It�s been a busy holiday weekend to say the least. I kicked it off by celebrating my one of my cousin�s 21st b-day. We got a table at a swank joint called Enclave. His friends and I pitched in for a bottle of Grey Goose, which we had enough to cover in cash. The problem was he ordered another bottle of Jack Daniels, which took our total way over the top of our available cash. I gave my card to help cover the rest of the tab. Despite there being more than enough to cover a large portion of the bill, my debit card was declined for some reason. Luckily, my other cousin who worked there as a bouncer there was able to loan his card to us help cover the rest of the tab. After we drank up the 2nd bottle, the boy got blitzed almost an hour before last call and managed to get bounced from the club and was outside puking his guts out while waiting for his ride. I guess we�ll need to work on his alcohol tolerance if he wants to party with the big dog. =p Luckily we had a designated driver, who was willing to take him home early while I gathered the rest of the people who rode in with us.

Christmas day itself has been surprisingly nice this year. Despite my limited budget, I managed to get most everyone what they wanted for Christmas. It�s weird, but everything just seemed to fall into place without me trying all that hard. One of the toughest gifts to buy was my sister�s, because there was something I knew she really wanted, ever since last summer, but she knew that she couldn�t possibly get it because the price was out of the reasonable range for our income. The item in question was a Juicy Couture purse. I recalled she wanted it again as we were at Bloomingdale�s shopping for others. There she was like last summer just there dreaming of getting one but knowing that she couldn�t because it was well out her price range. Since I was buying gifts for quite a few others as well, the purse was a bit out of my range as well. My fallback plan was to get her a gift certificate, with the promise to fill in the rest once my money supply was replenished.

So the next day I went shopping with my cousin and told her about my dilemma. She suggested talking to her mom, because one of her favorite hobbies is �bargain hunting� at Bloomingdale�s and she may actually have significantly discounted Juicy purses on hand that she may be willing to sell to me at cost from her �collection� of new purses. So we passed by my aunt-in-law�s to pick up some of the gifts her mom wrapped for her and sure enough, she had a brand new Juicy purse on hand and she was indeed willing to part with it for what it cost her, which was close to one-third of the retail price. Even more serendipitous was the fact that I happened to have almost exactly that amount in my pocket (I was a dollar short), and being someone that actually enjoys wrapping presents, she was even more than happy to wrap it up for me. Even though it wasn�t quite the kinds of purses she showed me back in the mall, the kicker was that my sister was absolutely in love with the gift and the simple fact that it was the brand of purse she was dying to get all this time made it all the more awesome.

I also received a few gifts that I really wanted, but will probably have little time to enjoy them because of the demands of school and work. Among the highlights was the World of Warcraft for the PC, Final Fantasy XII for the PS2 and complete first season of the new Battlestar Galactaca series, seriously one of the best sci-fi series ever, its sexy edgy and a very compelling story, which is not afraid to explore the darker side of human nature. Gone are the flawless heroes of the original series, replaced by strong-willed albeit very human characters.

I know for sure that I�m not ready for the World of Warcraft. In reading about the game through the website I now know way more about the game than anyone should know about it without actually having played it. I know what classes I want to play, how to build them and what professions they are going to specialize in, ad naueseum. The only thing that stopped me from getting the game a few months ago was me knowing that the Burning Crusade Expansion is due out this January, and I have no idea which classes are going to be buffed and/or nerfed. Well that and the fact that once I start playing this game any free time I once had will be over because I�ll be spending my days, nights and every other free moment playing that game, and that probably won�t help my already suffering social life. So this game will be going on the shelf for a bit, at least until I�m on summer break or something like that. I�ll probably pick up the expansion too before I start playing the game hardcore. FF-XII is a little different. It will probably pour my time into it just as intensely, but at least there is a finite and foreseeable end to the game, maybe 100 hours of game time or so and not a persistent online thing like WoW. Battlestar Galactaca probably has the least demands, time-wise of all the gifts. I can probably do one or two episodes per night and maybe a back-to-back marathon session over the weekends.

In other news I had this unusual dream. It was one of those erotically charged dreams that seemingly come to me at times that are very few and far between. What was interesting about it was that the subject of this dream is someone who I maintain contact here in diaryland. I�ll try not to get into too many details about the dream itself nor will I get into any specifics about who it was that I dreamt about, mostly out of respect for the relationship that she�s is currently in, but even more importantly, I don�t want to jeopardize the friendship that we have developed over the time that we have known each other. Although I�ll never quite admit it directly to you aside from this roundabout blog confession, because of the nature of our friendship I do want to apologize, however indirectly it may be because I�m having these thoughts about you when I know I shouldn�t be. I�m not necessarily apologizing for the dream itself because what happens when I�m dreaming is largely involuntary. What I am sorry for is indulging in the fantasy after waking up from the dream and consciously wanting to go back into the dream to continue where I left off.

You know it�s weird, just when you thought you were through with the whole sexual desire thing, or at the very least thought you had a handle on it, the desire seems to creep back up on you when you least expect it. What�s even more interesting is that although the dream is sort of faded from my memory, I don�t specifically recall any actual sexual action, it was the intimacy that got to me the most. It�s amazing how much you can almost believe that one can get along without physical intimacy, but when you have been without it for so long, eventually you just can�t help but miss it. Until you actually have that hole in your heart you never really know how much a kiss or an embrace can melt that void away. I suppose the whole erotic dream thing was my mind giving me that which I could not acquire for myself. Personally, I wouldn�t mind having a few more where that came from, but like I said before, I have little if any control over my dream state.

Although I find it a personal travesty that I have been alone for so long, I also know that I�m the kind of guy that is made to love and to be affectionate and to give the best of physical intimacy, I know because it is so pervasive in my thoughts and in my dreams even when I�m trying not to have them and I know that during times when I am lucky enough to have them, I do all those things not just in thought or in theory, but in my actions. It is almost as if me being alone goes against the flow of the universe and every moment that I have to suffer being alone is a moment of wrong that needs to be righted. But I suppose for now, things simply are the way that they are and whatever I�m going through now are just things that I need to be going though. Whatever the case may be, I guess I just need to do whatever I need to do and simply let the chips fall wherever they may. So anyway, whether or not you celebrate Christmas, I do wish you a good one. Until next time...