Category: heartstrings

Love, lust, and relationships.

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smiled all the way through

Hi guys, it’s Friday.  I’m ready for the weekend.  Ready to pack, and take to the skies around 10am Monday to get to the trailhead for our early Tuesday hike-start.  Let’s do this.

Tonight around ten o’clock, and after doing the dishes after watching Barack after eating dinner after playing with Keaton after taking off my workclothes and putting on gym shorts with no shirt after turning off the iPhone that was streaming the freshly-leaked Mogwai album after pulling into the garage after leaving work after running my staff meeting after working like three men again after grabbing Indian buffet for lunch after working like three men after grabbing my coffee and a fuji apple for breakfast after driving into work while listening to the freshly-leaked Mogwai album after getting dressed after showering after waking up, I decided to make a bowl of Honey Nut Cheerios to satisfy a latenight craving for something sweet.

Sharaun was in the living room stretched out on the big couch and had a good vantage of the countertop where I placed the empty bowl I pulled from the cabinet.  She watched as I pulled the box of cereal down from the cabinet and poured it into the bowl.  Here’s a pretty good approximation of how that went:

Oh my God David, how much cereal are you putting in that bowl?  Did you leave any? Why do you fill it that much?  Who makes bowls of cereal like that, anyway?  I saw you use your hand to push it down so it would fit!  What do you think it’s the Mongolian Grill?  Is there going to be any for Keaton in the morning?  Where are you even going to put the milk now?  Seriously.

I didn’t leave my side of the conversation out of that either, I just sort of stood there chuckling as she went on.  Sometimes these unprovoked rants really crack me up.  And, even though she was half-joking, there were definitely shades of the three-hundred babies thing from blogs of yore.  Anyway, I thought it was funny, and smiled all the way through my enormous bowl of delicious Cheerios.

Goodnight.

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two inches of fresh powder

Yeah, so I did.  Let me have it; it was a busy time at work and our evenings were filled most every night.  I’m gonna say that this week’ll be better, but it’s hard to make promises when things are busy.  I’m actually home alone right now, it’s around 10am on Sunday.  Sharaun and I drove separately to church, as I had to come home early to meet someone.  The weekend was good, if a little flaky on our part: Friday was a low-key evening with friends; we had two separate fêtes Saturday that we were supposed to attend, but ended up only making it to one; and today (Sunday) we were supposed to do lunch with friends… but…

When we got back from church Sunday Sharaun ended up having to call and cancel our lunch date with friends at the last minute because she mismanaged her time and was under too much pressure to get things done for a moms’ group steering team meeting this afternoon (she’s the coordinator).  So, now I’m sitting here feeling like an absolute heel for my complicity in flaking; half embarrassed and ashamed, and half angry at her for putting me in this position.  It’s a crappy situation, you know, feeling like a jerk because she overcommitted.  (And I say that knowing full well some of you are thinking about pots and kettles calling each other names.)

Back in college, I can remember Sharaun staying up all night, alternating between fits of nailbiting crunchtime-efficiency and fits of frustrated tears over her own procrastination.  I don’t think one major project or curriculum-deliverable went by where waiting until the last minute and working in a fevered panic wasn’t her modus operandi.  Even to this day, she still works that way – hunched in front of the monitor into the wee hours on the eve of her moms’ group events.  What’s worse is, when she gets in that panicked last-minute rush, I become a convenient outlet for frustrations.  Suddenly, I’m not helping enough with this or that, or could’ve done something to ease her to-the-wire trials.  I’ve learned to stay clear, let her work, and try and be as helpful as possible.  I figure, if it helps me stay married, I guess it’s just something I have to learn to do.

Seriously though, I don’t mean to dispariage the work she does, I think it’s great – it’s just days like today when I get to look like a shining ass that irk me.  For someone as unorganized as she is, possessing little to nothing of the rigors of planning, she garners tons of accolades for the work she does.  I suppose maybe I just don’t understand.  My Vulcanesque brain may just be too logical to understand the thought processes of the fairer sex, perhaps.  I do love her to death, though; all the little bits too: every sock or pair of jeans on the living room floor, every open jar of peanut butter on the counter, every cabinet left open, every light left on, and every spare set of keys Home Depot charges me for.

Well, I think I’ve covered that event enough, let’s move on.

Sharaun got on to me the other day because the camera’s memory card is full.  Used to be, I’d empty that thing once a week and post pictures online.  As you’ve no doubt noticed, I fallen off that wagon a bit.  If you wanted to stick to a theme here, you could say I’ve flaked on that part of my online responsibility too, I suppose.  Really, though, it was about time I cleared that thing off and went through images to get a new batch into the galleries.  So, that’s just what I did.  And, surprisingly, the whole of both June and July (which even included a trip to Florida and my parents’ Fourth of July visit) generated a measly twenty-three “decent” images.  Maybe we’ll get more now that I emptied the camera.  For now though, you get what I got – so go check out the new additions here.

And, that’s all folks.  Goodnight.

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heart=melt

Happy hot Wednesday, folks.

When the digital temperature readout in my car dips below thirty degrees Fahrenheit or so, it alternates between the outside temperature and flashing the word ICE! to let me that the conditions are right for slick and dangerous roads. Today when I drove home from work, however, it was alternating between 111° and SATAN! Really, it was that hot today here in smoky California. I had briefly considered going up into the attic after work to run a length of CAT5 cable to the new satellite receiver – but even at midnight it’d be like a blast furnace up there. So, yeah, it’s totally hot here.

Today (which was yesterday, as you’re reading this), Sharaun and I have been married for eight years.

Eight years ago today I was fiddling with my rented tuxedo behind closed doors at the back of a church I didn’t go to. My best friend and best man Jeremy was there with me, we were probably making coarse jokes. I can remember we’d walked through the motions and standing positions the day prior, and I shuffled out the side door to the front of the waiting crowd. Sharaun looked beautiful, and, as I often do at weddings, especially, it turns out, my own, I had to bite back tears watching her part the sea of onlookers walking towards me. I remember little of the vows, other than that they were simple and traditional, and that the whole thing was over in fifteen minutes or so. I do remember when our officiant asked the maid of honor for the ring, Sharaun instead reached into her cleavage to retrieve it – and the crowd let forth much mirth.

The reception is a blur, I barely remember it. I do recall taking my friends’ new daughter onto the dancefloor and shuffling around with her (I loved that girl to death).  I remember we had no booze at the fête, y’know, to keep The Lord happy (which conversely kept my highschool buddies quite unhappy, and was the reason for their early exit, I’m sure).  I remember the food being good, although probably ultimately unremarkable, and I remember hating every minute of dancing (I loathe dancing, I’m just not made for it).  And, finally, I remember driving off to spend our first night as a wedded couple in the airport at the hotel before we flew away for our honeymoon.  That’s it though, just a series of memories, mostly a blur.

I would’ve posted one of our wedding pictures as an accompaniment to this blog, but Sharaun has locked them away in a vault somewhere never to be seen by human eyes again.  Yes, she hates them that much.  So much even, that she’s, quite seriously, suggested we reshoot them now one time when we’re back in Florida.  Now, we’ll not be doing that – that much is sure – but you can see how much she hates them.

Tonight, on our way to drop Keaton off with Kerry so we could enjoy an anniversary dinner together, she said, “I wanna come with you dad!”  “No,” I said, “This is a special dinner for Mommy and Daddy.”  Sharaun chimed in with, “It’s Mommy and Daddy’s anniversary.”  (We’ve been telling her this for a few days.)  She replied, “I know!  Because Mommy and Daddy are married!”  And then, after a slight pause to think, “Daddy, I want to get married someday.”  (I’m not kidding, she totally said that!).  “Oh,” I said, curiously, “Who would you like to marry someday?”  “I want to marry my Daddy.”

Heart=melt.

Tell you what though, that day eight years ago was far and away the best decision I’ve ever made.

Goodnight.

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what day is this?!

Was hot today, California gets that way sometime a few hours after noon – unlike Florida where it’s blazing as soon as the sun’s up (or at least that’s how it seems). I’m sitting here in shorts and no shirt listening to the new Coldplay album. Just did the dishes and cleaned the kitchen, took a time out to kill some ants that had marched their way into the house in search of food and cooler temperatures – time to spray the perimeter with that Home Depot jug again I suppose. It’s not surprising that ants arrive inside, I’m convinced that the entire slope of our retaining wall is one giant anthill (and I’m barely exaggerating). Now I have to turn off my music so Sharaun can watch another one of those Hell-spawned dancing shows… and that means it’s time to write.

When my alarm sounded this morning at 6:40am, I grabbed my phone and silenced it. For some reason, my brain was telling me it was the weekend – maybe having just returned from traveling the evening before. Funny thing was, I thought it was odd, and a tad annoying if I’m being honest, that Sharaun kept asking me what time it was every few minutes. My weekend-blinded brain didn’t even consider she was gently trying to tell me I seemed to be sleeping late. Finally, she asked me, “Do you have to go to work today?” I sat bolt up and asked: “What day is this?!” “It’s Thursday,” she answered, as if I were stupid. Laughing at my mental mixup, I jumped from bed into a quick shower and dress before heading out the door. Funny, I could’ve sworn it was the weekend… I can even remember contemplating whether it was Saturday or Sunday, and what I was going to do.

Keaton and Sharaun came up to the sawmill today to eat lunch with me in the cafeteria. We have a pretty decent cafe downstairs, I guess on-par with most modern-day computery conglomerates… all sushi and free drinks and designed for blog exposés that make engineering grads drool. Keaton loves coming up to my work, she gets to wear a little temporary badge just like the one I wear to the office each day. Last time, the security guard who signs in visitors dug out a little lanyard and hung her paper badge off it before giving it to her, the picture of daddy and his lanyard-hung badge. She adored it, and wears it around the house sometimes too. She brought it back up today and they stamped the new date on it so she could continue wearing it.

Sharaun and I get her a plate of cold cuts, cooked vegetables, a little egg salad and a slice of cheese. If she eats well, she can share a cookie (OK, she’ll get to share it if she eats or not). The ladies working the cafe (I don’t say that to be sexist, they actually all are ladies) giver her a balloon as we walk around, clipping it to her sleeve – she’s come to expect it. After we eat, people look down and smile as she meanders her way through the halls back to the front desk – her little steps are still just so inherently cute. And, somehow, even though there are some eight-thousand people where I work, we always manage to run into friends from outside work – who she greets with loud hellos and sometimes hugs. It’s great to have her there, I imagine it’s what classic car people feel when their ride is all buffed and tricked out on the line at the carshow. Pure gloating.

As we were leaving, I walked the girls outside where Keaton gave me a hug and a kiss and began to walk back towards the car with Sharaun. As I turned to walk back into the building, she hollered to me, “Goodbye daddy I love you daddy goodbye!” I returned the I love you and goodbye just in time to see her blow me a quick triple of kisses. I smiled, and a total stranger next to me beamed at me saying, “Man, I wish I had a camera… that was the best thing I’ve seen all week.”

Now, that’ll make a dad feel good.

‘Night folks.  Don’t work too hard today, the weekend’s here… after all.

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love is blind

Internet, I am here again.

It’s something like 10pm on Wednesday night and, luckily, I wrote about 80% of this entry in a “creative” fit last night, only having to come back tonight to add a few rounding-out and closing paragraphs and proofread. It’s kinda long, actually, so I’m just gonna skip the intro and get right into it.

Hey, remember when I used to talk about music a lot on here? I mean, I used to do it all the time. Lately, though, music talk is usually relegated to a couple sentences here and there about a new album I like or what leaked recently or a the show I just went to. Well, for those looking for me to make a triumphant return with a music-centric post today, you’ll be happy. For those of you who typically gloss over the “music stuff,” I urge you to tune in today – as it’s really more of a story set around music, not just me talking about the latest Weezer album or something.

Oh, and, if you really are the kind of person who truly misses all the music stuff (I’m not even sure there are those people, actually), take heart – it’s almost June and that means it’s time for my annual half-best-of list for 2008. Look for it sometime soon, OK? OK.

Hey… have you guys heard that the New Kids on the Block are back together? No? Yeah, me neither.

Ahhh… guys… I wish I could say that, but the fact is that I live with the biggest New Kids on the Block fan I know in this world (yes, we’re talking about my lovely wife). I’ve always known this about her, from our very first encounters with each other back in middle school when she came to school wearing an eight inch round button with their five pubescent faces smiling out from below a neon 90’s paint-splash logo. In fact, to this day, that button resides in a box in our garage, along with a posterboard New Kids collage of images she cut from magazines like Tiger Beat and Bop!. I’m for real.

You may think that, over the years, as her tastes matured, she’d have taken time to reevaluate her love for the “band,” perhaps listening to the with the learned ears of someone who’s been schooled in “real” music by her husband (who, I might add, has impeccable taste). Yeah, you might think that, but you’d be totally wrong if you did. In fact, if anything, her infatuation with the band has continued to be a rolling snowball. I remember shortly after we first moved to California, she took off alone in the early morning hours to drive to San Francisco and stand outside some radio studio to meet Joey McIntyre (the Michael Jackson one to their Jackson-5 mold). And, that, my friends, is only one of the ways Sharaun has kept up her fanaticism over the years. I can, for instance, remember when she absolutely freaked out when the n0w off-air VH1 show “Reunited” tried to get them back together (unsuccessfully), and then of course there was her 30th birthday cake…

So, when rumors began flying around the internet last year about a possible reunion, Sharaun reacted with the unbridled glee of a thirteen year-old girl. She became a regular in the online fan communities, all of them filled with “birds of a feather” from the key New Kids on the Block reunion-fever demographic: They’re all moms now, likely married, most went through a Backstreet Boys or N*Sync phase along the way, and they are all now finally blessed with the liquidity they so fervently prayed for back when they were initially smitten as poor, allowance-funded preteens. It’s brilliant, really, waiting until your insanely-obsessed base finally has disposable funds in the bank to stage a full-fledged get-back-together… temporal marketing at its finest.

Anyway, when those same rumors began to firm up, and it was announced that the band was going to make an appearance on the Today Show, not to play, but only to announce they once again would be playing, she sent out an Evite to all the thirty-something-year-old women we hang out with asking them over at 7am for a viewing party complete with donuts and coffee. I still remember waking up to go to work and seeing ten or so women congregated in our living room, the working of them outfitted in their work-garb, sitting on chairs placed ’round the television all waiting for the posters from their 1989 walls to come to life in front of their grown-up eyes. Some people even came in vintage band-branded clothing… it was, in a word, phenomenal.

In fact, I was home the day the New Kids actually took to the stage together as a group for the first time in over a decade, which also happened on the Today Show, a month or so later. And, friends, when that happened, I saw my wife transformed before my eyes. The braces-wearing adolescent in her broke free from the shackles that thirty year-old Sharaun keeps her locked up in, screaming and jumping her way into consciousness, shrieking with delight as five has-beens instantly became five are-agains before a fawning crowd of aging females in Times Square. I’m for real, it’s still on our TiVo if you don’t believe me… you can come on over and watch it for yourself. They dance and everything, it’s beautiful.

When their new single debuted on iTunes, she bought two copies for herself (because, of course, everyone knows digital songs eventually wear out), and sent eight more as iTunes “gifts” to her friends (thanks for that little bit of functionality, Mr. Jobs), who, I’m almost certain, are all busy re-growing their rattails and practicing trash-talk for all the “sucka MCs” in throes their reunion anticipation as well.

So, when she told me that she’d be spending “some money” on the “VIP passes” to their announced California shows, I, for what it’s worth, gave my blessing. In fact, when she told me how bad she wished she could see a show with Natalie, her best friend from all those years ago, I reluctantly admitted we have enough “extra” skymiles to get her back to Florida for the Tampa show. So now, my wife is flying more than five hours across the USA and back to meet her best friend since 1st grade (when she shared her Garfield pizza-scented scratch-n-sniff sticker) and spend hundreds of dollars on “VIP passes” which include front-row tickets and a meet-and-greet.

I know, I’m a good husband, right? But, if I want to be able to justify the hundreds and hundreds of dollars I plan to spend seeing Led Zeppelin wherever on Earth they tour this summer (please guys, please do it), I figure I better let her have her “one show” too. No, really, I’m willing to pay just slightly under my the-two-dead-Beatles-resurrect-and-they-get-back-together concert ticket threshold. Jimmy, Robert, John, Jason – just tell me how much you want, and I’ll have it in your wrinkled hands before you can close your mouths… and am even willing, just like Sharaun, to get on a plane.

Well, that’s the story of Sharaun’s obsession with the New Kids.

Oh, and, in closing… when I told her I was writing about the New Kids on the Block, she said, shocked, “What are you writing about them? You better not be writing anything bad! You should let me write about them, because I know ‘what’s up.'” I laughed. “I know Joey’s favorite food is Mexican,” she continued, “And his favorite color is green. His middle name is Mulrey.”

See… I told you. Goodnight.

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until then, she’s mine

Hiiii internet. It’s me again. Back for another round of typing. You wanna hang out for a while? I think I may download some music and eat a bowl of cereal. Sit for a while and keep me company, OK? Yeah… you do what I say.

This past Friday we went to a wedding. I’ve written before about how I get at weddings, but, this time, I thought the story of my almost-tears was good enough to expand on a bit.

First off, the wedding itself was set square on the south shore of the incredible Lake Tahoe. The scenery made for quite a backdrop, the endless lake and snowcapped peaks towering all around was the vista from within the reception hall, where the entire back wall was glass.

So, the mood was already somewhat established by the whole man-in-nature vibe the venue itself gave off – this was an auspicious occasion, and, like any wedding, a celebration. The folks who were becoming one flesh that day are friends of ours, but we’re not terribly close or anything. For that reason I figured I would be fine in terms of my typical over-emotional response to the ceremony, not having a particularly strong emotional stake in the matter and all. And, as the reception speeches began I sat proudly dry-eyed, easily letting mushy anecdotes and proclamations of undying cosmic love and friendship bounce right off my tough skin. That is, until she took the mic…

The bride, that is. Her words were fine; heartfelt, kind, sincere. She moved from one person to the next, saying something nice about each. Soon, shifting the sights of her speech around the room from target to familial target, she eventually landed on her father. And then, dear friends, the thick dusty curtains hanging over my heart were rent to bits word by stabbing word. All of the sudden those TV-chimes sounded and I was the me of years from now, at my own daughter’s wedding, Keaton taking the form of the bride before me in the present time – speaking to me.

I can’t remember the entirety of her words, as all my powers of logical thought were lined up in defence of the hostile charge mounted by my emotions, but I do recall some particularly amazing (paraphrased, I’m sure) bits: “And, dad. You made me what I am today; taught me how to be a good person. I credit you with my spirit, the way I never give up. Thank you for making me into what I am.”

Oh, Lord… I can barely write about it without getting misty. To think that one day I’ll be sitting at the “family table” listening to Keaton say something (hopefully) similar, about broke me down. At one point I had to consciously break my attentions and focus instead on some boats scooting across the smooth surface of the lake on a sunset sail. I just couldn’t take it.

The brutality, the pure barbarity of having to, as a dad, “give away” your little girl. Biting back tears of sadness while at the same time damming the flood of tears from the pride and happiness filling you to bursting. You think I’m gonna let some guy take her away from me? Yeah… I guess I will… but not for a long time. Until then, she’s mine.

‘Night. Hold ’em tight.

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YDF #3: Passing Notes

Hi folks and welcome to You Decide Friday #3. This week, the winner of the poll, by a landslide, ending up being: “A humorous analysis of some high-school notes between Sharaun & I” (Ten votes is a landslide? Oh man, I need more readers). Anyway, I guess I don’t need much more exposition than that… so here goes.

You guys remember high school, right? Man, I sure do. Not getting into it too much, you should be able to tell by the abundance of high school era stories I post right here on sounds familiar that I had a pretty memorable four-year stint there. As everyone knows, teenage romance is the bread and butter of high school drama, the planet around which those fledgling emotions orbit and swirl. And, what would teenage romance be without the between-classes note exchange? The embryonic love of high school is a fragile thing, barely able to stand the forty minute breaks from each other as required by the bell schedule.

I’ll ask that you read these old notes with the former mindset. I mean… it’s not going to help really, they are still grotesque.

And, I need to be up-front with you guys here: On Tuesday night I dragged two old dusty cardboard boxes out of their resting places high and out of the way on shelves in the garage. One of these boxes is mine, the other Sharaun’s. Both boxes contain roughly the same things: a bunch of notes and other bric-a-brac from the halcyon highschool days of our budding, now going on fifteen years, romance (if you count highschool, which, after this, you might not).

Since it was already apparent that the highschool notes option was going to win this week’s contest, I figured I bet set about poring over the reams and reams of wide-ruled paper we’ve both held onto for so many years now. And, oh and this is the part I needed to be up-front about, it was a disgusting task. I’m serious. These notes are terrible. They are awful. Cringe-worthy. Emetic even. Honestly, as I glossed over note after note, revisiting each from within its pocket-sized quartered folds, I began to wish we’d never kept them at all. Well, maybe that’s not true, but they are certainly embarrassing, to say the least.

First off, it’s highschool, so of course Sharaun and I could barely contain the red-hot urgency of our love – a love the likes of which the world surely had never seen before. In fact, we used the word love so much, and with such conviction, it’s sickening. Other than the every-other-sentence professions of undying cosmic love, most of the notes were about how one of us shouldn’t talk to some other guy or girl, or flirt with this person or that, and quite a few were me apologizing for being lecherous.

Seriously friends, I had to read through so much pure and utter shameful crap to find a couple missives I could use… it was an exercise in patience. In the end though, I found what I think are some comical exchanges betwixt the Sharaun and I of fourteen years ago.

The notes I chose aren’t direct responses to each other, although that would’ve been easy to do. Know why? Because, in addition to passing notes between class at school, Sharaun and I also instituted something we called a “log.” The Log was a notebook that we traded off from one to another each day, and took home with us every other night. Each night, either Sharaun or I would write to each other in the notebook, logging our “in” and “out” times. In the morning, we’d give the log to the other, who’d read it and take it home to write and repeat.

Over the course of the first year or so we were together back in highschool, we filled up three ruled notebooks this way – and still have them all. They are, in a word, ghastly. But, I can manage to look back on them with fondness – because they are documents of a time gone by where I was pretty dang happy. In addition, I kept my own personal relationship journal-type thing (which I wrote in every day, go figure) for the first few months we dated. I had forgotten about that until I opened the box the other night… ugh.

Anyway, the notes I chose aren’t direct responses to each other (did I say that already?). They also aren’t presented here in their entirety, I had to cut the things down to try and get just the interesting bits – so if the portions I present seem somewhat disjointed, it’s because they are. Anyway, my criteria for choosing them was pretty much based on how much I thought I could make fun of them here on the blog, so I purposefully chose the ridiculous and overly inane.

Let’s start with my letter to Sharaun, because, well, honestly, it’s the worst of the two. Here we go, hope they’re not too hard to read…

Ahh, right off the bat we’re talking jealousy. For a relationship seemingly cemented together with a passion so undying, we sure didn’t seem to have a lot of trust in each other. I don’t really know who I was chastising her for hugging, but I love that my suggested solution to her was to stand like a stone while being hugged, rather than reciprocating. What a way to open a letter, right? Oh man… highschool… Moving on.

Oh, wait… what’s this? Apparently, I was also guilty of hugging someone (our highschool must’ve been a regular hugfest or something). At least I am big enough to commiserate, although I do manage to mention that I actually had to watch Sharaun’s scandalous embrace, whereas mine was more tastefully clandestine. Let’s keep wading through this crap, shall we?

Oh, here I’ve apparently made peace with myself, and am now laying on the love. Let’s see how long I keep up the nice-guy stuff…

Wow. What a jerk thing to say. Basically I’m saying, “I have tons of chicks on my jock, and I’m sure happy you’re not as wanted as I am. But, don’t worry, I don’t flirt with them… even though they’d totally do it with me if I said the word. Glad you’re not as desirable, I couldn’t handle it.” Reading through these notes makes me wonder why in the world Sharaun ever even gave me a shot.

“Rockledge Central” was an unfinished business park that was paved into a dead-end cul-de-sac. We used to drive down there into the dark and the trees and “park.” Notice how I kinda slip that one in there as the last option, as if it weren’t really the first and foremost thing I’d want to do. Sly, ain’t I?

“That huggin’ faggot?” Class act man. Class. Act.

No words… no words.

“Gay-ass fool?” Man, I bet the women truly were lining up.

When I read this stuff, I can actually almost remember feeling and acting like this jealous and possessive highschool kid. I’m not sure if everyone’s highschool relationships were like that or not, but ours sure was.

Once again I seem to be tooting my own womanizing horn. What a catch. How did I ever keep them off?

I’ll leave this to interpretation, but I almost puked up my dinner when I sounded it out. Oh my Lord we were sickening.

So, that’s it. I made it through. Time to collect my thoughts, remember I’m in my thirties and that this was a long time ago (I used to think we were so mature…). Now then, with my head cleared of that foul business, let’s move on to Sharaun’s note to me. This one was taken from one of those “log” deals I talked about above, you can see the in/out time-logging at the top. Ugh.

I just want to run away and hide. It’s that bad, right?

OK, something interesting. Sharaun and I used to stay up all night talking on the phone. We’d stay up well into the morning, sometimes “talking” for five or more hours. I have no idea what we talked about, but more than one time I remember falling asleep on the phone together. Eventually, Sharaun got caught talking to me in the middle of the night. In fact, the resulting phone ban was what started the whole “log” back-and-forth thing – a kind of alternative to being able to talk all night. On some nights, though, she’d manage to sneak the phone into her room and make secret calls to me in the wee hours. This didn’t wake my parents because, when I got my first computer back in ’92, I had decided to pay for a private line in my bedroom so I could monopolize the phone with my dialup Prodigy account. The five dollars per month was totally worth being able to surf the nubile WWW, which I was already addicted to.

Hahaha. Wow. You know what they say about flattery…

Here she’s talking about what we’ll bring with us to the beach when we go some night in the future. We used to tell her folks we were going to see a movie and then drive down to the beach and find a nice dark spot to spread a blanket and make out. Awesome, right?

We really did love talking on the phone…

Oh hey, this portion of the note makes for a neat sideline story…

Once, Sharaun’s grandmother found a note from me Sharaun had inadvertently left in the pocket of her jeans. No problem, right? Only thing was, in that particular note, I was joking around about Sharaun being pregnant – I mean, I was writing about it as if it were true, but Sharaun, of course, knew it for a joke. Anyway, Sharaun’s grandmother freaked out, called Sharaun’s mom (who immediately knew the note for a joke and did not, thank the Lord above, involve her dad). Needless to say Sharaun’s mom was not happy with the note, nor the “coarse” language I used in it (as was a habit of mine back then).

In order to avoid a similar situation again, and to add a layer of security to notes of a “sensitive” nature, I taught Sharaun the code Kyle and I had discovered, and subsequently broken, in the underground tunnels of Astrokalickrama (if you’re completely lost after reading that last sentence, catch your ignorant self up by clicking right here). She’s not using it to mask anything bad here, she must’ve just been keeping in practice or something.

Well, like I said – I had to cut them down a little, but that’s it. I’m not really sure how I feel about this one… as a blog entry I mean… for some reason I’m half tempted to trash the entire thing. But, it’s here now, and it took a loooong time, so it’s staying. I mean, it took forever to write. In the end, I got tired… and likely sloppy. Sorry. I don’t even know if I like it after all that work. Also, I’ve done something like it before here and here and maybe even here. Whatever.

Did it work?

Goodnight.