I want it all

I'm talking the things sold on tv in those 30 second spots. I want to cut garlic with just a few taps, I want to latest dance mixes, I want a fun, cardio dance party. I want those rocking abs, I want to be warm but can still use my arms which I can't do with a blanket, my dog (wait I don't have one) needs it's nails trimmed in a safe way.

I like television, I grew up with it, it has been a constant. I can remember sitting on a bouncy horse while mom was working on the new house we were going to move into and watching a little black and white tv. PBS with Mr. Rodgers, the Letter People, Sesame Street. I had a thermos filled with chocolate milk and I was happy.

That same black and white tv was in my room, in a different house, when my friend Richard and I first had Jolt. We went to the corner store, loaded up on candy and Jolt, and stayed up all night. Until the sun came up all night. I remember watching a movie, "Them" and was glad it was in black and white because giant ants can be scary.

I remember the nights that I would watch bad movies while growing up, the couch in my dorm room where every evening my roommate and I made time for the Simpsons and watched WWF, the countless travel shows I would watch so that I knew about other places, the laughs and tears.

Yeah, I am a tv junkie but can you blame me? It has been there for me no matter what, no matter how I am feeling, no matter who else is around me. It has offered escape, knowledge, insight and new things to find out about.

I'm a potato and I like it.

sangria

Let's see if I can do this

I'm not good at consistancy.

I'm also not good at spelling but that is a different story. I am going to try to blog more just because it is like a person to talk to. I don't have that right now and so I will use my "big words" to get things out. It is not a bad thing to blog, trust me, I have blogs that I read every day and even check several times a day just to see what is going on. I'm just bad at it. I have let a few other blogs of mine suffer from starvation.

Day 2 of the new year. It has been a day.

Did my normal work day stuff, put in hours that won't go on the books, felt up vehicles as only I can (yeah, I do it with style) came back home and did busy work. Got the mail and was shocked (my gas bill going up not 1, not 2, but over 300%? in just a month? while the electric bill went up a penny, yes a penny). I did figure out the design for my next tattoo which will be put on hold again but that is okay because it just isn't time for it yet. Talked to the kids while they were in their rooms zombing out in front of the tv, as it seems is normal.

I will say that in the past 2 days, this year has brought some surprises. I was going through some built up mail when I came across an envelope from my bank. It had the normal markings of "advert" but when I opened it, there was a $10 gift card. Plus one for me. I have found out that my newest cologne is "hip and cool" so at least I smell good and there are a lot of movies on demand for free that I want to watch. Can't beat that with a wet noodle.

I started to work out again and it feels good for my muscles to ache. In 6 months I am going to have definition because I have always wanted it. Sure, it will be as if I am wearing a sweater but I don't mind. My place is clean, I dusted and ran the vacuum. I have indulged my inner geek by playing video games, watching "Star Wars" movies, and making a good casadilla.

Things are looking up. Next week I start my 9 ball league. I was asked if I wanted to play and having no other commitments, said yes. Am I good? No, but that is what is needed, a filler. Being as I will probably be the only one not drinking, the games happen at bars, I will be able to shine, or atleast be the D.D. (I just hope we have cool shirts)

Take care readers, I know that things have been tough on many levels, but hell, you are reading this so you can get through anything (you made it to the end of this dribble)

Keyboard bigger than computer (don't ask)

Goodbye

The title is in reference to the year of 2008 because it sucked on a lot of levels, but at the same time was good and thus I have to do a lot of typing. I don't like typing, I'm good at it but that doesn't mean I like it.....*sigh*.....

I'm going to start off with the year in review, bad version:
I lost a pillar in my life in a way that really sucks. No warning, phone call at work, words I will never forget, things that were not supposed to happen. I had to say good bye to my dad without him showing my boy how to drive (behind my back, in the way a grandpa is supposed to do), just as we were becoming friends and not "father and son". I will never look at 2-ply the same way again.
I lost my family because of things. I had the american dream of a wife, 2 kids, a dog, a car, a truck, a house, debt out the wazoo, and happiness but that was taken away because of infidelity.

The above happened within 3 weeks. I was crushed and I won't lie, I thought about how easy it would be to drive into a ditch at 80mph, on a cliff road so that the kids would have money. I really did, more than once, but I also knew that I was too strong for that and so I trudged on. It was hard, harder than some would think (friends said that they would have ended things after all that) but I couldn't because I have 2 kids that mean more to me than some may ever know. I did things alone, sure I had family support but mom was dealing with things, sis was dealing with things and I don't have many friends so I was alone.

Alone sucks. I can go for days without talking to anyone by my kids but that doesn't make things better. Just imagine 8 moths without feeling the touch of someone else. I've done it and will be doing it again. But......

The year in review, good version:

I've learned that I deserve better. I have found out that I am not as bad of a man that I make myself out to be. I have found that there are wonderful women out there that have gone through a lot more than I have and just, for lack of a better word, rock. I have made friends that I wouldn't have a year ago, gone places that I wouldn't have, done things that I may have been afaid to before.

I have learned so much about people, myself and just life in the the past year but I am going to be selfish; I want to be happy. I want to find that one, I want to feel that way, I want to be happy and I feel that I will get those things. Sure, it will take work but I am willing to do that.

I am bear.

If you read this than that means that you are really awesome.
Thank you.




giant mixed nut tin (less than 50% peanuts)

You don't know

I lost a bit of my thumb on Friday and it made me realize that you don't know what you have until it is gone. I can't touch my thumb to anything because of the pain of exposed nerve endings so I have been learning to do things a different way. At the end of the day, the rest of my hand hurts and there have been times when I have yelled profanities and almost been brought to tears. At the same time, I get a lot of questions on what happened and a few laughs when I tell the story.

It dawned on me that my loss of thumb goes hand in hand with the divorce I went through. I had this part of me that was so much a part of my life, so much a part of my every day being that when it was gone I didn't know what to do. I had to learn to do things a different way from what I was used to. I may have taken parts of my marriage for granted, just thought that things were going to be "right" because we were together, but it wasn't the way things turned out. Over the past few months, I have had to learn to do things differently, for myself, for my kids, in a way that scared the crap out of me, but I could do them because I had to. It was all kind of mental.

Today, I realized that I have gone through a lot of mental things. C'mon, I lose my dad, the rock that I based my life on, the way I wanted to end up, my one and only "go to guy". Add to that a bit of infidelity, remove the family life I had tried to build up, add a dash of "every other weekend" and some other ingredients and my mental stew was fucked and fit for no one. Friends told me that they were surprised that I was still functioning, still alive, after that, but I was. It was mental and it has plagued me. I lop off a bit of my thumb and it becomes physical.

I have to change the way I do things. Sure, they will hurt at the end of the day but they will get done. It will take time but it will get done. I will swear, I will cry, I will remember but maybe I will get by.

camel

I talk way too much

about work.

I think it is because it is the only thing that I have each and every day. I wake up and start working and I just got done working about 20 minutes ago. That is my day.

I do have kids, 2 of them, that are great and are going through a lot themselves. New school, new place to live, new male figure in their lives, all kinds of new things. Like this coming weekend, they are spending the night at new friends. They are real excited about it and I think they will not be seen by me all night, even though I will be there. I guess sometimes I don't want to talk about my kids here because sometimes I want to keep them to myself.

It is a love/hate thing

I love to drive. I do it for my job and I do it well. I can, will, and have driven from my place to Chicago and still put in a few hours of work when I get there. It might not sound like much but imagine sitting in your favorite chair, listening to music, taking the occasional (very occasional for me) phone call, not being able to read, not being able to stand up when you want or grab something from the fridge for about 8 hours. Sure, you stop once, maybe twice, but for 8 hours you sit.

I have seen giant pumpkins made out of bales of hay, places advertising that they are in need of an "ass mechanic" (a garage someplace in Indiana) giant cowboys (Latrobe) and a lot of other things that escape my mind right now. I have zoned out in Ohio and snapped back to realize that I've traveled 30 miles with out seeing another vehicle. I love to drive.

I hate to drive. It is being stuck in a mobile office while talking to myself because there is nobody to talk to. It is a lonely job where the most recent thing is that I get to be a spy and suggest courses of action that should be taken. It is a job that I would like to share with someone but being as I am contemplating monkhood, I shouldn't be too worried about it. My back gets cramped up, my hip hurts from dealing with the gas pedal, sometimes I get headaches from staring out the window.

I get to do it again in 8 hrs and who knows where I will go tomorrow.

monk

Working in a coal mine

Okay, not really.

I don't even want to know what that is like but I do have the song going through my head as I type this. One thing that I love about hotels is the ice. It is great. Everything tastes better with ice. Stuff that I normally drink right out of the bottle now needs to be in a cup with ice.

I hate elevator people that do it wrong. I went to work this morning, I arrive at the ground floor preparing to exit the elevator and a woman just barges in(I am on the elevator and getting off on the only other floor to get off of and I know how to work the darn thing.) She should have stepped back, waited for me to exit, and then it would have been all her's. That just annoyed me.

I love being away from my work, which is piling up, to help others with theirs and yet I do more than they do A lot more. I guess they are just lazy and I am a good grunt.

Off to bed because 6:30 start time is early and I only have 2 more days before I make the 8hr trip home.

glass bottle