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As the personal odometer prepares to tick over another digit, I have been contemplating the events of the past year. I feel a mixture of excitement and apprehension regarding the impending celebration of my birth. That's natural for anyone, I suppose, but this year seems... Different.

This past year has been filled with struggle and accomplishment, rebirth and disappointment, the loss of old beliefs and the acquirement of new ones. It's been a busy year alright.

I have smiled and cheered for my best friend who overcame all odds to achieve his dream.

I have seen a wonderful change in my personal hero, who has finally thrown off the personal shackles he was chained with and is living life to the fullest and is finally, truly happy.

I have cried for a friend who died so senselessly, his murder unsolved and the culprit still running free.

I made a new friend who challenges me and threatens me to go for my dreams, no matter how silly they are, or else they will kick my ass. Heh.

I finally met an old friend I had never met beyond the confines of text and the occasional phone call, took them tubing with me and we were both relieved to discover that neither one of us was a psycho axe murderer in disguise.

I discovered that another friend of mine will most likely die within six months and there is not one current medical cure in this world that can stop it.

A person that I know well is a person I recently found that I don't know all that well after all.

I mourned the loss of Gerald, my old Ford, and celebrated finding the TARDIS, a vehicle that proves awesome in its own right and is reasonably affordable to boot.

I nearly died, but I didn't thanks to current medical cures that do work.

I became a Captain and a pirate, neither of which is connected.

I learned to accept constant diarrhea as a way of life and have been fighting with the Truth that I can't eat whatever the fuck I want to anymore. (I'm sure y'all LOVED to read that line... Sorry.)

I mourned the loss of fried food, BBQ, Dr. Pepper, Cheeseburgers, steak and lovely, lovely bacon.

I learned to eat like a communist, but realized that it's still ok to not like it.

I raced down Der Bahn a couple of hundred times, leaving my win/loss record at 214/8, certifying once and for all that Der Bahn is my bitch and Mother Schlitterbahn is my church.

I went tubing as much as was ridiculously possible. Until mid-October, no less.

I worked my ass off.

I actually wrote my ass off as well.

I wondered where my ass had gone.

I wrote this entry.