So, you’ve decided to convert…

Don’t get me wrong. There’s nothing inherently wrong with faith. Quite to the contrary, studies have repeatedly shown that those who have a belief in a higher power do better in life. On the other hand, it’s not like you were ever an atheist. You’ve always professed some kind of agnostic (perhaps nondenominational? I never asked, or really cared to hear a long monologue on your belief system) aspiration, so this is presumably not a new phenomenon. What is a change is that you’ve decided to become an apostate. I’m really not one to talk about it, given that my primary obstacle with regards to conversion to Islam is a proscription against eating pork. It’s not that I’d make a particularly good Muslim either, but of everything out there, it makes the most sense to me.

A change of faith is something everybody goes through eventually. It is. A conversion to a neo-Pagan religion is not something to be taken lightly, however. Almost all of them are intrinsically linked to a belief in magic, and none that I can think of have a history longer than perhaps 150 years. The particular creed which you’ve chosen to ascribe to was almost certainly founded after the Second World War. That aside, every major ritual endemic to it is based upon the practice of witchcraft. I would hope that your professedly logical mind would find that ridiculous. It seems not to be the case. That aside, given the relative youth of the movement, I’d hope you’d research things a bit more. Given your professed aim to let your hypothetical children choose their own religion, one would think you’d do the same rather than simply ascribing that which the one religious person you know practices. Note, by the way, that it is possibly the least codified system of belief out there. No coherent dogma, large gaps between initiated Wiccans and eclectic (that’d be you and your ignominious tutor), and really scattered in general.

I suppose, though, that it goes along with your willful denial of everything else. Norse background? I’d think neo-Druidism or Asatru. Your last name is clearly Croatian (maybe Serbian), as are your features, but whatever. There are a number of neo-Pagan religions out there which do not revolve around the practice of magic or divination. I assume that because you believe the sole Wiccan you know is somehow psychic that it will be conferred upon you. It, of course, has nothing to do with the fact that she has two children, is much older, and lived out of state for an extended period of time in her adult life. Beyond which, divination in all its forms is inherently subjective. You read into it what you want to see, or what makes sense given your current (limited) knowledge base. It’s generally penultimate hindsight, but will give you very little in the way of useful guidance forward. If you’re content to keep stringing yourself along in the hope that a system of gaming which is not believed to have been used for fortune-telling prior to the 18th century can accurately predict your existence, so be it. Realize, though, that disdainful looks and rolled eyes shall follow you.

Your perpetual Messianic outlook on life belies a belief that you are both Saviour and martyr. Neither is the case. Make your life of it what you will. Fundamentally, empiricism is wrong. There is no ultimate truth or meaning to your life. You go through, day by day, and make of it what you will. There is no guide other than your own experiences, from which you should form some sort of moral guide. That is not to say, though, that you should walk through life with blinders on. You cannot analyze your problems away. The culmination of reality is simply to live. “If I can believe that I am rational and everyone else is rational then I have nothing to fear and no reason to feel anxious about being free,” right? Kierkegaard disagrees. The world is, on a whole, not rational or predictable (nor are you). So long as you what other people think of you and post attention-whore MySpace blogs which completely ignore any sort of objective truth, you allow yourself to be defined and controlled by them.

Some Bertrand Russell quotes which apply to you, and you should try to follow:

• Contempt for happiness is usually contempt for other people’s happiness, and is an elegant disguise for hatred of the human race.
• If all our happiness is bound up entirely in our personal circumstances it is difficult not to demand of life more than it has to give.
• It seems to be the fate of idealists to obtain what they have struggled for in a form which destroys their ideals.
• Man needs, for his happiness, not only the enjoyment of this or that, but hope and enterprise and change.
• Men who are unhappy, like men who sleep badly, are always proud of the fact.
• The degree of one’s emotions varies inversely with one’s knowledge of the facts.
• The fact that an opinion has been widely held is no evidence whatever that it is not utterly absurd.
• The secret to happiness is to face the fact that the world is horrible.
• There is something feeble and a little contemptible about a man who cannot face the perils of life without the help of comfortable myths.
• We have, in fact, two kinds of morality side by side: one which we preach but do not practice, and another which we practice but seldom preach.

The most perfidious way of harming a cause consists of defending it deliberately with faulty arguments

My titles seem to be getting longer and longer. Short and snappy isn’t really my style, I guess. Concise? Sometimes. Relevant? Not always, but I try. I was contemplating beating my last entry as “the longest blog about nothing” Dan’s ever read, but I don’t think I’m going to make it. After all, at least parts of this shall be about something, veiled as those references may be. The internal evaluation process I go through on some level for every action I take is convoluted. There’s no logical reason why I should feel that every relationship I enter into is doomed from the start other than experience, but it’s a truly skewed set of landmarks. Should I assume that they are all condemned to an ignominious end merely because those I’ve had in the past did?

A great many of those were due to my shortcomings and personal failures, but not all. I’ve been involved with some people where the words best used to describe them fall into categories typically reserved for lunatics. Regardless, it’s rather silly of me to conclude that I’m bound to bungle things with all of them, or be so intolerable that others cannot stand me. I highly doubt that I’ll end up dating another person who drinks my blood, or one who prefers that I sleep with other people to breaking up (not that I’m necessarily opposed to open relationships, merely that it’s a bit pathetic to oblige in the indiscretions of somebody else just to stay together if it’s not something you actually desire). Why, then, do I automatically think that things must come to a cataclysmic end?

Eventually, I’m bound to end up in some kind of stable situation. I find that I get bored as time goes on, and the thrill of the chase is over. It’s possible that I’ve been involved with the wrong kind of people, or that it’s a mere rationalization on my part. All things considered, constantly being on uncertain footing would have to be draining. I look at my brother, and I he’s been married for five years. Why do I dismiss such a future for myself out of hand? It’s patently obvious that I’m not in such a situation, but it seems to be a bit of a Catch-22. It’s easy for him to point out that my logic is farcical at times given that he’s been married for five years. I suppose that the perspective has a lot to do with it. He and Missy are very happy together, and I’m glad. My life probably looks ridiculous, but a man’s got to have a code. I have standards. Not to imply that others do not, merely that I hardly hope to find reality-bending love. Who knows? I may be surprised.

On another note, I’m increasingly excited that people are coming to visit for Anya’s birthday. It will have been five months since I’ve seen Dan, Missy, Anya, or Alex by the time they get here. Considering my feelings on the way things ended down there, I’m not apt to visit anytime in the near future. Of course, I say that now, but I’ll likely head down sometime this summer. I miss my immediate family. It’s strange how little regard I gave to the thought of living across the country. I’m missing things in their development, and I’m acclimated to being there for those sorts of things from living with them. Anya is now capable of playing the Wii by herself, can hold a coherent conversation on the telephone, and is prescient enough to tell me that she’s worried Daddy may choke on the children’s toy he put in his mouth (unlikely as that may be, it’s cute that she voices her concern). I really don’t think she understands exactly how far away I live, nor that she’ll be coming here fairly soon, but it’s kind of heartbreaking to hear her tell me that she wants me to come visit tomorrow.

I’m not generally one to be emotionally affected by things (at least overtly), but this is a diary of sorts, so I may as well expound upon it. It’s frustrating in a way to know that those I care about live 1,300 miles away. It’s taken some time to really catch up with me, but now that life has somewhat settled down, it’s sinking in. It’ll be a few years at best before they live here, and I’m not prepared to leave here just yet. There are factors out of their control down there, and my life is not yet tragic enough to abandon it. That’s always in the back of my mind, anyway. If things go south rapidly, I’ve always got options in other places. Sure, there are things I could do here, but the idea of a completely fresh start where nobody knows me is compelling. As noted previously, I’m still here because somebody cares. What should happen if that disappears? I’m not sure, and it doesn’t matter for the moment. Still, I wish things were different with regards to the living situation. I’m content on many levels, but it’d be ever so nice to live within reasonably close proximity to them.

Yes, people get busy with their families. I can’t say I saw any of my aunts or uncles with the regularity that I’d likely see them when I was growing up. Maybe it’s different with twins? Maybe it’s different because I lived with them for two years? I’m not sure. I know that I feel like I should be more involved than I am, though that’s not realistic. Perhaps it’s about time that I gave up my grudges against the people they live with, or at least put them aside long enough to visit for a while.

That is my principal objection to life, I think; It’s too easy, when alive, to make perfectly horrible mistakes

So, yes, I’ll quote Vonnegut in a title. I’ve not kept up on the ‘blogging daily’ promise, but I’m endeavoring to try. A few mostly-written blogs went missing when I let the battery on my Powerbook expire, which is unfortunate. Why is it that Blogger doesn’t automatically save drafts ala Gmail? Granted, there were no particular epiphanies lost, but my state of mind at the time has gone missing. Daily espousals of my thoughts should be easy enough, but I find that I desire to maintain a certain level of form. Ideally, I’d like to communicate an idea with each blog. The whole paper-writing mindset. Establish a thesis in the first paragraph, supporting arguments in subsequent ones until I’m spent. None of you really want to hear what I do with my time apart from you, and a modicum of taste is maintained. Were I to expound upon my daily vitiations, a necessary facet of life would be irredeemably lost.

It’s not that I’m some kind of hedonist lasciviously flitting from vice to vice, but that some things are better kept out of the ‘Google me’ realm of information about myself. Do I want prospective employers/dates/whathaveyou to know about $thing? Well… I’m of the attitude if they’re apprehensive with regards to activities which I may or may not have engaged it, then any future is a moot point. Everybody makes poor choices at times, and I’m no exception. Little point in hiding it save to protect somebody else, but opportunities may be lost should the vagaries of my existence appear to reprehensible. Should anybody be truly interested in watching my fulminating tirades, primarily on the topic of my social life, they’re welcome to. People shall infer what they will, and I may allude to events, but naught shall be made plain.

It’s clear that nothing I write is going to convey a depth of emotion nor elucidate whatever may lie beneath the surface. It’s been done before (though the record has since been purged), but I can’t picture a repeat occurrence without a catastrophic event in my life, and that’s not likely. In the intervening time, a support network of sorts has been more clearly established. I’m not sure that a single person counts as a network, but at least there’s somebody who’s seen me stripped bare (figuratively in this context). The others do not live here, so all is promulgated without them being physically present. Presumably, whatever proverbial wall I careen into next will not so intimately involve them, but the future is ever-unknown.

Given the infrequency of my blogging for the last week, I’m going to forsake the aforementioned commitment to a definitive subject for each. I’m inevitably going to run out of things I’m up in arms about at some point anyway, so I’ll leave that ambition by the wayside. If it happens, it happens, and no loss if not.

I find that I’m increasingly aligned with an archetype which at least nominally includes 1/12th of the population. There’s a certain camaraderie among us all — a willingness to discard with established propriety if it’s exciting. The doldrums of life are far too mundane. Still, at what point did I decide it might be fun to check compatibility with others based upon this factor alone? As an aside, it seems that virtually none of the usual websites give me very good odds other than with an Aries, and I know none of them. It’s libelous to imply that I’m prone to infidelity and promiscuity merely because I think sex is an important part of a relationship. There are other factors to consider as well, and I’m not about to forsake or jeopardize that merely for a good time. Why am I a quintessential Sagittarius? Frivolous, magnanimous (maybe not), perpetually happy, and difficult to tie down? Nobody wants to feel tied down or constrained. The ‘right relationship’ shouldn’t make one feel that way anyway.

I’m not on some kind of quest for that, either. If it happens, fantastic; if I’m single in 10 years, that’s great too. I find myself given to inappropriate dreams about unexpected people lately. Life has been reminiscent of some Wagnerian tale of late, and it’s affecting me. This is worth noting since very little actually gets to me. There’s no overt knowledge of this, though I can tell I’m superficially adapting to the new dynamic. It’s been a long time since anything noteworthy enough for my brain to process nightly whilst I sleep has occurred. Sporadic dreams? Those are normal enough. Every day? Now that’s something. I only wish I knew what it were…

I still need a domain name to be selected for me, as I’m too busy learning how to properly use an ibrik to feed my encroaching addiction to coffee. If a thing’s worth doing, it’s worth doing right. Turkish/Arabic brewing is the ideal, and I’m willing to put in another investment of time.

Wait a minute…

Got a text message from someone I’ve not spoken with in months tonight. While I appreciate brevity, a two word invitation to your apartment is hardly sufficient given the length of time it’s been and the unusual circumstances of our parting. It’s obvious enough that “come over” carries other connotations as well, and while I’m by no means opposed to the idea of an intimate romp with someone I’ve been involved with in the past (or haven’t been, depending on the person), I hardly think that it’s proper. The sex was ok, and she was certainly open to, well, anything, but there’s a reason why my life diverged from hers. That’s not to say that people you’ve dated before are bad booty calls (quite the opposite), but it would most assuredly end up being more than that in her mind.

Anybody reading this (I only know of four, but meh) is aware of what transpired, at least in a cursory fashion. Nothing really terrible, just ‘a whole lotta crazy’ (her words, not mine). I’m tempted to link to her LiveJournal as evidence via inevitable discovery, but I’ll pass on it for now. Alcohol-fueled nights of debauchery are the norm for her, yet she was perplexed by my professed apathy with regards to her dating other people. Apparently, four dates in the span of a month implies an exclusivity typically reserved for real relationships. It’s not as if I really cared whether or not she dated other people (or if I dated other people), and that was the crux of the problem from her perspective. I didn’t care what she did, and it was an issue for her. I can’t imagine why.

After a night of progressively more irritated text messages while I was surrounded by women who looked at me as if I were a leper, followed by chatting up one of them for a friend’s possible benefit, that was the end for me. She knew in advance that I’d not be out with her that night anyway, and inviting herself to a gathering at somebody else’s apartment (which didn’t turn out so well for me anyway) was just too presumptuous. The carnival was over, and we went on with our respective lives.

I haven’t been keeping up on her blog. It never really says anything of note anyway in public posts, and I’m not about to create an account there merely to peruse an even larger array of vapid drivel detailing her slow path to cirrhosis. After the text message, I took a gander. She’s now unemployed, though of her own volition. The plan is for her to drive to the Grand Canyon this week and come back. Road trip with her? I think I’ll pass. Pre-departure fucking? I’ll pass on that, too. Gods only know what she’s come into contact with in the meantime. I’ve made it this far without acquiring any afflictions of the nether regions, and I’d like to keep it that way.

In other news… Well, there’s no other news. Not much else to say today. I’ve been in and out of work too many times for anything exciting to happen, and I’m out of here soon enough, so I’ll leave off. I expect to post a ranty blog about actual news sometime tomorrow, but I’m going to keep that free of here. Anything going on during the weekend is bound to be more interesting than today, so there’ll be more.

Also, somebody pick a domain name for me and email/Myspace it to me. I’m still paying for hosting services, and I ought to do something with it (Dreamhost still owes me a registration). No creativity in me today.

Broken Promises for Broken Hearts

For the second time in five months, I’ve given up on those with whom I have the longest relationships (save for one). It’s fair to say that I don’t really consider myself an adult. There’s that certain quality which is evident in people’s parents, and I do not (yet?) exhibit it. My personality is still in flux, to some degree. Perhaps that’s what I’m seeing in them, yet not in myself. Their lives do not fluctuate. From month to month and year to year, the same events happen with regularity. Family reunions, annual trips to the same places, static social lives (if any to speak of). Those are the hallmarks of an adult. Sure, I have my regular “grown-up” activities (cooking on Tuesdays, for instance), but there’s still an evolution which is observable by others.

There are some things in which I will admit I’m more mature than I’d like to be. I have more personal responsibility than desirable. I have a boring (non-retail) job. I have health insurance which is not provided by my parents. I have a car payment. I have a mortgage payment. These things are irksome, but necessary accouterments of progress. Some of my friends view themselves as Olympians. Not quite right. Even Olympians are anthropomorphic; they have very human flaws. My friends are infallible. Nothing is their fault. No matter how atrabilious their temperament, how rebarbative their behaviour, they are in the right. In the years (and in some cases, decades) for which we’ve been amenable to each other, they are fundamentally the same. Any perception of progress has been swept away in the last few weeks. The rose coloured glasses are off.

It’s perfectly normal to feign happiness in your relationship until such time as you can move your things out while your significant other is at work. After all, I’m not home much for you to talk to, and the 360 is gone, so how are you supposed to handle living there? Feel vindicated by going on a date immediately following your vitriolic tirade towards someone who was wholly undeserving. Corner her and tear her down for daring to mention that she bought you two tickets to Amsterdam for your graduation present. How dare anybody question whether you will actually graduate, though the 25 pages you need to write in 4 days are naught but a fleeting concern in comparison to the lure of a jazz club. Best of all, tell no one. Imperiously demand that she attend your graduation party with bells on so you can maintain the facade of a relationship which you’ve flushed down the drain, though it seems that you may not graduate.

There’s nothing wrong with hypocrisy, either. Go ahead. Berate somebody you profess to love because she caught you in a lie. That’s healthy and normal, isn’t it? Throw a tantrum because I am more aware of her life than you are, though it was primarily your actions which drove her away. Yes, I am more informed than you, but simply because I care about others as much as you profess to. What are the chances that you’d have gone with last night? That you would offer aid should it happen again? Your interaction with me is amensalistic more often than not, and it will not be as onerous as you presume for me to rid myself of that for now. When you had problems, I hit the “stop” button on the playback device of my life. The curtain on the stage of my romantic life dropped, and the thespians have left the theatre. You have purloined my social life, and I want it back. Feel like starting an internecine feud merely because I speak with somebody who does not wish to speak with you? I’m eerily prepared for that. In order to salvage this, ablutions shall be necessary at some point.

What kind of statement does it make when you cannot be trusted to watch a puppy? When you steal away inside to the cavernous maw of your video-game sanctuary rather than subject yourself to a scintillating conversation about pay scales in IT (and the reasons why academia does not attract the right candidates), the highlights of Civil War battlefields of the Army of Northern Virginia, and battles of antiquity in the Mediterranean basin? Ok. Admittedly those are interesting to me, and to the people I was speaking with, but not you. It’s not as if I said “Hi. How are you? When’s the last time you visited Antietam?” They are your roommate’s in-laws. Make the conversation what you will, interject with a new subject, or just stand around. It’s common courtesy. Apparently you are an uncommon man, and not in a complimentary way. You are supposed to be the best man at his wedding (assuming that does not change, and the one with you was another groomsman). Should she expect you to present a stirring toast? I appreciate that you think it would be funny to drop a lot of subtle video game references and movie quotes. That will certainly convey your sincerity and happiness about his wedlock.

On the upside, there are those who have made something of themselves. People who are going to business school, law school, nursing school. Friends who turned their education into a job which pays very well (and negotiated their way into a rather large signing bonus!). Surrogate siblings who have left their checkered past behind for a marriage, mortgage, and happiness in a career path which they have been on since 18. It is for (and because of) them that I do not pack my things and set out for Phoenix or destinations hitherto unknown. They maintain my sanity here. For the others? It’s high time to start cutting the lashes which bind you to me to leave you adrift in the current for a while. I’ve lost the energy and motivation necessary to pull dead weight through life. Hopefully you can keep up under your own power, and I’ll be ’round when you’re waving, not drowning.

Much easier than expected

Given the frequency with which I was inclined to post blogs having to do with me (rather than news) on Myspace, I suspected that I’d have some difficulty in finding a daily subject here. It seems that I was mistaken, and I’m rather glad of that. It’s not that I need an outlet for anything. I have enough people willing to listen to my drivel in a non-static form, and there’s nothing compelling in expounding upon my thoughts on the page (such as it is), but it’s here, and it’s oddly satisfying. I’m able to eschew the normal social mores which constrain my tongue. It’s not like I typically abide by these anyway, but I do, on some level, know that some things are just patently offensive. I can’t very well tell my friends in plain language that I think their actions are sometimes childish, nor give them advice as flatly as I would like to. This mental filtering very rarely takes any precedence in my day to day conversations.

I’m a deft manipulator of other people. It’s never the intention to coerce them into doing as I wish or acquiescing to my point of view, but it’s often the outcome. I have a certain knack for elaborating my ideas or observations in such as way that it’s natural to agree with me. I tend to be correct, so this it’s not necessarily a bad thing. What it does mean is that I’m frequently the confidante of those I interact with regularly. Should there be problems or concerns, it falls upon me to express them to the offending party, should that be desired. I’m fine with this. For whatever reason, advice I give to others is valued, and I get a bit more insight into the situation than I had before.

It’s a calculated and delicate dance at times. When it comes to my own conundrums, however, most everybody is kept at a distance. It’s exceedingly rare that I deem something so insurmountable or enigmatic that it’s worthwhile to enlist the aid of others. I’m not certain that they’d bother, but it’s apparent that it would be an exercise in futility given the blighted landscape of their own lives. Regardless, I’m not a man easily knowable. Perhaps that’s fallacious. The people who I’ve known the longest appear to willfully ignore changes since I moved away. I may have been capricious and unpredictable before I left, it’s true. That hasn’t been true for a long time. Some of the decisions in my life are a tad spontaneous. Nobody, including me, expected what happened when I helped Dan move. Sometimes we can astound even ourselves. I find it disheartening that they cannot anticipate my behavior. I’m direct with them at this point. No reason to be otherwise.

Still, there remains a sole person who knows my mind. It’s not because he hears everything (although that’s not far off), and it’s not because I’ve known him the longest. We are remarkably similar. Yes, we’ve lived apart for four of the last six years. It has not made a noticeable impact on our development. Disparate as we most assuredly are in some ways, we happen to read the same books at around the same time, frequent the same websites (even if they’ve not been mentioned), hold the same political and social views (though neither of us adhered to the current modus operandi at the time of our separation), and pursue many of the same ambitions. There’s only one person to whom I could be referring here, and it should be obvious.

I almost feel like we are one person in two places. Sure, genetics is proving to be an enlightening field when it comes to coincidences between twins. Upbringing may have had something to do with it, as could have the amount of time we spent with each other until adulthood. A lot of things have changed since May 16th, 2001 in both our lives, yet we seem tied to the same path. There is a bond which words cannot describe, and cannot be sundered. Though I had a lapse in trust not so long ago, I know without asking that he will always defend my cause, and he can expect the same from me. I need never preach my case, nor detail my reasoning. He understands, and he already knows what I what I’m thinking. What may seem opaque to others is but a veil which he has always seen through. It’s something which I cannot explain.

It’s been months since I’ve seen him, unfortunately. True, there have been longer stretches of time (mostly when he was in training), but there are no extenuating circumstances here. He has a wonderful wife who I don’t speak to nearly as often as I should (given the level of social activity I’ve been partaking in lately), the type that I would love to find one day (probability of this is near zero). Two children who I love dearly. I saw every major event in Anya’s first 19 months. Walking, first words, all the rest. I’m 1500 miles away from those now. I’m utterly absent from Alex’s development. I never saw myself becoming the doting uncle. I seem to have been wrong. Perhaps that’s because I do not, for the most part, find babies to hold my interest until they start exhibiting a definitive personality and the ability to communicate their thoughts and desires. They’re both old enough to do that now.

As to when I’ll be going down to visit again, I have no idea. On the upside, there’s a possibility that they’ll be coming here for Anya’s birthday (early June) for a weekend. That would elicit a great deal of happiness. There was some debate as to whether or not they would be moving here last summer, and I appreciate the reasons why they did not, but it was a disappointment nonetheless. Ideally, there will be a resuscitation of that topic of conversation when he finishes school (for a multitude of reasons). If not, life goes on. We’ve managed for years as it is, and it’s not the end of the world to wait longer or anticipate a few visits a year (either me there or them here). I’ll dare to hold out hope.

It’s Time to Explore My Feelings (or so says my horoscope)

So, yes, I’m on nights for another month or so. Nominally, I’m training somebody. Our night operators don’t seem to make it more than a few months. It’s possible that this is attributable to a pervasive incompetence in the lower levels of the IT ladder. The kind of people who apply for the job think that they’re God’s gift to computing just because they can troubleshoot a desktop or build a gaming machine. It’s a wholly different environment in a server room (and a UNIX server room at that). We don’t build our own systems. We’d rather have an enterprise level support contract, so we can have a new drive here same-day if we need to. We want remote administration (LOM, iLOM, whatever $vendor calls it). We want error reporting RAM and hot-swappable drive caddies. We want NAS clustering with intelligent rollover, and brocade switches. VLANs and BGP filtering. Yes, you can do all of these things on your own, but it’s generally not worth it. Troubleshooting comes down to the OS and application level. Enterprise-level hardware troubleshoots itself, then sends you (and ideally the vendor) an email letting you know what needs to be replaced.

Still, our night operators don’t make enough to be expected to know much about anything when they start. That’s why we train. It’s an exercise in futility. Without being here during the working week (daytime hours), you have no idea which developer handles which application. If something goes catastrophically wrong, or you have no idea what to do about some problem, you get to call somebody in the middle of the night. That person is often me. I’m ok with that, really. It’s far preferable to somebody who doesn’t even realize that there is a problem. Primary responsibilities of the night shift involve dumping files to tape. These are automated. An elementary schooler could handle it. Of our two night operators, neither one can manage. Mind, I’m training one of the two right now (and I doubt if the other will make it). This is day 6. Every night, he asks me the same questions. Repetition isn’t teaching this one. Documentation isn’t teaching this one. All that’s left to do is cross my fingers and hope that there’s a spontaneous genesis of gray matter in the next month. I suspect it’s not going to happen.

True, there is a language barrier. I don’t think that prevents one from following simple directions. If I tell you to type something, don’t blankly stare at me. Turn around and face the keyboard. I’d rather not have to spell “increment” for you each night when I watch you run one of our backups. At the age of 28, you should be able to spell “historical.” After all, you moved here when you were three. I’ve sent emails to better explain processes which are largely undocumented. I’ve walked him through the steps (ok, step: grep $thing /data/csv/spdump.csv) for finding when a particular stored procedure runs, or how to find the name of a stored procedure which needs to be run if a file hasn’t updated (it’s the same one-step process). He’s not going to make it more than a few weeks after training ends, and that’s fine with me, because you’re a cretinous lout with all the ethical integrity of a member of the house of Windsor.

It’s rare that I meet people with whom it genuinely makes me ill to speak with. This is such a person. The type who makes me realize that the modern feminist movement still has work to do. Generally, I have no problem fitting into any social situation or finding common ground with even the basest representatives of humanity. Suffice it to say that I’ve ceased speaking with him except when it’s necessary to teach him something (in vain). What kind of person complains that their wife is too tired to do the dishes, do the laundry, clean the house, and make dinner when she (by his own admittance) works 65 hours a week? What kind of person expects their wife to quit said job (which she likes) so he has more time to relax? Is it reasonable that he sees it as her duty, and hers alone, to take care of their children?

He’s a mentally stunted man, in every sense possible. After even fifteen minutes of conversation with me, it should be obvious that I do not empathize his plight. I do not agree that he doesn’t need to provide support for computers he sells. It’s great that they work at his house when he sells them. He’s selling them to people without much money, since in his mind, everybody should have a computer. Alright. I can see that, maybe. If that’s the goal, you should not bitch about people trying to negotiate a lower price as “cutting into your profit.” Selling computers which are lemons and cease to function after they are brought to the buyer’s home is not a pastime which anybody with moral compunctions engages in.

So here’s to you, misogynistic douchebag. I will relish with great zeal the moment in which you are escorted from the building, and out of my consciousness. I do not expect that to take long.

As an aside, what does it say about me when the only two people I can think of to invite to a wedding reception are my friend’s exes (note that it’s another friend’s wedding, and neither of them would really be appropriate)? Sure, I’m dating. Yes, H would likely come with me. I may meet somebody I like better by early August, but I’m skeptical at best.

It’s Strange…

I’ve never seen the point of a diary. Though I’ve never known anybody who actually kept one, recording your thoughts in a journal that nobody is going to see other than you is wasted effort. Without other people to go over your thought process, the chances of you getting any kind of benefit out of it are slim to none. Blogs are different somehow. I like the idea that people can review my reasoning and see a part of me which is rarely exposed to anything other than a pixelated screen or very close friends. I dislike that I can’t see the number of people who’ve viewed my blog here (of course, it’s been about twelve hours since it sprang into existence, but I didn’t see it anywhere in the dashboard), but that’s something which I’ll learn to deal with or code a way around eventually. It’s not at all a pressing issue, and I like the customization options available with CSS in Blogger much better than anything I happened to see on Myspace. Yes, CSS is an utter waste for a single page. XHTML/DHTML could do the job, but then I can’t drag and drop elements (not that I envision that happening). I seem to be digressing.

The last two weeks or so have been dramatic. That’s an egregious understatement. A certain friend of mine has been desperately seeking love for the last… well, decade? Sure, he’s had a few relationships. Each of them has been “the girl he’s going to marry.” Needless to say, it hasn’t quite turned out that way. I find the entire notion of seeking love to be exuding desperation in the worst kind of way. Sure, if you happen to find it, that’s fantastic. I’ve been in love, I think. It’s a a difficult thing to define. The fairy-tale, Shakespearean ideal doesn’t mesh with reality. Love is not enough to maintain a relationship on its own. You have to be a decent human being, you have to have a modicum of compatibility, you need all the other things that make two people click. Everything which is necessary for a lasting friendship should also be there in a long-term relationship. You can’t blindly hope you’ll go the distance just because there happen to be feelings involved. Eventually, those will fade, or they won’t be enough anymore.

If I’m anything, I’m a good friend. I’ll be there for those I care about no matter what how hectic things in my life may be or how ludicrous I find their situation to be. That is what I do. The happiness of those close to me is paramount, and I don’t really understand why. It’s not particularly important. Now, I’m no paragon of wisdom in a relationship, nor of virtue. I’ve been cheated on and stayed. I’ve tried to make a long-distance relationship work against all odds (multiple times). I’ve been drunk for months at a time (when I wasn’t working). I’ve also cheated. I’ve ended long-term relationships for no real reason other than boredom, never looking back as their lives collapsed into the void I left behind. For a while, I really believed that the thrill of the chase was the best part of being in a relationship, and there was no reason to stay once that was over with. All this has, at least, made me a veritable font of advice on what not to do, and how to fix a relationship (as well as when it’s not worth it).

Be that as it may, I will work against all odds to keep them happy. Even if I think it’s a waste of time, I’ll give it a go for as long as it seems feasible. Yeah, it sometimes makes me feel like a fool. That’s the way it goes. I don’t generally get in the middle of things. I’ll give advice from the sidelines and hear them out on whatever their issues may be, but I don’t play mediator. I’m a good ear, or so people tell me. I’m easy to vent to, and I give worthwhile feedback. Sure, it may be difficult to imagine, since I have propensity for speaking, but stranger things have happened. In this case, I got involved. It’s not as if I didn’t already know that they’d been having problems for a long time, but I wasn’t ever worried until recently. Though I didn’t ever see her much, there was a bit of a rapport, so I thought I’d inquire as to the specifics of the situation.

What I heard back was shocking and slightly appalling. I’ve been an observer to a couple of his relationships. They weren’t good ones, by any means, but I had attributed that to unsavory qualities in his exes. I still would. This was different. The more I spoke with her, the clearer things became. As noted, I understand where she’s coming from. I know her situation, her priorities, his problems. However, I was oblivious to the particular circumstances of their relationship. After a short period of time in the beginning, he wanted to tell her that he loved her. I told him it was a mistake; I told him that he’d freak her out, and she’d run (with good reason given the briefness of their involvement). I was right, and he elected not to tell me. As time went on, fights over trivial things began to occur. His obstinate refusal to compromise (or take care of himself in the most basic fashion) ended things more than once. These were not the reasons he told me (in fact, he never gave me reasons). Things came to a head because he didn’t think it was reasonable to sacrifice anything in his life in order to begin one with her. Things got fixed for a little while, but soon collapsed again.

Regardless, the point of this is not to go over his mistakes and where he went wrong. He hasn’t learned anything in years. I find that those I’ve kept in touch with the longest, by in large, are quintessentially the same as they were when I met them. There’s been no rise in maturity, no progress. They have not read a book since high school (sourcebooks do not count). Even then, they did very little other than what was required of them. Their interpersonal relationships are at the level mine were at when I was 19. We have essentially the same conversations we had back then, except we’re talking about new games or movies. It’s tragic. I love those guys to death, I just wonder how much longer we can keep going like this. It says something when the people who enjoy seeing the most are those who I reconnected with in the last year, and it’s not good.

A Frame of Reference

Well, I’ve made the commitment to blog every day. I’m not sure if I’ll quite live up to that, but it ought to be a lot more regular than merely days when I’m working (which is my Myspace blog). Counter-intuitively, this blog will be the one which deals with me as a person, my happenings, any epiphanies I may have, and similar things rather than the one on the page which is supposed to describe me. Sure, random news and political diatribes are just as defining as speaking at length about the details of my social life (and possibly romantic life), but not in the same way. Given that this will be the first entry in this blog, it’s not a bad idea to go through what’s happening in my life at the moment. It’s not as if I’m likely to forget, but dates and events don’t always line up the way you think they do in a few years time, or even a few months time.

I’ll endeavor not to call people out by name (note: just realized that I’m going out of my way and sounding awkward just to avoid splitting an infinitive, which is not technically grammatically improper in English. Perhaps I should stop making fun of Dan for it), other than whose whom I know I will never offend or say bad things about. That pretty much narrows the list to two (my brother and his wife), given that their children are not old enough to read, nor do I think they’d have any interest in reading my blog at this moment in their lives. Perhaps later, but I hope they live closer then, so they don’t get to know me by reading my blog online. It’s not as if I bitch about my friends constantly, or even with any kind of regularity, but there are times with anybody where they get on your nerves (note: S has not done this, nor has K), or you just need to vent. I’m fairly sure that anybody reading this will already know who it is I’m talking about by inference should it come to that, but I’d rather not do it so obviously. It’s rather tacky. I’ve successfully avoided naming names before, even in very long diatribes, so I’ll aim for that here.

Going through my social circle is fruitless. In many ways, it’s very static. It’s kind of like a high-school reunion every time I see them, though there are a number of post-education additions. Still, the principals of the group haven’t changed in quite a while, and I doubt if they’re going to. Yes, I have a solitary sibling, and he’s my identical twin. Does it feel like I have a brother? I’m not entirely sure. He’s more like my best friend, except he’s been around my entire life. The only person who hears everything. Judging by the sibling dynamic I’ve seen in other families, I’m not at all sure that it’s in the same vein. Twins are something on their own (not that I’ve observed many other twins either). We’ve all found a companionship in each other. A familial bond, and we’ve been there for some of the worst times in each other’s lives. Sure, some event may be so galling that it temporarily (or permanently) expels one of us, but we all know each other quite well at this point, so we have similar moral values and ethics. Yes, there are some things which I think are quite appalling which they don’t agree upon (mostly to do with children and what priority they ought to have in people’s lives), but that’s likely due to living with young children for an extended period of time. It’s something which you just have no perspective on until you live it, and I’d hope that theirs will change similarly should the time come that they become fathers or what have you. Then again, some of us can be very obtuse at times.

So how do I clarify where my life stands right now? I’m not concerned with my employment status as such, since figuring out when you worked which job is very easy given the date. I’ve already noted that I have a fairly static group of friends. My relationship status is in flux, to say the least. An ever-changing menagerie of women, some appealing, some not. There’s nothing I can do to lock that down at the moment, though the description given may well be enough. It’s the first time in a long time that I’ve been single for an extended period of time, and it’s kind of refreshing. It’s also true that I love meeting new people, so the dating ritual really suits me. I am, at the moment, a self-described socialist. That may date this, given time, but my political views have changed so gradually over the years that I can’t say what I believed in at any one point. I do recall being a bit of a fascist in high-school, but I can’t imagine why. My Myspace blogs will detail the reasons for my beliefs should I ever be curious, but I really don’t foresee this changing at any point.

My personal philosophy on life is perhaps somewhere between hedonism and nihilism. I have no idea how to describe that particular aspect of me. I don’t really think about it, so it’s hard for me to assign myself to some group which mandates conviction in your beliefs (as both hedonism and nihilism would seem to be). I’m rather apathetic to the whole thing. That’s not entirely true either. There are some things you just can’t change, so why worry about them? I cannot change the actions of others, nor will I ever be able to. I can’t say that I’m always happy about it, but I never let things get to me. Everything rolls off my back, so to speak. The only thing which has affected me in years was the sudden engagement, and the equally sudden end of it.

I read through people’s blogs fairly often if I don’t know them well, and I’d like to. It’s strange how you can see a metamorphosis through time as you go back further. You can watch their though process as they go through trying times, and be privy to the formative events of their life. It’s the kind of thing I’d hope people would be able to get going through what this blog will ideally be, and perhaps that kind of resource even to me. I’ve heard from a lot of people that I changed in the time when I was living in Georgia. I had a very difficult time believing that. People don’t often change. They grow up, maybe, but the core qualities of your persona and the tenets which you live your life by don’t often change after a certain age. I realize now that those people were right, but it took a major event in the life of one of my friends for it to be obvious to me. It’s likely to be the next subject which I write about anyway.