My new found infatuation with sweaters is in no way responsible for the gap in my productivity here. I blame that on time constraints, helping a friend with his computer and complete laziness.
Growing up as a fat kid all the way to becoming a fat man, the thought of sweaters confused me. They were always so tight, made me sweat and were normally itchy on my skin. I only recently found out that this was mainly because as a growing rotund youth my parents couldn't keep clothes in my size for long. I didn't know that when you get a sweater in your size or a little larger you can wear a shirt underneath (or buy yourself a higher quality sweater that's not made out of burlap). I can't really blame my parents I think the sweaters I had growing up were all presents from relatives that didn't really see me enough to understand my size.
The sweating? Well I have a theory as this has not been a problem in my most recent sweater wearing adventures. The cost of fossil fuels and energy in general has risen to the point that most people under heat their homes and businesses to save money. I also have only worn them when it's been really cold outside.
I've gotten them from goodwill(50% off day), JCPenny(on sale) and who knows where else. It isn't like I have an uncommon amount of sweaters. I maybe have three or four. It's just how much I enjoy wearing them. I feel better about myself. What I didn't know as a child was that those tight non-concealing sweat bags I was forced into years ago, could have been very concealing comfortable suits of armor had they been properly sized. Which is odd because also growing up I held the belief that women who wore baggy sweaters constantly, were overly conscious about being large breasted*. A thought I still hold today (which includes my library of thoughts on Velma Dinkley). Somehow I never made the connection.
I have a grey one that when I got it felt very much like chain mail. It was so heavy and I wasn't sure if I really liked it, but when I got this mental image of wearing it to battle I became fond of wearing it to work. Work has been a challenge for me. Armor would not be a bad idea. However with wearing and washing it (not that I am following any kind of recommended methods for cleaning my clothing as suggested by the manufacturer) I fear the dryer has taken several pounds of lint from it. It no longer feels like that heavy chain mail. I still like it though.
Wearing to sweaters to work isn't always a good idea. While I need to look professional, sometimes I need to step in a do the labor. The kind of labor that wants to destroy clothing. The chain mail sweater has some tiny holes in it. I'm not really sure how they got there and hope that they are not real noticeable.
*Human anatomy and size - I would say that it doesn't matter because somewhere there is someone who wants what you've got in the size that you have. Sadly on the way to finding that person, you're probably going to run into a lot of people who don't. They are going to be the ones that have everything you want exactly the way you think it should be. A painful life lesson our Funny Funny God has subjected us to.
Monday, February 26, 2007
Saturday, February 17, 2007
We now have snow
Snow seems to break down society in the same manner that Y2K was supposed to and 9-11 nearly did. If it's severe enough they shut everything down. At one point this past week that is exactly what they did.
For more than half of a week they had shut down schools, county's and most of the RV industry. My work did not however shut down at all. Just like when I was in High School and no matter how bad the weather was it would never be closed.
I was able to drive my cavalier to work on some of those days (other days I was able to take the 4wd GMC Jimmy my wife normally drives to work) so I was hard to convince that we needed to shut down whole cities. It was so easy to traverse the mounds of snow I had neglectfully failed to remove from my driveway, with the Jimmy. Four wheel drive Hi and Lo gear are like heaven.
When we bought the vehicle and found out how lousy in comparison to the Cavalier the gas mileage was going to be on my much longer commute, we determined Keely should have to drive it on her ten minutes to work instead. At the same moment I decided I would never shovel the driveway again. There simply wasn't any need. I was driving the car that would have a problem getting out, and as a man I was sure I could handle it at anytime of day or night with little problems. She was driving the car that had the power and ability to climb mountains of Eco-freaks. No more shoveling.
I know this winter, the late starter that it was, has become the worst we've had since we lived in this house. I noticed more clearly this fact when my cavalier, the front wheel drive winter warrior, became stuck at the front edge of my driveway where the city plows had sealed it off. Luckily I was on my way home from work and this wasn't going to be a real problem. I didn't have any evening plans. I could just dig myself out all afternoon. For the next forty five minutes Keely drove (read: held steering wheel and pushed the accelerator to the floor until it violently sputtered fluids from both ends) while I pushed the little car. It became stuck about seven times down the driveway. Maybe it was a storm worthy of shutting the city down.
[This is my story so I'll tell it the way I think it goes]
[even though Keely corrected me when I was retelling it to Joe the other day on the phone]
Shelly's brother's neighbor threw his snow blower across his garage in bitter anger at the machine's recent inability to do it's job. Something had fallen off and this neighbor walked the machine over to his trash pile, sat the machine down and turned his back on it forever. He went out to buy a new one and Shelly's brother went out and picked up the broken one. He took it to his father who fixed it. Just in time for me to borrow it.
When I first asked to borrow it I thought and kept thinking until I was done using it that it belonged to Shelly. I had no problem borrowing it from her, I would never have asked to borrow it from her dad. In the same way I would never criticize something her father owned but I have no problem revealing the downfalls of things that she may have bought. Normally I hold the value of FREE above the insane urge to insult the short comings of tools that do not work to my expectations. However we must proceed...
It was a 3hp Murray. From recent dealings with the Murry snow blower we have at work I knew that the company had been bought out and then shut down. I can only assume that there were issues of quality somewhere involved. This one was so small in comparison to the monster we have at work. This one you had to push, it didn't have a drive axle. It removed almost all the loose snow we had from the driveway. The packed down snow it couldn't touch though. My car still won't be able to come back into the driveway for a while. The weight of my car will undermine the stable layer of packed down snow and easily become stuck again.
Had I the money and it was earlier (or later for sales purposes) I would want to go out and buy a Snow blower that could handle the beast of a driveway I have. Even if I had to pay $300.00+ just to own a machine that would more than likely never be used.
I feel very strongly that when you have to buy something like that, it works more like a demonic charm. It would more likely keep the climate warmer and stop it from ever snowing again, for the simple fact that I would have put out that money for nothing. I'm one step ahead of this, because I have come to terms with it. I don't want to shovel, so if I buy a snow blower that stops it from snowing, in the end I have truly won! Until I find the deal or cash that I'm looking for it's gonna be a long winter.
For more than half of a week they had shut down schools, county's and most of the RV industry. My work did not however shut down at all. Just like when I was in High School and no matter how bad the weather was it would never be closed.
I was able to drive my cavalier to work on some of those days (other days I was able to take the 4wd GMC Jimmy my wife normally drives to work) so I was hard to convince that we needed to shut down whole cities. It was so easy to traverse the mounds of snow I had neglectfully failed to remove from my driveway, with the Jimmy. Four wheel drive Hi and Lo gear are like heaven.
When we bought the vehicle and found out how lousy in comparison to the Cavalier the gas mileage was going to be on my much longer commute, we determined Keely should have to drive it on her ten minutes to work instead. At the same moment I decided I would never shovel the driveway again. There simply wasn't any need. I was driving the car that would have a problem getting out, and as a man I was sure I could handle it at anytime of day or night with little problems. She was driving the car that had the power and ability to climb mountains of Eco-freaks. No more shoveling.
I know this winter, the late starter that it was, has become the worst we've had since we lived in this house. I noticed more clearly this fact when my cavalier, the front wheel drive winter warrior, became stuck at the front edge of my driveway where the city plows had sealed it off. Luckily I was on my way home from work and this wasn't going to be a real problem. I didn't have any evening plans. I could just dig myself out all afternoon. For the next forty five minutes Keely drove (read: held steering wheel and pushed the accelerator to the floor until it violently sputtered fluids from both ends) while I pushed the little car. It became stuck about seven times down the driveway. Maybe it was a storm worthy of shutting the city down.
[This is my story so I'll tell it the way I think it goes]
[even though Keely corrected me when I was retelling it to Joe the other day on the phone]
Shelly's brother's neighbor threw his snow blower across his garage in bitter anger at the machine's recent inability to do it's job. Something had fallen off and this neighbor walked the machine over to his trash pile, sat the machine down and turned his back on it forever. He went out to buy a new one and Shelly's brother went out and picked up the broken one. He took it to his father who fixed it. Just in time for me to borrow it.
When I first asked to borrow it I thought and kept thinking until I was done using it that it belonged to Shelly. I had no problem borrowing it from her, I would never have asked to borrow it from her dad. In the same way I would never criticize something her father owned but I have no problem revealing the downfalls of things that she may have bought. Normally I hold the value of FREE above the insane urge to insult the short comings of tools that do not work to my expectations. However we must proceed...
It was a 3hp Murray. From recent dealings with the Murry snow blower we have at work I knew that the company had been bought out and then shut down. I can only assume that there were issues of quality somewhere involved. This one was so small in comparison to the monster we have at work. This one you had to push, it didn't have a drive axle. It removed almost all the loose snow we had from the driveway. The packed down snow it couldn't touch though. My car still won't be able to come back into the driveway for a while. The weight of my car will undermine the stable layer of packed down snow and easily become stuck again.
Had I the money and it was earlier (or later for sales purposes) I would want to go out and buy a Snow blower that could handle the beast of a driveway I have. Even if I had to pay $300.00+ just to own a machine that would more than likely never be used.
I feel very strongly that when you have to buy something like that, it works more like a demonic charm. It would more likely keep the climate warmer and stop it from ever snowing again, for the simple fact that I would have put out that money for nothing. I'm one step ahead of this, because I have come to terms with it. I don't want to shovel, so if I buy a snow blower that stops it from snowing, in the end I have truly won! Until I find the deal or cash that I'm looking for it's gonna be a long winter.
Friday, February 2, 2007
The Competition in it's entirety
I have become an emotional eater. I think this happens more so when you've restricted yourself from the foods that you love. I hardly ever see Pasta, Chocolate, desserts or sweets. We are striving towards a goal. I have been encountering a lot of stress at work. This is how it goes, when I'm confused or feeling swamped, as if I dug myself into a hole I can't climb out of, what I'd really like to do is crawl into bed with my wife. She won't drive all the way to Elkhart to comfort me when I'm like this (for a number of great reasons, or a great number of okay reasons) so I go to do the next thing that makes me feel as good as holding Keely tight and crying quietly.
Little Debbie Nutty Buddy. I am nervous that in my blind love for this product I have completely messed up the name. I'm not terribly interested in the packaging when it comes to these treats. I've tried alot of different suppliers but the one with the most consistent quality is Little Debbie. If you've never had one, they come two to a package. Right their they are asking you to deny any sort of dietary rules you've tried to implant into your life. The way the package is made there is no way for you to save the other bar for later and yet the nutritional information panel brazenly declares that within there are two servings. As you can imagine being a large white male manager; I have no one at work with whom I'd feel comfortable about sharing a Little Debbie with.
*stops drooling*
[Normally I don't emote in my blog, but that was necessary.]
I'm in a competition, I may have mentioned it before. It's called Diet Club. I think everyone should know the first rule of diet club by now. For those of you who don't it is simply this.
1. We do not talk about Diet Club.
This rule is being overlooked because the competition is over.
Sadly my parents who initiated the competition and cheated their way through. Luckily they did not win. Shelly didn't win either. I most certainly of all did not win. In fact the largest contributor to the pot was myself. Money was added in to the pot when you lose a pound and half as much when you gain a pound. My fluctuations equalled about fifty dollars. The pot was only about $140.00.
Keely won. She was so happy.
I'm not really into this entry anymore, I'm sorry you've all suffered through this...
My only real complaint to the Nutty Buddy Bars are that the thin layer of chocolate that hugs the peanut butter hiding wafers is just that; too thin.
Little Debbie Nutty Buddy. I am nervous that in my blind love for this product I have completely messed up the name. I'm not terribly interested in the packaging when it comes to these treats. I've tried alot of different suppliers but the one with the most consistent quality is Little Debbie. If you've never had one, they come two to a package. Right their they are asking you to deny any sort of dietary rules you've tried to implant into your life. The way the package is made there is no way for you to save the other bar for later and yet the nutritional information panel brazenly declares that within there are two servings. As you can imagine being a large white male manager; I have no one at work with whom I'd feel comfortable about sharing a Little Debbie with.
*stops drooling*
[Normally I don't emote in my blog, but that was necessary.]
I'm in a competition, I may have mentioned it before. It's called Diet Club. I think everyone should know the first rule of diet club by now. For those of you who don't it is simply this.
1. We do not talk about Diet Club.
This rule is being overlooked because the competition is over.
Sadly my parents who initiated the competition and cheated their way through. Luckily they did not win. Shelly didn't win either. I most certainly of all did not win. In fact the largest contributor to the pot was myself. Money was added in to the pot when you lose a pound and half as much when you gain a pound. My fluctuations equalled about fifty dollars. The pot was only about $140.00.
Keely won. She was so happy.
I'm not really into this entry anymore, I'm sorry you've all suffered through this...
My only real complaint to the Nutty Buddy Bars are that the thin layer of chocolate that hugs the peanut butter hiding wafers is just that; too thin.
Thursday, February 1, 2007
A call from Toine*
Tony called me last night and told be about a story "Bomb Scare in Boston." He saw it on the main page of Yahoo. I had to search for it. The moral of the story is that viral advertising in the form of magnetic led lit graffiti was mistaken for dangerous "devices." The ads were for ATHF**. I found the news story with a nice picture of one of the devices. It was a moonanite flipping off anyone who looked at it.
TMBO.org is where I see news first. I went there immediately with a screen capture to post there of the image I had seen. It was too late people already had posted on this topic. They had not yet posted exactly the image that I had found so I put it up anyway. These guys must just sit around all day watching the computer. I would so love that. Damn work all to hell!!!
Tmbo also offered this link for more pictures.
*Toine Schafel is Tony, for some reason all of my friends have interesting aliases at nonspecific times.
**Aqua teen Hunger Force - a cartoon in the line up on Cartoon networks Adult Swim. I love it.
The alarm goes off and it takes a moment for me to become cognitive and realize what is happening. It's always harder after a night when I actually found myself dreaming. It's been hard some times to get dreams. I love dreams. Even when I have to settle for dreams like I had last night.** In the movie Stranger than Fiction (which apparently I'm hung up on) the main character uses his watch (the same watch I own) as an alarm clock. That wouldn't work for me. I don't think. I'm surprised that the alarm clock I use is working for me.
As a child working his way towards manhood I was able to take a few side steps off that path. I became oblivious to any form of alarm or alert that was to bring me to consciousness. It was to the point that I bought an alarm clock that could play CD. It was made by Sony and you could set it to a specific track if you like. At first it wasn't too successfull. I like music, I would go to sleep listening to music, when I heard it in the morning it was peaceful and I did not rouse. I ended up getting a sound fx CD. Track 69, believe it or not, was an air raid siren. This seemed effective for a while. Then I had to move it away from my bed to actually make me stand up to turn it off*.
I later became dependant upon my mother to wake me up. My bedroom was on one side of the house in the basement and the light switch to my bedroom was at the other end of the house. This was because originally the basement was just a place to store things, we converted it into a bedroom so my parents could hide the mess of my bedroom from any guests. My room was lit by four sets of four foot long fluorescent light fixtures. It was like waking up to the sun, six feet away from your head. This all lead to my wife keeping the alarm clock on her side of the bed and telling me when to get up. I was getting a little tired of Keely being in control of the alarm clock and sounding more than agitated when she had to scream at me to get me up in the morning. It was emasculating me to a level I could no longer tolerate. I think over the duration of her having to wake me up in that fashion she actually started her day with disdain for me.
One Christmas my parents bought me a Spongebob Squarepants alarm clock. Now this very simply alarm clock with a Spongebob toy melted to the top of it, sits on my side of the bed. It's surprisingly has done more than that. It also tells the time and wakes me up in the morning. Who would have thought. Having my own alarm clock and taking care of it I think has bettered the relationship I have with my wife. She still asks me every night if it's set and if it's armed but that is only because she cares.
I think this entry was going to be about my daily routine. I don't have one. I add and remove processes on a whim. It's hardly ever the same and I normally forget to complete one vital task. It's not the same task everyday but most of them are equally important. If I forget to shave, shower, exercise, comb hair, brush teeth, eat breakfast, watch TV, get on the computer, feed the dog, let the dog out or once a week take the trash out it's not always the end of the world. I normally don't forget any of the important hygiene ones.
I got up this morning put on my glasses. I used to go to the computer and put in my contacts but I am currently waiting for my new pair to come in. At the computer I would become distracted by the things I feel I need to look at daily.
It's starts with woot.com where I look to see what the one item for the day is that they are selling. [BTW for the past three days it has been some sort of optical mouse, each one has been a different color, they don't seem to be that popular] Then I look at techdeals.net to see what tech I've been drooling over may be cheap enough for me to afford (fun to look at almost never applies to me). I go to TMBO.org, which is now by invitation only (and sadly I don't know anyone who wants to be invited). I check out the torrents that have been added to my browsers "torrent bar" and if anything seems interesting I start the download and walk away as my computer slows down to the speed of a 386 and requests to be left alone while it does what it wants to.
This is the point when I walk to the little bedroom across the hall from my room. I take the second remote from our dish network DVR522 with me. It's our work out room and for at least twenty minutes I ride an exercise bike watching a 13" TV from far enough away it appears to be the size of a hand held television (that's why I need my vision correction application in full effect before the exercise begins).
[today is different because just like two days ago I am writing in my blog]
This isn't supposed to happen because with my glasses I am expected to stumble into that next room immediately. That is what Keely does. She's a trooper. I'm soft, and need something I don't know a warm up period for life. A mediation into full on willing myself to so something other than lie around and age. That's not always true. On some rare occasions I feel so energized from my sleep that I get up with a feeling of purpose and take care of things I may have been too tired to be bothered with the night before (such as dishes from dinner or picking up the shreds of something one my dogs destroyed).
I had heard from my sporadic listening to NPR, a recent study showed that the application of bright light to a sleepy person actually activates (and terminology escapes me) a reaction in the brain to become more alert. Not in a moment of shock, but in an evolved understanding that light comes from the sun and is the start of the day. It's a whole process that is based on the body wanting to sleep when it's dark and be active when it's light. I forget what it's called. The story was about the productivity in children at school based on the amount of rest they had the night before. Interesting stuff and very insightful considering my own educational past and the influence that sleep had in it.
*CD alarm clocks - need to bring the CD to top rotation before they can play the track you've selected. If you have it too close to your head you may involuntarily learn to listen for the noise of the disc spinning and turn it off before the sound kicks in. Then you fall back asleep and regret you spent that much on a useless alarm clock.
**The dream most prevalent in my mind is the one that ended when I woke up. I was with someone I could have sworn it was Tony but sometimes it seemed like this guy I work with named Carl. To be more correct Carl works under me but that really isn't important to the story. We had driven for some unknown reason to my friend Justin's house. I do not regularly speak to Justin nor have I spoken to him in about a year. This is a pattern that i rotate to all my friends. It doesn't mean anything. I do not intentionally not speak to him. It just doesn't happen. The house we go to is set back on a driveway behind two other houses and pole barn. This is not what I know to be Justin's house (the mind is a strange thing). We get to the house and get out of the car I was driving. I don't know why we're there. We knock on the door and go inside. We were invited inside by a large man with no teeth. He was holding a baby. It was another one (and I don't know if Justin has more than one child) of Justin's children. The man with no teeth was not Justin. Tony/Carl stayed quiet and out of my line of sight. Justin came from the back of the home with the normal long lost friend fan fare. The old man shared a short story about the baby's recent ordeal involving it trying to eat or drink something that was not intended for child. The story ended with the man making a face and moving his tongue in and out of his toothless mouth to demonstrate for me what the infant had tried to accomplish, because it too had no teeth and I was obviously beyond having an imagination for the inner mechanics of the efforts of babies. We left the house quickly. We did not get back in the vehicle we drove there. We also did not make any mention of how it was suddenly gone. We walked to the pole barn. Inside we were greeted by a woman who was playing Justin's wife. She was not Justin's wife as I know her at this time. She handed Tony/Carl and I yoga mats and had us take positions on the floor to exercise with her. I had to use the restroom. I walked to the end of the pole barn where there was a little room. I suddenly had a body guard with me. I'm not sure if he hated the menial task of protecting a person in the bathroom or he enjoyed the opportunity to interrupt progress and frustrate at will. The bathroom was horrible. It was the kind that had half residential, half industrial fixtures. The toilet paper dispenser was larger than the toilet itself and pretty much became a gigantic obstacle in all efforts of that type. Above the toilet paper was a paper towel dispenser. The toilet was the kind that used to be white but aged to a dingy yellow, the sink looked the same way. The toilet seat was black. Lighting was a mystery in this room because it was not dark but there wasn't any visible origin of light. At one point I was peeing in a paper cup and amazing myself at the capacity I was producing. I then went in the sink and some time later in the same urination attempted to angle it into the toilet. The time I was taking not only agitated the body guard who at one point was played by Robert De'niro but Carl/Tony was not too pleased that he was forced to complete a series of compromising stretches in front of a strange lady. This was roughly the end of the dream. I woke up needing to go to the bathroom pretty bad. In a dream drought I will settle for this variety.
As a child working his way towards manhood I was able to take a few side steps off that path. I became oblivious to any form of alarm or alert that was to bring me to consciousness. It was to the point that I bought an alarm clock that could play CD. It was made by Sony and you could set it to a specific track if you like. At first it wasn't too successfull. I like music, I would go to sleep listening to music, when I heard it in the morning it was peaceful and I did not rouse. I ended up getting a sound fx CD. Track 69, believe it or not, was an air raid siren. This seemed effective for a while. Then I had to move it away from my bed to actually make me stand up to turn it off*.
I later became dependant upon my mother to wake me up. My bedroom was on one side of the house in the basement and the light switch to my bedroom was at the other end of the house. This was because originally the basement was just a place to store things, we converted it into a bedroom so my parents could hide the mess of my bedroom from any guests. My room was lit by four sets of four foot long fluorescent light fixtures. It was like waking up to the sun, six feet away from your head. This all lead to my wife keeping the alarm clock on her side of the bed and telling me when to get up. I was getting a little tired of Keely being in control of the alarm clock and sounding more than agitated when she had to scream at me to get me up in the morning. It was emasculating me to a level I could no longer tolerate. I think over the duration of her having to wake me up in that fashion she actually started her day with disdain for me.
One Christmas my parents bought me a Spongebob Squarepants alarm clock. Now this very simply alarm clock with a Spongebob toy melted to the top of it, sits on my side of the bed. It's surprisingly has done more than that. It also tells the time and wakes me up in the morning. Who would have thought. Having my own alarm clock and taking care of it I think has bettered the relationship I have with my wife. She still asks me every night if it's set and if it's armed but that is only because she cares.
I think this entry was going to be about my daily routine. I don't have one. I add and remove processes on a whim. It's hardly ever the same and I normally forget to complete one vital task. It's not the same task everyday but most of them are equally important. If I forget to shave, shower, exercise, comb hair, brush teeth, eat breakfast, watch TV, get on the computer, feed the dog, let the dog out or once a week take the trash out it's not always the end of the world. I normally don't forget any of the important hygiene ones.
I got up this morning put on my glasses. I used to go to the computer and put in my contacts but I am currently waiting for my new pair to come in. At the computer I would become distracted by the things I feel I need to look at daily.
It's starts with woot.com where I look to see what the one item for the day is that they are selling. [BTW for the past three days it has been some sort of optical mouse, each one has been a different color, they don't seem to be that popular] Then I look at techdeals.net to see what tech I've been drooling over may be cheap enough for me to afford (fun to look at almost never applies to me). I go to TMBO.org, which is now by invitation only (and sadly I don't know anyone who wants to be invited). I check out the torrents that have been added to my browsers "torrent bar" and if anything seems interesting I start the download and walk away as my computer slows down to the speed of a 386 and requests to be left alone while it does what it wants to.
This is the point when I walk to the little bedroom across the hall from my room. I take the second remote from our dish network DVR522 with me. It's our work out room and for at least twenty minutes I ride an exercise bike watching a 13" TV from far enough away it appears to be the size of a hand held television (that's why I need my vision correction application in full effect before the exercise begins).
[today is different because just like two days ago I am writing in my blog]
This isn't supposed to happen because with my glasses I am expected to stumble into that next room immediately. That is what Keely does. She's a trooper. I'm soft, and need something I don't know a warm up period for life. A mediation into full on willing myself to so something other than lie around and age. That's not always true. On some rare occasions I feel so energized from my sleep that I get up with a feeling of purpose and take care of things I may have been too tired to be bothered with the night before (such as dishes from dinner or picking up the shreds of something one my dogs destroyed).
I had heard from my sporadic listening to NPR, a recent study showed that the application of bright light to a sleepy person actually activates (and terminology escapes me) a reaction in the brain to become more alert. Not in a moment of shock, but in an evolved understanding that light comes from the sun and is the start of the day. It's a whole process that is based on the body wanting to sleep when it's dark and be active when it's light. I forget what it's called. The story was about the productivity in children at school based on the amount of rest they had the night before. Interesting stuff and very insightful considering my own educational past and the influence that sleep had in it.
*CD alarm clocks - need to bring the CD to top rotation before they can play the track you've selected. If you have it too close to your head you may involuntarily learn to listen for the noise of the disc spinning and turn it off before the sound kicks in. Then you fall back asleep and regret you spent that much on a useless alarm clock.
**The dream most prevalent in my mind is the one that ended when I woke up. I was with someone I could have sworn it was Tony but sometimes it seemed like this guy I work with named Carl. To be more correct Carl works under me but that really isn't important to the story. We had driven for some unknown reason to my friend Justin's house. I do not regularly speak to Justin nor have I spoken to him in about a year. This is a pattern that i rotate to all my friends. It doesn't mean anything. I do not intentionally not speak to him. It just doesn't happen. The house we go to is set back on a driveway behind two other houses and pole barn. This is not what I know to be Justin's house (the mind is a strange thing). We get to the house and get out of the car I was driving. I don't know why we're there. We knock on the door and go inside. We were invited inside by a large man with no teeth. He was holding a baby. It was another one (and I don't know if Justin has more than one child) of Justin's children. The man with no teeth was not Justin. Tony/Carl stayed quiet and out of my line of sight. Justin came from the back of the home with the normal long lost friend fan fare. The old man shared a short story about the baby's recent ordeal involving it trying to eat or drink something that was not intended for child. The story ended with the man making a face and moving his tongue in and out of his toothless mouth to demonstrate for me what the infant had tried to accomplish, because it too had no teeth and I was obviously beyond having an imagination for the inner mechanics of the efforts of babies. We left the house quickly. We did not get back in the vehicle we drove there. We also did not make any mention of how it was suddenly gone. We walked to the pole barn. Inside we were greeted by a woman who was playing Justin's wife. She was not Justin's wife as I know her at this time. She handed Tony/Carl and I yoga mats and had us take positions on the floor to exercise with her. I had to use the restroom. I walked to the end of the pole barn where there was a little room. I suddenly had a body guard with me. I'm not sure if he hated the menial task of protecting a person in the bathroom or he enjoyed the opportunity to interrupt progress and frustrate at will. The bathroom was horrible. It was the kind that had half residential, half industrial fixtures. The toilet paper dispenser was larger than the toilet itself and pretty much became a gigantic obstacle in all efforts of that type. Above the toilet paper was a paper towel dispenser. The toilet was the kind that used to be white but aged to a dingy yellow, the sink looked the same way. The toilet seat was black. Lighting was a mystery in this room because it was not dark but there wasn't any visible origin of light. At one point I was peeing in a paper cup and amazing myself at the capacity I was producing. I then went in the sink and some time later in the same urination attempted to angle it into the toilet. The time I was taking not only agitated the body guard who at one point was played by Robert De'niro but Carl/Tony was not too pleased that he was forced to complete a series of compromising stretches in front of a strange lady. This was roughly the end of the dream. I woke up needing to go to the bathroom pretty bad. In a dream drought I will settle for this variety.
Wednesday, January 31, 2007
How a bad day starts
It was several odd minutes past midnight when a slight grumbling began to escalate in the hallway of Paul's home. This is the same small hallway that leads to his bedroom and more importantly the same side of the bed as Paul. When he sleeps more often than not his head faces in such a way that should his eyes be open he could view the closed door at the other end of it and usually a brown lump of a dog that enjoys sleeping at it's mid point. Under certain circumstances this unremarkable hallway is able to emulate a megaphone that has been placed against Paul's ear and is being utilized by Max
Max is the brown lump in the equidistance of the hall way that Paul prays stays silent through the wee hours of the night.
It starts as a throaty grumble and elevates itself to complicated method of breathing right before Max takes an audible gulp of air to aid in his acoustic master presence that takes no survivors in his relentless bark. He works it up for several minutes alerting the person well in advance so they can focus and truly appreciate the pitches he eventually belts out in a variety of tones and volumes.
Max was asking for two things. He wanted to be heard and more importantly obeyed.
Paul rose from his sleep, climbing over what he now regularly considers to be his good dog who sleeps through most of the night. That is largely in fact because she is old and partly due to her constant rabid snarling that tires her out at night. He walked down the hallway to the now bouncing and barking brown outline of Max.
It's not clear to anyone not even Max what is the exact thing he wants. He will stop bouncing and barking if you let him out, if you feed him, if you get down on the ground to love him and even if you drag him back to the bedroom. Some of those solutions are more temporary than the others.
Paul's journey to the back of the house requires him to walk past the book self where he stores his watch over night. It's the same bookshelf where he takes out his wallet, off his belt and sets them down together with his cell phone, keys and what ever else has been hanging around in his pockets that day.
The kitchen is lit with a decorative wine bottle that has been crammed full of white Christmas lights. It's a real nice effect for night light or an accent light. It is however blinding after several hours of sleep in an otherwise dark house. Paul's watch had on more than one occasion wished that lamp wasn't in the kitchen, since Paul seldom slept in pants.
More agitating than walking Max to the frozen tundra that has become his backyard corral is the random promptness in which he demands that he be returned to the coziness of home. Sometimes it's seconds other times it seems like hours. Always it ends with a frantic pawing on the glass, like a child threatening abuse in a shopping plaza. At this time of night you know the neighbors are listening. So does he.
This ritualistic madness of getting up, taking out, waiting, waiting too long and returning to bed only to get up and let back in wasn't enough for the puppet master Max. He has on more than one occasion doubled his efforts to drive Paul insane by awaking the Bean on his return to the bedroom. She who was once sound asleep now cannot rest without her own trip to the outside world. From that point on they pass the baton in an endless relay race of the imagination that allows Paul no more than forty two minutes sleep in any particular pass, or so calculates his shiny wrist watch who each time is sadly victimized seeing the bare ass and assorted other bits that only one other person was rightfully sentenced to see for the rest of her entire life.
Max is the brown lump in the equidistance of the hall way that Paul prays stays silent through the wee hours of the night.
It starts as a throaty grumble and elevates itself to complicated method of breathing right before Max takes an audible gulp of air to aid in his acoustic master presence that takes no survivors in his relentless bark. He works it up for several minutes alerting the person well in advance so they can focus and truly appreciate the pitches he eventually belts out in a variety of tones and volumes.
Max was asking for two things. He wanted to be heard and more importantly obeyed.
Paul rose from his sleep, climbing over what he now regularly considers to be his good dog who sleeps through most of the night. That is largely in fact because she is old and partly due to her constant rabid snarling that tires her out at night. He walked down the hallway to the now bouncing and barking brown outline of Max.
It's not clear to anyone not even Max what is the exact thing he wants. He will stop bouncing and barking if you let him out, if you feed him, if you get down on the ground to love him and even if you drag him back to the bedroom. Some of those solutions are more temporary than the others.
Paul's journey to the back of the house requires him to walk past the book self where he stores his watch over night. It's the same bookshelf where he takes out his wallet, off his belt and sets them down together with his cell phone, keys and what ever else has been hanging around in his pockets that day.
The kitchen is lit with a decorative wine bottle that has been crammed full of white Christmas lights. It's a real nice effect for night light or an accent light. It is however blinding after several hours of sleep in an otherwise dark house. Paul's watch had on more than one occasion wished that lamp wasn't in the kitchen, since Paul seldom slept in pants.
More agitating than walking Max to the frozen tundra that has become his backyard corral is the random promptness in which he demands that he be returned to the coziness of home. Sometimes it's seconds other times it seems like hours. Always it ends with a frantic pawing on the glass, like a child threatening abuse in a shopping plaza. At this time of night you know the neighbors are listening. So does he.
This ritualistic madness of getting up, taking out, waiting, waiting too long and returning to bed only to get up and let back in wasn't enough for the puppet master Max. He has on more than one occasion doubled his efforts to drive Paul insane by awaking the Bean on his return to the bedroom. She who was once sound asleep now cannot rest without her own trip to the outside world. From that point on they pass the baton in an endless relay race of the imagination that allows Paul no more than forty two minutes sleep in any particular pass, or so calculates his shiny wrist watch who each time is sadly victimized seeing the bare ass and assorted other bits that only one other person was rightfully sentenced to see for the rest of her entire life.
Tuesday, January 30, 2007
Wings, the blizzard and you tube
"Me and Tony are going to wings, I was just calling to see what you and Keely were doing later." Mozz said when he called me in the middle of the afternoon on Saturday. The day before my birthday. The day in which I had already went to lunch with my parents at the very decadent Yesterdays and also seen a movie.
The movie was Stranger than Fiction. The animation in it reminded me a lot of HHGTTG. While I would not recognize their names if I saw them, I would not be surprised if the animators at least a few of them were the same.
Mozz didn't for several minutes directly invite me out to eat. As of late I've been living life as a vampire and without direct invitation I will not assume that I am welcome anywhere. It took several more times of him saying "Tony and I are getting wings and I wondered what you were doing later," until he modified it to include "So if you wanted to come, that would be cool."
In the business world, the one that is mostly figurative and evolved from buzzwords and rumors from Japan it is a deadly sin for one to "ASSUME." I have as of late been inducted into that world in the same way I was not inducted into the Thespian Society in high school. It is only deep seated rage and coincidence that I mention that here in a post in which I am also discussing Mozz whom if memory serves correctly did get inducted to the Thespian Society. I need to end this line of discussion right now, because it is several blogs of a discussion I don't feel like covering it this morning.
Right now it is 5:00am on a Tuesday. Three days after these events took place. I probably wouldn't be writing about it at all except I was threatened. Tony at some point in the evening said that I should, no wait he said "That had better go in the Blog!" And since I don't remember exactly what he was talking about I am trying to remember the entire evening the best that I can.
This is going to be complicated. Mozz is staying at Tony's house. Tony owns this house but has not yet moved in. It's a nice house in a suburbia that seems ancient yet has defied the pattern of most, which quickly fall into the habit of becoming white trash neighborhoods or ghettos. It has kept it's secluded innocence, and before Tony took us over to see it, I had not known the area existed. This is partly because I do not entirely believe that anything exists outside of my personal experience but mostly because it's not on the way to anywhere I've been. It's right next to some places I always go, but it's not something you can drive through to get there. (At this point any one who hasn't been there and can not tolerate my non-descriptive writing, will begin to focus their browsers elsewhere.) Tony lives in an apartment. Mozz was waiting for Tony to drop by, then they were going for wings. They didn't know if they were going to Wings ETC or Hooters. When Tony arrived, Mozz was going to call us.
We waited and watched TV. We laid in bed and watched TV. We waited and got hungry. We waited and got tired. We waited and got mildly irritated. Then the phone rang. It was Mozz. Tony had made it and they wanted us to come over there to Tony's house. I had an overwhelming feeling that everything was going to be alright.
The drive from Tony's house to my house and vice versa (but not a round trip) is roughly four miles. Not very far at all. The roads were clear because the only snowfall we'd seen had melted or blown away. The weathermen were all, as per usual, fearing for their lives due to the constant lies they had been spinning. Global warming was kicking their ass.
When we got to Tony's house he was playing with his phone on his new couch in his newly painted front room of his newly purchased home. Sitting next to him was his old friend Mozz who was watching the new TV I gave them that was really old. In reference to which Mozz always said "That TV sucks, dude." Which makes me feel real good that I did not ask that they pay for it. It is common I have come to believe, with friends, that you give each other gifts that are either really cool or maddeningly of poor quality for the simple fact that these items hold those very attributes. Collectively the core of my giving has been I feel of the later. Am I a lesser friend because of this? Maybe not due to the quantity of my generosity. Or if you take into consideration the original value of the items that I gave long after their prime? On the other hand I have been nearly completely out of contact with my friends off and on for several years and the giving of things has been limited.
More importantly than all of that I may forever have to rename Tony; Envy. On more than one occasion he has possessed items, opportunities and experiences; that have caused me to sin. The sin being envy. The highest of these in my current mindset is his new cell phone. He now has a Motorola Q. When my Samsung 650a stopped doing anything, I looked into getting a new phone. That was the one I wanted more than anything. That was the one that cost more than some vehicles I have owned. It was so cool to hold his phone that I nearly cried. I wanted to take it with me and fondle it until it's battery died, then plug it into an A/C adapter/charger and continue the fondling it until I died. At some later point (perhaps after I own my own) I may post a review of it. I could tell it had some quirks. None of the quirks however outweighed it's coolness.
After sharing ring tones and hearing that my favorite Cake song was what he heard when I called him (however seldom that was) we all got into the Jimmy and went to Wings Etc. In my head this place of culinary limitted-ness is a fictional halfway point between my house and Tony's. I'm not squabbling over the back tracking because I understand how much fun we had car pooling.
I don't know why people assume or think that I am a bad driver. Have I had accidents? Have I had traffic violations? Have I fallen asleep at the wheel? Have I driven when I've perhaps been over the legal limit? I would say tentatively, yes but more like maybe once or twice and it's nothing I'm proud of. However on all of those occasions (for the most part) I was alone. No one witnessed them, yet as we begin our journey towards a legendary evening Mozz took the time to point out that while he was about to do it currently he had also in the past critiqued my driving skills (in a way that was not at all complaining). The better word is "Damned" my driving skills. Suddenly I was in the middle of a caucus in which all agreed I may have well been born an Asian woman past her prime and being less than four feet tall, the way I command control of an automobile.
[I don't know why I wrote that, no one said anything like that, and it's racist and prejudiced against Asians (that I find attractive and way to intelligent to ever communicate with, without being terribly embarrassed by my un-special American-ness) the elderly (which I am ever moving forward to become) and the height challenged (which as Randy Newman says "Got no reason to live.")]
Little to say we made it to the dinning experiance without complication.
Wings Etc. is a sports bar with family dinning. (Due to Indiana or St Joe Coutny laws there is no smoking in bars unless they are made completley seperate from dinning areas via walls and doors.) They have wings but they also have all the usual crap you'd find at a burger and beer place. Nothing too fancy. No paper towel or peanuts at the table or on the floor. Everyone but Keely got at least some portion of their meal made from the tiny wings of chickens. We had a great time and no time was greater than when I took out my new toy and took an 8mp picture of Mozz at about 2.5 inches away. I like Macro pictures. So then when you see the picture in all it's greatness you are very near to seeing the actual Mozzucules that make up a Mozz. Seeing ones self under such a microscope is a difficult thing to endure. There is no where to hide that close and detailed.
Oh there was one better moment, and that was when Mozz attempted to eat the coleslaw Tony got with his meal. This was challenge because they didn't supply any of us with silverware. We did have some paper plates and Mozz had an idea. My personal idea was to use my camera to record the event as the first post millennium Druidic-video to be produced. The second idea I had was to use the windows movie maker to turn it into a youtube classic.
When we left Wings Etc. the weathermen had won. My car was under six inches of snow and the large pieces of frozen water molecules were gently floating down in a sea of impaired vision. I went out to warm up and clean off the car while Mozz had a smoke and everyone hung out around him. Even at this point of life with our heavy knowledge of how Mozz will die long before any of us, he still emanates a level of cool to on lookers.
What doesn't emulate a level of cool is the no nonsense business side of Mozz we got to experience when we took him to Meijer to face out his product. Was he over the legal limit? No one really knows, we might have been able to tell by the amount of complaining he was doing because he never complains* and that would be a good measuring tool.
We are some of the best/worst friends. I really don't know which way to judge us, but we seem to like to gang up and frustrate each other on occasion and to no end. Normally it's when one of us is required to something serious. After he went behind the curtain of the Meijer gateway from selling space to storage space we felt ditched for several minutes until Mozz called on his cell phone from several rows away.
He was being forced to use a display stand that was not his own to support more product that it was built for all for capatalistic politics. Valentines day was coming and his Little Debbie supplies needed to be in a visible location for the early morning Sunday crowd. We stood there next to him and judged his company against his competitors and interrogated him about the methods in which he made money. Tony tried relentlessly to buy from Mozz instead of Meijer but there was some sort of catch 22 that could not be broken. Mozz only sells the treat that Tony likes to Meijer. Mozz didn't want Tony to have to buy the treat, he would give the treat to Tony. The only problem was that Mozz didn't have any extra or available to give him. So to recap Tony wanted to buy something that Mozz wouldn't let him and equally couldn't get for him or give to him. The only solution was that Tony, in order to have his chocolaty goodness available to him right now, he had to buy it from Meijer.
When that ordeal was complete, we took them back to Tony's house where the blizzard had full-on shut down most roads and people forgot how to drive completely. There were comments made on how my driving had improved the worse the roads became. I don't know if that was some kind of insult or weird coincidence.
When I got home I found out that my camera is a communist. It takes movies in the *.mov format known mostly as the quicktime format that is more commonly associated with the Mac computers. Windows movie maker denies that it's the kind of file it wants to associate with. I had to download a video converter. When I did the quality went to hell and I was pissed. So now I have gone on to stage two or plan B, which ever you prefer and have uploaded the mov file to jumpcut.com. there I hope to be able to edit it and snap it up a little then be able to post the finished project on youtube.com where we will all be come famous.
*At some point Mozz said durring dinner that he never complains. Twice this year since I've been hanging out with Mozz I've seen this look in his eyes like I've hurt his feelings. I never want to hurt anyone's feelings (which makes me screwed as a manager). It saddens me when I see that look. I also get a little scared because it's just a step to left for full on rage. Right here is offended and over there is kick your ass, which way do you want to take a walk? Tony heard this and began to laugh uncontrollably. We determined that Mozz doesn't ever complain. He shares his unbiased opinions that normally sway to the negative, but not because of him, because the truth is most things on a whole suck.
The movie was Stranger than Fiction. The animation in it reminded me a lot of HHGTTG. While I would not recognize their names if I saw them, I would not be surprised if the animators at least a few of them were the same.
Mozz didn't for several minutes directly invite me out to eat. As of late I've been living life as a vampire and without direct invitation I will not assume that I am welcome anywhere. It took several more times of him saying "Tony and I are getting wings and I wondered what you were doing later," until he modified it to include "So if you wanted to come, that would be cool."
In the business world, the one that is mostly figurative and evolved from buzzwords and rumors from Japan it is a deadly sin for one to "ASSUME." I have as of late been inducted into that world in the same way I was not inducted into the Thespian Society in high school. It is only deep seated rage and coincidence that I mention that here in a post in which I am also discussing Mozz whom if memory serves correctly did get inducted to the Thespian Society. I need to end this line of discussion right now, because it is several blogs of a discussion I don't feel like covering it this morning.
Right now it is 5:00am on a Tuesday. Three days after these events took place. I probably wouldn't be writing about it at all except I was threatened. Tony at some point in the evening said that I should, no wait he said "That had better go in the Blog!" And since I don't remember exactly what he was talking about I am trying to remember the entire evening the best that I can.
This is going to be complicated. Mozz is staying at Tony's house. Tony owns this house but has not yet moved in. It's a nice house in a suburbia that seems ancient yet has defied the pattern of most, which quickly fall into the habit of becoming white trash neighborhoods or ghettos. It has kept it's secluded innocence, and before Tony took us over to see it, I had not known the area existed. This is partly because I do not entirely believe that anything exists outside of my personal experience but mostly because it's not on the way to anywhere I've been. It's right next to some places I always go, but it's not something you can drive through to get there. (At this point any one who hasn't been there and can not tolerate my non-descriptive writing, will begin to focus their browsers elsewhere.) Tony lives in an apartment. Mozz was waiting for Tony to drop by, then they were going for wings. They didn't know if they were going to Wings ETC or Hooters. When Tony arrived, Mozz was going to call us.
We waited and watched TV. We laid in bed and watched TV. We waited and got hungry. We waited and got tired. We waited and got mildly irritated. Then the phone rang. It was Mozz. Tony had made it and they wanted us to come over there to Tony's house. I had an overwhelming feeling that everything was going to be alright.
The drive from Tony's house to my house and vice versa (but not a round trip) is roughly four miles. Not very far at all. The roads were clear because the only snowfall we'd seen had melted or blown away. The weathermen were all, as per usual, fearing for their lives due to the constant lies they had been spinning. Global warming was kicking their ass.
When we got to Tony's house he was playing with his phone on his new couch in his newly painted front room of his newly purchased home. Sitting next to him was his old friend Mozz who was watching the new TV I gave them that was really old. In reference to which Mozz always said "That TV sucks, dude." Which makes me feel real good that I did not ask that they pay for it. It is common I have come to believe, with friends, that you give each other gifts that are either really cool or maddeningly of poor quality for the simple fact that these items hold those very attributes. Collectively the core of my giving has been I feel of the later. Am I a lesser friend because of this? Maybe not due to the quantity of my generosity. Or if you take into consideration the original value of the items that I gave long after their prime? On the other hand I have been nearly completely out of contact with my friends off and on for several years and the giving of things has been limited.
More importantly than all of that I may forever have to rename Tony; Envy. On more than one occasion he has possessed items, opportunities and experiences; that have caused me to sin. The sin being envy. The highest of these in my current mindset is his new cell phone. He now has a Motorola Q. When my Samsung 650a stopped doing anything, I looked into getting a new phone. That was the one I wanted more than anything. That was the one that cost more than some vehicles I have owned. It was so cool to hold his phone that I nearly cried. I wanted to take it with me and fondle it until it's battery died, then plug it into an A/C adapter/charger and continue the fondling it until I died. At some later point (perhaps after I own my own) I may post a review of it. I could tell it had some quirks. None of the quirks however outweighed it's coolness.
After sharing ring tones and hearing that my favorite Cake song was what he heard when I called him (however seldom that was) we all got into the Jimmy and went to Wings Etc. In my head this place of culinary limitted-ness is a fictional halfway point between my house and Tony's. I'm not squabbling over the back tracking because I understand how much fun we had car pooling.
I don't know why people assume or think that I am a bad driver. Have I had accidents? Have I had traffic violations? Have I fallen asleep at the wheel? Have I driven when I've perhaps been over the legal limit? I would say tentatively, yes but more like maybe once or twice and it's nothing I'm proud of. However on all of those occasions (for the most part) I was alone. No one witnessed them, yet as we begin our journey towards a legendary evening Mozz took the time to point out that while he was about to do it currently he had also in the past critiqued my driving skills (in a way that was not at all complaining). The better word is "Damned" my driving skills. Suddenly I was in the middle of a caucus in which all agreed I may have well been born an Asian woman past her prime and being less than four feet tall, the way I command control of an automobile.
[I don't know why I wrote that, no one said anything like that, and it's racist and prejudiced against Asians (that I find attractive and way to intelligent to ever communicate with, without being terribly embarrassed by my un-special American-ness) the elderly (which I am ever moving forward to become) and the height challenged (which as Randy Newman says "Got no reason to live.")]
Little to say we made it to the dinning experiance without complication.
Wings Etc. is a sports bar with family dinning. (Due to Indiana or St Joe Coutny laws there is no smoking in bars unless they are made completley seperate from dinning areas via walls and doors.) They have wings but they also have all the usual crap you'd find at a burger and beer place. Nothing too fancy. No paper towel or peanuts at the table or on the floor. Everyone but Keely got at least some portion of their meal made from the tiny wings of chickens. We had a great time and no time was greater than when I took out my new toy and took an 8mp picture of Mozz at about 2.5 inches away. I like Macro pictures. So then when you see the picture in all it's greatness you are very near to seeing the actual Mozzucules that make up a Mozz. Seeing ones self under such a microscope is a difficult thing to endure. There is no where to hide that close and detailed.
Oh there was one better moment, and that was when Mozz attempted to eat the coleslaw Tony got with his meal. This was challenge because they didn't supply any of us with silverware. We did have some paper plates and Mozz had an idea. My personal idea was to use my camera to record the event as the first post millennium Druidic-video to be produced. The second idea I had was to use the windows movie maker to turn it into a youtube classic.
When we left Wings Etc. the weathermen had won. My car was under six inches of snow and the large pieces of frozen water molecules were gently floating down in a sea of impaired vision. I went out to warm up and clean off the car while Mozz had a smoke and everyone hung out around him. Even at this point of life with our heavy knowledge of how Mozz will die long before any of us, he still emanates a level of cool to on lookers.
What doesn't emulate a level of cool is the no nonsense business side of Mozz we got to experience when we took him to Meijer to face out his product. Was he over the legal limit? No one really knows, we might have been able to tell by the amount of complaining he was doing because he never complains* and that would be a good measuring tool.
We are some of the best/worst friends. I really don't know which way to judge us, but we seem to like to gang up and frustrate each other on occasion and to no end. Normally it's when one of us is required to something serious. After he went behind the curtain of the Meijer gateway from selling space to storage space we felt ditched for several minutes until Mozz called on his cell phone from several rows away.
He was being forced to use a display stand that was not his own to support more product that it was built for all for capatalistic politics. Valentines day was coming and his Little Debbie supplies needed to be in a visible location for the early morning Sunday crowd. We stood there next to him and judged his company against his competitors and interrogated him about the methods in which he made money. Tony tried relentlessly to buy from Mozz instead of Meijer but there was some sort of catch 22 that could not be broken. Mozz only sells the treat that Tony likes to Meijer. Mozz didn't want Tony to have to buy the treat, he would give the treat to Tony. The only problem was that Mozz didn't have any extra or available to give him. So to recap Tony wanted to buy something that Mozz wouldn't let him and equally couldn't get for him or give to him. The only solution was that Tony, in order to have his chocolaty goodness available to him right now, he had to buy it from Meijer.
When that ordeal was complete, we took them back to Tony's house where the blizzard had full-on shut down most roads and people forgot how to drive completely. There were comments made on how my driving had improved the worse the roads became. I don't know if that was some kind of insult or weird coincidence.
When I got home I found out that my camera is a communist. It takes movies in the *.mov format known mostly as the quicktime format that is more commonly associated with the Mac computers. Windows movie maker denies that it's the kind of file it wants to associate with. I had to download a video converter. When I did the quality went to hell and I was pissed. So now I have gone on to stage two or plan B, which ever you prefer and have uploaded the mov file to jumpcut.com. there I hope to be able to edit it and snap it up a little then be able to post the finished project on youtube.com where we will all be come famous.
*At some point Mozz said durring dinner that he never complains. Twice this year since I've been hanging out with Mozz I've seen this look in his eyes like I've hurt his feelings. I never want to hurt anyone's feelings (which makes me screwed as a manager). It saddens me when I see that look. I also get a little scared because it's just a step to left for full on rage. Right here is offended and over there is kick your ass, which way do you want to take a walk? Tony heard this and began to laugh uncontrollably. We determined that Mozz doesn't ever complain. He shares his unbiased opinions that normally sway to the negative, but not because of him, because the truth is most things on a whole suck.
Saturday, January 27, 2007
Stranger than Fiction
Yes. Before I saw the movie at the cheapest theatre in town I was attracted to the Timex ironman watch that is featured there in.
I saw it at Meijer (the watch not the movie). It was in a display with about twenty other identical watches. The card board shipper had the words (or something very close)"As featured in the Motion Picture : Stranger than Fiction." There may or may not have been a picture of Will Farrell included.
It did not however have any indication of price listed on it or printed around it. No one evidently ever works in the jewelry department, because every time I went there wasn't a single person I could seek out for assistance. I didn't just visit it once. I browsed them on several occasions. Finally I walked one over to a price scanner.
Located throughout the store are small electronic devices that incorporate LCD displays and laser eyes to identify and decipher prices of unmarked objects. More common than not these devices are known to be out of order or prompting you to complete menial tasks over and over again. "Please scan the item now." That is a famous request that beams unblinkingly from most monitors after several moments of strategic positioning of the items bar code in the eerie red light that is emitted from the laser at the base of the device. This is classic broken price checker behavior.
When I eventually learned of the MSRP for the watches that I'd been coveting for several weeks I was devastated. I'd never paid more than $20.00 for a wrist watch. (I never said I was an extremely classy person.) Meijer wants a person to pay $67.93 or some such amount.
I am a big person. I have big body parts. I know that a variety of fashionable and occasionally affordable wrist watches and even alternative wrist accessories will not fit on me. To avoid buying something and returning it when it doesn't fit, some establishments allow you the luxury of trying items on. Once I found the jewelry department manned by three people. On that same day they were having a sale for all watches. I asked to try it on and they allowed me to. To my surprise it fit.
I didn't buy the watch at Meijer. At this point the store only had two left and they (probably through the luxury of patrons trying the time pieces on) looked well worn.
I bought it online at a discounted price of something less than $67. The sale at Meijer did not change my feelings about the molestation that had at some point happened to the two last watches they had. I felt much more content buying it online at Amazon.com where it's past will stay hidden from me forever.
When I ended up seeing the movie on the weekend of my birthday I was pleased that while the watch in the movie was more impressive than the version I currently own, the movie itself was very enjoyable to me. It was about writing. It was about love. It was about death and it barely had a happy ending. Kind of like the pleasures derived from dark chocolate. It's so good because it dances on the edge between satisfying and questionably not quite hitting the spot.
I saw it at Meijer (the watch not the movie). It was in a display with about twenty other identical watches. The card board shipper had the words (or something very close)"As featured in the Motion Picture : Stranger than Fiction." There may or may not have been a picture of Will Farrell included.
It did not however have any indication of price listed on it or printed around it. No one evidently ever works in the jewelry department, because every time I went there wasn't a single person I could seek out for assistance. I didn't just visit it once. I browsed them on several occasions. Finally I walked one over to a price scanner.
Located throughout the store are small electronic devices that incorporate LCD displays and laser eyes to identify and decipher prices of unmarked objects. More common than not these devices are known to be out of order or prompting you to complete menial tasks over and over again. "Please scan the item now." That is a famous request that beams unblinkingly from most monitors after several moments of strategic positioning of the items bar code in the eerie red light that is emitted from the laser at the base of the device. This is classic broken price checker behavior.
When I eventually learned of the MSRP for the watches that I'd been coveting for several weeks I was devastated. I'd never paid more than $20.00 for a wrist watch. (I never said I was an extremely classy person.) Meijer wants a person to pay $67.93 or some such amount.
I am a big person. I have big body parts. I know that a variety of fashionable and occasionally affordable wrist watches and even alternative wrist accessories will not fit on me. To avoid buying something and returning it when it doesn't fit, some establishments allow you the luxury of trying items on. Once I found the jewelry department manned by three people. On that same day they were having a sale for all watches. I asked to try it on and they allowed me to. To my surprise it fit.
I didn't buy the watch at Meijer. At this point the store only had two left and they (probably through the luxury of patrons trying the time pieces on) looked well worn.
I bought it online at a discounted price of something less than $67. The sale at Meijer did not change my feelings about the molestation that had at some point happened to the two last watches they had. I felt much more content buying it online at Amazon.com where it's past will stay hidden from me forever.
When I ended up seeing the movie on the weekend of my birthday I was pleased that while the watch in the movie was more impressive than the version I currently own, the movie itself was very enjoyable to me. It was about writing. It was about love. It was about death and it barely had a happy ending. Kind of like the pleasures derived from dark chocolate. It's so good because it dances on the edge between satisfying and questionably not quite hitting the spot.
Wednesday, January 24, 2007
The Failings of Society
It happened. They told me it would. I didn't believe them. My parents said, if you're not careful credit cards will ruin your life. I had all the information I could possibly need. I had never had any kind of credit before. I moved out of my parents house and into an apartment in Muncie Indiana almost nine years ago. Then I proceeded to apply for every form of credit I could.
What happened on most occasions was that I got denied. Having no credit history is kind of frowned upon. What ever credit I did have all went bad. I never earned a degree or landed a good paying job, right after high school. I wasn't able to pay rent let alone credit card bills that piled up with nothing to show for it but empty pizza boxes and gas tanks. Later I was told that was a bad move to buy such exhaustible services on credit.
I feel off the credit world. I wasn't trusted for anything. Mail swamped my inbox for years with threats. The companies I owed sold their losses to other companies for half what I owed. Those companies sold them off to others as I sat and waited for Armageddon. The phone rang incessantly for years. Caller id is one of the best inventions ever. It was hard to explain at first why it rang and we didn't pick up while entertaining. We said it was telemarketers. Soon people didn't seem to care. I'd been visiting with other people and their phone was doing the same thing. Hiding from collectors was more secretly common than I had suspected.
What happened over those nine years I'm not incredibly proud of. Sure at the moment I'm kind of happy, but I'll get to that in a moment. I tried to apply for a Bankruptcy about four years into it. It turned out that while I couldn't pay my bills, while I had been throwing away statements and letters; I was unable to pay for legal assistance and I had no evidence of what I owed.
They say that chapter 11 (or is it 7) is no longer available in a form where you are no longer responsible to repay your debt. They also say that it takes 7 years to come off of your credit report. I heard from somewhere that all bad credit takes 7 years to fall off.
I haven't seen my credit report in several years. I'd been getting junk mail for at least two years where I'd been pre-aproved for this or that. Out of pure fantasy I'd fill them out and mail them in. Everyone was denied for this or that reason.
However in this year of 2007, someone made a mistake. They sent me back not a letter of failure but a platinum card. I'd never gotten above silver before. In fact I think I was at some new form of low level pewter.
I am taking it as some sort of honor. It's gonna be different this time around. I'm going to use my credit to reach higher levels of good credit. I'm am going to pursue heightened plateaus of available credit. Holding them as precious gems until I am near death.
At that point, if I do not have children or beloved relatives that will inherit my debt, I will blow it all. If I'm in any kind of right mind at that point, I'm gonna buy things I can leave in my will to friends. Chances are however as I am near the end of my right mind most of the time, it will be frivolous spending resulting in momentary capsules of entertainment.
What happened on most occasions was that I got denied. Having no credit history is kind of frowned upon. What ever credit I did have all went bad. I never earned a degree or landed a good paying job, right after high school. I wasn't able to pay rent let alone credit card bills that piled up with nothing to show for it but empty pizza boxes and gas tanks. Later I was told that was a bad move to buy such exhaustible services on credit.
I feel off the credit world. I wasn't trusted for anything. Mail swamped my inbox for years with threats. The companies I owed sold their losses to other companies for half what I owed. Those companies sold them off to others as I sat and waited for Armageddon. The phone rang incessantly for years. Caller id is one of the best inventions ever. It was hard to explain at first why it rang and we didn't pick up while entertaining. We said it was telemarketers. Soon people didn't seem to care. I'd been visiting with other people and their phone was doing the same thing. Hiding from collectors was more secretly common than I had suspected.
What happened over those nine years I'm not incredibly proud of. Sure at the moment I'm kind of happy, but I'll get to that in a moment. I tried to apply for a Bankruptcy about four years into it. It turned out that while I couldn't pay my bills, while I had been throwing away statements and letters; I was unable to pay for legal assistance and I had no evidence of what I owed.
They say that chapter 11 (or is it 7) is no longer available in a form where you are no longer responsible to repay your debt. They also say that it takes 7 years to come off of your credit report. I heard from somewhere that all bad credit takes 7 years to fall off.
I haven't seen my credit report in several years. I'd been getting junk mail for at least two years where I'd been pre-aproved for this or that. Out of pure fantasy I'd fill them out and mail them in. Everyone was denied for this or that reason.
However in this year of 2007, someone made a mistake. They sent me back not a letter of failure but a platinum card. I'd never gotten above silver before. In fact I think I was at some new form of low level pewter.
I am taking it as some sort of honor. It's gonna be different this time around. I'm going to use my credit to reach higher levels of good credit. I'm am going to pursue heightened plateaus of available credit. Holding them as precious gems until I am near death.
At that point, if I do not have children or beloved relatives that will inherit my debt, I will blow it all. If I'm in any kind of right mind at that point, I'm gonna buy things I can leave in my will to friends. Chances are however as I am near the end of my right mind most of the time, it will be frivolous spending resulting in momentary capsules of entertainment.
Friday, January 12, 2007
An evening that changed my mind
It was hump day. I had been feeling particularly humped by about three thirty in the afternoon when there was more work to be done than I had time or workers to do. An unanticipated extra effort came out of no where and I did a few people's jobs I don't normally do. I stayed later than I wanted to stay and completed tasks I would normally pawn off onto other people, so they could do more of the real work load.
Closing procedures are some of the most mundane activities of the day for me. Making sure someone didn't forget something. It wouldn't be so bad, but these people never forget to do these things they are asked to. They've been doing it for several years now and have pretty much gotten it down.
I walked outside of the building a few minutes before five pm. Checking the trucks is one of those tiresome tasks. It used to be relaxing over the summer on a nice day. I'd walk out there checking the windows, headlights, chock and enjoy the cool breeze and the blue skies. Now it's winter and the climate has actually started to change in these early weeks of January. The days of December and fifty degrees are long gone***. A bite to the wind made me sure to bundle up before I went out. I wore my black stocking cap and my trusty work jacket. It's a funny thing about work jackets. They seem so cheap and inexpensive but despite how unappealing they look on a whole they tend to keep you pretty warm.
All four semi's were parked in a row. I had made my way around each one. Not one had a window open, a head light on, a door unlocked, a trailer unchocked or were left unplugged*. The last truck was a straight truck, meaning the storage part didn't disconnect in the way a semi does. It had been parked in between the shipping dock and the receiving dock. When a truck is not backed up to the building we are forced to inspect the cargo area to be sure that no forgotten product was left behind.
This particular truck was parked here because it wasn't going to be used for the next day's delivery by it's normal driver. He had fallen out of the back of it on his first delivery of the day. He continued to work all day long and only told me later. Which is when I was taken away from my normal work to fill out an accident form and demand he get medical attention. Our Workman's comp place sent him to the hospital for x-rays. He's not coming back to work until Monday. He seemed pretty upset about it, but I tried to convince him it was like a four day weekend and he should rest and enjoy it.
I grabbed the handle to the back door of the vehicle. It was tougher to open than I expected from this truck seeing how it was a brand new vehicle we picked up earlier in the month. I suspect that there was a bit of an angle that it was parked at causing some torque to be applied to the frame which set the doors slightly out of alignment. I pulled harder with more of my body weight as pseudo strength. The handle didn't need that much help because at a certain point the torque was transferred to the handle and it flew out of my hand. Nearly instantaneously after that I was doubled over in pain with my eyes closed and my hands over my face.
I didn't realize how close to the truck my face was. I took a pretty good hit above my right eyebrow. It hit right at the double folded edge of the stocking cap. I don't know if that cushioned the blow or not. When I could stand up and open my eyes again the right one began to water. I walked back inside. Having just filled out an accident report for Jorge it was fresh on my mind as the next course of action. Not having any medical background it didn't occur to me what type of injuries are severe enough to forgo this procedure. I completed it and took it to my supervisor. Dumb founded by the accident having also been involved with Jorge's case he took me to his boss.
She started asking me questions and while I was able to answer them, there didn't seem to be any urgency on my part. At this point our medical facility was closed and they probably would have sent me to a hospital anyway. She called my wife and they worked out a hospital to take me to. Memorial in South bend. My boss Roy drove me. They decided I shouldn't drive. I left my car at work in the next city.
Roy dropped me off at the Emergency Room. I'd been to this hospital before, visiting other people. I walked through automated doors and into a labyrinth of insufficiently marked areas. I walked twenty feet in not seeing anything that struck me as where I should be. I walked back towards the exit hoping Roy would soon be in to help me. When he came in I told him "I don't know where to go." The ease in which he took me over to a window where people were working let me deduct that something wasn't completely right with me. It was interesting that how lost and in need of help I was and that none of those people who responded to Roy wouldn't even make contact with me.
They took me back to Triage 3 right away. Head injuries are a bit of a top priority I guess. I was alone in a u-shaped room with a curtain for a wall. It wasn't much bigger than most single person public toilets. The walls were beige. I was visited by two women, one in blue and one in beige. It seemed like these colors best matched their skin tones but I learned later that they were color coded by the jobs they held. I was asked on no less than three occasions what my name, birth date, ssn and various addresses and phone numbers I could be reached at if I did in fact outlive the night.
Roy was unable to come back with me. I'm not sure if that was stated to him or a decision he made on his own. I could see an eye chart where I was sitting and everything seemed to be fine with the world around me. What felt off was me. I didn't have an ounce of concern about any of the things that had been bothering me in days leading up to this event. My computer was giving me problems and my job was getting more complicated, but I didn't care. I felt solid and untouched by these events. I was more interested in current events involving, directly me. This is when the fear set in. I had seen several episodes of 3lbs, before they cancelled it. The brain is a very complex and mystical organ. It wasn't very difficult to think that my sudden lack of pain, discomfort and emotion were caused by internal bleeding suffocating those portions of my brain.
When there seems to be no up or down and one is completely lost, I have decided that regardless of what happens it's time to take a moment to thank Jesus. You don't have to voice your comments, questions or concerns because he/God knows what you're thinking. So I'm not sure if there was a nurse or anyone else there when the tears began to well up, but I said probably more quiet than I realize and mostly to myself "Thank you, Jesus." In a brief moment of hope that he would do what ever he thought was best.
Not more than five minutes later Keely (my wife) and Shelly (our friend**) walked around the curtain. "What are you doing to me?" Keely said crying as she bent down to hug me. "I don't know." I replied. Shelly was also, almost crying. "I'm gonna head out now." Roy said and I waved him on thanking him for the ride over to the hospital.
We were then taken to a room. I was asked to strip down to my underwear. I'm all man and made a professional decision that it didn't matter if Shelly was present to see me take my clothes off or not. She was a professional hospital employee and so I barely hesitated. It's not like we both hadn't been completely naked in a pool together at some point. My mind wasn't exactly right because a certain inhibition was released when I began talking about the sex dream I had the night before involving Keely, Shelly and a famous black woman and man. The black couple weren't actually a couple, and I couldn't remember who they were. All I could remember is that no one was having sex with me. Ripoff is the only brand of sex dream I tend to have.
Shell said (from her hospital knowledge) that we were in RTA. She also told us that that was where they put people whom the hospital has little immediate concern for.
I was seen by the orderly from terminator 2, the one that licks her face when she's restrained. When a doctor finally came to see me, he seemed upset that I had neither pain nor discomfort of any kind. I know that's because the severity of brain damage is hard to tell by looking at the outside. Shelly quickly told us as he left that he was the most attractive doctor in the hospital. This information only lead me to believe that the hospital was unable to attract handsome doctors. She really thinks he's hot, Keely kind of agreed. For an older gentlemen he was good looking. I failed to see it, and at times I can be pretty gay when it comes to determining the sexuality of men. However everyone has their own taste.
A cat scan is what they decided that I needed. It took a while for my transporter to arrive. He was black and had dreadlocks. I assumed he was Jamaican but the few words he spoke to me didn't give away any real hints to his accent. It was not American. He didn't like me. It was a distance between my room and the cat scan room. We traveled down hallways that gradually were less populated by people and then by light. He rolled me into a room and said "Some one will be with you in a moment." (when I retold that part to Shelly and Keely I added some "Jah's and Mon's"). It's jealousy not racism. I felt bad for him. He gave the general disposition of someone who didn't like his job. His breathing was heavy as he pushed the wheelchair I was in. The wheels felt like they may have had something wrong with them and then there is the fact that i weigh 325lbs. (I'm working on that).
I was in a room with the device and a no one else. In the next room on the other side of a wall of windows were two guys. They didn't make eye contact with me. Finally one came out. He had long hair and almost enough facial hair to detract from his large nose. He spoke to me in hippie/surfer/hard rock "dudes" and "Mans." He earned his stereotype and wore it well. Asking a person to lay down on a cat scan, who has just suffered a head injury, might require a little more information, is not a thought that crossed his mind. It was a bit of a puzzle to me. I know where the head goes, but at the opposite end of that table is where they put the pillows. Instead of pillows on the end that faces the machine there was a sheet covering what looked like some sort of robotic vice for mangling. I wasn't terribly keen on putting any part of my body into that, so I asked for help. "Where does my head go?" and it was as I feared, in the vice.
When you are in place the thing shoots lasers at you so the technician can line you up correctly. This is my first cat scan and I wasn't having a good time. I didn't know if it was going to be loud or what exactly it looked or sounded like when the machine was behaving normally. All I could think about is the guillotine and the last images I saw of the Saddam hanging. To help with this procedure I wasn't given any instructions. Either ol' boy was too stoned to remember or I simply looked like a veteran of head trauma. It moved the table I was on and the center portion of the ring I was in. It made what I can only now describe as calibration movements. That's what I assume since when the sporadic movements stopped a tiny voice came to me like a megaphone through a drive-thru intercom that said a few things but the only one I heard was "don't move." I think that is when the procedure began.
When the commotion stopped and I was back outside the machine looking up I saw a sticker. It was the informational kind and I felt compelled to read it. I don't know if it was upside down or not. Sometimes I don't seem to have problems reading upside down. It was less than an inch away from an aperture where one of the lasers came out of. The letters were fine and I had to concentrate. It read something to the effect of "Do not stare into the laser." Were the laser actually on I would not have been able to read the sign and obey it at the same time. This made my day. I live for this kind of idiocy.
My hippie came back out to tell me that it was over. He also suggested that I not try to hop off the table because it was a few feet higher in the air that it was when I got on. It is odd that now that the scary part was over he became filled with useful "what-to-do-next" information. Including the info that my transport would arrive shortly. Before retreating into his little glass room where he would once again ignore me, he opened two doors. I almost made a run for it. I didn't want my Rastafarian friend to have to huff and puff my fat ass back to the room where my friends were. I moved back in my wheelchair about three feet under my own power and then remembered that not only did I not know how to get back to where I came from but that we passed through a door he used a code to open, and like a considerate person waiting in line at the grocery store I didn't watch as he entered his pin.
When I got back Keely had left to call my parents and Shelly was sitting there alone. I told her everything that happened and when Keely came in I told it again. Shelly said the version she got was more comprehensive than the one I later told.
The Doctor came back in to tell us that nothing seemed to be wrong. No internal bleeding. That doesn't mean that it won't bleed just that's not bleeding now. I think I've been in management a tad too long because when anyone is CYA'ing I have an internal alert go off. I didn't bring it up but it was pretty thick. He also had a tad of over explaining why he wasn't going to give me narcotics for my own good, like that is what I had actually came for. I didn't have a problem with that because I wasn't in any pain.
I was in shock. At least I think it was shock, I was tweaked in a way that I can't really explain. I could think but I had nothing to think about. I could care but I really didn't have any feelings about anything. I remember wanting to go home and then feeling so comfortable that I didn't want to get up. I may never really know what normal is anymore. Such a subtle injury that only seems to have disrupted my interpretation of existence.
*A diesel engine needs to be plugged in during cold weather so the fuel does not freeze.
**Shelly is a phlebotomist. She works at Memorial and St. Joseph hospitals in South Bend.
***That's sarcasm, or maybe just a statement of our mild winter. This is Indiana, we used to enjoy (the hard core Hoosiers) a dusting of snow at Halloween and two plus feet by Christmas. It's what the Lord (born in the desert) demands for proper celebration of his birth.
Closing procedures are some of the most mundane activities of the day for me. Making sure someone didn't forget something. It wouldn't be so bad, but these people never forget to do these things they are asked to. They've been doing it for several years now and have pretty much gotten it down.
I walked outside of the building a few minutes before five pm. Checking the trucks is one of those tiresome tasks. It used to be relaxing over the summer on a nice day. I'd walk out there checking the windows, headlights, chock and enjoy the cool breeze and the blue skies. Now it's winter and the climate has actually started to change in these early weeks of January. The days of December and fifty degrees are long gone***. A bite to the wind made me sure to bundle up before I went out. I wore my black stocking cap and my trusty work jacket. It's a funny thing about work jackets. They seem so cheap and inexpensive but despite how unappealing they look on a whole they tend to keep you pretty warm.
All four semi's were parked in a row. I had made my way around each one. Not one had a window open, a head light on, a door unlocked, a trailer unchocked or were left unplugged*. The last truck was a straight truck, meaning the storage part didn't disconnect in the way a semi does. It had been parked in between the shipping dock and the receiving dock. When a truck is not backed up to the building we are forced to inspect the cargo area to be sure that no forgotten product was left behind.
This particular truck was parked here because it wasn't going to be used for the next day's delivery by it's normal driver. He had fallen out of the back of it on his first delivery of the day. He continued to work all day long and only told me later. Which is when I was taken away from my normal work to fill out an accident form and demand he get medical attention. Our Workman's comp place sent him to the hospital for x-rays. He's not coming back to work until Monday. He seemed pretty upset about it, but I tried to convince him it was like a four day weekend and he should rest and enjoy it.
I grabbed the handle to the back door of the vehicle. It was tougher to open than I expected from this truck seeing how it was a brand new vehicle we picked up earlier in the month. I suspect that there was a bit of an angle that it was parked at causing some torque to be applied to the frame which set the doors slightly out of alignment. I pulled harder with more of my body weight as pseudo strength. The handle didn't need that much help because at a certain point the torque was transferred to the handle and it flew out of my hand. Nearly instantaneously after that I was doubled over in pain with my eyes closed and my hands over my face.
I didn't realize how close to the truck my face was. I took a pretty good hit above my right eyebrow. It hit right at the double folded edge of the stocking cap. I don't know if that cushioned the blow or not. When I could stand up and open my eyes again the right one began to water. I walked back inside. Having just filled out an accident report for Jorge it was fresh on my mind as the next course of action. Not having any medical background it didn't occur to me what type of injuries are severe enough to forgo this procedure. I completed it and took it to my supervisor. Dumb founded by the accident having also been involved with Jorge's case he took me to his boss.
She started asking me questions and while I was able to answer them, there didn't seem to be any urgency on my part. At this point our medical facility was closed and they probably would have sent me to a hospital anyway. She called my wife and they worked out a hospital to take me to. Memorial in South bend. My boss Roy drove me. They decided I shouldn't drive. I left my car at work in the next city.
Roy dropped me off at the Emergency Room. I'd been to this hospital before, visiting other people. I walked through automated doors and into a labyrinth of insufficiently marked areas. I walked twenty feet in not seeing anything that struck me as where I should be. I walked back towards the exit hoping Roy would soon be in to help me. When he came in I told him "I don't know where to go." The ease in which he took me over to a window where people were working let me deduct that something wasn't completely right with me. It was interesting that how lost and in need of help I was and that none of those people who responded to Roy wouldn't even make contact with me.
They took me back to Triage 3 right away. Head injuries are a bit of a top priority I guess. I was alone in a u-shaped room with a curtain for a wall. It wasn't much bigger than most single person public toilets. The walls were beige. I was visited by two women, one in blue and one in beige. It seemed like these colors best matched their skin tones but I learned later that they were color coded by the jobs they held. I was asked on no less than three occasions what my name, birth date, ssn and various addresses and phone numbers I could be reached at if I did in fact outlive the night.
Roy was unable to come back with me. I'm not sure if that was stated to him or a decision he made on his own. I could see an eye chart where I was sitting and everything seemed to be fine with the world around me. What felt off was me. I didn't have an ounce of concern about any of the things that had been bothering me in days leading up to this event. My computer was giving me problems and my job was getting more complicated, but I didn't care. I felt solid and untouched by these events. I was more interested in current events involving, directly me. This is when the fear set in. I had seen several episodes of 3lbs, before they cancelled it. The brain is a very complex and mystical organ. It wasn't very difficult to think that my sudden lack of pain, discomfort and emotion were caused by internal bleeding suffocating those portions of my brain.
When there seems to be no up or down and one is completely lost, I have decided that regardless of what happens it's time to take a moment to thank Jesus. You don't have to voice your comments, questions or concerns because he/God knows what you're thinking. So I'm not sure if there was a nurse or anyone else there when the tears began to well up, but I said probably more quiet than I realize and mostly to myself "Thank you, Jesus." In a brief moment of hope that he would do what ever he thought was best.
Not more than five minutes later Keely (my wife) and Shelly (our friend**) walked around the curtain. "What are you doing to me?" Keely said crying as she bent down to hug me. "I don't know." I replied. Shelly was also, almost crying. "I'm gonna head out now." Roy said and I waved him on thanking him for the ride over to the hospital.
We were then taken to a room. I was asked to strip down to my underwear. I'm all man and made a professional decision that it didn't matter if Shelly was present to see me take my clothes off or not. She was a professional hospital employee and so I barely hesitated. It's not like we both hadn't been completely naked in a pool together at some point. My mind wasn't exactly right because a certain inhibition was released when I began talking about the sex dream I had the night before involving Keely, Shelly and a famous black woman and man. The black couple weren't actually a couple, and I couldn't remember who they were. All I could remember is that no one was having sex with me. Ripoff is the only brand of sex dream I tend to have.
Shell said (from her hospital knowledge) that we were in RTA. She also told us that that was where they put people whom the hospital has little immediate concern for.
I was seen by the orderly from terminator 2, the one that licks her face when she's restrained. When a doctor finally came to see me, he seemed upset that I had neither pain nor discomfort of any kind. I know that's because the severity of brain damage is hard to tell by looking at the outside. Shelly quickly told us as he left that he was the most attractive doctor in the hospital. This information only lead me to believe that the hospital was unable to attract handsome doctors. She really thinks he's hot, Keely kind of agreed. For an older gentlemen he was good looking. I failed to see it, and at times I can be pretty gay when it comes to determining the sexuality of men. However everyone has their own taste.
A cat scan is what they decided that I needed. It took a while for my transporter to arrive. He was black and had dreadlocks. I assumed he was Jamaican but the few words he spoke to me didn't give away any real hints to his accent. It was not American. He didn't like me. It was a distance between my room and the cat scan room. We traveled down hallways that gradually were less populated by people and then by light. He rolled me into a room and said "Some one will be with you in a moment." (when I retold that part to Shelly and Keely I added some "Jah's and Mon's"). It's jealousy not racism. I felt bad for him. He gave the general disposition of someone who didn't like his job. His breathing was heavy as he pushed the wheelchair I was in. The wheels felt like they may have had something wrong with them and then there is the fact that i weigh 325lbs. (I'm working on that).
I was in a room with the device and a no one else. In the next room on the other side of a wall of windows were two guys. They didn't make eye contact with me. Finally one came out. He had long hair and almost enough facial hair to detract from his large nose. He spoke to me in hippie/surfer/hard rock "dudes" and "Mans." He earned his stereotype and wore it well. Asking a person to lay down on a cat scan, who has just suffered a head injury, might require a little more information, is not a thought that crossed his mind. It was a bit of a puzzle to me. I know where the head goes, but at the opposite end of that table is where they put the pillows. Instead of pillows on the end that faces the machine there was a sheet covering what looked like some sort of robotic vice for mangling. I wasn't terribly keen on putting any part of my body into that, so I asked for help. "Where does my head go?" and it was as I feared, in the vice.
When you are in place the thing shoots lasers at you so the technician can line you up correctly. This is my first cat scan and I wasn't having a good time. I didn't know if it was going to be loud or what exactly it looked or sounded like when the machine was behaving normally. All I could think about is the guillotine and the last images I saw of the Saddam hanging. To help with this procedure I wasn't given any instructions. Either ol' boy was too stoned to remember or I simply looked like a veteran of head trauma. It moved the table I was on and the center portion of the ring I was in. It made what I can only now describe as calibration movements. That's what I assume since when the sporadic movements stopped a tiny voice came to me like a megaphone through a drive-thru intercom that said a few things but the only one I heard was "don't move." I think that is when the procedure began.
When the commotion stopped and I was back outside the machine looking up I saw a sticker. It was the informational kind and I felt compelled to read it. I don't know if it was upside down or not. Sometimes I don't seem to have problems reading upside down. It was less than an inch away from an aperture where one of the lasers came out of. The letters were fine and I had to concentrate. It read something to the effect of "Do not stare into the laser." Were the laser actually on I would not have been able to read the sign and obey it at the same time. This made my day. I live for this kind of idiocy.
My hippie came back out to tell me that it was over. He also suggested that I not try to hop off the table because it was a few feet higher in the air that it was when I got on. It is odd that now that the scary part was over he became filled with useful "what-to-do-next" information. Including the info that my transport would arrive shortly. Before retreating into his little glass room where he would once again ignore me, he opened two doors. I almost made a run for it. I didn't want my Rastafarian friend to have to huff and puff my fat ass back to the room where my friends were. I moved back in my wheelchair about three feet under my own power and then remembered that not only did I not know how to get back to where I came from but that we passed through a door he used a code to open, and like a considerate person waiting in line at the grocery store I didn't watch as he entered his pin.
When I got back Keely had left to call my parents and Shelly was sitting there alone. I told her everything that happened and when Keely came in I told it again. Shelly said the version she got was more comprehensive than the one I later told.
The Doctor came back in to tell us that nothing seemed to be wrong. No internal bleeding. That doesn't mean that it won't bleed just that's not bleeding now. I think I've been in management a tad too long because when anyone is CYA'ing I have an internal alert go off. I didn't bring it up but it was pretty thick. He also had a tad of over explaining why he wasn't going to give me narcotics for my own good, like that is what I had actually came for. I didn't have a problem with that because I wasn't in any pain.
I was in shock. At least I think it was shock, I was tweaked in a way that I can't really explain. I could think but I had nothing to think about. I could care but I really didn't have any feelings about anything. I remember wanting to go home and then feeling so comfortable that I didn't want to get up. I may never really know what normal is anymore. Such a subtle injury that only seems to have disrupted my interpretation of existence.
*A diesel engine needs to be plugged in during cold weather so the fuel does not freeze.
**Shelly is a phlebotomist. She works at Memorial and St. Joseph hospitals in South Bend.
***That's sarcasm, or maybe just a statement of our mild winter. This is Indiana, we used to enjoy (the hard core Hoosiers) a dusting of snow at Halloween and two plus feet by Christmas. It's what the Lord (born in the desert) demands for proper celebration of his birth.
Tuesday, January 9, 2007
Insomnia
Over the past ten years the affliction of insomnia has taken on the form of plot device in many forms of media. It is over glorified and for some time now sought out by even the likes of me. How many amazing things could I accomplish if I wasn't burdened by the encumbrance of sleep?
This week I've found out that I suddenly only need five hours of sleep. When I say sleep it's not steady or sound sleep. I am brought back from the dead every half hour or so by a dog who wants to go out or another one that wants to come in. Sometimes all they want to do it get me out of bed so they can relocate to a better spot. Damn dogs, God made the cute so you won't kill them when pull this sort of crap nightly.
When I get up at three in the morning from a slumber I began at ten in the evening, I feel mildly refreshed but definitely unable to fall back asleep. What have I been doing with my time? I've been stressing out about which digital camera deal is the best and how much research I can find to prove it to myself.
Digital cameras are an entirely different entry. Which I may just compose tomorrow morning at three.
This week I've found out that I suddenly only need five hours of sleep. When I say sleep it's not steady or sound sleep. I am brought back from the dead every half hour or so by a dog who wants to go out or another one that wants to come in. Sometimes all they want to do it get me out of bed so they can relocate to a better spot. Damn dogs, God made the cute so you won't kill them when pull this sort of crap nightly.
When I get up at three in the morning from a slumber I began at ten in the evening, I feel mildly refreshed but definitely unable to fall back asleep. What have I been doing with my time? I've been stressing out about which digital camera deal is the best and how much research I can find to prove it to myself.
Digital cameras are an entirely different entry. Which I may just compose tomorrow morning at three.
Tuesday, January 2, 2007
Mr. T in worktalk
Mr. T tendered his resignation today. He did so based on word of mouth from another worker that claimed he was getting more money and hours. The truth betrayed Mr. T. In true company spirit we told him the other half of the half truths he'd been exposed to. Strong in youthful spirit he stood his ground and proclaimed his just cause. However at the end of the day he was without occupation and/or income.
Monday, January 1, 2007
Everything was awesome until I woke up
After failing to join the Century Club* due to inviting Joe over to participate, allowing Keely to pour mine without measuring and running short on beer; I awaited New Years in predisposed depression. I was no doubt just getting a jump start on the terrific year to come. I didn't ever want to "join the century club" more than once. Well I mean attempt it more than once. I was going to do it and be done with it. The lesson here is that since I didn't complete my goal I now have the foresight to decline any future attempts. I will not be joining the Century Club.
I had some of the best "homemade" mixed drinks I think I've ever had that night. We too about a cup of Gordon's Vodka and poured it into half a bottle of Sour Apple Schnapps then mixed it equally with Sprite Zero. That was nice. I followed the directions and made a successful pitcher of SeaBreaze (1 part Vodka, 2 parts Grapefruit Juice, 2 parts Cranberry Juice).
Sadly Keely made several unpleasant Bloody Marys. It's not really her fault we've been searching for the best recipe ever since we had a really good one at the JOYCE. We've tried a few mixes but this time Keely thought what about V8 juice. We bought two kinds Hot and regular but they kept coming out too sweet. Next she says she's going to try normal tomato juice.
We had lots of food. I set up a table just for food so we could play games at the dinner table. We had melted down some Krogers brand Queso Blanco and added hamburger meat to it. We served it from a crock pot and had tortilla scoop chips to eat with it. There was a cheese and cracker tray. We had vegetables and ranch dip. Also potato chips, a popcorn tin and various peanuts added to the buffet.
Our entertainment portion of the evening beyond us all for the first time in a long time being pretty smashed was a few board games we've recently added to our collection. We played "Would you rather...," "Balderdash," and "Scene it!" By the time we got to Scene it! Joe had already left. We were so into playing it that we didn't notice that midnight had arrived. We missed the ball dropping, without actually missing it at all.
When I woke up I was in a swearing off alcohol mood. I would at some point between then and noon take four ibupropherens, drink three glasses of water, take a nap and throw up twice. Those things didn't occur in that order but I am pretty sure they occurred in those frequencies. Feeling the way I did, it caught me by surprise when Keely began talking about the next time she was going to make Bloody Marys. It wasn't something I really wanted to think about. At least not at that point in time.
*Century Club - Having drank 100 (1 oz) shots of beer in 100 minutes. Rules vary but the 100's stay constant. So if you wanted to drink it in cups instead of shot etc. it's just got to equal 100 oz in 100 minutes.
I had some of the best "homemade" mixed drinks I think I've ever had that night. We too about a cup of Gordon's Vodka and poured it into half a bottle of Sour Apple Schnapps then mixed it equally with Sprite Zero. That was nice. I followed the directions and made a successful pitcher of SeaBreaze (1 part Vodka, 2 parts Grapefruit Juice, 2 parts Cranberry Juice).
Sadly Keely made several unpleasant Bloody Marys. It's not really her fault we've been searching for the best recipe ever since we had a really good one at the JOYCE. We've tried a few mixes but this time Keely thought what about V8 juice. We bought two kinds Hot and regular but they kept coming out too sweet. Next she says she's going to try normal tomato juice.
We had lots of food. I set up a table just for food so we could play games at the dinner table. We had melted down some Krogers brand Queso Blanco and added hamburger meat to it. We served it from a crock pot and had tortilla scoop chips to eat with it. There was a cheese and cracker tray. We had vegetables and ranch dip. Also potato chips, a popcorn tin and various peanuts added to the buffet.
Our entertainment portion of the evening beyond us all for the first time in a long time being pretty smashed was a few board games we've recently added to our collection. We played "Would you rather...," "Balderdash," and "Scene it!" By the time we got to Scene it! Joe had already left. We were so into playing it that we didn't notice that midnight had arrived. We missed the ball dropping, without actually missing it at all.
When I woke up I was in a swearing off alcohol mood. I would at some point between then and noon take four ibupropherens, drink three glasses of water, take a nap and throw up twice. Those things didn't occur in that order but I am pretty sure they occurred in those frequencies. Feeling the way I did, it caught me by surprise when Keely began talking about the next time she was going to make Bloody Marys. It wasn't something I really wanted to think about. At least not at that point in time.
*Century Club - Having drank 100 (1 oz) shots of beer in 100 minutes. Rules vary but the 100's stay constant. So if you wanted to drink it in cups instead of shot etc. it's just got to equal 100 oz in 100 minutes.
Thursday, December 7, 2006
2006 and very confused
How is this beta? How is this anything other than my blogger account merged with my gmail account?
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