Today I get fitted with my new $6000 hearing aids, the Destiny 1600 by Starkey. I’m not expecting miracles, or the ability to hear conversations from 100 yards away, but it would be nice to have a normal conversation in noisy settings for once without finding myself trapped in a puffy shirt situation.

I grew up hoping with each new generation of hearing aids that passed, that the technology would finally advance enough to give me the level of hearing I so desperately needed and wanted. I wanted to be able to hear someone whispering in my ear at the movie theater, or the sound of crickets chirping in the early hours of the morning, or the sound of my car jingling its merry little tune whenever the keys were left in the ignition. I wanted to be able to carry on a decent conversation in places like the subway, or at ballparks, or anywhere I happened to be.

But most of all, I no longer wanted to be afraid. Afraid that if someone asked me for help, I wouldn’t be able to tell them because I’d have no idea what they were saying. Afraid to approach beautiful women I saw in everyday life, not so much because I was shy and ugly, but also because I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to hear a single thing they said to me.

But after 27 years of wearing all different kinds of hearing aids from all different kinds of manufacturers, I still have yet to realize those dreams.

Will today be the day? After so many years of disappointments and heartaches, has the moment finally arrived where I can at long get my life back?

We shall see.

What a night.

After a long, grueling day at work, I finally signed out and booked out of here as fast as I could. There was only one problem though.

My car battery was dead.

When I came to work today, several news vans had parked (and doubled parked) in spaces I usually took, and since I was in a hurry, I turned on my hazard lights, doubled parked my car as well, and ran inside so I could sign in on time. I came back out again, found another parking space to stash my car, and yep, I forgot to turn off the hazard lights.

Mother@#$%.

I didn’t want to embarrass myself by asking around here for somebody to help jumpstart my car, so I called up roadside assistance, figuring it wouldn’t be a big deal for them to send somebody over to quickly get me up and running again.

Good grief, it was like I had called the DMV.

“What is your VIN number?”

“What is the make and model of your vehicle?”

“What is your call back number?”

“What is your current home address?”

“What is your work address?”

“What is the color of your vehicle?”

Color???? Who gives a crap what color it is?? Just send somebody over here to jumpstart it already so I can go home, dammit!!!!!!!!

FINALLY, the operator informed me that someone would shortly arrive and that I would get two automated calls to confirm the service truck’s arrival.

I get the first call: “Your service truck is estimated to arrive in one hour.”

Fortunately the guy came sooner than that. On my way out to greet him, I passed by a couple of young lawyers, a guy and a girl who worked out of our case assessment office. They were stepping out too but ignored me. The guy was built, clean cut, and nicely dressed in a sharp suit, and the girl of course was a gorgeous looking brunette. I looked at them and felt ashamed. I was in rags of a uniform, a 5 o’ clock shadow on my face, with sad, broken eyes whose fire had died out a long time ago. I looked at them for a long moment. Accomplished people. Happy people. Something I would never become, a life that I would never have. I quickened my pace to get away from them and headed up the street

The service guy was a friendly dude who arrived in a minivan. When he stepped out, I noticed he was missing some of his front teeth.

“Awww kay, ley me paww ze ood herr.”

“Uh, ok.”

A few minutes later my precious baby roared to life once again.

“Awwwkay! Yor awww goods zuu go.”

I thanked him, jumped in and floored it. I wanted to get home, crawl into bed, and get away from this weary life. To sleep and dream, and perhaps never wake up again.

A guest blogger at JohnChow.com challenged the audience in commiting to writing at least one blogging post a day for 20 days. Apparently if you make something a part of your daily routine for about three weeks, it will eventually become a habit and thus a routine that will be easier to stick to.

I decided to answer the challenge as well, since one of the big problems I’ve had in getting this blog going was my history of erratic posting frequency. I have to admit I was actually afraid to link to Chow’s blog because he’s currently in the Google doghouse for engaging in controversial link building. I thought if Google saw that I linked to his site, they would think that I was another evil fan of his and then blacklist me from their search index for all eternity, forever doomed to the dark pits of internet obscurity.

I think I worry too much.

As for what’s holding me back, I think the main reason is TIME. I’m spending a lot of time working at my job, catching up on my news feeds, tweaking my site, reading up on affiliate marketing, learning about microstock photography, gaming, watching TV, staring into empty space, just about everything EXCEPT blogging. I make no time for it at all, and it shows.

There’s another reason for this though: I have nothing to write about. Well nothing that I think will at least interest anybody. I think my writing sucks monkey’s balls too. No matter how good an idea I have for a blogging post, it never seems to translate well on “paper.” Somewhere in the blogging process things get jammed up and the end result is mindless crap. Maybe as I attempt to blog more often things will get better. Maybe not.

Maybe I need a life. Maybe I need a woman too.

I’ve been as busy as a beaver lately, but now that I’ve set aside a few minutes to blog here, I can’t remember what I did five minutes ago, let alone what I’ve been doing for the past week. My head’s in a fog, I’m chronically tired, and the whole world seems hell bent on working my very last nerve.

So, what to write about? Well, I’m here at my desk at work, munching on some chicken fingers and using toilet paper as makeshift napkins. The Eagles are playing off my laptop, and I’m just sitting here, wondering about my life, and what it’s become.

*cruuuunch* Mmmmm, good chicken…

Fridays at work always seems to be a bittersweet day for me. On one hand I have the office to myself, I can relax and surf the Internet or watch TV. Sometimes I’ll order in some pizza and garlic rolls, then chow down while I check my email and blogging stats.

But it’s also a day when the reality of how lonely my existence has become really sets in. While everyone else is making plans for a fun night out with their loved ones and friends, I just sit here at work, with only a lukewarm pizza slice and a dead cell phone to keep me company.

I can’t help but wonder if I’ve finally managed to dig a hole deep enough that escaping it has now become utterly impossible. This seems to be my lot in life, as it has been for the past seven or more years. Nothing has changed, and nothing will ever change. It seems the only thing left for me to do is resign myself to my fate, and hope something like cancer will finish me off early.

What a waste of human flesh I’ve become.

Today marks the one year anniversary of the Habitation of Justice. I should say something profound, so here it is:

The chocolate moose is not in season.

If you can figure that out, let me know. On a more serious note, as far as blogs go, this has been a pretty quiet year for me. There were times when I literally would get only one visitor a day, and sometimes I’d let weeks go by before blogging another post. I had been focused on other things, (like going to law school), but as soon as it became clear that my life wouldn’t be going anywhere any time soon, I started to pay more attention to my blog. The last few months were all about promoting my site and optimizing it for search engines so I could bring in more traffic. Now I’m getting upwards of about 100 visits a day, which is still nowhere close to my goal, but at least it’s much better than what it used to be.

Sooooo, now that it’s been a year, where do I go from here? What direction should I take this blog in? Ever since my law school dream bombed out, I’ve been entertaining fantasies on how I could make a living out of blogging instead, quitting my dead end job and hitting the road, living the life of a nomad as I moved from place to place, finding ways to help people I encountered in my travels, and experiencing exciting new adventures that would endlessly provide great writing fodder for my blog.

Could it happen? Not unless I can find a way to monetize my blog so that it brings in a full time income, a feat that only one half of one percent of all bloggers on the Internet have been able to accomplish. And usually those types of blogs have the kind of niches where they tell everyone else how THEY can make money off their sites. Either that, or it’s rife with affiliate marketing and other business related themes that I simply can’t get into. I just don’t have the mentality for it. I can only tell a story, and telling stories through this particularly venue has not proven to be an especially profitable one for most people.

But…. it’s all I got. After racking my brain trying to come up with a niche suitable for me, I decided that it had to be something that I could always love doing, rather than delving into a niche only because it might prove to be more of a money maker. I loved to write, but not about products and marketing and technology and business and whatnot, but about life in general. About what’s real. About my deepest emotions, hopes, and despairs. About my life experiences, and how readers could relate to it. But I realized in order to blog about life, I had to first HAVE a life.

So I guess that’s what will define my second year: finding a life worthy of blogging about, and telling a story that could immerse the reader in my riveting world. Well… at least as riveting as I can possibly make it.

Only time will tell if this will be my breakout year (both online and offline), and whether I’ll be able to generate the kind of readership that I’ve been looking for.

So stay tuned, it’s going to get very interesting from here on out.

¿ʇsod sıɥʇ xǝpuı oʇ sǝıɹʇ ʇı uǝɥʍ ʇɔɐǝɹ llıʍ ǝlƃooƃ ʍoɥ ɹǝpuoʍ ı  ˙s˙d

¿¿ʞsɐ oʇ ɥɔnɯ ƃuıddılɟ ooʇ ʇɐɥʇ sı  ˙ʎʇıɹɐlɔ ɟo ʇıq ǝlʇʇıl ɐ ǝʌɐɥ oʇ ǝɟıl ʎɯ ʇuɐʍ ʇsnɾ ı  ˙ʇǝƃ plnoɥs ı ɐɹǝɯɐɔ lɐʇıƃıp ƃuı**** ɟo puıʞ ʇɐɥʍ ʇno ǝɹnƃıɟ oʇ ƃuıʎɹʇ sɐ ǝuɐpunɯ sɐ ƃuıɥʇǝɯos uǝʌǝ ɹo ‘ɥʇɐd  ɹǝǝɹɐɔ ʍǝu ɐ ʇno ǝɹnƃıɟ oʇ ƃuıʎɹʇ ɹo ‘(ɟoǝɹǝɥʇ ʞɔɐl ɹo) ǝɟıl ǝʌol ʎɯ s,ʇı ɹǝɥʇǝɥʍ ‘ǝɯ oʇ ǝsuǝs sǝʞɐɯ ƃuıɥʇou  ˙ǝɹoɯ ʎuɐ ƃuıɥʇʎuɐ ɟo slıɐʇ ɹo spɐǝɥ ǝʞɐɯ ʇ,uɐɔ ʇsnɾ ı uǝɥʍ sǝɯıʇ ǝɹɐ ǝɹǝɥʇ  ˙op ʎluıɐʇɹǝɔ ı  ¿sǝɯıʇǝɯos ʇno ǝpısuı ɹo uʍop ǝpısdn pǝuɹnʇ ƃuıʇʇǝƃ sı ǝɟıl ɹnoʎ ǝʞıl lǝǝɟ ɹǝʌǝ 

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