When the Crawling Chaos gets here, this party's gonna go insane.

Trying to get back into the blog because my therapist said it might be good for me. So.

The last year+ has been ….. a lot. I don’t even really remember the first few months after Mikey (M.) died. I have never suffered such a loss as this. It’s still devastating. There is a giant hole in my life and my heart. There is no one else in my life who I can tell literally anything and everything. There are thoughts and feelings that I can’t let out because he’s gone. Maybe that’s why my shrink thinks I should start blogging again.

I turned 40 in September, and the day before my birthday, I found out that Ivy had an untreatable tumour in her abdomen. A rapidly growing one, based on its size and the fact that the vet detected no sign of anything off at Ivy’s annual check up in February. They put her on steroids, to make her feel better and just give her more time. I thought “more time” would be more than just a month, but after a few weeks of Ivy getting almost back to her old self, she suddenly deteriorated over the course of a few days and I made the choice to let her go in late October.

It hurt just as much as losing Mikey. My tubby and formerly robust little asshole was suddenly gone.

And then in November democracy in the US went fuckitty-bye, and I’ve just been in kind of a haze since then.

BUT in coming back here, I’m going to try and focus on the good things and the funny things. I’ve got some comics lined up and a few ideas for some more. I’ve also perfected my granny’s traditional English Steak & Ale Pie recipe, so I’ll post that soon as well.

In the meantime I’m going to catch up on the blogs of those of you who are still here.

Keep fighting the good fight, my friends.

The Christmas decorations are still staying up.

I just need to yell into the void

 My best friend in the world, Mikey (known on this blog simply as M.) died yesterday. 

We're not sure yet if it was an accidental overdose or his heart just gave out, or a combo of both. He died in his sleep in the wee hours of Thursday morning. 

I'm still in shock kind of. Like it's hit me, but it also hasn't. My brain cannot accept the fact of a world that does not include Mikey. We were soul mates. We were supposed to grow old together, become those scary old hags in the creepy house at the edge of town with a ton of cats.

But now he's gone. I feel like part of myself is gone as well. He's been my best friend since like 1999. I've told him things about my life that I could never tell anyone else, and vice versa. He was the one person I loved and trusted most in the world. I know I'm lucky to have had a relationship like that; it's not something everyone gets to experience. But this loss is truly shaking me to my core.

So I just needed to vent this somewhere. 

I truly hope anyone of you still reading are doing well, and enjoying the holiday season.

State of the Blog Address .....again

 

It's been over six months since I vanished without explanation. I'll probably do that again in the near future, but for the moment, I have returned. Idk if anyone is still out there reading at this point. It's been that kind of year. 

 

2021 got off to an interesting start. I spent a week in January confined to a psych ward following a suicide attempt, and am still under constant supervision. M has been living with me since they let me out of the Home for the Bewildered and miraculously, I have not attempted to kill him yet.  It has actually been kind of nice having someone staying with me. I'm also on all new medications and am no longer suicidal. My family is monitoring my every move, and you never knew how many good friends you have until you almost died.

Bossman's wild weekends with his various girlfriends finally landed him bedridden with Covid-19. Even if the social worker had not ordered me to ease slowly back into full time employment, I would probably be working part time because there is NOTHIIIIINNNNNGG to do at the office. 

Baby Yoda has somehow amassed nearly 500 followers on Instagram. 

Am I officially an influenzaer now?

This is still a weird time for me. It feels like it will take a long time to feel normal, like a person again. Big Sis#2 still wakes up in the middle of the night screaming because she was the one who found me in a pool of blood in my living room. That's my fault. I did that to her. I traumatized her. I will never not feel horrible about that. I will never not feel horrible about making my mothers and father cry. About giving my siblings the fright of a lifetime. 

My cats are treating me like the worthless minimum wage employee I am (as far as they're concerned) for leaving them alone with M and the combined forces of StepMom and Mum for a week. 

Until next time, when I may or may not explain how a mothertrucking CAT was basically the start and end of the above events. 

 

IT'S AALIIIIIIIIIIIIIIVVVVVVEE!!!!!!

Hey y'aaallllll. It's been a while.

Most of this is going to be me rambling diary-like about the last few months because I really just need to write it down. Feel free to skip that part. 

BUT FIRST

For all of the lads reading this, I have some bUrNiNg questions. 

This is not me trying to question your manhood or anything, it's just genuine curiosity. I know I will never be able to afford to go back to school, but that doesn't mean I can't read and study on my own. Since devouring every last scrap of information I could find on behavioural psychology, I've gotten pretty good at observing and analysing people's behaviour.

Which was when I noticed some behaviour patterns that seemed exclusive to men. I find these behaviours incredibly odd, but I am not a man. I can't see the reason behind it, so I MUST HAVE ANSWERS. 

Four specific behaviours have left me baffled:

1. Backing into parking spaces. Family, friends, acquaintances, neighbours--all y'all dudes are CONSTANTLY making 50 point turns to back into parking spaces. WHY?!? Is it so you can pull forward out of the parking space? It takes like two seconds to back out of a parking space. What in bloody blazes are you doing?!? EXPLAIN.


2. Standing next to the car in states where you can't pump your own gas. I live right by the border of New Jersey, so I frequently have to stop for petrol in New Jersey. Idk how many other states do this, but in NJ a gas station attendant pumps your petrol for you. Like you're not allowed to do it yourself. 

But for some reason, soooooooooo many MEN get out of their cars and stand beside it while the car fills up. 

WHY. Is it, like, not manly enough if you don't actively participate in pumping your own petrol? Is it a control thing because someone else is doing something to your car?? I DON'T UNDERSTAND.


3. Leaving your bloody bollocky pickup truck running while you go pick up your take out food. And leaving it running for like 50 years because you're chatting with the other regulars. This is particularly annoying in the spring and autumn when I like to have my windows open, only to end up getting a living room full of diesel exhaust and a constant dvnfbfbnmgdfbhghgbhmgfbgbmgbhmfgbhmfgmfbfmjmnRUMBLERUMBLERUMBLE outside. 

Why can't you just shut the car off? Do you want your grandkids to die because you don't feel like giving 2 sh*ts about the environment? EXPLAIN PLS.


4. Spitting. Ive known some women who do this as well, but it's definitely more common in men--constant hacking and spitting IN PUBLIC. (One of the breeders downstairs for example, hocks up some nastiness and spits it out LIKE EVER FOUR SECONDS. RIGHT OUTSIDE MY BEDROOM WINDOW. EVERY MORNING.) Like seriously, don't any of y'all know it's impolite to spit IN FRONT OF A LADY?? It's also super duper disgusting and it makes me nauseous.  Please stop, for the love of Cthulhu, PLEASE STOP.




Your responses will be much appreciated. 

*     *     *

So yeah it's been a while. Things aren't really any better. My New Year's Resolution is to do everything possible to sabotage and eventually destroy my physical health. I went on the Pill and then deliberately increased my cigarette intake. I don't really eat. Most weekends, I just sleep. I probably drink too much.

Lil Bro#2 moved to Brooklyn a while back. I felt horrible for hoping he hated it so he would come back.

He loves it. I don't think he's coming back.

M. finally got out of the toxic household that wasted like 8 years of his life and almost led him to a total breakdown

and moved to Florida. To stay with his father for a while.

I AM SO HAPPY about this--M. needed to get away; I was so so afraid for him the last few months he was here--but it's also a knife to the gut every time I realize he's not here anymore. I've also been trying to help his mother out with her legal issues. Basically, once she was forced out of her house (foreclosure), she was entitled to an increase in alimony from her douchebag pedophile ex-husband so she could pay rent. 

Even though this was written into a LEGALLY BINDING AGREEMENT, he refuses to start the alimony increase until he gets a court order. So I filed a motion to get the increase, and naturally--because let's be honest when it comes to me I will get the shortest and shittiest end of the stick every time, no matter what the situation--our motion got assigned to the most incompetent POS judge in the whole state of New Jersey. Like this judge sucks so bad that she got fired from the Civil Division

...and for some reason was deemed competent enough for the family division. Go figure.

They've been giving me the run around for a month--not returning my calls, straight up lying to me, and now--for the second time--have postponed the motion. So M.'s mother is basically living in poverty and losing a different utility a week because she can't pay her bills. 

In other news....

My meds have been more or less tripled since I last posted. Increases in everything--the antidepressants, the mood stabilizers, sedatives, et. cetera. I have never taken the mood stabilizers, so I now have about 9,000 mg of quetiapine stashed away. I don't think I'll ever actually do it, but I take comfort in knowing I have the option. 

Also I now have an iron-clad 20-page living will that basically forbids any EMT's from performing any and all lifesaving nonsense if they arrive and find me unresponsive/dead, and forbids anyone at the hospital from attempting to resuscitate me. It's handy working for estate lawyers sometimes.

It's not that I really want to kill myself, I just want to die. I'm done. So completely and totally done with life. I don't even bother praying anymore. Pretty sure I've just been talking to myself the whole time anyway. 

My entire left hand has gone numb/pins and needlesy, progressively getting worse over the last two weeks (started with just the index finger). I'm hoping it's a clot or a stroke, but no way in hell am I that lucky. Probably just carpal tunnel or something. 


If you made it this far, I'm sorry if I made you depressed or unhappy in any way. Go make yourself a nice cup of tea (or a stiff drink) and pretend you never read any of this.

The Blob.

Do y'all believe in ghosts? I do. I didn't until I met M. and began spending a considerable amount of time in his house, but when some unseen presence is frequently throwing things across the room and slamming doors, you kind of have to accept it when there is no scientific explanation for it. 

In Philadelphia, at the corner of Broad and Pine Streets, there is a very old building that currently houses freshmen at the University of the Arts. Prior to this, it was a "school" for the deaf (read: asylum), and was also supposedly a "home" for fallen women (probably an even worse asylum). So prior to it becoming a college dorm, the building was probably not a place where you would have wanted to find yourself residing. 

On the second floor of one of the wings, at 6.00 every single morning, you would hear a door slam and footsteps running down the hallway. 

In my friend's room on the third floor, you could hear what sounded like someone tapping their nails on the window in the living room (yours truly got to discover that in the dead of night while trying to sleep on the couch). Their bathroom sink was also constantly getting turned on full blast when there was no one in the bathroom. And my personal fav? When you were sitting on her toilet, you could hear whispering coming from the direction of the bathtub. 

Another friend once saw a man standing in her bedroom doorway--a man whose clothing did not look like it belonged in the 20th century. When she stopped freaking out and went to investigate, there was no one in her bedroom or living room or kitchen, and the door remained locked. 

One apartment on the first floor got so bad they gave up trying to make people live in it and just used it for storage. 

My 2 roommates and I lived on the top floor. Most people think "dorms" and imagine a shoebox with a shared public bathroom down the hall. Not at the University of the Arts. There were a few studios, but in all the dorm buildings, most of the housing was 1 or 2 bedroom apartments with their own bathrooms and kitchens. Mine was a one-bedroom, and because we were in the top floor of that nice old building, we had the super high vaulted ceilings and skylights. 

We also had The Blob. 

At first we took no notice of it. Just a stain on the ceiling or something. Until

Psycho-Roomie and I shrugged it off, but not Supermodel-Roomie. She kept track of The Blob every day, and it was indeed moving about the room. 

If something does not have an explanation but keeps happening anyway and is not doing any harm, I have the ability to keep shrugging it off. Yes, The Blob was moving around on a daily basis; no, we never actually saw it moving; and yes, it was very strange; but it wasn't causing any of us harm; so I really didn't care about it. But Supermodel-Roomie could not just let it go. 

She tried using a super zoom lens on my video camera to get a closer look at it, but as luck would have it, all three times she tried to do this, The Blob had relocated to the highest and darkest part of the ceiling. All we could see was that it was in fact a black blob of....... something.

Then one day I came home from class and

A week later, I came home to find Supermodel-Roomie pushing the refrigerator across the bedroom, positioning it directly underneath The Blob. She had also made a long chain of wire hangers. 

She climbed onto the fridge and proceeded to jab The Blob with the wire hangers.

It wouldn't budge. Like it had been superglued to the ceiling. Supermodel-Roomie said it felt--as well as she could tell through the wire hangers--almost rubbery. She kept poking it, determined to pry it off of the ceiling, but eventually she had to admit defeat. 

The next day, The Blob had relocated to directly above Supermodel-Roomie's bed. She slept on the sofa that night. 

So The Blob continued to move around and Supermodel-Roomie continued to glare at it for the rest of the year, but she gave up trying to get it off the ceiling. We never figured out what it was. I'm tempted to go visit the dorms and see if it's still there....

What about the rest of you? Share some fun ghost stories!

Quickly, summon forth some bitches from Accounting for a pansexual adventure THROUGH TIME!

Happy Valentines Day, kids. 

You know in all my 31 years, I have only ONCE had a valentine on Valentines Day (2003). I might have had one this year, but he's in the mf Caribbean. >:(

I'm not that bothered, to be honest. I've never been one for romancey stuff. But I made him a card anyway:

M. and I are going to the cinema to see the new Coen Brothers movie and then have dinner, so for me that is a Valentines Day well spent. 

Expectations vs. Reality

I feel like television and movies give us some absurd expectations about life that we don't even realize until life fails to live up to those expectations.

Back in autumn, mumsy decided to get a chimney sweep to come in and clean out the fireplace and chimney in her new house.

Guys please tell me I'm not the only one who hears "chimney sweep" and immediately thinks:

EDIT: I realize many of you automatically think of chimney-sweep-Dick-Van-Dyke. I may be the only child in existence who hated the film Mary Poppins, so the chimney sweeps of other films and BBC period dramas come to mind first. Same difference--we expect a soot covered person in period clothing and that hat. 

A small soot-covered Victorian orphan boy did not show up at the house to sweep the chimney. It was just some burly dude with a bunch of tools.

We all agree that dramatic death scenes should have equally dramatic music, yes? Imagining the most dramatic events of your life that have not yet occurred, you probably add a great soundtrack to go with it. Even remembering past dramatic events, perhaps you mentally add Verdi's Requiem in the background.

This one time, a few friends and I were driving upstate to visit our friend Number2. At one point in the drive, one of the county roads ends at a T-junction, where it meets up with another county road that runs alongside a quarry and dammed lake. So directly on the other side of the road from the stop sign, there is a cliff and a several hundred foot drop onto jagged rock.

This is Upstate New York. Country roads. There are no police monitoring speed limits, so generally everyone drives 65 MPH+ on these windy roads. There are also no signs to warn you that there is a cliff and a several hundred foot drop ahead.

So we're driving along in the dark at night and M., who was driving, wasn't properly paying attention and that stop sign just appeared out of nowhere.

We were going like 80 MPH. We passed the stop sign. M. hit the brakes and swerved, but that cliff looked mighty close to us.

Somehow, presumably by the power of the Holy Spirit, the car did not go off the cliff. You could see the tire marks on the road from us skidding for months afterwards.

We retell this story with much dramatic flair, and a few weeks ago it occurred to M and myself just what we had been blasting on the car radio at that moment, a detail which has historically been left out of all of our re-tellings.

No my friends, we did not have a dramatic soundtrack of epic classical music with full chorus when we nearly drove off a cliff.

We nearly drove off a cliff to this:

I presume that is what saved our lives, because I cannot imagine a kind and loving God would ever let Wilson Philips be the last thing someone hears before plummeting to their death.

People incapable of guilt usually do have a good time.

Several years ago, it was customary in my group of friends to throw a surprise party whenever it was someone's birthday. (Something that always perplexed me, since everyone would then know for certain that their birthday would result in a surprise party, thus rendering said party not much of a surprise.)

My bff M's personality is such that when he gets it in his head to do something, or when he is annoyed about something, absolutely nothing can stop him from being as contrary as humanly possible.*

On his birthday this one year, for whatever reason, M felt like being extra contrary.

As I was his BFF, our friends decided it was my job to make sure he arrived at his sister's house at a certain time for his surprise party. M. and I hung out during the day, and then when evening came, I suggested we head over to his sister's place to meet up with a few other peeps and decide where to go for dinner.

M decided no, he did not like that plan, and instead he wanted to just go straight to Pizza Hut for dinner without anyone else. Since M was the one driving, I could do nothing but sit in the passenger seat and grow increasingly anxious about the fact that we would not be arriving at his sister's house when we were supposed to so everyone could surprise him for his birthday party.**

He knew that a surprise party awaited him. I tried. I really tried. I never said a word about it, but he knew. Five minutes after we were supposed to have been at his sister's house, she called him. He answered, and from what I gathered she told him he should come over so we could all go out to dinner together, but M. wasn't having any of it.

Then his sister's BFF called me and told me off for ruining everything, at which point I said you know there's really nothing I can do--M is driving.

We eventually met up with everyone else at his sister's house later on, although by then they were all less than enthusiastic about celebrating M.'s birthday. M. later admitted to me that he purposely did all of that to piss everyone off. For no reason other than he felt like it.

In other, sadder news, Rik Mayall has died. I'm very upset.

*Side story: I had a dream once that my friends and I went antique shop hopping out in the country somewhere, and all of a sudden the world turned apocalyptic. The apocalypse was headed straight for us (zombies, planes with bombs, etc.), and we all panicked and were like we need to run somewhere safe LIKE NOW. But M was admiring something in the antique shop, and could not be persuaded to leave. Like for reals, planes were bombing everything around us and we were all like WE NEED TO GET IN THE CAR AND FLOOR IT OUTTA HERE ASAP, but M would not abandon his shopping. This sums up his personality far better than any other description I could possibly give.

**In New Jersey, back when I was in high school, we took drivers' ed sophomore year and if you passed the written test at the end, you got your driving permit. I did not get my permit until several months after I turned 17 (my senior year) because I failed the written test twice. As a result, M was usually the one driving when we hung out. And as a result of his nature, I was late home 9 times out of 10 and would thus be grounded for the next month.

Dude, check it out! Time Cop on DVD. Three copies for eighteen bucks!

Let’s talk about Walmart.

 There are two Walmarts within driving distance of my house—the regular one in the Airmont/Monsey area on Route 59 and the Supercenter in Harriman. I never think to go to Walmart whenever I need something and recently someone accused me of being pompous, and cited this as one of the pieces of evidence that proves their theory.

 NO, arsehole.

I mean yes, I may be a pompous windbag, but that is not why I never think of going to Walmart. It has more to do with PTSD.

 My BFF M (I've mentioned his madness before) LOOOOVES Walmart. He physically cannot drive past a Walmart without stopping to go for a nice 3-6 hour browse. One time—and I sh*t you not—a couple of us were on one of our weekend adventures and M goes, “I smell a Walmart!”

 30 seconds later, we drive up and over a small hill

and there’s a fecking Walmart.

M had never been to that part of NJ before. Had never been anywhere near it.

 It was worse back when our group was larger and included M’s older sister, Ash-hole.

(Ash-hole and I have been arch-nemeses since like 2008, but that is a long and melodramatic and obnoxious story for another time…)

 Ash-hole loves Walmart, too. So if you were unfortunate enough to be in the car with both M and Ash-hole and they passed a Walmart, your entire day and/or night and/or weekend would be RUINED, because all the things that made a Walmart trip with M so horrific would be doubled in both duration and severity.

 M does the exact same thing every time he goes to Walmart:

 1. Walmart spotted!

 Sometimes he tries to pass this off as an accident.

 He MUST stop and go in.

 2. M will then try to convince you he needs something specific, like moisturizer.

 And then just one more thing, like some 50-thread count sandpaper they’re trying to call bedding.

 Oh and maybe some throw pillows.

 This leads directly to step 3:

 3. The acquisition of a shopping cart.

It’s all downhill from here.

 4. Cosmetics.

 M will spend 20-30 minutes browsing through the cosmetics and toiletries, sampling lotions and smelling every single bottle of shampoo that they have.

 5. Diet pills.

 Because they’re so much cheaper here! But we must make sure we read the entire label of every single one they sell before M eventually chooses the same one he always buys.

 (Total time in Walmart so far: 60 – 80 minutes)

6. Cheap electronics.

 M will spend 30 – 40 minutes comparing the prices of all the DVD players, televisions, and computers. You will browse through the cheap DVD’s until you need your own section in M’s shopping cart.

 7. The craft section.

 M will have a quick browse through the fake flowers and arts & craft kits and whatnot, at which point you will inevitably arrange the big wooden letters into filthy words.

8. The gardening section and plants.

 Kiss your Saturday night goodbye.

(Total time in Walmart so far: 120 - 200 minutes)

 9. The cart is now full and M decides he doesn’t want anything in it, so now you must stealthily move about the store emptying the cart, eventually leaving it in one of the clothing sections.

 10. a. M will now purchase one item and spend less than $2. You will spend at least $50 on all the shite you’ve acquired over the last 4 hours, mostly DVD’s.

 -or-

 10. b. M will not purchase anything and you will have a nervous breakdown.

…I have gotten my revenge, though, because I do the exact same thing to him in the Christmas Tree Shop.

Carol-Anne, I have asked you to keep the children quiet today! And for Christ's sake, get them out of the gaaaaaaaarden!!!!

I gave my mother a bit of a fright the other morning.

(Actually "bit of a fright" might be an understatement...)

You know how sometimes you have a really vivid dream right before you wake up in the morning, and the stuff happening in the dream kind of mimics stuff that's been going on in real life at the time, so when you wake up it takes you a minute before you can separate the dream from real life? Like for example, I often have dreams in which I find and purchase super exciting stuff like Baroque-style gowns, epic shoes, or extremely rare and expensive My Little Ponies, and wake up thinking I actually DID find and buy these items for a low price. And then when I wake up properly, I get kind of depressed when I realize it was only a dream.

The other morning, when I went back to bed at around 5.00 after a trip to the loo, I had a dream that my colourist, Greg had died. Aside from the fact that he is the one and only person on the planet whom I trust with colouring my hair, I adore Greg as a friend. We're both kind of snarky and sarcastic and love to gossip whilst I'm getting my hair did. We've even gone to see the Pogues together. So naturally, in the dream I got quite upset about his passing. Like REALLY upset. And because sometimes in dreams, your reactions to things can be quite a bit more extreme than they would be in real life, I was like FRANTICALLY upset. (I don't get frantic, even under extreme stress or in life-threatening situations.)

Most of the time after these types of dreams, it does take me quite a while to sort the two out (more than it probably takes normal people, I think). But the other morning... Perhaps it was a result of the sleeping pills? Or just a side effect of having epic sleep problems in general? Whatever the reason, that morning when I woke up again at around 6.00, my brain refused to separate the dream from real life ever after the normal waiting period.

My brain also failed to shake the frantic-epic-panic-attack that Greg's death had caused. I was wide awake, I knew I had just had a dream about Greg's death, but I COULD NOT figure out where the dream ended and real life began. That made the panic attack worse.

So, naturally:

You know when something sudden and startling shakes you out of a deep sleep, you get that heart-stopping FEAR? That particular kind of terror that is only caused by nightmares.

Yeah I'm pretty sure Mum almost had a heart attack.

While her brain was struggling to (a) wake up properly, (b) make sense of what I was saying, and (c) respond in the appropriate fashion; my brain decided to figure out how to separate the dream from real life.

Funny story:

This one time, a bunch of us stayed up at my friend, Number2's house in Upstate New York. His parents were away, so we were having the craic wandering around in the wilderness, dressing up in Number2's mother's old 70's and 80's clothes she had stashed away in the attic,

and drinking ourselves into a stupor. Even my friend T was drinking, and she NEVER drinks.

We retired to bed at around 2.30/3 in the morning--T and M in the spare room, S downstairs on the sofa, and me in with Number2. Myself and Number2 stayed up until like 4 in the morning finishing off the two bottles of wine we had stashed in his room and trying to convince the old and quite contrary VCR to play Harry Potter. (I'm amazed we didn't keep anyone else up with the racket we were making trying to get that VCR to work before we eventually passed out.)

I had a really bad dream. I was locked up in some kind of hospital, and awful horror-movie type things were happening all around me, and then someone started screaming. Like SCREAMING--horrific, blood-curdling screaming. It was so horrific if woke me up.

Except the screaming didn't stop when I woke up.

My brain actually cannot recall the sound of the screaming. It was that terrifying.

I tried to wake Number2, but he sleeps like the dead and so after shaking did not work, I punched him in the arm several times until he woke up and then made him go out into the hallway first to investigate. The screaming was coming from the spare room, and the more awake and alert I got, I realized it sounded like two people screaming. To be precise, it sounded like both M and T were screaming.

S was first to the scene, which still amazes me as she was downstairs, in the dark, ALONE, and yet she still rushed TOWARDS the scariness. By the time Number2 and I got there, the screaming had stopped and S was in the bedroom doorway asking T and M what the heck happened.

T was sitting up in her bed, the blankets pulled up to her chin, with a look of confusion and terror on her face. M was standing in the closet looking kind of dazed.

(Now before I go on, I should perhaps mention that M has a long history of intense sleep-walking and sleep-talking. (Sleepovers at M's house were super fun in high school.)

[His exact words--none of that was fabricated.]

I feel bad for M's mom. There was a while there that she kept finding all of M.'s pillows at the bottom of the basement stairs every morning for like 6 months. And then there were the times she'd be sat in the living room watching tv, and M (whose bedroom was on the other side of the living room wall) would start banging on the walls and screaming swear words.

Oh and my personal favourite:

The time M knocked his bedroom door clean off its hinges. And that didn't even wake up him up.)

T, still shaken from the whole incident, said she had half-woken up to M wandering around the room in the dark. He wandered into the closet and then started banging around and shouting "ARE YOU SERIOUS? ARE YOU SERIOUS, T?!?!?" etc., and so T not being properly awake, she got frightened and started screaming, and then M started screaming louder.

I'm guessing that's when I woke up.

M.'s version: "I don't know what was wrong with T, I was just getting up to go to the bathroom."

He managed to say that with a straight face, while still in the closet.

S managed to calm T down and the rest of us--dazed and shaken and still kind of confused--went back to bed. The next morning, once we were all fully awake, we discussed the events of the night until all of us were doubled over and sobbing with laughter.

That incident still makes me laugh quite a bit, actually.

Statcounter is really fun. It shows you more detailed info than the Blogger stats (although the downside is that there's a limit to how many records it keeps, unless you pay for it). I am greatly amused by some of the ways in which people have arrived at my blog when searching the internet. I think my favourite ever was "nude man bears explosion". And A LOT of people search for images of women in electric chairs. And baby bunnies. It's a bit disturbing how many people search for baby bunnies. And recently someone read my entire blog over the course of 2 days. I'm not gonna lie--I felt immensely flattered. :)