Again i update the journal of doom
And to all my adoring fans, I present to you...
Coping without batteries
By August Baker
I thought I was going crazy when the cat statue started talking to me. The problem wasn’t so much the statue talking, but what it said. If a cat statue is going to speak, it should meow or purr or something, not give me advice on my love life, or tell me where to go to buy groceries, or explain why Bush is doing such a horrible job. But that’s exactly what it’s done throughout the whole, long, summer.
At first, I ignored the whispers coming from the statue. I convinced myself it was faint chattering from an open window; maybe the neighbors left their TV on loud enough to carry to the ground. That worked for a while, and when it stopped working, I bought a cheap CD player and headphones. When the half dead batteries I put in the CD player died completely, I kept wearing the headphones, tucking the loose plug into my pocket. I didn’t have any spare batteries, and always forgot to buy more when I was out. I never told Deb anything about it, but I wondered if the cat talked to her too, or if I really was going crazy.
I have a pretty active imagination, but talking statues were too much even for me. At least, a mundane talking statue. If it had been a cool statue, like the Lincoln Memorial, or a church gargoyle, well, that would be neat enough to be interesting. But a pussycat? Not interesting. That’s how I finally decided I was going crazy. Rational thought determined my insanity. If it was just my imagination, I could have found something much cooler to project my thoughts on. Because even in my insane state, I figured the statue wasn’t really talking to me, as much as voicing my own insecurities. When it said, “Don’t be a fool, no one can possibly believe that!” it was really telling me that my latest idea was worthless. Statues are made of stone, and can’t talk; my psychological deficiencies were the only logical explanation. I’ve ignored my thoughts for so long, kept them strangled inside, and they have had enough. Now I do everything I can to escape them, but it’s not enough; they just chase me down and force me to listen.
Sometimes I get inspired to write something. That’s one part of the active imagination I guess. Nothing ever comes from it, but that’s what makes it a hobby and not a job. Unless someone starts paying me to play video games or read fantasy novels, writing will be just like the rest of my hobbies. I sat down at my computer desk, moved the keyboard and grabbed a pen. Notebook, need a notebook too. Fortunately, I have tons of notebooks, half-filled with long neglected writing projects I promised myself I would go back to. This would be cool. A story about a guy trying to rescue someone. His girlfriend? Daughter? The President? I didn’t know yet. And I could throw in some mystical elements too. I touched the pen to the paper.
“You gotta be kidding me,” I muttered. My Bic wasn’t working. I shook it, licked the tip, scribbled in the corner. The damn thing still wasn’t working. Somewhere I had more. I opened one drawer after another, finding all manner of useless stuff: used notebooks, floppy disks, dead batteries, but no pens. I swore.
I was making dinner for Deb. Spaghetti, one of the few things I can cook without setting off the fire alarms. I unhooked them anyways, just to be safe. I like to do random things like this for her. I would like to think it’s for selfless reasons, to make her happy, but that’s only partially true. Her happiness is important, but I’m always scared that if I don’t do enough, she’ll leave me. I know she wouldn’t unless I seriously screwed up, but still. So I make spaghetti to surprise her when she gets home from work.
When I was about to put the sauce on the burner, I found that we had no Parmesan cheese, a catastrophe when making a romantic spaghetti dinner. Leaving the burners on, then realizing that was a stupid idea and going back to turn them off, I jumped out the door. I didn’t grab my headphones in the rush out, so I hummed loudly to myself when walking outside, keeping an eye on the statue out of the corner of my eye. I hummed louder. I made it back from the grocery store five minutes before Deb pulled into the parking lot, giving me just enough time to get the sauce boiling and look hard at work.
I told her about my day at work, with the new Boss. She laughed in all the right places except for one. My joke fell flat, but it happens sometimes. We spent the rest of the night snuggling on the couch, watching TV before going to bed. She was pretty happy, so I was pretty happy. That’s how it usually works.
There’s one problem with living life day by day. It lacks focus. It lacks goals. It’s also part of a never-ending cycle. Without previous goals there’s no motivation to set goals, and there’s definitely no motivation to stick with them. This day-by-day life is nice, don’t get me wrong. It has a simplicity that does wonders for stress. The only things I ever worry about are Deb and lately that damn cat. It’s just lacking. It’s all the same. Get up, eat, go to work, do work stuff, eat lunch with the girlfriend, go back to work, come home, eat, do something by myself, do something with the girlfriend, go to bed. Everything else is out there, in the realm of fantasy. And fantasy can be ignored, or written off as whimsical when it’s actually more possible then you think. But thinking like that is dangerous because then you might actually do something and move towards that fantasy and break the comfortable routine you spent so long setting up. It’s easier to stick to things day by day.
Deb keeps getting in the way of the day-to-day lifestyle though, and I’m never sure if that’s a good or bad thing. I don’t have a problem with keeping my fantasies out of reach, but she has plans. Big plans. I don’t want to hold her back with my unwillingness to do anything. We’ve talked about it, but never reached a conclusion. The best solution I think would be for me to get off my ass and live one of those dreams. Then we could meet in the middle. As of now though, I’m holding her back, I know it, and she knows it even if she doesn’t admit it. But I don’t want to let her go.
She really is too good for me.
Over the summer, I succeeded admirably in ignoring the words of wisdom from the cat statue. Maybe I should have listened to what it said, but disregarding it is so much easier. It’s probably not healthy in the long run to ignore one’s psyche like that, but I didn’t take enough psychology classes in school to know for sure. I didn’t even think about the statue most the time, but kept my headphones on a stand near the front door. Deb never asked about them; maybe she never noticed.
Our warm bodies were pressed against each other, my chest against Deb’s bare back. It is amazing how you can be so comfortable with someone that you can be half naked, laying in bed, and not think of sex. The fact that she was asleep helped. Nights are the worst for an active imagination though. She was sleeping soundly, breathing gently, and my mind was rolling over what I was going to do next. Or rather, what I wanted to do next, but never would. Then those fantasies get mixed in with my dreams tucking me to sleep in a comfy bed of delusions.
No milk. Unbelievable. We were completely out of milk. I thought about maybe some orange juice, but that probably wouldn’t go too well on my Coco Puffs. Better then apple juice anyways. Maybe. But we didn’t have any juice either, orange or apple or cranberry or any of those others. And we were out of soda, though I knew from experience that didn’t work. Plenty of water left. Joy. I stared blankly at my bowl, trying to wrap my mind around the lack of milk. It was simply too early not to have any milk. Milk milk milk no damn milk.
I looked at my watch and wondered where the last fifteen minutes went. I should have left ten minutes ago. I grabbed a handful of dry cereal and ate it down the stairs outside, crunching it in defense.
My car was out of gas. I valiantly turned the key, hoping to get to the gas station down the street. The needle staggered, then dropped, utterly defeated. I didn’t even bother trying again. The Boss would have to be called, which meant going back upstairs. Goddamnit.
“You won’t believe the deals you’ll find this weekend…”
“Shut up!” I yelled, drowning out the words, and backslapped the stupid statue. Not my smartest move. I called the Boss after crawling upstairs, telling him how I was going to walk and be late. He was pissed, but so was I. Beautiful. Then I called Deb after putting some ice on my swelling hand. Damn, it hurt. It hurt like, well, it hurt like I smacked a fucking statue as hard as I could. Not creative or evocative maybe, but accurate.
I came back downstairs, hand throbbing, and that damn cat was waiting for me. I sat down on its pedestal and leaned back against its flank. “Cat,” I said, not caring if anyone else heard me, “me and you need a truce.” No response. “You have to stop talking to me.” No response. “I have a life to live goddamnit. My job, my girlfriend, my life! Notice how you’re not on that list?” My voice was rising, but still no response.
I rolled off the pedestal, kneeling in front of the cat, staring at its cold, stoney eyes. “Leave me the fuck alone. Please.” My voice cracked from menacing to pleading. “Just leave me alone.” I dropped my eyes. My hands clasped together and tucked themselves in between the statues open paws. “Just leave me alone, and I’ll get my shit together. Just please, leave me alone.”
I leaned my forehead against its muzzle as though I could channel my sincerity into its inanimate head. My hands went further into the crevice between its paws, resting against the back of the statue. No, actually, my hands weren’t touching cold stone, but plastic. There was something tucked away in the darkness. I pulled it out. In my hands I held a small radio. Its tuning bar was pointing to the local talk radio station. It was silent, but the volume wheel was at its max. I almost dropped it as it let out a brief burst of static. Unbelieving, I turned it over in my hands again and again. It was very lightweight, even for its small size. I turned it on its front, and popped the battery case open.
If you have a few minutes, please take the time to tell me what you think. If I remember, I might post some of the, erm, more interesting comments some people in my class left me.
Coping without batteries
By August Baker
I thought I was going crazy when the cat statue started talking to me. The problem wasn’t so much the statue talking, but what it said. If a cat statue is going to speak, it should meow or purr or something, not give me advice on my love life, or tell me where to go to buy groceries, or explain why Bush is doing such a horrible job. But that’s exactly what it’s done throughout the whole, long, summer.
At first, I ignored the whispers coming from the statue. I convinced myself it was faint chattering from an open window; maybe the neighbors left their TV on loud enough to carry to the ground. That worked for a while, and when it stopped working, I bought a cheap CD player and headphones. When the half dead batteries I put in the CD player died completely, I kept wearing the headphones, tucking the loose plug into my pocket. I didn’t have any spare batteries, and always forgot to buy more when I was out. I never told Deb anything about it, but I wondered if the cat talked to her too, or if I really was going crazy.
I have a pretty active imagination, but talking statues were too much even for me. At least, a mundane talking statue. If it had been a cool statue, like the Lincoln Memorial, or a church gargoyle, well, that would be neat enough to be interesting. But a pussycat? Not interesting. That’s how I finally decided I was going crazy. Rational thought determined my insanity. If it was just my imagination, I could have found something much cooler to project my thoughts on. Because even in my insane state, I figured the statue wasn’t really talking to me, as much as voicing my own insecurities. When it said, “Don’t be a fool, no one can possibly believe that!” it was really telling me that my latest idea was worthless. Statues are made of stone, and can’t talk; my psychological deficiencies were the only logical explanation. I’ve ignored my thoughts for so long, kept them strangled inside, and they have had enough. Now I do everything I can to escape them, but it’s not enough; they just chase me down and force me to listen.
Sometimes I get inspired to write something. That’s one part of the active imagination I guess. Nothing ever comes from it, but that’s what makes it a hobby and not a job. Unless someone starts paying me to play video games or read fantasy novels, writing will be just like the rest of my hobbies. I sat down at my computer desk, moved the keyboard and grabbed a pen. Notebook, need a notebook too. Fortunately, I have tons of notebooks, half-filled with long neglected writing projects I promised myself I would go back to. This would be cool. A story about a guy trying to rescue someone. His girlfriend? Daughter? The President? I didn’t know yet. And I could throw in some mystical elements too. I touched the pen to the paper.
“You gotta be kidding me,” I muttered. My Bic wasn’t working. I shook it, licked the tip, scribbled in the corner. The damn thing still wasn’t working. Somewhere I had more. I opened one drawer after another, finding all manner of useless stuff: used notebooks, floppy disks, dead batteries, but no pens. I swore.
I was making dinner for Deb. Spaghetti, one of the few things I can cook without setting off the fire alarms. I unhooked them anyways, just to be safe. I like to do random things like this for her. I would like to think it’s for selfless reasons, to make her happy, but that’s only partially true. Her happiness is important, but I’m always scared that if I don’t do enough, she’ll leave me. I know she wouldn’t unless I seriously screwed up, but still. So I make spaghetti to surprise her when she gets home from work.
When I was about to put the sauce on the burner, I found that we had no Parmesan cheese, a catastrophe when making a romantic spaghetti dinner. Leaving the burners on, then realizing that was a stupid idea and going back to turn them off, I jumped out the door. I didn’t grab my headphones in the rush out, so I hummed loudly to myself when walking outside, keeping an eye on the statue out of the corner of my eye. I hummed louder. I made it back from the grocery store five minutes before Deb pulled into the parking lot, giving me just enough time to get the sauce boiling and look hard at work.
I told her about my day at work, with the new Boss. She laughed in all the right places except for one. My joke fell flat, but it happens sometimes. We spent the rest of the night snuggling on the couch, watching TV before going to bed. She was pretty happy, so I was pretty happy. That’s how it usually works.
There’s one problem with living life day by day. It lacks focus. It lacks goals. It’s also part of a never-ending cycle. Without previous goals there’s no motivation to set goals, and there’s definitely no motivation to stick with them. This day-by-day life is nice, don’t get me wrong. It has a simplicity that does wonders for stress. The only things I ever worry about are Deb and lately that damn cat. It’s just lacking. It’s all the same. Get up, eat, go to work, do work stuff, eat lunch with the girlfriend, go back to work, come home, eat, do something by myself, do something with the girlfriend, go to bed. Everything else is out there, in the realm of fantasy. And fantasy can be ignored, or written off as whimsical when it’s actually more possible then you think. But thinking like that is dangerous because then you might actually do something and move towards that fantasy and break the comfortable routine you spent so long setting up. It’s easier to stick to things day by day.
Deb keeps getting in the way of the day-to-day lifestyle though, and I’m never sure if that’s a good or bad thing. I don’t have a problem with keeping my fantasies out of reach, but she has plans. Big plans. I don’t want to hold her back with my unwillingness to do anything. We’ve talked about it, but never reached a conclusion. The best solution I think would be for me to get off my ass and live one of those dreams. Then we could meet in the middle. As of now though, I’m holding her back, I know it, and she knows it even if she doesn’t admit it. But I don’t want to let her go.
She really is too good for me.
Over the summer, I succeeded admirably in ignoring the words of wisdom from the cat statue. Maybe I should have listened to what it said, but disregarding it is so much easier. It’s probably not healthy in the long run to ignore one’s psyche like that, but I didn’t take enough psychology classes in school to know for sure. I didn’t even think about the statue most the time, but kept my headphones on a stand near the front door. Deb never asked about them; maybe she never noticed.
Our warm bodies were pressed against each other, my chest against Deb’s bare back. It is amazing how you can be so comfortable with someone that you can be half naked, laying in bed, and not think of sex. The fact that she was asleep helped. Nights are the worst for an active imagination though. She was sleeping soundly, breathing gently, and my mind was rolling over what I was going to do next. Or rather, what I wanted to do next, but never would. Then those fantasies get mixed in with my dreams tucking me to sleep in a comfy bed of delusions.
No milk. Unbelievable. We were completely out of milk. I thought about maybe some orange juice, but that probably wouldn’t go too well on my Coco Puffs. Better then apple juice anyways. Maybe. But we didn’t have any juice either, orange or apple or cranberry or any of those others. And we were out of soda, though I knew from experience that didn’t work. Plenty of water left. Joy. I stared blankly at my bowl, trying to wrap my mind around the lack of milk. It was simply too early not to have any milk. Milk milk milk no damn milk.
I looked at my watch and wondered where the last fifteen minutes went. I should have left ten minutes ago. I grabbed a handful of dry cereal and ate it down the stairs outside, crunching it in defense.
My car was out of gas. I valiantly turned the key, hoping to get to the gas station down the street. The needle staggered, then dropped, utterly defeated. I didn’t even bother trying again. The Boss would have to be called, which meant going back upstairs. Goddamnit.
“You won’t believe the deals you’ll find this weekend…”
“Shut up!” I yelled, drowning out the words, and backslapped the stupid statue. Not my smartest move. I called the Boss after crawling upstairs, telling him how I was going to walk and be late. He was pissed, but so was I. Beautiful. Then I called Deb after putting some ice on my swelling hand. Damn, it hurt. It hurt like, well, it hurt like I smacked a fucking statue as hard as I could. Not creative or evocative maybe, but accurate.
I came back downstairs, hand throbbing, and that damn cat was waiting for me. I sat down on its pedestal and leaned back against its flank. “Cat,” I said, not caring if anyone else heard me, “me and you need a truce.” No response. “You have to stop talking to me.” No response. “I have a life to live goddamnit. My job, my girlfriend, my life! Notice how you’re not on that list?” My voice was rising, but still no response.
I rolled off the pedestal, kneeling in front of the cat, staring at its cold, stoney eyes. “Leave me the fuck alone. Please.” My voice cracked from menacing to pleading. “Just leave me alone.” I dropped my eyes. My hands clasped together and tucked themselves in between the statues open paws. “Just leave me alone, and I’ll get my shit together. Just please, leave me alone.”
I leaned my forehead against its muzzle as though I could channel my sincerity into its inanimate head. My hands went further into the crevice between its paws, resting against the back of the statue. No, actually, my hands weren’t touching cold stone, but plastic. There was something tucked away in the darkness. I pulled it out. In my hands I held a small radio. Its tuning bar was pointing to the local talk radio station. It was silent, but the volume wheel was at its max. I almost dropped it as it let out a brief burst of static. Unbelieving, I turned it over in my hands again and again. It was very lightweight, even for its small size. I turned it on its front, and popped the battery case open.
If you have a few minutes, please take the time to tell me what you think. If I remember, I might post some of the, erm, more interesting comments some people in my class left me.