Man, you know what they need? And, by "they," I mean Microsoft.

They need a page on xbox.com where you can look at a list of every achievement you've gotten, in the order you've got them. Like, with them separated by game, and the games listed in the order you played them, it's not hard to figure out, but a nice long list of all of them, the day you got them, the Gamerscore that achievement brought you to overall... it'd be nice, all I'm sayin'.

Man, I dunno why killing things in a video game feels so good, but it's so great for takin' your mind off things.

It turns out Gears of War is a better game than I first gave it credit for.

I feel more and more pathetic these days.

It just seems like everything I try to do either backfires or just doesn't work for me. Nothing appears to be heading in a positive direction for me. Trying to fix old problems just makes them worse, and trying to avoid new problems brings on more than I was attempting to dodge. Then they just tend to snowball, and nothing will go right.

Even in places or activities I scoff at, and make fun of, I find myself failing where so many around me succeed.

I just can't see how things all fell apart for me.

I promise I'm not angry. Just... sad, I guess. Or maybe disappointed.

But I feel like nobody understands where I'm coming from when I do get upset on this issue, so I just need to throw this out there.

Because I'm still at HCC, I've got maybe one or two friends left in Columbia, and none of whom I would consider particularly close. Not for lack of having friends, just everybody's out of town. So, when I make plans with somebody at another school, it's because in Columbia I've got nothing to do. So, when the plans I make fall through, the friends at other schools I make plans with have roommates/floormates/dormmates/classmates/schoolmates/etc. that they can just call up to say "hey, let's hang" and nothing happens. But for me, when those plans fall through, I get to be at home alone watching TV or something. And because kids aren't particularly consistent, this happening with any sort of regularity adds up rather quickly.

And that is why I get so frustrated every time plans fall through. And I feel like the people I make plans with don't notice, because they can make backup plans on a moment's notice.

Not a pointed jab at anyone, I promise. I just feel like this needed to be said.

Man, you guys all fail at being college students when I need you to. Why am I always the only one online at 3 45 in the morning? :P

Anyway, some crazy shit just went down in my head, but in a really good way. If you want the whole story, IM me or something, I decided I'm tired and don't want to type it up.

Basically, work was a bitch, and I was just like, "I need a goddamn drink right now." So I told Cory to get me some booze. He didn't. I went down to CP. Before I could get to a frat party, some friends of mine thought it was gonna get busted, so they left. So, we went to another one. They ran out of beer literally five minutes after we got there. But even so, I had a pretty great time. And on the way home, I put on some Elton John because I was looking for some mellow music for the drive home. And then Mona Lisas and Mad Hatters came on, and my life at present clicked into place.

I've been acting like the biggest bitch for two months now. I mean, I acknowledge that my relationship with Amanda was pretty great, but so what? It turns out a girl that I liked wasn't right for me. Why should I care? In the grand scheme of things, what the fuck does that even matter? This has been in the back of my head for the longest time, and tonight it finally came to the forefront. Like, even the big stuff in my life. My Dad let something slip earlier this month about money being tight, in reference to my schooling. If that's the case, I take a semester off and work to make some money. My teacher told me otherwise, but I was afraid of failing this english course. So what? If I did, I take it again. The important thing in life is to pick your battles, and in the ones that matter, never give up, come hell or high water.

And the main point I realized is that I've been taking my friends for granted. I'm surrounded by some of the best people I've ever met, and even when I'm being a huge whiny bitch and ignoring them except when I want to bitch about my problems, they're right by my side, wishing me the best. And I haven't seen how valuable that is until tonight. And I mean, look at how things are with Amanda. Amidst me being a whiny bitch, I found the time to yell at her time and time again. And still, she's not against the idea of us being friends! So why the fuck am I so concerned that our relationship didn't work out? She's a great girl, and I should be so lucky to have her as a friend. So why am I so concerned about a relationship? In short, I don't know. But now, I don't give a damn.

tl;dr I'm finally getting over Amanda, and I'm actually happy when I think about the future.

and I thank the Lord for the people I have found...

ADD is an awful thing. Like, I have little to no motivation anymore, and my life is pretty based on instant gratification. I need to save up money, because I have so little of it at the moment, yet I find myself going out to lunch with brooks several times a week. I need to pass all of my classes so I can transfer for the fall, yet I find it increasingly difficult to sit down and get my work done. Things of that nature. Most recently it's the songs I was planning on writing. I put in a solid few hours of work the night I wrote that last entry, and got a decent amount of my first song done... and haven't touched it since. Like, a lot of the time I'm sitting in my basement- right now, for instance- in the back of my mind there are several ideas being bounced around as to what I should be doing with my time, and one of the most prominent is usually "you should go work on those songs of yours!" But I never do, because I'm not motivated to do so, and I lack the focus that would help in that department.

I'm talking to Dr. Wells a lot about it these days, and I brought up drugs last session, so I may find myself on Ritalin or Aderol or something sometime soon. If I do hopefully I can get writing again and show off my work.

If anybody was hoping to hear some songs it'll be a while. Sorry. ><

In other news, I only have three more closing shifts to work this weekend. woooooooooooooo working until 1 in the morning

So, I don't know if anybody actually reads this ol' LJ o' mine anymore, but it's wonderful self-therapy, so I'ma keep at it. And write this post for posterity's sake.

I'm finding it hard to get over Amanda. I've never done so before. The rush of emotions hitting me these days is the most confusing thing I've ever been faced with. And all this time I thought I was just looking for some comfort from somebody, something I haven't gotten too much of since we broke up, but good ol' Tini comes through in the clutch yet again.

She was telling me about this cathartic exercise she knows of, where you make a music playlist that kinda goes through the emotions of the relationship in order, and then the last few songs are about what you want to feel next, and it's supposed to help push you towards that goal. I took her advice and did so, and realized this is the perfect opportunity to get back into guitar playing; and, going above and beyond, the perfect opportunity to finally hone my songwriting.

So, over the next however long it takes while I have time, I'm writing and hopefully recording an entire album. I have a mic for my computers, so after I've written at least half of the album, say, I'm going to look into getting myself Logic or MusicMaker or something, so that I can make mp3's of all of these songs. It's a work in progress, so don't expect much, but when I finish with some songs I'll probably post them here for whoever wants to see them. If you drop by my place, or if we're hanging out and there's nothing better to do, feel free to see what I've got so far or even, if I've done enough, hear a song or two. It'd be great to get some feedback on how I'm doing. Hopefully I can get the songwriting done before I'm off to JMU, but that's probably wishful thinking.

Wish me luck, guys. I want to see this through to the end, so try to keep me on task, ok?

Merry Christmas, everybody!

It was an interesting one. Especially in that I didn't know what to get my grandma, so I got her an IOU for a trip to lunch. I know she really did enjoy it, since above all else she just loves being able to spend time with her grandkids, but god damn if I didn't feel like the world's biggest copout giving her that envelope. Especially with the nametag and bow I stuck on it.

I got some good stuff though! I'll save the best for last because I didn't see it coming but god damn if I wasn't excited to get it.

*belt (too small; exchanging :( )
*socks (can never have too many)
*underwear (ditto)
*work socks (needed some; why do guys underestimate the number of clothes needed? we are so lazy about laundry. Or at least I am)
*two off the wall calendars (one of peanuts comics, one called "the stupidest things ever said")
*desk blotter (natch)
*jeans (needed some! I even got a dark pair; what do I wear those with?)
*khakis (nice.)
*yankees hat
*money (natch)
*pea coat! (I don't care how white I am. this fucker is WARM.)

Hopefully everybody had as good a day as I did! Happy holidays to you and yours, and hopefully I'll catch up with everybody soon! :D

What exactly constitutes bad sex?

Sex is sex. Like, GOOD sex is definitely noticeable, but I think there's a point that it pretty much doesn't go below. Like that first time is never thought of as good or anything, but it's held as a standard for future sex. Everything is better than the first time, but nothing is ever really worse than before.

dear god why am i thinking about this

And so, Yankee Stadium has seen the last game that'll ever be played there.

So much history, so little time.

And we say farewell as the Cathedral closes its doors for good.

http://newyork.yankees.mlb.com/news/gameday_recap.jsp?ymd=20080921&content_id=3525619&vkey=recap&fext=.jsp&c_id=mlb

No building has brought so much history to professional sports as this one, and no other has united so many from coast to coast.

I'm gonna miss it.

My sleep schedule is inherently fucked.

I'd consider it a blessing if I had two days in a row where I could get to bed at a decent hour and then get a respectable amount of sleep. Most of the time I go to bed early, it's because I'm not going to be getting much sleep anyway, or something to that effect.

Pretty much every night, I'm either tired as shit way too early in the evening, so I get nothing done and just sleep through to the next day and face hell, or, like tonight, I just can't sleep, and so I'm up way too fucking late. Tonight? All-nighter. Simply because I know myself; if I fell asleep now, I'd miss trig in a few hours. I am tired pretty much all day, unless I'm actively doing something to distract me from this. I can (and have) sleep for pretty much as long as I can lie in bed without being disturbed; I'm pretty sure my record is like 16 hours or something ridiculous. I mean, it's just damned inconvenient to be so tired all the time, and then have trouble getting to bed at night, only to be exhausted the next morning, regardless of how much sleep I got, lather, rinse, repeat.

Recently this has started to catch up with me much worse than I thought it would. My psychologist told me something about how humans are naturally tuned to a 25 hour clock for each day, and only through our parents adhering us to a tight schedule as kids (getting out meals, sleeping, etc. all at the same time or damn close throughout the day) can we adjust to the 24 hour clock we follow. This means that over the course of our lives, we will start to go to bed later and later and later, unless we can adhere to a schedule that prohibits us from doing so; being affected by this is apparently a symptom of ADD/ADHD, and it hits me like a ton of bricks on a regular basis. For example, this week; on tuesday, I just slept in and missed italian; wednesday, I missed trig and my italian lab; yesterday, I missed italian again; all because I just can't fucking motivate myself to get up. I'm literally too exhausted to do so. I had to tell my parents and Amanda that the class got cancelled, just because I'm so ashamed I actually did that.

My self-control is non-existant, and it is a bitch.

I now have another reason to dread this beach trip (ignoring the fact that I've come to terms with it already)

While I'm at the beach next week, the following things will be arriving for me in the mail:

-Katamari Damacy (FINALLY I HAVE BEEN LOOKING EVERYWHERE FOR THIS GAME)
-All three sbemail dvd's from HSR
-all three "everything else" dvd's from HSR
-Trogdor hoodie, also from HSR

grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr ><

EDIT: Plus, I just checked my Gmail account and they tried to charge me an extra 32 bucks or something like that for a set of HSR figurines I never bought.

If the Brothers Chaps weren't cool as shit I'd be angry about this.

Nobody ever let me say "this summer is going to be epic" after school lets out again.

It just becomes a huge disappointment eventually.

I have been getting brushed off left and right by people I was under the impression were friends of mine. I try to make plans, even for just hanging out one night, and from the 2 or 3 people I can actually get responses out of, I get resounding "no's." Even when I give people an entire fucking month of notice that I'm planning something, I still just don't hear from anybody. And the people I do hear from are either out of town/working (I can understand that to a degree), or just don't want to take the time to join me. I'm told from all angles that this is a common thing, but as I asked Stephanie earlier tonight, am I wrong for feeling bad about this? For being upset at having my plans thrown back at me? Somehow I think not.

Especially when I keep hearing about more and more that goes on that I'm left out of. I can count on one hand the number of people that keep me even semi-in the loop these days. And even they have started to turn on me somewhat.

I even feel a slight distance between me and Amanda. Don't get me wrong, I love her very dearly, I'm just starting to feel a bit... distant. And I hate every second of it.

I remember last year and into this past winter before I met Amanda, people would hear me complain about just being the guy that's there for everybody. Nowadays I'm not even that. People don't even gripe to me anymore. I've heard like five people say/blog things like "so-and-so is really the only one that understands me anymore" or "I don't even know anybody I can talk to" and I'm just standing here screaming "motherfucker, I have been standing right here this whole damn time." Yet nothing is working. At this point to get noticed I pretty much have to drive to everybody's house and find them in person.

Not counting my family and Cory's friends/roommates, I've hung out with/seen a total of 5 people that I would sincerely call friends of mine, as opposed to acquaintances or friends-of-a-friend.

It just irritates me to no end that I'm being completely shunned right now.

Fuck this summer.

I am looking forward to JMU with every fiber of my being. I'm starting to see why so many people want to leave Columbia.

So, new laptop! Compaq Presario CQ50, AMD Turion X2 processor, NVIDIA graphics card, built-in LightScribe drive, auto-wifi enabled. It's funny that it's like ten times faster than my desktop upstairs.

In other news, WALL-E might be the most adorable thing I've seen this side of Finding Nemo.

For now there is pizza and a drink in front of me and I'll be damned if I don't partake.

Man, after like ten people didn't even answer my invite to the grad party, I am going to be marginally perturbed if nobody wants to go to the beach in mid-july.

ESPECIALLY SINCE I'LL BE GOING ANYWAY


...:(

So if you've listened to me talk about music recently, you've probably heard me declare that one of a bunch of albums is "One of/the best album I've heard in a good while" or something similar. These are all good albums. Those that I've said this about include:

Cruel as School Children - Gym Class Heroes
Liberation Transmission - Lostprophets
Minutes to Midnight - Linkin Park
One X - Three Days Grace
maybe Phobia and We Are Not Alone? - Breaking Benjamin

but I swear I just got one that trumps 'em all. It's been out for a while, and it sounded amazing. I didn't know how much so until this morning; I finally downloaded it last night.

Alive 2007 - Daft Punk

Seriously. It's a live mash-up album. It's Daft Punk songs mashed-up... BY DAFT PUNK. So fucking good. Like, if you buy one album from this post it had better be Daft Punk.



seriously why aren't you listening to it right goddamn now

cross-posted from QC forums:

Today/Tonight I saw Cobra Starship, Simple Plan, The Bravery, and Wyclef Jean at Maryland; it was a show called Art Attack, and I liked how it was done. Between each band's set, after one band finished they would go to a booth to meet with fans and sign autographs, and the roadies would set up the stage for the next act and soundcheck and whatnot, while the MC would come out and entertain to the music spun by a DJ on the edge of the stage. Beach balls and glowsticks were given out to accentuate the crowd; plus everybody got a free magnetic calendar and condom upon entering. Many, many more free condoms were thrust upon everybody throughout the show. Not surprisingly, balloons were made. Good times, overall.

COBRA STARSHIP:
They definitely brought it all out tonight. Sadly, I could only catch the last few songs of their set, but I was still impressed by what I saw. The music was pretty good, as I expected it to be, but mainly I liked their interaction with the audience. I know it's pretty much expected, but I respect a band that's willing to say more to the audience than "thanks! alright, this next one is..." between songs.

Grade: B+

SIMPLE PLAN:
I'd never heard of these guys before I saw them tonight. The music was surprisingly good! Very rhythmic, definitely written with people jumping around and dancing at shows in mind. Plus the mock mosh pit that started during their set was pretty hilarious.

Notable quotes from the band:
"Was that a penis balloon I saw during that last one? *cheers from crowd* That's just rude, guys."

Grade: B

THE BRAVERY:
Another new band to me. A song or two of theirs was pretty much just atonal, fuzzy, distorted noise that overpowered any vocals whatsoever, but the other songs more than made up for it. The sound was very similar to that of Simple Plan, but a lot heavier, much better to just rawk the fuck out to. Actual mosh pit during this one.

Grade: B+

WYCLEF JEAN:
What can I say? Wyclef fucking killed it tonight. The songs from his latest album were great, but about half of his set was cut by a DJ, and was a mix of popular hip-hop tunes from today/the '90s, some of which was either early Wyclef or some work of his back from the Fugees. Bringing his sister out to sing a song was a nice touch. As was bringing some random dude from the audience up on stage to just rock the fuck out for a while. Plus he climbed a fucking rafter in the middle of a song. Then he got everyone in the audience to take their shirt off. Classic. Probably the best show I've ever seen, no joke.

Notable Quotes:
"Which way's DC? That way? A'ight, everybody look over there: [singing] George Bush mind your business..."
"Hey, when people are crowdsurfing, be nice to them, a'ight? Ain't every black motherfucker can have people crowdsurfin'. Shit is rock and roll, baby."
"War in Iraq costin' us a billion a month. You have any idea how much weed I could buy with a billion dollars?"
"Yeah, you, come here. Guys, let him up. *to fan* You just do whatever the fuck you want, man."

Grade: A+

Great fucking night.