08 is here. (OR: Rejoice, Ye Working Wounded)

As the ball dropped, I was holding a rack filled with dripping Movie Tavern cups, as two of my coworkers kissed a few feet away. Sure, I'd never rang in New Year's with two gay guys before, but I was on the clock and there was work to be done.

And so was this New Year's Eve.

It was an epic night at Movie Tavern, but not in the "oh my god, someone shit in one of the chairs!" way but rather in a way we will tell our grandchildren until they put us in a home.

See, Movie Tavern has 11 theaters (one was converted and is now the kitchen that is sucking away my soul). About four or five of them seat 150 and the rest seat seventy someodd. We sold them all out, minus some tickets for lack of space. Keep in mind we expected...well, no one. After all, there are parties and getting drunk to do!

Let me repeat this for emphasis: EVERY THEATER SOLD OUT.

We didn't seat the usual late set, and Adam and I (plus Eric) rolled out of the kitchen twenty minutes after the ball dropped.

Nancy and I left and welcomed the New Year around two o clock in Waffle House. The beautiful thing about Waffle House (side note: my typing is reminding me how poor I can be with my hands) is that no matter what, if you go there after dark you will see someone you feel superior to. Perhaps it will be your server. Perhaps the couple sitting at the table behind you. Perhaps the gentlemen with a tranny. Perhaps the drunks in the parking lot who pretend you hit them. (All real life Waffle House stories!)

It was an exhausting New Year, and yet I spent it with some of my favorite people.

Happy New Year to you all.

Also, a plug for Gill and her blog, Nothing But Song. She's put together some great pop songs for her end of the year list.

I Could Almost Write A Song (OR: A Movie Tavern Christmas)

I'm smiling.

Like, a real big smile, a natural, permagrin sort of smile. I think I wear it well, even if it struck with no one around to see it. It suits my fancy as I've managed to get back to really happy, in December no less.

I did miss A Charlie Brown Christmas, admittedly. However, I caught the best parts of How the Grinch Stole Christmas - the classic, animated version (all apologies to Jim Carrey, but his was just not as...jingly), which always makes my holiday.

But after spending most of my waking hours at work or with co-workers voluntarily, I'm actually enjoying myself.

Makes me almost not miss college. Almost.

Someone Call Relient K (OR: 4CHAN FTW)

I have been in one hell of a state recently. Really, two...bipolar, maybe?

I blame 4Chan (yes, I'm an occasional /b/tard) for making me incredibly slap happy on Wednesday and highly grumpy today. Yesterday?

What else but lazy?

Not Re-Finishing A Paper (OR: NARWHALS!)

So here I am, in Not Natural Science in not room 332 in Not Union Hall. I am very busy not doing a paper that I did not turn in over the weekend, when I was busy not cleaning the house. I'm probably...not, scratch that. I am an internet addict. Also, the guy across me here in the computer lab looks like some strange cross of Derek Zoolander and the monkey dude Chris Kattan never should have played on SNL. And the girl next to me sounds like Jillian from B-Dubs, whom I have not seen or heard form in a while. Triste.

Anyway, things are a little less sucky here, or at least I'm a little less crappy feeling. Hanna is at the house, probably sleeping and doing not homework (sorry). I will see her for all of a few minutes, after I get done not doing well on my oral exam for Spanish (look, it's just an awkward phrase, I stopped giggling at it a while ago. Grow up.). It's right back at work tonight for me - time to sully up my new kitchen coat, which I was oddly excited about getting. Don't ask me why, but I've been trying it on a few times since I got it Monday. I suppose that unlike a lot of people (guys especially), I actually enjoy dressing a part? Who knows. All I know is that it's spiffy and white and will soon be not spiffy and a pretty deep shade of Movie Tavern White. Heh.

I still don't think I blog enough. I don't even write a lot of real good stuff anyway. To be honest, I ramble and ramble and half of it is about how bad I blog...I'm blogging about blogging. That's gotta fall somewhere close to dividing by zero in cosmic conundrums. Oy. I will admit, I was pretty proud of getting on the front page of Drivl a few months back with that zoo thing, but I'm not there. I have been thinking of stuff for a redux of the list. After all, if I'm shameless enough to copy everyone else, why wouldn't I copy myself?

I need to figure out what computer I want. I'm thinking a white MacBook - a gig of memory and 120 megs o' hard drive, or maybe a similar PC for less. I can get down to $999 plus shipping with a student discount from Western, maybe Columbus State. The one I want is $1,199 - easily attainable by the end of winter if I cut out impulsive iTunes purchases. Damn you apple and your alluring purchase prices.

Random subtitle FTW.

Wallowing (OR: I'll Post Again, 'Cause I Can)

So I'm skipping English for the third time in two weeks, because there really isn't much of a point in me going. I can e-mail the assignment if I have the time. I just finished a pleading, albeit slightly snarky e-mail to my professor, in the thin hope I can get it in tomorrow morning.

I've got nearly an hour to kill before my 2:30, and I've had more time to kill today than I have classes - thus is Friday at Columbus State.

To be honest, I'e never had the particular feeling that an institution is below me. No, I went to schools with resources and faculty that enabled me to be challenged. There were easy classes at Darby, certainly - my Speech teacher, the ace Mr. Torrence, even dubbed me the King of BS - but there was enough meat that I could at least find some improvment.

No, here at Columbus State, we briefly touch on alchemy in Natural Science. Alchemy, for Christ sake. The curriculum, drawed up in earnest by CSCC themselves, is laughable, never touching on any subject long enough to make it matter to us. We went through the entire Biology chapter today, and all I can tell you from the textbook is that putting sweaty undergarments in a flask with wheat husks will not produce the spontaneus generation of rats. Seriously. This was apparently critical information. And I expect this shit to transfer?

I'm waiting, waiting, waiting. I miss last week, even, when I had something to look forward to, something to be excited about. Sure, it literally broke down an hour in, but I had something to motivate my being awake, really awake in the morning. Yeah, Hanna's supposed to come up next week, and I'll be delighted. But beyond that, what's there going to be? Christmas? Sure, but it really isn't what it used to be 'round the Lockman house, not with car repairs and insurance and whatnot. No, I fully expected less Christmas, even before any of these extras came along. I'm nineteen, I have no need to look to my parents for these things anymore. Not when I'm actually working full-time.

No, I'm just making it through a day, a week, maybe even a month at a time. I'm not even bothering to look ahead, because there's nothing even close on the horizon, not that I can see. Sure, the Playboy caravan might break down on Crestbury a little after New Year's, but I see no bus. No, minus any delightful surprises some higher power might have planned, it's more the same, I fear.

This isn't complaining, really. I've idled before and I'll idle again. It's a natural part of life, especially when nineteen and all that. This summer was pretty much the pits, and I found my way out of that, right?

Cold War Kids are playing Newport in a few weeks, that's gonna be pretty awesome. It's a great way to send out finals week. Without class, I can actually travel, or at least get out on the ton a little. Maybe this December won't suck. Maybe it'll be the worst yet.

Oh to be young, bored and vague.

EDIT: Jesus, I'm looking at my archives and realizing how pathetic my stats are. I'm averaging probably half a dozen posts a month. WTF?

United States v. Barry Lamar Bonds (OR: I Suppose One of My Occasional Sports-Themed Rants is in Order)

For those of you who are not interested in sports, baseball, and/or the US legal system, this is your chance to turn away. Also, this could easily turn into a pile of lousy, runny, ranty, gibberish-laden stool. So there's that warning.

On to business.

Few, if any, athletes today are as divisive as Barry Bonds. He's not merely an athlete in major legal trouble - no, for that, you can have Pacman Jones, Tank Johnson, or really, the majority of the Bengals roster. No, Bonds stands out for two major reasons: one, he is quite possibly, with all current issues aside, and looking from pure stats and awards and such, the greatest player to ever play. Two, he is one of, perhaps the central player in the latest and greatest epidemic to affect baseball and sports as a whole (I'm diggin' the add-on adjectives today!). Steroids have seeped into just about every sport at most known levels - yes, don't you shy away football fans, remember the incident involving the Carolina Panthers? No? No one does, but it happened. Replace offensive linemen with a few name running backs, and you've got Goodell in a pickle.

Anyway, back on topic: Bonds has now been named in an epic, sweeping, braznely broad and vague indictment, one that could theoretically land him in prison for up to 30 years - about the same time that this drama has been playing out, it feels. It's not been nearly as simple as the Marion Jones saga, which took far less time to play out, with a much broader scope of evidence to take in. Floyd Landis fell from grace in a measely three days, though the courts worked that one out only a few months ago (that's a bit of a sore subject for yours' truly, but that's a rant since passed. Sigh). No, Bonds' issues lay in a sport that didn't even ban, let alone test for steroids until just a few years ago. Even the IOC, the UN of sporting authorites, detailed their steroids policies back before I was eating paste. Instead, Bud Selig, a spineless jellyfish of a commish, waited until Congress - CONGRESS! - was on his ass, and he put flop sweat to paper in the most pathetic steroid policy any non-East-German sport body has ever produced. By the time anything was written, Bonds had done his thang, and began his ascent to the home-run list with new drugs.

Still, his supplier, BALCO was raided and cut down, unleashing a domino effect then unseen. This tiny little place - I like to think of BALCO as something like the lacrosse shop in those sprawling Sawmill strip malls, surrounded by countless empty storefronts, with more international reach and more horse testosterone - became the downfall of numerous star athletes, and probably more to come (Victor Conte has supposedly named 27 athletes). Victor Conte fell, then went Bonds' trainer, Greg Anderson. As ESPN so objectively pointed out in their three-hour long stretch of ten minutes of news last night, Bonds' new muscle showed up the spring after Bonds began training with Anderson. Bonds testify, got grilled, and ever since, the Justice Department has doggedly pursued Bonds, finally securing what they feel is suitable evidence to nail Bonds on perjury, as they can't really try him on douchebaggery. (On a side note, the statement Bonds' attorney issued yesterday is a pretty amusing read - he verbally attacked the Justice Department on the waterboarding issue - that's just a small, angry man being a small angry man, I suppose.)

Where does this put Bonds? Next year he's not going to play, I can pretty much guarantee that. He's an untouchable free agent. He's been shunted from San Fransisco; men who rape dogs don't necessarily feel out of place in San Fransisco. He may not play again, depending on how this process plays out (which will take approximately 34 years). And inevitably, the hall-of-fame debate comes up.

Opinion time! Simply put, Barry Bonds does not belong in the Hall of Fame. I can only think of two possible precedents set forth for Barry Bonds, both of which are theoretically still playing out. The more direct example is Mark McGwire's ongoing storming of the hall doors. His mere testimony in front of the House (a flop of Seligian proportions) seems suitable enough to keep him out, though I think people forget he didn't exactly piece together a Cooperstown career. If I could vote for a player from one year, 1998 McGwire would be unanimous, or at least close. But overall, he never really did a lot more than bash home runs, and even those didn't do that much good after 1990.

No, a better comparison is Pete Rose. Rose is an undeniable Hall-of-Fame player. All-tiem hits leader, World Series winner, one of the best players of his era, and of all-time. And yet, he now has no chance of getting in. There are numerous sins ballplayers can commit, but most of them are forgivable, especially in a city like Cincinnati where a beloved Red is more popular than any strip-club-banishing evangelist could ever hope to be. Why? He bet on the game. While not as murky and far-reaching as Bonds, his actions are part of a scandal that can immediately rock any game to its core - look at what Tim Donaghy is about to do to the NBA. It's not just a crime, not just a wrong, it's affecting the very way the game is played, and that is a cardinal sin. Unforgivable. The Hall of Fame rewards players who have propelled the game to new heights. And if Bonds is found guilty, essentially proving that he did use steroids, then that touches on the game itself, and there is absolutely no return from that.

My inner 10-year-old is weeping, Mister Bonds. What have you done?

The Seventy Three (OR: When It's Gone Away)

Well that was quick.

So about one hour, 75 miles, and twenty-some-odd songs in, my fuel pump decided to stop working. As in, my accelerator pumped, but it wuddint pumpin' nothin'. I coasted on up to the top of the exit ramp, flipped on the blinking lights, and proceeded to march on into despair.

There are only a surprisingly few moments in life when you feel more isolated than you do when sitting in your broken-down car in the middle of nowhere, waiting for a tow truck that feels like it'll never show.

After two hours of waiting on SR 73, and an hour-long ride in a tow truck up 71, I'm home. I'm not happy about it, but I'm home.

Bowling Green, I'll be home soon enough. Just a little later than any of us wanted.