I was going to go to Rich O's for some spaghetti after work. My spaghetti plans were detoured yesterday, and I was still craving it.

But noooooooo!

There was a stupid traffic jam on the highway leading toward Rich O's, so I just came straight home.

And there was a stupid traffic jam on the highway leading home, too. So that sucked.

Anyway, now I'm starving to death.

I wonder what cat food tastes like. That's all there is in this house.

A wise man once wrote, "Hope is a strange thing. It exists only to disappoint, for once it's fulfilled, it vanishes."

I'm not exactly sure what that (clearly drunk) wise man was getting at, but I have a theory.

The thing about hope, I think, is that there's only one way to completely destroy it. And that's to fulfill it. Anything else, anything less, and it's going to survive.

Disappointments will devastate, but a spark of hope will survive, and then grow. Setbacks will shatter, but a tiny glimmer of hope will survive, and then grow. Failure will, um, do something bad that starts with "f" but hope will still survive, and then grow.

Frustrate, perhaps?

Anyway, NakedGirl told me tonight that, "There's nothing wrong with a little hope."

I tend to agree with her. Good thing, too. Because, even after everything I've seen and heard and felt, I still have hope. And, more than that, I like having hope, misguided as it may be.

It's at least something.

I tried living with nothing, and it sucked. Big ones.

I cannot imagine going back to a life without hope. If such an existence could even be called life. But I suppose that I'd give it a shot, if I had to.

If all my hopes were fulfilled, and they all vanished, I guess I could try to live with that.

I thought, just for kicks and to see what happened, that I'd try to catch this damn thing up on what's happened in the last week or so.

Tuesday, September 16

A bunch of stuff I can't write about, and then I got my power back at 8:30, then more stuff I can't write about.

Wednesday, September 17

Stuff I can't write about, then I got to have lunch with HatGirl. Yay!

Then I got really really depressed. And then, while I was at Rich O's, some more stuff happened that I can't write about, but it put me in a better mood.

Then I got stuck doing some stuff for work, or maybe some other stuff might have happened. I couldn't have written about it though.

Thursday, September 18

I don't think anything happened all day, except that after work I got to do some stuff I can't write about, and it was a lot of fun.

Friday, September 19

I'd allowed myself to have hope. That was stupid. Friday was a very very sad day for me. Move along, please.

Saturday, September 20

I got to have lunch with HatGirl. Yay! But I already wrote about that, kinda. There was a picture.

Then Saturday night I sat around Rich O's and glared at my phone for hours, then I got to do something I can't write about, but it was really nice. Then when I got back home I did something stupid.

Sunday, September 21

A sad day. I even went on a rant, but I can't write about it.

Monday, September 22

Rich O's was out of every beer I've ever liked, but then I got to do something I can't write about. Found out some bad news that I can't write about.

Then, in an ironic twist, MisunderstoodGirl showed that she doesn't understand me at all.

Tuesday, September 23

A bunch of irrelevant stuff that I can't write about, then some bullshit that I can neither figure out nor write about.

The first time, I was in a crappy mood, and I did my writing elsewhere.

The second time, I was in a weird mood, and I wrote this:

The minutes take eternities to pass, but somehow the years rush by.

Two years have passed in the blink of a teary eye.

I never thought it would happen. I fought for so long, I convinced myself that I was winning. I faked a smile for so long, I convinced myself that I was happy. I fell for so long, I convinced myself that I was flying.

I never thought it would happen. I never thought it could happen.

But it did.

Splat!

My world still reverberates from the force of that impact.

I don't want to say any more.

I've already said too much, yet I could never never never say enough.

Those two words would lead to those three words would lead to a billion more words, and still it would not be enough.

And now it's the fourth time, that this date has come around. I finally feel like I've said everything there is to say. But it's still not enough.

This is the activity taking place outside my building this morning.

I have no idea what these people are doing. I just hope they get all that shit off the road before the afternoon rush hour.

I haven't done one of these for a couple of years, but it's time. It's definitely time.

I'm taking some time off. You won't be missing anything.

Or maybe not.

Sometimes it really irritates me, being unable to write the things that I most want to write.

But I should get over it.

Also, I don't like stupid games.

Sitting at Rich O's, at night. Stupid, I know. I was going to sit over on the weirdo Sportstime side, but they were packed. Over here, at least I'm able to sit.

Anyway, I kinda feel like I should be writing something about some thoughts that have been rattling around in the dark places inside my head. Thoughts that will neither go away nor venture into the light. Because these thoughts have never been fully illuminated, I fear that this entry will probably be disjointed crap. This is in contrast to my usual drivel, which is at least somewhat jointed, and sometimes it's not even crap. You have been warned.

---

The thing is, I only meant to make a statement. To finally get the entire truth out there. I'd say something like laying all my cards on the table, but this is no fucking game to me.

I realized that I was taking a very serious risk, but frankly, at the time, I didn't feel like I had much left to lose. I was rapidly dying anyway. So it was, at least partly, an act of desperation on my part, the statement that I made. I guess I wanted my dying words to mean something. More than that, I wanted them to be heard. And they were. They certainly were.

But all along, from the time I started considering it, through the time I was saying it, and even during the conversation that ensued, it was always a statement. Telling the truth, and nothing else.

It was never a question.

It was certainly never a request.

So why, I wonder, why do I wait so impatiently for an answer to a question I never asked?

Why, I wonder, do I long for a response to a request I never made?

This is my dilemma.

I could have asked the question, but the question wasn't the point. The statement was the point. Besides, deep down I knew that I wasn't ready for the pain that the answer might bring. I could have even made the request, but it would have been ludicrous to do so, without the answer to the question. I may be insane, but I'm not that insane.

The statement leads to the question leads to the request. That's just the way it works. And I stopped at the statement. I stopped myself, or she stopped me. I don't know. All I know is that I did stop, rather abruptly. Jarringly, you might say.

Which was fine with me. That had been my plan, such as it was, when I started. But I screwed up. I wasn't thinking clearly. I was distracted, after all.

See, I didn't need to ask the question, and I didn't need to make the request.

They were implied. Or inferred. Whatever.

And so, now I wait. For an answer to a question I never quite asked, and for a response to a request I never quite made.

This is my dilemma. This is my life.

Had lunch with HatGirl today.

Usually, I have something extra to add, whenever I mention HatGirl. But this time, I'll let her awesome t-shirt say it for me.

Got to have lunch with HatGirl Wednesday. So that was an awesome surprise. And we're having lunch again Saturday, so yay!

---

Then I had a long-overdue talk with TremensGirl after work. The overdue part could basically be summed-up as I'm a dick.

The other part of the conversation consisted of me asking, "What's wrong with me?" and TremensGirl essentially replying, "Everything."

So, that sucked, though I can't say I was really surprised. At least she didn't suggest that I misrepresent myself. Nope, she said that I needed to actually change who I am and what I feel. Like I wouldn't have done that a million years ago if I knew how.

But it was a nice conversation, and I really appreciate her candor.

---

I think I've slept about two hours per night starting Monday night. Surprisingly, this isn't even close to my personal worst, but I'm still pretty damn tired.

---

I have no middle anymore. It's a really disconcerting feeling, jumping from one extreme to another with nothing in between.

---

Oh yeah, I got to see OddlyFamiliarGirl Wednesday night! It had been a million bazillion years.

---

This is stupid. I have nothing to say.