blog contributors. The sites themselves stand to profit because they can increase their traffic and ad revenue without paying a dime for content. Sweet deal.

Who knows? Maybe blogging will experience a revival in the next few years. I'll be able to look back on this entry, laugh, and chalk it up to a moment of post-30 panic. I doubt that will happen. Sometimes, I pine for what was because I've romanticized the versions of events that exist in my memory. There's no guarantee that what was once new, fresh and exciting will feel the same way long after the novelty has worn off. For now, there's much to be content with in my present: wife, baby, and job—and they don't need a stat counter to measure their worth!

Credit

2011-05-09T11:59:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, CapitalOne saw it fit to bestow upon me a credit card, my first in nearly 7 years. Previous to yesterday, I applied for a number of cards online over the course of nearly a decade with little more to show for my efforts than a slew of rejection emails. I truly deserved my debt since I spent recklessly with no intention of repaying my plastic advance. Actually, I knew I'd one day repay my debt. What I could not foresee was the never-ending letters from collections and lawyers threatening legal action for nonpayment. That a credit company, after all that, didn't take a chance on me is no great mystery.

When you gain some stability in life, financial or otherwise, you start to reassess your goals because they're no longer just a pipe dream. Today, I can actually entertain the thought of going back to school without becoming interminably depressed. Haley may go back to school, too, and she truly deserves that opportunity. Her initial attempts at higher education were derailed by an overbearing parent who caused school to be become for her an anxiety-laden endeavor. Now, we've begun to forge our own path and are in a better place to start doing things on our own terms.

Of course, Baby Owen complicates any ambitions to pursue academic opportunities, but not in a bad way. He's our pride and joy, and we put him before anyone and anything else. It's just nice to know that whatever we do to better ourselves (college, new job, etc.), we'll be giving Owen a better life in return.

It's nice to feel a sense of independence again.

We had a baby!

2011-05-06T10:59:00.000-07:00

Owen Lee Connor. Born April 13, 2011 at 2:07am
8lbs 6 oz

Lies

2011-03-29T14:10:00.000-07:00

Have you ever been an accessory to a lie? In my case, the lies have been many and the friend telling them is out of control—with no foreseeable end to the tragic cycle.

We'll call this friend "Bob," since that moniker is pretty far off from his actual name. I met Bob in 2003 when I was living with my sister in Brooklyn. We became quick friends and he regaled me with stories of his life as a musician signed to a major label, a "fact" that would become important when I later began dissecting his lies. I immediately noticed that underneath his cocksureness was a desperate person with self esteem so depleted it could not fill a Dixie cup. Boasting is one thing, but outright lies (“I wrote some of the songs your favorite artists have performed.”) are difficult to overlook because they are blatantly unbelievable. I felt embarrassed for him because he was completely unaware of the absurdity of his claims. I think he had been brainwashed by his own bullshit.

So, successful musician/transplant from tony Scottsdale, Arizona finds himself in a quandary: What happens when people find out that his existence is a web of deceit woven by a man with gutter-level self esteem? I got my answer when Bob instant messaged me one night in 2004. He claimed he was suicidal and only moments away from ending it all. I guess you could say I was a little skeptical. After all, who really instant messages a threat to end their life? Still, I’ve always been behind the curve when it comes to social media, so I pressed a bit:

Me: Don’t do anything you’ll regret

Bob: I’ve already laid the knives out on the floor

When I read this exchange back to my roommate, he doubted the veracity of Bob’s promise to commit seppuku on a cold winter night.

“Who lays out multiple knives for such an occasion,” he queried. “Just be careful.”

Boy was I careful. I trekked out to a part of Brooklyn I hadn’t been to in almost 8 months. I arrived at Bob’s apartment and was truly shocked by what I found: it was hardly the bachelor pad belonging to an undercover songster I’d envisioned; in reality, it was a total fucking dump. By all accounts, this was a rundown shithole inhabited by a very obese, older man and his significantly younger roommate. Weird.

When I entered Bob’s room, I found no knives, no obvious signs of an impending suicide. Just a lonely guy who’d gotten so caught up in his shit that he could no longer cope with any of it. If Bob was unprepared for reality, his friends were equally caught off guard. As it turns out, Bob’s suicide attempt stemmed from a de facto intervention by a group of “friends” who’d put together the pieces and realized that the man who writes the songs you sing in the shower was a fraud. Of course, Bob never admitted any of this to me. He actually kept up the lie and told me that he couldn’t understand why his friends would cast him out. I was in no place to judge. I did what I used to best—I listened.

I suspect that Bob realized he showed me too much of his hand because after that night, we pretty much stopped speaking to one another. Occasionally, I’d see him pop up on a hip hop message board, always eager to play the antagonist and get under people’s skin. It’s so easy to be what you aren’t when it comes to the internet. Bob knew this, took full advantage, and unleashed online salvos with ghetto bravado that would lead you to believe he was from the Compton, not the mean streets of Scottsdale. People on that message board suspected something was up, just like the friends who brought Bob to the brink of ending it all…kind of. On the message board, everything from Bob’s street credibility to his alleged industry contacts was called into question. Pressed for answers, Bob promptly deleted himself from the website, a move that probably answers a lot of questions for his detractors. Full. Of. Shit.

Last year, I found out that Bob had married and had a child. I was happy for him. Did I mention that he once tried using a picture to pass of his baby cousin as his own to thwart rumors on the hip hop site that he was gay? Yeah. That really happened. I spoke to Bob a few times, online, and he sounded really happy. Unfortunately, I don’t think people like Bob handle actual success well, and he was quickly drawn back to the hip hop site with an arsenal of crap to pass off as genuine achievements. Silently, I wished him well and put him out of my mind.

About a week ago, I heard from Bob. I think the crazy never real go away. They just lurk in the shadows and spring from behind the tree of opportunity at the precise moment when YOU don’t need crazy in your life. Haley and I are about to have a baby, so it’s fitting that Bob would come knocking. According to Bob, his wife accused him of hitting her (he said he “fell into” her), an accusation that led to his incarceration in a U.K. prison reserved for violent felons. Upon release from jail, he was promptly deported and arrived in New York last week—a broken man with no wife or son. I asked him where he was living and he told me back in his old apartment in Brooklyn, the same place where he’d resided with the obese man. Strange. Did his former roommate just happen to have an opening? With Bob, it was always something and this time was no different.

Yesterday, I logged into Facebook and saw the following message posted by Bob:

“Hi friends of Bob. This is Bob’s friend Jake. Bob died today. Please keep him in your prayers and thoughts so that his spirit may live on.”

Initially, I was shocked. My gut was pierced by a sensation usually reserved for bad news about a loved one. While Bob was far from loved by me, I couldn’t help but to feel as if our paths had crossed enough times to make his death a relevant—and shocking—event. God bless the skeptic that lives in my heart, because I picked up the phone and texted Bob. Imagine my shock when a dead man answered me back.

“She filed for divorce”

This was followed by suicide threats, and I realized that I was firmly entrenched Bob’s cycle of bullshit. Who was this wonderful friend, Jake, who so selflessly agreed to log into Bob’s account and post an obituary for all to see? Wouldn’t a real friend call the cops instead of aiding and abetting a suicide? Of course, there probably is no Jake. Just another character in Bob’s cast of delusions.

This time, I didn’t take the bait. After he stated that he was in Long Island and “about to go in,” I called 911 and reported the suicide threat. 911 could do nothing about it without a solid lead as to his exact whereabouts, but I felt I did what I needed to do. One day, Bob will run out of options and, sadly, suicide may become a viable option to end the misery of a life lived as a total lie. I’m glad that I choose not to hide in the shadows of deceptions because the light of truth favors my skin! Bob will turn 40 years old next year, an awfully old age to be playing the lying game. In my experience, people like Bob end up dead or in jail. It’s a sad fact. I do, however, pledge to remove myself from Bob’s cycle of bullshit. It serves neither me nor my wife well to associate with someone like Bob. That’s the truth.

“To be persuasive we must be believable; to be believable we must be credible; credible we must be truthful.”—Edward R. Murrow

Smile!

2011-03-11T08:59:00.000-08:00

In both geographic and dental senses, Ireland isn't that far from England. So maligned are the Brits' calcified outgrowths that they've endured well-documented parody in all forms of media. Again, Ireland is a mere stone's throw away from England, so it stands to reason that the pearly whites of the Emerald Isle aren't all that pearly.

While my teeth are neither a buttery hue nor a cluster of jagged bone formations, they have seen their share of wear. What's the damage?

12 fillings
8 original fillings removed and replaced due to mercury content
4 wisdom teeth removed
1 root canal

It doesn't help that the dentist scares the shit out of me; so does the drill. I've given each individual drill bit a name based on the sound it makes. Buzzy and Choppy are the worst.

A few weeks ago, I underwent gum surgery. Fun. I received more anesthetic than I ever have in my life. Despite the constant sticking and a completely numb left side, I still felt the waterpik touch a nerve shortly after my gums had been ripped open. The best part is that I get to do the right side of my face in about a week.

With a baby on the way in a little over a month, I can assure you that I am not planning on getting lazy when it comes to my son's dental hygiene. I will dress up as Timmy the fucking Tooth if I have to. Whatever it takes. Because he's my son, and for that reason, the dentist will never be his friend.

A cold one

2011-02-07T08:57:00.000-08:00

After reading this story in ESPN, I'm a bit perturbed at what passes as "journalism" these days. Perry was an icon, a behemoth force to be reckoned with in the glory days of a juggernaut Chicago Bears defense. Surely, he is undeserving of the tale of woe presented for public consumption by ESPN.

Addiction is a malady no less deserving of privacy than that which we allot the AIDS or cancer sufferer. The media, unfortunately, believe that Perry, as a public figure, has forfeited certain rights for the fame he experienced in pro-football over 2 decades ago. Of course, let's not lay the blame entirely upon the shoulders of the media. WE are equally complicit in this crime against common decency. Our desire to consume, and to do so without boundaries and respect for privacy, creates an audience for ESPN to peddle gossip. After all, ESPN is merely reacting to our needs, and our needs are often woefully devoid of dignity.

Undoubtedly, supporters of such an article will employ the "if just one life is saved by reading this" defense. Shouldn't permission to disclose personal information that might lead to the saving of a life still lie with the article's subject? This article doesn't read like Perry consented at all. And that's a shame.

Perry's addiction should be addressed. There can be no doubt about that. It should, however, be on his and his family's terms, not for the purpose of satiating our morbid curiosity.

$$$=^%$$%##%@%$

2011-02-04T10:43:00.000-08:00

I love the stability that comes with having a full-time job. While I've definitely reaped the benefits of unemployment--4 times in 10 years--I'm hardly enamored by the prospect of sitting around and doing absolutely nothing. I heard all kids of stories about unemployment: it was a blessing, vacation, or even a war cry to the dormant, creative self. Whatever it is and means to others, I just don't like it. Keep your $405 a week, New York State.

Having just gotten married, and expecting a child in just a couple of months, money has become this frightening thing I know I can no longer be without. What scares me most is that I, along with Haley, am going to have to unlearn decades of poor spending habits. Much of my "brokeassness" is rooted in a compulsion to eat out all of the time: Who can resist the urge to forego a sweltering session in the kitchen when modestly compensated individuals will do the grunt work for you, all for a nominal fee? And this is why I have no money.

No excuses once the baby comes. Unless we want to invite the wrath of Child Service, we'll not be spending my entire paycheck on wasteful and frivolous things. God, who is writing this blog? Today me should send a memo to 2002 me and get that dude to put away some money.

Speaking of the baby, I find it quite amazing that Gerber Insurance's relentless mail campaign to enroll my child in their fabulous plan might actually come in useful. As a soon-to-be-expecting coworker told me last week, "There's no way that I ever thought at 30 that I would have a child at 40." I've got him beat by about 10 years on that sentiment. I am, however, quickly moving past the "shock and awe" phase of the pregnancy. To dwell any further on what "might have been" if "only I did this" serves to do nothing more than cheapen what has been an incredible journey of growth. I'll take the sleepless nights, dirty diapers, tears, colic, and health insurance with zero reservations.

Me...it's what's for dinner

2011-01-12T08:24:00.000-08:00

Ick!

Bedbugs are even grosser when they aren't fully engorged with blood. Thank god we do NOT have these suckas. Unfortunately, someone on our block does. I checked out http://www.bedbugregistry.com/ and there's definitely a building down the block that has the much-maligned bloodsuckers. Well, better them than us, I suppose.

Our first bedbug "scare" happened shortly after we moved into our last place. The media were saturating the airwaves and periodicals with a gloom and doom scenario in which bedbugs would eventually multiply at a rate beyond the means of ordinary pest control, depose the President and establish a New World Order of parasitic dominance. Adding to the panic a certain sartorial slaughterhouse of preppy fashion was shamed by a dressing-room infestation of the bed-dwelling parasitic scourges. You could easily call 2010 "The Summer of the Bedbug"

Haley (now-wife, then-girlfriend) was paranoid as fuck. I couldn't blame her. The media were in full swing, digesting nightly horror stories of homes overrun by bedbugs. Then posh hotels. By the time the critters reached a movie house on 42nd st, she was thoroughly convinced that we had them. Haley embarked on a quest to free us from the plague upon our house. I'll never forget the day I came home and every hole along the molding was covered with clear packing tape. Our bed! Oh, our dear bed. All 4 of its legs were submerged in small cups of some liquid. I can't quite remember. The theory was that if the bedbugs were to use the legs of the bed as a path to their host(s), they would instead find themselves drowning in a cup of...something.

Pre-dawn bedbug raids were the worst. Before first sunlight even had a chance to peek out from behind the black night, Haley was out of bed, shining a flashlight on the covers, frantically directing the beam from corner to corner of the mattress. There was no warning the first time this happened and I woke up in abject fear, certain that a criminal past of some kind had caught up with me. Nope. Just bedbugs.

The bedbugs took over and you know what the funny thing was? They never once bit us. They never appeared from beneath the mattress in the wee hours of the morning, like some marching brigade of bloodthirsty philistines of the insect world. They never existed. At least not in our apartment they didn't.

It took Haley months to recover from the psychological trauma of the invisible bedbugs. Poor girl. What's not there can do as much a number on you as what is there. Thanks to www.bedbugregistry.com, we now know that an apartment building about 100 yards away is occupied by the most unwanted of guests. We're better prepared and less anxious now that we know the little fuckers will have to make a certain-death march, across the street and in freezing temperatures, to feast on our juicy flesh. It's unlikely that they would survive such a journey, but Haley keeps the flashlight close by. You never know.

2011-01-03T08:33:00.000-08:00

A brief but ill-fated jaunt to Texas notwithstanding, I will be a first-time out-of-state New York resident by week's end. Am I excited? Sure. I'm also nervous. NYC has been my comfort zone forever. I grew up here, fell in love here, got married here, etc. Plus, calling myself a "New Jersey resident" sounds a bit strange. Then again, I'm a bit strange so the designation fits.

The MTA and its money-grubbings way has made my decision to move that much easier. Haley and I spent almost $20 dollars traveling to and from Jersey City. The PATH train costs considerably less and stops right by my job. Win-win.

Like it is every year, getting back to work after the extended Advertising Christmas (nearl 2 weeks off) is an odd transition. Thankfully, I didn't have to contend with a difficult workload. So far, I'm really enjoying my foray into the world of editing. My writing skills have sharpened and I find myself putting pen to paper with a level of confidence that had been absent for many years.

Can't wait to get home and go to the gym. 5k training everyday this week in preparation for the Fred Lebow 5-miler on Saturday.

2010-12-26T20:06:00.001-08:00

What on Earth happened to public television?

I turned on Channel 13 (PBS affiliate in NYC) recently and the featured classic film was "Batman Forever." Yup.

As best I can tell, PBS isn't suffering for want of better films. If it was, I imagine there must be something better in Joel Schumacher's lacking oeuvre to justify an otherwise poor use of public funds.

Once upon a time PBS was the standard bearer of quality programming. Lately, the programming choices our public television network has made are a testament to how far removed PBS is from its commitment to deliver offerings consistent with a legacy of excellence.

As much as I love Pete Seeger, it's sad that PBS must disguise a two-hour fundraising infomercial as a "documentary" about the folk pioneer. Sadly, such is the state of PBS these days.

I'm no fool. I know PBS depends on the contributions of "viewers like you" for sustenance. I also know that these infomercials are food for PBS. I just wish that the Reel 13 Classic Movie Showcase didn't have to feature Val Kilmer in a rubber suit with nipples.

The incoming Republican majority in congress will almost certainly ensure a rough-road ahead for public television funding. For now, I can tolerate it, but it looks like PBS will only survive by becoming as generic and uninspired as the programming it used to set itself apart from.

2010-12-26T19:27:00.001-08:00

The weather outside is frightful.

Change is almost always good

2010-12-07T12:23:00.000-08:00

Homeowner.

Holy shit. It's officially a reality. Haley and I now own a condo in Jersey City. I'll admit, leaving New York City will be a tad bittersweet. I've been to cities big and small and none of them come close to matching New York City's grandeur. Still, I'm very excited about beginning this next chapter of our lives in a brand new place we can call our own.

From the looks of things, Jersey City has much in common with its big brother across the Hudson: chipped sidewalks, diverse cuisine and truly insane street people; it's those similarities that attracted me to JC. It's unabashedly corrupt politicians rake in money hand over fist from illegal business dealings with mafia affiliates. I can't summon an ounce of civic pride when I re-read that last sentence but it all makes for good copy in the morning news. Maybe life in Jersey won't be a carbon copy of an episode of The Sopranos but I'd wager that the JC politicians will do their best to fulfill my expectations. As long as money has value, crooks will be lurking just around the corner. Some crooks are near the top of the pyramid and those are the ones you really need to watch out for.

I'm not sad about leaving NYC for any inevitable loss of "street credibility." Fuck that. New York lost its street cred when it lost Brooklyn to the developers. Brooklyn is a shell of the wonderland it once was. Tradition and history have been replaced with vapid hipsterdom and the ever-expanding yuppie empire. We moved to Queens in 2008 in the hopes of starting a new life in a working class neighborhood. Then New York Magazine fucked it all up by declaring Sunnyside the 2nd best neighborhood in New York. It wasn't long before the skinny jean armada drifted across the Newtown Creek from Greenpoint and got down to the business of destroying a neighborhood. Change is good. I get that. That's why we decided to leave.

The upstairs neighbor in our new place is supposedly an FBI agent. This is unconfirmed but, if true, makes me feel a lot more secure in the unlikely event of a home invasion. Third floor occupants are a nurse and her young daughter. Also awesome in case our baby gets sick.

Life is good!

The news

2010-11-16T13:30:00.000-08:00

When I was younger, my momentum to write was amazing. I wrote down every trivial detail in a blog.

Diaryland 2000-2002
Livejournal 2002-2004
Myspace Blog 2004-2006

Now that I actually have something to say, I never blog about it. Little slice of irony, eh? Well, I do have some rather exciting announcements to share. Here goes:

1) I'm having a baby! WHA? No, it's true. Haley and I found out shortly before our October trip to Seattle. Morning nausea made us suspect; the pregnancy test confirmed it. Haley is approximately 4 months along and judging from the tests, we are going to have a healthy baby boy. I've gone through the full gamut of joyous emotions and I'm really excited for what lies ahead.

2) Annnnd...we are getting married! Honestly, we would be just as happy if we remained registered domestic partners. What made us change our minds was the revelation that domestic partners get dicked BIG TIME in health benefits taxes. We are going to have a civil ceremony next month at City Hall and a church wedding in June of next year. We have to go through all of this pre-Cana marriage counseling before we can get married in the church.

3) New job! I finally maneuvered my way out of HR. I seized an opportunity to work in my company's editorial department; if I'm lucky, this new position (proofreader) will lead to a career in copywriting.

4) Moving on out :) Haley and I are thisclose to closing on a condo in Jersey City. Never thought I would leave NYC. Then again, I never thought I would have a wife, baby and desirable career.

Good things come to those who wait and take their swing when it's their turn at the plate.

The Hideous Burgundy Gown of Success

2010-04-30T22:24:00.000-07:00

On May 27th, I, at long last, received a coveted diploma from Brooklyn College. I entered college as an undergrad 13 years ago. 13 Fucking years ago. Bill Clinton was President of the United States during my freshman year. Ska music was still immensely popular in this region and gave uncoordinated white people an excuse to dance and feel connected to something other than an impending trust fund. I was one of these people, minus the rich relative death bonus. I listened to a lot of ska back in those days. My friends and I frequented shows in clubs in Manhattan that no longer exist. That's another story for a different.

Point is, over a decade later and that person I was has long since flatlined. Unfortunately, Brooklyn College is the one thing that melds my unimpressive past to my present. It keeps alive the memory of the me that I'd rather forget. The idiot who believed the high school teacher who told him that you have to "try really hard to not get laid in college." I guess my yeoman work ethic did me in that time. Or maybe the enlightened asshole who thought that drinking beer in the college radio station everyday in lieu of going to class was the key to succeeding in an academic setting. I nearly managed to get out close to "on time" but not quite.

The buracracy of Brooklyn College hadn't quite caught up to my shitty grades in the spring of 2002. In fact, the Degree Audit department saw it fit to send me a congratulatory postcard on my upcoming graduation. A bit of a shock to me since I was absolutely certain I would fail a required physics course I was taking at the time. from the moment they accepted my application and approved me for admission, nothing Brooklyn College ever did made any sense. Add my graduation to that lengthy laundry list.

Decked out in hideous nylon burgundy robes and caps, the graduates were paraded out into the middle of the campus, sparing none of us the misery of the merciless humidity and sun. The graduation began in earnest and slowed to a cruel and screeching halt when members of graduating classes pre-dating WWII made their way down aisle. Participating in nothing less than a death march, these elderly ladies and gents moved at an unbearably slow pace towards the stage. I wondered why these poor souls were not living out the remainder of their years spending their social security checks on bingo and vitamin tonics. Maybe they couldn't let go of the past, the same way I have difficulty letting go of mine.

I had little patience for the formulaic valedictorian speech. She hit all the usual points:

Distinguished members of the faculty. Check. We'll always carry with us the memories of this truly special experience. Check. For good measure, she threw in a little caveat about taking control of life not burying your head in the sand like an ostrich, an oft repeated myth that has no foundation in truth. Dating back to my pre-kindergarten graduation where me and my fellow graduates fashioned caps out of paper bags, I was reminded that this brand of spectacle is never for the graduates. In pre-k, it was clearly for the parents. Pretty much the same for elementary, middle and high school. College graduation is for the college itself. The institution. Like a new line of luxury cars, fresh off of the assembly line, the graduates are products on display. Knowing this, I'm less than thrilled to be a part of it.

A year removed from 9/11/2001, the speeches were chock full of references to that sad day. Unfortunately, such oratory trends inevitably come off as forced and, for lack of a better adjective, hokey. I'd had about enough of it all when I decided to deploy the ace in my sleeve---or more to the point, the narcotics in my blazing hot robe. I removed an asthma inhaler from the pocket of my button down shirt, unscrewed the mouth piece and tapped three yellowish pills into my hand. Seated to my left was an old friend from the college radio station. We witnessed the unveiling of the meds and watched me swallow them, sans water. I don't think he blinked. Members of the radio station had watched me consume massive quantities of Robitussin over a two year span, so a few little pills was probably no cause for alarm.

I ended up feeling a bit cheated. The pills, a diet medication I pilfered from my father, had little or no effect on my state of mind. The speeches still sucked and I was still hot, bored and restless. A solitary common sense idea did pop into my head, very close to the end of the ceremony. Even though I was sitting in the middle of campus amongst a sea of hideous Burgundy Gowns of Success, I was a fraud. Deep down inside, I knew that I had probably failed the Physics class required to graduate. No sense in revealing that to my parents, though, since that would cost me a $200 graduation present and a fish and chips dinner at the local pub/restaurant.

About a week after the ceremony, my parents' mailbox started to become inundated with postcards from the college saying things like:

FINISH WHAT YOU STARTED
DON'T QUIT NOW

Whatever I told my mother to assuage her suspicions and paranoia, quite miraculously worked. Even a call home from my physics professor was explained to her as a personal congratulations for having passed his class. In actuality, Professor Bond phoned me with irrefutable proof that I had failed his class. His exact words?

"I think you ought to consider signing up for summer classes this semester."

The charade was kept up for about two years. Sufficient time had passed and I no longer felt threatened by post cards and calls from Brooklyn College faculty. My mother had long since abandoned her efforts to "see" the diploma. I simply told her that I was way too busy at my new job sending faxes at a white shoe law firm in Midtown to ever make the trek to Flatbush and pick it up.

I received a call from my mother one day in 2003. She invoked the mighty "we" in telling me that "We know you didn't graduate from college." Usually, "we" was just my mother, who always felt emboldened by the support of her imaginary backers. I'm not very good at lying on the fly so I produced a fairly lackluster acknowledgment of my wrongdoing and hung up the phone. Fuck.

Years in the making, my moment of undoing was swift and less than epic. My mother fancied herself a sleuth, so I'm sure she took some satisfaction in discovering my deception. News travels fast and my brother called me from Cleveland later in the day to express his concern and disappointment. My sister, according to him, had taken all of this especially hard, a bit of foreshadowing for things to come when I would move in with her a year and a half later. I'm sure my sister and I discussed this at some point. My brain has done me a wonderful service by filtering out the details of that encounter.

In 2008, I was gainfully employed and doing a rather commendable job of managing my finances. I had just finished paying off nearly $20,000 in credit card debt accumulated during my years of drinking and using. Back then, I spent recklessly and often, always hoping that some wealthy benefactor would rescue me from financial ignominy. That incredibly generous, well bankrolled tutelary saint never descended from the heavens to assume my financial woes. Thank god for that. One goal I held onto, even through the miseries of addiction and homelessness, was graduating from college. So I did it. I enrolled, suffered through a shortened semester of core geology, complete with a lecture hall full of know-it-alls and the obligatory field trip in freezing weather to Central Park to discover the great mysteries of our earth. Yawn.

Graduation this time around was satisfying. No academic ambiguity, although there was more than enough red tape to overcome. I donned the burgundy gown and lined up in a stifling hot hallway, nestled uncomfortably in the thick of hundreds of other graduates. A throng of latecomers looked very lost. They were urgently herded to their proper lineup spots by faculty volunteers. I smiled to myself, knowing full well what so many of the other graduates were painfully unaware of. The hand-holding. The free counseling from advisers. The retroactive "pass-fail" option (don't ask, it's a City University of New York thing). It all ends when the tassel changes sides and the cap makes a brief but triumphant trip skyward.

The real world can be a cruel beast. Heartbreak, sickness, death, unemployment and despair await you. If your lucky, you'll get healthy doses of love, success and hope. Hope, above all, is the catalyst for success and love. I fill my life with hope, even when I don't feel deserving of it. Hope negates the same kind of despair that swallowed me whole and led me down a path of self ruin. Don't ever give up or you might deny yourself the opportunity to do something you never thought you could.

The blahs?

2009-11-28T07:32:00.000-08:00

I'm not accustomed to feeling crappy for a sustained period of time. The great pontificators of brain science call this depression, eh? Well, I'm not that happiest guy ALL of the time, but I'm far from being a terminal mope, so take your depression DSMIV, and stuff if. I've got the blahs.

I can't believe it's already Saturday, which means Sunday is tomorrow and Monday lurks around the bend. Next week, I get to spend two days in Roseland, NJ (where the fuck is that?) getting training for our new payroll/hr system. About as exciting as it sounds, I suspect.

It's been a long time!

2009-11-08T10:13:00.000-08:00

Indeed. Not much in the way of newsworthy events have occurred in my life since I last posted an entry (way back in August). The evil auditors have returned to my job and will end up causing me much anxiety for the duration of their stay. I'm told that they will only be here for a week, but last time they stayed for over a month. I won't hold my breath, but I hope they do. Hold their breaths, that is. And pass out. And leave me alone.

Finances have been tight here in the Connor/Powell household. We took a huge hit in the wallet two months ago when our dog, Fox, decided that he would begin chewing his ass. He was so unrelenting with his grotesque hobby that he successfully managed to chew a hole in his ass, thereby causing an anal pocket to rupture. Yum. We ended up taking the poor baby to an emergency animal hospital in Forest Hills. Peace of mind and a healthy doggy are priceless, but anesthesia, flushing, antibiotics and pain killers are, sadly, not.

Approximately $700 dollars :(

Thank god Haley has something "like" overdraft fee protection with her Chase debit card. We did NOT have anything close to $700 in checking, but were able to overdraw. It cost us a $4o fee, but it was better than walking out of the animal hospital with a wounded pup.

I guess I do have something newsworthy to share: I finally took the CPE (CUNY Proficiency Exam) and I'm pretty sure I passed! I won't know for sure for about 10 weeks, but the test was relatively easy and as much of a slam dunk that a test designed to test basic reading and writing skills could be.

Speaking of barbecues

2009-08-30T06:44:00.000-07:00

Kristen...weren't we supposed to get together at some point during this summer? Our plans kept getting derailed and now the summer is almost over :(

Summer is over?

2009-08-30T06:41:00.000-07:00

Seriously. The Mets are only slightly better than the Washington Nationals. I have not attended a single Mets game or barbecue. Therefore, the summer of 2009 sucks.

The best of times

2009-08-01T08:39:00.000-07:00

I've decided that I need lazier weekends spent at home. Haley and I have been awfully busy the last few weeks. She with her schoolwork and with work work. The crazy weather we've had in New York City hasn't contributed anything meaningful to my precious downtime, either.

Seriously.

What the fuck is up with thunder and lightning storms every week. After 30 years of living in NYC, I feel like we are experiencing late April/early May weather. Doesn't make much sense.

It's audit season again at my job and accordingly, I can expect to be working later than usual and harder than normal. I don't like these audits. They don't seem to serve a practical purpose other than to enforce a hastily passed reform law, aka SOX. The whole SOX act created a lot of jobs and a bureaucratic beast. Thank you, Ken Lay. Thank you so very much for all of this.

I'm at a stage where I have begun re-evaluating my goals and career wants. I've been at my company for almost 3 years. I began as a temporary receptionist----->full time receptionist----> human resources coordinator. There is little doubt in my mind that I could achieve a higher position in my company, especially within HR. Recruiting doesn't particularly appeal to me anymore. It sounded like an awesome position a year ago, an opportunity to hone one's people skills. After studying the logistics of recruiting, I've concluded that it's really a sales position with bottom lines, quotas and other things I do not enjoy. HR generalist is an interesting discipline. You need to be very knowledgeable of labor and INS laws. From what I've gathered, the generalist is also a gatekeeper of personnel data, so there's a huge trend tracking component to the job. You also have to fire people. I would not enjoy that.

What do I like? I enjoy communicating with people. To do so in an academic setting would be ideal. One of my friends starting tutoring at a community college in Brooklyn about 2 years ago. He is now an adjunct lecturer. It's worth exploring this a bit more, but my goals are more in site than they have ever been.

Now back to the regular scheduled program, Ryan sits on his ass and does nothing.

You are out there

2009-07-28T18:07:00.000-07:00

Who among us can lay claim to a truly purposeful existence? I know "purpose" is subjective and some may argue that the pauper who sleeps on the concrete in tattered clothes, stewing in his own excrement has great purpose: depending on our reaction, he can cause us to identify with our fear of poverty, confirm our ignorance of Reis' other half or pay him to assuage our guilt.

I question my own purpose and place on this earth. A lot. I have a great job, wonderful co-workers, a good boss who tries very hard to make my position a meaningful one. Sometimes it's just not enough. Is my purpose in life to guide volumes of paperwork into a filing cabinet and await a stipend with gleeful anticipation? Ask yourself this question, because I do all the time:

Are you out there?

Flea market circus

2009-07-12T11:09:00.000-07:00

This weekend went by super quick. I'm spoiled by working in an industry which allows its employees to take off every other Monday or Friday in the summer. Paid in full. Of course, the surefire torment provided by a weekend commute to Long Island makes the whole "summer Fridays" thing a little less rewarding.

Haley and her mom had a garage sale this weekend and garnered some well-earned coin. $2,270 to be exact. Apparently, this annual garage sale has taken on mythic dimensions since so many of the buyers remarked that they came because of last year's great sale. I still can't get over that figure. $2,270! I never made anything close to that at my own sales, (stoop sales in Brooklyn, since garages are a rarity where I grew up) perhaps because I never had quality merchandise to pawn off on deep pocketed individuals. Still, some of the stuff at Haley's sale was SHIT and yet, it sold.

I was somewhat raised in the sad circus that is the flea market business. When I was around 8 years old, my mother became to general manager of the P.S. 321 flea market. I think she only held that title for 1 year, but for 365 days, my mother showed up at my elementary school every weekend, ready to shuffle vendors around, listening to them complain and always making sure they weren't selling porn. I think she got paid $100 a weekend to do that.

I'm not really resentful that my mother kind of raised my brother and I at the flea market. I abhorred the walk from our apartment to the market, which was always prolonged by my mother ogling stoop sale advertisements posted to lampposts. Some of the regular vendors at the flea market were nice people, but most were creepy flea market lifers. Like Terry, the strange woman who always wore straw hats and insisted on kissing me and my brother. Gross. I wonder if my mother let her do that because she assumed those slimy, old lady kisses would result in a bargained down price on an antique clock.

There was also Minet, the 70+ year old drag queen who wore women's clothes and a fake orange wig underneath a cabby hat. For no prejudicial reasons whatsoever, Minet creeped me out much like clowns with shaved heads, little hats and macabre makeup give some people the willies. Minet called everyone "darling" and "honey" and walked with the urgency of a dehydrated turtle. I remember when Minet died (long after my Mom gave up her GM duties) and the flea market created a pictorial tribute to him in the schoolyard. Worst schoolyard poster ever.

Freed from her responsibilities as flea market GM, my mother began dragging me and my brother to stoop sales. Given the fact that my mother had a bad leg, we were sent ahead to stoop sales as advance scouts. "Go! Grab anything you think I would like. You know my style." With our directives clear, me and brother would dart up the block and grab items that looked as old as my mother. Uh huh. Who wouldn't forfeit an entire morning of watching Saturday cartoons for THAT kind of fun?

When I hit 12 years of age, my mother made a last ditch attempt to keep us going to the sales with her. She proclaimed my brother and I unfit to be alone with one another in the apartment. She seemed to believe we were violent towards one another and that we could not be trusted to conduct ourselves in a mature manner in absence of her superior guidance. Since she occasionally tape recorded us with a mico-cassette recorder hidden in a shoe, our efforts to portray ourselves as saintly practitioners of virtue were generally disregarded as lies. Because my brother was older, I got stuck going to the sales with my mother for one more year.

The flea market circus taught me a lot. With few job prospects in my early teens, I started selling my own personal items at illegal stoop sales (can't have an actual stoop sale with no stoop) in front of my apartment. Never made more than $200, but that's striking oil at age 15. The sales were a necessity since my parents rarely forked over cash to me. The experience of my dad being on strike from the airlines for 3 years made my folks fiercely protective of cash. They always tried to instill a sense of responsibility in me. It worked all the way until college when I signed up for a gasoline card in exchange for a "free" bag of M&Ms and ended up $20,000 in debt 10 years later.

I miss the circus sometimes. It was the one thing my mother, with no reservations, looked forward to each and every week. I'm sure to some degree, she appreciated my companionship at those sales. It's awfully strange when you get nostalgic about things you used to hate. I'll try and imagine Minet so I can make the feeling go away.

Melt

2009-07-10T04:45:00.000-07:00

I've eaten way too much over the last 2 years. Not too long ago (approx. 1 month) I began a high protein, lower carbohydrate diet. It's nothing suspiciously restrictive like Mr. Atkins. Instead, this diet I'm on encourages one to eat 6 times a day so the body does not go into starvation mode and begin storing calories. I love eating, so 6 meals a day is very appealing.

At least 2 of the meals are these high protein Myoplex shakes. My other meals are "raw" protein (low fat chicken, turkey, etc.) and veggies. In one month, I've lost about 23 lbs. Getting a reaction out of co-workers, who remember me just a couple of months ago when I was using my rotund frame to gain leverage against the evil vending machine that was trapping my Pop Tarts, is nice. Fitting into clothes I haven't been able to wear for years is a huge plus.

I'll let my true intentions for writing this entry be known: I need healthy recipes.

Anyone gots?

Fear

2009-06-22T19:23:00.000-07:00

The subject of fear came up in therapy the other day. It was the first time in nearly 2 years of being in therapy that it was ever mentioned. The focus of much of my therapy has been on recovery & sobriety, but the topic of fear finally surfaced. I can't recall exactly how it came up, but it got me thinking about my fears - some irrational, some funny, some paralyzing- and how it can take over one's life. That said, I will address several of my fears at this time for no other reason than documenting them:
Home Invasion: When I was a kid, there was this one ADT home security system commercial that scared the fucking shit out of me. It featured three criminals; a menacing black burglar ("I know when you're home and when you're not!"), a junkie cat burglar ("I can pick most locks with a credit card.") and finally, the Latino lurker (It was easy. They didn't even know we was in the house.") I'm least scared by junkie cat burglar. He's not a physically imposing figure and his claim of being able to pick most locks with a credit card is absurd. Motherfucker, if you can pick a deadbolt with a Visa card, I will gladly give you my shit. The black burglar looked like he could bend Bo Jackson into a pretzel and he knows my schedule. Scary. Latino burglar frightened me more than the other two combined. He's just walking behind my house while I'm watching TV, filling up a sack with electronics and other valuables. Years of watching Rescue 911, America's Most Wanted and Unsolved Mysteries did not help me overcome this fear.

This is a semi-rational fear that loses validity when I tell you that I include cockroaches in the "home invader" category. The roaches and I have an understanding that they can have any other apartment in the building if they leave mine alone. Sometimes they break this sacred contract and I freak out when I see one. Not because I fear their strange, alien little bodies. I just know there are many more where that one crawled out from.

Balloons Popping: The fear of balloons is known as globophobia. Fear of loud sounds is called ligyrophobia. I'm not afraid of balloons and I'm not afraid of all loud sounds. I'm terrified of balloons popping. I can never have children because they will expect parties with balloons and I can never accommodate them. I'm a bad, balloon-fearing daddy. This fear may be rooted in an early childhood incident when Andrew Montemorano, a kindergarten bully, purposefully missed a swing at a donkey pinata and struck me in the head with a souvenir size wooden bat. All I remember was a flash of light and the sound of the pinata exploding a few seconds later. Maybe Andrew thought I had better candy encased in my skull. Or maybe he was just a sociopath. Wondering what the connection is here? That pinata was once a balloon. True story.

Lightning: Professional golfer Lee Trevino was twice struck by lightning on the golf course. There is nothing scarier than a random bolt of electricity landing a few feet from the place in which you stand. Actually, being Lee Trevino is scarier.

Leaving New York City: I'm not going anywhere anytime soon. However, the day may come when opportunities abound elsewhere and I will set sail for fonder pastures. That scares me. I have a big time comfort zone in New York. I attribute all of my success to living in and making it in New York City. Even in the most punishing economic climates, I've forgiven New York for not providing me with work and ample shelter. I'm a sucker for this city, but I know I can make it outside its boundaries.

Breaking My Beak: That would fucking hurt. I'm a bleeder.

Being Alone: Other people, places and things do not define me. But my quality of life would be severely diminished without my girlfriend, cats and dog. I enjoy occasional solitude but loneliness with no end in sight scares me. I'm mindful of how lucky I am and the thought of losing that is, at times, too much to bear.

Well, there are just a few things that scare the bajeezus out of me. There are more, but these will do for now. What scares you?

I will never graduate

2009-06-15T18:03:00.001-07:00

Kristen can testify that I have awful blog color schemes. I'm in need of compassionate intervention when I choose the layouts for my blogs. Way back in 1999-2000, when I first started a blog on Diaryland, Kristen gently told me that my purple colors hurt her eyes. Since she was my only reader, I felt obliged to change it to something less...purpley.

No one told me that my current blog colors sucked fucking ass. Not even Kristen. Boo. Not even Haley, who up until last week, had paint samples taped to our living room wall to aid her in her plight to make our apartment look less like a granny flat. Thanks ladies.

In college news, Brooklyn College is royally fucking me over YET AGAIN. After finally finishing up my last class and going through an arduous and time consuming process to reclaim one of my grades, I thought I was at the finish line. I didn't care much about walking in the graduation ceremony. The last time I walked, I needed 4 Meridia diet pills smuggled in an inhaler to get me through that mess. I'm not sure if they would have let me walk since BC has crazy rules about people never participating in a graduation ceremony twice.

But hey, BC has different standards when it comes to fucking people over again and again and again with their grades. This time, I must prove to the registrar that each of the four film genre courses I took covered a different genre. Why is it incumbent upon me to provide THEM with this evidence? Can't they look in a fucking bulletin and find the classes that they programmed?

GRRRRRRRRRRRRRR

2009-05-26T19:51:00.000-07:00

I spent the better part of the last two years getting myself out of debt. I could not have achieved this feat without three things:

1) My girlfriend

2) GreenPath

3) Job

I'm glad that my nightmare is somewhat over. I get a full paycheck now and even though my credit score is an absolute mess, it's steadily improving with time. One detour I recently encountered on the road to credit recovery was a delinquent payment for a hospital visit. What really bothers me is that I had been in the emergency room of this hospital (Long Island College Hospital) two months prior to the visit in question and paid my bill on time.

I had absolutely no intention of not paying my hospital bill. Rather, I moved shortly after this visit and started getting my mail forwarded to my new apartment. I never received a final notice for my hospital bill; just a cheap looking collections notice from some rinky dink collection agency that looks like it was typed using Jessica Fletcher's typewriter.

Did I fuck up? Sure I did. I didn't perform diligence and follow up on my bill. Still, the fact that LICH put my bill into collections so soon after my stay will make me think twice before considering going there again.

Pussy

2009-05-09T22:49:00.000-07:00

Uh huh. Haley and I purchased this fine little piece of retro craftsmanship from Amazon.com. We figured that while universe is content to provide us with 48 degree weather and May, we'll forgo an air conditioner until exactly what fucking season we are in gets sorted out. I found a nice little spot for the fan (made by Hunter) right next to my window. Imagine my surprise when I woke up later that night to a strange sound and a rather disturbing sight: blue sparks shooting out from the back of the fan.

What made this even scarier was that the fan was placed in front of the window that leads to the fire escape. I know it's just a little fan and I'm blowing this somewhat out of proportion, but you never know. The fuckers at Hunter are going to get a letter or something to that effect.

Since Haley is away for the first time in ages this weekend, I decided to reacquaint myself with shitty horror movies on In Demand. Quarantine is fitting the bill quite nicely.

Around an hour ago, I heard some glass shatter and immediately, a chorus of windows in the courtyard opened up and all eyes were upon a drunken Irishman. One tenant began to chastise the man, to which drunken Irishman responded in a whiskey affected brogue, "I live here, ye pussy!" Nice!!! Let's call the people who are trying to sleep and aren't drunk "pussies" and mimic your neighborly invectives. You give Lucky Charms a bad name, sir.

When the cops showed up, they launched into a comical Keystone routine, investigating the ground in the courtyard adjacent to ours. "Pussy" yelled out to the cops from his apartment, directing them to the location of the shattered glass. There must have been 12 cops in the courtyard. I heard one of the cops say that a tenant told him that the drunken Irishman was actually our super.

Getting up there

2009-04-12T07:37:00.000-07:00

There's a big silver lining to turning 30. Once I get there (it's a month away) it will be done. I fretted and frowned about that less than magical number since turning 25. The day after that birthday, I found something terrifying about being closer to 30 than 20. My fear has waned significantly over the years, mostly because I really don't care. The aesthetic-conscious narcissist in me doesn't give a shit. I look okay for my age. It's not as if I'm supposed to look a certain way at 29, but most of my friends who are the same age have grays, are going bald and look like 30 came 5 years too early.

That the narcissist, by the way.

From a maturity perspective, I have grown immeasurably and in a way that I would not want to turn back the clock under any circumstances. Sometimes I miss being unabashedly goofy and writing about stupid shit that I did under the influence of cold medicine. Sometimes? Rarely. I don't miss it at all.

I don't miss being a completely self absorbed little prick and feeling a sense of entitlement to toy with the emotions of others.

I don't miss staying up for 4 straight days because I couldn't keep my promise of "Just one more bottle/line/pill."

I don't miss being a really unreliable fuck who no one could depend on or place an ounce of trust in.

I don't miss any of the elements of my undoing.

Every time I pass by a liquor store, I laugh with a sense of defiance. My days of shrinking in the presence of my former cathedral are gone.

If losing my hair, getting fatter and going gray are requirements for getting older, so be it. I accept those changes. I embraces my 30s with open arms.

The war is over.

Why is it so difficult?

2009-04-11T08:27:00.000-07:00

Can't seem to keep up with a blog these days. I look back at my old Diaryland journal and apparently, I derived much joy and happiness from trivial things.

Stale air

2009-02-21T14:21:00.001-08:00

Not since 1985, when a fabled Cape Verde type hurricane named Gloria swept through New York, have I been hospitalized with asthma or breathing difficulties. I suppose this past Tuesday was the every 20+ year exception.

I've been sick a lot over the last 4 months. In early November, I woke up one morning with a severe case of diarrhea and nausea. After completely emptying my stomach out and being unable to vomit or shit anything else, Haley got a little tired of my guttural dry heaves and convinced me to visit the emergency room of Long Island College Hospital. Luckily, LICH is right next door to our apartment. Seeing as I was not capable of doing much more than making the "I'm going to puke now" face, the hospital's proximity to my toilet was a good thing.

On account of having thrown up in excess of 4 hours and over ten times, I was fast tracked to the emergency room. Many IVs later and I was replenished and released, probably to the delight of Aetna.

In December, I developed a thrush infection on my tonsils that was so severe, my dentist made me get it checked out by a doctor before doing a procedure on my gums. It finally went away for good a couple of weeks ago.

My breathing problems began last Monday night, right before going to bed. Labored breathing normally doesn't affect me because it's par for the course with asthma. You just take a little puff of an inhaler and you're good as new. On Monday, I must have used my inhaler 10 times and it did little to alleviate my asthma symptoms. How I made it through work and then therapy on Tuesday is a mystery to me. I got home and let Haley know that I needed to go to LICH.

Did I mention that I haven't been to the hospital with asthma in over 20 years? Yeah. The ER nurse hands me some contraption and I just shrug.

"You've never used one of these??"

"No" It's a nebulizer, she tells me, and it's going to help me breathe again. Awesome.

Then she thrusts some kazoo-looking thing at my lips, again, under the assumption that I know what it is. This one is called a peak flow meter and it measures the force of your breath. Normal is 450. I blow 150. She tells me I'm going to need "the pipe." That's the little pet name they give the nebulizer. In a pulmonic sense, I felt ostracized by my meager knowledge of these instruments.

Two and a half hours later, I was discharged with a considerably clearer chest. They put me on Prednisone, a kind of steroid. Now I'm moody, restless and bored.

The medicine can be worse than the disease, can't it?

2009-01-24T07:06:00.000-08:00

On November 24th of this year, a high school/college acquaintance shuffled off the mortal coil by way of plummeting from the Brooklyn Bridge into the frigid waters of the East River. I'm so disconnected from actual people who I knew from certain periods of my life, it's only fitting that I found out about Alex' death by reading someone's RIP status on Facebook. What led him to that moment is most certainly a mystery that will not be answered anytime soon. In fact, I may never be privy to those answers, should they be discovered, as I was not a member of his inner circle. Not in 2008, anyway. From what I gather, Alex spent the better part of the final years of his life in a perpetual haze of intoxication, clouded judgement and a blatant disregard for a human being's limitations. He left behind a little daughter and lots of confusion.

They found his body a few days ago, but again, the details have been sparse and slow coming in.

Blahg!

2009-01-01T08:47:00.000-08:00

I really hope that this is the last fucking blogging platform I ever need to use. I began blogging back in 1999, before it was even called blogging. The good old days of dial up and Diaryland. You had to wait good and long to produce an utterly trivial piece of crap that 15 people saw fit to comment on. Then, you would read their crap and egos were massaged and all was right with the world.
When people left Diaryland, I followed them to Livejournal. Then Myspace. Facebook. And now Blogger.com. I think James has a blog somewhere. Let me go find it.