The Return of the (it turns out) Not-So Reluctant Blog

Travel Diary

2005-10-28T22:54:00.000-07:00

I had myself a bit to drink last night. Now, I wake up dehydrated, groggy and arguably not in the best of moods to welcome a day involving a lot of light. Oh gods of the intertropical convergence zone! Aid me!

Monday though dawns with a better note: the project I was asigned to has come to an end and with it go the involvement of people possessing all the mental acuity of a kiwi fruit. Although I can say that everyone was a complete moron (I am no exception, I suspect but this would have to do more with personal tragedies) . This doesn't mean that some of them had not other "redeeming" qualities that could endear them to me. Anyway, though my heart is light, my steps sprightely, and my mind's eye wide open to the vista spread before me, I cannot help but take one look back at an experience at best can only be described as... interesting. To Sheila, pretty you may be but prettier you CAN be if you find it in yourself to grasp the inner tramp and WORK it... To Michelle, anger no matter how tightly bottled will still let off steam... To Kat, no amount of emotional buffering can take you that far-- sometimes you just need to let things go, take them as they are, and free yourself from the inertia you find yourself in... and lastly, to Amalie. I don't know what mysterious dynamic propels us but I like the scenery so far. :) I have never worked with a noisier pack of bitches in my life. Your high-pitched screams will always be music to my ears, girls.

There ends an era for me and though the future may not promise a journey without the occasional eyesore and vehicular accident, may the destination not just be worth it in the end but so be my journey.

C/Raven

2005-10-22T07:44:00.000-07:00

I find myself, even after all these years, unable to face my past mistake. It may not be the greatest, but it is the one that continues to unman me even today. Guilt has been a bird on my shoulder, pecking away at my heart. I do not know for how long I can continue like this: a man maimed by his own doing, I live in a place full of mirrors, showing me what I have done. Such ruthlessness can only be reserved for Greek tragedies. Or comedies, even! It verges on the laughable (Although at times I have suspected it has crossed it, doubled back and circled again!)... I can only see one way out but it frightens me to think of a future without regret. Perhaps after everything, that is the only thing I have possessed?

Smooth and Definitely EASY

2005-10-02T04:27:00.000-07:00

I had gotten home at around ten o' clock in the morn and found myself waking up on the couch (ouch!) five hours later with a few parts "mysteriously" sore. And before anyone tries to try their hand at the hazards of guessing, let me make it easy by saying that it's my upperback muscles. I'm afraid, left to your own devices, one would have surmised at the point of injury as to somewhere farther south but then, I digress. >:)

One lesson learned: Though alcohol unzips many a tongue and fly, it is by no means Viagra. Heh heh.

Prodigal Curiousity

2005-09-04T06:06:00.000-07:00

Hello Unseen Reader. I have been quite remiss in updating this "beloved" journal of mine. I can only feel shamed and a bit put-upon as events of such size and shape have managed to monopolize me for their own. With that said, on with the details:

I haven't taken leave of my company. A shock truly, to some but more so to me. I have been enlisted to participate in a project whose limited shelflife magnifies, nay, aggravates one's particular action into something "life-threatening". T'was two weeks that were promised, and a merry way I would have gone had not the venture contained a personality whom I am uncommonly fond of: a friend in need makes for a highly effective blackmailer indeed. No doubt about it. So, saddled as I am, I take upon a load though not made of straw still promises a few spinal injuries and the occasional slipped discs. Two months now they say and I look quite eagerly to my emancipation. Too often have I allowed myself to be waylaid by my (frequent) passing distractions and woebegone good intentions.

A little pruning is at hand and I am quite handy with sharp objects, heh heh.

The Daily Grind Crushes Yet Another

2005-08-02T06:53:00.000-07:00

I hate working. And though this may sound like a familiar song, it may just be a different one (but from the same songwriter). I hate chipping away at something that's neverending. Like rolling a boulder all the way to some Godforsaken hilltop only to wake up the next day with the SAME THING going on again. I hate thinking about existence because, in my all-consuming human conceit, I'd still like to believe we're built for better stuff. I hate slaving away just so I could tell myself that a job's all there is to it. The all-mighty currency, that golden ticket to having a life a bit better than that of a pauper. As a beggar, you submit to the kindness (however arbitrary) of strangers. If not, there's always exploitation. With being a working stiff, you submit yourself to something even crueller than kindness-- the caprice of your "superiors". I'd like to believe that people would like to be better people in the end but the office place is a harsh teacher. I feel like a maggot working away at a carcass. Wait. A maggot has a better stand in the "grand" scheme of things. I feel "trivialized". Worse, I feel soiled. Perhaps it is foolish to subscribe to lofty notions but I feel as if I've been doing myself this great disservice staying, hanging on, this long. Perhaps a timely bath is in order. A purging. A cleansing...

Someday, I hope to get this nasty aftertaste off of my tongue.

The Last Man

2005-08-01T07:37:00.000-07:00

It's a strange feeling: finding yourself the only customer left inside an internet cafe that was, but a few minutes ago, so (noisily) full. It's an oddness that you can't quite place your finger on. Similar to finding yourself in a near-deserted booth of the monorail. It's almost unsettling except you keep trying to reason with yourself that it isn't. That it's quite a normal thing for places to find themselves empty now and then. But the proximity to such "blankness" disturbs me. Perhaps it reminds me only too well of how close we are to the abyss. Of how we harbor our own empty spaces.

Itchy Palms and Other Portents That Mean To Inspire

2005-07-14T04:34:00.000-07:00

AAAAAHHHH... The pause that refreshes, eh? Ha ha ha. Just slept the whole day and while, normally(?), that wouldn't exactly sound as good as it feels: Damn! That does just hit the spot!

And as for the theme for the day... Nada. Too bored.

Downside/Upside: One of my cats gave birth to two kittens (What else could she give birth to? Lawn chairs?!) and one of them's dead. Poor thing looks almost human- curled up defensively, perhaps trying to keep the last ebb of life from leaking away. Gave me the creeps. Fetal and blind, pale and pink. I wondered if it was dead before it came out or after. Couldn't briong myslef to touch it. Not particularly squeamish but this time I could scream. A vessel emptied of life. I could almost see those tiny claws scrabbling, one leg kicking, trying to drive itself towards the light. Argh.

Ennui as the Father of Perversion?

2005-07-12T21:06:00.000-07:00

Go to Heaven for the climate, Hell for the company.

Mark Twain

I wonder if murderers prove better company than nuns? I have never been a supporter of the Roman Catholic faith, even less in these times (if possible), but isn't fanaticism of an ideal the same on either side of the coin? The murderer indulges a pimitive response to acclimation while a nun does the same (with hypocritical flair, quite interestingly). How strange that we should employ a defective yet delightful defensive mechanism of sorts to an incidence factoring a supposed Divine concep yet learn to move with automatic (if more often than not) fatal grace with the termination of human (?) life. Should I be confused or is my Catholic upbringing getting in the way? Ha ha ha, to be quite serious, shall we indulge ourselves to a coldy served dish as "Man is inherently evil" or project dismay at the profound "admission"? Which begs the question, should this thought then support the existence of evil and the absence of good? That denial is the one thing we prize most-- the refusal to see in this Nightmare light is simply the ability to see all to clearly in the Dark? Very strange but typically human, no? Perverse creatures that we are, we find ourselves validating that which makes us so. Such odd enterprises often leave me short of breath but not without the excitement such an ascpade can promise. Do we begin to be Honest in simple Acknowledgement or is Action the final seal? I guess the Roman catholic faith really is just another well-publicized cult-- a formidable opponent, yes, but "correct"? Which makes me wonder more-- does this then support that what which we seek is what which is not "correct"? Or are we stultified with our denioal that we belive it "correct" but at the same time it is an indulgence of what we seek as "incorrect"?

Ho hum.

Boring day. Maybe the end of the world will happen. I hope not though. I don't have all my faculties available upon my disposal. *sigh* What a pity "it" is. >:)

The Wings of the Dove

2005-07-10T04:29:00.000-07:00

If there is a sin against life, it consists perhaps not so much in despairing of life as in hoping for another life and in eluding the implacable grandeur of this life.

Albert Camus

How strange that one would post the words of an existentialist in a blog entry entitled hope. Perhaps all is not lost, eh?

I'm actually tempted to leave it as it was (ending in those words) but perhaps I've got logorrhea (strike perhaps). I'm just not content to leave well-enough alone. Pity.

I work in a call center. I aim to end it-- Some time soon. It's not the money (I try to convince myself of this) but I am a creature who longs for comfort and routine (do we all?). And before I begin contradicting myself even more (if possible), let me say this: To Dream is the most terrifying thing I/we have done. And maybe that would be the same reason why I return to it. I have had Hope tear at my breast, and though bloody, I find my heart still beating. Silly things, hearts are. I'd be laughing if it didn't hurt so much. I have despaired at the thought of pursuing my dreams-- it can only mean suffering and, more importantly, bearing it. It can only mean taking your armour off and running naked through the streets. Ho well. I'm sure I've done it before. I just can't remember it being THIS scary. It does not mean though that I'll be a nicer person after it (maybe to exploit a few I might-- Heh heh). Nobler? I have no use for dignity if it only serves to make others feel better about treating me "humanely". I care not for human devices if they were simply made to make others feel better. I aim to please me.

Am I sad though? I definitely am. There are many I know whom I will miss terribly. There are many I know whom I'll never hear from again. Call centre life does that to you. Do I feel lucky? I don't know. I feel terrible, that much is sure. Terrified, to be exact. But there's a calming sense of finality that more than enough assures me I'm heading somewhere. At the very least, eh? I had often feared growing old in that industry. I hope I am able to finally escape it.

It feels like the end. It only means then that I'm probably right.

An Out-Of-The-Body Experience (More Commonly Known As What-Have-You)

2005-07-06T21:42:00.000-07:00

Here I was, thinking that maybe it was a bad mistake (you mean there're good ones?!-- Hmn.. Silly question but: yes. Although it does depend with the amount of prejudice, also known as preferred illusions, into it.). I normally like mistakes , especially my own, as they never fail to uncover something about me (and people) that I never thought I had but suspiciously felt I did (have, I mean). Lookit that! Another entry! When will I tire I wonder (I think I did yesterday but whoever said I had a limit on the times one can tire of something? God knows, and I'll bet "He" does- pardon affixing a gender to the idea- that humans are more than comfortable in repeat refreshments...)? Ho well. That was a rhetoric but, hey, don't they feel better when they're out of your head and out to annoy people with their imperviousness? *sigh* A relief, lemme tell ya.
So moving on, I was just speaking to Jayce of (pretentiously but oddly aptly titled) "Cobwebs and Souls Blog" and he, trying to deliver the message with as much insouciance (Boy, wouldn't he just LOVE having such a nice word used in the same sentence as his name!) he can muster, tells me that he's "outed" me (Mind you, I don't think I encased the word in quotation marks with the same reason he has but fools do stumble across treasures now and then). Whoa (insert deadpan humour). ... Gyah hah hah. As if it matters (I can hear people agreeing but I'll get you guys one of these days. Don't worry.). Those who do know me already know I am Egomet. And for those who don't know me as Joel but know me as Egomet-- Why should it even have any value? I just can't see it. Perhaps Old Age has stunted my learning growth but I just can't over this (mole) hill. Actually I can and I'm just being a drama queen insisting I can't. Ho hum. Now that terribly bores me (dainty creature that it is). So, Jayce, if yer reading this (and no doubt I'll force feed it to you-- yet again...), It doesna really matter so tell me why it gave you pleasure/satisfaction/ sense of fulfillment/_________(insert appropriate feeling associated with satiation). On second thought... Don't. 'll just annoy myself thinking why instead. Hooray. Now, that certainly feels better.
Now onto other things (assuming I can come up with the "other things"-- very post-mortem in reverse). I was thinking how nice it would be if the new pope (He, of the Roman Catholic persuasion) were to just die. He's a lot more annoying than the first (The previous one was afflicted with so much medical inconsistencies that he couldbn't really be bothered coming up with his own thoughts- I hear the new one ghostwrote for him). Plus he thinks a lot of things are plain evil. Especially people of MY persuasion (that would be me and the general populace of Homo-Rama-Ville). Great. I knew I'm evil but to be evil BY DEFAULT?! What sacrilege. I thought I had earned it and turns I needn't have tried. Oh well. What a waste of time and effort.

At least I had fun.

P.S.
And, yes, Jayce, I would be insulted were people to think you even came close to my level of intelligence but feel free to have your illusions. It's free I hear. I doubt that it is but I'm not about to clear THAT misconception up. So much more "happy thoughts" in waiting and seeing people eventually find out.

P.P.S.
But don't let this give people the wrong idea. Although he did exercise bad taste in calling me "Joselito" but what could I expect? I actually like Jayce. Terribly shallow but delightfully misled. Such honesty can't walk past me without a tug or two. I think we're starting to become friends (Not so horrific now that it's on its way... Feels strangely familiar...).

Let us gaze into the mirror and lose what's left of innocence, shall we?

Disclaimers (The OTHER Human Invention)

2005-06-28T02:41:00.000-07:00

I am a deeply superficial person.

Andy Warhol

And so this is the part where I have to explain myself ("Why two blogs?! You mean one wasn't enough!?" Simmer down, Fido. You're frothing at the mouth). I needed another one because my other side wanted one ( Him, my imaginary midget friends, and my other personality called Santa Lucia.). Kidding ( I think). I guess I didn't want to dilute the other blog's aura (The thought which I tend to entertain every now and then). The Devil's Little Helper blog's for my dark musings (also known as pretentious literary trash) and this one's for my evil one (Sorry Mom. You tried to raise me well but failed. Don't worry though. It's not your fault. The credit's all mine.). No good side though so there goes me having a Dear Abbie section here (But who's to say she had noble intentions... all those royalties coming in I'm sure kept encouraging her "positively"...). Plus, I get to keep a diary (Which I've always secretly wanted but couldn't go through due to the Herculean effort of having to use a pencil for a straight five minutes-- Poor me. I just tire so easily.). I guess this would be the cesspool with which I can keep dumping the dregs my mental crane too often brings up from the deep end of my cranial cavity. A near accepted manner of pissing and moaning about everything has got to be this generation's highlight. Talk about milestones, eh? Who cares about penicillin? I got me a blog and a shady understanding of Free Speech and Democracy. Talk about Weapons of War.

So now, where was I again? Oh yes. My disclaimer. I call this The Reluctant Blog ("Ta-daa...") because I wanted to poke fun at my supposed hesitation in setting (even) one up. I wanted to play coy, you see, and what better way than to pooh-pooh all the nice things a blog could do for my mental instability (I'm serious... ). It's great therapy I hear. And with that clause in hand, I'm sure people will pardon the things I keep saying (Oh Happy Day. The fun just never stops, does it?). Morals, I'm sure, were invented by the Evil People to trick the weak ones into thinking it will play into their favor. Funny why it has so many loopholes but, hey, whatever floats your boat (By the way, I think it's sprung another leak...).

Ho well. There's always the next evolution (Unless God's sprung on us this horrible joke. Now that's NOT funny. Ha ha ha.).

Cyanide and the Occasional Noose

2005-06-27T15:41:00.000-07:00

So here I am starting yet ANOTHER blog just when the blog fever's died down and everybody who used to think it was so cool, now think it's just something geeks and losers do (sorry guys if I lumped you in just one category... convenience plus I couldn't be bothered, really). From thinking that it was a too-cool way where you could prove you could write a more-than-two-cents-worth jumble of letters and words to simply going: "Huh?!" ...Jeezus. What a lovely world we live in. I gotta remember to send a postcard to these guys one of these days. That or a letter-bomb (sweet memories-- back then, Al-Qaeda wasn't so popular and we only had the Unabomber to worry about. Ho well. We're always on the lookout for the next big thing, eh?).

So, moving on, I think I was prattling about what pains I took in trying to set up another blog (if I didn't then I'm telling you now-- ) but I'm actually looking forward to seeing this one up (which would then explain the pains-- in retrospect I would probably gleefully gloat over a friend of mine that he may be able to write 2 cents but I'm worth a whole dollar... ahhh, don't you just love destroying other people's self-esteem? It makes my piddly one look so much bigger). Had another but it's just one to keep my pseudo-weighty thoughts in it (but that's another thing to talk about altogether... I've digressed too much already *got a clue finally*).

Where was I? Oh yeah, I was about to launch into my "theme" (if this puzzles you, please refer to the title above). I'm not really partial to cyanide (for fishing I prefer dynamite... all those pretty pretty yet useless fish parts floating around-- I'll bet THEY didn't know what hit them) BUT the noose does have its charm (very "old school"). Suicide is always a fantastic way to a quick NOTICE-ME sign over your head. Of course, if you ARE successful, it'd be your last but, hey, you'll always be fondly remembered (so for those planning a quick get-away into Mother Earth, lead a do-goody, non-supposing life so people won't feel too put-out in trying to remember you nicely). But if you fail, take heed. For each attempt lessens the novelty it inspires so please use this platform sparingly. A dash every mid-life crisis or so I think would be enough to spice anyone's personal history. By this I'm assuming you live with real AND sentient individuals and not in the company of volleyballs but AGAIN that's another story. Besides, suicide always looks cute on paper... It's the resulting remains that's always questionable. So if in doubt, practice on someone else. Remember, cyanide is "pretty" untraceable. But if you're really planning on not getting caught, I have a few poisons I could recommend. I like the drama (what with all the retching and face-twisting) better than a peaceful demise. So please-- remember to invite me along.

I always did love a good show.