February 17, 2002

I had only mentioned the falling in love with your best friend node to him and he knew what I was talking about. Unfortunately, I hadn't seen her, not for a while. While we live fairly close we never see each other. We did talk today though.

She's got a lot of stuff to worry about. Nothing has ever been easy for her. Suffice to say that anyone she has ever trusted let her down and Murphy's Law has always been in effect for her life. That's where I usually come in. She and I have shared much of our struggles. The saying "Shared pain is half pain, shared joy is double joy" was never far from my thoughts. She told me about her boyfriend, how they were going to get married, and how they eventually broke up. She told me about how great she was going to be in computer science, how much she hated it, and how business was a better route. She told me about her health problems, and about the funiture in her new apartment.

When we talked today part of my mind wondered off into my own little world. It was a world in which the ideas, feelings, and emotions from the past all mix in where time has no meaning. The feelings I had for her years ago assimilate with the feelings I have now. Years ago, I was a teenager who wanted a girlfriend that never was. Now she could be so much more than just a girlfriend.

In the end all he said was "Yeah." He knew how I felt. He knew what I was thinking. My only wish is that I knew what she was thinking.

"Yeah"

All gone

As I node this, I am drunk. I have just recently accidentally wiped my data hard drive, due to an error in how the IDE connection was set up.

All I wanted to do was migrate my Windows-side OS back to 98 from XP (worst OS ever!). Had to reformat back from an NTFS file system to FAT32, and so help me, the jumpers were wrong. Everything else was perfect - there were three hard drives in at the time, and I mis-set the jumpers on one of them.

Everything important had a backup, of course. But all my little foofy things, my sounds, my pictures, my decorations are gone. It's like running out of a burning house, thankful that you've saved the family pictures, knowing that your insurance documents are in the fireproof safe, but mourning the wallpaper will soon be ashes, the bookshelves you found at that estate sale will feed the flames, that the memories you made will just have to be repainted.

It could be worse.

I could be on fire.

In the end, what I have lost is time, time that will never return to me. But I guess I had better damn well get started.

Love is like a penny
If you give it away
You give it away
You give it away
Love is like a penny
If you give it away
It comes right back to you.

It's just like a magic penny,
Hold it tight and you don't have any.
Roll it up,
Hold it up,
Or give it away,
It comes right back to you.

The above is a song from my childhood. At first it seems like it's about the virtues of being free with one's love. I have just learned, with Life as my ever-vigilant teacher, that it is really about detachment.

Money has been woefully tight lately. I do not say that lightly. The last three paychecks have not been enough to hold me over until the next. I always seem to come up about 4 days to a week short of funds, wondering exactly how I'm going to afford to eat, put gas in my car or pay rent. But somehow, in the most amazing ways, things come up where money seems to fall in my lap. Of course, I have to earn the extra dough (I do have my principles), but the odd jobs are relatively easy and actually involved things I'm good at.

The paycheck before last it was a minor website update ($75) that swayed the tide. Last paycheck it was clearing a computer virus off a friend's system ($50). Both instances were just enough money to keep me afloat until the next paycheck came along.

This morning, at about 3:30 AM, I stopped by an ATM and learned that my bank account was once again empty- and I had only $5 on me, which was just enough to buy me breakfast, get me a pack of smokes and buy me a 99-cent Big'N'Tasty from McDonalds. By the time I got off work tonight, I had 10 cents in my pocket and I was curious as to how I was going to eat until Wednesday- nevermind cigarettes. For some reason, though, I wasn't worried... just curious. I had divested myself of all concern. Something would come up. Somehow.

So, I clocked out of work and decided to go to the cafe and visit with my friends, whom I haven't seen in a few days. When I got there and meandered into the smoking room, I saw that someone had left behind today's newspaper. The crossword was untouched as well as the CryptoQuote. It's the small pleasures in life that keep us going. I strolled up to the bar, ready to ask if I could open a tab until Wednesday. Ginny, the bartender, didn't look happy. As a matter of fact, she looked downright sullen. I'm a regular there. I see these people almost every day. I know them all by name and consider them to be friends, and make no mistake, we hang out and chat from time to time, so the feeling is mutual. "What's wrong, Ginny?" I asked.

Her face soured. "It's going to be hell night at the cafe. I just got word that our dishwasher won't be coming in, one of our cooks is sick, our busser just sliced her finger to the bone and is limited in what she can do, I just sent the other bartender home because she's worked 40 hours in three days... and it's a Saturday. It's going to suck ass."

I took exactly five seconds to think about it. These people have helped me out in times of need more than I count. They've been accomodating, patient and kind when I needed it most. I would be remiss in my duties as an honorable man to not offer assistance. "How can I help?" I asked.

Ginny looked up at me with a glint of surprise in her eyes. "What?"

"How can I help?" I repeated. "Cafe Coco is practically my second home. You guys are always good to me and you're my friends. I don't like seeing my friends suffer a hard time if I can avoid it. You need help. What can I do?"

Cory, the busser, joined Ginny's side as she wrapped her ruinded index finger with tape. She'd heard my offer. "I think I can do some bussing," she told Ginny, "but washing dishes is impossible with my finger like this. I'm afraid to get it wet."

"Say no more," I told them. "And if you need help bussing tables, lemme know." I took off my trench coat and sweater. I was now clad in my cargo pants and a tank top, ready to work. I had worked all day last night until 3 AM and all day today. My feet were killing me and I was tired. But I paid it no mind. After all, I would have spent the next few hours at the cafe anyway. The only difference now would be that I was going to be productive at the cafe. Get the ol' blood pumping.

Ginny poured me a cup of coffee and handed it to me. "On the house," she said. "You look tired as hell. Drink up. When you're done, I'll give you the grand tour of the kitchen and dishwashing area. Thank you, Jay."

I accepted the free cup o' joe and smiled. "It's all about the karma, baby." I went back to the smoking room, dithered with the unused crossword I had found just minutes before, completed it and finished the coffee. When I was done, I went back to the bar and reported for duty. "Let's do this."

It was bound to happen, really. I mean, after hanging out there for nearly 5 years, it would just have to come up that I would throw in my lot and help out. It's, like, the way things go. When you fit in at a place, it's just normal that you should rise to the occasion from time to time. So, I went back, filled the sinks and began washing. I started at 7:30 PM. I got done with the first round of dishes (of which there were a lot) at around 9. Gleb, the Russian immigrant who washes dishes during the week, came in just to hang about. He poked his head into the washing area, recognized me and said in a thick Russian accent and broken English, "You not work here. You wash? For why?"

I smiled. "The cafe is short staffed. I'm helping out."

This seemed to surprise him to no end. "You pay?" I took it to mean, "Are you getting paid?"

I thought about it a bit. "You know, that never came up. I didn't ask. If I do, then great. If not," I shrugged, "no big deal."

Gleb didn't miss a beat. "I help. I wash. You bus. Da?"

I nodded and smiled. "Spasebah." It's one of the few Russian words I know. And handed the dishes over to him gladly. In all honesty, I hate doing dishes. But I will do them in a heartbeat if it means that I can be of service to my friends.

I wound up bussing by myself until 11:30 and Cory ran orders. Bussing is something I know how to do very well, having done it for a few months at TGI Fridays. It was no sweat at all. I got to sit on the stairwell and smoke cigarettes when there wasn't anything to bus and make idle banter with the other regulars.

When it was time for the shift change and all the graveyard shift crew came in, I was free to go. I took the second cup of coffee that Ginny had given me when I started (which I still hadn't finished off) and sat in the smoking room to relax my feet. A few minutes later, Ginny came up to me. "Here's $10 cash, two packs of your brand of cigarettes and twenty dollars in Chuck Bucks," she said, shoving the items into my hand. Chuck Bucks are, basically, gift certificates that can only be used at the cafe, named after the cafe's owner Chuck Cinelli. Ginny hugged me. "Thank you for all your help. You were a Godsend."

I blushed. "I really didn't do all that much," I protested. "Bussed a few tables, did a few dishes. Certainly nothing to warrant this much." I felt this to be 100% true.

Ginny shook her head adamantly. "You were the difference between having a shitty night at work and running around like crazy to catch up in comparison to having things go smoothly. You were a bigger help than you think. Thank you. You rock."

Well, what could I say to that other than, "Thank you for the compliment. If ever you need help, just lemme know. Payment isn't necessary. I am here to serve."

Ginny patted me on the shoulder and smiled sweetly. "I know. You deserve more than what I gave you, in my honest opinion, but I hope this will help you."

Then I was reminded of my financial dire straights. I used the thing that passes for a calculator in my head to tabulate just how far two packs of smokes and, effectively, $30 would carry me. Sure enough, holding out 'till Wednesday would now no longer be a problem. I could eat at the cafe and buy my coffee with the Chuck Bucks. The $10 can pay for my lunch breaks- more 99-cent meals from fast food joints, but not really any different than what I expected.

Moral of the story? I could have just gone home after work, sad and depressed over my financial woes. Instead, I chose to be amongst my friends and took the opportunity to help others selflessly- with no thought of recompense. I was detached from my situation and willing to just... let it go, and trust in that age-old mantra of the Pilgrims, "Providence will provide."

...if you give it away, it comes right back to you....

Woke up with a slight buzzing in the head, a mild hangover.
Flashback: last night, pub, 6 pints, taxi....

Decided to spend the day doing absolutely nothing. Nothing. Watched American Psycho, quite impressed but the book was better. Have to sort out something to eat for lunch/dinner. Cup of tea will be fine for now.

Currently reading: I will fear no Evil by Robert A. Heinlein.

Today's WU(s): Spoiler effect, arse of the day*, hyperinflation, macroeconomics, scarcity, Jean-Baptiste Say, minesweeper

Regards.

* - ack! just got nuked...

I don't Daylog but I'm Daylogging. To americanise, this sucks. Some might know I've been feeling uneasy about some of the editorial nukes being bandied about. I've certainly had many nodes nuked, most justifiably.

I've had an entire experiment nuked from orbit, after some editor didn't get it.

I've had a set of quite neat-o nodes about 163 nuked; nobody in their right mind would want to read 163, but exp(sqrt(pi*163)), and various subexpressions, might pull someone in. So fewer people will know about a fairly amazing property of this number. Big deal. Editors don't have to like the ways I try to advertise neat facts, and they're called "editors" for a reason.

Some of my writeups (cough... windows error message haiku... cough) were meant to get nuked... along with the annoyance which had prompted them. I never did write enough Magic: The Gathering writeups to get rid of another annoyance, though; if you'd like to start, note that ``Everything needs facts. / Not Magic: The Gathering! / Wisdom not on cards.'' slashes added in accordance with E2's Irony Free Zone ordinances.

Now we've reached the next stage: Editors nuking what they do not understand. Case in point (and yes, this is what prompted this rant): What the hell is an assault monkey?

For all the monkey node control advocates throw around, they still haven't explained to me exactly what an "assault monkey" is. Is it some fictional type of marmoset that is specially meant for assaulting people? Or is it lemurs that are deadlier than others? Do they spit soy out faster than others? Or what?

It might seem a bit less weird if you examine the top-second softlink on that node: what the hell is an assault weapon?. Almost any user who's been here for a while will know about DMan rants; a few times I actually took him seriously enough to make fun of him (and to be made fun of, you have to be taken seriously, or it's not funny).

E2 still has its monkey node problem (although it is getting better). And it certainly has its share of monkey node control advocates, as well as members of the NMA (Noder's Monkey Association). Still, the debate is perhaps a bit less weighty than the debate over the right of a few psychopathic whackos^W^W^W^Wthe people to bear arms. Maybe a chance to translate arguments over, and separate logic from passion?

Evidently not. On E2 you can be serious. It really helps if you're serious about your teen angst, but noding lyrics for all songs of the 75 most important bands of the third quarter of 1987 will also do. Or you could even do something technical. Just remember to pretend you're writing for illiterate idiots who have no ability to comprehend irony.

DON'T MAKE SHIT UP! I did not invent that node, it really exists. And it's dead serious (yes, that node's author and I differ on the matter, which is OK, as long as it doesn't become policy). Ever seen a writeup end in the abbreviation "TWAJS"? What's next? A small Javascript window which will say "LAUGH" and "UPVOTE" when we should, just like in a TV studio? Everything is not a TV set, but it is fast becoming one.

Forget about using irony to make your point. E2 is an irony free zone. Somebody might not get your point!

When I don't get a writeup's point, I downvote it. I don't mind if people do the same to my writeups: a vote is an expression of personal opinion. I might think nasty things about their reading habits, just like they might think nasty things about my writing habits. I can wish that they looked into the context, but I cannot demand it. This is good.

When some editors don't get a writeup's point, they nuke it. I do mind when people do that. Nuking is not an expression of personal opinion, it is an expression of editorial control over what we'd like to see in the database. So I can demand that they look into the context.

I still think my writeup was a good, honest expression of two points of view on two debates. And I'm very sure I have to take a long, hard look at what I want to achieve on E2 today, and whether I can do that.

There is a difference between living and existing. I only exist. I am dead inside. I just go through the motions each and every day.

It's hard to tell sometimes who is really alive and who just exists. They look just alike. We're all alive in the medical sense of the word, but some of us died long ago, or at least part of us did.

Those of us who merely exist still breathe, still consume food, our bodies work just as yours. Our minds are different though. The physical body is "normal" the spiritual body, or soul, is very very different. I won't say that those who merely exist don't have a soul, we do, it's just empty. Our spirit weighs much more than those of people who live. Sometimes people who only exist seek psychiatric help. The doctors call this depression. It's much more than that though. When I was just depressed I wasn't dead. I'm dead now.

I'm excited, but also annoyed by all the actual work of moving. It's been almost 6 years since I've moved. The longer you stay put, the harder it is to go. I've wanted to move for about 3 years now. But the work was too good, the girlfriend didn't want to go, etc. etc. And she still doesn't. We're going to try the long-distance thing for awhile. We both need the space anyway. We've done it before, lived even further apart before - Ann Arbor and South Carolina, Iowa and Philadelphia, Los Angeles and Seattle. We've bounced around the country relatively independantly of each other, till we settled here in SF for the last few years.

But even when I first got here, I knew I didn't want to stay in the Bay Area forever, contrary to a lot of young hip people who arrive here. So many of them think San Francisco is the best place in the Universe, the most beautiful, the most cool, etc etc. I think it may have something to do with a lack of experience to compare it to. If you live in Boondock, Ohio all your life and then go straight to Bagdad by the Bay, of course it's going to seem like a hipster heaven. But I've lived in many places and a few them have been pretty great. I think Ann Arbor and Austin are easily as "cool" as San Francisco, so when I got here I wasn't blown away like many people, I already had some referent for this. SF is just yet another of the small number of enclaves in America where some semblance of alternative living and indepenant thinking can happen. But it sure as hell ain't the end-all be-all Mecca that lots of residents think it is. Now that I've been to Sydney, I don't even think SF is the most beautiful city.

So anyway, I am so over San Francisco. And I'm excited about Portland. It's funny getting the variety of reactions from my friends here. Some of them I've been griping about this place for years to, and mentioning my like of Portland. But even amongst those that weren't prepared, some are totally not suprised. Some are even thinking about moving to Portland too. Some others are wanting to move elsewhere. It's sad the way the city is emptying out, but for the most part the city did it to us. The crooked politics and NIMBYs which made the city unable or unwilling to properly deal with the internet boom, and the even longer history of provincialism and elitism all add up to the transformation of this once great bastion of counterculture into a place that is ultimately just hostile to artists, slackers, free-thinkers, and the poor.

hmm. I didn't really plan on this being a rant about San Francisco. sorry. My original goal was just to describe my last few hectic days, packing, painting, transferring utilities and dsl lines and blah blah blah. And amidst all of this, interestingly, I'm trying to finish a really great book loaned to me by a friend, which is the newest work of his former philosophy professor, Mark C. Taylor. When I finish it, I'll try to do a node on it. It's called The Moment of Complexity: Emerging Network Culture, and I think the Slashdot/E2/hacker/otaku crowd would really get a lot out of it. It's a fascinating theory of just about everything, and really is a good read, though it's hard to concentrate on it when I'm supposed to be filling boxes up with all my worldly possesions.

Anyway, my next writeup will probably be written from Portland. If you live there, /msg me....

sleep deprivation breeds unorthodox thought patterns that might be productive were they not so incoherent. Someone just offered to take over my shift so I can go to bed, and I said "no, thank you"- what the hell is up with that? I must be totally out to lunch today.

I am a security guard one day a week at my university. What really sucks is that there's a kind of clique of campus cops who are really into what they do, for some lame reason.
I mean, it's not like that's their career; they're students with a part time job! Fuck, the "chief" hands out our paycheques rocking an RCMP baseball hat; one of his toadies calls the campus cops "strike force kings" and he acts all militaristic when he has to deal with people on the job. They're into it so much.

I'm so glad this is only one day a week.

on a bright note, I played a show last night (see sleep deprivationabove), and it went pretty well. For any Haligonians that might be reading this or may have even been there, it was in Hell's Kitchen at the Marquee Club. It went off pretty well, and aside from having a good time, I'm probably going to get paid to boot! Not a bad situation, if you ask me.

The faculty strike is probably going to start next wednesday...this should be interesting

Saturday I woke up, and headed to the computer lab to work on a data structures project. Yay, programming. I was getting really frustrated because my compiler was convinced that b==r, I couldn't stand it, and I went over to a friend's house. The friend who I made a pact with, that if things ever started to head in a "more than just friends direction" we would put a stop to it, put some space between us, whatever.

It didn't work, the pact was broken. I could have stopped things when I realized they were going where they shouldn't be, but I was having fun torturing the boy with my presence. I'm evil, I know. I almost feel bad about this, when I saw how guilty he was later...knowing that I could have stopped, but didn't for my own sadistic pleasure.

But it's not like he didn't deserve it. At least he realizes that I deserve better.

My best friend left on thursday, apparently never to return.

I feel inclined to write about it, because it's not alright. She wasn't susposed to leave. We were companions for two years, friends for 6 years, and romantic for two months. If anything went wrong, she told me she'd still be my friend.

I am in Vermont, she is in Connecticut. We couldn't see each other very often. We talked for hours and hours, until very very late at night online. What we did was to build our own philosophy. We were going to figure the world out, we wanted the truth to be known. We were both aware of an ability we had to extend our wills into the world, and control things by force. Neither of us knew what to do about it. We were both alone, with incredeble isolation. She said she could never trust anyone. I wanted to help her learn to live in the world. I don't know why.

She was having troubles with her Mom last summer, so I offered her a place to stay. She lived with me for a week, and there didn't seem to be anything wrong. I decided to kiss her. She went along with it.

She used to write, she was an angst writer. She wrote poems that rhymed and fit poetic verse, and she would send them to me in emails. I sent her some of mine, too. After we kissed at my house, she had stopped writing. She started to be increasingly interested in computers. We no longer talked in the same way, I don't know why. One day I said I would need to leave her sometime, and she became very mad at me. She didn't tell me she was mad for many weeks after I said this, and in the mean time I was ignored. This wasn't something I had seen from her before. I saw her shortly after in person and we got back together. I told her we needed to take care of each other, and that the things that were best for me were best for her, and vice versa, and what was bad for her was bad for me, and what hurt her hurt me, and vice versa. This isn't anything she had heard before. We felt we had gotten over the hump. We understood now. We were going to be able to fix things.

I ended up with her in Bristol, Connecticut on New Years, this year, with some hacker friends of hers. I liked them, and I got along with them. But she said I freaked out, because I couldn't understand her out of the context I already knew her. I knew she was afraid because her skin was suddenly slightly colder. I was afraid, too, but I didn't say anything. I trusted her to tell me if things went wrong.

We lasted about a month after that night, as it is the beginning of Febuary now. I wrote her an email saying I was only taking time getting used to how things had improved with us, and that I'd get used to it eventually. She wrote back and said that she understood, and she told me she had reached the bottom of her barrel. I asked what this meant, and she didn't write me back for a long time. I wrote another email saying she shouldn't write me if she doesn't have anything to say. The next time I talked to her, she told me she would have to leave, and she couldn't give me any reason that made any sense.

I'm not sad about this. Don't /msg me with your sympathies. It's just that she wasn't susposed to leave, and she did. Countless other people have left me, in life, and none of them have been able to give a reason why. I had given up, but then after two years I came to trust Her. Things aren't susposed to end like this.