I woke up this morning, as I have on many mornings over the last few weeks, unable to go back to bed. A lot of things have been taking their toll on me recently including classes, personal relationships, the constant horror broadcast by the media nowadays, work (or more appropriately, the lack of it), sensory and information overload from every quarter, constantly questioning my role in this world, etc. Unfortunately, this morning I hit the snapping point and took my stress out upon the rest of the world. Primarily this was done via the Internet through email and social networking sites. If you received a weird message from me, just disregard it — I’m feeling much better now. I came really close to doing what Howard Beale advised everyone to do in the movie, Network:
That would have meant I would have spent most of the day in jail. Luckily though, I was able to chill enough to go back to bed. I was awoken five hours later by a visit from one of the people to whom I sent a crazy, obscenity-laced email. Big ups to Linda for understanding that I was under a lot of pressure. I couldn’t quite articulate what I was feeling, but I think she understood. Later, I realized that a verse from the Green Day song “Having A Blast” came closest to expressing my feelings:
Do you ever think back to another time?
Does it bring you so down that you thought you lost your mind?
Do you ever want to lead a long trail of destruction and mow down
any bullshit that confronts you?
Do you ever build up all the small things in your head
To make one problem that adds up to nothing?
Anyway, I blew off most of my plans for the day to unwind and de-stress by playing miniature golf, visiting the batting cages and hitting the arcade at Adventure Landing in Raleigh. It was a lot of fun and worked wonders for my overall stress level, especially a game in the arcade called Silent Scope. In it, you shoot terrorists with a sniper rifle-shaped controller. Mmmm, fantasy violence… makes me think that I missed my calling in life. Best of all, it kept me out of trouble. 
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