The Bar is a Beautiful Place

 It's been said here many times on the lounge that i'm a bit of a social misanthrope, i'm not all that fond of people but i tend to find them fascinating all at the same time, like some half-ass cultural anthropologist who specializes in the study of late 20th and early 21st century homo sapiens particularly from the Rust Belt but not limited to said geographical area... there has also been an evolution of sorts when it came to our hero over what is now approaching the 18th anniversary of the lounge (going back and looking at the early days is like looking at those old middle school/high school pictures and wondering, what the fuck was i thinking? but in this, to sound like a pretentious ass, years long art project, i can actually see some progress, dare i say that i've gotten better at this whole thing... or maybe it's more long-winded or maybe it's just understanding and becoming more adept or comfortable with what i'm doing while all the while still trying to remain uncomfortable...) that evolution has involved the using and losing of various substances over the years, one of the main ones being alcohol... when i started this endeavour so many years ago i was still much the drinker, in fact it would be roughly eight years or so into the lounge before i actually booted the serious drinking on the head and sobered up... it took one fine morning of legendary hangover status and coughing up what felt like my liver to finally look in the mirror and say, enough, no more hangovers... and i can say with all honesty that i haven't  had one since, some ten years ago now, and that while every once in a while i might have one beer too many these days that amounts to nothing more than a slight headache, easily remedied, gone are the days of clutching the toilet and wishing for relief that i knew was still hours (or sometimes days) away... 

Of course when one gives up or scales back the boozing one does not frequent the bars as much anymore... which out here in the lily white suburbs wasn't a real difficult thing to do due to the fact that most of the bars out here are shite... there's a halfway decent one up the street that due to the convoluted laws of the commonwealth can only serve beer, but they run the gamut from good beer to cheap swill so it's not bad... a burb over is the little Potomac Ave hub as i call it with a couple of decent joints including one that is a futbol bar on weekend mornings (though i haven't been there for the football) but for the most part if i want to go to a decent bar, one that aligns with my independent rock and roll sensibilities, it's still a ride into the city to my favorite dive... and so it is here that we will pick up the story... 

I'm not sure if i've mentioned it here at the lounge but one of my longest partners in crime is moving to Jersey, he's known as Uncle to the boyos and i've known him for over thirty years and we have raised much hell together in that time... it was in my favorite dive that he told me he was moving, a move to help his wife take care of her aging parents and the truth is i'd expect nothing less from my brother, he's as good as they come, in fact as we sat in the dive that day when he broke the news he admitted that i was the one person he felt the most nervous about telling, i didn't understand why but i also did, he knows me well and knows i don't suffer fools hence i don't really hangout with a ton of people, maybe  he felt guilty as if he was leaving me on my own but that's nonsense, i've always been on my own... he also knew that with him moving away that two of the three friends i consider my brothers were going to be living in different cities... i smiled when he told me and said, c'est la vie, bought another round, then quoted the brilliant Dan Bejar and said, all good things must come to an end, it's the bad ones that go on forever...

And so one day while the I-mac was doing a bit of community service over the holidays for a bit of legal trouble he ran into the first week of his freshman year at university, i dropped him off downtown and wondered what to do when it struck me that the boozer was a scant ten minute or less drive up the road, it was early and it would be mellow and i figured i'd get some of those Old Bay and butter wings that are tantamount to the food of the gods... and so i drove up Liberty Ave then up Herron) parked and wandered in, only to see a woman i knew (i had just recently met her and  her husband) and her friend... i ordered a beer pulled up a seat and stated i had roughly two hours to burn... 

The woman i knew is a stand up bass player with long dreads, her husband plays in a local band that has been around a long time with 13? records to it's credit though i believe he joined a few years back, her friend was a teacher who was trying to figure out how to get her sorta live-in boyfriend to move out of her upstairs apartment so that she could promptly make him her ex-boyfriend... she was explaining how an old (male) friend had been visiting with her and that she finally told him that he should probably think about leaving before she threw him down and fucked him, i was laughing and stated that's exactly what she should have done... she was talking about how she had crawled into bed with him (clothed) one morning and how the thought had crossed her mind to just get down to business... i told her she should have jumped on top and that when her current boyfriend walked in due to all the "sounds of ecstasy" he heard she could have looked over her shoulder and told him to put on some coffee and start making them breakfast... she of course thought this was a brilliant idea to which i replied it was the two birds one stone thing... you (she) gets a quality lay while basically telling the live-in upstairs to get the fuck out, something she apparently has been doing for close to a year, i also stated she should have jokingly said to her friend, "put out or get out", a statement which brought more laughter to our party... she mentioned her therapist and i told her i could do the job for half the cost and stated i was like Winston Wolf, i solved problems... at this point i realized i was scoring points here and pondered offering my services in the realm of getting her boyfriend to leave, ie she could bang me while he made breakfast... 

The guy next to me had said something in the course of this and i looked over and commented back and we had a laugh, it was around this point that  one of the ladies made a comment about shite poetry to which i replied laughingly i was once a shite poet, the guy next to me chimed in that he was a poet though i thought he was taking the piss... turned out he actually was and was thinking about attending and possibly reading later that night... he and i struck up a conversation about writing, as us writing types are known to do, and thus began a swapping of stories, he was probably at least 25 years my junior but i'm not one of those that believes my age gives me any great insight or wisdom into anything other than i've lived a little, i mentioned my previous occupation and told a story or two about the world of slinging back before shit became legal, back before my new friend was likely even born or round thereabout and then we began talking about our fathers... 

It turned out we had both lost our father to cancer... though i did clarify that i actually lost mine to what was most likely a heart attack but that might actually have been a good thing seeing as how bile duct cancer doesn't actually kill one it more less makes them starve to death due to the fact they stop eating, i explained that in a strange way i'm glad my dad didn't suffer through that in the same way that for the first time since he passed i was glad he was gone (that being in relation to the orange shitgibbon being voted back into office by a population of fucking lemmings...) i then told my new friend, Patrick, how one of the last times i actually saw my father we were watching The Departed, i explained how i was going back and forth to Cleveland and getting things in order and helping my dad out, i was sitting with him in his new apartment in the assisted living facility, and how my father and i had had a history of watching great movies together, when i came in and sat down my dad had asked if i had ever seen this flick before and i replied, absolutely, great film and i sat down and began watching with him... it was towards the end of the film when i looked over at my dad and said, this is a pretty bleak flick to watch for a guy with terminal cancer... i grinned as i told Patrick that my father looked back at me, smile creeping across his face and said... isn't though? to which we both started laughing, one of those good belly laughs... (i had always loved when my dad laughed, he was a pretty mellow guy, stoic one might say but when he laughed it was great... i remember one day a year or two ago when Disaster had said something that cracked me up and he looked at me and said, i like when you laugh dad... i knew exactly what he meant... fucking universe is a funny place...) 

Patrick then told me a story... it seemed that while he was in college he was having a bit of a time, probably much like i did as well, we sensitive sorts seem to have to battle a lot of demons and hopefully come out the other side... or at least keep them at bay most of the time... his parents had made him go see a therapist, this was near Philly, and said therapist was late, they were near a six lane highway when Patrick looked at his father and told him he could sense things, his dad asked what he meant and Patrick replied, like i could sprint across that highway and not get hit by a car cuz i know, his father gave him a look and then Patrick took off... he sprinted from one side to the other and on his way back, the last lane, narrowly avoided being hit by a semi-truck, and 18 wheeler as they say, he said it was close enough that he could feel the wind as it roared past... his father fainted.... we both had a laugh and i did say that now having sons of my own i have been both Patrick and his father, and it was interesting being able to see it from both sides... i did add it's much better from the non-father side as the last thing any parent wants to see is something happen to their kid (or most parents at least...) 

He then told me how he had went home to see his father when he was ill, pancreatic cancer, a fucking horror, a painful a form of cancer as one can get... Patrick had told me how when his dad was young they called him Capt. Trips cuz he liked psychedelics so much to which i laughed and said your dad and i could relate, briefly explained my own love of psychedelics to which he laughed and asked, you still take them? and to which i replied, every chance i get... and so Capt. Trips looked at his son and asked if he would like to go out back and smoke a joint, Patrick said of course, and off they went... out back they burned the joint and Patrick said his dad began talking about all kinds of things, about the trees and the sky and life, Patrick said it was gorgeous, just a father and son having a great conversation... his dad then said they should take a walk... now unbeknownst to Patrick his father was not supposed to leave the yard, apparently he was sicker than he had let on but Patrick didn't know and so they began walking, on a path through a bit of woods that would eventually lead to his older brother's house, talking the whole time... they were almost to the house when his phone started ringing and so Patrick checked and it was his mom, he answered and she frantically asked where the hell they were? that his dad wasn't supposed to leave the yard or do anything to taxing, he had the phone on speaker and his dad grabbed it from his hand and smiling at his son began telling his wife it was all his kid's idea and that he didn't want to go... then he started laughing hysterically and told his wife not to worry... she said she'd be right over to pick him up and drive him home... 

Of course Patrick now looked at his father and asked why didn't he tell him? his old man smiled and said, what's the difference? i wanted to take a walk... they sat on his brother's porch and waited for his mom to arrive to take them back to the house, his brother lived on a main street, somewhat busy and when his mom pulled up they walked towards the car when his dad suddenly stopped and looked at him... he then said, you know what son, i know things... and then began to bolt across the busy street, his dad took two or three strides then stopped, turned to look at his son's pale and horrified face and then laughed out loud and said, gotcha!!! Patrick smiled knowing it was a reference to a few years before and the highway incident... they got in the car and drove home the whole time his mom going on about what the hell were you two doing and the whole time his dad catching his son's eye and grinning... a week later he would be gone... i looked at Patrick and said, damn  dude... can i give you a hug? that was one of the most beautiful stories i've ever heard... and so much like Wayne Coyne gave me i gave my young friend a hug and we toasted to our fathers... 

We sat back down at the bar and i said that's the beauty of this shit innit? your father knew... that was his way of saying goodbye, a joint, a walk, a two hour conversation with his youngest son, how fucking beautiful is that? it was then that he asked if he could read me something... he explained how his brother was nine years older, a bit of an alcoholic, and used to beat the shit out of him when he was younger (until one day Patrick turned the tables, the last time his brother ever tried), i could tell there was some shit in this kid's life, the truth is we all have it it's how well we walk through those fires.. i understand how unnerving it can be to read something to someone, especially someone sitting in a bar, i also understand the "rapport" that can develop between not only writers but kindred spirits, he trusted me to listen... and so i said go ahead... he said it was sorta long but that he'd get to it cuz he knew i had to pick up the boyo, explained it was about his family and growing up... and so he began... 

I sat on my barstool and listened attentively... it was a good poem, it had quality, and i could tell it was deeply personal, that there were demons in there being exorcised, there was one line in particular about the "a household of glorified monsters", it hit home... in ways both past and present, my father wasn't one of those monsters but there were others in my household that were, in fact all these years later i realize now that my father was far more sensitive than he ever let on, but he was a product of his generation and men back then didn't show much emotion, it was considered weakness, i understood that the first time i ever saw it was that day when i wandered into the basement right before the "announcement", it registered but it didn't, but somehow i still remember it, it was pure hurt... but what that line also reminded me was that i did not want to be one of those "glorified monsters"... and sometimes i'm not sure if i can say i've succeeded on that front... and it's a hard fucking pill to swallow... 

When he had finished i looked at my new young friend and said, do me a favor... get your ass to that reading tonight, get up there, and read your stuff... the world will be better off for it, there's nothing wrong with having something to say or stories to tell, it's the most basic of human conditions, we've been telling stories to each other since we developed language, yeah it's nerve wracking but you'll feel good about shit when you're done, and when someone walks up to you and tells you that something you read hit home all those hours spent huddled over a keyboard or notebook make just a little more sense... but now i gotta pick up the boy... i got up and Patrick stood up and gave me another hug, he said thanks man, it was great talking to you, in fact it was more than that... i smiled and said likewise my friend now get to that reading... i said my goodbyes to the women and i knew, to her husband who had since come in, we laughed about the boyo and then i walked out into the cold December night, looked around the old stomping grounds, got in the car and then headed off to pick up the boy... it wasn't even 8pm.... the bar is a beautiful place... 

The Mushroom Diaries - vol. 29

 Sometimes things get dark... metaphorically and cosmically... i mean hell when one needs to write two apocalyptic state of the nation posts one could surmise that the darkness can sometimes drown out the light... or maybe it's something more like those strange short days and long nights way up north, where the sun, the light, makes an appearance for a few hours or less then disappears back into the darkness... it's when this happens that i usually look to carve out that time to sit in a dark room and let the mushroom speak... one might think therapy or some other such plunge into the world of psychoanalysis might help but to be honest i'm not a big believer in such things, at least not in the modern sense cuz it seems there are a lot of, let's just say, sub par professionals in said profession... it doesn't take much to hang out a shingle and declare oneself open for business, to collect a fee (from insurance or otherwise) without every really dispensing any sound advice or action for moving forward, whatever the fuck that means or what is more correctly the work of healing oneself... i guess the question is heal from what but that would most likely come down to the individual, is modern humanity so fucked up that we all need to heal? hell if i'm being honest, yeah probably, it's just i'm not sure how "modern therapy" accomplishes any of that... and so i turn to the mushroom and the mind to see what i can work out in the dim light of stars and moon through half shut shades... 

The interesting thing about the mushroom is not only the way it speaks but the way it listens... i never have a set idea of what's going to happen when i take a dose, i just let whatever happens happen, hence sometimes it's just listening to music and talking to Paco and now Archie... of course there are usually points in the night where that happens anyway, mushrooms or not, but i find it lovely how my two cats will just lay there patiently with their tripping human, will get right in my face as if to make sure i'm okay and then return to their spot purring away, glancing back to check on me while also watching the door as if they are guarding me as well... if there has been any light these days in the world of El Kono it comes from his animals, both wild and domestic, but particularly from his cats and more specifically from these two though all of them seem to make me laugh and smile and remind me of what unconditional love is like... it's a pretty cool thing the relationship that develops between human and feline (or any number of other animals) but i put the good old housecat a rung or two above most, they just seem to have a greater sense of things, at least the ones i've known, yeah they have their quirks, who of us doesn't? but i know that when shit gets bleak they will be the first ones there to give me a head butt and remind me that it's not all bad... 

Which brings me back to the other night, seems i've made it a habit of tripping on certain days and the eve of the winter solstice was no different, the longest night of the year, at times it's like an endless night around here, one shit show after another, which brings me once again to a domestic situation that is nothing more than a business relationship masquerading as some sort of union... it most definitely is not, neither physically or psychologically or emotionally, the BW and i come at things from such different perspectives it's a wonder the "business" still works at all around here... in a way we're play acting, tolerating just enough of each other to make things work and while i could piss and moan about being treated like an indentured servant around here that shit's just old, i do what i have to and though i may get frustrated at times i understand that's just natural, we all get frustrated by situations and we must deal with them in the best way possible... maybe mine is eating boomers and pondering, reading books, scratching Paco on his head, getting lost in a piece of music and daydreaming a few minutes away... that said it was an interesting trip the other night... 

As has been documented here the trials and tribulations of the I-mac have been more than a bit stressful... unfortunately his mother and i come at it from different approaches, hell i can even see some very minute progress being made but for the most part there is still a fucking long way to go... over the last six months or so i'd usually end up thinking about my sons when sitting in that dark room, many times the I-mac would cross my mind as i tried to work out the ways to help him, for lack of a better term, grow up, accept responsibility, often my idea and the BW's idea were not on the same page... sometimes i understood that in those moments of frustration and anger i could get lost in that maze, that instead of trying to find a solution emotion would end up exacerbating the problem, granted this is not an uncommon situation among fathers and sons everywhere but all that Zen shit flew out the window when the shouting started... as for Disaster, i worried about him in different ways, his big brother takes up a lot of time and energy, especially his mother's, and sometimes it's as if Disaster flies below the radar... Disaster is a lot more responsible than his big brother but does exhibit a lot of his father's tendencies when it comes to certain things, both the boyos do but there are different reasons for that, the I-mac and his ADHD has an impulsivity problem, Disaster is more calculated and that might be more worrisome in certain respects... he's a better poker player so to speak and knows how to keep things under wraps... 

But the solstice brought the old mind round the the BW and the place we find ourselves in now... and i can't exactly say that it's a good place, in fact i'm not sure it's much of a place at all, maybe placeholder is a better term... an honest assessment of things is that we have only two things in common, the boyos and the cats, after that? nothing... there is not one thing i can think of that we enjoy doing together (or maybe just i) or interest that we share... yeah i know i'm an odd one, i like books and music and mushrooms and cannabis, the odd beer, the BW likes none of those... well not exactly, she's been reading some series of books, mindless fiction as she calls it and granted my reading list is not everyone's cup of tea, i do a lot of heavy reading i guess but i still read a fiction it's just what i read and what she reads are worlds apart... as for music? my interests are vast and varied, i still dig going to see live music though my back and knees aren't as happy about that as they once were, but i usually find a place to sit for a few minutes especially because the bands i dig are all playing little clubs, that said i don't understand how someone could not love music as it's such an important part of my existence... it does so many things for the mind and the soul that on days when i don't hear enough i actively seek out some time to sit down and listen to something... the BW despises the bar and while i'm nowhere near the barfly i once was i still like a trip to my favorite boozer (another boozer post to follow most likely), as i've always said i'm a social misanthrope, i like to hear and tell stories, it's the beauty of that oral tradition and i like to see people look up from their phones and actually have a conversation, to engage with the living instead of the virtual... 

The mushrooms and the solstice had brought about some hard truths, most likely laid out previously... someday i'll get to the post weed king years but to not say too much, there is a large part of me that feels we'd have been better off going our separate ways way back when and we probably would have been much happier, granted i realize i stuck it out through the weed king years because of the sense of stability the relationship provided, i saw the dangers of dealing and being "single", each new relationship would pose a potential threat to the kingdom and while my actions in those years didn't really align with that theory it soothed my paranoia... i was a fucking bastard to say the least, i also understood i was never one for convention, yeah i understood someday i'd have to work a "regular" job but that didn't mean i had to live a normal life so to speak, browsing the halls of commerce and consumption, living in the burbs, (digression- i now realize that moving to the lily white may not have been the best move and that while it seemingly was better for the boyos i feel the amount of bullshit privilege that passes for normalcy out here is horrible, they'd have been better off in the city where while i would have had to put more effort into educating them, not that i haven't, they would have learned more firsthand, indispensable knowledge by seeing and dealing with people of much different circumstances than their own, out here the only difference is does the kid drive a Subaru or a BMW to school, it's frighteningly cookie cutter though the residents would huff and puff and talk diversity, it's bullshit... ) but back to the BW... back then there was a guy who she was obviously interested in but her being risk averse wasn't sure how to handle things or possibly break it off with yours truly because what if it didn't work out? in the end this guy became a CPA and i'm sure she may have finished her master's and been a teacher, something she would have felt more rewarding than the position she has now, though being a successful business owner pays well i'm not sure how satisfying it is... and i get that... granted it wasn't like i hid my views on things and the only job i really ever pursued and worked at was slinging weed (and making french fries at the beach but that's another series of posts)... 

If there is one thing the mushroom is a master at it's the ability to bring out the kindness, the compassion, the empathy... laying in the dark and letting the mind go i felt and overwhelming sadness and empathy for the BW... it's pretty obvious to anyone who has access to this relationship what it is (see above), it's not great and yes while some of that is my doing some of it is hers as well... and i would add the more "successful" she became, see $$$ earned, the less reciprocal the relationship became, which in modern therapy terms, can't shake the smartass can i, is not a good thing... i'd wager to say we both feel relatively alone when it comes to any meaningful relationship type thing, there's the most tenuous bit of a partnership but as stated that comes only when it's the boyos or the cats... throw in the fact her first born son is a right bastard to her on a near daily basis and there are times when she could probably use a hug... problem is that isn't a thing around here anymore for many reasons... the BW does a fucking lot of shit for the I-mac who in turn shits all over her, i've told her that until he learns that treating people like shit is not a recipe for having people do things for you i will not do fuck all for him, yes i do the basics but after that he has to fend for himself, no extra cash, no slack on schoolwork, granted i'll help if he honestly needs it but if it's one of those deals where he's claiming he can't do it cuz it's easier for someone else to do it for him (see his mama and his whole senior year of high school) then fuck no, failure is a great teacher problem is his mama won't let him fall down, which brings us back to the mess that is that relationship... 

Boyo Uno got dumped over Thanksgiving and was/has been a bit torn up about it... why? not sure as watching him and the ex-princess (a girl from a wealthy and snotty neighboring burb) interact i didn't see how anyone was having a good time, it was constant drama, granted maybe i'm just projecting my younger self and how i would have bailed on this shit show (ironic huh?) but it seemed way to stressful for a high school/ first year of college relationship... i could write a dissertation on the reasons and my son but i will spare the reader that... that being said, the I-mac leaned heavily on his mama for emotional support, cried and told her how much he loved her and how he knew he was horrible sometimes yet here we are and no less than Xmas morning his mother is crying because he has acted like a complete shit... i actually showed a huge amount of restraint as i was thinking about tossing his gifts into the backyard, i wanted to remind him that there were many "children" who didn't get fuck all at his age or at least not the amount of shit his mama bought him, in fact if is was up to me he'd have gotten much less or basically only shit he needed or possibly a list of expenses paid out over his last few fuck ups... i will add she can be a bit overbearing at times when it comes to helping him stay organized and get shit done but that's when i chime in that it's fucking grow up time, if he doesn't do what he needs to do he can deal with the consequences, but i'm not his mama and i know how mamas are so while i add my view it's usually met with disdain... in short i can see why she feels sad and lonely... 

What struck me about this last trip though was what a certain train of thought the seemed to sneak into the stream of consciousness... it had to do with where do i go from here? there were mental calculations in my head both financial and familial to work out... i realize i'm not what any company is looking to hire and i'm not even sure i know where to look (though the cannabis industry seems a logical start), a 50-something who hasn't held a meaningful job in over a decade, granted i would come out of this thing with a decent amount of assets and i'd be nowhere near as well off as the BW would be but that's okay, to me it's not a contest to see who can get the most, though i might be making the same mistake my father made, it's just about being fair, i don't need half even though she'd still have her business, i don't need alimony, i just need to be released from my contract so to speak... the unknown aspect is how she would react, i feel she would be shocked or blindsided but then again i could be completely wrong, if she thinks about this situation at all i don't think she would be that surprised, hell she might even be relieved but then again i realize we all have the capability to polish shit to a shiny gold sheen and pretend it's not really shit...  the other option is to bring up the unpleasant facts and decide if since we get along well enough to just turn a blind eye to whatever the other is doing, basically officially become roommates while sharing expenses... somehow i don't think that'll fly since i don't bring in nearly as much cash and one of the things often said around here is how "she's paying for this" or "her money being spent", i'm not even sure she realizes it anymore but it doesn't give me the most comfortable feeling... 

And then there are the boyos and the effect it will have on them... something i know all too well... i could see the I-mac being a bit like his old man and not speaking to me for a time regardless of the circumstances, even if his mother agreed to it and was on the same page as me i think he'd most likely place the blame at my feet, and that would be fine, for as much as they butt heads he is his mother's son and i'll freely admit she understands him better than i do... as for Disaster, i may worry about him the most... in the past year or so i've watched as his relationship with his mother has grown but at heart he's still his father's boy, i still remember the day when he got lost at the high school football game and the first thing he said when we found him was, i was afraid i'd never see my dad again, i also know that he'd worry about both his parents, he's more sensitive than he let's on, a bit like his old man, yet even though a situation like that would be tough i feel he'd understand it and get on with things accordingly, i've talked to both boyos about the fact they are probably not seeing the healthiest of relationships when it came to their parents and yes maybe i was trying to prepare them for the possibility of someday their parents living in different places, maybe even different cities, but the reality is it's not out of the question and i don't want them to feel like they've been sucker punched if it happens... though i'm not sure if that's even a realistic possibility...

The last bit that rolled through the old mind was about the cats... yes how could i not think about them, i dwelled on finding a place to live that accepted pets knowing that i'd most likely be renting an apartment, i also knew there would be a question of which cat goes where, some would be obvious, granted it depends on when/if this happened... there's no question about Paco, he'd come with me, Maya would stay with the BW and most likely Korra, though that might be a debate, same with Archie though i'd probably demand a trade and since Paco and Archie get along i'd have a good case that would appeal to the BW's love of cats, she'd want them to be happy... as for Zuko? it might depend on the boyos and the fact he's starting to get up there, but i'd lobby for him as well but since he tends to sleep upstairs with the BW he might be better off staying... so yes, a lot of shit to work out... but these were all the things the mushroom and i talked about... until the next time... 

State of the Nation - Apocalyptic Home Edition

 It may come as a surprise that i actually put some time and effort into these little missives ripped off into the ether, granted i'm under no illusions of fame and fortune as was once the want of the blogosphere, i recall many a site where it was all about monetization and the hopes of some "career"... career? fuck that, i write for sheer and simple reasons, it's what i do to make sense of things, i'm not all that into fame and fortune and everything that goes with it (i thank you all, Freddie) but as Vonnegut once said, go into the arts, you don't even have to be good at it, you do it cuz at the end of it you will have created something, and most likely learned a thing or two about this cosmic joke we're all temporarily traipsing through, when i see the madness around me every day and by madness i mean what people pass off as existence or a "meaningful life" i'm utterly and totally confused... the acquisition of "stuff" or to paraphrase Bill Hicks, look at my huge house and big wallet and fancy car, when in the end it means nothing... granted i'm a product of my culture and can be rightly and justly accused of accumulating far too many books and records but in a way that goes back to the whole art thing, even the art of living thing, the point of dancing is the dance as Alan Watts said, there is something about getting lost in a piece of literature or music that provides more value, dare i say wealth, than any fucking designer label or high end automobile will ever provide, call it the substance and not the stuff... 

As usual one could easily be sitting back and saying, what the fuck is he one about this time? as i watch the place i live skip blindly towards a new form of shit show, something akin to an oligarchy of the rich by the rich and for the rich disguised as a fascist theocracy it hit me the other day, or shortly after the orange shitgibbon was thought by the populace to be a viable option to run this place, that for the first time since my father had died i was glad to that he wasn't here to see this shit show, and to a lesser degree my uncle, his older brother as well... this might have done them both in really but as my father so often pointed out to his older brother, people don't give a rat's ass about anyone other than their own self and maybe their immediate family, as long as they go theirs, he said, they didn't give a shit... as usual the old man was spot on... which brings me around the gist of this post... 

It was seven years ago this week that i had suffered the Night of the Living Back Spasm, a night spent in agonizing pain where the first 45 minutes were spent face down on a hardwood floor begging for an ambulance and as one might recall the Breadwinner deemed that wholly unnecessary and expensive... so like most things in this life i gritted my teeth and got through it... (granted i should have known this would happen, i've written about an incident years ago where i had the flu, i had asked the BW to go to the store and get me a few things, namely Gatorade and some meds, she hemmed and hawed and said she would just not yet as i believe she needed her afternoon nap, i couldn't really wait and so exasperated i fucking got dressed and walked to the store myself and got what i needed feeling like i'd been hit by a truck, in truth i should have known how this whole thing would go way back when... or in short i fucked up...) it was that night that i spent my first night on the downstairs couch, due to the fact i couldn't even get up steps, and it has been on the couch where i slept, alone save for various cats, that i have stayed... 

The other day i was in my favorite boozer (see post) when i mentioned the situation and an old acquaintance looked at me in shock, he couldn't believe it, he asked why i don't move back to the bedroom, i didn't feel like explaining to him that the ship of which he spoke had sailed, even the BW doesn't mind anymore and that i quite liked sleeping alone, not to mention the fact i could eat mushrooms whenever i wanted and not have to worry about answering any questions... i didn't cite facts about the roughly 25% of couples who sleep in separate rooms for various reasons and the biggest reason he mentioned was the sexual aspect, i laughed and explained to him that frigid wasn't just a word in the dictionary... i explained that my life was just fine, how there is always a balance between the dark and the light and though i could use with more of certain things in my life i didn't wholly go without... as i explained, happiness is where you find it... 

Though these days happiness... or whatever that feeling is supposed to be, seems fleeting at best, like trying to catch water in my hands, of course i realize there is some psychic baggage that comes with this time of year, i've always been prone to bouts melancholia, why else would my favorite band of all time be The Smiths? and of course i think about my dad, i think about him every day and the truth is i miss those conversations, miss his wisdom and insight, his meticulous way of thinking through things... i also realize that he was the last person in my nuclear family i could speak or relate to as the current political climate has most definitely created a chasm between myself and the rest of my childhood household... 

It began in September when the norm between my lovely mother and i quickly disintegrated... there was a picture posted on a social media site of the BW and the guy from Minnesota, he was in town helping his running mate prepare for her debate, had gone out for a run and then decided to take his daughter to breakfast, no campaign stop just a guy and his kid having some pancakes... now my mother, the once Catholic now evangelical (due to the Catlicks not annulling her marriage on the grounds she didn't like the guy anymore), married to a guy who sports nothing but Jesus t-shirts and Shitgibbon bumper stickers, had seen the photo, we were having a conversation on the phone, i was telling her about her grandsons and avoiding all the topics i always have, politics and religion, i never bring it up because we are on opposite sides, i am most definitely my father's son, always have been, but now and then she'll try to slip something in about it, her biggest worry is for the soul of her grandson, notice i only mentioned one which also drives home a point about her and her husband's hypocrisy... 

--- the background is that when the Imac was a toddler, roughly around 3 years old, he somehow unprovoked drew a picture of Jesus on the cross, complete with gaping wound in his side, a picture that is now framed and hung on their wall in a most prominent place... i had told my mother that it was not her job to teach my sons about religion, that when old enough they could decide for themselves but as we all know in order to indoctrinate one must get them young... add the fact that my mother has often given the vibe that she and her Jesus freak hubby knew how to raise the boyos better than their parents and one gets the drift... let's just say this didn't go down with the BW very well... and it definitely did not fucking fly with yours truly... the line the Imac has heard since he was a small child was that he had Jesus in his heart... the Imac has asked if he could set them straight and i've always told him to be cool but i've now told him feel free to tell them whatever he wants, he's 18, he's more than welcome to espouse his "beliefs"... (one may notice she doesn't say much about her other grandson, probably because he's produced no religious drawings...)

The conversation the ensued that fine September day suddenly went south when my mother caustically spat out , "i saw the picture of the BW and that horrible man..." and while i knew what was coming i played a bit dumb, who? i said, "Tampon Tim!" she shot back... now one may be surprised to discover this but i can be a bit of a handful, there are times when i can go from zero to hundred in a split second, more so in my younger days but the ability is still there and this was one of those times... i unloaded on the daft cow, yes i just called my mother a daft cow because when the shoe fits... honestly there was no reason to bring it up and if she did she could have done it much more tactfully, there was no need for the animosity, the vitriol, she could have stated that was neat or whatever or she could have kept her fucking mouth shut, it's not as if she doesn't know my stance, as i've told her before we can agree to disagree... that being said, she didn't shut up...

The Cliff Notes version is that El Kono went full El Kono and while i didn't exactly tell her to go fuck herself i basically told her to go fuck herself... i unloaded on her hypocrisy, how these bible thumping knuckeldraggers like her and her husband fawned all over a thrice divorced, porn star shagging, racist shitbag and asked her to square that with the one and only book she seems to ever pick up, she then said i should pick up that book and i explained that i wasn't into beating my slaves or my wife but that hey by that books standards my father and i should have been able to throw stones at her... she bleated about wanting things to be "how they used to be" to which i replied that she had made some dumb and horrible statements over the years but that one by far was fucking top of the list and it was the not so veiled racism inherent in it that set me off even more... once i get going the acid tongue does the rest... she was soon crying (crocodile tears- as i told her,, that ex-husband tipped me to all her tricks) and scrambling to get off the phone... that was three months ago... we hadn't spoken since other than an odd text and...

One fine early October day i was watching the afternoon futbol when there was a sudden banging on the door, startled i walked around the corner to find my mother and her husband standing there, all half-smiles, i was very polite and kind towards them and yet i could tell they were nervous, my mother not knowing what to expect from her son... needless to say they came in, Disaster did his best to run away which i found funny, suddenly getting the urge to go outside and shoot baskets, the car plastered with bumper stickers was parked out front, i watched as they walked around my house and surveyed the place, even more disconcerting was their attitude towards the BW, a distant and cold attitude that has not been witnessed before... my theory is my mother often thought the BW would bring Jesus into our sons' lives... really? while she may not be as outspoken as me about the uselessness of Western religions (christianity in particular) she is by no means a follower or fan of it... in what was a totally bizarre visit they were there and gone in maybe 20 minutes? baffling really even more so the fact they were downright rude to the BW... when said info was relayed to her eldest son he about blew a gasket, the Imac may drive his mother nuts and act like a real shit sometimes but no one, absolutely no one better mess with his mama... 

Fast forward to this week... my big sis turned 60 this week and so i called her up to wish her happy birthday... my sister and i are not close, never have been, she's been pissed since the day i came home from the hospital, she has never been that fond of me and has contended her whole life that i was the "favorite", for someone who claims to be so intelligent she has never once sat down and examined her own actions and where those had led her for most of her life but instead chooses to blame everything and anything... though i should add she did buy me a ticket to see David Bowie (1990 Sound and Vision Tour) which to this day was a pivotal event in my development as a human being (a post in itself) she's six years older and has vastly different social and political views than i do, a fact that baffled my father to his last breath, she is a racist and a fascist, married to a guy who owns a full Third Reich uniform as well as a few other "artifacts"... 

Big Sis seems to take much joy when my mom and i are on the outs and it was during the birthday call that i could hear the excitement in her voice when she stated i heard you're not talking to mom... i stated i have no problem talking to anyone but that i'm at an age where i don't feel the need to suffer fools... it was then that she said, "mom tells me you're into the communism and the socialism"... the way she said it made me chuckle, the socialism?... for most of my life all i've ever heard is how brilliant my sister is, i once told Pops i'd put my intelligence up against hers any day (not in some egomaniacal way) to which he replied that's a bold statement, i then elaborated on the fact intelligence is like a muscle and must be kept in shape and i often wonder how well she's doing with that especially with her slide towards the far right, though she's one of those clever enough to cloak her racist tendencies in veiled language, the kind i hear from white guys when no one of color is around... my sister has never lived more than three miles from the house we grew up in, i've lived all over, the backwoods of Wyoming and Pennsyltucky, the shit part of Ocean City, various hoods in the Burgh the type she would be aghast to to go, it's not as if we talk very often, in fact i really don't remember the last time we did, it's been a couple years at least but as i said we don't have much common ground other than our parents, one of whom is gone and was sad that his daughter had become what she had... i remember my father telling me he felt bad because he avoided talking to my sister because of her politics.. (it should be noted that my sister refused to go to my dad's apartment because of the "neighborhood"... i stayed in his place for a month, would walk to the restaurant down the street, was it the best hood? no... but it was better than some of the ones i had lived in so i didn't take much notice...)

As my sister and i began our "debate" about "the socialism and the communism", i wanted to laugh, i could hear the snark in her voice, i almost started to tell her a story, that her little brother was one of the biggest weed dealers in his city for a time (a capitalist wet dream if ever there was one) and that he had honed his people skills to a fine point, that it behooved me to understand when i was being bullshitted or lied to which led me to sniff out quite quickly that her whole line of questioning was nonsense... she wanted me to explain what communism and socialism were and i told her that she could study that on her own, that i called to say happy birthday and didn't feel the need to explain things that could be easily looked up, she pretended that she wanted to know and i reiterated my statement, of course my sister is of the belief that all the "welfare kings and queens" are non-white while making racist statements cloaked in her white privilege... at one point she mentioned that if you don't work you don't eat... odd coming from a stay at home parent living in America, even stranger still seeing that someone who is not religious was quoting the bible, Paul, and somewhat spouting a principle of "the communism" under certain regimes... 

The most telling aspect of the whole conversation though arose when it came to Tim Walz's son... my nephew is on the spectrum, for a long time my sister was an ant-vaxxer (still is actually) due to a study that linked vaccines to autism... an old study that was found to be complete bullshit, a doctor/researcher who was paid to come up with that very result and somehow passed off a study that was done on a handful of patients into people actually believing it... when it finally came out that he was paid to lie about it, his own admission (subsequently losing his medical license), i asked my sis what she thought about vaccines now, her answer was as vague as when i asked my mother if dinosaurs lived 6000 years ago, nuff said... 

My question to my sister was how does she support a party that openly mocked a kid, who while not exactly like her son, suffered from (for lack of a better word) a disability... (not to mention the orange shitgibbon and his mocking of a journalist, the good christian that he is)... her response told me all i really needed to know, not that i didn't know it anyway... she launched into a diatribe about how kids like that forced her kid to sit in the back of the bus (how she didn't say), how he wasn't non-verbal (proving that she didn't understand a thing about this kid's condition) and how someone should have told the kid to sit down... hmm, i wonder how my sister would have responded if someone had said that to her son, i remember her getting upset when people would stare at her son when he flapped (something kids on the spectrum do when stressed) but now it was perfectly okay to tell a kid who was excited for his father to sit down and shut up... funny how this shit works... and while i won't discount any of the work my sister has put in to help her son i'd also wager to say that most of his anxiety issues come from being under her thumb his whole life... 

At this point i was just trying to get off the phone mind you as i really only wanted so say happy birthday, i didn't want to have some political or philosophical debate particularly with someone who, just like her mother, wasn't concerned so much about facts as she was about her opinions, which she perceived as her facts, the root cause of my big sis's issues were not much different than a lot of people currently, in the simplest terms possible... she's a selfish cunt... and the truth is she has been for most of her life, growing up most of her issues/problems whatever stemmed from the wrongs the she perceived were done to her, very rarely if ever did i hear take any responsibility for shit, it was always someone else's fault that she was in the situation she was in... from not going off to school (the university had restrictions because she was only 17 but still accepted her, she also could have started in the spring term but threw a fit about it), from not moving out of her parents house until she was 27, from not getting a "wedding" because of our parents impending divorce, things have always been about her and what she didn't get and she gave little regard to anyone else... it's why it's why she's had practically no friends for the last forty-five years... 

(What my big sis doesn't know is that i'm under no illusions how she feels about me, yes there is no bond really, the closest there has ever been was when my father was sick but that was more working as a team to take care of him, but here's an interesting fact... for years my sis threw an Xmas party and for years i was never invited, in fact i didn't know about it until my dad told me one day, her reason was she didn't want my young children to upset her child, which of course was a steaming pile of bullshit seeing as there were other kids there... it's really i all i needed to know, and honestly it's cool, our gap in age made us both a bit like only children and as stated we were never close, she was pretty shit to me most of my childhood but it didn't have an effect on me other than to honestly feel sorry for her, even as a kid, she never seemed all that happy and still doesn't, there is a victim complex that gets old and at some point one either deals with shit and fixes things or wallows in their own self pity... she seems to enjoy the latter...)   

And so once again i look around and see what i've always known... i'm on my own in this universe, of course the fact is we are all on our own but we can try our best to love and help those around us to navigate this mortal coil cuz the fact is it will go by quicker than any of us care to admit... i also know i'm a bit of a special case, my dad always used to marvel at his son's ability to get through things, i'm a hard bastard but i'm working on it, particularly when it comes to my sons and especially the I-mac, i tend to go about these days smiling at strangers and being polite and kind, even though at times i want to clock a motherfucker in the mouth i remember the wu-wei, and in practicing said mindset sometimes the best way to be kind is to not be there at all... if that makes sense... sometimes inaction is the best action... so it goes... 

 

Last of the Great Boozers

 

There are not many of them left... the last of the proper bars, pubs, boozers, dives, whatever one wishes to call them and i can count myself lucky as having been a regular and not so regular patron at one of the greatest bars known to humankind, lately i've made it a point to get back to it even though i live a bit further away than i once did... at one time i lived a short drive from the joint, with a secret knowledge of backroads that let me basically get to and from the place while never having to worry about the police, yes i understand this was not the most responsible of things but back then (and maybe even now) i wasn't the most responsible of sorts.... but this place is like an old and comfortable shirt that one can put on, it always feels great and never seems to go out of style... 

It was on one of my recent trips to the place (i won't give the name but if one really wants to know i'll email it) that the bartender and i, an absolute fucking legend when it came to the art of bartending, were discussing when he started working there and when i started wandering in, the year was 1996... i sat there for a second and said, fucking hell, i've been coming here for more than half my life, over 28 years... i first became aware of the place when i was on the payroll of one Hippie Jack... Hippie Jack lived right up the hill from the place on a main boulevard, the no man's land as i called it, the perfect place for a guy slinging weed and acid (and later coke), the place where the truly down and out lived, the hood is one Polish Hill and the street Hippie Jack lived on separated Polish Hill from the Hill District, both hoods when i started patronizing the bar had seen better days, like most of the neighborhoods i hung in back then (i've often wanted to print up shirts about another hood in the Burgh reading I Hung Out in Lawrenceville When it was Dangerous... seeing as now it's been fully gentrified)... it was Hippie Jack who told how great the place was which was funny because he was a card carrying hippie, a Deadhead and Zappa freak while this place was squarely in the world of punk and post-punk and whatever else the cool kids were listening to... and yes i counted myself among those cool kids though we'd never cop to that cuz that wouldn't be cool, dig? 

Oddly enough i never went to the place with Hippie Jack or ever actually saw him there, in fact by the time i really started hanging there Hippie Jack was dead, my friend a well documented casualty of the first wave of pure and cheap heroin... his wake was held at this bar... it was around this time that i had become a well known face to both my favorite bartender and the owner, the owner not much older than me who may or may not have been in the same game as i was (sort of) and who was wise enough to sink his money into real estate, buying this bar and several other properties in the neighborhood while shit was still cheap, these days it ain't so cheap anymore and one can probably guess where this is going... 

So what in fact makes this a great bar? the greatest bar i've ever had the privilege of frequenting... well it obviously starts with the world's greatest bartender but there is more... like a fucking absolutely stellar jukebox, in fact even to this day there is no "internet jukebox" in the place, there was one for a month or two but when the new kids started playing shit music it was quickly axed and the old one reinstalled... the music on it is fucking brilliant, it's the old flip type juke where you press the button and the CDs flip past, all of them curated by employees or patrons, there are almost no full albums but there are too many brilliant songs to count, in fact just the other night i walked in to Joy Division playing, when the juke stopped i walked over and put some money in and played songs by Can, the Misfits, Motley Crue (the owner's favorite band), Velvet Underground, Jesus and Mary Chain, The Stooges, The Replacements and the Buzzcocks, just to name a few, it's eclectic in the best sense of the word, one would be hard pressed to find a shit tune on it, the CDs all have hysterical names like Fuck Your Feelings or Communism Sucks designed to piss off or crack up whoever may be pouring money into it... it's fucking fantastic... 

What else? well let's start with the fact it's one of the last boozers anywhere that one can still smoke in, not that i have touched a cigarette in ages but i am of a certain age... back in the day one could almost retrace their steps, identify the bars they were in, by the aroma on their clothes... back in the day this place would be so smoky on weekend nights you could barely see, it's not like that anymore but the fact is you can still light up (and it makes it much easier to hit the weed pen which i do rather regularly when i'm there), i'm not even sure if it's actually legal to let people smoke, when the law was finally passed there were the usual battles, somehow one could still smoke in the casino and many of the bar owners protested saying it gave said casino and unfair advantage, i'm not sure one can smoke in the casino anymore but there are still a few bars that allow it and they just so happen to be my favorite ones, there is one in Lawrenceville that still allows it, another legendary hangout though not quite on par with this place though it definitely tried to be (it's not coincidence the guy who bought the place once worked at the bar i'm writing about)... so while most of the Millennials and Gen Z set will never have the pleasure of breathing massive amounts of second hand smoke or waking up smelling like an ashtray in the morning they can still get a taste of it if they know where to look... 

The beauty of this place is the fact that it's now been there for multiple generations, the old heads like me can rub elbows and converse with the kids and it's always interesting to watch the kids be cool and act like no one had ever done this before, luckily i can say i was pretty much in from the beginning at this place, started frequenting it shortly after the owner took it over and turned it into the beautiful dive it has become, as an old head i'm afforded a certain amount of respect by the kids, a funny thing cuz i think i'm still one, but they see how the bartender and some of the long time staff and patrons treat me, sometimes they hear stories about what a fucking maniac i used to be, how the old bouncer was scared to death of having to deal with me on my drug and booze fueled nights but the reality is it's a beautiful thing to watch the generations shoot the shit, trade stories, talk music or drugs or any number of things... 

There is the graffiti of the bathroom (above photo) and backroom walls, like a history of hipsters wrought out in magic marker on walls that no one bothers to repaint anymore, i believe they were repainted once, roughly twenty odd years ago but now have been dutifully marked up... the back room has been host to many a local and even national bands (recently a killer crew from Cincy called the Drins, i caught a great and i believe no defunct band called Merchandise there, The Eddy Current Suppression Ring from Australia played there one night, as well as many of the "rock stars and actors" who hear about the place and stop by thinking they'll get the rock star treatment... they don't, which is hysterical, one would think by now the word would be out and they'd know better but they don't, see the night Russell Crowe showed up only to be constantly referred to as Mel Gibson or Mad Max... even better is the fact the back room, on weeknights or non-band weekend nights, has a pool table and ping pong table and a pinball machine, all of which have been there since i started drinking there, i've played more than a few epic games of ping pong, (it's surprising how competitive the cool kids can get when it comes to shit like ping pong) as well as many an hour drinking and playing pinball, it's the type of place i can walk in by myself and speak to no one or end up in deep or meaningless conversations...

Most importantly it was a place with a "lock-in", if one was in the know, when last call came around one didn't have to leave, the regular folks were shuffled out the door but there would always be 20 or so of us who were allowed to stay, black shades were drawn to cover the windows, the door was locked and jukebox turned down, we couldn't "buy" drinks but could tip heftily and one could stay until the birds were singing their morning tunes, i've stood behind the bar towards 5am pouring people beers and sweeping up, it's a glorious fucking existence let me tell you, the barfly night owls of the world all hanging out and laughing, sharing the drugs that were left, having that last drink, then heading off into the early morning to get breakfast or go to bed... 

It's also one of those places with a sneaky good kitchen, a kitchen that has long served the fare of the hoods namesake, Polish Hill, where the pierogies are local and excellent, the kielbasa made locally and an assortment of wings that are fucking stellar (the Old Bay and butter being my favorite), yes one can get almost any fried app and the fact is one doesn't come here for dinner but when the munchies, booze or otherwise, kick in there is always something to satisfy... and it won't set you back a ton either..

Which brings us to the next bit... or what i call the "whitening" aka gentrification... i've written about this before, years ago actually when the dreaded little disease had come to Lawrenceville and began gobbling up that neighborhood, what was once a working class neighborhood in the shadows or more correctly ghost, of a shuttered steel mill was then becoming the new hip spot to live, one could still get cheap houses, there were still dive bars and local restaurants and one could argue there still are it's just  now many of the houses have been bought up and remodeled, a house that once went for $70,000 now runs roughly $350,000 or more, granted this has taken 15 years or so but one gets the idea... part of it was the new Children's Hospital that went along with a huge cancer center up the road in Bloomfield/Shadyside, my old hoods, which brought in a ton of professionals looking to move closer to their work, in fact when i put my little old house in Bloomfield up for sale it took exactly one day for it to sell, i had multiple offers, over a dozen people look at it, and that was all within 24 hours of hitting the market, one could walk to the either one of these hospitals and that didn't even include the other one (where the boyos were both born) up the street from me... and while Lawrenceville is still a great neighborhood it's insane how much it's changed, high end condos in every available old warehouse or building that was once used for industry, others razed and built with "luxury apartments" and while i understand it's supposedly good for the city and all it's not good for everyone... see those displaced by increased taxes and land value and made offers on houses they have lived in for years... at this point the gentrification is complete and there's not many (if any) affordable houses left... 

LoLa, as it's called, just about touches the one end of Polish Hill, a tiny hood (Lawrenceville being the biggest in the city) but one that has always been a haven for cheap living, hipsters and hoods all sharing the same space... that is until recently... now it's being gobbled up and changing, part of the beauty of Polish Hill were the three local boozers and a few locally owned shops, it was a cool little hood tucked away in a hillside and easily accessible to the everything, honestly i'm surprised it's taken this long... one is a short drive/bicycle ride away from downtown, Oakland (see University of Pittsburgh) and the Shadyside/Bloomfield/LoLa medical industrial complex, in short a brilliant location... but things have begun to change and not necessarily for the better... 

The aforementioned bars and businesses are what made this neighborhood, it's a gem, (not to mention the famous Polish church the pope once visited) but now the money is moving in... on returning to my all-time favorite boozer on a somewhat regular basis (which means once or twice a month for the old geezer) i was floored by all the remodeled row houses, all gutted and refurbished, the new apartments, the fact one of the bars at the one end of the neighborhood has gone full sports bar/yuppy enclave... of course my bar and one up the street haven't changed but the bar up the street has one advantage, it's on a corner and not smack dab in the middle of a residential street, now it appears the asshole who bought the house next to the bar has become the biggest proponent of getting my favorite boozer shut down.. the place is the reason a lot of people loved this hood, had kept this neighborhood viable when no one wanted to come here and yet some rich asshole moves in and suddenly it's got to go... granted the bar owner had built up a cache of goodwill and a large number of supporters but the resident dickhead is just waiting for a fuck-up so he can scream nuisance bar and shutter the place... fuck him in no uncertain terms... 

Of course on the lot to the left of the bar the old building has been demolished and of course a new house/apartments will be built which i'm sure will bring more pressure on my beloved boozer, none of the new residents would be the type to frequent this type of establishment i'm guessing, which is probably good, the cigarette smoke, the occasional patron in the bathroom stall doing blow (which warms this old wastoid's heart as in my youth, well let's just say i'm not unfamiliar with car keys in a bathroom stall) would i'm sure disgust the fucking yuppie scum who have infiltrated the neighborhood... and yes that's what i call them, hell i'd love to have a bar like this anywhere in my lily white suburb but alas i do not, not even close, it ain't that cool out here... but at least i know that i can get into the city and get back to my roots and i'll be damned if i'm gonna let some wanker try to shutter my favorite boozer... but for now it's steady as she goes, i'll pull up a seat at the bar, drink my Red Stripe and hit the weed pen, play my tunes, maybe have some of those delicious wings and enjoy this lovely island of misfit toys that i have patronized for close to 30 years... (fuck i'm old) 

State of the Nation - Apocalypse Edition

 "The government you elect is the government you deserve."  - Thomas Jefferson... and so here we are... there will be no sugarcoating the shit show that is about to ensue, i've seen this quote quite a bit lately, along with this one,  a Turkish proverb, "When a clown enters the palace he doesn't become a king, the palace becomes a circus."  What is about to happen is anyone's guess but that smart money will be that nothing that is about to happen is going to be good, it will not turn out how all the minions dreaming in trailers or their mother's basement or at church group think (the most googled question post election was what is a tariff? and can i change my vote? these muppets don't even understand what they voted for)... in fact we are quite possibly staring into the abyss, the end of a grand experiment, the WGP (white grievance party aka gop) will now have two years to rig the game as best they can, granted there is a glimmer of hope as this gang has proved a bit like a bunch of rich kids fighting over who gets to sit where at the lunch table, who gets which title, who is daddy's favorite, it may toss a money wrench in some but not all of their grand plans... but will it matter? The collective stupidity of a nation can be summed up in who they elect, Jefferson was right, and this time there is no excuse of manipulating the system, the Idiot King won the popular vote, the good people of what has become the foremost shithole country in the world have seen fit to put the Orange Shitgibbon back in power, a man in clear and obvious cognitive decline, a man who has been described by his "friends" as a fucking moron, a guy who doesn't understand basic math, can't read, drinks water like a toddler and apparently wears a diaper (see the odd video of Faux and Fiends where he sits on a black cushion instead of the white couch)... but the truly frightening part is the real Machiavellian menace is lying stealthily behind the Idiot King... 

When your own family refers to you as a fascist it should be a clue to the rest of us, particularly when the family in question is Jewish, little Stevie Miller and the rest of the gang, the Project 2025 crew are the truly disturbing ones... these people are both intelligent and evil and believe their worldview should be imposed on everyone, they are a mirror image of those regimes they swear are our sworn enemies but something tells me late at night they get on video calls with each other and wank into hankies talking about their plans... the fact is these shitbags know exactly how to handle the Idiot King aka Orange Shitgibbon... how? well the easiest and most effective way to get an ignorant raging narcissist to do what you want, especially one as mentally deficient as the Idiot King, is to make him believe he came up with the plan and then gush and fawn all over him about how brilliant he is... sadly, it really is that simple... yeah, i know, shit looks bleak... 

So how did we get here? easy really, for years there has been a systematic gutting of education by a certain party and as those who read certain books can tell you the dumber and more distracted the populace the easier they are to control and manipulate (one can start with Orwell and Fromm), now i'm not going to sit here and blame anyone though if that was my intent there is definitely enough to go around, one could even start with the Democratic Party which seems time and again to be more than capable of fucking up a one car parade and never understanding how to reach the people they need to reach, how to message, that the world we live in watches podcasts and bits of info on TikTok, which to a luddite like me who actually reads is anathema, the brain is much more mentally engaged when reading but as is quite obvious in the shithole country reading is not high on the agenda.... add in that i'll cross reference and check media bias of the articles i read and i understand that i'm in a very small minority... so in an effort to understand let's take a look at the lovely electorate that handed the keys to the house back to the Idiot King... 

First and foremost, and believe me when i say this is not meant to be in any misogynistic or sexist way, but white women... i mean what the fuck? the suburban soccer mom set went hard for a serial sex offender who brags about taking rights away from your gender, who has now created an army of sycophants running around and screaming "your body, my choice" in the face of women and girls, who has "bros" running the show behind the scenes who in all honesty want to turn this country into the Handmaid's Tale, their little project is damn near looking to turn back the clock to when women couldn't get their own credit cards, bank accounts or file for divorce... and yet over half the white women who voted voted for this... the myth that abortions are all due to heathens copulating to in Satanic rituals and then killing babies and not understanding that the vast majority of abortions are to safe the life of the mother (and possibly allow her to have another child) when a pregnancy isn't viable or doesn't take or is endangering the life of the mother (a life apparently secondary to a cluster of cells) all because a bunch of fucking morons believe that their ghost said some nonsense about the sanctity of life... mind you over the millennia this same group has slaughtered countless individuals in the name of said ghost but hey that's different, erm, somehow... to start on a theme that will be repeated ad nauseum this post... people voting against their own interest Exhibit A... 

And now entering the stage, the white working class and union members who voted for the Idiot King and his minions... the Idiot King has gone on the record talking about how much he hates paying overtime, how much he hates organized labor, how he'd hand unmitigated power to the so-called captains of industry like First Lady Elon, in fact if anyone had any doubts about this, those 1%ers saw their wealth explode by over $65 billion in the day or so after the election... i wonder how much those working class rubes net worth increased over that same time? i'm guessing nowhere near that and yes i called them rubes because they fucking got played... the fact is in the first shit show the only thing that got passed in the first two years, with both houses controlled by the Idiot King's party, was a massive tax cut for the rich, now the podcast crew will tell you that "all merkins" got a tax cut but that doesn't actually hold water when put under the microscope and while that would be a separate post or four the fact is the blue collar white working class boys and the service workers of the world got duped when they heard no tax on tips or overtime, a basic understanding of tax law will demonstrate that this would be a fucking mess and almost impossible to implement... of course i refer to Lt. Aldo Raine (from Inglorious Basterds) when he says, "when we hear a story that's true good to be true... it ain't... ) once again if one plies the masses with bullshit while keeping them distracted with football and beer one can easily manipulate said masses (what was that line about a circus?)... in fact in my current home state, which i had my doubts about when it came to intelligence, we are on the cusp of putting a guy who has lost multiple elections for every office he ran for previously into the Senate, a guy who was the CEO of the world's biggest hedge fund and made his money in China (and had no problem making money from  fentanyl producers)... but hey these people have this groups best interest at heart don't they? did i fail to mention he lives in Connecticut and not Pennsyltucky...  Exhibit B of people voting against their own interests... 

Of course white bread chickenshit crackers do not have the market cornered on groups voting against their own interest... now entering the stage... people of color, the non-white groups who voted for a guy who has said "that migrants are poisoning the blood of our nation..." hmm, think i've heard that somewhere before... the Idiot King has spent no small amount of time demonizing any and every non-white group he can, when it comes to the Hispanic and Latino community it's simply mind boggling that anyone would vote for a man who has openly stated he will begin mass deportations on day one... the whole "i'm okay cuz i'm here legally or was born here" rationale will go right out the window once and if the roundup begins, they WGP gestapo won't be asking if you're a citizen or not, you'll be bussed back to (insert Central or South American country or Mexico here) without so much as the secret police batting an eye... of course the "migrant problem" was a big thing for the aforementioned white bread chickenshit cracker set but wait until these fucking muppets find out just how many jobs, jobs no cracker would or probably could do, suddenly go unfilled, when the price of fruits and vegetables go up, when they can't get a new roof or landscaping done for the McMansion, when the restaurant is backed up and understaffed cuz the back of the house has no employees, oh wait until Karen (both male and female Karens) have to wait longer or can't get things done... many of my fellow countryman have fled countries like Cuba back in the day only to vote for something akin to the guy they were trying to flee from... Exhibit C in people voting against their own interests... 

Exhibit D is those black men who thought it would be a good idea to vote for the Idiot King, they may have wanted to ask the Central Park Five about that, but yet a number of black men thought the Idiot King, who once again has never been shy about his racism, see his disparaging remarks about his opponent and the DEI hire bullshit, see "black jobs" or what is commonly known as pitting one minority group against another, when the insinuation is that those "migrants" will be stealing up all the dishwashing and janitor jobs, or what the WGP considers "black jobs"... and let us not forget that the Orange Shitgibbon and his daddy were once successfully sued for basically being racist assholes and not renting to people of color or charging more when they had to rent to them... as all these groups are about to find out if there is one thing the Idiot King is an absolute master at it's the art of bullshit, he'll say whatever (often times saying shit that is complete non-sense... a golfer's cock, simulating fellatio, swaying moronically to Ave Maria cuz no artist will give him permission to use their music, the feasting on pets, Hannibal Lecter, fucking hell just typing drives home the point of just how stupid the fucking populace of this country is...) but once in power will do nothing that he's promised and will openly and most likely enact (or try to) policies that will fuck these groups over... he already has in some cases and yet they still voted for him... honestly when shit goes belly up i won't be surprised if they blame Biden... 

But alas our beloved shithole country is a melting pot... or at least in theory, and so we have even more groups voting against their own interests... Exhibit E and F please step forward... maybe i'm getting old and jaded, instead of young and jaded i guess, but i've often found it funny how those young super-lefties focused on one issue and let that sway them into voting or better yet not voting at all... yes i heard the kids bitching about the conflict in Palestine and how the current administration wasn't doing enough or was doing too much for one side and yet i what i would like to ask is... what did you expect? we are not a direct participant (yes i know we outfit the Israeli military) but we can only do so much and the fact is if you think the Idiot King is going to do any better you're flat out fucking wrong, the worst thing to happen to the Palestinian people is his election and he'll back Bibi in whatever sort of strongman tactics he wants to perpetrate, these fucking kids don't seem to get it, international diplomacy isn't an exact science and is downright fucking difficult... but hey let's vote for Jill Stein or not at all or even for the Idiot King cuz that'll show 'em... for fuck sake... 

Not to be left behind our all those lovely vets as well... don't get me wrong, i saw a number of signs stating that some vets were steadfastly against the Orange Shitgibbon, and why shouldn't they be? about the closest this fat buffoon ever came to exercise was dodging the draft on his "bone spurs" and boasting about it, he openly insulted every service member ever by calling them "suckers and losers", disparaged decorated vets, insulted Gold Star families and yet i still saw a multitude of signs that state Veterans for the Shitgibbon, honestly? are you fucking kidding? of course some of those people may be the ones googling if they can change their votes as everyone's favorite spoiled Hindu rich kid has now come out and stated that the VA needs to be trimmed by $120 billion or so... a pharma bro who doesn't have a fucking clue but has licked enough ass to get a cushy position to help push his worldview, basically thank you for your service now fuck off... 

And last but not least i give you Exhibit X... yes my generation, a generation i used to be almost proud to be a part of, well i ain't so fucking proud anymore... when the numbers were crunched it told the story of how the 45-64 year old vote went heavy for the Idiot King i about fucking choked... what in the everlovingfuck were these asshats thinking? that age group firmly encompasses GenX and the fact the majority of it went for the Orange Shitgibbon fucking disgusts me, for all the bitching and moaning i've heard over the past decade from the GenX crowd, disparaging the Boomers for their selfish and greedy behavior, guess what? we ain't no fucking better!! this whole "i got mine" shit fucking disgusts me, we can come down off our fucking crosses as we'll need the wood for the fire once the Shitgibbon and his minions are back at the reins, we have no moral high ground, take your fucking stories of being home when the streetlights came on or being latch-key kids and stuff them up your fucking asses! we've just fucked all the kids coming behind us, the shit we said we wouldn't do cuz we whined about how the Boomers did it to us, how we were gonna be the first generation to do worse than their parents and blah blah bliggety fucking blah... well i guess we'll bestow that honor to the Millenials and Gen Z set, yeah tell the kids to suck it cuz we had it so tough and we're so fucking cool, we partied all night and still went to work and whatever other fucking myth half these GenX social media influencers  like to peddle, right there tells me all i need to know, i was the fucking dunce for believing my generation might actually do some good, of course the hardcore GenX crowd will tell you this generation is too small to have an effect, fuck that, it's more booze to soothe their sellout soul, we're no better than what came before us and for that we should fucking be hanging our heads in shame... 

So welcome the the kleptocracy, the the corporate oligarchy, where a billionaire beta boy known as First Lady Elon tells the working folks they're gonna have to deal with some hardships... but as Jefferson said, you get what you vote for and the majority of those who bothered to vote thought this reality show would be "fun", "get us back on track", it's amazing how little people grasp, now kids buckle up because the shit show at the shithole is about to begin, with any luck and a not complete bumbling fuck fest the blue party might actually be able to win back a chamber of congress in two years... or we may not have elections at all... one really can't tell at this point, all i really know is what history has shown us... every empire falls and one of the surefire signs of an empire in decline is the rise of an Idiot King, now we have our own... it was fun while it lasted but in short... we're fucked. 

 

The Wilderness Years - Gainfully Unemployed

 I drove home singing at the top of my lungs, what a brilliant fucking day! i had effectively gotten myself laid off from my job while also being able to collect unemployment... i was a fucking conservative politicians worst nightmare, i needed unemployment bennies like i needed an asshole on my elbow but damn if i wasn't going to take them... i got home and immediately called the unemployment office and began the process of filing my paperwork... and from what i had understood the system had changed, i remember a few years back working the bagel store and guys coming in and asking for an application and the managers signature, it actually made one work to find employment which was the goal i guess... if you were a fucking square and i guess there were a lot of those out there, i knew guys who lost their mind if they didn't have work, i for one was not one of those guys, i was perfectly happy doing nothing, if i could scrape enough cash together for booze and a bit of drugs i was good... these days that wasn't even remotely a problem... the fact was i was now almost eight years removed from my college graduation, in that time i had turned down three jobs in advertising to go to the beach to surf and write poetry... other meaningless occupations were a bagel store clerk, dishwasher, stock boy, French Fry maker, 7-11 clerk, failed grad student and warehouse grunt... for most of that time my actual occupation was weed dealer... 

Back to the bennies... the system was a breeze now, i didn't even need signatures anymore, every week i called into an automated system and answered a few questions... was i looking for work? yes (i lied), was i able to work? yes, had i worked more than 20 hours? no... and that was it, every two weeks they'd send me my checks, a laughable sum of money to be honest, much less than i was making at the warehouse but as previously stated it was all for show, to make me look like an upstanding citizen... or as close to one as i could... bounding up the steps to my apartment i walked smiling and told the waitress that i had been laid off, i could tell this was not exactly the  news she wanted to hear as she was not a fan of my current occupational status, in fact it was another of the reasons i worked out of the apartment more, and to be fair she had a point though i don't think the local law and order set would have given two shits, she wanted nothing to do with it which was perfectly fine by me and with my expanding business i got it, hence why i cut the foot traffic down to the weight crew, she could disappear into the bedroom while i went into my bedroom/office and handled things... this new development though worried her and i knew it, the sense of normalcy, which granted was mostly a charade, was thrown off, with no job i'd be lounging around and doing my thing, granted at this point there wasn't much she could say, she was making decent enough money and saving even more cuz for the most part i was covering expenses, yeah we split the bills (at her insistence) but as for entertainment i paid for all of it, going out to dinner? i paid, i didn't care, i had more cash than i knew what to do with and i didn't forget the times, particularly grad school and the last summer at the beach, when i was broke and it was her helping me out, keeping me fed, handing me a few bucks for beers... 

That night there was quite the party down at the Little Corner Bar, being a Thursday it was a work night but it was also a celebration, a party to my new status as gainfully unemployed! i bought drinks and tipped like a rapper with a hit single... i was well on my way to wasted, around 11pm with business wrapped up i hopped in my car and drove the two blocks to Chez Anthony's, Red was working and i walked in smiling like the butcher' dog as the great Mike Lange used to say, i informed her that i had been laid off and that our morning workouts could begin again whenever we wanted, she was rubbing against me and whispered in my ear, see you tomorrow morning, i smiled back and said yes you will... i pulled up a seat at the stage and spread the money around, by this time i was a regular at the club, a bit of a legend due to my adventures with Veronica coupled with Red spinning stories about what a lovely guy i was... to be fair, i was not, i was a bastard doing whatever i wanted, whatever pleased me in the moment, a hedonist, a prick pretending to be a prince... i was hood rich and hood famous and got away with murder for the most part... i passed out more cash and then drove home... 

I quietly crept in to my place, the cats all stirred and came by for a leg rub and some pets, the Waitress rolled over and went back to sleep while i went into my office to sort out the money, as usual it had been a good night, truth be told i was in the red for the day due to my excessive tipping and buying drinks for anyone and everyone, what did i care? the money was pouring in, currently i didn't leave the apartment without a few hundred in spending cash, just in case something popped up, these days Xanax and Valium were making the rounds, readily available, not to mention the oxys, percs, vikes... and yes i dabbled in all of it, i'd score a few painkillers for when the hangover needed more than just weed and the Xanax and Valium were becoming sweeties for a night on the town or when the paranoia got thick and i needed to relax... better living through chemistry or something like that... with the accounting done i sat back and relaxed, the apartment was quiet, i gazed out the window onto the street, i drank some water and crept into bed and promptly passed out...

Dawn on the first day of unemployment, the hangover indicated it had been a good night, i had slept through the Waitress getting up and going to work, around 9 or so with the sun streaming in through the windows i rolled out of bed and got myself together, made some coffee then hopped into the car and rolled over to Red's place, as usual she was in bed naked and i strolled into her bedroom and immediately undressed, she rolled towards me and we began our festivities, two hours later i was out the door, i grabbed some food on the way home, took a shower and then went back to bed for a little, it had been a pretty nice first day for the gainfully employed weed king of North Oakland... 

The afternoon i cleaned up a bit, hung out with my cats, and as usual started fielding calls... Metal Jerry had arrange to stop by, i think he was nervous about the situation and wanted to make sure he got five more pounds in case something happened, though i assured him nothing was going to happen, i wanted to tell him that with what he paid and what he made that even if it went tits up he'd easily have over twelve grand in hand by the time he had flipped his five pounds, he was smart enough to stretch that until he got a new job but he would relax soon enough, in fact as time went on he would settle in nicely to the role of unemployed weed dealer, it was a prime gig to say the least... 

And so it began... i was 30 years old and living the life... talking to my old man i knew he was worried, not that i didn't have a job but the fact i wasn't all that concerned in finding one, he wasn't stupid, he knew his kid was into something and he probably had a good idea of what... but as he used to state, as long as he didn't get a call from jail or the morgue he'd figure i was doing okay... and he was right... my dad and my uncle once sat in their old apartment with me discussing my situation, i believe at the time i still had dreads and had begun to stack enough cash as to be a bit more comfortable, not in the way i was now but overall... they had dubbed me the "Perfect Barbarian", it was a compliment and i remember my uncle saying to me that if i had an income independent of the system, meaning an illegal source of income, i would be the Perfect Barbarian, in retrospect i think he was trying to get me to say something to the effect that i did but instead i just smiled, nodded my head and said yeah i guess i would be... if i did... then i laughed... 

The Wilderness Years - Lucky Breaks pt. 3

 What does it mean to be beholden to nothing? the word is freedom... but there are many different types of freedom and while my main source of income was the one that would easily get the most common type of freedom taken away it also provided me with another type of freedom, it gave me the ability to not give a flying fuck about any "job" at this point in my life, there were few gigs out there that would pay what i was earning each week, in fact had i put my college degree to work i still would not have been making the kind of cash i was slinging weed... so once again it was the old yin-yang, the positive and the negative, the risk and the reward... but back at the old warehouse i understood perfectly that i was not in a position like anyone else here... Metal Jerry realized he wasn't in as tough as a spot as some as he had taken to the game like a stripper to a fat line, hell he could have been rookie of the year as he went from a half pound to five or more pounds in no time, he was also smart enough to bank a chunk of money and not go hog wild tossing loot around... as for me i was in that rarified air, free from corporate masters and their demands, free from having to give a shit, if i didn't want to do something i said so, what could they do? nothing that mattered, i didn't care if i was shitcanned, i had successfully taken any and all leverage the bosses possessed... 

And then came a cool and sunny Thursday morning, late March (2001), a day that would warm to a pleasant early spring afternoon... the skeleton crew were all punching in and beginning our day, we'd been called up to the new warehouse twice in the first three days and there was much grumbling about the bullshit especially as the loose lips of the chosen ones, see the lumpen-proles already moved to the new joint, began to let slip about the new pay packet they were getting, remember District Dickhead loved this place, we were his all-star team, a bright and shiny star in his kingdom, something he obviously took full credit for when talking to his superiors, as if this fucking clown could pull an order or check in a truck, he spent most of his days ambling about in a ridiculous sweater vest while pretending to give a shit about we lumpen-proles... we were about an hour in to the day when Guy came over the intercom calling myself, Metal Jerry, Bug-eyed Steve to the receiving area, of course we all knew what was coming... 

The three of us stood in receiving waiting for Guy as Buzzo laughed and said, "off you go again"... i smiled and said, not today Buzzo... then Guy walked through the sales door and gave us the news, DD wanted us to head up to the new place to help out... Guy could tell we were all pretty much fed up and said he understood, he thought it was bullshit too and then i said, you know what... i'm not going... i could tell by Guy's face this was the last thing he wanted to hear but was actually cool about it... i then said, all those cats up there gotta raise while we got jack shit, as far as i know none of us had agreed to go up there and DD (i used his actual name) had said it was okay if we stayed here and once we got closer to closing down then we could make our decision, it's forty more minutes round trip not to mention the extra gas, no offense but i'm not making enough money to drive that much further three or four times a week... behind Guy i could see Buzzo silently laughing about my not making enough money, it was amazing i kept a straight face, it was an Oscar worthy performance... Guy looked at Metal Jerry and Bug-Eyed Steve, the both nodded and said they weren't going either... 

Guy sighed and said he understood while adding he really didn't feel like giving DD the news, he then turned around and walked back toward the sales counter, the three of us stood there commiserating and Metal Jerry looked at me and asked, "the connection is solid right? we should be good?"... i smiled at him and said, fucking-a right my friend, we're good... we stood bullshitting for a few minutes when Guy popped his head back in and told us that DD was raging and had said he would be down to speak with us personally, i actually started laughing, what an honor! i said and went back to checking in merchandise, i then made sure to go and score a small work knife that i'd been eyeing up and run it out to my car, not that i knew what was going to happen but the vibe we got from Guy was it wasn't good, the DD appeared incensed that some lumpen-proles would defy his edicts and we were about to suffer his wrath... fuck him is all i could think, fucking clown in a sweater vest sporting a bad mustache, he could get fucked...

The morning dragged on, i ate lunch, i could tell that Metal Jerry and Bug-Eyed Steve were sweating it, worried about what was to come, each time Guy walked back into the warehouse they'd ask if he'd heard from the DD and he said not since he'd talked to him that morning... it wasn't until after lunch that he walked in, attempting to do his best hard guy impersonation... i've always found it funny in the working world how guys further up the ladder of corporate non-sense somehow think they're more masculine or tough than those down at the bottom, i'd have paid  $500 to see DD unload a pallet of metal fittings on a cherry picker twenty feet in the air, those boxes weighed anywhere from 50-75lbs a piece, maybe forty to a skid, sometimes four or five on a truck, fact was he couldn't do it, he'd be lucky to unload five of those boxes as the cherry picker swayed from the weight, i wasn't impressed by his paycheck, it gave him no dominion over me, but it seems that's the culture and i've a history of unsettling bosses by once again having a good vocabulary, it fucks with them, not that i'm some fucking genius cuz i ain't but i understand the system and how to work it... 

The big moment finally arrived when the DD stuck his head into the warehouse and barked, "i want to see you three in the break room now!"... now i'm sure this was supposed to have the effect of us shitting our pants, the big boss was angry oh no what should we do... i could tell it worked on Metal Jerry and Bug-Eyed Steve, they looked a bit sheepish as they filed into the break room, i on the other hand entered with the look of complete indifference with a dash of pissed... we all sat down as DD paced the front of the room working himself up to a berating, i watched as MJ and BES shifted nervously in their seats, i sat there wondering if should ask if this was our break cuz it was bullshit if it was... it was the usual power dynamic, DD stood so he could be hovering over us and we were supposed to sit there like small schoolchildren and listen to the headmaster speak.... and so it began... 

From the outset he was projecting anger, his tone was shitty and borderline condescending as he stalked the front of the room, Metal Jerry and Bug-Eyed Steve kept glancing at me, it was obvious that i was the ringleader, a fact DD picked up on... that's when the fun really began, for the King of North Oakland as least, i had locked in on DD with the famous thousand yard stare, in fact one would have thought that DD had just beat me for a few pounds of grass and i was listening to his bullshit story, i was glaring at him as if i might get up out of my seat and beat the fucking piss out of him and he realized it... it was comical, it was a happy accident and the glare came more from me not giving a shit and this asshat wasting my time but the fact was it was truly unnerving him, he began to stumble over his words and was having trouble keeping up his hard guy act... what had began as a tirade against our most heinous crime of insubordination, of not dutifully bowing our heads and obeying his command, had softened considerably towards the end as he started his bullshit all-star team schtick, how he wants to keep the team together and blah blah fucking blah... it was then he asked if we had anything to say... of course the other two looked over at me... 

Yeah, i said, as a matter of fact we do... i kept the glare intact as i started talking in a firm and matter of fact way about all the shit he had spewed... when we were informed of this merger, i said, we were told we'd be given a choice and the fact is we clearly weren't, we didn't agree to go up to the new place and were told we could stay put for the time being, then each day we come in and are told to drive another twenty minutes up the road where we find out that all the guys up there have gotten raises and other benefits while we got nothing, no mileage or extra money for gas, not even a thank you, i know i've been putting extra gas in for the last few weeks going back and forth and the truth is the extra time and money doesn't square with what i make, there was no incentive for us, it basically seems like we were lied to about the whole thing and treated like second class employees, so yes i do have an issue, and also, i gestured to my two coworkers, we do have a problem with things and i for one will not be going back up to the new place... 

I sat back in  my chair and kept the glare locked on DD as he stood sheepishly at the front of the break room and looked around, he then looked towards Metal Jerry and Bug-Eyed Steve and asked if they were on the same page as i was, they both quietly mumbled yes and Metal Jerry gave a soft spoken reiteration about what i had stated about the pay and time and what not... DD then sighed and said, well... i didn't want this to happen, i was really hoping to keep the team together... there was a pause and then he said, but i'm going to have to let you guys go, lay you off, you can file for unemployment as you were laid off through no fault of your own, but that's it... sitting there it was all i could do from jumping out of my seat and screaming, fuck yeah!!! but i remained calm and asked should we punch out then? DD said no but we could leave and he'd pay us for the rest of the day (almost two whole hours, how sweet of him) and then the meeting was adjourned... 

We left the meeting, Guy and Dwayne both walked over to the three of us and asked what happened, i said he just laid us all off... Dwayne looked like someone had shit in his mouth, he just laid off all of you? he said... yeah i said, effective immediately... that fucking asshole, Dwayne growled, he just laid off  our whole crew... the DD had just reduced the current warehouse staff to Dwayne, Guy, Buzzo and two counter guys, meaning from here on out Dwayne and Guy would be doing our jobs and they knew it... Guy shook his head and said he was going to call the our coked up manager to tell him the news, DD had gone all sad face, pretending to fucking care and who knows maybe he did, i didn't, but he beelined for his car and got the fuck outta Dodge... i was wasting no time getting my shit and bolting lest DD change his mind... by this time i couldn't keep the grin off my face... Metal Jerry walked over and asked if i was sure things would be cool, supply wise, and i told him not to worry, we're fucking solid... i walked in and shook hands with the counter guys, told Buzzo to take it easy, told Guy it had been fun and gave a so long wave to Dwayne, then i jumped off the loading dock and headed towards my car... 

Walking through the parking lot i looked up at the blue sky, fluffy white clouds randomly tossed about, a nice breeze, it was a gorgeous day... i was most pleased, i didn't know what was going to happen in that meeting when i opened my mouth, i can honestly say i wasn't trying or expecting to get let go but the fact of the matter was this was like a Chrimbo come early, what a gift, six months of unemployment, six fucking months! it meant all i had to do was file the paperwork, pretend to be looking for a job and i'd be slinging full-time, my mornings free to indulge in whatever activity i chose and at this point i knew there was a certain activity i'd be indulging in quite a bit, i could sleep off my hangovers, stay out til whenever, what a brilliant fucking day! i got in my car and smiled as i looked at this industrial wasteland one more time... then i drove home to file the paperwork...