The miles were good but the miliage turning my hair grey.

 I'm getting this under the gun, so it still counts. Granted it's 11:15 p.m. Country Standard Time, so I doubt I'll get this finished before midnight. I say it still counts because, frankly, I make the rules. It's about the only place I have that sort of swing in this universe, so hell yeah, I'm going to abuse it.

 I pulled one of my all-day snoozes, and this one was legit. None of you're "wake up, read a little, and decide the world isn't worth it," no sir. After letting Otis out to do his morning ablutions, we both went right back down and didn't stir until after three. Granted, part of the reason is I spent most of last night getting a little further on Dragon's Dogma out of nowhere. I'm to that bit after you beat the dragon, the city collapses, and you're freefalling down the pit full of horrors from the dawn of time. Big fun.

 The big news in the outside world is still Trump's being taken to Walter Reed because he's come down with the COVID-19. Apparently, he's doing okay - even released a video to prove the point today - but the information we're getting from his camp is so full of static, all I'm willing to say is he's still alive, probably.

 Naturally, this has kicked off a Twitter snit between conservatives and liberals, as the "fuck your feelings" crowd is upset because the liberals hate Trump enough to not wish him well. Personally, I think this argument is garbage and nothing but a waste of time at this point. For one, people have celebrated the deaths of politicians they hated for years. I'd have to be more industrious than I am to look it up, but someone posted a news story from around the time Kennedy was shot. It was full of people gloating about his death, so it's nothing new.

 We talk a lot of nonsense about how our society has lost decorum, but we're also a society that used to consider hangings as a fun day out with the kiddies. It's the same place where all that "every life is sacred" bullshit comes from. When we have over 50 million children living in poverty without access to affordable health care or enough to eat, life ain't sacred. It just is.

 For the record, I am neither gloating over the rotten bastard getting sick nor do I hope he dies from it. Yes, I still want him out of office, and, yes, the irony would be almost Shakespearean, but it's not within my make-up to wish death on anyone. That being said, don't expect me to shame anyone who does. Especially the differentially abled, LGBT, or immigrants. And I still hold him culpable for the deaths of over 200,000 people due to the same virus he's currently experiencing.

 We demand decency out of each other that we refuse to show ourselves, so I'm not going to be a hypocrite about it. Him dying would be a mess because he's the president, but if nature takes its course, we all have to go sometime. I'm not going to waste any tears for a man I know wouldn't spend any on me.

 Hey, that's word count, and I've still got ten minutes. I'm going to go ahead and post this up and if something comes to me, I'll come back to it. I wouldn't hold my breath, though.

They say that murder ain't the cause of the weapon

 I had to shut it down today. Woke up from yesterday's nap in a foul mood that only got worse as I knocked out last night's News. Woke up this morning even gloomier, as bad as I've been in a while. Just one of those days, you know?

 Thankfully, today's nap seems to have shaken things loose. I'm not exactly dancing on the ceiling but at the very least I don't have that black cloud sitting on my face. Every little bit helps, I suppose. Part of the reason I'm in such a squirrelly mood is because I am, at best, a neurotic mess. I may have mentioned it here, but I've got a possible job opportunity I'm working on. Long story short, I haven't heard back whether I have the gig or not and I cannot stand having to wait to hear back from people.

 It's perfectly natural I haven't heard back after a day, as they no doubt have more important things to worry about than my mood. The one thing I have learned from this whole big nothing is how much of my own mental well being I have wrapped up in being able to consider myself a writer. Whether that right there is healthy or not, well, that's the issue.

 For what it's worth, this whole blogging thing and all the different types of things I do, from this Gibberish to the News to whatever I wind up calling the Tumblr stuff, ain't really giving the rush I need. Back when I was a working journalist, I got a little buzz out of seeing my name in a byline or even when I wrote something anonymously. Knowing people seeing it was enough.

 Ego is one of the greatest reasons any sort of artist (writer, musician, dancer, etc.) does what they do where someone else can see it. It's not the sole reason but if anyone tells you otherwise, they are lying. Sure, people see this, or so the viewer counts tell me. I still haven't managed to garner more than 10 readers a day apart from once or twice. I don't know if I even have any regular readers. I'm not sure how to get them. By nature, I am not comfortable advertising myself.

 There's no reason to be blogging, really. I could just bang out some stuff on Google Docs or a writing app I've downloaded. Since getting back into writing, I've read a lot of stuff on the mindset of being a writer, how you're supposed to think of yourself to be one. Frankly, the best advice I've ever seen still comes from Billy Crystal's character in Throw Mama From The Train: "A writer writes. Always."

 I used to think - and still pretty much do - that three things define a writer: a need to tell a story, having a story that needs to be told, and just being enamored of the physical, mechanical process of writing. Somewhere in there, it becomes a way to make a living, and you become either a newspaper reporter (or content creator or medical transcription writer or what have you) or Philip K.Dick. When I got burnt on writing back years ago, I lost the third aspect. It got painful and caused much misery. I like telling stories, but I've always dug putting words together to make something coherent.

 And, as it turns out, when I stopped writing, I lost sight of what it meant to be me. I just drifted through the world. This all ties together, because once I quit writing and once my last relationship ended, all I did pretty much was work, sleep, smoke pot and start it all over again. The last four years in New Orleans are a serious blur and all I remember is working jobs I hated.

 So, now I'm thinking of myself as a writer but the total lack of success or feedback is an issue I need to figure out how to crawl over. I don't have to do this to make a living anymore. It's just for fun, and it has been a lot of fun. I keep telling anyone who pretends to care that this right here is the best part of my day. It occupies my entire interest for the day, what to let out for the Gibberish or what to pay attention to for the News. I'm having a good time, it'd just be nice if I was helping someone else have a good time. Ah, well.

 That's enough bellyaching. The lovely weather we've been having turned to rain this afternoon and it's supposed to get cooler, with more rain peeking in once in a while. I'm still working on the goddamn From Eternity To Here because it asks a whole hell of a lot. Last couple of days I've been revisiting Dragon's Dogma: Dark Arisen and it is a barrel of monkeys. Your standard high fantasy hack-and-slash third-person RPG, it's got some weird aspects that set it apart from the pack as well as a really fun combat system. It's a couple years old and starting to show it, but if you're into games like Skyrim or The Witcher, it might be worth checking out. I'd wait until it's on sale, though.

 Okay for now. I think that's enough. Sorry for the bellyaching, but sometimes it's necessary. Thanks for putting up with it.