You can lead a horticulture...

2002-05-07T17:51:00.000-04:00

Realized it has been a long time since I've written anything, think that is just because things have been kinda "blah" lately. More when something interesting happens, or when I actually think something about something at least somewhat interesting.

2002-04-30T11:16:00.000-04:00

Why is it that someone using the word "gay" to mean "stupid" really gets to me? I'm not terribly politically correct at all really, so it isn't just some conditioned politically correct bullshit, and I'm not gay, so it isn't like it is something personally offensive, and in fact, I don't really have any close gay friends any more (excluding just about every woman I know - who all seem to be bisexual). So what is it about someone using the word "gay" that way that gets to me? It just sounds so juvenile I think. Perhaps I just have memories of elementary school where people were picked on for being "gay" or "queer", even though no one knew what those words meant in the context of homosexuality, or even what homosexuality was. At any rate, I found it really hard to pay attention to the person's point because of her use of the word as a slur, and this is someone who I consider to be a good writer, and pretty thoughful and intelligent too.

2002-04-28T21:27:00.000-04:00

What a strange day. Totally out of the blue, I get a call from Nadine this morning around 11, asking if Wendi and I would like to join her and her boyfriend for brunch in a couple hours. First off, I haven't talked to Nadine all that much in the last couple months, and second, we haven't gotten together and done anything in close to a year, and third, she has a boyfriend? I figure it will be fun though, and Wendi is game, so we iron out the details and then say goodbye to go get ready. I'm really not sure why Nadine and I don't do more stuff together, other than perhaps we've just taken different paths in life since high school, since we do live in the same city, well, on opposite ends of suburban hell from one another really.

But anyway, Wendi and I drive across town to the restuarant for brunch, and we meet Nadine and her boyfriend Bryan ("Bryan with a 'y'," as she introduced him), who seems like a good enough guy, pretty easy going and easy to talk to anyway. Nadine greeted me with a big hug, which means she must be back in one of her phases where she wants physical closeness to me again. I'm really not sure why, but ever since we stopped dating in high school, Nadine has really see-sawed back and forth between how much physical affection she thinks is proper between us as friends. In many ways, I pretty happy we are back on hugging terms though, since her hugs are really comforting sometimes.

So it turns out that Nadine and Bryan have actually been dating for close to six months now, although apparently just in the last couple months have things really gotten "serious" to where they are pretty much living together but in two different places. When his lease is up at the end of the summer, they're thinking that it might be time to move in together. Nadine seems really happy with him, and that is good, as she has dated some real dorks since college it seems. Bryan is a high school science teacher, he teaches geology and other earth science classes, and what I think is really interesting is that in the summer he leads groups of teens on the Appalachian Trail for a program that focuses on ecology and environmentalism while hiking the trail.

So brunch goes well, and we just end up talking and talking for quite awhile after we've eaten, I'm actually surprised because it seems that neither Wendi nor Bryan are really left out of the conversation, with all four of us participating pretty well. After awhile, Nadine suggests we go back to her place since it is close, since we're all having fun and don't really want to split up yet. So we go back to her place, and wow, I'm actually pretty impressed by her house. She bought her townhouse last year, but I had never gotten over to see it before. It was both bigger and nicer than I was expecting, and Nadine has obviously spent a lot of time and money getting it decorated just how she wanted. So we sat around talking for several more hours, played some video games, and then decided we were hungry again, so ordered pizza. After pizza consumption and increasingly competitive (and at this point alcohol-impaired for everyone except for me) video game playing, we finally decided it was time to call it a night.

We all swore it won't be another year before we get together again. Hopefully, this will be true. What a pleasant and entirely unexpected way to spend a Sunday.

2002-04-26T09:23:00.000-04:00

It was a pleasant surprise to talk to Cait last night on the telephone, since usually we just chat online and I think have only talked on the phone on average 2-3 times a year for the last 10 years. We started out talking on irc, but switched to the telephone as the conversation got a bit more weighty. It was mostly just both of us complaining back and forth about our jobs, I'm just bored at mine, and Cait has gotten in trouble recently at hers for screwing up some stuff.

One of the things Cait is going to have to do at work to try to not get in more trouble is cut back on her non-work-related Internet use, and that was especially bumming her out. She's going to have to not update her blog from work, nor chat on irc, nor use IM, which realistically will bum me out too, since talking to her is one of my diversions from boredom at work too.

I should really go to D.C. and go see her sometime, although since I was just on vacation a few weeks ago, will likely have to plan it for Memorial Day weekend at the earliest. Wendi and Cait have only met once or twice and both for short periods, although they seem to get along ok, and I'd sure Wendi would enjoy doing a bit of the tourist thing in D.C.

Oh yeah, something else I learned last night (but much later) - girls in boxer shorts and nothing else - mmmm-mmmm! Or more specifically, Wendi in boxer shorts and nothing else...

2002-04-22T12:01:00.000-04:00

I'm so ready to quit my job. The problem is that I've become accustomed to a certain lifestyle which I can only afford with my paycheck. I could survive for a couple months at least without another job, since I do have a considerable wad of cash saved up, but with such a shitty job market for technical jobs right now, there is the possibility that I could not find another job in time. The fact that I'm pretty much providing for a roof over Wendi's head as well as mine makes it tougher too. I'm not sure when I started feeling like I needed to be the provider, but it seems I've fallen into that role, and I'm not sure how I feel about it, or what to do about it.

After a week off from work, and then another week back and the weekend, it had become apparent that if I stay in this job much longer, I will just explode. A two day weekend is barely enough for me to relax and psyche myself up for Monday morning again. Ok, I should just stop right now, as I'm starting to whine and bitch too much about my life, instead of just taking control of my fate, and I hate that. I am in control of my own destiny, I just need to take some time and get some résumés out, find and respond to interesting job ads, and get things moving.

2002-04-17T17:26:00.000-04:00

Finally heard back from Nina, she is back in the country again. She didn't immediately say much about her trip, other than complaining again about the unreliable Internet access, so I asked a few questions and am hoping that is enough to get her going on about it. She's hoping perhaps we can get together sometime in the next few weeks, either she might be in the area for a bit, or Wendi and I might drive there to see her. Needless to say, no complaints from me about that.

2002-04-15T08:27:00.000-04:00

The other night on the subway on the way out to meet everyone at the bar, Wendi and I were musing about why it is that Nathan cannot seem to find himself a girlfriend lately. He is extemely private about his dating, and it seems that it is because he is a bit frustrated and disappointed by it. Neither Wendi nor I can really understand it, as Nathan had a steady girlfriend, Bridget, for quite a number of years before things fell apart, and Bridget was a total hottie, even if she did have some, er, problems, and before her, Nathan tells stories of dating quite a few interesting women in college. Lately it seems he just can't get a break though, like he is going out on first dates with completely the wrong people. Wendi and I just really can't understand it though, he's young, attractive, successful, and for all his talk of shyness and not being good at meeting people, Nathan is still a hundred times more outgoing and willing to chat up random strangers, and oh so much smoother at it than I am.

But anyway, the point of all this, I think is that Wendi and I wish Nathan the best of luck in finding someone he can connect with. It is obvious that he isn't happy in his present state, and even if he doesn't find someone for a serious long-term relationship, it'd be nice to see him meet someone he can go out with in a casual dating scenario anyway. It just seems like almost everyone else we know is coupling up, and Nathan is still the "single guy" and is starting to resent it. I mean, I don't even try to talk to him about anything to do with dating or relationships any more, since even if he starts the conversation, the limits to what is acceptable conversation in that vein, and what steps over some line into prying into things too personal is impossible to figure out, he is just so touchy about it.

2002-04-13T18:51:00.000-04:00

Soon was perhaps a bit optimistic. One of the things about being gone for several days is that I always have a ton of things to catch up on when I come back. However, I've learned from experience that what that really means is that I need to come back from travelling and still leave myself a couple days to catch up before having to go back to my daily routine. In this case, I have the weekend.

It was good for Wendi and I to get away for awhile, considering everything that has happened for both of us over the course of the last couple months, we really needed the time away. Things were nice and relaxing for pretty much the entire week, although I have to admit I cheated and did login real quick a couple times to check my email when it was convenient.

So I come back only to find out that a bunch of my friends are getting together tonight to go drink beer. Good beer. Really good beer. There is this bar in town that caters to beer snobs and has lots of really good and rare beers from around the world, and Nathan and Aidan are both really into good beer sometimes, along with Wendi who has acquired a taste for some better beers nowadays, and a bunch of other friends who come along too. So we go there with a varying regularity and run up a several hundred dollar bar tab, leave a nice big tip for the (almost universally) cute waitress, and it makes for an enjoyable night out. I don't drink alcohol, so for me the real pleasure is in the fact that I enjoy the company of friends and acquaintances, that the food is exceptional for bar food, that there are usually plenty of cute girls to stare at (both among the waitstaff and other patrons), and that my part of the tab is always cheap with only some food and a soft drink. Needless to say, I'm looking forward to this evening.

2002-04-12T11:16:00.000-04:00

I'm back. More soon.

2002-04-05T16:26:00.000-05:00

On hiatus next week

The blog will be on hiatus next week, which sounds a lot more professional than just saying that I'll be out of town next week and not near a computer much during that time. It is a little unclear when I will be back, possibly as early as Thursday the 11th, although perhaps not until Sunday.

2002-04-05T11:07:00.000-05:00

Just got off the phone with my mother, she is still at her parents' house helping out after my granddad's heart attack. Apparently he is up and around, was making pancakes for everyone for breakfast, and doing as best as can be expected given the circumstances. My mom worries the hardest part for him is going to be getting used to taking it easy a bit more than he used to so as not to cause futher problems. He is almost 86 years old, but still pretty darn active, so it will be tough for him.

I could hear from my mother's voice that being there with her mother and sister hasn't been easy on her. I'd talked to my dad yesterday and apparently my mom has had a few arguments with my aunt there, that my grandmother is being her usual impossible to get along with self, and that my mom has gotten very little sleep under extremely uncomfortable conditions the whole week she has been there. I feel bad for her and wish there was something I could do, I just hope things work out well so that she'll be able to go home next week as planned.

The other reason my mom called besides just wanting to give me a general update was to ask me to go see my dad and take him out to dinner sometime over the weekend if I had time to do so before heading out of town for the week. She says he is getting kinda lonely with her gone, especially since she will still be gone through sometime next week. Since my plans for the weekend and next week are pretty flexible, I'm sure I can go over and get him out of the house at some point.

2002-04-05T09:39:00.000-05:00

I found out why Nina hasn't responded to my email in well over a week. Thankfully, it has nothing to do with her being mad at me like I was starting to think. Instead, it seems she is halfway around the world in a country where she doesn't have reliable Internet access. That was pretty much the entire 2-line email, oh, and that she'll be back in a couple weeks and tell me about it then. I can't wait to hear it, as I'm sure there is an interesting story behind her travels.

2002-04-02T14:26:00.000-05:00

For the past week or so, I've been helping my friend Cait get her blog set up and looking good, and it is finally to a point now where she is happy with things and starting to publicize a bit, so I figured I should mention it too. Go check out lugubrious brooding, although thus far, Cait doesn't seem to be very lugubrious nor doing much brooding. Also, admire my handiwork fixing up the template a bunch (although realistically, you won't notice much, since most of the work involved converting a bunch of ugly HTML to use inline CSS), and the color choices were mostly Cait's, but with some suggestions and guidance from me.

In some senses, Cait is the inspiration for my blog, since the original bits that I wrote here were to be an email to her. She is an old, old friend, but yet we hardly ever see each other in person since we live so far apart. In fact, we never have done a lot together in person since we met online and our friendship is mostly carried out online. We both tend to share things with each other that we would never share with our real life friends, since we share a certain closeness and understanding, but yet too a certain distance, that makes it easier to not worry about the repercussions of our brutal honesty and confessions.

2002-04-02T09:15:00.000-05:00

I realized I haven't heard from Nadine since the day that started this whole thing really, and am wondering if she wasn't embarrassed by things after all. She's been on irc, but hasn't said much, and I haven't talked to her there, via email or on the phone really. I should send her some email and see what's up. Hopefully she's just been busy, after all, it isn't unusual for us not to talk for long periods sometimes.

2002-03-28T21:43:00.000-05:00

It has not been a good late winter / early spring for the elder generations of both Wendi's and my families. First Wendi's grandmother dies, then a few weeks later, her great uncle dies as well. About the same time, my paternal grandmother has a mild stroke and ends up in the hospital, only to develop gout in her foot while there, such that she only has gotten out of the hospital today. Finally, I get a call from my mother today that her father has had a heart attack and is in the hospital now as well. What a completely depressing month and a half it has been. I sincerely hope both my grandmother and grandfather will be ok. It is weird because in many ways, I feel detached from both of them, like I don't really know them that well, and that since both live half way across the country, they are not a part of my daily lives, but yet still, they are my family, and I do care about them deeply, and I only want good things to happen to them.

2002-03-27T10:55:00.000-05:00

In my quest to read and participate in commenting on other blogs, in hopes of getting some people to read and comment on mine, I started reading Ruthie's Top Secret Diary and made a comment on one of her entries about personal ads, and based on that and the follow-on comments, it made me question some things about gender roles in dating and personals.

My initial theory, which is based on personal observation as well as anecdotal evidence from others, is that when personal ads are free to place, but cost money to respond to, everyone writes ads because they are free, but no one responds because of the cost. So you end up with lots of lonely people looking to meet others, and all of them dejected because they get no responses. Yet no one wants to spend money to respond to the ads because no one is quite sure that this whole personals ads route to finding a date really works. A viscious circle?

Anyhow, my follow-on theory is that even in online personals, we are still trapped in roles handed down to us by traditional gender roles in dating rituals. As a man who places a personal ad, I do not expect anyone to respond to my ad, I need to go find ads from women that sound interesting, and pay for the privilege of responding to their ad. A woman who places a personal ad on the other hand, can expect to get responses from men, and might have to weed out the undesirable ones (at least in theory anyway, in reality, it seems women don't necessarily get responses either). In fact, a woman can go a step further, and contact men with a "collect call", initiating contact only if the man agrees to pay for it, and perhaps get a response, yet it seems pretty unlikely that a man could "collect call" a woman and ever hope to get a response.

Why is this? Ok, so it is not exactly an earth-shattering revelation (and it is also not meant as a dig or slam or judgment of you in any way, Ruthie), but is this still just years of gender roles in our society maintaining the status quo? Also, a further curiousity, how does this work in homosexual relationships? Do gays fall into butch / femme roles which dictates their behavior in placing and responding to online personal ads? Or are they blissfully free of gender roles in this instance?

2002-03-26T11:28:00.000-05:00

So communications with Nina continue... I still can't figure out if she is coming on to me though or just being friendly. I guess I am a typical guy that way sometimes, have to hit me over the head with it before I realize a girl is interested in something more than just friendship. From the tone of Nina's messages, it sure seems like something though.

Nina got into her first choice of medical residency programs, which will put her on the other side of the country in just a couple months. In response to my congratulatory message, she invited me to her med school graduation, which is in a city 3 hours away, which is one of the things that led me to believe there might be something more than just simple friendship on her mind. I mean, I wouldn't expect an old friend I was just renewing contact with to make the trip for me... I don't know, maybe I'm just insane. Realistically, I'm still not sure Wendi's real feelings about this whole thing with Nina too. I mean, for all the jokes about the two of us picking up girls, it is still a bit different when it looks like it is a possibility (no matter how distant), as opposed to just an abstract idea for amusement. Guess we'll just have to see how things play out, and if Nina turns up the heat a bit on her flirtatious little messages, I'll turn up the flirt on my responses, and we'll all go from there.

2002-03-21T16:16:00.000-05:00

What a just "blah" week it has been... Wendi's great uncle died at the end of last week, apparently after his younger sister's death (Wendi's grandmother) a couple weeks ago, he just succombed himself. He was well over 90 and Wendi didn't really know him, but Wendi's mother was close to him, and so she and Wendi's stepfather were supposed to come for the funeral this week, and were going to stay a couple extra days with us. Due to timing issues though (they live on the other side of the country) they couldn't get here in time, so what was gearing up to be a week of some stress for me has just turned to a week of ennui.

Not that I'm complaining really, but I just feel the need to get up and do something out of the routine. I just feel like I've been in such a rut lately... it has got to be the job doing it to me. Aidan seems content enough here at work again, but I've noticed Nathan making some noises of dissatisfaction now too, and wonder if he isn't shopping his résumé around a bit now too. I so need to find a new job. I'm still up in the air about just quitting even though I don't have a new job yet, Wendi and I have enough cash to live on for at least 6 months, and I feel like I could devote myself to finding a better job if I could just ditch this one. Such a hard decision to make in the current economic climate and job market though. <sigh>

2002-03-15T18:04:00.000-05:00

So I spent all afternoon ignoring work and reading other blogs. It interests me a great deal to see the relationship people have with their writing, the way in which they put words down in their blog. It seems most people tend to fall into one of two categories - either they write long entries with some real meat every day or less, or they write several very short entries every day, often with little more than links to other web sites. Most of the sites that were interesting to me to read were of the former, though a couple of the latter were at least amusing. I consider it research for my own writing, although with this second self-aware entry today, I'm wondering if my own tone has been influenced by that of all the other people whose writing I've read today in their blogs. I even posted a few comments in random strangers blogs where I felt moved to do so, after all, if I don't post comments in other blogs, how can I expect anyone to post comments in mine?

A few blogs that I found an especially interesting read were Brig's eatonweb and Jen's luckydevil.net. Perhaps it is because of similar interests - gaming and other geekdom with Brig, and music and amusing bits of pop culture and kitsch with Jen - that makes their blogs interesting to me. Also, why is it that I just can't find any blogs written by guys that hold my attention at all?

Oh yeah, and a big thanks to Brig for running the eatonweb portal, which is a lovely listing of blogs (and where I discovered most of the other blogs which kept me occupied this afternoon), especially for fixing things so that my blog would be listed in the directory there.

2002-03-15T10:23:00.000-05:00

Self-aware explanation... readers, are you there?

Ok, so for the most part, I've been trying to format my blog much like the journal I've kept on paper off and on for the past 13 years, that is, personal entries in a very stream-of-consciousness style, without the self-aware meta-entries that so many blogs seem to fall victim to. I had a few of them while I was setting things up with explanations of problems and such, but have since deleted them as they were no longer needed and esepcially superficial since no on was looking at my blog anyway.

Now however, I've actually built up enough entries to be at least a 5 minute read, and have started advertising my blog around a bit, and am seeing a respectible number of hits that are not me checking up on things. No one is really posting any comments however, and so I figured I'd write this little entry to specifically invite people to do so. Even just a comment saying "I read this." would show me that someone was intrigued enough by my writings just to do so, and if you want to say something more, that is great too. I understand it is hard to break that ice and leave a comment for just another stranger with a blog (I mean, nothing in particular makes my blog special from the millions of others out there), but perhaps someone will try.

Finally, a bit about audience. I really write all this stuff for me, except for one of my very close friends who I trust implicitly, none of my other friends know about this site. If there are bits and pieces I want to show someone in particular, I may cut and paste something here into an email to them, but much like my written journals, I don't just go showing the whole thing to everyone I know. So why post a blog at all? Perhaps I've just been feeling detached from real communication, communication unhampered by questions of status, position, professional persona, and so by trying to put my words out here, perhaps I can meet some pseudo-anonymous equals to talk to. Even though the tone of my entries might make it sound like they are very personal and precious to me, and that I am not looking for commentary, I actually am looking to start a dialog, it just seems silly to say something like "So what do you people think?" or to specifically address the tone to an audience other than personal introspection.

So what do you think? Leave a comment, huh? If you have a blog of your own, let me know where and I'll come read it. If just have comments about my blog, let me know. My writing style is perhaps a bit of an acquired taste, if you have comments about style I can take critique there as well.

Self-awareness ends.

2002-03-13T11:45:00.000-05:00

I was over-analyzing everything Nina said on Monday night while driving home from work last night and realized she made several statements that could have been interpreted as more than just friendly comments. As I've said previously, this is probably just me reading more into things because I want them to be true, but it sure seems like Nina's joking comments about her just curling up and falling asleep in front of our fireplace were perhaps only half-joking. Especially with her later comments about hating having to drive all the way back out to her parents house in the outer suburbs where she is staying, then having to be back in the city first thing in the morning.

I am such a dork sometimes.

2002-03-12T14:17:00.000-05:00

So dinner last night with Nina was indeed interesting. She was extremely warm and friendly to both Wendi and I, and in some ways, it was as if she and I had known each other well for years, instead of only really being close over a decade ago and just barely keeping in touch off and on since then. I was actually pretty impressed that Nina and Wendi seemed to genuinely like each other, Nina commented to me privately at a couple points in the evening that she really thought Wendi was cool and that she liked her, and Wendi thought Nina was really cute and appreciated her assertiveness and frank, straightforward manner.

Now I have to admit that at this point, I have these silly delusional fantasies about Nina, Wendi and I all having some sort of long term relationship together. It's all pretty far-fetched, mostly since Wendi has a pretty dim view of polyamorous relationships ever working out long term, and since Nina is likely to be on the other side of the country soon when she starts her medical residency... Not to mention the fact that I am likely just projecting my own thoughts about the whole thing into my perceptions of how Nina might feel about Wendi and/or I. After all, just because someone wants to renew a long but distant friendship doesn't mean they are scoping you out as potential date material. Not to mention the fact that I really don't know how Nina might define her own sexual orientation at this point, just because she had some non-heterosexual relationships in the past doesn't necessarily mean she is into bisexual polyamory. I can dream though, can't I?

I think the thing that impressed me the most about Nina last night was that she still retained all the good qualities that I remember about her from high school, but with a much more mature take on things, none of the silly adolescent weaknesses still remained. Goddammit, I like her, I really, really like her, I want nothing but the best for her, and hope she and I can continue to be friends regardless of anything else.

2002-03-11T17:04:00.000-05:00

So Nina, Wendi and I are going out to dinner here this evening. It should be interesting at least. Wendi is having a minor freakout already, and she says it is because she cannot remember if she took her medicine this morning (and thinks she didn't but is really unsure), but I wonder if it isn't just nerves or something. I mean, I would be nervous if I was meeting one of her ex-boyfriends for dinner, so I think it is perfectly understandable if she is nervous going to dinner with one of my ex-girlfriends. Ah well.

2002-03-04T15:52:00.000-05:00

So I was talking to Wendi on irc and she told me she got email from her cousin Helen saying that she had finally gone ahead and moved out of the house she shared with her husband and into her own apartment. This was a really big step for her, and she apparently had considered doing it for awhile, but never actually worked up the nerve to do it. Wendi and Helen spent quite a few hours talking about the whole situation when they were together last week for their grandmother's funeral apparently.

Helen is almost the same age as Wendi, a little younger, but took a totally different path, marrying her long-time boyfriend from college not too long after graduating. It was a big wedding out in the country, Wendi was one of the bridesmaids, and it was shortly after she and I had started dating, so I was shoe-horned in as her guest well after the guest response deadline. It seems so strange to have it all be falling apart now.

Helen just fell out of love with her husband it seems, and as he was pushing for them to move out of the city and into the suburbs and start having children, she felt it was time to end it apparently. Wendi and I were both secretly rooting for Helen to leave her husband, since neither of us were his biggest fans, but also just because it seemed like he was turning half a century of progress towards more equal roles for men and women balancing family and careers right out the window. Even though he had the more high-powered and high-paying job now, Helen has quite a career of her own, and she gave up a prestigous job when they moved after he got his current job, and she was the one supporting them when he was attending grad school.

I suppose it is also a bit rewarding to see Helen having the courage to at least try going it alone for a bit since it seemed she was doomed to repeat the role her mother played, also stuck in a loveless marriage, raising the child and sticking with her husband for the child's sake. Helen deserves better than that, and I'm glad she is giving a try. Even if she ends up staying married, she at least has taken the initiative to step out on her own and then make the decision, rather than just staying with him out of fear of the unknown.

2002-02-28T15:08:00.000-05:00

So Wendi went to her grandmother's memorial service without me on Tuesday, and surprisingly, it wasn't that big a deal. Her cousin Helen, who is about the same age as Wendi, came without her husband, so I don't think it was seen as a bad thing that I wasn't there. Even Wendi's aunt came without her uncle, and pretty much everyone only stayed the one night before the service and then had to leave again Tuesday afternoon after it. The other possible tension about me not going would have been between Wendi and her mother, but even that was headed off by her telling her mother she needed to go alone to the service and didn't want me to go even.

So since the service on Tuesday, Wendi's mom and stepfather have been staying with us, taking advantage of the fact that they were already here, spending a couple days with her and running around town. It has been fun in a way having the company, but of course I've been at work during the day, so haven't gotten to go out and do much with them, and sometimes after work, I just want to come home to some peace and quiet and relaxation, and that is hard with company. At any rate, it will be back to life as normal tomorrow as they head out first thing in the morning to fly back home.

2002-02-25T17:40:00.000-05:00

So Nina and I have now exchanged a couple pieces of email back and forth over the last week, and I'm still not sure I have things figured out. In the end, I think she must just still have good memories of our friendship in high school, and be seeking to see if we can get to know one another again well enough to be friends again in the present as well. She is going to be back in the area again soon for a couple weeks, so we've decided to try to get together sometime while she is in town.

I did some more snooping around on the web looking for anything relating to Nina, and still couldn't find anything actually personal. I did find a picture of her though, but it was in a professional journal, so not only was she a bit dressed up, but it was also a pretty low quality picture, so while I could tell it was her, I really couldn't make out details to see how she really looks now. Or well, really, how she looked 2 years ago, since even that picture wasn't current.

2002-02-19T11:20:00.000-05:00

So Wendi's grandmother died yesterday.

I'm not really sure how I'm supposed to feel about it, if at all. She had Alzheimer's, and was pretty far gone, so in some ways I think it is a bit of a relief to Wendi and the entire family, but at the same time, she's dead and there's no coming back. I feel like Wendi has been dealing with the loss of her grandmother for the last 3 years or more really, from the time when they first diagnosed her with Alzheimer's as it was beginning to get serious, so in some ways her grief is different than if her grandmother had been perfectly healthy and died in a freak accident or something. The timing is still a bit of a shock to Wendi though I think, as her grandmother had been ill a few weeks ago, but seemed to be on the mend again, and then this.

I'm trying to be supportive of Wendi as much as I can be. I'm not really sure what to say to her about the whole thing, so I've mostly just been listening to her, and being sure to give her extra hugs and kisses to help her feel secure. When my own grandfather died, almost a decade ago now, I strangely felt nothing. I feel like I should have felt something more, some sense of loss or grief, but in the end, I really didn't. I was never too close to my grandfather really, and I think that made it easy to be detached at his death, after all, he was just someone I saw every few years in my childhood, not a day-to-day fixture in my life. Wendi's relationship with her grandmother was totally the opposite though, her grandmother pretty much raised her for several years while her mom was off drunk and on the skids, so I think that makes her death all that much harder to deal with.

I'm still waiting to here what is going to be happening with funeral arrangments, and I'm not looking forward to having the discussion with Wendi about funeral attendance. It is pretty obvious that she will be going, but I'm really hoping I won't have to go. It is pretty selfish of me to say that, but I really just don't want to be there. Even though Wendi and I have been dating almost 5 years now, I've always preferred to keep a bit of distance from some of her family. They are all just so alien to me, much closer than my own family, much more formal in events and functions, and with overwhelming undercurrents of politics and drama. The fact that they also repress themselves totally in dealing with one another is so annoying. I'm not looking forward to the discussion with Wendi about this.

2002-02-18T13:41:00.000-05:00

I was surprised to get email from Nina yesterday afternoon with belated birthday wishes, after not having heard from her in probably a year or two. She is an old friend from high school, we were pretty close for awhile then, dated for a few months, then continued to keep in touch and remain friends until I graduated. After I went off to college we kinda lost touch for awhile, but got together for lunch once what must have been 8 years ago or so, then kept in touch by email off and on since then. I'd just about written off ever hearing from her again though after hearing nothing for awhile.

Nina was pretty wild in high school at time, after we dated, she told stories of her exploits with the entire boys soccer team, and later on when she was in college, she apparently was the president of her university's gay, lesbian and bisexual student organization. Later on, she seemed to be into older guys, she was her (much older) boss's mistress one summer while she was in school. Last I heard from her, she was in medical school about to become a doctor. I'm really kind of interested to talk to her again, as I'm sure she has some interesting stories to tell, and ever better, I'd like to see her again, cuz Nina was always pretty hot, and I'm guessing she still isn't too hard on the eyes.

Now maybe I'm just reading to much into Nina's words, but she said she'd been thinking about me for a couple weeks, and that she'd love to get back in touch. Even if I'm not reading too much into her words, and she just wants to get back in touch with an old friend, it still seems a little odd. I'm just intensely curious as to why she wants to talk again now. I'd actually tried to see if I could find a picture of her or a personal web page online a month or so ago, but I couldn't find anything, and she has a common enough name that just slogging through things to figure which could be her took awhile. Ah well, hopefully she'll write back again soon and we can get to know one another better again, perhaps get together sometime if she is back in the area even. At any rate, I'm intrigued and curious by the whole thing.

2002-02-17T10:54:00.000-05:00

So Nathan's party Friday night turned out to be exactly as I expected, pretty casual and relaxed, not too much excitement. It would have been nice if some more of the people he invited from outside our mutual circle of friends would have showed up, but ah well, such is life. It is just so hard to meet new people these days, probably mostly due to the fact the Wendi and I are pretty much hermits and hardly ever go out except to do stuff with friends, and mostly those outings are not to places where meeting new people might be part of the equation. (Although really, where do you go to meet new people?)

2002-02-15T17:40:00.000-05:00

There is nothing quite as mind-numblingly boring as Friday afternoon at work. Seconds seem to tick by more slowly, minutes stretch as if elastic. The situation is only made worse by the fact that Nathan is throwing a party tonight, and the anticipation of it makes the last hour or so here at work even longer. Wendi is helping Nathan with the party, preparing some anti-Valentine's Day decorations and foodstuffs. The irony of course is that aside from our host, it seems likely that almost everyone attending will already be coupled long-since, and fresh off their smushy Valentine's celebrations from last night.

Ah well, at least Wendi and I had a fight last night, so I can still remain bitter and cynical about the whole Valentine's Day experience. I really do wonder if there is something subconscious that causes that to happen though, since I can recall numerous fights with various girlfriends on February 14th all the way back to high school. Valentine's Day just seems to be a cursed holiday for me, either I'm destined to spend it alone and unhappy, fighting with my partner, or in those rare lucky years, just mellow and not really celebrating.

So I'm not expecting too much from the party tonight, it will likely just be a small and relaxed gathering, with people just hanging out and talking, munching on some nibblies and a healthy bit of drinking. It's a shame that Lolly couldn't make it, since she is known for taking parties into the realm of lotsa nekkidness. But then again, no, it is probably better not to go there, too many people who know each other perhaps a bit too closely for that. At any rate, I just hope Wendi doesn't get as drunk as at the last of Nathan's parties, where I had to practically carry her home on the subway, the whole time quietly coaxing her to keep making forward progress towards home and try to convince her not to keep yelling "No!" loudly enough to attract the attention of passersby. After all, she was in no state to explain the situation that I was really her boyfriend of 4 1/2 years, that we lived together, and that I was taking her home, which could have led to some pretty unpleasant things happening for me.

2002-02-15T15:01:00.000-05:00

Pre-blog tension, part 4 (the end) - lunch

So just one quick further comment for now... I'm eating lunch with the guys as usual, and Lydia comes to join us since none of her usual lunch crowd are around yet. I like Lydia just fine, but it always makes me a little uncomfortable having to sit directly across from her as I always feel like I make a little too much... eye contact, and I don't mean I stare at her face too much! I don't really know her all that well, she is the girlfriend of a former co-worker at a previous job, and she has recently taken a job at our company.

It isn't that I find Lydia all that attactive, because, honestly, she's a bit on the heavy side, even for my tastes, and she's even more of a geek than myself and my usual crowd. There is however, something about her exceedingly large breasts that are hard to keep from staring at. So sitting across from her at lunch, I had to work hard to make sure to make eye contact with her periodically, and to alternate between looking her in the eye, looking at the guys, and looking down at my food. Still hard to keep from looking at her breasts though. Not sure why I have such a problem with Lydia in that regard though, since I am usually very good about making eye contact with women and not talking to their chests.

2002-02-15T14:49:00.000-05:00

Pre-blog tension, part 3

So that put a good start on the morning, although making it through a whole day of work still didn't seem like it was going to be any easier. I got in to work nearly an hour later than usual after taking a long time getting showered and ready and making sure Wendi actually got up and out of bed for a change. Surprisingly, although there were more people in the office for 10 am than usual for the rest of the week, pretty much no one from my group was in. The boss-is-on-vacation factor is alive and well.

Everyone else showed up eventually, glad to see I'm not the only slacker in the group... I'd figured maybe people were just taking the extra day off and making a 4 day weekend out of it.

2002-02-15T14:36:00.000-05:00

Pre-blog tension, part 2

So anyhow, I'm on the computer and as I'm getting ready to surf for some good porn, notice that Nadine is online on irc. Not sure what she is doing awake so early, but after talking to her, realize that she isn't online early, she is on really, really late. So she asks what brings me on so early as well, since I usually don't get on irc until I'm at work in a couple hours. Never one to pull any punches, I tell her my reasons for being on now, and joke that perhaps she can help out the cause. I'm surprised when she says she'll put up her webcam. I mean, Nadine is an ex-girlfriend, and we parted ways pleasantly enough, but she was always the shy one and not terribly adventurous, so either she is just putting me on, or she's in an extremely ... mood.

So it turns out that Nadine isn't joking, as when I pull up the live streaming feed of her cam, she is sitting there topless and smiling. God her breasts are fabulous! Her breasts seem even slightly larger than the last time I've seen them, and they are oh so perfectly round, heavy enough so you can tell they are entirely natural, yet not saggy, and her nipples jutting out what seems to be a mile as usual. I compliment her on her stunning display and she blushes deeply, still a shy girl despite some newfound boldness.

...

2002-02-15T14:30:00.000-05:00

Pre-blog tension, part 1

So I wake up this morning and Wendi is still totally crashed out asleep next to me, probably with a bit of a hangover considering last night. Not such a good start for what is likely to be a long day which will culminate in another night of heavy drinking. Ah well. She has this habit of pushing the covers down while she is sleeping, which annoys me to no end when I'm sleeping, since I like the covers way up over my shoulders at night. The fact that she is a foot shorter than me and likes to sleep down further in the middle of the bed doesn't help the situation either. But the nice benefit in the morning is that I do get a lovely view of her pale white breasts as she continues to sleep in the morning. :-)

Of course, all this does is make me extra horny, since because of her drunkeness last night, we didn't fool around at all before just crashing out asleep. So I get up and head out to the computer and figure I'll find some nice porn to masturbate to this morning. It's funny that Wendi is always amazed that I masturbate at all, and even more funny that she never realizes (or at least never mentions) that I might be doing it in the mornings while she is still asleep. Perhaps now that she is off the meds that made her sex drive plummet, she will not only want to fuck like bunnies again, but also get around to some good old-fashioned masturbation herself. I mean, maybe I'm just weird, but I don't think it is natural for folks to never masturbate.

2002-02-15T14:25:00.000-05:00

A note on the first few posts...

All of this stuff is from earlier this morning... I was writing it up as a long email to a (very close) friend, but decided to just ago ahead and start my blog now with it, since I'd been meaning to start one for awhile now, and since I finally have a good story to get going with... it all starts at like 7 am...