So, since I've last posted in this thing, I've been laid off. Which means I sit around at home a lot. I have everything all set to start sending out resumes and such to prospective employers, I'm just hesitating on actually doing it. I don't know why, but taking that leap has always worried me. I'm trying to figure out if I have something else I should do. Should I iron my dress shirt for my suit before I starting sending out applications? What if someone wants to call me in almost instantly, and I show up in a wrinkly dress shirt? That wouldn't be very professional.

In other news, the free time has let me play a lot of WoW (too much, actually) and get in some solid Warmachine playing. I've played 5 games since I got laid off, and I've won 3 of them. That's pretty much the best streak I've ever been on. It's like Simon said, he knew that one of these days, everything I knew was just going to click. And it seems to have done that. My list building is much better, I feat early and at the right times, even when I end up in a hard place I can still manage to do some damage. And hell, I beat Simon. I never thought I would beat Simon.

Also, I've gotten to talk to Liz a lot. I'm going to pretend she's not the only person that reads this thing for the sake of documenting this stuff. We went to see Hot Fuzz and it was pretty awesome. I got there late, though, so I didn't get to give her the rose I'd brought until afterwards, along with a sweatshirt I had that doesn't fit me anymore. She's been wearing it a lot, it seems, which makes me smile. She makes me smile in general. I really enjoy chatting with her and especially enjoy the time we spend together, albeit however short it tends to be. Hopefully that can change soon.

So, that's where life stands right now. It's not bad, it's not amazing, but it's better than it's been before. The job thing is ok, because I wanted a new one, and everything else is looking up.

My car, on the other hand, not doing so hot. Gotta get my dad to look at that.

Got a tourney to go to on Saturday for Warmachine. I should start planning out my lists. And I need to get something for my mom for mother's day.

In other news, I realized the reason my credit card stopped working is because I maxed it out. So, I have $1000 in debt right now, thrilling. I'm going to cut way back on my spending for a few months. I really need to fix this problem and save up some money. Especially since I'm going to need to move out eventually and at some point I'm going to need a new car. So, plan right now is to pay off my credit card in the next two months and then not touch it except for small purchases, like gas and such, for a couple months after that. Hopefully I'll have a few thousand in the bank at that point.

Still need to work on looking for a new job too. Something in New Haven would be nice, then I'd be able to move there when I eventually have to get the hell out of my current residence. Staying in Milford would be really nice too, though I don't know how feasible it would be on my own. And I assume right now I'll be on my own when my next move comes around. I enjoy living with my friends, but it's just too much right now. I need some space.

Hmmm, I wonder what I should get my mom. She likes to garden, I should get her something garden related. Especially since I managed to punch a hole right through the palm of her work gloves the other day when I was helping my dad split wood. Thank God it only went through the glove and not my hand too.

...

no price you could hold sway 
or just to find my, kneeling away my, saturn 
so if i could i would wish it all away 
if i thought tomorrow would take you away 
you my piece of my mind, my own, my saturn 
just trying to hold on... one more day

...

I am so excited, this week is already shaping up to be awesome! :)

Gotta remember my secret stuff for Friday.

So much has happened and I'm so shitty at writing it down, but I have to because if I don't I'm going to hate myself or something. Here goes, I'll try to make it chronological.

I've become readdicted to World of Warcraft. I know, I know, it's bad, and I was finally free of it's pull, but the spark has been reignited and I've been sucked back in. I joined a new guild full of goons from SomethingAwful and it's been so amazing and everyone is awesome and I seem to be popular. I think that's why I play, because on there people like me and I'm useful. The times when the game gets really boring for me are the times when everyone outlevels me or I'm in a shitty guild where no one wants to help me out or do things with one another. This guild is the complete opposite, and everyone is always chatting and doing crazy shit and having so much fun and oh god it's awesome. I have been appointed the unofficial webmaster and I am hoping to use this as an excuse to brush up on my intarweb skills and maybe get back into a good groove of designing sites. I would love to use that as an excuse to escape my shitty cubical job.

Wednesday I went out for beer and wings which turned into beer and turkey club sandwich. It was tasty, the beer was tasty, the service was phenomenal, and our bartender was a girl we knew from high school (who has gotten much hotter than she was in high school, at least twice as hot, maybe three times as hot, not sure). She didn't recognize me, I don't think.

Friday night was fun. A bunch of us went out to the bars in New Haven and we started at Bar. Got pretty drunk there, checked out hot chicks, all that fun bar stuff. Then we moved on to Playwright, and it turned out that someone we knew from high school was there, but she didn't recognize me. No one recognizes me with the beard anymore, I think that's part of why I love it. It always gives me an edge in social situations, since I can reassert myself with people I used to know, and after I've used my recent confidence on them, I spring the "Oh snap it's me from the past!" card. I didn't spring that card at the bar, I just got really drunk, then grabbed this girl by the arm and said, "Hey, don't I know you?" It was sort of on a dare (from myself to myself), and she got this confused look on her face before her friend dragged her off. I considered it a success, though, because she was giving me confused looks all night after that, and those are just hilarious.

Saturday was painful to start with. Very very hungover. I went to my parent's house and Rich and I helped my dad split the wood from the tree that got cut down in our front yard recently. He wasn't expecting to get it all done, and we showed up late, but we still managed to get it all done. My dad was happy, and that makes me happy, so I spent the rest of the day in a good mood. I also got to see my mom for the first time since she got back from Germany, and she gave me two awesome Pilsner glasses she brought back for me along with some German chocolate (which is in the freezer, gotta remember that when I go home so I can have some!). I saw pictures and my mom promised to cook dinner for Rich and I for helping with the wood-splitting.

Then we headed to Rich's parents house and they gave us all kinds of lawn furniture they didn't want anymore because they got a new lawn furniture set. Also we managed to snag Rich's poker table top, and even though the car was crammed full of shit I figured out how to make it fit.

We got home, started drinking, watched "He-Man and the Masters of the Universe" followed by "Super Mario Bros." Both shitty live-action movies of our childhoods that were totally amazing. Some of our friends had been there, and left at this point (Ben, Heather, Drew, Keira and Franco), but Ryan got home from his show and then Adam, Nicole, and Ry's friend Katie showed up. We were outside smoking and playing poker on the patio at this point, which was fun but frustrating. No one knew how to play poker, and it's incredibly hard to play poker against people who don't know what they're doing. Mostly because you have no idea if they're betting because they have something good or have no friggin' clue what they're doing. They'll bet like crazy and get to the end and have a 10 high, or bet really conservatively and it turns out they had a full-house which I thought I had beat. It's so annoying it's not even funny. Also, I hate giving Ryan my cloves to smoke, because he smokes them and then spits all over the place. Like, seriously, he spits every 3-5 seconds. I asked him why the fuck he does that and he said it's because he doesn't like the taste in his mouth.

THEN DON'T FUCKING SMOKE, YOU MORON! JESUS!

This shit ain't cheap, y'know. He does the same damn thing with cigars. Which, consequently, is why he can't buy cigars for us, because he'll get the $1.50 ones from the gas station. He can't tell them apart (because they all taste like ass to him) but he smokes them with us anyways to feel "cool and included." He's like a goddamn 15-year-old on the fucking playground. Ugh. Grow some balls and be an individual, jesus. If you don't like the taste of smoke, don't fucking smoke, simple as that.

We watched one more shitty childhood movie, "Street Fighter," and then called it quits. Passed out and all that jazz. Next day was Bamboozled down in New Jersey. We left at about 2 and got there sometime around 4, and made it in quick enough to see Killswitch Engage. I was then fucked pretty hard since I forgot to bring money, so I barely afforded a drink and a hotdog to keep myself from dying before we left. I got money to pay our buddy for the tickets and then we hit up McDonald's on the way home. Other bands we got to see while we were there included The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus, Yellowcard, Thrice, Catch 22 (the end of their set), Taking Back Sunday (oh god that was so fucking painful) and finally Weird Al Yankovic (hilarious) followed by Linkin Park (awesome x 1000). There were a lot of issues with the sound, it seemed, but the day was pretty awesome. We missed a few bands I would have enjoyed seeing (It Dies Today, Lordi, Anberlin) but all in all it was pretty good.

And now, I sit here, on a Monday, in my cube, feeling shitty and not wanting to do any fucking work. So, I typed this out. Cool, huh? Hmmm, it's 12:15, totally time for lunch. I think I'm going to get a Steakhouse Burger from Wendy's. I know it's bad for me, but holy shit they taste so good. The diet Coke will help energize me for the rest of the afternoon too. I need to get Texas 4 fixed up and get back to Ohio 4 so that I can have it done by Wednesday morning at the latest.

New Heroes tonight! I'd cross my fingers for an e-date to watch it, but we'll see... :wink:

So, we had a power surge or something at work today. Oddly it only shut down about half of the building, and not like "the left half" but random rooms and outlets throughout the building. It did, however, shut down the room that the server is in. So I couldn't get to the internet, couldn't print anything to the printers, and I couldn't use our internal network to get files from my co-workers that I needed to start my newest project. So, yeah, I just took an early lunch. I mean, fuck, what else was I supposed to do?

This weekend is looking cool. Heading to Rhode Island probably on Saturday morning to hang with Jeff and Tim for the weekend. Saturday night we're going to see Stephen Lynch live, which I'm stoked for. Then I'll be back on Sunday, probably early afternoon or something. I'd enjoy planning time to hang out with a certain someone (*wink wink*) but that seems to always be hard. It's understandable, just frustrating, but I'll have to keep dealing with that I guess.

My mom gets back from Germany tonight, hopefully she brings me something kickin' rad. Or at least semi-rad. I'll be miffed if I get some lederhosen or something. I want a big beer stein.

Now back to our regularly scheduled program where I slack off and daydream at work. It's nice when I just started a new project, because they're not expecting anything from me for a day or two, so I can take my sweet time. Kinda relaxing.

So, I haven't known what to write in here for awhile, so I just haven't written. I dunno. This is the problem with me and journals, always always always. One day, nothing eventful will happen and I'll forget to write it down, and then it just snowballs and I stop. Hopefully I'm breaking that habit right now.

I went to my 'rents house on Sunday, which was nice. My family got new living room furniture (finally!) and it's pretty comfy. Especially compared to the horror that was the old love seat that was in there and the two rocking chairs that were falling apart. Instead of barely being able to seat our family of 4, we can now comfortably seat all of us plus another person. Crazy how that works.

4/20 came and went. I didn't do anything the day of, but I had some fun the next day. Holy shit that just reminded me.

Ok, so, on Saturday we celebrated a late 4/20, and then decided we wanted to do some grilling. So, we hop in the car and cruise to the supermarket, start grabbing our stuff and eventually get to the checkout. The girl ringing us up couldn't have been more that 17. I'm high as shit, and just leaning on the little countertop there by the register staring off into space. And Rich and Ry are bagging groceries. So, anyways, even though I was messed up, I could tell this girl was kinda checking me out (which is weird, because that doesn't happen often, maybe it was the new beard I'm sporting) and finally she tries to strike up a conversation with me.

Cashier Girl - "Oh my gawd, have you had these yet?"

Me - "No, not yet..."

This is the point where I look down to see what she's talking about, and she's holding a package of Ballpark Franks that we picked up. And my brain just shuts off. I mean, fuck, is this girl seriously asking me if I've ever eaten a hot dog? Or does she mean have I tried one of the hot dogs inside of that specific package yet? I started stuttering.

Me -"I mean... wait... yes?"

Cashier Girl - "Oh, 'cuz they're totally awesome." *giant smile*

Me (confused) - "Yeah, I... uh... yeah..."

Right about then we were done, I paid for the food, she gave me my receipt (with more smiles) and we left. I managed to hold the laughter in until the parking lot, at least.


Also, I'm supposed to repost this, even though Liz is the only person that reads my LJ right now anyways:

1 - Tell you why I friended you.
2 - Associate you with something. A fandom, a song, a colour, a piece of fruit. SOMETHING.
3 - Tell you something I like about you.
4 - Tell you a memory I have of you.
5 - Associate you with a character/pairing.
6 - Ask something I've always wanted to know about you. (Or else I'll just ask a random question. I reserve that right.)
7 - Tell you my favorite user pic of yours.
8 - In return, you must spread this disease in your LJ.

So, I had a dream last night that my roommates and I were all ninjas at some weird ninja school in Massachusetts. Our sensai was Master Fong from that episode of Futurama where Bender becomes a robot wrestler. Anways, we had this huge training area outside the school with trampolines and stuff that we had to jump to and fight on and it was just crazy. Then Master Fong had to go somewhere, and told me I would have to pick him up at the airport later, so we ended up alone for the weekend. So Megan and this girl Shannon (that I met like two weeks ago once, and Bob has been talking to) showed up, and we started talking and I took some weird self-administered shot that was like concentrated Red Bull straight into my veins (this shot thing has been in my dreams before). Then I ended up making out with Megan, before I went out onto the ninja course, and while hopped up on my Red Bull drug, I jumped around and did crazy flips and shit. I found some chopsticks and a box of instant ramen on top of one of the platforms. I remember thinking it was some sort of prize for getting onto the advanced level platform that we weren't supposed to be good enough to get to yet. Then we all piled in a car to go to some restaurant and out dancing. On the way, Meg got out of the car and walked faster than it (while we were going 45 mph, I distinctly remember this) and she picked some flower from the side of the road that looked sort of like a daffodil. I had a name for it in my head, but I can't remember the name now. And I also remember that this flower was indigeonous to England (in my dream, because I don't know shit about flowers), but was growing in Massachusetts due to coming over on a boat. The flower was kind of bruised and stuff, but smelled really nice. Meg managed to get back into the car while Bob was driving it at 45 mph, and none of this seemed odd. Then we got to the restaurant and we were eating in a quiet back area that had a big widescreen LCD television on the wall. We turned it to some sort of interactive weather channel and found out that there were storms coming. I remember not being able to find the town we were in while I was "mousing over" the other towns.  There was one town called Moon. This was all in some weird amalgamation of eastern Massachusetts, sorta near Mansfield. We changed the channel to anothe weather station, and then some guys in the room with us yelled to change the channel because they didn't like what we had on. Next thing I know, we're back at the ninja school, Meg and Shannon are gone, and the phone suddenly rang. It was Master Fong, I had forgotten to pick him up at the airport, so I took off at crazy speed to get him. And that's where I woke up.

And that was probably one of the weirdest and most vivid dreams I have ever had. Hands down. What the fuck does all of that mean?

...that you could just fall asleep and wake up and it turned out you have everything you've ever wanted? The perfect job, the perfect house, the perfect car, the perfect body, the perfect relationship (hell, any relationship). Maybe a dog that could bring you a beer while you watched your favorite football team win. Or a dragon to ride around on. I dunno, something like that.

I've been feeling really shitty today, and I don't know why. I think it's because I feel like everything I do is futile waste of time and I just want to curl up in a ball and not have to worry about anything ever again. I wonder if I just stopped now, and kinda coasted through life, how long would I survive? Years? Months? Weeks? I'd run out of money really fast, that's for sure. And then I'd have to just live under a bridge or something. And that totally wouldn't get me away from the void inside of me. It'd be just me and the void then, to the bitter end. Until the void gnawed me open from the inside out, and I became the void. Maybe that's what I'm scared of. Maybe I know that the void isn't in me... the void -is- me. Perhaps I will forever be this void, sitting on the edge, watching everyone be happy, getting brief flashes of happiness or what could be, but forever being told "no" by some karmic being that I must have royally pissed off in a past life. Maybe I stepped on some really holy insect when I was kid. Who knows.

Maybe if I just fall asleep, everything will turn out ok...

So, yeah, weekend was pretty good. Friday I did the whole work thing and then booked it up to Albany to go to the St. Rose formal. I have never seen so many hot girls in tight dresses in my life. And most of them didn't have dates! God, I so picked the wrong college to go to. After barely eating all day, we went to Denny's, and after like three bites of my food I was totally full because my stomach had basically decided that it just wasn't getting food that night. So, I had to take my food with me and slowly force myself to eat it over the next hour or so before I went to sleep.

Saturday was cool, hung out with my brothers, grabbed some Chinese food, then drove home in time for the party at my house. It was really low-key, only about ten of us in total, but it was a great time. Since it was so much calmer than any party we've had before, I wasn't freaking out about noise or the mess being made or anything like that. And I managed to keep my drinking under control, which made me a happy boy. Passed out that night and slept really well.

Woke up Sunday, did our usual post-party diner run, snagged a tasty omelet, then back to the house to lay around all day in my PJ's and play video games. I had really hoped I'd be able to see Liz at some point during the weekend, but since she started her new job it just wasn't feasible. Hopefully we'll get some time this week, even if I have to skip something in there somewhere so that we can have free time at the same time.

As far as exercising is going, I had hoped to hit the gym on Sunday, since I couldn't go on Saturday (due to all of the travelling and the party), but that didn't happen. So, this week I'm going to have to be really good about trying to stick to my Mon-Tue-Thur-Sat schedule that I set for myself. Hopefully two days of hardcore cardio and two days of hardcore lifting, along with eating well the whole time. As of right now, I've been doing pretty well.

Oh, and last night we had some crazy flooding, and when the tide came in the water was up to our front lawn. There was still some debris there this morning showing how high the water got, and it was pretty absurd. On my way to work this morning, the little park in our town that has a pond in it was completely under water, and the river that drains through the downtown Milford area was absurdly high. There was probably six INCHES between it and the bottom of a bridge where there is normally a good three or four FEET of space. Totally crazy, definitely the most water we've seen since we moved in.

There was this post. Hopefully I will keep this thing going. I'm usually terrible at blogs and diaries and all that crap, but this might work. Be prepared, if you plan on reading this at any consistent frequency, to hear about my dreams, read some of my poetry, see me bitch about work, and most importantly log what I've been doing as far as exercise and eating. I have a lot of goals that I want to achieve, and then I can start setting new goals for myself after that. For now, though, just getting this thing going is a good start.