Still loving the bike, riding every day. But, jebus h. christos, I need my ass to get used to the seat pronto.

It’s positively undignified for a woman of a certain age to be wanting to rub the soreness out of her rump all day and night.

Be that as it may, the best part about riding the bike to work is feeling like I’m 12 again. At 12 the bike was transportation. It was freedom. It was the means to go further and farther and hang out with kids outside my strict neighborhood.

My pink Huffy never tore up the road, but mileage rolled under it. It went to the convenient store for a Coke. It circled the mall, which was open air when I was a kid, endlessly. I looped and slalomed zig zags around parking islands.

By bike I was able to circle the historic, Revolutionary War era graveyard to scout whether other kids were hanging among the stones. In that cemetery, lunch money could get you a joint or two. In that hallowed space, I learned about all sorts of shit that was new and dangerous feeling.

My bike was the chariot to almost the earliest of an illicit rendezvous. It consisted of my nerdly inner self (surrounded by a rather mature looking outer self) being talked into giving a backrub to one of those guys who invariably hung out wherever teenagers congregated. The guy that was just a little too old to be hanging with a few 12- to 15-year-old folks but not so old it was criminal.

Now, waking up in a morning, jumping on and rolling out the driveway, a little bit of that fun is still afoot. The bones at 43 ache as they didn’t then, though. And the recovery of shaking off a fall is an eon or two longer.

Worst of all, I don’t ever remember sitting on that seat ruining me for sitting on any other. Maybe I’ll be looking at one of these soon:

Periodically, I imagine myself Stephen King, movie-of-the-week, batshit, psychopathic crazy. It would liven up the mundane, I feel.

For example, Saturday morning, M. and I were enjoying a nice, hot cup of Joe at the local Peet’s. As we sat there, soaking up the weekend relaxation and sitting on the stools facing the windows to watch the world passing, we were accosted.

A pair of women, older than us, safely what you might call middle-aged, asked us for a favor. Did we have a cell phone they could borrow for a two-second, local call? In a few seconds, on my minutes, they explained to someone on the other end that while out for a walk, they had stopped for coffee, and they invited the unseen to join them.

Replete with thanks, they gave me back my phone.

A lovely, yet boring, suburban weekend interlude.

But, imagine if I was sociopathic how very different and fun it could have been. The rest of the day could have proved a playground of prank calls to the very number now recorded on my telephone’s log.

Or maybe a reverse lookup on the internet could have given me the fodder for a stalking spree. Imagine my crazy self squatting in the bushes, awaiting for the return of at least one of the strolling companions who had brought us all together. I could rob the house or assume a new identity or maybe just insinuate myself into their lives.

The possibilities, the dramatic arcs, the scene-chomping horror that might have been, ended instead in a simple, “you’re welcome,” as I returned to my coffee, and M. and I picked up our conversation.

Similarly, when my friends, the Walsh boys, visited, they left with a possibly enjoyable but relatively boring story to tell. They stayed, we ate things, we visited places, we drank, we talked, we hiked, etc.

However, they’d be telling the story for years to come if their visit was laced with Rohypnol. I mean who wouldn’t remember waking up with a vague sense of dread and some soreness where there shouldn’t be any.

If only we had gotten all Edward Albee on them and screeched our improvisations on George’s and Martha’s best from Who’s Afraid of Virginia Wolfe? Now, they likely have the recollection that M. and I are spending our days in playful banter and relative contentedness. A lasting, memorable story? Perhaps not.

Sadly, I lack the gravitas for the type of greatness where I dent the world so hard I must be held in regard for days, months, years and generations to come.

Lacking that, crazy folks they remember. Meanwhile, I live a life eminently forgettable.

Thanks to M.’s gift of forethought, which socially is not my best suit, we went to a musical fundraiser for Dafur. Or against Dafur, I guess, since it was pro not having genocide.

Anyway, I loved watching the live auction and wished I peeked at the silent auction. There’s something lovely about wonderfully earnest liberals spending money for a cause. And, drinking vodka. Good vodka.

We were snaked on the bidding for Angelina Jolie’s signature. But, again, for a good cause. We could have bidded more aggressively, but I do have my reality to live within. It would be a giggle to own Angelina and work in the job where I do work, but how much is a giggle worth?

Here’s to rich people raising money for poor people and hope for the planet. Sort of.

Tonight we went out for a romantic dinner in a nice French restaurant down the street. Better yet, if we don’t finish the bottle of wine, they will jam a cork in it, throw it in a paper bag and let you get it to go.

I realized recently that we kind of have a sweet thing going on here. M. and I generally have dinner and a movie or dinner or dinner and TV come a Friday night. It’s a fine way to wrap up the week.

When I’ve mentioned to a couple of people that we have kind of a standard, standing engagement going on, their reactions told me it was notable. I figured that’s what couples do come a Friday night. But, I guess the good part is we don’t tend to take it for granted.

Now, with that sweet set up, you can realize what I maroon I am. For me, dinner, wine, M. and atmosphere meant the perfect forum to discuss my obsession with online fighting. In other words, see the cunt post below.

Apart from this here weblog, I thought I had largely exorcised any desire I might have to argue pointlessly in virtual reality.

As I mentioned yesterday, some hump got my righteous flaming anger juiced. Of course, I am solely responsible for what I did with that anger. I’m not proud, but I am unapologetic.

Here’s the thing, in the midst of an arrogant prick pontificating on what language he finds acceptable, I found myself needing to type “Your mother and your sister are both hairy cunts.” I realize that this statement might be the height of sophomoric (or a lesser grade) wisecracking. Still and all, I thought it funny, and I still do.

I mean you got a guy dictating (oh wait, as he took pains to point out “requesting”) the world do away with that which offends HIM particularly. Right there, you got a seed. But, then all of these dudes were posting in a pussy-footing (pardon the pun) kind of way partially because of this winning quote from the guy who started the argument:

You see, when you call me a cunt, you call my mother a cunt, you call my sister a cunt, you call my niece a cunt, etc.

The thoughtful thing to do would be to apologize.

Short of that, I “strongly suggest” that you not call me a cunt again. If you do, you will put me in an even more difficult position.

It’s the fucked up part of my brain, which is the same one that has had the need to go on stage and talk into a microphone, that couldn’t let that slide. It’s too stupid. The whole construct of that which you call me you call my family, the implied sisterhood, the sensitive new-agey, post-modern yearning guy of it. I couldn’t let it slide.

Better yet is the implied threat at the end. Violent testosterone surging to protect the ladies.

Someone had to call someone’s mom out, don’t you know. I nominated myself.

Foolishly, I don’t actually use the word myself that much. It would be pretty damn unlikely I would ever say it on stage. I sometimes swear on stage, but it’s more conversational tic than trying to get all edgy. It’s kind of fake edgy.

I can think of one guy who pulls its use off in a truly effective comedic thang. You get the sense the word is one he uses in the real world, and he’s fucking funny in the hands of Louis CK.

In other words, I do think shitty, stupid slurs are best avoided on stage, so I kind of agree in some way with the anti-cunt guy. But, he was such a jackass in the discussion, my trigger finger squeezed out a few rounds.

The ending (so far, but I think for awhile) has been the most satisfying. Tonight he wrote:

[dee-rob] i would really like to have a dialogue with you. i think you’ve made some great points, including your most recent post.

the fact that “pussy” and “cunt” offend you and your friends to the same degree is a lesson to me, and something that matters to me. i, myself, would never use “pussy” in a derogatory way, but mostly in a “romantic” way as myq described. of course, only following the lead of the woman i was with.

but, still, you’re the only one on this thread that has called my mother and my sister “cunts”.

and, i politely and respectfully request an apology.

(oh, and please identify yourself, since i don’t know you.)

thanks,

REAL NAME AND PHONE NUMBER REMOVED [I’m not a big enough douche to publish]

Sweet. A dialog with a man who wants to discuss which gynelogical references HE finds acceptable. I’ll get right on that.

I have actually met the guy, and I revealed my identity so he’d know. But, my stupid pills have all been taken, and I plan to no longer engage. Nor apologize. Nor use euphemisms.

Maybe it’s the headache. Or the weather. Or too much work. Or too little imagination. But, I got nothing at all in my fucking head.

Maybe I could write about how someone recently told me about Googling me. It’s a post search engine world, and I am accumulating a pile of bits and bytes that belie any attempt at anonymity I might fancy.

It’s alright, but Miss Manners better get on the stick when it comes to modern day etiquette. How does one answer when a stranger has read your weblog and told you as much?

Maybe I could write about the big writing time sink, giant, wasteful sinkhole, I sunk myself into earlier today. A ridiculous douchebag of an asshole started a vapid wasteland of internet conversation over here.

Lately, I’ve been successful in completely avoiding the urge to throw myself into web inanity. I’m proud of my distance. But, I fell off the wagon.

The upshot is some guy arrogantly asking everyone to stop using the word “cunt,” ‘cuz he don’t like it. Predictably, a chorus dumped on his ass way past my ability to stay interested. The central figure, the instigator, acted his delusional part beyond all reason as the keeper of some kind of true insight.

The downside of any group communication like a bulletin board on the web, or just about any kind of quote-unquote social networking is humanity’s limitless capacity to produce epic douchebaggery, arrogance and pettiness. You throw on that a good dollop of the reality that the prose of most people is inelegant and poorly written, and it’s a bit of a shit stew.

The comedy boards I’ve checked out are no different than any other hobby sites. And, every hobby site I have ever read (including most recently some bicycle sites) includes pointless aggression and arguments.

I can dig when political or religious or even adult sites can get a little spicy in the dialog. These are your standard hot buttons in society.

But, what the fuck? People are insulting each other on any average day in webworld about stuff that tryly shouldn’t hurt. On the bike bulletin boards, you get lambasted for recommending the wrong set of Shimano shifters. Quoting rec.bicycles.misc, in response to someone describing a header on their bike, someone opines “You’re a lying troll or the lousiest cyclist in the world.”

Pretty typical in the interwebs.

In conclusion, what the fuck is wrong with people? And, the guy on the comedy website is a complete and total cunt.

Nah, seriously I doubt it. Somewhere a lesser demon might be giggling, but by and large the universe will go on without Jerry Falwell.

When a “religious” man (note ironic quotes) separates from our mortal coil, I kind of wish I had a little of that faith they preach. Something that would have me believing that he’s ended up at the Gates of Heaven and right about now someone is asking, “Um, sir, you said what again?” Followed by Jesus himself stepping out, letting lose with a few dope slaps and then suggesting he re-read a few parables or so.

I just can’t believe a guy with quotes like these, you know like the ones about the fags and the rest of us deserving AIDS, would slip right into Jesus’ domain. Remember that whole hanging with the prostitutes, tax collectors thang? And, the loving the least of your brothers? Cool, hippie, loving shit, from the supposed one true son of the creator.

Yeah, that guy, he might have something to say about Falwell’s church. And, it wouldn’t be at the right side of the Father, I’m guessing.

Without faith, though, I roll with a kind of pseudo-karma. Somewhere the energy of the world is letting Jerry know about negativity.

Shit long day at work and came home to a dearth of Walshes. They left to the wonders of the road. Kerouac and Kesey and Cassady and Forrest Gump without the running.

Work wore me out, only because while I’m great at meeting planning it’s partially a product of my utter neuroses. I worry about details and shit gets done. But, man oh man you worry too much and it tuckers you the fuck out.

But, love is good friends visiting my good life with my great guy. Humor is where they left their thank you note.