Brogan

My family is moving.

Well, we were.

Moving was something my family teetered with almost two years ago, it didn't work out, so we took our house off the market. I didn't want to move then, and I thought I didn't want to move this time as well. I spent many days and trips with my family going to see houses and picking out the bad things about all the houses we saw. There wasn't one single house that I wanted to move into. It's not that the houses weren't nice, some of them really were, there was just something that was holding me back.

Fear.

I was scared of moving, and I was scared of having to go somewhere new, and somewhere different. I've lived in three houses my entire life, and I thought when we moved into the house we live in now that this would be it; that this house would be the house I take my grand kids to when they wanted to visit their grandfather and crazy Grandma Sue. Even though I hated this house when we first moved from South Philly, after some recent alterations, and a really nice extension of my "room" I began to really fall for it, and even looked forward to coming home some weekends last year when things were a bit rough at school. That all changed last Friday.

See, we went to go see a house behind a local church, before I even got there, I was putting down the neighborhood it was in, and trying to plant the seed of doubt in my parents' mind. We get there, and its actually a really nice house, four bedrooms, well almost five, two and a half baths, full finished basement, and the most spectacular backyard I've seen behind a house in real life. It was way below our budget, and it had everything we were looking for in a house. It was perfect!

We all begged and pleaded with our parents to put in a bid to buy the house, and I think they loved the house as much as we did. This is where this dream story comes to a crashing and confusing halt.

Long story short, our house isn't sold, and although we could probably just pay full price for the house, we still had to sell ours. As great as owning a home is, it comes with a fuck-ton of bills, and one of those being a mortgage. If we bought this nice house, and didn't sell ours right away, we would have to carry two mortgages. Again, long story short, my parents are afraid, although they can afford it, they afraid it might cripple us if our house doesn't sell, and the double mortgage goes on too long.

Fear.

I'm not going to go in depth on what must be going through my parents' minds. For two reasons, one it's none of your, or even mine for that matter, business. Second, It's their money, and although I am deeply disappointed that we aren't buying that home (even though I'll probably be out on my own in a year anyway) I understand their decision, although I don't agree with it. My parents deserve that house. Not that our house is shabby, it isn't, it's a great home, amazing kitchen, and we live comfortably here. That being said, my parents have earned the right to live beyond comfort, to be able to truly stretch their legs.

My Dad doesn't have a college degree, yet we go on over a months worth a vacation every year, I went to a 35 thousand dollar a year private university, and we live in a expensive town. My mother busted her ass in night school to get a degree in, like, six years at the age of forty, and works everyday. They doesn't just provide for our family, they flat out fucking spoil us. I know they must have a million things going through their head everyday, and god knows my brothers and I don't make it any easier on them.

The only way to truly thank them is to be at least half as good to my kids as they were and are to me. The reason I say this is because I want you to understand where I come from when I say that my parents are being scared dogs when it comes to this house ordeal.

Fear.

I want this house, they want this house, but they are too scared to take a risk. Case closed, end of story. Fear wins again, and again we all lose.

I really don't know when fear took over all of us. When we let it creep right into our fucking lives, sit in our favorite recliner, and drink the coldest beer from the back of the fridge. I'd blame George Bush and how he manipulated that bastard fear for his own personal gain. I'd blame Osama Bin Laden and every fucking "terrorist" that gets angry when he sees the red, white, and blue and is jealous of the freedom those colors represent. I'd blame the whores and the assholes who spread STDs with dirty needles and careless sex, or I'd blame the drug dealer who helps kids greet death everyday just so he can ride around in a pimped out caddy or sleek black Mercedes. I'd blame Barack Obama, and Hillary Clinton, and John McCain, and every other cock-sucking politician who makes us fear the future if we don't vote for them, so they can make our decisions for us. I'd blame all those stupid fucking signs and brand new security measures at the airport that scare the shit out of all the families before they board their flight to "sunny Florida!" I'd blame the finger-fucking Priests and all the clergy men of all religions for scaring it's patrons into believing God will make us pay. I'd blame all the atheists for pissing off God and believing something that wasn't Divine could possibly make everything around us. I'd blame all the models and workout shows for making some of my best friends hate themselves when they look in the mirror, and make people so scared to go to the beach, or go to a pool party, that they'd rather sit at home and do nothing for fear of being judged.

I'd blame everyone else, if I could. But I can't, because I know who is really to blame for letting fear take over ourselves. We are, and I would tell you how to change it, and I would tell you how to fix it, and how to regain our footing in this fucked up world. But I don't know how to.

Actually I think I do know how to fix it all, I'm just afraid I might be wrong.


Fear.


Author's note: So, the people that were selling the house that I wanted to move into said last night that anyone who wanted to put a bid in for their house had to do so by 10 am today, and they would make their decision by noon (apparently other people wanted that house as well) My parents went to bed last night deciding to not put in a bid, and to take our house off the market. I just got a call from my Dad telling me that they put in a bid for the house, and that they accepted it, thus making us the new owners of the house! Apparently something made them change their minds this morning, and take the risk. I sure am glad they did ;)

Pack Your Knives

I Love Top Chef.

I think it's the best reality show on TV at the moment. Bravo does an amazing job with editing the footage, getting top notch judges, (unlike American idol whose number one draw on the judges tables is someone whose only real credit in the music business for the first four seasons was producing a Teletubies soundtrack) (p.s. Simon Cowell) and bravo understands that the show isn't about the judges, it's about the contestants and their product.

Tonight, for those of you that don't watch, my favorite chef out of the remaining six was eliminated, Dale. The show consisted of the six remaining chefs competing in "Restaurant Wars" which pits two teams of three against each other, and the goal is to see who can put together the best one night only restaurant experience. Long story short Dale was the executive chef on the losing team, and was tossed from the show.

Most people don't like Dale because he is brash, ultra competitive, sometimes cocky contestant. I happened to love all of these qualities in Dale, and I thought it was what would have made him an excellent Top Chef. I'm not writing an entry about this just so I can bitch about the outcome (although Dale got fucking hosed if you ask me), it's because I feel that I possess the same qualities as Dale does, and I execute them in my life.

I'm rough, I'm open, I'm brash. I hate to fucking lose, and I hate to be beaten. I hate making mistakes, and sometimes I'm super confident about certain things. Over the past four to six years of my life I have tried to work these qualities into a more positive disposition for myself.

I didn't get along with many people in High School, but I always gave everyone a shot. Same thing for college, but looking back I see that me being brash, and real, and sometimes brutally honest causes people to not enjoy my company. Mostly these people are people I have never met, people that have never shared the same conversational air with me, or have even tried to, yet I'm no one that they would ever spend time with.

Now I'm not some hippie that thinks everyone can get along with everyone, we human beings aa a whole only really like certain people, and personality dictates a lot of the decisions we make about our relationships, but does that mean we should shut out people completely just because of what we might hear, or what obstacle their personality might present?

Dale said something in his post interview after he was told he was off the show. he said "You either love me or hate me, but either way, I'm myself." Cliche? Sure, but it got me thinking a little bit.

The reason some people shut me out before meeting me, is it the other people's fault, their negligence for not forming their own opinion, and instead just swallowing the spoon fed judgement dictated to the many from the few?

Or is it me?

Season 3

I had a wonderfully fantastic weekend, it goes without saying, i mean, i spent a lot of time with Jake, went to Rutgers and got sushi with Ruscoe, saw Greg, Jordan, and his lovely wife, and i even got to see my favorite band (Staind for all of you that don't know) and the reunion of Stone Temple Pilots. Needless to say, my weekend fucking rocked!

But for some reason i have this terrible feeling in the back of my stomach and this ever growing nag in the back of my brain that the fun times are going to end real soon. I don't have a job, my money is running low, and i owe the government and banks more than i care to share with you, so i guess i have a reason to be a bit worried. it's not like me to worry tho, not that I have ever just blown off responsibilities, but i have always just done what i was supposed to do and everything just has always tended to fall into place, i just don't know if this time it is enough.

There are mainly three things that need to be fixed right now in my life, my financial situation, my weight, and my employment situation. I feel that the first and third go hand in hand so i will start there. I am doing everything i fucking can to get a job. I want to start out waiting tables, so i have put in resumes in a bunch of places that fit my financial need. I'm not talking about going back to Friendly's, I'm talking nice places with bars and adults that tip well. The fucking economy is so upside down right now, jobs are at a premium, unless you have a degree in some sort of business related field or at least 3 -5 years of experience in any other. It is rough, and i don't want my parents to shoulder my burden, at least not fully. They work too hard.

As far as my weight, which directly influences my degenerate disc disease in my lower back (aka back pain) I'm doing it there too. I go to my physical therapy three days a week, and I am back to eating turkey and egg whites. It's great. At first there was no motivation behind what i was doing, but then i got some amazingly, yet indirectly, fantastic news and I am motivated more than ever, which is the perfect storm for what I am trying to accomplish.

It all came to me on Friday. I was driving to Rutgers with Nick and he decided to take the Turnpike, and for those of you that have ever taken the New Jersey Turnpike you know there isn't much to see. En route to Rutgers we drove by these long buildings. We must have driven by at least a half dozen of them. The buildings consisted of 20 - 30 loading docks for trailers to load their stuff into, and that's it. Just a long row of white garage doors, all the exact same, and it got me thinking.


There are people out there that go to these doors everyday to load up their trucks and deliver nameless product to nameless store. The truck driver, the guy who opens the garage door, the guy who helps load the trucks, and the guy that oversees the whole thing. Everyday these people do the exact same thing, the exact same way, in the exact same place, where all the doors look exactly alike.

This scared the absolute shit out of me.

I am scared that I am going to crash and burn so fucking bad, and I am going to be stuck in some sort of monotony where I will spend the rest of my life just drowning away, making no difference, being completely unhappy. This isn't to say that what those people do isn't important, someone needs to do it, and I applaud those that can, I just don't want to be stuck in a predictable situation.

I look at my mother and I see how goddamn happy she is at work. Sure, she wakes up everyday at the ass crack of dawn to get ready to go teach disrespectful and unappreciative high schoolers about Shakespeare and whatever the newest author of the month is, but she loves it. She truly loves what she does because she feels like she is making a difference.

I want that.

Yet those white garage doors got me so worried that I am going to become what everyone, including myself, says I'm not. Predictable. I am trying to fight it and fight it yet as everyday passes, I feel more and more...typical.

And this makes me fucking petrified.

Look at my fagstash!

Fucking NHL and their Cidney Crosby love is out of control, sure the flyers played like shit, and were not focused, but please, u cant even breath in the direction of Malkin or Crosby without getting a penalty. Is this the future of the NHL? Count me out.

In other news, i started Physical Therapy today, well more like i had my first appointment, which means he asks me what hurts and i tell him that my back does, and then he shows me this book, which must have been 800 years old. It had all these black and white pictures of people sitting and sleeping. There was even a set of pictures on how to pick up babies, i took copious notes, believe me.

Tomorrow I go job hunting. My goal is to try and get a posh waiting job, sock away a shit ton of money, and then move to NYC to start working on my Agent career. I dont want to be one of these people who goes to NY or LA and burns out early, that's not my style. I'll save up some cash, pay some loans, and then move out there, especially with the economy so upside down rite now, it just makes sense to me.

P.T. tomorrow at 815, in the morning, oh yeah. I'm looking forward to that like Mike Vick's dogs look forward to the friday night fites he had at his house. Oh I went there.

Fill in the _____

Welcome, and hello, for those of you that don't know, I'm mike, and i just graduated from college! yay!

Yeah, now that the introduction is out of the way, we can get serious. I'm starting this blog for a bunch of reasons, but the most important is so i can communicate with my friends. For some odd reason I feel that there are people out there (my friends) that do actually care about what i do with my life, and i believe in the "one to many" method of communication as opposed to the "many to many" method, thus my blog!

With this little blog i'll talk a lot about what it's like to be a recent college graduate in a terrible job market with an economy that requires us to pay four dollars for a gallon of terrible smelling piss water that runs our automobiles thus running our lives. I'll also post short stories, pictures, and whatever else i feel...

If you like what you see, come in, take your shoes off and have a seat!