ALL RIGHT ALL RIGHT ALL RIGHT, YOU GOT IT OUT OF ME:

I'm dating someone.

Now stop fucking pestering me about it.

Ann is an old friend of mine. We first met when we started working together about 8 years ago when I began writing at VH1, and I always found her incredibly funny, sweet, and intensely cute. Yes, this was 8 years ago, and as the years ticked by, we lost track of one another and then wound up working together at a friend's production company 4 years back, where we started to really get to know one another. After my mini-stroke, something she herself has had the pleasure of experiencing, Ann and I began to hang out fairly regularly, getting together for drinks or food or food and drinks every month or two and became close friends, keeping up with each other via the "I.M." on the "intertubes" or whatever the hell this thing is called.

Recently, following 2-3 months of intense self-examination and freaking out and my life flipping on it's ass and back again, I asked my friend Ann to go on a date. And she said yes.

ARE YOU SATISFIED NOW YOU NOSEY BASTARDS?

Laundry.

An issue that, for lo these past 4+ years, hasn't been much of an issue with me. I had, until recently, owned a washer and a dryer, and within the confines of these 2 metal boxes, I could guarantee to find myself a treasure trove of freshly dried, fluffed, and freshly softened items by a mere lifting of the lids.

As I have recently learned: Times change.

I now live in an 8-plex building with one washer and one dryer unit on the property. I had quite forgotten about jockying for position to get the stank out yo' clothing and unmentionables. (My unmentionables aren't really that unmentionable. They are cotton, mostly grey or black, and have the word "Jockey" stitched across the waistbands. I have been an advocate of the boxer-briefs for nearly 10 years now, mostly because boxers make you look like Dad during a weekend-football bender, and briefs...who the fuck over the age of 12 wears briefs? Underwear models and guys who tuck their tshirts into their underwear. That's who.)

I found myself tonight having to snake my way into the washer in between the loads of one of my neighbors. I gave the resting washer a good 10 minutes before scrambling downstairs and dumping in my stinking hamper. As I strode back towards the front of the building, I heard my downstairs neighbor open his door briefly and state flatly, "Shit," and close his door.

Sorry, friend. All's fair in love and a load of darks.

This morning, I pulled off a stunt I've been wanting all of my life to pull...

I was on my way to work (yes: WORK), stopped at a redlight, when on the other side of the intersection, my friend David sat in his Nissan, waving his arms and beeping his horn. The light turned green, we each outstreched our hands and high fived as we drove past one another.

You gotta set the bar high for your dreams, kids. As you havew just read, someday, they can be realized. No matter how big.

I have been sleeping for shit lately, until the last 2 nights, which have awarded me with 9+ hours and 8 hours respectively. Yesterday, at 36 years of age, I broke down and admitted to myself two things:

A. I'm 36 years of age and I sleep on a futon

B. The aforementioned futon mattress is thinner than the plot of a Cheech and Chong film.

I forged outside and to a North Hollywood futon store and discovered that - wha?! - FUTON MATTRESS TECHNOLOGY HAS FOREVER CHANGED. I purchased a mattress that is 11" thick and filled with both foam *and* springs. Pictured above, using a quarter for size reference, is said futon. I'm awaiting the cushion cover, arriving any day now, because it's being custom made, because my mattress is so fucking amazingly thick and because I am a big fucking deal 'round these parts.

As I might have mentioned (probably not), the building I've moved into is an 8 unit, 2 level apartment built in 1928, with all the built-ins a little (gay) boy could ask for. And Tony, the manager, informed me when I was checking it out for the first time, it is filled with artists and musicians, which is what truly sealed the deal for me.

No. Actually, 'twas the industrial grey carpet that did it. I have it covered with a HUGE throw rug, so don't worry: It ain't Rancho Depresso.

I have heard, on rare occassion, my neighbor, Lenny, practicing guitar (he is fucking amazing on acoustic and electric), and yesterday, my downstairs neighbor, Greg, was jamming...JAMMING on the sitar while I took out the trash. I tried to peek in his windows, hoping to see him draped in a kimono, sucking on a hookah, strumming away, but I saw nothing.

Inspired, I came back upstairs and lightly fingered my ukulele in shame, privately, in my walk-in closet, humbled. Then I said "fuck it", dropped my ass on the sofa and cranked out some Elvis Costello.

For just a few minutes, the echos of sitar and ukulele filled the street in front of 907 Sanborn Ave.

My new life. Wild.

I just hung up the phone after speaking with my oldest friend on the planet, Mike Kasper. He's married now to a friend of our from high school, living in suburban Chicago, working as a regional sales manager for Michael David Winery. Lately, we've been back in communication with each other, and it truly is one of those friendships that picks up right where we left off.

Mike in a nutshell: When speaking earlier of my separation from Dara, after feeding him some details, he asked, "Did you say you went on a date with a girl?"

Me: "Yes."

Mike: "Russ, you're supposed to do that when you're MARRIED."

That's my Mike.

Above are shots of us dating back to 1985 and '87. Our public behavior was regularly referred to as, "The Mike and Rusty Show". He got the chicks and the laughs, I got the...laughs. DAMN HIM!

It was 92 degrees yesterday in Hollywood. Where I live. Beaming sunlight and dry, hot air.

It's November, by the way.

I love autumn: The smell of crisp, fallen leaves, feeling the wool of sweater sleeves against my skin, the earthy scent of fireplaces being fired up in the nighttime...

It. Was. 92. Fucking. Degrees. Yesterday.

I saw shorts. Flip flops. Beads of sweat ran offa my bald head walking to and from my car. At one point, I heard a homeless guy say, "God DAMN, it's hot!", and that guy probably FEARS wet, rainy, cold weather (he also took a leak behind a park bench as I strode by, so he doesn't fear that much).

Amazingly, my new apartment has withstood the inferno pretty well. I own not so much as a fan, and it was fairly comfortable in the upstairs of Chez Russell during the heat of the day (I have the mass of trees surrounding the building to thank, pictured above). Which brings me to my point...

Where do I want to live? What do I want to do for a living? My entire world has been flipped on it's ear, with the - now - impending divorce, so....what's next? I don't think I can stand very many more Novembers without seasonal changes, and I really don't know if I can deal with television as a creative outlet/financial support for very much longer. The possibilities are mind-boggling. I'm beginning to assess what I want and get from Los Angeles, and what I want to get from life. I suppose I'll see how they match up.

In the meantime, sweat I will.

Yesterday, during my run at Griffith Park, I was about 1 1/2 hours in, padding up and down the horse trail hills on a gorgeous morning, passing hikers, families setting up birthday tents and moonjumps, a dude who plays a full drum kit almost every morning, and the usual array of horeback riders, when I approached 2 riders clopping up the path. As per usual, the courtesy is for runners/hikers to yield to horses, so I pulled over and waited as they passed. One of the riders tipped his baseball cap shading his bearded face and said, "Thanks. Have a great day!" I wished him well, and after they passed, it hit me.

"Steven Spielberg?"

Yes. Yes it was.

My mind raced back in time to two minutes prior, to all of the incredibly geeky responses I could have had to his simple, "Have a nice day":

"I've learned to hate you in the last ten years."

"Give me the idol! I throw you the whip!"

oh, and by the way, I refuse to mention the outcome of the date because, I mean, I don't kiss and tell.

Whoops.

I finally got my shit together and uploaded pics from the
San Diego 100 mile race.

Pictured, in a completely fucked up format (thank you blogger for the useless interface):

Bud, pre-race, at 5:30 AM. That billion dollar smile is forever on his face.

The burned out remains of a massive fire that streaked across the Cleveland Mountain range about 3 years ago. I love the new life blossoming from the decaying remains.

My "necessities" spread out: Headlamp, flashlight, food, and the smelliest pair of trail running shoes this nose has ever whiffed.

Me, heading out the door of my craptastic, $50 hotel room to Todd's Cabin Aid Station, around 10:00 PM. Little did I suspect that I had 5 hours of waiting for Bud and Darren to show up.

I have a date

It's true. She and I have set a time and (sorta) place for my first actual date in...ohhhhh....15 years?

I'm completely freaking out, in that good way, where I'm NOT sitting in a closet, weeping, trying to snuffle the whimpers. In that here I am state of mind, where I just enjoy the emotions rushing over me, not expecting a thing, just allowing the river of life to carry me towards whatever it is that awaits.

Jesus, what the fuck do I wear? I thought that a few hours ago. I mean, what the fuck do people wear on "dates"? I actually considered getting a thorough car wash. The 20 dollar kind, where you feel bad for spending that much for making your car sparkle, and some random bastards are forced to vacuum your ashtray.

It has been about 2 1/2 months since I have started searching new paths and directions, so I feel completely prepared to....date. Jesus Fuck, I'm really going on a date. How cool will THIS be?!

Okay, so the major life changes I've been avoiding putting in here have come to fruition:

I've moved out of North Hollywood and to Silverlake, separating from Dara and striking out on my own. This has been a terrifying, wonderful, sad, bizarre, and thrilling chapter in my life, and it is only serving to help me grow and blossom as a human being.

I never would, in a million years, have expected to be where I am now, physically and emotionally, but...here I am, and THIS is my new mantra.

Here I am. Only this moment is real. Everything from the past is a ghost and shadow, and relying on the phantoms of the future is equally as pointless.

Here I am.

I've been doing some (sometimes painful) work on myself, and there's mucho, mucho more to come, but all in all, this crisis has shaken me out of the cage I'd constructed for myself, all the while sitting quietly inside, polishing the bars to a high sheen. I'm outside now. And the world awaits.

Above is the kanji symbol for "danger". It's dual meaning?

"Opportunity".