In The Market

I've been saving money with the idea of buying a new computer. I'd planned on buying a hotrod quad-core, boosting the RAM to 6Gb and adding a vid card, more HD space and a flat monitor... which is less than $1k if I buy the parts and do my own upgrades. You can buy a very nice PC for a grand today...sweet!

Sadly, a thousand dollars doesn't buy much in the way of automobiles and that, I am afraid, is where my money is going. I had hoped to coax another 6-8 months out of my beloved Volvo 780, but the tires have recently become wobbly and it makes me afraid to drive it...my car-savvy pal Mike sez my tie-rods (and other things) are breaking, which is more than a little dangerous.

The repairs would cost a fortune in-shop but the parts are relatively cheap, the problem is it would take a long time to self-repair (weeks) because Mike has a busy, busy real-life and it's not an easy task suitable for an unguided know-little such as myself...plus there are still the oil leak issues...sigh. I love my car, but it mu...m-m-...m-must go. Sob.

I can't get to work without a car, so I need a new one soon...on the plus side, I have my late cousin's bicycle and it works like a charm, so groceries and small errands are easy- in fact, I love that bike, so having an excuse to ride is a good thing...riding to work is not an option.

I might have to drive (slowly) to work for a few days and hope that the tire doesn't snap. This week I can carpool, but next week my hours change and I'm not on anyone's work schedule. Yet.

Crap. If the wheel falls off my Volvo it'll wreck and look like this:

Or worse. I'd probably careen into a crowd of orphans while they were on a field trip to the endangered species petting zoo and I'd have to live with that for the rest of my life...or I'd plunge off of a bridge and into the ocean...or a cliff, like in those bad Hollywood movies...in any case, I'm not driving unless I really have to, like to avoid a volcano or meteor or something.

Unfortunately, this pic (above) is also what a $1,000 used car tends to look like. I haven't seen much in the under $2500 range on [ThatList] except a few scams..**see below for scam warning!

If I'm lucky, I'll find a nice Honda/Toyota/etc beater for around $15oo..if it lasts a year, that will give me time to save for a nicer "real" car and maybe a PC too...like I said, PCs are cheap now and I do have a job, so that helps. I will buy cash only. No credit. My Twin might loan me some money, but only what I can afford to pay back -no interest!

More good potential luck: The Twin is considering buying a nice home here in Fallentown. I would help defray the payments by paying rent to Twin and we will work out a sweat equity thing too...personally, I don't care if I own the house or not but I have no trouble with giving the Twin my rent- keep it in the family! My current apartment is small and totally overcrowded with decades of ...stuff. Some is mine and some belongs to dead relatives and missing friends.

It will feel good to rid myself of what I no longer value and to reacquaint myself with forgotten personal treasures.

Twin wants to build a home music/recording studio room...I have the gear, he is shopping for basements and de-commissioned bomb shelters for placement. If it happens, I'd live upstairs and run the studio. It's a big if, but I feel like talking about it anyway, jinx be damned. I can't live in fear of jinxes...it's a self-fulfilling fear,ya know?

Other items belong to the part of me that died in September 2005. I sometimes run into artifacts from my drinking days and I am baffled as to where they came from or why I have them...I just found an awesome letter of recommondation from my State Farm boss- he details the stellar above/beyond accomplishments and gives me the highest marks possible.

It scares me that I barely remember most of what I did on that job. I worked unsupervised, so I did all my work early in the morning and then I got drunk and fucked off all day. It's where this blog was born.

AND THIS BLOG HAS ALWAYS HATED SCAMS

I am in the "looking" process for a car, so I tried craigslist. It's has 100's of listings per day, some are repeats from dealers, some are single owners and some others are simply to good to be true...such as a 2002 Honda Accord for $2000. What's wrong with car? How many miles?...I wrote a letter with a dozen or so questions, including location and this is what I got, below.

NOTE: The reply came in less that 60 seconds after I sent my query, seems to indicate a robot at work:

THE REPLY:

First of all i want to say that the car is in perfect condition,
without faults or dents, no scratches or any kind of damage,
without engine problems, no hidden defects, the car has not suffered
damage.The interior is as new condition and was never smoked in. The price
I find it very reasonable, I ask for it $2,000. The problem is that
I had to leave with my family in Canada as my wife has been promoted
and we had to move here where she got the new job transfer for 5 years.
We can use eBay Safe Pay Insurer to complete the transaction. The deal
will go strictly according to eBay rules and policy.
In order to start the official transaction, I need to know your details:
-full name and shipping address
As soon as I have them, I'll start the official procedure and eBay
service will notify you about this. You'll also receive important
guidelines and payment instructions from them . I'll handle the
shipping, so this will be free of charge for you. We will use eBay
Safe Pay Insurer to manage the payment because it is the safest way
for both of us and also you will have 10 days to inspect the car
before I receive the money. Also, a refund policy will be included.

The car is still in US, at our home in Clinton, IN that we intend to keep
and not sell because we will return after the 5 years contract will close and
when we return we will get a new car so we don't need this one anymore.
I have a clean title ready to be signed.
The car has no electrical or mechanical problems.

END REPLY

1) Ebay doesn't have a 'Safe Pay' thingee. The ebay site warns you of this.

2) No one is gonna sell a sweet car at 50% of book on eBay. It would be very easy to sell such a car with local ads. Unless you are dealing with an established 'Collector/Specialty' dealer, there is no reason to buy a car via long-distance.

Look. Drive. Touch. Listen...

I hate car shopping. I'd rather buy a PC, it's been fun pricing them. Cars are harder.

I also need a good girlfriend. If I could meet a smart woman who likes sci-fi. politics, satire and has a nice house, two cars and a good broadband connection, I'd be set!

Currently holding breath.

MMMmmmMmMmmmMpphh....gasp

Pheeewhew...pant, pant....I'm all dizzy now...have my dreams come true yet?

Christmas Shadows and Winter Showers

Shortly before dinner last Christmas, my Grandmother made her final trip to the ER. She fell into a coma and died a little over a month later. My family, which was never very large or especially close, became even smaller and more divided. After her death, my father no longer had any reason to quit drinking , so he went back to a life of depressed, drunken isolation of his own choosing. My Uncle has almost vanished, he, like my father, didn't return my pre- Thanksgiving calls. My Twin brother and I stay in pretty close contact, though.

A rift has opened between myself and my older relatives. It's been in place for decades, but it widened significantly when I chose to quit drinking. I get the feeling that my dad and uncle are uncomfortable and resentful of me for not drinking; my sobriety pisses them off because it makes them look bad in comparison. I have tried to convince them just how painful, horrible and utterly pathetic a drunkard's death is, but they don't listen.

An aside: One of the women at work asked me if I was related a certain man who shares my last name. Yes, I answered, he is my uncle. She told me that she used to work with him 25 years ago. Then she asked if he still had a drinking problem. I got the impression that she didn't like him much. It was awkward and a bit embarrassing.

My dad finally called the other day. He suggested that we cancel Christmas this year. With Grandmother dead, he said, there's no real reason to gather at the old house-which is probably a burned-out wreck after a year of my father's drunken stewardship, after all.

My Grandma was the glue that held our tiny family together, Thanksgiving and Christmas were her days. My father, to his credit, would manage to stay sober during the holidays, although his younger brother tended to pick up the slack. This year, they will both be drunk and I have no desire to spend any time at all with my besotted relatives. I used to love preparing the big holiday dinners that my Grandma enjoyed so much, but I'll be damned if I'm gonna waste my time and energy cooking for a pair of mean, drunk old men.
Fuck that.

My brother will be visiting soon. It'll be good to see him. We only have one surviving relative on our mother's side, her younger brother, but we'll probably spend Christmas Day with him and his wife. I like them. If the weather allows, we might go ATV'ing. We'll find something to do. We might skip Christmas per se but we certainly won't cancel it. If Dad sobers up, I'd be glad to see him. If not, I don't care. He can cancel his own damn Christmas.

********************************************
I was in rush-hour traffic this morning, moving slowly through a heavy rain, when my driver's side windshield wiper stopped.

I was blind in less than a second, all I could see was the blur of the lights in front of me- I turned on my blinkers and slowed down to a crawl. I had to stick my head out of the window just to change lanes and my glasses got covered in water, I was driving on luck and adrenaline..I was terrified, I could barely tell the difference between a tractor-trailer and an off-ramp but somehow I managed to get off the main road and park safely. The windshield wiper turned out to a simple fix- a loose screw, basically- but by the time I fixed it, I was soaking wet, miserable and totally rattled by my roadway crisis. I think I was in a state of mild shock.

Things sort of went downhill from there.

But I'm not gonna let it cancel Christmas.

A Lot of Stuff

It was a busy weekend. The memorial and reception for my cousin were held at the nursing home where my great-aunt resides. It was a comforting service.
The lady in the picture above used to live across the street from us when I was in the 3rd grade, now she lives in the same home as my great-aunt...small world, eh?

I had to report to the temporary agency today to pick up the paperwork for a one-day job tomorrow- as I pulled into their parking lot, a cloud of white smoke billowed out from underneath the hood of my car. That's generally a sign of trouble.

I was relieved when I opened my hood and saw green coolant sprayed all over the engine compartment. That meant that it was most likely a broken hose, an easy fix even for me. On closer inspection I found two dangling, leaking hose ends, one of which had a 'do-hickey' attached to it that was supposed to join the two hoses together...one of the connector stems had broken...fuck...at least I'm lucky that it happened in a parking lot and not the highway.

I reported to the office and got my papers- I'm to be the 'Team Lead' at a foreclosure auction tomorrow night, probably selling the homes that I was forced to approve loans for during my stint at Bank of Generica-the pay is $20 an hour, which is better than most temp assignments and nearly 250% as much as I made as a stagehand...anyway, the office manager was very nice to me, she loaned me a screwdriver so I could remove my broken wotsit and even gave me a ride to the parts shop! Very kind, she was. I will do good work for her.

We arrived at the shop and I ran inside and plopped the broken doo-dad on the counter, told the parts guy that it came out of a 1990 Volvo 780 and that I needed a new one, whatever it was. He told me it was called a 'heater valve' and a new one would cost fifteen bucks.
Deal!
My boss drove us back to the office and I plugged the new piece into my system, poured a gallon of coolant into it and waited.
No leaks.
Turned the engine on.
No smoke.
Rockin'!



--------------------------------------------------
Sunday I finally managed to get back on the air. It was my first broadcast from our new studio- the Gospel Dude overslept again, so I got to start my show a little early, fine by me... man, I love our new broadcast booth!
Here's a pic of our crackerjack Jazz DJs Mike and Giz enjoying the new digs:



------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The New Breakfast Snob, Sunday March 9th, 2008


Tangerine Dream- On Crane's Passage
When I arrived at our dark, empty station I found a robot at the helm. Perhaps some melodic electronica will ease us back towards the human element.

Gong- Hymnalayas
I have extra time this morning...playin' long songs! Gospel Dude walks in, tells me that his cell phone didn't adjust it's clock and he overslept. Tsk. Snooze and lose.
I think I'll play a ten-minute song now...

Yes- Starship Trooper
The station had a huge pile of CDs that were being given away to make room for new ones...I grabbed this CD from that pile since no one else wanted it.
I think that I might be the only prog-rock enthusiast at the station. *sigh*

Savoy Brown- Take It Easy
Good advice from Kim Simmonds and Co. If something breaks, find the problem and fix it. Don't worry and don't freak out...it took me 41 years to figure this out.

Moody Blues- Eyes of a Child/Floating
As I progress in my sobriety I am continually amazed at how often I see old things in new ways. This old music speaks to that.

King Crimson- Epitaph
"If we make it we can all sit back and laugh"
It's not all fun and games.
A nod to sorrow.

Gong- You Can't Kill Me
Defiance!

Genesis- I Know What I Like
Another prog-rock CD that no one else wanted. Score!

Ray Manzarek- The Gambler
Former Doors organist's first solo album...his singing kinda sucks, but this 1974 recording is fucking great anyway. I might be the only DJ anywhere who keeps it in his rotation.

Faces- Ooo La La
'Nuff said.

Cardiacs- Mare's Nest
This band has everything I like , including a reverence for my own initials, ABC. I once saw a cut and paste of one of my playlists posted on a Cardiacs forum that is named after this rather 'in-your-face' song. It was a moment of validation for me.

Jethro Tull- Queen and Country
Still one of my all-time fave bands...Tull's War Child LP is timeless, which is kinda sad, since it's such an angry album.

Joe Strummer & Mescaleros- Get Down Moses
No moment of silence for Joe today- instead lets have five minutes of rawk!

Pretty Things- Defecting Grey
This 1967 single was deemed to be "too weird" for commercial success...it contains what may be the first-ever recorded example of what is now called "Heavy Metal".
Overdriven tubes and tape saturation, oh baby!

10,000 Maniacs- Grey Victory
Natalie once crashed at a house that I shared with a bunch of weirdos...she didn't crash with me though.
*sigh*
She did leave a grey ring around the bathtub, however.
(When you are on tour, you get dirty-no disrespect meant.)

The Kinks- Here Come The People In Grey
"...to take me away."
Muswell Hillbillies is one of the best albums of all-time. Just sayin'.

Claanad- Why Worry?
"This is not the way"

Captain Beefheart- Happy Love Song
She said, baby, how long is your song?
I said, baby, as long as you want it to be...

Alan Parsons Project- Cask Of Amontillado
Beware of people named Allan.
DJ Allan playing music by Producer Alan based on the story by writer Edgar Allan...time to run fer the hills! If you weren't so entombed, that is.

Eleanor Shanley- Road to Glory
What do Vikings have to do with Ireland? Quite a bit, actually.

Damien Dempsey- Hold Me
Dempsey is fookin' brilliant! I'm on a one-man crusade to promote him in America. My request to his label for CDs is still unanswered. *sigh*

Damien Rice & Christy Moore- Lonely Soldier
A sad song of war. Moving stuff, really.

Loreena McKinnett-Dark Night Of The Soul
There will be bad times and those times shall pass.

Damien Dempsey and Sharon Shannon- Norwegian Wood
I wish I could explain this...maybe one day. *sigh*

Anuna- Sleepsong
Fifteen hours later, a nap.



Goodnight!

The Importance of Being Frank

I had the extreme good fortune of seeing Frank Zappa perform a half-dozen or so times...the show I recall the best was Salt Lake City, circa 1985. FZ was originally booked to play at The Salt Palace, a god-awful sports arena with acoustics that were so bad it pretty much didn't matter what band was playing- all one heard was the sound of permanent hearing loss.

Luckily (for the fans) , Zappa didn't sell enough tickets for the Palace, so they moved the show next door to a small auditorium designed for symphonies- the sound was impeccable, the view from our third row seats was unbeatable and the skill of Zappa's band was on a level I have yet to see surpassed by anyone of any genre - and I have seen a lot of bands since 1985.

Frank would often light a cigarette and watch as one of his bandmates- such as Steve Vai- played a solo...after few minutes, he'd stick the cigarette in the strings of his own guitar's headstock, which was the signal that he was about to play his solo, which he would do until the cigarette was almost burning the guitar...oh, man...nobody had guitar attitude like Frank Zappa. Frank was better than almost anyone alive and he knew it. He didn't have to boast or talk it up, he just played and when he did there wasn't much you could do but stand in mute awe and try to absorb as much as possible, hoping to retain some fleeting bit of the creative mojo that came so easily to Zappa but so rarely touches most of us.

Years later, I was descending the stairs of a stage here in Fallentown after one of my own concerts and an excited young man approached me.

"You must listen to a lot of Zappa", he said, " you play a lot like Frank."

That was the highest compliment I have ever received, although I'm nowhere near the caliber of FZ. Few are.

If you really want to play like Zappa, it helps if you are Zappa. Dweezil Zappa, that is. I was interested in this show, but the $32 price tag was way out of reach...so I asked for free tickets on the virtue of my overall coolness- and got them!
So last Thursday night, a friend and I want to see Frank's son Dweezil play a concert of his father's material. When we arrived, all I could see was a jumbo screen playing concert footage of FZ himself...was this the warm-up, we wondered? On tip-toe, I could see the band...they were playing along to old footage while a roadie was trying to isolate the malfunction on Dweez's amplifier...a bad cable, I think...once all the tech difficulties were straightened out, his band- featuring FZ stalwart Ray White and a cast of great young players ( the sound was so bad I couldn't catch their names during the introductions)- launched into a 'best of' medley that lasted three hours, finishing with 'Muffin Man' and 'Illinois Enema Bandit'.
Awesome.


Zappa really did love his fans and he passed that on to Dweezil. After the show, he stayed on stage, shaking hands and giving autographs to dozens of fans, myself included.

"Your father would be proud", I said. It was loud and I don't know if he heard me, but I know it's true- what father wouldn't be proud to see their son carry on the family tradition- especially when it's a musical legacy as rare and powerful as Zappa's?

I spent most of the next day playing the riff from 'Muffin Man' over and over again on my guitar. It was pointless but quite gratifying.

Until my mixer exploded, that is. Every light that could go RED did go RED and a horrible buzzing sound blew out the speakers on my cheap stereo. I checked my receipt...the warranty expired 30 days ago. Fuck.
Might as well take a drive, get some food, calm down.

My engine died. After months of auto-drama and thousands of wasted dollars, I blew a cylinder and now my Volvo is little more than a giant Swedish paperweight.
Now I can't use it to not drive myself to the job I didn't get on Friday.

Except for the great show Thursday, my life has become pretty goddamn unbearable. For the first time in months, I have found myself thinking about drinking again, and how easy it would be to lose all my problems by crawling into the bottle and never coming out again...but, no.
Not gonna happen- I have too many things to do. The thought of drinking scares the shit out of me, which is exactly what it should do. As long as I have fear, I will be sober. I have lots of fear.

I have fun too:

I have a radio show today at 3PM, Songs from the Big Hair, which is our weekly 1980's program. I found a concert CD that has Dweezil's first ever live performance on it-, it's from 1984- Dweezil is 15 years old and he trades licks with his father on 'Sharleena' ...how cool is that?
I've got more Zappa lined up- I'll be carrying my tribute over to tomorrow morning's show...I might have to walk 20 blocks through cold rain to play my old Zappa records, but, by gum, that is what I'm gonna do.

There are a lot of things I can't seem to do- pay rent, eat, find a girlfriend, etc.- but there is one thing I can always do, and that thing is playing music.

After my show is over tomorrow, I'm gonna go home and play 'Muffin Man' until my fingers hurt.
Why?
Because I can.

Sunday Drive

My good looks are wasted on radio. My record collection is not. First a show, then a road trip.

Osibisa- Y Sharp
These guys had Roger Dean album covers. Groovy percussive funk.

Stranglers- Paradise
Lost and found.

Christy Moore- Don't Forget Your Shovel
"Don't forget yer shovel if ya wanta go to work"

--------------------------------------------------------------
I don't have a shovel- no wonder I can't find a job.
I do have a car that runs...I finally made it home to visit my grandmother, who is under hospice care at the moment. Here is my car parked at her house this morning.



Fairport Convention- The Way I Feel
A Gordon Lightfoot song...timeless.

Damien Dempsey- I Believe in a Thing Called Love
Remember the X-Files and the poster Fox Mulder had in his office? I want to believe.

Clanaad- Coinleach Ghlas an Fhomhair
I can't pronounce this. I listened to the lyrics and thought I had it, but nooooo....embarrassing.

Pogues & Steve Earle- Token Celtic Drinking Song
It is. Good stuff.

Isaac Hayes- Don't Let Go
Isaac Hayes was the voice of South Park's Chef before he was murdered by Scientologists. Those songs Chef sings on SP? Those aren't parodies-that is what Isaac really sounds like.

Damien Rice & Christy Moore- Lonely Soldier
Painful anti-war song.

Marianne Faithfull- The Soldier's Wife
No matter where you come from, war can kill you.

Isaac Hayes- Shaft (edit)
I am in a wah-wah mood.

Nouvelle Vague- In a Manner of Speaking
Wow. What a nice song.

-----------------------------------------------
When I arrived, my grandmother was engaged in some high-powered business negotiations . I had to wait while she finished her conversation with the Appalachian Mafia. Somebody is sleeping with the squirrels tonight!



Rickie Lee Jones- Girl From Ipanema
Ah...RLJ...

Isaac Hayes- Truck Turner
Man, again with the double-time wah wah...I wonder if this tune has anything to do with Ike and Tina? I think it's about a woman with an ass so fine that it turns trucks around. Really.
I told you those South Park songs aren't satire- that's the real Chef!

Jefferson Airplane- Milk Train
Grace Slick doesn't want to stop your milk train from coming- she just wants to ride it all of the time. That's a weird thing to write a song about...this has some great fiddle by Papa John Creach.

BeBop Deluxe- No Train To Heaven
From the man who brought you Blazing Apostles.
------------------------------------------------------
Finally- the open road! The leaves are still largely green- usually they have changed colors by now. By the way, I do not recommend taking photographs while driving.


Mister Sensitive- Laurie Says
Featuring me on guitar, slide guitar, vocals and keyboard; Greg Harrup on bass and Jimmy Kallis on drums. We got a review in the local paper following an exceptional gig, circa 1996:
" Mister Sensitive is destined to take a place in Richmond's rock pantheon. "
We broke up before the ink was dry.

Kinks- Money-go-round
One day I will play two hours of Kinks- that would barely scratch the tip of Ray Davies iceberg of genius.

Supertramp- Bloody Well Right
This record is very, very well produced. This song brings back some memories...

Jane Siberry- Love is Everything
This cut is labeled (Harmony Mix). I think that means it's 3 minutes longer than it should be.
After six minutes of this, I need something more cheerful.

Marianne Faithfull- Sister Morphine
Yep. This here's a cheerful tune...

Jethro Tull- The Mouse Police Never Sleeps
For Greebo, who probably isn't the mouser he dreams to be.

Loreena McKinnett - Marco Polo
One of my faves.

Eleni Mandell- Madhouse
Another fave. Imagine a female Tom Waits with an art-school punk attitude and a brazen cabaret swagger. That's Eleni.

War- Why Can't We Be Friends
Why?

Damien Dempsey- Celtic Tiger
Because of greed, that's why.

Gong- Cat in Clark's Shoes


My grandmother now has a cat. The cat has no name. Any ideas?

Update

My grandmother made it through the surgeries. My hat is off to the great docs at Winchester Memorial who saved her life by finding some previously over-looked problems. Tuesday, she was as white as the Blogger post field- last night her color had returned and she was lucid, if exhausted. With luck, she'll be home by next week. I'm home now.

This morning I noticed my left driver-side tire was bald on the edge to the point of showing mesh. The other three are like-new. I just drove 700 interstate miles with a tire that could blow any second- I think my tires were seriously pushed out of alignment when I hit that deer- the wear is extreme. It was pulling hard to left too...and it's leaking oil. Great.

Hopefully I'll have something less utilitarian and more entertaining to write soon- right now I'm putting together a database for the radio station because I miss my spreadsheets so much...it should keep me busy for a little while and help keep my as-yet unwanted job skills sharp!

Thanks for all the well wishes and emails and stuff. I hope everyone is well and I hope I'll be back around shortly.

New Plan

I broke down and closed out my vacation savings account. I have had only one vacation in the last five years- and this next one was gonna be a good one- I even got my passport!- but that was before I killed Bambi with my Volvo.

The car repairs are only a few pennies less than my savings...forty-six cents to be exact.

$.0.46.

Me at the Greyhound counter: " How far away from here can I get for 46 cents? One-way is fine."

Insomnia: A User's Guide Pt. 374

Ever had trouble sleeping and have someone suggest that you "count sheep?"
Bah.
Sleep is for the weak and counting sheep is for pussies.
I'm a bad-ass motherfucker, I don't need sleep and I sure as hell am not gonna waste my precious insomnia on being a virtual shepherd.
I like to lie awake all night and torture myself by making lists of things I can't change.
OK, that's not exactly true- I don't enjoy making the lists, but I do it anyway.

Here's a sampling from some of my fave self-torment lists:

THE LOVERS:
I'm not now and have never been promiscuous , so if I think about it long enough, I can actually name almost every woman I have ever slept with. But just counting them isn't enough, there aren't that many and it doesn't take long to merely list them. To really deprive myself of sleep, I need details.
So when the insomnia hits, I start sorting them by alphabetical order, last name (if known) first.
Then by chronology. And so on:
-Hair color.
-Astrological sign.
-Where we met.
-What music was playing?
-Drug of choice.
-Favorite position.
If we were 'dating', I replay the details of the break-up and try to figure out what it was that I did wrong. This leads to my next list- Faults, real or imagined:

THE FAULTS:
- HAIR: I started losing my hair when I was 18 but didn't admit it until I was 30 and I started shaving my head in a show of solidarity with my mom, who was undergoing chemo at the time.
If I had started shaving my head when I was 18, it would probably take me a lot longer than it does to count all my ex-lovers. For years, I had long hair and a bald spot, which is probably the least attractive hair-do a man can sport, short of wearing a toupee.
Once, a hippie GF convinced me to try wearing a ponytail.
I was dumb enough to agree.
I had a ponytail and a bald spot at 25 years old.
I may never outlive that shame.

- ROCKIN':
I used to be convinced that I would make a living playing music. Either that, or I would be dead before I turned 40. For 15 years, all my extra energy went into making music. I have at least six hours worth of my own material recorded- I could have written a novel, graduated college or invented a time machine with all of the energy I wasted on Rockin'.
Rockin' has ruined my love life more than once.
One of my girlfriends used to cheat on me when I had gigs- when I was on stage, she knew I wasn't gonna catch her at home...years later, I was trying to impress another woman with my musical awesomeness, so I sent her a CD. She called me and told me that my songs were indicative of serious mental illness and maybe it would be better if we didn't see each other.
That bothered me.

-GETTING WASTED:
I had a PermaBuzz from 1983 to 2005. From Absinthe to Xanax, I have done it all at least once. For a long time, this was fun, but it's really a difficult lifestyle to maintain and it tends to drive away sane people. I once boasted, truthfully, that I could snort an entire eight-ball in two giant lines. That ability didn't exactly attract the best sort of person, my personal possessions had a habit of vanishing when certain 'friends' visited.
And it leads to my new favorite list...


YET ANOTHER BRUSH WITH DEATH:

- DEATH BY AUTO:
Years ago, a man ran a stop sign and I broadsided his new Lexus with my old Honda at 55 mph, totalling both cars. We both emerged unscathed...I was so surprised to be unhurt that I didn't even get mad at the guy, in fact, we sorta bonded on the roadside, looking at the wrecked cars and waiting for the cops...dude sent me $600 even though I told him I wasn't planning on suing or anything.
A year or so later, I blew a tire and bounced my newer Accord across five lanes of rush-hour traffic. I hit a Ford, totalling it, bounced off a Toyota ( wrecked) and finally stopped pinballing when I hit a guardrail. My Honda had a couple dents and lost a headlight. The police officer said he couldn't imagine how I managed to wreck two cars while barely hurting my own. I drove away without a bruise or a ticket...my 4th of July collision with a deer made me think about that...three serious smash-ups that I've walked away from without a scratch.

-DEATH BY SCORPIO:
I haven't had a lot of girlfriends, but at least half of them have been Scorpios and each one of them has made at least one attempt on my life. Knives, guns, a bass guitar and a Wolf-Shepherd hybrid are some of the weapons employed by Scorpios seeking my demise. On the positive side, a failed murder attempt can lead to some pretty terrific revenge sex. It's the mortality buzz, I guess.

-DEATH BY BOOZE:
This is the one that lingers on my mind the most. When I saw the deer's blood and guts on the side of my car, the first thing I thought of was my own experience with alcohol-
induced internal hemorrhaging and how much of my own blood I have seen. If you drink heavily for a long, long time, your guts will literally dissolve and you will drown in your own blood - that is what happened to me.
I made it to the ER with a few minutes to spare. When I read the recent news story about a woman who bled to death in an L.A. hospital ER, I had a flashback that triggered a serious panic episode, so I know the fear is still with me. The fear keeps me sober.

I'd like to think that all these close calls have made me braver or stronger somehow, but yesterday it caught up to me- all of it- and I was literally paralyzed by thought. I spent the afternoon just sitting and trying not to think about all of the things that I have just spent an hour describing.
It must have worked, because I actually did sleep last night and my dreams weren't at all bad.

I had a good dream.
My dream had an accent, not an accident.
It was full of love and it rocked without fault.

A Country Drive

This was a beautiful morning for a drive, windows down, sunroof open, yeah baby, what I need is a long drive to clear my head.
I love a long drive on windy back roads. Usually, I crank the music really loud, but I'm enjoying the sound of the wind. You couldn't ask for better driving conditions. I have a feeling that by the time I reach the convalescent center where my grandma is residing, I'll be in a good mood. It'll cheer her up.

Then a deer comes out of nowhere.
Cue the split-second time freeze.
It's a small doe and it runs left to right in front of my car.
I hit the brakes and it crosses my vision, I think I'm gonna miss it.
Whew! That was close.
Bam!
Fuck!

But it doesn't feel that bad, I'm not going especially fast and the deer seems to have grazed my car, so I pull into the parking lot of a nearby church to assess the damage. Two cars pull in behind me.
A man and woman get out of one of them, a second woman gets out of the other car.The guy is walking very quickly towards me. He's awfully young to look so worried.

"Are you OK?", he asks.

"Sure, I'm fine."

"You're sure?"

I look at my hands. They are shaking.

"Uh...I need to sit down." But I don't.

"I have never seen a deer split in half before", says one of the women.

I look at my car. The right headlight assembly is gone. Not damaged, just gone. The front end is broken, exposed; the jagged, torn front of the right fender panel has a newly-serrated edge that is apparently capable of bisecting a deer at 45 mph.

Blood, shit, fur and deer viscera cover the entire passenger side. There are chunks of hairy meat embedded in the front grille. I pry as much off as I can and am surprised to find that the hood opens. That's a good sign.
My passenger window was down, yet no deer guts or blood went inside the car. The outside of the rear passenger is a mess. Lucky.

My car is a rolling total.

At least it runs. I spent $500 dollars on that engine less than a week ago, so it damned sure better run. The engine compartment seems unharmed. That's good.

Satisfied that I am OK, the drivers depart, leaving me to stare at my bloody, wrecked car. I'm calm. It was nice that they stopped. People are not so bad. I sit for a while, thinking about that and suddenly I'm on the ground, sobbing. I could have been killed. That thing could have come through the windshield.
I pull myself together, then I get back on the road heading home. There's a carwash not far away, I've gotta get there and wash this gore off before it fuses with my paint.
On the way back, I see the deer. It really was split in half, the front portion is a yard or so into the woods, the rear is in the roadside ditch.
I killed it.
It killed itself.
It could have killed me.
Calm down.

Have you ever been on the highway driving a car that is covered bumper-to-bumper with deer guts? It's not relaxing.
I really did expect to get pulled over, but I didn't. I got to the car wash.
OUT OF ORDER.
No biggie, they have eight other lanes.
OUT OF ORDER.
All of them.

I'm 25 miles from the next carwash. My car is dripping gore and it is already starting to stink in the sun. I go into the fast-food/quick shop and buy some Windex and a roll of paper towels and start wiping the deer smear off of my ruined vehicle. It's not easy and soon I'm using the windshield squeegee on the side of my car. It works pretty well.
Within a half-hour, I've removed the visible blood. During the entire time- in a busy, holiday gas station- only one guy asks me what happened.

"Hit a deer."

"Fuckin' hate that. Hit on last year. Cost me $3000, but my truck looks good now."

It does look good.
Sure wish I had $3000.


By the time my car is semi-clean, the wiper-fluid bucket looks like it's full of fishing chum.
Deer eat plants and so are usually full of chewed-up plant material; if a deer explodes on your car, there is considerable green matter along with the red. Half-chewed plant stalks and shredded animal tissue float in the bucket.

For a moment, I consider carrying the bucket inside and asking the staff: " Hey, I'm sorry, but no one can use this on their windshields. It's mostly deer blood and half-digested dung, not windex. What should I do with it?"

I think that if I do that, I will certainly wind up in some sort of trouble.

I decide to dump it into a storm drain.

I make it home. There's nothing I can do about the car today. It's a holiday. I can't drive anywhere to watch fireworks, I have no headlights, so no night driving.

I don't miss the fireworks, but I do miss having a car. My options are:

1) Borrow from family to repair/replace car.
But it's unlikely to be repairable -(Find a fender for a 1990 Volvo 780? Good luck, they only made 7,000 of them, ever...)-and I don't want to replace it. It's the only good car I have ever owned and the only reason I could afford it was that I bought it with the money that my suicided uncle Steve left to me. Losing that car would be like losing Steve again.

2) Don't drive.

Right.

I go back outside and look at my car. If I could get a lamp assembly and align it properly, it could almost pass our State inspection. Maybe a bodyshop could bend it back- it's about three inches pulled back and away from the body...more than I can do alone.

I think about all the blood that was on the car and what might have happened if the deer had come through my windshield.
Jesus.

I have terrible luck, but at least I'm alive to realize that.

Circuit Breaker

I am burnt. Shattered. Toasted.
It's been a long week. Too many problems all at once.
It all caught up to me when I called my grandmother late last week. She is in a 100-day convalescent program to determine if she will be able to return home or if she will need assisted living.
No one except my granny thinks she can complete the rehabilitative therapies.
When I talked to her, she could barely speak; I don't know if it she was drugged or not, all she could do was cough. Into the phone.
LOUDLY.
Then she would gasp and cough again.
"A...A..Allan? * HACK* "is that y..*HACK!..*gasp*..."
I tried to keep talking about the nice weather and the pie my neighbors gave me; about how my car runs better now ( omitting the fact I spent my vacation money on it), but I couldn't maintain my composure.
Her coughing was causing me physical pain and her palpable suffering was shutting me down emotionally.

Here comes the panic. Every problem, real or imagined, was being encoded into my grandmother's tortured breath and passed along the telephone wires until it reached the bullhorn I was staring into on the other end.

I can't breathe either, I want to tell her, but I can't speak. I can't think. Panic.
Forgive me, but I'm having a freakscene attack and I can't talk.
I love you. Goodbye.
I had to take two Ambien before I could sleep that night.

Saturday, I took my panic pills in the morning. I almost never do that but I felt twigged even before I showered.
I did two loads of laundry; swept the apartment; did the dishes; bought groceries and made a nice green chile, rice and cilantro dish; scrubbed the litterbox closet and started organizing my comic collection. I kept getting distracted by reading them so I didn't get far with that.

I did everything except what I was supposed to do, which was to drive north and sit by my grandmother's side.

The guilt from this dereliction kept me awake all night and I had to do my early morning radio show with barely any sleep. Now I'm too exhausted to make the six-hour round-trip, so I'll take my guilt to bed with me again tonight. Maybe I will visit on the Fourth.

Anyway, I did manage to do my show:

Soweto Gospel Choir- Many Rivers to Cross
I do not think that one must necessarily believe in God in order to draw strength from spiritual music. This song just sounds good to me.

Talking Heads- Take Me To The Water
More river music.

Peter Tosh- You Can't Fool Me Again
Perhaps you can't, but someone very much like you can. And has. And will.Again.

Damien Dempsey- Celtic Tiger
"I am your Goddess Greed, you shall have no God but me"

Fairport Convention- The Way I Feel
I don't recall what I was dreaming about, but in it, this song was playing. Who says dreams never come true?

Clarence Fountain & 5 Blind Boys- Lift Me Up
All the way to Olympus.

Loreena McKinnett- Gates of Istanbul
It's almost as if you were there.

Kinks- Waterloo Sunset
I believe that this is one of the most beautiful pop songs of all time.

Clash- Hate and War
Lest we get too complacent, let's remember what's really happening in the world.

Emmylou Harris- Here I am
At the end, the songs picks up a percolating, electronically-assisted groove as Emmylou announces her presence. Sweet production , sweet voice.

Camon Friel- Yanks
"If ya wanna make money, ya gotta sing like one"

Grace Slick/Paul Kantner- Walkin'
Wandering through the wasteland.

10 CC- Sand In My Face
Dynamic Tension!

Gary Numan- M.E.
Why should I care? Why should I try?
Oh no. Oh no.
I turn off the pain like I turned off you all
Now there's only M.E.
Gary Numan sure has some cheery lyrics.

Fiona Joyce- The Juggler
This is a current release from a St. Clair Records promo compilation. I don't like a lot of the stuff in their catalog, but Joyce is wonderful.

Graham Central Station- Can't Stand The Rain
It's warm and sunny and I can't stand feeling this tired on such a nice day. I'll pretend it's raining and try not to feel guilty about not visiting my grandmother.

Savoy Brown- Poor Girl
This song is for Moon Pie. Moon Pie was a girl I used to live with whose head and ass were both pale, nearly-perfect spheres; reminding me of twin Moons. I never did explain this term of endearment to her.

Pretty Things- Bitter End
Phil May feels your pain. What a great, underated band the Pretties were.

Atomic Rooster- Don't Know What Went Wrong
Story of my life. Same old song, don't know what went wrong, etc etc...

Lou Reed- Leave Me Alone
Really. I have maximum straws on my back.

Eleni Mandell- I Love Paris
I wish her records were easier to find. Perhaps in Paris?

Steeleye Span- Lowlands of Holland
After your husband drowns at sea, it's laments , homesickness and sorrow from there on out.

Maire Brennan- Beating Hearts
Yesterday I was outside, using a broom to beat the cat hair and dust out of my throw rugs. It's amazing how much crap is in those things. It reminded me of this song's title.

Marianne Faithfull- Broken English
I dedicated this song to "my good buddy in the UK, Tony B. Naming you envoy to the Middle East makes as much sense as making Pete Rose commissioner of baseball." I wonder if anyone knew what I was talking about?
What are we fighting for? It's not my security!
No shit.

Flaming Groovies - She's Falling Apart
She's my foundation.She keeps me standing. Now she's falling apart.
Dude. Eggs in one basket...tsk.

Golden Palominos - Pure
She has never felt so pure...
This song is so groovy and sexy that it almost always gets a call :"who is that? This is cool etc".
I love it when people call and ask what they just heard.

Velvet Underground- Train Goin' Round The Bend
I honestly don't know how I made it through the week, but I did.
Now it's over and it's time to rest. Maybe I'll scrub the bathtub...

Potential for Steam

My car came perilously close to overheating this evening. In the space of a mile or so, the
thermostat goes from it's normal '12 o'clock vertical all the way into the far-right red zone, not quite clipping it, but close.

Can't drive like that without wrecking my engine, so I park in a 'reserved' spot in a nearby apartment building.

Under the hood, greenish-gray spray is everywhere...a coolant hose has split and the antifreeze is squirting into the fan and the belts, which are spraying it downward and aroundward...there is a puddle forming on the asphalt...damn.

Well, I can patch the leak with duct tape and put enough coolant in to get home, but first I need to wait for the engine to cool...it's too hot to stick my hand inside.
(Note: find the fuse labeled 'radiator/turbo fans' and remove it before sticking your hand anywhere near a radiator or turbo fan. Important.)

So I sit in the sun and think. I was thinking about how I was recently forced into discussing my alcoholism in real life, and how uncomfortable that was for both me and my interlocutor.
I was asked about my "support system"...I don't go to AA or any other group, but I do have other things, things I think work. I'm somewhat proud to have these things but not so proud I can't be grateful for them:

1) The radio. I have to get up every Sunday at 5:30-6am and do radio. I love doing this so much that waking up is never a problem, although sleeping beforehand often is. If I started drinking again, I would lose my ability to function in the morning. I'd lose my show.
Radio is part of my support system.

2) My grandmother. She is proud of me. To her, I am the one who beat the odds, she can talk about me at church without eliciting sympathy. To me, she was my anchor in a tsunami childhood. She did everything she could, and I'm here now when I otherwise might not have been.

3) You. My blogpals. You accept me despite knowing things that I haven't told many of my close friends. (Perhaps some of you don't, but you aren't reading this , so it's a moot point. )The real point is: I appreciate all the kind thoughts. (Some of you have marvelous timing...uncanny! )
I write about things that are hard for me to explain and that must be difficult for others to read, but sometimes it reaches someone who reaches back and that makes it worthwhile. Contact.

The thing is, I explained this to someone who has a history of dealing with drunks. They seemed to think it was reasonable and they especially thought #3 above was an interesting alternative to AA. I had never looked at blogging quite like that before, my idea was more along the Isle of Misfit Toys...

Was she wrong? I see some truth in it, but I don't think that's bad. I think it good.

Anyway, I patched the leak (for now) and got home, but I did get some thinking done while I waited for the engine to cool.

I'm thinking it's gonna work out somehow.

Selling Jack

I recently inherited a new PC at work- one that runs on an 'operating system' known as 'electricity' . The old one used a system of springs, gears and wires and was 'booted-up' by turning a hand-crank for several tedious minutes each morning. This is how automobiles were started back in my childhood years, but shouldn't something as futuristic as a computer have an internal, electronic 'ignition' mechanism?
Like a button you could press or something?

Here is how a car was started back in my day, except instead of a smiling maiden doing the cranking, it would be me; standing barefoot in cold, ankle-deep mud:

Look at the date: Sept. 1911. By 1911 , advertisers were already using sex to sell cars - a technique apparently discovered before the invention of the automobile battery and 'hot-wiring'.
There is nothing accidental in the erotic composition of this picture, but please don't make me explain it.
I'm already distracted enough.

Check out what Crank Babe is wearing- in 1911 America had some really bizarre standards of dress for women- a repressive puritanical desire to cover everything.
Not unlike current Islamic standards, really:



Hmm...a little ankle , but no sash to emphasize the waist and I like the white gloves on the American lass better...
I have a crush on the model from that ad. I wonder what she's doing today?
Here she is in another ad.
This 1911 advertisement starts off by insulting the reader:

"Are You Lazy ?" it screams at them in the text.

If that ad were produced today , it wouldn't ask that question. It wouldn't have to.

Today, we are all lazy and we all know it, so why should we waste what little energy we have answering rhetorical questions?

Today the text would promise to help you lose weight or to overcome depression.
It would sell.

Again, there's nothing accidental in this picture.

What's the Story?

This is the view from my porch. My goal Saturday was to get to the mailboxes behind the yellow van and drop a number of envelopes into one of them. Pretty dull, eh?
Not for me.



First, I wondered if I was having an acid flashback - what's up with the stripes on the brick? That building doesn't usually look like that.
I went back inside to grab my camera...

And then I saw the car. The blue Volvo station wagon.
Actually, I could smell the car, but at first I thought it was the hospital across the street incinerating body parts and infectious medical waste again.
I was wrong.
It was the car.



Breathing as little as possible, I approached it. A bedraggled young man with a scruffy knapsack was standing a few yards away, waiting for the bus. The smell of cheap wine coming from him was staggering, even at that distance, and combined with the stench coming from the car, it was almost pukabley offensive. With the windows up.




I had to get a pic. This sort of thing isn't quite so unusual (or wasn't, back in my hobo days) in NYC ,San Francisco, the DC area and other places that are far too expensive for most humans- but this is Fallentown. It's getting bad, but rent is still pretty cheap here.
Our local homeless people don't own Volvos, they drive shopping carts.

The last time I saw a car like this , it was a battered old AMC Gremlin and it had luggage , furniture, clothes and other readily identifiable items neatly organized inside- it was clearly a 'domestic' vehicle.
Today's car was full of garbage-literally. Rotting offal.
It's been cold lately- what would this thing be like in summer?
Who drives this mess?
I looked around. No one nearby except the drunk on the corner.

"Don't take my picture," said the winey bus stop buzzard. He didn't seem especially drunk, but the smell was awful...oh, man it's bad when you can drink that much without showing it. I know.

I had no intention of taking wineman's photograph but I had to ask:

"Is this your car?"

"No. I'm waiting for the bus. That guy's fucked up or sumpin'.."

"Really?"

So I walked around the car, peering into the windows , trying to discern whether someone was living in it or if was simply full of refuse.
It was refuse alright, rotting remnants of fast-food meals and crumpled wads of disturbingly brown newspaper... but my question of inhabitation was unanswered.
There was a hairbrush and a desk fan on top of the junk in the driver's seat...why?

I didn't see how one could survive it, much less live in it; then again, there wasn't much at all I understood about this car. Curiosity piqued, I decided to sit on the wall and wait for the owner.
I figured I'd interview the driver and get their story; if they were in a bad way, there are places in town for different sorts of help and I know most of them, or people who do- but my motives weren't altogether altruistic- I was simply curious . Nosy, really. I like to know the story.

Speaking of nose...
Usually , one of my cats joins me when I sit outside, but neither one wanted to come close to the Stenchmobile. After a few minutes, the smell started to bother me. It smelled like a dead cow. Or a corpse. Or a corpse hidden in the hollowed-out body cavity of a dead cow.
Bad.

So I mailed my letters and went inside to see if the Dept. of Health and Sanitation was open on Saturday.
Hmmm...there's a number for abandoned vehicles, but this doesn't qualify. From the looks of it, the owner of this Volvo has abandoned everything but the car and it's contents.

Emergency? Given the freaked-out fear world we live in, I imagined the results of a call to the Hotline reporting a vehicle emitting a noxious odor - they'd probably evacuate the area until a CDC ABC team could scour the entire area, including my apartment.
I could find myself living in my own Volvo.
What do do? Nothing.

A few minutes later it was gone. I didn't hear the engine start or the door open and shut.

It was just gone.

The bricks had returned to normal.

Last Night's Missiles

The first thing I notice is the feel of a rubber band around my right ankle. It's on there to keep the baggy leg of my Army surplus trousers from getting caught in the chain of my Huffy 10-speed bike...
My vision clears just in time to swerve madly, barely missing a car that's parked in the middle of the road - it's facing the wrong direction, am I in England?



I stop, dismount, lean the bike against a tree that wasn't there ten seconds ago and walk over to the car.
It's a familiar model, something I've seen a million of but I can't quite place the name now.
It's got Maryland tags.
So I'm in Maryland, a glance inside the empty vehicle shows a Baltimore Sun newspaper folded neatly on the front seat. The large banner headline catches my eye and I reach in to grab the paper- holy shit!
The headline ,dated Sept 15, 1984, reads:

Missiles Launch at Midnight



Suddenly I remember that I'm in a real hurry to get home. Goddamnit, I sure wish they'd left the keys in the ignition.
I toss the paper back into the car, hop on the bike and zoom downhill. I've had this dream before and I know that my dreamyard has a really good view of the Apocalypse .
I don't want to miss the show.

Back up, hold on, wait a sec...OK, I'm back at the car and this time the keys are in it - as I said, I've had this dream before and I've learned to control parts of it.
Like the keys- I just wished for them and there they were...but I know somehow that driving isn't going to be so easy.
It's not- there's a mob of pedestrians and parked cars nearly blocking both lanes, HONK HONK HONK , no one budges or even looks, everyone is staring up at the sky between the trees, waiting for the missiles.

" Run them over"

What?

My Granpa is sitting next to me- how strange to see him in the passengers seat, Granpa was always driving. Granpa was not the sort of man to advise his grandson to run over pedestrians, this is a new twist. I'm losing my tenuous control over the dream.

"RUN THEM OVER!"

Granpa is mad. He was almost never mad. This scares me.

"But..." , I can't speak. I can't run over these people- look, some are just kids, some are old...
How can I do that?

"DO IT!"

I try to press the accelerator but my foot won't move.

"GO!"

The car rockets into motion and plows into the crowd, touching no one. The people are like water, displaced for a moment as we speed through, gradually filling in the space left in our wake, none the worse for our passage.

Hot Damn! Granpa will be so proud- he never did get to see me drive. I turn , beaming , to look at him but he's gone and I'm back on the bike, riding it up the dirt road to the little white farmhouse where I live during Missile Dreams.

There's a small crowd in the backyard, mostly gathered around the old brick BBQ grill- out of habit I guess, since there's no coals, no food, just some old leaves in the bottom that would make decent tinder if needed...I wonder where they came from- there are no trees nearby. That's why the view is so good from here.

Sara starts talking to me. I know a few Saras, but this woman is a stranger, I just know that she is a Sara, no H. It looks like she's been crying and I want to hold her but it's not my place to do that...so I try to listen to her instead.
Sara No H is worried about her boyfriend- he isn't answering his cell phone and it's almost midnight, where is he? As she tells me this, the people surrounding us start vanishing, but there's nothing to be done about that right now.

"Look", I explain, "it's 1985 and he doesn't have a cell phone-no one does- what are you talking into anyway?"

She pushes her long brunette hair back from where her ear used to be- Sara No H holds out her bloody hand, palm up.

There's something red and lumpy cupped in it.

"My knife", she says.

The sky goes bright yellow. It's missile time.

Above us there are twelve parallel columns of smoke rising into the sky, a tiny glowing dot at the head of each one.
They are already miles above us by the time the sound reaches us...the sound. Sound reaches our ears...all three of them. Oh God.

Sara! What have you done to yourself?

But she's not Sara anymore and it's OK for me to hold her now.

I whisper "I love you" into her ear and she is whole, there's no blood except what's in our hearts.

Together we watch the sky burn.

Multi-Tasking

Now what?
I'm driving on the highway and my car radio goes dead. It still lights up and all, it just produces no sound.
I am radio people. I need my radio.
Not having a radio bugs me, but not as much as the clouds of smoke my car has started belching recently.
Yesterday I was able to find a loose wire inside the passenger side door- the speaker's circuit was broken is all, sure wish I'd checked that before I took my dashboard apart to get to the radio's wiring...
Today I took the car to the garage. Stereos and wires I can figure out, audio is one of my specialties- engine repair is not. Anything more complex than changing sparkplugs is beyond me.
Better get it looked at now before something happens...shit. More money I don't have.

I'm almost out of medicine and my insurance is gone. I wonder how much it costs without insurance?

Guess I'll find out. After I find out what's wrong with my car.

I use the long walk home from the garage constructively.

I brood before breakfast.

I get a lot of quality brooding done during my stroll.
My heart's in a bad place today, a fortified bunker, attacked from all sides with little hope of victory , fighting simply to endure, a veritable Khe Sanh of the soul, living on whatever can be emotionally airlifted into the perimeter, not sure if that's a mortar shell or a Red Cross package...

I lost a tug-of-war with alcohol recently. I didn't drink but someone I care about did- another broken promise...funny word "promise"..."promise" was something I saw...the potential for something great.
Done. Over. Oh well.

Speaking of alcohol, my father has gone AWOL again. I don't have the fortitude to track him down and do another intervention, but my grandmother has asked me to do it.
I am utterly , totally overwhelmed by this sudden responsibility for my 60-something father's welfare.
I don't care what he does, he's an adult and he's had all the chances to change and then some, but his behavior is killing his mother. It's shameful in the truest sense.

So I have a good brood-on going when I get home *ring!*...a call?

It's my old boss from the Law Firm. He wants to know if I'm interested in coming back...fuck, I hated that job, but it's slack and comes with insurance, 401 k and all- and my savings are gone...might have to suck it up and go back. It's nice to know I have a sure thing, though ,as I am getting a bit weary of serial disappointment.
I tell him I'll let him know soon.

I have another call to make first. Perhaps a job, perhaps not...but I'll never know if I don't call.

Mostly Good , Trying Harder

Last night I had the chance to talk with an old friend I hadn't seen since before I got sick and quit drinking. My friend , of course , was drunk, so my words were most likely wasted, but I can't shake them off...

Many years ago, my friend drank a hole in himself in much the same manner that I did- he too almost died, yet once he'd recovered from his surgery he started drinking again and really hasn't stopped since. He has had life threatening surgeries and seizures. He tells me he's had another alcohol-induced grand mal seizure just last year- but he just doesn't have the willpower to quit... I have a hard time listening to this.

Look, I say, we have both had surgeries and seizures and done our hospital time- for me it was the most traumatic time of my life- I am haunted every single day by my memories of that time- you--you know what it's like to go through that and you KNOW that it's going to happen again and you still keep drinking...
I stop my tirade because I'm trying talk to a drunk about drinking and I know it's useless to do that.

He knows it's killing him and he keeps drinking despite that certain knowledge.

That takes a lot of willpower. I know because I've been there- "drink 'till it hurts" was not a Spring Break slogan , it was a lifestyle choice...oh, don't mind the blood, that's normal right? Everyone pukes a little blood now and then, don't they?

I actually convinced myself that a little blood in my vomit was normal- I never allowed myself to think that about why I was sick all the time in the first place- must be the flu, food poisoning, an allergy- anything but the truth.

Believing my own lies almost killed me.

My friend isn't even lying to himself - he admits what's happening but doesn't seem to care enough to stop. I wanted to shake him, yell at him, beat him...stop, stop, stop STOP...
I didn't do that. Maybe I should have.

It was an otherwise perfect night of good friends and much joy, so I didn't do that. Instead, I had great time bar-hopping and staying up into the early hours- all without drinking. I didn't even smoke any dope- I didn't want to.
I was enjoying myself too much to want to get high, which is something I never thought I would hear myself say.

We have, as a group, pledged to arrive en masse in London in 2008, where we have a number of gracious hosts who know exactly what they are in for but have invited us anyway. I am told, not for the first time, that I'd be much happier in the U.K.- plans for seeking political asylum need looking into*...

When we left the bar, my English passenger walked 'round to the driver's side of my Volvo and stood there expectantly while I unlocked and opened the passenger side door for her.
I waited a moment, holding the door open...my passenger looks at me like I'm nuts...

Oh, right.

"Hey, in America the driver sits on the left side."

Haha...we switch places and are on our way.

Two good nights in a row, this is a habit I could live with.

Ford Pinto

It's somehow appropriate that the bagpiper playing "Amazing Grace" for Gerald Ford's pallbearers hit so many wretched, discordant notes that he actually had no alternative but to stop and start over during the procession, which I am currently watching on TV.

Some Ford notes:

Mostly, all anyone on TV says is "he was a nice guy".
Great.
Maybe he'd have been an awesome neighbor or bowling buddy, but "nice guy" isn't even on the list of traits I find desirable in a President.

Of primary importance, the President must always place the needs of his country above his own needs. Sound pretty simple right?

The image of a crippled FDR comes to mind- leading America- and indeed, the world, through some of history's darkest days- being the man we needed even though he himself was dying...not merely troubled...the man was fucking dying and he put his country first, protected us.

Think, if you will, what might have happened if Dubya Bush, not JFK, had been President during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Think about that and look at the leaders the two(one) party system are offering us now.
Do any of them have what it takes to be a hero?
Because, no joke, what we fucking need right now is an honest-to-god hero that can be bigger than the job that needs doing and we need to stop worrying if so-and-so would be fun to have a beer with or who they diddled and how they diddled them and instead ask:

Do they have what it takes to be a goddamn hero?

I have yet to see that quality in a politician of my generation.

That sort of Presidental courage is long out of style, it seems.

I think Bobby had it, but he never got the chance.

Bill Clinton, who I generally respect and greatly miss, failed that very simple test of country first- if he'd just said "yeah, I did her, it's none of your damn business", he'd have saved us a lot of stupid national grief
( honestly, I don't care if my Prez fucks around, it's hard to start a bloody war when someone's going down on you-or at least it should be)

---------

Ford?
The best thing I can say about him is he wasn't Spiro Agnew.

He only got the job because Agnew got busted for tax fraud , bribe-taking and general bad behavior- damn, imagine if Agnew had become Prez- that's a scary thought, but it coulda happened.

First, Ford pardoned Nixon's thugs, just as intended; decades later, he had the chance to use his Presidential Voice to warn against Bush's Warmongering Hegemony and chose -for his own reasons- not to use the powerful platform that history had given him.
A great many so-called leaders knew that this war was wrong from the very beginning and they were afraid to speak up.

There is a word for that and the word is not "hero."

Jesus, I just learned Henry Kissinger spoke at Ford's ceremony.

Man, I don't like Ford, but no one deserves that sort of abuse.

I can't think of anything that would be more debasing, insulting or disgraceful than having Henry the K speak at one's funeral, so I'll ease up on Gerry now.
Feel kinda bad now, actually.

Rest in Peace Mr. President.

Delete Me

*RING!*

Usually I screen my calls but I'm kinda trembly with anticipation for a certain call, so I pick this one up.

It's the no-nonsense baritone of my arch-nemesis, Mason from Collections.

"Mr. C., you said you weren't employed."

"That is true."

"You answered the phone at your job."

"I answered the phone at home. I am at home."

"You answered at work." Mason , sadly, has never lied to me. I call my old workphone.

"Hello, you have reached the desk of Allan C..."

What the $^3@!!? The New Guy still hasn't changed the answering message? It's been 6 weeks since I quit.

Now I have to prove that I don't have a job so I can keep these wolves off my porch until I do get a job and can start paying them again. I try to reach my old boss, but all I get is his voice mail. I wonder if he still works there?
Maybe everyone's been replaced and no one has bothered changing any messages...it makes sense to not change them if you think about it:
A drone is a drone is a drone. Nobody gives a fuck what your name is.

Eh.

Now I'm hungry. Might as well have some Christmas leftovers. Yummy, made the gravy and dressing from scratch, I did. It's better the day after, the flavors have settled in...mmmm...
OUCH! MOTHERFUCK!
I just lost a filling and it feels like I cracked a tooth chewing on the dislodged dentrifice.
Sure wish I had insurance.
Sure wish I had a lot of things.
Some Tylenol would be a start. Better go get some, I don't seem to have any.

I do have a new MagLite that I got for Xmas. I should put it in the trunk of my new (for me ) 1990 Volvo, which is actually a really nice car for being so old- the only decent car I've ever had. It's my pride and joy.
It's almost cherry, all leather, power everything, nice.

Oh. It's not.

It has a giant-ass dent in the trunk, like someone hit it with a hammer. Twice.
That dent wasn't there last night. Was someone trying to break in? My old car was once vandalized when parked in this same spot , but they smashed the glass...this is weird, like something fell from above. The taillights are OK, not like a car hit it. Fuck.
So much for the one nice thing that I own.
I guess I am just not meant to have or do anything that isn't fucked-up.
This isn't the first time I've had this thought.

So I go back inside, my tooth aching and my brain seething, and there's a message on my machine, blinkity-blink-blink.
Mason has already called- maybe this is the Twin.
Maybe it's a call-back for a job?
Perhaps it's something even better than that?

It's my date! Yes! Been waiting for this call...

Oh wow. She's sorry to have to give such short notice and all, but it seems she's met someone else and that she's sorry , but he's the one she's sticking with...this is harsh stuff for a voice mail. I wonder if she was watching my apartment , waiting for me to leave before she called?


Met someone else? Since Saturday?

I just met this woman on Saturday- she must meet a lot of men.

Thinking about this makes me feel absolutely awful but it does take my mind off my toothache and my trashed car for a minute or two. Actually, it distracts me for about fifteen minutes, because I play the recording over and over, hoping for a different message.

As soon as I hear the words: " I'll see you tonight", I will walk outside and find that my car has been magically repaired.
Then my tooth will stop hurting.
I'll close my eyes and when I open them I'll be someone else, somewhere else and all this will go away.

But after the tenth playback of her sixty-second 'Dear John' I decide that the words are gonna stay just the way they are, so I hit DELETE.

*poof*

Reset to zero.