B1ue

Yes, I am lucky. Most of the x-rays, with the exception of a few chest, back, and teeth x-rays were from minor injuries that they wanted the x-ray as a second check. My parents had damn good medical insurance when I was growing up, on account of my older sister, who stayed several times over nights and seems to have broken everything at one time or another.

A - Age: 25 B- Bed size: Twin C - Chore you hate: All of them, except taking out the trash for some reason D - Dogs or cats: Cat E - Essential start your day item: Music F - Favorite color: Varies. I'm feeling black at the moment G - Gold or Silver: Silver. That one never changes H - Height: 5'10'' I - Instrument played: None J - Job title: Junior LMR K - Kid(s): I'll borrow my sister's if I ever feel a yearning for the pitter-patter of little feet L - Loud or quiet: Quiet M - Mom's name: Mary Louise N - Nicknames: Lots. Gabe at the moment. O - Overnight hospital stay: Never. P - Pet Peeve: Loud people. Q - Quote from a movie: "Oh sugar. You've just gone and done the dumbest thing in your whole damn life." R - Right or left handed: Right S - Siblings: 3, plus cousins and second cousins that are practically siblings. T - Time you wake up: 7:00 AM, if not earlier. U- Underwear: Boxer-briefs by preference. V - Vegetable you dislike: Beans, peas W - Ways you run late: Traffic. I drive slow. X - X-rays you've had: You name it. Y - Yummy food you make: Spicy Garlic Chicken Noodle soup. Z - Zoo favorite: Peacocks. They're running the show.

A - Age: It isn't polite to ask that. And I still say you're too young to start evading these questions.

Things I have wanted to say at my new job: "I am not a bartender. I am not paid to hear your life's woes. Please stop." "Why hello there! Can you turn around for me? Hmm, you know, tight jeans are in fashion right now, you should look into that. Oh, no reason." "Yes, I lived next to a beach, but I didn't go to the university of spoiled children. That's USC. My school was the University of Casual Sex and Beer." "It took me 45 minutes to drive to work today. Again. This will not do. So you bastards will either get out of my way, or I'm about to match Japanese engineering versus German." "As of right now, I have waited 11 hours for the IT department to get their thumbs out of their asses and let me start working instead of collecting dust. Go tech support!" "You realize that the only reason you think I'm qualified to be a part of the IT department is that I don't get scared when lights go blink blink. That worries me. Deeply." "Look, I'd love to give you an exact number right now, but that tends to make our legal department flustered and stern." "Yes sir, you can do this yourself. You can also perform an appendectomy on yourself using a hand mirror. In both cases, I'd probably recommend seeing someone who specializes in these things. Wouldn't you agree?" And, to show equality, one of my customers really got me today. "I'm sorry, but my father can no longer be reached at this number? Sure I'll give you his new contact information, do you have a pen and paper handy? Good! Do you have a Ouija board? Oh no? Well, best of luck then. Try he California Psychics Network." She hung up on me at exactly the right time, because I damn near hit the floor laughing a second later. Bad points: --I feel somewhat predatory. --The high turnover rate and potential high pay makes me real goddamn nervous. Give me a steady 13 an hours over a potential 13k a month any day. --45 minute drive to work really will not do. And because of how skittish I am, I'm not exactly thrilled with idea of relocating to deep Orange county to be closer to a job I may not have in a month (week) or two. --I'm spending way too much money on food. --I was not able to disguise how intelligent I am, which may prove a liability. --I hate sales! Good Points: --Guy I encouraged to wear tighter jeans. --Plethora of young Asian men in the immediate vicinity, it being Orange County and all. While not quite the same as a tall, muscular white guy in a wife beater, a short, slim Asian guy with a crooked smile can arrest my attention fairly well. Lunch breaks are fun, as long as I don't spend too much time looking inside of Acuras. --I'm doing fairly well, as a beginner. While I hate sales, I'm actually passable in skill. And they've made it idiot-ready, so as long as I don't display too much creativity, it'll be hard to screw up. --High turnover means potential for personal growth within company, if I keep my nose clean and mouth shut (and eyes from wandering). I've been reading a bit, here and there. The last book I completed was The Snow Queen by Mercedes Lackey. I got a wild idea about 02:30 in the morning when I was reading it, which I promptly forgot. So I might have to read it again, while more awake. And less drunk. And since so many seem to like Twilight, I may have to pick that up again and try and finish it this time. My first impression was that it was one of those books that made me glad I wasn't a teenager anymore (and if you don't know what I mean by that, you will), but it was liked by people whose opinions I respect. So I may have been too harsh in my initial assessment. Perhaps I should see the movie first, and that will help. Maybe not though. Every time I see Robert Pattinson, I keep wondering why i thought he was hot in Harry Potter. Edited to add: I forgot. I've apparently been stuck at the crazy desk. My cubicle has been used by a series of whack jobs, most recently by a real doozy of one, so everyone is eying me with a bit of trepidation in their expression. Which amuses me, and makes me a little sad. Because I wanted to put the motivational poster seen in the background of this comic as my desktop.. I revised that plan, thinking it would not ease my fellow employees' concerns that I would be bringing the crazy. Today I decided to do it anyways. Just to see what would happen.

I know a bit more about, "not wanting sympathy, just stating a fact," than I like to admit, so I can respect and even understand your position. I will comment that you're ability to think past it, even when time has faded the immediacy, is impressive. I wish I could say the same, but no, rapists still make me want to punch things. As far as what you said, I really cannot agree with this sentence: "As I stated in my vigilante thread, I don't find it wrong for some one to take up arms and seek private vengeance if the case becomes necessary to do so, because certain aspects of our legal systems are not able to deal with modern issues." I blame many of my attitudes, as Kevin has on occasion called me on, on being Catholic, but this really hits close to the nerve. Many of my friends have had a difficult time understanding why I still believe in the church and in God, why I try to follow their precepts instead deciding what is right for myself, and the real response is that I'm afraid if I did that, I'd be wrong. Note it isn't Hell or eternal damnation that scares me, it's the possibility that if I did not have the light in my life, I would not know evil when I saw it. Following from that basic distrust in my own ability to judge right from wrong, of defining right from wrong, I can't allow myself to be in a situation where my sole judgment would cost someone else their life. Like Kevin, I'll need to check out the threads you mentioned. I've a sneaky suspicion that someone threw out the quote, "Eye for an Eye," so I have to go screw with them. It's the principle of the thing, you understand? As for the people who wandered into your blog to criticize your grammar, of all things, Illegitimi non carborundum. I bet they thought Miss California should have been stripped of her title and first runner up status, too. -Gabe

A bicycle? In Orange county? Wouldn't the neighbors complain?

Tequila straight is a small part of my complete Saturday night. On the rare occasions where we are all in the same building, my sisters, cousins and I can go through quite a large bottle between the five of us and still make it to church the next morning. I've heard it has an adverse affects on others, but its just right for me. Except, strangely, in Long Island Ice Teas. I only make mine with half a shot of Tequila instead of a full one, because I dislike the taste of it against all the other alcohols.

My computer has a virus in it. I've guessed this for a couple days, but my anti-virus software just clued in a couple hours ago. The two programs are apparently waging a lengthy and brutal war across my hard drive, if the computer's performance is anything to go by. I wonder how many spam emails it's managed to disseminate over the last few days? Since I can't do anything complicated, I'll just write a long winded rambling blog. I hope the key logger is recording every tap I make for this. I hope it chokes on it. A few weeks back, I came across a thread in the writer's forum about how one weights different aspects of a story, in terms of one's strengths and one's preferences. The elements were style, plot, world-building, and characterization. It reminded me of several conversations I had in college with the other overly creative (but not matched in talent)* people I hung around with. We discussed much the same when it came to music, or how different aspects of a movie could be pieced together. [in a bit of serendipity, the program I'm watching has an all English cast, except for one boy who is quite clearly Irish. This guy plays a character named "Fearnot," who is a special kind of stupid. Who the hell made that kind of casting? Actually, to be fair, one other character isn't English. The animatronic dog is voiced by an American. Again...] For me, for writing, I have to admit its all about the style. Both what I do best, and what I like best. I would guess it has to do with my learning poetry first, and prose second. A good, clever, new style will suck me right in like nothing else will. I read Faulkner, willingly. And Neil Gaiman, in comic book or novel form, is one of my favorite authors. I blame my latest bit of inspiration on his Marvel, 1602. Well, partly him, partly this yaoi comic I reread this evening. It ends with a two page spread of two couples of men, the first guy having cried his eyes out, the second, his boyfriend, worried and pensive over the first, the second drunk to oblivion because he has feelings he can't deal with, the last bursting with happiness because boy three agreed to be his boyfriend. All four are thinking at the same time "I don't want anyone to see me like this tonight." The artist captures this juxtaposition quite well, but I wondered if I could do the same with prose. Maybe take it a step further, and show instead of one snapshot of time the entire rise and fall of a relationship over the course of three years or so. Reality set in soon after I finished plotting it out. While technically interesting, would this actually make a good story, or more accurately a good way to tell a story? Or does it matter, and should I allow artistry to trump its message? If so, would this, as I first thought, be appropriate for inclusion within one of the upcoming anthologies? Ultimately I decided no, perhaps, and no. This site is about a message, a particular message, and I realized that with this story its only real message would be, "Look how smart I am!" As I'd thought I was over that particular urge, this realization came as something of a shock. Eh. I may still write it. Not for here, of course, but if I ever apply to a creative writing program, I'll need samples, and that kind of literary mindf**k just calls to the people that run such programs. My kind of people, though they tend to have the credentials and talent to go with their airs. For a change of pace, I haven't really read anything new for the last month. Aside from Marvel, 1602, and that's a comic, so I'm not as qualified to critique it. Damn good story though, reimagining several of the Marvel superheroes as if they incarnated in the 1600's instead of the modern era. Sort of a reverse ghost story, now that I think of it. My favorite of the characters was of course the ultra-pretty Petros (Quicksilver), though the Devil in the Darkness (Matt Murdock, a.k.a Daredevil) came a close second. And there is one line in particular, towards the end, that telegraphed clear as anything that the words for this comic were penned with a British accent. It cracked me up in that horrified way good irony evokes. It isn't necessary to know the universe or the time period particularly well, which I appreciated since I don't. One last line before I sleep. The program I'm watching? Has a bunch of English men dressed as Russian peasantry and gentry. The blond and medium brown hair with fake black mustaches cracks me up. Clearly, Jim Hensen studio did not want the puppets to be upstaged. *Yes, I mean me too. My creativity far exceeds my actual talent. It happens.

I'd laugh, but that's happened to me before. More than once. Actually, just the being mistaken for a recording has happened to me. People have been willing to take my word for it so far. I'd have to guess that whoever was calling was attempting to flirt with you, because I'd hate to live in a world where a rational person would ask "Are you sure?" to a potential A.I..

Depends. My family was never on a reservation. We were absorbed into the local populace long before the reservations came into existence. And there were Natives around in that area at that time. More in in the Carolinas, but in Virginia as well. On the other hand, there are other ethnic backgrounds that produce much the same features. I'm often taken for Iranian, or North African, or Italian.

I had a curious thought about Jackie Diamond from "Land Whore," and how she's handling the epidemic. And all her little cash cow's dying like flies. Is she more desperate than ever, or has she changed her ways? If she gets her hands on Lou, will it be the same story as Armand (with likely the same outcome) or will she refuse to "kill another friend" like she did Armand and Peter? I don't like the hissy fit Brad is throwing. Yes, he's young, but Robbie has an opportunity of a lifetime. Just because Brad couldn't make it at the Sorbonne is no reason to deprive Robbie. Shouldn't he have learned this lesson already? Brad's starting to act like a less psychotic-version of Neil, and with less excuse. Hopefully Lou, Marcel, Mark, and Lark won't take advantage.

So you're saying you put back on some of the weight you lost since last year? I can't say that's a bad thing. You were a bit too skinny in my opinion, and this is me saying it. One of my cousins, who through high school and college was as thin if not thinner than I was, has finally caught up to me in weight. She a bit taller than you are, if that gives you a reference. She bemoans every time I visit that she's now a cow, but honestly she's never looked better. We just can't use the word healthy around her, because healthy=fat to someone who's been scary skinny her whole life, and no one wants to deal with that. So, enjoy looking healthy. Just because it isn't what you and others are used to, doesn't mean it's bad at all.

Personally, I'm a fan of certainty. A TA friend of mine gave me the quote "I may be wrong, but never in doubt!" which pretty much sums up my approach to life. I'm intelligent and analytical, and through the years I've gotten into the habit of being correct. To me, things just are a certain way, until something comes along to prove me otherwise. All that said, I have fewer issues with Bisexual and Transgender people than many. People that identify as Bisexual do not bother me because I can be classified as such. I'm mostly attracted to men, so I say Gay, but the exact truth is a bit more complicated than that. I also remember how extra confusing it was to be Bisexual during puberty, when I kept teasing myself "but you like women, you can't be Gay." As for transgender, people that know what they are and what they want to that degree are alright in my eyes. I disliked the main character of <i>Transamerica</i>, but that wasn't because she was switching genders. I wouldn't want to DATE a Transgender person, but that's because I'm more or less a hick and, for my bed, like people that subscribe a little closer to their preassigned gender roles.

I don't believe I've ever updated twice in one day, but I need to get this crap down before I forget it. In the process of commenting to Viv's blog, I remembered a conversation an old coworker and I had regarding religion. He told me about this guy named Matthew Alper who wrote a book called The "God" Part of the Brain. The premise of the book is that spirituality is a biological imperitive, a behavior that is as hard-wired into our genes as a cat marking its territory. And as I always do when I replay old conversations, I think of responses that I wish I had said at the time. In this case, my response might have been, "You make spirituality sound like a psychological condition, a neurological imbalance. One that can be corrected. That's a very interesting position to take, don't you think?" At that point, the right side of my brain took a look at the crap my left side was coming up with, and went Pop! Ding! Whir. What if someone tried that? Tried to cure humanity of religion? Flashes of The Giver danced with Brave New World and this Russian novel from the early 1900's whose name I cannot recall at this time. It started with an accident. Some chemical company in Texas got too friendly with a hurricane, and subtly altered the water supply in Oklahoma. It took some time, but eventually it was noticed that virtually everyone in the affected area no longer believed in God. Neurochemists and psychologists study the event, and, after much testing, divine what happened and more importantly, how to replicate it. Time passes, then there is a vaccine available. A Freedom from Religion amendment passes, which makes the vaccine available at no cost to any who desire it. It quickly becomes a requirement of citizenship. People who persist in their beliefs become shunned, a threat to the stability of society. The FBI maintains a list of such individuals, labeling them possible subversives. Then the vaccine is weaponized. And pointed at Israel. Then the rest of the Middle East. Then India, who points something back. Oops. No more USA. Not that we all go up in smoke, but a rather prominent delta city becomes ever burning bright, and the country disintegrates from there. It'd already been on the way to do so, once local political meetings took up the social function churches once provided, and that fracturing of national identity breaks us from a two party system to a multiple party system based partly on geography. The blast that eliminated most of the centripetal politicians and any clear line of succession merely completed the shattering, not caused it. I'm not sure if this is a novel, a collection of short stories, or just one with the events I just outlined in the distant background. I'm going to have to think about it more.

I am the praying kind. I am not, however, the free-form everybody-bare-their-iniquities-don't-we-all-feel-so-much-closer-to-God? prayer type of person. I'm catholic. I need at a rosary before I feel comfortable communing with my creator. So, having grown up in a town where evangelicalism reigned supreme, I can emphasize. Actually, it was a whole different sort of awkward for me, since I couldn't just tell whoever was trying to rope me into the group prayer session, "I'm not religious, but I wish them well." I recommend just smiling and letting them believe whatever they'd like to believe about you. You can even equivocate, instead of saying, "Yes, of course," when asked to pray for someone, say instead "He'll be in my thoughts." I was going to say "She's really asking you for your good will, not really an actual prayer," but I may be wrong about that. I've never really gotten the idea of prayers as a pledge drive or voter initiative, but it belatedly occurs to me that some do believe in that. So actually, I don't know what to tell you at all. I'd guess just smile and equivocate in this case, because your friend clearly has enough on her plate without adding metaphysical debates to the pile. Hmm. Recalling another conversation that was more or less on this topic has given me an idea for a story. I wonder if I'll use it.

I should be filling out more job applications, or cleaning up my apartment some more. But it is far too nice a day for that nonsense. No, no, I shall have to go to the beach. Maybe I'll get the groceries later. Maybe I'll follow my next whim and chase the sunset. Whatever. I have an iPod, a notebook, a book, and a good mood. I'm going to have a good day. Hey, I turned 25 last week. How many more chances am I going to get to play the "f--k the world" game?

It is certainly interesting reading a story like "Man in Motion," because it takes place right around the same time I was born. Don't hit me, I'm going somewhere with that. To people of Brad's, Stephen's, and JP's age group from what I've read it was like a slap out of nowhere. To my age group and the people a bit older (the tail end of Generation X), it was more the Sword of Damocles. Growing up we knew it wasn't a gay only disease, but there was still the warning given by our parents and teachers that having sex can kill you, and that gay sex specifically WILL kill you. I remember in high school there was this day when a couple AIDS patients came in to speak with my class. Both were Gay males in their thirties, probably the first time any of us had met an openly homosexual person face to face, and they both had the soft bruise like lesions we'd come to associate with AIDS. Even the one who said, "You know, I never really cared for the sex. I'm gay, yes, but it was more than sex to me, which makes me getting this disease even more ironic" seemed to be reinforcing the idea that Gay sex = death. Of course, we all got over that, but I look at stories from the "plague years," I look at the world today, and I wonder, without AIDS, would homosexuality have come out of the closet? It seems to me that this disease, more than anything, brought the fact that there were Gay men among us home to every household. It, for a while at least, slowed the orgies and promiscuity, and made the idea of couples lasting for decades not so far fetched. That a Gay married couple might actually work. I realize that these trends were already happening, that it was always a matter of when, not if, but I study the history of the late 80's and television from the 90's and you can see that "someday" becoming "now." I'm not trying to say that AIDS is a good thing. It did, however, have farther reaching consequences than just widespread availability of condoms, and you already seem to be addressing that in your story. Off the top of my head, the closing chapters of "Sea Change," Almost Like Being in Love, and A Boy I Once Knew all have stories about the advent of AIDS and its effects on Gay society.

As my tastes run to the austere, no, I don't have much problem finding boxer briefs that I like. Single color stretch cotton works for me. I do think underwear is a bit harder on women than men. For one, even an extremely well endowed man isn't in the same weight class of the average female, when it comes to their respective hanging anatomy. So a guy's underwear isn't used nearly as much for support (posing jocks excepted) as just keeping the bits out of the way.

If it was only one person, I would not have said anything. After all, its easy to just assume one person is an anomaly and continue on with my day. And to expand on that point, since your last entry is part of what made me think of this, talking about sex is normal. We, none of us, would be at this site if we were not interested in sex. Its talking about sex when it seems to have no bearing on the rest of what a person has written that makes me wonder what they are trying to say. Now that I missed, if you are referring to an actual post somewhere. And even if you aren't, you have a good point here.

I've been attempting for some time to rewrite a story that I originally started in college, then mostly lost the track of in its later stages. Since then, I wrote a sequel, then went back and utterly revised a fundamental aspect of the original story. I know none of this is particularly interesting, but I do have a point: when committing a revision of this magnitude, check your assumptions. Best in fact to check your assumptions about what you've written at the door. In this case, in the original draft, the opening section focused greatly around a rather obstinate character whose sole purpose seems to be to cause me problems during the writing process. Draft two, this is no longer the case, due to the aforementioned major change and how it affect the relationships between the major characters. However, I've just now realized that I've been stubbornly trying to rewrite the damn thing like he was still the central character. There are entire scenes I no longer need, but that I've been trying to rework with ever growing frustration. This has now ceased. Yay me. Actually, I don't really care about this story per se, but I have to get through it so I can go on to its natural sequel, and from there to the story I actually want to write. I'm bored of college age characters, I want to get cracking on proper adults (who, after all, have some relevancy to my life), but first I want to establish their "childhoods." Gah. Hopefully I won't have nearly so many problems when I finally finish revising my first story. It has in some ways just a major change, two characters are going to be combined into one, but since the two characters occupy the same mental territory anyway, I don

I don't believe its physically possible for you to look like hell. And wow, you weren't kidding about all the weight you'd lost over the last year. Nice abs, though. (Saves image) Sucks about your work. I had to deal with that kind of nonsense all through college. You'll find a balance for both work and social life eventually. Hope the presentation went well, Gabe

I've not smoked regularly since high school, and I still get the occasional craving, particularly in moments of high stress. My mom is the same way, and she's not let a cigarette past her lips since the first Bush was in office. The cravings do get easier with time, so that it's an every once in a while event instead of four times an hour, but I don't think they'll ever go away completely. So don't feel down or bothered because they haven't yet. Nothing to be done about them, so why stress over them? The fact that you've gone this long is very good. You'll adjust, probably sooner than you realize.

Something in the way of a public service message, since I'm probably not the only person about with a couple hundred books in their possession. I was pawing through the back section, looking for one of my old textbooks when the corner of my mind noted that sun rays were making light spots on one of my books. This thought engaged the rest of my brain, since it was 2 am and in any case it would be all but impossible for sunlight to ever reach that particular book, due to the angles of the windows. I glared at the book for a full three seconds before I was willing to admit the evidence of my eyes. One of my books had a lively crop of mold growing on it. I don't know if it was the glue, the binding, the ink used to color the cover, whatever, something was growing a bumper crop. A rather hasty scan of the rest of my collection hasn't turned up a second blighted manuscript, but be wary of this threat. I'll probably also have to rethink my long term plan of keeping my library and bedroom the same room. Meh. I'm sure someone would have put their foot down on that in any case.

My work, in its infinite wisdom, has once again screwed me over. This is one of the moments I wish I was a little less imaginative, because I can completely understand why they are making the changes they are making, and that they in no way are doing it to "get" me. While the situation would suck no less, irrational anger is fun and makes the time pass. Ah well. At least the concentrated stress of the last month is over, and we're hitting our natural lull. I can't say I have my life back until at least May, but where there's life there's hope I suppose. I did give up on plucking out the gray, so I'm developing a small crop which no one notices except me. Thank you bright lights and healthy hair shine. I hope everyone had a happy holiday season, and I look forward to this "cool weather" business giving up and going back to Illinois, where it belongs. --Gabe Edit: Forgot to add, the holiday furlough of my nightmares ended yesterday. There were a series of stories involving a haunted airship (think Final Fantasy) where I was: the sole survivor of a shipwreck that turned the other passengers and crew into ghosts; a woman trapped in a time warp created by ship itself, aging decades overnight; the son of that same woman, working to free her from her torment. It was a bit confused, but I wager my back brain was still warming up. Today may be more coherent.

Stupid work.