What now....now what?

Let's see what else I can dig up in my old notebooks from college. *creaky drawer opens*

The Date

Brad and Ellen seemed, to their friends, to be a perfect match. They set them up on a date to see. To see if their instincts still held true. The setting was perfect, a place of nostalgia. A place where love, if it were to spark, would ignite and raze the place to the ground. A fifties restaurant. The booths: red and white, the juke box: full of old 45s. The tunes lowly sounded out the voices of a generation past and lost.

The food was ordered and drinks accompanied the two. Small talk led to revelation of hometowns, family, and other useless information society thought was polite to speak of. In the midst of dinner, a cell phone rang loud and rang proud. The woman two booths down jumped with earnest. Alone she sat, in the corner, feasting upon the soup and salad. Cell phones were commonplace in society, and the new couple went back to engaging bullshit.

Then obnoxious laughter.

Hoping and thinking it would not last, Brad and Ellen continued until the cell phone chatter erupted once more much to the disgust of patrons. Annoyingly, she appeared not to have any regret.

Ellen glances over at Brad and notices him digging an ice cube out of his cup. With a questioning look upon her face, she was answered with a mischievous grin. Crunching softly and quickly with assassin-like precision, Brad lifts the straw. Making eye contact he winks as if to say watch this. Taking aim, the small melting bullet leaves the plastic barrel with a trail of water in it's path. Droplets run down the cell phone talker's neck after she slaps herself childishly.

'Stop laughing so damn loud.'





Quite literally, this was a page in one of my old notebooks. A complete story. Just one page. Put that in your pipe and smoke it War and Peace

The start.

So, over the course of the summer my job at the museum got pretty boring. Actually, it was closer to the fall. You know, in September when I would talk to, oh I don't know, ten people on a given day (just an example, but that felt like the average near the end of the season). I would bring a notebook and if anything popped into my head in between feeding the fire to keep the coffee warm and talking to visitors, I would write some stuff down. Some of it fun and entertaining, other things thought provoking. Please, forgive me for any cliches or anything like that, it has been quite a while since I have written anything, so there is about two years of creative writing rust on my brain. And I was never that good with grammar so fuck off if you don't like it. Anyway, I got the start of a quick little short story.

Enjoy:

Drinking Buddies (working title)

'Really, just the one?' Colin asked his youngest brother
'Yeah, why? It's not a big deal, is it?' Eric replied quickly hoping he was not an anomaly.
'No man. It's just...I don't know, it isn't something you hear about anymore.'
'Well actually, there are two more.'
'Ah ha! The truth comes out! So?' Jack threw in his two cents.
'What?'
'Whadda you mean "what"? Why don't you count em' Jack asked.
'Because.' A pause as Colin and Jack looked questioningly 'I wasn't single at the time.'
'Oh.' Silence. 'Ohhhhh.'
Then laughter. Drunken laughter.

It didn't happen on purpose, but it happened. The Margant brothers grew apart. The three were never close but school seemed to drive them apart. As they walked the hallways, quick nods were the most communication that was ever sent to each other. Never conversation. Never. Before school and after school was it. But to be seen talking in the hall with your younger brother? That was social suicide.

As they went away to separate colleges, they finally started to become brothers. Actual brothers who talked to each other. Who connected on a level they never thought possible. The holidays: a time to catch up on their latest catches, crushes, and classes. The great classes and the shitty ones. And oh the stories they had for each other.
'This hot girl down the hall from me passed out in between the bathroom and her bedroom a couple of weeks ago.' Colin started.
'So what.' Jack interjected.
'Listen fuck face, let me finish or...'
'Or I'll take you out back and kick your teeth in.' Jack and Eric both finished. It was Colin's signature threat, but they knew it would never happen. 'Go on with your story.'
'No, fuck you both, you don't get to hear the end of it.'
Then laughter. Drunken laughter.

They sat in the back booth of the Ice Box, the local bar known for it's cheap beer and poor lighting. This became the Margant brothers Mecca on their trips home. Four times a year they hurried home to meet up and drink and talk. Thanksgiving, Christmas, spring break, and Easter. It became a tradition once Eric went away to college. Rush back home the first night and head down to the bar. As Eric started college, Colin was entering his third year and Jack his second. The Ice Box was the kind of bar that never asked any questions. No I.D. required, which was why it became so popular when all the kids came home. It was like a high school reunion, but with alcohol and none of that bullshit small talk over catered dinner and over priced drinks. Oh no, the IB had three dollar pitchers and no questions.



So there you have it. The start of something great? Who knows, but probably not.

It was a whiskey kind of day

Have you ever had one of those days when you wanted to punch your boss in the face?


























Yeah. Me too.

facts about me

1. I have lived in nine different houses/apartments/dorms in my life. (Averaging 2.6 years in between moves)
2. I own every Led Zeppelin album on CD
3. I own seven of the nine Led Zeppelin albums on LP
4. I once stayed up for twenty five hours working on a paper and going to class (freshman year of college)
5. I met Jack Hanna in the Cincinnati airport
6. I have been to twenty-nine states
7. but only two countries (the U.S. and Canada)
8. I once took a two week road trip covering ten states
9. I barely remember anything that happened the one time I drank everclear
10. I drove twenty four hours straight with Adam going from Kansas to Michigan
11. I worked seven days a week without scheduled day off for seven months
12. I have been with the same person for nine years (in May)
13. and we're getting married in four months
14. I met Lynyrd Skynyrd
15. My music catalog ranges from Mozart and Glenn Miller to Rage Against the Machine and Metallica to Garth Brooks and George Strait
16. I can play the bodhran (not that it takes a lot of talent)
17. and the harmonica
18. and the trombone
19. I barely had any facial hair starting my college years
20. I fell in love with an Island
21. I have had the same best friend since junior high (so eleven years)
22. I have never been in a fist fight (not even with my brother)
23. I still, at the age of twenty four, love legos
24. I would love to run a museum
25. I have twice jumped into a snow bank without a shirt on on new years eve
26. My favorite song is The Rain Song by Led Zeppelin
27. I feel that stout beer should be a food group
28. and whiskey
29. When I'm bored, I write
30. I had two bar tabs both over one hundred dollars in a two week time span
31. and I wasn't sick after either of them
32. I'm going to be an uncle again in February
33. I'm going to a Red Wings game on the 23rd of February
34. I have a baseball signed by Wayne Gretzky
35. The first ever pot of coffee I made for myself was over an open fire
36. I miss water
37. I miss winter
38. I just set up a 401(k)
39. I have been working for Target for just under a year (anniversary is Feb. 3rd)
40. I'm a dork
41. I love history
42. I want to know the meaning of life
43. I am insecure at times
44. The worst movie I have ever seen was Time Bandits
45. I obsess with counting stairs as I climb them
46. The most zen moment I have had was sitting at Cemetery Ridge at the Gettysburg battlefield at six o'clock in the morning in 2004.
47. Euchre and I go together like whiskey and stout
48. I get along extremely well with my siblings
49. I give up alcohol for Lent
50. I repeat stories

Don't go outside...it's shitty out.

So, just days after posting about how the apartment complex had people cutting the grass, it turns into winter time....FINALLY! The wind picked up, the temperature dropped, and snow started to fall...and it is sticking. Granted, it isn't a whole lot and the wind is just blowing it all over hell, but it now feels like winter time. Okay, I'm ready for Christmas now.

That is the good news. The bad news? We have to move in this weather. Of all the weekends it decides to turn crappy out, it is this weekend. Oh irony. Mother Nature, come over here so I can bitch slap you. Of course, it'll still work out and it'll be fun and all that stuff. Our friends can't complain either, we're providing sustinance....beer and pizza, the old stand by.

So we'll see you on the other side and in the other apartment.

really? Seriously? It's January!

So I pulled into our apartment yesterday after work and what do I see? A lawn care company cutting the grass. Yeah....it is the beginning days of January and my apartment people think that it is time to cut the grass. Granted, the majority of it is green because the winters down here in Kansas suck ass, but still...it is the principle of the thing. You shouldn't have to cut the grass until at least April (maybe late March if it has been warm and rainy...you know, nice enough to make the grass green).

People down here are neurotic about their lawns. Lots of sprinkler systems, people out with hair trimmers making sure every single blade of grass is prefectly even, cutting the grass every two or three days. It is disgusting. It really truly is.

The big move

We're getting ready to move into our new apartment this weekend coming up. Stressful and time consuming. But in the same time, exciting. It is bigger and I can't wait. It is going to be a pain in the ass to unpack everything. This is not even a portion of the shit we have packed up. Speaking of which, we don't have much of that done. I guess we should get on top of that. That is the bad thing about not having two days off in a row. I just have Wednsday off this week, and then Saturday, but we are moving that day. I guess I have the afternoons to do that.

On a different note (and now for something completly different), I just found this band called on iTunes. They sing Irish music and have very political undertones. It is a great album I found (Rifles of the I.R.A.). If you like Irish music, I suggest you check it out.