talking to dogs

I’ve been awake 35 minutes, and already I’ve taken three shits.

It’s going to be one of those days.

On the third, of course, toilet paper runs out. I guess it could be worse. These things could be happening to me in a Malaysian forest.

Two nights ago I was writhing on the floor. Agonizing as some awesome tasting, but eventually abortionally awful for my stomach food was trying its best to get out of me. I twisted and turned and moaned for hours in bed. Finally, I got out, laid on the floor against the cool tiles of the bathroom and I felt a bit better.

For about two minutes. The nausea subsided a bit, but the stomach kept gurgling. I stumbled too my feet and sat on the commode. Finally, a burst of hot, smelly awfulness came out of my asshole. It splashed the bowl with its wretchedness. I spent most of that night either on the toilet, gushing brown water, or on the couch so as not to disturb my beautiful, and very understanding girlfriend.

Today, my body has come back to say “You shouldn’t eat that crap” again. I respectfully decline its advice. I need my variety of foodstuffs. Even when they cause so much angst.

Sometime later today, I’m going to have to drive the two hours to work. I wonder to myself if I’ll be able to just move here and do that every day. Instead of an hour-long commute each day, double it. Double the toll on my car. Double the thought-provoking conversations I have with myself late at night as the miles pass by. Also, double the chances of me getting a ticket as well.

The separation gets old. But so does the constant pressure to find another job. “When are you moving up here?” “Why haven’t you moved yet?” “I don’t understand why you can’t find a job here.” Are statements I get to hear almost every time I go out with friends in the city. It’s draining. It’s soul-sucking. And I’ve been through it all before. This time, I’d like to think I’ll come out on the right end. But I can’t help but wonder if I’m just the hamster on the wheel again. Churning and burning, but going nowhere. Fast.

The other object of scorn is my lack of time or motivation to write when I’m around her. This, of course, is a sign of a good thing. I’m not toiling away at some misguided exercise of futility. Instead, I’m smiling and hugging and whatever else you want to imagine I do with my girlfriend. Some of it was true! – in best Joe Strummer voice.

It’s been four days since I sat down and wrote something. I feel extremely guilty about it. It’s why I got up early today. Must type something. Even if my inspiration comes while I’m taking a shit.

The dogs look at me sitting here in bed, wearing just my boxer briefs, typing on this $400 laptop. It’s one of the first things I’ve bought for myself and paid off in a timely manner. I set a goal, and I achieved it. The wonder of it all.

I can’t help but wonder what those two dogs are thinking. Is it really all about food, food, food. Pee, pee, pee. Or poop, poop, poop?

I’d like to have a conversation with them. A two-sided one that is.

I once took advice from a dog. My sister’s now dead Labrador. I asked a question, and the dog walked up to me, panted with that smiling face and pushed her nose up against my heart. I took that as “follow your heart.” And I did. It’s funny that I still remember that day. Pretty vividly, which is a rarity for me. I barely remember eating lunch yesterday in some generic, chain bar-b-que restaurant. But I remember that day.

There are times when I’d like to just pack up my stuff and get in my car and drive until I can’t drive anymore – most likely because the money ran out. I romanticize the hell out of that kind of action. Yet, since I turned 30, it’s been dead for the most part. The feeling of wonder and wander still is in me. It’s never far away. But the acting on it, that rarely occurs. Yeah, I’ve still taken a few roadies, some of them way too expensive, and I’ve enjoyed them. But I used to have that feeling of adventure in me. And I acted on it all the time. Now? It seems to hibernate more often than gesticulate. And that, really makes no sense. Good as any place to end this….

penis grafitti

Never eat breakfast buffet eggs. Especially when you know you’ll be eating and drinking too much of a good and bad thing later.

Sitting at the table, I’m hung over. The decision to just “go back to Shula’s” was definitely Joshy’s. I had no desire to sit in that awful pit of lousiness for another minute. An afternoon and a late night there should have been enough.

Must not have been for him. I’d like to think it isn’t because it’s easy. The easy way out is always the wrong way out. Well, I’m sure there are times when it’s not, but it sounds better to say always. It’s more dramatic. Nah, that’s the wrong word. Emphatic. That’s what I was feverishly searching my slowly eroding vocabulary for. I always tell myself to read more. Those words will come back to you if you read. Instead, you continue to write (well, I don’t write anymore) and work for a newspaper. And the drivel that gets in the newspaper I work for, it dumbs me down just a little bit extra each day. Something to look forward to. Kind of like driving almost five hours to get to work today as the end of my little mini-vacation ended.

I do think I worked all of two hours today. That’s always fun. I did send a message to the redhead that doesn’t. She responded via text. I haven’t responded to that. I want to go to this show. I tried to get Joshy on board. He balked. Ditto Alli. Now the redhead that won’t seems interested. And, it’s her birthday weekend. Funny how that all seems to happen. Now, the question is do I dare try to take extra time off of work? We’ll be down a person again. I really don’t give a shit, however. Life is for living, what’s living for?

Where the hell was I?

Eggs. Yeah.

I ate lots of eggs at Shula’s. Quite possibly the worst sports-themed restaurant in the world right now. I’d much rather sit in a NASCAR themed place in Pickeral, New Jersey, than Shula’s in downtown Baltimore, Maryland. Fuck, I already hate the city with a passion just because that’s the place that pretty much ended what I thought was the best thing that ever happened to me. But, since it shat on my head, it couldn’t possibly be that. But this bar sucked.

And really, just because of the televisions. They were all old. Not flat screens at all. Just big-ass televisions from the late 1980s. All over the place. Hanging in the air, waiting for the old pieces of wire and metal holding them up to collapse from the shear weight of them all. Shear? Sheer? Fuck. There goes my awfulness again.

The televisions are so shitty, you can barely make out an image in some of them.

We watched LSU and Alabama play. We watched the Breeder’s Cup. I boldly proclaimed that Zenyatta would lose and I’d bet my life’s savings on Blame about a half hour before the race. When the race began, I was the only one cheering against Zenyatta. Baltimore being a horse-racing kind of town. Right? I cheered when I was right. Then I realized I didn’t really win anything but bragging rights with Joshy. And that won’t take me far. Kind of like picking the trifecta for the Derby in 2005. Didn’t put the money down, so it don’t matter a bit.

Anyways, the bar proved to be a good place to get a buzz, though. Which we did. Then we walked to the show.

After the show, we went back to Shula’s. Seems dumb, but we did. There I met Jennifer. But that story will have to wait, as I was talking about eggs.

Eggs. And bacon. And French toast. And sausage.

I ate them all. And 10 hours and 250 miles or so later, I was sitting on a toilet in the Jefferson Theater in Charlottesville as my favorite band in the world started to play the opening chords to their opening song. The girl I came to the show with was standing out in the pit by herself.

And I’m staring at graffiti on the wall. “Bob Dylan sucks. Long live Ha Ha Tonka!” It said. That and a penis. Why do guys draw penises on the bathroom stall doors? It baffles me. At least draw the old half McDonald’s trick.

This is one of those shits that you try to keep from coming out. I was wary of eating a cheeseburger and fries when I did about 45 minutes earlier. But damn, I was hungry. Hadn’t eaten since the eggs. It also kept me from drinking at the show. I had planned on getting drunk, finally (well, maybe) making a move. Who knows?

Now? I’m on a toilet. Embarrassing myself in a Dumb and Dumber way. But at least the only people hearing it, and smelling it, are random dudes at a concert venue. And that goodness for a door at the Jefferson.

Anyway, I finally finish and go out. Wash the hands and enjoy the end of the second song. I get the look, the knowing look, from my concert-going friend. She hands me her ginger ale. I take a swig. I start to tap my feet and sing along.

By the end of the night, we’re outside, cold, but happy. Sometimes things work the way you planned, and sometimes you get the shits.