The Body of a Journalist
I finished the latest volume of my journal this evening. I sleep soundly knowing I have in place arrangements to have them destroyed, one and all, unread by any eyes but mine, in the event of my demise. I'm counting on you, my friend (you know who you are), and I know you won't let me down.

Volume Zero: 8 October 1991 - 9 June 1992

This volume was an assignment for Mrs. Horvath's seventh grade English class, in which I sat next to Dylweed for most of the year. (Score!) We were required to write in our journals, so they were inspected, but were were allowed to mark our entries as unfit for prying eyes, "Do not read!" I hope that this requested was respected, and that the inspections were simply to confirm that we were writing, because I wrote my most private thoughts in that journal. I was in middle school, so those thoughts were mostly about a girl named Heidi Plumb, for whom I felt an unrequited "love." Ah, the folly of youth.

Volume I: 5 March 1994 - 2 June 1995

Jumpin' Jack Pratt, my handwriting was HUGE back then!

Volume II: 3 June 1995 - 23 April 1996

A ninety- instead of two hundred-page notebook.

Volume III: 25 April 1996 - 9 September 1998 (Wednesday)

Began recording the day of the week on 26 April 1997, a Saturday.

Volume IV: 10 September 1998 (Thursday) - 21 December 2001 (Friday)

Volume V: 22 December 2001 (Saturday) - 4 July 2004 (Sunday)

Volume VI: 4 July 2004 (Sunday, cont'd) - 12 November 2007 (Monday)

Volume VII: 13 November 2007 (Tuesday, probably) - ????

There are periodic flights of fancy in which I wish that my journal was preserved in exquisite red leather-bound tomes, but the notion is ridiculously impractical. Instead, the splendor of my madness is laid bare in unassuming Mead spiral-bound notebooks, with the pen-of-the-moment clipped inside the spiral.

The Rebel Black Dot Song of the Day
No Doubt, "Ex-Girlfriend" from Return of Saturn (T.L.A.M.)

Commentary: I try not to allow the monster Gwen Stefani has become to taint all that No Doubt once was. Return of Saturn is just an album, and an uneven one at that, but Tragic Kingdom was one-half of the soundtrack of my high school years.

Samstag, 10 November
Palooka-ville, "She Gave Me Pudding Cups" from Falling Off the Doghouse (T.L.A.M.)

Commentary: Ki-El is a rock star!

Freitag, 9 November
The Lawrence Arms, "Chicago is Burning" from Plea For Peace (T.L.A.M.)

Commentary: Years hence, my erstwhile friend The Plate and I attended a show at The Shelter, the basement of Saint Andrew's Hall in blessed Detroit. We were there for The Anniversary, who turned out to be a crummy live band, but first we had to survive the opening acts. The first, Har Mar Superstar, was bar-none the worst live act I have ever seen (I can endure anything, because I've endured that); The Lawrence Arms is nothing to write home about, but after the opening horror they seemed, as we remarked at the time, like the second coming of the damned Clash. I will forever be grateful to The Lawrence Arms for saving us from Har Mar Superstar. "The horror, the horror...."

I once remarked that the true measure of my wickedness is that even after all I have done I sleep the sleep of the just.

And as I end every journal entry, Until tomorrow, my friend.