Anything Goes

Hi, my name is Robert Otlowski, and this is my blog. There are no rules here - I may write about poetry, current events, your sex life, the most minute, boring details of my own daily life, the philosophy of space and time, how to make a nuclear bomb (likely to be my last blog entry for a while), or the latest asshole running for political office (even if said asshole is me). Some entries may be entirely fictional or designed primarily in an effort to make one person happy or offend the general public. In short, anything goes. I can and will violate the laws of any country, common sense, decency, the agreement I clicked "yes" to when I signed up for this site and / or access to the internet, and even the laws of nature if they need it. On the other hand, I'm a pretty nice guy and I don't often find such things necessary (at least, no complaints as of yet :). I can't make any promises about my blog not being censored because I don't control the interwebs, but hey, when it really comes down to it nobody controls anything, except maybe themselves (and even in that case there is a great deal of debate on the matter).

Like most people I've been bored my whole life. A witty remark, a good joke, something wonderful I've created with my own two hands, the smiling face of a friend - a pretty girl - a kind old gentleman or lady, a work of art, playing a fun video game or having a challenging competition - these are the kind of things I live for. Sadly, these things are far more rare than the ones most people spend their life pursuing - money, fame, security, power, knowledge, wisdom, sex, success, longevity, and so on. Of those I'm forced to admit sex makes a lot more sense than the others. If I winked into existence for one day and spent that day laughing with a stranger or watching the sunset with a pretty girl I would die a completely happy man. Two days, even better, might need some sunscreen though.

I've never done a daily blog before, and the reason is simple - I felt I had to write something useful or, failing that, at least document my life. Fuck that. My life is pretty damn boring. Which isn't to say I won't write about it here if I feel like it, I'm just not going to make it a rule to subject myself to recounting it. I also totally lack sufficient energy and discipline to always write something useful at the end of the day - if anything I prefer to carry on about nothing, kind of like this.

Like most people I spend a ridiculous % of my time working and another ridiculous % sleeping. The main reason I sleep, besides being tired, is so I don't fall asleep during work. No rest for the wicked. That leaves about 5 hours or less each weekday almost all of which go to waste through mundane conversations, failed attempts to relax, feeling sorry for myself or others when in fact we're all quite fortunate, and various mediocre forms of entertainment like writing blog entries. And the real tragedy of it is that it's all completely avoidable. As Patricia's character from the 1990 film Joe vs. the Volcano said:

"...almost the whole world's asleep. Everybody you know, everybody you see, everybody you talk to ... only a few people are awake. And they live in a state of constant total amazement."

Well folks, I'm awake. I just don't always like what I see. A good friend of mine, who I will honor by making him the first person I mention by name in my blog, Chris Ziemba, once said "The mind is a limitation - only when you have lost it can you truly be free." Call me a crackpot philosopher if you like but personally I think truer words have never been spoken. If I was just a little bit crazier I would be quite happy, or quite sad, or at least crazy enough to give up on stupid things like money and spend my time on something that really matters. As it is I'm working 9 hours (11+ really, you just don't get paid you for getting ready for work, lunch, travel, etc.) trying to contribute to something and saving enough money to buy a house and pay the absurd taxes that everyone who's too chicken shit to play hide and seek with the IRS puts up with. Do I like my job and my co-workers? Of course, or I'd quit. Does that mean I wouldn't rather be playing video games or planting crops sometimes? Hell no. On the other hand, a simpler life can get you into a lot of trouble and become even more desolate.

I often find people who write blogs like this think themselves terribly important, or at least interesting. I'm neither, just a little bored. If I ceased to exist a few people would be sad, perhaps even to the end of their lives, but that's it. No butterfly effect that I can foresee, no state funeral, nothing. Does that make me sad when I think about it? Not really, because the happiest people I know aren't remotely important or even terribly interesting by conventional definitions. I'm just not one of them, though I'm not ruling out bias in that regard.

Speaking of sex, I just watched a movie called Idiocracy. The short short version is: some Army librarian accidentally gets put into cryo-freeze for 500 years and when he wakes up the world is going to hell in a hand basket because stupid people have been breeding idiots for centuries while smart people read books, argue, and generally go extinct. It wasn't really that great a movie but the message is solid: smart people should have more sex, I mean, kids. So get smart, get married, and start making babies people! Coincidentally I'm available, I'm no genius but I'm smarter than the average bear ;).

I caught 15 seconds of the Democratic National Convention which was fourteen point nine repeating seconds too many. I'm hoping to miss the Republican Convention entirely but they do have a nasty tendency to put them on TVs in semi-public places like my gym. My politics are the worst kind - arm-chair, idealistic, simple, and not Democrat or Republican. I'm sure this will offend some of the people that don't despise me but if you apply simple logic (it's not just for Vulcans!) you might conclude, as I have, that you can't really represent anyone with two political parties. And that's if you even think political parties are a good idea, which I would argue they are not. We could go on all day about the perpetuation of the two party system and who to blame but since this is a one way talk I will simply say that when I do vote it's usually for a bad reason or an inflatable whale named Arthur Galpin (I was his lawyer once).

I'm off to bed now, not necessarily to sleep, but off to bed all the same. Have a good night, and may you dream happily of that which matters most.

Back | POSTED BY Robert Otlowski ON August 27, 2008 @ 7:05 pm MST