Feed Jake. He's been a good dog.

My best friend, right through it all.
So if I die before I wake, feed Jake.

Now that that's out of the way, I went skiing a couple of nights ago and Jake saved the day. (Aldrich, not a dog.)
I'm pretty much a big idiot most of the time. Most all of the time. This story shows no exception. On the way to the slopes I told Jake to not let our night of skiing end without me attempting a 360 off of one of the ski jumps.
Time out.
That makes me sound like a skier. I am not. I rent my skis just like the guys on the bunny slopes wearing Carhart's and camo. But what I lack in experience I make up for with inexhaustible stupidity.
Guy at rental counter- "150's or 160's?"
Smirk- "170's." (I have little understanding of what this actually means.)
Guy at rental counter- "Your DIN is 4."
Doh- "What the heck is that?"
Guy at rental counter- "The amount of strain required to pop the skis off in a landing or a crash."
Macho- "Make it 5."
I was now using the equipment of a 6' 2", 220lbs man. I am neither 6'2" nor 220lbs. Just a little fella with a big dream, pull a 360.
The reminder came at 4 o'clock. The other guys waited below the jump to watch the catastrophe. I pushed off, dug in, then tucked. It is truly an odd feeling to be flying through the air, looking back at the jump you just hit, and realizing you're not going to make it all the way around before you hit the ground. I don't know what possibly made me think I could pull it off, this requires a skill set and knowledge I am not privy to. Nevertheless, I tried it three more times, so did the other guys. The second time knocked the wind out of me. On the third, I actually came close to spotting a landing but intsead landed (smashed) sideways having lost only one ski that time. All previous attempts left me sitting fifteen feet from a pile of rubble.
Soon after we began we had a crowd of onlookers and lucky chairlift passengers enjoying the show. Shouts and cheers accompanied every attempt and every failure.
Thanks to Jake's reminder, a good night of skiing turned into a memorable one.
And I feel like I've been in a car crash.

Slumber.

The only thing keeping me awake today in class was heavy nasal breathing and three hours of seat shaking. The nose whistle next to me made it extremely difficult to concentrate.
And he was shaking his leg. Hard. The whole row was vibrating.
Oh, the actual professor wasn't there again and second string left a little to be desired.

I have a lawyer.

So, now I have a lawyer. That's kind of fun.
A month ago I was shocked to find on the traffic citation I had received a court date and time. I was a little surprised and admittedly excited. I was charged with driving 16 miles per hour over the posted speed limit.
"You know what the speed limit is son?", the unmarked cop said to the ONLY car on the four-lane major thoroughfare at 12:30 in the morning. (That's 0030 in cop speak.)
"I'm guessing it's alot less than what I was going."
"Uh, yeah."
Aside from the blunder of being "smart" with the cop, I followed all the rules of what-to-do-when-you're-pulled-over-to-get-out-of-a-ticket-as-a-male. Dome light on, hands on the steering wheel, music off, yes sir, no sir.
"Uh, yeah."
So, I had a court date, and a court time, and it was earlier this evening. Had no trouble finding the courthouse, sorry, the East Government Center, because I've been there several times before. The first ticket I got a mere four or five months ago led me there in the form of traffic school.
"Sir, you have to have a Kentucky driver's license to go to traffic school."
"Can I do that?"
"Yes."
"Where do I need to go to make that happen?"
"You're here." Lucky me.
"Umm. So. I mean do I take a number or...? How does that work?"
"Just sit in that chair and smile." I love Kentucky.
If you would, allow an aside: I've met people in Kentucky who actually believe that if you're designated as an organ donor on your driver's license, and in a major accident, the e.m.t.'s on the scene wil honest to goodness let you die. Some organ donors (identified by an orange sticker next to your picture) have even been killed. "First thing those vultures do is look in your wallet to see if they can let you die, no sir, not for me. I ain't no organ donor."
6:30 pm.
I arrive a half hour early for my big date with justice. I paced for a few minutes then had a seat in the hallway outside the courtroom. A well dressed, white-haired man has a seat next to me. My new friend.
"You here for court?" The man asked (most ridiculous question of the day by the way).
"You got me." I was sitting with a ticket in one hand and a checkbook in the other.
When he asked to see my ticket I realized that we weren't at court for the same reasons.
"Ooooh. Sixteen over, that's six points. Insurance up 30 percent sometimes." His words were chosen with the precision of a surgeon. "Have you been to traffic school?"
"Yes, four months ago."
"That's not good. That's the first thing the judge is going to ask you. Have you been to traffic school. No, that's not good that you've already been." I'm getting worried. "Do you have a lawyer?"
"No."
"That's not good either. No, they'll just give you the points. But with a lawyer, you know, things open up. We can drop that moving violation, change it to something else, faulty equipment, you know? No points that way." I didn't know. This was a whole new world to me.
"How much would that cost?" Honest question.
"Eighty-five dollars." Immediate answer.
"And the likelihood of what you're saying actually happening, I mean would they really change it?"
"Oh, yeah."
"Well, I guess it's too late for any of that now." Puppy dog eyes.
"Oh no. I uh, I can do it. I've got a couple of cases pending but I can represent you as well." This sounds kind of funny but it kind of felt like he was asking me out.
I looked up and shook the hand of my new lawyer. "Do you have a pen? Who do I make the check out to?"
David E. Klein, Attorney at Law began coaching me from that point. "When the sheriff let's you in just sit to the side and when the judge calls your name, don't you move. Don't stand up. Don't speak. I'll speak for you. When I'm done I'll walk out and you get up and come right behind me." Not going to lie, at this point I was pretty stoked. I had hired a lawyer. He was coaching me. This. This was kind of cool. Sheriff let us in, I sat down at the end, my attorney was up front talking. It's ten minutes to seven, criminals are still pouring in the door. David E. Klein motions to me, we walk out. "We're finished."
"What?"
"We're done?"
"Did it work?"
"Work? (snicker followed by grin) Yeah, it worked."
New day, new experience, new lesson learned. Never go to court without a lawyer. And if at all possible hire one that wears a gold, diamond encrusted, horseshoe pinky ring.

Dealer to the stars.

I got a call yesterday from world famous singer/songwriter, Doug Florio of Kimmet and Doug. They are a local Louisville duo via Long Island, New York who I just can't get enough of these days. Aside from original songs (many of which hold water believe it or not) they cover a little of everything and a lot of Zeppelin. I try to see them at least once a week which is easy enough because they play every wednesday and sunday night at Ye Ole Dutch's Tavern on Shelbyville Rd in St. Matthews. Somehow, over the course of a few months, they know my name and that I sell cars.
Hence the phone call.
"Hey Adrian, this is Doug, from Kimmet and Doug, and my girlfriend is looking to buy a car today......"
Dealer to the stars.

No concept of time.

Today in class, the grader was standing in for the professor, and he was to go over the syllabus and give an introduction to the book of Acts. This is a three hour course that meets only on Monday's so he had plenty of time. After going over the requirements for the course he let out a sigh.
"Whew. I really have absolutely no concept of time whatsoever. I had allotted an hour for covering the syllabus and, well... whew."
A mere twelve minutes had passed since class had begun, five of which were consumed by passing out materials. We decided to forego the break that was planned to go between the syllabus and the lecture and finished an unprecidented two hours ahead of schedule.

Broke a man down.

Today, at work, I encountered a salesman. In the end he won (for now) but I broke him down first.
When selling there are times, usually after important questions are asked, when the asker mustn't say a word until an answer, in whatever form is received. The adage goes that the first one to speak, loses, metaphorically speaking. So, tonight I came upon a salesman. (For context I sell cars part time while in school). After spending probably three hours with the man, his wife, and daughter, I finally, at long last, got him into my office and got a price on my computer screen and asked him the penultimate question.
"So what do you want to do?"
Silence.
He knew what was at stake. A salesman by trade, he was accustomed to this akward silence, terrible silence. And he was putting his wife and daughter through this.
Complete absence of sound.
After about three minutes I almost cracked but then realized how ridiculous this whole stand-off was and that fueled me, I almost smiled.
"I'm going to go back out and look at the car."
I had broken him down. Grown man. Accomplished ubersalesman. He was wearing a sales award ring. And he spoke first.

Then they walked.
Left.
Without buying a car.
I swear they're coming back though.
Rich said so.

The beginning of another book I've yet to write.

When you get old you get wrinkles in your face. Your skin, it gets dry or something and wrinkles up. It’s hard to notice at first but it gets real noticeable when you get to be, I don’t know, sixty or so. Every old person I’ve ever known has wrinkles in their face. Of course I don’t live in Hollywood or Los Angeles where apparently they have ways to deal with that sort of thing. I think I’d rather die with wrinkles though. I suppose it’s a sign that you’ve been to the beach or played with a dog or didn’t wear sunscreen. Anyhow, I hope I live long enough to have wrinkles.
I doubt it.
Heini Brothers' Coffee on Frankfort Avenue has thinned out. My wrinkled subject has departed. Into the cold. It hurts outside. I wish it were summer or at least spring. What good is the cold to anyone. It’s biting. I can’t stand it for more than a moment. Alaska must be the prettiest place in the world otherwise I can’t imagine anyone choosing to live there. On account of the temperature and all. If I had a million dollars I’d live in a greenhouse. Come to think of it I could probably live in a greenhouse for a lot less than that. And it probably wouldn’t be the best life. Greenhouses smell kind of funny in my opinion. I wonder if anyone would come and visit me in my greenhome. Smell the flowers. Steal potting soil. I’d have bags and bags of the stuff. Doesn’t every greenhouse? Potting soil, petunias, a bed in the corner. Maybe a dresser with clothes piled up next to it. A green hue cast on everything. An off-white bedspread. A little dirty. Not messy but dirt dirty. And well yes, probably messy too. I would have to drive a pickup truck, old, maybe green, hunter green, with too much rust to fix. Rust gone wild over the bed and tailgate. Large, gaping holes. Bald tires. Strong engine. Gardener friends. Leather hands. Dirty hands. Hands that feel pain but a face that doesn’t let on.
How does one go about buying a greenhouse and I suppose land to put it on. Good grief, how much would that cost. Being a landowner just sounds expensive. To get cheap land I’d probably have to move to… well Alaska, and you know I’m not moving there.
I could sell flowers I suppose, maybe sell fresh cream. I’d have to buy some dairy cows for the fresh cream. I could probably make enough money to stay alive if my gardener friends would stop stealing my potting soil while I was out making cream or milking cows or whatever. Maybe I’d buy a big fat combination lock and put it on the greenhouse door. That’s what I’d do.
If I live to see it I’ll be an old, lonely, wrinkled gardner.

Part of a book I've yet to write.

Buster had been sitting in the orange molded chair at the Branson/Springfield Regional Airport for three hours. His feet were propped atop his carry-on luggage and a folded newspaper flanked him on either side. He didn't want to talk.
It was only now five o'clock and the gray cloud cover was surrendering its low ambient light to the coming pitch night sky. As best he could tell from the Spanish closed-captioning of The Weather Channel the snow showed no signs of slacking in Memphis, the city through which his flight was to connect, and the reason his flight status went from delayed to delayed to cancelled.
Thoughts of other times and other loves filled his head. Giant blocks of time passed without a movement. Buster sat and thought. The snow in Memphis was only putting off his reemergence into a former life. Five hundred miles and five hundred years away.
Tomorrow was another day and it would begin some fifteen hours from then. Why don't airports have cots, he thought. Then he reasoned, that would be gross.
Because of the homeless people, they don't take care of anything.

Close call.

I went to the bathroom to take a leak and saw that my roomate had installed an over-the-toilet shelving system of sorts. So I looked at it and noted its shelves and towels and construction and looked down and... WHOOOA!!!
HOLD IT! HOLD IT! IT STINGS!
I almost peed on a closed toilet lid.
Close call.

Eject button.

I'll warn you up front, you may have had to be there in order to find this funny. I say this because I've gotten only sympathetic laughs thus far in the retelling.
At any rate.
A few days ago I was visiting John, a friend from college, in Nashville. At the end of the night we were headed to another friend, Brian's, house. We were in John's truck and it is awesome. Power windows and locks, keyless entry, extended cab, automatic transmission, you name it. You name it, his truck doesn't have it. Baseline and awesome. However, what it lacks in accoutrements it makes up for in novelty. It has a dash-mounted Eject button (ripped off of an old computer) and airbags that you can turn on and off with a key.
One more thing, when John and I hang out everything becomes ridiculously funny.
For whatever reason, I was threatening to push the Eject button. (Understand, absolutely nothing would have happened if I did. It is a fake button. A joke.) While traveling 40 mph down a major thoroughfare in Nashville's West End, John turned the car off (one of the few advantages of a manual transmission, John likes this trick and does it often), used the key to disarm my airbag, then started the engine again and continued on. I found this very amusing. I was screaming and my stomach hurt from the laughter. "Turn it back on!", I shouted. As we approached a traffic light, a red traffic light, John turned the engine off again, turned my airbag back on and DROPPED THE KEYS. The steering wheel locked, power brakes lost their power, and we rolled up onto the curb, narrowly missing a fire hydrant (really close), continued rolling over the curb and into the intersection and finally to a stop just short of a telephone pole. John picked up the keys, restarted the engine and pulled into a parking lot to regroup.
I was crying.
Really.
Really, really funny.

Digging a big hole.

Do you remember how much fun it was when you were younger to dig holes? It was out of control the amount of pleasure a little kid could coax out of a hill a bucket and a shovel. Of all the holes I dug, one particular excavation sticks out. This particular cave (it really was, it seemed enourmous) had a mouth probably three or four feet across went maybe three feet straight down before angleing off into the side of the mountain. At the end was maybe room for one or one and a half children. Just as a giant ship becomes seaworthy with the shatter of a bottle against its bow, my hole only felt like a true accomplishment after I had a sandwich and a glass of water in its depths. I must have made the strangest requests, "Mom, I need a glass of water and a sandwich so I can eat them in my tunnel."
Now.
Take that fun and multiply it by one hundred.
Digging is a grown man's job. As a child I was diligent but would tire of the filthy labor quickly. Oh, if only I didn't live in an apartment in the city. I am older, wiser, and stronger. I could dig an underground city.
I really think that I would.

An old story that was amended, entitled "Pleased as Punch".

It's more or less a wave right now.
I don't always see it through. I neglect it as often as I allow it to take me where it wants. Use me as it wishes.
It is a feeling. Almost a state of mind.
I want something great. Something grand.
I want the world.
I want to be injured. I want to bleed. More than anything I want to bleed. To be cold and pale.
I need a bruise or an abrasion. I want to be spent from hours of struggle. To be sore and sweaty.
I wish that my hands hurt. Covered in gauze. From a fire.
Maybe if I was burned I wouldn't have to think about ever finding someone that would want me for the reasons I want to be wanted.
My face would be scarred. And I could blame it on my face.
I would be one pitiful looking idiot because of my burned face.
I could be openly miserable. And for good reason too.
Maybe I would need a skin graft. And a blood transfusion.
Burn victims lose alot of blood believe it or not. A bunch. So I would get one, or two maybe.
Face wrapped in gauze, oozing. Weeks. Months. Little progress. Everyone has moved on.
The helium from the get well balloons long ago dissipated leaving mylar in piles near the head of the bed. The flowers are faded.  Everyone has taken off as much work as they can, and I'm not doing much better. It's been too long.
The balloons on the floor are depressing. I wish the nurse would throw them away. They're depressing all hell out of me. If I could stay awake long enough to tell her I would.
I want more than anything for those balloons to be gone.
I'm nothing but a deflated helium balloon.
I am a silver mylar grocery store get well worthless balloon.
I cost two dollars and thirteen cents and people know that I care about them for three or four days until the helium is gone. Then I'm piled on the floor at the head of the bed depressing the hell out of myself. And anyone that comes in for that matter. To look at their faces you'd think I were dead.
I've tried to pray for the past couple of nights. It's like that guy in college that knew you really well but you didn't know him all that great. You could never remember his name for the thirtieth time and it was the most embarrassing thing ever. You were totally supposed to know his name by now, no excuse, but you didn't. Not to save your life. Not for a million bucks. You dreaded seeing him 'cause it would be awkward as anything, you not knowing his name and all.
So that's what it was like praying. I didn't want to give up on it though. I didn't know him well but I knew enough to know that he was my only shot. He was my shot. The balloons were in the floor but he was at my bedside.
All my life I wanted to be loved by a woman. I wanted to be the perfect complement to someone. I would give all my love away for the hint of sincerety in a woman. For a woman to hold. To smile with. More than anything this consumed me. To be truly and utterly loved, to be placed above any other. To be prefered.
But now, all is gone. The balloons are in the corner and the air smells clinical. I am bedridden with one guest who is always staying past normal visiting hours.  And I can't recall his name.
So far as I can tell he's not much for conversation. Which is a good thing 'cause I don't much feel like talking anymore.
I can't believe he's still here. It's been months, it really has. They took the bandages off a couple of days ago and I'm the scariest man you've ever seen, ugly as hell. He didn't flinch though, like he didn't even notice. I cried my eyes out, for days. But he'd just rub my hand and grin like he didn't get what all the fuss was about. I'm glad too. I'd a jumped out the window if he'd made a face or even whinced a little when they pulled back the gauze.
I used to have a lot. All my ducks were in a row. Now I don't even have two ducks to put in a row. All I have is that old man with the big hands in that chair at the foot of my bed. I don't know why he's still there either. If he knew better he wouldn't. I'm the most arrogant person on planet earth is all. Not worth a dime. I'd sell him out for a glass of water if I was thirsty.
He still sits there though. He'll grin and he cries every now and again. Not a sad cry or a hurt cry but a satisfied cry. Like he's just found the greatest thing ever. I'm glad and all but it's confusing as anything. Really, I'm the ugliest thing you've ever seen, I don't even want to think about leaving this room. But he's not phased. Pleased as punch that I'd let him sit there. I'll tell you what though, I'd be some sort of basket case if he wasn't.
He's all I've got.
Nothing makes sense.
I have him, rather he has me, but I would settle for so much less.
To just be held.
I've sold myself.
I've burned myself.
To be held, for five minutes, five seconds even.
To be known and loved and held for five seconds.
I am so very basic. From the feast that has been offered I've eaten toast and jam thus far.
It's kept me alive but altogether unsatisfied.
And there is no one to blame.

I lost.

It's really late. Jake is the victor and undefeated. I tied Sam after being behind for several hours. We were both one away.

Trivial Pursuit.

Jake is setting up Trivial Pursuit the 90's. It's late but no one cares. He won last time but I will win tonight. I am the coffee mug and I will prevail over Jake and Sam. The Royal Tennenbaums plays in the background.