It's Miller Time!

Cheesy name for a post, I know, but I can't be clever all the time. Janet and Will asked if I wanted to go to Miller beach in Indiana with Sydney and Avery last Sunday, and of course I said yes. Why wouldn't I want to spend the day at the beach with those two tykes? Nothing brings family together more than an old fashioned day at the beach, and as you know, I'm all about bringing families together! If there's a birthday party, guess who's there? Me. If there's a funeral, guess who's there? Me. If it's Christmas, guess who's there? Me. If I throw a party, guess who's there? Me. The list goes on and on and on. Nary a month (or two) goes by when I'm not doing something with my wonderful family. And the best part is, once word got out that I was going, Jennifer, Bill, Ruth, Sylvia, Tristan, and Priscilla decided to join in the fun as well.

Anyway, this post is not about me, it's about my family (and me!). More specifically, it's just about Sydney and Avery, as you'll see in the pictures below. I really wanted to delete some of these as 24 pictures are probably too many for a blog, but I wanted you to get a sense of just how many goofy faces these two can make over the course of a day. Hope you enjoy them.

And thanks again Janet and Will for inviting me along! I had a great time, so let's do it again.

Unraveled Fortunes.

Being aware of your fears will improve your life. 
Why did I have to pull this one first? Seems a bit daunting to think about at 9 in the morning, but honestly, this fortune is daunting for me to think about at any time of day. I fear that my life is quickly passing me by and that I haven't really done much with it. Perhaps that's not so much a fear as it is reality. I'm supposed to be using this time off to figure out what I should be doing during my finite time on the Earth. So far, no good. Haven't figured it out. Let's move on.

You will be showered with good luck. 
That's more like it. Now I don't need to figure anything out, because good luck will shower down upon me for the rest of my days. Suck it fears! Problem solved.

You should be able to make money and hold on to it. 
Of course I should, but shouldn't we all be able to do this? There are also two smiley faces on this fortune. I'm not sure why they are there, but I suppose it's better than two sad faces mocking you once the realization sets in that you don't make enough money and certainly haven't saved enough to take care of those dreams, which are slowly receding from your reality. Perhaps you could go sell some of your plasma to kickstart your savings?

Your intense personality can make quite an impression on people. 
I've noticed this. Mostly when my fist impacts their stupid faces.

Your sense of humor allows you to glide through these difficult times. 
As does my intense personality and my witty charm and my rugged, handsome good looks. Oh sure, cheap rent and unemployment checks help out as well, but mostly it's my sense of humor. Too bad my trust fund hasn't matured yet...that would help out as well. My friend John at the pool hall was just telling me about his friend whose parents both died a while back. They owned 25 KFC restaurants and left it all to him with the stipulation that he can have it all if he stops drinking. Seems like a silly request, as the human body needs a lot of water to survive. Apparently he hasn't yet cashed in on their generosity.

Seek your comfort at home, it proves rewarding.
Not last night it wasn't. Tossed and turned and tossed and turned some more and finally fell asleep after what seemed like many hours. Then woke up about three and a half hours later at 6:30 in the morning, when I had to go to the bathroom. Kind of like I do now. Hold on. Talk about good fortune...just got into the bathroom before one of my roommates took a shower. Anyway, I tried to get back to bed, but all I could do was toss and turn some more, which made me irritated, so I decided to climb down out of bed and start my day. Hopefully the comfort I seek here at home will be a nice long nap this afternoon.

Your love of music will be an important part of your life. 
My brother Dan taught me how to play a small portion of Child In Time by Deep Purple the other day on the piano we have across the hallway in The Orphanage. It's not an actual orphanage and it's capitalized because that's the name of the space. Concerts are held there every now and again, but not lately, as it's been too hot. Anyway, I've never really learned an instrument, but now I'm proficient at playing piano. Not quite, but I've asked another roommate if I can borrow some basic piano lesson books for dummies so I can see if I can learn. Perhaps in a few days of practice, I'll be better than I was at banjo playing. I miss that thing.

Anyway, here's a couple pictures from a June show at The Orphanage...

Now is a good time for you to explore. Take a vacation. 
Well I am going to Gary, Indiana tomorrow! Looks like this is one fortune that will come true. Heading to some beach with Janet and Will and their kids for some fun in the sun! At least I think that's what will happen. Does the sun actually shine in Gary, Indiana or does the stench and grime wafting through the air block it? At least I won't need to apply sunscreen.

Actually I am taking a bit of a vacation. Heading to Vegas for eight days near the end of August for the APA 8-Ball National Team Championships tournament. Flights and hotel room are paid for by our league operator since my team won the city wide tournament a few weeks back. Guess I just need to come up with some money for food and gambling and hookers. After Vegas, I'll be traveling to Los Angeles to stay with my friends Chris and Kristin for a few days, maybe longer, depending on how long they can stand my company. I've never been to Los Angeles, so I'm looking forward to seeing what it's all about. So I suppose it is a good time for exploration and vacationing.

Thanks for the advice chinese fortune cookie fortune!

Bridgeport Kuhn-Fesh-Uhns.

Not so much actual confessions, but perhaps a few thoughts pertaining to living here these days.

Sometimes when I like to get away from my room for a few moments, I descend the staircase and exit the community center, walk through the parking lot and plop down on the simple, concrete steps of the church. It's here where I can find the peace of mind to ponder things greater than myself. It's also here where I sometimes, not always, but sometimes, decide to smoke a cigarette. I know, I know, I'm killing myself. No need to remind me. Anyway, what usually happens is that after sitting for a moment someone will walk by, stop and ask me a question. These questions take one of two forms. "Can I bum a  smoke from you?" or "Do you have any spare change?" No doubt this happens from time to time on the North Side as well, but it never seems to stop over here. Needless to say, I've learned to only bring one cigarette with me, so when I get asked, I won't be lying when I reply, "Sorry, I left my pack inside." As for the spare change, well my reply to that depends on how I'm feeling at the moment. I'm usually happy to help out, but you know what? I happen to have a jar of change on my desk and I almost never use the change in my pocket when purchasing something because I like filling up that jar. So maybe that person will get some change, maybe not.

There's not enough light in my room. It took me a month and a half to figure that out. I like a bright room so I don't get completely sleepy when I'm not doing things I should be doing. This is my reason for not having accomplished much of anything since I've moved in. How can I see the light if I can barely see much of anything? It's just not possible. Okay, okay, there is plenty of sunlight during the day, so perhaps this light issue isn't the only reason. So...anybody out there have any lamps they aren't using anymore? I've got space for lamps. I think I may even have light bulbs as well.

Judas Priest is still awesome on this side of town.

Folks are just more trusting the farther south you go. For example, I was standing in line at JJ Peppers a couple weeks ago, and there was a woman in front of me who was precariously holding onto 6 or 7 beverages in her hands. Her hands were so full, she certainly was not able to corral her son who was busy pulling out and dumping no less than 5 bags of M&M's onto the floor from the bin near the counter. He was pretty excited about all that candy. Unfortunately for him, once Mom unloaded the beverages onto the counter, all the candy got tossed back into the candy bin. Well Mom was having a bit of a hard time keeping track of her child and figuring out how to pay for the beverages, so she scooped up her kid, turned around, looked me in the eye and held him out to me so I could hold him while her transaction was completed. In that small moment I'm sure she asked if I'd hold him, and of course I said yes. Why wouldn't I want to hold some grubby tyke who just finished playing on the JJ Peppers floor? Not being all that used to holding kids of strangers, let alone kids of friends, I did my best to control his weak but constant flailing. Once Moms things were properly bagged, she took him out of my hands, thanked me and went on her way. Complete strangers helping each other out. Perhaps a bit reluctantly, but whatever...that's just the way we roll over here.

I got home late on Wednesday night after playing pool, and to my great delight noticed Subway was still open. Deciding it would be a great idea to order a sub at midnight, I walked inside and did just that. Spicy Italian with all the veggies in case you were wondering. I asked the worker behind the counter what time they closed, and he replied, "We're open 24 hours". Slightly shocked, yet quite pleased, I tipped the guy a dollar and left the store with my sandwich. The last time I had 24 hour access to Subway was when I worked there in college. We weren't open 24 hours, but I always had at least one or two subs in the fridge at home. A kids gotta eat you know.

Some people like to take hot showers. Not me. I like a nice cool shower that contrasts nicely with my warm shampoo and conditioner. These two items can be found on the window sill on the east side of our bathtub. That hot summer sun warms them up quite nicely before I finally decide to find the time to wash away my grime. I'm talking about a high viscosity cleaning of the scalp. It's tremendously relaxing. If you happen to have AC and your toiletries aren't on a window sill facing the sun, turn off the AC for a few days and take a cool shower, but first warm up a bit of water on the stove and put in your bottles of shampoo and conditioner. Wait about 7 minutes until they are nice and warm and then get your ass into the shower ASAP so you can enjoy the experience. Feel free to leave a comment below detailing your shower adventure.

That's all I have for this installment of Bridgeport Kuhn-Fesh-Uhns. Actually I have more, but that's all I'm going to type. It's been a slow evening here. All the roommates disappeared many hours ago except for one who, after roaming about aimlessly, finally decided to take a nap a while back. I've spent my evening preparing for Lollapalooza, which means that I've listened to two or three tracks from about 20 different performers. That's not even through day one, so there's still much to be done. I don't really know how I'm going to find time to get all this "work" done, but where there's a lack of will, there's a good chance I'll spend my time doing more nonsense like this instead of what others may regard as important or worthy of my time. To each their own, right?

The Gates of Babble-On

Well it’s been another week of house-sitting. Not sure what it is about being out of work, but everyone just thinks you’re happy to house-sit for them. I’m not sure where they get the balls to think I’m just going to drop everything going on in my life in order to house-sit in their beautiful, gigantic, stocked-with-food, air-conditioned houses, but…

Okay, I’m more than happy to do this.

I have nothing but the natural elements in my place in Bridgeport. What I mean by that is that my window stays open all day and all night. There’s nothing but brutal heat greeting me at all hours these days. Oh sure, sometimes a bit of a breeze blows on in and tries its best to comfort me, but it’s usually not all that successful. Sort of like this Great White song. Thanks for trying, but you’ll never be able to Rock Me. So the point is that it was some beautiful happenstance the Universe just laid at my feet getting me this house-sitting gig.

It’s hard to write a blog and watch Metal Mania on VH1 Classic at the same time. Not necessarily when a Great White song is playing, but when DIO’s Mystery starts playing…that’s another thing. I don’t even know if I’ve ever seen this video.  Dang. Way Cool Junior. As if I want to relive the death of Ratt one more time.

Okay back to house-sitting. First it was at Tessa’s place a couple weeks ago. I was needed because she was out of the country and also currently working on constructing her own personal biosphere. It may not technically be a biosphere bubble, but with 200+ planters on three decks, it sure seems like it. Watering those plants took approximately 45 minutes each day, and I gotta say, I kind of liked it. There’s a certain peacefulness being on top of an urban rooftop making sure that hundreds upon hundreds of plants receive their nourishment. It’s surprisingly calm when you lift yourself a couple stories above the city. I wouldn’t want to have to wake up at 5am to do it each day like she does, but it was a nice exercise in responsibility for a while.

This week I’m at the Moulton residence. All I have to do here is water the lawn every day. This takes a bit more time, especially when the temperature hits the century mark every day. I’m not one to wake up before the sun starts beating down, so I’ve had to carefully time the watering. And by carefully, I mean water the lawn when I’m drunk and it’s dark out. They’ll probably be disappointed to learn I didn’t bother with the sprinkler, but believe me, this lawn has been watered more this week than any other in it’s existence. And I guarantee they’ve never watered it at 4:30 in the morning…twice. If I’m lazy it takes at least an hour. If I’m not lazy, which I’m usually not, it’s at least three hours. Just kidding. Seriously though, if watering plants was relaxing, watering the lawn is….

Hold on, there’s a Trojan Vibrations commercial on right now. I thought it was a condom commercial, but apparently Trojan has some kind of vibrator they’re marketing now. They didn’t show it, so I have no idea what it looks like, but according to the commercial, you can twist it in different positions for different experiences. Apparently it’s also powerful, in the best possible way.  I’m not entirely sure what that means.

Okay so watering the lawn is probably nothing like using that Trojan “massager”. It is, however, a pretty enjoyable activity to do for one week. Any more than that, and I’d definitely be using the sprinkler.

I have 14% power left in this here MacBook Pro. Dang. I just added two more gigs of RAM today, so why isn’t the battery lasting longer? I’m sure at some point in computing history someone actually asked that question. He or she probably went on to dominate the computing industry in some shape or form. So what do I do? Stop typing this as it’s now down to 13%, or do I continue and wait for it to simply wind down and die?

Speaking of dying, my Great Aunt Gert passed away late last week. Her funeral was held this past Tuesday. She and her husband, Bill Joyner, were my Godparents. I’m not sure that’s supposed to be capitalized, but I did it anyway. They were good people. My Uncle Mike threw her a 90^th birthday party last year and I’m glad I was there and decided to tell her that I was not completely at fault for losing the tiny calculator they bought me for my birthday many, many years ago. I think I was in 4^th grade maybe and Uncle Bill had this calculator that was thin and slim just like an embryo penis, but I thought it was pretty damn cool nonetheless. I’d never seen anything like it, and to my surprise, a while later I was pretty ecstatic that it was my birthday present. Unfortunately, the next time I visited my Dad in Chicago, I brought it with. Actually bringing it with wasn’t the problem, him convincing me to let him borrow it was the problem, as that was the last time I ever saw the calculator. When I came back two weeks later it was gone. There was no explanation for what happened to it, and all I could do was walk up and down the alley time and time again, hoping I’d find it somewhere.

I didn’t.

At the time I never said anything about it and I have no idea what they thought I might have done with it. Hell, I didn’t even know what happened to it. Regardless, I felt the need to tell my Aunt that story so I could get some sort of guilt off my shoulders. I didn’t even do anything wrong, but I still felt bad about it 25 years later. I hope she understood.

Rest In Peace Aunt Gert.