The Seer

One night last week I had a rather disturbing yet very exciting dream. Cars were strewn all over the road, high speed collisions were happening all over the place, terribly loud. Two school buses were in a very dramatic crash, the kind you see in video games. The rear doors opened up and these old folks with canes and walkers came out the emergency exit in the back. This doesn't matter but I just realized the emergency buzzer wasn't working, on either bus. Anyway the elderly got mowed down all over the place.

I woke up, it was raining, just an awful day in general. I left work for some reason or another. On my way back I pulled up to a traffic light and heard a thud to my left. I looked and there was an old lady with a cane covered up to the hip by a late 1980's blue conversion van. Completely freaked me out. So the van guy backed off of her, I called 911, it was just really disturbing in and of itself.

About twenty minutes later I remembered the dream I had had not four hours earlier. That's when I realized I am a super hero. So. Yes.

I am a Super Hero.

And I'll tell your fortune for a dollar.

98.6

The fog had fallen and the street lights were dandelions gone to seed. The chill in the air just enough for the light jacket I was wearing, and just enough to make me check the dangling thermometer/compass/trendy/zipper pull.
“What is it?”
Almost as soon as I’d forgotten I remembered and that freaked me out.
So odd to forget that.
The healthy human body maintains an internal temperature of 98.6 degrees. Without my asking, it has been doing it all along. 98.6.
98.6.
98.6.
I completely forgot and that scared me. Not in a “put the gun down” kind of fear but in a far more serious and deeply unsettling way. A momentary lapse of modern common knowledge. Why couldn’t I think of my internal temperature? Why had I asked myself in the first place? Why am I talking to myself again?
Out loud.
Stop. Talking. Out Loud. Stop writing about it. It’s a pretty pathetic thing to forget.
Stop it.
98.6.
Why is it the same temperature under your tongue as it is in your ear canal?
“Because it’s your internal temperature stupid, not your 'under-the-tongue' or your 'in-the-ear' temperature,” said the chicken in my head, to himself, rolling his eyes with all the sarcastic flair I'd come to expect. He can be a real jerk sometimes. That’s probably not even true. I’ll bet the ear-temperature-taker is somehow calibrated to take its proper reading, maybe 85.4, and read in relation to 98.6. Which is the number I couldn’t remember. I do now, of course. I really only forgot for a second.
It’s kind of like forgetting how old you are. I did that this week too.
Did the chicken in your head just roll his internal eyes at you because for just a second, maybe longer, you forgot how old you were?
I hope so.

Figure Skating

I’m watching the Olympics and I am amazed. Not by the skiers or the curlers but surprisingly at the figure skaters. If you think I’m crazy try this combination.
Mute the television.
Pretend the skaters are prisoners and their captor forces them to wear such costumes as a form of punishment.
Pick your favorite mix of songs, play them, not too loud.
Watch with new eyes and ears.
With the exception of figure skating I could participate in every Olympic sport. I have no delusions of grandeur. I would not win, I would not qualify, but I could ski down the hill, I could sweep the ice, and I could I could skate in a circle and try to be fast. Under no circumstances could I begin to understand how to figure skate.
I’m serious, get over yourself and your machismo, mute the teley, put on some good tunes and watch it. It is incomprehensibly amazing.
And utterly devastating. A simple fact must be on every competitors mind. The winner doesn’t fall. If you fall you will not win. You probably will not get second or even third. Oh, and also, you’re spinning in circles, twirling in the air, turning, twisting, and jumping, on ice. All of which lend themselves to falling. Not to mention that unless you’re Russian you have but a fragment of a chance of winning because though they are ugly they skate well, really well. Better than you, and you know it, everyone knows it. Russians have a predisposition to ice skating like Americans have to being fat and greedy. They don’t mess up, they don’t fall, they will receive the highest short program score ever recorded and will break it two years from now. They will wear leg warmers and practice in hallways in designer tennis shoes like ballet dancers. They are even better ballet dancers than you. You may be prettier but you will not hear your national anthem tonight.
Yet you put on your fancy pants, you lace up your skates, and you hope. Not that the Russians will do poorly, but that you will not fall, that you will not fail. And yet nearly all do. It’s a beautifully devastating sport that I hadn’t truly seen until tonight.

The Chicken and Monkey

Lately I’ve been catching myself talking aloud when there's no one else in the room. Catching is not the right word. Noticing. Acknowledging. When I am home alone I talk to myself. I talk to the television. I sing. I rub my stomach. I smile at the television. The dancing light beams talk to each other and I smile at them and talk about them. It’s as if I have friends in the room and I’m clarifying that whatever just happened was in fact great/horrible/funny/ridiculous, what have you. I tell the Bachelor and his harem that they are so awkward and crazy and then I instruct him on which girl to not give a rose to. I chastise the girls for being so petty in their spats. I smile and say, “This is so weird.” “Oh, you are going home.” “What are you thinking?” “Are you kidding?” All aloud. I am losing my internal monologue. The chicken and monkey that used to have conversations in my head have pushed themselves down from my cranial confines and out of my mouth. Their form of payback for making them watch such atrocities silently. They make me laugh, the chicken and the monkey. I’ll tell you what the chicken said tonight so long as there is an understanding. The chicken and monkey are my friends, do not pass judgement on them. They hang out with me and we watch all of the same television shows. One of our favorites is The Biggest Loser. It’s touching. Caroline Rhea is the host. She has a tagline just like Trump does. That chicken is so clever. Tonight, we were watching The Bachelor and a girl got turned down and the host said, “I’m sorry” and with comedic timing fit for showbiz the chicken chimed in “You are not the biggest loser.” Oh, we laughed.

This all just turned creepy.

Groundhog Day

Today was Groundhog Day.

If the groundhog gets struck by lightning then it's summer for the rest of eternity. Because lightning is hot like the sun and summer is the hot season. Naturally.

If he gets speared in the head by a falling icycle then it's winter for the rest of eternity. Becanse an icycle is frozen dripped water and it has to be really cold to freeze water that's dripping and winter is the cold season. Naturally.

As it is Puxatawny Phil has way too much power. It's ridiculous that he gets to decide how long each miserable winter will last. He couldn't find his shadow this morning, stupid groundhog. That makes me angry. Not really angry mind you but certainlly a little angry. Like if you really loved the blue icing you can get on cupcakes, I mean, you were almost obsessed with it. "Boy, I can't wait till my birthday 'cause Mom's gonna get me some cupcakes with my favorite blue icing!" Then you wake up on your birthday, your birthday, and you look up and the sky is green, and the water is green, and your eyes are green but they used to be blue, and the cupcakes come out and the icing is green and it tastes like sour apples.

Angry like that.

For six more weeks.

Salesman

I'm sitting at Panera Bread.
Two people are sitting next to me.
One guy is trying to sell the other guy on something.
The selling guy just answered his phone and his voice became really high and really loud.
I just made eye contact with him on accident............
He just left, he came up to me after the incedental eye contact, asked how the internet worked, his inroad. Under the guise of networking, Atlanta is filled with people who utter sentences like, "You're a sharp looking fella, what do you do for a living? Ever thought about supplementing your income? What would you do with all that money?"
It makes me a little nauseous. This guy has a card that underneath his "company" name says - Marketing, Management, Distribution. Doesn't that cover virtually every corner of the business market. This guy's business rules the world and creates diversified incomes. Or, it probably doesn't. He asked me what I wanted to do when I got old, aiming for a retire early marry a 20 year old response. "I want to write." He didn't skip a beat, "You know, one of our biggest companies is Barnes and Noble, who knew you could make all that money selling books."
So
Sad

Baby Girl Collins

One of the most amazing things that can be experienced is to hold a child that has been breathing air, in our world, all that we are and all that we know, for just a few hours.

My cousin Jeff and his wife Ivy gave birth to their first yesterday, Baby Girl Collins. The proper name is on the way.

Trick or Treat.

Last night was my first official Halloween living in a neighborhood not dominated by college aged males. So I bought candy, turned on my porch light, dressed as a freshly dead truck salesman and waited. Began watching television and waited. Finally, at around 8:45 my non-English speaking neighbor felt sorry for me and brought over the cutest Mexican Pirate I believe could ever have existed. I'm not kidding, I gave him the whole bag of candy. We speak Spanish on close to the same level, me and the kid. "Hola" and "Adios" comprising 100 percent of our interactions. Of course, he's 2, so. Happy Halloween.