QUESTIONS! to all your answers.....

Why is it that y-o-j is of no use in Path Words,

but j-o-y is? Same letters.

Why is the wonderful aussie word "roo", (meaning kangaroo)

of no utter meaning in Yankdom?

Why can I fine 7 little words in 9 scrambled letters

but I can't see the 9 letter word?

Where are all the Scrabble players that used to be?

When, Oh when will I find time to read the 720 page book

I just got from the library,

A Team of Rivals?

Why, when we're now 4 days UP from the BOTTOM

(December 21)

do I not notice the long dark night being shorter

and the short (sometimes) bright day

being longer?

A+; how was yours ?

My sister and I used to swim at that lake right by the freeway. I think it was that one. I think it was my sister. It was in the summer when it looked a lot less like a steaming cauldron of icy vampire infested water. And it is a quarry, or sort of a pit scraped out in the mud. Never mind the details.

The teenager drove all the way to grandma's on the freeway, and all the way back, which was nice although it does not actually entitle a person to play rap music on the car radio (why do teenagers hate to be lectured unless it is via their music? I even hate for people to talk to me on and on without giving me space to say anything back or maybe run away from them. Rap music isn't the only kind of music that is like somebody hectoring you: there is a kind of frantic jazz that feels the same way. Oh, and show tunes. Or anything by Barbra Streisand or Whitney Houston.) I got to eat leftovers from my brother's family's holiday feast the night before. I really like doing that. Why can't I just go to my friends' houses and open up their refrigerators and browse whatever they have available? I could throw out moldy things as those presented themselves. The joy of not cooking and the joy of thriftiness and the joy of exploring all mixed up together and packed into a rubbery container with a lid that almost fits, who wouldn't like it? Besides some gifts selected just for me, I also got to take home quite a few things that didn't fit the nieces or they didn't like them. So did SWMBT. Good things, like fleece sweatpants and the sort of slippers you can walk around outside in, while you are being lectured via music over headphones, if you are a person who enjoys wearing slippers outdoors and lecturing music, for example.

Some of us took the hyper dog for a walk down a steep hill (the slobbery tennis ball kept getting away) and through a graveyard (oldest birth date logged, if you count having to do math to get it : 1812) and up a different street and around a twisty street and back up the hill, then (minus dog) to the backyard of a neighbor who was away in Hawaii who said we could let the hyper dog run in the enormous back yard, but first we had to check to see if their chickens were cooped up. They had a GREAT chicken run: a couple of pens connected by chicken tunnels (not underground tunnels but made of wire) with interesting doors that could segment off the different areas and a intricate folding double door system to allow or disallow access to the giant yard. Think of those plastic cages for gerbils connected by plastic hoses, and then make it much larger and turn it into chicken wire and you have the idea. I am impressed and inspired. That yard had its own hyper dog needing interaction with us and the spit covered tennis ball. One side of the dog was white and the other side had a certain amount of spots. It reminded me of a car I had a long time ago in Texas with different things painted on both sides, that somebody told me would be really useful because I could rob an icehouse, then just turn the car around and park it in the other side of the street, and nobody would catch me. I guess the dog could run at you from one direction, bite you, then run away and when out of sight turn in the other direction and sit down. "Uh, not me. I have spots. Wag wag wag."

After that we gathered up all our loot, took Mom/Grandma back home, watered her flowers for her and cut up her gift fudge and accepted some, and went back home. The End.

two more shopping days until one shopping day left!!

so, i've been noticing that all the "tarjét" commercials are coming pre-laced with a handy "countdown" calendar. in case you are too lazy to actually remember what today's date is, they tell you, in a friendly "flip-off" calendarway. they even imply that "tarjét" is so convenient that a roly-poly sandy clause will--get this!--RUN to make the closing bell. i'm a bit embarrassed to mention that the reason i know about these commercials is the vast amount of bad TV the landlord and i have been watching recently. he was sorely disappointed to miss last sunday's two hour survivor finale for a christmas party. i celebrated missing it by watching two hours of sportscenter. including chris berman's "the blitz". chris berman can SU(* *& *&^^S.
next on the agenda, we have the high cost of sled use. as a christmas gift to my boss (my portland buddy calls me a "suck-up" for this), i purchased a gallon of "VES Gold" 2-cycle sled oil. for $42.99. apparently sleds can only run on oil that is refined by artisan elves schooled at the prestigious OPEC school, from oil shale that is water-extracted on the dark side of mars. (remember that the $42.99 a gallon doesn't cover the actual gasoline part of the internal combustion reaction.) good thing i haven't had a day off in two weeks and that i won't for another two.
third on the FBC calendar: small towns. apparently i made the list of "eligible bachelors" over in the "snowsports school." while i am obviously eligible and certainly "in demand", i'm a bit taken aback by the drama and gossip it takes to be considered "eligible". most importantly, i'm worried that people in the "snowsports school" are talking about me. just the name "snowsports" gives me the "unfinished metal" shudders. or the "ceramic belt on ceramic belt" shudders. while in ballard, i was equally--possibly more than equally--"eligible". i mean, i'm a bike mechanic, for goodness' sake. in these trying economic times, considering as well the "green thrust" of our economy, a bike mechanic is like the archangel gabriel. and yet i never once heard of two neighbourhood women clamouring for my worthy attention. now i'm in the hills, telling eighteen year old "food handlers" who get paid 47 cents an hour to "stop pitching me attitude" and getting $175 speeding tickets and alla sudden my stock is "blue chips". hm. food, then, for thought.
fourth, i really like slaid cleaves. like "listen to all three albums i own at least once a day" sort of "like". i know these things, too, shall pass, but for today, i feel like a fourteen year old emo kid circa 2001 who just discovered chris carraba. for those who may have suggested i check out "insurgent country", i have this to say: i can't find but one album of his in the entire puget sound drainage. sonic boom can't see him with the HUBBLE. (thanks, aaron mcgruder.) how's that for "insurgent"?
fifth, and maybe most important, i'm wearing my black ibex wool jersey. it makes me refined and sleek and fast and awesome all at once. watch out, ladies!!!

an animal ate my insoles

A raccoon or a rat. An observer has theorized "They smelled dead and this was very attractive." Dude. That is a very revealing comment.

steel is also an "alloy".

my mom just asked me for a christmas list. here goes:
1) a HUM-V.
2) a "tat" with the word "RESPECK" in "olde english" script across my scapulae.
3) really expensive jeans.
4) a calfee bamboo frame hung with full Di2 and some ZIPP 808s.
5) one a them "flat brim" hats all the cool fixie kids is carrying.
6) tight-fitting t-shirts with lotsa stuff on em. best if they cost a lot.
7) "tall Ts". size xxxxlarge-long. brighter and flashier is best.
8) a pedicure.
9) 1991 reissue "air jordans".
10) an H2.
11) a membership to the hair club for men.
12) velcro.
13) 70s-era gym socks i can carry as arm warmers.
14) an H3
15) righteus new "alloy" wheels and "mudders" for my H3.
16) anything by fiddy.
17) two cases a hennessey.
18) a .44 magnum.
19) tinted windows for my H2.
20) girls to match my various "wardrobeways".
20a) girls to massage my shoulders while i'm driving to the club to "get tipsy".
21) ice for my lobes.
22) some righteous "skullies".
23) a couple r-f 16" subs for my HUM-V.
24) a "knuckle tat" reading "HUMM ERH3".
25) more velcro.
26) a kegerator.
27) a lifetime supply of coors light for my kegerator.
28) a house in which i can install my kegerator.
29) Au for my freshly waxed chest.
30) visa gift cards with enough cheddar for a salon who'll wax a dude's chest.

'sgone be tight!

Su casa es mi casa

I have stolen the following words from the clubhouse and sprinted furtively out the back and down the slick street with them and I will make something with them that I claim is my own, which I will have to keep a secret from you or anyone who knows you, for fear of lawsuits.

snobbery hobbery
regret it til I forget it
"Throw as much wood as you can fit in the stove and maybe some diesel, too" cold.

It is a compliment, but still when you discover this theft, it sucks to be you. You feel so violated. I wish I still drank beer, specifically the slightly skunky smelling kind, Rolling Rock for example. Those tasted exactly like they smelled which was so great that it made a person confused and itchy. Smelling and tasting would be hard to give up.

Did you ever imagine trying to describe a sense to somebody if the sense didn't exist and you were proposing it? Seeing for example would sound completely crazy. "You will have 2 squishy sort of gelatinous round parts of your body and you will POINT THESE at something, and light will bounce off the thing and some of it will bounce into your gelatinous part, or both of them would be better yet, but not absolutely necessary, and this will enable you to KNOW THINGS about the thing. But you can only know things about the side of the thing facing the gelatinous body part, not about the side of the thing farther away from the gelatinous body part. Also if something is between the gelatinous body part and the object, this flat out won't work." The only people who would even stick around to listen to it without hitting you with a frying pan would be people you wouldn't really want to talk to. People who play really complicated video games for hours, possibly.

Anyhow, where did all those labels come from? Did we vote on those? That's what happens when somebody lets the blog dashboard get damp. I'm borrowing a few of those, too.

gifting horses.

i'll begin with an admission: i like beer. beer tastes good. two pints of it generally gives a warm feeling; maybe a bit more willingness than usual to speak about what's on my mind. while it hasn't helped me dance, as the bumper sticker says, it has given me another outlet for one of my favourite hobbies: snobbery. some might not agree with me that this is a generally good thing, but i say that without snobbery, i'm quite close to nothing. being one who avoids absolutes, i tend to aim for the middle of the beer continuum. porters, browns, reds, ambers, and pales. i don't like many "american lagers", which are like "american 'cheese'". budweiser, miller, coors, pabst blue ribbon, rainier, all of those canned beers. hand me a "spaten pils" and i'll drink it. elysian's "perseus porter"? done. PBR, though? gives me heartburn. this isn't a metaphor. it seriously gives me heartburn. don't think i haven't tried to like it. hipsters dig PBR. bike snobs dig PBR. ski bums dig PBR. musicians dig PBR. i drink it and i regret until i forget and then try again, cycle after cycle.
i'll continue with another admission: i dig tips. i don't get tipped very often in the bike world, but i do in the ski world. i haven't figured this dichotomy out, but i also haven't really tried. i bring it up every time tipping arises in conversation, but i don't really listen to anyone's thoughts or provide my own, and thus remain voluntarily ignorant and a bit hypocritical. which are two more of my hobbies.
i'll add a story: last april i made an adapter plate for a customer so he could swap his alpine and tele setups easily while using one pair of skis. it involved a demo binding, some steel plating, a drill press, some rain and 8 hours of labour. when i was done, it was a passable setup, if a bit janky. fast forward to today, and a customer walks in with a similar setup, this using a UHMW plastic sort of materièl in place of the steel plating; otherwise it was identical. today's customer, however, had broken the demo plate part of his binding, causing what i'd call an "awesomeness void". my boss happened to be skiing with him, and his term for the incident was a "crash". i loaned the customer my own skis, sent him on his way and set out on the attack. details aside, it took three hours of wrangling, some free-to-the-customer parts and a lot of dremel grinding before i yelled "i win!" and handed the customer his skis back. my boss said it was a learning experience and sent the customer on his way, free of charge. NOW. . .were i in the customer's position, say in girdwood AK, i'd have proffered what cash i had in my wallet in gratitude. not so, this customer. he simply grunted and walked away, returning a few minutes later with a twelve of PBR. no pepto, just PBR.
i'll add a conclusion: unless things have changed, SHITTY BEER DOESN'T PAY RENT. while i have seen a couple cans of rainier in my landlord's fridge, the only non-currency currency i've found that i can use in lieu of rent is free-range, farm-fresh eggs. in the 18 pack.
that is all.

35 is the new 24 years, 5 months and 12 days.

we were over in the elk last winter getting pizza and drunk when i refused to allow my eldest coworker (we'll call her "carrie") to pay for her share of the pizza. her boyfriend was out of town, and my younger coworker (we'll call him "jj") and i decided we needed to make sure she wasn't lonely. by this, jj and i hoped to mean "make sure carrie's totally shitty by nine o'clock". by the time jj and i had reached the elk, she was already at least a sheet and a half in, with a fresh martini in her hand. when i said, "no, you may not pay for the pizza," she said "cash, i'm not sleeping with you." hm. this was new for me, cos while i assert that language is interpretive, i usually make the assumption that when one offers a kindness, he or she is generally rewarded with a "thank you" or is refused on the kindness alone. in scanning my statement, which i think actually took the form of a negative grunt, i found no expressed or intrinsic sexual type advances. or even moderate first-base type advances. in fact, grunting is usually accepted as a sure way to show neutrality or disinterest. maybe i'm "noncorrect". anyway, i like skiing. makes me all warm and fuzzy inside, even if my hands feel like pizza bricks, which is why i thought of this brief and past-tense scene.
in other news, it's cold. like "lobster boat in january off the northeast coast of labrador" cold. "throw as much wood as you can fit in the stove and maybe some diesel, too" cold. "wait at the bottom of the chair hoping a pretty girl comes along to cuddle with even though you don't know her and she's likely to punch your lights out" cold. i don't know how this came about, cos it's also WESTERN WASHINGTON. something about "modified arctic air" and local TV weatherperson catnip. heads tryna "clearify" just "how cold it's gonna get tonight" with more than a touch of schadenfreude and a loopy grin.
in other other news, i'm tryna "clearify" whether it's more lonely in phinney ditch, where i'm outnumbered by uninterested women, or in the white river drainage, where there are no women. every year, i think "maybe this is the year" and then it shows up, and i think "maybe next year." then i crave a 1554 and some waffle fries and a pudding cup and a juice box. (no, not that kind.)

Gift of the Kninja : a seasonal story

Chapter 1
"No plastic cling wrap? Did you run out?"
"Oh. No; I don't buy it. I had Grandma's after she died! It was in a cool 1980's box. But it ran a few years ago."

Chapter 2
" Look what I bought just for you at the grocery store! TA DA. Plastic film wrap."
"Frick. I was going to buy it for YOU, for Christmas."

(editor): Lacks something. Could we change this so that either you or your visiting sister cuts off a part of her body? Did anybody cry at all during any part of this? Or hugging? Was hugging involved?

look for us to be posting soon on Crankster

Crankster from the Issue of November 2, 2009: newyorker.com (a new site for anti-social networking. 24 members from the site shown in the paper copy of the New Yorker. What are you looking at? Don't you have things to do? Cheez and crackers.)

the brake pedal is to the left of the gas pedal!

last night on the way in to town to purchase groceries in the safeway, i saw an interesting parking "situ". it was mostly dark, so i saw the arrangement of the car's lights and little else, but what i saw was certainly enlightening: brake lights to the sky and headlights to the mostly dry river bed. i'm certain that most folks would have stopped and offered help, but given the location of said parking "situ", i decided against it. in order to reach his parking spot, the driver had to brake heavily (unless he was going slow already), line up the vehicle with the narrow driveway that one has to already know to exist as it is entirely unmarked and it was almost draconian dark in the trees, enter the driveway, ignore the sinking feeling one gets upon seeing the "end of the road" and simply "keep on keepin' on" until the river rock and pools of last week's high water were filling the windshield. knowing the white river drainage as i do, i understand that there's a small chance of misjudging where the "end of the road" really is, but it's a small one. there is a great deal of silt from last january's atmospheric river, and it is safe to walk on, so it's possible that the driver assumed it's also safe to drive two tons of plastic on, but other than that, the only explanation i can raise is that the driver really wanted a close-up of emmons glacier silt and millennia-old boulders, in which case, he was wholly and quickly successful.
in tangientially related news, november was wet. with all the el niño tv news weather punditry going on, i thought i'd add my two cents' worth and offer a forecast rife with local knowledge and history: it's winter. shit's gonna happen.

DO NOT INTERFERE IN THE AFFAIRS OF DRAGONS, FOR YOU ARE CRUNCHY AND GO GOOD WITH KETCHUP!

My reading hunger could be totally satisfied with bumper stickers and discarded shopping lists I've found in grocery store carts and parking lots. The stickers are glimpses at a polished cleverness I wish I had. The lists are windows into what people are REALLY doing, what is important to them. They're like glimpses into 2nd floor walk-ups seen from the windows of a speeding-by commuter train. From them, one gets a feeling we're all really pretty much alike, as contrasted with the uniqueness of someone who can come up with "Somewhere in Texas, there's a village that's lost its idiot."

making lefse while the potatoes are dry.

scene: eastbound highway 410 by the enumclaw safeway, around noon. i'm driving the subie along the "right turn" lane, blinkerless, next to a mid-nineties model chevrolet suburban. as i slow to execute the mandatory right on "watson road" (as the courier-herald calls it, not "watson street" as the city of enumclaw calls it), i notice two of those white window decal thingies. one escapes my attention cos it mumbles something "pastorial" about salmon, and the other grabs me like a claw hammer: "ditch the bitch lets go fishing". before we tackle the appalling lack punctuation and the overt misuse of My Language, "lets" pick apart the sentiment.
first, is he trying to make a clever pun? "ditch" and "fishing", y'know, the water, fish, the ditch where the dude probly fishes since there's one in front of his hovel and he can cast a line without actually scouting or worse, working? it may be a bit of a stretch, but i'm willing to grant him clever.
second, unless i miss my guess, given the timbre of the dude's countenance, the "bitch" is most likely his sister, who had to take him in when his mom kicked him out for the fifth and "final" time when she found his basement "meth kitchen". while i'm certain his sister is no saint--again, judging by his countenance--she absolutely does not deserve to be called a "bitch" by the man she took in when their own mother couldn't even take him any more.
third, given my own "love" life, i'd say "hangin" with a "bitch" is far more interesting than waiting for a coldblooded mouthbreather to be fooled by a metal hook floating in the lake. i mean, i'm down with water and trees and nature and all, but i don't get mucha that cuddly bidness, and i ain't about to give any up if i miraculously find some.
"abitmoreover", "lets" tackle the actual "phraseologie".
first, the motive. are punctuation marks more expensive than letters? i'd think the fish in the middle--intricate, though subtle, as it is--would cost more than any simple lettering. maybe commas, periods, apostrophes and their friends are considered gratuitous by the "graffix" community and thus charged for exponentially. having never priced these sorts of "mods" for the subie, i do not at this point know. one other consideration is that there are many choices of just which punctuation one should use: "Ditch the bitch, let's go fishing." "Ditch the bitch! Let's go fishing!" "Ditch the bitch who lets you go fishing; I want to date her!" okay, maybe the last is aslo a stretch, but you "get my drift".
second, the effect. basically, i threw up in my mouth a little.
third, the "vaguity". at this point, including, but not limited to, all the previously mentioned questions, i really don't know what the dude is saying. sure, it could be simple, an encouragement to a friend who's in a bad relationship. the dude could be saying, á la dan savage, "dtmfa". (um, in polite company, "break up with her already.) there could be more complicated messages, such as, "you know, bud, one afternoon a month isn't much to ask. just tell your wife you need an afternoon out with the guys, some cheap tallboys and a fishing pole to reset your psyche." maybe it's a grand "exhortational" to all men to "reclaim their manhood". maybe the dude just never graduated third grade and shouldn't be allowed to drive his tank until he does.
maybe i shouldn't say anything, cos after seeing the decal, i "text discussed" it with my "portland buddy" for a half hour, which, if all the literature and studies and politicians and state patrolmen are to be believed, is more dangerouser than the dude's vagrant illiteracy. maybe, to paraphrase my "portland buddy", i should just "calm down and have some lefse." tasty as that sounds, though, i'd rather be an @$$#()!&.

happy old pirates

It rained like washing of the Hindenburg last night & every time I woke up in I thought "Why am I so happy?" and then I went back to sleep like the air rushing very quickly and silently out of a tiny hole in the Hindenburg. In the morning it was still raining. That other voice in my head tried to figure it out for me. "Because you are sleeping on the couch. Your couch is very old (and conveniently long) but not actually dirty if you don't look at too closely. This is a rare combination. Sleeping on a couch when also have a bed makes a person feel as rich as Brandon Roy, and the back of the couch makes you feel like you are sleeping with a person (a person who minds their own business). Dude, you DO realize we already went over all this a few years ago when you were trying to figure out why half the old ladies you know sleep on their couches instead of their beds?"


But that wasn't it.


The other other voice said or it might be because the gutters were all blocked and the rain falls in a curtain of water all around the house, like a Disneyland pirate ride, only with less brightly colored plastic and other people's children and it was okay to go to sleep during it. And I should think about money making opportunities in the gutter blocking field for the gutters of depressed insomniac persons who would instantly be healed by the all night pirate ride long couch imaginary sleepover Autumn rainstorm experience.

I understand you're anxiously awaiting (with baited breath, no less) my next opine..... (am I using that word correctly?) and I apologize for causing you such discomfort. I had to dust my plants.

Have just discovered an amazing fakt about myself, me, the worst speler the Chicago publik skools ever gradiated! I was playing a game of Boggle on-line; you remember the one where I ocasionaly clime out of the very low scorring sekshun into the low sekshun? Well! I found the word "man" -- typed it in -- and low and beehold, it's an "ultra rare word" for which I got six points, instead of the usual 2! Imagine that! I've been looking for hard words, but it seems the easier ones are more vallubull. I do beter in the game where I look for three leter words instead of four leter ones two.

This is getting tiring -- for me and for you. Go back to holding your breath......

the FBC "resumé".

it's raining today, so i don't hafta be out "actually doing something". this gives me time to update my "rësumè". and actually, since i haven't really "looked for a job" in almost two full years, it gives me time to make an entire new one. here goes.

FBC, esq.
okay, really, do you need my mailing address and phone number? cos i don't feel comfortable giving you that information. the government knows where i am, and you can probly buy the info from experian or jp morgan chase anyway.

{cover letter}
if you are looking at this "rêumé", you probly already know that i am awesome. you should hire me to do whatever it is that "awesome people" do at in your corporation, and "compensitise" me handsomely. like, seriously. i'm talkin vintage '05, beechwood aged, extra sharp, "prívate label" cheddar. the kind that come with a warning label. none a that off-brand corner shit. cos i'm awesome, and that's what i get paid to be. you're gonna want me as your #1 teamster.

{"employment" history}
all right. once again, you can find this information elsewhere. instead, ima use this space to "drop" all my "exprientialistic" bidness.
1. i started skiing when i was 18 months old. that makes me a) brilliant and b) awesome.
2. i totally slayed the lionel hampton jazz festival when i was like 16. got a "solo award" and everything. if you din't already know, "solo award" mean "don't need no damn backing band."
3. i can drive a tractor.
4. did i mention that my name is finnish for "awesome"?
5. one time, i hit my oldest brother in the head with a potato for agreeing with me.
6. another time, i hit my middle brother in the head with a rock, cos it was there.
7. i once took a "writing class" from "contemporary crime writer" g.m. ford. what?!
8. my subaru is gold, and i've only seen two like it. theirs weren't as awesome cos i wasn't driving them.
9. see number 4.
10. see number 1.
11. see number 3.

{references}
aight, listen up, cos i'm on'y gone say dis once.
1. i skied on the same pitch at relatively the same time as ingrid backstrom, aka "the best damn female skier ever". her pops gave me a hug on father's day '07. she done tole me i make "nice turns". deez.
2. i rode the chair a couple spots back from laura ogden, aka "women's ifsa world champion" in like '06, once.
3. the last show i played was opening for david bazan.

this is good. i can already feel the cheddar startin to flow.

the dog is cold-nosing my elbow.

my mom called me all excited this morning cos her neighbour--we'll call her judy--had just shot an elk in the pasture. she sounded breathless and excited, saying that judy had offered the entire elk to my parents. "we hafta buy a new freezer now!!" the free elk meat wasn't her favourite part, though. "they gave us the ENITIRE liver!!!!" o. m. g. i hadda change my oil today, so i was over there and had dinner (no liver for me) and she and my father bantered back and forth about how "smooth" and "tender" the liver was. "it doesn't taste nearly as strong as a bouef liver!" sounded like my alcoholic boss at baker telling me that johnny walker red was "real smooth; good 'sippin' whiskey." (i hate whiskey more than almost anything.) at one point, my father exclaimed that it was the "best liver ever!!" which i liken to "being in the best automobile accident ever" or "going on the best 'worst date' ever". i'd rather be alone.
after work last night, i had some beers and dinner with my coworkers and my boss at the bullwheel and we chatted about relationships. my "outside coworker" is in a rough patch with her "other" and we were letting her talk it out. somehow my and my boss' "love" lives came up. my boss has been mostly single for the past two years and i have been completely single since, um, john lennon was shot. anyway, my "outside coworker" said the new bartender would be good for our boss, then corrected herself saying he "needs a girl who shaves her legs and stuff." (meaning a "nice, clean, traditional woman".) then she looked to me and said, with no irony evident, "actually, she'd be perfect for you!" snort. thanks, bud! i hope she meant i'm not hung up on stuff like that, cos i like to think i'm not, but it kinda felt like one of those "take what you can get" moments. oh well. i once tried to date a woman who could have killed me with a single punch. when she gave me a "practice massage" it felt like getting "practice rocks" thrown at my kidneys and scapulae from, oh, 7.5 inches away.

9.30 is now bedtime.

i miss riding my bike to work. i'd do it now, but it's like 40 miles one way, and like 3600' of elevation gain. i'd have already had to head out to make it there for tomorrow. guess i'm just gonna hafta get sicker. one does this by striking bodybuilder poses in front of the mirror and shotgunning 160s of red bull.
peace.

My Annual Angst

Bought my first Christmas gift this morning.....a pretty fun table game called Connect Four. It seems enjoyable to any age person, although grand-munchkin Max is a bit shaky seeing four matching pieces in a row on the diagonal. Totally inoffensive (on this game at least) he LOVES "blocking Lucy", the big sister. We applaud when he accidentally scores four in a-row, but I'm not sure he sees it.

Back to the angst. I have a real challenge, selecting gifts for others, when my strongest inclination is to donate to some charity, or buy a water buffalo for a family in a third world country. We usually buy things for others that WE like, and have a hard time selecting something we really know THEY would like.

What do I hope for under MY tree? Good question.......

on the clubhouse wall

Dudes. I worked in a Union 76 gas station for a while, too! I guess it is a requirement of Helmet Club. It was back in 1976. I did not work in a 99 cent store in 1999. I remember Lee, the woman who managed the Union 76, telling me how to (in case I ever needed to, which she believed I might) rip the jugular vein right out of an attacking Doberman. By not immediately practicing this skill, I have probably forgotten the details. Lee smoked cigarillos but pretended not to do it near the gas.

People are always trying to teach me things, but I tell them to shut their pie hole because I have plenty of wise things in my head already, and am very busy burning them into pieces of wood with beveled edges. The following are available in router edged wall plaques:



Do not walk behind me, for I may not lead.

Do not walk ahead of me, for I may not follow.

Do not walk beside me either. Just pretty much leave me alone.




Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes.

That way, when you criticize them, you're a mile away and you have their shoes.

curating my brand.

apparently i need work on my "social media image". people seem to think i've never heard of "bloodshot records" or "insurgent country" when in fact i was listening to "outlaw country" in the womb. granted, waylon jennings was somewhat mainstream thirty years ago, but i do believe most of the "alt" or "insurgent" or "cosmic" or whatever "i gotta distance myself from nasheville country label you wanna put on it" artists would list him as a major influence. emmylou harris' "cimmaron" record put me to sleep my entire childhood. "another lonesome morning" still makes me shiver. i'm down with billy joe shaver. as to the bloodshot records label, um, ryan adams? not exactly "insurgent". maybe "drank like a river" was "insurgent" back in '97, but "stars go blue"? come on. tim "i'm with her" mcgraw covered it, and somehow made it sound less whiny. AND IT STILL "UDDERLY" SUCKED! in this day and age, listening to mainstream country radio just may be the only refuge for the "outlaw". watch this: I'M DOWN WITH MIRANDA LAMBERT. does that make you shudder? i hear her like three times a day on KMPS if i wanna. maybe more. WHAT?! CAN'T TELL ME NUT'EN!
anyway. on to more important things.
after like five inches of snow, crystal is posting up a "planning to maybe think about opening" day of wednesday, 11 november. don't know why they even bother. i mean, loveland opened on 7 OCTOBER FOR GOODNESS' SAKE. can you say "way behind the curve?" if crystal REALLY wanneda make waves, they'd build a "climate box" over the upper silver creek drainage and drop the temps starting in august for a 15 SEPTEMBER opening. then they'd really be "git'n'r done". the upside of all this wet slop falling from te sky is that i get a $2.50 raise when we open. somehow my "customer tunes" are more valuable than my "rental tunes". same "steeze", diff'rent "deez", i'd say. in fact, i should be worth more while tuning rentals, COS ALL DEM BITCHEZ BETTAH RECKANISE! y'know. "jus' sayin'".
oh, last thing--the green river ain't flooded yet, despite the best efforts of all the local mainstream media. funny how the stranger, which doesn't stand to make any money on the coverage of a flood, hasn't joined in the fray.
okay, this is really the last thing, and it ties together a couple themes: i ran out of gas on the way home from the hill thursday. about four miles from town. i'd anticipated this, and anywhere i could, i used my--wait for it--"georgia overdrive". y'know, "six days on the road"? gram "cosmic american music" parsons covered it? okay. maybe that's a stretch. but it reminded me of the first (not the only, dammit.) time i ran out of gas. i had a righteous '81 toyota tercel that i bought with my own money ($1700!!) back junior year of high school. i was in running start at green river my senior year cos there wasn't anything left at the high school cep jazz band and jazz choir and symphonic band and marching band and pep band (sense a theme here?), all of which i took for no credit cep jazz band cos it was zero hour. i also "worked"--read: got paid to do my homework--at the 76 station across from les schwab along with the 2nd trombone kid in jazz band. he was "dropping" some running start as well and we carpooled a lot cos, let's face it, i'm awesome and e'erbody wanna be seen wid me. (he also din't have a car or license, but that's secondary.) anyway, we were heading up 212th outa the green valley on the way to work, in uniform, and the toyota starts the "i'm melting, gimme gas" jig and we hadda pull over. ask for gas from neighbours, all the while carrying big "76" patches and stripes on the front of our matching blue jackets. righteous, indeed.

welcome to the future.

i've been listening to a lot of country radio over the past, i don't know, 36-83 weeks. maybe more. i never used to do this. honestly. scout's honour. there've been some good singles passing through, and some terrible ones and a lot of "meh". i've noticed that if a song's good, it better be REALLY good, cos they only "drop" like five songs in rotation. if you like a song, you better wanna hear it four or nine times a day. and there's a few dudes tryna "out-hick" each other. one guy has the line "climb on up/ but honey, watch the cup/ where i been spit'n muh dip tonight". din't realise "dip" was "literary". guess i was wrong.
in other news, my "hikng buddy" is in tennessee. she sent me a text saying she just got her butt kicked at "Racko". i have no idea what that is. my thought was "why are you up so late? it's almost 11 over there and my parents are already nodding off here at eight!" then i thought about my thought, and i thought, "maybe there's an answer to your thought within that thought." then i just stopped thinking. that's usually best.
in other other news, dinner tonight was some kinda potato coloured ham dish with potatoes. can't vouch for the potatoes, but there was one box shaped chunk that had more "torsional stiffness" than the rest of the goo, so i think it was potatoes. my mom works "in the kitchen" at a retirement home and she brings home leftovers and she and my dad think "FREE FOOOOOOOOOOD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! SCOOOOOOOOOOOOOOORE!!!!" and i think. . .well. . .i've already covered that. and considering my reasoning for crashing here while waiting for snow is "FREE FOOOOOOOOOOD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! SCOOOOOOOOOOOOOOORE!!!!" i've no place to be saying anything. so i ate it.
in other other other news, i started tuning skis today, finally, which was kinda cool. the most important part of my job is to stare out the window and keep tabs on all the toddler ski patrollers "in training". (which is probly exactly what you'd expect toddlers "in training" to be.) i can tell who they are among the rest of the mountain folk cos they all have identical green patagonia puffies and really clean "mountain khakis" brand fake carhartts and they follow each other around discussing how "world travel" is "real enrichening". if you say you don't have the money to travel, they look at you as though you're speaking a foreign language. the one they din't bother to learn in whatever impoverished country they visited cos "it's what poor people speak".
anyway. just practicing my superpower.

Non-conforming water fowl?

What happens when amongst 3 dozen or so Canadian geese, there isn't one single bird willing to be the Leader of the V?

I watched a long long long string of honking geese flying sorta north-west (and even THAT isn't according to the directions) today, all of them refusing to "fall in", "belly up", and "fly right!"

Global warming? Standard Pacific time? Genetic disposition to be non-conforming?

Perhaps they were rehearsing for some air show later in the month, and really just got beyond the cover of the trees and then rearranged themselves. One would hope.

this is way slower on my moms' computer.

if i knew how to put photography up here, i'd show you these weird plants that were following us on our hike today. they looked like salmonberry plants in miniature, but i don't think they were. they have three leaves on a single stem, but one must scrutinise heavily the plants to see the stem, so they look like they're floating. the reeeeeeally mysterious part was that EVERY ONE OF THEM WAS THE SAME COLOUR OF KHAKI. creepy. it felt like when we stopped looking, they got up and moved. there was also a raven following us, making woodpecker noises. creepy as well. my "hiking friend" talks a lot, though, so i felt okay. actually, my "h-f" is a kind and humourous girl, so i felt better than okay. and skookum falls is WAY cooler from up close than it is from the highway. and ravens are supposedly old loggers who've passed on, so maybe it was my grandfather saying "hi!" and we just didn't know it.

Is this a test?

WHEN did the "hermit club" turn into the "helmet club"? Tell me "just recently".

I remember walking our dog in The Scratch, and always turning left at the street and left at the next street, and eventually turning left at another and again, and again at our driveway. I knew all the "sights" like the back of my whatever.

For some reason one day, I made all RIGHT turns, arriving -- yes, you guessed -- back at my driveway. Essentially the exact same route but it was as if I'd traveled to another state. Everything looked totally different, or at least I saw things I'd not seen before, which obviously were always there. Perception (or not) is a funny thing.

Hey! A new best score!

I neglected to tell all you guys who have been plugging for me, that I got a new high score in Boggle yesterday. I am no longer in the middle of the Very Low Scores, and have achieved (once at least) the middle of the Low Scores! I was like I don't believe it! I was like so pumped. I was like can I go even higher?

And the strange thing is, I got points for words I was like guessing about. When I saw them okayed, I was like ----- words fail me, like duh.

There might be slugs under there.

last day in seattle.

now that i have 6 months in seattle under my belt, i've decided i'm an expert. this makes a full year of working here, and i thought i'd compare my two living situations.
-beds in greenwater are much softer. funny, i know; you'd think all the fluffiness of seattlites would necessitate like feather beads or something, but that hasn't been my experience.
-it doesn't snow in seattle. after two sets of six months here, i've not got snowed on even once. last winter in greenwater, we had feet on the ground for four whole months! what gives?
-there's different people in each place. i thought everyone was the same, but it turns out, i'm wrong. there isn't one person who lives in both seattle and greenwater at exactly the same time. weird.
-it's way colder in greenwater. i think last winter the highest temp i felt (no need for a thermometer with THIS sami!) was around 55 degrees fahrenheit, while in seattle, i worked one day where it hit 103! record setting temps! i was under the impression that for every thousand feet of elevation the temps drop by 3 degrees in stable conditions. apparently i was wrong.
-seattle has only the months of may-october, and greenwater only has december-april. not a continuous calender. i guess they have not having november in common. i always thought the calendar was more or less start to finish, but in twelve months in seattle, i've not seen a single day on the calendar from november-april. also a bit weird. i blame greg nickels and tim carr.
-the stranger doesn't get distributed in greenwater. it's like they don't want to believe in a world outside of seattle. (oh wait. . .)
anyway. i'm sure there's more, but i'm in the middle of tryna move without my roommates knowing, so i'm a little distracted. i'm not moving out to avoid paying something, or to avoid them for any reason other than i haven't told them i'm leaving today. i'm certain there is a better way to do this, but for some reason, hindenburg the neighbour cat has my tongue. plus the junior roommate wasn't home last night, and this morning, everyone is sleeping. and i haven't seen hindenburg for a couple days, so i don't know if she'll give me my tongue back before i leave. i imagine awkwardness if the roomies wake up. the only issue i can think of is i hafta move my mattress, which is heavy, ergo i may hafta ask for help, and i hafta vaccuum. since the senior roomie shares a wall with me, he might hear. unless hindenburg has his ears.
lastly, someone mentioned an ex-neighbour "dating" me. while i know what dates are and indeed enjoy their meaty fruit and the milkshakes one can "drop" with the sugar drawn from said meaty fruit, i'm not sure what "dating" entails. would she "huck dates" at me? would she "paste dates" on my forhead? would she simply "gift dates" to me? until we clear this up, ima steer clear. no offence; i'm sure she's a really nice girl, but i reserve dates for when i'm in california and i can buy locally. i've not seen any date palms in the puget sound basin.

this is funny if i tell it right.

i'm unemployed. i kinda don't like this, with my prairie lutheran "work is virtue" upbringing, but that's the way it goes. i had things settled to avoid this, but they kinda fell through. as part of this, i am filing for unemployment, y'know, cos we pay in, why not use it when you're in a bind? as part of this, i hafta make 3 "job contacts" each week. i talked to one guy, the guy who had the "job" that became the "not job", and he said it'd become a "job" again on 3 november. cool, but if i wanna collect UI, i hafta keep up the façade of looking for work. so i applied for one job at REI redmond, which, if you don't know yr geography, is "way outa my way no matter which way i live". there was an option to attach my "resume" and i put that "i'm attempting to resume working." um. . .watch this: éèéè. just sayin. another spot asked for "responsibilities and accomplishments", which, since i had just put "mechanic" for my job title, i said i "fix shit. what do you think?" don't think they're callin me back.
the second job posting i found was on craigslist, for marmot "mountain" works in bellevue. which is similar to redmond, geographically--they are a continuous city, in a way, and there are spots in "redmond" that seem more geographically aligned with "bellevue"--except that it's way more uppity and even more dollar filled. the posting was that they were hiring for a "ski technician", willing to train. as in, apparently, right now. i thought, hm. i'm a "ski technician", bored, already trained, could start right now, as we speak. i rolled through belleveue to pick up an application on my way to tapeworm for a spin on my mountainy bicycle. on the way back, i spoke with the manager, explained my "situ", that i could start right now, y'know, cos it's almost ski season, and my friend at sturtevant's in the "fairly sketchy" part of tacoma (as opposed to the "way sketchy" section that you simply don't go to if you're a sheltered rural white kid) is two full weeks out on tunes, and the marmot manager said something to the effect of "we're not actually hiring [wait for it] RIGHT NOW, but sometime in the next few weeks." patronisingly, AS IF I DON'T CHECK THE NOAA FORECAST EVERY DAMN DAY, he added, "y'know, UNTIL IT SNOWS."
three things: 1) if i'm applying to a ski tech job with two seasons of experience, and 27 seasons of skiing, I KNOW WHAT SNOW LOOKS LIKE. I KNOW IT DOESN'T FALL IN GREAT AMOUNTS IN OCTOBER. 2) if a backwater place like tacoma can fill a back shop with two weeks of work before it snows, what can a monied, "outdoor-focused" place like bellevue do, if the store is on top of its game? marmot is the only "backcountry" shop on the eastside until you hit north bend, TWENTY MILES EAST. 3) why the f(*&^( are you posting on craigslist for a ski tech position when you're "not actually hiring right now"? don't get that annoyed look on your face when i say i can start tomorrow. you are looking, at least in theory, to hire someone right away. OTHERWISE, WHY DID YOU POST AN AD TO THAT EFFECT?
some quick admissions. . .i've never managed a "backcountry" retail location. i've managed a bike shop, which is different, i know. i've also been a mechanic, which definitely isn't "management", in both bike retail and ski service, though never in ski retail. supposedly this dude would know better, since he is a "manager" at a "backcountry" retail joint. that said, being a mechanic in a retail "situ", i've seen how to drum up business in an otherwise slow season. the first, biggest, and most effective way to bring people in the door is to have a "special". my grandmother LOVED "specials". so does my mom. SO DOES EVERYONE WHO NEEDS HIS OR HER SKIS TUNED. we just ran a $13 off tune special at the bike shop, POST season, when every good seattlite has totally forgotten his bike, and there were days i couldn't see the end. now, if, PRE season, one were to run this sorta thing, maybe just a $7.50 off tune special, at least you'd get some people through the door. THIS IS NOT A GREAT ECONOMY, if y'all ain't noticed. you MIGHT wanna do something to draw attention to yourself! falsely posting an employment ad on craigslist, while drawing attention to yourself, is NOT the type of attention you are looking for. unless you want to add to your "rep" as THE hip spot to make fun of in the puget sound basin, which apparently the good folks at marmot "mountain" works in bellevue wish to do.

the basement. the ceiling. the neighbors.

Are we supposed to tell dreams on this blog? Usually I have a stance against it but I have one about a coworker (basement drug treatment dungeon/door locks painted nearly shut/hook and eye closures plotted instead/"this is for your own good!" etc) that might actually be a dream about my chickens, that I could share. My chickens are still trying to spend all their time inside the coop because (I think) they are afraid of the neighbors' cats. I am getting a little worried about them.

A teenager I know in a boarding school says indignantly that the parenting program teens downstairs "say that WE walk like elephants!" That made me laugh. It is pretty bad when a pregnant person says you walk like an elephant.


The loudest overhead neighbors I ever had were two very young women who wore clogs a lot, and the place overhead had hardwood floors. They were very nice though, and they stopped wearing the clogs indoors after agreeably listening to me upstairs in MY clogs one day (I didn't have to even plead; I just said "stand right here. Is it okay if I go in your apartment for a minute?" and I walked to and fro and as I came back down the stairs they were already saying "we are SO SORRY!") One of them used to walk a ferret on a leash. I wish I still knew them because they were really fun and would be the right age to date Fillibuster. Er...I mean of course, one or the other of them, not both. Maybe not the ferret one. But they were both nice.

At that apartment, besides the upstairs girls for a while a homeless guy was sleeping out back, outside my kitchen. And there were mice in the basement. It felt comforting sometimes. I used to think that I was the filling in a sandwhich.

theoretical "mathematics"

the senior roommate and i watched "the wire" until 3.30 am this morning. i was surprised at our "last call" until i did the math: starting at 12.30, watching three episodes of roughly one hour apiece, let's see, um, multiply one hour by three, convert 12.30 to 030, add three, carry the peanut butter cups, and . . .OH! it's 0330. convert 0330 into a more palatable 3.30 am, and, no surprise, i woke up at noon. i blame the "employment security" mice.
in other news, i also didn't fall asleep till around 3 am saturday night. there was a "party" again, and the stated goal of the party was to "drink as much Pabst Blue Ribbon as possible." the gauge of just how much one could drink was a "staff" (stalf? staugh? stapholococous? methicylin resistant "stapholococous aurelius"?) of PBR cans made in a rough arrangement by "leveling up": duct taping a fresh can atop the just finished can. the winner--he or she who could "curate" the tallest "staff"--won a tin or copper or some kinda other mug with an aztec calendar motif. somewhere around 2 someone started tapdancing. to me in my bedroom directly underneath the "dance floor", it sounded like a drunk twenny-one year old impersonating an elephant. i could have been wrong. incidently, the junior roommate won the "competitives" with an eleven can "staff". speaking of "employment security" for cheap beer bräumeisters.
in other other news, there's a very pretty woman in her late twennies round the way. i have nothing else do here at the library, but i'm having a hard time "getting up to leave". not that i have anywhere to go but the coffee store. and some terrifyingly important business, like "holding down a park bench out at sunset hill for the afternoon while i read art spiegelman's 'Maus'."

there's a man behind me.

he's singing randomly in a "spanish falsetto", which is remarkably like an "english falsetto" except that he's singing in spanish. if he were singing in an "english falsetto", i'd be equally weirded out. this is a library, after all. he's also laughing in a jumpy, inhaly falsetto, which makes him sound like he's crying. actually, come to think of it, maybe he is crying. he's looking away, though, and behind me, and i can't really walk around and look. at least the music pouring out of his "headspeakers" that are jacked up way too loud for a library is kinda cool. i dig most mariachi type stuff. granted, in this part of the world, mariachi music usually means tacos.
speaking of tacos, i remember an experiment one of my coworkers and i ran when i "worked" at "performance" bike down in tacoma. we were supposed to only play music from the "approved" list of two stations, "adult contemporary" and "adult alternative" on "muzak"--and with "adult alternative" i was relieved to find that the "music" had nothing to do with stuff advertised at the back of the stranger--and that got pretty tiring. i guess this wasn't really an experiment, but we played the mariachi station for an entire day to see what our coworkers would say. the most common comment from customers was a bewildered "i'm kinda hungry. know any good mexican joints around?"
speaking of joints, the roomies and i watched the denzel washington joint "courage under fire" last night, which if i'm not mistaken won an oscar back in the day. i had a buncha negative things to say about it, but actually, i kinda liked it. it was inconsistent, like any good "oscar winning joint" should be, but we all cheered when sergeant carver from the wire showed up. meg ryan's daughter was heartbreaking as meg ryan's daughter. and denzel? he plays a damn good denzel. matt damon was good as a smirking, heroin addicted matt damon, and when the "poster moment" happened, we cheered again. (we have a massive denzel poster on our dining room wall.) i'll be honest: when the headless torso placed the "posthumous medal of honour" around captain meg ryan's daughter's neck, i teared up a bit. but then, to quote matt damon's charactor, matt damon, from my favourite joint of all time, "matt damon is a genious misfit who gets in fights and does 'theoretical mathematics' and also falls in love with a girl and tries really hard to sabotage it up but then gets a car for his 21st birthday and drives toward california, where she flew to on the plane you see flying over matt damon's head in the 'washed-out sequence' where matt damon 'finds his true self', but we don't actually know if he makes it to california", i "sacked up" and shut the tear ducts down. mission accomplished.

a light in the attic.

i'm a bit disappointed that the 6 year old who was supposedly "up at about 8000 feet in a massive helium-filled mylar balloon" was actually just "up in the attic". i mean, can you imagine telling that story to your grandkids?
"dude, grampa? THAT WAS YOU?!"
"why, yes, son! i just hopped in, cut the tether, and TOTALLY SLAYED THAT $#!@! IT WAS AWESOME!!!!"
okay, maybe it wouldn't go that way. my grandpa never spoke that way. course, he din't have such and epicky tale to tell. that said, the kid will still have quite a funny story to tell.
"grandpa! the CNN coverage lasted HOW LONG??"
"most of the day, i think. they had a "balloon curator" who was aptly named "gordon boring" and everything. helicopters, ground crews, all kinda people just millin about, watchin this shiny thing thinkin I WAS UP IN IT! there was probly seven figures in waste that day HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!"
i mean, when our government wastes a buncha money on nothing, i'm a bit pissed, but there was sposeta be some "credible" evidence--the 6 year old's brother "saw him get in the balloon"--and all the recovery efforts they made were with the expectation of finding a scared and possibly seriously injured 6 year old in the balloon, so i say, good on ya, got some practice chasing down some completely random, never-gonna-happen-again type of stuff. when the media spends money on helicopters, ground crews, "EXPERTS"; when they speculate about "what it's like in the balloon" and the "expert" says "i don't know" and they still broadcast it, i find it more to be a bit of "comeupagainst". and they said it was headed east from larimer county--way up north in CO, bordering on WY--and that the balloon was found "near colorado springs" which is due south of larimer county. there useta be these people called "fact checkers", but apparently they were downsized in the "great consumer bendover" of last fall, possibly replaced by people like me who "love to make shit up for free." the fact that the 6 year old was actually "in the attic" is pretty damn awesome.

diction airy.

i'll try, by using words or phrases in sentances, and one may draw a personal conclusion from there. if art is interpretation, then so is skiing and bikes cos I'M AN "ARTISTIK" AND I SAY SO!!!!

1) sick: "dude! that was so sick."
2) freshies: "dude! i just got some freshies!"
3) face shot: wait. never mind.
4) i had one for four, but i forgot it.
5) fixie: "ima go "rock" my fixie."
6) squishy: "ima go "rock" my squishy."
7) blew/blow up: a) "dude! he totally blew up!" b) "dude! i totally blew up!" c) "dude! wait'll next year! ima totally blow up!"
8) turns: "ima go make some turns."
9) deeskusting: "dude! that was DEESKUSTING!!"
10) dee-tech: a) "dude! that line was DEE-tech!" b) "dude! that trail was DEE-tech!"
11) slash: "dude! ima slash the F(*& outa this!"
12) drop: a) "dude! watch me drop this!" b) "dude! ima do this drop!" c) "dude! i just dropped a new line!" d) "dude! ima drop a new clothing line!"
13) line: "dude! dja SEE that line?!"
14) footy: "dude! dja get some footy of that?!"
15) edit: "dude! ima "rock" a new edit for the facebook!"
16) schralp: "dude! watch this! ima schralp the $#!@ outa this!"
17) back: "dude! ima throw a double back offa this $#!@"
18) three: "dude! i totally just stuck a couple threes!" (same same five, seven, nine, ten, twelve, fourteen.)
19) (the KINGpin) slay: "dude! ima slay this line, bro!"

now i'll attempt to weave a tapestry of ALL of these terms, so that usage will be wholly clear and easy to "rock". . .

"so, dude? i was "rocking" my fixie all summer to train for the winter, nahmeen? jus SLAYin the urban, aight? all fixed gear freestyle and $#!@. i got a bit bored and pulled out the squishy to slay some righteous singletrack and i started "rockin" all these sick drops? that was sick. now all i need is some footy of me slayin alla these drops so i can drop a new edit for the facebookies."
"naw, bro, i totally feel ya, man. i gotta get me some footy this winter. ima slash all that $#!@ we got up in here. ima slay some lines in that $#!@ you can't see with the hubble! just you watch! ima blow the f(*^& up this season! remember that sick line we dropped last year?"
"ah, hells yeah, man!! freshies all up in there, top ta bottom! i was gettin face shots more than kanye! we gotta slay some more dee-tech lines, though. THAT'S what all the kids is jonesin. throw a couple fives offa some rocks and $#!@, DEESKUSTING!"
"and some double backs, nahmeen? who we gone get to drop the footy on us? i got some SIIIICK lines ima drop, y'know? jus SLAY that $#!@. slash some DEE-tech turns all up in there, hit some a them rocks and $#!@ and just rip off a couple double backs."
"$#!t's gone be TIIIIIGHT!"
"dude! remember that other line last year? you TOtally blew up."
"ah, hells yeah! musta come in a bit too hot, nahmeen? i was totally shralpin the $#!t outa that $#!t. totally GETTIN SICKER and i just blew the f(&* up! i mean, i probly tomahawked like six times!"
"dude! too bad you wasn't in the air, man! thata been like a sexTOOPLE back nine, nahmeen?"
"ah, hells YEAH, man! some footy a that'd make a SIIIIIICK edit!!!!"

hope this helps.

help me

Just needing a little clarification, bros. "Schadenfruede": is that when the stuff in the fruit bowl sits long enough to get saggy and darkens up? Hey, did you 2 slublings (I feel really close to you 3 so I have created this contraction to express a joining of the concepts of "siblings" and "club members") know there have been SIX profile views of either our blog, or of me, and I think I was only one or at most 2 of them? How many times have you 2 looked at the profiles? I think somebody else looked at us.

.....Are YOU looking at us? .... then what the hingeringbirdsocks ARE YOU LOOKING AT?

last week.

speaking of skiing, i've a week left "inn town" before i head back to the hills for the winter to tune skis and ACTUALLY GET TIPPED. i'm tryna absorb all the ballard i can handle, which means i am at home, alone, hiding out again. i did grab a cherry stout at the dray and a slice a "pep" at crash landing, but other than that, my contact with the outside world has been some text from my "CO buddy" who' in socal at a jason mraz show. (took all the restraint i had to NOT say anything about that one cos she was way excited and i din't wanna use my "superpower" on her. which, if you din't know, is "bitterness" according to a friend.) to follow, a short list of "things i will tell you i will miss, whether they ring true or not".
1) not going to parties. (there you go, "club buddy". invited or not, one should definitely hide from them. parties are THE DEVIL!!!!)
2) all the hipsters. really. i need me some a that good ol'fashioned schadenfreude.
3) other people's shitty bikes. those test rides where i think ima die? glorious.
4) the bums. i mean this one. crystal has no "bums" in the conventional sense--though we're all bums in the eyes of "society" up there--and it's these rummies i'll miss seeing. all the skinny legged potbellies, the "garbash yelling" they do to one another, the "museum pieces" made of rags in grocery carts posting up randomly and completely "unattendedly" on the sidewalk behind the shop. . .i could go on. (but i said "short".)
5) attractive women. i really mean this one. ski joints the world over are renowned for their "male to female rations" in excess of 4,000 to 1. not so, ballard. i mean, what can be better than seeing hundreds, maybe thousands of women who want ABSOLUTELY NOTHING TO DO WITH YOU? we "artistik" types need that "unrequieted" longing to help in "curating" our "artistiks". it's too "temptating" to forget that women exist when they. . .um. . .don't exist.
6) being REALLY FAR FROM EVERYTHING. seattle as a "metropopulous" is lauded in the "editorical" world as being "centrally located". which to me has become synonymous (that's an ugly word, aesthetically) with "centrally located WAY THE HECK AWAY FROM EVERYTHING I WANNA DO". two hour drives to a pass? done. cramping after a hike from driving too far? done AND DONE.
7) arguing about the viaduct. 'nuff said.
8) arguing about the mayoral race. "mike bikes?" um, i could be mayor by that definition. joe "i useta run t mobile" mallahan? i useta "run" a "performance" bike shop. same same.
9) self righteous bike commuters. here's why i ride my bike to work: i'd be "a" utter moron not to. parking in this town's a joke. (i'm sure we're not unique in that sense.) driving in this town's a joke. (same same.) riding my bike is fun. "exercisional". OUTFKNSIDE. cars are not. i DO NOT CARE that you are "one less car". that you get--by "dirt rag's" computation--"486 miles to the gallon". that you are "green". i'm green, too, WHEN I HAVE A STOMACH BUG AND I'M PUKIN MY GUTS OUT ALL UP IN EVERYBUDDY'S TOILET BIDNESS.
10) "the stranger's" self righteousness. I DON'T CARE THAT YOU EMBRACE ALL "STROLLS" OF LIFE. I DO, TOO, BY DOING WHAT MOST PEOPLE WANT: BY LEAVING THEM THE F*&^ ALONE. it is a bit funny to me that in the "features section" they blast the south park "hooters" while in the tail end (haha) of the paper they post up all kinda ads for "escorter services". it's also frustrating, cos dan savage is actually a minor deity.
11) all this "neighbourhoodism". south park's better than maple leaf? okay. good for you. NOW SHUT UP. free ballard? last i checked, it's actually quite expensive. i'm payin 5 benjis for a BEDROOM. and i live in "east ballard", more "colourifically" known as "phinney ditch". HAVE YOU SEEN SUNSET HILL?? definitely not "free". unless you're one a them "rummy types".
12) and again, this is somewhat "sincerical": having so damn much to "complainicate" about. living in snow, a short drive away from skiing my brains out, among like minded individuals, i don't know, i get just a wee tad complaisant. (thank you, "601 words you need to know to pass your exam"!!)
aight. ima go cry myself to sleep. alone. again. peace.

Whoops!

I made the mistake of clicking on "next blog" at the top of the page, and up pops a big picture of a happy looking couple of strangers I never invited over! Weird.

I'm gonna muse a bit here, and try to puzzle out some feelings. I didn't go to an "Event" tonight that many of my friends went to, because I didn't think I could top off a busy day with something more, and I didn't want to try to find nearby parking when 82 people were expected! I didn't REALLY want to go. But now that I didn't go -- my own decision -- I'm feeling left out. How can that be? What's going on here?

I totally understand a hermit that can honestly say "don't care for weddings..... never go....." but if I invited that hermit to a "paaaahdee" and that hermit turned me down, I'd wince - at least.

Help me out, willyah?

next year, same time. . .

it's ten/ten. next year it will be ten/ten/ten. to quote russell from "almost famous", "think about that."

i went to the "enumclaw oktoberfest" last night. i know, i know, oktoberfest is actually in september, but leave it to enumclaw to "rock" a festivities later than the traditional "Münchener" festivities and to "rock" said festivities USING THE SAME PARKING LOT AS THE HIGH SCHOOL HOMECOMING FOOTBALL GAME. good plan. after "curating" my own parking spot and one for my male "oktoberfest buddy" where none truthfully existed, things actually went pretty well. there were a bunch of "duscher" guys carrying way expensive denim and fancy-printed t-shirts that according to my "oktoberfest buddies" probly cost a couple "benjamins", some people running around with bibs printed with the "archetypical" "mädchen chest"--a "boob bib"--and lots of silliness associated with the fact that the only people there were high school teachers and the students they taught three to fifteen years ago. there were also lots of women who looked like they buy their makeups at the "used" section and their clothing at the "look at my boobs not my face" section. i mean, there were lotsa boobs. i don't tend to frequent that sorta get-together. the beer selection--you know, the "raison d'aitre"--was, um, disappointing. each vendor had only two or three taps, and most chose to be "originalish" and posted up his or her own "oktoberfest" and probly a "german pils". a couple went "way" out on a limb to post "brown" ales, and my female "oktoberfest buddy" "rocked" a "ginger pale" from some high minded brewery calling itself the "trade route" brewery, but on the whole, the "fillosafee" seemed to be "variety is NOT the spice of life." also, even though two of us grew up in enumclaw, we must have looked outa place cos we got asked if we were "from seattle". which is akin to asking a portlander if he or she is "from los angeles". "last call" was an angry, "yelly" man running around "gettin all up in everybuddy's shit" and telling them they had a "half hour" to finish their beers. all five ounces of it. all in all, though, an amusing evening if not a dramatic one. oh, and this slightly-less-than-random (and kinda hot) woman with whom i used to work rushed up to us and told my male "oktoberfest buddy" that she "love[s his] parents" probly four times before giving me a mushy, drunken hug. which i totally appreciated. even though i don't think she remembers my name.

maybe i'm missing out.

1) loveland ski area is opening tomorrow. wednesday, OCTOBER FKN 7TH!!!! WHAT??!! it's still summer in ballard!!!!!

2) skating rinks. cos i'm SO graceful, i should be out there, "makin tha chicks", "droppin" some sick "pick me up" lines. i can do better than that "los angeles" dude!!! WATCH THIS: "have you seen my heart anywhere? no? you sure? COS YOU JUST STOLE IT!" HAHAHAHA. wait. that's not at all the same. and actually, being skated around a rink by someone who appears to be good at it sounds kinda fun. um, lemme get back to you.

3) my coworker says he's gonna take some classes at the art institute, or as he calls it, "AI". i'm jealous. I WANNA DEGREE IN "AI"!! what better thing to know in these troubled times than how to build robots who have personalities? i could create my own friends. have them grow sporty "moustachios". teach them how to "drop" some good "convos" about "politik". MAYBE WE COULD MAKE A MOVIE TOGETHER! CALL IT "A.I.". wait. that's already been done. um, lemme get back at ya.

4) there's an older woman at the "computations consolium" next to me. she's carrying a righteous "hairsnet", sorta like an older white woman's "venison" of the "archetypical" hispanic gangster "hairsnet". except she isn't wearing a gun. i could carry a "hairsnet"! wait. i'm "balding". um, lemme get back to you.

5) chipotle burritos. a friend texted me today to say she was tired, an hour and a half from the end of a meeting, and to say "I WANT A CHIPOTLE BURRITO RIGHT NOW!!!!!!!" i told her i din't believe in "chipotle burritos" cos i'd never seen one. she said i was silly, that they do indeed exist, possibly curated by "faeries".

6) there are three people palping laptops in the "us bancorp reading room". just think: if i wore a laptop, I COULD BE IN THE "US BANCORP READING ROOM" TOO!!!!

in other news, today was "one of those days". i toasted a brand new bearing cartridge on 3 grand worth of "classic blur" by santa cruz. (incidentally, i HATE that company. arrogant southern "californica" surfer jerks.) smashed my finger with a hammer doing so. installed a new "hydro" brake on a different--and i do mean "different"--dude's bike, noticed it was squishy--which is good in suspension, bad in braking--and proceeded to bleed it twice, each of which was less effective than the other. and MY SHIRT HAS MASSIVE AMOUNTS OF STAINY BIDNESS ALL UP IN THE FRONT!!!! it's my favouritist brown t-shirt, too. it says "beecher's hand made chesse" on the back. i said something about this to another friend and she said to "think of how funny a fat motorcycle cop looks." not too "curatorically sensitative", but it definitely cheered me up. after i got up from falling over.

a'ight. ima go call my brother and yell at him for living in CO, land of REALLY EARLY SKI SEASONS . (though the "skiing" they do resembles nothing i've seen in the cascades. the "telemarkers" in CO are actually "balleritos", and the alpiners are afraid of sliding snow. they call 40 degree pitches "xtreme", think 6 inches is a "hella deep day" and call anything over 8% "concrete". to quote "jay-z"--or what is kanye?--"NUH UH. CAN'T TELL ME NUH' EN!") peace.

dang

Last night at the roller skating rink a total stranger (similar to Harry Belafonte but with longer legs and wearing pressed blue jeans) said "Let's give your kid something to talk about," and squired me suavely around for an entire couples skate (according to the PA system this is TWO PEOPLE SKATING TOGETHER WHO MUST!!!! BE HOLDING HANDS), including (him) doing moves like skating backwards and passing me from side to side while (still him) saying "I thought you said you weren't any good at this!" and (me) doing basically nothing at all except being propelled in graceful swoops while not falling over. Afterwards I finally found SWMBT in the snack bar where, it turned out, she had missed the whole thing in favor of turning her tongue blue with an energy drink. "Really?" she said "REALLY?? The crazy guy who thinks he is at a bus stop?" *

In other news, I have so much housework that it is making me feel some triste 43% the size of the Hindenburg. And the doorknob is falling off the front door of this place. (!)

*I was reading a New Yorker magazine for a few non skating minutes in the din there and the skater guy introduced himself by saying "Is this the place to wait for a bus to Los Angeles?" I said "uh...YES IT IS." Then we sat there silently, or I think so at least, until a specialty skate number was announced where people who know how to dance on skates go do it. So he said "I think this is my bus now," and went and did it. I of course immediately gleefully found SWMBT and told her. It seems none of it computed with her.

Below ground trivia....

Now this musing truly is trivia, so click out if you've the urge. I'll never know the dif.

Earlier this week, at 12:35 P.M. on Tuesday, there was a brief power outage. Drat! All the clocks and timers to re-set, each with a different system.

Then on Thursday ... my helper bee, at my request, dug a $10 hole for transplanting two $5 plants. She discovered 1" of so-called topsoil, and right below it, a five or six inch layer of polished river rocks, the size of your clenched fist. They're WONDERFUL! The pricey kind you get by the bushel from a nursery. I've hauled them away to my back yard, lest Manuel, our maintenance-guy think they're his job to move.

Got to thinking...... hm-m-m, I know this place, this 10 acres or so that these condos are on, was a brick yard, way-back-when.

But before that, way way way eons before that, this whole sharply declining terrain between two ridges was a rushing river bed! Boggles my thought, weak in geology as I am.

Put into perspective, what meaning has that power outage? Was it even a blip in the history of this place?

long night.

apparently, my roommates are brighter than i thought. after "not-partying" last monday for the previously mentioned happy 2-0, they had a buncha people over last night and proceeded to "get after it".
some highlights:
1) a girl, freshly 21, we'll call her "sarah", argues with another partyer about "who hasta be drunk first." sarah proclaims that she CAN NEVER BE FIRST. i go downstairs to my room as someone, we'll call him "ed", hands her a glass of "vodka beverage". twenny minutes later i come back upstairs and she's stumbling drunk.
2) my newly twenny year old roommate, we'll call him "luke" regales me for ten minutes about how "shitty" it's gonna be retaining a new roommate when i leave for the hills in a month. "we'll hafta teach him how to do dishes and not steal our food and not drink our liquor. . ." he then admits these are "all things we don't honour ourselves."
3) i tell my roommates of five months how to actually pronounce my name, at which point the senior house member's girlfriend, we'll call her "patricia", gets remarkably angry at me and tells me to "never break this sorta news when (she's) this drunk."
4) after a small catnap, i hear sarah and ed talking outside my room. i catnap again, briefly, and wake up in time to hear a now entirely shitty sarah open my door and yell "SEX!!!" and promptly close my door.
5) lotsa loud music and thumping, which i for a moment investigate only to find all the skinny, young, upperclass white kids "dancing" awkwardly to some fairly aggressive "hippityhoppity", the foremost of which was ed, "rocking" his best weak-kneed interpretation of the "can-can does the hindenburg". i think he may have been doing it backward, cos instead of crossing his legs when kicking so to balance himself, he kinda lifted them to the side and almost fell over.
6) ed, still outside my door, pleadingly tells sarah they need to go back to his place. "BUT I HAVE A FIFTH OF VODKA!!!" he whines. i don't hear her answer, but i assume it was "nonaffirmative" cos his whimpering gets even more desperate and whiny.
and finally,
7) curtains. i wake up to a new morning and go to get some coffee and read the new richard russo novel, which i hope is better than bridge of sighs. that one was more like bridge of oh! i fell asleep! and as such was the most disappointing book ever cos russo's collection of shorts and his first five novels were amazing enough that i still get misty when reading them.

my library timer is telling me to go away. i shall.

my hands smell of linseed oil.

this is because i built a wheel. this in turn makes me WAY AWESOME.

in other news, the projected low (or "lo" as noaa likes to put it in "shorterhand") for leadville is 12 degrees fahrenheit. this is grossly "nonfair". the projected "lo" for ballard is in the upper fifties. how can i ready myself for the colds of winter amidst such mild "weathe"? and speaking of "shorterhand", the cats at noaa also like to call for a "hi" of whatever. maybe i've got this wrong ("rong"?), but i thought "hi" was an american "salutatory effect". maybe that one's actually sposeta be "i", but i think that'd "caus som mor" mischief. i realise that "high" might look to someone who is not an english "spaker" to be "pronounciated" more along the line of "hig", but anyone checking noaa's website for the "weathe" most likely does "spake" enough english--noaa is an american agency, after all--to understand the word "high". "" could be "rong".

in other other news, i woke up this morning roughly 2 minutes after i usually try to be at work. (which is a "haf our" before i'm scheduled to be there.) this is bad. I'M PRETTY SURE THE WORLD STOPS TURNING IF I'M LATE TO WORK!!! i felt out of sorts until i got coffee. i know what you possibly are thinking: "silly caffination junkee." actually, the girl pumping coffee was "dropping" a "practice latté" and i interrupted her. when she looked up, she SMILED AS THOUGH I HAD "UNNUMERABLY" BRIGHTENED HER DAY. which in turn "UNNUMERABLY" BRIGHTENED MINE. i asked if she needed to make a "practice americano" but she said she had it covered. at which point her boss made me a "professorial americano" and i was slightly disappointed cos i figured a "practice americano" might carry a hint of her smile with it and the "professorial" one merely tasted amazing. o wel, tomoro's anothe da.

all that filibluster, and then. . .

NOTHING! we sat around watching back issues of "the boondocks" and drinking beers. there were like three of us. why, when i turned twenny. . .i. . .um. . .did even less. but hey, i lived at my parents house. so probly i had a some sort of righteous "foodstuffs" and a baked cheesecake. (this in contrast to the one whose recipe--some sorta "no bake cheesecake"--is often on the back of "philadelphia brand cream cheese".) it was, however, easy to get to sleep, cos all the kids went home at like ten. I THOUGHT YOUNG 'UNS WERE SPOSETA PARTY LIKE ROCK STARS!!!! guess i was "noncorrect".

trivia last night. . .apparently there's some sort of reason why "trivial" means, actually, "whole types of useless". but fun. there were a) lots of people who b) knew each other, which makes me way "disuncomfortational" cos i knew, precisely, 1.35 other people in the joint. one was the friend by whom i had been coerced into joining said soiree, .25 was the erstwhile booker of a club inside which an old band i was in oncetuponatime useta play and .1 was this girl whose two wheeled bicycle i may or may not have fixed, but whom i remembered from some sort of "interactation" at my bicycle related job in the past 1-22.5 weeks, who "concidentationally" was one of our "teamsters". i did, "contrarian" to what i may appear to have felt, have fun. my friend and i "slayed" the music section and i "rocked" some "correctational" answers in the geography "biz". our other "teamsters" didn't know where kamchakta is and thought pink floyd's "money" was actually the theme song from "where the wild things is". none of my fellow "teamsters" had heard of chad ocho cinco and I TOTALLY KNOW WHO HE IS!!!!! this all boosted my ego precisely 3.8%. at the end of the evening i was so confident in my "biz" that i told my friend if she wanted to "do something" (my actual words. ach.) on sunday, we probly could. she said she "might be sleeping". i think what she really wanted to do was sing to me cheap trick's power anthem "i want you to want me". i can tell this cos she followed up her comment with a quick "exeunt" and then called in sick to work today. and y'all knows't dat means.

the big 2-0

my roommate is twenty today. this makes me feel OLD. not cos i am, but cos reminders of others' comparative youth. . .um. . .remind me that i'm no longer "young"? hm. anyway, it's cool for him cos NOW HE'S NO LONGER A TEENAGER. i remember how sweet a realisation that was. (though it was tempered by the fact that i was pushing carts in the safeway that day, which most kids in their early twenties tend not to do. whatever.) there will be an attendant party at our house tonight. this, of course, makes me pretty frightened, cos parties make me pretty frightened. all those people tryna impress each other, drinking like the fishes, i don't know. at least i know how to close my door when i go to bed.

in other news, i'm going to a bar with a girl tomorrow night. this is way surprising. in full disclosure, it's for trivia night and there will be other people on our team and it's not actually a date, but i'm a bit shaky. THIS DOESN'T HAPPEN TO ME VERY OFTEN. actually, this sort of thing has happened exactly ONCE before. hm. last time this sort of thing happened, the agreement was worked out in this fashion: female skier person says, "wanna go for a drink?" and i says, "you buyin? all the money i had till it snows i put in my gas tank to get up here." notice the confidence on my part, not afraid to tell her i'm flat broke. i'm sure that meant something to her. i know this cos THE RELATIONSHIP LASTED AS LONG AS THE HINDENBURG.

in other other news, i landed with my hip on a four inch root yesterday while falling on my bike. i could barely walk this morning, and i thought i'd be all hobbled and ready for some sympathy, but now it barely hurts and THERE'S NARY A BRUISE AS EVIDENCE! HOW CAN I SOLICIT SYMPATHY WITHOUT EVEN A BRUISE?? AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA.

anyway. ima check my, um, checking account, see if i'm broke. peace.

Who IS this guy, Anon?

I've always wondered why people are so willing to "speak out", as seems prevalent today, but are reluctant to leave a trail of bread-crumbs from the speaking out back to right where they're standing at the moment. So they put on this veil of secrecy and just sign their comments "Anonymous."

Now a manuscript -- words or music -- that has gotten separated from the author/composer is usually attributed to "Anon", and that's okay. But to always want to stay incognito shuts off inquiries, conversation, and perhaps compliments.

Contributed by The Shadow Knows.......

(If YOU'VE a response, send it by plain wrapper to The Shadow, c/o General Delivery, USPS)

TGIF ! ! !

That used to mean something -- as in "thank goodness it's Friday!" -- when I was a working woman.

Whoa! It's SATURDAY! Which shows to go you that one day isn't a whole lot different from another to me now.

But even THAT is inaccurate. Today is the day that the kids and grand-munchkins MIGHT come over (always a storm blowing in and out, and everyone talking at once. Does anyone LISTEN anymore?)

Today is the day I need to put final touches on my part of the church service tomorrow, and pray about it.

Today is the day I promised to watch disc one of a two-disc documentary titled Walking the Great Divide, showing the Continental Divide Walking Trail from Canada to Mexico. (What a glorious country we live in.) Watched the New Mexico portion over my french toast this morning, and was captivated by the stories of "trail angels", folks who live in the little towns along the trail who open their hearts and front porches and HOMES to hikers along the trail. (All ineligible to become hermits.)

And I guess most importantly, "today is the day the Lord hath made."

it isn't hermitude, only sanity

I don't like weddings either, but I guess I don't like them because they are parties, which is exactly why many people like them who like them. Also they are ceremonies, and ditto, and ditto. I just feel a small quiet misery when invited to them because I know they are really happy things for many people and it is pretty much exactly the same as looking at something somebody else cooked and saying "you probably did an excellent job of this and I probably could NEVER make this dish but is there any way at all for me to get out of eating it without you noticing ?"



It is also entertaining how, if you just admit that weddings aren't really your thang although you aren't scathing (anymore) about marriage, how many people will STILL will go right ahead and show you some wedding pictures. Well if you do that, I am going to pull a bunch of chicken pictures out of my wallet, I am warning you. There will be no mints made out of toothpaste afterwards, either.



Portaging bicycles. Well I don't do that. My method is to continue riding, while weeping.

Facebook: what? I don't know anything about that. But if I did I am sure that I would agree at least 70 % with my fellow club member. This will be the last agreeing I do with anybody for a while as it is sort of creeping me out.

ach. weddings.

sunday was wedding day in fbc land. not sure why; i hate weddings. they claim to be expositions for people who've "found each other" and want to "share the love" when in reality they are simply another forum for people to brag about their "conquests" and show their "superiority" to us single folk. i'm told weddings and their corollary "receptions" are "great places for 'hooking up'" but to me they are great places to be TERRIBLY BORED AND UTTERLY DEPRESSED. i only attended this "wedding"--which, in comparison with the other weddings in my life, was oddly lacking in pomp and ceremony--as a gesture to an old friend. in the end i just felt like i wasted a beautiful day. hm.

in other news, after "rocking" a complaint about a chase billboard in which some random dude is portaging his mountain bike, i got a bit of "reverse comeuppance". quickly, at that. after heading to the elysian in tangletown for some righteous "nighthawk" pumpkin ale, which i drank like a fish, and fish and chips, i hadda head back home. up the backside of phinney ridge. which is WAY STEEP, if you din't know. like a 20% grade or 80%. about a third of the way up, when the grade really gets after it, i made like the hindenburg and BLEW THE (*&(* UP. hadda jump off and PORTAGE MY DAMN BICYCLE. it was embarrassing. i mean, it's one thing to pick my bike up and jump over a--to me--unrideable log ride, but another entirely to WALK UP A PAVED STREET. ach. serves me right. i still hate chase manhattan bank, though, in case you wondered.

good news of the week: i got new pedals. my life is complete. they're at least 50 grams lighter than my old ones, and they "thunk". by that i mean they ROCK HARDER THAN A MARSHALL HALF STACK AT "ELEVEN". watch out, ryan trebon.

Facewords on Pathbook

It's a bit hypnotic..... a word game on Facebook which I play 2-3 times a day, total 15 minutes. I play alone, tho I'm continually instructed to "invite my friends", who total 0 since I decided the social network was beneath a real Hermit. I haven't boosted my score of 760 one bit in the past month. At the end of each game, I'm told "Congratulations! You're number one among your friends, with a score of 760!" I'm also given the option to log out, play again, or "trash talk." Hm-m-m-m. So many choices; so little time.

The object is to find words in an ever shifting sea of letters. With each successful word, it shifts again. I don't know what dictionary they use, but they keep refusing "zen", which is a very popular word on TV decorator shows. And I keep finding "roe", although I'm pretty picky about what kind of fish eggs I consume. Sometimes my misspellings turn out to be real words, but my score stays at 760!

I heard somewhere that a REAL Scrabble Player/Champion studies dictionaries. They don't just browse them; they don't just read them; they STUDY them and TAKE NOTES. (They might make good Hermits!)

Under cover of bright sunshine

I let myself into church today (sh-h-h-h-h) to play the new (though borrowed) electric piano. Have been curious as to it's playability, sound, versatility -- yet shy (and here's where the hermit part comes in) about playing with humankind around to listen. Other than convincing me that acoustic pianos rock like the Hindenberg, my visit was uneventful. Another technical "wonder" bites the dust in my book. But I'm just one......

it's sunny out, not a "chase" billboard in sight.

last night i took half of my remaining fifteen dollars to buy a bomber of righteous "pike's brewery" 9% and a bag of "food that tastes good" tortilla chips and headed up to sunset hill to imbibe beer and sunset. it was a worthy expenditure. took me three hours to stop weaving as i walked, even after a solid omellette and shower. made the work week end as it should, in a haze as i sat on the "la-z-boy" watching "waiting for guffman" and barking like an elephant seal.

in other tangientially related news, two full weeks passed and i din't empty my checking account like i was an 19 year old with a new WAMU account. o, wait, that's now obsolete. speaking of THE MOST HORRIBLE BANK IN THE HISTORY OF "BANKS THAT TASTE HORRIBLE", CHASE, i'm ready to torch billboards and make hindenburgs of buses that advertise for the "manhattan of banks". the chase logo as the sun? "'helpful' banking is here and already the weather is clearing up"? a man in hiking boots with floppy laces PORTAGING HIS BICYCLE? though i try to rein in my vulgarity, i can only express myself one way: F^$* YOU PEOPLE! really, chase? you think we "outdoor snobs" can't "slay" our righteous local singletrack and so must PORTAGE OUR MOUTNAIN BIKES? you think the bloody CHASE LOGO is what makes willis wall in late summer so breathtaking? you think we in seattle (and surrounding pugetopolis) din't like WASHINGTON mutual? until kerry killinger came along, it was a LOCAL bank headquartered in SEATTLE. it was started in WASHINGTON. it had WASHINGTON in its name, NOT MANHATTAN. ('WAMU' was for me the death knell.) yes, 'wamu' was a willing and volumatic player in the great economic consumer bend-over of last october, but DO YOU REALLY THINK WE WANT YOUR NEW YORK SMUGNESS MASQUERADING AS "HELPFUL BANKING"? no, we do not. if i were to recommend a bank who'd "lose" money somewhere along the line from bike shop back to customer in a TWO MONTH LONG BATTLE TO RETURN A HUNDRED FIFTY BUCKS THAT RIGHTFULLY BELONGED IN THE CUSOTMER'S CHECKING ACCOUNT, it'd be chase. if i wanted a bank that reduces me to "coffee [and] salmon", it'd be chase. if i wanted to wake up every morning hating the people who held my money hostage, i'd definitely choose chase. seeing as i want ABSOLUTELY NONE OF THESE THINGS, i'll recommend a good doughnut shop. top pot "drops" some heavy old fashioneds that'd make admirable targets when ALL YOU CHASE NUTJOBS TAKE A FLYING F*^% AT A ROLLING DOUGHNUT.

ima go "rock" my bicycle. peace.