Sometimes I think I should stop these beer reports. They're all so damn similar. As in boring.

But I guess I'll keep writing them. They at least let people know that I'm somewhat alive and that I have something of a social life.

My surprisaphobia was really acting up last night. Probably just from lack of sleep. I got to Rich O's at about 8:30. The place was about half full. For a Friday night, half-full is flipping wonderful to me.

So I sat on the loveseat and I ordered a Flying Dog K-9 Cruiser (34). After about 10 seconds the PBDs sitting around me tried to talk to me, so I got up and moved to the bar.

I was enjoying myself, reading some fiction that had won awards in a local newspaper's contest, when this dude decided to stand right behind me. I mean right behind me. I got the impression that the fucker wanted to sit in one of the two empty stools, but I didn't ask. What I did was pick up my shit again and move over to the recently-vacated island.

My next beer was a Bell's Kalamazoo Stout (295). Some dude came over and sat on the other side of the island, but he didn't try to talk to me, so I let him live.

After a while, WomanRepellant came in, so I talked to him. See, I do talk to people sometimes.

For some reason, a million people all crowded around the island and started yapping at each other, so I picked up my shit and went over and sat on the sofa.

I ordered another Bell's, but I only drank a little bit of it (300). I guess lack of sleep is messing with my ability to drink, making me even more of a lightweight than I normally am.

I went to Wal-Mart and bought some CDs and DVDs, then I went to White Castle and came home.

If anyone had seen me, back then, I know exactly what they'd have wondered.

What the hell is Dave doing in Plattsmouth?

That confusion might well have been universal, for I certainly felt it myself. And, after me and my anonymous questioner, who was there? Who else mattered?

The Platte River makes its way Eastward through Nebraska, beginning who knows or cares where, and ending by dumping itself into the Missouri River. Near that junction is a small town called Plattsmouth.

The Platte is not much of a river. Wide enough, to be sure, but very shallow. I've been told that anyone with a sturdy enough four-wheel-drive vehicle, and sufficient cojones, can simply drive across the thing. Not that I'd ever attempt such a feat. Not me. I'd be the guy that failed, and that somehow got washed away by that sluggish yet steady flow.

So, not much of a river, and that town named after its mouth was not much of a town. Two main streets - three if you drank enough beer and squinted at the map just right.

At the corner of those two streets was a grocery store, and that grocery store was where I found myself one night back in 1987.

I had a reason for being there, you see. Two reasons, actually. The two most beautiful eyes I'd ever seen in my life. To be honest, the two most beautiful eyes I've ever seen, before or since.

Those eyes belonged to a girl, of course. A girl that I'm quite tempted to name right here and right now. But I won't. If she reads this, then she'll know that it's her in this story. If anyone else reads this, they won't care what her name was. Her name was important to me, and I'm assuming that it was important to her, but to everyone else it really doesn't matter.

What matters is that she was as beautiful as any movie star, and that she had eyes that were beyond description.

I'd met her a few weeks earlier, at a bar up near the base where I was stationed. We'd talked for a bit - I don't remember what we'd talked about. Probably just mundane bullshit. But at one point during the evening, she'd told me where she worked. A little grocery store in a little town called Plattsmouth.

I knew nothing of her work schedule, but fate smiled upon me that night. I entered the store and there she was, working one of the registers. I guess, if she hadn't been there, I'd have just gone back home.

She recognized me, and she took a break from her duties to walk and talk with me while I pretended to shop.

I paused for a while at the greeting card stand, and I searched for the card that I wanted.

She asked me if she could help me find what I was looking for.

So I said yes of course she could help. As a woman she would be the ideal person to pick out the card I was looking for. I told her that I'd met a girl. A girl with the most amazing eyes I'd ever seen. I told her that I didn't know the girl at all, but that I wanted to get her a card. Nothing that would freak her out. Something sweet. Something that would make it very clear that I was very interested in getting to know her better.

I tried to read her face as she listened to all this, but I couldn't read a thing. I couldn't get past her eyes.

Those damn brown eyes.

She did pick out a card for me, and when I opened it up and read what was inside I knew that it was the perfect card for the occasion.

She went back to her register, and I followed. I paid cash for the card and for the random crap I'd thrown into my cart, and I asked to borrow a pen.

I wish I could remember what I wrote. Probably some drivel. The point of what I wrote, the last sentence that I wrote, was this:

I told you I could be romantic.

---

A few months later I was inside her, and I told her that I loved her.

---

A few years later I saw her at a gas station. She'd aged a lot, as had I. She was married, with a kid or two I think. I was trying to rebuild a life with my ex-wife. We exchanged pleasantries as we pumped gas into our cars, and that was it.

---

There was a time when I thought she was the love of my life. Maybe, back then, she really was. I think about her now, and I don't remember much about her. What she was like as a person. What she was like in bed. What she possibly saw in me.

What I remember, what I remember are those eyes.

Those damn brown eyes.

They haunt me sometimes.

I guess SassyGirl is mad at me. I didn't go to their Gay Night thingy on Monday because I was too tired. Haven't been able to get in touch with her since. So of course I assume that she's pissed instead of simply working.

Thursday evening I went to Rich O's. It's pretty rare for me to go out on a Thursday, or any work night for that matter, but I'm supposed to work at 6:00 AM Sunday morning so I figure that Saturday night will be a bust and I made up for it Thursday.

Anyway, there was nobody I knew there. I sat on the loveseat and had myself a yummy Bell's Kalamazoo Stout (255) and listened to a couple of guys talk about computers. Neither of them knew the slightest thing about them. I got a kick out of it for some reason.

Also one of them was drinking three different beers at once. I shit you not. He had three half-pints in front of him, each with a different beer. He'd take a sip out of one, then the next, then the next. Very strange.

Once those dipshits left I moved over to the throne and read my stupid horoscope from Free Will Astrology:

Happy Valentine Daze, Pisces! Borrowing the words of poet Pablo Neruda, I've prepared a love note for you to use as your own. Feel free to give these words to the person whose destiny needs to be woven more closely together with yours.

I love you between shadow and soul. I love you as the plant that hasn't bloomed yet, and carries hidden within itself the light of flowers. I love you without knowing how, or when, or from where. Because of you, the dense fragrance that rises from the earth lives in my body, rioting with hunger for the eternity of our victorious kisses.

I know writing is bad when even I can do better. But of course I won't bother because there's nobody. Waaaaaah!

Anyway.

This dude that looks like my cousin Robbie came over and we bullshitted for the rest of the time I was there.

I had another pint of the stout (275) and finished up with a glass of the Wostyntje Mustard Ale (24). It's pretty good. I think I like weird beers. I was one of the only people that liked that Hitachino ricey stuff when it was on tap.

I really don't want to go to Rich O's tonight. Which of course means that I'm probably going to Rich O's tonight.

I wish I may, I wish I might, I wish I was able to fucking write.

And not just any old drivel. I wish I was able to write something - something good. Something profound and memorable and thought-provoking.

Something worthy of the thoughts that went through my head tonight.

I sat, and I watched the door, and I experienced hope.

Not terror. Not paranoia. Not disgust. Not even apathy.

Nope. I experienced hope of all things.

It doesn't matter that my hope was misdirected, unwarranted, ill-conceived, baseless, unreal, unfounded, inordinate, and maybe even stupid. It doesn't matter that the thing that I hoped for did not happen.

None of that matters.

What matters, what fucking matters, is that I'm still capable of feeling hope at all.

I would not have thought it was possible.

I am not, as it turns out, completely dead inside. I am not, contrary to popular belief, incapable of having a single solitary optimistic thought. I am not, no matter what else you might have read or heard or deduced or even simply felt, I am not a lost cause.

So, please, don't give up on me. Don't write me off. Don't turn away. Certainly, don't run away.

Because if I, after everything I've been through - if I can still experience hope, then anything is possible.

It's fucking amazing.

I wish I could write words to describe it.

I wish I may, I wish I might.

I wish, now more than ever before since all this shit started, I wish I could write.

I don't really have much to say. I just kinda want to write something while I wait for my shirt to dewrinkle in the dryer.

Insomnia has taken over my life. It's cost me a day and a half of vacation since yesterday afternoon, and I'm pissed about that because they're my last vacation days until May. Now all I've got left is a half day, and what am I supposed to do with that?

This morning I went in to see my doctor about my inability to sleep. He of course prescribed me some pills that will supposedly help me to relax. I don't think I'm going to bother getting the prescription filled though. I don't want to medicate my problems away.

That's beer's job.

Anyway, I managed to solve one of the mysteries that's been plaguing me for a couple of days. One of my friends had the audacity to (a) live in Phoenix and (b) send me an anonymous message. So I freaked out a little, but that mystery has, like I said, been solved.

The other mystery may remain unsolved for a while, but you never know. Once my shirt dewrinkles I'm going to go do a little sleuthing.

One simple, stupid thing. That's all I asked her for. That's all I'd ever asked her for. I asked her to not leave, again, without giving me a chance to say goodbye. Again.

I asked, and she agreed.

I reminded her over the phone the next day, and she agreed. Again.

I actually fucking believed her.

That was the last time I ever spoke to her, heard her voice. Two days later she was gone. Again. There was no goodbye. Again.

Was she fucking with me all along? Did she ever have any intention of granting me that one simple thing that would have lifted my spirits to heights I'd been unable to even imagine a week earlier? Was it a conscious decision? Was she laughing at me the entire time?

When she planned out her trip, did she specifically write Crush Dave. Again. on her calendar and circle the date? Did she look forward to that day when I'd realize what had happened, even more than she looked forward to seeing her friends and family, and visiting her old hangouts? Is her only regret that she couldn't be there to see me finally crumble? To shit on me one last time?

That was the first thing I ever asked of her. I thought it would also be the last thing, but it wasn't.

The last thing was six months later, when she showed up. Again. I ran out the door, and I sent her a text message, asking her to leave me alone.

Because I'm on this poll again over at Ella's journal, I figured that I'd post some pictures.

I also owe you an evil update.

So I'll kill both birds with one stone.

I'm all efficient and shit.

Tonight I was downstairs making a little practice video for myself, and when I was finish with that, I took advantage of the camera and the lighting to check out my evilness.

I guess I'll keep it for a while longer. It's still got some filling in to do.

These are naught but echoes of screams from long ago. There is no need for concern. I've simply paused to listen to them one last time before they fade away forever.

I think.