The earlier one does the friday five, the higher up they can get on a list of poeple who does it, and the better advertising it is for their site! So I now take brutal advantage of the fact that I am up this early on a september morn (stay for just a while! stay and let me look at you!) and do this now, so that maybe dozens of strangers will come to my site today and be captivated by...all of my...uhm....well, they'll come anyway.

1. Would you say that you're good at keeping in touch with people?
You know, this is definitely an answer that applies to me really strongly one way or another, but I'm really not sure which. I guess not- when I think back on it, I tend to keep a few people in the "active" part of my brain at one time- I do everything I can for them, but I tend to forget about people in the back. I think what I'm mistaking for my alleged ability to keep in touch with people is the obscene amount of effort I put into making people who might not want to keep in touch with me want to...or trying, anyway. But that's something different altogether I guess. So, uh, no?

2. Which communication method do you usually prefer/use: e-mail, telephone, snail mail, blog comments, or meeting in person? Why?
I have a high regard for all of those methods- My relationships with Jeff and Mitch developed through e-mail, so I'm grateful for that, as well as for the four-hour long phone conversations I used to have with Kris and Jeremey in the pre-internet days, and while I've never had a pen pal, I ADORE getting real mail, so the idea of one thrills me. I met Jacquie through her blog, and she's my douche-sizzlin' sistah, but, over all, nothing beats meeting in person. Being near someone, being able to touch them, smell them, hear their voice, see their mannerisms...I met Elorza online, I talked to him on the phone after a while, he's read my blog (though never commented) and I've sent him some things, but I just saw him in person for the second time ever...let me tell you, that's a rush. He's wonderful. And being near him, as well as being near to everyone I love, is amazing. (GAH! Sooo clichéd-sounding! Please, hit me!) The method I use the most often, however, would have to be AIM...which is terribly unfortunate.

3. Do you have an instant messenger program? How many? Why/why not? How often do you use it?
Ah, and now we address it. I have AIM, I used to have ICQ and Yahoo and MSN instant messnegers as well, but when you come right down to it, everyone has aim, and if they don't, they should. I have it because it makes it easy and cheap to keep in touch with everyone who's far away- entirely too many people like that- and even people who are close, which is sort of abuse of the privelige. I also tend to like how it's the only medium in the world where you can have multiple, totally exclusive conversations at one time. Technology! Wowee! How often? I'll have to go with "nauseatingly". Less now then I used to, because the computer is currently set up in my parents room, and they're asleep at night, which used to be my key instant messaging hours, but every chance I get, so long as I'm not entertaining any guests (and even if I am, sometimes...). Soon, the computer will be moved to my room and I'll have a 24 hour connection, then you can see how sick my addiction really is...voyeur!

4. Do most of your close friends live nearby or far away?
Far the fuck away. While it was pretty even up until a month ago- I had a big group of friends in auburn, which was just too far to be close, a bunch in my home town and some spattered throughout the country in college- now they're ALL GONE. All of them went off to college, which is why now it's the Linda and Zack show! Starring Linda and Zack! Catch all the excitement and adventure of Linda and Zack in this week's episode! But, hey, there's a bright side to all of this- this severely cuts down on the chances that I'll cheat on him...uh, as long as you keep drunk strippers away from me.

5. Are you an "out of sight, out of mind" person, or do you believe that "distance makes the heart grow fonder"?
Both. I can definitely make somebody out of my sight stay out of my mind, but if I choose to think about them- and that's definitely the choice that should be made for the most part- distance can make one realize how much they're missing out on. That said, I love you Jenn, Nick, Chad, Emily, Kris, Mark, Jeff, Serena, and, uhm....etc.! If I missed you, it's not because I don't love you, it's just because I don't love you enough. :-P


Hmmm.....the mundanity of those questions made each answer special and unique...oh, wait, no. Exact opposite effect. Sorry about that, my bad.

Happy reading, strangers! While you're here, other shit I've written is MUCH more interesting.*


*Ignore anything in caps...and add a "sorta....not really...if you're easily amused" to the end of that.

ON WITH IT!

On yet another Burger King night shift, I embrace the duties of cook for the first time by playing MASH online in my abundance of free time. Seemingly every time I play this game, there are two answers that consistently come out the same- I am having no kids, and- move over Zack!- I'm going to marry Chad.

You will live in Mansion.
You will drive a Red VW van.
You will marry Chad and have 0 kids.
You will be a Playwright in Ozarks.

Not a bad life, all in all. I don't know how a Playwright is going to make a living in the Ozarks, but I guess we don't have to stay there all the time. It ALMOST got narrowed down to living in a Mansion in Paris and owning a VW Van, that would have been a clash of genres.

I haven't talked to Chad all that much since certain incidents, but, between you, me, and the rest of the world, I'm don't think I'd be entirely over him if I saw him again. Given the kind of tryst we had, I'm not sure I'll ever be completely over him- don't get me wrong, I love Zack, and, given the chance, I wouldn't go bounding off, eager to choose Chad over the comfort and stability of relationship I was already in....you know, again. But as sad as it is to see everyone leave, it's probably a really good thing for me that he's far away.

The rather humbling situation with Chad was what first got me into this rather unfortunate mindset that I am now- if something is hurtful, I just don't think too much about it. It started when he told me about Kara and I, not knowing how I was supposed to deal with being as- well, let's say it- in love with him as I was and rejected, especially while in a situation to hurt someone I loved as much as Jeff, and dealing with Kody's death at the same time, I put both of these things out of my mind, more for the sake of sanity than anyhting, I guess. I never really went back and faced my feelings, however, and the relative numbness kept going when Jeff and I broke up- it was sad, extremely sad, but I wrote about it here and put it as much behind me as I could, mostly to salvage the upcoming relationship with Zack, I guess. When Jenn left, same thing- I wasn't numb at all leading up to that one, I was teary and desperate and very, very scared, but since it has become a reality, I try not to think about it, and I've largely suceeded.

This is why things are left unresolved- I've kept them that way. I seem to remember one other issue with which I felt I hadn't really faced my emotions, but perhaps I've put it out of my mind so much, it's now completely gone. I guess I don't know. I'm afraid, though, that if I don't take time to reckon with these things soon, I might end up some jaded version of my former self, I guess, or maybe just lose my ability to face things as emotionally brazenly as I used to...if "brazen" was the word I was looking for then.

As a reader, perhaps, you might even be able to tell the difference, compairing the way I write now as compaired to before- that is, if you cared that much. Reading through my archives, and even just these past few entries, I seem more...intelligent about things now, and I odn't mean that in a nessecarily good way. There was a great deal of rawness and passion in my older stuff, a genuine, teenaged quality that just made me all that much more compelling....to me, I guess. Maybe that's what it was- I was a teenager then. Maybe it was exactly when I hit eighteen and became an official adult- albeit, a teenaged adult- that I started handling things as adults do. Maybe I am growing into maturity, feeling my way into rationality and comprehension. Maybe, from now on, I will be an altogether logical, reasonable adult!

Eeeeewwwwwwwwwww........ Let's hope THAT'S not it! I gotta get in touch with my inner teenager, before this whole voting/cigarette-buying/porn-renting power trip gets the best of me.

Look at me! I couldn't be more teenaged! I'm working at BURGER KING, haven for uneducated high school slackers! Oooh, and now I have to go make a croissan'wich. Viva la youth!

On with it.

Enduring the night shift at Burger King, I take advantage of the slack nature of my young shift supervisor, who's physical beauty has become something of a bonus for me- they probably wouldn't have to pay me at all to be here. My coworkers, all of whom know about my completely superficial attraction to him, however, overestimate this: They think my agenda is to seduce him, when really, I just like to appreciate art when I see it. As far as my sexual life goes, the cat's out of the bag to everyone who cares- albeit, not many- that Zack and I are now officially Zack and I. How long this has been going on is unclear, however, I can tell you with certainty that we're here, we're queer, get used to it....or, something like that. I never know what I'm saying at all, least of all when it's 1:20 am, and I'm getting paid seven measely dollars an hour to watch the progression of the night and serve burgers.

Except that right now, as we all know, I'm doing neither of those things. I'm satiating the long forgotten needs of my fans. My many, many fans- all of which have five speeds, and oscillation capabilities! Yipee!

As last you heard on "...you must be very bored...", the continuing saga of teenage mundanity (*promptly looks up validity of word...woo!*), I was doing something slightly less mundaniffic than usual- I was headed off to New York. Or, a few days away from being headed off to New York- between my trip and my last entry were several struggles involving the cancelling of my hotel accomidations, as done by my extremely caucasian parents, who seemed to think their extremely caucasian daughter should not be spending the night in a one-star hotel in an entirely uncaucasian area of town. This lead to the monetary donation of fifty dollars a night on their part so that I could stay some place with a little more class, and a little less ethniticity--- Times Square. My parents line of thought seemed to be that Times Square was a business district, or something: I assume they associated it with the New York Times, and figured that since they'd never heard of a HARLEM newspaper, I must be better off where people can, well, read. I must point out, this is THEIR (hypothetical) opinion, not my own, as I am far less ignorant, I like to think, and just a little more wordly- I, personally, doubt the ability of the average person in Times Square to read, as well. Our hotel, which was photographed with a deceptive air of surrounding class on the internet add, was sandwiched between a parking garage and a building with a strip club on the top and a porno store on the bottom. Directly across the street, however, was the Gershwinn Theater, where the Broadway shows "Metamorphosis" and "Oklahoma" were performed. This goes to show you- there is seemingly no way to gauge the class factor of a block in New York. Maybe the locals have it figured it out, but to me, it appeared some complex enigma.

While I don't have the energy to relate my experience in the Big Apple with satisfactory detail- and I probably shouldn't, being that I AM being paid a massive seven dollars an hour- I'll go over some of the highlights: Some confusion involving my lack of credit card lead the hotel to rob me of almost two hundred dollars on deposit as well as the two hundred for the room, which left me without the full 400 I had brought with me. This wouldn't have been much of a problem, however, if it had not been for the massive malfunction of my ATM card, which randomly decided to assign to me a daily limit of funds that I was allowed to withdraw, as well as completely going INSANE on the second day. This was worked out midway through th etrip, and thanks to my father faxing his permission to charge the room to his mastercard, I was able to survive without selling my body to stock brokers...too much. Heather and I saw "Rent", the musical from which quotes have graced this website for months and months, leading up to the change of format that now affects us- to put it simply, it was transcendent. Details escape me, especially at this time of night, but you can request a more detailed account in person or on the phone- that is, if any of you were around to see me or call anymore. We spent the following evening with Elorza, my second-ever real-life encounter with him. Heather found him to be a complete asshole, but I was once again taken aback by his confidence, humor, and charisma, not to mention that he, too, is undeniably an masterpiece to be appreciated. The most notable experience of our third and final morning there would be breakfast at the wonderful "Ellen's Stardust Cafe", where the waitstaff sang for us. During our layover in Boston, I was able to spend a much-needed hour with Jenn, without whom my life is becoming rather eerily like bad freshmen poetry.

And then home, home again, where I was able to return, the next day, to the eager arms of my Zack, with whom I had a great deal to talk about- the night before leaving for New York, Heather and I stayed with Torrie and a small party conspired, involving Jill and Mike and several of Torrie's roommates. There was much booze to be had, and, while I ingested only a few sips myself, the drunken atmosphere made for a bit of a haze in my mind, and quite the interesting- if regrettably inappropriate- situation conspired. Having resolved everything I need to with uninvolved parties, I now wonder whether or not I will forgive myself for my own irresponsibility, and if others involved have any recollection at all. Suffice to say, other people there were very drunk.

I've been overnights for the past three days, the first of which was spent entertained by conversation with two of my male coworkers, the second sustained by Zack's presence for the full nine hours of the shift, and tonight, Jeff stayed a while, having dropped my off after us hanging out for the first time in...far too long. He's been keeping closer track than I have, suffice to say that an inapprorpriate period of time has passed. And I do love him, so much- it seems that the only problem, on my part at any rate, with our friendship continuing unaffected will be fighting the instinct I have to kiss him every now and again, but with a slight amount of effort, I won't screw that up- that would be no good for me, no good for him, and no good for Zack. Zack, who's loving companionship has become a distraction from all the loss I've had recently, perhaps too much for my own good.

Another time, another place for that explanation however. I must get back to my dilligent post, doing nothing and getting paid just about the same. On with it!

My mother, thinking, because I had told her, that my hotel might be in Brooklyn, came in to my room today to warn me of something, and thus a quote of the day was born!

Mom: You know, there are parts of Brooklyn that are just...black.
Linda: It's not in Brooklyn.
Mom: Where is it?
Linda: Harlem.

The look on her racist little face was precious!

No, I take that back- I don't think my mom is actually a rascist, it's just getting close enoguh to the trip where she's becoming...paranoid with concern. But it's amusing, just the same!

On with it.

Two visiters, as well as the fact that Mike wasn't a manager, but a rather burnt-out BK cook, made last night not only bearable, but one of the most enjoyable nights of work I've ever experienced.

First to drop by was Mark, who brought me a blueberry muffin and chocolate milk from Tim Horton's. It's little considerations like that that I'm really going to miss about him when he leaves for Farmington tomorrow- the end of the summer is coming on strong.

Mark was there for about an hour and left somewhere around midnight, I would guess. Having got there at nine, I had pretty much nothing from my long list of night shift duties done by the time he left- he and I had taken a look at the list and decided I could easily accomplish all of it in two, maybe two-and-a-half hours. I don't know how much truer this might have been were I not distracted, an hour later, by Zack's arrival. Suffice to say, however, that with Zack there, it definitely wasn't true. Spending maybe the first forty-five minutes that Zack was there with my attention divided equally between him and those petty annoyances known as customers, I started working on the list at 2:15, and at 7:15, when he drove me home, it wasn't completed.

It's enough of an accomplishment to me, though, to know that I was paid for....certain moments of distraction. Or something like this.

I need to get some shit talked about to someone who deserves to know, because I'd really rather not have to keep going along being so damn ambiguous. Not that everyone hasn't figured out the little mystery already. But I think I have an e-mail to write.

On with it.

FieryGwenivere: Zack's fine
Mitch: thats good
Mitch: he's in my study hall
FieryGwenivere: is he then? nice
FieryGwenivere: when's that?
Mitch: 7 th period
FieryGwenivere: which moniter?
Mitch: Mrs B
FieryGwenivere: nice. I'll have to come visit you both sometime
Mitch: excellent. while you're at it, you can vsit becky too
Mitch: she sits right next to me
Mitch: did that drop the idea?
FieryGwenivere: Why would it? I like Becky
Mitch: thats good
FieryGwenivere: she made me nervous at first, but all girlfriends do that. And as far as they go, she's one of the cooler ones I've met
Mitch: thats good to know
FieryGwenivere: you must keep in mind, I'm not out to attempt to seduce you or whatever simply because I happen to find you attractive. I happen to find a lot of people attractive
Mitch: no matter what, you're comming to my weding and you're gonna dance with me


I find that awesome. Mitch is so great. He and I had a conversation a while back during which he asked if I was attracted to him and I told him, essentially, yes, but he's too good of a friend for me to ever hit on- as more than friends, we would have no chance, no future, no anything. He seems to have taken the conversation as indication that he needs to point out, every chance he gets, that he has a girlfriend, but I'm not about to hit on Mitch. The fact that he would go so far to be tactful, though, is adorable, as is just the idea of dancing at him with his wedding....even just BEING at his wedding. I love that he values me so much.

And on an even better note, my long, albeit undocumented, search for someone to accompany me to New York has seemingly come to an end- Heather, a friend of mine that, as of late, I have had somewhat unsatisfactory amounts of contact with, will be my travelling partner. Now all I have to do is make the reservations for the hotel and by bus tickets, as well as tickets to "Rent". The fact that I'm going to see "Rent" has not just a few people very jealous of me. Originally, the Broadway tickets were intended just to bribe Jenn to come accompany me so that I would be able to be there for the reason I really want to be there- the first anniversary of september 11th. Jenn, however, declined the idea of going to that and said we should save our travels for another time, so I then invited Emily, who entertained the idea for a short time but ultimately said no. Heather, as of yet, doesn't know of my plans to devote at least a few hours to whatever ceremony the city will be holding, but since I am paying for 75, if not 80 or 90 percent of the trip, I doubt she'll be uncooperative.

Speaking of paying for things, I must go work towards funding this trip. It's my first overnight shift at Burger King, and I look forward to ten straight hours alone with some manager from another store named "Mike". I also look forward to using up the batteries on my cd player.

So good to be detachted from the world around you...and payed for it! On with it.

The biggest, best laugh of the week is today's quote of the day, coming directly to us from The Pit, as supplied by Mal-

"Wed Aug 28 21:04:26 GMT 2002
(from:) Mal
(to:) Suede

How do you possibly put up with this guy?

Gag him with a sock and pretend he's a mute?

Tell him to 'shut up and lick' as soon as he walks through the door?

Pretend he's speaking in figurative language and invent intelligent, symbolic meanings for winners like 'Yeaaaaaaaaaaaaaa...I love big bold letters' ??

Come now, enquiring minds want to know."

He is referring, as none of you will know, to Zack, who's pit personality- Phillis- is not exactly everyone's favorite guy, as he basically stops in once in a while to post random bullshit punctuated entirely with ellipses (...) and making no sense to the outside world whatsoever. Mal, who has so far taken offense to every romantic interest of mine who wanders into the pit- including "Pedia" or "Einsames" (Jeff), with whom he fought for days over...well, it started off as Metallica, then became several different issues entirely, and "Tactless Wonder" (Chad), who never really did anything to anybody, but whom I seem to remember Mal having at least one run in with- is the number one anti-phillis of the pit. Seemingly, Mal just thinks I can do better than these people.

But, Mal baby, you're married. Everything better's already taken, remember?

(For the sake of my readers, I must inform that that is hardly a serious comment- Mal and I have a symbiotic relationship which involves mutual ego-stroking and long-winded writing talks, as well as the occasional arrogant piss-duel. But I love my demon, just the same.)

So, yes, as they say on the pit. "*cack* @ Mal".

And as they say here, "on with it."

As if to prove to the rest of the world that they are wrong, we CAN do it, last night with Jeff was great. From Tin Tin, our place, where we shoved strawberry jello from the buffet straight into my jacket pockets in sentiment to the top of the parking garage where we ended up throwing it to the streets below, from the car ride spent screaming "INDIANA ROCKS" at the top of our lungs my bathroom, serenading my pajama-clad sister with a bad rendition of Etheridge's "The Only One", the chemistry between us didn't falter once. Granted, it was difficult- after nine months, it's hard to remember, all of a sudden that no, you aren't allowed to kiss someone, and yeah, maybe you should pull away from that embrace before it becomes questionable. But between our mutual efforts and joking reminders that things we used to do without thought are now "inappropriate", we did good. And it was great.

It's been a long time since I've been able to hang out with him without feeling the strain of thoughts like "What if I'm about to hurt this magnificient human being? What if I really screw up?", and finally being relieved of that, knowing that I've finally done the right, if extremely painful, thing...that makes things between he and I easier and better and more enjoyable for me. I keep having to remind myself that he's not in the same place as I am- that he didn't have any great relief to be found in the end of our relationship, but I think the difference in it for me is positive, in it's own way, for both of us. I guess I really don't know if he'd disagree, but aside from a few delicate moments, last night felt better- more relaxed, more fun- than things have between us for a while. None of my zoning out to wonder about the validity of us, the deservingness of me, or how awful the end might finally be. Just he and I, the way we always were, the way- I hope- we always will be.

Last night reminded me very, very clearly of why I fell so totally in love with him, and why it's worth it to make sure that that doesn't happen again. He's one of the best friends I've ever had, or could ever hope for.

Oh, and INDIANA ROCKS!!!!! On with it.

Being that it's 9:44, and I have to start getting ready for work at 10, I won't work to make this a long, beautiful post that will impress, well, Mal. (Hi, Mal! You still reading?) But I wanted to point out a couple of things- A: work and social life have been ass-raping me to the point where I've barely been online, and this makes me feel bad because I haven't had the chance to reply to the e-mails of several people that I've really wanted to, so hang in there, I'll get back to you I swear. And, uh, B: Last night was the shit. Ben and Nick and- here's a shocker- Zack were over, and we had entirely too much fun hanging out in my room messing around with one of my...possesions. There was a beautiful quote of the day that I can't post, lest I should offend someone who wasn't even briefly related, and so I shall use the stand in quote of the day, though without context-
"If this thing were stiffer, I could duel you!"
~Nick

With too much of the delicious detail of last night's seemingly drunken get together in my boudoir, I would give away a magnificiently evil plan that we conspired last night...can one "conspire" a plan, or do they conspire to come up with a plan? I'll never fucking know. Either way....when it's all done with, I will give all the detail I possibly can. It's gonna rock.

On with it.

Nick was over last night. Nice change of pace- not that I don't appreciate the twenty-four hour Zack network, but I'm the type of person who needs variety...or something.

He and I went for a walk, then rented some playstation games at Movieland, came home and played them for a while, went out to eat, came back, more playstation, then music and conversation and such for a while and he left. Somewhat mundane, but I get along better with him than with a lot of people. Doesn't take a whole hell of a lot of action to keep me interested when I'm with my auburn boys. I hope I get to see more of him and the other two before college starts for them.

Kris moved to Kittery about a week ago. He and I never saw each other in person all that often, but that kinda sucked. I can't really miss him all that much, since I never saw him often in the first place, but the idea that he's so far away is depressing.
Jeremiah Freed's "Again" is a song I've become recently hooked on. I think I was at work once and it came on, and- having seen them in person, and talked to them in person, and just had a fairly great hands-on Jeremiah Freed experience in general, I was fairly happy about...that, I don't know where my sentence went...point being, I downloaded and it's great.

"And please if you know
Don't tell me
And please if you know
Don't tell me
'Cause I know that it's the same
When they all come back again
You'd think I'd know by now
And I know it's in the plan
When my heart is in my hands
Again."

Anyway, fuck this post, this is so bad and pointless. I'm gonna work on Triangle Sleep's website, being that I'm their new webmaster- whether or not all of them are mutually aware of that.

On with it.