Conundrum

Things went well today. Swine flu has hit and terrified every living being in school. A global plague is upon us, gloom and doom, etc. Whatever. Class was cancelled today because the Professor had flu like symptoms and stayed home. That is nice, but given that it is just the flu and the majority of people are virile young adults, shouldn't we all just get it, build our immunities, and carry on?

I just got over a head cold, so I am a little bitter. It is the middle of mid term examinations, and I am not totally prepared for them. I inherited a pair of sweatpants that give me the most severe mangina I have ever witnessed. Surprisingly, it's pretty comfortable.

The wife leaves for Denver tomorrow until Friday night. I have a midterm Friday afternoon and I think sometime between the end of the midterm and picking her up at the airport, I might be able to squeeze in a viewing of Zombieland. One can hope for the little decadences, right?

My family is coming up for a quick visit in two weeks, and I have to say that I am little homesick. Going back to whence I came from is now a pickle though, seeing as how most of the family has either moved, or is in the process of moving, to Alabama. I daydream of going home for Christmas, then remember that no family will be there. It makes me sad.

What a downer am I. A bright spark to my week is a Woody Harrelson vehicle. If I was doing lines of coke off a stripper's backside, I'd have the depression trifecta.

It could be worse though. It's cold outside, but the heat in the apartment is free. The wife has put up with me for the last six weeks like a real trooper. I am almost starting to understand the law. Then again, minimum wage factory work looks more and more appealing every day.

Godlike Powers

Last night, the wife and I had our date night. It began with her pulling me out of the leather recliner with the voracity and sound effects of a mother pulling the day old bandaid off of a child's skinned knee. We then went and saw a movie, did some shopping at the Target (because we will never, ever bow down to those cotton pickin' so's and so's at the Wally World), then home for me to retire to the basement with all of her laundry and her to make the bed and watch numb3rs.

We went and saw the movie 9. It was visually stunning. For ninety minutes. If I had just smoked a big fattie behind the theater with my addiction counseling wife before seeing it, it would have been better than even fucking Highlander. unfortunately, I do not smoke fatties and enjoy movies with a plot that can go from asinine to compelling but not the other way around.

Jesus, what kind of balls do you have to have to make a picture more action packed than a Steven Seagal movie but with a less legible plot and dialog?

Apparently, regular balls. But seven more than usual.

So, in a fit of benevolence, I have decided to save all the competents and gentle readers of this blog $8.00. See this movie at your own risk. The only redeeming qualities are the visuals and the creepy post-apocalyptic backdrop. If you find the urge to waste money and 90 minutes of your life, I have a live action substitute that you can probably get through netflix and thus avoid any human contact at all...

Synchronicity

Between classes this afternoon, I was reading a friend's blog about how nothing has really changed in the past few weeks. Great, nothing happening is better than than dam breaking and the village meeting its great reward under a billion gallons of water. I went to class with a little brighter demeanour, but that was all.

Class was, as usual, informative and wholly overwhelming. So it goes with new material. Stay positive. I am going to school to gain the tools and knowledge to actually make a difference in this world. I know, the world needs ditch diggers too, and without them we would be waist deep in our own shit, but no one remembers Diamitus Shitterius, the first guy to start digging the Cloaca Maxima. People think of the Romans and it gives them a warm fuzzy to think about all the neat inventions they made that allow us our modern basic conveniences of toilets, fresh water, and hedonism.

I got on the bus for the ride home with several points of contract law going through my head and colliding with each other in a scene reminiscent of Scanners. I instinctively said "Good Afternoon" to the shuttle driver, and plopped down in the back of the bus. The seat was warmer than my posterior. I had sat directly in a seat occupied by someone not a minute before me.

I immediately inhaled deeply through my nose. For some reason, I relate the heat of a freshly vacated seat to the ghosts of farts past being released upon disturbance. If there is such a haunting, it usually stinks and I get blamed, or at least judged. Why I inhale in expectation of the event, I can only think that maybe if I filter the air around me via my nose and lungs, the fallout from a previous occupants transgressions will be lessened. It's purely a selfish way to preserve my dignity.

But I digress.

The point is, barring a fart from the past, that I am taking the heat from some stranger for no other reason than I randomly chose to sit there. It's a feeling that is creepy in one respect, but mildly reassuring in another. By existing and sitting, someone before me helped me keep warm by transplanting their heat to a seat that I quickly occupied. Even passively, people help other people out. I find that comforting.

Terms of Art

The top (and only) three Google searches that will lead you here:

Facebook Goddess

Wookie bush

Children sad brush

Guess which one was a search from Germany?

Things are heating up for me. The initial shock has passed and reduced itself to major panic in the classroom. Lethargy holds sway when I come home, bordered by sudden fits of productivity about every hour or so. Only 93 more weeks of actual classroom time. That's less than two years....

Vivid Dreams of Protean Venues

So, the wife made a red curry dish last night that, while delicious at the time, has left my cinnamon ring a vermilion shade of burning. Maybe that was the cause of such vivid dreams last night. What do I remember?

I remember it being a get together with my two best friends. We were going out for drinks and then to a French movie that we had all seen before. Something totally frilly and un-macho, but really, really good. Probably the French version of Say Anything or somesuch. Regardless, we started the evening at the first incarnation of a bar that we used to frequent.

When you dream of familiar places and spaces, do these turn into a whole new landscape while still retaining their familiarity? They do with me. The weird thing is is that they are always consistent. I have a warped mirror world in my dreams, at once familiar, but so totally alien as to make me wonder about past lives and my subconscious affinity for hair metal.

Anyhow, the bar was uneventful. It was the beginning of a going away party for me (ah subconscious, are you finally accepting the move?), but I had to pay for everyone. I went across the street to an ATM to pay the bar tab, and was assaulted by an old woman on a pub crawl. She kept berating me with questions about where to go next. I finally sent her to a martini bar. I knew I was running late, so I skipped out on paying the tab and went to the theater.

My friends were already inside, so I got a ticket, was assaulted by a trio straight from the J Crew catalog with their asshole knobs turned all the way to eleven. After spending forty dollars on Milk Duds, I found my seat, meeting vague people from my past as I walked down the aisles of the theater.

Suddenly, a Springer worthy fight broke out during the trailer for a Stomp the Yard esque movie. A man no taller than my knee slowly walked up to me as the theater erupted into a full scale riot all around me. He was slow, deliberate, and looked exactly like R.L. Burnside in miniature. I threw up my hands in defeat as he slowly pulled a butterfly knife the size of his leg out of his jacket pocket. My fight or flight instinct kicked into fight and I pulled a chair off the floor and beat him relentlessly. Then the movie came on.

The riot ended instantly, Burnside disappeared and I sat in the dark, bored and wondering if I should buy more Milk Dudes. I woke soon after.

Weird, huh? Well, enough time wasted. I have to read another 100 pages before Monday. Best get started.

Procrastination

So, I was checking my old email accounts to put off studying for a few minutes and I found out that one person stills reads this damn thing, or at least checks in every few months. Hey lady, nice seeing you again.

What has changed since my last post? What hasn't? I got into a law school, quit my job, moved north, and got a facebook account that has let me reconnect to a million people I forgot existed. The new town is temperate and filled with people who are genuinely nice to each other. I am suffering from severe PTSD from the experience.

Example: A few days ago, I went to the DMV to get a new driver's license. The lady at the front desk greeted me with a smile and a courteous 'Good Morning and welcome to our facility, how may I help you?" I stood there shocked for a moment, recounting all my previous experiences at the DMV in my home state. Visions of grease stained signs reading 'Line Forms Here' vacant expressions from staff, and a belligerent 'You're in the wrong line for that!' to answer any of my questions flooded my vision. My wife, noticing my quick glances around the room looking for a solid item to curl up in a foetal position under, took the reigns.

"We need new driver's licenses." she said.

The lady behind the information desk actually lit up, maybe from the beginnings of my hyperventilation, and said, "Well then, welcome to the state of _____. Do you have proper identification?" Then she rattled off a few official documents. I reached into my pocket and produced a passport (the day before, I scoured the internets for any scrap of information that would make the DMV experience as painless as possible). She looked at the blue book in my hand and said, "well, I will stop right there. Here are some materials to study. You will have to take a knowledge exam first thing. Don't worry, just read over the book and you'll do fine." She leaned a bit over the desk, "between you and me,"she looked left and right over her shoulder, "pay attention to the school bus section." And then she leaned back in her chair and gave the wife and I a wink. An honest to God, in the know, wink.

She told us a few quiet spots in the building where we could study. We picked one and spent about half an hour reading the pamphlet. After that, we went back to the woman, who gave us a number and told us to wait behind her. I had sat down for maybe two minutes when my number was called. Another woman took all of my documents and pointed me to a testing booth. I missed four questions (look out bicyclists) but the test shut itself down when I got the requisite thirty questions of forty right. I stood up from the testing booth and a gentleman behind the counter pointed at me and told me to come over. He returned my documents, asked me if I wanted to register to vote, and said my new license would be in the mail in about two weeks.

Total DMV time, including studying: Less than an hour.

With that out of the way, and school starting next week, things are lazy right now. Our total move time, from signing the lease to unloading the last box from the moving truck: Two and half hours. With a break for lunch. Everything is going so smoothly. Everyone here is so nice. Now, I am just wondering when the proverbial shit is going to hit the fan.

Update`

I know I have neglected this place again, but I have an update. I was reading over this lovely dissertation in deprivation today and noticed a post from the past. It has repeated itself where I work. Now, a different lady I work with has been confined to the streamlined low techery of the scooter. I shit you not.

All I can do is shrug my shoulders and wait for another weekend full of studying. I'm stuck in some sort of loop of time where I age but the same things go on over and over, with just a little twist. I swear, if Keanu Reeves comes into my office and starts using his 'I'm a serious actor and not Ted from Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure, dude' voice, I will go completely insane and take both of you, gentle readers, with me.

Curse my Insensitive Lifesaving Ways!

This really, really cracked me up. I am really, really going to hell.

Spring Cleaning

I have a multitude of things to do, but they are so boring and monotonous that I do not even want to try to begin them. I have to send out my legal disclosures (Chuckie gave a little too much cash to the Miller brewing company one night and subsequently spent the rest of the evening in jail. Another story for another loathsome time.) which is the same three minor infractions of the law written five different ways. Some places wanted case numbers, others rulings, and finally, two wanted a narrative description of my actions and the subsequent outcomes. Jesus, I feel bad enough for doing it in the first place, now I have to shout it out in five different styles to complete strangers? Awesome.

I have another case of the blahs. It is going to get balls out cold where I live over the next couple days, which destroys any motivation I have on going to the gym after work. Also, I weighed myself on Friday and came in at 380 pounds. I usually hover around 375, but I am worried my metabolism has finally given up completely.

Everything has fallen into a stagnant routine that I do not want to be in. I know what I have to do to get out of it, but that calls for even more stagnation. God, I need to go out or something. Sorry to bore all of you, gentle readers. Oh wait, no one reads this anymore. I feel like a hot buttered piece of fail right now.

Facebook You Heinous Bitch Goddess

So, I cancelled my facebook account. Well, I did as much as I could. I made it no longer accessible to either me or anyone else in the world. You never lose your facebook account. It will always be out there, waiting to bring down your political career for friending a porn star or ruining your marriage because one night you just might have been drunk enough to not tell if it really was a woman and not a goat shaped tree stump. Whatever.

In other news, I have rediscovered a timeless pet peeve of mine. Last night, while making steaks for the wife, she decided to microwave a potato. She put it in, and, like all foods she prepares in the microwave, used a preset setting. Well, about four and a half minutes into the five minute cycle, she hits the stop button, takes her potato out, closes the microwave, and walks away. What is left is a thirty second timer staring out at all who dare meet its gaze. Maybe I have some sort of phobia against stopped timers, like they will start up again and doom us all to the inevitable fate we all must face, but in thirty seconds. Maybe I am too damn lazy to read the analog clock in front of me, especially when I am trying to roughly time how long a steak has been in the skillet.

I had asked her before, more than once mind you, to clear the timer when she was done. She never does, so I clear it as soon as she leaves the room with whatever food item she was nuking. Last night was no exception. Unfortunately for the microwave, I had a touch of the roid rage from too much treadmilling at the gym, I ended up hitting the cancel button about four dozen times in two seconds. The wife asked me what was wrong with the microwave. I explained my pet peeve again and she said she would try to hit the cancel button in the future.

This morning, she made oatmeal in the microwave. My life felt like it stalled out four seconds before it ended.

गुड मोर्निंग माय हिंदू फ्रिएंड्स

So, I found this little button that lets you convert your text to Hindi. Awesome! It almost makes me not want to end my life in the hopes that eternal suffering is a little better than earthly complacency. I have been thinking of this blog over the last few days and have decided that I need to rekindle the spark, the spirit, the martini glass of thirty weight that this blog and its predecessor had. In that need, I present a poop story.

I awoke this morning the same way I awoke yesterday morning, ten minutes before the alarm went off and a scorching pain running through my legs. I have been going to the gym for the last two days, subjecting myself to almost twenty five minutes of rigorous three mile an hour walking and superhuman five mile an hour bicycling while jamming out to the greatest band ever, QUEEN. I have to wait an extra thirty minutes after work for a bus that will get me to the gym. By the time I get to the gym, the only thing I want to do is go across the street to the bar, get hammered, and possibly try meth for the first time so I can lose my virginity in a shitty, shitty mensroom. But, I persevere, get my buttermilk ass firmly planted on the exercise bike, and in no time I am listening to the theme from Flash Gordon for the fourteenth time and my heart is ready to explode.

So, every morning (for the last two days anyway), I give a little stretch, pop all of my joints, then try not to cry as I make water while greeting the sunrise. Then, I shower, towel off, put on undergarments and black socks pulled up to my knees, and make the wife some sort of hot breakfast (no pun intended). This morning, I decided to shake things up a bit from the drab scrambled eggs and toast. I thought to myself, 'self, some sort of fusion is needed. What if I combined the scrambled eggs and toast... But how...?' Suddenly, a vision of baguettes and surrender flashed into my head. I dipped the bread into the scrambled egg mixture, then placed the concoction into a buttered pan. I called it French toast.

It paled in comparison to the curry that the wife made the night before. I pondered the comparison of breakfast to dinner foods and how they ranked against each other when they weren't even in the same category, let alone the same time of day. I worked via the scientific method, thinking maybe the nutritional content of the base ingredients decided the superiority of the meal. I thought of chick peas, coriander, curry, and the 5 grams of fiber in the whole wheat pita we used instead of nan bread.

Then, it hit me. I hadn't taken a shit in over two days. My body was holding all it could to keep from losing itself in my exercise routine. I had at least one ounce of hot sauce, jalapeno, or curry equivalent at every meal since then. I don't know about you, but if you eat the right amount of spicy, high fiber foods and wait a day or two, your colon actually screams "Tora! Tora! Tora!" in whale song. At least mine did.

I ran the two steps it took to get from kitchen stove to bathroom toilet, yanked down my boxers, and discovered what a champagne bottle feels during the decork and pour. After what seems an eternity of cascading hot liquids, my fourth eye closed itself to the world yet again, I wiped, and rose. What I beheld in the toilet took me by surprise. A single island of fetid curry, supported by a single beam of Brown that extended into the cave at the bottom of the bowl looked back at me. The crest of the shit volcano on this island looked as if it were mere inches to being even with the toilet seat. I knew this couldn't be true because I checked the back of my wiping hand and found no trace of excreta. As I flushed I said to my self, "Damn, this is why I want to be a lawyer."

One day, gentle reader, I will explain the dangerous and pointless reliance people have on facebook. Until then, no one is going to read this cacophonous creation.

Subconscious Ramblings

Last night I had a dream that I was walking across a university quad with a friend of mine who looked exactly like one of the guys who got killed in the Sopranos. We were trying to formulate an economic plan for the future in these uncertain economic times. We decided on starting a fake power company because we could simply charge a higher price for existing electricity and not have any tangible assets to be seized. We agreed on the plan with a handshake and kept walking.

My friend then proceeded to put on a blindfold and slowly walk behind me. In front of me were a dozen over complicated riding lawn mowers with university employees cutting grass. These machines were regular commercial riding mowers, but instead of 52 inch decks, each mower had a trunk in front with a pair of automatic scissors attached to them, cutting each blade of grass individually.

I am thinking about going to law school. Thinking so hard that I am going to take the admissions exam for a second time in the hopes of improving my score. I am tired of studying, but only have one more month. The wife is excited to move to a more northerly climate and so am I. My only regrets will be leaving the smug security of government benefits and stable income, leaving my two friends and confidants, and leaving the only town I know like the back of my hand. The payoff will be a new city, new friends, and the potential for a steady job in an unpredictable job market.

Maybe I should have just stuck to mowing lawns eight months out of the year and living hand to mouth.

This is the most boring thing that I have written since a paper on Stonehenge in my eighth year in Catholic school. Even the Stonehenge paper had the word 'blood-orgy' in it. I am totally writing a scathing tirade on the dangers of face book next. Maybe that will get me back on the old blogging horse.

Some things

I think I might have a touch of the depression again. I am busy at work, so cannot write much. But, after taking the first pee break of the day twenty minutes before my shift ends, I thought to myself. I don't know what preceded it, but it just kind of popped in there. I was walking back to my desk, empty bladder and downtrodden soul, when I thought to myself, "Does bad poetry ever get ugly people laid?" Well, nonexistent and most gentle of readers, does it?

Sorry Readers, They Got This Depression On

I wonder if anyone still pops in now and again to see if I am up to anything? I think any subsequent heat that this little project in morbidly infantile fallacy has worn off. My apologies to anyone who has been waiting by their monitors for an update. Get a job, losers.

Updates:

I took the law school entrance exam and didn't do too bad on it. I might have to move north and sell my soul for federal loans with no real job prospects when I get out of law school, but what the hell?

The wife and I never got a dog. We did get a kitchen. It has hot and cold running water.

I have established an unhealthy addiction to Legos. Seriously, the wife said she would leave me if she ever woke up late at night, the blue glow of the environmental flourescents beeming under the bedroom door, and me quietly saying "take that Darth Vader, PEW! PEW!" It's odd that she mentioned nothing about the clothespins on the nipples, the dog collar, or the scented candles surrounding the Lego star destroyer.

I've been reading a lot since we haven't had cable in over a year and I no longer need to study for the LSAT. I finished a book in a day and a half. Weird.

How are you doing?