"So take that look out of here it doesn't fit you
Because it's happened doesn't mean you've been discarded
Pull up your head off the floor—come up screaming
Cry out for everything you ever might have wanted
I thought that pain and truth were things that really mattered
But you can't stay here with every single hope you had shattered"

Dude, mormons on my doorstep.

Oh, and just to top that day off, I broke a nail as I was leaving my apartment and found out a friend almost died. Feh.

"I don't know what to do with my life"

So after work on Monday, I was dropped of on Spencer and Flamingo by a coworker. I began walking past the SRO (which used to be Club 662, owned by Suge Knight and his destination the night Tupac got capped) towards Play of the Day, a smaller bar right next to Albertson's. I got to it but something about it made me turn around and head home. I took off my backpack and rinsed off as well as I could in the cool water. I left again, undecided as to my destination. I wound up at Cheer's, just across from UNLV. It has a seedy, downtime vibe with bad metal on the jukebox and emo kids playing pool. I had a few Newcastles and a shot of Jager. It was enough to take the edge off and I stumbled home. My apartment is rather messy at the moment and seeing it under the pale light of a flashlight made it seem pathetic. I went to sleep on the couch hoping the sunlight would wake me up early enough to go to the power company and get to work on time. I got up at 10-something and managed to leave at about 11. Forgetting my bus schedule, I walked to Maryland Parkway. The lunchtime traffic is awful there. There were over a dozen people waiting for the bus. One finally arrived at about 11:30. I had to take it all the way down to Sahara, the edge of what I know of Las Vegas. It's a rather busy intersection. I remember a friend that takes the Sahara bus telling me that it sucks ass but I haven't had much experience with it. Before I got a bank account, I had to take this bus to get to a casino that would cash my check (I also didn't have a local ID so cashing my check was an issue for a few months.) The bus took 45 minutes to get there, it's supposed to run every 30 minutes. That intersection is bleak, like much of this city I suppose. There is a KFC, Taco Bell, auto audio shop, 7-11, and a few other stores but absolutely no grass or shade. At least it was only 100 degrees and not hotter. I got a Gatorade from the 7-11. When the bus did finally show up it's airconditioner was on nuclear winter, cooling me down some. Some rather dumb Canadians were sitting next to me, fat as americans but better groomed. They had left the comfort of the Strip to go to some fat lady shop called Joanne's or something. It was funny to hear them try to say "Decatur", the name of the street the shop is on, "Deck-a-tour" instead of "Dee-cater". It took quite a while to get all the way up to Jones (again on the far edge of what I know of this city) but I was relieved to finally be there. It took me a moment to find the electric company (it's a really huge building that you have to try not to find) and make my way in. There is an express lane for paying bills so I tried that one first. No dice, get in the long queue with people screaming and drooling on themselves. Great, I thought this was going to be somewhat better than the DMV or welfare office. It took maybe a half hour to get to a window. The woman behind the counter was somewhat dispassionate. "Are you paying the full balance or just the past due?" I thought I'd have to pay way more than that, so I paid just the past due so I'd have some cash for ramen and smokes. I asked if they could have the power on the next day, she said it should be on that night. At least I have an excuse to still go in to work, air conditioning and bandwidth. As I was crossing Sahara on my way back to the bus, the bus just passed me. I sortof lucked out because it was an express bus; I wouldn't have to wait that long for the next one but it would take longer to get to work. On the bus finally, we pass another bus that had broken down 40 minutes earlier. That had to be rough for some people. A rather loud man from that bus sat next to me, holding a 128 meg SDRAM chip. He is upgrading from a 64 meg chip. I tell him he paid too much for it (I'm worse than a Jew when it comes to computer gear.) He couldn't pronounce things well, like he was deaf or something, but he talked quite a bit. I didn't mind listening for a few. He was telling me about his computer. I'm glad he has something in his life, a way to make connections and a way to find entertainment. He lives on disability and would have had a rather more difficult life twenty years ago, I think. Having a PC with internet access is better than having a cat for the homebound, IMHO. He wasn't all that bad, but his voice bothered me after a time so I moved back in the bus at one of the stops. I hope he wasn't offended. I got all the way down to Pecos (clear the fuck across town by my standards, but less than half of the city if you count the suburbs and such) where I had to wait for another bus. Of course that one was late as well, but I still managed to get to work by 15:40, just 10 minutes late. Needless to say I was beat, the whole adventure took 4 and a half hours. Work went by fairly quickly and I left a little early.

Poop. The electric company has a drive through window open until midnight. I could ask a coworker to drive me there, but I'm too embarrassed.

Bloody hell. I ordered a vegetarian burrito and a cheese quesadilla from a Mexican restaurant and the quesadilla came back with meat. I don’t know what it is about Nevada, it seems like 1950s meat and potatoes, a pack of Marlboro’s, and a double Scotch on the rocks.

I’m such a shlemiel. I got my power turned off again. I’ve got enough gelt in the bank this time at least, but the payment office is so far away. I woke up at one and the power was still on, I set my alarm for two and shut my eyes again. By the time I reopened them, the power was off. I could have called in late to work and taken the bus out to the power company’s office but I really didn’t have the energy. I just went in to work. I guess I’ll go to bed early tonight and try to get out there tomorrow. Moving to Bakersfield is really starting to become more appealing. Even if I despise the petty bourgeois aspirations of what little family I have at least I would eat more regularly.

A: Hey, does reading books about anarchy at a security post count as detournment?
t: no, just irony
A: Okay. Wasn't sure.
t: and in SF it's called "Fishing for a date"
A: hehehe. If I was reading it at a bus stop, yes.

Make baby Jesus cry

http://www.hamjudo.com/notes/cdrom.html
http://www.electricstuff.co.uk/cdzap.html

This is scary as fuck.

And so this same phone rep raises her hand a few moments later. Disaster! Someone bought a new computer! So do we have to add his already existing email account into the support page to get it to work? Or do we just set it up in Outlook Express?

I can't believe just how stupid people are. As some of you know, I work in a call center that provides technical support for an ISP. Dealing with stupid people calling in is one thing, but dealing with stupid phone reps is another. Let me give you an example. Someone calls in wanting to add an email address. We have a support page to do this. The phone rep runs the caller through setting up the email address into Outlook Express and gives me a blank stare when for some reason the mail account doesn’t work. She didn’t add it in the web page so the email account doesn’t exist. I tell her how to do this 4 times, twice even showing her where in the page to do this. I get blank stares in response. How difficult is it to follow written instructions that were read to you during 5 weeks of training? Why can’t you follow a 4 step process that is verbally and visually illustrated several times? Sometimes I’m amazed that I don’t go postal.

"Won't you say the words that I can't say"

A friend from Bakersfield came to visit me today. I thought he was going to be here tomorrow, so I didn't get up until 16:30. After I woke, I did some cleaning, had a beer or two. A knock on the door, I thought it was a friend that lives near me, but it was my friend from Bakersfield. Someone I play chess with. We played chess, backgammon, Trivial Pursuit. Two other friends came over. We played Trivial Pursuit for a while, then a fourth friend came over. My visitor from Bakersfield got sick from the drink, we took care of him. The two friends that live near me left to go home. One of them came back with a painting for me. I got paint on my hand (I don't mind) and an old Nirvana shirt, made just after Kurt died; it has a picture of him as a child. The only other person to hurt a shirt of mine like that got punched in the nose a year or so ago.

To back up something I said before: "Marriage is a wonderful institution, but who would want to live in an institution" -H. L. Mencken.

"A loaded gun won't set you free
So you say"

"A dream too tired to come true"

I thought food would make me feel better, I'm having a crying spell again anyway.

I wish I had a microwave right now. It takes 2 minutes to cook a potato in a microwave, an hour to cook one in the oven.

The past few months, I've kept my stuffed friends in a corner, covered with a sheet and laying on a pillow. I'm embarrassed to masturbate in front of them. I don't want them to see daddy being bad. Tonight I got one out, a cute black kitty with big, out-stretched arms. He likes to hug.

From a friend: "How do you dig when you've already been living on granite?"

Walking from my apartment towards Flamingo to the bus stop, there is a broken, abandoned stroller strewn across the lawn of one of the business parks.

"I know a girl
a girl called Party"

New Jane's Addiction video is on. They gave it up in the early 90s. They should have kept to that.

Someone just said that I look like Jim Reid of Jesus and Mary Chain.

I just realized that I will probably never see Santa Cruz again.

From Dr. Dean's interview on “NBC NEWS’ MEET THE PRESS.”

"The position I’ve always taken is that it’s the church’s business to decide who they can marry and who they can’t marry."

By extension, marriage is the province of the church. We strive for a government that is separate from churchly matters. Ergo, marriage is not something that should have any legal status. Q.E.D.

Rain. Thunder. It's still 110 out, windy. The thunderclaps shake the ground, the car tires are slipping on the hot, wet asphalt. I should put on Tones on Tail, like Spuds would do for the summer rains. We would light all the candles and listen to the stereo for a few hours. Sometimes we would sit on the patio and just let the rain hit us. I still have the blinds drawn. I walked to the store without an umbrella, my shirt dried almost as soon as it got wet.

A few years ago, a gregarious friend of mine came to visit from San Bernardino bearing the gift of a bottle of "Shine On" corn whiskey. I'm not sure why he brought it, but it was New Year's eve and we had to get tossed so what the hell. There were three of us, just drinking ourselves into liver problems. So I just drank the last shot of that bottle. "To Life!"

Finally broke down and bought shit to kill the ants. They went away very quickly.

ants are taking over my apartment, the kitchen's a mess, I'm hungover from a two day bender, there's nothing on tv, and one of my computers is about to take a dump. i hate myself i want to die.

It sucks, I'm finally home at a time MASH is on TV and it's an episode that I have on DVD. Bleh.

I just love the media. Yesterday, Vincent Brothers, accused of shooting 5 people in Bakersfield, CA was supposed to work at Fremont Elementary, a school I attended for a year. Now, he is supposed to work for Emerson Junior High, a school I don't know.

Your [sic] all gay

Leviticus 19:28:

"'You shall not make any cuttings in your flesh for the dead, nor tattoo any marks on you. I am Yahweh."

This is an accusation:" If you called your dad you could stop it all."

"Someday we'll find a rainbow connection, the lovers, the dreamers, and me"

I just noticed a coworker that I thought didn't smoke has an open pack of Djarum Specials at her desk. On a day I didn't bring my cloves!

It's going to be 110 degrees tomorrow. I need to move.

INDIANAPOLIS (AP) -- Estel Wood "Ed" Kelley, co-chairman of The Steak 'n Shake Co. and a food industry executive credited with introducing Americans to brands such as Tang, Grey Poupon mustard and Cool Whip, has died. He was 86.

the Fully Informed Jury Association

“I’m gonna kick tomorrow.” I went to bed early last night. The debauchery from the evening of the 4th into the morning of the 5th left me in some pain. I spent too much money at the Double Down so I really didn’t want to stay up late last night drinking and smoking. I ripped a copy of Logan’s Run that a coworker loaned me and then pulled the 13” television set (that Spuds was nice enough to leave me when she moved out) into the bedroom. I vaguely remember eating a slice of cold pizza and a bowl of ramen, but I could be wrong. I watched some Nova episode about fireworks and some police chase video show before drifting into sleep. My eyes reopened at about noon and I suppose I could have gotten of bed then to eat or do some cleaning or something, but instead I went back to sleep and didn’t get up until 2. No booze and just one clove all day.

Vic Chesnutt is on one of the late night shows. A few years ago, I went to San Francisco with some women to see a free show for Food Not Bomb's 10th anniversary. I went to see Fugazi, but Vic put on a much better show. I don't think the girls were really into him, but I'm glad I got to see the show. I hope I'm not living on memories and there are still many more to be made. By the way, thanks girls. That was one of the highlights of that year for me. :*

I really hate to be a whiny vegetarian, but Las Vegas is light years behind California in so many ways. Some coworkers are ordering lunch and I look at the menu, the only thing I can have is a garden salad or a vegetarian pizza. None of the pasta dishes and none of the burgers are vegetarian. It’s sad when Denny’s has a more diverse menu than a “better” restaurant.

I'm watching the Christmas episode of Invader Zim. I keep getting flashes of how I'd explain Christmas to a child, my child. I don't want to have kids, mind you, but it's disturbing still. "Santa doesn't exist, really. He is beyond what we call 'real', but please accept these gifts that you know are from other people as gifts from something else, a hope and a dream."

JTHM moment. Here I was feeling all depressed and shit then I started reading the Urban Dictionary and stumbled on this definition of Blog:

"
"BLOG"

See Queef

*pfffffffffffffffffffftttt*
"

Crisis averted.

I'm going insane. I really don't want to be here any more, but I don't have any place better to be.

Got a Blogger T-shirt. It's cute.

I took a nap. I woke up at 2pm, drank some beer, then took a nap at 6pm. I woke up at 9 pm to the sound of dipshit porchmonkies setting off bottle rockets over this 25 year old apartment complex. You wonder if being poor rots people's minds.

I just got called "angst on a stick".

Hung out with some friends last night. We were driving to get some cigarettes and beer when we passed by this dive on Maryland Parkway, just across from UNLV. On a lark, I say we should go in. My companions agree for some really odd reason. We order our beers (two bottles of Guinness for them, a Newcastle for me) and settle in. The pool tables were free so I talked them into a game. A hispanic boy played a round with us. He had no idea what were are about, where we are from. I tried to explain the music I listen to, but that is just useless without a reference point. We had a few shots, the bartender poured doubles. Nice. I didn't wake up today until 6pm. We were out very late. It will be difficult to transition to a place where bars close at 2am.