This is the entry I originally had planned for Friday but angst happened. I have been meaning to write it for a while now, but I kept putting it off because I know it will not be easy for me. But it needs doing.

So today I will try to list all my good points and put them all in one document so I can try to cobble together a positive version of myself that I can believe in, or at least try.

Let’s get the big obvious one out of the way first : I am crazy smart.

I have a massive brain (metaphorically speaking). I have been way too smart for my own good for my entire life. Schoolwork was always easy, I never studied for tests, yadda yadda yadda.

This big brain, along with an introverted and introspective personality (aided by having a lot of time in school where I had nothing to do but think), has made me quite the deep thinker. I have a deep understanding of human nature and why people do the things they do (handy for a writer) and a great deal of philosophical insight and political understanding in this bulging noggin of mind.

I also have the maaad verbal skills. I am a wizard of words, and the English language is my bitch. Verbal communication has always been easy for me, and I am a fluent and eloquent speaker with real knack for expressing both ideas and emotion with inspired metaphors and evocative language.

And other good word things.

I am also quite funny. I used to wonder about that, because I did not exactly make a lot of people laugh when I was younger, but something inside me compelled me to keep trying till I got it right and now I have had a lot of people either tell me I am funny or tell me how funny they found one of the skits I have written, and that is enough positive feedback for me to conclude that I must be one hilarious dude.

Why I haven’t written the next Hitchhiker’s Guide yet is beyond even me.

I also have a very sharp analytical mind, good with science and other quantitative disciplines. I am quite comfortable with working with numbers and I think I have a natural flair for accounting and business.

What can I say… I grok money!

But that is all brain stuff, stuck on that overbearing cold circuit of mine. Sure, I have a lot of impressive brain circuitry which could really make me an asset to any enterprise lucky enough to hire me, but what kind of a person am I?

Pretty nice, I think. I am sensitive and understanding towards others and I really, truly want to understand the world from their point of view. I firmnly believe that you don’t know anything until you have looked at the world from angles other than your own, just like you can’t know all of what an object looks like in 3D if all you have seen is a 2D photograph.

And I truly care about people. I really want everyone to be happy and I really feel for people when they are feeling down. I have a strong urge to help people and I have no problem with listening to people vent about their lives or express all the sadness and pain inside because I know how much good can be done by simply listening to people and thus helping them release their inner demons and let the ghosts inside them scream into the night, never to return.

See? Pictures with words!

In fact, when people share their innermost pain with me, I feel privileged. It honors and pleases me to be the trustworthy and understanding voice for someone, a midwife to their pain, a witness to their unburdening.

To me, it feels downright holy. I can’t think of a better way to describe it. It gives me the feeling of reverence and joy that I can only assume is what people get from traditional religion.

Also in my favor : I am an atheist, but I’m not an asshole about it.

I am also pretty charismatic. Not in a handsome actor way, of course, but more a combination of projecting personal warmth and the magnetism of my mighty and mysterious mind. When I am relaxed and not self-conscious, I can be the life of the party, or at least a compelling raconteur.

What else. I have a pretty good intuitive grasp of music, and I definitely could not live without my MP3 collection. In all things, I have pretty broad and far-ranging taste. There is good art and there is bad art and that is the only distinction that matters. All other categories like genre or cuisine are only tools to guide you towards other things you might like. They should in no way define or restrict you.

Go ahead, look around at what other people have on their plates. Maybe you will want to order it yourself some day, when you are feeling bored with your usual fare.

Oh, and I am, if I say so myself, extraordinarily independent of mind. I accept no authority and I test everything in the laboratory of my mind before I accept it. That doesn’t make me a hardcore skeptic (at least, not since I was 20) but it does mean that my point of view tends to lie quite outside the mainstream.

That gets you some pretty weird looks sometimes.

One last thing : I am also brilliantly creative. My mind overflows with ideas and I can come up with unique solutions for problems without a lot of effort.

So with all those wonderful qualities, does it matter that I am klutzy and goofy and not great with physical things? This is the era of information, after all. A good brain is far more useful than big muscles or agile hands in this day and age.

So sure, I have my limits like everybody else.

But overall, I think I am one heck of a guy.

Loyal reader and fabulous human being Felicity Walker has asked me to cover some topics on the ol’ blog tonight, mostly relating to recent events, and I live to serve^[1], so here goes.

Topic 1 : Woody Allen

Recently, the allegations of sexual abuse against Woody Allen have resurfaced because for the first time, his alleged victim has accused him directly and signed her name to it.

Said alleged victim is Dylan Farrow, and the allegation is that Allen abused her while Mia and Woody were still married. Dylan actually wrote a whole letter detailing the allegations and I think had it published in a full page ad to boot.

Well, you have to get people’s attention somehow.

Now I am not normally one to doubt people who make these kinds of accusations. As an adult survivor of sexual abuse myself, I know just how crushing it would be to finally come up with the courage to tell people about what happened, only to be doubted and attacked by fans of my abuser.

But these accusations originally surfaced as part of very, very acrimonious divorce proceedings, and sad to say, that changes things. If there is one circumstance in which people do horrible, unthinkable things like coach a child to lie about sexual abuse, or even convince them it happened, it is divorce.

So I have to wonder if this all started with Mia getting mad with Woody over something. I am not saying Dylan is lying. False memories happen, as much as we wish they did not.

However, none of that changes my utter contempt for Woody Allen as a human being. The deal with Soon Yi was quite enough for me to loathe him forever, thank you kindly. It doesn’t matter that she was not a blood relative. It doesn’t matter than they say the whole thing became sexual only after she was of legal age (yeah right).

What matters is the profound betrayal of trust, and the profound and contemptuous weakness it shows on the part of Woody. The temptation could happen to anyone, and no doubt happens to millions of men every day. Young girls are attracted to powerful, famous, funny, intelligent, sensitive men.

The difference is, most men have the moral integrity to say NO. Let them down gently, but say NO. Even if it is just out of a sense of self-preservation, they say NO.

You didn’t say no, Woody, and to me that puts you in the same category as any pedophile. You are just as bad as any bad babysitter or ‘weird’ uncle. You took advantage of someone far too young to know better just because she fed your lust and your ego.

And this knows no gender lines. Whether it’s Wood and Soon Yi or Mary Kay Letourneaux and Vili, the betrayal of trust for your own selfish reasons and the denial of the inherent wrongness of the actions is exactly the same, and just as repulsive to any decent human being.

So fuck you forever, Woody. When I read about these new/old allegations, I didn’t think “Oh god, how horrible!”

I thought “It figures. ”

Fuck you, Woody Allen. Fuck you till the day you die.

Topic 2 : The Nye/Ham debate ^[2]

I am glad that Bill Nye, unmitigated force for awesomeness, debated Ken Ham, the clown prince of creationism, about evolution et all recently.

I really am. It shows that people are finally taking ideas seriously again, and are willing to engage with them instead of us all hiding away in our ideological cubbyholes online.

Here is the video, if you want to watch it.

But I never will, and neither will Felicity, because honestly, it can only be depressing.

I mean, I am totally on Bill Nye’s side and I am told he totally kicked Ham’s corn-fed ass, but I don’t care. The fact that the USA still hasn’t gotten over the whole evolution thing is just too depressing and the creationist side is so incredibly weak that I can derive no pleasure from watching it destroyed.

To me, it’s like Crispin Glover picking a fight with Mike Tyson. You know who’ll win and you know it will be brutal, but nobody except people with neckbeards and a fedoras will walk away feeling good about the fight.

Not even if Glover really deserved it.

And honestly, I hate the radical fundamentalist atheist bullies who are crowing about this supposed glorious victory far more than I care about “the cause” of reason versus evolution.

So no, I won’t the video. I won’t even watch a highlights reel. Hell, I won’t even read the transcript. I want nothing to do with it.

The whole thing just reeks of sadness to me.

Topic 3 : Monty Python Recut

On a lighter note, check out this brilliant example of the editor’s art.

Fake trailer recuts that change the genre of the movie and thus radically misrepresent the film make me so happy. They are such a juicy form of satire that I can’t help but love them.

And that one is done so well that it makes me glad all over. A few of the cuts are a little cheap looking, and it is probably a little longer than it needed to be, but it’s still a work of genius.

Also in a jocular vein…

Topic 4 : Giant Russian Penis

So, this happened.

I do believe that Putin’s homophobic supporters just received the biggest teabagging in world history.

I support the move to uses penises in politics.

Heck, I still want to put a giant condom on the Washington Monument.

And speaking of humiliated homophobes….

Topic 5 : Rob Ford

Do I really have to bother with an actual story for this one? I mean, the man’s name alone has been a punchline for at least a month now.

Fuck it. I will catch him on the next public disaster.

(And I promise to have a LOC for you by Tuesday at the latest, Felicity!)