Everyone Stumbles, Gets Tired, And Feels Like Crying Sometimes, But Don't Feel Bad, Don't Sigh, Puff Up Your Chest, And Let Us Hear You Say, I'm Home

--"Tadaima (english translation)", Do As Infinity

I was going to write my usual post about what happened fifteen or twenty years ago in my life. Instead, I got the brilliant idea for a post in the fact that I couldn't for the life of me find a song to translate as a topic. What follows is the scatter-brained and idiotic manner in which my supposedly intelligent mind operates.

Frustrated at not being able to find anything that sparked my interest in terms of post ideas, I turned to a ready and reliable source of musical inspiration, Myspace. Normally when I cannot think of a song to serve as a title I'll just take a whirl around people's profiles and find something that brings back a memory. Or, on the opposite end of the spectrum, I'll find a new song that really catches my ear. Either way, I can normally find a tune to work with within ten minutes of searching. Tonight, however, I found myself more fiddling with the songs on my profile than actually searching for the right song to get my creative juices flowing.

The trouble stemmed from the fact that, as a rule, I am usually floating a half dozen ideas in my head at a time. Tonight a couple of those ideas were a) I wanted to write a post before I went to bed, b) I wanted to get to bed before midnight, c) I didn't like the last video on my profile, and d) I was waxing nostalgic for Do As Infinity. So what started out as me screwing around on Myspace for songs turned into me clicking onto the Do As Infinity profile and "ooohing" and "aaahing" at songs I haven't heard for a couple of months. Soon, as per my custom, all thoughts of writing a post tonight were forgotten as I delved deeper and deeper into DAI lore on the internet. I began visiting old stomping grounds for DAI information until finally I visited another one of my favorite sites, YouTube, where I discovered they had a plethora of DAI swag. As I began to listen to all the old familiar songs, another piece to my posting impotence began to take form. I began to look for my favorite song by them, which, unfortunately, I had forgotten the name of. As I poured over page after page of DAI videos I could only cringe as each song wasn't the one I was looking for. It was twenty minutes into this endeavor that I suddenly remembered that I was on the clock for writing a post.

That's how I am, though. I have this idiotic "first in, first out" logic in my mind which states that I cannot move onto my next task until the first task is done to completion, even if that first task really could wait till tomorrow. I think I'm kind of O.C. that way. I refuse to give up on problems or dilemmas that I think should be easy. It bothers me when I get stumped. For instance, if a person asks me a riddle that I cannot figure out I'll get huffy rather hastily if they refuse to give me the answer when I inquire after one. Double that if they dare to tell me, "figure it out." I can't handle incompletes on my slate. Everything has to be done until I'm satisfied with the results. This meant that I was going to ascertain the song's title before even attempting to formulate the post you are reading now.

I finally chanced upon the title of the song, "Tadaima," after sifting through the fourteenth (!) page of Do As Infinity videos equalling about one hundred songs of theirs. I quickly watched it, smiled like a boy caught with his hands down his pants, and then posted it into the third slot of my profile. This solved two of my dilemmas--namely, satisfying my craving for DAI any time I want and replacing the third video, which I had gotten sick and tired of. Tragically, this brought up yet another task that delayed my writing.

It dawned on me that I wanted a translation of the song for anyone curious enough to watch the video and felt the compulsion to see what it would sound like in English. Again, I was on the verge of tears as the forty minutes of searching for a good English translation of the song began to appear for naught. No matter what I tried, I couldn't find the one place that would just tell me what I was hearing about. That's when the depressing thought that I wouldn't be able to formulate a post tonight crept in. I truly began to believe that I would be up all night searching high and low for this elusive translation.

I think this is absolutely the number one reason why I have a reputation for being strange or weird. I get fixated on tasks rather easily. Whereas most people would give up after about twenty or thirty minutes of looking, I went forty to fifty minutes looking for a translation that probably no one will ever bother clicking on. I just had to do it. I mean--it's good for writing. Being thorough lends itself to being detailed which, in itself, lends itself to fooling the audience into thinking what you're writing about is actually real. In "real life", though, it gets rather tiresome. I almost would rather be less stubborn if it meant I could go to bed earlier. I cannot even count how many times I've caught a case of the insomnia because I was up dallying on the net for a project that only I would see.

As it turned out, I finally found my translation, posted it up, and smiled in relief. I had found everything I'd wanted to find tonight. And, as serendipity would have it, I was struck with an idea for a post after all. I wanted you all to see what a tiring framework my mind operates in and give you a taste of the frantic pace with which any and all idea come to be in my head. I never seem to do something from A to B. It always seems to be a matter of A, sidestepping to C, which brings up D,E, and F, which finally works itself out in the end and gets me to B.

Remember, all I wanted to do at 9 p.m. was find something to write a post about before 10. And here it is 12:30 a.m. and I'm only now finishing up this piece. Yet, somehow, this is what works for me. It's how I can appear to be doing a million things at once when in actuality I feel like I've been stalled on the same thing for a century. It's also how I learn a cavalcade of bits of information. Perhaps if I didn't fail so many times trying to look up one idea, one name, one translation, I wouldn't actually be as well-versed in the variety of topics I feel I'm competent to converse about.

So there's my post about my (sort of) frantic night. It was touch and go for a minute. I didn't think I'd be able to come up with anything but, somehow, I brought this baby home.

Yours Swimmingly,
mojo shivers