inherently different

This just goes to show you that some people shouldn’t have kids! There was a School Shooting near San Diego by some kid with a whacked sense of reality. I mean, c’mon! You need a license to drive a car but not one to have children? It’s easier for a kid to buy a gun than it is to buy alcohol (or drugs for that matter)…how fucked up is that? Seriously, while the fault lies solely with the sick bastard pulling the trigger, the parents obviously failed to teach their child the difference between right and wrong, reality vs fantasy! Don’t go blaming society nor video games…the fault lies within the realm of parenting. For me, growing up in Poway, which is just a stone’s throw from Santee, was as uneventful as you could imagine. Its hard for me to think about northern San Diego as anything but idyllic but I guess times have changed…maybe it’s something in the water? Hmmm…perhaps its time to advocate drive by NORPLANT shootings…

When I was very young, I realized two very important things. The first was that no matter what I might believe, I wasn’t special. In fact, it might even be suggested that the mere fact that I wasn’t special in the least, thereby made me special. But, by and large, I’m not any more or less special than the next guy. That was a lesson that made me want to act out. Eventually, acting out grew tedious, not to mention dangerous.

The second epiphany was much less philosophical in nature. I like writing. Whether it is lists, reviews, thoughts and for lack of anything better to do, stories that have no import or basis in reality, I like to write.

Anyone who does anything they love and gets paid to do it eventually develops a love/hate relationship with it. I know. Somewhere along the line, I forgot how happy writing made me feel. After I graduated from college and after the luster had faded from my first real gig writing for someone else, I stopped writing for passion’s sake and started writing for paycheck’s sake. Fortunately, through misfortune or fortune (depending on which side of the paycheck you’re sitting on), I am discovering once again what it is like to write for passion’s sake. While I’d like to take the credit for this rediscovered love affair with the written word, in all honesty, I can’t.

Recently, a friend of mine decided that he wanted to become a writer. Just like that. He writes with the same enthusiasm I had back in the day. While I’ve kept an online journal or blog since 2001 (More Inhuman Than Human), it took a graphic designer turned travel writer to remind me what it is about putting pen to paper (or as in this case, pixel to processor).

That said, the Monkey Diaries are all the random thoughts and stories that I come across from day to day. It’s where I put it all down so it doesn’t interfere with what I’m doing outside of this blog which is writing a screenplay that will hopefully get purchased by some Hollywood mogul hellbent on winning an oscar. For my part, I just want the voices in my head, the characters that swim in my blood and the visions that dance nightly in my dreams to stop.

I hosted a dinner party tonight. Lotsa pasta & wine and the season premiere of the Soprano’s to boot. What more can someone ask for? Yeah, I know, every one watches the Soprano’s…its almost as cliché as saying you watch The West Wing but I’m addicted ever since I watched the entire first season on DVD. I’ve been working more than my fair share lately, but loving every minute of it. Lots to do makes me a happy boy so to speak. Although, I did find time to drop into the local cineplex last night to take in the latest performance by Julia Roberts in The Mexican.

There are few things on this earth I dread more than Julie Roberts. Her huge gaping maw, filled with row upon row of picture-perfect, razor-sharp teeth are enough to send me into a peroxide-induced coma. And when my friend asked me to go see The Mexican at the local cineplex, I was a bit apprehensive.. Okay, so maybe it was from the sheer horror of spending two hours with Julia and her Green Giant Niblet perfect choppers, but I was terrified!

Amazingly enough, I actually found myself laughing…and not at the performances by Brad Pitt (he out does his dark turn in SEVEN), Julia Roberts (how does the camera add twenty pounds to her teeth?) and James Gandolfini of Sopranos fame (coincidentally enough, he has a great role and could have almost carried the character into another movie entirely). Anyway, The Mexican. Good movie…The characters are flawless, the script tight, and the visual panorama stunning…Check it out and see if you don’t agree.