Really, I just miss living with and amongst people my own age, people who have similar habits when it comes to socializing, bedtimes, video game-playing and television-watching. My parents generally don’t care what I do or where at this point, but the tip-toeing in at 2 a.m. just isn’t for me. Throw a puppy in the mix, and the fact that he needs puppysitting (and guess who gets to do that?) when I’m not around for an extended period, and I feel like even more of a burden.

All this has been a roundabout way of getting to this: I need a job, and (maybe more importantly) I need a place of my own, for the sake of my sanity. I’m wearing out my welcome (both mine and theirs) at home, and it’s getting to be about that time. And yes, this post is a direct effect of it being Thursday and of having just talked to Andy, who’s at Bonas tonight and probably painting The OP red at this point. I’m way past a lot of the college experience, especially the schoolwork and going to class portions, but I keep holding onto these memories of everyone sitting around our living room every Thursday night for “The Office,” “30 Rock” and “Sunny.” I feel like I’m in some sort of purgatory right now, between chapters of life, and the maddening thing is not knowing how long I’m stuck here.

My apologies to anyone who’s stayed with me to this point. This has been a Thursday night funk; now back to our regular programming.

• an overhyped 4-0 Bills team lose their starting quarterback and the ability to win.
• Dick Jauron receive a three-year extension (three years!) (THREE YEARS!).
• the Sabres trot out another wimpy, speed-and-finesse-based team, while all indications from around the NHL pointed toward the game becoming more defense- and size-oriented.
• Sabres management assuring us that said team was built for a Stanley Cup run.
• an excrutiating Monday Night Football loss to the hapless Cleveland Browns, on an impossible last-second field goal by a mediocre kicker.
• the Bills play a “home game” (against the archrival Miami Dolphins, I should add) in Toronto, a city rumored to be the franchise’s future home.
• an injury to Sabres goalie Ryan Miller derail any playoff hopes.
• the hated Boston Bruins and Miami Dolphins turn things around much faster than we Buffalonians have come to believe possible.
• our Pittsburgh foes celebrate world championships five months apart in our two professional teams’ sports, and then, maybe even worse, had to listen to our Pittsburgh-fan friends gloat about it.
• fellow Bills fans scoop up season tickets at the same levels as the Super Bowl years because the team, in a brilliant marketing move (believe me, I can’t believe I’m using the word “brilliant” to describe an action of Bills management), signed a single player, the outspoken wide receiver Terrell Owens.
• our Bills manhandle an obviously better New England Patriots team during a nationally televised MNF game, giving us even more false hope for the 2009 season, only to have everything unravel with a kickoff-return fumble.
• Dick Jauron and Russ Brandon keep their jobs, despite another 7-9 season, then a 1-4 start to the 2009 season that has left no hope for success in the near (or far) future.
• the Bills’ 91-year-old owner show no interest whatsoever in fielding a winning football team (I have no reservations about stating that as fact).

And that’s just off the top of my head. I’m sure, with more time and research, I could double, maybe triple, the size of this list.

It’s immediately apparent that things are skewed toward the Bills’ side of the scale. That’s what happens when a team hasn’t made (and won’t make) the playoffs this decade. ESPN columnist Bill Simmons often writes about things entering “The Tyson Zone,” the point at which you’ll believe anything, real or made-up, about a subject (it’s named after the actor from The Hangover). Folks, the Buffalo Bills are in The Tyson Zone. Tomorrow, if you told me Ralph Wilson had fired Dick Jauron, named himself as head coach and moved all remaining home games to Toronto, I would sincerely believe you. That’s what a joke this franchise has become. How any of us are still fans is beyond me. We buy the tickets (all of them), watch the games, give them our undying support, and get shit on. It’s sports’ version of Chinese water torture.

So how are the sports gods maybe messing with us? Well, the Sabres are unbeaten, and they’re looking damn good. Tonight they manhandled a Red Wings team (down a few key players, I’ll concede) that has skated circles around them for years. Miller is playing like an elite goaltender. All four lines are rolling, creating turnovers, playing big and buzzing around the net all the time. None of the goals tonight were of the “pretty” variety, and I couldn’t be happier to say that. For two playoffless years, we’ve been inundated with pretty goals while the team blows chances with juicy rebounds, empty nets and shots through traffic with screened goalies. It’s about time we see pucks flying at the net from every angle and rebounds getting slammed home. Everything the Sabres did tonight made me forget what a shitty year it’s been to be a Buffalo sports fan.

And yet, the Buffalo sports fan in me won’t let me get overly excited. After all, this team is a key injury or two away from being the Phoenix Coyotes. The defense is relying on two second-year players and a 19-year-old rookie. Tim Connolly has a bad habit of getting season-ending injuries. We’ve been led down this road so many times before, I can’t help but be skeptical of success when it comes to Buffalo sports. Since they all have at some point, when will this bubble burst?

So here’s what I propose to my fellow Buffalo sports fans: throw what’s left of your support for the Bills and throw it behind the Sabres. They’re our only hope at this point. If you were planning on buying a Bills ticket, buy two Sabres tickets instead. Buy a Vanek jersey rather than an Edwards one. Go hoarse booing Sidney Crosby, not Tom Brady. Make every game at HSBC Arena feel like a playoff game.

It’s only four games into the season, but something feels right about this underdog Sabres team. Like 2006-07 all over again. Sure, we’re probably setting ourselves up for failure, but that’s the definition of being a Buffalo sports fan.

(And by the way, seriously, screw any hotel that doesn’t have complimentary WiFi nowadays. Or one that charges almost $20 for a “continental” breakfast. I think we have, in America, come to equate “continental” with “free.” That’s just how it works. I went and double-checked that I’d read the hotel info right on its Web site, and sure enough, I had. “High-speed Internet access is available,” sure, for $12.95 per 24 hours, as noted in smaller print, further down the page. What an effing ripoff. The Marriott Renaissance will never get my business again, that’s for sure. Good lord, even the rinky-dink motel I stayed at in Saranac Lake had free WiFi. I digress.)

Anyway, it was a wonderful day off in observance of Columbus Day. And by “day off,” I mean I did the same thing I’ve done pretty much every day since the end of August. And by “observance,” I mean reading a bunch of snarky tweets. And by “Columbus Day,” I mean the day we celebrate Europe’s “discovery” of North America and their subsequent plundering and pillaging of said land to the point of driving the natives to tears. Or down a Trail of Tears. Something like that. In other words, I think what we’re celebrating today is being on the winning side of history.

Cheers to that?

Dear New York Yankees: The Metrodome is a formidable postseason opponent. Make sure you win these first two games. And tell AJ to bring his A-game.

Dear TV Networks: You’ve got until the end of the MLB playoffs to fix this, so no rush, but can you put together some watchable shows for Tuesday night?

Dear Buffalo Bills: If you lose to Cleveland on Sunday, will you please, please, pretty please with a cherry on top fire Dick Jauron?

Dear Clothes, Toiletries and Other Assorted Trip-worthy Items: Please pack yourselves in a bag of some sort by 6 a.m. Thursday.

Dear Winter Weather: It’s only October. You can wait a month. Or, ideally, not show up at all.

Dear Vampire Weekend & Minus The Bear: Diggin’ the new tracks. Keep up the good work.

Dear Self: You’re no longer in college. It’s bed your pastime. Go to sleep.

• Grady had his big surgery day today. Judging from his behavior the past few hours, I’d say he’s feeling loopy, hungry, sleepy and a little less manly.
• Currently listening to the entire Where the Wild Things Are soundtrack, which only increases the giddiness I’ve been feeling for this movie since, oh, March?
• A few car-ride listens in, Pearl Jam gets a big thumbs-up for Backspacer. When I heard they were putting out another album, I had my reservations, even after their decent 2006 effort and Eddie Vedder’s wonderful soundtrack for Into the Wild (I mean, really, how long can grunge last?). Backspacer is spot-on, with a perfect balance of slow ballads and riff-heavy foot-tappers. I’ve learned my lesson — never doubt Eddie Vedder. Brand New and Daisy, on the other hand, continue to confound me. I hate half the album, but like the other half well enough to keep listening to it. It’s no Devil and God, or Deja Entendu, that’s for sure.
• Memo to my favorite bands: Please stop inserting sound effects into your songs that make me think something is wrong with my truck. Memo to self: If you’re that paranoid about things going wrong with your truck, get it checked out. Duly noted.
• Oh, how I wish the Black Eyed Peas had released “I Gotta Feeling” a year ago. It’s a little repetitive, but catchy as hell and the perfect college weekend song. (Let’s pause for a moment as I mourn my college life.)
• Internal monologue just now as I surfed on over to nytimes.com: Hey, let’s see what’s going on with the world tonight. Where better than nytimes.com? [Click. Pause. Realization that Monday Night Football just ended, with everybody's favorite quarterback emerging the victor.] Good lord, I’ll be horrified if I see Brett Favre’s face on the front page. [Page starts loading.] Oh no, that’s exactly what’s going to happen. I wish I could stop this page from loading, but I need to know for sure! [Page loads.] Dammit.
• Speechwriting is hard enough when you don’t have to worry about (potentially) five Pulitzer Prize winners being present to hear you speak.
• Got some serious pangs for summer and the Aqua Casa porch last night.
• Job searching sucks. I don’t think I need to elaborate.
• Did I mention how excited I am for Where the Wild Things Are? Eleven more days!

Now I’m just pissed.

I’ve let it stew for a couple hours, just to make sure I wasn’t overreacting in the heat of the moment, but now I’m absolutely certain that the utter deflation of fandom I felt today was genuine and severe. What I saw was the on-field manifestation of a franchise that just doesn’t seem to give a damn about its fiercely loyal fanbase. They know how to get us riled up, for sure, signing a splashy free agent, firing an ineffective offensive coordinator and hiring a fan-favorite to replace him. The stadium will almost definitely sell out its remaining five home games, regardless of whether the team wins another game, and also regardless of the fact that it hasn’t seen postseason football for more than a decade.

Yes, today I reexamined my loyalty to this team, to which I give a lot and get almost nothing in return. An occasional thrill (this season’s opener), sometimes a false hope (we almost made the playoffs in ’07!), but little more. At this moment, I’m relieved that I merely view this travesty through a television screen, for free, and that I don’t attend home games or spend hundreds of dollars on season tickets, because then I’d feel really betrayed.

For a team that hasn’t tasted the playoffs since the 1990s, I can’t believe the sense of complacency. Seriously, is the team’s upper managment sitting behind closed doors, just laughing at how gullible we fans are, how they once again fleeced us of our time and money?

I don’t even think I saw a play-action pass today. Trent Edwards has never, I’m positive, heard the term “pump fake.” The defense got trampled. And it all came against an 0-3 team, a bitter divisional rival missing its starting quarterback and defensive MVP, for chrissakes!

You know, though, I sit here and spew this, and yet, I know next Sunday I’ll be watching the Bills play Cleveland (who’s 0-4, by the way). That’s just how fans operate. It may seem too early in the season to panic and start crucifying coaches, but when a team puts forth as lethargic a performance as we saw today, change is never premature.

Letchworth State Park Upper Falls

My Saturday’s been pretty productive, and by “pretty productive” I mean I’ve kept myself busy enough to not worry about the job situation, or lack thereof. We capped off two big cross country meets with a brief foray into New York’s Letchworth State Park, a gorgeous swath of land at the heart of the Genessee Valley. My new phone comes equipped with a 3.2 megapixel lens (about four times better than my first digital point-and-shoot camera, mind you), so I was able to get some pretty sweet shots of the Upper Falls and the Portage Viaduct, which rises a few hundred feet above it.

We’re headed camping now. Time to unplug.

Oy.

Continuing on the “a week ago, I was doing this” theme from the last post, well, literally a week ago from right this second I was sitting on the deck of The OP, sipping down a few Blue Moons and giving long-lost friends the good news that I’d had a job interview that went quite well and just so happened to be in the Adirondacks. Tonight, as evidenced by my last few tweets, I was watching a pathetic Yankees performance and reading the “surprisingly elaborate” Wikipedia pages on “The Price Is Right.” Apparently, this is what my life has become. Comfortable, yes; exciting, not so much.

I hate dwelling on things, especially kaput (man, where is all this Yiddish coming from?) things, but my disappointment about that job grows a little more each day as I’m reminded about the things I loved about it. Yesterday, it was the lakes and general picturesque-ness. Today, it was the hours, and the fact that if I’d gotten it, I’d have a steady income and no need to search for jobs. And, oh yeah, I wouldn’t have to attend the Hellingers next week as a jobless schmuck. (A Bonas J-school prof blogged tonight that the school has an “excellent” job placement record for students six months after matriculation. Somehow, I believe that record will be less than excellent this year. Is it really that bad? I think yes.) But dammit! Dammitall! For a few days there, I felt some semblance of financial security for the foreseeable future was within my reach.

Oy.

Where I’m going with this I really have no idea. I want to have a pity party for me and everyone else out there in the same situation (This isn’t the way it’s supposed to be! We’re college-educated! We shouldn’t have to live with our parents! Companies should be lining up for our services!), but that’s just self-defeating. Much better to keep on keepin’ on. I will say, though, that it’s reassuring — in a sick, self-assuring sort of way — that I’m not alone, not by a long shot. I’m glad I’m not the only passenger on this boat sailing the Sea of Dispair and Self-Doubt.

I’m in need of some good life news. Hey Apple, can you announce the new iMac already?

It is, however, a jungle out there, and the more I think about it, the more I wonder if I want to be a passenger on this safari. I’ve had a few hours of private brainstorming sessions: Hey, I tell myself, you’ve hardly ever done anything by the book. Why start now? And it’s a great thought, let me tell ya. A way to make money on my own and not need to jump through all these corporate hoops to even have a chance at working? Sign me up! The time is right, right? Hell, I’m already thousands of dollars in debt; why not risk a few more?

Desperate times call for desperate measures. Weird times call for weird measures. I’ve got an idea, and maybe it’s worth persuing. Maybe. I need some more time to flesh it out. When I acted in high school, the director always told us to improvise if we drew a blank or had an onstage brainfart. I don’t see why this same philosophy can’t be applied to life. I’m having a quarter-life brainfart (crisis is way too strong a word). Perhaps I should improvise.