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Wednesday afternoon, I rode in a Cessna Skyhawk from Honolulu, over Molokai, and onto Maui.  After we landed, I learned my new friend had never landed at Maui before, because his instructor told him it was the most difficult runway in the U.S. to land a private plane, since the winds come off the ocean and through the trees to create vortexes of sorts in the crosswinds on the tarmac.  Maybe that’s why we approached at an angle and got blown back into the air when we were a few feet above the runway, only to come down a few seconds later and actually land.  That wasn’t frightening at all.

I did find interest in our flying over a leper colony near the coast of Molokai, though.

Somewhere over the Pacific, I took the yoke for a few minutes…just long enough to update Twitter with a Top Gun reference:

I’m piloting a Cessna while tweeting! Where’s Viper? I want Viper!  posted by @themuskrat from Twitter for iPhone

Anyone watching CNN on Saturday probably witnessed the pulse-pounding, nail-biting broadcast focused on a reef off of the coast of Hawaii, awaiting the destructive forces of a tsunami. Rarely has there been a broadcast so packed with intensity and urgency about such a life-altering issue of world concern. In fact, I can only think of the following several instances of breaking news that CNN covered as well as this one:

• President Obama's Shoes Untied, Trip and Fall Expected
• Will Spelling Bee Semi-Finalists Misspell a Word?
• The Exciting World of Pi to 10,000 Digits
• The Toyota Recall: Important Technical Jargon that You Must Know or You Might Die!
• The Cure For Cancer – We Watch Scientists Look at Things in Microscopes
• Records Being Broken: How Long Can One Man Stand Still and Will He Get into the Guinness Book?
• Words That Begin With A – Part 1 of a 26-Part Series
• Breaking News: Paint Drying

Thank you, CNN, for being our source for timely, pressing, breaking news!

Fuck, it’s DECEMBER. The last month of the year. How’d that happen, right?

Worse yet, it’s the Holidays. Fuck me with something hard and sandpapery. Yeah, so not a fan.

When I was a wee lad, the Magic was still there. Months in advance, I’d pour through the Sears Wishbook and make a 1970’s version of an Excel spreadsheet, noting everything I wanted for Christmas. Item name, page number, Stock #, price, color and size (if appropriate). Yeah, I was really thinking of Santa, trying to make it easier for him to fulfill my needs.

What can I say? I’m a giver.

Christmas Eve? Forget it. I couldn’t sleep if you’d slipped gingerbread roofies into my warm milk. Not that I was allowed to have warm milk before bed, mind you (or water, for that matter). I was a bed-wetter. But you catch my drift.

In my early years - both before and just after my parents’ divorce - Christmas morning was all about navigating a very tight path through the myriad of presents carpeting the living room floor. An obscene amount of pressies, really, but I didn’t think so at the time. My parents weren’t rich, but they were doing pretty well.

In my tweens and teens - both in New York, and then New Mexico - it was the opposite. We were poor. Food stamps poor. And when I started working at 16, and subsequently having to hand over the bulk of my paychecks to my parents just so the five of us could eat, I think that’s where I started getting jaded. It was probably well before that, but it was around 16 that I specifically remember HATING Christmas.

I hated having to wake up early on Christmas morning. I hated having to put on a cheerful face when all I wanted to do was sleep. I hated having to act like a 6-pack of tube socks was exactly what I wanted. Well, everyone else pretended. I was just a total dickhead of a teenager, who felt that my job was to make everyone around me as miserable as I was.

At 18, I was freshly on my own. In fact, everyone else in the family had moved back to New York and left me in New Mexico. It was my first Christmas alone. And I hated that, too, fucking despised it.

Magic returned a couple of years later. I was married and a new daddy. It was the first Christmas for the twins and I was happy. I was in the Air Force, in love, a proud papa of 6-month-old girls…everything was good. For a while.

Flashforward a few years, when the marriage started sailing to southern climes. Christmas itself was still good because it was all about the girls. The Little Mermaid was brand new on VHS (and yeah, I’ve seen it about 2,742 times), my daughters had adorable British accents (because we lived in England at the time), and my wife and I always wore a happy face for the holidays.

Another few years and a divorce later, and I was depressed - yes - but still OK when my girls were around for Christmas. They’d visit me in San Antonio, and then Dallas (when I got out of the Air Force)…Santa would leave notes for the girls on the computer. It was fun.

Little later. Severe depression. Drugs. Even a suicide attempt. This was right after the flashbacks started hitting me enough to where I couldn’t ignore them any longer. My protective barriers were crumbling. All of this led me to neglect my girls. Don’t get me wrong, I was trying to protect them. Keep them away from the Fucking Disaster Formerly Known As Their Father, you know? Ugh. I could get really specific about all the ways I fucked up in those years (and since), but it’s not really relevant to the point.

Oh, yes, there IS a point. Somewhere. The Magic has been gone for a long time, that’s the point.

Nowadays, the holidays are nothing more than a 2-month period that I’d rather skip past, thanks very much. Love the Halloween. But from November 1 through,  oh, let’s say the day after New Year’s, I’d just like to fast forward through it all a’la Tivo.

It’s a ton of forced socializing, being “on” the whole time, putting on a happy face when I’m not happy, and family dynamics that sometimes make The Simpsons look like The Brady Bunch. Trust me, my mother and father got divorced for a reason. It should be against the law for them to be under the same roof these days…yet they are, right around this time every year. At my sister’s house.

Awkward, thy name is FAMILY.

And there’s always the political discussions. Most everyone in my immediate family is staunchly conservative in every way. Me, on the other hand…I’ve been growing more and more liberal as the years go by. Relative to them, I mean. Shit, I voted for Barack a year ago, and that’s grounds for castration in my family. Verbally speaking, of course.

Just you wait until Barack gets his thumbs in the health care system.

The economy is only going to get worse with a Democrat in the White House.

Barack isn’t really a Christian, you know.

Yeah, yeah. There’s a lot of tongue-biting on my part. It’s truly not worth trying to have a political discussion with my family. It’s not as if there’s going to be any actual  mind-changing going on. It’s all about the bashing, not the exchange of ideas. I’m very good at the occasional nodding, raising of the eyebrow, and mmm-hmm’ing.

Of course I enjoy my nieces. And I get along fine with my family, really. I’m not saying it’s ALL this horrible experience 24/7. It’s not.

But I don’t enjoy being out of my element for days at a time…sleeping in a foreign bed, not being able to socially retreat whenever I want to, having to wagon-train all over town to various relatives’ houses for brunches and dinners and gatherings, being subject to frou-frou coffee flavors like Vanilla Candy Cane Guava Hazelnut Chai Nectarine, and worse - single ply toilet paper.

Mix all that together with no wifi? Well, folks, all you need to do is add a few grains of sand in my crack and you have the Oxford English Dictionary definition of “hell.”

Add to that all the shit that has been 2009 and I’m stressed to the gills. I lost Lisa this year. Cancer. And then more cancer in my family…and more in friends and their families. Sickness, too, aside from the cancer. Anissa and her stroke.

Financial troubles (many of which have been caused by my not working for a while now - by choice, I might add). Relationship troubles with friends both new and old. Pyschotic assholes stalking dear friends of mine, sociopathic dickhead ex-spouses fucking with friends, too.

Hell, even people I don’t know who just lost a child in a tragic accident. And subsequent SHITHEADS that cast aspersions and say horrible things to a woman that just lost her fucking child. Clearly there’s no accounting for compassionless assholes. Happy fucking holidays, people.

For real… I can haz 2010 now pleaze? I’ve been done with this godforsaken year for a while now.

Thank God I started therapy again this year, or I’d be even more fucked. Hell, here’s how messed up in the head I’ve been lately. I’ve missed not only one, but TWO therapy sessions in the last month. I never do that shit.

Spent a couple days away from home over the weekend, right? Thought I’d enjoy a stress-free break. And I did have a great weekend. BUT…

Before I even got out of town, it started with my Garmin GPS sliding off the dashboard onto the floor and breaking.

Out of warranty, natch.

And then, having parked my car for two days, I discovered that some asshats had tried to break into it. Now the driver’s side lock is all stripped out and I have to unlock the car from the passenger’s side. And yes, this is the car that I JUST got out of the repair shop a week ago.

Because, y’know, my car is such an amazing Piece Of Shit that people are just dying to steal it. Not everyone can swim in the back of their car. No one got IN the car, at least. Not that there was anything to take…except for the busted-ass GPS.

This time of year always brings me a lot of anxiety. And I’ve noticed how short my fuse is lately, too, which isn’t making it any easier. I feel like snapping at close friends, let alone the fuckwad prunts that annoy the living shit out of me…which is much easier to do right now.

I’d just like to betchslap the dumb out of EVERYONE and EVERYTHING, really.

1. Stalkers. Seriously, WTF? Is your life so pathetic that you can’t do anything but harass people that want nothing to do with you? When I was a kid, I got bullied a lot. The problem with the Internet is that it allows people that can’t physically bully you to bully you electronically. Die, bitches, die. Though I now have a better understanding of restraining orders, so there’s that.
2. Mind Games. Played by 95% of the population, I have no patience for them, either. Fuck off. If you cannot flat out TELL ME what you want to tell me, without resorting to passive-aggressive tactics, I’m done. People are (for the most part) rather transparent, particularly those that feel confident they’re being clever. Try pretending you’re a grown-up. For once.
3. Mean People. Suck. Period.
4. Closed-Minded People. My friends are from all walks of life, and I dig that. Political spectrum, religious/spiritual spectrum…they’re all over the board, and I dig that. The people I want to be around are the kinds of people that can talk about any topic under the sun without screaming or yelling or namecalling. When you’re the OPPOSITE of that? Piss off.
5. Bad Drivers. They’re everywhere, I know. But it’s this time of year when southern Florida gets the Snowbirds. Snowbirds, if you don’t know, are the people that live here for half the year, and live up north the other half of the year. It’s warm in Florida (today’s high is 77) while they have penis-shrinking temperatures up north. Good for the local economy, bad for your sanity if you’re driving. Yesterday, some dipshit with an Ontario license plate  pulled out in front of me and I had to slam on my brakes. There was no one behind me for half a mile, so the dipshit could have waited 8 more seconds and then pulled out with no trouble. But no. It’s a shame my Scanners powers haven’t yet developed, cuz that fucker’s brains would have covered the entire interior of that Ford Taurus.
6. Garmin. WTF? My nice little sandbagged bracket (which worked just fine for over a year) slid off the side of the dash, onto the floor…the GPS hit NOTHING but the carpet and the screen BREAKS? Grrr. $80 I don’t have right now.
7. My Laptop. Beyond 3 years old now, it’s on its last legs, and has been for a while. Sometimes, Firefox acts all wonky and I have to reboot. Internal hard drive is maxed. RAM is maxed. Friends talk to me about doing a clean install with XP, but that scares the crap out of me because I don’t know where all my software discs are. Reinstalling all that crap? Not high on my list of fun things to do. 2010 is  most definitely the year for a new computer. Y’know, when I work and make some money and can make that happen. Right now, though? I wanna put a bullet right through the middle of this POS Dell laptop.
8. My Car. Yes, it drives fine. I’m not one of those people that really obsesses over vehicles. To me, it’s merely a tool to get from Point A to Point B, and I drive my cars into the ground before getting a new one. But it’s time for my car, too, I think. There is literally a fucking pool of water on the floorboard in the back seat. I have  no idea where it’s coming from but it’s moldy and nasty. And when I have money again, I don’t know that I want to spend a ton of money to fix what is clearly going to be replaced relatively soon. And with the new driver’s side keyhole party? I want to kick my car in the junk, too.
9. Christmas Shopping. Haven’t done one damn bit of it. Yet. Looks like an Amazon year, if you ask me. Do I need to mention again that I have no money?
10. ME. Last but not least, yeah. I am my own worst enemy. I haven’t worked consistently since Lisa died, and that’s been ALMOST A YEAR. I’ve been repeating major mistakes that I haven’t made in decades. I’m neglecting all sorts of relationships because of my blinders. I’ve been attempting to change bedrooms in my house for a year, but never really getting anything accomplished. I don’t know where the hell my days are going! I’m not doing SHIT. Well, that’s not true, exactly. I’m putting out one fire after another, only to have THREE MORE FIRES take their place as soon as I extinguish one. Yeah, I’m a mucking foron.

I just want to retreat away somewhere, curl up into the fetal position, and hide. Unplug everything. Delete all my damn accounts and just…disappear. I don’t feel like I can take one more straw on my back, not even a teeny tiny Barbie straw.

Moments like this make me seriously question whether or not there’s enough Guinness on the planet.

Nevertheless, I look forward to seeing some friends this weekend. Cissa is driving through North Carolina as I type this, and I’m glad she’ll be local to me very soon.

I have episodes of Supernatural, Smallville, and Fringe to watch, too. So that’s something.

I’ve lost 40 pounds over the course of the last year. Recently had to go spend $90 just on new underwear and jeans because I’m down from a size 38 waist to a 30 now, something I haven’t been able to say since I was in my 20s. EARLY 20’s. So there’s that. Even if my incredible t-shirt collection is of the Large variety and I now wear a Medium.

And I’ve decided that I ultimately can’t wait to move to one of the following states: Alaska, California, Hawaii, Colorado, Maine, Michigan, Montana, Nevada, Oregon, New Mexico, Washington, Rhode Island, or Vermont. So there’s that.

I’ll take some stress-free happy moments, please. Or maybe I’ll just taken enough Ambien to put me out like Rip Van Winkle for a while. Either way.

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