Even though I won't be using these characters in my comics, I still think they're kind of cute, and I thought I'd show all of the ones I made over the past few days.

This is me.

SassyGirl, who will finally be back from Peru on Wednesday. This is exactly what her new hairstyle looks like.

MixedSignalGirl. I was being very optimistic when I made this on the off chance that she'd actually show up in one of my comics again.

This is supposed to be LaptopGirl. See the part about optimism above and multiply times about a gazillion. Her hair is too long here, but I suppose it might have grown since the last time I saw her.

This is EwokGirl, who I work with. The hair isn't even close to her real hair.

This is HatGirl. Lovely, isn't she?

DooRagGirl has had a major haircut. This is what she looked like before. She's going to make me change this. Not so much because of the hair, but because of what she's wearing.

Okay, my instructions were as follows: ANYTHING but pink, but I usually wear black, sometimes grey, sometimes brown, sometimes blue, just never pink. I wouldn't be caught dead in pink. I fixed the hair too.

I've already mentioned that I hadn't wanted to go out Saturday night. I've already mentioned that I'd tried to go somewhere Saturday afternoon, and failed.

That's just the tip of the iceberg, as they say.

No less than five times, on Saturday - starting at about 10:00 and ending at about 1:00 - I tried to go out. The first several times I only got as far as my kitchen. I'd put my jacket on, and I'd pick up my keys, and then I'd just stand there.

After a while, I'd take my jacket off and go back to my office or to my basement or to my living room.

Eventually, I did leave my house. I got about halfway to Louisville, then I turned around and came back home.

I was in such a strange mood. I was very much aware of the futility of pretending to be a part of a world that I just didn't belong to. Not on Saturday. On Saturday night, if it hadn't been for the admittedly slim chances of (a) seeing HatGirl, and (b) being normal for a while, I would not have left my couch.

But that was Saturday.

By Sunday morning, I was more or less back to normal. Normal, as always, is a relative term. I mean normal for me.

For the most part. I thought so, anyway.

Except that I put my jacket on about ten times, and for eight of the first nine of those times I ended up just standing in my kitchen for a while before taking my jacket back off. One time I made it to the end of my driveway before I threw my truck into reverse and pulled back into my garage.

The tenth time I went and bought some groceries, which had been my plan all along.

This isn't really social anxiety, I don't think. When I'm standing in my kitchen, I'm not nervous or anxious about leaving my house.

I just don't see the point. There's nothing out there.

So I guess my strange mood hasn't left me completely.

Today would have been my 21st wedding anniversary.

This doesn't bother me at all, and it hasn't in well over a decade.

I'd take a thousand March 5ths over a single November 14th, and I'd take a billion March 5ths over a single October 9th.

I wonder if there'll ever be a date that overshadows those two.

I fucking hope not.

I'm just going to combine all this into one entry.

Friday was so damn long ago, but I'll try to describe it for those of you that actually care for whatever reason.

SCRIBBLERESQUE PARENTHETICAL THOUGHT: Besides my lovely self, there's one person on Earth that knows the courage it took for me to go into Rich O's Friday night. Even though that courage was wasted, I'm still kind of proud of myself.

The place was, of course, packed as fuck. It wasn't quite standing room only though. In fact the only seat still available was the throne. This dude that looks like my cousin Robbie was there in the living room area with a bunch of people, I asked him if the throne was taken, and he said that it wasn't. So I took it.

I ordered a Founder's Dirty Bastard (30). At the time I didn't remember that I'd tried this last year, or I'd have ordered something else.

The group in the living room area consisted of the dude that looks like my cousin Robbie, a smoldering hot blonde girl, and some dipshits. I think they were dipshits because of their ages though - they may grow out of it eventually. At least they were all drinking real beer.

Oh, before I forget. The other day I came in after work and tried something I hadn't tried before:

Unibroue Maudite (10)

(draft) Quite yummy actually. This surprised me until I remember that the same brewer makes La Fin Du Monde. If I had to describe this, and I guess I do, I'd call it Newcastle on steroids.

One of the dipshits kept trying to talk to me. I answered his questions as efficiently as I could while I scanned the room for a better place to sit.

So then this tall hot blonde girl with very short hair got up from the island and walked over towards me. She got to within about four feet before I recognized her.

It was DooRagGirl!

Man, she'd got her hair cut short! It was really a huge difference.

Anyway, I ended up giving DooRagGirl the throne and I moved over to the arm of the loveseat. The dipshits were becoming more and more dipshitty - one of them started loudly proclaiming his desire to have "anal sex with any girl, at any time."

Classy, huh? I redoubled my efforts to find better seating.

Eventually some people left the island so DooRagGirl and I moved over there and sat with CoffeeDude and InterruptingCow.

I had another beer:

North Coast PranQster (10)

(draft) A very pretty beer, hazy orange with a nice creamy head. The taste was a little sour, but in a good way. It reminded me of a good lambic more than anything else.

The night was fairly tame, despite my heightened surprisaphobia. I talked with CoffeeDude and DooRagGirl, then once InterruptingCow left a couple of PBDs sat down and we all just bullshitted for a while.

I had myself a couple bottles of Weihenstephaner Hefeweissbier (558), then went to White Castle and came home around midnight.

Saturday, I was in a strange mood all day.

I wasn't going out at all. I'd already tried to go out in the early afternoon, but I'd ended up just turning around and coming back home.

Then, at around 6:00, I figured that going out would be a waste of time, so I decided to just stay home instead. I slept on the couch until I was awakened by HatGirl wanting to know how crowded Rich O's was. So I told her that I wasn't even there yet, but that I'd let her know.

The place was packed with strangers. I texted HatGirl that information then, a few minutes later, I texted her again and told her I was leaving.

What I ended up doing was going over to The Pub in Louisville where I had myself a couple of yummy Young's Double Chocolate Stouts (335).

Then I went back to Rich O's, hoping that the crowd would have died down a little.

It hadn't died down that much, but the seat at the end of the bar was at least open, so I sat there with my back to everyone.

I had a couple bottles of Weihenstephaner Hefeweissbier, and eventually the ghost showed up and made me smile.

That's it. Another weekend gone.

I am shades of gray, snarling and clawing at the colors swirling around me.

One swatch, full of confidence, approaches too closely. After a brief but painful moment, it jerks away, but not quickly enough. Its leading edge, once a vibrant hue, is now a dead and dark and dreary gray. The color of fog on a moonless night, it wilts and it rots.

---

I am shades of gray, watching in awe all of the colors making up the world I inhabit.

I live inside a kaleidoscope, yet I am not a part of it. The colorful blobs don't even notice my existence, and for that I am grateful. I am free to observe the cacophony that surrounds me, without fear of contaminating it. Or it, me.

---

I am shades of gray, and I am alone.

---

I am shades of gray, and another swatch of color settles in beside me.

It does not put out feelers. It does not acknowledge my presence at all. It just is, existing at my side. To my left to be precise. It is but the slightest inkling of the faintest memory of the most tenuous presence, yet it is more real than anything else in this, my world.

I try to pull away, but I am too late.

--

I am shades of gray, but my left edge is tinged with color.

And that color is spreading.

I feel strange this morning. More strange than normal I mean.

I'm floating in a featureless void, and I wonder what I'm doing here. I could call out, but I know that there's nobody to hear me. I wouldn't know what to say anyway.

This isn't right. I don't belong here, in this empty place. This is not where I'm supposed to be. I'm not afraid, and I'm not sad, but I'm not entirely comfortable either. Uneasy would be the word I'm looking for.

This morning I proposed, in an email to a friend, that perhaps I'd died in my sleep during the night. Well she got the email so I guess that theory is no good.

Something happened though. I didn't just wander out here. In fact, I don't really feel as if I went anywhere. It's more like the world disappeared around me. It was there when I went to sleep last night, but now it's gone.

Last Spring I wrote this:

There is...Nothing.

Blackness and silence surround him, seep into him.

He wonders how long it has been. A minute? A day? A million years?

Even the familiar thump thump of his heart has stopped. He ponders this, and reaches his hand to his chest, but he finds that he has no hand, and that he has no chest.

He simply exists, seeing, hearing, feeling nothing.

He waits for something to happen, and wonders if he is dead.

Back then, though, something had happened. There was a reason that I found myself in that void. Back then, I was pushed. This time, this time I don't know what happened.

I shouldn't be here.

Those characters take up a lot of valuable real estate.