Sunday 13 August 2000

Pic of the day: Due to the lack of babies here in the Chaos Node, I once again had to resort to The Sims.

Friends, love and babies

You may remember the young woman I adore, the incredible SuperWoman. She's traditionally the best of my friends that I meet in the outer world. (Not that there are heaps of them, but anyway.) However, after she came home to Norway for a month's vacation, I haven't heard a word. It's been nearly two weeks! Uh, that does not look long when I read it, but it sure was. I grew increasingly certain that she did not like me any longer and did not want to be friends with me anymore.

***

Today I took a walk around the neighborhood, again, with my trusty MiniDisc walkman for company. I played another of my Chris de Burgh favorites, Shine on, from his perhaps most powerful album ever: Power of ten.

"I was looking at a photograph
taken from a garden long before the war
and out on the lawn
there were old men and dogs and little children.
All of them gone, forever.
There were people by the waterside
standing in the same place where I am today.
Nothing has changed. But you know
that time is moving like a river;
there can only be love forever."

Praying, I went home with a decision in my heart. As soon as I was indoors and had thrown off my warm shirt, I called the number. I wanted to ask her how I had offended her and if I could do anything to make amends.

Cutie, the younger sister, took the phone. She informed me that they had just been talking about me, but refused to tell me what. She sounded healthy and happy, though, and told me that SW would call me soon. She did, too, and I found out what had happened. It wasn't anything I had done, and I know at least one guy who is glad for that, aside from me.

My Old Friend, SW's oldest sister, had had a baby. Yet another boy, and born almost precisely on term. (But still rather small. Good thing for the mother, who barely managed to give birth as it was. I hear it's no easy job at the best of times, and she is over 30 and the first one was a premature.) Anyway, SW had been taking care of their firstborn and also did not want to call me before she knew the outcome. She had, in fact, thought to call me today. :)

But of course, I called her first. Now she probably thinks I am desperate. I said that I wanted to take her younger sister shopping. She replied that her younger sister is going to America for a year. Oops. You can't start to believe what consequenses this will have. The more important that I buy her some stylish but un-sexy clothes. You know how raunchy Americans are. Poor little girl, she'll be just 20. And she is incredibly, stunningly, mind-numbingly cute. America will not be the same again.

***

You may have noticed this: When I don't hear from people in a while, I tend to assume that they don't like me anymore. The exception to this is my birth family. I grew up nearly friendless, which was in part because I was different (small, weak and smart) and part because I was insufferably arrogant and lacked in social intelligence what I had extra in theoretical. I was the born nerd, and we know they don't exactly win popularity contests. In fact, even when they earn billions and help the poor, they are still generally disliked even by those who rely on them for a living. So I don't expect too much.

I also got my conditioning thoroughly reinforced today, on a mailing list. Someone I generally like and respect took me to task for stating the obvious, that web pages should be static (as in not moving). It was like, how could I possibly be so stupid as to think web pages should just stand still, like a piece of paper?

But you don't need to be a psychologist to know that people are distracted by movement. And I know I am hard enough to understand even if people are not distracted. It's one thing when I write fairly fluffy stuff, like today. But try to read comparative theology when the lines expand and contract while color-changing smurfs run back and forth across them. Thanks, but no thanks.

I am a nerd. I may not look like a nerd, sometimes I don't even act like a nerd anymore. But I am a nerd at heart. If I chase you away, I want it to be because you are bored by the nerdy stuff I write. Not because you can't afford a new computer or a fast connection. That's how I am. I do not chase away friends. Nor do I cater to the masses. I write this for my friends, but my friendship is free for any who wish it.