Nineteen - Thriving Clarity

I should tell you more about Ol' Herb, the guy I sometimes bunk with in the dump behind the burned out school. 

He's a swell guy; he's great to chat with late into the night, he's warm to spoon with when it's cold, he knows eight languages, seven of which he invented himself, and all eight of which sound like the sound a wildebeest makes when it sheds its baby spleen, he wears the coolest sunglasses I've ever seen as super impractical underpants, he smells like vinegar so whenever he's around you don't have to worry about your spare fingers disintegrating, he claims to have once knitted seven thousand fully functioning mountain bikes in just nine days, and when you point out that physics would make that implausible and that in fact he probably only knitted four or five thousand perfectly functioning mountain bikes, he whips off what you think is his scarf and is suddenly popping wheelies on it, which is funny, because it's not a mountain bike at all, it's a more like a freestyle BMX, and even still, it doesn't change a thing, five thousands is the maximum number of ANY kind of fully functioning bike you can knit in nine days, that's just physics, he has great taste in who to violently loath based on what music they like, and he has a badass nickname - 'Herb' ('Ol' is his given name). 

Yet he's not ALL fun and games.  (Although we do have great fun playing the game 'throw a spare finger near a kid and see if he eats it' copy write me and Ol' Herb). But like most people he also has some flaws. For example he doesn't understand metaphors. And I'm saying he doesn't understand them AT ALL! 

Like say I say to him something normal such as - 'I'm gonna go fondle a scream level taste of the moon lit monsoon principle that's going on below the rust hatted simulating harbor night'. 

He'll reply something like 'huh'? When clearly the obvious response, from someone who DOES understand metaphors, would be - 'ah yeah, I also feel like rolling myself up in a ball of bubble wrap and diving into crowds of people waiting in line to meet the meat eating star of the film 'Meeting the Meat', can I come?' 

Yes! I'm being serious here. Like he doesn't understand metaphors AT ALL. 

Or like one time I said to him - 'well dungeon beyond the flip of a gregarious hunch boot'. 

And instead of replying - 'Can we add two junctions of length streamed poll rip',  such as you or me would respond. He just went - 'wha?'

Doesn't understand them. AT ALL. Metaphors that is. 

Or one time I asked him - 'clip flung desert wielded quip fast?' 

And instead of replying the obvious - 'no thanks, I wrap young plied ether myself', he simply said 'eh?'

Just doesn't get them. Metaphors we're talking about. AT ALL! 

And another unrelated thing, he also doesn't hear great, which would be another of his flaws. 

And here's the lesson. You can still learn things from flawed people. Valuable things. In fact hanging out with Ol' herb has taught me quite a few things in my life, things that affect me almost daily, things such as:

 - Don't steal a man's blanket when you're both sleeping outside in a blizzard, or while you're sleeping he'll dump a deep pile of snow on you. 

- Never discuss music with an adolescent spleen shedding wildebeest, or you'll end up singing three part harmonies in a style that really ends up hurting your throat. 

- Don't play 'throw a spare finger at a kid and see if he eats it' near a flock of Maroon Beaked Vulture Hawks unless you really don't care if you don't get your fingers back (and yes I know Maroon Beaked Vulture Hawks have officially had their existence denied, but things that don't legally exist are often very hungry). And..

-  If you're ever in danger, which you always are, because danger lurks everywhere, if you're lucky enough to figure out what SORT of danger you're in, then you can't dilly dally, you have to respond, and your response needs to be BIG! And it needs to be NOW! 

Ol' Herb had said this last one to me thousands of times. 

- He said it when we were licking our wounds having been pecked half to death by non-existent birds.

- He said it after we'd injured our wrists diving into hordes of Meeting the Meat fans. And...

- It was the last thing he said to me as he was taken to the hospital due to some random freak hypothermia. 

And I always nodded along. Promised him I would take his advice. That I would learn from him. That I would not let the wisdom he learned from his many sufferings go to waste. And I meant it too. Why wouldn't I? Ol' Herb is a swell guy after all. 

The only problem was that I had a secret. Something BIG. And something that affected me right NOW, and by NOW I don't mean then, I mean NOW! 

Yep I still didn't know what 'dilly dally' meant, and this lack of knowledge was about to affect me NOW, and in a BIG way...

*In what way to be revealed shortly* 

*Short like Ol' Herbs patience for wildebeest that can't harmonize well*

*A well being where we'd sing, the acoustics down there are great! 

Six - Fight or uncaged

'Get into my office!' Yelled my boss at me one day with an angry menace being expressed by his volume of choice, in this case specifically as a yell. 

This was back when I was was a rare and exotic bird denier working for the federal department of rare and exotic bird denying. It was a plum job for the most part, the main five roles were as follows:

1. Saying 'nah, don't believe in em' myself'. When asked about our specific belief in specific birds, and with 'em' taking the place of the specific bird being specifically discussed at that specific time. 

2. Accusing professional birdologists of stuff, specifically that they'd done stuff like just painting pigeons to look like things such as different birds we were trying to deny, Lavender Crested TitHawks being a specific example. Or to be even more specific I'll tell you about one of my specific favorite days at work the whole time I was there, which was when I got to yell at a bird loving dick! And more specifically when I got to yell this - 'You're trying to tell me that THAT specific bird in that specific cage you're holding in front of me, is a Wingtailed Blue Mouse Godwit, nah man, you've clearly just glued some cut up blue t-shirt onto a different bird, in this case clearly a penguin to be specific, you lying dick, and oh look, now that I've opened the cage its flown away, definitely a penguin, fuck you for trying to fool people, you're a male body part, specifically a dick!' 

3. Doctoring all company wide memos to say at the bottom 'and remember, it's company policy to say "specific" as often as humanly possible, and anyone who fails at this will have their genitals (whatever that may entail to the specific employee) jammed into an item of office equipment, specially the paper shredder, and specifically the big rusty one by the ladies bathroom'. 

4. Making fun of the kid in accounts with a lisp who couldn't say 'specific' without spitting on the girl who worked on the desk immediately opposite him. 

5. Making fun of the girl in accounts who always seemed to have spit on her for some unknown reason.

It was a fun job. But the boss was a dick. I'd done absolutely nothing wrong on this day that he'd yelled at me to come into his office. Not a damn thing. ZILCH. 

Luckily I'd predicted that this dick would pull this kind of thing one day, so I'd been sneaking into his office every day when he was at lunch and setting up little boobie traps like thumb tacks on his seat to stick into his butt, and sending emails to his wife from his company account that were addressed to his secretary and referenced the fact that she was female, and ended with pictures of his butt, which were easy to get because he was always pulling down his pants at work and dabbing blood off his ass, the gross bastard, and I'd also been stashing some snacks around in case he had a lot to say, and I got peckish. 

On this particular day he was screaming at me for some nonsense, so I went to grab the burrito I'd stashed six months earlier in the locked draw where he kept all the company cash reserves, and yet when I reached for it all I found was a draw full of mush, bugs, stank, and for some reason some tiny fragments of cash. That boss sure was a dick. 

But now, seven years later, and I suddenly knew what the ordeal that day (of having to eat the bowl of fried rice I'd stashed in his briefcase instead of my coveted burrito, while he rattled on) was for. I'd stared gastronomical dissatisfaction right in the eye and burped hard on its lips, or more specifically on my bosses lips, to prepare me for this exact moment. A moment with so much on the line. 

And having faced this pain in the past I know knew exactly what to do the second I began to look over the menu now handed to me by the waiter. 

'Just don't order the six month old draw burrito, it'd probably be mushy, 

just don't order the six month old draw burrito, it'd probably be mushy' I began to chant to myself as a perused the options. Feeling more and more calm that I could make a choice that wouldn't bring further attention to my failures that day. 

Knowledge is power. And I had knowledge. And therefore I had power. And power is powerful. And I was ready to blow my power right in the face of this waiter. 

Of course even if I hadn't had that job, I could have just drawn on some knowledge about ordering options of learned the last time I'd eaten here, about thirty five minutes or so ago with Kev. But I'd forgotten totally about that.

Not that Kev bothered to remind me, that dick, no he instead asked if he could borrow my scarf to tie around his wound and try and stop he bleeding. Why would I want blood on my scarf? He knows I don't like wearing l red on Sundays, but I don't think he even thought about that. Selfish dick. 

Also I had the same waiter as I'd had earlier. Not that I remembered. Why  would I? What kind of a loser remembers other people? A loser like this waiter, that's what type. 

'Seriously?' He said when I told him I'd never seen him before in my life 'you don't remember less than an hour ago throwing a bowl of chilli in my face and calling me a dick for not warning you that chilli was served hot?' 

Why would I remember that? Some people are so self-centered, you're not all we think about dicks! 

'I'll just have any burrito less than six months old that's never been in a draw' I suddenly blurted out, to shut him up, he'd begun to ramble on... 'you don't remember asking if any of your own butt cheek was in the food? You don't remember screaming at me to expose the secret hole of celebrities, you don't remember lighting the table cloth on fire and then accusing the fish in the tank of being selfish dicks for not offering their water to put it out?' On and on and on he went. But the next thing he said shocked me. Specifically to the core. Like seeing a completely mythical bird in the flesh, something like a peahen, and then having every bit of truth you believed in cut from under you, like cutting the legs off a peahen to see if it was actually just a sparrow with dryer fluff stapled to it. 

'All our burritos are less than six months old, and none of them have been in draws, so you need to be more specific about what you'd like please'. 

Yep he said it. And it was a dig. A dig at me. ME! Yes ME! Of all people he could have said that to, he chose to say it to me! And it was a dig. Like what you do to make a hole. And a hole is my favorite type of ground opening. Yep! He'd used the method of creating something I like to hurt ME! That self-centered dick. And now, among the numerous balls I was juggling, all of which represented a disaster, things like:

- Making sure that dick Kev got distracted by me doing something BIG and NOW, that he'd forget that I'd promised that I'd find something cool in the cloakroom. And

- Making sure everyone in the room knew that I didn't think you eat the menus themselves, and making sure they new that by eating BIG and NOW! 

And now I now also had to deal with this dig, and I had to deal with it NOW and in a BIG way. Yep, I now had to add retribution against the waiter to the list, and it would have to be specifically BIG retribution, and specifically NOW! Right NOW! 

More to be unearthed*

*Not a great word for continued, but a nice word none-the-less, it reminds you of earth, and un, and ed, all great things. Although if you ask me at least one of those things isn't even a thing, for example I'm sure earth is really just a large Diamond Taloned Condor* with alligator barf stuck in its beard. 

*Which are of course just seagulls that someone nailed a cactus to. 

Bird

Just remember...

BIRDS WOULDN'T BE SO ARROGANT IF CATS COULD FLY! 

What you got to say about that? 

Ok, well played, you got me this time bird. 

The best day of my life initiative – three festering t-shirts

Hello people, assuming that most of the people reading this blog are in fact people, which is a matter of fact more than an assumption. The only ‘people’ who read this blog are definitely people. But that says nothing of the potential monkeys, invisible light beams, gas leaks, kittens, alien shoulder blades, or even (name a famous or notorious person you think has done such horrific things as to no longer warrant being considered a human here) well none of those things are human are they? And of course they’re reading this, so why did I discount their tireless, and generous reading truths?

Today was the best day of my life. Now here is something I have learned, when the only rules of your awesome new project have been cleverly crafted to ensure two and only two things:

1.     To live every day as if it is, and was, the best day of your life.

2.     To write at least a page about it before bed.

 Then two things seem to happen:

1.     Your life can turn out to be somewhat busy.

2.     It’s easy to procrastinate doing the writing until well after your planned bedtime.

Also there are two other things to note here:

1.     My life would have been really friggin’ busy regardless.

2.     I would have procrastinated the shit out of this regardless.

I think we have two of strong lessons here. 

1.     Separating the writing of this into various bullet points takes up lots of space which could quite easily be construed as an intentional method to short change the very point of doing this in the first place – for shame David.

2.     I’ve finally figured out why my bathroom smells like my old mouse cages that I kept mice in as a kid, which I always felt like was both the perfect thing to be kept in a mouse cage, and simultaneously was the best place to keep the mice.

3.     This last point is reminding me of just how smart I was as a teenager who kept mice as a pet – go me! I’m not one of those idiots who kept their mice in aquariums, their fish in atriums, and their birds delivering notes to the front bumper of cars, and ultimately being squished in the road so hard they just become a beaked part of it. 

4.     Remembering where I kept my mice is bringing up nostalgia which is an awesome and underutilized emotion, I mean it hardly even gets a look in during most half time pep-talks by coaches in charge of pee-wee lacrosse, and yet who among us doesn’t spend their lives without rolling around in our head three of four classic memories of epic lacrosse battles, which would be awesome fodder for half time speeches, and yet we all ignore them, why? Are we scared? Are we too sidetracked from hearing that gas leaks have developed the ability to read? Are we saving them up for a fun evening of playing the game spotlight on the grounds of a medieval era chateau? Who knows.

5.     Regardless is a weird word, and even weirder when you try and sneak it into a sentence where it really never should fit.

6.     Such as – the strong-armed helicopter pilot who has been accused of regardless the shopping trolley!

7.     Oh wait, I never told you the reason my bathroom smells like my old mouse cage, because my bath has three sweaty t-shirts in there from gym trips at least several days ago.

8.     Lists are fun places to lie about how long they were promised to be, I think that’s the definition of a win-win.

9.     Well I guess a win-win could also be defined by a situation such as a shark biting your arm off, which is like ‘cool, I always wanted to learn to play darts with my non-dominate hand’ and  ‘wow, I think I just spotted a shark!’

So I think what I have learned here is obvious, today was the best day of my life because I didn’t get around to doing this until really late because I was procrastinating on writing up about why today was the best day of life, which is an awesome excuse I previously didn’t have for staying up too late to write about the best day of my life. And anytime you figure out a new awesome, flawless and endlessly useful excuse for stuff, how could it not be considered the best day of your life, because it’s proof that we’re evolving, and if we are evolving then we still have a decent chance that humans can stay a in front of those evil alien shoulder blades.

Ps. Let me guess I bet your famous or notorious person from above was the same as mine? Let’s say them out loud at the same time, on the count of three.

1…

2…

3…

Kevin Costner!!!

Awesome, we were all the same, weren’t we? Yep we all know the truth of, he’s responsible for the dead birds you see on roads all over the world, just because he’s never figured out what his mouse cage is for.

Pps. When playing darts it’s a good idea to have the dart penetrate the board in the zones with lots of regardless triple regardless minge.