With every iRANT I post, The Girlfriend says I mistell the story and paint her in an unfavorable light. She wants to have a rebuttal and be able to tell her side of the story. While I'm not gonna allow that, if anyone is determined to hear her side of the story, they can contact her here: thegirlfriend@siknerd.com.

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I don't think I'm the kinda of person that can adhere to the strict schedule of clocks. It's not that opposed to a time keeping system of some sort, it's just that I can't let my life revolve around a clock. I have tremendous difficulty coping with events that have to happen at a scheduled time. Maybe it's just my inner hippie talking, but I'm more comfortable doing something when the moment strikes instead of at its designated time.

Take work for example. I don't really have a set time when I leave work. A lot of my coworkers are out the door immediately at five, but I am not one of them. Unless I have a set reason to leave at a specific time, my departure time can fluctuate anywhere between a 90-minute window. Quite often I'm doing something and don't realize what time it is. Sometimes I'll tell myself I hafta leave soon only to end up sticking around another half hour. I'm not one of those guys who leaves when the day is over: I leave when I feel like I'm done.

This is probably why I don't have a set bedtime (I sleep when I'm tired). It's probably why dinner can happen as late as 11 at night (I eat when I'm hungry). And it probably plays a big part in why I record pretty much anything on TV that I 'hafta' watch (that and I hate commercials).

The Girlfriend has to have her lunch everyday at one--which proves to be an incredibly difficulty for me. I'm used to having lunch when I get hungry/things slow down. Now, I find myself incredibly reluctant to take on any tasks or projects at 12:30 because I know I won't finish in time for lunch. It kills me 'cause I don't know what to do.

Maybe I need to do a better job of learning how to live with clocks. Personally, I've never been that structured kind of individual. When I used to be the editor of my college newspaper, writers would ask me how long a story should be. My response was always the same:

"As long as it needs to be."

I never thought you should put a word minimum or maximum on a story. There's a reason books aren't all identical in page length: you don't know how long it takes to tell a story until you get around to telling it. Only when it's finished do you know how long it's supposed to be.

Unfortunately, my advice to reporters proved to be disastrous. Quite often, I would get 'stories' that were under 200 words long. You know people are cutting corners when the press release is longer than the article describing it.

What was I talking about again?

Oh yeah, I don't live by the clock. Nobody tells me what to do.

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