If it's tit for tat, I chose tit.

I worry about the beeswax in my wings.

…

Sometimes, I’ll write something and then change it from the truth to a little bit of better writing.


I can smell the beeswax on her angel wings.

dreams and homicide

I finished my task and was about to leave. We were in very close proximity. I moved a little closer, close enough to make my intention known. I half expected her to move ever so slightly away but she didn't. I tilted my head slightly to my right and moved closer still, our lips were almost touching.

I wondered what my breathe was like but figured it was too late to back out now. My plan was to kiss she and wait to see her response and then go from there. I gave her a slightly firm kiss and waited, or tried to wait but she replied with a firmer kiss that pulled at my top lip when she broke it. I really didn't have a next step in place if she hadn't returned the kiss so I gave a slight smile in relief before we kissed again.

After the third kiss, I lowered my head, moving my lips away from hers. I knew that no amount of kissing was going to satisfy my desire and I thought reaching for more was too much to ask.

Then I heard, "But it's just a dream. You're allowed to go further. You are allowed to go as far as you want. You are expected not to limit your dreams." The voice in my head was right. It was just a dream and I knew it but I could feel her breathe on my face, I could feel her lips slight tug on mine, I could taste her kiss. Continuing the dream was an option, I could still feel her waiting presence; sometimes I can direct my dreams and the 'camera' was still rolling.

I ended up rolling over which was like as if the electric cord was wrapped around me and my rolling pulled the plug right from the wall. The dream ending in the fading light.

That voice that was in my head just throw up his arms in disbelievement and disgust.

I couldn't blame him.

sponge cake

so, there I was, trading baking tips with her while I really wanted to trade bodily fluids.

What's a Had Hat?

He walked into my cube and asked if I knew so-and-so. I thought for a moment because the name he said wasn't like Harry Williams but more like Dutchy O'Neil and the latter is more like a bunch of other odd ball nicknames that folks from my hometown are refer to by but I didn't know the guy he mentioned and I said so.

"Oh, I thought you knew him."

"Yeah, nope. I don't."

"Well, he took two to the back of the head at M Street beach, this morning."

"Wow."

"Yeah. He was in and out of jail his whole life. I just thought you knew him."

My home was in the neighborhood but I never felt that my hometown was my home, as soon as I left my front steps, I was a foreigner.

I never drank on the corner. I never did drugs. I never tried to completely pound the life out of someone during a fight. I never had any first hand dealings with the mob. I never personally knew most of the guys with the odd nicknames. I never hated someone based solely on race.

One on one, the guys were fine with me but in a group, I was an outsider. I never bought into what was required to fit in. I dropped using double negatives but you can still tell where I'm from if I say something about a hard heart.

I think 'crazy' is contagious

I miss her when she’s not there and I miss her a little less when she is.

...

I certainly wouldn’t welcome it but I’m not certain that I fear death. But then I'm not certain that I brave live, either.

That statement above is not really me. I was just thinking what the opposite of fearing death was and even though braving life sounds like it might not be correct, it is, at least grammatically.

I actually write a lot of things that are not me at the core but they may have a kernel of truth to them. A kernel of something that I wish to deal with and I can see it better if I view it from the outside at a magnified level.

I draw a lot of technically correct drawings; actuate drawings to scale, lines and arcs at precise locations. There are drawing aids that assist in the creation of these drawings but sometimes the drawing aids give you what looks right at a distance but when you zoom in on what is supposed to be an intersection, you can see that the lines don’t actually touch or touch in slightly the wrong place, which makes the drawing technically wrong.

Wrong close up is still wrong at a distance even if it’s unnoticed. Sometimes it doesn’t matter but sometimes it does.

…

So the crazy receptionist told me that next week she is going to buy a new shirt for the bear, one that lights up for Christmas. She then goes on and tells me that I can save the Halloween one for next year or I could give the shirt to her and she would save it for next year. She then assured me that the new shirt would be cute and that the bear is my baby and I can do what I want with it.

I would dress the bear in normal clothes and not dress him up like a holiday freak.

…

So, the crazy guy steps into my cube.

“Hey, you know those playground sign layout guidelines that you came up with?”

“I didn’t come up with them but I know what you’re talking about?”

“What?!”

“I did not come up with them and I don’t want any association with coming up with them, but I know what you're talking about.”

“Well, remember the playground you chose in Dorchester?”

“I remember the location but I didn’t choose it.”

Dude, stop trying to pin that bullshit on me. We were told to do something that we both personally disagreed with and I did it because we were told to, and you’re incompetent. I still don’t agree with it.

“Well, I was out with the boss and he wants to just put up the playground sign on Irving Street without the 20 miles per hour sign before it because there is no place to put it. So, I want to put a 20 MPH sign under it. Can I do that?”

“A regular 20 MPH sign or an advisory 20 MPH sign?”

“There is no place to put a 20 MPH sign before the playground sign because the street is too small and the street lights are the old gas lamp style so there is no room. Can I put a 20 MPH sign below the playground sign?”

“Yeah, I know, but are you planning on using a regular black & white 20 MPH sign under the playground sign or an advisory speed limit sign under the playground sign?”

He stared blankly at me trying to get his brain to work. So, I continued.

“Because, if you use a regular 20 MPH sign, no matter where you put it, you need to give an advance warning for it, so you'll have to put a warning sign prior to it. If you use an advisory speed sign, then you do not have to give prior warning.”

“Oh. I’m going to use an advisory sign, that’s not enforceable,” he said not as a revelation or a declaration but as answer to my previous question.

“Then you can put it below the playground sign.”

I actually tell people I'm genius quite frequently but really, at best, I'm just cleaver

So, I was given a bear from Build-A-Bear because I’m such a great guy. It was given to me by the receptionist; the receptionist that for the most part drives me crazy. At Build-A-Bear, you build your own bear, you stuff it and dress it and I imagine there are other steps involved. She dressed it in blue jeans and a jersey shirt. The jersey shirt was emblazoned with “Happy Halloween.”

She could have picked whatever she wanted for a shirt but she chose Halloween for a motif even though as she explained to me that she doesn’t like Halloween. Once Halloween had passed, she said she was going to get a new shirt for the bear and when she tried, the shirt didn’t fit. So, the other day, after being tired of seeing “Happy Halloween,” I turned the shirt inside out, so now he’s wearing what looks like just a plain orange shirt.

The receptionist saw what I did and told me that she liked my creativity. I replied, “Yeah, I’m a genius.”

If I think it's funny and ridiculous, chances are I'm going to say it.

I baked some bread on Veterans’ Day. I baked enough for the house and then whatever else would fit in the oven. The total was six medium size loaves. I like the medium size loaves because mostly it means you don’t have to worry about a whole loaf of bread being started.

Despite the holiday, I still was committed to drop by the second job. In between my house and where the second job is located, is my friend Joe. Joe will usually cook for his family when he’s at home so I dropped two loaves to him and brought a loaf to the owner of the Real Estate company, to were I was heading.

Baking a double batch of bread isn’t too much more effort than baking the one, and I’m sure that it saves a bunch of the natural gas that powers my oven, so if I know I’m going to be baking and have a convenient way of unloading the bread, I’ll bake extra because I’m good like that.

But I still have reservations about just showing up to someone’s house with fresh baked bread even though if a trusted baker showed up at my door, I would happily take whatever was offered.

It would be more convenient giving away bread if I had an actual relationship with my direct neighbors.

…

I was there with a Sprite on ice trying to decide what I wanted off of the menu when he walked in. He sat at the bar next to me.

“Hey, you’re right on time. It’s two for one entrees on Tuesday. We can get a free entree. It will be like a date.” The bartender laughed a little but he was not amused.

“It would be like a what?”

“Like a date,” I repeated and then added, “Don’t worry; I know that you are happily married.”

I think offering two for one entrees on Tuesday in a bar in the Financial District in the capital city of Massachusetts is a little bit silly. I don’t think it is a big draw but maybe I’m wrong.

He then asked me what an entree was.

I pointed to the entree section of the menu.

We didn’t get two entrees for the price of one. I just ordered an appetizer to the disappointment of the newly pouting bartender. He just devoured two baskets of free tortilla chips.

He quietly complained to me later when he was handed a bill for $6.00 for four beers; he claimed he only had three.

we speak through glances

“Obnoxious,” is all she said with a slight tilt of her head towards the guys sitting at the end of the bar.

“I’ve kind of miss that.”

“What?!”

“Come on, some of that stuff is funny,” I said but I could tell by her look that she didn’t agree so I added, “Well maybe not funny for you.”

“Yeah, definitely not funny for me.”

“But the guy just seriously said that he’s a meatball aficionado. That’s funny.”

Nov 10

I don’t know if I’m going to make it. I’m letting the things that he does drive me crazy.

For sixty two years old, he’s rather immature.

So, I just confirmed that I didn’t finish the crazy guy phone call story.

There a phone line that rings on everyone’s desk in the division. We usually give this number out because that’s the best change to get to leave a message because the chances are greater that someone will be at their desk, then the receptionist picking up the phone.

I pick up the ringing line and the person asks for the crazy guy by name. I can’t hear the crazy guy at his desk at that moment but I think that he is still around so I ask, “Who’s calling.” The guy on the phone answers, “Virgil.”

I know Virgil. I’ve dealt with him in the past. Virgil is a little bit of a cook and a whole lot of a pain in the ass. I certainly don’t want to deal with him so I get up from my chair to go find the crazy guy.

I don’t even leave my cube when I see the crazy guy sitting in someone else’s cube trying to figure out his cell phone; the same cell phone that he has had for at least two years.

I tell him who is on the phone. “I’m not talking to him,” he said, which was fine by me. I was just going to take a message but then he continued.

“He’s looking to get some signs replaced that were damaged in the fire so he needs to talk to someone else. So, I’m not going to talk to him.”

“Fine, but does he know that?”

“He sent me an email the other day. I’m not talking to him.”

“Yeah, but my question is: Does he know that? Does he know that he needs to talk to someone else? Did you actually tell him that?”

I want to know what was said to Virgil so that I can handle it appropriately. He’ll get more patience from me if I know he hasn’t talked to anyone before but if he’s just trying to get around the system then he will get less patience.

The crazy guy then gets out of his chair and talks to Virgil on the phone, which is what he should have done in the first place. From the conversation that I hear, he never told the guy what he needed to do.

Sidenote: The crazy guy also thinks that if he doesn’t actually open an email then he doesn’t have to respond to it. “Yeah, I saw your email but I was working on other things so I didn’t read it.”

“Yeah, electric company, I saw your bill but I was using my money to buy Keno tickets so I didn’t open it.”

“So you received our bill but didn’t pay it?”

“Yeah, I received it, but I didn’t open it. Aren’t you listening?”

eh

On Tuesdays for the second job, I go right from the day job. I hop on a bus which drops me off literally right next door. I do this because I am no longer a resident of that neighborhood so I can't park my vehicle on the street for long periods of time, so instead of worrying about getting a ticket, I just use my monthly public transportation pass to get me where I need to be. One of the downsides is that I have to leave before bus service stops but that is also an upside.

Anyway, I walked through the door, I'm greeted and then informed that the information that I need to do my job hasn't been provide yet and then I'm complemented on the design work that I did over the weekend.

Can you guess which happenstance I had a problem with?

Not the greeting.

Not the info that I needed was missing.

But the complement.


I hate being complemented by people for whom I have little respect. But what can I say? I would love to say, "Fuck you," but that's very, very, extremely rude and most witnesses would think I'm the asshole, if I said that, so I just said, "Thanks."

"Nice Job, Timmy."

"What the fuck do you know about anything? Much less about print design. Go fuck yourself."

There is just too much anger over nothing sometimes but I don't suffer fools lightly.

"Oh Timmy's such a nice man."

"No, Timmy is not. It's just that often he controls himself."

It's a little weird, sometimes

So, I write more 'posts' then you actually get to see. I don't publish them because I think the story sucks, the storytelling suck and the writing ain't far behind the storytelling.

Anyway, I posted those things below because they sort of coincide with someone I read, and whenever that happens I look to see who wrote what first to see who's coping who but sometimes people just write about similar things or say the similar phrase like 'I don't talk politics' or explain why some people don't/can't eat bread no matter how good that bread is when someone else has said that if you don't like good bread, then you have no soul but with the caveat that possibly that statement isn't true if the person has a medical reason for not eating bread, and all these things were done independently of each other.

(I do think you're psychic but I'm okay with you reading my thoughts)

I wrote this on November 9th and did publish it, although I don't know why

It’s like dealing with the mentally ill.

Probably because the guy genuinely has a mental illness, even if he never seriously admits it.

He got upset during the card game when it was his deal. He was slightly confused at how we were betting so the total bet would be three one dollar bets for a total of three dollars. He thought that it was only going to be two dollars total.

We bet the say way all the time and we have been doing so for the last seven years.

He threw his cards onto the table and said, “That’s it! I’m through! I shouldn’t even be playing. My mind is not in it.”

His cards landed face down, so we had him pick them up again and we finished the hand.

He was sitting next to me and leaned over and asked what the problem was.

“The problem is that none of us know why you are all upset about it.”

“It’s a friendly card game. Relax,” someone across the table added.

There was another hand where a straight was the highest hand called using a called wild card and the dude is still trying to decipher what’s in his hand. We play “cards talk,” which means that if you show your cards and your hand is the winning hand, whether you know it or not, you win, and we always tell him to just show his cards and he continues to not show his cards.

So, the guy with the winning hand starts to take his chips, so the dude tosses his cards onto the table, most hit face down but I get a glimpse at all of them and he had a full house.

I should have told him he lost because he refused to show his cards in time but we let him win anyway.

I need to me meaner. I need to go more with that first instinct to be mean.

So, I answered the common phone line in work and it’s for the crazy guy

I wrote this on November 8th and didn't publish it

I feel that it would be best for me to leave.

I feel that she gives me no reason to stay.

1986.

24 years.

It’s a long time.

.

I baked bread for the card game. I thought it was a good loaf but it wasn’t my best. I felt that the flavor was a little muted but then I was fighting a cold; the problem could have been with my taste buds.

Everyone else said that the bread was great.

“Why don’t you sell this?” or “You could do this for a living,” usually follows after people find out some of my talents.

The reason I don’t is because the moment that you take money for something there is a contract to perform and when I “have to” do something, I no longer enjoy it.

I’ve also had my own business for awhile and the convenience and the benefits didn’t outweigh the hassles and headaches.

And you can’t bake professionally from your home kitchen, not in the City of Boston, anyway.

“Oh, you beat the rest of us at poker. Why don’t you play poker professionally?”

Isn’t that a ridiculous question?

The bread was an addition to what I had promised to bring, I brought it to show off and also to share some very good bread.

Very good bread is a great thing. If you think that bread is bread, you are ignorant. If you don’t like bread, absent of any medical conditions, then you lack a good bit of soul.

I actually share bread mostly so others get to experience it and not so much to show off because I always let people know that the ingredients are just flour, water, yeast and salt and that I bake it in just a regular oven. Although, there is also barley malt in the dough and my oven is tricked out with baking tiles and a cast iron pan that I use to create steam.

But, I think that it’s basically simple. It just takes time and attention and both are rather forgiving. A lot of good bread baking is just waiting for the yeast to do its thing.

One of the guys started taking about how his wife and daughters will sometimes purchase premade bread dough and place two loaves worth together to make one big loaf and that there are tricks to get the bread to rise quickly.

“So, you’re giving me bread baking advice?” is what I thought but what I said was, “With good bread, you don’t want a quick rise.”

His reply was, “Oh.”

I doubt that he knows what good bread is.

I wrote this on November 1st and didn't publish it

It’s mostly moments of failing charter mixed with moments of what could be misconstrued as greatness.

We need a better plan for Halloween 2011.

I’ve always been told that my nieces would prefer not to trick-or-treat but the oldest one told me something different while we were passing out candy, so we found a bad for her and her sisters and took then to a couple houses.

Also, I have a large front lawn, so the front door isn’t close to the sidewalk, so there is a bit of a walk involved, so some people won’t make the effort to walk to the door, so we’ll sit on the short retaining wall were our property meets the sidewalk. Next year, we’re staying in our house. I would rather throw candy away than free my ass off for four hours.

Also, it’s hard to socialize when you’re 75 feet or so from the house.

.

The craziness in work that stated late Friday morning continued into Monday morning.
Sometimes, politics dictate my work load.
It seems some folks are scared.

.

I don’t talk politics much here because I don’t like politics. I think it’s important to vote and I think it’s important to know what you’re voting for; I also think that if you want change or even if you don’t want change, you have to be willing to invest more than just your vote.

I don’t talk politics much anywhere but if they come up, I’ll respond.

I wish there were more viable political parties in the United States.

.

I think this stuff is a chore to read.

I guess I gotta read it now

I tend to procrastinate. It may be due to my arrogance but I think mostly: I'm just lazy. It's hard for me to self motivate. So I was up past one finishing those reports because I'm a volunteer treasure for some nonprofit.

I could have done then after I finished diner which consisted of meatloaf, mash potatoes and carrots. It was important to use some of the ingredients today or else I would be too busy later in the week and things would spoil. But after diner I sat in the room with the TV and started to doze off, I didn't fight it too much because I figure that I could use the rest because I fighting off the start of a cold.

I finished the reports and then went to the kitchen and then passed where all the mail gets put. I check the mail earlier so I was surprised to see a box there.

In the box was a copy of John Steinbeck's "East of Eden." It was sent be someone with a very cool phone.



In my mind, I like Steinbeck, even though I've only read two of his books but I sort of remember reading something about him, on why he wrote, that made me like him but I can't remember what that something was.

Thanks for the book Cool Phone User.

I'll get to it when I get to it

I walked through the door and the second greeting from the five folks in the room was: "How's your backup?"

There are two guests in the room so I have to be civil so I merely ask: "Why?"

I was then told that the owner deleted some stuff from the front desk computer and one thing that went was a program that was needed.

"I don't backup program files; I save the install disks."

"So, we will have to start from scratch and reset everything up?" someone else asked.

"It depends on where you were saving the files. Just because you delete the program files doesn't mean that you delete the data files."

They rarely do what I ask them to do so when I shit hits the fan, I don't sweat their inconvenience too much and the lady that dropped the backup question on me is the worst at doing what I say, mostly because she thinks she knows better. She mostly just knows what people tell her, all her knowledge is second hand and when I challenge her on things her defense is always that she was told that by someone.

I'll get to it when I get to it.