ive done my best over the last year and a half to adopt a new policy with regards to the way i live my life. a new set of rules, a new perspective. and its allowed me so much more freedom. the freedom to be happy no matter what the circumstance. the freedom to see the good instead of the bad. and although its not always easy, and because bad habits die hard, i occasionally revert back to my old self. and i really cant believe i ever lived that way. what a horribly stressful world i created for myself. a place in which if but one thing fell out of place, i lost sight of all the great things i have. tolerance, acceptance, gratefulness, freedom, spirituality. all things ive come to embrace in such a short period of time considering i knew nothing of these qualities until i met helen.

having said all that. and not to pat myself on the back, but a lot was said and my actions have backed that all up. i sit here a little wiser but still flawed as i recall todays events. a time in which i briefly threw away all ive learned and reverted back to someone i once was.

the situation is this. i have a new web host. they transferred my sites (their sales pitch was “we’ll transfer everything over and make it all work”) over without me having to lift a finger. score! except of course, they forgot to mention that “everything” was actually excluding ftp and mail accounts. i threw a minor fit, then quickly corrected myself, apologized for my behavior and moved on. a small bump in the road. especially when taking into account the tales of my last host. a server in which it was not uncommon for us to experience outages on a daily basis. a server that went down for three days while i was in europe with no explanation. they refused to reboot the server because i had forgotten my admin password and therefore couldnt verify that i wasnt some hacker for europe, hellbent on making sure my server received no downtime. in comparison, my new host was a breeze. an absolute pleasure. fast forward and i notice that certain parts of my sites are not updating as normal. they tell me that a programmer will fix it asap. two weeks later virtually nothing has been touched and i was told the programmer went on vacation.

again, this is something i can forgive. people make mistakes. human error. im not perfect so why would i expect others to be. all things i try and tell myself. knowing full well that i would never make these errors. its either stupidity on their part or apathy.

anyhow, strike … what number are we on? strike three happens as im at a gas station and my card is declined. ive got several bank accounts, so it wasnt a major thing, but upon my arrival home i found that one of my accounts was overdrawn. a little more investigating revealed that my hosting company charged me twice for the same month. this account is basically my “outgoing” one. i keep enough money in there to cover fixed expenses and petty cash purchases. i had, for the last two weeks, racked up 15 overdraft fees totaling ….. $495. i emailed the company and they reversed the charges. mind you, its not as though they alerted me of the error, i had to find it for myself. i walked into the bank today and for some reason i was under the impression that if i could prove i was not responsible, they would reverse these overdraft fees. ohhhh no. being the it was an error on someone else’s part other than their’s or my own, they wanted to keep their found money. lets face it, charging $33 dollars each time i made a $2.99 purchase of doritos at 7-11 is called theft. not a fee. but in any case, i called up the hosting company and requested they reimburse me for $495. i faxed them, from my bank mind you, a statement showing all the fees. that was not good enough. they needed to see all of my transactions for the month so they could prove that i wasnt making all this up. because out of the two of us, i being the one whos paid my bills faithfully, and them being the one that took money out of my account with no authorization .. i should not be trusted. not only that … they want a letter from my bank stating that it was indeed their mess, and that they would have to clean it up. the trouble is that my bank doesnt just stop everything for someone elses mistake. theyre only authorized to send such letters from the corporate offices. and i should receive them in 2 business days. so on wednesday or so, i might see my fucking money back. my fucking money. i love how these companies think that because they open at 9 and close at 5, make the people who serve me wear ties, and give out free coffee it means i dont see them for what they really are. crooks. and not even good ones at that. the good ones either take your money without you realizing it, or they take it and when you begin to complain they shut your face up with their fists. honor among thieves. so its war and when its time for war, i bring out all the weapons. my voice jumps in volume, my wit sharpens, and the threats spew. i somehow got them to accept my transaction history without any letter accompanying it. i was told they would credit my card with $495. late at night i login to my online banking site to see that indeed $495 was recorded in the ledger. however, IN THE WRONG FUCKING COLUMN. instead of giving, they took even more. that puts the grand total sum of money my host took from my account or caused to be charged, without my authorization to roughly $1200.

i sent an email to the owner asking “am i seeing things? i cant imagine this is happening, yet the evidence is all too clear. she replied “OMG”. of course there were a few admissions of wrong doing and apologies in there. but yeah “OMG”. and that really just sums it all up. i now have every intention of heading down to orange county to meet the person that did this to my account. i have to put a face to the mistakes. i imagine some sort of monkey wearing brightly colored overalls, banging his fists into an old apple IIe.

if youve decided your life is too peaceful. that chaos would be a nice change of pace. that money in your bank account is really more like the change you see in the “take a penny leave a penny” jar at your local convenient store. youve found yourself visiting dynamic sites like myspace and felt that it’d be nicer if they never updated. if you enjoy sales pitches like “unlimited miles* ………. *limited to 5 miles. if youre doing a study on human error and need test subjects. or you simply like spending more time at your bank than you do at your real job …

its time to switch to nakedhosting.com

end rant. begin cleanse.

ps. im in bed and helen is laying here next to me eating sliced ham from a salsa bowl. *swoon*

i wonder how many times i’ve said that in the last year. a lot. thats a unit of measurement right? a lot. but its true. its been overwhelming. ive made some really good decisions this year. of course i can’t go without mentioning the addition of helen into my life as a driving force in my overall happiness.

i’ll start with last night. i woke up next to helen, struggled to leave her side … but eventually made my way into hollywood to play some hockey. had lunch with my fantasmic friends. headed back to the valley to help my brother in al-anon move some of his ex’s stuff out of his house. finished up with enough time to grab a shower and load up the car for a night at the Hollywood Forever Cemetery to watch …… “A Clockwork Orange“! one of my favorite movies, if not my number one. for those of you who don’t know, i named my business after the lead character’s prison number, 655321. its tattooed on my back. the movie changed my life. i was pretty naive, way sheltered and i simply did not know movies like this existed. i was pretty sure Disney was solely responsible for manufacturing all moving pictures. till i started dating my first girlfriend who was 5 years my senior and the main influence on my corruption. kinda scary to think women have that much influence on me, but its been that way all my life starting with the first woman i laid eyes on. maybe now you have an understanding as to why i shoot erotica. women. thats why its so important for me to have a good woman by my side, as some of you know, it gets really ugly when i dont. if i had seen a picture like orange when i was still involved in acting, i wouldve stayed an actor. instead i read for parts in the Goonies, which of course is a great movie, but not something i wanted to give up my teenage years to be a part of.

we were actually invited out by a good friend of mine and his girlfriend. and in turn another mutual friend and his partner came along too. so it was 6 of us, all sprawled out on blankets laid on top of the grass, eating dinner and watching the movie projected onto the side of the mausoleum. only in Hollywood would this sort of thing be acceptable. the sounds of rape reverberate off the tombstones. the woman i love cuddled up beside me. the sight of Alex beating an old man with his Droogs competes with a skyline of palm trees and moonlight. it was gorgeousity and gorgeousness all at once o my brothers. i could not be any happier. its was ridiculously fun. i couldnt stop showering Helen with affection. ive had lust for women, i’ve even loved a couple, but its taken 15 years to find someone to be in love with. helen wore this perfectly fitted tank top with no bra, per my request. and as it got chilly, she put on a thermal i picked out for her. theres something sexy about thermals (if you read this journal often you may come to realize that what i shoot doesn’t exactly coincide with what i find sexy in my personal life. i do that because i like to express that part of my sexuality with my partner alone). that tight fit that hugs all the curves. the warm temperature that keeps her cozy. and the texture that glides across my skin as i pet her. she beamed all night long. she feels right. she has no pretension. just whimsy and magic. just smiles and laughter. warmth and tenderness. her glow lights up a room. or in this case, a cemetery.

i let go a little of my strict schedule so that i could reconnect with Helen recently. and in so doing our sex life has reached another high i thought was inconceivable. shes been …

we eat at the house of blues when we hit disneyland. their food is yum.

i went to see the gutter twins a week or so ago with helen. for those who dont know, its greg dulli from the afghan whigs/twilight singers & mark lanegan from the screaming trees. greg dulli is one of my favorite musicians. mark’s got crazy deep voice. fun night!