Stupid Test

I hate these tests, that's why you have to go through more effort to get to it. HAHAHAHA!

Approaching Death

Pilot-types may have a different meaning for AD, but I think my version is better.

So yes, Sup, I may as well be dead…

I’ve been working on a project at work to avoid an AD at all costs, which has resulted in quite a bit of overtime. In fact I just got back from work (it’s almost 6pm on a Sunday).

Add that to the other big project, and the infinite other little things that try to steal my attention, and I don’t have very much brain power left at my disposal.

That’s why I got my Dell Axim; it does all my remembering for me. And it does it in style. What little brain power I have left I am using to try to figure out the complexity that is Linux. I’m using Red Hat 7.3 right now (because that was an arbitrarily simple number to remember, and I have a book that references it often). As soon as I get comfortable with the commands and intricacies that is RH, I will upgrade to a newer version (now called Fedora), or a different distribution (I’m thinking Debian).

To continue my random typing:

I have just recently realized I am the coolest person I know! This came about from talking to a friend who randomly called me a couple weeks ago (this is his normal style, complete randomness…).
But I must go back a little:
About three years ago, while in school, this nameless individual and I decided it would extremely sweet to make our own Root Beer. We searched the Internet for the perfect recipe, and once found set out on a Quest for those ingredients.
Upon locating and procuring such ingredients, we headed back to my room to brew some Roots. This sounds easy enough, if a full kitchen with stove and sink are available; however, we happened to be living in a residence which technically didn’t allow heat of any kind. So we locked the door and proceeded to light my camping stove.
I shall save you the gruesomeness that is the mess we created that night; it took the rest of the semester to clean it up…and I’m sure the carpet is still stained…
We let it sit about a week (that’s about all the patience we had), and cracked open the bottle to taste our sweet, sweet, nectar of the demi-gods. It was horrible! We were able to con several other members of the residence to try some, and they all chocked (that part was actually pretty funny…). We had hoped for a sweet, sasafrass, juniper berry, sugary perfectness with a side of alcohol (we used natural carbonation). Instead we got a nasty soup of I don’t know what.

But it got my wheels turning, and hanging out with a Homebrewer that summer and the next didn’t help any.

In about April, I brewed my first batch of real Beer. After waiting the prerequisite month (my patience has grown a little), I cracked open a bottle. It was good! Damn Good! I rock! I proceeded to brew another batch as I drank the first. And to drink the second as I made the third, and so on.

Everybody seemed to like it; even that girl of several previous posts.

It was somewhere around batch 4 that my little brother got engaged. He and his fiancé had helped with several of the brews, and asked me to brew the Toasting Beer. A big undertaking; this is the drink that a hundred people are going to be savoring above all other beverages. This is the drink that will be drunk slowly and with much reflection. It had to be perfect. And there had to be a lot of it!

I called in some extra help, and we cranked out 15 gallons of pure perfectness in a matter of a month. We had to get it done early so it could age properly before the wedding.

186 bottles of Homeade Beer later, and probably 20 comments, we are almost up to the present.

Yesterday, I decided it was time to go beyond the nectar of the demi-gods. It was time to go all the way. The Nectar of the Gods!

Mead. Pure, sweet, unadulterated, perfect, natural, amazing Mead. Truly the one drink God himself wanted us to drink - even above Absinthe!

So I proceeded to make this sweet nectar that is truly amazing.

It turns out that Mead is much easier to make than Beer. The only hard part is going to be the waiting. 3 months! MONTHS! Argh! Where’s that damn time machine?!

But it will be worth the wait.

And this is how I came to realize that I am the coolest person I know. I make Beer, and I make Mead.

2486

2486. That’s what my odometer read in early June.
Northern Washington to Southern California and back again is 2486 miles. 1600 miles of utter desolation through the middle of California, miles broken only by the company of good friends and mortal enemies of the Road. On the Road, friends are made in a quarter mile, and may last for 50 or 60, as was done with Cigar Man. Mortal enemies may be made faster; Cigarette man and Crazy Dude in the Small Honda were capable of.
Cigar Man was one with whom we became good friends with; he was driving a BMW, smoking a Cigar (obviously). But what’s more, he knew how to drive. We found him in the middle of a rolling pileup (crappy truck drivers going 55 side-by-side when everyone else wants to go 80) trying to move nimbly through the jam. We were too. We helped each other through the traffic, and stuck together through the open nothingness of central California for probably 50 miles. It was fun, we laughed, we shared stories, we sat around a campfire…oh wait, that was later…and not with Cigar Man…

Cigarette Man, the bane of a different 50 miles; he knew how to dive, but something about him just pissed us off. Perhaps it was the way he stayed in the Left lane. For 10,000 miles (or so it seemed). Or the way that, when he finally moved to the right, stayed directly on my right rear quarterpanel.

Then there was Crazy Dude in the Small Honda; he almost killed us. It’s that simple. I was cruseing at a nice 80 mph, which is what the rest of the Left lane was doing, past the 55 mph Right lane. A line of cars entering traffic from an onramp was matching the Right lane speed (remember, it is 55 mph), when one little mid ‘80’s era Honda thought to it’self, “screw this 55 mph lane, I want to go FAST!! HELL YEAH!!” Well, what it thought and what it did were two very different things. I wouldn’t mind so much if he had waited about 1.3 seconds for me to pass, but he decided he wanted to go FAST right NOW!!
25 mph. That is the difference in speed between the Crazy Guy, and myself. The distance? Probably 50 feet. I figure I was inches from his ass by the time I matched his speed.
That pisses me off, so before I start ranting too much, I’m going to move on…

The rest of the trip was pretty cool.
I had forgotten how differently-beautiful Southern California can be. Granted, it is hot, and dry, and crowded, and smoggy, and gangy (is that a word?), and a whole host of other things, but it is also very nice.
The people can be nice, the girls are hot, the beaches have crazy rabid pelicans that dive-bomb unsuspecting humans. What more could a guy want?

The wedding was pretty nice, too. Oh, did I forget to mention that? Yeah, I was there to watch a friend’s chain lose some more links. A lot of links, actually. But I don’t think he saw it coming; you see, women have this way of shortening chains very sneakily, almost criminally. But guys never see this (especially when it is happening to them), and almost welcome it.
This isn’t to say I won’t welcome it, but as long as I have the world by a string, as Frank Sinatra sang about, I’m not complaining.

But probably the most fun town we saw was Weed, CA. too bad we passed through it at about 5:30.

I Suck

Yes, I know I suck, and this post sucks, but I will be back to post again soon, maybe (could I use any more commas?).

Personal Destruction

Today was an interesting one: it began early (for a Saturday) at 8, sitting in a classroom to begin the process of learning to fly.

I decided not to go straight home after the class, but wound up doing just that.

At home I made dinner; nothing fancy, just a cheeseburger.

Then I decided to continue my quest for whatever was I was seeking before dinner. So I drove around and wound up at the beach near the ferry. Being on the ocean (well, the Sound anyway) causes winds to kick up quite easily, and they were in full force this afternoon. I sat down there for a while thinking, but decided to leave, as it was quite windy.

Then things started to get interesting. I don’t even know if I should be saying this, but what the hell?
I broke.
My brain specifically, and my emoter.

I am the ultimate when it comes to masks. I almost never show my true emotion, or self; no, that is hidden deep inside for only me to know. Really, the only emotion I show truthfully is happiness. Actually, that is the only emotion I ever show anyone; whether it is true or not.

I decided that I am emotionally unstable. All my pent-up hidden emotions build, to a place and time when there is a sufficient stockpile, then all it takes is one little tiny event to set off the whole pile.

Funny how Happiness, Joy and other assorted good emotions are never included in the pile, just Fear, Hatred, Sorrow, and the like. Makes for a very interesting couple of hours…

The Fear

I know this is a Blog, and reading it is purely the choice of the reader, but I feel like this one needs a disclaimer. Below is more of my relational drivel which graces these pages occasionally. If you feel physically ill, or otherwise want to kill me for my thoughts, remember it was your choice. You have been warned….

I went ‘home’ yesterday. By ‘home’ I mean the place my parents live. I don’t exactly call where I live ‘home’ because it doesn’t feel like it. It’s hollow, and even though my bro. lives here, and there is rarely a dull moment, it still feels empty.

I returned to ‘the hole’ today (that’s what I call where I live). During the drive, I had a revelation; it occurred at about the I-5 and I-90 interchange, but in order to get there, I need to back up.

Today is Easter Sunday, and my home church put on a play for it. The reason I was there was because I was in the play, I was The Mob (there where actually three mob members, but I was the leader). But that’s fairly beside the point; the main point is a conversation I had with one of the ‘disciples’ in the play (the conversation was before the play).

He started this little conversation by asking if I had ever seen the move Emma, and then explained it’s plot a little. He then said that his wife has been talking to a ‘young girl’ (he’s in his 40’s so he can say that), and wanted to know if I would be interested in participating. And that is all he told me.

What was I supposed to say?

Of course I said yes.

He said he would talk to his wife and that she would get back to me with more details. Apparently that messed things up a little, because I still don’t have any more information, other than that her (this ‘young girl’) parents think it’s a great idea (what parent doesn’t think this kind of think a great idea?).

However, I get excited and nervous at the same time, because immediately I start analyzing what just happened. The only thing I can surmise is that it is either very good, or very bad.

At the present, I consider this a blind date, only with no ‘date’ set.

I have done this before, and some of you may remember that it didn’t go very well. In fact, it was pretty much a disaster, but that is in the past, and I don’t dwell there very often.

My motto is “Try Everything Twice”. Obviously that doesn’t apply to certain extremely detrimental activities, or anything overtly illegal (generally, anyway…). So, even though I have classified this as a ‘blind date’, I have only done one of those so I am held to my motto, and shall proceed. However, if this does go poorly, I don’t ever have to do another one again. Happy day!

Anyway, all that preceded the thought I contemplated on my way back to the hole this afternoon.

I am irrational.

WTF? I am the most rational, down to earth person I know! How the H can I, of all people, consider MYSELF IRRATIONAL?!?

I’m not one for spontaneity, given to bouts of absolute craziness. On the contrary, it takes me quite some time to contemplate the consequences of my actions. Take, for example, this weekend I was asked to climb a latter about 30 feet high with an angle of attack of about 5 degrees. I know this is not safe, and proclaim this; someone else decides to be heroic and goes shooting up the latter. Of course it is safe, as 5 degrees is plenty, but I like a margin of safety.

However, I can’t decide if a relationship is rational, or irrational. The number of people who have entered relationships is astounding, some of them very rational, but I also see the incredible number of relationships ending, causing me to wonder if they were irrational to think it would work.

Let me put this out there: I have a fear of commitment. I’m not talking about committing to do something like show up to a Poker game, or go to work. Not even to pay back a loan, whether it be school or a mortgage.

No, my commitment fear is a personal one.

People are too unpredictable. A monetary commitment is doable, because I know exactly what it is doing at any given time. People are different.

Perhaps my Fear isn’t commitment per se, maybe it’s more of a Fear of what happens when that commitment ceases.

I have seen and heard of some H’ed up stuff that happens at the cessation of a commitment. Everything ranging from a ‘broken heart’ to a complete divorce where the house, kids and dog are all split comes to mind. None of it can I imagine I would remotely enjoy.

I have heard several people say, “Yeah, but it’s the journey that counts”. I have been on many journeys, some quite adventurous (Tornados come to mind…), where my neck has been on the line, but I don’t want to throw my emotions out on the line. My neck is fairly tough; it can take quite a beating and still provide a pedestal for my head. My emotions, on the other hand, are not so resilient. I haven’t had a chance to test them to their full potential, but then again, don’t really want to.

But I will do it. Why the H not? I’m 24 and phenomenally single. I’m so single it’s not even funny. And everybody knows it, too; that’s why they are doing this. Should I feel humiliated? Should I feel sorrow for being so lame? Probably, but I’m not; I just have the Fear.

Artist

I’m sitting outside, on my back porch, with my pipe, beer, pen and paper, wishing I was an artist.
I have a vision in my head, and the perfect wall in my house:

It is of a mountain, black and sinister, looming close to the observer, too close for comfort.

Fire escapes from vents in the top and sides of this monolith; with one particularly large and fiery opening.

Out of this crack in the very living, evil rock, is a demon-creature, possibly even the Devil himself; crawling out like a lizard.

With smoke from his nose, and fire in his breath, he seeks his prey; creeping ever closer to his defenseless, small prey, a baby.

The baby is terrified, fear consumes his mind and body, paralyzed; he only seemingly possibility of life, movement, escapes him.

However, unseen at first observation is a figure, tall and strong, muscles stretching skin to the breaking point. Light emanating from his eyes, holding a blazing sword, burning with an unquenchable flame.

He is standing around the corner, waiting for the opportune moment to fulfill his duty.