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Where to begin? I guess, first, I should mention that I'm reaching out to you all from a two-story Starbucks in Seattle, WA. Not three days after I returned home from my DC/NYC vacation, I boarded a plane for a four-hour flight to the great northwest.

When I was sitting in the terminal waiting for my flight, I noticed a particularly ill-behaved toddler screaming his head off. I just knew he would be sitting near me. And I was right. This little fucker was directly across the aisle from me ... and he did not shut the fuck up the entire flight. He was screaming for the sake of screaming. Now here's what really bothers me. His mother catches my glare, smiles, chuckles, shakes her head ... like she's expecting me to be the same, like, "Eh! What'reyagonnado?!" and ruffle the kid's hair. I'll tell you what you should do. You should smack that kid so fucking hard that the next time he ever thinks about screaming on a crowded airplane, the resulting Pavlovian headache is crippling enough to quell that impulse. Good lord, people, it's bad enough you decided to breed, then decided to do a poor job in raising your children, but at least have the foresight not to bring them in public. No one thinks your kid is cute but you.

Except my nieces. They're all adorable.

So Seattle kinda sucks. The weather is pretty kickass, but I'm bored out of my gourd. I don't know anyone here and my room doesn't have internet access until I move hotels on Thursday. I really just want to be home, but that won't happen until September 1. Somebody call the whambulance.

My trip to DC was spectacular. Daniel and I got along famously, something that had mildly concerned me before our departure. While we spend nearly every hour outside of school and work together, that doesn't always give you a good indication of how you'll handle 24/7 with a person. But it was not even an issue. We spent every night in DC gay bar hopping. We got to meet up with Mr. K■■■■■■ and my dear friend JonS■■■. DC is a pretty cool city, but it's missing that essential pretentious attitude that makes going out really fun. Nobody dresses up. They wear flip-flops and cameo shorts and sleeveless Ts out the bar. What's the fun in that? Daniel and I had to get all fancied up and go out with our sunglasses on to show em how we do. Daniel's dad had a nice apartment in Dupont Circle with a huge terrace. The terrace was surrounded on three sides by a tall brick wall, and the fourth side was a rod iron fence. So every night when we were smashed and getting home, we'd climb the rod iron fence to sit on top of the brick wall and smoke cigarettes. Every single night one of us got hurt. Daniel tore his foot open. I have a puncture wound on each knee. You'd think we would learn our lesson after a few nights, but we managed to avoid any lessons learned.

New York was a b-last. I still don't like the city, but I definitely like the time I had there. We stayed with Daniel's friend David (so bear with me during this story, I'm not speaking in the third person). David showed us as much as he could in the short weekend we were there. We went to some good bars, but they were all so fucking packed. I can't imagine paying 8 times as much for an apartment 1/4 the size just to spend every night packed into bars so tightly that it's hard to even drink. And if you go to New York, make sure you take a lot of cash. IF places even took credit cards, they all had minimums. 5 dollars at most stores, 50 at some bars, and one bar even said they wouldn't swipe my card more than once when I told them to just run it. I suppose if you're marking up alcohol 800% customer service isn't at the forefront of your concerns. But like I said, we still managed to have a blast. One day we went on a Project Runway tour of the city. We went to Bryant Park, and Parsons New School for Design, and the Red Lobster that Santino made fun of Tim Gunn and Andre about. We went to Mood, the fabric store they always shop at and had a fabric scavenger hunt. We managed to find 3 of the fabrics that they've used on the show this season. Too exciting. We also went to the flagship Macy's and they had a window display with all of the winning outfits so far this season. It was fun to look at them up close. By far one of my favorite parts of the vacation. The other day we just kind of strolled around Central Park. Thank you thank you thank you to our most gracious host and newest Sidesho-Viewer, David. Can't wait to see you again soon!

We did so much walking on our trip. I really felt like my legs got a good workout, since they haven't had any recently. We also took a train from DC to NYC. That was a first for me. I like the train. The train is kind of like what I assume airplanes would be like if there weren't assholes trying to blow them up all the time. You just kind of get on where you need to get on and then get off when you need to get off. It just made a lot of sense to me.

I have to apologize for the length of this blog. I had a lot to say and nothing else to do in this fucking city. I'm bored. If anybody knows somebody who lives in Seattle, or knows somebody who knows somebody PLEASE get in contact with me. I would kill for some company. Alright, I'll update more when I have internet in my room. Later, bitches.

I'm off tomorrow for my week long vacation to Washington, D.C. and New York City with Daniel. I can't imagine that I'll have internet access readily available (or that Daniel will tolerate me updating my website when there are so many things to do). So this is my farewell to you all. I will update when I get home and let you know how it went. Laaaaaaater bitches!

This pain is bordering on unbearable. I've already burned through my first prescription for painkillers and my attempts to ration the lone refill aren't going so well. I pretty much have to take one every 4 hours. I haven't been able to stay a full day at work yet because of the pain. My throat is so swollen that my tonsils are nearly touching. It's probably infected because it's so bright red. If you're thinking about having a uvulectomy, I suggest you plan ahead and take a week off of work. The only relief I get is after a pill kicks in and I sleep for a few hours. If I sleep much more than that, it's really painful when I wake up, so I'm going to try to spend the weekend doing nothing but healing and sleeping.

It hurts so much to eat, well, swallow. I am supposed to drink ice water in small sips to try and take the swelling down, but the cold hurts on top of swallowing. I eat a lot at each meal to try and space them out as much as possible. I have a huge, gaping open wound directly in the path of all food and liquids on their path to my stomach. Since I don't have an IV, I don't know much choice but to keep doing it, but I dread the thought.

My wishlist hasn't turned out exactly like I thought it would. It was intended to help me plan far in advance for the purchases I wanted to make. Instead, it's become a grocery list for the past few days. Whenever I'm hurting, I find that spending large sums of money always brings a smile to my face. Today I got a couple new pillows and all new pillowcases for every pillow I have. It's not enough to just put one pillowcase per pillow though, because then sometimes the case folds back and you can see the pillow. Unacceptable, so we put two on each pillow. Not exactly cheap when you're dealing with DaMask Stripe sheets, which also happens to be the product placement for today. These sheets are so comfy and stylish. Pick your favorite color and then pick yourself up a set. I have the chocolate brown to match my ceiling and wall stripes and then I got red for the pillows that I keep on the couch. Rawk!

Oh, Daniel and I will be in Washington D.C. August 8th through the 16th with an excursion up to NYC the 11th through the 14th. Yes, I'm returning to New York despite my vow to never do that. I have a feeling this trip will be exponentially better than the last. Anyway, if you reside in either of these cities, let's plan a get-together. Til then!

This has turned into the weekend from hell. They pulled what they glibly described as "the ol' bait and switch." My "3 day all expenses paid weekend in New York City" has turned into "working 18 hours a day in Queens while commuting from South Jersey all over Labor Day weekend." I'd have to say I rarely if ever get this pissed. It has just been a disaster. My boss and boss's boss and boss's boss's boss aren't happy about how things went down either, so without divulging anything that would get me dooced, they've promised to make it up to me. And I know they will. And while I'm here I'm working hard. I've just never been so slighted before.

It's all thankless too, that's the best part. So just in case any of you were jealous, which I know some of you were, because quite honestly, I'm awesome, this is one of those times when you can lean your lawn chair way back as you bask in the simplicity of your own living room. I'm having no fun at all.

So I won't even get to see New York City, besides what I see from the highways as I traverse my way from Jersey to NYC through toll roads, turn pikes, and bridges. The bridges here have tolls as high as 9 dollars. Insanity. I am making my way pretty well though. Today I was chatting with my sister on the drive home and took a wrong split in the highway and ended up in Williamsburg. With my limited knowledge of the city I was able to make it back to Queens and then start my trip over again. I kinda love the city itself. It's rather sexy. I just wish I could enjoy it.

Enough complaining though. I was supposed to come home the 16th and I just changed my flight to the 9th. They can eat me if they don't like it. I informed my boss that I was coming home early and he encouraged me to do so. It's so nice to have management that really and truly backs you up and is understanding and respectful. That's what's lacking here.

No NYC for me, but yay I'm coming home. I can't wait to be home. In two weeks I go back to the sleep clinic to get my Constant Positive Air Pressure (CPAP) machine calibrated. Another night in the sleep lab, ugh! The last one wasn't as bad as I thought. You know how I said I didn't sleep at all? Well I did. I slept for six and a half hours. I just didn't realize it because I rarely made it out of the first stage of sleep. I only hit REM for 20 minutes, so I basically have been getting about 20 minutes of sleep a night for the past decade. It's nice to know I'm not crazy.

The apnea though. Lordy, lordy! A normal 24 year old probably wakes up during the course of the night about 5 times for any range of reasons. I, on the other hand, again, because I'm awesome, wake up 70 fucking times an HOUR!1!! They classify that as "severe." No shit. And every time I wake up it is because I've stopped breathing. So I stop breathing 70 times per hour. I'll spare you the hassle of pulling up your desktop calculator -- That's roughly every 51 seconds. Not exactly conducive to sleep. But this CPAP stops that from happening, meaning I could hit REM for 8 hours in one night. Holy shit, can you imagine what a difference that would make in my life?!

A few people have separately expressed the same concern. What if my personality changes on account of this? Think about it. How much more easy going are you after you've just pulled an all-nighter? Just kinda lazily making through the day. Miles even commented that when he's really tired he gets loopy and funny. I'm like that all the time. What if when I'm well rested I'm a really serious asshole? Hard to imagine, I know, I know.

Anyway, I gotta go piss and moan a little more to my parents, I just wanted you all to know that I'm miserable, so you could at least feel a little better about your own Labor Day weekend. An ULDE:IYDKYDG this is not. THIS time when I get back I'm not going nowhere, no how. So all those parties I've promised you all, we're gonna have. Unfortunately medical costs have bankrupted me, but I still have enough $$$ to get bombed. So this weekend, Ryan S■■■ specifically, it's on!

The sleep clinic. Worst. experience. of. my. life. It was so terrible. It sucked because I was so looking forward to it, but in practice it was extremely uncomfortable and upsetting. You go to this hotel room and a nurse comes in to get you ready for bed. They put 3 electrodes on my face, 3 on my scalp, 2 on my chest, 4 on my legs. I had a band around my chest and one around my stomach. I had tubes up my nose and in front of my mouth. They could measure my eye movements along with all of these other medical wonders. So imagine a trunk of cables coming from your body and attaching to the headboard. Now place a camera so that it points directly at your face. Then relax and go to sleep.

Yeah, not so much. I was so geared up that I couldn't sleep all night long. I got up in the middle of the night to use the restroom (with the nurse's help) and I told her I hadn't slept at all and she said, "I noticed." So the room of technicians really were sitting there watching me all night. Didn't help matters. I did doze off for a bit toward the morning so I think they were able to collect enough data to do some good. She described my sleeping ability as "terrible." Whooptie doo.

So the next day of work was shot. I skipped the fucker. I've decided that the 12 hour trip from Cincinnati to Austin was redeemed by this day off. Mikey was in town interviewing and needed a ride so I drove him around to his interview. While he was interviewing I treated myself to a nice lunch at Tom Toms and then bought myself a new phone. This one has a camera, people. It may be the end of the Sidesho-illustrations as we know them.

Today at work they told me I was going to New York for two weeks. I told them no fucking way. They told me I could have an all expenses paid 3 day Labor Day weekend in New York City if I agreed. My flight leaves tomorrow.

I apologize to everyone that I promised I would hang out with now that I was finally back, but we're going to have to delay that another two weeks. Sorry!

It's not every day that you meet a fucking great guy, get a new phone, make a bit of extra cash, win a free trip to NYC, and have everything professional dripping off your forked tongue like silk chocolate.

I think I just went overboard there. I'm off to take friends from Sweden out for margaritas. Ole!