I have written music, and I have written short stories. I look back on the things I made 2, 3 years ago and I wonder how I came up with them. Everything presents itself as an opportunity for analysis. Interestingly, I find it easier to appreciate the works of others now. I actually understand what the philosophers were thinking. I know what music makes people feel like. I comprehend the metaphor or meaning of writings that would have gone completely over my head a few years back. Is that the price for understanding? I lose the capacity for original thought? I'd rather be dead.

But as of a few days ago I've started feeling a little less like a computer, and a little more like a human being. I'm no longer programming for GST. I am on vay-fuckin-cation. I have a chance to sit around and do whatever the hell I want. I can hang out with my musician friends, which is GREAT. I haven't been around anyone who spends time making up tunes in a long while. I forgot what it was like to share a musical idea with someone who actually understood what you were talking about, and has his own ideas to add to it.

Looking back on my journal, system log of my brain, I see that I stopped telling my story and started just barfing up my job. Oh well. That's what happens when you go into a technical job and have no anchor to keep you from turning into a robot. Gotta be careful about that in the future.

There are other things to do. Why didn't I take up vandalism, or maybe rollerblading? Well, it turns out that I feel very alone in this world. No one to talk to. I've got my friends, but as with all humans, they've got their hands full dealing with their own problems. No one, of course, knows whats going on in my head better than I do. So who better to talk to?

This log file is really me talking to myself, out loud, in public. In this place my voice is the loudest and no one can interrupt me. I can change the subject as often and as abruptly as I wish. I can talk about anything I want to.

Someday someone might read this stuff and they might recognize something familiar. Maybe something that they can speak to. They might send mail to that something, and I would be a little less alone.

Ah yes. That was why I do it.

A few stories and a sore butt later, we went outside for a smoke. (Actually, she smoked, I stood around shifting from foot to foot.) Orson joined us; he had been standing in the back of the room, not wanting to disturb the glasses on the seat opposite Javina, he said. I was notified that Ceej was there (with Clarion West) and so was another online journalist. We went back down to talk with them, very briefly. Ceej seems like a very focused person. Focus is something I value most highly. Go Ceej!

Anyway, after that short meeting, Javina, Orson, and I went to a local bar to talk about life, the universe, and the other online journalers. We discussed Elly vs. Gus, and the journals we each read. We spoke about the future and where we'd be headed. (J + O are getting married and stuff, writing books, all sorts of great things. I'm gonna keep doing the same old crap I always do.) They're great folks. I hope we run into each other again someday.

Javina, as announced elsewhere, has terminated her ongoing online outpouring. The phase of her life that included betrayal and bleeding and drugs and despair is over. Thus, the journal it is recorded in will stop growing.

Remember when Tracy Lee stopped updating her stuff? I was pretty bummed about that, and I wasn't even really her friend. Javina would actually correspond every so often, and I sort of feel like... I dunno... she was my friend. Is that presumptuous? It's like a friend is moving away. Yeh, I think that's it...

But she's doing it for the best possible reasons. Talk about your mixed feelings.

Hey! Since I'm on vacation, I can write every single day if I want! And I can write ass-loads of text! This is great!

You want to know where I went today? I went to the wizards of the coast center here in Seattle. They have a gigantic white minotaur over the stairs leading down into the "M:TG" area (you Magic folks probably know what kind of minotaur it is) and they have a battletech center. Jumpsuited staff, steel grille walkways, metallic hoses and revolving lights. It's quite atmospheric. The 'pods' you sit in to play battletech are very dark and contain many, many monitors and buttons. There are also headsets that you can wear while playing to keep in contact with the other players (or in tonight's case, to make stupid jokes and irritate the other players with your stories). My opponents were my friends, a punk guy (with many metal decorations) a goth chick (Callsign: Screaming Harpy) and her boyfriend, and some normal looking guys. (Screaming Herpes!) It was great, once they got the computers all working.