Still too hot

Well, after my 15 hr coma last night, I got up, made a damn tasty veggie & meat breakfast burro with extra hot peppers (which I'll regret later...), checked my emails & got my daily computer fix. After which, I felt like getting out and doing something despite the 108 degrees today. I got my gear on, aired my tires and turned on the ipod for a 10 mile bike ride.

It started off well as within the first 1/2 mile, some wannabe hot shot bike commuter on his cruiser, wearing slacks and a tie decided he wanted to try and dust me. Well, he did...then he ran out of juice a 1/4 mile later as I warmed up and got my cadence going enough to zoom past him and hold a pace. Poor lower management boy tried to catch up, but the only times he actually got close enough to taste matching me is when I stopped for stop signs. He ran through them all and it would have been even sweeter justice if a cop was nearby...

Anyways, I turned south and rode 3 miles off road along the canal path system. That's when I didn't like breakfast any longer. Spicy heartburn and veggies don't taste good coming up, but it is good for searing your throat with hot lava acid. That sucked. Eventually I drank enough water and slowed enough to manage it. On the way home it wasn't the heartburn that kicked my ass, but the heat and the usual numbing of my hands and lower arms that comes with riding and being too top heavy on my chest and shoulders.

That's the part of riding that sucks. I really do like bike riding, but after 6-8 miles my arms go numb. I don't have that problem with cruisers obviously, but I can't exactly get a good ride or go off road on a 3 speed beach cruiser.

I'm home, sweaty and ready for a relaxing night. I still need to see if I work tomorrow or not.

My most addictive habit

I slept for 15 hours last night. Me in my little dark cave in the extra bedroom that I sleep in during the summer because the room is coolest then. Jenny is out just as much as I am when I'm in my cave. I can't help it, I just love sleeping. Fact of the matter was that I could have easily gone on longer today but my phone went off waking me up.

I suppose being asleep has underlying reasons for me. One, I'm a lazy SOB and just plain like it too much. Two, my bed isn't exactly the most comfortable one for me anymore, so it takes longer to feel at ease and get solid rest. Thirdly, I think sleep is more of an escape for me. I have no responsibilities when I sleep. Its like a at ease 10+ hour vacation from what is now, again, my repetitive boring existence in this state. In my dreams, which are honestly more engaging when nothing exciting happens in real life, I literally can live a "dream life". AS of lately too, I've been bored around home with not too many people hanging out, and its caused my dreams to be more and more lucid. I've had dreams lately where my adrenalin has me pumped up enough that I've woken up to see my bedding thrown off. Whether it be fighting dreams, falling, flying or running, my dreams have been really interactive. So much so that I'm a little upset when I wake up because the dream never finished.

I travel alot in my dreams, almost always by foot, and I'm usually trying to find a location or something or leaving a area because I don't want someone to find me. I'm not in a panic when I am in those situations, I'm calm and collected, and actually methodical enough in my dreams to consciously (in my subconscious) work out a solution.

I like to sleep because it gives me total freedom to live a life that I am not currently achieving in reality.

The downside, usually I do not find my goals, destinations or objects sought in my dreams. It's my subconscious making myself aware of my unmotivation in real life. Regardless, sleep for me is addictive. Its not that I need that many hours of sleep to function daily, that is covered by about 5-6 hours. It's the lazy pleasure of being out cold.

It's not like I could really do anything outdoors like I want anyways, since it won't be under 105 degrees until late September. In certain aspects, summertime is hibernation time for the big bear. The irony is that until I moved out here, I relished summertime. No school, playing outside all day, going out to the beach, the park, the mall or just on a long walk. Now you have the real fear of heat stroke, 3rd degree sunburn and exploding on contact with the pavement.

Sleep seems like a good alternative to that right now.

busted foot?

I have no idea what happened or even if I did anything, but apparently a week ago i accquired a deep tisue or a bone bruise on the bottom right part of my right foot. It doesn't really bug me, but when I sit shoeless and even barely touch it, I know its there. I know I had no drunken stumbles, no falls or anything, so its a weird mystery. It has subsided a bit in the past couple of days, but man it boggles me.

Ol' W aint that bad....

Oh, G.W. aint that bad...he's just a good old boy enjoying the olympics...I'd be enjoying the scenery too. Besides, you know Laura Bush was over watching the men's matches.

38 special- a short story

My hands are almost raw, yet I still think that my shirt and hands still taste of crimson after scrubbing them for so long. I never knew that this stain was so hard to get out! Persistently egged on my that cursed ringing in my ears! Apparently if you own a Honda, that sickly horn comes along with it and exists to endlessly torment other's souls with that sound of a diseased squeak toy. It wouldn't let up! I tried to drown it out, but the radio just wasn't doing its job. That mutated squeal came through the closed windows and permeated through the radio at full volume. Then came the screams. The cursing of my dear mother. Last I checked I wasn't a son of a dirty whore, but apparently today I was.

It was one of my favorite shirts too. The white one with the pseudo tribal graphic that I got on vacation last year. It didn't make me look fat, as white shirts usually do, but instead it hung loosely in the right places and clung snugly to emphasise the better areas. Now I think its ruined. Should I burn it? Just tossing it may come back to haunt me. Yes, I should burn it. Besides, if I scrub any harder, I'll just start staining it in my own blood.

To think it started off as such a normal happy day. I slept in, got up, had a big bowl of Happy O's while I watched whatever tragic news occurred while I slept. The usual overnite calamities; a house fire on the east side, a shooting resulting in one death in a strip mall parking lot and one suicide in an affluent north side housing community. Apparently spending all of mommy and daddy's cash to live the rock and roll lifestyle couldn't cancel out poor Chip's lack of purpose in life so he checked out with 10 times the normal dose of depressants. The newscaster said there was a suicide note, probably along the lines of " Goodbye cruel world, I forgive you daddy for molesting me when I was 6...yadda yadda yadda".

My cell phone is ringing again. it's been going off for the past 3 hours straight. No doubt it's work for me not showing up today. Well I'm sure that cock of a manager at Freddy's can find another stockworker to shelve and price point cans of corn for him. Todd...that putz of a manager. I'm sorry, but anyone named Todd has got a deathwish. Every Todd I knew has been a giant bag of douche. I bet its on his birth certificate.

First Name: Todd.

Middle Name: Bag O'.

Surname: Douche.

To think I actually was motivated enough to come to work early. I had my reasons. I was even going to bring my friend to work today, and Mr Todd was going to hear exactly what my friend was going to tell him. Just my luck we never got to have our little "talk". It was all that idiot's fault in that Honda!

I know for a fact that my turn signal was on to go into his lane! I gave him plenty of room, but I guess I cut too close inside his little bubble. That damn horn! I ignored it for about a quarter of a mile before I was stuck in front of him at a light. He was so persistent! There wasn't any more short beep beeps. It was as if he took vengeance by laying on that horn for a minute straight.

"Beeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep!"

"I am not a son of a whore!" I screamed.

I just stared ahead, trying as hard as I can to tune it out. It was relentless! Like a tiny weevil bored in my ear carrying a tiny chalkboard to run nails all over it in my head. Then it just stopped. It was peaceful again, yet tense. It reminded me of growing up during hurricane season in Galveston. One would blow in for a few days, but for a hour or so when you ride in the eye, the chaos just stops. Yet you know more crap is coming your way. You just know it.

The hurricane came back. I got startled back into reality by a hammering on my driver's window. A plethora of profanities erupted out of the man's sweaty, greasy inbred mouth that would make a pirate blush. My adrenalin was going into my veins at an explosive rate. I think one of the last lucid memories I have is of rolling down the window and seeing his doughboy hands reach through and grab my shirt.

I vaguely remember the sound of my shirt collar start to rip a bit. I guess my friend had enough and had to do something. I saw a flash of white light. I guess that's where I blacked out. Next thing I knew, I'm here hovered over the bathroom sink, scrubbing my shirt and hands raw.

I really need to burn it. Maybe in doing so it will get that sulfuric metallic saltpeter smell out of my nostrils. I have to get this done. Phone's ringing again.

There's a knock at the door now too. I stick my head out the bathroom door and look out the window down the hall to see the back end of a black sedan parked out front. As long as its not a Honda I don't think my friend will cause any more problems. I'll have to burn the shirt after I get the door.

Desperate Housewives vs. The Real World

I swear...as of late my neighborhood has been the focal point of a daytime soap opera reality show. As of late, the current situation, rumors included with reality are that there are 2 divorces occurring, not directly resulting from numerous interneighboorly affairs with opposite spouses. The victims of the infidelity aren't really doing anything about it because, well when they aren't busy embezzling dead relatives money...they are being unfaithful to thier spouses too with varying outside parties including one "interior decorator" hired by a neighboor and having affairs with two of my neighbours as she cheats on her husband. One other neighboor had gangrene of the gall bladder and nearly died before emergency surgery and another neighboor, I am convinced is running a puppy mill. One neighboors kid may be dating a Mexican national "aka illegal". Ironically, his father works for a government agency shuttling illegals back to their country of origin.

Yet another neighboor is a nationally known "girly" doctor who is really big here in AZ as well as Hollywood and the nation who has been dumping insane amounts of cash into his house that he never lives in because when he's not sleeping in his office, or his wife or his girlfriend, he's spending the weekend at his "church"...aka some weird scientology commune out of town.

So, in retrospect...there are 6 cheaters, one hired help multi-cheater, one hospital patient, a cooky religious cultist ob-gyn, a botox infused money stealing cheating gold digger, possible illegal immigrant, multiple divorces and all around dysfunctionality.

Then there's me. Man it feels good to be Switzerland. All I do bad is stay up late with a friend or two having a beer and grilling out in the yard.

Flakes, not the kind you eat.

Its a simple premise that all should stand by in order to make yourself a respectable and honorable person. If you commit to something, don't back out on it. It is by far the largest pet peeve of mine, the flake. It encompasses all elements around me, work, family and personal. You are supposed to show up on time, and in fact, just show up. The whole no call no show for your shift at work is really disrespectful, not only to your bosses, but to your co-workers who now have to either stay longer or work doubles to cover your butt. If you don't like working somewhere, that's your prerogative, but quit in a respectful manner and see your stuff through.

As for more personal connections. I'm glad to say that those around me who committed to things and then did not show up have had the decency to call or contact me saying that they can't make it. That's the right thing to do. At least I won't be fuming at the fact that nobody shows up. I may still have a surplus of food and drink or whatever else, but I'll still put it to good use, even if, as of lately, its with myself.

Now I'm going to go off on a tangent about my social life. It's more of an introspective rant than anything else. I find it disconcertingly curious that I'm always the one to contact people to make plans, whether it be to go do something, to party, or just to hang out. Being a "B" type personality, that seems odd to me. The mind reels. Do I smell? Am I not cool enough for others to think of hanging out with me? Am I just being used for my provisions that I wantonly give out without discretion? Am I too old to party with now?

My sincere self knows that I am an entertainer. I love taking pride in the fact that I can, and have taken care of people and give them a good time. It ties in with my passion of foods. In viewing myself in third person, I like to see people enjoy the food as it feeds their soul. But yet, sometimes I have felt that my efforts, while appreciated, are just used by people for its face value and are never reciprocated.

Case in point-when was the last time I actually had a birthday party? Sixteen? Fifteen? I'm going to be 32 in October, which is less than 2 months away. Being 31, this is supposed to be my "golden year", which is complete bullshit. In the past year I've lost a girlfriend, had sick parents, downgraded a couple of friends to "accquaintances", had some ex coworkers try and throw me under the bus at work (didn't work asshole!), quit my job in order to find a bit of self peace only to fail, went back to my old job and have been tryin to crawl back up the financials, had the west nile virus, totally fucked up my right knee, and its been 105+ for the past 2 months.

Well whatever, I'm rambling. The good friends I have are the ones that count.

Rant time

Well now, as today I am 90% recovered from Sunday's debauchery, my head is coherent enough to form proper thoughts and sentences. I put this rant off for 4 days because I've been busy, but it still irks me enough that I can't let it go.

The topic-dog tags.

Here's what I understood what the purpose of wearing dog tags were for. You are an enlisted person in the armed forces. You are in combat and die. When they find your corpse, if they cannot bring it back at the moment, they snap off one of the tags and leave the other one to identify your remains while still confirming your death during combat.

It kind of defeats the purpose of it if you are wearing a bedazzled cubic zirconia Prada dog tag on a sterling silver chain to go along with the rest of your fake millionaire ensemble. Well, that and the fact that you never served.

Case in point 4 days ago where there was a pair of idiots wearing their 30k milli gear playing pong at work. One of them was wearing a 2 sizes too small Affliction shirt to go along with his spikey frosted tips. Adorning his neck was a sparkly jeweled & silvered dog tag, which he was obviously proud of. I suppose he's in his rights to be proud of the fact that he was able to afford the $200 piece. However not as proud as those who devoted priceless years of their lives, families, time, tears, pain, blood and their own lives to proudly earn a set of their own.

Second case in point- about 2 weeks ago, one of the bar regulars was walking outside when she was hit on by another male customer wearing a set of tags outside of his shirt. She questioned him on if he served. He said no. She asked why he was wearing them if he didn't serve, and then proceeded to make him eat the fact that her deceased USMC husband died a year ago in Iraq. Unbelievably...and I quote....his response was....

"But they're GUCCI!"

I almost threw up. After she walked away I overheard his rants to his friends on what the hell was that "crazy bitch's" problem. Again, I stood astonished.

Again, from what I understood, a soldier does not wear them out to be noticed, and chances are, the only way that the soldier gives up his tags is when he dies. On that note, shame on you Scottsdale, shame on you.

That's my rant, and I'm sticking to it.