A Story In As Many Parts As It Takes, Part II

Ada's Dance
Before

Ada looked at Derrick. He was tall and very thin, the kind of thin where nurses get concerned about pushing the needle all the way through his arm, with arms and legs a bit too long for his body. The green shirt he wore made her think he looked like a praying mantis. He stood a few steps away from the door and wasn’t moving. He was looking at the bleachers that had been rolled into the wall to his left, away from the DJ.

Ada rolled her eyes. She couldn’t believe how stupid he was being. Sure, she knew that Derrick was sometimes afraid of large groups of people, but he was the one who asked her to the dance. Shouldn’t he be out there dancing with her? Shouldn’t he have his arm around her waist, grinding his hips into hers-- well, with his height it would be her stomach, but shouldn’t he be grinding her? Shouldn’t Chip be watching Derrick grind her and be getting jealous? Shouldn’t Chip be wanting to push Derrick out of the way by now and draw her into him and softly place his lips on hers? What was Derrick doing over there by the door?

With a quick glance back at Chip, Ada grudgingly lifted one foot and slammed it down in the direction of the door then lifted the other. Each step was faster than the last. She would have called what she was doing running, but since it wasn’t ladylike to be running in a dress, she would have called what she was doing running, instead, she chose to believe that she was just a bit hurried. Her left foot came down on the inside of her dress causing her to stumble. She stopped, grumbled, stomped her feet, lifted her dress, and started to hurry toward Derrick again.

He was still just standing there. Hadn’t he seen her stumble and nearly fall? Would he have moved if she had fallen? Chip would have, probably, if he wasn’t so far away and bumping butts with that evil temptress. That Debbie, stealing away her man, made her so mad. Her face flushed and she moved even faster, muttering about all the horrible things that happen to girls like Debbie and grinning.

“What are you doing over here?” she asked as she hit Derrick in the shoulder. “We should be out there dancing.”

“Uh . . . yeah . . . w-we should be,” he said, shivering and trying to not look at Ada. “It’s j-just that I th-thought, you know, since we had our p-picture taken already and e-everything, m-maybe we could j-just . . . leave?”

“What?” Ada couldn’t believe what she was hearing. How could he want to leave? She lifted and separated her boobs, she slathered her face in make-up, and she even put glitter in her hair, all to go to the dance with him. She hated glitter. Why would he want to leave?

“I mean,” he looked down at her, “I just thought that . . . Well, I know how much you hate d-dancing and I thought that you m-might not want to, you know, go out there and m-make a fool of yourself in f-front of everyone.”

“What!” Ada’s whole body flushed. How dare he say something like this to her? About her? Wasn’t he her friend?

“C-come on,” he said, his hand shaking as he put it on her shoulder. “Neither of us really wants to be here. We don’t like to d-dance, at least in front of people. Let’s just get out of here. We could go get dessert at that cheesecake p-place. It’s open until, like, ten this evening. You can get chocolate and caramel on yours and a scoop of ice-cream. Come on, can we just get out of h-here?”

Ada shook Derrick’s hand off of her, took a deep breath, and looked him straight in the eye, “You, Derrick Perkins, are the one who asked me to this dance. I never even said that I wanted to go, but when you asked, I said yes. Look at me.” She twirled. “I dressed up to come to this dance with you.” She took his shaking hands in hers. “I wanted to come with you. You’re my friend and you deserve to have some fun once in a while. You’re here with me. Just pretend it’s only you and me here. No one else. Just the two of us. We have the whole gym to ourselves. The music is only for us. We’ll go out there and dance. We might be fools, but we’ll have fun. Besides, you’ve heard me fart, what could be more embarrassing than that?”

He laughed, looked at his hands in hers, and said, “Yeah, and I’ve smelled them, too. Rotten meat and broccoli. Yummy.”

“Shhhh. Just because you know about my old-man farts doesn’t mean that I want the whole school to know.” She smiled up at him. He’d stopped stuttering, that meant he was feeling more comfortable, that was a good sign. “Can we go dance now?”

“Okay, we can dance.”

“Great,” she said and started to drag him toward the DJ. “Let’s go dance in that group. They won’t even notice us.”

“Great,” echoed Derrick, plodding after her.

Chip was in Ada’s sight again. Chip was all that she could see. Sure, she knew that Debbie was rubbing against him, but that wasn’t important. What was important was getting close enough so she could make out that tiny freckle--or was it a birthmark, he’d always had it--to the left of the cleft in his bold, masculine chin. She loved that freckle. That imperfection on his perfect face made him more appealing to her, as if he were only human, instead of some sort of Mozart opera made human. How could one of the greatest pieces of music made human dance with some hip-hop ho?

A hole opened up next to Chip. Ada yanked harder at Derrick’s arm, they had to get there. She had to be near him. Chip had to see her with Derrick and see how happy they were together and see how much she didn’t want him. He just had to. She yanked again and Derrick started to hurry.

“Ladies don’t run, you know,” he said.

Ada ignored him. What did he know about it? He wasn’t a lady and he didn’t have a plan that had to be stuck to. She did and she’d do anything to have it work.

Gone

I think (or is it more hope?) That ~o is in China by now. I'm excited for him and jealous of him. I hope that, while he's there, he updates his blog regularly because no one out there sees the world in the way he does, and then is willing to put it in writing for the world to see. He's gone for at least a year, and I'll miss seeing him, even though I didn't visit him near the Bay enough in the past eight months.

Everyone wish him the best and check his blog for, hopefully, interesting stories about the insane capitalism going on in a "communist" country.

Hmmmm...

I can't remember too much from today. That probably means that I didn't do anything, which is nearly the truth. What I do remember is going to Wal*Mart to try to buy a backpack, but getting creeped out by the new one here in Cowcity. (It has an escalator in it. It's not a Super Wal*Mart, but it has a second story and a freezer. Next to the people escalator is a shopping cart escalator.) So, I followed my father's advice and went to REI, where I found one. I even used it today when I went to school. Hooray for me.

Hope your day was more interesting.

A Story In As Many Parts As It Takes, Part I

Ada's Dance

Ada hated to dance. Dancing was second on the list of things she hated most in the world. When her friends asked her why she wouldn’t dance, she said it was the music. It was, she said, the hard bass line that thudded in 4/4 time and that the only music they played at the school’s dances were all bass, no rhythm. She’d tell them that it didn’t offer enough variation, she couldn’t do the steps she wanted to such a simple rhythm, she wanted something more complicated so she could really move. Her friends believed her because she was the best musician at school. She composed pieces for the woodwind quartet she was part of. She could play all the instruments in the school band, but was an expert at the clarinet. All this convinced her friends that she knew what she was talking about and, therefore, needed better music to dance.

The truth was that her body didn’t have the rhythm that her mind and fingers had. Her foot never tapped out the proper time while she was playing. Instead, it tapped with a beat all its own. She couldn’t even march properly with the school’s band. Always half a step off , having to do a little hop to match the girl next to her, only to be half a step off twenty feet down the road.

Ada had tried to dance. Oh, how she had tried. She took lessons. Tap. Jazz. Ballet. Hip-hop. Square. Folk. She even went out to the local Indian reservation to learn some of the tribal dances. She tripped on the foot of the girl next to her, which caused the whole row of girl to fall face first into the hard-packed dirt. Her body didn’t move to the beat. It was always too fast or too slow, swaying to the left when it should be dipping to the right, never where it should actually be. All of her teacher encouraged her to quit after the third or fourth class, telling her they thought anyone could learn to dance, until they met her.

What really pissed her off was that she could play her clarinet like Benny Goodman, but couldn’t tap her feet as well as the kids in the up to eight years class at the other end of the studio.

Yes, Ada hated to dance, but she had come to the spring formal with her friend Derrick anyway. Actually, she had tricked him into asking her to the dance. She knew he hated any school functions, so she had to trick him into asking her. What she did was constantly complain about the way an acquaintance of theirs, Ken, had been following her around since their return from Christmas vacation. She told Derrick that she didn’t like the way Ken made moon-eyes at her whenever he saw her. She said she didn’t like they was he stood a little closer to her than she was comfortable with. She constantly mentioned Ken’s bad breath and how she was afraid she’d faint when he opened his mouth. Every day for a month before tickets for the dance went on sale, she complained about Ken to Derrick.

“It’s not that I don’t like Ken,” she told Derrick at lunch the day tickets went on sail. “It’s just that I’m afraid he’s gonna ask me to the dance and I don’t think I could say no. I don’t want to hurt his feelings.”

“Well,” Derrick said, his voice catching in his throat, “maybe I could take you to the dance. You know, protect you from Ken and the other Kens out there. That way you could tell him the truth. You’re already going to the dance with someone else.”

“Really?” Ada’s eyes brightened and she grinned. “You’d do that for me?”

“S-sure. I-I’d do just about anything for you, Ada.”

“Thanks, Derrick,” she said, taking his hand, impressed that the first part of her plan had worked. “You’re the best friend a girl could ever want.”

The second part of her plan was to make Chip, the boy of her dreams, to really notice her and, if all goes well, become so enraptured with her that he’d whisk her away from the dance with a kiss, take her to the highest peak in the mountains, and proclaim his everlasting love for her and only her as the sun pushed its way into the sky. Of course, just the noticing and kissing thing would be good too. Sure, it might ruin Derrick’s night if the girl he came in with ended up in another boy’s arms, but Derrick was a good friend and would understand. He had too, right?

The music in the gym was thumping when Derrick, wearing a dark green button-down shirt and Garfield tie, and Ada, in a strapless purple dress that she thought hugged her curves in a way to emphasize the good and hide the bad, stepped into the room. The music was so loud that Ada felt her heart adjust to beat along with the bass.

Most people were split into small groups which formed circles. All the people circles swayed with the music, spastically flailing their arms around, and occasionally lifting a foot. In short, they were dancing. At least they thought they were dancing. Ada thought it was more like they were all having seizures in time with the music.

She tried to sway and flail and lift her feet there in the door way. Immediately, she noticed she was off the beat. Her swaying, flailing, and lifting not following to beat of the music at all. She was disgusted that she couldn’t even have a seizure correctly. She stalked away, scanning the crowd for Chip. She spotted him. He was dressed in all black, no tie. He didn’t need one. A tie would have made him less cool. He was having a seizure next to Debbie--a blonde from Ada’s English class with huge, probably fake, tits, narrow hips, little personality, and no brains--right in front of the DJ’s booth. Ada’s knees felt weak watching Chip move with the music. She wanted to run her fingers through his black, spiked hair, lay her head on his broad shoulders, and run her fingers across his perfect stomach. First, she’d have to get him to notice her more than he noticed Debbie.

Ada ran her hands up and down her dress, hoping it looked like she was smoothing it. Really, she was trying to push her boobs up even higher. If Chip liked cleavage, she’d show him cleavage, even if she had to push her boobs all the way up to her eyes.

She reached her hand out to grab Derrick. He was the first step in helping her to get really noticed. She groped to her right, then her left, then behind her, not wanting to take her eyes off of Chip. No Derrick. She looked to her left and right. No Derrick. She turned around. Derrick was standing by the door. Ada could barely make him out in the darkness. She turned back to Chip, watching him gyrate toward Debbie. Her face flushed. She ripped her eyes away and looked at Derrick. She needed him for her plan to work. Without him, there was no plan.

Whelp...

The Manager came into work, looked at me, smiled a big Manager smile, and said, "Hi." to me. This was disappointing to me. I was all ready to make reasonable requests and maybe do some OWGAWE bashing. (OWGAWE was actually early this morning! Last Friday, I overheard a conversation between her and The Manager, and The Manager had suggested that OWGAWE should be demoted since OWGAWE doesn't fulfill shift supervisor duties. I'm guessing that OWGAWE is trying to make a good impression to keep her position. If I were a betting man, I'd set up a betting pool at work about the day she'll start being late again.)

Mornings are starting to get busy again, which means there's so much work that I don't really have time to think, just do. Maybe it's all my thinking recently that makes the job seem so horrible. Do you think that's possible?

School started, for me, today. I think my class will be cool, but one day is hardly time enough to judge. My biggest problem is that we're going to use a stylus and tablet. In the past, I've had problems using a stylus. Keep your fingers crossed for me and my work.

Front Is Back

My front is back in Cowcity. I braved the 100 degree valley to drive back today because I have to open with OWGAWE tomorrow. Tomorrow is also the first day I will see The Manager since she had her meeting with The Wraith and had to show him the papers five of us had to fill out and sign, but I didn't sign. Will she speak with me about it? I don't know, and I don't really care.

School also starts tomorrow. I have my parking permit, but no books yet. I still have no backpack, or other bag, yet. Hopefully, it'll be a good class.

The friends I have who are going to China are leaving this week. If I had stayed in Cowtown until sometime this evening (maybe now?) I would have been able to say good-bye face to face, but that isn't going to happen. This is disappointing, but I stayed as long as I could and still make it here in time to catch many hours of sleep, which is what I should bet too now.

Out

Made it Cowtown yesterday afternoon. Sailing was smooth except for that detour that was lifted by the time I finally made it back to the highway.

Glad to be out of the city.

Even more glad to not be working.

Will there be a post tomorrow? Only tomorrow can tell.

TESTING

I'm testing to see if I can post into the future.

If all goes well, this'll be posted as I'm driving away from Cowcity to Cowtown. Which way I'll be going, I don't know. That'll depend on how hungry I am because one way has many more choices for food type places than the other way.

When I get in my car and change out of the coffee stank shirt into the one on the front seat, I'll be amazed that even though it's 90ish degrees, probably over 100 in the car, at how nice it is to put a warm shirt on. I'll swap my shoes for sandals, and my car will grumble away (it doesn't roar).

If all does not go well, this'll be posted tonight, right after the tale of The Wraith. I'm sort of looking forward to seeing if The Manager will need to speak with my about that paper I filled out tomorrow (or today, depending on if this works).

In any case, it's just another useless post contributing to the title of this page.

I'm sure I'll let you know about what happened at work soon.

The Wraith

There was a sense of unease when I walked through the door to work this morning. Some tension in the air. Maybe, I thought, it's because the assistant manager opened, or OWGAWE was late again. (How I hoped she was late again.) I could just sense that the three people behind the counter were tense.

I wasn't going to ask them about it. Why would I want to have their troubles spread to me? I didn't want to feel bad too. At 9:30, I found out why they were so unhappy.

Today was the monthly visit from one who upsets us all. They call him the District Manager or his name, to his face. Like all DMs, he's a wraith like figure who everyone knows exists, but all fear to meet. During all the days and weeks we don't see him, we occasionally get e-mail filled with instructions that we are already following or that don't make any sense at all (How the hell do I "interweave the pastries"?), or a phone call that makes The Manger and TWBMs go crazy. Today, the wraith floated into our store to wreck the havoc they all so enjoy.

He made sure to arrive fifteen minutes early so that when The Manager showed up, she'd think she was late. During those fifteen minutes, he hovered around his favorite table until the couple sitting at it left, he set up his laptop and other materials, then hovered around the bar asking us how we were, but not really giving a rat's testicle how we really are. He really wanted to instill fear in us as we tried to make drinks for the eight people who were waiting for the drinks they could barely order. I was one of the lucky two, I was taking orders and he couldn't talk to me unless he was willing to disturb customers, but that would destroy the his evil powers.

The Manager finally came through the door, and The Wraith had one particular person he could focus on sucking the life out of. I was just happy he was moving away from me. I think the customers were glad he was gone, too.

Most of the day, he and The Manager were at his favorite table. He talked, she nodded. I don't know how much she was actually hearing. If I was the one at the table, I would have been singing to myself the whole time.

The times The Wraith came near me, I fled--to the dishes or to clean the lobby or to the trash--anywhere that wasn't near him. I was even given two quests by the TWBM who was there. One was to bleach the sidewalk where morons constantly spill their drinks changing the color from stupid gray to stupid brownish gray. I was outside for a good thirty minutes, always nice, even if I was scrubbing sidewalk. The other was a job that should have been handled the last time the merchandise was rearranged, the marking down of clearance items. This required me to carry ten object to a register, use it for five minutes without helping a single customer, making a list, then playing with the price gun. I didn't have to speak with any co-workers while doing it. And I convinced a lady to buy one of the things by lying to her and saying that I had one and it was great. (I know I was doing my job, but I felt dirty after she bought it.)

As I counted out my drawer, The Manager frantically searched though her papers for the forms that all the people who were on the shift during that bad Snapshot had to fill out. She kept saying that she hoped they were all signed. Mine isn't signed. I left work quickly, so that when it was discovered that mine wasn't signed, I wouldn't be there.

I wonder what The Manager told The Wraith.

Two things that drive me nuts. Part II

FIRST

The word "hella."

I can't stand it. I don't remember when I first heard it, but I know that I didn't like it. If I've said it, it was by accident. I do my best not to use this word and I do my best not scream at the people who do. (Especially since one of my best friends says it all the time, but I forgive her.) Gwen Stefani and those three guys who follow her around did me a great disservice when they used this word in a song that the idiot masses of this nation took into their barely beating hearts.

I do know where this word came from. It all started by someone somewhere shortening the phrase "hell of a" into one word. That way instead of saying, "I had a hell of a good time." they could be more succinct and say, "I had a hella good time." Then it started to be used out of that context, like if someone says, "This song's hella good." Doesn't that translate into: "This song's hell of a good"? Does that make sense to anyone? It's "hell of a good" what? It doesn't make sense! AAAARRRRRG!

Whenever I hear the word "hella" used, I cringe inside. It may not look like it, but a piece of my soul is torn out each time that so called word is used. Yeah, I know that English is one of the most accepting languages in the world and there are probably more variations on it than any other language out there, but my knowing that still won't make me like that word.

And for you jokers out there who want to fill up my comments with posts using the word "hella" go right ahead, just know that I already knew you were thinking of doing it. Not so funny anymore, is it?

SECOND

The phrase "Take it easy."

I just don't understand this phrase. Take what easy? Life? Work? School? Girls? Masturbation? Love? Sex? The Monkees? What? I don't know what I should take easy.

Maybe it's about stealing. "Take [the money or the car or the dog or the magazine or the candy or the keys or the baby] easy." I don't think that's right, though.

Why not just say "bye" or "good-bye" or "I hope to see you later" instead of "Take it easy"? Those are things that I understand, that I trust you mean. That I don't assume it is a pleasantry you use just to lull me into a calm before you hit me over the head and take my wallet, easy.

And I know it's not the people who say it. One of my mom's friends is a wonderful persons, but her way of saying "bye" is always "Take it easy." In person or on the phone and probably even in e-mail. I doubt she even realizes she says it, like all those people who say "you know?" or "know what I mean?" at the end of almost every sentence.

Even if the "it" in this phrase was to be defined, I think the phrase would drive me nuts. It's been used so much it's become meaningless, and for this phrase it wasn't a long move.

Today's Real Post

--or--
Bile, Puss, and Radio-Active Waste
--or--
Wowed by the Wonders of Work
--or--
All Service Jobs Should Come With a Cyanide Pill

I went to work happy today, which is a rare thing when I leave the apartment at five in the morning. I was smiling. I drove with all the windows rolled down. Good songs played on the radio and I sang with them, screaming over the sound of wind rushing into the car. GIESW was there, she opened, so I was happy to see her again. OWGAWE was there too, but she was a little sour, which made me smile. I was moving to the music that only I could hear. Nothing could take me down, until 6:43AM came around, that it.

At that time, OWGAWE came to me and asked if The Manager had me told me about the survey I had to fill out. I hadn't heard of any survey. Was it for everyone? Nope, she said. Why me? She wouldn't say.

She had me sit at the back desk, handed me a form, which was mostly blank lines and told me what everything was about.

"You know about our last snapshot, right?" she asked. I nodded. Our last snapshot (the secret shopper bullshit so many companies use) was 43.7% and ***. The stars are okay, but the percentage sucks, especially since last quarter we had three five star snapshots and one of them was 100% (the others were in the 90s). "[The Manager]," OWGAWE continued, "is having everyone who was working at the time of the snapshot fill one of these out." She waved another form around. "You were on the shift," she looked at the snapshot paper, "but you weren't the register person or the barista, but you could have been the other bar person or the stocker or the missing fifth person. What you need to do is fill this out and sign it." She pointed to the paper in front of me. "And when your done," she said, "put it in [The Manager's] box."

OWGAWE did a quick turn and left. I looked at the form. It had four places that I needed to fill out. The first said:

"What did the barista do correctly on the:
Snapshot_____________"

The second said:

"What did the barista do incorrectly on the:
Snapshot_____________"

The third said:

"What could have been done to get a better:
Snapshot_____________"

The fourth said:

"Why is this important do these things for the:
Snapshot_____________"

The snapshot happened over a month ago. My work day is a blur by the next morning, how can I be expected to remember what happened at work a month ago?

On the first two, I copied what the secret shopper put on the snapshot. What else could I do?

The third was how people can correct the problems the secret shopper had.

The forth was answered with bullshit 'Bucks propaganda about 3rd places and special experiences and other things I don't really believe in.

Then came a paragraph telling me this paper was considered a conversation and a verbal warning. Does this seem wrong only to me? I wasn't involved in the poor score, why is it my warning? And who did I have a conversation with? I just filled out a fucking form. Then the next line said that if I'm involved in another snapshot like this one a more severe form of punishment will be involved, "up to and including termination."

Whoa! I thought. Something isn't right here. I don't deserve any threat like this. I'm a hard worker, not one of those fuck-ups. I always show up for work on time, not like [OWGAWE].

I noticed that I had signed the paper.

I knew then that I was a moron.

I rifled through the crap on the back desk until I found white-out. I took my signature off the paper and slid it into my manager's box. If she wants me to sign and date it, I decided, I'll have to speak directly with her.

I've also decided that I want a copy of the paper I wrote, a copy of the snapshot, and a copy of that weeks schedule. If the store is gonna fuck with me in this way, I'm gonna try and fuck with them back.

I don't deserve this kind of bullshit.

Too bad the places I interviewed at didn't want me. Not even the fucking movie theater.

*sigh*

FYI

So, I just got off the phone with my parents, whom I am staying with and visiting this weekend in Cowtown. I spoke with them for two reasons: 1. To let them know when I'd be up. 2. To congratulate my dad for getting hired full time at the junior college out there. Everyone, tell him he did good!

During the talk, it was mentioned that two of my relatives (who lurk here and maybe on your blog), counselors of a sort, are concerned about me. Getting me pills was even spoken of. (I NEVER plan on taking pills like that, unless the world gets so unbearable I need someone to wheel me out of here while wearing a Napoleon style hat and a straight jacket. GIESW went to the doctor with her mother, the other day; her mother explained GIESW's moods and the doctor wrote a prescription without asking GIESW if she wanted pills. Does that sound like the right move? I don't think so. I'd rather spend money on a psychiatrist whom I won't speak to in thirty minute sessions than get pills that fuck with my brains chemistry.) I understand the concern, but you don't have to be worried about me. The only way I'd hurt myself is after I finish off all the rounds out of a semi-automatic rifle into a crowded mall, and that's unlikely to happen. I keep the sunshine, lolly-pops, and rainbows of my life balled up inside and spew the bile, puss, and radio active waste all over the blog. That's what it's there for.

If you want to see sunshine, lolly-pops, and rainbows then check out the April 13th through 19th posts.

Hi

Just a superficial post to try to do one each day of the month.

Keep your fingers crossed.

Oh, and due to lack of interest, I threw the red SweeTarts away.

And another one bites the dust.

The new guy at work quit. He only worked for 'Bucks for a two weeks. The first was only for his training. The second was for learning by actually doing the work. He was one of the good ones. One with personality. He was funny. He quit on Friday night. In fact, he told me, after we had closed the store, that Friday was his last night. I was surprised, not only because he was doing a good job, but because he had worked for 'Bucks a couple of years ago for a year(ish) before school forced him to quit. Today, one of the assistant managers cornered me, during those ten minutes before my shift, and kept asking me why people keep quitting. I should have answered her, but I didn't, mainly because I had to work with her for four more hours and didn't want to make her more upset than she was. I steered the conversation to her trip to New York instead, that made the day much more bearable.

What doesn't make work bearable is that our CD player is broken. Sure, the CDs aren't that great, but the music helps to make the day move faster. Plus, it broke on the day we got a CD that had a bunch of Aretha Franklin tunes. I was looking forward to annoying coworker by singing along. I guess I'll have to wait another few days to do that.

Not that I need music to sing at work because I don't. I bothered the whole crew the other day by reciting all the words to "Working in the Coal Mine" as if it were Shakespeare. Much fun was had by me. The other thing I do to really bother them is hum "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star" with no breaks. The best way to use this is to keep moving, so everyone hears it, but no one knows where it's coming from. Not easy to do in a small store.

I once did the Twinkle for three hours. It was during a cleaning thing/award ceremony for the gun club I shot at for a couple of months in high school. Ask my dad and my brothers about it. Everyone was asking where the Twinkle was coming from, but no one asked me. It was brilliant.

I don't think the people who came up with this trailer (be warned, it's a biggie) have ever watched an episode of Star Trek.

Waitin'

I'm sitting here, wait until it's time for me to head to work. I smell like coffee already because I'm wearing the Wednesday/Saturday summer shirt and I really didn't want to do laundry just for one stupid shirt. Once again I close. Oh, joy.

All of the red SweeTarts, that I refuse to eat, have been arranged into the shape of a fish on my desk. I'm still waiting to see if anyone wants them. Do you? Don't be afraid to ask. I'll even take out the one that I accidentally put in my mouth because I thought it was an orange in the low light.

Because one of the assistant managers actually did the schedule correctly, I have next weekend off so I can go to Cowtown where I'll see the parents and, hopefully, the cousins I missed the last time I was up.

School starts the day after my trip to Cowtown. I should probably get out there and buy a new backpack or other kind of bag I can use to carry books and such. The class I'm excited about next semester is to learn Lightwave, which is a 3D animation program. I hope it's not too hard.

Two things that drive me nuts. Part I

FIRST

I can't stand it when a friend or an acquaintance comes up to you and says, "I have something I need to tell me. Give me a call." Arrrg! Why do people do this? First of all, you're right there in front of me, why not say it? If it needs to be said in private, we can go to the other room or outside or at least move out of earshot of the person who'll be offended. Why does a phone have to be involved? And why am I supposed to be the one to call? I don't have anything to say to you. And, I promise, I won't be calling you back.

Same goes for those people who ask me to e-mail them. Why can't they e-mail me? Are they too busy to e-mail me, but assume I'm not too busy to e-mail them and wait for a response? (I admit, I'm rarely too busy to e-mail, but that's not the point.) Someone on wingb's blog did this to her. It took quite a bit of will power for me not to write something about it there, but that's her blog, and I don't need to pick a fight about manners with someone who is her friend and I don't know at all. I'm sure this tkd_ostrich is a perfectly nice person, but I still hate it when people do this.

(Sorry wingb, I don't want to pick on your blog or your friend, but the thought of that was driving me nuts. I held off for as many days as I could.)

SECOND

When did people stop knocking on bathroom doors? Almost each time I use the bathroom at work, someone on the outside grabs the handle and tries to shove the door open. It's not a simple tester jiggle, these people expect the room to be empty and think the door will be unlocked for them. At first, I thought it was mostly young people who were doing this, but most of the time, when I leave the room, it's a guy at or above the age of thirty. According to the girls I work with, the women don't knock either. Didn't their mothers teach them that you should always knock on a closed bathroom door? This is a public place that can have up to a thousand people a day, couldn't people be in the bathroom at the time you'd like to use it? Do you think the people using the bathroom like it when you walk in on them? Would you like it?

It's not hard. If the door that houses the toilet is closed, curl your fingers into the palm of your hand then use your knuckles to tap. If someone's in there, I bet you'll hear an answer, if you don't it's safe to try the door. When you try the door, though, don't jerk the handle down and throw your shoulder into it, be gentle, in case it is locked and the person in there didn't answer. You don't want to scare him and make him pee on the floor, do you?

QUIZ

Category V - The Lone
Wolf

Though you'd be welcome in most groups, you prefer
a more solitary path.


What Type of Social Entity are You?
brought to you by Quizilla

Now that's a funky picture, isn't it? Oh the things you find on other peoples blogs that reaffirm what you thought of yourself.

I work late tonight (and tomorrow night), so I forced myself to sleep in. "How did I do that?" I ask myself. Well, I woke up at 6:30, saw the clock, called myself a stupid carp-knocker because I'll be at work until at least midnight and that's way too early to wake up. I closed my eyes, buried my face in my pillow and eventually slept. I did it twice more before finally accepting that 9ish was late enough. Only 14 or so hours left until I'm off work. Cheer for me.

I'm being weird again over at Johnny Logic's page. I'm not sure why I'm compelled to do this, but I am. I'm just afraid that I'll run out of songs and poems about roads and street.

*sigh*

I've started a new book. This one's by Margaret Weis without Tracy Hickman, who make up one of my favorite writing teams out there. I've read other books by just Weis, she has on series that's just wonderful fun, very little serious about it at all. This series that she's written isn't shaping up to be quite as fun as that other, but it'll be interesting. Books are always interesting, aren't they? Even when it's so impossible horrid, I can't help but wonder why it was published or who is actually paying for the pleasure of reading the crap. Of course, what's crap to me is treasure to others.

"Okay, hair doll, but you have to be quiet this time."

Feelin' better this evening. I've watched some movies, eaten popcorn, and the flesh from my cheeks is rotting away because of the SweeTarts.

SweeTarts, though tasty, are dangerous. If you let only eight or nine of them dissolve in the same place (lower right side of mouth, between the last molar and cheek, for me) then rub your tongue over it, loose bits of flesh, that weren't there before, will now be floating around in your mouth. Then what do you do? Do you swallow them? Do you get a napkin to wipe the flesh off your tongue? Do you rinse with water? Or do you just gather up as much as you can in the center of your mouth and spit? Such wonderful options from such a delicious candy. Maybe the red ones undo the damage the other colors cause, but I don't like the red ones, so I'll never know. If you want the pile of red SweeTarts I have left over, let me know.

Today contained two movies. One for laughing and one for thinking.

The thinking one was The Fog of War, a documentary that was mostly Robert McNamara, former Secretary of Defense for Kennedy and Johnson, talking to a camera or over footage from wars or himself with a president or alone and the occasional recorded conversation he had with a president. The movie was excellent, but I was disappointed that he wasn't willing to speak more about Vietnam and the only stuff to learn about his time with the World Bank was in the special features. Sure, he said he didn't want to say more about Vietnam, which ended that conversation, but what about all the stuff he did after his time in government? I'd like to know more.

The laughing movie was Slackers. I rented this movie for one reason, Jason Schwartzman is in it. He's one of the most brilliant comedic actors of my generation. Don't believe me, watch this movie and Rushmore. In my opinion, the movie was about Ethan (Schwartzman's character) blackmailing cheaters at his college so he can get a girl. Ethan is evil and ruthless and hilarious. There's also a love story between the girl and one of the cheaters who started out spying on her but fell in love (*gag*), a singing sock (you have to see it to believe it), and Laura Prepon with her bra showing (always nice). The only thing I hated was the happy ending. You know, the girl learns the guy had spied on her and hates him, but when he's honest with her in the end, she kisses him, when she should have decked him and gone back to the test. The song Ethan sings at the very end kinda makes up for the crappy love story ending though.

I am Not Eton, Mai. = .i aM ,not EtoN maI

Sometimes I'm surprised at the madness that is me. While a friend was away, I used his blog just to be weird. Did it work? I don't know what everyone else thinks, but two months after the fact, I think so.

My bed is covered in stuff. Not just the usual pillows and blankets, but a stack of comics, a couple of books, the bookstore bag that I used to carry my summer school supplies, rented movies, a bag with large rolls for the polish sausages I bought for tomorrow, an empty over-sized envelope addressed to me, the shirts that were in the over-sized envelope, the not from my mom that came with the shirts (which I forgot to thank her for when I e-mailed this afternoon, better get on it), and my glasses. I know that to sleep in the bed, which is where I prefer to sleep, I need to clean the stuff off, but I don't want to. If the other comforter wasn't winter heavy, I think I'd just curl up on the floor and sleep, if I push the shorts away, there's plenty of room. I'm just lazy that way. Like women and the damn toilet seat!

That's right, I wrote it. Women think that men are lazy because we (well, most of us) like to leave the toilet seat up. And you know what? They're right, we are lazy when it come to the toilet seat. Most of us use that toilet seat about once a day, but we gotta pee way more than that. So it makes sense to leave the seat up, it's convenient. Women want the seat down because they want to be lazy too. I understand the argument that it's not fun to stumble into the bathroom in the middle of the night and sit on cold porcelain because she forgot to check that the seat was down. If that's the case, then women shouldn't get upset if, on occasion, in the middle of the night, the guy pisses on the seat on accident because he forgot to check to see if the seat was down. Men want to be lazy and never have to lift the seat. Women want to be lazy and never put the seat down. Me? I put the fucking lid down because I don't want to have the bowl staring at me while I'm brushing my teeth or drying off or something. And that makes me, in the toilet wars, the least lazy of all, so eat it all of you.

I've been trying to learn all the words to two songs, recently. The first is Adam Sandler's "Lunch Lady Land" because it makes me laugh. Unfortunately, when ever I sing it to myself I always skip to the "hoagies and grinders" part. I don't know why. The other song is "Norwegian Wood (This Bird Has Flown) from The Beatles. One of my favorites that I don't think enough people pay attention to. It's not one that we have been told is great, so most people ignore it.

Okay, it's time to clean off the bed for the finishing of the book and then the sleeping.

Gloomy

I'm feeling a wee bit sad today.

It started in the night with a dream about the girl who was my first... whatever it's called when it's more than a crush but probably not love. Once in a while her face drifts through my dreams. After that I always wake u p and I remember her the way she was when we first met. I remember watching her sit at her desk reading, flicking the stray hairs that kept falling to block her vision, concentrating on the page and looking excited each time she turned to the next one. I wanted to get up from my desk, walk away from my friends, and sit on the floor beside her and just watch her read, but I never did, of course. I barely had the courage to speak around her, and when I did I would stutter w-w-words out and st-st-stumble my way through sentences. All I wanted to do was be witty, make her laugh, but I could hardly get anything out. The last week of school, she loaned me a book. I didn't ask for it, she just said I should read it. I didn't have time to finish it. I had to return it and could never remember the title, only the plot as far as I had read. This was fifth grade.

Before sixth grade, she moved out of the district to another one and in the hills all schools are nearly impossible for a sixth grader to get to on his own. I remember looking for her and asking if anyone had seen her during the first week of school. I wanted to see if I could borrow the book to finish it. She was gone. I sort of pushed her out of my mind, but when ever I was at the bookstore, I looked for the book. I didn't find it. That year was the first time I had my heart broken by a girl, as well as many other horrors, making it the worst year of my life.

Sixth grade passed, so did seventh and eighth. Still no book. Sometime in the summer between eighth and ninth grade, two of my friends (brothers) discovered BBSs. When I spent the night at their house we'd stay up until three or four in the morning reading posts and playing text games like Legend of the Red Dragon and Trade Wars. When I learned that she, the one who loaned me the book, was the SysOp for a BBS, I got the program from my friends so I could use the BBSs from home. It was during this time that I fell for her again. I was only allowed to use the phone lines on Friday and Saturday nights, but each of those nights, she and I would exchange letters. Nothing spectacular, nothing that told her how I melted when I thought about her. The nights that she had insomnia and broke in for a live chat with me made it so I couldn't fall asleep for hours after. From her, I got the title of the book, ordered it at the bookstore, and read it. (It wasn't that great, but it was a good way to start a conversation with her.)

A couple of times during the two or so years of BBSing, there were gatherings of the people so we could get to know each other in person at a pizza place, or a lake, or something. I was always hoping that she would be at them, but, according to the people who always went, she never came. Once, though, as I was leaving a party, the guy who was giving the ride pointed to a beautiful girl and said that she was the SysOp that I always asked about. My knees got weak and my stomach fluttered. She was even more gorgeous than I remembered. I tried to walk over to her and introduce myself, but I couldn't. To me, she was too perfect.

*sigh*

I only saw her once after that and it was also after most of the BBSs, hers was one, had been dismantled because the internet was becoming popular and all the SysOps wanted to use their dedicated phone lines to play on the internet rather than let others play on their computers. I saw her at a play, it was either during or just before senior year started. She was sitting in on of the really tall chairs at the back of the theater. Once again, my knees went week and my stomach fluttered. She was talking to the guy she was there with (who happened to be the older brother of a guy who I was friendly with, at least she was with someone nice). She started to laugh. Her eyes squinched up. Her head would fall forward and she'd jerk it back only to have it fall forward again. I think I could have counted all her teeth, her smile was so big. As I walked down the aisle, I couldn't keep my eyes off of her. When the lights fell, I concentrated on the play (which is always easy for me, going to the theater is one of the greatest experiences in life), but when the lights came back up, I kept stealing glances back and to the left to see her again. I wanted to see her laugh again. The old lady sitting behind me probably thought I was nuts. I remember, after the play, watching her slide out of her seat, take the guy's hand and walk out with her. I feared my heart was going to thump its way out of my chest. I haven't seen her since.

I've thought about her all day long. I've also thought about the other girls I've more than liked who said I was a "good friend" or that I was just "too nice" to be anything more than what I was to them. (I'd love to know, what, exactly, is "too nice"?) I've thought about the girl who reached through my ribs and crushed my heart with her left hand in the sixth grade. I've thought about the friends who have moved far away and how I won't be able to see them before next summer in their new home. I've thought about the friend moving to China for at least a year. And I've thought about how GIESW's mother wants GIESW to go to the doctor and get Paxil or Xanax or some other wonder drug because GIESW's mother thinks GIESW is depressed.

I've thought about all of this and it makes me sad.

If I were a drinker, I'd drown my self in a bottle. I'm not a drinker, though. Instead, on my day off tomorrow, I'm going to drown myself in a rented movie or two or three and a bowl of popcorn and some SweeTarts.

200?

Summer school is out and I'm gonna watch TV and try to rot my brain tonight.

Pretty pathetic for the 200th post, eh?

Laceration

I cut my thumb at work last night while washing the dishes. Not a little paper cut thing, nothing that simple. I mean a deep cut. The cut is not across the tip on the thumb, no, it's up and down, so when ever I grab something I can feel the cut spilt open and sting.

Like I wrote, I was washing dishes when the cut happened, but I didn't cut it on a knife. I cut my thumb on the thing that hangs from the wall and holds the ice teas and iced coffee. Why that would be made so sharp is something I can't (and don't really want to) fathom. As soon as I saw the cut, I tucked my thumb into my palm, curled the rest of my finger over it, and went in search of Band-Aids (or adhesive bandagess, for those Randals of the world). Can you guess what happened? After a couple of minutes rummaging through the first aid kit, I found no Band Aides.

On my way to the front of the store, I grabbed a paper towel, wrapped it around my thumb, then retucked and recurled.

"Are Band-Aids only kept in the first aid kit?" I asked BCTB.

"What?" she asked. I repeated my question. "Yup, that the only place," she said. "Why?"

"Oh, I was just looking for them and couldn't find any. I cut myself and figure I shouldn't get blood on the drinks." I headed back to the kit to check again.

As I finished up my third time going through all the pockets, The Manager came back.

"What's up?" she asked.

"Lookin' for Band-Aids," I said, starting a fourth search.

"Did you cut yourself?"

"Yup."

"Find any?" She started to look over my shoulder as I pushed the bag (yes, a bag) of aspirin aside, again.

"Nope."

"Do you really think you need one?"

"Yup. See," I said unwrapping my thumb and showing her the cut.

"Oh, dear God," she said (I swear I could hear the uppercase "G" in her voice.) and took a step away from me.

I turned back to the kit and said, "And that's why I keep looking."

"Here," she said, "I'll get you five dollars from my till. You can run to the store and get a box." She started walking toward the front of the store then turned back to me. "Will five dollars be enough? Do you think it'll cover it? Do you think it'll be enough?"

"Yes."

"I'm not sure it'll be enough."

She walked out front. I zipped the kit up, put it back on the shelf, and headed out front. The Manager handed me a five. I slipped off my apron, hung it up, and headed out the store.

I have to admit, once I got out the front door, I took my time. I didn't want to hurry back to serve the public. Who does? (Not those people in Washington, that's for sure.)

Rather than making this short story long, I'll just say I found Band-Aids (the real brand) on sale. I put two on my thumb (When I saw the paper towel I sang to myself, "I once was brown, but now am red / was clean, now am dirty.") and when I bled through both I put a third on. I couldn't put on any Neosporinesque stuff until I got back to the apartment, which I did, but that was three hours later.

Now, my thumb is wrapped in two non-Band-Aid brand Band-Aids, but it still stings, especially when I pick things up. Oh, did I mention that it's the thumb on my right hand and that I'm right handed? Well, it is and I am, and that makes things all the more uncomfortable.

Dreams

I have, to the best of my recollection, two very different recurring dream. One started back in the fourth grade, when I was nine. Every time I've dreamed it, it is exactly the same. I think I have it once or twice a year. The other dream started during my first year of college, and I had it again last night. This dream isn't as static as the other one, there are always minor differences.

The dream is basically a chase. I'm running around a town, which I don't recognize, and the college I go to, but I've never actually seen the buildings. I don't know who I'm running from, only that he or she drives a black boxy looking car.

It usually starts with me in the middle of a street in town running from the car, and it did this time too, but that was all that was exactly the same. I turn down side streets an alleys hoping to dodge the person, but he or she (somehow I know that it's only one person) is always there. I end up smashing the window of a white mini-van. I hop into the driver, pull out a screwdriver from my pocket, and jam it into the steering column so I can start the car. The engine revs up and I peel out, the black car behind me. I head for campus think that I can lose the person when he or she will have to get out and follow me on foot.

I drive as fast as I can. The tires squeal as I turn around corners. I ignore all the stop lights and the stop signs. I just want to get to campus, get away from this person who's after me.

Finally, I see the library building, which is eight stories high with stairs circling the outside. I turn the car on a road that runs parallel to campus. I press harder on the gas pedal, take my seat belt off, crack the door, then jump. My body rolls across grass, then concrete, then grass again. I spring to my feet and run for the library. I run across the quad, dodging the Frisbee players, people doing home work, the mermaid fountain, and loose goats. I can't see the black car, but I can hear it's engine. I'm still being followed. I'm at the front of the library.

I decide to go up the stairs instead of going inside, so I head around to the back and take the stairs two at a time. Halfway through the third story, a guy I know, Jack, is coming down the stairs. He tells me that he knows someone is after me and that the only way I can get away is to fly away. He pulls my arm and says we have to get to the seventh floor so I can jump. I don't know what to do, but soon I can hear heavy foot steps coming up the stairs. I turn to Jack and we run up the stairs.

We stop at the door to enter the seventh floor. I climb up onto the railing and look out over the campus. I look back at Jack, he has a huge grin on his face.

I woke up.







Oh, on a different note, it sickens me how interested I am in seeingthis movie.

So Long July...

It's the end of the month the goal was not met. Not all my fault. Strange internet outages caused problems and class time was spent doing class work, rather than blogging.

*sigh*

OWGAWE didn't show up for work, again. She also didn't call. She was called at least ten times between 4:45AM and 11:00AM, but never answered. This was Wednesday. For me, it was a good day. I figured that OWGAWE would be out of there for good. I was thrilled.

Noonish the same day, GWWSU called and quit. She said she wouldn't be in that night. All three managers were in the store and started to freak out. I giggled hysterically. I'm not one of the people in charge. I'm not the one who did the hiring. I should be getting more hours for a while. GWWSU quitting shocked all the managers. All three said that they never saw it coming. They couldn't tell that she was unhappy. Yeah, the five days that she called in sick during her last two weeks weren't a sign. Plus, she wouldn't shut up about how she didn't want to work because she had other things she'd rather be doing. Surprised she quit? HA. Am I that observant, or are they that stupid?

At about 1:30PM, OWGAWE called work. She claimed that she had asked for the day off, and it had been okayed. One of the assistants pulled out the time off request sheet and saw that OWGAWE had only asked for time off through Tuesday. My smile was so broad you could see my wisdom teeth, if I still had them; OWGAWE was fucked, she was fired. (Does this make me cruel?) Then the assistant said that they would have to talk about what's been going on the next day.

Shit.

My face fell. My jaw clenched. The silver lining on my day turned out to be tin. The only thing that will happen to OWGAWE is a write up, nothing more. Nothing more. NOTHING MORE!

*ah-hem*

Today was my first day back at work with OWGAWE. I had both Thursday and Friday off and I didn't answer the phone in the mornings, just in case work called (which it probably did since FLIG's grandfather died (which is sad, but we all learned about the Circle of Life from the Lion King, right?) and JCFB called in with a "personal" problem (although I think he just didn't want to show up, next Thursday is his last day before he heads back to school)), and made sure to be out for a while. The subject of her two missing days from work. I went in angry, but made the day better, more fun in a number of ways.

The first way is to make sure that I talk to every piece of equipment in the store and often call all of it stupid or a "goat shucker." The second way is to talk out loud to myself; I mumble loud enough to make sure that the person nearest me knows I'm talking, but can't make out what I'm actually saying, when they ask, "What?" I say, "Nothing, just talking to myself." and turn away mumbling. The third way is to make up bizarre stories about why things are the way they are after a coworker says something obvious.

(The best example of this is when GIESW said, "This damn coffee cake keeps falling apart on me."

"Do you know why it keeps falling apart?" I asked.

"No," she said.

"Do you want to know?"

"Sure," she said with trepidation in her voice.

"It's because you don't love the coffee cake."

"What?"

"It's because you told the coffee cake you don't love it, that's why it keeps falling apart on you."

"Well, fuck the coffee cake," she said, throwing it into the garbage.

"Don't be sad, coffee cake, she doesn't mean it," I said looking into the trash.

"I don't mean what?"

"You don't mean what you said."

"What was that?"

"You told the coffee cake that you didn't love it, that you didn't think of it in that way, that you only thought of it as a friend, and you don't want to ruin that friendship." By this time, GIESW's grin is as big as mine and is called away. I continue, "The coffee cake got so upset, I could hear its sobs all the way across the room. Then it just crumbles. It can't keep itself together anymore and falls apart, sobbing," by this time, I was calling this to her, "'You only think of me as a friend. As a friend. Dear god, why does she only think of me as her friend. I can be so much more. As a friend!'")

So, I made the day much better than it originally been and didn't come back to the apartment miserable.

*sigh*

Farewell July, here comes August and a new page in my Crumb calendar.

No Post?

Last night, after class, I was prepared to write. I can't remember what it was going to be, but I know it was going to be long. Many words were going to be tapped out by the tips of my fingers. Of course, it didn't happen. The same thing that was wrong with my connection Monday night was wrong last night. I'm still not sure what that could be, or why it only happens at night.

What did I do instead of post to my blog? I read 100+ pages of a Robert Cormier book (We All Fall Down, for those who are interested) and finished it. Cormier is one of those authors that everyone should have read in Junior High just so they could see that there are some book written for young adults (Is that the correct term?) that are willing to remember that things rarely work out perfectly in the end.

Well, off to work.

Bye.

Well...

For those of you who felt slighted at no entry yesterday, whoops. Something was wrong with the connection and I'm not going to pretend that I know anything about setting up any sort of network or fixing the problems. I'm sure I could have taken the time to learn, but I choose to work on my final project for class instead.

Off to work in a couple of minutes.

Bye.

What to Write

I rarely know what I'm going to write when I sit down at the keyboard everyday.

Tonight is a good example. As I was driving back from work, I pondered possibilities to write about. Should I write about work again, or do I do that too much? Should I write something positive about kittens and puppies? Should I lie and say that I've written a novel and found a publisher? Should I mock President Junior? Should I mention how I've been King of No Pants this weekend, since the roommate is gone? Soluhd I wtrie an etrine bolg tihs way? Should I explain how I've come to the conclusion that the sixth grade was probably the most fomative year for my personality? Should I tell you how wonderful Wil Wheaton's books are? Should I pontificate on the summerschool class? Should I go on about the movie I most want to see next year?

Nah. None of those.

Instead, I sit down and write this.

Absolutely Nothing

I work in just over an hour. GIESW will be there since she only works morning shifts. I wish that I only worked morning shifts, even if it would mean not watching Xaiolin Showdown on Saturdays.

I should probably eat a sandwhich or something, since I'm not going to eat for the rest of the night.

Roommate has gone to Cowtown to a wedding for some friends, which makes them friends of friends to me. I like these friends of friends, I hope everything is wonderful.

I washed and changed the sheets on my bed today. All I really want to do is curl up on them with a stack of comics and the novel that's sitting in my car.

Responsibilty... What is it good for?

Grotching

I was cleaning my room (mostly picking up coffee smelling clothes that I just wanted to get out of and moving the pile of comics away from my bed) and listening to The Restaurant at the End of the Universe (again) when I realized that I had yet to blog today. I don't have much to say, but there's that nutty goal I set for myself to blog something, however useless (which is why the name is what it is) it happens to be. I didn't do anything worth writing about, today.

Is it worth mentioning that I didn't vomit or bleed from my eyes today? If I did those things each day, I suppose it'd be worth mentioning, but since I don't, I doubt it is.

One important thing happened to me, I suppose. I spoke with ~o, who was calling to speak with my roommate. He was happy to learn that my illness wasn't from the food at his party, but probably from work, since three or four people are sick, but keep showing up since we don't have anyone to cover shifts. (The illness has nothing to do with OWGAWE, she was just stupid. How many of you would just take three pills from your roommates, or any roommate you had, without at least asking what they were?) I was happy to learn that ~o understands what it's like for me at large gatherings and he accepted that I had a much better time at the party than my post about it suggested, because I did.

I made some people laugh a couple of times. I listened to some wonderful music. I tried some crappy Japanese snack food, each thing tasted like one I ate before, except for the one with seaweed wrapped around, which tasted the same, but with seaweed. And there was that one time when I said something (I wish I could remember what it was) to a group of people that made all their eyes bug out, jaws drop, and stare at me. I wandered away during that silence. I think I could live off of those moments, if they had the necessary vitamins, minerals, carbs, proteins, oxygen, and water the human animal needs to survive.

OWGAWE

This morning, I covered for the One-Who-Gets-Away-With-Everything this morning. It wasn’t like I was called at 5:30AM and asked if I could come in and cover for OWGAWE. No, I was asked yesterday, when she didn’t show up or call, to cover for her today because they figured she wouldn’t show up, or shouldn’t show up, I’m not sure which.

Yesterday, I went in at 6AM. (The store opens at 5AM, I’m not sure if I’ve ever mentioned it here before.) I saw the manager’s car parked out front, but didn’t think she was the opener because she opened with me the day before. I also saw that the tables and chairs weren’t put out and there was a pile of newspapers in front of the door. The guy coming out of the store, as I opened the door, said, “You don’t want to go in there. Trust me. You want to run away.”

I wasn’t sure what to think of this, most customers in that early tell me that I should have been there earlier so they could get their coffee faster.

I turned away from the guy and peered through the door. The room was darker than it should have been. I looked at the ceiling and noticed that only half the lights were on, the ones left on during the night. I saw about six people in front of the registers. And I tripped over the pile of pastries that were blocking the way to the back room.

I knew then that OWGAWE had been late.

I looked to my right to see who was there. Huh. Only Girl-I-Enjoy-Speaking-With and The Manager were behind the counter frantically making drinks, but not charging a single customer. Open, emptied, pastry boxes were scattered around the counter and floor. Ice coffee brewed. Tea steeped. Customers rolled their eyes. I fled to the back room to see if OWGAWE was hiding. She wasn’t.

I put on my apron and headed out front to help the best that I could. Together, with GIESW and The Manager, we blazed through the customers and could finally get to setting up the store. I wanted to ask GIESW what had happed, but knew that gossip had to come after the tables and chairs.

Too much time passed because who likes to lift tables and chairs that weigh a million pounds each?

Not enough time passed because I got to be outside instead of trapped in coffee smelling hell, even though it’s been hot and sticky recently.

As soon as I finished and The Manager left the front room, I charged over to GIESW and asked what happed.

“OWGAWE didn’t show up this morning,” she said.

“I figured,” I said.

“First I tried calling OWGAWE’s cell, but there was no answer, so I had to call The Manager. She didn’t get here until fifteen or twenty minutes ago. I just tried calling OWGAWE while you were outside, still no answer.”

OWGAWE is never on time when she’s the opening supervisor. Back in the days when she was the opening supervisor every morning (we opened at 5:30AM in those days), she’d show up fifteen or twenty minutes late every time. When other people are that late, once, we get a warning, usually a loud one that tells us never to do it again. The second time we do it, we get written up. I’m not quite sure what that is, but from what I gather, I don’t want it to happen to me. To the best of my knowledge, OWGAWE has only been written up once because I opened with her for three days on week and each day wrote in the log that she had been late, I don’t think OWGAWE was happy with that. The next day, one girl was a half-hour late and had called to say she over slept and would be late, OWGAWE pulled out the for and wrote the late one up. When the hours were changed so we opened earlier, she refused to come to work before 5:30, except to be the opening supervisor once, maybe twice, a week. Yesterday was her once this week and she didn’t show up.

At about 7:30, when the next person was scheduled to come in, The Manager told GIESW and me that she was concerned about OWGAWE. Not a “Where the hell is she!” like we usually hear when people are no call/no show.

At about 10:30, when I was on my lunch break, The Manager called OWGAWE’s friend who also works at this store. The friend knew nothing. The Manager then called OWGAWE’s brother, who is OWGAWE’s emergency contact and got him to go to OWGAWE’s house and find out what’s going on.

At about that same time, some girl from another store came to our store to cover for two people who were being sent home sick.

Noonish, GIESW came out of the back and headed straight to me. “We’ve just heard from OWGAWE’s brother,” she said and stared at me.

“What’s going on?” I asked.

“Well,” she said, suppressing a grin, “OWGAWE’s been asleep all this time.”

“Really?”

“Really. Apparently, she took some pills that her roommate gave her and has been asleep ever since.”

“Shit,” I said.

“I know,” GIESW said.

* * * * * * * * * * *

Today, GIESW and I came into work at the same time. Me to cover for OWGAWE and her to cover for The Manager so the schedule could, perhaps, be finished by the end of the day. (It wasn’t finished when I left this afternoon.) It looks like OWGAWE is once again getting away with it. The Manager doesn’t want to blame OWGAWE for what happened since it was because of medication, we are all assuming.

If I took something and slept through my shift, would I just get a pat on the head too?

I’d probably get a boot to the head, instead though. Oh, and I’d be written up for not coming to work one day and then again for the blood I’d probably leak on the floor.

Glasses?

I'm sitting here in class staring at the screen, watching the teacher sort through all the work the class has turned in. My eyes are a bit unfocused, so the screen is fuzzy. I can't see! I think, Where are my glasses? What the fuck did I do with them? I start to look around the desk, my movements getting more frantic as I notice only the monitor, keyboard, mouse, and my CDs. My heart is racing. Did I leave them outside? I start to stand.

I notice the black frames surrounding my field of vision. I'm wearing my glasses. I'm an idiot.

Smile Sharing

Work this morning. Opening shift. It was pretty normal. I go, set up pastries, put out tables and chairs that weigh a million pounds each, and serve coffee based drinks filled with flavors so it doesn't actually taste like coffee.

If anyone, who I actually like, had been to ask me how my day was, I would have answered, "Mweh." That was until about ten.

I was making two iced lattes with sugar-free vanilla for two old ladies. As I was setting the first finished drink on the counter, the one with silver hair ran off to the toilet and the one with blue (I swear it was blue) hair said, "This should help us get to Ashland."

I stared at the shots pouring from the machine. The comment clicked. My head whipped to the left. "Where did you say you're going?" I asked with too much enthusiasm.

"Uhh, Ashland," she said, her eyes shifting down the hall. I'm sure she was hoping her friend would be back very soon.

"Are you going to see plays?"

"Uhh, yeah." She looked the other way, where a line of customers may have been, I wasn't going to look.

"Oh, you are so lucky."

"Really?" She turned toward me.

"Yeah, I've wanted to go to the Ashland festival since high school. I had planned a trip for this summer, but found I had no money."

"That's too bad. I go every year."

"EVERY YEAR?"

"Yup, I'm hoping to see ever play Shakespeare wrote up in Ashland. I think I'm nearly there."

"Wow. I wish I could go. What are you going to see?"

I heard the echoey thud of a paper cup being slammed down to my right. I ignored it and focused on the blue haired lady.

"Well, when we first get there, we're going to see the first part of Henry. Tomorrow is part two and a comedy. Day after that is part three and A Rasin in the Sun."

"When I made my plans to go, I was going to see the Henry series and Raisin and I wanted to see that Oedipus Complex, that looked really cool."

"If you're into that kind of thing," she laughed.

I smiled, "I just like the original and wanted to see this interpretation... Have you seen many repeated plays?"

"Lots, but they always keep it interesting, you know they change times, or let the new actors go a little wild. Last year there was one--I can't remember which, it was a comedy--that they set in the 50s with the puffy dresses and the suits and stuff." Her face broke into a huge grin. "And at the second act, one of the characters enters the scene in a VW van dressed as a hippy." She started to laugh and so did I. "It was one of the funniest things I'd ever seen, especially with the Elizabethan coming out of his mouth."

The sliver haired lady came down the hall. "Is that mine?" she asked.

"Yeah," said blue.

Silver headed off toward the door.

"Thanks," said blue, following her friend.

"No, thank you," I said actually meaning it. "Have a safe drive and have fun up there. If you're ever in this store again, I'd like to hear more!"

Blue was at the door when she turned and sent a huge toothy smile my way.

I spent the last 90 minutes of my shift sharing that smile and singing all the tracks from TMBGs Flood.

New Comments

Thanks to Queenie leaving me a nice comment, I've learned that Blogger has its own built in comments that will also allow people to link to the actual post rather than the whole month.

Cool.

Now to get rid of the Haloscan one.

Hmmm.

Now, if only I can figure out that nifty title thing without changing my template.

Hmmmm.

Speak No Evil

Today was spent not worrying about espresso, lattes, or evil customers.

Today was a day for comic books, singing with the radio, and Douglas Adams reading The Restaurant at the End of the Universe.

Other than the singing, I don't think I've said a word all day.

These days are rare, Josh, treasure them.

Queasy

Well, woke up this morning still feeling like vomiting would be a good idea. It's nice to know that it wasn't the party, isn't it?

Safe Return

Back from the party. I left there at 10:30ish.

I'm sure that everyone there had/is having a wonderful time. I kept putting my hand in my pocket feeling the note I wrote to remind me why I was going, why I was there. I never actually pulled it out, but touching it sent the message through my fingertips and I knew that I couldn't leave yet.

I sat in corners. I stood in corners. I hovered on the edge of groups of people, if I said something it was dirty, but usually said nothing at all. I stood in the breeze and smelled the salt in the air, although it could have been my imagination. I began a conversation with Venus, but I was interrupted. I didn't once start reading the book that was in my pocket. I had some fish, some chicken, two sodas, and a bottle of blackberry/pomegranate sparklely juice stuff. I hunted down cats to pet.

At several times, I found myself asking, "Why don't I just join in and drink? Why not use a social lubricant? It'd open you up. You'd join in with everyone and not sit near a group pretending to be part of it, while really staring out the window or at some girls chest." Then I'd remember why, a chill would go through my body, goose-bumps would develop on my arms, and I'd take another sip of my soda.

I arrived at the house early for the party, a little after 5:30, it wasn't "scheduled" (if you could call it that) to start until 8. I was there for about five hours. I knew it was time for me to leave when I was outside in the breeze and I could feel sweat beading up on my forehead and my hands started shaking. (This was also about the moment when I could easily count 25 people in the house.)

I said my good-byes to the people I knew. I walked out the door, hands shaking, sweat dripping, and my stomach lurched. Maybe it was the chicken or the fish or the sodas or something else entirely, but I was afraid I was about to empty my stomach on the porch. I moved quickly to the street, sat on the curb, put my head between my knees and took deep breaths. I didn't get in the car until I felt settled. Several times on the drive back, I had to release my grip on the steering wheel because I held it so tight, my fingers were getting sore.

Leaving

I was going to leave for El Cerrito (sp?) and hour ago, but I didn't. I find that I have to constantly remind myself why I'm going. Pants are on now and I'm finally going to leave. Hooray for me.

Late

This was supposed to have been written an hour ago, about the time I should have been back from work so it could have yesterday's date. It was also supposed to be about how much I would have liked to have been in bed at ten reading Just a Geek.

Instead, it's just going to say that I'm going to bed now. 'Night.

Dancing Barefoot

Last week, I started an account with Amazon.com. I’ve waited this long because that place is dangerous for a person who like books and movies as much as I do, very dangerous. But I had to so I could get the books that I wanted.

What were they? Well, I’m glad I asked. I got Dancing Barefoot and Just a Geek, both by Wil Wheaton.

Why did I do this? I did it to support someone I haven’t met, but like. I buy comics that Stuart Immonen draws, he’s one of the few artists I pick up a book because of. I buy almost everything that Warren Ellis (or Big Ethel, as Mr. Immonen calls him) writes. The day I get the courage to buy a bitpass is the day I’ll join in on Scott McCloud’s crazy experiment and send him money, of course he’s got some of my cash because of Understanding Comics. And I’m sure I’ll be buying Lore Sjöberg book, after my next credit card bill.

What the hell is the reason for this post? To tell you how much I enjoyed reading Dancing Barefoot. And because I finished the book at 12:15 and couldn’t sleep.

I got in from class at 9:40ish this evening and was directed to a package on the couch. My books had arrived. I broke them open and read the front, back, and inside of the covers. I then put them down and screwed around on the Internet for a while, playing some games and writing a post at other blog. 11ish, I turned off the computer, grabbed Dancing Barefoot and started reading and couldn’t stop reading.

The cover says that it’s five stories that span 30 years, but I don’t think it’s that simple. These five stories are things that could happen to any of us, if things had gone just a little bit differently.

Brief summary:

Story 1: "Houses in Motion": Wil visits the house of his dead aunt and revisits his memories.

Story 2: "Ready Or Not Hear I Come": Playing with his stepkids and learning who’s lucky.

Story 3: "Inferno": Love found and lost in the middle of a street.

Story 4: "We Close Our Eyes": Walking in the rain.

Story 5: "The Saga of SpongeBob VegasPants": Learning to let go and love the Trek.

The first four are short, very short. The longest is only seven pages, but that’s part of their charm. Being so short, they have no time for a slow build up, they have to start with the steep climb to the top. Each one does in it’s own way. Each one is it’s own kind of wonderful.

The fifth, takes up most of the book and is so much fun to read. I’ve only been to one Star Trek convention, and it was small compared to most, but he captures everything I saw and more. He has a different view of the Trek mania than I do, I’m part of that mania. I may not be one of those fans who wants would ask how the warp core works, but I think about it. Wil paints a picture of the types he meets, one fan at a time. The One-Who-Dresses-Normal. The Klingons. The Wesley Haters. The One-Who-Claims-To-Not-Be-A-Geek-But-Is. The Detail Seekers. The "Battlefield" Experience. And even when it comes to the insane fans, I never got the feeling that he was making fun of them because he didn’t like them, but because he knows that what they are is a part of him as well, that he appreciates what these people have done to give him the whole Trek experience.

The fifth story also explores how Wil has thought about the whole Trek thing. What it’s meant for him. How it’s controlled him. How it’s hurt him. How it’s helped him. And in the end, how much he’s always enjoyed it.

In the end, my favorite story wasn’t "SpongeBob," but "Inferno." My brief description doesn’t do any justice to specialness this story has. Maybe it’s just me and my need to be a hopeless romantic, but that one made me melt.

In the end, Dancing Barefoot was amazing. Short, sweet, full of fun. Just the sort of thing I needed to end my day on.

Time

4:30AMish, woke up with a sharp pain in my chest and a numb left arm. Fortunately, it was all because I was sleeping oddly on my left arm, the circulation was being cut off, with my thumb poking into a newly formed zit (or ingrown hair, who knows?). I rolled onto my side and soon the arm was doing that many prickly thing it does when circulation is restored and glared at the clock. I didn't have to be into work until 8:30. I had a solid three more hours of sleep ahead of me. I closed my eyes and willed myself to sleep.

5AMish, woke up with a start, falling dream. Glanced at clock, closed eyes. Slept.

6AMish, woke up as legs slipped off bed. Quite a ways down. Twisted so feet would hit the floor instead of butt and head. Climbed back into bed, shut eyes. Felt breeze come through window. Felt cool. Drifted to Nemo's world.

6:30AMish, neighbor took a shower, lucky me, my room is right next to the neighbor's toilet room. Saw the time, muttered something about monkey raping pineapples, turned over, put cool side of the pillow over my head to drown out the noise.

7:13AM on the nose (watched the last digit change from one prime to another), still more than twenty minutes until the alarm "eeeeeeents." Nothing to blame the awakeness on but myself. Said, "Fuck this," and climbed out of bed. Stumbled around the room, doing the try-to-step-on-only-carpet dance, and failing. Picked up a book, read until the alarm went off, then showered.

8:00AM, in my car to head to work. Have my books and Flash drive for class. Have music to drown out the drone of classmates. Have a shirt so I won't stink like coffee too much all day. Have a book to read at work. Have cash for crappy lunch. Have apr.... No, don't have apron for work. Washed all them yesterday. Sitting on bed. Shit.

8:04AM, back in car, have everything I need for work, except desire and drive and passion and respect and...

8:23AM, copying next weeks schedule. Huh. Since all those people left the 'Bucks, I've been scheduled for between 32 and 37 hours each week. This week, only 30. Next week, 27. Am I being punished? Is something wrong with the way I work? Do my managers hate me? If there is a God, couldn't he just smite me instead of fucking with me like this?

10:43AM, sitting in back room of work, reading on my break and sipping on a rare cup of caramel iced coffee. Book is okay, the characters a kind of stupid, plot is a little weak, but it's better than talking with coworkers. One coworker is sitting at desk finishing her lunch break, another is back there just talking to the first as they always do. Second is surprised I'm drinking coffee. First insists I always drink coffee Second says she's never seen me First says I drink it all the time. Both turn to me with wondering eyes. With a mouthful of ice, I say, "Hot chocolate." Second says she told first so and that she knows me better than I know me. First says that second should go and give me a high-five and laughs. I laugh too. Second asks me why I don't high-five, is it the touch or "cheese factor"? I say both. She asks if I shake hands. I say I do, but I'm never the one to start a handshake. (All this done not looking up from my book.)

1:02PM, leaving 'Bucks for the day, off for crappy food. Don't have to be back for about 27 hours.

2:14PM, finished crappy fish 'n chips. Only had dill tartar sauce, not sweet. Didn't even have vinegar. Was offered ranch dressing, however. Wished that I could have some good fish 'n chips. Wished for good tart vinegar. Could feel the tingle on the back underside of tongue and had a large pool of saliva developing.

5PMish, book is done. It ended like I thought it would and characters were still stupid. After everything had happened, they finally pieced together the clues they had been spouting throughout to understand why it ended like it did. Didn't understand why, exactly, I read it, then remembered that it's a book from mother that is to be returned, hopefully, soon.

6:08PM, class is supposed to start at 6, teacher just showed up and let us in the room. Time to plug in headphones and finish book work.

9:07PM, book work finished. Three chapters tonight. Can't say I'm ready to complete the next assignment, but at least there's no more work from the book. Time to pack up and leave.

9:11PM, driving toward apartment, only commercials, Spanish, and Christian rock on the radio. Couldn't God just smite me instead of torturing me?

10:30PMish, started writing this thing.

11PMish, finished.

They're Back

Parents are officially back from their quasi-religious cruise to Alaska. I'm sure that we'll all soon be able to read about it at SuziFitz Beads. I know I can't wait.

And Little Fluffy Industries has posted a wonderful game. It takes some figuring out, but it's worth it.

Problem with Music

I finished my animation on Sunday afternoon, before work. There's something up with the music, it wouldn't sync the way it's supposed to, as in, let's say, I have a scene that 158 frames long, when I cut the music to be 158 frames, it would be too short, so I figured out a way to make it run through the whole thing then fade out a little bit before the whole thing ends. I wanted to be able to edit the music better, but I don't know how to. Oh well. It's due tonight, and I think I did a pretty good job.

Party

So, this Saturday, unless I hear differently, I'm off to ~o's "grandma" house for a good-byeish party for him, who is going to China, and Johnny Logic and Heels, who are going to Pittsburgh. I know the where, but I don't know the when yet. I'm also not sure if there's a what involved. The only thing I'm sure of is that I'll be leaving relatively early, since I have work the next day.

Saturday sure looks like it's a long way away from this side of the week.

Flash

How important is it to have moving clouds in every outdoor scene of my animation? Probably not very, but I just added them to each one. Why? Because I'm anal, that's why. This must be what real animators go through. They must constantly ask themselves how much detail to add. Everyone wants these things to be as close to reality as possible, but no one wants to do extra work if they don't have to. So, how important are the damn clouds? To me? Very important. I have to have them to prove that I can do it. It's like all the movement in the first chunk of animation, do I need it? A moving roller coaster, a moving Ferris Wheel, a moving flag, then they all get larger so I can do a zoom. Will anyone out there really notice these things on the first or second viewing? Do I need to stay consistent with the positioning? Should blueberry pie vomit have bobbing chunks of blueberries? Will I go mad trying to answer all of these questions?

I didn't go to work today, but I've been workin' hard.

Except for the two hour sanity break this afternoon (and a couple of trips to the potty room), I've been working on the next Flash project for my class since ten AM. So, that's like ten hours of work. Thats a lot. I'm almost finished. I know what my problem is, I made it too complicated for me. Lots of things moving and not enough repitition.

Tomorrow, before work, I have to complete one more scene then add the music, then I'm done. Hooray! Only two more projects and summer school is done! Hooray!

Modest No More

(at least for today)

I’m a pretty modest guy. I don’t gloat about myself, much. I rarely think that the things I do are all that amazing and that everyone can do the things I do as well or better than me. It’s not often that I get off my ass and shout the glory that is me at the world.

I bet you can see where this post will be going.

Earlier, I was bored and trying to think of something to write, so I decided to skim the other things that I’ve written here. I’ve been doing this Blog intermittently for the past ten months (okay, so ten months will actually be next Friday, but none of you knew that until just now, and most of you still don’t care, do you?) and Blogger says that I have over 170 posts, that’s about a post ever other day.

As expected, much of it is crap. Lots of short crap, one or two lines or a picture with a line or just a picture or stupid quiz results, basically useless stuff. Then there are longer posts, over five lines, that are crap, posts where I write a lot, but don’t really say anything at all. Yeah, there are lots of posts like that (like this one will probably turn out to be).

Then there are those posts that I read that surprised me. As I read them, I couldn’t believe that I was the person who had written them. They were actually well written. They told the story or gave the information in a way that kept me interested. These were the posts that I actually read all the way through, word for word, rather than just skimming to get some basic content. Thinking back on those posts, I’m still surprised that I wrote them.

They were, and still are, damn good reading. And I feel like I need a pat on the back right now, even if it comes from me.

Here it is:

Sometimes, I’m a damn fine writer.
Sometimes, I rival the professionals I read.
Sometimes, I surpass the quality of some professionals.
Sometimes, I’m amazing.

That’s it, no more of that from me.

I’m not going to tell you people which posts I think push the boarder of good toward great, that’s for each reader to decide for his or herself. Feel free to make random guesses at the posts I like, or just say which you like, I could use the ego boost after yesterday’s post. Thanks.

Grave Concern

I think that I worry the assistant manager at my store. It’s not because I constantly hum, or whistle, or sing under my breath. It’s because I’m antisocial.

Supposedly, my store gets a day (or maybe it’s just a night, I’m not sure) where other managers and district managers take over and us regular folks get the day off. We get this because we had three 5-star snapshots (secret customers grade our store) in a row.

Last week, the assistant was bitching that a couple of the employees want to take the day to go rafting on the river, then she turned to me and asked if I’d want to go rafting for our day. I told her that I wasn’t planning on going to any store social gathering.

“Why not?” she asked.

“Because I don’t like people in large groups and I don’t much care for people.”

She looked at me. And looked at me. And looked at me. The look was on the verge of turning into a stare when she asked, “These people, or all people.”

“People in general,” I said and headed off to my lunch.

Today, early in her shift, while we were working on the bar together, she started whispering to me about this thing again. She wanted to know if I’d be willing to go bowling, or on a picnic, or out to a restaurant, and on, and on. Each time I said I didn’t know because I figured it would get her off my back, but it didn’t. Eventually, I told her that unless I’m getting paid for my time, it’s very unlikely that I was going to do anything with a group of my co-workers.

“Are you agoraphobic?” she asked.

“Not really,” I said. “It’s not going out that I don’t like, it’s people. Being around too many people makes me nervous. Being in a situation with lots of people I don’t know is hard.”

“But you went to that wedding a few weeks ago.”

“Yeah, but I was with some really close friends and that made it easier. If it weren’t for them, I would have gotten a stomach ache to go along with my clammy hands.”

“Oh,” she said.

Later, while I was counting out my drawer, she started talking to me about this again. I wanted to scream that we’ve been over enough already, but I didn’t. This time, she started talking about drugs to help me. I said I’d rather not take drugs if I don’t have to, that I can function in the world when I need to, that drugs should be a last resort not a first strike, that I doubt anything could make me like or trust people more than I do now, and that I needed her to double check my money. She started to count and also started to tell me about how drugs aren’t a stigma and that she’s on Prozac and it just helps to even her out. On and on. When she finished, she pulled out a piece of paper and started to write the name of a doctor who I should go to and asked if I had benefits. I said I didn’t and she stopped writing. I dropped my money, grabbed my book, and hauled ass out of there.

Picture

Good Byes

Sometimes, when someone says good-bye to me, my stomach lurches and my heart flutter and I get this fear that I'll never see that person again. So far nothing has happened. I've always seen the person again, but it hasn't helped with the lurching and fluttering.

Read This Book

“On the 5th of August the Prime Minister, accompanied by the Home Secretary, arrived at Lambeth Palace and presented the Head of the Church of England with the six billion pounds as promised in the Restoration Bill.

Two hours later the Archbishop of Canterbury walked into the very first betting shop and blew the entire six billion on a single metaphysical bet.

The bet was this: God is love.”

Bursting With Light

The apartment smells like sulfur and popcorn.

The sulfur comes from the people who have been lighting little, loud fireworks on the road and in the parking spaces.

The popcorn comes from me because I wanted something to eat while I watched the big fireworks.

The show was pretty far away, but still wonderful. I liked the ones that had a ring around the ball of sparkling light. I also like the ones that burst, then the sparkles do some erratic flying of their own. These people had a lot that burst into shapes--hearts, stars, smiley faces, cat faces, other thing--I don't much care for those. Not enough to them. Give me the large spheres of color, not stupid flat shapes.

I didn't get to see my cousins today. I woke up late. (Silly me, I didn't set the alarm. Of course Saturday morning, I woke up at six-thirty, with no alarm.) I had to rush to get out and then get to work on time. It turns out that I had miss written my schedule. I showed up just before one, but didn't have to start until one-thirty. I guess I could have spent some time with my cousins, but is it really fair to see them for maybe a half hour, when I haven't seen them in a year or so? I think that if I had visited with them and had to run away after only twenty or thirty minutes, I would be feeling much more guilty than I am right now.

*Sigh*

TRIP!

So, yesterday, I left the madness of Cowcity, for the absurdity of Cowtown. Yes, at this very moment, I’m in my hometown in my parents’ house. The parents are gone. They went on a quasi-religious cruise to Alaska. So, I’m in charge of feeding the cats and fish for them for three days.

Today was a good day.

It started with a trip to my first Starbucks. The place where I couldn’t keep my mouth shut enough and started to have a miserable time so I quit, only to come back to be rehired after the old manager left. It was nice seeing these people. I prefer them to nearly all of the people I work with in Cowcity. The difference is that nearly all the people at the Cowtown ‘Bucks have personality. In Cowcity, many of the people watch the MTV and seem to want to be the people they see. In Cowtown, the people seem much more willing to be themselves, to break out in a spontaneous song about cappuccino foam, or do the “No More Customer” dance (which never worked), or shoot spit-balls at the drive-thru window.

I miss those crazy people.

Next was a trip to Grandma’s house. I was hoping to see an uncle and three cousins who are down from Washington, but they did a strange thing on a hot day and went swimming. I didn’t see them. Instead, I visited with Grandma. Mostly, I listened. I think she just had a lot of stuff that needed to be said that she hasn’t been able to, since my Mom is out of town. It was nice. I learned about lots of relatives and the odd things that they did. That was fun.

After Grandma’s house was a trip to see Johnny Logic and Heels. They’re having a yard sale this weekend, due to all the moving they’ll be doing at the end of the month. We visited. I forgot to bring then the books and movies they loaned me, left them at the house, so I’ll be dropping them off tomorrow on my way back to Cowcity. We talked books, movies, Pittsburgh, moving, my life, their summer job, Douglass Adams, and other whatnot. Eventually, Heels packed up the sale to go to a barbeque, I was also invited. There we ate, we talked, they (all the they there) drank, some they smoked, and I took Spencer to the dirt so he could dig. (He mostly shoveled pine needles and dry leaves then threw them down the hill.) I had a good time.

Tomorrow brings another trip to Grandma’s to try to see cousins and uncle, then to drop of books and movies, then back to Cowcity to work. I may get to see some fireworks from the porch. I hope so.

Why Me?

What is it about me?

Is it my face? Do I have a face that says to people, “Tell me everything”?

Is there an air about me? Does this air make people feel that I’m a person they can trust?

What is it about me that makes people, who I barely know, want to tell me things about themselves, or ask for advice in their lives?

Today at work is a good example. I was sitting in the back room reading my book on my break when one of the girls comes back to count out her drawer. I said hi, scooted out of the way, and continued my reading. Suddenly, she goes into this story about her and her boyfriend and how it’s been wonderful. It all led up to her saying that he wanted them to get a joint bank account and she wanted to know what I thought.

What am I supposed to do? If I say to do it, she’d tell me all the reasons she shouldn’t. If I say not to do it, she’d launch into another story and give me all the reasons she should. If I just ignore her, I’m rude and then everyone in the store would be told how rude I am and I’d be hated. (As much as I don’t care for people in general, I don’t like to be hated. Who does?) If I mumble incoherently, she’d get curious and ask me what I said and pester me until I say something.

What am I supposed to do?

I played it as safe as I could. I said that if she’s worried about the two of them breaking up at some point soon not to get the account, but if she thought that marriage, or years and years together, were in their future that getting it should be fine.

Then I did a stupid thing, I started to read again. She started to tell me that they’ve been together for four years and that she loved him a lot and that she wanted them to be together forever, but that she liked her money being her money and she didn’t always trust his judgement with his money and it was always possible that he may leave her or she may leave him.

What am I supposed to do here? I’ve been in, like, zero long term relationships. I guard my money almost as well as Scrooge McDuck. I can barely picture a future past tomorrow. I only seem to love women who don’t want to love me back. And I trust almost no one. I don’t think I’m the best person to be giving advice in a relationship situation. Hell, I don’t think I’m qualified to give advice in any situation, unless it’s about what Spider-man should do while fighting Doc Ock or Electro or some other guy. Observations, sure. I like to give observations, and I think I’m pretty good at them, but not advice. No, never advice.

The silence between us had gone from being thoughtful, to awkward as I was trying to figure out the safe thing to say. She was staring at me, her blue-green eyes magnified by her glasses. My palms had become clammy. There was nothing safe to say. Anything that I could say would have led to her telling me more things and wanting me to say more and the cycle would grow until it would, in time, come to me having to convince her to stay with or break up with her boyfriend. I don’t want weeks worth of stupid relationship crap to waste my breaks every time we worked together.

Sure, it would give me lots to write about here, but is that really worth ruining my time over?

She was getting impatient. I could tell by the flush in her cheeks, the pursing of her lips, the tapping of her fingers on the printer, and the way her other hand was planted on her hip.

“I... th–,” I started to say when the shift supervisor came back and said, “Kelsey, what’s going on? We need you out front. Just drop your money and come pour some coffee.”

Kelsey glanced over at the shift, then gave me a glare that tried to peel the skin from my face. She dropped her money, grabbed her drawer, and headed out front. I rolled my chair back to the desk, took a deep breath, and started to read again.

UP UP UP

Once again, I have a day that I don't have to wake up until the afternoon, and when do I wake up? Why, seven AM, of course. Lucky me.

I also have an earworm. I've had it since Tuesday, when I saw Fahrenheit 9/11. It's the theme song from The Greatest American Hero. At least when it's worming its way into my ear now, I have images of Bush running around the flight deck of an aircraft carrier. It could be worse.