You ever know somebody you hope never ever manages to back you into a corner so they can talk and talk and talk talktalktalktalk till your ears scream out for mercy?

That was me yesterday. I’m here minding my own business and doing some data entry, when I get verbally jumped by one of my coworkers, who decided I really needed to hear what he had been doing for the past 9 days:

HeyLinc!SoIwasgoingtothestorebecausemy
computerwentdownandIhadtogetitfixedbutthe
technicianhadproblemsandhewasn’tabletofixitright
awayunlessheorderedapartsoItookittoanother
technicianbutthenIdecidedtocomehome
andtestitoutmyselfbypluggingitinandjigglingthe
cablesalittleandguesswhatitcamerightupbutthenmy
wifehadaproblemwitherprinterthatIhadtofixas
wellbutallIhadtodotherewasclickclickclick
clickclickandboomitwasdonejustintimefor
mydaughtertofinishherreportsoshecould
printitoutandtakeittoschoolandthenblahblahblah
blahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblah
blahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblah
blahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblah
blahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblah
blahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblah
blahblahblahblahblahblahblahblahblah
blahblahblahblahblah
………………………

20 minutes later I faked having to go to the bathroom and hid out there for another 15 minutes until I was sure he was gone.

I now have a newfound appreciation for silence.

Wow, I can’t believe a whole week flew by since I last blogged. Oops. Guess time flies when you’re having f… ahhhh who am I kidding, it was a pretty crappy week. My whole daily routine has been shot to hades for some time now, and try as I might, I just can’t seem to get a rhythm going. A lot of it stems from staying up till 3AM because I just gotta check my email one last time, just one more time, and then I’ll head off to bed, but oooooh, somebody else just visited my blog! Gotta see who that was… ok I’m done, now it’s off to ooooh, just got an IM from a friend in California, let’s see how she is! Ok, NOW I’m gonna sign off and, oh wait, it’s been 15 minutes, let me see if anyone responded to my thread on one of the forums I belong to… ok nothing yet, but let me just check my email one last time…

Next thing you know the sun is up and I still haven’t slept yet. Mother, I’m even doing it now.

I have to stop this. The lack of sleep and poor health is draining any energy I might have to blog at all. It’s also affecting my job performance as well, but that’s not really important right now. I’m a government employee after all, so not doing any work would actually be par for the course.

I do need to set a routine for myself that will put me back on the road to good health again. So starting tomorrow (uh, today) I will resolve to going to bed at a more godly hour, finally getting myself the sleep that I so desperately need.

But let me just check my email one last time…

I woke up late this morning, and not being in any hurry to get to work, I lazily surfed the Daily Blog Tips site, looking for advice and suggestions that I could apply to my own blog. I came across one post that linked to this article on how bloggers can use social networking sites like StumbleUpon to boost their traffic. So with nothing better to do 10 minutes before I had to head on to work, I submitted my blog post about women emulating men, yawned, then went to get dressed. My jaw unhinged and dropped when I went back to check my stats one last time.

The result of that seemingly innocuous submittal was the biggest traffic count I’ve ever seen since I started this blog. I generated over 50 visits in just under 15 minutes, and it was still going strong by the time I left for work.

I think I may have stumbled onto something here (uhhh, no pun intended). To be honest though, I wasn’t able to wrap my head around the appeal of social networking sites, partly because I couldn’t understand exactly how some of them worked. Sites like StumbleUpon, Flickr, YouTube and Last.FM (all of which I belong to) were easy enough to figure out, but places like Del.icio.us, Digg and Reddit made less sense to me. I think part of it might be because I wasn’t interested in what the most “digged” articles or highest ranked posts of the day happened to be. That perspective might change though as I give these sites a harder look. But one thing that will never, ever change is my utter disdain for places like MySpace, and other social networks that emulate them. The ilk you find at these online ghettos is something I just can’t abide by.

After thinking about what I wrote earlier about being set apart, I realized it isn’t people I don’t want to associate myself with: it’s ugly people. Not physically ugly mind you, but people who just don’t know how to be civilized. You see it all the time on MySpace and YouTube sites. People who drop f-bombs in comments for YouTube videos that show nothing more than a harmless clip of Big Bird singing on Sesame Street. People who feel the compelling need to take snapshots of their hairy buttingtocks and moon me on MySpace. Why? Why do they do this? Why must people always be so utterly depraved and tasteless? All I want is a little civility, to be able to enjoy surfing to a Peter Cetera’s MySpace page without seeing disgusting, lewd (and illegal) photos in the comments, or enjoy a YouTube video without some schmuck cluttering up the comments with mindless f-bombs. Crikey mate, get a grip you psychotic blokes.

Fortunately, though, I may have stumbled (again, no pun intended) onto a way to draw some of the better quality Internet surfers out there to my home on the web, all by making legitimate use of the social networking tools. I have to figure by doing so, eventually a few gems will end up at my doorstep and become regular readers, even if it means they had to ride a wave of sewage to get here.

Paradoxically, the kind of people I’d like visit to my blog would actually be those who are unfamiliar with Internet usage. I know it’s strange, but I think I’d enjoy the perspective of folks who rarely use computers (much less the Internet) more than those who basically spend their entire lives online (like I do). My hearing loss precludes me from being able to enjoy a healthy and active social life, so to compensate I do a lot of my talking through the keyboard. Still, I think it’d be nice to meet people (specifically a hot babe), who could pull me into the real world, and help me enjoy all that it has to offer there.

But until then, gotta keep on surfing.

No, it’s not love, it’s that damned acid reflux that’s been giving me “agita” for the past few months now.

I’ve never been what you would call a healthy eater. A delivery from Papa John’s or another local pizza joint is what I would consider a decent home cooked meal, and I usually got my meals on the run from places where I could get some serious grub in 30 seconds or less. For years I’ve lead a life where I made no time to do my own cooking, and while part of it was just the circumstances of life, most of it was my own doing.

Now those years are finally catching up to me, as I’ve begun to develop food allergies and other health problems as a result of my bad eating habits, which led to my current acid reflux condition. Now I have to finally face the music and hope these problems will only turn out to be temporary. I usually get heartburn a few times a day, and though it’s not severe, it’s annoying enough that it’s negatively impacted my life and affected my moods. One of the most frustrating things about this is not only having to develop a diet that would avoid all the foods that triggers heartburn, but going through the agonizingly growing pains of learning how to do my own cooking. It also has to be a diet that won’t leave me starving 15 minutes after I’ve eaten. The past couple of weeks has seen me fumbling and stumbling towards a new regimen that would finally control my heartburn issues. Sometimes I can’t resist (I just HAVE to had that can of Coke, or a bite of dark chocolate), but I’m beginning to realize I may have to do without tickling my tastes buds for quite a while.

What’s ironic about all this is that I used to have an interest in cooking, making my own breakfast and even preparing my meals in advance. One of the things I’ve wanted to do was make use of a cookbook so I could do my own meals without caving in and calling up Papa John for some of his deliciously greasy pizzas. The problem is, I wouldn’t even know where to begin to find a cookbook that would suit me. The problem isn’t that there aren’t a lot of options and possibilities, but that there’s too many.

Regardless, it’s clear my life in the fast food lane is coming to an end. I suspect God is using the problems I have now to force me into a more sensible lifestyle and help me finally shed the weight that’s literally been a burden to me since the 21st century began. I don’t resent it though, and in fact I’m willing to accept the consequences of my poor eating ways. But I do hope it’s not a condition that I will have to learn to live with. In a way I’m lucky, especially after having read the horror stories of people whose acid reflux problems were agonizingly painful, kept them up at night, and even had cases where they spit up blood. My problems aren’t nearly as severe, but if I don’t wise up now, they certainly could become that way.

For now, it’s time to fire up that George Foreman grill that’s been collecting dust for too long. Good times are here again.