PERSONAL AND CONFIDENTIAL
[RED] - INTERNAL ONLY
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START

this is an exact copy of nics web journal as it appeared on the previously mentioned web site from 12 apr until 11 may. after 11 may no new entries were posted. after 2 jun the web log was removed from the site and no other content has ever been posted there. -#

First Post
12 April

Looking back, the stunt with the anonymous email to the guy in the bookstore was not the best thing I could have done. Yes, all this had just started and, at the time, I was pretty sure I was going crazy; but still...

Spilled milk I guess. On the bright side, as far as I can tell nothing ever came of it. I wish I could have # take a look, but that would mean letting him know that I had contacted the guy in the first place, and that is definitely not a good idea. I think the guy's name was Paglia; something Paglia. Hopefully he'll be able to stay out of it.

Which brings me to the next in the long string of ridiculous things I've done since this all started. This journal. Blog? I'm pretty sure that this is the stupidest thing yet, but I've got to have a place where I can keep notes and think things through. I've got access to just about any gadget I could use for this type of thing through E, but I'm sure every keystroke is logged and analyzed by someone; probably #. And even after all I've been through with these guys I still don't completely trust them. Any of them. Except for, maybe, S. And it wouldn't surprise me if she, not C, was running the whole show.

So anyway, I got this free site using the standard cuts and kept the 'under construction' page as the home (in case anyone ends up there by accident) and set up this freeware web log software several directories deep behind some software that # says (in the course of an unrelated conversation) should keep the sub-directories from ever being spidered by the search engines. Just in case, though, I'm going to use my own set of synonyms for any names or words that E or # might go looking for.

I don't think I'll spend too much time catching up on things since the beginning. I'm sure that as I update information on certain people and things any background I have on them will get documented. I guess I can save time by copying some of the 'official' information from my notes to E. We'll see.

Took a while to get this software installed, so I think this will be it for tonight. Haven't heard from C for a couple weeks, so have had a little time to think about things. I can't believe it's been almost a year. I'll make some notes on that, too.

Second Post
13 April

Looking over yesterday's entry really made me stop and think about a couple of things. For one, even when I wrote it yesterday it didn't hit me that it has been just about a year since C showed up and dragged me into this. Well, maybe not dragged.   How about opened the door and made sure I almost understood exactly what I would never know for sure if I didn't walk through.

May 16th. Full moon. You know, I never even found out that guy's name. With all I've gotten involved in, with the absolute freak out that I went through in the weeks after that first night, the image of the silver sand under the moon never leaving my head; I never had any more to do with that. And C never went after him. Or the girl (because she must know). Maybe he sent someone else. Maybe I can find out.

It wasn't long after the night that C came back and laid it all out, about E and all of it. I asked him what the guy from the beach was. I asked him if that had been a vampire. And C was dead serious when he said that there were no such things as vampires. That comment is much funnier now than it was then.

I guess it was that night, the night that C showed up again after leaving me standing on the beach at John's Pass, that I started getting over it. It's hard to say why, exactly. C is a very calm and rational guy (generally). Very confident. All the information about E seemed to make sense (at least in the context of what had happened to me and what C said E was trying to do.) And, really, nothing had changed. I had experienced this very strange thing, this thing that pushed me right outside normal reality, but absolutely nothing else was different. I did not all of the sudden have some special vibe. I had not become "sensitive", seeing flashes of the future (although that was a good movie). The only difference was that now I knew that sometimes impossible things happen.

But you still have to do the dishes.

That last comment reminds me of something C said during one of those first meetings. He said "The absolute worst part of all this is that there is no mystery; no initiations, no secret handshake. It is just a job, and the only real satisfaction is that you get to know. You get to KNOW what almost everyone else in the world has to wonder about. But in knowing, your world turns a little more grey. You never again get to wonder at how fantastic it would be if the unreal were real - because now it is just another part of your reality."

Bookmarklet
14 April

This software is pretty handy. I was going through some of the other features and I found this one called Bookmarklet. It is a little subprogram that resides on the browser's bookmark bar (or in the bookmarks section I suppose) and lets you, with just one click, send the link for the web page you are currently viewing, along with comments, back to your web journal and post it. You don't even have to log in. I guess this whole online journal concept is referred to as blogs or blogging, and I have to say that this is an unfortunate term. Just sounds stupid.

I've been checking out a bunch of these web journals (unlike mine they are public and try to get as many readers as possible) and man what a bunch of crap. About 95% of them anyway. Looks like these things fall into about three categories; journalistic and political (some of these are OK, but a lot of kooks), links (just a bunch of links to other web sites or other web journals, some are very useful), and diaries (this is most of them, and almost all are very bad or very sad).

I wonder why so many people would want the rest of the world to read their diary. So many are exactly what you would find if you broke into some 16-year-old's bedroom and popped the lock on her personal journal; full of angst and hormones and misunderstanding and, for the most part, not interesting in the least. And some are exceptionally sad. Some are more than a little scary. But I guess there is a type of validation in someone else, someone you don't know and never will, knowing your secrets. I wonder how Socrates would have felt about a life examined by everyone in the world who has a computer. One starts to feel that the over-examined life is pretty tedious.

Which brings me back to the process of over-examining mine. Even if I had the opportunity, I don't think I would keep a public blog; too much pressure to perform. And even for the very small percentage that are good (well-written, insightful, sometimes profound) you wonder why those folks don't write for a living. I guess some of them probably do. I noticed that Neil Gaiman keeps a very popular online journal (mostly links and answering questions from fans), and I've always liked him.

Long pause there. I was just thinking about how much I've always liked Neil's stuff. And why. And then I had one of those moments that I've had quite a few times in the last year and now I can't think straight. Gonna go for a while and look through some of my old Sandman comics (I think I actually have #1 somewhere). More later.

Bookmarklet Test
16 April

Watched Bulletproof Monk last night, and I checked imdb to see who played the 'Nazi Girl'. (Not who I thought it was.) While I was here I thought I'd actually use the Bookmarklet - looks like it works.

The movie was just what it was supposed to be; a special effects heavy, slightly better than average, super hero story made in Hollywood. I'd say it hit right in the middle of the expectations meter.

As to the premise; well, I am no longer the right person to comment on that.

I was not able to find any of my old Sandman books (very annoyed, but I think they may be in the storage unit) after that last bit the other night, so I went to the library yesterday, but, of course, they only had 2 or 3 graphic novels - all mass market, super hero stuff. And the only book by Neil Gaiman they had was Neverwhere. I read that when it first came out, and really enjoyed it, but I don't recall anything in it that might shed any light on the 'feeling' I had 2 nights ago.

I don't want to comment more right now on the Gaiman thing, I want to go through the books again and see. I'll try Borders tomorrow. And there are also the Books of Magic. But this isn't the first time in the past year that I've had a feeling like this. We humans like to make connections, even when there is no real connection to be made. There is so much 'magic' in western pop culture; movies like this one, thousands of books and TV shows, scholarly articles and goofy, new age crap. 99% of all that is just what it is; entertainment, fiction. But with so much of it EVERYWHERE, it would be impossible for some of it NOT to hit close to the mark - even if the person who wrote it or created it had no idea what they were talking about.

It's getting late and it has been a long and tedious week, so maybe more on this later. Maybe I'll just leave Neil a post on his web site and ask him. I think I'll check in with C tomorrow, this down time is getting to me.

Relinfo: Thule-Gesellschaft
18 April

More a bit later, just sending this reference to the site: Relinfo: Thule-Gesellschaft . C seems to think there may be something interesting here, checking some recent references # picked up somewhere. Looks like I have more German than the rest of them. I need to brush up on the history too.

 

Across the pond
19 April

I had a pretty good idea where this was heading. I'm on my way to Germany. I'll stop for a layover in London and hook up with C, and then on to Bonn. I should be able to update some notes along the way. We'll see. Probably good to keep a low profile re: this with C.

Test from new phone
21 April

Regardless of how secure this is, should keep it discreet for now re: C and otherwise. Not too sure about this one - some good new gear, though. posting from new phone. We'll see if this works. Probably no other posts until back in the states.

Back at last
11 May

Well, that was a long trip. Just got back a little while ago. The mail's all piled up, neatly at least thanks to Carmin, and that's just the physical mail. I haven't even bothered to look at the e-mail yet. I may just crash for a day or so. Couldn't sleep at all on the flight back, and then got delayed at JFK.

As I said in that last post I didn't plan to make notes to this thing while I was over there (turned out to be mostly impossible anyway). And after things started happening I don't think I even thought of this. Now that I'm back, though, there's a bunch I'd like to put down and think about. And a bunch more that I think it would be better not to write down. We'll see. Too tired to think.

END