Every smile you fake, every claim you stake

Whether it's because I am a single child who had a busy, rarely home single parent growing up, I entered this "family" phase when I was 15. Almost every girl I met, and with my closest guy friends, I wanted to name our bond "brother" or "sister". I mean, some of my high school mates did this too, and they were quite needy. We eventually had this family tree that didn't exist but in words. We cared about them as youths do. I read Stranger in a Strange Land and was enamoured with the idea of a Water Sister, and I got one. How strange these relationships may have seemed to the girls involved. I feel like I should apologize.

When I was 16, or Grade 10, I went through a drastic change. I abandoned trying to be popular with everyone, I hated being a fob, and I went through the usual rebellion and search for authenticity that most kids do. I was goth in a true spirit - I wanted to be alone, and to find out who I can rely on, if any. I entirely rejected who I was only a year ago.

Then I met the gang. The sequence of events I'm proposing here may be disorganized, so if anyone tells you different, they're probably right. Well, I had met them before through some BBS meets and stuff, but it was at this time that we started to roleplay every weekend. And we started doing other things, of course, like going to concerts (something I don't do anymore), or Swedish fairs. And ever since then they have become the closest people to me (except, of course, for my wife. My mom is a bit different, in the way that our relationships to our mother usually are). But it never occurred to me, until this past birthday when Linda gave me a card with a note that says you'll always be our little brother, that they really are my family. In the wake of the backlash against my tendency to try and create false family ties, real ones had developed. Even though I never thought of it that way, I felt that deeply for them. Another reason may be that I never trusted my acceptance with them, something that I'm not sure I'll ever get over, but something that may not be entirely bad. It certainly keeps me on the best behaviour when they are around!

I said "You look so fine and I really want to make you mine"

I realized how aptly I named this blog when I broke down and bought World of Warcraft. I am a huge Blizzard fanboy but I had resisted all this time because of the monthly fees and because I knew the game would consume my life. And now it has. I can't stop thinking about it... I want to be home and play.

The worst thing is, I was really having fun with Knights of the Old Republic. I guess I can play that when the server is down or something like that. And I'm sure I can't play WoW for too many hours straight.. right? Oh boy. I'm reading the manual on the bus... I'm looking at community sites when I'm at work. It's almost all I can talk about.

I am supposed to be interviewing someone right now, but it looks like they're not showing up. Bummer.

But I really think it's better this way

The more you suffer, the more it shows you really care.

Vince Carter needs to go to basketball hell. His character is almost of a vile sort. Though certainly not evil, his utter lack of professional principles should convince teams to leave him with no place on any team forever. When he first came to Toronto, we worshipped him. We made excuses for him. We bought his merchandise. And he didn't even give us his best. What is worse is that he suggests talented people do not have to try hard, which is one of the worst messages you can send to the youth who are supposed to love the game. Sports heroes? Don't look at basketball. The proportion of ego to ball size is greater in B-Ball than any other sport, and that is a tough title to win, considering the silly endzone dances they have in football.

We walked the narrow path, beneath the smoking skies

Such sweet poetry.

I am an awful mess. I haven't done anything good for anyone lately, and it leaves me with a spiritual dread in this time of tsunami's(sp?) and child kidnappings. I mean, I've donated like every other decent being on this earth, but still... I'd like to do more for those around me, you know?

Well, of course, in particular my friends and Nads and my mom, but even people who have been peripherally nice to me... like my Godmother Teresa. I didn't even call her to say Merry Christmas and Happy New Year and such.. I'm such a horrible person. Perhaps I should make a resolution. It feels like that kind of moment.

I'm on a roll, with all the girls I know

I had an interesting discussion about authenticity last night. Of course, this is a discussion I've had many times, and my position on it is difficult, to say the least. It's hard convincing people that the authentic self that everyone is looking for is not our instinctual selves, but rather the modified self. For example, someone who tries to correct potentially annoying behaviour because she cares whether she is annoying those around them. Let's say she wants to say something, but doesn't. I would argue that this person hasn't betrayed her "natural" (authentic) self at all. She *is* that filter. We are our minds, and that is what separates us from beasts. In general, I think we must believe that we are our modified selves, or that we could never improve and that we are slaves of instinct and habit. I am quite aware that I do not act the same way with everyone, but that is because I'd like to act in the way best suited to the person I'm around, and that is me. I like to please, or I'm happy when others are happy. Whatever you like.

Richard cancelled on our session at the last minute last night, again. I was already on my way to Linda's house, in fact. We still had a fun time, playing this new game called Lunch Money, but it was rather annoying. I am bothered by two facts about this incident:

a) there was no advance notice
b) Richard has given different reasons to different people

I'm exhausted. I can't remember if these kinds of things always happened before, or somehow our dynamics have changed into this retarded environment. He told Sabrina that he was to work early and didn't want to stay out late, which is something he left out when he talked to Linda. He told Linda that he just didn't have anything prepared, and he had not known we were playing so he didn't want to prepare it, and he didn't want to spend his holidays preparing it. There are a lot of valid reasons in there, and I could accept any of those (except that he didn't know if we were playing, because we play unless someone cancels), if he told us in *advance*. Linda said she got the impression that Richard feels like he's the victim in all this, which just makes it worse, because he'll be on the defensive. I don't think I'm going to touch this one.

We went to MexiTaco and I asked for some hot sauce. The waiter/proprietor/dude prepared some and as he put it on the table he told me "You're on your own". That could explain my stomach turbulence this morning.

Mark and Linda got into another argument last night, with Mark threatening to leave and Linda telling him to do so. Mostly I just sit back and try to let them resolve it, until Mark was gathering his stuff, then I tried to saying something. The argument was about how Linda's Meloku deck was pretty much entirely Mark's creation and he tells her that "a smart person would do this". Linda has mounting frustration over the poor performance of her deck and is enjoying Magic less. So I said that in the end we really just want her to have fun and no matter what we say and how we come across, we still want that. And if the changes we suggest will make her enjoy the game less than by all means ignore them. Things calmed down eventually, but I still think Linda was unsatisfied by the end of the night.

I got home at around 1 and Nads and I talked until 2:30am. I got five hours of sleep.