The Internet: An Abrreviated Personal History

I've had access to the Internet for as long as I can remember. I vaguely remember Prodigy waay back when I lived on Indian Ridge, and finding my mom's dot-matrix-printed copy of a romance novel. She snatched it away from me before I could read beyond "Tina's long brown hair", though, and when I asked her about it recently she denied its existence. I also remember finding a web page about Daniel Boone and copy-pasting it into Word Perfect for one of my first book reports. The intense guilt I felt as I did that is a really strong emotional memory and I'm not sure why.

From there we moved to AOL and my memory jumps forward to 3.0 chat rooms on the old computer in my bedroom at my house now. So it must have been 6th grade. Anyway, Sarah was there and we definitely talked to some really mature, cool Depeche Mode fan in Denver. I can't for the life of me remember his name, but his screen name was egodram. I think. I remember putting a blanket over the tower when we signed on at 3 am to make sure that my parents didn't wake up to the sound of it logging on.



Then that computer broke (it is in the attic still for some reason, I harvested it for the power cord I am using on this one), and we bought an AWESOME new Compaq. That one was downstairs in the kitchen and I remember talking to Chris Britten on it. (My first kiss omg) and I remember typing "I love you" and totally wigging out about it. My first I love you. On the Internet. On AOL. Jesus. I am pretty sure Sarah and I did some cybering on that one, too.

Then we got a nice computer desk and a Dell. That's where I really spread my wings. We had AOL for a while on that one, and I think my screenname went from being mje0203 (my initials and birthdate, to match Chris' cmb0219, which he still has) to MzNutty33. I was really into Pokey the Penguin and downloading music. One of the first mixes I ever made, in 2000 (because I dated them all) is still really, really good. Like I love every song on it. So I think it's safe to say that the Internet really, really opened me up to some good stuff via -- shit, what was it called? -- well, it wasn't Napster and it wasn't Limewire or any of that. Oh well, what's important is that the first stuff I downloaded was The Beatles and Low and Space and The Cardigans. Before that I had been listening to Powerman5000 and Godsmack and TRL was my favorite TV show. Ew.

We got cable modem thinger when I was a junior, I think. It was so awesome because I was like the only kid who had it yet. So Carlos would come over to watch Bjork videos with me and I would watch and listen intently for good things to use for away messages. I didn't need AOL anymore so I went through about a billion screennames on AIM before I finally settled on sleepylovelorn, the one I used for two years. It's my cell phone's screenname now, but sometimes I miss it. It was emo before emo and still entirely true. This is about the time I got my awful, horrible, inexcusably depressing LJ.

When I was leaving for school I had to have a computer of my own. So I had Anthony's friend (I think?) build me one. I wrote him a $300 check and asked no questions. I think it is made of stolen parts. At least that's what I tell people, because sometimes it tells me I have a fatal horrible error and that it has to shut down and then it does and then it's fine. Whatever. Anyway, while at school I was on my computer a lot. Reading webcomics, updating my Xanga (ew) every twenty-five minutes, chatting with Betty and Anthony non-stop; I was queen of my corner of the digital world, and nothing (like Core papers) could stop me from reading the entire archive of Boy on a Stick and Slither or WIGU or Perry Bible Fellowship while listening to Rock and Roll Part Three over and over again.

When my computer died, I was pissed. Really, really pissed. I made up for it though, by being in the office (at a computer) all the time. It was a slow little Apple and it was then I discovered the wonders of Safari. I Googled shit all day long, posted to my blog notes from work meetings, streamed some awful radio stations. It was an okay substitute.

I moved back home where my parents had for some reason set up wireless Internet in my house. So I got a wireless card put into my big black desktop computer and then--- an awful thing happened.

I stumbled on this webcomic messageboard. I talked to people who had posted there on AIM. Then the phone. Then, Monday, I met one of them.

Her name is Jess Mason. She isn't the first I'd talked to, or the one I've talked to the most. I don't think she even reads webcomics. But she is one of the only girls I talk to online, and she was in Pittsburgh (a reasonable drive opposed to, say, Seattle, San Fransisco, New York, Sacramento, Los Angeles). So I met her!

It was fun. We took pictures for the Internet to see, we talked about people from the Internet who are dating each other or did or should or who should not be allowed near a computer, and about these people's real lives as if they were real, live people we actually knew in real life. In Jess's case, she's met a lot of them in New York and a visit to SF. But I have no excuse. I read these people's blogs and I am friends with them on MySpace and Facebook and OKCupid and I talk to them on AIM probably more often than I talk to my real friends in real life.



So, here I am wearing the ring of a fake engagement to a guy who works for Apple in Sacramento, whose dad was a cop in New York and is taking care of his ferret which is illegal in California. I have the address of a guy from OK Cupid who is a PhD student in Arizona with a really ridiculous moustache in front of me, and I'm thinking of what to mail him and what I'll say when I call him later tonight like he asked me to. I am listening to a mix CD sent to me by a guy from Modesto who is spending a night in my house a few weekends from now; his girlfriend is named Katrina and he really likes scarves and playing cello. I am looking at a button I bought because it says "polka mit mir" on it, and polka is the messageboard name of this chemistry student at Berkeley who lives behind a 7-11 and likes to paint her face and pretend she likes YuGiOh; she listened to me being depressed for months and then, one day, summed up my problem with myself in about three IMs.

Since I met these people on the Internet, I've listened to a lot better music and more music, I've seen a bunch of movies, I've renewed my interest in Star Trek, I've started eating better, I've been reading fewer and less shitty books, and I've started to think that maybe there's some hope for assholes like me.

They're real friends. Is that creepy? I hope not, because if so I am The Biggest Creep.

Check out what Ryan, a landscaping student in Oregon who has a lip ring and dressed as a pirate for his senior prom, made for me:



And now my foot's asleep. But as a parting gift I will leave you a screenshot from last night.

Simple joys of the past year

As anyone who has ever stumbled across me in any of my Internet incarnations would know, I really, really like to talk about myself. And since I have spent much of the last year being pretty sad, this means I've been making 144 posts in my Blogger and god-knows-how-many in my late Xanga about how lonely and ugly and stupid I am. I mean, this is not just a case of the Mondays. This is serious, coming-of-age-movie histronics: curling up in a ball and crying with the curtains drawn, crying in the shower before work, gazing vacantly into the middle ground while checking out 198 cans of Fancy Feast for the Saturday Hoarders, and so on. So, now, the ass-end of December, might be the time to talk about those times I've actually felt good, and why.

And now, like something out of Family Circle magazine, I present five simple joys of 2005:

1. Meat Loaf.

Irony is a big thing with kids these days, and I bet most anyone who tells you they really like Meat Loaf is just saying that because they saw him on VH1 and laughed a little. When I tell you I spent $3 on "Bat Out of Hell" on casette and listened to it in my Jetta for 2 hours a day for more than a month -- despite the fact that I had a working iPod with hundreds of suitably indie albums on it tucked inside my thrift store purse -- I am not playing.

Meat Loaf made me happy on days when hot baths, long chats, and Lexapro did nothing. "I would do anything for love -- but I won't do that" -- truer words have never been belted over strains of bombastic Wagnerian rock.

2. Boogers.

It took a few conversations in CAPITAL LETTERS to cement it, but now I am positive that booger removal is soul-cleansing as well. Once I was driving home, inspecting my nose thoughtfully to some "Day to Day" on the radio, when I felt the tip of my index finger stick to something substantial. I gave it a little pull and out comes this long, gooey string of booger. I can feel it coming from inside my nasal cavity -- maybe even from inside my brain. As I balled it up between my fingers, visually inspected its color and consistency and wiped it beneath the driver's seat for safekeeping, I paused for a moment to reflect on how good that felt. It was satisying in ways that sex or Pulitzers never could be.

I also really like the fully formed, round boogers that hide out inside. You need only to poke your finger in and you come out with a prize! What other area of life has such a high work-to-reward ratio? Nothing but boogers, baby.

3. That time I decided to go to some guy I met once's party and ended up staying for like, five hours.

I don't know what it is about me, but I don't get invited to many parties. So when this guy I've hung out with on maybe two occasions (once when we put a note beneath an angel food cake, set it ablaze and put it out to Lake Erie, and once when we went to Books-A-Million) mentions in an IM that someone he works with is having a party at his house, which is somewhere near Hurd Street, but he's not sure which house, or whether he even really feels like going, but he doesn't really have a ride anyway, but maybe he should go because they are pretty good friends sort of and he said he might -- I just jump at the opportunity to maybe kick up my heels and make this guy I met once when I filled in at his branch of the franchise for which I used to work's birthday a little bit brighter.

Anyway, yeah, the two drinks I had were delish, the water was great, the drunk twenty-somethings (do people use that phrase anymore?) screaming about "Glass Joe" from an Mike Tysons' Punchout and repeatedly recommeding we watch "Menace II Society" were exteremely memorable. Besides the guy who IMd me, I was the only sober person. That night I realized that I don't hate drunk people. I just thought I hated drunk people because I was really hating the same people I would hate anyway, except more, because they were louder. These drunks were class acts, except for Joey, who passed out in the bathroom and missed his mother's baptism the next morning.

4. Ryan

Ryan told me to add him to this list. We are going to have an au gratin potatoes eating contest. He is good at Photoshop and has a stupid hat.

5. Star Trek

I'm serious. TNG is my favorite series, but I've only ever seen TOS movies and a few episodes of DS9. The more I watch it, the easier it is to talk to my Internet friends. It's ... deep, I promise. IM me if you really want to hear me talk about it; I have this feeling that you don't, really. Just rest assured that the day I skipped five classes and called off work because I really wanted to watch the three episodes that were on Spike TV was one of the best days I've had all year. There are four lights!

Christmas

Re-posted from Christmas 2004:

Betty was sad about Christmas in her blog th'other day, Ben was sad about his, and I spent all of my Christmas in a minivan driving from Alabama, so here's what I say about that:

Christmas is horrible because you see all these movies and hear all of these stupid songs about how it's so great, that families spend quality time together, that Santa brings exactly what you wanted, that there's love and goodwill and harmony everywhere. These things aren't real.

We're not kids anymore. We're too old to believe in Santa, too young to appreciate our families, and impossible to buy for.

When Christmas rolls around all I see is dirty snow on the sides of the road, where people driving Hummers with wreaths on the front are cutting me off, not fucking signaling, same as the rest of the year, but now they're in a big hurry to get the new Nintendo for that kid they half-way regret having most of the time.

Christmas demands something of us that's just unnatural. To feign surprise opening the gifts you asked for specifically, to stay awake while your aunt asks you All About College, and still have a smile on your face when it's time to start peeling potatoes? Not something I'd carol about, honestly.

Life is NOT "It's a Wonderful Life," it's not "Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree." It's the same as every other day, except no one's working, and no one expects to be let down.

It's impossible to live up to that.

But if you think about it, do you really want to be a Lifetime original movie?

The best thing to do, I guess, is to buy cheap presents (you're probably poor if you're reading this anyway) for everyone else so you have more money left to buy yourself what you really wanted, suffer through the innumberable reunions to enjoy the time with people you really like that much more.

Once you've spent time with your family, realizing at the same time how much you've missed them and why you left in the first place, you have time for your friends. You can spend the little time you have at home making fun of cripples and old people and going to porn shops and drinking soda-pops and eating when you're not hungry and bowling and giggling and everything.

I love being home.

But I hate the holidays.