Curiouser & curiouser

I had decided to pack it in and just head off to the gym after thoroughly FUBAR'ing my blog this morning when I thought I heard someone knock on my back door. It's an old building full of strange and misleading noises, so I ignored it. I checked my bag and was just about to put on my jacket when there is was again. By this time Alice was staring intently at the back door.

I went to the door, opened it and when the alcohol fumes cleared I saw a not unattractive young man. He was looking very nervous and I was wondering if he had somehow gained access to the building and was trying to..... who knows? He began to explain that he lived in the building and saw the light under my door and I was waiting to hear the, I'm drunk and can't get back into my apartment story. He hemmed and hahed a bit and then blurted out, "Well I live here, see and I'm bi-curious." I was a bit startled at this declaration, and unable to stop staring at the quart bottle of Bud that he was clutching, tried to politely explain that I was just on my way out the door. He looked truly crestfallen, and started off towards the elevator. I am still kicking myself, but I relented enough to say, maybe he should come back some other time. Why? I think it is largely because I am a sucker. I hate to see people miserable. Maybe it's because I want to tell him he needs to rethink his approach. Tell him, don't go around doing things like this while you're loaded. There are bad people, who unlike me will take advantage of a situation and you may not be happy with the result. At any rate I showed the good sense not to try and talk to him while he was in a rather advanced state of inebriation. Having had drunks for parents I learned early there is no reasoning with a drunk.

Now I am asking myself was I ever that young, that stupid or that drunk. The answer comes yes. I have been pretty lucky and had only a couple of times in my misspent youth found myself in situations that got out of control. These types of life lessons are not necessary, they can be avoided with the exercise of a little common sense. Though sometimes if you are young and confused or scared, common sense can be pretty thin on the ground. I guess it was his vulnerability, that prompted me to make this poorly thought out offer. The thing is I don't want to have sex with him. I only want to sit him down and find out what he's looking for and then, if I can, point him off in a more appropriate direction. With any luck, he will wake up with an enormous hangover and a huge case of embarrassment and that will be the end of it. If not I can only hope that the drunkenness was an attempt to bolster his courage for this experiment and that he is not a chronic lush. I have had to put up with enough alcoholics in my life and I don't need to go out and adopt any more. What am I doing?

It seemed like a good idea....

I, having woke up early and having some time on my hands decided to dick around with the old blog. Blogger has been nagging me to upgrade to their new and fabulous template, and I have been toying with the idea of feeding comments through haloscan. So off into the depths of internet hell I merrily tripped. After a certain amount of vigorous swearing, I was able to implement the changes. Ooopsie! Where the f##%$$# did all the f*%$$@&&ing comments go? Let me caution you, read the boiler plate. If I had read the fine print and caveats I would have seen that my comments would not import to haloscan. In order to restore them is going to require a certain investment in time, cutting and pasting. I apologize to everyone who has been commenting on my blog (Even Anonymous) since I wouldn't be indulging in this low level narcissism if I wasn't trying to find out what other people think. I will be trying to restore things to there proper place in the blogosphere in the coming days. For the moment, I am heading off to the gym and will try not to dislocate my shoulder while I am doing shrugs. Oh BTW, Anonymous, skinny? Really? Cool!

The Monster

I started to work on an entry about going to the gym. It has grown out of control, and now is 7 1/2 pages. What do I do with it? Monkey has invoked the 500 word rule. "A blog entry should only be around 500 words, people don't sign on for more." That said he has read it and likes it. If anyone would like to read this thing, email me and I'll be happy to send it out for comment. Brief synopsis, it is about what goes through my fevered little mind while I am at the gym. I realize this is a pathetic cry for help, but what are you going to do?

What Fresh Hell...

It started out so well. I dragged my perfectly formed ass off to the gym at the crack of dawn against my will and wound up, against all expectations, having a really good workout. I headed off to work with the 'pod cranking out some of my favorite songs, stopped at my regular morning coffee place and had my paper cup handed to me before I could get the money out of my wallet. Service with a smile. The commuting gods were smiling on me as I came down the stairs and walked straight onto a train.

It was all a cruel joke. I didn't even make it through the door before I heard someone calling my name. I spent the rest of the day hearing my name. The problem with being the go-to guy at work is that people go to you. And on days like today, they all show up in shifts, all with a bad case of the "I wants"oblivious to the line forming behind them. Some days it can be very rewarding. You feel like you have helped people out, job well done, you're a good man Charlie Brown. On days like today when they gang up on you, you wind up fantasizing about scorpion pits.

5 o'clock finally arrived and I bee lined out the door. The walk home was no improvement as SUV's demonstrated that traffic lights do not apply to them and cyclists on the Mass. Ave. bridge who refuse to ride in the bike lane sped down the sidewalk, impatient with the damned pedestrians who persist in using the pedestrian walkway. Once again safely on the Boston side of the river I am then harried by Mommies with those SUV's of the sidewalk and the store aisle, the stroller the size of a Buick sedan as they perambulate their spawn, forcing everyone out of their path by the shear force of their entitlement. By the time I get home I am cursing anything on wheels.

As I check my mail, there is a mystery envelope from my friend Clint. He has sent me some crack and peel reproductions of some stamps that were a feature of the book "Going Postal" which he Photoshoped into some snazzy stamp sizes, suitable for decorating envelopes (do we ever really get out of 5th grade) and for the first time since I stepped off the train this morning I had a smile on my face. I got in the house and gave him a call to thank him, and the conversation drifted around to other topics, and finally he said "Oh, I checked out your blog, I didn't know you even had one." (I suffer from blog shame) But I had told him that I had been linked by that blogger, and so he checked my blog out. "Yeah, I read the whole thing." I asked what Clint thought with a bit of trepidation. He is cursed with honesty, and is not going to hand out praise if he doesn't like something. "I didn't know you could write", says he "Very slick."

Okay, maybe the day wasn't such a complete waste.

In the Headlines

It's been an eventful week. Our new governor will be inaugurated today, the former governor, officially snuck out yesterday because the inauguration will not be taking place at the state house and he did not want to miss his photo op of walking out of the state house into the adoring arms of his supporters.

The carpet bagger in chief leaves behind the mess from his shameless manueverings to place himself with the presidential hopefuls. Same sex marriage is being tossed in the hopper because our spineless legislature caved on the issue. "This is an issue for the people to decide." It would seem that our current law makers have never read the articles of federation or choose to ignore the section that admonished those taking up the reins of government that the purpose of the government is to insure that the needs of the few are not subject to the tyranny of the many.

We are also being saddled with what I predict will be a nightmarish mandatory insurance law that seems to be geared as a punitive measure against the low wage earners in the commonwealth. From what I have seen so far, anyone who does not assume the financial responsibility of taking out their own insurance will be fined $295.00 a month. Businesses with 10 or more employees who do not provide insurance will be fined $295.00 per employee per year. Sounds fair, huh? It seems we don't want to interfere with businesses ability to do business. The logic is that irresponsable 20 somethings are refusing to get health coverage because they are less likely to be ill, and everyone else who is not insured can easily afford insurance. They seem to have closed their eyes to the working poor with families, and anyone else who will be overburdened by insurance costs. Once again, I say our legislators need to start paying for their own health care and get dumped into this broken system. If they had to negotiate the health care nightmare they would be enacting a socialized health system so fast your head would spin. As it stands, I can forsee a mass exodus from the state of lower income people, who no matter how unsightly we are, are necessary to do all of those tedious jobs that the well heeled cannot be expected to do for themselves.

Our new guv, Deval Patrick has already created controversy over his spending on the inaugural ball and has had shots fired over the bow by the legislature, and the man hasn't even been sworn in yet. He ran on a campaign of inclusiveness and a message of reinvolving the disaffected voter. It's great to send out a message of hope, it's another to act on it. I have lived in Massachusetts a long time now and I predict it will just be more politics as usual.

I wish our new governor luck. He is off to a rocky start already and I think he's going to need all the luck he can get

no subject

This morning when I logged onto my computer at work, I cruised over to my favorite blog Joemygod. Imagine my surprise when I found out he had linked one of my posts to his site. However it has left me without a topic for the day. I was going to write a piece on the fact that approximately 3 people read my blog. Today I got more traffic than I usually see in a month. This is great and my pal the Monkeyboy summed it up best, "It's like having someone ask you to come and sit at their table for lunch."

But where is my topic? That heartless bastard has taken away my inspiration! I was already to write some insightful piece about why I continue. I was going to do the backstroke through an exceptionally maudlin lake, nay sea of misunderstood self pity. It was going to be very touching. I think you would have cried. I was prepared to shed a couple of tears myself. Instead, I am now being forced to go around shouting Woooo Hooooo. You're a bunch of heartless bastards.

I have to go now, and email the niece and tell her she's famous, or my beard's famous, or maybe it's my dick, I'm not really sure.

Hello moon

On my walk home across the Mass. Ave. bridge this evening I was treated to both a beautiful sunset in the west and a beautiful moonrise in the east. Note to self. Get camera that does not suck.

The New Black

me:"Where are my sneakers?"

niece:"Which ones are they?"

me: "The size 11's."

niece: "Jesus, you really do have big feet!"

She gives me a look and I know where this is going.

me: "Keep your funny remarks to yourself."

niece: "I'm just sayin'...."

me: "Let's just say that when I was younger I was very popular."

And it's true. When I was younger, and fags were fags and jeans were tight, the most effective piece of artillery I had when I sallied out onto the lists of love were a tight pair of 501's and no underwear. I may not have been the prettiest girl in the class, but I wasn't starving for company either. The real problem was that in later life I figured out that these guys were dating my dick, and would eventually get tired of me tagging along. The years have gone by, fashion has changed and now with baggy pants, everyone just takes their chances.

I give my niece this little synopsis, then pause and add, "Though I think my beard is my new dick." I find myself having to explain. I have not been enjoying terrific success in the wonderful world of hooking up, much less dating. However, since the facial sagebrush has been allowed to run wild, for some reason I am starting to have the "Daddy" effect on younger guys. Not that I am all that into younger guys, and also younger is a relative term. Mostly men in their early to mid 30's. A couple of times guys in their early 20's have come sniffing around, but that just sent me off screaming in the opposite direction. Just 'cause okay!

It seems like every year they announce what color the new black is. Usually, against all predictions it winds up being, well, black. It seems for me this year, that my beard is the new dick. Now the question is what they'll be attracted to, and what they wind up dating.

New Year's Day

It was a cold rainy day in dear old Beantown. I met Wahz for coffee at Starbuck's his preferred hang out and we exchanged our good wishes over coffee. Not that I hadn't been over at his place last night eating Chinese take-out, but what the hey. I spoke with Clint, my parents and then the niece and I headed over to the Buttermonkey's and Dabunny's new condo for a combo housewarming New Year's Day celebration. Waffles are the traditional fare, and Monkeyboy outdid himself, venturing into savor waffles this year. Bacon, potato, cheddar waffles. Mmmmm, just hear those arteries slam shut.

Having finished "From Boys to Men", which is excellent by the way, I am working my way through "The March of Folly", a timely read. I am currently reading the section on the renaissance about the break up of the Holy See and the rise protestantism. The inbuilt self destruct of government is discouraging and a little frightening considering the state our own country is in. I am also trying to gear myself up for the return to the gym, work and the daily routine. It is nice to fantasize about a life where I could do as I please, but I am not sure how well I deal with only unstructured time, so perhaps it is a blessing that I have to mold my life around my obligations. At any rate, I feel like I have got off to a good start for the new year. Monkey's house is beautiful and he and Dabunny are happy and in the full flush of homeownership, and it make me feel good to see then in such a happy state.

Me, it is just gratifying that things are going as well as they are, and who knows, things might get even better as the year progresses. I have stuck with the gym, I have stuck with the blog and I have ridden out a lot of doubt and weirdness at work, so who knows where this new year will take me if I am willing to do the work and persist.

New Years 2007

I went out this afternoon for a walk and got to see the preparations for the big night. The media, funny hats and of course, what is New Year's without... French Fries and Fried Dough? Did I not get the memo?