Championable | Love, parenting, politics.

Maggie’s been sick for two days.  I stayed home from work yesterday to take care of Maggie and drop off/pick up kids… which was kind of a drag because we planned our first field trip at the office, to plan out furnishings for our new Universal Headquarters / Fortress of Good / Central Karma Station.

And, you know, if your gonna have a Fortress of Good, you have to be able to sit down.  Right?

Anyway.  My daughter is, at this very second, sitting down to a fabulous extravaganza of  cutene, having been invited to have lunch at the American Girl restaurant in midtown. This is my favorite restaurant in all of NYC. I am not kidding.  And eight girls with American Girl dolls waiting to board the Metro North train to Manhattan = cutest. thing. ever.

For now, there’s dishes to do, laundry to fold, and HDMI cables to replace.  Off I go.

Love to all. Even you, Simon Lazowsky.

So I have this theory.

First, you have to design an automated, self-cleaning, completely sanitary handjob machine. Then, you have create a large series of small rooms, each containing one of these machines. Then, you have to require ALL men to enter one of these rooms for 10 minutes each day, between the hours of 9 and 11 am.

What they do in this room is up to them. They can use the machine, they can pray, they can read the paper, they can do whatever. The only thing they CAN’T do is contact anyone outside the room for ten minutes. That way, nobody can influence (psychologically or otherwise) what they do in the room.

Would the world be a better place?

Maggie and I were talking about Spitzer et al. She believes that the whole “going to a hooker” thing is a power trip for men. I disagree. I think that some/many men may look at it as a power thing, but I think that it’s inherently an EJACULATION thing, and if men were chemically rebalanced every day, the world might be a little easier place to be.

Either that, or I’m trying to justify a robust masturbation schedule.

Anyway. I clearly haven’t thought this plan through.

Sirius radio was really fun. Before I actually got called in, I took my daughter on a tour of the floor via video iChat.  That was really neat.

The show was on channel 110 (”The Blog Bunker”), and I didn’t realize it was LIVE  until I was entering the studio. The host was 23, smart, very well spoken, and a wee bit detached. He didn’t make a lot of eye contact, and when the show was over I had to kind of get in his way to shake his hand and thank him. He was someone that would be fun to talk to somewhat more aggressively, since I think he’d enjoy the back and forth.

I was told that he was a little sarcastic and head-on, but compared to my friends, he was a most gentle of lambs.

He had read my post about Elizabeth, and wanted to talk about that. The last thing I wanted was to appear to be pining for someone I’m not, so we managed to find out that HE was breaking up with someone at that moment, which was actually a lot more interesting. We also touched on gay rights, the separation of church and state, and took a call from a Canadian who said that I was a bad Catholic.

Totally fun.  When I left, the lady who booked me said “When we have you back, you’ll know what to expect now.”  I was like, “Whoo hoo!”  She wrote me an email this morning saying the same thing, so I’m pretty sure it was more than just a nice way of getting me out the door.

All in all, it was a blast.  Yay.

Love to all. Even you, the fabulous salespeople at the ticket scalping place.

Hair:  me.
Lack of  moustache:  my oldest.
Type of sideburns:  mostly maggie.
Stupid pose: totally me.

I believe in Look Consensus.  I live it, baby.

Love to all.  Even you, gentle painter.

The Sirius thing is tonight, actually.  I’ve got to be at the studio at 5:30pm, but I don’t know when the actual show is, or when the show airs, vs. being taped.

I’m actually going to skip the ADHD meds today to make sure I’m not in a focused rage upon arrival.  Is that a strange thing to do?  I’m usually back to my normal self by the time I get home

This focalin, it’s a mixed bag.  On the one hand, it does what it’s supposed to.   On the other hand, it often makes me feel vaguely outraged.  I think that, externally, this can be a good thing… since I usually have very few thought-to-mouth filters, being highly aware of my emotional state actually makes me come across way better.

Passing Harlem/125th Street, which means this train is about to go underground.  Must publish.

Love to all.  Even you, the doctor who, although talking to me about HPV prevalence amongst teen girls, really didn’t need to point at his crotch so much.

Apparently, I’m going on Sirius radio tomorrow night. The show is called “The Blog Bunker” on Indie Talk 110. The blurb describes the show as “a cutting-edge roundtable featuring a selection of the over 100 million bloggers around the globe.”

I get two kinds of nervous. One is quiet. I don’t say much.

The other is when I get stupid. Like the time my parents sent me to the store for Tucks medicated pads AND tampons. I asked the clerk in a really loud voice - “DO YOU HAVE ANY CONDOMS? EXTRA SMALL?”

Saturation theory, I guess.

I don’t really know what time the show is. I’m supposed to be there at 5:30pm, but I don’t know what that translates to in terms of when the show goes on, and whether or not the show is actually live. More info as I get it.

Love to all. Even you, the woman with more lip-to-lip saliva connectivity than I have ever seen before.

I just had a delightful Facebook conversation with an ex-girlfriend. Back then, she was a wonderful, somewhat troubled girl with great smarts and a fabulous heart. She’s happily married, living in CA, and designed the interface for two of the greatest applications of the internet age. If I told you which ones they were, you’d both plotz and be able to identify her. So, alas.

If it weren’t for this woman, I wouldn’t be with Maggie today. Strange but true. She was integral to the process. And me? If we didn’t have this brief ricochet in just the manner we did, she might still be in Jersey, instead of riding an unbelievable wave of fabulous success in CA. Thank you, God, for important interludes.

This post isn’t about her.

This post is about Elizabeth. She was 8 years older than me, and I was madly in love with her. I’ve never mentioned her on this blog before. Probably, it’s 98% because “My present life has enough to talk about” and 2% shame.

Back then, I had no boundaries.

Back then, I believed that not telling everything was a sign of betrayal.

Back then, if you didn’t agree with me, EVERYONE ELSE HAD TO. Which meant, of course, that everyone knew everything about our business.

Our problems were very different, and utterly contradictory. She had incredible intimacy issues, and I took those issues personally. I had commitment-phobia in the first place, and her problems would combine with mine to result in frequent breakups, a 1-month relationship with another woman, then an inescapable desire to be with her again.

Repeat x 10. I believe, in the end, I broke up with her 8 times and she broke up with me 3 times.

I was 21 when we started dating. She was 29.

There are things I have not talked about on this blog, and probably won’t. Things from decades ago that shaped who I was, and influence who I am now. With Maggie, and my children, I have overcome the worst of these events to the point that they don’t do much damage to anyone. I have my negative quirks, that’s for sure, but they aren’t, God willing, going to blow anything up. I wouldn’t trade the life I have now for anything, which means I have to accept the past.

But I can’t always do that so easily.

There are two things from my past that still make me ashamed, that make me feel decayed, that make me flash to a state of Less Than. One of them is how I couldn’t respect the sanctity of the relationship I had with this woman.

I was madly in love with her. But I failed to live that love. And if you can’t live it, you don’t deserve it.

I had what she needed. I had the spirit that could have helped her. I had a perspective she couldn’t see, and positive energy she could feed off of to pull her through some very dark tunnels. I could bring her into the light.

If I was in a crowded room with my back to the door and she walked in, I could immediately feel her. Not just feel her, but know what mood she was in. I could literally feel what she felt from about fifty feet away. It scared her sometimes. Me, too.

It was like we were wired together.

But I wasn’t strong enough, man enough, grown up enough, or de-fucked-up enough to understand how to have a real, respectful relationship. Through my inability to stand on my own two feet, I hurt her desperately.

She offered me a lot, as well. She saw what my Father was, and was capable of doing. She taught me how to be a boyfriend. How to date. How to have dinner. How to do things together. And, most of the time, she was a beautiful, gentle, and artistic spirit with a flair for the short phrase.

I left her a message a few years back, as part of the 9th-Step amends process. I was going to tell her what I did wrong. She never returned my call, and it’s not my place to follow up.

As my old sponsor told me, “Usually, the best amend you can make to an ex-girlfriend is to never talk to her again.”

So, Elizabeth. I’m sorry I wasn’t ready for you, but I’m so glad that I knew you. I owe you so many thanks for getting me ready for Maggie. You primed me for my future, and you started me on the long, painful road to freedom.

I can only hope that I helped you, too

I am forever in your debt.

Love to all. Even you.

Love to all. Even you, the always late.

Signed, sealed, and delivered.

Fifth avenue, baby.  Here we come.

Love to all.  Even you, the heroin-addicted couple who couldn’t keep it inside.

I’ve been married for almost thirteen years.  I have a house.  Three children.  Five cats.  Two dogs.   I’ve started two companies, and managed the transition of a third.

But I have never, ever signed a lease for any of my businesses.  Seriously.  I had one in the 90’s, but it was ludicrously unenforceable, because the setup was completely illegal.

Tomorrow, I’m picking up a two-year lease for new office space on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan.  It’s not much.  It’s just 500 square feet.  Nice windows.  Good light.

It scares me more than anything I’ve done, business-wise.  I don’t know why.

Love to all.  Even you, the guy who admitted lying before it became a risk.

This might seem a little random, but I just wanted to say this: Business IS personal. Anyone who tells you otherwise is absolutely wrong.  Anyone who tells you that business isn’t personal is trying to get away with something.

Due to the building collapse in Harlem (injury-free, I understand!) and the resulting Metro North havoc, my echocardiogram has been rescheduled to tomorrow morning.

Love to all.  Even you, the guy who sent emails to everyone and anyone but rich-at-championable.com.