The sidebar is on vacation.

So I finally decided to get off my ass and post something.

I have something like a gozillion half-written entries. An entry about a disastrous trip to Wendy's, an entry about my trip to California to see Elise which, among other things, finally broke my depression, an entry about my new temp job that I loathe and despise, an entry about why I carelessly hurt people I love, an entry about the basketball team that carelessly breaks my heart, an entry about five of my favorite songs of all time, an entry about my new musical passion, and an entry that will very likely turn you all on your ear as it is about how right now, today, at this moment, not always and probably not forever, but right now, I hate religion.

They're all there, sort of written, kind of put together, mostly disassembled blatherings that wouldn't make sense to anyone. Kind of like my head these days.

Would you like snippets?

So it was, on this fateful day in the fall of 1977, that Elizabeth, the brand new first grader, met Elise, the girl with the white blonde hair.

I don't miss it. I don't miss it at all. And to be completely honest, I more than don't miss it. I have disdain for it.

Anyway, what captivated me about this song is the fact that it has a 7/8 time signature, which I had never heard in a pop song before. And the fact that it contains the line "You'll never have to sweep the floor." A seductive line if ever there was one.

So it took me almost two weeks to actually break down and cry in the office. I'm surprised I lasted that long.

My years at this school were, to be hokey about it, the best years of my life, and I want them and everything about them to remain frozen. I want to be able to go back and walk across campus and have everything be the same. I don't want whistles to break, and I don't want coaches to leave.

Now. I'm ashamed to tell you that I came very, very close to throwing the big-ass root beer through the window at him out of sheer frustration. But I didn't. I said "Okay." I drove around the building and into the parking lot. I got out of the car, carrying this giant goddamned root beer that I never wanted in the first place, and went into the store.

I don't know how it happens. I think I forget sometimes that life isn't like television, where you can roll your eyes and shake your head and things go back to normal just because you say so, because it's not and they don't.

I do believe that the greatest invention in the entire world is something called a practice mute.

I offer these up as proof that I have been writing. I have been writing a lot. But I get distracted, overwhelmed, discouraged, what have you, and I close up the HTML editor without ever actually finishing anything.

I don't know why, but I'm working on it. My goal is to post all of these entries in their entirety by the end of May. Feel free to smack me around a little if I don't.

Remember when I said I didn't have any pictures of my grandfather, but that I'd get one next time and post it? We went to visit him on Saturday.

Can you believe this is a 97-year-old man who had a heart attack five weeks ago?

Me either.