I woke up around 1:30 pm yesyerday, not really recharged but not dead to the world, either. Amanda seized this state of mind to get me to help with housework. Happy to do it… but I knew I needed more sleep. We did get the majority of work done downstairs that we needed to.

If you want to read the posts associated with Blogathon 2006, you can click this here link whenever you want.

The stuff I’m the most proud of (besides that I was able to make it through without keeling over, or only slightly bruising the posting schedule) are the video posts. I feel they added a groovy little texture to the day’s documentation.

And I may well do it again next year. If I do, two caveats: I’m not changing charities again, and will be blogging to benefit the Hello Win Column Fund; and I’m staying within five miles of home. No more galavanting around the Metroplex, or attempting to blog from a place that doesn’t have wi-fi. Madness.

You can still pledge to this year’s effort, and I hope you do.

- Amanda, my rock
- Marty, the hero of the Soggy Bottom Bloggin’ Boys
- Thomas, the Breast Whisperer
- Ali, who came out to the NRH Starbucks to cheer me on
- Nathan, the man with a shop full of my toys
- Sara, for being a necessary angel
- Sheana and Colleen, for posting this picture
- Schtick participants Richard Hunter, Greg Woodson, Brent Gette, Erika Eeds, Sara & Marty (mostly for not getting irate with me when I cajoled them into writing their “first time” stories)
- Everyone who pledged to the Hello Win Column Fund
- Everyone who hasn’t pledged yet, but will when they see how much fun this was (no, really)
- Prana, my Blogathon monitor, who reminded me of the definition of “namaste”
- …and finally, you. Yeah, that’s right, you.

I’m going to bed now. I hope to be unconscious in less than three minutes.

Goodnight, farewell, amen.

Right now, this is all about getting to 8:01.

I didn’t finish the story about Amanda tonight. The whole bandwidth debacle at MacHenry’s sidetracked me to the point where I couldn’t focus on good, long-form posts. i promise I won’t make El Blog readers wait until we’re married in ’07 to tell the rest of the story.

Declaring myself President sounds like such a good idea right now. I have no idea what my first presidential decree would be, but I know for a fact I would abuse the power of the office, much in the same vein Adam Carolla would have in the late, lamented Man Show segment “When I Become Supreme Ruler of Everything.”

It’s as bright outside as it can be without the sun making an appearance. The Bastard Fuzzlets are running around like goobers.

Thirty minutes to go.

“Come on… there’s something in your brain that makes you enjoy this.”

I have to wonder if she’s right. If everything went off like clockwork, all I would have to do is show up, ge the endeavor done, and go home. Boring. Put in a little adversity, a hurdle or two, an obstacle here or there… that’s where I start to get creative. Solve the problem, don’t whine about the speedbump.

The ‘Serenity’ screening went off with nary a hitch. The only thing that didn’t happen precisely as I had pre-visualized it was handing out the gift certificates for the Done The Impossible’ DVD door prizes. The problem was fixed quickly, and everyone was happy.

I hope the “find a problem, so you have to work harder to fix it” tendency doesn’t twist into other parts of my life. Something inside me tells me I’m wrong.

Tip For Staying Up Late: If you’re going to drink an energy drink like Red Bull, swish it around on your gums a bit before swallowing the first sip. the thin tissues there help for absorption.

If the movie had been called anything else, the lead characters been named anything other than Crockett and Tubbs, the setting been anywhere but Miami, I would have been more on board. I love crime dramas. Amanda’s got me hooked on ‘Criminal Minds,’ and I don’t mind the occasional ‘CSI’ (although I eagerly await the debut of ‘CSI: Dubuque’). Mann’s work in ‘Heat’ and ‘Collateral’ was nothing short of genius. So, why did my brain just reject the Colin Farrell / Jamie Foxx ‘Vice’ off the bat?

On a tangent (because I feel like I’m cheating you, gentle readers, if I don’t give you your half-hour’s worth), go immediately to your video store or NetFlix and get ‘Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang.’ It’s easily one of the best movies I’ve seen recently, and should not have been released and ignored by mainstream media. It’s damned funny, pretty smart, and wholly entertaining.

There’s light coming in the window from outside. Not much longer, now.

I keep thinking about the Hello Win Column Fund. (Remember that? We’re doing this for charity! Wow!) Pledges are down from last year — and I do understand things are not the best for people economically these days. I just hope that you take time to give something to the cause that speaks the loudest to your heart.

I said this last year, and I still believe it to this day: the three hundred people around the world who took a day out of their lives to sit in front of a computer and post everything imagineable under the sun to make a difference in their world are heroes in every sense of the word. They hear people say that you can’t change the world, that the problem is just too big, and they refuse to believe it.

This is why I beat myself up for Blogathon year after year. I want to make a difference in the world. I refuse to let the status quo remain in place. I choose to act.

- When Will America Do Something About The FCC? It’s been three years since Janet Jackson’s boob saw the light of day, and we’re to the point now where FCC auditers are reviewing tapes of sporting events to listen for profanity — whether there’s a complaint against that broadcaster or not. It has gotten to the point where the prurient nature of conservative thought consistently oversteps the mandate of the people. The FCC is not answerable to any citizen, only to Congress. This has to stop, and the pendulum has to swing back in the other direction.

- Where Will The Next Real Music Star Come From? The last music that made a lasting impact — where the art endures more than a three-year shelf life — came from bands like Pearl Jam and Nirvana. Listening to Sara tonight reminded me how badly the world needs a legion of real musicians like her, or Aimee Mann, or Ben Folds, and quickly. When we’re settling for the next winner of “PopIdol/ American Idol / RockStar” to provide our next favorite musician, we should weep for the present, let alone the future.

- Where Will Our Next Royalty Come From? From the ’30s to the ’80s, America’s royalty came from Hollywood. For the last thirty years, sports have provided us with the idol worship. With free agency, spiraling salaries and the latest performance enhancing scandal stripping away the veneer of pro athletes, who’s left to look up to?

With three hours to go, I’m starting to feel like Richard was right this evening.

He described Blogathon participants, in the late hours of the event, as cast members from “Lost,” where instead of pushing “the button” every 108 minutes, we have to get the post online every 30 minutes.

At MacHenry’s tonight, when Marty was outside and I needed his phone to get my post and Sara’s online, I got really frantic… not at all unlike Locke when the counter in the Hatch got down close to zero.

Towards the end, I suppose we all feel a little slavish when it comes to posts. I know I do, at any rate.

I have to say this in the interest of full disclosure: I also saw ‘Jersey Girl.’ It wasn’t that bad of a movie. What Kevin Smith tried to do was to have an honest modern love story, and he was still trying to feel his way through the storymaking process.

He took the lessons learned from ‘Jersey Girl’ and applied them to writing ‘Clerks II.’ The film is touching at points. Brazen in others. “Jesus, I can’t believe Smith put that in there!” at points. It equals Smith’s best film, by a long shot — and I LOVED Dogma.

So, don’t be scared. You can go see it with a light heart and eased brow. Just don’t have too many hang-ups about bestiality, like Joel Siegel.

Theatrical Version:
Happy-Scrappy’ Mom: Excuse me, do you sell videos?
Randal Graves: Yeah, what’re you looking for?
‘Happy-Scrappy’ Kid: Happy Scrappy Hero Pup.
Randal Graves: Okay, hang on, I’m on the phone with the distribution house now, lemme make sure we got it. What was it called again?
‘Happy-Scrappy’ Mom: Happy Scrappy Hero Pup.
‘Happy-Scrappy’ Kid: Happy Scrappy!
‘Happy-Scrappy’ Mom: She loves it.
Randal Graves: Obviously. Yeah, hello, this is RST Video, customer number 4352, I need to place an order. Okay, I need one each of the following tapes: “Whispers in the Wind”, “To Each His Own”, “Put It Where It Doesn’t Belong”, “My Pipes Need Cleaning”, “All Tit-Fucking Volume 8″, “I Need Your Cock”, “Ass-Worshipping Rim-Jobbers”, “My Cunt Needs Shafts”, “Cum Clean”, “Cum-Gargling Naked Sluts”, “Cum Buns III”, “Cumming in Socks”, “Cum On Eileen”, “Huge Black Cocks and Pearly White Cum”, “Girls Who Crave Cock”, “Girls Who Crave Cunt”, “Men Alone II: the KY Connection”, “Pink Pussy Lips”, and, uh, oh yeah, “All Holes Filled with Hard Cock”. Uh-huh… yeah… Oh, wait, and, what was that called again?

Televised Version: … (Scene was edited out entirely)