Who do I still think I am??

This one's about light and the dark center.

MOB-RELATED ACTIVITY:

Good evening dear readers...what's goin' on? It's been a relatively quiet day in the "30-Day Blogging Challenge ON HIATUS" 's Blog Mob's forum as compared with the last couple, and I'm not sure how to interpret that. Is it because rumors of our bOSS (with an uncapital B) Brother Nature have surfaced regarding the return from his getaway, one way or the other? Are we to trust each other now that Lyn's a Witchy Woman (aka "Red") has claimed to have seen traces of his virtual existence, yet no one else will confirm nor deny it? I've yet to receive a decapitated horse's head under my pillow, so am I safe? Too many questions, and not enough time to care answers.

Besides Red's mysterious claim about three hours ago, Elle - on hiatus calling my Chips Ahoy cookies with Reese's Peanut Butter cups "crazy" in the comments section of "The mob wants cookies!!"  yesterday, and ANN Counselor, Lesbian & Happy forgetting who the authors of the last entries she's read are, life around these parts has been tamer than I expected an organization going by a nickname like "Mob" should be. I keep thinking anywhere between now and ten minutes after I finish this entry, Joel's actually gonna resurface for real, and this whole entry will have been pointless. There's nothing like taking your sweet-ass time to do something and then finding out just as soon as you're done it's about as relevant as a PC extended warranty plan.

I think I'm just gonna move on and see what else I can come up with for the "Blogging Circle of Friends "  and "The Soundtrack of Your Life"  instead.

BCF PROMPT: "After spending 12 hours without electricity, I am wondering what other people do to preserve things in their homes, stay warm and keep their family members amused. If you live in other places around the world, does this happen often where you live?"

I just deleted the entire direction I was gonna go with this prompt because I didn't feel like having to explain how it felt living for a few months without electricity...plus I'm in a really cranky mood and I'm not in the frame of mind I should be in to discuss those circumstances. How screwed up is life sometimes that you'd rather talk about the last time you lost power for almost an hour while living with your ex and her kids than you would the adventure of living by yourself in a spacious apartment minus refrigerated food and hot water? Anyway..

I know I shouldn't have been surprised, but after about ten minutes of largely being without any devices that have a connection to the world outside of the one directly in front of you, the first thing you notice is how much time as a family you haven't been talking to each other in months. Conversations that were just shreds and tatters suddenly have details and life, as if the mute button stopped intermittently cutting off entire trains of thought and tangents.

Well, for a little while, at least. Then I realized I was the only one with a smartphone and could still go on Facebook...which is about the same time you learn people you haven't seen in anywhere from five to twenty years live in your neighborhood also, and they too have grown tired of listening to the people they live with suddenly discover that sentences can be more meaningful than "What's for dinner?", "Can you drive me to so-and-so's house?" or "Mom's not home, but she said she'd give me money and I don't see it out in the open right in front of me so give me yours!!". Not only are we now trying to figure out what the hell has happened in our neighborhood to the electricity, but where we all live without coming right out and saying "the house on the corner with the awful, sun-faded fake grass covering the porch".

It used to be that you'd light candles and tell stories and bond. Nowadays, I wouldn't be as worried as much about preserving the meat in the freezer as I'd be trying to preserve my sanity. It's almost as if the loss of something that's taken for granted tends to amplify how much you really need that electricity restored so you can go back to trying to escape from society...it's easier to acknowledge our divides through lenses of social media and video games than it is to confront them because we don't know what else to do. I can say that because sometimes I feel like I've got a Masters degree in awkward conversation with a minor in being a jerk.

I can't imagine having to spend 12 whole hours like that. Especially in the dead of winter while it's snowing and temperatures are well beyond reasonable, acceptable measures of cold. You know what that is? That's love. That's devotion. And that's knowing in advance to have a lot of wine in the house and having the wherewithal to make it last.

MUSICAL BREAK!!

** Image ID #1970900 Unavailable **

Six days into "The Soundtrack of Your Life" , and I'm breaking out one of the few bands I absolutely love that I haven't seen live yet, Modest Mouse. In fact, on the very first date said ex from the BCF portion of today's entry and I went on, we danced (albeit not appropriately in accordance with the tempo of the music) to a Modest Mouse song, and on one of the next few dates I discovered the cd that the song I'm gonna share today happened to be in her car, which was weird because they were one of those bands that nobody I knew at the time would listen to.

"Dark Center Of The Universe" (album: The Moon And Antarctica {link:http://www.amazon.com/Moon-Antarctica-Explicit-Modest-Mouse/dp/B00138EW16/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1391740550&sr=8-2&keywords=modest+mouse+the+moon+and+antarctica}; lyrics: http://songmeanings.com/songs/view/32509/...although they don't entirely match up with what's being sung, the comments after are kinda insightful) fits me on days like today when I'm full of piss and vinegar for no good reason and/or everything seems to not be going the way I'd expected them to. I have to remind myself that while I can be a complete ass and come off as hurtful, disengaged and aloof at times, deep down I'm not entirely a bad person just because I'm prone to arguing misinformed points occasionally or falling into the random lapse in judgment.

THE DAILY BOX SCORE:

Ok, so the first day at the new work-type thing (CAPCO...http://www.capco.org/) wasn't actually bad, although I really shouldn't have stayed on my feet for as long as I did. I understand why some of the volunteers there only do it for an hour or so at a time. I did it from 9am-4pm with a half hour in the middle for lunch, and my legs and lower back were burning by the time I got home. I never thought I'd be finding myself looking forward to Valentines's Day next Friday (particularly being single and not minding), but it's more the doctor's appointment (another thing I never could imagine myself saying) than the companionship I'm longing for. But CAPCO...yeah, so that. Basically, people come in either to drop off clothes they'd like to donate, or pick out items for themselves. If they're giving, I have to log it and put it out on the racks (and write up a form so they can be mailed a receipt if they want to claim it as a tax deduction); if they're "shopping" I have to look them up in a database and make sure they're taking no more than ten items a month. Not totally taxing work mentally (like I said, it's the "on the feet" part that's killing me), but I did kinda get into it with this guy who kept mumbling when I asked him for his last name. Is it my fault that he had a hyphenated last name, and both parts sounded like snooty "guy who has a first name that sounds like it should be a last name but it's not" names? Plus, he totally sounded like a bitter drunk who was unhappy to be searching through racks of donated clothes at 9:20am (yes, 20 minutes into this gig and I've already had one negative run-in with someone) with his equally dissatisfied baby-momma as he attempted to repeat his name when I asked him to spell it, and then (as nicely as I could manage) told him he didn't have to yell. His tone of voice was definitely betraying him.

That's it for fun stories today...I really need to stop typing because every other word coming out is wrong and it's hard for me to concentrate when that's happening. It's bad enough I noticed about twenty typos after I put up yesterday's entry...I'm sure today's is worse and that's just with correcting what I've seen as I've gone along. Peace, it took a lot of work, and GOODNIGHT NOW!!