1. I can’t believe how
long it’s been since I last blogged.
MARCH! I don’t think I’ve ever
gone this long in between posts.
Needless to say*, I’ve had a very trying two months. Some of the items here will be interesting,
some will be funny, and some will be decidedly unfunny.
*But notice I say it anyway.
2. I can’t wait until
I’m a crotchety old man, somehow bitching to my grandkids about how rough I had
it. “When I was a child, we didn’t have
1000 channels on TV! We only had
112! We only had one HBO…but we dealt with it. Because we were tougher back then. We were—hey!
Where are you going?!?”
3. In my last blog, I
linked to an article in MSNBC that stated that Asians who suffer from Asian
Blush Syndrome when they drink (i.e. me) have a 6-10 times greater chance of
getting esophageal cancer in their lifetime.
I mulled that over for a week and then embarked on Alcohol Free
April. I lived my life as I normally would;
going to bars, parties, and hanging out at friends’ houses, all while
completely stone sober, just to see what it was like. The result: not too bad. I’ve discovered I can have fun without
it. Only two things suck about it:
1. I
seem to get sleepy and ready to go home earlier than I used to.
2. I
can no longer blame my dorky-ass behavior on drinking.
Anyway, after April was over, I kept it up with a few
exceptions. I had a margarita on Cinco
de Mayo, and I had three beers last Saturday when meeting up with an old friend
I hadn’t seen in probably six years. I’m
not going complete teetotaler, but I am greatly reducing the amount I imbibe.
4. I’m performing this Sunday night at Reserve
in Fort Myers,
and the headliner is pushing me to go 30 full minutes. I’ve never gone past fifteen before. I’ve written a lot of new material, but
obviously I never know if it sucks or not until I perform it. It should be interesting. If you’re local, you should come out. What the hell else do you have to do on a
Sunday? There’s no cover, no drink
minimum, and you’ll get oral from me.*
*As in talking. You know, jokes? You pervert.
5. On April 13th, I woke up and said
to myself, “Self, you’ve already quit alcohol.
What can you do to make your life even more miserable?” So I quit caffeine and went on a low carb
diet. If you’ve never done low carb, let
me tell you: that first week is pure hell.
Your body has a natural addiction to carbs because it’s the first and
easiest fuel for your body to process into energy. So when you deprive your body of them, the
symptoms are like withdrawal from Vicodin.*
*Not that I know anything about that.
However, after that week, low carb is basically a piece of
cake. I lost ten pounds in three weeks. I’ve only lost one more pound in the last
two, but I seem to remember getting stuck at one weight for a while the only
other time I successfully did low carb.
Plus, I’m doing a hell of a lot of bike riding and weightlifting, so I
know I’m getting in better shape regardless of what the scale says. I am patient and will stick to it for a long
while; in fact, I’m changing my eating habits permanently.
6. Have you ever noticed that no matter what
time of year you get a cold, some jackass tells you, “Oh, it’s going
around.” Every single time. No one ever says, “What the hell are you
talking about? No one else has a cold
right now! It’s you! You’re starting that shit!”
7. By the way, I have a question: Is MySpace
dying? It seems quiet here. My favorite bloggers hardly write anymore. I’ve been getting fewer comments, messages,
etc. Even the bulletins are sparser. I’m wondering if MySpace’s archaic website architecture
is starting to catch up with it. It
seems like every “new feature” of this site is a direct rip-off of facebook,
only more poorly executed. And speaking
of facebook, my account over there is blowing up. I had to turn off phone notifications because
my damn BlackBerry was buzzing me every 45 seconds.*
*No, I’m not bragging.
Okay, maybe a little.
It would be a shame if MySpace goes the way of Friendster,
because I really do (did?) enjoy this place, and the creativity it
encourages. Unlike facebook’s stale
profile pages, MySpace allows you to actually manipulate how you express
yourself. And, of course, there are
actual blogs. AND, you can make friends
on here, where facebook is more geared towards networking with friends you
already have.
However, facebook has flown by MySpace in number of active
user accounts. If facebook ever comes
out with blogs and profile customization, you can stick a fork in MySpace.
8. I also have a
Twitter account. You can follow me
here. But let me say for the record:
Twitter bores the hell out of me. And
140 characters just aren’t enough. I
think it’s a fad.
9. One advantage facebook definitely has over
MySpace: fewer fake accounts. Fake
accounts are a fact of life in MySpace.
I am loath to admit it, but I’ve been duped three times now. I must have no sense of pattern
recognition. I’m like an idiot rat that
keeps pressing the lever that electrocutes it.
Anyway, I’ve noticed one thing in common with the girls who
I know (and a few I suspect) are fake profiles: They’ll all do MySpace and even
Twitter, but they all stay the hell away from facebook. I’m thinking that facebook’s requirement of
more information disclosure spooks them all out.
10. This last item is
a big part of why I haven’t written in so long.
Over the course of two weeks, two very close friends of mine lost their
lives in entirely separate incidents. They
were both right about my age, both have May birthdays, both had a lot going for
them in life, and both of their deaths were completely unexpected.
And, oddly enough, I am apparently the only friend they had
in common, as I was the only person who attended both funerals.
Anyway, it doesn’t seem right to eulogize them in an item in
a shitty blog like this. I’ll probably
post a separate dedication to them another time. For now, just know that it’s been kind of
tough on me, more so on their families, and it’s really had me thinking about
what the hell I’m doing with the rest of my life.
R.I.P. Martha Feeney (May 15th, 1970 – April 23rd,
2009)
R.I.P. Steve Adkins (May 26th, 1971 – May 5th,
2009)