The Thousand Yard Stare

I’m recovering from a rather extreme sleep deficit.

My coffee is at my side, my computer is humming along as I brainlessly surf the net, answer e-mails, and plaintively profess thoughts and feelings that course though my brainhead.

I’m still waking up.

It’s 3pm and I woke up about an hour ago.  My sleep schedule is pretty much hacked again, and I’m fairly sure I answered at least four phone calls while sleeping. Yes, yes, I’m not supposed to do that – because I never remember what I said, or even know if I said anything that made any sense.

First call was from my tailor. I think we agreed that we’re going to try to get together next week.

Second call was from my investment company. Sales call. Easy to brush that off – even in the fog of sleep.

Third call?

Fourth call?

I’m sure hoping that #3 and #4 were not insurance calls regarding the accident. I spent most of yesterday telling the same story over and over again. And over and over again. I tried to tell the same joke four different times with each agent to entertain myself – and see if they’d laugh.

Q: “How was the weather”

A: “Freaking gorgeous, I had my top off and was trying to get a tan!”

Basically (from the police report):

Funny, that doesn’t LOOK like my car. And there’s no WAY that SUV was bigger than the dually.

Anyway, I had wanted to work on the bathroom today, because I’m just so close to finishing. But working on the bathroom in the state I’m in (Fog) is not a good plan. Better to wait until tomorrow when I’m not so burned out on it.

So close….

So what did you do yesterday?

Me? I got into a four car pileup. Not the first one….or the third one….or the fourth one. Yes, the second one.

I was “leader of the pack” as it were – the girl behind me stopped in time, the guy behind her stopped in time, but the lady behind him…..didn’t.

She rammed his truck so hard that his trailer hitch got wedged into her bumper. He had to drag her car off the road. It was pretty crazy.

The upshot was that his truck hit the girl’s car, who nailed my bumper. My neck was a little sore last night, but it’s fine today. My daughter was fine, so all in all we were pretty lucky.

I’m sure you can’t see the largish puncture holes/gashes in the bumper, but I’m not especially concerned. You get the idea. I’m taking it to the body shop to get checked out tomorrow.  All the insurance agents are ganging up on Geico – who is the insurance company that represents the last lady that hit the truck.

There were two more four car pileups while we were pulled over. My daughter saw one of them. She was pretty surprised. “I saw a car bounce off another car and then run right back into it!”

The neighbors that live behind me….well….let me rephrase….the renters behind me have an old 80’s Buick Regal in their driveway.

It reminds me of my first car – which was a 1982 Buick Regal (in silver/blue). If I recall, it had power locks and manual windows. It had A/C (nice in Houston).

It was stolen twice (if I recall) although I can only remember the details of the one time at our house.

My habit was to come home at 3 or 4 am after being out in the poolhalls (even on school nights) and then pass out for a few hours. Well, one evening, I believe I was at home, but my brother didn’t know it – and his room was on the same side of the house as the garage. So he hears some people screwing around with the car, and then assumes it’s me or my friends. They drive off. Apparently, the next morning he realizes it wasn’t me.

The dudes were high or drunk, because they took the car down the street, then turned into a giant field – and drove down the field instead of driving down the regular roads.

The cops recovered the car.

My brother eventually ended up running the car under a really tall truck – wedging the hood shut pretty much permanently. Which was kind of a bummer, because even though I bitched about it a lot, I really liked that car.

A – Age: 37.
B – Bed size: King.
C – Chore you hate: Hand washing dishes.
D – Don’t eat: Banana Peppers.
E – Essential start your day item: Espresso.
F – Favorite board game: Sorry!.
G – Gold or Silver: Silver.
H – Height: 5’6″
I – Instruments you play(ed): Cornet (barely), French Horn (barely), Guitar, Piano
J – Job title: Unemployed ne’er-do-well
K – Kid(s): Yes.
L – Love or lust: I didn’t think it was a choice between one or the other. Both.
M – Mom’s name: Pam
N – Nicknames: Babe, Dave, Dumbass
O – Overnight hospital stay other than birth: MMmmmm. No.
P – Pants or pantyhose: Pants.
Q – Famous Movie Quote: “Call me Snake”
R – Right or left handed: Right.
S – Sibling(s): Yes.
T – Time you wake up: Generally? 9:00am.
U – Underwear: Yes.
V – Vegetable favorite: Spinach or Corn
W – Ways you run late: Surfing the internet – printing maps because I’m too lame to have a smart phone.
X – X-rays you’ve had: Teeth, ankle, hand.
Y – Yummy food you make: Benigets
Z – Zoo favorite: I always remember the vampire bat exhibit in Houston. And the cobras.

Back in 1982 (?) I desperately wanted an Omnibot. I’m not sure why I was so possessed by wanting one. In my imagination, it was a robot that would roam the house doing robot-ly deeds.

Of course, the fact that almost my entire house was carpeted did not deter my thinking process.
Well, I pestered and pestered my parents until Christmas and kept a copy of a Sharper Image catalog (I think?) that I read every day imagining the great robotic deeds that I could program the robot to do.

Fast forward after several months of talking everyone’s ear off about the Omnibot.

About a week and a half before Christmas, I was hanging out with a friend at the Galleria in Houston and we happened upon an import toy shop – with the keenest Japanese toy imports. I immediately abandoned my quest for an Omnibot and instead requested a Soul of Chogokin robot (which is a non-moving, non-programmable toy robot). I’m not really sure what possessed me to request the change in gift – although I did hear that it involved my father returning an Omnibot to a Sears or something on Christmas Eve – which couldn’t have been fun.

After Christmas, I think I snapped to my senses and then started requesting an Omnibot 2000.  Buuuut I’m pretty sure that request fell on deaf ears.

Ahh, parenthood.

Ok, so seriously.

Today I went to pick up a picture frame at my local picture-frame-shop.

As I’m walking up to the counter, I spy a guy who seems to be flirting with the girl behind the counter.  This in and of itself didn’t bother me.

Now, it had already been “one of those days” so I wasn’t really in the mood to be conversed with.

I walk up.

Him: So, how are you doing today?

Me: Uh, fine?

Him: Buying a frame, huh?

Me: Uh, yeah?

Him: What are you going to put in it?

Me: Uh, a picture?

Him: Uh….

Girl: Hee-hee-hee

Totally realizing that I just busted his chops in front of his lady-friend, I immediately counter with, “Well, I mean, what else would you put in there?”

Him: I don’t know. (He wasn’t helping his case at all)

So I just shut up, paid, and moved on.

Case closed.

I’m not much for crowds.

Seriously.

While I’ve managed to tame my anti-social tendencies, sometimes walking into an extremely crowded restaurant triggers something.

Today, I took my daughter to a relatively popular (and in my mind – disgusting) place that was the only one convenient for our dining purposes.

As we were led to our table, it was like a cloud of despair that washed over me. Surrounded by the masses of humanity – I almost couldn’t handle it.  I had to withdraw into myself in order not to freak out.  Granted, it’s pretty rare that this happens. Exceptionally rare actually, but if it’s a rather confined/claustrophobic place – it’s more likely to happen.

On top of that, I did manage to eat healthy rather than order an omelette  with six pieces of bacon and cheese.  Sometimes being around the masses of humanity remind me how fat everyone is – which subconsciously makes me order things that are healthy. So we finished up rather quickly (one cup of coffee? Seriously? Who does THAT?) and left.

I did notice today that someone had hit my car. They scarred one of my headlight lenses rather well.

What really pisses me off about this, is that I’m pretty sure it was from a trailer hitch on some mofo’s giant truck. There’s no other damage on the bumper, just on the headlight lens.
And of course, I’ll never know who it was, and knowing how gigantic the trucks are around here, they probably didn’t even realize they hit me. Fuckers.

National Art Gallery – Napoleon Bonaparte

Napoleon.

I like this name because a guy that I once worked with was named Napoleon. He was in the U.S. Navy at one time. We had a photo booth at this place, and in the middle of a dinner rush, he took pictures of himself and then proceeded to go to each employee there – because he had made up captions for each. Kind of an odd duck, but I'll never forget him.

I was thinking today about how many pictures it usually takes me to get a “good one”. Well, seeing as how I normally take about forty to get one good one, I was curious as to the success rate of other people.

So, I googled DSC_001, which would be the first picture taken on a Sony Camera.

I’m pretty surprised, people manage to take some good first pictures.

Granted, there’s only about 8,270 actually online.

So that, coupled with the hundreds (thousands?) of Sony cameras actually sold….means……yeah, people don’t have much better luck with their first pictures either.