floozy industries

Ring Ring

I’m reading this book about rudeness. So I sit down at lunch and open this book and almost immediately the man next to me gets a call on his cell. We’re in the dining room of a sushi place, its quiet. He’s been chatting with his companion but when he answers the phone, doubles his volume. Then I get to hear a really extensive and dull one sided conversation about tax on a line of equity. He completely ignores his companion who continues to poke her teriyaki chicken around her bento box with a chopstick (no rice, extra salad - she's watching the carbs). Before he finishes, because he stays on the phone for about 8 minutes, a guy on the other side of the room gets a call too. His phone rings about 6 times, full volume, he finally realizes it is in fact his uniquely annoying ring, and answers. I hear him bless someone for their kindness and laugh jovially. I contemplate digging my earphones out of my bag. Everyone talks twice as loud on the phone as they do to the person next to them. I can’t concentrate on my book. My book about how rude people are these days. Dramatic irony.

Livin' the High Life

It’s true, I have been drinking High Life lately rather than Bud. Somehow the “Champagne of beers!” just makes me feel festive during the holiday party season. And there has been no shortage of parties this season. I’d better stock up on “Champagne” for New Year’s Eve too. Nothing says, “Classy!” like reaching into your bag and pulling out another tallboy at a fancy soiree.

And I says to Jim, I says, “Don’t worry!” He’s worried that I’m diluting my brand loyalty. Jim is really into branding, though usually his own. Thanks to him I walked into my second party of Saturday night with a 24 ounce can of Bud dripping down my arm. I never know if I should think it is good or bad that people now expect that I will walk into a party where everyone is drinking microbrews and pink cocktails with my can of cheap beer in my hand, but for now I’m going with good. Objections can be logged in the comment section.

Mark Parties Harder... Again.

<*mark*> I went to a crazy party last night. gene simmons, ron jeremy,
<*mark*> strippers, roller skating, booze, vienna sausages.

Drunk, Half-Naked Finn

(12-16) 08:12 PST OSLO, Norway (AP) --

A Finnish citizen arrested on a public bus while drunk and nearly naked has set an apparent record for unpaid fines in Norway, with an estimated 99 of them, police said Friday.

The man, whose name was not released, is known by police for his tendency to discard pieces of clothing as his level of intoxication increases, the Bergens Tidende newspaper reported.

"He has gotten up to 99 fines," police attorney Rudolf Christophersen told the newspaper. "In the (Bergen area's) Hordaland Police District alone he has 95,000 kroner (euro12,200; US$14,260) worth of fines. That must be a record."

The man, whom police said offered up five different identities, has repeatedly been expelled from Norway, but keeps returning.

In the latest incident, on Wednesday, police received a telephone call from the bus driver in Bergen, the main city on Norway's west coast, who said: "There is a naked, drunk, difficult Finn causing trouble on board."

Police found the man dressed only his underpants, and extremely drunk, and are seeking to have him jailed on charges that include indecent exposure, vagrancy, public drunkenness and failing to pay his outstanding fines.

Neither Christophersen nor Bergen police spokesman Trygve Hillestad could immediately be reached for comment.

11 Million Adults Illiterate, Study Shows

Nothing makes me feel more homicidal lately than the teaching of intelligent design in public schools. It fills me with an irrational rage. Just FYI.

Fingers

Somehow I* managed to slice up both pinkies. Just at the tip of the pads that I use to type and all those other pinky finger things. Eff.

*Actually the left one was done this morning by one of the cats as she scrambled to get out from under the covers and dug a claw right into me. Maybe I'll get cat scratch fever. Or some cat litter bacteria will cause a horrible finger based illness.

Things

I did finally ride my own bike by the way. I can start it (sorta, the carb still needs work and it still needs a new battery) and I can now turn. I haven't yet shifted out of first gear, but I'm slow. I like to know what I'm doing before I add another piece. I also have a strong need to be as safe as possible so that if I'm ever hurt, it wont be due to something stupid I've done.

I also recorded a new song. Another 80s cover. Maybe I'll link to some of the other covers in the comments so people who try hard can find them if they want to. But first, someone will have to comment, and I'll reply.

Pumpkin

Most of my more lucid dreams have been tragic lately. But I’ve still managed to have a few of the less sad, more bizarre variety.

I was on a swim team and we were losing to the competing team. The meet took place in a swampy lake, more like a bayou than the suburban pool clubs where I competed in swim meets as a kid. I wandered around a lot in my racing suit. The ground was moist and covered with a layer of spongy decomposing leaves and I had to step over the exposed roots of trees that grew next to the water. I don’t remember competing in any of the events, but I do remember that it was partly my fault we were losing.

After the other team won and I’d made it back from a little store where I’d gone to use the bathroom (this store sold souvenirs and memorabilia for their team) they started doing a water show for us. They swam in the murk over to a big pile of foam rubber pumpkins. One pumpkin was much larger than the rest… maybe the size of a small shack. They began to saw the top off like you would to start a jack-o-lantern. When they took the top off the top, instead of pumpkin seeds, it was full of those little plastic balls (the color of seeds) that kids dive through in playgrounds. They all dove in.

It all had a feeling of gloom and failure and sadness to it, but nothing like the disconcerting dreams of disaster that have been hanging around lately. But not to worry, I know what the disaster dreams are about. It’ll pass.

Fully Insured and Fully Inured

As of today I have a motorcycle, permit to ride it, AND insurance.

AND I get to go record a song later (unless one of us flakes).

With such fun exciting things on my plate, why am I super annoyed and having a craptastic day? CRAPTASTIC!!!!!

Suburban Performance Art

I dreamt I’d created a performance piece. It started with my friend Julie on stage in the Santa Clara Parks and Recreation Department Community Multi Purpose Room where I was in all those Jr. Theater plays like Tom Sawyer and Brigadoon. She was seated on the ground, lit up center stage by a spotlight with an old record player in front of her. She slowly put the needle on the record and began moving it with her finger, lifting the needle and playing only the intros to two different songs. After the intros one of the songs starts, and stage lights come up. Behind her (she keeps spinning the record with her finger throughout the entire performance) dancers come into view. They are dressed in pastel costumes like some kind of suburban drill team. I am one of the dancers, my position is 3rd from the right. The next song (of the second intro she originally played) we come out on stage again and do another dance. At the end there’s a guitarist downstage left, and a drummer slides out on a platform downstage right. Final beat and he throws a drumstick in the air. One of the dancers does a leap into his arms and catches it. Lights out except the one spot on Julie center stage, she slowly stops turning the record with her finger. Blackout.

Permitted

I passed the written portion of the motorcycle license test this morning. I’ve been told that most people don’t pass on their first try, so I’m feeling like a champ. Now I can ride during daylight hours, no freeway, no passengers. Next week the class, then I’m good to go.

I just wish I’d thought about the fact that they’d be taking a new ID photo for the license. I might have washed my hair before leaving the house. Or at least brushed it. Oh well, at least it’ll look like the real me. I managed to find some face powder and lipstick in the bottom of my bag. I kept my mouth closed so you can’t see the delicious Cliff bar in my teeth.

Here are some additional photos of the motorcycle for your viewing pleasure. These are "before" shots without the tuff new rear end. They are too large for now. Sad for you.

6 Friends Become 5

In the dream I was with 5 good friends. Not good friends from real life, but good friends that exist only in the time and place of this dream. We lived in a long flat motel in a small town, with white walls and a turquoise roof. The kind of motel where the doors open right to the parking lot. The day of the dream the sky was heavy and grey. One of the friends was hurt. I think he was hurt in a fight or an accident. He had a few obvious wounds on the head and torso, but wasn’t bleeding too badly. At first he seemed totally fine. Over the afternoon his condition deteriorated. He became disoriented, lethargic, and weak. Eventually he laid down and died. Later that night the 5 of us slept in one bed in room in a large warehouse. I slept at one edge. We were all clothed and though there were 5 in the bed, we just slept. I think everyone else was a guy. All of us were sad. I was weeping about the one who died, quietly so no one else would hear.

Crappy Bike Photo

I don't know how to get the photos off my new phone yet. I have some issues with modern technology. Here's a little tease of the bike though, and I promise to have a better photo soon.

Today we took off the tail section, mounted the plate underneath the seat, just above the tire, and put on smaller and sleeker turn signals. Tuff.

OK, "we" didn't really do this, but I made unhelpful remarks and acted very excited while my friend spread tools all over and gave me lectures on motorcycle stuff.

Patterns

Patterns. Once you find an old pattern and settle into it, it's hard to get out again. Neural pathways. Unlimited routes in unlimited directions and 85% or 90% wasted space. Room to create a million new and different paths that don't lead to the same dead ends. But the brain is an organ of habit, an old dog without much concern for new tricks.

Where Someone is Shot, but Nobody Dies

The nights I wake up in the middle, before morning I remember more of my dreams. Last night I dreamt I was standing on the sidewalk, I think saying goodbye to a friend at a party, when some dark and dangerous type in a hoodie obscuring his face came up to rob us. My friend fought back and was shot in the guts. Around us other people were screaming. Some of them yelling, "Call 911!" But not calling, just screeching and clamping their hands over their ears, helpless. It was up to me to kneel down, put my fist over the bloody patch growing on his stomach and pull my phone out with the other hand. I called. I got blood all over my phone and blood all over myself and all over my friend. When the ambulance came I had to yell at them that in spite of the blood on his head and face, the only wound was in the lower ab. I lied and said I was his sister and rode in the ambulance talking carefully about how everything was going to be just fine. I either got his phone out of his pocket or got him to hand it over so I could call a real sibling. I woke up wondering if it was against the rules to make a call from a squealing ambulance.