The Internet is Interfering with My Ability to Hide My Head in the Sand.

When the question 'How Are You' can't be answered with a simple word like 'Fine,' it seems the only options are to lie or tell the truth and run the risk of making the questioner feel uncomfortably obligated to listen or worse, ask more questions. Hating both those options, I prefer a third: Temporarily absenting myself thereby avoiding the question altogether. It's in my nature to vanish when things suck, but Facebook and Twitter are making my disappearance more visible than I'd like.

"Hey Kiddo - How ya doing? I haven't seen your' witticisms or rants. Hope you're alright."

"Suddenly worried, due to what seems like an unusual, extended period of schtumness from your good self, that all might not be okay." 

"Hey Luv. Where ya hidin'? XO."

"Hi! Miss you." 


I have lovely friends. I am lucky to have each and everyone of them that is willing to put up with me. I just don't know what to say to them at times like this. When the going gets tough, This Tough goes on Hiatus, into Hiding, and Hybernates in her Invisible Plastic Bubble.

The last time things got rough, The Boy and I moved clear across the country in the middle of the night. We told our jobs, the landlord, and a few close friends then packed the pets and everything that fit in a truck. As world got around the emails and phone calls came with roughly the same question: Why did you leave your support system?

What can I say? I've taken care of myself for so long, I don't know how to use a support system without feeling like a burden. The Boy is my support system. He asked for the job, and I gave it to him. It wasn't easy, but I did it. The Plastic Bubble now stretches just enough to accommodate The Boy, the dog, and the cat, but that's at maximum capacity.

Some time has passed since we got here. I've made new friends and have been coaxed into Social Networks which allow me to keep in touch with those I left behind. And here I am, once again, temporarily avoiding them all because one day it will be easier for me to say the words, "My father died," than to currently say, "My father is dying."

I have a fake Twitter account I use for Trolling. I know it's immature, but when things get really awful, I take my frustration out on idiots who idolize Sarah Palin and Ayn Rand. Just yesterday, I got a Tweet from a kind but complete stranger who follows that account. He wanted to know where I've been and If I'm OK. Oh, for Fuck's Sake. Not even Waldo could stay hidden these days...

☯ Circle of Friends

When I'm by myself

nobody else can say Goodbye.

More Light

"Goethe's final words: more light. Ever since we crawled out of that primordial slime, that's been our unifying cry: more light. 


Sunlight, torchlight, candlelight, neon, incandescent, light to banish the darkness from our caves, to illuminate our roads, the insides of our refrigerators. Big floods for the night games at Soldier's Field, little tiny flashlight for those books we read under the covers when we're supposed to be asleep. 


Light is more than watts and footcandles, light is metaphor. Thy word is a lamp unto my feet. Rage, rage against the dying of the light! Lead, kindly light, amid the encircling gloom, lead thou me on. The night is dark and I am far from home, lead thou me on. Arise, shine, for thy light has come. 


Light is knowledge, light is life, light is light." - Chris Stephens/Northern Exposure

☯ Ebudae

Lead thou me on.

Joni Mitchell Never Lies.

☯ The River

I wish I had a river

 I could skate away on.

When Life Gives You Lemons Give Them Back, Moocher - Ayn Rand

You purchase a car and on the day it's ready for you, the dealership hands you a Transit Pass and tells you you can choose whichever mode of transportation best suits you - bus, train, cab - your choice. You tell them that what suits you is what you've paid a lot of fucking money for, and you want your fucking car, right fucking now. The dealership tells you the Transit Pass is really the best thing for you, and while you stand there demanding what is rightfully yours, a nearby group of toothless, inbred morons tell you you're asking for a handout. The dealership knows the Transit Pass gives smart people the full body sensation of Not Fucking Tempting At All, but the toothless inbreds are stupid enough to not realize they've spent years sucking dick for bus fare and will end up walking home.

Maybe this is a bad analogy.

You spend almost thirty years working your ass off and paying taxes with the knowledge that one of the things your tax dollars are going towards is health care for when you are older. But before you can collect it some punk that looks like Eric Cantor, Paul Ryan, or some other Metrosexual Douchebag tells you that when your time comes, all the money you've been spending will not lead to guaranteed health care, but a useless fucking voucher that you can spend on any insurance company you want as long as that voucher can afford it.

Fuck a bunch of that. I want what I've been paying for, and it's not a fucking voucher. It's also not a Handout. Know why? Because I've already spent my fucking money on it. It's fucking mine.

If you're already shaking your head No, you are either really rich or really brainwashed, and if you're very young and saying No, I assure you you haven't been paying taxes long enough to have earned anything yet so piss off, but before you do, we have a little business You and I.

Let me lay this out for you: You don't want any of your paychecks to go towards Medicare and Social Security? Fine. But I've spent the last few decades paying for your parents' or grandparents' health care and you, my child, owe me. That's right, your loved ones have been taking the very same Handout you're whining about from each and every one of my paychecks, and if you're not going to pay into government health care when it's my turn, I want you to pay me back everything I spent on your family. I will take it in the form of government health care or cash. Don't say No unless you're willing to admit you come from a family of moochers.

And if you are one of those Ayn Rand fanatics, I've got some news for you. She was on Welfare, Social Security, and Medicare, and worshiping her character John Galt is about as valid as idolizing Lord Voldemort except Voldemort lasted longer out there. He had servants.

You should go now, I see they've set out another cup of tea for you. Drink it all. Sometimes the poison's at the bottom...


☯ Bitchin Camaro

You are the result of 4 billion years of evolutionary success.

Fucking act like it.

My 'Go To' Warm, Happy Place.

I'm standing in line waiting for a coffee and glance outside. There is a man leaning against a bike rack talking on a cell phone with one hand and casually petting his dog with his other. He finishes his conversation, gives the grateful thing his full attention and a final bit of love, and runs into a nearby store.

Moments later I see the dog excitedly jumping around as he spots something - a man he clearly knows is approaching him. As this second man unties the dog from the bike stand through frantic kisses to his face, I realize this is the dog's actual owner. They walk away, and he has no idea that a good samaritan loved his dog for a few minutes, but I'm glad I witnessed it.

☯ Somersault

You feed other people's parking meters.

I'm Unfriending Kansas.

As if I didn't have enough things to worry about and deal with in my own personal life, I have to read that Kansas Rep. Pete DeGraaf thinks that being impregnated during rape is like getting a flat tire. Really, Kansas? You voted for this guy? Fuck a bunch of that. I have no choice but to have less respect for you than I already did.

Last week Kansas approved a ban on insurance companies offering abortion coverage as part of their general health plans. When discussing whether or not rape pregnancies should be covered DeGraaf's response was, "We do need to plan ahead, don't we, in life?... I have a spare tire on my car ... I also have life insurance... I have a lot of things that I plan ahead for."

My email to him was a lot more civilized than the thoughts running through my head: That someone in office should have the compassion and intelligence to understand that rape can't be fixed like a flat tire, that a pregnancy resulting from rape can't be prepared for the way one keeps a spare tire handy, and that a politician who believes it can should be anally raped and infected with herpes and HIV then asked how his spare tire worked out. That would be justice for all the women he just screwed.


DeGraaf's Web site
His office number 785-296-7693
His home phone as 316-777-0715
Home address 1545 E. 119th St. Mulvane, KS
His e-mail pete.degraaf@house.ks.gov

☯ Nimrod's Son

You are the result of 4 billion years of evolutionary success.

Fucking act like it.

Frontier Psychiatrist Sample Breakdown

I am blown away by the work that went into the creation of this song, but having just found this Youtube video that breaks down all the samples, I'm not sure who is more impressive -  The Avalanches or Rickydown...

☯ Frontier Psychiatrist

A sculptor is a person who is interested in the shape of things,

a poet in words,

a musician by sounds.