Murphy’s Law is my life.

This past Saturday was Press Day for Christopher Guest’s For Your Consideration. If you’re late to the party, read my previous preview here to find out what this is all about. Anyway, my current day job has me working a shift that I haven’t quite adjusted to yet. In fact, I should have been in bed hours ago, but instead I’m blogging. And it’s this night owl lifestyle that’s just screwing me over. So, because I don’t get enough sleep througout the week, I overslept on Saturday morning. It wasn’t fatal. I still had time to make the junket since the invite said it started at 10:30 am and I was up at 8:45 am, but there was more to consider than just drive-time. There was shower-time, invitation and map printing-time, visual and audio recording prep-time, blah, blah, blah-time.

I was out the door at 9:15 am. Check-in was at 10 on the nose. From Fullerton to the Regent Beverly Wilshire in Beverly Hills it’s about 45 minutes with light traffic and an hour and change in moderate traffic. Even if I got there a little late for check-in I’d be okay. I’d just miss out on the catered breakfast they usually have for Press. And they don’t skimp at these functions, let me tell you. We’re talking Mother’s Day brunch buffet over here.Read the rest of this blog entry here.

THE CAR THING…

Luckily for me, my car was still under warranty, so I called my brother up and he used one of his AAA tows to get me hauled over to the nearest Chrysler dealership. A quick word on my relationship with my brother: when I finally get around to writing my memoirs it will be painfully obvious that car trouble is what bonded us most. How many times did I drive through rush-hour traffic to help my brother push-start his car? And how long would I be pushing before he realized that he forgot to lower the parking brake? Conversely, how many times has he waiting with me while a tow truck guy snapped off the lugs from a stubborn wheel so that the tire could be changed? Ah, horrible times to experience, but wonderful to look back on. In any event, my PT Cruiser got hauled off and my brother and I followed. Unfortunately, the tow truck guy knew the way better than we did and we ended up driving around for an hour, trying to find the place. We showed up at the Service station just as they were closing and the rep–a guy who called me “buddy” more often than I would have liked–took my info and said that he would call me in the morning.

Read the rest of this blog entery here.

I don't really want to write this one.

But if I don't get this out of my head.

I'll be chewing my guts forever.

If I keep typing.

Constant and forward thought will keep the tears from brimming over.

I'm broken inside.

And it hurts.

v1.0

I fell in love with a girl a long time ago. She was smart, capable, engaging, and a natural beauty. She brought fun into my otherwise rigid and rehearsed life. I was 11. She was a classmate. I moved away, but I kept in touch with her; mailed her lengthy letters filled with short stories and drawings. With my friend, The Mormon's, help, I upgraded from letters to audio cassettes, punctuating our commentary with poignant songs. This went on for years. She never wrote back. But I still loved her in the way that only children know how to love: unconditional and blind.

One day, on a whim, I called her to find out how she was. She was going through a bad breakup. She was broken inside. She hurt. I told her I'd come over. I was older then. I had lived more of life. I knew that there were things that couldn't be forced. I knew that she and I would only be friends. I was well adjusted to that idea.

We went to a coffee house that night and just talked. Outside, however, the planets were aligning and caused just enough of a gravitational field to alter her thinking. She told me she wanted to date me. Those were the only words I'd have taken over a Governor's pardon if I were ever sitting on the electric chair.

For the first time in a long time, I felt alive. God, what a strange concept to be in a moment and realize that you haven't lived until that moment. And how amazing is it to have it be another person that breathes life into you?

I was 17 and she lived half an hour away in another city. With my parents and my home life, she might as well have lived on another planet. My parents, my father especially, would never approve of me driving that far for a girl. He was against commitment of that magnitude at that age. Besides, he had already gone through a similar and costly debacle with my brother over similar circumstances. His long distance relationship and events contextual to that were such sore points for the family that it became easier to hide the phone bill rather than incur my father's wrath upon seeing the outrageous charge. My slight of hand became so good, that I could fetch the mail, find the phone bill in the stack by touch alone, slide it into the band of my underwear under my shirt, and then bow and curtsy in front of my father without having the cellophane window crinkle and betray me. My mother and I went to great lengths, but they were worth it, because my father was pretty maniacal when it came to spending money on his children's happiness. When I pre-approved a date with the girl, my father took note of the mileage on the car before and after to make sure I had adhered to my itinerary. I knew, in the deepest valleys of my soul, that if I defied my father, a grisly fate awaited me.

I couldn't see enough of this girl.

At the time, there were very few things in my life that would be worth defying my father for.

She was one of them.

I would sail a boat on dry land for her.Read the rest of this blog entry here.

Work, like suffering, is the great equalizer and a thing that bonds us all. These are my stories.

THE CATERPILLAR AND THE SUV

On my breaks I enjoy circling around my building and taking in some sun. The parking lot completely encompasses my building, providing a nice little black top track. One hot day, around the back, where the parking lot isn’t as wide, something moving on the ground caught my eye. I bent down and noticed a caterpillar inching its way across the undoubtedly hot asphalt. It squirmed into my shadow and moved on to the curb. Looking over to where it must have come from, I marvelled at how far it traveled; a lone nomad in a Sahara of black sand and white stripes. Now, only a wall 15 times the caterpillar’s size stood between it and the freedom of the grass.

It craned its segmented body up and began to scale the curb, but the firetruck red paint that told people not to park there negated the catapiller’s natural adhesive and it fell down onto its side, time and time again. At length, it gave up and wormed over to me, looking for help. I shot a glance at the grass and saw all manner of bugs and creepy-crawlies in its dark recesses.

“Do you really want to be in there?” I asked.

The caterpillar craned most of its body onto my steel, square toed boots and looked at me. I had half a mind to pinch it between my fingers and carry him over the curb. Then ECN’s words echoed through my head. He once recounted a news story he read about a man who attempted to stop a rape in progress. The man was stabbed, survived the cut, but died from complications of the rust on the knife. Then I took into account that I was at work and ECN once said to me, “Never treat anyone at work like a human being.” Did that include caterpillars? Could this be a poisonous caterpillar or might it be carrying a rare form of flesh eating bacteria? Why should I risk these possibilities just to do a good deed for a bug that probably doesn’t have the brain capacity to appreciate it?

Realizing that the risk was too much for too little gain, I stood up, shook the caterpillar off my boot and walked on. The caterpillar did the same. A few seconds later, the unmistakeable sound of a monstrous SUV approached from behind. It swerved close to me so that it could fit its gigantic proportions between two other SUVs without clipping a bumper when it turned into the parking space. At that point, I knew–based on where the caterpillar was when I left it, how close the ginormous Escalade was to me, and the sudden stuffiness of a tiny soul floating in the air–the caterpillar was dead.

I walked back to the caterpillar and found its squashed remains in a small stain of green and blue ichor and I at once felt very sad. I could have done something to have prevented the outcome. I chose not to out of fear and insecurity. It suffered, albeit briefly, and died unnecessarily due to my inaction. My decision had such rapid consequences, it frightened me. The caterpillar didn’t die hours later, when the blame could be stretched over several variables. No, it was me and then death. I began to sink into depression, questioning my validity as a human being, but then I realized it was just a fucking caterpillar and had a cigarette as I walked away.Read the rest of this blog entry here.