Good morning, boys and girls. Today I greet you from the confines of my very spacious and comfortable bed. And although I am breaking one of the covenants of sleep by doing something other than sleeping or fucking in bed, I'm afraid I have very little choice. You see, it wasn't my internet that was broken, it was my wireless router. And since I know precious little about networking, and am employed somewhere where I basically do nothing but troubleshoot all day every day, I have very little interest in trying to fix it. So for now, I'm just going to plug in in my bedroom. Who knows, maybe if I ignore the problem long enough, it'll go away. Seems to work for everything else. At least Ryan Short gave me his extra 6' cable, so I could quit using the 6" cable that ties my router to the wall.

He gave it me to pay for the lunch that I made him. I think maybe you should all start calling me Sidesho With His Shoes Off. I was watching Ina Garten (Contessa With Her Shoes Off) the other day and she was making roasted tomato basil soup. And I thought to myself, "I could do that. I could fuckin do that." So I printed out the recipe and went to the store. The only edits I had to make were soy margarine instead of butter and vegetable stock instead of chicken broth. Cooking is so much easier than baking because you can make substitutions without it ruining everything. But seriously, folks, this soup was from absolute scratch. I chopped up onions and garlic cloves and sauteed them in margarine and olive oil with a sprinkle of red pepper flakes. Meanwhile my tomatoes cut in half were tossed in olive oil, salt, and pepper and were roasting in the oven. Then I mixed them with a can of whole tomatoes, vegetable stock, a shit ton of fresh basil, and thyme. After that boiled and simmered for 40 minutes, I busted out my brand new immersion blender and went to town. Awesome. I do have to say my tomato basil soup was a smidge better than La Madelines. And now that I'm confident in the recipe, I can totally tweak it to my liking.

Being a vegan is proving more challenging than good, clean living. But it is distracting me a little bit from the pains of withdrawl. Unfortunately, it's also making me gassy. I've never had gas before. It's bizarre. I have to assume that drastically altering my diet is to blame and hopefully it'll calm down once I get situated. Because I'll tell you one thing, I will either starve or explode before I break Febrehabruariii. I committed to this and I'm going to see it through til the end, but at this point, don't expect me to be a vegan again next year.

Best wishes to my fellow Febrehabruariiites, especially Matt Cweech who has taken this to the extreme and is ingesting nothing but lemonade for a month. You are truly more hardcore than I, sir. Laaaaaaaaaate.

Kelly went away for a while. When she returned, she brought with her a man named Alexander. Alexander has more money than you or I will ever see in 10 lifetimes. Aside from that little tid-bit, he's a really cool, laid back, generous guy. Him and Kelly get along really well. That said, I've had a few firsts as of late.

First, I broke the Sidesho-Land Speed Record. I'm not sure what it was before, probably about 100mph that one time Allison and I made it from College Station to Dallas in just over 2 hours. The new record is 150mph. Did I mention Alexander used to be a race car driver? He has some really awesome car, but I obviously don't remember what kind it is. The other night Daniel, Matt Cweech, his friend Sean, and I met up with Kelly and Alexander here in the circle. Afterwards, he took us for a spin down the Tollway. Treating lanes as if they were a mere suggestion, we weaved our way in and around traffic until we hit a top speed of just around 150mph. I was pretty scared, but it was such a rush.

Shortly thereafter, we were invited out to the boat. Yup, I broke the Sidesho-Water Speed Record. Can you believe that I've never been to Lake Lewisville? Or I hadn't, rather. Well, I have now and I must say the next time you get out that way, you simply must do it on a certified yacht. This thing had a little picnic table in the back, and a couch, and a bedroom, and a kitchen, and a bathroom, and it hauled ass too. It was so nice. He let me drive it a little bit even though I didn't know what the fuck I was doing. And when we were sitting out front on top of the boat, he would veer wildly trying to knock us off. I spent the whole day out there sipping on beers, chatting it up with Daniel, Hunter, Lauren, Matt Cweech, and of course, Kelly and Alexander. It was just a gorgeous day and way too much fun. I'm hoping we do that like every weekend.

I had to get those stories out there because I'm gonna have a different story to tell when I get home in a few hours. Daniel is about to take me down to see the doctor that does the Pillar Procedure. I'm getting that done as well as a turbinate cobilation (?). They're gonna stick foam pillars in my throat and shove a laser up my nose, essentially. Here's a link to that article Ryan Short wrote about me for the Dallas Voice. I don't think I ever shared it with you all. So wish me luck. It probably won't help me sleep, but it couldn't hurt. Ciao bellas.