Things Old and New

I'll be starting a new job in a couple of weeks and in the mean time, I'll be trying to extend some of the older stuff I've written to be useful for the podcast I'm helping out with. Things are getting better. Slowly but steadily. Hopefully the trend continues. In the mean time, I've still got a decent selection of wine and I found out that the Foodland I normally go to carries my current drink of the month, Bushmills.

Red Wine

I've been doing more writing lately than I normally do. Some of it, as I described earlier (below) is for something new I might get into doing, but a lot of it lately has been for speech and debate. I'm still in the process of trying to revise my old sets of notes. Make corrections for things like grammar and generally update them. I'm about half way done. I got a few of them done while I was on vacation in Kona in December, but there's still a bunch more to do. I've also been writing new notes as the new topics come out. I'm not sure how much time I'll have for this if/when I start working for Pacific LightNet which I hope happens fairly soon. I also came to the realization that I have four different blogs, three of which demand at least a little time. This one in particular is something I want to keep up with for myself.

The fuel that keeps the fire burning for most of these is (lately) wine. If I drink Bushmills I get lazy, but wine is the nice balance between inspiration and motivation that keeps the creativity flowing for the random thoughts and internet blog and keeps me in check enough to post coherent things here. I don't normally like dependency and I fear that's what this is becoming. I used to drink quite a bit when I was younger, not that I'm particularly aged now, but I cut back for a while. I don't drink a whole bunch now, but it's at least more than I used to. Writing the last set of debate notes (on use of eminent domain) I ended up going through a whole bottle of cabernet. Thankfully I still have a decent bottle of syrah for the rest of my editing. And yes, if it comes down to it, I have a few bottles of the hard stuff should I get writers block. Though it does make me wonder if inspiration comes from the liver and maybe I just need to give it a kick start and get it working before I can get some good stuff on paper.

Podcast writing

On an random whim, I emailed one of my random thoughts to the guys who do the podcast Pacific Coast Hellway (www.pacificcoasthellway.com) and after a bit of a conversation they want me to consider writing for the show regularly. Seems like kind of a neat opportunity. Most of my shit just sits around anyway, someone might as well put it to use. Oddly the only commonality to most of it is that it was induced/inspired by alcohol.

Maybe I'll get a coffe mug or a t-shirt or something out of it. I've already given them permission to use whatever I have written and posted online. There's supposedly some interest in an old rant of mine. Kind of nifty. I suppose it's one more thing positive. Hopefully it'll be a fun, or at least entertaining thing to do.

Self Defeat

Lately I’ve been drinking more. Not considerable amounts, nor enough that I’ve gotten drunk, but something like a couple of glasses of wine or a highball full of Bushmills (I’d be drinking Glen Morangie if I wasn’t on a budget). It helps me relax; it gets me into a more creative mood. For example I was writing debate notes this morning. I had maybe half a bottle of wine. The notes are done by any means, but they’re easier to write and of better quality when I’ve had something to drink. I’m not entirely sure if this is a psychological or a physiological effect. I’d like to think the latter, but it’s probably a mix of both.

Anyhow, the only problem with drinking is that it also makes me think. The neurons seem to fire faster in my head. I can make connections easier, and go through topics much quicker. Normally this would be a good thing but it also makes me think about a number of different random things. For example, for no particular reason, I diverged from thinking about eminent domain today (the topic of the notes I was writing) and got to thinking about Renell and Ryen again. At the moment I’m stuck thinking angry thoughts, wishing I had enough spine to have been the one to cut it off earlier. I like to image that it would have hurt less. Oh well, I suppose. It’s just one of many an opportunity lost in the name of trust and love.
The crazy thing about the drinking is that it feels like coming home. That might seem strange, but it’s like returning to a place I know. It’s not necessarily just a comfort thing, but I know that’s part of it. It just feels normal. I feel better with a slight buzz running, than without. I feel more capable, more productive, more constructive. And yet, I know it’s not something I should be doing. I guess without any external motivation for self control, I turn to self defeat

I Did a Stupid Thing Today

It’s been a while since I’ve posted. In large part because things have been busy and pretty much okay. Not great, but tolerable. Today however, I once again have the urge to spend the next few hours drunk off my ass. Unfortunately I have a job interview tomorrow, or I’d spend the next few days drunk off my ass.

As with so many others this is a convoluted story. I’ve gotten to see Ryen a few times in the past couple of weeks which is nice. Once I find work, it’ll probably be a normal work week and since Renell works on the weekends and won’t let me take Ryen without herself being present I should be enjoying this time with him as much as possible. When she left, seeing Ryen was supposed to be something we’d mutually plan and at least schedule. Lately, it’s been at the last minute when it’s convenient for her. This is normally okay as my schedule is somewhat flexible. Today was no different. Well, let’s step back for a second

Yesterday I worked for about half the day before I had an eye appt. at Kuakini at 1:30 PM. Depending on what they need to do this could be relatively quick or take a long fucking time. In this case, they were backed up so I didn’t leave the office until 4 PM. Now I was supposed to have met Ryen and Renell after my appt. because she was going to bring him in to school which is right down the street from Kuakini. They were running late so she decided not to bring him in to school. Okay fine, but we were still going to meet after the eye appt. because she was supposed to get some information from me regarding what I paid for his preschool so she could submit it to CSEA (along long story involving the fact that she never reported any of the money I’ve given to her directly instead of through the child support agency, thus causing the state to say I owe them some crazy amount of money, which I don’t). As they’re getting ready to leave the house (in Ewa) Ryen takes a fall down some stairs and she freaks out. The kid is shocked but pretty much okay. No bruises, nothing big, just a spill down some stairs and he’s running around after a little break. So they get delayed which again wouldn’t be a problem because my eye appt. is running late anyway. So she decides to still come into town so she can get the check data and I can spend some time with Ryen. They walk out the door and she locks all her keys inside the house. So now she’s locked outside the house without keys to the car or the house. Genius. So that cancel’s that trip. Again, not a big deal. I got a nice walk home from Nu’uanu. But annoying none the less.

Today was another last minute deal, she brought the kid into town because she had signed up to read to his class. After she was done reading they came by my apartment and we took the kid to Fun Factory. He enjoys it. So we find out way, after a missed turn and a couple of wrong lanes, to Market City, where we spend 20 minutes in a craft store where Ryen’s getting antsy and I’m losing time that could be spend doing something that either involves the kid or involves getting something productive done. This started to annoy me but fine, shrug it off, because at least I get to spend some time with Ryen. We go through Fun Factory, which is honestly a place I don’t really tend to like much anyway. It’s usually noisy and I go because Ryen enjoys it. Renell likes it, because she ends up playing the games to win him tickets. I pretty much just follow him around and put tokens in machines (or in this case, swipe cards) and collect any tickets he wins. That whole deal is also tolerable. Afterwards we try to find someplace to eat. Again keeping in mind it’s supposed to be about Ryen, we ask where he wants to eat, he says Zippy’s but they don’t have one there, or close by. Se she decides on Gina’s which is Korean food. Okay fine. She decides on a mini family pack which was supposed to be “less than two plates” but ended up costing me just about $20. As we’re waiting for the food to come we try to find some seats. The tables have three seats on either side of a long table. So here comes the part where I did something stupid. Now it’s pretty hard to share a mean across three people, so it makes sense to have one person sit on the other side of the table. She’s not going to feed him so I figure I’d sit next to him and she’d sit on the other side. She disagreed and started giving me shit. So I left. I walked out of the place and walked home. I didn’t say goodbye to Ryen, I just said, “See you later” to both of them and walked out.

Thinking about Faith (not that kind) and trust.

I've lately been trying to catch up and keep up with different threads in the news. Abranoff and this whole scandal, Ariel Sharon, the chubby Jew with two chick names and his HMO, lots of different stuff. I've succeeded in some of it, but not much. I'd love to spend a bunch of time really thinking it all through, but the more I look into things the more disconcerted I feel about a lot of things. I have lost faith in people, in society. I have lost faith in the things I do not trust and trust takes time to build but only seconds to destroy.

There's a (moderate) conservative by the name of David Brooks, for those of you not familiar he writes for The Atlantic Monthly, which is one of the better magazines and one of the few that I'm actually willing to spend money on (2600, is the only other one off the top of head even thought I get about half a dozen magazines each week). I'm usually both surprised and relatively impressed by his thoughtfulness on subjects. Sometimes I think that sensitivity to detail and logistics is lost in mindless support of, as he put it on Charlie Rose this evening, his "team." But there is a centrist view there that I know I support and I think would gain considerable following. Neither of the two dominant sides has strong trust or backing by the American people, nor does either side have any trust in the other to do the right thing.

If we face herein a culture war, it should be between those willing to offer a hand in faith, and an arm in support of compromise and cooperation. This "third way" is what made Clinton a pimp. Not the Lewinsky thing, that just made him, kind of skanky. It is the ability to look objectively at both sides and recognize that each philosophical foundation has valuable lessons and valuable ideas that can be used if both sides are willing to honestly work together in good faith with one another. It shouldn't be a surprise that in a nation with a stupid high divorce rate that our leaders look at the other side and thing "fuck I should have gotten a political prenup." I would support McCain if he ran because he looks objectively and sees the value in the other side. I would support Hillary because I believe she holds the same view. If it came to the two of them, I'd pick Hillary because in the end 1) She's a Clinton, 2) McCain is getting on in his years and I would have a hard time believing in his abilities to serve two terms effectively 3) I don't know who he would be able to pick from for a VP that I could support whereas with Hillary I can think of a number of different moderates 4) Hillary sent me a bumper sticker and I get bought very easily and 5) In the end, I see more moderate democrats than moderate Republicans and believe that the ability of those people to govern and govern effectively would be carried out easier under a moderate second Clinton Presidency.

What does any of this mean? Jack shit, I'm just trying to keep busy while the laptop I'm working on fixing right now does a virus scan and downloads updates.

It's been a long day, a long week and shit, I'm only half a month in, but it's been a long year so far. I'm tired. I'm tired of not being able to trust of have faith in those around me, I'm tired of not having faith or trust in the society I am a part of, I'm tired of thinking that so far, the highlight of my day is Guinness in a chilled stein.

What Fucking Day Is It?

Okay, I think technically it's Tuesday but fuck that. I say it's not tomorrow until the sun comes up.

It's been a long couple of days. I had some papers to go through so I haven't slept since something like Friday. I meant to try and get some sleep but then Renell brought Ryen over so I was up. Now I just can't seem to go sleep. Oh well. Insomnia is back. Alcohol consumption seems to be pretty regular. Ah bad habits die hard.

Thursday Ups and Downs

Fuck glasses. And I’m not talking about the kind for seeing; I’m talking about the kind for drinking out of. There is a fine bottle of Sonoma Chardonnay sitting on my desk right now and quite frankly, if I don’t finish off the bottle tonight, I’m officially a pussy.

Today was a somewhat productive day. I got a little work done and managed to get to spend the evening watching a movie. I went to see The Weather Man which surprisingly fits my current mood and mental state VERY well. It’s a dark comedy, lots of dry humor, plus Nicholas Cage dressed as Abe Lincoln fucking a woman dressed as either a German barmaid or something like that, an actually camel toe (as in the animal part, but with many references to the slang term) and “implied pedophilia” for which it partly earned its R rating. I’m not sure of the particular message that was trying to be conveyed as there was a lot of shit going on in the movie, but there were a few good things to take home from it. I’d like to drop a few quotes in from the movie, but quite frankly can’t remember them verbatim at the moment. When I get some time I’ll add them I suppose.

In the mean time I also once again reaffirmed that I have a tendency to be the one who listens way to fucking often and have the tendency to be the shoulder that gets leaned on or perhaps more accurately, the foot that gets stepped on which generally has the tendency of making me feeling more the like the shit that gets stepped in. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing and it’s a role I often have put myself into. Just that, like David in Anger Management or David in The Weather Man I’d be a nice box to break out of.

The prompt for all of this? Another (thankfully shorter) conversation with the ex and the continued realization that sometimes in life, shit happens and the things you thought you wanted? Sometimes you just have to chuck ‘em. Cheers all and may the gods of grapes smile upon you.

Busy Tues....oh and USC can suck it.

Tues. was quite busy. I spent most of the day up at Kam helping the speech people and spent the latter part of the afternoon/early part of the evening trying to get Walter's computer up and running. it's got some spyware issues. I have some time to work on it as they left this morning (Wed.) for California. Anyhow, it was nice to feel relatively productive again, even if it was largely sitting around doing very little.

And the Rose Bowl game just ended with Texas beating USC by three points. Oh well.

A Thank You, Insomnia and Music

I once again can’t find myself asleep and I was thinking again. I want to say thank you to someone who helped me through the period in which I was feeling self destructive. Lately the slump I’ve been in is because I didn’t have that same positive light around. I’m not sure whether she reads this, I doubt it, but if you do, thank you. For trying to get me to stop internalizing shit, for trying to get me to think a little more freely, for trying to remind me that sometimes the random and the improvised is the best. I hope your New Year brings you peace, happiness, joy and love. I remain in your debt. I also have a belated Christmas present for you.

Sleep is an odd thing, I suppose. I was up late last night (well early Sun. morning really) and I slept in on Sunday, which I’m sure is part of the reason why I can’t fall asleep tonight, but I have a bunch of stuff to do on Monday. I have to head off to CompUSA in the morning (I think they open at 9) to pick up some network stuff. I thought I had a spare wireless router around here for my dad, turns out it was a regular wired router, but CompUSA has a wireless on sale for $3 after rebate, so I’m going to go pick up one of those. I also have to submit a few forms and fill out some other forms and get some other bullshit work done in the morning. I’ve made some plans for Tuesday to help out at Kam then go over and fix Walter’s computer and/or network depending on which it is that’s broken, so I want to get all this done before then.

Lastly and someone more appropriately since It’s been recurring, my digital music collection is growing and I’m quite happy. There’s a lot of great music out there if you know where to find it. At the moment, I’ve got iTunes mixing a bunch of songs, everything from Joe Purdy to Edwin McCain and Eva Cassidy to Kelly Clarkson (who by the way has an amazing voice for rock music). I’ve come to realize that I have a very odd taste in music. I have a remake here of the song Straight Outta Compton done as a folk song by Nina Gordon and a song called Rewind that I’ve been playing a lot lately by a band called Granian, I’ve got instrumental by Bernie Williams (as in MLB Yankee Centerfielder and classically trained guitarist) and blues from Robert Cray. The only common theme among the songs is that they all carry some message (even the instrumental). The message varies but for the most part it’s all got a nice story to tell and I appreciate that.  That is part of what makes the thank you above meaningful to me. There was a time that I needed someone to help me write part of the song and help me tell the story and I appreciate that effort. Gracci.

It's The Small Things That Count

It might seem kind of stupid, but my watch band broke the day before I left for Kona. The whole time I was there I didn’t have my watch. I didn’t get a replacement band for it until the day after I got back to Honolulu. The catch was that the pins that came with the band didn’t quite fit properly so I didn’t actually get the new watch band on until this evening. So for about the past two weeks I haven’t had my watch. Normally I would have been agitated enough to fix it, but I’ve been getting by with my cell phone. Still it’s nice to have my watch back. It’s almost like a small restoration of normalcy. Now yes, it’s stupid, but the small things like this count.

Other little things matter too. I drank too much on New Years Eve and stayed up far too late into the morning of the first drinking what will hopefully be the last of my tequila for the year. I saw another sunrise, though I was buzzing enough that by the time I saw it, it didn’t depress me nearly as much as seeing another sunrise normally would.

On another positive note, I think I finally have my uncle’s computer running stable again. Seems like it might also have a faulty power supply, so I want to run a stress test on it, leave it running for a day or two, but at the very least everything is back to normal. Interesting though, between my neighbor, my friends and my family, I’ve done quite a bit of pro bono work since I’ve been back from Kona. Well sort of pro bono, I generally ended up doing it for meals and drink so I guess it’s not totally free and I’m happy.

Meanwhile the job search continues and I have a few more places to drop a resume at. I’ve heard back from a couple and some leads look relatively promising, I guess I’m just tired of working for myself. The flexible schedule is nice, but the benefits suck, and the retirement plan leaves much to be desired (

Resolutions

I resolve this year to stop smoking when I get really stressed. In the past two years I’ve smoked a total of maybe two packs. But most of them have been in the past two months because I picked up Renell’s bad habits when I get really stressed. It’s not so bad that I need to smoke when I get stressed, just that it, like alcohol, temporarily relieves some of the stress. It’s a stupid habit, it’s literally burning money and it’s a resolution I can keep so what the hell, why not?

I resolve to stop feeling sorry for myself. I’m not even sure if that’s the right way to word it. I don’t so much feel sorry for myself as feel like I’d be happier if I knew that Renell was miserable, or at least as depressed as I feel. I know that seems petty but at this point I’d feel better if she felt like shit too. Since I don’t see that happening soon it doesn’t do much good for me to get pissy over things I can’t change or resolve. So sometime in the near future I’m going to have to let go. Easier said than done I suppose

I resolve to stop drinking tequila. Between the triple shot I had at midnight and the beer afterwards, holy shit, man I need to stop drinking. I mean I should stop drinking in general, but we’ll start with tequila because I felt that quite a bit more than anything else and it wasn’t fun. Triple shot, blah blah blah, yeah, Happy New Year, but damn I need to go back to my normal mode of occasionally having a glass of wine, or Guinness with dinner, rather than the mode I find myself in currently which is closer to having a shot for breakfast.