In the immortal words of Jacobim Mugatu, “TODD! are you not aware that I get farty and bloated with a foamy latte!!”

I had, in past, only ever briefly made a mental connection between certain body functions and the consumption of specific kinds of foods. I had never really connected the dots between feeling a little extra pressure in the belly region and consuming quantities of dairy products. Not until this evening. I had consumed, in a fit reckless abandon and in violation of every one of my new rules for food consumption, an enormous latte… Not just any enormous latte, mind you! My second latte of the day, my favorite latte in the world, the iced caramel macchiato.

I was hanging out with a friend this evening and we stopped by the local coffee place for some refreshing beverages. I had previously allowed myself a very rare “venti” caramel macchiato earlier in the day when I was on the verge of being seriously un-cool at work and needed a little pep. I figured that a second round would not do any harm, as a very rare exception to my generally well-portioned eating habits. I was wrong.

My lovely coffee creation was light on actual coffee and heavy on the whole milk, which I had blithely requested. Just a couple hours later, I found myself doubled over on the floor of my kitchen experiencing some of the most acute gastrointestinal drama I have ever witnessed outside of food poisoning. I very shortly saw my guest out and proceeded to wish that I could just die of embarrassment and end the multiple levels of suffering I was experiencing. After a quick game of connect the dots, an extended trip to the loo, and a quick visit to wikipedia to confirm my findings, I realize that I’m lactose intolerant.

It’s astounding what amazing learning experiences we can have at any age, especially at the expense of any shred of dignity we may have had. And rather than pretend that it didn’t happen and wish that I could silently will this memory into non-existence I have chosen to share it with the universe. Why? Because humor is the best medicine.

It’s always less humiliating when you trip in public and smile and laugh it off, its more easily forgotten and lost in the mundane details of life. Allowing myself the luxury of privately mulling it over and obsessing about the embarrassing details would only serve to further kill whatever sense of dignity I had left. One of the key elements of becoming a classier person is to learn to roll with the punches and take them in stride. Some people may disagree with the strangely public nature of this stride, but I find it oddly therapeutic to get this one out in the open.

We all cycle, we revisit points in our past in scary and amazing ways.

Contrary to this trend, I was asked recently to “hang out”, the modern non-date date sort of affair with someone I found very suitable.  We hung out a number of times and it was very low-key and very nice to have the chance to get to know someone new with the possible lingering prospect for romance…  They put the moves on me to get things started.  They subsequently and abruptly terminated it.

Some reasons were given but it didn’t change the fact that it was over and that it sucked.  Its been a long time since I’ve opened up to someone.  It generally leads to getting hurt.  In fact, to the analysts of the glass half-empty persuasion, it will always lead to hurt and pain of some sort.  Even in a steady, committed relationship there will be moments where that openness will leave us vulnerable to intentional/accidental injury.  But to the glass half-full people it means that at some point, or even multiple points, we will have the opportunity for greater happiness and fulfillment.

Now I’m not one of those annoyingly chipper sort of people, always happy to gloss over the negative aspects of this life, but I am an idealistic pragmatist.  I understand that there will be heartache, it’s a fact of life.  But there are very direct, observable, proven cases where people are happier as a result of this risk or openness.  Some people may claim to be closed to the idea of opening their hearts again, when actually they do it all the time.  They will make friends, either with people, or the 1900 cats they will adopt when they shun all human contact.  That small emotional bond we create with people, places or things is a point of potential weakness  However, even in its most basic form, it is first and foremost a source of fulfillment, happiness, or security.

Sometimes people panic and reach for the fire alarm when things are going great.  They do it on both in-valid and valid grounds.  They do it for selfish and selfless reasons.  Bust mostly, I think people just get scared when standing in the realm of dating, mating and love.  Everyone has done this, or had it done to them at some point, I’ve been guilty of it myself in the past.  The important take-home message is that we have to get out there and try.  We have to get up and try again because its worth it at some point, be that the final destination or at stops in-between.  Besides, feeding 1900 cats is expensive enough, let alone the cat litter.

I HAVE SERIOUS DIFFICULTY USING MAJOR APPLIANCES.

There, I’ve said it.  It’s really hard for me because i’ve a very intelligent person.  I passed AP physics in high school (I mention that because its pretty much the geekiest thing I can think of).  I can code basic HTML.  I can whip up a lean, mean Excel spreadsheet that will automate the socks off your budget.  I can reprogram cellular phones to do tricks and sit up and beg.  But god help me if I need to re-heat a bowl of soup in the microwave.

Back in the day, ovens and microwaves and all of these great, mighty appliances, were simple affairs with a knob.  For example, I need to re-heat ANYTHING in the microwave back in the day I could just turn the knob to that golden spot in-between the two and three minute marks and voila! I’ve just reheated pizza, or cooked a frozen turkey.  It always just worked right there.  But now, its like I need a PhD in Button Pushing-ology to be able to do anything.  I’m reduced to pressing that one button that makes it turn on for 30 seconds at a time and testing whatever inside for the right done-ness.

Let us also not forget the disaster that inevitably happens each time I try using one of these new ovens with the push buttons.  Because apparently I’m not intelligent enough to decipher the difference between “Cook Timer” and “Timer Cook”.  Every time I try to use the oven at a friend’s house or wherever these new ovens live I end up making the damned thing very cross with me.  The range starts beeping at me in a degrading manner, insisting I get someone over to help me out before i accidentally launch nuclear arms at an unsuspecting country.

I’m all about the super-modern kitchen.  I love gadgets and stainless steel everything and enough watts and btus of energy to incinerate small planets.  But for whatever reason, I’m reduced to the IQ of Malibu Barbie whenever I’m left alone with any sort of modern kitchen installation.  I figure that its a very subtle hint from the universe that I should eat out.  One day, I will master the major appliance, I will be able to microwave soup and eat it too.  And when that day comes, there will be no stopping me… from making soup and sandwiches.

This was the first major move I’ve made.  I have moved a total of two times before this.  Both times I was able to shove my entire life in to the confines of the Tragically Gay Kia and move them in one fell swoop.  This time I was constrained to Quincy, the little car that could, which has all the storage capacity equivalent of an eight year old child’s short term memory with ADHD.  I was also faced with the significant accumulation of crap and stuff and fluff and shit over the course of two years.  Without some very beloved friends of mine, this venture would have ended in tears and misery.

This weeks accomplishments include the following great and not so great harrowing and not so harrowing items:

• Transferring my Comcast service (never, not ever, ever again, EVER!)
• Moving down from a second floor apartment and up to a third floor apartment
• Tearing space-time itself to get my couch into said third floor apartment  (thanks to fantastic friends to whom I owe my life)
• Successfully procrastinated making any progress on unpacking
• Completely avoided buying Mac OS X.5 Leopard

I’m pretty impressed my this.  I’d say, all in all, i’ve been a very successful human being this week.  Which is why I will most likely accomplish nothing this weekend.  I suppose I’m not required to channel Martha Stewart at all times, I just wish though that I were more successful at prodding myself to action when it comes to cleaning up.

This concludes probably the most random post I’ve made.  But I made it!  Sometimes some chaotic creativity its what’s needed to kick a project like this into gear.  I want to get active on here again and this month I’m going to make it.

Then the joy of Trauma Week of 2007: Now With More Irritation happened.  I found out that a co-worker and friend of mine from my previous internment camp job had committed suicide.  This was a deeply disturbing and upsetting thing to hear.  She was unhappy and though surrounded by a great support network of loving friends, she had made a choice, set a plan, and carried through with ending her own life.  I’ve been there before, sitting on precipice of fate, taking all the ideas of my continued existence and turning them over in my hands like stones, looking for the silver lining.  For whatever reasons that I found I was able to back away from that cliff and turn back toward the rolling plains, deciding to look for hope beyond the next hill.  Unfortunately my friend was not able to find a reason in her sadness, to find a hope or even to procrastinate that choice, and with a very severe finality ended it all.

Then, though nothing in comparison to what I had learned, I woke up Monday in pain, my body hurt all over but most specifically my throat hurt, it burned and my tonsils were swollen badly.  I thought that it might just be a head cold or some other short-termed malady, but as I woke Tuesday my symptoms were worse.  I went to my local medical rapid care center to confirm my fears, I found that I had strep.  This meant that I would have to take Wednesday off as well so that I wouldn’t burden them with my illness now that I was confirmed to be an incubus of bacterial plague.  I had to use the majority of my vacation time to pay for this leave of absence, vacation time I was hoarding for a more exciting trip at another time.

I returned to work Thursday, only to take Friday off for the funeral of my friend.  I hate funerals, they always gravitate toward the realm of enhancing or deepening whatever feelings of sorrow you may have instead of providing a time for people to laugh about times past without guilt of offense or social taboo.  It was nice to be able to go and pay respects, it was just a really uncomfortable and saddening time as funerals inevitably tend to be.

This weekend has been very helpful in providing me a chance to recharge and re-center myself.  I’ve thought a lot about things and I’ve decided that I need to slow down and re-focus on some of the things that I do to enjoy myself by myself.  I’m certain I became ill because i’ve been very busy, no matter how refreshing it was to go on vacation, it didn’t change the fact that I’ve been moving non-stop for the last 3-months.  I need to focus on projects that I care about, like this site, and allow myself more “me time”.  This is not to say that I don’t love every second I which I spend with the people I care about, they make my life a very fulfilling and rewarding one, but I think that in our age of hustle and bustle there may not be enough focus to the concept of being comfortable with yourself to be alone by yourself without the distraction of the outside world.  Being able to be your own ally and positive support and not your own worst critic and opposition is not easy, but some events just drive home the understanding of how fragile we are and how careful we must be to stay healthy, happy, and well.