And for those of you still living in the 20th century and on dial-up connections, this audio post will be available on vinyl record in a few days.
Monthly Archive for May, 2005
Funny Joy Of Tech Cartoon:
I had a dream Wednesday night that I had 2 days to live. In the dream I spent time deciding who was going to get my stuff, and how I was going to spend the last 48 hours on earth. I don’t really remember much, but the dream bothered me just because I had decided that my quit date was going to be Friday, 27 May.
So tonight I finished up my last pack of cigarretes, smoking the last one in the car after work while talking to Brad.
I intend it to be the last cigarette I ever smoke.
It all started in around October of 1994. Those halcion days of my freshman year of high school… my first cigarette was a Camel light. Over the years I smoked a lot of different kinds; I switched to Marlboro Menthol Lights shortly after my brother got his first car our sophomore year, not because I particularly liked them but we used to hide our cigarettes in the car and if he’d run out he would smoke mine&emdash;but not menthols. Then there were the Benson & Hedges 100s I smoked for a time. That came to a stop during my Junior year when I was in Lincoln, Nebraska and the gas station there didn’t have them. Switched to Marlboro Lights. Then I found my most favorite cigarettes in the whole world: Kamel Red Lights. It was one of these cigarettes that I handed to Brad Peters on a fateful night at Common Ground Coffee House when he was fretting over Stacey Burns. Then I met Jeff and he smoked Marlboro Menthol (not lights) so I started smoking those. After Jeff and I broke up I smoked Winston lights for awhile, then switched back to Kamels, then around ‘98 Mike York got me hooked on Parliament Lights which was my brand of smokes ever since. When I was with Todd I smoked his cigarettes, Marlboro Light 100s, but I never really liked them. It was just easier. The first thing I did after we broke up was go and get a pack of Parliament Lights and smoked them to reassert my individuality. After I moved in with Jay and Josh and Joe I was forced to smoke on the porch, which helped me cut back a lot. Still with the Parliaments. Every now and then I’d get something different, I tried Marlboro Milds for awhile and sometimes I’d get the giveaways from the bar. Adam got me Camel Lights once because some boy he liked smoked them; I bought Camel Wide Lights because I like them. Last week I smoked a lot; I burned through 2 packs of Camel Wides in as many days, then a buy 2 get 1 free special of Parliament, then I decided I ought to just fucking quit. So I got 2 packs of Kamel Red Lights. Those are gone…
Oddly enough, I can remember every single brand of cigarette I’ve ever smoked. Here’s a run down.
Camel Lights
Camel Turkish Jade
Camel Turkish Blend
Those different flavored Camels in the tins
Camel Wide
Camel Wide Lights (favorite Camel)
Marlboro Lights
Marlboro Medium (favorite Marlboro)
Marlboro Red
Marlboro Light Menthol
Marlboro Menthol
Marlboro Milds
Marlboro 27s
Parliament
Parliament Lights (regular brand)
Parliament Menthol Lights (thanks Charlie)
Side note: Last fall I ordered Parliament Lights from the Internet and got Russian Parliaments, which I referred to as Dumas.
Salem & Salem Lights & Kool & Kool Lights (free from the bar)
Kamel
Kamel Red Lights (Favoritest Cigarette EVAR!)
Benson & Hedges Ultra Light Menthol 100s
Basic & Basic Lights (gross)
Winston Lights (cheap, also gross)
Merit (Yuck! Some gay friends and I back in the day actually made an arbitrary rule, “Never date someone who smokes Merit” and we’d actually turned down people because they smoked them!)
Lucky Strike Filtered & Non Filtered (it’s toasted!)
Pall Mall Filtered & Non Filtered
Virginia Slims (My friend Amanda from high school & I would steal these from her mom)
Misty (The Official Cigarette of Pam Peters)
Wow! That makes me wanna smoke!
But I won’t. And I’m certainly not doing this alone. I got a prescription for bupropion and nicotine patches. The patches were unusually covered by my prescription insurance and only cost $10 for thirty of them. That’s cheaper than cigarettes! This way I won’t kill anyone while I figure out what the fuck to do with my life instead of smoking.
—
Check out Truth In Advertising: “This site is powered by the white-hot bitterness of long-term Nicotine withdrawal”
They made me eat again! *Happy Birthday Terry!!*
Left to right: Terry’s brother Tommy, me, Terry, Adam, Kevin.
Here’s an interesting widget for Mac OS 10.4: the Gun Self Defense Counter. It “counts” how many times guns have been used in self defense this year by extrapolating on the statistic that guns are used in self defence 2.5 million times per year. I like watching it count up… “Ooooh! Somebody just got shot!”
What would really be fun is a traffic death counter widget; 40 000 deaths per year / 365 days = about 4 deaths per hour. Someone make me a widget.
They made me eat.
Joe and I played a marathon game of Monopoly tonight.
Joe won. We used both packs of money from the Deluxe edition. At the end of the game he had:
$27 584 in cash
$1 295 in property
$2 250 in hotels
for a grand total of $31 129. Good thing it’s just Monopoly money.
We played for about 3.5 hours, our longest game ever. They usually last about an hour or so, our shortest was 15 minutes.
I might have lost, but it certainly lifted my spirits. (Thanks Joe)
Feeling a little bit like this.
Nine Inch Nails :: Still :: And All That Could Have Been
Breeze still carries the sound
Maybe I’ll disappear
Tracks will fade in the snow
You won’t find me here
Ice is starting to form
Ending what had begun
I am locked in my head
With what I’ve done
I know you tried to rescue me
Didn’t let anyone get in
Left with a trace of all that was
And all that could have been
Please
Take this
And run far away
Far away from me
I am
Tainted
The two of us
Were never meant to be
All these
Pieces
And promises and left behinds
If only I could see
In my
Nothing
You meant everything
Everything to me
Gone fading everything
And all that could have been
Please
Take this
And run far away
Far as you can see
I am
Tainted
And happiness and peace of mind
Were never meant for me
All these
Pieces
And promises and left behinds
If only I could see
In my
Nothing
You meant everything
Everything to me
Download here [6.1mb AAC]
Let’s see if I’ll have more fun this way.
Patty at work: “Oh my god, look at your hair. If you’re not queer I don’t know what is.”
I know we’re all Casey Stratton fans here (wink) but don’t you find the Casey Stratton Sims [scroll about 3/4 down] just a little er, creepy?
I heard this song today and it made me smile.
Ben Folds Five :: Whatever and Ever Amen :: Song for the Dumped
so, you wanted
to take a break
slow it down some
and have some space
well, fuck you too!
give me my money back
give me my money back, you bitch
I want my money back
and don’t forget
and don’t forget
to give me back my black t-shirt
I wish I hadn’t
bought you dinner
right before you
dumped me on your front porch
give me my money back
give me my money back, you bitch
I want my money back
and don’t forget
and don’t forget
to give me back my black t-shirt
hey, hey!
so, you wanted
to take a break
slow it down some
and have some space
give me my money back
give me my money back, you bitch
I want my money back
I want my money back
and don’t forget
I just wanted to compile a list of shitty things that have happened in the past month:
I lost my debit card.
Rent money was tight.
A few weeks ago I was 2 hours late for work—massive irresponsibility I haven’t forgiven myself for.
I had to send my iBook in for repair.
Last night I got into a small car accident, which will just be a hassle to repair. (more later)
Met & fell in love with a boy who doesn’t feel the same way.
To not be completely pessimistic, I did enjoy the time I spent with Adam. I had 2 awesome times hanging out with Casey and his posse, and I made friends with Terry and got Tiger. Oh, and Dino and I finally touched base again.
I dunno. Maybe I broke even. My heart sure doesn’t feel like it did.
Adam and I talked tonight…
After 5 weeks of seeing a lot of each other he’s told me he doesn’t feel like he’s falling in love with me.
I’ve heard that many times like most people have. It doesn’t ever not hurt, but it gets easier.
He wants to be friends, but I’m not sure how that’s going to be. We’ll see.
I, of course, was really in love with him.
Part of me hopes he’ll change his mind. Part of me knows that won’t happen. Part of me saw this coming.
I haven’t cried yet.
“We have the idea that our hearts, once broken, scar over with an indestructible tissue that prevents their ever breaking again in quite the same place.” -Michael Chabon, The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay
Around the beginning of this month, Patrick graduated truck driving school and now he’s out on the road practicing with another driver. Take a look at his photostream or check out his diary for a road journal.
Keep on truckin’ Patrick!
AMS TSD called me last week to let me know they had to send my iBook into Apple for repair; I needed to hda looked at and I wanted the latch fixed. I called them today to ask how it was going. They told me that Apple had sent it back today with the latch fixed but not the hda. They didn’t know why, either.
Me: “and you guys don’t have a hard drive to put in it there?”
AMS guy: “hrm. I guess we could. let me check with one of the other technicians”
He said they could swap out the hard drive there, but wanted to make sure it wasn’t the logic board instead of the hda. Now, I know that iBook have had logic board issues before, but I can’t see how a S.M.A.R.T. error could be construed as a logic board problem. But it’s best to be safe than sorry; I guess I’ll have to wait another week to get it back. The tech was also on the phone with Apple trying to close out this repair so they could open another one for the hda and find out why they didn’t fix it th first time.
Dusty from AMS just called me back and said Apple had no idea why they didn’t fix it, but they’re sending it in tomorrow morning.
“If you tip it, there’s like an ounce left!”
—Joe forages for liquor.
Well, thanks to S.M.A.R.T. when I opened Disk Utility it told me my HDD is going to fail. I’m on the phone with Apple Support right now, they told me I can drop it off tomorrow at AMS TSD for service. I guess I’ll be out of a computer for a week. Thank God for AppleCare! What sucks is I’m on vacation next week!
