E Tu Cupid?

It seems I have once again managed to dodge an arrow, or my Cupid Proof Vest must be working, continuing to protect my heart with the state of the art. The only thing you'll fall in love with and lose your head over is the price. Remember shop smart, Shop S-Mart. You can find them in the sporting goods department. Well, now that I've woken up a bit and have gotten enough food in me to chase the viscous and diabolical Hungry Monster away, maybe I can put two thoughts together. Happy Thursday, folks? Okay, depending on when you're reading this, I've got a one in seven chance of being right. Happy whatever, my dearest friends, robots and strangers. Incidentally, in my dimension of space and time, yesterday was Valentine's Day. Okay, Universe: I like roses, lilies, daffodils, and chocolate bunnies. Wait: wrong holiday. Gimmie a heart-shaped box full of chocolate covered cherries. And make it snappy, for goodness sake! I mean, you're already a day late, right? Oh well, unless you're trying really hard to woo me, The oversized teddy bear and brightly colored heart-shaped balloons are completely optional. Hell, write me a flowery love letter. I was once skilled at that sorta thing a long time ago. Oh, go on, woo me with your declarations of looooooove! Okay, I'm kidding, ha! ...Or am I? Serious disclaimer: Seriously, I am joking. Though some of these items just might be on my Friday after Valentine's discount shopping list. I love discounted candy in heart-shaped boxes 😀 Of course, it will be way after the 14th by the time this will be published, so the point is probably moot. This has always been about what I was thinking last week or the week before. Delayed reaction, I guess. Beyond singleness awareness day, here is another weird thing to have stuck in my brain: The whole yamma yamma scene from Police Academy 4. Just a heads up in case I start muttering, "Yamma yamma yamma yaaaaaamaa!" Or something about yaks, hearts, and the brother of Badulla, Y'all know I ain't completely flipped.... only a little. I have got to find crazy things to occupy my mind to get through the workday. You know? Just five minutes, gimmie just five more minutes. Once again, I am suffering from "Just five more minutes" syndrome. I should have learned a long time ago that five minutes is never just five minutes. Made it, though. Never late, just frazzled and rushed and looking like a middle-aged Doctor Emmitt Brown that just got zapped by one of his electrical experiments. Great Scott, Marty! What in the name of Sir Issac H Newton is going on here?! Holy shit! She blinded me with science! Life really keeps us running, and when we're not running, we're worn down, not to mention the times we are worn and running.. It can be very difficult to make time for the ones we love. Still, we should, anyway. Life takes time and energy, but time takes away so much more. Even as someone who has obviously been taught this lesson all too clearly, I still have to remind myself. It's never too late until it suddenly is. I guess inertia is more than a property of motion through space. There is this inertia that we humans have also, and it can be most difficult to break free from. There's no such thing as a fancy meal without the check, no such thing as a good sugar caff-o-tine rush without the crash. What goes up must come down. Therefore, we have human gravity as well as human inertia. What am I trying to say here? While the unknown isn't necessarily bad, it can certainly scare the hell out of some of us, especially me. And don't even get me started on relationships. How wonderful would it be to have the closeness, company, and meaning without all the stress, worry, and drama to go along with it? I guess I wouldn't know much about that, coming out of a bad marriage, rebounding into a relationship with a beautiful woman who only returned the physicality, and sadly none of my feelings. And maybe, I wasn't so clear in that regard myself, this being on the rebound, feeling lost and lonely, reaching out for whatever I could even half perceive as love and belonging. It was a hell of a hell to be in. Nonetheless I think of her every now and then. I honestly hope she has found what it was she was looking for. Depending on how you look at it, the timing of her appearance into my life, was either the absolute best or the absolute worst. Funny how time gives one perspective. Even as I learned to find emotional support in other ways and just did my best to try and forget the physical, which became far easier for me to do since 2019. But that happens to be a rambling for another time. Suffice it to say it is far better to be alone than in a bad relationship. Take it from someone who has been there. It is far lonelier to be with someone who treats you badly, than to be with nobody at all. And this is where I'll clean cup and move down. Subject change and avoid the crazy train.

In a continuation of what I did with my 30 years worth if Doom levels, I am now doing the same for the rest of my digital collection, sort of a refresh and a reset. Large files I will keep the same, but arranged differently. Smaller files, especially my older ones, I am gathering in groups to compress. I am also going to do my best to eliminate duplicates and yadda yadda Yoda. It is probably time for new hard drives, too. It has been 5 years and that's probably as long as I can trust them to be reliable. I intend to keep the old ones, too, but all the files are going to be refreshed. It may be my weird opinion, but I think having a bunch of small files adds more wear and tear to the drives, so everything is going to be stored in large blocks. Once I am satisfied that every compressed file has been checked for the integrity on the master drive, that's when the copying to drives, both old and new. Between the compression and eliminating duplicate and obsolete files, I should be down from 7.5Tb to just under 6. This should allow me to make many, many backups. This includes every game, every level, every song, every book, every movie, and most importantly, all of my baby sister's digital things like her plays, her game characters, her writings, and of course, her voice. These are things you can't really replace if you lose them. I couldn't save her, but it is my one remaining mission in life to save whatever I can. It is only a small drop of water in this 6 Terabyte sea, but it's the most important part. Beyond Marsha's stuff, I have the family pictures, the voicemails from my mother, all these precious afterimages of the people that I love are the many other things that can not simply be re-downloaded or replaced, old game levels, recordings of the records I used to listen to with my Dad, and thank the merciful stars my father is still here, yet there are still those memories that mean so much to me, that will only become more precious with time. Basicly my digital collection is just about every kind of file format you could think of, audio, video, text, programs, compressed, disk images, emulators, and entire operating systems and virtual computers. Within all these formats, lies a large portion of my life. If I happen to do a Kermit and croak, an old Macdonald and buy the freakin farm, a library book and check out, an actor and exit stage left, I want my one remaining sister, all three of my children, and any of my nieces or nephews who might be interested to have at least one copy. Hopefully somebody will continue where I leave off. You know, despite cutting it so damn close, I started this day surprisingly full of energy, and it was a good thing because I needed to rock and roll (and I did). But now it seems the ol batteries have drained. I'm that fancy 1980s boombox playing special sloooooow remixes of your favorite song... I need a jumpstart, a zap for the zapster, a boostorama, and charge me up like Frankenstein's monster. They've got a forklift charger, but no human chargers. A pity, really. Turn up the voltage, Igor! Zap zap zap zap! He's awake, Igor! He's awake!! 

Momma's birthday is in a week, or is so at this moment I happen to be writing these words. I guess this makes the second since, well, March of 2022. I swear these latter years of my life are so full of birthdays and death days. I want to at least keep the loved ones I still have. Really, I want Momma and Marsha back. But I guess it just doesn't work that way. (later) An interesting thing happened the night after I wrote this. I had a dream about my mother. In it, she was happy, excited about a new job arranging artistic displays. She was into arts and crafts in real life. It was her main hobby. I remember telling her that her new career was very artsy crafty, that it fit her to a T. Even if only in a dream, it did my old heart good to see Momma that happy. You deserve it, Momma. It may well be a figment of my subconscious mind, but at this point, it's too late for anything else, so I'll take whatever comfort and solice I can get. 

Anyway, despite it already being the 15th. I shall now deliver my Valentine's address: Four score and seven years ago, Uhhhh huhuhuhuh, I scored... Wait. I wasn't even born back then! 87 years? I think that was 1927. Even my parents weren't born yet for more than another 20 years. Okay, four score minus a couple decades or so, multiple people scored and so here I am. It is my belief that while we are born physically at the beginning of our lives, the true birth is spiritual, and takes a lifetime to complete. Growing up does not stop at 18. Don't kick yourself so hard for once being young and stupid, of not knowing how to act, of being a jerk that didn't know any better. See, that was an early version who had not yet learned. We are all born ignorant of everything and we tend to make a lot of stupid mistakes in our youth. Damn... I was quite the ignoramus dumbass at 18. Isn't it wonderful that growing up doesn't stop at 18? I thought I knew everything and that everyone else was stupid. Imagine my surprise. I have done just as much growing up since 18 as I ever did before, maybe a whole hell of a lot more. See that earlier version, that person we were is not.... us. If we never grew, if we never changed, would regrets both minor and major even be a thing? See, here is the plot twist: You wouldn't be so down on your former self, had you not become this new creature, this better person. More, it also means you are capable of self-reflection. Fools never doubt themselves, but you, my friend are wise enough to know that nobody is absolutely right all of the time. Not you and certainly not me. This is something to celebrate, not lament! So, when doling out the forgiveness, start with that human in the mirror. I think you're doing great myself. This means you should also respect yourself. Never be somebody's second choice. If they make you feel like they're settling for you, then for goodness sake, don't settle for them. While few things in life should all or nothing, love and respect are two of them.  

A final thought: My Great Aunt had an awesomely unique sense of humor. I remember this decorative ashtray. It had something of a breakup poem written next to a picture of this dude wearing a fancy suit and a top hat apparently flushing himself down the toilet. The words read as follows:

"Goodbye, Cruel World'

"The moon may kiss the stars on high,"

"The stars may kiss the bright blue sky,"

"The dew drops may kiss the grass,"

"But, you, my friend...... Farewell"