I'm sitting in the apartment, so I suppose this is my first official entry from the new world. I haven't gotten quite straightened out yet, but I'm working on it and the end is most definitely in sight.

Maybe an update is in order. Let me see ...

Well, Carmen stayed the night Saturday. We cleaned up some. We ate. We talked. We finally made love and managed, somehow, to sleep together in that twin bed. I'm not sure how I feel about her right now, but its nice to think about. I am far from in love, and have only just begun to feel anything at all, though whether due to real affection or simply loneliness I've yet to decide. I suppose time will tell, as always.

I haven't talked to Tony since starting this. He probably thinks I've changed my mind and don't have the nerve to tell him. I don't know. Wouldn't surprise me. I do know this, and its only partly to do with Tony. I have to get back into playing. Things here will be rough enough as it is. I am going to need that extra
money.

Southern Bell was supposed to put in my phone yesterday, but hasn't shown. All I can figure is that they came in the morning when I was at work. Lynn doesn't work tomorrow, so it will be Thursday before anything can be done about it. Its mildly ironic that I should get back onto Delphi just hours before I was to be stranded without a phone.

And speaking of which ...

I got my e-mail from Delphi. Jesus. What a waste of money. Two of the four letters were from Faith. They were very impersonal; brief, obligatory details of how her life was now, or rather reasons why I shouldn't write or call. They both sounded very well thought out and rehearsed.

Another of the letters was from Marti, a lady whom I talked to a lot online, who tried to help me when I was stuck in Florida. It was nice. She told me she missed me and said that I had touched her life. It was warm and friendly, and really stressed the formality of Faith's messages. I dropped her (Marti) a few lines before signing off, but haven't had the opportunity to sign back on to check for responses.

I've been exchanging messages with Kris Retz on Prodigy some. She seems guarded a lot of times, and seems to talk to me only out of some sort of obligation. Maybe I'm just too sensitive, but a lot of her "good natured ribbing" seems to have a certain edge to it. Not that I blame her. Its just sad for me.

Oh, well.

The CD I had playing has stopped. I have a stereo again. Or, rather, I have a power amp and some Pioneer speakers (the latter of which Loretta loaned me the money to buy). It isn't the most likely setup one could imagine, but it works.

So ... here I am. And that is the state of the union.

I just wasted $25 on a power strip and a surge protector so that I could hook this computer back up, only to discover that it wasn't the power strip which had crashed, but rather the outlet receptacle. When it rains, it pours, huh? I may try to take the power strip back. I don't need it and could use the $13 I paid for it.

Now, of course, this means the computer is operational and I have the opportunity to explore myself and my words again. It can be as quite here as I like, and now that I have a stereo I can play ambient environmental recordings to mask any sounds which might annoy me. So this should work.

Time will tell ...

I have the 1992 Writer's Market and Poet's Market books. I think I'm going to go ahead and start submitting poetry, but will wait on the stories until I get the Write-Pro software.

All in all, I feel good here. I am a little lonely, but I'm sure that will pass. The silence here feels good. Very much so. And I feel optimistic about the future, probably because there is no one here to tell me I am out of my mind. That's a change I welcome.

So we'll see...