Facebook and I are taking a break.

I have been a member of facebook since the summer of 2008. I quit on January 8, 2012.  Cold turkey.  I walked away from it early in the evening and I don't know if I will return.  I am not mad at facebook, I am not disenchanted with facebook, I think it has some very nice qualities.  Facebook is very attractive, it is not like this is a thing where I have gone looking elsewhere for companionship. Facebook didn't do anything wrong, I don't want to paint an ugly picture of facebook. My biggest problem with facebook is essentially an "It's not you, it's me..." sorta break up.  I think facebook was giving me everything I wanted out of the relationship.  It gave me positive reinforcement when I was down, encouraged me with it's constant "likes", made me feel better when I was ill, made me laugh when I was sad and "poked" me when I needed to be poked. Sounds like the perfect relationship... doesn't it?  But like in many relationships, there comes a time when you just start going through the motions, you do what is expected, you get into a rut, a routine, the spotaniety is gone and all you are left with is a sparkless relationship but unfortunately with facebook you have to face the fact that it is no one's fault but your own.  You control the content of the relationship you have with this social behemoth, you make the comments, you post the statuses and you poke who you want to poke and you chooses the players in this game.  I got into a routine and a rut with none other than myself.  I got sick and tired of myself.  I would read comments I would make and start questioning if they were the right ones or not, I would read a status and say:  "My God, that is just pandering." I realized also that as a creative person who makes his living performing and writing that it was draining me creatively.  I was getting all of the performance satisfaction out of simply posting a "witty" status and at times gave that more thought than a conversation with my children.

I am not going to call it an addiction or get harsh about how others spend their time.  I think facebook is a wonderful tool to keep in touch with people, I think drinking alcohol is a wonderful way to spend a few hours with friends as well but if you do it everyday, every five minutes and it saps you of valuable creative energy then it is time to step back and get control of it.  I loved my time with facebook and all of the people that I touched base with and who knows I could very well return to it one day, but as of right now I am very happy in my detox.  I know that I have probably missed out on some major trend or event ad many "likes" and discussions and I have probably missed out on wishing people a birthday but that's cool.  I am going to try to live without it for awhile.

Motivation

What motivates us?  Actually screw you... what the hell motivates me?  Because today, this particular depressing nothing day in january I couldn't tell you, I don't have any drive, focus or point of view.  I really know that I should be "getting after it."  "stayin' ahead of the pack." "Workin' toward goals" and all of that shit but i really don't feel like it, ya know?  Truthfully i would like to sit around all day and do nothing but watch reruns of "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia" online but guess what, i have kids, a wife and a career.  I want to continue to improve my health so I have to workout and eat right, I have to maintain some kind of marketing and networking presence for my company and I have to continue to the creative process by "writing" projects for the company to perform so i can't just play on Facebook, watch reruns or just between me and you-- take naps.  You know the only naps I take are involuntary... they honestly happen when my son and I are sitting on the couch watching some cartoon, and they are not pretty either, they are really bad naps that take place while I'm sitting up and drooling, it's more of a sanitarium catatonic thing than it is a nap.  Today, i have taken four of them, and they are not nourishing bits of slumber either, they leave my eyes droopier, my mind foggier and my body crampier.  I have spent 30 seconds of every minute of today feeling worthless, not in a harmful "end of the world" type way, just in a "What is wrong with me?" kind of way. 

I think I figured it out, there is nothing wrong with me, Outside of being human.  I think the number of people that can make themselves get up at the crack of Dark-Thirty and do a 60 minute Pilates workout, drink Grapefruit Juice and take 19 servings of vitamins are an admirable insane bunch of people, they are also the same people that put their jobs above their families, their money above their friends and their goals at the cost of everyone else around them.  They are deeply motivated, they don't allow themselves to have a day like mine because then they lose "The race" I don't think I'm a runner in their race.  I think I'm that guy who entered the Marathon with the idea of finishing but not killing myself to do it.  So, yes, today I'm a useless blob, it's true-- of all the blobbiest days of my life this may be the very blobbiest.  I have done nothing that resembles work, I have pawned my son off on computer games and TV, I sent the other one to ski.  Tomorrow I am going to be right back in the marathon amongst the motivated but today let me have my reruns and my Nacho chips.  I don't know if I've earned them but I'm not a bad guy, just a little unmotivated that's all.

Pet Peeves

I am finding out a lot about pet peeves people have.  They are little things mostly, things you wouldn't think people hate but then when they are confronted with the subject they lose it!  Sometimes if you are in the right company and you say just the right thing you can cause a forehead vein to absolutely pop in the person you are talking to.  Sometimes it can be simply mentioning a sports team, driving through a certain state, dancing, reality shows or people who don't take care of carts at the grocery store. 

Recently I posted something on my facebook status about putting your carts back.  I was surprised at how seriously people take this simple task and some of the emotions that were attached to it, I recently heard a friend of mine lose his mind on how much he hates the act of dancing and I have another friend who hates anything and all things involving actress/model Andie MacDowell.  I myself can get pretty rabid whenever I am confronted with a conversation involving the NY Yankees.  I think people look at us when we are in these states of pure ballistic hate and disgust and think we are crazy but in truth i think we are more sane than those calm people who say:  "Why are you wasting your time and energy on being so upset about this stupid stuff?" 

Here's the world that I live in, I live in a world where I like to go off about the little things, I like to release the valve on things like "Why Snooki has a book deal" or "Why does Rob Schneider continue to get movie roles?" and why do radio stations still feel the need to play "Takin'Care of Business" and why "Born to be wild" is played as a comedic device in a movie everytime an old person gets on a motorcycle.  I have to lose my mind on these things because there is a lot of real pain in the world, and a lot of things that piss me off and if I didn't release humorously on some of the less offensive things the things that really blow my mind would make me explode. 

So if you read this I want you think of something little that really just bakes your cookies and then think of something that just makes you sad and worry about the future of mankind and then go off about the lesser thing and I think you will feel better overall.

Warm and Fuzzy!

This Christmas season could be more aptly titled Thanksgiving for me.  I know, I know Thanksgiving is part of the Holiday season but Thanksgiving seemed somewhat detached from the rest of it all, because Christmas was so incredibly cool.  I had a chance to not only spend quality time with my two wonderful children and outstanding wife but I also was able to see people that have touched every single aspect of my life from childhood, to high school to college and beyond.  I am so very thankful to have seen all of them and to be able to spend time with them.

We shared stories of family, tragedy, comedy and drama.  Cancer survival, parental illnesses and parental deaths, adopted children, the things that our kids do that drive us crazy, the things that our spouses do that drive us crazy and the thing that kept us all from losing our minds was finding the humor in all of it.  I don't remember a Christmas season in which I found so much light and I don't mean the LED's hanging from eavestroughs I mean the light in my friend's and familie's eyes.  There was truly a feeling of hope and goodwill amongst all that I encountered, some traveled from very far and some from right around the corner but we all found the common ground of reminiscence and laughter. 

When the clock struck 12 on New Year's Eve... I suddenly had that stupid "I turn 40 this year!!!!" moment. and then I thought of all of the stories, laughs and moments shared in the past week and I felt good when I gave my wife that New Year's kiss because I knew that I was a rich man because of the roof over my head, the woman by my side, the kids on the other and all of the great friends I have. Thanks for the great Thanksgiving family and friends, that being said my next blog post could be an angry rant about dieting but enjoy this warm and fuzzy!!!!

All I want for Christmas is Taylor Swift and Lady GaGa to get in a catfight!

It's weird, I had someone ask me what I wanted for Christmas the other day and I couldn't think of one thing.  I furrowed my brow, I puzzled my puzzler until it was sore and nothing.  Not a day goes by that I'm not thinking of some little thing that I couldn't live without and then when someone asks me flat out:  "Hey buddy, what do you want?"  I have no reply.  Nothing, nada, zilch.  When I was a kid I took the JC Penney catalog and circled every NFL jersey and Bathrobe that I could find, I even got a Cincinnati Bengals robe one year, don't ask me why, maybe I had a thing for orange or the stripes or I thought Kenny Anderson was a great QB, I walked through countless stores with my mom throwing myself at every little cap gun, Lite-Brite, Clue, Operation, Uno and Tri-ominos, there wasn't a Lego set that got past me without a "PLEASE!, I'll be good!"  And Star Wars figures and ships and Incredible Hulk underoos, there was no end to the list of crap I would give my mom and dad to put on my list and then Atari came and the games would range from Kaboom! to Pitfall to even Video Olympics (Yeah, I was the kid that wanted that one)  Hot Wheels, train sets and the 12" GI Joes and even Kiss dolls.  I could give you an answer for the question what do you want for Christmas? all the time.  I could start giving you answers to that question on December 26th for next year.  But nowadays when someone asks me what it is that I want?  I hem, I haw, I think and nothing comes immediately to mind....  So here, in this year where I turn 40 I will give you my non-kid Christmas wish list....in no particular order

1.  A long date alone with my wife perhaps 3 days.
2.  For my muscles and joints to get on board with the "think younger" program.
3.  An uninterupted 8 hours of sleep.
4.  More time, just an extra 4 to 17 minutes in the day.
5.  To see friends more often.
6.  clear roads for safe travel.
7.  Health to my friends and family.
8.  The Tigers to go to and win the World Series.
9.  To see a "catfight" break out between Taylor Swift and Lady GaGa during Dick Clark's New Year's Rockin' Eve.
10.  A Cincinnati Bengals bathrobe.

That should about cover it.  I think the reason that it is harder to come up with things that you want now is that you are A) Either completely content in your life. (haha)  or B)  You realize that Christmas is, was and should always be a wonderful time for kids. 

It is a time to believe in magic, whimsy and and mysticism whether it's the bambino in the barn or the fat guy at the pole; these are stories that children identify with because they can feel and anticipate the magic of the season they know that it means gifts will appear and people will spend time with their loved ones.  Just because we understand that the magic isn't real anymore, the wonderment in their eyes still is.  We are able to live that magic through them and that is all I really need for Christmas, that and these ten things I mentioned above. 

As adults we are in touch with too many harsh realities of life to get lost in the malaise of what we "want for Christmas" some of us want jobs or better ones, others want their loved ones or for themselves to break an addiction, others want cancer to leave their family alone, or they just want the pain to end for someone they love.  But that is not something you can put on a list as an adult but what you can do is find that special moment whether it's Christmas morning when they run to the tree or on Christmas evening when Grandma brings out the pie or when they see Santa at the mall. Look at your child...  As an adult with all the bills, aches, pains and stress you need to get lost in that small pocket of hope and wonderment in your kid's eyes and escape for just a moment and remember what December was like when you were 7 and all that mattered was what you circled in a catolog or wrote on a piece of paper addressed to the fat man and that will be a gift to you!  The "Oh My goodness" moment. 

(Unless you didn't find that gift or they were out of them and all you have is a rain check and then you're screwed because no hope and wonderment ever resulted in the eyes oif a kid looking at a rain check, but you know what I mean.  Merry Christmas!)

Impatience

Impatience may be the worst emotion or idiosyncrancy a person can have.  It can cause you to behave in very adverse ways toward the people you love and cause a lot of harm to that realtionship.  I am very impatient with my children at times and say things that I would normally never say to them or any other person in my life but given the circumstances of my impatience I can't seem to find the self-control to hold back, I immediately open mouth and insert foot, which is a terrible idiom because if I did indeed insert my foot, the foot would have kept the shitty thing I just said to my kid inside my mouth.

 I had a bad parenting moment today with my 11 year old son Seth and to make matters worse, it was public.  I misunderstood where he was being picked up and what he had to where and how long he would be gone and... well let's just put it this way, i missed all the memos on his agenda for the day and now in the span of about seven minutes I had to make it all happen and when i received the phone call to tell me where he was to be dropped off, i was in my underwear prepared to take a quick shower; the shower never happened and by the time I picked him up I was down to having about two minutes left on the clock before I had to have him  to another locale and he informed me he wanted to change his clothes, so i took him back into the building I was picking up from (church) and threw his clean clothes on the bathroom floor and yelled:  "Get dressed!" this with a bunch of members of church walking by and witnessing my behavior.  First of all I don't care what any of them think, I care about what the kid in the bathroom thinks and I know that I have just scared him and embarrassed him severely.  he doesn't deserve that, he's a great kid, he does everything we ask of him, gets good grades, treats us with respect and is a great big brother to Sam and because I can't take a little curve ball in my schedule I took it out on him.  It wasn't fair and I told him immediately that it wasn't fair, it wasn't his fault and that I loved him.  He forgave me.  But when I picked him up many hours later at the same rendevous point: I apologized again and tried to make him realize that I understood what i did to him was wrong ands that I would try to nver do it again.  "I know, Dad, I know."  What he knows truly is that I will get impatient again, i will be a dick again and I will apologize again.  But I'm trying son, I'm trying and I love you so much.

My new "in-crowd"

"Everybody Loves Raymond" is a terrible show.  It shows all the things that are wrong with the perception of an American marriage.  It shows a bumbling idiot husband who is completely inept in everything except pissing off his wife.  It shows that the wife is most proficient in being a shrill, joyless bitch.  It is not just this show either- American television has a rich history of showing us this perception of marriage and unfortunately in this case life imitates art.  I find myself sometimes reaching for a laugh at the expense of my wife too many times.  I just did it the other day when I referred to my marriage as a "hostage situation" when talking about shopping with her on "Black friday" all for nothing more than to get a couple of hyucks and some people to click "like" but it is not fair.  My wife and I actually had a wonderful time this weekend; we spent a couple of hours on Thanksgiving night going to Meijer and Toys R' Us and there were some tepid moments between us but once we communicated to each other that we are here for the "Black Friday" experience and we could spend the time not only maybe finding a deal or two (which we did) but we could also poke some fun at the good folks who live for the "Black friday" experience.  We had a great time. 

We also "Had" to drive to Wisconsin to see her family and I spent most of the week leading up to it complaining about the drive.  Not seeing her family, because I love her family, but the drive seemed to be laborious to me and I really wanted to just hang out and watch Spartan football.  But once I got over my selfish BS, my wife, kids and myself had a pretty pleasant weekend, we found ourselves reminissing about when Seth was just little and Sam saying:  "Where was I?" and we didn't have anyway to answer that except "You weren't born yet?"  and he would say:  "But I wanted to be there." It is becoming abundantly clear to me that every time I slam my marriage or complain about time with my family that I am doing them a great disservice because I am telling the rest of the world that "I don't like being married or I wish I didn't have to spend so much time with my kids."  and that could not be further from the truth.  I truly love the close knit group of friends that I have accumulated over the years and I cherish my time with them dearly but I have reached the point in my life where my "in-crowd" is my wonderful, supportive wife Lori, my very talented, sweet 11 year old son Seth and my firecracker cutie 4 year old son Sam.  Call it bad-mouthing, venting or just joking but it is something that I need to stop doing so much.  Marriage and family is really great despite what you see on TV.