Finally, a place to store my self-esteem, and not waste any space.

I now store my pride here.

Thanks Charm City U!

Lesbian Dog Walkers

If Easy Rider taught us to stay out of the south at all costs, then this should teach us to stay out of Singapore at all costs.

A golf club.

Man, shoot the frickin' thing in the head.

And then put it on a plane with Sam Jackson.

Heroic Self Promotion reaches new heights

I saw this on the way to the Inner Charm City Harbor.

And it reminded me of this.

A list of gripes. Cellularly.

1. The walkie talkie feature on certain cell phones. Square State only saw these on commercials, and thought it was the "cool" way to get business done. So, far I've only seen them in use for people to yell into them "Where you at?" only to have the staticky voice respond, "Where YOU at?"

2. Cell phone conversations in general. I'm not eavesdropping, I'm not stealing anyone's "public privacy." What I am getting is a lot of information that is redundant. Like when the plane lands and I hear the statement 80 times over, "The plane just landed. Yeah. Baggage claim. Okay. Thanks." Or on the Charm City University shuttle, "Yeah, I'm on the shuttle." I've decided I'm just going to start saying obvious things around people and hopefully they'll just assume that I have a bluetooth headphone set so small it fits in my nostril.

I'm writing a blog entry. Yep. Thanks.

3. The Shuttle of dreams destroyed
My choice on the shuttle is listening to a buxom asian girl talk about getting trashed at Fraternity parties and aspiring to be a hip-hop ballerina and wonder aloud why the fuzz off her leopard print stilletos is wearing off("Oh, I know, it's my Se7en Jeans! Tuh-Tah") or the Frat boys busy making mental notes to purchase certain Veterinary substances while clicking on the walkie talkie, "Where you at? Oh. A'ight. Rager. Dude. MCATS. Rich Dads. Wake Stevie. Just do it. Bench press." All this and on top of it the rattling. Everything rattles on the shuttles. I can now see the justification for people medicating themselves with iPods.

4. Girls in love with the character House, M.D.
or by proxy, Hugh Laurie because of his portrayal of the character House, M.D.
The easiest thing to do to snap them out of this is to have the following conversation:
girl: I just love House.
ft: What about him do you love?
girl: Just those analytical powers, and that intensity. His brilliance. His wit.
ft: Do you wish you could call him yours?
girl: Oh, fantasticterrific, do I ever!
ft: Do you think that he would turn off those powers when around you?
girl: What do you mean?
ft: He wouldn't stop being analytical or acerbically insightful. He would use those powers on you. He would analyze your frivolous expenditures at The Gap and Victoria's Secret and pointedly assert how irrational it is to spend so much time fretting over which pipping on the pillows will best tie together your first room out of the dormitories.
girl: No. No he wouldn't.
ft: Yes. Yes, he would.
girl: [tears, swelling of violin] He's a gentleman.
ft: He's a character in a situationally constructed hour.
girl: He's perfect.
ft: Only in your crush-world.
girl: F*** you, fantasticterrific.
ft: I'll still p/u the check, since the concept of equal rights equating to equal responsibility means nothing to you.
girl: Title IX.
ft: Can you haul a 240 lb man out of a burning tank, GI Jane?
girl: What movie is that quote from?


I am not just griping. I am proposing solutions:

1) With the Dems in Charge in Congress, make them outlaw Cellular Walkie Talkies.
2) Get the wunderkinds at MIT to develop a noise cancellation system that exists in the mouth pieces of cellphones that emit a wave to cancel out the user's voice so that one sided public conversations (esp the redundant ones) can be eliminated from bothering tax paying, God-fearing citizens in the greatest country in the world.
3) Blow up the shuttle. Drive it straight into City Hall.
4) Clone Hugh Laurie several million times. Brain wash him to only be analytical of other's besides the one that purchases him (something akin to the programming system in the hit movie, "AI." Say seven words and he'll love you long time and tear everyone else to pieces). Sell versions of him on ebay in time for Christmas and retire a bajillionaire.

More on the creative nature of videos. Of film.

Another aspect, is to integrate a legitmate video with parodic content.

reference (my fave version with slow-mo)

a spin off


Or even just creative edit your point.

The Beast of Movie Making

Some of my old high school compatriots made this music video, featuring the western regions of the Square State and the guy who prevented me from being the most awesome high school sophomore in the world b/c he asked a girl out to Prom 5 months in advance in a video that everyone thought was a joke - including the girl.

But I digress -

Even more.

I've heard some Charm City Compatriots (compatriots count: 2) say the word "Balls" when disgusted or disheartened. I'm pretty sure my friends and I in said Square State started this, with such deviations as "Balls", "huge Balls", and "Balls on my Balls".

I will lose the hour of sleep I'm gaining trying to figure out how to set my alarm clock back one hour.

This is the Techonlogy Pinch.

Two videos

Great.

Parody.

I always wanted to make a video and a parody simultaneously, release the first and get amazing praise for it, and then immediately release the parody to bash it and thus those who praised it.

And then be hired by Carson Daly.

Technology pinch

I will get you more details later, but I decided to pull an all nighter at Charm City U tonight. I want to go to sleep very very badly, but I do not have an alarm. I need an alarm because I have to go determine 40% of my epidemiology grade in 3 hours or so. "Use your cell phone," you say, but alas, my cell phone alarm and reminder function doesn't work anymore - just ask the epidemiology lecture I missed.

So, my only recourse is to Google "Internet Alarm Clock."

If nothing turns up, I am going to go move the microwave from the faculty kitchen into my office and set the timer for an hour or two.

"Sleep on the kitchen floor like a dog," you say, but I tell no - Kitchen floor's are for sexual debuts, not naps.

I just tried this but alas a pop-up window was blocked, and then additional plugins were required, etc etc.

I'll go sleep on the kitchen floor like a dog - a dirty, mangy, virgin dog.

First Term Finals at Charm City U

According to this:

* Uncomfortable pressure, fullness, squeezing or pain in the center of the chest lasting more than a few minutes.
* Pain spreading to the shoulders, neck or arms. The pain may be mild to intense. It may feel like pressure, tightness, burning, or heavy weight. It may be located in the chest, upper abdomen, neck, jaw, or inside the arms or shoulders.
* Chest discomfort with lightheadedness, fainting, sweating, nausea or shortness of breath.
* Anxiety, nervousness and/or cold, sweaty skin.
* Paleness or pallor.
* Increased or irregular heart rate.
* Feeling of impending doom.

I'm having a heart attack. Or maybe the doom is just something I ate. I have made a similar check list for assessing if whether or not one is in love:

* Uncomfortable pressure, fullness, squeezing or pain in the center of the chest lasting more than a few minutes.
* Pain spreading to the shoulders, neck or arms. The pain may be mild to intense. It may feel like pressure, tightness, burning, or heavy weight. It may be located in the chest, upper abdomen, neck, jaw, or inside the arms or shoulders.
* Chest discomfort with lightheadedness, fainting, sweating, nausea or shortness of breath.
* Anxiety, nervousness and/or cold, sweaty skin.
* Paleness or pallor.
* Increased or irregular heart rate.
* Feeling of impending doom.

Beck's new album, The Information, is out and good. There is a track that has the chorus "think I'm in love 'cause I'm kind of nervous to say so" which irrevocably backs up the list just compiled.

Oh boy.

I mentioned AJ Hawk and the relationship he has with Norte Dame's Quarterback's sister.

He got drafted.
He got married to her.
In a courthouse in Green Bay.

Que romantica, Hawk.

Rumor has it she was wearing the chimera jersey when she signed the license. The jersey later went for 80 million dollars on ebay, and thrown in as a mystery prize was a grilled cheese sandwich which had the Green Bay G on it, thought to be holy and of course made with Wisconsin cheese.

AJ is the only man in history to record a sack on a brother-sister duo, so, this Bud is for Hawk.

The clip featuring Hawk, Bush, and Bloom (yellow and gold, for 2 seconds)...it is amazing they got into college, given the extensive vocabulary demonstrated in this rivoting piece that shows a lot of huge men running around very quickly.

I hear AIDS is still uncured. However, Reggie Bush's TD draught is not.


Fantastic.

Terrific.

Or, as our friends to the south might type,

Que Gloria.

I should have

played football.

Why is so much money poured into getting the youth of america stronger and faster so that a ball can be carried on a field?

We could have cured AIDS by now if College Football didn't exist.

This diatribe was inspired by a 48 million dollar workout facility.

This diatribe is in no way related to the fact that my ex-girlfriend wanted me to wear her former boyfriends' linebacking jerseys when we made out or to the fact that she is now dating Jeremy Bloom.

And yes, I put the apostrophe in the right place. She dated an outside linebacker first, then the middle. The same order she uses silverware at her fancy restaurants where she only eats half the meal for which she pays nothing.

My Tipless Weekend

Oops, I did it again.

No, no, I didn't let Britney talk her way into letting me loan her money.

I slept in until 2PM on Saturday. I feel horrible...I have not seen the AM hours of Saturday yet since school started. I suppose it is the Science of Sleep - catching up on the weekends of the weeks you are pushed to the max.

Speaking of which, after running and studying at Chipotle, I checked my messages and a friend invited me to see The Science of Sleep at the Charles Theater. She (I have no "friends" who are guys, SanFran) said it started at 9:45PM, and a deft movement of my left arm allowed me to ascertain the time of 9:30PM.

Light rail would not work, and I left my wings in the Square State.

So, I walked up Charles Street as far as I could, and then hailed a taxi.

I had a ten spot out, ready to hand to the driver, and I'd ask for a 5 spot back which would give him a tip and me five dollars.

He drove me for a minute. With lights. A total of 10 blocks.

ft: "How much will that be?"
Cabman: "10 dollars."

In my head, I thought, "What organization in the world exists to protect me from this crap?" I had no time for an answer, so I handed him the ten and got out of the taxi cab. I got into the theater just as the last trailer/preview was ending.

The movie was at least "good" - I need a second viewing to appreciate it fully.

After the film, I used my CIA skills to locate my friend in the dark. She is beautiful so it wasn't really that hard, because beauty shines in darkness. That, and she glows in the dark because of all the phosphorescent tobacco she smoked sophomore year ("my boyfriend at the time was a hipster.")

We went to Club Charles, across the street, to discuss the movie and why people with two first names ought not to be trusted, although I argued that Caffo really isn't a first name.

I ordered a dark and tan, and our bartender, after pouring the tan, mentions that the Guinness is busted.

I left no tip there as well.

I hope to take a picture every time I don't leave a tip, and have as many as this guy did.

Burning the Ships

Today, at the metro stop, in big letters a la chalk, was inscribed "EPHE 6:24" which, for those of you using a bible underneath the leg of the table (please get a new table - for safety reasons. There's wobbly, and then there's wobbly):

"Grace to all who love our Lord Jesus Christ with an undying love."
- "Ephe 6:24"

Thought I would share.

So I have bombed two midterms this week, and am currently getting stymied on the take home exam currently next to me. I am going after this weekend with a Cortez like mentality:

Before I go to bed on Sunday I will catch up with all reading. Or skimming. At least my eyes will see every page that has been assigned in the last 4 weeks.

Last night I ordered workout clothes, protein powder, and towels, and had them sent to the school. I'm moving in so that I can move out 5 years from now rather than 1.

El Hundo and other enumerations

The dashboard says I have a 100 posts on the blog. Fantastic.

I have noticed some nasty little quirks of mine as of late.

1) Whenever I go to eat at a Fast Food restaurant, I may not always grab the tray so that the fries are always facing away from me, but dog gone it, by the time I sit down with the beverage and my niece and the 19 year old fox that joined for me lunch so that she could see my niece for a spell, my fries will always be pointing away from me, and I will continue to awkwardly draw fries from the box out, until getting fed up and turning the tray around 10 minutes later.

2) I was using my computer case to store my computer and my documents in the same compartment. Often, I would unzip the case, take out my documents, start doing work for some marked amount of time, and then I would frantically notice I needed to be somewhere and gather up my documents and then grab my case and go - and my computer would fly out of the unzipped case.

3) I will type "you" instead of "your" in so many emails and other text documents it is worthy of slapping a grandma.

Also, another bad habit: I narrate during class. For instance, there is this gentleman in my class that wears a blazer and you can tell he uses face products and is into whatever the girl is into for the sake of appearing metrosexual. So, whenever he raises his hand, I say in my head "This week on The Blazer" as if he is the star of some TV show and this is the beginning minute of that show. I've gotten quite good at timing my narrator's voice with what he says, gesticulates, and hounds.

The bad thing is now the button is stuck in the 'on' position. Whenever I see him, I say "This week on -The Blazer".

The really bad thing is that I've been known to wear a blazer and it isn't even mine, but a professor's blazer on loan. The same professor I shared a bed with. In a hotel. Away from his wife.

Yeah, the professor is a dude. I will share a bed with a man, but I will NOT wear a woman's blazer.

Terrific.

Baltimore Comicon

I was invited to a Comic Book Convention (Comicon) this weekend. It is the reason that I saw a Sonic the Hedgehog on the light rail en route to the Cookoff de Chilicon and the reason that I know that Lou Ferrigno does not wash his hands after using the lavatory.

Which reminded me that a wedding I was at in the Square State, I was chastised for washing my hands post-bladder-relief by a real live cowboy:

"If you wash your hands it means your dick is dirty."

This is from the same man, who, when asked what he was feeling before marrying the girl who was carrying his twin babies, said:

"It's just another party."

Yee-haw.

Pranks

I really want to do this...

I went to the bathroom at Charm City U around 10am. I was at the urinal, and I felt like singing, but DIDN'T. I was glad that I chose not to sing, because when I went to wash my hands (it is a school of public health) I noticed a pair of shoes underneath one of the stalls.

I used the bathroom, the same bathroom, five hours later, and the same situation.

I wondered if it was the same guy stuck on the can. And if whether it was even a real guy - what if it was a mannequin?

Then I had a thought: what if I could put mannequins in every stall on a floor in every men's restroom. Some poor bloke would be running around the 3rd floor with a hand over his butt, contemplating the stairs while he's waiting for the elevator, nervously and repeatedly hitting the down button yelling "c'mon- C'MON".

But, let's adjust for gender -

If mannequins were put in all the stalls for men, men who need to urinate can survive.

Ladies.

A mannequin in every stall in every ladies restroom of a floor would cause pandemonium. The girls would not run around, but would line up outside the restroom. The queues would grow and the members of the queues would get restless, whip each other up via social interaction gossip and dissatisfaction verbiage and a mob would form and they would all charge into the restroom and tear down the stall walls to see mannequins sitting on the commodes...

and piss and dump their panties.

Names of kids

I was in Chipotle, wondering why my integration by parts was not working when I received the second call within 15 minutes from my sister:

sis: Why didn't you answer my first call - where are you -
ft: I -
sis: What are you doing in May?
ft: I'll be here, at Charm City U.
sis: Oh, well, I wanted to tell you that you're going to be an Uncle again!
ft: Name him "v du".
sis: No.
ft: I -
sis: Are you coming home for Thanksgiving?
ft: Will there be 800 dollars stuffed in the Turkey?
sis: Oh, baby's crying take care. Bye. Love you.

Maybe she would have liked "u dv" or "u v" better.

On my South-wing Veranda, my Chocolate Lab sunbathes

Man, this is tough. Being on new to the East coast all my new East coast friends think I live on these.

And my friends from the Square State, in the absence of phone calls and emails, think I survive on these.

The degradation of friendship

Note: throwing the laundry cap of liquid laundry detergent right in the wash works like a charm. And why am I using liquid like some kind of pansy? Because here in Charm City aka Humidity City, the powdered stuff chunks up unless it is in an airtight gunsafe.

And now onto some news.

My favorite line is "friends now know too much about them."

I wish I was on Facebook so I could protest the following:

1) The use of the word "friend." All 202030984 people "poked" are not friends. They are by and large acquaintances, if that. People you will never meet, and will only know that they love Dave Matthews just as much as you do and hate Starbucks just as much as you do and want a 10,000 dollar Cartier or Bust just like you do.

2) Being on Facebook.

To quote a good movie, "With friends like you who needs friends."

I just joined a We (Heart) Max Fischer group on MySpace, where real friendships are forged.

The line above was typed in Blogger where lonely people whine about the world and fabricate things like joining fanclubs.

Two finds

I've been bloggin a lot lately - making up for lost time perhaps.

Find 1: A perfectly good office chair put in the hallway as garbage. Just need to get the cat hair off the seat.

Find 2: Knowledge. I kept putting on the laundry cap back on my liquid laundry container, and soap would slowly ooze out and make everything all gummy. Today, I stared at the bottom of said cap and it said "after use, rinse or throw in wash".

So I threw it in the frickin' wash. I'll let you know how it goes!

-Stay At Home Dad

OK GO!

I saw these guys in New York and listened to them for 7 hours straight on a lonely trip to Durango.

Enjoy two great videos. (and I know how to embed them...they just take up too much space, ladies.)

Video1 (they did this dance for the folks in Time Square).
Video2

Death, where is thy stingray?

Ouch.

The Crocodile Hunter has fallen. As a humanist (and a human) I am saddened. As a statistician, I must say this might be an example of long run probability: the guy played with death on many occasions.

History: Silent Cal

I think the AP US History exam is getting easier. Here is a question from 2005:

Although Coolidge was known to be a skilled and effective public speaker, in private he was a man of few words and was therefore commonly referred to as "Silent Cal." It is said that a White House dinner guest once made a bet with her friends that she could get the President to say at least three words during the course of the meal. Upon telling Coolidge of her wager, he replied

a. "You lose."
b. "Ma'am, when I was six I crapped in a mason jar and gave it to my kid brother, Nosy Cal, as a chocolate ice cream treat."
c. "And you're ugly. But in the morning I will still be silent. And drunk. I mean - Winston! Come over here, if you please."
d. "I love you for your body - and nothing else."
e. "Kiss this."

Hey, I just beat that horse buried 6 feet under deader than dead.

Some jokes are getting quite old, in my opinion.

Like jokes involving alcohol. It's only the easiest button to push. We all GET it. Drinking alcohol leads to getting drunk and doing dumb things. Like the classic is for someone to ask someone who is acting a little unusual,

"How many have you had?"

or

"What's in your glass!?!"

Also, given I've just run the gauntlet of orientation here at Charm City U, the joke or jab involving the concept of PhD programs being very lengthy is old hat. Like when a dean announces to a group of of entering students, some masters and some phd:

"Enjoy your time here - whether it be a year, or for the PhDs three, four, seven, ten, twenty, elventy billion."

[kind laughter from me, real laughter from those who think this is joke].

Like, I think this is way more funny (albeit more obscure):

Girl: Do you like veggies or fruit with your cottage cheese?
ft: Fruit.
Girl: I figured you would.
ft: Is that a fat joke?

[this is funny because my bmi > eleventy billion, and fruits contain fructose which
lends itself to spike insulin moreso than the typical veggie which means it aids in
fat storage...or the angle of her making a fat joke when unprovoked, since she
is a very very nice girl.]

Or this:

Vivacious Lady: [talking to group of incoming students at meet and greet]: Fantasticterrific, what's the matter? You're so quiet.
ft: [beat] I'm the strong and silent type.

[this brought the house down. It got me invited to a party. However, at the party, it was Yale and Stanford boys club with stories about undergrad wastedness ("I drank a tequila, chased with a double tequila, and that really f###ed me up! [raucous laugther, because things that are obvious are really hilarious] )and being privileged ("I flew home to India to get my hair cut and eat a bigmac on the back of a skinny cow before the winter formal. 1st class. Daddy bought me two seats so I could stretch out. I drank for two as well, and that really f###ed me up! [raucous laughter, because things that are obvious are hilarious])).

Sidenotes of note:

Caramel flavored cream in Oreos: Yes.
Vanilla Frosties courtesy of equal opportunity loving Wendy's: Mind blowing.

Olympics - Mind the Flap

This guy.

And this guy.

Awesome. There is a lot of red paper clip-esque blog fame to be had in the world.

Lord of Drug

We are all familiar with my hate-hate relationship with Bank of America.

To avoid the bank fee for transferring funds, I made out a bunch of blank checks to keep in Colorado so that my parent's could, at a moment's notice, fill it out and deposit it in a local bank back in the Square State.

Well, upon my return to the Square State, lo and behold, this crappy little Diamond Shamrock in the middle of Junktown has a BOA ATM. There is not a Bank of America or ATM located within 740 miles, but for some reason in a gas station that had the syrupiest cokes of my high school days, an ATM stands.

This was great. I would have access to Charm City funds from Junktown.

One thing: I had forgotten the PIN.

So, I would go in and try a different combination each day for a week. I swear it had a 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and/or 9 in it...

Anyway, so I finally punched in the right one and made a withdrawal.

I swore I would never forget it.

Then, three days later, I couldn't remember it. So I caved and called BOA. To my surprise the lady was very nice and the whole process was rather pleasant. A little too pleasant...I want to be harassed when it comes to my PIN - not about bank fees.

I'm pretty sure the PIN they sent me and the PIN that I entered and successfully allowed me to access my cash are two different numbers. I can't bank on it, but it is an eerie feeling, nonetheless.

Anyhow, as of late, as in, the past two days, I've needed to transfer a massive amount of funds from BOA to Junktown Bank. The max withdrawal on the ATM was going to necessitate two separate days of cash deposit, and I needed instant availability, so I had to make the deposit face-to-face with a real teller at Junktown Bank.

The teller's name is Amy, she thinks brown and pink go together as well as yellow and gray, and that I'm a druglord.

What other explanation could there be for me making huge cash deposits and not looking her in the eye and sniffling a lot? Her finger was on the alarm button the whole time, despite my pleas with her to "Be cool baby, just, be, cool."

3 salient reasons I am obviously not a drug lord:
1) My dress: (less Miami Vice and more derelict)
2) My stature: (less 1991 Chris Rock and more 2003 Star Jones)
3) My insistence on saying "oh my gosh!" instead of "what the f***?"

I wrote the aforementioned tips on the back of a deposit slip.

Along with my pager number.

And the going rate for a kilo.

The treasure chest that is my glove compartment

Whoa!

I just realized...I've never stored gloves in my car's glove compartment. It must an atavism of some sort, that name. That nomenclature.

Anyway, I found a post-it note pad that had various thoughts I had written down, apparently while sitting around in my car, because it was beneath the socks I keep in my glove compartment. Some highlights:

The concept of dynamically neutral is born. The sine curve idea is that if you view a sine curve from the side, you see a dynamic/periodic curve. So imagine viewing a sagging telephone wire from the side...you see it going down between poles, and up where it is supported. However, if you were flying overhead, the bird's eye view would show the line being straight, because there is no horizontal deviation. So, within that neutral curve, there is something dynamic. It is all about perspective. Please bear with these ... they were written by a 17 year old who thought he was being philosophical, when in reality he was just sitting in his car waiting to pick up his sister from volleyball practice.

The idea is to have a beautiful girl who is recently engaged utter the top line to some boys, and for the coolest gentleman of the bunch to respond with saying the bottom line, classily relaying that the nice girls are being taken off the market left and right. He exits with a smile on his face, but knows he will be forever...alone. Once again, a 17 year old without a prom date wrote this.



The line about the elderly...kind of stolen from Dumb and Dumber I imagine. The line about teens, really true. I would love to go back in time and smack my teen face in the face and tell him to breathe a little deeper and commit crimes while he could be written up as "teen" in the blotter.


Imagine two guys playing bocce, a close up on the most recent toss, and then into frame comes a golf ball. We go wideshot, and see that bocce is being played on the 18th hole at a swanky country club. Hilarity and bad fashion ensues. Hopefully Bill Cosby is one of the bocce players.

Into what did the universe expand? Do we exist only as a warm place for snowflakes to land?
Oh, please.

I will need help on this one...I think I'm referencing Cat's Cradle by Vonnegut but have no idea. I'm sure this idea was sweet. If only they had a waybackmachine for my mind.

So picture a scenario where a man is about to die, is in a relationship, and the question "is it better to have love and lost than to have never loved at all." So, he goes for it, with 6 months to live. Things are great, and cute, and with meaning. Then she dies of unnatural causes, leaving this guy dying at an accelerated pace and a widower. We'll rate it G for the kids.



Apparently, I thought it would be funny if a character existed in the form of a black lady so pro-black that she refuses to wear white (standard) bras.



This is some note about the lies of Onion Girl. For some reason I thought it pertinent, while in my car, to write it down on the post-it notepad. She is married now and con bebe, and I'm completely cool with that, so I won't hold grudges and just post this so it can live forever on the internet.

Task for the day, blog-kateers! Write an ambigious note and stick it in your glove compartment. When you rediscover it in 5 years, see how relevant/humiliating it is.

Fin.

Funny Images

You probably noticed the pretentious two Hummer garage of the last post, which made me remember this and this.

I've never seen pets so happy with their genitals being covered by giant band-aids.

And I've not thought of using birth control as caging babies...wait a tick. They changed the cage to a window. I new I should have made this post before the complaints rolled in. Brilliant move though...instead of saying "birth control cages babies", change the bars to panes and call it "investigating fertility windows of opportunity via ovulation method."


Horizons -> expanded.

Filming and living

We scoped out a restaurant for filming...a cute french place that is open so infrequently it must charge 6 dollars for a crêpe...but worth it if you care about her.

The owner has grand ideas for a wine/dessert bar that will pay homage to the art of filmmaking from its orgins...namely, big trains and super 8s.

The transpose(dessert/wine) bar will be in the same complex as his restaurant.

I want to live here so I can eat there every 5PM-10PM Wednesday - Saturday (I just won't eat on the other days - or maybe the wine/dessert bar will be open
(5PM-10PM Wednesday - Saturday) ^C ).

Friendship around the clock

There was a time in my undergrad career where I had my own desk in a friend's room. We studied around the clock together, in an effort for him to rid himself of academic probation and for me to not have to pay for wireless internet. It was the final semester at Square State University, and our peak hours were 9PM - 3AM. We posted the following schedule above my desk so we could keep track of the hours I worked. The highlight was a random comment left by one of the housemates that declared self inflicted defication in the pants.



I lived across town, and often the night would involve a run to Wendy's (why am I so fat?) and my study-buddy would drive me home at 3AM, just in time for me to run into my roommate coming home from his fiancee's (smelling like Bed Bath Body and BEYOND). I remember that our place was so horrible that year we made a pledge to spend as much time away from it as possible - thus my study habits at my friend's house. I also would walk uphill in the driving snow the half mile to my friend's house with a pot full of marinating boneless chicken breasts and grill 14 at a time and then eat them for the rest of the week. Once, a housemate ate one of my chicken breasts. He is now the star of Snakes on a Plane.

Also, I put the note on the back of the schedule indicating the last time I studied in my friend's room and apparently, Nora Jone's subdued me with a cudgel and signed where my signature should have gone:

Any Grad Schools in Hawaii? Fiji?

Exhibit A:

This is proof that I spent 390 dollars applying to Graduate schools. I only landed interviews at two of the five, but was reimbursed airfare and put up for several nights at very expensive hotels and got to eat whole pizzas instead of slices of pizzas on someone else's tab. My only regret: applying to cold places like Boston and Baltimore. Why didn't I feign interest in Fiji State University's Quantitative Coconut Summation Graduate Certificate Program?

More to come, and more often.

I owe everyone a Vega$ report, a monthly report, a car status report, and yet another underwear report.

I'm going to be a more faithful blogger to you. I promise, this time, it will all be different.

Currently I am cleaning out my childhood room. I like to think of myself as a streamlined-rat as opposed to a pack-rat, but the following suggests otherwise:

From top, clockwise: a slip of paper with a girl's email address on it that was given to me the day before I left Junktown to go to undergraduate university (some 6 years ago...it was a magical night of rain showers, bouncy trampolines, a flash-mob butt slap chemical reaction pandemonium, and sweet hugs for someone who accepted Jesus Christ as their personal Lord and Saviour); a postcard from Germany from 2001 sent to me by a girl who raises emus despite what they did to the late Johnny Cash; and a Las Vegas Star Trek Hilton hotel card that I decided to keep from an ill-fated Vegas trip (not the 24 hour trip...this happened immediately after seeing Onion Girl give a prayer to open up the FMHS commencement ceremony, where I ran into Afton and her boyfriend (who, consequently, is six foot four and full of muscle) - this Vegas trip was ill-fated because I drank too much Pepsi in the sarcophagus of the Luxor and experienced heat rash on my calves from walking the Strip in the summer so badly that I had to go the pharmacist, buy ointment and apply it to my wounds in the parking lot with a sock. I also had to throw away all the change cups from that Vegas trip...for some reason GRY and I thought it would be awesome to have these nasty, filthy cups in our possession. I thought one day I would wash them and have awkwardly obtuse cups be in my cupboards so I could drink cheap wine from them with Heidi Klum, or better yet, Star Jones. Or even better yet, Tracey Morgan as Star Jones (don't even mention Keenan and Kel around me).

Higher fidelity, to you, my blog readers. I'm so sorry. Take me back.

De-motivation to a whole new level: Yours.

Have fun, ladies.

http://flagrantdisregard.com/flickr/motivator.php

Vegas, baby. Vegas.

Brought to you by a man who traveled Europe with only a backpack for 17 days.

This promises to be a heck of a week. Yesterday I took my last final for my MS requirements, and now, officially, if I were to die I would have a MS degree (awarded posthumously, but otherwise bending no requirements).

Tonight (in 30 minutes) I have a grad party, which will be fairly tame, considering it's a bunch of biostatisticians and Caffo is not there.

Tomorrow night, after a day of Body Worlds 2 where I get to see why the Potter put skin on the clay vessels, I will board a plane for Vegas.

I am doing Vegas in 24 hours. Yes, it seems ridiculous, but it is necessary. I do not have much time left before returning to Charm City, yet a visit a to Sin City is necessary to celebrate the ending of a buddy's bachelorhood.

I will become every NASCAR Dad and Soccer Mom's dream. I will travel so light...not "no checking baggage" light or "just my laptop" light.

I will travel "no toiletries, just a wallet, smile, and aviators" light.

I will empty my wallet of the safeway card, sams club card, change, sheepskin con- I don't know what those are mom, and change. I will have 150 dollars cash, credit card, debit card, and I am putting a new set of contacts in the change compartment (it is that time of the month, and it allows me to be free of toiletries, especially toiletries that cause eye-fungus.)

My teeth will not be brushed for 24 hours.
My deordorant will have to last for 24 hours.
My aviator glasses will not have a case for 24 hours.

I also have a red t-shirt that was given to me by my sister. She, being a manager at a certain store, was able to get it dirt cheap. That, and the fact that it was in the bargain bin because it is big enough to fit an elephant as a parachute or clothe the latest flash-in-the-pan rapper.

This shirt has destroyed so many socks and shirts with its bleeding red wash characterisitcs that I have resolved to never wash it again - I will wear it to Vegas over another shirt. Sometime during the night I will leave this shirt on the strip, or take it off to cover up one of the cocktail waitresses to protect the eyes of young and old men alike from lust.

If only I had a million bleeding red shirts to cloak the sin of SIN City!

Some Panera Bread employee just said "I can play this on the piano." I think he is referencing the music that is in the air. He is trying to impress the 17 year old girl who (wo)mans the register. Maybe it would impress her more if he actually knew the name of the piece (Fur Elise). Or maybe it would impress her more if he would stop looking at her like she was a Vegas cocktail waitress.

Any-who.

I'm traveling light, I'm traveling fast.

I touch back down in the Square State at 2:37 AM Sunday. I will sleep all of Sunday, right up to the movie premiere.

I haven't told you of the movie premiere! Oh my titanium balls!

Omura-san convinced everyone to make another movie after The Red King. The Red King was a great first attempt, and the greatest fans of it are none other than my sister and all her friends (apparently, they love the scene where I drop the f-bomb...which is actually Omura-san dropping it, since it sounded like someone saying it for the first time (fyi, it was, like, my fifth time...since I lost my virginity...for the fifth time...to myself)).

Anyway, the movie premiere is finally here. I plan to wear my aviators the whole night to mask the Vegas strips under my eyes and party like a rock-star...a rock-star who lives out of his car.

Print it, Panera!

Bruce-Tracker

Using the powers of the internet and GPS, it is now possible to tell where in the United States I am at any given moment.

Transience has never had it better.

The website is enabled by using my cell phone.

No, no, silly - it doesn't plug into a satellite feed that is tracking my cell phone signal like in the hit movie The Recruit starring Colin "She pissed her jeans" Farrell - I simply call up the nice lady who maintains the site and say "East/West side - I had a lovely time at Homecoming, bye, [click]"

Technology! Get with it!

potentially Sweet Blog that is frequently updated

This blog was correctly recommended to me. It might just make it to the worthwhile blogs section on the right of your screen.

The Sentinel: Not just a small town paper

If you want to watch a movie that celebrates Adultery: The Sentinel.

If you want to read about people complaining about round-a-bouts or triumphing prep athletes that made it to the NFL: The Sentinel.

What am I supposed to do with Trunk briefs?

So, I'm in Target. Their brand recognition is undeniable with all of the catchy advertising. I think when robots are not dreaming of electric sheep, they're dreaming of people dreaming about that bullseye.

Anywho.

I need things.

The list:

Nivea Toner (to shape up a fat face)
OK Go CD #1: OK Go.
OK Go CD #2: Oh no.
Under-roos. (to shape up a fat can)
Wedding gift.

I rarely purchase music from a store, but I figure that I have a 7 hour solo drive to get to a wedding rehearsal that I might as well treat myself. OK Go impressed me on New Year's, so we'll see if they impress me en route to Durango.

The under-roos. I know I like Fruit of the Loom, and I know the size. I don't care about the colors. I don't care how many come in a pack either. All I want are the boxer briefs. I want the package picture to depict this clearly.

Go.

Go now.

Go now to a store and find a pack of Fruit of the Loom's Boxer Briefs, Large.

Blink your eyes.

What!? They've changed to "Trunk Briefs"...are you sure?

Is the picture exactly the same as the Boxer Briefs?

Injustice?
A money drain?
Body image problem reinforcement on a level only The Adonis Complex would address?


I know!

I feel your pain.

I was trying to be a responsible nomad and buy some under-roos. Somehow I got a pack of TRUNK and a pack of BOXER briefs. The pictures looks exactly the same. I blindly threw them into the washer pre-wearing them, so I'm screwed as far as returning these things. If I wanted to waste 10 dollars I would've rather at least gotten thrown out of a Hooters for placing a ten-spot tip where it has never been ("I was never a stripper, you pig!")

The wedding gift I purchased for the Bro in Durango was a bottle opener. Hopefully he will use it to open up many a brew to drink away the pain of marriage...or as an eye-gouger to poke away the pain of marriage.


We need rules, we need structure.

1) On the way down to Durango, only OK Go will be playing.
2) Do not fall in love with any bridesmaids.
3) Make them fall in love with you.
4) No beer.
5) Maybe a little.

I have a theory that "car bombs" do not curdle. I think someone started the rumor and everyone just chugs them now because they have a legitimate excuse besides being a boozehound.

Q: Why are you chugging that fine tasting beverage, Bill?
A: Because of science, Mary Ann!

I intend to waste a little money and find out how long it takes for the curdling to happen, if ever. I am going to enjoy that sweet drink. I owe it to the fine people in Massachussetts, whose chippable teeth disallow the quick drop of the shot glass, and who, also, support such fine caricatures as "Swift Boat" Kerry and "Chappaquiddick - you must acquit" Kennedy.

I'm trying to explain to my parents that I am moving to Baltimore in June, explaining to them how rushed it seems given I'm graduating and working on papers and going to class and trying to jump start a tormented-romantic lifestyle. They just told me to follow my heart and then my dad tried to convince me that the snow tires for my former car were "worth a lot of money" and "shouldn't be taking up space." He does the same thing to my friends that have flip-cell phones. The idea is for my dad to convince you that something you have is worthless and then he'll collect it from you and then turn a quick buck on it. If you ever want to win my dad over, just give him a bag of flip-cell phones in the front seat of a pick-up truck that has a 500-lb breakfast omelet in the bed and tell him it is all his. He will eat a glass samwich on your command.

I need to address Johnny Ca$h's "Sunday Morning" and how it played into my Easter, but now is not the time. I need to *know* my audience, and for all I know I'm being read by my grandmother's bridge club ("Are you sure this is it...you're grandson seems so mild mannered. He's so tall and kind - bringing down that can of prunes at the Kroger store for me. Yes, he did.")

Flex.
Breathe.


Lately I've been intrigued by long-distance relationships because I'm contemplating entering one...with myself.

I know! The Trunk Briefs...if it wasn't for the wedding I would go to the Body World exhibit with someone that is smarter than me, taller than me, and has a better credit score than me and I would deftly put the Trunk Briefs on the plasticized humans of yester-time. But no.

Of course, I've already put under-roos on art/scultpures before, so there's no need to be redundant...if I can find photos I will post. Grand Junktown will never be the same.

Toby..Toby, Toby. I went into a Wal*mart the other day, the first time in a long time, and there was his image, on an ad board for his latest: "Toby Keith: White Trash with Money."

Somehow, there is irony in Wal*mart displaying this.

Speaking of Wal*mart and given my nomadic nature, this might be of note.

I hear they have a Durango in Wal*mart. I'll be sure to check it out.

Yeah, I meant it like that.

NSF follow-up (fall-out)

I should have read this before applying for the NSF GRFP...very insightful.

After April 17th I can check my rate sheet...if I received negative marks for being a 1st year grad student as opposed to a graduating senior I will flap out and each some flip jacks at Village Inn with my good friend, the honorable Reverend William Archibald Spooner. Syrass the purp.

The NSF has this to say about its Honorable Mention:

The NSF accords Honorable Mention to meritorious applicants who do not receive fellowship awards of fat ca$h. Honorable Mention is considered a significant academic achievement nationwide and does not award skinny ca$h or any ca$h, for that matter, whatsoever.

Hey, who can argue with the Federal Government?

How much does a moment weigh?

...And, do we exist just so that snowflakes have a warm place to land?

Okay, philosopy wax aside, I need to post this.

This year has been brutal. Yes, it was launched with great hope because of New Year's. Yes, it is crashing and burning because of my failure to land the next big thing.

While in Charm City, I applied to five schools and applied for two grants. I submitted a paper to a student paper competition. So, all in all I've been awaiting answers to 8 questions. All but one are answered.


Harvard: Accepted, with loads of ca$h.

Johns Hopkins: Accepted, with loads of ca$h.

Wharton at UPENN: Rejected.

Princeton: Rejected.

Stanford: Rejected (with a smarmy, "We'll take you into our Master's program, for a fee, of course.")

Graphics Section of ASA Student Paper Competition: Slapped in the mouth. Four out of 24 papers selected, and mine did not make the cut.

Department of Energy Computational Science Grant: Slapped my grandma in the face. (This hurts worse than my face getting it).

The question still lingering is if I got the NSF Graduate Fellowship grant. It is a huge honor and a nice stipend. The proposed project is the same as that of the rejected DOE grant: to develop mathematical models to further Paired Kidney Donation.

I have an email sitting in my inbox.

It is from the NSF.

It has been sitting there for the last 4 hours.

It is my last stand for having a great year. A year that launches a thousand ships.

I do not want to look because I feel I will get distracted from my work this week if I do.

I have to finish my thesis this weekend. It is the reason I am in Charm City right now and not the Square State. I also, have to finish my revision of the graphics paper (the one that the ASA Graphics Section rejected) for two competitions with deadlines of April 1st.

I must stay focused.

But the moment weighs on me. It weighs on me like a thousand ships.

One thousand ships.

However, to draw it out even more, the anticipation, the excitement, the dread, I wanted to list evidence and superstitions in a "Point, Counterpoint" fashion of my speculation as to what the answer lying in that email is.

Point: Email was sent by Ryan R. Krausmann. I did a little research. Mr. Krausmann is the "Help Desk Team Lead - NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program." If it was a positive response, they would have had Mr. NSF send the letter, not the male secretary.

Counterpoint: Frequently, all responses come via an administrative assistant because the high-ups are too busy rolling in money like Mike Meyers did in "54."

Point: Internet rumor, which was made known to me by Drewborg, who also applied for a NSF grant, said that the NSF always notifies on a Friday. I received my notification on a Thursday. Bad news always comes ahead of schedule.

Counterpoint: The rumor speculated that they tell applicants on Friday so that they do not have to receive hot-headed calls asking "Why didn't I win, Goat-f***er!" Therefore, they would notify the winners a day ahead so that they could receive calls singing "Thank you, and I love you. May I send you a case of Oatmeal Stout from the Square State?"

Point: The email is only 11k.

Counterpoint: You can't really apply the "small envelope" theory to emails.

Point: God will not allow me to have this grant because instead of waiting for him to provide a bread carrying raven to feed me, I went to McDonald's at 10:45PM after getting back to my hotel from working on my thesis at Bayview.

Counterpoint: God threw a shooting star down from Heaven across the sky upon my exit from said McDonald's. I wished upon it that I would win the NSF Grant.

Rebuttal to counterpoint: That wasn't a star - it was the tardy raven being chucked through the atmosphere by Gabriel.

Point: When I sent an email to Drewborg asking if he had received an email from Ryan Krausmann, he replied "Mum's the word." which means I am not telling which means he did receive it and the probability of us both not getting it is higher than the probability of both of us getting it so I didn't get.

Counterpoint: "Mum's the word" is British and therefore has no meaning in the United States.

Well, here's the deal. I am going to finish my graphics paper and review my thesis. Then, I will check the email.

If I do not get it, I will rack myself with a gunrack (not a riflerack, for all you irony loving fans of Full Metal Jacket).

If I do get it, I will go down to the 24 hour KFC in the Travel Plaza in the worst part of Charm City, order 54 chicken breasts (they should always come in pairs, baby!), take them up to my hotel room, dump them out on the bed I am not using, roll around in them as if I was Mike Meyers, a poor man's Mike Meyers.

Time elapses....

......
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...
..
.
.
..
...
....
.....
......

Got my graphics paper done. Now I need to read my thesis.

Time elapses.

......
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...
..
.
.
..
...
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Thesis is reviewed. I think I will check my email. Oh, dear, I need to log-in. Just a second.

Time elapses.

......
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..
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.
..
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I'm logged-in. And I'm nervous. I'm nervous and its okay.


And the results are:

Sorry, I got distracted. Slow internet here at the Best Western.

I just read this.

It appears that these fine folks received an email today as well, and did not get the NSF grant.

It appears I did not either.

But, not all is lost - I have received an "honorable mention," which is basically saying I got second place at the special olympics (psst...and I'm not disabled, but I'm going to be soon).

Bring on the gun rack.

To Beauty and Truth, 250 miles at a time

CDOT.

Doesn't mean much to you.

Colorado Department of Transportation.

They save our lives when it snows. They keep the I-70 corridor free of snow as much as humanly and snow plowly possible.

And they have a great logo:



It is based on the Colorado state flag:

You see, CDOT stands for Colorado Department of Transportation.

It's logo is based on the state flag.

The state flag is a "C" and a "Dot"!

Now that's self-reinforcement!

Now that's the kind of thoughts you get driving the I-70 corridor twice a week!

To Beauty, Dr. Zeger! To truth!

I'm going to be (Ctrl +) r ich

A suggestion:

"Ctrl + r " to refresh the page.

Another suggestion: No matter how vehemently my dad suggests the check for the royalties of the "Ctrl + r" usage should go to him because of his self proclaimed "creator" status, it shouldn't. The proof is in the fact that he thinks that a check is generated each time those buttons are pushed.

On Being Transient

I have been called elusive. Cheap. Fat. And Lazy.

And Brilliant.

When I returned to the Square State from Charm City, it was in the middle of the academic year. More problematic, I was intending to go right back to the City of Charm after 5 months of being back in the Square State. This would mean I would need to find some weird sub-lease or bite bullets to the tune of 800 dollars a month to rent a studio apartment with a sweet premium. The studio idea was manageable, but my business in Denver was only 3 days a week, and I wanted to spend a lot of time on the Western Slope and the I-70 corridor and the I-haven't-been-snowboarding-in-12-years slopes (and your hearts); and spending a lot of money to live somewhere for 3 days a week seemed ludicrous.

So, I went with an option so much more ludicrous that it just.

Might.

Work.

I decided to become a Transient whilst in Denver. In Grand Junction as well, I would not just stay with my parents but with friends as well. A couch crasher. And if the Mrs. Is willing, a home wrecker.

Before I left for Baltimore, I hatched a plan of being a couch crasher. I had a long list of friends that had roofs, heat, and showers that they'd be willing to share for 3 days or so, especially with a pal that just got back from a 6 month internship on the Eastern seaboard.

I was blessed (and condemned) when a professor of mine in Denver suggested housesitting for her while she was out of the country. Blessed, because it was a month of rent I didn't have to pay (or couch crash), and condemned because it made the amount of time to rent a place in Denver even more ludicrous (4 months...The place with the studio had 3 month leases and 5 month leases. Thanks, AMLI!).

Anyway, I sold my overheating Honda and invested in a Subaru Legacy Outback. A couple years newer, forty thousand miles fewer, an existent rear wiper, a Yakima RocketBox, two more doors, and air conditioning is the sum of the switch. I needed a vehicle that I could afford financially that itself could afford to have a bunch of miles put on it in a hurry: round trip each week is 500 miles, plus whatever driving I do while in town.

One protester of this plan proclaimed that it would be more expensive to do this than to just rent a place. Not so. I've done the calculations. Oil changes, new tires, OK GO! cds, gasoline (dinosaur bones, Mr. Cash), and grocery/meals for the host and hostess still comes to less than keeping a place.

Plus, it is a lot more sociable. This taciturn catepillar is slowly turning into a social butterfly.

I am learning about the great hospitality of my friends and gaining a little bit of solidarity with my transient brothers. I fully recognize I am not as bad off as many of them, since I am some bloated fat American white preppie that has a car, a lap-top, credit cards accepted by Chipotle and Wi-Fi friendly (free o' charge) Panera Bread Co., friends with showers, and a 24 hour gym membership that allows showers and mirror checks to preserve my vanity. I am closely monitoring my emotional state, as I have been advised that not having a home can cause identity crises and loss of bowel/bladder/sinus control.

Whoever I am just crapped/pissed/snotted on this public library keyboard.


-*-

I'll try to write up little observations of this life as I go along, but if I do not my saving grace is in Physics: we cannot know both the position and speed of certain particles because measuring one affects the other. So I cannot both record life and keep living it.

My friend Boston

I know 75% of the rescued. The other 25% I know was in the Army and earns a living ultimate fighting.

I love this story. There are so many little pot-shots. There are so many little gems. My favorite is the dad who steps in to save his son's political career with apologies and mula.

The ski-poles were borrowed. For crying out loud! This is journalism. These are the facts.

I will post soon two other favorite stories that demonstrate great journalism in a small town in a square state.

After my ball just dropped: the Homeward Bound Sojourner

From the last installment…

Many decide to stay in and sleep. It was my plan to stay up.

From this installment…

The ball has dropped and so have many of my colleagues, my buddies, face-down in the mud. The plan was hatched a while ago, and it looked a lot better on paper. I was to stay up with two of the CG all night. One was to be in a taxi-cab by 5:30AM to go back to Square State Capitol, the other was to be escorted by yours truly to the city of Love Brotherly.

I disappeared briefly from the CG group at the Hotel W and retrieved my bag and belongings from Actress-lady’s apartment. When I returned, everyone was asleep in the W except for my two early morning comrades. We found refuge in a nearby McDonald’s.

I nearly get thrown out of the McDonald’s for being logical.

“Hello. You want?”

“Hi, Ma’am. Happy New Year’s to you and your fine crew. I was hoping to procure a McFlurry and sit and talk with my friends in your fine establishment here in New York, New York.”

“No McFlurry.”

“No problems. I will adjust what I desire to have in the cup of good cheer . A chocolate shake, please?”

“No chocolate shake.”

“Very well then. May I please have a sundae?”

“No sundae.”

“Ice cream cone”

“No ice cream cone.”

“I’m getting the impression that this restaurant doesn’t have ice cream available at the moment.”

“No ice cream. None at all.”

“Oh, well this game has been fun, and long, especially for those behind me in the queue. Logically, it may have been –“

“No logic! Get my store out!”

“Hold on, hold on. A number one combo, please. Hold the ice cream, oh wait-“

“You give me the sass?”

“What are you going to do? Shoot me with an ice cream gun?”




We sit down and chat about our hopes, dreams, fears, and other things that pertain only to those of the female persuasion. Then, the Invasion.

Two gents and a lady sit at the table next to us, and they are HAMMERED. They set their bags o’ food down and then carefully reveal some contraband from the inside of their coats. They had snuck in some sweet booze. They asked us where we were from and we replied The Square State. Immediately the happy-go-luckiest of the group says,

“Colorado! Very comfortable. Durable.”

He explains that Colorado is a clothing brand Down Under. The other gent is as big as a house and keeps feeling around his pockets commenting that he is always losing his keys and cell phone. We asked him his profession. He said “detective.”

So we have a bartender who can say nothing more than “Colorado! Very comfortable. Durable” and a Detective who is no good at keeping track of inanimate pocket sized objects who snuck double jacks and cokes into a McDonald’s. The thing I really dislike about the situation is that it made me realize that the Aussies and the Brits make us eat their vituperations with a smile, and it is all because of the charming accent. These Aussies attacked everything, from the obesity epidemic to the size of the NYE ball that they just saw dropped to the fact that no good surfing can be found anywhere in the Northern Hemisphere. If you have an accent, you can say anything to anybody and get a smiling laugh from them. Example:

Aussie: The ball was a f##ing joke.
American: Hahahaha. Yeah, it sure was.

Aussie: Your country sucks a big river.
American: Hahahaha. Yeah, it sure does.

Aussie: You Americans sure do eat a lot…and it shows.
American: Hahahaha. Yeah, we sure do.

Aussie: You have really big hips, for a lady, I mean.
American Lady: Hahahaha. Yeah, I sure do. Is that an accent I detect?

I have a story that involves a Brit and myself, but I must restrain myself at the present time and finish the relaying of this epic tale.

Anyway, the Bumbling Detective saw that I was engaged in the shenanigans of the Bartend, so he asked the ladies to come with him over to a corner of the restaurant, and proceeded to give them his Detective Business card complete with international phone number. Cast many nets, I suppose. And he was charming. I’m sure if the Colorado ladies find a weekend free and happen to be 10,000 miles away from Denver in Australia they’ll look him up. Or, if on Valentine’s Day they find no cards in their milk carton / mailbox contraption at work, call to just see “what’s up.”

We bid them adieu and go back to the W to send off our comrade. This leaves me, the Transporter, and my cargo, the Transportee, in the lobby of a rather somber high-end Hotel. It is 5AM and it is startling to see how many people are checking out at this time. The Lobby is over-run with the group of smartly dressed, authentically beautiful Indian men and women. I asked the fattest man of the group if a marriage could be arranged, and he said that whatever it was that I learned in “Bend it Like Beckham,” it was wrong.

The Transportee and I go up to the room, step over sleeping people of a weaker constitution, and gather our goods so that we can make our way to Port Authority for an early morning bus ride to Philadelphia. We successfully get down to the lobby when she realizes she does not have her hat. This is a problem because she is the one that checked the room out, and she locked the key in the room with those that were staying in New York longer than she was. I was about to suggest a Romeo-Juliet ending, because this hat seemed like that big of a deal. The front desk was contacted, and spare key secured, and she went up to the room. She came back down, and confessed that the hat was in her purse the whole time. This is why, as a Transporter, I always allow six hours more than *needed* to get anywhere.

At the Port Authority, I was disheartened to learn that on-line specials are only good for purchases on the internet. The trip to Brother Love City was 21 dollars each instead of 14, all because I did not have the wherewithal to sit down and purchase tickets. The System gained 14 (2 passengers x 7 dollar mistake) dollars more than it should have that day. Do not worry, I nearly got it all back (more on this later).

We are insanely early and insanely tired. We sit in the Port Authority basement café and watch a man in a coma get his hair mussed by another bum, and his face playfully slapped. I did not intervene, because my pacifism dial could not be found due to willful blindness.

We sleep on the bus.

We roll into Philadelphia.

Philadelphia is a ghost town. It is not only a Sunday, but a Holiday Sunday. It looks like the city has been evacuated. My cohort and I walk up the street to City Hall, and eventually see groups of men dressed like girls. Like Li’l Bo Peep girls. We walk through the splendor of City Hall, a bit dazed given our sleep deficit and the fact that the only Philadelphians we’ve seen are fairy tale cross-dressers.

Perseverance pays off, and we eventually see a parade. The streets were lined thick with spectators, and the streets were filled with cross-dressers yelling inanities. We were still in the court yard of the City Hall, a way from the street. I had no desire to watch this or make my way to through the spectators to watch this, so we start to head back from whence we came. I notice off to my left is a dad pushing a double stroller. The double stroller is structured so that one child sits in front of the other kid, not side by side. Their was a female toddler in the back, and a slightly younger male in the front. The dad was standing in this historic court yard, scratching the bill of his hat against the crown of his head. His dilemma, his quandary, his quagmire was how the heck to get the double stroller up a set of 6 steps. This made me think, as I was heading to a Starbucks I saw open on the way to the Sexual Identity Crisis Parade, that it must be an interesting problem to make historic areas Disabled-Friendly. I mentally wished the father of two good luck, and hoped that an early marriage did not end his ambition in life. This is where I wish the story of this man having any construct in my brain ends.

I understand his logic. This logic was a theme of my frickin’ trip. A mega theme.

He turned on his scanners and set the setting to “largest man in the crowd.”

He yells for me to stop and turn around, and then gestures that I should pick up the front end of the stroller and move it up the steps. I want to ask him if he has insurance, because the bulkiness of the stroller would not allow me to use my legs and not my back, and going backwards up steps with a load is never an OSHA approved activity. For whatever reason, I lumber down the steps and grab the front end of the stroller.

Keep in mind the situation.

Keep in mind, the little boy in the front.

He has no idea that I have been commissioned by his father to come and pick up the stroller. All he sees is a giant, hairy mountain man lumber up to him on a direct vector and pick him up. He did what any child would have done: kick and scream.

The dad said half-heartedly, “It’s okay.” This did not stop the onslaught on my ears. This did not stop the onslaught on my groin. This kid is kicking me in the balls and the dad is barking orders for me to just “move up the steps.” He gets to just roll the back end up, while I am carting his two cannonball weight kids while getting screamed at and kicked in the crotch.
I set down the stroller gingerly, although, according to the Geneva Convention, I had every right to toss the stroller in front of a steamroller.

The parade, I am told later, is called the Mummers Parade. Everyone I have told the story to has cut me off at “guys in dresses” and instantly shout with glee, “The Mummers Parade!” They offer no explanation of why it exists or why anyone would want to participate or spectator-ate.

Starbucks was nice. Getting the Transportee in a Cab to go the “Get Naked Christian Initiative” convention was nice, too.

I could ride a train in Philly to get to StockBroker’s house, but I am too exhausted and have a feeling I will be on trains aplenty in the remainder of the trip, so I contact StockBroker and he kindly picks me up.

Now, in the planning stage of this trip, I contacted him about staying at his house. He was amazing mature and inviting and said that he was renting the top floor of a house and that his buddy was renting the bottom floor, so that the impression was there would be plenty of room to accommodate me for a day or two. He also said that he would have some of his friends over, visiting for their first reunion out of college. How sweet. I picture a time of fellowship and camaraderie, and a house with 5 rooms.

The StockBroker drives me to a restaurant to where a lunch is in progress amongst his friends. I eat, I listen, I talk. Then the lot of us walk straight up a hill to his house. He lives in a place called Manayunk, which is American Indian for “trying to be trendy, and we’ll charge for it.”

Into the house. I just want to sleep. I want StockBroker to say, “Here is your room” and see a bed with freshly washed, folded towels on the bed. Him to walk into the room ahead of me, flip on a light in the private bathroom and say “You must be tired and want to freshen up. Welcome to my house. Let me know if you need anything.”

Instead, we march straight up the stairs, and I notice that the bottom floor does not look rented out, but rather, uninhabited. Not a trace of furnishings or anything. I am bringing up the rear on the staircase, and I look over the railing on my ascent, and see 10 more people in addition to the 5 that were at the restaurant crammed on a couch, crammed on the floor, and crammed onto what appears to be patio furniture, watching football and quoting Lord of the Rings over and over, and laughing mechanically after each line.

The top floor of the house is no bigger than a one bedroom apartment, and it is housing a fridge full of booze, a living room filled with recent college grads, and a bathroom filled with Hans’ stink. I retire quickly to the bedroom, which is filled with 14 sleeping bags covering the floor and a modest sized mattress.

I pass out. Somewhere in this time I hear the group ask if I want food. I wave them away. They come back, after a minute or an hour, and ask if I want entertainment. I wave them away. My phone vibrated in my pant pocket and I let it ring through. Then I hear StockBroker’s voice say “I’m not sure where he is.”

Then, an angel appears.

Her name is The Publisher. She scooped me up in her arms and whisked me out of Manayunk. How she knew where I was might have been due to a cell phone call I do not remember or the Divine.

She took me to Dinner in a trendy place in Manayunk where waiters are allowed to wear leather bracelets. I told her the story of New Year’s Eve and the Ball Drop, and she said that it was like a Jellyfish’s diarrhea: no form, no point. She is a publisher, so I figure her point is quite valid and I vow to never ever tell the story again.

She takes me to the West Side of Philadelphia (born and raised). She tucks me into bed, turns her head over her shoulder to show a stack of fresh towels, printed instructions of how to get to the metro (with handwritten notes elaborating the ambiguities) and a tour book of Philadelphia sightseeing, and a house key.

She asked if she could kiss my forehead, and I said Joshua Harris probably wouldn’t approve, but sure.

I awoke the next day, not sure where I was, but very sure of the time thanks to a watch: 4PM. That made it sixteen hours of continuous sleep. I am now recovered from Times Square.

I call StockBroker and we agree to hang out at his place, since 12 people have left in the last 16 hours. It was pouring rain, and by the time I am picked up Publisher is back and gives me an umbrella and warm wishes. She apologized for not having the time to bake fresh cookies or secure a cow and milk it. She is the best hostess in the world, providing me a bed and a shower and not controlling my schedule. I rewarded her efforts by losing the house key in the rain and leaving the umbrella in StockBroker’s car.

At StockBroker’s we try to decide where we can go to watch the bowl game (Ohio State’s Hawk vs. Notre Dame’s Brother of Hawk’s Girlfriend) on a decent TV. Every place in the trend-setting Manayunk (we built our homes in the hills, and hills are like trend lines in of themselves) has either a crappy TV or has kicked the StockBroker out for disorderly conduct (offering waitresses IPOs in exchange for an evening’s worth of “company”). So we opt to order in and watch on StockBroker’s TV.

The pizza that came was deemed the moniker of MeatWave. It was so grease-laden the restaurant’s standard policy is to put it in two boxes. The only spared of its wrath was StockBroker himself, who decided to reheat a steak on a sketchy contraption that did not properly fit over the burner on his stove. I asked StockBroker where he got the contraption, and he explained one of his co-workers had recently got married and brought in a box of various things that had been outlawed by the Mrs. Being an opportunist and not a shopper, StockBroker picked it up this heat-plate of sorts, and attempted to reheat steak with it, flipping the steak precariously with a plastic fork. I realized at that moment that nothing was in the cupboards or drawers as far as food or instruments, and nothing would be until StockBroker got married.

In the middle of a later bowl game StockBroker made a “Well,” noise and stretched his arms and went to bed. I asked how I was to get back to the place I was staying, and he said “Take a cab.” His friend asked how he should get back to the hotel at which he was staying, and StockBroker said, “Meet fantasticterrific. His specialty is sharing cabs. Good night, suckas.”

I call Publisher. She picks us up, as the cab company gave us an upper bound of infinity on a cab coming up the hills of Manayunk.

The next day I venture out into Philly. I have been once before an saw the Bell. I was determined not to do so again. So, I went over to the Constitution center. I was carrying my backpack and all my possessions in it. The security guard made strange faces as he pulled out clothes, toiletries, and an autographed picture of Aaron Burr. He informed me that I could not sleep in the museum.

With that, I loaded my bag to my back and started up the stairs, only to hear a sharp “HEY!” behind me. I turn around and the security guard was beckoning me with his Homeland Security endorsed gloved hand.

He took me under his arm, like a father about to say that it is “Cool to wait, you know, to abstain from smoking the drugs and doing it with girls” and informs me that free-of-charge venues are across the street. Apparently, I was just about to go see a museum without paying for it.

Apparently, I was going to see the Liberty Bell again.

I also saw Independence Hall. The Birthplace of the nation was pretty cool. Not as cool as Babe Ruth’s birthplace or JFK’s birthplace, but pretty cool nonetheless.

I needed cash before going to New York City, so I decided to hunt down a Bank of America. I finally find one and insert my card to gain admittance to the ATM. Being Bank of America LINK, I should have known they’d design their system to be the dumbest in the world. Instead, I had good faith that you would insert the card parallel to the ground with the strip on the bottom side. When I was denied admittance, I tried to enter through a lobby of sorts, where I was quickly accosted by a security guard and told that I could not sleep there. I told her that her assessment of my being a bum was not too far off, but that this bum had a credit card. She told me to try the card with the strip point to the sky.

It worked. Thanks Bank of America! When you aren’t liars or really inconvenient, I enjoy banking with you.

I did not just need cash for New York, I needed singles. So I ducked into a 7-11 and bought a coffee. In retrospect, I regret this choice, because at the spicket they were offering hot chocolate made with Hershey’s Chocolate. I imagine this is like having Clam Chowder in Boston: appropriate and rewarding and anti-climatic.

Publisher and I eat at a place trying to emulate Chipotle, minus the IPO. I asked her to forgive me for losing a house key and an umbrella. She said no. I offered buying her guacamole for her burrito, and she said that I was forgiven.

A bus is to take me back to New York City. I was going to write a hilarious little diddy on how this lady’s derriere owed me 3 dollars for taking up part of my seat, but this was better done on the best of Craigslist.

Back to ActressLady’s. I without snag get myself from Port Authority to her apartment and we watch Arrested Development episodes until we puke.

January 4th, 2005, will be a day remembered forever by Cat, ActressLady, and the Hawaiian. ActressLady and the Hawaiian had spent over 6 weeks and 82 dollars trying to get two items for the upstairs bathroom: an elongated toilet seat and a device that sat down in the tub drain to collect hair and germs.

In a matter of one hour and 4 minutes, Cat and I successfully secured a toilet seat and drain hair catcher, installed them, fixed the wall clock, ate Pizza at Pete’s around the corner and held a party for the Democratic Party in the living room. Ted Danson, Ted Kennedy, and the dapper Kerry step-sons were in attendance. We talked about Sharon’s health status and what could be done about that nefarious Toby Keith and the Ford truck revolution. The answer was biodiesel, obviously.

Later that evening, ActressLady contested an Xcel heating bill. The operator told her to check the meter readings, and ActressLady asked if it looked like a parking meter with a fundraising thermometer on it. Xcel wisely hung up the phone. ActressLady and I went into the basement where the washers and driers commingle. We spotted a door that was deftly labeled with a permanent marker “utility’s”.

Locked.

ActressLady was going to retire to the green room and let life hand her whatever script was in the chute.

I was never an actor. The world is not a stage, but a war zone.

I took out my wallet and extracted a library card. The ActressLady rolled her eyes, and started up the stairs, trying to think of some monologue to convince her roommates to shell out six hundred dollars a month for heat. She could not, so then she started to think about the indecent proposal that Robert Redford had given her the night before. Then the picture was shattered to smithereens by the audible click of a Mesa County Public Library card moving the locking mechanism out of the way.

She was thoroughly impressed and asked if I was seeing anyone. I asked her if she had read the Fountainhead, and she asked “Is that the Vogue spin-off?” and I told her I was a priest. A super priest.

Anyway, we read the meters, and decided to come back down the next night, a 24 hour period, read them again, do some SERIOUS mathematics and extrapolation and see if the Xcel bill was really that outrageous or not.

The morning came about quickly on January 5th. This was ActressLady’s Birthday, the first one away from home. The gals whipped up a great early morning breakfast and I was given the duty of getting her out of bed. Now, she has a cell phone alarm that has the voices of her mother and sister beckoning her out of sleep. I don’t know how she stands it. The most heinous sound to me when I am in the final REM cycles of the night is the voice of my mother, and just for the record my mom is a voice model.

Anway, I go down very calmly to her bed. I cannot touch her, because her bunk is 15 feet in the air. I trip over a pineapple top and it hurts because I am bare foot and a wuss. I decided to use the power of logic to get the birthday girl up and at ‘em. No wet willies, no yelling or water or peppermint sticks. It worked. It worked because nothing works without logic.

As an additional gift on the birthday I go with Cat to pick up a package on Birthday Girl’s behalf. For the record, for your information, by the way, I spent 44% of my time in New York in package pick-up related situations. Stop sending your friends in New York packages. Send gift cards. I’m serious. You are not being impersonal, you are being savvy .

The USPS took so long to find this package. The sign above the window said that ID must be presented, and we were hoping that Cat would be able to use her ID and the fact that she was a girl to pick up a package that was for a Cathryn and had a different last name on it (“I swear, mail man, I JUST got married.”). Anyway, the USPS was taking so long that Cat had to skedaddle off to work (Starbucks). So, here I am, in minute 45 of waiting for a package, not looking anything like a Cat or a Cathryn or a female holding the claim slip. There is no way, with the Patriot Act in full swing, that this Federal Institution would give me this package.

They call out ActressLady’s name.

I, the Lumberjack, the antithesis of feminity, approach the window.

“You’re Cathryn?”

“Yep.”

“That’s a girl’s name.”

“Ever hear of Cat Stevens?”

“Oh MY GOD! I lost my virginity while Hard Headed Woman was playing. Here you go, Cat.”

I left the Post Office and headed towards Cat’s place of work. She works, as mentioned before, at Starbucks. I passed three on the way to the particular one she works. I only walked 5 blocks.

America!

I then walked over to where the Birthday Girl was working. Her job basically entails taking reservations for a restaurant while the restaurant is not open for food or bar service. I told the owner that I had invented a device that could replace Birthday Girl. It would do the job just as well and not suck away money while practicing different ambulances for her Acting and Walking 101 class. The owner said I needed to eat something because I was too thin.

She opened the package, a birthday gift that contained some candies and a poster making fun of Winnebagos. Again, nothing that could not have been secured with a gift card that could be sent directly to her, instead of being re-routed into the annals of the USPS.

Later that day, I decided to go down to 14th street, for no reason other than the fact that Rufus Wainwright sings a song about 14th street. I concluded that 14th street must be a very long street, and I was not on the same part that Rufus had been. I did duck into a sweet Barnes and Noble and rock out to the OK GO cd. Then I made it back to ActressLady’s for a birthday dinner.

It was very delicious. ActressLady had her roommates, some of her classmates (all British with those accents that make us willfully eat our own excrement with a smile, if so commanded), and an old high school friend who had taken up residence in the Big Apple. ActressLady, being the Birthday Girl, very selflessly made us dinner and it was delicious (as I stated in the first part of this paragraph). During the dinner, the Hawaiian was shooting off a Gigapixel digital camera complete with paparazzi flash. This reminded the aspiring thespians of a paparazzi craze. This spawned the idea of creating a pseudo-paparazzi phase.

Basically, the set-up was to have one of the actresses dressed up in scarves and sunglasses and walking with a friend arm in arm. Then one “passerby” would shout, “Oh no way, Keira Knightley?” and dump their long johns while chasing them, which would cause a chain reaction amongst other strategically placed “passersby.” Then, a “member of the tabloid press” would just happen to be walking up 86th street and hear the shouts, and being an opportunist, quickly come into pursuit of the mob. The Hawaiian decided not to act, but just be herself, which involved sitting on the stoop and sporting a half consumed bottle of Midnight Express.
The whole ordeal (anagram: Laredo) was filmed with a digital video camera, and was about as exciting as an arson (anagram: Sonar) without an instrument of ignition. The camera could not be everywhere there was sound, so only the tail end of the scene could be deciphered as to who said what. Oh, and of course, at the end of each run we would run into the apartment and watch what had just happened! Basically, it was a session of not being able to hear a single thing and all the female participants pointing out other’s “cuteness” and “funniness” in hopes of receiving the accolades themselves. It escalated something like this:

“You’re so funny.”

“Oh that’s hilarious. You’re hilarious.”

“You are so cute.”

“No, you’re cute.”

“You’re SO THIN.”

“No, you’re so THIN, even on CAMERA.”

“YOU ARE THE BEST.”

“NO, YOU ARE THE BEST. I AM NOT THE BEST.”

Then, little slap fights broker out. Then I spoke up and said:

“Who wants to be Keira this time around?”

and the slap fights ceased and all the girls put their right hands in the air yelling, “Me, me, oh me, please? Me!” like Kindergartners.

Oy. And I did not escape it unscathed. When I hinted that I would like to be the star, one of the Brits commented, “Who’d you be? Louis Anderson?”

And because of the accent, I smiled and said, “Yeah, I guess I do look like Louis Anderson. Thanks for talking to me with your voice. I love Tony Blair. I want to buy you an orange glazed éclair that looks like Blair. Then I’ll hold it up and give it a little British voice, and ask you, “Orange you glad to see me?” What? You want me to eat my own poop? With a smile? Ask me again with your accent. Oh, okay. You are so charming.”

The birthday party ended, and the next day I re-visited Garlic Bob’s pizza. I went on a pizza tasting rampage, and decided that Garlic Bob’s had the best pizza. I ordered a whole pizza for pick-up.

I showed up to pick up my pizza, and while waiting in line a Puerto Rican comes in with two of his buddies. The Puerto Rican engaged conversation with the over-worked Garlic Bob:

Puerto Rican: You played me.

Garlic Bob: What does that even mean? “You played me?” “YOU PLAYED ME?” I played you in basketball? I played you in a game of cards?

From stage left, entered the sweetly retarded help. Garlic Bob was yelling at him to give me my pizza, while snapping a towel at the Puerto Rican youths. The help handed me the pizza and told me to have a nice day.

Now, in the confusion I was never asked to pay. I wanted to leave with the most delicious, most free pizza in the world at the time being. But, I believe that this would have been wrong. I am not gaining a pizza so much as losing integrity.

Plus, God would have given me a burnt roof of my mouth for all of eternity, and I hate having a scorched roof.

So, I wait in line again, with a pizza. The Puerto Ricans re-appear.

Puerto Rican: Hey, Hey! Garlic Bob, how much is that slice?

Garlic Bob: Sixty-five thousand DOLLARS! A special just for you!

The Puerto Ricans disappear again. I can only imagine they were going to a bank to withdraw sixty-five thousand dollars.

Garlic Bob asks me what I am still doing there. I tell him I haven’t paid. He nearly slaps his help with the pizza splade.

The help takes my card swipes it, hands me the card and my receipt. The cost I was quoted on the phone was $13.58. The receipt said my card would be charged $1.35.

I was really frustrated. I earnestly tried to do the right thing once. I contemplated leaving a $12.23 tip, but then I took the stance of tough love. The help needed to learn from this experience. So, I left a $0.65 tip and walked out with a two dollar pizza.

God said he is considering a reduced sentence for my first efforts.

The roof of my mouth hangs in the balance.

I then find myself in the Port Authority to get on an Amtrak train from NYC to Chicago. Now, I had purchased a student advantage card minutes before purchasing the train ticket online. The card cost 20 dollars, the savings it enabled on train ticket was 28 dollars, for a net of savings of 8 dollars. This combined with the $11.58 savings on the pizza made it $19.58 total in my favor, whereas there was the Greyhound bus on-line special debacle that had cost me seven dollars lands me still at 12.58 in the fat money. That’s how you travel!

Anyway, I did not have printing capabilities when I purchased the card, but was able to copy and paste the id # into the Amtrak site to get the savings.

Well, there I was, staring a New York train ticketer in the face trying to convince him that I legitimately owned the card and did not just use my buddy's. He asked where my final destination was, and I said Colorado. His face changed. He said, “Coloradans are honest, God fearing people. You have a nice ride.”

18 hours on the train from NYC to Chicago. Kinda cool, kinda not. No, I did not have a Sleeper car. I did not plan well and had no food or liquid for the trip, and the microwaved brawurst from the food car made me swear I would remedy that for the next leg of the trip via train.

Chicago was awesome. My hostess in Chicago was awesome. Chicago Pizza was awesome. Sipping a Windy City martini in the Signature Lounge on the second highest floor in the John Hancock Center was awesome. It is way better to pay $10 dollars for a drink and get a view for free as opposed to paying $10 dollars for a view. We weren’t sure if there was a dress code at the Hancock center, so we called ahead, and they said no street shoes. This made us go to a huge department store and nearly had me purchase marked down Merrill slippers for 19 dollars, size 16. We decided to instead risk it and that my hostess would stand very close and directly in front of me to hide my street shoes.

Turned out to be a non-issue. The dress is beyond casual. One man had his genitalia out, stirring drinks.

In the morning, I boarded a train with 28 dollars worth of candy bars and drinks purchased from a train station convenience store (all other down town grocery stores were closed, and I was not about to eat another Bratwurst or lap up water from the lavatory sink).

I snuggled into a seat next to a fierce looking bic-headed man.

He got up and offered me his Maxim. I did not want to look at it, then again, I did not want to be too rude and out reject it in a “holier than thou” sort of way, so I grabbed it and flipped through very quickly. Apparently, Hilary Duff is good at singing and acting and her sister is riding the coattails of Napoleon Dynamite but not wearing them: she posed in the Maxim in next to nothing, with her mom on the set.

The Bic-headed Man returned. He complained, emphatically about the price of a Corona.
I told him that I had spent a heavy amount of money at the Train Convenience store, trying to make small talk. I kept wanting to sort of share the misery, but this guy definitely had it worse.

Fantastic terrific: So, visiting Chicago?

Bic-headed Man: No. I came up from Louisana – took over 30 hours to get to Chicago, and then spent the night in Union station.

Ft: Oh. Well 30 hours beats my 27 to Grand Junktown.

Bic-headed Man: Y’know what also beats your 27 to Grand Junktown? The 38 I’m spending on this leg from Chicago to Martinez. My old lady told me to take a train – “see the country”…I’m going to yell at her when I get to California.

[I begin to read The Fountainhead, because I have no misery that can match this man’s]

BHM: 10 times worse what you’ve seen on TV. 10 times.

FT: Excuse me?

BHM: The hurricane. I worked on a shrimping boat. I was going to buy it in the next couple of months- I was saving my money. Wait – [gets up, climbs over me to the aisle, digs in his bag in the overhead bin, and produces a picture of a boat that is amongst debris that used to be housing] The Luna. One night I had to defend my house with a shotgun. These guys came up with sticks and clubs and were demanding I give them my diesel. I told them I would make them a sandwich, give ‘em a beer, but there was no way they were getting a drop of my diesel. They went on. So, everything’s horrible there, I sent my old lady out to California, where her dad is the head of the department of transportation, and he’ll set she and I up with jobs.

FT: How long has it been since you’ve seen your wife?

BHM: My wife? Years.

FT: I thought the hurricane –

BHM: Oh, my girlfriend? 4 months.

FT: Ah, my apologies. You see, when you said “old lady,” I thought you meant wife. Perfectly understandable. You needn’t tell me anything else about your life.

BHM: Yup. My Ex. That’s a story.

FT: (thinking: I am only in hour 2 of this 27 hour journey…just read The Fountainhead…just look like you’re really into it…)
BHM: My Ex won’t let me see my kid.

FT: Ah- (There’s a kid involved!)

BHM: When she was pregnant, far along, she was telling me how she wanted a divorce and how that she wanted alimony but she wasn’t going to let me see my kid and she was going to tell him that I didn’t love him, that his granddaddy and grandmammy didn’t love him. So I did the only thing I could do: I went out the night he was born and got a tattoo of his name on my arm. That way if ever searched me out, he would know the truth.

FT: Whoa. That’s a statement. (Or you could’ve bought a savings bond in his name and helped him out with college, but ink is louder than dollars, I suppose).

From Chicago to Winter Park, you are not missing anything. Do not let Johnny Cash’s version of “City of New Orleans” trick you into taking the train, as it did me. Do let Johnny Cash’s version of “Hurt” convince you to never do drugs, as it did me. From Winter Park to Grand Junktown, it was gorgeous. You are on the other side of the mountains from I-70 and see beauty that cannot be seen by car, but only by train, boat, or stunt airplane/helicopter. My notes tell me I also saw a carcass of a buck laying on the frozen river, its blood bright on the white.

I detrained in GJ. I walked over to Burger King, and ordered the Trippple Patty skycraping Whopper, in the honor of the King Kong promo. I King sized it. Upon eating it, I realized that combining the cost of the food consumed on the train journey with the train tickets (even with the Student Disadvantage card) I saved no money (and definitely no time) taking the train.

My travels continue in the Square State. More on that later...