home.

i'm extremely tired and should probably just go to sleep, but i miss my blog and it's been way too long since i've written. more importantly i've been thinking and feeling a lot as of late and thus have a need to write.

first of all, the gyros i ate at the fleetwood diner about 30 minutes ago has left me feel rather gross right now and my stomach is not particularly pleased with me. coupled with the smell of grease from the restaurant, i almost just want to die.

anyway...on to the realer stuff. i've been home for almost a whole week now and it's provided a lot to think about. i've had a great time back here but oddly i feel a sense of sadness. it's not a simple: "i miss home" feeling. it goes well beyond that to thoughts about things i miss that i know will never be in a permanent sense to also dissatisfaction with certain aspects of life right now.

being back here has been so wonderful. i've had great times with my closest friends and also shared times with those who aren't as close but are still individuals with a shared past. i feel like there's something about the group of kids who i went to high school (even those beyond my closest group of friends who i've stayed in really good touch with) and it's just this kind of unspoken bond of sorts that just feels good.

it's also been great being at home with my family and getting to spend some time with them. obviously no one could be more important (altho some of my friends definitely are like family).

these wonderful times definitely make me miss ann arbor and being here but i also realize, as i have before that these experiences are an alternate reality due to the holidays in which we all come back here. it's not what living here would really feel like. and it's not that i'm longing to come back here, as i mentioned already.

it's more that i see things i really love and know that these things are not a part of my normal, everyday life and they really won't be in a way. while my everyday life is pretty great, it's tough to know there are things i enjoy that aren't a part of the norm. but i'm lucky to have these times at home, with my family, with my friends, even just with myself in the most familiar of places.

at the end of the day, anytime i feel down i get this sense of not feeling like myself; i feel an urge to get back to being me. sadly, as great as many things are right now i feel that urge to a certain degree. at this point, knowing i feel that urge is what gnaws at me a little and honestly probably makes it all seem worse than it is...because it's not that bad. really, it's not and i'm not trying to say it is. i think i'm just being somewhat idealistic in my hopes and desires and feeling the discord between them and reality is sometimes difficult (even if they aren't as far apart as i may make them seem).


ok, it's like 3:10 am over here and i still feel ill from the food. time to try and sleep it off...

coming soon: new year's resolutions and highlights from home.

"In the conditions of the city, the city, the city, the city, the city, the city, c'mon"

Tonite's title comes from the Common song Chi-City. I love the song and I really love when it hits that part of the song. Obviously he's referring to Chicago [a great city in its own right], but the city that speaks to me in that way is San Francisco. I spent another amazing weekend up there, in a place that always feels like home as opposed to some place I've left and am no longer familiar with. I'm sure part of it has to do with the fact that I was always learning about new things there...so even if I come up on something new it doesn't feel foreign in the usual sense. But there's a lot I do know and love. I actually had the chance to really just hang out in the City on Saturday and it was wonderful...really, really making me want to move back.

Anywho...the usual list of highlights:

• getting asked for directions twice while standing on the street with my rolling carry-on bag [who asks someone who is clearly traveling for directions?]
• hotel upgrade to the suite with 2 huge flat-panel TVs within 15 feet of each other, a stereos system, a shower and a separate tub, and a collection of CDs
• Kobe beef bacon cheeseburger and gyudon beef for dinner
• hotel goods as a present [i wish it was my idea...but it wasn't]
  
• lots and lots of shopping [premium jeans for me...but no winter coat]
• meeting some new ppl
• the guys winning in Taboo [I consider myself the difference maker - and "darling"]
• white elephant exchange, stealing the present i brought, and not getting anything except a box of funny cards in the end [not even the pooping reindeer!]
• strolling around a bit

It gets harder and harder to be away from such a great place where so many great ppl are, but I'll be back for New Year's eve and I'm sure again not long after that [by then I'll have earned 2 free round-trip tickets on Southwest...suhweet!] At the end of the day I feel like my real life is the time I spend up there [as well as the rest of my time traveling and being out & about], while my time here and working is some falsity. Maybe not falsity...but not a reality. But hey...i guess it's all real, all a part of life and all I can do now is work hard and continue to enjoy my free time. What comes next [be it now or in a while.

Some pics from the weekend as well as some black & whites I shot a little while ago up on the flickr page. I left my camera in the car so I didn't get any pics from the party...sadness. I should probably get some sleep after a fun and full weekend.