For those that are too young to remember that quote, “Da Plane! Da Plane!” is from the original Fantasy Island TV show. And that particular line was from the midget known as Tattoo, Khan’s right-hand man. Or Mr. Roarke, whatever.

I bring up Tattoo because I may actually be getting my first tattoo in a couple of weeks. Not the TequilaCon variety of tattoo, which comes off within a few days, a REAL one.

That’s right, Mr. Wild & Crazy is tatless. But my pending road trip to Lexington, Kentucky for the party fest known as ConFab has me thinking about getting one. There’s going to be a tattoo excursion and I think I’m going along for it.

The problem with tattoos, for me anyway, is finding the right one. What the hell do you put on your body PERMANENTLY when you’re one of those people who bore fairly easily? It’s not like my desktop wallpaper, where I can change the picture dozens of times a day if I feel like it. Tattoos don’t come off. Not without lasers, at any rate, and I’ve yet to go peeling off layers of epidermis with laser beams…don’t feel like starting now, either.

So contemplating something cool enough to place on your body is difficult, especially when you’re thinking 40 years down the road. What’s cool enough, significant enough, to put on your arm or shoulder or the small of your back, that isn’t going to look positively ridiculous when you’re 82 years old and not the tight, lean, fighting machine you are today? (cough)

I don’t know the answer to that question, but I’m working on it. The only thing I can think of so far is to get the little cartoon smoking guy at the top of my blog. See, even when I quit smoking (and I will), I’m pretty sure that some iteration of the smoking dude will always appear here at 2HT. So that’s where I’m leaning at the moment.

Course, I could make that 14-hour drive to Kentucky in a couple of weeks and totally change my mind. I could wander into the tattoo parlor, see the needle, and say “No fucking way.” But for now, I’m feeling more and more like this may be my first ink. We’ll see. Thoughts?

Now for a meme. I got tagged by Kim for this Crazy 8’s meme. Haven’t done one in a while, so I thought I’d give it a go. I don’t tag people back, but feel free to yank it and put it on your own blog, of course.

To do list (i.e. “the rules”):

1. Mention the person who tagged me, and I did !!
2. Complete the list of 8’s, and I did !!
3. Tag 8 bloggers & tell them I tagged them!

Eight things I am looking forward to:

1. ConFab, June 11-13, roughly. Lots of friends, old and new.
2. Road trip with Jill TO ConFab.
3. Watching the “Reaper” series finale some time today.
4. The magical room-moving fairies that are going to clean my current bedroom and move all my shit into the NEW bedroom.
5. BlogHer ‘09, Chicago (July)! Rooming with Neil, a first time attendee, and a chick magnet.
6. SecondHand Radio tomorrow night. My guest is my buddy Mike. Gonna be a blast.
7. Sex. Just kidding, there’s virtually no chance of that happening any time soon.
8. iPhone 3.0!

Eight things I did yesterday:

1. Worked
2. Went to Walgreens
3. Had dinner with Mom & friends at the Olive Garden
4. Watched far too much television.
5. Hung out with Mindy and Sarah for a while last night.
6. Played a fuckton of Zombieville USA on my iPhone.
7. Listened to Adam Carolla’s podcast. Seriously? Best podcast on Earth.
8. Smoked.

Eight things I wish I could do:

1. Play piano.
2. Have sex, maybe on the piano.
3. Finish one of my frakking novels.
4. Heal relationships.
5. Travel the world.
6. Escape my depression forever.
7. Get a new pancreas so I can eat giant fishbowls full of Fruity Pebbles again.
8. Marry Jaime Murray.

Eight shows I watch:

1. Jeopardy
2. Fringe
3. Lost
4. Heroes
5. Extreme Makeover: Home Edition
6. Leverage
7. House
8. Criminal Minds

Eight favorite fruits:

1. Grapes
2. Bananas
3. Watermelon
4. Cherries
5. Pineapples
6. Oranges
7. Apples
8. Peaches

Eight places I’d like to travel:

1. Australia
2. U.K.
3. Netherlands
4. Spain
5. Hawaii
6. Canada
7. Africa
8. Alaska

Eight places I’ve lived:

1. Westhampton Beach, NY
2. Alamogordo, NM
3. England
4. Biloxi, MS
5. Dallas, TX
6. San Antonio, TX
7. Boca Raton, FL
8. Sebring, FL

Filed under 2HT Radio, BlogHer, Blogging, Famecrawler, Local Goings On, Memes, TequilaCon, Travel, Weblogs, iPhone, quitting smoking, relationships | Comments (34)

I want to say big thanks to both Avitable for Saturday’s guest post and Jan for yesterday’s post. Avitable actually got me in a little trouble. Nothing major, of course, and thanks to one of my very graphic sex posts in April, I was prepared for such a contingency. I just need to remember on those rare occasions that someone decides to photoshop my head onto a guy getting fucked in the ass that I should remove the advertisements from that particular post.

Thanks to all of you for your support on me falling off the quitting wagon. I’ll be getting back on soon. Haven’t figured out when. I’m fucking stressed to the gills right now. I know, I know. No excuse. I know the stats. Most all smokers fail their first time quitting. I don’t feel good about it, but I’m proud as hell of Britt and guarantee you I won’t be smoking when I next see her. Which will be soon.

I’m loving the Famecrawler gig. It’s a great job and I get to show a side that I don’t often show here. The snarky ass bitchy side. OK, maybe I DO show it here often. Still, it’s not every day that I get called a misogynist like I did over at FC the other day. I really feel like I’ve made it now that I’ve gotten some negative comments.

I used the word “douchebaggery” in a headline and someone called me on it. Said that was dissing women because douches are feminine hygiene products, used to clean vaginas (who knew?) and they were NOT to be used in a negative way like that. Funny thing is, she misspelled misogynist. Heh. I may be a douchebag, but at least I know how to spell.

Then last night I got a little comment saying I took a cheap shot at Kim Kardashian for calling her a slut. It was a cheap shot. Doesn’t make it any less true, though. Not that there’s anything wrong with sluts, mind you. I just wouldn’t want my daughters acting like Kim Kardashian. Does that make me insane? I don’t think so.

So I’m firmly entrenched over there now, all snarks ahead. But I’m tired. Still learning the ropes, trying to get into a groove, maximize my time, all that shit. I was up until 5 in the morning last night. And here it is, 1:40 in the morning now.

By the way, if you happen to subscribe to the Famecrawler blog, I’d really appreciate it if you’d Digg on my stories. And Propel them. Whatever your favorite submission sites might be. The more hits I get on my stories, the better it is for me in my pocket.

Don’t forget, Thursday night is another episode of SecondHand Radio and I hope you’ll join me. I don’t quite know who my guest is because I lost track of days and forgot to line someone up. But I’ve got a few emails out and hope to hear later today. Keep your eyes on Twitter. Show time is 10pm Eastern Thursday night.

I totally forgot that Monday was my THREE YEAR BLOGIVERSARY! Go me.

And I’m late in announcing this, but there’s this calendar coming out called the Hot Blogger Calendar. It’d be awesome if you’d vote for me.

Doesn’t take long. I really think I should be on a calendar, don’t you? Especially THIS one.

And yeah, this is the final week of The Summer of Love. Only two more guest posts left. Tomorrow it’s my good friend, Cindy, who I’ve known longer than any other Internet friend. Saturday, it’s Winter. Then I’m back to the seven-day grind.

Filed under 2HT Radio, Blogging, Depression, Famecrawler, Local Goings On, Weblogs, quitting smoking | Comments (23)

I mean, that’s what I hear. Balance. Moderation. All that shit, right?

I have to say that I always struggle to find that fucking balance…in nearly every aspect of my life.

I am thrilled beyond words at this new job of mine. I can’t even begin to tell you what a boost that is to my self esteem. And it’s the perfect job for me, too. Telecommuting is my friend.

I don’t do corporate very well. The office buildings, the elevators, the floors that all look exactly the same and the only way you can tell that you’re on the RIGHT floor is by the scarce bit of personalized cubicle wall fluff.

Yeah, that shit just doesn’t work well with Karl. I’ve done it. Did it for a long time. Technical writing was my thing for a while there. The excitement of policy and procedures manuals…oh, how I loved to craft them. *cough* You want to know what drains the creative spirit faster than anything? Other than Yanni, I mean? It’s working for The Man. Not just any man…THE Man. That cookie cutter corporate sonofabitch that cares about nothing but the bottom line from quarter to quarter. Ugh.

I’ve never adapted well to that mentality, which is a problem. I used to work for a big real estate financing corporation and, while I worked with cool people in my department, it was more and more difficult for me to wrap my brain around who I was working for. I mean, the concept of real estate, when you get existential (which I often tend to do) is BIZARRE.

How the fuck on Earth is it that we somehow feel we can own land? I mean, really, think about it. How did you get your land? Not the house…the land the house sits on. You bought it from someone, who bought it from someone, and so on and so forth ad nauseum. UNTIL you work your way back to the FIRST person that “owned” the land. Yeah, how did that happen?

It’s just…weird to me. The concept of us owning property, which is somehow arbitrarily assigned invisible boundary lines. Completely alien when I get that high up on the thinking plane.

Seriously, in a thousand years, do you think anyone is going to give a shit about the property you reside on? In TEN thousand years? In the grand scheme of the universe, what the fuck are we all doing? Working our asses off in these cookie-cutter buildings, most of us working for someone other than ourselves, all getting paid some arbitrary amount of money so that we can pay the bills. Pay for the car. Pay for the house. Pay the rent. Pay our property taxes.

All for shit that means NOTHING in 10,000 or 100,000 years. If that doesn’t blow your mind, I don’t know what will.

It’s THIS kind of thinking exactly that brought me to my knees working on technical manuals for a real estate financing company. An industry I felt was/is ludicrous in The Universe. And if I can’t believe in what I’m DOING? Bah, I might as well just chuck it all in to the middle of the ring and say “fuck this.” And that’s precisely what I did.

Yeah, Karl? Not so much a joiner. I’ll join the choir. I’ll join the blood drive. I’ll join the MST3K Fan Club. As long as I can buy into it.

All of that longwinded shit is my way of saying I’m far better off outside the office. Most offices, anyway. I’ve seen some great news stories on TV and in magazines that profile companies like Zappos.com and I could really see working there. They don’t believe in the hive mentality as much as they do the individual. And I dig that. Treating people like people…go figure, it’s a good thing.

So yeah, the balance. I haven’t forgotten where I began this ramble fest. Bear with me. I’m exhausted. I had less than 3 hours of sleep last night and my head has been (primarily) filled with vapid stories about K-Fed and babies wearing designer diapers. It’s fun, it’s exhilerating to be working again, but it’s also taxing in a way I haven’t felt in quite a while because - yeah, it’s been a while since I’ve worked.

Balance. I haven’t found it yet. I know that I haven’t had time to read blogs in the last week or two, and BAM! Today is already come and gone and I haven’t touched my feedreader in days. But I’ll get there. As I learn the ropes at Famecrawler, I’ll get there.

And I’ll occasionally get up and step away from the laptop so I can watch Big Brother or cheesy B horror flicks on SciFi, all in an effort to stop thinking about what celebrities are fucking pregnant. Don’t get me wrong, it’s fun making fun of celebs. But too much of ANYTHING - well, we come back to balance.

You can get burned out on anything, I know from experience. Even sex. Been there, and that’s one thing you really don’t want to get burned out on.

I spent a few hours yesterday away from my laptop, only to visit a friend to help her with HER computer troubles. She needs me to build her a web site, and I’m happy to help where I can. But there’s only so much I can do.

Ugh, rambling again. I’m tired. I guess I started all this bullshit to talk about the balance in life and how I struggle to find it and I got really stressed out on Friday and fell off the smoking horse. I hate to admit it, but I did. I fell. And I was too angry and ashamed at myself to call Britt and tell her or to admit it here before now. Stupid, but hey, it’s true. You guys have all been very supportive and that helped me a lot, so I didn’t want to let you down.

It started with just one…and I SHOULD have called Britt for the support that we both signed up for, but I didn’t. And I caved.

I’m gonna quit again. I made it for nearly five days. I’m not about to say “fuck it” and just keep on puffing away. But right now, I’m smoking. I need to set a new quit date and go for it again until it sticks.

There, I said it. I’m a bad boy. I suck. But I’ll move on from this and get back on the horse. Soon.

In the meantime, I need some rest. After I finish gossiping.

Filed under Famecrawler, Local Goings On, Rants, Uncategorized, quitting smoking | Comments (27)