How to Make It in Life

Ah, visitors. Aren't they great? What with their imposing and eating all my food? Actually, the visitor I'll be hosting for the next few days is someone I look forward to seeing - Jesus Christ.

Actually, it's my cousin Rob, but it may as well be Jesus, if you know what I mean.

Actually, Rob isn't that religious and is actually more like Satan, so you can just forget the whole Jesus thing altogether.

I just think it would be cool to hang with Jesus -- not in a Christian sort of way, but more like a two dudes wearin' sandals, sharin' a bud sort of way.

Anyway, Rob and I are the same age, and as kids we would do all sorts of things together, like building clubhouses, hiding money in the backyard, catching lizards, tormenting our sisters, breakdancing, fighting, and all sorts of fun stuff.

As we grew older, we inevitably grew apart, and so we haven't seen much of each other lately.

So he'll be staying with me for a few days before he flies back home, and in the meantime we will hopefully be reminiscing and partying it up. There is of course my job(s) that may get in the way of that, but I'll just call in sick or something.

So my posting will, as usual of late, be intermittent, but maybe I'll have fun stories to report in the coming days.

Down the drain! Actually, that's where my money goes, but my time is for making the money that goes down the drain, so that's what I've been doing, dammit. Makes me appreciate more of what my dad did for us kids, working overtime to pay for our food and schooling and stuff. I am also two years older than he was when he became a father. That is kinda weird. I can't even imagine having kids yet. Maybe I was a mistake! That would be kinda funny. Maybe that's why my mom dropped me on my head when I was a baby. Not on purpose of course, or so she tells me...

So I'm actually working two jobs now. One is a full time and then some job, and the other is sort of an on-call place for when they need people. This week both places have needed me, so I've actually had to turn down work, which would've been unthinkable last year when I was unemployed with all my student loans, car insurance and stuff looming.

But anyway, that subject bores me. And I'm sure it's boring you. But you know what's a fun subject? Mockingbirds! My cell phone was ringing yesterday morning, and I was too sleepy to answer it. So it just kept ringing, and all of a sudden I hear the same ringing coming from outside my window. And you know what it was? A mockingbird! Imitating my cell phone! Isn't that hilarious? I've heard them imitate car alarms before, but I thought they had to practice first. This guy just picked it up right away. Ah, the wonders of nature... and cell phones.

Surprisingly, no binge-drinking. In fact, there was no booze at all. Not even a glass of wine or a bottle of beer. Not even a shot. Not even a hot toddy. Nope, all I had to drink on my birthday was some fruit punch and hot tea.

Something's terribly wrong!

But you know, it's probably a good thing, not ending up naked in some parking lot, running around and peeing on cars. Yet it's probably a sign that I may no longer be the dashing young lad anymore, or shall I say, the drunken unsteady young lad.

Oh, but it's all good. I'll probably get drunk at my friend's birthday next weekend.

So anyway, what did I do for my birthday? My girlfriend took me out for a sushi lunch, even though she doesn't like fish, then we watched Goonies, then we went to dinner at a Korean BBQ place, and then we made sweet butt love. I'm just kidding about that last one. Or am I?

And then I opened my presents! It was nice, one of my gifts was a bamboo steamer, which I will put to good use making dumplings and all sorts of meals that require steam. In fact, Cooking With Amy has a recipe I would like to try. I also got Risk, the board game, which will account for endless fun and hurt feelings.

Overall, a nice birthday. And I can remember it too!

Oh well, it was bound to happen sooner or later. After three years of not going to the dentist, I finally have a cavity. Well, it's not for sure yet, since I haven't been to the dentist, but I know it's there. I can feel it. Especially when I drink really cold water. Yikes!

I guess I could blame my avoidance of the dentist on my lack of dental insurance for the past three years. But I think that's just an excuse. I could've easily gone out and gotten insurance, I think. I figured if I just gargled enough Listerine, I wouldn't need to. But there's not enough Listerine in the world to hide the fear and the shame. Oh lordy, the shame!

So I'm scheduled to go in for X-rays next Tuesday with my recently purchased dental insurance. Hopefully technology has advanced since the last time I had my cavities filled -- back then they had to stick needles in my gums, and drill, with an actual drill, into my teeth. How barbaric!

Maybe this time my teeth will be treated with a nice subsonic blast, which, while deadly to plaque, produces a nice soothing vibration for me. One that that shall hum me to sleep in the way only a robot mama can.

Sometimes, walking around, I occasionally step in doggy poo. Not on purpose of course, even though it's supposed to be good luck, for that would be cheating. It just turns up where you least expect it: getting out of your car at the supermarket, taking romantic walks on the beach, or on slides at McDonaldland playgrounds (this last one, come to think of it, may not have been of canine origin.)

When I was a kid, running around barefoot, stepping on poo was usually not a good thing, what with being barefoot and all, but especially since I then tracked the poo back into the house, which caused my mother to burn with the fire of a thousand angry mothers. Even as a young adult with shoes on, it still wasn't such a good thing. Walking into an office for a job interview with the aroma of fresh poo emanating from your person does not leave a very good first impression.

But with all the bad experiences one can have with poo, when you think about it, there's no use being offended by poo at all. After all, everybody poos. In fact, I believe there is a book called Everybody Poos. There's Pooing in the Woods, which is a great place to visit. There's also dung beetles, which make poo their homes, or is it their meals? In any case, poo serves it's purpose. And if I ever run out of money to buy fertilizer for my tomato plants, I take comfort in the fact that I will always have a cheap, yet morally questionable, alternative.

Remember the little tomato plants I got back in March? They were dwarfed by my now-eaten marigolds at the time. Well, possibly due to our most recent heat wave, they've been growing like mad. And look what I saw when I was watering them today:

That's right, tomatoes! On a tomato plant! It makes a grandma proud. With such an early start, maybe this means I'll best my record of five tomatoes from last summer. Mmmm, just thinking of all those fat juicy bastards ripening and being made into a most delicious pasta sauce or what do you call it, with the basil and the olive oil -- damn, son! It makes grandma wanna slap a sucka with a coochie coo!

Grandma realizes that grandma's overreacting to some tomatoes that have yet to ripen, for grandma knows that they may yet be ravaged by plague, pestilence or goat, but grandma doesn't care. Grandma has nothing else to live for, what with all her kids having moved away and grandpa shitting himself on the regulah. Ah, but grandma talks too much. Sometimes grandma does that. Go play outside with your friends.

To all you mothers out there. I hope you all had a good day, full of restaurant food and flowers. I sent my mom a card written in Spanish. She doesn't speak Spanish. How funny. I'm not a very good son. But she liked it, I think.

And of course my grandma cooked for the family on Mother's Day, which doesn't seem right, but you really don't hear anyone complaining. Except maybe her, on the inside. Poor grandma. But mmmm, can she cook. Too bad I wasn't there to join in on the feast. They had venison today too. My sister's boyfriend hunted a deer on Molokai and gave the family some of the meat.

Well, to say "hunted" implies that he either shot it with a gun or with a bow and arrow (like Ted Nugent), neither of which is the case. He actually just came across a deer, decided to run after it, and when he finally chased it into the ocean, he drowned it. That's not a guy you wanna mess with.

I have to stop drinking coffee. We just got a new coffee machine at work, so I've been chugging it like a madman. Now it's the weekend, and being away from the coffee, all I'm thinking about is the coffee. I feel sluggish without it. So I guess I'm addicted. Perhaps I should make some, but I'm too lazy to make it. Yet if I had it, I would not be too lazy to make it. Did I just blow your mind? Yeah, me and Confucius can do that sometimes.

When you're driving down the freeway, don't shift the car into neutral. Sure, it's fun, and it doesn't hurt the car or anything. But it's pretty easy to then accidentally shift the car into reverse. And that is what I did one day, a long time ago. The car made a funny noise, and the engine shut down, but luckily I was able to pull over to the side of the road. I felt like the stupidest moron in the world. And I was. But amazingly, the car was fine. But I soon felt like an even stupider moron, after I told my dad what I did with his car. Wow, he was so mad. I never saw a man's face get that red before. Anyway, so don't do that. Tell the truth, that is.