I suppose I'm not exactly feeling my best right now.

Physically, I'm still weak from this stupid sinus infection. Mentally, I'm feeling just a little bit lost. Like I'm not sure what to do for the next several days.

It's not that I won't be able to find some way to pass the time, perhaps even enjoy the time, but I don't think I'll really be able to look forward to anything. So even simple planning seems like a waste of effort.

I suppose I could just hole-up here at home. Shoot some pool, watch some movies. Things like that used to be enough for me, but that was a long time ago. Another life ago.

---

Oh yeah, I had a big-ass fucking tree limb fall this morning. This one grazed the side of my detached garage, and may have damaged my fence. The big problem with this limb is that it's still partly attached to the tree - about 30 feet up. So I don't know what I'm going to do. I already tried closing my eyes and counting to ten, but the damn thing was still there when I looked again.

Stupid non-imaginary limb.

I'll take some pictures of it tomorrow, if I remember, and it's not raining.

If I can get the limb on the ground, then I can cut it up or maybe just drag it into the woods. I think I'll try to attach a rope to it, then pull it free with my truck. It might work.

---

I was wondering about something today. Wondering if something cool might happen. Well, it didn't happen, but that's okay. It was a long shot.

It would have been really cool, though.

Okay, so in what may go down in history as The Most Ironic Thing Ever In The History Of Everything, tonight LaptopGirl took a step toward knowingly being my new muse, when she asked me why I'm not writing in my blog.

So much for secret number two.

I'll admit, I could certainly use a muse. I can't seem to find any motivation on my own. So I guess I should take whatever help and/or encouragement I can get.

But c'mon, LaptopGirl?

Seriously?

Okay, fine.

The other night, Saturday night if you desire any sort of precision, LaptopGirl seemed to take great umbrage at my near-constant use of the word "weirdo" to describe myself. I don't think it was because she really disagreed, on principle, with my use of that word - I think her outrage was a two-parter.

Part the First: She wanted to understand just what the fuck I mean when I write that I am weird.

Part the Second: I'm pretty sure that LaptopGirl feels that she has staked a claim for herself onto weirdness, and she isn't sure that I'm worthy of that label.

Anyway.

Questions questions questions.

What do I mean when I say that I'm weird?

Can I provide an example of my so-called weirdness?

Why am I weird?

Answers answers.

I think that when I say I'm weird, what I really mean is that I'm in a weird mood. My weirdness is certainly nothing like the weirdness which I'm constantly accusing certain people at Rich O's of displaying. Those people suck, while I myself am awesome.

Sure. Saturday night I felt that being at Rich O's was the stupidest thing that had ever been stupid. But, I also did not want to miss LaptopGirl if she were to show up. So my compromise was that I avoided everyone, sat in the parking lot for most of the night actually, until LaptopGirl showed up.

Now, that third question was a bit of a lit fuse, or so it seemed at first. When LaptopGirl asked me that question, everyone within 20 feet of us immediately stopped their conversations. I think they all held their breath. I know I held mine. Everyone looked at me, not even bothering with false apathy, to see what my answer would be.

Would it be, fucking finally, the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth? Or would it be a cop-out?

So I looked into LaptopGirl's eyes, as well as I could, considering the distance between us and the distortions caused by the lenses of our glasses. I looked into her eyes as deeply as I could, being very careful not to drown, and what I saw was that it wasn't a serious question.

She was neither looking for, nor expecting, a serious answer. The serious answer.

So I didn't provide that serious answer.

It was a cop-out. Maybe.

Okay, so now I've written something in my blog. Time for bed.

I guess I still don't feel like writing anything just yet, so here is a picture of a squirrel peeking out from a tree in my backyard.

Uh oh, I'm in a weird mood again. Usually that means that I'm about to start spouting drivel, but maybe not this time.

Okay, maybe just a little.

Most of the time, I can honestly say that I'm not ashamed of anything that I feel, and therefore write. Usually, I know that I don't have a choice, and that's enough to assuage any embarrassment or shame. But sometimes, sometimes like tonight, I find myself very uncomfortable inside my own skin.

Tonight, I am afraid.

I don't like it, and I don't have a choice, and I'd like to be able to wish this feeling away to make room for those pleasant feelings that are right now cowering inside me. But I think I'm going to have to deal with this fear. I don't think it's going to go away.

Not this time.

I think that, this time, I'm going to have to face my fear or else I'm going to have to run from it.

If only it were that simple. If only those choices weren't both so selfish.

There is a third choice.

Ignore my fear, and be destroyed.

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(repeat until fingers bleed)

I'm feeling generous. Over at the journalspace incarnation of this blog, I'm offering a year of pro-access to whoever gets this right.

I think today was kinda boring. It must have been because I can't remember any of it.

Hold on a second while I scour my brain...

Okay, found some things.

First, my guilt-induced insomnia really played havoc with me Sunday night and into Monday morning. I bet I got three whopping hours of sleep. So that sucked.

Then some crap exciting and challenging activities I was doing for work finally finished, so I was able to stop checking my computer every 10 minutes. So that was cool.

All day long I was starving, yet totally unmotivated to get dressed and leave my house. I just saw no point in it. I see no point in much these days. At about 5:00, however, I noticed that I was almost out of Diet Coke, so I showered, grudgingly put on some clothes, and exited the premises. Because there's no way I'd be able to get up in the morning without my caffeine.

I drove my Monte Carlo (the day's predicted tornado stampede never materialized) to Red Lobster for dinner. My phone rang when I was on the way. It was StupidGirl! Yay! She's so nice. She wanted to wish me a happy Memorial Day because I'm a veteran. Of course, I'm not a dead veteran, but it was the thought that counted.

At Red Lobster, I had my usual yummy food. So that was cool. And I texted OddlyFamiliarGirl in case she was working, but I guess she wasn't.

Then I went to Hooters and had a couple glasses of Newcastle (9618). I traded a few million emails with RockGirl. Then I came home.

I've been watching a bunch of tivoed episodes of The Alaska Experiment.

Now I want to move back to Alaska. I liked it there, except for it being a nonstop statewide sausage festival. It was pretty, except for all the sausages.

Okay, so after my last entry, I remembered that I was bored, so I left my house.

I went to Polly's Freeze for dinner. Some dipshits had my table, but I got over it.

When I was waiting for my food, there was this old woman standing nearby, also waiting for her food. She kinda looked like the mother of a childhood friend of mine, except much older.

"Excuse me Ma'am, are you Brian's great-great-great-great-great-grandmother, by any chance?" I asked.

"I'm his mother," she conceded.

So I told her who I was, and that it was good to see her. I'm pretty sure that she even remembered me. Weird how she's managed to age a quarter-century since I last saw her, a quarter-century ago. I'm sure it's my fault somehow.

But seriously, it was cool to see her. I always worry about people dying. I'm glad she didn't.

Interestingly enough, her son Brian was the model for one of my youngest sister's imaginary childhood friends. For about six months after this one day when Brian came down to our house to play, my sister Neisha was always, "Brian this," and "Brian that." it was quite cute, actually. Her other imaginary friend was named Rakis and I always figured that she'd heard the word rapist on TV or something.

After I left Polly's, I went down to Sluttopia for a Newcastle (9578). I might have stayed for another one but this one drunk kept mumbling to me about the race that was on TV. He kept saying, "Aaarg yuuurg blarr farrrrrrrr uttttt," which I think translates as, "Look at them make all those fucking left turns."

I soon realized that I was just as bored at Sluttopia as I'd be at my house. I also realized that there weren't any mumbling drunk NASCAR fans at my house. So I came home.

My fun day started at about 7:00 in the morning, when I woke up and remembered that everything is my fault. After that, I couldn't get back to sleep, because of all the guilt, so I just stayed up and shot some pool for a while.

Then, I went to NotHideousGirl's house to help move some of her shit into storage. We'd agreed to meet at 1:00, and NotHideousGirl was considerate enough to call me at 12:59, when I was about 30 seconds from her house, to tell me that the time would be 3:00 instead of 1:00.

I ended up waiting on her porch for an hour or so, listening to the neighbors having a full blown white-trash throw-down. I suspected that one of them was going to murder the other, then murder me for being a witness. So I shot off a couple of quick emails, to RockGirl and LaptopGirl. You know, to say a proper goodbye and stuff.

But I guess the neighbors must have ended up killing each other, as the racket suddenly stopped after about an hour, and I'm still alive, so whew! My lucky day.

Then we loaded my truck up and took NotHideousGirl's stuff to storage, five or six times. It's not quite as bad as it sounds, though, because my truck has the carrying capacity of a gnat's rectum. Plus, MusicalYuppieDude was there to help, and TremensGirl and UPSDude showed up as well. The whole thing only took a couple of hours.

Now I'm back home trying to decide what to do with the rest of my Sunday. It'll be pretty hard to top what's already happened, so I may just stay home. Quit while I'm ahead and all that.

I think that, to carry a metaphor way too far, I think that the arches of my feet are simply getting too sore to bear.

All this fucking tiptoeing around. Like I'm all sneaky and shit.

New flash: I'm not sneaky. Everyone sees me. Everyone knows what I'm doing. Everyone is laughing at my fumbling attempts to pretend that things are normal. That I'm normal.

I'm just getting sick and tired of it. My tiptoeing is not fooling anyone, and so it serves no purpose except to spotlight a failed attempt at deception.

I hate doing this, I did it, for a long time, because I thought it was necessary. The right thing to do. And maybe it was the right thing to do, for a while. But that time has passed.

A lie of omission is still a lie.

---

Also, because I don't want to forget this, and also because I thought it was funny, I had myself a gay cheeseburger tonight.

What's that you say? You didn't know there was such a thing as a gay cheesburger?

Well, I didn't know it either, but I was wrong. As were you.

So I went to Wendy's and, as usual, I ordered the #2 meal plain with a Diet Coke. Then I stepped aside to wait for my order to be prepared.

I guess the burger guy was a trainee or something, because the manager chick had to explain to him what "plain" meant. She said that it should have just cheese on it. He didn't understand, so she said it more clearly. "A plain cheeseburger should have meat, cheese, bread, and nothing else on it," she said.

"Well that's gay," the burger guy replied.

For the record, my gay cheeseburger was very good.

It was weird, though. I had the strangest urge to go dancing after I'd eaten it.