Midnight Snack

I feel like I must have something to say. Every time I try to think of something to put here, the only things I can think of are passing distractions; the new REM album or the movies I watched this weekend or the number of lunches I had today. Nothing of value. Nothing with substance. Someone remarked to me recently that I “don’t know how to have a conversation that isn’t serious.” I said something like “I never understood small talk” and went back to talking about what was on my heart and mind. I think they just sighed and tried to pay attention.

Is that what you are doing now? Sighing, trying to pay attention as I type miles of text about my own trivial experiences? I thought at first that the idea of an audience would just encourage me to write, but I think now it scares me. Some of the people who know that they can find me here… I don’t know… I just feel like I can’t be myself when they’re around. I have no way of knowing whether they’re around, either.

Look, if you don’t really care, why are you still reading? Is this some form of rubbernecking? Are you hoping to see a glimpse of someone else’s pain, and willing to wade through everything else I spew out? If you do care, why did you let them remove the nearby Taco Bell?

Apparently, kissing me is very satisfying. I am glad to know that even without regular practice the deep understanding of the kiss remains a powerful force between any two people. I remember when I was young I used to use the secret to more fulfilling kissing as a gateway to solving the mysteries of the universe and unlocking the secrets to life itself. Ask me someday about it. Or just kiss me deeply a couple of times and I think you’ll begin to be on the right track. It’s all about letting go and giving up.

So, from one idea to the next very quickly, and back to Taco Bell. Mostly because I’m hungry. If it gets to be too bad by the time I finish up here (or really, really bad and I stop in the middle, wracked with hunger), I’ll probably go melt some cheese into my belly. Not the burrito I had in mind, but it will have to do. Silly body, needing fuel to keep running all the time.

So, some of you are aware of a very sweet little project I’ve been working on for Sara, where I read The Princess Bride aloud to my computer, and it reads it aloud to a magical disc of plastic, which in turn reads it aloud to Sara. I read three entire chapters to my computer tonight. Two of them were very short chapters, I will admit, but the next one is nearly 100 pages long. Luckily, it is broken up into several distinct parts. I plan on making separate tracks from each of the different parts of the chapter, and splitting it between two CD’s in the most appropriate fashion. I find the experience very fulfilling for many reasons. First, because I love Sara very deeply, and I know that this is something that she will be able to appreciate not just this summer, but as years go by. I have long promised to read to her, and this book in particular deserves to be read aloud; we have simply not had the opportunity to sit together and read the book before. Additionally, I am making use of software and technology that I have long been interested in, and I have already learned quite a bit about how to manipulate audio digitally to get it to behave the way you want it to. Heck, I love The Princess Bride. I’ve read it many times before, and in order to do this, I have to hear every chapter no less than twice, often three times. I am not getting sick of it; it is well written, and I am loving the story while picking up William Goldman’s writing style a little more.

Of course, picking up and thinking about the writing style of a well-known, widely published and appreciated author is one thing. Actually beginning to write is another. I am trying to create an interface that will make it as easy to write a page or a chapter or whatever of a book I would like to write, as it is for me to post here. In fact, for those of you familiar with my monkey-related religion, you know where it will be kept. I’ve even already set up the visual style of the thing. I’ve just got to configure the back end now to work more easily with writing a single, coherent work of fiction.

I like the idea that it will be there for me (or the people I invite to look at it) to give me feedback about whenever something occurs to me. Not limited by the width of the margin for making notes, I can go back to a particular passage or page and make comments forever, re-writing as I see fit. (I hope. Traditionally when I write, by the time the words reach the first draft, they are the final draft. I realize that this is not really the best way for most people to write, and I would like to see if I can benefit from this weird “re-writing” thing that everyone seems so fond of.

A week or two ago, Iain said that He was going to Fry’s electronics and asked if I would like to go along. The normal answer for this is yes, but I am always interested to know what Iain is going for, so I asked him. He said he was interested in picking up a copy of Quicken so that he can keep track of his budget easier. So, since I’d been designing spreadsheets and coming up with intricate plans involving whiteboards and cork-boards to try to get myself organized and get all my financial information into one place, so I can see where my money is going and what I can afford (especially with the increased upcoming expense of living alone), I did a little research about Quicken and its competitors. Since its competitors basically comes down to a Microsoft product, and because Quicken does everything I need and some stuff I’d like to learn to do (that being the business side of the program), I decided to pick up a copy of Quicken 2001 for Mac.

When Iain and I went to Fry’s, I picked up Quicken and he decided not to. Whatever. I installed it and tried to get it to automatically get my account information online, with varied success. Actually, the software on my laptop doesn’t seem to be able to get ANY information over the internet, whereas the companion website (which is supposed to integrate with all the information I put into my local copy of quicken, but I can’t seem to get that to work yet either) quicken.com is at least able to get all of the information about my Discover Card account. Not that it can share it with my Quicken software, but I’m sure that if I can figure out how to get the help files installed I’ll be good to go in no time.

So, I spent all afternoon today manually entering information about all my various accounts and all the transactions and interactions between all the accounts between about mid-February and the present (I’ll keep entering data pre-Feb as time goes on. With some of my accounts there is no way for me to have complete historical data, but with others I will be able to show every transaction from day one. Mostly my recent loans.) and it all seems to work pretty well. The more data I have already entered, the easier it is to enter more data. The more closely I follow the guidelines for how to use the various fields, the more information I can get about my accounts, and the more tightly they integrate. It seems to be quite a powerful program, with thousands of features I hope to learn about over time. Again with me, it is all about ease of use. Because it is easy for me to post here at any time from basically any location, I am more likely to do so and for it to occur to me to do so. The same with accounting; if it’s easy, I’ll do it.

When I started typing this, it was just after midnight and I was a little hungry, and I thought the title “Midnight Snack” was cute and appropriate, since I though I would basically be giving you a little something to chew on. Who know what it’s turning out to be,though. My mind is getting pretty drowsy. I was up a little extra late last night (definitely not regretting that) so it thinks it should get the chance to sleep. As far as I’m concerned it can just fuck itself to hell for all I care. It didn’t respond appropriately to Caffeine. I didn’t get a chance to go back to the grocery store to pick up more dMD, so i accidentally quit caffeine again on saturday. I actually complained on Sunday and Monday about not getting any ill side effects. Then again, when I got up to consuming 3 times the dose considered an overdose without even getting jittery, and still wanting to sleep eight to twelve hours a night, I was complaining about that, too. I guess my body just forgot what caffeine was after not seeing it for so long. Oh well. I guess that will save me some money.

But it means that I have to decide to sleep less and be more active without the use of drugs. Fine, I can do that, obviously. I think sticking to it is the hard part. Like, some people who are aware of my mild cyclothymia (like bi-polar disorder, except it is the difference between a square wave and a sine wave) thought that I have been on the “Up” part of the roller-coaster lately. Nope. Been melancholy lately. Really down in the dumps. Trouble coming up with motivation, feelings of desperation, feelings of loneliness and isolation; all that fun stuff. I just don’t let it stop me from continuing to live my life. I figure that if the preferred method is to be happy and live your life at the same time, then being depressed and living your life shouldn’t be any more difficult. (Yes, I realize most people who just live their lives aren’t as happy as the depressed are sad, but you get the idea I’m trying to get across, right? Feelings should be a part of life, not instead of life.)

Okay, obviously getting a little too wacky in the head there. I guess this is where we part ways for a little while. Looks like my stomach has found a way to digest its own liner, so I should be able to make it until morning. Unless you stop by with a Burrito. I’ll get up for a delicious burrito.

Mmmmm…. Burrito….