I bought the new Hawksley Workman album today. Jonathan gave me a mini-CD of the first single, Anger as Beauty, and I was hooked to the unrestrained expressiveness of his voice. I’m generally not a fan of this type of music, but something about it has struck a chord with me.

I caught Anything Else at the World Exchange today. I went by myself, since no one I knew was interested in seeing it, and I didn’t think it would be appropriate to see such a movie with anyone else anyway. Going to the movies alone generally makes me feel awkward. I usually adapt the sense of humour I share with John when I’m by myself, which is of the “ludicrous” variety. For some reason, exaggerately bad situations can always make us roll on the floor in laughter, such as LL Cool J’s walk through chest-high shark-infested water to find his parrot in Deep Blue Sea, or Tom Cruise’s blindfolded search for sustenance in a fridge filled with rotten food in Minority Report. The more fucked the characters seem in a scene, the funnier it is. Unfortunately, not many people share this sense of humour, and I’ll be the only one laughing in the theatre. My muffled voice sometimes pierces the silence around me as my embarrasment about the inablitiy to control my laughter grows. At least with John there, I don’t feel so awkward about laughing at such things, even if we’re the only ones laughing. Anything Else, a movie full of painfully bad situations, had me cachinnating uncontrollably in a theatre full of silent watchers.

Sometimes I see the same movie twice with a large gap of time between viewings, and I understand the characters, thoughts, emotions, and actions very differently each time.

A few days ago, I came to the realization that I’ve been a different person in every relationship through my eight year dating period. Not all of me has changed, but there are a few aspects which I believe would be important in such a bond.

I’ve gained more maturity and more confidence. I’ve gained a fair amount of intelligence (though I still feel like I have infinitely more to learn). I’ve changed career goals, relationship goals, and happiness goals. I’m more outgoing, more tolerant, more secure, less pretentious (I hope), less arrogant, and less ignorant. I’ve changed my opinions on children, abortion, and religion. I’ve even changed my actions based on these shifting beliefs.

Although I view most of these changes as being good things, they may put strain on a relationship nonetheless. After all, change is change, and unless a relationship is strong and flexible enough, it cannot endure such stress. It’s a little scary to think that I may be bringing extra strain into a relationship, simply by being myself.

At one point in my inexperienced youth, after having changed a fair deal already, I believed that I wouldn’t change any more. Now I realize how stupidly oblivious a comment that was, and am of the belief that I’ll never stop changing.

The most important thing to keep in mind through all of this is whether the change is for the better, and as Tom has helped me realize, relationships (friendships or otherwise) should form around this idea.

Whether or not a relationship will work out in the end is not based on one person, but the foundation and dynamic of two people.

Living as a nocturnal being over the last week has caused me to sleep improperly. I wake up every three hours, drowsy and feeling exhausted, unable to fall back asleep again. This is the first time in my life that I haven’t really cared about my system too much. I only eat two meals a day now and go to bed between four and eight in the morning. It’s all worth it.

I’m thinking of buying Dolly a self-grooming arch because she seems to enjoy rubbing her cheeks against my stiff-needled brush. With the arch I won’t have to hold the brush against a solid surface for her, and she’ll be able to groom her whiskers whenever she wants. I set up a little perch for her at the sun room window so that she can look outside and smell the air. I made a little staircase for her using some milk crates and wicker baskets, but she hasn’t figured out how to use them to get to the highest point yet.

I watched Tricky Brains again yesterday. The only other time that I’ve seen it in my life was when I was too young to remember much about it. I do remember that I really enjoyed it though, and that it was one of the more emotional Steven Chow films. This is Chow at his best and the gags never stop coming.

I’m thoroughly exhausted. A fuchsia crescent pierced the sky tonight, and filled the sky with crimson clouds. Time for some orchestral pop noir romantique.

I went to the Royal Oak on Friday with quite a few people. Drew told everyone a choda story, his choda story, in fact, which just happened to be the most hilarious thing I’ve ever heard. I was quite glad that Aaron couldn’t make it, or he would have suffocated from laughter spasms. Unfortunately, I’m afraid that any stories I’ll hear from this point on will, at best, be irksome in comparison.

Saturday, Sunday, and Monday were spent hanging out with Aaron during his time off. Much table tennis was played. We watched Brotherhood of the Wolf, which was a decent movie, due mainly to the satisfying action scenes. The slow motion effect was used much too profusely, but there were some drop-dead gorgeous actresses throughout the two hour movie. We also watched Brain Candy with it’s rather random humour. I enjoyed watching it, even though it was the third time around for me, but I’ve always been a big fan of The Kids in the Hall. I only wish that Trolley was with us so that he too could have bathed in the spasmodic glory of their humour.

Today was spent at Mooney’s Bay with Tom and Mel’s group of friends in celebration of Canada Day. I had a chance to meet Aaron’s cousin, Ellie, who came from Edinborough, Scotland to visit. She had a nice, thick Scottish accent and tells me that there are quite a few Chinese people there with the same inflection. I might be heading out to a club with her and Aaron next weekend. Mooney’s Bay was greatly relaxing, aside from Ivana putting me on the spot with her intrinsic questions. I had the opportunity to catch up on some reading before throwing the Frisbee around.

And now, I need sleep.

I bought a pair of dark blue linen pants from America two weeks ago during one of Aaron’s shifts, and have been wearing them ever since. They have to be the most comfortable pair of anything I’ve ever bought. I’ve also been looking for a black collar, but nothing has really been turning up; stores usually only sell cuffs of the spiked or non-spiked variety.

My download of Super Troopers finished yesterday and I finally got a chance to watch it. I was expecting more humour, but the humour that was there was definitely of the gut busting, side-splitting variety.