Memoirs Of An Evil Genius

CROSS YOUR LEGS

Jamie-Lynn Spears is pregnant.  Oh, yes she is.  This is not a drill, folks!  This is the real thing!  The SIXTEEN-YEAR-OLD sister of Britney motherfuckin' Spears is going to HAVE A BABY.  They are like The Beverly HIllbillies FOR REAL.

One Day at a Time

I'm kind of backed up right now.  There are three or four entries I've been meaning to write for a while, all long stories and observations that have come up at times where I didn't really have a chance to sit down and transcribe -- a humorous screaming match I had with the phone company, a lamentation on the fact that I am STILL reading The Count of Monte Cristo, a rage-fueled conniption about Time Warner Cable, remarks on the tragedy in Virginia -- and now something else has come up.

My grandmother had a stroke this morning -- evidently a pretty serious one.  She's stable, thank God, but paralyzed on her left side.  The doctors are currently optimistic about her chances for at least partial recovery, but it's scary nonetheless, not least because this is her second stroke in the past four years.  We had already arranged a visit with them in June before this happened, so although there isn't much I can really offer in the way of functional support I can at least be there physically and emotionally.

It scares me a lot, truth be told.  She's in her eighties, and ultimately an end is inevitable, but I have trouble picturing a world without her in it.  She's the woman who took us kids on walks through alligator-infested marshland, and brought her dog so she'd have something to FEED THEM if a "situation" came up.  She is also the woman who wanted me to access my inner-genius, which, if nothing else, gave me a lot to talk about with my friends.  We were closer when I was much younger -- she fed my interest in nature by sending me field guides to birds and insects, and shared stories of her own childhood in Depression-era New England -- but she's a part of me and always will be.

Anyway, my heart is with her and my dad today.  I hope she gets through this the way she did the last one.

"I Think I Know A Shortcut!"

It's funny how you can write a post that you're really invested in, then your internets spontaneously shut down and erase it, and you have absolutely no desire to go back and reconstruct the original entry.  It just seems too tiresome.  To wit: a brief recap of my original post, as it looked before the Evil Computer Spirit ate it.

Ulrich and I decided to have an impromptu, European-style picnic in the mountains on Saturday, replete with gourmet cheeses, freshly-baked bread, olives, and sopressata.  Then we went for a beautiful and invigorating hike afterwards and discovered a car that had gone off the road and crashed into a thicket of dense shrubs about thirty feet down a 60-degree embankment.

Picking up the thread: I scooted down the thirty feet or so on my ass to get a better look -- with much trepidation, I might add, having noted to Ulrich before making the journey, "I did not come all the way up here to find a dead body on my weekend," -- but I couldn't see anything.  The rear windshield was filthy, and although there was a gaping hole in it, I couldn't make out the front seat.  I also couldn't smell death, which I am OVERJOYED to report.

Anyway, I got the license plate number, climbed back up the slope, and called the Highway Patrol.  I have yet to find out what happened after that, but I'm going to call them again this afternoon to see if there's any news.

Happy Blogday!

Okay, everybody -- go freshen your drinks, because I've got a lot to talk about.  I'm going to try and break it down into three separate entries, but I AM on a schedule.  Forgive me if I start splicing everything together like some madman playing God on a private island in the south Pacific, conjoining men and animals in an unholy miscegenation to satisfy a crazed thirst for power.  You know, it would probably behoove me to update more often.  But ANYway...

It's the 21st, y'all, and do you know what that means?  It means that another birthday for Memoirs of an Evil Genius has passed.  Hooray!  Sound the trump!  Cue the dancing girls!  It's been four years now, and I'm quite proud of it.  I would ordinarily celebrate by putting together a compendium of interesting snippets from the last 365 days' worth of entries, but this new format doesn't really work well for that.  Instead, I'll just reminisce.  I know how much you guys love that.

It has been a strange year.  I guess I'm still young enough that I still think of time as it relates to my childhood and to my life when I was in school.  I'm six years out of college, and still don't really feel like a grown up.  Pussy Galore is on the way to pop out Baby #2 (whom she just named -- she's having a little girl!  Hooray for little girls!) and my sister just had her first, and while the concept of having a baby around doesn't seem crazy to me, exactly, it still sounds bizarre. 

I always thought my timeline was just great -- sure, I'm living in sort of an arrested adolescence with the occasional partying and responsible irresponsibilities, but I live in Los Angeles.  "Arrested Adolescence" is written on the city seal!  But, I don't know.  A lot of things have changed in my life over the last four years, and now I find myself starting to worry that I've outgrown my adolescence.

And then Ulrich I sneak booze into the movies and get plastered in the back row while watching Casino Royale and I realize: I may NEVER outgrow my adolescence.  Woot!

Telling It Like It Is

"But it also gets us to a point: Democrats have spent a lot of time complaining about what the president has done. This is an opportunity for them to kind of stand up,"

Quoth spokesman Tony Snow, in the White House's magnanimous reaction to the GOP losing the House of Representatives.  His humility is inspiring, isn't it?  It's also great the way that he seems to have such a firm handle on how things stand regarding the electorate's general feeling toward the two respective major political parties involved.  You tell 'em, former TOTALLY IMPARTIAL Fox News correspondent!  You FORCE those Democrats to accept accountability for the spate of recent, wildly unpopular political decisions that have led the deterioration of this country's global credibility!

That Tony Snow is a regular Faith Hill when it comes to graciously accepting defeat, isn't he?

Factory Boy

For various reasons, I just really haven't had the time to think about a Halloween costume for this year.  It generally seems to work in my favor, this 'putting it off till the last second' thing.  Two years ago, I slapped together a costume at the last second -- just to avoid going as the same thing for two different parties (quelle horreur!) -- when I got an 11th-hour invite, and it was the hit of the night.  I was so happy about it that I really planned ahead for last year.  I went as a murdered bathroom attendant, and I bought a tuxedo shirt and a vest, I got a bow tie, I carried around a tray with mints and mouthwash and had a towel draped over my arm ALL NIGHT LONG, and no one effing cared.  All that work!  Philistines.

So on Thursday, when Argyle and I were goofing around and accidentally stumbled headlong into my costume, I was overjoyed.  It was free!  It was creative!  It was free!!!  I went as Andy Warhol, and everyone really loved it.  Well, everyone who didn't think I was being Austin Scarlett from Project Runway.  Philistines.  That show is DEAD to me.  Anyway, you tell me:

                

Neither of those is me, incidentally.  Although I have to admit there are *maybe* some physical similarities -- appearance-wise -- betwixt myself and Mr. Scarlett, although I wear slightly less lip gloss. Well, and also, I couldn't get my hair to do a wave like that if I took it to a baseball game.

Anyway, Warhol was a big hit.  Also that night, however, Ulrich and I turned on the TV to de-drunk before going to bed, and I was absolutely shocked to see an episode of Dr. 90210 that featured one fo the victims of this accident.  I guess the guy who lost his nose had reconstructive surgery done on the show.  It was surreal to see, but I'm really happy to know that he survived.  It was a brutal wreck.

Yesterday we had a wedding to attend way, way out in Topanga Canyon.  It was a traditional Hindu ceremony, and it was absolutely beautiful.  Or, I assume.  I kind of misread the invitation and we showed up an hour and a half late.  A brilliant move, I know.  Fortunately, I wasn't exactly their lynchpin guest -- I was invited because the father of the groom was a teacher of mine in high school; he's a wonderful man who, thanks to some other connections, has a character on Lost named after him.  It was a lot of fun, and we made some new friends, so all told it was a great time had by all.

Lastly, and sadly, Pussy Galore's mother had a major heart attack the other night.  She survived, and it turns out it may have been the result of a congenital defect.  If that's so, and they figure it out, it'll be beneficial for them all to have discovered it.  My thoughts are with them all today.

Pictures From The Homefront: UPDATE

This is why I get homesick:

I took this picture with my phone when I was at home, visiting the family and engaging in baby therapy. Unfortunately, I cannot figure out for the life of me how to get an even SLIGHTLY larger version, so we'll all have to make do with the small one. I figured out how to retrieve my pictures properly! Hooray for technology and shit! However, it's still stands as a really good example of what I'm missing out on, here on the west coast.

Don't get me wrong, the west coast rocks in its own way - and I wouldn't exactly say my lil ole hometown has it all over LA for the cultural experience - but home is...you know, home. I used to see skies like this all the time, and it pricks a sensitive place in my heart when I look at pictures like this and think how I don't have that pleasure anymore. It pricks harder when I see my nephew and think that he's going to know me from holidays and photographs, and precious little else for a long time.

I don't know. I'm hoping to make some big changes soon - more on that at another date - and all may not be lost. In the meantime, please admire the morning sky spreading out over the golf course...

Yep, I'm Ambiguous

It's one of those days again, dear readers. You know the kind of day I'm talking about. It's the kind of day where you can't park in your regular spot because some 50-foot truck carrying cement blocks is parked horizontally across the entire row. It's the kind of day where you step up to the urinal to...unleash the dragon, as it were, only you can't get at the dragon, because it turns out you put your underwear on backwards this morning. It's the kind of day where you're dead tired and then "Waterfalls" by TLC comes on the radio, and you get all jazzed, and you stand up and start dancing -- just to keep up your energy, you know, and because it's a good song and it's from back in the day when you and your friends listened to the radio all the time, and I don't have to defend myself to you people; It's my office and I'll dance if I want to -- and that's when you realize that the office door is swinging wide open and people on the street are pointing at you and laughing.

It's that kind of day.

It actually hasn't been a bad day, per se, just sort of farcical. And now the modem is all jammed up or something, so it takes my pages like three hours to load, which is just great. My savings bonds mature in the time it takes to access everything2.com, my current favorite font of useless knowledge. However, I spent the morning sort of revamping my weblog, here, so I feel a bit productive at least. Of course, if the internet goes out altogether, it's going to turn into Lord of the Flies in here, or something.

I didn't make any huge changes, but you'll notice I moved the links to my next and last entries to the bottom of the page and threw a title up on the header bar, which, for a boy who knows squat about html, is really pretty impressive. I also dropped the cutesy "In Which Our Hero" post titles in favor of something a little less wordy. That was a hard decision to make, but it was the right one. I originally started it, thinking it would be a fun and unique way to chronicle my life on a day to day basis, but instead it became limiting and cumbersome. I mean, eventually a title like "In Which Our Hero Goes to the Store" will no longer be an easily identifiable title, and people will be like, "Which time? Which store? Is that the one where he fell on his face, or the one where he dropped everything and knocked that old lady into the yogurt bin?" So, a change.

On Tuesday, Annabelle, for whom I work, asked me, "So what's your story? Are you seeing anyone? Girlfriend? Boyfriend?" And it wasn't meant to be intrusive or harrassmenty, but it threw me for a second. I think she truly was curious about my life, and not just so far as to whether I like boys or girls as most people seem to be, but I was still a bit put-off.

Now, it's not like I'm offended by people thinking I might be gay (I mean, obviously), but I do have a problem with people asking about it like it's all their business or some shit like that. I mean, I don't go around asking people things like, "So, are you wearing panties today?" That would be rude and intrusive, not to mention none of my business. And I know that in today's climate, "Are you gay?" doesn't carry the same connotations as it did back in the sixth grade when it would be coming from a kid three times your size with anger management issues, and phrased more like, "What are you -- some kinda fag?" Still, I bristle when I'm at the library and some girl waltzes up to the table and goes, "Excuse me...my friends and I were talking, and we just wanted to know...are you gay?" Like, people are getting bombed in Pakistan, and this is what you have to talk about?

Whatever. I mean, as many people assume I'm straight as assume I'm not. In college, my best friend Solitaire, assumed I was gay. No real harm there, except that it just kind of bugs me when people assume. Then again, it bugs when people ask, so what the hell do I want? Anyway, later, when I started talking to her about my ex-girlfriend (Honey Ryder, who, I should mention, recently got married. To a woman. Not that there's anything wrong with that) she got all weird. Then she decided I was totally straight and started viciously defending my sexuality to other people, so when I started dating a guy our senior year, my friendship with her took a really strong hit. The issue was compounded by her homophobic boyfriend, who pretty much had her wrapped around his finger.

See, the subject of sexuality never came up between us. She assumed, and I assumed, and we both assumed wrong. Then I found out that all along, unbeknownst to me, she had been playing my advocate when I wasn't around. I was flattered by her fierce loyalty, but completely unsure how to say, "But..." Also, I was getting really pissed by the fact that she should have to defend me at all. Again, not that being thought of as gay is a bad thing, but why are people sitting around analyzing my hormones like the Department of Defense or something?

And maybe I'm a little ultra-sensitive about it anyway, due to the fact that in those first, vulnerable stages of the Coming Out process, I was grabbed by my metaphoric hair and dragged out forcibly by Honey Ryder, who came out herself at full tilt and pulled most of her friends along with her. Suddenly, something that should have been mine to divulge at my own discretion was made public knowledge. I even lost a friend over it, which wasn't terribly reassuring. Then, I went off to college, determined to be completely open about everything, and that went down in flames (no pun intended) before it even hit cruising altitude. I tried to tell some people, but I totally blew the dismount and...well, basically went back into the closet. Sort of.

It's hard to describe. The point is that I reached the point where I was quite comfortable with my sexuality, but I became this weird object of curiosity for my friends, who would whisper and gossip about me behind my back and declare that they "knew", and then smile to my face and act like they were my best buds. And that? Pissed me off. Fuck 'em all, I thought. They don't deserve my confidence.

So what's my point? Hell if I know. I've got no problem with Annabelle knowing my preferences, especially if she can hook me up with a cute gay boy model, as she promised. I just resent having my chemical impulses be a hot-button issue. It makes you want to knock an old lady into the yogurt bin.

The More Things Change, the More They Stay the Same

Well, all in all it was a very successful Thanksgiving holiday, I must say. I'm still at my parents' place right now (my flight back to LA isn't until tomorrow), it's cold-ass outside, I don't have a car and am therefore housebound like something out of an Agatha Christie novel, but my parents' dog is curled up next to me and keeping me toasty warm, so that's fine.

Thanksgiving itself was a whirlwind of turkey, shrieking three-year-olds, and wacky family hijinks. Since then, I've spent copious amounts of time with my best friend from high school (whom we shall refer to as Pussy Galore), caught up with some of my other schoolmates I see most infrequently, ran into one of my few college chums I'm not trying avoid, and got to see a good friend I've been missing for two years now. So, like I say, a success.

Right now it's snowing, and I really wish I was out there in it. It doesn't snow in LA (which is kind of a craptacular city, all things being equal), so I miss the ambience you get when everything is covered by a blanket of white. Of course, I don't have a car, so I must enjoy the ambience through the kitchen windows, but whatever. I always enjoyed snow better from the vantage point of a cup of hot cocoa anyway. Mmmm, cocoa.

Anyway, Pussy Galore is supposed to call me today so we can see a movie, catch dinner, or just bum around the mall like the couple of low-level hoodlums we were back in our rowdy high school days. Actually, if we were truly to revert back to high school, we'd be sniping at our contemporaries over an assy cup of Denny's coffee, griping about our serious lack of funding, and exulting over our most recent inside jokes. Hmmm. Now that I think of it, we did that on Friday.

Life has actually changed a lot since high school. We're all very different people now. Of the four girls I crushed on the hardest as an underclassman, one is married, one is a teacher, one is...kinda crazy, and two are mothers. My closest friends are scattered to the four winds and we rarely (if ever) see or speak to each other, my ex-girlfriend is married (to a woman), my arch-nemesis is also married and feeling quite superior to me (some things never change), and a one-time friend turned enemy is dead.

Talk about conflicted emotions; I was on Freud's payroll that weekend, I can assure you. This girl had said some very offensive and hurtful things about me and my closest friends directly to my face, and I had called the "friendship" off on the spot. After her death, I wasn't quite sure how to feel. I'd already mourned the loss of the relationship, and I'd promised never to speak to her again, so what had I lost on her death? On the other hand, she was somebody I knew and was once close with, and any death is a sad thing. Still, it felt hypocritical and self-serving for me to go around crying over the loss of someone I'd professed to be my enemy, and had already washed my hands of. I hate people that use any random tragedy as an excuse to garner some sympathy from their acquaintances. I didn't go to the funeral, and I'm still not sure how I feel about that.

Anyway, my dysfunctional psyche aside, it's so weird to meet up with high school friends and catch up on their lives. We're completely different people now -- I'm much, much sexier, for one thing, plus I'm a genius and I invented post-its -- but our relationships are still defined by the same things that bound us together back in the day. I value them for being a part of my past youth and for experiencing a piece of my life that no one else in this world can understand. Sometimes, that alone is reason enough to stay friends despite our ever-widening differences.

Life is a bowl of cherries, y'all. Sometimes it's sweet, and sometimes it's the pits. The point is that there's always someone sharing the bowl with you.

In Which Our Hero Hates Dawson's Creek

Before we get started, I have to ask: is Dawson's Creek, like, the worst show ever, or what? I mean seriously. I thought that was just understood, but apparently there are people out there that disagree with this irrefutable truth. To those people I say, "WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU SMOKING?" I mean, it was okay in its first season, but then in its second season it started to spin wildly out of control, and by its third year it was sucking rocks. Hard! The writing is pedestrian (at best), the characters are all predictable and obnoxious (and that's being charitable in most cases), and the "plotlines" are self-important, overblown, melodramatic, and unrealistic.

Honestly. Critics rant and rave about how "teenagers don't use those words", but that's a load of horse shit. In high school, my friends and I could've SAT vocab-ed your ass off, so there goes that theory. However, we didn't sit around making endless, self-referential metastatements about our own lives like a bunch of Psych junkies on a coke bender. And now Pacey's a stockbroker. The hell? Isn't this the guy who couldn't even figure out how to rent a freaking limo a year and a half ago? Whatever. That show is evil.

And on to the spiral. It seems I suffer from the occasional bout of clinical depression, and this is one of those bouts. It's an awful feeling, because you just start to disconnect from everything around you. The things that should be making you happy fail to cheer you up, and because of that, you panic and sink deeper. Then you start to wonder if there might be something morally wrong with you, because your feelings are so blunted, and you sink deeper still.

And you can't talk about it with anyone, either. At least, those of us without health insurance can't, anyway. No one wants to hear a clinically depressed person babble on about how much they hate their life without getting paid to do so, and can you really blame them? Still, that makes it even harder. And the more you try to act happy around the people who don't want to deal with your problems, the more it breaks your heart inside.

About two years ago I went through a very dark period where I cried whenever I was alone because nothing in my life made sense anymore. I made it through because I was surrounded by people that cared very deeply for me and were ready to carry me when I couldn't go on. Now? I'm 3,000 miles from my family, and I'm pretty much alone in this. It's frightening, but I'm determined to get through it. I have good genes, and a history of perseverence in the face of adversity.

Besides, if Pacey can become a stockbroker, I can do anything.