We'll crucify the insincere tonight

I am in a wretchedly emo segment of my life. Beware, all those who stand in my way, though it'll be mostly just me, and poor, poor Nads.

Something to understand about me: I will never feel like I am worth someone's time or effort. Even if this person is a salesperson at a shoe store, I feel embarrassed that someone should help me when I deserve nothing. It takes a long, long time to convince me that a person actually cares and wants to help (when it's more than business), and even after that it's very easy, and nearly unavoidable, to break that trust again. I require an awful lot of care and effort.

This behaviour extends online, too. I will try to give gold to people who are helping me, even though I've helped them in the past and in all likelihood owe me a bit of help (but I don't keep track). But I guess that's only with people I like... most of the people on the internet are pretty dreadful.

I wonder what it says about me that I can't really keep acquaintances. If I don't love you in some way, there's pretty much no chance of us keeping contact. I tire of, and fear, transactional relationships. Surround myself with a fence of deep and meaningful relationships, that's the dream. And I can't see outside the fence. I don't want to. I can't think of a single person from any institution or company I've been with that I keep contact with on even an occasional basis, and there is nothing against them. Perhaps if situations were different and different aspects about them were exposed, we would be friends.

Can you be friends with someone and not really want to spend much time with them? Anyone who has bothered to ask knows that if I had infinite money, I would build a luxurious loft/condo complex so that all my friends and I can live on a separate story, with come common facilities where we can do things together. I want them close, and I want to take care of a large portion of their needs. I want to help them fulfill their dreams. I don't think I'd ever pay for everything though, because life starts to become meaningless at some point, doesn't it? Having to pay for things keeps us grounded, and keeps our minds on the sad realities of the world. As I think this I imagine myself lying down on some grassy earth, with my ear to the ground, listening.

I feel myself withdrawing, and I know that I am breaking beyond repair. I am sad every time I have a chance to think. And even though I know my life is pretty good, I can't let go of the problems that beset me. Maybe I'm just spoiled, even though I'm more than thankful for everything and everyone I have.

I want to record this nightmare from the other night in case I forget it. It was really short. Nev was talking to me about something online and I was really tired so I kept dozing off. She was slightly miffed and eventually I just had to log off and go to sleep. However, when I tried to get to sleep, I had to go to the bathroom. At nights I use the bathroom outside so that I don't disturb Jas. As I neared the door to the bathroom, I heard that the tv was on in the living room and wonder why Nads left it on. But it could wait until after, and suddenly I felt this evil, malicious presence. I tried to brush it off and reach for the light switch to the bathroom, but something was holding onto my sleeve and not letting me move. I became really scared and tried to walk back into my bedroom, but I was paralyzed, and not by fear, although it was consuming me at this point. With all my willpower I tried to cry for Nads to help, but only small and intelligible sounds came out. In the real, waking world, however, I made loud unintelligible sounds and I wasn't paralyzed. I was kicking around, and just as the overwhelming fear was about to give me a heart attack, Nads woke me up. My heart raced for many minutes, and slowly came the awful realization that I needed to go to the bathroom. I managed to muster up the courage and go after a few minutes, but I quietly cursed my subconscious. I wasn't in tears like when I had my worst nightmare ever, but I was really, really scared and it took me a very long time to calm down.

The next chapter involves the Watchmen. There are spoilers here, so if you haven't read the book or if you haven't watched the movie, you should skip this section. It is very true to the graphic novel, and for this reason I highly recommend reading the book before seeing the movie. I felt like some of the scenes would not interest anyone who did not read or maybe even enjoy the book. Rorshach translated surprisingly well to screen even with the broken sentence structure. He was a complete badass, and I thank Mr. Haley for doing my favourite character justice. Overall the movie was good, so I'll just cover the three problems I had with it:

It was often overdramatized. Slow motion felt a bit abused at times, even though I realize this is supposed to be the style of the movie, it was a bit jarring at some points. I found myself wondering if they really needed slow motion for that particular shot. Anyway, this was not a big deal in any way.

I felt the way Laurie Jupiter (Silk Spectre) discovers the identity of her father was completely forced (and dumbed down) and I did not feel the way I did when I read the novel. They also didn't spend a lot of time developing or showing Laurie's hatred for the Comedian, so it was hard to understand why she was so upset. Finally, I could have sworn I didn't actually see any tears.

But the thing that bothered me the most was Dan's (Nite Owl) stupid little outburst and lashing out at Adrian Veidt (Ozymandias) after Rorshach is killed. Not only was this defeating the point of Dan's character (he's supposed to be helpless in the face of the events, even though he is a masked hero with all these super gadgets), but even moreso than that, he very clearly tells us that what Adrian did is wrong. That really violates one of the things that makes Watchmen great, which is the ambiguity of ethics and the weird morality that exists through the entire novel and culminates with the destruction of millions to save billions. Was what Adrian did right or wrong? That is the question that the Watchmen asks of us, and Dan's little didactic tirade takes that question away.

Otherwise, the movie was good. The score was a compilation of fairly popular tunes, and I felt they might have been chosen for popularity rather than suitability, but I'm no music critic so I'm not really sure if you can count on my opinion on this. The action was visceral and brutal, and the nudity did not feel gratuitous or unnecessary. I'll watch it again.

I guess I should stop rambling. Needless to say I feel like crap. As only when someone you care about tells you “you're not worth the effort” can make you feel.

If I had a funeral, would you even care?

I don't know why I can't go back to sleep, but it sucks. It is now 04:54, and I have been awake for about half an hour. No, I've been awake longer than that, I just decided that it was pointless to try to get back to sleep half an hour ago.

A few things led to this. One, I'm crazy and obsessive and I am agonizing over either working on a crappy crappy laptop with XP on it or turning on UAC and jumping through various hoops on my regular laptop in order to do the current project for work (thanks Quickbooks, I hate you). Second, the temperature is just cold enough that I can't not have a cover (fun fact: I always need a cover to sleep, even if it's just a thin bed sheet) but using my regular cover means I overheat just very slightly after a while. Then, to really seal the deal when I was sleeping after making a decision about problem One, my dreams decided to take me to unhappy land.

I dreamed that Nads was dead. The details were hidden from me, and I could only feel sadness and pain. I imagined myself crumpled in the shower, convincing myself to survive for Jasmine's sake. I thought about how I was going to feed Jasmine, how I would get her to sleep without Nads around. Pictures jumped around in my mind and they painted a picture an artistic and tortured undead may paint, but thankfully I woke up before I started to actually cry. But at this point, I was wide awake and didn't want to go back to those dreams again, and kept my eyes open. And here I am.

I like when you sleep, when you sleep next to me

I had a weird nightmare last night... it was strangely continuous and fairly long. It had me in its grasp such that after I woke up to turn off my alarm, it dragged me back into its eerie embrace. It was one of those nightmares that affected you even after you're awake – even though I was half an hour later than my usual routine, I could not muster myself to move very quickly. I was stunned, still enthralled and contemplative, and as a result I still spaced out in the shower despite every intention of speeding through that comforting time trap.

It started with work. Except we were now located in a mall. And on this particular day, Irene wanted me to pick up roses for her from this store in the mall, and she had handed me an invoice from the store. I remember telling her that $24 was a bit expensive for roses, and she looked a little ashamed and said she liked the proximity of the store. I didn't push it further but I was curious as to why she was buying roses. Similarly, Mark, who doesn't work anywhere near me, also had two receipts for me to pick up some things in the mall. The work day went by, and there was a club inside the mall that we were going to go to after work. So Richard, Irene and I headed down there, and there was this other crowd of indeterminate extras that I was talking to as Richard was laying on the charm at the bar, and I was explaining to them how he's always charming like that and popular. Except currently he seemed a little drunk and no one was around him. He was working on some girl across the bar though. I was satisfied that he'd have a companion soon... and then I remembered about the errands I was supposed to run, and the mall was about to close. I ran across the mall (Irene told me to go in the wrong direction), and when I finally got to the flower shop, I realized I didn't have the receipt. So I ran back the short distance to the club to grab the receipts from the jacket, intending to grab Mark's stuff for him too.

And this is where it really began. I consider it some kind of miracle that I remember all the details before this, and they are all still very clear in my mind instead of the usual uncertainty that comes with remembering details of dreams.

I grabbed my jacket, and I noticed the various bouncers were ushering everyone out, except for a few people here and there. I overheard one of the bouncers tell Richard sarcastically “yeah, yeah, only the cool people get to stay”. I was one of the few that wasn't ushered out, and we were all directed to this theatre room. I remember being very shocked and confused as to why I was being chosen to stay, and I wanted to get out there and hang out with Richard but was too curious about what was about to happen here. On my way to the theatre room, I noticed that Snoop Dogg was one of the people heading there, and apparently I knew him in this dimension. He had a pocket on the arm of his jacket, and I unzipped it and searched in there for some clue of what's about to happen, since Snoop seemed to be the type of guy to be in the know. Nothing but some money and a bus token, and I handed him back all his materials and then I never saw him again for the rest of the dream.

In this theatre we sat for a short while and then we were herded onto a bus, and it started driving us into the countryside. The sides of the road looked golden, and I was suddenly reminded of jPod and (spoilers warning!) how Ethan got on this bus and he didn't know where it would take him and it could easily take him into a slavery at a sweat shop, and I started getting worried. Maybe this was where the nightmare seed was planted in my mind and the dream changed. I'm not too sure of how they work. Then Brad Pitt, who was the club proprietor, except he wasn't Brad Pitt, came on the bus P.A. System and announced that we were all going to die, and that we started thinking about our last wishes. As everyone around me were shocked and mildly freaking out, I began to seriously agonize over what my last wish would be. I thought about something that would maybe buy us some time, but I couldn't really get a hold of it. Then Pitt announced that first he was going to come around and break our knees with a baseball bat, and then he would come around to ask us the meaning of life, and if any of us answer 42 as some of us “must” do, we would be mutilated and tossed off the bus immediately. I was unfortunately sitting near the front of the bus, and I braced for the pain as he wound up his bat, but I knew I could not move or duck away or I would be killed. I imagined the pain I would be in moments from then, but instead, he turned around to harass a lady on the opposite side. A balding man in the first seat opposite me grabbed some rope and stealthily manuevered around Pitt. I thought to myself, maybe I should help him when he attacks (he forcefully put the rope around Pitt's neck like a garrotte at this point), and as I was getting up, Pitt twisted around quickly (I guess the balding man did not hold him tight enough) and stabbed him with a small corkscrew type thing. I sat down from shock and fear that he had seen me wanting to take action against him and would kill me next. Pitt stabbed the man a few more times in the neck for good measure and left him on the floor.

Pitt cleaned himself up at the front of the bus and as he walked past me to the back of the bus, he threw the corkscrew weapon into my lap. It was the size of my pinky, and I was curious as to why he handed me a weapon. He probably did see me half standing and was daring me to make a move. I gripped the weapon in a fist and remained calm and seated, wondering if I had failed the balding man and questioning whether I should have moved sooner.

There were ocassional scenes throughout this part that focused on these two eighteen year-olds who were somehow left behind in the club. They couldn't find a way out because the door was locked. They did not know each other before this crisis. Somehow I ended up back at the club. There was a clear slip in time and space that I'm not sure can really be explained. I checked the front door and found that it was a thin wooden door. I found the teens and scolded the male teen: “Surely you can break through a wood.” When the female pushed on the door it opened. It wasn't locked at all. At this point I was incensed but managed to keep my cool, knowing that I needed these teens to get help. So I showed them on an interactive map like you would find in WoW using Cartographer that happened to be on the wall by the door. According to the moving dots, the bus group seemed to be somewhere in Africa and moving rapidly east through Asia. I asked them to hurry and get help for the people there. At this point my mind asked why I couldn't leave, and it reasoned that Pitt must've threatened my family if I had left when I returned to the club.

The bus crew returned, with a few people missing, and there was entertainment. It was a sinister sort of entertainment, like a siren's song. One of Pitt's cronies was singing karaoke, and all his ladies were entertaining guests in the pool, which I stayed out of. No one bothered me, surprisingly, and I walked around the pool. The girls were drowning various people and I felt sorry for them. I thought of all the dead bodies in the pool. There was a girl who managed to surface, and the Pitt girl pretended nothing was going on and continued to be sweet and soothing, but the girl was irate and could not be soothed. When the song was done, a girl I used to know, Vivian, asked me to sing a song, but I told her to go ahead, that she had a better voice anyway, and she went into the booth. I felt some despair as to the helplessness of my situation and how sinister it was that there were all these dead bodies everywhere in broad daylight that was pouring in now from the newly revealed skylight. Yet I felt some relief that nothing has happened to me yet and that I still had hope that help would find us here instead of searching in Africa and through Asia as I had directed the teens. I wondered how Pitt got back from Africa so fast, and of course, the answer was that it was the same way I got back here so fast.

That's when I realized that my alarm had already alerted my it was time to wake up a while ago. Uh oh.

But we only have 24 hours to save the Earth!

Two occurences of note this week:

On Wednesday night I had the worst nightmare I ever remembered having. I apparently screamed "HELP!" clearly in my sleep. Usually when people sleep they mumble and are not clear in their speech... the dream was very real.

I came home from a roleplaying session early on a Monday night, and instead of going up to Nads I decided to play around in the mud outside the building. I slid around, and it was fun, as the mud was so slippery that I managed to glide around on my behind with very little effort. The darkness was a little worrisome but the ease of motion kept my mind on more sapid things. A woman came from somewhere, with stockings, and she was a bit muddy too and walked into the building and I thought it was time to finally go up, and that Nads would be a bit upset at me for getting mud all over my socks. The front doors of the building matched those of my own building, but the hallway layout and stuff was my mom's building.
I entered the elevator with this other woman, and she was averting my gaze, hiding behind her long blonde hair. Our eyes met once during the short ride. There was also a young girl and her mother in the elevator. The elevator stopped on the first floor - I am unsure of whether I knew that - but I got out of the elevator in a hurry as I often do. At that point the little girl started burning this incense and her mother warned her against bothering people. The blonde woman held the door open and started to mutter and chant. I hurried around the corner, out of sight, and walked faster.
Out of the stairs came this brown haired woman with a long nose. She hurried towards me and I tried to run away. I couldn't identify her, and I desperately searched her face for a match with someone I am familiar with. But my vision was blurry and I desperately clung on to the fact that I didn't know if she was a friend or foe. She said "Wait" and I replied "Do I know you?" all the while walking. I almost reached my door. Except as I approached it I realized that I was on the first floor and not the eigth! I fell, weak and she reached me, and started rubbing a rib underneath my arm - closest to my heart. I was paralyzed instantly as she started chanting, and that's when I cried for help hoping one of the tenants of the two apartments near me would help me.

Thank goodness Nads was there to save me.

The other weird occurence is this intense headache that I have. It started yesterday and has persisted through until today. I have never had a headache this bad.... it usually disappears after I sleep. It could be a tumour.

He's got nobody left to believe

Somebody left an old rusty bike chain onto the sidewalk today. It was extremely rusted, and the rust tainted the snow around it. I felt sad as I walked past it.

I'm trying desperately not to develop a complex over this, but... I'm so weak. I asked Linda if she still wanted to hang out tonight even though we have no session, and she replied "To do what?". I never have an answer to that. To me, my goal is just to hang out and spend some time with her, so I figure we'll figure something out. But I think I'm just too boring... she still can't imagine anything we can do together. I'd be happy doing anything, but she wouldn't. It made me very sad, even though I know that is just the way she is. "If you'd like", "I don't know what we'd do though". Daggers.

Just put your tiny daggers in my heart.

I also had nightmares. I'm not sure if it was related... I had a little trouble sleeping after that. I dreamed of some great evil that a group of innocents (including me and apparently Nads) were trapped in, and I couldn't save them all. Nads told me that I was freaking out at night and I screamed her name and it scared her. I curled into her arms and went into another nightmare.

Every night I burn, every night I scream your name.

I'm so lucky to have her. I suffer the guilt of someone who knows that they are getting better than they deserve, and yet still want more.