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November 22 Tree-With-Heart... A Short StoryWhen you first hear a person’s name you tend to draw certain conclusions about that person based on their name. My best friend has a strange name… But then again, my best friend is sort of strange too. His name is Tree-With-Heart and he is a 60 foot tall Maple Tree. He got his name because towards the top of his branches, he has two branches that diverge from each other making the shape of a heart. During the Fall and Winter, when there are no leaves, the Heart isn’t actually complete but you can still tell Tree-With-Heart has a heart. We chat quite a bit as I sit on my balcony. He’s right across the street from my building where I rent the 3rd story corner apartment. Now, of course, you think I’m strange since I chat constantly with a Maple Tree. But if you knew Tree-With-Heart like I do you would understand… We live in a very odd little neighborhood. Other than the apartment building where I live, the rest of the homes are the quaint little homes built shortly after World War 2 and the people who live in them tend to be older and established or younger and renting. The only person’s name we actually know, because we talk to hardly anyone else, is Jordan. Jordan is the son of Mother-With-Unruly-Children and the younger brother of Oldest-Unruly-Child. The reason we know Jordan’s name is because of the number of times Mother-With-Unruly-Children goes through the neighborhood yelling his name for any number of different reasons. I can’t tell you how many times Tree-With-Heart and I have just looked at each other and I shake my head and he sighs with his leaves when we witness Jordan’s mishaps. Jordan’s nemesis is Construction-Guy-With-Big-Truck. You can tell that Construction-Guy-With-Big-Truck thinks Mother-With-Unruly-Children is an unfit mother and feels some sort of responsibility for Jordan in a “I’m Your Elder” sort of way. While Tree-With-Heart and I both think it’s kind of nice of him and sorta cute, we know it goes in one of Jordan’s ears and straight out the other… We know Jordan by now… Jordan lives on the corner across from Tree-With-Heart. Woman-Who-Owns-Tree-With-Heart is the only person I won’t talk about. Sort of an unwritten rule between him and I. She is, after all, Woman-Who-Owns-Tree-With-Heart… She is one of the most normal in the neighborhood anyway and has a cute little routine of opening her shutters within minutes of the same time every morning and shutting off her lights within minutes of the same time every night. Me and Tree-With-Heart chuckle about how normal she is… Lady-With-Dog-Who-Pees-A lot was the first person I named in the neighborhood, even before Tree-With-Heart. He and I met by noticing just how many times her tiny little dog needed to be walked on a daily basis. She’s a very conscientious home-owner, constantly doing upkeep on her tiny little house. She and Woman-Who-Owns-Tree-With-Heart are always visiting in their shared driveway about the Man-Who-Mows-All-The-Yards or about Squirrel-Who-Causes-Problems… Once in a while the two of them will say hi to Stone-Man-With-Moving-Legs as he walks by. He lives a block or two over but walks past on his way to McDonalds every morning. I only know this because I stopped by McDonalds one morning and saw him eating there. He never shows emotion or reaction and when he walks, nothing moves but his legs. Since noticing him, I have tried to walk like him and Tree-With-Heart laughed at me for how silly I looked. The only time I’ve ever seen any emotion from Stone-Man-With-Moving-Legs is once when he walked past Girl-With-Many-Boyfriends on the sidewalk. She lives in the 1st floor apartment and, on occasion, can wear provocative clothing. This particular time she was dressed up for Man-With-Expensive-Car and smoking a cigarette while waiting for him to pick her up. Stone-Man-With-Moving-Legs saw her… stopped… did a small shake of his head and then continued on his way. Tree-With-Heart thinks he was disapproving but I think otherwise… We don’t always chat. Sometimes when Woman-With-Crazy-Landscaping-And-Wears-A-Badge heads to work in her police cruiser or Couple-Who-Just-Don’t-Fit go their separate ways we don’t say a thing to each other… we just watch and wonder… no funny comments or remarks… One thing I do make sure of each night is to say Goodnight to Tree-With-Heart. He is my Friend after all… I wouldn’t want him to think I was acting like Lady-Who-Never-Speaks… I woke up this morning to the sound of heavy equipment… When I opened the door to my balcony to have my first smoke of the day I halted… I recognized the trucks. Lady-With-Dog-Who-Pees-A lot had used them to trim the next door tree-neighbor to Tree-With-Heart… Normally I would have been as amazed as Jordan was to watch these guys (Shouldn’t Jordan be in school?). Anytime a man gets to watch heavy equipment being used the little Boy in him comes out… But I saw the man strap these steel spikes onto his feet and got a bad feeling. Sure enough, as he started to climb Tree-With-Heart I felt every spike pierce just as a twin feels pain in his sibling…. I knew before he got there which limb this Tree-Trimmer was going for… Jordan was excited as the tree-climber looped his rope round the branch and pull-started his chain-saw… I wasn’t… The Heart-Limb came down and went into the chipper while Woman-Who-Owns-Tree-With-Heart watched… I wanted to run downstairs and yell at her… I wanted to rant and rave… But I knew she was only doing what she thought was right… what was safe… so I couldn’t… My Friend still stands there… He’s still a sturdy, good-looking Maple Tree… But he has no Heart…
October 14 Checking in... Is there anyone still out there? I've been gone so long from blogging that I wonder if anyone still even knows me... I miss Blogging.... January 14 Distracted Wisdom...Well, my novel idea of writing a novel on my blog was squashed when a friend of mine reminded me that there is no way to protect it copyright-wise. Since it’s going to be a best seller and all I decided against sharing it until the movie deal is firmly contracted and I close on my new mansion with a zip code of 90210. I am supposed to be working right now but I am entirely distracted. Late last night, I discovered something stuck between my back tooth and my gums. I strongly suspect it is a popcorn hull and I’m blaming Orville and his stupid buttery goodness and the fact that his popcorn is only 2 minutes away in my microwave. Whatever it is that is stuck, it is stuck good. I have flossed and brushed and picked and flossed and wiggled and flossed. Nothing. My tongue reflexively just goes to the offending foreign object and worries it and it won’t budge! And I can’t even concentrate! Here’s part of the problem. When I went to Boot Camp as a wet-behind-the-ears 18 year old, the Navy, in all their wisdom, X-rayed my mouth and decided that my bottom wisdom-teeth HAD to come out but the top wisdom-teeth were perfectly fine. As the years went by, things seemed fine. But about 10 years ago, the top left wisdom tooth started to… what do you call it… come in? When it did break through, it was perfectly sideways! I know, it sounds freaky right? Anyways, that’s where the popcorn hull is stuck. And to get to it I would have to be able to disconnect my jaw. Now I’m wondering why they call them wisdom-teeth in the first place. I remember when it first started to break through I was all like “Cool! Now I can find the meaning of life!” but, to be honest, I haven’t really felt any smarter or wiser since the tooth debuted. Maybe you have to have all 4 of them for it to work which makes me wonder why we pull them out in the first place. Anyhow… I need to go floss… August 02 little Candy Man...The goal of my blog has always been "a 5 minute break from reality" but sometimes reality smacks you in the face so hard you can't ignore it. But here is what I really don’t understand. I was just an extra in this scene, not one of the main characters, so why did it leave me with emotions, felt so deeply, that it is still bothering me after four days? I don’t even know what the laws are about selling candy on the streets. Maybe the cop was justified in every way to confiscate little Candy Man’s box of M&M’s. But the disrespectful way he did it bothers me more than what he did. It seemed to me that he was more concerned with proving that he could take the candy than he was at enforcing the law of the land. The experiences we have during our formative years are what shape us into the person we ultimately become. I can’t help but think that this experience will affect little Candy Man in a negative way towards police officers and/or authority figures and possibly even worse. It seems events such as this are what cause the perpetual tension between citizens and law enforcement that is ever-present, especially in big cities. Who is going to be big enough to stop this? Are the police waiting until they get respect before they give any? Are the citizens willing to show respect if they got some in return? Does that one box of M&M’s represent a major flaw in our society? Sometimes our days are filled with our own problems and concerns and we don’t ever take the time to think or worry about anyone else. I can’t honestly say that I will buy a bag of M&M’s from every little Candy Man I see from now on. But I can say this: I won’t ignore them like I have in the past. Perhaps a kind word or a positive encounter can cancel out one of the negative events they have had. I don’t know. July 27 Friends don't let Friends...Had my first downtown-grocery-store experience… While it seems very weird to go into a grocery store that’s in a high-rise instead of the sprawling suburban type stores that I am used to, that’s not what this blog is actually about. I have to valet park my car here in the building I live in but haven’t even driven it for two weeks since I have found walking to be much easier. So the first thing I do is get the car from valet. They drive it up and all I can think of is that it looks like Pigpens car with a little dust cloud following it since it has sat there for two weeks. I get in and it feels very strange to drive again. (Remember, I was the guy who drove a 1000 miles a week not all that long ago and now it takes me a few minutes to get used to driving again.) I drive to the store and navigate the parking garage. After parking in the garage I get on the elevator. In walks these two girls. Both are dressed like they are going out “clubbing”. Mind you, this is 2 o’clock in the afternoon on a Sunday, so I have no idea where in the world they may have been going. But if the dresses were a ¼ inch smaller, they could have been arrested in 47 states. But one of these women had on a dress and nothing underneath. She may as well have been nude because the dress was virtually see-through. Now, most of you think that any red-blooded American Male would have enjoyed the “show” but it was actually a little repulsive and the first thing that came to my mind was, “It’s a little early for you girls to be going to work, isn’t it?” I didn’t say that out loud but, looking back, I wish I would have. Here’s my question. Did her friend not see the problem with the way she was dressed and clue her in? to me, letting this girl walk out of her apartment dressed the way she was is tantamount to letting your friend walk around all day with a booger in their mustache. I just don’t understand… Of course, now I am watching “America’s Got Talent” and have the same problem. Do these people not have enough friends to explain to them that they probably ought not to go on national TV and sing/dance/(add equally talent necessary task here)? Is putting yourself on display so important to some people that normal rules of civility do not apply? Do friends not care enough anymore to stop someone from making a fool of themselves? Or am I just getting old… July 20 Eating my Words...What do you call it? The meal that you eat at night? There is breakfast… then lunch… then…? I have always called it supper and, apparently, in the city that makes people laugh at me. Here they call it Dinner. And I have been told many times that only country folk call it supper. Actually they don’t say country folk they say “southern people”. I try to explain to them that over 90% of the country is south of here so almost everyone is “southern people “ to them but they laugh anyway… I googled “supper”, then I Wikipedia’ed it and neither really helped. (Spellcheck doesn’t like the verbs I am using. He is telling me they aren’t words. What’s even funnier is Spellcheck is telling me that Spellcheck isn’t even a word and that’s his own name… ha ha ha… God, I hate him…) My family has always called it supper and we reserve the word Dinner for the special or formal occasions. You know… Christmas Dinner, Easter Dinner, Thanksgiving Dinner… but even then, those meals are usually in the middle of the day not at the end. It’s the “Old Dog/New Trick” thing but I am trying to remember to say Dinner versus Supper. But since I am used to Dinner being formal it feels weird to say “I had buffalo wings for Dinner last night”. Eventually I will figure it out. Or, maybe not. If Jesus wasn’t even pretentious enough to call it “The Last Dinner” in the Bible then maybe it’s ok for me to keep calling it supper… July 19 Head in the Clouds...I miss writing… Or I miss blogging… one or the other… or both… Not really sure which… Now I find my head in the clouds… Literally… today I woke up and stepped out on my balcony and I was in a cloud. You see, just in the last week Zwebbyville has been moved to the Marina Towers in downtown Chicago. You may not know the Marina Towers but once upon a time Steve McQueen drove a car off of one of them into the Chicago River. Anyway… It is very strange to find yourself in a cloud in your own home. We have all flown through a cloud in an airliner. (Did I just say “airliner”. I have no idea where that came from. I meant jet or plane but airliner came out… ) But to walk out onto your balcony and to be in the middle of a cloud is very strange indeed. Just another odd experience for a country boy who has been firmly planted in a big city… There are a lot of new things happening now that I live right downtown. I am going to try to chronicle them here. Now that I don’t have 3 hours a day of commuting, I should have some time to write. Zwebbyville has changed a lot!
September 09 A Train Ride...I’m sitting on the train. I was unusually efficient today and got out in time to get on the 6:50 Express. (Ok let me decode that for you into what it really means… “Both the owners were out of town instead of at the office so I snuck out earlier than normal so that I could catch the train that has fewer stops and gets me home in 45 minutes instead of an hour.”) Trains are amazing things… There is the guy 5 seats up who is arguing with what I assume is his significant other about what’s for dinner… there are numerous book readers, everything from Stephen King to Louis L’amour… The newspapers a big one too, lots of those… then there is the guy eating McDonalds I am sure he picked up just as he got on the train (that’s really bothering me to watch too because I know he probably held onto the railing on the escalator and the handrails getting on the train and now he’s using those same hands to stuff a Big Mac into his mouth! UGH!) All these people trying to kill 45 minutes of time… It’s sort of fun to watch but then I realize that MY way of killing time is to watch what everybody else’s way to kill time is… Not so sure what that says about me… June 17 A Dad and his Cubs...I gave myself a couple of Fathers Day presents… The first was a trip to Wrigley Field today where I witnessed my Beloved Cubbies pitch a game where the other team (San Diego Padres) only got two hits… a completely awesome job by the Cubs pitching staff, but, unfortunately, in a way that only a Cubs Fan could ever understand, these guys found a way to lose by a score of 1 – 0… Unbelievable… unless you’re a Cubs fan… The other thing I gave myself, which may sound strange to some, was… I gave both the Aldermen cell phones… Some may think it strange that I gave a 14 Year old and an 11 Year old phones but it’s really cool because we have talked more in the last two days since they got them than EVER before… It never ceases to amaze me how fast these two pick up on how to work new stuff… within two hours of having his new phone, Cman had it figured out better than I know how to use mine! Of course, though, during the game today, he blew my cell phone up with text messages giving me play-by-play to a game that I WAS ACTUALLY AT!! I spent most of my time trying to text him back than watching the game… and I loved every minute of it!! Then when I got home, I watched a Superman movie… I have a question… Just how stupid were the residents of Metropolis to not ever put two and two together to realize that the glasses-wearing cub reporter was the un-spectacled Man-Of-Steel? THAT WAS HIS ONLY DISGUISE!!! No fake mustache… no fake hairdo… not even a hat! Just a pair of glasses! Now… being a glasses wearing guy myself, I understand that glasses can change your looks quite a bit. But, surely, at some point, someone should have realized that if innocent little Clark took off the lenses he was a dead ringer for the Leap-Tall-Buildings-In-A-Single-Bound Dude! I know it was just a Comic Book but I like my comics to have a little reality like Bugs Bunny or Scooby Doo did… Anyway… I hope all the Fathers out there have a great day and I also hope they all enjoy being a Father as much as I do! If only the Cubbies would have won… June 04 Puttering thoughts...I golfed today… Yesterday was the first time I had golfed in over two years and then I did another 18 holes today. The owners of the company paid for both rounds which made it even more fun. Unfortunately, I think it’s going to take me all night to type this with the one finger I own that isn’t sore. Recently I have been getting no exercise at all except for pushing the elevator button to get to the floor the office is on (which explains, I guess, why that finger isn’t sore) so I am now walking around in the old-man shuffle and standing up in stages. This was also the first weekend that I have worn shorts and been out in the sun… So, now, from where my shorts end and my ankle socks begin, it appears as if I soaked that part of my legs in Cherry Koolaid. Have you ever tried taking a shower without letting the water hit your legs?? As much as I love to golf, I started to wonder as I sat here tonight in complete pain from the soreness and the sunburn… Why in the heck do I love to golf?? 10+ hours of my weekend were spent cussing, swearing, throwing clubs, scraping goose poop off my shoes, searching through weeds and bramble for an expensive little white ball that is the embodiment of frustration to me. I am completely unsure if I will even be able to get out of bed in the morning. But, yet, as my boss dropped me off I shook his hand and thanked him for such an enjoyable weekend… Some would say it’s just a Male thing but I saw plenty of Females out there golfing too. Some may say it’s for the exercise but a treadmill is lots less frustrating and tons cheaper. Some would say it’s to enjoy being in the outdoors but goose poop has never been all that enjoyable to me. The mystery that is golf may never be solved but I will have plenty of time to think about it as I shuffle off to my bedroom…
January 14 Power Rambling...It’s sort of a good thing I’m not in ZwebbyVille right now. That area of the country just got hit with its worst ice storm ever and the power is off with no idea of how long it will be that way. I spoke to the Aldermen on the phone this morning. They are managing ok but are completely bored out of their skulls since all of their normal time-wasters, i.e. PS2, TV, etc., require electricity. I joked with Gman about how he is getting to experience what it was like to be a kid living in the 1800’s. His response was, “Yeah, well that’s an experience I could have lived without!” The whole thing has made me think of how dependent we are on modern conveniences. Maybe groups like the Amish aren’t as strange as we sometimes think they are. They are probably sitting back chuckling right now at all of us… Speaking of the Amish… I don’t understand what made them draw the line where they did. Why is it ok to have a horse and buggy but not ok to put a motor in the buggy? Why is it just fine to use tools but a sin to use a screwdriver that is battery-powered? At what point did they say, “OK! This is enough!” I’m not making fun of them, I’m just confused as to how they decided what was ok and what was not. Maybe in 20 or 30 years there will be another group of people just like them. They will be the people you hear say things like, “I’m just not a computer person” or “Cell phone? Never use one” or “Blog? Why would you ever want to write a blog?” My theory is this: Each of us has a Technology Saturation Limit. Our TSL depends on how much technology our brains can absorb. It’s the only thing that makes sense. Why can I build an Excel spreadsheet that will calculate the number of tries it takes to find a needle in a haystack but can’t program my VCR to tape a movie? Why do some people have trouble tying their shoes but can design a submarine that will pick a coin off the deepest part of the ocean floor? Some Amish dude must have reached his TSL right before electricity became popular and was powerful enough in his community to make sure he didn’t have to ever worry about it by making it a sin to use it. Of course the only reason we even have electricity is because of how high ole Ben Franklin’s TSL was. I sometimes wonder exactly what the guy was thinking about when he decided to take a kite out in the middle of a lightning storm, attach a key to it and hope that he was lucky enough to get struck by a huge bolt of lightning. I imagine it took quite a few tries to get it just right. I can just see him after an unsuccessful try, dripping wet with his head hanging low trudging back into his house when someone asks him how it went… “It sucked! Lightning was striking all around me and do you think just one bolt… one measly little bolt… hit my kite?? No… nada… zilch…” It seems that having a high TSL might be a dangerous thing… Somehow though we all manage to find our own TSL comfort level. I wonder just where the Aldermen’s TSL will be when they reach my age… If, that is, they don’t die from boredom before the power comes back on…
December 17 Money Problems...Today was the most exciting day in ZwebbyVille in a long time! As a matter of fact, it was so thrilling that at one point I finally stood up from the couch and, while trying to stretch out the creaks in my back, actually ran into a spider web… There was so little to do that I counted my change… For some reason I do not like to carry change. When I am on the road I seem to acquire a lot of change in my pockets by the end of every day. When I get back to the room, I empty my pockets onto the dresser and then when I check out of the hotel I just scoop all the change into the outside pocket of my suitcase. I really can’t remember the last time I emptied that pocket out but it has been a long time. So long that I had accumulated $105.21! And that isn’t counting ten $1 coins! At first I was pretty excited! It was sort of like putting on a jacket you haven’t worn for a long time and finding a twenty dollar bill. But then I started thinking about how heavy the bag was that I put all the coins into to take them to be counted. It was really heavy! I didn’t weigh it but I would bet it was between 8 and 10 pounds. Then I thought about the fact that the last six times I have flown (three round trips) I have had to pay $25 extra every time because my bag was over the 50 pound weight limit. So here’s the math: $25 X 6 = $150 to carry around $100 dollars worth of change… God I’m such a doink sometimes! And on top of this realization I had a heck of a time even getting it counted! I had enough presence of mind to call my bank first. You know the bank that I have been a client of for over 10 years now… and here is what they told me… “We’re sorry Mr. Russ but we don’t have the ability to count change at this location. We will have an armored vehicle take it to our main branch and they will deposit into your account within three days.” “Uh… you can’t count change? Aren’t you a bank?” “Well, of course we are, but they count the change at the main branch” “So if I took it down to the main branch, would the Qualified Coin Counters be available immediately or would I need an appointment?” “Uh… Let me give you their number and you can call and ask” Remember the good ole days when a bank considered coins to be a part of their business? When did the ability to remember that four quarters make a dollar become a specialty? Ok… I’m off to do something else as equally fun… I’m not sure what yet… but I will let you know…
December 10 What Goes On...Long time visitors to ZwebbyVille may remember all the trouble we used to have with the town directly above us. Everything from a whiny little dog who would constantly jump up and down on their kitchen floor to having to listen to them walk around the town with their ginormous feet that sounded like the T-Rex scene from Jurassic Park. Well I am happy to report that at some point during my long out-of-Town run, the residents of that town must have packed up and left for another state somewhere. And, other than the chirping of the smoke detectors that need batteries, life has been blissfully quiet on the Northern Front. However… When ZwebbyVille was first established, the town next door, which shares walls with us, only had two residents. A single mother and her son. On the rare occasion we heard anything out of them it was usually a cupboard that was shut too hard or something like that. For the most part, they were very neighborly neighbors and we enjoyed living next to them. But the new residents are as loud as the old ones were quiet... Last night I had the opportunity to listen to an argument that the town leaders were having. Apparently the two of them share Mayoral responsibilities. I am unsure why they ever chose to accept the position because, after hearing the things they say during their Town Meetings, I don’t think they like each other very much. Please understand I wasn’t eavesdropping on purpose. I really had no choice since their voices were peaking at about the same decibel level as a fighter jet taking off. But of course I didn’t catch every word either (the old glass on the wall trick doesn’t work by the way). Here is what I have concluded from their meeting:
When we have meetings here in ZwebbyVille we really don’t follow Robert’s Rules of Order either but they aren’t even close next door. They adjourn their meetings when Male slams the door on his way out of town… I guess I don’t mind having to hear their meetings all that much. I just wish they would schedule them closer to normal business hours and not at 1 AM…
December 05 Chinny Chin Chin...We join this therapy session already in progress:
Doc: I would say you are in Stage 4… Zman: Stage 4?? Stage 4 of what? Doc: Stage 4 of "The 5 stages of Grief” Zman: What are you talking about, Doc? Doc: The first stage is Denial. How did you feel when it first happened? Zman: Well… at first I do remember saying, “I can’t believe this happened!” Doc: See? Then Stage 2 is Anger. Were you ever angry? Zman: Oh Yeah! I knew the Aldermen must have been playing with it or it got messed up during travel or something. I even looked at it first and it was set on #4 just like it was supposed to be. Matter of fact… I think I may still be a little angry. Doc: Hmmm… This may be worse than I thought… Zman: What is Stage 3? Doc: Bargaining… You know, “If I do this then maybe it will do that” type of thing… Zman: You may be onto something, Doc. I spent like 20 minutes trying to do just that! Doc: So that brings us to Stage 4…. Depression or Defeat… Zman: Well… yes… I am thinking I can’t go out in public anymore… that I can’t bear to face it like this… especially being winter and all… Then what is Stage 5?? Doc: Stage 5 is Acceptance and the sooner we can get you here the better. Zman: I suppose it will grow back in a few weeks. Doc: It will… and it wasn’t really your fault to begin with, right? Zman: No… something was wrong with the clippers… I was just trying to trim it… Even though it showed it was set on #4 it was really on #1 so when I made the first pass through the middle of my goatee it trimmed it all the way down… and there wasn’t any way to save it… Doc: And, like you said, it will grow back right? Zman: Yes it will. I hope it hurries though because my chin is freezing! Thanks, Doc! For once I think you've helped!! Doc: Good because we have a few more minutes and I need to talk to you about a problem I’ve been having lately…
December 04 Experience necessary...The Boys left Town late Saturday night so things around ZwebbyVille were very quiet today. Gilbert and I watched America’s Funniest Home Videos and, once again, he was disappointed to not see any of his tapes on there. He sends them 10 or 20 tapes a month of some of the crazy things he does that I capture on film for him. Some of them are really funny too. Just this weekend I caught him trying to run and slide on the ice and he lost control and slid into a dumpster headfirst. It was hilarious. Gilbert is thinking about contacting an attorney about a lawsuit. He swears AFHV is prejudiced against Imaginary People… I spent the rest of the day working hard on preparing to go out on the road again. Ok, that’s not really true… I laid on the couch all day… watching TV… thinking about how much stuff I needed to do to prepare to go out on the road again… but I was thinking about it really hard so it’s not like I was procrastinating completely… ok… actually I didn’t give it much thought at all… I procrastinated all day… there… I said it… Procrastinating is actually an art form. I don’t recommend you try it at home unless you are a professional like me. It can be dangerous. I have been a Master Procrastinator for so long now that it’s second nature to me. I can’t even imagine what it’s like when people tell me they already have their Christmas Shopping done. I mean, how much fun can there be in that? There is nothing more thrilling than putting up with the terrible Christmas Eve traffic to get to the Mall, filling up with gas just before you pull into the parking lot to ensure you won’t run out while you circle the lot trying to find a parking spot, walking the 3.6 miles to get inside since, for some reason, the only spots that actually ever open seem to be in the next county, fighting your way through thousands of people full of Christmas Spirit (which somehow has come to be synonymous with ‘rude’) just to get to that same article that you have walked by 50 times in the last six months… See what I mean?? Procrastinating should only be performed by those of us with the NPE (necessary procrastination experience) to put up with stuff like that without having to worry about our nerves being so frazzeled by the end of the day on Christmas Eve that we set up a tree stand on our roof while muttering about how much we hate Rudolph… Maybe I should change this year though… Maybe this should be the year where all my shopping is done with weeks to spare… Maybe I should retire from the Master Procrastinators of America once and for all… I’ll decide tomorrow…
November 30 Snow days...The Aldermen are pretty excited… When I picked them up from Alderman Training this afternoon the temperature was 72 degrees. Less than 4 hours later it was in the 40’s and falling. The weather people say that by morning tomorrow ZwebbyVille could have 4+ inches of the white stuff on the ground. So, the Aldermen are absolutely positive that they will not have classes tomorrow and, like I said, are pretty excited about it. I remember those days when I was in school and the threat of snow made you so excited you couldn’t sleep. Then as soon as you opened your eyes you would rush to the window and just before you pulled back the curtain you would hesitate… You knew that once those curtains were open you would either be super happy or very disappointed. But you had to know! So you would slowly peel back the curtain hoping to see that brightness that the sun makes when the ground is covered with snow. And then… YES!! SNOW!! But wait a minute… is it enough? Doesn’t look like it’s as much as that guy was saying it would be on the news last night. Where’s the radio?? Within seconds you would have the radio and the TV on looking for a channel with the School Report. Then when you found it and the school names started scrolling across the bottom of the screen the tension would start to build again. Oh, man… this is worse than when you opened the curtain! I always knew which three or four names would come right before my school and when it got to those I would be on the edge of my seat about to have a heart attack from the stress! Here they come… Farmington… Franklin… THERE! THERE IT IS!! My mother was always amazed how fast I could get dressed in full Snow Day Play Gear! Literally within minutes of seeing the school’s name on the TV I would be double-layered, booted, stocking-capped and gloved with the majority of Mr. Snowman’s bottom third already rolled. She would tell me that I could sleep an extra 30 minutes every morning if I would get dressed that fast on a regular school day. We would stay outside so long that our hands were numb from the cold and the runny nose had frozen to our upper lip. Then Mom would always have Tomato Soup and Grilled Cheese sandwiches ready for lunch which would warm us up enough for another round outside in the afternoon. By the end of the day you could see everything in our yard from snow angels to areas that were obvious battle-zones for snowball fights to forts to snowmen… Of course there were those times too where you would open the curtain to perfectly dry ground and your faith in TV weathermen would take a big hit. By the time you were out of Junior High you knew every weatherman joke ever told. Tonight I think I’m going to say a little prayer for the snow to make it here. I’ve got the tomato soup ready just in case…
November 27 Sweet Dreams of Reality...I walked into the Doc’s office for a much-needed therapy session. All this time on the road has prevented me from spending any quality time with Dr. Hans Von Glutenschnapps, my personal therapist. Since I will be home all week I thought I needed to get a session or two in. Unfortunately, it seems like the entire town had the same idea since the waiting room was completely full and the only seat available was right in between Harry, the Barber and Gilbert O’Sullivan, my imaginary friend. Normally I love to spend time with these two but it looked like they were in the middle of a heated argument. Of course, when they saw me they both started pleading their argument to me hoping that I would take their side. The argument in question was about the lyrics to a certain song by the Eurythmics… Harry, the ultimate ladies man, was absolutely positive that the words said “Sweet Dreams are made of Threes…” While Gilbert, who is always thinking about eating, was equally positive that the song says, “Sweet Dreams are made of Cheese…” Doc called my name just as they asked me my opinion. I told them I wasn’t sure which one it was… Who am I to disagree? When I got into Doc’s office we made small talk for a few minutes and he caught me up on some of the Town happenings. We spent considerable amount of time talking about how the local television network, ZV-TV, will be starting a new show this week. It’s a reality show based on living in ZwebbyVille and will air tomorrow. There is some uncertainty on my part as to how the Producers are going to portray Life in ZwebbyVille, but the residents seem to be excited. It’s a great week for it too since not only will I be home all week but the Aldermen will also be in Town for the entire week. When my hour with Doc was up I realized I hadn’t talked to him about much else except the new show and his inability to sleep because he recently became concerned that the Martian from the Flintstones was sneaking into his bathroom at night to use his toothbrush… Regardless, it is shaping up to be a busy week in ZwebbyVille… Stay Tuned
November 24 What a Day!...It had been a long time since I had the opportunity to actually be in ZwebbyVille so when I rolled into Town late Wednesday night I called an Emergency Town Meeting… The Aldermen and I stayed up late discussing Town business. Since it has been almost two months since we were able to have a meeting, we decided to make it a long weekend and will be spending the next week together as well. Here are some of the highlights:
I sincerely hope all of you enjoyed your Thanksgiving as much as I did mine… November 13 Another Term...The recounts are finally done… I am still Mayor of ZwebbyVille even after a close call where Harry (the barber of ZVille) gave me a run for my money. He ran on a platform that I wasn’t spending enough time in ZwebbyVille to run it properly. And he almost beat me. While I agree that I have been absent from town a lot lately, I still think I am the best Mayor that ZwebbyVille could have. Harry is always too pre-occupied with his ladies to pay enough attention to Town business. Not to mention his barber shop… The Aldermen, Gman & Cman, also were elected to another term. Cman won another term even though he was recently affected by a scandal in which he made a few off-the-record comments to his mother that were uncalled for and very disrespectful. As 11 year-olds can sometimes do, he let his mouth start talking before his brain thought about what he was saying. I had a Mayor-to-Alderman talk to him about these comments and informed him that I wanted him to spend the remainder of his afternoon in his office thinking about the comments he made and when I called him later that evening, I wanted him to tell me how he had rectified the situation. That evening, I asked him what solution he came up with… He informed me that, of his own accord, he had written “I will not disrespect you again” fifty times on a sheet of paper and given it to his mother… along with $11 dollars… which was all he had available… While I can’t really condone bribery, I find it somewhat humorous that Cman thought that a little cash would grease the skids with his mother so that she wouldn’t call out the media about his improprieties… It just goes to show that the political wheels are turning even in a small town like ZwebbyVille… During my next term as Mayor, I promise to run the town of ZwebbyVille to the best of my abilities… I promise to keep all of you informed of town events as much as I can… and I promise to try to show the Aldermen how to be the best Mayor they can be by my example… My name is Russ and I approved this blog…
October 16 Life Goes on...It’s been so long since I’ve written I am unsure if I remember how…
One thing I do know… I miss writing.
I have gotten a lot of comments recently wondering if I am still alive, wondering if I have given up blogging, or even if there is a girlfriend in the Mayor’s life…
None of these are true. Just the simple fact of life getting in the way of the things that we enjoy. And blogging is definitely one of the things I have come to enjoy…
Here’s what actually happened.
When I realized I was going to be as busy as I have been I handed over the keys to ZwebbyVille to Gilbert and told him to write something every day to keep everyone up to speed on what is going on.
Just recently I found out that, unknowingly, Gilbert got the username and password mixed up and has been updating a blog named ZwebbyBurg (a small town in Scandanavia). His blogs have been received with… welll… let’s just say that this small little community is now is a state if civil unrest and the poor little village may never recover from Gilbert’s posts…
I should have known better…
So many things have happened since I last wrote that I don’t even know where to begin…
So let’s start here…
Recently, PETA (People for Ethical Treatment of Animals) has been flooded with calls to stop a contest proposed by Six Flags, Inc. which offers a four person season pass complete with VIP line-cutting privileges for anyone who can beat the World Record for eating the most Madagascar hissing cockroaches in one minute. The current record is 36, held by a man in England.
Apparently, people think that eating these live cockroaches is cruel and inhumane. "Insects do not deserve to be eaten alive especially for a gratuitous marketing gimmick," PETA spokeswoman Jackie Vergerio told Reuters.
Here’s my question…
I am unsure whether I am more disturbed by the fact that there are people actually willing to eat cockroaches in able to get to the front of the line at the Screaming Eagle or the fact that there is an actual group that thinks cockroaches deserve some sort of civil rights…
Would these people fight just as hard if the cockroaches in question were the more common variety of cockroach? Say… a German cockroach or a Brownbanded cockroach? Or are they concerned solely because we are talking about the more high-browed Madagascar Cockroach?
And would we be as willing to put magic marker to posterboard and picket if they were eating these cockroaches for something more palatable as raising funds for the local elementary school…
I just don’t know…
These are questions that Gilbert has been asking of these poor people in Scandanavia and I have realized that, instead of letting Gilbert start World War III, I need to take ZwebbyVille back over and start asking you people…
I miss all of you and promise to keep you up to date a little better…
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