Wednesday, July 30, 2008

"Luxury Apartments"...Whatever!!

The wife and I sold our home in July, 2007 for a couple of reasons. First, because the neighborhood appeared to be in the first stage of serious decline ("For Rent" signs everywhere). Second, because an "affordable housing" apartment complex was about to be built on the next street. Third, because we wanted to pay off our debt.

So, we started apartment hunting; what a miserable task. But, after one or two weekends, we found some apartments that we actually liked. They're only a few years old, they're in the area we want to live, they're not outrageously expensive, and the front-office personnel seemed to be a little better than the run-of-the-mill knuckle-draggers that you usually encounter.

You see, these apartments are "luxury apartments". Fenced property with a security gate and everything and the assurance that every single vehicle that entered the property would be photographed! Whoa...(Insert sarcastic remark)... We actually looked forward to moving in.

Our love-affair with these "luxury apartments" lasted exactly two days, when the sound of our upstairs neighbor's footsteps began to really irritate us. His floorboards (our ceiling) creak with every step. Not only that, but we can hear his phone ringing. We can hear him taking a piss. We can hear him vacuuming. So, as revenge, we have nauseatingly loud sex. Hah-hah! Hope that creeps him out.

Next, someone smashed the security gate, which in reality is nothing more than a two-by-four painted white. It stayed broken for about a month before being repaired. Less than a week later, someone smashed it again.

This routine has been repeated several times over the last year. Sometimes someone smashes the gate, and sometimes they just break and stay in the "up" position.

When combined with our upstairs neighbor, the constant shortage of parking spots, and the propensity of both our refrigerator and our dishwasher to suddenly, unexpectedly dump several gallons of water into the kitchen floor, it's not hard to conclude that "luxury apartments" are no different than regular old dumpy apartments.

Whoever invented apartments should be punched in the throat...

Saturday, July 19, 2008

A Paying Gig? Yeah, Right...

I swear, man... Just when I think I'm right where I'm supposed to be, I go and see a live show, and it completely throws my world into a tailspin...

The wife is in Las Vegas this weekend, so I'm a "bachelor" for a few days, right? An acquaintance of mine had a CD release party tonight at a local club and I thought, for a change, I'd actually go and check it out. I wanted to support her show, you know?

So, I showed up early, hoping some of the friends I invited might show up, too. They didn't.

There I am, the old guy all by himself at the bar. Waiting. Waiting for the show to start, with no one to talk to. Drinking Heineken. All alone. One Heine after another. I began to think about how this acquaintance actually asked me to be her drummer at one point.

Of course, since I'm a complete dumb-ass, I turned her down. Now, sitting on a barstool watching her and her band perform, I realize that I missed out on a great opportunity. She's playing precisely the style of music I'd love to be playing right now.

Then another realization hit me: I have no confidence in my abilities as a drummer. She probably would have replaced me by now, anyway, and I'd still be right here, right now, whining about this situation.

So........I need to drink some water, put a little food into my stomach, go to bed, and forget about ever playing drums anywhere other than at church on Sundays...

Tuesday, July 15, 2008

Monday on Tuesday...

Yeah, yeah, yeah, maybe I'm trying too hard with the title. But, who cares? Today was one of those days when, as a Christian, I am spending a lot of energy trying to decide whether today is just one of "those days", or if God is trying to tell me something.

It all started...well, it all started last night, when I got really, really, really sleepy and went to bed. Shortly thereafter I became wide awake. I tossed, I turned. I tossed some more. I lay on my back. I lay on my stomach. I lay on my right side...then my left. I tied myself into the shape of a pretzel. I counted sheep. I counted bulldozers. But, no matter what I did, I could not go to sleep.

So, around 10:00, I heaved myself out of bed and moved it to the couch, where I felt around in the dark until I found the remote. Pushing the power button, I said to myself, "Let the channel flipping begin!" The channel flipping didn't end until after midnight, when I couldn't push the channel button any more and decided to move it to the computer, where I checked on my eBay auctions. I inherited an expensive watch from my grandfather, and, since the wife and I are house-hunting, I decided to listed it along with another vintage watch I own. That led me to think about all the cool "stuff" I could get with the money I make from the sale of the watches...

...until I got tired of that.

Back to bed I went, where I lay for another half-hour or so before finally sinking beneath the waves of sleep, where I had a series of violently bizarre dreams. Until the alarm went off at 6:00. I got out of bed and did my usual morning routine of stumbling around the bedroom trying to get ready for the day. It was considerably more difficult this morning due to my lack of sleep, but I eventually made it to work.

My patience was at an all-time low, which corresponded nicely with the onslaught of phone calls and emails I got. I felt completely exhausted and drained the entire day, as if I was in a fog. Food and drink tasted strange, and there was a haze around me, like I was covered in cheesecloth or something...

Until my wife called me and said she was broken down on the side of the interstate; that snapped me out of it. I leaped into "Husband-Protecting-His-Wife" mode and ran out of the office. During the high-speed drive to get to her, my tired brain was embroiled in a struggle with whether or not to get mad at God for "doing this to me". I don't think God sits in Heaven and chortles over our misfortune. On the contrary, I think everything happens for a reason from which we can benefit if we're willing to be patient. I just couldn't figure this out. What was God trying to tell me?

I mean, of the two vehicles I own, I would have expected my Ford Exploder (yes, I meant to call it an Exploder), whom I lovingly refer to as "Eleanor", to die first. I would have bet everything I own that my wife's Honda Civic, which has only 114,000 miles on it, wouldn't have bit the dust first. But, based on the wife's description of what happened, that's exactly what it sounded like. She talked of the car shaking, sputtering, lurching, clattering, and thumping. I convinced myself that the engine had thrown a rod or something.

So, I finally reached her car and made a death-defying u-turn in the median. Seriously, it was death-defying. You should have seen it! I was actually proud of my Eleanor. Anyway, I pulled up to the car, got out, and turned the key to my wife's Civic.

Vroooooom! Started right up. I mashed the accelerator. Vroooooom, vroooooom! Sounded like it always has: like a little four-cylinder. My wife and I stared at each other and shrugged.

I drove the car home, fully expecting the engine/transmission to fall out onto the road at any second, only to have the car run perfectly all the way home. The only quirk was that the ubiquitous "check engine" light won't go off.

So, now I'm home, typing this, still trying to figure out why everything that happened over the last 18-hours happened. My initial gut reaction is that the watches will sell. And I'll spend every cent on fixing the wife's car...

Hmm...

Wednesday, July 9, 2008

Quotes and Mispronunciations by Mumbles

Typical statements made by Mumbles, as they sound to me:

"Chore and score the floor some more..."

"Sheeba-shabba-shooba-shabba..."

"Clean um for a fistful uh googen..."

"Ah had uh dang ol' flattop since 19-and-65..."

Typical mispronunciations by Mumbles of relatively simple words:

Actual word: Walmart Mumbles' version: Walmark

Actual word: hereditary Mumbles' version: herditatory

Actual word: sever Mumbles' version: severe

...more to follow...

Thursday, July 3, 2008

R.I.P. Big Daddy

My friend, my "big brother", Robert Bardsley passed away Tuesday afternoon, July 1, 2008. I will miss him, but at the same time, I'm glad his suffering is now over and he is finally Home...

Tuesday, July 1, 2008

Ms. Gollum SnailiVader

Gollum SnailiVader is a nickname developed over time by me and a few of my coworkers for a particular member of our staff. This...employee...is in her mid-60's and has the metabolism of someone in her mid-90's.

If she sits still for more than two minutes, she's asleep. And I don't mean dozing; I mean she is in REM-stage sleep, drooling all over herself. But, that's not the worst of it.

It's what she does when she's awake that drives us all insane. What is that, you ask? I'll tell you!

But, before I tell you about that, let me explain her nickname. The "SnailiVader" surname actually evolved from "Snailigator", which is an animal that stays in a constant state of hunger because it is too slow to actually catch something to eat. Gollum's last name remained "Snailigator" until the day someone in the office mentioned her excessively loud and raspy breathing being similar to that of Darth Vader. Nobody knows exactly who changed Snailigator to SnailiVader. We just know that Gollum's last name is better than it used to be.

Now for her first name: Gollum. Some of you may recognize the name as it appears in the Lord of the Ring books and movies. Gollum was a pathetic little creature who had this chronic, hacking cough that actually sounded like, "gollum...gollum..." Thus the name. Now you know where I'm going with this, don't you? Ms. SnailiVader is afflicted with a similar condition, although it's not really a cough, per se. What she's actually doing is, well...hocking up a "loogie", which she promptly swallows. She does this several hundred times each day.

So, now you know why her name is what it is. Now I'll tell you what she does when she's awake.

She doesn't do anything. This mouth-breathing knuckle-dragger sits at her desk and vacillates between playing solitaire, checking the online obituaries, and having a pleasant conversation with herself. She used to have duties, but, one by one, The Boss took them away from her due to her utter incompetence.

Why hasn't she been fired, you ask? Silly private-sector employee, we are State government employees, that's why! Gollum can't be fired! Oh, sure The Boss could have written her up the required amount of times, which would have led to some sort of "formal reprimand". Then, The Boss could've continued to write her up, which may have eventually led to a Civil Service hearing, which may have resulted in Ms. SnailiVader finally being fired, but...I suppose she would rather just take the easy road and dump all of Gollum's former duties on the rest of the staff.

That worked for awhile, until The Boss finally began to hear the rumblings of dissent coming from the staff. She knew she had to do something about Gollum. So, at long last, The Boss had a "fire & brimstone" meeting with Ms. SnailiVader, reassigning one of her former duties with the requirement that she pay attention to what she's doing and earn her paycheck. Not surprisingly, Gollum called in sick the next day, ostensibly in protest to the new requirements.

Gollum's next day at work started with her stomping into the office, pouting like an 8-year-old, and attempting to start her day by playing a freaking game of solitaire! After discovering that the games had all been removed from her computer, she begrudgingly began working. She was not, however, having her usual pleasant conversation with herself. Hell, no. She was now having a bitter argument with herself, punctuated occasionally by her standing up and flopping violently back down into her chair.

Luckily for us, that only lasted two days. But it's obvious that she longs for the days when she could play computer games, sleep, and ignore the phone when it rang, because she now has a hearing problem when she answers the phone. Her greeting sounds something like this, "Uh...gollum...gollum...*gulp*...(name of business)...gollum...can I help you? Huh? Huh?!? I can't hear you...gollum...gollum...You're gonna have to speak up, I can't hear what you're saying..." I am convinced that she does this on purpose in an effort to convince The Boss that she shouldn't be allowed to answer the phones, and I'll bet that day is coming.

After being banned from answering the phones, her next mission will be to get out of having to answer the office's front door. I'm thinking she'll formulate some nasty habit to engage in just as she's opening the door, like digging in her nose or digging in her cottage-cheese butt crack, which will induce the gag reflex of whoever she's letting in the front door. After that happens a few times, or after The Boss sees her do it once or twice, she'll ban Ms. SnailiVader from answering the front door.

Then, the diabolical plan of Ms. Gollum SnailiVader will be complete: She'll once again have, at the direction of The Boss, nothing to do...