David - Procrit commercial #4

                                                                 

Grandpa: David was really wearing me out -- so as I couldn't stand to see the little bastard. What did I do? Picked up some Procrit, and I locked him in the closet. Schmuck.

<interlude>

Grandpa (cont.): Anyway, this David is turning out to be quite the troublemaker. The other day, he lit a firecracker when I was on the toilet. What did I do? I dug it out of the toilet and threw it back at him. But instead, I guess I must have grabbed a turd. Little prick.

Context: I wrote this song in 2005 as a response to an ad called Procrit commercial #4. The ad was repeated often enough that it weaseled its way into my subconscious, and I had no other choice but to memorialize it forever by hacking the original to bits and putting in my original song as a soundtrack.

The vending machine

 

I dreamed I was at work again, making myself useless. I didn't have a job or a purpose for being there. I was just wandering around talking to my ex-coworkers. I saw Luis Ramirez at the vending machine, and I stopped to talk with him for a minute. He didn't have much to say to me and left without taking his change. I stuck my finger in the change receptacle, and a quarter fell out on the ground with a very audible tinkle. Luis swung around and looked at me.

"Go ahead," he said. "I guess you need it more than I do."

I did go ahead, picking up the one coin and digging further into the receptacle. I kept pulling quarters out until I had about a dollar fifty total. Score. I usually don't have this kind of luck with vending machines, or cash in general. 

After collecting my fortune, I walked past the front desk. Art, the owner, was sitting in front of a computer terminal, intently poring over some data. I greeted him cordially, and he looked up at me.

"Hey, Andrew," he said. "I'm looking at some new hires. Do you want to see their pictures?"

"Sure," I said.

"I don't know if I can pull them up on this machine, but I'll try," he said.

----

That's all I remember. Pretty basic, I know. My brain has been occupied of late with the defense of my home. I am at war with the ants on my property. 

Since a tree went down in my backyard, millions of ants who had been nesting inside the dying trunk have now been displaced and are seeking new accommodations inside my house. There are long lines of refugees crawling around the foundation, and some have made incursions as far as the kitchen. 

Spraying them with bug killer only seems to stem the immediate invasion, a single battle won in a war that is gearing up to be an infinitely long conflict. We have opposing agendas, the ants and I. They want in, and I want them out.  

Today, after spotting another two lines of attack, I brought out the next phase of my chemical warfare, the bait granules. The product alleges to be able to kill the entire colony, since the ants will carry their food back to the nest, eventually reaching the queen. No queen, no colony. We'll see, as the Zen master said.

I did watch some of them pick up these rather large poison laden particles and head in the direction of my house. This new strategy is testing my patience, though. My instinct is to kill them on sight to prevent them from entering the house. I have to have faith that wherever they are going, I should let them go, since the poison won't get to the queen if I kill the workers. 

That's my life right now. Big struggle, I know. I'm literally making a mountain out of an anthill. Oh, and I may need a small bowel resection, but I don't want to go on about it.

Mutated Mutant

I stole this picture from someone else on Blogspot -- sue me!

 

Muted mutant

I feel muted 

Mutilated and mutated

Ablated and outdated Miscreated With a fatal flaw Checkmated With an iron will and glass jaw Living life above and below the law

Who thought of such a thing as a me? That I’d be any more useful than a tree? A blank piece of paper to be written upon And this is my song Far away, in a distant land I make peace with my demons I make them understand We’re not so different you know The singer sings and the sower sows

“Ahh-ahh ahh-ahhhh-----you got me!” I said Quoting every gunfighter who’s ever been gut shot dead

Nuclear War

 

A co-worker and I were out on a landscaping job in the company van outside a customer's house when the news report came over the radio:

"It is with great sadness that I must report that two nuclear explosions have taken place on American soil. We are still trying to determine their origin. Scientists have yet to explain who will be affected by the fallout, but for now, citizens are advised to remain in their current location."

We both knew instantly that nothing would ever be the same. An all out response was sure to ensue, followed by a counter response and a counter counter response. Society would break down in a matter of days, if not hours, as the news filtered down. We saw a pallet of toilet paper in the customer's garage, and we both had the same thought:

"Let's grab that and get out of here!" my co-worker barked.

"May as well," I said. "It will probably be the last time we'll ever see this much of the stuff. I just wonder if we'll live long enough for it to even matter. We're probably dead already. It's just a matter of time."

We loaded up the van and started driving, where we didn't know. Anywhere, I guess. It didn't matter; the radiation was invisible, and we'd never know until it was too late whether or not we'd received a lethal dose.

We continued driving, and I saw bright flash of light as an electrical transformer exploded. I instinctively shielded my eyes, thinking it was another nuclear blast. My co-worker assured me that it wasn't that. It was the electrical grid going down. 

"Say bye-bye to electricity," he said with a sardonic grin. "That flash was the last you'll see of it in this lifetime."

I don't remember much more of the dream than that. It was just a feeling of dread at the irrevocable nature of nuclear conflict. I remember thinking, "Damn. They've went and done it. They've killed us all."