Feeling better, but I still have my problems.

But my problems aren't what I'm here to discuss.

The radio and my iPod aren't interesting me so much lately, so I've been driving around listening to CDs. One of those CDs was made for turnip a long time ago, and she never got it due to a mix-up with the mail. In fact, it was gone so long I was surprised to get the package back. This was ages ago, and I forgot about it again until I re-found that crap a little while ago.

I'm a bit of a pack-rat at times.

This mix fascinates me, since most of the ones I make have tracks I continue to like for a long, long time. About half of these songs are nearly unknown to me now. Was I being quirky? Was I experimenting?

Shit, at least there's some Zombies. They never get old.

It's one of those times again. I'm feeling incredibly bored, and I'm feeling incredibly boring.

I'm alone on Easter. I had ideas for what I would do today, but none of that happened. Some of it had to do with my own mood. Some of it had to do with it being Easter. One of these contributed to the other.

I'm alone today, and I'm not blameless in that. I'm picky. I have my mind on something in particular and don't feel like settling for anything short of perfection. It's not helpful. I know it. It doesn't change.


Maybe I just need to stop watching "America's Worst Driver". I'm either not in a schadenfreude mood or there's nothing to be gleaned from people screaming at each other.


I'm not entirely alone. There are cats here, and they need to be fed.

I have plans for tomorrow, and right now I feel I'll stick to them. I just need to make it through tonight.

Couldn't sleep, too much to think about.

Trying to think more about what is good, write it down to cement it in my mind.

Last night, got up and recorded a list of things that were on my mind. It was a good list. Parts of it were stated well. There was a flow. It could've been some sort of beatnik poem.

As for the items on the list, they were not about what is good. The poem, if indeed poem it is, would have to be titled something like "I am a horrible person" or "My life sucks because I suck" or "What the god-damned shit-pissing hell?" or maybe just "Balls".

The catch is that at least some of the information in this list could be helpful, at least in a "bringing feelings to harsh light" way. But they were written in an emotional state that probably makes them harsher than necessary. And so I try to figure out whether it's better to go over the list or to get rid of it and attempt to expunge the thoughts from my head.

So I watch an old Sony commercial. And I think about that instead.

I'm not dead. Surprised?

I have lots of thoughts, some of which have caused me to look through old journal entries, some of which have been caused by looking through old journal entries.

I have little else to say right now.

The quick saga of a car:

Quite some time ago, my check engine light came on. I didn't care. I'm a bad car owner.

My registration lasts until the end of the month, and to renew it I need to pass an emissions test. With a car as new as mine (2001 Galant), they connect to the computer and reject the results entirely if that light is on.

Legally, I need to do this. Personally, I don't really care. I just don't want to deal with the consequences of not doing it.

So I took it to the shop and they did the scan to find out which of the myriad reasons that light could be on is making it so. There's some valve not doing what it's supposed to. The shop originally tested the valve and it seemed fine, so they replaced the stuff that controlled it.

The light was back on before I got home.

They decided they needed to replace the valve itself, but those parts (like the ones before) had to come from Mitsubishi, and the nearest dealership is in Clarksville. Also, the dealership hired a new driver who kept getting lost, so they didn't receive the valve when they should've.

Today they replaced the valve and the light stayed on. They got Mitsubishi technical support on the phone and went through everything. Turns out it's probably the computer that's bad. If I want that fixed, it'll be around $2,000.

My friend can have his car start smoking while in line to be tested and pass because they only check what's coming out of the tail pipe, but at this point mine could be emitting pure oxygen and it wouldn't matter.

It's a fucking racket.

A question/concern:

What disgusting and vile substance is generated and exuded by my body and has resulted in some of my undershirts having brownish underarm stains?

I just had one hell of a birthday weekend. Apparently some local dancers wanted to make a big thing out of it and throw a competition in my honor. The least they could have done is let my team win.

Or place.

Or even show.

Anyway, the point was to have a good time, and I had a blast. Dancing, socializing, meeting new people, learning new things (like the Big Apple), learning from new people, finding another dancer with my same birthday.

It was also very hectic and tiring. Crowded living quarters, no time for good food or sleep, sore all over and tired as hell.

And when I finally came back to my phone, I had ten missed calls and five messages. Seems I need to talk to some people tomorrow.

On Saturday, someone drew large cartoon penises in the intersection outside my home. Since then, they've been covered over and replaced with drawn hearts. The thing is, I thought the penises were drawn in chalk, but apparently they were painted on because they weren't just washed off. Instead, they were painted over so instead of the penises being white, they are now black. Now, a faded asphalt backdrop makes a black design harder to see than a white one, but c'mon.

Apparently, 8th Avenue in downtown Nashville has been renamed Rosa L. Parks Boulevard. I only discovered this because the street signs have been replaced. That was a bit of a surprise when coming in to work this morning.

On the drive to work today, I spied my first Washington, D.C. license plate. At the bottom of the plate, where a state motto or slogan might be found, were the words "TAXATION WITHOUT REPRESENTATION".

Does that seem odd at all? It certainly did to me. I thought that was the entire problem that resulted in this being a country instead of a colony. It doesn't seem like the sort of thing to brag about.

Or maybe the word "NO" was there, but covered up or otherwise obscured.

I knew Reuel was going to be in Memphis for his blues workshop this weekend, so I thought it'd be amusing to give him a call as we drove through. He was apparently too busy to answer the phone, but we weren't too far into Arkansas when he called back. Since we hadn't been around to check e-mail when he sent it out, he offered to give us the news over the phone: Beth and I made one of the teams. We're going to be working our butts off between now (well, when we get back) and the end of September. It's going to be great.

If I wanted to downplay it all, I could point out it looks like everyone who tried out made a team, since Nashville was going to form two teams and the showing was pretty paltry. That doesn't matter, though. What matters is this is going to be great.

There's a sort of potluck thing going on today at work, and someone brought orange juice and chocolate milk. My first thought was that I'd make a "Brown Julius", but that doesn't work because the "Orange" in the name comes from the juice, not the milk. Another coworker suggested "Orange Caligula", but then said that should probably be saved for an alcoholic beverage. When I told this story to mendel, he suggested "Orange Dr. Julius""Orange Dr. J" (he insists), which is excellent (and obvious in hindsight).

It tastes about as good as it sounds.

There's a church Beth and I pass pretty often, considering it's between home and the dance studio. Right now it has a sign reading "PLAN AHEAD! IT WASN'T RAINING WHEN NOAH BUILT THE ARK." and that just annoys me. It annoys me because it wasn't so much that Noah considered the future and thought building the ark was a good idea, but more that God specifically told him to.

Maybe "listening to God" counts as "planning ahead" for Christians.

Never before have I left a dance session with my shirt as soaked as it was today. On the other hand, never before have I tried out for a performance team. I felt somewhat out of it, especially after some of the faster stuff, but when I mentioned it to Reuel later, he said I had good energy, good lines, and good fundamentals.

It feels good that people say we should do this. We've only been at it for six months now, and these people think we're good (or at least that we have potential).

So I recently finally climbed with ropes, and it was okay. It was fun, really. At the least, it was a different experience, and that's always interesting. One of the guys who works at the climbing gym, T.K., mentioned that I should also learn lead climbing.

I've been hearing this a lot lately. People keep saying I should do more, go out on real rock, play with ropes, &c &c.

Well, there aren't dance classes this week and the guy who gives lessons doesn't do it on weekends, so this was as good a time as any, at least if I didn't want to wait until August.

Now, talk about a different experience. It was fun, challenging, sometimes frustrating, and at times a bit scary. Bouldering will always be my first and true climbing love, but this was something. Even if other things start to interest me more, at least bouldering won't require other people and somewhere around $200 worth of equipment.

Before today, I never thought I would thank someone for giving me a wedgie. Top roping/belaying with Reuel changed all that.

That is all.

For some reason, I was with a group that was meeting with 37signals, but the meetings weren't what I would've expected. We met in boardrooms, seated at separate long tables. Their head would get up and talk to us while slowly pacing the room. He was wearing a shirt with something printed on it in Hebrew, but I can't remember what it was now. Things seemed tense.

The meetings went on for a while.

Finally, we had a big, important meeting. It followed the same general format. I noticed that more people were wearing Hebrew shirts this time, and he had a cane now. He seemed disappointed.

One person from each side was escorted from the room.

That's when the weapons came out. Suddenly, everyone was holding a knife or worse, and I realized I must've missed something really important. I was about to dive under the table when something occurred to me. My last thought before waking was "I should find DHH right now."

I work in the sort of neighborhood where people shout out into the street while waiting at bus stops, where a pizzeria will shut its doors and scrawl a message on the doors explaining "WE MOVD TO 281 CLARKSVILL PIK", where there's a business named "MO' MONEY TAXE$", and where a man will walk down the street pushing an empty baby stroller.

That is all.