I ended up talking to a semi-old friend online. A little holiday heroin for my usual. Not a cute play on words either, although the charm is there waiting with a brown bow. Eventualtimes, I got hungry. Kabul wasn't open, and the hostess was an imbecile. I stood there for 5 minutes until she noticed me. She smiled from 20 feet over, making some arcane gestures. I asked, quite simply, "Are you open?" Rather than a no, I got some choppy lip-synch that equated (roughly equated) to "no, no open." I gave her a look that approximated, "Why the fuck didn't you just say 'we're closed?', you useless bitch" and walked out mumbling to myself.

But Gino's was still open. I'd gone here for Thanksgiving last year. When nowhere else in Madison was open, this italian place quietly sparked its neon into the warm air. I'd forgotten how unnecessarily expensive italian was. I'd also forgotten the dazzling mediocrity the food. I ended up having a 10 inch sausage and pepperoni pizza, with cheese that seemed to stick together in that elastic clay way.

So I was sitting there, by myself, and it suddenly occurred to me that this was the first Christmas Eve I'd really spent alone. The light overhead was pale. The wood appointed log-cabin tables and arches had festive garlands and wreathes. I felt too pathetic for words to just sit there in silence and pretend to think, when nothing came to mind.

So I called Rachel. She was asleep but, unlike most of her friends, she didn't hang up on me. At least I had a voice of some kind to pay attention to. I'd excused myself to eat the 'eh' pizza in question, quietly paid my bill without having to be reminded I was alone on a holiday, and exited. A black dude in his late 30's leaned against a building, singing silent night or one of those more somber tunes. It was like something out of a movie script. He looked up to me and wished me a merry Christmas. I genuinely wished him a good one too. 10 seconds later he asked me for change. As usual I didn't have any, so we exchanged god blesses and I walked off.

I picked up the convo with Rachel after that. 2 hours and 30 minutes. I couldn't believe it when I finally got to hang up.

After that I brushed my teeth, got a second wind, and watched flash animation online and mostly worked on photographs. I got back into the technique of doing chimeric blends: taking two or more photos and combining them using different kinds of algorithms. Thankfully photoshop provides click boxes. Made a few good ones, but then I forgot to save them as separate documents instead of new color channels. So I may do more of that today.

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So what about Christmas Day today? Well I noted Hill a happy xmas just now. I'm guessing if the offer still stands to hang with her and Sven, she'll note back and mention it. If not, I figure they're busy or off on their trip already. And I absolutely refuse to do any work whatsoever on Christmas; that shit'll just depress me.

I figure the best option is to hunt down a chinese place that's open. After that...um...no idea. Call my mom and Gran, at least. I'll single-step the day and try to pretend it's just another day.

I'll cut the sounding pathetic shit after the holiday. Honest. This is just the first one by myself, and the ones with mom or my friends were universally wonderful.

Yeah, Chinese.

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