Confidence

About fifteen minutes after I woke up this morning there was a knock on my door. I thought I had heard my landlord's voice earlier so perhaps there was some emergency he was going around to warn the tenants about. I open the door and did not see my landlord. "I take it you are the king of this castle?" It was some kid who I would guess might be 16 or so. He was incredibly obnoxious. He kept bouncing around telling me I can help him get enough points to win a thousand bucks to go towards a trip to some mystery location. He wouldn't say where at first, but he gave me a hint: "You can't drink the water but you don't want to down the worm if you know what I mean." He confused my flat affect with ignorance as I told him to cut to the chase. But no, he wanted me to read the question written in the red box on the card he was carrying around. As I closed the door on him, he thanked me in a way that tried to make it seem like I was the asshole in the dialogue. That kid was lucky that I was already awake, because if he had woken me up he would be trying to avoid sucking up the worm with his straw.

What astounded me about the whole interaction was the extreme level of confidence demonstrated by this kid. I'm not envious, as this little exercise shows that there is an upper limit where too much confidence makes you really annoying, but I am aware that the highest level of confidence I have ever demonstrated has certainly paled in comparison. Yes, there have been instances where I have demonstrated cajones, but those were more in response to some sort of adrenaline rush or some other breaking point. I visualize confidence as sauntering, not barging in guns blazing.

One of my pet peeves when I talk to people about my job is the initial response that I get 90% of the time. "I'm the manager at a bowling center." "Oh, I suck at bowling." Usually this conversation takes place in singles chat rooms (shut up) and it certainly takes the flirtiness out of the situation. I realize that they might think they are being self-deprecating, but that would be like me responding to a guy saying "I'm in real estate" with "Oh, I suck at selling houses." To me, it's a confidence issue. I would be much more comfortable with a guy that said "I don't like bowling" than someone who immediately discounts their abilities.

It's a bit strange talking about this topic. I felt so confident leaving high school and Oberlin did a fantastic job of destroying any and all confidence I had built up in myself. It is only recently that I have finally felt like I have been coming into my own. I've been out of school for 3 years: that's a long time. Don't worry: at this pace I will be like that kid when I'm in my seventies. I'm fairly confident in that estimation.

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Phase

I'm a little late getting out the post-reunion post. My excuse is that reunion weekend caught up with me on Tuesday and I'm still trying to revive.

I inadvertently scheduled myself for nine hours on Friday. Oops. When I got home I thought about just vegging out as preparation for the weekend but then the Mazurs invited me over for an impromptu barbecue. Part of the refreshments included a combination of leftover margarita mix and leftover tequila, though the proportions favored the alcohol instead of the mix. Did I mention that I adore tequila?

We played some bocce and Wii (I beat Brian in Smash!) and then I got a call from Zaldonis. Yay! Turns out he was staying with a friend who lives in another section in my building so I headed over there after dropping off some stuff at my place. It was great catching up with John and Kayla and meeting some new people talking about Oberlin, New York, and things in between. Staying up until 2 might not have been the wisest course of action with an alumni bowling tournament starting at 10am.

The turnout for the Funraiser was much higher than anticipated, even with the RSVP's from a Facebook invite. We actually had to turn people away, which was unfortunate. But I got to bowl with Clare, Meghan, and Colin and schmooze with quite a few other alums. Unfortunately, despite our camaraderie, we were not able to scrounge up enough pins to beat the current students. We'll get them next year. Afterwards we headed to Tom's house for picnicking, croquet, and cornhole. After spending almost the entire day at Tom's, I met up with Clare, Anna and Anna's boyfriend at Toooooooooo Chi-noise for dinner. We had a lovely meal and eventually made our way to South, which was the headquarters for the 5 Year Reunion. So many people!

I had to oil the lanes on Sunday and treated the afternoon as a rest period before heading out to meet Sarah on Tappan Square. We were to meet John and his crew for dinner but everything was packed. We eventually got a table at Lorenzo's and had a pretty good meal. Illumination had finished setting up as we ate, so Sarah and I wandered Tappan Square a bit until I got a call from the lanes. An emergency came up and I had to close, which put a damper on my evening.

Commencement went well. Sarah and I skipped out on most of the talking, opting to go to Feve brunch instead. We did get back in time for Fareed Zakaria's speech which was pretty good. Then people graduated. It's a little weird now: this class was the last class of students who were students while I was a student. Except for the few people on the 5+ year plan, there aren't any "peers" remaining in the student body. I'm not saying that in an elitist way, but now the students I know I met through my manager position. Eeek.

After the ceremony, Sarah and I got lunch, browsed downtown, played some Wii, then headed to the Union Street house to say "so long" to the fellas. "So long" includes GTAIV, Red Wings hockey, double entendres, and microwaving light bulbs (among other things). I'll miss those guys.

So now it's summer, I guess. Work is in a transition period and things are really quiet on campus. As for me, I met my initial weight loss goal for this year, which was to get down to or below 205 pounds (my weight at the end of Freshman year) and I now tip the scales at 195. I know! I'm using this week as the benchmark to try to lose 10% (thanks, Jenny Craig commercials) before Labor Day, which would put me at 176 pounds. Considering I've been rather lazy these past couple of weeks and have not suffered any negative consequences yet, I think once I get back into an exercise routine I should be able to meet that goal.

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Snooze

I love board games, but there are a few out there that make me uncomfortable. When I visited Amanda in Chicago a few years ago we stopped by FAO Schwarz where I saw the following:

I wish I could have found a good photo of the box. This game, much like its predecessor, requires precise movement to extract all the wacky objects implanted in your patient. It's like an episode of House. Unlike Operation Original Recipe, rather than tweezers you just stick your hand INTO THE HEAD OF YOUR PATIENT. Unsanitary. Also, one misstep and the nose lights up and your patient will squeal "Ooooooo! That tickles!" Ick.

The other game that causes great concern is called Don't Wake Daddy. I have not played this game, but I remember the commercial:



Let's discuss. First, there are a lot of obstacles en route to the fridge. That seems dangerous, regardless of time of day. Also, if daddy happens to awaken, he seems more like he is recovering from a night terror rather than being inconvenienced by his clumsy, clumsy children. Also, the way he shoots up is apparently physically impossible. And let's not forget the implications of child abuse that make the game FUN!

They have updated the game though. I was at Target tonight and walked past the endcaps in the toy department. Mostly it was Indiana Jones branded toys, but one endcap actually made me stop and look again. For 2008: Don't Wake the Hulk! That actually seems more realistic.

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Sedigive

I have yet to give any money to Oberlin since changing my membership status from "student" to "alum" 3 years ago. It's not like I haven't tried: I filled out the "Donate my matriculation deposit" paperwork completely the day it arrived in my OCMR yet the school still sent me my check. I certainly can afford to give but I feel no guilt about my current miserly ways. I figure I am already making a contribution by working for the school (as a wage slave, no less) and actually keeping one of the few profitable parts of the campus up and running and, dare I say, more profitable. I've actually tried explaining this logic to the student fundraisers (leaving out the profits part) but it seems to fall on deaf ears. Whatever.

Today I received a troubling e-mail. Here is how it began:

Dear Michael,

Hello, fellow classmates! I hope that this letter finds you well. I am not the most articulate when writing these types of letters. And, like you, when I see a letter asking for money, I simply throw it into the recycle bin. This letter, however, is different. The purpose of this letter is not simply to ask you for money, rather it is a letter designed to evoke your emotions and thus make you want to give back to Oberlin College.

Don't you love it when a form letter tries, and fails, to seem all personalized? I do give it points for the "throw it into the recycle bin" part -- I usually throw mine in the trash. Save your tar and feathers, it gets better.

I was thinking about starting this letter with some type of antidotal story, but I was not able to think of one. Then, I was thinking that I would just quickly tell you about the many changes at Oberlin, but the reality is that things haven't changed much in the past two and half years. While Oberlin does have a new president, the student body is still liberal, and they are still trying to change the world one person at a time.

"Antidotal"? Seriously? SERIOUSLY?! This person is trying to convince his fellow college graduates to donate money by using not just the wrong word but a word that Firefox is currently underlining with red? And Oberlin not changing that much in the last 2.5 years? Are you kidding me? There is a controversial new slogan, a couple new programs of study, new village housing with additional construction projects on the horizon, new scholarship and financial aid programs...none of these are worth highlighting?

He goes on to talk about the alumni website, which is a helpful resource from the various "antidotes" I've heard from others. But then:

While some of these options may not interest you, or you might be like me and want to do more, you can also give back with a monetary donation. The amount you donate does not matter because, like you, I know that things are financially hard being a recent grad. Nevertheless, I have decided to give back to Oberlin yearly because I want current students to have at least the same, if not better, experience that I had while at Oberlin. Furthermore, donating to Oberlin helps increase alumni participation rates. This is important not only for national ranking in U.S. News and World Report, but also for grant funding, which most ask for participation rates.

Besides the dubious politics of the U.S. News and World Report rankings, that seems like a pretty lousy reason to donate to the school. I would much rather my (currently hypothetical) donation go towards developing something more positive than elitism.

He concludes with:

I challenge you to walk with me in the pursuit of bringing Oberlin to the next level. If you have any questions, comments, or intelligent thoughts, then please do not hesitate to contact me.

Whenever I hear the phrase "bring [blah] to the next level", I immediately think of America's Next Top Model, where that phrase loosely translates to "we're dying your hair blonde." I don't think Oberlin would look good as a blonde -- it's more of a brunette.

As for intelligent thoughts: PROOFREAD.

Then I read the signature and busted out laughing. Apparently our '05 alumni shill happens to be a person who holds the distinction of saying one of the stupidest things I have ever heard in my time at Oberlin (7 years and counting). It was sophomore year in Dawson's Intro to Government class. A bunch of students were up in arms over some auxiliary staff getting sacked (this was when the College's financial future started looking gloomy). They wanted us to donate the class treasury (money collected from people who showed up late to class) to help out the recently jobless. This person made the argument that we should help them pay their cable bill, to which I asked "if times are tight, why not get rid of the cable?" His response: "But there are a lot of good shows..." We ended up donating the money to a recovering cancer patient. The alumni fund was not proposed.

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Perfect

So I've been sick for the last week or so -- a sinus infection thing that is as stubborn as its host. It usually happens once a year, so fortunately I've got the 2008 bug out of the way, though things still sound really tinny as I continue to recover. But today was the first day where I felt really, really good. Like, in a long while.

Last night I was all ambitious, thinking I would wake up fresh as a daisy at 7:30, get a workout at the gym, shower, and then head to work. I scored a 50 on that test, waking up at 8:45, showering and then hightailing it to work (Thursday is my early day). The weather has been beautiful the last few days and being able to walk to work with little to no trouble is certainly a perk. When I get to work, there is a note from Tom that Chris will be coming in to practice and wanted a pattern if possible. Since last night's PBA was still on the lanes, the hour I had scheduled for oiling now only required half that time -- bonus!

As Bowling I trickled in, Shaq asked if it was possible to prebowl after class. I told him yes, pleased with the knowledge that I would get to prebowl with someone else. You see, I hate prebowling. Besides not being a full recreation of the league experience, if I am by myself I end up rushing and generally do not bowl well. Having some to pace with helps me immensely. Plus, Shaq is a good egg so even if I don't bowl well I'll still have a good time.

Class finally ended and I gave Shaq the score sheet for prebowling. Practice went fine, with a number of errant shots made by both of us. When we finally started, we bowled TV style. This is where you bowl two frames in a row and then wait for your opponent to bowl two frames. This way each bowler gets to step back for a bit and there will be someone at the score table - two very important aspects of the game. Anyway, I was standing on board 19 and targeted 2nd arrow. I did not deviate from this position the entire session. I bowled a 236 the first game. I felt completely locked in and, despite a horrible loss of focus in the third frame of game two causing a gutterball, I regained my focus and bowled another 236. Consistent.

At this point, Shaq mentioned the possibility of me getting a triplicate. I have yet to accomplish that feat, and I agreed that 236 would be a great score to do it with. "Would that be a 7?" he asked. Realizing that he was about to do the arithmetic, I quickly said that we can figure out the math later, knowing full well that it would be a 708. I got the first strike and the second strike in my first turn. On the third frame, I sent the ball a little too far left. But the Black Widow Bite, my Platonic love, swung into the pins and managed to knock them all down. The next few shots were solid and I soon found myself with 8 strikes in a row.

I glimpsed at the clock to see that it was about five past one. "Good," I thought to myself, "Murray Ridge isn't here yet, so they probably won't be showing up at all." As soon as I finish the thought, they walk through the door. Murray Ridge is a service center for the Mentally Retarded and Developmentally Disabled. Every Thursday they come in to bowl and it is a really cool program. However, they do require bumpers, the wheelchair ramps, and aren't necessarily aware of the concept of lane courtesy. 99% of the time this is a non-issue. Today was that magical 1%. They were using lanes 5 and 6 and we were prebowling on 3 and 4. My ninth frame was on lane 3 and not an issue (strike). During the first shot of my tenth frame, Alan was waiting for me so he could pull up the bumpers. Strike. As I waited for my ball to return for shot 11, the Murray Ridge staff used that as an opportunity to pull a wheelchair up onto the approach and help the client get into playing position. I was able to shoot once they settled (strike). As I stepped up onto the approach for my final shot, I could hear Anne tell one of the bowlers "Ok, go ahead." I stepped down immediately as one of the clients grabbed his ball for a practice shot. In fairness, Anne had no idea that I had the first 11 strikes and that this was kind of a big deal. That didn't stop me from putting the ball down and saying "oh my gawwwwwwwd," whining as my "worst case scenario" unfolded before my eyes. I fanned my hand as the bowler on 5 completed his frame, thinking not about the shot so much as I thought "okay, you are locked in and it is ALL gravy at this point." I had my 7, that was what I wanted.

I get up on the approach. Shaq, Alan, Tom, Chris and one of his PBA friends are all there. I make my approach and it felt like almost all the other approaches I made during the series. The ball came off my hand the same way it had been, going over my target. As soon as I release I lock my eyes on the ball, my hand drawn to my mouth as if I am trying to remember the last item I wanted to add to my grocery list. It was a solid pocket hit - much more solid than the last time I was in this situation. Unlike last time: ALL the pins went down.

Once I calmed down and Shaq finished his game, we had Alan double check the scoring. Oddly, both games one and two had a 10-pin error, resulting in scores of 226 for both. That triplicate would have been less impressive, resulting in a 678 series. My final series: 752.

I just wish I could have been at the beginning of league tonight to see how everyone reacted to seeing the scores -- not in a braggy way, but rather to see what sort of response people would have seeing that one of their rivals bowled out of their mind. Unfortunately, it sounds like my team struggled and the only game we won was the third one. I haven't done the official tally, but I'm secretly hoping that we lose the third game just so I can razz them about "Hey, I did everything I possibly could, what more do you want?"

And I didn't have to use my AK. Today was a good day.

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Defer

So I haven't been updating much recently, as you might have noticed. It is not because stuff hasn't been happening -- quite the contrary. It has been a hectic month and I ended up crashing last week as a result of go go GOING without rest. Fortunately, everything that is happening intertwines nicely so this post should border on coherent.

So the end of March was Spring Break and I was facing the indecision about following through and going to Syracuse, remember? Anyway, I took on a project the remainder of Spring Break where I would try to talk with the President's office to see if maybe they could apply some top-down pressure. This required me to research the College's Strategic Plan, all of my timesheets since 2005, and dusting off my George Bailey crystal ball to predict what would happen if my position were left unfilled next year. Think of it as an immersion language course where the dialect is influenced by cost-benefit analysis.

I didn't get to schedule my meeting until after my trip to Syracuse. The drive there was a bit torturous, as I was really tired before the 6 hour trek and there's nothing all that stimulating on the New York Thruway. The weather was chilly and drizzly, something that could be considered a bad sign of things to come. But after checking out the facility, listening about the details of the TRF program, and seeing just how excited the current students still were 9 months into the program totally sold me. More importantly, I finally understood that I was beyond qualified for the program and couldn't imagine not participating.

Of course, a 6 hour drive there means a 6 hour drive back, giving me a lot of time to think things through. Yes, the program is exactly what I want to do. However, what I have been doing for the last 3 years would be completely erased with no one there to keep things going. Another major concern occurred to me as I put another $30 into the gas tank: I'm not in a position to move. Specifically, the brakes needing repair, car insurance coming due, visiting a potential grad school, and a slew of other unavoidable expenses and a dwindling savings account means that I could move to Syracuse but not do anything that cost money -- including eat or acquire toiletries.

So I have a applied for a deferment of my admission and my request has been granted. What this means:

I will be going to Syracuse in July of 2009.

I will be in Oberlin in the meantime, working on saving money.

In the event that my job doesn't become a real job (we'll call that "status quo"), I can use the next year to prepare the staff and the facility for transition. 14 months is way easier to work with than 10 weeks.

The best part is I think this solution works for everyone, especially me. When I sent my defer request, I did not feel any twinges of regret or despair. And who knows, maybe some more positive change will come out of waiting one more year.

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Supercouple

Back in high school, there were a number of pairings within my group of acquaintances that non-paired individuals often referred to as "Supercouples". The term, not always used positively, was reserved for those couples who could not be referred to by their individual parts: it was never Lamis or Ryan, it was "LamisAndRyan", "ErinAndCory", etc. Fortunately this was before portmanteau became the way to refer to couples, so the word "Rymis" never came out of anyone's misguided mouth. Come to think about it, none of those Supercouples are in existence today, though their individual components are all doing their own thing and have turned out fine.

There has been only one time at Oberlin that I have encountered the "Supercouple" phenomenon. It was my senior year and the weekend of that God forsaken bowling tournament in Pittsburgh. I was one of the drivers and the new guy on the team and his girlfriend were two of my passengers. I didn't really know either of them that well, but he was from the Pittsburgh area so if we got lost, he would be a good person to have in the car. Well, sort of. We got lost almost instantly, and he didn't know that area of the city at all. As we passed the final street we were supposed to turn on, I decided to turn on the next street to try to catch the intersection. Of course, Pittsburgh is not constructed that way, so when I turn I am faced with a 45 degree incline. This was back when I had my Lumina, so as the car struggled up the hill, the girlfriend mentions "I think I smell gas fumes." We were already about 45 minutes late, so this concern was added to the bottom of an already lengthy list.

Add in all the shenanigans after the tournament involving dinner, I don't think I made the most positive first impression. But as we got back on the expressway to Ohio, the two of them decided to sing a couple of songs from Avenue Q, a capella, apropos of nothing. I wasn't really in the mood, but I did make a note of just how, precious?, the whole thing was. It was one of those lucid moments where you fully understand just how compatible two people can be. I seem to recall joking with Meister later about how those two must have been married for years.



Well, they weren't officially married until this past Saturday. Congratulations Meghan and Brian!

And thanks for not letting a poor first impression on my part complicate things :)

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Google

I was hanging out with Sir Cucumber on Saturday and while eating dinner and watching Mr. Show he pulled up his data from Google Analytics. Basically, this site keeps track of webtraffic to and from any website that you specify, so long as the site has the special html/java code written in. This is how Ben, I mean Cucumber, found out that one of his weekly haiku entries on his gaming blog was linked by G4 (a video gaming news network) earlier in the day. Pretty nifty. As he checked again, the same entry was linked by Kotaku, a video game news blog that many gaming nerds flock to regularly (myself included).

You haven't seen "Geeking Out" until a gamer has his blog linked by another blog -- all demonstrated in line graph form.

Anyway, I decided to set up analysis for my blogs and the College Lanes site just as a curiosity. My second blog (which I haven't told anyone about yet -- be on the lookout) has yet to get any traffic, but RGD is actually getting some traffic. 5 unique hits. That's 4 people who are not me! Also, the reports tell you how people get to your site. One of the hits was from someone on Resigned Gamer. My favorite info point is what sort of web searches bring people to you.

Google the phrase "old songs kids still listen to" and see what site is at the top of the list. Awesome.

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Bluff

In case you missed it in my last post: I got into Syracuse. I'm not exactly jumping up and down about this development. I got my letters about a week and a half ago and the feeling I experienced as I retrieved the envelopes could best be described as "dread".

The issue here I think is motivation. I decided to apply to grad school towards the end of summer because I was pissed at how awful work was...at that point. Actually, it was going to be law school that I was going to focus on since I had an LSAT score that was set to expire. I also wanted to try to create some leverage with Tom to see if maybe, just maybe, my job might get turned into a real position. Of course, both Tom and I knew that applying leverage to the top of the boulder isn't going to cause it to move. It wasn't until the drive to the Pittsburgh tournament that Tom and I discussed the issue further. We eventually settled on the idea that perhaps grad school would be a better fit -- despite the obvious consequence of me having to leave the lanes.

I was still waffling on whether or not to apply, despite taking the GRE over Fall Break. I ended up seeing a therapist shortly after Thanksgiving due to some emotional and stress related issues. During the course of our first meeting, she suggested that I follow through with applying so that I could confront a fear of rejection that seemed to be coming up as a recurring theme in our discussions.

Syracuse did not hold up on its end of the "confrontation". I thoroughly did not expect to get in and I'm still a little surprised that I got into both programs I applied for. Honestly, I feel like Syracuse is calling my bluff, which...crap.

What sucks is that, despite the setback of last summer (which I know this summer is not going to be a repeat), I REALLY like my job. But it still isn't a real job and I don't know if I can afford it. But is the best alternative to take on what could be $40,000 of additional student debt? I haven't really told a lot of people yet about getting into Syracuse, mainly because the people who do know ave expressed their concerns about "what happens next"? "I don't know" doesn't put them at ease, specifically Tom.

James and I had a pretty lengthy discussion about the situation this afternoon. He brought up the good point that if I enjoy what I'm doing so much, why stop doing it? I confided in him that when I go to visit the campus next week, I secretly hope that I hate it there and see nothing but red flags. And then the fire alarms went off. My job still holds surprises.

I hate this -- I really don't know what to do. I have until May 1st to send in my matriculation deposit. It's going to be a challenging five weeks. Any feedback would be appreciated.

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Belt

So the always awesome Kathy has been blogging about her adventures in the realm of ritualized dieting and I think it is high time that I update about my own adventures.

It began with an epiphany of sorts during staff training last August. The first day of First Year Orientation is also the same day that the entire staff meets for the first time to go over procedures and introductions. One of the odd things about this year is that, up until February 29th, the days and dates this year matched up with my first year back in 2001 (I'm not an FTL! I'm launching, I swear!). For some reason, this bit of nostalgic trivia was bubbling on the back burner of my mind as I looked over the staff. The overly-athletic-or-at-least-otherwise-trim-staff. And then there was me. Back in 2001, I was under doctor's advisement that I needed to lose some of my 240 pounds, which, thanks to avoiding evil roommate and a co-op diet that included poorly cooked kale, I was able to do. I think the lowest I ever got was 205 by the middle of my first year - a number I gradually crept away from as the years moved on.

Although I did try going to the gym a bit more (as in, ever) during the fall, my motivation wasn't really where it needed to be. Specifically, the mantra "get thin for him" which...no. I'm sure there were tiny results, but nothing that counterbalanced the constant dining out and weekends spent with TiVo and Pepsi. It wasn't until I started getting information about this year's class reunions that I realized a major shift was needed. You see, this year's 5-year reunion is for the 02-03-04 cluster of grads. In other words, all the older cool kids when I was a bright-eyed first year. Thinking back to people who may have last seen me in 2002, I could honestly see their reaction being "wow, he really let himself go." Not really the best way to kick off reminiscing.

Oddly, I haven't treated that perception as a mantra during this process. Basically, I'm using Alumni Weekend as the end-date goal, which is so much more helpful than an open-ended process. Right now I'm just trying to get under 200 and I'm getting pretty close. I was at about 230 in December and, as of this morning, I'm down to 207. I'm less intimidated by the weight room, though I'm still befuddled by a number of the machines. Still, I'm learning, which is good. My endurance is much higher than I think it has ever been and I'm not dreading the process the way I have in the past.

There is one disadvantage I am noticing. I have this pair of pants that I call my "hot pants" (boot-cut jeans from H&M, NOT booty shorts) which I used to pull out for special occasions or when I want to create the effect of sausage casing. They have now entered my regular rotation because they are the only ones that fit me comfortably now - the rest are a bit too loose. I am also in need of new belts - partly because I am apparently too abusive to some, partly because a couple are too big and there aren't any more notches. Money is tight at the moment, so a new wardrobe isn't really an option at the moment. But I'm making progress. I just need a belt.

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