Living.

You can see from the dearth of posts that that's what I've been doing--offline, not so much focused on this sort of thing. With it being the end of one of the most momentous years so far, I owe another list to myself. For my own satisfaction, then...
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This is the seventh resurrection of the '04-'05 yearly list, courtesy of Bizzy Herbolsheimer.

1. What did you do in 2011 that you'd never done before?
Had major surgery. A fucking ADVENTURE, that was.

2. Did you keep your new years' resolutions, and will you make more for next year?
I don't remember what they were, but I'll try harder in 2012.

3. Did anyone close to you give birth?
Krissy did, again.

4. Did anyone close to you die?
No, but I do have friends who lost people very close to them. (This seems to be universal from year to year.)

5. What countries did you visit?
Pittsburgh. Wait...

6. What would you like to have in 2012 that you lacked in 2011?
An apartment on the beach in Nahant.

7. What date from 2011 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
8/15/11, when I realized that hiding your feelings still counts as being a fucking liar.

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
Moving in, trying to move up, not blowing all my ca$h money. (Ditto.)

9. What was your biggest failure?
Nothing that was in my control. Nature had to take its course.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
Yes, and it's all done, kid.

11. What was the best thing you bought?
GIROUX on Black Friday.

12. Whose behavior merited celebration?
My real friends: Laurie, Bizzy, and Krissy.

13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?
William John Barry.

14. Where did most of your money go?
Rent, car, travel.

15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?
The hockey thing just kept on going, and going, and going...

16. What song will always remind you of 2011?
"Hey Fuck You" by The Beastie Boys.

17. Compared to this time last year, are you:
i. happier or sadder? definitely happier
ii. thinner or fatter? definitely thinner
iii. richer or poorer? almost breaking even

18. What do you wish you'd done more of?
Told people like it is/was.

19. What do you wish you'd done less of?
Eating out, but damn it tastes good! (This is another perennial winner.)

20. How did you spend Christmas?
As it hasn't happened yet, it'll be in D.C. and then Philly on the way back.

21. Who did you spend the most time on the phone with?
Real friends from #12.

22. Did you fall in love in 2011?
Yeah, kinda.

23. How many one-night stands?
I (still) haven't had one of those since 2005.

24. What was your favorite TV program?
Hockey.

25. Do you hate anyone now that you didn't hate this time last year?
Absolutely YE.

26. What was the best book you read?
The Ballad of the Whiskey Robber, which actually involved hockey.

27. What was your greatest musical discovery?
I re-discovered that despite my penchant for whiny Brits, deep down I'm hardest core.

28. What did you want and get?
Hockey players talking to me.

29. What did you want and not get?
Honesty from someone I thought I was close to.

30. What was your favorite film of this year?
Couldn't tell you.

31. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
Thirty-five. There was probably dinner involved.

32. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
Kicking some ass sooner rather than later, but better late than never.

33. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2011?
Casual, comfortable, maybe-punked-out office wear interspersed with hockey gear, hoodies, and ridiculous shoes.

34. What kept you sane?
Family, friends, Kiki, and hockey at the end of it all.

35. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
It's a battle between Giroux, Perreault, and the infamous Randy Jones.

36. What political issue stirred you the most?
Definitely health care bullshit.

37. Who did you miss?
Family.

38. Who was the best new person you met?
Or will meet... Mick Brochu.

39. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2011 (and are still learning):
Don't weeze the juice. (Again.)

40. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year:
(it's not the whole verse but it's the best part)
"I'm walkin' on water while you're steppin' in shit
So put your sewer boots on before your ass gets lit
And if you don't like it then hey fuck you
So put a quarter in your ass 'cause you played yourself"

Tardy, but still relevant.

Quoting Apollo Creed from the Bud Light commercials, "Here we go!"

--

This is another resurrection of the '04-'05 yearly list, courtesy of Bizzy Herbolsheimer, in case anyone is wondering.

1. What did you do in 2010 that you'd never done before?
Lived with a guy who was neither a smoker nor an asshole. Try it sometime!

2. Did you keep your new years' resolutions, and will you make more for next year?
Yes and yes, because it's the same for the second year running: My main resolution is to not quit my job unless I get something spectacularly fabulous that makes me back into an editor.

3. Did anyone close to you give birth?
Yup, a bunch of people at work.

4. Did anyone close to you die?
No, but I do have friends who lost people very close to them.

5. What countries did you visit?
Canada, Japan, China, the UK, France, Italy, Morocco... Wait, fuck. That shit was Epcot, shenanigans!

6. What would you like to have in 2011 that you lacked in 2010?
Historic dwelling, salaried position with benefits, even higher credit score.

7. What date from 2010 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?
11/13/10. Hershey Bears at Syracuse Crunch. You know the drill.

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?
Moving in, trying to move up, not blowing all my ca$h money.

9. What was your biggest failure?
Nothing really of note. It was all someone else's fault.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury?
Sort of, but you know what, my ass is stupid. Literally, my ass. Cut it out, ass!

11. What was the best thing you bought?
A Mazda3. Red. Sherman Junior!

12. Whose behavior merited celebration?
BillyB wins again!

13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?
Brian Coffey fails again! A close second goes to the "supervisor" who interviewed me at O'Reilly Media in December who wouldn't stop doodling.

14. Where did most of your money go?
Rent and the new car.

15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?
The AHL and the Washington Capitals, for the first time since 1992.

16. What song will always remind you of 2010?
The boss' ringtone from the GEICO bathroom commercial.

17. Compared to this time last year, are you:
i. happier or sadder? definitely happier
ii. thinner or fatter? I'm still oscillating
iii. richer or poorer? it's not much, but it'll do

18. What do you wish you'd done more of?
Earn money. (Always!)

19. What do you wish you'd done less of?
Eating out, but damn it tastes good! (This is another perennial winner.)

20. How did you spend Christmas?
In Newton and then just outside of Worcester, MA, again.

21. Who did you spend the most time on the phone with?
BillyB, via text message. Again.

22. Did you fall in love in 2010?
Um. What? Who's talking?

23. How many one-night stands?
I (still) haven't had one of those since 2005.

24. What was your favorite TV program?
Baseball, hockey, HGTV, Travel/Food channels.

25. Do you hate anyone now that you didn't hate this time last year?
Absolutely yes.

26. What was the best book you read?
"Lost Heritage," another romance novel that was a rummage sale find.

27. What was your greatest musical discovery?
MC Wateva & Dawn Jawnsun Pamperz

28. What did you want and get?
Results. And a lot of owl stuff.

29. What did you want and not get?
Respect during job interviews. Thanks, peers!

30. What was your favorite film of this year?
Actually, I don't know.

31. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?
Thirty-four. I did... something. Shit. It was fun, whatever it was.

32. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?
See item 29.

33. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2010?
Still Anthropologique, with a hint of British rock star girlfriend. Cheap but fashionable clothes (sale rack holla!) but ridiculous shoes.

34. What kept you sane?
Family, friends, Kiki, BillyB, and hockey at the end of it all.

35. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?
That would be Mathieu Perreault.

36. What political issue stirred you the most?
The housing market, national health care, and Republican and/or Tea Party bullshit.

37. Who did you miss?
Family.

38. Who was the best new person you met?
Define "met"...

39. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2010 (and are still learning):
Don't weeze the juice.

40. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year:

Go figure...

It was a total waste of time; four hours, to be exact. Honest effort on my end resulted in an automated two-line rejection letter. I mean, really? The HR representative who contacted me in the first place didn't have five minutes to write a personal note? In response, I wrote back requesting that they remove my personal information from their database. I didn't go on to say what else I felt, namely, that I would never consider working for a company with such unprofessional practices as wearing sloppy clothes to an interview (regardless of the casual work environment) and also openly doodling during said interview. I knew at that point that I wasn't being taken seriously. Great job, [name withheld]. You really had me thinking for a minute that you were interested in what I had to say. You're certainly no artist, so don't quit your day job.

But, in other news, M. Perreault has been up with the Capitals for a few games now, and he and his Hershey cohorts have done excellent work in keeping the ship afloat while other players search for their "A" games. Couple that with all the work I have to do at this contractor job and I'm not doing that badly. Although I would certainly appreciate some added security, as long as the work doesn't dry up--and I keep getting told that it won't--well, OK, I'll deal with it for now.

Coming up: The annual list of shit that happened this year.

Sports.

It's basketball season, which is a fine time, of course, for more irrational hate. Kyle Singler, I'm watching you and your stupid face. You must be over 21 by now and you look 6. I can't wait for the NBA to run you over like a ton of bricks. I hope the #12 jersey is cursed--ever notice that your bench coach, The Great Wojo, wore the same jersey? Sure, he was great in college, but I sure as hell never saw him getting his drink on like Bobby Hurley and running his truck off of a cliff somewhere on the west coast. Damn right, Bobby Hurley. Those were the days. But back to you, Kyle: I can't stand you. You are on the Tulowitzki List. And speaking of that cocky bastard, what were the Rockies thinking when they signed him to a 10-year extension?! Jesus.

It's also hockey season. It's the 75th anniversary of the creation of the AHL. I have to say, $25 to sit behind the team bench is way more cost effective than a million times that up at the next level. I must say a big thanks to our recent hosts in Syracuse, who were gracious enough to take us to a Syracuse Crunch game. Now, the Crunch I can do without, but their formidable opponents, the Hershey Bears--that's a team I can get behind. I like chocolate. I like bears. I like French-Canadian centers with names that are somewhat difficult to pronounce. Yes, especially those. Never mind that the name in particular rhymes with a large-eared, petite former presidential candidate who happens to own the IT company with which my current employer has a contract for tech support. J'aime, j'aime, j'aime. Now if I could just remember how to say twenty-four in French... Ou est le bus?

Finally, it's getting close to the end of the year. Time to resolve all the shit that happened in the past 11 months. Being an adult has been horrifying yet entertaining once again; the next hurdle on my horizon is obtaining a mortgage, so long as my house of choice doesn't disappear from the market. To that end, I've made it to the final interview round for a senior position at a tech publishing company. Although being a contractor has its perks, like a higher rate of pay (at least on paper), paying for my own health insurance fucking blows. That, and it's cheapy-high-deductible-nothing-covered-until-you-are-broke insurance. To hell with that. So in reality I'll be making more money at the new job and get my benefits at a greatly subsidized rate. I may even be able to do some business on the side for my old employer, because I've been in the system for five years and they know I know my shit. Can't wait to see what happens with all that; I should know sometime before Xmas.

I think it's time for some sushi. That is all.

Why I rule.

The world is a funny place.

I got an email, a text, and a Facebook message from one of my best friends in the area earlier today, someone who witnessed firsthand the sheer idiocy of a personal relationship I had that spanned from approximately October 2002 through approximately December 2006. (The creepy text messages didn't end until March 2010, but the last physical sighting was definitely '06.) This friend said she had something to tell me, and I had an immediate suspicion that it had something to do with said idiot relationship. Man, was I ever right, and it was deliciously entertaining.

It turns out that my friend's BFF has a close friend I know. Not through personal interaction, but through the periphery known as the sexual travails of the aforementioned personal relationship. Yup, this is the person with whom Brian Coffey cheated on me numerous times. The one and the same. At this point, I can't even vouch for whether I was the only person that got cheated on with this individual, however; seeing as how Brian failed massively at having an exclusive relationship with me, there's no telling how many other people actually thought at one time they might be his "girlfriend." I'm sure there are many layers of us lurking in the Boston area. I suppose we should all be thankful that none of us has syphilis, gonorrhea, AIDS... At least, I don't, so YAY. I could provide a name of the massively offending female party here, a Twitter link, a Facebook page, etc. It isn't worth it, however, because I'm the only one who needed to put a face to the name to get closure and see what I was inadvertently "competing" with. Blech.

So back to the anecdote--My friend was hanging out with the BFF and this other woman without realizing at first who she was, and eventually she put two and two together and figured out her identity based on statements she was making that culminated in a request for parking for a 1976 Cadillac. My friend made a point to say whose side she's on in the situation, and I love her for that. I also hope that she said, verbatim, "I don't have a parking space for that red-headed slut" like she said she did on the phone in describing her opinion of Brian, to this other woman in person. That would be extra icing on the cake.

What I find especially amusing is that amidst all his lies and talk of how the things we did together meant so much to him, Brian was banging a suicide girl who loves Dave Matthews. Talk about as opposite as you can get from me, in both aspects... And speaking of opposites, I rule, and Brian and everything about Brian sucks. In addition, Bill's ex from New York sucks and is probably still a huge bitch and I hope that the coke kills her. Or ebola. Or, hell, AIDS, just to bring it up again. EBOLA HEART ATTACK AIDS!!! (It's probably a speed metal band in Poland somewhere.)

The great thing is that I'm deliriously happy with my life, my body is no longer trying to eat my intestines and kill me, and I'm pooping like a champion racehorse. This enables me to feel entitled to talk about the two people I hate the most in the world (with rational hate, as opposed to irrational hate, like what I feel when I see Troy Tulowitzki), one of whom I will never meet, and the other of whom I hope to crush in an embarrassing social situation that reveals just how flawed he actually is. Well, or I could just continue to ignore him. That's just fine, too.

One year later.

There's a delicious irony in having one's anniversary on 8/8. Yes, an anniversary that celebrates something so goddamn wonderful, it's a shame that such a massive idiot out there shares the date as his birthday. Oh well on that one; he's someone else's problem by now. Or, perhaps, no one's. I would hope that the taint of his dishonesty hasn't been hung over anyone else's head in the time elapsed since I last told him "no" (just four months shy of four years ago, how the time flies!), but on the other hand anyone stupid enough to fall for it pretty much gets what they deserve in doing so. Learn to watch your back, ladies. That's all that I'll say on that one.

It really doesn't give me as much of a thrill to post here when I don't know my audience; back in the day when LiveJournal was taking off and everyone was on it like files on shit, you could guarantee at least one stalkeriffic visit per day from the unwashed masses out there. Here, well, it's just personal, is all. I'm probably the only one who really goes back and reads this. I'm cool with that. There's nothing meant to be fanatical here, just some everyday bullshit about how 34 years later, life finally took a right turn and stuck with it. That just about sums it up.

I could make a laundry list of people who might read this as a test to see if anyone actually is, and then deal with folks freaking about about their names being in print, but you know, I'm over the online retribution thing. It's about as dumb as social networking, which I like only for the pictures and ease of getting back in touch, not as a platform to launch my views about everything under the sun and beyond. Ho hum. I wonder if there'll be a "next big thing," or if we'll marinate in Interwebz-being for the next couple of years, focusing on one-upping each other with our "smart" phones. Bleah. When the day is done, all I care about is Bill and my bologna sandwich.

Happy Friday the 13th, all you stalkers!

Pause...

... and genuflect. What a strange-looking word.

You let 6 months go by, and the world evolves. Stupid people remain stupid; the awesome become even more so. I'm writing for a pretty selfish reason in that some days I can't stop thinking about how marvelous someone is. I don't want to trash myself and talk about how deluded I must have been to think that previous relationships were ideal, but I *will* concede that rather than abandoning situations that should have been categorized as hopeless to begin with, I attempted to "fix" and mold them into something against their wills that instead should have been natural all along. I'm sure that this is why some people second-guess their way down the aisle to the altar when there are what-ifs in their relationships. Once you've discovered one that runs itself with little effort and the effort you find yourself putting in comes easily and doesn't equate to having a second job, it's that much harder NOT to look back and wonder what the fuck it was you were doing all those years before. This isn't to say that a relationship can't evolve and have its moments of confusion versus moments of clarity, but when you've truly found a person you can call your soul mate and you feel satisfied simply coexisting with the person rather than feeling as if you're "managing" the relationship, it's quite exhilarating in its simplicity. We can even sit around and talk about flatulence without feeling alarmed or repulsed. Such a precious gift, that one.

All that said, this summer will bring a change of residence--cohabitation being the reason--and a higher monthly payment, but quite an improvement in neighborhood and accommodations as well. A certain beagle will also be reunited with her owner after a year of exile at the family house, and a certain calico will no doubt be intrigued by the addition of another warm, furry body not of the feline species. Things are looking fabulous; let's keep it that way, everyone.