Thursday, Aug. 12, 2004 - 11:37 a.m.
Greetings,
Well, the cardboard Ghiardelli cable car filled with chocolate squares that I brought back as an office gift from vacation is nearly gone. Everyone on the floor basically has been by to squeal with delight and sample some chocolate. Nothing truly spells “vacation over” better than the empty box of chocolate you brought back as a gift, I suppose.
However, I’m finding it excessively hard to swing back into the groove of actual work. I can’t quite seem to buckle down the way I told myself I would back on Sunday afternoon when I realized I only had a precious few hours of vacation left.
Next day off is Labor Day and then after that I don’t get any time until Thanksgiving.
But enough of that sort of whining.
There’s really not much to report in my life at the moment. New Orleans has seemed to have successfully dodged both hurricanes which are now aimed at Florida.
Speaking of Florida, I am going there for New Year’s Eve. Yes, I know I’ve mentioned this before in my journal, but I’m big on the free association thing and my writing tends to ramble all over hell and back anyway, so what the fuck. What’s the big deal? :)
Ken Doll is contemplating journeying to New Orleans for New Year’s Eve this year. Yes, I know you’ve all heard this one before too and it hasn’t happened yet, so of course I’m not holding my breath. He has put in for the time off, but he won’t come unless Monkey has a steady job because, the gods forbid he, Ken Doll, go on vacation when he’s only got $10,000 or so dollars sitting in his savings account. Aye carumba, he might spend as much as $300 or $400 whole dollars if he came to New Orleans! And Monkey has NO JOB!
Yeah, I’m not bitter or cynical or anything. Not me.
Tonight Thomas and I are going to aeronfae’s for cheeseburgers and conversation. We haven’t seen him in quite some time, probably at least a month. We have to stop at Home Depot on the way to picket ah up some wire or something like that for the weed whacker. Thomas plans to hack the shit out of the jungle that is our backyard one last time and then we’re hiring somebody to come do it every couple of weeks like everyone else on the block appears to be doing. It has become monstrously apparent that we are not the gardening type, nor do we take well to strenuous outdoor activity in the brutal, blistering hot sun. Or any other type of weather for that matter either come to think of it.
One of the great philosophers once wrote, “Know Thyself” and I would append to that, “Know Thyself and Thy Yardwork Aversions and Hire Thyself a Gardener.”
I shudder to think of Thomas and I transported back to the 50s when everyone did their own lawns and baked cookies and drank lemonade on front porches with the neighbors as I’ve seen in many a Twilight Zone episode.
Thomas and I would be branded the aliens from outer space in a heartbeat I’m sure.
“Look, see that couple over there! He never mows the lawn and when’s the last time she ever baked anything? They’re…they’re… they’re…UNNATURAL!”
(Cue the howling mob brandishing golf clubs, hammers and rolling pins.)
Tomorrow I am working, goddamnit, but it also happens to be Friday the 13th. Those of you who know me also probably know what I am going to be doing tomorrow night after work.
I’ll give you a few brief seconds to mull things over and take a stab at it.
La la la.
Tra la la.
La la.
Time’s up.
If you guessed that I would be (in no particular order), taking a bubble bath, eating Hamburger Helper and watching one of the Friday the 13th movies, why if this wasn’t the Internet and we were face to face, I’d give you a prize.
Yes, that’s right, it’s Caftan Night and since it’s Friday the 13th, I will be watching one of the Jason movies. Since it’s summer, I am going with the first one definitely. (Yes, I know they are all set in the summer, but shut up. This is my world. My paradigm! The first one really makes me think of summer the most, okay??)
If I have time I’ll plug in the second one as well. Even though I generally hate Amy Steel’s pompous ass boyfriend, Paul, lately he’s been growing on me. Maybe he’s not so damn bad after all, just a bit annoying. I mean the way he tells that asshole cop off and “punishes’ the two wandering campers who went to Camp Blood on dare by denying them seconds on dessert, ah, that was nice. But the way he gives Amy Steel a hard time when she arrives late to the campground because of her crappy old Volkswagen Beetle, not so nice.
Some of my favorite moments of the first Friday the 13th are:
When Kevin Bacon says, “Emergency generator” and the other campers make fun of him. Hee hee.
The twilight thunderstorm scene when Kevin Bacon and his doomed girlfriend are making their way to their cabin for some sex and death. The quality of light always affects me.
When the trucker drops Annie, the doomed cook, off at the crossroads and there’s a cemetery in the background. Yum.
The slickers. Oh, the slickers. The one Kevin Bacon’s doomed girlfriend wears when she runs off to pee in the bathroom especially.
The scene where Kevin Bacon’s girlfriend pretends to be Katharine Hepburn, “Lizzie, Lizzie I said, you’ll never be pretty…”
The strip Monopoly game.
The way the nails stick out of the mouth of the Girl Who Lives and she has to talk around them when she’s fixing the gutters and Steve Christie is trying to talk her into bed.
When Steve Christie looks at the drawing she drew of him and says, “Do I really look like that?” and she says, “You did last night!”
Everything about the swimming in the lake part. Love that part.
When Steve’s in the diner “flirting” with that incredibly horridly fascinating waitress with the booming voice.
When the dumb cop says, “Can it, Cochise!” to the prankster camper who is running around in nothing but an Indian headdress and a loincloth made of his tee shirt.
Right now I’m bothered because I can’t remember hardly any of their names and I’ve watched the movie about 150 times.
Steve Christie is the owner. He looks just like the father of the kids I used to babysit when I was in high school. Sort of sleazy like he was too.
Alice was the Girl Who Lives
Neddie was the jokester.
Annie was the hitchhiking camper who was going to be cook.
But I can’t remember Kevin Bacon’s character or his girlfriend’s name or the name of the girl who initiated the strip Monopoly game. Or the guitar playing camper that Alice had the crush on.
I do remember Jason and Mrs. Voorhees though. I’m not that far gone.
But what the hell do I care? They’re all meat for the butcher’s block anyway, the black hearted sinning Satan’s spawn! I mean they swear! They drink! They smoke pot! They FUCK! They DESERVE TO DIE!
Today is misterjohn’s last day at the home he has lived in since he moved to jolleye olde Englande two years ago. He and Wifey Jules bought a house and are moving tomorrow. On Friday the 13th! Jawhn, if you two have any sort of semblance of order to your new place tomorrow night, (that is, if the VCR is plugged in and you can see the television over the piles of boxes), you should watch one of the Friday the 13th movies. Of course I know you have the whole series in your collection. You keep them right next to Bridget Jones Diary and Aliens, right? ;)
Anyway, good luck to you both and I expect to hear about the whole process soon in your LJ.
I guess I should really clear some of the clutter (and work) off my desk now. I’ve been saying I would do this since Monday and the clutter (and work) has only gotten worse since.
Until next time,
Olrun
