| Icks and ughs, followed by Acks and Gags!I happen to be one of those who re-heats coffee in the morning.?When there is a syrupy bit left in the pot from the morning before, I fill my logo'd coffee cup as far as I can, mindlessly watching the escaped grounds plop in my cup and toss it in the microwave.I realize that this is java blasphemy, and maybe there is a coffee know-it-all out there that will tell me exactly why, but hell, I can have wakefulness and heat in 70 seconds.?How can that be wrong???Caffeine at the speed of light sacrificing all but the desired effect.?I like to do this while I am fixing some dry whole-grain toast for breakfast or a bowl of sticky oatmeal, and if timed out correctly I carry it all in together to my office where I begin my day by reading emails, and checking my calendar for things that I have forgotten from the night before.?It's not that I am so busy I can't manage to squeeze in another four minutes for the brewing of the coffee, it's just a matter of well thought out time-management, resource-allotment and a good dose of laziness.?Mostly laziness.?If there were a choice given, having a day start badly is really a better way to go than having it end badly.?I have found through many experiences with both that I can finish off a badly begun day, but no matter how great your morning was, how sweet the birds were singing, or even if you had fresh brewed coffee, not what I have so often, if your day ends in sucky fashion, it gets chalked up to suckiness forever.Imagine, if you will, a fantastic day of work-bliss, dreamy co-workers, yummy lunch, and flowers from your sweetheart.?You miss the evening commute, and get to the gym early where you have a fantastic workout and have your butt stared at.?But as you are sitting down, later that night, in front of American Idol eating your pre-portioned single-awareness dinner entre with the lights down and a nice smelling candle burning, you notice something odd on your fork.?..r inspection, after reaching for the light, knocking over your wine and stepping on your cat, which screams, you find that it is a human hair.?One that may have curls resembling a hair that might come from someplace other than yours, or anyone else's, head.?Can you still remember the birds that morning????Still remember how great the morning dew looked sparkling on your window as you sipped your perfectly brewed coffee??I don't think so.?A strong vomit, followed by a scalding shower and dry heaves maybe leaving a brown spot in your undies are probably going to be what you remember this day for forever.?You have uncovered a new post traumatic stress disorder.?The best you can do is try to forget it, or share it.?This day for me, however, was not like so many other days that start well and end poorly, or vice versa.?Days with re-heated coffee, and dry toast leading followed by a run and boring TV leaving nothing to talk to anyone about.?This morning, while reading my email and drinking my stale coffee, I drank a fly.?The fly was dead, if that helps at all and if my taste buds are ever going to amount to anything on CSI, I would say it had been for at least four hours.?The little bugger (get it?)got tossed from side to side in my mouth just long enough for me to be sure it was not alive, and definitely had feathery wings.?Yes bile is creeping up as I re-count this.?A fly on its own merit is simply a horrible little creature I think we all universally look upon with distain.?Even if, and this is a big if, the little fly-boy never finds a pile of crap, or dead animal to land on, roll around on, eat, or lay eggs on (how does a fly get pregnant anyway?), it was once a maggot and if there is anything more disgusting than a hairy black fat fly it's a white wormy maggot, especially on the kitchen?counter.?A fly, unlike a butterfly, does not escape its creepiness by going through its metamorphisis.?Fly's are gross even if they never touch a thing because they were once maggots and there is just no way to not discriminate.?This particular fly, since he was house-bound had no poop, that I know of, to land on.?No dead animals to worm around it or to drink the blood of (I know, I know), but at best he was a maggot at one time and that is more than enough to give me the hee-jeebies thinking about him laying limply on my tongue.?This story is going somewhere I promise. |
| This story is going somewhere I promise.?Misery does love company after all.I have discovered that if I experience something horrible, that scars my retina, if I share it with someone else, and they experience mental damage second hand, I feel better.?It's not gone from my memory but I do get some relief.?In this vein for you now I have a treat;?We all have wondered at some time or another where do seagulls go when they die.?There are hundreds at every beach, yet I have never had to watch my step to be sure I did not step on a carcass.?They just disappear.?I actually might have been the only one wondering this, but now, with you, I have company and through your collective wisdom I hope to have an answer, or at least shared ignorance.?We may have also wondered, again maybe just me, something about those who end up on the streets of Seattle, hiding, sleeping, or enjoying hallucinations under the overpass's, or in the alleys as we drive by.?Something that, if your radio is quiet for too long may have crossed your mind for a nano-second but was wiped away, by your self protection mode, as cleanly as if you used an eraser on a new dry-erase board.?What is it??Its something that I no longer have the privilege of not knowing.?Its left a mark like a ten year old erase board where every mark stays forever, faded but forever.?This day, the one in which I was able to enjoy a rare April 2008 vintage fly with my coffee, a treat I must say, I also had to drive myself down to my office which is just so far from civilization I keep expecting someone to check my passport, in Auburn.?Sorry for those of you living in Auburn, or (Gasp) south of Auburn if that is possible (do you even have TV in there?).?Since I get to work from home, starting my morning here at my desk and finishing it at the same place I have quite a bit of freedom, but about once every six weeks there is something I just cannot ignore, and have to use ten dollars in gas, and a mind numbingly boring drive to my other office which of course is in Auburn.??
Auburn.Auburn.Auburn.?Just try saying it ten times to yourself out loud and you will hear how ridiculous it even sounds.?Ugh, I hate Auburn.?The drive is about an hour from my house and along the way I pass through Seattle, which if you have not been here means driving along in four lanes, which then are constricted to two just as you go underneath our gloriously distracting convention center.?Yes imagine the evil genius who thought of this freeway.?One that constricts to two lanes as it travels through a major city, while passing under a dark convention center dripping with vines.?Possibly scenery was what this mad-man was after because with all of the overpasses, underpasses, exits and onramps there is a lot of time to enjoy whatever is around you, not necessarily in front of you, while limping along at 19 miles per hour.?People seem to enjoy watching me pick my nose while I in turn watch them put on makeup, read the paper or put their ankles around their ears for sport, or car-yoga.?As I was driving southbound this fine morning still trying to scrape the oil off of my tongue I noticed, a not so unfamiliar site where a group of homeless people were gathered in the shelter of an overpass right next to the freeway.?As I came closer one seemed to break away from the group, which was huddled in the sharp V shape where the overpass meets the bottle strewn dirt, and scurried towards the freeway itself, where I was.?No way for this person to get on the freeway, much like the lion den at the zoo there is a large gap protecting us (errr, them?)so I was not afraid, more curious.?I was closer now and this hooded fellow was doing what looked like a sack race alone because his pants were so far down his legs it kept him from making normal strides, but today that is nothing strange.?Kids still think this is cool to wear their pants around their ankles, at least in Seattle they do.?Probably already 'out' in every other large market city, but the news has not made it here yet.?A moment later, while facing in my direction I notice his dress was not a style statement he is making, now away safely away from his colleagues, but in front of the civilized world, sunrise and collective waking city, but was rather a statement of necessity as he began to poop.?I hope, like watching "Platoon" on a small black and white television set, the true horror of the war in Vietnam is minimized by not being there, but rather allows just a taste of what has marred the minds of so many, that this perfectly frozen moment left crystallized on my brain shared via blog will only give you a night sweat or two and not the endless loops of "bend and plop" that cycle in mine.?But regardless, I am feeling better just having shared it, knowing that like the lung-cheese coughing balding business man on a steamy coach flight cross country, a little of me now resides in you.?END? |
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