Vapors

I am a gas.

I am rapidly vibrating molecules with generous spacing. I am insidious, insinuating myself through porous membranes and traveling across open expanses. I am not inhaled at first but I hover and eventually she grows tired of holding her breath. I am exhaled quickly enough but part of me is absorbed. I am getting her acclimated to me.

I am a gas. This is my plan:

Through repeated exposure I will win her over.

I am a gas.

SSSSSSSSSSSSSSS...

Uh oh

I recently read Fight Club (Chuck Palahniuk) and I've gotta say that I wasn't terribly impressed. I've been told it's better than the movie, but it just didn't work as well for me. I guess pop nihilism reads better on screen than it does in print.

I'm going to give Survivor a shot sometime soon. Hopefully I'll enjoy that more.

Maybe I should just give up and start reading actual literature. Or not.

What goes around...

As long as I've had access to the web, people have been able to self-publish websites, ranging from mediocre one-pagers with photos of family and pets to major endeavors with complex navigation and graphics. In those early days, the super-sites had yet to really be established as main sources for news and entertainment, so I found myself browsing personal Geocities sites.

As a matter of course, the super-sites with their professional (and spell-checked) content quickly eclipsed personal sites and became the staple of my web surfing. As surrogate newspapers and magazines, they quickly scooped any competing personal sites.

We've come full circle. Blogs and forums have brought the focus back to the small-scale content. I still read news sites and DVD sites and such, but once I'm done reading blogs for the day, there's almost nothing else that compels me to keep reading.

Blog sites and software have made self-published content fast and easy. Simple feedback systems have made us bold in demanding new content from our entertaining anonymous friends. We are no longer dealing with sealed off mega-sites to get the bulk of our entertainment and enrichment. Our blog friends, both the faceless and the dear, have become the new staple.

Cool.

primer

Wow. This movie was nuts and I'm not sure I even understood most of what happened. It's a thinking man's sci-fi flick about time travel made for $7,000. It's been done incredibly well, considering the budget. It definitely won't coddle viewers and you have to pay attention to catch everything. In other words, I liked it.

I recommend it, but only if you're interested in actively watching it, possibly more than once. Yeah.

It's done

Well, the self-imposed posting challenge is over. I learned a couple things from this experience. It's fun to try to post every day because I found myself writing more things and also found myself happier with what I wrote. There were a couple days in there that I wasn't happy with (filler days when nothing good was coming), but overall I was pleased with it. You get a lot more comments when you post more, which is fun, even if it's just Neill telling you to check your email.

I'll keep trying to post every day, but there's no reason to post the filler stuff, so if I don't have anything good to post, you probably won't hear from me.

An important rule of blogging (posting challenge: day seven)

Sometimes it's better to say nothing than to say that you've got nothing to say.

Shortly before the end (posting challenge: day six)

Let me tell you about how I wasted the last 12 hours of my life. Sounds crazy, huh? Yeah, that pretty much describes it.

--

I'm at Sara's, getting my weekly aura cleansing. We always talk when she's working--politics, movies, coffee--so when she stops gabbing in the middle of a sentence, I'm caught a little off guard. I open my eyes and look at her, and she tells me point blank that something's wrong and that I'm going to die in 12 hours.

"Oh."

Who am I to be satisfied with one opinion? It's only my life, right? So I go to see my herbalist. I tell him the story and he says he'll see what he can do. He goes to the back room and comes back and gives me a cup full of sludge that tastes like mud. I go back to Sara and ask her if I'm all better and she says that nope, sorry, I'm still doomed.

My Tai Chi instructor only confirms it: in the elegantly appointed dojo, he informs me that my chi is seriously screwed. My interior decorator tweaks my feng shui and says I'll get the bill in the mail. The acupuncturist jabs me appropriately. My broker has plenty of stock tips but no advice and no insight.

Back to Sara. Still about to shuffle off.

My impending doom confirmed, I sit down to plan my final hours. I consider calling my parents, but it would take them the rest of my life to come out here. I think about calling my friends, but we haven't been all that close since last year when I got into Scientology and kept bugging them to get audited. Man, that was a stupid phase.

That leaves me with one person to call--my girlfriend. Do I really want to spend my last hours with her crying on my shoulder? I pick up the phone and start to dial her number, but I put it back down on the cradle. Why ruin her day and mine, you know? So I go to the movies.

The show gets out and as I walk to my car I realize how much of my time I've already wasted. You'll never realize how important your time is until you come out of a movie that took up a sixth of your life. I decide that I'll get my lady something nice, pretend it isn't the end of the world, and have a great time. Finally I've decided on a reasonable plan for the hours leading up to my demise.

I pull up to Carl's Jewelers with 6 hours left and feeling the best I've felt since I found out I was going to die. I walk through the door and nod to the security guard who's getting chewed out by the manager. He returns the nod with a distracted smile. I look through the necklaces for a bit and find one that I know she'll love. And I wait. The manager's retreated to his tiny office and the only salesperson around is busy with a ring-shopping couple that seems way too young to be getting married. You know how whenever you need something right away, it takes forever to get it?

I keep waiting, burning half an hour.

So I say to myself: You're going to die in five hours. Get on with it.

Before I know it, I've got the necklace--she is gonna love it--in my coat pocket and I'm heading for the door. I haven't gone two steps before I feel a meaty hand drop on my shoulder. I turn around and the sheepish guard from the door must have noticed me, because he isn't smiling anymore. I'm not about to spend my few hours in jail. I shove the guy in the chest and turn for the door.

I get punched in the back and a whipcrack sound hammers my eardrums. I turn around and the guard has a gun and where'd he get the gun he didn't have that when I walked in I think and I've got this incredulous look on my face and he just looks shocked. I look at my shirt and Oh Lord my white shirt is all red and I'm all Hail Mary and such and then I'm sitting and so is the guard and the gun falls out of his numb hands.

It doesn't really hurt all that much, but the guard's crying and I feel like crap about it. I try to talk to him, but the words aren't really coming out too well and my mouth feels too dry. I gesture and get him to come closer and I manage to whisper in his ear:

It's okay, man. I was going to die today anyway.

And he looks a little better but I'm having trouble staying awake. And then it's over.

--

When I think back on all this, I realize that I wasted my 12 hours. I died with time left on the clock. I didn't get to say goodbye or make anyone laugh or feel the wind on my face. What really gets my goat, though, is that they were wrong. I didn't have 12 hours left; I died too early for that to be true. I died because I bought into it. I could have had 2 more years or 60 more years, for all I know. Do I regret that it happened like this? Yeah, more than a little. But I know that it would probably happen the same way if I had to do it all over again. Kinda sticks in your craw, huh?

Shabby substitute. (posting challenge: day five)

Okay, so I promised a story today, but you know what? I decided I didn't want to rush it (read: write the story in the 20 minutes before I post it). I'm not that reckless, man.

Instead, I present for your perusal crappy amateur photography!

Here's some of the stuff that happened on my first try with the camera:

After the rain
Sunset obscura
Cement thing

A couple of shots from a lil' fire--underexposed is my middle name:

Dan and the blaze
Dan and the blaze, cont'd
MACRO LOG
MACRO LOG RETURNS
It's a lampshade, but cooler

So that's about it. Hopefully I will have something more substantive for tomorrow night. Good night, folks.

I'm a dick. (posting challenge: day four)

I just realized today that I have missed every single wedding of my college friends. Through some combination of apathy and circumstance, I've missed them all. That's just weird.

When one comes up, there's always a ready rationale for why I can't go. It seems reasonable to me at the time, but I always regret the decision afterwards. I'll be working for the rest of my life, but (hopefully) they'll only get married once.

The worst part is that this isn't just weddings; it's keeping in touch, it's taking little trips to hang out, it's remembering them and the rockin times. I guess absence only makes the heart grow fonder when you've known the person for more than four years or something. That phrase sucked to begin with, anyway.

So why the remorse? It boils down to this: if my friends acted like I do, I probably wouldn't want them as friends.

I need to stop listening to this melancholy music.

(coming tomorrow: a story with a dead narrator. how cliche!)

I might get one of these, except:
A) I don't wear t-shirts.
B) I'm not that much of a dork.
C) If Serenity sucks, he's got some 'splaining to do.

Last call (posting challenge: day three)

I'm about to go to bed because I have to get up early tomorrow. I don't really want to get up at 4:45, but I'm going to have to anyway. The things we do for employment...

If I got a position as a multi-millionaire, I think I'd get to set my own hours.

Also, being a golf course designer sounds relaxing.

(There's better stuff to come this week. Please forgive the hasty filler post. Mmm... pastry filling paste.)

Celebrity Violence: Issue One

Give me a break.

"New York police say [Russell] Crowe was upset about not being able to get a call out to wife Danielle Spencer in Australia. After getting no response from the hotel's management, he went down to the front desk where he took his frustration out by allegedly hurling said phone at the clerk, "hitting him in the face and causing a laceration and substantial pain," according to the complaint."

What kind of celebrity doesn't have a cell phone? Or at least a toady who'll go out and find one at 4 AM? I guess we can't expect more than this from the man who won our affections playing a vicious warrior and a mentally unstable guy.

[Stay tuned for our next issue, to be published when stuff happens]

Every prose has its thorn (posting challenge: day two)

The S.S. Zaquinas sets out from the harbor of Inspiration, guided along by the strong wind of Motivation. It is a fine day for sailing; the gulls are swooping about in a gullsome manner, and the bright sun of Good Intentions warms the deck. Indeed, the easy sailing continues for quite some time, but the day gradually darkens. Confusion patters against the deck, Doubt cracks in the sky, and the thunderheads of Poor Planning roll in, but the vessel still sails on. Some of the Sentence rigging snaps, and the scurrying crew quickly patches it with Comma splices. These shabby constructions fall apart, and the crew realize in horror that there is not enough Style on board to save the rigging. A howling wind of Disillusionment arises, shearing the Plot mast in half, taking the hastily prepared Theme sails along into the roiling sea. The vessel runs aground on the Rock of Incompletion, and remains there for several weeks.

After some time, the crew begin salvage work, saving what they can from the wreckage. A rickety raft of Compromise coalesces from the shambles of the ship. The crew pack as much of the remaining supplies as possible on the raft, taking extra care to leave room for the paltry Dignity that survived the wreck. Narrowly avoiding jagged Editing reefs, the makeshift vessel finally arrives at the intended destination: the port of Completion. Along the way, they have lost men to neglect and weeks to distraction, but they arrive nevertheless.

With their troublesome journey complete, the crew realize they are one-dimensional puppets in a ham-fisted metaphor and go drinking.

THE END

A growing epidemic (posting challenge: day one)

Across the country, men both young and old are embroiled in a bitter battle with compulsion and indulgence. They slave away at nine-to-fives, eagerly awaiting the moment bells ring, the moment meetings end, the moment minute hands point straight up. Cars start up and the emigration begins. Exhausted laborers and drowsy businessmen head home, save for one quick stop. One by one, they make their purchases, expressions ranging from casual to self-conscious. At home, they ply their common trade in front of televisions and monitors, the walls painted with flickering blues. What compels these men to act this way?

It's Tuesday.

New DVD day.

I own a goodly number of DVDs, but I would say I have not yet approached too many DVDs. I'm sure the owners of those collections would probably say the same thing, though. I've come a long way from that summer in 99 when I bought Aliens and Rush Hour to start the collection and played them on the weak sauce DVD player in my computer. I joined Columbia House a couple times, got a bunch as gifts, and bought the rest at stores. The DVD format seems to have made collectors and film buffs out of people who may never have been interested if VHS still was the leading format.

There's a warped perspective at work in a lot of the mega-collectors. I present for your inspection this dialogue from a message board (unedited for authenticity):

Guy 1: (posts photo of big collection)
Guy 2: Why are most of your dvds unopened? dont you watch them before you buy others
Guy 1: Not everyone does that I would say 60% of my collection is unopened. It is because I want the movie not cause I need something to watch. I have seen a lot of the movies and just haven't watched them again.

Come on, dude.

Anyway, the size of the collection has reached a plateau as I stopped buying DVDs just because and began only buying movies I loved in the theater. There's a little fat to trim off the collection, but mostly I think I'm back under control.

Heaven forbid I walk by a $6 sale rack, though.

A challenge

In recent news, Pete has decided to categorize his blog links by posting frequency. I, of course, have been placed in the "Seldom" category.

I'm going to try to post once a day for the next week, beginning tomorrow. How's that for often?

It's on.

Intriguing

It appears that my comment ceiling is 5.

Usually one or two of those is mine. Dang.