Everything is the same old-same old

I am sitting on a plane watching a very dumb movie. Something about a night in a museum with creepy Ben Stiller. Everything in the museum comes alive while he’s on duty at his new job. An all star cast of losers like Dick Van Dyke and Robin Williams and Owen Wilson. One gold tablet makes everything in the museum come to life.

For some reason, I feel like this story has been told before. In countless childhood books, in other movies and in a lunatic rant of a book a few years ago: Smithsonian Institution by Gore Vidal. Sure, they all have their own unique characteristics, but they are all the same thing. Something funny comes alive, something is violent, a beautiful mannequin of Pocahontas or Sacajawea befriends the male protagonist.

Actually nothing is new, or so it seems. Sometimes I feel that everything I read, eat, listen to, see, visit, try on, or smell is something I already read, ate, heard, saw, visited, tried on or stunk. I recently was listening to some songs by Belle and Sebastian. What’s up with them? Everything they sing sounds like something I heard in the 80s. Every new neighborhood I visit in a city I’ve not yet explored looks just like a neighborhood in some other place I’ve already visited. Every dismal suburban shopping center looks like every other dismal suburban shopping center.

I know this entry is dull because it’s just like every other posting on Splendasucks.com. It’s me ranting about everything that’s the same or that’s irritating in one way or another.

I’m looking for a new experience. I just don’t know what it is. What can one do who has had too many of the same experiences? People tend to do one of the following:

• Move to a new city
• Move to a new house
• Go on vacation
• Change their job
• Have a child
• Take up a new hobby
• Have an affair
• Buy a different kind of breakfast cereal
• Do nothing at all and hope something will surprise them.

I regularly do one of the things above and I’m easily capable of doing six more of the things on the list. I like to travel and use that as a way to uncover new experiences. I find that it helps to escape the US, to get away from some of the drab same old-same old. Like this trip I’m making right now to Houston: talk about drab same old-same old.

I could take up a new hobby, because many things interest me, but because many things interest me, I would always be taking up a new hobby.

Some things should be same old-same old, because they don’t become drab. Friendships get better the more same old-same old they become. Friendships are meant to comfort and provide enjoyment, so pair a same old-same old friend with a new experience and you have a perfect combination. Relationships are the same. Or at least they are supposed to be. For me they tend to be, but I think for many people same old-same old in a relationship is dull. More later...