A shot in the arm...

alright already

2007-04-13T06:58:00.000-07:00

I'm tired of all you fools crying like I shot the easter bunny just because I didn't update my blog.

So you got one comin'. I've got a bar crawl in our Nation's capital on Saturday, which I'm sure will lend fuel to the literary fire.

keep your head on a swivel.

J

Ice is back with a brand new edition...

2006-12-04T20:40:00.000-08:00

I've broken one of the ten commandments, well I've broken a couple of them, but I broke one of the big ones recently. Captaining my new truck home from work, I was put in a position of making three choices, hit the brake, swerve left, or swerve right. I chose the brake. The possum chose to turn around and head back towards the parked car that I couldn't swerve towards. New truck 1, North America's only marsupial 0. I'd prefer to stick to coveting my neighbors wife.

Speaking of neighbors, I haven't really met any of my new neighbors. The hood be pin drop quiet. I have a girl that lives downstairs from me, she's got a shamrock on the door so she can't be all bad, but not even a hello yet. There is probably a good reason for it. I'd imagine she isn't too psyched to be living below a guy that is the size of an NFL lineman. I try not to stomp or anything, but something tells me she knows where I am in my apartment most days. The other people in my unit seem nice enough, I've only talked to them once. Its probably better that way, they probably just think I'm quiet and keep odd hours. This way they'll be surprised when something bad happens to me. Why do I assume something bad will happen? Born under a bad sign I guess. I just got done lighting one of the pilot lights on my stove and the only thing that went through my mind as the match met the gas was “Somehow it will be fitting if I blow myself up right now”. I'm not sure what that says about me, I think I've transitioned from low self esteem to Karmic grudge. I'm just a realist though, the universe has it in for all of us, I just accept it and look for some irony as proof of higher power.

What happened to the parkway rocket? It ate the reinforced steel tow hitch of a Chevy Trailblazer. I had been pushing my luck, I needed tires and a suspension, both may seem like things that just affect your ride, but under heavy braking it tends to help if you can grip the road and your car doesn't dive like Greg Louganis. So yeah I hit the brakes, the nose went down and the tow hitch went through the Japanese plastic like Paris Hilton through Valtrex. Besides it doesn't take much to total a car that costs less than the unpaid parking tickets inside of it. So I have a new truck that I'm really happy with and a car payment that I'm really unhappy with.

You may be questioning my choice of vehicle. The pickup isn't terribly practical, but its already come in handy. I sucked up some liberal pride and economic prejudice, for a car I can fit comfortably in. I'm not a huge tree hugger anyway. I made my concession to reducing consumption by moving down here. Yeah everything in the back gets wet or stolen. It's a crew cab so ladies there is a backseat. I've proven its a danger to wildlife. Time will tell, as of now I'm happy, my lefty friends are a tad disappointed, my Mom bought me a cowboy hat and I'm thinking of instituting a Southern rock only policy, but that might be hard to live by.

How is the new place? Good. A lot of people ask me if I've adjusted to living alone. This seems like a loaded question, I think what they are really asking is “do you poop with the door open and walk to the kitchen naked?” I'll let your imagination wander for a bit. I never thought that I would ever be on the lookout for Bed, Bath, and Beyond coupons, but even an ardent hetero man like myself needs a paper towel holder. Don't worry, everything that I've purchased for my apartment has been chrome. Cold and colorless like tools and engines, you know, man things. I made an exception to my Neanderthal credo. Apparently my apartment smelled like “new paint and grandma”, so I've been lighting a few candles here and there. I figured I was in the clear because candles involve fire, and really if the plan is to pull women with loose morals back here after a night of drinking I don't want them to be reminded of Septuagenarian Aunt Tilly wallowing away in a home somewhere, I want them arching their back and ignoring the camera.

I haven't spent a full weekend here yet, I've been commuting home to stand at the door of the bar. We've had some excitement as of late, but I don't think I'm at liberty to discuss it. There actually is a pending court case, and in this day and age, I'm actually worried that by describing the events that unfolded I might be setting myself up for legal action. Who is going to be reading my blog and using it against me in court? I have no idea but rather than end up as a legal side note, I'll just talk around it. There is a hole in the wall at the frog, created by a fist that had my name all over it. However I have cat like speed and reflexes, plus a mean counter, if you have questions ask Art.

I worked Thanksgiving-eve, and some guy that was on line for the bar was like “I miss reading your blog”. He followed that with “thats kind of weird isn't it?” Yeah bro, I don't know you and as much as I'm flattered that you like reading what I write, your choice of words is astounding. I've been duct taping my ass shut before I go to bed for a week now. Why is it always some guy? Girls always say they want a guy with a sense of humor, well check the blog action ladies, I already covered possums, Greg Louganis, and duct taping my butt. That right there is a full season of South Park.

I've been having pain in my hip for a while now. I decided to go get it checked out. So I went to the Orthopedist, he took x-rays of my hip. Note to anyone that cares, when they x-ray your hip, they don't put the lead apron over your nads. So if the fruit of my loin has a harelip or retractable claws you can pinpoint the mutation. I'm sure my kids will be fine, and thankful that only their mother has the ability to give them fetal alcohol syndrome. Turns out its not my hip, more gonad irradiation. This is the doctor that looked at x-rays of my separated shoulder in college, and remarked “these look like animal bones.” So I thought it was curious when he remarked how large my spine was. Fine then refer me to a veterinarian, just give me the diagnosis. Squished disk, get an MRI . So I brought the films home for Mom to see and to bring with me for my MRI. Mom looked at my spine and said “Jesus your spine is big.” The woman who has been calling me “moose” for 30 years is shocked, SHOCKED, that I'm literally big boned. They're half your genes lady, so the jokes on you.

So I went to the radiology center today and got loaded into a giant tube like some sort of primate torpedo. They asked if I was claustrophobic. I wasn't really sure because last time I checked it was R. Kelly that was trapped in the closet, not me. Good news, I'm not afraid of small spaces. I found it interesting that I sort of didn't fit into the MRI machine, I had to scrunch my shoulders a little. No amount of weight loss is making my shoulders any less wide. I wonder what they do for really big people, lots of lube I suppose. So I'm waiting to hear back on that. Considering that most days I have pain shooting down my leg thats so bad at times I wish all this radiation would turn me green so I can smash stuff. Jamie hurt world that hurt Jamie. Not much I can do. Who knew there were health risks to being big and not exercising? I blame gravity, and if I ever get my hands on Sir Isaac Newton, I'll show him an equal and opposite reaction. Stupid 17th century scientists.

Thats about it, I've missed about 69,000 good stories since I lost the will to write. I apologize, these things happen, I'll get back into form. Hope this holds you over till next time.

J

I haven't retired....

2006-11-09T10:34:00.000-08:00

I've had plenty to write about, fisticuffs, moving, the hunt, and wrecking my automobile, my heart just hasn't been in it and I refuse to post a blog that doesn't live up to the standards i've set forth. I understand I'm way overdue and its unfair to keep loyal readers waiting. I promise to have something by the weekend. I think I've defeated the large brown spider that I was sharing my new one bedroom apartment with, so things are looking up... I'll get my mojo back. Stay tuned.

J

Play like a champion today...

2006-09-19T21:17:00.000-07:00

Searching for an apartment is kind of like a Korean bar-b-q. You have to go through a lot of dogs before you find one you like. I've been perusing a section of Monmouth county for a place where I can pay way too much for very little space for about 2 months now. Thankfully the search is over. As of last Thursday my days as a Morristown resident are coming to an end. Its been a good run, but its time for something new. I'm doubling my rent to shed 3 roomates, save hundreds of dollars in gas, tolls and wear and tear, and buy back 2 hours of my life each day. It's definitely the right choice. You get a different kind of people near the beach. I think I'll fit in because Red Bank is more of a commuter town and kind of artsy. I have to find a whole new group of bartenders to put up with my antics and give me fuel for my only creative outlet. Though I will have to keep myself under control, this isn't prison or the wilderness. I don't think picking out the largest guy in town beating him near death and then urinating to mark my territory is necessary, but you never know. It has been a while since I lived somewhere new. One of the things that put the new place at the top of the list was that I have a garage. I have escaped the evils of on the street parking. I can't wait till the first time I can hunker the scrap heap that I use for transportation into its new home. Keeping it out of the elements might buy me an extra week before it disintegrates into a pile of bolts and cloth seating.

So anyway in between making dealings for my new abode, I had way too much work to do and ended up getting out of the office real late. This was problematic because I was procrastinating all week, didn't do any laundry and hadn't packed for my trip. Needless to say I didn't adhere to many traffic laws. Thankfully the five-o was none the wiser and I made it home to shed the skin of my office's casual dress policy, and once again don the grey shirt that has been an albatross around my neck for two years. I really don't want a second job anymore. Thursday's crowd was decent. I told Art that I found a place, and he told me what a bastard I was, and that I can't quit and even if I have to drive an hour home each night I'm stuck working there until his body is cold and in the ground. So I've got that going for me. I'm going to need to work in October because paying two rents will cut my cash flow down just a bit. By a bit means I'll probably be selling my blood, if you want some let me know. It's mostly clean, besides alcohol is a antiseptic. So really if you've been reading this blog, what could I possibly be harboring in my body? Ok don't answer that I don't want to know. I kind of limped around the bar, it really dropped off after happy hour. There were a disproportionate amount of women in the bar Thursday, had some good convos but didn't pull any numbers. I was a little disappointed, then I realized that telling girls that you were moving an hour away doesn't really increase your dating potential.

So the bar reached the skeleton crew of weeknight customers. Art let me go early, so I shoveled down some cold rigatoni, untucked my shirt and walked home. This is about 1am, about 1:01 I realize that I don't have any clean underwear, my brother borrowed my small suitcase, and I had to be up in 4.5 hours. This is when flying by the seat of your pants becomes a problem. I've been really good lately about planning and doing things ahead of time, now all of a sudden I'm FEMA and there is a hurricane in the gulf. So I set my alarm first. I can wear dirty clothes, I can't miss my plane. I throw a load of laundry in, just stuff I'll need, and I go lie down and hope that I don't fall asleep before I can put stuff in the dryer. You never realize how hypnotic the white noise generated by a washing machine is. That damn industrial lulaby contraption almost knocked me out like Tyson. Thankfully I had my eyes on the prize, and got the wash in the dryer before disaster struck. I woke up at 0 dark hundred, hopped in the shower, came out and jammed my belongings and toiletries into a duffel bag with a bad zipper. Kevin, Brendan and I made it to the airport in plenty of time. Navigated the check-in kiosk and headed toward the gate. Then I remembered that the terrorists had won in the name of inconvenience and I had to check my bag in because I was carrying toothpaste and hair gel. I don't like checking luggage on a short trip, but I also don't like being strip searched and interogated at Guantanamo Bay, so I chose the lesser of two evils.

Brendan had sprained his knee a few weeks ago, and was wearing a knee brace on the plane. I'm not sure if he planned on a game of one on one at 35,000 feet, but I guess it made him feel better. He got stopped at the metal detector, and they needed to call the wand guy over. I got the security gaurd to laugh by making six million dollar man jokes. "Where is your red jumpsuit, Steve Austin" and "He can sit on a plane, we have the technology". I ditched the steve maddens and the digital camera for the x-ray and made it through without a hitch. I changed my Prince Albert to plastic a while ago for just this reason. Anyhoo, I bought a bottle of water in the terminal and had to leave the cap at the counter because of the dangerous dihydrogen oxide. I moved to an aisle seat because getting hit by the drink cart is better than being sweated on (depending on the company I suppose). I zonked out after my complimentary OJ and muffin.

We were in Chicago in no time, picked up our bags, hit the rest room and was dazzled by this turbo hand dryer. I'm pretty sure it exfoliated my outer layer of skin, but my hands were dry in five seconds. I had to ponder if anyone ever used it as a marital aid, and then I had to ponder what kind of hospital they were going to lock me in. Kevin, Brendan, and I waited for what seemed like eternity for the Avis bus to pick us up. It finally arrived and brought us to our rental whip, a maroon Chevy Impala. This boat had a trunk that is literally bigger than my new apartment. It swallowed luggage like Linda Lovelace. Leather seats, a cd player, we were rolling to South Bend like pimps, 50 year old middle management pimps. It actually was pretty comfortable, until Brendan started driving like an epileptic on a cell phone. I think we missed every exit. Of course it didn't help that Kevin and I started circling like vultures, its probably hard to pay attention to the road when you know if you make a mistake two misanthropes will be questioning if you grew up under power lines. I did get him to pull over for breakfast, at White Castle, in the ghetto. Nothing bad happened, but if you are taking notes at home this is probably the point in my life where Type II diabetes sets in. Sliders for breakfast, granted it was very close to lunch, and we had changed time zones. I've made better decisions in my life. Though if you are going to make bad decisions, lets hope they are delicious. We rolled on down the highway for over an hour, and finally made it to South Bend. South Bend is awash in everything that is wrong with America. Four lane highways peppered by strip malls. Cheap gas, cheap cigarettes, and no motorcycle helmet laws. We swung into a liquor store and bought a case of beer for some nominal charge and headed to the nexus of our upcoming weekend.

Tailgating for college football is a religion for many. Notre Dame doesn't allow you to park RVs on campus, so if you are so inclined you can find a house just off campus to moor your land yacht for a small fee. We pulled up to the RV, tents and coolers were out, flat screen tv was on, 500 watt sound system ready. I've seen this before, Kevin was awestruck, this is one of those RVs that expands so it has a full living room, bedroom, shower and bathroom. One of the Ron's was there. There are 3 over 50 gentlemen that pilot this roaming den of debauchery, two Rons and a Jim. The other guys were out on their motorcycles. We hung around for a bit and then went to meet some of Brendan's friends at this place called CJ's. We met Pat, Jess, and Jess' brother John. Started going through pitchers like we were bailing water from a row boat. Brendan and I split a basket of fries and onion rings. Kevin was enjoying being able to smoke in a bar. We all returned to the RV to get primed for a night out.

Cheap beer was torn into like dingoes on a carcas. We played hillbilly golf, which is kind of like the cornhole game or horseshoes. You have to throw golfballs attached by rope over this rack system for different sets of points. Its kind of hard to explain, but its just slightly safer than lawn darts. At some point we decided to go throw the football around. I had just enough beer to think that I was in shape and started running patterns. I've got soft hands, should have been a tight end. I also should get some cardiovascular exercise sometime this decade because I was out of breath and sweating like a farm animal in no time. It started to get dark, we were in full swing, mingling with the other RVs and the local people. I like to use the term "Whiskey Tango" for people that burn their trash, but they were nice. Kevin and I were having a great time, and were reminding each other that we had nothing at all to think about other than drinking and playing games. I had two cajun hot bratwursts with sauerkraut and onions for dinner. My liver gave up on me long ago, but I'm pretty sure I angred the rest of my internal organs with that move. One of the Ron's made a drink for this local girl that was hanging out, he said it was a "Captain Ron", I'm pretty sure it was a "Roofie Collada". Apparently, Kevin had caught a story about a stag party involving a German Sheppard. I hope thats really all I need to paint a picture of what we were dealing with.

Eventually Brendan, Kevin and I headed out to one of the local watering holes. At the Linebacker you got in for 5 bucks and got a free drink ticket. We exchanged ours for LITs because thats what we needed. The bar was loaded with middle aged alums and tailgaters, we headed outside to sit for a bit and wait for the crowd to turn over. Kevin and Brendan ordered hot dogs, I couldn't imagine eating any more tubular meat. We were shooting bull for a while checking out the scenery. The rest of the younger crew was at the bar so we headed inside. Even though I'm 30, I look younger, and if you look young and have money to buy drinks you should have no fear talking to college girls. I didn't have a problem, I was all over the place. I never switched to beer, so I stayed on the LIT train, because thats a safe choice. I talked to this one Library Science major, really pretty, from Poland. She thought I was cute, so maybe I'm not a big horrible monster after all. Between the LITs and the ego boosting, I was dellusional and had intentions of staying out till 3am and passing out in the motorcycle trailer behind the RV. Thank god Brendan was in charge of being sober driver and reasoning. We had accomodations in Michigan City, Indiana. We stopped at BK on the way out of town, I had to be the hero and dropped a Jackson for 4 chicken sandwich meals.

Although Michigan City was about 30 miles away, Kevin and I thought it was right at the end of the BK driveway. Passed out in the back seat. I woke up in a children's bed, with a picket fence headboard and my feet sticking over the edge. I know no one carried me inside since I weigh as much as a volkswagen, apparently I lumbered in and hit the deck. We headed back out around 9am, taking a swing by Lake Michigan, its very large, a great lake so to say. We headed back to the RV, parked the car in some guy's yard. The first thing that hit my stomach was a tequila jello shot that some guy in the lot gave me. Drink like a champion today was my motto. We had a few beers and headed out for a tour of the campus. Brendan spent 4 years there, but between his lack of direction and the new construction, the tour was only partly informative. We hit the big spots, the dome, touchdown jesus, the grotto, the bookstore. The bookstore was mobbed, literally, people were trying on hats and throwing them on the ground. It was clearly a fire hazard, so we decided to return after the game.

We headed back to the RV, and this is when the fun begins, Brendan's ND boys and the RV guys had recruited some tailgaters to party with. The sound system was cranking out the ND fight song and an assortment of hits from an iPod. More hillbilly golf, and a flip cup tournament. I played on a team to start against some current ND students, the kid I was lined up against was talking smack and explaining things like I haven't wasted my years after the age of 18 playing drinking games. I had to walk away before I scattered his remains around the RV. Eventually we assembled an all Jersey team, putting on a display of flip cup prowess never before seen by mortal men. We headed into the game under the most beautiful weather imaginable. It would have been nice if ND showed up, I'm pretty sure they were replaced by the South Bend HS team. They were dominated by Michigan, which sucked the air out of an amazing day. It was so bad we left the game early, so we didn't have to hear any more of the Michigan fans. I dropped a bunch of loot at the bookstore for merch, you know because the most famous football college in the country needs my money, and I need to remind people that I'm Irish.

Back at the RV we faced different levels of dejection. Brendan, Kevin, Andy and I headed back to Chicago. Kevin passed out in the back seat. I found the greatest hair metal station in the world. We got to Andy's after some traffic, Brendan was probably shell shocked from the amount of abuse he received about his driving. We cleaned up and squared away our sleeping arrangements and headed out to Yakzee's. Yakzee's has awesome chicken wing pizza, toasted ravioli and cheap beer. We were all clearly drained, but we needed to eat and a few beers wouldn't hurt right? At this point my insides felt like I was swallowing light bulbs in the freak show. Jess and Pat showed up, we were all tired and bitter. The sun and about 600 beers had sapped our strength, so we actually went home. Had ND won, we probably would have raged till dawn. I hit an aero bed at Andy's house and aparently was in a diabetic coma, because Brendan and Kevin couldn't even get me to stir in the morning. They checked out Chicago while I was slumbering like a narcoleptic sloth. They came back, we packed the car, and headed to Joe's. Joe's is a sports bar, the ND guys met us there. We ordered some Bloody Marys because a little hair of the dog never hurts, and its got some vitamins and stuff. I remembered we were in Chicago when the bloody came out garnished with a pickle, celery stalk, and a skewer with peperoni and swiss cheese. I guess I needed to drink meat this weekend. It was actually delicious. We started watching the Giants crumble, started to put down pitchers. I ordered a BLT with avacado which was excellent. I think I reached 20,000 calories at that point and my body was starting to run on a nuclear reaction instead of a biochemical one. The G men decided to pull the game out in OT. We headed for the airport, Kevin tried to keep the party going, looking for hotels and flights to go home the next day. When I finally said no, he pouted in the back seat for a while because we were stuck in traffic.

The flight home was delayed because of rain, we caught the late NFL games at the sports bar in the terminal. We actually ran into my old roommate and his wife who were on our flight. Brendan was in another terminal because he was flying to London, I think because that's what workaholics do after vacations. I lucked out with a middle seat on the flight home. Thankfully I was between to older ladies who didn't want to talk to me, and didn't take up space, because I was wedged in like a clog in a drain. The flight got off ground, took a little longer than expected, but we were home. Picked up the bags, hit the car, and was home and in bed before midnight.

You need weekends like these every once in a while to remind yourself why you aren't still in college. I was almost happy to return to an unmade bed and 7 loads of laundry. I've haven't done jack with my website but there are pictures up from this trip, the full images are very large, I would suggest browsing the thumbnails. www.jfdavidson.com/pictures I should have more galleries up in a while. Thats it for now, stay tuned for more adventures.

Remember...

2006-09-12T11:11:00.000-07:00

I've previously discussed some of the advantages of driving a crappy car. One important one is it attracts very little attention, granted this means it pulls less wool then a Chihuahua shearer, but it has an ability to hide things in plain sight. When you are in a band, this is very important. Chris learned this lesson well when he took my bass cabinet home one time after a gig and left it in the back of his Cherokee in Brooklyn. Not smart, but these things happen, and needless to say he had to replace a car window and my bass cabinet. The Mitsubishi has a trunk that works well for a guitarist, I was able to wedge my Rivera amp and my guitar in the back and not really worry about my car being messed with. This was before it truly looked like something that should be rolling around a fairground with a number 5 spray painted on it. I didn't have the aftermarket stereo, just the stock tape deck with a poorly working FM tuner. I had entered the CD era early so I didn't really have many tapes. If I recall correctly I had an infinite loop running with one of three choices, Weezer's green album (which was an actual promo copy from the record label, why they would send an audiocassette to be reviewed I'll never know, but I was thankful), Soul Asylum's "And The Horse They Rode In On", and the greatest hits of the Spencer Davis Group (As far as I'm concerned they had one hit and one other good song, but what do I know). Needless to say, thieves weren't enticed by the stereo system, and the faded cloth interior probably didn't make it any better.

I was relying on this large chunk of urban camouflage the morning of September 11th, 2001. JLT had a gig in the city that night at the rock club Continental. My plan was to go into work a little late to avoid the morning rush, park the car somewhere mostly safe and hope for the best. After work, slide downtown and force feed rock and roll to a couple bartenders, and whoever else we convinced to show up that night. Obviously that plan didn't come to fruition. I ended up pulling over somewhere on Route 80 to listen to someone on the radio describe people jumping from the towers while watching smoke rise from the southern part of the skyline. I was in the WTC 2 days before when NJ Transit was doing a marvelous job of botching my commute. For some reason I had to go to Hoboken then I took the PATH to the WTC and hopped on the subway to get to Chelsea. I don't really remember why that worked that way, but that was fresh in my Mom's mind when I called her to let her know I never made it in that day, and was home safe. There is a clip in the commercial for that Oliver Stone movie where two of the firefighters are running in front of stores. I have vivid memories of navigating the mall that was underneath the WTC trying to get to work, so I get a little weirded out when I see it on TV.

So watching the Giants game Sunday night, with the continual aerial shots of the big reminder that is scarring downtown, I had to reflect a little bit. I was thankful to be around, and thankful that none of my friends were hurt. I lost a couple of acquaintances and people I never really knew but would see on the train, or just around. I had to remember being evacuated from a karaoke bar a few days after the 11th. I was back into work ASAP because the power outages had knocked our email server down, and the magazine I worked for was having an extremely large music festival right around that time. I got everything up, the festival was delayed, and a few of us went out to unwind. Having a few beers and singing Elton John can actually help. Some moron called in a bomb threat to the Empire State Building and New York's finest had to throw us out on the street. 9/11 was the nail in the coffin for the dot com era, I eventually lost my job, and was unemployed for some time because the market was so flooded with people with computer skills. I look back at all this and think about how lucky I really am, I hope all of us do. I also hope that the end result isn't just American flags on pizza boxes, and a bunch of jingoistic hatred of non whites. I've long been concerned with our consumerism and apathy. George Bush's first term was predicated on an election with the lowest voter turnout in 40 years. If you wonder why there is still a giant hole in the ground in NYC. Take a gander at Iraq. How much money and resources are we spending fighting a war and having Haliburton put up walls and fortifications? Think any of that could have been used over here? I understand its not a popular view, and I certainly don't think we can just turn our backs on the situation over there now. Though I don't think we can turn our backs on the situation over here either.

The past few days have reminded me that I've lost sight of a few things I believe strongly in. I've been procrastinating for a while now. I was on the lookout for a non-partisan organization that promotes voter turnout. Suffrage is something that not too long ago was denied women and blacks in this country, people fought and died for that right and so many people think that their voice doesn't matter. So I've resolved to get in the game and figure out what I can do to help. If anyone can point me in a direction it would be appreciated. MoveOn is a little too far left, and Rock the Vote doesn't really grab me. I would really like something as neutral as possible, I try not to inflict my politics on anyone. It really doesn't matter to me how people vote, just that they use one of the few gifts from the founders of this country that hasn't been tainted. Anyway, I'll do my best to follow through with that. I hope we all still remember and we all do something, no matter how small, to show our respect to those people and this country.

In other news, I realize I went a little off the deep end last blog. Thanks for those of you who were looking out. I'm really fine, just a little stressed, and I have some anger issues to work out. Its times like those when I miss rugby. It would have been nice to go out and just level someone, but I'm stuck keeping things on the inside, walking around like Bruce Banner hoping no one sets me off. Its really not good, and I've been doing it for a really long time, but put it on the list of things to work on. Besides you have to dive in the deep end if you want to learn how to swim, you can't always touch bottom.

Thursday I had a bit of a rough night out. A few drinks in Red Bank, then a long drive home. I was way fine to drive if you were concerned. I can't mess with that with an hour commute each way and the dismal state of public transportation. I ended up stopping in at the Frog to pick up my check, with full intention of going home and going to bed. I knew full well that I had a rough week and a weekend filled with bouncing. Of course I ran into my roommate at the bar. Why yes I'll have a drink. And no why would I want to eat something? So I ended up hanging out on an empty stomach, it was nice to be out though, I really haven't made much time for myself in a while. So a few beers at the Frog, then down to the Grasshopper. It wasn't that busy surprisingly since summer was over. I was by myself, even though I really can't be by myself in Mo'town. I found a few familiar faces to hang out with. One of which bought me a shot at the end of the night, had me walk her home, and made out with me in front of her house. An interesting end to a Thursday night to say the least. Nights like these help promote the mythology of going out. What I mean is we all have feelings from time to time that if we sit at home, we are going to miss something good happening. You can't meet boys/girls on your couch, really its just a fallacy and all you end up doing most nights is spending money on a hangover. Every once in a while, sometimes more often, sometimes less, you get a night where something does happen and you forget all those nights where your team lost and you drank a beer that someone put a cigarette out in, or that time you sent a beer to that transvestite that was making eyes at you. So the night ended as it was supposed to, the way I least expected it. You might be wondering what my next move is. I don't know. I'm leaving town in a month, there are other mitigating circumstances, and frankly I might just want to leave it where it lies, its kind of nice and simple the way it is, and I'm fine with just having a Thursday night make out story.

Friday was another issue altogether. I was starving in the morning and felt like I went 10 rounds in a cage match with Mothra and Mickey Rourke. Thankfully the office gods were kind to me, and I was able to spend time hydrating myself. I'm sure people thought it was weird that I moved the water cooler next to my desk, but it was much easier to get my head under the spout from the comfort of my own chair. I escaped the confines of my white collar work camp on time to jump right into the indentured servitude of my second job. I'm pretty sure everyone is home from the shore and they were all out Friday night. Its so much better when the bar is busy, more ass to look at, more meatheads to size up. Its like you are actually accomplishing something. Yeah I realize I spent 3 paragraphs on 9/11 and the right to vote and I'm referring to standing around a bar as "accomplishing something", go somewhere else if you don't like it. I got picked up by some girl from Hacketstown, but lost track of her before digits could be pulled, the downside of being busy is it allows less time for game. I'll have to get back into the 2 minute drill rather than the cricket match of summer. Not a bad night though, no problems, and its good to see the regulars.

Needless to say I slept in Saturday. I put a hurting on my pillow, thankfully all I had to accomplish was watch college football. I went over to my friend Brendan's house, he's been there since April, this was the first time I'm seeing it. Think we've been busy? Its a nice two floor townhouse in Morristown. Brendan bought the largest LCD TV known to man. I believe it was constructed by 25,000 Egyptian slaves and houses the sarcophagus of Jackie Gleason. Notre Dame kicked the hell out of Penn State. Which is good news because Brendan, Kevin and I are traveling to South Bend on Friday. The ancient rivalry of ND vs. Michigan will be viewed live under the Indiana sky, but that will probably pail in comparison to watching it in HD on Brendan's TV. I left B's to get to the bar a little early. We have a new bouncer who hopefully will be filling in for me when I finally get the hell out of Dodge. Training a bouncer is probably the most ridiculous thing you could ever do. As long as you can read numbers and stand around you are in business. Granted paying attention and being able to handle yourself is a bonus, but you can't really train that. I welcomed Mike to the easiest job in the world. It was slower Saturday, so I got to hang out with some people and walk around more. No real action to speak of, some girl lost her lunch in the bathroom, spinach is never nice the second time around.

Sunday was the true return of football season. I got a late start because I had work to catch up on. I caught the second half of the first games. The Jets almost snatched defeat from the jaws of victory, which seems par for the course. Dallas looked bad, Reggie Bush looked good. I started feeling under the weather around 3pm. Didn't drink much at all, choked down some food, I wasn't sure what was up. It kind of put a damper on the night game. The Giants should have won that game, that pass interference was a bad call, but they didn't capitalize on any of Indy's miscues. They looked good though and I think it should be a good season to watch.

I carried my illness into Monday. Didn't really eat much, I think it was a 24 hour thing because I'm fine today. I got a copy of the Wolfmother album, its everything I hoped it would be. Though I was really only hoping for an album that would make me feel like I was driving a Camaro to a Judas Priest concert. Last night I helped my roommate's parents set up a wireless network. I really don't like helping people with technology outside of work hours, but I figured the karma could use a boost these days, and I think Darren's dad was going to start using the DSL modem to open coconuts. So thats where we are, the apartment search continues, stay tuned for more adventures.

Laboring Day...

2006-09-04T20:59:00.000-07:00

So the Crocodile Hunter Steve Irwin died. Its kind of sad that I don't really care, I think we all assumed that he would probably be killed by interacting with dangerous animals in their own territory. I don't really believe in fate, I believe more in percentages, so I was a tad surprised to find out he was stabbed in the heart by a stingray. I would have thought poisonous snake or crocodile would have been much more likely. I used to enjoy his antics, but I gave up on him when he brought his infant son into the croc pit for feeding time. You would think he would be safety conscious, once again percentages. Sure you believe that you understand crocodile behavior, but accidents happen, you slip and Wally Gator has a baby McNugget for lunch. I try to explain this to people at the bar, invariably some moron will try and stand on their stool for some idiotic reason. I tell them to get down, they tell me its ok, their mom was Mary Lou Retton and their dad was a ninja, or they were state champion stool standers in high school or some such nonsense. Its very simple, I'm sure you are a premier athlete. Why else would you be getting drunk in a bar in New Jersey? Its not so much that I think that alcohol inhibits your equilibrium and you might just lose your balance and I'll be sweeping your gray matter under the Golden Tee machine. I just think its likely that the person next to you doesn't realize that you are going through your Cirque du Solei routine and might bump your stool and the world could be denied another double jointed flag pole sitter. But what the hell do I know, I intellectualize everything, I'm a misfit in this era of extreme sports and shows where people kick each other in the crotch.

I got a call Wednesday that I knew was inevitable but still wasn't expecting. Apparently my Dad's bad habits wore a hole in his stomach and he was pumping half digested food and air into his abdomen. A little emergency surgery and a liver biopsy later and I'm driving down to Delaware confronting 30 years of buried emotions. I usually don't share these things ever, I tend just to keep everything bottled up inside. But why not throw my demons on the Internet? I haven't seen my Dad in probably 5 years, 2 of those years we didn't talk at all. So it kind of sucked to walk into the critical care unit in some podunk hospital and see him lying there with a tube in his nose. I'm really having a hell of a year, hey look its me whining again, but really can't anything good happen? I realize things could be a whole hell of a lot worse, I've got friends, a job, a car, and a roof over my head, but I'm supposed to. I'm glad I don't live in Rwanda, but just something I can put in the plus column. Just existing is dandy, but maybe a gentle reminder that God doesn't hate me. Why did I have to take all those science classes? No wonder Jesus never calls. Listen Evolution and the Big Bang don't preclude a higher being buddy. How about I get some frankincense and myrrh and I'll trade you for a winning scratch off ticket or an insurance settlement. When people ask me how things are going, should I tell them that I've resorted to making wishes to invisible superheroes? Anyway back to Dad, he is going to be OK, I don't have a whole lot of hope that in 2012 I will be writing a blog telling you how good things are between us and how healthy he is, its much more likely I'll be angry that he died because I missed the chance to do the job myself. Well that was a nice story. Should I get back to misanthropy and drunken adventures? Yep.

Anyway, needless to say I didn't do much on Thursday. I had plans to get stood up for drinks after work and irony of ironies I'm the one that had to cancel. I got home, ate leftovers and watched CSI. Sleep couldn't come fast enough. Sometimes you just need the sun to go down so you can start over again in the morning. Friday at the day job was mostly uneventful. I enjoy the days before holiday weekends, I seem to get more done because its quiet and the people that are there are focused on getting out at 5pm. I of course am a giant loser and had no grand plans for the weekend, I was working at the bar Friday and Saturday. The remnants of the hurricane made for a wonderful ride home, and I decided to walk to the bar and got drenched because I didn't realize how hard it was actually raining. The crowd was ok Friday night, and we actually got to toss some people. Little bit of drunken testosterone caused a scuffle, so we tossed two of the culprits and left some of the guys in the bar under recommendation from one of the bartenders. Always throw everyone out, that should be rule number one. Even if you feel guilty because its slow and the bartenders need to make money, throw all the culprits out. Trying to do the right thing got us an extra dose of adult adolescence. This waste of 26 chromosomes that was involved with the scuffle previously started with some poor guy at the end of the bar, who actually looked like he could rip phonebooks in half even though he was kind of small. He was doing a good job of ignoring the mutant with the crappy goatee. Art tosses white trash facial hair, he gets loud, his buddy picks him up and takes him outside. This guy's friend was large, and apparently in charge, which was fine by us. I follow them out so they can call me fat and I can say something a tad more intelligent and hopefully provoke him into doing something he will regret. He was all fired up anyway, Art came outside and stood in the door, I was to his left next to the open door. Johnny Temper starts coming at Art, this guy has no clue that I'm about to demonstrate Newtonian physics on his larynx. I've got a shot that bouncers dream of, my feet are set and if this guy takes one more step I'm about to try and decapitate him with one hand. All the anger from the week could have been resolved, but I was denied, the big guy grabbed him before I could do my Darth Vader impression and jack this guy up and ask him the location of the rebel base. Foiled. That was the only drama of the evening, we ended up staying real late just because. Its been awhile since we all hung out till the wee hours and its good for morale sometimes. Random side notes: thanks to some trivia from the regulars, I now know that the only words in the English language that start with “dw” are dwarf, dwell, and dwindle. I did know that facetious was the only word that had all the vowels in order. Also I got a nice goodbye kiss from one of the semi-regulars (it was on the cheek but still nice), she is a hot mom and made me seriously consider why I waste my time chasing girls that are younger than I am. Perhaps a cougar hunt is in my future.

Saturday I slept in, checked up on my Dad, and met Rob and Priscilla at the Dublin Pub for a late lunch. I had onion soup, grilled pork chops and mashed potatoes. A little bit of comfort food, that Rob and Priscilla kept commenting on, I suppose I could have shared, but I'm a hungry hungry hippo and the more marbles in my belly the better. I came home and changed, Rob was nice enough to give me a lift to the bar. Rob and I hadn't shaved in 2 days, John C. asked us if he pays us to look like animals. Hmm lets see, we get paid to be bigger than everyone else and you make us wear horrible gray shirts that make us look like elephants, I think that would be a yes. 2am couldn't come fast enough, no action just a bunch of mutants. Holiday weekends attract the strangest crowds. We spent the end of the night poking fun at Rob's desire to work one night a week. Frankly I can't wait to move and never have a second job again, but he gets all sensitive and its much more fun to prod someone who clearly gets uncomfortable. I actually don't get made fun of that much, I like to think its because I'm a good person, kind of funny, and generally self deprecating anyway, but its probably that I'm a dog thats been kicked to many times.

Sunday I was supposed to go to the Yankee game, but my ticket fell through. So I used the opportunity to do laundry and get things together around the apartment. I went over to Mom's for the usual Sunday night dinner. I ended up in a conversation that I didn't really need to have ever. This whole Dad thing has opened a hole that you could drive a car through. I really want to get back to swallowing my emotions and growing a tumor. I went back to my apartment to change, Rob wanted to go out and I needed a little escape. I went to the Frog for one drink, the crowd was decent for a Sunday. My real plan was to go to the new bar in town, Tashmoo. I have no idea what the hell a Tashmoo is, apparently its a section of Martha's Vineyard, or some such nonsense. Wanna head to the “moo”? No actually I just want a shot and a beer and ponder my navel, not wonder what the hell the etymology of the bar's name is. They don't have Harp on tap, strike two. Its not a bad place, saw some familiar faces, it helps that the bartender has been a family friend of mine for a couple hundred years. Music was provided by an iPod, with what seemed to be a playlist designed to expose latent homosexuality. Rob had a good laugh at my expense when a girl I've mentioned before came to say hello, after she left Rob wondered if she was looking for a ride home. Yeah that one, so so awkward. Priscilla lifted my spirits and claimed that girls are pretty much evil and manipulative, thats good to know, so I'm not crazy, but since I'm straight I kind of still need women around. We were on our way out, Safe Ride Home told me she liked the new haircut, score one for me, I might be a shell of a human being at this point but at least my hair looks good. I should get some head shots so when I go feral and decide to live in the Canadian wilderness, the picture on the back of the milk cartons will have the stylin' new hairdo.
We went down to the Grasshopper just for a change of pace, besides we know everyone that works there and when you are trying to unwind it doesn't hurt to get a few drinks on the house here and there. It was busy, Matty was working the door. I headed to the bar to get beers and shots, there was an attractive girl just getting her drinks, I asked her if she bought her own drinks, she said yes, I said thats too bad because you are too good looking to buy your own drinks. Priscilla thought it was a good line, I'll try and remember it, it of course didn't lead to anything but thats because I didn't follow up. My wingman decided to bring his girlfriend, so I had about as much game as the Kansas City Royals. We headed upstairs, where the fun was soon to begin.

We were at the bar minding our own business, Priscilla goes to the bathroom, two girls barge between us and bump Rob. We were being wise asses, they didn't really take kindly but we don't care. Apparently the guido they were with did. House of pain starts staring at Rob, at which point I'm staring at him trying to decide how far I'm going to put my fist inside his skull. Think I had some anger issues this weekend? Whatever, we supposedly dissed the girls. He is jaw jacking with Rob, he doesn't like me looking at him. I tell him “Wrong guy, Wrong bar”. Allegedly the wannabe goomba is from Newark, and how do I know that he isn't the wrong guy to mess with. Well because Tony Soprano is a fictional character, I outweigh you by 120 lbs. And I'm 6 inches taller, I know everyone working right now, plus the two cops outside. I agree this is a lot of braggadocio, but damn it I grew up here, I bounce here and I don't have to take any crap from anybody. Besides I hate guidos, gold chains and Camaros and club music, good for nothing. I have no problem with Italians, my roommate's last name has an apostrophe and enough vowels to send to Eastern Europe so we know what the hell they are talking about. I explain that we aren't in Newark, we are in an Irish bar in Morristown, and I'm still the wrong guy at the wrong bar, but if there is a problem we can go downstairs. Ironbound didn't like that so much, and didn't realize that we were on the second floor because he didn't want to go downstairs he wanted to go outside, I explained that outside is down the stairs. His buddies kind of came up behind me, he seemed to think he had me by himself, I wasn't backing down and I was actually eerily calm. Usually your heart gets going a little bit when the adrenaline kicks in, fight or flight as it were. I think I'm just ready to unload on somebody at this point, when Matt steps in front of me and kicks all of them out. Matt knows that I don't start shit in his bar, thats why when he saw the guy in my face he just decided to throw them all out, he was relieved that my glasses were still on because the international sign of me about to get ugly is the glasses coming off. I hate fighting, and violence actually, and I won't throw a punch. If you are curious as to what I would do to my friend from Newark, I'd probably let him hit me somewhere that doesn't really hurt, it always hurts, but the back of your head hurts a lot less than your groin or your nose, but this way he is close enough that I can put him on the ground, put my weight on him and start twisting things in directions that they aren't supposed to go. People have epic ideas of bar fights being boxing matches, fights go to the ground awfully quick.

People started asking me what happened because I'm usually the nice one. I think people forget that when it comes down to it I'm a big dumb animal, sure I can write 5000 words about my Bukowskian adventures, but keep your hands out of the cage during feeding time. Don't interfere with my drinking and my pathetic attempts to impress unavailable women. We headed back downstairs to mingle with the women of loose morals, and whatever other bar characters that were hanging out after 1 on a Sunday. After last call we headed to the diner to replay our evening over Taylor ham and disco fries. I ate way way too much, because I woke up Monday feeling like I swallowed a boat anchor. But its good to have 2500 extra calories before you sleep, dreaming takes energy. I didn't accomplish much today other than writing this blog. I've been moping about a subject I can't address in this forum, it shouldn't bother me this much, but with everything going on lately I'm a little scrambled. I've been really good about keeping the train on the tracks, my life is mostly in order, but sometimes you can't see the forest for all the trees or whatever cliché means I have my head up my ass.

I have yet to get my web page together, I've been distracted, but I'll work on that. I've been looking for a lightweight text editor for Mac OS X, but still have yet to find one I like. Right now I'm using Neo Office, seems to get the job done, but its bulky. I'll have more for everyone this week. If you care, Dad is out of the hospital and seems to be ok. I'm not ok yet, but I'm starting to wonder if I was ever ok. Probably not, but stay tuned.

Bringing sexy back...

2006-08-30T09:19:00.000-07:00

People seem to want to know what's up. Well lets see, we are still fighting a war in Iraq, that John Karr guy might be the creepiest guy on the planet, and I made egg salad for dinner last night but I didn't have any bread to make sandwiches so I used chocolate chip cookies. I'm an innovator, and I won't be recognized as a revolutionary thinker until after my time on this earth has passed. I took a little break from blogging, I wasn't planning on taking two weeks it just sort of happened. I haven't had a whole lot of action in my life these days, and I don't want my blog to just me complaining It's a lot more fun when I can make fun of people and expound on the ridiculousness of suburban living.

I don't have a whole hell of a lot to report. I've entered a new game/phrase into my lexicon. While at my friend Cliff's bachelor party, we were tooling around in my friend Dan's VW Vanagon, like the Libyans from Back to the Future. Dan installed an aftermarket stereo so he could interface with his iPod while driving, very nice. We discovered though that when the iPod is on random, you have two choices either whatever comes up is "gay" or "Slayer". No not that Slayer is new slang for cool, I mean Slayer the band, because whatever isn't Slayer is gay. Yeah its insensitive to use the word gay that way. Its also insensitive to pick on people for being mouth breathing mongoloids that get confused when the front door of the Frog says pull. I've been doing that for months now and nobody complains.

My automobile situation is worsening. Apparently driving 600 miles a week isn't so good on the front tires. It was a little rainy this morning and I put power to the pavement coming out of a turn and the front end started going sideways. Fun. Yesterday I did an online appraisal of my car, the trade in value of a beat up 97 Mitsubishi Galant with 180k miles is about 150 dollars, I can get 500 for it street value. So in order not to die driving to work, I'm going to have to spend half of the car's value on two new front tires. I was an Econ major in college and I can tell you its not a worthwhile investment. The nice thing is I have no choice right now because I'm getting a new apartment, I have no idea what my monthly expenditure is going to be, and if I get a new car I will lose one quarter of my blogging material. New cars are stupid though, why anyone would pay for something that depreciates 15 percent of its value in the first year is beyond me. I have to say though, this is probably the best car I have ever owned, its nothing special but I've beaten it like a rented mule and it still starts up every day without complaint. I haven't poured money into it. And yeah it burns about 3 quarts of oil every 5000 miles now, but that has a whole lot more to do with my driving than it does the reliability of the engine. I'm probably not going to be able to drive it the average distance to the moon, but I can't complain about getting 200k miles out of a car in 10 years without replacing the transmission, head gasket, universal joint, or whatever the hell else usually takes 1500 dollars out of your pocket at 120,000 miles.

Nothing new on the lady front, I pulled some digits last Thursday that was hopefully going to turn into going out for drinks Friday, but it didn't come together. Working Thursday nights has been good for getting numbers, granted its a giant pain in the ass Friday morning, but there are some fringe benefits. Why I'm even talking to girls in Morristown when I plan on moving in a couple of months I don't really know. I suppose I have to stay in practice so I can get accustomed to getting shot down in Red Bank. I despise dating, its all way too much work to find out that people are shallow and uninteresting. I'll find that diamond in the rough, and hopefully I'll get to spend 6 weeks with her before the aneurysm that I developed from chasing around bimbos and passive-aggresive emotional wastelands pops in my brain. Shout out to a certain red haired friend of mine, I'm glad you enjoy my blog, I was going to mention that guy that turned down the Fields medal, but I'm a big enough nerd already.

Apparently some of my friends feel like I'm abandoning them. It's not my first choice to move away and start all over. I think its a matter of perception, I haven't partied like a rock star in months, I made a decision to cut down on going out during the week a long time ago, and I've been working on the weekends for 4 years now. Its just the fact that I'm moving away highlights the fact that I don't spend a lot of time with anyone anymore. If I'm abandoning anyone it happened 6 months ago not now. It's not even that drastic anyway, its just guilt. I'm going to put together a tally of my friends that come to visit me in Red Bank and keep it online and we'll compare it with how many times I go out in Mo'town in the first 6 months of me moving and we'll see who is abandoning who.

Speaking of online, I bought a domain name and some hosting so I can flesh out some of this here blog and have a place for me to post pictures of the usual suspects, the places I go, and things I do. Stay tuned for that, because you know this blogging thing has gotten me a lot money and ass, I'm sure by having a web site I will be an overnight porno rock star. I'll be writing more soon, part of my problem was that I got depressed and that tends not to motivate me much. I have no idea what I was depressed about, its never anything specific, but it seems to build up to the point where I feel like there is a giant weight on my shoulders and I don't want to do anything. It happens from time to time, I'm sure it happens to everybody, or probably not and I need to be medicated and kept away from society. I told a friend of mine once that I was depressed at the time and they said "Why don't you just be happy?". Oh yeah I forgot just to be happy, I'm sure the pharmaceutical industry is going be ecstatic when they find out people can just be happy. I should go ride on my unicorn across rainbows and marshmallows and everything will be perfect. Anyway, my doom and gloom is lifting, things aren't bad, its just life. Its good when life kicks you in the ass, it gives you an excuse to kick back. I was driving home yesterday and Van Morrison was on the radio, and that made a lot of things better. Why aren't there more Van Morrisons on the radio? Don't get me wrong I appreciate that Justin Timberlake is bringing sexy back. You need a good dance jam, but have you listened to It Stoned Me? Ah whatever kids these days. If anyone has the Wolfmother album, I want it, not just because of the band name but because they rock out.

Speaking of band names, when JLT was just getting going I sat down and made a list of like 75 potential band names in 15 minutes. I'm not entirely sure how Joanie Loves Trotsky won, because there were some real gems like Joan Lunden Calling, Gonorrhea Perlman, and Pol Pot Pie. Obviously I like puns. I think it came down to three choices; Ninjavitis, Pontius Toilet, and Joanie Loves Trotsky. I often wonder what would have happened if we were Ninjavitis. Anyway, apparently that list I had is lost and gone forever, no one seems to be able to find it. I know some of the extended friends of the band had access to the list, if anyone can dig it up I'd be very appreciative.

Thats all for now, I'll get back to my usual lamentations shortly.

A life wasted...

2006-08-14T11:20:00.000-07:00

I often wonder if I have OCD, probably not considering I'm not a germophobe and the inside of my car looks like someone parked it at the end of an alley, opened all the doors, and used a leaf blower to insert the contents of the street into the interior. I do get in routines though. I've been trying not to eat after 9pm, so generally when I work at the bar I take a break during my shift to shovel my dinner into my face and hopefully catch an inning of the Yankee game without the distraction of moronic bar patrons. We have a limited menu to select from, and even though I have it memorized, I tend to pour over it hoping that there is something I missed. There never is though, so enter routine numero uno. I've eaten the chicken rigatoni at the Famished frog, easily 69,000 times. Like an old friend its always there for me, its just enough food to keep me sane, and there aren't any fries. I realize its probably more calories than I need, but anything served without french fries, I pretty much consider health food. I've been trying to break this routine lately. Recently I've resorted to getting the grilled chicken breast with veggies. I don't know if I've decided that there is something or someone to live for, or if the arterial plaque has finally started to affect my higher brain function, but I'm on a little bit of a health kick. I even went to the gym last week. Stop gasping, and yes Art constantly questions my sexuality because I'm not eating something deep fried. Quite a support system I have. But enter routine number b, after my shift I raid the salad prep area like some sort of jungle snake entering a parrot's nest and steal eggs. Granted they are hard boiled and peeled so I don't have to swallow them whole and raw, like our reptilian friends. Oscar seems to find some humor in it, I suppose the concept of me snacking on hard boiled eggs is kind of ridiculous. I'm not sure why I do it, I think its part hunger, and part Cool Hand Luke fetish. That reminds me, I have to remember to stop modeling my life after guys in movies that were made before I was born. I've been thinking about getting a new car again. So what do I do? Check Ebay for '67 Mustang Fastbacks, you know because thats practical in the winter or when gas costs 3 dollars a gallon or when I need reliable transportation with air bags. Though if I did buy one don't think I wouldn't drive it to go see my brother in San Fran and rip around streets like Steve McQueen.

I haven't bitched about my day job lately, mostly because its uneventful. I poke along, it pokes back sometimes, but generally things are good. Of course I say this and knock on wood and throw salt over my shoulder because I've been here coming up on 3 years now, my longest tenure at any job, and I constantly check under my chair because the bottom has to drop out sometime. I like to imagine that I have some job security because I have marketable skills, but lets remember that I'm a sarcastic smart ass with no regard for work hours, even less regard for authority, no ambition, and a distinct inability to kiss ass. If you are interested you can email me for my resume, you don't need references, I really did invent the artificial heart. Thursday at the bar was a complete waste of time. You can't pay people to stay out late on Thursday it seems like these days, maybe thats an exaggeration, and maybe the bar that I work at sucks now, but if I'm having cocktails before 1am, something is amiss. I don't even have any good stories. My streak of pulling digits on Thursday ended way before its time, no problem drinkers, there was a bum sighting, and apparently I can't spell "Kellie" or "Cari" so my shoutout-makeout deal was nullified (Side note to the girls, my bad, we've had the discussion before, I'm lazy and stupid). At least I was being paid to stand around, I'm not entirely sure its worth it. Art claims that I'm not allowed to quit ever, so even though I'm moving an hour away, I'm still going to have to drive back on the weekends to work. I just nod my head in agreement because I'm not sure there is much point in arguing. I really think I'm tapped out, which leads me to Friday.

Friday at the day job was mostly uneventful, except for the overbearing feeling of exhaustion I had. I was supposed to go to LBI, probably get hammered and sleep on a floor. This wasn't sounding appetizing. I think there is something wrong with me. In talking to a very wise co-worker we determined that I probably haven't had a quiet Friday in five years maybe even longer. I've been bouncing at the Frog for two years, before that I was at the Calaloo for like 2 years, before that I was in prime drinking territory. Anytime I had off from one of my second jobs it would be to go out drinking or go get in some adventure somewhere. I literally can't tell you when the last time I spent a weekend night at home was. I've gone out sick, tired, overworked, underpaid, you name it. Granted this points at a serious problem I have, but lets not point out my imperfections. So I decided that I was going home and not going anywhere. I drove home, bought some laundry detergent, and picked up Chinese food. I opened a bottle of BV Cabernet that I received for my birthday and proceeded to do as little as possible. There is something to be said for a good red wine buzz. I'm wondering if I've been wasting my time with beer and liquor. This must be fascinating reading, because besides finishing a bottle of wine and completing 10 supposedly difficult Sudoku puzzles, the only thing I managed to accomplish was changing into mesh shorts and a T-shirt. I did play a little guitar, but that got tedious when I realized I had to remain upright. My roommate Mike got home from work late, and was flabbergasted that I was home. He literally had to do a double take. I did dodge some bad influences, some of my friends don't take no for an answer the first time. Thankfully the effort of putting on jeans and a shirt was too much for me to be swayed. I slept like a damn baby, a baby gorilla maybe, but a baby nonetheless.

Saturday, I awoke refreshed, I did some stuff around the house and tried my best to enjoy the incredible weather. I did my roommate duty to clean out the fridge, by eating whatever half opened food was available. Hot dogs and ravioli, the brunch of champions. What was that I was saying about a health kick? Mike came home in the late afternoon and offered up the prospect of hitting golf balls. I figured he meant the driving range, he did, just not the regular one. Mike is a member of Morris County Country Club. So I had to throw on a collared shirt in preparation of doing my Rodney Dangerfield impression. Honest to God, when we got there, there was a groundhog out on the range. I know there is a difference between gophers and groundhogs but whatever. I stopped seriously swinging a golf club after I had surgery on my knee, yeah its an excuse, but really it wasn't enjoyable not being able to swing correctly and having to dig myself out of the woods. My knee has been better these days, so I don't have much of an excuse anymore, but if you saw me swing Saturday you might realize why I haven't rushed back to the links. A golf swing should be harmonious, the hands go back, left arm straight, turn the shoulders, load the hips, clear the hips, keep your head down and follow through. If my swing had a sound, it would be a garbage truck full of turkeys colliding with a freight train. My head was up, my hips didn't clear, I'm lucky I didn't throw the club. Pieces were good but the whole thing together was ugly. But it was free and no one was really paying attention. I left on a good note using the pitching wedge to group three balls around the 100 yard marker. I didn't bother to swing the big stick, I figured I couldn't afford to pay for that many windshields. We headed into the clubhouse for a couple beers. I saw some remarkable clothing. If I ever wear salmon pants with a jacket that looks like a patchwork quilt, I believe that is grounds for homicide with a cricket bat. I'm sure he and Lovey just got back from Pago Pago, but come on, don't read the whitey playbook so literally. I had to get home to listen to NWA or James Brown or something.

Actually I had a bar crawl to attend in Red Bank. Someone at work put together a small crawl, and I figured I could do some force recon in my soon to be drinking habitat. I got down to Red Bank around 9:30. I met up with the crawl at the Dublin House. There wasn't much of a crawl, a lot of people didn't show. I was disappointed but whatever I wasn't in Morristown. Of course I ran into someone from Morristown, as always happens, maybe I should try getting farther away, like Greenland. The Dub was good, it was nice to be outside. We headed down the street to Ashes, where I had a vision of my future bar scene. Lots of hot chicks, drinks were expensive though. I bought a Stella, a Gimlet, and a Cosmo and nearly collapsed when the bartender asked for 27 dollars. I collected myself, and remembered that I probably wouldn't hang out there, there has to be a good deal in town. If there is PBR to be had, I'll find it. I was also comforted by the fact that in a typical drinking scene I'm a large predator. I'll go out during the week and meet the bartenders and eventually if the world works the way it should, I'll get taken care of. I've been kind of concerned that I'm not going to have anyone to really go out with, but that might play to my advantage. I can reinvent myself as an astronaut or a rodeo clown or some other ridiculous profession. I haven't had the luxury of anonymity in a long time. I'm also delusional, because I probably won't talk to anyone. Though judging by the talent on display at Ashes, being a single young professional with a one bedroom apartment might not be something I should let go to waste. From there we headed to Brannigan's which seemed to attract the college crowd, not that I really mind, but I can tell I'm kind of past that. I used to be cool, what happened? When did I start valuing peace and quiet over binge drinking and wenching? The mini crawl kind of dissolved around 12:30. I was faced with 3 choices, go home, stay out, and I had a line on a bachelorette party a little ways down the road. I couldn't really stay out, because I would probably end up sleeping in my car. I called to determine the viability of the bachelorette party. There was a lack of single women or even unhappy girlfriends. Thwarted again. So I decided it was in my best interest to hurry home and try and catch last call. I was fine to drive, and if you are counting it was 2 hours of driving for 3 hours of bar time. Not particularly worthwhile but not a wash either.

I got back into Morristown around 1:20. I went straight to the Grasshopper because the only reason I would go to the Frog would be to burn the building down. I said hello to the bouncers, and went inside. It was pretty dead, and I was disappointed. I ran into a girl I know, said hello and she introduced my to her three "friends". I put it in quotes because she is a known boy collector. You know, wants the attention but not the relationship. I kind of waved at the guys like I was driving by a chain gang, and got myself out of whatever conversation I was getting lead into. I know better than to even think of pursuing. I bolted for the bar. I grabbed a shot of Jameson and a pint of Harp. Upstairs was even worse, lots of youngins, no one I knew, a bad cover band playing Kiss. It was time to quit while I was ahead, so back downstairs, out the door and home. The evening was unsalvageable, though I can't say I had a bad time, just unremarkable. Funny how it fits into 800 words.

Thats it for the weekend, Sunday was beautiful but I'm not going to bore you with the details. Nothing happened, I'm way over due for something to complain about or something worth retelling. I guess I'm sort of looking forward to summer ending. I have to find an apartment, that I know for sure because I've committed to moving out of my current place, and blogs about being homeless can't be that funny. Until next time.

Secret Shout Out: I remembered, and thanks for the visual.

The New Slang...

2006-08-10T08:05:00.000-07:00

I went to Mom's for dinner last night, apparently she has been rocking out to the Chamillionaire because she wanted to know what "ridin dirty" was. Explaining street lingo to Mom has been an adventure because of the infamous Jennifer Garner incident. My brother was living at home at the time, and I had come over for dinner. After dinner we were flipping around channels and we caught an ad for Alias. Mom said something like "that Jen Garner is pretty good looking". My brother in his infinite wisdom says "Yeah she has some DSLs". At this point something in my head popped and all I could do was stare at my brother with my mouth open. "What are DSLs?", oh nothing, its that service that brings high speed Internet to your house. My brother at this point is laughing his head off. I'm turning a color of red that isn't found in nature, at which point my Mom says "it doesn't matter I'll just ask at work and they will tell me". Cripes, so now everyone in her office will think we are deranged perverts. Apparently no one in the office knew the acronym, so one guy calls his teenage son for an explanation. So now my brother's comment has turned into Six Degrees of Perversion. The kid answered dutifully, so I got a phone call saying that my Mom now knew what it meant and I was disowned. So last night as I explained that "riding dirty" is when you are rolling with product in your car, and you don't want the po po creepin' up and sniffin' 'round your trunk. Mom says with a straight face "Everyone in the office thought it was having sex without a condom, but I didn't think that was right." Way to go Mom, maybe I should just send her the link for Urban Dictionary.

Mom's last chemo treatment is today. She is doing well and apparently will be around for plenty more awkward conversations.

In other news, I was reading about the new Triumph Scrambler in the Sunday Times. Someone has to teach me how to drive a motorcycle, just in case I get captured by the Nazis and have to jump over a barbed wire fence to get into Switzerland.

More later.

Missed Opportunities...

2006-08-08T13:03:00.000-07:00

Last week I finally saw Donnie Darko. How I missed this movie until it was on Showtime at midnight on a Monday, I'll never know. I definitely recommend it, its not exactly a date movie, and it definitely needs a second viewing, but really well done, and really funny. Its good to know I can have a point of reference for Jake Gyllenhaal other than being a gay cowboy.

I actually had off work Wednesday. Apparently going to the dermatologist is good for something other than feeling like a cow at a convention for tanners. My hour commute makes a mid day appointment and all day affair. Plus I had some things to take care of around town. If anyone is curious, I checked out fine, I'm not growing anything unnecessary. I went and got fitted for a tuxedo after my appointment. I went into the changing room and half expected the inhabitants of Skull Island to start pounding drums for my unveiling. Fay Ray wasn't available for kidnapping, but I did find out that I have a 19.5 inch neck, wear a 50 long jacket, and have 36 inch sleeves. That all seemed mostly reasonable, I'm a little worried about my neck size, though its good to know that they might have trouble attaching a radio collar to track me, damn Discovery Channel. Speaking of the Discovery Channel, I caught parts of shark week, did you realize that there was only one species of shark? Yeah apparently all the other sharks died and there are only great whites out in the ocean. After my fitting, I decided to spend a little money on myself. 300 bucks later, I had a bunch of new shirts, 2 pairs of jeans, 2 pairs of shoes, a belt, some socks and some boxers. Not a bad take, I still dress like a slacker, but an updated slacker. I would actually be a clothes horse if I had the money, the closet space, and the will to go to the dry cleaner. Not being much of an ironer severely limits my wardrobe, that and I tend to get food or beer spilled on my regularly. It was all one stop shopping at Century 21, which actually has some bargains. I miss out on a lot of stuff because they don't carry everything in Nimitz class sizing. I did notice that all the urban designers carry large sizing, I can't really get away with rocking the Fubu or the Sean John. Though the thought of thugging it out at the mall food court did cross my mind. Don't step to the Orange Julius mofos! If you are wondering about my fresh kicks, most of you know that I wear sneakers exclusively, usually one of them isn't tied. So I picked up some Steve Maddens and Gordon Rush, because they look like sneakers. Baby steps people, I can't reinvent myself over night. I figure I'm on pace to be a completely new person by 2046.

I was supposed to work on all three nights this weekend. Thursday at the bar was completely miserable. I don't have one good story, I'm not sure how thats possible because I can waste words on just about anything. However nothing happened, Big Jeff was filling in for Art. Jeff is a State Trooper and had plenty of stories about high speed chases, but all that did was fill in the gaps between nothing going on. The lights went up early and we chased everyone out. I should have done the responsible thing and went home to go to bed for work the next day. But I wasn't tired so I sat around and had a few drinks after work.

Friday was a different story, as I was walking up to the back of the restaurant there was a family coming down the stairs. The back stairwell is encased in these big windows. The father and older daughter were already outside, and I could see the mom coming down the stairs with her little boy. He was tearing ass down the stairs, he might have been 4 or 5 years old. Just before the door, he took a hard right and went right into the window with a ringing thud, backed up, looked around, and then found the door. His mother was horrified, and I kind of looked at the dad and laughed because he was fine, its nothing 1000 birds don't do every day. I got up to the bar, and the bum that I have mentioned previously was across the street with a 30 pack of Coors light. I am secretly jealous of this guy because while I'm busy busting my ass at two jobs, he is outside drinking beer and publicly urinating. Two guys were outside wondering if they rolled a cigarette halfway in the street if he would go chase it. I advised them ever so subtly that this was a bad idea. I guess "I can throw you to the middle of the street faster than he can get there" was enough of a deterrent for their experiment in socioeconomics.

I went back inside the bar and saw a guy I know from around town that is usually out on weeknights picking up women. He was at a table with an attractive blonde and 4 children that bore a resemblance. I remembered why I don't really like people in general. Not that I'm going to tell anyone how to live, but generally returning to the scene of the crime with the wife and kids isn't on my list of good ideas. Granted I'm making some assumptions, but I can tell a lot by body language, and really the scenario isn't that far fetched. There were some bears on the loose throughout the evening, at one point I had to send Kate in to save Ashley from a short bear with a receding hairline. Ashley later said he was funny, so apparently she was feeding the bears, next time she isn't getting bailed out. I'm supposed to give a shout out to Kelly and Carrie. Girls you are now famous to the 50 people that will read this blog, I hope you appreciate it. Carrie, as discussed I am now entitled to a make out session next time we see each other, wear some loose clothing for easy access. I have to wonder what has become of my life when I need to trade shout outs in my blog to make out with girls. Dylan and Chris remember when we were in a band, and were cool and used to have girls throwing their underwear at us? Yeah that never happened, but you could imagine right?

Anyway I had a visit from the guy with the Napoleon complex that I had words with a few weeks ago, he was getting wasted and took to staring at me every time he went and came back from the bathroom. I don't know if he figured out that I wasn't intimidated when I started making kissing noises at him. I got tired of the machismo dance and just had him cut off so he would leave. I get the sense that this situation isn't going to end well, however I'm not particularly worried about it. At the end of the night, I drove home parked my car and noticed a funny looking cat walking towards me. Something about its tail didn't seem quite right, and it really wasn't walking like a cat. As much fun as bathing in tomato juice is, I figured that was a situation to be avoided. So as I cross the street and head towards my house, there is a guy walking his dog at 3am. A little weird, but I tell him there is a skunk down the street and he is like "yeah whatever". It would have been nice to get a thank you, hopefully Karma works the way it should and he got sprayed instead of his dog.

Saturday, I figured out a way to get covered so I could have the night off. I cleaned up my apartment most of the day and sent out text messages to see what everyone was up to. I had a visit from Chris in the morning because I am his personal music store and he needed to borrow a bass amp to play at a friend's wedding. I helped my roommate Darren take the hard top off of his jeep, in exchange for dinner later in the day. Taking the top off a jeep isn't particularly difficult unless you have hooves for hands, damn small spaces, I often wonder how I touch type so well. Later Darren and I went over to this place he has been house sitting and raided their freezer. I made these center cut pork chops on the grill that were killer, had some burgers, and fresh tomatoes from the garden. Throw in a beautiful day, eating outside, and hanging out with dogs and I'm a pretty happy guy. It's all about the simple things. After dinner I had plans to meet someone out, she showed up which was a good start and then things went downhill from there. I hate dating, especially dating people with the social etiquette of wolves. Thankfully I didn't waste the whole night and I didn't do or say anything that I couldn't take back or repent on my deathbed. I ended up heading down to the Grasshopper to try and turn a negative into a positive. My plan was to have one or seventeen drinks and start trying to pull numbers like a Cray supercomputer. That didn't really happen, I think because I kept getting shots bought for me, Jameson's Irish Whiskey can do a lot of things, but it can't keep the J Train on the tracks. I don't particularly remember much after say 1 AM. I wasn't arrested, but I did wake up with some mystery scratches and bruises. I do remember seeing Frankie Goes to Englewood, who not only have a witty name, but crank out the 80s hits. I was in front of the band at the end of the night and hit on the bass player, she was married to the guitar player, which was unfortunate because I'm sure she wanted to go home with something resembling a drunken grizzly bear. I did just get an email from Ken. Ken played bass in my band for a few months after Chris left, apparently he told me Saturday about his new band and wanted to send me information. He also wanted to know what happened with the two hot chicks I was with. If you are one of the two hot chicks, please do not take it personally that I have no idea what your name is or what you look like. I had a bad night and was incredibly intoxicated and I'm sure I meant everything I said to you, and I probably meant to get your number but I just didn't feel it was the right time. I don't like to move too fast, baby. I'm not entirely sure how I got home, yes I was walking, and the walk may or may not have included me getting thrown out of the Famished Frog after hours.

Sunday, I was up early because of the bright bright light of the sun and the deep pounding headache. Chris was back to drop off the amp at 10 AM, I'm sure I looked great. Eventually I met Rob and Priscilla at the bar for a late lunch. There was an interesting cast of characters out on Sunday afternoon. There was a table of 3 girls who I know to have particularly loose morals. I don't know from experience, but there certainly are a lot of stories. The one girl was wearing a one piece denim outfit that made her look like some sort of a blue sausage. Rob and Priscilla debated the physics of actually being able to wear a one piece anything. Eventually Priscilla explained that they were sort of like overalls, I claimed they were more like "ho-veralls". We played some video golf, which I lost because I must have been hung over. I left to go to dinner at Mom's and caught a little bit of 60 Minutes. I got to feel like one of the have-nots, apparently the trend in America is to live in gigantic homes. I'm supposed to be living in a prefab mansion the size of a blimp hanger. But what do I have? One stinking room in a 4 bedroom apartment. Cursed Fate! I went home and drowned my sorrows in 100 gigabytes of MP3s and soduku. If I can't have a 15,000 square foot house, I can at least have rock and roll and faux intellectualism.

I think thats all I got, we'll keep it short this time I know I've droned on and on the last few blogs. More reports from the trenches this week.

6 months? really?

2006-07-31T12:52:00.000-07:00

I just realized that I've been blogging for 6 months now. And those first few blogs are ugly and stupid and I'm not sure why anyone read them and encouraged me to write more. Now its like a weekly routine where I write 2500 to 5000 words about my daily life, that quite a few people read regularly. I recently uncovered some writing I did about 4 years ago. I used to journal daily to keep myself on track when I was unemployed (or was I unemployable, I forget). Its kind of interesting because the some of the tone and the details were similar to what I do now. I would make jokes in my journal, I guess to make myself laugh later, because I had no plans on anyone reading that writing. The idea of me writing punch lines for my future self kind of hurts my head. I am happy to note that I am in a much better place than I was 4 years ago, though judging by some of the stories that I post "better place" is a relative term. I also had some journals from 2 years ago, from when I first moved into my current apartment, those were interesting. I kind of wonder what my blogs would be like if I was writing then, because my love life was in turmoil, and my social life was changing rapidly. This is the period that probably puts the flavor in the current blogs, that which does not kill you only makes you stronger. There have been a couple of times that I have questioned the intelligence in posting my thoughts and actions openly on the web. Basically I'm letting everyone read my online journal, and by everyone I not only mean my friends but anyone that seeks me out on myspace. I had an interesting email exchange a few weeks ago that convinced me that maybe I shouldn't tell people what I'm going to do, maybe just tell them what I did. Hopefully I won't end up in a well in someone's basement, if thats my fate so be it, but I wouldn't mind signing off the blog. Also in this digital age, I'm sure potential employers and dates are seeking me out on the social network and are horrified. Your loss, I'm being mostly honest, there are a few exaggerations here and there for humor's sake, and I do my best to protect the innocent or the unaware. Not everyone would agree with being mentally recorded for the eventual inclusion into my blog, though I think its hilarious when people say they are happy to be mentioned. Anyway, I'll head to the weekend recap, but I wanted to thank everyone for reading for 6 months and being supportive, I hope you enjoy my misadventures as much as I enjoy writing them down.

Friday at the day job was quiet, a lot of people were out of the office for whatever reason. I actually had stuff to do, and amazingly I got it all done even though I was working on 4 hours sleep. Realistically I shouldn't be amazed, I never really sleep during the week, I plan on sleeping when I'm dead, and given my current drinking and eating habits that should be in 2 or 3 years. I left work on the dot of 5pm, and captained the 'bishi through summer volume. I called the digits I pulled Thursday to confirm plans for this evening, and what do you know? We were still on. I jettisoned the green heap, and headed upstairs to start cleaning up. Sunday is usually my get crap done around the house day but this Sunday was booked. Besides, if I'm meeting someone out, you never know how loose their morals are. I don't put out on the first date, but if you want to head home for a second base make out, come on over. I live with 3 other guys, when you put 4 young professional men in an apartment, there are a few inevitabilities. My least favorite one is dishes in the sink, I know we don't have a dishwasher, but if you do your dishes right after you use them then you spend a whole lot less time scraping what the Native American's used as spackle off of the plates. We have a nice collection of cardboard in the kitchen that needs to be broken down and taken out. If anyone would like to build a fort, or knows a few dozen homeless people that could use some temporary shelter you are welcome to take it. Upstairs, I took care of some laundry, folded some clothes that have been sitting around clean. Typically if you see clothes out in my room, they are actually clean. I have this aversion to folding and ironing, I can't really explain it, maybe it a little tribute to the second law of thermodynamics, maybe I'm slightly retarded. Dirty clothes are in the hamper, clean clothes are everywhere except where they are supposed to be.

Then it was time to work on the bathroom. The upstairs bathroom is an enigma, it clearly wasn't designed to be there, because the gables of the roof actually interfere with the geometry of the room. Someone actually had to wedge a shower, toilet and sink into a 5 X 10 room that is also constrained by the slope of the roof. I find the bathroom generally amusing. I realized when I first moved in that I actually didn't fit between the bathroom wall and the end of the shower. I know I'm large, but the bathroom gives me the sense that I'm a goldfish in a tank that I'm quickly growing out of. I actually have to play tetris with my body to get to the can or the sink. Sitting on the toilet is also interesting because on one side you have the sink, and on the other you have the window. Seeing as there is probably as much space as an airline seat, you really can't get any serious reading in without the window sill poking you in the ribs. I really had no intentions of cleaning the bathroom on a Friday night when I had off, but I had time to kill, and it would make Saturday go by that much more quickly. How wrong I was. Inside the shower it resembled an alligator farm. I grabbed my Clorox bath wand and given the geometrical constraints of the bathroom did what I can only imagine looked like an impression of Erol Flynn fencing inside of a trash compactor. I gave up after 10 minutes, I was headed nowhere fast, I had to shower and clean myself up and I knew that I could give a much more valiant effort Saturday afternoon.

Anyway, I made it to the bar with time to spare. My decision to meet her for drinks was probably misguided. First I run the risk of indulging my demons and getting into my regular routine of pouring alcohol down my neck at a rate that challenges Bernoulli's principles. Secondly, back when I played guitar, I had a habit of cranking things up. There is nothing finer than a 100 watt amplifier ready to take the paint off of passing cars. Of course when I was at rehearsal or a gig pretending to be kicking out the jams for millions of screaming fans, I wasn't wearing ear plugs. Not the brightest idea, but I also had problems playing with ear plugs in. If you don't get in the habit early on in life, it becomes difficult to play when you don't hear all the music. So I don't hear so good, which makes having conversation with background noise interesting. Also if any of you ever call me on the phone and it seems like I'm not entirely paying attention, I am paying attention, and I'm also desperately trying to determine what it is you said to me, because I can't see your face to read lips. Not that I can actually lip read, I just can get a better sense of what people a shouting at me, like "the bar is closed" and "you've had enough". Despite my best efforts, things seemed to go well. We got through all that who are you where you from information without any scares or awkwardness, and really given my life that's quite a feat. I went home alone Friday night, which is fine by me seeing as the beast that lives in my shower was probably plotting its revenge and really I didn't want anything to move in that direction anyway. I fell asleep watching Phantasm II, which I remembered as being very creepy, but 20 years of advances in movie effects have made it ridiculous.

I woke up with my cell phone next to my head. I was eagerly anticipating a late night phone call that never came. I typically don't mind late night phone hi jinks, I'm typically up late, and if you wake me up, its not really a big deal because I'm probably planning on being on little sleep anyway or I've set aside the next morning to recover. This call was going to come from Vegas, so I had the volume cranked so I wouldn't miss it. So when Art called in the morning to tell me that I was going to be working as the only bouncer on a Saturday night, I got two surprises. Apparently people were off, people were hurt, people quit, and I got stuck with securing the bar by myself. So I got out of bed grumbling about my predicament for that evening and lamenting the lack of late night telecommunication. I had to get back to cleaning the hovel that I live in. A trip to Walmart, got me a new shower curtain, some cleaning supplies, and a renewed disgust for fat people on scooters. I contemplated buying some pomade for my hair, maybe I could rock a pompadour or some other anachronistic hairstyle, but if O Brother Where Art Thou? taught me anything I'm a Dapper Dan man, and they didn't carry Dapper Dan. I saw a girl I know from the bar down one of the aisles, she made eye contact and smiled, I returned the smile, but I was trying to telepathically send her a message. The message was "I know you are a ho". Anyway I escaped with my supplies and a little bit more social anxiety, and returned home to rid the world of the ecosystem developing in the upstairs bathroom.

Saturday night I entered the bar with a plan. Basically if anything happened I would just go in the corner and sob like a little girl. Actually, it was fairly simple, we'll cut the problem drinkers off a little bit earlier than normal, and if anything actually does happen one of the bartenders covers the door while I throw people out. I was still nervous, I can handle myself fine, but if you end up dealing with more than one person its generally reassuring to know that someone you trust has your back. How bad could it be on a Saturday in the summer anyway? Yeah so the bar filled up by 10pm after a slow start. Around 10:30 we tossed two guys one of which was wearing a Viking helmet that he wanted the bartenders to fill up so he could drink out of it. He seemed pretty pissed to be leaving, he might have also been angry because he couldn't rape and pillage northern Europe. Then we had a bunch of mooks come in from the far reaches of Bergen and Hudson counties. One guy was wearing a wife beater, an army hat and designer sunglasses in the Frog, you are going to be out of place. His buddies were dressed more acceptably, but I could tell they were tools. The night wore on, they got more rowdy, I started to expect the worst when they were dancing and people were asking me to have them removed based on their moves. I ended up cutting one of them off for not being able to form an understandable sentence. This is when I got worried, because taking 5 on at a time isn't what I'm looking for unless its cheerleaders or hot dogs. But they ended up leaving, I got called a dork, which was lame and disappointing. So I escaped the evening with no real problems.

Sunday was interesting, my ex-girlfriend was in the area seeing a friend. She wanted to meet up and go see my Mom, since Mom has been the poster child for women's health issues lately. I have a few ex-girlfriends that I still talk to, a few that I don't, and one or two that I wish I didn't talk to in first place. So I picked her up at her friends house, which was awkward since I knew the friend when we were going out. Mom had already grilled me on why I'm still talking to this particular gf, now that she is married and lives 300 miles away. Oh yeah did I forget the married part? Her husband was ok with the whole thing, which is bizarre. Mom and the ex caught up on each others lives, and I kind of just sat there in existential shock. We ended up going to lunch and getting ice cream. It all seemed eerily date like and comfortable, yet completely disconnected. I'm not really sure how to describe it, its like we both had boxes of old feelings and issues and whatever, we traded boxes but never opened them. Ships passing in the night, as it were. Very odd, but it was nice to see her, and she gave me some good advice, and generally it was a nice day. Once I dropped her off back in the twilight zone, I headed back into town, and then back to Mom's for dinner. When I finally got back to my apartment, I kind of channel surfed and reflected on how little I accomplished this weekend but figured it was about 3000 words of nothing. Be Cool was on, its only notable because I typically don't find Uma Thurman attractive, but something about her in that movie made me tolerate the worst Vince Vaughan performance ever, the Rock with an afro, and that Scientologist airplane pilot from Welcome Back Kotter. I also caught the end of an incredibly violent S+M film called The Passion of The Christ. I find Mel Gibson's recent arrest hilarious. OK so Mad Max doesn't like Jews, good thing you work in Hollywood. Oh and remember that time Jesus preached tolerance? Good thing you forgot about that.

Well thats all for now, I'll have more later this week. Dan I'll come up with something more on the apartment, and maybe my addiction to Sudoku, and the current state of Internet pornography. Bye for now.

I play the Doldrums...

2006-07-28T10:56:00.000-07:00

I have the stink of social death on me. Wednesday after work I went and looked at an apartment in Red Bank. It seemed nice, close to downtown, so I got an application and put it in this morning. Wednesday night I was at the bar telling some people about my plan to move. I might as well have told them that I shot the Easter bunny. Looks of disgust and puzzlement. I don't have a terminal illness (as far as I know) I'm just moving an hour away. I guess I should look forward to making new friends, because apparently my current ones don't like change. Whatever, I'm sticking to my plan. I'm looking forward to reclaiming 2 hours of my daily life from the clutches of commuting and traffic. Though its going to get worse before it gets better, apparently they are closing the express lanes on route 78. Once summer is over that should be a real treat, I might as well take a dog sled to work. I'm planning on having some overlap in the apartments, so maybe that will alleviate some of my driving woes early. I'm also planning on joining a gym. Are you ok? Did that last one throw you? I understand. It's been a while since I've worked out, I go through periods when I actually do move around and try and prevent the onset of Type II diabetes. I used to go to the gym down the street from work, because it was free, but they don't have any free weights, some of the machines look like they were extras on Lost in Space, and the locker room situation was less than appetizing. Besides getting home that much later really wasn't motivating. I suppose I could have gotten up early and gone before work. Technically I could have also cured cancer and jumped a rocket powered motorcycle over the Snake River Canyon, but all of these things seem unlikely.

Tuesday night was interesting I got a call at work from Art. He wanted to go out to dinner, since his wife was away. Never underestimate a man who has temporarily escaped the bonds of matrimony. We decided to meet at Collin's in Morris Plains, because Jill was working the bar and its far enough away from Morristown to be an escape, but close enough not to be inconvenient. I went straight from work, parked across the way at the train station and headed in. Jill threw me my first Miller Lite of the evening, and I saddled up next to some old timer who wanted to bore me with the details of his life. There were a few families in for dinner and a couple of scattered regulars at the bar. Art arrived with John C. following closely behind. John is one of the managers at the Frog and sometimes his wardrobe choices are questionable. Art was calling him Don Ho, he had white linen pants on a light purple/blue Hawaiian shirt on with the collar up, and flip flops. I couldn't decide if he was an extra from Magnum P.I. or the Love Boat, either way I think he was riding the confidence of hitting the town with two large carnivores. I have a couple of rules that I live by, one is never wear white linen pants to a bar that has Marshall Tucker on the jukebox.

Speaking of the jukebox, Collin's juke is heading toward legendary status. A great mix of classic rock, country and alternative. I threw 5 bucks in before our food arrived and made a few choice selections. I played Thin Lizzy's "Cowboy Song" for Jill to start out. I keep offering to marry Jill, basically because she is good looking and likes Thin Lizzy. She claims I don't have very high standards. Though really how much higher can you go than a pretty woman that likes Thin Lizzy? I ran threw a few more credits, Ray Charles, early Aerosmith, the Black Crowes, Van Morrison. They have Danzig and the Pixies in there, but I skipped them because it wasn't going with whatever imaginary theme or mood I had in mind. That's when the food came.

Art and I had ordered the prime rib special. Out came our sizzling brontosaurus burgers, medium rare and surrounded by aus jus, which is French for bloody goodness. I think the other patrons were disturbed by the Discovery Channel display we put on. I ate every last morsel of meat on the plate, and proceeded to use my baked potato to sop up any remaining liquid for consumption. I just lost all my vegetarian and PETA readers, but I don't mind. As far as I'm concerned meat and potatoes is a way of life, if you are gonna do it, do it right. I stole a couple of Art's onion rings for good measure. The only vegetable around was the garnish, I ate that too. Jill took the utensils away before I went to work on the placemat or any customer that came within a 6 foot radius of my bar stool. I was slightly concerned about my cardiovascular health at the end of the meal, but I regained feeling in my left arm after my 7th Miller Lite. We hung around making fun of John's wardrobe until around 9:30pm.

After that we of course headed to the Frog like some sort of deranged carrier pigeons. I would like to hang out somewhere other than where I work, but the cheap drinks and my friends keep pulling me back. We met John's roommate and her friend Kelly at the bar. Art and I seemed to be on a mission, and that mission was to make sure John couldn't see at the end of the evening. John doesn't really drink much, we've been getting him into shape, but there isn't much hope when he is caught between to seasoned veterans that outweigh him by 100 lbs each. At one point John had dropped a flip flop, which I picked up and took outside to throw across the street, much to the confusion of the smokers outside. Round after round went by. Art threw the first of the knockout punches ordering a round of SoCo sans lime. That hurt just a smidge. When John got a little wobbly we decided to head down to the Grasshopper.

Karaoke night, I always forget Tuesday is karaoke night. Whatever it was mostly tolerable, someone did some BeeGees, I tried to slit my wrists but my blood was too thick from the earlier meal. Things didn't really get better from there. Eventually John reached the point where he wasn't confident that his plumbing would work, and Kelly was cozying up to him at the bar, so rather than tempt fate he made the trek home. Probably the right choice. If it were me, since my mistress is alcohol, I probably would have stayed at the bar till close and made a fool of myself later. Not the best option for the personal life, but I'm sure people would want to read about it. So Art and I soldiered on. Eventually it was getting near close, karaoke was over, Tim the bartender noticed that he had poured a vodka cranberry for John's roommate that was never touched. Tim yelled "finish that", so I did, in 3 seconds. I should have a circus act. The were a few shocked faces around the bar, thats when Tim says "that had at least four shots of vodka in it". Not what I wanted to hear since I was staring at 5 hours sleep and a full day of work. Then some guy says "I bet he can't chug a Blue Moon that fast", all of a sudden Art becomes Don King and there is a Blue Moon being poured for me to down in less the 5 seconds. I didn't lose. Then its closing time and I have a shot of SoCo in front of me, I guess just to make sure that I don't get any REM sleep that night. I wasn't driving so whatever.

A girl that I used to chase around who had said hello to me earlier in the evening and had parked herself next to some other guy the rest of the night, popped up and asked for a ride home. No problem. We dropped her off, I got home, and for some reason decided that I didn't like being a doormat. It couldn't have been the alcohol, could it? So I send a text message inquiring if all I am is a safe ride home. This is why my phone should just turn off at midnight and not be able to work unless its an emergency. The conversation afterward really didn't go well, I had a point, but that point gets outweighed by the fact that I would never let a girl walk home alone. I usually display a very high level of altruism, which gets me walked on and used. I will never truly complain about being called nice or dependable, but I realize that it will never really get me anywhere. I think my plan is to continue being nice, and let the shallow and self serving continually wear me down until I'm just bitter enough keep someone interested. A lot of people, girls especially, claim that girls eventually stop chasing the meatheads and outlaw bikers and want a nice guy to settle down with. I say its bullshit, but I'll have my revenge when some lucky lady sees through the fiction and sarcasm of this blog, realizes that I have more than half a brain, that I'm good with my hands (read that however you want), and that life might be better with me than some 40 year old adolescent, and I'll go out in town with T-shirts that say "I told you so", "I bet you thought he would change when you got married", "I bet you thought he would change when you had kids", and "I have a job and a 401k, your husband traded his motorcycle for amphetamines". So yeah I'll die alone, but it sounds like a good plan.

Wednesday morning at work wasn't pleasant. I realized why I stopped going out during the week when I drank my 15th glass of water and still didn't urinate for 8 hours. Don't do the crime if you can't do the time. I did stop at the bar for one beer on my way home thinking that the hair of the dog might make me feel just a little bit better. I asked the bartender if its normal to feel like you are swallowing rusty nails, he said no, I went home.

Last night at the bar was pretty much uneventful. I certainly didn't want to be there, and around 12 none of the other patrons did either. I did manage to get pull some digits, its nice when the bar isn't busy I can walk around and work my magic. By magic I mean creepily staring like I have bodies in my freezer and making awkward conversations. I'm kidding, I was actually kind of funny last night, maybe the breaks do go my way sometimes. I have plans with her tonight, so I'm sure I'll have some awkward story or a rant about dating for Monday. She's a teacher, I'm not sure how I feel about that, either she is lazy and only wants to work half the year, or she wants to put me in detention. Lets hope for the latter. No real problems, a little issue with a fake ID. I haven't had to throw anyone out in ages. A bunch of my friends were in and stayed until the end of the night. Shout out to Dan, who has been reading the blog faithfully, I'll work on writing something about our apartment shortly. Ashley has printed out my blog about the "bear" phenomenon for her dad to read, I suggested that she print out the one about me being solicited by the stripper in Montreal, I guess that's not an option. Kevin Hogan still thinks he can wrestle me and take me down within 10 seconds, this needs to be settled soon. Look forward to a blog about the time I snapped my friend's arm in half sometime in the next two weeks.

A lot of people say I should try and get this mindless drivel published, I'm all for it but don't really know what the market is. I'm happy to announce that I have over 1000 blog views on myspace, and its not all just the people I know, I guess word of mouth actually works. I'm trying to drive traffic to my blogger site http://jfdavidson.blogspot.com. So if you think of it look over there for updates, or if you want to point someone in my direction give them that link. Also, the little blog I wrote for Dylan about Montreal is up on Punchline Magazine, check it out and support my friends. Thats all for now, more picture postcards of dark places coming soon.

Updates...

2006-07-24T20:56:00.000-07:00

I've posted two new blogs so be sure to read them both. Yes they are really long hopefully not boring. I've really been enjoying writing theses so I hope you enjoy reading them. I've updated some of the pictures on my myspace page so you can see some of the people I talk about. I have to find a way to post some pictures elsewhere on the web. if you have a suggestion let me know. Bon Apetit.

Oh Canada...

2006-07-24T20:55:00.000-07:00

A female co-worker of mine suggested Monday that since I was going to Mr. Dom's to get my ears lowered and it was sweltering like Pol Pot's afterlife outside, that I should get a crew cut. When I arrived Mr. Dom suggested that I don't want a crew cut, and remembering my rugby days and the fact that my hairline like the current economy is prone to recession, I realized he was right had him go extra short. So I brought the high and tight back to the ladies of the office, the general consensus was that I was rockin it right, maybe throw a little gel in it Tuesday. Who am I to question those who pee sitting down when it comes to follicular style? So Tuesday the product went in and the compliments came out. So all week, people have seemed to notice the 5 minutes of extra effort in the morning. I don't know if this sudden change in attention will get me to stop dressing like a slacker, its under consideration. The more important question was will the new hairstyle get me some action in another country.

Friday if you recall I was scheduled to fly to Montreal. I didn't accomplish a whole lot during the day since I was recovering from the previous nights adventures at the Ryan Adam's concert. In the afternoon I participated in a focus group at my CEO's house about how to keep the newer/younger employees in the office, since at most business keeping someone longer than 3 years is a task. I did my best to give answers that weren't "more money" and "foosball table". The meeting was capped off by my CEO's dog doing it's best Cujo impression and diving through a screen door to go tree a cat across the street. You can't make up such high comedy. We were released early, and I went back to the office tied up some loose ends (hid my flask in my desk, and cleared my internet cache of online poker sites and music downloads). I stopped in to meet some of my fellow focus groupers for a quick cocktail before I headed back out on the road to the airport.

Up the Parkway, to the Turnpike, started hitting traffic just before I got to Newark Liberty, but generally smooth sailing. I wasn't surprised when I heard on the radio that we were due for rain and thunderstorms. I just hoped that I would get in the air, and was willing to deal with turbulence if it meant going out on time. Of course this is my life, I always moan about how things are so hard, believe me I realize I could live in Rwanda, but just once can't anything go smoothly. So the rain started, and didn't really get any better, I parked my car got soaked just grabbing my bag. I try and be prepared, which is really just code words for being lazy and not cleaning out my car. In the trunk I new I had a nylon over shirt that I used to use for golf, and a spare baseball hat. So I got more wet, shoved aside the foreman grill and the audio mixing board (you never know) and grabbed my bad weather gear. The 200 yard walk was delightful without an umbrella. Thankfully I had plenty of time to sit in line at the check in, I talked to a guy from Toronto, told him I was a writer, he was a kitchen manufacturer. He wondered if I knew that Montreal was a sex oriented city, I assured him that I had lap dance cash on hand. So I get to the front, don't have any luggage to check, just my carry on and a laptop that could have been mistaken for Kirstie Allie's lunchbox. I suppose I needed the workout. So the flight is delayed, but I need to eat and delayed isn't bad. I make my phone calls and head to the wok and roll. I try and pick out some items that probably won't come back up midair. I navigate the seating area with a tray containing the hardest dumplings known to man and some chicken lo mein, the computing boat anchor, and my clothes. Choked down my food and noticed there weren't a whole lot of planes pulling into the airport.

My flight was moved from 7:30 to 9, I headed through security. They confiscated my mini swiss army knife that I forgot about on my key chain. Not a big deal, I wasn't planning on tweezing anyone to death, or slicing through Canada with miniature scissors. The bar in the terminal was of course packed, so no bacchanalia for our hero. I strolled around looking for available seating, amazed at all the business types jockeying for open outlets. If you have $700 dollars for a PIM, can't you spend $15 on a power strip? I suppose part of the fun is hunting down the outlets and then jacking in so no one else can use it. The centuries long competition for resources continues unabated. I can't wait till humans evolve a gland for detecting 15 amp circuits. So I found a seat where I wouldn't have to deal with angry travelers and fired up the Precambrian laptop I was hauling. Around 8:30 when my flight should have been boarding I realized that the flight number wasn't up on any of the monitors. So I queued up with other puzzled travelers to the only Air Canada desk. Flight was cancelled, thanks for announcing it. My next best option is Saturday morning with a stop over in Toronto. So 15 dollars in parking and 3 hours of my life down the drain. I start working the phones like I'm running a PBS telethon, because I need a damn drink.

Turns out Brian was in town from DC (you might remember him from my LBI adventures), Brendan was up for going out along with his girlfriend. Got a call from Kate who was dragging the ladies out, and secured a ride to the airport for the morning. Feeling like a rock star for salvaging a Friday night, I hurried home to pick up Bri and head to the Frog. Got my requisite ball busting for showing up on a night that I said I couldn't work. We started taking advantage of the cheap drinks right away, being off duty has its privileges since the bartenders will pay attention to me. The crew showed up, at around 11:30 I started to wonder when I should go to bed for my 9:25 flight in the morning. I drowned all reason from my system with miller lite by 11:35. It turned out to be a good night out, I know this is true because instead of driving Brian home and turning in at closing time, we were headed with the ladies to a late night pool party.

Ashley and Maggie were already at the house when we arrived. I sent Ashley some creepy text messages about seeing her in the window, while trying to get the lock undone to the backyard. That went over well. By the time I was doing a canon ball in my boxer shorts at 2am, I didn't really have a whole lot of hope for getting to my flight on time. Bri looked especially studly in his penguin boxers. We trounced the ladies at water volleyball,and had discussions about "box buddies". Bri and I think its possible to be a gentleman caller and only provide carpet munching without reciprocation or higher expectation. For further information feel free to contact me. I made it home with wet pants just before 4 (wet from the pool activity you perverts). Waking up at 7:30 was not pleasant. I didn't shower assuming that chlorine would provide odor prevention. Kate was running late, and I reminded her all the way to the airport. Thankfully I already had my boarding pass, and they already confiscated my miniature tools of mass destruction. I was off to Toronto on time.

The ticket agent the previous night must have had a sense of humor, since I was jammed in the window seat next to the bulkhead for the exit door. Hopefully no one large would be next to me. So when the 8 foot Canadian sat down, I was less than happy. Ok not 8 feet, probably 6'8", at least he was friendly, and airline engineer on his way back from Bermuda. "Montreal has some good lookin women, eh?". The stewardess came by to ask if I was aware I was in the exit seat. I pointed at the day glow letters that said "Emergency Exit" and said "You're kidding this is the exit?". She was actually mildly amused and proceeded to tell me that in case of an emergency I just need to pull the handles in and then throw the door from the plane making sure to be aware of any fire and debris. I said "no problem as long as I can scream like a little girl while doing it", I think she spit in my drink later. Thankfully the flight was uneventful, got through customs by stating that the intention of my trip was lap dances and went to enjoy my layover.

I found some bar space at some eatery in the terminal, I have no idea what half-assed Canadian chain it was, I was just hungry and hoping not to spend too much money. That went out the window when I ordered a Stella. The bartender with the mullet and mustache asked if I wanted the large, eh? I said sure thinking it was like a pint or something, he returned with a glass bucket with a handle attached that was filled with more liquid than any human bladder can hold. I ordered chicken quesadillas from the limited menu and hoped I could get through most of Paul Bunyan's shot glass. Actually thats not true, I really had no doubt that I could finish 32 ounces of beer before my flight took off, I just didn't know if I should. The quesadillas came out with salsa that tasted like chunky ketchup, and what I would assume was melted government cheese. Maybe ordering Mexican food from our neighbors to the north was too much of a paradox. I survived to board the flight to Montreal, which thankfully had seat back entertainment. Star Trek and Wallace and Grommit helped me ignore the turbulence. Small planes always seem to come down faster, I don't particularly enjoy that. I was alive, grabbed a cab, and headed for the hotel. Remember what I was saying about things going smoothly, most people would be face down in the hotel bed right now, I was watching red and white flags with green trees go by my cab. I guess the Lebanese of Montreal were making their presence known to people that couldn't care less. So my cabbie had to route us around town, because regular crosstown traffic had stopped. Eventually I made it upstairs to the hotel room to rack out and dream of clubbing protestors to death with an extra heavy laptop while Dylan watched Robin Hood Men in Tights in French.

So I was rudely awakened to the sound of Dylan's drums and the best guitar tone to come out of New Jersey, aparently Dylan thought it would be funny to put Joanie Loves Trotsky on his iPod to wake me up. So I was refreshed and we had a plan, get something to eat, hit the street fair that was attached to the Just For Laughs festival, catch the Bill Cosby set at the Place des Artes, and then head out on the town looking for beer and loose women. There was a slight rain outside, because why wouldn't it rain if I was travelling? We headed down St. Catherine street past the sex shops, and the gutter punks. Canada is socialized, high tax rates pay to keep schizophrenics off the streets so the only homeless are young drug addicts. Not only is their beer stronger but their bums are better. We hung left onto St. Denis, looking for grub. Dylan had explored earlier, so he had an idea what was around. I'm not picky, I just like to try either local cuisine or stuff you can't usually get at home when travelling. Though I did veto Indian food, because facing a night of drinking and a flight home with curried lamb providing the foundation for my intestinal fortitude didn't seem like the smart play. Dylan suggested a Tibetan place he saw earlier in the week, I figure why not. Irony of ironies, the Tibetan resteraunt was at the top of a large hill on St. Denis. I begged Dylan to let me die halfway up, we shared an oxygen tank the rest of the way. Maybe its time I start working out again. The food wasn't bad, it wasn't particularly good either. We fumbled with lacquered chopsticks and fried dumplings. Over the entree we had an interesting discussion about VD, probably to the horror of most of the patrons. No, I've never had the pleasure of a burning urethra, but I went to public school and I am well versed on the subject.

Back downhill to the street fair. It was interesting very European, mimes and weird ass artsy stuff going on. Not a lot of commercialism. There were tons of good looking women around, I don't really understand it. If I was a hot french Canadian, I would use my looks and my cunning to escape a country that has a 10 month winter. There were some hot chicks dressed up like lobsters on stilts interacting with the crowd. Some guy was doing a drum solo that wasn't very interesting, we were a little short on time so nothing was really engaging. I stopped by to check the merch booth for the comedy festival, using my not so strong American dollar to purchase a plush green devil for a certain someone who probably won't ever talk to me again after reading the rest of this blog.

After traversing the last of the street fair, we hit the Place des Artes, which is French for the big hall that Bill Cosby be doing his show at. Dylan and I found some adventure in the Men's room, no not a glory hole, some Frenchie was doing his Van Damme impression and kicked the door open into Dylan who was waiting in line for a urinal. I stayed out of it, because Dylan was cursing like these people have never heard before, and me getting in on it would have just made things worse. Canadians seem to be mild mannered, Dylan and I were raised on violent TV and sugar, not a good combo. Cosby was really solid, he is still one of the top observationists, making a great career on imitating his wife. He went through his set on aging, fattening, and long term companionship. Capping the night off with the classic dentist bit that I'm sure we can probably recite. I didn't realize he was 69 years old, and some of his observations hit home, I couldn't wait to wash the stink of my mortality off with Labatt blue and purchased affection. I was wondering if he was going to politicize any of his performance. Cosby has been publicly disappointed with the black community for a few years now, or at least thats what I've gleaned from his commencement speeches. No politics to be seen, just the ridiculousness of family life, masterfully relayed with sing-songy detail.

Dylan and I headed back to les hotel, dropped off anything we didn't want stolen, confiscated, or ruined by passing out in a gutter. So the digital camera was resting quietly, not able to capture any incriminating evidence. Besides what do you need pictures for when I'm going to relay everything that happened in 10,000 words. I suggested that we hit Les Club Super Sexe, which from what I remembered during my college days was the premier strip club in the city. 5 bucks to get in (I'm using Canadian funny money at this point so there is a 15% discount for Americans to use pink money with pictures of wildlife on it). We were seated at what must have been the two worst seats in the house, lots of foot traffic and inattentive waitresses. Customer service is an interesting concept in Canada. They don't have that killer capitalistic instinct, if you enter a department store in America, some one is perched like a peregrine falcon ready to swoop on your potential sale. In Canada, you have to ask for help, they'll take their time, and are perfectly oblivious. Granted living in the NYC metro area makes me jaded, greedy, and impatient, but the service industry in Canada is comparable to taking a supermarket in Russia and employing people from the deep South. Glacial pacing. The dancers made up for it, these are probably the hottest collection of strippers outside of Vegas. So Dylan and I are slugging down 6 dollar beers, I was running with Labatt blue because of nostalgia. Blue (Bleue in Frenchyland) was my staple in college, it was cheap at the bars and cheaper by the case, but tasty and the reason why I slept in a snowbank more than once. The ladies are showing off their goods, Dylan and I were trying to determine who's breasts were real, not a particularly difficult game but it passed the time. Eventually it was dance time.

There are too types of clubs in Montreal, contact and non-contact, Les Club Super Sexe is non-contact a fact I failed to realize upon entry. I had grabbed this girl, who the hell cares what her name was because its made up anyway, and asked for a dance. I was puzzled when she said she had to go get her blanket. We went upstairs to the VIP room, because that's how I roll with a favorable exchange rate, she put her blanket down on a table and proceeded to remove her clothing over the course of a few songs. I'm a fan of naked women, but after a while it became more like some sort of medical exam performed by Scientologists. You never know where to look. I kept waiting for her to turn around, not just because I'm an ass man, but because it takes the feeling away that you are a giant pervert. Live and learn. After she was finished I thought about the blanket. I had to wonder who laundered such things, because all I could think about was the blankets that early settlers traded with Native Americans. They fed us and gave us their land, we traded them blankets with typhoid and small pox. I walked past 17 guys watching a lesbian show, one of the strippers tried to sell us on it earlier by telling us they "eat pussy for real" well its good to know there isn't any deception when it comes to pussy eating. After finishing our overpriced beers we headed onward for ATMs and contact dances.

St. Catherine street is interesting, you would think with all the strip clubs that ATMs would be plentiful, you would be sadly mistaken. So we trekked onward found an ATM with what looked to be a tourist sleeping inside the vestibule. His feet were up on his backpack and he was laying on a newspaper. My thoughts wandered from "why do I need to observe these things, can't it just be normal" to "maybe he wont wake up when I step on his neck and grab his wallet". I decided to let him sleep since it would be out of character for a US citizen to go into a foreign country and start beating up the inhabitants. We backtracked past some Salsa clubs, which seemed to be very popular. I suppose girls need a place to dance that isn't on a pole. We found Les Club Downtown, and headed upstairs to see where the night would take us.

Another 5 dollar cover, more inattentive bar service. I got bumped by some guy at the bar, who gave a half-assed apology I shot him a look and made sure I sounded American when I told him not to worry about it. At this point I'm more than a few beers in, so of course I'm an international bad ass. The bouncer at the door was giant and probably would have had no problem grabbing my by the neck and throwing me downstairs, but I have a rep to uphold, even if that rep is 400 miles away in a bar that all my friends to go to. So we stood at the bar, because the club was packed, admiring the not quite as hot girls, but definitely not slouches. There seemed to be a lot of girls that worked in pairs. I guess its less hassle to make out with another stripper, but you certainly seem to get less business, but I suppose two girls can charge more to make up the difference. Since this was a contact dance place, I had to choose wisely. Basically the rule in Montreal is this, its not really a lap dance, because the girl can't touch your lap, but you can touch the girl, pretty much everywhere except where she pees. I've discussed some of my predilections in the female arena before, but here is what I typically go for; usually taller, brunette, and generally I would say I'm a fan of the posterior and leg region, not much of a chest man. Granted I'm not exactly one to turn anything down. If you are curious to find out if I find you attractive feel free to send me pictures in a variety of poses and if you have the chance tell me your turn ons and turn offs. Since I was basically paying for a grope session, I had to find someone that was suitably molestable. This is where Jessie enters the picture, a shorter French Canadian brunette, with largish breasts and curves, you know stuff to hold onto, and not that I could know this then but she would be fuel for the blogging fire.

So we head upstairs to a small booth, that even has a little shelf to hold my beer. She goes over the rules with me, and explains that they keep an eye on what they are up to. Engage voyeuristic fantasies! Wait I don't have any of those. So the dance starts, and I'm sampling the merchandise, she mentions that she likes my haircut. Score one for female advice. I'm having a good time so why not go for another song. At this point she asks me if I'm single and where I'm from, suitable small talk for someone that I'm putting my paws on like that tiger that went crazy on Roy Horn. Just before the third song it happens, I know you all have been waiting for it. So I had asked her if she was single and she said she sort of had a boyfriend. Like you tell some dude that is paying to read you like braile that you are single. She asks me if I like her breasts. Sure why wouldn't I? Apparently the twins are a year old, I couldn't count the rings so I had to take her word for it. Nice job though, couldn't really feel the implants. Here comes the downhill section, just before the moguls. I've just been informed that she hasn't had a certain part of the male anatomy between them in the year after their enhancement. Begin the third song.

I have an idea where this is going, and no I'm not an idiot, the longer I talk to her the more money I pay. The beauty of a Canadian lap dance is that its $10, so with the exchange thats just over $8 American. If you don't know, a lapper costs $20 bucks pretty much everywhere in the States. So I was willing to sacrifice my hard earned American dollars for you readers, I hope you appreciate it. So I'm baffled that no one has split the difference of her mammaries. I ask her what I can do to remedy this situation. Then she asks if I'm staying alone, I explain that my afroed friend is in the room but he can sit quietly in the corner and take pictures or I can maybe get him to take a walk around a foriegn country for a little while in the rain at 3 AM. I ask her what other interests she might have, sailing, sculpting, oral? So over the course of two songs, what one of my ex-girlfriends describes as "that side of you" kicks in and participate in the depraved banter that I excel at. You don't think my literacy is only good for blogging do you? At one point I remember that Dylan is waiting dutifully downstairs. So my dances will be over soon and now its time for the good part, the part where I get to use my degree in Economics that I have been squandering while working in IT. I hope you didn't think I just happened upon a stripper that was interested in me. I know guys that have actually picked up strippers, they don't look like a yeti. So I inquire what home delivery of the Vaginal Times will cost me. 400 Canadian dollars for two hours. Now, the night life isn't the right life, but its my life. I've been solicited for sex before, that pretty asian girl in vegas told me that an hour would cost 300 dollars. So I start bartering out of principle, because I have no intentions on taking home a prostitute even though its legal in Quebec. They aren't allowed to solicit. So no crazy bums and no streetwalkers, what are you supposed to look at when walking home drunk? I bid much lower, she doesn't seem happy and explains the cab ride home is expensive.

It turns out I have very little patience for stripper economics, basically she is dancing, I'm feeling her up and trying to figure out at what point she will either slap me or just stop talking to me altogether. I couldn't get her below 300 for one hour, she thought I was funny when I suggested we go out for pizza and she could give me an over the pants handjob for 50 dollars. So basically I ran the Price is Right Showcase Showdown for sex I didn't plan on paying for. She asked for my number so she could call when the bar closed to see if the situation had changed, probably thinking I would be drunk and horny and willing to hit the ATM machine in the lobby. I was more than willing to give it to her, thinking if anything, telling you all about the fight I got into with a pimp in the lobby of my hotel would be worth the trouble. I headed back downstairs grabbed the overly patient Dylan, and headed back down St. Catherine street toward the hotel, stopping once to grab pomme frites from a diner.

When we got back to the hotel, I made sure to put my phone on loud for any late night hijinks. Dylan miraculously found his passport which he thought he lost and which was going to cost us an extra hour of sleep in the morning to make sure he could get back in he country. For once something went right. Dylan was up first, because he is a worrier, I kind of stumbled around and got ready and met him downstairs where he had a cab already waiting. We drove out through the suburban sprawl on a beautiful summer day. Walked all around the airport trying to find our terminal because the woman at the check in didn't explain that you actually have to walk behind the check in counter. I stopped in the duty free shop to pick up a bottle of Jameson 12 year old whiskey, its like candy for big boys. Headed through customs on the Canadian side which seemed funny but convenient. Dylan got the wand at security because his buttons were too big or something. I was still lugging that giant laptop that didn't get used, good choice. Our plane boarded on time, once again I was wedged against the security door, Dylan was behind me and got the exit door speech. The last thing I remember was going over the river or lake or whatever it is that surrounds Montreal and wondering how the water was so clear. I slept off a bit of my hangover, touched down in beautiful Newark, back to Mo'town to throw in laundry and fall into that "own bed" coma.

Big props to Dylan, the Just For Laughs festival, the city of Montreal, and strippers. No props go to the weather, air travel and that big meat head in Les Club Downtown. I'll have more to report soon. And yes, we did answer the question, my new haircut would get me action, I'd just have to pay for it.

Ryan Adams Live at Starland...

2006-07-24T20:52:00.000-07:00

I got good and angry Thursday. Thursday was one of those days, you know somebody at work asks you to do something that clearly isn't your job, and it snowballs into bailing water out of a sinking ship captained by mismanagement and unrealistic expectations. That's how my morning started, throw in some incompetenet morons, add a dash of nepotism, and you have Jamie's recipe for homicidal stew. Basically I planned on burning the building down, going and buying a bottle of Jameson, and leading a high speed chase that ended with me slamming my Mitsubishi into a roadblock formed by bulldozers in the desert. Admittedly, I didn't help my own situation by trying to resolve a mess in my personal life by being stubborn and stoic, and not talking, which on paper seemed like the right idea, but in practice is easily defeated by the double x chromosome. It's the best when you feel guilty for being human. Whatever, anyone who works with me owes a thank you to Rob for letting me vent on IM. Maybe we didn't resolve anything, but we did determine that "Bitches be crazy".

The one thing I did have going for me was the Ryan Adams concert at the Starland Ballroom. We all know how I love a good rock show. Of course part of my angst was caused by this concert. This was the second time I've had tickets for Ryan Adams, both times I've invited someone I'm really interested in, both times they skipped out on me. The first time I thought I was asking the wrong question, but it turned out I was asking the wrong person. This time I think its the right person at the wrong time but it remains to be seen. I'll probably be disappointed but you wouldn't read this blog if I came out winning. History may be written by the victors but its the losers that make it interesting. Maybe I should have explained it was Ryan Adams, not Bryan Adams. Anyway, enough of my self loathing. After turning my homicidal tendencies down a notch, I skipped out of work and headed down to Quick Check, to abuse the no fee ATM and to fill my belly with sliced meat and Dr. Pepper. Quick Check has made my life so much better by installing those ordering kiosks at the deli counter. I don't want to talk to the wage slave who makes my turkey deluxe wrap, and since I grew up in the personal computing era, I have not problem navigating a touch screen. I can't wait till a robot makes my wrap, and sends it down a pneumatic tube by the door and they deduct the transaction from my debit information planted on a chip in my skull. The less contact I have with people the better, unless its a lap dance.

I took my deli meat on the road, along with the aforementioned Dr. Pepper and a bag of cool ranch Doritos. Miracle of miracles, I managed to not get food on the front of me for once, a sure sign that the ladies would be in trouble. I parked my car at the VFW across the way as always. Why not give 5 bucks to someone who watched their buddies die in the muck while my Dad was busy smoking dope in high school and being too young to draft? Besides, they have that tank parked out front so you know your car is safe. Now as proof that my head is bigger than my heart, I had a back up plan this time for the inevitable rejection I recieved. I even asked the backup before I asked my intended companion. I may be smarter than I look, but I'm certainly not luckier, so yeah my backup fell through. I arrived at the venue with plenty of time to go to will call and get rid of the cursed ticket.

I hopped in the will call line behind a girl who was sporting some serious camel toe. I kept checking my watch to see if I could use the time distortion to detect the event horizon of the black hole that was sucking this girls shorts into a space between her legs where light couldn't escape. Eventually I got distracted by the pimply teenager behind me who seem way too concerned about whether or not they allowed photography in the venue. I reassured him by repeatedly beating him about the head and neck with my digital camera. The shots came out great. Some guy walked by looking for 3 tickets, I told him I had one, and would find him, I just needed the doors to open. While admiring the slackers in obscure band t-shirts and counting the chicks in vintage sun dresses, I saw and interesting sight. Two girls who looked like Edgar Winter's back up singers, not so much because of their dress, but because of their shockingly pail skin and bleached blonde hair. Finally we were let in, I unloaded the albatross minus the ticketmaster fees, and headed to the bar, where I do that voodoo that I do so well.

I knew the show was sold out, and there were a lot of people there early, so I parked myself at the bar located stage right. It just so happened to be attended by the hottest bartender in the building. Of course I didn't walk around and check before deciding to stand there. Yuengling one went down smooth. The bar was filling up. Yuengling two went down smoother, there are chicks at the bar. Yuengling three, I'm feeling sassy. At Yuengling four, I was engrossed by the skate videos they were showing, some nasty kick flips and tail whips and I remember being in 6th grade again, with a stupid haircut that was slanted and turqouise airwalks. Finally the opening act came on, Ryan's guitarist in the Cardinals I guess is a songwriter himself and is the opening act, so he did some nice work on the acoustic guitar. Yuengling five, the bartender's name is Shannon. By this time I've been rapping with some superfans in the audience, the crowd has reached butts to nuts level, thankfully the guy next to me will hold my spot while I hit the men's room. The bouncer said I had to leave the bottle outside the rest room, I told him no roofies. 9:30 Ryan hits the stage, Yuengling six hits my throat.

Back during the Clinton administration when grunge was winding down, the next big thing was supposedly Alt-Country. There were a bunch of hick rock bands with country roots and punk or pop or rock influences. It never really hit, there were some high points though, this is when I started following Wilco. Uncle Tupelo had disolved, Jay Farrar started Son Volt, Jeff Tweedy started Wilco. The Jayhawks put out Hollywood Town Hall, which is a killer record, I highly recommend it, but I didn't discover it till much later. All the while Ryan Adams was building his chops in Whiskeytown. Whiskeytown fell apart for whatever reason, I think the general consensus is because of Ryan's ego, but bands break up for lots of reasons, I don't need to point fingers. Anyway so all this time I was oblivious, just getting out of college, looking for jobs. I had a giant boner for Radiohead like every music nerd did, and this roots rock was kind of drifting by me.

I didn't discover Ryan Adams until his album Gold came out, most people know the track New York, New York. Besides its 9/11 anthem (btw the song is actually about a break up, as are most of his songs), there were a lot of really solid songs on that record. I hated it. I thought it was derivative, he ripped off the Band and the Who and Van Morrison. Except I kept listening. Most of my music nerd friends couldn't get into it, I finally figured out that he was actually giving the songs a pretext. It was a 70s record, written by a guy in 2001. I gathered he wasn't really ripping anyone off, and all of a sudden I've got someone new to listen to. Some of my music nerd friends will never agree with me, but thats ok, to each their own, plus I know I'm right. So I ended up getting his first album Heartbreaker, which is probably the best break up album ever written, I'm sure he hates hearing that, and I know he doesn't like the focus that album gets. You put your heart out there that much people are going to respond. Its one of those albums that you put on so you know other people have problems too and they got by and recorded some cool ass songs. If you are into those sort of things, I also recommend Matthew Sweet's Altered Beast, the album that got me through freshmen year of college. So I've been hooked by Ryan Adams, and now he releases albums faster than I can buy them. Prolific is the word I'm looking for, you could probably argue that he could condense all the good stuff to one album. But if people are buying it, why not sell it?

Ryan opened with "Shakedown on 9th street" a rocker from Heartbreaker. Then he tore into new material throwing twangy riffs into elegant pop songs. He closed the first set with "To Be Young', the popular opening song to Hearbreaker which also preceeded the infamous gang bang scene in Old School, you can hear it when that dreamboat Luke Wilson is getting on that early flight home. And finally "This Is it", a wry poke at the Strokes from his album Rock 'n Roll. I convince Shannon that I need another Yuengling and the Yankees score, both of which arrive promptly. Beer good, an extra inning Yankee loss bad. At least I can take solace in the fact that my top heavy bartender is a Yankees fan, even if she probably texted her boyfriend the for the score.

The second set was more new material with a couple of dashes from his middle period where he showed his Morrisey influence. Only musically that is, I'm pretty sure Ryan Adams isn't abstinent since he was dating my girl Parker Posey for a while. He engaged the audience a lot during the second set, it was obvious that he had a few cocktails before the show, but thats OK so did I. At one point after someone yelled something that he didn't understand, he thought they said "martians" and improvised a song about martians and will smith and harry conick jr. That was entertaining. I was firing off my digital camera in the air like a Shiite insurgent.

Things got weird after the second set, the house lights came on and so did the house music. People started to leave. I planned on finishing my beer anyway, and had a suspicion that something was amiss. 5 minutes later Ryan is back on stage, appologizing, he was planning on playing till the curfew kicked in at midnight. He didn't have any monitors but he went into "Why do they leave" , which seemed appropriate. He did the fan favorite "Chin Up Cheer Up" , two others that I didn't recognize, and closed with "Come Picke Me Up" which is everyones favorite, mine especially. He capturese a certain mentality that you get from the end of a relationship. He was standing on the piano bench throughout the song. I got a sweet video of the second verse. Plus a bunch of great snapshots throughout. Good thing I got that monster memory card. I'll have to find a place to post them.

After the show, people started splitting, Shannon asked me if I had a good time, I said yeah. I think she was concerned since I drank like a barnyard animal, but I had switched to water a while ago since I had to drive home. I rattled the Mitsubishi down the parkway listening to classic rock on Q104.3. I thankfully avoided the Pink Floyd that they seem to play every ten minutes. Waking up for work was going to be a chore. I know I'm going to get messages that say two things, either I'm a pussy for not asking the bartender for her number, or I'm a pussy for liking Ryan Adams. Guilty on both counts, but go write in your blog about it, I'm sure all your friends with their Black Flag shirts and heavy handed principles will have your back. Stay tuned for the report from Montreal.

You are getting warmer...

2006-07-17T12:49:00.000-07:00

Can someone turn off the heat? Its getting a little warm around here. I checked the forecast in the paper yesterday and the whole country was either red or pink. I understand its summer, but it would be nice if there was an escape route. I think its even hot in Canada, which will make the upcoming weekend interesting. I believe we've given the Canadians air conditioning technology as part of the NAFTA agreement, so I should be relatively comfortable. I'm thinking grab some Molson Triple X add a few shots of Pernod, combine with 100 degree heat in a French speaking foreign country and we might have a great series of blogs in store for the weekend.

I left off Thursday afternoon. Thursday evening I was heading home, and my friend Tooey called me. He was just getting off his plane from San Fran, in town for a mutual friends wedding. He needed a place to crash. Nothing like giving advance notice. I really don't care, I have two couches, they are open to anyone, but if you stay more that 3 nights a month you have to help take out the trash and perhaps throw in a six pack to appease the hospitality gods. I swung on home found Tooey on my porch, lying in wait, let him in went and changed and headed down to the bar. That's when Tooey started texting me, "Can you get us in the bar?". Which didn't stop until he was actually in the bar standing right next to me, texting me. Funny stuff. A few of the other people I know from the wedding party were there, its always interesting when you see someone from high school that is married and pregnant, tends to give you a little perspective. That perspective being running down a hallway in the opposite direction saying "Thank god its not me".

Its become apparent to me anyway that the frog has turned into town's pre game bar. From what I can tell the drinking pattern is that people come in after work, because the atmosphere is laid back but classy, maybe you have your boss in tow or you are meeting your friends. You have one or six drinks and then around 11 o'clock you realize that we don't draw in the clientele you are looking for, namely girls that just turned 21. At which point you and your friends head down the street to one of the bars with a DJ to circle the dance floor like vultures seeking women with loose morals. Leaving me to watch people that want easy access to the bartenders or to be able to watch sports in peace. I'm not complaining, the other places can have all the binge drinking, wenching, and misplaced aggression. The bar really died down around 1, I had a few drinks and kibitzed with Art and the regulars until about 2. When I came home Tooey's wedding date, was on one of the couches. Tooey was MIA, his wedding date was platonic, a friend from college. When I left him he was talking to a mutual friend that used to dance. Yes that kind of dance. I don't want to know or find out what Tooey was up to, he can write about it in his blog.

Friday at the day job wasn't so bad since I got home a little earlier than usual. Got out for a nice lunch in the park, wasn't completely productive when I got back but hey its the summer. I drove home and cleaned my room a bit, seems like I haven't made the time to do that in a while. I forget how the biggest guy in the apartment wound up with the smallest room, throw in way too much music equipment, a computer and a penchant for keeping useless crap and my life becomes an organizational challenge. It seems I've fully committed in my mind to moving, which is good, because usually I do everything at the last minute. I long to be able to live on my own and throw everything into Sterilite bins. I could just use more storage space that's for sure. Anyway, I got cleaned up and actually thought about staying in and just puttering around the house, maybe playing guitar, but I got the itch and I had some very informal plans to meet someone at the frog. So I showered and told my roommate Fitz that I would probably be home early, he thought I was abusing inhalants.

I headed to the Frog, my informal plans didn't show up, I almost got in a fight. Some prick with a Napoleon complex was harassing Phil the bouncer about taking his drink away when he took it outside to smoke. I explained that if he wanted a free replacement drink he could go to some other bar and be short there. He didn't like that and started pointing in my face, I don't take kindly to jockeys invading my personal space, plus it was hot out. I was putting my drink down and about to toss the glasses, which is the last thing anyone wants to see if I'm out in street clothes. Art came over and diffused the situation, and Tattoo from Fantasy Island parked himself across the bar and stared at me with his wee beady eyes. Sometimes I get scrappy, its unlikely but something about this moron set me off. Whatever, I was done pretending to be tough. Kevin Hogan who was mentioned last blog, rolled in 3 sheets to the wind, which is always entertaining. A few of the other regulars got me some shots and my early night went out the window. I went down to the Grasshopper by myself for no other reason than for a change of scenery. Not a lot of familiar faces, the dance floor was packed with youngins, not a lot of tail to be chased. I ran into some lady-regulars at the end of the night and somehow talked my way into going to Cluck U with them. We hoofed it down the street, I picked up the tab because I'm stupid and don't think chivalry is dead. We went back to their place, and conversation quickly stopped and was replaced by the sound of fried poultry being inhaled. Usually I feel like some sort of zoo animal in these situations, but the ladies were keeping pace, they had been out a lot longer than I was, and no matter what kind of genitalia you have drunken hunger is universal. After we made a bone pile that looked like a Cambodian roadside attraction, the girls were headed off to bed, and I was headed out the door. No deals to be closed, I wasn't delusional, and if you read my blog you shouldn't expect such things. I realized once I was outside, we had headed in the opposite direction of my apartment, and I was in flip flops. I started the 2 mile Bataan Death March home, stopping once to check a discarded scratch off ticket, no I'm still not lucky, and finally was up the stairs and in bed.

Saturday, I met Chris at my Mom's house. I've become Chris' guitar tech, my lack of discretionary spending over the years and inability to get rid of musical equipment because "I might need it" has lead to me having the equivalent of a pawn shop spread across my apartment and a room in my Mom's basement. We loaded up his car with a telecaster and an old fender amp that is the size of my Mitsubishi and talked about his upcoming nuptials. I puttered around Mom's for a while, avoiding some chores that she needed me to take care of, then headed back to my apartment. Two of the guys that lived in my apartment before I moved in were back in town for a pseudo bachelor party, Kevin Hogan was in attendance, Dan and Fitz, Darren was in Philadelphia. Dan had made jungle juice, which is dangerous since I had to work that evening, we all had jungle juice stories from college and they all ended the same way, with people passed out drunk not knowing what happened. I had a few beers, 2 dogs and a burger, hung out with the boys till I had to get changed and go stand around and be big. I wondered if the apartment would still be standing when I returned. Saturdays crowd was busy, but it died out again early, the boys showed up in rare form, on the dance floor, and then scattered like cockroaches with the lights on once the tail had left the bar for greener pastures. Kevin was outside claiming that he could get me off my feet in 10 seconds. Apparently he wrestled in High School, he also apparently failed physics. This bet will be settled when I'm not working and we aren't standing on concrete. Saturday after work we unwound with the usual discussions, what dirty things we would do to the bartenders, why women are evil, why we don't have enough money. I've literally had the same after work discussion 100 times, and I've enjoyed ever single one of them. I tend to have a lot of answers that no one wants to hear. I came home to a refugee camp in my living room and the remnants of fried food and a good night out.

I got up around 10 am and showered and got ready to go to the Yankee game. When I came downstairs, Dan was staggering out of the living room that smelled like man and chicken wings wearing sunglasses, all he could muster was "this isn't good" and went back to bed. I was picking up Cliff at 10, so I got to his house at 10:30. It wasn't bad getting in, even though I know the government is tracking me with my easy pass, it does make things more convenient. Cliff tried to pay for part of the parking, but I had to explain to him that a 6 dollar toll and $13.50 for parking equals $19.50, and if the ticket he gave me was worth 10 dollars then its a wash. He inquired about the missing 50 cents, and I said I was keeping it for teaching him remedial math. I lathered up on sunscreen and realized my arms didn't really fit in the shirt I was wearing, must be all the 12oz curls that I do. We had plenty of time to go get water outside the stadium in anticipation of the sub-saharan heat of the day. We headed into the bleachers to catch batting practice, I was stifled when the sausage cart wasn't operational yet, but we went outside to hopefully catch some of the White Sox big hitters (We were way too late for the Yanks batting practice). Jim Thome didn't disappoint, the first ball we saw him hit cruised for the upper deck of right field and broke the bottom of the scoreboard that sits up there, leaving the housing dangling precariously over the box seats. Some other left hander sent a hot shot to our section. I proved to be a formidable obstacle to souvenir hunters, this guy with a glove couldn't get around me in time to catch the ball on the fly, it rattled under the seats, and Cliffy picked it up. I was happy I was useful.

The heat was a bit much, I heard a rumor that the EPA was going to introduce an endangered turtle species to my shorts, as I was working on generating new wetlands, but the shade came over eventually. The sausage guy finally got rolling, I couldn't decide when I got there, so I got a hot Italian sausage and a giant hot dog with sauerkraut. They didn't really have a chance the poor little fellas. It was an interesting game, the Yanks got a lot of outs on base runners, in rundowns and fielders choices. Mariano Rivera recorded his 400th save. The bleacher creatures were in pretty good form, not a lot of heckling Jermaine Dye since he is having a career year, but they annoyed the hell out of the Peanut lady. We got out of the stadium and returned to my car which was now full of puppy killing heat. The guy next to us seemed perplexed that we had the doors open and weren't getting in, until he hopped in his beemer and burned his hands on the steering wheel, as he pulled away complaining I said "enjoy those leather seats". Cliff was having dinner in the city, so I offered to drive him into Manhattan because stuffing him on a subway in 100 degree heat didn't seem right. Besides driving on a nice day in the city is a guilty pleasure of mine, and he was going to one of my favorite places to ride around, the upper west side. The area where Broadway, Amsterdam, and Columbus all intersect makes for a neat little neighborhood, and hopping on the Henry Hudson by riverside park, cranking the tunes and checking out the sailboats on the river while heading to the GWB isn't a bad diversion. I headed home to have dinner with Mom as is my weekly routine.

I stopped into Walmart to pick up sundries, a big pack of paper towels, and a giant memory card for my digital camera. I can now take 400 hi res images or about 10 minutes of video, I wasn't sure what I needed that much space for, then it hit me. So ladies don't worry, it will be tastefull and we can split the proceeds down the middle. Walmart didn't carry the plumbing supplies I needed, so I headed down to Sears Hardware which was closing in 5 minutes. 6 minutes later, I was still waiting to check out, the guy in front of me and his wife thought it would be a good idea to take the brass fittings they needed out of the boxes to make sure they fit together. I'm not sure but that's probably why they put measurements on the boxes, but if you don't trust them OK, just bring the f'ing boxes with you when you check out. They wore off every bit of hope I had for humanity, but I cooled down before having dinner. I went home to take care of my plumbing problem. My apartment is in an old house, like pre-depression old. The drain control in my shower had stopped working a while back, I had adjusted it, but it crapped out again. So I took off the old one and installed the new one. Basically the old one had corroded and worn through, it basically looked like an artifact from the titanic covered in soap scum. Fitz and I were kind of scared of it, so I performed the last rights and threw it out. I proceeded to get started on 3 giant loads of laundry since apparently I had forgotten to do it all last week and I was wearing Christmas boxers. Thankfully the 40 year old virgin was on HBO to help me pass the time.

Today, I'm waiting to see if the sun is actually going to go down or if its just going to scorch the life out of North Jersey, if its the latter lets hope it starts with the hardware store couple. In other news I'm starting to get a feeling back that I haven't had in a long time, when I was growing up back in the 80s (before I had status, before I had a pager) the specter of mutually assured destruction between the US and the Soviet Union used to rock me to sleep. Now with North Korea testing missiles, Iran trying to become nuclear capable, and Israel opening the door for a two front war on terror, I get that little tingle on the back of my neck before I go to bed. I have other things to write about soon outside of the scope of my usual adventures so stay tuned.

Wednesday is spelled funny...

2006-07-13T11:32:00.000-07:00

As much as I paint myself to be a sarcastic curmudgeon who prefers ordering drinks from the bartender over actual human contact, I'm actually a decent person. From time to time, someone I know will have a grand scheme to set me up with some nice girl they work with, met last week, friend of a friend, or some other cliche. I'm always open to meeting new people, and I figure that since I'm honest and don't pull any punches, my friends probably know what they are getting the poor cliche into. The nice thing is it usually never comes to fruition. Its a lot of work dragging someone out to meet someone else. Typically the best way to do it is to set up a scenario where you can get the two people together without them knowing your intentions, and then working the room like a puppeteer trying to get the intended connection. This doesn't always work and takes strategy greater than what is demanded by Battleship or Connect Four, so its lost on 95% of humanity. Usually what happens is people talk a lot of smack, get lazy and nothing ever happens. I don't blame them, why look out for someone else, when you should be looking out for yourself. However every once in a while someone seems to come through.

So I'm driving home from work last night I get a call from my friend Kevin, he is at the Frog, he wants me to come meet him. No problem, I need to get my check anyway, I'll stop in for a few before I go see Superman Returns, which was my intended plan for the evening. About a half hour later I get a call from Kevin again. He can speak more freely since whoever he is with is in the bathroom. See where this is going? I did. So I have to make sure I come out because he's told her all about me. Kevin is in sales. I think at this point this poor girl thinks that I just got done foiling a bank robbery, and it takes me a long time to get back to Morristown because of all that water I have to walk on and cancer I have to cure. I roll into town through the evening thunderstorms, head into the bar, which has become a process because I have to say hello to half the patrons who apparently don't have homes. Go downstairs, get harassed by Steve for wanting to get my money that I threw my weekend away for, head back upstairs and into the side bar. This is usually where I get into trouble because after working all day, driving home through the rain, parking, and dealing with the people in the bar, I don't want to talk to anyone. I didn't even want to go to the movie at this point, I just wanted a drink. Then the drink becomes a process.

I've been drinking vodka lately, Stoli-O, club soda, splash of cran, maybe an orange or a lime garnish. Whatever, everyone makes it a little different. It can be kind of bland if there is too much soda, but its nice, especially when its hot outside. I'm not sure if there is a proper name for it, I've been calling it the "Pink Lady" since everyone seems to question my sexuality when they see me drinking something with a reddish hue. Oscar flat out doesn't serve me if I order it that way, if he is nice I can get away with calling it a "Pink Panther" and he'll make it, usually I order a Pink Lady and he pours me a Harp and a shot of Jameson's and makes me feel bad about myself. I've had a few regular drinks over the years, Captain and Coke, Tanqueray and Tonic, Harp, Miller Lite. If you see me out, a pint of Harp is a safe bet, I know no one in Ireland drinks it, I like the taste. Some people always have the same drink, the routine is comforting, I like to keep my bartenders on their toes, no slacking off.

Anyway I've been diverted, so I get my drink, say hello to Kevin, meet the intended Setup, one of her friends who I know from the bar, and two other girls that the friend has in tow. So I try and make idle conversation, I'm not doing a bad job, she goes to the bathroom, comes back and 5 minutes later there is a guy I recognize from the bar who comes over and introduces himself and is hanging around, I'll call him Johnny Random. I don't think much of it other than that I have to move far away where I don't know anyone. The conversation kind of dries up, no big deal, I wouldn't talk to me either. Kevin starts getting on my case because I'm not trying hard enough, which I proceed to tell him is bullshit because I'm 30 years old and I know when someone doesn't want to talk to me, plus if he really wants us to hit it off I shouldn't be interrogating this girl like she's at Guantanamo Bay. He knows I'm right but continues to break my balls, until he realizes that he was talking to one of the other girls and should go back to doing that. So, I'm hanging out, he is working on the other end of the group, and I end up talking to Johnny Random here and there. The Setup is all over her phone and apparently has bladder control issues. I start giving my exit interviews, Kevin pulls me aside and says "I'm really sorry, apparently Johnny Random is her ex-boyfriend, he was standing around trying to make everything uncomfortable, here is the Setup's number she wants you to call her". This all should have been obvious to anyone with half a brain, I didn't think much of it because I was taller than the guy sitting down. My life is complicated enough, but I make it worse by being oblivious. Anyway, its still better that I leave rather than get roped into pouring 15 pink ladies down my neck while dealing with the mini drama that I walked into.

I went to see Superman Returns. I enjoy going to see movies during the week, the crowds are better, and if I'm going to spend 10 bucks to see some poorly written piece of Hollywood trash I might as well be able to enjoy it without someone kicking my seat and giving instructions to the actors. The movie was pretty good, it was no Superman II, but it was enjoyable. Superman was played by some guy that looked like Jason Schwartzman's older brother, and when he spoke it sounded creepily like Christopher Reeve. My problem was that he didn't seem big enough, its not the suit, everyone looks gay in the suit, I just don't think there is a human actor who can fill out the proportions that Superman requires. Kevin Spacey as Lex Luthor was pretty convincing, a little angrier, and plenty evil enough. Kate Bosworth is an improvement over Margot Kidder, but still I don't really see what Superman sees in Lois Lane, and I like brunettes. Speaking of brunettes, I've made mention of my Parker Posey fetish before, she was almost nonexistent in this movie, so I was kind of disappointed, plus they dressed her up in anachronisms. If they use computers at the Daily Planet, why do Kitty Kowalski and Lex Luthor look like they are Bonnie and Clyde impersonators? The guy that plays Cyclops in the X-men movies is Lois Lane's current husband, apparently if you have a comic book movie and you need a guy for a hot actress to be conflicted over, Cyclops guy is your man. I was also happy to see that Kumar got out of White Castle and became one of Lex Luthor's cronies. The movie wasn't all about action, the action sequences they got right, there was a lot more human drama which I suppose is good for a movie that is trying to erase the memories of Richard Pryor as an evil computer scientist and that guy that looked like the Greatest American Hero from Superman IV. Basically Superman went away for a bit, comes back to Earth to find Lois living with another man and a kid, and tries to prove to the world why he is still relevant and then foiling Lex Luthor's plan for world domination. I could get into a movie where a guy finds out the girl he likes is with some other dude and then goes out and plays the field until the girl realizes what she is missing out on. However I didn't particularly care, I have a hard time sympathizing for Superman. Ask anyone what they would do as Superman, its always worlds greatest peeping tom or bank robber, never savior to humanity. I'm glad the big blue boy scout likes to help people, but it would be nice if he had one character flaw. Life isn't usually that easy, and even though Lois Lane's fiance is some editor/pilot its still pretty easy to chose the guy that can fly without a plane and can reheat pizza by staring at it. Plus I'm sure Superman is no slouch in bed. The physics involved in parts of the movie are a little flawed also, but talking about physics in a comic book movie is for someone else's blog. I will say Brian Singer did a good job directing, and this movie probably puts the franchise back on course. If you are looking for all action, see this one on DVD and wait for the sequel, which is inevitable unless the role of Superman really is cursed, then look for the guy that looks like Jason Schwartzman's brother to be gunned down robbing a liquor store with Todd Bridges or caught in some sort of horrible industrial accident.

I often ponder why I work so much, I realized the answer the other day. It's because I look for trouble. I just got done telling my friends that I hate working two jobs, when I get a call from Dylan telling me that we are going to Montreal on the 21st. It would be nice if the French Canadian Lap Dance Fairy would throw me a few trips to the champagne room on the house, but we all know that's not going to happen. It's all about the adventure, my motto has long been "as long as you get a good story out of it, it was worth doing". Knowing that I'll be regaling my friends (or online readers at this point) with the minutiae of my tough times and embarrassing situations has kept me from sticking my head in the oven. I really need to find someone to bankroll me though, not being independently wealthy sucks. I'm not sure what's on tap for this weekend, more bar room adventures, and I have Friday off. Next week, I'll be covering the Ryan Adams show at the Starland Ballroom on Thursday night, I should have some good pictures because I will be bringing my camera this time and then its off to Canada for the Montreal Comedy Festival. If someone can tell me how to say "I want my lawyer" in French it would be appreciated. Oh, and if you are wondering why I'm going to the Montreal Comedy Festival, its because Dylan runs a great publication called Punchline Magazine, and he invited me along to cover the festival and get him into trouble. If you get a chance check out Punchline, and keep checking back because hopefully I will be doing some blogging over there for him. http://www.punchlinemagazine.com

A short week ends...

2006-07-10T14:39:00.000-07:00

I got my oil changed today. I go to a place near work called "Lube It All", which sounds more like a phrase to remember on the weekends than a business. But for 25 bucks, I get a fresh batch of dinosaur blood, a filter to collect the little bits of my engine that I scrape off when I forget to change my oil for 2,000 extra miles, and service with a smile. I'm not entirely sure how they change the oil in less than 10 minutes, but it seems to work. I'm quickly bearing down on 180k miles in the old 'bishi. I'm still devising a plan for a new automobile, currently the latest, plan involves me getting the hell out of Morristown. I was working at the bar Saturday when I kind of looked around and realized that there were a few girls there that I dated, a couple I called that never called me back, and a majority of them who look down on my laissez faire attitude toward life. Its probably a good time for a new dating pool to pollute. Besides, the sheer comic potential of throwing me and this blog into a new bar scene where I know very few people is off the charts. Its a very serious consideration. I'd have to find new bartenders to hook me up, I wouldn't know any of the cops, let alone be able to have them give me a ride without cuffs on. It might be nice not to waste 2 hours of my day and maybe go to the gym, ok, you caught me I left the cap off the glue. Anyway, the car is still running, I'm hoping it makes 200k miles, a secret nerd hope of mine is to drive the average distance to the moon. Last I checked that was about 238,856 miles give or take. I'm thinking I'll have a new whip before that actually happens, but since the green heap is worth approximately $4.25 or however much change I have in the center console, I don't see much point in trading it in. I can use it for long trips or to put bodies in before I sink it in a swamp or river.

Thursday at the bar was uneventful, when the crowds are smaller people don't binge drink and cause problems quite as often. Art decided to let the new guy go first, because apparently there was a surprise in store for me. Having to go to an actual job in the morning means nothing apparently, but I soldiered on. At the end of the night, I found out what my surprise was once we kicked the last of the degenerates off of their stools. My brother got around to sending my birthday present. Art threw me a fed ex envelope with the phrase "Happy Birthday, Fat Kid" scrawled on it. He always calls me that, I find it ironic because before he left for San Francisco he was working on making his neck the same size as his waist. Inside the package was a T-shirt. I haven't exactly dived into the current trend of funny T-shirts, I don't really need a shirt that says "beaver hunter" or "new jersey girls aren't trash, trash gets picked up", but I find them mildly amusing. However, my brother in his immutable way discovered a true comic gem. The shirt says "Hopeless Romantic - seeks filthy whore", I and everyone else found it oddly fitting. You can discern whatever you want from that, part of it will probably be right, either way it gave everyone a good laugh. He also sent us a 12 pack of Fat Tire Belgian Ale, which didn't get broken or skunked and was really good after sitting on ice waiting for me to clear the bar flies out into the street. It might have been a month late, but if it makes the blog, its probably a good present.

Friday at work was not so much fun, it was a damn beautiful day, and I was trapped in the office working on 4 hours sleep. I wasn't hung over thank god, but I did want more Belgian style beer. The lunch club was on hiatus for the short week. So my friend Cathy and I went over to the local Quizno's. I got the veggie, no there is nothing wrong with me, its really good and they put guacamole on it. I don't understand why there aren't more Quizno's around. Granted I'll take a good deli any day over the purveyors of Toasty, but Subway sucks, I long for the day when Jared gains all the weight back and goes on a rampage through Subway headquarters, occasionally stopping to catch his breath. I made it through the afternoon, and then back home to go back to work. This needs to stop soon. Friday at the bar we had a reappearance of a local homeless man who is prone to public urination and pestering our customers for cigarettes. Thankfully he stayed across the street, because "bum wrasslin'" isn't in my job description. I had a guy come charging out of the bar looking for his friends and ran right into some poor pedestrian. His excuse was that he was "memorized". I don't think Mr. Inebriated took AP English in high school.

Saturday I was supposed to be off, I had plans to go to the city and well get into a lot of trouble, but I had to cancel because I got the call to work. I'm saving up some cash for this grand moving scheme, and somehow making 75 dollars beats spending 200 dollars. Especially since I reek of Bridge and Tunnel, my Jersey cool points don't always transfer to Manhattan. Its tough when you regret making the smart play, and tougher when you get text messages reminding you of the trouble that you missed. Some things aren't meant to be. Its been a while since I've been to Manhattan, its really not that hard to get to, I drive everywhere else, I just don't seem to find the excuse to go in more often. I used to have a plan to live in the city, this goes back a while, I kind of thought I would be some sort of Bohemian, living in a walk up with hardwood floors, a small kitchen and a smaller bathroom. Kind of like Serpico, I could have a sheep dog and hit on the neighbor who listens to opera. Actually I think I just wanted to be Serpico, except for the getting shot in the face and testifying against the police in the grand jury.

I have a bunch of things I want to write about, so keep reading. I appreciate the responses I've been getting. Hopefully I can turn all this misadventure and half assed literature into something. For those of you who can't get myspace at work, I have a real blog address. http://jfdavidson.blogspot.com, I always post to both so no worries on missing anything. I'm going to look to develop the blogspot site a little more so check it out when you can.

The skin I'm in...

2006-07-10T10:29:00.000-07:00

Did everyone catch the World Cup finals on Sunday? I did, and I remembered why I don't particularly like soccer. First, could you imagine if the NBA finals were decided by a game of horse? Shootouts are lame, they should play until a goal is scored or everyone drops. Secondly what is with the mysterious injuries? These guys go down more than Nicole Richie in a men's room. I'm slightly biased since I used to play rugby, which is a sport some guy in England created when he got tired of all this kicking and midfield play and decided to pick up the ball and run with it. I was shirt tackled in a game once and driven into the ground head first, when I got up I realized my shoulder hurt. A lot. It might have been because all the ligaments were stretched out and my humerus was outside of the socket. That was fun, it was more fun when i had someone pull on my arm to put my shoulder back in place (I wouldn't recommend this because I ended up tearing my rotator cuff and that's not good). I didn't come off the field, I ran around like a moron trying to tackle people with one arm. I would think that if you are a professional soccer player you probably train hard and deal with injuries all the time so if someone coughs on you, you wouldn't fall down like Scarlet O'Hara's family planning coach. Though I did thoroughly enjoy when that guy from France head butted that Italian guy. I doubt he would have done it to the German team, but lets leave history alone and applaud his gusto. I used to be into soccer, back when I was young and should have been playing football, soccer is fun to play, bad to watch. I suppose hockey is only the true opposite. Though I think if you are from a country that doesn't get enough sunlight to support anything but reindeer or maple syrup, I suppose working real hard to propel yourself on a frictionless surface while guys with no teeth chase you with sticks is probably fun.

Speaking of countries with no sun, I've been meaning to discuss my pigment problems. I'm half Irish and half Scottish (actually there is some other junk mixed in there, but not much and really people that are so into genealogy that they have to mention that little bit of Cherokee Indian that they used to get into college annoy me). The British Isles aren't exactly bathed in a lot of sunlight. Why this lead my male ancestors to wear skirts remains a mystery to me and most of the modern world, though I've never tried it I'm sure it's very freeing. In the great Darwinian coin flip, I inherited my share of stereotypical traits and avoided others. Ladies don't worry the "Irish Curse" was successfully foiled by the Scottish side. At least my Dad was good for something. Wait did this just get really awkward? I needed braces, but at least my teeth don't look like a picket fence from Detroit. The drinking? Are you buying? I didn't get the temper, and I'm not a cheap Scott. What I did inherit was this damn ruddy complexion. They should call it unfair skin. Lots of people get sunburned, sure. Do they turn purple and splotchy after about 15 minutes of exposure? Lucky me. I blame my Mom, she is as white as they come. I once heard James Brown avoids the airspace over Morris County because she lives there. My Mom couldn't tan if she wanted to, if she is out in the sun too long she has what seems to be an allergic reaction to sunlight. I've been meaning to throw holy water on her just to check. So the damn X chromosome cursed me to look develop a pinkish hue between April and October. Don't get me started on freckles.

Freckles are those little spots that come out when you are exposed to the sun. Some people think that those brown spots that are around all year are freckles also. Those are actually moles, and no they don't have to be lumpy and have hair growing out of them. Some are big and ugly, most are flat and just little imperfections in your skin. A little over two years ago I noticed a freckle on my right temple. I was pretty sure it had been there for a while, but I started to realize that it was getting bigger, and uglier. Brown spots on my skin, I can deal with, something whose colors look more appropriate in a puddle at a gas station kind of bother me. Sometimes you just know something is wrong. I generally avoid doctors like the plague, case in point the above relocation of my left shoulder, and that time I set my broken nose in the shower after rugby practice. I appreciate their extra years of college and residency, I suppose I just don't like knowing something is wrong. Anyway, I made an appointment to go see the dermatologist. I applaud any man that wants to look at me in my boxers under a magnifying glass. Apparently I was right to come in, but it was nothing to worry about, but he still wanted to cut it off me. I had a vague feeling of uneasiness when I left that day, if its not big deal couldn't they just leave it on me? Whatever, I'm no doctor (If I have told you I was a doctor don't worry my examination was very thorough). So I returned in a week, to have a different doctor cut a chunk out of my head. If you didn't know, your head bleeds a lot, also it hurts if they start cutting before the Novocain has set in. After we got through some of the rough spots, I ended up getting a free facelift on the right side, stitches are tight. Of course it wouldn't be a good story if something weird didn't happen. The nurse assisting on the surgery I sort of knew because she came into the Calaloo Cafe where I used to stand around and be big before I worked at the Frog. She noticed as she was walking me back to the waiting room that my bandage wasn't tight enough and I had a little seepage. So she took me into another room to take care of my bandage which looked ridiculous enough without things spurting out of it. Now if it was someone else's life she would have come on to me or something. My life works a little differently, she was carrying the chunk of my noggin with her to send out for testing. She asked if I wanted to see it. I was like "Hell yeah!". She asked me if I was going to pass out, I replied that there was only one way to find out. I'm never really squeamish so I didn't think it was going to be a problem. But why not add a little danger to the situation? So she opened up the container and there was part of my face sitting in fluid. The weird part was I recognized it as part of my head that I've been staring at in the mirror for a while, you get this weird cognitive disconnect because it doesn't seem real but you know that it was a part of you.

So I went home and had a horrible headache and my face hurt. I ended up walking around with this big stupid band aid on my face for a while. Then I go in to get my check up and they have something to tell me. Finding out you have cancer is not an enjoyable event. I didn't know much, but out of the choices of skin cancer, squamous cell, basal cell, and melanoma. I didn't want the last one, which is exactly what I got. I was reassured that I was going to be fine, but I should schedule an appointment with my regular doctor for a checkup and they were going to take more flesh off of my skull. Nice. So I went to my doctor, they did blood work to check my liver and I needed a chest x-ray to check my lungs. If anyone ever asks my least favorite word is "metastasize", because if Melanoma decides to take a vacation and check out some other area of your body besides your skin, its typically your lungs, liver or bone. If any of that happens, I think the next medical procedure they recommend is putting your head between your legs and kissing your ass goodbye. I know all this because I'm a nerd and the minute I was diagnosed I had to intellectualize everything. Seriously though, melanoma is a killer, especially in young people because they think that skin cancer is for old people, and all of a sudden it metastasizes and you are looking at a 15 to 25% survival rate. This did not make me happy. But my liver was normal (I don't know if they asked it about abuse, but he knows what happens if he tells) and my chest x-ray was clear. They took a bigger chunk out of my head and there wasn't any bad stuff around. So all I really got out of all this was the fear of God, and a dopey scar on the side of my head that you can see every once in a while. Carolina was actually the first person to ever say anything to me about it Fourth of July weekend. I guess I should have combed my hair that day.

I've had one other biopsy since then, they took a nice chunk out of my shoulder that I tell people is a bullet wound. It was only displastic cells which is like pre-cancer so no big deal right? Yeah so basically I get to wait around for something bad to happen and lather myself up with SPF 45. Yet another cheery story from the archives. People wonder why the tone of my blog is so sunny. I have other tales of misfortune, like the time I was nearly arrested for kidnapping, or the time I passed out drunk outside during a snowstorm. Those I brought upon myself. I like them better when there are some outside forces that make me miserable so I can get people to feel sorry for me and buy me beer. I'm gonna go shake the magic 8 ball and see what kind of adventures I can get into, I'll be back soon with a wrap up of the weekend.

The road not so less traveled...

2006-07-06T09:38:00.000-07:00

Independence day is when we show true American spirit by taking long weekends, shoveling copious amounts of charred meat and carbohydrates coated in mayo down our gullets all against the backdrop of colorful explosions. Far be it from me to buck the tradition of grilling and simulated violence, I just decided to add a more modern American twist to the weekend by driving like an Alzheimer's patient. I logged nearly 600 miles on my car between Friday and Tuesday. I'm not entirely sure why. My roommate speculated that it was a convenient parlor trick to feign omnipresence. He might be right, and if it really worked I might keep it up so I can get a renegade sect of Mormon's to follow me around. Start drinking the Kool Aid ladies, I was supposed to get this polygamy thing rolling before 30, so I'm a little behind schedule.

Friday was my company picnic, I'm never one to complain about losing a half days work to sit in the owner's backyard and eat and drink for free. A couple of new spins for this year, there was an honest to goodness DJ at the event, who played a pretty good mix of hits from the past 40 years. And for the kiddies, a bouncy castle, I think we all see where this is going. Yes towards the end of the afternoon, once the kids were bored and the inflatable keep was taunting me with the lonely hiss of his air pump, I decided to inspect the situation. Apparently in this politically correct age they don't put weight limits on these things. I don't know if its because they don't want to offend anyone or because Americans probably couldn't handle the simple addition involved combining the weight of six pre-teens. All the sign said was that if you have kids that are 12 or under, you could have 4 on at a time. I felt dejected, but then I remembered that kids these days don't do anything except eat fruit roll-ups and stare blankly at the X-box 360. So I reasoned I was safe, since I couldn't possibly weigh more than 4 of the ever fattening future leaders of America. I was still a little concerned after the first jump, but my worry floated away on the weightlessness of tarpaulin filled with air. I didn't stay in long, I rode for 8 seconds to get my qualifying score from the judges. There was business to attend to.

A group of us said our goodbyes and headed northward towards the Atlantic Highlands, which seems to be a cool place to hang out in the summertime. On the way my travelogue started, I had to get gasoline so I reset the trip odometer at this point so for those of you that are following along at home, this is mile marker zero. We headed towards an establishment called Windansea, a witty contraction, and not a bad outside bar. I had wisely taken time off from the old bouncing job so I could have the option of hanging around the shore that night. I was lured to hob knob with my fellow worker-bees by the prospect of my friend Kim's sister's 21st birthday celebration. You might remember Kim from a few weeks back in Morristown. I'm sure she her intentions were to have people to hang out with and keeping me as far away from her siblings as possible, but you don't look a gift horse in the mouth. The problem as I saw it was it was about 7pm and the party wasn't arriving until 10, so I had to keep a leash on the forces that generally make these blogs humorous, at least for the time being. It wasn't so hard, we had a few suds and finger food, jalapeno poppers might be the most important invention of my lifetime. As it got darker out and cooled down a bit, the weather started to turn, some high winds and sprinkles, but nothing major. A few of my co-workers had to leave to attend to other obligations, but they seemed to get replaced by others from the bullpen. Of course I was firmly planted at the bar, I have to wonder if anyone thought of this because I believe I was the only one to stay for the duration. Not that I really care what anyone thinks. The birthday party finally arrived and we headed upstairs to see Brian Kirk and the Jerks. They were a really good cover band, and apparently they bring the ladies in. I reached a crossroads at around 12:30, my weekend plan was to ditch and head down to LBI for AM fishing. Looking back, I probably should have raged like a maniac from the minute I got there and found some sort of trouble around 1:30 with full intentions of crashing somewhere and getting up real early to make the boat, but actually oversleeping by 2 hours and getting angry voicemails. I'm disappointed in my new found responsibility. I calmly departed the club, took the long ride to the parkway, and barreled 50 miles down the coast.

I arrived in LBI around 2am to a dark house. I woke my friend Brian up when I came in, Bri had made the trip from D.C. and was part of the reason I stayed in control during the previous events. Bri was sleeping on the previously mentioned torture couch, which meant I was on the tile floor, and I wasn't really prepared for my stay. 5:30am came awfully fast, and though I had a nice sleeping bag, I pretty much felt like Mickey Rourke looks. A quick stop at 7-11 for portable nutrition, which included a giant Gatorade for me, and we were out on the water. Partway out of the inlet, we had some engine sputtering. I'm actually a strong swimmer, and I figure I'm a little more buoyant than I used to be, but still comprehending a dive into 60 degree water to get to shore wasn't a comforting thought. It turned out to be bad gas, because we switched tanks and were going again in no time. The weather was beautiful, not a lot of wind though and the tide wasn't helping, so we didn't get a good drift. However before we headed in, I managed to pull the only keeper fluke of the day out of the murky deep. 21 inches and 4 pounds of good eatin. I am the master angler. Back at the dock, we cleaned my catch and headed home for food. Tiki Taco is a short walk away from Brendan's house. We got carry out and feasted on Mexican delights. Guacamole is a wonder of nature. It was getting late in the day, and I had to work that night, so I packed my catch in ice, and drove around 100 or so miles back to Mo'town. Dropped off the fish at mom's and back to the apartment to rest up for work.

When I arrived at the bar, we had way to many people on duty, however it turned out that we were going to need them all. I stayed out front most of the night because the weather was nice, and I had a splotch of sunburn on my forearm where I missed with the sun block. Thanks Irish ancestors! I'm overdue for a blog about my pigment problems, I promise that's next. At some point during the night, this girl comes out with her friends and decides to try and pick me up. Lets just say she limped in, it might be because she was incredibly intoxicated. I don't think highly of myself, but my mom thinks I'm a good catch, besides I really can't turn down the chance to bust on anyone. So I listened to her run horrible game on me, and proceeded to twist her words around and make her feel bad about herself for the amusement of the other bouncers. I actually used the phrase "I really hope this isn't your A game". It wasn't, apparently her A game consisted of sticking her ass out at me. Maybe she should have gotten my name first. Her friends seemed to enjoy my belittling also. She went away, Rob didn't understand why I was being mean, I wasn't really mean, I'm just not going to give somebody the time of day just because they have a vagina. I ended up going inside to see if this drama was going to play out, and you know sometimes something can be said for effort so maybe if she wanted my number I would give it to her, who am I to judge someone who is impaired? It turns out that I dodged a bullet, while stationed at the inside door, watching this girl try and talk to some other guys, she came back from the bar and fell. HARD. Like Evil Kneivel hard. She was ok, but one of my standards for making time for someone is they have to stay upright. The bar was full most of the night, so I suppose it was worth me not being able to hang out with my friends by the water. I hit the bed with a vengeance when I got home, I probably should have gotten up early and done laundry and took care of business around the house, but I needed to make sure I removed the imprint of the tile floor from the night before.

Sunday I headed out to the boondocks of Newton, NJ. I haven't always been a dazzling urbanite, I grew up in Sussex county until my parents got divorced, and then was there every other weekend till high school. Its nice out in the country, a few too many mullets and pick up trucks, but its a give and take. This was my second year at Oscar's fourth of July celebration. Horseshoes and beer pong balls were flying when I arrived. I lingered around the grill till a burger came off with my name on it. Then I circled like a buzzard for the kebobs. Rob and I went through a fair amount of drafts, I didn't participate in any games, wasn't feeling up to horseshoes, and couldn't find a suitable partner for pong. I had other things on my mind. The year previous Rob and I had discovered that Oscar likes seafood, and buys a bushel of clams to throw on the grill. This year I was devising the bivalve final solution. Once the steamers hit the grill, it was on like donkey kong. Rob and I actually stood right next to the grill and proceeded to shovel hot mollusks down our throats as they came off the fire. It was ugly. I probably am so filled with mercury at this point that I can tell the temperature outside just by looking. The day progressed on, a little sprinkle of rain. Oscar is Latino, Columbian I believe, so a pinata was in order for the rug rats. There was a little adventure trying to throw an extension cord over a high branch by tying it to a horseshoe and heaving the contraption in the air. Unfortunately no head injuries, and I did my part by boosting Oscar into the air to pull the shoe down once it was in a reasonable range. On a side note, when my friend Steve arrived he didn't come up to shake our hands, apparently he didn't see me, I suppose it was an honest mistake it could have been an iceberg or a good humor truck standing in the backyard. No Steve, I was the large white object passing slowly through the grass. Before I left the elder group of Oscar's family had kicked out the jams and were doing the meringue and the cha-cha on the patio. It was pretty cool, I couldn't bring myself to do the Rerun dance. I was headed back down the shore, Oscar gave me a fair share of guilt for leaving, and I felt it, I did stay 4 hours though not 1. Hopefully the bottle of 12 year old scotch I brought him eased the pain of my early exit.

I threw Ray Charles in the stereo, and got on the accelerator back down to LBI. I wanted to catch up with Brian, and there were some of the other Mo'town boys thrown into the mix. Down 15 to 80 East, onto 287, across 24 and 78 to the Parkway, yet again. When I got to the Raritan River, I had changed CDs to Traffic's John Barleycorn Must Die, which is actually a good driving record. I was rocking out to the organ hits of "Empty Pages" when the lightning started on one side and the fireworks were going up on the other. It was kind of a surreal backdrop for the snake of headlights that were heading northbound. This was around 9pm, I still had an hour to go on the Parkway, plus getting to the Island. I arrived to a well lubricated crowd playing a well known card based drinking game. We headed out to the Marlin bar, to catch Lifespeed, a cover band that I usually enjoy. The 20 dollar cover didn't make me happy, nor did the mooks all jammed in like rats on a sinking ship. I accidentally bumped into some guido on my way to the bathroom who was too old to be chicken hawking girls at a shore bar and apparently spent too much time at the gym. I could tell he was disappointed when he turned around and realized that I was 6 inches taller than he was and outweighed him by enough to make him uncomfortable. I'm not a tough guy, really far from it, I fully admit it, I get by on size, but I think had he said something I might have flipped on him, because really if the club is at fire hazard level, get over it. In the bathroom, I overheard a conversation about a guy getting dirty looks from people, I said he should try being my size, he said I should try being my size and black, apparently I misunderstood the problem. I kind of shook my head and said sorry, he said no big deal. Then some guy came out of the stall and asked him if anyone ever told him he looked like Tiger Woods, which he kind of did but that's besides the point. I pulled him aside at the sink and said "you are kidding me right?" and he said it was like that all weekend for him, damn whitey. I told him to grab me if some redneck gave him a hard time and I bought him a beer later when he got out. People are stupid and that's why I take the time to make fun of them on the Internet. We headed out at close, picked up food from Chicken or the Egg on the way home. Best wings on earth I swear. There wasn't much hope for my little fried friends. One of the girls that was staying in the house started to clean compulsively, so I started to make fun of her compulsively. I have no idea who she was, a friend of a friend leeching off of a mutual friend for a place to stay at the shore like I was. She seemed a little perturbed when I called her Mary Poppins, then she tried to throw the uneaten wings away, asking if I really was going to eat them in the morning.

I had chicken wings and cold pizza for breakfast. Partly to nettle Mary Poppins, mostly because its delicious. I hung out and caught up with my friends and headed once again back to Morristown because I don't think I could take much more of this pace and I needed to do laundry. I got home, threw a few loads in stripped my bed, and promptly got a call to go to Randolph to drink poolside. A man has to do what a man has to do. Poolside turned into a night out in Mo'town, which turned into me low on sleep and drinking a bit too much. Nothing too eventful, at some point I remembered that my bed wasn't made and covered in laundry, the laundry was clean, but I think its better that I didn't stay at home. Sometimes alcohol is like that waterfall that family traveled over to enter the Land of the Lost. However you don't enter a world of prehistoric creatures and Sleestaks, you enter a world of pink sheets with fringe and beds with too many pillows on them. I'll leave it at that. I escaped my confines and once again made it home to finish my laundry and eventually head over to Mom's for the final barbeque of the weekend. Nothing like eating fish that you caught, especially when paired with steak and the best damn potato salad in the world. Many have tried to top my mom's potato cooking abilities, and all of them have failed. Her potato salad is second only to her mashed. A little corn on the cob helped keep things moving and a favorite of mine deviled eggs. I ended up playing cribbage with my mom after dinner, just for nostalgia's sake. Its a good card game, counting, luck and strategy. I wanted to play for money, but I forgot that my mom isn't a degenerate, she only raises them. I returned home to clean sheets and laundry to swap stories of my epic travels with my roommate. I tried to interject some Cyclops and Kraken into my tales, but he reminded me that I drive a Mitsubishi not a ship from Odysseus.

Well I think we have reached information saturation. There are a few stories that were shortened to protect the innocent. I have mixed feelings on self editing, but for now I feel its best, maybe I can expound on them in the future. Short work week this week so stay tuned for more adventures.

On the road again...

2006-06-29T13:16:00.000-07:00

Saturday was one of my more interesting days, I was in a coma for a good part of the day. Originally the plan was for me to work at the bar and then for Art and I to drive out to Pittsburgh right after my shift, the thinking being there would be no traffic and we could maximize our Pittsburgh time. So I made sure I slept off Friday's debauchery. A quick stop at Mom's before my shift to take care of a few things and I was ready for the evening. The bar had a pretty good crowd, never really getting full but it seemed fun. Nothing really eventful happened that evening, we were able to close up a little early. Art and I haggled about the drive, we finally figured out that driving after working a shift was not wise and probably dangerous. So we were going to bed but how little sleep were we getting? He said "6:30", I said "9", he said "7:30", I said "8:30", he said "7:30", I said "sold to the man with no neck". So we unwound a bit and headed home with intentions of being bright eyed and bushy tailed for our drive across Pennsyltucky. My alarm went off at 7:20, I was going to hop in the shower but then I thought better of it, since I am lazy and unreliable. Art called me at 8:20 and said he was on his way, I did the quick shower and change, and was in the car at 8:30 apparently 7:30 didn't agree with Art either. My laziness instincts are impeccable.

Morristown was kind of gray as we pulled out of town, down 287 to 78. Through the verdant pastures that are west Jersey. Its not all smokestacks and warehouses you know, there are lots and lots of farms out in yonder Jersey. Once we crossed the Delaware things started getting a little darker. The rain started about 5 miles into Pennsylvania. The highways in Pennsylvania in a word, blow. Nothing is smooth, most of it is four lane highway, with dividers on either side. When your visibility is cut in half and throw in a populace that apparently all sell fireworks, driving can be a little hairy. Thankfully we had the satellite radio to keep us company, I highly recommend Sirius' hair metal station. If you are going to be careening through a 400 mile thunderstorm you might as well listen to Quiet Riot. We stopped in Carlisle for gas, its a big truck transfer to get off of 78 to the Pennsylvania Turnpike. I encountered a bathroom I don't think you would want to overdose in, let alone use the facilities. Unsurprisingly they had a condom machine above the urinals. Did you know that rough riders were the worlds first studded condom? I didn't. I emerged slightly puzzled, but after seeing the clientele of the gas station convenience store I was glad they sold condoms, because god forbid these web footed mongoloids breed. I grabbed my chex mix and a water and hurried back to the car, I think I was afraid that the guy that looked like ZZ Top's stunt double was going to find out that I vote Democrat. At least gas was cheap. Back in the car we encountered more rain, only finding refuge in the tunnels that cut through the Allegheny mountains. Finally we started to head downhill towards the bustling metropolis that is Pittsburgh.

I've been to Pittsburgh twice now, both times it was overcast in the summer. Something tells me this is the norm. I couldn't imagine working in a steel mill your whole life with that climate. It doesn't surprise me that they are so sports obsessed and eat food that would choke a billygoat. Art's parents live on the outside of town, we cruised through what looked like the set of Deliverance and suddenly we were in the middle of a housing development. I don't really understand the economies of Western PA, apparently Pittsburgh is on the upswing (where else could it go, there already is a Camden). New stadiums and suburbanization I guess is what is happening. I think Art's mom tried to feed us when we stepped out of the car, it didn't stop until we left. We relaxed watching sports center till Matt and Erin got home, they left a day earlier, smart move. Grazing on the parental smorgasbord just before we had to head to the show.

Robert Randolph has lived in Morristown for a few years now, I met him at the Office bar a while back. We hang out when he is in town, I try not to bring up the usual fan stuff, just talk about how work is going and things. We've had a couple of late night adventures that I can't really relay here. So it was cool to have to opportunity to hang with him outside of home base. We parked the car at the back of the lot, picked up our tickets and passes and headed over to Robert's tour bus. There were flat panel TVs everywhere, nice couches and the free food and drinks from the venue. Pretty sweet. The last time I was in Pittsburgh, I was on tour with Joanie Loves Trotsky, crammed into a van that smelled like socks. I kind of sat there for a second and wished I practiced the guitar more, oh well, free beer washed away the sorrow. So 20 minutes before Robert hit the stage, we headed in to the venue to buy overpriced beer. Robert hit the stage and we forced our way up front. Great show, did his version of Voodoo Chile, showed off the multi instrumental capability of the band. Right before he headed off he waved and gave shouts to Jersey. We hung out a bit, the Crowes came on the actually played a good mix of old and new, we only caught the first hour because we headed back to the tour bus. Robert told me that the Crowes wanted him to come out and sing on Instant Karma during the encore, but he decided not to. I offered to go out in disguise, but I think we all realized that I am a large white man and there isn't a way to camouflage that. We hung out on the bus drinking beers and catching up. Eventually we started pulling girls aboard, which is what tour busses are for. I remember why I love rock and roll when three hot girls got on the bus with their hot mom. I guess one of the girls was into Robert's guitar player I really don't want to know how that whole system works, I think I'd just be depressed. We got some Duquesne students on board, and Art and I played security when these two guys came around, fun. We spent a fair amount of time hanging out while Robert played iPod DJ. Heavy on the Party Rap, which was excellent because it made the hot mom uncomfortable. Robert couldn't hang out because they had to get on the road to Nashville. We dropped Erin off at the house because she wasn't feeling good, and Matt, Art and I headed down to the college bars which were actually empty since it was Sunday in the summer.

This one bar Casey's has a midget, it even has a sign in the window claiming so. I'm not sure how much exploitation I could handle, and I guess I'll never know because they were closed. We hit Jack's which seemed to be popular and had a beer there, then after looking down the street and realizing that we were the only degenerates out, we stopped into the Smiling Moose, which seems to be a metal bar. They had a few skulls around and it looked like we missed a band. There were some cookie monster sounding bands on the jukebox. I think Art and Matt were scared, I didn't mind it. We had the local brew, Iron City Beer there. Unfortunately we realized too late that they had Mickey's wide mouths in the cooler. We bailed before they were even close to throwing us out, we had other business to attend to.

There is a Pittsburgh institution called Primanti Brothers sandwiches. Rumor has it, it started on the strip where truckers making their deliveries didn't have a lot of time, so everything goes on the sandwich. Meat and cheese topped with cole slaw and french fries. I've had one before, and the anticipation of having one after a night of drinking was almost unbearable. Horror of horrors Art ordered them to go, so we had to drive 10 minutes home with the smell of the most delicious drunk food imaginable, overstuffed hot sandwiches and an order of cheese fries. I'm not sure what happened when I opened the bag, the next thing I know all the sandwiches were gone and I felt at peace with the world. I saw my body as I drifted toward the light, only to come crashing back to finish the cheese fries. There isn't a word to describe that sort of perfection. I rolled upstairs to dream of groupies feeding me sandwiches.

Surprisingly I was the first one up the next day. I headed downstairs for water, and waited while everyone rolled out of bed. Art's mom got breakfast out of course. I haven't had Sugar Crisp in probably 20 years. Sugar Bear is looking good, and I sang the jingle along with him, you really can't get enough of that Sugar Crisp. We got packed and headed back down to the strip, by night it is clubs and after hours bars and the home of culinary perfection. By day they have lots of interesting stores, Like the Pennsylvania Macaroni company. We wandered checking out the fresh food that we know wouldn't keep on the 6 hour trip home, but it was fun just to poke around. I stopped in a spice store, looking at the rubs and marinades until I realized that my cooking during the week consists of opening a can of soup. It was fun to imagine that I would use spices...yes my life is pathetic. Back in the car, and lucky for us we didn't hit rain until the mid point of Pennsylvania. We stopped at a rest stop while listening to Cheap Trick on Howard Stern. Headed into the Bob's Big Boy, because I'm pretty sure if you stop at a rest stop and there is a Bob's Big Boy you have to go there. Apparently their steamer was down, so meatloaf was not available, after Art pried my hands from the waitress' neck I ordered the hot turkey sandwich. White bread and gravy is where its at. Before getting back on the road, I hit the men's room and on the way out I stopped to pay a quarter to get my weight and my lucky number, I think the machine was broken because it just blinked "URGNNADIE". We stopped back in Carlisle again to get gas, there were far fewer unsavory characters this time. Art wanted me to drive, so I ended up white knuckling an unfamiliar car through the rest of the rain. If you are wondering Art snores in the car also. We got a little relief from the weather after crossing the Delaware, and I relaxed once we were on 287.

12 hours of driving in the rain during a 36 hour trip isn't exactly relaxing. Thankfully we got some good stories out of it. Not too many hi jinks, but you have to remember what happens on the tour bus stays on the tour bus. Robert, if you ever read this, thanks for the hospitality. I don't have a whole lot to write about this week, so I might just make something up over the weekend. Hopefully there will be a fireworks mishap or some sort of binge drinking going on over the holiday for me to report on.

Stay tuned.

Something Different...

2006-06-29T08:20:00.000-07:00

My last blog reminded me of a phenomenon that I've been meaning to discuss. Bears. No not the large omnivorous animals that now terrorize suburbia, nor the large hairy men that garner some sort of following in the homosexual community. I'm describing something that actually seems to happen to me a lot. I tend to congregate with groups of unavailable women. Most of them I'm planted firmly in the friend zone, some are married, some have boyfriends, and some don't date guys that use words like "omnivorous" and "congregate". Not a big deal, I appreciate the symbiotic nature of the relationship. Much like the rhinos and the small birds that eat the insects that try and nettle the rhinos, we each have a purpose. The ladies purpose is simple, they keep me from looking like someone who just buried a body near the railroad tracks, making it easier for me to try and pick up women and go home with fake numbers and memories of dirty looks. They also have advanced scouting information, somewhat like a spider sense about other women in the bar which can come in handy. My purpose is even easier, seeing as I'm the size of an offensive lineman, my job is to block. Generally I stand near the back of the group and keep my eyes open. Usually a couple of looks or strategic positioning keep the socially maladjusted away. However, lets go over the bear situation.

The reference is based on some old tricks I learned in boy scouts. Its very simple, If you keep your campsite clean and don't leave treats out, the bears won't come bother you. However if you leave an open case of Ho-Hos in the middle of the campground, you will be overrun by woodland creatures. In the case of the bears at the bar, typically they tend to be men that are obviously not dating material, usually older, sometimes misshapen, and mostly don't have anything to offer. Basically me in two years. What generally happens is after a few drinks the bears will get close, and one of the girls will either make eye contact or not pay attention and allow the bear to approach the campground. Then if I have my A game and the girls realize what is going on the fences go up and Yogi and Boo Boo don't grab the picnic basket. My Ranger Smith impression is successful. However, what tends to happen is the girls in an effort to be polite or adventurous engage the animals on mutual ground. I call this "feeding the bears", its not recommended because it makes my job harder. Once a bear has been fed, I have a single purpose of removing that bear from the campground. Once I am focused on that task it makes it easier for other bears to start sniffing around. Sometimes they are deflected, sometimes the campground is overrun, and I have to go start drinking heavily so I can with stand the painful stories I will hear when the bar closes.

People sometimes ask me if I have advice on how to pick a girl up in a bar. I laugh and laugh until I realize they are serious. I have no game, if that isn't obvious I don't know what is. I intellectualize everything, I'm generally antisocial towards strangers, and I'm certainly not model material. I generally run the anti-game, which is I sit at the bar and try to avoid listening to the diatribes of the unwashed masses. Eventually either someone approaches me or I get thrown into an unavoidable conversation. This actually works pretty well, its not exactly proactive, but generally you at least meet someone that has something to say. Occasionally if I'm feeling saucy, I'll be on the look out for eye contact, and then go talk to someone. I don't have any real pick up lines other than "you got a perty mouth" or "you'd look real nice in the trunk of my car". Those don't seem to work so well, I think its the audience though. I hate small talk because frankly I don't care, and I really hate casual dating even more, so the chances of anything materializing from my witty repartee, is slim. A lot of times my best bet is when I'm working, if I'm at the front door I get first shot at any girl in the place. I usually ask how everyone is doing, most people don't answer, if a girl seems genuinely interested in how I am doing, then I either compliment them or make fun of them, either way I can find out if they have a sense of humor, and then I at least have a foot in the door. Unfortunately, I don't run game as well as I blog. Besides most of my references are lost on people anyway. My advice though for anyone is don't pop your collar, do be funny, and be nice to the bouncer, because he can tell you where all the ho's be at and which ones brought some other dude home last night.

Pittsburgh story is forth coming.

Prelude

2006-06-28T10:53:00.000-07:00

Well I got some responses about my last blog. It seems like it only happens when I'm unhappy with what I write. I don't know, I guess you can't please everybody, especially yourself. Actually that's not true you can please yourself just try and do it when you are home not at the supermarket. Kelly, I'll get to Pittsburgh in a bit, I think there are more stories to catch up on. On a side note, I've been worried that the picture I've been painting of myself in my blog isn't quite... what's the word...savory. I like to think that I'm not so one dimensional, writing stories about drinking and going to rock shows, then I caught myself singing along to Thin Lizzy in my car on my way home. So much for being a Renaissance man, but I suppose if I'm stuck doing a bad Hemingway impression in NJ, so be it, as long as people enjoy it.

Last Thursday I had to head home to bounce. Like I've said before, Summer in the North Jersey bar scene is pretty miserable at times. Thursday's bar crowd was actually decent, the aberration was that there were an unusually high number of attractive girls in the bar. Yeah Yeah, I'm shallow whatever, you tend to notice these things. Believe me when you are stuck at a door checking IDs its not a bad thing to have a little eye candy standing around to check out in between innings of the Yankees game. For a bouncer there is a strange corollary that happens when demographics get shifted toward the hot girl end, you get a larger number of creepy guys. Thursday was no exception, there were two guys parked on one side of the bar staring across, presumably looking for a nubile co-ed to store in their freezer. Then there was the guy I threw out. Guys, If you can't stand up reasonably straight from alcohol, its a fair assumption that if you do laps around the bar and stand next to whatever female you come across, you probably aren't taking any of them home. Bars like having girls in attendance, girls bring guys and guys drink, so its in my best interest to make sure the girls don't feel like they are being cast in Saw 3.

So this one guy was making laps creeping out everybody, I saw him and pointed him out to Art, so we watched him come back around to my end of the bar. I grabbed him and said "Time to leave", he replied in what I think was mandarin Chinese that he was with these guys and was ok. I said "ok finish your beer and leave", so now he is hiding behind what I think are his friends watching me stare at him until he finishes his beer. Which he does and actually leaves, avoiding me doing my Darth Vader impression and taking him off his feet and out the door. Later, the guys he was hiding behind asked me what happened, they didn't know the guy, he just asked them if he could stand there so I wouldn't toss him. As a kicker he was apparently rubbing the one guys back. I just gave everyone reading this the chills, so I would imagine that back rubbing victim went home and scrubbed his body in the shower like he was decontaminating from nuclear fallout. Not much else to report, I had some bright chick come out to smoke and tell me that I didn't look happy. No really I like dealing with adult adolescents with the interpersonal skills of Rain Man. Thanks for trying to brighten my day, now stop talking because you bother me.

Friday needless to say I was late for work, sleep is precious don't ever squander it. I limped through my morning at the office. Apparently my karma hit a speed bump during its rapid descent, and I was bailed out in the afternoon by a late lunch paid for by my company president. We got to eat outside and relax and comeback to the office with just enough time to close up email. Lunch ended up fueling the fire for a few happy hour drinks with some co-workers. I had to bail out of there to get back to Morristown to meet up with someone else who I work with. Its nice having some younger people in the office that actually go out, it makes me feel like less of a degenerate. My friend Kim called me and told me to meet her and her friends at the Grasshopper, Kim is married but any married chick that will bring her single friends out is worth hanging out with. I got to the 'Hops about 9ish, started upstairs, went downstairs, back upstairs. I was force feeding the girls drinks, not with any intention, I was keeping them on my pace, which I guess is generally a bad idea if you aren't the size of a VW. The girls were impressed with how many people I knew, I found it funny since I work in a bar in the town I grew up in. But I guess pointing out the degenerates and problem drinkers is an impressive skill. Maybe I can set up some sort of carnival act. The girls just didn't have the stamina and went home around 12:30 or 1. I think they had a good time, or hopefully they will only remember the good stuff. There is a nice shot of me and the ladies in my Pics page. I went through a stage where most of the pictures of me drinking involved the horn hands and my tongue sticking out. I think I used to pretend I was at a Kiss concert. A little bit of that resurrected for that photo.

Anyway, I headed back to the frog for closing time, things get a little fuzzy, I think I drunk texted a lot of people and said things that were probably off color and inappropriate. To those of you in the area, if you see me wobbly and probably setting up the next series of blogs, smack the phone out of my hand, please. Art ended up dragging me to after hours, which I definitely needed on 4 hours sleep and a full day of drinking. I didn't really see much since my eyes were half closed, but I believe someone got sick and also broke the shower rod. Kelly I think you were there some confirmation is needed. Anyway, I eventually became horizontal and I woke up at 9am stuck to a leather sofa. Did I mention it was like a crock pot in that apartment. Naked Gun was on TV while I did my impression of Han Solo emerging from carbonite. Thankfully I was a block away from my apartment, but lucky me ran into my roommate who was going to coach soccer, nothing like doing the walk of shame without anything to be ashamed about and running into someone you know. Thankfully the AC was cranked so I could hibernate in anticipation of my Pittsburgh trip.

More to come.

Tuesday's gone with the wind...

2006-06-27T14:29:00.000-07:00

Last week was interesting to say the least. Apparently New Jersey has a monsoon season now and we are in the middle of it. It was uncharacteristically hot the beginning of last week (Thanks SUVs!) and we headed into thunderstorms at the end of the week. I'm pretty sure we've doubled the record amount of rainfall for June. As a precaution I've started lining up animals 2 by 2, just in case the big guy calls. I'm not really sure why he would call me seeing as he hasn't let me win the lottery or struck down the guy who took Airwolf off the air, actually he hasn't answered any of my prayers, but the lord works in mysterious ways so its good to be prepared. I'm not sure what my landlord is going to say when he sees the ring tailed lemurs I hijacked, but the Lord will provide. If I don't get to build an ark, maybe he can throw me a bone and set up that Parker Posey, Lisa Loeb three way I've been asking for before he washes all us sinners away.

Tuesday, I skipped out on an in office poker game. I'm not sure where gambling lies in the company handbook, but I'm not going to rat anyone out. I should have stayed, something tells me that it would have been easy money. Apparently my co-workers have been cyber stalking me, but as of yet have been unable to find my myspace profile. I'm safe for now, but I may have to move my literary exploits over to a safer haven. Anyway, what I left work for was the Blues Traveler show at the Stone Pony, in beautiful Asbury Park, NJ. Thankfully I had crash space in Point Pleasant so I had a reprieve from the long commute. I realize that this is yet another band that was popular in the 90s. I think this confirms that I'm getting old, maybe I should go to the Warp tour and hang out with the emo kids and pop punkers just so I keep in touch with America's youth. Though the minute I see some dipshit with a faux hawk and a popped collar over his Dashboard Confessional shirt, I'll probably go on a rampage and throw him through a stand full of overpriced hoodies.

I booked out of work to meet Art, Kevin, and Sean at the house in Point Pleasant. Its only a 20 minute drive, and apparently 20 minutes was all it took for me to realize what an idiot I am for driving an hour each way to work. We had a few beers and played the sport of kings. If you don't know, wiffle ball is America's true national pastime. I put on a display of power not seen since BALCO stopped home delivery to the Bonds residence. My pitching wasn't as good the slider wasn't biting, but it didn't really matter. Babe Ruth was smiling on us as we drank and ate while swinging the bat. The humidity did start to get to us, so we walked down to Jenkinson's to eat and grab a cab. For a Tuesday the boardwalk was pretty busy, especially for early in the summer. I got a slice of chicken wing pizza, the two great tastes that go great together. We sat an people watched for a bit, wondering what egg most of the people walking around were hatched from. There was a pretty good collection of mouth breathers and aspiring juvenile delinquents. The general consensus was that if any of us ever had daughters, they aren't leaving the house, and that there is a reason people shouldn't live near the shore year round. We called a cab and escaped the South Jersey Morlocks for Asbury Park.

Asbury was once a great resort town, which is highly ironic considering that the climate is pretty much the same now as it was back in the day. The cab veered through the remnants of seaside amusements, that is now peppered with redevelopment. The Stone Pony is a historic venue, I think mostly for its health code violations. Actually there is a big Springsteen connection. Springsteen is like Bigfoot in south jersey, everyone has a sighting story, they all are roughly similar, you see something you vaguely recognize and then it disappears or does something ordinary but seems magical. Not that I would mind meeting the Boss, its just the reverence of the situation that seems funny to me. We bought tickets at the door and headed for the outside bar, since apparently they were importing hot air from Africa as a special treat that night. The outside bar was mobbed, and we got special warm beers, apparently the Pony was borrowing the Quizno's playbook everything was toasty. The band came on and opened with "The Devil Went Down to Georgia". I've seen Blues Traveler before, and I remember being impressed the last time too. They are really good musicians and as "Jammy" as they are, their songs have good structure. Granted I get a little lost in the lyrical content, but generally that is every band's weak point. John Popper wasn't looking Behind the Music thin, but he wasn't back to Samoan big either. I think he is pretty underrated as a vocalist goes, because he just hammered out the hits all night inside of a club that was starting to resemble an Easy Bake oven. We had to stop having beers at one point during the show because we remembered that you need some water in your body to live. Eventually we found a spot with some ventilation.

We escaped the Pony before the end of the encore to call our cab. While recovering from our John McCain concert experience, we waited outside the Vietnamese Tiger Box that is the Stone Pony and watched 2 cars get pulled over for going the wrong way. Easy money for the APPD, when drunk kids unfamiliar with the area are cruising to a concert in daddy's beemer. Eventually our cabbie showed up and gave us a dissertation on local fishing and oil based paints on the way back to Point Pleasant. Once home we realized that late night food wasn't readily available, so Art and I went looking for 7-11. After traversing north and backtracking eventually we hit the mother lode. Microwavable sandwiches and Combos are a godsend. Throw in a healthy dose of Gatorade and some beef jerky and you are looking at a pleasant morning. Not that we were going to be hung over, we stopped drinking, it was just the fact that we had all lost 15 lbs in sweat and water soluble minerals.

Tuesday night I was concerned that a bear or maybe a narwhal had encroached into the other bedroom of the house. Turns out that Art has a snoring problem, I was actually concerned that his sleep apnea might actually stop my heart and those in a surrounding 5km area. Thankfully tragedy was averted when I stuffed a sock in his mouth and threw him into the basement. I might actually want to go check on him. In the morning I erased all the benefit of staying close to work by getting slightly lost, I was mostly on time though, besides I do my best work between the hours of 11:45 and 11:55 anyway.

I have more to update later so stay tuned.

Catching up (Part 2)

2006-06-19T09:08:00.000-07:00

So where was I? I left you at the Starland Ballroom, which is a great place to see music, its easier to get to than the city and they get good acts. Granted its in the middle of nowhere so there is really nothing to do before or after the show, but I think that pretty much sums up every venue in NJ, its not like you can go bar hopping at the Arts Center considering the grounds are bisected by a toll highway. Don't get me started on the Meadowlands, though they are constructing the largest money pit in North America. Apparently Xanadu is going to have indoor skiing, laser tag, shopping, and who knows what else. I'm sure that if you can't get people to show up to see a Stanley Cup winning hockey team or one of the best teams in basketball over the last 5 years, they'll be lining up to pay 75 dollars to climb an indoor plastic cliff to reach the summit and eat krispy kreme donuts and then ski down a mechanical mountain covered in Astroturf. Sounds like a plan.

Anyway last weekend I worked at the bar Friday. Its summer so the regulars escape to the beach, to binge drink with recent college graduates and have anonymous sex with someone that paid 6000 dollars to share a bedroom infested with cryptosporidium mold, its only a 1/4 mile to the beach though. No I'm not bitter. Anyway, the drop in local bar patrons allows room for the socially inept and people that live close to Pennsylvania that are afraid to traverse the Parkway. I don't really understand it, but I see plenty of IDs from the hinterlands. So Friday I divided my time between barely being conscious waiting for my chance to throttle someone from the Delaware River Valley and wishing that I could drive down the shore and throttle the people that made space for these web footed mongoloids. Apparently I have issues. Saturday, I caught up with an old friend who was in town for early Fathers Day activities. Then I drove down to Red Bank to hang out with some work peeps outside of the confines of our wage slavery. Red Bank is a hip town, good bar scene, I kept my demons in check, its best not to let your co-workers see you arm wrestle for money or defile public buildings. At least that's my policy, your mileage may vary. Not too much else I can say, the night was mostly uneventful, good weather. I had to run out of south jersey early Sunday though because Yankee baseball was in order.

First game of the year for me, its very late, I usually end up at a game early in the season, typically one that should be rained out but isn't and I'm forced to down 8 dollar beers for warmth. Yes force, don't judge. I was parked in the bleachers for this game, so no beer during the game, which was actually perfect because even though I took it easy the night before I still fell victim to the osmotic effect of alcohol. To cure my dehydration I had 2 hot dogs and a souvenir cup of soda during the first inning. Babe Ruth would have been proud. Quickly followed by a second soda. I was going to have 2 more hot dogs but my brain decided that any more lips and ears and I might stroke out, and I hadn't seen the whole game yet. The bleachers are an adventure when you are shaped like a small grizzly bear, the lack of backs and arm rests leaves you open to all sorts of elbows and bumping. I tried my best to keep confined, but people need concessions. So I stood up, sat down, leaned, shifted in some sort of deranged hokey pokey game. The left foot was definitely in, out, and shaken all about. I did enjoy the crowd though, a few years back they stopped the beer in the cheap seats, I think because there was a human sacrifice during a Red Sox game. So its toned down, but Oakland right fielder Milton Bradley still got an ear full. The best being after he trickled in a relay throw, apparently the bleachers have seen better arms on a snake. Priceless.

Last week was back to the daily grind, I've been trying to stay away from the vending machine seeing as its bikini season. I don't want the old plum smuggler to be overly form fitting, the ladies can only take so much. I got new glasses, since my most recent pair was lost, and I had been using the old backup pair that wore out last week. Even with the insurance discount, I paid quite a premium to play Mr. Potatohead. Trying on glasses is a ridiculous experience when your head looks like it should be carved into a mountain next to Abe Lincoln's. I do wish I had a plastic derby and mustache to put on while trying out glasses, that would be fantastic. Thankfully the Lens Crafter girl was easy on the eyes so getting robbed blind wasn't so bad. I'm out of ocular references so lets move on.

This past weekend was action packed, Friday I raced down after work to LBI. A last minute fishing invite was all I needed to keep me away from home. I hit the island just before 8pm and stopped in at the Beach Haven fishery, I paid 20 dollars for dinner, which is outrageous when you consider that it was an appetizer and a sandwich with fries. But then when you realize that it was clams on the half shell and a fresh Yellowfin tuna salad sandwich on ciabatta bread, and I got to eat it on one of the best weather days I can remember during a nice sunset, it starts to make sense. I never want to eat canned tuna again, but that might not be practical seeing as I'm mostly land locked. Anyway, I headed down to my friends bungalow, a house behind a house that is his summer rental. The ceilings were disturbingly low, and though I could stand up straight I still developed a complex and was walking around like a Neanderthal. The plan was to go out for a bit, and go to bed early to go fishing at 5 AM. We headed down to the Hudson House and had a few suds and played video golf till about midnight, when we headed home and I curled up on what might be the most uncomfortable couch devised by man. Exposed wooden armrests and probably 66 inches long means that my 75 inch body was packed into something that used to be an medieval torture device. Around 3am the other roommates came home in altered states, nearly walking through a screen door. Some late night phone hi jinks and a lack of REM sleep and I emerged from the Iron Maiden ready to fish.

We headed out, it was a little cool but the weather was going to be beautiful. We were just off the beach when the Bunker were coming out of the water looking for smaller bait fish. I was making bunker jokes (Archie, Hitler, whatever worked) when we started treble casting. The hope is that there are large schools of Striped Bass or Bluefish that are chasing the Bunker which are chasing the smaller bait fish. The point of treble casting is you throw a hook that looks like a tiny grappling hook across the school and literally drag one into the boat. You hook 'em wherever it sticks. Its surprisingly effective, once on the boat you live line them, which means you stick a hook through their back and throw the Bunker back in the water hopefully to be chased and then eaten by a larger fish that you will then eat. Its completely barbaric and actually kind of fun, granted I have liberal guilt, but I'm not apologizing we eat what we catch and they are fish for crying out loud. However all this live lining was unsuccessful, the bigger fish were sleeping in like I should have. So we headed off shore to go fluking. I caught a delicious Sea Bass, and we had a couple of other keeper fluke on the boat. We headed in around lunch time, I hopped in my car and headed back to Morristown, I had a party to miss and work to go to. The ride home was interesting, no iPod so I was stuck with the radio. Thankfully there was good classic rock on. About 20 miles up the Parkway, I noticed that my eyes were closing and I was weaving like a long haul trucker. Unfortunately I don't have access to crystal meth like long haul truckers do, so I needed to pull over. I napped at the Monmouth rest area, for about 15 minutes which was all I really needed. I was disappointed I didn't get solicited for sex or harassed by the police or something, I figured that was the norm since I don't really sleep at rest areas. I made it home safely to install two air conditioners for my Mom, and then enter a coma while watching the US Open. Work Saturday night was uneventful.

Yesterday, I mooched some backyard pool access and got a little sun. Very little seeing as I'm cancer prone and have an office job. Thanks genetics! Went over to my Mom's to eat my catch. Called my Dad even though he forgot my birthday, eye for an eye only makes the world blind I suppose. So that brings us up to date, I'll try and keep up with my weeks events from now on, I don't think the broad strokes work out as well as my little vignettes about the day to day operations. So stay tuned there should be more this week.

J