Moments Frozen In Time

This past weekend, Allison drove to Pitt to visit, Dave went home to see his girlfriend, and I ditched schoolwork in order to catch up with some anime. It was fun watching and reviewing again, but now I need to get caught up with my schoolwork again or else I will get buried underneath all of it.

Anyways, these are some photos that Steve took the night before we were going back to Pitt. Steve came over about 20 minutes before Allison and Erin did, and he was in my room screwing around when he saw a picture of Erin and myself. I related to him the duality of how I look at the picture, he looked around my room, found my Advantix camera with film (Four leftover rolls from Otakon 2003), and decided to take some pictures of Erin for me. I was all for the idea, but I was hesitant to personally take the pictures; the hesitation was spawned from a paranoia about how Erin might get some less-than-pleasant ideas about the purpose of the photos. Call me a pussy if you wish, but I prefer to tread lightly. Also, some of the pictures have been edited to get rid of dead space. Anyways...


Pictured (Left to Right): Erin Schmucker and Allison Geiger
Without a doubt, this is Erin's best deer-staring-into-headlights pose. Steve walked into the living room, shouted out something real quick to get our attention, and then snapped the photo. However, Allison saw Steve walking up with the camera, quickly covered her face with a pillow, and then just as quickly started spouting out some "nonsense" about how people should not unexpectedly take pictures of women because it was rude (Because of Allison's tone, I could not tell if she was being sarcastic or really serious). Erin never voiced any opinion like that; all she did was smile.

Before I continue, I just want to note that my parents have a Native American fetish or something of the sort. I really do not know why, but they just do. Hence, you will notice that pieces of furniture (The couch screams Navajo to me, but someone who is more knowledgeable about the style and subject would know precisely) are not exactly "normal" American household style furniture.


Pictured (Left to Right): Erin Schmucker and Allison Geiger
This is the picture that Allison wanted Steve to take. The only difference is that both of them were prepared to have their picture taken even though they do not look physically different other than the addition of smiles. One thing I do not like about this picture is that the quality is horrible, although that has more to do with my desire to balance picture quality with size, but something else I do not like is... well, I will discuss the "dislike" with the next picture to illustrate a comparison.

If you look at Allison's hoody (A few days ago, I figured out that hoody is not spelled "hoodie," so I feel a bit like an idiot because that is how I have been spelling it for a while), it says on the front La Salle, which is the college that she attends. I have a strong feeling that, if she had never received a field hockey scholarship to La Salle, she would have attended Pitt in order to stay close to Steve. I have yet to see La Salle, but I will when Steve and I take our road trip during Pitt's Spring Break. And allow me to be that little bastard for a moment while I say this: Allison is a big girl. Not fat, although she does pack some cellulite over her hamstrings; I mean to say that she is naturally stocky, and she would still have huge hips and shoulders were she to lose 80 pounds. Suffice to say, she makes a good field hockey player (At least, I think that a physically-rigorous sport like that requires that build). But I digress.


Pictured (Left to Right): Erin Schmucker and Eric Joseph (Me)
Call me a whiny bitch if you would like, but this is another photo where I see a duality. On one hand, I love the fact that I have a good picture of Erin and I even if Steve had the camera aimed a bit too high. The lighting was well placed in order to bring out our best sides, we are both smiling, and it shows off Erin's cute face. What is there not to like?

On the other hand, there is a gap between Erin and myself. Compare the gap to the picture with Erin and Allison posing and you will notice a stark difference. I correlate that physical gap between people as also being a mental gap; the closeness that both individuals can be to one another without feeling like they are too close or too far from one another. In short, the Hedgehog's Dilemma. I see this as physical evidence of the theory at hand, or it could just be purely a fluke that we were that far/close together (However you want to look at it), but I see it as the former. Allison and Erin have been friends for a long time (Two years longer than Erin and I have been, I believe), and they feel far more comfortable being closer together. Yet, when it comes to the picture with Erin and myself, I have to wonder about who did not want to get closer to the other: Erin, me, or both of us. However, I also see it from another perspective: I have come so far to get that close to Erin, and I merely need to bridge that physical and mental gap between ourselves in order to get closer to who she is.

Perhaps she will get more comfortable with who I am when I reveal more of who I am so that we both can get closer to one another instead of it being one-sided.


Pictured: Steve Whetstone
Sometime during our lengthy group chat, Allison snapped a picture of Steve reading/flipping through some of my mother's magazines. Forgiving the bad quality of the picture, you can see a fair amount of my living room and just how much Native American/Southwest stuff there is hanging around and whatnot. I really have to speak to Allison and Steve about how to properly aim a camera...

Now that I think about it, I believe this was about the time that Erin got up and proceeded to "raid" my refrigerator. I smirk when I think about that, and even though she did not ask permission, she went right ahead and grabbed a bag of venison. Perhaps that is a show of Erin's carelessness or just that she feels more comfortable in my house, but either way, I had no problem with it at all.


Pictured (Left to Right): Erin Schmucker and Eric Joseph (Me)
Yet another picture that was taken on a moment's notice. Steve got up, and I guess we were both expecting him to take a picture; I mean, it is obvious when he has it in his hand and brings it above his waist. Otherwise, nothing really special about this picture other than it is showing us chilling on my couch.

Small side story: I forget where I got it from, but my shirt says "Three Wise Men", followed by three drunken frogs dressed in different clothing, each frog having their own shot glass, and their respective names below them: Jim, Jack, and Jose. Basically, it is indirectly advertising for Jim Beam Bourbon, Jack Daniel Whiskey, and Jose Cuervo Tequila, and now that I give it some thought, that was perhaps not the best attire to wear around Erin. Oh well; I cannot change the past.


Pictured (Left to Right): Erin Schmucker and Eric Joseph (Me)
Every time I see this picture, I giggle and a smile blooms on my face, and it is not because of the additional Native American stuff and Christmas lights strung on the wall.

Steve and Allison suggested that Erin and I do something "whacky" to pose for a picture. We sat around for a minute thinking of something to do, and I just sort of scratched my head. In the end, I decided to do a handstand on the couch. My first attempt at it ended rather quickly; basically, my hands slipped because I did not have a good "footing" and my head almost slid right into the coffee table in front of the couch. Everyone was quick to screech in distress and they even wanted to not go ahead with my idea, but I just went back to trying to do a handstand and they stopped worrying. After I got it, Steve's idea was to have Erin stand behind me and hold my legs up while she smiled at the camera from between my legs.

As the picture shows, that is not what happened, but oh well. Erin put on her I-cannot-believe-I-am-doing-this face (Actually, I have to wonder where her left hand got off to because she clearly had it up behind my pants), I could not stop laughing at all, and Steve took the picture.

Afterwards, I remember Allison saying something to the effect of "That was closest she has ever gotten to a sexual act." I wondered what the hell she meant by that simply because I did not consider the pose to be sexual in nature. I speculate that she meant something about how it was the most sexual of an act that Erin has ever done, but I have to disagree. Now, had Erin held me up and looked at the camera from between my legs, I would be far more inclined to say that that would have been sort of sexual in nature, but that did not happen.

Either way, these are precious moments forever frozen in time where I am smiling and not just showing teeth. I cannot wait for Erin to see them.

A Week In Review

• Good news: I finally moved out of McCormick Hall! J.D. moved out over Winter break, and although a new kid moved in, we found him another place at Bouquet Gardens that was open. So now, I have J.D.'s old room and my living arrangements are far better than they were before.
  
  Steve made it seem like the best part about the place is that we all have our own separate rooms, but I have to disagree. Although it is nice to be able to have some privacy and be able to sleep without having your roommate walk in only to crank the volume on his television up all the way, I consider roommates to be a much more important aspect. Seeing as how I had grown a particular hate for Bill, I also grew to realize just how important it is to have roommates that you actually like. And seeing how Koop, Dave, and Steve are good friends of mine, it is a good combination. At the same time, I am put into a situation I have never had to face before: the fact that I care about my roommates. Sure, I was friends with my roommate and floormates during my freshman and sophomore year, but I never truly cared about them and their situations. As cold-hearted as this may sound, it was all just meaningless banter to me; they would have fights or whatnot, and I could have cared less about their past, present, and future. The difference is that I care about my current roommates. Hence, I cannot say certain things that I could freely say before (i.e. poke fun at them because of their past girlfriends in front of their current girlfriend/fiancée).
  
  To boot: Bill never knew I had moved out until he came back Sunday night.
• A direct result of my moving is that I actually have the opportunity to regularly work out without interrupting a roommate's sleep. However, I started running every morning when I was still rooming with Bill, so he had to put up with my alarm clock going off every morning at 6 AM and the subsequent noise I made as I stretched and put on clothes.
  
  I hope I woke him up everyday at 6 AM that entire week.
  
  Waking up and running in sub-zero weather is stronger than coffee; that much I am positive of. For the first few days, I was coughing up a storm and my legs were sore as hell, but I adapted to my new routine and things were okay. A week after beginning, I did get sick, and adding sit-ups and pushups to my work out also meant that my abdominal and arm muscles got their chance at being very sore. But, I got over them. Granted, I do have the occasional aches and pains, but nothing that some stretching cannot fix. Also, last Tuesday (January 13th), I added a Personal Fitness class on to my schedule, which means that I will be even more active.
  
  I wonder where I can find the time for anime this semester.
• It seems like I cannot go an entire entry without some mention of Erin.
  
  On Friday night (January 16th), Allison drove to Pitt, and while I have a feeling that I will be seeing a lot more of her this semester because I moved into the same suite as Steve, that is not a bad thing. Allison is a good girl; virtual friend or party chick or whatever label you wish to slap on her. Cutting to the chase, Allison asked me what was up with my AIM profile and a specific away message that I used.

  From my AIM profile
  I wept and found love, but love did not find me. Yet, that has given me a new goal in this aimless life. For now, I shall smile and gaze into those sparkling eyes.

  The away message in question
  Happily dreaming of sugar plums, fairies, and... Allison knows the last part.

  The last part of the away message is "Erin." It is something that I told Steve and Allison on New Years Eve when we were driving to Steve's house. I forget what prompted me to say it (Probably the three beers I had drunk before hopping into the back seat of the car), but I said it quite clearly: "Tonight, I shall happily dream of sugar plums, fairies, and Erin." That warranted an "Aww" from Allison, but I was not striving for sympathy or pity or anything of the sort; I merely said what I felt.
  
  Anyways, Allison said that Erin had been asking her about it. At first, I felt... something, and that something was not good. It was neither jealousy, anger, or hate, but just a general "Not again..." feeling. It spawned mainly from the fact that this seemed to be yet another example of how Erin does not want to directly ask me about an issue and instead goes behind my back to find an answer that I would not hesitate to respond to her about. However, I quickly realized that I do the same thing many times; I ask people for certain information about Erin, trying to get to know her better than I do already. After I got over that small quirk, I forget what I asked Allison, but she said something similar to what Steve had said barely a month ago: "Perhaps she just wants to be friends."
  
  Yet, as much as it hurt to hear and think about Allison's words, I know that I have to trudge onward through all of the shit and muck that may cloud my vision. And I will only rest when I have heard Erin's response to what I told her last summer. It is either a success I must enjoy to the fullest or a failure I cannot bear knowing of. While it would break my heart to hear her tell me something that could be summed up with a simple "No", it would break my heart even more to see her be forced against her will to get into a relationship with me.
  
  If she is truly kind, she will be honest.
• Something else that I have noticed about moving into a better dorm that is inhabited by real friends is that my time is guzzled up. I wake up at 6 AM to work out, and by the time I finish, it is at least 8 AM. I will usually get breakfast, then usually watch television, read assigned material, or go back to sleep for another hour or two before I need to get up for any classes. Depending upon the day, I usually have class starting at 9:30 AM or 10 AM, and with exception to Tuesdays, class ends at 3 PM, but after class is done, I need to take a nap. I wake up between 5 PM and 6 PM, and after dinner (Most days, I only have two meals: breakfast and dinner), it seems like there is always something going on with Koop, Steve, or Dave, and that sucks up a good portion of my time. If nothing important is going on, I try to catch up with my assigned readings (And there is quite a lot of that), but I try to make it to bed by midnight.
  
  At least they cannot take away my weekends; I can at least do something productive then. And while I am on the subject, here is my schedule for this semester:

  Class - Day - Start Time - End Time:
  Introduction to Fiction Writing - T - 6:00 PM - 8:30 PM
  History of Japanese Women - T H - 11:00 AM - 12:15 PM
  Personal Fitness - T H - 9:30 AM - 10:25 AM
  Introduction to Logic - T H - 2:00 PM - 2:50 PM
  Introduction to Logic Recitation - M - 11:00 AM - 11:50 AM
  Comparative Political Party Systems - M W F - 2:00 PM - 2:50 PM
  American Foreign Policy - M W F - 10:00 AM - 10:50 AM

• I openly admit that I drink alcohol despite the fact that I am only 20 years old, but I feel no shame in drinking or any great desire to. I can remember back during high school when alcohol still had that whole magical allure to it, and even the first time I tried some, I never really liked it. To this day, I can say that I have no great love for alcohol, but I drink it at times to use it as a social lubricant, yet I know when I have had enough. Consequently, I have yet to do anything that I regret, I have not been arrested, nor have I ever puked. At the same time, if I was serious about a woman and she asked me to never drink again, I would have no problem giving it up; even now, there are times when I do not feel like drinking, and I imagine that I would probably be a better person if I never drank alcohol again in my life.
  
  It may sound stupid, but even though I prefer to drink beer, I still cannot chug a bottle or can of beer. I even have problems downing a shot glass full of... whatever, be it Captain Morgan or Grey Goose. It is not something I am proud of, but I am not ashamed of it either. I prefer to drink alcoholic beverages for the taste rather than to get drunk, and it could be said that I have strange tastes. I cannot stand drinking anything fruity or sugary like Bacardi Silver because a good alcoholic drink to me is a good tasting beer.
  
  And still, I drink to be someone I am not; that friendly guy who always has a smile glued to his face and is eager to talk about anything with practically anyone. As sick as it may sound, it could be argued that I also drink to forget about some things in my life. Perhaps I use it to forget about how I hate being a third/fifth/seventh wheel all the time, to forget about an outcome of my Erin situation that I do not want to imagine, to forget about my aimless life, or to forget about a loneliness that clings to the back of my heels no matter how hard I try to outrun it.

Dedication Means One

My parents bought me two anime books for Christmas: Anime: From Akira to Princess Mononoke and Anime Interviews: The First Five Years of Animerica, Anime & Manga Monthly. Long story short, they are returning that trash and getting me Berserk Volume 1. Now that that is out of the way...

From Ali Davis' True Porn Clerk Stories – Instant Karma
One of my beefs with traditional Christianity is that most sects treat sex as a dirty or sinful thing. I like the fact that say, Taoism, treats sex as not only good but sacred.

Side note: Before I get to talking about what I want, I recommend that anyone should read True Porn Clerk Stories. I was first introduced to it when my brother said that it was hilarious, yet I found it to be both an unintended commentary about human sexuality and a well-written journal that explores nine months of a young woman’s life. Very fascinating stuff and well worth anyone’s time.

Although I have said it before, I will say it again: I am a virgin. Big deal.

During the other night, Steve, Allison, and Erin came over to my place to all say goodbyes (Rather, that was the reason that Steve gave, but we ended up talking for almost two hours), and I felt at home sitting next to Erin. Hell, I wanted to wrap my arms around her, hold her for a while, smell her pretty hair, and chat it up with everyone, but I refrained from doing so. Instead, Steve got a few pictures of us, and I was happier than a crack addict who got a fix just by sitting with her. Within ten minutes after they left, Lance, Matt Jakab, and Brian Gravino (I am not sure if I have ever discussed anything about these two guys, but they graduated in my class at Hershey) unexpectedly walked into the house and I stood around, watched Lance play Halo and helped bake french fries and a pizza. I was sitting on one of the chairs in our living room and talking to Lance when Brian suddenly interrupted me and we started talking about this girl that he was chasing for a few weeks. I forget the specifics, but Brian had grown discouraged and had stopped calling her as soon as he realized that this woman would not be able to get over the physical abuse that her previous boyfriend had given her. Instead, Brian had been clubbing lately and just wanted to get sex for the time being. I laughed at Brian's statement, and he said something along the lines of "Well Eric, you know how it is with women. I know that even you need sex to get by."

Suddenly, my laugh turned into a mild snort, and I simply responded with, "Dude, I've never had sex before in my life."

Brian first thought that I was joking, but when I repeated myself, he acted like this was horribly wrong; like I had committed some heinous crime. He gave me a horrified look when I chuckled and was quick to ask, "You're telling me that a charming guy like yourself has never fucked a woman before? Are you a fag?" This was when I got semi-serious and proceeded to lay things down for him. "What's so bad about waiting to fall in love with a woman before having sex? Does the fact that I've never jumped a woman's bones mean that I'm automatically homosexual?" Brian quickly gave in along that line of reasoning, but I was more than ready to say a lot more.

So let's attack the issue directly: what are my beliefs on sex?

• Virginity is overrated - Movies, television, and teenagers with too many hormones running through their blood act like losing your virginity is a big deal; if you have it, there is an implied notion that you are not that you are still incomplete as a person. However, in modern American society, this applies mostly for males. Guys are patted on the back for screwing this chick or that girl. Rarely will you ever find a female being congratulated for having sex, but that is another topic for another time. Basically, the act of losing your virginity seems grossly overrated to me.
• Sex is good, but it should be sacred - I relate having sex too often to eating your favorite candy all the time; as time wears on, you gradually lose an appreciation for it until you can never have it again. Now, the "sex is good" part is merely my speculation. Since I have yet to actually have sex, I do not know that it is good, but I am merely led to believe that it is good. Yet, I still believe that everything should be done in moderation, and sex is no exception.
• Complete abstinence before marriage is going too far - I realize that a lot of Christian fundamentalists out there believe that having sex before you are married is a sin, a blight upon humanity, or some other such nonsense, but that is taking things a bit too far. My stance is that someone should get into a meaningful relationship with another person before engaging in sex with that other person. Is having a bit of substance there going to make things worse? I would imagine not. I mean, you are enjoying doing something with someone that you love, and if they are enjoying it as well, what is so bad about that? On the flip of the coin, what if you have sex with some random person? In all likelihood, you are probably never going to meet that person ever again, and the one-night stand is merely used as a physical release and nothing more. If someone needs a physical release, I have a better, cleaner, and easier idea: masturbation. Is there anything wrong with getting off by yourself? Unless someone walks in on you, nothing at all.

Now that I have made it clear where I stand on the issue, perhaps it would be better that I explained what I mean by "sex." Many people go by different definitions of the word; for some, it means actual penetration; for others, it can mean merely kissing and groping. My definition of sex would be something along the lines of "performing acts with the intention to cause orgasm to yourself or another person." Basically, oral sex is still sex because the intended result is to get the other person off. How do I justify this? Because I look at sex as having two purposes: pleasure and procreation. If it does not fit into one, it fits into the other. And the last time I checked, forced sex is rape, which I consider to fall into an entirely separate category; it can be used as a means to degrade the victim or simply for the criminal's pleasure and the victim's discontent.

True story: when I was a little munchkin, I thought that people made babies merely by kissing. I never believed in any of that "the stork brings the baby" stuff, and I never received "the birds, the bees, and the babies" talk from my folks; whenever I watched television, I would see a guy and a gal smooching like there was no tomorrow, and I just got to thinking that was how babies were made. I forget when it was, but sometime in elementary or middle school, I learned how babies were really created. The introduction of sexual humor followed not far behind that, and the breeding of another generation of males who cannot stand pubic hair began.

At the same time, I realize that I do not have a more "normal" perspective of sex simply because I have never experienced it. I imagine that many people believe that to be bad to a certain degree, but I think it is a good thing. Despite all of the times throughout college that I have been in the position to have sex with a woman, I have simply said "No thank you" and walked away. Most guys give me a sideways glance, like they are asking me "Are you even heterosexual?", whenever I mention that. If sex is considered to be so damn important, why can people not show an ounce of dedication to the one that they love by not having sex until they find him or her? I am not saying that you have to be in a position or have a desire to want to marry the other person, but rather, that there is some substance there rather than nothing at all.

At least, that is what I believe.

It seems like the vast majority of American society believes that we are better people if males have bigger muscles and a large penis and if women have larger breasts and curvier hips, or that could just be a 20 year old college guy's perception based upon mass media. Males are thought to be better people if they have more sex, while women are thought to be better if they never have sex or very rarely have sex, yet even then, they are at risk of being labeled "slut" or "skank" simply because they like to have sex. I look at this and I see a double standard, which is difficult to deny. Guys are cooler if they have sex with random women, but women are shunned or scowled at if they are promiscuous; both sexes are participating in the same act, yet they are looked upon in an opposite manner. To make a political science analogy, it is like nuclear weapons; if the United States possesses them, then the "free world" is safe from danger, but if another "rogue" nation possesses them, then everyone is at risk of being bombed at any moment.

I guess you could say that I raise sex up on a pedestal, but at the same time, I think that other people should too. Having indiscriminate sex causes you to be at risk for STDs (Which could lead to other moral problems), but most importantly of all (To me), it says that you were not willing to wait until you found your soulmate before indulging in such activities.

Thoughts and Ideas

• A while back in another entry, I remember talking about how I took Erin to her junior year Homecoming dance. Something I intentionally did not mention was that Allison had taken a picture of us dancing. Here is a scanned copy of that photo:
  
  
  Pictured (Left to Right): Erin Schmucker and Eric Joseph (Me)
  Allow me to give some background on this picture. I did not necessarily hate it, but I did not want to see it or know of its existence, so I guess you can say that I loathed it. If you notice, there is a white dot in the upper middle portion; that is not from any light source, but rather, Steve had been carrying it around for a while and he pinned it up somewhere along there. I can remember numerous times where I would come over to his house or dorm, he would hand the picture to me expecting me to be eager to take it, and I would put it back on his desk or a shelf when he was not looking.
  
  The reason for this was not because I disliked Erin to any degree, but rather, because I disliked the picture. I felt that it was like (To use a clichéd term) having my cake but being unable to eat it. I wanted a picture of Erin's beautiful face, her precious smile, and her sparkling eyes, but I instead got a picture of me. And for a long time, I could not get over the fact that all I could see in the picture was the back of Erin and a smiling kid holding her who could not stop wondering if he should have shaved the day of the Homecoming (Yes, I am referring to myself).
  
  Not that long ago, Steve made sure that I took the picture back; in fact, he came over to my pathetic excuse of a dorm and dropped off the picture just to see that I had it. And for a while after that, I did not want to look at it. However, one morning after my roommate's alarm clock woke me up half of an hour early, I sat at my desk and stared at the picture, looking over it in a daze. Yet, I felt no hate; I felt good and much better than I had been during the majority of the semester. It reminded me of a time when I had a boatload of fun with a woman whom I in love with and enjoy spending any amount of time with. I remembered how bad my dancing skills are and how my smile was stuck on my face for so long that my cheeks were hurting long after I dropped off Erin at her house. I remembered being embarrassed at the fact that my penis was erect while dancing some of the time with Erin, how I bumped it into her multiple times purely by accident (Seriously), and how she only smiled back and quietly ignored it. I remembered just how good it felt to have her in my arms like that for so long.
  
  So really, I look at this picture from two perspectives now. On the plus side, the picture has a good shot of Erin's cute butt.
• I have seen the movie Kill Bill Volume One twice now. I like how it accurately pays homage to Japanese samurai without making things become too silly. And hell, I like it just because I like Quentin Tarantino's filmmaking style; I like that brutally bluntness, those timely one-liners, and the thoughtful dialogues that characters have with one another. However, one thing I never particularly liked was Uma Thurman. She starred in and was on the front cover of the VHS for Pulp Fiction, and although her character was supposed to be sexy, I never found her to be sexy at all. Do not get me wrong; she is not ugly by any stretch of the imagination, but she did not look how I imagined Mia Wallace was supposed to look. When I saw her in Kill Bill Volume One, she seemed to fit her role much better because it did not ask her to be particularly sexy in any manner. However, during one scene, she walks into a small Japanese bar in order to talk to an ex-katana-maker and she smiled upon seeing the bartender. Now, I usually do not say anything at all while watching a movie, but when I saw her pearly white smile the first time I watched the movie, I blurted out "HOLY SHIT, SHE'S FUCKING GORGEOUS!" Seriously, she is a golden example (To me, at least) of how smiling makes women look better. I see dozen of supermodels on calendars just staring at or away from the camera as they pose, and none of them ever really look that good because they never smile. Hell, if Erin never smiled as much as she did, I probably would never have grown to love her as much as I do; her smile just made her that much more beautiful (No, I am not saying that I am only attracted to Erin because of her beauty; I am saying that her smile is what made her stand out and it caught my attention in a flash).
  
  For all the lovely ladies out there, SMILE!
• Call me old-fashioned if you want, but I do not understand why people need to say "nigga" instead of "nigger." Is "nigga" supposed to be any less derogatory than saying "nigger"? The same can be said for "biotch" and "bitch." Do everyone a big favor and at least learn to spell your vulgar language properly.
  
  On a similar thought, the term "honkey" is supposed to be a derogatory word for "white people" just how "nigger" is supposed to be a derogatory word for "black people", just how "slant" or "chinky" is supposed to be a derogatory word for "Asian people", just how "redskin" is supposed to be a derogatory term for "Native Americans", et cetera. However, since I do not actively recognize "honkey" as being derogatory, does that still mean that it is a derogatory word if I take no offense to it at all? Bikutoru and I had this conversation a while ago, and although I forget what conclusion we both came to, I do remember that we agreed that a vulgar word could only be vulgar if both parties interacting recognized the word or the word's usage as being vulgar.
  
  Go ahead and look up the meaning of "faggot" in the dictionary and see what you find. The definition does not paint the picture of a vulgar word.
• There were quite a few entries in this blog that I wrote in rapid succession, or at least, what I consider to be rapid. Basically, six entries in three days is quite a lot, but that is because I had a lot to update on. However, I do not really think that those entries and a few entries after those are up to my par; they felt rushed and rather sloppy. However, I notice that when I take a few days to write an entry or I have all of the thoughts in my head and the feelings in my heart bunched up (Like when I write about Erin), I write better entries. And I like doing it this way. However, when I was busy cranking out reviews for Anime Academy, it would only take me an hour or two to pump one out. The big difference is that I try to keep my Anime Academy reviews around 400 words and that I try to get my blog entries as close to the 10,000 character limit as possible. Still, I do not like to rush what I write.
• On Wednesday (December 31st), I went with my mother over to the Hershey Outlets to buy a pair of running shoes. I ended up getting a pair of Adidas Sambas and a pair of Nike Air Storm Pegasus. The reason why I wanted to get a pair of running shoes was because I want to get back into shape; I mean, when you look at the scale and it reads that you weigh almost 160 lbs without any clothes on, you get scared. I need to divert some more time to staying in shape and keeping my weight around 150 lbs (I would be happy with 140 lbs, but getting down that low would require a healthy diet, and there is nothing healthy about Pitt's fast food). As far as the Sambas, this is the fourth pair I have bought, and I even told my mother that I felt like a cartoon character when I realized how many pairs I have gone through (Cartoon characters tend to wear the same clothing and shoes). I have had the third pair, which I am currently still wearing, since my senior year in high school, so that makes them about three years old. However, the tread on them is still decent, so I think I will keep the fourth pair in the closet until I run the third pair into the ground.
• Happy New Years!
• Although I will not retell the entire story of my 2004 New Years party, I was talking with Allison about Erin towards the end of it (About 4:15 AM). In short, she helped me paint another portion of how I see Erin. In long, she basically said that Erin was usually at extreme moods during high school. By that, I mean that she was either very peppy and upbeat or very depressed and saddened. Allison did not give me any specific examples of this behavior, and I have mostly only experienced the happier side of those mood swings. However, Allison did say that Erin had mellowed out since she went to college, and such mood swings have become far rarer.
  
  Still, that does not deter me in the slightest. I am still deeply interested in learning more about the woman that I love, although I should just talk to her directly about such things rather than finding out from her friends.
• I am still stuck on page 150 of Battle Royale, and I think I will take it back up with me to Pitt so I can start it over from the beginning and read the entire book. Also, I got a free copy of the Book of Mormon a few years ago, and I think I should read it this semester as well. The reason behind that decision has more to do with wanting to understand the religion that Erin was brought up on rather than wanting to gain a better understanding of non-Christian religions.