A most pleasant day to you all. In my region of the planet it is presently thirty degrees with nary a cloud in the sky - mild humidity, hot at the beach, a flawless day for lying in the sand or playing cricket or some such. It's also driving me absolutely mad, to be completely honest. I am a creature born of a chill climate, preferring calm overcast days with single-digit temperatures. With soft rain lightly coating one's head and shoulders, or running down the windshield of a car while the moonlight projects the water's image upon the vehicle's inhabitants...... Which would bring me to my next, more depressed point, but I'd really rather start on a more positive note seeing as I've been going on the weather since the beginning.

Oh, right, people. (Sorry, sometimes I forget how to converse normally.) Greetings to all once again, or, for the none of you who are new, welcome. Ubiquitous apologies for the lack of updates and presence - I'm sure it has rarely, if ever, been noticed, but I apologise for it nonetheless. This journal in particular is probably going to be a little long and moderately, ah, I believe that the term to use would be 'emo'..... Anyone with any respect for me (if so, you obviously don't know me very well) would do best to stop reading now and return to whatever fantasy realm you must surely inhabit. (No offence intended, as always, I'm just feeling rather cynical at the moment.)

I suppose I forgot that positive note... Well then, yesterday marked my twentieth year in existence (time spent as a foetus and sperm/egg notwithstanding) on this world, which means that I am officially well on my way to becoming Old. (Apologies to all those of you who are older than 20 - it's a bit of a mental hurdle for me.) Now I'm feeling as if I've got to be Responsible and Reasonable and Healthy and Witty and Wise (Wealthy being beaten back by overwhelming evidence to the contrary) and most notably Not Wasting My Time Engaging In Worthless Pursuits. Which really is a pity, because I rather dislike letting that oh-so-noble aspect of my subconscious down. (What, you thought I was going to begin being such things? Perish the thought.) Teenagerdom has been left behind, and now I've got nothing to look forward to but wrinkles, atrophying muscles, and Alzheimer's. So, er, happy birthday to me. Long-time readers will be pleased to know that no bourbon (or any other form of alcohol) was consumed, a fact which pleases me to no end.

And that was the positive note. I know, I know, I'm just one of those bright and happy rays of sunshine. In any case, here's the 'teeny angst' (and here I was thinking it had been left behind!) bit... I suppose what with the inevitable approach of Oldness I've been getting introspective (again) and have realised the sort of troubling thing that makes one realise that one is pathetic (and generates disinterested derision amongst all within earshot - again, my apologies) - I am lacking some form of significant other. (Yeah, I know, I can hear your groans and the re-evaluation of your respect for me from all the way over here.) And I mean that in a more complete way than most - I possess no real 'best friend' or any sort of girl/boyfriend. (For the One Who I Will Not Name, no, I am not gay. Not yet, anyways. You know who you are.) I moved from the closest I ever had to a best friend at age 8 (more scorn and derision, yes) and since then it's all been casual friendships which come and go with the tides. Everyone I knew who lived within walking distance had taken off to parts unknown or foreign, and most of my university friends have either departed to their constituent home countries or live an hour or so away from me. And not being the happy, outgoing type who makes new friends easily, I've just become decent acquaintances with the people at work (few of them being the sort of individual I'd chose to consort with) and living through the summer. (I mean no offence to any of you, it is a true and honest pleasure to know each and every individual, but there's some part of me that just wants to kick back with an old friend and shoot the proverbial refuse over some dessert.) I actually met up with that old friend of mine a few months ago, after eleven years, and it was fantastic to meet up and talk for a few hours over some sushi..... but she's got an incredibly overprotective boyfriend (now fiancée, apparently) who seems to think that I'm trying to steal her away, so that's killed that happening in the foreseeable future. And as for girlfriends..... Well, let's just say I'm not precisely a ladies' man. It's not that I'm horrendously ugly or mentally inept, just that I never know quite what to say. (So perhaps that classifies as mental ineptitude. C'est vie.) Hah... For my birthday, I didn't even do anything. Most people I know are having grand, no-holds-barred invite-everyone bashes at pubs and clubs to celebrate their 20th - I stayed home and whiled my hours away watching Wall Street and Eastern Promises.

Aaaaaand........ that's about all I have to say about that. I would like to offer my sincere, deepest and most humble apologies for subjecting you to that, as well as my congratulations if you've managed to sit through all of that. Sorry for doing that to you - I'll try not to do it again. I know, nobody wants to hear it, and the writing of it has no doubt turned many of you off, but now it's done and I'm rather glad it's finished with. I know it's really nothing in the grand scheme of things - I'm not starving, no eviction notice, no crippling disabilities.... I live in a first-world country and am going to university, which is a huge luxury in itself.... I've really got nothing to complain about, and yet you've been subjected to this thing you deserve not at all, so again, my apologies. Please ignore it, I'm just glad it's down.

Writing update: Honestly, pretty much nothing. Second chapter for The Longest Roads is in near-finished form (those same long-time readers should know that it doesn't look like it, but it's actually the steampunk story mentioned a year ago) but I've got nothing for the third, so I'll hold off until I get a decent lead for that. Random Question du jour: What was the best book you ever read, would you recommend it, and why was it good? ( You're good at this, I figure you can manage three questions in one. )

In any case, that was incomprehensibly overlong and I will apologise yet again, for what it's worth. I know it's cheap to drop into the same self-pitying mire as every 14-year-old blogger with a number in his/her screen name, but I offer no excuse or reason save for the work itself. Give me a couple days, and I'll be back to my normal quasi-pleasant and sarcastic self. In any case, it is as always a pleasure, and I will try to get another journal up in the forseeable future that's a little easier to respond to without feeling incredibly awkward.

Keep Deviating,

- Introcrat

And if I can't hear the music
and the audience is gone,
I'll dance here on my own.
And I hope the Lonely Hearts' Club Band
will play out one last song,
Before the sun goes down.

(Relief 'mood' used due to inability to change it. Further apologies for the low quality and confusing nature of the writing.)