The End...

Once More The Whicked Whirlwind,
Once More The Dark Grows Wide.
Once More Into The Night Dear Friends,
Another Day Has Died...

To Rigby, King, Kong, Hob, Lazzy, The Beast and all the others who helped tell the story.

To my friends, family, and random strangers who helped make up the story.

And to anyone who cared enough for the past three years to read the story.

Thank you.

Just because we're leaving, doesn't mean we're going anywhere.

So it goes...

This is the end... for now.

The Return of the King: Or How Rigby Got His Groove Back

"It must be painful to watch a man die piece by piece. Casting off his parts leaving holes in his whole." - King, from "It Was Beauty Killed The Beast"

When I got home last night he was waiting for me.

I couldn't see him at first, but as I sat in the dark listening to a sound I knew I should have been able to place I realized he was there.

~

It has been a wicked week. My mortgage fell through at the last minute, business is both tough and good and bad all at the same time, people just suck.

The closing got pushed back till Friday while I worked out another way to pay for the house, but I am pleased (and scared shitless) to say that I am now the proud owner of a piece of paper and a key. If I ever actually decide to take up residence I'll consider myself the proud owner of a home as well.

It's not a grand house. Not really special in any way, but it's perfect for me. And in an amazingly simple way that's more than I ever could have really asked for.

We haven't done a radio show in a month. Just too much going on, too much going wrong. Tuesday will be our last show before Goldberg goes and starts a real full time job. With everything going on right now I don't know how much I'll have left by Tuesday night. Have to come up with something though, I mean...this is the end.

~

I'm about to relate two stories to you at once here. Try and keep up. I have, for the majority of my life, been sure of two things about myself. The first is that I will never be normal. That's never bothered me. No one's really normal, the word itself is filled with lies and fallacies. But I'm not normal in all the wrong ways. I'm not unique, or special, or quirky, or eccentric, or oddly charming. I'm just off. I've never really felt right in my entire life.

The second thing is that I will always be uncomfortable around other people. I don't know why. I love being around other people. I love to be able to talk to people, to be near people, to be surrounded by life and all it's trappings. I don't always do well in social situations, I struggle like a motherfucker sometimes, but I even love that. Sometimes I freak, I know, I'm 25 and sometimes when you put me in a room full of people I still completely lose my shit. But it's not fear or nervousness, I like to let people believe that because that just makes me weak or pitiable. It's that everything that is going on is always so fantastic that it absolutely overwhelms me. It drives me mad to the point of almost losing control.

That frightens me.

I've built up mechanisms my entire life, studied it, practiced it, worked at it till I had "Me" designed and refined to the point of absurdity. I found me and ran with it. Problem is sometimes I'm not very good at being me, and other times I am so good it's frightening.

It's a balancing act. A fragile one at that. I've always said that heaven and hell lie so close together in my head that if you haven't been paying attention it's often difficult to discern one from the other.

I don't drink much anymore. A drink or two a month is what it's come down to. I never really drank much. I'd have two, maybe three drinks tops and be happy with it. I got drunk once, but I was trying really hard, and haven't come close since. Drinking really could have become my vice, but I just wasn't feeling it. I don't think I'd make a very good drunk. I don't smoke, don't do drugs. For a while I thought my vice could be pornography, but I never really could make myself enjoy that. It just didn't do anything for me. Sure I checked out some porn, but that childish fascination that other guys have with it never really took root in me. Gambling didn't work either. Either I was too conservative (and didn't have fun), too repetitive (come on six), or too blase (and when you don't care if you win or lose you tend to lose a lot really quick). Gambling just didn't do it for me. And then were was my latest attempt at a vice. Strippers. Holy Shit. Strippers.

When I was younger I hated strip clubs. All the guys were really into them so we went every once and awhile, but I never liked it. Never got a lap dance, never talked to the girls. It was interesting for about ten seconds and then I just sort of sat and stewed the rest of the time. Then we went to Montreal. Holy Shit. Montreal.

The night we spent in a strip club in Montreal was so awesome I knew nothing could top it. So for four years I didn't set foot in another one of those joints, no matter how bad the guys wanted to go. Then we ended up there one night for someone's bachelor party. I was in a shit mood, had been for weeks, months even. I had a shitload of money in my pocket and nothing to lose, everyone else was having a great time. I decided I had to make my own fun, and in an odd sort of way that made everything better. I was cracking stupid jokes, telling stupid stories, and combining two of my favorite past things: women so beautiful they want nothing to do with, and giving away money. It was all a grand joke. But I still didn't like the places.

And then, I'm not entirely sure how, we ended up in one of them a few months back. And for some reason I had fun. I had a blast. It was great. It wasn't the women, or even the guys that I was with, it was just...the moment. I'll be damned if that makes any sense.

I walked out of there not completely comfortable with anything that had just happened, but relaxed. And if you know me, then you know...I'm never relaxed. A few months later we went again. It was ok, but I didn't enjoy it. When we left that night I was finally able to put my finger on what had made it great that last time. The whole thing had made me feel normal. In a place that was anything but normal I felt normal. And now I had lost that. So we went again. And again. Four times in all, which is both not a lot of times and far too many times all at once. I spent a shit load of money, had a little bit of fun, but I could never find that feeling of normalcy again. It sound insane and certainly doesn't make any sense (or sound like that good of idea) searching for normalcy inside a strip club. But the truth is it had very little to do with the strip club and entirely to do with me. I just couldn't wrap my head around what it was and why it wasn't working anymore.

So last night I went back...by myself. I was on a mission. I don't mind being by myself, but I hate going places by myself. There's nothing worse than being alone around other people. It just burns you. And being alone in a place like that is sort of creepy. But I had to sort my shit out and this was my last ditch effort of sorts. Sounds pathetic, right? And it is. But...

Just as I was about to give up, as I was about to leave and start out on my next insane experiment one of the girls caught my eye. I walked all the way across the room to talk to her and said something that in a million year no one would ever imagine could come out of my mouth, "I'm just dying for a lap dance, think you could help me out?"

A half hour later, with a completely naked total stranger sitting on my lap it hit me. I was comfortable. Not because of the situation, but in spite of the situation. This was one hundred percent not "me", not any of the "Me's" I could possibly conjure up. But here we were, and I was comfortable.

That's what it was all along...I'd accomplished something. In a situation where I should be ridiculously un-fucking-comfortable...I wasn't. I'd been beating back The Afflictions for so long that I thought it would be a permamnent struggle, and now I was sure, I've beaten them.

I was done with this.

I looked at this girl, this girl I was paying a shitload of money to for nothing, and suddenly I realized she reminded me of someone.

She reminded me of her.

Fuck.

I started to laugh. Not in my head. Not to myself. Not quietly. Just regular old Palomba laughter. And I couldn't stop.

She stopped dancing and looked at me like I'd lost my mind.

But I kept laughing, because in that instant I knew.

He was back.
~

I ran into "The Beast" once. It was in one of my less clear episodes where I found myself wandering around Central Jersey at three o'clock on a Saturday morning trying to figure out where all my ambitions had gone. I don't remember where I had left my car, but I was on foot walking down a somewhat shady street in South Plainfield. I felt him long before I saw him, lurking in the shadows, watching my every move. When I realized who it was I called out to him. The darkness shifted and from it rumbled a guttural growl that told me he was in no mood to talk. I moved towards him but before I could take two steps he had fled deeper into the shadows. My encounters with "The Beast" were always like that. Fleeting and inconclusive. He would show up and disappear before you ever even knew he was there.

King was never like that. He was always more brash, more showy, more King like. You always knew when King entered a room because he did his damndest to light up the whole place. Which is why it surprised me that I felt him so long before I saw him.

When I walked into the house in North Haledon I could tell that he had been there. I had always expected him to show up at some point, so the fact that he was suddenly around wasn't a complete shock. But like I said the fact that I couldn't see him was. Why was he hiding?

When I walked into the house in Hawthorne I could tell that he had been there too. I plopped down on the couch so exhausted I hadn't even bothered to stop and turn on the lights and as I sat there in the darkness there was a noise. A tapping noise. A familiar tapping noise. His ring against the wall. It shouldn't have taken that long to realize I'd heard it so many times so long ago. But that was all it could be. I was up in a second moving to turn on the lights, when he spoke.

"Stop."

It was the first word I'd heard from him in over a year. And as I turned to face him I could tell he wasn't alone. There were two others with him. They could be no one else but Rigby and Kong, back from the dead. And as the four of us stood face to face in that small little room and black of night turned into the dreary grey of a cold rainy day I knew they were here to stay. This time they weren't going anywhere.

The old team was back together.

Here we go again.

"This is the end of something I did not want to end,
Begining of hard times to come.
But something that was not meant to be is done,
And this is the start of what was." - The Streets, Empty Cans

P For Palomba or P.S.- Nietzsche Was An Asshole And So Are You

"Quis custodiet
ipsos custodes." - Juvenal, Satires, VI, 347

"Oft the query of the studious mind,
are we all dumb, or are we just blind?" - Epistocles

"God it feels like the whole world done fell in." - Lazarus Jones

"You ain't kidding Lazzy." - T.O. Hob

I am so fucked.

I really don't know how to explain it.

Let's put it this way. I've done some things recently that I'm not too proud of. But I've also done some things that I shouldn't be too proud of...but am.

Confusing, right?

I miss my puppy. The Tuck is currently boarding with the parents because my closing went long and my landlord wouldn't let me keep him. A week ago I expected to have a house and a puppy at this time...instead I have neither.

I've given up some of the moral high ground so I could understand a few things better, so I could defend myself against a lot of what is going on. It doesn't change everything, it just changes some things. But some things it changes too much.

We had a plan. The problem is one of us stuck to it, and one of us didn't. And as it happens with things like plans when you try and veer of from it the momentum ends up taking you in the complete opposite direction, further from the plan then you ever intended to be. But when this sudden veering off of sorts catches the other parties in your plan by surprise it makes things that much worse. Dangerously so actually.

We're in a spot of trouble. I guarantee things will get much messier before they get much better.

I'm devouring books like they were candy, yearning for stories even if they aren't mine. I've run out of things to talk about, run out of tales to tell, run out of people to tell them too.

It's cold in here and I'm feeling awfully alone.

But I feel strong.

Fucking strong.

I need to call some people. Need to see some shit. Need to get my god damn head clear before something bad happens.

Nobody needs to get hurt.


"Battle not
with monsters,
lest ye become
a monster,

and if you gaze
into the abyss,
the abyss gazes
also into you." - Nietzsche

An Untimely Post About My Father

"What are you saying? Strippers can't study law? Cuz that sounds like some racist shit to me." - Lazarus Jones

"You're one in a million Lazzy, never change." - T.O. Hob

~

It may not have started out like one, but this is a serious entry.

~

After twenty some odd years I have come to the conclusion that I may never forgive my father for not wanting us. I tried, I really did. And while I very often thought I was close to forgiving what he had done, I knew I couldn't forget it. And in the end it's not the kind of slight you can live with.

Let me explain.

I'm twenty five years old. When I was three years old my mother and father split up. It was her first marriage, his second. His first one had ended in a similar way, kids he didn't want, a life he couldn't live, infidelities he could no longer hide. He was his first and only priority...but that didn't make him a bad guy. Just immature...even thought he was well into his forties.

My mother was younger, not young, but younger and very, very pregnant. This was the time my father chose to split. He had one kid he didn't want, and one more wasn't going to make the
situation any better. So before my brother showed up, our old man split. Didn't even come to visit him in the hospital, or so the story goes.

Now my mother wasn't the easiest person to get a long with, she can be a bit loopy sometimes, takes things to heart too much, doesn't always makes the most sense. But she's not a bad person either, just takes some patience in dealing with. My father had no patience, and was quick on the trigger when it came to being a little too physical. It was a bad combination.

It sounds horrible, but I was a little kid. I could have forgiven him for everything he did to me, everything he did to my mother. I could have lived with the separation, the financial and emotional problems it caused me, my mother, and my baby brother if only the old son of a bitch had tried a little harder. If he had wanted us, if he had fought for us. If he had done anything but basically abandon us. It would have been easier if he had just disappeared. But he didn't. His new "wife" lived nearby, his business was nearby, and he figured that if he had to continue to support us financially he would stick around to abuse and harass my mother. Somehow that sort of made sense to him.

We were good little kids my brother and I. We weren't like his older boys. They didn't do well in school, had problems at young ages, just weren't nice little kids. When I was young I thought maybe they had deserved to be abandoned. But what had we done? I didn't see at the time that they were that way because he had abandoned them. They were victims, not criminals.

My father was a terror when he was around. It wasn't that he hit us much, or neglected us even. It was just how he treated us. He yelled more than he talked, took pleasure in frightening us, would do anything he could to get us out of the way when he had something he found more important going on. Those memories were so frequent and so disturbing that I try not to think about them. But what really stands out in my memory isn't so much how he was when he did show up but how often he didn't show up...and how disappointed we always were. We would sit in the living room, staring out the window, waiting for him to come up the hill. Sometimes we would wait right up until bedtime, when finally our mother had to concede, he wasn't coming. I've talked about it before, but writing this now I remember how much it hurt. And I almost tear up thinking about how stupid we were. Most people only touch a hot stove once, we just kept on getting burned.

When he remarried he didn't tell us. She didn't like us very much, and she was a bit fucked up herself. Kids can sense when they're not liked, and we responded in the only way we knew how, by not liking her just as much. There were long periods where my father would ditch us. Not return phonecalls, not come to visit, not even take time inquire about how we were doing. Usually when he disappeared he'd stop sending child support checks and things would become very tight around the house. A couple of times they almost cut the power off, few times they might have actually cut the television and phones off. One of the predominant memories of my childhood was my mother calling in to radio station contests where they were giving away small monetary prizes, because she couldn't come up with another way to make ends meet.

He would always show back up. It was like sometimes he needed us, or needed us to need him, just long enough till he felt better about himself. Then he returned to being cold and distant. We wanted a father, he just didn't wants sons. He made no secrets about it.

When I was in high school he disappeared once, refused to take our calls, told his secretary to tell us he went away, but not tells us where and not give us a phone number to get him at. It was a tough time for me, a lot was going on in my life, I needed someone to talk to, someone to back me up, someone to teach me things. I needed him, and he wasn't there for me. It wasn't a surprise. I forgave him, treated him no differently when he came back. But I knew I could never forget. I got by alright on my own, but when you're a kid like that, and you're struggling...you shouldn't have to get by on your own.

When he returned this time there was something different about him. All of a sudden he needed us. He wanted us to be interested in what he was doing, the company he was building, the toys he had acquired. He needed someone to admire him, someone to love him for what he had done. We tried...we really did.

My father didn't come to my high school graduation. He had the gout. He went to work...but didn't come to my high school graduation.

I still didn't hold it against him.

When I was a freshman in college he had some health problems. Suddenly he changed again. Although he would never admit it, and none of us would ever call him on it, it was like he realized what a shit he had been for so long. Now, as he stared death in the eye, he had to do something to make up for it. Had to work his way into heaven.

My grandmother (my mom's mom) hated my father. She once told me that one day he would realize what a miserable fuck he was and that he would try and buy his way into heaven. She seemed almost eager to watch him try. The day after he checked into the hospital, she died.

She was right. He had previously refused to contribute to my college education (I paid for my first year of school with my mother's help). Now he was willing to foot the entire bill for my education. Whereas previously I had worked several shit jobs at once, suddenly he was willing to give my brother and I jobs working for him. He just seemed to care more. I could never forget the things he had done, but this was what I had been waiting my entire life for. My father finally seemed to give a shit.

It didn't last long, and I guess, on the surface I knew it wouldn't.

When I first went to work for him we had discussed my taking over for him. There were parameters. I wouldn't quit school, I would work with him not for him, I would never have to lie, cheat, or steal.

We had a deal.


He tried to make me quit school. I wouldn't. He hated the fact. Hated me for the fact. He barely made it out of high school, and in his mind no one should be able to do anything he couldn't. So if he couldn't make it into college, I shouldn't be able to either. I stuck with it anyway. He did his best to make it miserable for me.

I came out of school all ready to work side by side with him learning everything there was to learn about the business. Only thing was he wasn't ready to teach. He upped and left for Florida as soon as I arrived leaving me to figure things out on my own.

So I did.

For over two years I've worked at figuring things out on my own, fixing things that didn't work and running with the things that did. I don't know it all yet, but I know a lot of it, and most of it I've had to teach myself. What that means though is I don't always do things exactly like my father would. More often than not they work. He hates that. If something isn't done exactly as he wants it should fail miserably. As often as we can we will do exactly as he wants, and if it fails he'll say that it was never how he wanted it done. If something fails miserably it must be because it wasn't done exactly how he wanted it done.

He's sort of insane like that...and sort of typical for any father.

He likes to browbeat people, yell, and scream, and abuse people for no real reason. He'll make up a reason just so he can show how "powerful" he is. And woe be the person who challenges him. I remember the first time I challenged him. I was 12 years old. We were driving and he said something that I disagreed with. So I told him I disagreed and explained why. I thought I had made a pretty eloquent argument. He didn't, so he smacked me. I called him an asshole. I don't think I had ever even used that word before, but it just seemed to fit the situation. He hit me so hard I could taste the blood before I even realized I should be bleeding. Funny part was, it didn't hurt. I was a big kid getting bigger and he was an old man getting older. I realized that day that he couldn't hurt me. I was smarter than him even then, and soon I would be stronger. There was nothing he could do to me.

For a long time I thought that everyone's families were as fucked up as mine. A lot of the kids I knew had it just as bad as I did. But as I got older, as I met more people, as I shared more stories, I realized not everyone was like us. There were some good people out there. It scared me. I'd spent all this time swearing I would never have a family because I wouldn't want to become as big of a bastard as my father and here were all these people that had pulled it off. What if I could make it work too?

I don't know why I'm writing all this, rushing through it all when know I'll have to come back to it later. I guess it has a lot to do with something my father said today.

Last night we had it out again. He left the office in a huff. I don't like it when a conversation ends like that, and I don't like it when he thinks he's won an argument simply because he's left before you've had a chance to say your side. If you let him get away with that he'll just do it over and over and over again. So I went to his house, beat him home actually. And before he got in the door I said to him, "Do you have a fucking problem with me? Because if you do let's get it out there right now and get this shit over with, because I can't keep working like this."

He tried to ignore me, but I couldn't let him. "What's going on with us? Tell me what the problem is so we can past all this. Otherwise it's going to be a fight every god damn day. There's no reason for you to be up my ass all the time, so why are you?"

He just kept ignoring the question, and started complaining about shit he knew nothing about. As usual. I let it go and headed back to work.

Today he started again. I asked him to close the door of the office so we could talk about it. He did and then said this, "All this fucking talking isn't any good. You always want to talk about shit. It's no good."

The man would rather have no idea what's going on, would rather complain without resolution, would rather fight then discuss something.

He'd rather just keep on being an asshole.

My response was quick (as it usually is) and not entirely fair (as it has been lately). Before he could walk away I lowered my voice and said to him, "If you don't want to discuss things because you can't keep up, that's fine. But don't cry about it later when you have no idea what's going on."

He started to reply, but couldn't think of anything to say. He just stomped off like he usually does. The argument took a different course then it usually did, but ended just the same.

Nothing solved, nothing different.

I really wish I could forgive my father, it's just getting tougher and tougher to even try.

~

"I know, a minute doesn't seem like much, but just wait. That minute will turn into an hour. That hour into a day. Before you know it you're dead and buried thinking, 'What the fuck just happened?'" - T.O. Hob

Good Ol' Mel

I've always liked Mel Gibson, even when I was bothered by the whole "Passion of the Christ" thing, even when he became overtly anti-semitic, even when he made those two movies with two completely different kids that absolutely no one can tell apart even though they really have nothing to do with each other. Yeah, you know which two I'm talking about.

Anyway, I haven't really been doing the whole social commentary thing on here in a long while. It just doesn't seem my place anymore. I'm no longer that bastion of pop culture knowledge, that hellion of social causes, that minion of media, that onion of...well shit, you get the point. I used to be and now I'm not. Have I even mentioned Hezbollah? Hizbullah? Bachagaloops? Whatever the hell they're calling themselves now? I didn't say shit about any of Georgie's latest indiscretions or North Korea's missiles. I'm not that guy anymore. But for some reason I want to talk a little bit about Mel.

See I liked the Mad Max movies, The Bounty, The Lethal Weapon movies, Maverick, Braveheart, Ransom, Conspiracy Theory, Payback, The Patriot, We Were Soldiers, I even tolerated What Women Want even though I really wish I hadn't.

I just think the guy is...

...decent. Not even decent in the Kevin Costner sort of way where I watch his movies because the movies were good but I really wish he wasn't in them. Or the Dennis Quaid sort of way where I watch the movies even though their questionable mostly because he's in them just because he's in them. Or the in the Kevin Bacon way where I probably don't watch them period even though I have nothing against the guy. Just normal old fucked up decent.

And slightly anti-semitic. But hey I've never faulted anyone for being racist, not because I don't think it's a horrible horrible thing, but just because I understand that most people are stupid...and don't know any better.

And an alcoholic. But hey let's remember drunk is a reason, not an excuse. And Mel did say he was sorry even if he maybe didn't completely mean it.

And a pedophile. I think I may have just made that one up, but while we're pouring it on...

You know, maybe I don't like Mel all that much...I'll have to think some more about that one. But you know what? I definitely still like Lethal Weapon...definitely.

So anyway...

My father has completely lost his mind. Today he complained about how much water people drink...think about it, seriously, it was 90 degrees out yesterday and 90 degrees again today. But according to him people shouldn't be able to drink that much water. It was a fantastic tantrum...in part because we've always joked that one day he would realize how much the water cooler water cost and he would lose his mind. We'd strut around the office joking that it was time to "cut off the water, and next we'll cut off the air! That will teach them!" And it was infinitely more funny when it actually happened then we were just joking about it. But it was kind of sad...

The house is ALL fucked up...

My puppy is insane...

I worked late, picked up chinese food on the way home. The lady didn't seal the lid properly on something and it leaked through the bag and onto my lap ruining a new pair of pants. God damn.

You have got to love Mondays...I need a drink, and a lapdance, and some heroin.

Night All.

Pandemonium

"Is That Thelonious Monk In Your Pants Or Are You Just Happy To See Me?" - Lazarus Jones

"You should seriously consider laying off the pipe Jones, can't you see you're scaring the poor girl?" - T.O. Hob

Sometimes I think Jones and Hob don't run together enough. They'd make one hell of a team.

With Rigby and Kong gone and King deep in hiding it's almost like Lazarus and T.O. are the only friends I've got left.

~

There are so many papers on my desk I can barely see the desk.

My father's only purpose is to ruin others like he ruined himself.

My puppy is sick and I'm a little nervous.

There's a cute girl in the deli but she's probably like sixteen.

~

It's not that this is a busy time at work, it's just that it's always busy for me. I've been coming in pretty late in the morning lately, but staying for hours after everyone leaves. My secretary is shit and I just hired a girl to eventually replace her but I was forced to rush into a decision and I'm not entirely sure I made the right one. We're probably letting one of the managers go because he gets more and more useless every single day. He's slow, overpaid, annoying, and he doesn't do anything right the first time. He makes things harder for everyone else, but he's not a bad guy, so it sucks having to let him go. And even though he doesn't get things right the first time if you keep an eye on him he eventually gets them right. Now that will just be one more thing I have to do by myself. We're going to be short people in September, just like always and that makes me a little pissed off. Every chance I have to fix something gets crushed under my old man's stubborn and ignorant feet.

~

I love my father because he's my father. If he wasn't I would probably just think that he was one of the most miserable human beings to ever walk on the face of the earth. He's stubborn as hell, all Palombas are (myself included), but none can find the exact mix of stubborness and ignorance that my father has. Not having a fucking clue what he's talking about has never stopped him from insisting that he's the absolute authority on the subject. He makes a decision, one that has great potential for disaster, and while we're all generally smart enough to avoid telling him he's wrong we very often try and warn him. Over the years I have become so used to the agitated look on my father's face when he realizes that exactly what everyone was expecting to go wrong has gone wrong, and that everyone knows it, that it doesn't faze me anymore. What still gets to me is the fact that he never, ever, will admit that he was wrong. Or that things didn't go exactly as planned. When I was a kid it never really mattered, I could ignore his decisions because I really didn't have a right to argue with him. When you're eight years old what the fuck do you know about anything? But I'm 25 now, an adult in a lot more ways than I care to admit. I'm smarter then my father, I know more about a lot of things then he does. Not about everything, certainly not about this business. But I know more about what's going on right now, and I know enough to know that things are quite different then they used to be. But he asks me to report everything to him, so I do. But no matter how much I tell him...I just can't make him understand. He likes my damn puppy more than he likes me. I told him the other day how the dog was having a hard time getting used to his leash, making it impossible to walk him, making it difficult to house break him. So my old man asks how long after he eats do you wait before you take him out. I say about 15 to 20 minutes. He says, "That's not enough, wait 25." I chuckle a little at how silly that sounds but figure maybe he knows something I don't. So then he asks how long do I stay outside waiting for the dog to go, I say 25-30 minutes. He says, "That's not enough, you have to wait 35 minutes." He doesn't know why I'm laughing. If I said I waited 14 hours he would have said wait 14 hours and five minutes. That's just how my old man is.

~

I took The Tuck to the vet today, his first trip with me. Turns out he has an ear infection (which wasn't even why I took him there). Every one of the girls at the vet has to come visit the cute puppy, one of the girls even hints that maybe I got the dog because I knew he would get so much attention. I laughed, if I wasn't me I could have gotten some mileage out of that. So they give him a few shots and check him out and then we're on our way. At first Tuck is fine, tired, but fine. But then I get him back to the office and he starts to act a little funny. Won't stand up, kind of wobbling on his side when he lays down. It's making me a bit nervous so I call the Vet, we run through everything and they say he's probably fine. I call the breeder to see if he had any problems or if there were any shots or medication he had that they didn't tell me about because I'm starting to suspect he's having a reaction to something. They swear he didn't but they seem sort of confused. It all made me a little nervous. I've been nervous a lot lately. So unlike me...I've also been spelling nervous with an "e" at the end, which is wrong...also so unlike me.

~

So I've been going into this deli for lunch lately. And the other day there was a girl behind the counter. From the other end of the deli I thought she looked pretty cute (which is something guys notice even when we aren't trying to, it just sort of jumps out at you.) When I get up close I see that she is really cute...but in the really young sort of way. She was probably seventeen. And of course I'm me, so my mind doesn't go the first place most guys minds do. First I do the stories, something I've been doing since I was a little kid. I just make up background stories for people I don't even know. (She must be a young college student working her way through school by making sandwiches at the deli, she must be the owner's young and rebellious daughter reigned in by her job at the family shop but secretly yearning to break free by writing poetry and playing the harmonica, she must be an alien sent to earth to observe the lunch habits of what passes as sentient beings on this planet.) Ok, so really I didn't think of the alien one, but of course there were six thousand others. Then I start to guess how old she is, which is probably a thing most guys do, except that I was doing it because I was trying to gauge exactly how old I think I am. See when you think someone is older then they are it's usually because you're feeling young and when you guess someone is younger then they are it's because you're feeling old. Then I start to think "Oh shit she probably things I'm staring, which means she probably thinks I'm perving on her, and she probably thinks I'm like 40 years old which means she probably thinks I'm some sort of pedophile who is going to be waiting out in the back alley to kidnap her and hide her in my dank dark basement with all the random body parts of my previous victims which means she probably thinks I'm a murderer which means she's probably going to call the cops who will most certainly believe this cute little seventeen year old more than they'll believe me and then they'll find that unpaid speeding ticket in my glovebox which means I'm probably going to jail...oh shit what will my mother think." Which all made me sort of nervouse which was compounded by the fact that now I was staring...and she definitely noticed. But then she sort of smiled in that "I clearly pity you so don't get any ideas" sort of way which made me pretty sure she probably wasn't calling the cops...but I didn't waste any time leaving just in case.

~

"I feel like I've jumped off a bridge and forgotten where the ground was." - Palomba

"Don't worry buddy, just keep on falling and it will find you." - T.O. Hob

Of Puppies, Houses, And Other Semi-Remarkable Changes

"And Jesus said, 'Wherever two of you gather in my name I will be present.' But seriously I think he expected a bigger fucking crowd." - T.O. Hob

My father had surgery just the other day, I'm happy to report he's doing well, but I'm even happier to say that you never really get used to being worried about your parents. My father and I don't always see eye to eye on things, but at least we have the opportunity to disagree.

Outside some mortgage complications the house is pretty much all locked up. We won't be closing on the 11th, but we'll be closing soon after. I got to wander around a bit during the home inspection and I'm very happy with what I'm getting...even if it did cost quite a bit too much.

So I jumped the gun a little bit and bought a dog before I could actually move into my house. I made a few calls and managed to find a French Bulldog puppy in Northern Massachusetts, just a few minutes outside Vermont. So I took a few hours off and hauled ass up to the sticks, had lunch with two very gay but very nice gentleman, discussed the responsibilites of having a dog, picked out my puppy and headed back. I had thought of so many names for the little guy but none seemed to really fit him. They called him Tucky, which is far too...you know. So I think I'll call him Tuck for now. See if it takes. Little guy has some learning to do, he won't take the leash and while housebreaking has turned out to be an adventure. He took a nice little shit on his training mat, then waddled off and pissed on the floor. Can't win sometimes.

Youth Mass was small again today, only two kids showed up, good kids the both of them. I wish there was something I could do to make people understand how important that community is, even though I'm not a huge fan of the place the community happens to be tied to.

Lot going on at work, but it's Sunday night, I'm tired and not entirely optimistic about the upcoming week. We'll just have to see how it goes though...see which way the ball bounces and the whatnot.

Night All.

Zidane Giveth, And Zidane Taketh Away

"Call me gay but I'm dreaming of Fabio Cannavaro and Gianluigi Buffon tonight!" - Lazzaro Jones

"Ok, you're gay." - T.O. Hob

AZZURRI!

So the Italians pulled it off, World Cup Champions 2006. Congrats boys, nicely done.

My old man is back at work after being out for a few days, he's been a total pain in the ass since the minute he walked in the door this morning. I've learned to live with it.

Goldberg called off the show tomorrow night, which is good because I'll most likely be a complete mess by then.

Italy won the World Cup, did I mention that?

The little guy thinks I'm taking him to South Africa for the 2010 World Cup, I hate to disappoint him so I might just have to.

I made an effort to talk a little with some people I haven't talked to in far too long. It was nice, but I need to try harder to stay in touch.

Did you hear? Italy won the World Cup.

I bought a house. That's a pretty big deal. I should be closing within a month.

But seriously...Italy won the World Cup.

I implore the French fans not to be too hard on Zidane, he's still (probably) a good guy but everybody has their moments. It's not his fault France lost, it's FIFA's. If shootouts were abolished it was still anyone's game and France had me might scared down the stretch there.

So yeah...new house, good mood...Azzurri!

Whaddya gonna do?

The Little Lost Dogs

"I don't know man, it seems like I'm getting older every day."

"Could be worse, you could be not."

Westwardly. How's that for a direction?

I don't even know what that means.

Wow.

What a couple of days.

You know what I need? A reason to hang out at strip clubs more. And wanting to see naked women isn't a good enough one (and it's not entirely true either). I need like a scientific experiment so I can call it "research", or I need to write a story so I can call it "background". You know something. Just...something.

But serioulsly folks I've decided to act like I do drugs. Not actually do drugs, just act like I do. People who do drugs just seem to have more fun, so I'm going to pretend like I do them to. Enjoy myself a bit.

Makes sense, right? Right?

Italy's in the World Cup final on Sunday, I'm so excited I'm erect.

I'm still hunting for a house, I am making several offers at once and the tension is palpable...if palpable means "I wouldn't give a flying fuck except for the fact that I don't have a place to live after next month."

I saw "Click" the other night. It was surprisingly good, and with a little time and a favorable career turn by Adam Sandler it could become the next "Groundhog Day". No really, I'm not kidding. Seriously.

Been driving for C@mp R@m@quois the last couple of days. That place must be amazing for little kids, but the noise they make is driving me absolutely nuts. We drive through a lot of really rich communities (I think parents pay like $10k to send one kid to camp for the summer and some of them send like 4 kids). So we're rolling down a side street yesterday afternoon when a little white Scottish Terrier comes sprinting down the side of the road. He's this perfectly groomed little fucker running ripshod all over Tenafly. He's bounding out into the street like he owns the road, cavorting through perfectly trimmed ridiculously green grass, enjoying himself thoroughly from all appearances. It made me laugh just a little. This morning there was a pug doing just the same thing. Roaring all over town blissfuly unrestrained without a care in the world. It's like the rich folks forgot to lock their doggie doors and here were all these expensive little mutts excercising just a few minutes of rebellion. A stray dog in Paterson is likely to try and kill you, a stray dog in Tenafly might tickle you a little bit. I was disproportionally amused.

Anyway, I gotta fly, it's hot out and I'm thinking of blowing a hole in the middle of the parking lot and starting my own little pool. By the way my father was just in the hospital, but he might be ok so I'm glad of that. The Kid is going back to school which hopefully will be good for him and keep him out from under my feet, and I'm slowly loosing my mind...so yeah, that's where we're at.

Thanks for reading.

"I don't know where we started...I just got a sort of good idea about where we're ending up." - Palomba

Bore-dom

Nothing much really happens here anymore. Nothing worth talking about at least. I mean hell, it's been what? Three months since we last found a dead body?

I remember this one time, back in high school, where I woke up feeling sick in the middle of the night. I didn't sleep again for damn near a week.

This was back before I had my driver's license, back before I had more then two close friends, back before I had 600 dvd's, before I drank, before I masturbated, before I did anything that could really help pass the time.

So I did nothing.

That week sort of ran together in an awkward stew of colors and sounds none of which really meant anything at the time. But now, for some reason, they do.

That was good nothing. The kind of nothing you can hang your hat on at the end of a long happy life. Not the kind of nothing which drives you half mad. The kind of nothing that's been dogging me lately.

So this weekend I drank (twice), wrote (once), and spent far too much money in a place featuring women with far too little clothing.

I almost enjoyed myself.

It was a curious weekend, but one that shit me out in the exact same state it swallowed me up in.

Same old shit, you know?

People

"People are rarely ever all that good, and rarely ever all that bad. 'bout the only thing you can ever count on people to be is...well, people...to the bitter fucking end." - T.O. Hob

I had chinese food on Thursday. That in and of itself isn't all that odd. Fact it's sort of normal. But in the hustle and bustle of another busy day I never did manage to open my fortune cookie. Now look, most people don't pay no mind to things like that, but for some reason I tend to put more stock in any wisdom that comes with food attached to it, and have always held in high regard the wisdom of the fortune cookie. There's even a small ritual about it. First you crack the cookie in two and slowly pull the halves apart. Whichever part ends up absent the fortune you eat first. When that half is done, and not before, you may read the fortune. If it's a good fortune you slowly eat the other half of the cookie. If it's a bad fortune you eat the other half real quick, because it don't deserve the respect (but of course since you already got some bad luck coming why waste half a cookie.)

So Friday morning I'm sifting through the miserable pile of shit on my desk when I find aforementioned cookie. I say "Why look a fortune cookie." My brother says, "So?" And I say, "I haven't had chinese food today." He says, "Must be from before." I reply (quite honestly), "Must be. But it doesn't seem much like me to have a cookie and not eat it." And it certainly does not.

So I commence with the ritual. And what does my fortune say? "The weekend will bring you a surprise." Not exactly Confucious but here's to hoping.

It was a long weekend, a good one, but one with many amusing setbacks and delays but when Sunday night came I was sitting in my office banging away at payroll. Not a surprise in sight.

I headed home and bunked down for the night. I was laying in bed staring at the ceiling just past midnight when it hit me. Nothing surprising had happened. Not a single thing.

Damn.

I really believed in that one.

I was really surprised that nothing had happened...and there it was.

The worst sort of surprise on an otherwise excellent weekend.

"I've decided I'm going to kill myself when I turn 103 by fucking a sixteen year old virgin while her twin sisters suck my balls and her mother licks my asshole. At that age the sheer lasciviousness of it all should do me in...Why are you crying?"

"Because that's the most beautiful goddamn thing I ever did hear."

"Fucking poetry."

God Rest The Souls Of That Poor Family... And Pussy's Half Price For The Next 15 Minutes.

"They call me The King."

"Why's that?"

"I don't know. I reckon calling me The Shithead In Charge to my face wasn't too popular an idea among those who wanted to keep their tongues in their fucking heads."

Well hello there...

Now look I don't have time for a lot of words or a lot of words for the time being...I just wanted to stop by and say that I had a very nice weekend.

On Friday night I went out for drinks with some friends I don't hardly see enough and although it did interfere with some other plans (ain't that always the way?) I most certainly will be making good on those too.

I stayed awake straight through the night Saturday so I could open up the yard on time, and after seeing to business I hurried over to my mom's to catch my little brother as he woke up. Rookie insisted on going to McDonald's for breakfast (six friggin' hash browns buddy) and then we picked up my little sister from a sleepover at her friends house. I tried to sleep that afternoon but had little luck. Ended up back in the office. Went by the kids for dinner, hung out for a bit afterwards, headed back to the office and knocked off some more work in the middle of the night. Went home and slept for a bit.

Work again on Sunday morning, but back by the kids in the afternoon. Took them to Best Buy to buy some movies. Dropped them at the house and headed back to the office. Dinner by the kids again. Played catch for what seemed like forever, don't have a baseball glove anymore so I bare handed it. Yeah, that's right, I'm a tough son of a bitch...and the little guy throws like a girl. Don't tell him I said so, it would break the poor buggers heart. (has it coming though, Mike Piazza is not a better ball player then Mickey Mantle...damn kids.) Cleaned up for a minute and then headed in to watch a movie with them. They were half passed out by the time it was over. I'd run them ragged all weekend. I headed home to my empty house and my lonely life and chuckled to myself about how good I have it.

Monday was a holiday for many, it was just another day for me. Can't say I didn't enjoy the slow pace just a little bit.

So why am I telling you about this seemingly average, seemingly quiet weekend? Because...to me it was just perfect.

So here's where I stand. I have offers in on two houses, one in North Haledon, one in Hawthorne. If I get either one I'll be thrilled. I'm getting a lot of business straightened out, hopefully so much so that I'll have some free time soon. Things are so close to being great...but so damn far at the same time. It's tough. It seems like I'm forcing so many things to work, like I've got the weight of the whole world on my shoulders...and shit, if you know me, you know I wouldn't have it any other way.

So here's the question...how are you?

What?

I don't know how this happened.

Really...

Somehow I'm still alive.

Egads...

What happens now to the rest of my plan?

In the middle of the night (in the middle of a fever) I began to write. A story, several stories really. I thought they were all rather pleasant.

Today I saw a beautiful girl. Odd how rarely that happens nowadays.

I'm tired.

I'm working late tonight so I mademyself some Kraft Easy Mac Macaroni & Cheese. You put some water in, nuke it for three minutes, mix that powdered "cheese" shit in, and voila. It tastes just like when ma used to make it. If only I had known this in college. I would have eaten a lot more macaroni and cheese, I mean, I new it was easy. And I knew it was tasty, but I never knew how easy and had forgotten how tasty. Shit.

What?

Those People That Come And Go

I ran into somebody the other day. Guy I used to know in high school. We were friendly, if not really friends, and we talked a bit our first year out of school. But then we sort of lost touch, in that way you tend to do. So six years went by, and next thing you know here we are passing each other on the way out of the 7-11 not more than that five minutes walk from where we both went to school. And what do you have to talk about after six years? Not what you've done, but what you're doing. We both remember what we intended to do when last we spoke, and here we are in a parking lot near Paterson reminding each other about how we haven't done it. But still when you walk away...

Kid I used to know died the other day. Shit, I barely remember him and I'm sure he wouldn't have remembered me, but there was that funny little moment when I heard about him passing that kind of made me wonder. What about everyone else I used to know? Where are they? What happened to them?

Ran into another guy I know going into the 7-11 last night. Known the kid most of my life, wouldn't think twice about calling him a good friend. But I can count on both hands the number of times I've seen him in the last seven years. Can count on one hand the number of times I've even thought of him in the last year. It's like the stories we used to share have been shrewdly edited to let us all forget that he ever existed. Just makes telling them easier. Not that he ever did anything wrong, just that he's not there to defend his part in our stories anymore and that makes it easier to write him out of them completely. And it's funny when you run into a guy like that now, funny what you talk about. Not what you're doing, or even what you've done, but who you still know, who you've seen. "What about old so-and-so?" You almost assume that since you haven't seen 'em, that they must have, since you don't really see each other anymore. And if neither one of you see them then, hell, they must not exist anymore. And when being specific gets too depressing you say, "Have you seen anyone?" Just begging for them to tell you something about someone you both used to know, and when they answer no, that they haven't seen anyone it almost breaks your heart. Because you know they must have seen someone. Just not possible for seven years to pass and you not see anyone. But then they ask you the same thing...and you lie right back to them. Nope, I ain't seen anyone either. And then you figure it's time to go, so you promise to get together soon and invite all the people that neither one of you have seen out for a drink, and for about four seconds you actually believe it's going to happen and then you remember...you've got other things to do. And that's that. You're both gone and wondering if either one of you ever really knew the other.

And then someone asks...

You remember old so-and-so? And you're not really sure you do. More likely you remember something they might have done then you really remember who they are. (Isn't he the one that...went hiking in Spain? fucked that guys sister? got arrested for public urination? ) Or some minor characteristic that let you sort them out from all the other friends of friends you never really had the time or inclination to get to know all that well. (Isn't he the one with the...funky hair? gay-ass moustache? lazy eye?) It's not like you ever really knew them anyhow...but when you hear they're gone, well hell, it slows you down a bit. Because you gotta think that if that's all you remember about them, then what the hell is everyone else going to remember about you? When they say "You remember old so-and-so?" and they're talking about you...will anybody have anything to say at all?

Ran into another guy today, in 7-11, and it took me a minute to make sure I knew it was him. Nothing worse then thinking you know someone only to find out it ain't them. And I said, "Hey Dave. Been awhile." And he looked at me for a minute, like maybe he'd done too many drugs, or maybe I'd gained too much weight, and he wasn't really sure if I was who he thought I was, and he didn't want to get it wrong because there ain't nothing worse then knowing someone but not realizing who it is you think you know. And he said, "Chris, right?" And I said, "Hell yes." Like it ain't been seven years and it wouldn't have been the most natural thing in the world for him not to remember me. And I said, "So what have you been up to?" And he goes, "Just working." And I said, "Yeah. Same here." Even though there were seven years worth of things I could have told him that would have all been completely new to him, but instead I said "How's your brother? You tell him I said hello." And he said, "Same to yours." And I said, "It was good seeing you." Even though I'm not entirely sure it really was, and he said the same and we shook hands and headed out. And if it were seven years till I saw him again, I don't know if I'd notice, and neither would he.

So what about old so-and-so? And I wonder if I'm done meeting new people, and if I was have I met enough to have my fill? And the thought frightens the living shit out of me. I ain't been but 45 minutes away from whereever I start in damn near a year, and though there's plenty of adventure to be had 45 minutes from anywhere in North Jersey I'm beginning to wonder if there's enough.
In my life I've met the greatest people I could ever want to meet, and I've watched them come, and I've watched them go and I've lost far too many of them before I was ready. And some days I wake up wondering if today's the day someone that's gone will come back, or someone that only just got here will move on, and I never seem to know which it will be. But I do know one thing...if I die today or if I live forever, my life just wouldn't have been worth living without those people that come and go.

But...

What about old so-and-so?

I don't know...

I don't know...

I don't know...

Murder Most Foul?

I found a dead body tonight.

Yeah...

Today was one of those days.

It started out tough, we were already short people and so many people just didn't show up this morning that we all ended up on the road. I didn't even have a proper dispatcher (not that I usually do).

Tonight was the contractor's association dinner, which means I got to sit and listen to people talk for 3 hours about something I think about all day long. Then I get to listen to all the other rich folk complain about how bad they have it. Then I smile and bullshit just like everyone else. It is what it is.

We had a few drinks there, then went out. Ended up at some shit strip club which we literally paid the cover for, went in for less than a minute, and walked the fuck out. The cover wasn't cheap. It was just that bad.

We ended up at some other go-go type place (which isn't usually my cup of tea) but this one was sort of fun. I actually enjoy it more when the girls in these places don't take their clothes off. It makes me much less uncomfortable. I'm sort of strange like that.

Tim had to piss. I wouldn't let him go in my house since I was ill just before we went to dinner and I wasn't sure the bathroom was completely clean.

I know that's disgusting, but it plays an important part in what happens next. I was planning on going by the yard to check up on things, but since we were both exhausted we were thinking of skipping it. Since Tim had to piss I figured we'd stop anyway.

Once we locked up I drove around the corner to check on the garage like I always do. And as I rounded the corner there he was.

There was a red Ford Taurus parked on the side of the road. There's often cars there in the middle of the night. Guys smoking dope, people learning to drive, pervs looking for a quite place to get off. But I could see something was wrong from a block and a half away. There was someone laying next to the car.

My first thought was that someone broke down and was working half under their car, but as I drew closer I saw that the guy was face down facing away from the car. My next thought was that the guy was playing possum, waiting for someone to stop for help so he could jack them. But it looked like I drove past that the guy was dead still, with his pants around his ankles.

I should have stopped right then and checked on him, but you can't do that in Paterson. So we called 911. To their credit the cops where there in less than five minutes, probably because they were sitting around the corner with no clue what was going on.

I heard the cop calling in his codes and I knew the guy was dead. Three more cop cars, two detectives, a fire department paramedic and an emergency paramedic all showed up. The responding officer asked that we wait for the detective to talk to us. We grabbed a seat in the garage...and waited for nearly an hour.

Turns out the cops think the guy died of natural causes, can't really explain how he ended up over there, can't really explain the pants being off. But they're pretty sure it wasn't anything foul.

So basically we're witness to a guy laying in the street.

And it took an hour for us to say just that.

Shit... I need some sleep.

I Always Say If You Have One Hot Dog With Ketchup And One Hotdog With Ketchup And Relish You Should...

...eat the one with Ketchup first. Otherwise what do you have to look forward to?

For the second time in a month I had someone offer me a puppy. I have no use for a puppy, nowhere to keep it, no one to watch it while I work.

Both times I accepted.

Neither time did I actually get a puppy.

There are very few things in life as depressing as missing out on a free puppy.

I made an offer on the house I live in today. I was turned down. It was quite the bummer. It probably means I'm out of a place to live in the next few months.

I've been doing everything I could to keep this business on its feet. Other people are doing everything they can to tear it down. I'm still winning, but my old man is ready to give up. It probably means I'm out of a job in the next few months.

I have no nerve when it comes to certain things. I'm afraid I may never get anywhere with her. It probably means I'll be alone for the rest of my life.

No home. No job. No girl.

No puppy.

Shit.

So...why am I still smiling?

Potential baby, potential.

For the first time in a long time, I don't know what's going to happen next. I love it.

Maybe I'll find another house, or maybe my landlord will change his mind, or maybe a million friggin other things will happen. It's not the end of the world...and even if it was that would mean I wouldn't have to worry about it anymore.

So what if I'm out of a job? If I could love doing this I can love doing anything. I'm smart, funny, a good guy all around. I've got a little money put away, I can spend some time working on me. Lose a shitload of weight, go back and get my masters, spend more time with my family and my friends. Maybe I even come out of this with a nice compensation package, enough to start my own business. Shit...maybe the old man loses his nerve, or starts to believe in me, and I get to keep on trying to straighten this joing out. Whatever right?

The personal life...ha, well, hey. Can't win them all, right? Or can you? Why should now be different then any other point in my life? I can give you a million reasons. I'll just have to try harder, or even try at all. I know it won't just sort itself out, but when was the last time I just gave up on anything? There's still time...still plenty of time.

And as far as that other matter goes...I'll just have to wait till someone offers me another puppy.

My Name Is Yon Yonson, I Work In Wisconsin.

"My name is Yon Yonson,
I work in Wisconsin.
I work in a lumbermill there.
The people I meet when I walk down the street,
They say, "What's your name?"
And I say..." indigneous Wisconsin poem repeated in Kurt Vonnegut's Slaughterhouse-Five

Wow.

Last night was brief, but fun. I still find it odd that we're on a hugging basis with the waitress at the bar we frequent on Friday nights, and it still bothers me being hugged, but how do you say no to someone who brings you alchol?

This morning I was up early trying to stamp out another one of my father's horrible ideas. I failed miserably and was rather miserable because of it. He's 67 years old. If he is hellbent on ruining the only decent things he's done in his life then I guess he's earned that right. Comforting fact: He's back in Florida now, and somewhat out of the way. Discomforting fact: He chose the slowest week all year to come back. The busiest time of the year is coming up. He refuses to acknowledge this. I went home miserable and tried to get some sleep.

I fall asleep. Ten seconds later my phone rings. My landlord is calling to tell me he's thinking of selling the house I live in. There's no guarantee the new owner will allow me to stay on. I say that's ok, because I'm looking to buy a house of my own. He asks if I want to buy this one. There was a point, prior to his offer where I thought of asking him if he would sell me the house. Now I'm not so sure I want it. Still... I seriously consider buying it. An hour worth of phonecalls later I'm ready to make an offer...first thing Monday because now I'm going to sleep.

I intended to do laundry this afternoon as I have no clean clothes, and hoped to visit my youngest brother for his first reconciliation. Instead I got a call at noon (not an twenty minutes after I'd finally gotten to sleep) saying Ridgewood had forgotten to book a bus for their girls lacrosse team and had a busload of kids sitting out front of the school waiting to be picked up by a bus that wasn't coming. (point in fact it wasn't really a busload since they didn't have a bus, it was more of a cluster but you get the point).

I being the gentleman that I am drop what I am doing (which was sleeping) and speed over to Ridgewood. I pick up the girls and off we go.

I'd forgotten how alive seventeen year old girls are. I still can't recall why that's important.

Cut to me spending five hours sitting in the bus in Randolph reading Slaughterhouse Five and listening to Boston on my iPod (don't ask). I finally manage to fall asleep when I hear the team coming out of the building. It's funny how loud teenage girls can be. Have I mentioned how alive seventeen year old girls seem? And how dead that made me feel?

I haul ass back to Paterson, but I've missed everything. I get a little more work done. Deal with some more problems. Go visit the family for a bit. Go back to work.

It's now way too late to do laundry. I still haven't slept. I head to the store intending to buy some clothes so I can at least go out tonight. The store is closed...an hour early. There are still people inside, but they will not let me in. I am big and tall...I can not shop anywhere else.

I go home...almost defeated.

Now I am not going out, but at least I can sleep. I lay down. The phone rings. I go back to work. It is midnight. I lay down. The phone rings. I go back to work. It is 1:30 A.M. I lay down. 45 minutes later the phone rings. I do not answer. I have a voicemail. I feel guilty so I check it. An old friend is in trouble. I'll leave out the name, but here's the message.

"Chris, it's *****...call me."

I call him back right away. He doesn't answer I leave a message.

"***** yeah, it's Chris. Two minutes after you called me. If it's important call me right back, if not, it's nearly 2:30 in the morning so leave me alone."

I hang up. I lay down. The phone rings.

Abbreviated conversation transcript.

Me: What's up?
Him: I need a favor.
Me: Yeah?
Him: I fell asleep in my car with this girl and the cops won't let us go unless someone comes and gets us.
Me: Ha. Where are you?
Him: I'm in Morristown with this girl from Boonton and we need to get to Parsippany.
Me: Ha. Yeah, I'm on my way.

I cover the 45 minutes to Morristown in less than 30. Pick them up and shoot over to a grocery store parking lot in Parsippany. I drop them. I take my time heading home. It's now 4 A.M. It's already time to go back to work. I go. I rush. I head home. It's a quarter after five.

I am exhausted, I stink.

I have not slept, I have not done laundry. I am "scheduled" to work sixteen hours today.

Fuck it.

I'm going to sleep...and when I wake up I'll work on the stinking thing.

Who gives a shit if the whole place goes to pot. I've got more important things to do right now...like sleep.

So it goes...

The Masked Ninja Rides Again

"I must confess I am less than admirable when it comes to sword fighting, but I do have wicked skills with the nun-chuks." - The Masked Ninja

I used to dream of ghosts.

When I was a young boy, much more of a boy then I should ever care to admit, I often found myself lost in the fantasies that made up my character. I dreamed of the strange, the bizarre, the horrific, but also the splendid, the divine, the simply amazing. I was a dreamer. And that, perhaps, is where I was lost...in that I dreamed.

Now so much of that is gone. Where I used to see mysteries I now see questions, where I used to seek answers I now see solutions. I loved those mysteries, I loved looking for those answers. I truly wanted to know simply because I wanted to know, now I see solutions so that I don't have to keep looking for the answers. I've run out of time, except that all I have is time. It would seem I have simply forgotten how to use it.

I have found the means and forgotten the ends.

And though I watched so carefully all the things which have had their places in my life, I so rarely saw them that you would think me blind. Why should I see all these things in life, when I had already seen in fantastic dreams that which made them merely inferior?

We are not a fantastic people. We are very rarely people at all. Be we cut from marble or cast in gold, be we bathed in light or drowned in a certain darkness...no we are very rarely people at all.

Does that stop us, or even slow us on our way?

Not I.

I am enamored, in love if you will. For that I am eternally grateful. She will never know, and for that I am eternally damned. It is not the love I have often known, it is not the love I have shared with so many, not the sort of love I have been afraid to declare before. It is a special sort of love, one which will not be belittled by its nature. God that I could only say those words.

If we always watch, and never see, then we may be wiser, but are we better? Are we?

I have watched far too much for far too many differing reasons and never for the proper reason alone. I have failed to discover the purpose of watching them. Before anything else, that must change. Before anything else I must improve on that.

I will live with less reason so that I may enjoy the purpose.

I will begin right now...

And tomorrow I will watch the sun...simply so that I may see it.

"O Rose thou art sick,
the invisible worm
that flies in the night
in the howling storm
has found out thy bed of secret joy,
and his dark secret love
does thy life destroy." - William Blake, The Sick Rose

History In The Making

"If 13's unlucky then 12 and 14 are guilty by association." - Mitch Hedberg, Mitch All Together

Well hey...

I mean hey.

For a minute there I thought this week was going to work, suck, but work. Boy was I wrong. So today was an unmitigated disaster. Monday and Tuesday were bad, but we were so on top of everything that we stopped it from being so much worse. Today just didn't pan out like that. We dropped the ball, so when everyone else fucked up we couldn't save them.

I'm finishing up reading James Swanson's Manhunt, which turned out to be a surprisingly fantastic book. I really enjoyed it.

I've worked too much these past few days, and the truth is it's got me feeling a bit sick. There are entirely too many people who suck in this line of work, entirely too many people who just don't give a shit. No matter what you do for them, they fuck you over. It's just how it is. One minute they love you, one minute you're a complete bastard. All that matters too them is what you'll do for them. It doesn't seem to make a difference whether or not they've earned it, whether or not they deserve it. They just don't get it.

I've got a job, I'm looking at buying a house, I'm finally getting my head together. All I need now is a family...holy shit. Look where I ended up. I'm finally at the point in my life where all I need now is to not be alone...and just a little more time. Ain't that something? Despite it all, I'm getting there.

Taxation

Talk about a fucking headache...

My back hurt this morning, so I worked for 18 hours. Now my knees hurt. Shit. That doesn't even make sense.

So last weekend (Not this past weekend, but the weekend before, alright? Ok.) was Antioch 2006. It was a blast, and I really miss those kids already. Which kind of sucks.

It was strange because Antioch always gives you this sort of high, and before you could just let it go. Just ride with it, enjoy it. It's not like that anymore...now you sort of have to force yourself back down so you can continue to function in this shithole of a world. Sucks, don't it?

So oddly enough one of the first things I notice post-Antioch is that I was due for a raise. So I gave myself one (the fact that I can do that still rocks.) So now I decide that I'm going to take $400 more a week. Which (by some fucked up ass math) seems like enough more than I make now so that I can afford a house. Yeah...I didn't put much thought into this one.

Now look...I waste money. I really do. DVD's by the hundreds, Xbox, big tips and plenty of rounds on me. I buy multiple Comedy CD's from the same comedian on ITunes, even though I know half the jokes on the damn CD are the same.

Anyway...

So I take $400 more per week. Not a stunning amount, but a lot to me still. And then I actually get my check. I feel like calling up Uncle Sam and being like, "What the hell happened to my $400 bitch?" Because there's only like $200 extra there. And I understand taxes, I really do, but what the fuck man?

No taxation without representation. But I don't have representation anymore. My guys lost. Does my vote count as my representation? Because then I'm not represented all that well. Shit, I'm paying for some other guy's war. Somebody else's representation is using the dollars my ass worked for. Shit.

All I want to do is buy a nice little house so that I have something to show for my 18 hour workdays. Because god damn and I shot to shit. And I have nothing to show for it.

I am so damn tired.

Hallelujah

"Love is not a victory march
It's a cold and it's a broken Hallelujah" - Jeff Buckley, Hallelujah

Antioch 2006 is over...and my god was it as amazing as ever.

I think that the greatest thing I learned this weekend was that, in the end, I really am just like everyone else. That I hurt, that I heal, that I know I'll be hurt again...but I keep going anyway.

I didn't realize it till I said it, but the worst part about hanging on for so long is that I've had to say goodbye to so many great people, so many people I didn't want to say good-bye to. How can you guys just keep on leaving? Don't you know I'm going to miss you?

Somebody said last night that you are either a college person or a high school person, and I definitely know what she meant, but it wasn't till well after she said it that I realized...that's not really true. You see you can be either a college person or a high school person, but you don't have to be. You don't have to be. I'm not. And I hadn't realized it till she said it, and I can't believe that it took so long for me to figure it out but...I'm a life person. I just keep hanging on, I just keep going, I'm not waiting, I'm moving...I'm trying.

Last night I sat in church with my little brother and sister by my side and thought about how much I loved the two of them, about how I'd do anything for them. And I looked at the Antioch kids sitting around me and I knew...I'd do anything for them too.

We don't really live in that big of a place, but somehow I never manage to run into any of these kids. I don't know how that is, maybe I just don't get out enough anymore. When we walked out those doors last night, that was it. I'll never see some of those kids again. God damn.

I can never figure out exactly how to look at it, have so many people left me behind? Or have I left them behind?

I don't know. I just know that it doesn't really make a difference.

It always hurts.

I'll get where I'm going someday...and when I do maybe I won't have to lose anyone else.

Until then?

I'll just keep hanging on.

After all...what else is there?

"Maybe there is a God above
But all I've ever learned from loveWas how to shoot somebody who outdrew ya
And it's not a cry that you can hear at night
It's not somebody who's seen the light
It's a cold and it's a broken Hallelujah." - Jeff Buckley, Hallelujah

Funny Man, Funny Fucking Man

Saw King Kong the other night, liked it. Liked it a lot. Related to the ape a bit. Can't lie. Can't fucking lie.

Working all day, working all night, working straight through tomorrow. No radio show. Disappointing.

DVD player on the desktop not working right (friggin' vertical trays). So as I'm doing payroll on the laptop I need to find something to watch, or listen to, or fuck...no, hey wait, forget that last part. Just watch...or listen to.

So I hit ITunes (Back Satan!) and download some comedy CD's at ten bucks a pop.

Mitch Hedberg. Funny man, funny fucking man. ( I play tennis, thing that's depressing about tennis is no matter how good I get I'll never be as good as a wall. I played a wall once, they're fucking relentless.) Reminded me of when Nick and I didn't know who Mitch Hedberg was and we just called him the slow talking guy who was really fucking funny. (I'm out to dinner with a bunch of friends and someone offers to pay for the check I immediately reach for my wallet because inside's a note that says "Say Thanks.") We used to laugh at that motherfucker, laugh really hard.(I used to do drugs, I still do, but I used to too.) Funny man, funny fucking man. Too bad he's dead.

Dave Attell. Not as funny as Mitch Hedberg. But still a funny man, funny fucking man. (Even as we're sitting here, people are having sex with animals. And then we wonder why the animals attack us, I'll tell you why, because one man is fucking them and riling them. And it's up to me and a half indian to track 'em.) See not as funny as Mitch Hedberg, but still a funny man, funny fucking man.

Dane Cook. Remember that shitty movie he did with Dennis Rodman? No. No one else does either, and that's why this man has a career. Not because he's a funny man, funny fucking man. I mean he is funny, but not that funny. He was talking about how he was laying in bed watching tv and then he made a joke, but I didn't care because all I could think of was being home, in bed, watching tv. Usually when I dream about being in bed there's some sort of fantasy involving women I have no chance with, but now it was just about sleeping...so Dance Cook actually made me pretty fucking angry. Normally a funny man, funny fucking man. Tonight...not so much....bastard.

What Was It Like Being Dead? I Don't Really Recall...I Don't Think I Fancied It Very Much Though.

"Never hold yourself up as an example to others,you can only be disappointed when they fail to measure up or when they exceed you with great ease." -Epistocles

Hey, where the hell have you been?

Oh wait...I was the one that was "gone". Nevermind then, I guess you're ok. I however have been dead...and loving it.

Oh it wasn't that I was busier than normal, or that I wasn't feeling at all myself. It wasn't that things were going wrong (or that things were going right even). It just was. It was time for a break.

So let's recap.

Christmas was balls, except we ended up playing a lot of XBOX 360 and that was fun. New Years was double balls and there is no exception to that. I recently turned 25. Antioch is well on its way although it's not going well and we have very little time to remedy that. Business is good but being part of the business is bad. I bought a new car and am looking to buy a house. I'm thoroughly bored. So where to start?

My mother didn't get me a birthday card. I told her not to get me a gift, and not to give me money because I would feel bad taking money I don't need that they really do. But at least get me a freaking card! My birthday was the same night as the Rose Bowl so at least I got to go out for the first time in awhile.

I went down to New Brunswick to see Gonzo's band play (Michelle came with which was fun and they wouldn't let House in which was just fucking funny) and remembered for a second both why I loved and hated New Brunswick nightlife.

I was sorting through the Lost & Found at work when I found a purse with the Playboy Bunny on it, what kind of parent lets their teenage daughter have a purse with the Playboy Bunny on it? Standard Op is to open any unclaimed bags and see if they have an address in them so that we can return them. This one didn't but it did have a digital camera. It was a nice camera so I checked it out. I turned it on...and was confronted by some strange pictures...of Frankie Muniz from Malcolm in The Middle opening his Christmas gifts...I can't even make this shit up.

I was sitting in a parking lot off the Henry Hudson when a car pulls in. A guy and a girl get out, walk over to the water, the guy kneels down, the girl gets all excited and starts to cry. They kiss. It was fun to see a guy propose and the girl say yes. They got in the car looking ridiculously happy and pull off. Fifteen minutes later another car with a guy in a girl pulls in. They get out. Walk to roughly the same place. The guys kneels down. The girl gets all excited and starts to cry. They kiss. I begin to laugh...very loudly and for a very long time.

Goldberg decides he wants to do a serious radio program. So we do, and we kick ass. Now we're pre-empted for Rutgers Basketball for the next month practically. It's called momentum folks thanks for killing it. Rutgers basketball (as much as I love them) will always suck. We were actually getting good.

My secretary was told very clearly not to write a letter saying a certain thing. She insisted. So I wrote the letter the way it was supposed to be. My letter disappears and while I'm out of the office she re-writes the letter saying exactly what it wasn't supposed to say and gives it to my father to sign knowing he won't read it. She tells him I said it was ok. I find out and go through the roof. I don't yell or scream, I don't fire her, I don't punish her. First she lies about it. Then she lies about me. And all I say to her is, "We went over this, and I'm really getting sick of this bullshit. We can't do certain things for a reason, so cut it out." She throws a fit and takes the rest of the day off sticking us with more work when we're already busy. She calls out the next day saying she's too upset to work. I don't fire her out of what little respect I have left for my father. But she's really starting to piss me off.

Ah not a whole hell of a lot has changed. I was dead for a bit and now I'm not. Now I'm just sort of eh. What are you going to do?

Thanks for reading, thanks for hanging around, drop me a line sometime.

"There's two types of people that should never fall in love, priests and prostitutes. Neither one would like very much what it does to their business." - T.O. Hob