Of Ennui

"Gads this is so boring." That was the message flashing across my screen, as a certain pal of mine expressed their feeling about whatever activity they were doing at the time. This led me to thinking about how much of our lives is boring. How many times a day do you say "God, I am bored?" or "this is so dull." Maybe if you are fucking supermodels on a pile of money the thought never enters your head (either one). Or maybe you do not stop to think about it because your day is so full of excitement that you never get bored. I suspect that for large amount of people boredom does creep into this petty pace from day to day. Then what happens? Do you rush out and play in traffic for the adrenaline rush?, or do you just struggle to stay awake for the rest of the work day until you can go home and snore away the afternoon good and proper? Then ponder how much time you actually waste on any given day. The argument can be made that right now as I am typing this I am wasting time. If not mine then someone else's. Maybe someone will waste their time reading it as well. A school of thought exists that says that only immature minds get bored. I am certainly guilty of having an immature almost childish mind. So perhaps that is my problem. In theory I should be able to engage my mind in some activity (perhaps even do some actual work) that would fight off the boredom monster. All this time wasting can not be good for you. We only have a certain amount of time on this mortal coil, and wasting it seems to rise to a criminal level. I have been reminded of this in the last day by the death of a colleague of mine. Fuck that he was more than a colleague he was a friend. He was bulletproof, or so I thought, and when he got sick (leukemia) most of us thought he would pull through. Sadly, he did not, and he was only about 11 years older than I am. I am fairly certain that if you totaled it all up I may have wasted, or been bitching about being bored for 11 years of my life. That is also sad. I wish I could say that I have been inspired by his passing into a Carpe Diem! attitude. However, that is probably not so either. I am so hungover from toasting his life for about eight hours last night that I feel like death eating a cracker. I did not know him well enough to know how much of his life he may have felt he wasted, or if he ever got bored, but as the group of his friends of which I am proud to be a member struggle with our grief, and mourn him, I would think that he got the most out of his time on the planet. Being bored, or pissing away my time now seems just a bit more senseless. Days go by, and life (for some of us) drags on, but time seems just a bit more important. Of course he would not be impressed by this maudlin moment I am having, and would tell me to get my head out of my ass, and do some work for a fucking change, and he would be right. One of his closest friends put it best in stating that "he would have said something like this." "I got leukemia, it is a deadly fucking disease, and I died." "What is so hard to understand about that?" Certainly not hard to understand, but one motherfucker of a concept to deal with. I suppose in some respects I should thank him because he has solved one problem for me at least for now. Grief is anything but fucking boring.

Pachyderm(s)

Hemingway wrote a story titled "Hills like White Elephants" in which a man and a woman have a discussion about one thing, but are really talking about something completely different. White Elephants have had a bit of a bum rap since then. All sorts of images are used in the story, and the hills along side the Ebro river (where the story takes place), are used as a metaphor. They could be interpreted to stand for a woman's breasts, or a woman's extended belly during pregnancy. In the story the woman is pregnant, and the man is trying to talk her into getting an abortion. Children are the white elephants in question, and the man wants nothing to do with having one. Of course not a whole lot of this is made particularly clear in the text, some knuckle head of a critic had to sort all the deep meaning out for us great unwashed. Sylvia Plath wrote a poem in which she compared herself to a house, it was also about being pregnant. Once again not obvious from the text. This led me to thinking about literary critics, and their place in the world. What if just for shit and giggles, good, old Ernest did merely stop at that train station by the Ebro one day, and think "damn those hills look like white elephants." Nothing else, just a story about some hills that remind me of white elephants, and I will place them in some vapid story about abortion just to see if I can "work them in." I have experienced this a couple of times in my own "writings." Some of my more intelligent, or less drunk readers sometimes ask me about a blog post, and credit me with far too much metaphoric ability. Sometimes a blanket is just merely a blanket, nothing else. No deep philosophical meaning, no great analogy meaning I had a cold, and distant mother during my childhood, and just want to be held. It would be a great larf if Faulkner, Poe, or Flaubert somewhere in literary heaven or hell, are sitting around laughing themselves stupid about how their stories are being used to mean something entirely different from what they themselves meant when they wrote it. What if "The Fall of the House of Usher" was about some poor carpentry that Poe had to endure, and pay for while building an outhouse? Here we are generation up generation of students who have had all this "deep meaning" crap shoved down our throat, when it is possible that some of these stories mean nothing more than what they appear to mean on the surface. All those pretentious bastards who sip Merlot, and disclaim about how Hawthorne symbolises Yankee ingenuity would be shocked out of their Ann Taylor knickers. Of course an alternative theory is that the critics got it exactly wrong. Perhaps all this time white elephants stood for man's inhumanity to man, and the operation mentioned in the story was to have her tonsils removed. That would be a laugh riot as well. The author in all his earnestness meaning one specific thing, and it getting misinterpreted to mean something entirely different. What a sad fate for any author. To be forever identified with one idea when what you really meant was the exact opposite. Like being shot out of a cannon, and realizing that some goofy bastard forgot to set up the safety net. Of course this takes the piss out of all of our icons. Can we really live with the idea that Ernest was just taking the piss out of us by writing about hills? Nah, let's not knock them off the pedestal that we have carefully placed them upon. Better to put the gloss we need on them, than to know that perhaps like Anais Nin they were writing porn for a dollar a page because they just fucking needed the money.

ilska

Anger is the one thing that I seem to have an abundance of. Ask people who know me, and they will tell you that I seem to have an anger grudge against large portions of the world at large. I wish I could say that was not true, but it is. I have enough anger to make the 12 Angry Men seem like kittens playing with a ball of yarn. Generally speaking my anger is over with quickly. I finally get enough of it built up inside of me, and I blow it off. Quickly, suddenly, and with any real damage done. Screaming a few curse words is quite cathartic, and good for the bowels. In fact, I am rather angry right now. The keyboard is replacing the throat of the person(s) I am at which I am angry. Rather to type it out than to wring their neck(s) like a chicken. Maybe this way only feelings get hurt. Not that I am overly concerned about too many people's feelings, my own included. Hopefully, this beer, and perhaps the next two will calm the anger I feel welling up in my heart like an ink stain spreading out over paper. If not, well then I guess I will have to finish the six pack, and hope for the best. In spite of published reports I have no problem managing my anger, and directing my anger can be quite productive. There exists a theory that if you make me particularly mad, you get the best out of me. I can not really deny that either. At times, my anger has been the driving force behind some of my best ideas/work. Sad, but true, it sometimes take getting me pissed off in order to get a reaction out of me. Not something to be overly proud of, but there it is. My anger is not the anger of injustice. No one has been so evil to me that I feel as if I have been hard done by. I am not a victim of some massive conspiracy to keep me "down," and in my place. It is just that I do not suffer fools. I used to say that I did not suffer fools gladly, but as I get older I am beginning to think that I should leave off the gladly part entirely. My anger is not that type of anger. Mine is the slow burn type of anger that is set off by people doing things I consider exceptionally stupid or annoying. It is a subjective kind of anger, and it does smack of "who the hell made you the god of deciding stupid or annoying." Well, in this case, I did. After all, it is my anger I am talking about, and I think I should be the one deciding when to let it loose. Generally it blows over like a summer rainstorm, but every once in a great while it festers like an infected wound. Luckily for me, it does not turn to hate. I have found that hating someone/thing generally only is bad for the person doing the hating. It is much better for the soul to let the anger out, and try to direct it as well as possible. Notice I said generally there are people/things, besides Tottenham, that make my eyes narrow, and my blood pressure rise. They are few and far between, but they do exist. There are grudges that I bear, and no real amount of deep breathing will help. These grudges are like a warm, familiar blanket that I can rely on for warmth, and wrap myself in on cold days. In fact, I do not want to lose, or manage my anger. Some days it is the only thing that keeps me from falling into despair. My anger is not to be confused with rage. It is an entirely different animal. Sort of like the difference between having an affair with a married person, and just fucking them. More subtle, more complex, and in some respects, more dangerous. Rage is like morning dew, a few hours of sunshine and lollipops will make it all go away. Anger is like permafrost. The sun may come out, the birds may be singing, and spring may have sprung, but anger is still there grimly holding on to whatever niche it can. My anger is easily misinterpreted, do not mistake it for caring. I am a proud, card carrying, misanthrope (see MSS below) and, do not confuse my anger for me actually caring about the human race. It is quite easy to be angry at someone/thing and, still not be overly concerned if that person/thing exists. The sheer number of people and things in the universe assure that if I am not angry at you/it, there are innumerable other people/things to raise my ire. Some misguided souls actually think it is fun to get my anger stirred up. They consider it some sort of (blood) sport, a bit like bear baiting. It is not a particularly good idea. I am not some "bad man" whom you should not dare to fuck with, but I do not forget things like that. Have your fun now, but rest assured someday, somewhere, and somehow my revenge will be shoved, none too politely down your throat. This is not a threat, it is not posturing, and it is not said with any evil intent. It is merely a fact, part and parcel of who I am as a person. Perhaps it is not the most pleasant personality trait, nor do I wear it like a badge of honour, but there it is.

2429

As the door creaked open, I heard the tinkling of the bell. Gloomy, dusty, and dank the interior of the store did not instill confidence. "The Time Store" was clearly not thriving. Oh well, no matter I had something to sell, and they hopefully had the will and the money to buy, or rather the time to barter. That was why I was hear to trade/sell one my last possessions for an hour, maybe two (if I was lucky) of time. The time to go back, and fix one of the major errors of my life that put me in this situation to begin with. A bit of a paradox to go back, and fix what got me here would mean I never got here in order to go back, and fix the error. This is what time is a great big paradox. Either way, I had to at least give it a shot. After all, this was about the only item of value I had left, and my landlady was not "running a charity for losers" as she reminded me on a semi-daily basis. All sort of detritus lined the shelves of "The Time Store," other people's prized possessions sold off for a chance to buy enough time to make things right, or at least better. The old man behind the counter looked up from reading his hologram, and gave me the same look a man give to eggs after discovering they had gone off. Not a good beginning to what, for me, was a desperate transaction. "Excuse me, Sir, but I have this for sale." I laid the last possession my great aunt Julia had left me me from her all too small estate. The old man picked up the dusty tome I had laid on his counter as if it was toxic. Very gently by the corner, and with only his index finger and thumb. "And what, pray tell, is THIS exactly" he sniffed. "The collected works of the Grand Inquisitor" I said, then added none too proudly. "My great-great-great uncle on my mother's side." "I see," the old man replied. "The Grand Inquisitor?" "Your blood relative?" "No wonder you look as downtrodden as you do." "You're lucky that your family survived the purges of the '70's." I sighed not this again "not all of us did, but that is a family tragedy that I do not care to discuss today." "How much for the book?" "Surely the paper alone has to be worth something, even if the writings are dribble." "Dribble?" "Well certainly the GI was no Poe or Hemingway, but he had his own niche in literary history." Even managed a few decades of fame, long after his body was found floating by the Quai des Beoufes." "So of course, it did him absolutely no good at all, but such are the twists of fate." I released another sigh "Look Mister, all I know is my great-aunt gave me the book, and said it was valuable." "I have not bothered to read it, nor have I ever heard of the fool that wrote it besides the story of him being some wacko distant relative of mine from centuries ago." "I have my own problems, and just want to know if the damn book is worth two hours of time or not?" The owner looked shocked "never read the damn book?" "Tsk, tsk, the poor GI dying in poverty, and then cursed with relatives without a sense of history." "He would roll over in his grave, if any knew exactly where it was nowadays." "You lad need to at least understand what you are trying to pawn off for a mere two hours of time." "Sit your sorry ass down, and listen for a few minutes while I give you the lesson your mother should have given you a long time ago." I bristled "my mother is dead, you bastard, she died bringing me into this shit world, so don't preach to me about her failing in her duties." He blinked "ah, sorry lad, clearly I did not know." "Tell you what you listen, and I will give you two and a half hours, fair enough?" "Fine," I muttered not like I have anywhere else to be at the moment. "So go ahead and regal me with the story of my famed ancestor." He chuckled, and said "far from famous, but a minor celebrity, but like I said much too late to do him any good." "He was not a particularly good man, your uncle, but he did have the good sense to realize it, and use it to some small advantage." "He was the generation that first discovered what they called "blogging" some new fangled way of pouring your heart out on the Internet for a bunch of your friends to read, and make pithy comments about." "Never really understood what all the fuss was about myself, but it caught on and was all the rage for about 75 years or so, until the long winter came, and took care of all that fancy technological stuff." "Anyway, your uncle earned just enough minor celebrity with his blog posts to become famous enough to be included in the Archives, when the Commonwealth rebuilt the grid of the old American empire." "Not the most famous blogger in the world, but one deemed worthy of keeping a copy of in the archives." "Seems he was a bit of the Baudelaire of his set." "Of course since the original Baudelaire's writing were completely lost during the long winter, I guess the Commonwealth decided to take what it could get, and use your uncle's writings as the archetype." "Not the most uplifting of writings, and he certainly was not a lover of humankind, but he did manage a dedicated following in his time." "Not that I expect you to appreciate any of this, but at least you should have some idea of what you are selling before you sell for a mere two and a half hours." "Tell you what, you take your book home read it for a couple of days, and if you still want to sell it, I will buy it without any further pontificating." I sighed "fair enough I suppose." "Guess I should read what the old codger was on about all those years ago."

That was 2429. It is now 2630, and the desperate fellow in the story above was my great-great grandfather. The above story is from his diaries nothing further about this particular incidence survive. I don't know what he did to get the two hours of time he needed to go back, and "fix things," and I not sure I want to know. The old guy was considered a serious black sheep in the family, but he must have done something, because before he died, he took me aside, and gave me the "dusty tome" mentioned above. Making me promise never to sell it, and never republish it, but to keep it in the family for as long as there is a family. I kept that promise, and will lay the same duty upon my son, and he will do the same to his son as well. Of course no one now reads the Grand Inquisitor, but for some reason the book seems to be a good luck charm for the family. Perhaps that is the irony of it all. The poor sod that wrote it never reaped any benefit from it, but his ancestors thrive and prosper because of the babbling of a man without qualities.

In answer to Tidy's challenge. This was the hardest of the three by far, and I am not sure it went the way you requested, but sometimes these things happen. Now it is time for you to send in the clowns.

--GI

Gold

"For the thousandth time! Silence is GOLDEN!" "Can your defective little mind not wrap itself around that concept!" Those words shouted by the normally mild mannered Sister Mary jerked me out of a lovely daydream about the number fourteen of all things. Luckily for me, at least this time, Sister Mary's wrath was directed at some unfortunate classmate of mine, and not, as usual, at me. Fear of the ruler that the Sister wielded like a sword usually kept most of my classmates in line, but not G__. G___ was a talkative soul, and even managed to have something worth listening to every once in a while. The problem for G___ was that the Sisters did not want to hear the majority of G___'s blather even the stuff worth hearing. The Sisters were not hear to listen, they were here to teach, and if that did not work, well they were here to punish. Quite simple really listen, learn, or get the ruler. You would not think that a 110 lb lady could inflict that much pain with a ruler, but Sister Mary was a true artist. She must have finished top of her class in the "making them squeal like a pig" at her university. She knew where to hit, when to hit, and precisely how hard to hit for the maximum amount of agony. Surviving her lashings without screaming was considered a rite of passage. Sadly for G___ the talkative streak he possessed also made him a bit of a screamer. Sad for the rest of us too. Hearing the thunk of the ruler followed by the yelp of pain from poor G____ was beginning to grate on my nerves. It only took me a couple of times being teed up by Sister Mary before I figured out that talking could be, and probably is vastly overrated. Which is why today I am usually described as laconic or taciturn depending on who is doing the describing. I have also been compared to a stone wall, and we all know that stone walls do not have a lot to say for themselves, or to anyone else. The trick is to be well spoken in ten words or less. If you can pull that off, then people will begin to believe you are much smarter than you really are. Notice I said trick. It is not a gift, or a talent, it is at its most fundamental level a trick. You are fooling whatever audience you are around into something. Not showing off some mental feat of amazing skill. It is the old coin from behind a child's ear stuff. All flash no fire. Something to distract attention from the fact that you could really give a shit less about whatever conversation you have been drug, kicking and screaming, into against your desire to just be left alone to get drunk. Most of us spend our day talking our proverbial heads off, most of do not realize that people are really not listening. Like telling a "bad beat" poker story to a friend. Yeah, yeah we all have them, and halfway through yours the bastard you are talking to began to remember, and burst at the seams, to share HIS bad beat story. Which of course, is much more entertaining because it is his story. His story, history pretty damn close don't you think? Sexist, but still close. Poor G___ never learned this lesson, at least not while he was in the "arc of pain" that constituted Sister Mary's wingspan. Pretty much everyday day G__ would blather, and Sister Mary would exact her revenge. We tried to explain, in as few words as possible, to G___ that talking was only an avenue of pain, but he just did not seem to be able to keep his trap shut. I suppose he saw silence as a void to be filled, and if no one else was brave enough to do it, he would boldly stride into the breach. There are those among us who think that silence is not golden, but awkward and needs to be filled before it grows uncomfortable. I am not one of those people. I refer you to the title of this blog for example. I guess the irony of being a "man of few words" is that I write overly long, complicated, convoluted blog posts. Maybe it is just easier to type, aside from the spelling thing, than it is to talk. Though at least if you write people do not have to listen. All they have to do is not read. Still being ignored, but at least they do not have to sit there with a fake interested expression on their mug while you blather on about whatever you think is important. The better proverb for me has always been better to be thought a fool, than to open your mouth and prove everyone right.

In acceptance of Challenge's challenge. Not exactly what you were looking for I am sure, but I never said I had any talent. Merely tricks, and not even magic ones at that. However, I gave it a shot, and undercurrents abound. Sometimes the gold is buried under a mountain of dross. I made the mountain, you get to shift the dross. Careful all that glitters is not gold.

Theatre/House of Pain

Darkness, complete and utter darkness. Hmm where did that come from? There should be at least some light coming in from somewhere. Then I remember, oh yes the struggle, and the hands grabbing me pinning my arms to my side, and then the bag over the head, and darkness. Body found floating by the docks is the only thought that I can form as I am wrenched out of bed, and manhandled down the stairs. I go limp, there is no use in fighting, no hope of expecting an explanation so I might as well let these bastards earn their money by having to drag my dead weight, fat ass along. An indeterminable time later, I am thrown into what seems to be a rather hard, straight-backed chair. Well this is the usual drill is it not? I have been on the other side of the bag often enough to generally expect what will happen next. However, expecting it and being ready for it are two separate things, and as the bag is whipped away from my head the light is typically blinding. Lovely, I knew that was going to happen, and yet I was still too stupid to keep my eyes closed. Blinking is not the way to meet whatever nemesis has managed to put you in your present condition. As the vision returns, a familiar voice greets me, "Well, well the Grand Inquisitor himself, welcome to my little kingdom." Damn but that voice sounds familiar. Shit I know this person! The blindness fades, and I look across a small table to see my old friend Inquisitor Wooten with a not so friendly smile on his face. "Junior Inquisitor Wooten how pleasant to see you" I say with much more nonchalance than I feel. "If you needed me to continue your training, all you had to do was simply ask." "There was no need for the enforced trip just for a bit of a refresher course in interrogation." Glancing around I see the familiar (large) shapes of Mr. Williams and Mr. Catron looming over my colleagues shoulders. Well at least it is not the docks yet. "I think my training is complete" Inquisitor Wooten says with entirely too much confidence for my liking. "Now you get to see just how well you did train me in the gentle art of persuasion." Shit, fuck, damn! I did train this ape, and a few other besides, but he was the best of the lot, born to ask the tough questions that no one wants to answer. "Bah, you never could get the questions in the right order Wooten, no matter how many times I tried to tell you." "At some point, I would assume, you are going to clue me in as to why I am here, and why a junior Inquisitor has the temerity to drag a Grand Inquisitor out of his bed in the middle of the night?" "Oh I think you know that is not going to happen, I do not give answers, I ask the questions, YOU give the answers," he said as he pulled the all too familiar plain black case from somewhere, and placed it on the table. "You know the drill my boy, time for the instruments." He opens the cases, and I see the bright, shiny instruments of our trade, MY trade, exposed. Gruesome looking things that are intended to frighten just by sight, the pain they inflict makes people scream like schoolgirls. "Of course there is the alternative," he says, and produced the little brown pill that looks like it would choke a horse. Alternative? Pain or pain which would you prefer? "You always were a bit of a bastard Wooten, perhaps that is why I liked you." "Noticed the past tense." "Give me the pill you jamy cunt, I will not give you the pleasure of screaming for you tonight." I swallow the pill with some difficulty, and wait for the effects that I know are coming. No real choice really, but that is the point now isn't it? As my eyes begin to go heavier, and heavier I think well at least I will still have my looks after this is over. Small comfort, but it is the only one I can cling to at the moment. Sleep takes me as it is supposed to do, and off I go to confront the terrors that my colleague has dreamed up when he manufactured the pill.
Starts out pleasant enough, (then again don't they all?). A old classmate and I are at a fairly swank hotel for some conference or other, and are enjoying a lovely swim in the pool. Odd, in real life they would be fishing me out of the pool, my people sink they do not swim. Wrapping a towel around myself, I begin to walk across the lobby towards the elevator to my room. That is when I saw her from a middle distance. A quick double take confirms my belief. Damn them! Of course they would have to bring someone like her into it. How fucking original. An ex-girlfriend of course who else? From about a decade ago, and one that I treated a bit badly near the end (a shock, I know). Well this is just peachy isn't it? Might as well get the screaming, cursing, and the inevitable slap across the face over with. Our paths are just so conveniently going to intersect anyway so might as well stop, and pretend this is a surprise. I stop, and begin to form the words of a pithy greeting, she however sails past me like I am invisible, and continues on her journey. This is my punishment? Being ignored by an ex-flame that I have not spoken to in ten years? Really Wooten, you must have made a mistake with your formula. This is almost fun. I shrug, and continue on my merry way whistling a Wayne Newton tune as we all are apt to do from time to time. Of course that was too easy, as I get on the elevator a stranger get on as well, and slips me a note. How quaint. Where did you get this idea Wooten? Watching too many late night film noir again? It merely has a place, time, and is signed "B." What a surprise the old flame's first initial just happens to be "B." I sigh as I look at the time of this rendezvous. Ten minutes from now? Jeez, where is the rush? No time to change since the damn meeting is of course as far away from my room as humanly possible. Great my first meeting with this girl in a decade, and I am in swimming trunks and a towel. Oh well, nothing I can do, but show up and hope for the best. Surprisingly enough, there she is at the right place, and at the right time. How do you just jump into that conversation? Where do you start something like Hi, how are you? I know I sort of fucked you over ten years ago or so, but hey water under the bridge right? Hallmark does not make a card for this situation. Oh right sorry about wearing a towel to this meeting I thought it was informal attire. What's that you got married did you? Well congrats on that I am sure he is a lovely fellow. Oh really divorced eh? Well you have to be realistic about these things I suppose. Me? Oh I am just fine and dandy. Can not really try to explain that actually I am tied to a chair somewhere, and this is a dream. That is what is happening isn't it? After a few minutes of this nonsense I decided to cut to the chase, and ask the important stuff. You know like why the hell did you ignore me in the lobby, and why the hell all this cloak and dagger stuff? She said "well my mother is with me, and I did not want her to know that I was meeting you." Ah yes, your mother large, ungainly woman with a marked distaste for being in my company. Yes it is for the best that we do not cross paths. Then of course the nice little A-bomb that my colleague Wooten had designed this little passion play for gets dropped. "Umm, I have been thinking about you a lot since my divorce, and I missed you a great deal." "In fact, I found out you would be here at this hotel on these dates, and that is why I am here." "My mother tagging along was not in my plans at all trust me." Okay this has potential to end in tears. Maybe this is not a dream. She certainly felt real when she pressed up close to me at the end of that pretty little speech. Some place private you say? Well I am not really dressed for going any place, but back to my room to change. "Oh back to your room was exactly what I had in mind and, dressed does not matter so much," she replied. Well clearly this is a great idea, and off we when in some haste to my room. Here the details get a little vague. Of course they do. Why would Wooten want me to remember the good, juicy bits of this experience. The parts I do remember where a) quite nice, and b) felt quite real. Well now, this part of our relationship does bring back some good memories, and then right on cue, bright, searing, painful light. What the hell, did I finally die whilst having sex? Do I walk towards the light or what? Of course not, just me snapping back to consciousness in the same room, tied to the same fucking chair. Once I had figured it all out, and that it was a dream. I look up to see my old friend still sitting across the table. "Well Wooten, I told you that you needed more training." "That dream had a happy ending you wanky bastard!" "Oh, I dont think the good bit has happened yet," he replied. "Perhaps you should just nod back off, and wait for the ending." "Hah" I sneered, "not bloody likely, you can't just resume a dream where you left off." "Going back to sleep will just start the process over again, and by then the pill will have lost its effectiveness." All well and good, but damn it all I am feeling drowsy again. Eh, maybe just a 10 minute nap. Not like I am going to resume the dream where it stopped anyway. Wooten is drunk on his own sense of power. "I should get back to my room, mother will begin to wonder where I have gotten off to." "Huh" I mutter "What about mother?" "Who the, what the." Bollocks seems Wooten is smarter than I thought I am back in the same dream at the same place in time, but it seems our location has changed to my actual house. Walk her to the door like a good gentleman. A kiss or two on the cheek before parting, and a wave as she climbs into her car to drive off. Who knows how many decades before I see her again? Then as she gets to the end of the block, tires screech, metal grinds, and an very loud, violent crash occurs. "Son of a bitch" I scream, and run to the scene. Twisted metal and a bit of smoke make it difficult to find her, but eventually there she is, thrown from her car lying in the grass. No last dying romantic words of loves labour lost, just an ex-girlfriend whose neck is clearly broken, and just as clearly is dead as a doornail. Then a sensation of drowning as I sputter awake to find Mr. Catron standing in front of me, bucket in hand, grin on his face. "From the screams, and the thrashing about we figured it was time to wake you," say my pal Wooten. "Guess you got to the good bit at the end after all." "Damn you all to hell," I mutter. "Don't you bastards have someone that is actually guilty of something to torture?" Then another sensation this one of a cool wind on my face. Now what are they putting me in a wind tunnel to see if I am aerodynamic enough to sink? Body found floating by the docks. No not a wind tunnel just the gentle breeze caused by the fan next to my bed, as I wake up very confused as to what the hell just happened. Was that a dream within a dream? How the fuck is that possible? What is it time to go to work already? Damn I just want to lie here, and be sad. For exactly what reason I am not sure, but I certainly do not feel in the most chipper of moods. Well, perhaps I will just have to get over it. After all, it was only a dream, and at least this one did not feature any crows.

All the Muck that's Fit to Rake

"Morning Ralph" those were the first words spoken to me by another human being today. The human doing the speaking was the owner/operator of my local news stand, a elderly fellow by the name of Sam. I thought his greeting rather odd, since my name is not Ralph, but I put it down to his old age, and bad eyesight. "Morning Sam" I grunted as I bought the local rag to read on my leisurely stroll into work. Apparently I was in no particular hurry today, and I chatted for a few minutes with the old dodger about sports, politics, and of course the weather. Speaking of which, when did it get so cloudy? Was it this foreboding when I staggered out of my house without either my raincoat or umbrella? Years of watching my father obsess over the weather, and determined not to be like the old man, had lead me to generally ignore the weather forecast based on the theory that I can not change it so why bother? Well, as the wind picked up, and the cloud begin to roll in I realized that I might not be able to change it, but surely I could at least pay enough attention to prepare for it. Clearly my 20 minute stroll to work might be a little wetter than I had planned. Living in a town with a dearth of public transportation, and realizing that the newspaper I just bought had exhausted my supply of actual money, I had little choice but to wrap up my small talk with Sam, and toddle off to work. As I begin my stroll, I passed a friend of mine (with his umbrella the cheeky bastard) who greeted me, and queried whether I had read the paper. "Not yet, is there something earth shattering in there?" He laughed, and said "not earth shattering, but you made the paper. "Near the back of course" and off he went on his merry way chuckling. "Near the back" I muttered. If the bastard only knew his wife was rogering the postman he might not be so cheerful. Puzzled as to why I would be in the paper except as a misprint, I paused to open up the damn thing to take a gander. As I did cursing a bit as the ink smudged my hands (how can they not invent an ink that does not smudge? Man on the Moon, and all that shit, but I still have to have ink on my hands from reading the daily news?). About the time I shuffle the pages to "near the back" the skies decide to finally ruin my (so far, brief) day by opening up, and begin pissing straight down on me. Blast! It appears I have bought my only protection from the rain, and I quickly placed the newspaper over my head as I ran for the nearest shelter. Luckily it was not too far away, but the rain had ruined my newspaper. Oh well, I guess at least the water cleaned the ink off my hands. I threw the soggy paper into the nearest trash can, and waited for the rain to stop thinking that at least my last seventy five cents managed to keep me dry so not a bad return after all. Eventually after a few minutes the rain slackened to a drizzle that I figured I would just have to endure, and I continued on my way to work. Making to my building not quite soaked to the skin, but still rather damp, I was greeted by a co-worker from across the foyer with a "hey, you made it into the paper!" "I am aware" I replied, but before I could ask to see his paper, neatly and dryly tucked under his arm, he flounced onto the elevator, and was gone. I shook what water I could off myself, and trudged to the bank of elevators to make my up to the floor on which my office, or rather cube, was located. I stepped onto the elevator and pushed my floor, and as the car begin to fill up I noticed a woman reading her paper just a bit in front of and to the right of me. I craned my neck to see if perhaps she had made it to the big article about me, but she seemed to be reading the results from the local dog track. I had, of course, checked the coin operated paper stand in my building's lobby, but as usual it was full of yesterday's newspapers. Jeez who knew it would be so hard to find a current newspaper. It is not like there is some "Dewey defeats Truman" headline that would cause a idiotic public to begin hoarding copies like canned goods before a nuclear holocaust. Getting off the elevator on my floor I walked into my office hoping that at least the online edition would be available for me to see what news I had made. As I waited the 7 to 10 minutes for my computer to boot up, I begin to wonder exactly what it was I could have done (clearly without knowing it) to get my fool name in the paper. I had not, to my knowledge, robbed any banks, or saved any children or cats (both of whom I detest) from burning buildings, foiled any terrorist attacks, or been caught with my pants down in a public park. After a little grinding noise, my computer finally made it to the point that I could access the internet, but as I clicked on the proper icon all I got was a blue line, and a connecting, connecting message. Motherfucker! Those guys in IT are depriving a perfectly good village of an idiot! Of course, they will not stagger into work for another hour at the earliest. Must have had a rough night at the X Men convention, or perhaps they had to alphabetize their Battle Star Galactica playing cards till the wee hours of the morning. Well now not only can I not solve the mystery of my paper appearance, I can not do any actual work. Well, the boss is not around either, those wild nights at the "country club" where they have pole dancing assures me that he will not be in for at least two hours. I suppose I might as well make the best of it, and take an early morning siesta. I lean back in my rickety ass chair, put my feet up, and begin to nod off. Just as I was beginning to get good and asleep a co-worker comes to the corner of my cube pale as a ghost, and clearly shocked about something. Before I could get fully awake to ask what she backs out of my cube like she had seen Hitler's ghost dropping her newspaper. Well she always was a bit weird, I can sort out her issues later, but for now at least I have the paper. Looking down I see the article she had folded her paper over to. A little chill started to run down my spine as I saw she was reading the obituaries (I said she was odd), the intercom on my phone begins to buzz, buzz, buzz, as I read with absolute horror why she was acting as if she had seen a ghost. It seems that she had. The obit she was reading was mine. Funny, I don't feel dead. Is this why my news seller called me the wrong name. Will somebody stop that damn buzzing!!!! I collapsed back into my chair paper gripped tightly in my hands as I read the news of my demise. What the fuck? Then I feel a sharp jab in my ribs. Turning expecting to see some guy in a black robe with a sickle in his hands, I gasp half in relief, half in surprise, to find it is just my girlfriend muttering for me to turn off "that bloody alarm, and go to work." "Oh" she mutters as she rolls over to go back to sleep (the bitch) "you might want to take your umbrella, it is supposed to rain today."

For Cynnie loyal reader, and one nice lady. I hope this piss poor attempt has honoured your request for a post about newspapers. It stinks, but I did the best I could.

Challenge

The above (slightly soiled) gauntlet is for you all you readers at home. Consider it my literary challenge, and I do hope that at least one of the four loyal readers I think I have will take the challenge. It is a simple challenge, at least for you, pick a topic, any topic, and I will blog about it. Keep it mind I do not do sensitive, girly, emotional types of blog post, so try to keep it within reason. Do not expect immediate results, or expect miracles. If you can come up with something that I feel is within my power I will try to churn out a reasonably readable post about it within a short amount of time. I seriously doubt that anyone will pose a topic, but since my previous outings have caused the well of my ideas to run dry, I hope that at least one of you can come up with something that sparks my interest. Keep in mind I am a snob, but not overly intelligent, so plan your pick accordingly. Do not make it too Laurel and Hardy like, but do not expect Rabelais. A immediate response is not to be expected, and I hope you would want me to at least spend some amount of time formulating a proper post. If, as I expect, no one bothers that just means that you bastards will just have to suffer to read whatever inane drivel I happen to produce from my own over active imagination. You have been warned. Oh and P.S. post your challenges here in the comments not by email, text, IM, or smoke signal.

Blanket

"One blanket each that's all that is allowed." These words, shouted in my general direction, brought me out of a lovely daydream, followed by the aforementioned blanket being tossed roughly at me. It is not in any way a remarkable blanket. A dull grey in colour, and a little frayed around the edges, it has clearly seen both several owners and better days. As I take in these minor details of the blanket's life, I realize that for some unknown reason I have been placed into what appears to be a prison cell. Huh, wonder how this came about? I do not remember committing any crime, or rather getting caught committing a crime. I do not recall any arrest, guilty plea, trial, judge, jury, or sentencing. Oh well, appears it is too late to worry about those details, time to access the current situation. A rather gloomy prison cell, but then again how many pastel, Charlie Brown-themed, prison cells have you ever seen? Dark, dank, smelly, and probably populated with bedbugs, and fleas. Well, it appears it is "home" for now. Not sure for how long, not sure exactly why, but certainly there will be someone along to sort those issues out for me at some point. I mean that is what usually happens in these situations right? Some older, wiser guy comes around like Cain from the Kung Fu series, and explains it all in delightfully cryptic terms teaching our young hero a valuable life lesson on the road to redemption. Happens all the time, nothing to be worried about, just make myself comfortable, and await the messiah of the this passion play to put in his appearance. Looking around I do realize that comfortable is going to be a relative term, a hard bunk, a lovely high, and of course barred window, and a bucket seem to be the latest in this prison's furnishings. As I take in this absurd scene, I suddenly reason why the first words I heard about the blanket were so important. It is fucking cold! Not just cold, but sheep bleating, mind numbing, balls freezing off cold. Shit, fuck, damn! This I was not prepared for (to the dismay of my long lost boy scout leader I am sure). Certainly this one blanket rule is a joke. This sorry excuse for a blanket is not going to get the job done when it comes to keeping me from being a giant prisoner Popsicle come morning. The "explainer" better be here in a hurry, or he is going to find it difficult to be heard as he passes on his wisdom because my teeth will be chattering to loudly. Plopping my cold ass on the bunk, I wrap my new most important possession around me, and try to think warm thoughts. I realize I got a little tipsy last night, and maybe had a round of shots, but that does not explain how or why I am suddenly locked away in this hellhole. How long can a alcohol induced black out last? How much memory can you wipe away with just booze? Certainly not enough to explain my sudden transformation from upright citizen to frozen prisoner number 22143. 22143? Where the hell did that come from? Nowhere as far as I can tell. I look at my non-descript, cheaply made, prison suit, and can not see any markings that account for my "knowledge" of my prison number. Maybe other important details of why I am in my situation will start rushing back to me in a flood of emotion. I felt neither still drunk nor hung over, and a quick inspection revealed no major bumps on my head, so hopefully I would be to reconstruct the events that landed me in my current predicament. After about an hour with no new flashes of memory, and in spite of the mind numbing cold, I begin to feel sleep might be the best plan. Everything will look better in the morning, it is night isn't it? Everything always looks better in the morning, except maybe that "looker" you took home from the bar at 2 in the morning, but still there is hope when morning breaks. After what felt like hours, I began to despair of anyone appearing to explain to me exactly what I had done to be placed in my present circumstances. Despite the bone chilling cold, I began to grow sleepy. I thought well sleep might not be a bad plan, and I began to nod off. My eyes grew heavier and heavier, and the time between me opening them back up grew longer and longer. Just as I was about to give up the ghost, and drop off to sleep, someone, whom I had not heard come into my cell began to shake me gently by the shoulder. As my half awake mind began to process this action, the thought that finally an explanation to why I am here awaits started to form in my mind. Finally, surrendering sleep to the insistent shaking I opened my eyes to see what all the commotion was about, and to receive my explanation. When I did everything became clear, but in a odd kind of way. The person shaking me was my bartender, and he was saying the line we love to hear "dude wake up it is closing time, you don't have to go home but you can not stay here."

Le Misanthrope

The fellow above is one M. Moliere author of a somewhat famous play entitled Le Misanthrope. Clearly, not a lover of humankind, and overall bastard about town. Considering that I have been accused of being a misanthrope myself, I feel more than a little sympathy for M. Moliere's protagonist Alceste. I was once described as a misogynist, and was quick to point out that I do not dislike just women. I dislike all people. It has been said of me that "he just does not like people." A statement that I can not, even if I wanted to, deny. I sometimes try to blame certain aspects of my job for my misanthropy, but the truth of the matter is I was a misanthrope long before I obtained my present employment. In some ways a certain part of my job does exacerbate my condition, but it is not the cause. It is a long standing and deeply held conviction of mine, and I just do not seem to be able to shed it. I mean I just spent two whole days without having a real live conversation with another human being, and I loved it. It plays hell with the Christmas party season, birthday parties, and just any social function that will require me to speak to more than four people. I do not really care if it makes look like a grouch, but other people have sometimes been upset at my lack of sociability. I think it is for the best that I avoid these types of situations because I would either be unable to conceal my scorn, or I would be considered the worst conversationalist alive. People just seem to be rather put out when you explain that you do not like them. Trying to explain that it is not necessarily them personally, but them as a species does not seem to mollify them. My (quite few) friends understand my condition, and do their best to not be horribly offended by my bad behaviour. Which is probably why I consider them my friends in the first place. To be fair, I do not exclude myself from my misanthropy. I am certainly not a fan of myself, and in some respects I represent almost everything I can not stand about the human race. Of course that is probably because I am the one human being that I spend the most time with, and just can not seem to get away from. I look in the mirror, and bam! There I am. I go to the bathroom, and I am there dawdling about. Even asleep I appear in my dreams (well, me and a crow or two). I mean jesus, can I not get a moment's peace from myself. Spending all this time with myself causes me to notice, and be disgusted by my own (many) flaws. With that much time to pick them out it is inevitable that they become, to me at least, painfully obvious. Hopefully, that softens the blow of my condition in regards to other people, but even if it does not, I can not say that I am too upset. I do not really expect this condition to win me any popularity contests, and understand if the majority of people are put off my by position. Perhaps my misanthropy is part of the reason I blog. After all, I am certainly not inclined to open my "heart" in person (sober at least), and blogging allows me to express my feelings (provided I have them) in a impersonal forum. It is much easier, in some respects, to merely be read rather than listened to by people. By writing my thoughts and feelings out I am in many ways being a Fascist. Schopenhauer said that there were only about 25 books written in the history of time worth reading. His rational was that when you read a book the author of that book is taking over the controls of your thought processes, and his theory was that there are only a VERY limited number of people you should allow to do that. It is similar to a line by Blind Melon about reading a book to stay awake though it strips my mind away. It is much harder to do that in person since very few of us really listen to what the other person is saying. We are usually much too busy formulating or thinking of our reply to actually listen. Writing, on the other hand, is much more tyrannical. I can control (at least in theory), where this "conversation" goes, and how it gets there. I say in theory because I sometimes have a tendency to "write myself into a corner." It is a very similar experience to painting yourself into a corner, but you can not just wait for the paint to dry. I actually wrote myself into, and (I hope at least) out of about three corners during this post alone. I have to be careful of blind alleys when I write because I have a tendency to write what I am thinking as I am thinking it. Calm reflection does not appear to be my strong suit. Of course, the reader does have the ultimate veto power, they can just stop reading altogether. A lesser threat, but one that writers such as Arthur Rimbaud, have used to great effect is to approach the problem from the other way around. That is they just stopped writing.

A drunkard's prayer

A few of my elderly readers will recognize the fellow in the picture above. He is Otis Campbell the town drunk of Mayberry, and a delightful fellow. Now I do not claim to be the town drunk in the city in which I reside. There are, I am sure, much more qualified candidates (some of which I know personally). Besides the city where I live has more than enough space for multiple town drunks. Therefore, I am just one of many, a bleary face in the crowd as it were. However, tonight I am breaking new ground. For the first time in the "history" of this blog I am writing while ever so slightly intoxicated. Of course ideas for blog posts have came to me while I was hammered, but not until tonight did I maintain the required dexterity to type out my brilliant drunken thoughts. The tale I have to impart is a rather sad one, but I hope to tell it without getting too maudlin. After two nights of serious drinking I feel the need for a little confession. I haunt two bars in my fair city, and pretty much only two bars. Luckily for me they are right beside one another, within easy staggering distance. I have been going to one of them about a year longer than the other one, but each of them have their pro and cons. One has a better menu and is non-smoking, while the other has a nice long bar that begs to be propped up, and cool video games to play. After as many debauched nights as I am spent in these places, I have befriended the bartenders. Going on the theory that you can never have enough bartender "friends." Each of the bartenders are lovely fellows, and both treat me much better than I deserve. One of the great tragedies of my life is that, for some reason, the two bartenders do not like each other. This has been a source of some consternation for me. It is sort of like having two best friends that can not stand each other, and you are trapped in the middle. In some respects it is not quite that serious, but in other ways it is very, very serious. Now there is enough of a drunk in me to go around, and I have been able to consistently stagger from one bar to another with alarming regularity. The tension was there, but if you tip well enough, and drink enough eventually you either smooth it over or forget all about it as you sink into an alcohol induced stupor. Sadly this week tragedy struck. One of my bartenders managed to get himself fired, not too big of a surprise considering his boss fires people as often as he changes his underwear, but still a rather upsetting turn of events. Even worse was the manner in which I was made aware of my bartender's demise. My other bartender was the first to break the news, and he did so with a thinly veiled glee that did not reflect well upon him. Saddened by this news, I stumbled next door to see if the new was in fact true. Much to my dismay, it was, and standing there behind the bar was a totally new bartender. This was a very sad occasion because a good bartender is very, very difficult to find, and training a new bartender is a task that requires a great deal of time and patience. At my age, I am not sure my liver is going to be up to the task of "breaking in" a new bartender. All sorts of things go into the process, and it can be quite expensive at first. Eventually, a good bartender will realize that they have a good solid drunk on their hands, and will make the corresponding adjustments. However, in the meantime you have to suffer being treated like a common, twice a week, amateur drinker out to drink enough sexs on the beach to set some sort of personal record. The indignity of it all is enough to make you want to become a teetotaler. Of course being sober all the time has its own pitfalls that I am not sure I am quite ready to face on a 365 day-a-year basis. So for now I will spend a little more time at the bar that still has my regular bartender employed, and stumble over to the new bar to begin the long, arduous process of training a new barkeep on the width and depth of my drunkenness. This has great potential to end in tears. I can only hope that if it does the tears are at least laced with enough alcohol to make it all worth while.

A bit of a Puzzler

As I was discussing a previous blog post with a friend of mine the other night they had to go and ruin a perfectly good day by posing me the question of "Why do you blog?" I took a deep breathe and fully expected a witty answer to appear in a matter of seconds. It did not. Not only did a witty answer not appear, it eventually dawned on me that I am not sure I had AN answer at all. This was quite puzzling. I mean we should at least have some clue as to why we do the things we do right? I mean if you do not have a clue why you do something aren't you a bit like a brick wall? No one asked a brick wall why it is just standing there. Who knows maybe it is load bearing and critical to the integrity of the building. I eventually muttered some nonsense about it being a "creative outlet." My friend seemed satisfied with that answer but I am not sure it is really the reason. It is true that my job does not really allow for a lot of creativity, but I am not exactly sure I am a creative person. Also, I am not sure if what I blog is particularly creative. I could say that I do it in order to be read, but that answer smacks of a certain neediness that I find unattractive. Maybe it is just something to do as I pass the hours between sleep, work, drinking, and wild monkey sex. I certainly do not entertain the notion that anything I write has any sort of literary value. Perhaps, at some point it has provided a bit of comic relief, but other than that I am not sure it has any particular value. It has at times allowed (some of) my readers the opportunity to criticize me, and point out my faults. At other times they have praised what I wrote as being very insightful. I am uncertain on how to handle either the praise or the criticism. I guess a tendency to take either one with a grain of salt is my usual response. The problem that I keep coming back to over and over again is that here it is almost 2 full days later, and I still do not have a bloody answer. I find this unacceptable there has to be an answer somewhere locked away inside some vault of my inner self. I should have the key around here somewhere, and if not I should at least be able to pick lock. Sitting here watching the damn cursor blink over and over on the page of this post, I can not for the life of me, unlock this riddle. I suppose sometimes "I do not know" is, in fact, the best answer to the question.

"I" is someone else

As I was sorting through my (mostly junk) email today, I found among the notices that I had won the Nigerian lottery, and offers of all the free Viagra I could ever need, I noticed some jackass friend of mine had forwarded me one of those 25 things about you lists. Normally, if an email has FWD: on it I delete it out of hand (hint to those who know me, and send me forwards). Perhaps, it was because there was not anything on TV, and I seem to have run out of decent books to read, but I opened the damn thing. The usual nonsensical questions about my favourite ice cream, and red or pink where there, but one question got me to pondering (and then posting). It was if you were another person would you like/be friends with you? Now the initial reaction most people have is "yes" or "I think/hope so." Upon really putting some thought into it and getting past the knee jerk yes, and then the well I am a bastard, so no, I can to the conclusion that it would depend on certain things. We all have our circle of friends that we hope will last forever, and that constitute people we can trust with our inner most feelings. People you can call at 4 a.m. drunk out of your mind, and ask them to come pick you up from whatever sinkhole or wine house you find yourself and expect them to say "fine, jackass I will be there in 20 minutes." No questions asked or explanation necessary. Of course, you give them one because that is why you are friends, but if you were to say I do not want to talk about it, they say fine no problem. These are more than cronies from your college days, they are "pals" people who you realize might be the group that attend your wedding(s), child's birth(s), and eventually form the group that carry your ass to the grave if you kick the bucket before they do. Now try to put yourself in their position. Why are they here? Are you really that cool of a person? That much fun to hang out with? That trustworthy? That solid? Can you see yourself getting into a disagreement with one of them, and chucking X number of years of friendship because of it? Then think how well do they know you after all? We all wear masks, and we show different masks to different people. Have you let this certain person see behind the mask? To the uncut version of yourself? To the "I" that you sometimes think is someone else. Have you told them all of the reprehensible things you have done in your past, and if so, how did they react? Did you tell them things that you could not even tell to your family pictures? If they knew you as you (hopefully) know yourself, would they still be your friend? Hell, would they even speak to you every again? I, myself have a couple of "friends" like that people that would not cross the street to piss on me if I were on fire and vice versa. Or do you tell them just enough to get them to like you, and decide that is enough. Allowing the relationship to settle somewhere along the close friend level, but not sure I want to unburden my childhood psychosis to them. How many are in your circle of friends that were there 5 years ago? 10 years? 15 years? Are you a bad friend? So difficult to get along with that people just eventually stop making the effort? How many boon companions does a person really need? Is there one who moral compass points due north, and you can not fathom telling them some of your more lurid misdeeds. Is there another who's moral compass goes due south, and you sometimes wonder how such a monster can look so human. Where does your needle fall on that compass? Which one of them can you truly trust with something you need to discuss with someone besides your house plants or pets? What do you have in common? Are you all close in age, or educational background? Are you all a bunch of Wops or Frogs, or Yids? Is one of you much richer that the rest or one much poorer? If so does that affect the relationship? Which one could you trust with your wife or girlfriend or your car for that matter? Any of them? None of them? Could they trust you with their wife or girlfriend? Is there a "loser" in the group that you are still friends with out of some form of pity, or could you be the loser in the group, and just not realize it? Ever had to punch one of them in the mouth? Have they ever punched you in mouth? Can your friendship survive a punch in the mouth? These things and a multitude of more are the things I pondered on after reading that one silly little question. Clearly it is a slow news day. After all my pondering I think I found my answer, but I am not certain that I am happy with it. I can not say "Yes" for certain that if I were someone else I would be my friend, nor can I say "Not no, but fuck no." The truth is it would depend a lot on how I (the other self) saw me. How much of the mask I let slip, and how many of those questions had positive answers. For the most part, I figure myself to be a slightly below average friend to some, a shitty friend to others, and a rock to some. I am of the opinion that to truly know a person's worth do not ask their friends, but rather, ask their enemies.

Two For Joy

I know this is probably getting old to my dedicated public, but think how I feel about the situation. Maybe I just need to return to those lovely days of not sleeping to avoid this kind of stuff, but then again that was not a lot of fun either. Anyway this particular dream was rather short, and some of the details are lost to the history of my waking up so suddenly. For this was a sudden waking based on the actions going on in the dream. Like a drowning sailor breaking out of the water. Rasping and gasping for dry land, which luckily is not that far away. The dream starts out simply enough. I am just in a normal situation surrounded by a group of people that I sort of know. At least I think I know them, though no one particular person stands out of the group in my memory. The one person that I interacted with in the dream does leave a memory trail. She was a rather good looking and Swedish (for some odd reason). Not a member of the famous Swedish bikini team, or Greta Garbo, or even Tiger Woods' newly minted wife, but Swedish nonetheless. In my real life I do not know this Swede, but in the dream it appeared that I did. We were having a simple enough chat about what I can not recall, when she suddenly decided to switch to speaking Swedish. It seems she wanted to have a conversation without the other people in the room knowing what was being said, and speaking Swedish is a pretty damn good way of ensuring that. It is an interesting language that has words like Sjuksköterska (which means nurse) and hemskt (means awful, who puts four consonants in a row?). Not a language for the faint of heart, but it seemed that my dream self could understand a few, a very few, Swedish words. As she is blathering out Swedish at a amazing rate of speed, my poor dream self is trying very hard to understand what the hell she just said, and to formulate an answer in my first grade Swedish. Needless to say (but I will say it anyway) the intended conversation (whatever it was supposed to be about) quickly went to hell in a handbasket. She seemed a bit put out at my inability to respond with a coherent sentence part of my problem was I kept putting in French words so I would have a sentence of broken Swedish mixed with bad French. This seemed to flummox her to no end, and she began to yell at me in a mixture of Swedish (which I could not understand, but got the gist of, and English in which she was very clear in her opinion of my rather limited intelligence). Finally, after much gnashing of teeth, she spat out a final sentence in Swedish which was Jag är kråkan and then began a remarkable transformation which led to me waking up like a drowning sailor. You can translate what she said here http://lexin.nada.kth.se/swe-eng.html and then it will all become painfully clear why I am a little off center today.

One for Sorrow

The story goes that the number of the birds of the above type you see determine your fate. One for sorrow, two for joy, etc. etc. Not really sure if that is true or not, but I am a bit worried. I also wonder if the count is cumulative or not. I see just one at a time, which indicates sorrow. That isn't good for the home team at all. It appears that to dream of crows means disappointment in everything. Grief and misfortune. This just keeps getting worse from sorrow to grief in two easy steps. Shouldn't there be some sort of support group for this kind of stuff? Clearly after the events of my last post I have been a bit wary when drifting off to sleep, but for a while I was crow free. This was good news, I figured that the books had just seeped a little too deep into my subconscious, and the one dream managed to get rid of it. All well and good until about a week later when dream number two with a crow takes place. This was a sad dream (hence the one for sorrow I guess). It involved the first girl I ever was cuckoo for cocoa puffs over, and that was a LONG time ago. When she first showed up in my dream I thought "hey this is not so bad." I mean after all she was really cute, and perhaps in my dream I was going to get things right this time. In real life things ended in (my) tears, as these things tend to do, but I was hopeful that in dreamland I would be able to get my shit together. We were not doing anything especially interesting (again with the no sex, dammit to hell), but at least no one's heart had been broken. In fact, things (in the beginning at least) seemed to be going remarkably well. The dream girl had consented to go on an actual date. Something that never happened in our real life "relationship." Oh happy days! Second time was the charm. She said yes! This was my big chance to get it right for once, and maybe I could stay asleep long enough for the x-rated bits this time. I get my positive answer and immediately rush out to my vehicle to go pick up my dream date, and as you probably have guessed by now tragedy was waiting. It seems some rotten bastard had rear ended my car while it was parked, and the damage was beyond some simple repair. Of course it seemed that this was the ONLY vehicle around for MILES (hey it is a dream after all). Date ruined, chances at redemption shot to hell, and certainly not going to be any sex in this dream. Of course, as this realization sinks slowly into my pea brain, sitting on my shoulder cawing its head off is a crow. Well at least this time it was an actual crow, and not some girl named Crow, I am taking this as progress no matter what the dream interpretation people tell me.

Murder of Crows

Bear with me this is a long story, and it takes a side trip in the middle, but I think it is either very creepy or very cool. It all starts in bed, as most cool and or creepy things do. I had a rougher than usual Wednesday night, and was determined to catch up on my sleep Thursday night. Therefore, according to plan I toddled off to bed rather earlier to snore away the night. In due course off I go to dream land. We all dream or so the experts tell us, and some of us are better at remembering their dreams than others. I usually do NOT remember my dreams, I guess I am just retarded that way. Sometime during the night I woke up, and in my confused state I realized that I had been dreaming. I only figured this out later so bear with me. I only assumed I had been dreaming because I was saying a word that was clearly the answer to some question I had been asked in the dream. I chuckled a bit and thought "wow I wish I could go back into that dream, and give my dream self the answer to the question." Now, this is the aside, and I will try to make it short, but bear with me. I had just finished reading a trilogy of books by K.J. Parker entitled The Scavenger Trilogy. They are very good books, and I recommend them to anyone looking to read about 1400 pages of interesting fiction. I have to give some detail of the books in order for my dream sequence to make sense, but I wont give away too much. The main character in the books loses his memory. He wakes up in a stream surrounded by dead bodies with no idea how he got there or who the hell he is. The rest of the books are sort of his journey to discover who and what he is. Eventually, he meets a fellow that tells him they were school chums together, and begins to fill in the blanks. It seems the main character is from another continent from where he woke up, and his school chum tells him that he always talked in his sleep in his native tongue which no one could understand. The main character would always wake up and say that he had been dreaming, but could not remember his dreams (sometimes he would shout in his sleep, and the others would wake him up, and he would say that he had been dreaming). The school chum tells the main character that he suggested the main character try to put something in his dream that he could focus on that would help him remember his dreams. I know odd, but hey this is fiction after all. The main character for lengthy reasons picks a crow as his memory device, and is able to understand that now when he sees a crow (and he sees a lot of crows) he is dreaming and should pay careful attention if he wants to remember.
That is the aside that I needed to veer off into in order for the rest of my story to make some sort of sense. When I awoke from the first dream, I did not really remember many details. The details of the first dream only came to me later after I had a second dream. However, I guess the books had more of an affect on my mind than I realized. When I woke up the first time, and after I realized I was answering a dream question, I thought "maybe I should put a crow in my dream to help me remember." I chuckled a bit and rolled my goofy ass over and went back to sleep. Along comes the second dream of the night, and it was a real corker. I will use italics to record those details so this already rambling post does not go over the edge. I apparently had been recently married by proxy to some lady that I had never laid eyes seen before. Not only had I not seen this woman, but I had not even seen a picture, photograph, artist's rendition, or portrait of her. I have no earthly idea why I had married this woman, or why she was such a mystery. I figured she was hideous or had a humpback, and I was being punished for my sins. I travel to my newly minted bride's parents estate, and blimey it was a PALACE . There were these two huge pools (sadly it was pissing down rain, and therefore, no obligatory bevy of bathing beauties, it seems my dreams sometimes suck). I am introduced to the parents who seem happy to have me as a son-in-law (a clear warning sign to my dream self that the woman must have a hare lip or something really wrong with her). I then meet a girl that people indicate is my new wife, I take a gander and am not too horribly disappointed. She does not have any clear deformity like an extra arm or anything. She is a little chubby, but I am in no position to deny a woman a little meat on her bones, she is not Orca fat, and looks pleasing enough. However, she is encumbered with a child, some little toddler that is running around screaming like all toddlers do. This appears to upset my dream self quite a bit (as, to a lesser degree, it would my conscious self, I am not a fan of children). My entourage, which for some odd reason consists of people I knew in high school, and have not laid eyes on in real life for over twenty years, does not seem too upset at my situation. Me and my "wife" are duly introduced to each other, and the wedding feast begins. (Leave it to me to skip the sex part, and go straight to the food part, bollocks my dreams stink, no wonder I do not remember them). At the feast everyone seems to be having a wonderful time, I guess feasts are like that in dreams. Somewhere about the third course I look down and realize that I am wearing one of my real life suits. This shocks me horribly because my "work" suits are not fashion statements. They are fairly cheap suits I buy because I have to wear one at work, no Armani here. Well too damn late to change now, so back to the feast I go. It seems my new in-laws have some sort of estate in the Azores islands that I think is to be my wedding present. Things are looking up it seems, rich in-laws that live in luxury, and my very own "estate." Perhaps this is worth a slightly chubby wife with child included. Even better news follows, it seems I have been put into the in laws will, and they appear to be fairly old people. Much joy for me! (What this says about my real life self, I really choose not to think too much about). The will? Me? The heir apparent? More wine! Sometime around course four, I think, even better news it appears that chubby girl is NOT actually my new bride. This puzzles me a bit until I am informed that she was a "test." Seems I passed without even knowing it, and was not sure why I was being tested. It seems that the real bride is a real stunner. (Although I never actually see her in the dream, damn and blast). This is also good news, and clearly a reason for the feast to continue. However, this is where the dream train goes off the rails for good. Suddenly I am alone in a room with a girl I went to high school with, and have not spoken too in over 20 years. Odd, but hey this is a dream. We begin to catch up on "old times" and chatter away about nonsense for a bit, and then I wake up. No big deal end of dream time to stagger out of bed, and go to work. I was surprised that I was able to remember this second dream in such detail, and while I was getting ready for work the details of the first dream began to come back to me as well. I did not think too much of it until suddenly while I was in the shower the name of the girl I had went to high school came back to me. It took a few seconds I got her first name pretty quickly (and I will not divulge it just in case she is alive and does not want to be slandered). Repeating her first name a couple of times jogged my memory enough for me to remember her last name, and this is what I think is the creepy/cool part. Her last name is/was Crow.

Forbidden

I have just engaged in a horrible, horrible act. I know that really does not come as a surprise to anyone, but this time it surprises me quite a bit. I realize that I have done mind numbingly bad things in my past. Things that really do not need to be dredged up every again, things that the light of day need to continue to not illuminate. However, this particular act of mine is above and beyond my usual bad behaviour. I did not kill anyone, or commit any sort of crime of violence, but I still feel the shame of it all. I certainly feel like I have done something terrible, my mood has darkened, and I think I might need to drink myself silly, or just go to bed right now. The unclean feeling that I have, and the bad taste in my mouth just do not seem to want to go away. They linger like the last drunk at a New Year's Eve party that you finally have to tell "dude it is 4 a.m. go home, and go to fucking bed already." I am not sure that I am going to be able to remove this particular stain on my soul. I feel like a criminal sitting in a chair across the desk from the duty sergeant who is going through my rap sheet, and making little "tutting" noises. The look of contempt on his face as he looks up from my police blotter up at me makes me want to curl up into a very small ball, and hope that he forgets I exist. I understand the suspense must be killing my patient readers as they ponder what it is I could have done that is any worse than things I have done in my past. The good news is that the only true victim of this "crime" is myself. Rather poetic that I have done all those horrid things to other people in the past, and now here I am doing horrid things to myself. Guess I wanted a change of pace. The crime (kind of overly dramatic, but hell I am in a mood), that I am guilty of today is simple, it is censorship. I just brought the iron hand of the censor down upon my own fool self. I spend a good two hours writing an extremely long blog post about something that I a) feel strongly about and b) is a very good insight into my life (trying my best to follow Coleridge's dictum), and then I censored it. Not only was it very long, and very personal it was fairly well written. For once, I took some time over a post, and chose my words carefully. I would not say that I was overly impressed by the end result, but I was at least slightly proud. Like a new father would feel, I suppose, until he his told that his "baby" is some sort of beast. I guess I should take some solace in the fact that I had the good sense to realize that posting it was not really the best plan. I have in the past, cut my nose off to spite my face just on general principle. Perhaps, as I approach my fortieth year (good god, I am old!), wisdom may finally putting in an appearance. A part of me believes that, but the bigger part of me is disgusted by my actions. I feel like a moral coward, and let me tell you it is not a pleasant feeling. It is not like I just took parts of the post out to keep it safe. I did not change the names to protect the innocent. I did not try to make it deliberately vague so that people could read it, and still not know exactly what I was talking about. I did not do any of those simple things, though to make it vague would have been virtually impossible. No, I cut the whole fucking thing! I did not censor, I executed. I did not try to excise part of it to make it where it could be posted. I took an axe to it not a scalpel. So now I feel like I have stolen the crown jewels, and pawned them off to buy a really expensive label maker. Like I took my grandmother's retirement check, and blew it on the ponies. Maybe one day I will screw my courage up to the sticking point, and post the damn thing anyway, but for now it stays an undiscovered country.

Style

After receiving a couple of (near) compliments on my ability to write, I decided to go back and re-read some of my older posts. Well, I say re-read, some of them I never actually read all the way through. My defense to not doing that was that I wrote them, I should not be forced to read them. I understand that this is not the best defense, but it is the only one I have. Unlike some people I know, I do not write a "draft" of my posts, and then go back and edit. I probably should, and I commend the people who are dedicated to their craft enough to put in the extra time and effort. I just normally write it all out about ten seconds after I think it. Very much a brain to page kind of exercise. I will, upon occasion, think about a topic I want to blog about for a couple of days, and maybe come up with a brief general outline, but for the most part I just type it as I think it. Looking back on some of my earlier posts horrified me. Some of them are SO very bad, that I cringed, and immediately considering deleting them from my sight. That I could write such dribble shocked me. I am not sure why I was so shocked at the abominations I had created, I certainly understand my limitations when it comes to the written word. Even giving myself some slack (for a change), I still looked at some of those posts, and thought "My god, why did I write that?" "What possessed me to think that any of that made sense, and that anyone, anywhere would want to read it?" However, before I took a battle axe to my blog, and sheared it of all the posts that I believed only a third grader could be proud of authoring, I paused and considered that to do so would be intellectually dishonest. After all, no matter how absolutely horrible those posts are, and in my opinion they are shockingly bad, they still are mine. I can not abort them now that I think I have improved my writing skill. In truth, I am not sure that I have improved my writing skill in any quantifiable way. Perhaps in two weeks when I glance back over this post, I will be just as shocked at the poor quality contained within. Then again I have been accused of being too hard on myself, and I would think that if that applies to anything in my life, it applies to my "writing." I try to do better, I really do. I attempt to avoid too many posts that contain arrant nonsense, but I am clearly not always successful. I can only look back at those old posts and sigh. They are like ugly children, sure they are ugly, sure they are stinky, but for better or worse they are mine, and I can not disown them no matter how hard I try. I suppose even the ugly duckling needs a little love, and maybe with a little more care I can stop producing ugly ducklings and come up with a few lovely little swans.

January 9th, 1977

Yes, January 9th, 1977 was a long, long, time ago. However, I remember exactly where I was, and what I was doing on that day like it happened last week. Guess that is a sign of becoming an old fart, when you start saying you remember shit like it was yesterday. Oh well, I am old, so might as well starting acting like it, rather than acting like I am 19 so people are shocked when they find out my real age. On that particular day in 1977 I had just passed being 7 and a half years old, and I was watching my heroes the Minnesota Vikings play in Super Bowl XI against the John Madden coached Oakland Raiders. Now I have never, to my knowledge, stepped foot in the state of Minnesota. I have no relatives from there, no real connections at all with the state that explain why I am a Vikings fan. However, I do know the reason for my fandom. It would appear that sometime before that fateful day in January, 1977, I, with all the innocence and ignorance of youth, picked out a Vikings jersey from the Sears catalog (another sign of how fucking old I am). Here is where the story goes to hell in a hand basket. My mother decided that it would be a good idea to buy me this jersey as a present. Now most people will think this is cute, it IS NOT cute, it is what I consider to this day child abuse. If only my mother would have had the great good sense to say "No son that team will cause you decades of untold misery, here pick out a 49ers jersey or a Cowboys jersey, or a fucking Steelers jersey." Alas, she did not do that, and here we are almost thirty-two years later, and I have watched the Vikings fail again to make the Super Bowl. It is a sad fact of my life that I can clearly remember Fran Tarkenton, the Vikings QB toss that critical, game losing, interception to Willie Brown to run back 75 yards for a Raiders' touchdown, and nail the coffin lid of Minnesota's chances firmly shut. It is one of the clearest childhood memories that I have, and that is probably a line sad enough to make you cry. I am pretty sure my seven year old self shed a few tears that day. Actually, I am almost positive that I cried like a Frenchman at the fall of Paris, and had to be put to bed without any dinner. This trauma has probably helped to make me the angry, miserable, bastard that I am today. I still call my mother every year when the Vikings' hopes have been dashed, to blame her for her unpardonable sin. She, like most guilty people, denies her crime. Claiming that it is not "her fault the Vikings lost." Actually, she is correct it is not her fault they LOST. However, it is, and always will be her fault that I am still crushed when they do. At least I have progressed from the tearful 7 year old from 1977, now I am the foul mouthed, get me a fucking drink, and leave me the hell alone 39 year old that really wants to break something. It is a sad commentary on my life, and a clear indication of my misplaced priorities when I am able to say that my longest standing relationship of any kind is with the Minnesota Vikings. People have found out to their cost that it is not a wise thing to come between us. Perhaps every year on the 9th of January I should go out and get raging drunk (not that I need any more reasons to get raging drunk). After all, that day some thirty-two years ago was the last time the Vikings played in the Super Bowl, and from the looks of it they may never get there again (if you doubt me look up their 1998 season, I am still unable to discuss it rationally). Upon calm reflection maybe January 9th, 1977 is the day where it all started to go horribly wrong, maybe the Minnesota Vikings helped my childhood end a little quicker than it needed to, and not on a high note. Maybe they taught me a valuable life lesson about how we can't win all the time, and get used to being disappointed a majority of the time. Maybe we deserve each other, the Vikings and I, underachievers both, annual disappointments followed by a spring time rekindling of hope, and then a season of ups and downs that usually end in tears. Of course these things do usually end in tears, but even now only an hour or so after watching them fail for another year all I can think is we will get them next year. I guess hope does spring eternal.

A late but happy christmas

Clearly, I am not a fan of the holidays. Ask people that know me fairly well, and they will tell you that Scrooge does not have anything on me when it comes to the "humbug" department. Until I am visited by four ghosts, and suddenly see the light I will remain the "humbug" fellow that I am. Even then I would not be so easily convinced, as much as I drink, random ghost sightings or visual hallucinations are part and parcel of some of my more vivid dreams. Sadly for me and the literary community, I do not write epic poetry while I am in my drunken stupors. However, this christmas was not as bad as usual. I did manage to beg off of going home, and spending "quality" time with the parental units. Perhaps they have finally ascertained that "home" it where ever I happen to be. In this case a house that I can barely afford, and can not give away, i.e. sell for anything but a bag of chips. The "home" that my parents wish me to go back to is a very small, very shitty, little town called Gleason (pop. 1,463). It is a poster child for one horse towns. In this day and age that would equal to being a one stop light town. Not a red light, that would be too fancy, and more than the budget could bear. No we have a stop light, just one bulb, one colour, thank you very much. Being bore, bred, and educated in such an environment did not produce the witty, sophisticated, well spoken fellow that at least three people read, on occasion, on this blog. No I managed to obtain the benefits of a classical education both on my own, and quite by accident. So, I would quite expect that the majority of those 1,463 people's imagination would boggle at the list of my christmas guests. Of course, for their safety no names will be doled out, and who can blame them? To be counted among my friends, and my christmas guests could be considered a slander that would require an immediate lawsuit. Either way the list included one Swede, one Scotsman, an Englander, and later an Aussie. I was the only U.S. citizen at the table, not like that is a badge of honour, and I was also the person with the least amount of education. Considering that I spent a decade in various and sundry post-secondary school, and have the massive student loans to prove it, that is no mean feat. Lots of food was consumed, lots of drink was consumed, and a poker game or two broke out. Apparently everyone had fun,and no international incidents occurred. No one got too terribly mad at another else, and no one tried to punch anyone in the face (unlike my usual christmas experiences at "home"). International relations were quite pleasant, and we even managed to stagger out to a bar without any violence, of course it helps that we did not invite any Irish.