Style Versus Style!

So, I got "tagged" by Brooks to make a list of my five current favorite songs, so here they are in no particular order:

1. Statistics, "Final Broadcast". The rest of the album is a bit ho-hum, although I may like it a lot more with future listens. However, this song freakin' rocks. An excellent take on the Loud/Quiet/Loud trend of the early ninetys, only moreso. To get the full impact, play in your car as loud as you can possibly take it. You'll see what I mean.

2. Smoke or Fire, "Above the City". I couldn't pick just one song so I chose the entire album. Sue me. Every once in a while a band comes along and blasts a hole in the hipster haze, allowing the pure white light of punk to shine through and remind me why I love rock n' roll so much in the first place. This record has a few bad apples (note to all punkers: acoustic ballads belong on Cat Stevens records NOT on your anarcho/hardcore rock album), but overall a great record. Me likey.

3. Kelly Clarkson, "Since U Been Gone" . Yeah, that's right: Kelly American Fucking Idol Clarkson. I haven't heard any of her other stuff, but this song is awesome, and, face it, the lady can sing. Poppy, but a tiny bit punky, this song is fun. Remember: don't hate the playa', hate the game.

4. The Pixes, "Brick Is Red". Yes, the Pixes are the best band ever. No, really jackass. They are. This song, hidden away at the end of "Surfer Rosa", always reminds me of that warm, one-with-the-world feeling you can only get on a balmy summer evening. Listen to this over and over as you watch the sun set and realize how awesome life can be.

5. Jane's Addiction, "Summertime Rolls". Actually, I haven't heard this song in a year or two, but I was singing it to Audrey today and it reminded me of what a great summer album "Nothing's Shocking" is. This tune in particular is so sunny and sweet it reminds me of many long gone summers, and then I remember all over again why I loved Jane's Addiction so much in the first place.

Once again, I win the "Worst Blogger in The World" award. Its great to be here tonight, receiving this most esteemed token of my complete and total laziness and all around suckitude.

I would like to thank my wife and child, my family, the internet, work, other bloggers, reading, and everything else that fills my days and keeps me from writing this stupid shit that only 4 people read anyway.

For the most part, humanity is a worthless disease, infesting the earth like cockroaches in a sugar bin. Except for a few notable exceptions, we should probably be completely eradicated from the planet, leaving mother nature back in the state of perfect balance. Clearly there is no god, otherwise a fiery vengance would have been unleashed upon us without mercy long, long ago. And, if we were created as an experiment by some alien race, I beseech them to come back post-hatse and clean up their fucking mess.

p.s. For all you blog nazi's out there "moustache" is a variation, and I feel, much more entertaining spelling of the word "mustache". So save your whining for when you bask in the glory of the stash, slutbags.

Who knew so many people liked us?
On Friday Angela’s parents sent us out for Mexican food while they watched the baby. I had A BEER and we were gone for 52 MINUTES! We are horrible parents…
Saturday, we went over to the Boutwell’s to see Meredith, Chris and their 4-week old Josie. Chris and Mere were a riot (as always) and Josie is REALLY cute. With both babies in the room, the cuteness factor was almost too much to handle. Plus, Chris spiked up Josie’s hair and it looked just like mine. Lucky baby.
On Saturday night Jen and Bill came over with a fully prepared meal consisting of Lasagna, bread, cookies, salad, and non-alcoholic champagne. The only thing we provided was the grape soda! We had a great time, and the food was wonderful (actually, we had left-overs tonight). We can’t wait to see their little speck in a few months.
Sunday was Grandparent extravaganza. Both sets of ‘rents showed up to take turns holding the Tiny Worm. My Mom and Pop sent us out for an all expenses paid trip to La Fonda (on of Angela’s favorites) while they watched Audrey.
Last night I let Angela get some sleep and I watched Baby Girl. I fed that fat baby 2 OUNCES of milk right after Angela had fed her! Needless to say she slept most the night.
Angela and I would like to give a big thank you to everyone who has shown their love and support. From phonecalls to dinners to good conversation, everything people have done for us is so appreciated. Since a lot of daily life can seem so drab and negative, it’s a nice change of pace to experience so much positive emotion for a change.
Thank you.

A quick post to say Happy Late Birthday to Mike and Paul2k5!!1
And yes Mike, hopefully we'll bring Baby Girl out to Portland sometime in the near future.
Hope you guys had a great Birfday throwdown and stuff.

Well, it’s been 1 week and 10 hours since Baby Girl was born-I can’t believe she’s already been in our lives a week!
We are slowly but surely getting her on a semi-regular schedule of feedings and sleepings, so that Angela and I can often sleep for a few hours straight during the night.
Of course, being a combination of two highly evolved humans, she is a far superior model of baby than most. She can: Turn her head, lift her head, reach for objects, kick & punch her dad in a boobie seeking rage, and stand. Yes suckers, fucking stand. Admittedly it’s only for a second, but still, quite an accomplishment for a 1 week old.
Next week, she’s mowing the lawn while Daddy sips margaritas on the veranda. Sweet.
My amazement and love for her have grown, although that hardly seems possible since I love her so much already.
Also, I have a nearly uncontrollable urge to kiss and tickle her all over-my mode of attack is to wait until she’s all drunk on sweet boobie juice, then I move in: kisses on the cheek, forehead, hands, feet, toes, and tickles all over. I play with her teeny tiny hands and feet and she’s too content and happy being full to stop me. Hee-hee!
Another highlight of my day is getting to feed her the Evening Daddy Bottle. Its cool ‘cause we get to bond, and she always gives me a weird look like, “Hey, you’re not the one with the boobies! You’ve been holding out on me!”.
Also, I change diapers whenever she needs it. I never thought I would be so excited about poo before.
All in all, I just pray that she’ll be healthy and safe.
She is, to us anyway, perfect.

Here is my newest tattoo done by Richard (formerly at Black Cat Tattoo, now at Monster Tattoo in Lilburn). He's the same artist who did the girl on my forearm, and the star on my left bicep. He's an awesome artist and an all-around nice guy.

Angela did most of the art and I did the lettering-we were kinda' going for an old-school, slightly rough sailor design. It turned out perfectly -just like little Argie!

As many of you may know, Angela gave birth to our “little” girl, Audrey Rose Georges, on Friday, May 13^th, 2005.

Thursday May 12^th rolled around and there were almost no signs that Audrey was coming anytime soon, so I was at work, figuring I had another weekend to get the house ready and do chores before the little bundle of joy arrived. My cell phone rang and I didn’t think much of it-I knew Angela had been to the doctor that morning and I assumed we would have to wait until next week to have the baby. However, my premonition had been that the 13^th would be the day, and I was right.

“Come home, we’re going to the hospital,” Angela said. I told my boss and sped off. Fugazi’s album “13 Songs” was playing in my truck when I started it up, featuring the songs “Waiting Room”(“sitting in the waiting room! A-ha!”) and “Badmouth” (“you can’t be what you were. So you better start being just what you are”). Very appropriate.

The birth process takes a LONG time. And for all you fools even considering doing natural birth, it may take quite a while longer. The first 18 hours at the hospital sucked so much ass that words cannot even describe. First we waited for about 6 hours in a tiny hospital room while the baby was monitored. Apparently it was a very busy day and there were a lot of births going on so we had to wait for a big room. So we sat there and watched TV, which doesn’t sound so bad except that we were kinda hoping to have a baby sometime soon. They gave Angela some medication to thin her cervix, and then, around 10 P.M. the contractions began. Angela described them as like menstrual cramps. Now, obviously I’ve never had cramps, but I’ve been around women who are having them and from what I hear they are pretty painful. As the night wore on the contractions got worse and worse. By about 3 in the morning they moved us into the larger “birthing” room, and Angela was in so much pain she couldn’t sleep at all. Every 5 minutes or so her face would contort, she would curl into a ball, grip the bed rail and moan. Then she started throwing up at the end of every contraction, probably due to pain and anxiety. And I couldn’t do a thing but feed her ice and cry. Honestly, it was the most awful few hours of my life. The nurses were waiting for a doctor to arrive with the morning shift, so they couldn’t give her an epidural yet. They gave her some narcotics and some anti-nausea medicine, which didn’t help one fucking bit. Finally, at about 8:15 A.M. I went out to the nurse’s station and demanded they get a doctor and give her the epidural RIGHT NOW. Within an hour Angela had received the epidural and was feeling pretty good. She still had pain in one area of her pelvis, so they increased the epidural dose and it was smooth sailing from there. Three painless hours later she was fully dialated and ready to push. About 8-10 contractions and 15 minutes of pushing later and Baby Audrey came shooting out, covered in blood and wailing like a banshee.

For the most part, all the hospital staff at Northside were excellent. Birth is an EXTREMELY gory and messy affair. Blood, fluids, and unidentifiable liquids abound. Plus, seeing a tiny, misshapen head emerge from your wife’s private-ist of privates is really weird, to say the least. That all said, I didn’t really even notice it. Some folks say, “Oh golly! Watching the epidural go in is horrible! You may feint!”. Bullshit. If you have any human decency at all you will be far too focused on your wife to even notice how much of a pansy you are compared to her.

I know you’ve heard all the clichés before. How great it is, how much you’ll love the baby, etc. Well, let me tell you, they’re all true, times about 100 billion-million. The whole process was probably the most extremely emotional experience of my entire life.

I have a new-found respect for how tough Angela can be-she was nothing short of amazing through the entire ordeal: the pain & nausea of contractions, the effort of pushing, the frustration of sleeplessness and the difficulty teaching both herself and Audrey to breastfeed. I can only imagine how hard it must have been, and she continues to impress and surprise me with her resilience (hey Angela, my birthday’s coming up soon and I sure would like…just kidding).

Our families and friends have been beyond great. The whole experience has just brought out so much love and concern and caring from people, I am reminded of how truly lucky I am. Thank you everyone.

Audrey is awesome. Since I first saw her, covered in slimy blood, I loved her like nothing else. On a strictly objective note, she is a good-looking baby. In my years of baby-sitting I’ve seen ugly babies, especially newborns which can be hairy, blotchy, yellowish, have misshapen heads, etc. Audrey is proportionate, pink and cute as a button. Of course, to me, she is the most beautiful thing ever. I love just holding her in my hands and looking in her eyes, kissing her fat cheeks, or playing with her tiny tiny toes. Sometimes, just thinking about her makes me cry. I would kill every ninja on earth to protect her, if I had to (note to ninjas: I’m fucking serious. Don’t try me). I will resort to all manner of inane sounds or conversations to keep her from crying. I worry about her all the time. If she’s sleeping, often I’ll poke her a little just to make sure she’s still alive. I will gladly put aside my own feelings to help her and not think a thing about it. She is truly wonderful.

Of course, life has been insane since she was born, but I can’t wait until she can talk and asks Daddy for her first Mohawk. Then the real fun begins…

Holy shit, this thing is still on the internet?

I won't even begin to apololgize for the lack of updates. After so long, what would be the point?

I will say the this is the first night in at least a month I have been done working before 9 p.m. Overtime at work, house painting job in Inman Park, Victory Designs orders from January, Angela's ever-expanding "honey do" list, springtime lawn care...well at least I've got MOST of the stuff done I need to.

So now you know. I'm a working machine.

My new job at Avery is pretty cool. The people are nice, and it rules that I'm actually getting paid to learn so much hardcore carpentry. I'm so busy all day that I hardly ever notice what time it is. Plus, I don't wake up dreading going to work, which is always a bonus. In a month or two I'll be eligible for insurance, which is crucial since Angela will soon be losing hers.

The baby will be here any day, I just wish she'd hurry up. I can't even remember what Angela looks like when she's not pregnant. Sheesh.

Good new music-the first Jolie Holland "Catalpa".

No time to read, except for magazines, so no good books lately.

I wish Angela and I were famous painters who lived in Tahiti.

In the past 8 or 9 months, life has been incredibly hectic. Job changes, firings, hirings, pregnancy, quitting smoking, no drinking. When life is hard I tend to look to the past as proof that things can be better. As I mentioned last time, nostalgia has been snuggling up to me like a warm, fluffy puppy, making everything in the present seem like a cold, bleak ghost compared to the golden times of yore. Yeah right.

One night in the early spring of 2001, a couple of friends and I went out on the town. What began as a few beers quickly turned into a night of revelry. We got kicked out of one bar for staging a fake fight, and another for having the most radical moves on the dance floor. Clearly I needed another drink, so I decided to go visit Angela at the bar where she worked at the time. Before I even get to the door Angela came running out of the bar.
“My ex-boyfriend is in there, please don’t cause a scene.”
The ex-boyfriend who treated the love of my life like garbage.
The ex-boyfriend who had caused the best woman in the world so much hurt.
The ex-boyfriend who didn’t deserve to breathe the same air as Angela was in the bar.
Without a first thought I burst in the door and demanded, “Which one of you is Jamie?”
A guy at the bar, who looked more like a regular guy than Satan or Hitler, looked at me funny and said, “Me, why?”.
I stared him straight in the eye and said, “I just wanted you to know that when you decided to treat Angela like shit all those years, you lost the best girl you’ll ever have in your life.”
“Fuck you,” he said.
“Stand up and say that to my face.”
He didn’t.
“That’s what I thought,” I said.
I grabbed a beer from the bar, chugged it down, and walked out the door.
Now stop right there.

I should’ve walked outside, bent Angela over backward with a passionate kiss, and gone home, knowing I had finally told that dastardly jerk what he needed to hear.

Unfortunately, I wasn’t done being mad, so Angela and I had it out in the parking lot.
Eventually, the bar owner, her boss, asked me to leave and go home. I left angry and feeling like a fool. Because of my blow up, I was banned from the bar for quite some time, and I didn’t set foot in there for years to come.
Since then, I’ve hung out with that no-goodnick Jamie quite a few times, and he’s not such a bad guy. A confused, stupid, messed up boyfriend, maybe, but really not a bad person at all (although he DID loose the best girl he’ll ever have in his life, I was right about that).
Sometimes the past is more like a beer soaked rat than a warm puppy I guess.

Why write about the past at all? Because I want my soon-to be born daughter to read this some day (when she’s older, of course) and know her father was human. I triumphed, I failed, I did stupid stuff, I did some great stuff-we all do, and that’s life. Many parents (mine included) hide their imperfections and their past failures from their kids and in the process loose some of their uniqueness, their humanity. It’s these similar stories, these shared experiences, which help bring people together and bind us to one another. So here is part of my story.

A good quote by Jim Harrison (author of “Legends of the Fall” which I’ve never read or seen):
“I like grit, I like love and death, I’m tired of irony…I would rather give full vent to all human loves and disappointments, and take a chance on being corny, than die a smartass.”

Here’s a little tale I’ve been meaning to tell for a while.
Last May Angela and I went to Saint Petersburg, FL to see our friends Kelly and Joel get married. Without a doubt that weekend was one of the best times in my life. The wedding actually took place on Treasure Island, and the entire wedding party stayed in a Holiday Inn right on the beach. Every morning we would wake up to the sound of the ocean waves and the laughing seagulls that nested on the roof next door. The weather was perfect-the exact temperature where you don’t have to wear much clothing, but can if you want to without being too hot. We spent a lot of time with Kelly and Joel and their families, drinking and laughing and having tons of fun. Angela and I snuck off a few times to go thrift store shopping-I found some awesome old tiki mugs and she found the coolest embroidered jacket that has ever been thrifted. I was managing Gildid at the time, so I had plenty of money to spend-in fact, I was talking to Joel one night about my job and he commented, “Man, that sounds like an awesome job,” and I remember thinking for the thousandth time that year that it was by far the best job I had ever had. The actual wedding was one of the most beautiful I had ever seen. It was on the beach-I mean, 50 feet from the ocean. At the Bride and Groom’s request all the guests were dressed in black, and the wedding party was dressed in white. When Joel saw Kelly walk down the aisle he burst into tears at how beautiful she looked. The ceremony was short and sweet, the setting sun casting the entire scene in pinks and oranges and reds. A pirate ship passed by about 100 yards offshore, then turned around and passed by again-it was that kind of strange and beautiful weekend where every little thing went right and I remember looking out over the ocean and thinking that very few times in my life had I been so happy.
Flash forward to November and its funny how much can change in six short fucking months. Joel’s brother Justin was getting married, so Angela and I were back in Saint Pete. We had made plans to attend the wedding, purchasing our plane tickets and such, but somewhere in there we had gotten pregnant. Which was great, except the weekend was filled with two of my favorite pastimes that I had recently given up-drinking and smoking. Crap. No problem, we would just use our spare time looking for houses-we had been talking about moving to Florida for 3 years, so now was the time to get serious. Somehow though, all the neighborhoods we had looked at back in May weren't as cool as I we remembered-the schools weren’t that great, the homes were small for the price thanks to a recent price boom, and suddenly a “transitional” area translated into “dangerous for children”. The night of the rehearsal dinner was fun-we finally got to see Joel play with a band and that was awesome. After the show the party was just getting started and we were just getting tired as hell. So, we skipped out and decided to get a near-by hotel room and relax and watch some cable. However, that weekend just happened to be Wing Fest in downtown Saint Pete. No, I’m not kidding-an entire weekend devoted to fried chicken wings and general red-neckery. Every hotel room within 15 miles was either $250 a night or booked solid. I had been laid off my job at Gildid at the end of May, so I was watching my money and wondering when my job at the Doctor’s would end. Angela and I decided, what the hell-we’ll drive the 30 minutes to Treasure Island and stay on the beach. What we didn’t know was that November is apparently peak tourist season-EVERY hotel on the beach was full. We decided to try the Holiday Inn we had stayed at in May (which, according to my parents, has been there since before I was born). We pulled in the parking lot and realized that the Inn was closed-for good. The inside was in mid-demolition, and the huge green Holiday Inn street sign had the letters ripped out. Thankfully, Kelly and Joel, being the coolest ever, let us stay at their place. We had to drive to a bar all the way back in St. Pete to get Kelly’s keys, then drive another 30 minutes to her house before we could put poor Angela to bed. The wedding itself was nice and in a really cool old building and hanging out with Kelly and Joel and their families was great, but by the end of the weekend we were glad to go home.
Lately, I have been crushed by nostalgia. This is a common thing for me-I always remember the past as being better than where I am now-but its been really bad lately and anything can set me off-music, people smoking, trees without leaves, pictures of trees with leaves, cold, heat, sleep, no sleep, etc. Soon I’ll have to leap forward or be stuck in a morass of reliving half-imagined past glories.
We’re having a baby. I’ll find a new job. Spring will come.
I’m making the jump.
Hey not all things are bad!
I like: Garden State (Zach Braff rules!), “Hairstyles of the Damned” by Joe Meno (a book about your high school life story written by someone else-some of the similarities to my own time in school are downright eerie), Sleepytime Tea by Celestial Seasonings, feeling the baby poke at me from inside Angela’s tummy, bright beach-blue baby rooms, and the thought of chopping down some motherfucking trees before spring.

Another Christmas, here and soon to be gone. Damn-feels like it should still be June...of 1993. Last night Angela and I went to Fontaines in Virginia Highland for some x-mas eve seafood. It was early(about 6), and only the hard-corest of lushes were out drinking. Watching the bar folk smoke and drink their way into oblivion, I felt a little nostalgic. I always enjoyed going out for a drink or 5 on x-mas eve-everyone is laid back, its much less crowded, good cheer abounds, and you can count on getting at least one free shot before the night is through. Ah, the good old days. Afterwards we drove around the Highlands and Inman Park and looked at all the lights-it was 7 P.M. and the streets were quiet and serene. On nights like that I could almost love this city.

Angela and I have been together 5 x-mases-that's half a decade of x-mas fun! Wow, time does fly. This will be our last x-mas together without a child in our life. From here on out it'll be totally different. I can't wait.

I won't get all philosofical about how this, and most other, christian holidays were stolen from the pagans-why ruin the mood?

Hope everyone is having a wonderful giftmas and happy holidays! See you at the new years party.

P.S. Uh, hello ladies? Tony? Paul? If precedent is any indicator, we all know who Jen's dream was about, thank you very much.

Angela and I saw the movie "Spanglish" earlier tonight, which was an excellent movie that we both highly reccomend. I won't ruin it for you, but it combines some interesting aspects of reality and Hollywood. When we got home, I read Tony's Blog and was surprised at a similarity between what he wrote and the movie.

Tony is completely right-EVERYONE regrets something. But more importantly, realizing that you will have regrets in life is an important lesson. When we are young we think in Black and White: I will meet the perfect person, I won't regret anything, I will always treat everyone with respect, etc., etc. As we get older though, we learn more and more that life is a wide range of experiences, not just the simplicity of absolutes. Sure, you might meet the person who is perfect for you, but that might mean that you infuriate each other by your shortcomings and thereby become better people over time. Maybe you won't regret anything, but then (as Tony points out) you may never learn from your mistakes.

But the thing I liked about the movie and Tony's Blog, is how they both point out that life works in unexpected and often extremely painful ways, but somehow you learn and grow and laugh and move on to experience another day. Life can be oddly reassuring in its sweetly sad uncertainty.

Also, I'm torn between being a lumberjack or a beach bum. I guess with my first million I'll have to buy one house in the Bahamas and one house in the Yukon. Anyone want to visit.

I just spent the last hour writing a post about how life can seem negative and I was tired of having a pessimistic attitude.

Then, as I finished, Angela's 1983 Dell with the Pentium .01 decided it didn't want to save my stuff anymore, and the entire entry was lost.

So much for not having a negative fucking attitude-people who create technology really need a little more training in practical applications and a little less in computer theory. But that's a post for another day.

Looking over my last 2 posts I realize I may have sounded a bit negative, but honestly this isn't my intention.

Its just that, one morning in the recent past I woke up and found myself becoming a bitter old bastard. When I was 18 or 21 my negativity was flippant, off-handed and sarcastic-it always contained an undercurrent of humor. But somewhere along the line I started believing my own bullshit and the negativity became like a mantra.

Every day my mind comes up with ideas for projects I'd like to do. Some of them, like the home-made flame thrower and the time-unraveling machine, are best left unstarted. But many times I just don't do things because of a gigantic doom-colored wall of, "ah, why fucking bother." You how it is-"why bother doing a journal, no one really cares what I think. Or: why do artwork, no one wants to see that shit." So, you end up doing nothing.

So, bitching and moaning was not the point of the last 2 posts. These thoughts had just been eating at me for a while, and I thought maybe a different perspective would be helpful. Not that I think someone will write in the comments box, "well, God is cool" and I'll go-"HOLY SHIT! JESUS BE PRAISED! HE'S RIGHT-GOD IS COOL!". But I hope that by putting some of my thoughts out there someone may offer an insight I may not have considered before.

We are doing the Atlanta Gift Show in January, which is a BIG deal. There is still a ton to do, and Angela can't help as much as usual, because she's preggo and all. I'm excited, and I can't wait to see how things turn out.

Tony is the winner for first comment in what will hopefully be a regular updating of this loser log. Congrats Tony! Also he makes a good point:
"... Organized religion is crap. Mankind's worst moments have all been at the hands of religious conflict. Even if religion had brought me some sort of relief or strength, I still don't think I could condone something that has caused and continues to cause so much evil and destruction in the world. Rampant use of nothing more than a story book as justification for violence proves that we are not that far removed from the dumb apes that religious types believe we are not even related to. "
The horrors committed in god's name are yet another reason for me to shun the religion of my childhood, and another thing that ultimately drove me from the church. Hypocrisy in its most revolting form seems to be the norm for organized american religion. Example: At the Doctor's church (Lutheran) a few Sunday’s ago the sermon was about Lazarus. He laid sick &dying outside the rich man's house, but the rich bastard didn't help him. So he died there alone. All the righteous pricks in the church sat there, nodding their oh-so-holy heads, thinking,"Oh yeah, that rich guy is a jerk. He didn't help poor old Lazarus.". Uh-huh. How many of these pious churchgoers pass homeless people on their way to church every Sunday and don't do a fucking thing about it? Personally, I see AT LEAST 4-5 homeless people every time I go downtown. If this is such a "christian" country, why doesn't every bum have a gaggle of concerned christians flocking around them trying to help save their lost souls?
Yes, yes my brothers and sisters-Love thy neighbor as thyself! Unless they are a fag or a jew or a black person or a china man or a buddhist or an arab or a muslim or not-american or an american that thinks differently than me. Then it’s ok to hate their ass.
Now, 2 side notes:
1. I didn't start this conversation to rant and rave. Pointing out the flaws within the christian church is way too fucking easy for any semi-intelligent person.
2. This is the last time I will apologize for ranting in this blog. I, for one, am sick and tired of hearing people who get passionate about certain subjects suddenly end their "rant", look about sheepishly, and mumble "sorry dude. that shit just makes me mad...". Fuck that. Perhaps if people throughout history weren't afraid to get mad about injustice then shit wouldn't be so bad today. The right has its overly emotional windbags (limbaugh, hannity, bore-rtz)-maybe its time the left got some also.
ANYWAY, no I don't think organized religion (at least organized christianity) is for me. But, I do believe wholeheartedly that having a spiritual base in your life is important. Or do I? Maybe this "spiritual" feeling is just a byproduct of having large, overactive brains. Maybe what you see in life is what you get.
It just seems to me that writing off love as just a squirt of chemicals in your brain, or looking at a sunset over the vast ocean as just completely random, or meeting people by chance who seem so compatible with us-if these things in life have no greater meaning or importance, well, that just seems like a dark and lonely way to look at life.
And that's what bothers me.

Well, well, well...
Here I am again.
Unfortunately this long-overdue update isn't going to be some fun "what I've been up to" recap of my international partying and multi-million dollar lifestyle. Oh no, quite the opposite.

WAIT WAIT WAIT! PLEASE don't go read Homestar Runner or some other enjoyably lighthearted site without giving me a chance first.

From the moment I can remember being alive I have had religion in my life. Literally. I went to Saint David's Episcopal church in Roswell from age three until I left for college at 18. Unless I was very sick or out of town I went to church every Sunday and all holidays (including Ash Wednesday, Fat Tuesday, etc.). Sometimes, when my family was out of town, we went to a church in whatever town we were vacationing in. Needless to say, as a three year old I didn't ask questions like, "So, how exactly does the water and wine turn into Jesus’ actual flesh and blood?". However, since I had been "indoctrinated" to this form of belief for my entire life, I just assumed Christianity and it's tenets were true. Even as a young adult (18-21) I still held the concepts of Christianity to be basically true.

(As a side note, the Episcopal Church isn't NEARLY as right wing and reactionary as many Christian sects. We were taught to respect other ideas and religions and we were NEVER taught to hate gays, abortionists, etc.)

Once I started college I quit going to church, mainly because I wanted to relax whenever I wasn't working or doing school stuff. If my 1 day off a week was Sunday, I sure as fuck wasn't getting up at 8 a.m. to go to church. Needless to say, over time this left a void in my life, since my spiritual needs had been fulfilled by Christianity for so many years. For a while using drugs filled this void in me. Believe it or not, drug use is actually a widely acknowledged form of spiritual exploration in both ancient and modern societies. See, for instance, the TV Series "The Power of Myth" by Joseph Campbell & Bill Moyers, the books of Timothy Leary, or even the song from the Tool album Aenima "Third Eye" with the lyric, "prying open my third eye"(that is, using drugs to gain spiritual knowledge as opposed to, say, prayer or meditation). I still believe that using drugs allowed me to open my mind and see life and the world from different perspectives that I may have never even considered without drugs. But the problem with using drugs to open yourself to spiritual knowledge is its messiness and inaccuracy-you are more open to new or foreign ideas, but you have less of a threshold to filter out the bullshit. Hence the existence of cults, Birkinstocks,the Grateful Dead and Hippies.

(Also, let's make 1 point clear: I was doing drugs mainly for fun. Doing drugs can make you feel good-that's why most people do 'em. But, for many others, and myself you start doing drugs for fun and gradually discover the spiritual aspect that can come with getting high. It is my belief, in retrospect, that drugs helped fill the spiritual void I was experiencing due to the loss of belief in Christianity.)

However, drugs clearly have a lot of drawbacks like overdoses, D.W.I.s and jail (none of which I experienced during college, which may be proof of God in and of itself!) and I eventually quit using them. So, spiritually, I was lost again.

For a few years I went back and forth-from believing in God to just not thinking about spiritual things at all. Mostly I just drifted about with the vague but uniquely American concept of "God with a little g". You know: "there is some higher power but as long as I'm a good person everything will be alright and I'll go to heaven even though I know damn well these Nikes are made by children in China but I'm not whipping the little bastards and I love my mom and the United States so i'll be alright and go to heaven for sure." A pseudo-religion of non-commitment and no-risk.

And then I started watching the news with stories of serial killers murdering babies in front of their mothers.

And reading things like Punk Planet, "A People's History of the United States", and "Lies My Teacher Told Me".

And listening to fools like George W. preach the gospel of Jesus (a prophet of peace) while dressed in s general's uniform.

And hearing on NPR stories of the genocide in Rwanda and thinking of how fucking horrible THAT must have been only to have it start all over again in Sudan.

And watching a bunch of ignorant red-neck fucks use "christianity" to rationalize everything from the crappy "Left Behind" book series to shooting abortion doctors.

Where o' where is the great, capital G God that I had heard of all my life? And why o' why is he letting all this really incredibly bad shit happen?

I asked a priest and he said,"the greatest gift God gave us is free will". Fine. Free will and individuality are great. But like anyone who has ever owned a pet can tell you, Fido shouldn't be able to eat the neighbor's children and then crap on the rug just because its his "free will".

Oh you're still here? Wow! Even I was getting bored with myself there for a minute...

Do we really need spirituality in our lives? Its my belief that we do, but logically it makes more sense for humanity to be an experiment put here by a space traveling alien race than for some all powerful, vague god-ghost thing to have created us in his image. And if the monotheistic religions aren't right, then who is? Hindus? Satanists? Hippies(god-forbid)?

Maybe life as we know it is just a random occurrence of cells and their completely random interactions and after the collection of cells that is my body ceases to be alive then "Tim Georges II" is gone forever.

Why does all of this matter? Well, it has been bothering me for over a year now, but suddenly it seems much more important to me. Because we're having a baby. How can I tell a child, "Don't misbehave" if I believe that we're only here for a fleeting moment in this black, empty, howling void? Or, if the Christian idea of God is true, shouldn't I raise my child to be a social worker or a charity director because the entire point of Christianity is treating your fellow man as you would be treated (another point lost on the "religious" right)?

I have no answers, only nagging questions. I've been writing for 2 hours now and I'm exhausted.

Yes I deleted yesterday's entry. I spent WAY too much time last night trying to get it to post pictures-first on shit-fish(aka snapfish) which didn't work at all and then on fuck-face station (aka imagestation) which worked, then didn't work, then showed 3 pics, then worked fine on my computer until this morning. Fuck it. That's what you get for using free internet programs. Can't you nerds make anything that works easily? I guess not...

The Valiant didn't sell on Ebay. I may relist it in a week or so, or I may put it in the Auto Trader, I'm not sure yet. Fuck.

Today I went and got my Wellbutrin to begin my gradual descent into non-smoker hell. Last time I used the Wellbutrin it really helped-except with my insurance plan at the time it was $100 a month-I figured it was cheaper to just keep smoking. I'm excited about quitting actually, so I won't be out of breath after...well, just about anything. Sheesh, I'm breathing hard just from typing.

I did nothing today. A general sense of malaise has settled over me since last night when my car didn't sell. Hopefully I'll snap out of it soon.

Speaking of great shows, Against Me! is playing the Masquerade October 28th with the Blood Brothers. I bought the Blood Brothers CD a while back and promptly decided to sell it, but Against Me! rules as we all know.

I know they're no Belle and Sebastion or Pedro the Lion but I think it'll be a pretty good show nonetheless.

The last three days have been the greatest. I spent most of my time either shopping for Victory Design supplies or working in the shop. Our garage (aka The Shop) is a disaster-tools, sawdust, and cigarette butts everywhere. I am so dirty I look homeless. Rock on. I plan to make as much product (uh-huh-huh, you said product) as possible, clean the HAIL out of the shop and then do all the painting. Today I finally got to make some designs that Angela and I invented (as opposed to simply reinterpreting designs from my old job), which was a lot of fun. So far I have 12 pieces done, which is about half of what I'll need. So far so good.

The Valiant is up to $1425 on Ebay with 4 days left-not bad. Also 47 people are watching, so I figure my little darling might sell after all. It IS an awesome daily driver, especially for a classic car-low gas mileage (respectively), low repair cost, easy to find parts, etc. A few hundred bucks spent on the interior and you've got a real beauty. Listen to me-I sound like a used car salesman. I just hope she goes to a good home.

Anyone hear any great new music lately? Social Distortion is playing the Tabernacle in October with Tiger Army and I'll be sure to be there. I won't even bother to post a Tiger Army link here, because no one who reads this blog would like them one bit. But I think they're great in a Misfits-do-Rockabilly kinda' way. So there.

Tomorrow its back to work with The Doctor. I'll call everyone I know on my way to work at 6:30 A.M.

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