And How Was Your Weekend?

Darin and I, we did a little shopping. We bought a house. House #3, in case you're wondering.

Needless to say, I've been a wee bit freaked out about it. I'm getting more excited as time goes on, but mostly I'm just numb: there's all this stuff you have to do when you buy a house, a lot of legal hoops to take care of, and oh yes, you have to sign up to fork over more money than you thought you'd ever see in a lifetime, let alone spend on a house.

Whenever you hear Congresscritters talking about limiting the tax deduction on home interest loans, remember that doing that would kill the California economy cold. And try to keep in mind that 1 out of every 8 Americans lives here.

You wanna be the President to piss off 1 out of 8 Americans? I don't think so.

Buck of the Meyhem wrote me and asked whatever happened to my essay, "Why Web Journals Suck." Did I write it? Did I post it? What?

Cut to: a very embarrassed moi.

Yes, I did write it. Longhand, on a legal pad, back when I had an unhappy Donut. Right around that time, there was an explosion of navel-gazing among the online journalers, mostly because of Todd What's-his-face's essay. One of the best analyses of what's going in online Diaryland is Alethea's Tracing entry of January 12. Where she writes about the motives of the journalers, I think she's right on.

Alethea also has a great analysis of some of the good points and the bad points of the journals in I Like It When You Do That. Dammit, just go read Alethea's writing already.

Another reason I haven't wanted to post my sage thoughts on the topic is that I'm hoping that there's going to be a shakeout of sorts. I'm glad that Open Pages has started up again, but there are another ten journals to check out. (More than that, actually; I have the feeling that new ones are being slipped in place of ones that get dropped.)

Quite a few of the journals that are on there haven't been touch in months, either. I can understand having a slight break because of the Christmas vacation, but there are quite a few who took off and never came back.

Well, now that I've started ranting again...maybe I will post my essay, even though I haven't edited since I first typed it in and there's more that needs to be said. Here it is. Feel free to comment. This is the only place I'll mention its existence.

Yesterday I dropped Darin off at the airport early, so I went to Babylonian and hung around most of the day. I started to get annoyed by a few things towards the end of the day, enough so that when I started to recount them to Darin that night he immediately wanted to start working on how I can improve my situation there. I still love the company, I'm just annoyed about some of the things I have to do. Mostly I'm annoyed by some people's attitudes, and since I can't change those, I have to work on what I can or let myself be dragged down with them.

Darin is so proactive about things like this, which is of course why he is so successful. I, on the other hand, felt like wallowing in my misery and feelings of helplessness, and I got annoyed when he tried to help me work out ways I could help myself. It took me another day to talk about it rationally and with any enthusiasm (we just got off the phone; during the call I scribbled down his suggestions for what I should say).

I don't know why I should have such a reaction of resistance to Darin's efforts to help me move forward. (It's always important to move towards something, not away from something else -- remember that.) Why am I so interested in wallowing in my own misery instead of striking forward to self-actualized happiness? Discuss.

Yo. Happy Mardi Gras. Have a good Lent. Go on a search for the real killers.