So, I ended up brushing my teeth afterall. I DID NOT floss or use the little pointy brush on my wisdom teeth. Why I still have wisdom teeth is a mystery. It DOES explain how Solomic and sage I am.

I was so frustrated as I prepared for sleep last night, I wasn't paying attention when I tossed my cell phone onto the bed. A few moments later when I got between the sheets, the cell-phone remained where I tossed it and through the night was tangled up in the bedding. At some point it fell off the bottom of the bed into the gap between frame and mattress. During the night I woke and after getting a half a glass of Tropical Punch Kool-Aid, started one of the new books from the library. It hooked me and I read about 100 pages before I started dozing and dropping the book onto my face. Rather than risk blindness, I put the book aside and slipped back into the arms of Morpheus.

This morning I read another hundred pages. The book was really getting interesting. Just as philosphers wonder about the sound of a tree in the forest without someone to hear it fall, I didn't notice the absence of my phone because I didn't or couldn't hear it ringing. Just as you sometimes have a tune in your head you can't get rid of, I kept imagining I was hearing Beethoven's Fur Elise. The fact that I have used it as a ring-tone on my cell-phone for 2 years (because I can't figure out how to change it) didn't penetrate my early-morning brain until I had eaten a Power Bar, drunk a bottle of Diet Mountain Dew, and munched on 4 Oreos with chocolate Creme filling. That's when I noticed the phone wasn't in the usual spot and began my search. First the floor, then the bedroom sofa, then in the living room because maybe I was mis-remembering bringing it into the bedroom. Nothing. Fur Elise kept haunting me at five minute intervals but only a subtle whisper; never loud enough to lead me to the hiding place. Emulating my Mother I said a quick prayer to St. Anthony, the Saint of Lost Objects. My prayers have been ignored here because of past prayers for virginity, libido, and sanity, all things I have lost many years ago.

My booked, splayed open on the bed, I carefully moved. I didn't want to lose my place and I didn't want to dog-ear the page, so I placed it, still splayed, on top of my TV. The television is on the opposite side of my bed. The side I don't use. Now my bed was stripped down to linen, pillows and blankets strewn about the floor, I was sweating and beginning to have angina pains in my chest when....Fur Elise. It was coming from the bottom of the bed. St. Anthony relented and two seconds later I held the instrument in my hand.

The next few moments were spent putting my bed back in order, taking the empty Mountain Dew bottle to the kitchen and taking a nitro. Now it was time to climb back on the bed and continue my great read.

I couldn't find the book. I didn't even think of looking on top of the TV. I NEVER put anything on top of the TV. St. Anthony ignored my prayers because I'd used up my 'one-lost-object-request-per-decade' so my search began again. I won't bore you anymore but after an hour of more bed-mess, more angina, more nitro, and.....I put on my glasses and without the attending blur, saw my book splayed on top of the television.

I learned in some psych ward somewhere that it wasn't the major traumas and neurosis of one's life that drove one crazy. It was the little thing like the growing ash at the tip of your cigarette that might fall and get on your clothes. Of course it would be simple to just flick the ash in an ash tray, but people!...if things were simple one wouldn't be in a psych ward.

I blame this entire ferkacka day on that ferkacka toaster! Would someone please shoot me?

Just before Christmas of 2005, I bought some books and magazines at Barnes and Noble and they put them in a Christmasy shopping bag. This afternoon, I went to the library to exchange books and as always carried the returns and the new loans in that very same Christmas Barnes and Noble bag. Considering that it was free (or at least the cost was buried somewhere in the outrageous cost of the books) after using it at least twice a month for almost 3 years, I would think I have gotten my money's worth and those Chinese really make a good bag.

I am upset because about 20 minutes ago I had a craving for some peanut butter toast. Why I just charged ahead with that plan without analyzing how I would feel using my defective toaster, I just do not have the answer. It took 15 minutes to make two slices of toast. First I toasted it on one side. Then I toasted it on the other side. And since the damned toaster doesn't complete the toasting in one cycle, like a bottle of shampoo I had to toast and repeat!!! It upset me so much, I didn't even enjoy the toast. Usually I sprinkle the peanut butter toast with cinnamon, but at this point my life was such drek, I just thought to myself..."why bother?"

I'm just going to take a pill and go to sleep. I'm not even sure I shall brush my teeth. Let the peanut butter fester in the crevices all night. In the broad scheme of things, what does it matter.

Ah me!

How did I survive for over 35 years without bottled water? This afternoon I went to Sam's Club for three cases of water and spent an hour or so loading it into the refrigerator. (I was tempted to say icebox but how the fuck old do you think I am?) With 72 bottles of water and 18 bottles of diet Mountain Dew, plus a dozen liters of Pelagrino I don't have any room in there for food. The water in Duluth used to have a reputation as being WONDERFUL water. They just dipped a ladle into it, pushed it through a pipe and delighted the masses, fish crap, rusty cans, spilled iron-ore, sea-gull shit and all. I used to swim in the lake at Park Point. The Axeman wrote me about how cold the lake water is. Our skin would turn blue and after a half hour in the water my weenie was smaller than most clean-up batters at the All-Star game. (I just thought of something....even with steroids my weenie is probably smaller than most clean-up batters at the All-Star game)

The plan is to spend the day on the beach tomorrow but it doesn't look like the weather is going to cooperate. Back to the Lake Superior water....it tastes like crap. I say that figuratively because I don't have an actual comparison. Whatever happened in the last 40 years has ruined the lake water....and so Sam's family gets my money.

Bob Brokeman...salesmanager at U100...reminded me of some time spent as a youth in River City. I was good but I was no Eddie Hodges!! Great to hear from you, Bob!

What could be better than spending a couple of hours at the Mall shopping with my nephews. I had plenty of plastic in my wallet and would have indulgently bought them almost anything. When it came down to it though, they ended up buying a couple of cap-guns from the Dollar Store. Those cheap cap-gun pistols thrilled these two 7 years old boys.

I was trying to remember what would have thrilled me when I was seven. I can't really remember. When I was five I wanted a beaver costume. It was the beginning of my theatrical bent. When I was six I wanted my Dad to bring me a box of Nibs and let me stay up to listen on the radio to Mr. Keene, Tracer of Lost Persons. Whe I was seven I used to dress like Hopalong Cassidy and I KNOW I had a six-shooter or two. When I was eight I wanted the war in Korea to end, Sister Joseph Marie to drop dead, no more world hunger, the defeat of International Communism and freedom for Red China.

When I was nine I realized life is not fair. The Korean War never really ended (truce & cease fire)....Sister J-M lived to be 91....the world is still hungry (I could use a bacon sandwich RIGHT NOW but bacon is so expensive)....it took years to defeat the Commies and China is still Red....and I'm still waiting for those Nibs. (I ordered a beaver costume from a company in Southern California but what I got wasn't what I expected...A couple of months ago I found it packed away but it is almost sixty years old and all the beaver hair had fallen off....now it's a shaved beaver costume)

Would I want to be a seven year old in 2008? I'm not sure. Think of all the things I would have missed.

I would have to be awfully hungry to cook up 4-5 eggs for lunch. My guess is that would be the case with most people except maybe those huge fat guys on Jerry Springer. There was one guy who was so huge they had to tear out a wall to move him to a hospital. He kept on saying that he really didn't eat all that much...while knocking down a pound of bacon.

Anyway, where as most people wouldn't admit to having 4 eggs for lunch, what is the deal with deviled eggs? I could eat 8 deviled eggs without even blinking. That's 4 eggs PLUS mayo! And other stuff! I have decided I will no longer attend parties featuring deviled eggs. (Are there supposed to be 2 L's in devilled? No....that looks like it is some kind of ghetto Caddie) Anyway...no more deviled egg parties. My luck I'd go to the party and they'd have to tear out a wall so I could leave.

When I smoked I hated going to people's houses where they enforced a No Smoking rule. I say that because I had some company and I knew they smoked. I allowed them to smoke in my home. That's why God invented Fabrese. When I smoked and visited a non-smoking home in the winter in California I would be standing out on the patio with the dog...both of us shivering and getting wet. That dog didn't understand why I was with him on the patio while the party continued inside. You know he just thought I was out there for sticking my nose in people's crotches and humping some lady's leg. Just like him.

Have you seen the price of bacon these days? Pre-cooked bacon costs at least $2 per slice. What a convenience. At that rate I won't be able to afford a new wall.

Now I am even more depressed. I figured it out that the baguette cost me 13.8 cents per bite! I know a dominatrix who is cheaper! Cindy's comment to my last blog is priceless! Another reason why I still talk to her after 35 years!

Mesa says the drugs from Bangkok are cheap...it WAS Bangkok wasn't it? I can't remember and I just read it 2 minutes ago. Bangkok is cheap? I refer to you my dominatrix comment!

What a wonderfully hot and humid week-end it has been. I bought a box fan at WalMart 5 years ago and it has been running almost constantly since then, winter, summer. I paid $14 for it. On THAT I'm getting my money's worth. Those Chinese slave laborers really make a good box fan. The Kathy Lee toaster I bought was crap!

High blood pressure meds....hmmmmm. I'm lucky to have any blood pressure at all.

Back to work tomorrow?.....not for me.....tomorrow I shall...well....do....nothing.

Rob

I just paid $4.45 for a baguette! For God's sake I used to buy them in San Francisco for a buck.

I am totally depressed. How much am I paying for Prozac?

R