Below are the 20 most recent journal entries recorded in Nick's LiveJournal:

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Sunday, May 7th, 2006
12:14 am	Since I participated in this in another journal... I've been meaning to do a real update for awhile now, but I don't even know where to go with it. In the meantime, though, here's one of those generic comment bait/survey things. If you comment... 1. I'll respond with something random I like about you. 2. I'll tell you what song/movie reminds me of you. 3. I'll name something we should do together. 4. I'll say something that only makes sense to you and me (or just me). 5. I'll tell you my first/clearest memory of you. 6. I'll leave you a quote that is somehow appropriate to you. 7. I'll ask you something that I've always wondered about you. 8. If I do this for you, you must post this on your journal so you can do the same for other people. Current Mood: pensive Current Music: Cubs vs. Padres in the background (3 Comments |Comment on this)
Friday, April 7th, 2006
1:48 pm	Stupid machines.... Ugh... I might have had a MAJOR setback with ever wanting to do anything on my site again. A couple days ago, I restarted my computer normally, and while that was going on, it started beeping almost the entire time, after which it refused to recognize the existence of my slave drive, which is a problem, considering it has the files of my entire site that I did months worth of formatting changes to. I can probably deal with losing everything else, especially since I have most of my music I have backup copies of in some form (both my home recorded stuff and MP3 playlist), but if I end up losing my site changes, I won't have ANY motivation to redo all that again. And after numerous attempts to get it fixed (including taking it to one of my dad's co-workers who's practically an expert in dealing with just about anything computer-related), it still doesn't look good. The really frustrating part is that I was in the process of looking for a new domain name to upload it all - if my computer had just waited a few more days to crash, everything would be on the web, and this wouldn't be an issue. Fucking shit. As if I needed anything else to feel hopeless about. Current Mood: frustrated Current Music: Queensryche - Operation: Mindcrime II (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Sunday, March 19th, 2006
9:20 pm	AGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHH. *throws hands up in disgust* :( Current Mood: pissed off (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Thursday, March 9th, 2006
2:41 pm	So my stupid job situation still isn't resolved. A couple weeks ago at another meeting with Karen, I was referred to a "job coaching" agency who was supposed to have someone call me, and that still hasn't happened. So after I spotted some random data entry/filing/customer service job on Monster, I just got impatient and applied for it yesterday... I haven't heard from them yet either. I'm so tired of this shit. Why is it so difficult to just find something? On more promising news, I'm more seriously contemplating the idea of continuing my review site rebuilding process in the same reworked format I was planning on before, with my reviews in a separate section and converted to letter grades. Listening to certain albums over the last couple months is really giving me the itch to write again. Of course, part of my recent desire to do a revival also has to do with Casey also very much expressing a recent interest in writing new reviews again. Apparently he wants to do a new "personal" site that he offered to pay for the maintenance of. I also want to dump a lot of my more inferior, poorly written reviews I don't sympathize much with anymore, and rewrite them later. That way if someone else should ever take it over, there won't be anywhere near as much material on there I'm not pleased with. I may just have someone else take over the outside reviewer portion of it, though. I had another big idea of making the new look MJA merely one part of a planned "super site" project, where I also want to include a place for my own Physical Illusion music and possibly a whole bunch of other stuff. Jay mentioned creating some sort of group that gathers a lot of the open mic performers together on MySpace or somewhere like that, and I'd be all for linking to that as well, not to mention somehow integrating a whole bunch of unsigned music from other sources (*cough* Web Reivewing Community *cough*). There's just so much musical talent out there that I want to make a lot more people aware of. That's one of the good things the internet was invented for, right? I should take advantage of that as much as I can. Eventually, I'll need a good domain name for all this, obviously. If it doesn't end up mjareviews.com, then it should be something quirky and Physical Illusion-like. Like, I dunno, snakeswithoutarms.com. Or burnt-toast.com. I'll throw in updates if I decide to actually go through with all this. I guess it'll probably be brought up in discussion soon enough. Current Mood: ambitious Current Music: Jefferson Airplane - Surrealistic Pillow (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Monday, February 20th, 2006
5:47 pm	Whoa, I suddenly feel really disoriented. Despite the date of my last entry clearly saying "Monday", I was thinking pretty much all of today that it's Sunday, and that yesterday was Saturday. I'm really not sure what brought that on. I must be losing it. Current Mood: confused Current Music: Sparks - "Waterproof" (2 Comments |Comment on this)
1:30 am	Snakes still don't have arms and... hey, look over there! Once again I find myself not having written in here in awhile, and like a magnet, I return. There's a WHOLE lot on my mind, believe me, but I wouldn't want to go into it too much. I've had a couple meetings at vocational rehab since my last entry, and I'm feeling kind of mixed about all this... the whole process just feels sloooooow, like it's going to constantly stay unresolved forever like everything else that's troubling me, even though I know it isn't. I'm still not entirely sure where my next appointment on Tuesday is going to lead, and I'm always nervous about those "summary questions" I always struggle with so much. The woman I met with, Karen, in addition to advising me to really study my career test results, also discussed the possibility of me going through therapy for all this shit, which I'm perfectly willing to do. Another interesting development is that she's correctly pointed out on a couple occasions that my parents are too controlling of me and thinking about how to handle discussing this in depth is causing me to feel even more stressed. It's not that my parents aren't great people - they're just not the easiest people in the world to argue about things with, and it certainly doesn't help that I have enough trouble getting out what I want to say on the spot as it is. This is particularly true about my mom, who often takes things too personally, and often has a lot of trouble admitting her point of view might be wrong, like anything negative against her is apparently evidence that she's "failed" as a parent, which works pretty well as a guilt trip. Ugh. I've also pretty much decided not to go along with that "MJA buyout" thing, though in true procrastinating fashion, I haven't come up with an actual E-mail response to this mysterious company yet. I dunno - this proposal just sounds like the total opposite of what my site was founded on in the first place. I'm not sure I like the idea of an amateur review site turned into a glorified online music store. It was a good opportunity on paper, but I can't see it ideally working out. Everything else is going along pretty much the same - open mic nights are still highly successful and everyone who's supportive there is awesome, I'm still hopelessly lovesick to the point of annoyance, the internet (particularly Wikipedia and assorted message boards) is pure evil, and other assorted blah blah blah. I think this dumb journal needs another "fun" entry soon. Maybe I should do one of those totally mindless surveys.... heh. Current Mood: restless Current Music: Laura Veirs - "Lake Swimming" (Comment on this)
Thursday, February 2nd, 2006
1:13 am	Oh no... snakes don't have arms. I feel so bad for snakes because they can't pick things up. So in a little over 12 hours, I've got another appointment at vocational rehab to discuss my test results and where I should go with things from there, and along with other things, it's making me so fucking anxious I could explode. I want to believe this is a step in the right direction, and it's probably going to be one, but there's the cynical side of me that's wary of it possibly turning into absolutely nothing substantial at all (Network Relocation Services, a couple web design offers a year and a half ago). I'm also quite nervous about all the challenges and very stressful situations ahead, but I think just finding something solid in the job market is going to take so much psychological weight off me. It's really not healthy to get totally up on life one or two days a week (particularly Monday nights) and then feel like worthless, directionless scum of the Earth the rest of the time, when I'm constantly around people who have a lot more of a life direction than I do. I'm hoping all of it will help me become a much more focused, stronger person so that, through all the hard times, I can at least feel tons more accomplished and deserving of everything I'm fortunate to have in life. As of right now, apart from the more successful open mics and scattered other things, I just can't find much focus or sense of accomplishment at all, and it upsets me so much. It certainly doesn't help that I'm still very, very much fighting battles within myself as to what I should ultimately do with my review site - there are so many complicated angles to that situation that I can't even think straight. And yeah, there are other unresolved issues too, but you can probably figure out what those are. I need sleep. Yeah. Current Mood: on the edge Current Music: Shortwave Dahlia - "The View From A Moving Car" (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Saturday, January 28th, 2006
12:46 am	Part III of the "MJA Takeover" plot I guess the whole MJA situation is starting to get slightly clearer now. Nice to know somebody professional actually considers my site "established", but I'm still a little skeptical of a lame "sell out" on the horizon. I'll deal with coming up with a follow-up E-mail after I sleep on it, as I'm a bit exhausted now: Financially we would put some banner advertising on the site to create a revenue flow, we would probably also backend it with a music store and market the album/cd corresponding with the written review. Our goal would be to maintain the current interest of the site and try to build upon what has already been done. Point of Impact Technologies Inc. was originally a company setup to do domain purchasing & domain brokering but over the last few months that market has become saturated and we've decided to start buying established websites to build upon. That is pretty much the extent of the company. The Colin Meloy show at the TLA = awesome. That guy has some of the most entertaining stage banter I've ever heard, and awesome taste in covers. It was even hilarious when he was playing a snippet of "the worst song I ever wrote", plus he played my two favorite Decemberists songs we didn't hear at the full band show in October ("Bachelor And The Bride", "California One"). I've felt ehhh most of the week because of about four or five different unresolved things that I'm feeling more worried about than usual all building up at the same time, most of which aren't anything new to readers of this journal, and this show was a very nice escape from that. Current Mood: tired Current Music: The Decemberists - Picaresque (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Tuesday, January 24th, 2006
1:10 pm	The followup to this MJA purchase thing So I did ask around about what to do with this E-mail from last entry, and virtually everyone around me, including my parents and a few people they talked to who know their stuff about web-related business, has advised me to go for it, but also find out more details to make sure I won't get ripped off. Well, I basically replied that I'm interested in considering the offer, but want more details on it. I don't know if it's just me or not, but the reply I just got an hour ago is making me feel somewhat more skeptical. I'm a whole lot less sure about how to respond to this one: Thanks for returning my email Nick, i've never actually purchased a website before so the whole process is new to me. I would like to offer you $500 US for your website. I could have the money sent to you by either paypal, cheque or wire transfer. If you accepted the offer, we would proceed by taking the content off your website and placing it on to the new website, we would then have the old pages point to the new website that way anyone looking for the your site could find it. Thanks, Lance As it was with last time, any advice and thoughts would be very much appreciated. I'm one of the last people who'd be objective at estimating what my site is actually worth, and this is certainly not something I just want to take action on absent-mindedly. I'd elaborate more on all this, but right now I somewhat feel like shit, both mentally and physically. I started feeling sick shortly before open mic started last night (though I was still able to do okay, I guess), and I haven't felt any better this morning. I'm not entirely sure what brought this on, considering I've been in quite a good mood most of the last week or so. Hmm.... Current Mood: sick Current Music: Cheap Trick - "Clock Strikes Ten" (3 Comments |Comment on this)
Sunday, January 22nd, 2006
11:06 pm	Hmm.... A few minutes ago, I was just going through my mailbox, deleting a whole bunch of junk mail that I've gotten in the habit of accumulating, and I just came across this E-mail from 4 days ago on January 18th that I hadn't noticed before, one that I'm not sure what to make of, below. For those who don't know, it's about my old music review site, which I would like to have someone "inherit" from me eventually, but haven't gotten around to doing that yet: "Hi, I am contacting you with what may be an unusual inquiry. I am interested in acquiring http://www.geocities.com/mjareviews/, or at least the content from you. If you're wondering why, it is because I am in the process of building a similar site and it would be easier for me to start off with a foundation rather than start from scratch with a brand new site. Please let me know if you are interested? Thanks for your time, Lance Point Of Impact Technologies Inc." Thoughts? Current Mood: contemplative Current Music: Johnny Cash - "Folsom Prison Blues" (5 Comments |Comment on this)
Wednesday, January 18th, 2006
1:47 am	A LJ-related question/observational thing: Here's something I've been wondering for awhile, but I really have no idea what people's tendencies are: how often do any of you browse around the "friends pages" of those from your own list for fun, just to see if you'll stumble upon any particularly interesting entries/people? I wouldn't say I take part in this activity a whole lot, but every once in awhile, I catch myself mindlessly surfing through a whole crapload of journals, and it's sometimes kinda fun. This process hasn't ever led to me to commenting on, or bookmarking, any total stranger's journal yet, but I'm curious as to whether or not it has for others. Thoughts? Current Mood: peaceful Current Music: Massive Attack - "Dissolved Girl" (5 Comments |Comment on this)
Monday, January 9th, 2006
2:40 pm	So on Thursday, I had another appointment at this vocational rehab place, and in the middle of taking extensive job hunting tests (which included 150 generic true/false personality questions, as well as a ton of questions on abilities, how much you like or dislike being in certain situations and certain jobs, etc.), I had a discussion with a psychologist type. A lot of what he found out about me I knew already, but I came out of it realizing for the first time that, in fact, there are people out there who can actually help me on working with my strengths and weaknesses. Basically, I was told I'm very employable, and it's just a matter of me finding my career niche. I realize that I suck at organizing my thoughts in conversation quickly enough, reasoning ("what objects are missing from this picture?"), and trying to find the best way to explain what certain things and concepts are (that "what is that stupid word??" disease that Skeeter's dad from Doug had). On the other hand, I also apparently have a great memory and very good ability at solving math puzzles in my head. I felt very naked about having my mental vulnerabilities out there at first, but in the long run I know it might help, and at least I'm better at coming to terms with them. Now if I could only shake the idea that everyone around me is silently thinking I'm a complete loser because of my total retardedness in being able to find a career. Yes, I know it's not completely true, but still, there are those ugly signs every now and then. Other than that, I really haven't accomplished crap all week. Curse you, Thing #1 and Thing #2! That and the start of the NFL playoffs. Current Mood: still extremely anxious Current Music: Galactic Cowboys - "No Problems" (ha) (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Tuesday, January 3rd, 2006
2:17 pm	Does God have a sense of humor? I hope so Thinking back, I still find it amusing that I could have created a hilariously awkward situation at last night's open mic had I decided to do a certain song called "Church Is Boring", which I had done only once on... *checks the setlists he's got written down in a Word document* November 14th. I was never planning to, but instead introduced a medley in which I did an untitled instrumental version of a new song with "Circle Of Icicles" and my version of Europe's "The Final Countdown" (which didn't work very well since my guitar was out-of-tune, "Circle Of Icicles" is one of those songs I totally have trouble singing, and I forgot a few of the words to "Final Countdown"). I also added in three other standards ("Throw Your Neighbors Down The Stairs", "Polar Bear Rock" and what might now be my 16 second set-closing staple "How To Find Girls To Go Out With"). There were also other highlights of the night (most notably Jeremy encouraging the crowd to write him angry letters on account of his subpar performance and accidentally creating a couple hilarious hooks when he coughed a couple times in between lyrics), but that's not what inspired this entry..... See, about 20-30 minutes after I finished my set, there was a "special guest" performance from this guy named Sean Michel. I guess he and his band were okay, though I got a little too much of a self-important Creed vibe from that performance, which only got stronger when his stage banter started getting a lot more overtly religious, centering around Jesus Christ, how he loves everyone the same and babble like that, and also relating this story in the Bible about a woman weeping at Jesus' feet and spilling perfume all over it, among other things. He also seemed to get very emotional at points talking on stage (particularly talking about the not-so-cleverly titled alcohol addiction song "Bottles") and all of this made Jay wonder how much different things would have been had I actually played "Church Is Boring", and the idea of that cracked me up way more than it should. As the subject indicates, I hope God has a sense of humor about things as I do. :) As for Casey's New Year's Eve party, it was kinda lame, though it still ended up being fun since both Jay and I were able to rock out extensively in the background on a whole bunch of songs, and it was great being shown around Casey's house for the first time (interestingly enough, it's not his real housewarming party - that doesn't happen until the 13th). Playing that drinking game Asshole for several hours surrounded by personalities I don't jive with very well and mostly crappy music on the radio isn't exactly my idea of a great time, though, and I personally found it very depressing how terrible Dick Clark looked and sounded during the countdown to 2006. Other than that unsettling observation, the new year seemed to come in very unassumingly as far as I'm concerned. Hopefully the rest of 2006 doesn't go that way! Current Mood: blasphemous Current Music: They Might Be Giants - "Everything Right Is Wrong Again" (2 Comments |Comment on this)
Saturday, December 31st, 2005
12:36 am	Some holiday ramblings plus *gasp* pictures! Well, I've come to what will most likely be my last entry of 2005, but I won't spend too much time on generic 'end of the year' summary things. I've had a great holiday season so far, and I hope all of you have as well. Although it no longer has quite the magic on me it once did as a child, I had a very good Christmas - it's always an uplifting, pleasurable time at my house, and this year was no different. Among the highlights of my gifts were the first volume of the Nuggets boxed sets, the Arrested Development Season One DVD (thanks to everyone I know who has raved about it, particularly Jay - it's really quite entertaining and crazy), the last couple of Homestar Runner DVDs (including the 4th Strong Bad E-mail disc and the Everything Else thing with a whole bunch of toons and shorts), and one of those really sweet electronic rocking chairs (with built-in speakers and an adapter you can use to hook it up to the computer, Playstation, or whatever). Ironically, though, the gift I got most addicted to was a cheap stocking stuffer - an electronic hand-held version of Yahtzee. Hey, I like simple pleasures... haha. The 26th, though, was arguably even better, seeing as it fell open mic Monday, my current favorite day of the week. This one particularly stood out because Jay's latest guest to join us, Rachael, was cool enough to be the first person to take pictures of all of us on stage! I do have access to a digital camera, but for whatever reason, I never thought to bring it with me. I'm glad someone else did fill that void, though, as I really like how these turned out. Here they are in all their glory. ( Pic action from The Fire ) I was going to do at least some sort of 2005 summary, but I've just decided at the last minute to not really bother. Let's just say I've made huge advances on one of my New Year's resolutions from the end of 2004 (to get further along with my music in terms of playing, songwriting, performing and even producing - the open mic thing is an opportunity I especially never thought would work out as well as it has), and can quite possibly make another huge advance on another (my full-time job searching progress, which I might know a lot about in just the next few weeks or so), so that's not too bad. I've discovered more about myself personally than I ever have, I've gotten a bit better around people in general than at this same time last year, and although thinking about what I haven't accomplished yet but should have by now does eat at me sometimes, I can say as of December 31st I'm generally hopeful. And later on, I'm going to Casey's New Year's Eve party at his new house, and I think that could be a gathering of epic proportions. Less than 24 hours until 2006.... man... it just doesn't seem possible, does it? Current Mood: satisfied Current Music: The Clash - "One More Time" (3 Comments |Comment on this)
Friday, December 23rd, 2005
11:19 am	A pointless exercise (updated 100-song list) For no other reason other than the fact that I'm in an utterly silly (and kinda inspired) mood right now following a relistening to my 100-song album on random with 3-second crossfades between each song, I decided to go to the All Music Guide and see how many of those song titles have already been used by other bands/artists that AMG can verify. And hey, if nothing else, some of these titles might be entertaining to read as a display of my "creativity". Original titles are in bold. ( Blah blah blah ) Current Mood: silly Current Music: duh (10 Comments |Comment on this)
Thursday, December 22nd, 2005
1:11 pm	Stupid internet games This thing has a grip on me and won't let go. So far, my personal best score is 153, but I haven't been able to get anywhere near that since. To tie this in a bit with my last entry, it's kind of making me feel tense, almost like a cat chasing after the red dot on the wall coming from a light pen. But I can't stop! Ahhhh! Current Mood: anxious Current Music: Talking Heads - "(Nothing But) Flowers" (Comment on this)
Wednesday, December 21st, 2005
2:02 am	More "stories [that] are boring and stuff"... yeah, such a deep line, Interpol :p Ah, I knew there was something else I forgot to write in here. Last week, we got two new kittens, bringing the total number in our house to 7. But even though that's probably a lot, we've still got a ways to go to catch up to the 17(!) my aunt owns. These happen to be just about the most manic cats when it comes to food I've ever seen - they flip out when anyone even THINKS about starting to fix something, and they're more than willing to dive headfirst into the refrigerator or trash can. And this considering they seem to want just about anything but regular cat food. They're so nice and playful, though, and life with them could prove fun and interesting. Maybe I'll throw out pics of them later, and as for their names, they're Liam and Ben. The Trans-Siberian Orchestra show on Saturday night was also totally great as expected, though like with Sigur Ros a few months ago, I felt like I would have enjoyed it a lot more if we weren't so far from the stage, to get the full powerful effect. Only a minor complaint, though, as it hit a lot of emotionally beautiful highs, and their light show is waberawesome, somewhat like a stage equivalent of this. And of course, last Monday's open mic was yet again amazing. It's like, my 10-15 minutes a week to go crazy, especially on my AC/DC parody "The Balls Of Rock" I wrote 4 years ago and my ending with "How To Find Girls To Go Out With". Speaking of girls, it's kind of an unusual development that at least a couple of the most prominent people I'm winning over are females, which for me is really saying something. The great Katie Davenport was there. She put on a brilliant singing display as usual, we conversed with her for a bit and also met her brother, plus she got a very clumsy CD of Physical Illusion stuff sent her way - now let's see if she still thinks I'm a genius... heh. Then there's Diana, who had requested "Suburban Homeboy" a couple weeks ago, and who I also had a very nice chat with (by my anti-social standards, anyways). We also had a violinist guesting on several people's sets, including Jay's - a half-step down version of "Burial Clothes" went off particularly well. Still the longshot best day of my week, Monday is. And that's all I wrote. Current Mood: energetic Current Music: Mogwai - "Ex-Cowboy" (4 Comments |Comment on this)
Saturday, December 17th, 2005
3:07 pm	Well, as a short update, I'm feeling much better than I was a few days ago. I went to an appointment at this vocational rehabilitation place on Thursday for assistance in finding appropriate work, and a lot of the same social issues I detailed in my last entry came up in discussion. But unlike the couple neurologists I've gone to in the recent past, they actually seemed to understand where I was coming from, offering responses that were much, much more than just vague, and even thought some of what I was diagnosed with in the past was ridiculous (for instance, the idea that it's somehow not possible to have both cerebral palsy and Asperger's syndrome at the same time, and that I was dragging my foot crookedly as a child to "get attention"). It appears to be the type of place I'm seeking to get my foot in the door career-wise in some way besides the traditional one, and in the next month or so, I should have a VERY good idea through as psychological and career tests where the heck I'm going. Until something actually comes of this, there's still a part of me that's skeptical, but I'm optimistic, even if cautiously so. Last night was pretty good. I went with Jay to a party Brandon from open mic was having at his house (which he also played at) for awhile. It wasn't quite as entertaining as a couple weeks ago when we went to see him play at two different places in one night in Philly, but there was a nice enough crowd and vibe. And tonight I'm going to the Trans-Siberian Orchestra show that everyone who's seen it seems to rave about, so I'm excited about that. And that's about it for now. Current Mood: hopeful Current Music: Ozzy Osbourne - "Mr. Crowley" (1 Comment |Comment on this)
Wednesday, December 14th, 2005
4:38 pm	A psychological rant *cue “Shout” by Tears For Fears* First off, apologies for the length of this entry, but lately, I’ve been having a whole bunch of realizations and fights within myself that have kind of been hitting me hard. Tomorrow afternoon, I have an appointment at a place in Trenton that might be able to help me out with finding work as well as suggestions on my general life direction, so writing some personal thoughts out here on the eve of this might keep them fresh in my mind and make them easier to actually talk about with people. It’s a heck of a lot easier for me to get them out this way than in conversation, and good therapy for me to let things out, especially among several of you who are great at offering advice and encouragement. I promise I won’t rant this long again for awhile. Really. :) I think I’ve already established that I’m stressed out about not having full-time work, but I’ve also discovered that I’m just as, if not more, upset about something that’s a big contributor to me having a hard time with that in the first place. It’s pretty much the enormous roadblock for me in having the kind of fulfilling life I really want – social ineptitude. I’ve never gone into my problems with that in very great detail, because I have a hard time explaining them, but I’ll try my best. Some of this I’ve gone into a bit in the past, but some not. I just thought it’d be better if I threw everything in there. The thing with me is that there are some “social cues” that are completely obvious to most people that I have a really, really hard time with. For one thing, and it may seem strange to think this way, but there’s something about making eye contact with people in conversation that makes me uncomfortable. I also tend to have a tough time organizing my responses to someone efficiently in conversation, which usually causes me to respond in a different, sometimes much less coherent, way than what I meant to. People who actually know me offline will know what I’m talking about, but I’m not sure how to adequately explain it. But although I’m not quite as bad with this in online conversations, it will even show itself there too. Another example: There are numerous times when someone will ask something I don’t quite understand right away, and for some reason, my personal stubbornness takes over. Often, instead of asking people to clarify what they said for fear of seeming stupid, for some reason I just freeze and say nothing, which makes me look even worse. I’ve tried hard to stop these tendencies, but they always seem to come up, and they’ve gotten me into way too many awkward situations to count throughout my life. I know this will seem insane to some of you, but I also have quite a bit of trouble answering a simple, friendly “What’s going on?” very well, even when there actually are numerous interesting things going on in my life. But this is certainly is not the case with me now, so it's made twice as hard. It just seems like such a broad question sometimes, and one I find difficult to answer without resorting to the typical answer of “Same old stuff”. Maybe it isn’t difficult for some of you to summarize what you’ve been up to for the last several days, weeks, months, or however long it’s been since you last talked to whoever you’re conversing with, but it is so for me. It doesn’t help that I’m just really, really terrible of summarizing things in general – I often even have trouble retelling stories about interesting incidents that happened to people, even if they occurred within the last day or so. As you can imagine, because of this trouble I have, the prospect of a job interview where broader questions like, “What do you bring to this company?” or “Where do you see your career going in five years?” intimidates me more than a little. Along similar lines, I know I’ve probably alienated some people by coming off as rude, since it sometimes doesn’t appear like I give a shit about what they’ve been up to. But I honestly do, sincerely! I’ve come to realize that this reaction probably has a lot to do with the fact that I have a hard time responding to that question myself, and at the same time forgetting that most others don’t feel that way, so I tend not to ask it. Asking how someone’s doing is one of those social cues that just doesn’t come naturally to me at all. When you throw these social things in with all my other problems - terrible procrastinating habits and not being able to stick with the same tasks for very long, acting overly obsessive about anything related my interests, having severe picky eating (and drinking) habits, as well as below average reflexes and mild cerebral palsy - that’s not exactly a good combination. It also doesn’t help that I’ve been in quite a lovesick state, and my social ineptness is about the worst possible quality to have when it comes to getting into a potential relationship. That’s another issue entirely that I don’t really like to discuss very much, though. But at least this year, more than any other, I’ve tried to dedicate myself to completely coming to terms with my weaknesses and trying to adjust to life with them, though I’m still really scared about how I’m ever going to be able to handle my future. It’s going to take awhile to really build my confidence up to where I want it to be, but at least I’ve gotten a half decent start at it. Open mic nights, after a few rough patches, have been going far better than I ever expected them to, and I actually feel comfortable about playing (or sending) songs to almost anyone, as opposed to just Casey, and Cole, of course. Can’t forget that Physical Illusion page. Taking part in that has improved my confidence level considerably, though I really wish I could be a lot more talkative around the community there than I actually am. I’m so jealous of all you more social types I know. Especially Jay, the bastard (kidding!) Hopefully everything goes well tomorrow, as well as the rest of the week. In any case, it felt really good to let a whole ton of stuff that’s been on me out in one place (which I actually did twice, because I lost well over half this entry to a power failure after I was almost done it the first time… sigh). If anyone has any thoughts or helpful suggestions about what I’m going through, I’d appreciate it so much – like I’ve said, I know some of you on here are very good at that, and I just know Mike D. in particular can really relate to some of this. I think I’ll probably even end up printing out this entry so I’ll be able to come back to it for future reference, in case I end up getting professional help or something. That’s about it, I guess, so I’ll just go back into the unassuming LJ background where I’ve been most of the time the last couple months. Later all! Current Mood: refreshed Current Music: Tears For Fears - "Shout" (4 Comments |Comment on this)
Tuesday, December 6th, 2005
12:43 pm	I don't like to keep bringing up open mic nights in like, half the entries I write, but OMG... like, this one completely made my week. Seriously. And not just because of stuff like Nate's brilliant idea of having everyone read a random paragraph out of the "E" volume of the Encyclopedia Brittanica (which often produced priceless results), Steve's completely bizarre ambient noise-making pieces with effects pedals on his vocals, harmonica, and other assorted instruments, or Herb's out of freaking nowhere song about how he hates leather pants (combine that with his 'I don't actually know how to play guitar' style, and it was a trip and a half). No, this one was awesome because of what happened after my self-proclaimed 'commercial whore' set during which I did all my most popular songs (An Accidental Flash Of Genius, Polar Bear Rock, Throw Your Neighbors Down The Stairs) with a crazy jingle for the Norton Antivirus Information Wizard thrown in there. Katie D., who I've said has been my favorite performer so far, told me afterwards I was a genius, and even better, expressed interest in covering my songs and getting a CD of my stuff! Of course, I told her she had to return the favor and send me one too. Needless to say, I've got such girlish excitement over that right now, especially since I was quite intimidated by her talent (especially after seeing her set last night). THE Katie Davenport covering Physical Illusion! It still hasn't totally sunk in yet how freaking cool that is. It's an honor! God, I'm such a fanboy nerd... :P Yeah, I can and will write about other crap on here when the time comes. I'll be at a couple job fairs, so I'm really really hoping that issue will get resolved soon, and my life will be so much better for it. I wish I could think of more random funny observations to put in here too like a few others I know so effortlessly can. But whatever. Current Mood: energetic Current Music: Sarsaparilla - "Subway Carol" (hey, another open mic fave) (1 Comment |Comment on this)