meatloaf

In accordance with my christmas plan, I made meatloaf. My friend, who knows how to cook, came over to supervise and provide tips since I've never made it before. I think my favorite comment was "don't pretend you know how to use a can opener, just give me that can and I'll open it for you."

My can opener is very complicated to use.

We also made mashed potatoes, brussel sprouts, and asparagus. I added a bunch of shit to the meatloaf recipe, including red and green peppers, spinach, and feta cheese.

It was really good except for a few mishaps. Firstly, I didn't realize I had to beat the eggs before I added them into the meatloaf. Because I had just dumped hot vegetables in with the meat the eggs basically cooked on contact. So the meatloaf had little white chunks of egg in it (I tried to pretend the white chunks were feta but my friend was not fooled).

And I believe because I added extra vegetables and didn't get the eggs added right I couldn't form the meatloaf into a loaf. Solution? Put it in a bread loaf pan thingy. Which was a great idea except that as it cooked the meatloaf swelled up and the catsup on top spilled all over the inside of the oven causing a small fire and a lot of smoke. We had to prop open the back door to get the smoke to clear even though it was fucking cold outside.

We remedied that problem by putting a cookie tray with potatoes on it under the meatloaf to catch the overflow. They (the potatoes) turned out really well.

The final verdict from my friend?

"The meatloaf looks really weird but it tastes good. And you included a lot of things in this dinner that make people fart. Maybe next time just make one vegetable that causes people to fart. And learn to use a can opener."

I declare victory.

dog owning dicks

I have a neighbor on one side of me with two retarded, ugly, fat dogs. I love people who own dogs but don't take care of them. For the past 6 years I've had an ongoing battle with them to keep their dogs from barking non-stop. Annoying.

Then, in September, my crazy neighbor moved out and new people moved in with...a retarded, ugly, fat dog that barks non-stop, even when they are home. Now my house sounds like a kennel and I have dogs barking on both sides.

This is a summary of our email exchanges:

Me (to my new neighbor):

Hi [let's just call him fucking asspipe], your dog was barking yesterday for most of the afternoon and now this morning. My house guest is still here. If you could do something about that I would appreciate it. Steve and Abby are gone for the weekend so we've also had to contend with their dogs barking pretty much nonstop on the other side.

I'll be around this afternoon if you want to come by to see my place. Let me know.

Thanks!

Asspipe:

Sorry we were out a while yesterday! Promise we will be mindful and good news is Candace returns to work 12/1 and Apollo goes with her to work. Are you home the week of Thanksgiving?

We will try and swing by this afternoon after golf.

Aside from the dog issue we'd love to meet you :) Maybe you can swing by 1 night this week for a glass of wine? We heard you've done some cool stuff upstairs and we're doing some work too.

As for the dog, sorry, I hate it too. Is there anything you'd suggest for when we're not in the house?

Me:

I would like to meet you both as well! I have a guest this week and am not sure what our plans are yet. I'll let you know. And if you'd like a tour I'm happy to give one. I've redone everything in the house.

As for the dog, I'm not sure. When my ex's dog stayed at my house I used to take him for a long walk before I left and he was fine. Maybe the vet could make some suggestions.

I've been dealing with Steve's dogs for over 6 years now and am getting ready to turn that over to the city to handle. So, sorry if my email seemed bitchy. It sounds like a kennel in my house when all three dogs are barking. And it has been typical that their dogs bark all night until they get home which makes it impossible to sleep.

Anyway, enough about the dogs. When I figure out my schedule this week I'll let you know.

Thanks for the response! 

I find it funny when people ask me to solve their problems, like why their dog is barking. My guess, it has no toys to entertain it, they don't exercise it properly, and they don't leave a light on for it when they are gone at night. If it were my dog, I would be mortified and would research the shit out of the problem until I fixed it. That's why I'm not an asspipe.

Me (a week later, on a week night, when asspipe's dog had been barking for 6 hours, at the time I sent the email it was 1130 at night...and yes, I still get up at 5 am):

Your dog has been barking since I got home at 545 this evening. Can you please do something?Thanks.

Asspipe:

We are doing our best. Seriously. 

We take him to work every day. Does Steve at Find Solutions know that we take him to work Every day? We are great dog owners.

Why don't you come introduce yourself instead of just emailing complaints all the time. How long have we lived here and you can't say hello? We are neighbors.

Do not email me again until you introduce yourself. Cool?

 So now I have to meet and be friends with someone who doesn't give a shit about his fucking dog? And he's a great dog owner? WTF? Also, I have tried numerous times to schedule a time for us to meet but he never responds. So fuck him.

Anyway, I've turned the situation over to the city and we have to go to a mediation session and come up with an agreement. The mediator contacted me and was like "you might not get what you want." As if people have a right to have an animal that barks non-fucking stop for hours on end with no regard to other people.

I'm going to hopefully get a friend to go with me so it's not my four neighbors against me.

The worst part is I bet that if they just took their dogs out for some exercise this would not be an issue. But, why have a fit happy dog when you can have a fat lazy one.

Drama...I hate it.

christmas chef

Due to my success with breakfast burritos I have decided to spend a few hours every day for the next three days making shit.

Today, I made the beginnings of a lemon basil sorbet. I hope it's as good as the one I had at this french restaurant my parents took me to when I was in Williamsburg over Thanksgiving. It has to chill over night in the refrigerator and then I'm going to put it in the sorbet making machine I got for my niece but then accidentally shipped to myself because I was drinking and forgot to change the shipping address. Anyway, my niece already has a sorbet making machine.

Tomorrow I will make more breakfast burritos with a changed up recipe. I'm adding potatoes and some other shit. I was going to look at a recipe but then was like well if I add enough bacon they will taste good. I will also be attempting some strawberry frozen yogurt.

Then on Sunday I will make meatloaf because I had a request for that. I like to exchange weird emails every christmas with my friend G. This is the one I sent this year:

Me:

Also, I am going to attempt to make a meat loaf on sunday. I found a recipe which I will follow more or less except I want to add some additional stuff to it. I guess I'm getting cocky after my breakfast burritos. Maybe that's a bad thing. I also have to roast some potatoes but I'm not sure what temperature roast is. I'm pretty sure my old oven had a button that said roast. Or maybe it said broil. I can't remember now. I assume roasting and broiling are different but with cooks who can say, they are so imprecise. 

I tried to find the answer on line but got a temperature range of 200 - 375 and apparently there's something called slow roasting which may or may not apply to potatoes. I got bored and stopped reading the article.

I need to find a famous chef who studied as an engineer so I can learn to cook shit and not have to do research every time I want to do something simple like make a fucking potato.

G:

Ha ha, I hope the potatoes die well! 

slowly to Rapid City

Friday night my soon to be official flight instructor asked if I wanted to go on a cross country trip to Rapid City South Dakota on Saturday night. Um, YEAH.

It was part of his solo check list he has to do to get his commercial license. I tagged along so he could practice also being an instructor. Our initial flight plan was to leave Denver at 630 pm, fly to Cheyenne, land and take off, fly to Rapid City, land and take off, and then fly back to Denver, which would have gotten us back to Denver at 3 am (the plane we were in manages about 105 MPH).

My instructor's instructor (luckily) suggested we crash in Rapid City Saturday night and fly back early Sunday. I never realized this but when you rent a plane you only pay for the hours you fly so you can keep the plane out for a day or two and it isn't that expensive.

We got to McAir around 4 pm on Saturday. After some socializing with the staff there we went out to check the plane. It was around 430 and the temperature had started dropping and the wind was picking up.

I was surprised how tiny the cockpit was in the plane. It was smaller than even my Toyota MR2. I learned how to do the outside airplane check, how to undo the chains that hold the plane on the runway (not so easy to do when it's cold and windy), how to check the fuel (you have to drain it from 13 different spots on the airplane and then you have to climb up on the wing and put the fuel back), and how to do the cockpit pre-check. And how to navigate a runway that has patches of ice (not so fun with those little airplane tires).

The flight from Denver to Cheyenne was really turbulent. But fun. Like being on a roller coaster. The wind was really strong so we were getting bumped around a lot. Visibility was pretty good. The plane was freezing. The heat knob thing for the cockpit wouldn't pull out. By the time we landed in Rapid City the cuffs of my jeans, which I had gotten wet on the runway doing the pre-flight check, were frozen solid.

west jet lobby in Rapid city...

glad it was nice because we waited almost an hour for the airport shuttle - we got to the hotel at 11 pm and had to get up at 5 to be back at the airport for takeoff - yes, I'm doing this for fun

Weirdly I could hear radio traffic but could not hear my instructor as he was responding to the various towers we communicated with. I hope my head set isn't fucked. I was supposed to do radio calls this morning but begged off since I wasn't sure what to say. My instructor, who does a very accurate impression of Borat, tried to teach me the radio calls when we had a few down minutes. I think I will learn a lot if he continues to say things in a Borat accent.

Yesterday was a confusion of gauges, weather shit, weird calculations for flight plans, and basically I was just grateful I got my seat belt buckled correctly and the door closed properly. Today I was able to read the gauges and sort of understand the instructions from the tower.

We took off in a very strong headwind (I stayed in the plane while my instructor did the pre-flight outside check - it was fucking cold and the plane was shaking as if it were flying). Then we got into a layer of fog (had we planned to take off at our originally scheduled departure we definitely would have been delayed) and flew in that, off instruments because there was no visibility, for 30 minutes. It was pretty fun. I took some pics of the fog and of Denver as we approached...

south dakota hinterlands, lots of snow, not much else

approaching the front range

Denver off the nose - those weird black blurs are the propeller

Anyway, over the holidays I'm hitting the books for ground school and will hopefully get in a few more flights this winter to prep me for when I start my private pilot's license in the spring.

breakfast burrito

The past few weeks have been super busy at work, I've haven't had much free time.

But, using a free hour I had last sunday, I managed to make breakfast burritos. No recipe, I just made shit up. I brought them into work and two guys I work with who come from countries where many burritos are consumed said "these are legit!" So, maybe I've found my cooking niche. Burritos.

I made them with eggs, bacon, feta cheese, three types of peppers, onions, jalapenos, and then topped them with green salsa

I had to eat the first two because I fucked up wrapping them - but then I realized if I spread the salsa on the tortilla before I wrapped them they would stick together - and they taste good! though I was counseled to put black beans (Mexico) or potatoes (Spain) in them - roasted potatoes, apparently - when I asked "what temperature is "roast"?" I think I slightly destroyed my credibility as a cook

projections

When I got home late Friday night from williamsburg all I wanted to do was watch a movie (had received the frontline documentary called Tank Man about the dude who stood in front of the tanks in Tienanmen Square and really wanted to watch it).

But my remote for the volume had somehow unpaired itself from the stereo. I finally got it repaired but then the projector wouldn't display. I fiddled around with the wires and then got the screen of doom that indicates the mother board is shot (I know this because it's happened twice with the projector before).

In the past I had been able to get the mother board replaced for free. But my projector is 10 years and 5 months old so I knew that wasn't going to work again. So on Saturday I braced myself for a horrible experience, and, armed with consumer reports reviews of home movie projectors, headed to best buy.

I got there at the perfect time because hardly anyone was in the store. A sales guy immediately helped me. Though they didn't have the projector in their inventory he found one at a store in Centennial that was only 10 minutes away. I paid for the projector at a POS kiosk so I didn't have to wait in line. The pick up at the other store only took 2 minutes.

I was shocked how uncrowded the stores were. I guess most people shop online these days. And I managed to get my new projector set up and running in 10 minutes (most of which time was spent untangling wires).

I did discover I was missing a cable but was able to get the missing cable today. So, movie tonight!

AND this projector works with blu ray - much better picture than my old projector, it's like watching tv

floor tiles in the attic

My dad asked me to paint all the bare wood in the attic and then put down some floor tiles. I agreed thinking the job wouldn't take that long.

The attic floor has two levels. I figured he just wanted the floor put down on the first level based on the number of floor tiles I saw. I got to work on that and then started painting. I was saving the steps leading up to the attic for last for obvious reasons (so I could get out of the attic).

I got the floor tile put down and asked my dad to come look at it. He said "oh good, now you can put the rest down" and brought up like a billion more floor tiles for the second level of the attic. I had assumed I was 30 minutes away from completing the project (it was around 930 pm). Wrong.

to put down the floor tile I had to move all these boxes out of the way - they were heavy

Finally around midnight I was done.

a friend that I sent this pic to asked "is it Anne Frank times?" and my dad responded "no, we're gearing up for syrian refuges"

Then I had just finished painting the stairs leading up to the attic and was talking to my brother Steve when his cat decided to run up the stairs.

we had to put his cat's paws under the sink to get the paint off - after that the cat hissed at me every time she saw me

I repainted the stairs the next day. My dad was pretty happy with the way everything turned out.

stirring up the kids

I got to hang out last saturday evening with my sister's kids.

Here are some of the reasons why it may or may not be advisable to let me hang out with your kids.

First, we decided to play a game we invented called "farts domino". It's like regular dominoes, but my nephew farts on a random, unselected domino so my niece can't pick it if she has to go dig for dominoes.

Second, my sister yelled at me for saying "that's so gay" around her kids (for the record, I am in the habit of saying that because my gay friends say it). So I said "We were actually talking about Greg Lougaines". My niece is a fan of his because she's a swimmer.

This resulted in me filling out all the gift cards for my niece's presents "With Love, From Greg".

I also enlisted the kids in helping me with multiple manual labor projects around my parents' house. But I think they learned a lot about floor tile and cleaning so I don't feel too bad about that.

My final really bad thing I did was at dinner. I was doing my usual idiot act (my mom asked my nephew how he liked middle school and I followed up with a question about how he liked middle earth). Then my sister told a story about how their dog ate their gingerbread house and gingerbread train. I said "oh well, I guess you'll only have a ginger poop house this year" at which point my brother Steve started laughing hysterically which made me laugh and the kids laugh, and that joke wound up somewhere around the Egyptians and the great pyramid of poop at which point my mom took my dinner plate and asked me, in a rather menacing tone, if I was going to have a piece of pumpkin pie.

Perhaps it's funnier if you were there.

are you fist fucking me flights

Gosh, has it really been 20 days since I've written anything?

Yes, but that's because I've been traveling and running around with my hair on fire.

A bag of dicks I work with decided, on Thursday the 12th, that I needed to fly to San Antonio on Monday the 16th and then Atlanta on the 18th for work.

Grr. Any idea how hard it is to find cost effective flights and hotels with corporate rates on short notice? No idea? Well, it's really fucking hard.

Then there was the travel itself. I was unable to get a direct flight to San Antonio, or a direct flight from San Antonio to Atlanta. I had to route through Dallas. As you may be aware, Dallas has had some serious rain and flooding.

Monday I had estimated I would get to my hotel in San Antonio by 8 pm. It was actually more like 11:30 pm. I was in meetings all day and then working in the evening doing my real job.

The flight to Atlanta was a disaster. I got to Dallas, boarded my flight, and then we were delayed for an hour due to a hurricane in Atlanta. When we finally landed in Atlanta we were stuck on the runway for an hour waiting for a gate to open because all of the outbound flights were still at their gates because of the aforementioned tornado. When the gate finally opened we couldn't get to it because there was a back up of planes waiting to take off blocking the way.

I had estimated I would get to my hotel at 11 pm, and I had to be at work for a 6:30 am meeting. But I didn't get to the rental car place until 1130 and they had canceled my reservation because I was so late to pick up my car. I ran around to different counters until I finally procured a car from, I'm not making this up, EZ rental. Then I called my hotel to make sure they didn't cancel my room (they just had but reinstated my reservation).

I finally got to the hotel around 130 am. Then I overslept my 630 am meeting because I didn't realize turning the volume off for my phone calls would turn off the volume for alarms (say what you will about blackberry, I never had half the problems with their phones as I do with my android phone). I have never, in my entire career, overslept a meeting. I got into work at 7 am and no one said anything to me about missing the 630 meeting.

My dad said "why do you keep flying directly into the path of storms?" Why indeed.

Friday most people left work at noon because of the holiday but I was there until 7 pm. Then on the way to the hotel I was staying at in Atlanta (near the airport) I ran into a horrible traffic jam due to an accident. I was estimating my hotel arrival to be 9 pm, it was actually 1030 pm.

Ech.

The next day, Saturday, I was flying to Williamsburg to spend the week with my family for thanksgiving. I got up on time, I had clear skies, security wasn't too bad. I had a tight connection through Charlottesville and was texting my parents that I was worried about missing my connection. But instead my plane took off early from Atlanta and I didn't have to run (too fast) to my connecting gate.

Travel was going so smoothly compared to the past week's travel that I joked with my parents that they would probably lose my luggage.

Also, on the flight from Charlottesville to Williamsburg, a little girl in front of me (age 8) started to totally lose her shit. To the point where she was about to delay our departure. So I popped over the top of her seat and said "do you want to see pictures of my tiger?"

It turns out the little girl is autistic and her mom had forgotten to bring her favorite stuffed bear (her poor mom had 3 back packs full of toys and stuff, but had forgotten the bear, who could blame her). Anyway, seats were shifted around and I spent the 45 minute flight educating the little girl on tigers.

When we landed I held the little girl's hand so the mom could manage all the backpacks (the mom said "she never touches strangers" and I was like "she knows I have asperger's so we're in the same tribe") and we went to baggage claim where their bags were waiting (courtesy of American airlines who made their bags a priority). The mom wanted to wait to meet my mom, who was picking me up, to tell her what a big help I was (my mom's response was "um, she was???" because I'm usually winding kids up, not calming them down).

They then waited for my bag to come out on the baggage claim thingamajig because the autistic girl wanted to find it for me. After asking if every suitcase on the thingamajig was mine (there were like 60 suitcases) she got frustrated and said "take this one!" pointing to some random suitcase. I asked why that suitcase and she said "it's pretty" (it had flowers on it). Then she and her mom left.

They lost my luggage. It got routed to Orlando somehow.

I went to customer service to fill out a claim with my mom, with whom I was carrying on a conversation with as I filled out the claim.

I gave the dude my claim check, gave him my phone number and shit, and when he asked for an alternative number my mom gave him my parents' land line.

At which point the guy looked at me and said "do you know this woman?"

For fucking real.

My bag was supposed to be delivered at 7 pm Saturday night. My mom and I finally got it at 11 pm and we had to meet the driver part way. He had tried to deliver the bag at 7 but realized they gave him the wrong bag. Then he got stuck in traffic, and then lost, and all other kinds of shit. I gave him $10 for his efforts and he said "you are the only person today to tip me" and then spent the next 15 minutes telling me his life story.

Anyway, first world problems. I read a new yorker story today about a syrian refuge escaping to Sweden. I should not complain.

tarot class

On Saturday I took a 5 hour tarot reading class for fun. I wasn't sure what to expect but it did end up being a really fun class.

The class was taught by a woman named Rochelle who is a professional tarot card reader. She created a cool mat that can be used to easily do readings. And she taught me how to do a yes no question with the deck and how to predict the amount of time something will take to happen.

I explained to Rochelle how I do readings and she said she'd never heard of anyone doing readings the way I do (I hand the cards to the person I'm doing the reading for and tell them to shuffle the deck until the cards run smoothly while thinking about their question - I then take the cards back and turn over three cards, first one what the present state is, second one, what's required to transition to a future state, and third one, what does the future look like). Also, I never ask what the question is, I do the reading cold and then ask if the makes sense (I don't want the person I'm reading for to think that I'm gaming them). I have a 100% accuracy rate in my readings.

Rochelle didn't believe me and said I can't read friends because I'll influence the deck. I had her repeat a reading I had done on a friend (I had a pic of the reading on my phone so I could prove what cards I got). Rochelle repeated the reading and got the same cards I did.

So then she told me to do a reading on the woman sitting across from me. I did it my way and managed to correctly determine that her question was about starting a business. Then Rochelle told me to do a reading, but using her mat, on the woman sitting next to me. I did it Rochelle's way except that I insisted on not knowing the question until I finished the reading. I got that reading right too (it was about whether the woman should move).

By the end of class I had done a reading on everyone and got them all right (well, I correctly guessed what the question was and what the present state was, not sure how the future will turn out). Rochelle invited me to a fair she's doing next weekend and said I could be a professional psychic.

Yeah, I got a master's in engineering from Johns Hopkins so I could be a professional psychic.

Anyway, tarot is only meant to focus your attention on shit you need to change, not to predict the future. It shows you a potential future. Rochelle and I talked about that a lot in class.

Interestingly, one of the students did a reading on me and I asked about my children's book. She said I would get it published but it would take two years (we were practicing yes / no questions and figuring out how much time would pass before something happened). I hope that future is right...

halloween at the sanctuary

I picked up my friend C on Saturday around 5 PM and we headed out to Serenity Springs for our halloween tour. Neither of us knew what to expect. I had packed a ton of warm clothes but when we got to the sanctuary it was 62 degrees so I left my super warm sweatshirt in the car and decided to just wear my light down jacket.

Mistake. We had to wait until it got dark to start the tour and by the time darkness descended on us it was really fucking cold. But once you go into the sanctuary you have to stay with the tour. By the end of the tour everyone was freezing.

For the first part of the tour we stood at the entrance to the sanctuary. A lion started roaring and then the tigers joined in and then the bears. It was so loud I experienced literally that phrase "so loud I can't hear myself think". It was also as if the sound waves were physically hitting my body. It's hard to explain, perhaps it was some kind of cave man reaction.

Then we started walking through the sanctuary, which they had made into a haunted house of sorts. I was not expecting that. And the volunteers at the sanctuary kept popping out of the dark wearing scary masks. The first few times it scared the shit out of me. But then it was just funny. We all had headlamps because it was pitch black inside the sanctuary and we put them on red because it made the animals' eyes glow red. Pretty cool. As soon as we started walking through the cages the animals got eerily silent.

We would be standing between two cages looking into one cage when suddenly the animal in the cage behind us would jump against the fencing. If you ever want to know what it's like to get attacked by a tiger or lion or what ever in the dark without actually dying I suggest taking a night time sanctuary tour.

I was going to take pictures but it was too dark and my hands were almost frozen by the time the tour ended.

I dropped C off and went back to my hotel. My eyes were yoking me so I decided to read a magazine until I felt sleepy. But it turns out the room I stayed in has 50% non-working light bulbs. So I spent 2 hours re-configuring them for the optimal lighting that didn't hurt my eyes but allowed me to read with sufficient light. I also rearranged the lamps and moved the giant tv cabinet away from the wall and unplugged the tv so I could charge my two laptops and it was fucking hard to move the cabinet back and I almost broke the tv because it fell over while I was moving the cabinet and the wire for the cable box thingy got stuck under the cabinet and I couldn't get it out.

I wonder if they will change their policy so people with asperger's can't stay there.

Next weekend C is coming to Denver to hang out in the city. Should be fun!

more PINSM proliferation

My work boss A was driving to colorado springs to visit his daughter on thursday night. Usually he brings her a funny card but work has been hopping busy lately and he hadn't had time to get her one.

I suggested he make a PINSM for her because when she visited him here at work this summer she liked the PINSMs. He suggested that I make it instead because he said he's worse at drawing than I am (how is that even possible?).

She speaks spanish so I made this for her:

it took me a while playing with the spanish translator to find a spanish phrase that I could make a joke about - the bird is a spanish bird called a hoopoe - I picked it because of the way it looks and also because its call is "poopoopoo"

I wasn't sure what her reaction would be. It turns out not only did she love it, but she also brought it into school to show her fellow students and now her elementary school is doing post it note social media.

:D

growl-o-ween party

Last night my friend C and I went to the Serenity Springs growl-o-ween party, hosted at the home of the owners of Serenity Springs, Jeff and Julie. Maybe I shouldn't have been driving. I mistook C's neighbor's yard for a driveway and also went to the wrong house. C found me and the neighbors weren't mad that I parked in the middle of their yard.

The party was seriously in the middle of nowhere. I drove past the road I was supposed to turn on and had to turn around. When we found the road we realized we were entering a gated property. Then we drove around on random dirt roads until we found the house. It was HUGE (15,000 square feet of party space). We walked in and found ourselves in a room that had a swimming pool, complete with a slide, diving board, and of course a giant disco ball.

I want to live here!

The walls were stone and the ceiling was wood with intricate patterns. The place must have cost a fortune to build. It's on 40 acres of land and Jeff is going to build enclosures for some of the cats that are injured so they can recover before moving to the sanctuary.

We spent about an hour talking to Julie about the sanctuary. She's open to some of my marketing ideas and I'm going to talk to her about them in the future. She and her husband pay most of the sanctuary expenses. She also showed me pictures of two two week old white tigers. She hasn't advertised them yet. I think I'm going to adopt them for the kids of two of my work colleagues.

C did some Jamaican shots called bob marleys (the party was catered by a Jamaican couple) and then we wandered around the house. It has 8 bedrooms and 14 bathrooms. And art work all over the place.

coming around one corner we stumbled on a knight in shining armor - literally

C told me to stand next to him so she could take a picture and then we would pretend he was my boyfriend - I thought the picture was blurry because of my eyes but it turns out it was just a shitty picture - no offense C!

Then we hung out with Julie and Jeff's son and daughter in law in their bedroom which is almost as big as my house. They just moved to Colorado from South Carolina and we were telling them fun things to do downtown.

They were laughing at me because I was walking funny due to my depth perception going in and out. I kept putting in eye drops to see if that would help and the daughter in law said "I was once addicted to eye drops" and I said "Fuck, I guess I'll have to go to eye drops anonymous".

Then C and I wandered onto a cool deck but people were smoking up so we decided to check out the yard. Right behind the house is a huge gazebo that could easily hold 40 people. There was a little bridge going to the gazebo because it was surrounded by a moat. Yes, a moat.

It kind of reminded me of the drug dealer houses in Central America.

And then we left and went to a party that C's parents were attending. It was someone's birthday, his name is Pops, or that's what everyone called him. I got to meet C's mom and dad and they said C makes them laugh with stories of the crazy shit I do at work (I was like "but most of the time those things are HER idea!"). I left and C told me to text her when I got back to the hotel because she was worried about me but I was fine.

Text at 1 am this morning with C:

me: I should go to sleep but I'm wired tired. I was exhausted at the party but now I can't sleep. I watched tv for an hour. I think it jacked up my brain.
C: maybe that's why I am so jacked up, I have my tv on 24 / 7...have you been using your sleep mode on your fitbit?
me: yes, every morning I'm like "I had to have slept at least 6 hours!"  and then my fitbit is like "guess what loser, you only slept 5 hours, 4 times awake, 18 times restless" and I'm like "seriously, fitbit? why do you have to tell me that I was restless 18 times? fucking lie to me and maybe I'll sleep better."

Tonight we go to the sanctuary for a tour. Julie said if there's time we can hold the baby tigers. If not we're going to go back in two weeks to see them.

Chapter 15: The Croco-diamond Performs His Experiment

The giant man saw the ticky-tap-tap of the Italianis parked in the drive way of the farm. He worried. And when he saw the Italianis in the courtyard, chopping termaters with a large knife, he worried more.

The kangawrong, terrified at the sight of the Italianis with a large knife, felt its ears crinkle down the sides of its head. It rolled up the passenger window and ducked down onto the seat so none outside the ticky-tap-tap could see it.

“Ah good sir, so kind of you to join us at the farm! Sorry to keep you waiting. I trust you’ve brought everything for the plan?” said the croco-diamond, kalumping out of the hammock in the bed of the ticky-tap-tap.

“Eetsa all-a here!” said the Italianis, pointing with the large knife first to the chopped termaters and then to some green herbs.

“Then it’s time for the experiment.”

“Hold on a second,” said the giant man. “What experiment?”

“I have been doing some studies on curative foods for allergies. I stumbled upon a plantae, in the family lampshade, latin name SolanYum LycoParis. Some think it a fruit, and some a vegeta-”

“But what experiment?”

“An experiment to attempt to cure me of my cringle sensitivity using termaters, which have medicinal powers. And to try a new recipe of my own making. Now, where is my dear one to fetch me a cringle crisp?”

All turned towards the ticky-tap-tap and saw the tips of the kangawrong’s furry ears just visible at the bottom of the passenger window.

“Come out dear one! I have a surprise for you!”

The tips of the ears shook back and forth nononono.

“He’s afraid of the Italianis,” said the giant man.

“He won’t hurt you. Put down the knife,” said the croco-diamond to the Italianis. And then to the kangawrong, “In fact, the Italianis wants to apologize for yelling at you.”

“But-ah, it murshed-ah my-ah termaters!” said the Italianis.

“You, dear sir, must learn to forgive and forget. Especially as we are now business partners. And here, as promised, is my investment in the business.”

The croco-diamond handed the Italiani his d.Dornian ruby that had been given to him by a real King, the King having given the croco-diamond the ruby so he would leave the King’s kingdom. And though it was a constant reminder to the croco-diamond that sometimes his lectures and speeches irritated people to the point where they sent him away forever, he had never given a jewel to anyone before. It was a momentous occasion.

The giant man looked surprised.

And more surprised when the Italiani said, “You want-a me-ah to apologize-a to the biggie feetsie one?”

And the croco-diamond said, “Yes. Come, I’ll show you how it’s done. Dear one?” The croco-diamond walked up to the passenger window. “May I speak to you for a moment?”

The passenger window rolled down. Then the kangawrong’s ears popped up and pointed toward the croco-diamond.

“Can I see your face?”

The kangawrong raised its head so that just its eyes showed above the door.

“I am sorry.”

Ploink ploink went the eyes.

The croco-diamond turned toward the Italianis. “I will demonstrate again how to apologize.”

He turned to the giant man, bowed his head, and said, “I am sorry.”

#

The croco-diamond sat the kitchen table. Before him was a plate of cringle crisps covered with chopped termaters and herbs. All stood behind him nervously. The croco-diamond put the cringle crisp and termater mix in his mouth.

Crunch. Crunch.

“I...I...” The croco-diamond covered his face with his front feet. Everyone was silent. He removed his front feet from his face.

“I am cured!”

All clapped.

“And! I’ve invented a marvelous new topping! Which we will sell with the cringle crisps! We will sell lots! So the giant man will never worry about losing his farm again! And the new topping will also make money to pay back the Italianis for the murshed termaters!”

At that the kangawrong blushed but could not resist a fancy hop. However, it checked first that it wasn’t going to land on anything.

“Why, this is wonderful! This is the most wonderful thing in all of the worlds!” The giant man beamed at the croco-diamond.

“But there’s one more thing,” said the croco-diamond. He produced, from under the table, the new packaging that would soon contain the best and most crunchy snack in all of the worlds.

The kangawrong looked at the box, and its eyes went plink plink poink.

For there, on the front of the box, was a picture drawn by the croco-diamond and not too badly of the kangawrong. The lettering on the box said “Kanga Crisps.”

Beside the box, the croco-diamond placed a glass jar. On the front was a picture he had drawn of himself in a white chef’s hat, holding a spatula. All murmured their admiration of the glass jar which would soon contain the new topping.

“But what will you call the topping?” asked the giant man.

“I think I will call it...” The croco-diamond paused dramatically, and then said -

 “Salsa!”  

And the giant man laughed and the kangawrong clapped.

Because it was the silliest thing they had ever heard.

Chapter 14: All Learn From the Croco-diamond’s Song

“Gentleman, please!” said the croco-diamond, “Before you tooth him with your teeth, may I offer up a parable?”

“Pair a bowls? Them’s the thangs you et spaghetti in, right?” Asked Earl. “That feller talks funny but he’s always givin’ us things.”

“Parable. It’s a story whose purpose is to teach a lesson,” said the giant man. “I would mention also that it’s a VERY SHORT story,” he added, giving the croco-diamond a look.

“Very well then, the parable,” said the croco-diamond. “Once there was a - feller.”

The whitey biteys looked bored. One said, “That feller’s jest gonna talk some more stuff nobody unnerstans what he’s sayin’. I thought we was gettin’ some spaghetti.”

The croco-diamond had to keep their attention and make them understand.

So he sang his parable.

“Once there was a feller, he never was a yeller!”

On the wharf the kangawrong did drum jumps to accompany the croco-diamond.

“He would not get maaaaad

Even when others made him sad

Because they did things that were bad

He said the best way to live

Was always to forgiiiiive!”

The croco-diamond lifted the octopeu from his head and looked into his eyes, which were still covered, sort of, by the sunglass. The tentacles stretched but did not release the croco-diamond’s head.

“And if you’re bad or tell lies

You must always apologiiiiiize!”

“I think that feller is on ta somethin’ with his pair-a-bowls,” said the largest whitey bitey. “Anyways, now we got back our fine mittens. We don’t need no more bother with that crafty feller and doin’ things like to tooth him.”

The octopeu released the croco-diamond’s head and plopped with a ploop into the water. The croco-diamond poked him with a nail and whispered “Go ahead.”

“Here ees a leetle song from moi.

I le stole your le meetens

eet was very bad

I made every fone oh sooooo sad

I jeest fant to say I’m sorry

I am good now

plees don’t worry!”

All clapped and the octopeu bowed.

Earl said, “Aw shucks, pardner, we done forgave you your stealin’ all our fine mittens.”

And then the whitey biteys sang their own song for all who had brought the mittens:

Under the sea! Under the sea!

Won't you come see us under the sea?

We'll eat starfish crackers and jellyfish cheese!

So pleeeeeeeeeeeeeeeease

Won't you come see us under the sea?

Slowly their grey heads vanished into the water as the last line was being sung. Soon all that could be seen in the deep were the OrangeUGlad and BananaSafely mittens glowing in the water.

#

The kangawrong patted the giant man’s leg. When he bent down creak oof it handed him the beret and scarf it had knitted from the sock. The giant man put his hand in the water KERPLUNK and the octopeu took the gifts.

“Ees perfecto! Very stylee!” With his scarf, beret, and sunglass the octopeu looked very Freuch.

“Well, I am finally glad he wears red socks!” said the croco-diamond. “The color is very suitable to the octopeu’s complexion I think.”

#

After the whitey biteys and the octopeu departed the croco-diamond made a few more swim strokes in the water so all on the wharf could see how well he swam. Then he swam the length of the wharf, following the kangawrong and the giant man.

The sun dried the water from the croco-diamond’s back and he lay sleepily on the sand as the giant man pulled out a snack for all to eat.

“Given your song, is there anything you’d like to say to us?” he asked the croco-diamond, handing him a plate of pretsicles.

“Yes, yes there is.” The croco-diamond put his plate of pretsicles down in the sand and looked at all with a serious expression.

“I think my song was better. I have much more range than the octopeu.” He began to hum dee dee deetle deeeeeeeeeeeeeeee.

“Anything else?”

“Hm,” thought the croco-diamond, “I wanted to tell you about what happened on my mission but thought I should wait until dinner...dinner...Oh dear, I’d forgotten!”

The croco-diamond quickly dumped his plate of pretsicles into his mouth and hurriedly crunched them. He indicated to the kangawrong and the giant man by madly flapping his front feet that they should finish their snacks as well.

“In all the excitement of the mission I forgot about THE experiment! We must return home IMMEDIATELY! He is going to be waiting...”

“Oh no,” said the giant man. “What now?”

crack and cracked

My skylight got cracked somehow. Annoying.

I had to wait a week to go up and look at it because of my eyes - in that time it got bigger

I caulked it as advised by the internet - it hasn't gotten worse and isn't leaking

other bad things we did

A few other pranks that my friend C and I did at work...

There was a guy we don't like particularly who talks really loud and who thinks all women are maids. We unscrewed some screws in his chair and when he sat in it it toppled over.

We also put things in his work shoes (he goes running after work so leaves his shoes in his cube). Those things include a gummi worm, a jolly rancher, staples, a paper clip, and a slightly chewed piece of gum. He never seemed to notice. Then one morning he was like "whoa, I just found the oddest thing in my shoe!" C and I were like "oh shit!" but it turns out a tiny bear statue that C had on top of her flat screen monitor had fallen off the monitor and into his shoe. He gave it back to C and suggested she put it somewhere else so it wouldn't fall in his shoe again.

Is it possible to die laughing? Probably. Because we almost did.

Chapter 13: The Whitey Biteys Confront The Crafty Feller

The croco-diamond surfaced dramatically, taking in a deep breath of air and blowing large amounts of water out of his snout.

“I am ALIVE! Though I have been gone for so long, I have returned, and returned victorious!”

“Five minutes you’ve been gone, I’d say, from the sun,” offered the giant man helpfully from the wharf.

“Time passes more slowly under water because of...lack of gravity,” said the croco-diamond.

“We are glad you’ve returned!” said the giant man, and the kangawrong did a special twirly hop, slap hop, and pop hop in celebration.

“My dear, dear friends. I...knew you would miss me!” The croco-diamonds eyes filled once again with tears. “As for my victory...”

“You got the mittens back?” Asked the giant man. He sounded proud of the croco-diamond.

“I did. But. There is still...I have a special mission...for you.” He looked at the kangawrong, who stopped doing pop hops. Its ears went flunk down to the side of its head. It clasped its hands together and wriggled its fingers nervously.

“Have you...your knitting needles?”

The kangawrong produced them from its fedora.

“And have we any yarn?”

The two on the wharf looked around them. Finally the giant man said “My socks could be made into yarn.”

“Then forthwith and post haste! A beret and a scarf for the crafty feller!”

At which mention the octopeu popped up near the croco-diamond and cried, “Eye doan like ziss bright light!”

“Measurements dear fellow. We want to be accurate.” He patted the octopeu on the head quish Quush.

“But eets hurt me le blinkers!”

The croco-diamond gave the giant man a look that said the whining isn’t going to stop anytime soon with this feller. So the giant man departed to the ticky-tap-tap and returned with the lens from a pair of his sunglasses and a rubber band.

Using one of the kangawrong’s knitting needles he poked two holes in the lens and then threaded the rubber band through.

He handed the lens to the croco-diamond, who helped the octopeu put it on.

“Le glassee es verrry styleesh!”

The octopeu made a few minor adjustments of the lens with his tentacles and forgot all about being upset.

When suddenly.

A large fin rose menacingly out of the water.

Followed by another large fin.

And six more.

The rotund head of the largest whitey bitey surfaced, its black eyes gleaming. Next appeared the head of Evett, who smiled threateningly with the most teeth in all of the worlds.

“Oh la troub-lee!” screamed the octopeu.

It wrapped its tentacles around the croco-diamond, bopping him in the head with the mittens and klonking its sunglass into one of the croco-diamond’s teeth. A mitten fell off in the struggle and a tentacle went up the croco-diamond’s nostril.

“Phht! Phhhch! Unhand me you octo-hander!”

The croco-diamond tried to shake off the octopeu but its tentacles just wrapped more tightly around him. All the mittens fell off in the struggle.

When next he could see (the octopeu had squoshed himself over the croco-diamond’s eyes) bleu ribbons floated everywhere like broken branches. And all the whitey biteys were mitted.

They glared at the octopeu.

“Evett, y’all shore was right ‘bout that bein’ the crafty feller.” The largest whitey bitey pointed a mitted fin at the croco-diamond. “He done thinks we’s gonna be fooled by that there dee-skies.”

“That there’s the worst dee-skies I done seen out of alla the dee-skies-is in all the worlds,” said Evett. “Pretendin’ ta be a crocker-die-min hat. Everybody know that they don’t wear no hats.”

“Well, whatcha boys thankin’ we gonna do with that there crafty feller?” asked the largest whitey bitey.

They swam closer to the croco-diamond, who still had the octopeu perched on his head.

The lots of sharp teeth were very close indeed.

Chapter 12: Disguised, He Attempts To Out craft The Crafty Feller

“Hand me a mitten, forthwith and post haste!” The kangawrong gave the croco-diamond the mitten it had been holding.

“Gentlemen, to the cave!”

The croco-diamond leaped into the air with the mitten wrapped in his tail. He touched his front feet to his back feet, and then gracefully executed his dive into the water. The whitey biteys were impressed as he barely made a splash.

They swam down into the cool water, which was at first a light green, then a dark green, then a dark blue. Having been away from the water for so long the croco-diamond was quite pleased with his swimming.

He was also afraid.

After some time, they arrived at a rocky wall at the base of what was indeed a cave. It was dark. And scary. Just as the croco-diamond had imagined.

“Mostly that crafty feller’s in there, when he’s not out falootin’ in the water stealin’ up everybody’s stuff like mittens,” said Evett, pointing with his fin at the cave.

The croco-diamond faced the whitey biteys, trying to look brave.

“Quickly, and as according to plan, I will begin the implementation as outlined and sketched and prepped previously and prior to our descent to this chasm.”

“That feller don’t never talk no sense. Whatcha think we’s supposed to do that he jest said?” asked Earl.

The croco-diamond waved away the whitey biteys with his front foot, dismissing them.

As the whitey bitey swam away he pulled the mitten over his snout and head glad none could see how ridiculous he looked. He planned, and not because he was afraid, to lure the octopeu out of the cave by pretending to be a mitten.

He let his body float gently to the bottom of the sea floor.

He waited.

And waited.

Waiting with his head in a mitten was boring. Surely an hour had past? A day, at least, maybe a week. His stomach was hungry and the croco-diamond had to squeeze it with his hands so it wouldn’t let out a grumble and give his ruse away. 

He suddenly thought of the kangawrong, who was finally gaining weight. He thought of how he had taken its cringle crisps for himself even when he was sure that the kangawrong was the one who secretly made him gifts like his jewel brush and the crutches. And how because of him it had hurt its feet and turned purple in the colossal cringle crisp caper. And worse, how he had tried to send the kangawrong instead of himself on this very dangerous mission.

He thought also of the giant man, so kind, who had taken him in when no one else would have him, even the other croco-diamonds who to be honest had kicked him out of the swamp. The giant man never yelled at him though the croco-diamond did the most horrible things like sneak eating all the cringle crisps and blaming the clouds.

The croco-diamond was suddenly so sad that tears might have fallen from his eyes. It was hard to tell since he was under water.

And what would happen to his poor beloved friends if he never returned from this dangerous mission? The giant man would surely go bankrupt and lose his farm. He was, to be honest, terrible at picking cringle roots and marketing.

The kangawrong would never have a bath again and would become matted, stinky, and so depressed that it would never make a fancy hop again.

And maybe the giant man would forget his promise to rename the cringle crisps to croco-diamond crisps, which is what the croco-diamond wanted more than anything in all of the worlds.

Everything was so terrible to contemplate that the croco-diamond began to cry inside the mitten. He shook with sobs, sure that this was the end for himself and for his dear friends.

“Ooh la, ees zees a meeten? A weeping meeten?”

The croco-diamond quickly wiped the snivel from his snout on the inside of the mitten and then peeped out of a hole between two stitches in the yarn. The crafty feller had arrived. 

The croco-diamond saw a black body, with two large tired eyes. Eight tentacles curled around the body, floating gracefully in the water. At the end of each tentacle was an oversized mitten. The octopeu had fastened the ends of the mittens with bleu ribbons tied with bows that, presumably, kept them from falling off his tentacles because the mittens were way too big.

The croco-diamond found the octopeu so ridiculous that he unexpectedly laughed. SNICKER SNICK.

“Ooh la, now zee meeten, eet zuddenly make a hee hee?”

The octopeu glared at the mitten.

“Wat ees thees ha weeth zees meeten?”

“My dear sir, I am quite sorry,” said the croco-diamond, from inside the mitten. “It’s just that you - you look ridiculous! Those bows don’t even match! Bleu with OrangeUGlad and BananaSafely? Ha ha! And I’d always read that the Freuch were so stylish.”

“Ooh, but I am quite zee styley! You critique moi, monsieur meeten? You are zust a yarn! And I am a Freuch! I spit on you! You yarn!”

The octopeu produced an inky substance that floated s  l   o    w     l    y toward the croco-diamond.

“I - I apologize, dear sir. I meant no ill will. I suppose I am - just - jealous. Where ever did you get those fine mittens?”

“Ay stoled zem from zee le whitey biteys! Zay do not deserve zees fine-airy.” The octopeu then paused, suspicious. “Zoe, zee meeten...ees je-aH-lous of...my meetens? How ees zees possible?”

The croco-diamond dashingly pulled the mitten from his head.

“Because I am in fact NOT a mitten! And you will unmit yourself or I will! I will! let me think a moment... Unravel you!”

With that the croco-diamond displayed his gleaming white gold teeth and his shiny long nails. He jumped to his hind feet and sucked in his stomach.

“WUF! THE MITTENS, SIR!”

The octopeu began to cry.

“Ooh wah wah! You take me meetens? And hee hee at my bows? No fone breeng to me gefts! Jus gefting to zee le whitey biteys!” Its eight tentacles covered its eyes. “Boo hoo hoooo!”

“You are a crybaby! Indeed! You steal things and then think you don’t need to give them back! You are a selfish creature! And look so ridiculous in those mittens!”

The octopeu sobbed even louder. “Oh, oh! No fone loafes me!”

The croco-diamond suddenly felt bad. He reached out his front foot and patted the octopeu on his soft head squish squoosh sqush.

“Dear sir please, let’s be calm. And please, please don’t cry anymore.”

“Because it’s annoying,” he couldn’t help to say, but he said it quietly.

The octopeu attempted to stop crying with a snuffle and a wuffle.

Fuffle fuffle.

He finally stopped and looked expectantly at the croco-diamond.

Who had to think quick what to do next because this wasn’t in the plan.

He finally said, “If I made be so bold, I would like to propose a solution to this situation. Which, if you will agree to said solution, loses you the mittens, but gains you - a gift.”

The octopeu blinked his tired eyes. Its mitted tentacles swirled around it.

“You geeve me a le geft?” It finally asked, rubbing away the last tear.

“Yes but, post haste, we must go! To the surface! Le quickly!”

The croco-diamond, even in a situation, couldn’t help but show off that he knew some Freuch.