i googled a quote i’d seen on a poster in high school. the poster was of a persian cat reclined on a cat sofa. above the cat was “too much of a good thing is wonderful.” when i googled that quote in college, i found out the quote was from mae west.

how cool! you see, i’d gone to a free will baptist high school that was very conservative. they believed that your salvation could go away if you sinned too much. come to find out they had a mae west quote in the music room the whole time. it seemed ironic because some might say she sinned too much. i might never have known w/out the internet.

i was in.

i didn’t know about aim. what i knew about aol was that you needed a cd to come in the mail, which i didn’t have at college. i googled “chat rooms.” i found chat-avenue.com

chat-avenue.com was amazing. there were different categories of chatrooms. the best was “general chat.” the most popular chatter was mips. she might’ve been mips1970. she was only 32 at the time. she was from britain and lived in america w her american fiance whom she met in a chatroom.

all i knew about typing is that i had to keep my fingers on “asdfjkl;” i wasn’t very fast, but in order to keep up with the conversations, i had to become quick. now i touchtype as fast as anything.

college gave me access to the internet and the internet taught me to type and use my voice for college papers. it’s a symbiotic relationship.

now college is all online.

almost as good as chatrooms was the bobandsheri.com message board. bob and sheri was a nationally syndicated radio show out of charlotte. they’re becoming an internet-only show as we speak. every morning, they’d have their own chatroom where callers would talk about things with the hosts. the conversations would continue on the message boards.

message boards have dopamine hits more like what we have now. you don’t get an immediate response from a user, like in a chatroom. i forget how we got the notification when someone responded on the message board. in the chatroom, if you saw your friends, you stayed and typed. if they weren’t there, you left to another room. or you checked the bobandsheri.com message board where we had ongoing threads, like the psychology game, music game, and movie game.

the psychology game was word association. the music game you had to name a song title that used a word from the previous song title. the movie game was similar but you could name a new movie that shared an actor from the previous movie mentioned or something.

sometimes on the bobandsheri.com message board we’d drag one of them for admitting to voting against bush or for not being as good solo when the other called-in sick. the hosts or producers would go on the boards to defend against the crowd. it seemed libertine. one time sheri went onto the boards to say that she was pro-life even though she was a democrat. the boards shutdown not long after that.

while the message boards thrived, the bobandsheri show never won a marconi award. the other day, they won just as the show announced it was leaving the radio waves. that’s ironic.

earlier in the year, i checked chat-avenue.com. bots had taken over. mips would be 56 today. she wasn’t there. i haven’t found her on any new social media.

unrelated, i was dreaming about the song “into my arms,” so i listened to it while i typed this. i typed this as soon as i woke up from dreaming about that nick cave & the bad seeds song. it’s solemn and about a mustard seed sized faith.

I don’t really like the name as much. “college” seems more intimate. but that’s my judgement.

fall came in this weekend in hartsville, south carolina. it drizzled. i wore my hoodie the whole time. jena and i walked down the main road to davidson hall between all the tents of free food and merch. not many people attended. the only alumni that morning were me and jena.

jena and i pulled on doors until they opened: door-checking practice. (that’s how we’d explored the dormitories the night before w tiffany.) yesterday, we tried the music building, dance studios, and theater department. we saw inside of them all.

in the theater department, we bumped into robin bloodworth. his mom was our teacher. he told us how his dad started the theater department at coker. the bloodworths divorced. deb stayed on. she stayed for many, many years. 40 or so years. she’s in assisted living and robin is the visiting artist.

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i took pics of jena in front of the posters of the plays she directed or acted in. the theater department lined the hallway w memorabilia. a lot happens in 40 years. it’s been 20 since we attended.

we stood on the stage. at the edge of the stage, a lone tiki lamp glowed.

“that’s a ghost light,” jena said.

“what’s a ghost light?” i said.

“so people don’t fall off when it’s dark. it’s for safety.”

neither jena nor i made jokes on the stage. we didn’t jump or scream or sing. it felt solemn, looking at the empty seats. once we had an audience. i remembered where my family sat watching me play paravacini in mousetrap. it’s been 22 years. they’re gone, either dead or estranged.

i remembered other things about the stage, like the marley we danced on. i remembered striking the stage. i remembered playing 1 of the witches in shakespeare for a class and deb saying, “now that’s theater.”

jena and i walked around the lobby. it seemed grander than i remembered. the art teachers donated their large paintings or their sculptures. back then, i thought it was cheesy. i don’t know why. maybe because they weren’t famous. now, i’m glad they got to show off. that they did something nice and let everyone see it.

back on the main road to davidson hall, i looked at the tall oaks. they seemed as tall as they were when i attended. it takes a long time to grow an oak. in 100 years they will create a massive canopy over the road to davidson. i should take a pic now and compare it later.

the sun peaked through the grey sky a little bit. “we didn’t know how good we had it,” i said. i could hear mema’s voice in my head saying the same thing. jena walked along w me. she’d been more present in college. she graduated summa cum laude. i stayed an extra year.

o! how annoyed i was w college. how i have bemoaned student loan debt after college!

several years ago, a counselor asked me if i imagined that i would attend college. i said, “i thought i’d go to harvard or something.”

he said, “still you thought you’d go to college.”

lightbulb: i thought since i didn’t go to a big college or a college i’d heard of that my experience was less than the experiences i saw on tv. the only thing i knew about college was from saved by the bell when jessie spano couldn’t get into stanford, so their actor friend pretended to be a scalper from harvard to make the stanford people jealous.

where else, however, would i have gotten to commune w people who really cared about art and literature and making a good show of it w fancy buildings? i’m now older than some of my professors then. they were trying their best to leave a mark on this world. they wanted to cultivate interesting people to share their interests with. that’s my judgment now. i hope they got fulfillment.

walking along under the live oaks, i made a list of all the other things i didn’t know how good i had it at the time:

• going to college

• being a twink

• summer vacation

don’t worry. i’ll make a series around these (and more!) for the rest of the year…

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Filming in Portland lends itself to helping Twinless seem like an indie from the 2000’s—the spirit of weirdness, the overcast skies, the off-beat extras.

Dennis dresses similarly to Joseph Gordon-Levitt in 2009’s 500 Days Of Summer. Twinless uses split-screens, like 2005’s Conversations With Other Women. The bi-polar nature of the story unfolds on the screen like 2002’s He Loves Me… He Loves Me Not.

The soundtrack includes favorite sing-a-longs that aren’t indie. Other times, liminal tones ring out in the watcher’s ears. I’ve heard similar tones in 2005’s The Squid And The Whale. Definitely in 2006’s Children Of Men. I noticed the tone one time in Twinless. The tone appears more than once, I think.

Contemporary movies influence Twinless, too, like 2023’s Saltburn. Dennis looks at the camera wearing the plumbob from 2000’s The Sims how k.d. lang looks at the camera wearing antlers in Saltburn. Twinless takes the modern shot, exchanging the antlers for computer game nostalgia—when—wasn’t Saltburn reminding us of 2001’s Donnie Darko?

Twinless shows us Chekov’s gun, and gives us the inevitable conclusion, not unlike 2004’s Clay’s Way. Clay’s Way is a novel. Both Twinless and Clay’s Way lead us onto a brighter path that turns disastrous. We feel the rug get snatched. Deep down, we know that the courses of action lead only to true outcomes. I’m borrowing the phrase “course of action” from Conversations With Other Women.

Most importantly, Twinless gives us real characters who live authentic lives. Dennis is lib-coded (with a mullet and Harry Potter glasses) because people like him exist. What these characters aren’t are perfect, savior, shrill nags. This could be the start of a turn in our culture away from all art being political. The Conundrum Cluster mentions the return or glimpses of a possible new awakening in this post. Please enjoy it.

The Oscar nominations came out yesterday. I felt bored reading them. Even Leo’s charm seems to be fading. We all lose our charms in the end, quoteth a movie star. The only nominated movie star is Ethan Hawke. — I kept thinking while watching Twinless how luxurious it would’ve been to have first heard about this movie from an Oscar nomination…

Imagine an Oscar nomination that says, “Go ahead and watch Twinless if that’s what you want. Have a movie nite w Twinless if that’s what you need.”

But that’s my judgement.

The Books-A-Million is in a dinky mall that is carpeted throughout. I don’t hate it. Everyone in Sumter does. People have abandoned it. The restaurants in the food court abandoned it. Only Sara, her daughter, and I were there.

In BAM, I got The Bad Weather Friend off the back shelf. Sara browsed the front display of Freida McFadden titles. She said, “I wish you’d give Freida McFadden’s little books a try.”

I said, “I will.”

I bought The Closed Door by Freida McFadden. I read The Closed Door in 2 days. It was unputdownable.

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Back in Florence, I browsed the miscellaneous aisle at Aldi. That’s the aisle where Aldi carries non-food items. The miscellaneous aisle has gadgets, linens, utensils, bric-a-brac, outdoor items, like lounge chairs and umbrellas, and more.

I found a copy of Never Lie by Freida McFadden. It lay on its back cover on the corner edge. It seemed discarded. I thought, “I’ve never seen Aldi sell a book. Someone must have left it.” I remembered that my friend Melanie leaves gift cards in retail stores on her birthday for strangers. Someone must have left this book for a stranger to read.

I tucked the book under my arm. I pushed my buggy to the check out. I queued behind one customer. I unloaded my bottle of wine, box of crackers, pack of charcuterie on the checkout belt. I thought, “I read a Freida McFadden. I loved it. Maybe I should let someone else find this book. Someone else could love it.” Then I thought, “Who reads anymore? Sara, me, and whoever the kind soul is who left this book. A worker might trash it. I better keep it.”

I paid for my items, went to the counter to pack the groceries in my reusable bag, I untucked Never Lie to place on top, returned my buggy outside, collected my quarter, and left.

When I got home, I didn’t feel keen on touching a book that a stranger handled already. I didn’t recognize the publisher. It was print-on-demand. I thought, “Did Freida McFadden self-publish this?” I googled if Freida McFadden self-published before she found notoriety. I don’t remember what I found.

I convinced my former book club to read The Coworker. I bought it from Barnes & Noble. Everyone loved the book. Later, I convinced them to read The Tenant, which had just come out. I bought the red cover version from Target. Everyone loved The Tenant by Freida McFadden.

Later in the Summer, a coworker mentioned how much she loved Freida McFadden. I said that I loved Freida McFadden. She said her favorite book by Freida McFadden was Never Lie. I said that I had Never Lie, but I hadn’t read it yet. She said to read it that I would love it.

I read Never Lie by Freida McFadden. It was unputdownable. All of Freida McFadden’s books are unputdownable.

Last month, I went to Aldi w my friend Jesse. I bought some Cajun seasoning. We walked down the miscellaneous aisle. I picked up some cream flannel sheets patterned w black reindeer. In the middle of the shelf, I saw several Freida McFadden Books. I saw The Accident, and I saw The Housemaid’s Secret. I realized that Aldi does sell books. Aldi sells Freida McFadden exclusively. I’d stolen my copy of Never Lie.

I bought The Accident. I gave it away as a Christmas gift. I don’t know where my copy of Never Lie is. I put it in a free library, I think. My Catholic friends tell me stealing Never Lie by Freida McFadden is a venial sin. I will put it back if I find it maybe.

I want to talk about the buying of food in restaurants because people in my daily life get it twisted. My goal is to curb whims, impulsivity, and poor-coping. Before the trip, I was thinking of ways to feed myself. I even suggested to Leslie that I pay for his food and that he pay for my food. I’m thinking of the story in Judges 21 where Israel couldn’t give their wives to Benjamites, so they set-up an opportunity for them to be captured. Anyway, it worked-out.

The concert banned cellphones, so there’s not footage. TPLH did create a review, in which a video of my take is included. It’s on YouTube under “Bob Dylan at Fayetteville, North Carolina’s Crown Theatre — The Concert Review.”

Before getting out of bed, I read some of One Corinthians.

At work, I called the vet to see if the cremators delivered my dog’s ashes. They said that they had been delivered. They offered condolences. Everyone loved my dog. She was so sweet.

For my lunch, I stopped by the bank. Then, I went to the vet. Then, I made a quesadilla at home.

Back at work, I bought a sweet tea for my afternoon reading break. What I don’t like about the book is that it has a monster in it. Today’s reading made me laugh. I enjoyed some of the banter, but what I want from Koontz is suspense.

After work, I made another quesadilla. Then, I walked familiar routes w the ashes in tow. I sprinkled almost all of the cremains in Mrs. Ghost’s favorite spots. There’s just a smidge left to put in my mom’s yard. Whenever I asked if she wanted to go to “Mimi’s house,” she got excited. Mom has a big yard that dogs love.

total steps: 10,939

At work, I bought 2 cups of coffee from Circle K. This afternoon, I bought an extra sweet tea.

Not many people came in, so I was able to read on both breaks. The book made me laugh. I’m ready for it to be over.

After work, I walked a long time, listening to CWSA. During the walk, TPLH released its 1000th episode. I listened to that at home while doing calisthenics and grabbing a shower. I washed dishes and talked to Mom about writing the intro for the Dick Carlson episode. He’s Tucker Carlson’s dad. You can watch it if you search on YouTube, “Dick Carlson (Richard Warner Carlson) Interview On The Paul Leslie Hour.”

total steps: 10,269

This morning, I bought so much coffee from the Circle K. I read in my car on my reading break. The Bad Weather Friend isn’t that good.

I didn’t get an afternoon reading break, but I was asked to write the intro for the 1,000th episode of TPLH, which I did on the clock between customers.

I walked a really long time after work. During the walk, I stopped into a politial meeting. I donated $6 dollars in change to eat some of their food. It only cost $5, but since I paid in change, I gave them more. Does this count as eating at a restaurant or buying food on a whim? I think it’s gray area.

total steps: 12,221

I procrastinated my calisthenics. Arrived to work 2 minutes late. Sneaked to Circle K for coffee right before we opened.

It’s been 1 week since my dog died. I’m dealing w it. All day, I tried to lose myself in my work. I imagined having a different job. I tried to imagine writing full-time. I imagined saving $500 per month.

Both reading breaks felt nice, but I couldn’t concentrate on my book.

This evening, I walked, did calisthenics, heard some exciting news, talked to Mom, and visited a friend.

total steps: 11,972

This mornting, I walked to the farmer’s market grounds, and I walked back home while listening to CWSA.

Church wasn’t bad. Subs for lunch were good. I won the after dinner games.

I forgot all about the Oscars. I walked the rail trail. I bought some groceries. I went to some friends’ house for supper al fresca. We ate cookies and milk for dessert. I returned home where I commenced an evening of doom scrolling.

total steps: 13,954

This morning, I met a friend at Bean Bar. We walked a tad. Then, I came home and napped.

I decided I wanted a pizza for supper. At aldi, I bought one to heat at home. Also, I got a puzzle. 500 pieces.

Tonight, I watched Rear Window, drank numerous real sugar pepsis, and ate a gifted box of buncha crunch.

total steps: 3727

Further research showed that in the 80’s teachers started complaining that they couldn’t read students’ cursive. In 2010, they removed cursive from the US national standards. Now, some teachers are complaining that they can’t read students’ printing. Teachers say that digital is best. I can see where this is going—soon teachers won’t be able to understand digital shorthand, like btw or omw or rlol. Teachers will suggest neurotransmission is best.

Cursive writing used to be called “writing.” English learners in other countries learn cursive. Printing is not the standard because scripted English developed naturally as all languages do.

American slaves were not allowed to read and write. Robert E. Lee ran an illegal slave school teaching slaves reading and writing. Today, I see teenagers w retarded-looking print. They hold their pens as if their hands were claws. Natalie Goldberg said in Greenville, SC in 2013 about writing—”It’s good to drive a car, but you gotta learn how to walk first.”

Speaking of…

total steps: 6064

This morning was a walking day.

For the morning reading break, I had a medium cup of decaf from, I hate to say it, Circle K. The Bad Weather Friend continues to entertain me. Twice today on breaks from work.

Lunch seemed like a blur. I made a milkshake at home. I returned to work, parked, and read until I was 1 minute late clocking in.

After work, I interviewed an author for the 26th episode of Evening Magic. Then, I went to Mom’s house where I cooked quesadillas. A special episode of Wheel Of Fortune aired where Vanna played for a charity. I left during the episode. It seemed rigged. I bought a card from Dollar Tree otw home. I looked through each aisle. I felt all my purchasing whims fade. Maybe in controlling my snack whims, I’ve learned to control other impulses.

total steps: 10,994