Of Special Value

Today marked my third time donating plasma this year, and Monday will be my last time in before 2013 officially arrives.
In all honesty though, this isn't donation, even though the company calls it that. The reality is I'm receiving monetary compensation for what they are taking. I'm selling the plasma.
Is this a good thing? Sure, it can be received that way. What they are taking is, as far as I've been told, being put into service for creating various medications that treat everything from high blood pressure to burn victims. That is certainly something not to feel ill about.
But when you bring the blunt, bare bones truth out, I'm taking part of myself and trading it in for money, and I'm doing it to supplement a meager to non-existent income. Without going on the streets, this is by all means the bottom of the barrel in terms of income.
I'd like to think of it in more optimistic terms, but the point is driven in every single time I go in to donate. The people in the chairs aren't there for the good of their donation, they are there for the money. They are there to cover the rent, buy another week's worth of groceries, and maybe pay off their credit cards. I may have cleaner clothes and no scarring on my veins (I'm presuming from a past life as I would like to believe that everyone there was honest on their questionnaire), but if I'm sitting in that chair, watching whatever movie is running on their TV screens, I can't be that different. Can I?

Thus it begins...

I suppose that the best time to start a new blog would be the first of the upcoming year. However, due to either my lack of patience or the fact that if I don't start this damn thing now (again for the third time - damn app doesn't auto save, which is blissfully idiotic.), it will most likely fade away and be logged with the other "great ideas that never made it out of my head." Which is something I very well can't let happen.
I was lucky enough to receive a new tablet with QWERTY dock for Christmas, and while it is likely something I never would have the foresight to purchase myself, the advantages of this over a traditional laptop are massive. I've been thinking about this for the past few years, with the rapid advancement of technology, this is the future. Long battery life, light weight and with the cloud as our friend, storage is a non issue. Now the only real hold-up is the cost of unlimited data streaming. While I'm all for capitalism, here's to hoping that the corporations greed doesn't completely ruin the common person's access to our greatest innovation.

Is it wrong that I secretly hope a solar flare whomps us on our ass for a few years so we can properly learn to appreciate what we have achieved in the past few decades? I think that's why I enjoy camping so much, it affords an opportunity to leave technology behind, at least after the batteries finally wear down.

With the holidays recently past, I suppose there is no better time to add how grateful I am for what I have.
First off, my parents have been incredibly supportive, both emotionally and financially, during what has most likely been the most trying few years of my life. Between several bouts of unemployment over the past 3 years, it is no small thing to say that I most likely would be homeless if not for them.
The love of my beautiful girlfriend, which I'm not always sure I deserve. She knows me better than is probably safe to let someone know me, and she still accepts me. As anyone who has been in a long term relationship can attest, the love of  another is just as fulfilling as the love from family, but in a completely separate way.
Speaking of love, I don't think I could have understood the word when paired with 'unconditional' until I got my dog. I can easily say that it goes both ways.
And of course my friends, cool enough to accept my idiocy, and honest enough to knock me down a couple pegs when my ego gets the best of me.

I don't mean to boast, but this holiday has really been good to me. Not only did I get to eat like a king amongst the best company imaginable, but their gifts showed just how well they know me.
My girlfriend hit the nail on the head when she got me a "Spirit Hood" of the Silver Coyote. To quote the inner lining, "Trickster, Humor, Cunning." It's how I've seen myself since grade school, not a lion, not  a wolf, not a unicorn, shark or dolphin, but a coyote.
Now that I think about it, among the ancient Greek gods, I suppose that would make me Loki...

Since words can be boring, here's a pic of my holiday cheer.