The funny RL observations and anecdotes thread RPG omnibus

OK, I could have made it very plain by saying how I think about it, maybe using some hand gestures.

So, I make a fist with my RH, and say "this our 'take-away' number, that we're subtracting, called the subtrahend, but that's not important."

Now, with my index finger in the LH I point to the top of my fist and say, "I'm call this our 'index number,' the very top number of our subtrahend. So, it's 13 in our example, right?"

Now, I say, "When we take away our whole number to be subtracted, we're taking all of that number away."

I lower my RH and leave my index finger pointing where it was in mid-air.

"But now we've lost our index, and we need that back, so we're just going to add it back in while leaving the lower numbers gone."

I think that's the best way I could explain it in person.

I don't think that would have been patronizing or "mansplaining" or whatever, just a clear visualization.

Plus, I get to use the word "subtrahend," which I was happy to remember correctly. Really not a word you get to use every day.

ETA Oh, I should have pointed out, so to speak, to her, that the managers when assigning routes to fill up this "spots" on the floor did it wrong and we in fact comfortably have room for 39 vehicles in that section of the warehouse, not 38. So the spreadsheet warriors got it wrong, as well.

Oh yeah, I learned a few day's ago that a ewe or even a lamb's vagina is remarkably similar to a real human one.

As NatalieDee put it, "it has meat flaps and everything."

/////////

Anyway, enough about that.

Oh, the other way to demonstrate the counting "problem" — it amounts to the same, but it's an alternate explanation and is easier to say in a few words. The minuend represents the upper bound. So, continue one past to count the number of "holes" or "places" in your group.

Probably that's the more traditional approach, and is how places in an array in CS are often denoted, where the index is zero. You can just say the terminal spot is (n + 1).

That was very frustrating to not be able to explain it in the heat of the moment, especially while not trying to be a jerk.

ANYWAY, that was a good chance to introspect a bit and think about better ways to explain shit.

Quote:

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Originally posted by Jizzelbin

Amazon has not, to my knowledge, "sacrificed" even ONE person with knowledge of high-school mathematics, let alone any form of ability in scheduling and shortest-path algorithms, in order to provide some idea of direction at any given delivery unit.

---

Actually, I think I just convinced myself this is true, considering their allocation of space in the warehouse and the "off-by-one" type of error typical of people who aren't used to counting, but rely on arithmetic functions blindly.

So, yes, it doesn't affect the total "body count" (i.e., number of vehicles included in each wave of traffic — my own term, thank you very much), but it affects (yes, I know, people like that would probably say something insane and idiotic like "impacts") the potential of each staging effort. When the capacity is significantly larger for larger vehicles...well, it's more important.

It's important enough that the "safety margin" of accounting for accounting errors or counting errors should probably be eliminated.

Although, it's probably true that the expense of training outweighs the +1 error.

I doubt it, though.

Yeah, so I guess sometime last week I did both.

I was trying to explain to one of our floor-level supervisors what the best way to explain it is, and tried out my hand-gesture technique. Meh.

Then maybe the same day or thereabouts I walked up to the break room after having a smoke, with my dry-erase marker in hand and said to that same guy, "Hey, where's a whiteboard around here?"

Yeah, my people tried to get me to write on the roll-down projection screen. I gave them the finger, everyone laughed.

No, I found a small corner of a whiteboard and "proved" the fact by using summation notation.

I'm not going to do the LaTeX codes, but [big sigma], upper bound=23, lower bound, n=13. So, go through one more step (i.e., lower bound n=13-12=1, upper bound = 23-12=11, summation is (n-12)), well, whatever.

It's still there, with my result, alongside some horrid cartoon.

And, yes, the next day, "Hey, John, are you going to give us a math lesson today?"

It's all in fun, and I'm not great at maths or logics, but I think I might have "broken the seal" in terms of saying more than I should have.

Eh, we're all still tight, and I didn't mansplain or anything.

I like my little team of coworkers: we're all like, "Dude, look at that guy go!" and "John, honey, you ain't take that VTO?"

Oh, anyway, so the "fencepost problem" is solved as it has always been, so maybe some of the managerial errors can be handled by me and my team. I just have to remind them that spot 23 on drivelane 2 is not needed, so put it against the bottom wall.

Jesus fucking christ.

Fucking un fucking believable.

Surely, because of water damage to the clubhouse, the pool and clubhouse is temporarily closed.

And yet, when I try to access the clubhouse via the fob, to add money to my laundry card, with that cunt Jacqui inside the property manager's office (it really should be reserved for actual people, not animals like her), I'm denied access.

Well, I guess my best move was to leave, kicking over the orange pylon and return back to two loads of laundry which will never be dried.

I would fuck her in the ass with a goddamned knife.

For fun.

She should have come running to suck my dick or open the door, the amount I pay her, that bleeding, clotted cunt of a shit pile.

Yeah.

Fuck.

Well, PC-7 epoxy sounds about right for her.

What kind of property management company allows its reserves to get so low?

Yep. Pass the savings right on to me.

You motherfucking cornholing sack of sandblasted shit.

Shit. Bitch.

Well, I gave the infamous "Frank" a lift, basically down the street near where I was going anyway, from work. A bunch of us elected to leave work early because of lack of stuff to do.

Goddamned, there really isn't any place to put a passenger in my car, which the amount of books, CDs, tapes, extra jackets and shirts, empty coffee cups, and all that.

For some reason he started off a conversation about how he was diagnosed as bipolar when he was about forty.

Not sure why he wanted to share that particular bit information. Maybe he thinks I'm crazy or something. In fact, no, I'm just an unusually-well-groomed slob and suffer from chronic "don't-give-a-fuck-itis." Although I do work hard at things that interest me, like music, some computer shit, and improving my knowledge of dead languages and bits of theoretical information sciences. It just happens to leave a wake of messy desks and unfiled papers all around permanently.

Anyway, that was kind of fun, I guess, being able to help somebody out with a lift.

AND the burger of the week at my bar is a winner: beef burger, with corned beef, sauerkraut, thousand-island dressing. Actually it wasn't quite the best, kind of messy, but I now no longer have to eat anything today, so problem solved.

What a fucking day.

First, our immediate managers and supervisors have gone off the rail. Scanning each and every person in and out for breaks. One more symptom of micromanagement. Our team doesn't actually require any oversight, since we're fucking good.

Second, my phone has completely died, beyond all hope of doing factory resets. It's possible I could flash the android OS, but in a fucking stupid joke, every single reputable bit of PC software is written for Windows or MacOS. No Linux. I'm not going to make a virtual machine with Win10 just to do some stupid shit.

It is a fucking PITA shopping for a new unlocked CDMA phone: I really don't want to inspect nerd details on Amazon or Walmart. It is a hassle.

AND THIRD, I was 0.1 mile from home, stopped by the grocery store for some beer, and noticed the bartender gave me back someone else's debit card. Same bank.

So, I drove back in rush hour.

Oh, well, I've got five free beers coming to me next time I come in, which was a nice way of resolving the situation.

I really don't need or want to drink any more beer, but I do need to wait until rush hour is a bit over, and also check e-mail and stuff.

Fucking A.

Fuck my life. Fuck it right in the ass.

You know what the icing on today's cake is?

This gal Nat___ie, apparently she's in constant text contact with this other guy at work.

You know, that's beneath me to get upset that she doesn't have time to text me back in a dog's age, but apparently she's got all the time in the world for this chooch.

No, it's beneath me.

I don't own her, she doesn't owe me anything, but still, I was the one who had the balls to take her out for hours of good conversation, and didn't ask for anything in return.

No, I'm not upset.

It's just the icing on the cake after two shit weeks.

So be it! I was pretty sure she didn't want to fuck me.

That's cool. I mean, I like screwing, but I also like playing chess, so...

Just the way it is.

No, it's not anything to do with "plenty of fish in the sea."

It's the concrete realization of disloyalty: it's like a little contract game among peers.

"You do this, I do that." Shake hands and come out swinging, or a handshake deal over selling some goods.

The fact that two people are of mutually-compatible genders (call it whatever, man-woman, or who knows what the kids are calling it these days — whatever arrangement for potential jollies, it doesn't matter), is really immaterial.

It's more when you look in someone's eyes, and he or she back, and so on, and there's a feeling of trust or obligation.

Even among pretty disreputable people, the least I've ever gotten back is "Fuck you, get the fuck out of here."

In the past.

Not so, these days. Not when there's such asynchrony in messaging.

So, yes, I think she owes me at least as much as some really shady or untrustworthy people, for breaking that contract. "I'm just too busy, so that's the way it is, champ."

And, yes, I think I owe others just as much. Some crappy kid bumming cigarettes on the street: even just a shrug of the shoulders is enough. Or if one is truly busy or occupied in some mental or physical task, walking down the street or wherever, the gesture or visage conveys as much, a la "Don't fuck with me, no time."

So, that's it.

I did send her a last text saying, in essence, "I know you're super-mega-ultra busy, and I'm not unprolix in text, but just let me know if you don't want to be friends."

Not quite in those words: I tarted it up a bit.

So, in my own way, whether she replies or doesn't, I already have my answer.

If she doesn't want to be friends with me, that's absolutely OK. I'm not an easy person to get along with, most times, and that's fine.

If she does, that's fine, too, although I'd have to think about if I want to be associated with her kind of person.

Either way, for me, that's the end of it.

OK, here's the final "Deep Thoughts":

By making this performative speech act (think of speech acts like "I now pronounce you husband and wife," is one of the canonical examples, or christening a ship, things like that), I've actually created an end to the spectacle.

So, it's over, and all it took was one speech act of a particular kind.

The continuations, while perhaps amusing, especially to the parties involved, are irrelevant to the performance of the speech act.

Ah.

Twas written on his tombstone, "That car that parked in front of my carport whilst they were doingst launderings against my will shallt have been dealt with by two minutes of my car alarmest blowing the fiercest of trumpets, and the presence of the master appears in robes saying "Fuck you!"."

Silly words they hear not.

And so the master retreated, with a second tactical LED light focused upon hisseth car from high, balanced from the kitcheneth window, forthwith to discourageth the wayward car-dudeths.

But still the lamps remain, and the words of the pestilent cry out "Why?" and "What?"

And the words of the master remain firm as his robes: "Fuck you! That's why!"

And it was good.

Probably until tomorrow morning when the master's windshield gets smashed in. Therefore the master keeps a couple of high-intensity bulbs on the master's car. Or else the master is going to go apeshit,

Or, the master will eat some more flamin' hot cheetos in his robes and hope it just blows over.

And still the words of the master remain, among the (literal!) "Woo-hoo!" of those people in the apartment complex next door.

Judas priest.

Literal "woo--hoos,"

Nope. Not in my neighborhood.

Also, pro-tip, put your ear-plugs in before using the marine air horn.

Holy shit it's loud.

I might have said that before.

But it's worth repeating.

And the master sayeth unto thee and thine, that a thick curtain shall hangeth over the spot lights so as to disguise the behindeth comingeths and goings of the master, so as to be like a backlighteth and such

Yeah, so what I'm saying is I kept the LEDs pointed at my careth and put a light-proof screen behind them so that shadoweth shall not appeareth unto like teratological enormities like when going to take the pisseth or whatever.

Whatever.

It's pretty sweet.

I suppose it's sort of like making a fort out of pillows as an adult, except I really don't want to shoot someone with 0.12 shot multiple times.

I mean, I do, but (i) stay the fuck off my property and out of my way and (ii) shut the hell up.

And then there's no problems, is there?

Hippies.

Oh, and besides the recent unpleasantness, I should share my one good thing I realized about myself today.

Actually, I'll probably be known by strangers and coworkers as the guy who says "Yo <whatsyerface>! What's the <blahblah> on the <whatsit>?"

Or whatever. The <whosit> on <cheezit> covering <blah> <whogivesashit>.

Yes.

John, beloved father of either some or none, who was not afraid to say "Yo! What the fuck is that shit doing over there?"

I suppose I'll translate the above into human speech.

Some shit-nugget thought he can just park in front of the laundry room door directly across from me, partly blocking my car.

I was wearing a bathrobe and nothing else, eating some flaming hot Cheetos, but it kind of bothered me, so I set my car alarm off from my front porch, and when the cracker asshole was like "Hunh, what?" I had only one word. "Fuck you!" And again, "What's the problem?" "Fuck you!"


I might have said some other words, but there was no significant variation.



////

And, as for today's, well, that's just an observation. I don't actually know if I have any children. I doubt it, but it's possible. But, indeed, I will be best remembered as the guy who says, "Yo! <insert name>! We good here?"

That's it.

///ETA Oh, yeah, I set a second "tactical" LED flashlight trained at my carport. For I suspect my list of enemies is not shrinking, and I think shining a bright light into areas of vulnerability is not a bad idea. Costs me nothing — I think the electrical cost per month is in the pennies, if that much. Yes, I already had the lights, and still have a spare for inside the car for changing tires or such.

Fuck you, you fucking cunt "property manager."

There is no fucking way talking with you in person and "asking" for permission to enter the condo clubhouse to recharge my laundry card is worth it.

Face like a deflated football, voice like a belt sander.

No.

No fucking way.

Yeah, it'd take five minutes, but it'd take ten years off my life just listening to that bitch.

Fucking ass bitch, the fucking repairs were supposed to have been done by late August.

I think my best option is to get real fucking drunk and angry and pound on MY fucking clubhouse door, and not stop until she opens the fucking door.

Worthless fucking cunt.

ETA Just show up in my "laundering clothes" — unbuttoned filthy white collared shirt, swim trunks, and barefeet, and just sit there with a basket of laundry until she wises up.

How can someone like that actually

Fuck it, I'm going up there right now, as described.

////

OK. Apparently if you beat on the door like the goddamned police, she will open the door. "Oh, I see you're not wearing any shoes!" "That's right."

She didn't blink an eye at my shirt being completely unbuttoned, from vent to sternum.

What a retard. "Oh, well, you know, we say two to three weeks, but you know how contractors' schedules...."

Fuck you, lady, it's your fucking job to know how to deal with contractors, especially when it's not your money.

Oh, here's a happier little FRLO&A observation.

For weeks now I've been "rehearsing" if I get called on to lead this stupid Agile-style chant in the morning.

Normally a manager would do it, but we don't have any managers who know how to manage people. Just sort of spreadsheet warriors without any soft skills.

Yeah, so, I just chill my team out by pretending to surveil them evenly, then say "let's start out a little medium," then count in on the offbeats and do a common-time thing.

Blah blah I can say some stuff or whatever, who cares, then say I'm going to count them off, "like this, we do a few first, one...two....one, two, three, HITIT!" Repeat as needed.

Then, just like regular, when I want the final count, give them the sign with my head and LH and go "one, two, three, HIT-IT!"

How the hell could somebody become a manager of a small, close-knit team with no ability to relate on a basic, human and humane level with his or her staff?

We had that for almost a year, and now we have some cunt reading off a placard of what "stretches" we're supposedly supposed to do.

Goddamned fucking shit.

There are still people in my crew who think that, for example, spots 13 through 23, inclusive on both ends, yields ten vehicles. Which it does not.

Jesus fucking christ. Stop fucking up my shit.

At this point it's beyond me demonstrating how or why that is eleven vehicles: it's more like just "trust me, it's fucking eleven, use your fucking fingers to count if you want, I don't give a fuck, just we're on to the next wave, so move your ass, get out of my way, and just do what I fucking tell you, you goddamned fucking rtards."

Well, one nice thing about having my weekend start on Friday is that I can fuck with my dumbass fucking HOA who doesn't have (i) jack and (ii) shit together.

Yeah, I'm not going to do the whole story about this one, but it'd been, I guess you could say grandfathered in, from, well, decades ago, about my particular street that there's "no parking" along the curb.

Yeah, I understand about in front of the mailbox. That's fine, that's always the way.

So, supposedly about two or three months ago some piece of turd got a bug up his ass about this, and...

I don't the have the energy to type it all out, but it involves stencils and white paint and "No Parking" (in caps) and one of my neighbors, whoever it is is a fucking genius angel, taking black paint and erasing....

It's been going on for weeks, just the masked eraser, and then some shmo coming around in a golf cart like at seven am and redoing it.

Oh, so, anyway, yeah, one of my longtime nextdoorsnikehs, she and I sometimes just fuck around and deliberately park in the "no parking."

I don't know why. Just silent protest. We both own our own fucking carport spots, but it's just ridiculous to sit by while our duly elected board does jack and shit. Bunch of fucking bums.

ETA Oh, and it's ridiculous because, not just because it's ridiculous, but it's also ridiculous because anyone who's ever been alive since...I don't know, like forever, has personally seen a hook and ladder firetruck, with the guy in the back with the steering wheel and all that, they'll fucking turn around in a spot one of those gay little Eurocars can. Trust me. Those guys are fucking good, so, once those fucking homos on the board fucking amend shit the next meeting, this fucking bullshit is dead in the water. Stricken from the record.

That is not all, but that's enough for now.

All right, I'm about cheesed off about the tendonitis in my LH between fingers two and three.

The worst thing is I did it to myself. NB: this was like six months ago or more.

What's worse than that? I did it to myself by playing that stupid-ass fucking Chopin prélude, the G major, by doggedly insisting on using a fingering that, while reasonable, wasn't suited for my approach.

What's worse than that?

Well, I don't know. Biting into a hot dog and finding a vein in it.

How the fuck should I know.

But, I am really liking gorilla-taping those two fingers together every workday.

Hey, two fingers is indeed the gentleman's limit.

Oh yeah, can't leave out my best news yes, today.

Actually, it's not that bad, and I knew I'd be denied for a credit line from my bank, BUT along with the usual reasons (blah blah debt income whatever, all that):

SERIOUSLY, THIS IS AWESOME:

Quote:

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SERIOUS DELIQUENCY, AND DEROGATORY PUBLIC RECORD

---

Yeah, I know it's not that good, and fuck Eliot Spitzer, and whatever, but that's probably the coolest thing that has ever been written about me, and ever will.

That's like Cagney or George Raft or Al Capone or something.

I Love It!

I'm keeping this letter and might do have it framed.

That is the goddamned second motherfuckeringest time in ninety minutes I have spilled whiskey on myself.

No shit.

Fuck it.

I'm just sitting here naked with my terrycloth bathrobe underneath me and a handful of towels at the ready.

You believe that shit?

Trust me, I've been drinkiing on my own a long ass time.

I blame that extra-tasty cran-rasberry juice I bought: drinking's not supposed to taste all good and shit, it's supposed to hurt you!

Oh, and I suppose I should cap off the day with some maudlin stuff (no, don't lecture me about spelling, I know exactly what it is).

Yeah, I was just half asleep at my desk, sort of with my head down like how junkies get that so-called rosette from nodding off with fags in their mouths.

I don't know, whatever — I'm sure it's in some movies and certainly in some beat-era novels.

OK. So I was just fantasizing about when one of our team-mates, let's call her Désirée (actuallly that is her name, but let's pretend I'm not pretending) is off to another shit job somewhere.

I was just thinking about what a big hug I'd give her and tell her into her ear "If there's anything....anything....you need help with, I will find a way."

No, we're not sexually partners, just pretty close co-workers for a number of months.

It's going to be bad when she leaves — I know she's a lot closer like with Facebook and shit with a few other coworkers, so I just hope I get my chance to give her a big-ass hug. She knows we're all good, but I just want to have a chance to say goodbye like I know she wants. We're all right, but I want to send her off proper.

ETA Oh, while I was napping sitting at my desk, I found this old safety vest from like a year ago. I'm really too lazy to take the hexadecimal codes I sharpied on the back and see if it's just an XOR encryption or what....judging by the sub-literate French scrawl on the front and the crude emulation of the band "Black Flag"'s on the lapel, I'm pretty sure that's an XOR encyrption saying something like "My manager eats her ass babies and so do you."

Something stupid like that, but I don't feel like decyphering it. I might have hidden the XOR key or mask somewhere in sharpie on it, and I know I can solve it by hand, but I don't really care.

So, I'm going to give a little gift to this like 19-year old kid on my team who's going off to do electrical engineering soon and just throw it on the front room table where we all clock in and like "Yo! What the fuck is this shit? I dare you to wear it!"

Ah.

Good times.

EETA Actually, I'll probably just toss it on the table and say, "Hey, what's that, like hexadecimal or some shit?" IIRC it really decodes to something super-offensve, so I don't want to get too close to the offending garment.

Damn, shit, the French on the front....uhhhh.....never mind, I don't speak French.

They can't prove anything, those goddamned Germans and British.

Uh, yeah, like my grandfather had some French blood and they just kept it. I think they were from Wisconsin or somehing.

Nope, they were all like Methodists or Unitarians or something. Oh yeah, Salvataion Army? That's like Mormon or something, right?

I don't know. I took Spanish in high school, but it was like the teacher didn't know.

So, I don't remember....what's that? non hablo español si bueno. Yeah, I don't recuerdo.

All right. That's too exhausting. I can't possibly keep that up IRL.

It's not just my last name, it's too many people. Yeah, I can fake a stupid yankee schoolboy French I guess but I've already pulled the plug so dozens of people already know I understand their filthy jokes about how big their wives' cunts are and how tight that bitch's ass is.

Yeah, once you laugh once, the game's over.

Shit.

No thank you. I'm just going to stick to hollering "putain merde" out of my window every time a Triscuit misses my putain chie foute merde putasse mouth where dieu fait-il connasse eh it's I am proud to be an goddamned motherfuck shit whore American.

Oh.

I thought this would be funny or amusing, but IRL it's kind of a PITA to type out.

I don't know how to do the short version: I guess the very short version was some cornholer was tailgating me.

AND I ADD for no reason. No place to pass, and I'm just following the persons up front at an appropriate distance.

This is one person who should not have been operating a vehicle:

I could and did see well more than two-hundred meters ahead that, while I'm not going to waste space and screw up the traffic pattern by being deiberately "pokey," but apparently this moron couldn't see that good.

So, I got some good laughs at myself by engaging the rear brakelights while accelerating like a champ through this set of (very mild) curves.

Eh, never mind, I'm getting board.

Oh, let me pretend to be a teacher: don't fucking do shit unless you know what is ahead in the road.

I'm not convinced these people ever learned to drive in the first place.

I'm no Dale Andretti Jr or whatever myself, but at least I'm fucking aware of things three or four hundred meters ahead of me. And if I'm not, that's my fault, and I take the ultimate consequence.

I'm very sorry if I'm a bad man, but just drive off the road and kill yourself, you morons.

Sorry to say it, but operating a heavy, powerful machine is fucking serious.

If you can't do it, and you're too impoverished to live in a city, I'm sorry, honey. You just can't do it.

No two ways about it.

Oh, so yeah, I can't even remember.

This fucking cunt in some shitty beginner-for-Baby-Boomers-Benz, thinks he or she is like the road warrior Mad Max or whatever.

Fine.

Trust me, that is perfectly fine with me: if you've got the lane, and you can take it, go ahead. I don't particularly want to race you.

Go for it.

In fact, I don't even see a problem with that: if you can do it, and your machine can, I'm not going to stand in your way,

No, it was a whole confluence of bullshit, and I can't remember.

I'm pretty sure somebody did my favorite trick of following a supposedly defective driver to his or her house and sat out front, except it was me.

Which is bullshit.

Anyway, that's why I have LED lights on my carport and some other stuff.

Some people, man.

Like, look three hundred meters ahead, you bint! Look where the next controlled signal is, cornboy! Look how many car-lengths I am behind the preceding automobile!

I'm the first to say I'm not a smartest man, but JHFC, if you're operating heavy equipment, maybe take a look ahead.

Fucking idiots.

Excuse my language, but they are.

Well, I'm just going to say the best recourse is to engage your rear brakelights while accelerating at the speed of traffic.

This is not "brakechecking," which I understand to be engaging one's brakes unexpectedly.

Obviously, terribly dangerous, and if I were on a "traffic jury," I'd say completely inappropriate.

But, downshifting and the like is, IMHO, a perfectly reasonable way to maintain speed.

Provided the defectives can see twenty yards in front of them.

There are very few surprises driving on a highway.

Actually, it's kind of pathetic how few teuetonic "cars" or even USA huge trucks can overtake me in my Camry XLE V6. Maybe it's just because my vehicle is slow-slung to the ground, has regular alignment tests, fresh tires, and a driver who knows what the fuck he's doing.

Actually, I'm not a great driver, but I know how to take the motherfucking corners, and even stupid shit every fourteen-year-old knows, like how to gain speed out of a corner.

More importantly, I don't shit my pants when somebody up the lane brakes for (i) unexpected encumbrance (ii) perfectly expected, but impredictable traffic control signal.

Jeez Louise.

How can you call yourself a driver and not be prepared for every and I mean EVERY thing in the road?

Yeah, sure, sometimes some fucking elk or a deer. Can't do much about that.

But you best believe I can anticipate a goddamned red light or four, same as it's always been, or an errant bicyclist or pedestrian.

Don't they teach these people anything? Except how to be public menaces, even if inadvertently?

https://youtu.be/5hfYJsQAhl0

Oh, so I guess I summarize the last few posts.

No, I can't really pretend I don't speak French: it's not just all the Africans from the earlier shift, but the crazy Franco-American linguist professor who blabbed all over "ZOMG it's so good!" and took no opportunity to avoid speaking to my in that language.

No, I don't take any pride in that, I just know the language from little kid stuff to adult kid stuff, plus, just academic stuff, which doesn't IMHO have too much to do with the language.

AND, I don't understand how people drive like maniacs on a three-lane highway.

Freeways/thruways? Yeah, sure.

I don't usually agree with the latter, but I understand it.

Not on a two-three lane highway with multiple controlled signals. Complete idiocy.

Quote:

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Originally posted by Jizzelbin

Well, I'm just going to say the best recourse is to engage your rear brakelights while accelerating at the speed of traffic.

This is not "brakechecking," which I understand to be engaging one's brakes unexpectedly.

Obviously, terribly dangerous, and if I were on a "traffic jury," I'd say completely inappropriate.

---

Just to clarify, actually engaging the brakes as in "brakechecking" is about the stupidest stunt I can think of.

That's not what I was talking about.

And I'm not just CYA about "haha some joke."

But, on many vehcles, including my own, it's entirely possible to continue at the regular rate of speed, and even accelerate when appropriate, while having the rear brake lights actuated.

That is not "brake-checking," IMHO, anymore than downshifting to a lower gear to macth the traffic one sees, say, two-hundred yards above.

Why would a "close-follower" not have observed the same road or traffic conditions?

I don't know, and I don't care.

Just shitty drivers who are probably cornholing some kidnapped boys in their front seat.

Don't know, don't care, just don't do your pervert shit on my fucking roads.

Assholes.

Well. I don't know.

I did about three racks from the continuous 14.1 straight pool configuration. The head ball thrown randomly, as well as the cue ball, of course.

Got some, learned a few things.

Main thing I learned is that I can finally just nail any given ball if it's a gimme, even with my shit eyesight. Just, take the cue, and just ram it down the pocket. I guess I always knew that. I also confirmed my suspicion that predicting even simple combination shots, especially with a cluster of three or more is, well, not really worth it.

I also saw one of the best looking broads in one of those form-fitting dresses .... what was she doing? She was playing fucking pinball. On my second or third game she was texting on her phone right in front of the house cues, so I got to say "I'm going to reach around, honey," and she said "It's no problem, you're fine."

The dialogue is not unusual — I call everybody "honey" or whatever.

But DAMN. That was a good looking woman.

She filled out that dress good.

What was I talking about?

Eh, I don't remember. I don't care.

I prefer to only remember the highlight of the day: the rest of it was pretty crappy. A few bright spots, but mostly just the lesson I learned is that "tightly packed" really is not just good for tuna or sardines.

Yeah, this sounds stupid, but believe it or not I think I shoot better pool when there's a nice looking broad beside me.

Don't tell me about hyphenation rules about compound adjectives or whatever: believe you me, I heard it and done it all before. I don't want some nickel and dime bullshit.

Doesn't matter.

Just, my only point is, when you're within two feet of a real nice woman, somehow...it just happens.

Those smooth position plays where you land the cue ball within two inches of where you expected, or some slam-bam, pocket it and do the next, because that's the way the table reads.

I'm not a very good player, and I can only just barely hold my own with the ladies, but trust me, it's such a nice feeling to actually play the table instead of just doing what it takes to win.

It's IME not that hard to take down some people on shitty tables using house cues and crap balls.

Comes down to luck and balls, most of the time, IME.

I like surgically extracting every single motherfucking ball and every shot. Call pocket. Ball in hand? Meh, whatever, in the kitchen. That doesn't matter.

I fucking hate eight-ball.

Oh, my new year's resolution, though, is to stop literally dropping the cue ball (because I foul so much) or the head ball on the table.

Yes, I know you don't do that because of maybe cracking the slate, and you'd never do that during play.

More importantly, it's a distracting noise to other people doing whatever other people do, and it's obnoxious.

Not intended to be, but you're not going to hear any of that from me.

I'll still hit hard for a stop shot or try to get some draw on the cue ball (not going to happen on these crap felts and with my crap stroke), but I think that's the way it's going to be from now on.

Yes, I lived up to my resolution today.

To me, there is no finer sound than a soft stroke, and the target ball dropping gently into a coin-op table's pocket.

I think I did three racks, my usual practice routine (head ball, cue ball, wherever, and fourteen balls racked), and I saw the craziest shit I've ever seen.

I think it was the four ball, after trying a nice combination shot to break up this cluster.

I shit you not, the damned purple fucking ball was about a centimeter from the pocket, and it had so much side English on it, it just spun on its own vertical axis for what must have been a good ten seconds. Five or ten seconds. Whichever, it was a real fucking long time to watch waiting to see if it would drop. It did not.

Yeah, I know, fascinating story. Got a couple of good short-banks and one long-bank in, but I don't consider those good percentage shots on shitty felt and house cues and balls with a bunch of shit on them: I mean, each of those were naturals, like pretty normal shots you'd try in a game, but to me that's not playing pool, that's like rolling the dice. Too much luck.

It is, to me, one of the most pleasant sounds and feelings, though, when, as happens increasingly often, a softer impact yields a dropped ball and a good position for the next shot.

Yeah, sure, hard contact and balls in place gets the job done, but it's not very pleasing to me, aesthetically.

I conclude my lesson from today is that my stroke just plain kind of sucks: bridge positions (I only use three: closed-loop, rail, and arched over in-the-way balls, and, no, I don't know if those are official terms, but who cares).

I need better stroke control on the many many times my cueball is against the rail, or when I have to go high over some bullshit in my way.

Probably just eat more Wheaties or something.

At least I know what the problem is.

Fascinating, I'm sure.

Oh, I did have one funny one from today.

So, like I doubled down on a bet if a certain number of cars would show up for their routes. Nice kid, probably like 18-19 or something, is going to start studying electrical engineering later this month. Doesn't know shit, but he's young: he didn't know what I meant when I said "double or nothing, seventh car doesn't show for the 1115 run."

No, we were only betting a company scrip that's only redeemable for some store-branded horseshit. Like most people who haven't got fired, I've accumulated quite a few of those.

Oh, anyway.

So, he didn't show today, but I'd already done my super-secret XOR encrypted message and had it in the pocket of my work safety vest. So, I was like, "Yo, if J____ isn't here, that means who wants ten swag bucks?"

Of course Ra___sha is one of my main buddies. And she was all like "What is this voodoo DaVinci Code, it's like a Devil's message!"

No shit. Yeah, she was joking around, but we were all just waiting to get the show started and I'm like "You never figure it out: J____ couldn't figure it out if he tried." She's like "Well, I don't know, he's a pretty smart little dude."

Me: "Yeah, but I'm smarter."

This other guy: "Yeah? Then what are you doing here and he's not!"

That earned the only time I've ever said the word "touché" in my life.

Yeah, the other guy's also a long-timer, and a super-nerd, so it was all in good fun.

I'm a terrible person: yes, I'm still mooning over this woman at work (not the more recent one, but my old reliable).

No, I'm not creeping on her, and the few times we interact it's just chill: she knows I tried my hand with her, and we seem to just be fine with that. Didn't work, whatever. I don't know the reason, and I don't really care. That's her business, and there's no problems whatsoever.

But she is one hell of a nice little lady: I kid you not, it just makes me happy to see her on the few days our paths intersect. Just really makes my day.

//////////

Oh, about the women in form-fitting dresses: yeah, I've been noticing, that must be like the new "autumn look" or something.

I mean, they've always been around, that style of dress, but it must be some kind of fashion trend, because I'm seeing it quite a bit lately.

Even on women who are a little bit....no, I'm not going there....I'll just say it's pretty nice, both in theory and in practice.

For once, something popular that I don't reflexively despise.

///////////////

Oh, and while I'm glad I added full overdraft protection to my credit union accounts, it's really something that should be used with extreme caution. It's more or less a lazy way to do a super-expensive payday loan, provided one isn't disciplined enough.

Well, I consider that I paid a few hundred bucks to learn that lesson, and that was money well spent, since I clearly needed the lesson.

I'm pretty darned frugal, but I can be a real idiot about money. Or, more likely, not be blowing cash on vile habits like chain-smoking cigarettes. The books and my beloved clutch pencils, notebooks, erasers? Yeah, that's OK.

Grr.

ETA Oh, yeah, about pool playing: yes, it's funny, but I found all it took was just a tiny bit of attention to smoothing out my stroke. Like just a tiny little switch and a bit of extra attention.

I think I had one of the quietest, most precise racks today. I got jammed up, as is usual when you don't break the 14-ball rack (but, really, really, there is no reason I can see that I can jam the head ball down and not rely on the residual force from the cueball to break up the big cluster. I know if I try to use follow or "top English" I'll often end up fouling the cue ball, but .... well, I don't know.

I think I could probably justify paying somebody for some lessons. You know, like, what, twenty bucks for ... an hour? Probably more like half-hour or forty-five. Don't know what the going rate is.

There's is so much shit to learn about this stupid game, and while I'm great at teaching myself, some things I'm just not getting, and while playing off some randos at the bar is often instructive, it's pretty rare to find somebody who has the enthusiasm and knowledge of the game and who isn't just some face who's trying to be a hotshot.

To be continued.

//////////////

Also, judas priest, I mean, I think the Astra platinum double-edged razor blades are nice, but holy hell, do not just start hacking at your face if you're in a hurry. or hungover.

It looks like I got in a bar fight or some woman clawed at my face with her fingernails.

I wouldn't be surprised if some of the multiple cuts I gave myself didn't leave some permanent scars.

Yes, I am glad I did not pull the trigger on an actual straight razor: considering I still have imprecise moments with a safety razor, that's probably a good thing.

And, I think I can get as close a shave with a safety razor as a razor without the guard — the blades are certainly sharp enough, even just fresh out of the little wax paper coverings, and no stropping the blades or any of that. What is one double-edged blade, like six cents or so?

Jesus fucking priest fucking christ.

Goddamned fucking christ shit fucking rain.

Me, who fucking has been walking on goddamnned city streets since whenever.

Judas fucking priest, I almost stepped out in front of a fucking line of traffic today, just willy nilly, sober as a judge.

Yeah, I mean fucking A, why people don't have their headlights on is a fucking mystery to me, but it still...well, it didn't take the breath out of me, exactly, just sort of an apologetic handwave while I immediately immediately moved back to the curb.

Am I superstititious? Well, riddle me this, the first thing I did after further impeding traffic was give the sign of the cross on myself.

No, I don't know why. Just seemed like the thing to do.

But I will say that I kind of enjoy knowing that everyone in town driving a white, unmarked panel van likely comes from my warehouse and probably recognizes first my car and then me.

Not that I know every driver personally, but if they've been through my warehouse, they've seen me. Humping carts or fucking around with flex drivers, or whatever.

So, if it's an unmarked white panel van, and they see my car or me through the windshield, you can be damned sure they know who I am, because they've seen me, talked to me, etc.

That's kind of a nice bit of feeling.

I am not sure it's such a good idea to associate with colorful, but dubious characters.

On the one hand, some of them shoot a pretty good game of pool.

On the other hand, it's 99.99% a pile of bullshit.

It's not worth it playing pool with people who are....what's a polite word...well, let's just say they have their own world and they live in it.

Also, Alice is a shitty temp bartender, and I hope they get someone better who's more used to the clientele. I mean, she pours good, and has an OK memory.

She could end up being a good substitute bartender, but I just don't like having to deal with her. She's fair, honest, and never gave me a bad shake once she got the "news" that she doesn't have to shake me down every time, because I go there every day after work, for over a year.

Oh, to tie it all together, maybe I just don't like change, even smaller ones, and I learned it's irritating to willingly engage in social activities with people who are not quite fitting into the categories I recognize and adhere to.

Yeah, I suppose that's it.

It sounds like I'm being a jerk, and I probably am, but I just don't like being irritated.

Oh.

I guess the lesson I learned today is that sometimes (meaning: always or most times) not to try to get too much knowledge of random peoples' interior worlds (courtesy Georges Bataille).

Because it can be fucking crazy in there.

IOW, sometimes it is better to just let the crazies sort themselves out.

Sounds harsh, but it's reasonable when you consider how many interesting people you meet and get to know over time, and just gravitate towards: they always have something, ways of speech, common knowledge. I'm not saying these people "out of category" are "out of play," but for me it's no good.

Some people....yeah, rarely, I've been accused of being eccentric in my own way, but not in the way that "if you crack that guy's head open you'd find a nest of scorpions inside an elephant's dream."

So, that's bad, and I should work on being more empathetic, even when it seems hardly possible.

Just "being nice" or "playing along" doesn't quite cut it for me: I should have some more ability to put myself in these unfortunates' shoes.

Not as a thought-exercise, but it might help me to better categorize some of these people.

QED, or whatever.

Eh.

So the PM flex team apparently has some dude who has some difficulties. I don't know what, like Tourette's or something.

Yeah, har-de-fucking-har. I mean like some pretty pronounced compulsions like saying "Blah" or I can't remember what his favorite is this week.

I think I might be an evil person, but he has some kind of handler, like I think they call it a "job coach" or something.

I have ... never? Well, hardly ever... Well never? I never have thought about fondling some woman's teats as

No, never.

OK, hardly ever.

It's almost driving me nuts, and I'm ....

never mind. She's actually not that memorable, to me, and she's likely paired off. For me that's a deal-breaker.

I don't know, kind of cute, dumpy, brunette woman whom I could probably convince to go do some crimes with.

Nah.

I could probably convince her I was challenged in some ways and get her to take me home with her.

No. I've already tried the "But I'm an idiot!" excuse a few times on ths job, and it didn't take.

And, yes, the form-fitting slinky dresses has got to be a "thing" this season.

Afuckingmen.

I've seen too many women wearing them for it to be a coincidence.

And it is, excuse my language, absofuckinglutely OK.

It's also "body-positive," I suppose. It certainly leaves no folds uncovered. And bigger gals can and do wear these nowadays, and it's just fine.

No, I think I've started down the path of compulsive gambling.

About ridiculous things.

First all my stupid side bets for company scrip about "You know, if the last vehicle shows up, I'll give you ten," and then doubling down.

Second in playing pool, also side bets: "If you make the eight in the corner without scratching the cueball, I'll buy you a beer."

I don't know what that's about.

Maybe some way to make things more interesting.

It's pretty stupid, though.

I suppose the stakes are low, and my estimations are sometimes accurate, so it's not a terrible burden.

Except to my psyche when I invariably count short or fall short on my predictions.

Also, it's not necessarily the kind of image or reputation I want to give of myself to the general public.

No, I'm cutting that shit out.

I'm wondering how much of the gane (of pool) is deterministic in nature.

Quite a lot of it.

So, let's say ten or even three percent is "accident" or "just happens that way" or "the balls roll funny for everybody sometimes, kid, I told you that."

No.

I don't want to bet on some specific shots, I want to see the long money. Amortized, worst-case, long-run. Give me the upper bound and estimate the likelihood according to a function of some kind of polynomials.

I don't know the physics of the game, and, I don't really care. Really big shit or really small shit, I don't care about. All I care about is if the ball sinks and if I called it.

I see it every motherfucking day, well, 5/7ths of the week, sometimes more.

OTOH this is not a dealer's rake of the pot. AFAIC, this is every player for himself.

Too much luck.

It's still not a sucker's game, IME. Even putting the cueball against that right spot of the table that some asshole didn't spill their drink on the other night: that's enough, that's a good bet. Getting the right cue from the rack of house cues. Slowing down your roll when you see that a bartender is approaching from twenty meters SSE with a tray full of drinks for some hen party.

But, judas priest, there is still an awful amount of blind luck in this game.

I did this twice times today. Just, literally, a quarter of a centimeter from the pocket, in both cases. Yes, if I jumped on the floor, the ball would have dropped.

It took almost 100% of my discipline to not just jump up in place and get it to drop.

Not once.

Two times.

That wouldn't have helped: the slates are pretty heavy, and the joists under the floor are fine.

No, I'm not going to do an ASCII diagram, but twice.

It's a magic box, son, and I got to have some more.

At least I'm not a Redskins fan!

Lots of trouble wth them recently: I wouldn't go near sports gambling unless I'm the one playing. At least then I have someone to blame besides some random juiced-up players.

I'd rather put the weight on me.

I am so fucked. All of it thanks to abusing my overdraft protection.

Doesn't help that this week I didn't put in very many hours at work, because of, essentially, lack of stuff to do.

Fortunately, I was able to unlink my checking account from Geico in order to defer payment until next week. But that's going to be a shit show, especially if I can't pay the premium next week. And, no, I have no idea how much they're going to roll over in fees and recomputed monthly premiums once I reconnect my automatic deposit.

And forget about the electrical bill. Well, I stay on top of that, at least in the past, and I suspect they're happy enough to wait a bit, just so long as I don't blow them off for like months. At least I think so.

With any luck, my paycheck this Friday should cover (barely) the overdraft fees and the hundy I withdrew with it. If not, when I see the pending deposit tomorrow, I can do a cash deposit at the ATM.

No, this is going of weeks where there's going to be no going out, no buying beers, and hoping against hope I don't run out of gas during the commute.

With some good luck, I can get by by buying a big bag of drugstore pipe tobacco. Or just severely curtail my cigarette use. Either way I'm not going to be happy about that, especially.

Sobering thoughts, indeed.

So, the lesson of the tale is (i) don't be a spendthrift (ii) don't be greedy (iii) pay all your bills early, when you're sure you can cover it (iv) and don't be broke, because it sucks.

And, no, I don't have any good ways to raise some quick cash: I guess I could sell some books, but I've already trimmed my modest library down to the bare wire. I don't have any musical equipment I want to sell. Pawn shop for musical equipment? But I just don't know where one is near me, and I don't want to burn the gas. I only probably have a couple bucks in empty beer cans: not really worth it, also that is quite a drive to the return center.

Well, turns out it's not quite as bad as all that. Pending deposit of this week's paycheck, which is much larger than I feared, I can cover Geico and have like thirty something bucks left over for some gasoline and sundries. And I was able to buy a big bag of pipe tobacco today, which will last me quite a while.

Electric company? Meh, they're not disconnect me, given that I regular pay up per month for years and years: I think they only shutoff your power if you're like months deliquent or something.

Not going to be drinking much beer for the next few weeks, though, I'll tell you what!

That's probably for the best.

That's not, from what I can see, true, about my local electrical utility: they care if you have made NO payments for, I think fifteen days after the "due date" for the current bill.

Usually I just slip them a ten or a twenty (electronically!) per week or whenever I feel like it, and it's been a dog's age since I got one of those fancy-colored envelopes in the mail. The bill always gets paid, I just don't see the percentage in putting myself out to do it all at once.

Meh, maybe I'll have them take a five-dollar token payment tomorrow or late tonight when my paycheck clears.

Or, maybe I'll just wait and see what happens.

They shouldn't be fucking with me, IMHO, since it's been years I've been making good on my bill at the same address, but, you never know.

OR, I bite the bullet and call the number and say, "Yo, this week's drop is going to be a little late, cool? You're going to get your money, but don't send your people after me or nothing."

Really. A telephone.

In this day and age.

Well, OK, if that's their procedure.

Jesus fucking christ.

I just spent about six or seven minutes trying to capture (then crush — I am not a good man) this baby rat around my bathroom.

Almost had it under the toilet plunger a few times.

Ah, but at least it appeared to have escaped into one of my hall closets where I keep clean bath towels near to the floor. Or my bedroom.

Shit.

That was no mouse I ever seen, that was a goddamned baby rat.

FUCK.

Well, I guess I live in interesting times.

So, apparently my small surplus of money is going into getting big ass traps and you best believe I'm going to be crossing my fingers in the hopes I get it.

"It?" Pretty damned sure it's not just one.

I am a complete slob, always have been, wherever I've lived, but I've never had even so much as a cockroach or anything bigger than a pantry moth in my places.

Fuck.

Maybe it's the weather changing to the rainy season?

I don't know the reasons, all I know is those varmints, or at least the one, is going down.

And, no, I came so close to catching under the toilet plunger, and there's no doubt I would have crushed it and nuked it from orbit.

Yeah, maybe I'm a bad man, but, I'm sorry, I just can't have that in here.

ETA could explain the rotting smell from my crawl space above my home office.

That's it. I'm buying strychnine and a bunch of rat traps.

If there's some goddamned infestation, those motherfuckers are going down.

Can't have it.

You can easily buy strychnine in your jurisdiction?

Pretty sure. If not, AMZ delivers all kinds of stuff that is otherwise not supposed to be shipped by the federal post office.

If not, whatever is in rat poison that isn't strychnine. I have heard rats find it delicious, and then they go apeshit, either hiding in the walls, or leaving trails of blood and viscera all over the place.

I think it could have been a mouse, though: it was about three-and-a-half to four inches long, including the tail. It had rounded ears, like a rat, and was brown in color like a rat, but those can be features of mice as well.

No food products in my kitchen have been visibly disturbed, nor have I found any droppings.

ETA Perhaps not. There seem to be some controls over its purchase by people without some kind of credentials or license. But, similar to buying lock-picking equipment, it wouldn't surprise me if it could be found pretty easily.

EETA You can absolutely buy strychnine-containing bait and are legally allowed to use it for below-ground pests, provided the product contains no more than 0.5% of the chemical. Cite: this PDF data sheet issued by the US Environmental Protection Agency

EEETA However, its handling is known to be not very good for humans at all, through multiple modes of transmission.

So, one would be, it seems, advised to wear a respirator, gloves, and other protective equipment.

And it wouldn't be a bad idea to purchase ahead of time a bottle of ToxiBan Suspension, so to minimize the risk of perishing on the way to the ER.

All these products are available on AMZ for relatively low cost.

Strychnine would appear to be difficult to synthesize without a relatively sophisticated home laboratory.

"Popcorn you can trust."

That is one big horseshit slogan.

I want to know three things about microwave popcorn:

(i) Is it wholesome?

(ii) Does it taste good?

(iii) Will it give me diarrhea?

Actually, any food, really.

Bunch of ponces with their fancy slogans.

OK, fine.

I believe I can trust Jolly Time Blast o' Butter microwave popcorn to deliver remarkably few unpopped kernels, with no burning, and a completely recklessly delicious flavor.

And it appears to be wholesome — I didn't find any rodent hairs or spurious elements in my sampling.

While it's too early to tell, I'm fairly certain the fiber content of the corn will not inspire loose stool.

It's still a stupid slogan, though.

AND I'm glad I didn't find a live mouse in the microwave, because then I would have been FORCED to close the door and nuke it, which would have put an end to...any future use of the microwave. Well, I guess I could have cleaned it....but...mmmm....I don't know. Maybe if I was really drunk I'd eventually have cleaned up the cremains.

That was kind of funny.

So, I stop in at this grocery store probably once a day. Sometimes on the way to work, with my little "high-visibility safety vest" with all my badge and work gloves and shit clipped onto it, often on the way home to pick up a beer or something to eat.

Obviously, I'm first-name with most of the regular cashiers, if I'm buying cigarettes or whatever, usually they'll ask "cigs?" and I'll "please, yep, two packs."

That kind of thing.

Ahh. The plot thickens. There's a younger woman (I don't know, late-twenties, early-thirties) who's an assistant front-end supervisor named "Missy" (no kidding). She's pretty darned hefty, but not really like orca-fat. And she's cool.

I was leaving the checkout lane and she made a big point of giving me a big wave as I was leaving with a nice smile.

Hmmm...yeah, I could go me some of that. Never been with a bigger gal, but she's cool and she's not THAT big. Just....husky....I guess. I don't care, she's cool, and I'm pretty sure her parts are in the right places.

////////////

Oh, there's a younger woman at work. Her English isn't too good, and she's probably in her early twenties. Native Spanish speaker. Good steady worker, good to be around, doesn't get in the way.

I think she's got something in mind with me, although I'm not sure what. She always trusts me to answer questions or even just sometimes to have a small joke or complaint. I wonder if she doesn't have a bit of a crush on me. Or, maybe she thinks of me as like a friendly uncle or something, which is fine too.

Not sure if I can go that young, and it wouldn't feel right, like dating a student....ahem....not that....I wouldn't know anything about that, but it's not entirely the best idea.

But I do like that she's getting more comfortable being part of the team (no, I don't mean "Team ME!") and is adapting well to the job. That makes me happy: I think it's difficult for newer hires to acclimate, when a lot of us have been together a while and have inside jokes and just are pretty rowdy. About half-and-half men and women: all equally rowdy. Racially? I don't know, probably half-and-half black and white, and a few Latinos and Indians, so, you know, just a pretty mixed bunch but we all know each other pretty good so for a newbie, maybe kind of intimidating.

So, I'm happy she's finding her place and being a little more confident in joking around. Her English is really not that good, but it's OK.

Quote:

---

Originally posted by Jizzelbin

I don't know, kind of cute, dumpy, brunette woman whom I could probably convince to go do some crimes with.

Nah.

I could probably convince her I was challenged in some ways and get her to take me home with her.

---

Oh, turns out, no need.

It happens she asked me if I wouldn't mind assisting her ward while he was populating some empty sorting racks with empty bags. Apparently she's not allowed to assist her charge with work, but she's supposed to...I don't know what exactly. Whatever she does.

Of course, I was glad to. Not just because she asked, but just because, you know, that's just what you should do if some help is needed.

Oh, believe me, man, she was beaming with all kinds of smiles, and not just polite friendly, but like "Oh, my tender parts are aware, what a kind, polite, humble, and capable man!"

Although...what's with the thick layer of pancake makeup? It looks OK from a distance, and she has good hair, is of a preferred girl-height and weight...the yoga pants are a nice touch. What does she have a history of syphilis or something?

Well, whatever.

I don't need to try to bang every woman I interact with in a friendly way.

Maybe some mysteries are best left unsolved.

It's still nice to be friendly and professional.

Ah. I think I found the best solution to a case like Mo___an, assuming she didn't quit (no one's seen her for a few weeks, she might have taken some vacation or something).

She's probably justifiably intimidated by the height difference between us.

In addition to the extremely unlikely event that she's not interested in me except as a friendly coworker.

Anyway.

So, the general solution is to say, "Hey, I get it, I'm bigger and stronger than you and I sometimes use foul language. So, what you should do is punch me in the face as hard as you can. No rings on the fingers, though, but go ahead. Then, when you see I remain completely calm and don't retaliate, you can let me ride you like a bitch, and you can even be on top."

Problem solved.

Or answer in search of a problem.

Well, that's one possible interesting thing to do.

I don't think it's a reasonable request, although the right girl might think it's kind of funny.

////////

About "Missy" (yes, that is her name), yeah, so this morning I dropped by on my way down to do some pool and have some breakfast.

Yeah, I just walked up to her register (she was the only one on point, so it wasn't like I chose her line).

Her: "Two packs?"
Me: "Yes, please!"
Her: "hundreds or...."
Me: "No, just king size, you know the shorts....I still can't figure out who buys the 100s..."
Her: "Yeah, I know, we were just talking about..."
Me: "Right, yeah, that was a few weeks ago...well, I guess still don't know."
Her: "Eleven <something>...."
Me: "Sure, here's twenty and let me get some change....here's twenty and sixty cents [or whatever]"
Her: "OK, here's twelve cents back [or whatever]."
Me: "Yep. <hand outstretched, palm flat, like a good customer>"
[BLAMMO!!!! she misses her target and the change goes onto the rubber conveyer belt!]
Her: "OH, [I don't remember if she said 'damn' or 'shit'or 'darn', she wasn't happy]. Sorry!"
Me: "Oh, that's probably my fault."
Her: "Both our faults."
Me: "Well, I'll take the fall on this one"
Her: "No, I got it, I'll take the heat."

I think that's a pretty accurate transcription.

She just got flustered and was able to recover her wits and didn't really drop much of her cool in the process.

So, yeah, she wants me, pretty much.

So, I got that going for me, but I don't ask service women out as a rule. Although since half the time I see her it's really early in the morning, like zero customers except me...no, still no. I'm not going to chat her up about her job and stuff.

That is nice, though.

////////////

Speaking of women service women, I did order breakfast this morning along with some beers and quarters for the pool table. I don't know what Britt***'s problem is, lately, she's just been really bitchy. Not to me, specifically, just in general.

So I get two eggs, wheat toast, potatoes, bacon, and like I always do I make little sandwiches out of them. You know, it's just...I don't know, just the way I always ate bar breakfasts.

Her: "Oh, you make little sandwiches! That's pretty smart!" (She's genuinely being her regular friendly self here, not sarcastic).
Me: "<Smirk, eye contact>. Not really."

That kind of deflated her ego a bit, I think.

Whatever funk she's been in, I think she's been trying to come out of it and having a quiet bar on a Saturday morning, with me and a few well-known cabbies (she fucking despises Bill, for some reason, I think if I take her at her word because he'll hold court on Sunday afternoon [it's a football bar, so, crowded then], even though he brings people in and orders big and tips big, because he's a big fat old cabbie), so it seemed like normal for her, me practicing pool, drinking steadily, eating something, obviously I tip good.

So, I feel kind of bad about that.

No, I mean, I'd screw her and everything, but I don't think of her in that way, and my great fear is that she suspects I'm one of those people who has a "zomg crush on the bartender!" Fucking no fucking way. If I did I would did something about it.

But she is super-nice, and I try to be nice in return.

//////////

AND yes, it would seem the closest relationships I have are with women who sell me things, and people I work with. That's pretty much it.

You know, I could probably change my rule about asking service women out.

After all, when you walk up to her and without saying nothing she's like "Two packs or one?" it's kind of not like being a complete creep to say, when she invariably asks, "Having a good morning?"

Not much of a stretch to say, "Oh, just planning out my day, got the day off. Play some pool, drink some beers. You shoot pool?"

Yeah, I think my rules are a bit too rigid: it can be allowed.

I'll allow it.

Also, I want to know what a big girl is like in the sack. Like do they fart a lot more than regular ones? Is she going to use all my toilet paper? Is the bed frame going to break?

Probably..........one third of those is possible.

No, I'm sure she's a nice girl.

Oh, there are so many funny RL observations recently.

But, for fun, here's a Not-RL observation. Check this shit out.

I followed the link from some moron on another board about....I think some idiot was saying some garbage about "Turing equivalence" and "Turing completeness" in a completely wrong context.

But, holy shit.

This is the reason you don't learn things and science and stuff from random blogs. Not that the author, whose handle I won't name, isn't wrong, but well, the entire approach is wrong.

And it's offensive.

To anyone who has ever read more than one book about complexity theory.

The illiterate prose. The random condescension. The lack of anything anywhere resembling a coherent thought.

It is one of the most insanely idiotic things I have ever heard.

I award him no points, and may God have mercy on his soul.

Actually, I shouldn't have said "complexity theory." That's something else.

To mock the "author" of that "special" blog, I'll just say "we say computational theory, or sometimes for short the computational time for which to compute the complexity of operations." Yes, that's meant to sound stupid. But, it's sort of accurate.

Why?

Why do people read this crap?

There are actual books written by real people. Some of those also do some blogs. But not nerd blogs.

There is a giant nerd-bro cesspit into which I'd like to throw fake pundits, stupid webcomic authors and such.

I'd rather let NatalieDee take care of them. At least she's cool.

Epic bacon, good sir! Another game of D&D? Or perhaps a refreshing round of XKCD? Why yes, milord! Would you like a Quine or a logic? Nay, mine sooth lord, for that would be a liberal art, good sir!

No. No.

No.

None of this shit.

You know, it turns out I caught (well, killed by an instrument of killing, namely a Victor [!] brand mousetrap) my first mouse.

It's kind of not my favorite task, using a pair of pliers and dumping the trap+corpse into the dumpster. I've dealt with dead animals before, but not this kind, where I used the device with the "kill bar" (technical term!).

Call me a spendthrift, but I'm not reusing the trap. Straight to trash.

Eh, one down, who knows how many to go.

I don't care anymore. Fuck it. I'll still leave a few traps out, but I don't fucking care. They seem kind of dumb, and since they haven't been into my pantry or left a bunch of droppings, whatever.

Man, I ain't riding in no goddamned trunk for no minute.

This is what happens when you take some paid time off because they managers scheduled shit wrong. Fucking idiots, taking their marching orders from Seattle, when everybody knows what the situation is on the floor, or they would if they didn't keep pulling each others' puds and paid attention, rather than dealing with their problems of attrition and making some correlations between their under-the-roof-time and the amount of volume they keep shovelling into this warehouse.

You know, the UTR metrics, employee retention ... this is really something that can be taken care of. Instead of "promoting" a half-dozen more people into doing a sucker's job, called being an "Ambassador," maybe you can work on building your crews up to a competent level.

And stop all this stupid bullshit about "pins" and "badges" and "wear your stupid costume" day: we don't need any more ambassadors, we don't need any of that bullshit, and we certainly don't give a shit about your stupid company scrip. The latter is like Venezuelan currency: worthless. We need actual people who know what they're doing, which is me and a dozen or so from my crew. And no bullshit about "Oh, let me scan you out for break!" Like they're doing me a fucking favor. Bullshit. We know what we're doing, and if you send down ridiculous, nonsensical routes, then, well, that's your problem.

It's OK, because I had about three hours sleep last night, after pulling a double shift yesterday at the warehouse. And picked up an extra shift on Friday. Bah, it evens out and puts me slightly ahead into the black.

Oh, yeah.

What happens?

I go and get myself a haircut and do some laundry.

About fucking time. Penny. Dude, she did about the worst haircut I ever seen. I'm not picky, but that is some raggedy ass shit. Meh, I tipped her five bucks. She'll live.

Oh yeah, and I got via text this morning that my fucking mother is back in the hospital with her colitis shit again. Goddamned it. Literally about a mile from my place. I guess they're going to keep her for two or three days. I don't have any more information, just whatever.

You can't ride up front with me. The surprise element is ninety percent of it. I am sorry, man, but I ain't getting in no goddamned trunk.

Enough is enough.

I can't be sitting around my place all day, just at my desk.

It only takes one misguided impulse, like glancing at Melanie Lynskey's wikipedia page, and I have powerful urges.

Normally, I think those are sublimated by usual social interactions.

I think I'm going to drink a bunch of beer, smoke some cigarettes, and just not let it get the better of me.

Yes, I admit I want to tie Melanie Lynskey up and dominate her in the bedroom.

FFS, that's plenty normal.

It's just not a thought I want to have: it's unremarkable, uninteresting, but compelling in an odd, visceral sense.

Isn't there something else I should be doing? Like memorizing some piano music, or finally setting up the Hammond in my front room after how many years?

No. Not really.

I'm just going to drink beer and think about Melanie Lynskey.

That is the way of shame.

Going back to an earlier observation, yesterday I stayed a bit later at work to TCB and for some extra scratch.

Yes, indeed, I don't know how that happened, but this new crew just seemed to defer (or at least cooperate in a non-combative manner) with me. I guess they think I know what I'm doing, but probably not from any direct observation. I think that's a good "look," even though it's not something I cultivated or wanted to have. Just kind of like the guy who's supposed to know stuff. Now, this isn't rocket shit or anything, but still, I found that odd.

///////

What was genuinely funny was when I went in after work to my usual place a few hours later. This chorus of a few people: "You're late!" Bunch of jokers. Yeah, I know who they are, and, obviously likewise. Bunch of jokers.

I don't know where to start.

A few hours shift differential has really messed with my routine.

I can't go in to my regular place at like 1700 or 1730 — it's a fucking zoo. And it's one of the quieter places in town.

And I can't fucking drive at night: yeah, sure, I wear glasses and all that, but it takes too much concentration to deal with the glare of oncoming traffic and their stupid-ass halogen shit-ass lightbulbs. Bull fucking shit mother fucking cocksucking asswipes and their verkakte rigs.

No. There's more. Plenty more stories, observations, and anecdotes.

But it's just more than I can say in a mere posting here. It's like a lifetime, a novel, in one week.

However, I got my flu shot and helped a coworker find her employee ID number so she could fill out the paperwork to get hers.

That was good, I guess.

Meh. Did an extra early morning shift at my old task, picking and staging first-cycle van routes.

I am very fast and accurate at this task. It's not rocket shit, but it does take some finesse. Never mind waking up at 0230.

AMZ has already hired a bunch of people for the Xmas rush: jeez, man, some of those kids. I understand they aren't very good, but just do me a favor and don't talk to me, jackass. "You can't put your cart there!"

Bullshit I can't. Just go around, idiot.

I don't know if it's funny, exactly, but my mother told me this morning she has a brain aneurysm somewhere in the frontal lobe. We were going to go for a walk to see this new pedestrian bridge built to facilitate hiker traffic through Forest Park. I also didn't know my father has one, somewhere in the back of the brain, affecting gross motor controls. We ended up driving around for a bit to see if the park surveyors had done anything to ease parking congestion at the various terminus.

I do have a new joke to say to mom when I see her, "Mother? Is your aneurysm getting bigger again?"

She got a good laugh at that, probably the first good laugh she had since a month ago, I guess, and she was glad to see I wouldn't freak out like her brother. Long discussion about whether or not to tell her brother, given his ... what's the phrase ... I don't know, general freak-out-itude about stuff.

Also, jesus christ, what is wrong with me?

It seems lately every day after five pm the bar is tended by this woman named Seanna, or Shawna, or whatever.

She is very slow, but she knows me by now and remembers how I like my beer (cheap and fast).

I almost got a semi-chub going on yesterday evening.

And she's like...I don't like forty-five or something, at least.

Gross, dude!

And she's totally not cool at all. Definitely got a librarian thing going on, with the glasses and hair pulled back.

Gross.

No, I can't be one of those fetish people IRL.

All right, fine.

I have a raging boner ... well, it would be. Yeah, I'm kind of into this new Shawna lady or whatever it's spelled.

She's the right height. She's kind of impoverished. She's not a vegetarian.

I think she's a little suspicious of me, but she's only observed me at the traditional "happy hour" time for a few weeks. And my perception may be a bit skewed to notice times when she is less than overly pleased to see me and serve me.

I still cannot guess her age,,,womens' ages. Probably a mere mid-forties.

Gross.

But, I think I could do something with that.

Have to readjust ... no, that's fine .... yeah, OK. I'm kind of into her.

All right!

Game, set, match!

I'm going to nail an old broad!


Go me!

Quote:

---

Originally posted by Jizzelbin

parking congestion at the various terminus.

---

Goddammit fuck shit. I thought it was a fourth-declension noun.

I'll be damned if I'd write "termini." No. Fucking. Way.

Well, in my defense, it does sort of seem like a fourth-declension word, like "apparatus" and others.

Fuck. Shit. Goddamned.

All right, fine. It was a swing and a miss.

But I don't write or talk with a goddamned dictionary open.

Although, point against, there were several dictionaries at arms length, including a pocket paperback Latin dictionay and the OED Compact Edition at the time.

No.

I did bad.

That's like some jerkoff pronouncing "processes" as "prah-ses-seez." There is, to borrow some words from Orson Welles, no known way in, pace Welles, any language it can be said.

In July.

In July.

There is no known way in the English language you can say the phrase "In July" and emphasize the "in."

Show me where it's said, and I'll go down on you.

Fuck.

Shit.

Fucking shit.

Fuck.

Goddamned it.

Well, I guess the lesson is that the word "terminus" is a second-declension noun.

Apparently.

Fuck. Shit. Damned.

Shit.

I think I should drop a bunch of acid and just get my head cleared.

I'm too involved with other people, and I should just go live in a cave for like a week.

HOW is it possible that out of twenty people on a crew, about seven people are actually doing stuff? Or even try? I mean, I understand it takes a while to get it, but did these people come from underneath a bridge or something? It would make my life a lot easier if they would not try to "help," just don't. I have to go back over every fucking thing to see what somebody might have screwed up.

No, I'm not saying it's as critical as ATC, but time is a real factor. I move fast, I think fast, I talk fast, and I don't have time to dick around with some bullshit motherfucks. And these are heavy fucking carts, so excuse me if I'm covered in sweat. Just don't be a fucking idiot, people.

And, more importantly, how in the fucking world can some dipshit have allowed this to happen?

It's not difficult to compute the average time overages when one adheres to the "each person corrects the Flex drivers' problems in an ad hoc fashion," and correcting for about 70% failure rate of devices, and the addition +20% time spent per route per stager.

This is not a well-run warehouse. We have unmanageable volume, which is a known quantity, because they fucking come in on goddamned trailers in pallets. This is known. We have insufficient staff who are unseasoned. 20% of the new hires, at best, do anything. 3% of the floor workers have signficant intellectual disabilities: which is great, god love them and everything. I've bonded with a few and they are good at doing repetative tasks and not bothering me. They should not be counted by some fry cook supervisor as "well, hurr, we have enurff people." No, that's a manager's job. We don't have managers here. A few we have. We have a lot of supervisors who are not being handled correctly, and not enough actual managers.

Also, there is not one IT person in the warehouse. Not one. So, every single driver, vans or flex, and a large number of employees, who rely on stable throughput. What is there? Some repeaters. No reliable device support. No training for employees of the driver apps. Broken devices, poor redistribution of charging stations for company devices. Digital clocks on the floor that are exceeding ten minutes from UTC. No visual displays of routes except for little paper handouts, except when some chooch forgets to put paper in the printer.

Every single goddamned package that goes to somebody's house in the larger metro area, excepting funiture and gross bulk like that, comes through my warehouse.

Jesus fucking christ. Get with the fucking program.

ETA Actually, if some fry cook supervisor wants the chili served at the right temperature. Well, that's good for them. I'm sorry, but I get paid by the hour, so if I put an ad hoc sort ahead of a Cycle 1 or whatever, that's the fucking way it is.

I'm done with prioritizing routes on the fly: fuck it. So, a four hour driver gets a three hour route.

Fuck. You.

"I show that those routes are in the warehouse so I need you to go find them."

Fuck. You.

You can have under-the-roof-time, you can have accuracy, and you can have optimal results.

Not my fucking problem.

You need more people, you dumbass.

Today is going to be one of the bad days. This sea-ward supervisor takes over. The other one, she learns, she observes. This one. No.

Universally despised. Her incompetence at doing the simple arithmetic can be excused, but her manner is not. I'm the last one to have observed this, since I only work "with" her two days a week.

I'm thinking up a good way to fuck her over, seeing that I'm one of about four or seven people who know WTF they're doing, depending on who shows up today, and I think I've got it.

I'll just put in "sick time" for fifteen minutes via my phone during the busiest hour, go sit in my car, smoke some tobacco, have a coffee, and then clock back in.

Yo, "supervisor," when your coworkers start actively planning ways to fuck over your metrics (which aren't yours, but reflect on mgmt, not some little scrub like you), you might reconsider your approach.

Yep. Menstrual cramps. They're bad this time of year. I can't predict when I have them, but probably about 1523 this afternoon to 1538. It's all been recorded via the employee website, so, fuck, and fuck you.

And shit no, I'm not breaking a goddamned bead of sweat. And fucking hell no, I'm not taking a radio to listen to this cacophony of bullshit. Follow the chain of command, and if it's important, one of the floor-level supervisors will get it to me. They actually know what they're doing, and we figure it out together, they take my suggestions, I listen to them. We're all a team on the floor, and you're a broken leg on a goddamned harvester.

Actually, no. That's a petty and stupid way to draw attention to myself, and not the good kind. What I do is, the minute before clocking in, state officially that I'll be leaving after two hours.

The supervisors don't actually have access to the employee information via official channels: managers do, but not supervisors. They can get it, but it's not up-to-the-minute updates.

My hands are clean, I've reported my absence ahead of time, via the proper channels, and the next minute you turn around. Where's he? What?

Well, that's a problem. I actually don't want to hurt my team by just dropping out.

How can I keep on good terms with my group without doing this slacker bullshit?

I suppose all I can do is just show up, and do the good old work-to-rule, and just play it straight.

Slow, but straight and to reg. My people will know what I'm up to, so there's no problem.

Yeah, I did end up doing that: viz, stating that I would be leaving after two hours, ahead of time.

Yes, people the next day were like "WTF, dude, we were like looking for you and you weren't here, we thought you like just left, man!"

Apparently, after living in a place for a while, you sort of absorb the local culture.

In this case, extreme passive-aggression.

But, hey, it's not all bad: I finally went native and have a bitchen set of muttonchops. Like that comic thing, the Wolverine, like if he sat around for a few months eating junk food. And without the metal shit. Strong, go all day, but no Wolverine abs.

Oh, now I'm fucking pissed off. So, my usual work day 0930 to 1700, Sun-->Thurs.

Fucking A. I do not like going to my fucking hangout after 1700. Stupid shithead bar, usually they can just pad your tab with, like a hundred bucks, to save you a trip to the bank. It's not free money, it's not a loan. It gets paid when they run their checks after every day, minus their fee.

No more, apparently. It's like twenty bucks maximum.

Fuck that. Plus, Shawna's a fucking retard, as is most everybody who comes in after five. No offense.

I'm switching to Joe's Cellar on my way back home. No, that's not code for anything, it's another dive bar on my way home.

/////////

ETA Oh, and another thing, "Jennifer," when I tell you drivelane 3 is ready, it's fine.

No. You don't need one of your little people to say it's OK.

If I say over the radio it's good, it's fucking good.

What'd I stutter, you caked-on-pancake makeup ghoul?

I'm the one who made it OK, and if I say on the radio the beach is safe to surf, it's safe to surf.

Door people sassing me? How about I sass you into a fucking garbage can.

Hmmm. I'm not using the word "fucking" entirely well in text.

It's pretty close to the way I talk IRL, but I think I say "motherfucker" or "motherfucking" a bit more. But that's longer to type.

And I underuse some of my favorite RL terms in writing, like "cocksucker" or the more direct "fuck you" (usually said to a third party, understood as being directed to a second party known to us.

"Fucking A" is represented with verisimilitude in text.

This is not an exhaustive analysis, but it seems that I could do better at representing my RL speech habits (within the right crowd, of course) in text.

What the fuck is this goddamned shit, motherfucking cornhole bullshit?

See, all is right again.

The bitchen Lemmy Kilmister/Duane Allman/Chester Alan Arthur/Martin van Buren muttonchops are gone. It was a funny joke while it lasted, but it's too much effort. I didn't even keep my lifelong dream to resemble a sex offender with a John Waters-style pencil moustache, and I'm certainly not going to grow one from scratch.

Although Vincent from Jackie Brown did have a pretty sweet handlebar moustache. I might consider that, but, again, too much effort.

Nice thing, though, with a safety razor armed with a fresh Astra platinum double-edged blade, it took less than ten minutes.

With a cartridge razor or a disposable, it could have taken a long ass time, and certainly gone through multiple cartridges or razors, as well as being a PITA.

Didn't even cut myself, although my bathroom sink is probably not happy about the quantity of hair that passed through its drain.

And the blade is still bitch-ass sharp as a motherfucker.

Fuck all that. Yeah, so I'm going in tomorrow AM to help these motherfuckers do shit, out of the goodness of my heart. Because of course I like to volunteer my efforts.

Yes, that's a joke. I get paid, obviously.

But help me god if fucking Jerry starts pulling his shit idea of how to stage carts. Bullshit. The flex drivers expect to see the cart parallel to the drivelane indicators. They've got plenty of room to drive, and I can double-stage in a sensible manner. Fucking Jerry. Fuck him. I know what the fuck I'm doing, and so does he. He's just wrong.

Holy smokes, blank casstte tapes are freaking expensive! No, I haven't checked Amazon, but just glanced at Walmart's offerings.

Don't ask why I want them, I just do. And, no, I don't have a higher-end deck with a meter to indicate clipping, let alone a full VU meter nor am I going to us audio compression to even out the dynamics, which I should, for the source material I listen to, I just have an older dictaphone desktop model, which is pretty sweet, but aside from speed control on playback, is not really designed for typical audio uses.

I did feel kind of bad at Walmart today (I had twenty bucks in gift cards "earned" from the Microsoft Rewards program, figured I'd just use them to buy smokes so I wouldn't feel so profligate). I was using the self checkout (which is very nice, actually, at the store I went to — I could scan in my GCs myself, AND use the Walmart app for another GC I didn't have a chance to print out. So, the checkout guy, the helper or whatever, was a big help, since I don't anything about Walmart or all that, I walked over with him to point out the Marlboro Black Menthols (KING size, bitch, why does everyone call them "shorts"? Nobody smokes 100s, anyway, maybe somebody's ancient grandmother with the blue-rinse hair).

Oh, so anyway, I do all that and some chooch is ringing up peroxide where I had just been not two seconds ago, with a million open terminals, I just say, "Wrong." I think I repeated that a few times when he was justifiably confused. That was sort of me being an asshole, but, since I'm an idiot, I had my phone on the checkout scanning place, plus some printed out coupons, and one of those cloth shopping bags opened up.

The more I think about it, c'mon. He knew what was up. I don't feel bad about it at all.

Nor about that asshole flex driver at AMZ today (I came in for a few hours on my weekend), who insisted he just couldn't fit all the packages in his car. When he started to complain after I put my boot on his neck, he was all bitching like "Now I can't see out of the back window!"

"I don't care. Do it or not, it's just the way we do things." Perfectly calm, no insults, no raised voice. The "I don't care" was the first part, for sure, the second sentence is about right, but I might have said "It's just what Amazon does." I don't remember exactly, but I'm sure it was the "I don't care" that "triggered" that little weenus.

So like a little bitch he asked to talk to the supervisor after wasting a bunch of time. So I radio her to come over to deal with the "problem driver," within earshot of him. He ended up forfeiting his route, after she probably told him the same thing I did, with him personally taking everything out of his car, not get paid, and a giant black mark on his record as a driver.

Obviously, it's not a problem for me to say pretty much whatever to these people, but I don't know why he thought he could burn me by tattling to my supervisor. Does he think he's doing me a favor by driving for my warehouse? He's not a customer by any stretch of the imagination. He's there to do as he's told.

My "tech" life or "life" got a bit simpler since I figured out that MS has, years ago, made available PowerShell for Linux devices.

It's somewhat an important tool for using Windows machines, and I've been admittedly lazy about re-jiggering virtual machines to run Win10, relying instead on WINE to keep current with basic Excel skills I need.

Now I can just stick to my good old Xubuntu forks with CentOS on the side, and get most of it in one place. Useful Windows/.NET tools, without having to do too much KVM/Quem virtual machine swapping.

Also, I finally found out that I can use a tool called Termux on my Android phone to get a pretty good Linux shell on Android. So, that's not so important, but at least I can use wget or curl to download large files while my phone is in the car charging on my car-starter battery pack, as well as use vim and all that without having to go through that shitty GooglePlay crap.

No, I'm not into "rooting" my phone — for me, it's a hassle and I don't care that much, but being able to fiddle with powershell, python3, gcc, git, nosqllite/dynamo, and much of the other good things from the CLI on the phone is a good thing. I mean, fuck all that "file explorer" bullshit and "durr, hey, touch screen make point good!"

Make no mistake: Android sucks butt, but I'm glad to have stumbled upon a way to use it as a computer, instead of that candy-colored bullshit "me touch screen good!"

Finally put Windows 10 back on a laptop I wasn't using for much. Unfortunately, the version I could find without having to download from Microsoft (yes, I have a license) is only in French prompts and Cortana voice.

I thought that would be no problem, but I find it slightly annoying. Cortana's lady French voice is OK, I guess...definitely not a sexy lady voice, but it's OK. But the French have an annoying mixture of words drawn from English and ordinary French words for technology stuff. It's fine, it's just kind of annoying, like switching between languages all the time. It screws up the language part of my brain.

Computer bitches.

Fucking GEICO.

It's the only insurer for automobiles I've ever used: in the past and now in the present. They've always been pretty cool, gave good rates, gave good lip service over the phone, never any complaints.

I mean, fucking A.

This is the second time in the past, I don't know, like year or so, when I try to shuffle around a monthly payment, call them up and say, "Yeah, just put this month's premium on this card, instead of out of my checking."

They have some inflexible, inscrutable rules, and I'm in principle offended that I'm offering them cash money (well, you know, electronic funds transfer) and they say "Mewl, mewl, it's not been three days before <insert some J** crap>"

Fuck it.

I'm going the nuclear option and, since inquiring about quotes from other insurers, my spam folder is littered with quotes and shit, if they don't fuck off and fly right, I'll look forward to saying over the phone, "OK. Cancel my policy immediately. Nope. Nope. I don't want your garbage anymore, you bunch of straightjacketed hooligans."

They are cheap, and reliable, but fuck 'em.

ETA Yeah, it's a bit of a PITA to remember my license plate n° and write down the mileage and all that and do a whole forty minute thing over the phone, but it's worth it to say in writing "You have gravely disappointed me, GEICO, and you and I shall not be doing business any longer. Good day, sir."

Oh. And the muttonchops. They're back.

It's not really a conscious decision, just I get busy and distracted and don't shave for a week or ten days, and then the beardlet has to come off in stages. First, trim the neckline — no matter what you might expect, "neckbeard" isn't something I want.

From there, it's pretty sensible. The densest growth about the chin goes.

And then, well, inertia sets in. Much like lumbago or whatever.

All right, tomorrow I get rid of the "chops" but only do to about late-Elvis length.

I have to pop in a fresh double-edged blade, and if I do much more cutting of facial hair than that, I'm liable to cut myself, which is extremely annoying.

My only rallying cry to myself in front of the mirror is "Now I know a woman's pain! That is, one who shaves her pubes!"

Speaking of that.....never mind....that's a story for another time.

Oh.

Spoiler (mouseover to read):

I was just now told via telephone to GEICO that my good-faith effort to pay this month's premium with my credit card, instead of through my checking account, will result in a $20 "checking account closed" fee. Since you will not accept my alternate, valid method of payment, well in advance of the date due, and your CS representative replied that the twenty USD fee should be waived, even including my advance notice and preparation of alternate valid payment, I'd like to cancel my insurance by you effective November 28, 2019. It is out of the question that a company should refuse payment in advance, as I offered to do, and I choose to spend forty minutes on the phone with one of the many other companies who solicit my company, rather than do the same fighting against your strict policy of refusing my good-faith efforts to pay.

Yeah.

In my defense, it's really hard to write some "customer service" "comment" that doesn't sound bitchy and entitled.

I understand their point of view, but it's, to me, a ridiculously arbitrary, bureaucratic notion, in the worst sense of that penultimate word.

Actually, no.

They can process whatever charge they want. But they're selling me a fat line of horseshit about "Oh, we can't possibly process that, since your previous payment is still being processed."

If it were a regulatory obstacle, he or she must have said so, or be banished.

If not, they're just fucking stupid rummies.

Not that I'm not, but I'm not running a goddamned company, just my own fucking life, which is pretty fucking simple.

Well, I'll be a son of a bitch.

GEICO called my bluff, and as of Nov. 28th, they will no longer be my auto insurer.

And not only will they refund my premium, but they will do so less their twenty dollar fee.

I guess I'm now a customer of Progressive, mainly because it's the first company I can think of, and it's the one that doesn't have that stupid cartoon nerd-rape-fantasy mascot with like the fright wig on.

Well, I did tell them exactly what was what. Apparently they manage to listen when it's dropping their customers, but not when retaining them.

What an odd business model.

I'm glad to be done with them.

Fuck Thanksgiving. Right in the ass.

Fuck forced celebrations.

Fuck everybody who thinks Christmas season begins when Advent season does.

Fuck Mariah Carey and "All I Want for Christmas is You," and every other song ever made that tasteless mutants listen to.

And fuck everybody on Black Friday: I hope every single person gets boxes of crab lice from Walmart or whatever.

Well, this was somewhat amusing. Regular day at work. I think this driver was in the afternoon batch of routes, but I'd seen her before at least once — one of many regular drivers.

Maybe mid-to-late twenties, woman/girl, died blue hair, sort of flibberty-jibberty I guess, but pretty cool.

Yeah, so blah blah, something package missing from her route. So I guide her to getting the QR code through her smartphone "app" so I can scan it and take it off her route.

"Yeah. It takes a second, I know my screen is cracked. You can touch it if you want. I don't mind if you touch my phone. It's OK, I mean."

No shit.

WTH? !!!!!!!

Goddamned woman, suggestive much? No, I'm not kidding, that's pretty much her dialog 88-95% accurate.

"You can touch it if you want!"

Although, in her defense, the company-wide "theme" was "everybody dress in black," and I was one of the few people on this shift who went for it. Black "dress" shirt, black undershirt, black trousers, black lace-up shoes, black socks, black shorts. Black leather belt. Pretty fucking studly if you ask me.

Oh. And the high-visibility safety vest.

It really spoiled my figure!

No, I did feel a bit bad in that a number of people (it's a small crew, and I was just here as extra help 9h30->1700) did try but a few of the crew were like "Well, I did black wear except didn't have black shoes."

Yeah, I kind of remembered that not everybody is as old as shit as me and has a bunch of clothes in all colors moldering in some corner of my place.

I must say, though, wearing adult shoes, rather than sneakers or leather loafers felt good on my feet, even walking miles on concrete warehouse floors.

I'm glad I had the foresight to put new laces in those ... what would you call them ... just leather boots that look like shoes when the cuff of the pants is over them. Not Nazi boots, nor even dress boots. Just regular leather boots with a leather or synthetic sole that lace up and that I should clean and polish more often.

My right heel still hurts after a few hours doing stuff in them, but no worse than any other pairs of athletic shoes or loafers.

/////////////


Oh, for your amusement. I've smelled a lot of ganj coming off a lot of flex drivers, but this little foreign guy (I don't know, like Belgian probably or something) takes the cake.

How can you possibly infuse 40 cubic meters with such a pungent smell?

And it was good stuff, too. I can tell.

Well, it smelled good, anyway. It was like Pépé Lepew was in the building for about a half an hour.

Nice guy, cubed out a package that wouldn't fit in his car and he was like "Thank you so much, man. I really appreciate it."

"Oh, that's all right!"

Fucking Po5tland, city of immigrants. I think the secret of "European" style is just dress like a human: I still don't understand fashion and whatever. Yeah, I mean, sure, I'll wear my Led Zeppelin T-shirt or whatever black T-shirt with cigarette or pipe burns in it and jeans, probably most days, but it's like tuck in your shirt and "mr. fancy!" I think not. Don't comb your hair with a fork, use a comb. Seems pretty fucking regular to me.

Words to live by.

ETA And, no, I don't mean like the usual scumbag piece of crap Portlander who squats in a condemnable "habitation" and is a menace to his or her neighbors, online or offline.

AFAIC, pieces of garbage like that should be rounded up and sent to Fresham, where they can get their animal molestation and cop-impersonation fantasies taken care of.

That was funny. At work some chick was like "You know who you look like? Alec Baldwin!"

So we joked a bit, and I guess she had in mind that checkered shirt the actor wore in the movie Beetlejuice, or however it's spelled. She saw me at the 0400 shift, and, natch, I changed shirts for my second shift into a sort of shirt with a vaguely checkered pattern. More of a Western-style shirt, with fake mother-of-pearl snaps and such. My Led Zeppelin ZOSO T-shirt was soaked with sweat, so it was necessary.

Weird. Yes, she made a point to mention she was married, so it wasn't that. Just some light-hearted joking around. Not a bad looking woman, though. A little chunky, but she seemed smart, and she probably has friends who are goers. I'm not a perfect specimen myself, and anyway, I can be convinced to fuck just about anything, within reason, so no complaints.

There are some good looking babes at the warehouse, but just not so much working on my team. I suppose if the gossip mill is still active word is out that I "go there" when it comes to socializing off-duty, although I'm not sure that's a positive thing.

Holy shit.

I just interacted with one of the most beautiful women I've ever seen in my life, ever. She was a contractor-driver who was having some problems with her phone. Alas, I could not help her, but I did try, you know tried in vain to get someone on the radio who could just do what I asked.

Wow.

That son of a bitch Michael got her up and running by just power-cycling her phone, and what a waste, he claimed to be insensible to her charms because he's engaged to be married, and thought she was too skinny.

Nonsense.

No, I wasn't going to creep on her or anything, but I would have enjoyed spending more time helping her fix the problem...just because....well, just because it's fun for me to chat with astonishing, friendly, smart, women with a sense of humor.

Oh well.

That was still a memorable encounter.

Oh, not to distract from the much more important prurient matters, but here's a funny one.

So, about once a day, some flex driver (independent contractors driving their own vehicles, just doing piece-work deliveries, sort of like GrubHub or one of those — they just pick a time, and if there's a route for them, they come in and take it) comes in whose whole car and its surroundings absolutely reeks of dank weed.

I shit you not, some of the more naïve people who actually work for my company were like "that car hit a skunk!"

No, honey, that may smell a bit like a skunk, but trust me, it's not. At least two people were like running around like "ZOMG they hit a skunk! There's blood on the front of the car. (There was not: I looked)."

C'mon people, really?

Oh well. I don't even smoke weed except socially on occasion, but it's not really an obscure bit of knowledge, IMHO. Well, maybe it is for some people.

Yeah, that's certainly the most likely explanation: someone hit a skunk on the highway, and as a result, umpteen miles later on the open highway, the smell has clung to the car.

Ahhh. The innocents abroad, the innocents at home.

Oh, and in post 495, I didn't mean I changed shirts because of the conversation: I was speculating that she made the connection after I'd already changed shirts.

BUT, I'm sure you'll all be happy to know I'm pretty much perma-...............polite way to say ........ interested in this woman at work who does some stuff for the stuff after my team does stuff.

Difficult to say why.

EXTREMELY striking. Petite, black/dark brown hair, type more greek than Italian (lol), good nose, all desired teeth appear to be present, reserved, capable.

Oh well, I forgot what it's like living in a city where every day you pass a hundred of the most beautiful girls just walking to your whereabouts.

Vive la différence! Les femmes, je vous salue!

Actually, I revise the above statement.

You know, she just looks nice and doesn't seem dumb.

But, yes, I know (am pretty sure) Ra Tea****ha noticed my look sometime last week...so, since she's kind of one of the gossip queens (yes, I can say that, she is female, as in a full-grown woman as well as a friend, as far as coworkers go who text each other and stuff), I can at least be like "Hey, is she a goer?"

Although, IME, single mothers who still have strong sexual urges about my age don't usually like being "friend-zoned" by men their own age confessing their prurient interests in others.

BUT, they know IME what's what.

No, I'm just going to leave the warehouse talk between me and...here, I guess.

Actually I saw something extremely appalling today while waiting until rush hour was over grabbing a beer and watching the Jets game on TV at the bar:

yeah, maybe it's like seeing a really good, like these girls I was talking about, versus something just plain astonishing.

WTF? I've been going to this bar almost daily for about sixteen months, and WTF is this mountain man just stalking behind the bar, delivering shit and whatever?

I'm not a small man, but I was fucking frightened: dude was like 6'9" and probably 300 lbs.

I mean, he wasn't a bouncer, he wasn't the retired NFL player owner, but fucking shit.

How often do you ever say to yourself, "That's not a man, that's a mountain, or what the fuck is that?"

Like seeing Mongo (Alex Karras) from Blazing Saddles IRL.

I'll ask tomorrow after an extra morning shift at work, but it's not often I see somebody who's like "WTF is that thing???!!!"

Christ.

At least the girls who really hit me with the thunderbolt (second gratuitous GF reference in two posts) are not terrifying.

Yeah, I've seen football players IRL at campuses, but these people are fucking freaks of nature!!!!!

That's why all the barstools in every place ever are broken!

Oh, that was fun. It is freezing cold, and I just spent more time than I should admit fiddling with IRC clients.

Yes, on DALnet (irc.dal.net) there is a channel named #jizzelbin which I created.

IRC is, IMHO, completely useless without using something called an IRC Bouncer, which permits the history of chats to be visible during times one is not online.

There are plenty of ways to set this combination up, but it's pretty hacker-ish, and probably not something the average person would want to do.

However, on the Android phone, a good client program is AndroIRC (among others, but I like that the best, in addition to Weechat in a TerMux session).

On Linux I like Weechat and, for a very simple GUI program, HexChat.

I'm thinking IRC is tedious and useless, unless you're actively online most of the time, or need up-to-the minute chat during some prescribed interval of the day.

No clue what people are actually chatting about in the bigger channels, but I'm pretty sure it's either disgusting or illegal, or else very boring.

well, I got to try out my once-favorite expression (that I only fairly recently copied) in (appropriate) company, and it was not exactly met with the LOLZ I expected. That really does make my pussy dry. Christ, man, "Oh, man, hey, I didn't know, uh." Lighten up, Francis, it's a joke.

OTOH, I'm pretty sure "the women" are getting a little bit friendlier nowadays, as in the past week or so.

It's probably some combination of, if they're partnered up, they're getting boned more attentively what with the dark season approaching and ek setera, or, if not, "they" have more of an inclination to seek the company of others.

NO, I really do insist I'm not a misogynist, nor a complete virgin nerd. Of course it's a generalization, but it is based on up-to-the-moment observation. So, at least for the women I encounter in the wild of the warehouse, namely coworkers, I think it's true.

And I think I can read people pretty well. Except when I don't.

OH, on the similar vein of sociological gold, I've observed that at least two separate women, not relations or especially close to me, but women I know on a friendly basis, instantly seem to understand the gesture .... how to describe ... if, say, you hold your LH with the palm at chest-height, thumb facing "north," and with the RH, also in an open palm configuration, roughly parallel to the "line" created by the opposing hand, make a few swift strokes resulting in contact, whether .... OH, fuck it, you know what I mean, a sort of miming of a "pimp slap," in the same way you'd see a jock in the movies pounding his fist into the other hand while blurting out "NERRRRRRDS!"

Well, they thought it was funny, I guess, each in their separate ways, and in separate contexts, but I was surprised each seemed to immediately get my humorous intent.

nm

Motherfuckers.

Well, it is a nylon watch band (although it's apparently made for midgets or ladies — and, confession time, I actually have not very big wrists), and the lady at the jeweler's put it on my Casio MTP-4500D-1AV just to be nice. (Just a quartz watch with a chronograph and a slide-rule bezel: Not an expensive watch, but it suits my purpose, having tradition big hand-little hand analog hands and the chronograph. TBH, the slide rule is a bit superfluous: for the precision, it's really no better than just doing the arithmetic in your head).

It's not a NATO band, though: those have the extra loop around back so if one of the springbars comes loose, the whole thing doesn't fall in the toilet. Also, $24.95 for that hunk of shit? I admit I chose the green color because the black nylon band was $27.95.

Oh well, it's fine for now.

Here was a new one from today. So, this guy I've talked with a bunch at this bar, he works a few days in the kitchen there. A little older than me, but not by much. Musician guy you know. He always says "Hey, what's up Maestro!" so that's his nickname for me. I can't remember his name so I just call him "Chef" or "Cookie."

Yeah, so he had a good one today: "So, what's good, Maestro?"

Me: "what's good?"

Him: "Yeah, what's good?"

I never heard that one before. I didn't have a cool answer like "New Orleans red beans rice, pralines and pianos," but I always enjoy hearing new bits of speech.

ETA And, yes, while my forearms and wrists are plenty strong, they lack in bulk. I make up for it in having extremely strong grip strength and relatively large hands, not to mention large-ish upper arm muscles. It was a problem playing tennis, since one of my strengths was volleying at the net, and despite having a powerful, accurate forehand and backhand, even one-handed backhand, my serve was never what it could have been, despite my height, thanks to poor study habits and underdeveloped muscle bulk in my forearms. Believe you me, I drank milk, lifted, everything.

Yeah, it is funny in that I can do crazy stupid feats of strength with forearms and wrists, like wrangling dowels loaded with weights of various kinds, or all kinds of stuff, but they just aren't bulky like the biceps and triceps, and the pectoral muscles and those about the shoulders.

Well, some tailgater (or rather his child bride driving, or someone similarly inexperienced) happened to pull into the same store I was going to after work.

So, I got to call someone a cocksucker, somewhat sotto voce, but audible.

Granted, that's not unusual: usually I reserve that language for contract drivers at work who do defective things.

I'm back! Yeah!

This seems to be a continuing theme. Some cockbiting prick was up my ass on a rainy night on what should be a hassle-free highway.

I turn into the grocery store where I was headed after going to my bank before they closed.

Of course Mr. Cockbiting Prick Dickless Shithead pulled in after me.

I was able, through correct use of turn signals through the small parking lot, to end up within fifty meters of his car.

Even though it was misting gently with rain, I had the satisfaction of having a cigarette while sitting on the hood of my car (N.B., my car, not his or anybody else's), and conspicuously using my cell phone to photograph his vehicle.

I hope that little prick shit himself and continues to do so. And his child bride or whoever the fuck was in the passenger seat.

I could see he was considering coming up to me and starting some shit, but apparently nobody fucks with the Jesus. That'd be me.

Stupid fucking pricks, driving like animals. Where do the fuck do you think you're going, shithead? Ain't nothing up that road except my foot in your ass, you peckerwood.

Oh, this gal at work....I really wish I could remember if she was the one who said I looked like Alec Baldwin (not exactly a compliment, but I'll take that over the standard "ZOMG it's Nic Cage!" any day, since I heard that so many times, and am not appreciative especially of men who say that — "yeah, cool dude, he's a good actor, man!") and also mentioned she was married.

So, anyway, I don't know if this is the same gal or just one, but she has really been pouring it on pretty thick.

Calling me by my first name, saying "Hi, Jizzelbin [not my actual first name :)], and wishing me a Happy new year blah blah.

It's enough to make me confused.

In the first place, I'm not sure if it's the same gal — I can find that out easy enough and just ask her to remind me of her name (trust me, that's not uncommon for me to forget names, nor to remedy the problem with a quick question, takes under ten seconds) — in the second place, I wouldn't say it wasn't a ruse a bit on her part, the whole "blah blah...BTW my husband...blah blah." OTOH, she just might be friendly (although in a rather flirtatious way) and just likes the way I roll freight.

Meh.

Next time I see her, I can figure it out.

Speaking of nothing, in my current town there sure do seem to be a number of chunky white woman of impregnable age who seem nevertheless healthy and desirous of male company.

I'm not complaining a bit!

Sholem aleichem!

I really hope daily use of pseudoephedrine (aka Sudafed, generic name Sudogest) does not have a rebound effect upon discontinuation.

Yeah, probably not smoking like a chimney and cleaning my domicile once in a while would have an effect as well.

I don't have no fucking cold like a goddamned infant — fuck it. I'll buy some Mucinex and use that.

I'm pretty well convinced I have a form of COPD or emphysema, at this point, I just don't want to be blowing my fucking nose for no reason all the fucking time. Yeah, I'll have plenty of time to contemplate my demise while imitating Mikey after that bastard Sterling Hayden punched him (yeah, I know the guy's name in the "book," I just don't want to misspell it).

Fucking A.

That's all I have to say about today. Go to the bank, eagle flies on Friday, put gas in the car, bought some Febreze, some smokes, had a few beers and a breakfast out, and then went home and did dishes.

Fucking A.

And I'm glad I did it, too.

I suppose this is funny, or remarkable.

So, I always fuel up at this place where cabbies use. No reason, except they're the cheapest price in town, and they don't give you any bullshit about making you go inside and pay next to the Slim Jims and all that bullshit.

Anyway, so, I ask for forty cash regular, and it's an old buddy from an earlier shift.

Yeah. so it takes a few minutes for the meter to click and blah blah, "yeah, I have three nephews," "Oh? I have twenty-five, the oldest age, maybe thirty-four,"

ZOMG, every week or every day I hope to make the sign of peace, but sometimes it is very difficult!

Perhaps the soul has no age, or whatever. I do not believe in a soul or what-have-you, yet, I practice, but these encounters try my patience!

Oh, I suppose this is remarkable. So, I was about halfway through The Irishman, and I ran out of cigarettes.

See, because it's a long movie, also, and whatever.

Anyway, I shouldn't probably have been driving, but i did.

So since i knew only one of the two automatic doors would be working past ten pm, I naturally knew where to park.

I knew it was a county sherriff's SUV cruiser when I deftly slided next to it.

I suspected there would be some State or County fellows inside the store. Naturally, right?

I did NOT expect some caged hell-beast to start barking the second I parked up next to "it's" vehicle and walk to the entrance. Normally animals love me, if not vice versa.

Of course, I ended up in line behind the county sheriff.

It was chill, but it reminded me of that scene from Reservoir Dogs, in the bathroom. I was chill, but I think the cashier was more worried than me, like he was mortally frightened or something. I think he thought I was high on weed and would like have a Hunter S. Thompson-style, and probably was relieved when I just asked for some cigarettes and paid in cash and didn't shit my pants when I "noticed" (as in deliberately parked by them and stood behind them in line) the pigs were near.

It was a funny moment, though.

I had no reason to not have had my driving privileges revoked, but, well, whatever.

I unwrapped my cigarettes while the cruiser was moved, turned over the engine, started up the tape deck to Mac's Desitively Bonnaroo, as usual. and proceeded down the highway with zero BAC and no THC.

Coffee and cigarettes, baby. That and the man upstairs, what gets me high.

I did find it amusing just now while vomiting my concoction of whiskey, coffee, and milk into the toilet to notice how often one associates the phonemes "p^" and "m^" with certain biological functions.

No, I'm not going to do the whole net-ological nerd-crap nor properly notate these sounds in IPA.

You know damned well what I mean, and it isn't a paper of any sort.

IIRC Jakobson (sp?) and more recently Reuven Tsur (sp?) as well as Jakobson's direct disciples did suppose a correspondance betweence meaning and utterance.

Of course, we know of medical doctors who proposed more or less elaborate theories based on some kind of observation, one presumes.

I simply say that there's probably both (i) some possibility that certain sounds are more appropriate at certain biologically-imperative cues than others and that (ii) it's entirely possible that entire civiizations have been built upon observations of such correspondences.

And, that is my theory of Christianity, and actually, why I consider myself a Christian.

QED.

I might sound drunk, and probably, actually, I really probably could not walk a mile without falling over, but this is not a new thought to me. In fact, it is why I began observing the sacraments of the church after a very long time of abeyance since the age of reason (for me, say, age six? five? seven? i don't know).

I should not say any more.

I hope that my thoughts and their expression is not unpleasant to others, but this is what I wish to have said.

No, I'm not joking. I'm going to try to finish this bottle of whiskey and see if I can have more cigarettes tomorrow before Sunday comes up and I should do mass and whatever which I can't because unclean.

And, no, after more than an hour's worth of sobriety, I confirm my findings.

I think the myth of incarnation is probably somewhat of a side-effect to which we humans must endure. How is it that speech or utterance can resemble a gesture, or a grasp? It is, indeed, the whole of humanity, in nuce. So, while the Jews have a Golem, the Christians have a Christ, and so forth.

It's a reasonable explanation, I've found.

And, how can I possibly, like my superior, Ludwig Wittgenstein, assist the Roman mass and each day of obligation?

Well, I cannot. I cannot pronounce the Nicene Creed, nor honestly receive the host, so I do not. But I do observe, and with the best of my efforts.

All right, I'm sort of getting annoyed at this constant coming up to me at work by mere shift supervisors and my shift manager and them blowing smoke up my ass about "such good leadership," "won't you consider please?"

Yeah, I get it, you people want some stooge to be a floor supervisor so you can keep the troops in line.

I appreciate the heavy-handed flattery and glad-handing and all that, but it should be obvious (and is, to the dwindling members of my team) that if I wanted to do that, for no extra pay, and the same hours, I'd have been doing more to that end. I work hard because that's just how I can stay awake and not get bored jacking off. It should be equally obvious I don't give two shits about the rules, except staying barely on the right side of them, and also that I don't cotton to bossing my people around. We're a team, and that's it. I'll step up when needed, and help people out without being told once, but that's it. That's just being a good worker.

//////////////

Oh. You know, dammit, I think I almost like this bartender/server at this little microbrewery, except AFAIK she only works Sundays.

Nothing special, just a pretty nice gal. Quiet, competent, and not a lot of sass. I think she might have terrible taste in music, though.

Well, that was interesting.

She does seem a bit frail: not petite, exactly. Probably medium height for a woman, but somewhat frail in bone structure.

Well, I'm sure that after another few months of me seeing her once a week for about a half-an-hour, I might decide differently.

I think she was impressed when, on driving out today after lunch, I hooked the tail end of my car on a wire rope and pulled down a few signs in the opposite construction yard.

It's a way to get attention. I'll have to ask her about that sometime.

Gussetted crotch my ass. Fucking bitch ass punk bullshit jeans.

Where's the motherfucking gussett, supposed to be so great? Yeah I need a hole in my crotch like I need an asshole on my elbow.

Fucking punk bitches making clothes and shit.

I think more than thirty or forty uses of a pair of jeans advertised as "for Johnny sixpack on the job" with "gussetted crotch" isn't unreasonable.

Other than that, they're fine jeans, good dark color, the size is as advertised (36x34), has an extra pocket for .... I'm not sure what it's for. Something workman-like, like a slide rule (or even just a regular ruler or caliper) or some pencils and shit. I suppose a cell phone could fit in there, but I don't like carrying my phone around where it's liable to smash into things. Maybe a hard case for eyeglasses, but I find I need to wear my eyeglasses pretty much all the time to see what nonsense my coworkers are getting up to. Something like that. Pocket calculator. Whatever. Collapsible baton. Knife. Fake ATF badge. Oh, shit: it's for putting prescription sunglasses in a small hard case for when you don't know what the weather's going to be like! Winning!

Bastard shitheads are losing, though, because of fucking crotch hole developing. Maybe I need a triple gussetted crotch, for those extra heavy days. Well, "pun" only sort of intended we'll see how far it spreads across the crotch.

I'm preferring the darker jeans as canvas work pants tend to show the sweat around the groin, and it looks like I pissed myself, and I don't always wear a longer shirt to cover up the tainted area. Denim is more forgiving of my man-stains.

Oh, for fuck's sake.

I hardly ever get suckered into these bullshit

But, yes, so I'm going to buy beer from the grocery store.

Fine, but plump, grocer, front-end supervisor is manning checkout.

Yeah, so, she and the guy in front of me and the bagger are just, you know, just like my friendly neighborhood grocer.

Fucking bitch, "Missy"! Sell that to the tourists!

I should have got the joke immediately, viz, "That was our union president!" And so forth.

Goddamned I am a fucking idiot.

Still, Missy did a fine job. "Did you need smokes today? What'd you quit?"

She would have made a fine job as a horse. "MIssy." Indeed. That is a horse's name.

I admit I appreciate that she and the rest of the gals up front (except Jodi, she's awful) know what I smoke and what brand and kind.

I admit, she snookered me on that one.

Yeah, I get it, she and the bagger and the old dude in a suit were kind of ... well, it's kind of an inside joke about the previous customer.

I should have got it, but I wasn't having my thinking cap on.

Spoiler alert: he was absolutely not the president of any union whatsoever. He was just some guy and they were having a laugh.

Why?

I just want to know why people drive like a horse's ass.

A simple explanation would satisfy me. A reason. One I could believe that isn't completely ridiculous.

All I got is: inexperienced and rash.

I can't explain it any other way.

I still need explaining why or how some fifty-plus year old "driver" is inexperienced at driving, but that's the best I can come up with.

I still want to know about the above post, but it occurred to me to relate a funny story from work yesterday.

So, yeah, lots of new people, lots of people hired for the Xmas surge either dropped out or I don't know what.

So anyways, I was just chucking carts around triple-staging stuff during a slow morning. The usual.

This woman, younger woman, probably in her mid twenties, asked me an odd question, "So, you're Catholic, right?"

I say, "Well, yeah, I try to attend mass. What gave you that idea?"

"Well, I just remember, last year you had that [she mimes doing the smudge on the forehead from last Ash Wednesday]. If it's too personal, that's OK"

Me: "Oh, well, sure. You know, it's just something I do."

And it goes on for a few minutes, she's like "what church do you attend?" "St. Mary's right up the street."

I'm not sure what her game was, but she seemed really interested in what I do, where I do it, and all that.

I think she was a little disappointed that I admitted it's more of a practice and I'm not really a person who goes along through life being zealously trying to convert people. Maybe she was looking for that kind of thing and so forth, like some kind of example of "regular cool guy who does church shit."

It was just remarkable that someone noticed that kind of thing: yeah, I make the sign of the cross sometimes when I'm frustrated, but I try not to do it in a way that signifies anything to others.

OTOH, it is a precept of the Church that one is to help others to enter the fold. I just can't do that.

SO, on the one hand, it was a very charming way of her to ask delicately about the Church, and I was very happy to talk with her and answer questions and so forth, but on the other hand, maybe I didn't act on the "between the lines" thing enough, and perhaps she could have benefitted from some friendly prosletyzation.

But, honestly, I can't do that: I can just try to be friendly, which it was a friendly just conversation between two coworkers.

I could have done more to make it seem like the Church wasn't some secret club where people chant Latin, and talk about Neo-Thomism (they don't: that's just how I do it, sotto voce).

As I see it, it was a missed opportunity to help instruct a fellow person who was clearly curious and interested find someplace welcoming to her.

But, I'm just not a missionary at heart. Not to mention my lack of faith, and not feeling able to receive the eucharist.

And I suspect she might have felt a bit embarrassed at revealing a curious side of herself to me.

Oh, goddamned motherfuck.

I have to either buy some new unbalanced "guitar" cables or else resolder some new TS jacks, preferably with right-angle connectors.

Yeah, I have some extras, but it pisses me off to put more shit on my shopping list.

Oh. about the girl above: yeah, it pretty much upsets me if I wasn't able to fulfill her needs.

No, I don't need to fuck every girl I meet, and this wasn't about that. I'm just disappointed that I couldn't have been what she wanted. She really seemed interested in the Church, but, unfortunately, I wasn't up to being some charimsatic leader: all I can tell her is what I'd say to anybody. It's just my hobby and you're more than welcome to come by anytime. I don't think she dug what I had to tell her, and I really do think she was hoping I'd have been more of an "out and proud" soldier of Christ. Sorry, honey, that's just the way it is.

I feel bad if she was wanting something more, like a coupon to a church picnic or whatever, but that's just not how it rolls.

ETA But now I have an excuse to buy a proper soldering pencil and a stand: my regular soldering iron is ancient, and doesn't do so good for finer-detailed stuff. It's OK for doing a little guitar cable, but it's time to step up.

I'm sorry to keep going on about this, but I feel very bad about missing a chance to help somebody who seemed to crave something in her life.

You'll have noticed that I'm not raving about her sexy body or whatever.

No, not that I couldn't be interested in that aspect, but that can be for another time.

I suppose that she was probably baptised as a Christian at some point, otherwise why would she have been all that interested in my own practice?

All I can say what I could have suggested is that she practice the sacrament of reconciliation (often just called "confession"): I don't know if she was worried about saying the right words or whatever, but I probably didn't help by saying that I like to pray the rosary and the responses to mass in Latin. It's really not important, that, but it gets more difficult for me to put myself in the shoes of somebody in their twenties as I get older. I did mention that I don't always remember every line.

The rest of the day I saw her again and she pretty much avoided talking to me or even making eye contact.

For once it wasn't because I made an unwanted advance, or so forth. Probably, I don't know.

Probably in her eyes I'm just "Catholic guy" but "not good Christian," because of me not witnessing or prosletyzing and admitting I'm not a real Christian, just some "practicing" Catholic.

Which is fine.

But, she asked me all those questions, and I answered in as friendly a way as I could.

And, yes, supposing she sees me this year again on Ash Wednesday, I will probably have some visible sign on my forehead. That's not exclusive to Christians, and especially not Catholics, of whatever rite.

Quote:

---

Originally posted by Jizzelbin

Holy shit.

I just interacted with one of the most beautiful women I've ever seen in my life, ever. She was a contractor-driver who was having some problems with her phone. Alas, I could not help her, but I did try, you know tried in vain to get someone on the radio who could just do what I asked.

---

This was bad.

It was a ... I think the day before yesterday or something.

I think she came back.

I had my eyeglasses on, and I was in charge of her ... "area" ... er...."zone".....never mind.

It was really bad.

Like, cartoon wolf with its tongue dragging along the floor.

I controlled myself, and reasoned with myself that th.........

never mind.

There was no reasoning in "myself." I just recalled that it's probably not good to be obviously distracted by a nice-looking broad, so I kept it clean.

Quote:

---

Originally posted by Jizzelbin

You know, she just looks nice and doesn't seem dumb.

---

Actually, about this woman, it is true. She happens to be hearing impaired, as it happens, and she does indeed work the shift after me, doing similar things. Obviously we haven't had long conversations, but she is probably aware that I have an expressive face, when it suits me, and also make deliberate hand gestures when appropriate.

I wonder how that would work, you know, "romantically." I think pretty well: it would be sort of "opposites attract" kind of thing: I respond almost only to auditory cues, but am very expressive with my hands and eyes, and she would perhaps be about the opposite of that.

Well, that little thought experiment needs some more thinking, but at least I know her a bit more and vice versa, so we're not on "first name," but more like "hey, hearty nod-of-the-head!" Or whatever.

This was not my finest moment. So I'm out in the suburbs, and I happened to notice gasoline at $2.83 per gallon (compared to the $3.19 or so I usually get at the cabbies' place, which is still the cheapest nearest to me). Yeah, I pull up, remembering after the fact that some places won't reach the pump on the opposite side of the car. Which is stupid, of them, but I wasn't sure if this was one of those places or not.

Yeah, yeah, so the pump lady finally comes out of the attached "convenience" store and says "Wrong side!" OK, that's fine.

However, in a moment of dickishness, I did pull around to the farthest pump from my original spot, and after waiting about a minute (kind of a long time, with no customers), I figure if I get out of the car and start trying to pump it myself she'd come over. Indeed. I got the gas cap off and laid it on the trunk and...that got her going.

I'd say that was a meeting of minds: just two assholes gong about their business.

Aww... That's good. I think Jen and I at work are having more of a meeting of the minds.

She's really nice, and funny and casual, and pretty good looking. But, that she's apparently married and has a kid, you know, I've been a little bit slowing my roll down, just because I don't want her to think I'm ... well, I wouldn't say perv-ing, but you know.

Nah. I think the walls are coming down on both sides.

You know, we've always been able to be casual and friendly and joke around, trade compliments or figure out solutions to some problems.

But, you know, getting to the next level of just asking each other's opinions about stuff and such.

So that's good.

I mean, I'm not shy about talking to pretty women, but I was a little uptight around her because I didn't want her to get the wrong idea.

It helps having some work-friends in common, especially since we're a tight crew, and Ra Te**sha knows me pretty well, so she's a good buffer, IRL as well as on the job. I wouldn't say she's a good friend IRL, but we text and stuff out of work sometimes.

And no, I'm not trying to "get with" Jen, I just like her as a person, and not in a million years am I going on the hunt for women with attachements.

So, that's good.

///////////

ETA Oh, no, fucking shit no. So I'm catching up on the last few podcasts of "Drew and Natalie's Garbage Brain University." It's some recent episode about CIA and conspiracy theories.

No.

That fucking asshole Drew Toothpaste is into that transhumanist bullshit about some AI singularity?

Like a real person thinks this way, not some moron doing like Roko's Basilisk or whatever stupid shit?

No.

No fucking way.

That is very disappointing.

Oh, fucking A.

I'm just going to post this in case anyone in the future has a similar problem.

Deaf woman?

I call it CAN woman!

In your RH, just do Morse code.

Oh.

Oh.

Well.

I can do it!

Oh.

No.

No.

No.

ETA No, I'm not talking about fingerbanging, I was doing like straight-up Morse code. Fail. EETA Even if I tried it with deaf girl, I don't have any reason to think she'd know Morse code. She'd probably slap me. That would be fine, but off topic.

Oh. I don't know.

It seems to me that this thread has turned into my blog.

Well, that's OK, I guess.

Here's an example of how low down a "man" can get: I think the best feeling in the world is gently holding a woman by one's side.

Fuck. Shit.

I'm not supposed to say that.

Well, fine. My playing of Bach is shit, my scholarship is shit, and so all I got left is handling women, and I might be getting to fat for that.

But don't bet the house on that!

Because I'm back!

I can pocket balls on rickety tables as good as any half-blind man, and I can make off with the deaf girl without knowing more than Morse code, motherfuckers!

Well, maybe.

But I think I can, and nobody ever asked me for a refund, honey.

Wow.

Today really opened my eyes to what's probably an actual phenomenon.

I mean, all right, there was an image or a stereotype in US culture, from, I don't know, maybe the 1840s through the early 1920s. The shiftless person. The lazy.

It was a real eye-opener, as far as how some (a small number of people) people adhere and self-adhere to that idea.

No, Maggie's going to keep working that farm, but I ain't doing shit beyond the shiftless shuffle from now on.

And, actually, it doesn't dissect into races or skin color. There are just a buttload of people who don't and won't haul ass.

Not me anymore.

I'll move slightly faster than the slowest person on the crew.

Fuck 'em. It's not my job to be the boss. It's my job to show up on time and perform my tasks.

I'm done changing my shirt every two hours.

I think I work with a bunch of fucking retards.

Yeah, and it does seem that my eldest nephew is retarded, so fuck you, I'll say what I want.

Pickaninny Rag was a tune by Joplin, I'm pretty sure.

Me, now on?

I'm Gomer fucking Pyle. Fuck ruining my feet, my clothes, for working 10x harder than the lowest 40%. Fuck them. I'm working to rule now, and I can't always hear on the handheld.

Shit.

I am still really fucking pissed off at a couple of people on the job.

Yeah, I am saying I'm that good, but fuck. You. I'm not carrying your load anymore.

Fucking prick motherfuckers.

And, yeah, I am that good.

Oh. And while I'm here: fucking bitches of the US federal government say I owe them some bills from this year.

Yeah.

Well, the refund from last year, plus state refund will make it OK.

Fucking bastard shit motherfuckers.

Whatever.

Cocksucker assholes.

Well, there was one from Sunday.

So I'm doing my rounds and making sure people didn't do anything stupid.

Yeah, so I hear this frantic call from multiple people, calling my name, out loud. I cup my hand to my ear, because I don't actually hear too good.

"Can you help these people out?"

(i) WTF are you talking about? There are three motherfucking employees and I'm still fixing the mistakes they made up there.

(ii) Oh. I get. I'm supposedly "language guy." I don't know why, because aside from talking to a few immigrant van drivers in French and writing some graffiti in dry-erase markers in Latin, that's not my job. Yes, fine, I explain in pidgin Spanish how to do the "app," for two consecutive cars. No, I don't speak Spanish, you know, I mean, I can understand and speak a bit, and I can read the phone "app" enough to say, "No, no! Perque es no importante! Come se dice in espanol, 'jamais', 'never.' Pero never you comprende touch that button."

(iii) Congratulations, you cockbiting cunts behind the desk. Put "Johnny on the language" and make him do whatever, and then my actual task gets all fucked up because your people weren't doing their shit.

And, yes, the two separate cars did all right, thanks to me. Actually, I like the Spanish language, but I just can't speak it or understand it beyond a rudimentary level.

It was kind of an odd dynamic: each driver had a spouse who spoke a bit more English than the driver.

Yeah, it's really not that hard to explain things or so forth.

We had three or four people whose only job is to get those motherfuckers out of the warehouse, on the road, and they call on me?

Well, good job explaining why we're thirty minutes behind.

That was the best part of that day: you know, I explained stuff, and used a sort of Spanglish to get the job done, and what's best is that maybe four people total don't think that all norteamericanos are completely dickholes. I mean, probably true, but at least some of us can glance at a smartphone "app" in Spanish and say, "No! Madre de dios, never usted touch that putain merde iejo de puta."

Shit.

I was just fooling around with my flashlight and got a good look at my feet.

Yeah, har de fricking har, I'm a few pounds heavy, but I can touch my toes and do so every day many times.

Shit.

I think I need to find a referral to a podiatrist.

My feet are all kinds of fucked up. Leaving aside severe, consistent heel pain, and the episode with acute tendonitis of the posterior tibial tendon.

Mostly they're just fucked up.

Discolored toenails. Obviously, many places where the nails had broken and healed over, near to the cuticle.

The leathery hide, abundant callouses.

No. They're all fucked up.

I do have a tube of ketoconazole from fixing tinnea versistrata. I can start applying that to my feet.

Beyond that, I should wash my feet more often, and try the antifungal (it's pretty expensive, and I don't remember the Rx number or whatever) and the old wives' tale about vinegar and so forth.

I guess I could just call up my regular doctor and get a referral to a specialist, but I don't want to deal with the whole insurance thing, and spending days on the phone trying to schedule shit.

Dude. My feet are fucked. They've been literally rode hard and put away wet. For years. And this despite my normally admirable job of keeping the feet in good repair, cosmetically, until I started working in this warehouse.

And also, what these people don't understand is that not only are my feet probably very literally rotting out from under me, those sturdy companions, but that I despise every single kind of music these people listen to.

Despise, don't understand, don't want.

Same thing.

Shit.

I'm fucked.

What would make me happy is to see a coyote eat a crippled groomed pet of someody. A neighbor's pet. For example.

State tax refund? Likely garnished in toto. Vehicle emissions test? Probably fail. Year? It's a leap year. Ham? No burger.

Fuck off.

Hmmm... I thought it amused me to recursively apply the contents of a package to itself.

Namely, I had bought a few weeks ago a thing of rubber bands and a box of plastic pushpins.

Just now I was wondering: goddamned it, where's another container to put these rubber bands in? Must have an empty box or basket around someplace!

No.

Loop a rubber band around the bag containing the remaining rubber bands and ....

THEN!

Yes! Box of thumbtacks?

Thumbtack it to the wall!

Eeez geeniuz, non?

Si, well, maybe not.

It amusing to me, anyway.

Oh, it was kind of funny at the job, what with having the ashes on the forehead (TBH, it only vaguely resembled a cross after a bit, just kind of a smudge, which, incidentally, a self-described High Eposcalian noted on FB is possible a difference between the two sects).

ETA I'm talking about yesterday, of course.

Most people were just full of questions, which, as you know, I like to talk when it's something that interests me, so I was happy to do a thirty-second explanation.

Really? It seems most people don't know what freaking Mardi Gras or Carnival is? They must know it exists, but to my surprise, I don't think most people really grok why Mardi Gras, for example, is a "thing"!

Of course it's an excuse for a raging party, but there's a reason for that, you know!

People are funny!

Well, I didn't "make it to Mass" — in my view, which is that shared by the RCC, one must not receive the eucharist unless one has been reconciled for mortal sins, such as not assisting at a Sunday mass, so...well, it's not my goddamned playbook, but I kind of have a Rain Man thing going where it's one part of my life where I can follow the rules and it doesn't matter either way.

But I did, before work "make it to" the local cathedral between their Sunday masses have a few quiet moments of reflection.....no, I can't say even that. I basically tried to remember the Latin responses while sitting in a nearly empty, pretty large cathedral. Not huge, you know, but by West Coast standards, of respectable size. Sat quietly and recalled as much of the mass as I could, with responses. Of course I had my copy of Order of Mass in Nine Languages folded up in my jacket pocket, and, of course, had a jacket and tie on. That's just probably something peculiar to me: I don't especially enjoy wearing a necktie these days: my torso is pretty long and it's hard to tie it so you don't look like Lou Costello or something. You have to use the lazy-man's knot and really use every last inch.

Oh shit. Just...never mind. Have to deal me with my uncle tomorrow. Fuck. Noblesse oblige. Shit.

Never mind.

I think I'm going to drop the pedantic thing about kneeling in the direction of the tabernacle before seating oneself in the pew: I'm not sure that's a real "rule" anyway, and certainly nobody else IME, ever, has ever done that. Maybe at the initial font.

Goddammit I think I've gone over the edge with the whole RCC thing.

I'm not apologizing, and certainly I'm not the first. Ahem.

I mean, I'm not as far gone as "Wapner at Four, definitely going to miss Wapner," but I think a little structured socialization is not so bad.

Ferchrissake I listened to a guy at a bar after "mass" go on about movies and shit. A guy who was freaking talking to himself about who knows what. Turned out he had a pretty encylclopedic knowledge of movies, including some I'd never even thought about seeing.

Fuck.

ETA And yes I didn't feel too bad about this guy who between masses had his sleeping bag in the vestibule, and while I was doing a rosary, I overheard somebody saying....well, I couldn't make out the words, but like "Sir, something blah blah." As I'd finished my session, but during, as I was leaving, obviously he wanted some change and asked for it. I had a few bucks, probably, in quarters, reserved for my high pursuit of the lady of the cue ball.

I was honest and said I really couldn't do it: I'm saving up for renewal of car registration which is due next week.

Fuck.

But I think he was that same dickhole who not two minutes before touched the cathedral's piano: fuck him.

I'm a bad man, but I think I'm consistently fair.

Fuck.

Well that was a motherfucker of a day. As yesterday, work was a jumbled clusterfuck, and as usual, I seemed to be the only person doing anything while everybody else is jerking off.

That's not true, of course, but by percentages, it might as well be.

So, that's normal, not noteworthy.

But I agreed to take my uncle ... I don't know, as like a "companion animal" or something to the grocery store. He drinks a lot and as a result is all fucked up with brain damage and all that, the result being probably depression and anxiety.

That's fine: I'm glad to be able to help, much as I despise driving downtown in...well, any town, really.

In exchange he bought me a few groceries, which is fair enough, I figure.

Just a random comment: he's healthy, trim, and not outwardly in bad shape, especially for a 62 year old who hasn't had a job in probably twenty years and doesn't even go to mass.

What? How can an adult eat that crap? What he bought was exactly what a 10 or 12 year old boy would probably eat.

I don't care, but, I mean...what?

I know he has cookware and a stove, because I gave him some of my old AllClad and we shot the shit afterwards for a bit in his apartment.

No, it doesn't upset me in the least, and he seems to be none the worse for wear, but, really? Peanut butter sandwiches on bunny bread, and a handful of snack items?

I'm not claiming to be superior, but it just shocked me.

Actually it does remind me of one of those Updike "Rabbit" novels, where he brings the whore back with groceries and she says something like "You like to eat kind of bland, huh?"

Well, whatever floats the wagon, I just usually do the supermarket solo and don't pay attention to what other people chow down on.

Well that was a motherfucker of a day. As yesterday, work was a jumbled clusterfuck, and as usual, I seemed to be the only person doing anything while everybody else is jerking off.

That's not true, of course, but by percentages, it might as well be.

So, that's normal, not noteworthy.

But I agreed to take my uncle ... I don't know, as like a "companion animal" or something to the grocery store. He drinks a lot and as a result is all fucked up with brain damage and all that, the result being probably depression and anxiety.

That's fine: I'm glad to be able to help, much as I despise driving downtown in...well, any town, really.

In exchange he bought me a few groceries, which is fair enough, I figure.

Just a random comment: he's healthy, trim, and not outwardly in bad shape, especially for a 62 year old who hasn't had a job in probably twenty years and doesn't even go to mass.

What? How can an adult eat that crap? What he bought was exactly what a 10 or 12 year old boy would probably eat.

I don't care, but, I mean...what?

I know he has cookware and a stove, because I gave him some of my old AllClad and we shot the shit afterwards for a bit in his apartment.

No, it doesn't upset me in the least, and he seems to be none the worse for wear, but, really? Peanut butter sandwiches on bunny bread, and a handful of snack items?

I'm not claiming to be superior, but it just shocked me.

Actually it does remind me of one of those Updike "Rabbit" novels, where he brings the whore back with groceries and she says something like "You like to eat kind of bland, huh?"

Well, whatever floats the wagon, I just usually do the supermarket solo and don't pay attention to what other people chow down on.

Well, that was kind of exciting. Never mind. I finally came to terms with a mortal enemy, the "ratchet strap" (I've always known how they work, but mechanical things in general...they give me a pain in the ass unless I've used them a bunch). I've got them figured out now.

Some dickhead, in the warehouse — not one of our people, but a flex/contract driver, was getting into it with a nice lady down a few spots behind him. All I heard when I was doing shit in the area was him saying "Fuck you!"

I smiled and gave a little chuckle: I figured they knew each other and they were having a joke. No.

Mind you, I insult people quite a bit IRL, but straight up like that? I'm pretty sure that is a crime (a misdemeanor) in my state, either menacing or harassment. I know because I've had to talk to the "man" about it before, but I was never charged! And that was with neighbors, near my home, where my wife sleeps, and where my children come to play with their toys!

Unfortunately, I don't think our temporary supervisor had enough on the ball to want to follow through, but at the least, we can have given him what's called a "ticket" (no shit, that's what they call it) which is for bad contractors: people who don't deliver their packages or whatever other nonsense they get up to.

I can't have that shit in my warehouse. Fuck, I don't even give a shit, just take it outside, Roid Boy.

Unbelievable. I think I misplaced my bank card. Pretty sure I didn't leave it someplace, but wouldn't rule that. It's no doubt somewhere in my car or in a shirt pocket.

Why would that be? I don't know, because I'm an idiot? Yes, I carry a wallet for that very purpose.

They can print me out a new card in two seconds flat at the credit union, but I'd have to change every single place I pay bills with the new account numbers. Major hassle, and some of those "companies" take their sweet time updating their records.

Damn.

Well, I am pretty (actually, extremely) glad I got to my credit union before shit apparently started getting real. I had to navigate some suburb traffic and deal with all that, but it was easily done at the time. Nowadays, it might have been more of a problem. Yeah, yeah, the new printed debit card works fine and the account numbers are fine, so ACH transactions are just the same as before.

I suspect I could be carrier zero in my home state: high-risk occupation, pretty accustomed to having the sniffles, bone aches, and various respiratory problems. Ad the latter, such that about four or five months ago I self-diagnosed with a kind of pulmonary embolysm, of the type that I convinced myself to have an aspirin and see if I woke up.

The weekend before the 17th March, on Thursday, I'd had an unusually large amount of contact with a few acquaintances and a few strangers. Jello shots were involved. Horrible: who the fuck thinks that's a good "drink"? Disgusting. Yeah, I had several.

Well that's about usual, whatever. But I happen to work in one of the most inflammatory places there is: in VERY close contact with hundreds of drivers per day, and especially of late, picking up extra shifts which require <0.5m respiratory space with several or more heavily respirating people. For many hours. Including a bit of "petting" with some supposedly "Russian" broad.

I'll bet you anything I'm patient zero.

The nephews would have a cool story.

Oh fucking A, son of bitch.

Actually, not too bad at my local grocery store this afternoon.

They had one of the two entrances (no, don't pronounce it "entranseez" or I'll have to cut somebody) open, with my man the bag boy out front offering carts and wipes and all that.

Pretty well behaved (no, it does not require an hypostrophe, though it may be added for clarity), given the high proportion of asshole yuppies and the typical time of day during which they thrive, by habit.

Nobody got in my space and I scruulously avoided the space of others.

It would appear that Totino's Party Pizzas were among the last to go.

Meh.

I grabbed six (they're small and easily carried in one hand) plus two beers, and figured nobody would mistake me for a hoarder.

I did note with some pleasure that no reusable bags can be used: that's an obvious control, and so I was happy to pay the five cents for a regular bag.

Really scrupulous work by the front end, as well as by the distributors working the aisles. The chef of the beer aisle seemed kind of a dick to his team, but they were stocking the beer aisle and seemed to be used to that kind of shit from their supervisor.

The actual employees of the store were about the same: just dealing with a bunch of clueless people. Self-checkout? No problem. My gal A_____ holding down the front end, just like usual.

Compared to this morning, about six hours ago? Obviously, more people, but there was a bit less tense vibe since a bunch more traffic and there was a procedure in place.

And this is not a small grocery store, really: one of the worst parking lots and some of the worst drivers I've ever seen, ever. It's soccer mom deville at feeding time, which is about now, and it wasn't that bad.

You were pretty lucky in your grocery store. A colleague was telling me that the store near his place, normally one of the nicest in Toronto, reminded him of the time he went to a supermarket in East Berlin in 1986.

Yeah, I guess kind of a grim 1980s central European is what seemed about right.

I don't know anything about it personally, but that is probably about it, from stories I've heard. Roumania was fucking dire, for example. Yes, even in the smaller towns in the nw region and before all that statehood. Don't even.

Anyway, that's part of what I think of as a whole "trust, but verify" ethos.

Not part of my own childhood but enough people seem to have been raised in such environments that a bit influenced me in my earlier years as a young adult. I don't believe it's an era worth romanticizing, nor am I capable of such a task.

//////////////

Yeah. I did do supposedly a bad thing and break quarantine today.

I justified it to myself in the weasliest of ways: "I'm an essential worker, and need to be out of my place about four AM tomorrow, so, I'm going to get a bottle of wine and a deck of smokes at the drugstore. I'm going to be practically shoving your delivery driver's dong down my throat or vice versa in five hours, so, fuck off."

It's an extremely wrong sort of privileged approach to take, and I hope people notice it and are aware. It doesn't matter if it's some tacky Italian costume-shop garbage or a reflective vest, it's wrong and it even looks worse on self-described blue-collar "front-line" people. STFU, you fucking, nurse or EMT or truck driver. Do your fucking job, or don't: that's why you're paid what you are. Replaceable. ATC? Do it or don't. Sanitation? Sure. It's getting done with or without your brave little heroics about the little paramedic that could. STFU, garbage girl.

Yeah, I think have made a small mistake by starting texting with a girl from the warehouse yesterday, late last night. So, I was listening to all these Sam Cooke records and did a nice little, "How we doing child?" and then back at me "Well Ive been washed in the blood of Jesus, so, it doesn't affect me who you lust over, but you're good and still my friend."

More or less.

Yeah, I'm familiar with the more shout-y types of xian congregations, but i never would have picked her out as a holy roller type, unless maybe I drove her to it.

All right. I can believe that a bit: I was bothering her a bit and she reached back into her old snake kettle and found something that she knew I wouldn't mess with, since she knows I at least pretend to attend mass every Sunday.

That's why she's my friend: pretty smart lady.

I don't know if I want to fuck her or just eat her out or both, but I like the way both me and her got the tempo chilled out.

I think she's not sure if I'm her kind either, in that way.

I think we're just going to keep being friends, and that's about good for me.

ETA The closest church to my work has laid out some impressive guidelines for how to proceed on the following and for near future masses, as well as weekday masses and the stations of the cross.

Impressively, Fr. Tim has agreed to the reconciliation every day from 1000 to 1150, with a pretty impressive set of instructions on where to line up and all that.

No. There's not going to be blood of christ and the flesh and all that. I know, you budding young theologians, it's disappointing, but I don't care about that.

Well that was kind of exciting. Here's my literal word's spoken out loud (yeah, I'm alone in my place, but I still said them out loud!): "what the fuck time is it?" [looks at computer's icon] "oh shit. fuck. shit." [waits a few seconds and realizes it's my weekend now]. "oh. huh. oh. ok."

Yeah that kind of stripped a bit of varnish off my esophagelea cilia for a few moments. Yeah that's likely spelled wrong.

Well, I hate to say it, but I did a major round of errands today and if I didn't get the plague, or very probably any number of other viruses, it'll be a miracle. Went to a drug store, filled up tank with gasoline, went to a grocery store, went to the Dollar Store, went to the drug store, went to a different grocery store for prescription ibuprofen and sudogest pick up, went to liquor store.

I really don't want to say it, but I'm not that pleased with the poors at the grocery store. Yeah, I mean, har fucking har, the whole working class hero thing. It's great you're fucking immune. What the fuck do you think I do every five days of a week? Just STFU: you can show off how cool you are by driving like a shrimp-dick or whatever.

Fucking shit.

I was hopeful after observing several three-day periods of relative rest that the pain in my heel had gone away.

No. fucking bullshit. I think I have goddamnned plantar fasciitis in the left foot. Fucking shit.

No, I can't tell any difference with using whatever inserts or comfy pads. It's the same bullshit, and while I can exercise and stretch the relevant fascii, the pain is, at times, unbelievable. None more so than upon waking up and trying to walk.

Fucking a. This fucking sucks. What, hobble around with a limp? I don't have much to offer the workforce except brute force. I mean, Cisco gave a few months extension for renewal of certs, but let's be real, I got a fucking gimp foot and it's fucking bullshit.

ETA Yeah, well, I guess I can rise through the ranks and do the whole logistics managemant. Yeah, I've kept my pimp hand strong with spreadsheets and have my soft skills good. Fucking A.

Oh, I did read a bit today a paper by some guy who managed to, I would call it a manful effort, reject what is to me a horror.

I would say it's nice to see people rejecting the computational theory of mind. Yes, it's true that many people you might have read or heard about use this kind of model. Steven Pinker, for one. So, it's not about if there are worthy people working under this notion, but on a wrong model. It may or may not matter, but I think it does matter more when people are bleating every day about "AI" and "machine learning" and so forth. That's why we look to Rodney Brooks and not, say, some nerd when it comes to navigating the world.

What does one say, "When you leave behind a machine and a mouse between a piece of cheese, what do you get? The cheese."

No, that was a bracing reminder that some people have not left their realms and are still working in theory.

The fact of the matter is that this issue has been closed for decades, and the result is what's used in, for example, biomedical ontology. Smith, Arp, and Spear have it in their book published by MIT press IIRC.

But, yes, there are people who "disagree" with the basic ideas of direct realism, more or less, and I quite admire the above mentioned for putting the boots to the ground in the matter of theory.

I approve. And so does Barry Smith and Roman Ingarden and the Husserl of the third logical investigation.

ETA IOW we do have structure, but it is of a kind that is best described by formal ontology and various ecological niches. That's the one word summary.

Oh. Thinking back, that was kind of fucked up, on R 12th Mar of this year. Doing jello shots, playing four-way nine-ball and ending up with a goddamned beautiful girl slinging around my arm in a booth at the bar and she was enjoying my arm muscles.

Shit.

And looking straight across the booth at some Russian motherfuckers while their girl is hanging on me and liking my thing.

Shit.

She was a good girl. I could have at least fingered her or something. Dammit.

Yeah, whatever. You don't understand how good she was, physically.

Eh, whatever. I had worse, maybe I had better. But I should have got a bit more with that one so I'd have a better story to tell. She was good to go. Fuck.

All right, fine. That was a bit bragging about how this astonishingly pretty girl couldn't help but attach herself to my arm, which is pretty much made of meat.

No, it's actually true, but I would never think about bragging about such a commonplace thing.

I do have a somewhat more more ordinary thing. Deaf girl seems to not think I'm repulsive and doesn't shirk my company. I think she's pretty, but I don't speak her language. The language of love.

I'm just going to stfu now.

oh, shit. Yeah, my beard was getting a bit shaggy so I did the whole Duane Allman/Lemmy Klimister thing again.

Fuck.

I'm pretty sure one of my gals at work tomorrow is going to sass me.

But, fortunately, I have a good comeback, for once.

"Don't you don't rile me, sugar!"

And, yes I did cut the shit out of my chin while I was hacking away with a fresh double-edged blade.

Meh, it'll probably be healed by tomorrow.

I don't know and I don't much care.

ETA That was almost a good half-inch of beard I trimmed, though! At least off the chin.

And if anyone here says about MaxiPads or whatever....yeah, that is what could be inferred. That's fine, it's not a problem.

In my experience it's more women who are a little bit troubled by their man doing the whole "red wings" thing.

But, hey.

Not my problem.

OMG.

I can't believe at least one moron is actually arguing FOR a computational theory of mind in some other thread on a different board.

I really cannot believe it.

Well, sure, I mean, some "people" voted some reality TV game show host into office.

I just cannot believe in the idiocy of some people.

Or maybe just I'd rather not have to admit such morons into the human condition.

Unbelievable.

Well, I guess I believe it now. Some people are effing dense.

In other news, it's probably going to rain in the next week. Stay classy, San Diego!

I did have a funny at the liquor store today, behind the sheet of plexiglass they put up.

Yeah, I just pay using my regular bank card and they got this whole system of one pile of "clean" pens and a little coffee cup to put the pen after it's been handled.

Pretty neat system, I'd say.

So, anyway, for once I got to do the whole Jake Blues and say to the lady (yes, she knows me), "Well, I'm just going to have to do the whole Blues Brothers thing and make my mark!."

Yeah, my bank will put it through, it's fine, but I did enjoy for once putting an "X" on the signature line while standing a good seven feet or more from my gal at the store.

Good times!

I really have to get this out in the open and it's a bit too late for me to be texting my gal pal from work.

I'm not sure if this is pathological, or if I'm just a depraved moron.

Pretty much 99% of the time I'm thinking about pussy.

No, I'm not going around molesting women I know, and I do have pretty close and healthy relationships with women on the job.

And, no, I don't spend a million hours a day jacking off at home: you know, I go to work and all that and keep pretty normal friendships.

But, damn.

All I think about in my spare moments is "Hey, how can I get this new girl I just met at work into the sack?"

Fuck. It's really, to borrorw a word from somewhere in Samuel Beckett, a very "absorbing" sexual life.

I'm going to text my gal Ra______ tomorrow, because she knows me as well as anyone, and I pretty often chat with her about "Hey, what's up with that new woman who's on Cycle 1 or Same Day" and she's used to hearing my shit.

Fuck.

I really don't think it's pathological. Maybe just a high sex drive or testosterone or whatever.

And good for me for maintaining healthy friendships with women at work. But damned if I don't every other second be thinking like, "well, I'd hit that from behind, but she's my friend and so not going to do that this week. Next week, maybe!"

I feel like a retard or something, just every day thinking about busting my nut on or in some new gal I meet.

Nah. That's probably pretty normal. It just occurred to me that maybe it might be a problem. It's fine. I'm just a degenerate poonhound, I guess.

Yeah, Ra_____'s on board with my whole thing, although she was not too happy about waking up today to a bunch of my idiotic texts.

She knows what I'm talking about and she's even halfway on my side about me trying to pick up this white deaf girl from work. OK, hearing impaired, maybe. And she might not be white or whatever. All right, anyway, Ra******* did suggest that deaf white girl is pretty good at reading lips and so I can just talk to her and get her name and see how she rolls.

That's going to be a hard first conversation, because I don't know how to sign or anything about ASL, but like I was saying, well, I'll just have to see how it is. And like I was saying also, well, there's a little bit of an art to it, but I got it covered.

You know, I'm about 75% of the way there to just asking R******* if she wants to fuck sometime.

Yeah, just like that.

We're pretty good friends, and she's a smart girl, and she knows all about me just from observation.

Pretty different people, me and her: she's pretty much rocking the "street smart colored girl from the hood who got a kid she been raising on her own," and well, I'm obviously not that, but we get along as friends and talk about everything.

Yeah. I'd say why not.

I don't think she'd be into having me take her from behind, but she knows I live alone and maybe she wouldn't mind a little bit getting away from her own life.

A little bit.

And, yeah, we're pretty friendly so the most she'd do is just punch me in the arm and say "Shut up, fool!"

Yeah. I could go me some of that, and for all that I've texted her about other gals at work, she probably wondering why I haven't just been like I said, "let's fuck, woman! come on over, and it's cool!"

This is an EDIT but, yeah, I would change that to about 100% of the way there. It just have to be in person and depend on the right mood. I could certainly text her right now and say, "Hey! You're a good woman and why don't we just fuck sometime soon," but she'd probably not respond to that text.

Yeah, I'm going 100% going to get some of my gal: hell, we'll be together all week starting tomorrow, and I'll just ask her when it's a good moment. She knows I respect her, because I've said that, and maybe we'll just get it on. Maybe not, but you know, she's a friend and it's not going to be a problem just doing that. Can I actually get it up for her? That's something....well...I'm not too sure about that. I don't find her that attractive physically. But, you know, the lord works in mysterious ways.

Oh. Dammit.

Yeah, I 100% did just text R******* just now. I said it in French and I used mostly slang so it wouldn't have been so obvious, and I said it politely as well, but still all I said was, basically, "It's be a pretty good idea if you and me just got down and started fucking: it'd probably be OK, don't you think? It's no big deal either way but you might have fun."

No, I'm not going to quote exactly what I said, but that's what I said.

Shit.

She's probably have to google translate and I used text slang so it probably wouldn't be translated word-for-word correctly by the machine bots, but I'm pretty sure she's going to punch me in the face tomorrow at work. I mean, I was really not subtle, I basically said, "Hey baby, you want to fuck or what."

I guess my only hope is she doesn't know an actual francophone who can translate it, but that's what I said. A machine translator might not translate it correctly, but anybody who speaks French would know exactly what I said.

ETA I did give her the option of w...never mind.

She probably could get me fired for that shit. I was polite, sort of, but very direct. No she wouldn't do me like that, she curses as much as I do and we're friendly.

But it was pretty damned direct, however much I put it polite language. There's not any doubt about what I said.

And yes now I'm somewhat dreading tomorrow at beginning of shift.

I know she's going to give me a big look.

I know that, because I know her.

And because she knows me and this is what she'll expect, I'm going to look at her square in the eyes and shake my head and mouth the words. "Don't. Even. Sugar. Rile. Me."

And then I know for a fact she and me will get to talking.

And she's going to hint about what I said.

I got one phrase, after I look her up and down and I know for sure she's going to be all with some nice clothes and stuff tomorrow. "Yep. That's what I said. Let's boogie."

Or, worst case, she'll give me a bad look when I see her and be like "Oh yeah? Well let me think about it."

And then I can just say, "Well, suit yourself woman."

And don't think I wouldn't say that. That's my whole bag, motherfuckers.

No, here's the more realistic thing.

She's going to give me a big look tomorrow, and I'm going to reply by deliberately looking her up and down, all five feet of her, and I'll just say, "We all good, honey?" And she'll reply by not saying anything and keep giving me that look. And, that'll be my cue to apologize a bit by saying like I already did via text, "Well, it's just one of those things. I know you know me probably better than I know myself, but I respect you, and you know for certain there's not going to be any problems from here. First, you're part of my team, and, second, the warehouse is also in my crew. You're a good woman and you're a good woman for putting up with my shit, and I know you know that."

And that will be that. And she can keep giving me advice about how I can fuck the other gals in the warehouse, and she certainly gives some good advice, she knows how it all shakes down.

She's not going to look at me the same way again, but it'll be OK. She knows I've got an eye for the ladies, because that's most of what me and her talk about.

I think we'll be about the same as before.

Or more probably, she's going to give me that big look, and I'll just look back, glance away for bit, and then look back in her eyes and look ashamedly down at my feet.

That's fine: hey, I did bad, she knows it, and she knows I know it, and she just wants me to acknowledge that.

That's 100% fine with me.

What matters most to me is that she knows I know that she knows that I know I did her a bit wrong, even though it wasn't technically a bad thing, just me talking too forward to her. Which is all we talk about IRL anyway, so, she knows what I'm talking about, I just asked her "Hey, wanna fuck?"

Well now I did! That's all in the air between R*** and me, I guess.

And, yes, everything's fine with my gal and me. It's all fine.

Although I will say I shouldn't have done my infamous text in French. I guess I thought I was crafty.

And, yes, it was about 90% using abbreviations or shorthand/chat slang.

I'll defend that. I love abbreviations, plus she can't just type it into Bing and have it translated by some stupid motherfucking cracker machine bullshit.

So, that's all good. And, yes, I told her what I said in real language and, predictably, she was not having any of that but we're cool.

It's her son's birthday today so she wasn't at work but we got in touch briefly and it's all good.

//////////////

ETA OK, this was pretty fucking funny. It's just a thread from some other board going off on some telemarketer.

Nothing to do with anything, it just made me laugh a bit. That was a pretty epic public shaming.

And, yes, I'm going to be publicly shamed over this week at work, I have no doubt at all, at least for being such a ponce to Ra***** and talking to her in a language I knows she doesn't speak but doing it in a maximally obfuscated manner such that she probably couldn't easily have a computer translate it.

And, plus, word's going to get out at work that I asked my friend if she wanted to fuck, and so, that's going to be...well...I'll just have to take my medicine. I did say it, after all. And she's my friend so I'm 100% sure she's not going to repeat all the stuff I was talking about about some other gals in the place. Hell, she was laughing too and put her own contributions in as well. I mean, yeah, she'll repeat it and it will get around, because she likes to talk, but she'll do it cool so it's not going to be a problem.

But that one made me smile contentedly. Pretty good stuff.

Shit. That's one of the funniest things I've read, the above cited thread.

Yeah. Funny as in it took of my powers, and all of my strength to not spit a mouthful of beer all over myself and the keyboard.

If you all haven't seen that one yet, I really can't recommend it highly enough.

It's pretty stupid, but, still, really damned funny.

Shit. I believe I'm really pretty ill, most likely with CV19. I just got over a pretty moderate little head cold, but in the last few days: extreme fatigue (as in a regularly fall asleep sitting up at my desk), slight difficulty breathing, most likely a fever (I used to have a thermometer, but I wouldn't know where it is now), slight nausea. Slightly more profound coughing than usual, and it is indeed a dry cough.

Some of this can be explained by just my regular habits: I don't sleep very well, and when I do it's only because I take quite a bit of diphenhdramine before going to sleep, also, I smoke tobacco like a chimney, and my diet is pretty much not nutritious at all, when I even bother to eat solid foods over the course of a day or even several.

I'm not exactly fat or obese, I have perfect blood pressure numbers, I get a lot of exercise most days of the week, both cardio and heavy lifting, and while I'm not exactly a young man, I wouldn't say I'm too gimpy and old, except for my permanent problems with my feet.

OTOH, I am obliged to be in public seeing hundreds of people, many of them new to me, and in quite close contact with many of even most of them, and, while I do an excellent job of social distancing, being generally a hygienic type, I unfortunately am sometimes obliged to run a few errands.

Probably a confusion of cause and effect: I do drink quite a lot of alcohol, which destroys my ability to sleep well, and I'm likely sure I have some kind of COPD from my unwise tobacco habits. And given how ridiculous my dietary habits are, aside from alcohol, there's an innate problem there. Also, generally, I'm under quite a bit of stress, especially lately, which might have some repressive effects on my immune system as well.

Fuck it, I'm just not going into work today. That motherfucking hump, dear leader and CEO doesn't have the corporate ability to produce a sensibile policy for we grunts at the bottom, and he also doesn't have the leadership ability to inspire better management techniques at the finer-grained level. Stupid crap like putting 19 year olds on the corporate treadmill, with very, very few experienced leaders at the local/regional level.

Well, that was kind of fun, doing the US Census online.

Also put in for a shift transfer to full time at The Company: not that my team doesn't get along, for the most part, but at least I'll get better health benefits, and, obviously, more money from wages. Yeah, I know the shift: the managers are, some of them, a real PITA, but that's fine with me. AND there happen to be some very prety girls working that shift.

Well, I don't know if it's funny, but I found it remarkable when I received confession today on Good Friday (I was the only one dressed in black! heathens!), they didn't need anybody at the door saying what to do and how far to stand.

Everybody just did it, not even one word from the fifty or more of us lined up outside.

That doesn't explain anything, but at least within this parish people behaved themselves.

What out the door they did? I wouldn't know. I was solemn for a few moments and then when I got in my car I lit a cigarette and was like, "Fuck yeah!" A motherfucking priest said I was absolved after all that shit? I'm on that like white on toast.

ETA Yeah the dude asked me at the end to say the prayer of contrition, and I started, "Confiteor..." sorry father I can't remember the rest. Look at your feet.

Holy shit the RCC is getting soft!

Yeah, it is a good feeling, at least for people who believe somewhat in the binding and loosing of the Church.

Just to be able to say, "I have not felt able to receive the joy of the resurrection each Sunday and each day of obligation, for the past three years, and that is my most grave sin I have committed, father."

Yes, I know it's a shell game or whatever, but I like it, and I have no problems with it whatever.

There is no better feeling than doing the right thing and being released. Maybe some reiki stretches or doing to the sun-god of NKor or talk therapy or whatever bullshit Whatever.

And besides there is a kind of kinship one can establish with others of differing sects.

Which I wouldn't call a small benefit, nor would I think much of an exploiter of this fact. Have I used this common faith to try to "get with" a few women. Yes. Is it a problem? Yes, it would be, if I misrepresented myself. The RCC as one knows is pretty much not for fornication. But, I'm not a theologian and I don't excuse what I do. I never deceive anyone.

At worst, I do say in conversation that I read the bible (true, the Wordsworth Clementine Vulgate) and revere Stes. Teresas and read and study the neo-Thomists. That's all true.

I don't wear a cross on my neck, but I do have a medallion of Mary on my keychain, and I observe the usual things.

So, it's not for some advantage in chatting up ladies, but it can be some way we can get further. Which, yes, fornication, but, you know, it's about respect, is how I read the catechism of the RCC.

I just did a RL experiment on how it would go with me and deaf white girl trying to speak.

First. I speak French bi-lingually, but in a very crude form of the language with almost no grammar and hardly any words I of course learned some that later, just like when one becomes a scientist one learns to read and write German.

Second. I find it extremely difficult to decide how to shape my mouth when I ask her her name. You know, I don't know how to lip read, so a little inflection or something is going to throw a deaf white girl off her game if I don't do it right.

I mean, I can talk in a few different ways, but I don't know how many she can read.

Fuck. I can hardly walk these days. Even just getting up from my desk at home to refill a liter of water.

I really suspect this is not going to ever be cured. Orthotics? Doesn't seem to matter. I take a shitload of ibuprofen every day. I use some stretching techniques for the relevant fascii.

This just plain sucks ass.

Oh, and as a bonus, adaptive moving to the balls of the foot, well, that just fucks up my toes and all that.

Yeah, happy Easter. Tomb is empty this, motherfuckers.

Damn stupid IRS mofos. Yeah, I could have predicted my check would have been held up, judging by their idiotic, non-functional "identity verification" nonsense. Yes, they have my account information, but I probably have to wait for a paper check. It's fine, just annoying.

Eh. Fortunately I don't need the money right at the moment, but it would have been nice to just check that off the list of things to do. Well, that's not true: I owe my mother three hundred bucks from last month, and I'd like to pay her back ASAP instead just a hundred here or there. I have the cash now, thanks to overpaying my state tax returns by quite a bit, but it's not that convenient to figure out a way to get it to her.

But obviously I'm not going to see her in person anytime soon and I don't think she knows how to set up an ACH payment from her bank, which would be the easiest.

No, I'm not going to be the one who killed my parents by being a carrier. Neither of them are in super health: quite the opposite, and so it's a necessity that I be prudent and not initiate contact. Fortunately, they're both pretty damned smart, so they wouldn't accept the risk either. Which is good, since that indicates I'm probably the only nuclear family member with a touch of dementia.

Also, I owe the electric company quite a bit, and I'd rather just get that off the books as well. And lard up my 401K, buy stock options, and all that good stuff.

Geico? Meh, they can wait for a bit.

Where to start. No, Ra T****** is definitely cooled off to me: we're still cool, but she's definitely not having any of my bullshit, and, as I predicted, she's never going to look at me the same way again.

And here's the home of the Whopper: I was chatting on FB with an old friend of the family, a very good painter, me and his family go back generations.

Apparently many of the men related to me from generations past had giant dongs, like Milton Berle type stuff.

I really feel a bit cheated in that respect. But, hey, at least when that magnum-sized condom falls off in coitus, I have huge hands so I can go fish it out of my lady.

That is not really much consolation. I did have a vivid dream yesterday or the day before about "retrieving" an errant condom from a woman's snapper. No, it wasn't an erotic dream at all, just...well, you know, it's just what you have to do from time to time. I'd call it an uncomfortable situation, but a necessary one at times.

ETA but word on the street is that "Jeff" (that sounds like a kid's name, like "Jimmy" or "Biff" or "Skipper") Bezos is pretty much on the road to being fucked. IMHO this is the time to take stimulus money, or any, and buy up AMZ stock at its rock bottom price. I don't think it can go any lower, and the infrastructure they've built up can't easily be liquidated, since the various kinds of warehouse or distribution centers are pretty much purpose built or completely redone to company specs. Just my opinion, not any inside information, just observation.

Oh, dammit.

I hate this woman who lives in the downstairs condo, but I'll be damned if I'm not thinking about fucking her these days. And I'd be surprised if she weren't thinking the same thing about me. She knows I'm a terribly crude man, but she also knows I can kick hell out of piano and organ when I feel like it.

Dammit.

She's a nice enough gal, I guess. Any port in a storm, I suppose.

Dammit.

What the fuck is wrong with me, thinking about women every damned day and night.

Dammit.

Well, it's fine, I guess. If she feels like effing, she can come get it: it's a little too close to home for me, literally, and I just don't want to get that involved.

You people have no idea how incredibly pissed off I am right now

Yeah, yeah, I know I'm out of cigarettes and the grocery store is closed. That's fine, and I did predict that.

What I didn't predict is that magically somewhere my bag of pipe tobacco should have magically vanished.

I am fucking pissed off, and can hardly see straight to methodically look for it.

Fuck.

I'm going to drink some whiskey, finish watching Rain Man, and just....fuck. Goddammit. What kind of fucking retard just "misplaces" a giant bag of pipe tobacco? Fuck. Shit.

Well at least I haven't offended my RL friend Ra T*******. Oh. Yeah. But she still is on my side, right. Oh. Kind of not so much. Well at least talk to her about eating out some other bitches at work. Oh. Right. Well, I'm pretty sure she's probably not going to kick me in the nuts tomorrow. That I'm pretty sure about, so, I got that going for me. Which is nice. I'm pretty sure I'm not her favorite person right now, which is not that good.

Oh, this is going to be a super summer.

Hard manual labor in a sweltering distribution center, AND I get to wear a surgical mask at all times!

I'm really looking forward to that combination.

It's not just hell — I'm used to that — but a fresh hell.

A novel hell, one might say.

Damn right.

I fooled the judge into reducing my noise violation citation to the minimum allowable under a "no contest" plea.

Just got a check in the mail from the county!

Still waiting for the "stimulus check," but the IRS assures me I shouldn't be holding my breath waiting for that, despite that I haven't changed addresses for years and dutifully file each year.

But yeah! I was right! And they were wrong! Motherfuckers!

Probably could have got the whole thing dismissed if I pled not guilty, maybe, but this was easier: just scrawl out some mitigating reasons and go visit the courthouse and do all that.

Motherfuckers.

I cannot still believe it.

Yeah, this was last evening coming home from work. A bunch of goddamned monkey-ass clown motherfucking white bitches decided it would be amusing to tailgate me.

Well, I do like having the hand operated parking brake (no, it's a compound adjective, so it doesn't need to take a hyphen), so that I can depress it while simultaneously accelerating to well over the conditions of the road.

What in the fuck is wrong with people?

You don't tailgate people, ever.

Point final.

Ever.

What the fuck drives somebody, so to speak, to tailgate?

Honestly, I'd have no problem putting them in the Dispose-All or a nice hydrogen cyanide shower.

You don't tailgate. Anyone. Ever. At any time. Ever.

New plan.

Not that it's new to me.

Just safely indicate that one is turning, pull off to the side of the road, and follow them to their domicile.

And put their address and license plate ID on Facebook.

I do actually want these people to be killed, but I'm not going to do it myself.

My team of administrators and workers at AMZN are getting short-shrifted.

However, with CV-19 rules, they always need people to run temp check, and people who walk around the warehouse admonishing people who do not stay six feet apart.

Since I like doing temp check (not everybody is trained for it, and among those, not everybody likes sitting in a chair most times — I love it, I have a stack of books, and so forth), my strategy to avoid being assigned to be a "social distancing champion" is to dress entirely in black, hold a rosary in my hand to keep count of how many "laps" of about 400m around the warehouse I do, and clip to my vest the rosary prayers in Latin and memorize them (the only one I'm not sure yet of is the Salve regina, with the collect, but that's easy to memorize I find).

And clip to my vest complete declensions of various types of Finnish nouns, including ones with consonant gradation.

While I don't utter phrases out loud nor ostentatiously display the rosary (my abacus, really), I'm pretty sure they don't want someone dressed in head to toe in black fingering rosary beads walking laps nonstop for many hours.

But, I like to walk. Maybe walking 3mph isn't exactly an ironman triathlete event, but it's good for you, and it makes it easier to memorize stuff.

Credo (shorter, apostles)
Pater noster
Ave Maria
Gloria
Fatima
Salve regina

Aside from the Salve regina, which I almost got down today, I run through the rest periodically to make sure it's automatic.

From then, the collect from the Salve reg.

And the Nicene creed, also in Latin: pretty much the same as the shorter creed, but some odd replacements.

Well, put that in your pipe and smoke it. While technically a Catholic, and a practicing one to boot, but not exactly a true believer, in a few short weeks I can recite the rosary in Latin without a crib (except for a peek at the final Salve Regina).

Suck on that!

Oh, yeah, I use the reconstructed Ciceronian-age pronunciation, just because I don't like the Italian mongrel pronunciation the Church uses.

I did the CV-19 nose-stick-plunger thing yesterday.

Kind of fun actually: really cleans out your nose, much better than the pedestrian nose-picking and farmers-blowing.

I have about zero faith in the accuracy of whatever results I get in a few days, but it was kind of fun, I guess. It was at work, so between bullshitting with one of my coworkers who was manning the entrance, it killed about twenty minutes of time, which is always nice, since I don't give two shits about AMZN or their productivity metrics.

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ETA I did memorize the Salve regina today. It's not very long. I'm not going to bother with the versicle, response, and the collect.

Next challenge is, since I have the Apostles' Creed in Latin, to do the longer Nicene Creed, which is very similar but...longer and I want to see if I can do both of them from memory without getting confused.

Don't even ask. This is just one way I try to keep from getting bored out of my skull. Like a hobby and maybe even an abstract test of memory, just to make sure I'm not completely demented.

Well, I actually was out in the suburbs filling up the tank with my rewards discount from my grocery store.

Good deal. Fifty cents off per gallon.

Couldn't resist: there's a box store called "PetCo" or "PetSmart" or something like that, and I bought one of those dog "clicker" training devices.

Except I'm not using it to train any dog: it's to be clipped to my safety vest to train the contract drivers in my warehouse who refuse to social distance and who do not respond to verbal commands.

I've been told that snapping one's fingers to achieve compliance can be interpreted as "rude," so I have a better tool at my disposal.

Since I don't the authority to rub their nose in their mistakes when they soil my rug, figuratively speaking, I have a very good tool now.

And, of course, I'm always going to be carrying a radio.

"This is SDC1, we have need of escalation at ASLT pod 1, over."

You think I'm joking. No, I am not. Nor am I on a frolic of my own. Strictly by the books.

If you think I'm going to get called an asshole for doing AMZN's ridiculous task by some dickless contract DSP van drivers, then, well, that's not the way it happens. Not the kind of sugar papa likes, so I'm going right to the edge.

My way is Amazon's way, and that's all there is to it. Much as I would like to "take it outside" and settle it like men, and take apart some little fairy, that's not the way it's done, and despite appearances, I like being employed.

Ahhh. I love my dog-training "clicker" device.

And, no, if they're dumb enough to put me in charge of "social distancing" (which would be stupid: I'd be a terrible, abusive, corrupt cop, and it is not the role for me), I pledge to only use it to gain the attention of bad actors.

And if any superior of mine has a problem with that, what better rejoinder than "Was I mistaken that Amazon takes social distancing seriously? How many CV-19 cases have we had in this distribution center in the past six months?"

Oh, and that stupid swab nasal test for me came back negative for CV-19....but the test is bullshit, with ridiculously large tolerances for spurious results.

I probably shouldn't say this, but I have a raging boner for my Finnish lady friend.

No, not literally: not at this moment, anyway.

Yes, she knows all about it, and she just tells me to fuck off. But she still corresponds with me in writing, so it's not like an adversarial thing. We're both of us adults and each capable of compartmentalizing baser urges.

I will say that continuing to learn the Finnish language, and, unavoidably, more about Finnish culture, such as it might exist, is more appealing to me given a "contact" on the ground. An astonishing language and culture, both beautiful and savage.

That is all.

Dominus uobiscum.

Motherfucker.

They do have written instructions on moonwalk.

Fucking a, yeah I guess I can do it, but, still, fucking a.

I'd rather get my ass to Finland and be able to say more things than vile insults in direct conversation.

Here's the progression in learning Finnish: (i) 15 cases? Shit! (ii) Oh, that's not so bad (iii) Oh, that's not how people talk (iv) it's a difficult language

I will moonwalk, motherfuckers! In steel-toed shoes, motherfucker!

Shit. Well, it's good: because of Portland having had recently the worst air quality in the world.

Yes, you read that right.

Anyway, AMZN closed my distribution center until further notice, but with full pay for everybody. Apparently they closed quite a few in OR and WA, various types of warehouse-like places.

Well, I got to do dishes today, look up some strange Finnish pornography, and looked at the D major fugue from Bach's WTC2.

I still need to find which fuse is blown in the car, but it's too fucking disgusting outside to be spending what would probably be hours opening the hood and checking a few suspect fuses.

Much less driving out to get some replacements, and all that.

Eh, fuck it.

Same old, same old.

Here's a truly odd anecdote. So, I stopped by the grocery store on my way back from town today, and, since I just had a few items, I dutifully waited for the self-checkout, six-feet apart, all that.

As did everyone else. No problems there.

So the gal in charge of the self-checkout did the usual cursory wipe-down of the next spot, and, since it's not a big store, and she knows me and likewise, I say, "Thanks, Angie!" and go ahead.

Except: the previous woman-shaped thing with a small cartload of supplies seemed to take exception to...something. Despite that she had her own scanning cubicle to do her "self-checkout."

She grumbles under her breath, "Yeah, thanks, bud!"

Why? I've no idea.

I'm just trying to get back home, but I can't resist muttering, "Yeah. Bud. That's what your proud boys drink. What do you think is under this shirt besides a full holster?"

No, it doesn't mean anything, just an extremely odd oblique encounter.

For all I know she was a little "touched" in the head and talking to herself, or perhaps aggrieved about something.

Still, very strange.

I think she might have been a Trumper.

Fucking A, I just heard Bob Gibson died just soon ago.

See, that's not nothing I know a lot about, I never seen the whole of that *Baseball* documentary by that dude with the hair, but some people have sports heroes, or movie actors or directors or whatever from even before they were born, and Bob Gibson was that guy for me in sports.

Baseball, at least. And, no, I don't know anything about St. Louis and I don't think they're doing so hot this year, but I like to fight, and he was a fighter, so even though he was before my time, I wish him well in resurrectionem carnis or whatever.

Maybe it was all mythology, but he was my kind of pitcher. You know, one straight to the bean if the batter don't play right, but not for nothing like...Don Drysdale or some assassin like that.

All right, I admit I don't often have the chance to play contract bridge much. Now that I have broadband internet at my place, that may change.

There must be some kind of terminological change: you know, like in lowball poker, the lowest hand wins.

I can and, god willing, if I get the right hand dealt, bid "no trump." That's fine. After all, "no trump" is as good as it gets: in bridge and in life.

There has to be some changes.

But, and I don't play a ton of cards at all, ever (although I'll beat anybody you know and their superior associate in Gin Rummy), terms like "dumping" and all that already have meanings in card games or adjacent games.

No, I'm not going on to any bridge forums to see what's what, but there has to be a solution.

I guess this is funny, in a sort of .... Jerry Lewis sort of way.

Finally broke down and went to a brand-new alternate pipe/tobacconist store (they're really more cigars, but whatever: they're not a new business, but have been around forever).

Yes, I'm still boycotting the dominant local small "chain," because of having been insulted more than once by some little skateboarder who works there (yes, it's all in my yelp review!).

This place was OK. The owner/shopkeep was kind of a surly dude with a shitty attitude, but he did give me some practical advice when I mentioned I was thinking about switching from a bent-stem briar to a straight-stem. They didn't have a great many pipes, but I found a good one.

Got about three ounces of a blend called "Black Coffee" which is nice, while I'm breaking in the pipe, got a spare little pipe tool (just a little folding doo-hickey with a stick, a spoon, and a tamper), and a new jet lighter (butane torch) angled for pipe lighting......

I do have one of the Zippo butane/torch inserts, which worked well for a while.....I have a bad touch with torch lighters. I know how to bleed them of air, and I have quality Zippo brand butane (not the liquid, but the compressed butane), which maybe not as refined as Colibri brand, but it's still better than Ronson, I think.

Well that wasn't much of a story, not even a funny one.

Oh well. Never look back.

Me: "That was all just a mess. I think I was a little mental yesterday. Maybe we can agree to just...whatever. If I see you around, that's fine, not into passive-aggressively ignoring you. But I'm having trouble dealing with emotions right now, so let's agree to be cool and that'll be how that story ends. And, no, I'm not going to keep bothering you with endless texts full of my bullshit nonsense. Nobody deserves that!"

Her final salvo: "Yeah think I might quit drinking. Probably won't see you around much. Not angry with you. But I'm not available for all I've been getting from you. You're an intelligent person just perhaps not so much emotionally. It's hard work. I can't help you with that. Please respectfully leave be. I was busy being an idiot on my birthday. And then spent time with my mother for her's to periodically get these low level agro texts. Was kinda real bullshit. Again I'm not mad but am not dealing with it. I've done nothing wrong and won't make excuses or explain myself to you or any fucking one. Please leave me alone. I gotta work and getting these messages aren't doing anything for you. Take care of yourself."

Does she not understand that we agree about the exact same thing? And that I said it first?

There are massive blind spots in her "goodbye" to what was in fact already a "goodbye" on my part.

This doesn't absolve my responsibility for being prolix in texts, however I told her straight that we can chat by e-mail, precisely for the reason that I know random texts can be irritating for people who don't know any better than to live upon their phones. And that e-mail is a perfect solution.

E-mail is very easy to ignore. Texts, for some people, is too immediate and recipients are too prone to becoming distracted by them.

Anyway, the "final solution" was mine.

I think I also "win" in composition, directness, and finality, among this battle of the intellectual giants. :)

And, also, I won.

That rottencrotch actually showed up to "my" bar sometime earlier this week, with a new hairstyle. And a gaggle of her "posse."

It happened to be that I was holding court with the owner of the bar, together with three fairly close acquaintances for a number of years. Just chilling and low-key bunch of professional looking people chatting quietly, having some drinks and chatting. Regular crew.

The best stick in the house (who happened to be a high school friend of one of Janice's neighbors, a mutual friend), who I also have known for a good while, rolled in to make it four regulars plus me, plus the owner, who was just in and out, and asked me for a game, and, man, did I play it how she likes it. Miscue on the break. Mark took down two highballs in one stroke, legally called (he wanted to play hillbilly biker's rules "call everything," which is OK with me, instead of real eight ball, call pocket). Fluffed on the one after that.

I ran five balls using what I knew to be Janice's favorite technique: extremely gentle strokes. Which is actually how I play: some biker "banging" balls all around into their pockets are a bunch of hicks, and I beat them 80% of the time by playing for position on the next. You can see why she liked me.

Got hung up on the eight, after some fairly difficult, low percentage banks.

The miscue on the break was really the best thing for me, since it left a dense cluster of balls near the center of the table. Now, I play and practice straight pool, so I'm used to finding and breaking up clusters. Even a very good "straight eight" player doesn't know how to do that, since they're just banging balls into pockets with maximum macho and maximum losing to actual players like me.

Cheated the pocket on the eight for my win, you know, it was in the jaws of the pocket, so rail, ball pocketed, next rail, then a smooth roll down right where I said it would be. (/* that is a legal shot, and I did call it like that, if only to satisfy the podunk biker's rules bullshit, although it was obvious. it's just called "cheating the pocket" for some reason. no, it's not a difficult shot at all. it's just added insurance to not be that asshole who fouls the cue ball going dead-center into the money ball, which could be lack of speed, or shaved slate, or whatever. it's the only shot one should make, really.. */)

Also, the manner in which I selected one of the house cues. Demonstrated value by feeling the tips, cursory inspection for true on the cue.

Just beautiful. Even bought the motherfucker a beer afterwards after he was done practically sucking my dick for how smooth I carried that game. Lot of laughs and high-fives. All that.

Spent the next twenty minutes talking stock prices, golf, tennis, music like I was having the time of my life.

Which I was.

Best revenge is living well.

Small place, so everyone sees everything. And, to boot, I didn't use my eyeglasses except to see the table when my opponent was playing, so she could see how blind I actually am. Like she didn't exist. Plus, repetitive stress injury in left shoulder, so I had that going for me, which was a nice little addition.

Well, it's not really all that funny.

But in the interests of truth-saying, or sooth or whatever.

Yeah, I'm 100% sober, just pissed off and burning bridges,

Quote:

---

All right. Here's me being mellow:
https://youtu.be/IKNzhlE6HQ0

And here's Lisa's neigbhbors:
https://www.dogmal.com/.../Snarl.../...og-picture.jpg


Yep. I'm definitely the bad guy in this scenario.

You know what, Lisa? Your out of control neighbors are 100% your problem.

Fuck them, and fuck you. At least I follow the goddamned rules, you cunt.

Don't ever take sides against the family again.

I'll see you in court, or I'll see you in hell, or I'll see your corpse on a gurney,

You really shouldn't have taken sides against me and against the family. I can forgive, but that was a mistake on your part.

In the future, watch your goddamned mouth when you speak to me about business matters.

---

Update:

Quote:

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Fuck you, Lisa, and I hope your liver fails, you fat bitch.

Don't you ever take that tone with me again.

Fuck off.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ELdnsm-5oq

---

Yes, my sister has been on a transplant list for liver. She's 43 and has three sons. No, she's not a dipso or anything, just bad luck.

Well, she shouldn't have taken sides against me.

Oh, and it gets better.

Quote:

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Hey Lisa. You dumb fucking cunt. Why the fuck aren't you dead yet?

Your best pal neighbors are certainly rooting through your barely fresh remains.

Remember your best pals, from 7554 a and c, and 7556 unit d, whose word you accept over mine, despite me having been to court over your disgusting cunt of a neighbor's lawsuit.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WEzkk03sNoY

Nobody's going to mourn for you when we pick up a shovel and pitch your fat ass into the hole.

Next time, think about your words, you fucking cow.

You're a filthy pig, Lisa, and I wish you were dead.

---

I'm starting to think I should probably feel a bit bad about what I said to my sister, but on the other hand, fuck her.

I wouldn't have said it if I didn't mean it.

No, I did remove my insane tyrades from FB completely, in addition to blocking my sister from FB, Gmail, and text.

To her credit, she is committed to not allowing spurious, retaliatory complains to affect my relationship with the HOA, who may be in their rights to unilaterally evict me.

Fortunately, she has legal counsel and is willing to fight in court. And equally fortunately, I have complete records, including audio recordings, of this and numerous other actions by the scofflaw would-be complainants.

Credibility on the part of these complainants is, I would think, much diminished by their recorded, documented violation of HOA bylaws, including keeping non-ADA dogs, which are unambiguously prohibited.

There is no standard of evidence or proof on the part of the HOA, which is a problem which rises to the level of harrassment, in some jurisdictions, and plain bullying in the vernacular parlance of our times.

If any action comes from spurious complaints, this is going to civil court, with the full support of my sister's legal counsel.

Given that she was denied a liver transplant a month ago, having been on a donor list for five months, due to the likelihood that her condition can be managed for at least several years with diet and many, many medications, in addition to having her eldest son with tetralogy of Fallot with pulmonary atresia and will be due for another valve transplant (his third), with a brain tumor, there's simply no question I'm outraged on her behalf as well as my own.

It's time for professional remedies, which I'm happy she recognizes and am convinced both parties (me, as part owner, and her, as part owner) will prevail.

Actually, this is ridiculous, but I am incensed. Not in the RCC sense.

See, I'm rewatching the recent movie *Nobody* for the second time.

No, I'm not timid, and I don't have a family, so I've nothing to lose.

The most is a pinched nerve in my left shoulder combined with RSI in the same. It is painful, between doses of 800mg ibuprofen 3x quod diem. For about eighteenth months. 3x qd. Trying to taper off, but I find if I miss a bolus it catches up.

No, I fixed the little issue with above.

I think I had the ... one of ... the worst moments of my darker angel, when after having an otherwise decent bartender cancel my jukebox order, I took my CC slip, crossed out my 75% tip, and wrote in zero for the tip.

Zero percent.

I was there for like four hours after work and she was, for once (for being a n00b) pretty good.

I've tried to time it so I never am there when she is tending bar, but apparently I have a new good reason to avoid her.

She's new, but taking a Bic pen, scratching out my tip, which, as I said, was ample, probably would rub her the wrong way. And, taking a picture on my phone of my amended submission in her full view.

Aw gawd, it's always something.

But you never fuck with a man's jukebox playlist!

Just can't be done!

Yeah, I know, she's not going to starve or whatever because of an extra ten or twenty bucks, but it's the insult that counts.

And I do think scratching out my tip, initialling it, and taking a photo of it if I have to dispute it counts as an insult.

Is this a forum thread, or a blog? Either way, it's a hell of a ride. Shine on!

Seems like a blog, I guess.

My virile essence has consumed the thread.

Words overheard two weeks ago at a local bar, by a guy playing video poker: "Fuck you motherfucker, you will die!" To the machine.

That was a good laugh to the barflies: everybody seemed to know him, as a generally humorous weed smoker.

Here's a funny one, I guess.

So, I guess it was last Thursday (of last week, numbnuts!) and my task was this utterly stupid thing of securing raincovers on moveable carts, since, apparently, rain and stuff.

Yeah, so whatever. If they want to pay full medical, dental, vision and have me do this bullshit, whatever. I don't care.

So, it's a little bit tricky to fit the raincovers over the carts off of which the van drivers have to load out in fifteen minutes or less, after which we get on the megaphone and have to say "Fucking find a hole and use it, you lazy bastards!" More or less.

Anyway, so I was doing this and this older dude said his "hello!" to my as he does and asked if I needed a hand. Of course, I say, "Yeah! This thing is caught in the corner, and do you mind grabbing that end!"

**ANYWAY** So, he helped save me thirty seconds or so, nice guy, I've known him for at least a few months just in passing.

He says as I thank him for his help, "Can you give me a hug?"

Well, of course! I mean, so I give him a good hug, pat him on the back and tell him he's a good guy and all that.

That's the kind of shit that could get me fired, though!

OTOH, what kind of animal would say "No, I'm sorry, you are allowed no hugs today, you turd."

No, I'm not worried about getting canned, but it seemed to me almost pathetic, in the sense of pathos: maybe he really did need or want a hug. Older guy, you know, late 60s at least. Maybe doesn't have much or any family or close friends.

Both a bit sad, but also uplifting that it's possible for distant acquaintances to provide such a simple gesture.

Awww.

Little Janice has started to figure out that (i) I do the exact thing every day after work (ii) I know absolutely everyone in the bar (iii) I'm not changing my routine just because of her.

And I suppose it was her little gesture of recognition that in addition to her usual "What do you want dude?" she actually asked "How ya doin?" today. You know, like an actual person! My response was typical for this day, namely, "Eh."

No, no way in hell would I ever get involved with her again, but she and I could end up being OK bar-acquaintances/friends, which is all I ever was after in the first place.

So, we mutually tolerate each other. Which is fine. Even for a hardcore introvert like me, I recognize humans are a social creature. While drinking alcohol is not ideal for one's various states of health, it's a trade-off for maintaining a psychological state of equilibrium.

I got to say, she does have absolutely beautiful eyes, but that is not the game I'm going after. Never. Not in a million years. I'm sure plenty of my man acquaintances have great eyes, too: so what?

Nothing to get excited about!

/* edit: I will say, she could be a very rewarding romantic partner, but I don't trust her, on the one hand, and I think she has terrible taste in general, on the other hand. And, I just can't have either of those flaws in my woman, end of story. */