Greater Satellites

Alternate Titles For This Post: “You Haven’t Updated Since November 7th”, “I’m Hungry”, and “Woo Bang”. I reserve the right to use those blog titles in the future.

I don’t know how many people who read this keep blogs or journals themselves, but I’m just a few entries shy of 300 posts. Not too shabby, although I can’t help but think that number should be quite a bit higher considering that this journal is now five years and 11 days old (wow). But if you break it down and play the numbers game that roughly averages out to an entry a week. There were a few months where I wrote nothing at all, so I guess my current game of catch up has leveled the proverbial playing field.

SO, some major developments in the Gormley world recently. Let’s start from where we left off, eh? Since the time I smelled Windex at Glendale and Erie I’ve secured my place in the working world once again, had a great weekend with a great lady, caught up with an old friend, and coerced said femme into a mutual, exclusive relationship. I gotta say, I’m feeling pretty good about the way things have been going recently. The job is pretty self explanatory. I discussed payment and responsibiities last week and came to a happy medium. I actually start later today (it’s close to 3am as of this sentence). I’m still searching for something better (see: more pertinent), but to pay the bills and get caught up, not to mention finally have a little extra spending money, is going to be nice. Now to the meaty parts…

On Friday Jackie and I went out to Paddy Whacks for some drinking and brief stints of in-your-chair dancing. We talked about everything and anything, joking around and cracking up when we noticed how white girls always grind up on each other while dancing. I got a little loaded, I’ll admit, and it was nice of her to be the designated driver for the evening. Afterwards we came to my humble abode (her first time here, as a matter o’ fact) and watched… wait for it… wait for it… Don’t Tell Mom The Babysitter’s Dead. That’s right, I’m an awesome host.

On Saturday during daylight hours I did very little other than clean up, do some laundry, shower, eat (I think), and get a bit of writing done. That night I agreed to accompany Jackie to Top Dog over in Jersey for some drinking and dance (although I didn’t) along with her friends Sylvia and Paul. It was a great time and I got to return the designated driver favor to Jackie, who wasn’t so much drunk as she was pleasantly buzzed. After Top Dog we hit a diner that I can’t quite recall the name of and then shot home. Two great nights in a row, who’da thunk it?

Sunday was the Lords day. The weather sucked, the Eagles played, Denise woke me up, I ate a Wawa hoagie, I drank a Lemonade Tea, I talked on the phone for a bit, pirated many softwares (Photoshop CS2, Windows Vista, Office 2007, among others) and ended up getting an old friends phone number. I decided to call and see what he’s been up to and how life has been treating him. He told me he just moved into a house with a couple guys from grade school / high school and invited me over to party. I’ve heard some crazy stories come from those guys, but I’m feeling like maybe that’s something I would like to do, so who knows?

Monday: Monday, ’nuff said.

I stopped up the Excel office today to see one of my favorite people. I brought her some pirated softwares as a peace offering (which makes us both nerds, I believe) and hung around for a few hours. Came back home, took a nap, and then talked to Jackie on the phone again until just a short while ago. I asked her something that, to me, felt a little overdue but was graciously accepted and returned in kind. I won’t go into too much detail, but let’s just say my status has changed. Woot!

I haven’t felt this way in a while… I was almost positive that I never would again. Reinforces the old “never say never” addage, I suppose…

As wise person once said a great place to start is at the beginning, so I will follow that sagely advice and do just that:

Friday: Woke up pretty early (10 am, hah) and checked the internets for jobs and things. Shortly thereafter we turned the heat on for the first time and found that there was a big leak in one of the pipes. Awesome! So we called the plumber and waited for him to come out and fix things up so my room doesn’t have a foot of standing water on the floor. That was taken care of around 12:30, and shortly thereafter I left for Jackie’s house. I was running a little late (as usual) but, luckily, she was too. We arrived at her house separately but almost simultaneously and talked for a bit while she gathered her clothes/costumes and got ready to roll. Come 1:15 we hit the ground running, bound for Pottstown. We met up with Jackie’s sister Christa at Wal Mart as they finished up some last minute party shopping. She’s very nice, and I had a feeling from just looking at her that I knew her type. Don’t take that as a negative thing, she’s a very nice person and quite tenacious. We got back to her house and did some decorating (I did the webs outside, thank you Spider Man) and began readying the foods and whatnots. People started rolling in around 8-ish in full costume and everyone looked great (one person in particular looked very yummy). Anywho, Christa and Mike’s friends were funny and very sociable. A little later Brigette and Vinny showed up and the four of us broke off for the remainder of the evening just drinking, talking, and joking around. As the night wound down people started leaving and eventually we all found a place to sleep. Jackie and I talked for a while before we went to bed and I told her some things that I wanted her to know. I won’t go into the details here, but it ended up quite well (no, not like that, perv). Slumber happened around 2 or 3am, I believe.

Saturday: Slept late at Christa’s house (later than everyone else, at least) and eventually left there around 1:45 for Philly. Ran into some traffic on the way home so it took a little over an hour to arrive back. Jackie and I said our goodbyes and I jumped head first into the awkward situation I like to call family get-togethers. The occasion was a suprise 80th birthday party for my grandmom. People started showing up around 2pm and the surprise happened at 3pm. Grandma was very happy and overall she appreciated the fact that, quite literally, almost everyone made it out. We had family over that I’ve never even met before. Cousins that I’m seeing for the first time. Uncles and aunts that I don’t know the names of. I’m not saying all of this for any reason other than setting up how many people were in my house… we have a very big family. At some point I decided to show my cousin Kenny the video I did by the name of Friends. He REALLY liked it and decided (drunkenly) it would be a good idea to tell my family to come watch it too. Now, these are people who, for all intents and purposes, don’t know me. Now they’re all excited to see Andrew’s “funny video”. The abridged version sounds something like this: my entire family watched it and every time I passed through the living room where a majority of the guests were, I overhear things like “There’s the Longshaft!” and “Can I be a Longshaft too?” For some reason, it was a little much for me so I did a couple shots of some really bad Canadian whiskey and continued drinking my beers. That made things better. Most of the family was gone by 10pm and I knew Marek was in town so I gave him a call. Denise, Marek, Kenny, Kristen (Kenny’s wife), and I ended up hanging out and drinking much more. We started a game of Ultimate Yahtzee around 1am and finished (with me winning) close to 2am. 2am then became 1am again because we had to turn the clocks back. Kenny left after the game, Denise went to be shortly after, Marek and I chilled for about another hour and then I booted his ass out. I went to bed shortly after the second 2am.

Sunday: Slept very late due to a relatively large headache. I wonder why? Anyway, some family stopped back over to drink more of our alcohol and eat more of our food (savages, I know) throughout the afternoon. A little after 6pm we departed for the Bates Motel up in Glen Mills. Unfortunately Jackie couldn’t make it, but it was fun group nonetheless: Denise, Ian, Kathy, Rich, and I. The lines weren’t too bad and we ventured through the corn maze, braved our way through the haunted house, and sat on the edge of our seats for the hayride. All of it was good and I’m not too proud to admit that I jumped a few times. Got back just before midnight when I started writing this and am now finishing close to 5AM because I got caught up talking to Denise, taking a shower, and watching a Friday the 13th marathon.

After this weekend, despite a little awkwardness with the fam, I can say that I haven’t been this happy in a long time. Thanks to any and all involved.

Holy shit, where did the summer go? If you used this blog as any indication of passing time, feel free to call me a terrible scribe. One minute it’s June 10th, the next it’s August 21st. Yikes. Well, I can summarize the summer (summerize, if you will) in a few key points and hopefully start making this an integral part of my life again. I miss writing dearly; I truly, truly do.

Nothing is static, everything is transient. I sat for a few hours today reading my old blogs. In case you didn’t know, this particular journal is an amalgamation of every other blog I’ve ever had since the early days of lostintheair.com. That’s five years going on six come this November. I think I’ve learned a few things about myself after reading that much, even stuff from the recent past. I’m becoming less happy. I’ve become less responsible. I’m becoming more apathetic. I’ve wasted a lot of time in gray areas. I’m becoming more removed. Detatched. I can’t explain a lot of it, and it’s not all self-relization. Some of the aforementioned becomings are the combined opinions of peers, family, and professionals. I don’t regret anything, but this pattern simply cannot persist. I was not born as what I’ve come to be. I want to improve and I’m having a hard time moving. Because things are so comfortable right now, I know any step towards a positive direction will become the epicenter of a difficult and possibly lengthy transitory period. A few recent catalysts have set forth a great incentive for change, but it’s a mind-over-matter situation. As soon as I can convince my stupid brain how much better things could be, I think a newer, truer, bluer me should emerge. Ahhhhhh shit.

Let me try to summerize in a few key points. July was hot and sweaty. I learned a lot in school, and took a whole bunch of personal days. I did quite a bit of work for Diztinct and was paid fairly well. Had a couple parties at the house, good times with good friends. August was a repeat, same kind of summer attitude and actions. Mom was on vacation for the past week and it was the most peaceful week I’ve experienced in quite some time. Here we are at current. It was an awful summary, I know, but there wasn’t one defining moment of the summer thus far, just a continuous plateau of goodness.

“How quickly words can become our hands, resigning everything we believe…”