Fat Tuesday...and this skinny (but toned) bastard is MOTIVATED!

Happy Fat Tuesday! Damn, I wish I had the foresight and cashflow to plot a trip to New Orleans. I'd have LOVED to have gone there this year...help usher the city back. Jesus, so that means Lent is upon us. Hmm, should I get ashes tomorrow?
Anyway, today continued my snowballing obsession with organizing/bettering my life. And the focus continued to zero in on college alumni. Through my weeding/reading of old alumni magazines, I was inspired to stalk an old friend...who turns out to be in NYC working for Martha Stewart Living!?! Instantaneous machinations of me gaining entry for a tour of Martha's workplace ensue. Or perhaps a job? Who the fuck knows! All I know is, yet again, it all ties together. My organizing = finding old AND potential new friends = potential job AND Southern California information = Gary's in a GRAND old mood. Does THAT make any sense to those out there who think I just sit around, rearranging piles of shit into different configurations, windexing furniture and vacuuming all day, every day? My unsubtle point...again...i'm BEYOND weary of trying to explain my mind to others, as exasperating and unconventional as I know I am. If I start doing heroin or LOOKING like I am, worry about me. Until I cry for help, leave me alone. Some don't seem to realize that I AM fine...ironically UNTIL they start offering their "helpful" advice or cute commentary, at which point my stomach gets into knots and I run the risk of diving into a depressed funk when I WAS in a very GOOD mood. FOLLOW?? I'm not an asshole, but more and more, I think I may start being one. And I CAN be one. The best one. Icing people out has its appeal. Gee, i'm sounding evil. MUAAHHHHHAAAAAA!! LOL, nothing even happened today to warrant this tirade. Guess it's become a permanent defensive thing on my mind. SO, yeah, I look forward to seeing my old friend...he was my peer counselor, actually. Funny. Oh, look, that slut Hillary Andrews is on The Weather Channel now. So I saw my Hungarian Goddess today...and she gave me a bigass mag she just happened to stumble on at work in her Amanda Woodward setting....LOS ANGELES CONFIDENTIAL. Looks like a zesty read. I don't know, the signs just KEEP on smacking me in the nuts. Or face. Or both. In closing, I got 3 boxes of Kellogg's cereals for $5.00 today. THAT'S how you shop, motherfuckers. Learn from The Master. I just wish I'd had a coupon, also. If you spend any more than $3.00 on a box of cereal, you're an idiot. Harsh words, I know. Maybe after I've eventually insulted everyone I know, others will ice ME out first?

CONFESSIONS ON A HARDWOOD FLOOR

I've been wanting to put that caption with this photo since I started this blog...wow...4 weeks ago tonight! FOUR weeks, EVERY night, I've written! Kudos to ME! I actually cropped out my face so strangers can't match the face with the crotch. If you MUST know, I was spontaneously dancing to The Killers' "Mr. Brightside" here. And, no, I don't need to be drunk to do so. Oh, wow again...my shoes...I saw today in an old SPIN, Tupac wearing Karl Kani boxers...and that's the brand shoes I have on in this pic. See how "street" I am. Yes, the shoes are old. Yes, I couldn't be more proud across the board. I wanna continue what i've spent the large part of the day doing...going through old college magazines, tossing them out and/or saving pertinent alumni/job info from them. Thus, i'm about done with this blog entry. I wanted to also note how last night, I googled SoCal photos and spent an absurd amount of time daydreaming/plotting about getting/living there. I love the Jersey shore, but man, you add a palm tree or 12 and the setting sun...Jesus Christ, doesn't seem to compare. MAN, I love palm trees!!!!!!

Last Sunday of February!!

Can that title be more boring? Hard, sometimes, to come up with zippy blog titles that lure you in. Pretty good day...went fast, though, it seems. I finally left the house at 5:15ish for the first time since Friday night...of course, I was instantly annoyed. Same old shit. Slow people and inconsiderate people. In short, stupid people. I'm due for an entire blog on the evil of the cell phone; I was reminded of it at ShopRite, where I had to endure the following...a woman going through the entire selection of $1.99 Edy's half-gallons on the phone. So not only was she in my way, but she was yapping the flavors out loud. IN a Latina accent. An ANNOYING one. A Maria Conchita Alonso type of one. "There's CHAWKlit, VINilla, StWAUberry, KAWfee, BUTTA pecan, KOOKY dough..." Christ, I wanted to rip the fucking phone out of her hand and force it deep into a tub of ice cream, while screaming, "there, now the asshole on the other end of the line can TASTE it, too!" Stupid cunt. A full cell-phone-in-supermarket rant will come, but in brief...SHUT THE FUCK UP! I DON'T WANNA HEAR YOU! God, I love cursing. It's like my heroin. I've never done a drug in my life, I don't normally drink to excess, and I don't get in fights. I just curse. And wish people driving badly to crash into poles. I don't want them to die...i'm not evil. I merely want their car mangled, their nerves shot to hell, their license suspended, and some painful abrasions. That'll teach 'em...in my dreams, at least. I also wish there was a public place in each town where one could smash bottles, destroy furniture, and shoot things. THAT would calm me down. I should market a unique spa of that type.

GRRRRRRRRRRR...I sound so ANGRY. HA! The majority of the day was actually pretty "chill" as I continued my Pile Weeding of yesterday, though it was interrupted by a trip to the parents'. There, I cut out coupons, had 3 helpings of coconut custard pie, read the paper, and enjoyed a lovely turkey dinner. I read a lengthy article on Don Knotts...it made me sad. THREE'S COMPANY is one of my all time fave shows. Amusing that I liked it so much as an 8-year-old. Did mom and dad not grasp its sexually charged humor? Of course, I was somehow allowed to watch DALLAS at that age, too.

It's funny...as I went through my sports papers, I was startled to recall that, within the last 4 years, the Nets played the Lakers in the finals, and the Devils played the Ducks. My point...ANOTHER Los Angeles reference. This morphed into me stalking via Mapquest where Byron Scott lived in his teens in Inglewood, CA. I'm telling ya, i'm gettin to know all of LA and Orange Counties VERY well from my NJ apartment. I'm now in the middle of weeding through job and address updates of college alumni via the helpful newsletters...see if I can get any leads. Productivity!! I really MUST start working out again this week...I need to milk another gym's free trial membership. Memorial Day's a mere 3 months away...gotta fill out that wife beater and leopard thong! Again, it's 3am and i'm writing a blog. I should conduct an experiment where I go to bed at midnight...but only if Letterman's in repeats.

R.I.P. Mr. Furley...move along, move along...

HAHA, OMG, RIOT...there's a reason, of course, I said "move along, move along" in the title...not only does it kinda sum up both my day and overall mindset, but that SONG has been constantly on MTV Hits today...and LITERALLY 2 seconds after I typed that title, I looked up...and it's on yet again! "And even when your hope is gone, move along, move along, just to make it through." God, I'm gonna be singing it in my sleep. Motherfucking catchy All-American Rejects! Well, this peppy first paragraph doesn't remotely reflect the day I've had. I never left the house on this 50 degree Saturday. I planned to, as I always do, but when I'm swept by Productivity Momentum, it's hard for me to stop. Kinda like a writer who gets inspired and writes his Great Novel in 3 days. My productivity was far more boring than that. Frankly, i'm sick of talking and writing about my "piles of shit." It's impossible for me to explain unless you're in my house for me to show them to you. Again, though, mainly newspapers. But it has been an ungodly productive 12 hours in terms of moving closer to an ungodly pared-down existence. One good example...I got rid of a notebook -- from junior year of high school!! Now, I DID rip out some pages as mementos, but you get my drift. That's a humorous extreme, though. Most of my "stuff" is a tad more relevant. I went through all my Sept. 11 newspapers/articles, keeping most of the stuff, but still whittling it down just a bit. And a bunch of magazines...gone! So i've been READING for hours and my eyes are glazing over. Bizarre reading such detail about 9/11 on a random night in Feb. '06...as startling and heartbreaking as ever, yet again a reminder that life's short, which is a good reminder. It was actually refreshing to me that my mindset pretty much remains as it was exactly after the attacks, in the sense of "re-prioritizing." Not to get on my high horse, but it also seems to me -- has for some time -- that many others have reverted to pre-9/11 Daily Life Outlooks. Only after more mass carnage will they all See The Light again...for maybe a month. I can say with absolute certainty that that day forever altered my thinking...which surely is a small part of a much broader rant about people not "getting" me and why I do or DON'T do things. But that aggravation passed hours ago. But a big motherfucking manifesto could possibly be coming. Or not. Because, at heart, I have little patience to explain myself to anyone...even when people are 110% offbase. Most don't get me. I get that & accept it. Doesn't mean it doesn't infuriate me...while at the exact same time, I delight in the fact that i'm so perplexing. Tough cross to bear, huh? I wonder when i'll say fuck it and be TRULY the arrogant, sure of myself, Fox News Channel-esque prick that I am for all the Blog viewers to see, without holding back or offering apologies. Hmmm. **Note to self...pen blog in favor of death penalty while railing against all the idiots opposed to it, ASAP. Christ, it's almost 5am. Yes, i'm glad I got things done instead of drinking for free. I didn't have a single encounter with another human being all day & I loved it. Oh, it was amusing, too, to find a pre-9/11 story referencing Osama as a "Saudi businessman." Can you fucking imagine? Ok, I think i'm done with my ramblings for this evening...er, morning. OH!! Don Knotts, dead at 81! NOOO!! And I had an odd feeling a celeb would die today...I even checked the Yahoo newspage like an hour before I heard the news. Spooky. Another great one gone. Move along...

Windburned with my ShopRite circular

Sums up my last Friday night of February. Riveting, huh? Walked forEVER today in the 50mph gusts...made me most weary by this evening. There was a lot of screaming profanities on the street, admittedly not in high-crowd areas, but perhaps for those in cars to witness, as i struggled to move ahead, nose dripping, hat barely staying on. I HATE wind. I curse it often. It really does ruin ANY outdoor activity. Well, it's fun sometimes...certainly welcome in the summer or to offically make a snowstorm a blizzard. A balmy breeze is one of life's delights. That first 75 degree day of the season...windows open wide...the smell of fresh grass. AHHH. Fucking Calgon, take me the FUCK away! But wind is just as often intrusive...blowin that napkin off the table, your hat off your head, that tree onto that poor expectant mother's car. Things like that. Speaking of expectant mothers (and I'm not sure why I am), I read today that they're NOW graced with being allowed to park in handicapped zones. Ya knoooooooowww, OUR mothers had to walk a mile and we wound up just fine. OUR mothers did a LOT of things that are equated with prison time now, but that's another blog. This really isn't an issue that fills me with something even close to rage; more so, a brief, seizure-esque eyeroll, before moving on to more deserving targets of ire. Yeah, so, after hours of running around, I basically sat on my ass and "onlined" tonight, while sipping various hot and cold beverages. Oh, and I made brownies, filling the house with the smell of chocolate. I'm ready for my big, fluffy pillow and a bedtime document...

Do I HAVE "15 friends who can drink for free"?

An amusing/interesting/pathetic thing just happened. I decided to log off (yes, I have dial-up) for the first time in about 34 hours and check my voicemail...and for the first time in ages, there was actually a worthwhile message. Seems I won a free hour of drinking at Porky's NYC this weekend and I can invite 15 of my friends to join me. YAY, right? Well, yes. I NEVER win anything (the lone Big Exception being when I won Springsteen tickets from WPLJ after calling for hours at work), and a free hour of drinking in NYC is particularly welcome. However, I instantaneously wondered who the FUCK would join me. Scraping together FIVE local friends is difficult, let alone fifteen. Three people popped immediately to mind, but one of them is only in NYC on Fridays after work. Then she's off to Lily White Land, otherwise known as Fairfield County. So she doesn't count for Saturdays. That leaves two people. And all 3 are women. I have NO close guy friends locally. Zero. Nada. Zilch. WHERE the bloody fuck is MY "Entourage"?!?!?!?!? I mean, there's others locally, even my brother, but the whole thing is such a fucking production, for merely one hour of free drinks, no matter who I wrangled. Certainly, I don't have 15 people of the SAME clique to invite. Does anyone, though? It's all just another huge slap in the face that 1) I need new friends because 2) most of mine are scattered...3) the ones who haven't drifted off into Awkward Aquaintance to begin with. What do I do? Join a church group? Volunteer work? REALLY get into making friends online to meet in the Real World? Do other men feel this void or is it only me? The better question, maybe, is if other men HAVE this void? Or do their work friends or brother-in-law become their drinking buddy/forced confidant? If they still drink, of course...the babies at home and all. Not that I'm some raging drunk. But just to go out to a bar or club. Hell, a night of bowling. Hey, there you go...I can join a bowling league! I think my problem is that i've always put such value in longtime friends. The shared history, knowing their parents and siblings, having been in their house, going to school with them. HOW can I be friends with someone whose mother i've never met?! I guess I kinda feel like new friends just won't measure up. And they won't...by the old rules. You can't replicate history. So I guess I'm just always leery of new people...guarded, cautious, aloof to a degree. And good, LOL. Because as much as I think new friends are good, I can't fucking stand people who have New Best Friends after one week of knowing someone. It's fake. And this all morphs nicely into my ongoing California dreaming. Why have I been so tethered to NYC? Media jobs, family, friends...that's why. But I can ax that last one off my excuses to stay local. I mean, I don't even LIKE other humans around me very often. It's not like i'm needy. So what the FUCK has been my excuse?! If I moved ANYwhere, i'd be gloriously alone, lol. My dream!! I'm exaggerating slightly...but maybe not by much. I've always been someone who likes to do what I want, when I want, with whom I want, withOUT explaining myself to another living soul. Come and go as I please. Go down that intriguing lonely road. Dammit, I should've gone west 10 years ago. I kept waiting for a companion...who was never to arrive. I should've had the balls to do it alone. I comfort myself with the fact I've driven to northern Maine and North Carolina by myself. Better than nothing. For now.

POP Goes the World!

No, i'm not referring to our potential imminent death if Dipshit Bush proceeds with his plan to let the United Arab Emirates take over our ports. Instead, I'm merely singing over and over the deliciously catchy Men Without Hats song from '88 that was just on VH1 Classics. But don't ya love how I deftly meshed together both pressing topics? That song is one of the last 45s I bought. Ahhh, 45s. I still have a turntable, ya know. Too bad literally all of my records seem to skip...unless I just need a new needle. Does anyone under the age of 20 know what a needle is? But I digress, as usual. So yet again, I'm staggered beyond human belief by the lack of precautions taking place more than four years since Sept. 11, 2001. There's about 10 different ways northeast Jersey could be flattened in an instant. Comforting. But yet again, it's far too late (3:15am) for me to go into complete rant mode. I gotta read Joan Didion's "The Year of Magical Thinking." I think i'd enjoy it...perversely. It's all about death and loss. I read an interview tonight with her where she says during the entire first year after her husband died, the calendar was of paramount importance to her...every day, she'd obsess over what her husband was doing the year before. She also felt like something awful could happen at any moment...being hit by a taxi, for instance. Both of these things I totally related to...bizarre in and of itself, but more so in that, knock on wood, no one super close to me has died recently. But people "close enough" have. I've obsessed over death for years. My attention to dates and the passage of time...again, all related to my acute awareness of how fragile "it" all is. How it can be snuffed out in an instant. Every time I enter the Lincoln Tunnel, I pray to God (or, um, whoever) I make it to the other side. And yet, there's so much I still don't do that I should, feeling this way. Ah, human contradictions. But i'm trying. So what WOULD I/you do if I/you knew I/you had only one month to live? Isn't that how everyone SHOULD lead their life? HAHAHA, GOD, this is ONE RIOTIOUS entry! Hmm, how can I end this on a frivolous, profane note? Actually, I just saw a JEFFERSONS with the wonderful Mother Jefferson in it, almost getting married. This reminded me of my own grandmother and her late-in-life "gentleman friend." They never got married. I'm not even sure to this day if they were a couple. They met through church. Christ, so fucking Waltons, but they did. She basically, as I recall, was hired to cook his meals after his first wife died. I don't even know if money was exchanged. I should look into these details, further perplexing my parents as to what the fuck's going through my mind, and why, at any given moment. All I know is that, eventually, they seemed like a couple. And my favorite story is when they took my brother and I to Arby's and thought you had to get into separate lines for the burgers, fries, and drinks. Wildly alarmed at the potential time about to be wasted, I set them straight quick. Amusing memory. I must've been 12 or 13. Heavy sigh...on all counts. But that's not frivolous or profane. This melancholy quipster doesn't have it in me tonight, i guess.

My Witheringly Pointed AWAY MESSAGE

In the shower...after which i'll be on the phone with Dan, then early dinner with Suzy, followed by the gym, running errands, then some ironing. Once that's done, but not before I take a shit, i'll be in the city, hangin' with John. At 11:22pm, I'll bend down to tie my shoe, before hopping on the Path, then hailing a cab. From 2am-8am, I'll be sleeping, then working till 5:30, but don't forget that lunch is at 1pm sharp, each and every day without fail, because I certainly wouldn't wanna deviate from ANY routine. Now during ALL of this time, if none of my previously listed actions allows you to know what I'm doing every second of my life (because i'm JUST that important), you can CERTAINLY "cell it" to find my exact latitude and longitude coordinates.

Sam Champion...tool extraordinaire

Happy Presidents Day! Ok, I really don't know why i'm picking on Sam other than i'm tired, don't have time or energy to devote to my TRUE thoughts, and the Eyewitness News team DOES generally agitate me, so why NOT? I've even had a Ch. 7 reporter standing in my living room...i'll leave ya hangin' with that one. Though it's REALLY not that interesting. And I mean REALLY not. In truth, i'm pondering Big Life stuff, "Christ, I JUST wanna snap my fingers and be in Hermosa Beach, CA!" stuff, wondering who my friends are (and aren't), thinking about current events. Just a laugh RIOT, huh?! This public blog seems to more and more show what a bi-polar lunatic I am. The Melancholy Quipster. Hmm, I like that...may need to change my blog name. But fuck all that shit. I'll get to it tomorrow...or not. Back to Sam. He just annoys me. Let's start with his hair. I guess it's his floppy hair that grates. Cut it, jackass! But actually, it's more about his insipid banter with Diana and Sade. I can't even think of specifics. I just know today at 5pm, I wanted to fire a pistol at my TV. This is morphing into a rant on the Ch. 7 promos. Did ya all see the one from last fall with various New Yorkers singing some idiot version of "We Are The Champions"...meaning SAM? Absolutely cringe-inducing. And NOW they have Diana and Sade just popping up at people's houses, with homeowners joyously inviting them in. AWFUL. I also recall one where Bill Ritter and Liz Cho pretended to order pizza at the same time in the newsroom. Shudder. And Bill waving merrily from a newsvan that glided through the 5 boroughs, carefully avoiding execution-style murders and small children tied to chairs. Christ, they are ALL just sooooooooooo fucking nauseating. Sooooooo FAKE. Someone is getting PAID to come up with these?! Their ass should be FIRED. These spots make me NOT wanna tune in. Have you ONCE seen my local newscaster idol, SUE SIMMONS, in some painful promo where she's traipsing around town or barking "hold the pepperoni" into a fake phone? NO. And she's the best there is in this town. Her and Chuckie together more than 25 years. Sue is REAL. Not a thing fake about her. Even Ch. 7's cliched "newsy" intro music makes my blood boil. Sigh. But I guess I have "a lot of problems," as my mom and dad BOTH told me tonight, for reasons i'll rant about later. Yup, i'm difficult and discriminating. Seems to be the truth. Oh, well.

My skin will be IN!

Speaking to my Hungarian Goddess now...about turning 33, and the upcoming summer, and I mentioned how I plan on having a GREAT summer...how i'm gonna flaunt my 33-year-old badass fucking self to the admiring public. Actually, SHE (who we'll call Vulga) spoke of her high summer hopes first...how she'll dress like a whore on her Long Island Sound boat, her huge cans heaving out of her barely-there bikini. I will pretend to be her Austrian cousin. This will be my excuse to parade on deck in a speedo, my nutsack perilously close to flopping out and getting caught in fishing line. We will embrace our thirtysomething bodies for all of Greenwich to see. I had a running fear in my youth of my nuts dangling out of my plaid shorts. I don't know why, in retrospect. It would've brought me the street cred I so desperately needed. Speaking of nutsack, I finally caught TARADISE last night. I stumbled upon it; it wasn't something I sought out. A train wreck indeed. Fucking Tara making Wyckoff, NJ look bad. Stupid cuntwhore. This girl is just APPALLING. Her voice, her body, her vocabulary, her demeanor, her PARENTS. Awful, all of it. Am I being harsh? Probably...but not by much. Surely there's dumber loose, drunken whores out there with parents that don't know when they and their daughter are being made to look like fools. But since they're the ones on E!, I'll pick on them. OY! So I hope this blog was witty and thought-provoking, filling a niche, inviting rampant LINK-age, as the "New York" cover story suggests are surefire ways to add readers. ONE more time...NUTSACK!!

Coldest night of the year

I'm in a rush...to get back to my latest housesitting gig. I've been continuing the streamlining of The Piles for the past hour or so. Another trip to ShopRite also took place...had to fetch more .99 strawberry shortcake Good Humor bars...mmmmm. In the arctic cold, I discovered a set of keys on the ground as I raced to my car...always looking on the ground for cash, of course. So I felt enormously like a good human as I went BACK inside to hand them to customer service, imagining some panicked person not being able to get into their house on the coldest night of the winter. I wanted to leave my name and # for a reward, but that would've been tacky. So I'll just pray for good karma to swing back to me.

So it's 1:07am...um, a good day. Tired, a lot of running around, but ultimately productive. The old man even greeted me with a cheery hello as I handed him the rent more than 2 weeks late. Most odd. Got a surprise visit from Donna and Freddy...always a joy. Delighted in being Uncle Gary. Continuing my absorbing of everything LA...I am a man obsessed. Random rant...I have zero interest in Kanye West, the man OR the music. Can he PLEASE go away? Overrated beyond belief. I dig this All-American Rejects song, "Move Along," though. I feel i've said that before. OK, time to bolt. Boring entry, I know. I can't ALWAYS provoke, inspire, humor, or shock. Or induce eye-rolling.

Madonna's SORRY & Oprah's opening my eyes...again

Madonna's SORRY video finally aired today, though I missed the beginning. On MTV Hits, mind you...certainly not MTV or even VH1 at this point, neither of which actually seem to show videos anymore -- though this is a stale criticism. I chart my life in many ways, and Madonna albums/singles/videos somehow have freakishly aligned with pivotal points in my life. Honest. Like hearing "You'll See" for the first time minutes before my First Job Interview Ever (with HBO!...though look where that's gotten me) while sitting in Bryant Park. So her new video is another winner. The woman hasn't been relevant for 22 years for nothing. It's very "busy." Lots of quick cuts and frenetic dancing. Then there's the roller skates and overall disco vibe. It's FUN. It's dizzyingly watchable...what a video should be. Not that all videos need to be dizzying. James Blunt's "You're Beautiful" comes to mind again...perfect in its own way. But to prove I'm not kneejerk Pro Madge, something is starting to ring a tad false about her being in a leotard while dancing crazily at a club at age 47. Part of me hates saying that, because why should it matter how old she is? She looks great...though the leotard's getting a tad scary. And I thought the HUNG UP video premise worked fine. You know, where she's alone, doing her stretching, thrusting her finely-manicured vagina toward the camera. That worked for me. Hmm, i'm not sure i'll agree with anything i'm writing after several viewings. I think i'm just maybe getting tired of the leotard and exhausting disco imagery. And I think i'm just getting critical of everyone and everything. But catch the video, please, and prepare to be dazzled. Now I REALLY wanna sample rollerskating night at the Roxy... (This begins a NEW PARAGRAPH, as I'm again having issues with FUCKING BLOGSPOT.COM's layout...) **When Oprah's Movement, I mean, show began today, I was in a rather foul, cranky, tired, vaguely depressed mood. And I didn't think the topic -- people in extreme financial misery -- was going to remotely cheer me up. But damn if I didn't, yet again, come away from an Oprah viewing feeling inspired. First and foremost by the fact that the 3 families profiled were waaaaaaaaayyyyyyyy worse off than me. YAY! But beyond that selfish joy, the following ideas...the need to take control of one's life, not being a prisoner to debt, how it IS very possible to turn things around, all that shit, lol. FACE the brutal realities of your debt.I could be way more eloquent if I wasn't so inexplicably tired, and actually, the ideas presented weren't revelations that I needed to hear. It all falls in line with my Monstrous Life Overhaul Goals of '06. But at 4pm, in the mood I was in, it was divine intervention when I needed it. And I found it exceedingly amusing/vastly reassuring that I, jobless and in a rented apt, had a better idea of how to keep track of every cent than a woman with 5 cars who was living in a mansion. Christ, the endless things I could blog about! Newsflash, people...you DON'T just buy what you want. You shop around, you clip coupons, you wait for sales, you pay with cash, you...DON'T BUY THAT ITEM AT ALL. Then there's the eating out...DAILY?!?!? And the CELL PHONE BILL INSANITY. Honestly, though, the cell phone deserves a weeklong series of blogs. I can't get into it now. So, thank you, Oprah! You were the first to tell young Gary that he had obsessive compulsive disorder back in '88 or '89. I learned I wasn't alone in my burning need to touch and check things repeatedly. It's all about control and death, of course. It all is. A little superstition thrown in. God, i'm all over the place here. **May I add i've never been medicated or seen a shrink...MORE $$ wasted. I conquered my OCD on my OWN, baby!! Which means I still kinda have it, lol...but not NEARLY as bad as back in the day. God, it's really all so simple when you sit and think about it...MAKE A DECISION TO CHANGE YOUR LIFE. I think I need to be a motivational speaker. Thank you, Oprah! Sure, you think you're God and always right...BUT SO DO I!! It's bound to annoy people sometimes, if not daily. Overall, Oprah, I think you're swell. Golly.

SCREW the Red Cross!! I'm in a GOOD mood, though...REALLY!

What an odd little day. I really can't express how TRULY focused on "shaking it up" I am. I'm in SUCH a "chill" mood that i'm currently listening to Stevie Nicks' superlative "Trouble In Shangri-La" from that magical Summer of 2001...before everything went haywire. "I am something of a dreamer," she's repeating. I've been thinking a lot about 2001 lately, for various reasons, but i'm digressing again. Onward with my Thoughts of the Day!! For some reason that defies any kind of explanation...I went for a run at midnight...around the bigass block. And it IS a big block. Honest. But I never run. EVER. I loathe running. Don't understand the national obsession with it. Nor golf, but that's another blog. Seems to me most people jogging look like they're about to collapse of a heart attack. They're barely struggling along, dripping with sweat, face etched in agony. And for what, really? Just walk, bike, rollerblade, pogo...ANYthing but run. I love when I'm fucking walking faster than some of these chicks jogging in Hoboken. But, tonight, I ran. And I enjoyed it. It's a beautiful night for mid-February...low 50s. Gorgeous. Arctic air on the way again. I was savoring the night air. Sat on the porch for a few afterwards. What the fuck came over me? Not sure, besides my escalating need to do things differently. Challenge myself. Mix it up. So it's at this juncture that I note that for some reason, this motherfucking blog site won't allow me to hit enter and start a new paragraph. I just wasted about 15 minutes trying to figure it out to no avail. TWO nights in a row of computer issues in the wee hours to test my patience. These are the times I'd like an arsenal of glasses at the ready to hurl against the fucking wall. Over and over and bloody over, I'd scream profanities while firing large glasses against the wall. That would make me feel better. So, I apologize for the longest paragraph EVER, and since my blood pressure is rising, it seems time to rant against THE RED CROSS. The Red Cross fucking sucks moosecock. If I live to be 115, unless sweeping change is enacted, they won't get a penny from me. I've been leery of them since the aftermath of Sept 11, when it was shown that they woefully mismanaged TONS of money. Now, tonight, on the CBS Evening News, a story on the escalating scrutiny put on The Red Cross in the aftermath of Katrina. It seems money issues loom large again. Where HAS all the money gone? Seems, also, that volunteers were sent to affluent areas instead of the hardest hit ones...and these volunteers had so little to do that they engaged in volleyball games. Boxes and boxes of food went rotten because it wasn't doled out fast enough and to the people who needed it most. Last, but not least, underlings were told by their managers to steer STORM VICTIMS WHOSE LIVES WERE TORN APART to 800 numbers that they KNEW would either be busy or "manned" by a recorded voice that got the victims nowhere. One woman told of spending FIVE HOURS on the phone one night, only to be disconnected. Workers or volunteers who raised questions were made to feel that THEY were the troublemakers. This is simply appalling. I've given nothing to Katrina victims yet...because I trust NO ONE. I want to know that my money, whether it's $5 (about all I can afford to give anyway...lol?) or a million, is going DIRECTLY to people in need. Hell, I want to personally HAND them the money...or the food...or the clothes...or the soap...WHATEVER these poor people need. I'm NOT giving money so that the Red Cross' Charlotte office can get a fresh coat of paint. Jesus, Mary & Joseph! And make no mistake about it, THOUSANDS of people along the Gulf Coast are still desperately in need of so much. The front page, daily accounts of their misery have vanished, though. Like they always do. Onto the next tragedy. The Red Cross needs to be held accountable. Legit organization, my ass. Everyone hears Red Cross and goes "OOOOOOOO, they're up there with GOD! Where's my checkbook?!" Be leery, people. Where's the healthy skepticism?!!? Too many are too trusting about too many things. End of rant, I guess. I'm still angry about this "enter" button shit... Hmm, what else...well, I worked today...basically, I typed for a charming young man whose finger was broken. I was his bitch for the day. Easy work. And free McDonald's lunch! Oh, and even beer and a dog in the office! The work itself wasn't for me, but the environment certainly was. OH...after my jog, I leapt up for the lowest tree branch and ripped at it to confirm my suspicions from a few days' worth of daylight observation...there are BUDS already on the trees!! Incredible! Yes, thoughts of spring ARE building inside of me. Do I have anything else to add as it nears 3am? Saw MTV VJ Damien Fahey today on 44th St...yapping on his cell, looking like hell. And all I thought was, "HE'S met Madonna?" Heavy sigh. Superbowl Sunday I saw Joe Franklin!! LOFL! He was shuffling along 8th Avenue by 34th St...IN the street, trying to hail a cab it seemed, while holding a Bloomie's bag or something. Strange little man. He's gotta be in his 80s, no? Ok, i'm clearly running out of topics. A VERY good day, this was. Good night.

Zen, then anger...FUCK perspective!

So I fucking spent about 40 minutes writing 2 longass paragraphs -- even though not a hell of a lot happened today -- only for the fucking computer to freeze JUST AS I hit "publish." Honestly, one of THE most aggravating things in life...freezing computers. Well, now that it's 3am and I'm tired AND have to work tomorrow (!), i'll sum up super briefly...overall it was a zen day...not much happened...Dipshit went to Chicago, perhaps explaining my "chill" mood...so chill that I feel like I should be playing a Jack Johnson album while smoking pot...IF I smoked pot. I daydreamed on the porch at 1am (the only time I left the house, to bring out the trash) of calling a taxi to take me to Newark, where i'd find the next plane to LA, where i'd spend 5 days. The "noteworthy" event of the day was Heather emailing me, again imploring me to donate time in the coming year at a homeless shelter. I vow that I will. Witty joke about recalling Phil Collins' "Another Day In Paradise" ensued in the previous, frozen blog, and again now to PROVE how damn witty I am. I worked out a bit today, I cleaned my stovetop, I cleaned and streamlined yet MORE of my bedroom, which is like a museum with all my diaries, letters, photos, mementos. If I dropped dead now, people would have a field day. I closed the previous blog by saying how I needed to put the laptop back on the table, and away from my lap, for fear that my genitals would get hot and numb, and how that's NOT a good thing. The end. **A month and a half into 2006, and I continue to feel GOOD!!

MY BLOODY VALENTINE

BE MINE.

Perhaps the most ridiculously blown out of proportion day of the year (yes, even more than New Year's Eve and Arbor Day) is upon us. But you know what...that's all I have to say about it. No bitter rants to be found here. Because I'm not bitter. I barely even noticed today was That Day. Actually, when I woke up, as I slipped into my brown Isotoner slippers, the first thought in my head was to title today's blog MY BLOODY VALENTINE. But it was a funny thought, not a seething with rage, angry one. That thought stemmed from recalling the movie of the same name. You know, the cheaply made, poorly received slasher flick from February of 1981. I actually thought it was released in '82, but after becoming obsessed with researching this long-forgotten film, I naturally googled it, and learned that it has now been 25 years to the week since its release. THIS got me thinking of my old house, grammar school, and the long shuttered Warner Theater, which in turn got me thinking of my movie theater obsession of my youth. Getting the idea of how my mind works? Yes, I was obsessed with movies...but in the typically twisted form of mine, not really watching them, but instead, RUNNING one. I turned my back hall into a box office, complete with "Cinema 1" and "Cinema 2" signs, with torn from the paper movie advertisements identifying which films were showing. I made up signs for showtimes and admission prices, usually closely in-sync with the Warner's. I recall when it was $4 for adults and $2 for children and seniors. I have a faint memory of it being even cheaper, like $3.50, but can't say for sure. I was especially fascinated with the term "HELD OVER." This meant, to me, that a film was an event, a big hit, something to talk about. Oh, and I can't forget the terribly exciting "coming soon" or "starts Friday." You could often find me in my back hall...alone...with my movie signs. Straight out of "Angela's Ashes," isn't it? Oh, and I canNOT forget the MOST bizarre thing...I loved to stand a block away from the Warner Theater, particularly on opening night Fridays, to see how long the lines would get for the 7:30pm show. That's right...i'd stand there, just watching the line grow, YEARNING for it to snake around the corner, thus signifying that Something Big was doin' in our little burg! And I wonder why I had trouble fitting in with the blue-collar kiddies in town? Yes, sir...that entire paragraph just from a random thought upon waking of a bad movie released a quarter century ago this week.

My V Day was actually rather productive and inspiring. I REALLY began tackling those ungodly high piles of papers/articles/bills...which led to a lot of READING of said articles at long last. I found it especially amsuing that I had a big article on New Year's Resolutions...from last year. But I read it finally...and it only further cemented my snowballing, laser-like focus on COMPLETELY OVERHAULING my life. My favorite tip, short and simple...GET STARTED. The first step can create a momentum that will keep you going until the last. My other faves...1) break projects into small, manageable steps, 2) don't think everything will be accomplished smoothly & without bumps in the road, and 3) my favorite, REWARD YOURSELF when tasks are accomplished to add further incentive. You know, with ice cream or a pricy latte or something. Jesus, I really sound like Oprah.

Speaking of Oprah, what the fuck was with Dr. Phil's Valentine's Day CBS special with Paula Adbul sobbing about her inability to snag a man? Jesus, what a waste of time. I fucking hate Dr. Phil. With a passion. I MAY hate his best-selling author (but only because of daddy, of course) of a son even more. The same son who's engaged to a Playboy playmate. You KNOW this will fail, and it can't come soon enough for me. And I PRAY the fallout is deeply messy, perverse, and riddled with unspeakable humiliation for the entire McGraw clan. Asswipes.

In yet another "what the fuck!??!" moment, I found myself randomly coming upon the 130th Annual Westminster Dog Show from MSG. Ok, I loooooooooooooove dogs. LOVE them. Can't get enough of them. But WHO is going to MSG, paying God knows what admission, to watch dogs...well, what DO they do? Seems to me some masculine lady races back and forth with each dog for several hours. On TV, it's kinda fun and cute...for like 20 minutes, 'cause the doggies are up close and the top-notch graphics dept. clearly labels each dog's background. But to sit in an arena? To make a TRIP to the arena? To sit for hours? What the FUCK is the point?! These dogs just WALK. No tricks. No racing. No hot-yet-hilarious dog sex action. JUST walking. And I kept thinking of MY Precious Baby Furball. She'd NEVER gracefully walk. She'd probably have escaped from her leash, run in circles, stopped to take a shit, vomited, lapped the vomit right back up, before finally coming to a rest, whereupon she'd plop down and lick her twat. Yes, that's what MY Beloved Baby Furball would've done. Now THAT'S Best In Show!!

Today's random thoughts...

**Came upon EVITA tonight on cable. Only musical i've ever seen in my life. Madonna acts well in it, dammit. She is NOT as bad as They make her out to be.

**Came upon both Rick Springfield and New Edition on VH1 Classics. Rick has aged HORRIBLY. He looks like The Crypt Keeper now on GENERAL HOSPITAL. Yes, I watch GH. But that's another blog. Fuck off. As for New Edition, it was "Mr. Telephone Man," and the entire video was shot in NYC...in like '85. I LOVE seeing old footage of NYC. It's just so surreal to me, knowing i'm so often on those same streets now. There's a longer, rather melancholy thought here, again, on the passage of time. But not in the mood. I'll just say...there was a K train?!

And i'm done. 2:38am. AND TO ALL A GOOD NIGHT...

THE COUNTDOWN begins...to my being The Age of Christ...at death, that is

I've always wondered if I'm the Second Coming of Christ, who died at 33, so it's of particular note to me that one month from yesterday, i'll be 33. I wanna write 23. Desperately. Even though I hated 23. But it's just so much...YOUNGER. Instead, i'll be THIRTY-THREE. The last year of my early thirties. UGH. Shoot me. No, wait, please don't. I don't want to die so young like Christ did. And, in fact, I always start bracing myself for the next birthday at the 6-month mark. So, I ain't that worried about 33. But I HAVE enjoyed 32. It's just such a nice number. And I have a month left...that i'm gonna try to cram full of productivity. Go out on a high note. And, as i've alluded to before, I don't really feel remotely old in any fucking way. I'm not bald, fat, going grey, dressing in Middle American Stepford Wear...so all the superficial signs of aging haven't hit me yet. And, dammit, i'll make whatever happens work for me...gracefully. Oh, but I won't go on and bloody on about this. I'll just say that, despite this long paragraph, I actually feel pretty fucking good. JUST wish there was still a 2 as the first digit of my age. But I idiotically flipped out at 20, too, so there's no satisfying me. Eventually, I accept things and run around screaming how GREAT it feels to be ME at whatever age i'm currently at. But I just wanted to note that The Last Month of 32 has begun...

Random thoughts/rants/suggestions...

**Enough with these celebs placing their hands together as if in prayer and bowing to each other and/or the audience on talk shows. Oprah's fond of this; the new INXS guy just did it to the Letterman audience. What the fuck is this exactly? I think Cher started it. Is this some religious-Dahli Lama-Asian influence thing? Just shake hands or kiss on the cheek, wave to the audience, get your ass in the fucking chair, and start talking. Quit fucking bowing. Fuckin' A.

**I am ENRAGED at these cuntlicking, motherFUCKING assholes who place items (chairs, orange cones, garbage cans) in the street after a snowstorm to "save" their space. Who the FUCK do they think they are?!?!? WHO!????!! The nerve! They should get $500 tickets for having the fucking audacity to think they own that spot somehow just because there's 20 inches of snow on the ground and parking is tough. "Wahhhhhhhhhh, I can't be bothered to search for a spot and maybe end up walking my ass a few blocks...wahhhhhh!." Guess what, fucknuts...LIFE is tough. Every man for himself. Parking in an urban area is an ongoing game of skill and chance. Deal with it. Or risk slashed tires.

**On that note, I'm even MORE infuriated by people who are too lazy to clear the tops of their cars of snow. Newsflash, you fucking dim bulbs...that snow hardens and becomes DEADLY PROJECTILES as you speed down the highway, yapping on your cellphone to no one important about an issue even less important, while also balancing your $8.99 .5 oz. venti half-caf/full caf/decaf expresso with goat testicle shavings and a HINT of jasmine mocha caramel latte on your fucking lap. I was ALMOST KILLED once by one of you idiots on Rt. 21 when a sheet of ice slammed into my windshield at 70mph. Forget ticketing for you fucks...jailtime!! Christ, the fucking stupidity of people!

**My rage portion over, may I recommend Good Humor Strawberry Shortcake bars? I could eat the box of 6 in one sitting. And only 99 cents at ShopRite this week...WITH your Price Plus card! I may buy 5 more boxes.

**Investigate SARAH VOWELL. Very bright. Very humorous.

**Franklin Cover from THE JEFFERSONS died last week, in NJ, the news breaking the day after an episode centered on him. Only George and Florence remain with us. Sigh. Movin' on up, indeed.

Thunder! Lightning! No, I'm not knocking on wood, but musing on THE HISTORIC BLIZZARD OF 2006!!

WOW. Never do you know what you'll wake up to. I dozed on the couch shortly after 5am, only to be stirred awake by a bigass rumble of thunder about 6:15am. And then more thunder. And lightning...LOTS of lightning! I've been in "thundersnow" before, but NEVER in my life have I witnessed something like this. It was like a midsummer storm, except with relentlessly heavy, windblown snow. PERFECT! Somehow I stayed awake again for another 45 minutes, even though I was exhausted. But as the light of day made the piling snow more visible, and the morning news shows were all on by now, I was just too EXCITED to go to bed. Shortly after 7am, though, I did.

Now I'd say about 6 inches was on the ground when I stopped "shoveling" at 4am. So when I fumbled for my remote control about 11:30am, turned on the news, and heard that some 22 inches was on the ground in Central Park, making this the 2nd biggest storm on record, I was just flabbergasted. But it only got better! Eventually, the official Central Park reading was 26.9 inches of snow...THE MOST ON RECORD!! We broke the old record of 26.4 or 26.5 set in December of 1947!! Amazing!! And it's one of those things that's just surreal...that's kind of anticlimactic, even though there's clearly tons of snow on the ground. But you kinda feel like OK, THIS IS IT?!?! This is as BAD as it gets?! I mean, I've heard stories of that 1947 storm where the snow was up to the first floor windows of houses. Were the drifts just worse then? I just expect MORE chaos, lol, from the worst storm on record, dammit. Like me literally being trapped inside my house, you know? Instead, buses were running by 4pm. So how bad could this have REALLY been? Also, ShopRite was open; I know, because I walked to it...after I shoveled the tail end of the storm's effects.

I got up at like 12:30pm to hear the roomie downstairs talking...and talking...to the landlords. Turns out he helped them shovel, and they in turn invited him inside for some 1pm wine and chatter. He also came upstairs with the by-now-standard Plate of Food For Dinner During a Blizzard cooked by the landlady. God BLESS her. Today's treat...some kind of roast beef and potatoes. MMMMMMM. I enjoyed them about 7pm after my roughly 3-hour shoveling/walking/ShopRite/Dunkin Donuts adventure. Naturally, some foreign day-laborer types in front of me took about 15 minutes to complete their order at DD, but I refused to get too steamed. I'd woken in a far better mood today, even though Dipshit was still housebound with me. Besides, the ShopRite experience was just like going into the White Light, it was so good. There were like 30 people in the entire store. NO ONE was in my way. Everything on sale was in stock. Sale dates were all sufficiently far in the future. They even had stacks of newspapers, which I didn't count on with the storm. I proceeded to glance through them all without buying one. One of the best food shopping experiences i've EVER had. It was fantastic being out in the storm, walking down the middle of streets, feeling this sense of camaraderie. There was also the brief moment earlier when the dog next door was nearly crushed by another "I can drive as fast as I want in ANY conditions!" SUV, inciting a screaming match between owner and driver, but that anecdote just ruins the mood here.

It was a good day. I work out pretty regularly, yet shoveling always makes my body feel like it went through 6 hours of pilates...a feeling I enjoy, mind you. I will sleep VERY well tonight. I called home this afternoon, too. As I could have predicted, my brother slept elsewhere last night, leaving stent-in-his-heart, 64-year-old dad to shovel the sidewalk AND a car. He wisely left the 2nd car for Baby Bro to do. Cue eye rolling on multiple counts. I was reminded of Precious Baby Furball Power today, and how much I enjoyed observing her sink to the bottom of powdery snowdrifts, as I snapped photos of her desperate attempts to stay on solid ground. Awwww, I still miss my Doggy Furball Ratbeast. It's 3am and I need to fucking go to bed. Oy, vey. The skin under my eyes needs a MAJOR spa treatment. Ok, i'm falling asleep. Peace out.

My ASS on the radiator

And I DO mean BARE ass. My white, bony, flat, yet wonderfully toned, ass. Tonight -- in the aftermath of one of the worst blizzards on record in the NYC area -- it seems particularly appropriate to both enjoy, and blog about, one of the things I most treasure about this apartment...the living room radiator. It sits just over 4 feet long; I know this because I just measured it for the sole purpose of this blog entry. It's painted white and sits beneath the middle bay window. My "ocean" view is rather spectacular, and something I try not to take for granted...Manhattan and Jersey City skyscrapers, tiny sections of the Williamsburg and Manhattan Bridges, a sweeping view of the street to note when visitors and the roomie are coming to impose on me. And so, on frosty winter nights, with the shimmering water, twinkling city lights, and, ideally, ample snowcover all to stare out at in wonder, I like to casually glide over to that radiator, in the quietest wee hours, once the roomie is dozing, and slide off my shorts...AND underwear...and FEEL it...FEEL the awesome heat capturing every nook of my Caucasian buttocks! YES!! I lean back against the window and pivot my body to the right to take in the view. A steaming hot beverage...tea, cocoa, perhaps even hot cider?!...is the PERFECT addition to this wintertime favorite. **Read that last line over while imagining my alarmingly accurate Martha Stewart impression. Tonight, the room is candlelit...another big plus. One must always be careful that no one in the neighboring houses sees my living room nudity. Or for that matter, anyone on the street. But i'm discreet. It's beyond soothing...like a cheap spa treatment. Ahhhhh. Try it at home!

4am...just "swept" the snow...

I'd intended on regular updates on the Big Blizzard, but Dipshit proceeded to ruin my entire day. Well, it's pouring snow to beat the band, and has been since just before midnight...FINALLY! Up until then, there was maybe an inch on grassy surfaces only...just annoying light, wet snow for HOURS. I was growing beyond impatient...with everything. At about 12:15am, I went out to shovel the first coating of snow...and then proceeded on a half-hour walk just as the storm reached full fury. Oh, I actually used a fraying broom to "sweep" the snow, as shoveling late at night wouldn't go over well with the neighbors. See, THIS is why i'm Mr. Anger...because I actually CONSIDER my fellow man, and rarely get it in return. But that's another posting. The broom works well enough. Along with the side of my boot for caked-on ice. My walk was wonderful. There I was, walking down the middle of the street...something I like to do whenever possible. In the snow, though, I add some touches...I spun around in circles with my arms outstretched, yelling "YEEEEEHAW!" & also yelled other things along the lines of "winter is BACK! Fuck yeah!" See, because one can get away with such things during the muffled middle of a blizzard. Thus, I do it. If I were to scream FUCK in the middle of the street at 1am in June, I'd be arrested. And I don't need that. Oh, I also did a LOT of running and sliding in the street. So I noticed a decent amount of cars out...getting in the way of my street shenanigans. I wondered WHERE the fuck these morons were going to or coming from. Had they not heard the forecast? Was going to the Black Bear for the 179th Saturday in a row WORTH their life or someone else's? I yearned to flag down each and every car and ask their purpose in being out, but I refrained. I merely categorized them in my head as Stupid Fucks and carried on being giddy in the snow. Oh, and just now, during my 2nd sweeping out front, I decided to taste the snow. It's been a while. I wanted to taste what the heavens have blessed us with. How better to be one with nature? It was like tasting God. Or the Prophet Muhammad. The snow tasted fresh. I took several gulps off my railing. I also rubbed my face in it. Delightful! Then I came in, put an english muffin on, and am now writing my blog. I would say there's about 6 inches on the ground...and the radar shows MANY more hours to come. YAY! But now I can go to sleep knowing I put a healthy dent in clearing the snow for my landlords. A goodwill gesture.

So let's briefly talk about Dipshit. But not that much, because he already ruined my entire night and I'm tired of wasting energy on him. It was a night that truly tested the "perspective" of this blog's title. In a nutshell, he sat online for hours, doing work stuff. In my way. Not that I NEEDED to be online...but JUST in my way. No, but worse, MUCH worse, was that he made and received seemingly dozens of phonecalls, which I had to listen to. All work-related. All in that voice. That hideous voice. That voice that was giving me a headache. That voice that is, on the Annoyance Meter, akin to what I imagine a cat would sound like if its rectum was being prodded slowly, inch by excruciating inch, by a hot curling iron, over a period of some 3 hours. Yes, akin to that. His voice makes me INSANE. I can't deal with it anymore. I understand why people snap and beat others to death with baseball bats. It's a tightrope, sanity. I literally did nothing for hours but nibble on snacks, dust, and watch the Weather Channel. I couldn't focus on ANYthing with his madness surrounding me. Oh, wait, I DID do some minimal lifting of weights. He's lucky I didn't drop the 30-pounder on his nuts. I held off dinner until he left for Hoboken for the night....except that he decided around 11pm that, with work and getting a cab issues, he wouldn't be going. I nearly threw myself through the window. And so, the perverse conundrum of severe winter storms continues...as much as I love them, I'm ALWAYS trapped inside for hours with roomies. Nightmare. SOOOOO hard to maintain perspective. Was that brief, lol?

And about my dinner...I had Barilla farfalle pasta. Filling and tasty enough, but never again with this farfalle. It's just a fucking bitch to pick up with a fork. Just NOT easy. I was chasing the fuckers around my plate, stabbing at them. Oh, and when I came in from walking around in a blizzard, is it odd that I had ice cream? Hot cocoa, too, but I LOVE ice cream any day of the year. I guess that's it for now. Christ, it's 5am. I'm buoyed by the blizzard. Yeehaw!!

Paul Kocin, Winter Weather Expert

3:09pm. I'm giddy with glee over the reappearance of Paul Kocin on The Weather Channel for our Big Blizzard. And don't we often have one in the middle of February?! Why, yes, yes we do. It IS our snowiest month, you know. But I digress. Paul just appeared, and his tone was deliciously dire as he noted the storm "really coming together now," while pointing to an exploding radar full of JUICY, coalescing precipitation, PUMPED into play by explosive Gulf and Atlantic MOISTURE. MMMMMMMMMM, Gary fucking LOVES it!! Paul's presence always means BIG TROUBLE. Mr. Kocin will be my special friend throughout this event. A warm, comforting guide. His voice gravelly, yet mellifluous, much like Bea Arthur's. Swing by the house for an impression...of Paul, not Bea. Though you can join me for double viewings of THE GOLDEN GIRLS on Lifetime, Monday through Thursday from midnight to 1am. If Letterman's a repeat, that is. If you're a Leno watcher, I'm not sure I wanna know you. But back to Paul. OHHHHH, I love him. He'll be pulling a double shift, i'm sure. As for me, i've noted the clouds lowering and thickening in the mere 20 minutes I've been writing this. The faint sun has disappeared. The Metro Channel's traffic cameras show the snow has advanced as far north as Sayreville. Yes (said in a tone much like that agitatingly Desperate Mary Alice), the hour is near. Soon, ...OMG...FUCK SOON...3:28PM...IT HAS BEGUN TO SNOW!! The Evil is upon us!!

White man muttering profanities while rolling eyes, Aisle 8

My Hungarian Goddess friend said that the Mystery Website that links me found me particularly hilarious when I wrote about being annoyed. Well, this isn't hard, as I'm always annoyed. But I'm increasingly afraid of coming off like an Angry Hillary Clinton type. And i'm not. But I won't go into how wonderfully complex I am...how, while i'm annoyed at every turn in life, i'm really a "chill" zen (NOTE THE TITLE, fools!) type. Instead, I'll bitch and moan about what pissed me off today. It seems to be my schtick. Hours later, I can recount EVERY bloody dolt who got in my way on the 5-minute trip to ShopRite by car from my parents. First, the idiot 2 kids who crossed in front of me far too slowly at the end of my block. "MOVE IT, TUBBY!!," I screamed inside my car to the fatter of the 2 young boys. These 2 little fucks ALMOST made me catch the light at the next corner, but I raced to barely make it. Naturally, another dawdling pedestrian made the car in front of me stop before turning right. **So, if you're on foot, and a car's trying to turn, can you FUCKING HUSTLE, ALREADY?! This car proceeded to literally go about 15mph for several blocks, inspiring my new favorite sardonic response...directly eying them in their rear view mirror while making my MOVE, MOVE, MOVE...MAKE THE LIGHT!! gesture with my right hand. Once I was free to turn left, away from this slow-witted dolt surely of some foreign background (I'll wager Asian...and please, save your letters), I floored my stylin' 1989 Chevy Caprice up that motherfuckin hill, and was soon at ShopRite...for new horrors. You see, it's gonna SNOW. A LOT, "they" say. This means people will be trapped inside for days. This means New Orleans Superdome-style pushin and shoving and clamoring for food. This means that the fucking parking lot was fucking as full as i've EVER fucking seen it...like, worse than the day before Thanksgiving. Oh, my fucking God. Well, at least I don't mind walking, and settled into literally the only spot I saw, in the farthest row away from the entrance. Inside, it was just mobbed. But, you see, mobbed is one thing...but shuffling idiots moving almost backwards they're moving so slowly...THAT I canNOT tolerate. And they're all fat, too. Everyone's fat. But that's another story. Ok, some aren't, but a lot are. Obviously, everyone but me has 150 more years to live on this planet and they KNOW it, because that's the only reason I can accept for moving so slowly through life. I wanna GET my fucking shit, and get the fuck out of there. And if I'm analyzing a shelf of food or something on my person, I GET THE FUCK OUT OF THE MIDDLE OF THE AISLE. So, you know, people can file past me. That IS me now...that person just cursing out loud in the store or on the street, glaring, tapping my foot, rolling my eyes so far back it's like i'm convulsing. And JUST when I thought I couldn't be more annoyed...check-out time. A short line even! Ahh, but the Asian man who could barely speak English and who only had 2 large things of Wesson to buy...well, he had a problem. Some kind of "i'm not sure if these are the large vats of oil that my lovely Asian wife at home wants" problem. A problem that Said Asian Man decided he'd solve by...well, calling his wife, of course. As a line grows behind him. As I'm convinced I'm finally gonna have my aneurysm right there in line. I'd always assumed it'd be behind the wheel of a car. He then leaves the line for a more private area...as we're all STILL standing there. Can you FUCKING imagine?! WHHHHHHHHHHHYYYYYYYYYY?!?!??! Finally, he shakes his head no, grabs his daughter and leaves the store. The cashier then has to wait to have the sale voided. All as i'm daydreaming of owning a handgun. Weary, I slowly make my way home. Ranting to my mother, she gives me her usual "oh, calm down" bit, which only makes me angrier. Heavy sigh. All that said, it WAS a productive day, despite hours of running around and aggravation. Martha Stewart on Dave was beyond amusing. The oncoming blizzard (?) has me wet with anticipation. And people are reading my blog!!!!!

Wait, people I don't KNOW are reading this fucking blog?!?!

Hello, kind readers. Let me start today's entry, at 2am EST, by noting that, about 50 minutes ago, I received THE most stunning, "Christ, life is NUTTY!" info...basically, that people "out there" are reading -- and liking -- my little blog test. Actually, more to the point...well, the "point" involves a little story. There's this ravenous Hungarian goddess that I know. She logged online shortly after 1am and proceeded to tell me that she forwarded my blog to a mutual friend of ours. We'll call him D. What UP, D?!?! Well, she later asked D if he'd read it. Yes, D replied...he'd BEEN reading it. HUH?!?!...the Hungarian Goddess asked. HUH?!?!...I also asked. Apparently, HG didn't specify that it was MY blog, because D was reportedly stunned at my identity. HE'D gotten my blog site via a link on someone ELSE'S site. Both D and Mystery Linker are said to really enjoy my ramblings. God bless you. WELL...I'm just stunned beyond belief at this. I mean, I guess i'm still naive to the rampant scope of The Evil Net...as smart and savvy as I am, and as much as Gettin Myself Out There was a key point of all this to begin with. I've given this link to roughly 7 people. I didn't think it was POSSIBLE that others would be reading it so soon. I guess blogger.com randomly supplies my blog to some people? I have no fucking clue. I just know I am FLOORED that someone I know has been reading my blog for DAYS via some random other person's link. I'm ALREADY dazzled by this whole blogging thing...a whopping 11 days into it. Whoever you all are, I appreciate your taking your precious Prophet Muhammad-given time to read me. Thank you from the bottom of my compassionate heart. Keep reading me! Spread my Gospel! Fall under my spell and don't look back!!!!!!!!!!!! TESTIFY, MOTHERFUCKERS!!!!!

It's official...I hate cooking

I decided tonight that if I could afford to eat out nightly, I would. Wait, I'd order in, too, as going out nightly would be too exhausting and surely infuriate me in some way -- dealing with traffic and other humans and all. Hmm, though even answering the door COULD be taxing. I guess the solution is a personal chef? But I mean, all I cooked was my usual...pasta. Specifically, vermicelli...with sauce, dribbled with olive oil, and sprinkled with cheese. Oh, and a single frozen meatball for "the meat portion." Whew, i'll tell ya...straining the pasta, then quickly rinsing the colander, then rushing to heat the sauce, as I raced to heat the meatball, then soaking the pot...all in under 15 minutes, mind you. But Jesus fucking Christ, I was weary. It tasted fantastic as I half-assedly stared at the 39th installment of SURVIVOR. But honestly, it was too much, lol. And then I had to WASH all of 2 dishes?!?! How in the name of God do some people deal with honest to God whole meats and 2 or 3 side dishes? Like my mother. Oy. Breakfast I can tolerate, as I usually just have cereal and toast. Lunch also involves a single small plate. But dinner...a nightmare. Frozen dinners were invented for ME. What the fuck is so relaxing about cooking?! I try and try and try to get into it, but I think it's another area where my overall impatience doesn't serve me well. I'm so bad that merely adding bacon bits (which any salad SHOULD have) and dressing to an already premade salad-in-a-bag is kind of wearying. But I'll keep cookin my pasta...

Don't feel like writing much, so here's some random, brief thoughts...

I added to my week-long Cleanfest by taking 45 minutes out of my afternoon to thoroughly scrub down our (naturally) white fridge.

Had the ODDEST dream last night involving....try to follow...2 grammar school friends who ended up hooking up in the nonexistent living room, upstairs portion of my fave college bar, which served as the setting for my upcoming 15-year high school reunion. I was alarmed, jealous, and ecstatic all at once.

Hey, as i write this, it's fucking snowing out!!?! Gotta love those non-predicted, sudden snow squalls. But a BIG ASS NOR'EASTER is a'comin' Saturday! FINALLY!! I YEARN for a crippling blizzard! I DON'T yearn to be stuck inside with Dipshit...so i'm praying he goes to Philly for work before the storm hits.

I FINALLY began wrestling with my piles of bills, receipts, papers, mailings, God knows what else that has lurked on my floor since, oh, Thanksgiving. Included in my "to read" pile, humorously, was an article from PARADE from fucking July on How To Start A Blog. HA! Daunting, this piles are. And they're not even the PERMANENT piles, lol, which reside on the other side of my bedroom. But ALL of them will soon be gone. GONE!! I also put aside a pic of LA and an article on the fastest way to obtain a passport. I will hang both up tomorrow in a prominent place to inspire me. YAY!

Catchy song of the moment...MOVE ALONG by the All-American Rejects. The video, too, mesmerizes. Oh, and to become part of the hoi polloi bandwagon...James Blunt's YOU'RE BEAUTIFUL is just that. It, too, has an arresting video...about suicide? Seems it...though the song ain't about such a dark topic. I like the juxtaposition, though. The video reminds me of Sinead's NOTHING COMPARES 2 U in its peaceful simplicity. Speaking of arresting, I believe the 2 HOUR series (?) finale of ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT is on tomorrow. I must make a note of this. I now know what i'm doing tomorrow evening. OK, time for THE JEFFERSONS and some light reading...2:30am...

NEVER become complacent!!!!!

This is one of my fundamental Life Rules. I got to thinking about it today because Violet said to me via email that she was shocked I said I was "relaxing" -- that she didn't KNOW me to relax. Well, of course I relax. Some would argue my entire life is relaxing, given I don't have a job. But I don't have the patience to take on THAT argument right now...or, well, EVER. But I got what Violet was saying. In fact, there's not a day that goes by that i'm not plotting, scheming, organizing, LEARNING. Seeking to better myself. I'm restless to a great degree. It's why, I think, I have little patience for movies. Sit there for 2 HOURS and watch something?! Something that 90% of the time adds nothing to my life? I have an insatiable appetite for LIFE. It's why I always have a fucking pile of papers or magazines...I always feel like there's SOME pearl of genius buried in those pages and pages of print. Right now, I have an article on Liberia next to me that I tore out. I didn't know jackshit about Liberia...and I feel ignorant saying that. And I don't LIKE being ignorant or feeling stupid. I'm not gonna immerse myself in everything Liberian, but at the very least, I'll now have a basic outline of the country's situation. I try not to be ashamed of my ignorance on things. Fuck, i'm known as a pretty bright person, to be frank. But i'm sooooooooooooo not the smartest person on earth. Smoke and mirrors is a game I AM a genius at, and I learned long ago that a good written and spoken vocabulary can get you VERY far in this life. Not to mention being a good speller, using proper grammar, and keeping track of current events. All effortless things to me...and easily learned. For example, one of my favorite books is the dictionary. If I see a word I don't know, I will literally jot it down on my hand if there's no paper around, and look it up as soon as I get home. Most people wouldn't bother to look up a word if the dictionary was sitting next to them. But it bothers me feeling like an idiot. Perhaps my favorite explanation, though, of my superior vocabulary...soap operas. I've always liked them...and the FUN characters on them, the villians...they're forever spouting devilishly clever wordplay, which eventually you pick up on as a 10-year-old watching Donna Mills eviscerate her latest business enemy or bedroom plaything. Oh, and TV GUIDE always employed the most captivating summary of my fave weekly shows...another way I learned. See, all around you are opportunities to hone your vocabulary. But this wasn't about vocabulary. It's about complacency. It's about my nonstop HUNGER for knowledge and new experiences. It's about feeling like few people around me share that hunger. It's about feeling as curious and optimistic about life now -- if not more so -- as I did at eighteen. I can see the eyerolls now. Who the FUCK do I think I am?! I am Gary. Hear me blog.

Touch-Up Painting, Death & Muslims

Another day of major house cleaning...another day where I didn't expect to be doing such a thing. But somehow it turned into, oh, roughly 6 hours (with breaks) of touching up the various white walls and cabinets in my apt. Not a terribly taxing job. In fact, rather wax-on, wax-off soothing. Yet after I was done, I was worn out. Still am. And it's "only" 1am. Think it has more to do with the fact I didn't sleep terribly well last night. But who cares. Point is, it was another day of something very productive taking place. Sure, MY PILES and tending to ME got put off another day. But to my memory, it's only the 2nd time in 8 years I've played touch-up painting. It was much needed and looks fucking great. I'm happy. I'm also very hungry...and have been all night, despite constant snacking. Thank Christ for my metabolism.

I forgot to note that on Thursday, Oprah had on Susan Saint James, Dick Ebersol, and their 2 sons...discussing the death of the youngest brother in a plane crash in Nov. '04. I've been waiting, rather perversely, for Susan's interview on this since it happened. I've always liked her, and in the daily onslaught of misery that the news brings you, her tragedy stood out to me. On the one hand, I felt like "WHY are they talking to Oprah about this?!" It's always such a fine line, but on the other hand, I felt that they probably wanted to 1) honor their son & brother by talking about him and 2) maybe inspire others in similarly horrific circumstances to NOT let THEIR life come to an end because someone they loved died. It was hard to watch sometimes, but worthwhile TV. This from the guy who's read the obituaries since I was a teen. I'm strange, my mother will always say upon spying me scanning who's died. "You're like the old ladies." Whatever. I find it more of a wake-up call than depressing. OOOOOOO, now that I think of it, this dovetails nicely with Coretta Scott King's funeral marathon today. Jesus Christ, it was like 5 hours long. JUST BURY HER! It's a flippant comment like that that I just spent a couple minutes debating whether or not to write on a BLOG, but I detest the idea of censoring myself, and that IS the first thought that popped into my head when I heard on the news how long the service had taken. But in all seriousness, all I've thought is how wonderful to have affected so many millions of people. THAT'S what I want out of life. To affect change. To influence. To make a difference. I canNOT fathom my entire life being reduced to some 5"x3" write-up in one state paper and a couple locals. Of course, I DO have VOLUMES of Shocking and Revealing diaries for my survivors to sort through. Hmm, this is comforting. And I MUST take my Death Photo ASAP. Donna and I can go together. Eh, my best pics are probably behind me, lol. Oh, and videotaped messages. And maybe a post-death Automatic Reply Email. "Hey, I'm out of the Life right now. I WON'T be back anytime soon. Please forward your question/complaint/commentary to my next-of-kin. Have a great day!" So good for Coretta. She lived a LIFE. Rest in peace. Has this paragraph been too macabre? ***Oh, and I SO need to go off on all the Muslims burning buildings and rioting because their FUCKING precious Prophet Muhammad was portrayed negatively in cartoons. AWWWWWWW. Poor babies. Do you see me firebombing Jann Wenner's office because Rolling Stone portrays Kanye West as Jesus this month?!?! Oh, my fucking God, these people are insane. ALL religious freaks are insane. Period. WARS and MURDERS...in the name of GOD?!?!?!?!? Um, newsflash, dipshits...no one ALIVE has ever MET Mr. God...thus, there's not a soul on earth who can speak for Him. SOUNDS so simple, doesn't it?! Guess what...it is. There goes any political career, along with my Nice & Non-Inflammatory Little Blog. Good.

Sean Combs & I...Our Tragic Connection

I read with amusement yesterday that Sean Combs, like me, detests his profile. He has asked cameramen on "Making The Band 3" to avoid shooting him from the side, concerned it reveals his overbite and nonexistent chin. Riot. This made me feel good. Very good. In my twisted, yet always on-target head, this actually inspires me. Because so much of self-confidence comes from the way you look. And yet, who's hot and who's not is both so wildly subjective and prone to relativity and the whims of idiots (think, randomly, Anna Wintour) who somehow become arbiters of taste. What the fuck am I saying, lol? There's a Big Point here, along with my general amusement at reading the little blurb in the Post. I think it's too late, though, for me to fully flesh out said Big Point. Something to do with believing in yourself and creating your own Aura of Chutspah, coming to grips with what you look like (e.g., my annoying bumpy nose), and realizing that people who've Made It Big and give off this vibe of effortless poise still have immense insecurities...and somehow still, er, Made It Big. Yeah, something like that. Unless you're just flat out ugly with no hope for a single good photo in your life...well, then, good luck with that. But keep your chin up, Always Hideous Fellow Humans! I'm sure you have much inner beauty and are well on your way to curing cancer or something, so good for you!

I had a focus group on "sandwiches" tonight. Paid me $75 for 2 hours of my time. I also came away from it with 5 Oreos, 2 cans of Coke, and 2 Earl Grey tea bags that i'll enjoy tomorrow. It was the first time (and i've done about 8 focus groups, i'd say) I've actually used one of those remote control things often utilized in genius SIMPSONS episodes, where you press certain buttons depending how good or bad you feel about what you're viewing. It was mainly about Subway commercials. Now I loathe Subway. Anyone with taste, literally, knows Blimpie makes a better sub. And it IS a sub. No hoagie bullshit for me. But I gave average answers for everything, with a few above average for the yummy images of meatball subs and hot, rising loaves of bread. I made sure the crowded room knew I liked the meatballs with grated cheese, too. MMMMMMM!! But every time, there's some people with just TOO much to say about things. I mean, opine on a thing or 2, then shut the fuck up, and speed up the process so we can grab our money and run, you know? And it's always the overweight, middle-aged woman with a thick Nu Yawk accent who runs at the mouth. Rambling about how she fucking liked that they put up the calories on the commercial, as if I give a shit. Shut your mouth, you dumb whore. Go run around the block. Not once in my 32 years and 11 months of drawing breath have I hesitated to shove an artery-clogging piece of food in my mouth due to high calories. *DISCLAIMER...Gary also enjoys salads, fruits, and fish.

On my way to the dreaded Port Authority, I discovered one can urinate with relative ease, free from scrutiny, on 30th St. just off Broadway. Make a note of it!

The night also included a hellish and endless quest to add time to my expiring at midnight welfare Tracfone. One couldn't script what I went through, but as always, I pulled it off in the nick of time. Awful, just awful. SOOOOOOO glad this night is over. Far too much running around on foot in 30mph gusts.

This afternoon, I spent more than 3 hours continuing my cleaning frenzy. This time, it was finishing all the kitchen cabinets. Good Lord, do they look good now, though! Not much is left to do in that department. The next 3 days I can FINALLY devote to MOI. Thank Christ. Ok, I guess i'm done with today's blog. Time to enjoy "The Jeffersons." Appropriate, as I've felt like Florence lately.

Thorsten lived in Montana!

Today was the Superbowl. Pittsburgh vs. Seattle. Pitt won. I don't care. The event, though, allowed me to make my 2nd visit to Mark's fascinating apt on 37th, where he had quite a lovely affair. Only my 2nd Superbowl party ever, I think. I arrived right at kickoff at 6:25pm and left with Kate shortly after 9:30pm. Four beers and tons of food. And lots of Thorsten...and his English-challenged blond friend. I so immensely enjoyed probing Thorsten on his life back in Germany...learning about his family and the style of home he grew up in. And I was amazed to learn he spent 6 months in Bozeman, MT. I probably knew this, but forgot. Again, the Germans inspire! I YEARN to travel across the country solo, taking pics, soaking in local culture. Sigh. I'll see Thorsten again before he goes back to Germany. Roland flew back today. Chris drove him to the airport, where young Roland was said to be sad. Awwww. So it was a nice night. But i'm glad the string of social gatherings of the past 2 weeks is over. I need to focus on ME, dammit. I wound up taking a sponge and cleaning spray to the kitchen cabinets after midnight, continuing my major cleaning frenzy. I again could have clubbed Doug, who felt the need to recite scenes from tonight's SOPRANOS repeat to me as I stood on a chair, breaking a sweat, furiously scrubbing away YEARS of grime. I imagined kicking him in the face, silencing him in one shot. This made me scrub faster. Stupid four-eyed fuck. Did I mention my cabinets are white, thus dirtied with alarming ease? And, yes, I realize I'm a four-eyed fuck, too. Oh, and I got a disposable camera for $3.49 today in Shoprite...a new record in terms of a bargain, 800-speed camera. I felt for sure there had to be a catch. Like, maybe I had to assemble the thing. But, no! Though you DO need to hold the flash button as you take the picture, which taxes me. But anyway...it's 3am. Two social gatherings, cleaning the apt, and an overload of Germans...THAT'S a good weekend!

Jenny L Hewitt is drivin' my old K Car!

JUST when I wondered what the fuck i'd write about tonight, divine intervention...I randomly find I KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST SUMMER on HBO and note with delight that JLH is tooling around Southport, NC in my old Plymouth Reliant. Same color (blue), too. Oh, the memories! God, it's so hard to concentrate on my blog, what with JLH's breasts' pivotal role, Ryan Phillippe's McQueen-esque heroics, and Sarah Michelle's steely confidence. I was even on the beaches of NC that summer of '97. I didn't hit anyone with my car, though. THAT occured in '92. Anyway, OK, movie's over. It's 2:43am. What to do now? Today's highlight was randomly mopping the kitchen floor...I don't think the floor's ever been so clean. A trip to Pathmark at 1am also was productive. It feels like fucking April outside. I want it to be zero for a week, along with a couple blizzards. Then it can be spring. I'm gonna read now.

Auf Wiedersehen, German friends of 5 months!

It's 3:15am and I'm tired. I can't imagine I'll be writing anything but cliched sentimental garbage. We gathered at Porky's on 21st tonight to bid farewell to The Germans, Roland and Thorsten. Actually, I'll see Thorsten again on Sunday. It was more so a goodbye to Roland. Roland and I have had some good talks, starting with on the roof of Kate's beach house on Sept 10, talking about 9/11/01. His happiness at always seeing me is a nice thing. He finds me "fun" and interesting, which, of course, I am, lol. And while many get to see that side of me, I feel like many don't. I can be hard to know. Anyway, it's not often enough that you're genuinely made to feel like you've left an impression on someone. Never gets old. But HE'S left an impression on me, too. The fact that he and Thorsten have come from Germany to live in NYC for 6 months is hugely inspirational to me. Specifically, if they can do THAT...why can't I move to LA? Or anywhere? I feel like the whole recent "LA thing" has to some degree been blown out of proportion, though maybe not. Who the fuck knows. I KNOW I could do it. But do I want to? If I survived being dropped off in Bumblefuck, PA at age 18, knowing no one, and thriving, I can do fucking anything! Or should I even think too much about it? As Roland says, what's 6 months to a year out of your life? If I like it, fantastic. If I don't, move back. Win-win. He's right, of course. But it's more an issue of $$ and a vehicle than anything else. But I can work on that. Point is, if I ever move to LA, I partly have Roland to thank. The FUNNIEST thing is that as Roland again pushed me toward moving to LA, and sooner than later, Kelly Clarkson's BREAKAWAY came on. I was listening to Roland's heartfelt urging and Kelly's deafeningly loud lyrics at the same time. It was bizarre, like some John Hughes movie moment. I find it amazing that I now know 2 Germans lol. If I went to Germany, I'd have connections there! Maybe that sounds ridiculous, but I think it's cool. I hate goodbyes, so I didn't treat leaving the bar at 11:30pm as a goodbye to Roland. As he said tonight, the world is so global now...email, IMs, cells, digital pics...it's not like we can't communicate regularly. And I trust he'll be back in NYC some time. So a hug and handshake and best wishes and "it was great getting to know you." But no goodbye. I'd arrived at 7pm...the Germans around 7:30 I guess. It was a good 4 hours with them. I just wish I'd spent more time with them in NYC. They were a refreshing surprise. Damn the swift passage of time.

I smell of bleach

Jesus fucking Christ, this is SO not the day I had planned. But what are ya gonna do? Spending the better part of ELEVEN hours cleaning your bathroom is at least productive in SOME sense, right? Perspective, Gary, perspective, I kept tellin myself all day. You see, after having one of my super insomnia nights where I went to bed close to 5:30am, I was awoken by that familiar, instantly ulcer-inducing sound -- a knock on my apt. door. Translation, the landlords. After being given the usual 3 seconds to answer the door, The Old Man keys himself in, and I soon hear him and The Plumber enter the bathroom. I knew exactly what was going on. The whole fucking thing's my own fault. I should have alerted them MONTHS ago that the shower didn't totally turn off...that it dripped. If you jerked the knob several times, you could make it so it didn't leak MUCH, so this is what i've done. Anything to avoid the landlords. My life is ALL about avoidance. Avoidance of anyone, and to some degree, anything, that causes me stress. I recommend it. I'm a big Put It Off-er. Anyway, I'm sure at some point, the faucet actually turned off after several jerks, but it's gotten progressively worse. Literally, in the past week, i've flirted with telling the landlords. So after gathering my composure, I casually walk into my hallway after hearing the LANDLADY being called up to join her husband. This is how I start my fucking day. I'm soon bullshitting about how I've noticed it for a couple months (reality: July) and how if you jerk the knob it kinda stops (reality: no more, if ever). Ugh. Just a nightmare. The old man's shaking his head, the plumber and his teenage assistant are laughing, and the landlady, always nice, simply says we should TELL them when there's a problem. I know, I know, I utter, desperate to both urinate and put on a cup of tea. The landlady's soon noting how she's been on the phone with the water company, "yelling at the lady," saying her bill can't possibly be so high. Never having paid a water bill, I shudder to think what our 6-month dripping faucet has cost them. It's at this point that I instantly think "rent hike?" My mood darkens even more. Then it actually gets worse. After I slink back toward the kitchen in shame, I hear the old man say to the fucking plumber in disgust, and in his broken Italian accent, "they don't clean." Um, WHAT?! So the fucking plumber was commenting at the cleanliness of my bathroom? And the old man flat out states that we don't clean?!?!?!?!? I was CONSUMED with rage. My fucking apt. is NOT a hellhole. In fact, most everyone who enters it comments how clean it is, "especially for a guy's place." And more to the point, I am CONSTANTLY tidying up. HERE is the problem...roomies. I am NOT Florence, The Fucking Maid. And I admittedly don't clean as thoroughly as I would if I lived alone, because I know in 10 minutes, the roomie will mess it up. And it was even worse when I had two roomies. But one is still bad. Especially one who's incapable of, for example, eating at the living room table without leaving behind some sticky residue like a 4-year-old retarded child would. I'm also not going to cause friction by constantly noting how Dipshit isn't cleaning this or cleaning that to perfection. He's certainly not the biggest slob on earth, but he's still bad. And so, the coup de grace came when suddenly the old man's sauntering into the kitchen to join me in an Awkward Moment. At first, he's just staring at me. I think I uttered a pointless "hi!" as my tea boiled and he began to look around the premises. He is soon saying "you need to clean...if you want to live here, you need to clean." He begins pointing at the stove, which MERCIFULLY I actually took a brillo pad to like 2 weeks ago, so it COULD have been much, much worse. But he's pointing at it and shaking his head in contempt, saying it's a new stove and blah blah blah. SHUT THE FUCK UP, OLD MAN, DO YOU HEAR ME?! That's what I wanted to say in my fantasy, as I whip a large steak knife out and hold it to his throat. I promptly blamed the roomie, saying HE'S a slob and I DO clean and can't be held responsible. I even whipped out my patented "I'm on your side here" shoulder pat, speaking to him in a soft, comforting tone. He then wondered if we even had cleaning supplies. I promptly shut him up by whipping open the cabinet under the sink, which revealed a bevy of helpful products to make the apt sparkle. His eyes lit up at the Comet bleach and Brillo Pads. Our eyes met and we made love. Kidding about that part. So this has been an exhausting background story, but the point is...around noon, I entered the bathroom with paper towels and an arsenal of cleaning aids. While I maintain the bathroom was acceptable, sure, it definitely had its issues...and over the next 11 hours, I fucking sprayed, brilloed, wiped, and scrubbed every fucking inch of that bathroom. I literally did nothing else all day of consequence except eat, write this blog, and make my bed. Pathetic...yet necessary...I guess? So now it's spotless. How long can it last? Well, being some things literally hadn't been cleaned in there perhaps in my duration in this apt, I think today's effort will last long. Oh, and Dipshit told me he just noticed the leak "2 or 3 days ago." THIS is the stupidity i'm dealing with. The guy has zero idea how to live like an adult. I'm so fucking tired of being The Responsible One in any given situation. Ugh. Anyway, I still reek of Comit, and should really get to bed. What a ridiculous fucking day.

8 damn years

Today marks EIGHT fucking years of living in this apt. WHY, Lord, WHY?! Well, it's clear why...$$$. I could have had a breakdown today over this anniversary, but instead, I threw myself into continuing what i've BEEN doin in '06...organizing my life, workin out, and cleaning random parts of my apt. that don't appear to have been cleaned IN the eight years. Today's winner...the slab of granite or whatever the hell it is that is at the entrance to the bathroom. Lord knows Dipshit would never clean it. See, when I take a shit, I just sit there observing the filth around me. I'm not sure what passes through Dipshit's mind, but it ain't to clean something. But who cares. Bottom line...today was another good, productive day. I look forward to all that February brings. But can I PLEASE not celebrate a 9th year here?

So I read last week that a Weather Channel forecaster broad was fired for being too old like 3 years ago and a memo has circulated stating for all the On Air Talent to freshen up their looks. Very amusing when TWC now gets a sleazy spread in the Post. Hey, it's been my fave station for 15 years...about time America caught on. But it's funny that I read this, because more and more, Hilary Andrews looks like some frisky cumwhore who just got done having her cunt pummeled by Warren Madden before rushing into her midnight-3am anchor chair. Her blouse consistently has the top few buttons open, her lips appear blowjob-ready, her gaze often lingers far too long on male co-anchors, and her hair is increasingly way out of place. Oh, and she's from north Jersey, which automatically ups the Loose Slut potential. All that said, i've slowly developed a warm spot for her. Where that spot is depends on the day. But I feel protective of her. I feel like the other ladies of TWC must hate her. Oh, the drama.

Ok, I need to go to bed. It's far too late, and I don't think I should have had this Triscuits and hot cocoa mix so late...