Bert   *Finished*

• Male, divorced (or he was, who knows now), mid-twenties, living in the desert southwest.
• I met him many years ago on a H/P/V/A board. I've known Bert for about half of his life.
• I never met him in real life until he discovered Bert was marrying somebody I knew in real life already. (Let it never be said I didn't warn him.)
• I used to "mentor" him, but now Bert is more like the Darth Vader quote from Star Wars: "Once I was the pupil, but now I am the master." It's okay - I'm secure in my suckage.
• Bert makes an obscene amount of money doing his job, and then makes an even more obscene amount doing consulting on the side. He hopes to parlay this money into being able to retire by age thirty and practice his music or something.
• I've not kept up with Bert, so I can't even say if we're really friends anymore. (Then again, I'm not keeping up with much of anybody like I used to.)

Booby (1999-2000)  *Finished*

• Female, single, late teens, living in the Pacific Northwest.
• She was a good friend and my "adopted little sister." I guess I should stop adopting people like her.
• We seemed to understand each other because for some reason, we had a lot of the same issues in life. Even when we talk about our younger lives, we seem to have similar experiences. It makes me worry that she's going to end up like me.
• What makes it all the more entertaining that she walked away from me, is that she said I was too depressing sometimes. I think she just likes to blame a lot of her own problems on other people. Nonetheless, I've decided that I don't need people like her in my life anymore.
• Changes her site designs entirely too much.
• Disclaimer: this is her real nickname! I didn't give her this name. (Get your minds out of the gutter.)

Eleanor (1999)

• Female, relationship status changes faster than the weather, mid-twenties, living in the great frozen northern wastelands.
• Sometimes she has a tendency to let her life get a little out of her control, which I can soooo identify with, but at least I'm trying to get mine back together. Unfortunately, this has meant that I have to dispense with this friendship, since I can't take the constant change and roller-coaster nature of it all and maintain my own sanity.
• She seems to be the only currently living human being who seems to have as many problems with relationships as I do.
• She's moving in with a woman she met online, and I have my serious doubts. I mean, I expect it to go through the usual: when she gets into somebody in her life locally, she drops our friendship like a hot rock, and when it falls apart she comes back and is there all the time. This time, I've decided to let it stay behind me. I'm sick of roller-coaster relationships with people. If they want to go, then go, and good riddance.

Evita *Finished*

• Female, married but getting a divorce (or something. Like I care?), age indeterminate (to me, anyway), living in Houston, Republic of Texas.
• Kirk's ex-boss, before he went back to northern California to take a job at the Big Ivy League Medical School’. She owns a small language training firm trying to break into other areas of the business (like translations).
• Given my experience in the language industry and people who run firms like that, I wouldn't trust her any further than I could throw her. Like others in the industry, she's fairly scheming and calculating, and most definitely only out for number one, although I guess she's not as bad as most (despite stories I've heard). But then, I'm bitter given my other experiences working for language companies, and then trying to own one.

Geegee (1989-1993)

• Female, married, then in late teens/early twenties, living in the Rockies with her husband ([grumble]) and daughter ([grumble]^[grumble]).
• My "lost love." True to form, I met her on the internet, specifically in a Star Trek newsgroup. We flamed each other quite a while regarding the subtleties of transporter technology. Geek-a-rama, and I loved every bit of it. Thank goodness we were both at the same university campus, none of this long-distance mess.
• She's probably the primary reason for the perpetuation of my redhead and geek girl fetishes.
• I've carried a torch for this girl since I pushed her away when she insisted that I get some help for my moods and depression. (Better late than never, huh?) I guess I've carried that torch up until recently. Okay, maybe still, although it's gotten a little better since I got a little closure with the whole affair. (I'm surprised Gurugrrl has never killed me over that comment.)
• Geegee actually managed to follow her career dreams to an extent, for which I envy her greatly. Unfortunately, it appears that her life hasn't turned out quite as she would have expected. I have to wonder how our lives would be different if we had worked out.

Gurugrrl (1999-2000)

• Female, single, early thirties, living in the "sticks" near the eastern seaboard's urban sprawl.
• She's an extremely intelligent and fascinating girl geek that I met when we both were having a particularly weak moment. I was taken with her from the first, and she said she was with me, also. Too bad it didn't last.
• She is an eater of vegetables, a lover of musicals, groupie to The Bard, Queen of Grilled Cheese World (don't ask), a master of juggling too many responsibilities and crazy enough to own an over-the-counter brand computer. She was the light of my life, but all wasn't well in paradise.
• Our relationship was extremely variable with time ("roller coaster" described it quite well; we had more than our share of problems), as are all relationships between people suffering from depression. Our moods never seemed to line up properly, and though I am getting help with mine, she resisted doing the same for hers.
• She is private in the extreme, which always ran afoul of me writing about her in my journal, including this cast list. It was annoying at times, and I tried to get her to realize there was no danger in her being discovered, to no avail.
• She said she isn't ready, whatever that means. Ready for a serious relationship? Ready to face her depression? Ready to let go of the pain? I have no idea. She's also said that she was down and didn't see that changing, and had been upset quite a bit of the time because I tend to focus on her depression because I was constantly trying to get her to face it and deal with it for both of our goods, and didn't see me changing on insisting on that.
• Finally, when I became interested in Trinity, that was the final straw, and pushed the final wedge between us. She's gone forever.

Hypochondria (1999)

• Female, single, mid-twenties, currently living near the Ozarks.
• A mistake I made that is best considered a "growth experience." I became infatuated with this girl, but definitely not for the best, because when you deal with plastic people you get what you deserve.
• She's probably best considered either fickle or a tease.
• She's got an encyclopedic knowledge of medicines and medical therapies. Once I thought it was because she told me how she had wanted to become a doctor. Through experience, I realized that it's because she's probably had most of them at least once for some malady (real or, more likely, imagined, thus the name). Let's put it this way - anybody who brags that she's only 24 and has been through a drug-induced menopause already... well, you have to wonder.
• She's shut me out her life, and made sure to get as many others as possible to shut me out, too. Little does she know that over the long run, she's probably done me a favor. Now if they'd just stay away. (Occasionally I may mention some of the others in her brood (I like to call them "The Three Stooges"), including a an ill-tempered descendant of Nazi Germany called Goosestepgirl and a particularly self-indulgent Brit I call Digestive Biscuit.)

MDM (a/k/a "Metal Death Music", 1996-1997)

• Male, once married (now unsure), then in late twenties, currently living in Pacific Northwest.
• MDM is this genericized fellow computer geek who got the idea once that I was a really bright and had a future doing something, so he was going to work out some sort of business arrangement with me, as well as being a pretty good friend.
• However, MDM changed his mind at some point. I'm still trying to bitterly work out what happened.
• I have to wonder to myself what would happen if I contacted him after all these years? Would he blow me off? That goes with about anybody on this part of the list, I suppose.

Snowbound (1999)

• Female, married, early forties, living in a state that doesn't exist ("there's no such place as North Dakota!").
• She had been an occasional shoulder for me to cry on, or at least it seemed to work out that way.
• She's a much better friend of Eleanor than of mine, and I haven't heard from her in a while, so I imagine that she's probably essentially passed out of my life, I just haven't been informed of that fact yet.
• She's a serious .mp3 fiend, especially for her age.

Trinity (2000)

• Female, separated, mid-thirties, living near the beach in southern California.
• A writer, an artist, a conversationalist, a treasure.
• She originally wrote me because she was researching online journals as a new literary form, and ran across mine on Yahoo. We started talking, and then talking every night, and after not too long we were spending all our time together.
• She says that she's a freak magnet. Apparently, at some point I fell under the rubric of "freak," too, so she has started to keep me pushed away.
• Everything between us was so easy. We both commented on it. It was like we'd known each other our whole lives. It was very strange, but also very wonderful. Unfortunately, without it things don't seem right, and I don't know if it's worth keeping the relationship going without the former intensity.
• If she's a little off-kilter, it's probably because she works for a defense contractor. The Military-Industrial Complex takes its toll on people.
• Nobody had ever become this important to me so quickly, and she said the same about me. Apparently either I was mistaken, or she was using a bit too much hyperbole, because now I am to be shunned for the most part because I am a net detriment to her life. If I am so awful, I just want to leave her behind.
• I fell for her. Now I don't know if I regret meeting her altogether or should feel bad about myself because it was my (in)famous pronounced mood changes (when I'm not under the influence of Remeron) that scared her away.
• The final straw that drove Gurugrrl away.

Violet (1999-2000)

• Female, single, early-to-mid-twenties, living in sunny Florida.
• A warez babe.
• Currently studying psychology in college (although she said in her journal that's probably changing to journalism, and she studied dance before... hey, I thought I was the only one who had changed majors that much!), but I think she goes for the party atmosphere, personally.
• She owns entirely too many shoes. I tend to own two or three pairs and wear them a lot. She's probably got as many as Imelda Marcos.
• She has a penchant for Disney characters. Hasn't anybody ever told you that Disney is an evil, manipulative megacorp, dear?
• She lives in a very silly place, considering that she claims to be as afraid of hurricanes as I am.
• Has been known to use Yiddish and Spanish expressions, confirming my stereotypical preconception that Miami is full of Cubans and old Jewish people (Violet calls this mythical Miami resident a "jewban").