Crappy New Year

Well, we're a week in and already the year is shaping up to be one big crapfest.

New Year's Day my USB ports overheated, causing my computer to crash, taking out every digital photo I've ever taken in the process. I still have a few photos here and there - on various disks and at Facebook - but all in all more than 5,000 photos of mine have been lost, including pictures of various parties and events I've covered, most of which are irreplaceable.

The ring I inherited - the sale of which was to finance my purchase of a new laptop - sold for a whopping $62; it had been appraised, understand, at $3,000. This past week I discovered just what a racket is the jewellery business; a friend of mine had a similar experience with the ring he gave his fiancee - $2,500 he paid, and three months later after they broke up the jeweller he bought it from offered him $100 for it.

Despite the fact that it turns out I am actually hot stuff - if Facebook is to be believed, anyway - that turns out to be a minor consolation when compared to numerous crippling losses I've suffered in the same time period. And yet...

I'm still searching for that silver lining like it's the motherfucking Comstock Lode. Like a supermodel's lunch, you can't keep me down; despite failure after failure, not even occasionally lightened by a glimmer of success, I keep going. Why? It turns out masochism isn't a result of low self-esteem in my case, but a defense mechanism.

No one ever wanted to hope as badly as I do, despite every sign from the Universe that it's time to take a long walk off a short bridge. Professionally I am hanging on by a thread, having seen 18 months work destroyed through no fault of my own; at least these blogs are still up, although the way things are going I wouldn't count on them lasting either, especially given the technical difficulties that plagued them in November and December.

And, of course, none of the guys who think I'm hotter than magma in a Speedo lives within a thousand kilometres of me.