Meaning/full/less Interaction(?)

"There's a thunder in our hearts baby...
tell me we both matter..."
-Placebo


Go Team America! Gold medal time!

Friday night:
got a tattoo....Slept with ***** girl after we put on a trainwreck show @ a local haunt we both frequent. Knocked it out again the next morning.


Saturday:
went to a charity event, talked to probably 10 different girls since I started around 12. Some amogs tried to clown me but I maintained frame. Went to the fights. Was supposed to meet up with the girl I stayed with Thursday night.....but somewhere between the millionth beer and that last shot.....I headed back, my boy took me home.....and I dreamed the same fucking dream of sailing on a black sea beneath a vermilion sky. Woke up to the sound of my buddy railing some girl in the room adjoining the living room where I slept. Ah.....the hilarity of life.
As it is, I'm headed out to watch the gold medal hockey game. Let's go Team America! Murkaaaah!

She's out there somewhere waking up next to some dude. His fingers are running through her hair. It bothers me. More than I thought it would.

"I'd beg forgiveness but I know that your will is strong....there's no difference, those admissions bear the sting of the past....."
- She Wants Revenge

And in other news....Israel does not fuck around.

Once More with Feeling

Soundtrack: Songs for Clay by Bloc Party

Disclaimer: I won't get into specifics but I had tempered some truths in the blog as of late for the benefit of another. That no longer proves necessary. Continue reading at your peril.
---

I woke up in a house I did not recognize. I woke up in a house on a street I did not recognize. The girl who took me home likely thought sex would occur. Matter of fact, I know she thought sex would occur b/c she said couldn't stop weaving it into conversation on the walk home from downtown to her place. I've been pullin' the self cockblock since I was in college, brah.
I awoke before her and let myself out into the cold morning air as I searched my vague memory as to where the fuck my car was parked. I had to check two parking lots before striking gold. Fittingly, it was next to a church.

I slid into my change of clothes in the front seat of my car (an acquired skill necessary to any self-respecting and wandering vagabond in this age of modernity) and headed into work for a meeting painfully packed with colleagues and co-workers.

Onto Tonight....
As it is....I'm on tap to meet either **** girl, dinner girl, a Latina I met last week, or the girl whose place I slept at last night. Place your bets now ladies and gentlemen.
Possibilities abound.

My buddy last night said I used Jedi Mind shit on the girl who later took me home. We'll call her JR for short. I told him it wasn't Jedi Mind shit....just that JR had given me all the IOI's and I had only to say little, touch her in increasingly sexual ways....and things would "fall into my lap" as he claims they do.

As my mind roves over tonight......I consider that I have a bit of quid with which to socially lubricate and a venue which has always done me well in the past. In another time, they'd say I lead the "sporting life," that is men who, " flourished on the margin of big-city life. Their world revolved around betting and good times and the elusive promise of easy money." Men also described as being, "game for any excitement, particularly excitement that involved gambling or women."

Hoist the black flag. Good luck & Happy hunting to my like-minded denizens of life.

-With Greatest Affection

"So I enjoy and I devour
Flesh and wine and luxury
But in my heart I am lukewarm
Nothing ever really touches me"

Pathology

Used this clip on a comment over at Seasons of Tumult & Discord...and it got me thinking.


Remember the last movie you saw in a theatre?
I guarantee the light from some asshole's phone came on at some point. Recently, in the last 5 min's of Shutter Island some motherfucker LITERALLY ANSWERED HIS GODDAMN PHONE.
Thanks jerkoff....we haven't been engrossed in this film for virtually 2 hours. It's called ambience and atmosphere you fuckin vesche.

It's a symptom.

A symptom of a fuckin' disease. It's called social connecto-technoligitis

We can't take a shit without our cell phone in our pocket. You can't holla at homegirl downtown b/c she's busy texting other people other fuckin' places about what she's (not) doing right now. You waste time better spent hollerin' @ devotchkas texting/calling buddies to figure out which place you want to go to but then can't b/c homeboy X has an ex that works there and you can't go b/c you banged the bartender awhile back after doing rails in a bar after 2am.
You leave a record of your doings b/c of text/cell.
You get caught dropping your boy off @ a coke deal gone bad b/c your cell phone triangulates where and when you are located.
You can't take a shit without feeling compelled to check your texts/voicemail.

Man Challenge of the week:
I challenge you to go out WITHOUT your cell phone. Leave it in the car. Leave it off and do not check it the entire night.
Pulling it out to take a number is semi-passable allowance...but as we all know. Numbers are nearly always bullshit.
--
You know the guy.
The guy checking his iphone/new phone/fuck you in the face with a studded mandingo dildo while people around him semi-attempt to engage in quasi-superficial interaction seeking commonality/security. If your email/text/phone is more important than where you are...you've fucked something up. Period.

-With Greatest Affection

Speakin' of movies...I'm gonna see The Crazies this weekend...and I'll admit I'm gonna see the new Nightmare on Elm Street whenever it comes out.

And last but not least...Top Gun is Gay.

This is not an exit/Brett Easton Ellis News

Soundtrack to this Post: Rachel by SWR

Time, time, time
See what's become of me
While I looked around
For my possibilities
I was so hard to please
- Hazy Shade of Winter by She Wants Revenge

June 15th, Brett Easton Ellis's new book, "Imperial Bedrooms" comes out.

Humor for your Day

Obesity saves lives.....*sigh*

Andrew Stack and the others like him

Read the story here, but in summary, a man bulldozed his $350,000 home rather than give it to the bank in foreclosure.

I drove past a home the other day that had literally been gutted: windows gone, chimney broken apart, windows out, front door/side door removed, and spraypainted with Neon Orange paint to read "The Governement Did This to us". The yard had been stripped, the driveway cracked and likely worked over with a jackhammer or similar tool. Trees chopped down. Seriously.

Stack shouldn't have killed anyone....but damn if he isn't delivering a message that others are also feeling/experiencing.

The BIG THIEVES HANG THE LITTLE ONES

For the SWPL's that like to think they can raise a child just as well on their own - Have a peeksy :)

Dating in the Time of Flakery/The Now n' Then Girls

Dinner girl hasn't responded since *****.
Drinks girl gave a tepid response to my text after coming back from outta town.
Dancing girl is a long shot so far out of the window of conceivable....who knows? We'll see one another at another venue and that chemistry briefly shared will warrant an acknowledgment of one another's presence if we're not too drunk to recognize one another.

Ah...the predictability of it all. I had forgotten the cotton mouth/stale taste of predictable futility in dating. I don't know how ugly guys do it.
--

Time for some half-assed speculation:
1) As I think about it....one of dinner girl's friends that I met looked very familiar. Like...I know I have met her before through someone else. Le sigh. Likely, my reputation has surfaced yet again which would explain dinner girl not returning my text.
2) Drinks girl - I got a nonchalant text after she returned from out of town but nothing open ended or belying interest to do something else. Then again, she's *****, and used to being pursued hard. Le sigh.
3) Dancing girl texted me earlier. She waits just long enough to tease, like an angler fish, that I'm tempted to bite each time. In my heart of hearts I know that nothing will come of it. She's a Now n' Then girl. You know the type. You meet them. Seem to hit it off. Good chemistry. She likes that you speak Spanish (oh wait, is that just in my experience?). Good talk. Easy conversation. Then comes the logistics of setting up a date. Flakery occurs near last minute or a couple hours prior. You likely had to send more than one text to each one of hers sent (this is clear foreshadowing of a trend to come) in order to procure the date but you ignored this b/c she's **** and used to aggressive pursuit by guys in her culture. You all but take her number out of your phone before she texts again, out of the blue, some morning while you're at work/on a conference call/staff meeting/presentation/taking a piss/whatever. You begrudgingly text back but doubt anything will come of it.
--

The same parts being played by different people over and over and fucking over.

More news for a guy who hates predictable news: my fight may be off. The matchmaker's trying to feed me a ringer. I only know what's up b/c of some info I got through the grapevine. Sucks too, b/c I thought I knew the matchmaker pretty well. Didn't think he'd do me grimey like that. But, that's the fight game for you. Grimey.

Saturday Night Trainwreck(s)

Saturday Night:

Posted up to catch the fights with a buddy. Another buddy and 2 of his friends showed mid-way through the UFC. Nog got stopped in startling fashion. A cougar and her irritatingly goofy friend showed up to see one the guys in the group. I suggested a bar where I know the entire staff. The girls claimed it was a cockfest. I vocalized my doubt that they would have left a cockfest to see us, and would want us to try a different bar with likely younger girls to take attention from them.

The other guys in the group stood silently on the sidewalk in awkward shock while this processed in the brains of the cougar and her younger friend. I was now, "the asshole," which was fine with me. I had zero intention of so much as slapping one of the chicks on the ass. The other guys could bukkake all over them and I would skip out to grab a taco or head home to sleep.

We all segued to a nearby bar/club where a buddy of mine bartends. I grabbed an import beer and took stock of things which proved difficult in the dark...but allowed me to take introspective stock of the trainwreck that is my personal life.

Some random white trash chick was flirting with one friend. A darker-haired chubby girl was flirting with another friend. And the cougar would soon be making out with the 4th member of our wayward group of revelers. I sat on a stool, facing the garish display of the drunken mating dance on the dance floor. Bodies gyrated and forms held one another drunkenly attempting to stay in tune with the pulsating bass of whatever bullshit top 40 song was playing.

A friend of one of the girls began talking to me. She had that jaded tone you find in a girl either hung up on some guy, or mayhap mad that she has no one to be hung up on, or is irritated that her less cute friends are getting more attention than her. It may have been a mix of the 3. Doesn't matter. Didn't care. We were in the same field and I had to control my eyes from rolling when she trucked right over my repeated statements that I do not talk about work when I'm not, y'know, like....at fuckin' work.

A blonde girl I'd grabbed by the arm and told to talk to my friend began flirting with me. She had the face of a girl doing hotel room filmed cheap amateur porn with bad lighting and no make-up crew. She was obnoxious and not a girl I'd consider touching in the slightest sense. I was repulsed. I thought about dinner girl and how we kissed the night before. Doesn't matter. Didn't care.
Obnoxious white trash girl literally forced me to dance with her much cuter friend whom I had not met, and only to avoid making the girl feel bad by making it appear that I did not want to dance with her at all, did I relent and dance. She had the icy exterior of a girl that is a 7 but likes to think she's an 8.5....we danced, she warmed up b/c I didn't do the herky jerky terrible-ness most dorky guys do when they dance, she asked my name, told me to call her......I took her number but I won't call her b/c she struck me as a vapid, clothing obsessed slag with whom I couldn't carry a conversation about anything meaningful, nor could she get any references/allusions/witticisms of note.

A girl I know from **** texted me saying how glad she was to have seen me earlier @ a different bar. My eyes rolled in almost uncontrollable fashion. My buddy texted me. He had returned to that bar and girls who knew the girl just mentioned were going on and on about how bad the girl wants to fuck me. I was nonplussed. When it rains it predictably pours. I've had enough of the fucking rain.

I asked myself what separated me from these people? Was it my social poise? My vocabulary? My appreciation for Fitzgerald? My chosen sport? Sure, these represent different values and different skills. These are facts, things to associate with my face. They form a compelling attraction index but belie a vacuousness that proves immense and deep.
--

As it was, mercifully, 2am arrived in time to bring a close to this shit show of epic proportions. The white trash blonde girl was hawkisly guarded by one of the guys in the group that was spying an easy score as the chick was clearly seeking some penis. The blonde girl literally grabbed me by the fucking wrist and said, "let's go, we're getting a cab. you're coming with me."
I gritted my teeth and pulled my wrist back without a word. I turned to my buddy who was arm in arm with the cougar and told him, "I'm out, champ," and headed to my car.
--

I headed into the night thinking it was over. The end was just beginning.....

The Aftermath of Carelessness

Soundtrack
I sat in my room weeks ago. I did something I rarely do. I stopped to think and asked if I could settle down. I searched my emotions and thoughts, coming up empty handed and uncertain as always.

I looked at a photo of her and I taken shortly after we'd first met. An innocent time. A time of hope. A time before all the hurt and the pain. A time so pure. This is not waxing poetic, but statement of fact. If I had forseen the hurt I would cause her....I would never have crossed the room and asked her to dance that first time. But as it was, I was drawn to her by wordless whispers and a fragile innocence that left me breathless and anxious.
As it is....in the photo my face is slightly younger, the hint of the passage of time one would know by comparing the photo to my facade now.....my mistakes and the dark passenger sitting silently behind my eyes then as now.

She became the fingers on the chords of fibers in my being.

My mind snapped to the road in front of me. A road I could barely see due to tears. She had seen tears in my eyes but I had left before breaking down and pounding on my steering wheel until my hands hurt from rage and futility.
We had said our goodbyes. This time it was for good. I knew this from the cold, concrete, leaden feeling in the core of my being. This wasn't a bluff. This wasn't an attempt. She had accepted that love could not overcome my dark passenger. Her dream of me was dead.

"Even if you could settle down....I don't know that you're someone I would want to even be with."
--

You read a lot of blogging about alpha this, beta that. You've read it here and you've likely read it elsewhere. I've written a lot about leading a life of your own volition, of thrill seeking and lust for dark nights spent in the brink. I'd be lying if I claimed that doubt doesn't creep in from time to time.

I'd be lying if I said there weren't odd mornings when my eyes open and I question the house of cards I've built as tears come to my eyes and the stone faced idol of doubt gnaws at my vagabond lifestyle making mockery and satire of my decisions. As it is, I'm left with the dampness of her tears on my shirt and the feel of her hand in mine haunting me as I drink a beer before sleeping with my ghosts.
-With Greatest Affection
--

Fitzgerald wrote it far more exquisitely than I ever could.....from The Great Gatsby:
"He talked a lot about the past, and I gathered that he wanted to recover something, some idea of himself perhaps, that had gone into loving Daisy. His life had been confused and disordered since then, but if he could once return to a certain starting place and go over it all slowly, he could find out what that thing was. . . .

. . . One autumn night, five years before, they had been walking down the street when the leaves were falling, and they came to a place where there were no trees and the sidewalk was white with moonlight. They stopped here and turned toward each other....
His heart beat faster and faster as Daisy’s white face came up to his own. He knew that when he kissed this girl, and forever wed his unutterable visions to her perishable breath, his mind would never romp again like the mind of God. So he waited, listening for a moment longer to the tuning-fork that had been struck upon a star. Then he kissed her. At his lips’ touch she blossomed for him like a flower and the incarnation was complete.

Through all he said, even through his appalling sentimentality, I was reminded of something—an elusive rhythm, a fragment of lost words, that I had heard somewhere a long time ago. For a moment a phrase tried to take shape in my mouth and my lips parted like a dumb man’s, as though there was more struggling upon them than a wisp of startled air. But they made no sound, and what I had almost remembered was uncommunicable forever."

Field Report 2

Soundtrack to this Post: Fuel Injected by Swollen Members




Got a follow-up text from the hottest number of the bunch I met last week. She texted one of those blaise, generic, we should hang out sometime feeler texts. I responded with, "sure".

Dinner girl texted me shortly after dinner to say she had a great time. My mind roved over the hug at the end of the night when we had dinner, and the moment in time frozen in expectation of a kiss, but I hesitated just a split second too long. Hopefully I'm cool and interesting enough (hat tip: Roosh) to warrant a follow-up. I didn't see the text til the next morning b/c I was ******. Texted her back. Did not receive a reply until the following day (Friday morning).
She said she had a friend in town.
The problem with being a rake is just that....you think to yourself, "that's some shit I would say if I was indisposed of..." and it makes you wonder. Thinking: a dangerous pastime. Best not to ask too many questions. When you dig, you find dirt.

What's it going to be then, eh?

I headed into the night with a droog of mine.
Started off local at a bar we both frequent, flirted with a girl I know from ******. We did the semi-flirt dance but I can do without the awkwardness that will follow my knockin' it out and having to see her @ the ******. Read that: she's not hot enough to warrant dealing with some marginal awkwardness.

Predictably, en route to meet dinner girl downtown, @ the 2nd bar of the night, a cute Latina sparked my interest and asked my name. My wingman was deep in flux with a nearby divorcee. I flexed my coversational muscles for practice with these plastic actresses ( hat tip: Swollen Members). Having waited long enough to make my appearance with dinner girl and her coterie, I left my wingman to lock things up, got the number of the Latina, then made my way over to do some dancin' with dinner girl. We kissed a solid 20 min's after I got there. We danced the perfunctory amount of time to assess physical compatibility in bed, she took my hand as we walked through the crowd. I did the prerequisite face time with her friends, polite, humorous, blah fuckin' blaise.

Headed to another joint with dinner girl as I fig'd my wingman was still deep in set and why not? The greatest discoveries come not from the "let's turn back" mentality. Walked the girls to their car, headed back, got some food with my buddy and the divorcee. Tiger Woods came up in conversation. I said that if Tiger had a sex addiction, pretty much every guy qualifies by that litmus test. As it was, I faded into the night like a shadow and slept deep, catatonic sleep and my recurring dream of sitting on a small boat underneath a red sky in a black ocean came to me.

Field Report 3 Coming soon. Scandalous hoes ahead!

Chronicles in Flakedom/Pointing Fingers

3 girls. 3 nights. 3 phone numbers.

Drinks with 1 girl. - opened me
Dinner with 1 girl. - opened me
flaking maneuver by 1 girl on plans to go dancing. - IOI's then I opened her

Drinks girl - segued from conversation to side by side seating, to her arm in mine.
Dinner girl - hug @ end of dinner, then after pause her hint of wanting a kiss but lack of recent time in the saddle and I segued to semi-awkward moment. no kino in dinner. my fault for not planning better venue/seating/location

Drinks girl texted me that night to make sure I got home safe after drinks.
Dinner girl texted me shortly after dinner to say how much fun she had.

Drinks girl has become monosyllabic over text to set up subsequent plans.
Dinner girl took a day to reply attempt at 2nd date with a questionable excuse. She countered my offer with a possible meet downtown tonight.

---

This is why I'm a SNL believer people. Press for that same night lay or abandon all hope ye who enter follow-up(s). There are simply a plethora of variables (read that: obstacles) to overcome once the interaction breaks from the first occurrence.

I spent nearly a year never even taking phone numbers. I got laid about as much as I did before when I took numbers. I don't doubt dating game....I just see it as low end on the benefit vs cost scale.

Over at Roosh's he calculates the cost per notch ratio. This is a useful tool in holding yourself accountable for your investment to benefit ratio.

Guess it's back to the grindstone. Predictably, when I write off a couple of flakesters/delete numbers, I get calls/texts from numbers no longer in my phone. And I'm a good lookin' dude.....and it's this much of a struggle. No wonder some guys become mindless plowers in pursuit of 'gina.
I've also been lazy b/c of my physical appearance. The byline whenever a less than hot girl talks to me socially has become, "she's not pretty enough to be with you."
Kino/escalation is a part of my game sorely lacking. My looks and charm usually get my foot in the door. My follow-through is hit or miss. Part of this is my deep held notion that most girls will not simply go full throttle with some guy they just met (minus the German, Brazilian, ******, girls I've met...and even then, there's variation within the culture).

Dropping sexuality into the conversation is also a missed opportunity on at least one date as of late. It's easy to blame some other factors, but at the end of the day, I did not create the right environment to facilitate the lessening of inhibitions.

You must hold yourself accountable to make real change(improvement) possible. My failures are my own. As such, my victories will also be my own.

Back in the Saddle: Part One

For fight fans: A great, concise analogy posted over at Krauser's.


Rumblings in the jungle as of late. I've gotten back on the horse that is game. Been awhile. Took a nice long multi-month break from actually getting out there and sarging. Like sticking your foot in the pool and feeling it chilly, the usual feeling out/accustomed phase is coming along. I've found blogs by guys who are separated, marriages ended, newly out of a LTR....and the quest begins anew. I'll provide my personal outline for getting back in the game and then follow up with my real world example from recent pursuit(s).

Here's my method for getting back in it.

1. go to a place where you have had success in the past/where you have social proof
2. springboard/open off a girl that gives you IOI's.
3. cold approach/"date" establishment
4. go on a "date"

Headed out last week and hit up a venue where I know virtually all of the staff, have been a regular on/off for several years, and has optimal grounds for interaction and non-threatening approaches. I skipped the dance lessons and watched as things picked up pace. An unattractive ginger came onto me, but I demured. Eventually, I asked a girl from **** to dance, we did, then later she said her friend wanted to dance. Flexed the conversational muscles with the two cute bartender girls I know, bullshitted with the barbacks and other guys I know, and got back in the mindset of confident, socially skilled, fun guy.

That's it. No peacocking or canned opening material. Just working on my inner state or whatever they sell as natural game these days by being social and having fun/relaxing.

2. Glanced down the bar in time to see an exquisite dark-haired girl. We made eye contact, and both of us broke into a smile. I opened with a simple, "hello", we talked for a few minutes then danced. I quickly segued into non-platonic dancing and we chatted again afterwards. We exchanged numbers.

3. the following night I headed out to meet a buddy. I glanced nearby and noticed a tall (uncharacteristic of my type) dark-haired girl with the latent sexiness of a non-American. I read the body language between her and the guy with her and deduced they were friends, and he was clearly in the LJBF purgatory. When he wasn't glued to her side, I was going to open. As luck would have it, she grabbed a seat next to mine and opened me with some situational bullshit about my *****. In life, like in game, it doesn't have to be pretty to be effective. So we talked, we compared interests, she read what she needed to in the semi-vague answers I gave. My experiences with girls from her native country helped me temper my dialogue with the right demonstrations of value regarding family and work ethic.

4. Most game centers around avoiding the standard, tried and true date. Normally, I agree. However, after a long lay off, sarging out on some HB10 (god, I loathe PUA lingo) is like coming out of knee surgery and trying to play pick up basketball with the local college team. It will likely end in catastrophic failure. Instead, go play with some 5th graders and go through the fundamentals.
- So, whilst I was waiting the call the girl I met dancing, the ***** from the 2nd night called and invited me out for a drink. We talked, flirted, she had her arm in mine, blah blaise.

I see success like a snowball or an avalanche. When it starts, like a crack or fissure in the surface, one may not even notice if they're not looking for the spark, the start. When it begins to pick up speed, awareness starts to spread....eventually, there's very little than can stop it. Rather than jump right off the deep and face a setback due to variable (s) like non-calibration, poor logistics, flakiness, I started small and worked my way back in the saddle. Of course, I made mistakes along the way, but by slowly increasing the pressure/situations, the learning curve is at times uncomfortable but manageable and bears a decent opportunity for success.
- With Greatest Affection

Filthy Tuesday: Mardi Gras Edition

Soundtrack to this blog/my life

Something over at Playing the Devil's Advocate that mitigated the smiting power of my hangover

Eyes open. Uncertain of where I am. Not an altogether unfamiliar condition to awaken to, but still.....it's been awhile. The more things change, the more they....blah blah fuckin' blaise.
Eyes scan the living room from the couch I am laying on in true derelict and hungover fashion. Ah. Like the beginning of every poorly written/predictable CSI or SVU episode, the context clues give answers hidden in plain sight.
I am at my buddy's place. Certainly worse mornings and certainly better mornings have been awoken to in my illustrious past. Grateful, I have time to go back to sleep before heading to work. I dream symbolic and random dreams as only the haggard/battered can. I think not of the hellacious sparring lined up for this evening. My shoulder still hurts from sparring in preparation for my upcoming fight. C'est la fuckin' vie.

I make my way to my favorite cafe. I stop en route only to purchase some Pedialyte, the pinnacle of resuscitation technology. If the silver surfer stopped me inquiring as to why mankind should be spared galactic excintction...I would point to pedialyte, porn, beer, and the writing of F. Scott Fitzgerald. That's about it.

I begin slamming down water as well. The need to piss/drink out my hangover proves unavoidable b/c of considerable training lined up this evening.

Shards of memory involving Tequila and cheap beer flit behind my eyes in fragmented order. I recall two bars and a number of humorous observations that I lack the energy to relate at this time. In particular, I recall a girl with sleeve tattoos who was too cool for school b/c she was from Virginia. Seriously. There was some weird tattoo one upsmanship occurring b/c she had sleeves and I didn't. Too bad tats didn't make her any prettier. I was being the dutiful wingman. She had religious tattoos but wasn't religious. Pure awesomeness in a bottle. Her dark-haired friend was fare cuter and had a superbly preferential body.

As it is, I grab my reliable coat and change of clothes in my car and head to work to facade my way through a day of appearing normal.
--
I'd ridden the wagon for awhile as of late. I'd managed to go out and function socially wi/out the consumption of booze. Somewhere between the first cheap beer and the 3rd shot of cheap tequila it all fell apart in catastrophic fashion. It's clear what I should give up for lent.

-With Greatest Affection

Alleged Porn Star Miscarriages/Fat & Famous on an Airplane

Tiger allegedly knocked up a pornstar girlfriend of his. Twice.

Not to cast aspersions...but a woman who starred in Big Breasted Nurses is hardly one to believe in the realm of hearsay:

Woods was never told about either pregnancy, she said, claiming she "just didn't want to ruin anything."

"I feel bad for (Elin)," she said.

"She didn't deserve this, and she didn't deserve being humiliated."

Classic appeal to sympathy....not so bad that she wasn't banging this other woman's husband for long enough a period of time that she got pregnant twice.

Call me a bit of a skeptic on this one: either that she "felt" bad...or that she "miscarried" twice.

Kevin Smith.... was too fat for a seat on a plane. With the kind of money he has...he could afford a personal chef/personal trainer. He's just simply THAT lazy. I'm glad airplanes and economics are still able to have some shaming power over the fatties of the world.

Staring into the Matrix

It starts happening one day.

You realize that you have looked away mid-conversation with an attractive woman without choosing to do so.

You choose to end the conversation on your terms rather than let it peter out in the death knell of LJBF symptoms.

You wait to call.

You maintain terse dialogue.

You offer specific plans or lassez-faire opened ones. There is no middle ground.

You remain consciously/deliberately ambiguous in answering her specific inquiries.

You touch her at apropos times in the conversation initially. You graduate each successive touch over time to a more intimate spot based on her reaction.

You note how she interprets your answer(s) to suit her attraction.

The matrix appears. The music pulses. The band plays on. Other girls notice you b/c you are talking to an attractive woman. The body language of the platonic male friend bleeds envy. You see the ending if this continues. You see the trainwreck. You see the warning bells and the red flags.

You realize that you are staring into the matrix. The numbers fly by and scroll in pattern.

There is a step after this one. You realize that there is not just the script. You realize when to break convention. Like a great writer, you know that understanding the rules proves integral to breaking them.

The amateur breaks the rules due to ignorance or a fundamental lack of understanding. The master breaks them with purpose. The master breaks them for emotional velocity and effect, often misconstrued for attraction/comfort.

This is the final stage. This is the final barrier. Not only predicting the behavior of potential conquests....but pre-emptively preventing blow outs when possible....and breaking convention with decisive intention.
--

Most of the surprises subside. This was the goal: framing and controlling the interaction. All but gone is the thrill of the unknown....what made the heart beat, what made the heart pulse and palpitate.

Knowing is half the battle...and not knowing is virtually all of the thrill of the chase.

V-Day Fallout/Aftermath

Soundtrack to this post:
I have a trio of field reports waiting for my strength to renew after a lengthy sojourn into the brink this past weekend. I'll go ahead and share one now rather than wait to codify them all together.

Headed out Saturday night to meet a number of friends. One guy, blogged about before is separating from his wife and realizing that no matter how hard he wants to make it work, his wife is hellbound and determined to take him for all he's worth...and they have a young son in the midst as well. The other is an older couple who for an inexplicable reason has attempted to cast me out of this particular social circle....and the last is my mentor/confidant in the form of an older, **** woman. I had downed a number of drinks @ another spot with a buddy before starting his shift downtown. Checked out 2 bars with another member of the rogue's gallery where some girls opened us with a simple "hello". Interesting how a mass-marketed/media blitzed holiday will shake the status quo with tremors.

Headed into the upscale bar full of cougars, older/business guys, some escorts, and wealthier married couples. Grabbed a stool and got ogled by a gay guy and his faghag friend nearby. I guess it was the Argyle I was wearing. At any rate, got an earful about the divorce proceedings, caught up faux style with the older couple with whom I no longer keep contact, and my mentor dropped some precious wisdom in the ear of your humble narrator.

Posted up at the bar to get a beer where an effeminate guy made a pass. Le sigh.
A waitress with teeth like this, jokingly gave me a hard time for ordering a domestic beer (apparently I would have been smarter to overpay for a top shelf martini - and only seemed more likely to be a sucker of cock to twinks nearby - ).

"Our love is never free...."

20 min's later I was approached by another guy. Le sigh.
At this point I'd already downed 8 beers and 1 shot. Having not been out in the brink much as of late, I was hitting the fade to black barrier. Our group headed to a nearby club/bar. My motor skills remained in tune, but just barely. Downed 2 more drinks before a girl grabbed my arm and introduced me to her young, sing-song, college-age friend. Another girl tried to swipe my hat but I brushed her hand away. The college-age girl assaulted me with questions. It wasn't even 1am. I bid adieu to my friends. I was exhausted. There was an unmistakable urgency to the crowd. A need for validation. A seeking of affirmation if only in the visual, cheap sense of attention and human interaction of the most superficial manner. I wished to take part no longer. My emotional currency had traded hands and faded with the bottom of however many bottles/glasses. So many girls....so little lust.

Woke up and trained like a fuckin' champ b/c well, that's what I do...and sweating out a hangover in the purgatory of the gym beats feeling like shit all day.

-With Greatest Affection

Belladonna Interview for your Saturday

It's here. V Day is tomorrow.....but most of us will see the social show/charade/facade of dates/couple dinners tonight. Watch with detached amusement, appreciate the sentimentality of stopping to appreciate others....and go out in hopes of picking up the singles on the prowl. Pragmatism and Romanticism abounds on this heavily marketed holiday in the midst of our humdrum busy lives of quiet desperation.

Porn starlet.....Pornlet, hmm, there need be a term for the moniker'd of the porn world....at any rate, here she's interviewing some fanboys.

Next time you watch her in a rough sex scene, just remember...that is someone's daughter, your hands will grow hair, you will go blind, and Domo-Kuns are killing kittens.
That's a powerful index compelling you not to whack off to rough sex/anal scenes.

Forthcoming, I have some field reports/observations of note. When it rains it pours.
-With Greatest Affection

Life is Humorous

In Humorous news...I ran into an ex from a loooong time ago this past weekend.

I'll put this in terms any guy will understand: She's gotten fat.

I haven't :)

I have to admit, it kinda made me smile. Well, no, let me be more accurate. I felt bad that she was slightly older than me yet considerably heavier (plus her being shorter). Then she gave me this fake "hello" bit (her life sucks)....and I grinned. B/c she is fat. She's married too. To a schnerdling (got that from Roissy) guy who's already got the beer gut, stubby nose, outward jutting chin, glasses combo with some young guy haircut. I can almost imagine his shallow, tepid semi-thrusts made difficult by his gut hanging onto her considerable girl-paunch and fat titties jiggling as they huff and puff and blow down the house that mediocrity built with the ovum and sperm seeking to make mediocre carbon copies of themselves. *shudder*

Weeks ago, I'd passed her husband, rather he walked by me in a bar. I didn't notice him at first, and I guess he was butthurt I didn't recognize the husband of a chick I dated something near a decade ago (damn, I am getting old/er). Like we had shit to talk about b/c I was the first guy to fuck his wife? Y'know? At any rate, I shook his hand last night b/c I was feeling sociable and benevolent. It got me a dismissive gesture on his part. I just laughed and shook my head. I should have cracked his fucking jaw and tapdanced on his face. If this weren't America, that's what would've happened. C'est la vie. As it is, he can live the soulsucking life of suicidal thoughts, depression and Zoloft spent waking up next to the same girl you married getting fatter by the day. I'll keep my freedom, thanks Guv'nor.

No wonder she's so aggravated. I bounced out on her ass before she hit the expiration date. She told me a few years ago when I ran into her, that after we split up(read that: I broke up with her) she banged a bunch of guys, did some drugs, then met this guy. They've been dating/now married since.
Now she's gotten fat. I haven't. Guess she's mad I wasn't dumb enough to buy in long term. She's probably also mad that she put on enough weight for the both of us to have aged by about 10 years.

That downward slide really starts to pick up speed in the later half of the 20's I've noticed.
It's always struck me as odd that people are angry when you pass on needless and bullshit small talk. If we don't care enough to keep in contact and speak on the regular, why the fuck should we talk b/c we happened to run into one another in a social setting?

Valen-, Valenti-......Victory Day (not for men)

JUST a reminder...same post from a few weeks ago

It's coming gentleman. There's even a movie already in commercials for all the saps out there straddled to a woman who makes less of the money but spends more of it and determines how what she doesn't directly spend should be spent better (in her mind).
The market onslaught and date night which looms on the horizon is frightening. February 14th looms like some coming dark time when even if you are not directly the target of the plague, you will feel its effects and see its forthcoming aftermath for several days before/leading up to the night of sacrifice and appeasement.

Fortunately, for the first time in well, like years....I don't have a date nor someone who can rightfully expect that I splurge for said expected date as randomly selected by greeting card companies like hallmark, diamond cartels, demented florists, and the sugar industry/chocolate moguls.

It should be called victory day. Another victory for the emasculation of humanoids genetically deemed "men". Another day of guys bending over for some righteous pegging/butt pounding by the women dominating their lives or some chick who needs crack (validation) in the form of getting some guy to spend money on her.

However, an interesting quandry presents itself. As (single) girls get closer to the day, their hitched friends are already voided. If they want to do a group/couple thing (based on the girl's friends, not the guy's of course...that would be ridiculous), she has to find a date.

This means that virtually any semi-publicly tolerable man that can stutter words, button up a semi-fitting dress shirt or throw a polo in the dryer to de-wrinkle it, will do. Be careful both this weekend and the next gentlemen.
There are 3 weekends, well 2 full weekends and the friday before the big day in which meeting single women will NOT be under the usual pretexts.
The single 'ladies' are vigilant for some dude, some where, desperate enough to think that taking her out on V-day will make her more likely to be romantic (read that: sexual in manspeak). Do not MAKE THIS ASSUMPTION, MEN.

In girlsperanto, a guy you meet and genuinely like before V-day could be "the one"!
However, he just as easily could simply be some guy you meet that doesn't cut the snuff but takes you out to dinner/buys you shit, is a great punchline to slash and burn for years afterward with the girls over martinis. "Remember that one guy I let take me out for Valentine's day?!??!"

Guys. Do. Not. Be. The. Punchline.

Stay home and beat off....or head out the days prior, and enjoy the throng of girls nursing battered egos and jealousy from watching (in their minds) their less attractive friends go out to eat at some overpriced fondue restaurant.

I feel a moment of something...not melancholy...not sympathy...for the untold men, divorcees, men supporting an ex-wife who's now bangin' some other dude....all the untold penises sitting at home on February 14th. Play some Halo. Watch some foreign chicks do anal. Have the (admittedly) few male friends who are single over to do man shit like play cards, get drunk on the couch or go to a strip club. - quick thought- does going to a strip club on V-Day make it any more possibly kinda whack? Methinks not. It's like a carnival game. You know it's a rip off. It is what it is. As long as you don't go in with the illusion that you'll come out a winner.

At any rate......for the younger class of men....not suffering from post traumatic stress flashbacks from divorce court proceedings...go out and spit some game at who ever's out, enjoy the sight of the guys laying down cold, hard cash for girls they've already slept with...hell, the guys who think that money is what get you laid......then walk right on by the window of that restaurant you don't care to eat at in the first place, saddle up at the bar, and spend that money on some booze and a good time with whatever single friends that haven't bit the dust. Can't put a price on a good time motherfuckers. Hoist the black flag.
-With Greatest Affection

....what's that honey? you say your drink tastes funny? it must have gotten warm at the store.

Epic Fail

I started this blog hoping to record successes and failures. It would be disingenuous to only highlight the victories despite any prideful wish to craft a persona of perfection online.



I strolled into a local pub with a member from my rogues gallery of friends....there were a number of Brazilian girls present. Their position in the bar was not logistically favorable, in fact, it only allowed for a head on assault with all guns blazing. As I passed to the middle bar, a brasileirinha glanced my way, we both smiled, and I continued on my way. My buddy opened a girl on shift who was surprisingly well-adjusted for being such a cutie. She had the right amount of teasing and sass plus a bit of wit that most girls simply do not possess. I had set forth in my mind that I would do at least one approach and there was no reason not to. Yet...I did not pull the trigger. Admittedly, the brasileirinha's were not as hot as one might normally expect, and it did remind me of Roosh's post awhile back about how the really cute ones are in the motherland, not relocating/through the jumps and hoops and chutes necessary to hack it in the US...but still. I had lamented a shortage of their type in my city....and I watched as the opportunity passed. I simply felt no urgency. No instinctual push. Nothing.

My lust for deep, dark nights has abated as of late, esp. when coupled with 5-6 days training for my fight, and only a day off before back on the grind/getting beat up. I felt the onset of weariness creeping in before I could elevate my state to a more energetic frame. C'est la vie.

Bloodwork tomorrow to make sure my HIV isn't so bad that I can fight another guy with little MMA gloves and try to pummel another person into submission.

The Hilarity of Youth

Soundtrack to this Post: OneSideZero
Recently, I watched UFC 109: Geriatric, where aging, still fighting professionally legends Couture and Coleman slugged it out.

Humorously and likewise irritatingly enough it was held at a college style party bar owned by a friend. Moments after the fights began, a small trickle of 18+ kids head in. I say kids b/c the girls had the fat of youth/rolly polly obesity, the guys wore chains on the outside of their shirts ala 7th grade rednecks....and that awkward swagger of a male attempting to proclaim alpha but busy looking around as if to say "see? see? I'm a guy. I'm a man." No. You. Are. Not.



At any rate, the usual signs of college sexual dynamics/desperation quickly came into view: 2 guys dancing on one girl, girls making out with one another for cheers/beers, clearly underage girls drinking a beer and acting drunk within moments of arriving at the club/bar. Girls dancing on a ledge nearby. I was interested to note the number of short/thigh-revealing dresses being worn. The fat girl positioned in the midst of each set of girls. The days of pants plus slutty/glittery top with some errant flip flops or heels of my college yesteryear have passed for the time being it appears. Kudos for attempting to appear to possess fashion sense. Girls walking awkwardly in heels also went by in droves.

Some essentials were proven in the midst of the awkward haze of youth attempting the mating dance. Appearance worked for a handful of guys in relatively more expensive dress shirts and jeans. Swagger worked for a number of others far too unattractive to pull gash otherwise. A young girl grabbed my arm after walking out of the bathroom. I distastefully glanced at her hand on my arm, she blushed nervously, I gave her a half, kind, little sister kind of smile and made my way back to chat with my training buddies. The thought of knocking out young gash on a dorm room bed brought back nostalgically humorous memories. It's a wonder I ever got laid in college. It's not like I had internalized ANY understanding whatsoever of how men/women work.

I could have done a lot more if I hadn't been such a pussy. Sex wasn't something I actually sought out. It fell in my lap often enough that for the most part I didn't have to go looking for it. I also had some spirit-crushing spells in college. I was like some lost, small dog wandering around, uncertain of which tree to sniff.

Ah, the joys of youth......at any rate, back to my recent exposure to college life:
Some breakdancers did some dance/off dancefest type thing on the dance floor. The pulsating bass made my head hurt. I called it a night and slept good, catatonic rest after having spent a fair amount of time earlier in the day getting punched in the face. Insipid is the word that comes to mind when describing the crowd, but that's not it. Perhaps, uncertain is the word.

I 'spose I'm getting old(er).

Movie Recommendation and News Bits

Rented a movie titled Train last night, feat. Thora Birch, the daughter of Kevin Spacey's character in American Beauty.

In summary, it has everything: vivisection, organ harvesting, gore, amputation, necrophilia, creepy Euro trash, Golden Showers....I mean, it takes a lot to make me say "wow" repeatedly throughout a movie. This one managed to top Hostel and Saw in terms of cringe-worthy moments. Wow, again. I don't want to give out the real look-away moments....but it completely tops Saw/Hostel and other films of the like.

Give it a go, find it @ Redbox. If you don't, you'll just blow a hundred pennies on some other more worthless shit.
--

Proof that man's capacity for evil is stranger than fiction

All-American boy murders father. Family cries out for support....for the boy. Not for the 8 month pregnant woman he shot to death while she was sleeping. Note the article's title. It could just as easily read "12 Year old Executes 8 mth. pregnant woman in her sleep"

The Death of a Real Man. A hard man who did hard shit.....died like a real man. Of a fucking stroke. Should we all be so lucky to live a life like his.

Let Kids....Be....Kids

Full story here. Outcry over racy line of kid's clothes.
I've been seeing this for years, from way back to when in high school I worked stock at a distribution center and would unbundle massive amounts of tween clothing.

Years ago this was, and I was seeing underwear for girls under 13 with stuff like cherries and words like sexy on it. Seriously.

I'm tired of seeing girls who are that young in tights, short skirts, or wearing shorts that fit more like a bathing suit. Cover up/dress appropriately your goddamn kid.

File Drawer Effect

In the midst of a college class in Sociology (never before had I seen so much opinion and Political Correctness combined with snarkiness/sniping towards white males) I read about an interesting phenomenon known as the file drawer effect. See also: publication bias.

Research into this has yielded various responses, but more sometimes as high as 6% of those polled admitted having tossed out, silenced, or simply not reported findings which contradicted their original hypothesis/theory/work.

IE: The file-drawer effect refers to the practice of researchers filing away studies with negative outcomes. Negative outcome refers to finding nothing of statistical significance or causal consequence, not to finding that something affects us negatively. Negative outcome may also refer to finding something that is contrary to one's earlier research or to what one expects.

We all do this. Those of us in the burgeoning MRA movement, and in the blogosphere are not immune.
Last night, whilst making dinner, I happened upon an open panel discussion of Women Lawyers held by Georgetown University. Based on the lawyer chicks I've met, the blogging of others (Roissy in particular portrays them as pre-destined cougars passing their days in cockfiending and martini nights bathed in wanton sex), I expected some pretty hardcore sniping by the women on the panel. Sandra Day O'Connor was overseeing the panel in a moderator capacity, and as such, she demured from virtually any question posed. A seemingly high profile female attorney was talking about the struggles of being a mother and a lawyer and that law in particular b/c of hours required/competitiveness is especially demanding for women.

My eyes rolled and I turned the volume up hoping for fodder about entitlement from women et cetera. Then something interesting happened. A woman from the audience asked the pointed/anticipating the answer type question, " what more could your law firm be doing to help you as a working mother?"

The female attorney replied flatly and unequivocally: "nothing. I can't think of anything add'ly they could be doing to help."

The woman faltered for a moment, then asked another pointed question about the "subtle barriers" women still face despite having made progress.
The female attorney replied flatly, "professional dress is something of a gray area".

There was some other predictable commenting by another panel member, solicitor general, I believe, about the subtle barriers....but by and large the panel's advice was to show up over-prepared, do your best, and like with anyone seeking success, sacrifice your social life if you want a family and a career.

At any rate, near the start of the program, I was going to turn off the program upon hearing the sage advice of the female attorney.....but then I remembered the file drawer effect and wanted to potentially hear something other than the usual men-slanted support I tend to drum up in the blogosphere.

It's not all bad news gentlemen. Whilst fighting the perilous family law, divorce court conditions that now embody much of America, it's not an excuse to only seek out/focus on the negatives.

Super Bowl Emasculation & Doubletalk Edition

First....watch the commercial here or stream via my page:


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Yeah...because 1) if you live that life your wife will let you buy a car....and 2) driving it around will somehow offset your suicidal impulses from waking in the morning to finally sleeping late at night. Fuck that.
--
On to my favorite dead horse: Avatar -
If I hear one more person admit the writing was trite, cliched, hackneyed, uninspired, and unoriginal...and then in the same sentence say, "but it was so visually stunning that I saw it a second time,".....I will begin crackin' skulls.

If you admit that your mind is vacuous enough to shell out the overpriced movie ticket prices more than once for a film that you readily ACKNOWLEDGE is plagiarized and ripped off to the hilt because it "looks pretty"...you are a fucking clown.

Go buy a Dodge like the Super Bowl Commercial suggests...b/c looking at a pretty car in your driveway offsets how empty your life actually is. Be like my buddy who owns said car and does what the fuck he wants when he wants. The car fits him b/c he lives his life on his terms. Don't buy a car b/c you hate your life.

Coming to Terms?

Soundtrack to this Post: Sleeping with Ghosts by Placebo

REAL QUICK: did anyone notice how bitch-ified the male characters were in the Super Bowl Ad's? the Khaki "who's wearing the pants" commercial...and the one with the guys talking about how shitty their lives are....and that somehow buying a Dodge will offset a shitty to do list life?



There was a time when I wantonly made decisions and followed impulse. I shied away from viewing the aftermath of my choices. I anesthetized myself with booze and made many decisions over the past several years. That's not entirely accurate. I've made plenty of selfish decisions without the aid of booze.

I find less reprieve in booze than I once did. I find less enjoyment as well. I find no purpose. I hit the bottom of that pursuit. I've hit the bottom of many things as of late. My fight's coming up. I know that win or lose, in the aftermath....I will find release...I will find peace. I will find solace.
There will be a moment. I will sit alone in a folding chair backstage. Hundreds will sit nearby, no doubt some of them discussing what they just saw. Friends and even family will feel proud. I will feel no pain save the crash from chemicals no longer pulsing through my body. A bitter, pained smile will cross my face and I will tell myself that I "won".....but I will know that it is as hollow a victory as I am a person. For I will be unchanged in my chasing a state which I do not believe I will attain.

That moment....that moment focused on my victory will pass. I will sit at square one. I will sit with all the demons around the campfire and they will begin telling stories. The same stories with the same endings. The same stories with similar if not the same characters.

I will feel as alone as always. I will rise and bask in the congratulations and applause. This will lessen the discontent for a time. I will enjoy a few drinks, exhaustion will overtake, I will sleep. I will awaken and for much of the day feel sated.

In a few days time....the chasing of the dragon will begin again.

My white whale.

Wash. Rinse. Repeat.

As it is...each day spent breathing remains in vain pursuit of my white whale.......peace.
My core belief that all things crumble with time makes this a curious attempt.
Let's hope that I am misinformed and permanence in more than a singular moment proves possible.
-With Greatest Affection


Ahab: "Towards thee I roll, thou all-destroying but unconquering whale; to the last I grapple with thee; from hell's heart I stab at thee; for hate's sake I spit my last breath at thee."

Blood in the Water

Soundtrack to this Post
I could see the doubt on her face when I asked her to dance. Too bad I danced circles around her. I was also too pretty for her. A brunette nearby nervously glanced my way as she had at the bar. I casually strolled up and wordlessly extended my hand. We danced a song, her furtive glances stemming from a shy awkwardness that was pleasantly refreshing. A bossy Asian girl proclaimed she went to UNC and that I should go there to dance sometime. I told her I'd pass. Bossy, business like in their interactions Asian girls aren't my cup o' tea. A cute bartender friend chatted with me for a time.
A black girl told me I was too pretty for the Asian girl I'd danced with. We laughed and joked for a time. I mocked the leggings and poofy skirts some girls were wearing as what passes for fashion. I was dressed in the heighth of fashion which she appreciated. Her pleasant demeanor and lack of need to prove anything to me was pleasantly refreshing. I felt like I was talking with a human being, not a fembot programmed to prove she doesn't need a man.

The black girl made a lot of innuendo about fucking. For a change, I could tell it wasn't the type of sex talk that white girls use which is bullshit and proves just talk. She was testing the waters and gauging my reaction. She wasn't pretty enough for me either.

The brunette from earlier kept glancing my way as I sat and stared into the throng of people from a comfortable couch. An older devotchka asked me to take a picture. I told her that my photography skills could be purchased in exchange for a beer. She thought I was kidding. I reiterated my price in trade. She acted offended, then got some simpy-er lookin' guy to take the photo. T-Minus, 3, 2, 1-a friend of the girl came over and gesticulated wildly about my being rude. I shook my head and sipped my beer. Blaise-fuckin' blah. Sometime later another friend of the group apologized for the harpy friend. We chatted for a bit. I twirled her around the room amidst the smell of cheap cologne, excessive perfume, and human humidity.

I blacked out in my car and slept for hours. Woke up, hurried home, changed/showered, jerked off then headed to work amidst the internal din of my hangover.

Headed into what looks to be a long weekend folks. Good luck and happy hunting.
Your humble narrator presses forth as always. Hoist the black flag and all that shit.
- With Greatest Affection

The Tiger Can't Change Its Stripes

Soundtrack to this Post

Alternative Soundtrack

Alternative Soundtrack






The ancient Greeks believed a strong outpouring of emotion was key to the maintenance of well-being, and overly beneficial to the health. I sat on a folding chair nearby the blue mats after training mid-day today. I had tears in my eyes. I had already fought back tears the night before in the midst of training.
Midday today: I had been exhausted from the week's training but that was no excuse for being tapped out 3 times. I had done well but also been dominated at times. I felt the wellspring of emotion only a fighter can know. I felt the helplessness, the weakness....that drives us. The belief that only by facing this situation day after endless and innumerable day that over time we will face it less often, or that when faced will come out the victor. I felt the humiliation, disgust, and fury at the fact that I had been beaten. It's not that I truly love winning...it's that I abhor losing with every fiber of my being. I roll my eyes when non-fighters talk about the ego of actual fighters........the very essence of a great fighter is having been forged in the furnace of failure and humiliation and taking those lessons learned into the public and when it counts most, when the most people are watching.....winning.

I sat in a cold, metallic chair and heard only the persistent buzz of the overhead fluorescent lights and the intermittent piercing cry of the timer marking off rounds. I was alone. Training partners were changing, grabbing water et cetera. My leaden body felt detached as I slumped slightly forward unable to quell my emotions. I breathed deeply and slowly and the emotions subsided. I had done my best. I had trained hard and I had fallen short. Better than to have quit while I was ahead b/c I feared fatigue....but the sting of failure burned like the fire of a thousand suns.

I recalled last week when I was punched so hard that for a moment I was bathed in white light. For what was likely a split second, I was immersed in pleasant white light.....slowly the world had came back into focus. I realized I was at the gym. I realized I was in the middle of a round. I realized I had been punched so hard that the blue mats appeared green for several seconds. Eventually, I perceived sound in the world.

In that several minutes within a round....I am free. I am separate and removed from all those things which make my waking hours so unbearable. The singular focus of fighting alleviates all that I cannot control, all that is stronger than myself. In the ring, in the cage...there is only the man in front of me and the pulsation, cessation of time as we fight for dominance. It is pure.

I sat against the wall tonight at the close of my 2nd training session of the day. I had fared better despite my exhaustion. I had punished a would-be aggressor who sought to take advantage of my weariness. I dominated him and broke him mentally and physically. I crushed his will. I looked upon him with disdain. I can accept a difference in skill. I can accept fatigue. I can accept many things. I cannot accept excuses and utter quitting. Do not make excuses vocally. Show me that you are game and I will respect you all the more. In the gym, the willingness to try and fail is paramount.

In the past....after hard training....I could have a beer with dinner...I could sleep quickly and deeply. Such has not been the case as of late. As my body conditions and adjusts to the hellish training regimen....so does its tolerance for pushing the envelope. Nearly an hour of fighting doesn't do the trick even when burning concrete fills my lungs, muscles burn with lactic acid, and various injuries plague me.

The dark passenger is the blessing and the curse. The lack of fulfillment, of peace, of content spurs me forward to press on in the face of pain and exhaustion....seeking something, anything other than the constant discontent. Those that know peace, those that know contentment...those that know pleasantry....they shy away from the hurt business that is fighting.....b/c they have sanctuary in life. I shy away from all the hurt business that is life.....by fighting.

When you read about great fighters and boxers, the writers always wax poetic about the sordid and tragic personal lives of said people....b/c they do not understand. No more than they could understand the drive to grow accustomed to inflicting and receiving pain....no more can they understand that lack, that absence, that missing part that leads to such destructive ways. They are simply incapable of understanding.

I read about a former Muhammad Ali opponent who at the age of 63 still hits the heavy bag each morning "to get the venom out".
I'm 27. I have accepted that the dark passenger is a permanent stowaway on the ark that is my life....and that even some days physical exhaustion in the gym will not be enough to sate the dark passenger.

-With Greatest Affection

Spent some time at a local haunt the other night. A girl from the gym chatted me up. Her body language mimic'd mine and we made small talk. She touched me at apropos points in conversation and I did the same out of habit. She's young enough to believe in the dream. She's young enough that the hubris of still attractive female aesthetic works for her. She asked the logistics questions and further screened me with surface innocent/depth determining questions throughout our chat.....I was unmoved and did my best impression of being polite and pleasant. I wore the plastic mask of a charlatan then called it a night.

As it is, I've worked hard in the furnace of man-dom....paid my dues....bled, sweated, cried...and I'm sipping a Dos Equis before bed. Stay thirsty my friends.

"heartwrenchingly familiar....." For A Reason

(Yeah, that's the bastard lovechild of cyber/interspecies/beasiality and James Cameron's plagiarism in the form of Avatar)

Michelle Rodriguez, the predictably tough female helicopter pilot in Dances with Smur-I mean Avatar, was asked what she first thought when she first read the script. She said she was struck by how "heartwrenchingly familiar it was...."

Yeah. Take that in.

It was familiar b/c it is entirely un-original.
Avatar is actually a CGI version of Disney's Ferngully: the last rainforest (remember some 15 years ago as kids when they said the rain forest was disappearing...in school we donated money, made projects, and we talked about losing the cure for cancer. Well, cancer's not cured and there's still plenty of dangerous rainforest around the world)....and Dances with Wolves about a civil war vet that befriends those he was to betray.

Apparently, ripping off two movies (not just one) and using CGI fueled by millions of dollars (wonder what the carbon footprint on things like Cameron flying in private planes amounts to?) is the best way to get 9, yes 9, Oscar nominations.

My only cause for less than indignation is that The Hurt Locker was also nominated (best movie I've seen in the past year).
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At any rate, aside from rewarding outright a complete lack of creativity and willingness to wholesale rip off thematic elements and visuals from the work of others....whilst generating 100's in millions of revenue.....the whole green peace, humans are awful to those different that seem less primitive yet in a heartfelt way are more in touch with nature (laughable to a legion of people who are plugged into their iphones and itouch's and bullshit social networking sites) than us "civilized" humans......there's just a boring movie, absurdly cliched film with CGI no more amazing than say Starship Troopers or the last Matrix movie.