It Was Beauty Killed The Beast

"And now, ladies and gentlemen, before I tell you any more, I'm going to show you the greatest thing your eyes have ever beheld. He was a king and a god in the world he knew, but now he comes to civilization merely a captive - a show to gratify your curiosity. Ladies and gentlemen, look at Kong, the Eighth Wonder of the World." - Carl Denham, in King Kong

Now Kong.

First Rigby, now Kong.

There was a noise at sunrise, and in the waning moments of last night's darkness Kong went with barely a whimper. Only King is left.

And someday soon he will go to, slipping off into the moonlight or getting gunned down at high noon. Whatever way they choose for him. And I'll be left alone. Just me.

It must be painful to watch a man die piece by piece. Casting off his parts leaving holes in his whole.

I know it hurts like hell.

First Rigby,now Kong. Soon King. And then I go on. Living out life's moments till some day down the road a sharp pain takes me home.Whisking me back from whence I came, meeting my fallen brothers on our native soil. Nothing left of me beginning, so far from the end. And when I go I will say, "It could have been worse." and what I'll mean is, "It could have been better." though I'll be content with who I was even though I don't think I can ever be comfortable with what I've done.

We are all such fools, we have been such fools, getting trapped in His wicked whirlwind all the while trying to figure out exactly what He wanted. It was all so simple. All He ever wanted us to do is stand-up. Stand-up and say: I have done some shit, and I am glad I did. And when we're done, we're done. Everything else moves on.

And so does this...just not yet. Not yet. Soon...but not now.

It's time for something...I'm just not sure what.

"The love I have known in my life pales only in comparison to the love I had hoped to know." - T.O. Hob

I Probably Would Have Posted This Entry...But The Knicks Game Was On

Funny a week ago right this moment I was sitting on a rather uncomfortable chair in the cafeteria of the old St. Paul's school. I was keeping watch. Somebody had to do it.

But as I think back on the time spent sitting there I realize a few things. I didn't have to do it. I could have let someone else do it, or it could have not been done at all. The idea behind it all is that we give the kids a few days off from the real world. We protect them from everything outside and hope that it helps them learn a little about themselves.

The night watch really isn't different. I was supposed to be watching to make sure the kids don't do anything, but the truth is I was really only watching to make sure that nothing happened to them. Mrs.K always talked about making sure the windows were locked and the doors shut tight so that no one could get in, and that bent me up something awful. The thought that someone could get to these kids when I was responsible for them. So I had to make sure nothing happened. My chair went between them and the only open door in the building. Anyone trying to get to them had to go through me first. And I kept watch all night, barely blinking. I had to be sure.

People like to talk a lot about faith. But the truth is I don't know anyone who has enough faith in the right places. It's all fun and good to have faith in God the Almighty, but what about people? What about having faith in your fellow man? It's easy to have faith in someone that's infallible, but the real leap is having faith in something you know to be flawed. You believe in God, I believe in Good People. I dare anyone to argue with me.

I do believe in God, do think there's someone watching over all of us. Someone keeping an eye on us to make sure that nothing bad happens. But I also believe that sometimes that someone is me...and people like me. And people like you. Sometimes God doesn't have to look out for you, because there are other people who already have it covered.

Yeah, that's right. I got your back.

Reclaim Thy Name: Porno Magazines & Towering Infernos

"Wait...they're calling me a dick? Fuck." - Palomba

"It's still funny."- T.O. Hob

"I think I liked it better when people laughed with me." - Palomba

But seriously folks...

So I've been stocking the Ipod with a bunch of new CD's and I realized I was missing some of my old favorites, so I headed out to Tower Records where CD's are ridiculously expensive, but at least they have what I want in stock.

I get there and I'm wandering around the back of the store by the Gospel section when I notice this guy reading a magazine off to my left....I look over his shoulder as I pass only to find that it's a porno. I'm a little surprised, but then I realize there's a whole rack of porno magazines in front of him. Right in the middle of Tower Records there's a porno section, and at 5:00 on a Friday afternoon this guy is looking at porno magazines in plain view of the whole store.

I'm trying not to laugh so I look around trying to find someone else that finds this odd so we can share one of those stranger bonding moments where two people who have nothing to do with each other can for a second come together over a smile, or brief laugh, or witty passing comment. Except there is no one. I look around and find that it's pretty much all middle aged guys in the store. There's one middle aged blonde woman being led around by a gorky little clerk. the two of them desperately trying to find a Cam'ron CD. But otherwise it's all dirty middle aged men. No merciless college kids, no bemused young businessmen, no young ladies trying to cover up their giggles. I have no comrades here. No one to laugh with. No one to share what should have been a funny moment with. I felt absolutely alone...and the porno guy just kept on looking at his magazines.

I realize I'm the one who should be laughed at. This is my future, standing alone in a Tower Records holding a handful of CD's and trying to find someone to laugh with. That's fucking depressing. So I book..

Paid for my CD's (Pennywise Live [Bro...Oh Oh Oh], Catch 22 [Even though I have the whole CD on tape from my time at The Core], Michael W. Smith [I know, I'm going to hell, but no one should have to go a full year without hearing Secret Ambition, am I right?] and Harry Chapin [Which led to an awkward conversation with the gorky clerk about whether or not I remembered Chapin's death on the L.I.E., but since I was five months old at the time...]. And left the store with my head down.

I headed home thinking about all sorts of things and rocking Bro Hymn as loud as the Pontiac's CD player would allow. It seemed like the whole world was burning, starting with me and working its way around. Last night burned into my consciousness several previously unrealized truths. And they've got me a little afraid. But for some reason something else made me laugh...

"My Palombo itches? How is that funny?" - Palomba

"You were never a sixteen year old boy."- T.O. Hob

"Well, yeah, but..." - Palomba

"And besides who are you kidding? You laugh. You think it's funny too." - T.O. Hob

"Yeah, well I'm fucked up. What was their excuse?" - Palomba

"I think you are." - T.O. Hob

"Great." - Palomba

Brief Blog Blurbs

I am the whipping boy.

Bought new headphones and a new case for my Ipod. They won't be here for a few days.

Still haven't learned a bit of Spanish.

Wanted to buy the first Pennywise CD but couldn't get out of work long enough to make it to a CD store.

Looked at a warehouse and a factory today. Warehouse isn't any good, factory isn't bad...but right now it's kind of falling apart, and it turns everything blue.

Was flipping through channels when I saw two chicks kissing on Fox, and suddenly felt like a guy for a second. The OC is so much less gay than I thought....or more gay actually, but in a good chicks kissing sort of way.

My secretary is a plump little Spanish woman who hates my guts. Sometimes she laughs at me and I can't tell why. Sometimes I can tell she thinks I'm doing something like my father would and she can't figure out if it's because I'm secretly checking with him, or I'm learning, or it's just in my genes. Other times she laughs like she knows I've just made a colossal mistake that will someday doom the company.

I'm reading a new book that I really seem to be enjoying.

I think I'm almost done unloading baggage, which means I'm almost ready to fall in love...or get a pet, I don't know. I lost that page in the life manual.

I didn't urinate all day. Not even when I woke up this morning.

I've got a Palombo...and I firmly intend with the help of Jesus to do penance and get as much mileage out of a joke no one understands as I possibly can.

Two guys walk into a bar...kidding, really.

I just realized that someone I know hates me for no reason. Odd. I never noticed. But now that I add it up, she definitely hates me. Not that it matters. I don't know what I did...but shit, the kid hates me. Definitely hates me.

I just realized that I often realize well after the fact that people hate me. Shit.

Slightly depressed now...so time for Glenlivet and Ginger Ale, and back to watching the lesbians on The OC.

Speakeasy

I always wanted to make my living with my words. I gave up on that happening a long time ago, but coming off my recent obsession with things that I have done I would like to take a moment to reflect on a few of the things I have said.

The Three Gayest Things I Have Ever Said:
3. I'll watch anything with hot chicks in it...aw, who the hell am I kidding?
2. Cut it out you two before I come in there and fuck both of you. And remember I don't know the god damn difference.
1. I don't care. First I'll beat you, then I'll fuck you. Just to make a point.

The Three Straightest Things I Have Ever Said:
3. Wait, she's how old? Oh fuck, now I have to cut my dick off just for thinking that.
2. Hell yes I'd buy insurance off of her.
1. That's the kind of girl who makes you forget you have morals.

So...I'm thinking of learning Spanish again. I knew bits and pieces in high school, but never really cared enough to pick it up. Now I could use it for work, so I'm going to start slowly and work my way up.

I'm not sure where this came from. Part of it is not being able to talk to certain people, and really wanting to. Part of it comes from a conversation about German (ok, a German teacher...ok, a German teacher's daughter) that I had over the weekend that made me realize I never learned to speak another language even when the opportunity was readily available. Part of it comes from reading Albert Camus's The Stranger and thinking it was an amazingly beautiful book, a book that I wish I could have read in its original language: French.

There's not much practicality to me learning French or German (I could enjoy my favorite movies more I suppose) but Spanish might actually have a use. So I figure why not give it a crack.

In other Palomba news:

• I'm currently working on a real estate deal that runs into the several million dollar realm and is now little more than an idea. It's going to take a lot of thinking before I know whether or not this is a good idea. I know I can get the money, but do I really want to spend the next ten years paying it off?
• I've recently heard about (note: not from) some people I've lost touch with. Thankfully it's all good news, and I can't wait to hear more about (note: or from) them.
• Few new things coming out of this years Antioch. All good things. All good things.
• I've decided to write something new, not sure what.
• Just updated my Ipod with The Clash's London Calling, The Anti-Nowhere League's We are...the League, Operation Ivy, and The Best of Manfred Mann's Earth Band
• Made myself breakfast for dinner. Eggs, bagel, and Apricot Marmalade on toast.

That's not much. But it's quite a bit in my book. I think I'll kick back, have a Glenlivet & Ginger Ale, and get some sleep.

'Night All.

Tossing Tires

"You need not believe in what is or what isn't, you need only believe in what might be." - T.O. Hob

"To who we are, what we've done, and the great things I'm sure you're all going to do." - Hob's "A Toast to Friends"

"Damn man, my name got more play than Jesus." - Palomba, on the second strangest part of the weekend (the first involving a sombrero and pom-poms)

"My Palombo itches." - The Third Most Disturbing Thing I Heard All Weekend (the first again involving a sombrero and pom-poms, and the second involving the phrase "I'll be the caboose")

We're doing it again. I don't know how. I don't know why. The voices talk about them and then they appear. They're calling the shots again...but I'm still in charge.

It's funny how you can dodge the mystic shit for so long, and it comes back in spades the minute you start feeling good about something. Start thinking there's a chance. Start seeing the future for what it can be, and not what it is right now...a dream.

The hardest part of other people making up their minds is that there's no guarantee I can do anything to change them. I can change most decisions I make, can change my own mind. I know that. But I can't force other people to change their minds (ok, I probably could...but I choose not to). People make promises, but I can't make them keep them. I can only keep mine. And I swear to God I always will.

I have loved many people in my life, and I will always be there for them, whether they know it or not. They need only say the word.

But now it's time to love myself (and not in the dirty grow hair on the palms and go blind way, but in the taking another crack at this whole life thing way). Somebody saved my life once, and a whole lot of other people have done their part to make it worth living. All things considered I've got it pretty good. I've been down before, maybe never for this long or in this way, but I've certainly been down lower than this. I've always bounced back, and while the comebacks may not last as long as the slumps, they're always there. And that's enough.

So here's to old friends, and new friends, and friends I've yet to meet.

Here's to yesterday and what today means for tomorrow.

Here's to inspiration.

"Think everybody's talking about you, And conspiring to bring you down. You're thinking that nobody loves you, Ever wonder why I'm still around?" - Good Riddance, One for the Braves

"Blinded by the light, wrapped up like a deuce, Another runner in the night."-Manfred Mann, Blinded by the Light

"When everyone's lost, the battle is won. With all these things that I have done." - The Killers, All These Things That I've Done

"If you need a friend, don't look to a stranger,You know in the end, I'll always be there.But when you're in doubt, and when you're in danger,Take a look all around, and I'll be there." -When In Rome, The Promise

Punchline

Third guy finds a genuine good feeling, a place he can call home, and a group of people he's proud to call his "family"....and oh yeah, ducks.

I'm that guy.

"I got a Palombo." - Everybody Else

"You're God damn right you do."- Me

Joke

Two guys walk into a bar...

The Fall of Rigby

"You know what, I'm going to go get me a Fat Bitch right now...and when I'm done with her I think I'll get a sandwich." - T.O. Hob, on The Rutgers Grease Truck Scandal (See the February 11th edition of The Daily Targum)

"I work seven days a week, 24 hours a day. If something goes wrong, they call me. I mean usually I can't fix it, but at least I can go and watch." - Palomba's Practical Theory of Business

"Those who can't do, watch." - T.O. Hob, on the definition of "Film Theory"

"If he wasn't me, he could have been a great man." - King, in A Eulogy for Rigby

"You don't shit where you eat, fuck where you work, or clean where you shit. That's just good wholesome life advice." - T.O. Hob

I came home this afternoon to find Rigby's brains splattered across my bathroom wall and his corrupted body sinking slowly into the bowels of my toilet bowl. Seeing as we don't clean anything in my bathroom I just left him there.

Work was hell today. Nobody understands exactly what I do, and as such they don't understand how hard it can be. They assume that I'm only there when they can see me, so if they're not there they assume I'm not there. It's a pretty foolish assumption on their part, but then again they aren't the brightest bunch on the block.

I asked King what happened to Rigby and he simply said it had to be done, he just couldn't let one person hold back the entire group. I reminded him that we really are only one person, and he reminded me that I should shut the fuck up.

Matt and I kicked ass tonight. Knightbeat was actually something I would have listened to if I wasn't part of the show. Matt wrote and produced a funny little bit about WMD's in Iraq. It was probably the first actual decent thing we ever played on that show. And qualifying that statement with "probably" definitely gives some of the crap we've done more credit than it is due.

Rigby was taking a shit. King wandered in and started running his mouth. Next thing Rigby knew King had a gun to his head. Rigby argued, "It doesn't have to be this way." And King countered, "Of course it does. Do you think if there was any other way I'd be going through all this trouble?" With that he pulled the trigger and most of Rigby was lost in a splattering of tissue and body fluids that began to run down the bathroom wall.

I ran into Brian and SCRU on my way out of the student center. It was good to see that group, good to see they're doing well. My time may have been spent at WRSU, but I was pulling for SCRU all along. They were creating something, and they've done a great job with it. I miss seeing them just as much as I miss the old WRSU team. I've never really missed Rutgers, but I've always missed the people I knew there.

Kong found him first, but Kong really didn't know what to make of it all. So he waited for me to get home before he did anything about it. I, being me, of course did nothing. Six hours, two jaunts up the Garden State Parkway, one radio show, and a small antipasto later I realized Rigby was still breathing. The son of a bitch was still alive.

Just when my days were starting to look promising I realized something. Everything which is good is coming to an end. I won't have a radio show for two weeks, the news department I once loved has been bastardized, and I don't know how much longer Matt can keep the show going with me being little more than dead weight. Antioch is this weekend, and then that's over. Months (years actually) of something I love will disappear, and may never come back again. The bad part of the business cycle is coming up hard-core and I really need to sort out all sorts of problems. For instance, I lost $27,000 yesterday. Not "lost" as in a hit in profits, but "lost" as in I don't know where the bank put it. And I'm tired. Sick and tired. Sick and tired and a little bit lonely.

I need to start looking for Rigby's replacement. He's still spluttering away on the john, but who knows how long he'll last now. Hob already said no, the old soul is more of a loner afterall. Laz Jones has very particular views on God and religion and seeing as King thinks he's god and Kong often agrees I don't think Lazarus would quite fit in. The Beast is currently on a three month tour of South American Cocoa producing countries, and the others have scattered to the wind leaving only the occasional postcard or required child support payment.

There must be someone out there...in fact I think there is, right there...

I see you.

Wait...What Happened?

"Everytime one of them fucks up it fucks me, I'm going to start fucking up myself. I figure if I'm going to get fucked I might as well be the one doing the fucking for once." - King

"You should stop cursing. Not for good, just for the next thirty seconds or so. Trust me it will be a major accomplishment." - Rigby

Panicked women, surprising drug test results, high speed chases, missing children in New York City, and a migraine headache to boot.

That's what happens when I leave work early.

I left work at six tonight, and somehow ended up just getting home from work now...at half past midnight.

I can't exactly describe tonight just yet, the overwhelming stupidity and collosal cock-up factor of it all is just off the bloody charts.

So much for the calm peaceful existence of school bus driver.

I might as well have been something.

Door to Door Express Package Delivery Service To The Phillipines

Talk about narrowing your field of expertise. I saw the title on the back of a truck on my way back from work this morning. I'm constantly amazed that I make money doing what I do, I have no idea how people with such a specific service make any money at all. And why the Phillipines? And what good does the truck really do you once you've hit coastline? Does it just sit there waiting for the Phillipines to send something back?

Anyway...so I'm tired, sick, and amazingly still not hungry but we won't harp on that instead we'll share a little of last night's dreams. I fell asleep at about two, was up at four, and then fell back asleep till five thirty or so. Which means I actually slept more than usual, but god damn did I have some odd dreams. It's funny because usually my strange dreams have more to do with me, and last night it was more like watching a movie.

First there was this really great (but really sad) dream about American Prisoners of War trying to escape from Japanese prison camps. It was really detailed, and really long, and didn't go at all like I would have written it. So when I woke up I wondered if I had really dreamed it or if I had left the television on and just barely watched it, but there were no war movies on last night, and as I think through the dream there are certain Palombonian charactersitics that let me know it was indeed one of my dreams.

I managed to make a cameo in my next dream. These kids were trying out for their high school basketball team, but they spilled jelly beans all over their coaches pick-up truck so he cut the little fuckers...from the team I mean. At some point I drove past the pick-up truck in my father's last Cadillac. But that was all.

The next dream actually frightened me. I think I've spoken of the noises in my apartment before, but I may have failed to mention that they disappeared for a bit and just recently came back. Last night I thought I started to hear them, but they were much louder than usual. Now I know I was awake when they started, but at some point I must have fallen asleep...but the noises continued into the first dream, which really threw me off. I didn't realize I was dreaming. And then there was someone in the apartment with me. Someone bad. But I was afraid to open my eyes and see who it was. It was like I was a little kid again thinking the monsters can't get me if I don't open my eyes. I hear this "person" stomping from the kitchen right past me and into the bedroom, the door smacking the wall hard as it's thrown open. Then the "person" stomps back towards the kitchen, passing me again. A second later I can tell "he's" standing by the door, a mere three feet from my head. Now I start to think logically. I'm 6'3" and weigh 300 lbs. I can tear most people apart with my bare hands. Who do I have to be afraid of? So I slowly open my eyes, but before I can even turn my head towards the door I spot my dining room window and see it's covered with a black garbage bag. I know I put my new blinds up weeks ago. At this point dream me realizes that real me is out like a light, and pops up off the bed. Standing by the door is a large black shape. A second later real me wakes up, already standing, and sees there is nothing there. My blinds are back where they are supposed to be. Standing there I realize that when I stood up in the dream I stood up in real life, and it just took a minute for my mind to catch up with my body. My heart was beating fast as hell, and I was sweating like a fucker. For the first time ever I was glad to be alone in my apartment.

Then there were the commercial dreams, which may have been the strangest of them all. First John Travolta was selling Mop & Glo floor cleaner, then Brad Pitt was selling Heineken (although I think that one actually happened), and finally the strangest of them all. I was either really hungry, or really horny when I fell asleep last night and I must not have noticed either one, but somewhere in between falling asleep and waking up I dreamed of Emmy Rossum & Minnie Driver doing a commercial for some kind of Granola Bar. In the dream there were two guys watching the commercial. The young guy (a slightly distorted version of me?) says, "They've sold out." And the older guy (I have a sneaking suspicion this might have been the first actual "sighting" of my old friend Hob) replies, "You haven't really lived until you spend all morning vomiting up orange juice and stale granola." Then Emmy began to vomit up dry granola while Minnie held her hair.

That last dream threw me so far off that I actually popped up off the couch and immediately began checking that I was in my apartment and not a sanitarium.

So doomed POWs, aspiring B-ballers, demonic visitors, vomiting teenage sexpots, and a mythical construct of my own imagination...all in all a rather average night inside my head.

Adventures In Vicissitude or The Return of The Abject Wit

"I have a cock, so I'm betting that's not it."- T.O. Hob

I'm a very sick person.

Pause for a second and contemplate the double meaning of that sentence.

Now move on. I went to sleep on Sunday night with an inexplicably broken heart...and woke up Monday morning to a sink full of blood (pictures respectfully withheld). It's funny how you can still recognize your own blood once it's no longer part of you, like it somehow screams out about the debt you owe it (I gave you life...). My nose hadn't been bleeding, I had no open wounds. In fact I felt pretty damn ok. So where did all this blood come from?

And then I hurled.

Most people would find that odd. Not me. See I puke a lot (look at that learning new and disgusting things about me every day). I try and explain it to people every once and awhile, but they never get it. "I get sick when I eat tomato sauce." No, that's not it. "I get sick on rollercoasters." I don't fit on rollercoasters, but that's not it either. "I got sick a lot when I was pregnant." I defer to Hob on that witty retort.

But this was different. Not my usual vomitiness (vomitocity? vomitility? vominosity?).

It was about six hours in when I realized this was a completely new sick feeling and it had a new side effect. I couldn't eat.

Now this might not seem odd to some of you. But it is to me. Let's review. I'm fat. Not chubby, not porky, not big boned. I'm fat (and ugly to boot, but that's besides the point). And contrary to popular belief fat people don't always eat a lot, but we do eat often and very poorly. So when I passed on lunch Monday, and realized it had been 24 hours since I last ate I was a little surprised. When Monday night came and went without any food I was getting a little nervous, I wasn't even hungry. I've gone 24 hours without eating, but at the end of that time I was hungry. I was pushing 40 hours without even a twinge. This wasn't normal. Fat people must eat every few hours unless a) There are no food items or small animals available, or b) they're having a heart attack, and even then eating is possible unless it's a very severe heart attack. So when lunch time today came and went with only an iced tea and the occasional glass of water I began contemplate calling the doctor.

And then I started to think, maybe this isn't a bad thing. Maybe I'm just permanently full. How odd would that be? After 24 years of slowly gourging myself I've actually reached the point where I never have to eat again? But what if I'm just fucked up?

So at nine o'clock tonight, after 57 hours of unintentional fasting I munched on a handful of Chex-Mix and a piece of beef jerky. I kept it down so I guess that's a good sign.

So now I'm left to ponder what exactly is going on. I'm left to decide how exactly to handle this. And then there's another part to this story, I feel fine, in fact I feel great. My heart broke, and bled out. My body was tired, my bones ached. And suddenly I felt...different.

And now I'm left to wonder why. It will give me something to chew on.

I Believe In Just Another Day

Not every day can be full of pain, and misery, and loss. Not every day. It's just not possible. There are other days, and I love those days almost as much as I love the nights that follow them. But I wonder if there are enough of those other days, I wonder if when you stack the horrible days and the other days together if you get enough days to fill a lifetime, or if all those empty days are really the worst of all.

So I sit here smiling my disaffected smile, that of a man who knows most of the world will die in their sleep and understands that rather illogically most people truly despise that fact and would rather go off in a fiery crash, or some other effulgent blaze of glory. I sit here and think about what comes next, because it seems that all that's really mattered to me lately is how to set right what hasn't happened yet. I spent enough time straightening out what's already happened, and while I hardly think I've learned all my lessons, I know that I have to start moving on. I just don't know how.

There are a lot of things I don't know. And then there others I do. But what's I've always loved more than what I know, is what I believe...

I believe in hard days and long sleepless nights. I believe in the good of man, the will of woman, and the genuine honesty that makes them both human. I believe that it is absolutely not the parts, and that it is indeed the wiring that makes the difference. I believe that for every wrong there is a right, and for every right there are at least half a dozen easier wrongs. I believe that words can hurt, words can heal, words can make the world go round...but that even a million words can not properly describe a single feeling. I believe that for any question, love is the answer...unless of course that question involves people and then the answer is just as likely to be money. I believe that God is good people. I believe that you should play big, or go home...and when you get there you should bake a cake, or paint a picture, or at the very least tidy up a bit. I believe in never giving up, because there is nothing worse in life than wasting time you have yet to waste. I believe in yesterday, and I believe in today, and I believe in tomorrow, because yesterday I was, today I am, and tomorrow maybe I will be. But no matter what happens to me, no matter where I go, or what happens next I believe that tomorrow will be just another day. And I sort of like being able to believe just that.

I've thought some bad things lately, things I had no right thinking, and in the last few days I've managed to wash those thoughts away. But bad thoughts can't be replaced with good ones. The void left by bad thoughts is one that can only be filled with fear and doubt, and since I'm rarely afraid doubt has got me double good. The truth is I don't know what to think. I don't know what my chances of making it are. If it was simple matter of success and failure I could live with that. Being a failure has never really bothered me. You sort of get used to it. It's really a matter of failure and survival. See some people's failures destroy them, but there's so little of "me" left that failure isn't going to hurt me any. It won't finish me off. It'll blow through me like the wind in the trees and when it's done I'll still be standing, albeit slightly tilted to one side with a god awful stench around me most likely. It's just what happens. I was always able to deal with the idea of failing, because in my mind there was only really one fight, and it was the sort of fight that once you lost you really didn't have to worry about anything anymore. But this new idea, the idea that I can both fail and survive, poses a slate of new problems. Problems I'm not ready to face. But for the time being what choice do I have? I'm not going anywhere.

I'm cold, I'm hungry, I'm tired. I'm sitting here wondering why I bothered writing any of this when I don't seem to have gone anywhere with it. And then I remember. It was to tell you something.

This morning I had love in me. It was old, and stale, and not altogether love-like...but it was a love, even if it was never real or realized. And now that's gone. I can't explain how, I can't explain why, but something small that was there this morning is not there now.

I think I will miss it.

And that's all I really wanted to say.

Requisite Recantations

In Reference To The February 1st, 2005 Edition of WRSU News Presents Knightbeat on 88.7 WRSU FM-New Brunsick:

Certain statements included in this program may have been erroneous.

Matt was wrong, burning Mexicans for fuel is not a viable option. I also apologize to any Californians who feel we were mocking their failure to capitalize on this abundant, cheap, and efficient source of energy in an effort to solve their perpetual energy problems.

Also, I may have been wrong. Bill Cosby has not molested any children...that we know of.

I acknowledge there were many other erroneous and insulting statments withing the program, and we probably apologize for at least a few of them.

Teardrop Epiphanies: Honest Answers To Question You Never Asked

You...you were afraid of me. I'm sorry about that. I hope you know you never had any reason to be.

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I don't understand why you think you have to lie to me. Why you need to be like that. It doesn't hurt me that you are, if anything it hurts me that I've made you feel like you have to be like that. I must have done something very, very wrong, but for the life of me I can't think of what that would be.

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There are very few things in life as bewildering as experiencing several new things at once. I've been there. I began to feel a different way about people, a way I'd never felt before. That frightened me, and I'd never really been frightened before. I was beginning to say the way I felt about things, but I really didn't know how and even when I did I couldn't say it very well. I was having fun, and it was all so new to me.

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I never thought we would be friends. It didn't seem possible. I just wanted you to not hate me. I just wanted you to understand that I wasn't what everyone else thought I was. I couldn't have asked you to understand me, that wouldn't have been fair...but I can't stand the fact that we parted ways with you feeling the way you did.

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I have no idea who these people I'm talking about are.

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Sometimes I say things that I think sound straight, just because I don't want people to think I'm gay. Which I'm not...

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The types of magicians we now call illusionists used to train to perform their simpler coin tricks with one hand so that they could pick the pockets of their spectators with the other. As these tricks became more for entertainment the ability to perform a trick with a single hand allowed them to use their empty hand as a distraction, thus allowing the second hand to perform a more complex coin trick without fear of detection. Magicians have lost this talent, forgoing the simple slight of hand for more flashy and less genuine illusions. But those who still understand the old trade now encounter a complex problem. Which hand is performing the trick? The empty hand or the hand with the coin?

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I create a silly little world here. Create one dimensional characters with no features or history. Think about it. Rigby, King, and Kong all sort of seem like me. We never really let on what Hob is like, and though I can't explain why for the life of me Lazarus Jones has always reminded me of the cop from Police Academy who makes all the funny noises.

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I was drunk once. Really drunk, on a night I probably should have stayed really sober. I acted pretty retarded that night, but I always thought I remembered all the things I said. Until the other night. I woke up about four in the morning with the phrase "let him get it out" ringing in my ears. I remember my grandfather used to say that when I took sick, and I always figured that someone said that when I was getting sick that night. But when it was repeating in my head the other day I realized that it couldn't have been said then. There was only one guy with me, he had no one to say it to. And suddenly a bit of black lifted, and I knew exactly when it was said. I just can't remember what of a million things I was trying to get out at that exact second. I hope it wasn't anything too horrible. Truth is it sort of changes everything, I always assumed I remembered everything, but now how do I know that there aren't a dozen wicked things I'd forgotten?
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There's this woman at work. It just so happens that every morning when she comes into the office to drop her keys I'm standing in the doorway, and every afternoon when she comes in to drop her keys I'm standing in that same doorway. I've never seen her otherwise, which probably means she's never seen me otherwise either. I wonder if she thinks I spend all day standing in that doorway...although I reckon she's never given it much thought at all.
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Everytime I walk into a crowded room the first think I think is, "all these people hate me." The second thing I think is, "don't be a jackass, you jackass. Of course they don't all hate you." It wears on you thinking like that. But I can't help it.

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Just because you shit in a pot and call it dinner don't make it so.

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There was a whole lot more story to tell on a night like this, but I'm tired now and completely unsure whether I have it in me.