A conversation on a sunny October day.

I had a conversation with some bloke at a stall set up for evangelizing a couple of months past. Some time in October it would have been, cos Mum was in town and we'd headed to the Asian Food Festival at Silverton Casino for some middling Asian food. The stall didn't have much in the way of.... well, anything really. There was a table, couple of chairs, and a sign with several 'brain teasers,' of the sort designed to trick you by asking almost-right-questions. Such as "How many animals did Moses take into the Ark?" So we stopped and answered them between ourselves, and one of the guys manning the stall came up to us.

We repeated our answers back to him, and he seemed impressed that I knew that it wasn't just two of each animal that went into the Ark, but several each of the herding animals. He was less impressed that I didn't realize the question asked about Moses, not Noah. But then he asked how many of the ten commandments I'd broken.

"Oh, I'd say nine of them." Mum was surprised. "Nine?" "Yep. I haven't killed anyone as far as I know." "You haven't committed adultery. You're not married." "I have. Even thinking about sex outside of marriage is considered adultery in some passages of the bible, and as I'm not married it's definitely adultery. "

By this point the guy is looking at me as though I'm a disgusting star pupil. I knew the theology, but I'd broken it. And then he notices my shirt. It's the teach the controversy shirt, with the devil burying dinosaur bones, so he asks about it. I told him it's making a joke about the people who believe that the devil buried fossils to confuse mankind away from the belief that the world is six thousand years old.

"So you believe in evolution?" He asked. "No I don't." "You don't?" Both Mum and the guy seemed surprised. "No. What's the point. Evolution just is. To me, believing in it makes as much sense as believing in that table over there. Whether I believe in it or not doesn't matter." "But you can see the table. You can't see evolution. Have you ever seen a cat turn into a dog?" "Actually, if you look at a Cheetah, it's evolved to be much more dog-like than other cats. The claws don't retract because of the way it hunts, which is similar to a lot of dogs. And even the call is more of a bark than a meow. So it's adapted and picked up the similarities that make dogs successful hunters. "But a dog has never turned into a cat." Mum's turn. "That's not how evolution works. It's a progressive change over many generations. Viruses evolve, and you've heard of them becoming immune to antibiotics?" "Well, yeah." "That's because they live much faster life cycles than bigger animals, so evolution happens much more quickly."

So by this point I think he worked out he wasn't going to sell us on un-science, so he brings up the topic of morality, and heaven, and whether we think we're moral people. To which we both respond we think we are.

He asks if we think we're going to heaven. And neither of us say we think we're going. Because we don't think it exists. He talks about heaven in the bible, and I ask him where. Because heaven is a fairly recent invention. Even Jesus didn't talk about people going to heaven when they die, it was all about the Kingdom of God coming to Earth and all the good and righteous people joining in there.

And it was great to see my Mum get in to the discussion. She doesn't usually go for this sort of thing, but to have some random guy tell her she's not a moral person, when she's one of the most selfless people I know, actually pissed me off a bit. Call me an immoral person all you want, but leave Mum out of it. She's give you the shirt off her back if you needed it. And while I try to be, try to live without hurting other people, I'm not brilliant at it. I've hurt people, and will hurt more, I'm sure. But this guy actually had the gall to tell us that we weren't moral because we hadn't been born again. He seemed willing to go on for a while until I gave him a spiel about guns.

I consider myself a moral person, and I don't own a gun. I don't have one because I'm not willing to entertain the idea of killing another person. And if you're telling me that the ten commandments are the basic requirement to be a moral person, then as a moral person you cannot own a gun because you're opening yourself to the possibility of killing another person, and that, to me, is immoral.

And for some reason, that's pretty much where the conversation ended. He put up with the evolution, and the heaven, but bring up the gun and he didn't want to talk about it any more. And this is what I don't get about guns. Jesus didn't have a gun. Hell, he got pissed off when Peter used a sword to defend him. So what is it that makes guns and Christianity in this country go arm in arm? I know a guy who called one of his kids Psalm, and then posts pictures of kids shooting to protect their second amendment rights. I know people who go to church regularly, then make comments about "Proudly carrying a weapon." Why is this something to be proud of? I'm proud of my Mammoth ivory turtle necklace cos it's pretty unique and I made it myself out of extinct animal. I'm proud of my friend's achievements. But saying you're proud of being a gun carrier just doesn't make sense to me. Especially when you hold yourself up as a paragon of morality due to your (less than) strict adherence to a collection of writings from quite a while ago. And when you're actively prepared to break one of the rules you hold up as something that shouldn't be broken.

Please, can anyone explain?

In the meantime, here's a link to the t-shirts, cos they're awesome.

Motivation pt. . . .who knows?

Couple of years ago, I started counting calories. Did it for a couple of weeks, and I was genuinely surprised and pleased with the results. I lost about ten pounds, just by paying attention to calorie intake. Bear in mind, I didn't pay attention to the type of calories; it was all about the magic number: 1890.

So for six weeks I drove my friends crazy, only going to bars I could get the calorie count for food online. I got adept at finagling calories from day to day, so I could have another drink if I applied the calories to the following day, meaning eventually I'd skip a meal for the booze. But, in six weeks I lost ten pounds.

Lost. It's generally such a negative word except for when it comes to weight and virginity. Depending on your situation. But If you lose weight, it's not like losing your keys. You son't spend hours searching for them, retracing your steps, wondering where they cold have gone. Same thing about weight-- does anyone actually look for the weight they've lost? And virginity. I"d be willing to bet money that everyone reading this right now knows exactly where they left that. But, I suppose, some people do try to find it again.

Regardless, six weeks, ten pounds, and I still ate shit and drank. . .really good stuff. I just cut back on all of it. And now I'm doing it again. This time around, however, I weigh more to being with so I'm allowed 1960 calories a day instead of 1890. And I'll still lose a pound a week, leading a completely sedentary lifestyle. And, if lat time around is anything to go by, by just eating less of the crap. And when I get home, I log in to my little app on my phone, and find out I've got 161 calories left for the day, unfortunately I'm the guy who works out I can have a double Highland Park single malt, instead of a small packet of instant oatmeal and half an orange.

But here's the point about motivation. I have more motivation right now than I've had in a hell of a long time. And it's not the motivation that there's some sort of weight loss challenge going on at work right now. To me, weight loss ins;t a competitive thing. But to me, the motivation is that if I don't lose the several extra kilos I've been carrying around (sorry, American readers, I'm going metric from now on), then my first week of training for the race is going to kick my arse, and not in a good way. I want to finish the first week of training, and be able to celebrate a 100th birthday party two days later. I want to finish the first week of training, and not think 'what the fuck have I let myself in for.' I want to finish the first week of training, and think 'Brilliant, I can get fit by counting the number of calories rather than the type.'

Cos right now, giving another test with socks and sealskins in an icy pool, the Highland park calories are the only thing stopping me from running into the house crying like a sad bastard.

Jealousy

I am a very jealous person. Most of the time, though, it's stupid jealousy. It's jealousy I could do something about if I was. . .well, someone I was jealous about. If I had more motivation or self-confidence or commitment, I could be the sort of person I'm jealous about easily, and not be jealous of them.

Sure there's some sort of vicious circle, completely stupid and needless thing going on there, but I think that's a lot of what being human is. Stupid, needless insecurity. Too much if...then, and not enough when....then.

But Right now, I'm jealous for what I feel is a totally acceptable reason. I'm jealous, because right now in London is a boat show, and people who will, in the near future, become a part of my life, are walking around an object that will become more meaningful to me probably than my condo ever was. They got to see the first full outfitted clipper 70. There's eleven more coming, so who knows if that'll be the one I end up living on for a year, but still, I'm so incredibly jealous right now, because to me it's still just a theoretical goal. I haven't seen the boat, I haven't met up with any of the other people who are going on the race. The only thing I have is the sealskins socks I'm wearing, over a pair of hiking socks, over a pair of merino wool base layer socks, in the pool that I had to break ice to get in to (I know it's winter, but 27 degrees in Vegas? Seriously, fuck off).

But I did find out the dates for training today, so I have a rough idea of when the goal will become more tangible (October). So while they get to do all the things I'd love to be doing right now, and all I have is some waterproof socks and an ice-covered swimming pool, eventually I'll be there, jealous of the people tucked in their nice warm beds while the pants-shittingly-frigid waters of the northern Pacific seep through the very socks I am this moment testing out in a frozen pool.

Except I probably won't be all that jealous.

Working Out

is something I'm going to have to start to do. And not in a generic 'oh, I really must lose weight, doctor cholesterol heart murmur blah blah blah' way. As in, I've got to undo the damage done by countless years (20) of drinking, happy hour fried food specials, desk jobs, and general lack of physical activity. Or sailing round the world is going to kick my arse. Well, the sailing bit is probably going to kick my arse regardless. I mean, that's why I'm doing it. The mental and physical challenge is what attracted me to the whole thing in the first place (with learning to sail competently a close second, and running away from responsibility a middling third). But reading other people's accounts of their experiences on previous races, I've got to start preparing by the sound of it. Hoping to do the first week of training in September or October (we find out the training schedule next week), and right now going up three flights of stairs isn't the best feeling in the world.

So we'll see how having a tangible motivation works. I hate going to the gym, and just as well I can't afford a membership while paying for the race. There's a 25' pool in the back garden of the house I live in, but it's bloody freezing right now (good practice for the North Pacific maybe?). There's a bike in the garage hidden behind kitchen cabinetry. See? already making excuses before anyone starts giving me shit about it. And tomorrow's not the day to start, driving to LA and back to see a show.

Then it's Wednesday. Wednesday I'll get back to Vegas, probably around 3am. I'll sleep til I wake up, eat breakfast (something with protein I'm led to believe by the couple websites I've half-heartedly visited), put on some laundry, watch netflix, then maybe do a pushup and four crunches.

Baby steps to Working out. Wouldn't want to overdo it my first day.

Oh dear.

It is, as far as I'm concerned, two hours in to the new year. And I already want to punch people. Mostly it's cos of the TV station on.

I'm not sure which station it is. I don't even care. All I know it was a fairly decent New Year's Eve, with good food, and wine, and mead, and company and conversation. Nothing to stick out and say 'holy shit, that was an awesome end/beginning to the year,' but nothing to cringe about. Until Inside Edition comes on TV. Everyone's gone to bed or home, except me. Drinking another bottle of wine, and enjoying hiccoughs. And then Inside Fucking Edition has to remind me that while 2012 was a shitty year, nothing really changes on New Years.

Because there's still a bunch of bullshit that we have to deal with. Kim Kardashian is pregnant. Giraffes use their necks to fight for territory. People video stupid shit. And Inside Edition will be there to remind us of all the crap that makes us less. . .intelligent. . .nice. . .human.

So this next year, let's be better to each other. Let's care about important things, instead of what KK has decided to do to keep herself in the headlines, or photos people liked on the internet, or things that National Geographic taught us years ago. Let's not care what our neighbors are doing, unless they need help. Let's hold our peers and employees and employers and elected officials accountable. And let's turn off the tube, and the reality shows, and gossip, stop the shit, and be the people we suspect we're capable of being.

You may say that I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one. I hope some day you'll join us, and the world we be as one.

-John Lennon

900

Where the hell did the last hundred days go? Although thinking about it, there's been a tone of stuff go on. I moved in to a house and learned how to lay carpet, plaster a wall, clean a pool, install a kitchen faucet, and lay roofing shingles. There's been a lot of movement at work with people coming and going. Nearly finished editing (video editing, not the horrible type of editing) the first short I wrote. Took up shaving with a straight razor. Saw Cloud Atlas twice. Reconnected with a couple of friends in person. Cut back on drinking. Thought about working out.

And on the global front, Obama got re-elected. The Mars Rover discovered ancient stream beds. Benghazi and Newtown and Sandy and Syria and Egypt and Instagram have been in the news.

And in 900 days I start my next major adventure. It's forever away, and yet if the last hundred days are anything to go by, it'll be here before I know it. Before I'm ready? Not mentally, I could leave tomorrow. Physically, I've still got some work to do. And by still, I mean I should start. I've started buying the things I'm going to need for the trip-- an S-biner by Nite-Ize bought on a whim from Home Depot. They've been recommended by past crews, and it was just there, so it has begun.

I also started sending checks. Two so far, so I've at least paid for the first two training sessions. Only another ten to go.

But here's to the next hundred days. Sitting in the airport, headed up to Eugene for my first Christmas off since, I think, 2001. And quite possibly my last until after the race. But that's a ways away, in time and distance, so for now have a good one and take care of yourselves. And here's wishing common sense to all this season.

Of no fixed abode

Being homeless is tiring. Not that I was properly homeless; I still had a job, and a car, and friends with couches and spare rooms and beds. But when most of what you own is in a POD, and the rest of it is in the boot of your car (and the back seat and the passenger seat), there's a mild sense of fatigue that never seems to go away.

I moved out of my condo on the 6th of July. Closed the door to a stuffed-to-the-gills POD, and drove away from the place that had been my home since March 2005. That's longer than I've been blogging, or able to grow facial hair. I put in bamboo flooring, and re-tiled the fireplace and entrance. BluRay's weren't available for sale, and no one had heard of Lady Gaga. I had six roommates in that time, changed show, got two promotions, and started going grey. I wrote a book, and two screenplays.

The point is, a lot of shit happened in those seven years. It's the longest I've lived in a house since I left England in 1995, and the place I moved in to isn't going to be home in the same way. I don't own it; I can't, as my credit is shite. The condo went from $229k when I bought it, to $245k when I refinanced three years later, to $280k four months after I refinanced, to being sold in July for $75k. That's not a lot of money for the time and effort and emotion, but it's the way of the world. Now I'm in a new place, which is older than my old place, and definitely a different experience.

When I moved into my condo, it was barely lived in. Everything was clean. It was the equivalent of getting a five year old car with ten thousand miles on the clock. This new one? It's been lived in. A lot. By a lot of cats. And some people too, but mostly cats. There's a certain voyeuristic pleasure in moving in somewhere, and finding those little things that hint at the sort of person who lived in a place before you. Of course, depending on what you find, this can last a while, or be gone almost instantly.

For me it was pretty instant. Along with enough animal fur to stuff a king size mattress ground into the carpets (there's one room I've just shut the door to. I'm dealing with that one next month), I've so far found a business card for a strip club in Idaho, a pair of unopened white thigh high fishnets, instructions for putting on a condom, and three boxes of cereal.

Oh, and five porn DVD's.

To be fair to the last owner, they were in the trash. To be unfair to the owner, the trash can was upside down, so when I picked it up, two of them made a break for freedom (Horny Moms and Big Rides), one did the obligatory circumference roll until it was flat (Nina Hartley's guide to alternate sex), and the other two lay there unashamedly, as did their titles (Dragon girls #7 and No Spring Chicken #4).

Coupled with the mirrored ceiling in one of the bathrooms, and the blue neon light in the bedroom, it really makes wonder about the people that lived here. Not too much though.

Regardless of all that, I now have a fridge and an oven and a bed of my own. One of the carpets is ripped out and (mostly) replaced. New sink and cabinet in the master bedroom. An unpacked box as a nightstand. And a tonne of stuff I'm going to have to figure out what to do with in another two and a half years, when I will once again become voluntarily homeless.

At least that's something to be grateful for; my homelessness is voluntary. That's why I hesitate to call myself actually homeless. I haven't been one of those poor sods who has little choice in the matter. I haven't had to worry about where the next meal will come from, or a secure place to sleep, and I won't be in that situation next time either. I prefer the moniker 'Of no fixed abode.'

And I can't wait for the next time I wear that label.

Democracy

Silly people, thinking that Democracy is for you! There are two things everyone should want in a democratic election. 1. As many people as possible voting to get a true reflection of the beliefs and viewpoints of the populace, and 2. Everyone who votes to be as well-informed as possible.

Currently, there's a push against both of these things. By changing voter laws in Florida, Texas, Wisconsin, Ohio, and Pennsylvania, by requiring ID and changing the hours people can vote, you limit the people taking place in the election and disenfranchise thousands of people. Apart from the fact that voter ID fraud is minimal (check out www.truchtaboutfraud.org for the statistics), surely you want to give people as much opportunity to vote as possible? I mean, the damned election has been going on for two years! You can't tell me they get two years to posture, blather, skirt the issue, and lie, and then we get almost no time whatsoever in which to cast our vote? If you want voter ID laws, then fine, require voter ID. BUT if that's the case, then it should be the state's responsibility (and financial burden) to provide voter ID to everyone eligible to vote.

Second, we're not well-informed. If Romney can put out a performance that is all presentation and no substance, and be declared the winner of a debate, then we're done. Yes, one of the skills of debating is the presentation. But I don't blame Obama for not having the best responses, rebuttals, comebacks. It's hard to debate when the person you're debating all of a sudden seems to have a completely different point of view from the one you expected. According to Romney, he is FOR financial regulation. He is FOR increasing taxes on the wealthiest members of society. he is FOR medical coverage for people with pre-existing conditions. But the debate is the first time he was for any of those things.

And as long as people argue about 'who won the debate,' and base that determination on delivery, we won't have an educated populace. As long as candidates can go out there with their pre-prepared soundbytes, and don't have to have any accountability to what they're actually saying, the debates are a waste of time. They aren't about informing the populace any more; they're about giving the 24-hour news machines fodder to chew up, regurgitate, digest, and any other food metaphor you wish to use.

Elections are about the Super-PACs. They're about the money that TV stations and websites and (decreasingly) print media stand to make off the election. They're about who can shout longer and louder and get people to believe them, because as long as the delivery is good, that's all people seem to care about any more.

Basically, we all like polished shit. We don't care that it's shit any more. And that makes me want to not bother with part one of what it takes to make democracy work. I'm almost looking forward to moving away, to not having to listen to two-year campaigns, to people who vote based on crap and falsehoods someone with a nice delivery told them.

I'm looking forward to not voting. But not just yet. I'm still going to fulfill my obligation to be as informed, educated a voter as I can be.

999

A couple of posts ago, I talked about the yacht race. This is how many days I have left, before I say goodbye to the company I've worked for for eight and a half years. It'll be 11 years almost to the day by that point. The exact starting date of the race hasn't been announced yet, and probably won't be until January of that year. But I like to have things to look forward to, so 12 Jun 2015 is the most tangible date I can give myself. I don't know which ports we'll end up sailing in to. I don't know where I'll go at the end of the race. And I'm actually excited about that.

I've had a career. I decided when I was pretty young that I wanted to do theatre professionally. I've been a lighting tech, run sound, automation, stage management, even acted and been paid for it. I started my own company with a couple of friends, wrote scripts, built sets, hung lights- and on one memorable occasion, a snow machine with a squirrel fan which blanketed the audience. I've loaded and fired pyro.

I've programmed automation for three Cirque Du Soleil shows. I've gone from an hourly employee, to Show Lead, to Assistant Head. I've gone from having a problem with authority to being the authority.

And I'm only 32, and ready for something else. Automation, theatre, is comfortable for me. I have no problems operating a multi-million dollar system with people's lives in my hands, while two thousand people watch in awe. I'll take a screwdriver or a wrench to just about anything, especially when I've got a bunch of people waiting for me to either continue the show, or cancel it.

So the way I see it, I've got 999 more days until the end of my career. Will I continue to progress in that time? Who knows. My bosses know I'm making this trip, so are definitely less likely to consider me for promotion, but I'm fine with that. I have 999 more days to work on finishing some of the writing projects I'm working on. I have 999 more days of 2am shopping, and 24 hour bars, and showgirls and slot machines.

I have 999 more days of paying for the trip.

Guns

Guns scare the fuck out of me. I see the point of them, to an extent. I love game, and hunting is the best way to get it in the US. But I didn't grow up around them. I had a friend in England who had an air rifle, and we would shoot targets on a rock in his back garden, but that was the extent of my exposure to guns until moving to Louisiana at 15.

While there, a friend of my brother's waved his mother's .45 (I think it was) around in our faces to show off one day. It wasn't until later that the incident really worried me, because that's when I found out that statistically, that's how most of the kids killed by guns die.

And the idea of becoming a statistic sickens me. I have goals, and plans, and stories to write and experiences to. . .experience, and I don't want some little twat to take that all away from me.

I'm not saying that guns need to be banned. That's not going to solve anything. But in the light of the recent horrific events in Colorado, I feel like both sides of the argument are missing the point. On the one side, you've got the people who are pro gun, who are saying that if someone had been armed in the threatre, then the loss of life wouldn't have been as high. The trouble with that argument is that Colorado has some pretty liberal (in the sense of lax, not in the sense of what conservatives think liberals want) gun laws. There was nothing to prevent any one of the people watching the movie from taking a gun with them, and unless you're going to make it compulsory to carry a gun, there's no way to make sure an innocent bystander will be armed.

On the other side, you've got people complaining about the root causes of gun violence in this country being poverty and income inequality, which is why the US has a higher level of gun violence than any other western society. Now, I agree with this to an extent, but if you think about the mass murders in this country, they don't have anything to do with that. Columbine, Virginia Tech, Fort Hood, and now Aurora, none of the gunmen have been from impoverished backgrounds.

The problem is, no one is willing to have an open conversation about guns in this country. If you are pro gun, understand me when I say I DO NOT want to take away your right to bear arms. I just want there to be some system in place to keep a bit better track of who has what. And if you're anti gun, understand that you'll never get rid of guns in this country, and you shouldn't have to if people are willing to be responsible and sensible about owning the damned things.

K, rant over. But one last statement. Part of civilization is being able to have a civil conversation about things that affect all of us. Let's start trying that again.

The Future.

Three years. I have to make it three more years. Three years of living in Las Vegas, the stupid hot summers, dusty windy winters, constant construction, and twenty-four-hour whatever you want. It's been eight, so it's less than half the time I've been here already, and when you look at it that way it's much more survivable.

It's not that I hate Vegas any more. It's grown on me. It's like a mole that you hate when you're young, cos everyone makes fun of it. Then you grow up, realize that those people don't really matter, and accept the mole as a part of who you are. I'm accepting now that Vegas is a part of who I am, and I don't really mind it too much.

It's just a matter of getting out before the Vegas mole metastases.

But I have a plan to get out. Actually, this week I'm signing a contract to get out. And as a result of that contract, and money paid, Sometime in July of 2015, I'm going to be a part of a crew on a round-the-world yacht race. It hits six of seven continents, ten boats, eleven months, fifteen ports of call, and about 450 crew over the course of the race.

I've known about the race for a little over a year. But about six weeks ago, out of the blue, I said fuck it, and decided instead of talking about the race, I was going to do it. Emailed the recruiter to arrange a time to talk about the race while I was in the UK, but instead of just talking, I actually went in and did the interview. Got accepted. Come pay day, I'm sending off some money, along with the signed contract, and that's my life for the next four years sorted out. No more buying computers, or cameras, or rounds of drinks, cos all the money is going to the race. It's expensive. But I'm at the point where I feel like I can't afford to NOT do the race. I need a kick in the arse. I need a challenge. I need to get the shit kicked out of me as only the Northern Pacific Ocean can do. I need to go away for eleven months, get out of my comfort zone, out of my rut, and see more of the world-- at least the wet parts of it.

So for now, that's what's going on. At some point, I might ask you for money. It's expensive. But I won't ask just yet. Right now, I'm just letting you know if you want to visit Vegas while I'm here, you got three years. And if you're already here, then we'll hang out at some point. But three years is it. Then I'm gone.

Motivation pt. IV

So here's the thing. It doesn't matter where it comes from, as long as you can find it for a while, use it, and make it to where you're going. Tonight was necessary. Very Necessary, to use the title to a Salt-N-Pepa album that has absolutely nothing to do with this post. I'm not going to talk about Sex. I don't want to shoop. But I do want to keep a hold of the feeling I have inside right now, cos it's a good one. It's a little to do with the Manhattan and Martini and double Whiskey, but mostly to do with the conversation of the last two and a half hours.

I went to Europe with 29 lucky people my sophomore year of University. I wish I had the arrogance to claim they were lucky cos they went with me, but no. The reason they were lucky is because Holy Fuck! Europe for a year when you're nineteen! So I went over there with these people I knew a little or a lot or nothing about, and after the year I knew a little more or a little less about all of them. But the funny thing about being over there is that while I made some of the best friendships of my life, that wasn't even the important part. It set me up for what was to come.

To come was now. And not now in the sense of some fleeting moment that is always just gone, but now as in a state of mind. It makes more sense to measure your life in states of mind, or transitions from one to the next. So I like to think that everything was leading to here, it is the recent discovery of friendships I laid years ago that is going to get me out of this now, and in to the next.

Confused? Good, me too. Should probably have had a single.

So here it is. I've been lucky in my life that I've had almost no one I've been close to die. Grandparents, Great-something-or-others, a cousin, but I was younger than twelve for all of them, and no one recently enough to affect me, until Greg a couple of months ago. And his death has been in the back of my mind since in found out about it, because fuck, thirties is too young to die, and because the conversations I'd had with him in the couple years before had made me feel not so alone.

When part of your crutch, one of your coping mechanisms is taken away, it hurts. And you go back to some of the things you've gone through before, because there's something of a regression whether you want there to be or not.

Here's the thing, though. You're never alone. Never fucking alone. No matter how bleak, how helpless, how unique you feel, someone else has been there before, is there right now, and is going through what you're going. And you lose sight of that in the bollocks of living your life, and saying the things you're supposed to say to the people you're supposed to say it to, when all you want to do is scream, or sing, or tell someone to stop being a twat. And while I'm way too much of a pussy to ever let the totally minor hardships that I come across in life-- loss of value in my house, grey hairs, less than satisfactory performance in the sack-- push me to the point of ending it all, it takes some convincing to remember that I'm not alone sometimes.

I'm rambling. Going back and looking at the rest of this post I can see that, but it's still helping me get to what I want to say right now. So if you've made it this far, and you're still following the tenuous thread of this badly grammaticized post, here's my point.

Take the time to talk to people. Share yourself, and let them share themselves. Because you never know what you can give to each other, and you never know what the other bugger's going to take away from the conversation. An almost-three-hour, mildly-alcohol-encouraged conversation made me get to this point:

We're both better than we'll admit to, and while that's somewhat endearing, it ain't going to get us to where we want to go. And we're both worse than we want to be, because that's just the nature of being alive. There's always lapses regardless of your moral code or belief system, and as long as those lapses don't affect your ability to be a member of the human race, you're ahead of the game. Because after tonight, I understand it isn't BAD to use a friend for the people he knows. And I think he's in the same place, and gods I wish I was in a point to be used. And I feel more motivated that I have in a long time, and if I never get rid of this white-hot, soul-twitching, stupid-pose-in-front-of-the-mirror-inducing feeling, then it's too soon and I'm not ready yet and don't take my keyboard or my drink or my internet access away just yet, and I'm sorry and you need to fuck off or raise a glass and say here's to all of it in all its glory and disappointment and wonder, and just understand that motivation is wherever you force it from.

Greg.

I don't remember the first time I met him, but it would have been during a Salzburg orientation meeting. He was one of the people I'd be spending a year abroad with, and we all had to go through them, so I assume he was in them. The thing is, moments in your life pass by unnoticed, and you never think on them until years later, and you find that the memory is gone. Can't have been important, you tell yourself. We called him the Patriarch, cos he was older than all of us, and the name lent itself in a year we were studying Art History like it was going out of style. He was lucky enough to get one of the only two single rooms that the UP Salzburg Centre has to offer, and he would stand on his balcony, cigarette in hand, and survey the courtyard-- and mutter comments about Schneibel under his breath. Or maybe he didn't, but this is how I remember it. I do remember he was there, with Bri and Ali, on the day I got back after a night of extra-curricular activities. And he wondered why it took me so long to start enjoying all that Europe had to offer.

After Salzburg, we were part of a great group of friends who hung out with each other and, to be honest, whoever the fuck wanted to hang out with us. It wasn't until after University, when I moved away because working on a cruise ship seemed like a better idea than getting a real job, that I lost touch with him. Then he went into the Army, and I don't think we said two words to each other in twice as many years.

It wasn't until FaceBook that we started to reconnect. Say what you will about the evil timewaster, it IS a good way to keep in touch, reconnect, and bombard people with game notifications. It was good to catch up, and to find out that he was going through some of the same things I was. Drifting apart from people, through no fault of anyone's but life, it was a comfort to know that there was nothing wrong with me. While other people were getting married and having kids, he made it okay in my mind to not want any of that. And when I coerced him into coming down to Portland for our 10-year Reunion, it was because I was selfish and wanted someone to grumble with.

The last time I talked to him was January. He asked me to write a letter of recommendation for Seattle University. He'd decided to go back to school, Seattle University, to join the Therapeutic Psychology Program. I'm lucky, because I got a chance to let him know what I thought of him, how highly I valued our friendship, even if the letter was for a specific purpose. I didn't have to embellish.

Fuck, this is hard. I'm going to miss you, Greg. I'm going to miss your 'Ladieth Man' impressions. Your opinions, your stubbornness, your compassion, your generosity, your friendship.

Thank you, old friend.

Light.

Driving through Vegas at night I love looking at the lights. Not the green glow of the MGM Grand, or the over-compensating shaft that shoots out the top of the Luxor, but the scattered lights that shine from people's hotel rooms. Each one has the promise of a story. It might be something boring. It might be something exciting. It'll almost definitely be something that I won't get to hear about, but that doesn't matter. What matters is behind every one there's people being people. Whether that involves a mundane activity like watching infomercials, or something that requires the participants to wear rubber, it doesn't matter.

I've always been fascinated by lights. One of the best things about the university I went to was that it looked out over Portland, and the docks, and at night there were a thousand lights looking up at The Bluff, hinting at their stories. Provided the weather wasn't too bad and the clouds or rain didn't cover them. Hell, lights are the reason I am where I am right now. If I hadn't have taken a drunken stumble all those years ago, and seen a cruise ship in dry dock a hundred points of moving and working and preparing for sea, I don't know if I'd have had such a stupid idea as work on ships. If I hadn't worked on ships, then I probably wouldn't have ended up in Vegas.

But now I'm here, and I see each of those points of illumination as something more than they ever were before. Each one is someone, or some people, who have specifically made the decision to come to Vegas. Whether they've come for a wedding or funeral or divorce or other life-changing event, they're here. They're here for the hell of it. They're here for the heaven of it. They're here, doing whatever they're doing in those little pools of light, and if the potential behind each and every one of them doesn't make you curious, at least for a second, well then take a moment and think about it.

Enjoy the fact that none of us are in this alone unless we choose to be, no matter how bad we think things are, because behind each one of those lights is someone, and we're all just writing the stories of our lives as hard as we can.

Writing

Writing is a lot like sex. Sometimes it's easy, and enjoyable, and better than therapy. Everything flows, and you don't want to stop, can keep going for hours, and it makes you feel good about yourself.

Sometimes it's a struggle, and you're not in the mood, and every little bit of progress is a huge effort. You might need therapy because of it. Things on your mind get in the way, and you feel bad about subjecting other people to it.

Sometimes music helps, and most of the time alcohol is involved.

And the majority of what you'll do in your lifetime probably happens alone.

I don't get it.

So. I don't understand how a country that sells itself as the 'best country in the universe!' can almost shut down three times in a year.

This isn't a judgement, or anything like that. I'm just trying to wrap my head around it.

in my mind, a country that is a contender for 'best country in the world,' should be able to operate without the fear of shutting down a day or a week or a month from now.

In my mind, a country should be willing and able to take care of its citizens, no matter what their income bracket, or sexual partner, of skin colour, or how they spell the word colour.

Otherwise what's the point in having a fucking country? Honestly?

What's the point in having a country that can shut down because one (earning eight times more than the average citizen) member of government throws a hissy fit about some bullshit issue?

Because right now I'm pretty sure the $11,000 I've paid in federal taxes so far this year hasn't been earned by a single member of congress, Democrat or Conservative. I'm pretty sure that the programs I want to keep running have been shut down while the programs I have no taste/interest in have been paid for.

I don't want the government to cut anything, except the bullshit and the lies.

if they cut teachers salaries, they need to cut their own. if they cut people who actually contribute to society (firefighters/teachers/cops/everyone except for politicians) then they have to start cutting themselves. they need to cut subsidies to every single industry except for those involved in alcohol.

Because the only way I feel like things might work out is by drinking copiously. But the problem with that is, if I end up going to hospital for some alcohol induced/related illness, the government (who are partially to blame for my drinking) aren't going to look after me. But they'll look after themselves. They'll make sure that while campaigning against state/govt sponsored healthcare and pensions that they've got that shit.

All I want in this world (apart for a 36' CS Marlin) is for someone who votes republican to explain to me why the fuck they would do something against their own best interests.

Please.

Stephen Perkin

When Stephen asked me about six months ago to be his best man, he told me he didn't want a speech, and I thought great, I don't have anything to prepare. So when I got into town a couple of days ago and he said 'yeah, sure, you can give a speech' I thought 'great, I don't have any time to prepare any embarrassing stories about when he was younger, and maybe got caught in the homes of young women-- not his current young woman-- without his pants on.'

Actually, there aren't any stories about that. Because where we grew up, we didn't wear pants, we wore trousers. So one of these times. . .

Nah, I'm kidding. Maybe he did it to get back at me, because he knows I hate getting up in front of people and talking into a mic, and despite my best efforts growing up-- like getting him to jump out of an upstairs window when we were young-- he still asked me to be his best man.

Best man is a bit of a misnomer. He asked me to be his best man, but my brother is the best man, and we're here today to celebrate his marriage to Melissa, and I need to stop now or I'm going to start crying.

So please, join me in raising your glasses to Stephen and Melissa.

Les Langues

It's invigorating walking around Montreal. Apart from the fact I love to travel to new places, and people watch, it's been four years since I was in a country doesn't just speak English. My brain is more engaged as I walk down the street, eavesdropping on the conversations, and trying to translate them as I go. It's mostly impossible. The last French class I took was 1996. It was taught in Baton Rouge, a name that would imply French, but is in Louisiana. Another French-sounding name. And yes, there's an influence left over there, but it's pretty distant now. The class was taught by a short, squat woman, whose name I can't remember, but she was from Algeria or Tunisia or somewhere. The French I learned there was a repeat of the French I started learning in England. But that repeat was years ago, and over time my French has grown rusty.

This is the first time I've really had to use French in years, then. It's not the French I learned. There's a different accent, different dialect, and it's not as easy to understand, especially when two native speakers are in discussion. But for the most part everyone here is bilingual, and if you try to speak French but are obviously having trouble, they'll switch to English and help you get there. Cuts down on listening to conversations in the street though.

It's tiring. It was a lot like this going to Vorstetten in Germany for dad's sixtieth birthday. No one really spoke English there, so I spent a lot of the time translating for my brother and sister, neither of whom speak German. But at the same time I remember a sense of accomplishment that I could actually converse with someone in their language. It was the first time in my life I've thought in a different language, not had to think about what someone said, translate it in my mind, work out a response, translate that, then reply. It was also the first time in my life I was in a country that spoke a different language (that I had learned) and NOT while I was in school.

This is the second, and I feel the same sense of satisfaction sifting through the years of memories to just exactly what the MRS VAN DER TRAMP verbs were, and remembering enough of them to get by. Don't remember them all, but it shows that those years of school weren't a waste. I've always said that most of what I learned when I was in school I learned outside of the classroom, and I still think that's true, but I guess unbeknownst to me, and despite my best efforts, my teachers were able to force some knowledge into my stubborn brain.

It makes me want to learn a new language. It makes me want to get better at the ones I hack my way through, buggering up the tenses and genders and still managing to communicate. It makes me want to immerse myself, disappear for a while to a place like Vorstetten, where they don't speak English, and use my brain.

Mais je assis ici, sur mon balcon, et je bois une biere, et le semaine prochaine je retourne aux Etats Unis, pour oublie tous que j'ai . . .bugger. Unforgotten. Relearned. Never learned that.

Guess I've got three more days to find out.

Revelation.

you know what growing up is? It's the ability to reevaluate who you are, and what you think and believe and know, and question it.

When you grow up, you believe certain things. Your parents, your teachers, your siblings and classmates and children's teevee presenters, all of them tell you about the way the world works and help form your opinions. As you get older, your feelings about everything ebb and flow. You'll feel stronger about something, and then care less about it next week or month or year. As time goes on, you'll (hopefully) never stop growing, evolving, and adjusting who you are. And we do it unknowingly. you might hate one sort of music, and come to like it over time. You might think a film is shit, but in later viewings recognize it's merits.

You might hate the taste of whisky when you're young-- scratch that, you WILL hate the taste of whisky when you're young. But as you get older, your palate changes. I took twenty years before I took an interest in politics, and about twenty three years before I developed a taste for whisky. Now, I vote and caucus and volunteer for the campaigns I believe in, and I have no problems making friends with a bottle of Dalwhinnie.

So change happens whether we want it to or not, and wether we're conscious of it or not. But growing up, reaching maturity, coming of age, any of those bullshit terms we use as a society to try and justify legal drinking or cheaper car insurance or the maturity to fuck someone, none of that comes because of a specific age. Hell, I'm not old enough to drink, because I enjoy it too much and do it too often for polite society. My car insurance never dropped because of a speeding ticket or two. And the maturity to fuck someone? Show me one person on the planet who has the maturity to do that, taking into consideration all the possible repercussions of that little bit of hedonism, and I'l buy you a drink. Or maybe try and sleep with you.

But that's not the point. The point is, tonight, I really thought about a viewpoint I had, I've had for years, and it changed. It's personal, and it's not world-changing, but it might have the potential to be subtly life-changing. We shall see. But the acknowledgement that I was wrong, and that I'm okay with having been wrong, and want to move on with my new mindset is satisfying. I had an opinion, and I'm not going to excuse it, but it was wrong. And I'm going to go forward, knowing that I can admit that and change my opinion. I'm probably going to be slightly smug about it too, but that's just my way, and baby steps to maturity.

So growing up isn't the ability to change, but it's the ability to recognize those changes in yourself, and accept them, and use them to become the person you should, are meant, to be.

Or maybe I'm saying all this cos I'm just trying to sleep with you.

Noises.

When you own a house (read: when the bank has had your balls in a sling), you get used to certain things. There's the pleasure of coming back to the same place, decorated how you want it (to the best of your budget's abilities). You get used to the creaky stair at the top but one, that you try to step over so as not to disturb the puppy. You get used to the sound of the air conditioning kicking on, to make sure the Vegas summers are mostly liveable. I guess it's mostly about the noise. I'm used to the aforementioned step, and a/c. I'm used to the buzz from the light that the HOA decided, in their infinite wisdom, to mount on the exterior of my bedroom. There's the sliding patio door, the front door, the fridge kicking on, the microwave beep, the dishwasher and washer and dryer.

But then there's the noises you think you hear. My condo is pushing twenty, and it wasn't fantastically built. None of the houses in Vegas are. But it's mine until the bank decides to kick me out or lets me sell it for less than I owe, whichever comes first, and I pay attention to its moods.

The summer I first moved in, I was flush with the excitement of being a first-time homeowner. I'd never planned on buying a house, I saw myself as a more footloose and fancy free type, content to roam the earth like Caine (except without the mysticism and kung fu). Then something snapped inside, and I decided it was time to try being a grown-up. I would accept real responsibilities. I would buy a house! And it was everything I thought, until that summer when I realized what owning a wood-and-plasterboard (I hesitate to use the word) construction meant.

It meant when things broke, I had to fix the damn things or call someone in who could. That summer, my roommate handed me the towel rod from her bathroom. It had fallen out, because the wall was soggy. How the fuck does a wall get soggy? A wall gets soggy when the runoff pipe for your a/c compressor in the attic gets clogged with insulation, causing the water to seep through the ceiling and walls. Not fun, and if it had gone on any longer there would have been major damage. But I spent an hour in the roof, with a saw and a pipe patch kit, and fixed the problem.

Two nights ago (and this is where the noises part comes in), I thought I heard dripping. Jumped out of bed, listened to the wall I thought it was coming from, and panicked. Spent ten minutes in the roof, feeling for water, listening for water, because I was buggered if I was going to let the ceiling collapse this close to moving out. It turned out that nothing was wrong, there was nothing leaking, but owning a house has made me completely paranoid about the slightest little change in noise.

Why am I even writing this? It's a pretty mundane story as far as stories go. It's definitely not as exciting as the train ride through Morocco, or camping out in a Swedish park, or running automation even. I think I'm writing it, because soon I won't be a homeowner. I don't know how long it's going to take, but the condo's on the market, and a lawyer has been hired because the the thing's 'worth' about $140k less than I owe on it. At a time when a lot of my friends are buying houses, starting families, I'm doing the opposite. And I've never written much about owning a house. I've wasted six and a half years of living in my own place and not talked about it as much as I should have. So when I move out and no longer own my own abode, I guess I'll miss the small familiar sounds. I'll miss the first fireplace I tiled myself, and the way I can hear the pigeons that perch on top of the chimney. I'll miss the creaky step, and the buzz of the light. I'll miss the drip of water and the panic of moist drywall.

But I won't miss having to fix the bloody things myself.