Empty

I'm anxious.

I don't know why. I'm awake at night, thinking about my ex. I'm stuck here - I've never been stuck like this before.

She's moved on, and there's never any going back; but I can't seem to close this chapter of my life for good.

I'm generally depressed. Work is stressful, differently so than usual, because I'm stuck in a position where I can't do anything productive.

Everyone is pointing out to me that I seem down. It is not that I'm never happy, but there are long stretches of glum.

I keep dwelling on the past; happy times I had with her. I've been apart for almost a year now. I keep thinking about what I used to be like, why we separated, and the things I've changed.

For instance, I really enjoy my computer, and pornography - or did. It was a horrible rut I was in; and always a point of contention. That's something I've changed a lot of: both are much more in moderation.

I'm fit for the first time in a long time with my cycling. I go out socially and enjoy doing the things I want to do - at least somewhat. I want to go out clubbing more, but don't have that set of friends.

Sometimes I know I'm seeking approval with these changes. Other times it feels a little bit as though I'm doing this for me. Mostly though, its the approval.

I have little to no interest in meeting other people. I've tried, and where every other time I've been in this situation, someone has come along and I've been able to move on; it's different now.

I don't care enough to get to know someone. This makes me cold, distant, bitter.

Last night, I went out for St Patricks Day. Lisa from work starts talking to me about all of this; specifically Chloe; and I have to ask her to stop - I feel as though I'm just going to sit down and cry.

I can't comfortably talk to anyone else about Chloe. I've just shut up and dealt with it. Paulie is probably the closest I've got. My old man is surprisingly filling that gap too - I would never have picked that.
Worse, the only person I could talk to this kind of stuff about was her; and now that she's made the first steps to moving on, that avenue is completely closed to me.

I've never felt I needed it before. I don't know why I need it now. Perhaps because I've been angry before, and I know how to cope with anger. Now I'm just empty. I'm not afraid - fear I can cope with too.

I'm just hollow.

Usability failure

My phone has a usability problem.

It took me ages to figure it out. I don't understand why it does it in reverse to every other phone ever made.

A new hero: Salome Samadashvili

Salome Samadashvili is a new personal hero for me. She's the Georgian ambassador to the EU.

I saw her on Lateline last night. The day before, she broke down into tears during a press conference.

To give you an insight as to why that helps make her a hero...

TONY JONES: Now you were very emotional personally, you were very personally emotional about this yesterday. Were you responding to the reality that Europe and the United States were not going to be coming to your rescue if you were invaded by Russia?

SALOME SAMADASHVILI: It's very difficult not to be emotional when your country is attacked and under siege. Yesterday there was a moment when I think all of us believed that it would take something extraordinary to prevent disappearance of our country from the face of the earth. You know, we are people, most of the Georgian leadership are people like me, who have lived in the West for a long time. We left in the '90s to receive our education in the West, and we all realise that we want to do is go back to Georgia and build our country up, and we want to live in our country and we want our people to have a better future, and this is what we have devoted our lives to. And to realise that just in a matter of hours all your dreams for your country, for your future, might just disappear and you might become a province of the Russian Federation administered by the hated Russian security agencies, and, you know, having the governors who represent the same kind of mentality, that will, that meant the end of any future for my country and for my people. So it's very difficult not to be emotional. This concerns the future of each and every one of us in Georgia, and you know, I think it's difficult to stay calm under the circumstances.

All of her answers to questions put to her were to the point, avoiding hyperbole, and utterly genuine in content.

Read the transcript.


Also worth a look: War in South Ossetia.

Tired

I am so tired my eyes bleed sand. The grit of the day sluices down through my body, from the depths of my skull to the tips of my eyelids. I am weary. I feel the cold whispers of winter flavouring the air. My cycling-short-clad legs are unable to hold me, so I sit.

The rumbles of an unsatisfied stomach arise from below my chest. The desk cuts into me, my teeth hurt, and together these two make me sick with the worry of the day. Every moment I live and breathe, every moment I edge closer to death. I work myself there.

I don't know why I must absorb the burdens of all my colleagues. Perhaps I do not value them as much as I should.

My betrothed to be, whom is blissfully unaware of her status and importance in my life, is away from me. She is torn away by the clutches of a fierce economic beast, a beast who mewls the sickeningly plantative cry of the poor.

She serves the hungry, the tired, the stupid. It is no shelter, no soup kitchen in which she works. She works in the hell kitchens of the local McDonalds – the friendly face of the facist corporate family. The mewling, which is ever present, beeping and calling, demanding her most exemplary efforts and obsessive attentions knows no bounds.

She dares not slow, nor know no rest; for her cruel overseers taunt her onwards. She will not be home a happy soul.

I dare not tarry, for my time is precious. She will be home, and I must lay to sleep. Of the work, I know no end. The work has no meaning anymore, it has long since fallen into an endless gray blur. I must write, I must create, I must learn and think! To stop is to die! To let the crushing tides of life ebb and flow no more!
She does not understand, she only want that I care for her. That in itself has become work – work to which I throw myself with merry abandon. I lay my axe to the grindstone of our love, to feel the tortured screams of metal against stone. The flecks of red hot metal are what I seek – the warmth, the light, the tiny specks of solace that we together only know.

Only through struggle can one truly know hope, and it is with our struggle I carry myself through the hellish days.

The work consumes me, the pull of duty. I cannot harken to its call. The medium with which it summons me has long since washed away; but alas, I cannot cease my endless toil. I sweat with angst, I gnaw hungrily on the forces of mediocrity. I cannot do, I cannot make, so what have I become?

I can only hope she will return soon, to wash the worries of this wretched day away.

100 mile diet

I just stumbled across the 100 mile diet.

It's pretty simple: only eat things produced within a hundred miles of you.

I wonder how hard it is to do?

Soldiers wearing prothetics returning to active duty

An upbeat article about soldiers with prosthetics in active duty. These people are missing both legs but still doing parachute jumps.

Jesus; that's amazing.

Aceh

Right now, I'm sitting in my lounge room. I'm watching the tradgedy of the Acehenese people. Gen. Bambang was a leader of the indonesian army and more or less actively wiped out hundreds of people fighting for a free Aceh.

It's fucking saddening - I've just seen the story of how one of the journalist's friends has been tortured and murdered by security forces. We just saw the old man who supported GAM once again, the voice over telling of how he had his throat cut.

Only... AND HERE's THE FUCKING KICKER... I can't hear because people won't SHUT THE FUCK UP ABOUT THE OC.

You can see the people crying on television because their families have died.

BUT HEAVEN FORFEND THAT THE TALES OF THE OC SHOULD GO UNREPEATED.

Just as the credits kicked in, they left.

Fuck.

Here's SBS's promo material.

The Black Road In the province of Aceh, journalist William Nessen gained the trust and friendship of General Bambang Darmono, the Indonesian commander of military operations, and patrolled with his military. He fell in love with Shadia Marhaban, a local ‘fixer,' who worked secretly for the independence movement. Days after Nessen's marriage to Shadia, the security forces kidnapped and killed his ‘best man,' an outspoken human rights activist. Nessen, the only journalist to report from the rebel zones, lived and filmed for months on the frontlines with GAM independence guerrillas. He was hunted by the military, imprisoned for 40 days and twice expelled from the country. Filmed over four years, The Black Road brings us directly to the battlefields and burnt-out villages of the province. We step into the lives and experience the deaths of Aceh's GAM guerrillas, its human rights activists and ordinary farmers. Acknowledging a hundred-year history of resistance to outside rule, the film focuses on the post-Suharto years of escalating fighting, martial law, and the conflict after the tsunami. (Commissioned by SBS Independent, in English, Indonesian and Acehnese, English subtitles) M (A,V) CC WS

and HERE's the outline of the OC

Plot Outline: A troubled youth becomes embroiled in the lives of a close-knit group of people in the wealthy, upper-class neighborhood of Newport Beach, Orange County, California. (more)