R.I.P. Chris Benoit

As most of you know, I am a big pro wrestling fan and have been since age 5 or so. My favorite wrestler for most of my life was the Canadian Crippler, Chris Benoit. I own all sorts of Benoit tapes, and one of the only wrestling shirts that I own was Chris's first shirt after coming to the WWE.

Yesterday, Chris Benoit and his wife and child were found dead in their home in Georgia. It appears to be a double-murder/suicide, but all the details aren't in place yet. I looked up to Chris as a hero and always thought he handled himself in a manner that I as a fan could be proud of, but if this is true, I'll have to obviously reevaluate how I feel about him in reflection. Right now though, despite wanting to say so much more, all I can say is thank you. Thank you Chris for the years of entertainment, for the blood, sweat and tears. Thank you for your tireless efforts to reach the top of your field, despite your limitations. Thank you for being the best. Thank you for your intensity and your passion for what you did. Thank you for showing me what the art of pro wrestling should look like. Thank you for showing me what the art of patience and perserverence should look like, and the results that it can bring if you believe in yourself.

I'll miss you.

"The One"

Taking a break from the Anberlin song titles as blog titles, I want to discuss a concept near and dear to me, "The One." Some people call it "Ms. Right," others say "that special someone," and even others might say "soulmate," but all of these terms refer to the same thing. Sharing your life with someone is a very time-consuming, difficult, and interesting process, but it also happens to be one of, if not the most rewarding way to spend your days and nights. And for those of you that don't want to be in this kind of reflective mood, or have heard enough on this subject from me for one lifetime, feel free to click away, but besides the cookout on Saturday (HOPE YOU CAN MAKE IT ALL NONFAGS THAT WENT TO MONTREAL), this is what is on my mind, and it's my journal, so suck it.

So what do I think of the concept known as "The One (not Billy Gunn!)?" I hate it, but I've embraced it like a fucking security blanket for years and years. I have a tendancy to get caught up in women...they have been such a challenge for me and especially with my formally embarassing self-confidence about my physical stature (somewhat justified), I had a lot of trouble with falling for the first girl who was nice to me. Lately, however, a trend has been to shoot for bigger and brighter things. With my newfound focus on my looks and my always sparkling personality (lol), I have felt the urge to go for women that meet very specific standards that I hold deep within the recess of my brain and heart. So what is most important to me and how can I reach that goal?

1. Sense of Humor. I don't mean any old sense of humor, either. I'm an odd duck and I pretty much require effort to talk to even in daily conversation (more on this later). Not only that, but my sarcastic/cynical yet goofy sense of humor requires tolerance for some people just to stay around me, but only the true devout friends actually ENJOY my antics all of the time. My "one" is going to have to at least be able to tolerate my humor, and hopefully get all of my jokes, obscure references, and lingo craziness. The ability to give beats is also a plus, since if we can't pick on each other, who CAN we pick on?

2. Intelligence. I said I would get back to the "difficult to talk to" point, and here we are already. My vocabulary, while not as extensive as it once was, still is one of a reasonably high intellect. If you have no clue what I'm saying, how can I date you? Not only that, but as a purveyor of fine conversation, I expect to be able to discuss things that go beyond the basic scope of "how was your day?" Sometimes I like to engage in chatter about world events, philosophy, and other pursuits, and I need someone that can keep up (and hopefully not blow right by me!).

3. Looks/Sexual Chemistry. Anyone who leaves this off of their list is a liar. That being said, if you fufill the other standards that I am looking for, you instantly become more physically attractive. Not only that, but sometimes a simple highlight will be enough for me...a beautiful set of eyes, a warm smile, or ( /turns on guy mode) a great rack can hide physical flaws elsewhere. In other words, my "one" doesn't have to be physical perfection, but hopefully she has some feature that stands out and makes me say, "WOW." (she-wow is also acceptable)

4. Gets along with my family and friends. My family is a load of fun, so usually most people that I bring home love them. My dad alone is worth the price of admission, and my mom may actually be the nut mother-in-law of all time (sample quote: "You want to come over and bake cookies and have a drink?"). My brothers are both very cool when they are around, if shy, and my dog is just so lovable. My true friends might be the most accepting and awesome guys on the planet...if they don't like you as a group, something is SERIOUSLY wrong. One cookout at Chris's should be enough to figure this one out.

5. Loves me back. As I said earlier, I really get wrapped up in women. The smell, the way a smile can turn your day around, being there for each other, all the little things that make women the fairer sex and make relationships actually good. Remember the little things, like the chats we've had or the things we've done together, and that's when I'll know that we have something beyond just a crush. This is usually the sticking point as of late. I've met a couple very special women over the past couple of years, special enough to pass the first four qualities pretty easily. The problem is they didn't have those same feelings towards me for whatever reasons.

If I can have these five things in my life, I would be happy romantically. I know it's not all wine and roses, but to feel like I've gotten there would really be great. And btw, Happy Birthday to me. I got one of the nicest gifts of my life today, something heartfelt and as dumb as it sounds, it was nice to feel good, even for a little while.

FAITH

Songs of the Second:
The Ataris - Soundtrack for this Rainy Morning
+44 - Baby Come On
Relient K - Be My Escape (From the VAULT)

The Unwinding Cable Car

Hi everyone,

Lots of stuff going on in my life right now. Happy Father's Day to all of you Dads out there! With that out of the way, I guess I can just start with that most tilt-worthy of topics: women.

I know I've said lots of things re: being alone. Some posts I say how I think it's best that I'm alone, but even in those posts, the unstated but obvious thing is that I fear being alone and want to share my life with someone. I have finally started to get some confidence in myself, not wanting to change my personality or who I am to impress a girl, and all-around just feeling better about who I am (the freshest, obv) and what makes me the man that I am today. The confidence that I have built up is still fragile, however, and a few things can easily put me right back to tilt, but the good news is that after a little reflection, I usually feel BETTER, rather than always going into the deepest darkest recesses of Emotown.

So what is going on right now? I have no idea. For the first time in seemingly forever, someone was interested in me, but due to forces outside my control and a messy situation that probably will only get messier, I find myself doing my best to keep things stable. I know that I'm usually not very secretive in this journal...in fact, I've called out my closest friends before here and still feel justified in doing so, and I've aired plenty of dirty laundry. This is different. People that aren't me deserve some sense of privacy in these pages, so I'm going to leave out the details. I'll just say that I'm in a bit of an ethical/moral quandry and I've been praying a lot for guidence.

In other women-related news, I think my long running mutual animosity with Stepf at work has come to an end. In the end, I've come to the realization that people are what they are, but there is some good in most people. And while she and I will never see eye-to-eye on certain things I'm sure, she's still an intelligent young woman who I enjoy chatting with, and the redeeming qualities are what we should ALL focus on in our daily lives rather than pointing out the flaws or things that we don't like about people. I'd like to take a moment here to congratulate Stepf on her engagement and also to apologize for any part I played in what amounted to nearly a year of anger.

Further continuing the bright side of things, I've actually gotten to spend a good bit of time with my few female friends lately. Between Dana, Leslie, and Missy, I've actually had a fair dose of estrogen to bounce my ideas off of, and seeing "Knocked Up" with Dana/Dave and John/Christy was an experience, as that movie pegged the way that men and women think better than any movie that I've ever seen. It was also hilarious, but you all need to see it for yourselves if you haven't yet. I even went hiking and thanks to the insane accomidations of Missy and Ben, I managed to survive not too much worse for wear and even had a good time "experiencing nature." I still maintain that nature defeated me, but at least I put up a fight.

Truly things are interesting right now, as most of my social interaction comes from people that I work with due to my shift and lack of friends that work the same shift as I do outside of Omnicare.

Next Saturday, the 23rd, is my birthday, and I would really like to get as many people together as I can to go out and have a good time. Maybe something like cookout/board gaming?/card gaming? during the day, go out to the bars or something else at night and get hammered, all of my friends together. I know Bren isn't gonna drink but hopefully he can drive us around and the rest of us can just see how much fun we can have and really let loose. Let me know this week if any of you can make it so that we can plan it all out.

May update again soon, but for now,
lets
push
things
forward.

Songs of the Second:
Anberlin - Inevitable
Breaking Benjamin (?) - Breath
White Stripes - Icky Thump
Snow Patrol - Signal Fire