Assorted Relevant Facts
* Went out to see a friend tonight at a kind of "grand opening party" for a new beer.
* I don't like beer, so I was just going to see the friend.
* It was at a Whole Foods, which I dislike because they're all "we're green and organic and recycle and all about healthy foods" and then they charge you 8 bucks for a head of lettuce.
* It turns out this particular Whole Foods has a bar in it (2 actually, if you count the mini wine bar in the back).
* When I got there, there was a table my friend and his other friends were at, and there weren't enough seats, and the ambient noise was all overwhelming my discriminatory hearing, which is decreasing ever steadily in my advancing age.
* I ended up sitting on a counter off to the side, trying to listen but being unable to discern individual words, just watching other people drink and talk and laugh and have fun.
* All that just exacerbated the loneliness and frustration and loss I feel all throughout my personal life. To the point that, on the drive home, thinking about all of it (as I seem to do whenever I am alone these days, which means at least 90 minutes a workday on my work commute, plus whatever evening time I spend alone), I was close to tears of useless, helpless frustration at the wasted potential of my life and the hopelessness of trying to improve it.
* I'm turning 40 in just over 2 weeks, which marks a threshold of ever-diminishing capability and possibility.
* It's not been exactly the best of evenings.