Eulogy For A Desktop....or, Dude, You're Getting (Rid Of) A Dell!

My desktop is dying a most undignified death.

It takes twenty minutes, no exaggeration, to boot up and load one Firefox window. Opening iTunes takes another five minutes and if I open up more than three tabs? The entire system schitzes out and needs to be reset.

Ol' Desky is finally heading to the glue factory (or Staples for their computer recycling program).

I've had some great memories with the lumbering beast, though.

It was the first computer I owned. Not a family machine or something I had to share, but solely mine. That ownership meant I could download Paul Frank icons, emblazon the screen with wallpaper that showed off Ron Livingston's exposed rear (Body Shots -- awful movie, awesome scene) and set up my email so that every time I got a new message, a gruff voice would shout out, "Mail, Motherfucker!"

I remember meeting Dan for the first time and spending the night watching Before Sunrise and True Romance. Movies to fall in love to...and we did.

I also watched One Night In Paris on that computer -- approximately eight of us, smooshed together in my room critiquing Ms. Hilton's technique and deciding that she was a lousy lay.

I discovered and downloaded amazing music -- everything from Stevie Ray's ode to Oreo cookies to Rage Against The Machine's condemnation of corrupt political systems.

I uploaded over a thousand pictures -- artsy shots like the one of buddy Paul dressed in his martial arts gear slicing a blue sky with his sword and drunken snapshots of the night we decided to slide down the hallway on beanbags.

I played lots of free Tetris and spent even more time talking to tech support after Pepe's extensive porn viewing crashed my system (thanks, dude).

And I wrote. I wrote. I wrote.

Articles, emails, blog entries, Livejournal entries, papers about the Geto Boys contribution to hip-hop and about the philosophical definition of art, screenplays, unrequited love letters, requited love letters, rants and bits and pieces that have never seen the light of day since.

I brought the desktop with me when I moved to Pennsylvania and it helped serve as a lifeline to my former life. We've had some good times together but now, it's time to move on.

Vaya con Dios, Ol' Desky. Hopefully you'll be recycled into something that gives someone else as much happiness as you gave me.

On Writing

Most writers can be distinguished by four inalienable traits:

1) Their egos. As massive and fragile as Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade balloons.

2) Their ability to be unashamedly self-congratulatory. In high school, I had this amazing English teacher named Terence Oliga who also happened to be a writer. After writing a particularly pleasing piece, he would lean back and pronounce, "Damn it, Oliga! You've done it again!" I blatantly stole this quirk from him and every time I write something that moves me, I lean back, smug and self-satisfied, and proclaim, "Damn it, Oliga! You've done it again!"

3) Their desperate insecurity. It's like erectile dysfunction. They glare at the blank page, seething with an increasingly visceral anger. They stalk the room, clutching fistfuls of hair, wild-eyed and wondering why the words won't come. They lament the death of their gift by drinking until they're either as jittery as hyperactive children on sugar benders or until they slur their words and collapse in a heap - cheap whiskey lingering in the air like rancid perfume.

4) The fact that when it comes down to it, writers are essentially assholes. The worst being the Public Writer. Real writers hate this guy. You know the type -- he sets himself up at Starbucks, laptop and iPod in tow, pretending to be an artsy type when in actuality, he's just a hapless prick who spends more time leering at the cute barista than he does actually writing.

These traits aside, I started thinking about what it means to be a writer. Anyone could be an insecure asshole. Anyone would be egomaniacal and self-serving. But, what defines a writer?Publication? The constant fluttering of fingers over keys? The ability to craft a thicker, juicier sentence than one's peer? The almost orgasmic glee that comes with the organic usage of polysyllabic words?

It's been two years since I had anything published and these days, my fluttering fingers craft more emails than anything else.

This drought lead to a bit of a personal crisis for me. Could I really even consider myself a writer anymore? Am I a neverwas hasbeen? Is this the bit where I start drinking?

I've never written for glory (because let's face it, it's not like I was writing for Rolling Stone, The Guardian or The Times) and neither did I write for money. I wrote for myself. Because I could. Because I was good at it. Because it was the one thing that made sense in a world filled with uncertainty.

For a while, everything I scribbled seemed like effete rubbish. It was soulless and devoid of intellect.....like a Fox News anchor minus that creepy plastic sheen they all seem to have. Lethargy and the daily grind won out over inspiration and I just stopped.

And I hated that. For me, not writing is arrhythmic -- not life-threatening, not devastating, but annoying. I feel uncomfortable in my own skin and impatiently huff until it passes and I can be me again.

My heartbeat regulated itself and I've started writing again. Nothing epic, but I have a good feeling about this. I hope it lasts.

And on that note -- what makes you feel like you? Your ability to talk politics/religion/money without inciting a riot? Your ability to make anyone laugh? Your athletic skills? Have you ever had this ability wane? What happened when it did?

Something to think about...

Cook Free or Die

Anthony Bourdain, originally uploaded by blumpimag.

Reason #4784512310320365479411 I love Dan:

Dan (On the phone after a long day of work): So, we're having pizza and I'll start it if you want, but could you work the dough? You're better at it.
Jaime: Yeah, sure.
Dan: I'll be your sous chef.

He watches Top Chef, No Reservations, Man Vs. Food and Kitchen Nightmares with me and uses the term 'sous chef' in everyday vernacular.

My guy rules.