I'm exhausted. I flew down to LA this morning, checked out three museums and now I'm back home bone tired. It still trips me out to think that I spent the afternoon in one city which is on the other end of the state and now I'm back home.

LA was nice and warm, and very summery. For a brief second, I thought to myself wouldn't it be nice to live some place where it always warm.

So red-headed marina frat boy called me at work today, and I made him talk to me for a long time even though he said wasn't a phone guy because I was bored at work. He did have one of his funny little exec lines though.

He said he was in his room and he had just taken a 40 minute bubble bath and had thought of me the whole time. And now he was on the phone with me buck naked lying in his big king size bed drinking red wine. He's such a trip isn't he? He's so very, very amusing.

He said he wanted to be friends with me, but that he would keep doing his exec guy thing and try to get me horizontal. And I'm like whatever. "I'm just having a little, a very little buyer's remorse." I said. Then he kept saying he loved me, and I was special and the real thing, the real deal, and on and on. And how this was just the beginning of our book, the first chapter, the opening line, and how the book has yet to be written, and we don't know how it's going to end, and we should take a chance and enjoy life and other silly sentimental drivel like that.

And then I asked him how his week went and he said he was really busy, but very productive. Then I said, "And so you did think about me every day this week?" And he said yes. And then I said, "Okay so you thought about me every day this week, but you didn't call me?". Mean huh?

But red-haired marina frat guy is a cool customer, and he just laughed and said, "After that D minus rating you gave on our date, what did you expect?" He's just so funny.

And then I asked him where my shoes were, and he said that "I know I'm such a flake." Then he said something about how the shoes would cost me, and I said "you got way more than should have gotten on that first date seeing as how you kissed me and all, and copped a good enough feel in the car to determine I didn't have a fake rack." He said he thought I had a plastique rack, but he wasn't sure and he wanted to make sure, but yes he owed me a dozen pair of shoes for those kinds of liberties and I was such a good kisser to boot.

I don't know. This guy just makes me laugh so much; I just never know what's going pop out of his mouth and it's usually something very, very funny. Plus I guess I'm just a silly sentimental stupid little girl because when he said "God,I love you!" with a huge sigh before we hung up, I got a little thrill. And even though I know it's huge fat honking lie and an old tired and overused line, it seems to work for me ... at least for now.

I know when I'm going to have a bad day when I start out the morning hearing the crows cawing outside of my bathroom window, and when the freakazoid at Starfbombs can't get a simple grande mocha no whip cream right and has to ask me three times what I want, and I hear a chorus of groans from the oh so cranky very long line of people in back of me.

So I had lunch with my boss today and she asked me about the guy I met on the plane from LAX to Oakland. In the course of talking to her, I started to feel a "little buyer's remorse" about tossing red-headed frat marina boy out of my life. I hate buyer's remorse, talk about wussyitis extremis! And I'm still pretty darn sure I made the right decision, but whatever.

Anyway, I'm not sure why I did this but I sent an email to the guy and here's what he said.

**************************
-----Original Message-----
From: Red-headed frat marina boy
Sent: Thursday, July 29, 2004 1:39 PM
To: Brenda Elgirl
Subject: Re: Buyer's Remorse

Let's get together on Friday night in LA or get together as soon
as I get back in town in August?
Love ya,
Red-headed frat marina boy

-----Original Message-----
From: Brenda Elgirl
Date: Thu, 29 Jul 2004 13:12:00
To:Red-headed frat marina boy
Subject: Buyer's Remorse

Hi Red-headed frat marina shoe boy,

I'm having a little buyer's remorse about what happened ... besides ...
where are my shoes???

Hope your week is going well.

--Brenda
**************************

I showed this email to my boss and she was like "what does the 'love ya' salutation mean?" I told her I didn't know, and then I asked her what she thought and she said she didn't know eitehir, but that it was a little familiar for someone I only met last week.

I'm sure it's like one of his used car salesman lines ... like don't you think he signs "love ya" to all the random girls he meets?

What's funny is he wants me fly to LA tomorrow to have dinner with him because he's staying there for a conference this weekend. Like I don't think so. Like if this guy was really serious, don't you think he should have at least offered to pay for my way down there? I mean, not that I would have gone, but he could have at least offered to pay my way. I guess he thinks if I really want it, I'd figure out a way to get it. Some women I know would have flown down to LA for a dinner with a guy they barely knew. I've never done anything like that before ever because, and frankly there hasn't been a guy I've met that's worth that kind of effort.

Of course, he could be thinking the same of me. Like oh my god, I can't believe she emailed me, what am I going to do, I thought the whole thing was over on Friday and now, what if she's weird and starts stalking me, and honestly, she really isn't worth that kind of effort or that outlay of cash. But I wanna come off like a nice guy, so I'll put "love ya" at end of my email because women always like that kind of stuff, and hopefully the whole thing will blow over by August and she won't ever communicate with me again.

So I skipped the democratic convention last night to work out. I kind of regret missing Theresa Heinz Kerry's speech, but then when they showed Howard Dean on the TV at the gym I was glad I was working out. Boy that man scares me! I don't know what I would have done if he was anywhere on the ticket or heaven forbid the democratic presidential nominee. I probably just wouldn't have voted for president, which would have been a first for me since I was 18 years old.

I went to gym again tonight but listened to John Edwards' speech on the radio. Man is Edwards a cutie! He is the cutest vice presidential candidate I've ever seen. He kind of looks like my first love which is such a trip. M was born in Virginia and had a bit of a southern twangy thing going in his voice despite spending most of list life in Bethesday Maryland. Edwards and M have the same face, same hairdo and same boyish smile.

I think John Edwards will one day be a great presidential candidate. Now is not his time, but he's definitely be a contender one day. You got to love his populist speech about how there are two Americas. Paul Krugman from the NY Times has been harping on the "two americas" theme for quite some time as well. Krugman said that what people have to figure out is which America you're a part of, because most middle class americans get it wrong.

I'll go home tomorrow to watch John Kerry speak, and watch the wrap up of the democratic convention. I don't know. I would like to think that the race will close, but I just don't know. My favorite stock picker, who has the best stock picking record in the country, also does quite well at predicting presidential races. Stock picker guy thinks that Bush will win by a landslide. Stock picker guy also picked Shrub to win the presidential republican nomination back in 1995-96, before the Shrubmeister was on anybody's radar. But then stock picker guy's mother is good friend with the Bush's and gets a Chrristmas cards from Laura Bush, so he's kind of got an inside track on stuff.

So I heard this great song on the radio today called "I will breath fire" by this band called Strata. If you like Evanescence, you'll like this band. Strata is from the same label, Wind-up Records.

Strata just released their album yesterday, so the music is like oh so current. On the Strata site, look for the music link to listen to samples of their tunes.

Wow, vintage Bill Clinton 'Slick Willie' speech tonight at the democratic convention. The man is so talented at it's just amazing. One of the political talking heads said later that 'Clinton can take arcane points of foreign policy and talk about them conversationally in a way ordinary americans can understand.'

The boy definitely has a gift, and it makes me wish he was still the President only because he could speak so well. Another pundit said he was watching Bill Clinton reading the teleprompted and adlibing as well. Nobody does it better than 'Slick Willie' at energizing a democratic crowd. I'm sure the republicans were just rolling their eyes and throwing things at their television, but nobody, and I mean nobody does it better than Bill Clinton and his political speechmaking.

So the story keeps writing itself in my head this morning, and this part goes before the part below.

******************
I think I got played. Which is such a trip and a back handed compliment. Like the time my old boyfriend John screamed at me in the middle of a fight, “You are such a Barbie doll!” And I was like wow! He compared to me Barbie. What does that mean?

Does that mean my figure represented Barbie’s impossible idea? Or that I was cute like Barbie and that I was doll-like? Or did he mean I was just some plastic pint-sized idiot without a brain my head? See what I mean when I say it’s a back handed compliment.

Being played is like that. After a certain age in a woman’s life, you don’t really expect to get played anymore by a player. I mean, there’s the matter of the few extra pounds, the constantly harried expression from being frazzled at work all the time, there’s the defensive layers that have been built up over the years from too many dead end relationships and broken marriages, and then there’s gravity transforming what figure you had into some unrecognizable lumpy round shape.

So when a guy plays you, it’s a back handed Barbie compliment. Like did he play me because I’m attractive? Did he play me because despite all my physical and mental grumpiness I’m still attractive? Or did I just get displayed because I looked desperate, like no one’s played me in years, and well what do you when you’re bored a on a plane ride from LAX to Oakland with a woman reading an Anne Rice novel?
******************

I think this part should go at the beginning of my story anyway, you know setting it up as like this really weird and strange experience, and then maybe it was a dream kind of thing.

So I decided that line I wrote, "From LAX to Oakland" would be a good title for a story, and I keep getting hearing this story in my head which is kind of based on last week's love adventure. This is the start of it, and note how I'm so current because I have a Ricky Williams the Miami Dolphins football player reference in it.

********
Maybe he was a dream, the kind of dream that happens right before you wake up, the kind of dream you remember for years afterwards with haunting images that flicker in and out of your mind like bulb about to burn out. It’s annoying but you’re too lazy to get up and change it so you wait till it burns itself out. Except this is the kind of bulb that never burns out.

It’s the romanticism of it all. Men are so seductive that way, because they’re total romantics and some of them have this innate ability to suffuse all of their love affaires with the thick veil of fairy tale love.

'I’m going to be your new best friend', he said as I glanced up from my book and peered at the red-haired stranger at the end of the seat row. I smiled thinking now that’s an interesting line, he must be in sales, well, at least he’s kind of cute.

'Save my place will you?' he said with a smile as he dropped a crumpled USA today on the seat and took off for the end of the plane. I went back to reading. Maybe I won’t like him after all.

I mean why would a cute guy like that be available if there wasn’t something wrong with him, if he wasn’t carrying a load of emotional so heavy he’d make Ricky Williams the football player seem normal.
**************

I am hooked on that new USA channel show, "The 4400". Someone is my neighborhood spraypainted into the sidewalk the phrase, "The 4400 are coming." So I know I'm not the only fan of the show out there.

It will be interesting to watch the democratic convention this week. I love David Gergen who is commentating on CNN. Gergen is one of the most insightful political commentators out there. But CNN, why Mo Rocha? That man is such a freak. He makes me not want to watch CNN's coverage. But I do love David Gergen, so I'll just have to channel surf when Rocha comes on. Mo Rocha is no Jon Stewart.

So like what is it lately with me and marina boys? All these years I've lived in San Francisco and I've never ever met a marina boy I wanted to date. And now my last two crushes were Marina boys. Cute screenwriting guy lived in the marina, and I had an awful crush on him.

And now as red-headed boy and I are driving throught the Marina on the way to lunch yesterday, he tells me that he used live in the marina and chase girls and hang out in the "triangle". And I'm like "oh my".

But I so miss my red-headed marina frat boy already. He was such a fun, fun crush. He kept telling me not to count him out just yet, and that he would get his act together. And my intuition tells me that he's still in the game, but I don't know. We'll see.

I'm praying and if it's meant to be, it will happen and if it's not, then I'm definitely going to look for his more available twin. I had so much hanging with my red-headed marina frat boy yesterday, despite the fact that he was kind of really breaking my heart. He was so much fun, and he kept making me laugh, and I could be myself and say the things that I say without him getting all freaked out.

And what's interesting is that he's got this interesting habit of telling me everything that he's thinking. So like I don't have to guess, analyze or try to figure him out because he plays with all his card face up on the table. It's such an interesting habit because I don't have an excuse to be bored by him anymore. It was kind of fun to hear all his thoughts and his feelings so willingly thrown at my feet like that. It was all so fascinating and interesting, like kind of looking inside of his head and seeing what's there. I've never had a guy act that way with me before and I really, really like it. I don't think I would ever get bored with someone like him, although it's probably too early to tell that yet.

But someone who plays with all his cards on the table always has a trump card up his sleeve, and that needs figuring it out. What is red-headed marina frat boy's trump card? If he decides to stay in my life, I'll have to work on knowing what his trump card is. I told him we could be friends, but I warned him that I don't really want to get an email a year from now that says "I can't just have a friendship with you without wanting something more." I've been there, done that and I got really, really hurt by it. And I'd like to avoid that experience happening again.

I am so bummed. I want to to say my heart is broken but I only met him Wednesday night and honestly that's really not long enough to have a broken heart I think.

What I liked most about what happened is I got this guy to really come out of his relationship issue shell and ask me out. That took guts on his part, and I give him credit for that. I also liked that he told me right away and didn't let the relationship drag on and then dump on me all his problems.

And he did give me hope that there is some guy out there for me who totally think I'm the next best thing to sliced bread. I made my joke about how a guy should look at a women he finds attractive like a starving man looks at food, and he said he was doing that with me and he was. I like that I could be honest with him, and mean, and I was really mean when he told his situation, but that we could laugh about it all later.

And I never thought I'd meet a man who was as close to perfect as perfect can get for me, and so it gives me hope that what I want isn't that far fetched and hopefully there's another more available one of him out there for me one day who will chat me on a plane ride one day and make me want to fall in love again.

Well, we had lunch and we talked and I'm bummed because although he seemed dreamy as all heck, he has several, several issues about getting involved. I'm glad he laid them all out on the first date of sorts, because he could have just lied about them all. I had a feeling he had serious relationship issues, so I kind of made him do his confession thing right away.

Wow, I'm bummed, very bummed and I told him so and he apologized for bumming me out but he is the way he is and he's not willing to change right now. But we did have a nice very long lunch and we did part friends, and I didn't shut the door completely shut in his case but I warned him that I play for keeps and if he's not willing to do the same then well, friendship is all he'll have.

I told him, "I'm giving you a very long rope, now don't hang yourself too quickly because in my experience if you give a guy a lot of rope, eventually he'll hang himself. So I don't have to shut the door completely in your face and be mean, because you'll do that yourself one day soon."

God, can I say again I'm bummed, bummed, bummed, but not really surprised. He was really too good to be true I suppose, but it was fun as heck to get caught up in the silly romanticism of it all. He's defintely a romantic, way more romantic than me, and maybe I'll end up his "one that got away." Who knows.

Again, I am bummed, so bummed because he was so, so cute and very, very sweet, and that's not a combo I find very often.

I hate playing games with guys and I've never understood "the rules" about how you're supposed to behave with men you've just met and want to date. Besides, I'm a half hippie chick who loved those four years in college when a guy could just walk up to you at a party and say "let's have sex", and you'd either say yes or no. How simple is that? No flirting, no delay, no stupid games, just plain and simple and so practical because it's get that sex stuff out of the way so you can concentrate on more important things like getting to know each other's mnds

Anyway, at around noon I emailed the red headed shoe guy with an email that went something like this:

***************
Subject:Fools and Snobby Girls (this is a reference to a comment he made about not wanting to make a fool out of himself with snobby girls)

Just so you don't think I'm a "snobby girl", I wanted to thank you for making my trip from LAX to Oakland a fun experience. (I think it's a good idea to always reference when and where you met the guy because chances are the guy has probably alrady forgotten who the hell I am. (Okay this is where I was being a naughty naughty elf girl and trying to flirt in an email at the same time). It isn't every day that I meet a total stranger who fulfills one of my secret fantasies by uttering an innocuous phrase, and then making it onto one of my top ten lists. (I'm sure he totally won't get what I wrote here, but he'll appreciate the "secret fantasy" phrase because it makes most men's mind go straight to the gutter)

Take care, Elf Girl

p.s. There was an accident on the Bay Bridge last night and I was seriously regretting the offer of a ride home as I was arguing about voting and Ralph Nader with my shuttle driver.
****************

Cute huh? Maybe a little to clever for him, who knows? So he emails me back and asks me if I wanted to do a late lunch tomorrow, which he said we would do on the plane, and leaves his cell phone number.

So I called him and I know it's bad, but when I heard his voice on the phone I kind of didn't recognize it; people sound so different on the phone. So we have a lunch date tomorrow and I'm nervous. Red-headed guy said something very odd too. He asked me I had sent me an email back and I said no, because I had left a message on his phone. Like why would I have to send him an email if I left him a voicemail message? I'm sure this is a subtle way of training me or something, like don't just leave me voicemail, send me an email too to remind me. I'm sorry but I'm very cynical and I've had several men try to subtely and sometimes not so subtlely try to train me to behave in ways that they liked. And what's worse, they'v copped to it too and told me that they were trying to train me.

So I did the girlie thing and came home and tried on a dozen outfits before deciding on two possible outfits that I might wear tomorrow. Damn! I hate that I'm 15 pound heavier than I was last year. I have such bad, bad timing, gaining weight like this and meeting a really sweet, sweet cute guy out of the blue. I'm trying to tell myself it doesn't matter because we sat on the plane together and my fat belly was I'm sure hanging out over my pants, and like I'm sure he noticed my very large love handle. One the other hand I've had guys tells me that they never notice a women's weight, but I was dating these guys at the time so I don't think they were telling me the truth.

And I always say the wrong thing with guys but I had to tell him I had concerns about his monster SUV and I had to think about what it meant that he owned and drove one. He asked me what I decided, and I told him that it was okay because he told me grew up on a huge 400 or 800 acre ranch so it was like in his background, his childhood to drive cars like an SUV. I told him that everyone has quirks or habit that are because of their background, their nationality, etc. And that well sometimes you have to accept the fact a guy really is the way he is and it's ingrained and it's probably never going to change, so you either have to accept the quirks or habits early on or get out of the relationship. I told him it's like dating a republican guy. I know he has bad politics, but it's okay because he's a republican and that's the way he is, always will be and I can't change it, and as long as his politics don't freak me out too much then I'm okay with the republican thing.

So I'm nervous and I keep wondering if this guy has a usual two-week shelf life and that I'll get seriously bored with him in two weeks. He'll go rotten like milk past its due date and I'll have to boot him out of my life. And I feel bad that I think such things and I know it's not about the guy, it's about me and my shallow level of boredom with most people but guys especially because they're too easy for me to figure out.

And I'm nervous because with my people karma, if God doesn't think he belongs in my life, he won't be in my life for very long and something will happen to take him away. And I really kind of like him because he's so affectionate, sweet and cute. Not sure if he's smart but at least he hasn't proven himself to be not as smart as me. Talk about another relationship killer. I can't be with a guy that I think isn't smarter than me. I've tried it and it just doesn't work. I have to respect the guy intellectually or I get very disturbed. And there are so few guys that I've met that I know are smarter than me.

So I'm like sad because I feel like I have to treasure every moment with this guy because I don't know how long he's going to be around. And I kind of understand now why some of my boyfriends have looked at me like a starving guy looks at food. If you think there isn't a future with someone then you have to stare at them and memorize every line of their face because that face won't be in your life for very long. At least romantically that's why I think men have looked at me like a starving man looks at food. Well, that and the other sexual reason too but I like the romantic reason better.

I'm such a sucker for lines like this but red-headed guy said that he thought all morning about kissing me, and I'm such a bad flirt and I answered back the thought had crossed my mind as well several times. He was so cute though because then he asked me if I was going to kiss him tomorrow and of course I said sure.

So I flew down to LA today just for a meeting and flew back. I went down to help and to transport the meeting materials. It was fun in its own way and I didn't have to work work. Not sure if the meeting went really well because we ran out of time, but my boss says we'll find out tomorrow if the senior vp doesn't send an email thanking us.

But I think it might have all worth it because I met a really cute guy on the plane back. He had red hair, which is a big plus because I have a thing for redheads because of Steve so I like him because he reminds me of Steve. He was sweet and friendly like Steve too, but he's a business traveller so it's probably second nature to him to chat up girls on planes.

But being a business traveller he didn't want to be known as someone who can chat anyone up and get them to buy things, so his line to me was "I'm a workaholic and women don't want to date me because I'm too shy." And I'm talking to him and looking at him, like yeah right. And I'm thinking to myself you're an exec, you're a frickin' director for god's sake, you're not shy, you're cute, you're smart, and women don't want to date you. So of course that this guy's line he uses with women to get them to feel sorry for him. Every guy has a line or two that he uses that he thinks will get a woman to give him her phone number.

And I told him that the shy exec guy bit was his line, but obviously it must work because I ended up giving him my business card. Red headed guy just laughed. And no his name wasn't Chris, but he had other good signs.

We ended up discussing politics, and I'm excited because even though he's a registered democrat his politics didn't disturb me. Most guy's politics always freak me out. Republicans I can take because well they're republicans and they're all that way, but democrats and other liberal left types always freak me out. Talk about a relationship killer. I'm always meeting cute guys at parties that I can't date because their politics freak me out. Red headed guy is a moderate like me, and he's not a full of rage and anger democrat either. He didn't even blink an eye when I told him I wasn't even going to watch Michael Moore's movie. But he was just meeting me for the first time so maybe he was smart and didn't want to say anything just yet.

I liked him. I had fun talking to him and he was very charming, very frat boyish. I love a charming frat boy guy who can hold a conversation and make me laugh. He even offered to drive me home, and even though every part of me was screaming to say yes, I was a good girl and said no. But then I said if I was 20 years younger I would of course have said yes, like whatever. He liked that. I also told him he was too much of a temptation and I just had to say no. I hoped he liked that.

He was very tempting, because back in the day I would have let him take me home and then had my way with him. And I know he would have been fun too, in fact I know we would have had a blast. But it's not back in the day, so I took the shuttle home.

But there was another good sign. The gate for our plane failed to open so the captain announced that we had to back up and take the plane to another door. I told red headed guy I've never been on a plane and had his happen before, and red headed guy agreed and then said "God must want us not end our relationship yet." And oh my god, I just about died in my seat. Talk about fantasy come true. I've always wanted a guy to say to me the first time we meet, "it must be destiny that I met you or God wants us to be together." No guy has ever said that to me until now.

I mean I hardly know the guy and already he made one of my secret fantasies come true. I am like so in crush! And he was so touchy and affectionate too, but not in a weird way. He tried to give me a massage on the plane, and I let him because I never turn down a free massage. He grabbed some of my hair and said he liked me hair. Then he kept putting his hand on my knee, kept stroking my arm, and he kind of tried to hold my hand. It was so cute, and I wasn't freaked out. Usually I hate when I guy gets too touchy like that. Like get your hands off the merchandise you freak! But it was different with this guy. His touch wasn't creepy but very sweet and affectionate. He reminded me of this guy I dated who was so affectionate. I mean that guy was totally worthless as a boyfriend except for the fact that I loved how affectionate he was with me. Red headed guy's touchiness reminded me of that guy's affectionate nature.

And like I'm such a plane slut because I let the guy kiss me on the cheek when we parted. On the way out of the airport he kept trying to hold my hand, and he kept saying he didn't want to say goodbye to me, which was so sweet and so cute. So when he bent his head next to mine to kiss my cheek, I let him but didn't kiss him back. And I thought I would be kind of grossed out to let a total stranger kiss my cheek but it was sweet.

I just remembered something else. The guy smelled really good. Not sure if he was wearing cologne or something but he smelled clean and good. Talk about a turn on. I hate dirty smelly stinky skanky boys! He looked clean and he smelled clean. I'm not sure about the clothes, they were too nondescript but at least he didn't look like a slob. Talk about another relationship killer. Sloppy dressing is just such a huge, huge turnoff.

But it's not like he's Mr. Perfect because he had to tell me drives one of those monster SUVs, and part of me just shrivelled up at that little factoid but I'm willing to concede that maybe it's a guy guy thing to drive an environmentally unfriendly and politically incorrect car. Because red headed guy is not a femme boy but a guy guy, not oozing with way too much maleness and definitely oozing enough where he's not coming across like some wimpie cali girlie man. I hate this type of guy!

He's not a city dweller either. He lives in the East Bay. But he says he's a city boy and always go rollerblading in Golden Gate Park, and he just lives in East Bay because he likes the sunshine.

So we exchanged business cards, and he said he would take me out to lunch on Friday. And I'm like okay, let's see if he calls or emails me. I'm like so ready to email him and tell him I'm in so crush with you. I mean I tried to kind of tell him that on the plane. I told him our whole conversation reminded of this scene in the movie "Practical Magic". He of course had never seen the movie. There's this one scene in the movie where the Sandra Bullock character tells the cop she loves that he's everything she told herself she wanted when she was a little girl, that she made a spell about this impossible man so she wouldn't ever have to experience the hurt of falling in love, and now here was this guy, the cop, who had all the qualities she put in her spell.

So for like the briefest of moments, I thought I had dreamed up red headed guy, that he was everything I told myself I wanted in a guy, especially when he made the God comment. But only for the briefest of moments, because like who knows. Even my best friend whom I totally loved from Dallas told me he knew my attention span with men was two weeks, two weeks before I looked a guy in the eyes and figured out that he totally bored me to death. Dallas guy felt happy that it took longer for me to get bored with him, even though I did get bored with him eventually but not for the resons I get bored with most guys.

So I am in such a crush and it's fun and exciting for now.

When I set my sights on Silicon Valley in 1997 and left my comfortable 5-year job in San Francisco for the world of start-ups, little did I know how such a move would impact my life. I spent about 6 years working in the suburbs outside of San Francisco, although I had a brief 16-month stint in the middle of those sixe years working in China Basin, which was in 2000 the heart of the dotcom explosion in San Francisco.

Working outside the city changed me politically. I learned to take the middle road, and grew wary of extremism on both ends of the political spectrum. Outside the extreme left-wing politics of San Francisco, another world exists where political extremism has no place. People in suburbs aren't as politicized. They're working and trying to raise their families, and don't really have the time to indulge in the self indulgent political masturbation that city folks go through. And if you do have time for it, the extremism of the left and the right make no sense to a family just barely struggling to pay bills and survive.

There's also a negativity, a uncontrollable rage that exists on both extremes of the political spectrum. You can't raise a family and have that kind of extreme anger and rage, and not have it affect your family. The extreme anger and rage is so intense, I keep hearing Obewon Kanobi telling Luke "anger leads to the dark side of the force."

I don't understand that kind of rage, that kind of anger. It doesn't make sense to me to operate out of that kind emotion, because if you did, you wouldn't be able to make rational decisions. Politics like business is not about emotion. It's about making rational decisions for the good of the community, the corporation. If you're too full of emotion, you're not balanced and you make bad decisions.

Besides when you hate something that much, I think you're basically projecting. That what you actually hate is the shadow side of your personality that you see in the other person. This hatred of the shadow was responsible for holocaust, slavery, and any kind of bad thing that happened to any group.

I don't believe in that kind of hating. To hate like that would mean you have to make the other person less than human, and it's the root of Nazism, this is why Hitler was popular. How you can think of anyone as less than human, as an animal, because once you do that, the next step is slavery of people isn't it? These people are not human after all, so they can enslaved, they can chained, they can beaten and whipped, gassed, killed and burnt till the ground beneath the human ovens rises two inches because of all the human ash.

I will not take the walk towards anger and to the dark side of the force.

My post is incoherent I know. I just hate all this negativity and anger and rage. It's dangerous and it's scary.

Another link for the 9/11 conspiracy crowd, Inside Job - Unmasking the 9/11 Conspiracies by Jim Marrs.

I've heard this man in interviews; he's very, very interesting.

"There is also the fact that NORAD-Northeast was conducting war game exercises that morning, a fact that has been very little talked about and certainly not reported to the general public. What's also not been reported, according to the information that I have, at least one of the scenarios they were considering in their war game exercises concerned hijacked aircraft being crashed into buildings. Now, this could explain the lack of response when the air traffic controllers began to report that four planes were off course..."
- Jim Marrs, Author, Inside Job

For the 9/11 conspiracists, here's what The NY Post had to say about Alex Jones:

NOTHING NEW

MICHAEL Moore's anti-Bush film "Fahrenheit 9/11" isn't even original. Two years ago, "9/11: The Road to Tyranny," a real documentary by Alex Jones, had most of the "facts" Moore uses in his scatter-shot diatribe. Jones, who is less interested in making money than the self-aggrandizing Moore, released his film for free on his Web site www.infowars.com, where it drew legions of new fans, including producer Curt Johnson, who is hiring Jones as a consultant on a political action thriller titled "Wake Up.", NY Post on Alex Jones.

I've heard this guy speak over the years, and he's great! This is his website, Alex Jones. He's been harping on the 9/11 Bush Conspiracy for two years, long before Mr. Moore. Here's a link to his 9/11 conspiracy page, 911: THE ROAD TO TYRANNY. There's a link on the right where you can watch 40 minutes of his 9/11 Bush conspiracy film.

I think I've been depressed for primarily two reasons:

1) This month is the one-year anniversary of my grandma' death. I forgot about it and just remembered it today. It's not the kind of thing I ever wanted to have an anniversary for, but it's there. I smelled grandma smells in my living room today too. Usually if she's visiting me, my kitchen smells like her but today she was in the living room. How spooky is that!

2) I haven't been sleeping well lately. I fell asleep in an odd position a couple of weeks ago, and my upper back has been hurting. I tried switching pillows, but that didn't help. At my monthly acupuncture appointment on Saturday, I told my chinese doctor and he asked me if I snored and I said yes, it's an inherited bad trait. He said snoring meant that I never get enough sleep every night, so he did a treatment for snoring. I had needles in my throat, so scary! Aferwards he told me that my chi was stuck around my heart area, or my heart chakra, he did a massage on it and then gave massage on my upper back.

When I woke up this morning, I felt like a had my first good night of sleep in weeks, and my upper back stopped hurting. But then I decided I needed to sleep more, so I stayed in bed all day and listened to old shows of this radio program I subscribe to via streamlink.

Then I was thinking that the reason my upper back was hurting was because my chi was stuck in my heart chakra, which meant the chi couldn't escape out of my wing chakras on the back. I had my wing chakras (charkas 11 & 12) opened up at a seminar a couple of years ago. Most people have it but you have it have it opened by someone who knows how. Whatever. I'm just the doctor released me chi, although when I massage my heart center, it stil hurts and he said I needed to keep massaging that spot so the chi keeps flowing.

But as much I have physical problems, other people have it worse. While I was writing out my check at the acupuncture clinic, a woman came in and said her husband had so much back pain that he couldn't get out of bed. She asked the acupuncture doctor if he could see her husband. I could tell she had just walked right off the street and into the clinic because my doctor didn't even know her name, and neither did his wife. They were nice though, and gave the woman's husband a 3 pm appointment. Poor guy! He was in so much pain, he couldn't get out of bed. That's bad. My acupuncture guy is very good though and I almost felt like telling the woman that she picked a good clinic, but I didn't want to embarrass my doctor.