I AM CRANKY!

No, really, I am. I think most of it has to do with being up too late and being really hungry. Solving one problem will exacerbate the other so naturally I have chosen the third, crappiest way: postpone a decision and blog!

First: Thank you kindly, Cathy, for commenting. It is always good to see you come by, especially when it means my little comment box gets a morsel of joy. I did indeed know about Dear Old Craig's list, and am hoping very much to find a magical car and other, cheaper magical things with it.

Second: Nowedidnt.com has now planted the tiniest of roots, acknowledging its own existence to the rest of the world and tentatively hoping to become something more than a one-page greeting to passers-by. If you're feeling frisky, link to it on your site (better yet, ask your friends to link to it) and watch as the hits stimulate hopefully-interesting responses from the nascent webpage. A link is available in the sidebar if you don't feel like entering the URL yourself

Third: I am irked. There were like seventeen things I wanted to say and now I'm stuck on three. Perhaps increasing the numbers will make things come to mind.

Fourth: Nope. Nothing yet.

Fifth: Oh! Here we go: I'm not depressed after all! I'm bipolar (type II with rapid cycling)! So now I'm taking new drugs and recognizing my hypomanic episodes for what they are. Sweet! Note, though, that if somehow keeping this knowledge out of the public domain means an easier and cheaper life for me, I will take it away. But I don't think it will matter--and even if it did, these pages are archived in Google's memory so that there will always be an original copy of this entry for those who know how to look. I wish I didn't have to worry about these things now.

Sixth: Both Mike Huckabee and Nate Silver have recently misused the word "infer", writing it when they meant "imply". This is a very, very bad thing. Do not fall victim to this spreading plague.

Seventh: Related to the fifth, health insurance is going to be a bitch. If I want the barest possible insurance, which provides me with nothing but a $5000 deductible for medical expenses (with 0% coinsurance--the amount I'm responsible for paying--above that) I have to pay $100 per month. The price barely changes if coinsurance above $5000 is increased to 20%. And these are the prices without bipolar disorder. These prices would be much lower if not for the fact that insurers know that people who seek insurance are more likely to actually receive payouts than people who don't seek it. Self-employment is a bitch.

Eighth: Self-employment also sucks because it prevents me from financing a car and causes trouble for anything where I have to provide proof of income. Tax returns would normally be valid for such circumstances but I don't have any returns that show a decent income. Putting costs upfront like this is a severe strain when your income is feast-or-famine like mine. It upsets and stresses me.

Ninth: I got a new cellular telephone, but I got it from a semi-shady company called Wirefly. Everything is all right so far except that I had trouble activating my first phone--because I was being an idiot, as it turns out--so I had them debit me $250 so they could send out another phone before they received the old one. The money will be credited back to my account upon receipt of the phone, which will probably happen. Unfortunately, at least one person in the world had Wirefly tell them that the return box came empty, so they did not refund his debit. This makes me nervous. And stressed.

Tenth: The hardest part about playing poker is having to remove yourself from it when you start to run hot--also known as going on tilt or playing badly. The problem isn't so much knowing when to leave, but suffering the emotional drain of leaving and waiting. And while knowing when to leave is easy, knowing when to return is very difficult. Emotional resilience means better play within matches and allows for more of them, but the façade of resilience feels very similar and can crack in the right situation, meaning at the least that I must once more detach, wait and reattach. This leads to yet more stress in my life, which I try to relieve by focusing on other activities, which decreases playing time, which decreases cash. To combat this problem I think I need to play more large tournaments instead of the one-on-one matches.

Eleventh: It's looking like the date for going to New Hampshire will be between April 7 and April 15. I'm sad that I won't get to see Eric before then, as he's spending his Spring Break working in Lubbock. It used to wrack my soul to think of Eric, John and Travi gradually drifting away. Somehow we seem to click in a way that I don't think everyone will experience in their lives, and that I worry I won't experience again without them. Something was inherently right about our little coterie. I hope I can see John at least once more before I go, and I'm fortunate to have Travi and Tae here--though that fucking Korean never bothered to call me while his girlfriend was in town. I still feel an intense melancholy when I think about the distances that grow between us, but I still harbor a few fleeting hopes and I know that the situation is hardly improved by lamenting.

Twelfth: To reverse the progressive darkening of this entry, I saw Watchmen on Saturday, and enjoyed it very much despite not having read the comics. It was long, but it was tight. If you ask me it could have used more length for character development, but I doubt that would have made very many other people happy. I also saw The Wrestler with Travi a few hours ago, and that was also a very nice film. Few characters are so bluntly poignant as Randy the Ram. Oh, and I thought it was based on a true story. Evidently it wasn't. Shoot.

Thirteenth: <3 Danielle. Also, <3 goats.

Hasta la byebye, ladies and gentlemen. Don't forget about the website-that-may-be, nowedidnt.com.

Oh shit!

Wow! I didn't even realize how long I hadn't blogged until I stood back to admire my own work from afar!

Well, I graduated from UT. That's done. And now I'm a professional poker player--or more accurately a baby-professional poker player. It's how I earn my living, but "professional" implies more skill and experience than is appropriate.

Oh, and in case I wasn't sufficiently clear, I will be moving to New Hampshire in reasonably short order. Exact dates will be forthcoming upon purchase of a plane ticket. I will get to experience the fun of having really crappy health insurance, my own car (and car insurance) payments, higher rent, massive self-employment taxes and random other itty-bitty-grown-up stuff.

I'm sad that Carry (my dear old Saturn) won't be making the trip with me, but she's just too old to handle it all. I'll also be leaving behind all of my furniture and most of my other stuff so that I can focus on clothes, Yildirimoglu (my desktop), Minik (my Eee--by the way, I got an Eee Pc) and other associated gadgetry.

In fact, I could use a bit of help, 2.2 readers! If you have any suggestions for a young fellow like me on a short budget, who will be needing at least a desk, bed, chairs and table, I happily solicit them.

We ain't even been to the ocean

So.

So it would appear that I'm going to remain in my Race Policy class and take it pass/fail. This seems the best of several unsavory options. The most unfortunate consequence will be my poor participation in what should be a two-person effort to describe a book's purpose both orally and in writing. Updates might be forthcoming.

I will depart for Newark in 41 hours. Once I arrive I will depart for Manchester. At that point I hope to be picked up by Danielle. I will then spend much of my six days in the Shire reading.

Late in high school or early in college I started viewing myself metaphorically as some sort of large aircraft--usually a World War II bomber--trying to fly home. In the beginning of a semester everything would appear all right and everything would be running with a fine hum. But then there would be a hiccup, and the thin veneer of quality would be largely stripped away, baring damage from untold missions past. Faulty wiring, poor insulation, makeshift workarounds everywhere, but I could still fly.

No machine runs perfectly, however, and the longer I flew the less sound I became. Pieces of me would fall away repeatedly in an exaggerated parallel to how I seemed to be faring. Never enough to make me crash, and the pieces would often magically reappear a day later to fall away again in an identical fashion. My crew was desperately trying to stabilize me. We'd be almost home.

Once the majority of my work for the semester would complete I would let the bomber metaphor rest. I would just stop thinking about landing, and be relieved that everything was almost over; I would never even think to see myself flying home. It just ends. There was no success, but simply a lack of failure. My crew would repair me while I rested, but there's only so much they can do when they're still stuck in the air.

I could use a real vacation in the Shire. But perhaps we can patch a few holes, reconnect some wires, make sure the second engine doesn't fall off again.