The Rabbit and The Hound

 

I don't have much of a story, but I was left with this one image from my nighttime dreamworld escapades. The rabbit, played by Manny Salazar, an ex-employee of YC Honda, was an embezzler extraordinaire. Bugs Bunny-like, he made a sport out of outwitting the owner, the befuddled but relentless hound, played by John Hitzler, owner of Hondo Die Supply, a place I worked in LA in the '80s.

John Hitzler (yes, we all referred to him as Hitler behind his back) was the archetypal slumlord absentee owner, showing up to work just long enough to check his books to see how much money he could re-route to his personal expense account. All of the needs of the company and its employees he overlooked while making certain that his sports car was freshly detailed and his country club dues were paid in full. He wasn't well liked, and most of his employees had worked out their own methods of extracting personal benefits from the company to compensate for their stagnant wages. 

Whether it was using the company vehicle as a moving truck, as I did to make two moves (one of them over 500 miles), or using his private office with bathroom and shower as a temporary residence (as I also did during my last two weeks of employment there), the company proved to be a fruitful tree of embezzlement opportunities. One worker, Kay Doering, even entrepreneured her own private collection agency, soliciting cash payments (which she would pocket) from some of the delinquent accounts in exchange for a reduction of the bill. 

In my dream, Manny was going to quit his job but wanted to retain access to the free motor oil that was a fringe benefit of working in the shop. He went about this by drilling an access port into side of the bulk oil tank, which was conveniently located off-site, in a residential neighborhood. He could then drive up anytime and siphon off as much oil as he needed, bypassing the regular locked and metered pumps used in the shop.

"But Manny," I asked him, "Won't this throw off their inventory?"

"Sure," he said, "But he'll never see my access port, so he'll never know how the oil went missing."

It was true. His drilling was camouflaged with a professionally installed valve which he'd painted to look like part of the original equipment. Certainly, no one with John Hitzler's level of involvement in company affairs would be able to detect or identify the inconspicuous device. 

"I don't know, Manny," I told him, still unsure. "He said just the other day that he was closing in on the embezzlers. He said he was 'circling the wagon' and that it was just a matter of time until he would catch them."

Manny laughed at this remark. "They aren't closing in on shit. There aren't any wagons, and he's just going around in circles. That fool will never catch me."

I knew this was true. Manny had always been too good at covering his tracks. He had always been two steps ahead of any of Hitzler's crackdowns or investigations in the past, and this would be no different. Elmer Fudd would be left scratching his head, while Bugs Bunny casually munched a carrot from his prized garden with impunity. As determined as the hound was, he was outmatched by the stealth and speed of the rabbit.

That's all I've got. As you can see, I'm really reaching to make this little dream snippet into more of a story than it really is. The real characters are far more fleshed out and dynamic than those in my dream were, so I'm borrowing from them liberally.

Something, something, naked cheeseburger and fries

 

My recollections have become more scant, so I'll have to just briefly report the basics and call it a day. 

Last night I had one of those naked dreams. I was somewhere in the suburbs, reminiscent of Orange County, living a car. I left the car briefly to urinate but had apparently forgotten to clothe myself before my little excursion. Some kids wandered by and also some nuns, who quickly gathered up the young ones to protect their innocent eyes from the distasteful sight of a naked homeless person urinating in a parking lot.

I tried to remedy the situation by offering the kids a toy battleship, but this didn't sit well with the nuns. They were now certain that I had some kind of evil plans to lure their young ones into a life of naked homeless debauchery. In my defense, when I looked down to check myself, I found that I was at least wearing some boxer briefs.

Still scantily clad, I made my way to a burger joint and stepped in line to order some food at the streetside walk-up window. No one mentioned my lack of proper attire. I guess the "no shirt, no shoes, no service" policy only applied to indoor dining. 

The fellow in front of me ordered a cheeseburger plate with fries and some other side, possibly a small salad. It looked delicious. When it was my turn to order, I fumbled around looking at the menu, but upon seeing the cheeseburger plate, I made up my mind.

"I'll take one of those," I said pointing to the other customer's order.

Just like that, the the proprietor whipped around and grabbed another identical plate from the counter and began to hand it to me. 

"Whoa, whoa, hold it," I said, "I'll have to get my wallet from my car." I still wasn't wearing any pants, hence, no wallet. 

I went back and got my wallet and eventually produced a credit card. The proprietor was a little perturbed, since he'd already handed off the plate to another customer.  It was a busy day at the diner, so I had to wait my turn again and reorder.

That's all folks. Just a naked cheeseburger dream, with a couple of nuns and kids tossed in the mix, nothing to get all Freudian over. I'd be more worried if I were Eugene Levy. (Ha. That was a reference to an unpublished draft of a rather embarrassing dream I had the other day. I'll publish it retroactively at some future date, so it will be buried among the older posts.)

Mom Vacation Dream

 

I dreamed I was on vacation with my my mom, Greg and the kids. They were still teenagers, and the car was an older Odyssey minivan with transmission issues. At one point we were all waiting out a windshield replacement and needed to hitch a ride with Javier Martinez. He had an electrician's truck with lots of electrical conduit and wires in the back. I guess he said he was a cable guy, but it was just him being self-deprecative; he was actually somewhat of an electrical engineer, and the cables were fiber optic.

The windshield replacement only took two seconds, but the transmission issues threatened to keep us grounded for a couple of days in some armpit type of town, reminiscent of Gilroy or Bakersfield in the '70s. While we waited on the verdict, sitting on a bench in the heat, my mom looked at me, and we had a moment.

 “Promise me one thing,” she told me, “That you will always remember this day and how we are right now.”

 “I will,” I told her, laying my head against her chest, “You know I love you, right? I love you, Mom.”

This seemed to be the whole point of the dream, and she hugged me back, satisfied that I’d gotten the message. I knew she was referring to the fact that she was getting older, and her walking disability more severe. Possibly soon there would be no more vacations, and she wanted me to remember her like this, not as she might become, old and infirm.

We got back underway, but it was tenuous. Greg said something to the effect that second gear seemed to be acting up, and he hoped it would get us home. That’s about all I can glean at the moment. Now I have to pack up my room and get on the road back to Northern California. Vacation is officially over.

Fuck Eugene Levy in the Ass, Reverse Breakers and A Still for Sharon

Well, I don't know, but that seemed to be what Eugene wanted, anyway. I wasn't too keen on the idea, but somehow I got roped into it. He had a son named Paul, who was participating in some way, rounding out a very unpleasant three-way. The part of Paul was played by Paul Fallen, a deceased acquaintance from my high school era. A junkie with a long criminal record, Paul was overweight and mostly unwashed, among his other less than desirable traits. 

The entire Fallen clan and dwelling looked as if they had been plucked up Dorothy-style from a rundown shantytown in Bumfuck, Alabama and plopped down into their tidily manicured suburban neighborhood in Garden Grove, California. Beer cans and old motorcycle parts festooned the dead lawn, and the family station wagon was always parked at some crazy angle in the driveway, as Dorsey, the patriarch, narrowly avoided colliding with the house upon returning home from the bar every night.

I don't know why I am bothering with any backstory or character development; it was the kind of sex dream I'd really rather not have, much less write about. 

We were doing the deed in the back of a pickup truck. Although it had a camper shell, the damn thing had no curtains on the windows, and the tailgate was down. To make matters worse, we were parked on a public road where there were tons of people milling around, and some began to take notice. I just wanted to be done with it, but due to lack of arousal, it kept on interminably.

"Paul needs finish first, then you, Andrew," Eugene Levy said, in his uniquely pedantic and parental tone.

We had to keep moving the vehicle, which was quite a feat for Eugene, as he was being fucked in the ass by me the whole time. Paul was somewhere underneath, near the floorboards. We moved from spot to spot, but we never did find a suitable venue. Perhaps because there is no suitable venue for doing something of that nature in a pickup truck in broad daylight. 

I felt nothing but annoyance and embarrassment at the whole thing and just wanted it to be over. It eventually concluded without anyone "finishing."

Before the Eugene fuck sandwich, I'd been out wading in the surf with my friend, Bongo. There was a rare tidal phenomenon known as "the reverse breaker" that I was told to watch out for. The reverse breaker is the result of an extremely high tidal surge, where the receding waters form a huge wave as they rush back out to sea. The resulting collision of the reverse breaker with the incoming breakers would cause a crushingly devastating impact on anyone unlucky enough to be caught in the middle.

"Reverse breaker!" Bongo called out from the safety of the shore.

It was too late. I was in the intermediary "crush zone" and about to be pummeled by the backwards tidal wave as it crashed into the monstrous incoming waves. I watched, paralyzed, as an ocean bound tsunami mounted higher and higher and began cresting. I was sure to be obliterated in a matter of seconds. Rather than that happening, however, I was transported into an even less desirable situation, the Eugene Levy family fuckfest, which I've already reluctantly related.

Sometime after both of these events, I was with Sharon in her parent's home in Paradise. Sharon wasn't very disabled, but I was still responsible for fulfilling many of her daily requests. 

Her mom, Hannelore, was throwing out a 20 inch Toshiba tube type TV set, and Sharon wanted me to save it for some reason. I offered to put it into a room that we called "her bedroom," which was actually an office. It would make a good monitor for playing the older style Xbox video games, I told her, and she agreed.

Then a busload of Christian youth showed up and asked what kind of still we wanted. Apparently, Sharon had ordered a still but hadn't been specific about the type or application. I assumed it was for making moonshine, so I came right out and asked:

"Are you going to be using it to make alcohol, sweetie?"

She hedged and hemmed and hawed, so I assumed that was a yes. I began to order the necessary parts, although I had no clue what parts actually go into making a still.

"I guess we'll take sixteen feet of copper tubing. Is that about right? And we'll need a boiler, too, you know, the kettle. So, we'll take one of those," I rattled off all the parts I could think of. 

Some time before the still ordering and the after the other, you know...well, "you know," I was talking to Mike Cardenas, ex-coworker and friend from YC Honda. He was telling me about his latest dilemma: He had MS. He needed to get some injections, but he didn't know what kind to get. I told him about the steroids that Sharon had received during her stay at UC Davis. He thanked me and told me he'd look into it.

That's about it for my fucked up potpourri of scrambled synapses. Make of that you will. If I hit the publish button, like, ever, that is.

The Guitar Stand, A Ten Mile Walk For A Nut, A Fanny Pack, Chili Cheese Fries and Other Insults

It's my story, so I get to connect as many dots as I want, even if they are all unrelated. A narrative is a selective string of facts with or without overt interpretation. The simple selection of events and the language used to describe them can lead one toward a belief (or away from one), to draw conclusions and ascribe meaning to things where none exists, or not. Quite possibly nothing in this universe has any intrinsic meaning, but that's a polemic for another day. 

So let's get to the facts, shall we? 

On my second day in San Diego, I went out to the store with my mom to pick up some last minute groceries. When we returned home with the bags, I helped my mom into the house with hers and was about to take mine upstairs, when she suggested that I take the guitar and guitar stand that she had planned to give to me. My hands were full with groceries and the guitar, so I left the stand on an outside table on their patio.

The patio is adjacent to a walkway leading from Mission Beach to Mission Bay. During the day it receives its share of foot traffic from people accessing either place. When I went upstairs with the guitar and groceries, I promptly forgot about the guitar stand and began cooking breakfast. I was excited about the guitar, but I'd wait until after breakfast to pull it out of its case. 

Midway through cooking breakfast, I had a sudden thought about the guitar stand that I'd left on the table. It had been twenty minutes or so, and I thought I'd better run downstairs and grab it before someone took it. Too late, I found, when I looked on the table, and it was nowhere in sight. Someone had lifted it during the time it took to chop a few vegetables and fry a couple of eggs.

I was a bit anxious and wondered if I should ask if anyone downstairs had brought it in the house. I was too embarrassed to ask, though, fearing that they would say that they hadn't and that I'd have to tell them that it had just been stolen. So I kept it to myself, wanting to spare my mom the frustration that I was feeling about people stealing stuff, how you just can't trust anyone these days, etc. I didn't have much faith in humanity to lose, but I still didn't feel too good about it, mainly for my mom's sake. I have other guitar stands at home, so no biggie.

I was still excited about the guitar, so after breakfast I got it out and began tuning it up. Ka-jang! Dowww!  Bing bing bing bing -- bonk! It sounded terrible. I kept trying to tune it, but it refused to make one decent sounding chord. Something was off. Glancing down the neck to the one particular string that had the really sour sound, I saw that the nut was broken. 

(The nut is the little guide thingy that separates the strings on the end of the neck with the tuning pegs, for you non-guitar people. The bridge is the larger version on the body of the guitar, which serves the same purpose, though it has adjustments for determining the height and length of the string. You wanted to know all that, right?)

I googled "nut replacement Takamine G series" and watched a quick video on YouTube, detailing how to replace a nut on that specific guitar. They are generally glued in place, and it looks intimidating. The process for removing one is relatively simple: Inspect for any glue on the fretboard and headstock which may cause problems by adhering to the wood and taking chunks of it with it when you go to remove it. If there is glue visible it is necessary to use an exacto knife or some such precision blade to get in between the wood and the nut and break the bond.

Not finding any glue, I went on to the next step: Tap it ever so slightly with a wooden peg and a hammer. Not having either, I grabbed a TV remote and just bipped it enough to break it free from the little notch where it was minimally held in place with a drop or two of glue. Bip, bip -- bingo. It was off, and pretty cleanly, if I do say so. Now to find a new nut.

I made a quick search of the local area for music stores and honed in on one that sounded promising, Mark's Guitar Exchange on Midway drive. I called them and they indicated that they might have something suitable, but I'd have to bring in the original part and try to match it up. No problem, it was within walking distance, and I needed to get my steps in for the day. 

I walked south down the bike path alongside Mission Bay, taking in the atmosphere. There were bikers, scooter riders, skateboarders,  people walking dogs, jogging -- you name it. On the bay side people were playing volleyball, paddleboarding, swimming or just hanging out on the beach; on the residential side people were on patios and balconies, drinking beverages, listening to music, barbecuing and generally having a good time. 

I strode along purposefully, knowing I'd have to keep up a good pace in order to get there before they closed. I reached the end of the bike path and went over a bridge, down some sidewalk and then ran into a snag because some roadwork was being done which had eliminated the foot path on the side of the bridge. I looked at my phone and found another route, one which didn't involve me walking in traffic, at least not for the length of an entire bridge. It did, however, add an extra mile to my trip.

No matter. I arrived at Mark's none the worse for wear and found the place cramped and packed floor to ceiling with guitars, amps and accessories of all kinds. Someone was playing a few licks on an electric guitar while the clerk, an Alice Cooper looking gentleman with spectacles, was taking an interminably long time ringing up a customer. I'd just walked five miles, though, so what was five more minutes. Or ten.

It was finally my turn. He remembered me from my phone call. He brought out a box of nuts of various sizes and configurations, some six and some twelve string varieties. I looked them over thoroughly and was not quite finding a match. I started getting a bit flushed. I didn't want to be the nut who walked five miles to buy a nut only to turn back around and return home nutless. 

The last one I looked at had the exact size and configuration as the broken one. I put the pieces together and compared the two, looking at them side by side from every angle. Yup. This one would do. He rang me up and it came to five bucks. I looked in my wallet and found seven. Whew. Another potentially embarrassing bullet dodged, since they didn't take credit cards, only cash. 

I left the store and began the long walk home, having the satisfaction of a finding an exact replacement, on a Sunday, within walking distance from my apartment. Things were falling into place. 

As I walked past a large grass field in front of some apartments, I saw a hat on the ground. It looked brand new. There was nobody around, and it looked to have been abandoned, or ditched, certainly not cared for or claimable by anyone in close proximity. 

I picked it up and tried it on. Yeah, I know, gross. But looking at the condition of the hat, I felt I had more chance of giving it the cooties than the other way around. I walked off with a new hat that said "San Diego" on it and felt all at once very touristy, and perhaps a tiny bit guilty, in case there was someone, somewhere, missing this hat and searching desperately for it. 

I kept going. After crossing back over the bay bridges and walking along Mission Bay Blvd. for a while, I decided to sit at a bus stop for a minute. On the bus stop, unattended and with no one in close proximity (again), I found a fanny pack with a Frisbee under it. I looked up and down the road in all directions, and there was no one in sight. 

I opened it up and found a driver's license and a bunch of ladies grooming accessories, a house key and an envelope that looked like it might contain a paycheck, or something official from a business, addressed to the person on the driver's license. 

I knew what I must do. I must take the items and try to locate the person and return it to them. It seemed like the right thing to do, since leaving it there would most likely result in someone else, possibly with less altruistic intentions, taking it and making its contents their own.

When I got home, I emptied it out, searching for clues, and out of curiosity, of course. One always wonders what ladies really carry around in their purses. I found out that this one belonged to a fairly attractive twenty nine year old Bianca Ann Hawks, female, brown hair, blue eyes, height 5'3", weight 120. I would have guessed Hispanic, but it was probably just because of the way she wore her hair in the picture, parted in the middle and tied in a tight bun in the back.

Along with the previously mentioned items, the pack contained a phone charger, earphones, an eyelash curler, several shades and flavors of lipstick, a few nickles and quarters, a pocket knife -- and last but not least -- a small baggie of unidentified white powder, and a loose bud of cannabis floating around freely among the lint. I sniffed the bud and found it to be of high quality. The powder I did not touch or even sniff. Not my cup of tea. 

The presence of the last two items made me unsure of the best course of action to take. I would certainly give everything back, not try to take whatever minuscule amount of drugs she possessed or attempt to be a narc or a finger-wagger. But it did mean that I'd have to give the pack directly to her. I couldn't leave it with an apartment manager, say, if she wasn't at home. They might open it, which could have the unintended consequence of getting her evicted or arrested, who knows. I left it all in there for the time being.

The next day my mom and I went out on an excursion to the address on the license. It was a fair distance from our apartment, so I wasn't going to walk it. My mom needed quite a bit of help navigating the streets and freeways, getting a bit frustrated with me and my slow response times giving her the exact lanes to be in and places to turn. I make a terrible GPS, even with Siri's help.

We finally got there and I rang the bell. No one answered, so I guessed that would be the end of it. I would just have to keep the items, assume her identity and live out my days as a twenty nine year old female named Bianca Ann Hawks. Or not.

When I got home, I did some more investigating and decided to call the number of the company whose address was on the envelope. If it was her employer, certainly they'd know how to get in touch with her. It turned out that she worked about two blocks from our apartment. 

I rang up the employer and they told me that she wasn't working today, but that I could give them my phone number and they would relay the message to her about the missing items. She could then call me and schedule a pickup. Brilliant. Within a half an hour I got a call from a very grateful Bianca, and by the end of 45 minutes she was downstairs outside my apartment. 

I brought her the pack and the Frisbee and gave them to her. She mentioned how glad she was that I didn't drop the bag off at the address on the license. That was her dad's address, and he'd most certainly have rooted through her items and found the naughty stuff. I told her no worries, I wasn't going to judge her for anything; I was just trying to do a good deed. 

She hugged me and thanked me once again, asking me how long I was staying in town. I told her, and she mentioned that she'd be working down the street for the next two nights. I told her I might stop by, and that was that. Off she went on her way. I felt lighter for having done a good deed, even if I knew nothing was going to come from it. At least I did get a grateful hug and her appreciation. Good for me.

The next part of the narrative is unrelated to the previous two stories, but I'll have to back up just a bit to give the context. 

I was out walking the night before the purse reunion, making up my steps for the missing two days that I'd spent driving and preparing to drive. I am meticulous about not losing progress on my yearly goal of 1000 miles. So, if I have to walk at ten o'clock at night in order to avoid getting sunburned, so be it. 

I'd only gotten a few houses down on Sunset Court, when I was eyed by a group of youths hanging out in an alleyway. I caught the attention of one of them apparently, because he started singing the Neil Young song, "Old Man" very loudly while looking directly at me. 

"Old man, look at my life, I'm a lot like you were."

I looked at him, sizing him up quickly and then continued past the group. He sang the lyric again, this time even louder, staring at me as if to challenge me in some way.

"You will be," I told him menacingly, not quite Yoda-like, but close enough. 

I'd hoped to instill the fear and dread of the realization that youth is fleeting, old age and death inevitable and his taunt a pointless waste, since he was mocking an old man with a lyric that would apply to him soon enough. All of that intent was not sufficiently transmitted nor received, apparently, since he went on singing and laughing to himself as I walked into the distance.

I went on another two or three miles to the end of the beach, where it ends in a jetty. No further incidents occurred, and I decided it was safe enough to walk at night, despite the presence of many nighttime travelers along the beach walkway. I could handle a little singing.

The next night, tonight, the night that prompted me to have to unburden myself of all the backlog of accumulated experiences of the last two days, I was down at my parents apartment eating dinner. After dinner they played a game called Rummy Cube, some kind of tile based version of rummy where you make confusing combinations and try to be the first one to divest themselves of their tiles. I sat it out.

While they played, my stepdad Greg brought out a piece of the missing guitar stand and set it on the table. I looked at it in amazement. 

"Did you find that outside?" I asked, still thinking someone had made off with the rest of it.

"No," he told me, "Someone brought it in the house. The rest of it is in the bedroom." And he went and produced the rest of the pieces.

"I was sweating telling you guys about it, since I was embarrassed about losing it so quickly. I thought someone had stolen it, and I didn't have the heart to tell you," I confessed.

I felt a lot better having gotten that off my chest. Plus, I was beginning to think that karma was possibly working in my favor for a change. I'd done something good for someone, and now the universe was repaying me by giving me back something that I thought I'd lost. I was almost believing in synchronicity and all that magical positivity stuff that I eschew. Almost. I did feel better for a while, though. 

After that, I went out for my evening walk. It is June 22, the 18th anniversary of Sharon's and my wedding. I brought some of her ashes along to spread on the beach. It is a ritual that I promised to perform, spreading her ashes on every beach we had ever been to together. San Diego was one stop of many that I have already and still have yet to do this. 

It was an ultra high tide so this was a perfect opportunity. I walked to the end of the walkway in the opposite direction from the night before. There were lots of people on the path, since it was right around sunset. Many people were taking snapshots of the rosy sky with cellphones. I gave in and took one myself, but only when there was a break in the crowd. I'm pretty self conscious about taking pictures in public for some reason.

I walked down to the beach and released her ashes into the surf. I milled around on the beach for a moment or two and then turned back and headed for home. I felt a little guilty about having so little actual feeling about the ritual. It was simply a ritual at this point. A few years ago, it was much more emotional, although not cathartic at all, just sad. What was wrong with me? This was like dumping out a half empty soda can onto the ground. 

As I walked back home, my thoughts were on a million things that weren't Sharon, nor about anything much of significance at all, really. I took the main road, Mission Bay Blvd. this time. I thought I might walk past the place where Bianca worked. In my pathetic mind, I reasoned that she just might be grateful enough to be my company for the evening. Perhaps she was a party girl, and she'd be amenable to spending a little time with me, if only to have a place to hang out.

The reality of the situation was far from whatever I might be able to conjure up in my fantasies, though. I know I'm an older, less attractive man, unkempt, unappealing, more likely sending out a grandfatherly vibe, based on the reviews from the local youth singing brigade. I'm an old man, worn out, whose time has passed. I was muddling these kinds of self-pitying thoughts about in my head when it hit me. Literally.

The chili cheese fries, soupy and soppy in their paper serving basket, were hurled from a passing car and struck me on my left ear. Smeary, goopy chili juice ran down my neck, sprayed onto my glasses and soaked the left side of my hair and beard. The assailants laughed and sped off as I was just barely figuring out that I'd been assaulted with leftovers. 

"What the fuck?!" I said, as it slowly dawned on me what was happening. 

I saw the car at a stop light and started walking faster towards it. They quickly backed up and changed lanes, still laughing and congratulating themselves for their achievement. 

"Oh, look! Here he comes!" And with that they exited the intersection, made a left, and I figured that was the last of it. 

I saw them again, however, in a few minutes. They cruised right past me again, rolled down their window and laughed at me some more. What a pathetic loser I was, moping down the road, chili still wet in my hair and beard and smearing my glasses. I cursed them and gave them the finger, but to what end? They were already off on another adventure, and this time I wouldn't see them again. I'd put a brick through their window if I did, I told myself. 

Although I had the adrenaline and anger to do such a thing, I also had the common sense not to tempt fate. There were probably at least four of them, and I wouldn't have a chance. I'd just get beat up, possibly phone-jacked, in addition to being the victim of a drive by food attack. Plus, I remember being that young and doing similar random anonymous pranks and hurting an untold number of innocent victims. Karma again, but this time not in my favor.

I told myself many such stories, interpreting and interpolating the events of the last few days, and the whole of my life up to this point. I was the pathetic sufferer, the old man, the mocked one, someone at whom things are thrown. This was the proof. If I added it to my basket of self-criticisms, I'd surely have a case for defining myself as a washed-up, has-been/never was, losery loser, a real life Aqualung, wretched and unlovable.

But even as much as I wanted to wallow in the defeatism that I felt (and still do feel), I couldn't get myself on board. It wasn't about me. It was random. It was about how stupid kids do stupid things, for no reason pertaining to me. It just was an event that happened. I can read into it what I want, but it doesn't give it that absolute value. The chili could have just as easily been bird poop, or space junk, or sewage dumped from an airplane. It wasn't personal; it just was.

So, here I am, at the apartment, showered, eyes bleary from typing all of this. My butt is sore from sitting so long, and I am not convinced of anything. I really wanted to tell a story, though. Now, I have, and I don't feel any better for it. It was long, filled with boring details, and just enough self-pity to make me unlikable. 

I give up. I'm going to bed. Maybe tomorrow I'll fix the punctuation or try to make it flow a little better. For now, I'm done.

 

The Big One

I dreamed I was fishing on a boat docked at a pier that was a favorite spot for serious anglers to catch world record sized fish of all kinds. Commercial fishing boats trolled the waters nearby, their catches providing much of the local economy's revenue. The air was salty and the sky was overcast; the smell of fish bait mixed with caramel corn gave the place a seaside carnival-like atmosphere.

I felt a little out of place with my little freshwater rod and reel, but I lazily cast out my line anyway. I was soon jarred into action by the familiar tug on the line, followed by the zippity-click sound of the loosely set drag as it let out yard after yard of fishing line. 

I tightened up on the drag a bit and began to reel whatever it was toward the boat. It had other ideas and took off parallel to the boat crossing the lines of many other somewhat perturbed fishermen. I somehow managed to steer it back towards me and avoided getting tangled up with them. They still were none too happy to see a rookie getting action, and they had to remain ready to reel in their lines at a moment's notice, per fishing etiquette.

After a little back and forth, reeling and releasing, the fish was finally near the boat. When it broke the surface I got my first glimpse of my prize. It was giant grouper-like fish that they were calling a "groucette," which was a local name for a fish that was a cross between a grouper and a halibut. Their disdain of me and my tiny, inappropriate gear was being replaced by envy and admiration as they began to estimate the weight of the fish from its size in the water.

"I'd say it was 2000 lbs at least," said one.

"Gonna bring in a pretty penny, that one," said another.

Someone alerted the netter, an employee of a charter company based on the pier, and he got in a dinghy and guided the fish into a net that was attached to a crane and winch which was conveniently located right where I was fishing. They began cranking it in, slowly lifting it out of the water, its giant mass straining the capacity of the net and bending the metal of the crane just a bit. It was likely to be a record haul for the pier, if not the entire angling world.

I began making arrangements to sell it to a local fish market. I intended to keep some of the cuts for myself, but would it would exceed the capacity of my freezer, so I was calculating just how much money I'd make on the bulk of the meat after paying the processing fees. It was going to be a pretty profitable afternoon, I imagined.

That's about where that dream left off. I had another dream that involved me riding a BMX bike around some mountainous terrain. The trails were adjacent to a giant chasmous crater. I was following Juan Paul, an ex-employee of YC Honda around as we skirted the perimeter of the abyss. Flirting with death in a most precocious manner, we were getting as close as possible to the edge without falling in. My tires sent pebbles dribbling down the steep hillside as I drifted ever closer to the point of sliding towards certain death.

I managed to escape with impunity, and showed off a bit more by doing some tricks on another steep hillside basin that formed a kind of natural half-pipe, going up and turning around rapidly, defying gravity for a moment or two, then descending back down the hill. 

After that, I found myself in someone's '99 Honda Accord, assisting in the replacement of its audio unit. Someone had installed an aftermarket stereo and done a pretty hacked job of it. I was showing the lady and her son how the panels came apart and pointed out several broken pieces held in place with screws that should have been removed before attempting to pry them off. The remaining pieces were fastened with clips which snapped in and popped out if you knew just where to pry. 

That's about all I got. Besides the strange rash on my calves and a sore on my backside from the car trip, I am mostly intact. The sunburn I got from walking 10 miles to the guitar store on Sunday will prohibit me from doing much in the way of outdoor activities today. I will try to find a 9 volt battery for the guitar and will attempt to return a fanny pack containing a woman's driver's license, house key and some assorted items to it's rightful owner. 

I'd found the bag on a bus stop, abandoned and forlorn, with a frisbee sitting next to it. Inside the pack, along with a lot of ladies grooming essentials, lipstick, toothbrush, phone charger, earphones, and some loose change, I also found a small baggie with some unidentified white powder in it. A loose bud of some pretty nice smelling cannabis rounded out the potpourri.

Time to get my butt out of bed, do my exercises and get to making my breakfast.

The Suburbs Will Kill You... Eventually - and My Family Reunion Begins

Last night I dreamed I was in the suburbs. Good schools, neatly mowed lawns, freshly erected crackerbox tract houses...and a ninja militia, whose aim was to root out all non-conformists. There was a nebulous governmental entity controlling the militia, with a vaguely defined set of ideals and doctrines that must be accepted in toto, or one was subject to persecution resulting in death. 

Anyone holding dissimilar beliefs (and they knew if you did -- don't ask me how they knew, they just did) was hunted down by this murderous squadron and executed on the spot. Sometimes whole neighborhoods were wiped out for their thought-crimes in random sweeps. 

Because the beliefs were so poorly defined, and the dogma changed daily, one walked on pins and needles, never knowing which interaction was going to trigger the silent alarm issuing your death warrant. Needless to say, it was a stressful place to try to make a go of it.

I found myself on the run at several points, fleeing the killers, MPs as they were called. The MPs dressed in military style camouflage with armbands, worn in the traditional nazi fashion, the letters "MP" in black letters replacing the swastika in the familiar white circle with a red background. 

Now that I've described the setting and general tone of the dream, it occurs to me that I've forgotten most of what transpired. I was hoping more would come back to me while I was dribbling out this description, but alas, it hasn't. One detail remains with me, and that is an image of one of the elite squad's tactical leaders, a black woman with long cornrow braids, who looked suspiciously like my ex-therapist, Shannon. 

---- 

I'm sitting in a bed 500 miles from my home as I write this. I'm attending a family reunion in San Diego, and staying in a moderately upscale condo in the Mission Beach district. My family rented out the whole building, a furnished three story triple residence called Stacy's House. 

I'm sharing the second floor unit with two other people, one a chubby sixteen year old, pimply faced boy named Jeremy and the other an older lady who was a longtime girlfriend of one of the family's elder brothers, Tom. I know very few of the relatives on this side of the family, and the ones I do know, I haven't seen for over twenty years. 

One of the main enticements for me going on this trip was that my mom was going to give me her guitar and amp, a nice Takamine with Crate amplifier in brand new condition, that she'd been holding onto for twenty years, but has been unable to play due to arthritis. I also wanted to visit some friends in LA on the way down and give them a couple of shopping bags worth of my hoarded weed supply from several seasons that had been accumulating in my closet.

I arrived in LA, after a superbly navigated 8 hour drive, which consisted of mostly smooth freeway driving. There were minimal inconveniences such as the mandatory gas and pee stops, and the inevitable LA traffic, which slowed my progress to a crawl and ate up an hour of my time, traversing the Glendale area at a miserable three miles per hour.

My friends were glad to see me. I met my friend Richard's mom Lydia whom I remembered from her brief time in the cult, before she was unmercifully cast out, as so many others had been, for lacking the proper faith and discipline. Jesus's "Woman what have I to do with thee?" was the scriptural precedent for breaking the 5th commandment to honor thy father and mother. 

Lydia was nice, and so was their dog, Mikey, who is named after Michael McDonald. Every dog has a backstory, but I never did find out why this seemingly conservative, old world lady named her dog after the famous Doobie Brother. But hey, Mikey likes me. He didn't bark once upon my entry into their apartment, a luxury not even afforded to my friend Rich, at whom he barks relentlessly upon his every coming and going.

My friends Richard and Chris took me out to eat at Chris and Pitts, a very old establishment, a rib joint and monument to the days of dark woodgrained formica laminate tables and naugahyde booth seating. As I sat there eating my Hawaiian style chicken accompanied by chili, a small salad and garlic bread, I became aware of a strange vibrating sensation which I assumed was coming from their rumbly AC unit. I mentioned it to my friends but they didn't notice.

Later on while my friends and I were chit chatting, reminiscing in the car and playing rotating Bluetooth DJ over Chris's Hyundai's audio system, I noticed the vibration was still present. I got out of the car to stretch my legs and found it was still present. It was like my legs and sacral region were vibrating at something slightly less than 60hz. It felt like a vibromassage bed on it's lowest setting.

It was only after I went to move my car from the parking lot that I figured out the source of the vibration. It was me. I was vibrating at the exact frequency of my car's engine. I only knew this because when I got in my car and started it up, the vibration went away. It was like I was synced up to it's rhythm, not unlike a sailor gains his sea legs after his equilibrium is forced to adjust to the constant shifting of the boat in the waves. Being in the car cancelled it out, but being anywhere else, I felt like I was slightly electrified.

We said our goodbyes, and I got back on the road at ten o'clock to make the final leg of the trip to SD. I arrived intact (and still vibrating) and woke up my mom to let me into the condo. By now it was midnight, so everyone was in bed. I went to bed after unpacking, still vibrating and slightly caffeinated, and eventually my spring wound down enough to get some shuteye. 

I guess I could go on and on detailing the minutia of yesterday, but right now I have to make breakfast and join my folks downstairs. I brought all my groceries with me from home, so I could eat my exact restrictive menu and maintain continuity in my diet. So far I've only broken the routine twice in as many days, indulging in a Tommy's chili cheeseburger yesterday. I was eyeing the smores and "woofums," a biscuit based stuffed pastry made by cooking a biscuit on a stick like a marshmallow, then stuffing its innards with pudding or strawberries and cool whip, but I restrained myself and enjoyed the process vicariously through my roommate Jeremy, who became the resident expert on the difficult process.

Ta ta for now.

 

Pouty McSnibbler

 

I’m thinking of a name change, and that one sounds about right.

Remember when your mom used to comfort you when you would come home from school in tears, upset because you didn’t get the lead role in the school play? Instead of Romeo, you landed the role of a tree or shrub. What would your mother tell you? “There, there. It’s alright. You just be the best little shrub you can be.”

Somewhere along the line, my life took a turn. I watched the years fly by like so many cornfields. It feels like my journey is almost over, but I am miles from anything resembling a destination, and there’s nothing on the horizon.

I’m sorry, mom. I never lived up to my potential. I’m not a writer or a famous musician. I haven’t traveled much; I’m not even well read. I am nobody. Just a pouty snibbler. And I know what you would say: “That’s alright, son. You just be the best little pouty snibbler you can be.”

I am a multi-layered complex of façades and defense mechanisms. Beneath this ragged, slightly off-putting exterior, unshaven face, downcast eyes and slumped shoulders, there is a layer of semi-congenial engageability. If you wave to me, I will wave back; speak to me nicely, and I will respond in kind.

But before you go thinking you have found some heart of gold, keep digging. You will reach a layer of steel-reinforced concrete. This too is a facade. See how easily it crumbles when you pick at it?

The next layer is a bit more tricky: a titanium-plated hardened tool steel shell, the final protective shield which guards the living tissue of my heart. It has evolved over the years to make my heart impenetrable, impervious to heartbreak and betrayal.

The only way in, short of nuclear blasting or high powered lasers, plasma cutters, etc., is through a hidden door which is always locked. I possess the only key, and it is locked in here with me.

It’s OK though, really. You don’t want in here anyway. It’s pretty dark most of the time and mostly barren. Dank and dingy too, not the clean sparkling marble fortress of spartan repose that you might imagine.

And though it feels like it should be lonely in here, the place is actually quite crowded and alive with conversation. Demons and ghosts from the past, the many abandoned and unused former personas of mine, all swirl about in a stew, bumping into one another, merging and congealing to form the personality that I call myself.

The junkyard gate is locked, and snarling dogs patrol the perimiter. But if you look closely, you'll see that their tails are wagging. They can't help it; it's in their nature.

They are dogs, after all, and deep down they just long for someone to throw them a bone and tell them "good boy."

I wonder if Hitler's mom ever told him, upon hearing of his desire to become an evil tyrant, "Well, then you just be the best little Nazi you can be."

I still have an image of the world's most despicable dictator taking a moment or two, between issuing execution orders or invading a country, to pet his favorite kitty cat. And not a fucked up, evil cat, like Doctor Evil had, either, but a genuinely lovable furry friend, who saw past the atrocities into the one spark of light that exists at the innermost core of all beings.

I think babies see that. They haven't yet developed the filters or the mental constructs with which to classify other humans as good or bad, beautiful or abhorrent. When I am in the grocery store, as repugnant and decrepit as I may appear to the adult members of my species, a person from whom one does their best to avert their eyes, these tiny sentients look upon me with fascination and delight.

OK, I'm rambling at this point, making value judgements in a self-important voice. It's what I do best. That and snibbling in a pouty manner. That'll be my title from now on. Pouty Snibbler. You have to give me that; I've earned it. I may plagiarize a few song lyrics here or there, but Pouty Snibbler is mine, all mine.

Cloudy with a chance of orgies (I'm gonna stop with the trigger warnings, they are becoming passe)

What's more frustrating than an unfulfilling sex dream? An unfulfilling sex dream where you struggle to recall enough details to string together a decent narrative. To stick to "just the facts" is difficult, if not impossible, since, duh, it was all a dream anyway, hence, how can there even be any facts?

I was at a sleepover, I do remember that much. Rienna was there, another so-called fact. We were at her house, or the house she shared with roommates. Maybe it was a flop house, I don't know. The details are already fuzzy. It was a communal living situation of some kind.

We were doing a little making out, and I made the classic dream mistake of thinking, "Oh, boy. This is actually happening. Charlie Brown is going to get lucky, finally." That's pretty much a guarantee that whatever luck I thought I was going to have was about to run out. Sure enough, as clothes were being stripped, and the deed about to occur, enter antagonist No. 1: The Midget.

Yeah, a little person, dwarf, growth restricted, or whatever they wish to be called. Fine. I don't have time to be PC or worry about offending a fictional character offered up by my subconscious as an obstacle to my sexual fulfillment. Do I harbor hate for people of diminutive stature? Not in the least. Did I resent this little fucker horning in my action? Certainly. 

As Rienna and I were about to seal the deal, I turn around for one second, and when I look back, she's being mounted and gyrated upon by this miniature human. Good fucking grief! How much crap am I gonna have to put up with in order to get some, I thought. But I was persistent and waited my turn, and the little guy finished in rapid order.

It was a bit messy at that point, without going into too much graphic detail, although unfortunately, those are the images that persist, permanently seared into my brain. Let's just soldier through this less than optimal experience, I thought to myself,  and see if anything good comes comes of it.

It didn't. After Shorty, another, and then another suitor or ex-beau appeared in the queue, which was rapidly becoming a who's who line-up of anyone and everyone from her romantic past, present and future. I guess I got my turn eventually. I was so nonplussed by the parade of sexual partners that I was barely conscious of any pleasure being derived from the act.

Don't get me wrong, I'm not against orgies, at least in theory. But the details should probably be outlined and agreed upon by all parties in advance. Less toes and other appendages get stepped on that way. 

Besides the multiple partner business, another detail emerged that crushed any arousal that I have been about to experience: She was a junkie. These partners, or roommates, I guess they were, were all getting her share of the rent and drug expenses in the form of sexual favors. I guess I could put up with the orgies and the extreme diversity of her choices of sexual partners, but I had to draw the line somewhere. 

It kind of ended on that note of extreme disillusionment. I can't really moralize about the rightness or wrongness of sex for rent, IV drug use or multiple partner sexual situations, with or without midgets. I'm not really qualified. In my case, "Don't knock it til you've tried it" applies to at least one of the above scenarios, but I'll leave it to the reader to try to figure out which.

The Passport

I dreamed I was waiting around an airport with my mom, getting ready to board a plane to Hawaii. I was a bit anxious about the flying part and not at all looking forward to it. When it got close to the time to step up to the window for the screening process, I realized that I didn't know where my passport was. It occurred to me that I'd never actually even seen it, my mom having been its primary custodian through the years.

We got out of line and sat down on some uncomfortable molded plastic chairs to regroup. My mom was quite disappointed, since she had paid for the tickets already. Gracie would be disappointed too, as I was supposed to be meeting her in Hawaii. I was nothing but relieved, since flying and I don't agree. 

The airport had a designated team of passport specialists on staff who were capable of generating me a new passport, but it was doubtful whether or not they could pull off the whole procedure before the plane was scheduled to take off. I was banking on their inability to get the job done, but I had the uneasy feeling that they just might, and I would have to board that damned plane after all.

I'd gotten as far as having my picture taken and was waiting for one of the team members to come and sign off on some documents. The whole thing became moot, however, when one last check of my bags  revealed the original passport in my carry on bag, tucked neatly in a side pocket. 

Anxiety turned to dread as the countdown to my certain demise resumed. I felt every bit of the fear that a condemned man feels when the clock reaches the final hour on execution day. The fear you feel when you're sitting in a dentist office, aware of the exact number of patients before you, and the number slowly dwindles down to two, then one, then zero...and you are next. 

My mom tried to offer me distraction by playing a video game with me on one of the airport's multi-use entertainment/information consoles. It didn't work. Nothing could smooth over the fact that I was going to have to get on that plane. 

Getting on the plane equaled death in my paranoia addled brain. I was a sentient being among cattle who were unaware that they were being led to their slaughter. Why didn't everybody know this? Were they all so easily fooled by the friendly faces of the airport staff, distracted and deluded into a feeling of security by all the comforts and conveniences, the video games and snacks that the airlines provided them with, to notice that they were being herded down the chute of death?

The time had arrived. The line was moving. I left the cold comfort of my molded plastic chair to join the queue. Nothing would have suited me better than to remain in that hard plastic chair just a little longer. I'd have been content to ride out eternity in the perpetual limbo of an uncomfortable waiting room, just so long as I could avoid boarding that plane and flying off into the event horizon. 

I said my goodbyes to my mom. I tried to be stoic, but I was completely gutted, and we both knew it. The dream ended with me just a few feet from the plane. I guess I get to remain in limbo for another day at least.

----

It occurred to me later in the day that one doesn't really need a passport to travel to Hawaii from the continental United States.

JT, Mom and me ride out the fire

 

I was in Lake Isabella again, though not at Gracie and Bill's place. It was a bit more run-down, a 1950's time capsule of a place that belonged to my Grandma Buckwitz. I have an image of her being there, wearing an atrocious purple blouse, a brooding expression on her face, etched from years of suffering stoically under the reign of my grandfather's oppressive silence. She was a flower whose bloom was stunted, frozen in the frost of his emotional indifference. He wasn't there in the dream, but his presence was still felt by the residual effect he had on my grandmother's countenance.

I was in the closet rummaging around for a pair of boots to wear. So many choices. Most of them were old and worn out. It was like an entire lifetime's worth of the same boots, purchased over and over, had gone into retirement and were living in this packed closet, stacked floor to ceiling, taking up every nook and cranny. 

Some were in boxes and some were not, but all had seen better days. Or perhaps not actually better, since they'd have been worn by my grandfather to work and had machine oil and coolant spilled on them and been scorched by welding sparks daily. Perhaps they were glad to be here, living out the rest of eternity in the respite of this communal hording cell of a closet, in the company of fellow sufferers of my grandfather's indignities.

I had to settle for a pair picked at random from this lot, since my time browsing was cut short when I became aware of a fire creeping down from the hills outside the window of the bedroom. It first started as an eerie orange glow. I made mention of this to Jim Turnbough, who pooh-poohed the idea that yet another fire would encroach upon our land.

"Nah. I don't see it," he said, ignoring the obvious flashes of orange light peeking through a gathering cloud of dark gray smoke at the top of the nearby mountain, giving it a sinister, volcano-like appearance.

"Are you kidding me?" I said, alarmed at his nonchalance.

The wind was picking up, and within seconds flames leapt out of the smoke clouds explosively, like a barbecue whose gas jets had been on too long before igniting.  

"Come on, Jim!" I said shrilly, my alarm turning to outright panic. "You have to be seeing this!"

Reluctantly, he acknowledged that, yes there was a fire, but it was certainly nothing to get panicked about. By now the fire had descended the entire side of the mountain, and its flames were licking the dead branches of trees and singeing the corners of nearby houses. 

The wind was at a gale pitch, and the fire would soon overtake our house. If we didn't leave this instant, both we and the house would soon self-combust, as most things do when fires reach their tipping point. We had to leave now.

Jim got in the car and began to drive us down the road at a leisurely pace, like he was on his way to a Sunday church picnic, taking in the scenery and making small talk unrelated to the fire. I thought to mention the fact that we were in immediate danger of the fire catching us if we didn't pick up the pace. 

He became so incensed at my constant bitching about "the fire this and the fire that" that he jerked the steering wheel and sent the car over the embankment. We free fell for a second before landing smoothly, without losing any speed, as we traveled off-road through the sandy sagebrush of the valley floor. 

"Really, Jim?" I said, appalled at his petulant driving antics.

Soon we arrived at a roadside diner which looked suspiciously like the dingy outpost we'd just left. In fact, the interior was identical, right down to the bowl of day old nachos on the table and the half opened bag of flour tortillas in the fridge. I was hungry, so I helped myself to a cold flour tortilla and a handful of greasy nachos. Once again Jim showed his displeasure with me and made a snide comment to my mom.

"They ought to have a rule for everyone born after 1998," he began, but I cut him off.

"I was born before that, so whatever you are going to say is irrelevant."

He wrestled half of the nachos from my hand nonetheless, and we continued our previous argument about the fire. He continued to downplay the imminent danger of the encroaching fire, even though the whole mountain had been singed black, and all the nearby structures had yellow flames creeping from their innards.  

That's about where we left it: My mom, Jim and I, sitting in a decrepit roadside shack of a diner, eating stale tortillas and bitching at one another while a fire threatened our very existence.

Dammit, Mongo!

I had another work dream again last night. Ugh. I was back at my favorite locale (YC Honda) working at my old job. As per usual, things were different, and I was no longer a senior tech, but a bumbling newbie, requiring constant babysitting and assistance. Some things were the same: there wasn't enough work to go around, and guys were being less than helpful, since everyone had to scrap to get their hours.

Silva, aka "the Mongo Man," was no exception. Now, normally he'd have been the most helpful of the bunch. In real life, he'd have stopped whatever he was doing to lend a hand, even if it meant losing time on his job. He'd eventually gotten himself fired for allowing himself to fall behind so often that his hours were the lowest of anyone in the shop, racking up more than the acceptable amount of "unapplied time." 

Unapplied time is wasted or otherwise unbillable time, which the employer pays for when the mechanic is either standing around too much or is struggling to do the job in the "flat rate" time that is allotted for the particular job he is working on. The idea, as a flat rate mechanic, is to beat the flat rate and clock more hours than you are actually present at work. This is usually done by upselling multiple jobs on the same car and utilizing the overlapping labor time, cutting corners wherever possible.

Greed, for lack of a better word, is good, as the saying goes, and in this dream at least, Mongo was being as good as it gets. 

I had managed to land a car that should have been a gravy boat. It was a 2001 Civic, or something equivalent. I'd upsold some brakes and sway bar links. Simple stuff. I should have breezed through it, but it was taking me all day, as I struggled with each nut and bolt. At this rate, my unapplied time would be in the traditional Mongo territory, and I'd eventually get called out for it.

I asked Mongo for some help and he said, sure, he'd help me in a minute. He just had to finish what he was doing. He'd taken the brake lathe apart and reconfigured it to machine some cover plate for a transmission. When I went over to use the brake lathe, it was in pieces, and I was completely unaware of how to reconfigure it for its primary purpose as a brake lathe. And Mongo was nowhere to be found.

I just stood there, fumbled a bit, and stood there some more, staring at the brake lathe in just the same manner as Mongo used to do when he was perplexed by some unique job for which he was mentally unprepared. His normal diagnostic procedure was to stare at something for a really long time and just hope that the answer would present itself. 

Nothing was presenting itself to me, though, and eventually my boss, as played by Neal Patrick Harris, showed up to find out what the holdup was. I told him about Mongo and the brake lathe, and he set out to make things right. First he went looking for Mongo to try to get him to reconfigure the brake lathe. Being unable to find him, he then attempted to help me himself, but that just resulted in the two of us struggling to find and reassemble the parts.

As Mongo was turning in his paperwork and getting praised for his banner day of productivity, I was losing so much time that I'd most likely hear about it and be reprimanded. So much for my triumphant return to the work force. 

Cory Allred showed up, fresh from prison, as he always seems to be, in any dream I have with him in it, overly muscled and speaking in inmate jargon. He suggested that I shank Mongo or some other such retribution oriented solution. Cory should have been as familiar with the brake lathe as anyone, since he'd spent so much time working in the machine shop while in the joint, but, no, shanking Mongo seemed to be the only kind of advice I was getting. 

I may be embellishing that last point, but that was the feeling I had of it. No one was able to put the lathe back together again, and Mongo deserved a good shanking in my book.

What's my number? (more random ruminations on my brainscape)

 

I'm trying to make sure I give myself a fair evaluation.

When I described my situation in group last week, I had determined that I would need to reevaluate my parameters of what constitutes a 5 -- for myself -- on the mood scale pyramid. I can’t compare my 5 to your 5, or anyone else’s 5. We are all different. 

But can I even compare it to previous versions of myself and the 5 that I may have assessed myself with 10 years ago or 20? Or even last year, or five minutes ago? The landscape changes day to day, hour to hour. Every second, new inputs are making themselves known or old ones re-surfacing, some good some bad, and this in turn changes my perspective. How does one even begin to entertain the concept of objectivity, with regard to self-assessment?

These days, I feel like I am not living my life in the way that it is possible that I could, or would, want to live it. I feel like I am stuck in some trial version of my life, not the premium version. My choices seem limited; so although I am aware that they are there, the drop-down menu has many items grayed out.

Happiness, joy, contentment, serenity, gratitude, empathy – – these are concepts I am aware of, familiar with even, to some extent. I have experienced them in my lifetime. But for whatever reason, at this time, they do not seem to be on the menu. Sorrow, melancholy, self-pity punctuated by occasional fits of rage and then more morose lethargy— that’s what I’m serving up for myself on a daily basis.

I know it’s tiresome to hear, I get that. It’s tiresome to experience. I'm tired of being tired of being tired. It’s like watching the same rerun of a very boring TV show every day all day. At this point, I would welcome a break, even if it were an infomercial. Something different. But the remote, if I could find it, is broken or has dead batteries, so I can’t change the channel.

But before you go suggesting I try hang gliding or scuba diving, joining the chess club or starting a jam band, you must understand that my current software version does not support these types of things. I am like a hamster in a cage, only having the wheel to entertain himself with. My Habitrail may have extensions leading to other recreational options, but the tubes are all blocked off.

I don’t know what all is involved in getting the upgrade. Is it even possible, with the hardware that I’ve got? Certainly a reformat would be needed, to clear out all of the junk programming that’s been running in the background clogging up my operating system. But we may or may not be dealing with faulty components, a few bad transistors on the main board.

In this analogy, I would need some kind of “hardware oriented” fix to physically alter my brain. Since I can’t swap out my components, order up a new pre-frontal lobe or cerebral cortex, my options there are limited. There’s medication and there’s electroshock therapy. I suppose a lobotomy is out of the question, although if I knew the exact part of my brain that was malfunctioning I might sign a waiver for them to go in and kill it. So far it has proven itself to be reprobate and irredeemable. May as well sign its order of execution. 

I'm not talking suicide here, just selective component removal. Would my brain respond by re-routing those programmed tendencies to another part of the brain, its plasticity enabling the depressive thoughts to pop up in other places? Yeah, I'd have to think that one through. No drilling into my skull just yet.

Thus far, therapy and medication don’t seem to be working. The Bupropion is a joke. I could be on a placebo for all I know. And as for therapy, well, I can talk about things till the cows come home; it still doesn't change anything. Some kind of action is needed out of me. And at this point, I don’t know what it is. That’s about all I’ve got.

 ----

This message was dictated to my Iphone while I was out walking in some windy-ass conditions. I had to distract myself from my eyeballs being buffeted by the wind. It worked, to some extent. I thought about my immediate pain less while I was busy coming up with dumb metaphors to describe my other pain. 

Reformat

 

6-7-21

 

Trying to make sure I give myself a fair evaluation.

When I described my situation last week, I determined that I would need to reevaluate my parameters, for myself, of what constitutes a 5 on the mood scale pyramid. I can’t compare my 5 to your 5, or anyone else’s 5. But can I even compare it to previous versions of myself and the 5 that I may have assessed myself with 10 years ago or 20? Or even last year, or five minutes ago? The landscape changes from day to day. Every second new inputs make themselves known or old ones re-surface, some good some bad. How does one even formulate the concept of objectivity?

These days I feel like I am not living my life in the way that it is possible that I could, or would want to. I feel like I am stuck in some trial version of my life, not the premium version. My choices seem limited. Although I am aware that they are there, the drop-down menu has many items grayed out.

Happiness, joy, contentment, serenity, gratitude, empathy – – these are concepts I am aware of, familiar with even to some extent. I have experienced them in my lifetime. But for whatever reason, at this time they do not seem to be on the menu. Sorrow, melancholy, self-pity punctuated by occasional fits of rage and then more morose lethargy— that’s what I’m serving up for myself on a daily basis.

I know it’s tiresome to hear, I get that. It’s tiresome to experience. It’s like watching the same rerun of a very boring TV show all day every day. At this point I would welcome a break, even if it were an infomercial. Something different. But the remote, if I could find it, is broken or has dead batteries, so I can’t change the channel.

But before you go suggesting I try to hang gliding or scuba diving, joining the chess club or starting a jam band, just know that my current software version does not allow for this. I am like a hamster in a cage, only having a wheel with which to entertain himself. My Habitrail may have extensions leading to other recreational options, but the tubes are all blocked off.

I don’t know what all is involved in getting the upgrade. Is it even possible, with the hardware that I’ve got? Certainly a reformat would be needed, to clear out all of the junk programming that’s been running in the background clogging up my operating system. But we may or may not be dealing with faulty components, a few bad transistors on the main board.

In this analogy, I would need some kind of “hardware oriented” fix. Since I can’t swap out my components, order up a new pre-frontal lobe or cerebral cortex, my options there are limited. There’s medication and there’s electroshock therapy. I suppose a lobotomy is out of the question, although if I knew the exact part of my brain that was malfunctioning I might sign a waiver for them to go in and kill it.

Therapy doesn’t seem to be working. I can talk about things till the cows come home. Some kind of action is needed out of me. And I don’t know what it is. That’s about all I’ve got.

President Robert Leon Trump

Meanwhile, back in the cult...I dreamed I was following my ex-cult leader again, who was somehow both Robert Leon and Donald Trump at the same time. One moment he was wearing presidential attire, giving press conferences and holding rallies in his own honor, and the next he would be counseling someone, one on one, using his low, smooth bedroom voice, a voice that had lured many a young female into said bedroom.  

Although his status as president was suspect, he was still wildly popular, and his core of devoted followers were committed to doing his bidding. Mostly, that bidding involved following him around on his errands, opening every door and lifting every latch, or toting about his enormous arsenal of audio equipment, which was necessary to project his nearly sub-audible, hypnotic intonations to the masses. 

Complete adoration was required and enforced among the followers. Every bit of lighting and stage preparation at the rallies was designed to project the perfect image: the loving, gentle leader, sage and saintly but possessing an aura of virility, a sex appeal which should have expired long ago, had it not been for the efforts of his faithful entourage of make-up artists, tailors and video editors. I was apparently one of the inner circle, or at least I was trying to be. 

I was at one of his rallies, trying to position myself in the crowd as one of his plants. There always needed to be a smattering of enthused worshipers peppered among the members of the audience to liven up the crowd and give the illusion of complete obeyance. Every spot upon which his eye fell during a press conference or a rally needed to have at least one face which radiated pure affection for Dear Leader. I feigned such adoration, partly out of fear, but also because I was somewhat under his spell.

"Is this spot ok?" I asked President Robert Leon Trump.

After much jockeying, I'd finally picked a spot up front, almost next to the podium. If something happened, I'd be right there, as his right hand man, to step in. At least, that was the perception; I was far from his right hand man. That job was taken by Jim Turnbough, someone whose value as a sound engineer exceeded mine and whose talent for obsequious flattery was unrivaled. 

"Yeah, that's OK for now," he told me, but it was understood that I might be asked to move at a moment's notice to make room for one of his more camera-ready female supporters.

I sat and watched as the crowd assembled and packed the venue to capacity. It was an outdoor arena that was also set up as a dining hall for some kind of honorary banquet. For an aging charlatan, he could still draw them in. The event was just getting underway, and after the whistles and cheers subsided, the ex-President and cult leader gave a few words of self-congratulatory thanks to his fans. A "you are all great, but I made you who you are, so thank you, but really, thank me" kind of a thing, if that makes any sense.

I don't remember much of after that. The rallies were all the same, unmemorable as far as content; the message was transmitted almost below the level of conscious perception. Like a hypnotist so skilled that he can induce a trance without the subject being aware that they were falling under it, the transition was completely seamless. One minute you're awake and autonomous, the next minute you have being programmed for service. Like when the anesthesiologist begins his countdown and you black out, only to awaken later with a missing liver. In the case of Robert Leon Trump, it was your wallet he was after, but he would take your heart in trade, if you were strapped for cash.

The rest of the dream was spent following him around to various shopping malls. He always needed to have a large entourage of well-trained bots in tow to perform the necessary duties of flattery and bag carrying. "Oh, that hat looks great on you, Bobby." "Can I carry that amp for you, Bobby?" "Your hair plugs look great today, Bobby..." Blah, blah, blah. The stream of bullshit we had to spout was unending. Being a member of the elect wasn't all it was advertised to be in the brochure. 

Since I'm running low on details, I'm filling in with my perceptions of the actual dynamic of the Bible Study turned sex cult that I attended in the mid '80s. I didn't dream that stuff up. Robert really did, and probably still does, have an ego as large as our disgraced, disgusting ex-President. And his core of true followers, though by now completely soulless and drained of financial assets, still follow him around and would sanctify bits of toilet paper as holy relics if Bobby had wiped his ass with them.

Gracie and Bill -- A House Full of Holes

 

I dreamed I was with Gracie and Bill, helping out around the house with light cleaning and stuff. Gracie just liked having me around, but I thought I'd try to make myself useful by cleaning the kitchen counter, which had a bit of grease and grime on it (should have used 409). I left the water running in the kitchen sink and created more work for myself as it overflowed and ran down back of the counter and onto the floor. 

I noticed that the house seemed to have been designed for this type of eventuality, as there was a drain in the floor in precisely the spot where the water dripped off the counter. 

"Hey, look. They thought of everything. There's a drain on the floor, conveniently located right where I need one," I said happily.

"That's not the only one," Bill said. "Look around." 

He pointed to the many drains, spaced six feet apart, checkerboarded throughout the kitchen's linoleum tiled floor. Sure, enough, someone had put the little metal grates over openings strategically countersunk to provide maximum drainage throughout the house. 

"Why not?" I agreed. 

I supposed if they could have central air conditioning vents running under the floor, why not have a system of drainage? It would certainly make floor cleaning a breeze. But then I noticed that the grates didn't seem to have anything by way of piping under them. They were just covering holes in the floor which drained out into the dirt under the house.

"Do these vents drain anywhere," I asked Bill. "Or do they just drain out into the crawlspace? You do have a crawlspace, don't you?"

"Yes, we have a crawlspace, and yes, they just drain out into the dirt," he said, sounding a bit guilty.

I knew that must have been the case. There was no way they could have tied them in with the rain gutters, as I'd first imagined. The flow was all wrong. The house was on a hill, and the water would have to go uphill in order to get to the street. The backyard, likewise, had no place for the water to drain, other than a small cement patio. I saw no evidence that any drainage had been going on in that direction either. 

"But aren't you inviting mold, with all that moisture under there? And what about bugs? You're giving them a bunch of free access points with all of these openings." I continued to expose the short-sighted nature of the poorly engineered drainage plan.

We never I had time to discuss a solution, however. I had to finish up with the cleanup at hand, so I could accompany Bill to do some minor repairs on a few rental properties. Gracie wanted me to spend the afternoon with her, but I really wanted to help Bill out.

"You gonna be OK here?" I asked her.

"Sure," she said. "I'll be fine. You go on and help Bill."

There was an hour or so worth of driving to get to the first rental, so we said our goodbyes and got ready to go. For some reason I thought he'd said that the houses were on the east coast, so this was not going to be as big of a trip as I'd imagined. We could conceivably finish and get home before supper. Gracie always had a nice supper ready at six o'clock.

That's about all I can recollect. I realize that nothing much actually happened, and I included as much of the dialogue and minutia as I could recall without fabrication. These dreams may or may not have significance. I'm just recording them since I have nothing better to write about at the moment.