A Brief, Obnoxious Return to Normalcy

originally posted on 7/21/07

Normalcy sucks. I've now exceeded my longest so called normalcy period since November of 2005. I hated November of 2005, and really all of 2005 for that matter.

By normalcy, I mean a month or so without, you know, the un-usual, like no trips, or house guests, or unemployment, or medical maladies, or bizarre whirlwind romances. you know what I mean. The good old wake up every afternoon and go to work, and go out every weekend and stay out until 8 a.m. or so. and yes, I realize my "normalcy" here is a bit strange, sort of like normalcy for your average college sophomore, only the college is in a town that makes New Orleans look reasonably sober.

This makes normalcy a bit of a difficult concept, but one that by my estimation I had experienced 17 days of prior to July. October wasn't normal - I was in a new country, and I was broke. Same for early November. December was totally abnormal, as I was searching for jobs all month, moved, and went to Hong Kong to boot. January and February were the "winter intensives," meaning I worked 6 days a week and really never did anything, which isn't normal. March was when the old man visited, and also included trips to Jeju and Busan, so that's abnormal. April had all the makings of normalcy, but instead it rocked out into quite possibly the second best month of my life. May was when Wiley visited, and also involved the lion's share of the strange pseudo-relationship with the crazy girl. Fun, but not normal. In June I was ill, and even stranger, sober, for much of the month, which was neither normal, fun, nor interesting, other than buying a computer.

Maybe part of it is that I've finally become a bit desensitized to the craziness out here. I've had 4 or 5 nights out in the last 2 or 3 weeks that ended well after the sun came up. I've taken to thinking that going home at 4 or 5 is "an early night." as I noted in a story last week, one night I didn't even go out until after 2. still, even a few months ago, I probably would have written stories about each of these nights, but now they seem to sort of blend together. Go out, play darts, chat with strangers, maybe talk to some girls, maybe get their phone numbers with no intention of ever actually calling them (I'm pretty sure they don't take offense. Hey, remember me, I'm the guy you met at 6 a.m.)

A big part of the normalcy now is, of course, the girl thing. Or, lack thereof. I don't know what the hell happened, but it seems, as I wrote a few weeks ago, that I had maybe 5 girls that I had some interest in, some of which would even take my calls. now, I've got 0. Which certainly makes things normal for me, 2005 style normal. It also makes things extraordinarily boring, and I find myself spending an inordinate amount of time playing video games, cruising the Interwebs, and god help me, reading.

At least the end of all this normalcy is in sight, for whatever that's worth. Summer intensives start Thursday, so I'm working 6 days a week for the next month. Then, a short vacation to Thailand, followed by annoying wholesale changes at work, when 3 people are leaving, including Brad, one of my 2 real friends here. September is the Chuseok holiday and likely a trip to Tokyo, and in October, both the old man and Wiley are making another visit. Of course, at around that time, I should probably start trying to figure out what the hell I'm going to do with my life, or at least what to do for Christmas. No easy answer there, because, depending on how things shake out, I could be spending Christmas in basically any country in the world, though I'm fairly positive and hopeful that it won't be Somalia.