Thought for the day

I had a brilliant thought just now, but I'm drunk so I forget what it was exactly. As a side note, I think Toy Story 3 should have had a Raiders of the Lost Ark ending!




Who's with me!?

Injun Joe and the Pink MicroMites Part I

One time I was seventeen years old. It seems like a long ass time ago, but it really wasn't. You see, as we grow older, time loses its meaning, and twenty years seems like yesterday. This was 1989 and anything was still possible. I was on my own (except for the ones who were helping me out) and was totally into psychedelic drugs. I had many friends back then, because when you're using drugs, friends come easy. It doesn't matter if one friend is a hippy and another is a skinhead. You always have the chems in common. Anyway, this particular night, some of my friends got a hold of some of the most pure and potent acid I have ever known... we dubbed this particular strain of LSD... Pink MicroMites.  the micro in the name came from the fact that these hits were about 1/3 the size of typical hits of blotter acid. The potency, however, was off the charts!

Earlier in the night, I was at the house of a friend of mine, drinking Bacardi rum and smoking weed. By the time the Pink MicroMites showed up, all inhibition was gone, and I was ready for the next level! The delivery boy explained to me that I didn't want to take three of these at once. Of course I was seventeen at the time and explained to him that I could handle anything he could throw my way, purity be damned!  he reluctantly tore off three hits and I promptly ate them. 

It's a funny thing waiting for acid to take effect. You can tell from the moment you take it whether or not it's good. When it is good, you get a shiver down your spine once the tab touches your tongue (and man did I get a shiver)! After that you try to stay occupied for the next twenty - forty five minutes until it takes full effect. This particular night, it kicked in on the way home.

The driver was using as well. We pulled up to an on ramp when he suddenly stopped and surveyed what lay ahead. I imagine that while we were parked in the middle of the road, that he was contemplating the pros and cons of using the highway to get us home as opposed to the back roads. He was probably wondering what would happen if he was pulled over. what could he tell the police while I was drooling in the back seat laughing uncontrollably while reading Garfield comics? How would he explain to a traffic cop that we were just good average kids returning home from a long night of punch and cookies while I was rolling around on the floor boards jabbering about sex with his family members? I like to think he had all these things in mind, but I remember looking up and noticing that he was staring at the street lamps. I knew that whenever his eyes involuntarily adjusted, it would leave a large trail, and then another, and another, and so on until he was seeing nothing but streaks of light highlighted by flashing colors like some sort of twisted neon carnival. At that point driving anywhere would no longer be an option. Our safety, his own included, was the furthest thing from his mind at this point...or was it? He stared at those bright lights for what seemed like an eternity, then calmly turned his head toward the back seat, looked me dead in the eye, shook his head slowly and said "no." He then proceeded to back up off the ramp, turn the car around, and make us disappear into the deep, dark, and relatively safe side roads.





Liberate Tuteme ex Infernis

I've been drunk all day. My wife is trying to get her business to actually be profitable, and the only thing I need to do is take care of the house while she works. I'm not even capable of doing that. My idea of the perfect day is to be left alone to do whatever the hell I want to do. Of course when you're the father of six children, that's a hard day to come by.

I like to wake up around noon and then spend two-eight hours drinking coffee and liquor and scouring the internet for useless information about nonsense. Meanwhile, the kids watch television and ruin their minds in between screaming fits.

My wife loves me for some strange reason. No matter how much I try to destroy our lives, she always forgives me after a good cry. The other day, I promised her that I would do whatever it takes to help her with her business. Of course I was drunk and left out the part where helping her doesn't actually include housework, changing diapers, and cooking. No, I'd rather get shitfaced and allow the children to fight among themselves about trivial things like food and water that are not readily available because their father is a loser.Yes, believe it or not, in the deranged mind of the addict, innocent children do not matter. Whether or not they have food and drink makes no difference as long as the one who is supposed to provide these things has a hard drink in hand. Once that minor annoyance is taken care of, the kids still don't matter because children are an obstacle to enjoying oneself.

The human child is the most complex product of unskilled labor in the history of life on Earth. Any two people can have drunken sexual intercourse and conceive a whole new person. A person with a soul. A person so totally pure and innocent, that they will unconditionally love the one who blatantly places the importance of a glass of whiskey in his hand above the importance of a cup of water in theirs. At the same time, children are very demanding. They will love you no matter how much you neglect and abuse them, but they will not do it quietly! You see, children do not understand diplomacy. They only understand their immediate needs (sort of like an alcoholic). When a child gets hungry or thirsty, they will not grin and bear it like an adult. They will make a scene. Not the kind of scene that makes your heart feel full of butterflies like in a movie staring Meryl Streep, but the kind of scene that includes piercing screams like in a movie directed by the guy who made Saw.

In my world, the piercing screams of unhappy children are commonplace. I try to meet their immediate needs, but I fail. As a matter of fact, I fail at every important thing that I attempt to accomplish! I don't know why. All my friends that I grew up with are atheists. Money-wise, they are doing fine. I, on the other hand, can't seem to make shit out of shit, and I'm Catholic! I have no choice but to rely on God. Maybe that's the whole point. Either way it doesn't make a difference because I am not a man. I am a staggering apparition who places his responsibility upon the shoulders of an omnipotent God who loved him into existence. I abuse myself. Moreover, I abuse the ones who have been placed in my care. I don't deserve these little ones who have been placed in my care, yet here they are. Here they are screaming constantly for stupid crap like food and water. I can easily provide these things for them, but that would mean separating my ass from the couch, and I only do that when I need another drink.

I've grown tired of typing. Chew on what I've said. If one thing applies to you, beware! I may be a loser, but you don't have to follow suit! Love your kids! Love your wife! Love everyone regardless of whether or not they love you back! This is the secret to happiness (and eternal life). I may not be capable of seeing my nose before my face, but you can. I refuse to see the forest through the trees, but maybe one of you poor, unfortunate souls who actually took the time to read this can. Save yourself from hell! Learn from my mistakes!

I thought I Was Dead. Turns Out I Was just in Nebraska

I haven't updated in a while because I've been working. No, I haven't gotten a job. I've been helping my father-in-law on his corn farm. My father-in-law is the poster child for the American farmer. He can tell you how many inches of rain his crops got in 1978. He is equally meticulous about everything he does. It's surprising to me that a man so detail oriented as he is never swears. In fact, he never raises his voice at all. Well that's not completely true. He shouts and curses plenty when I'm around.

A typical day working on the farm begins with me downing 5-7 shots of hard liquor and wishing I was dead. After that it becomes a fun filled day of picking up irrigation pipe for about 12+ hours in hundred degree weather with no breeze. For those who don't know, irrigation pipe is how water from the wells is transported to the crops. This ensures that a farmer can harvest a good yield even in dryer seasons. A good harvest ensures that grocery stores around the nation can remain well stocked so that folks who never leave the city have enough energy to act all smug and laugh at the dumb-ass rednecks.

The pipe itself is made from aluminum and each section is 30' long with an 8" diameter. The job entails walking behind a tractor at 5 mph and picking up the sections, one after the other after the other........., and loading them on a special trailer that, coincidentally, resembles a medieval torture rack!
Torture Rack

Pipe Trailer
The other day I was so drunk that I became dehydrated and repeatedly dropped my end of the pipe sections while attempting to hoist them into the trailer. Each time I dropped my end, it would send a shock-wave to the opposite end that my father-in-law was holding. This would irritate his arthritis and he would begin with the shouting and cursing which he never does. At one point he actually instructed me to walk in front of the tractor. I guessed this was so I could use the fender for leverage. On this particular day I also noticed he had his shotgun with him. That's when I decided to get my act together. I resolved to take at least one drink of water from the cooler for every 5 drinks of whiskey from the flask. 

Once I was stationed in front of the tractor, the day went much more smoothly. It's amazing how well an intoxicated person can focus on his job with ten tons of metal bearing down on him at all times. I think dad was in a hurry to get the job done because he kept instructing my mother-in-law (who was driving) to speed up! She was a good sport about it too. 

My mother-in-law is the only person I know who's more heavily medicated than I am. Medicated or not, she handles that tractor like an old pro. That is when she's not veering off into the field and destroying all the corn! I'm okay with it, though, because as long as she is driving over the corn, she can't be driving over me! During the rare times when her meds are properly metabolized in her system and not impairing her judgement, she likes to tell stories. She tells stories of her childhood, and fun times with her family. She also speaks lovingly about her children and how much better off her other daughter is mainly because she's not married to me. 

All in all, hauling irrigation pipe is the closest thing to purgatory on Earth that I can imagine. As a matter of fact, if I were given a choice between picking up pipe or the torture rack, I would have to think about it for a minute. You would think that being reduced to such soul crushing work at the hands of abusive extended family members might encourage me to go out and look for something more permanent and less punishing, but you would be wrong. A few days of hell in exchange for a couple weeks of heavy drinking is a fair trade in my book! So until next time, bottoms up my friends! Of course I can't guarantee there will be a next time as my internet could be shut off at any time for non-payment.    

House Guests and fish

As the saying goes; house guests are like fish, they both stink after three days. I never have to worry about house guests though. No one ever stays at my place for more than a few minutes. I don't worry about anything, though. As a matter of fact, I relish in my imperfections. Who cares if the people I love the most see me as nothing more than free room and board for a day? Also, that trout in the fridge is starting to ferment. The smell permeates the house whenever the fridge is opened! I don't care. If you can't deal with a little dead fish, you're not really alive! I had something totally profound and revealing to say just now, but while I was trying to flesh it out in my mind the commotion started upstairs. Everyone is starting to wake up! @ $

The greatest thing about being an alcoholic is that you never have to worry about... well... Anything! As long as that drink is within your grasp, all is well. My wife is, as we speak, hacking up a fur ball. I don't care, though, because I have a drink! While she's busy coughing up phlegm,  the little ones are running amok while I'm trying to write something profound and enlightening. That doesn't matter, because I have a drink! Of course profundity and enlightenment are the last words in the English language that I should ever expect my readers to come away with (because I have a drink). If I actually had readers, I would expect them to choke to death on their own saliva because of their brain's inability to decipher enough information to differentiate the drivel being read and the regulation of saliva dripping into their lungs that hasn't been successfully drooled! There is a certain freedom in all of this, however. As long as I know that no one reads what I write, I don't have to worry about pandering to anyone but myself. After all, isn't that what's really important in life? Pandering to oneself?


Loser Lay Off

I just got laid off today. I had this crappy job cooking for a second rate college cafeteria. In a typical day I would get cussed out by at least ten students. One time, a very attractive drama student complained about my split pea with rhubarb casserole. When I asked her what was wrong with it her face contorted into this unnatural look of disgust and confusion right before she began shrieking. Then she moved on to the sloppy joes. During the next mandatory staff meeting, we were informed of a new company policy expressly forbidding any and all employees who are me, to "directly or indirectly address a student, faculty, or staff member with either the spoken word, bodily gesture, or eye contact." When I filed a grievance with the dean of students, he told me to "stop sucking" and to kindly never look him in the eyes again as dictated by company policy. Guess I should have seen it coming.

Better Living Through Fermentation

Coping with loss is the most important life skill to master for a guy like me. Drugs and alcohol work most of the time. I'm not able to use as many drugs as I would like because the local dealers won't sell to me being that I'm such a loser. So after I got fired today, I did the only reasonable thing for a man in my position; I bought a gigantic bottle of cheap whiskey with no chaser (you know, because I'm broke and need to be more financially responsible). The first swig of cheap booze is always the worst. Your throat burns, your nose wrinkles, and your eyes begin to water. That's why I always chug five or six shots all in a row before doing anything. Today I chugged 8, then I was good and ready for the drive home.