My first day as a stock market data enterer

It's been a full and rewarding day of fainting and hitting my head into floors at the office. Sat impotently watching co-workers do the job that I was hired (but not yet cleared by the network) to do, then went home and had a good cry. God, I love being an adult with every fiber of my being.

My head hurts and I am going to sleep until I become a grown man. With a beard. And an agent.

M

Crystal Crackers

Had a dream that an old lady shot my dog after he savagely attacked a lil' child. It was one of those dreams where you're running and shouting, but you don't make it to the destination in time to save the day. I think it's somehow related to starting work tomorrow for the corporate machine.

muuuuuuuuuaaaaaaaaaaaaarg

The Game of Life

The other night I was at the pub playing the boardgame Life with some college friends. They were having a fine and fanciful time buying fake stocks and navigating their featureless peg-spouses and peg-children around the sinuous track to Retirement Mansion, whereas I began to chafe as the game progressed. The winner in Life is the person who reaches retirement with the most money. Complications such as marriage, children, and homeownership are meaningless chevrons that one accrues along that journey towards "the Big Win."

Perhaps children too young to work, buy property, and make sound fiscal investments enjoy the role-playing of a chance-based capatalistic model, but I found it to be a distasteful metaphor for the de-soulification (yes) of modern America. I drew the "Win the Nobel Peace Prize" card, but it didn't matter to the game's outcome. I feel that we should avoid the quantitative view of success.

Give me money.

Regarding recent observations on Internet pedophilia

Is anyone else as disturbed as I am that people kept track of the 18th birthdays of the Olsen Twins?

I have suspicions, which with the introduction of high-speed internet access into my life (and through the pop-up advertisements thereon) have been slowly gaining confirmation, that there exists in our beastial male society the encouragement for men to mate with little girleens. I suspect that this appetite is somehow linked to several off-putting elements which coalesce into a groady phenomenon which is not overtly spoken of, but somehow lingers underneath the skin of dumb male civilization.

The elements:

Youth. It seems commonplace for men to marry younger women in our world. On a biological level this makes sense. A younger woman may be better suited to surviving the rigors of childbirth more readily than an older, less-regenerative woman. If humans were insentient creatures, this would be fine. But we are cognizent of things such as personality and compatibility, which old fat cats with "trophy wives" seem to have neglected to consider before marrying younguns. Case in point: Anna Nicole Smith and the Oldest Man on Earth.

Power. I fear and surmise that many men seek women who are weaker (either physically or psychologically) than they are. This allows the hubby to exert his dominance in the homestead and feel 1) Vital to the family unit - a person without whom the family would flounder and fail, and 2) Strong and capable in comparison to his spouse. I think that this behavior is a combination of Man's narcissistic lust for power and the gender roles that society reinforces. Indeed, the Modern Man retains vestigial traces of needing to be the strong protector and provider for his family unit even though the struggle for survival has advanced beyond the phycial realm, e.g. a woman is equally suited to earning money in the world of business.

Virginality. This is not a word. I know. But the concept that it implies is a real one. I believe that many men seek the ideal of a young, pure, and "unspoiled" female for several reasons. 1) It ensures that they (the men) are the first to couple with the female and, therefore, the first ones to win the selfish genetic race to further one's own progeny. 2) A woman being a virgin implies that she has not contracted any raunchy diseases from other filthy menfolks. It is presumably safe to mate with a virgin then, because she is not going to lay a terminal disease on you.

"So What?" you ask. I'll tell you "so what"!! The disturbing reality that is the result of this genetic and narcissistic struggle is that the younger a person is, the less time they've had to experience life and learn the ability to make rational decisions. The "Loss of Innocence" is a cliched and oft under-contemplated phrase that groans with pitious relevance. Can anyone truly become an adult until they've been fucked over by the lustful designs of the previous generation?

The point of this tirade - It seems to me that guys privately celebrate the sexual exploitation of "barely legal" women. This snickering, backroom, high-fiving undercurrent to our society is as contemptable as it is primitive. Perhaps some of you readers might find me to be a prude. Yeah, maybe I am. All I ask is that you stop to think about the aforementioned phenomena before your actions (or inaction) furthers the cause of exploitation.

That's me on my high horse. Maybe I'll stick to the shit jokes in future entries.

A.J.

Things that I'm proud of

1. Standing up for Johnny K. against the drunken menacing of Eric K.'s former roomate.

2. Demanding proper change in spite of my linguistic inability from a French restaurant cashier when the waiter stiffed me.

3. Writing and performing a solo play.

4. Moving my new couch.

5. Getting into a grown-up improv troupe in Columbus.

6. Writing a thesis on zombies.

7. Choosing to love in spite of prior nihilistic philosophies.


Note: This entry was more for me than for you. No slight intended. It may be healthy in times of uncertainty to periodically remind oneself about previous achievements. Get the good juices flowing.


Markre

The Worm and the Wheelchair

Transcription from fictional adventures:

Flaming SUV careens across N. Halsted St. and impacts into the concrete guard rails which protect the construction site of a Whole Foods store. Markre dives out of the now-shattered windshield, slides over the accordianed hood, and sprints from the wreckage.
"Run. RUN!"
In a blast of heat and hail of steel, the SUV explodes. Under a canopy of white-hot particles, Markre laments bringing a car to Chicago.