[cheers, darlin']

i guess waking up in my own vomit on the first day of this year should have given me an indication of the year that was waiting ahead. there are a lot of things i’d like to forget, and some i’ll do my best to prevent the alcohol related brain destruction from erasing. i spent the year getting to know three amazing people who were strangers to me this time last year. bloggers of course. one i had been reading for close to a year(jen), one a couple months(kia), and one was quietly reading mine(rach). other people came and went along the way, most of them really aren’t worth even remembering to be honest.

i found damien rice in january. i saw matt nathanson for the third time, at his best show, this fall. i fell in love with my nomad, and wondered how i made it through any day without an mp3 player before. felicity junior year and popular season 1 both came out on dvd this year. nikki and i got our favorite, hot, bartender to flash us his abs. soon after nikki was the star of the wedding we attended in july. i got lost in DC and saw dupont circle close to 100 times. i met kia and keara and will never forget that. especially when kia waved to her fans through the glass of the elevator as we rode it up to dave & buster’s. now that i think about that night keara going out dressed up as me was pretty funny too. i ended things with the boy. that was best for us both even if i second-guess myself at least once a day. i fell in love with LOST. found two new addictions in garden state and eternal sunshine of the spotless mind. my uncle passed away, and with that a big part of my aunt died with him. G became a bigger part of my life again, five years ago i never thought i’d type a sentence like that. rach made me smile when i didn’t think it was possible to ever do that again. jen made me dream of being a better writer, and gush with each new word she wrote. kia gave and gave, more than i ever deserved. saying thank you to her seems like an empty gesture when i think about all we’ve been through over the last year.

i guess all the bad from the year helped me see how lucky i am to have such amazing friends. when i couldn’t even think straight kia and G were there to talk me off my ledge. ms. b & ms. k were there just like always, making me laugh, making me happy. making me feel as if I belonged to another family, not just the one i was born into. and i guess when it comes down to it, i am a very lucky boy.

the first email rach ever sent me caught me completely off guard, made me smile, and made me feel a little less alone when i was feeling sorry for myself. now that the year is winding down, i find myself smiling once again thanks to her words:

"i hope spending time with your family was all that it could be, and i hope that you see all your good friends soon, and you see in the new year with a smile on your face, as the clock ticks down. ten seconds to go, i want you to just breathe. a new year is on it's way. new possibilities. 365 new days for you to live. to do whatever the hell you want to do. all with your very own self programmed soundtrack (thanks to the nomad). it's going to be a good one. and like i said in the very beginning, J...

things are going to be okay."

thank you rach. here’s hoping 2005 will be a good year for everyone.

[discoveries]

-several days can pass by without you really even noticing.

-i love having my sister home.

-no matter what day of the week it is, it's a pretty safe bet that a football game is on. and my sister's boyfriend can pick it out of hundreds of channels in just a few seconds. it's like gaydar for the straights. and while it may look like the very same game you've watched for the last five days in a row, it's really not.

-nyquil can kick your ass, make you pass out while reading a book or watching the family guy, and make you dream strange dreams about people you've never met or movies you've never seen.

-no matter how many times you watch garden state (3 times so far) you can still fall in love with natalie portman as if it's the first time every time.

-the first time since beautiful girls that is.

-brak season 1 will FINALLY be released on dvd in february, just in time for my birthday.

-no matter how much you want to spend new year's eve as a hermit, drinking a bottle of wine and watching garden state, eternal sunshine of the spotless mind and random episodes of felicity, your cell phone that won't stop ringing, and your friends on the other end just won't let you.

[it's christmas eve?!?]

yesterday we fought a lot of traffic. thirty minutes to go about, two inches. FUN. saw a lot of stressed out and angry people. wondered why people wait until the last minute to do their shopping. also wondered why people project their anger at themselves onto others. went to see Christmas with the Cranks. let’s just say it wasn’t by choice and we’ll leave it at that. watched five episodes of will & grace. and finally got to see napoleon dynamite. that movie was insane.

after seeing the preview for the new patricia arquette show medium:

me: um, i think NBC forgot that it already made that show, and it was called the profiler.
boyfriend of the sis: no, you see that was on saturday nights.
me: oh, you’re right, my mistake. i see the difference now.

today we somehow managed to eat again. i swear i’ve had more food in the last week than i had all year long. later we’re headed to my aunt’s to, that’s right, eat. then we’re gonna squeeze in a little Christmas Vacation (an eve tradition) and midnight candlelight service.

[monday, tuesday, wednesday]

let’s see...

monday found me at lunch with G. well i was at lunch, she was outside yelling at her boyfriend who kept calling her. what a dick. other than that, we had fun. headed home, met up with the family and made some christmas cookies. watched scrooged. played, “spot the dead person” with my sister. like 75% of that cast is dead now. it got to the point when someone new would pop up we’d say they were dead, even if they weren't. it’s funny how you can mix up bobcat goldwait and sam kennison in your head, and then hear two other people say the same thing. three days into her visit home my sister and i were already freaking one another out with the whole finishing each other’s sentences thing. we tend to drive everyone else crazy because we just look at one another and laugh, knowing exactly what each other is thinking without saying a word.

tuesday was a chill day. all i remember doing was seeing ocean’s twelve. good movie. i forgot how dreamy scott caan was. i loves my short little ripped guy. i dug the music and it had a lot of funny moments too.

today was lunch and then a visit to my uncle’s. that was followed up with the road trip from hell. it’s not really winter in the midwest until you find yourself driving twenty-five miles an hour on the highway, and actually passing people. covered back roads, white everywhere you look, snow coming at you sideways, and sliding in your 4x4. ah, christmas. i almost drove into a ditch at the cemetery when we stopped to see my dad's grave. the road and the grass pretty much looked the same so i had no idea where we were going. we ended our night with some ice cream, a little muppet family christmas, and some MSCL. every year when we watch the muppets i want bert’s kick ass blue coat. we watched the MSCL episode where patty is uptight and bitchy. but since it was the christmas episode she lightened up for the last five minutes.

tomorrow i think we’re gonna brave the mall, just for the fun of it, and try to track down a copy of the still unviewed napoleon dynamite.

[counting]

5. degrees outside right now, brrr.
4. more inches on the way, to go with the 6 we got today.
3. drinks i'll have at lunch with G tomorrow.
2. days into my vacation, make it go slower.
1. finger i fear i might lose after digging my sister's car out of said 6 inches.
0. self control when it comes to my mom's christmas cookies.

spanglish, i wanted to like it more than i did.
i smiled like i was in pain when we got our family portrait taken today.
plans with friends, family in town, lights that twinkle.

this is me smiling.

[hard candy christmas]

i heard this song for the first time a few days ago. i have no idea what it is about dolly parton and my odd fascination with her. she seems like the sweetest, honest, most sincere person in the world. and for some reason the way she talks, and her white blonde hair, has always reminded me of my aunt. anyway to me, in so many ways, she is christmas. i guess liking this song really shouldn’t be much of a surprise to me. this time of year always makes me think of watching dolly & kenny’s a christmas to remember. before she got all skinny, before he had so many face lifts that he had to start shaving behind his ears. my sister and i would sit in front of the tv and watch their special every christmas. scary elves and all. then came a smoky mountain christmas and i fell in love all over again. by this time however my sister was no longer a fan, she outgrew her in the same way other normal kids outgrow the idea of santa. i could accept losing faith in the jolly fat man, but outgrowing dolly was an act of treason. so this movie became a christmas tradition that i had to uphold on my very own. after that came one of the best designing women episodes ever. and yes, surprisingly enough, it was a christmas episode with very special guest star dolly parton. it was the one where charlene was having her baby. and dolly was her guardian movie star. and the sweet little old lady died down the hall. and bernice, my favorite, wasn’t about to miss out on any of it. so she called 911 and had the paramedics bring her in on a stretcher, wearing her christmas tree skirt around her waist. the funny thing was, watching that show as a teenager, no matter how over the top it was, everything that happened seemed perfectly normal to me. then again i'm not so sure a teenage boy who was fascinated with dolly parton really had a grasp on what normal was.

[first snow]

i love the first snow of the season. once the world around you is blanketed in a sea of white, it’s easy to make yourself believe it’s a world you’ve never been in before. new, different, a change. it was coming down fast and in large pieces today. naturally i thought of you, us, that night. holding hands so we wouldn’t fall as we walked across the parking lot, a little past midnight. stopping for a second to look up at the snow falling from the dark night sky. the way the light in the parking lot tricked us into believing we were somehow living inside of a large snow globe. the quiet white falling all around us, dancing in different directions. i remember a year later, when you were a million miles away, and i sent you that picture of us inside a snow globe of your own. now that we’ve moved on from one another i find that i don’t think of you so much anymore. except on days like this. days when i can trick myself into believing that i somehow woke up in a different world, one more white than the one that was there when i went to sleep last night. one that still has an us, rather than a you and a me.

[balls]

as i looked down at the folded piece of paper i laughed a little when I read, “no bake nut balls.” it turned out the full name was no bake peanut balls. i laughed even harder when i convinced her to put my name at the top of the recipe and cross out the pea part, thus creating:

“J’s no bake nut balls.”

i then proceeded to tell everyone that my balls were delicious. and if they wanted other recipes i would share. the other varieties were also tasty, my chocolate salty balls and my schwetty balls. they laughed pretty hard when i told them that i was well known for my delicious balls. a holiday favorite.

-welcome to the world of a twelve-year-old.

[saturday]

me: hey.
G: hey.
me: how goes it?
G: oh good, same old same old. my boyfriend filed for a marriage license.
me: what?
G: oh, not with me, with some other whore.
me: ouch.

so we drove to the cinema to see what was playing. kicked around the idea of a second viewing of closer but she passed on the idea of seeing something that was too much like her current relationship. so we settled on saw. i so wasn’t in the mood to see that movie, but i figured how bad could it be? it was freakin' sweet. you have no idea what to expect, what’s going on, and when you think you have it figured out the entire movie collapses on itself. you find yourself sitting in the dark, shocked, feeling as if the rug was pulled out from under you. i loved this movie. i don't think the people behind us even realized that they were watching a movie. they talked the entire time. one was chewing on what i can only assume was a large bag of rocks. and the one guy had nasal issues, every 15 seconds he made loud long snorts with his nose. they were a treat.

after the flick we decided to drive to the wannabe dive bar down the street. it’s a new bar, so it really shouldn’t look as rundown as it does, but... yeah, I have no explanation for it. texted kia to inform her we were in the very same bar that the "great antenna incident of ‘04" went down. the longer we sat at the bar the more insane people would come in the door. at one point i looked at G and said, “we are sooo gonna get shot tonight.” there was a mild altercation like three feet away from us where two twelve-year-olds came in with a group of guys who can only be described as thugs. the one girl appeared to be with child. they migrated to the dance side so we stayed safely tucked away on the “bon jovi” side. he’s a lyrical genius, wurd. G kept running to the restroom, i kept ordering beer. i kept her updated on the colorful characters around us when she would rejoin me on her stool. the bartenders name was steve, and he knew EVERYone in that place but the two of us.

G: what did I miss?
me: well the guy to my right is slowly trying to come out.
G: really?
me: yeah, he asked bartender steve if they could play some dance music.
G: oh yeah?
me: he said he would consider it a personal favor if they could.
G: (laughing)
me: then he turned to his friends and said he really likes usher, and wondered if that made him gay.

the guy on the other side of G kept trying to talk to me every time she’d run off. i sat there quietly freaking out, trying my best not to accidentally make eye contact, pretending not to hear him over the loud music. much to my delight he knew “gay boy in yellow hoodie” to my right and i ended up in the middle of their conversation. that’s when i jetted off to the juke box.

G: you brought nikki here?
me: yeah, she was like the only girl here that night.
G: really?
me: yeah, she was convinced i brought her to a gay bar.
G: she knows right?
me: well, i told her, but i don’t think she believes me.
G: she doesn’t believe you?
me: no, i guess i’m just not that convincing as a gay man.

after we closed down the bar, aka steve trying to take our beer from us before we were done with it, we headed back into the cold and snow. at this point G decided she needed breakfast. i called kia to give her an update on our evening. she kept us company as we drove for some food. G opened her christmas gift. i got her the charlie brown christmas dvd because she sounded like she was going to cry on the phone when i told her it was on tv the night before, and she missed it. so we made our way to IHOP. G almost ran over a cop that was walking across the parking lot.

me: i can’t believe you almost drove over that cop.
G: yeah, well she should stay out of my way.

i didn’t think it was possible, but IHOP was way more ghetto than the bar we were in. it was loud, it was crazy, mass confusion. i guess our waitress got skurrd because we never saw her again after she brought us our food. i tried to get G to just leave since we just sat there for 15 minutes without ever getting a check. i told her to just guess, and leave the money behind. so we stood another 10 minutes in line to pay. i was tired. i was drunk. i just wanted to get home and crawl into bed. G insisted on going back to the table to leave a generous tip for our invisible waitress. she said that she was going to fire off a nasty email to them about our insane experience. somehow by the time we got into the car it was 4:30am. i have no idea how it ended up that late, or where the missing few hours went. i’m thinking IHOP may be a black hole, i’m not sure. we said our goodbyes and i crawled into bed and got a nice long 4 hour nap before i got to head off and do shopping and lunch with the mom. and now the couch is calling out to me.

five more days until vacation. five more days.

[i love]

how we get dressed up and try to pretend that we’re not a drunken mess since we have "pretty" clothes on.

that your "pretty songs" are so foul, they would make a pirate blush.

how you can be the mom and the out-of-control kid sister all in the same evening.

walking upstairs to the tiki bar, alone, to escape the people who are my friends.

talking me down from the ledge, under the speakers, in that loud dive bar.

the way you used to make fun of me in your letters twenty years ago.

twenty years before i liked you.

twenty years before you liked me.

the night at your dad’s, watching Amityville Horror, when you were “her kid sister”.

the night we were doing shots in your mom’s kitchen when the sister was in her room studying.

falling asleep with you in your dad’s back yard. the pillows and comforter from your bed.

the fact that your dad came out at 5am to get his radio, but left our money laying right where it was.

your couch.

the way that everyone who doesn’t know you thinks that you’re a total bitch.

the way that the few of us you actually let in know that you have the biggest heart.

that you look out for me.

that we’re the "terrible ones" together.

that we're not allowed to make your sister cry anymore.

that you came into my life by accident.

that you stuck around, by choice.

that we're romy & michele, and nothing can change that.

[timing]

i know i shouldn’t be mad that vegas is out for the new year, and maybe i’m not. i guess let down is a better word. i’ll get over it, i always do. but right now i need to pout, and right now i need you to let me. hopefully the big birthday plans will pan out. i know it’s my day, my plans, my weekend, so i should do what i want. but i know i’m going to end up inviting people i’d really rather not have around, just to keep the peace among the others. and that sucks too.

i got a booty call around 1 this morning. just yesterday, while brushing my teeth, i was thinking of him. i promised myself that the next time i ran into him nothing was going to happen. i could find strength, even in my fall down drunken stupor i could be strong. well that’s easy to tell your reflection, early in the morning before you’re really even awake. sober. without him anywhere in sight. but i meant it as much as i could at the time. so the timing of said call made me laugh as i was heading out the door this morning, checking my calls. it’s just a call. i don’t have to do anything about it, right? that’s also easy. running into him today was another story.

"yeah i got your call last night, nah i was asleep, no that’s cool the ringer was off. me? i’m fine. what about you? cool. well i will catch you later."

and again, all i can really do is walk away laughing. it’s still not too late to put last year’s resolution, something about not letting the wrong boy in, into practice.

missy higgins, “ten days” is now bouncing around in this lil’ noggin of mine. soon to become track number one on my latest playlist on the ol’ nomad.

thank YOU.

“if i’m going away, your heart’s coming too.”

[strangers with candy]

i remember when my sister and i were little all these kidnapping were making the local news. this of course gave my mother yet another reason to add to the list of things beyond her control to worry about. so she followed the advice of some "expert" on tv and came up with a word that she was to tell a stranger if something were to happen and she needed them to pick us up at school. that way if we didn't know them, but they knew the word, we'd know it was safe to get in the car with them. i'm not really sure what could possibly happen that no one in our life, that we did know, would be able to come get us and my mom would have to send a stranger instead, but whatever. so i went about my business holding on to my secret word ever fearing that one day i'd have to use it. nothing ever came of it, and no one ever tried to kidnap me. but one day we were sitting around discussing it and it turns out i was the ONLY one in the family who knew my version of the secret word. and everyone else knew of a different one. apparently mine was wrong. i got mine from my mother, i’m thinking maybe i should be hurt by that.

[gone to the movies]

met up with jules for our sunday cinema thing. first up was Closer. four of the most fucked up characters ever assembled in one little movie. the opening shot of jude and natalie walking towards one another in slow motion to damien rice’s "the blower’s daughter" could have been the entire movie and i would have felt justified in paying my $6. damien’s "cold water" also makes a few brief appearances in the movie, not enough to really satisfy you, but at least he’s finally getting some exposure i guess. the movie was sad, they all played such sad, flawed people. it’s hard to sit through at times, but it was such a good movie.

since we were doing a double feature today we thought it would be wise to do the candy combo thing. so we got this HUGE drum of popcorn that came on wheels. well, it should have. and drinks in cups the size of our heads. we ate about a tenth of the popcorn and tossed the rest. but we saved our containers so we could get our free refills for the second flick. after the movie we hit up chili’s for some lunch. that was where we met the world’s slowest waitress. at one point she finally came running from across the restaurant when she saw that jules had to get up to look for her own napkin.

back at the theater, we walked across the parking lot with our empty containers and looked like a couple of panhandlers or homeless people. i tried my best to hide my cup as we walked but jules had a hard time disguising the large popcorn drum in her hands. the girl in the ticket booth gave us a funny look as we stood there with our empty cups. she asked us if we were seeing our second movie for the day. i told jules that she should have told her that we hadn’t seen a movie in months and we like to bring our own cups, fearing germs and all. once inside we tossed the popcorn one and just got refills on our drinks. we followed up lunch with Sideways. It had several laugh so hard you could cry moments in it. but again, a movie filled with some seriously messed up characters. Sideways was kind of a downer too. it was good, but i was hoping for more of a comedy after just sitting through the heavy Closer.

after seeing Finding Neverland on friday and a second viewing of Before Sunset on saturday night i feel kind of drained. i’ve never really seen the appeal of johnny depp but i loved him in this movie. i guess Finding Neverland rounds out my top five for the year. i doubt i’ll see anything better than that before the end of the year. i fell in love with the little boy who plays peter in the movie. his sad little blue eyes that fill with tears at the movie’s end broke my heart. now i want to adopt a little british boy.

and tomorrow is work, i find myself dreading the typing of that sentence this time every week. ten more days to put in before vacation. ten more days.

[reindeer games]

nikki: they make underwear with little faces and stuff on the front, you know, where the thingy goes.
her: you don’t say.
nikki: like an elephant, and the trunk is the…
us: we get it.
nikki: they even have a rudolph pair.
me: rudolph?
nikki: yeah.
her: but his nose wasn’t really that big.
nikki: they make ‘em.
me: are you sure it’s not frosty?
nikki: frosty?
me: yeah. more of a corn cob pipe, rather than a button nose.
nikki: ha ha.
me: and two eyes made out of coal, they’re just a little lower.
her: you're not right. not right at all.

[what's that smell?]

i bought this deodorant that was supposed to smell like clean cotton, or whatever. i thought, "how could you go wrong with smelling clean?" instead it smells like flowers. so i’m walking around smelling like someone’s grandmother. nice. even better, flowers make me sneeze. so i can't stop sneezing thanks to the grandma smell coming from my pits.

i came across the Garden State poster today. it will look hot next to my Eternal Sunshine Of the Spotless Mind one. i can sit and stare at them while i type.

i awoke with the song, “I Love Your Smile” by Shanice bouncing around in my head. WTF? let me just say once you get that one in your head, there ain’t no gettin’ it out.

oh, no. it happened in the most sneaky and underhanded way. i’m kickin it the other day while jetting off to somewhere amazingly fab like target or the gas station and i fell for this song. “is this new britney?” i thought to myself. “i hate her, ashlee sucks too. they make the money while the people with real talent have a hard time selling out concerts when their tickets are like $10...” but anyway, back to the song. i loved it. then last night i found out it’s a song by my nemesis lindsay lohan. it’s too late, i’m too far gone to turn back now. i love her single. damn her and her big boobs too.

every time i see the promo for the new season of Alias i come this close to peeing my pants.

and this is rawking my world. it’s not sweet enough that the song is used in the trailer for closer, oh no, they don’t stop there. the video actually has clips from the movie in it. this leads me to believe there’s a pretty good chance the song will make an appearance in the movie. i can’t stop watching it.