Usually I come to this page with an idea of something to write about. Not today. This will probably be one of those random posts with little bits of everything in it. Have you ever noticed that my first paragraph is always long enough to make that drop cap thing on the left look right? Often I’ll want to start off with a single sentence, but I write some fluff to make it look right.

I just gave my fish some medicine. They still have fin rot. It’s really scary because huge chunks of their fins just dissolve into the water, so they look really pitiful. I’ve bought tons of different kinds of medicine for them, but none have fixed them yet. Each time they seem better, but then after the treatment the symptoms start showing up again. Of course I’m trying to treat the root problem, too, although I don’t really know what it is. I change the water and feed them less. Almost everyone feeds their fish too much.

I really love my fish. I think they’re the best pet ever. I can go out of town and not have to worry about them, but whenever I have a spare moment I sit and watch them swim around. Now I don’t like watching them as much because they’re sick so it makes me feel bad. It’s amazing that they can just swim around and not die of boredom. I couldn’t.

I watched a couple documentaries recently. One was about String Theory. It was really fascinating. I love it when I know nothing about some subject, then I learn about it and all of a sudden it changes how I look at life. Maybe not in a big way, but enough that it has had an effect. I watched another documentary on the Concorde, too.

I was going to ride on the Concorde once. I found this crazy deal to ride it for $1000 to either France or England. Normally it’s $20,000, so I was really excited about this. I tried to get my friends to go, but no one wanted to. How is that even possible? You’re in a plane that flies FASTER THAN A RIFLE BULLET. That’s insane. It was the 31st of the month and I thought “well, if none of my friends want to go by tomorrow, I’ll just get a ticket and go by myself.”

The next day the deal was dead and I never went. Now it’s out of commission so I may never get to ride it. Never skip opportunities like that.

I got new sheets the other day. They’re really comfy.

I also got new underwear. I used to wear really dumb baggy underwear that made it hard to wear tight pants. Katya suggested this Perry Ellis underwear, which I liked a a lot, but I could only find it in XL. I’m nowhere near XL. It would fit snugly enough in the morning, but after walking around a lot it got way too loose by night time.

Buying underwear is hard. There are a lot of choices. I bought five different kinds and have been trying them out. I think I’ve got a winner.

I have a ton of self discipline. I have no idea where I got it from or when this happened, because I feel like I used to be completely not discplined. I see all these people doing things that are just insane. They smoke. They eat unhealthy foods. They play video games. It’s amazing. Why not just exercise some discpline and cut these things out? Even with my discipline, I’m not perfect. I can’t get myself to have a normal sleep schedule. I spend too much time on the computer (which is why I’m getting rid of it). I imagine life would be even better if I was more disciplined.

My life is fantastic. Every day I laugh because I’m so lucky to have such an awesome life. The best part is that it seems to keep getting better. Good things happen to me, good people come into my life, and “bad” events end up being good in the long run. The other day a friend was explaining this exercise where you think of something negative that happened to you. I couldn’t. I really tried, and couldn’t. I’ll try right now again.

…

Ok, actually that was easy. I’m fixing my old car to sell it and the water pump needs to be replaced. I don’t really care, though. My other car had a really annoying problem that I’ve been trying to fix, but Ben’s Workshop fixed it for me for FREE! I was so happy because I was expecting it to be at least $1000.

I set up an account at www.emigrantdirect.com and have 10% of all my income going there. I’ll never spend that money, only the interest. You guys should try that too. It’s cool to have a savings account that you KNOW will never go down. It feels like playing a game.

Ok, that’s enough random thoughts.

On my fancy Treo 700 I have a little plugin that shows my daily todo list and calendar entries below my programs. I have to do this because otherwise I never really notice the things I write there, and thus don’t do them. I use the todo list a lot, but the calendar is basically empty.

Today I looked down and saw something unusual. “Are you totally ripped? Bet.”

No, I’m not.

Flash back a year ago. Hayden and I are sitting at Magnolia. I’ve been eating healthy, ending the 24 year reign on my body which white flour and sugar had enjoyed. I no longer order the “Ty Special” at Magnolia because it’s not healthy (ask for it). I’ve been working out. I don’t have a girlfriend.

Hayden and I have an illustrious history of large bets to motivate each other. I’ll save those stories for another day. I offer to bet him that within a year I’ll be the most ripped person he knows. He wants to bet because I lost the last bet, but knows better. I want him to bet because then I know I’ll do it.

I offer to make it totally subjective. If he thinks I’m the most ripped person, I win. If not, he wins. New friends don’t count.

We finally agree to make a gentleman’s bet and I put it in my Treo.

Now, a year later I look at it. I’ve failed. Although my body fat hovers around 8-9%, my weight is under 140 pounds. I’m not jacked at all - I’m skinny. I worked out religiously for several months and was over 150 pounds at one point, still with 9% body fat. People noticed that I was more muscular. Then I went polyphasic and raw and stopped working out. I haven’t picked it back up in all that time - it’s a lot easier to keep working out than it is to start again.

I IM Hayden to tell him about the bet. He’ll be amused that it wasn’t totally forgotten.

“Wow. Time flies.” he says.

It does fly. But it’s packed. I think back over the past twelve months, and a lot has happened. I quit gambling, I went polyphasic, I went back to normal, I went raw, I went back, I kept eating healthy, I got my first “real” job, I made some cool songs, I got a new place, My parents are getting divorced, I got some pet fish that I really love, I started this site, I started Tynan’s Angels, I bought my trademark sequin hat, I made a bunch of new friends, I got rid of Windows and moved to Linux, and I rapped on stage for the first time. That’s a lot of stuff. Most days seem to be pretty calm, but arching over them are huge changes in my life.

It’s exciting. I love change. Honestly, I’m probably addicted to it.

When I first got into the pickup artist thing I went to a seminar in Chicago. I didn’t know anyone there, so I was set up with a roommate. His name was Brian, known as LittleBigDick in the community. “LBD” if you’re around children or old people. I remember as we ate sloppy joes in the airport before leaving he told me about something he does. Every year he writes down what he accomplished that year. I told him I liked the idea and that I’d do it too.

And now, years later, I’ve finally done it. Those aren’t all the things I’ve done, of course, but they’re all little milestones in my life. Little occurances and coincidences that happen on a daily basis that snowball into changes that shape who I am.

All this leads up to a question - what will happen in the next 12 months? I can think of a few things - I’ll move into my new place, I’ll get rid of my computers, I’ll start working out again once I move, etc. Those are definite. I’ll probably (finally) make my first million, Tynan’s Angels will become huge, as will another project or two I’m working on, maybe I’ll get another girlfriend, maybe I’ll go to Africa, and surely I’ll learn some new skills. But that leaves a lot of blanks. What’s amazing to me is that I would have NEVER predicted or even conceived of half of the things on my list (raw, polyphasic, angels, job, gambling). And now as I think of what might happen, there are things I’ll write about in 12 months that I never could have imagined happening.

I wonder what they’ll be.

I actually found this on boingboing.net. I shouldn’t even post their name since they’re one of the few big aggregating sites that has never run one of my articles. But hey, when they’ve got a good article, they’ve got a good article.

They posted This MP3 about how to always do the right thing. It’s brilliant. I’ve actually been wanting to write a post to that effect, but the speaker, Dan Gilbert, did a much better job than I would have.

The essence of the speech is that EV is king. EV is expected value, a term used commonly in the gambling world. I would explain what it is, but if you listen to the lecture you will have a better understanding and then I won’t have to type as much.

I always try to live my life by maximizing EV. Most people live their lives trying to minimize risk, which is a truly awful strategy. I’d say that roughly 90% of my favorite experiences in life have been the result of taking risk, but maximizing EV. The story of How I became a pickup artist is a great example. Moving to LA was risky - I was leaving my friends, moving in with people I didn’t know, and was paying a ton of money for the privilege. However, it was clear that the upside was huge, so I did it. I’m glad I did.

Listen to the lecture think about how it applies to your life, and post your thoughts here.

Wow. Is this three posts in three days? It’s like the good old days. Remember those? So, today I wake up and go through my normal routine. Read e-mails, listen to voicemails, eat some breakfast, say hi to my beautiful fishies, etc. Time for the shower.

I turn the water to hot and weigh myself while I wait for it to heat up. 139. Damn. That’s really skinny. I eat a lot of salmon. Shouldn’t I weigh more? I check the water - it’s still cold. I brush my teeth while I wait.

Still cold.

It doesn’t usually take this long, but ever since I got this hippie low flow showerhead that removes chlorine, it takes longer to heat up. I freestyle in front of the mirror.

It’s still cold. Something’s wrong. I go check my stove - it won’t work either. Dammit. They turned off my gas. For the first four years I lived here, my gas was directly debited from my checking account. This was a good system. All of a sudden they stopped, but I keep forgetting to check my bills. They’re just not that interesting. Yep. I’m a deadbeat.

I have to take a shower. Normally a huge wimp with cold water I stick my leg in. Not so bad. I slowly inch forward appendage by appendage until I’m mostly within the showerhead’s deadly aim.

Maybe because of years of conditioning, only taking showers with hot water, the water actually feels warm. As soon as I remember it’s cold, it feels cold again. I try to imagine that it’s a warm shower and it actually works. I continue my shower as I normally would and dry off.

Then it hits me - that wasn’t so bad. I’m moving in a month or so (you won’t believe where! I’ll write about it once it’s finalized), so I figure that I can just take cold showers for a month. I don’t need the gas to heat the house, obviously, and I don’t really need to use the stove.

So, if you see me in a month or so and realize I have gained a tremendous amount of character, now you know why.

As I may have mentioned before, I am a huge fan of cruises. Although I haven’t gone on one yet this year, I usually go on at least one or two every year. Where the cruise actually goes is wholly unimportant to me. Half the time I sleep through the stops anyway, and just stay on the boat. I just like having no cell phone, having great food available 24/7, and sitting on the back of the boat watching the waves.

It takes a certain type of person to enjoy a cruise. Usually that person is an old person. My friend Jonah and I are the two exceptions. I think we’ve gone on two cruises together, and each time we were the only people remotely close to our age. So much for meeting the hot ladies pirate-style.

On one such cruise we woke up at our usual time - 3pm. The boat was docked in Mexico, and was leaving at 5:30, meaning that everyone had to be on the boat at 5.

We strolled up to the dining room to get some food. We’d been to Mexico a few times prior, and unless you’re willing to wake up early and go for a long drive, there’s not much to see.

We sat down with an older couple named Rita and Willis for lunch. Rita and Willis are two of my favorite people ever. They’re an old black couple who have more personality than ten honkies combined. For some reason, be it weight, medical condition, or simply because of the style, Rita drives around the ship in a Rascal, an old person scooter.

Willis would order every single item on the menu during every dinner. Don’t get me wrong - Jonah and I would do the same exact thing. One day we ordered (and ate) 31 plates of food between the two of us. Due to voodoo magic (and the convenience of a gym upstairs) I have lost weight every cruise despite the high caloric intake.

The first entree that Willis ordered would arrive. He’d eat a good portion of it, but was usually full from the 3 soups, salad, bread, and 3 appetizers.

Then the second entree would arrive. He might peck at it.

When the third entree arrived, he would inevitably snap at the waiter.

“No, no, no, no, no no!”

I don’t think he meant to be rude about it, but it came off that way. He’d resume telling us a story, punctuated by Rita exclaiming “yes you did!” amongst self-satisfied laughter.

Inevitably I’d see the waiter approaching with the fourth entree, obviously pondering whether or not he should try serving Willis another dish. Every time he would wince as he offered it, only to be rebuffed by a second “no, no no!”

Every day this pattern continued. By the end I felt bad for the waiter.

We sat down with Rita and Willis while they regaled us with tales of their adventures in Mexico. We told them that we were about to go walk around in Mexica, but they laughed. It seemed odd.

We finished our food by 4:00. Plenty of time to walk around the shore for an hour and get back onto the ship.

As we exited the ship we couldn’t help but notice a large line of people snaking from the end of the pier to the ship. Why were they getting back on the boat so early? It was hot, so I assumed they had enough sun.

Jonah and I leisurely strolled down the sidewalk next to the ocean. We marveled at the strange trees, half finished buildings, and took pictures. By 4:25 or so we decided to head back.

We arrived at the pier at 4:45 and lesuirely handed our passports and ship IDs to the guard. He told us to hurry up.

We started walking towards the boat when he yelled,

“No, you need to run!”

We looked at the boat and then at each other. Something wasn’t right.

We started running.

The boat was parallel with the shore, at the end of a T shaped pier. By the time we ran up to the head of the T, our mistake was clear. The boat was 25 feet away from the concrete.

We both doubled over laughing. We had wondered earlier what happens when you miss the boat, and now we had done it. The Mexican guards on the pier looked at us and laughed. They’d seen this before.

With big smiles on our faces we sheepishly walked back to the entrance to the pier. There was nothing we could do about it now.

We were wrong, according to the guard. He could get us a boat to take us out to the ship. He wanted $50, but we only had $30. In my mediocre Spanish I brokered the deal.

A small boat pulled up to the dock and we jumped onto the roof. We were led into the cabin and were given two orange life jackets. The boat sped off towards the cruise ship.

Jonah was sitting closer to the person in charge of the boat than I was. The hum of the engine was overpowering, so I let him listen to the instructions. I picked up bits and pieces. Something about going on the roof of the boat and taking off the lifejacket.

What I didn’t know at the time was that Jonah thought that I was figuring out what we had to do since I was speaking spanish earlier.

Before we knew it, we were right next to the ship. It towered over the small boat. How were we supposed to get up there?

The answer came to us suddenly. A hatch 20 feet above the water opened up in the ship and someone dropped down a rope ladder.

A ROPE LADDER.

Both ships are still moving.

I take off my lifejacket. The Mexicans in the boat start screaming at me. That wasn’t the plan. I fumble to put it back on as I climb onto the roof of the little boat.

With waves crashing below I lean towards the ship and grab the ladder. I climbed up to safety and watched as Jonah did the same thing.

For the rest of the cruise, we were the heroes of the ship. Everyone asked us about our adventure. Apparently they had been calling our names on the intercom for quite a while, and a good portion of the passengers had watched the debacle from the upper decks.

We were still confused about how we missed the ship until we returned to our cabin. The unread newsletter that had been slipped under the door that morning had a large headline across the top :

BE SURE TO SET YOUR WATCHES FORWARD ONE HOUR TO ACCOMODATE THE TIME CHANGE

Oops.

Here are some pictures :

Wow, that was a really busy week. I’m not used to being busy at all - back in the day I had all the free time I could possibly imagine. Maybe it’s about time to revisit polyphasic sleep? Here are some things that made me busy :

Work, of course. I’ve been waiting for weeks for a company to send us a new computer for our data center that lets me do fancy things. Last week it seemed like every day was going to be the day that it would be ready, so I would just wait all day for it to be set up. Then there would be some problem, and the process would repeat itself the next day. Finally this week it got all set up, so now I have more to do than I have time for. Yes! I love having things to do. It just so happens that this particular task is really fun too.

My car broke AGAIN. I have a 1994 S600, which is known to be one of the hardest (read : most expensive) cars to maintain. The reason is that it’s a V12. Since it’s basically two V6 engines stuck together, it also has two of a lot of components. Twice as many things to be broken. It also has a hydraulic suspension, which is what broke on mine. Of course this time I didn’t take the car to the dealership.

I barely even care when it breaks anymore. I just assume that every month or two something huge will need to be replaced on it. Then again, there’s no other car that I want more, so I’m basically stuck with it. Actually, my friend Todd has an Audi All Road wagon, and that is a really cool car. I might get one if my car ever totally blows up.

My top secret new web site / business is coming along great. Expect to hear a lot more about it in about a week.

I got my new
http://www.betterthanyourboyfriend.com/get-a-deal-on-a-treo-700p.htm” mce_href=”Treo” class=”linkification-ext” href=”http://www.betterthanyourboyfriend.com/get-a-deal-on-a-treo-700p.htm%22%3ETreo”>http://www.betterthanyourboyfriend.com/get-a-deal-on-a-treo-700p.htm”>Treo 700p this week. At first I was underwhelmed, but now that I’ve copied all my software to it and gotten it set up, I really love it.. The best part about it is that having an open internet transfer doesn’t send callers straight to voicemail anymore. That was a common annoyance for people trying to call me.

I’ve switched 100% over to Linux. Usually I make fun of the nerds who run linux because there’s no point and it sucks. I was bored one night and decided to try it out on my computer. It’s FANTASTIC. There are a lot of differences between it and Windows, but there are two main ones :

• It assumes you’re smart. Windows assumes you’re a huge idiot.
• It’s much quicker than Windows.

It used to be that Windows was much easier to use in every area. Not so anymore - the linux installation process is easier than windows, as is installing new programs. It also comes with tons of programs preinstalled which saves time - and I’m not talking about crappy spyware and antivirus tools that Dell puts on computers. I’m running Suse 10.1, which you might want to try out too.

My good friends Austin and Matt were in town. Matt has recently moved to San Antonio (close enough) and Austin has moved to Florida somewhere to be a helicopter pilot with the Navy. I don’t get to see these guys a lot, so we spent a lot of time hanging out. Perhaps the best part about having out of towners in town is that they’re very proactive about getting people together. Every day this week my friends were doing something interesting.

One of the more fun things we did was go to Matt’s house and just hang out. What happened to just hanging out? No one ever calls anyone and says “Hey, want to come over and hang out?”. I mean… I might say that to girls, but it probably means “Hey, want to come over and hang out and also make out?”. Matt has a pool and a fire pit, so we had a good time swimming and making s’mores. I also got bitten by some crazy mutated breed of mosquitos that has left my legs covered in huge mosquito bites. Form a single file line, ladies… no pushing…

I went to a Roots / Blackalicious / Incredibuls concert last night. It was bad. I love The Roots, but hadn’t ever heard Blackalicious or the Incredibuls. I actually liked the Incredibuls the best, even though they’re some no name act. The Roots just sorta jammed, which was interesting for about twenty minutes. The vocals were way too quiet and the songs were done so differently that I couldn’t recognize them. I actually left early, as did Todd and Steve. It’s weird - I usually LOVE rap acts, but this was pretty bad. The ?uestlove drum solo was cool, though.

It’s bike week in Austin. This means that going anywhere downtown is extremely unpleasant because there are thousands of motorcycles driving around everywhere. The funny thing is that if it weren’t for the motorcycles, one would probably assume that it was a gay pride weekend or something. Everyone’s dressed in all leather gear.

If you’re a biker, please don’t kill me. Thanks.

Oh, and I slept through my police physical aptitude test. How dumb is that? I actually slept while the alarm clock went off for over an hour. To be fair I had gone to bed at 2am and had the alarm set for 5am. Where’s polyphasic when you need it? I e-mailed the deputy to reschedule but she advised me that I needed to submit a formal request for a reschedule in writing. How idiotic is that? There is absolutely no benefit to that process.

When I create Tynan Island (you’re all invited), there won’t be any retarded laws. Unless you count “no pants for hotties” a retarded law. But you probably don’t.

I’ve decided to streamline my shower process. Usually I go into the shower, stand under the hot water for 20-30 minutes while I rap or just stare into space. Finally I actually wash myself and get out. Because my whole shower / brush teeth / shave / etc. routine started taking so long, I would procrastinate and do it as late as possible. I have three bedroom house with an appropriately sized water heater, but even though I live alone I would often use all the hot water. I would actually crank the tempurature up so that each shower would need less hot water per minute, giving me even longer showers.

So for one week I decided to try taking showers as quickly as I could. As soon as I get in I begin washing, and when I’m done washing I get out immediately. I even brush my teeth while I wait for the water to heat up. Now I don’t procrastinate because I know that I will be in and out of the shower in under ten minutes.

Steve moved into a really cool place in downtown Austin. The best part about his condo isn’t the 6 burner Wolf stove, the bamboo floors, or the two balconies looking over the city. It’s the laundry machines in the closet. What a good idea! My laundry room is off of my Kitchen, which is absolutely idiotic because the kitchen towels and cloth napkins rarely get washed. Why should I have to walk all the way to the other end of my house just to wash clothes? It makes no sense at all.

Anyway… that’s what’s on my mind this week. Time to go to work!

If you’re wondering why I always put my name in the topics of these things, it’s not because I have a huge ego. I do have a huge ego, but I do it so that my name gets better search rankings in google. My goal is for people to be able to search for “Tynan” and for my site to be number one. Soon. If you want to help, like the almighty Magnus, you can link to my blog and put my name in the link.

Today Doug, Steve, Steve’s (ex?) girlfriend, Todd and I headed down to Canyon Lake, TX to do some tubing. You see, I bought the sweetest tube ever to bring to the lake. The thing actually flies 15 feet in the air behind the boat. I think I wrote about it before, but I’m not sure. Anyway, the first time we tried I skipped along the water, but didn’t really take flight because my weak human lungs couldn’t inflate the tube enough.

Today before going to the lake I bought two different pumps to ensure that the thing would actually inflate. As it turned out, the boat rental place had a sweet air compressor, negating the need for our own pumps. Oh well… you owe me one (two?), Wal Mart. Our rental boat was a shoddy looking boat most certainly manufactured before 1990 which was apparently very fast. The interior was a coccoon of brightly colored vinyl couches covered by a weathered bimini top. I climbed aboard and with the help of Todd, tied the monsterous tube to the boat.

Then it rained. Soon it was pouring out.

On the way over we spotted a school bus for sale by the side of the road. Since we weren’t going anywhere in the rain, we headed back to check it out. I walked aboard and felt a warmth in my heart that I hadn’t known since converting our first school bus. The ceiling was high - over six feet. This is a rarity in used school buses. The interior was in great shape, and it even had the same controls that our old one had. It was nostalia inducing. The price? $650. I’m sold. I was ready to pay cash but the owner wasn’t there. Oh well - if it drives as “good” as it claims on the windshield, I’ll have a new vehicle in the stable. BTYB tour, anyone? I’m coming to a highway near you.

The rain continued on, and the rental place told us we were probably out of luck. After putting the tube through an elaborate deflation process involving all five of us we began to discuss what to do next. Of course just minutes later the sun came up as if it had never been raining. Oh well.

Steve had an idea. Why don’t we buy a lake house? We quickly agreed that we should buy a lake house. For $500k-$1mil you can get an incredible lake house in canyone lake. It’s a lot of money, but if it were split eight to ten ways, it would be managable. After all, lake houses are more fun with lots of people anyway. We went to a gas station to get real estate advertisement magazines and then found a restaurant where we could eat while studying them.

We were immediately excited. There were incredible lake houses in our price range. Some were up to 5 acres, some had hot tubs, others had “media rooms”. I called up a real estate agent to see if we could be shown some properties that day. I always laugh when I give people my e-mail address “Tynan at better than your boyfriend…. “. After that she took us slightly less seriously. She was at home, but could e-mail me listings tomorrow.

Undaunted, we set off on our own to find some of these properties. The more exciting ones were in a division called “Mystic River”. We were met with one of those false-security gates. Usually 911 will let you in (ever think about how ambulances get in?) 2142 is another common bypass code for pizza delivery boys. It didn’t work either. We started serially calling every person in the directory. Only one answered and wouldn’t let us in.

Slightly disappointed, but still excited by the inevitable outcome of buying a sweet lake house, we headed home.

At the last minute Todd pulled into a brand new development. He drives an Audi All Road, which is one of the sweetest vehicles I’ve ever seen. I’m a huge fan of Mercedes, as you probably remember, but this thing is incredible. I would buy one. It’s a luxury station wagon (perfect for road trips) that has a built in adjustable suspension. One button click and we had a higher ground clearance than a suburban.

We blazed over the dirt road until we reached a little temporary building. There were actually people there. It’s not often that I get taken particularly seriously by vendors of luxury goods. How likely is it that a 25 year old (who looks 20) wearing a shiny sequin hat is seriously going to buy a million dollar house? However, the gentleman there didn’t even blink an eye.

We looked at the map, pointed to the most expensive lot, and he showed it to us.

The lot was gorgeous. It was a long strip of land that totalled about four acres. It started on a tall hill, where the house would be built, and extended way down to the water. The development even had a private airstrip for flying in. Whoa! I took a few flying lessons a while back but got preoccupied and stopped taking them. We need to get back on that gravy train, Elisia! Ultimately that particular place probably isn’t nearly as good of a value as we can find, but it was still fun to see.

I have another exciting project coming up soon that I want to write about, but I’ve already gone on for so long here. Tomorrow maybe …

I woke up and stumbled to the front door to check for packages. I wasn’t really expecting one, but you can never be too sure. To my surprise there was a small brown box waiting on the doorstep for me. What had I ordered? I couldn’t remember. I walked back inside and tore the package open.

Inside was a book and a board game. Not just any book and board game, though - they were abominations thrust in in front of my virgin eyes. The game was called A Hot Affair and the book was Penthouse: Naughty by Nature: Female Readers\’ Sexy Letters to Penthouse. Confused, I check the shipping address. Sure enough they weren’t meant for me.

They were my neighbor’s.

I still haven’t returned them. Any ideas on fun ways to do it? If someone comes up with something interesting I will do it and video it.

A guy named Zachary Bleu recently started a blog. Like any smart blogger, he linked to Better than your Boyfriend. Through the magic of science and the internet I can see all the sites who link to me, so I always check them out. I need to make sure no one is besmirching my good name! I think his focus is going to be his upcoming transition to polyphasic sleep, but he had one post about ambigrams. For those of you who haven’t read Angels & Demons (instant review : written by Dan Brown, author of The Da Vinci Code - read it!), an ambigram is a word drawn so that it looks the same upside down. After reading Angels and Demons, I spent a good amount of time trying to make one with my name. It wasn’t easy, and the results weren’t good.

I commented on the ambigram post on Zachary’s Blog, and I was surprised when he IMed me the next day with a link to an ambigram he made for me!

How cool is that? I’ve always wanted a good ambigram of my name and now I have one! I had the daring and bold idea to make business cards with it in the middle. Kristen suggested getting tattoo with it. You never know… I’m crrrazy like that! Thanks again Zachary!

Yesterday on the way to work I stopped by my mailbox. I have no idea why I can’t just have my own mailbox on my property like people have had for millions of years, but in my subdivision we have these stupid communal mailboxes. Because of the added hassle of finding the key (who is going to steal my mail, seriously?) and walking down to the mailbox, I don’t check my mail more than once or twice a week.I sifted through the tall stack of mail. Bills, checks, magazines, and tons of advertisements for crap I don’t want. As I neared the bottom of the stack a small envelope caught my eye. It was addressed to “Black Tie”, my rap name. The return address was just a smiley face. Strange.

I turned it around and on the back was a lipstick kiss mark over the seal of the envelope. A lady!

I carefully opened the envelope, but there was no letter inside. Just a sticker that said “I’m famous / you just don’t know it yet”. I laughed.

How did she get my address? It’s not like it’s some huge secret - there ARE ways to figure it out. That takes effort, though. The postmark was from New Jersey and I don’t really know anyone in New Jersey other than my aunt (pronounced Auuuunt), uncle, and little cousins. Maybe I should be creeped out or something, but I think it’s awesome. Steve said the other day “Tynan, I don’t know anyone who needs attention as much as you do.” I don’t know about NEED, but I certainly do appreciate it. So thanks mystery woman.

For your viewing / sleuthing pleasure, here are pictures of the fan mail :