Matt and I trucked to Atlanta yesterday for the Pride Celebration and ended up spending a good half-day there, walking around Piedmont Park, getting dinner and wandering through the gay bars and bookstores. Being around so many gay people always seems to drag out every single one of my insecurities, and I'm still not sure why. I had fun, though! It was great to watch all the different people who turned out-- the preening twinks and the hot boyish lesbians and the scores and scores of nice, normal people. I'm glad we went.

Okay, still awake at the moment. Anyone surprised by this?

Matt and I saw Charlie's Angels 2 tonight. "What did you think?" I asked as we were leaving. He looked at his watch and said, "Nothing for the last two hours." It definitely had some great music, but we both left with headaches, which is not how I wanted to end the night. See it if you get bored, I guess.

I finally went by the New Job today and they said that applications are picked randomly whenever there's an opening, so it could be a while, if ever, before I make it there. I talked to my boss at work tonight, though, and she told me that I'm guaranteed to be the next new supervisor whenever one of the current crew leaves. Rock on! I suspect someone will duck out before Fall semester.

Matt and I are going to Pride tomorrow in Atlanta so I guess I'll get some sleep. Here is yesterday's update which I wrote but couldn't get to post, since Blogger's apparently incorporating a new system:
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Today's news:

"Gay sex is okay!" The Supreme Court voted 6-3 this morning to reverse the anti-sodomy laws that 13 states still had on the records. This is a gigantic step in the mission for equality. Maybe marriage will be next?

The Killer Elite: part two, "From Hell to Baghdad," is now up at rollingstone.com. Once again I would definitely suggest getting the real issue for its pictures and maps. I actually haven't finished it myself yet; the magazine just came a couple days ago and I've been saving the best for last.

Today I finally got a haircut (which looks militaristic), took my car into the shop (the heat shield on the engine is loose but it's not a big problem), checked on my credit card (should be arriving anyday now) and worked. That is all.

I am now working 7 shifts (28 hours) a week, which will be enough to tide me over till I find something better. I keep wanting to go by FedEx and see what's going on, but every morning I get too nervous and chicken out. The only problem with working every day is that by the time I'm ready to go out and do errands, it's time to go to work. I need to get a haircut, grow some balls and go by FedEx, go by the bank to mess with my account, take my car into the shop for some work... errands errands errands! They are ganging up on me.

Last night Matt and I went out to dinner with his friend Alex and Alex's new girlfriend Kim. We both thought Kim was awesome, and today Alex mentioned that she was equally impressed with us and asked him a lot of questions about us. I hope the four of us can hang out again. Speaking of dates, though, my roommate is downstairs watching a movie with some chick. It's a bit of an awkward situation whenever he has company over, because my loft bedroom has a giant window in the wall that overlooks the living room, meaning that sound travels quite easily between the rooms. Right now I am listening to them watching some movie with a lot of gunfire and crying, for instance-- doesn't sound like a great date movie to be honest-- and they are listening to me clacking away on the keyboard with X2 music playing. This has also proven an aggravating situation for me whenever I have someone in my room. Like, say, Matt. ...Yeah. Very aggravating. Ah, Dan just paused the movie and left the room to take a call on his cel (I'm sure that'll earn him a ton of points with her!). I think I'll slink downstairs and investigate.

Can't sleep = update. I spent all weekend with Matt, which was great as always. We had something of a Matrixfest: rented the original, played the hell out of Enter the Matrix (one of the most fun games I've played in ages) and saw Reloaded again. I forgot how entertaining the first movie was, and Reloaded is a lot better the second time, when your expectations are lower and you catch a lot more of the theory and innuendo. Also, Persephone and Niobe kiss in EtM and it's really, really bizarre.

Work tonight was notably awful. There are a lot of new employees lately and it happens that the vast majority of them are slackers. Thanks to these guys, our superiors have, of course, been cracking down on all of us, making the job a great deal less fun. But I am trying not to make an uppity nuisance of myself in responce. Rather, I am waiting patiently for this fall, when I will hopefully become a supervisor and get to make people pay for their irresponcibility. The fact that people can't muster the slight energy necessary to be grateful for a job this cushy is simply beyond me-- and when it starts to get me in trouble, well, that's the last straw. (And for the record, this isn't vindictiveness. It's a very, um, proactive form of karma.)

New art in the works: Zeus.

I talked to Mom again last night and she said the tests all came back fine, and that Shadow's doing better, though she still seems to be walking stiffly with her back legs.

Dad gave back the Corvette and bought another car but he won't tell me what kind it is! I'll see for myself when I go up July 4th weekend for my tests and his birthday.

My mom just called to tell me that Shadow, the family cat, has taken a turn for the worse. She's been throwing up, having bad seizures and can't walk without falling over. Mom took her to the vet and they're running some tests, but she says it doesn't look very good. I'm glad I got to see her when I drove down, at least.

There is no better way to brighten up a crumby day than by helping an elderly neighboor with her groceries.

&c.:

Monkeypox confirmed in US: Perhaps the moral of this story is not to sell wild animals like priarie dogs-- the carriers in this case-- as pets. (While we were in Paris our tour guide Veronique told us that priarie dogs have become the hottest new exotic pet there, and we actually went by the street markets where people could buy them. Wait, why did I parenthesize this?

The Killer Elite, part one: This is the best article concerning the war in Iraq that I've read. I didn't read many, admittedly, but this is simply great journalism. I would definitely recommend buying the issue to get the full effect of its pictures and the like, but this's better than nothing. Read it. I'm serious.

I'm getting called "sir" a lot more often at work now, which is odd but nice. Lately I've been hanging out, both on and off the job, with some of the supervisors and hearing all the funny behind-the-scenes action. Apparently in the early days of the facility, the workers and supervisors would all smoke a bowl during break and then go back to work stoned as hell. As lousy as it is overall, this job never ceases to amuse me.

It is already past noon and I have barely done anything besides breathe, drink a glass of water and scratch myself. I think I'm going to try to clean my room today, as it's once again reached the stage where my desk is covered in strata of detritus and the floor is so carpeted with junk that all that remains is a series of aisleways to my closet, computer, bed and bathroom. I would take a picture of it but the $300+ dollar digicam I got from my mom for my high school graduation appears to be broken. It was one of the first-gen digi's, and there are cameras today half that price which are a thousand times better, but it still makes me a little sad to see it go. And I couldn't afford another one right now even if it mattered (good thing it doesn't really).

This summer (post-road trip) hasn't gone at all the way I hoped. By this point I expected to have gotten my second job and be raking in the money which I will be living off for the next year, but now with barely two months left of summer this has yet to happen. It seemed like everything was lined up perfectly, too. I am going to try to get my shit together and chisel out a plan before Monday rolls around, because this whole living from paycheck-to-paycheck thing just ain't cutting it. I also planned to have paid Matt back for a lot of the Europe trip costs by now and that hasn't happened either. I am getting sick of things not working, so I am going to make some work. Goddamn, how did my room get this dirty?

If you've sat through all of my whining, you deserve some humor! Matrix Reloaded: The Abridged Script.

I just dreamt about being attacked by zombies while working the graveyard shift (haha-- pun) sweeping up ashes at a cremation facility in the middle of the Arizona desert.

Jesus, I am so crazily in love. But also very tired. Goodnight world!

Has it really almost been a week since I got home? My car is still running fine, which leads me to assume that the trouble I had on my way home was just a fluke. Something else I wanted to mention about the trip was that I was doing it in part to stave off a long-running fear of mine. For as long as I can remember I've always felt that I was going to die in a car accident someday, either by being in a crashing car or being struck by one. It's always been looming in the back of my mind, and this trip was sort of a way to face that fear head-on (no bad pun intended). And seeing that I survived, the worry no longer seems quite so strong. You know, now that I think about it, I don't think I've ever really mentioned this to anyone before. I guess it's out now!

Been spending a lot of time with Matt since I've been back, which is always great, and also seeing a lot of films, which has helped to wash out the bad aftertaste of Matrix Reloaded. Great fight scenes or not, creative and interesting theories or not, it's still a horrifyingly boring movie with dialogue that rivals the inanity of Glitter and acting that's even worse. I'm now up to five times with X2-- I know it's sad, and I can't justify it other than with the fact that I love the damn thing. Today there was The Italian Job with Matt (aka Ocean's Eleven 2, minus the swank but still almost as good), and of course Finding Nemo. The music is fantastic and the art is truly gorgeous, in some places breathtakingly so. The more I think about it, though, the more episodic the plot was, especially when compared to the tightness of Monsters Inc. But the thing that bothered me the most was that there were also a handful of truly cheap emotional ploys that the movie simply didn't need, and which made me feel manipulated. But even with these problems, it's still great! I probably wouldn't mind seeing it again.

Now that I have established myself as the biggest geek in the universe, I think I'll establish myself as the most pathetic one by taking a pre-bedtime nap-- ironically, now that I have no classes to worry about, I've been sleeping worse than ever. I wonder if I could request even more hours at work. This is Shrimpy McCancerpants, signing off.

George W. Bush's Resumé: Biased in places but still quite alarming.

Eight days and 1346.2 miles later, Aaron's Florida Odyssey came to an end on Monday night. It was an amazing trip! After seeing my family in Sarasota I drove to Jacksonville to see Manna and Shelia, and got the nice bonus of seeing Holly and Brian too. I was nervous about staying with Shelia since we'd only talked a few times, but the minute we met it felt as though we were best friends. While I was there I was also lucky enough to hold a teeny tiny little kitten, to acquire a disembodied guardian angel (pictures to come soon), and to watch Kung Pow, one of the funniest movies I've ever seen. Furthermore, I was fortunate enough to make almost the entire trip without any car troubles; the lack of any serious problems actually came as a huge surprise. I made the mistake of setting out from Jacksonville at rush hour and while sitting in bumper-to-bumper traffic, the engine temperature suddenly shot through the roof. I rolled the windows down and put the heat on max, which cooled the engine enough to let me drive on the shoulder to an exit and head straight for the nearest gas station (ironically right down the street from Shelia's house). All the fluids were fine, so I got back onto the highway and discovered that as long as I maintained highway speeds the engine got enough wind to stay cool. Since I've been back the problem seems to have fixed itself; hopefully it'll stay that way.

The longest drive I'd ever done up to this point was under three hours, which had me a little nervous, but I found that I can drive 8+ just as easily-- in fact, I really enjoyed it. I simply cruised along with the windows down, listening to the wind, and didn't even get bored enough to listen to music. And it gave me time to think up silly little raps like this:

On the radio, Creed
is singing to me
a song apparently
about how to get free.
But I really don't see
why it's got to be
always about Je-
sus-- but that's just me.

There are other things I wanted to mention but I'm too hungry to think at the moment. Time for dinner.

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