STORIES FROM THE STOCKPILE

WORDS: monopoly, double, smile, mexico, serendipity, monster, bomb, sun, stationary, warning.

When one is looking down the barrel of a .45, one’s surroundings tend to get dimmer. The ceiling fades first. Then the tables and the chairs begin to turn fuzzy, turn sepia-toned and then they fade from view, too. The pictures on the wall? Forget them. They weren’t even noticed before the big guy with blank black eyes and the big muscles and the big gun pulled out his gun and leveled it. For a majority of people, their right eye is dominant, and so the left wall fades first and the right follows shortly thereafter until all one is aware of is the gaping maw--Hudson Tunnel-sized, now--of the .45’s muzzle. It looks malevolent; it is malevolent, and, for the first time in his heretofore short but impassioned life, Giavonni Volietti, felt passionless. He felt great fear. But he still felt somewhat alive. But. He had only himself to blame. They (whoever “they” are) say that when faced with mortal danger, time slows and one’s senses become more acute. Vonny had this to add to what “they” had asserted: One’s life does most definitely roller coast through one’s mind. And images do flit and do flash and do swim to the surface and then sink back to the black. As for sensory stimulation? That was true, too. Vonny could smell what the dude had eaten for lunch--a marinara meatball sub on Asiago bread with green olives and peppers and onions and a pinch of oregano. And a couple or three Budweisers. And, yes, time does slow down. Until it crawls. Like a snail in molasses.
* * * * *
“Vonny the Violet.” Not a moniker most men would embrace. And Giavonni Volietti was no different. Growing up in Brooklyn in the mostly-blue collar Italian neighborhood of 32nd and Brush, and with just a few friends, Volietti had had his fair share of scrapes and fights and nasty catcalls hurled his way. He dealt with the belittlement the way his father had taught him: He swung first and often. The taunts had started off slowly, but by the time he was in junior high school, Volietti was fighting every other day at school, winning more fights than he lost. He swung first and often, and, eventually, the taunts dissipated and dried up, and “Vonny the Violet” was a nickname that he could wrap his arms around. The little flower is a bad-ass, people began to say, and, by the way, do you know who his friends are? His friends were the sons of middle-echlon soldiers for the Rattiano Family. They had strength, and Vonny soaked up that strength like a sponge. Before long, Vonny, then a freshman at St. Mary High School, exercised a monopoly over all the deviance of the school. He ran numbers games; he ran dice games; he owned St. Mary’s pubescent gamblers. And even the seniors, and their friends, listened when Vonny spoke. He dropped out of high school after his sophomore year and his mama, Rita, cried--his dad hadn’t. Had his dad, a somewhat-bitter plumber, seen the looks that Vonny received or had his dad heard the word on the street? Vonny never found out. They’d never had a particularly close relationship and his dad, Anthony Volietti, had fallen dead of a massive stroke a year after Vonny’d quit the schooling. But, by that time, just seventeen, Giavonni Volietti was making a name for himself. Backed by his Rattiano friends, and using their muscle, “Vonny the Violet” was making a big name for himself. And, eventually, others would take notice.
* * * * *
“Hey sweetie, make mine a double.” He teethed at the new bartender, nineteen if she were a day, and leaned against the bar stool’s back, his arms folded behind his head. Clad in a shiny new blue silk suit, 18-year-old Giavonni Volietti, had the world by the balls. He owned the world, making two grand a week, apartmenting out of the squalor of the old neighborhood, and he wanted to make this pretty girl, with a swell of breast, aware. “What’s your name, baby-doll?”
“First, I’m not a ’baby-doll’ or your ’sweetie.’ Second, I just do this shit-job so that I can go to college at night. And third, you can’t even shave yet, little man. What’re you doing in here? Shouldn’t you be studying Geometry, or something?” She stood back, hands on flaring hips, her dark eyes flashing. Without a hint of a smile.
Volietti sighed. Leaned forward. Elbows on the bar. He pasted a suave look to his countenance. Eyebrows up, brown eyes wide. “Honey, honey, honey. Don’t you know who I am?” He smiled his baby-gonna-getcha smile.
“No. I guess I don’t know who you are,” she said. “Would you like a Diet Coke, though? Or some milk? Or maybe you could show me your ID,” she added.
Victor, at Vonny’s right shoulder, laughed. “Dude, good luck with this chick. She do mean bidness!” And he laughed again.
Vonny glared at Vic and Vic’s laughter dried. “Abby?” Vonny said, gesturing. “Abby? Will you set this woman straight, please? Just a double Jim Beam. All I’m asking.”
Abby, 42, slouchy and pale, extracted herself from the bar’s shadows and winced to the bar. Abby had been working at the Golden Eagle for just under ten years, and it was evident. Dark shadows under her deadened blue eyes. Slumped shoulders. Apron tied carelessly around too-ample hips. Dead eyes. With dark shadows. She sighed. Cocked a thumb at the patrons. “Angela, this here is Vonny. And that’s Vic. Both cool. Get him what he wants.”
Angela glared at Vonny and turned to Abby. “But he’s not 21,” she said. “I don’t even think he’s 15.”
Victor laughed again and finished his beer. “Another, ma’am?” Holding up his stein.
“Sure, no problem. At least you know what a razor is.”
Abby: “Get him his beer and get Vonny his…whatever. It’s all on the house. It’s always…on the house.” With that, she turned and slouched back to her shadows. Her duty was done.
Angela blew exasperation through her lips and glared at Vonny. “Whatever. Just don’t call me ’baby-doll’ again. Or ‘sweetie.’” She turned to get the drinks.
Vonny held up his hands in mock surrender and then smoothed his black, gelled hair. To Victor, he whispered, “She’s a freaking firecracker. And I’ll know her…soon.”
Vic sighed and smiled. “You know what, Vonny? I don’t doubt you for a minute. You have a way about you, man. You are living the good life. But Karma, man. Karma….”
Vonny laughed abrasively--Abby winced--and cracked his knuckles. “Fuck Karma.”
* * * * *
When a .45 is leveled at one’s face, surrounding scenery dissipates till nothing is left but the Grand Canyon-sized maw of the firearm’s muzzle.
* * * * *
Later, on the night Vonny had met Acerbic Angela, he’d dreamed deeply. He hadn’t dreamed since his dad had passed. Not that he could remember, at least. But he remembered this dream, and woke on the floor of his bedroom, shivering and sweating, a scream frozen behind his lips:

Mexico. Sweltering. Moist heat. What his father’s mother had called “el Diablo’s pendejo.” And that, from a Sicilian grayhair. In the dream, Vonny knows something’s amiss. He walks through the scrubby brush of rural Mexico, and rattlers raise on end, swiping , barely missing, punching furnace heat past face. He is eight years old again, scared of everything, scared of nothing. His gym-formed body is reduced to an eight-year-old’s scrawniness: chest concave, arms sticks. Heat ripples. No oasis to be found. Rattlers swipe and miss, punching furnace heat past his tearless sobs. Alone. Alone in the desert. And eight. Vonny weeps air-tears, each tear arcing brilliant green shoots through the brown of Desert. He sees something ahead. It is Angela. It must be. He puts his eight-year-old scrawn to the test, running to beat el Diablo. Morass; taffy. The shimmering Angel in the distance stays away, retreats. And the heat bakes, as he runs. And runs. And runs. His tiny lungs burn. Burn with the ice-cold heat of narcissistic meglomania. And his body shifts once again. He is 12, shucking greenbacks off of believers. Shift up: He is 15, chatting up the plaid female that is St. Mary. Shift up: He is 17, resplendent in black silk, in good with the bad guys. And he thanks his lucky stars to swipe away the tears of his bitter father. And Angela is there, somewhere, past the horizon. Vonny, baking, sweating blood, smiles. He walks purposefully. The desert shimmers; the desert shimmers. Footing is muy dificil. The desert folds on itself, folds and folds again. Serendipity? Far from it. Far from it. Oh-so far from a fortunate discovery. The desert folds again. There is black-dark around where the sky and the horizon should be. There is black beneath his feet. There is nothing left of the unwilling desert but the straight-ahead, blinded Vision of the Vonny. And that shrinks, too. Blackness. Nothing but blackness. Save for the Blue-Black. The Blue-Black muzzle of Righteousness. And Vonny believes quite strongly in Righteousness; and so he feels--knows--he must have a palaver with the Righteousness, and so he opens his mouth
And Vonny found himself on the floor of his well-furnished bedroom, shivering and sweating, a scream stuck behind his lips.
* * * * *
“So you had a dream? So the fuck what?”
“So the fuck what is that I haven’t dreamed in a coon’s age and then this shit dream comes out of nowhere. Listen, Vic, I believe in Karma. Like you said the other night?”
Victor Rattiano sighed and stroked the eight-ball off of two banks and into the side pocket. “Game. Listen, man: Listen! I was only joking about Karma. I don’t believe in that shit. Karma is for suckers—Protestants, Greeks, whatever. They believe in that crap. I don’t. Play again?”
“Hindus. Yeah--play again, dickhead. Anyway, Hindus believe in Karma and nirvana and that sort of stuff. I gotta say, Vic, I do too.” Vonny began to set the new rack and then straightened up. “What the fuck am I doing? Have I ever set a rack?” He pushed back from the table and scrubbed his eyes. His bloodshot eyes.
“Yeah…yeah, Vonny? What the fuck, man?” Victor walked quickly to the other side of the table and solid-striped his way to a rack. Eight ball? Always in the middle. “Dude, if you have a thing for this Angela chick, ask her out, man. Easy as that. ’Would you like to maybe grab a cup of coffee, sometime?’ Seven or eight words, man. You’re loaded with green, you have great hair, you dress well…what?”
“Sounds like you want me to ask you out…dude.”
“You’re a fucking monster, Flower-Boy. You’re a fucking monster. Even if I was a chick, and you were the last circle-arrow on Eart--”
“Circle-arrow?”
“Sign for dude, man. The ladies’ is a circle-cross. Pointing down, if you know what I mean.” He chucked a laugh.
“Oh. Okay.”
“Anyway, to summarize: You’re a monster--”
“A fucking monster, sir.”
“Right. You’re a fucking monster and even if I was the last lady on Earth…if I was the last female on Earth…or, wait…if you was the last dude on Earth--”
“Have another, Vic, why don’t you? If I have to sit here and listen to you bomb your way through another fucking analogy, I might just have to go on a bender of coffee and Valium and Bette Midler movies.” Vonny raised his eyebrows at Vic.
Vic: “Say it ain’t so, man!” He feigned weeping into his crossed arms.
“It isn’t so, sir. You won--break.”
And so Victor Rattiano broke. And won the billiards game. And after he drove Vonny the Violet back to Vonny’s well-furnished apartment, Victor wasn’t seen again for three weeks. When he was found…when he was found…. When he was found by a teary-eyed 28-year-old blonde jogger who clutched her hands between her small breasts, police and firefighters were on the scene. And yellow tape was cautioning. And the shit had most definitely hit the fan. And Giavonni Volietti, smarmy, back-dealing, rich beyond his years, was not to be found.
* * * * *
The Sun shines, always. Even sheltered--hidden--behind dark clouds, the Sun shines. Brings life to the planet. Enables crops to grow and plants to bloom and human souls to survive. The Sun shines, thrives, and Giavonni Volietti believes this, still. A mantra continues to run through his head, as he stares into the muzzle of a big-assed handgun. The .45, a most-powerful handgun. Nothing else matters but this Niagra Falls-sized maw of deadly intent. Nothing else matters. Not his dead plumber father, not his absent siblings, not even his dear graying mother. All that matters is the black hole of the muzzle of the .45, and the man at the trigger. Bill Shimmons. Boyfriend to Angela Smith, the hot new barkeep at the Golden Eagle.
* * * * *
“Hey, sweetie, make mine a double,” Vonny had said again, alone, and this time? This time, Angela had.
* * * * *
Time slows; it becomes almost stationary. Life’s mental images do flit and do flash and do swim to the surface and then back to the black. The black of memory. And the light of memory. Thoughts and images do flash across one’s mind, when one is in mortal danger: Pre-school accidents, quality wins as junior high sportskid, high school inadequacies, first kisses, first loves, first deaths, sport teams’ victories, familial love, Mike Jordan’s scoring average during the 1987 NBA basketball season (37.1) and many many other flashes of neurons. The synapses fire so quickly whilst one is at Death’s door, why, the images blend into one image--a silent, beautifully brilliant, cacaphonic visual bliss--they can never be equaled, in any way, at any time. It is a once-in-a-lifetime “moment.”
* * * * *
“I’m warning you--you and Angie even talk again, these bullets that I have loaded in this hand-cannon will end your fucking love-fest…Dude. Yours, most definitely, and Angie’s? Ain’t decided yet.” Shimmons leans in, presses cold blue steel against Giavonni Volietti’s eyebrow. “Do I make myself clear?”
* * * * *
dear old mama and dear dead daddy and sisters who have slipped away and sun that shines and brings warmth to these cold times and the good god above and his baby son jesus and the sunsets at night and the sunrises in the mornings and Jessica, the first girl I ever kissed and Marilyn the first girl I ever went all the way with and shooting threes and making threes and hitting that perfect drive in golf and soaking up the sun’s rays and sipping a cold one on a hot summer’s day and playing with my childhood pooch and and and and…and taking money from suckas and cheating the system and boning easy whores and splitting a man’s face with an axe and and and and…loving the shelter of home before daddy died and laughing with my friends about how he was a fucking plumber and loving him for it and loving my poor graying mamacita who never passed seventh grade in italy dumb bitch and wondering where victor is hidden if he’s all right and denouncing my ties to the cosa nostra and loving it--bitches violent eyetalian bitches--and and and and…remembering my gramma my daddy’s mom who always had frozen twinkies for me and my absent sisters and loving nana’s dog gigi and hating how grandpa always smelled like juicy fruit gum and liquor of one sort or the other and biking with the parents and the sisses down to coney island in nueva york and my oldest sister crying and me plugging right away and my mommy saying what a good boy I was. And I ask now, deer sir: be you a doe or will you actually use said hand-cannon? I tend to believe that you’re all talk you muscle-bound piece of garbage--can’t even buy shirts that fit correctly--Angela never asked for that. By the way? How is Angela?
* * * * *
Giavonni “Vonny the Violet” Volietti stands slowly, the muzzle of a heavy .45 pressed against his left eyebrow, the scenery of the room filtering back, slowly. The chairs return before the ceiling and the left and right walls--surprising, but not a buzz-kill. The .45’s muzzle slides off of Vonny’s eyebrow and clacks against his whitened teeth. And then the muzzle is in his mouth. Metal, tin-foil, grease. Vonny is not one to panic. And he doesn’t. Calmly, he folds his arms behind his head, fingers interlocked, in a classic “prisoner” position. His eyes are like dark glass--they hold no emotion.
Shimmons, who outweighs Vonny by 45 pounds and towers six inches above the Flower’s head, retreats, his gun barrel shaking, slightly. “You’re a tough guy, huh?” he says.
Volietti shakes his head slowly. Nope.
Shimmons says, “Me and Angela is gonna get married, man. She’ll be my fucking wife!” Shimmons points the gun, distractedly, at Giavonni.
Giavonni shrugs, arms still in “prisoner position.” So what? You gonna use that, cowboy?
“Don’t ever let me see you ‘round my wife again!”
Giavonni shrugs, arms still in “prisoner position.” So what? You gonna use that, cowboy?
“Never!” Face red, sweat beading at the temples, gun forgotten. “Who are you, silent bitch? Charlie-fucking-Chaplin? Buster Keaton?!”
Giavonni shrugs, arms still in “prisoner position.” So what? You gonna use that, cowboy?
“You’re a fucking nut, man! You do know that this is a .45, man?! Fucking nut bag. You deserve my fucking fiancee!” Shimmons shimmies, drops the .45. Picks it up, quick-like. The “5-second Rule” is in effect.
Giavonni shrugs, arms still in “prisoner position.” So what?
Shimmons drops the gun; Vonny kicks it to the corner. “So what? You were gonna use that, cowboy?”
Shimmons begins to speak and Voliette interjects-- “Leave.”



THE CANARY WHO DIDN'T


"Quiet, Freddy. I'm doin' something, here."
Timothy York looked back to the television that had been awarded to him when his grandmother had passed on. It was a grainy old black-and-white Zenith, some arifact left from the middle of the previous century, but it got the job done. Sure, he had to mess with the rabbit-ears every once in awhile and, sure, cable was a no-go--no connection on the back of the beast--but it still served its purpose. It allowed him to watch his sports and his newscasts and his favorite genre of movies--old-style Bronte-esque Romanticism flicks. Sometimes York thought to himself that he would have been a fine "gentleman caller," back in the 1800s. Verily, he would be the one to lay his coat in the puddle so that the lady wouldn't get her toes wet. He would have have been the type of dandy who would open doors and rise when the lady rose. And sit only after said lady sat. It seemed to him, sometimes, that the 21st Century had come too quickly. And when it had come? Manners and chivalry had exited, it seemed, to stage left. The 21st Century, when everything was a quick sound byte and news was old news four seconds later. The 21st Century, when most media lived by the mottos "shock thy neighbor," and "get the story first, right or wrong." When nothing sold better than sex and violence. The 21st Century, as far as Tim York was concerned, could stick a sock in it, could go fly a kite. York longed for simpler days. Which was a dichotomy, of course, considering for whom he worked.
His Great Dane Alfredo (Freddy) had stopped whining about whatever he had been whining about--he was a practical dog; he knew whence his food came--and now he ambled over to the couch and laid his brindled head in York's lap.
"Good old Freddy," he said, stroking the dog's ears. "Always wanting to be a lap dog." York turned his attention back to "Sense and Sensiblity," starring Emma Thompson. An instant-classic, in his mind.

***

"Hey, Timmy. Timmy! Timmy, come 'ere. I got to ask the smart college boy a question."
Tim York set down the glass that he'd been drying and walked over to where his boss and his associates were seated. "Yes sir?"
Antonio Guliatti looked up at him, with slightly-watery eyes, and gestured loosely with his left hand. "Drag up a stone, kid. I don't like looking up at people. You know that. Makes me feel like a shoe-shine boy, or somethin'." A high-pitched laugh warbled out of his barrel chest and his associates dutifully joined in.
"Sorry, sir." York pulled a folding chair from the corner and sat. He looked fixedly at the table.
"Kid?"
"Yes, sir."
"Kid, I gotta ask you a question. Tommy, here--" Guliatti swam a thumb in the general direction of a sallow-faced man with shiny black hair "--Tommy here's tellin' me about this artist. The dude was a painter. The guy painted all kinds of crazy shit and I'm tellin' Tommy that the guy was an Italian. And Tommy's sayin' that the guy was a friggin' Greek! Now, kid, you're a smart kid. You did some time at college, right?"
York nodded.
"Okay, then." Guliatti stared at Tommy and then turned his attention to York. "You tell me and this whole table of assholes, here, that I'm right. Okay?"
York nodded.
"Slovian Darling was from Italy. Italy. Correct?"
York stared.
"I'm right as rain? Right?"
"Sir?"
"Kid, I'm right as rain that Slovian Darling was from Italy, right?"
York felt his ears getting red. He was in a pickle. "Mr. Guliatti, sir, I've--I've never heard of an artist named Slovian Darling, sir."
Guliatti sighed heavily, which was always a bad sign. Sometimes, after a heavy sigh, the recipient's car could blow up, or he could find a beloved pet missing, or something worse. He flashed a grin at York that seemed as real as a three-dollar bill. Guliatti's hooded eyes didn't smile. "Kid? Listen carefully."
York nodded.
"This dude from Italy lived until, like, 1970, or something, and he drew all these messed-up pictures like clocks was melting and the crickets was in the shape of dudes and he had all these kind of..." Guliatti struggled for the word, and York felt a small pleasure. "...kind of, oh--"
"Motiffs?" said Rocco, quietly.
"Yeah? Yeah! More teefs. That's it. Thanks Rocco. The check's in the mail. Anyway. This Darling dude had all these more teefs that kept showing up in his drawings. Like the clocks. The melted clocks. And, what else? What else..? God."
"Crutches?" said Rocco, quietly.
"Yeah! Them too! Drippin' clocks and crutches. They was Darling's more teefs. Now, tell me, college boy. Tell me and Tommy, here. Where was Darling from?"
York pondered the question carefully. Bad job? Sure. He was working for a man who wielded power over many shady characters and payed badly, too. Said boss also, however, had the city of Newark by the short hairs. With power and unyielding ferocity, Antonio "Big Cat" Guliatti had risen to control everything in Newark. Everything. Everything from bookmaking and chop-shops to prostitution and drug trafficking. The man had power. And he'd used it often to reach his high perch. York thought, Tread carefully, kemo sabe. On the other hand, the man was a bully and a jackass. Anyone, in York's mind, who called Salvador Dali "Slovian Darling" and thought he had been Italian needed to have his Intelligence Quotient revoked. But it was a slippery situation. York opted for avoidance. "Sir, that turkey you gave me last Thanksgiving was delicious." [The turkey had, in fact, probably gone bad before his boss had given to him, but York had cooked it, anyway, and had gotten past two mouthfuls before throwing the bird into the Dumpster. But, when in Rome....]
Guliatti blinked at him. And blinked again. Slowly. Almost in slow-motion. York was reminded, visually, of a goldfish with big bulging eyes and he had to bite his tongue to keep from snickering.
"Kid?"
"Yes, sir."
Guliatti turned his full attention to York. He now felt the presence that the big man contained. His eyes burned into him. His gaze made York's stomach do a lazy flip-flop. "Kid, I like you. You're a good worker, for me. But, kid, you seem to have a hearing problem. I didn't ask you about a goddamn turkey. I asked you about Slovian Darling and what country he came from." Guliatti smiled that chilling smile. The we're-all-pals-here-but-if-you-mess-with-me-again-I'll-feed-you-to-the-pigs smile. "See? Tommy here thinks he came from Greece. I know better. I know the dude came from Italy. I got some coin on this one, kid. Care to arbitrate the bet?"
Occasionally, the big guy got a word right. Not often, but when he did, the trumpets flared and the angels sang. It was always such a big, celestial, mind-fuck.
York tried on a grin, and the grin slid away. He crossed his arms over his chest and slouched and slouched and slouched back into his chair until his ass was higher than his head. Or so it felt. He cleared his throat. "Sir, Mr. Guliatti, sir. I think, maybe, who you're talking about? Sir? I think you and Mr. Tortinni are actually? I think you sirs are actually talking about Salvador Dali. And, sir? He was a Spainard. I think he was born in Madrid." York had no idea from what city Dali had been birthed, but he felt the need, the overwhelming need, to keep chattering. Like his teeth. "It's like this: Salvador Dali was a pretty, uh, funny guy and he had a pet ocelot that he used to bring to restaurants in New York and, uh, I know that he painted some paintings that came to be known as surrealistic and he had this really, uh, funny mustache that kinda curled up and tha--"
"Kid." Death-clap.
York cleared his throat. "Uh. Yes, sir?"
"Torment me once more, kid. Make me look like a jackass in front of my associates once more, kid." Guliatti held up a fat index finger. This time, there was no smile, fake or otherwise. York's face went white and his balls searched for sanctuary in his abdomen. Mama, Daddy, little sis, I loved you all.
"Sir?" he croaked.
Guliatti raised his huge right fist; it sparkled, in the overhead light, from his pinky ring. The fist swung down, down, and turned into an open palm. Guliatti smacked him, hard--harder than necessary--on his right shoulder. Guliatti laughed. And his associates joined him, hesitantly. "You're all right, kid. You're all right. You gotcha some elephant balls on you to tell me, to my face, that I don't know shit about art, but you're a good kid, anyway."
Color drained back into York's face. He stage-whispered, "Thank you, sir."
Guliatti nodded. "Now, kid? Now?"
York nodded slowly. What, prick? What?
"Get my friends here and me some more drinks."
York rose from his seat on wobbly knees.
"And make sure, this time, you put some fucking rocks in my sour. Capiche?"
Timothy York had, in fact, put three ice cubes into Antonio Guliatti's previous whiskey sour. He knew that for the fact that it was. But, realizing that intact kneecaps were the better part of valor, he nodded dolefully, and he made his way back to the bar upon shaky, licorice-legs.
Behind, he heard, "Push. It's a friggin' push, Tommy!" And sodden laughter.

***

Life is like a balloon. Timothy York knows this. Timothy York realizes that a balloon, at birth, is flat. And, then: Helium or human breath is breathed into the balloon. Gives the balloon Life. With care, the balloon will rise, become plump, healthy. And then, at that point, the balloon has its own identity. It can rise, like Icarus, to the Sun, or it can bounce around, get volleyed into the air, float majestically for mere seconds and fall to the following volley.


York wanted to be Icarus. He wanted Helium. He wanted to float way the hell away. Never to be seen, again. The image had crossed his mind. As he sat, watching Audrey Hepburn in a Romanticism flick, the thought that had flashed was that he was a poet and that, also, if he stuck with Guliatti, he'd either be dead or in prison or living a very very bad life. And then Freddy had come over and had actually climbed into York's lap. Freddy, supersized-lap dog, all gangly limbs and giant head and huge, empathetic heart. And York had allowed his pooch his ear.
Alfredo, he said, what do you think about the Big Cat? And Freddy growled, deep in his throat. Okay, he said. What do you think about me working for such a man? A bully, a cocksuck? And Freddy growled, deeper, and the hairs on his nape rose. Okay, okay, York said. Fredo? Kid? You tell me. I have a shitload of info on this cat. Should I become a canary? Should I sing, big boy?
And Freddy hadn't growled. Rather, he'd lifted his unwieldy head and slouched off to the darkest corner of the room, whereupon he licked himself. Loudly.
"Quiet, Freddy. I'm doin' something here."

***

Police headquarters. Bleak blank and boring. Industrial paint on the walls. No paintings. Cries from indigents and drunks. Loud arguments. The click-clack of computer keyboards. The sharp smell of bleach.
"Officer, I have a heck of a lot on Guliatti."
Officer William Percy Henderbrook. 40-ish. Muscular. Shiny pate. Porn mustache. The odd odd habit of repeating everthing he said, to a lesser degree.
"Sir?"
"So you have the goods on Big Cat? You got goods?"
York answered, "Sir, I know what he does, how he does it. I don't actually have any paper proof of it, but I know that nasty shit goes down. And I'm sick of working under such a friggin' devil. Sir."
"So you have no proof. No proof?"
York shrugged. "No sir, Officer. I don't have tangible stuff...."
Henderbrook stroked his facial hair. "So, kid, what you're trying to tell me is that Antonio Guliatti is a big-assed "Goodfella" crime boss? He lives the Cosa Nostra life? He's got Ray Liotta and Bobby and Joe Pesci as his backdoor boys? Does his Uncle Pauly shave the garlic with a razor? Does the garlic melt in the pan?"
York goggled.
"Because, Mr. York, what it seems to me, simply, is that you are a disgruntled employee, looking to sully your old boss. And we don‘t have time for those kinds of games, here. The clock’s always ticking."
"I can tell you, sir, I am not enamored with your caveman-like questioning. I came here in good faith and as a law-abiding citizen." York stood tall; he stretched every inch out of his 5'5" frame. His eyes spoke of murderous injustice.
"Son," said the officer. "You just keep on making those 'wide-eyes' at me. Keep it up. You ever been in a jail cell? A holding room?"
"No sir."
Henderbrook sighed. "Well, kid, keep up your facial fucking gymnastics and I'll see you in the morning. When the sun does rise."
York thought. He looked at the clock on the wall and then he looked at his feet. He still had freedom, to do with what he would. He offered the pig a muddy expression. "So I can go, then? Officer...Sir?"
"Mr. York. At this point in the interview, it is your privlege to scoot. But you came here with some very very deregatory statements against Mr. Guliatti, who--and I'm sure you know this--owns about half the friggin’ city." Henderbrook sighed heavily. “Just clue us in. Or don't. It's your call. Your song to sing."
York said, "You know what, Sir?"
"Yes. What is it? What?"
Fade to black, baby....

***
Always...Timothy York had always considered himself above, past, more mature than--whatever--a snitch. But Time, it seemed, had caught up to him. He was older than the 8-year-old who’d refused to incriminate his schoolmate who’d thrown up in the coat room; he was older than the 13-year-old who’d looked the other way when his buddies had trashed the ice sculptures; shit, he wasn’t 18 anymore, armed with the belief that if the other guys wanted to smoke reefer under the bridge then who the fuck was he to tell them any different? Was he a father or a mother or a police officer? Nope. He was himself, Tim. And so he’d never snitched on anyone. In his life. But times had changed. And now he wasn’t talking about vomit, ice chips or herb. For sure…now he was talking about vice and jewelry and drug rings. He had a responsibility to the innocents of New Jersey. But, now, a piss-ant-lackey-cop for Guliatti. It was sort of funny, in a way. What was that song? How did it go? “Win the lottery then die the very next day?” “Blah blah blah like a fly in the Chardonnay?” He had another lyric that the woman may have, could have used: “Float like a butterfly all your day / Once to sing, get found in the bay.” Snared by the spiderweb of Guliatti. Isn’t it ironic?

***

Timothy York said, "Sir, you can take your melody of dirty ratting and and shove it in your trashcan. Sir."
Henderbrook sighed heavily. To York's untrained ear, it sounded like a sigh of relief. "Son. Son, you'd best get the heck out of my office before I do something silly, like book you on a false police report. No lies, please." York left. Quickly. He had bigger fish to fry.

"IT'S A GOOD DAY FOR..."

"It's a good day for cleaning." I think that I have heard that from my mom about a thousand times, most often (m)uttered on a day like today: it rains, it stops, it rains, it stops, it rains...you get the idea. Overcast and drizzly, sometimes outright shower-y.

So, today, I have made my mother proud. I mopped the kitchen floor, cleaned off the refrigerator, organized the photos and magnets and other not-so-pertinent knick-shit-knacks on said fridge, I cleaned off the stove, I debated organizing/tackling the "junk" counter (saving it for later), and I organized the chemicals that I have on the top of the refrigerator.

And now it is sunny again.

Louie and Oliver have been casting uneasy looks at me (mostly Lou) for the last hour or so, apparently nonplussed by my manic cleaning. Get used to it, kids. I am sick and tired of living in a "house o' skank," a house that has dust everywhere and secretive grime. Oh, and dog hairs. I am sick of them, too.

To paraphrase (and I'm not quite sure that one can paraphrase an axiom), here's another of mi mamacita's axioms: "When your house is clean, it makes you feel so good." Sho nuff, C-Money, sho nuff.

LOS TOCADOS SORDIDOS

This just in: bathrooms get dirty and they need to be cleaned more than once every blue moon.

My God! I need to wear my glasses more often! Anyway, that's all I've got.

Carry on.

MEMORY

Reading Stephen King's latest book, Duma Key, got me to thinking about memory. In the book [I'm only about sixty pages in] the protagonist is severely injured in a construction site accident--a forty-story crane failed to go beep-beep-beep when it backed up and it turned his pickup truck into a crumpled beer can--and, during the rough days of early recovery he finds that he cannot remember as well as he used to and that sometimes the words just don't come together the way they should. Calling his soon-to-be ex-wife a birch instead of a bitch and failing to remember zipper, calling it instead a zoomer and/or a zapper, are a couple of examples.

It made me think about memory. I think that mine sucks. I can't remember shit. Childhood is all a blur, for example and each day seems to slide seamlessly into the next, leaving the path that I took to arrive at the Present cloudy chickenscratch. My sister says that she, too, remembers little. Why is this? Don't most people remember their childhoods?

My friend read me the riot act today because I failed to find the poker book that he lent me. When he asked for it at bowling, I told him that I had not been able to find it, had I perhaps given it to him last time I saw him? He fucking exploded. "I knew I shouldn't have gave you that book to read!" he exclaimed, his eyes wide. "Wouldn't you remember if you gave it to me? Why are you always in a haze?! I knew that you'd lose it or ruin it." I felt that he was talking to me like a fricking three-year-old and I'd been having a bit of a bad day, so I exploded in kind. "I just misplaced it!" I said. "I was just wondering if maybe I had given it to you already. Jesus!" He went on to say that I was acting like a crybaby and that I had the penchant for getting pissed off at the drop of a hat [while, he, seriously, is one of the most volatile people I have ever met and he'll explode over absolutely inconsequential things] and blah blah blah and whoop whoop whoop. Bowling sucked tonight. I could not have cared less about how I bowled; I just wanted to get the fuck out of there. [My scores said as much: 88, 102 and 116. Whoops.]

But...what was I saying? Oh yeah: memory. Mine is not so good.

Is it that I just don't give two shits about most things? Is it because I don't really care that I drift daily through life? Do I perhaps see things more haphazardly than most? Maybe, maybe and yes. I do know this, though: if I had lent him a book and he had misplaced it or lost it, I would have damn well not blown up at him when he told me of the misfortune. Shit happens. Buy a new book to replace the old. There is often a simple solution to most "problems."

Or is my memory bad because I drank my brain into pickle juice? Probably not. I guess I just have different priorities as to what is truly important. Maybe I have that off-the-beaten-path bend to my mind that creative people often have. You know what I'm talking about: absent-mindedness, illogical thinking, randomness, et cetera.

Later, when I texted my friend for the name of the book and asked again if I had maybe already given it back to him [I could have sworn that I gave it to him on the day of the Synryd concert] he texted back, "I double-checked. It's not here. Maybe it's in your sloppy house or in your car somewhere." No. And no. And no again, Marky-Mark. It ain't here. And my house is not all that sloppy. And my car? Spotless.

At the bowling alley, he intimated that my house was just plain dirty, making me feel like Pig Pen of the Peanuts comic strip. You know what, Mark? People are fucking different, man. Not everyone is as miserlypenny-pinchinggood with their money as you and not everyone is as analorganized and clean as you are. These are good qualities, for sure. But never let it be said that I would call you out for being yourself. Some people are cat people and some people roll with the dogs. I could not be happier to roll with the dogs.

Anyway, my memory ain't what it used to be and I'll be going to Las Vegas with this guy (and another guy) at the end of May. No drinking for me and I don't like to gamble and he and I will argue over the most inane things...um, why am I going again?

I reckon I forgot.

UNOFFICIAL SIGNS O' SPRING

After a seemingly interminable winter, I am delighted to engage in my unofficial second sure sign o' Spring (MLB Opening Day being the first unofficial sign o' Spring): I am off to chase a little white ball around fieldz o' green. That's right, folks, invest in a hardhat. Adam is off to the links.

Whilst cleaning my golf bag out for the opening of my season, I determined these things: by looking at the old crumpled scorecards, I found that I really really am not a good golfer (and I'm okay with that), I found that my clubs are declining in number (I broke about four clubs last year, simply by swinging), and I found that I had not lost my favorite Detroit Tigers sweatshirt (it was jammed in one of the pockets of the bag--who the hell looks in a golf bag for misplaced clothing?).

So...this should be fun.

Oh, by the way: happy 420 to you all out there. Smoke a J for me.

A QUICK QUESTION

I have a quick question to ask you. You are familiar with the game of bowling, right? (That wasn't the question.) You understand that there is a certain etiquette to the game, right? You know that you do a little dance of "you-go first-no-you" when two people in side-by-side lanes step up to bowl simultaneously, right? (Neither of those were The Question, either.)

Here is the question: Should you be concerned with the bowler two lanes over? I say no. I say that you should concern yourself only with the person immediately to your right or left. Otherwise, what? you end up looking five fricking lanes down, hoping that you're not throwing someone off their game, thus throwing you off your own. It's ridiculous, is what it is.

On Sunday, for my league bowling (I bowled a 161, a 164 and a 144--not too bad) the people two lanes over (against whom we were not even competing) kept looking over at us and our competitors and basically rolling their eyes at us, as if to say, "Hey-Zeus! Those people don't even know the basic premises of courtesy in bowling!" The majorly-pregnant woman was the worst of the lot. I caught her a couple of times, looking over and shaking her head in disbelief. I wanted to shout, "Hey, bee-yotch, you're two fricking lanes over. If you have a problem with seeing us bowl out of the corner of your eye, I think you have some problems with concentration." Yeah, that would have stopped the eye-rolling, huh?

Focus, focus, focus. I should be able to do naked cartwheels in my lane--if it is two or more lanes removed--and not fuck up your approach.

A WEDNESDAY REPRIEVE

I took today off. Work has been going badly for me, recently. Hell, who am I kidding? Ever since I switched to this department, I've been--as Joe Namath would have said--strrrrrugglin'. I have had troubles with attaining my CDL and attaining my Trench Machine Operating qualification, I have been paired with the absolutely worst dude in the department with whom to be paired, I have second-guessed myself (due in large part to the aforementioned dude's abrasive nature) on everything from pipe-connections to fucking digging holes, for God's sake, and I was involved in a 15-second unplanned gas release into a person's home, a situation which could have been avoided had my boss-on-the-job double-checked my neophytic work to ensure that the shut-off had indeed been shut off before he turned the gas on at the curb. I have gotten the crew truck-trailer shebang shamdazzered (stuck) at a tiny dead-end in a ritzy neighborhood--I had to call my capriciously antagonistic co-worker to come help me out. I have often dragged my ass out of bed in the morning, dreading going to work with the fine fellow, dreading just what creative new fuckup I could execute that day. The fine fellow slashed at my fragile (in the new job) self-confidence with his inimitable "humor" from Day One and now he has me believing that I am, in his words, a "motherfucking dumbass." (When I bristled at that unnecessary belittlement, he answered, "It's just a term of endearment, bubba.")

I lack confidence in even the most basic parts of the job.

Word has spread--this place is like a fucking high school--that I am clueless; I have had a co-worker with whom I share a generally amicable relationship tell me that "no one trusts you, Adam." I took that to mean, obviously, that, well, no one believes that I can do the job. I feel that I am an anchor on the jobsites because I am trepidatious about fucking up; I have hamstrung myself with my paralysis by analysis. And now--worse--some people have taken to talking to me like I'm a mentally-slow seventh grader. They don't do it to be mean-spirited; they just don't know how clueless I am--they're appealing to the lowest-common denominator.

"You need to get some thicker skin," my callous colleague informed me. When I responded that, yeah, my skin is a little thin, he said, "Hell, you have no skin." To him, I offer this: my middle finger, jammed straight up his overweight ass.

Here's a thought: when someone is new at something, and trying their best, try not to be a belittling prick-ass. Some people (read: most) don't respond well to acerbic "humor."

Corrosive hilarity works about as well as it looks.

I mentioned to him that, geez, man, you must sure want someone else on your crew with ya, huh? "The only reason you're still with me is that you work your fucking ass off," he said. A compliment, sure, but I will translate for you further. Let's read between the lines: You're still with me because I can get you to do everything and you can bust your ass in the hole and I can sit back and tell you what you're doing wrong. "It's how it was in the old days," he told me. "The lineman would sit in the truck and tell the other guys what to do." Notice that I said guys, plural. The crews used to consist of three people instead of the two we have now. So that could go a long fucking way towards explaining why some linemen, back in the good ole days, were complete and utter lazy pieces of dictatorial shit.

Needless to say, he and I don't click. We are about as far away, personality-wise, as two people can get.

Yesterday, the elephant-train of ineptitude continued. At the start of the day, I went to the counter to get the key to the truck and Bill, the PFL (Principle Field Leader) pulled me aside and told me that, after the morning stretching routine, he needed to see me in his office for a little conference. "Um, all right," I said, scanning my brain for any recent egregious errors that I may have committed. Robin, the union steward, walked past, her face as somber as an Easter Island monolith, and asked if she could talk with me. A feeling of dread began to collect in my stomach. Though I wasn't in fear of losing my job (we're union and it's easier to walk three city blocks on your hands than to get fired from here), I was concerned. "Here's what's going to happen," she began, "you're going to be meeting with Tom and Bill...and Gary (the union president) is here in case you want him in there with you." She gestured in the direction of our union president, who was sitting at the table, chatting with some co-workers, bags like Samsonites under his eyes. "Yeah," I said, thinking litigiously, "I think it'd be good to have him with me."

After the stretching, the three fellas and I walked into the conference to have a little palaver. Tom, the qualifications guy, Bill, Gary and I sat down and started talking. Long story short, they ended up snatching back my qualifications for an indeterminate period. Happy happy, joy joy.

"What can we do," Bill asked, after he informed me of the revocations, "to help you succeed in this department?" I believe Bill to be a good guy, and I knew that he was asking a sincere question. "I don't know what there is for you to do," I said. "This stuff isn't rocket science. I'm just struggling with the most basic things. I know what I need to do, I'm just not executing the procedures properly." "Would more training help you, Adam?" Bill asked. I sighed. "It couldn't hurt, I'll tell you that much. Whatever you guys gotta do, you gotta do. I don't, at this point, know what else to tell you."

I paused. I am not one to crack on other people; I'm not comfortable with talking to management negatively about partners, co-workers. But the main problem, in my eyes, is the dude with whom I am paired up, and I know that he would not hesitate to crack on me to management--in fact, he already had, more than a few times.. Oil and water, man. Ensured that what was said in the room would stay in the room, I said, "I'll tell you what would help: get me the hell away from R___." I felt like a prima donna saying that. In my mind, I was telling myself, Toughen up, ya fuck, and do the job right and there won't be any problems between you and R___. What is this? Third grade? Shut up and do the job. Why do you deserve special treatment? I rationalized it this way: the guy is, much of the time, a prick. He has been a lineman for all of a year and, already, I'm his third partner. People can't stand to work with him because he is a lazy, antagonistic, miserable individual who carries with him his own personal raincloud every-fucking-where he goes. So, fine. Out with it. Much of the reason for my paralysis by analysis was/is having R___ as my work partner. It's the simple truth. It's just the way it is. He sliced through my job-confidence from the beginning and, as the weeks mounted, the unease I had with him deepened exponentially. You can't do an effective job--I don't give a shit what line of work in which you find yourself--going about business as usual with the mindset of doing everything--everything--just right so that you don't get cut down, belittled, fucking cursed at. The dynamic becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy: the other expects abysmal ineptitude and so you happily--or not-so-happily--provide it; regardless of your effort, there will always be something that you didn't do right.

So, internally, I threw up my hands and put myself at the mercy of the committee. Bill read off a laundry list of the qualifications that had been pulled from me--again, for an indeterminate period of time. Pipe-fusing, mechanical coupling, electro-fusing, butt-fusing...they were all pulled from me and I am not to do them, even, I believe, in the presence of a qualified individual. I'll have to get requalified on all; until then, I will be a third-person anchor on crews, unable to volunteer for on-call (money) or work overtime (more money), able only, as I see it, to dig holes. The ultimate grunt.

To add insult to injury, they even pulled my leak soap investigation qualification. Listen: leak soap is putting soap on pipe junctions to see if it bubbles up. My voice rose: "Are you kidding me? My leak soap qual is pulled, too? Do you honestly think I'm that fucking stupid that I can't even tell if a bubble is...bubbling? Come on." I looked squarely at Tom, the sixty-something qualifications guy, a throwback to the Dinosaur Age. I like Tom--he's a good guy--but I was insulted by this soap shit. I mean, come on, I had been a serviceman for three years; I'd used soap every day. I know how to look for leaks. "When the hell did I screw up with soap?" I asked, my voice dripping with unabashed belligerence. Tom calmly opened his mouth, shut it, opened it again, and rumbled, "'Member that job in Bloomfield?" I thought back and, yes, I remembered that job in Bloomfield. That was the day that I got the crew truck stuck at the dead end, got bailed out by the fine fellow, drove his van back to the jobsite and got out of the van, flustered, sans hardhat and safety glasses (I wear both religiously) just in time to see Tommy-boy strolling up the road in his hunched-shoulders-hands-in-pockets saunter. He gigged me for the lack of personal protective equipment (PPE), and, apparently, when he stood atop the hole, looking down at me--along with everyone else looking down at me, making me increasingly goldfish-y and self-conscious and nervous about doing things right, damn it--when he asked me if that was "twenty-minute leak soap," he was testing me to see if I had seen the minute fizzing leak on the bottom half of the welded tee. Had I seen it? No. Would I have caught it had I not been so conscious of everyone on top of the hole, looking down on me as I worked? Yes. I would have seen it. Unfortunately, that's the way things go. There is a whole hell of a lot of stand-around time, a whole lot of time for people to watch the guy in the hole who is doing the job. There is no malicious intent--in fact, it is a safety procedure: never leave a man (or woman) alone in the hole--but, for me, struggling with my indecisiveness and self-perceived inadequacies, it is nothing but a recipe for a fuck-up. So, anyway, that obviously went into his report, too, along with the lack of PPE.

So...qualifications revoked, I am now a third wheel. I feel like a fucking loser, my skin shines thin to highlight the blazing incompetence, and...what? I wonder if I'll ever become proficient at this motherfucking job? No. I know I will turn out fine. Like I said: I am far from a moron. Every gosh damned thing that has gone wrong can be tracked back to my second-guessing myself, my wanting to do everything just right. I just need to relax. I need to take a deep breath and bellow to myself, "This is not fucking rocket science! Just do it!"

I do belive that I made my point about working with R___, though. If they want me to succeed--and I know they do, if only for the cost of training me--they'll get me with a different lineman. I'll be the third TMO in just under a year who can't work with the fine fellow. That should tell them something. With every other crew, I'm fine and dandy and I do the job adequately enough. With him? Not so much so. (Understatement of the decade.)

One last thing before I go. I actually fucking dreamt about the job today. I woke up at five-thirty to go to the bathroom and then I lay back down and slept until my alarm went off. In my dream, I was with, like, ten other Consumer Energy employees and we were in this ramshackle house in which a couple of guys resided, We were tracking mud all across the carpet and across the kitchen floor, but the guys seemed not to give two hoots. Apparently, we were all there to turn off their gas service and they were helpful in showing us (for some reason) where the furnace and the water heaters were. I walked through the guy's living room and I saw that he was apparently a Batman fan. Huge posters of the bat sign covered his walls, just above his couch, and, from a distance, a superhero theme song bellowed. It wasn't right, though. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I registered that the song I heard was not a Batman theme but, instead, the Superman theme. "Can you shut that off?" someone asked me. I told them that I'd try and I began wandering around the house. One room that I looked in seemed to have BDSM equipment, complete with a swing. I closed the door and floated down to the basement. The homeowner was hovering over my shoulder, pointing at the furnace. Apparently, this was where the music/alarm was coming from. "I think it's broke," he mumbled. I pulled off the door to the furnace and the Superman theme song bellowed forth. It seemed to be gaining in volume. "How do you shut this alarm off?!" I shouted. The guy shrugged. I walked back outside and wandered past a gaggle of Consumers employees, looking like ducks in their yellow hardhats.

The Superman theme song grew louder and louder until I finally reached a tree and looked inside. I awoke, then, my alarm clock blaring its insistent message for me to get up. And so I did.

One final thing: to anyone who reads this and thinks, "Hey, Adam, maybe you should consider doing something else. Not necessarily leaving the company, but maybe working in a different department, doing something different," I say this: no fucking way. I say this for a couple of reasons. One, now it's personal. I'll not be seen as an incompetent boob, good only at digging fucking holes. I need to--and I will--prove to everybody that I am perfectly capable of doing something that, back in the day, high school dropouts could do with aplomb. Egotistical much? No. I'm just fed up. With myself, with my partner, with our tension-filled work hours. I will adapt and overcome. And the second reason, of course, is financial. They pay us very well for what we do. In this economy, especially in this Michigan economy, now is not the time to put job-seeking oars into the water. But, basically, it comes down to my ego. I feel fucking humiliated...I'll not have that.

Adapt and overcome, baby.

HOODWINKED BY CARESS

Okay. In my defense, I had just burst forth from a three-and-a-half hour, (assuredly) apnea-addled, "sleep," but, when I saw this link on my homepage, the first things that came to my mind were smooth baby seals...or smooth other things. Jiminy Christmas, Adam! It's a Caress ad. On the MSN homepage, for Pete's (and Will's) sake. Still, the first thought that came to my mind was: Maybe they have some kind of before-and-after pictures in the video. Maybe they show the actual process, zooming in close to show how to get to every nook and cranny....

With my brainpower firing at--at most--a quarter percent, my eyes had seized upon the words "caress," "brazillian," and "pussycat dolls" and so the battle was lost before it had even begun. Clicked I did on the link and I was actually disappointed to see a Pussycat Doll blathering on about winning a trip to Aruba, or something. And then I was treated to a nice jazzy number--audio only, no visual stimulation--of the knockouts crooning in their oh-so inimitable "girl band" style. (True musical geniuses, these women are; let no one tell you that any hot group of girls, accompanied with studio-generated percussion and spacey effects, could sing the same way--they'd be yanking your chain.)

I guess I was expecting a razor and some shaving cream...and a nice geometrically-true landing strip.

PREY-DRIVE

My career choice of working at the utility company has at least given me this: the blazing ability to dig squirrel graves. Lickety-split, it's dug and done.

I don't know whether to be (somewhat) angry at my boys or proud of them. I think I'm leaning towards the former but, what the hell, they're dogs. They are hunters. They are hardwired with a prey drive. Today, it reared its head.

They were outside and I wandered outside to have a smoke and drink some coffee and call my friend, all while enjoying the beautiful weather. I walked outside and Lou and Ollie ran over to me, tails wagging, dog smiles on their faces. I saw the raquetball on the ground, so I picked it up and faked a throw at the tree and waited for Lou to realize that I hadn't thrown the ball. (Oliver's eyes, on the other hand, had not strayed from the little blue target. He regarded it with a look of Okay, jackass, I know you still have it. Are you going to throw the damned thing or should we maybe just wait for a new ball at Christmas?) Lou turned to me, then, and I chucked the ball up in the air--straight up--as high as I could.

Lou looked the opposite way until, hearing it strike the ground, he turned around and streaked for the ball. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw something greenish-yellow fall from the tree and hit the ground, about ten, fifteen feet from Lou and Oliver. I had time to think to myself, Huh, was a tennis ball stuck up in the tree, too? before something else plummeted from the branches, about twenty feet up. The brown object hit the ground and twisted and I realized it was a squirrel.

Lou abandoned all thoughts of the raquetball and spun on a dime to close the distance before the squirrel could shake off the shock of falling--relatively-speaking--twenty stories. It wasn't even close. Before I could get to Lou and Ollie, they'd batted the rodent to the ground and had sunk their teeth into its side. "Back!" I shouted. Lou turned to me, the squirrel dangling from the side of his mouth and shook it like a bag of popcorn. The squirrel flopped like a wet noodle.

Eventually I got the dogs by their collars and pulled them from their quarry. As I held them back, I looked at the squirrel. His eyes were wide open and he was breathing rapidly. He tried to gain his feet and get away, but the commands weren't making it from his brain to his legs. His back left leg came into my sight and I saw that his inner thigh and groin area had been torn into flaps of furry red. His grayish muscle poked from a gash near his tail. The kid wasn't looking too good, and I knew what I'd probably have to do.

First thing, though, was to get the boys inside so that I could deal with the situation in a more-subdued atmosphere.

I came back out and sat down in the chair and regarded the unfortunate little guy. His respiration was shallow and quick and his equalibrium was fucked. I was hoping that he was simply stunned, that the wound on his leg would heal over time, that my dogs had not become cold-blooded...um, dogs. It was not to be. As I watched, the squirrel regained his feet and staggered over to the old oak tree. Though he was walking like a drunk, I was hoping that he wasn't too messed up. Though his leg was fucked up and I figured his back might be broken, I was silently cheering him on. I really did not want to have to finish him off.

Aloud, I said, "Come on, kid, you can do it." And he nearly did. With only one working hind leg, he started up the tree and headed for the nook. Right before the nook, he lost momentum. His left rear leg slipped and he was left clinging to the gray-brown bark with one front paw. He reminded me of a cliff-climber, all swaying in the moutain breeze, one handhold the only thing preventing certain death. The kid didn't make it. The bark broke and he fell backwards, doing a lazy backflip before his head connected hard with a gnarled old root. If he looked like he was in bad shape previously, this was the icing on the cake. He lay in a psuedo-fetal position, breathing shallowly, nothing moving but his eyes and his whiskers and his side...barely.

Enough.

Saying a quick silent prayer and telling him aloud that I was sorry, I scooped him up in a flat shovel and walked him over to a bush near the back fenceline. I, for whatever reason, didn't want anyone to see what I needed to do. His body twisted unnaturally (broken back) as I slid him off the shovel underneath the evergreen bush. I went back to the shed and selected the sharp spade shovel. I wanted--needed--to be able to quickly put him out of his misery. No more pain, man. I practiced on a couple of nearby sticks--snap--and then I walked over to the fallen squirrel and, without pause, slammed the point of the shovel down on his neck. Snap.

I closed his eye with a small stick and then dug about three feet down and lay his body in the hole. I put the half-eaten Granny Smith apple in the hole next to him. [Imagine, giving your life for a fucking apple.] I grabbed a piece of concrete from the side of the house and gently lay it down over his body and I finished filling in the hole.

I walked back inside and Lou and Oliver sniffed at my hands, almost as if they'd been expecting me to bring their toy back in the house with me. No such luck. They got dog biscuits, instead.

EDIT: You know what makes this sad story even more sad? I took the boys out, just now, to see how they would do sharing their playground with a squirrel graveyard and, as I walked out to the table and chair, I heard a chick-chluck-chluck from over my head. 'Twas another squirrel in the aforementioned nook. As I watched, it scooted from the nook and up the branch a ways, whereupon it sat, tail twitching, staring down and chattering at me. I sat there for a good ten minutes and it sat there, too--didn't move an inch. It just sat there and burned holes in me with its beady black eyes, raining squirrel curses down on me. It makes me think that I killed its spouse or something. God, is the natural world really this Disney-esque? Damn squirrel is giving me a guilt trip.

BORED

Eye. Am. Bwaneded.

Or so it feels. Perhaps I am just bored. Who knows? I feel that I want to write an extremely sexually-graphic blogpost. Either that or an extremely violent blogpost. Maybe a combination? Yeah, I'm definitely bored.

On the plus side, I went to the Community Center today--after I got off of work early--and I played three games of basketball. So that was good. I got the ole blood pumping and I exercised me lungs a bit. Also I sweat out some toxins and I connected with some real live people instead of a computer keyboard.

Also, since I went to the C.C. virtually right after I got home, I was--sadly?--unable to take my daily nap. Listen: naps are great, they really are. But, to me, they seem to be more of an escape mechanism for me (from Boredom with a capital b) than an essential part of a 35-year-old man's day. I am not a baby. Nor am I an eighty-year-old. I don't need daily naps. And, without said nap, I should be able to get to bed at a reasonable hour tonight. 1:00 and 1:30? Those aren't reasonable times to retire to the bedroom.

The key is Exercise. That's the key, damn it!

I'm blathering. I am blathering because I am bored. I might be well-off to get a hobby. Maybe I could make little Monster Miniatures. Have the Wolf-Man posed up on my shelf, snarling at the rainy sky. Or the Invisible Man. See him? Nor do I. Which sucks, because it took me three times as long to complete him, seeing as how I kept losing him all the time. Maybe I could make a traintrack down in the basement, have it snake and weave through bundled stuff and underneath the ping-pong table and past the doggies' cage. Wouldn't that be swell?! Maybe I could wield a drawring pen and create vast panoramas of desolate desert scenes. Maybe I could include camouflaged Daffy Ducks in the scenery. Kinda make it like a "Where's Daffy?" type of thing. Waldo? Eat your heart out.

Maybe I could just read a book and go to sleep. Maybe I could surf the Interwebs for porn, porn, porn. Maybe I could wash the dishes or wash my sheets. Maybe I could scour the bathroom or brush the dogs' fur coats. Maybe I could juggle pennies; maybe I could shave my head (and maybe my balls) and then take a shower. That sounds good. Thanks for being my sounding board, y'all.

BORED: Bring On Rigorous Erectile Dynamics

BORED: Barring Obvious Ramifications, Everybody Dreams

BORED: B--

Ah, fuggit.

:-)

SLEEP PATTERNS

And now it's 11:15 at night. I think the bedtime of 1:00 or 1:30 has begun to catch up with me. After a full day of trying to keep my eyes open during training on pipe location, I came home, let the boys out, lay down on the couch and was jerked out of a semi-doze by Oliver baying like a madman (maddog?) as a squirrel had the gall, the audacity to be...well, squirrely. Into the house came the boys and down the basement they went until the mud on their paws dried enough to flake off.

I passed the open door to my bedroom on my way to the bathroom and my bed looked so damned inviting I had to test out its softness. Three hours later, I awoke.

Nice.

It was a beautiful day outside--the first in a while, perfect for dog-walking or picking up poop or getting my bicycle ready for the season--and I wasted it by listening to the siren song of my comfortable (com-fort-a-bull) bed/nest.

Again, nice.

And now it's 11:19. And bedtime is nearing.

I hate it when I do this. But gosh damn! That bed was soooooo fricking comfortable.

Tomorrow, if I get out of training early (which I fully anticipate), I will go to the Community Center--I just got a membership there about a week or two ago and haven't used it yet--and I will play some basketball. I will elevate my fucking blood pressure and I will get my legs moving and I will get high on endorphins.

Use it or lose it, Boffo.

This life-cycle I have going on right now is for the birds.

Happy Thursday, everyone.

IT'S GIFT-TIME...BRING ON BASEBALL!

For my 35th birthday, I asked for the start of the MLB season. And guess what? I got the gift!

Sweet!

Though the weather has not been co-operating recently, this is the official start of Spring for me. The start of the baseball season. Rebirth, green, flowers, the sun on my face. This is one of the best times of the year.

I can't wait to see how the Deeeeeeeeee-troit Tigers do this year. They have one of the most potent lineups in the Bigs, but their pitching--the bullpen especially--has me thinking that this may be a Rolaids season, replete with blown leads and blown saves and last-inning offensive heroics and red-hot blistering Louisville Sluggers.

Bring on the baseball, indeed.

By the way, I'm five today--in dog years. Ah, ain't illogical aging grand?

OVER-OVER-OVERANALYSIS

I logged on to the computer today and my MSN homepage popped up and this is the first thing that caught my eye. Cleveland superstar Lebron James and supermodel Gisele on the cover of Vogue magazine. In the cover photo, Lebron is snarling at the camera and dribbling a basketball with his left hand whilst his right hand is (enviably) draped around Gisele's hip.

Apparently, to some, this controversial. Wha--?! What the fuck did I miss?

Some people are saying that this is a racist photo, that it conjures in their minds an image of King Kong and the blonde, Fay Wray. That it connotes an image of "The Dangerous Black Man."

Come. On.

Who are these people who Chicken Little like this?!

I'll tell you one thing: they are automatically geared to see things with a racist slant. That they, in fact, are racist.

And another thing: they obviously aren't people who view NBA basketball...shit, any basketball, for that matter. If they had, they'd have seen Lebron making this face about ten times per game. This is a victorious countanence--this is the face that he makes when he throws down over a seven-footer. This is him being who he is--an emotional 23-year-old. And why wouldn't he be excitable? He's Lebron James, for God's sake. He is paid outrageous sums of money to sell his image, to play around with a ball; he's arguably the best player in the game today. And he's got his arm around a supermodel. I'd be roaring, too.

Whisper this: but...he's...black. And she's...white. Gasp. And he's...tattooed. And she's...white. And he's...huge. And she's...white. Double-gasp.

Will we ever move on? Will we Americans ever move on? Will the race issue ever die? Will we ever just see people as people and not colors?

"What does this mean?" "What is the underlying socio-racial paradigm of this?! Why does he look so dangerous?! Oh me! Oh my!" The sky is falling, apparently.

What would have the Chicken Littles preferred? A somber Lebron and a bashful Gisele? Sitting at either end of a plaid couch. Come. On. They are entertainers. They are two people who have reached the pinnacles of their chosen professions. And, you know why these two were on the cover? The magazine had a story about professional athletes and supermodels and how they sculpted their bodies into the works of art that they are. That's it. And, yes, these two human beings are very blessed, genetically.

By the way, when I think of Lebron, I think of the photo at the top. And when I think of Gisele? Well, I think of this.

DUST OFF THAT DUCK, BEE-YOTCH!

Today, when I was in a drug store with my sister Alexis, a woman knocked a stuffed animal--I think it was a duck--off of its display and, when she bent down to pick it up, she brushed it off and said, "Oh, I'm sorry, honey." I looked around to see if she had, perhaps, been talking to someone out of my line of sight. No. She'd apologized to the yellow ducky. Interesting. Yes, interesting in that her apology had not been needed. I looked at the duck and it still had its same inane smile greasing its bill.

I glanced at my sister, who was waiting at the door. She was smiling at me. I assumed that she had heard the human-toy exchange as well, but, when we got to the car and I mentioned the woman, she looked at me quizzically and remarked that she had simply been smiling at how much candy I was buying.

Happy Easter, everybody. Gorge yourselves on Peeps and ham and remember that Jesus of Nazereth died for our sins. :-O

UM, WHAT'S THE DATE, AGAIN?

Looks like winter, doesn't it? Argh. Today is March 21, and we here in southeastern Michigan are expecting about four inches of the white shit. Did I say argh yet?

Argh!

Argh, actually, is an apropos ejaculation, seeing as how Mother Michigan is treating us all as round-headed Charlie Browns as she, Lucy Van Pelt, holds the promises of Spring right out of our flailing, kicking reaches. Argh.

In other news, there is no other news. I am plumb tapped out of ideas for this blog posting.

Think, Adam, think.

Um.

Um.

I'm ready for the baseball season to start. I went over to my friend's house today and looked in the garage and, lo and behold, crammed in the corner and, covered with dust and grass clippings and leaves, was a time capsule of sorts. 'Twas my softball bag. Included in said bag were two (2) aluminum softball bats--one of which is a pretty damned good bat--and some hightop field cleats. Sweet! I'd thought that the bag was in his garage, but it's cool to finally get that stuff back. I haven't played softball in nigh upon six fucking years. Wow. My friend Mark was talking about joining a league and now I have my shit back in my possession.

Maybe I will take my bats to a batting cage and swing out some of my aggressions and frustrations. And, judging by the interminable leanings of this motherfucking winter-like weather, I should be swinging in around July, when batting cages open for Spring.

See what happens when the skies are gray instead of blue and the temperature is 28 instead of 52? I turn into a bitter blathering moron who feels it his civic duty to whine and bitch and moan to Cyberland about meaningless things like weather and softball bats. Aren'tcha glad you tuned in?!

:-P

LOST DOG

Lou's mom, Roxy, has come up missing. She has been gone for three or four days. Pablo said that the last time he saw her, she was standing up against the back fence. Next thing he knew, she was gone.

I am bummed out--I've known that dog since she was a puppy--but I can't imagine what Pablo is going through. He's had her since she was a puppy, about seven years now. Anyone who doesn't realize that a dog is like a family member and, without the animal, silence echoes around the house, has missed out on a really human experience.

I asked him the basic question: "Did she have any form of identification on her?" No. His girl got him a tag with Roxy's name and his phone number on it, but he said that it kept falling off, so he never made it stay. Damn.

I've called him and texted him these last couple of days, and he has not returned my phone calls. Last night he sent me a text saying, "Thanks for your concern. I'll talk with you soon."

This absolutely sucks for him, I'm sure. He's got to be feeling pretty guilty right now. I know I would be. All I can do is be there if and when he wants to talk.

Right after I heard the news, I slapped together a "LOST DOG" poster and dropped it in his door. (He had not been home.) Hopefully he has copied the hell out of that and pasted it on every available telephone pole in the neighborhood. Or done one of his own.

Sometimes, stories like these end with a happy ending. The dog finally makes it back home, after a long time out on the road. I hope and wish and pray that that is the case with this, too. Roxy is a good girl, full of loving energy. And she gave me (and my sister) three of the best gifts we could have ever gotten, in the slobbering smiling forms of Louie, Pete and Will.

I hope that Roxy is not in pain anywhere. I hope that she isn't on Doggy's Death Row--he has checked repeatedly, but no Roxy--and I hope, that if she was picked up by someone, they have a lot of love to give to her. That's how my family and I got our childhood dog: he followed my sis home from tennis practice and, after Pounding him for the requisite time to allow for his true owners to find him, we kept Merlyn and made him a loved family member.

I hope the same can be said for Roxy...if she doesn't make it back home.

FRIDAY THE FOURTEENTH [CUE THE DRAMATIC ORGAN]

'Tis a day, 'tis a day, 'tis a day, I say

'tis a day that makes me face turn gray

But I climb, I climb, I climb from me bed

and I circle the number in wide blood-red

Next to its neighbour, the twelver-plus-one

the four-bear seems timid, but--oh!--then its won

You see, dear reader, it's so much worse than thirteen

its penchant for mayhem is obscenely obscene

Friday the fourteenth makes me quake in me shoes

for tragedy follows, keep yon eyes on the clews

It's worse than its neighbour, you need to know now

before you stroll, whistling, 'neath a dangling sow

Friday the thirteenth conjures snapshots o' killers

but Friday the fourteenth delivers the chillers

I pray that you read this and watch where you walk

if you don't--I am fearful--you'll be outlined in chalk

So I hope that this warning "brightened" your day

I'm not saying hide, just watch where you play

I pray I'm not Cassy, of ancient Greek lore

who knew all the answers, but was dismissed as a bore

PAGING DOCTOR KICK-THIS-BUG'S-ASS....

Wow. I can't shake this fricking bug. This is getting pretty annoying. Now I'll have to go to the doctor to get an excuse for work. That's all right, though--I was planning to go, anyway. Maybe the doc can prescribe me some antibiotics or something. I generally don't take them, but this is a tenacious little bugger. (It makes me think of a million Olivers, virus-sized, swimming in my blood plasma, baying at the white blood cells, attacking without quarter.)

I talked to my supervisor about ten minutes ago. I hate making calls like that. I feel guilty, guilty as hell. It makes no difference that I have been holed up like a hibernating bear the last few days. It makes no difference that I sweat through another two shirts last night and woke to my sheets icy-cold wet. I still feel guilty for taking time off of work and still getting paid (Not a hundred percent, but something like ninety, I believe. Maybe seventy-five. Regardless, I ain't getting shut out of the greenbacks.).

Is there such a thing as "Irish guilt?" Or am I just making that up? I think that I've heard it somewhere before. I was IM-ing with my sister Melissa on Monday, the day that this crap-sickness began, and, even then, I was spouting off (jokingly) about Irish guilt. "Adam," she wrote, "you're killing me with that [Irish guilt] stuff." So I made sure to reference it about fifteen more times. That is me: the little brother. When I find something that might maybe perhaps get under my big sisters' skin a bit (even in jest, especially in jest) I hammer that "joke" until it is a trampled tin soda pop can, flat as a board, crinkled and all warshed out. It's one of my favourite things to do. I rather like to do that.

Irregardless, I am feeling a little guilty about being sick and missing work. It is more than legitimate...but I still feel like a slug. Truth be told, I feel quite a bit like a pussy. Meow.

Now, in my defense: gas utility, the work that I do (when I'm not at home, sucking my thumb and watching "Barney") is not exactly the easiest job on the body. It is really quite physically-demanding. Not to mention it has the capacity for danger. My company preaches safety all the time; it could be a safety issue if a worker is there, half-assed. Also, with a lowered lung capacity--from the dastardly bug--don't you think it would become easier to be overcome by the natural gas fumes, if they were so blowing? I think so. In fact, I know this to be the case.

And, finally, one last feather for my defense: a guy at work named Ken S____ was off with the "same" sickness. He stayed off for the loosely-expected three days and then he came back on the fourth...and ended going right back home. He had not been over the illness. My supervisor mentioned this to me in passing and I seized upon it. "Yeah," I said, "it's [the bug] a bastard."

And it is. It truly is. Sincerely. It sucks.

Okay. My Irish guilt thus assauged, I'm off to hit the hay. Maybe when I wake up, I won't be feeling so weak and achey. And so much like a feline.

I'm not counting on it, though.

MUSINGS

I am a lucky guy.

Slam-dazzered by this cold-slash-flu for the last few days, I have been feeling about as energetic as a lump of Crisco. M'Meegie (and her daughter Naomi) came over today and Meagan brought with her a noodle dish from a Thai place called Salah Thai and also a couple of packets of Fortifense, an immune system-boosting powder that one mixes with hot water.

"One for tonight," she admonished, "before you go to bed, and the other packet in the morning, when you get up."

And then we sat down and had the drunken noodle dish and the fresh spring rolls and I started to feel better almost immediately.

It is tres bien to be with the one you love, no?

After the meal, I was instructed to go sit down in the front room--which I did--and Meagan washed the dishes that had been piling up in the sink. And 409-ed the sink a bit. Oh, and swept the ubiquitous coffee grounds that littered the counter near the nectar-maker. What did I do to be so lucky? =o)

Maybe it's a guy-thing. Maybe we like to be fussed over when we're feeling sick. I know I do.

I also know this: this is the best I have felt in about three days. Is it simply because the cold-slash-flu virus has been weakened? Or is it for another reason altogether?

I'll say a combination of the two, but I'll lean towards the latter.

LOOK FOR THE SILVER LINING, DAMN IT!

Being sick sucks ass. It's not any fun to wake up ten times during the night to piss liquid fire, one's body alternating between being shiver-me-timbers cold and put-another-twenty-logs-on-the-fire hot. When every tissue and bone in the body hurts. You know you have a bad cold when even your perenium hurts!

That being said, sometimes a wrench in the routine opens a door to some really cool stuff. This guy's art is pretty dark--sure it is--but, damn, I wish I had some of his talent for lines. Cool, cool artwork.

RANDOM OBSERVATIONS

A couple of observations on this chilly March 9th afternoon.

One, I am glad that Daylight Savings Time rolled around again. Now, when I look at the clock in my automobile, it'll be the correct time. I know what you're thinking: "Dude? How tough can it be to change a car clock?" Believe me, if it had been easy or in any way logical, it'd have been changed by now. So, anyway, I guess I'm good until Fall. Sweet.

The second observation I have to impart to you, my three loyal readers, is this: people who seemingly don't do so often look funny when they run. (Kinda like dog trainers at dog shows...funny stuff.) I was at the local 24-hour megastore today, piling shit into my cart that I--if I really sit down and think about it--don't really absolutely need. As I walked out, I saw a small sunglassed Asian woman standing near the stop sign to the crosswalk. There weren't any cars coming, so she bunched her little fist around a yellow plastic bag and ran in small mincing steps to the door. Amusing to look at, sure, but I also wondered to myself, as I walked towards my car, just why the hell she was running. Did Meijer have that much of a hold on her that she couldn't casually walk the last twenty feet to the doors? Did she really have to run? Why couldn't she have ambled? Or strolled? Why did she have to rev up her gluteus maximus and quadriceps and calf muscles and feet muscles to an accelerated pace? For that matter, why put unnecessary stressors on her Achille's tendons? When those things pop, you're in a whole world of pain. Just ask former Piston great Isiah Thomas; he'll tell you--ouch. Slow down, small Asian woman in the knee-length camel-colored winter coat. Meijer will still be there. It's twenty-four hours, for God's sake.

As I got nearer my car--I'd parked about as far as humanly possible from the entrance; I guess I wanted to amble, to stroll--I saw another person running. I couldn't really tell if it was a man or a woman. I'm thinking woman, but I could be wrong. I think he or she was a Meijer employee. He or she had a red polo shirt; to the casual observer (me), it looked like it could have been a Meijer shirt. He or she was heavyset. He or she had shoulder-length brown permed hair and he or she was clutching what looked to be a paper bag in his or her arms. As I ambled to my Focus, I saw him or her moving at a fast pace out of the corner of my eye, so I focussed my attention on the runner. He or she lurched along, facing the ground at almost a one-hundred-ten degree angle. And when I say "lurch," I mean it. There was no grace, no balance, no co-ordination at all to his or her run. I am reminded now of a circus bear, motorvating along at a loping shambling gait. As I watched, he or she shot a look over in my direction and kept running. Odd.

I guess Meijer is the place to be. Everyone is busting their asses to get inside the fabled doors. It's a cool place, don't get me wrong. It has got lots of stuff from which to choose. Mister Meijer did well for himself, I'm sure. And, although they have those gosh-damned annoying fucking store "greeters," like Arnie, I'll be baaaaack. But I'll walk in. I'll save the running for the basketball court.

HEAVY BOWLING

I went bowling with Meegie tonight and halfway into the first game, the lights darkened and Glo Bowl began. You know what I'm talking about: fluorescent lights and a rocking sound system.

The theme seemed to be '80s music. Simple Minds, Bryan Adams, Duran-Duran, The Divinyls, et cetera, et cetera.

It is amazing how memories can be triggered. Olfactory stimulation is the most immediate of the senses-memory-trigger, but, hell, a song can take you back, too. For sure, for sure.

"Don't You Forget About Me," by Simple Minds. Bam! I was right back in eighth grade, dressed in my parochial school uniform, finally turning cool after seven-plus years of being a dork. Memories of Friday Ponderosa runs blasted into my forebrain. Fridays were short days (off at 1:30) at Shrine and I remembered the group of "cool kids" and I walking the block, block and a half down Woodward Avenue to the Ponderosa restaurant, much to the (I'd imagine) chagrin of the wait staff. We'd all order the sundae bar and plates of french fries and just be pubescents. Shaking salt at each other and jamming sundae after sundae down our throats, not tipping the waitresses...good times.

Duran-Duran's "Hungry Like a Wolf." First off, who the fuck named these songs?! Hungry like a wolf?! Lame. Anyway, that song played while we were bowling and--wham!--I was transported back to seventh grade when I would ball up socks and shoot them like basketballs into my Detroit Tigers dented metal wastebasket. At some point in the song, some woman in the background wails and I remembered that I used to hear that while I was up in my bedroom and I would always think that my Mom was calling me from the kitchen, maybe calling me to dinner. Upon (older) reflection, I reckon that the wailing woman on the track was probably being sexually pleasured. Whoops. Sorry, Mom. For the mix-up, that is.

It was just amazing, though, the way that the songs at the bowling alley were hitting me and my emotions. It was almost melancholy, kind of like looking back on times past, ruing lost friendships and paths that, perhaps, ought not been taken. Eighth grade is the last time that I can recall being truly carefree. Since then, I have always had at least a background grumble of anxiety in my life, in my mind. That gets old. It really does. To be one's own worst enemy for 20-plus years sucks ass.

Thoughts thundered.

So, while it was great to bowl and to spend time with my Meeg-doll, the music was kind of bumming me out. Crazy shit, man. Crazy shit.

Maybe this winter has gone on too long. Maybe I am actually experiencing S.A.D. Whatever it is, I'd like to lose the funk. That, too, is getting old.

A POST ABOUT DOGS, #27,492

Oliver is exactly 40 pounds. I weighed him today. I think, for a two-year-old male Beagle, that might be a little high. Beagles tend to have excess skin around their neck, but I think I'd be able to pull his neck-skin over his snout and tie it in a knot...if I were so inclined...which I'm not.

A friend of mine suggested that I feed El Gordo two raw chicken wings per day--one in the morning and one in the evening. The first thing that came to my mind was the slinky evil of the word Salmonella. I think, before I go the route of raw fowl, I may try to give the kid a little more exercise. He sleeps a lot. And he eats a lot. Bring the two facets of his uproariously-active canine life together and what do you have?! A fat-assed dog. Seriously, when he is sitting placidly on the floor, and I am looking down on him from above, he looks like a giant foreshortened fur-covered pear, replete with a peanut head and deep trusting melting eyes.

Fur-covered pear. Yeah. That about sums it up.

Meanwhile, Lou is rapier-sharp. This odd couple just keeps getting odder and odder.

THIS COULD GET A LITTLE GROSS--YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED

Somebody get me this woman on the horn immediately, please. I need my backyard declared a disaster area. The picture to the right does the yard absolutely no justice. In real life, it far, far worse.

I blame Michigan's schizophrenic weather. One day it is 10 degrees and the next day it is 48 degrees with steady rain. The piles of dog poop in the backyard stood not a snowball's chance in Hades of maintaining their integrity, their base solidity.

So why, I wonder, did I choose today of all days to do my Deca-Annual Shit Pick-up?

I don't know. I'm illogical, sometimes.

Actually, I know why I huddled in the drizzle, scooping shit up with a flat steel shovel: the neighbor next door said hello to me and, as I was walking to my side door, called me back and mentioned that little beagle named Uno that won the Westminster Dog Show, said that he had thought of my Oliver. He made me aware of my pooches and so I followed them outside when I let them out. What a fucking disaster!

The backyard is mud, first of all. Nary a blade of grass rears its head in the first half, three-quarters, of the lawn from the side door back to the back fence line. It is mud and it is ice and it is spotted like a leper with smooshy piles of brown and orange and red dog feces. I slapped my head in disgust.

I had become what I had hated when I was a meter reader: I was the guy with the lawn filled with shit. We used to put messages on the handheld computers that would spring up whilst we were walking to the address stating things like "WARNING. DOG FESES [sic]" and "WATCH WHERE U STEP" and "SKIP THIS HOUSE."

I determined to save face and do my ownerly duty. Never mind that it had been since November that I had last half-heartedly plastic-bagged the dog feces. Today, amidst the drizzle and drooping temperatures, I would make amends. I would rid the lawn of the foul-smelling land mines, damn it!

Easier said than done.

Dog shit is organic, obviously, so it is susceptible to the malevolent whims of that bitch, Michigan Mother Nature. Frozen, thawed, frozen, thawed...repeat that cycle a couple score more times and you might get an idea of what the majority of the shit was like. Let me try to put it into words. Hmm.... The majority of the shit was like melted soft serve chocolate ice cream. I'd have been better off using a sponge to pick it up. But I perservered with a plastic baggy around my right--shit-picking--hand. All was gravy (sorry for the word choice) until I got to the back fence. This is the area in which Louie loves to empty his bowels. 'Twas a multi-colored shit carpet, is what it was. And, to add to the drizzly misery, a large bush acted as an offensive lineman to the most egregious piles of shit's runningback. If that makes any sense. Basically, it was a bitch to get to. So I came up with an end-around: I would use the flat shovel to scrape the booty to a place where I could easily scoop it up.

Bad idea.

Here is a fun experiment that you can try at home, kids! Plop some chocolate ice cream on the kitchen floor and mix in some twigs and branches. Then? Let the mess melt until it is a slightly-congealed brown mess with odd angles and protrusions. Then, standing at an awkward angle, try to scrape the stuff--with a big ole flat shovel--into a neat pile. Does it smear? You betcha!

You--sob--betcha.

It was damn-near pudding by the time I had it in an easily-accessible pile. Sticks and twigs and leaves and all. This was proving to be a very bad idea. But I was determined. Determined, I say! So now I had a pile. And behind the pile, I had a thin layer of orangish-brown shit carpet. I thought about just using the shovel to execute an impromptu rototill...but the ground was frozen. So I nixed that idea. I wandered over to the shed in the backyard and found some peat moss. Perfect! Cold and wet, with the acrid smell of dog excrement clinging to the inside of my nostrils, I dumped half the bag of the peat moss onto the stinking "carpet" and I spread it out, artistically, with the back of the shovel. It was--is--beautiful.

I filled up a black garbage bag with the excrement and I still have about another half a bag of droppings still out there to be...un-dropped.

And now my dogs stink because they slid through wet piles of shit. They'll be getting a bath. Posthaste. Just another day of lovely dog ownership, no?

I often have lessons hidden in my 'blog postings. Here is today's lesson: don't be a lazy ass. Pretend that you live outside, that you "pitch a tent" in the backyard every day and every night. Pretend that that big ole tree is your living room TV and pretend that the back fence is your hallway. Pretend that your olfactory sense has not gone AWOL and pretend that you do have a scintilla of pet responsibility and that your neighbors don't like the smell of wet dog shit. If you do all that, I think everyone will be happy. Or at least their nose hairs won't be curling come the spring thaw.

Thanks. That is all.

WHY BOTHER WITH A TITLE?

Got damn! I am so fricking uninspired. To do a lick of anything. What the hell? What gives? Even keystrokes are an effort, my fat fingers fumbling an "F" instead of a "D," a "K" instead of an "L."

I look out the window and through the gray of my omni-fucking-present cigarette smoke, the day is gray. And gray. And, oh yes, gray. Snowflakes flitter slowly down, rendering the backyard a soft white carpet.

I swallow some more of the omni-fucking-present coffee. The inside of my stomach is a friggin Starbucks. But without all the hype and the pretentiousness.

My dogs are somewhere. Wait, I know where they are: one of them will be laying by the heating vent and the other will be curled, snout to tail, on the overstuffed armchair.

I look out the window again. Yup, still gray. And gray. And, oh yes, gray.

By some (man-made) cosmic accident, today is a day that only comes around once every four years. If you were born on a Leap Year, would you celebrate your birthday on February 28th or on March 1st? I think I would celebrate mine on March 1st--kind of like a rebirth thing. February is just so fucking dreary. March is a month with purpose; just look at the name, for God's sake! March to it. Whereas February is a month in which even the spelling is a pain in the ass. How many times did you spell it (or pronounce it) "Febuary," with the "R" nowhere to be found? Shit, I just looked at the kee-rect spelling of the word and it reminded me of "mortuary." Maybe it's just the kind of mood that I'm in.

In the adjoining room, Bob Marley says to me: "Open your eyes, and look within/ are you satisfied with the life you're living?"

Well, Bobby, for the most part, yes. Thanks for asking, sir.

Now Marley sings, "Ex-ee-dous! Movement of jah people."

Exodous, indeed, Bobby. Exodous out of this gray fucking world and into a green one, resplendent with the smell of freshly-mown grass and burgers on the grill and images of blue skies and white puffed clouds.

TEN SYLLABLES

Enough. Of. Winter. And. Snow.

I. Want. Spring.

HOME IS WHERE THE HEART IS

out of the cold

stinging wind and harsh

skeletal reality

a warm bed,

nest here,

sleep here,

safe

let the world slide by

--greased skid--

let the world slide by and

cocoon yourself, here,

wrap me around you

together we will make sense

out of the senseless and

find Time

let the harsh shadow-world slide by

--greased skid--

nest with me

close your eyes and

sleep and know that

Tomorrow is a better day

THE CASE OF THE SHRINKING CANINE

Once upon a time, there was a cute brown dog. His fur was shiny and multi-colored: browns, yellows and blacks joined together on his coat to cull images of sun-dappled foliage in a viewer's eyes. The dog's name was Louis and he lived with a bald man named Adam. The two were inseperable and became fast friends. The bald man was a caring individual and he had a big heart, but he was often moody and distant. The dog tried his best to bring the man smiles, but he failed as often as he succeeded.

Then, one day, the bald man came to a decision to stop injesting toxic beverages at a manic pace and his moods began to even out a bit and the dog was happier. But the high that the man enjoyed from making his life-altering decision was transient and soon he reverted back to his self-absorbed ways.

The dog still had much love to offer, but the man was oftentimes unreceptive to the overtures and so the dog slipped into what seemed to be a depression. Day after day, the brindled bundle of benevolence bounded up at the sound of his master's alarm clock only to be subtly ignored for the flash of the computer, the squeaks and squirks of the video game system. Day after day, night after night, the dog lay on the couch, in the armchair, letting loose great sighs, his Boxer face more droopy than Nature had intended.

The bald man saw his depressed dog and tried to buoy his spirits, but the man's attention was sketchy at best...often the man would come home from work and go directly to bed for hour-long naps.

The man thought to himself, Hell, I live in a house, now. I have a backyard. Maybe Lou would benefit from having a partner-in-crime. Maybe another dog would help the situation.

And that thought of another dog stewed in the back of the man's mind.

And then, one day, the man's co-worker mentioned that she knew of a Beagle that was looking for a new home. The man, after some consideration, decided, sure, that could very well be a damned good thing. So he adopted the Beagle. With Dickensian sugar plums cavorting in his head, he named the dog Oliver, after the orphan from Oliver Twist. (Plus? The dog just looked like an Oliver.)

At first, things were gravy. Louie had never seemed happier and Oliver, after an extremely brief transitional period of uncertainty, soon became comfortable with the living situations.

Overly comfortable, it turned out.

The man noticed, after a time, that, when Oliver ate, Louie sat a respectful distance away, eating only after Oliver had finished. The problem became quickly clear, though, that Oliver was never finished. The little sausage-bodied dog did not eat to live. Rather, he lived to eat. And he rapidly attained Alpha status when food was concerned.

Thus, Oliver began to resemble a black-and-tan-and-white bowling ball with legs. And Louie, after putting on a quick layer of intial muscle from increased playtime, began to shrink. Still a muscular canine, his spine and ribs became more appreciable and his fur seemed to lose some of its luster. Meanwhile, the bowling ball glowed.

The bald man began to get a little worried. He wondered just how the hell he could fatten Louie up while gently nudging Oliver towards a healthier lifestyle.

He came up with this idea: who the hell said that they had to eat together all the time? That was what the doggy gate was for, he reckoned. Segregation (no pun intended) was the key. To isolate the sons-of-bitches seemed to be the order of the day.

So that was what the man decided to do. And he had heard (or read) somewhere that raw eggs mixed with the dry dog food were good for dogs. And that he--not the dogs--controlled the quantity of food that was delivered to the furry bodies, one rotund, the other stretched like a rubber band.

And so the experiment began in earnest....

{To be continued}

GANGSTA RAP

I stopped at the local music resale store today. I was intent on finding some Anthrax and/or some Megadeath. Just in one of those moods, I reckon. Headbangers, unite.

Anyway, I found neither. I ended up getting some other CDs, one of which was N.W.A.'s 1988 release Straight Outta Compton. Blast from the past, eh? An acronym for Niggaz With Attitudes, N.W.A. was basically a rap super-group which counted as its members such icons of gangsta rap as Dr. Dre, Ice Cube, Eazy-E, MC Ren and DJ Yella.

The second song on the disc is "Fuck Tha Police." The chorus sounded for the first time, and I found myself vehemently barking, "Fuck the police!" I paused and started laughing to myself. There I was, a somewhat mild-mannered, mid-30s white guy, driving the speed limit, safely seatbelted in a silver Ford Focus hatchback in an affluent suburb of Detroit. I was about as far from Dr Dre and the other fellas of N.W.A. as I could be.

Yet, I felt an affinity towards them. They m'boyz.

I, too, have had run-ins with the boys in blue. More than a couple of times, actually. Of course, every time I had a problem with the law, I was a million sheets to the wind and I can't really blame them for doing their jobs, ridding Suburbia of sodden belligerence. But, still, the animosity remains. Fucking pompous do-gooders. Strapped egos sauntering about like Hands of God.

Fuck tha Police, indeed.

One of these days, my childish, churlish attuitude towards our beloved protectors will change. Until then, I am,

Signed,

Gangsta Adam

[Now excuse me. Heavens to Betsy, but the dishes are piling up!]

WE'RE NUMBER ONE! WE'RE NUMBER ONE!

But I demand a retabulation of the numbers. This is bullshit. I think that Detroit was the fattest city in the United States, too.

Well, you gotta be good at something, right?

(And, trust me, it isn't shocking that Flint, MI, came in third in the "Misery Ranking.")