Something That Happened.

It was time for him to wrap the day up. He'd been up since early morning, the earliest he'd been up all week. Tonight there was a decent chance he'd get some sleep, as he had last night. Yesterday had been a full day, and today had approached fullness as well. Though he hadn't gotten outside for exercise -- it was his day off from his exercise routine, after all -- he'd masturbated enough to realize about the same amount of exertion as he had on his run the day before.

So he popped a couple of Target's Up & Up brand of diphenhydramine hydrochloride pink pills, "Compare to the active ingredients of BENADRYL® Allergy ULTRATAB® Tablets" . He'd been taking one or two of the pills on most nights to sleep. Though he'd been trying to keep from making it a regular habit again, it was beginning to become one again. This made him worry again. And worry kept him up in bed, awake.

He worried about his brain. He worried and wondered whether his brain was being damaged by his regular dosing of the Benadryl and its generic equivalents. He was actually a little bit more worried about the generics. Were the generics of a lesser quality than the branded diphenhydramine? Did they include ingredients that were dangerous to the body and mind? Was there any cause for concern at all? Perhaps the generics were actually composed of better ingredients than the branded ones. CLICK HERE TO CONTINUE READING "Time to Wrap the Day Up"...

As 2012 winds down, we're all hearing a bunch of proverbs, most of which are ambiguous at best. All roads do not, in fact, lead to Rome. If they did, then we'd be screwed. I mean, who would want to be in bloody Rome? Well sure, it may be a lovely place to visit now, on the last Sunday of 2012. Many of those touring the ancient city at this moment are fantasizing about moving there permanently or living near to (or at least within the same country as) the famous comune, especially now that Mussolini is long gone. I hear they have some nice antiques there, some fine sculptures and paintings. Some really old stinky books. And great wine.

But you wouldn't want to be heading to ancient Rome, circa 70-80 AD, a place full of superstition, greed, and spectator sports showcasing murder Live! Right before your very eyes!

And if you really think you would enjoy watching gladiatorial combat and other entertainments of the bloody Romans of old...well, you might enjoy the Sunday night entertainments put on by The Governor in his village facade. As for me, I'll be sticking with Rick and the rest of the gang living in the prison. And I'll refrain from judging your entertainments lest I expose the hypocrisy of my enjoying men running into each other at risk of permanent injury to body and mind -- and even death -- on Sunday afternoons and evenings. And Monday nights. And many Thursday nights, and Saturday afternoons...

Perhaps we're not so different from the ancient Romans, after all.

But taking the proverb as it is usually (and far less literally) accepted -- that alternative paths lead to the same goal -- is that still where we want to find ourselves in 2013? Do we each wish to reach the same goal? And what goal would that be? Can we even agree on a common goal?
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If there's one thing the good people of Littleton, Colorado would probably appreciate -- particularly those attending or who have family attending Columbine High School or living in the Columbine area today -- is for the world to move on from associating the name of their school and the region they live in with the tragedy visited upon them in the spring of 1999. Death and murder, school killings and horror -- these are not images most people prefer to accompany their lives. The people of the Columbine area probably prefer people to stop thinking of the names Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold whenever their city's high school is mentioned. Those closest to the tragedy that occurred in 1999 at the school in Colorado prefer to be seen as survivors rather than victims.

My hunch is that most of the people closely affected by "Columbine" prefer for their high school and the area it is located in to conjure the image for which it was originally named: a species of flower which resembles a cluster of doves. I know this because I read the book Columbine recently, written by Dave Cullen. The author researched and documented what was at the time known as the worst school killing in U.S. history, and what sticks out in my mind in relation to the event that occurred in Newtown, Connecticut today is this: For the entire day that all of us were glued to our televisions on that dark day in 1999, none of us had realized that most of what we were watching was misinformation. It was a horror that the media took the opportunity to present as a fascinating drama that was unfolding in real-time, right before our very eyes. But it wasn't until later that most of the world realized that what we'd been watching on television was far from an accurate document of what took place at the high school in Littleton, Colorado. There was no "trench coat mafia". The killers were not quite the outsiders they were reported to be, intent on killing the "jocks" (as was reported on the day of the murders. They had, in fact, friends. They were even somewhat popular and well-liked.
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