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July 1, 2002 (6:08pm): Hrm. This place really sucks. I tried to think of a better way of saying it, but no, there is no better way. Just gotta go with the guts, and the guts say this place sucks.
July 2, 2002 (1:03pm): I'm not sure what I'm gonna do right here...
Okay, I've dropped this English class. It's ridiculously remedial and I can just test out of it later in the year, or have my credits from WVU-P sent. Also, I don't think I'm on the mealplan 'cause my ID hasn't been accepted since I got here. I can't eat otherwise, so...
I guess I should just go home. No class, no food, what reason is there for being here?
I'll leave most of my stuff in my room, of course, no sense taking it all back. But I can't get ahold of my parents. No answer the phoney. I hate to ask them to come back up here, but I really can't stay.
Would this be self-fulfilling prophecy? Hmm.
July 2, 2002 (4:19pm): I've been forced to find solace in Mama's Family and Mr. Pibb soda. It's come to this.
I want some hush puppies.
July 2, 2002 (5:39pm): Okay, yes, I shall go back to Roane County.
July 3, 2002 (3:54pm): People say "hate" too much in our culture, I think. It's always hate hate hate. Somebody's always hating something. Like, "I hate drugstore ponies," or "I hate giving money to charity."
To combat this, I'm gonna say instead something like, "I don't love it when I drop food in my lap," or maybe even "If I were the kind of person who said 'hate,' I'd say I hate you. But I'm not. I'm just saying."
July 5, 2002 (1:26am): I'm pretty sure some entries are being deleted...
Anyway, my cat is missing.
July 6, 2002 (3:52pm): As of right about now, I gotta say that the new Reel Big Fish album, Cheer Up!, is pretty disappointing.
Well, it sounds good, and maybe I just haven't listened enough, but there's nothing new. The songwriting is decent but lacking, and the sound is just like Why Do They Rock So Hard?.
Hrm.
July 6, 2002 (10:40pm): According to a recent poll, 31% of Americans would not support US peace initiatives in foreign nations.
That means 31% of America thinks it's a good thing to have nations at war and split by civil unrest. How the fuck can that be a good thing?
July 7, 2002 (6:00pm): I keep starting to work on my webpage, as I do every couple of months, then I just get this sluggish apathetic feeling. I think, "Aw, whatever. This looks feeble. I quit." Then five minutes later I'm back working on it again.
Hrm!
July 8, 2002 (12:26pm): I knew I shouldn't have left my X-Force comics in my dorm room. Now I wanna read'em. Stupid lack of foresight!
July 8, 2002 (10:36pm): One of the pleasantly simplest things has got to be the can of soda.
It's this wonderful little package of sweet elixir. Portable tin of bubbles. Mmm.
July 9, 2002 (1:42am): Oh me, oh my...
I drew a picture of a bunny today. A red bunny. And I was gonna give him a light brown belly but I forgot. I am sad. He has a white belly.
July 9, 2002 (9:23pm): I dreamt about a firefly last night. It was dying.
There was pale green carpet, and just the little firely lying on the floor on its back.
If dreams have meanings, then I'm at a loss 'cause I have no idea what this could infer.
July 11, 2002 (4:32pm): Ooh, look. The numbers of the current time are going in descending order. Wow.
Okay, that's not interesting. Nevermind.
July 11, 2002 (8:06pm): My friends have gotten weird. And I say "weird" because I hesitate to say "grown up". Maybe grown apart.
Either way, I don't know what's going on anymore. I'm just left scratching my head in some big race.
July 12, 2002 (9:31pm): I've come to the realization that maybe I don't eat enough Chinese food. I like Chinese food. Most Chinese food. But there are no restaurants around here, or at least, none I can afford. The ones I can afford have baklava and petite fors, and what the hell are baklava and petite fors doing in a Chinese restaurant!
I used to make loads and loads of mix tapes. All the time. I'd come home after school and make a couple, just to give them to friends. But my stereo's tape deck has long since been busted. (Note: THANKS A LOT, WAAK'S FRIENDS! I'm happy you're all in prison or whatever now!)
I had a tiny little radio/cassette player, but I broke it. It sounded awful, anyway. All the tapes had a wheezing squeal sound in the background.
Hrm. I should redo my Mix Tape Manifesto. Update it a bit. But I forget some of the most important stuff. You really have to keep your hands in something, keep doing it. It's been a while. Hrm.
July 13, 2002 (7:34pm): There's a comic book convention tomorrow. Wowee. Haven't been to a convention in, like, two years.
The ones in Charleston are always poky and almost not worth attending, but I still like to go. The comics are usually over-priced, but that's just a great motivator in buying cheap, unnoticed titles that are often quaint surprises. How else would I have ever read Heroes For Hire (and liked it, no less)? Heh heh.
So I'm just going through the pre-con ritual of feverishly trying to figure out how much money I have and what exactly I have to look for. Huge stacks of cheap comics are a seedy deterent. I go in looking for X-Force back issues and leave with Avengers instead. And bite me. I know I sound like a geek. It's not like you have to date and be seen in public with me.
July 15, 2002 (1:33pm): You know, one wouldn't think that great girls hang out at comic book conventions. But one would be WRONG! Mostly.
Okay, so I was at a convention yesterday, the first in two years. I was just puttering along, avoiding the expectant glare of the venders, looking for cheap back issues of The Atomics and Iron Man ('cause I read superhero comics like a big stupid teenager). I got to a table and some girl was flipping through the A-C box of new issues. I stood beside her and pretended I was looking for something in the D-F box, Defenders, say, or Daredevil, whatever. She kept glancing over at me, at which point I would go the little eyebrow-raise thing like "Hi, I need to look through there, hurry up." Finally, I just turned around and leaned against the table, 'cause she was taking FOREVER.
She started messing with my head. She'd pull out some obscure comic and go, "Hmm... This one looks dandy. Have you read it?" And I'd say, "No, but I'm sure it'd be a great read. Maybe you could buy it and go across the room far away from here." She did this a couple times. I was about to just ask if I could look through the box (I hardly ever do 'cause I know people wanna find stuff as much as I), when she said, "I bet you'd like to look through this box, huh?" I chuckled. And shoved her outta the way. She said, "Ha, I was wondering if you'd do that. There are so many ways I can pretend to be interested in the same three Avengers over and over."
I started nosing through the box and picked out some Atomics. She was down at some other box but came back up and observed, "Mike Allred's so great. Most people just pick up some flash-in-the-pan like Frank Quitely's X-Men art." I turned to her and said, "Uh-huh," and flipped through my little stack of comics, making sure she saw the load of Frank Quitely covers on the X-Men books.
She said, "Well, that's dandy... Dammit." I talked to her for a little while, but not about much. I mean, the conversation is pretty obviously topical when you're standing in a room full of thousands of comics. But it was cool, talking to someone who didn't like Batman and didn't get their source material from cartoons. (Nyah!) Then she said she had to look for Madman or something, and I had to leave anyway.
But yeah. Convention girls are cool.
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July 16, 2002 (4:42pm): You really got me. You really got me.
Anyway, I just thought I should add something for some reason.
July 17, 2002 (1:10pm): I was all ready to go somewhere today but everyone else had already made plans. So I'm stuck here working on this stupid webpage again.
Hrm. At least there's ample air conditioning.
And Eels.
So at any rate, I woke up at 11:30am this morning, but I knew I had nothing to do and no one to talk to, so I just stayed in bed till about fifteen minutes ago. I steadfastly refuse to believe there's anything else to do today.
July 18, 2002 (4:53pm): Whoa. Saurkraut smells like garbage. But I still like it. A lot of the best things smell bad.
Ahem.
So I went upstairs to the attic and started digging through the junk. You can't imagine how much dust and spider webs (and prob'ly spider poop, if spiders do indeed poop) there was. Anyway, I was looking for stuff for my dad to sell in some yard sale or whatever. I kept digging through boxes and boxes and spilled boxes of my old toys and books. Weird.
Even at my young age of 21 I can't imagine the depth of life I've lived. I mean, things as recent as five years ago are an entire mystery to me. I remember where I was and what I was doing, roughly. Like, I know I was in 10th grade, and I remember a few classes, and maybe who my friends were. But overall it's very very fuzzy. It takes a handful of photos or a recovered notebook to fully realize even a marginal moment of time.
Even then I just feel like it was something fascinating that's happened to a close friend, and I'm just someone trying to tap into it. It feels like I'm taking credit for something I had nothing to do with. Maybe it's just because I was a different person then. Same face, same, I dunno, allergies, but really no one I know.
So I dug up hundreds of action figures and bits of LEGOs and all that good stuff that used to keep me amused. Then it got really sad 'cause I couldn't transform the Go-Bots or even imagine that I ever wanted to. I just kept thinking of Ben Folds's "Still Fighting It" (which, if it's an anomalous song, you should download, o reader-folk).
Then everything shifted to Shawn and his little bundle-on-the-way. I mean, here I am barely able to either play with toys or get a grown-up job, and he's got a full new person to tend to. We're not even people right now and yet we're begetting people. It's horrifying and heartening at the same time.
Well, at any rate, I found my old Where's Waldo? books. I'm gonna go see if I have the patience to find him again.
July 19, 2002 (2:46pm): I've had a nice little burst of activity on this webpage lately. Don't know what's going on there. Wacky.
Anyway, I finally got Electro-Shock Blues Show in the mail, and while I'm not usually too enthused about live albums, I was giddy as hell when this one showed up. I immediately ripped it onto my computer and fiddled around with the labels, but I haven't actually listened to much yet. I'll get around to it. When I first listen to an album I like to sit down and hear it all the way through with no distractions. So I'll do that later when everyone leaves me alone.
Oops. Gotta go watch something inane and ultimately hollow on teevee.
July 20, 2002 (1:52am): I think my biggest goal today was to take a shower, and I didn't even get around to it.
That makes me feel guilty somehow.
July 21, 2002 (1:26am): Pepushi o yonde kudasai.
This sounds entirely like a song I was listening to a while ago, but it's a true story. Probably prompted by the song, but still.
I get so sad when I see photos in thrift stores or flea markets. I mean, photos in antique frames or albums. Who are those people, anyway? Someone's there peddling their remains. Maybe somewhere they've been long forgotten by their family because their pictures would up in an errant to-Goodwill box.
It's strange, I know, to bring up something like this. But it's true. It's just a little unnerving to have a photo of someone you don't even know. If you buy the frame, it's the frame that means so much, not the photo inside. Someone's memory is in that frame. What can you do with that? And do you realize you'll end up that way too?
I saw some photos of a happy family, hanging on the thrift shop wall, I paid the man and I brought them back home, I feel better now when they don't call...
July 24, 2002 (2:20pm): Wow. I've been spending too much time playing a video game. Makes me feel stupid, 'cause in the end what've I got to show for it? But it's fun at the time.
I've been subsisting on Gobstoppers and Coca-Cola, and haven't been stopping except to watch a few hours of TV (which makes it all the worse). Oh, and I've been reading that James Bond biography. So. Depending on who you are I've either been living it up or just tossing my time away.
July 26, 2002 (1:46am): Build me a cabin in Utah / Marry me wife, catch rainbow trout / Have a buncha kids who call me Pa / That must be what it's all about...
I can't image there's a person anywhere who wonders what I'm doing right now. It's both exhilirating and sad to think so. More sad, though.
July 26, 2002 (2:15pm): I'd go get the mail but it's been raining like crazy all day. And the mail's not for me, anyway.
July 27, 2002 (3:58pm): I woke up and was immediately bored. Waking up bored is never a good sign.
So to keep myself busy, I took all my comics off the shelves and decided to put'em in alphabetical order again. I usually get lazy, pull out a handful of comics, read them, and stuff them back in some other spot, so it's high time I reorder them. I do this every year...
They're so dusty and dank. It's awful. Good thing I'm not trying to make money with them anymore. I sorted them all by letter, but then left 26 tidy piles on the floor and looked for something else to do.
July 28, 2002 (7:01pm): Jeepers creepers. I just remembered the dream I dreamt last night.
Okay, the first thing I remember is being in a chicken coop that had a drive-thru window. And some girl was there, but I don't know whom. I was at the window, but I wasn't serving fast food or anything. The window was just there.
So I was standing there leaning out the window and looking around. Some guy comes up, I'm not sure who, and takes the bottle of alcohol I had that appeared outta nowhere. It was like Boone's Farm, but it was red wine, which is odd 'cause Boone's Farm doesn't make wine, only crappy malted liquor that they call wine.
The guy takes my wine and drinks it all, and I'm just like, "Hey, don't do that." Then I get really pissed and jump out the window.
Then most everything changes. The scenery is a gently sloping hill all covered with snow, and a few trees. At the bottom of the hill is a chateau of some kind, like a ski shack or something. All of a sudden there are many people all fighting, like some kinda Avengers throwdown with the Masters of Evil (the geekiest reference so far). They're all shooting power-blasts from their hands and, I dunno, kicking ass.
The guy who took my wine is now some sort of James Bond villain/Nazi warden hardass. At some point Weezer's "Keep Fishin'" is playing. Well, not really playing, but everyone is singing it. Wacky.
I'm throwing down with the Nazi warden guy and then everyone scatters as the explosions get outta control. That's when it ends.
Strange.
July 28, 2002 (7:11pm): Wait! There's more.
At some point I was in a store and paid a huge sum for a guitar. Then I hadda pick out the guitar. Some girl behind the counter told me to get "this black matte metal one," but I wanted a natural wood one. I remarked that neither Dr. Jekyll nor Mr. Hyde would approve otherwise.
And I'd swear Satan was in there somewhere.
July 28, 2002 (10:38pm): Oh, the girl behind the counter was Bic Runga. Just came to me.
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