Overheard No. 4

"..... to take over the world."

Okay, by itself that's not really profound, hell it's not really very interesting. But what I liked about it, is, as I walked by the person saying this, he was pointing to a picture of Kim Jong-il. Now, I don't know for a fact that Kim Jong-il wants to take over the world, but he certainly rules N. Korea with what appears to be an Iron Fist. I'm not going to get into any sort of political rambling here, but it just seems strange to me how so many will obey so few. Don't we realize *we* have the numbers? It's like we are beaten already, not by guns, but in our spirits, in our souls... I'm speaking mostly for western states here... certainly there is a more complicated situation easterly from where I live. Why do we hate each other so much? Why do we look away, because TV or shoes or work is more important than our fellow man. I'm as guilty as anyone of it. I want to live a happy life, it's the only one I've got, as far as I know... and that seems more important to me than another's suffering if they aren't directly before me. At least I can admit it. I don't like it when it's put on display like that, but it is the reality.

Heavy duty.

It's gurbling...

I'm fasting.

Apparently I'm rather punchy today.

I said to my cubemate "You're just grouchy because I'm not eating" and she said "I'm grouchy because you won't shut up" and I said "I'm probably passed out on the bathroom floor dreaming this interaction and foaming at the mouth" and she said "yeah, and you're probably making gurbling noises."

The purple stuff.

I bought grape juice tonight. Damn that shit tastes good. I used to get it from my mother all the time when I was little. It still tastes just like I remember it. That's a nice memory. And a delicious drink. And a sub-par blog.

Two out of three ain't bad, as they say....

Overheard No. 3

"The more you bang on it, the better it tastes."

While it's obvious to infer the common sexual reference to this one, my guess is some sort of meat tenderizing is going on. I can't think of anything else that improves it's tastes when beat upon.

I know, for myself, the more you bang on me, I may or may not taste better... depending on what you like to taste...

In discovery...

I was thinking the other day, or remembering, actually. While reading Ilium , I came across a funny moment, where a Greek soldier is ordered to hand over all his armor and clothing to our naked hero, right down to his underpants. The soldier is admonished to "kill all the lice" as well. Yuck. I had a good laugh, but this immediately triggered a memory of my childhood.

I don't remember my age, maybe 5 years, when I was in kindergarten. I got the lice at some point, from some kid, somewhere, and roughly the memory was of a woman washing my hair and treating me for lice. We were in her kitchen, and she was massaging the magical anti-lice shampoo through my hair, and washing it out it the sink. Now, I don't remember her name, or even her relation to me. She was not family, but I know that me and several other children were bussed over to her house after school. I attended Riverside Elementary in Snohomish, that much I remember, but I don't know who this woman was. I remember she had a husband, or perhaps her father, who didn't hear to well, and didn't seem to do much other that sit at the end of the couch, watching 'Wheel of Fortune'.

After school, me, and sometimes other children were dropped off at her house. Sometimes she would make an egg-salad sandwich, most time is was just cookies and juice. I was always a cookie dipper then and even when all I got was juice, I still put my cookies in. There was a very small room just off the kitchen with a small old couch, the kind that was scratchy to the touch, colored dark brown and orange, and a very small television. We would watch Woody the Woodpecker, or Tom and Jerry in the afternoons, but we couldn't take our treats into the room, if I remember correctly; we had to eat at the table in the kitchen.

The house was an older two-story home, plus an attic I think, painted green with white trim. The garage was detached, and inside was the all important box that controlled the electric fence surrounding the small field behind the house. The fence was always on, it kept the cows at bay apparently. I was a curious child and grabbed the electric fence at least once, I remember it was an amazing feeling, like my very atoms were afire. There was a safety handle you could grasp to walk through the fence, but it was extremely low-tech, and strung very tightly, one slip and you'd zap yourself. To this day, I'm quite afraid of electric things, especially car batteries, with both positive and negative post exposed, waiting for a slip up

They had a long, narrow garden to one side of their house, the first time I ever saw a live sunflower. I don't think most people see them in real life, and my memory of it is pretty amazing. They are quite large and large. In the winters we would get a good blanket of snow, sometimes several feet deep, and back then we did all the usual fun things in snow, like snow ball fights, snowman building and snow-forts. And between the house and dirt driveway, was a lone, large tree. I'm not sure of the type of tree it was, but I would guess it was Oak, or at least, Oak-like, and it was replete with a tire swing. Several other trees on the lawn were good for climbing, which the boys did as much as possible.

Now that I'm going back through this memory it seems like there was a lot of fun to be had back then. She had a neighbor that I think was her daughter, who had a son a bit older than I, and we would play, and it seems as though I have a memory of a birthday party. It seems they were more than just babysitters, although I still cannot remember who they are, and how my mother knew them..

I suppose I could ask....

fealty

Now there is a word nobody uses anymore....

no mind

I turned off my TV last night. I stopped watching television and started watching my cat instead. I had just been sitting there on the couch, watching the TV, and I don't even remember what was on, but I was so unaware of my life around me. My cat was sitting on the floor, leaning up against my briefcase, I guess it's called. It's one of those soft leathery ones, not like a traditional briefcase. But that's not really important, unless you like to envision things accurately. What caught my eye, he was playing with a tiny cloth bag that had catnip in it. It was tied with a tiny burlap rope like some old timey money bag from the old west. He'd lean over and lick it, then he'd grab it up in his had and hold it up to his mouth like some kind of.... well some kind of.... burlappy, bag of catnip lollipop or something. And he'd roll on his back a little bit and clean his belly. Then he'd hear a sound outside and it would stop him immediately and he would stare at the wall in the direction of the sound. When he tired of waiting for the sound to return, which it didn't, he would go back to cleaning himself a little bit. Then he rolled around a little bit against my bag and rub his cheek on the buckle. Eventually he noticed me watching him, and he stared back at me. It was cool that he noticed me looking at him and he stopped all activity to look back. We both sat there, me on the couch about six feet away, him on the floor, just looking in each others eyes. We had a connection. I don't know how many people can look into each others eyes for so long. I can't remember the last time even, when I was in love and looked into my mate's eyes for so long, which is a little sad. That seems like something we all aspire to, but seldom actually find. The beauty of this connection is there were no words getting in the way. No barrier to soften the intensity of the connection. He is a good friend, and a sweat little creature and I'm lucky to have him around. It was a very peaceful moment. He is way better than the television.

The Return of Fortune Cookie, Part 1

So you remember the blog I posted about fortune cookies.... of course you do. You're smart, studious, and most importantly, you read and remember my blogs. Huh.

This actually happened a over a month ago, I just didn't have the nerve to blog it....

So I get this fortune cookie.... I'm at Little Hong Kong, which is a Chinese restaurant located, ironically enough, in Little Osaka, and finally at the end of the meal, the fortune cookies show up as is custom. Just so you know, Little Hong Kong has the most kick ass fried noodles and pepper beef you've ever had. Actually they have the most kick ass versions of a couple dishes you've probably ever had. If you don't live in LA, don't worry about it's location so much. I promise not to bring up that little factoid at the end of this blog.

And so, I pop my fortune cookie open, thinking I'll get some advice, or maybe just a random observation from some chimp in a locked room banging on a typewriter, consisting of a vague compliment, like my shoes and shirt match in a handsome fashion or some such.... but...

No.

Not today.

Today Fortune Cookie has decided to drop it's bomb....

"You will have a close encounter of a serious kind."

Whoa. That is not a friendly fortune. No "you will inherit a large sum of cash" or "everyone will soon bow at you feet" in this cookie. It didn't even tell me to sit down first. Interestingly enough though, it still works with the old "...in bed" joke.

Okay, well, I mean, come on. Close encounters obviously come in as many kinds as the mind can conjure. It's not terribly original. It's not inventive. It's not even something else I can't think of right now, to steer you away from the obvious in a half hearted attempt to wow you with my next sentence. No.

It is most certainly one thing: a fortune.

Yikes. This strip of waxy paper has definitely been manufactured with a fortune on it, stuffed into a cookie and sold to me in a Chinese restaurant ran by the Japanese. And an ominous fortune it is. I have to admit, I was a bit concerned when I left the restaurant... what sort of fate was to befall me? I certainly, from that moment forward, had a sense of ominous doom lurking behind me, like some dark shadow... waiting...

**********

Stay tuned for The Return of Fortune Cookie, Part 2... when I get around to writing that up... and it has nothing at all to do with Little Osaka (sorry for breaking my promise), but I'm not completely through it yet, so I don't want to prematurely set it in stone....

...lest I awaken the beast that has only just slipped into slumbering...