warning**boy with issues ahead

Alright here's the deal: this is not a rant (sorry (not really)). Well, it's not a rant on any sort of current event / political shitstorm / repugnant historical figure / lecherous travel shenanigans that you may or may not have become accustomed to. Rather this is a rant (kind of) on the frustration I'm experiencing in my personal life. You are welcome to read on, but be forewarned that you may learn more about me than you're comfortable knowing. Trust me…nobody can know too much about me without experiencing the frustration I feel daily. Read on at your peril…


I'm fed up with myself. It's not that I'm mad or upset with anything I'm doing; more that I'm just tired--worn out--at having to work so damn hard every day just to stay normal. And I still manage to fail miserably!

So here's the deal: I have AD/HD Type I, or Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder of the Inattentive Type. That means a number of things for me. To rattle some of them off in no particular order…I have a very poor memory, it's painfully difficult for me to focus on any one thing for any period of time, I randomly don't know how to deal with social situations, I have an erratic train of thought, I procrastinate, I have great difficulty finishing what I start, etc. etc. etc. In addition to AD/HD, I'm also partially dyslexic and slightly afflicted with OCD (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder). Fun mix, huh? The implications of those include difficulties reading, difficulties with stupid little simple things like dialing a phone correctly, and problems fixating on patterns for no particular reason. It's annoying as fuck.

But while annoying, so far it really doesn't seem all that bad. This is where it gets fun though; this is where I get to tell you how this particular mix of weird-ass problems mixes and affects my day-to-day life…

**Incidentally, we're talking personal life here, not work life. The problems presented to me at work are of an entirely different nature, and not what I want to get in to here.**

Essentially, what are affected more than anything else are the relationships--past, current and potential--that I have in and around me all the time. I don't know how to handle them! That may seem somewhat idiotic to most people reading this, but please let me at least try to explain (though I don't expect to do it very successfully).

When I'm fine, I'm fine. I'm confident, happy, talkative, energetic, engaging, smiley, funny, blah blah blah. But I'm not always fine…on a fairly regular basis I, for whatever reason, suddenly don't know how to be around people. I feel awkward, out of place, and I don't know how to talk to anyone. If I try to talk to someone it's just painfully obvious that I don't know what I'm doing. I come across as an awkward middle-schooler, which makes me and anyone I'm around visibly uncomfortable. So I just stop talking to people. Essentially, I go into hiding. I shut myself in my room, go for a long walk, or do any number of other things that allow me to isolate myself. There are two major problems with this tactic:

1. I never know when I'm going to suddenly feel like this. It's impossible to predict, which makes planning social outings infuriating! All too often I make plans to get together with friends somewhere and, after getting there, suddenly go silent. If I try to explain myself I succeed only in making everyone uncomfortable, so I don't. Consequently, people think I'm pissed or upset with them. There's just no comfortable way out of it other than just not making plans.
2. I need to interact with people. Whether I want to or not, I at least have to go to my job, which includes meeting and dealing with a lot of people. I don't have the time or the patience for this kind of shit coming and going! But unfortunately, it's not exactly something that's going to go away.

There is one solution so far: medication. Since 2004 I've taken Adderall on a daily basis. Let me tell you, this shit works wonders! I become focused, intent on my job, I can read books (without it I just read and re-read sentences without understanding what's being said), my memory gets better, I can stay on track…all sorts of wonderful things! Plus it's an upper, meaning that it makes me feel happy! So what could be better??

Being me. That's what. For about two months now I've been off of the medication for a number of reasons. At first it was because my doctor moved out of town and to get a new prescription I had to meet with a new one…something that I just kept putting off. After awhile though, I began noticing something: certain personality traits about which I had long forgotten had begun to return. Quirks I used to be quite fond of, like my ability to write creatively (this self-righteous ramble aside), my ability to not care about what people thought of me, and just my general quirky demeanor that I used to be known for. I had gotten so caught up in the novelty of being able to focus for the first time in my life that I hadn't noticed myself becoming a quiet, appropriate, complacent businessman. That's one of the last things I ever wanted to be, and still is!

So what the hell do I do now? Do I really have to trade off between being productive and being myself? That's not fair, of course, but life rarely seems to be anymore. And if I choose myself, how do I deal with other people successfully? I almost feel as if it's not fair for me to try to make friends anymore because my personality is so damned erratic and unpredictable, I'd just end up pissing them off and ultimately being a bad friend. I don't want to be a bad friend.

Why is it that the only options fair to everyone else leave me by myself?

possible counter-maneuver (C-M) needed

So here's the scoop: Two of my kickass roomies and I are heading downstate tonight for a weekend of camping, rock climbing, bonfiring, and general merriment. We're going to a place called Jackson Falls, just south of the the tiny little burg of Ozark.

I decided to post this because you never can be too sure. There have been reports recently verifying packs of roaming evil red ninjas, and in the event that I don't make it back Sunday night, I'd like everybody to know where to send the Tactical Ninja Counter-Offensive Unit (TaNC-OU). Better safe than sorry, right?

Also, we'll be in a bright yellow tent should the Aerial TaNC-OU (AerTaNC-OU) need to be dropped in. Should things begin to look bad, we may have to escalate to Code Orange and drop in the Anti-Ninja Star AerTaNC-OU (A-NiSAerTaNC-OU) to get me out.

I appreciate everyone's attention. I keep you all informed because, should a ninja strike happen, what would the world be like without me?

Thank you.

here's to goats!

Guess what today is everybody! That's right, we're shutting down the post office and staying away from the bank, because it's CHRISTOPHER COLUMBUS DAY!!! YAAAAAAAYYYYYYYY!!! This year we're going to celebrate it just a little bit differently. Instead of dancing joyously while eating ice cream cones or sipping hot cocoa (depending upon your region), we're all going to go out, shoot an Indian in the head and steal its wallet! YAAAAAAAYYYYYYYY!!!

Jesus Christ why is this retarded, asinine bitch of a holiday still here? That is not a rhetorical question; if Jesus Christ has given any of you the answer, for the love of god pass it on. I want everybody** to ask themselves "why do we have a holiday for this pompous ass-licker?" It's because he "discovered" America, right? Leading the way for us to become the greatest country in the world? One nation under god? The best that the dominant white race has to offer? Fuck that shit – Chris Columbus was a greedy, bigoted, religiously-dogmatic pygmy goat-raping torturous murderer ready and willing to do anything he could to get another buck (or whatever the hell they used for currency back then; I'm too lazy and pissed off at the moment to look it up). Let's look a little bit closer at what this heroic raper of ibexes did to deserve his own national holiday…

First of all, the great legend has him sailing from Spain to America in 1492. Wrong. His first voyage across the ocean took place in 1492, but he did not land in the United States of America as we know it, NOR was he even looking for it! He was looking for a quick and easy way to the West Indies so he could set up a trade route for spices, thus trumping Portugal. And guess what he demanded as a fee for performing this service for Spain (what, you think he did it out the goodness of his black heart?). His contract read as such:

He would:

• be given the rank of Admiral of the Ocean Sea (Atlantic Ocean).
• be appointed Viceroy and Governor of all the new lands.
• have the right to nominate three persons, from whom the sovereigns would choose one, for any office in the new lands.
• be entitled to 10 percent of all the revenues from the new lands in perpetuity; this part was denied to him in the contract, although it was one of his demands.
• have the option of buying one-eighth interest in any commercial venture with the new lands and receive one-eighth of the profits.
  

How's that for humility?

But, as fate would have it, instead of navigating around the globe as he intended, he bumped into the Bahamas. Not a bad place for a vacation these days, but in those days it just happened to be inhabited by natives. Natives who no longer exist thanks to that Don Juan of the Nigerian Dwarf, but I'll get to that in a minute. Much went on, which I will not delve into here, but ultimately he didn't even reach the mainland until 1498. If you want to read the history of his great voyages, I would encourage you to do so here, but I won't waste time by copying it all down in this blog. In lieu of complete documentation, I simply will put the following:

SHIT HAPPENED

He sailed back and forth a few times, kidnapped a few thousand natives to sell into slavery in Spain, but ultimately began to run low on cash to fund his exciting adventures. So, he did what the rest of us do when we want to vacation in the Bahamas: he put into place on Haiti a clear, fair system that required every native above 14 years of age to bring him a certain quota of gold, the amount of which determined by a token that he forced all of them to wear around their necks. Should these gold-bearing servants of his fail to bring the full amount, he simply chopped their hands off. HE CHOPPED...THEIR FUCKING...HANDS OFF!!! Are you enraged yet that this molester of Black Bengals has his own national fucking holiday?? You damn well better be!!

If, for some perverse reason you were too busy fucking a Tahr to have read that correctly and you're still not red in the face (aside for the color derived from your vigorously amorous bestial encounter), here are two more little tidbits of Senior Columbus' sense of humor:

• He ordered a man who was caught stealing corn to have his nose and ears cut off and auctioned off as a slave.
• A woman who suggested Columbus was of lowly birth was punished by Columbus' brother Bartolomé: she was stripped naked and paraded around the colony on a mule. When Bartolomé had her tongue cut out, Columbus congratulated him for defending the family's honor.
  

Do you seriously need any more reasons to be pissed as fuck about this bastard of a holiday still existing? I don't give a shit about what you learned about this Cretan kri-kri fellator in grade school – this man does not deserve his own holiday. This man deserves to have his body exhumed, his femur removed and placed where his asshole would have been just before scattering the bones at the bottom of a portable toilet to be shat upon.

Fuck I'm pissed.



**WHAT THE FUCK??! Microsoft Word just tried to change "themselves" to himself or herself!!! Does my writing sound like it's supposed to be politically correct you Down syndrome genome of a program?? What's that? You can't tell the tone of my writing because you suck at life? Then don't try to correct the tone of my shit!!