Read the original press release from NBC, or The Futon Critic's copy.

The key passage:

NBC "bulks up" with 30 combined episodes of Heroes and Heroes: Origins, an innovative new spin-off that each week will introduce a new character—one of whom will be chosen by viewers through the Heroes website on NBC.com to become a cast regular the following season.

davidh

Dragon
..., 1976, ...
You are eccentric and your life complex. You have a very passionate nature and abundant health. Marry a Monkey or Rat late in life. Avoid the Dog.

[...]

Monkey
..., 1980, ...
You are very intelligent and able to influence people. An enthusiastic achiever, you are easily discouraged and confused. Avoid Tigers. Seek a Dragon or a Rat.

I was born in 1976. I can easily be described as eccentric, and my life is indeed complex. I try to balance passion/emotion with logic/reason, but I've probably started leaning more toward the passion side of things in the past three weeks. Abundant health? Dubious. But three out of four's not bad, and comparing myself to the other eleven options, this one is at least in the top two of matching me (Ox's description is about equally close).

Josh was born in 1980. He is quite intelligent, and he controls my mind with sonic pressure (in-joke.) I will respectfully decline to comment on the negative components.

Now, I don't believe in horoscopes, zodiacs, etc. It's just some guy sitting in a room, making up stuff, as far as I'm concerned. But the law of averages suggests that, just like those random-number-generated memes over on LiveJournal, every once in a while, they'll end up about right for someone. So maybe this is one for me and Josh.

Question: How long do I have to wait to marry my monkey so that it counts as "late in life"? :-)

davidh

I'm not sure there was any specific event that triggered it, but in May, I started feeling a little better about the situation with Aaron. Maybe it was that as the time grew nearer that he would be leaving, I realized that if things didn't get better before he left, chances are they never would. Maybe it was something else. I don't know. But whatever the cause, I knew that this journey was right for him.

In looking back on it now, it seems pretty clear that I'd been going through the classic stages of grief (denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance, though not necessarily in the usual order) regarding Aaron leaving. When I first discovered the note, there was Anger. Much anger. It's a very good thing that I had several days to work through that before he returned, because if I'd discovered that shortly before he'd returned, there's a good chance that our friendship would've been irreparable. But I got over it, and moved onto Denial... surely Aaron didn't really intend to leave; Melissa had probably just been exaggerating or playing, and Aaron hadn't told me about it because there was nothing to tell. The idea of me also moving to Alabama, while certainly a long shot, would've been Bargaining. From mid-March through most of April, my behavior was consistent with Depression... for example, I was withdrawn from and much less communicative with Aaron. That is really not a nice stage to be in, especially for that long, though I think Anger was a bit worse. And finally there was Acceptance, which is where I came to be in May.

Interesting... I used to think that the "stages of grief" thing was kind of silly, that Human behavior was both complex and diverse enough that it couldn't be boiled down to such a simple formula. And now I find that, at least in this case, it fit. Very interesting.

A few noteworthy events happened with Aaron in May. First, there was his graduation from ICC, which essentially raised the last anchor keeping him in Peoria. Then he filled up his car with possessions and drove down to Mobile, returning a few days later with Dave and Melissa in a minivan. There was a going away party, where Aaron announced that while he'd been down in Alabama, he had officially proposed to Melissa, she had accepted, and they had set a date. They left, with as many of Aaron's remaining possessions as they could fit in the van, the following day. He actually left quite a bit behind with me... a couple chairs and desks, a dresser, his bed, and the downstairs TV and DVD player being the most significant. It's kind of funny that so many items in this house were left behind when somebody departed... the refrigerator, dishwasher, and washer and dryer; all but one of the couches; several chairs, a lot of bookshelves. Technically, it's all mine, but I still tend to think of a lot of it like "That's Dave's chair", "That's Aaron's desk", and so on. About the only thing that I've really made the mental transition with is my cat Patches, and in that case, it's really more like she owns me than that I own her. :-)

By the beginning of May, it seemed like all of the other Psi Phi members who'd been participating at OkCupid hadn't returned in a while, and it seemed unlikely that anyone I knew would find me there. I decided to be just a little bit more open, so I changed my ID to "davidh_peoria", copied over my information, and added a couple of pictures. I marked the options "Friends", "Penpals", and "Activity Partners" in the "Looking For" blank, so that people would know that I wasn't seeking anything more than that.

After signing up under the new name, I started communicating with a few people on the site, including Kevin, in Bloomington. We mailed each other about Star Trek, games, and assorted other geeky things. After a couple of weeks, he suggested perhaps meeting for a meal sometime. Although it wasn't an inherently suprising suggestion, I did have to think about it for a couple days. See, I'd never been on a date before, and here was another gay guy asking me out. After giving it some consideration, I decided to proceed cautiously. We worked out a time that he'd be near Peoria anyway, and I met him at Culver's for dinner on May 30th. We talked about science fiction books, political satire music, and some other stuff. I had gone on my first date, and it was a good experience.

More on developments in this area next month. :-)

In Psi Phi-related happenings, we elected new officers (I remained Chief of Operations), I hired Xeen as my lawnmower (because I'm lazy and Xeen was looking to earn some extra money), and I helped Joel F. get his stuff moved into storage.

Other random things of note that happened in May, 2004:

• Google made an initial public offering of $ee9.

• I posted my first My Upcoming Week post.

• I made a very interesting discovery at work.

• Steve Mollmann sent me some secret messages in my blog referer. I wish the referer spam I got these days was as innocuous. :-)

• Enterprise's season finale left my jaw dangling.

• I saw The Passion of the Christ at the theater. This was, to the best of my recollection, the first time I've gone to the theater solo.

• I played Munchkin for the first time.

So that's pretty much my May. Stay tuned for a June recap.

davidh

"died"

Yes, Peter guessed correctly in yesterday's entry. I considered changing it to something else, such as "croaked", "expired", "redecorated", "pondered", or "sublimed"... but ultimately I decided that a lucky guess (some might say a "predictable" one) shouldn't deter me from writing the story as I saw fit.

In conclusion, here is the story:

Suddenly, his daughter collapsed.
"Why did you leave me?"
"I forgot my lunch."
"That's more important than me?"
"It was Mom's homemade pepperoni pizza; I love it."
Then she died.

Left ambiguous is who left whom. It could be that the daughter died of hunger, leaving her father in search of lunch, but not getting to the pizza in time. Or it could be loneliness, feeling abandoned by her father who himself got hungry. Either father or daughter might refer to her mother (presumably, his wife) as "Mom", so that's inconclusive.

This has been a rather interesting exercise. I'll have to try it again next November. :-)

davidh

For the past 99 posts, I've been allowing people to peer into my life: highs, such as the birth of my niece (#37), and lows, such as the unexpected shift in vacation plans (#51); new experiences, such as my my first Seder (#67), a Weird Al concert (#68), and my trip to Oregon (#53-62); frequently updated references, such as an index to the blog (#50) and my long-term upcoming calendar; abandoned projects, such as the Upgrade 74 tracker (#12) (I'm sure you're all disappointed that I gave up on that one); fun music stuff, such as Nickelback and Eminenya (#78) and Once More, With Hobbits (#77); and a lot more.

I'd like to know who's reading this journal. Whether you stop by every day, or just once in a while, or even if this is your first visit, please post a reply to this entry and let me know who you are. And feel free to include links to your own blogs, if you like.

davidh