Status update

A quick update among the excitement of moving.

The apartment is set. They received our lease and first month's rent. Now if there was just someone living in the place!

I have several interviews lined up for this week as well as several other prospective employers, some of them in the field I've dreamed of being in for years and years: writing.

I met with a friend who has made it into the biz. He advised me if these writing gigs do not pan out, or even if they do, with so much drive to write and to do it regardless of benefit, I should approach tv stations, radio stations, magazines, newspapers, e-zines, web sites, etc., and tell them I am eager to gain some experience in the business. I already have a full-time job with a nice salary, so I do not need a full time position or any significant compensation. I just want an opportunity to be a part of the business.

Operations like TV stations often run on shoe string budgets, looking for a guy with some talent to walk in and work for free. The only downside is if they take a second look at the guy they've been paying ten grand a year to do the job I'm offering to do for free. :D

Just finished adapting a play based off of Hobbit's short story, Night Watch. We will submit it to this years play festival.

A dear friend and fellow poker fiend just won a satellite into this years WSOP Main Event!!!! Ever since our first time playing poker with him, we have called him Nemesis (or the later developed Nemie-Poo). I am very excited for him. Last year we committed to playing in a WSOP bracelet event in 2008. If we didn't make it, we agreed to cut our balls off. Well, I am grinding out cash games, and he... well, he is playing in the tournament of our dreams with a potential payday of millions of dollars. Geez I am so jealous! Not because he is playing in that tournie... But because he will still have his balls :P

I'm driving to Athens this week to complete an interview for a company that offers such high compensation, I could make the same salary now except work part-time. This would be great. I could use the extra time to return to school part-time ahead of schedule, as well as become involved in any available writing opportunity.

Otherwise, I have to also file for my GA drivers license, GA car title, and GA car tag within the next couple of weeks. I went through a hectic day searching for my passport, birth certificate, and car title, driving to my dad's where my few things are stores, bombing my car open, only to eventually return to Gamemaster's and find them sitting neat and pretty in a box next to my bed. Such is life.

Hobbit and I are more in love than ever. We made some difficult decisions, such as postponing our wedding, that have solidified a new level of trust and intimacy. Seems life is full of decisions that will only work if you take the risk of failing. I've caved in to fear and, most notably, the need to placate, for so long it is a little awe-inspiring to see some dramatic changes happen in my relationships when I realized how dishonest I was and how genuine I could be.

I can't wait to move and check out all 73 bars in the Athens area. That's at least one new bar a week!

Recently we went to TN and saw Eddie Izzard in concert. The man is amazing. We all wondered if he would wear his traditional women's clothing, being a transvestite, but I suppose he is in full Riches mode. Instead, he wore a T-shirt, jeans, and a leather opera coat!!!

Some very exciting times ahead, folks. Wish I could take you with me.

Now I'm exhausted and ready to drink some brandy and plop into bed.

This ends today's stream of consciousness.

Beeeeeeeeep.........

Giving back and Paying it forward

3 months ago I made the difficult decision to either move out or live in an apartment without utilities. Though the caveman lifestyle seemed appealing in its own way (I'm eating a caveman diet, why not go the whole way?), I immediately began my search for a new place to live until Hobbit and I moved to Georgia.

Since then Gamemaster invited me into his home. He already has a family, including the sweetest chow chow I have ever met, a dog named Bear because of his often shaggy hairdoo. Every Sunday Gamemaster shows a new horror movie, sometimes an A-movie, sometimes a B-movie, but more often a film so low in quality you can only sit in amazement until the credits.

Take the film at right for example. Where else would the Son of God return early to vanquish the hordes of vampires overrunning the earth? Where else would he do it in song and dance? Indeed, this film shows Christ making the ultimate sacrifice to save the world in style, and for those of the more zealous among us, he does it within the first 20 minutes.

Since staying here, I've seen Gamemaster and his long-time girlfriend get married. I've seen their daughter learn to walk. I've seen Bear get mauled by some dog in the neighborhood that will certainly die if I can find out which one it was!!!!!

They don't have a lot of space, but I have my own room and feel grateful for his generosity. I have told him thanks and insisted he allow me to do SOMETHING to repay him while I stay here. He told me no, though. Years ago, he had no place to live during high school. He resorted to eating out of garbage cans to survive, sleeping in cold corners, bathing what he could in public bathrooms, living a life many would not consider an option, all the while going to high school, determined to graduate no matter his circumstances. During that time, a teacher found out about his situation, saw his tenacity and rented an apartment for him, gave him some weekly money to live on.

The gesture had a profound effect on Gamemaster. He says as long as someone is willing to take that step to complete the journey on their own, he has no problem giving them a lift on the way. He believes in paying it forward, not necessarily paying it back.

Even his wife insists on this generosity. I offered to do the dishes. She told me to leave them alone, that is her job.

But yesterday, aha! With groceries at an all time high cost, she informed me they were almost out of toilet paper. Not to pass up this opportunity, I bought them the biggest package of TP their house could fit!

Sit back at ease, my temp roomies, the TP is taken care of for now. And at the end of the day, what more could anyone ask for?

Unsigned letters

These are fun! I got the idea from Hobbit.

1) One thing is for sure, the people we were when we met half my life ago aren't the same people we are today. We knew each other for years before we were close. For a time, it seemed you would become a real part of our family. Then that relationship died. You were left a shell of the man that had to many of us seemed unbreakable.

But in the midst of your pain, we started a friendship that has turned you as much into my brother as you ever could be.

You've pushed me to be a better man. You've pushed me to embrace who I am and show it to the world. Without you, I may never have discovered the true sport of all men: karaoke.

Because of you, I recognize I have feelings. That sounds ludicrous when I say it, but I was on the path to becoming a robot consumed with the need for emotional distance. I recognize feelings are neither right or wrong. It is up to us to recognize how we feel and communicate our feelings.

Because of you I value honesty and the ability to express myself. Stop placating people. Just be honest with them and allow them to be honest.

I celebrate that when I shy away from a confrontation, when I hesitate to admit reality, you are an influence I can't ignore. You have taught me honesty and generosity.

Even when you drive me nuts with your need to over analyze and deliberate over several months, I realize I drive you nuts with the same problem. Our ability to agree to disagree, to state our opinions and let the other person decide without the need to manipulate or intimidate each other has motivated me to seek this honesty in all my interactions. You can have a strong personality and be direct without being rude.

You're my brother in every way but blood.

2) All you ever wanted was for us to love you. For years, you couldn't understand why we didn't like you. We couldn't follow a man that wouldn't accept anyone else's opinion. We couldn't be around a man that seemed so fixated on the goodness of his character he could not listen to someone point out what they considered a fault without him turning defensive.

You spoke as though stupefied that one thing could go wrong and it would eradicate all the good things you had done, all the while alienating those who wanted to be close to you as much as you wanted to be close to them. Why were we pointing out your errors? How could those things outshine your generosity? Why weren't we celebrating all the good things you had done? How could you be so vastly misunderstood?

Now, I'm sad to see a person that means so much to you going through similar problems.

But for you? I am proud to be close to you. We've both had to grow up a lot. We've wronged each others in ways that have changed our relationship forever. But today we are close. Today I look forward to seeing you. I look forward to those cushy lunches we have, those deep conversations that you insisted you were not capable of. In many ways, you have grown from the kind of man I wanted nothing to do with into the kind of man I want to be.

Jack Black sings Kiss from a Rose on American Idol!

If you think it gets much better than Jack Black making a guest appearance on American Idol to sing Seal's "Kiss From a Rose," you're right. Just watch this video.