3AM Conversations...

Have a strange way of keeping me entertained. Had no intention whatsoever of staying up late last night, I knew I was going to have to get up and write a paper the next day due at 2pm, yet I got involved in multiple conversations that were more entertaining than usual.

First I was jabberin away with a friend of mine from high school, and grovelling for forgiveness about the fact that something I'd been close minded to and given her crap for like a year ago was now something I could see her side of. We ended up having fun with Netmeeting as she showed off her webcam and new pad up at Stanford, and getting the usual giggles out of doing silly things for the camera and making strange noises in the microphones.

Somewhere in the middle of that conversation I got an IM from my brother's SN, but it was apparently one of his friends. I do tend to get random IMs from strangers somewhat often as they discover my SN through various search methods or this page. Generally the conversations don't last very long, I tend to lose interest in a hurry. I can't really explain what it is that manages to hold my attention for longer than the usual 4.5 seconds. Some people are just more interesting to chat with than others. Sadly I'm generally a busy person, and many people who might get interesting eventually are brushed aside as soon as I get bored with answering open-ended questions. This one though seemed like a halfway-intelligent person, even though she's hanging out with my brother... So I actually play along and converse with this total stranger for well over an hour while I'm multitasking, and become somewhat interested in her as a person.

Then she makes the mistake of telling me she's similar to my brother in the most negative way possible, that being she is also a smoker. Yeah, I've become open minded about many things in the last few years. When it comes to shortening one's lifespan though, I won't ever see the other side of that. Not only are these people hurting themselves, but eventually they will put a financial and emotional burden on everyone around them, hurting everyone who cares about them as well.

There's just nothing else to say about that. I gave her the abridged version, and then went to bed, not expecting to hear from her again.