Now, as I read that back I just realized it might come across as me trying to brag about doing something philanthropic. Nah. I’m one of the least philanthropic people you’ll meet. I’m self-motivated and rarely do much to assist others. In short – I’m a typical American.

So, please don’t think this is a bragging session. That’s not what I’m doing here. I’ll tell you when I need to brag. I actually do one big philanthropic thing that I can’t wait to brag about one of these days when my self-esteem is super low. You’ll be really impressed and want to have my baby.

Just to be clear, I was also kidding there.

I went on a Google Hangout which was me and the heads of the various boards so we could meet. They were all very nice , and, like many boards, needed more volunteers. After all of the introductions I talked about myself and what I thought I could add to the organization.

I also did something that surprised even me. I chose not to over-commit. I actually did the responsible thing and chose the easiest and most direct introductory position in the group. “Easiest” not because it’s actually easy work; it’s actually busy work and will require a few hours a week.

Here’s a corollary example. Every month or two I volunteer a few hours to wash dishes at a shelter two blocks from me. The organization that runs this group has thousands of groups across Chicago. I chose this one, not because I have a lot of passion for the homeless, but because it’s two blocks from me. I can walk over, put on the apron and hair net, scrub pans, and leave. I have virtually no interaction with the people there. It’s not one of those volunteer jobs where you walk away going, “I just made a HUGE difference.” You just washed and rinsed. Not sexy, but necessary.

As a creative type I wanted to jump in with each department head and say, “Here’s how you take you online organization to the next level! I have all the solutions!” I easily came up with several strategies to assist their growth. But, this is a pattern for me that is in line with my spazziness, but not responsible. Here’s how it goes.

1. I think I know everything
2. I offers “solutions” to everyone’s problems
3. I have no time to implement
4. I miss the deadlines

This is one of my big challenges. I have a horrible perspective on time. I’m never sure how much I have, how long things are going to take, and how to schedule it in advance. My toughest job at work is not ability, but scheduling. My goal for 2013 is to have my workday planned in advanced.

So, in this instance I just said, “Well, let me start small. I have a job, the website, podcast, etc. and I don’t want to let you guys down. Trust me I want to do more, but I’d rather just pick up the mop for now.”

This is how low my self-esteem is at this point in the post. I actually contemplated changing the entire thing to, “I took a small paying gig…” so that you wouldn’t think this was a veiled attempt at bragging.

I’m feeling insecure tonight for some reason. So, I’m going to go drown it in some gyro meat because that appeals to me. That’ll fix my fear!

Gyro meat really does cure a lot of life’s ills. Just ask around.

When I started getting some decent traffic to my site, I began to receive emails from readers. I noticed that nearly all of these emails were from women. I suspect that there are more women who read blogs than men. This may just be a result of many mothers who stay at home and raise their children. In fact, there is a whole “mommy blogger” category of blogs, and it is HUGE. Every year one of the biggest blogging conventions is called BlogHer which you have probably have figured out is for birds.

Now, of course, being a single man, I love the idea of women reading my posts. Even though most of the women who write to me seem to be happily married, it is nice to receive the attention.

But not all of them are married.

Some are downright single.

And hot.

My idea was, since I’ve saved up like 10 free flights over the years, to visit a few of these women in their hometown and go on a proper date. I would call it “Dates With Readers.”

Then I would write about the night, chronicling every part of the experience. The woman would also write about their experience with me, and whether they liked me, or if they had thought I was a total d-bag.

Would be hilarious.

And I had two lined up already. First is a fellow blogger, Karen, who, despite her gross old-lady name, is pretty and funny. Problem? She’s stationed overseas in the air guard in one of those middle eastern countries with the sand. Her blog is Chick in a Box, and I highly encourage you to read it. She’s great.

And she is totally in, but doesn’t come back to the U.S. until March. Plus, she might get blown to shit before that.

Next is Jaime who is a university professor in the southwest. Also pretty and very intelligent. Funny as well. I suspect she would make a great friend. She also thought it was a fabulous idea.

I felt like I needed one more woman to make this an actual blog “feature.”

So this random woman, out of nowhere, friends me on Facebook.

Full disclosure – She found me on Facebook by accident. She meant to “like” my ThoughtsFromParis page, and somehow ended up on my personal page. I’d love to say that she was a die-hard groupie who stalked me, but this is just not true. Sadly.

Her profile picture really grabbed my attention as her physical beauty really matched up with what I’m attracted to. Big, full shoulder blades, and a defined jaw. Just kidding. She was super hot in the traditional sense.

Second Full disclosure : The phrase “big full shoulder blades” is a reference lifted from a Bloom County cartoon where Steve Dallas, drunk on root beer, announces that he is attracted to women with “big, full shoulder blades.” God that was the greatest comic strip ever.

The bottom line was that I just had to talk with this woman. Except she had never sent me a message or attempted to contact me in any way. I didn’t even know she had read my site. I thought she might just be a friend of a friend. So I reached out.

When I learned she had read a few of my stories, I used that as a leverage point to wedge my way into her life. I just had to, you understand. She was that beautiful.

Her name is Jessica and she lives in Atlanta.

We exchanged phone numbers and I pitched the idea of flying down there and going on a date. She loved it and we tentatively planned on me coming down there for New Year’s Eve. Since we didn’t yet really know each other, this made sense, as we could spend the next few months chatting and connecting.

Also, if she turned out to be a psycho I could always bail mid-December.

The more I talked with her, the more I really started to like her. As much as you can within a few phone calls for somebody that you’ve never met in person.

And then I realized I didn’t actually want to go out with the other women. I mean, they are fantastic, and super fun and great supporters. But we were just going to go out as a joke.

Jessica and I were really connecting. I dropped the idea of going out with the other women, and decided that this was not, in fact, a joke. This was real.

I called my father to tell him of this woman I had met online. And he said something that was so outrageous and unexpected, I was speechless for a few seconds (the longest ever in my life).

You’ll have to wait until tomorrow for the rest of this story. What a dick move!

Until then, here’s a picture of a stoned dog’s birthday party.

I was on the phone talking with a friend, lying down on the bed in the second bedroom, when all of a sudden I smelled smoke.   I leaped up, ran into the hallway, and noticed smoke accumulating around the ceiling lighting.   My first thought was the air conditioner.   Even though it’s sort of past air conditioning season, today was 82 here in Chicago.   Since I’m on the top floor of my condo building, it’s always extremely hot.   When it’s 70 outside, it will register as 77 inside, so the air has to be on.

I just assumed the HVAC unit (I think that’s what it’s called) had malfunctioned and a wire had caught fire.   It had that smell of burning metal.   So, I ran to the thermostat, and turned off the air.   I couldn’t tell where the smoke was coming from.   Also in the room with the HVAC is the washing machine.   I had both the washer and dryer going, too.   My mind immediately flashed huge dollar signs thinking that this had probably broken and was shooting out smoke.   But when I opened to door to this room, there was no smoke.

The only other thing I have in the hallway, except for a few prints hanging up is my reef tank.

When I spun around to check out the tank, I noticed smoke billowing up from the cabinet underneath the tank.   When I opened the cabinet, I saw a power strip shooting sparks out of itself.   I realized that water, salt water, was dripping directly into one of the outlets.

Five seconds later, the fuse got tripped.   Darkness.

The good news is there’s no leak on the tank.   It’s a 65 gallon tank, and weighs hundreds of pounds.   If there was a leak, it would be a huge pain in the butt.

Also, good news – all my fish had dies months ago, and my corals, too.   Normally, this is a bad thing, and of course it is, but it meant I didn’t have to do anything with the tank upkeep-wise for awhile.

My tank is seven years old, and if you don’t know anything about reef tanks, just think about the ocean.   It’s basically that.   Saltwater, with sand and rock.   You have to mimic the conditions of the ocean in just about every way possible.   After a few years, the tank settles down, and everything kind of filters itself.   You have snails, and crabs, and shrimp eating all the waste and algae.   You have even smaller critters hiding in the sandbed eating the snail waste, and so on.   The rock is alive, the sand is alive.   You really don’t need much filtration, because everything is filtered by something else.

Except it’s a HUGE hassle to keep everything in stasis.   I have ten different chemical tests for things like nitrate, nitrite, calcium, ph, salinity, alkalinity, etc.   If just one of those levels gets out of whack, you’re fucked.   Things start to die.

Plus, you can’t use tap water in a reef tank.   No way.   I have a RO/DI unit (think a Brita filter with five chambers on steroids) that drips into a bucket after going through many filtration stages.   Once the bucket fills up, the dripping stops.   Then I siphon the good water into another bucket and pour it into the tank.   You have to do this every few days, because the lighting is metal hallide, which is crazy hot.

Every day several gallons of water evaporate under these lamps.

So, you can begin to see just how much of a pain a reef tank is.   Not to mention all the food, keeping the tank to a specific temperature, etc.

I’ve spent hundreds of hours, and thousands of dollars over the years on this tank.   And I’m not a guy that throws around money at hobbies just to do it.   When four fish die, that’s probably $200 to replace.

I figured out it was the protein skimmer that had been jostled and somehow decided to leak, out of the blue.   So weird.

So, I have made the decision to sell ALL of my equipment – the tank, the lighting, the live rock, the sand, everything.   If I wasn’t home during this, there’s a good chance my place could have caught fire.   I can’t handle that sort of thing in my life right now.

Dealing with the aftershocks of a divorce, new career, and taking care of a cat and dog is plenty for me.

I will dig up some photos soon of the tank in happier times.   Just glad my place didn’t burn.