Forget the Slow Fade

I don't think I'm giving up any new information about the stages of relationships. There's the courting stage, where both sides flirt and flatter and doll themselves up in their very best to try to win the affections of the other.

Then there is the first stage, the all powerful new love. You do ANYTHING and EVERYTHING with that person. You give up your free time, your friends, your hobbies...all to spend time with that person and you don't care. Mostly that's because you're doing nothing but screwing each other's brains out most of the time.

After all that screwing slows down, you get into the comfortable time. You go back to normal, but you still spend a lot of time together and you still are pretty good to each other, even if you go back to having your lives be a little more separate.

But should it start to fail for some reason, there are a few different tactics to breaking up. I am the "clean break" guy. I bail out, tell it like it is, tell her I'm not going to change my mind and I'm not going to come back. Yeah, it's kind of harsh, but it's honest.

The one I hate is what I call the "Slow Fade". It's when one side decides it's over and doesn't have the guts to just confront the other person. So you start "missing" phone calls, not returning messages maybe. You break plans at the last minute. You start finding excuses to do other things to be away from the other person. Things you used to always do together either don't get done, or they are done alone or with other people.

Sadly, it's usually a toss up whether the other person sees it coming or not. When it happens to me, I see it coming. I am a person of routine mostly. I know what I do, when I do it and who I do it with. Now I don't always plan everything to the hilt, but even I can tell when someone stops answering their phone, or if they magically have email difficulty or scheduling conflicts.

The thing is, it's insulting. Like no one sees it coming? When people start saying "So where is (insert name) lately?" Or when the other person is sitting around wondering why plans get canceled or when they don't hear for days.

If you're going to break things off, just be honest about it, it's that simple. Plus you'll earn more respect.

Perez Hilton says Miss USA should be "politically correct"

In case you haven't heard this story overexposed enough on the news already, earlier in the week during the Miss USA competition, celebrity gossip blogger Perez Hilton, who is very gay, asked Miss California's opinion of gay marriage.

Now despite the fact that the majority of Americans are opposed to gay marriage, Mr (or Ms.?) Hilton got all annoyed when Miss California stated that she believed that marriage should be between a man and a woman.

Well Perez didn't really like that answer. So he's gone on a tirade on his blog ripping into her because she doesn't support his agenda and that he believes that her answer cost her the crown of Miss USA. (You can read about it here.)

First of all, let me say that beauty pageants, in my opinion, are stupid and a complete waste of time. They are nothing more then civilized wet t-shirt contests with a talent & interview section thrown in to hide the fact that it's just a contest over which girl is hottest.

Second of all, where the hell does Perez Hilton get off demanding ANYONE be politically correct? This is coming from a guy that publishes stories in which he opines that any female celeb or psuedo-celeb may be "sperminated" the moment a photographer catches anything like a round belly. He frequently questions the sexual orientation of anyone that will grab him a headline and an extra click on a sponsored ad on his site.

Best of all, my personal favorite in this tale of hypocrisy and fame whoredom, let's take a look at a couple of pictures that Mr. Political Correctness Champion posted on his site in the past couple of weeks:








I know I know...political correctness at its finest. I pose one question for anyone who cares...gay or straight. That is:

"Do you want a man who draws cum bubbles on people's faces for money being YOUR marriage rights spokesperson?"

I don't either.

What's my time worth?

Apparently the answer to that question to some people is "Nothing".

Thursday my sister called me, crying about how she's been thrown out of her mother's house and doesn't have a working car to go anywhere. Now I'm generally the good brother, I tell her if she needs to, I'll come get her and she can crash at my house for a few days. She agrees.

So I drive over an hour down to her house. When I get there she comes out and says "My mother says I can't go with you". Ummm...you're 23 years old and if your mom kicked you out, what the fuck right does she have to say anything? But I just wait patiently as her mother sticks her head out the door and yells some more.

Then she asks me to go get her a new cell charger because her mother just broke hers. Now I'm annoyed, but I go to the store and grab one. $30 frickin dollars. WTF???? On my way back, my sister asks me to bring her back BEFORE I go to work in the morning. I just can't do that, I have to be in the office around 7:30, I can't go to Massachusetts before that. So she says "Oh, never mind then. I'll stay somewhere else".

So let me recap: Hours now spent driving there and around there: 2 Money spent on a cell charge I don't need: $31.50 Meals missed: 1 Gas wasted: 6 gallons @ $2/gallon.

Needless to say, I was not pleased and told her I was going home and I didn't want to be bothered with any more of that bullshit. I was pretty obvious about how pissed off I was that I had wasted my whole night on this stupid game. That's when I got a text message that sent me over the edge.

"Can you drop off the charger for me on your way home?"

Let's just say...the words that came out of my mouth were loud, angry and of the 4 letter variety...and that I'm still really pissed off about it all.

A change in the reflection

As Neil Diamond sings..."Where it began, I can't begin to know when."

That's just it, I have no idea when or where it began. Last night I was sitting here quietly thinking about a lot of things. I went out for a bit, swung by Jamie's house and he just looked at me and said "You look like shit". Matched how I felt, so I couldn't possibly be mad at the guy for being intuitive. He's known me 30 fucking years, I'd be insulted if he hadn't noticed.

I went home after being there for just an hour. I hung out, not accomplishing anything. Unless of course you consider the fight I got in over IM. What a pathetic cliche that is. IT guy gets in fights on the internet.

After that I spent a long time up thinking some more. I went into the bathroom and brushed my teeth. As I was standing at the sink, looking in the mirror...it hit me.

I don't like...me. I'm not happy.

It's a hell of a thing to acknowledge that our house of cards has toppled over. I suspect it was just a matter of time. I spent most of my childhood, teen and young adult years not liking myself. After I got divorced, things were looking good for a while there. My instincts were honed pretty well, I had a good eye on things and that was cool.

I'm not quite sure when that went away. It wasn't all at once. I'm sure it was a little bit at a time. To say that the last 2 years have been tough would be an understatement. Anyone close to me knows I've had to fight and scratch and claw to keep my head above water. But now it's not enough to just get by, I want to thrive.

Someone whose opinions I used to hold as valuable recently told me that I'm looking for someone to rescue me from my own self made misery. At first I was indignant, aghast. I'm sure it looked that way from her perspective, but that's not it at all.

I've spent the last little bit not wanting to be rescued. I've rejected help at every turn until it was impossible for me to go on without it. Jamie tells me I'm too prideful...even when I need help, I won't ask for it.

So what's my point here? What am I trying to say? I need to make changes. I'm not 100% sure of what they are, but what I am sure of is that they are mine alone to make. I firmly believe that we make our own happiness. If we depend on someone else for our happiness, we'll be perpetually disappointed.

It's time for the next step for me...I just need to find out which direction to step in.

What's with all these shootings?

Valentine's Day 2008 - Gunman kills 5 and wounds 18 at Northern Illinois University.

Christmas Eve 2008 - Gunman dresses up as Santa Claus and kills 9 people, sets a booby trap for police and sets a fire.

March 10, 2009 - Gunman kills 10 people in three towns including his own mother and grandparents.

March 29, 2009 - Gunman walks into a rehab hospital and kills 7 patients and a nurse.

Today - An immigrant gunman walks into an immigrant training center, says nothing and starts shooting...killing 13 people.

These things happen in every corner of our country and it crosses economic and ethnic backgrounds. But why does this keep happening?

Can you blame the economy? Perhaps, but the sheer random violence of many of these killings is far beyond just being broke. Being broke may be a factor, but I can't see it as the prime motivation. These people had a heart to kill, period.

I know many non-Americans will point to the proliferation of guns in the United States. It's an easy and popular place to point the blame, but March 11th, a teen in Germany went into his former school and killed 15 people and last September a college student in Finland shot and killed 10 people. So this isn't a case of the American Wild West where everyone is packing a gun and only the crazies are shooting people.

But what's the reason? Or better yet, what's the answer? We seem to be caught in a tug of war. On one side is the gun owners and lobbyists...trying to protect our rights guaranteed under the 2nd Amendment. On the other side are the gun control activists...arguing for fewer guns and presumably a safer general public.

I don't necessarily buy either side in this argument. Yes, the Bill of Rights grants us the right to "bear arms". Now I'm all for that, but I have a hard time why anyone has the "right" or, better yet, the need to own assault weapons. Besides, even if you ban handguns, you won't be rid of them. People will just risk breaking the law to keep them...or the criminals will be the vast majority of gun owners.

With the recent news stories, today at work, I turned to Wayne and said "You know I'm being nice to you so that when you snap, you won't shoot me." Thankfully he said "Oh I won't kill you. I actually like you."

Thank heavens for small mercies...