On Total and Utter Randomness

I had a couple different topics that I could probably milk and get a couple of blog posts out of, but they seemed so insignificant to merit their own post, except for maybe this news right here:

As some or most of you might know, I am an attempted writer. I do have one fiction book published at the moment, that has remained rather stagnant since its publication in 2011. This year I decided I'd spend a little money and enter it in a couple book festivals, not expecting high results, because, what writer does? My first festival was the San Francisco Beach Book Festival. "Stress Test" did not win any of the grand prizes... however, it did win First Honorable Mention in the General Fiction category. Not such a huge deal to most, but a pretty big deal to me, as its creator who though my first book might very well be utter drivel. This little milestone is quite exciting to me, and almost a week later, I'm still riding the high from it.

This second bit is just a general observation about G-Money. I will preface this by saying, I know my boy is only almost two and things will change for him drastically as he gets older. I brought him over to a school a couple weeks ago to play, his future elementary school actually. One of the many things I like about him is his ability to stand back and observe his surroundings before he dives right in and reacts. There were about a dozen other kids playing while we were there and he cautiously walked up to the playground and kept a safe distance and watched each of the kids doing various things. He stood there for probably about 20 minutes just taking it in. He then started to play on his own, near the other kids, but not trying to play with them. I could see that he was hesitant about engaging them and it brought me back to my own elementary school playground happenings where I'd often times either play alone or with a set group of friends. I was painfully shy throughout all of my school years, and am still very shy, I know how it affected me, and I shudder to think that my sweet boy might take after me in that aspect. On the other hand, I know he's still so young and he may blossom into a social butterfly by time he reaches school. Either way, I just want him to be happy.

This third bit has to do with dating. I was at a bar with some co-workers the other day, having a good time, relaxing, when totally unsolicited a freakishly tall biker man approached me. He asked my name, I told him, he told me his name, he asked if he could hang out (at the bar) with me, I quickly said, I'm married. He was like... "that's okay." Red flag number one. Now, when a woman almost immediately tells a stranger she's married, does that not tell said stranger that she is not interested in talking to him any further? He still persisted. It must have been something about my red nosed, puffy eyed, sick voiced, no make-up personality that really got this guy. Then I was like, look dude, I'm married to this guy's sister (pointing at my co-worker). "Oh, that's even better." Seriously, bro? It took him a minute or two to let it sink in, then he was like, "Oh, so it's like a f**k off kinda thing right?" I stared at him while it set in. You'd think he would of gathered that from the whole, I'm "married" thing. Don't get me wrong, just because I'm married doesn't mean I'll be an asshole and refuse to talk to the opposite sex completely. But, I'm not completely blind, creepy biker man approaches one of only a couple mildly okay looking chicks in a bar asking to hang around after knowing she's married, and to a woman (so he thinks) and won't back down. Man, I can't be a party to that.

See what I'm saying? Three somewhat interesting pieces of information that really do not merit their own post, but it's something to think about. So let me know, any of you have any scum bag stories for me?

On Lyrics that Resonate

On my way in to work this morning, I decided some Jeff Buckley was in order. It's a melancholy, foggy morning with rain threatening... RAIN in January. Yes folks, we had ourselves a thunderstorm last night into this morning if you can believe it. Temps near 60 today and tomorrow and... down to 20 by the end of the week. Classic.

In any case, I was listening to "I know it's over" originally by The Smiths and some of the lyrics stuck out:

If you're so funny, then why are you on your own tonight?

And if you're so clever then why are you on your own tonight?
And if you're so very entertaining then why are you on your own tonight?

It's so easy to laugh it's so easy to hate,

it takes strength to be gentle and kind,
over and over and over.
It's so easy to laugh it's so easy to hate,
It takes guts to be gentle and kind

I'll be honest, I can be a catty bitch, but the first step to recovery is admitting you have a problem, right? So, while I recognize that I can in fact be catty, I'm trying to reform myself into a nicer person. This does not relegate me to being a door mat, but I do see that maybe sometimes I could be a little more tender hearted toward people. I wouldn't go so far as calling this a "New Year's resolution" since it's practically February, and nobody cares about resolutions anyway, so I'll consider it a "Life Resolution."

On a side note, yesterday I had my first ultrasound, the sex determining ultrasound, and I'll admit that in the morning before work, I talked to my gut, trying to sweet talk the kid into showing us its garbage so we could refer to it as a he or she rather than it. I'm not gonna lie, I felt like an idiot talking to my gut, and the cat and dog looked at me as if I were a fool.

I'll you what though, I think the sweet talking worked because J and I found out we're having a perfectly healthy little boy. I already feel bad for him though, because I think the boy is going to be stricken with his mother's turtle-like upper lip. Sorry kid.