Residual RENT Effect

Everyone is depressed lately. On Joe’s blog that was referred to as the “residual RENT effect.” Funny, I only went to see RENT this weekend because I was already depressed. I wanted to take Tony to see the musical on Broadway, but would never go because I had this dream he interrupted it and everybody was pissed. Now I realize my own stupidity. Who cares if everybody gets pissed? In fact, make them pissed. It’s not about them, only you, right? Only this? I mean I bet the characters in RENT fucked a lot of shit up and didn’t give a shit about it. I live my life like I’m Dante when secretly I wish I was Randall. Fuck all that, fuck everybody and fuck myself the most. No wonder I’m depressed when my whole life is a dance around the truths and a desperate attempt not to upset people. People even tell me they don’t like my blog. Fuck everybody who doesn’t like my bog, it’s my goddamn diary people, not fucking Fox 5. No Day But Today? – well thank God because if I had to worry about tomorrow too I think I would lose it. Residual RENT effect my friends.

Men that need no introduction

STING. BOWIE. BOWIE. STING. STING and BOWIE. BOWIE and STING. I don’t care who you are – these two guys are hot! Listening to old school Police today and let me tell you how well it holds up. Sting is a gentleman, scholar and a total badass. Remember how he saved Walden Pond from becoming a stupid housing community? Bowie is just totally awesome. Probably the only straight guy who could pull off glam rock. What about Labyrinth? Now that was completely sweet. Have you seen his new XM commercial where he steals Snoop’s bling? Priceless!
The coolest part is that these guys were superstars almost 30 years ago!!! The fact that they get hotter and more fun year after year really just reminds me that life doesn’t end just because you have a 9-5 and a mortgage.

80’s music holds up

So Jodie and I are talking in the car, and we are straining our brains to remember what songs were on this old cassette tape I used to have. I remember one, extremely vaguely and start just blurting out whatever lyrics I can recall. Jodie has a similar hazy familiarity and starts adding a few stunted lyrics of her own. Suddenly it all comes together and the two of us burst into a song that moments before we couldn’t even picture and moments before that had forgotten it’s existence completely. After our chorus, Jodie turns to me and asks “How old is that song?” “Like 20 years,” I tell her. 20 years. Damn.

Old School

Thank God I'm Not in High School Anymore Day is today. This is actually from a year after high school but it is the most embarassing picture Joe could find on short notice. If I could do HS again, I would do it just like Trish. She may have done some crazy shit, but she had a million adventures. My high school days, pretty lame.

Thanksgiving

“Has English hospitality changed so much that a friend of mine's not welcome at this table?”- Robin Hood Prince of Thieves

I have one message to send to someone who I am certain doesn’t read this blog: GROW UP! There are MANY things you have done in your lifetime that I have not liked but I handled them MATURELY and RESPECTFULLY. I apologize that it is so overwhelmingly difficult for you to approach my decisions with the same consideration. When I was a wriggling pink bundle 29 years ago I hope you didn’t look down at me and say “my, I hope she never makes any independent decisions that go beyond the scope of my own moral values.”

Hath not a Jew eyes? Hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions? fed with the same food, hurt with the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, healed by the same means, warmed and cooled by the same winter and summer, as a Christian is? If you prick us, do we not bleed? if you tickle us, do we not laugh? if you poison us, do we not die? - Shakespeare

Can’t have sunshine everyday

Pretty bummed today.
No real reason.
Days like this feel like mice gnawing at the cheese of my soul.

The Chupacabra!

Loved ones, it’s worse then we thought. Moving to Arizona may have helped us escape the pollution, crime and foul language that characterizes New Jersey, but it led us to the lair of an even scarier foe : The Chupacabra! Please, if you value your very lives read this article. The Only Thing We Have To Fear Is The Chupacabra. Then, only then can you know of the fear the Chupacabra strikes in my heart!

POWER: part 4 - Challenge

When huge crises occur in your life, people are always telling you to take stock of your life and figure out what it is that you really want. Well I know what I want, and have always wanted: A rival! All the epic stories have them, the ultimate matchup between two who are so evenly matched that they must constantly improve themselves to outdo the other. Typically they utterly despise yet completely respect each other.
Ash vs Gary, Yugi vs Kaiba, Uncle vs Daolon Wong.
Rival. Webster defines this as 1 : one of two or more striving to reach or obtain something that only one can possess and also 2 : one that equals another in desired qualities.
I wants someone to inspire me, outwit me, challenge me. Someone who wants to beat me so bad, that they grow and adapt on a constant basis, forcing me to constantly grow and adapt. The neverending challenge.

POWER: part 3 - Control

Control is the greatest of all illusions. Nearly all people associate power with control.

Control a situation, organization or individual and you have power. It is true, mostly because people or organizations have to relinquish their control in order to be controlled. It makes perfect sense to think control=power. Except, as I have already said, control is an illusion.

People waste their whole lives in a desperate frenzy for control. Those who cannot gain overt control manipulate. They think they are the smartest because they know more then the person who thinks they are in control. They are both losers.

Illusions are objects or concepts that seem completely tangible. Once the integrity is tested, however, it disintegrates or disappears. Like when you grow up and learn that your parents never really had the control over you that you thought they did. You realize that their control was entirely based on you relinquishing yours. When things are said to “escalate out of control,” truly it is just becoming apparent that things were never actually under control.

I am lucky to see through this veil that so many live their lives under. I have a mental illness, though disciplined with medication, can appear and take control over my life at anytime. If I organize my life so that even I don’t have control, I can’t ever lose that control again and therefore have less exposure to danger. Sounds crazy right? Try having some other entity control you for months. Then one day you come to, look around and your entire life is destroyed by your hands, but you have only faint knowledge of how it got that way. Better to be a leaf on the wind (Serenity) and let fate toss you on the breeze or drive an enormous spike through your chest.

The truest achievement comes from relinquishing your control without diminishing any of your power. This way, you can really see what is going on in a situation, but you still have the power to determine your position. Less control=more power.

POWER: part 2 - Calm

Calm. Only someone with true power could see calm for what it is: one of the greatest heights a human being can achieve. It seems so simple, quiet, gentle even; but it is truly a dynamic force, able to slow and stop even the most forceful momentum. It is it's own strain of power.

Calm, my antithesis. I actually had no idea what it was for most of my life. I was 22 and someone I trusted who was very against drugs told me to take Ecstasy. I was more then confused. She told me “Whatever it is in life that is missing, the key ingredient to making you happy – your first time on ecstasy will show that to you. After that it’s up to you to bring it into your life.” I listened and believed. She then went on to tell her own story of spiraling heights. I couldn’t wait, I thought I was going to soar! I dressed up all sexy and danced around and took this pill. My world did spiral, but not up, it went in. I sat on the ground to concentrate on this new feeling. Radiating from my heart was this soft, gentle profound feeling of peace. It took me over completely, my muscles started to relax, my mind emptied and for the first time in my life, I felt calm. Webster defines calm as a: free from agitation of mind or spirit b : free from disturbance or turmoil. Free. Calm is existence that has been liberated. No pressures, no shackles, no binds. Just breathe. Just believe.

To me calm is a form of happiness. It is the highest most elite form.

Breaking away from both worlds. I want to be strong and powerful, but I want to be calm and happy too. Haven’t you noticed that all the greatest heros are solitary? There’s a reason for that. How did Buffy manage amidst so many people? How was she still able to find her calm when she needed it?

POWER: part 1 - Rising

Cartoons. It’s not just that I enjoy them, it’s that they are the threads to the fabric of my soul. You don’t know what I’m talking about, I’ve only ever met one person who did. That’s not what I’m here to talk about. I’m here to talk about power.

Webster describes power succinct and perfect as the “ability to act or produce an effect.” Over the past few months I have felt myself rising in power – advancing my abilities to act and certainly producing the effects. A cartoon, Yu Yu Hakasho, helped me recognize that building my power has been my desire from the start. Transcendentalism, Buddhism, Wicca all the things that I have always believed in and always followed are simply roads to building power. Tai Chi, Reiki, coming of age stories. I’ve been walking this path since childhood.

The epiphany came from a Yu Yu Hakasho character Hiei. Hiei spent his life building his power for revenge. He had no great dreams, no perfect destiny. His only mission was one of constant self improvement. When he finally realized he was powerful enough to have his revenge, he realized that it didn’t really matter to him anymore. He continued to build his power, but with no real motivation, he decided to give up and die. On his resurrection it became clear that it no longer mattered why he had the power, just that he had it. A greater destiny was about to find him, and all he had to do was be ready to handle it.

I realize now, as I have since I was a child, that I have a greater destiny. I always thought it was my job to search blindly for it but now I realize that when I am ready, it will find me. As far as I know, power can be built only by education and training. If you know another way, please enlighten me. I will continue to build mine, I’m hungry for it. There is only one thing in existence that I want more. Calm. I guess that’s why I wrote this series in parts.

I got Cotton Candy!

Did you know cotton candy is actually just hot sugar thrown against a wall? My pals from the Chuck E Cheese days sure know. Hey wait, that’s a lot of my pals. I guess overpriced pizza and spoiled, whiny kids are the recipe for enduring friendships.

So – the fair. It was awesome! Cost was $76.50 + my gas tank is on E. Talk about gouging. I got sick eating deep fried zucchini. It sat in the pit of my stomach making me feel nauseous all night. I gave it some company with one of those chocolate dipped frozen bananas…mmmmm.

Riding the rides turned into a series of escalating dares. We started with the tame stuff like the Ferris Wheel and gradually increased danger and fear factor until we ended up on the one ride that we had stared at when we first walked in murmuring things like “No way in hell.” I’ll tell you, it was f—‘n scary. Half-way through I just went limp.

It was loud, too bright and smelly. I got sick from the food, terrified at the rides and dirty carnies barked at me to play their stupid, rigged games. It was exactly what I wanted!

State Fair (not the musical)

Tonight I am going to the state fair (or state unfair, I mean damn $6 to go on one ride?) You’d think with all the price gouging the fair would take in enough bucks to hose down all the smelly carnies and put the poor petting zoo animals on respective planes back to their native lands. There’s nothing sadder then a sad giraffe. Maybe drowning kittens, but there would have to be a lot of them (just ask my Dad.) As for happy giraffes, that’s not such a pretty sight either. I got to witness one giraffe drinking straight from the urine stream of another giraffe at the San Diego Zoo. You may think that it’s disgusting for me to mention it, but I had to see it! It was so gross and believe me giraffes pee for like 10 straight minutes.
So back to the fair. Can’t wait! Gonna release my inner child who, it turns out is actually more mature then my everyday self. Just hope they have my favorite ride the “Wild Mouse” of NJ boardwalk fame! If not I can just impress strangers with my ability to turn upside down on the Gravitron, which they will always have, because it’s cheap.

Just like everything I do...

This blog was created by accident. I was trying to post some stupid comment on Joe’s blog and they wouldn’t let me post it without signing in. I signed in and voila - I have a blog.