Things, but not to be confused with Swamp Things.

1. If you are a parent tending to your child's animals, keep in mind one thing about said animals: You cannot paint fish to match the fish that you starved to death. You can paint cats. You can paint dogs. Fish? Nope. You will likely have to use the "He was pretty old" excuse. Or, just let the kids cry about the fish being dead. They might get married someday so they should warm up to the idea of disappointment.

2. I haven't been too busy to write anything out lately. I just haven't been writing anything at all. I don't know if it is because work has been busier? Maybe it is because I have switched to diet pop [again]? Is it the fat from all the ice cream I have been eating clogging up my brain? I don't know. Whatever it is, I am feeling less intelligent by the minute and a general sense of boredom with the world around me.



3. I have watched four "Monsterquest" episodes about sasquatch, bigfoot, ape-man, mountain-man, and monkey-man. I don't know if such a thing exists or not. I saw a picture of a 500lb lake sturgeon that was supposed to be over 100 years old, so I guess anything is possible, right? All I know for sure is the whooping calls in the pitch black night scare the living crap out of me. If I would have witnessed that, I would have shit myself and then perhaps dropped dead. Aside from that, I think bigfoot is having an identity crisis since he/she has so many names. Maybe it's name is Steve. Or Sally. Maybe that's why he/she is so doggone camera shy? Hmm.



4. I am getting a hat addiction. Not with baseball caps, but like porkpies. I have a nice fedora and a nice porkpie right now, but I can't help but browse for hats online all the time. I know it is pointless for me to buy more hats because since I don't go out much. I rarely wear the ones that I have. I feel guilty for not wearing them more since they aren't what I would call cheap. For now, I have been pacifying myself with shopping for hats online, putting the ones I want in my cart, and then distracting myself and logging out [not to be confused with Kenny Loggins] before I order them. So far, so good.

5. I really feel a great sense of accomplishment when I get time to work on my own cars and I finish them. Since I work on cars for a living, I get plenty of time to work on cars and plenty of car repair jobs that I start and finish that create a sense of accomplishment within me. But, I am sorry to say, I like working on my stuff a lot more than I like working on yours. And, although your money is nice and all, I still prefer an environment that allows my projects to get done in a reasonable time.

6. I never feel like I get enough sleep. Well, I think I get too much sleep sometimes and then I get lethargic in the middle of the day because of it. It is a fine line. Many days I think I don't get enough sleep to function at wide-open-throttle for 11 hours so at about 3:30 PM, I am fighting to keep my eyes open. Too little sleep? Too much sleep? I don't know. Either way, I am either distracted by the resounding waves of sunlight caressing me through my window at 3:30 PM, or I have already fallen asleep and missed them completely. Is it possible to be ADHD and a narcolepic?



7. I must have moved up or down on the chains of evolution. I bought bread today for $1.50 a loaf out of the back of one of my customer's vans. She is a great lady and a super customer that has hit me up in the past to try some of this bread she gets from a bakery that she goes to. She came in today with a bunch of bread and I bought some. Syd and I had some of it for supper and it was really delicious. But, if I tell people that I buy my bread out of the back of a van, they might suspect that I am carrying the bread I just bought into my house that has wheels on it. The premise of buying bread out of a van that doesn't belong to a bakery sounds very white trashy. But, the bread is very good and I am thankful to have gotten a chance to try some. Also, if I can coax my customer into stopping by the next time she goes and gets bread, I will buy it again.



8. I really think I need a late 40's/early 50's Indian Chief. I want a crude, unrestored running original that I can ride around on. Is that too much to ask? Who was I in a former life that I am obsessed with all the transportation of the days gone by? This Indian motorcycle craving has been with me for years and I can't seem to shake it. But, on the same token, I still think that there is no engine that has the sound of a flathead Ford V-8 and I still know all of the lines of the cars of the 40's and 50's, so I guess why would I be any different about the bikes?

I originally started this posting as "20 things." Lucky for you I am getting tired and bored with typing all this crap out.

Thursday is just another day that isn't Monday, but that I still have a lot of work to do.

Peace out!

Ran-dumb-ness.

I have had a few things on my mind today.

1. I almost always wear boxer/briefs. In fact, I usually only wear black boxer/briefs. I don't think I own any boxer/briefs that aren't black. One thing is for sure: The extra money I spent on Adidas brand underwear in completely worth it. I have bought Merona and some other cheaper Target brand, but they both pale in comparison to Adidas. Now, I am so very happy with the Adidas brand that I am scared to try Hanes, Fruit-of-the-Loom or really any other brand. I know Charlie Sheen and Michael Jordan like Hanes, but will I? I don't know if I want to gamble with my hard earned money and find out. Sounds risky. It is hard to fix what isn't broke.

2. I really like Portishead. I know many people label the band as being trip-hop. I don't really know what that is supposed to mean. I suppose I am a poser fan of theirs since I have never done any acid and the label "trip-hop" implies an acid trip/rave party. I am also not a very good fan because I really only like a few songs. One thing is for sure, though. The songs that they perform that I like I do really intensely like. Sometimes. Unless I am in the mood for something else.

3. I think I am getting older because I forget a lot of things these days. I think part of it is that I get so bored with the same old day-to-day things. I don't mean disrespect, but I think much of the time I am barely paying attention to what is being said to me. I can't remember when I stopped listening in a more focused intent manner, but I think in the last couple years I have gotten progressively worse. Can I blame this on too many things on my mind at once? Is it just a different way to organize the wealth of daily data that I process? Do I just not really care what some people are saying most of the time? Is it father time telling me that I have a limit? Are there many things said to me really that require my intense focus to understand? I don't know.

4. I think for the most part a monkey could do my job, but I couldn't do a monkey's job. I couldn't be a monkey's uncle, either. In Russia, monkeys are astronauts. "The first ever monkey astronaut was Albert, a rhesus monkey, who on June 11, 1948 rode to over 63 km (39 miles) on a V2 rocket. Albert died of suffocation during the flight." (sourced from Wikipedia). If in 1948 monkey astronauts were trained and dying in Russia, I would think that by now the monkeys there are probably dying doing advanced physics. Maybe the monkeys there are dying reinventing the wheel. I guess my point is that monkeys flying in spaceships is probably harder than installing tires on cars most days. As a side note, if I were a monkey, I would not move to Russia.

5. I might spend too much time during my day being OCD and ADHD. Of course I was never formally diagnosed with either of these conditions, but sometimes I have a hard time staying focused and finishing thi

6. I spend about an hour of my work day today creating more car club plaques for the member less car club that I have. There was no meeting of any kind. There is no core group of founders. There isn't a base group of friends with similar interests. I created a plaque design and I like it, so I am going with that. I thought about the idea of a car club and I guess other then the benefit of having somebody to call when my junky cars break down, there really is no point to it. I don't know about you, but to make forty phone calls and try to plan an event with other people sounds suspiciously like work. I don't really think I am very interested in it. I don't really want to make a bunch more friends but my unwillingness doesn't come from an antisocial attitude. I simply don't think that I have enough time in my week to inject more social interaction. I like people as a general rule, but I also require some time away from people to recharge after my week of work. It was nice today welding up some more plaques. It was fun. But, after I was feeling really guilty because I could have been working on more important projects. So, good feeling for a bit followed by guilt. Sounds like eating a gallon of ice cream in a week. Good, but bad.




7. Somebody should make extensions for beards. I think I have been growing mine for almost a year and it still isn't very long. I did more or less shave it down pretty short last fall, but that was still months ago. I had a customer in the shop the other day that had a great looking longer beard. I was jealous. Also, I see my age is showing in that my beard is flecked with white. I am only a spry 36 years old. I should not be graying yet, should I?

8. I am really becoming more and more in love with the idea of my finished tattoo. The problem lies in that I am not very sure I want to sit for another 10 hours to get it done. Since I don't think I need to be purified by pain or anything, the time sitting getting tattooed seems to be a waste. Really, it is just a pain in the butt. For me, it is the sacrifice of the one day every other week I get to do what I want. I wish the sitting and getting tattooed was more pleasurable. Don't get me wrong, it isn't miserable. It just isn't what I would choose to do on my day off. As far as the pain goes, I was married for eleven years. I am used to excruciating pain. The pain is really non issue. But, time just keeps ticking away. When I go back in to get my tattoo finished, I will have one less day in my life to do something I really want to do.

Thursdays can be not only confusing, but discouraging.