My night really began with half an hour of being derided and chastised for a wide variety of things, from my hair, to my general demeanor, to what I idly do with my hands when my head is empty. It was mostly amusing, really, in a sort of smug kind of way. Then it got kind of shocking, when I said something with complete sincerity and it was the wrong thing — and really, who’s to know that saying, “So, is your dad still kickin’?” would be the faux pas to break the Camel. And no, there is no dead father in this tale, just someone who is apparently deeply offended by certain wordings of typical “so, how’s life?” small talk questions. Or, I’m just a idiot. This, I’m beginning to realize, is certainly a possibility.

I’ve always been concerned that I was slightly more inept at social situations than I was aware. Then I started spending a lot of time with people and I’ve caught myself saying things like, “You know, in the last year I’ve really learned a lot of things about how to function socially within intricate groups of friends,” since then. I believed this, but now I’m not so sure. Ever since I’ve become more social within the realm of reality, I’ve…

This is boring.

I think I’m getting worse at cultivating and maintaining decent relationships with people. For a while I just thought, you know what, these are my friends and they are this way and hey, that’s whatever, I’m fucked up, too. For a long while I thought that. Now I wonder if I am the problem, too. I know I’m not the only problem, so I’m not worried about that. I know the people in my life are all crazy in their own ways and we’re all fucked up and quirky and maybe everyone is that way, I don’t know. But maybe I’m fucked up, too.

I think I am.

I’m not sure what it is… maybe it’s a few things. But, back to my night.

Then nothing happened. I called about ten people. The first eight didn’t answer the phone and haven’t returned my calls. I even drove to common hang-out locations trying to locate people randomly, but no one was around. Even Andrew, who almost invariably calls me randomly or answers the phone — and even told me to call him later, didn’t answer the phone. I hung out with Becca’s brother. Then, later on, Becca. Then I went home. Now I’m sitting here. The end!

I spent, I think, a good two years utterly convinced there was a God and a Jesus and all that in an attempt to justify all the horrid shit I felt was happening to me. Something about catching your woman in bed with another dude just has this weird power of putting Jesus inside you? I heard a rumor once. I don’t know. But, I got The Jesus. It’d been hanging around a bit, thanks to Philip K. Dick and Gnosticism and my own curiosity about my Quaker heritage or whatever, but then one day I just got The Jesus.

The Jesus was my justification for bullshit. The Jesus is why I got into a fight with someone today. The Jesus is why some asshole ripped me off for $100. The Jesus is why I did not get laid, etc. The Jesus was a good scapegoat, and in many ways I am thankful that I had The Jesus in my life for a spell.

But I think I am over The Jesus. There is no justification or reason for anything that happens. There are no scales that balance out. No karma, not that The Jesus comes with Karma, The Karma is something separate that acutely affects certain individuals. I’m not saying that people don’t deserve shit, on occasion, but I’ve seen plenty of assholes and cunts who still live charmed lives despite the assholes and cunts they are.

I deserve, for some reason, the things that happen to me. I say “for some reason” mainly to subtly display that I’m still not sure about positively declaring that I deserve everything that happens to me. I’m open to the idea, but I know if I think really deeply about it I’ll begin to feel really fucking gypped and then I’ll get all pissed off but since The Jesus has left me, I have nowhere to deflect all the anger and rage! What’ll I do then?

I’m a shitty person. I have almost no conscience at all.

I think I surround myself with other shitty people who each have no conscience for various reasons specific to their own upbringings.

As a side note: I’ve been thinking a lot about what make us Los Angeles natives possibly different from people not from Los Angeles, as I’ve certainly identified that Bay Area people are distinctively different from Los Angeles people, and San Diego people, who are then distinctively different from Los Angeles people. Perhaps it’s this lack of conscience that is distinctly Los Angeles about me, and everyone else who peppers my life. This is something I’ll have to watch closely. (I’m going to say that Bay Area are motivated by deeply rooted cores of self-loathing, and that San Diego people are motivated by tiny sunshine generators located in their solar plexi.)

But I get what I deserve, and as a shitty person I deserve shitty people, and just by my own nature I surround myself with… you get it? See! It’s all so simple.

So, obviously, I’m totally wrong. Whatever.

The revolution is never coming. The apocalypse came and went — and left us yawny.* We’ll see the end of oil, and maybe that’ll affect us. I don’t know.

Matt said that out of everyone we know, I am the person who is the most motivated by fear. I still have absolutely no idea what he means. He gave an example by saying before Sarah came down the last time I got all panicky and started hocking all my shit to make sure I had enough money for us to have a good time. To this, I said, I don’t think I hocked all my shit until after the last time Sarah was here, and I did that because I felt like I needed to hoard money, and two, how is wanting a bunch of money to entertain a girl an act motivated by fear? I mean, alright, sure, I guess, but that’s not FEAR. Fear as a word is like hate, it’s strong shit.

I mean, I wander through abandoned mental asylums, man. I lead people into them! I map them out in my head and run from cops and shit! How am I, to Matt, who wont even go and check it out once, a person motivated primarily by fear? I don’t know. Now I’ve just confused myself.

Fear is a bunch of shit. I’m way to analytical to get consumed by fear. The only time that fear can’t be explained away is when you’re dealing with the supernatural, and the supernatural ain’t real, so I don’t have anything to worry about. I mean, alright, if someone is going to throw me off a cliff in car, I’ll know what fear is, but until then, fuck it.

In short, my day and night sucked. Hello, Sunday. I’m hope you’re not a fickle bitch as well.

*(Thanks, Bird.)