drainedHad kind of a melancholy evening. Since I got up late my day was shifted. I was reading a number of MiSTs of old Eyrie fics. Last night I was going a completely unrelated Google search and one of the first links was, oddly, a MiST. I checked it out and that brought be to some of the MiST groups who had done, or are doing, work on UF, NXE, WL, and HL. So I was reading through them.
It kind of got me down. Not that people were MiSTing our stuff - I've told people before to feel free to do so. And some of the nastier jibes aimed at the authors (i.e., me or Gryph) weren't nice, but I have thick skin. What got me down was mostly nostolgia. Because they were mostly stories we wrote back in the early 90s, and it reminded me of those days. More friends concentrated into one location, fewer responsibilities draining time and energy, and life seemed to be more fun. Made me wonder what the past 10 years really amount to, what I've really accomplished. It also makes me wonder where my drive and energy, and optimism, went. Even then I was a bit of a cynic, but I remember being a bit more optimistic about life - of course, I also remember being a lot more naive. Perhaps it goes hand in hand.
It also got to me a bit because I was reading what we wrote 10 years ago, and it struck me again how *bad* a lot of it is. And I know that at the time I thought it was great stuff. So I have to wonder, since I think the things I do today are pretty good, but maybe everything I do is lame and I just need the perspective of time to realize it.
Anyway, around 01:00 I decided I should go get something to eat. I tried Ground Round, but they closed at 1:30 and it was too close when I got there. I hate being a dick and coming into a place 10 minutes to closing. So I just kept going down Route 9, not really going anywhere in particular, and in a mood to just go in one direction and see what happened. Turns out Harry's is open until 2AM on Friday and Saturday, so that's where I stopped. It know it isn't high class dining, but I have a soft spot for a casual diner with good food. And I really dig their chili. So I got out of there a little after 02:00 which a strong desire to do something social.
2AM? Great time to decide I'd like to hang out with someone. Or even to go someplace with people. I suppose there *might* have been somewhere in Boston open, but Worcester? Yeah, sure. Other than Denny's or The Kenmore, I doubt any hangouts were open - and I'd just fed anyway. Made me miss Berkeley, always things open until 3 or 4.
So I drove around listening to a CD (Magdelen Hsu-Li 'Evolution') and thinking. I drove around Worcester, up past Bancroft Tower (nice to see people still use it as a place to park and make out after the bars close), then around and through the WPI campus. I think that might not have been a good idea, it just made me melancholy.
I thought about calling
impykins, but I'm not that rude a bastard. I know she was working today and was sleep deprived, and I think she might work tomorrow, so calling after 02:00 seemed rather a rude thing to do. (And sorry I missed you call this afternoon - my cell was off. My boss called while I was out sick yesterday and I turned it off after that so it wouldn't wake me again. Plus my cell reception in my apt is spotty - I live in a basement apartment on the side of a hill. My landline is more reliable.) I guess I should crash soon, I don't want my hours all reverse for Monday morning - the new VP starts and I should try to make a good first impression. 