It's good to be awesome

I feel so good it's not fair. I'm still not a million dollar producer, but senior guys have been talking to me more and more. They drop a hint here, an idea there, and when I talk to them I feel like they are taking a genuine interest in helping me out. It feels awesome.

Things are looking up outside of work as well. I had a great night last night, hung out with Brad for a while tonight (but failed to find good camo for Sunday), have my cousin's wedding on Saturday morning, my buddy Arch is flying in on Saturday afternoon, and Sunday is paintball!

Add to this impressive list that I've been making more quality contacts and doing more stuff outside of prospecting this week than I have in a long long time. I now have a good number of people who I can call at any time and they will know my name, what I do, that I'm trustworthy, and that I don't call them with stupid shit. Knowing someone is going to listen to you instead of guessing that they will is a HUGE stress reliever. You don't get that knot in your stomach as the phone's ringing because you know it's going to be like calling a friend. I deeply respect that relationship and I don't do anything that would put that on thin ice.

OK, assholes, I'm out.

About time

All is right with the world. It's about time I have something to look forward to. I'm very happy tonight. Let's just hope things go well.

Other plans

Another bullshit set of zeros and ones landed.

Anyways, I have plans for this evening so I wanted to just type something now so I wouldn't be inclined to type something later.

I have nothing to say, so you get a nerd/EQ update:

Baromen Ironsack has earned 61 and 2 more AAs. He now has Run3, Regen3, sta3, and ND2. Well on my way to being a 10k tank. All stat caps have been raised to 260 and hit points over 7k. Working on staging a raid on the Plane of Fear to get moving on my epic, but not getting my hopes up. Also looking forward to Friday night when we raid Old World zones.

That is all I have.

Look what I found

Google Video hosted my stupid movie where I drink mustard and wear a pink bra! Great.

Just as it started...

…it’s over.  I still have no idea who sent it to me or why.  All I know is that today it’s gone.  It no longer exists.  I did an extensive search and it ceases to be.  This makes me lean even more toward it being a cruel joke.  I only wonder what the evil piece of garbage that tried to trick me wanted to do if I fell for her stupid trap?  What would have been said?  What pleasure do you get out of doing this?  

Fuck it.

I took a couple screen shots to prove I’m not losing my mind last night.  I’m glad I did.  

I sent someone who I had consistently butted heads with an email in March (that I saved) where I admitted to being wrong in the way I had acted towards some people and just asked that I be forgiven even if I never heard from any of them again.  I said in the email that if I didn’t get a reply that I would never write again.  I never got a reply.  I never wrote again.  I held up my end of the deal.  

If you’re wondering what the fuck I’m talking about, basically there were a group of friends that gave me a hard time for years and I did the same in return.  As it turns out they didn’t take what I was dishing out as well as I had figured they would and really thought that I hated them.  I didn’t hate them.  So when things changed and I was told exactly what they thought of me, realized that I’d never get a chance to apologize for anything, and that I’d never get a chance to clear my name.  I sent the only one whose email address I had an email and just laid it all out and explained that I was sorry.  I’ve never heard back, which is fine, but I just hope one of these people isn’t behind this.  I did the best I could to say I’m sorry.  The least you can do is leave me alone.

I will stop complaining about this now.  It just came as such a surprise and at a weird time.  I just didn’t know what to think, the friends I talk to are tired of hearing about bullshit like this, and I just want to share this with someone.  

I had a good day at work.  Good appointment, but I was too tired all day to get much of anything done.  I should be in bed now… so I’m going to bed.

goodbye

Head v4.0

fresh new haircut

I finally made a decision that made me happy today.  I got my head buzzed high and tight.  I’m as close as I can be to just buzzing my head like I used to while still having a normal haircut.  I love it.  The dude I went to last time has such a thick Jamaican accent that it’s hard to understand what he’s saying, but he does a bang up job on my dome piece, so he’s my barber now.  Last time he did exactly what I wanted, but I forgot that when I am in between long and short hair that I have a cowlick that will stand up on the back of my head like a ponytail unless it’s weighted down with something.  I tried dealing with my hair, but I’m happiest the way I am now if I can’t just buzz it.  I hadn’t shaved since Thursday coming up on this morning, and I had a few extra minutes getting ready for work, so I shaved in the chinstrap again.  It felt so damn good to have it back even though it was only a few minutes.  I almost forgot to shave it off before I left the house.  I think that was my heart trying to tell my brain to forget on purpose.  So, for the time being I’m clean shaven.  It really sounds like it’s going to be a long long time before I’m in a place at work where I have a leg to stand on when it comes to my appearance, but damn it, I’m going to get there asap so I can go back to being who I am.

Regardless of my beard, I still have a haircut I’m really happy with.  I’m typing this entry on word, so if I can figure out how to upload a pic of my new head then I will.  I’ll probably just edit this afterwards to include a pic… but why the fuck am I telling you this?  

Anyhoo… Frank looks good today making two straight days of healthy lil fish..  Wouldn’t be surprised if that jerk ate a rock that was weighing him down or something.  Whatever it was it’s over now as far as I can see, so that’s great news.  

I’m realizing how bad my blog grammar is now that I’m typing here.  Every freaken sentence gets a wavy green line under it.  Now I’m getting self conscious.  

This Saturday, two cool things are going down.  First, my cousin Russ is getting married.  I’m happy for him.  It still feels weird that Anthony is married; I can only imagine it will be even weirder now that Russ is going to me married too.  The second cool thing is that my buddy Mike from Texas is coming up for the weekend.  Mike, Brad, Randy Flagg, and I are going to hit www.skirmish.com for some good ol’ paintball fun.  I’m so excited, but I’m a little disappointed I missed The Battle of Normandy (check out the site for more info).  Thousands vs thousands for an 8 hour battle.  The next big game is the 30th of October when they have some raid on a castle.  That one sounds cool, but I’m REALLY looking forward to March when they are staging The Battle of Stalingrad… wait… who the hell am I kidding?  I’m looking forward to Sunday.  

I like to have a few beers while I lounge during the week, but I got home from work so late tonight that I really should have halved the number of beers, but I decided to just drink my 3 faster than normal, so now I’ve got a nice little Monday night buzz on.  

The question from the post this one is standing on top of is still out there in my head.  I don’t know if it’s legit, if it’s who it says it is, if I should even respond, whatever.  My guess is that it’s a cruel joke being played on me by people who never knew where to draw the line (and that’s coming from me… go figure).

Now, for an unrelated story:  When I was playing ball if I had the slightest cut on my hands, forearms, elbows, etc they weren’t going to heal until a month or so after the season.  My hands and arms are scarred to hell from constant punishment and no time to heal.  The second football season was over and my body could grow back the skin and seal itself up it was done.  A cut that would bleed all over from game 1 through 15 would heal in a week.  The scar would calm down in a month.  After a while it’s just another badge of service.  Only thing that would screw that process up was if I was doing something and reopened an old scar.  Spending as much time in the woods as I used to there were times it would take all summer to heal the stupid little cuts that I earned during Spring Ball.  In other words, opening up old wounds just slows down the healing process.  If you want proof, I’ll show you my hands.

It rained like hell tonight.  It made me so happy.  I just sat in my truck with the engine off for a while to hear the rain hitting the windshield.  Then I went inside and just sat on the couch for about an hour and gave myself a chance to just stop thinking and enjoy the smell and feel of a real good rain.

OK, you may go about your business.

And the plot thickens...

It's a guarantee every time something is said or done to make me feel good something else will happen and bring me down or confuse the fucking bullshit out of me and I'm back to where I was.

Anyways, Friday I come home from work and Frank looks like he's dieing. His colors are bright, his scales look clean, he's perfectly upright, but he's not moving. He's just sitting on the bottom of the tank. When I walk up he freaks out and swims all over, but when he relaxes he just sinks back down to the bottom. I did a water change, added a bit of slime coat builder to the tank, and just prayed he'd be allright. Today I woke up and was trying to mentally prepare to burry my little friend, and he was fine. Swimming around happily. Asshole was just fucking with me. As I was writing that I looked over and he looks as good as new. He seriously has a strange personality. He does shit just to get attention. Mao is bigger and can really thrash up a storm on the surface to get you to look at him, but Frank is the strangest fish I've ever seen. He's upside down, does flips, spins around and parks himself at strang angles, visibly sleeps and can be woken up, and does shit like sit there and scare the hell out of me for a day.

I got to bed nice and early Friday night, woke up and got into work when I wanted to get in, and got smashed like I've never been smashed before and left after only 2 hours because I'd allready lost 20 contacts.

Got 2 emails. 1 brought me up. 1 confused me beyond the fucking limits of my mind. Now I feel like shit all over again and I don't know what to do.

I'm going to bed. Will figure it out tomorrow.

In EQ news, Baromen Ironsack now is level 60 and has earned 13AAs. Even when the world around me is at a standstill or worse, at least I can nerd it up and I'm only getting better and better at that.

Oh, and here's the link to where Archangel75, Alex Trebek, and me (BYOB Kenobi) are going on Sunday: www.skirmish.com

fuck yeah

...

Nothing substantial to post about. I'm just getting by. The only thing that I have had on my mind is getting my job in order and it might be working... then again, I might be spinning my wheels. I ordered another list yesterday... on my card... and am waiting on payment from the other party who is splitting the list with me. I trust him, but it's hard to wait more than 3.34 seconds without freaking out when you know it's either list or bills.

Speaking of money, I had an interesting thought... but my mom is stopping by and just pulled in, so I'm going to go give her hugs and come back later.

Lazy Weekend

I spent this weekend doing nothing as hard as I could. I felt like I was in a hurry to do shit ever since I got home on Friday night, but I ended up not doing anything but spending Saturday night at my Uncle's birthday dinner. Good times. I got a chance to see my cousin's wedding invitation. And by see I mean it's a DVD that was drawn and animated to the music of "somebody's getting married" from The Muppet Movie. My cousin's best friend is in animation for a living (I think... at least I know it's something he does) and he did a hell of a job putting together a funny little movie in the place of a static invitation. It's different, and I like it.

I also learned my other cousin's ex... who's like 4 years younger than he is... and he's 2 years younger than I am... was married this weekend. Good luck with that. It really made me laugh.

Spent a little too much time on EQ this weekend. I have been taking it like this: If I don't have shit to do and I stay in wasting time, then that's more money I'll have in my pocket to have fun when I do have plans. I could have done more with this weekend than I did, but one "plan" never materialized and I really didn't have a plan B. Didn't want one.

Anyways, my friends, I have to get going. Need to be awake bright and early tomorrow.

To my friends

You guys are family. We can fight, do stupid shit (see post "a 3 hour tour" or "post 201"), beat the shit out of each other, be offensive as hell, piss each other off, but God damn it, we're tight and that's all there is to it. If you ever think that me getting mad at any one of you means shit, it doesn't. We all go through moods or have things that really get under our skin (BBB wasn't too happy when Capt. Knopantz broke his hand with a huge set of log pliars) but in the end, I got your backs forever. This goes to all of you, and you all know who you are. From the guys I rode the bus with as a kid, the ones who sweat and bled side by side with me in Giants stadium on an unseasonably warm saturday in december, the ones who used to get us into fist fights with drunks and force us to battle our way out of bars together, the ones who got up at 4am every day to run because one guy couldn't get out of bed, to the guys who send the coast guard after my ass when I get lost on the lake. You can always count on me. I'll always be there. I'd take a bullet for any one of you and I know you'd do the same.

Always know that.

The Road Sometimes Traveled

I don't understand why there are so many ups and downs.  I always thought that once I had a steady job and a place of my own that things would settle down emotionally for me, but it's not been the case.  One day I have a conversation that I believe will change the course of my life forever, the next I'm being put on blast for not doing enough.  One night I'm having a great time with my friends, the next I'm realizing the intense shallowness of the last person I would have guessed.  One day it's all coming together, the next it's falling apart. 
Again, I'd like to reiterate my position (holy shit I"ve been reading too many opinion reports) that I just want some kind of confirmation that the choices I've made over the past 8 years of my life have brought me to a place where things are eventually going to work out. 
I have to mention this now:  I got a ride back with an old teammate of mine from FU who had to stop playing because of a knee injury.  He started making comments about how FU football was insignificant and it set me on fire.  I didn't even realize why I was mad until I stepped away for a while and thought about it.  I decided to put football first above everything but God ever since I was old enough to know that football was where a kid twice the size of the next biggest kid becomes acceptable.  I made that fact annoyingly and self destructively clear to the people I cared about and that is one of the reasons I am alone.  I realized when I was argueing with him that the only reason his words hurt me so deeply is because I need to know that thing I built my life on for so long wasn't bullshit.  If it was, then it was, but the pain of not knowing what the future holds and being stuck having to take it day by day and having no idea when the weathers going to clear up and I'm going to be able to see a future that I'd enjoy being a part of in the distance is for nothing.  I NEED to know that I made the right decisions, even if only in my head, and even if it's something 100% pointless.  I NEED to have something to hold onto.
OK, it's way past my bedtime, but I was reading an old friend's blog on her myspace and it made me think very hard.  I just wanted to share something and I figured this would be a good way to do it.

post 201

This is my 201st post... and I'm too tired to make anything out of it. Been keeping myself busy with work and nerdery. I'll be here to post something legit in the next day or so, but I just wanted to post, celebrate breaking 200, and let you guys know i'm still here.

and to share the pictures of me being towed in by the marine patrol:






Worst Character Ever

...A Three Hour Tour, and my mitts.

Wow, I don't know if this is the right place to start when talking about this weekend, but I have to give this portion of the weekend the proper attention before moving on to other things. Sunday, around 2pm EST I finally got up the nerve to ask BBB to take out one of his jetskis. That thing was a damn rocket ship on water. Much faster than the ones I used to take out on the sound/ocean with my dad when I was a kid. Those must have had a serious governer on them... or BBB just has nice toys. Only problem was that on our side of the island the water was so choppy that I couldn't get the machine over 30mph without getting beat up, dunking the jetski or getting a wall of water in my face that would damn near knock me off the seat. I decided I'd stay where I could see his house, but I'd been out for almost a half hour and never been able to lay the hammer down, so I thought to myself, "how hard could it be to get around the island, rip at full throttle for a little while, and ride back?" Well, I did just that. I went out around the island, it was nice and smooth, I got the thing up as fast as I could get it. I think I topped out at around 60, but I was having too much fun to look down. Now the tank was half full when I went out, and it was displayed in bars, so I decided when I went from 3 to 2 bars I was going to come back. That wasn't long when I running full open, so I turned around and started following the shore back... in the wrong fucking direction. I ended up lost. At this point the lake smoothed out and I was able to just rip in any direction I wanted, so I was flying around trying to find some of the landmarks I took mental pictures of to get me back... then again, all I did was go one way and turn around... I must be going the right way.

Well... long story short, I was at 1 bar (and the thing shows more gas than you really have when you have the nose higher than the rear) so I stopped for directions. It went like this, "Do you know where Johnson's Landing is from here?" "Uh... what county is that in?" "COUNTY??? UH........ well, I'm almost out of gas, where can I stop around here?" "Stop down the shore at Pier 19. They have a grocery store and they should know this area better than we do, we just spend our weekends here." "Thank you very much" and I'm off. I stop at pier 19... the little buz I put on before going out had gone away, and I had spent an hour or two with a solid wall of water splashing in my face and the sun beating down on me, so I was a little disoriented. I have never tied a boat to a dock, so I did my best with the one cord I found under the seat and went inside. There were 2 girls working the counter whos combined age was around 26 and they had no idea what I was talking about so I just asked to use the phone. For anyone who has been using a cell phone since the mid 90s, you know how many numbers you have memorized... ZERO! Luckily I could remember my mom and dad's number, so I tried to call them collect. I wasn't thinking and it wasn't until after my mom picked up that I realized that people call collect from jail, and she knew where I was and what I was up to... straight psychopath drinking mania. She picks up and it says, "you have a collect call from... NJX70..." to which my mom exclaims, "OH NO! WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON" Now, the automated machine picked up on the "no" and said, "you will not be charged for this call" over her panicked "oh my dear jesus, I'll accept the charges! are you ok NJX70?" click. I looked over at the jail bait working the counter and realized neither of them would care if I racked up some charges on their phone so I just dialed her back. After 5 minutes of explaining that I was sober (kind of) safe (kind of) and everything was fine (uh...) she relaxed and gave me Drufus's number. Why Drufus? Because her phone that she uses was mine and I knew Drufus's number would be in the phonebook. I call drufus, but he had allready left BBB's house, so he just laughed in my face as I tried to get BBB's number. He didn't have it, so he gave me Hot Carl's number. Hot Carl got about 10 calls before I gave up trying to reach him and called back for Bobby Orr's number. He got it on the first try, I told him where I was, and he hung up on me before I could explain the plan from there. I had a plan. It was for someone to drive BBB out to Pier 19 with my wallet in hand. I'd pay for gas, he'd ride the jetski back and I'd ride back home. At least that way I'd pay for gas. What I didn't know was that Hot Carl was on the phone with the Coast Guard when I was calling him (I'd been lost at sea for about 5 hours at this point) and Bobby gave them my 20 and sent an attack boat looking for me.

At this point I went back out the jetski and sat at the end of the dock waiting for what was going to happen next. I look up and a twin motor attack ship is coming right at me. The 20 year old cop working the controlls looks at me and goes, "You look like you're the guy who ran out of gas on his jetski" "well, I have gas, I'm just lost and don't know if I have enough to get back." "You play football?" OK, he asked me about football... mark another one down. "yes." "well, stay a half a football field behind me and if you run out I'll tow you the rest of the way." So, now I'm ripping behind a police boat and I see BBB come tearing up waving at me. I break out of the dude's wake and start following BBB when the motor cuts out. I start it back up, it warms up a second, and I'm off again. That happens about 10 times and then it finally won't come back on... about a quarter mile from BBB's dock. So now I'm being towed in by a police boat... and if I didn't know that signing onto AIM would mean me having to tell this story over and over I'd get the pictures from my friends of me being towed in. By the time I parked the jetski it was dark... I left at 2pm. I was the worst character ever.

Oh, and on a related note, I feel like someone beat the shit out of me. I forgot how hard those rides are on you in smooth water, let alone the fucking white caps I was riding on. I could barely move last night and I was boozing as hard as I could. Good shit.

I have to say though, riding that jet ski was one highlight of the weekend for me. Nothing beats the feeling of just thrashing through the water on a guided missle. I was laughing for most of the ride, and that says a lot. I was alone, in the sun shine, water splashing in my face, and loving every second of it. At one point I glanced to my left and realized with every crash back down to the surface of the lake I was supplying myself with my own personal rainbow. I was giggly like a school girl and so happy that I can't even explain it. Then I was lost for hours and felt worse and worse as I watched the gas and my street cred go to nothing. I still had an awesome time that night, but it would have been so much better if I rolled back into port with not a story to tell. Good thing I packed some limes for the voyage. I might have got scurvy from my time at sea.

I am going to stop here so I can take a shower, get some sleep, and actually wake up early for work. But I do have to let you know what the line of the weekend was. Unfortunately it happened on Saturday morning and left no room for a better line. Here's how it went:

We rolled into a sandwitch joint and there was a nice looking girl working the counter. Starfish kept looking at her and had flirted with her at the counter before we sat down.

Starfish:(looks over his shoulder for the 100th time at the girl at the counter)

BBB: Hey, Starfish, why don't you ask her what her name is so you can finish that song you've been working on.

I'll save the rest for another night, goodbye

Dudestravaganza

I'm going up to NH for a much needed weekend with my friends. Fuck gas prices. Fuck my poverty. Fuck cold calling. I'm going up there to clear my head and spend time with the people who make this world a little smaller and a little more friendly. These are the people who made all the bullshit and all the strife in my life liveable and the only thing I wish is that we all lived closer together.

OK, enough on the internets, I have to get ready to go.

See you on monday!

The Death of a Future Texas Millionaire

I killed Archangel's chances of being a successful business man.  He has a general contractor in Texas, and a friend of mine through Xbox live that I had the privilege to meet in person.  The poor bastard started playing EverQuest with Dubya and me.  Now he'll call at 3pm and say, "Yo, how do I make arrows?  I'm out." "Dude, shouldn't you be at work?" "Nah, nothing's going on."  

Sorry, Arch.  Didn't mean to stop you from being a Texas Millionaire.  Another victim falls to EQ.  

We are currently wasting our time on Maelin Starpyre.  He is the 23rd warrior Omegadon and I am the 24th Rogue Bloxx.  Baromen Ironsack, warrior of 59 winters, White Wolf of The North, and follower of The Tribunal has taken a back seat to hanging out with my buddy.

I used to feel very creepy talking about playing EQ, but I don't care anymore.  People who don't know the game or don't like video games think it's for super nerds... and they are probably right, but what do I care what my label is?  I played pro football; I think I still have a touch of street cred I can turn in.  

It's a fun way to just hang out and chat with friends.  It's like AIM with teamwork and a high body count.  I don't have the time right now to go into details, but it's fun.  One of these days I'll do "A Relative Rookie's Review of EQ" on my other site and link it here, but that's really not where my focus is now.

Oh, and if you couldn't tell by the temperament of my last few posts, this has been a rough week.  I've been on an emotional rollercoaster that's done nothing but slow me down.  There have been a few times in this lil week that I've considered a lot of bad things.  Quitting, selling my truck, selling shit I have on eBay, etc.  Then something good happens and I feel great.  Then my bills came in and I realized I have to live for 2 weeks on about $20.  Then my parents called to let me know that my insurance is going into my name (yeah, I know.) and I let them know about the crispy 20 dollar bill I have to live off of for 2 weeks with an empty fridge and no gas.  My mother made a surprise visit and brought me food.  I was so emotional I thought I was going to cry.  I didn't know what to say.  I'm trying so hard to do this all myself.  I want to be independent and successful, but it's so hard to bring in the money I need to survive.  Eventually I'll look back on posts like this and laugh because I'll have more money than I know what to do with, but for now, I'm just trying to eat a meal or two a day and get back and forth to work.  That's also forced me to cut off communications with the few girls that I really was looking forward to spending time with.  I can't even explain to them where I'm at because it's weak.  If it was 2008 and I'm still at AGE and I had just met these ladies than things would be different, but now, in 2005, I have to let myself be the bad guy.  I have to avoid phone calls, not reply to emails, etc to hide from the fact that I can't afford to go out.  I've heard it only gets worse before it gets better, but this month I did 9X the business I did last month.  If I could keep it going at that rate I'll be bringing in more accounts than I know what to do with by the end of the year.  I don't expect it to keep going up like this, but if it does... well, I'll be posting about how I went from being happy to almost in tears a lot less.  

All you people trying to argue the side of the people being cruel on the other end of the phone don't help.  Nobody has the right to be mean to someone just because they don't know them.  If I walked up to you on the street and said hello, I wouldn't expect you to punch me out.  That's what it's like.  Just think about this, I'm educated, well spoken, honest, I do the right thing in all situations, I work hard for my clients, I have missed out on big paydays already because I didn't do things I could have easily got away with because it wasn't in a client's best interest (while I'm going a day or two at a time not eating and have lost almost 70lbs), and all I want is a minute of your time.  There are a lot of people like me out there that can really help you if you let them, but that isn't even what we want.  Sure, we'd love you if you'd just let us find you a CD instead of buying one at the bank, but if you'd just treat us like human beings it would make my life so much better.  

So the next time someone calls you and you don't recognize the number, don't write them off as some high school drop out who doesn't give a shit about their job or who they're calling.  Most of us are good people.  Treat us like it.  

it's 1:30 and I'm still not in bed... I can't sleep anymore.  I can't make my gym payments, so I had to stop going.  Now I have all this energy and nowhere to get rid of it.  After 20 years of year round athletics, sitting at a desk all day and laying around all night leaves my body wanting more.  If I don't work out, I don't sleep.  I don't sleep; I don't get to work on time.  I don't get to work on time, I don't get shit done.  I would love to run, and I will, but the only running shoes I have are shredded to pieces.  I need to find something to do.  I should get my bike I rode at school and take that around!  I just thought of it!  I'll have to do it right after I get paid so I have a lil slack money for gas.  I could ride back and forth to Cousin Fil's house.  Hmm... this might work...

Screw this post.  I'm going to bed.  


[editor's note:  I didn't expect to write a lot, so when I did, I didn't leave myself enough time to proofread this post... so I'm sure it is riddled with spelling and grammatical errors... my bad, yo]