Dear B-rye

Today I was half-heartedly watching a daytime sitcom(for research purposes) and it struck me(as it has before and I assume has struck you at some point as well) that the laugh track inserted into comedies are so.......so......well, frankly I don't know what they are. I like to think the familiar spurt of laughing behind every sitcom joke isn't necessary, but then I wonder if I'd miss it if it happened to be absent.
The real reason I bring this up is to pose this question; Could these laugh tracks be utilized in other areas of our existence?
Here are a few ideas:
-every time after anyone anywhere farts
-a replacement for all the clapping during the State Of The Union addresses
-an alternative to the gross squishing sound of stepping on bugs
-upon opening an umbrella
-the immediate greeting upon entering Canada
-the sound that comes out whenever you're about to say something really stupid to a girl, then instead of her laughing at you when you say in your quasi-pubescent voice 'I think you smell pretty' you can impress her by blasting the sound of a live studio audience laughing in her face. Then she'd be sure to fall head over heels for you, and she wouldn't have her boyfriend beat you up like last time.

All in all B-rye, I wanted to mention this to you and my other avid reader for the purpose of saying the following; I don't think you need a laugh track to be funny, you're great just the way you are(especially if you fall down or do anything with Jim Belushi). I can think of a few people that I know that might benefit from one, but you, my friend, are so much better than that.

The Great Lakes Tour

This coming week I'm leaving for what may possibly be my greatest road trip ever. For some time I've earnestly wanted to drive too all of the Great Lakes, stopping to swim in each one. Now I'm going. And the best part? Johannah is coming with! We're heading east on Thursday, driving towards Lake Superior, making our way across the U.P. of Michigan, then into Ontario around the north side of Lake Huron and south toward Toronto. We'll swim in Lake Ontario and Lake Erie and then make our way west again back into the good ol' U.S. of A. After a dip in Lake Huron we'll drive to Sleeping Bear Dunes N.L. on Lake Michigan and swim it up. I'll give an update when I return!

20 Questions About Bathrooms: Question #4

4. Is having the double sink really a luxury, how often are both sinks being used?

Another dumb idea passed off as ‘fancy’. I could understand having two toilets in a bathroom because sometimes when your mind says “….just hold on a minute” you body is saying “GET OUT OF THE WAY, I CAN’T HOLD HIM ANY LONGER!!”. How often have you found that you simply cannot wait to wash your hands or do your hair?(Those of you having OCD please disregard) Ladies and Gentlemen of the Jury; yes to multiple toilets, no to multiple sinks.

I Talk To Myself

While talking to myself I often engage in conversation with others, you know they’re not really there, but they are - firing dialogue back to me in discreet but perfect tones and lyrics. The usual chimeric conversation teeters on the spine of self-obsession with the other party of my choosing asking all kinds of interesting questions about my interesting past. There I am wallowing in my own indulgence, drunk on the idea that these people should find me incredible. The exception to this insanity is that when I carry apparitional exchange with this girl I overflow with queries of her life and thoughts and sorrows. I want to know all that I can about her, to gather all of her information in my arms like picking up a pile of autumn leaves. Tell me everything, please I’m interested in everything about you.

I Am Dangerous

I am dangerous…
I am dangerous, I leave burning candles unattended.
I am dangerous, I've eaten expired lunch meat.
I am dangerous, I once drove 22 miles without my seatbelt on.
I am dangerous, I ride my bicycle without a helmet.
I am dangerous, I’ve stared almost directly at the sun.

I am a risk taker…
I am a risk taker, I bought a scratch off lottery ticket once, I lost.
I am a risk taker, I leave home without an umbrella on rainy days.
I am a risk taker, I’ve played the game RISK with my brother-in-law.
I am a risk taker, I buy used cars.
I am a risk taker, I don’t separate my bright colors from my whites when I do laundry.

I am a wild man…
I am a wild man, If I don’t shave everyday, I grow a beard.
I am a wild man, as a kid I would climb trees and occasionally I will climb them as an adult.
I am a wild man, I drink tap water.
I am a wild man, sometimes I watch Oprah.
I am a wild man, when I sleep, I dare to stay on one side of the bed.

The Heart is Like a Night Sky

Fall 2007
A few months ago I was told something that’s been walking around in my head. I was told I gave away the key to my heart, but I didn’t show the lock.

Maybe showing your heart is like turning a lamp on yourself or taking away cloud cover. It gives people the ability to really see you, not who you want to be though, just you - with all the rust and riches that are included. Showing your heart, parting the clouds - it’s not a spectacle it’s just the stars and night sky that’s always been there, but no one has been able to experience.
The human heart is a night sky, a dark space containing many bright spots. All of the good and the bad of your life is there on the midnight tapestry, deep black shaded corners of your worst coupled with the glittering stars of your best. I think seeing a person’s heart is like looking at the night sky, they wear it like a blanket. If you know someone, you know their stars, the constellations of themselves. I think all of my stars are on the inside and I don’t know how to get them out.

Sometimes during the most thrilling moments in life the sun begins to ever so slightly peek over the horizon and turn the whole place into a tremendous shade of twilight. A glowing warm immersed in orange and violet. It is there then, in those times, that we are falling in love.

20 Questions About Bathrooms: Question #3

3. Why would anyone situate a mirror such that you could watch yourself urinate?

This is complete madness! I have been in more than several home bathrooms with large, wall-covering mirrors fastened directly behind the throne and every time I do, I find myself perplexed and disgusted at the sight of a man peeing directly in front of me. My immediate defense therefore is to close my eyes, leaving my pee stream to find it’s own way home. Lassie’s pee may be capable of this, mine however, is not.

Instructions For the Operation Of a Clothespin

Instructions For the Operation Of a Clothespin
(A) Spring Type Clothespins

1. Grasp clothespin by the open end(the end that’s shaped like a V) between your thumb(if you do not have a thumb one can be purchased at your local Home Depot) and your forefinger.
   
   
2. Squeeze the clothespin ends together causing the opposite end of the clothespin to open(At this point we recommend using extreme caution. Clothespins are not toys, the open, spring-loaded end could come in contact with unattended body parts and cause severe discomfort. Keep all children, pets, and baby unicorns away from open clothespins). Aim away from face.
   
   
3. Place open clothespin over clothing article and pinning apparatus(We strongly encourage using certified clothes line cable in any clothes hanging situation. Poorly anchored or weak clothes line cable could result in clothing falling from dangerous heights; creating a hazard by landing on and/or covering up important items such as car keys or the entrance to a really cool cave.). Wait 5-7 minutes after eating before pinning clothing to a clothes line. Do not hang clothing while you are on fire.
   
   
4. Remove fingers from the clothespin releasing the spring tension onto the clothing and cable(release speed is critical during this step; releasing to fast could result in a loud SNAP sound startling nearby wildlife and/or napping grandparents. Releasing the clothespin too slowly could result in finger fatigue and cramping - the leading cause of accidents during the picking of noses, ears, and kickball teammates.). Practice responsible clothes pinning; avoid using clothespins while under the influence of alcohol or hallucinogens.
   

(B)Friction Type Clothespins

1. Place clothespin over clothing and clothesline. Enjoy!
   

My First Fluevogs

I ordered my very first pair of Fluevogs today. I've been waiting to own a pair for over 10 years!

Fluevog

Don't Delay Fluevog Today!

The Heart of Moana

The Heart of Moana

Resplendency strikes, it takes all away
All matter and meaning, with forging and reeling
A feeling that bears all this strength and deep red
Awaken the heart and awaken what may

The Heart of Moana unfolded like thus
The folds that unfolded rigid and secure
It startled and conquered and make her the slave
To whirlwinds unharnessed in ashes and dust

And then it was taken, the beauty of it
Put in the cellar, a shoebox in the corner
Tremendous amounts of alone so intense
The Heart of Moana reduced to a pit

Oh! Heart of Moana will you be seen again?
To wrestle and dance and warm up the blood?
The champion of life is not great success
It’s the Heart of Moana that brings life to men

20 Questions About Bathrooms: Question #2

2. Am I the only one that thinks bathrooms with windows are a dumb idea?

The bathroom is the one place that I can find nude solace. In fact, every time I set foot in a bathroom I feel as though I owe it to the bathroom to be naked while I’m there. So who is the guy that thinks “hey, why don’t we put a window right here, right in the bathroom.”? Thanks for ruining the mood. My dear friend the bathroom, whom I can usually trust, marred by a window to the outside world.

20 Questions About Bathrooms: Question #1

1. Why is the tube for TP much larger than would ever be necessary?

With all of the stark claims of Charmin, White Cloud, and all of the other ’bog roll’ makers that their rolls are the longest ones out there, I propose that the TP tube be made smaller. I have yet to see a holder that was the same size as the tube, they are about half the size typically. We live in a time when TP shortage is not taken lightly, my friends. My hope is that this short rebuttal with spur a lobbyist group to go to Washington with the intentions of changing the TP tube world. Then, those confined rolls could hold about 80 more sheets of wiping power and just think of how fun it would be to see that little tube spin super fast when you got to the end of the roll.

Bicycle

The bike, the bike, the bicycle
The epitome of machine
The machine though is simply a summation of other machines
Go ahead, take apart the bicycle
Kill it
You will only have more and smaller machines to handle
When you take the bicycle apart
When you dissect it, the lines of definition blur
You have chain oil on your hands

You can take her apart
Though I was wrong, you can’t explain her
It’s a mistake; taking her apart, that is
What a mess you’ll have
Think of the dark oil on your hands
You won’t be pleased with that

I’m sorry
I don’t want to compare you to a machine
I just like the way that sounds…machine
You’re more like Autumn
All kinds of different and strange things happening
Animals going places
Temperatures rocketing
Holidays erupting with delight
All of the obstinate colors revealing
Entirely for the sake of existing
Dramatic and lovely existence
That’s what you remind me of

Top Tens

My top ten reasons to die young
10. Poor 401k planning is a non-issue
9. Won’t ever have to make the bed again
8. You probably died because of a freak thing,….exciting!
7. You won’t know the meaning of the words catheter tube, or enema bag.
6. Getting answers to important spiritual questions early!
5. You won’t have to watch your best friend die…
4. You’re done working, forever
3. You don’t leave anyone behind(provided you aren’t married and don’t have kids)
2. Young deaths leave a legacy
1. To die is to gain

My top ten reasons to die old
10. Grandkids
9. You had the chance to be “…that creepy old guy that tells all those stories”.
8. Most people aren’t too troubled when you bite it.
7. You get buried in a suit!
6. If you didn’t get to do something in life that you wanted, it’s your own fault.
5. Chances are you’ll see death coming
4. Friends and family tell you how great you are before you go.
3. You can look back on your life and think, “hmmm…”
2. People listen to the stupid stuff you say while you’re minutes away from croaking.
1. Maybe it all makes sense in this moment, when you are making your way towards home, passing all the people you’ve built because others like them built you, maybe something clicks as you look in each of their wet eyes, something that makes you sigh, ‘I understand‘. Maybe it’s this time that all the madness that is life comes together and makes an unusual and wondrous piece of music that is your exit, your postlude.

My Life As a Waiting Room

My life as a waiting room:
Seems to me that I’ve spent a lot of time waiting. Mostly waiting for folks to show up. The earliest of memories have me standing at the full-glass front door peeking at the corner where the main road clears the grove of Ole’s evergreens in an effort to spot my wayward friend barreling towards my house. He was being delivered via his mother in a Hershey brown Oldsmobile. Besides times like those, there were the stretches of summer afternoons or winter evenings where I, bursting with anticipation, would saunter around the yard waiting for the sisters to come outside and act as playmates if only for a little while.

I want a surprise in my next friend, but I’m afraid I can’t have that for I always have both eyes open, using them to constantly check at the window for an arriving. Just try to sneak up on me Miss Wonderful, I dare you, because everywhere I go I’m looking.

Am I fated to find myself in wait for hours a day, every day; Lethargically kicking rocks down the sidewalk, methodically reading the buzzer names in her apartment lobby, and routinely leaning against the headrest with my eyes closed, listening to the car stereo all in an effort to pass the hour-like minutes prior to the arrival of my friend?

I’ve seen all of them coming because I was there first.

The Beautifulest Wagon

I'm a big fan of the station wagons and regard them as the epoch of human transport. That being the case, I'd like to introduce you to the greatest wagon I've met so far. The early 70's Saab 95 Wagon. It's for sale, It's on Ebay. If anyone cares to buy me a gift, this thing would look great with a bow.

Ebay Link

If my future wife is reading; please acclimate yourself to the idea of me desperately trying to buy a bizarre vehicle such as this to haul our charming family around. It beats a minivan, trust me I owned one.

Snakes In The Well

7.6.08
Of Gophers, Ticks, and Snakes in the Well

I shot another pocket gopher today. It was digging up the yard over by the barn, so I snuck up there with the 22mag and pulled the trigger before all of the swallows went crazy with their squawking. The bullet went through his back and splayed him open in the very way that you imagine it will when you hold your breath to take the shot. I used my last round for that gopher. I’d been saving it for a few weeks now, for a day such as this.

Most guys trap pocket gophers when they encroach into their yard. Not me. If I am going to kill something, I owe it to them to be present. Gophers will dig in the evenings at about 7 o’clock at my place and whenever I pass through the kitchen I find myself peering out the windows looking for evidence of them. If I see a new dark mound of dirt I’ll give it my full attention and stare at it looking for activity, gun at the ready.

I’m not much for killing animals. I’ve never been deer hunting and don’t much care to. Though there is something satisfying in killing an animal that is bothering you. Eliminated, with no remorse. When we were young, my sister would get after me for squishing lady bugs because they were pretty. And when it rains heavy, my oldest sister swerves all over the road to avoid the frogs and their families.

I don’t plan on buying anymore bullets for my gun. There is no sport in shooting pocket gophers anymore, only maintenance.

Have you ever been around someone when they find a tick on themselves and their reaction is an over-the-top discourse on how terrible it is? Are you one of these people? I recently realized that this drives me mad.

“Just calm down,” I say “nothing’s going to happen to you. It‘s only a tick”

Ticks abound here. Killing ticks for sport is nonsense. When you feel one crawling on your skin you’d just as soon drive your car off the road in order to get a hold of it and kill the little bastard. Killing ticks is mere maintenance. No one feels remorse for ending the life of a parasite.

I have an open pit well, which means it’s big enough and wide enough to fall into. At about 12 feet deep it’s not the best quality of water, but it’s water and it’s the only well I have. It’s been in use here for 100 years or more and always has water flowing through it like a river. However, I have a problem with snakes, snakes that get into my well. It’s usually the worst in the spring. The water will begin to smell squalid, that’s when I know the snakes are in the well. Then, I march outside, throw the lid off of the well and see their foul, thin bodies floating in the water. I’ve honed my snake wrangling skills with a garden rake to competition standards because of this. Whenever I find the snakes in there I put half a gallon of bleach in the well to clean it up and start over. When the bleach wears off however, the snakes are back in full force swimming around like idiots.

Sometimes, when the snakes are still alive after I pull them out of the water I’ll take great pleasure in bludgeoning them with the garden rake. It’s the consequence of having to bathe in their stinky water.

If someone shot me in the back, ending my life instantly, leaving my splayed body for the birds, I don’t think I’d be upset. I wouldn’t be upset because I’d assume the killer that killed me was too much like myself. Not blood thirsty, not killing for the sake of killing. Merely out eliminating something they saw as a problem. I’ve tried burning ants with a magnifying glass when they‘re busy building their tiny ant towns, minding their own ant business. It’s tedious and it makes your vision all blotchy afterwards.

To Be Noticed Without Notification

Sometime January 2008
Today it was 10 below, and as I was gathering some wood for the stove, I happened to recall a time this past fall. It was just before dusk sometime in October, I was picking tiny apples from the trees just north of the house, the ones mixed in with giant cottonwoods. After sunset, and after I had snagged a shirt-full of them, I walked into the yard, sat on the ground, and reclined under the yard light. I was eating each tiny apple one bye one, then tossing them into the abyss of my dark yard. As I lay there heartily enjoying life I distinctly remember thinking how much I wanted someone to drive up to the house and find me there, laying on my back in the middle of my yard, looking up at my stars.

I wanted someone to drive up and see me enjoying life. I wanted someone to be compelled to enjoy my life with me. Secretly, I wanted Johannah to drive up, though I knew it couldn’t happen for she new nothing of where I lived or of what I was doing. That is what I wanted then, however. If I could’ve directed that moment, Johannah would’ve driven up the driveway, sauntered over to that yard-light light, laid on the downy grass with me and eaten tiny apples. Johannah and I, enjoying life, looking up at my stars.

It brings to mind a time that I, as a young boy, was again laying on the bendable grass of my yard gazing at the daytime, blue sky. Dreaming probably, imagining something grandiose, lost in the wonderment of my own playful ideas. I was under the canopy of our bounding willow trees. It was one of the few times I can recall feeling as though my dad was concerned about me in my youth. Dad was at the house and he called my name, I bent my neck fully to see him from half a world away and yelled…“yeah?”.

“Never mind.” he said.

It took a few minutes for me to realize that my dad was only making sure I wasn’t passed out, or dead. Even then, I think, I wanted someone to lay there with me and enjoy my life. “Dad, why don’t you come over here, lay down, and look up and the daytime, blue sky with me?”. I don’t want to be the only one that enjoys my life, I should be shared with somebody.

I want to be noticed without having to notify.

An Open Window In June

I haven't brought myself to install the window screens yet this year, though this hasn't stopped me from recklessly opening my house windows to the outside world. A June Bug flew in just now, straight to the light that I'm sitting under.
June bugs, they don’t want to come in. I'd like to say that they want to come towards the light, however this is not even true. They only want to go where they are going, they belong in the night. The only thing the illumination does is screw them up. The June bugs belong in the night,...the light takes them away from home.
June bugs, the 'Flying Fortress' of the insect community, a large armored car . He came in like a lethargic giant, laboring his heft across my living room only to be repeatedly smashed with a fly swatter. All of that hard work, that fierce determination for naught.
It almost makes me feel sorry for the little big guy and for all the others that have met a similar fate, but then I remember that I hate the fuckers.

Coach, My Favorite Cat

Sometime in Dec 2007
I found Coach in the garage tonight, so I put out a plate for him, leftover sandwich meat and a can of tuna. I sure hope he sticks around for awhile, Coach brings jubilee with him, I erupt with emotion when I spot him trotting through my yard. It is the same emotion felt when seeing an old friend after a long departure, except Coach is far from an old friend, he is new, he is strange. Coach is wild. He is a wild cat, making his way quietly and elusively through the sparse countryside, he almost wants a home, here at my place. I’m doing what I can to show that he can have a home here, he doesn’t have to cozy up in the house, really he can come and go as he pleases. I suspect that he wants to come and go, and often at that. Most of these thoughts are fantasy, but I don’t care, I like Coach, nay I love Coach. We’re chips off the same ol’ block, I want to be Coach and he wants to be me. We’re in this together for now, that is why I thoughtlessly yell excited words when I see him trotting through my yard for the third, fourth, and fifth times. “Hey Coach, I’ll be your mascot if you’ll be mine.”