Clutter

I cannot keep up with all the junk; it just keeps coming. My mailbox is full of junk mail and duplicate catalogs everyday - and so is my email. Work sends me home with armloads of training manuals and other propaganda, and it usually just sits in a certain spot, only to be moved to another spot, and finally someday placed in the recycle bin. As I look around this room, I see all kinds of clutter that never gets used. It just sits there, lonely, listening to the crickets outside my window.

Maybe I'll clean it up tomorrow...

Maybe, and then again....maybe not.

I just took an annual Health Risk Assessment quiz on my medical insurance's website ( I get a $50 credit for doing so), and I came across a question that caused me to double-take:

Have you had a sigmoidoscopy within the last 5 years (tube inserted in rectum to check for lower intestinal problems)?

I read it, answered, and then had to read it again. The answers for this particular question were: a.) Yes, b.) No, and c.) Don't Know. Uh....don't know? That's really an option? I'd love to meet some of the respondents from group C. "So, you're not sure if you had a tube inserted into your ass in the last five years, eh?

Well....what now?

Some quick updates, as I've been lagging....

• I came to a 4 way stop almost at the same time with another vehicle on 10/12/06. As a tie, I waved the other car through the intersection. Then I proceeded, and the car behind the car I waved through, rammed me from the right side.
• Close to mid-term elections, the White House and the Iraqi gov't have somehow been able to at least publicize vague notions of a timetable for an American troop withdrawal from Iraq. Coincidence?
• Stock Market continues to defy all notions of sanity. I think Q1 2007 is a brand new story.
• Finished reading "Flyboys," and I am now reading " The Kite Runner."

One Day, A While Back...

...I found myself down in Venice Beach, on a school day, during school hours, with 3 friends. We made our way to the boardwalk, as seniors, not in charge of a phantom entitlement, but a self-indulged right to our time.

I was 17 then, so I don't recall too many of the details. I do remember the car that took us there; I do remember that Venice was almost entirely empty; and I do remember meeting a guy who wanted to sing to us for tips - I suppose.

The first, and only, song this guy sang to us on his broken down guitar.....escaped me for a few bars. It seemed familiar, and yet I just couldn't put my finger to it. And then I got it! Though still innocent to it's lyrics, it was a Bob Dylan. And then, out of my delirium, clearly it was that classic about homelessness.

Here was this this guy, apparently down on his luck on a relatively warm southern California winter's day in Venice Beach, singing to a few middle-class boys from Woodland Hills about the perils of being.....well, down on your luck.

Why did it have to be that song? Why not something romantic and gentle? I remember realizing what he was singing about, and then having to leave the scene immediately. And then I remember being out on Santa Monica Pier, and then I remember being back home, in a bean bag in my room, wondering why I was so happy and content from this day?

Trust me, it wasn't from the song. That song has stuck with me for almost 20 years....

Spermbank

From the comments section of a few posts ago, asking about ethically dubious acts, an anonymous person added the simple, and yet ardent one word response: "spermbank."

It goes without saying that the word is just funny. Ha ha, giggle, giggle. But let's put down our firecrackers and not superglue our friends hand to his crotch while he's sleeping. Is a spermbank an ethically dubious place to get money? I never really thought about going to one at all, much less to get money, and then how often?? Good questions that never crossed my mind.

How much does a spermbank pay anyway?

Also, I just found out by Googling 'spermbank,' that it's two words. Sperm bank. I like my way better though...

I did find Sperm Bank of California, but did not find Sperm Bank of America, nor Balls Fargo, or Washington Manual.

My Golf Swing

I come from the outside in, taking a divot that moves towards me and produces a ball flight that moves from left to right, or 'fades' at best, and in full panic perfectly demonstrates a 'slice.' And as well as I have mastered the English language (through the Junior High level), I have never really understood what it meant when golf instructors said that someone's hands were outpacing their swing, or more importantly the clubhead.

But last week it hit me, as squarely as that time a bird diarrhea'd on my head. And it was immediately so simple! Alas, I was not in a position to test out my new understanding as I was meditating in the lavatory.....but I will get out there soon. And then we'll see who's Tiger, and who's not.

iTunes

It's Saturday night, and the wife is out of town, boogying to the sounds of electric love at her cousin's wedding somewhere down the peninsula from San francisco. And so I'm sitting here savoring the bliss of my devirginization of downloading music from iTunes. On my last birthday, one of the sisters gave me a gift card to iTunes, and I'm just getting around to using it. Within minutes.........I'm addicted, and so I must say - what a great gift.

So far I've downloaded The B-52's first album, The Best of the Talking Heads, and Beck's Mellow Gold. I wish iTunes was free. Or maybe I don't, now that I think about it. I might never leave the computer. And of course I probably don't need to mention that I have downloaded music before, and come to think of it, the process may have swerved wide of any cash transaction, and that never led to any sort of addiction. So, whatever.

In other news, I was in an accident on Thurs. afternoon and the woman who broadsided me is claiming that it wasn't her fault b/c it was her turn to proceed through the four-way stop. When I asked her how it was possible that it was her turn when I arrived perpendicular to her lane of traffic at the same time as the car in front of her, she reiterated that it was her turn to go. Yep, I can smell the cool times ahead, can't you?

Update - just purchased Orlando 'Cachaito' Lopez' phenonemonal album, aptly titled "Cachaito," so now I only have $9.21 left at iTunes. On a brighter note, Steve Jobs can still buy anything in the world that his little heart desires. I heart Steve.

Ethics Question

From a money blog (Make Love, Not Debt) I check in on from time to time:

" What is the most ethically dubious thing you've ever done to either save a buck, or gain more money?"

Be anonymous if you have to, but try to be honest. Any good stories?

There's Gold in Them Thar Hills

On my way back from Surf Fest XII this past Sunday morning, somewhere just north of Oceanside, I saw a girl picking her nose. Okay, sounds innocent enough, but let's dissect this a bit.

I was in the second lane from the right side of the highway, and she was in the lane just to my left. Her car and my car seemed to be going about the same rate of speed, with my hood about even with her front seat car doors. As I glanced over to look into the car, I see this young, pretty blonde with her right index finger in her left nostril. Since I was behind her a bit, I didn't need to pretend that I didn't see it. I just kept staring. We all have our little picks, our pretend "scratches" that when we feel we have the green light become quick (read: no more than .8 seconds) probes for lodged irratations of dried mucus. But this was different. She just kept going. Going like those old men who just don't give a damn. In fact, upon looking more closely, I realized that she was up to her second knuckle. Second knuckle!! Ponder that.

But now I feel bad. Maybe she wasn't picking her nose at all. Maybe her contact lens slipped back behind her eyeball and she was merely retrieving it through her nasal cavity? Or maybe she'd detached her retinal nerve the night before while engaging the pit of Red Square in TJ during "Surfin' Bird," and was just now attempting to reattach it? The point is, it's none of my business why she's going 75 m.p.h. on the northbound lane of Interstate 5, just outside of Camp Pendleton with one of her fingers so far up her nose it appears she's scraching her Occipital Lobe. None of my business whatsover.