esoteric soccer practice

 right now I'm picking kale out of my teeth

I benched 195 today! hooray for me! Now I'm a person who has done that. 

Tomorrow I'm going to coach at a climbing competition in Lynchburg. My goal for the team is that our climbers get good experience at climbing on ropes in a competition. John Cleese said, "you can't be creative if you're worried about making mistakes." Or something like that. Just do stuff. People who are comfortable with things. Why are they comfortable? Cuz they've just done a lot of stuff. 

I'm most proud of times when I put myself out there and took chances. And I have a lot of respect and admiration for people who do the same thing. It's hard! It's not something I feel like I do very often. 

And now, here's something I wrote in 2018 from this day

February 2018 was when I was in my phase of making ads for Charlottesville and I made this

I made like 30 of these things. Should I make more?

you can't put your clear coat on too thick

 I've been painting something for a friend at the gym and I finished today and all I had to do was put on a layer of clear coat and as the title of this post suggests I unknowingly put on way too thick of a layer and that causes CRINKLING

a bunch of little crinkly wrinkles all over my beautiful work. dang. dang dang dang.

So I sanded it down as best as I could and managed to salvage it somewhat without having to start over. 

I love being open to making mistakes but I HATE making mistakes. It's just the worst.

Energy levels were lower today after doing so much yesterday. Also at like 4 or 5 in the morning I woke up to this distant beeping, like it sounded like a big truck back-up beep and it went on for so long but I was kinda half-asleep half-awake so I kept getting confused about what it was.

Because of today I'm the kind of person who now knows what happens when you put clear coat on too thick. It's not every day that you become a whole new kind of person. But maybe it could be. Maybe I'll see how many days in a row I can go where I become a whole new person.

Today I became a clear coat guy. Super expert. Clinical mastery.

Tomorrow? Maybe tomorrow I'll say sorry to someone for something I've never apologized for. The possibilities are endless.

I ran today! and some facts about cheese

 Met with my friend Meghan who was feeling sick but we ran about 3 miles going downtown and back. It was nice!

I also went on a nice walk with my other friend to get Bodo's and coffee and be in the sunshine! It was great.

Did you know I love the sun?

Did you know I love when it's warm?

Did you know?! Were you AWARE?! Has this parcel of information found purchase in your consciousness that I prefer the seasons where the temperature is higher over the seasons of a colder temperature?

Something I learned today is this: MUENSTER cheese. With an 'e' is an American-made cheese from the 1800's that is based on the French MUNSTER cheese (no 'e'). 

Munster cheese, cheese from a town in the Alsace region of France called Munster traces back to 1371. 

And that town, Munster, is different than the German city of Münster (with an umlaut over the u).

And so if you absorb all this information you can be really insufferable whenever anyone talks about Muenster cheese.

Also this part of the history of German city Münster and I really enjoyed it

In 1534, an apocalyptic Anabaptist sect, led by John of Leiden, took power in the Münster rebellion and founded a democratic proto-socialistic state. They claimed all property, burned all books except the Bible, and called it the "New Jerusalem". John of Leiden believed he would lead the elect from Münster to capture the entire world and purify it of evil with the sword in preparation for the Second Coming of Christ and the beginning of the Millennium. They went so far as to require all citizens to be naked as preparation for the Second Coming. However, the town was recaptured in 1535; the Anabaptists were tortured to death and their corpses were exhibited in metal baskets, which can still be seen hanging from the tower of St. Lambert's Church.

People were just DOING STUFF back then.

I like humans doing human things

today I finished coaching and then I clocked out and then I sat behind the front desk and people came in and out of the gym and different groups would form and have little conversations and then leave and it was so great.

A little space for people to gather and discuss. Incredible.

everybody says they love good rapport

everybody says they hate small talk and prefer to have deep conversations or be able to riff with someone or pick on someone or have inside jokes, right? Everybody says that. Because those things suggest trust and understanding and intimacy and that's like a basic social need.

It's like saying, 'oh I prefer food that tastes good and is my preference instead of food that is bad and I'm allergic to." 

But my rapport is better, okay? I remember details. You will not have to tell me the same story twice. I'll bring up relevant information if it comes up again. Also, if you share an interesting story I won't just automatically share a story of my own that it reminds me of. I'll ask questions. I'll use active listening. I'm not just waiting for my turn to speak. 

I'm an easy laugh. Some might say too easy. I don't care. Laughter is a beautiful thing. It's like salt or eggs. There's no limits. More is more is better.

What else? Bits? Jokes? Listen, I am a professional. I have built my livelihood on jokes and bits. Am I a comedian? No. But I did do stand-up in college and I was decent. When you work with kids and especially at a camp if you don't have jokes and bits you are dead in the water. If my jokes stop hitting I'm gonna end up on the streets and I wouldn't have it any other way. 

Finally, I have a liberal arts degree. And that taught me how to make something out of nothing. Do you want to sound smart and interesting and cool? I will use textual evidence (aka things you said) and connect them to all sorts of ideas and movements and a bunch of other nonsense that I spent the first 22 years of my life learning about. 

You say, "Isn't it crazy how food reminds you of your childhood?"

I say, "Oh that's just like Marcel Proust eating the madeleine in In Search of Lost Time."

You think 'Wow I am so French and sophisticated and refined, no?"

This is all very pick-me, right now. But ha! Look at that. I'm self aware too!

I don't know. Originally I wanted to write about my strengths and things I think I'm good at and then it turned into this but oh well. 

emotional intelligence. I have worked in a therapeutic setting. just sayin

training update

 a few years ago I got a bunch of yellow notepads from Maw Maw and I've been using those to record my workouts and training and every page is about a month's worth so I've started writing goals on the top of that page that I want to finish by the time I run out of lines. This month/page was really good and I'm feeling really optimistic about where my fitness is at. Here are the goals and how I felt about it

Finger Strength Goal- hang +75 lbs on a 20mm edge for 10s

Today was the last day of the page and I hung for 7 seconds which is a new best. I can tell that I'm very close to getting it and it's just about feeling good on the right day. I had a lot of good hangboard workouts and played around with repeaters and pulling with the tension block so that's been great. My big goal for the year has been to hang +50% bodyweight for 10 seconds which is about 75lbs and once I do that I can start climbing! I did a little bit of climbing on the moon board today as a treat! Technique and learning all the holds will have to improve but I felt really strong and good!

Squat Goal- 185lbs barbell back squat for 1

I crushed this goal! On February 12th I hit 185 for 1 and then exactly a week later I hit 195! I'm really happy with that. Also during that week I started taking creatine and I felt a pretty drastic effect. It was kind of like when I first started drinking coffee for the first time. It was probably a mix of placebo effect and you're supposed to drink a lot of water with it and I felt really hydrated for the first time in a long time so I bet that was the biggest difference maker. The day I hit 195 I was building up to hit and every weight felt about 20lbs lighter than it normally did so that was really exciting.

Bench- 190lbs for 1

Similar to squats! I had a great week last week where after a bunch of consistent workouts I felt great and everything was moving better than it ever had. 190 moved pretty smoothly so that was awesome. I think 195 will come soon and then it's just 5 more pounds to hit my big goal.

Pull-Ups. 

Pull-Ups are weird. Compared to every other lift I've progressed way farther in pull-ups. A lot of these I've only really started progressing in the last year or two but I've been doing pull-ups on and off basically since high school. All that to say the progress has not been as linear but I will say this! They feel better than they ever have. Like I'm activating more muscles and more in control of the movement than I've ever been. So, there's that. 

So for the next page we're just gonna add 5 pounds to every goal I met and it's looking like the weather might improve so I'll be outside a little more! I was able to sneak out and do some running between the snow a few times and those felt good. I do missing running but the strength and stability I feel now in my hips knees and ankles tell me this was time well spent. I'd like to get outside more and do some regular plyometrics--skips and jumps and all that and aim for about 2 workouts a week. 

Shoutout creatine. Shoutout breaking through plateaus. 

Do you breakthrough a plateau? Surpassing it? Moving on from plateaus? 

Blormp blermp. if you read this far you're a real one and I love you

 

went to a sauna today

 I love saunas. One of mankind's greatest inventions. 

That's it. That's the post.

this is something I'll never forget

 one time in 5th grade we were learning about when to use 'a' and when to use 'an' and our teacher Ms. Frye was explaining that you use 'a' before a word that starts with a consonant and 'an' before a word that starts with a vowel. and then she said there were exceptions to this rule and she asked if anyone could think of any and the girl I had a crush on immediately said in the most clear and lucid and serious voice

'honor'

And her saying 'honor' with the conviction of like a proud veteran is burned into my head forever. Why did she say it like that? Why was she so quick on the draw???

Anyway, for me the true definition of honor is tied to a tiny 5th grade girl.

this summer at camp I'm just going to give out quests

 long ago, the four nations of camp lived in peace. The youngers, the younger middles, the older middles, and the olders. Each took turns getting up for lunch and being dismissed for pick up. Until one day a older middle by the name of Bocephus assembled a faction that sought to rule the pool and make it so that you could only play Bad Movie Game and Bad Categories. And what that was was that in Bad Movie Game if you were the cooler you'd just say 'A' and then wait for your friends to go and no matter what they say you just say that was it, even if it doesn't even start with A. That's how bad it was. 

Ancient camp law says that if one group wins every game of Gagaball, every game of tetherball, every game of Elijahball, the Wednesday rotations, AND the Friday games AND you have the most Pokemon cards with the most legendaries and holo-rares you get to rewrite the schedule for the rest of the summer. And so Bocephus and his wicked crew of gremlins, rats, and rascals set about rigging all the games. Which mostly what that looked like was they found a sharp stick and popped all the balls so that no one could play any of the games and then they printed out a bunch of fake cards at home and traded them for all the good cards at camp. One camp named Anti-Bocephus, who funnily enough was not related to Bocephus, realized Bocephus's plan on Friday morning and mounted a desperate attempt to stop him from winning the Friday games but it was too late and a lot of the kids who Anti-Bocephus had hoped would show up on Friday morning didn't because they were too tired from losing everything on Thursday. Anyway, Bocephus was triumphant and that meant that the next week would be spent playing Bad Movie Game and Bad Categories--bad categories is where the category is lame like 'Say something cool' and then if your friend goes then you say whatever they said was cool--even if it's not cool. That's how bad it is. 

6 weeks went by of nothing but Bad Movie Game and Bad Categories. It was shaping up to be the worst summer in history. But then, a group of campers and counselors who were so bored out of their minds that they decided to read discovered an even more ancient set of camp laws that said if someone could assemble a piece of the original gaga pit, a scrap of the original Elijahball, the original tether of the original tetherball, a big bucket of fire ants, a shell from the creek, and 5 boxes of popsicles, then they would be able to throw the bucket of fire ants on the bad guys and then eat the popsicles and the day would be saved. Your mission is to assemble the camp artifacts of lore and end the reign of lameness. 

I love Speedy West. I love steel guitar. I hate imperialism.

 Have you wondered where the steel guitar comes from and why hearing it is like someone rubbing your back in a way that nothing else can? Well I can answer one of those questions.

Before Hawaii was a state it was a kingdom with a king and stuff and they hired Spaniards and such to do work and those Spaniards and had guitars and one day a Hawaaian guy named Joseph Kekuku figured out a much cooler way to play guitar by changing the tuning and using a metal object to slide on the strings for chord changes. This was in 1889 and in 1916 recordings of indigenous Hawaiian music outsold all other music genres in the US. 

Did you know in 1993 the US government formally apologized for its role in overthrowing the Hawaiian government a hundred year prior?

John Prine sang,

Then the coal company came with the world's largest shovel

And they tortured the timber and stripped all the land

Well, they dug for their coal till the land was forsaken

Then they wrote it all down as the progress of man.

funky february

 I'm really looking forward to spring weather. I'm really really looking forward to summer weather.

Felt a little lackluster this morning looking out my window and seeing another grey 40 degree day. But then I had a good workout and a good meal before coaching. Coaching went well. 

I had fun. I helped others. I made myself a tiny bit better. I ate good food. I made a tiny drawing.

That's pretty good. Where I come from that's pretty good.

I am now accepting applications to be part of my merry band.

I sometimes read a running forum that's trash but I can't help it and today I read a thread titled

 "Will the runners between 2005 and 2015 be forgotten?"

The context here is that in the past 10 years a bunch of advancements in shoe technology have caused a lot of old world records to fall really fast. So this time frame was full of runners who were good but never got to see the benefits of the technology.

But I just think it's a cute question because it's like, "aw babygirl are you having your first existential thoughts????? Are you realizing that you and everyone you've ever known and everyone you will know will one day be forgotten??? Don't despair, sweet prince, that's exactly what gives life meaning and makes it beautiful!"

"I fear this puppy bowl of oafs is nothing but mere ornamentation."

 a quote by me in the heat of the moment

Also (reacting to Vincent Price and Jack White being 6'4" and 6'2" respectively)

"It's my personal theory that tall people shouldn't be able to have this much personality and be this expressive. This is a privilege reserved for the short AKA god's consolation prize. Anyone over 6' 3" should be sedated and lumbering. Look at Tim Curry. He's 5' 9". The perfect height for Tim Curry to be."

clicking & ticking!

everything is coming up Millhouse!

fingers were STRONG

sun is SHINING

I ran FAST

my truck STARTED

green lights were HIT

feelings AFFIRMED

I'm on a hot streak baby

also a tree branch broke off in the wind and smashed the back window of the car that parks on the other side of the street from my truck so I'm not letting my guard down!!!

a little bit of telepathy must be real

 right?

a list of really basic songs I like for Valentine's day

 mitski's my love mine all mine

father john misty I love you honeybear

beck favorite nerve

beck mattress

Florence and the machine kiss with a fist

the Walters I love you so

the beatles something

That's probably enough. 

When I was in high school I had an iPod that kind of broke and could only hold like one album's worth of music on it. I forget what happened exactly but I remember it still kind of worked but it hardly had any memory left and the one album I put on it was Beck's 1994 album One Foot in the Grave and I listened to that album A LOT!

It's a bunch of short songs about Beck being a sad little art boy and I really liked lyrics like in Favorite Nerve:

Come for a visit

Come for a stay

I won't annoy you

I won't complain

You can be crazy

Tear up all my things

Cut up the kitchens

Wear all my rings

It's definitely not the healthiest but I find it really endearing that there's sad ol' Beck who's really smitten with someone and telling them they can be flawed and he'll put up with it because he wants to be around them. Explaining it makes it sound even worse but part of me really likes the sentiment.

I definitely didn't have a bad high school experience but I definitely felt 'low' in a lot of ways. Like I was short and looked really young and didn't have a ton of confidence and the thing I loved about Beck was that he was low also but he kind of reveled in it and made it this kind of cool fun weird thing to be. He owned it in a way that felt really authentic.

My favorite part of Mattress is

Take me out to dinner

I'm a loser, I'm a winner

I'm a sucker, I'm a sinner

Won't you take me out to dinner?

Your love

Your kindness

Your body on the mattress

My views have changed but at the time I really liked the idea of this low self-esteem goofy white boy who still ends up with someone and it's not glamorous but like, nothing in my life was glamorous. It's sad little dirtbag nerd love. In a way it's it's own kind of fantasy but it's a low-stakes fantasy.

I don't know if that attitude makes you a very good partner but songs don't have to do that.  

anyway there you go

the world is too much with us and blue world

 william wordsworth said once,

The world is too much with us; late and soon,

Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers;—

Little we see in Nature that is ours;

We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!

A sordid boon! An awful good thing. A dirty blessing. A nasty prize. 

Oh William Wordsworth you would've HATED Instagram and TikTok. Oh you would've LOST IT. But also he totally would've been all over those apps. The boy loved to talk!

He's talking about the same kind of stuff as Walt Whitman. All anyone cares about is this made up stuff and we're alienated from Nature which is the thing we are and makes us whole. 

Except Wordsworth uses the much cooler phrase, "we lay waste our powers"

You have powers. We all have powers. And we can't waste them! But we do. What powers you ask? 

Love mostly. If you act from love, dang near unstoppable force.

Mac Miller once said,

Well, it's a mad world, it made me crazy

Might just turn around, do 180

I ain't politicking, I ain't kissing no babies

The devil on my doorstep bein' so shady

Mm, don't trip, we don't gotta let him in

Don't trip

Hey, yeah

I let it go but I never go with it

Well, if you could see me now

Love me then hold me down

My mind, it goes, it goes

It goes, it goes, it goes

It's the same stuff. I think the biggest difference is that Mac Miller doesn't offer an answer or an alternative like Nature or the miracle of everything. He's in it and there's no way out of it. But there is love and companionship and that offers a break from the world and the devil. The ability to say 'no'. Mac says, 'Maybe it'll work out. Maybe I'll turn things around. I'll try my best.' It's the difference between escaping a problem and managing it.

I just think it's really cool that there are sensitive people who exist who put this stuff down in words for other people to see and experience and talk about their life and how they see the world and THAT'S PRETTY NEAT!

I think the right person is out there for me

 Walt Whitman said in "Come Closer to Me"

There is something that comes home to one now and perpetually,

It is not what is printed or preached or discussed . . . . it eludes discussion and  

 print,

It is not to be put in a book . . . . it is not in this book,

It is for you whoever you are . . . . it is no farther from you than your hearing and  

 sight are from you,

It is hinted by nearest and commonest and readiest . . . . it is not them, though it is  

 endlessly provoked by them . . . . What is there ready and near you now?

You may read in many languages and read nothing about it;

You may read the President's message and read nothing about it there,

Nothing in the reports from the state department or treasury department . . . . or in  

 the daily papers, or the weekly papers,

Or in the census returns or assessors' returns or prices current or any accounts of  

 stock.

The sun and stars that float in the open air . . . . the apple shaped earth and we upon  

 it . . . . surely the drift of them is something grand;

I do not know what it is except that it is grand, and that it is happiness,

And that the enclosing purport of us here is not a speculation, or bon-mot or  

 reconnoissance,

And that it is not something which by luck may turn out well for us, and without  

 luck must be a failure for us,

And not something which may yet be retracted in a certain contingency.

The light and shade—the curious sense of body and identity—the greed that  

 with perfect complaisance devours all things—the endless pride and out- 

 stretching of man—unspeakable joys and sorrows,

The wonder every one sees in every one else he sees . . . . and the wonders that fill  

 each minute of time forever and each acre of surface and space forever,

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

It's just SO GOOD. 

My attempt to summarize this is that one of the baseline assumptions that everyone has about themselves and everyone else is that we are incomplete. We're missing something. Or we have to get to somewhere or we have to keep going so we don't fall into destitution or whatever. There's always more to be had. And so everything we read and learn about and everything we've created as a society is meant to feed that cycle. It presents a thing you have to acquire so you can go on acquiring more things forever and ever.

And this thing that Walt Whitman is talking about that you won't find in all these places is a thing that you have all the time no matter what. You'll never find it in that endless cycle because the thing is outside of the cycle--it's "the wonders that fill each minute of time forever and each acre of surface and space forever". It's realizing the miracle of every moment as it is. That the universe is whole and perfect and that you are part of the universe--not separate from it.

Do I really feel that right now? No. Not really. But I'm pretty sure I have. And I know I've been in situations where I've felt completely cut off from that and entirely within the cycle. And so my optimism is based in this thing and, "I do not know what it is except that it is grand, and that it is happiness"

listening to music while watching snow fall is PEAK and a blessing on my houseplants

 the other thing I'll say is that a lot of people talk about putting curses on others

"I curse you for this. I curse you for that. Curse your mule and curse your crops and curse curse curse."

But I think a lot of people forget about the inverse curse--aka a blessing.

And recently I bestowed a blessing upon my dear sweet precious plant babies. And by that I mean I bought plant food from Lowe's. And so now all that stuff plants crave like nitrogen and...urea(?) will be absorbed into their bloodstream and give them big huge hulking flower muscles. Or something.

The craziest thing about plant food is that you put a teaspoon of the stuff into a gallon of water--I don't have many things in my apartment that can hold a measurable gallon of water so I had to go use the 'neath-the-sink bucket.

Anyway here is my blessing to my plants:

To all my green children, you are the greatest and most powerful plants to ever exist. You are exotic and wild and free and untameable. You are like bird whispers. You are like the dreams of a horse. You are entangled in many elaborate intrigues and plots and from all of them you will emerge victorious and your enemies squashed, tarnished, and depleted. Not a single star in the whole night sky shines as brightly as any of you, and within each of you lies entire universes that contain even better versions of Shakespeare and Lucille Ball. Arrivederci and ciao Bella per sempre per sempre per sempre

 you know how sometimes little kids will get so excited that they'll just like thrash about--like they're feeling so much visceral emotion that their body can't contain it. 

that's how I imagine the city of philadelphia feels when they win the super bowl and tear down a light pole and parade it around the streets. like they're so overcome with pride and joy for their community that they destroy some of it and wallow in its destruction. 

you just don't see that kind of communal ritualistic behavior anymore and I think on some level that's a shame. 

here's my favorite thing

this is my actual actual favorite thing. actual favorite.

when things break in very specific ways and you discover very specific solutions.

my little Chromebook has been doing a lot of overtime since I got rid of my smartphone and for some reason, sometimes, if I go from a reel to someone's profile on Instagram while also a YouTube video is paused, the screen will freak out and go black and all I can do is restart the computer. BUT very recently I discovered that if I furiously move the mouse as soon as the screen goes black until the profile is loaded, it won't freeze up. 

I'm like Bill Murray in groundhog's day. I understand the loop now.

update on the dream

 I tell you what them dreams is slippery

But I did remember a dream I had the night I said I was going to remember a dream and learn something from it and the key nugget of the dream that I remember is that I looked down at my fingernail and I had a fungal infection on it. And I was like dang. Because I did have a fungal infection on my thumbnail in college but I went to the health center and they gave me something that made it go away. 

What did I learn from this dream? I am anxious about the health of my nails. Which isn't really new information. It's some of the oldest information I have. 

I'm aware this doesn't bolster my point. How about some art I've made recently instead!

sorry it's out of focus I don't know how to make it focus

I've been having a lot of dreams lately

 almost every night

I couldn't tell you a single thing about them but I know I'm having them.

They aren't stress dreams--they're just like normal dream-having dreams.

I think--I think, easily, that if you really knew your dreams and knew what was going on with all of that--you'd basically have super powers. You'd know like ten to one hundred times more about the world and your self. Gotta be. That can't just be nothing. 

There's a line from a Weezer song that I think about whenever I think about dreams. It's not a particularly good song but it goes:

And I will learn by studying the lessons in my dreams

So turn off the TV, 'cause that's what others see

And movies are as bad as eating chocolate ice cream

It's the song Troublemaker off their Red Album. 

My goal for tonight is to remember a part of my dream and learn something from it. Stay tuned.

everything comes together in the end in the middle and was always together since the beginning as well

 2013! I'm living in Williamsburg Virginia and driving home from the grocery store listening to the college radio station and this weird song is on with this guy kind of talk singing about an ice cream man and it sounds sort of off but in a fun and catchy way. Get home and look up the name of the guy and listen to the song a couple times and proceed to forget about it entirely!

TWELVE YEARS LATER

2025 I'm in the climbing gym on Monday and a weird bouncy song is playing and it's some guys going 'dum de dum de dum doo la day ooooo New England" kind of thing over and over again. It's the kind of song that's hard to find again because the only words are 'new england' and the rest is just kind of noises. It's a fun song and I don't really bother to look it up.

Wednesday of the same week AKA today! Seemingly unrelated I remember the weird ice cream man song from twelve years ago and look up 'ice cream man lyrics college radio'. I don't know why I added college radio I just thought it might help and it kind of did because I found the song and the guy and his name is Jonathan Richman AND!!! AND!! HE'S ALSO THE GUY WHO DID THE NEW ENGLAND SONG!

I haven't thought of this guy in over a decade and then I hear a song that I don't know is by him and then two days later I look him up again. 

Something I love about music is that you retain and are aware of so much more than you're consciously paying attention to. 

It's that stew of consciousness. What's in there swirling around and bubbling up? You gotta investigate the stew. You gotta let it simmer.

I mean, just look at this guy: he's a sweet boy Singing his little song with his floppy hair and his striped shirt.

things I will never do

 here's a fun exercise. sit down and make a list of things you will confidently never do. where do you draw the line? it doesn't have to be super high stakes. like you don't have to put I will never murder someone. And just because you don't put something doesn't mean you're going to do that or actively want to. like if I don't put, 'never siphon gasoline out of someone else's car with a rubber hose and my mouth' that doesn't mean I secretly really want to. It's more about trying to think of some things that you think you will never do on principle. Not because they would necessarily ruin your life if you did them.

I will never own a self-driving car. 

I'm pretty sure I'll never knowingly eat meat again. At this point I've gone about a third of my life without eating meat so I think I'll keep that going. 

You know what. Turns out, this is not that fun. 

Here's what I think is fun. Instagram has a thing now where it shows you nothing but reels that have been like by people who you mutually follow and that is fun. That is fun in a way that like a Jane Austen novel is fun because it's at like the near absolute limit of any sort of communication happening. It's like I happened to notice a thing that I know you noticed and you might know if I noticed it but you don't know for sure and it's like the tiniest breadcrumb and I think something in the brain likes that.  Just a trace. Just a tiny bit.

And what I really mean is that today I saw that my sister and her husband both liked a video that just said 'Will you be my gleepenstine?" and it was in space and had a picture of an alien cat and I sent it to them and said, 'you both are gross'

But the fun was in finding it.

I do love my truck

 

I do I do I do

this is how I know I am good person

I move to new area and get job working with children. My boss is awful man who is bad at his job. His bosses get mad at him for being bad at his job. He, in turn, treats me like garbage and tries to get me fired.

I am forced to leave and accept new job at school for chronically miserable boys. One day, miserable boy says to me, "I hate most everyone I meet but I do not hate you."

This is feather in my cap that I wear for rest of my days. 8 years later I still have drawing he did on my refrigerator of a demonic king sitting on a throne while a lowly underling writhes beneath him.

big cat AAAAHHHHHHHHH