Charly’s
Angles
By
Mark Wilson
Charly is a work of fiction based on real people and real thoughts. He’s a combination of myself and some other friends of mine, mostly Aaron Banyai. The events and experiences really happen to some degree or other and are interwoven into one piece. The thoughts and opinions expressed are again a mish mash of thoughts expressed from myself and many other people.
Fiction: truth based on a lie- Stephen King
Charly’s Angles Vol. ? Issue ?
Charly’s Angles for Dummies
“Out of Snow You can’t make Cheese Cake” -Jewish Proverb
FOC INTRO
If your getting this letter, it means we’ve meet somewhere, struck up a conversation, and hit it off well enough for us to exchange address (e-mail or snail). And that automatically makes you a F.O.C. (Friend of Chuck). And you will now receive the Friends of Chuck newsletter “Charly’s Angles”. It highlights the current and up to date drama of my life either in the real world or in the world of my inner mind.
“You probably already realize this, but if you could make money doing something like this, Charly would be great at it. How, I'm not sure. I know that AOL pays people to run chat rooms and stuff and keep people interested. This type of stuff is clearly Charly’s calling, but limiting it to his friends will not make him much money.” –Eddie Blake
What’s In CA?
It includes a bunch of stories, (kinda, the best-of out of my files), idea’s, (entertaining and interesting according to me anyway), and then there are the thoughts (the things I or others are thinking about). Sometimes the line is blurred as to where my mind begins and those of my friends begin. Any thoughts I find interesting, fascinating, wacky, challenging, “pure, pleasing,
Commendable, excellent, or praise worthy”, I will give you to think about.” (1) Thoughts are often best stated in quotes. I love [quotations, puns, wit, and jokes], and often integrate them into my letters. Even my friends get quoted (quite a bit actually). They come from all the wasted time spent hours on end searching the Internet when I could be out feeding the poor or visiting the elderly. They come from countless hours, roaming around the library and bookstores when I could be sitting down using my talents to write that hit novel. And of course they come from other people’s heads and mine. “It is a joy to find thoughts I might have beautifully expressed with much authority by someone recognizably wiser than myself.” (2)
To save space I decided not to quote each and every person I found. I have so much good stuff; all my computer files (room, bookcases, life) are a little disorderly and cluttered. “One of the advantages of being disorderly is that one is constantly making exciting discoveries.” (3) If a cluttered desk is characteristic of a cluttered mind, what does an empty desk mean? So I stole some ideas and thoughts. “Bad artists copy. Great artists steal.” (4) To steal ideas from one person is plagiarism; to steal from many is research. But I'm using my creativity and imagination to create these pieces of writing which could wine up being read one day much like the “The Diary of Anne Frank’. “The secret to creativity is knowing how to hide your sources.” (5) ) “My letter’s are like water; those of the great geniuses are wine. (Fortunately) Everybody drinks water.” (6) It is good though. Lots of witty wit. (sounds like a cool name for some character)
OBJECTIONS OF the copyed letter format…(+ tips on communication)
I WANT A PERSONAL LETTER, NOT SOMETHING COPYED.
One of the #1 Complaints I get with CA is that one. Here are my main answers to that cry.
Most people I write to don’t write to me. This does not apply to YOU who do, so don’t say I said You never write cause I didn’t mean YOU. Some of them when they do write say they don’t, because they want a personal letter. If someone doesn’t write to me, I have nothing to say to that person on a personal level. WHY? Because our conversation has stopped. There is no current dialogue so I don’t know what’s going on in their life so I can comment on it. Often times too, I don’t have enough past experiences of us together or its been so long since we’ve had an experience together or I don’t know enough about that person based on low conversation to bring personal things up to them.
What I have to say to one person about my life, I can say to all. It doesn’t make sense to write to Kristin, tell her about my brand new job and then write a new letter to Dave and tell him about my brand new job. Write it once, copy, & give it to everybody who’s interested in my life. I even do it for MOM & DAD. It’s not as impersonal as it seems. I care enough to update people about my life and send them mail. I usually write to ‘YOU’ or ‘Friend’. Anyone who receives the letter should know that they fit one of those terms, thus it becomes personal. When I do have something to say personally to an individual I will say it. That usually happens when people actually write to me and tell me of their life, comment on my letter, or ask me a question. If I throw the ball it has to be thrown back to make the conversation work.
Seeing I try to keep in touch with so many people, I make a uniformed letter to save TIME. It takes a lot o time just to make one letter to send it out to many people. First I have to make a current list of all those whom I’m currently in contact with. This is something in which my close friends find amusing and comical. But if it wasn’t for the CHUCK UP LIST, some people who are lonely and depressed wouldn’t get mail except from the Credit Card Company. I then have to go down to the library, think of what to write. Write it. Edit it. Correct it. Then it is ready to go out to all those who have e-mail. That’s a lengthy process in which I probably left out some details. THEN, for all those who have not caught up to modern times, I have to print ‘Charly’s Angle’s’ out, Drive to the copy place, make copies, get envelopes, address them, print my return address on them with my handy dandy little printer (which I lost for awhile, which added more time to the already lengthy process) lick the envelopes, (ick) go down to the post office, get stamps, and drop them in the slot. If I made time to write everyone I know a personal letter, with any depth or meaning, I wouldn’t keep in touch with 2 many people.
THE LETTERS ARE 2 LONG
“Sometimes the letters are long because I lacked the time to make them shorter.” (7)
I CAN’T READ YOUR LETTERS BECAUSE THE SPELLING (& sometimes grammer) ARE SO BAD IT EMBARACES ME.
You can usually be yourself in front of your friends. Walk around in shabby cloths, hair uncombed est. Sending letters out with bad spelling is equivalent to that. But AGAIN. If I sat and really perfected my letters, I would never get them done and delivered. Often times the library closes too early for me to polish my CA’s so they shine bright enough to see your face in. So If any thing is mispelled, please don't hold it against me. Hookt On Fonicks Werked Four Me!
“Charlys a good writer but here is some writing advice for him and for any other inspiring young writers. You should always read over what you write at least once before you send it. Doing that prevents making you look like a goof every time you send a letter. Just correct silly typos and poorly written stuff. You'll catch it when you read it to yourself. Or don't. See if I care.”
–Lewis
I try and use good English. “But "English - Who needs that? I'm never going to England!" (8) But still... Ever wonder, “Why "abbreviation" is such a long word?” and “What's another word for "thesaurus"? If a word in the dictionary were misspelled, how would we know?” (9) If Yoda so clever is, why together a sentence can not he put?
“Seriously I can spell Tuesday. You can't help respecting anybody who can spell TUESDAY, even if he doesn't spell it right; but spelling isn't everything. There are days when spelling Tuesday simply doesn't count.” (10) I could always spell the words I can't spell in invisible ink or invisible type. But how could I then tell when and if I ran out of invisible ink (these refers to the snail mail crowd)? I'd explain it to you, but your brain would explode. And you would dead, Ohh. Excuse me, electroencephalographically challenged. Okay lots of thought to be brought to your mind in the coming letters of my life, which actually my way of keeping a journal. Ever stop to think, and forget to start again? Anyone lost in thought or is it unfamiliar territory? If so think on and will find a map in ‘Charly’s Angles’. Probably enclosed will be some classic back issues.
Read 'em. Collect 'em. Trade 'em.
CHARLY
NOTES TO QUOTE
1.Phil. 4:8 6. Mark Twain
2.Marlene Dictrich 7. MT or Pascal
3. Winnie the Pooh 8. Homer Simpson
4. Picasso 9. Steven Wright
5. Einstein 10. Winnie the Pooh
My friend Charly is awesome. Did you know that? He's caring and gentle and genuine and honest and innocent. He's the ONLY male that I know that is as unassuming as he is with women. I know that he has hormones like the rest of us, but when he meets people, he meets people, whether they're male or female. -Lewis
Charly’s Angles September 97
Don't stop enjoying life because you fear pain. That's why people get old so fast. "Oh, I can't do that, i'd get too sore." Hey, pain comes with fun. It's a trade-off. Get of your butt, sissy!
-Eddieism
LEAF THE FIRE ALONE.
HELLO ALL YOU CHUCKSTERS
My first big job out of college (the Gas Station) ended on a sad note the other day when I was fired. FIRED. My first Job Fire. I don’t want to get into the story of why I’m working at a Gas Station when I have a degree in Television Production. It was slow. I was by myself. I was tired. It was hot. I fell asleep. I must say the look on the owner’s face was pretty funny. I can’t describe it in words. I’ll miss working with Manny, the old man who’s actually worked at the Gas Station for 45 years
(I kid you not). It’s now time to move on and find another job. AND YES, I’ll begin to look for a job in my field, but first something to buy food with (even though mom buys all my food for me) so I don’t have to resort to always going throw garbage bins, which I actually do quite a bit. “OHHHH THAT”S GROSS”, say. Let me explain.
I was walking around Fitchburg. It was gloomy and dark. I thought that it might rain, mostly cause everyone said ‘it's gonna rain’. I don't have an umbrella, which sucks when you’re walking around in the rain. I happen to walk by a trashcan and sticking up right in plain view was an umbrella. It had sort of a broken handle, which was probably why it was thrown away. But it worked fine. So, I picked it up and dropped it in my bag. People throw away lots of stuff you can use. If you want to pay for it, feel free to pay for it. But people throw away a lot of stuff that's useful. It's hard to describe to someone. It sounds disgusting and horrible. When you say you can get food out of a dumpster, the only thing people can imagine is the crap they throw out at home. Pizza crusts and 1/2 eaten pasta. They forget that grocery stores throw out fully packaged food. Like a day over due or something like that, which is perfectly fine.
There's a lot of things that companies throw out that people don't realize. One time I was temping at this sports store and they threw out boxes of shoes. I loved wearing the sneakers I got then, Partly because I got them for free, but mostly because when I mentioned dumpster diving and people would ask why I want other people's garbage, I would point to my shoes and tell them that I got them out of a dumpster. That happened more often than you might think. People think that dumpsters are dirty, nasty smelling things. And some are, but mostly people throw out cardboard boxes and packaging. There's nothing in dumpsters pretty much but Styrofoam and cardboard. When I grabbed that umbrella, I didn't mind taking it out of a trashcan. I got a free umbrella, so there you go. Also, it came in handy when a couple of cute girls were strained in the rain looking for a dry place to stand. Enter me with the umbrella.
Well I am sort of sad, having gone through my first Job Fire, but that doesn’t compare with another fire story that happen to me when I was a little kid. I'm probably in about 7th grade or so. I was a little loner freak in 7th grade. I was kinna a maniac in 7th grade as most of us were. I remember clearly gathering all my little G.I. Joes up and going outside. I was gonna light the leaves on fire. I asked my mom how much longer till lunch and she said 10 min. Out of the whole event that is what I remembered the most because that was long enough for me to go outside and play with fire.
I go outside and am sitting under this big tree that is next to the street. There is all these dry leaves and I am lighting them on fire, playing with my GI Joes.
My friends Anthony and Bobby come over. Were hanging out, were lighting fires. Tony brings a new kid with him named Justin. Justin is a kid that I would get to know latter and this was the first time I ever meet him. We get introduced and I look up at him with a match and I say "I LOVE FIRE!" That was his first impression of me for the rest of his life.
We throw a rock on the leaves. But this time it blew the leaves underneath the rock and they land on other leaves. Lighting them on fire. This is fall by the way, lots of nice dry leaves on the ground by this time. It starts spreading, catching the other leaves on fire. So I think I can smother it by showering it with leaves. Of course it only fueled the fire with dry leaves. Anthony runs inside and I am madly trying to stomp this flame out. Dancing in a ring of fire, which is growing steadily. This car drives by and of course the occupants of the car are looking at this crazed kid dancing in fire. They had a look like, "does that exist? Is that a kid dancing in fire?" They only get to see it for an instance as they drive by. It starts to be a pretty big circle. The flames as I remember them, were about a foot high, cause burning leaves can burn pretty quickly. The ring of fire got to be a good 10-15 feet wide. It did get significant for a kid dancing in fire.
Anthony goes in and says, "Mr. Banyai, Mr. Banyai." And my dad says, "Hold on a second Pete, I'm talking to somebody."
So Anthony stands there and waits. That's the best part. So I'm outside trying to stomp this flame out, horribly unsuccessfully. Finally my dad says "O.K. Anthony what is it?" "Aw Mr. Banyai your lawn is on fire." He runs outside and grabs a fire extinguisher along the way. He runs outside and aims it at the fire and pulls the little trigger and the fire extinguisher is empty. So he runs back inside and gets the another fire extinguisher in the shed. He ran out and put it out. The fire extinguisher works really well by the way. Many of my GI Joes died that day to a melty gooey death. Bobby’s bicycle tire got melted too.
About this time the fire trucks started to arrive. One of these crazy people driving by thought to call the fire fighters. At this point I got dragged inside by my ear. I never really got to see the full-scale grand grandeur that is the Fitchburg volunteer fire dept. They filled our driveway; we have a huge driveway, with fire trucks including this ladder truck. It was sitting around there and every time they saw a little thing of smoke, they would dose it with massive amounts of water. I wish I could have seen that.
I sat on the couch just knowing that I was dead. Stomach in Knott’s. I was dead Dead! The fire chief comes to the door. My dad opens it. "Now the boy who did this", he knew I was dead, he knew I was dead dead, he was trying to get a little bit of mercy, "I think we should probably try to understand the boy, I know that he didn't mean to start the fire, maybe you should go easy on him." My dad was probably freaking out and shouting outside. I actually got off fairly lightly, looking back. I was spanked quite a bit. And was forbidden to see Anthony, Bobby and Justin for 2 weeks to a month or something like that. I actually obeyed because I was an obedient little tyke and wanted to fulfill the forth commandment honoring mother and father. Looking back I got off pretty easy and of course and fairly soon after 6 months to a year I was playing with fire again.
Well that’s this week’s update on my life. What spark of interest is happening in all of your lives? Charly
The embarrassing thing is the salad dressing is out grossing my films- Paul Newman
Charly’s Angles October 97
If you go flying back through time and you see somebody else flying forward into the future, it’s probably best to avoid eye contact. –Jack Handy
JUMP START
I got a job at comic book shop, selling comics. That’s my big job break into entertainment. Speaking of BREAK, my car Broke down on John Fitch Highway. The tow truck guy came and towed it away. They took it to the car doctor who pronounced it DOA. Actually if I had a real job working in the media I might have been able to fix it. The engine just wore out or something. But alas it is not the first or probably the last car that will die in my possession. In High School I was borrowing my mom' s car one time and was driving around for quite a while. And I never checked the oil. I never filled up the oil. Even though, there was an oil thing on the dashboard I never looked at it. It ran out of oil. The engine seized up, and shrewd it self.
So I got a new car from Juma, well my parents actually did, and I'm paying them back. (HA they say) It's frustrating, because I borrowed it from her so I could drive it around and look at it and see if I liked it. And a couple of days later she says, "Soo am I gonna get it back?"
It had been in her driveway for months doing absolutely nothing. She wasn't advertising; she wasn't doing anything! It was just sitting there. I had position of it for two days and she's freaking out. 'Who cares.” It's not going to do anything with her having it, as opposed to me having it. I wasn't even driving it around that much.
Finally I decide to buy it. I call her up and say, "I'm gonna buy it" and she says "Great". Then she went on vacation, on a business trip to Washington D.C. So she couldn’t give me the title or anything. So I actually couldn't get it. I still didn't have the car even though I had the car. So a few days ago she comes back and gives my mom the title and she pays her and everything. And I went to register it and I couldn't because she put whiteout on the title because she screwed a date up. So they wouldn't accept it. So they had to get this letter notarized which is a pain in the butt. Now I have everything but now the register is closed. I couldn't get out on Friday because I had a doctor’s appointment, which lasted all day. And I didn't get there before 12 on Saturday, like I even knew they closed at 12. Of course they’re closed Monday because it's Columbus Day. Well that’s the somewhat small details of my life. The library closes soon and I have to get this printed out. Till next time.
Charly
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An EDDIE IDEA
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If we could send a guy to the moon with a huge blowtorch or something, we could melt the
surface of the moon into glass, and it would reflect more light at night, making it daytime
24 hours a day. Granted we'd all go crazy and stuff, but who cares. We'd save on our
electric bill. The electric company would hate that idea.
Parents keep saying that they want their kids to have the things that they didn't have. But, kids do have the things that they didn't have. We have color TV's and computers and cars and stereo's and stuff. I assume, it's because people are more efficient. And, big surprise, people still aren't happy. Gee, I wonder if there's a problem.- Eddieism
Why is it that kids are crazy and full of energy, and adults just want to relax and be calm? Could it be that it is not physical, and that it just has to do
with being at work for years and years and years? Could it be that because of the stress and the drudgery of work, it just saps the kid out of you? Banyaism
Part 2 Store re's
These stories are about my adventrues working
in a comic book shop with a guy named Dave.
Dave is working there as the manager, not making much
more than me. Dave is propably still working there, I might add.
What if i worked tuesday through thursday. 3 days a week. That wouldn't be all that bad. And it would give me time to go to stuff, and about half the income that i have now. About 15 grand a year -Banyaism
Chapter 3 THE SHOPLIFTER
How sad a story this is to weave. Lets see... This is about
a year ago. I was working as a clerk at a comic shop. Your average "joe" job. We had this stupid game sitting on our shelf for the longest time. Time Travel Lizard Game or something. This guy comes in and says "I bought it for my kid, but my son doesn't want it." It seemed obvious that he bought it here, as no one else would carry this stupid piece of crap. So I gave him his money back. He left. Now I'm thinking, "we now have TWO of these stupid things. Now we're never gonna sell ether of them." I go back to put this one back and the other one was gone. And I'm thinking "how strange. Someone else must have bought the other one." Didn't really think about it at the time.
So this woman comes into the store. She comes into the store with a few gaming books. Books that are between $15 - 20 bucks a piece. This
is now a month or 2 later. The woman says to me, "I bought these for my nephew and then he died. I was wondering if I could get some of my money back?"
I was a little suspicious, but knew they were our games. No one else had them. So Cha Ching, more cash out the door. Didn't have a receipt or store credit, just cash for the books. She walks out with $50, 60 bucks in cash. It was wicked busy that day and we were flustered. Just handed her her money.
A couple hours later, this guy (who I later realized was the same guy that returned the Lizard game) came in with some sob story excuse of why he needed money back for his books he was returning. Gave me the books, I gave him money, Chi ching, more cash out the door. Later on when putting them back I noticed spaces on the shelf, right where they should fit.
"They were here a little bit a go", I thought. Then my head turned into a giant lollypop with the word "SUCKER" written on it. They just walked in and walked out with these books, and returned them,
and I actually gave them cash for it. How much more of a sucker could I be?
So we called the cops and they came by. The books were soft covered and I think they put them in their shirts and walked outwith them, really hard to tell at this point. Not much we can do aboutit now. From now on, no more cash, which was the store policy already anyway. We were thinking about getting an ID from people from now on, to get a record when they return stuff. We're ticked as these people are probably eating and drinking our $$ away. The owners were not super annoyed, it was busy and an honest mistake.
The next day or the day after this, the same woman comes waltzing in again. This woman comes in to try the same ploy yet again. Now, I realize we were stupid to fall for their ploy up until this point, but to fall for it again, would be ridiculous. It's not busy and were totally prepared for this. "We found some more books at my nephew's.", she cried to me. I recognized that these are the books I had just ordered and that had just come in the day before. I knew that they were those books. She didn't know it. She was just grabbing random books. "When did you by these?", I asked. "Oh a couple months ago." Any hope or shred that she might be telling the truth was gone. She says she bought them months ago, but they're brand new and they just came out. Dave, my manager, at this point says, "Gotta get something outside." Oh my Gosh, Dave just left, what's going on?", I thought to myself.
I said we need an ID. "Well I'll just go to my car and get it." I thought that she'd just run away, but she goes out to her car and comes back and says, "I don't have it on me."
"I know we just got these books in. I know you haven't had it for months. We just had some guy return books that are stolen." "I didn't steal them." I asked for her name and she told me some name and said "I have the reciet, I'll get it and come back."
"Whatever", I thought, "Just get out of the store." So, I still have the books and she leaves. She drives away. Dave comes back in and I said "Where did you go?"
"I got her licence plate number, when she got her licence out of the car."
"You got her licence number? Very good thinking Dave."
We call the cops and give them the name of this girl. She actually gave us her real name, Lydia. It turns out that Lyida and that guy had been robbing stores left and right. A little while later we saw her walking by. She went in the pizza place or something and we called the cops. Andthe cops came by and it was this big thing. In the end, sadly, they got off. I think they got off because there was no hard evidence against them. It's sad because she knew we couldn't do anything to her after like the forth time she did it. She didn't care until the cops arrested her. And now that she was arrested, probably still doesn't care.
If we keep increasing the number of laws and cops, and yet crime still increases, why do we continue to think that police is the answer. Jenine's answer: Because it allows people to not think about the things they'd have to do to get rid of crime. -Banyaism
Chapter 4 CHASING ALI
I'm working at a comic book store, about 2 years ago or so. I'm alone there to about 12 noon or so. This girl walks in with a bunch of retarded adults. She's brining them around so they can get accustomed to normal social life and not be social deviants their whole life. Immediately I'm struck by this woman. Gorgeous deep blue eyes, long curly blond hair. I'm like "WOW".
The cool thing was, she didn't seem like your regular snobby, annoying, blond haired, blue eyed, Aryan girl. She was cool. She might have good taste in people, seeing she's working at a home for those with mental disabilities. They walk around for awhile and I'm just looking at her. And then they all start to walk out. Being a guy I just can't let her walk out, I have to attempt some form of conversation; meager attempt thou it may be.
"So where you from?", I asked. She'ss like, "by the place by S & Lobster." And then they walk out. Like most of the women who walk in and out of our lives, we put them on the back burner and forget about them. Sooo, Dave, who's on from 12-8, comes in. And of course I chatted about her, talked about her a few times during the day. He said, "You should just shut up about her and find her." And I'm like, "Yeah, whatever". And then I thought about it, and said, "Maybe I _should_ find her." So I stated thinking about it. I got off work at 6 and the store closed at 8. First thing is, I didn't know where this place was. So I looked up S & S Lobster in the phone book, which turned out to be some crappy fish joint. Disgusting place if your ever in Fitchburg, MA and are looking for some place to eat. I then went down to S & S Lobster thinking I'd just see the building that I was looking for, imagining it to be some huge multi-level complex. I get there and there's like nothing. A couple of houses are around. I go in the lobster place.
"So, do you know anything about a home for people with mental disabilities around here," and they're like, "Do you wanna order some fish?"
"No I just wanna know if their is a home place around here."
"No I don't know anything about that."
I leave there and I'm looking around the lobster place trying to find it, and I can't find it. So I drive back to the comic book shop which is still open. I look in the phone book, and I think, what can I look up in the phone book. Dave says, "look up retarded." So I look up 'retarded' cause I have nothing else to look up. And I found retirement homes.
I figure this is close enough and I figure they'll know what to look for. I called the retirement home which was not near S & S Lobster but was on that side of town. I ask them something like, "Do you know where retarded people live?"
"NOOOO", they said not expecting weird questions from strange men at 8 o clock at night. So I called this hospital. I got transferred a couple of times. And I got this one woman, and I asked her if they took care of retarded people there. She then asked me questions as if I wanted to check somebody in. 'How old is the person? Bla, bla bla?' I started describing the people whom I saw with her to see if they might take care of people like that there. She started asking me 'how retarded is he? This and that, this and that.' So finally I said, "all right, wait, hold on a second. The reason I'm calling is this. There was this woman who came into my store, and I was struck with her, and she has the
most beautiful eyes and I'm trying to find her cause I know she works at one of these types of homes. I'm just trying to find that home." Then I figure that she would just hang up on me at that point. She's like "that's so romantic, that's so cool. You gotta find her now." This is an approach I hadn't thought of, being honest. She suggested "Maybe you should take out a radio ad", which is a little too crazy even for me. "How beautiful were her eyes, how bad do you want to find her?" She used the guilt method on me which worked pretty well. She told me the name of the place I was looking for is called a residential home because it's like a big house, and they take care of twenty people there. They're not advertised to the public or anything. They pretty much keep quiet so that their residents can keep their privacy. It's not the easiest thing to find unless you're in that social circle.
So then I went to the retirement home near S & S lobster. Walked in and was kinda poking around since there was no reception desk of any kind and the door was open. I was hoping that maybe they know where this place might be. This girl came out and I told her the whole story, and she said "How Romantic". And she's like swooning and everything. "There's a place next door, maybe they'll know." I go next door and they're like, "How did you find us? We're an unmarked building." I started talking to them and one of the clients there, and two of the workers started brainstorming on how I could find this girl. "There is a number you can call, some mental health hotline or something. You can go to the police station maybe they'll know where it is." That's a little crazy too. So I go back to the lobster place and start knocking on doors of houses around, asking people if their house is a residential home. People are like, "NO, this is a house." Thinking I'm the most insane person who ever knocked on their door. Near one of the houses was a church across the street. "Maybe that's it." Let me pause here to say I had no idea what this woman's name was. I've seen her for maybe two min. of my life, but now I was committed, now I couldn't turn back, now I had to find her, because it was like a Quest. I can't say I've come this far and then say I didn't find her. I have to keep going even if I didn't find her for the rest of my life. I had to keep searching.
So I go in the church. And there is this woman shouting with a loud powerful voice. I can't see her, but I can hear her shouting.
"AND THEN HE SAID THAT, AND I SAID NO WAY!" I'm looking around for someone as she's shouting and screaming. This little girl comes out and looks at me and I ask her if there is anyone I could talk to. The girl scurries off into the room and it was like "BLA BLA BLA-" And her head poked out. And she was like, "can I help you?" I asked her if this was the place I was looking for. She's like "Noooo. This is a church." Yeah yeah I know.
That wasn't it. I'm about to leave and I think, "what can I do?" I go to the Fitchburg Police Station at 9 o'clock at night asking if they have a list of all the residentials in Fitchburg. I can see the look in their eyes, "No this is a Police Station". They told me to go to the town Assessor, and that he would have the information that I needed.
Cause that's their JOB, I might add at this point. Us tax payers pay the town Assessor, the land Assessor, to know these things. If you can't tell the foreshadowing by that, I don't know what your problem is.
I go home, I go up early for work the next day. I go to the town Assessor. I tell him I'm looking for all the residentials in the town. "We have a listing of all the places in town, but we can't access them by all the residentials, but the tax collector will have that because they'll have to have different taxes for them and stuff." Worthless town Assessor. GO to the tax assessor. "Well we don't have that list, the town Assessor will have that definitely." Worthless employee's at city hall.
I go out and down to this big hospital. They have a mental health ward and people recommended that I go there. The front desk won't let me up there because I'm some freak asking them about some woman. I call up and left a message. Left some of my numbers, at work and at home and they never called me back.
So now I'm stuck. What else can I do? I'm going to work in a half
hour. I have no more leads. I'm driving around this stupid lobster place thinking "how am I gonna find this place?" The mailman walks by and I'm like, 'THE MAILMAN!' I turn my car around and chased down the mailman and said "hey wait. I'm looking for this place around here. Residential place with retarded people?"
"There is none of those places around here," he told me, knowing the
place is around here. Had I just excepted that and left my Quest would
have ended but I kept on. "It's probably an unmarked building", I
injected. He casually says, "There's one place, but that's probably not
it." But of course that was it. "Where is it?"
"Go up here, around here, big white house." So I follow his
directions and there it is. It's behind S & S Lobster but you have to go
up and around and down this street. It's a big 3-decker house. 3 big trash cans in the driveway and this huge 18 person van. Good chance this is probably the place. I go up and look in the window and there is no one home. I looked through their mail and it's definetly the place. I committed a federal offence I guess, looking through their mail. I was amazed that I found the place at all.
I go to work and was talking to Dave and asked,
"what do I now?" I started asking any woman who came into the store
what I should do. I got this one woman and a mother talking to me. They said
"you should just send her flowers, because if you confront her with what
you have done, she'll think your just some freak and she'll feel pressure and not know what to do. If you just send her flowers and let her know who you are... and give her your number, she'll decide if she wants to call you." That sounds reasonable. Probably the most rational advise I'd gotten the whole time.
They leave, and I realize I don't even know her name. I can't send
flowers to this blond haired blue eyed ggirl at this address. What the heck am I gonna do? If I get flowers, I can have my friends go to the place, and they can find her and give it to her. Now the question is, which of my freak friends do I want to go and represent me. So I think of how I can try to sucker my friends into doing it. Most are not home or say 'Noooo.' One friend, the one who is writing this, suggested that maybe she goes to FSC. I'm like, "it's possible but not probable." The next day I'm sitting at work, alone from 10-12. "Who am I gonna sucker to bring these stupid flowers. How am i gonna contact this girl".
At the moment I was trying to contemplate all this, She wanders in
the store. All this searching and she just walks into the store again.
My heart is pounding out of my chest. I never flat out asked any woman
for her number or anything before this. I was a nerdy kid throughout high
school. She's gliding around the store in my eyes. They're getting ready
to leave and I asked her, "You came in a few days ago and was wondering if you
wanted to hang out at a jazz club or something?" And she's like, "Yeah
Ok." It was like an unreal moment. She gave me her number and wrote it
down, her name was Allison. She walks out and I'm standing there
shocked. There was a woman buying or looking at Star Wars figures in the
back the whole time listening in on the whole thing. "I can't believe
she gave me her number", I told her. She said "That's the most romantic
thing I've heard in a long time. Wow that was so cool." Dave comes in
and I tell him I got her number. He's like 'no way, that's insane.'
I call her up later, we go out for Chinese food. We got along
pretty good, but never hooked up after that. I actually went on a date
with this girl, a woman whom I have never seen before or since. Though I
didn't track her down and get her number, I did get her number. I never
saw her besides the time she came into the comic book store. She blew me
off after that. I never told her I tracked her all over Fitchburg. She
would have said, "this man is far too insane." I learned that she did go
to FSC, and had I had to resort to finding her there, I probably would have
found her.
Fast Forward to a few years later. I was temping at this place.
There was an intern there who also went to FSC. "I got this great deal
on an apartment in Fitchburg, it's close to where you work and there are
these two gorgeous babes living there, and they need two roommates. Two
Roommates! They don't want one person and then another person to move in. If
you come in with me, it's cheap rent, it's a great apartment and will be
living with these two gorgeous women." He mentioned that one of them was
Allison. "She doesn't have blond hair, and blue eyes and work at a human
service's job does she?" And he's like "Yeah." I almost ended up moving
in with this girl. I didn't want to move to Fitchburg though. I was hoping
to get out of that crappy job anyway.
I tracked Allison (blue eyed one) down on less than what i know of Shri. I know that she's in college at a school in Vermont. Was from NJ. Probably a freshman. Hmmm.... The insane thoughts of a romance starved madman...
Make a moth that has about a yard wingspan. You'd wear a little transmitter and
it would have a tracking device on it. The deal is that it would follow you around. And as you walk away, it would fly in the air and when you stop it would catch up and land on your head. And there'd be a huge moth following you around and landing on your head!!! -Banyaism
Part 3 Dancing Philosphys:
Bathroom rave strobelight, portable boombox,
go to resturants and party in their bathroom -Banyaism
Before Aaron discovered clubs, he experencied THE RAVE.
Chapter 5 Aaron's Rave
Let me tell you about the rave. I don't know if I told you about
the rave, but we went to one. The idea is to pack as many people into a
place and dance to tecno music all night long, till morning ... till the
afternoon. And you dance as long as you can. Of course people go there
and do a lot of drugs and stuff like that. We've been talking
about this forever. 18 people said, "Yeah, yeah, we want to go!" How many
came? 6! 6 people actually went. Which, sadly, is a bit more then what I
actually thought would go. We actually found the place and got there on time.
They were frisking people for drugs and stuff. Not so they would
actually find any, but so they could cut down and keep it out a little
bit. We were hoping to watch people tripping. But the drug use wasn't as
blatant as we had wanted.
We got there and the music was pretty loud. There was supposed to
be all these people there who were alternative and free, but they were
pretty timid and shy in the way they were dancing and stuff.
Kinna lame.
Everybody was exactly the same. They all had their baggy paints, the
long shirt with the big wallet chain, backwards baseball cap. So sad.
All the women were dressed slutaly, well... provocavely. None of us were
actually attracted to them because of the image they were trying to
potray. We actually danced for 4 hours. Not straight in a row, but
like... total combined, which is pretty good. We would dance for an
hour or two and then we would go and sit. Sit in the bletchers and
stuff. It was kinda cool. Techno music gets a little tiring after
awhile. It's all the basically the same stuff. It's all people dance
too. It's all it's good for. You really just can't listen to it. It's
kinda goofy. Probably gonna go someplace someother time, probably not
another techo club but some other club. Dance our brains out.
We describe everything by relating it to other stuff that we already
understand. But at some point, we derive knowlege from just seeing
and experiencing. No one has defined "blue" for you, but you see
stuff, and people say, that is blue, that is not. But seeing enough
examples of it allow you to know what it is. So that when someone
says, the object is blue, and round. You know what that means.- Banyaism
Chapter Intellectual Conversation
Mark: It would take a long time and many weeks to explain myself fully on a lot of points that you bring up in our conversartions
Aaron: I'm not going anywhere.
Mark: And This is just one conversation.
Aaron: "just" one conversation brought about the freedom of this country.
"just" one conversation brought about the most hated cult of our time, The Church of Scientology. [but, i know what you mean. :) ]
Mark: You believe highly in Free thought and don't believe that the Catholic Church allows one to think. Overall The church does allow free-thought. It tells you to love Christ and do as you please. But love is going to restrict the things you think about. Truth does limit free thought to a degree.
Aaron: What exactly do you mean? When i talk about free-thought, i mean having
the ability to ask ANY question and try to find out the answer. There is no
"such questions shouldn't be asked." or "these thoughts are from the
devil. Resist them and they will flee." or "doubt in God is natural, allow
it to pass and trust in the Lord Almighty." Truth doesn't limit that kind
of free thought. Though, you are correct if you are saying that if you
are free to believe what is not True, but you are Incorrect. Truth does
limit correct thought.
Mark: Okay Aaron, and as a sinner and one who is prond to do the wrong thing I
don't believe in independance, But I believe in total dependance in God
and in God alone.
Aaron: Where does "free" play in anywhere to total dependance? That would imply
dependance for thought and opinion. This will stop you from ever asking the question, "Is what i believe what is best for me?" This is the same phallicy as trying to prove that rationality is true, by using rationality. Of course it's going to tell you that itself is true. (wink wink. Didn't think you'd hear me say that did ya!)
Mark : Your right I have free will and with my free will I choose
Aaron: Just for the record, you don't.
Mark: Aaron these discussions have been going on with us for years and probably
will for a while.
Aaron: Yeah. :) Ain't it great!?!
Mark: Aaron you are open to the truth and one day (soon I hope) you will discover The truth and you will be amazed.
Aaron: If i ever discover too much of the truth it will probably permanantly
warp my brain.
Chapter Selected Banyaism's
Given that we'll spend more in a person's last few days of life to keep them alive,
than we have in their entire life of prevention: Would it be possible to run an insurance
company backwards. Something like, they'll put you on a fitness program, and if you live, you pay them money. The healthier you are, the more money you pay. The sicker you get, the less you pay, since they aren't doing their job. You're paying to remain healthy. It sounds odd, but isn't that better than betting that you'll die?
----------
IDEA
----------
Pigeon traps to attatch a banner to their leg so that you could put an ad on some freaking out pigeon.
Or it would attach a dollar bill to their leg and people would have to catch the pigeon to get the buck!
----------
IDEA
----------
If a flashlight simply uses a porabola type mirror to reflect most of the light from a bulb,
and focuses it onto one spot, and those spy microphones use a parabola to reflect a
sound into a microphone, would it be possible to put a speaker in a porabola and shoot
a unidirectional sound? As soon as you walk into the beam, you'd hear it, but when you
walk out, it drops off quick.
----------
IDEA
----------
A movie? maybe, about a purgutory/hell place. It would be waiting in line for a roller
coaster. And you're waiting and waiting, and everyonce in a while, you see people that
reached the end of the line go by in the train, shouting "We're going to Heaven!" and
"whoopee!" And if you get caught cutting in line, or other various offenses, you get
sent to the back of the line. Of course, the line never ends.
----------
IDEA
----------
What if you planned it so that you crossed the international date line at the right time,
so that you skipped from December 31, 1999, just before midnight, to January 2nd, 2000,
so that you never experienced the new year change or jan 1st 2000. That'd be pretty
lame.
----------
IDEA
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compananny - no real idea, just a cool word.
bananananny
fannynanny
----------
IDEA
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----------
IDEA
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---
booya
"
Part II:
-----------------
THOUGHTS
----------
If everyone is brainwashed, but happy, someone that isn't, will find it very easy to control
and manipulate everyone. Is this reason enough for free thought? For we have no idea
if everyone will be happy under this new guy's rule. So the only possible solution is to
have everyone think for themselves. Oh well.
-----------------
THOUGHT
----------
-----------------
If money is power, traded for the benefit you bring society. Why
do people complain when rich people have more advantages than
poor people. That's what money is. The ability to buy your way
out jail or whatever. If people don't like rich people having more
power, or they don't think that the benefit that rich people bring
society is worth what they get paid, STOP BUYING THEIR CRAP!!!
Otherwise, shutup!
-----------------
THOUGHT
----------
THOUGHT
----------
I got a call the other day from Rich Ferguson, my sponsor in Amway.
He was calling to see how i was doing, and to let me know that Dave
Bedard had gone Diamond. This was kinda cool, until he then told
me about a "promotion" that he was in, and did i want to place an
order. Asking for this, invalidated the whole rest of the conversation.
It was fairly obvious, or at least made it seem, as if the only reason
he had called was to get an order, and he didn't really call to see how
i was doing, no matter how sincere it sounded, or even actually was.
-----------------
THOUGHT
----------
Are we confusing our emotional side when we try to figure out why
stuff makes us happy, or what love is? We usually end up ruining
it for our emotional side.
-----------------
THOUGHT
----------
In whose best interest is it to cure diseases, that has the capability?
It is not in the best interest of psychiatrists to cure you. It is in an
optometrist's best interest for you to need glasses. It is not in a
car dealer's best interest to sell a car that will last longer. It is not
in a dentist best interest for you to brush your teeth. It is not in
a game companie's best interest to have you happy with a game
for very long. It is not in a politicians interest to have everything
running well, as we would no longer need the politician. It is not
in a lawmakers best interest to have fair laws.
-----------------
THOUGHT
----------
There will always be more that i don't have than i do have.
-----------------
THOUGHT
----------
If fear and embarrassment stop us from doing what we want to
do, but, fear and embarrassment diminish with repeated sucesses,
why do we feel different about guilt? Sometimes people feel
guilty about things that they even acknoledge that aren't wrong,
and as you do more "wrong" things, guilt dimineshes. Why do
we feel differently about it, that it is not something to be ignored,
but fear and embarrasment are?
-----------------
THOUGHT
----------
"I'm only human." or "You're only human" will take on a subtle
new meaning if we discover intelligent aliens.
-----------------
THOUGHT
----------
What makes us think that because our technology and knowledge
is expanding quickly now, that it always will? People are predicting
that our knowlege and technology will expand quicker and quicker.
But technology as we know it, has only recently been moving quickly.
When they discovered mathematics, they thought that people would
figure everything out within a few years/decades. We're still not
all THAT much more advanced in our knowledge of mathematics,
are we? Exponentially?
-----------------
THOUGHT
----------
I had a dream last night that an "alien" type bug was invading.
It was Frightening! After a while, it was me and only about 10
other people. I was part of the lookout, and when we saw them
coming, we'd shout. We'd watch as our friends were ripped apart,
or lit on fire, or killed in other horrible ways. I'm glad it was just
a dream, but for the people in a war, things like this are real.
And yet, we continue to have wars. Only because we can't
resolve our conflicts any other way. It's like two immature
kids, they argue, and can't resolve it, so they fight. Our countries
are led by immature kids.
-----------------
THOUGHT
----------
Since all of the social problems, unemployment, child abuse,
whatever, are really, deep down, that people are unhappy,
then it makes sense that that is the point of life. It's the thing
that everyone wants, without really realizing it.
-----------------
THOUGHT
----------
If one of the best ways to be happy, is to help other people,
than why aren't we helping people more, and if we're not, how
is it that we're happy?
-----------------
THOUGHT
----------
"Democracy is the the majority having power over the minority."
"You know what crazy is? Crazy is Majority Rules."
Democracy doesn't seem like a solution to disagreement, only
a quick fix so that most people are reasonable happy.
But people seem to see it as the solution.
-----------------
THOUGHT
----------
There's a subtle difference between the things that we feel
are "opinion" and "fact". Generally, many of the things that
we feel are fact are just opinions that most everyone shares.
"This table is solid", "That is blue", "It's wrong to kill" or
whatever, are really opinions, but we view them as fact. I would
never ask anyone for their opinion on something that we
consider fact, nor would i ask someone if something is true,
and accept their aswer as fact, if it is an opinion. This is
because i understand the differnce between the two. I know
instinctively if something is opinion or fact. But, children don't
and they are never taught. This is why children accept their
parent's opinion as fact. It's because that's what it's presented
as. So it's no wonder that children end up rebelling against
what their parents have taught them. They grew up thinking
one thing, and then suddenly, their world is turned upside
down, as they find out that these things aren't necessarily
true. Would it be better to teach children the difference?
-----------------
THOUGHT
----------
I have never seen arguments stop as fast as when i admit that i am
wrong and they are right.
-----------------
THOUGHT
----------
How is it that people can go on day to day, without feeling like i do?
Trapped and frustrated in this crappy system? And if they do, how
come more don't do something about it? It's not like i even have
a choice, i'm forced by my constant feelings to escape. That is all
i can think of. How can you not?
-----------------
THOUGHT
----------
I remember asking my parents, when i was in school, "Why am i
learning all this? It's pointless. Mostly because i'm going to
forget it all soon anyway." And you know what? I still agree!
It WAS pointless.
-----------------
THOUGHT
----------
-----------------
THOUGHT
----------
When we first invented technology, lets say, a device that
turns a waterfall into a washing machine. If at that point, we
had said, ok, now that you have more time, spend it by being
happier and being with people more, i think that we'd be much
better off. But instead, we said, now that you have more time,
we'll create more work by thinking of more and more
expensive and complicated ways to entertain ourselves.
Think about it. Almost all of the businesses out there are for
our entertainment or enjoyment. Look at all the resteraunts!
There didn't use to be all of them.
-----------------
THOUGHT
----------
...When i was in college, i watched so many movies, and bad student films,
that i could easily sit through a bad movie. I just had watched so many
of them, that they no longer had to be entertaining or good for me to be
able to sit through them. I think that that is the way that people used to
be with books. The book didn't have to be written snappily, it just had to
be intelligent enough and have something to say. Perhaps we need to
reach that level on the trip so that we can read philosphy books and such.
That may be why i've never been able to endure them. It may just take practice.
-----------------
THOUGHT
----------
We were talking yesterday about a couple on TV that was completely
self-sufficient. We were wondering if this would be possible, and were
annoyed that it wouldn't be because of property tax. We thought this
unfair since they had no income. We also thought it unfair that poor people
that have owned a house for generations, might be forced to give it up since
they can't pay the taxes. But, if a family has no income, they still consume
services provided by the government. Such as Fire, Police, Army and roads.
So, it does make sense, in some way. If too many people were exempt from
paying taxes, we wouldn't be able to maintain the roads or police or army,
or.... hmmm.... maybe that's not such a bad idea after all.
-----------------
THOUGHT
----------
Penn Jillette was criticizing a vegetarian because he felt like she wasn't
taking advantage of being at the top of the food chain. And
you know what, he's right. I'm in many positions, that if i wanted to take
advantage of them, i could "have" a lot more. I'm in the
position to be stronger than many women, and so i could force them
to submit to me. I'm more intelligent than some people, and so
i could belittle them and and make myself feel stronger. I could have kids,
and take advantage of being the "head" of the household and
make the children my slaves. I could do these things, but i choose
not to because they are wrong.
-----------------
THOUGHT
----------
-----------------
THOUGHT
----------
Is it possible that foods that are high in calories taste good,
because before we understood metabolism and calories, we
needed lots of calories to survive. And if we only ate lettuce,
we would die. Now we know what has high calories, but
before, if it tasted good, we'd eat more of it.
-----------------
THOUGHT
----------
I wonder what "evil dictator government" type people think
about when they watch a movie like star wars. When the hero
always beats the guy and dictator/liers/manipulators are always
shown to be bad, i wonder if they realize that they are one?
They probably do and just don't care. They probably see these
movies and laugh at us because they doubt that we'll ever take
their power.
I-----------------
THOUGHT
----------
Music is the communication of emotion. There's two parts of
doing this. Being able to translate emotion to music, which is
writing music, or "jamming". The other part is the skill of playing
it. Many people are skilled with instruments, but cannot translate
emotion well to music. Others can only write music. Those who
can do both are wonderful.
Receiving music, through dance is the same way. There are people
who can understand the emotion well, but cannot coordinate
physically very well. There are also people that can be very coordinated,
but cannot connect with the music. Those who can do both are wonderful.
-----------------
THOUGHT
----------
Part 4 Aaron's Car Woes
Chapter 8 Tired of Driving
So I'm at Rick & John's birthday party the other day. We had a couple of cool conversations. After most of the people left we were still having a cool conversation. We talked into the wee hours of the night. I was supposed to go to Fithchburg and sleep there, and I wasn't that tired so I decided to drive over there, instead of crashing at Rick's place. It was 4AM. Rick told me how to get to Fitchburg from Gardner including the taking of Rt. 2 west. So I got on Rt 2 and started to drive. I didn't know how long it would take to get to Fitchburg, but I guessed about 20 min. because Rick commutes back and forth from college. Well, after about a half hour I started to wonder just how long Rick commutes. I also started to get VERY drowsy. But I figured, why would Rick tell me the wrong direction? ANd if I turn around, I'm gonna have to drive a 1/2 hour before I get back to where I started from. And I didn't have a map so I kept on driving. I fell asleep a couple of times, so I decided to pull over and take a nap. But being in the middle of nowhere, in a car, with a rythmic hazard light blinking, makes you more scared than tired. SO I kept on driving. At about 5AM, I found an open gas station. I got out and asked the guy scraping ice , "If I stay on RT 2 will I hit Fitchburg?" "Oh sure," he says, "Just keep on RT 2 East and you'll hit it. It's about 65 MILES away!! That's when I fully understood my mstake. I had driven for an hour in the completly wrong direction. What else could I do other than drive all the way back? But I was so tired. So I got a huge cup of coffie and slugged it down. Didn't fell tired at all the whole way home. But I wanted to get to Fitchburg before everyone woke up and at least get a little sleep. So I ended up driving 75-85 mph the whole way there. Got into FItchburg at 6 am. Pretty good time. Went to sleep with caffine pumping through me, and woke up 3 hrs later. So I went to work tired. Sleep is annoying.
Chapter 9 Aaron VS the DMV
This is a story about my friend and yours the DMV. Actually its about Cops giving me tickets. They were probably both legitimate tickets looking back. I'm not sure how I got em, speeding, my light was out; anyway I got 2 tickets. One of which I got a while ago. I got this letter which said 'if you don't pay this ticket, will pull your licence 30 days from now.' Well, I have to pay that ticket. I had this other one on there also. I didn't have enough money to pay them both. I call up the DMV with my handy little debt card.
"Ok I have 2 tickets and I need to pay one of them. And I NEED YOU TO MAKE SURE THAT YOU CANCEL THE TICKET THAT"S GONNA CANCEL MY LICENSE. ONE OF THEM IS GONNA CANCEL MY LICENCE THE OTHER IS NOT AND I NEED YOU TO MAKE SURE YOU CANCEL THE EARLIER, BLA BLA BLA BLA BLA." I made sure that I repeated it a couple of times. "I understand, Oh yeah yeah, yeah yeah. It's all paid it's all set," they told me. Foolishly thinking it was all set, I continued to drive to OHIO. Drove all around Ohio for about a week. Came back, out of the rental van, into my crappy cop magnet, not even a half a mile from the place, the cop pulls me over. Little hatchback full of a weeks worth of crap. One of the people just sitting on the crap. The seat was down and she was propped up on luggage. And the cop pulls us over. He comes over and says, You know you got a headlight out. And in my usual manner in how I deal with cops I say "REALLY?" Gee I just replaced that just the other day. Than I get out of the car and look at the headlight and go, "oh, dang it all." The cop goes back to his car. I was following my friends at the time. They went out one way and then had gone the wrong direction and then turned around and then I said forget it. I'm going the way I know. Had they gone the right direction from the begining I would not have gotten pulled over.
When the cop comes back he usually hands you a ticket and this time he added, "WIll you step out of the vechile sir." Having this never happen to me before, I was like "AAA! I guess so." You don't really know how to respond to that situation. Because you don't expect it. Especially being a little suberbunite like me who has barely ever crossed over the law. So I get out of the car and he's like, "YOU know... This car is no longer registered, and bla bla bla bla bla bla. I can tow the car and arrest you." OHHH JOYYY!!!! It's two in the morning I thought I might add. I realized that Jimmy Joe working the swich board at the DMV clearly paid the wrong ticket there fore having my licence pulled and there fore having my regestration pulled. The DMV didn't let me know or anything. That's what the first letter was for.
The Cop actually let us go. The other person in back had to drive, and of course I'm sitting on the luggage. I walk into work the next day and call the DMV. Can I pay this ticket, Here's my debt. Card number. Paid. Registraion back in full. All I had to do is call them and give them my debt card number. That's so sad. I'm sure many of you thinking 'Aaron's fault.' Month later I get this little thing in the mail. Not in these words specifically, "Hey remember when we pulled you over for that whole registration cancel thing? Why don't you come down to the court office in that town, were gonna whop your ass." OHHHH JOYYY. I GO down to the courthouse at my appointed time. Somehow I'm thinking I missed the court apointment. I'm wondering why would that be?
Chapter 10 How to impress a judge
I get down to the court and have no idea who to talk to. I end up talking to the probations officer. He's asking me all kinds of questions. How much $ do you make? Where do you live? What do you pay for rent? How far do you have to go to work? Who is this and who is that? All kinds of crazy questions. We need all that information to determine if you want a attorney, if you can you afford a attorney. And I'm thinking, "an attorney? I've been to traffic court before and I thought that I would be just in and out and that would be it. He continues, "And the offence that you had, driving without a licence, having a suspended licence, is punishable up to 18 months in jail" or something like that. "18 months in jail?" This is insane. Some stupid mix-up at the DmV. Not really even my fault. I wasn't off the hook the judges didn't arrest me. The judge vaguely mentioned that I would be going to court later on. I'm thinking that I didn't get the first court summons in the mail. My mind was swimming in confusion.
"We got to make a plea bargain," I am told. I just want this whole thing to be over because this is such a mess. The long and short of it is that I go before the judge. This is not even the trial. This is the pre-trial. It's amazingly baffles me that this thing has 2 trials. They asked me some stupid questions, like have you been drugged, or pressured in anyway to answer any questions. no. Some court officer stood up and says "able coal load", do you agree acme agodrofj? and then looks at me and says "Do you understand this?" I'm thinking I didn't understand a word this guy just said. I said, "what did you just say?" "Didn't someone explain to you what was going to happen?" .Basically he read off what the guy had explained to me. But I had no idea that is what he was reading off. "Oh yeah," he explained this and this. And He said "ALL RIGHT, You agree." As if I was to magically know what he was saying in His little gibberish talk. "The long and short of it, is you got to go to trial, when do you want to go to trial?" Their asking me when I want the trial. ASAP. I've already missed work to come to this trial. I just want to get this over with. Their like, "Well WHEN?" "How about Thursday Morning?" And their like, "That's tomorrow." I said "yeah." And the judge says, "does he have any prior record?" Someone flips a couple pages of his notes. And goes "no." "All right that's fine." I said ASAP, they didn't know what that meant apparently. Tomorrow was not as soon ASAP. So I go Home, go to work. The next morning I'm there with my little suit and tie. Now I'm in court, possible 18 month sentence. I know that it's not gonna happen, their just gonna fine me up the ying-yang like they always do. I at least showed up in a suit because I wanted to make some type of impression. I'm sitting there with all the other shmos who are there. Me and one other guy, and there's about 30 other people there, are the only ones in suits. The rest are in cut off jeans, tank tops, or what ever they happen to be wearing that day. These people have no idea how to impress the judge. I go up there and have to make this plea bargain with this plaintiff guy. "Were gonna charge you $300 for court fees. $35 for the light that was out. and 3 months probation, and plus we will eagerly await for your next arrival in our court. " I wasn't gonna take it to court and get a lawyer, which I could have done and probably gotten a better deal. Whatever. They charged me $335 and gave me a 3 month probation. I didn't have to see the probation officer, but I couldn't leave the state or anything. If I got caught or did anything wrong, I would get all these crazy fines and it would not be good. Sitting at work I'm telling Dave about it. There's this girl looking though the cd's. "Your on probation? I'm on probation. What did you do?" "Well what did you do?" Well I told her and she told me. "$335 and bla bla blaI. I had a bowl of weed in my car. And I was driving and I had a minor in the car. I got arrested for Possession, transpiration, and corruption of a minor." "Aw, yikes what did you get?" $200 fine and 3 months probation. You got a lesser fine than I did and I didn't do anything wrong. How the lovely DMV can screw you over.
Chapter 11 The price of Lazyness
I'm driving the same piece of crap car, a little while later. I'm leaving the video store when I think to myself, "gee, i'd better stop at wal-mart, since I'm very close (500 feet down the street) to get a light, since one of my car's lights are broken and cops don't like that. I get ready to pull out of the video store and there's (of course) a cop there, to let me go in front of him. I go, knowing he's gonna be right behind me the whole way and realizing that of course, I'm about to be pulled over yet again. Thank you officer. Of course the lights come on. The boys in blue pull me over. I'm thinking about how I'm gonna tell him that I'm about to get the light fixed and all that. I'm gonna say "I'm going to wallmart right over there and I'm gonna get a light, bla bla bla." I'm working on my little shtick on what I'm gonna tell the cop. He comes over and asks "Got your drivers liscence?" I reach for my drivers liscence which I thought was on my passenger's seat. I looked but I couldn't find my daily planner. I'm looking all over for my planner.. Of course my planner with my license in it has disappeared. I'm expecting him to say next, "You have a light out." He says "Your car's not registered." My whole shtick was thrown right out the window.
I'm thinking, "I didn't even know that they did expire." I was like, "AHH, EEE," But i say, "Um,no. Aren't they supposed to send me something in the mail letting me know that?"
"Yes", he says, you didn't get a letter?." I'm thinking "Ohh Great." At this point the DMV had negleted to send me quite a few letters. And I was like, "no I did not get a letter." He told me, the fine is gonna be like $300 bucks or something. He then asks me the usual questions while I'm fumbling, still looking for my license. He goes back to his car. He comes back and tells me that he can't let me drive the car since it's un-registered, and therefore un-insured. My situation is not looking very promising. It very much looks like, unregestered car, no drivers liscence, this is clearly some punk pulling something. It is so sad because I wasn't. I couldn't for the life of me find my drivers liscence. He showed me a computer printout of my regestration and said, "See how it expires? It's expired." And I'm like "what?" This is a shock to me, news to me that registrations even expire. Cause it seems to me like the most idiotic thing in the world. Why in the world do you have to renew the regestration when it's the same dang car. It's not like they retest it, that's what the inspections are for. There's no need for a re-registration because we've already regestered the car. That's what a registration is. You don't re-regester your marrige, cause we know your married. You've regestered it. Stubidest thing in the world (but I'm sure I could find something more stubid.. I then asked him how much the tow truck was going to be. "I don't know how much a tow truck's gonna be," he replied, "I don't own a tow truck company. All of a sudden he starts going through my car. Ah this is great, my car was at the peek of it's messiness. If you were not in the drivers seat you could not sit in the car. I had a fileing cabinet in the back seat, and my trunk was full of crap. Garbage and garbage, and papers, just full of crap. The officer starts looking throught my garbage. Have any valuebles in here? I go "WWhat?" "Got any valuebles, money Jewlery?" "noo why?" "So when we tow it you can't claim you lost a bunch of money." That's a legedimite question. "So what are you doing?" "I'm searching your car." And I go "why?" At this point I didn't give a crap about cops because I was so annoyed about how much I have been getting screwed by them. He goes, "oh looking for anything illegal." At this point I was like, "aha" but couldn't contest him searching my car. whatever. I was started to get more ammused as he started looking through my car. I had a huge box filled with spawn matchs given in a free give away. No need to have it in my car. It looked like it might have drugs or something in it. He open's it up, 'Spawn matchs.' And there's this crap and crap. He finishes his search of the passenger side. He looks in the back seat and says 'forget it', and gets out of the car. He gave up on his search; it was the best. And so he calls a tow truck. And hands me a $100 fine. Woopie. The tow truck to my house was $75. Yippee. And he gave me a ticket for having a unregeserd car for $300 bucks. I had to drive home with the tow truck guy. And he was like, "it's $75 bucks." "All right, I don't have $75 bucks in cash on me." He says, "well do you have a credit card?" "nooo." Will you take a check?" "Well we don't take cheaks." aokay, "I don't have any $ on me. I can not pay you in any form other than a cheak. What else can I do, You either get a check or you get nothing." He said, "all right I'll take a cheack." So I wrote him a cheek for $75 bucks which was good because I had Money in the bank. "Don't just drive your car to the DMV to regester it because if they pull you over they'll have a record of it, and they'll put you in jail and throw all these fines on you." So now i gotta go down to the DMV tomorrow and kiss THEIR butt to get my registration back, which hopefully will not entail me getting the car re-inspected, cause there's NO way it's gonna pass. I LOVE COPS. And later I find my planner under a few pieces of paper in the car later that nite. Don't know why I couldn't find it when the cop pulled me over So I'm thinking where is this notice that the registration was supposed to have given me? And I called them and they said, "yeah we sent it." After calling 800 people back and forth I called the DMV yet again. "You have to talk to suspensions about bla bla bla." I call suspensions and they said, you got to talk to these people. I call those people and they say, "We sent out a notice, on the 18th we sent it out. But you have to talk to suspensions". So I call them up I have to find out what happen to the notice that got sent out on the 18th. We didn't send you out a notice. "The other people just said that you sent it out." "Well they don't know how to read the screen. It says clearly right here, 'To Be Sent.' ok SO I call back the other place at the DMV. "Suspensions said you didn't send it out. I'm showing that we sent it out on the 18th we definitly sent it out." I know it sounds complicated, but it's really not. Meanwhile my dad is saying, "I think you got that mail. I think maybe your just disorganized and maybe you didn't read it. Maybe you didn't pay attioned to it. Maybe you should open your mail. bla bla bla bla bla. " "I didn't get the notice, I would have regonized that." "I think you got it. I remember seeing that. awhile ago, a long time ago." Whatever. After going back to suspensions and stuff, a little while later my dad says he found this letter from the regestry of moter vechiles. "I meant to give it to you a long time ago but it got lost in the paperwork in my office. Sorry I hope it's not important." Knowing it was important I opened up the letter. And it says "Hey here's a friendly reminder your regestration is about to expire and your gonna want to reregister that, so cops don't pull you over and harras you and give you $300 fines and tow your car, and make your insurence go wild mad up in the sky. Thank you dad, but of course I've ruined his truck and set his lawn on fire, and all these other things so I guess I can't blame him.
Cops can harass and push around all of us, and we pay them! We decide the
rules they go by, and we fear them! -Banyaism
Chapter 12 Don't assume because the crowd does it, you won't get a ticket.
I got this speading ticket, because I was speeding. Which was fine and I paid it. That is one speeding ticket. If I get two more within a year, rumor has it, I lose my liscene. Most of those crazy rumors are not even true. But I started slowing down. About 4 or 5 mounts later, I was on this road called route 9. It's one of those psyodo highways that goes in and out of rurel type areas and there's traffic lights and stuff. At some point it dipped down from around 40 to 25. And apparently I didn't see the sign that informed me of this speed change. So I'm going 40 into this 25 mile an hour zone and a cop pulls me over.
"I'm sorry I didn't realize it was 25", I politely pleaded with the cop, assuming he would just let me go. But of course he didnt. He gave me my 2nd ticket. I sent it in to be contested because I thought the ticket was unjust. This ties in to the last story about the whole regestation thing. I believe that story happen before the 2nd ticket. I don't know other than that, an accurate timeline is hard to formulate at this point. Just realize that at this point I'm running around with one defintite ticket, two potential tickets and so I'm definitly going to make sure that I'm not gonna speed anymore, cause if I get a second definate ticket, i'm screwed. I'm driving to work and I'm on MAIN STEEET. This is the MAIN STREET of the town where everybody goes 35, 40 down the street, and it's a MAIN STREET and there's like nothing around. I'm driving there and I see this cop driving the other way. I'm like yeah whatever, 'cop'. I'm making a right hand turn into my work parking lot. I hear that little farmilar brew of a cop with that little siren that scares the dickens out of anybody. They all sneak up on you somehow. How do cops sneak up on you in a cop car? How do they do that, because they do that so often. There so stealthy and sly in those cars and those cars are huge. And they have those headlights, I don't know how they do that anyway.
I looked around and I didn't see any cops, so I'm like, 'yeah whatever', so I continue to pull in and hear the 'brew' again. And there's the cop with his lights going right behind me. I'm like 'all right. I can't stop here, half pulled into the parking lot, so I pull into the parking lot. There is this little entrance driveway thing that you have to get through to get to the main parking lot, which is where the cop wanted to pull me over. I can't stop here, cause if I stop here no one can get in and out of the parking lot. That's ridiculous. I continue slowly, so he knows I'm not trying to run away or anything. I'm going really slow. I go all the way and I stop once I get in the parking lot. Thinking this is a reasonible safe thing to do. When I had got pulled over a long time ago, I pulled over into what I thought was a breakdown lane but it was actually the right hand lane and there was no break down lane. And the cop came running over and he's like, " What are you doing, slow down, what are you trying to do kill us." He looked at my car, got back in his car and drove away, cause we were in the right hand lane and he was scared about getting killed from some crazy driver. I guess I just wasn't worth the trouble that day. So I'm thinking I'm not going to do that again. So I'm thinging I pulled into a reasonible place. He comes over and he's like, "How come you didn't stop when you saw me. I'm like what!? "I know you saw me in your rear view mirror." I'm thinking that it was the cop driving by going the other way.
"You mean when you were going by the other way?"
"No when we were in the parking lot."
" Oh in here? I wasn't going to stop back there, cause no one else can get in and out."
"You'll stop when I turn the lights on. I'll decide if it's a safe place to stop or not. It's not a descion for you to make. Bla, Bla, bla." Ok I can now see all my workers with their little faces pressed up against the window panes watching me get arrested. He says, "do you know what the speed limit is on this street?" And I said 35 40. "You don't know, your guessing."
"yeah." Having nothing else to say, having no other responce.
"It's 25."
I go, "25?"
"You were going 37. Well I'm sorry." And he rose to give me a ticket. THANNNK YOUUUUU for daring to question his mighty authority and pull over to a safe. I have 30 days to send this thing in to appeal it. Meanwhile my court date comes up for the second ticket. I go in it doesn't get repeeled. And I then, this is clearly my fault, didn't send the thing in to get the ticket repealed. No the third ticket goes through and I have lost my liscence for 30 days. Which sucked. Because I worked 45 min. away. There was no public transportation to get there. Every single day I had to think of a way to get to work. Many times it was getting a ride after work to the train station. Taking the train accross the state. To where a friend of mine lived in college. And a few of my other friends who were around there. Staying overnite at their house. Getting up taking the train back having that same person pick me up at the train station and bring me to work or sometimes someone who might be driviing near where I worked or lived and I would get dropped off on the side of the highway. I would have to call my parents or they would come to the mall and pick me up. Or I would have to walk all the way home from the mall and go back there stand on the side of the highway, and they would come by and I would have to inconvence them and they would pick me up on the side of the highway and bring me to work. What this comes down to is a punishement on people and not a punishment on me. But Regardless anyway, there's the story. When i was pulled over here, at work on friday, and then told the sunday story on monday, there was a woman that sympathized with me. She has lost her licence when she was a kid. And she's gotten a speeding ticket for going 64 in a 55. Well, she just came into my office with ANOTHER speeding ticket. This is two in two weeks for her! She was following a line of traffic going 45 in a 35. The cop held her for a half hour!
crazzzzzyyyyyyy. When I did finnally get my car back my fellow co-worker Greg comes into work at about 1 pm and asks me,
"hey, where'd you park your car?" (you can see where this is going)
So, after much of "Are you kidding" and "What do you mean by 'It's not
there'" we went out to see that my car is truly no longer in our parking
lot.
[Time passes....]
Of course, in the middle of writing this, I realized that I
parked in a different parking lot, because I was late, and snuck in the
side.
false alarm....
Part 5 Life in The Garden State
Chapter 13 Entering the Garden State
I'm living in New Jersey now, working at a company called Midi corp. The two most common questions I get about my job is: 1. Does Midi make those .midi audio files? No.Sorry. "Midi" is french for "noon" and the owner's name is Jack Noon. 2. What exactlydo you do there? That's kinda hard to describe,but basically, we mostly make training programs for companies. I take the graphics that someone else makes, the script that someone else wrote and put it all together onto a CD. It's pretty cool, but I'm still working for "the man". It's about five degrees warmer down here, so when it's snowing up there, it could only be raining down here! (I'll be laughing come February!) I spent most of my 1998 summer weekends either working (yuck!) or driving up to Vermont to go to concerts and festivals. How odd that I had to move South to discover the state to the North. My hair is purple now. I like the way it looks, but it's a pain to keep up, costs money, and knuckleheads constantly ask me how i did it. If you're wondering how i did it, just go to the mall and buy some hair dye at
"Hot Topics" or an equivalent.
But to be nice here are some FAQ about the purple hair.
Q: How did you do that?
This is the most common question that i get from people
that i don't know. It seems obvious to me. I went to the
mall and bought a bleach kit and some blue hair dye.
Then i followed the manufacturer's instructions. Seems
simple to me.
Q: Why in God's name did you do that to your hair?
It's funny, but i HONESTLY didn't realize
that everyone would mistake my intentions. I dyed it
blue because i thought that i would like the way it
looked. I did. I dyed it purple because the store
was out of blue. I like the purple better. So does
everyone else. I DIDN'T dye it to look different. And
it may have seemed obvious to everyone else, but i
didn't think that everyone would think that i was
"just trying to be different". And i'm glad i didn't,
because it may have influenced my decision.
Q: Doesn't that damage your hair?
I don't know, and i don't really care.
A few weekends ago, a few of us went to
a festival in Vermont called Bread and Puppet.
It was INCREDIBLE. It was fields
of people hanging out and being nice to each other.
Imagine that! A fair amount of the people had brought
hand drums and would spontaneously form impromptue
drum circles. There were all
these people that were part of the music, but not
totally controlling it. I got to use some drums and
get into it. It's hard to describe, but everything
that i ever wanted in a club or party was in this
one drum circle. Everyone was totally into it
and totally tuned into each other.
There was so much going on that i stayed
up all night, and all the next day. I didn't even
get to see the puppets, i was so occupied!
Then last week, we went camping in Virgina with some
people that i knew from college. It was cool. We took
a tour into these crazy caverns. They were like 350
feet deep. Pretty crazy.
So, now i'm here, back at work. The project that i've
been working on is over, and all the managers are in a
meeting, so i have no idea what to do! One thing i've
learned from all this, is that work is really a big
waste of time. If you're doing something every day,
because it's something that you feel needs to be done,
that you would do anyway, even if you weren't getting
paid, then that's not really a job, that's a passion.
But working 40-60 hours a week, just to have money
to do and have "stuff" seems pretty pointless and
wasteful. What I'm going to do, i haven't exactly
determined yet. But the ideas are forming....
>Well how's NJ?
NJ's ok. But Vermont is AWESOME! Have you ever been there?
It's just nature and friendly people and hardly any cops. Talk
about heaven.
I was at a festival in vermont over labor day weekend and i met this
gal, Shri. She's awesome. She was trying to move to New Mexico
to study herbal medicine, but she ended up going to school in
Vermont. She's from New Jersey though. Anyway, we got along
great, but we got separated and i never saw her again. My only hope
is that she shows up to this reggae festival in Massachusetts next
week. I told her about it, and she wanted to go, but didn't know if
she could find a ride. Oh well.. We'll see. Such is the ways of romance.
I tried to call you last night, but it rang and rang and there was
no answering machine...
You're FOM thing made me laugh in various places. You're so cool
mark.
Chapter 14 Differences between Massachusetts and New Jersey
MA 5% sales tax MA is called TAXachusetts. NO NO NO!!!
NJ 6% NJ is called the armpit of the USA.
One of MY letters has
When you're searching for something that's in multiple states, become a FORWARD!!
like a small tour, it usually comes to NJ and ALWAYS to NYC, I CANNOT LIVE
but rarely to MA. WITH THIS DISHONOR!!
The traffic lights take FOREVER to change in NJ. Car insurance is higher in NJ.
The legal speed limit, and the actual speed limit, are the same in NJ.
NJ has a female governor.
People look better on the beaches in NJ.
There's more people in NJ.
There's more of a feeling of patriotism towards NJ as a state than in MA.
There's more 7-11s in NJ.
Cops will ticket you for not having your headlights on in the rain in NJ.
Gas prices are lower in NJ.
Outside your car, cops will harass you for insignificant things in MA.
They're more preoccupied with otherstuff in NJ. The PAIN!
Although there's some really nice parts of NJ in the west and north, The AGONY!
you have to drive pretty far to get to them. In MA nature is mixed with the urban. The DISGRACE!
NJ has a comic book store owned by Kevin Smith
If you're from New Jersey, you can say that you're from "Jersey" and you sound tough.
MA has rotarys that everyone understands. People in MA seem friendlier.
NJ has traffic circles that everyone fears. People in NJ seem more content.
People are more accepting of "alternative lifestyles" in NJ. People in MA make fun of NJ.
People in NJ hate that
Movies, and books and stuff, take place in NJ sometimes. I live in NJ.
People laugh at you when you say "wicked", meaning "very" in NJ.
NJ Chinese resturants give you free crispy stuff with duck sauce before you order.
You don't have to pay tolls to get into NJ, but you have to pay them to get out.
.--- booya "Pure gold does not fear the test of fire."
Chapter 15 Conversations with Right Knee
I was in Manhattan waiting for this club to open. It opens about 9:00PM or 10:00PM. So I'm sitting in the park reading Winnie the Pooh, which is a good book by the way. There is this drunk guy sitting near me listening to his walkman. I'm sitting there involved in my book, basically ignoring this guy. He starts laughing and as he's laughing this couple is walking by, trying their best to hurry away from him as quickly as their legs can carry them. He said something real quick before I looked up. I looked at him grinning, and began to laugh to my self, laughing more at him more then anything he said. He said, "YEAH you get it. YEAH, you see it now." I'm laughing because I have no idea what the heck he is talking about.
Then to his horror his tape jammed. He then started fixing it with his fingers. And as he was doing this some women walked by and looked at him, with her boyfriend right by her side. And he said "Yeah, that's it baby", making some sick gesture with his hands. And she just sort of smiled at him. Now she's probably smiling at him like, "stay away from me you freak", and he interpreted it as her flirting with him. He's like, "that isn't right. Now she's with him. He's taking her out, and she's smiling at me. That ain't right."
I was like, "yeah whatever." And so then we start chatting about it. Were talking about how wrong this was and stuff. As we walk I tell him I'm going to this club. He says, "Your going to this club? You don't want to go to that club! Weird people go in there."
Meanwhile I'm sitting there painting my fingernails with glow in the dark nail polish, and he's telling me weird people go into the club. Obviously he didn't see what was in front of him. I said "I don't know if I'm talking about the same club your talking about."
We start walking down the street to this club. He shows me the club he was talking about. Guys going in with suits and all. "No that's not the club I'm talking about." Were walking down the street, and he's like this skinny little black guy. He's limping on one leg and he called himself 'Right Knee'. Two women walk by and he's like, "HEY BABY, OWWWW". There like, "yeah whatever".
He then rebounds with, "And that's where's it at, you know it." I tried to rationalize with this very drunk out of his mind guy. "What's the difference between what you just did and what the women just did that you condemned her for?"
"You see this is mutual, I'm checking them out, and there checking me out." I didn't say anything. In this guys delusional drunk mind, when he catcalls women, they are into it, and there checking him out too, even thou he's a degenerate freak. "Yeah whatever", I responded.
The two of us then proceed to the club I was going to. We get there and it's a Gothic club. There are all these people in black. Black skirts, Black paints, Half of them have Sunglasses on. There standing there in this very somber way. People going into clubs with suits on are freaks, people dressed in black at nite, with sunglasses are not.
"And so this is where I'm going.
"OK, can I have some $ to go by beer?
I'm like "Noo!"
"Come on man, I don't have any money."
"I replied, Well you probably don't need it."
He's like ,"yeah".
It was cool that we talked for awhile.
-booya
"I WAS A STRANGER AND YOU INVITED ME IN. I TELL YOU THE TRUTH, WHENEVER YOU DID FOR ONE OF THE LEAST OF THESE BROTHERS OF MINE, YOU DID FOR ME.
CHASING THE GIRL"
MATT 25:35b,49---
booya
"Pure gold does not fear the test of fire."
Chapter 16 Romance Update: Romance in the Garden State
Try your best to sing the following to
the tune of The Brady Bunch.
Here's a story,
of a lovely lady.
Who was living in New Jersey with two cats.
They would cuddle her at night,
Like a boyfriend
But really they're just cats.
It's a story,
of a man named Banyai
who moved down into Jersey, who knows why?
It was neat there, seeing Manhattan,
But he was all alone.
Till the one day when the lady met this fellow,
and she knew that it was much more than a hunch.
That they could
be a good girl and boyfriend
but the guy was a nervous knucklehead
and didn't really see that and didn't want
to rush into things and ended up prolonging
their frustration for six months, but then he
finally got it and asked her out and then they
were together and happy and kinda giddy
and silly, but it's cool cause they're really
honest and trusting and respectful and stuff,
and it's still crazy and fragile, but then they
all are aren't they?
By the way, her name is Jenine.
Chapter 17 The Return of Aaron's Car Woos
Allright, some back history. I'm driving my car, and you know I don't drive any kind of good car. I only drive crappy cars. That's so cops can pull me over, but it hasn't happen since I've moved to New Jersy, cause I have what looks like a decent car, even thou it's not. Cops are decieved by the lack of rust and duct tape. I'm not sure if this is relevent to the script but I find it sad and ironic when I was driving what looked like and was a little crappy white car with rust and a couple of pieces hanging off cops were constanly pulling me over, and constanly harrasing me. Now that I have a decent looking car and even though it's unregestered and uninsured, I've driven it around for at least 2 mounts and it has not been touched by a cop at all. My last car is sitting in my driveway waiting to go to the junk yard. I got this car in Mass. and it was insured when I was in Mass. But since I have been down here in New Jersy, I haven't paid for anything and I think they cancelled the registration and the insurence.
So anyway my altanator broke, and I got it fixed and it supposely had a life time gurantee on the altinator. So I'm driving my Crappy car. Now Jenny my girlfriend is driving her car which is a fairly brand new Saturn, completly under warenty. Part of the term of her warrenty is that she had to get her oil changed every 3000 miles. The standard time to change your oil. I kinna noticed that she hadn't really changed it much, since I moved down to New Jersy, about a year ago. I mentioned it to her and she said, "I think I have to get my oil changed maybe." I vialated my warentee, I think I've gone over. Were driving down the road and it seems like it's not driving as well as it normally does. She's giving me a ride to work. All of a sudden it starts making this kinna noise. TA TA TA TA TA TA TA TA TA TA TA TA TA TA TA TA TA TA TA TA TA TA TA TA TA TA TA TA TA TA TA TA TA TAT TA TA TA TA TA TA TA TA TA TA TA TA, WHICH IS NEVER A GOOD SOUND FOR AN ENGINE TO MAKE. "You really gotta get that oil changed." I said. It started to get so bad that I said, "Pull over now." She pulled over and luckly she had another quart of oil in the car. We poured it in and still sounded bad but not as it did before. We drove to work and had it towed to the Saturn Dealership. She completly vialated her warente. They cheaked and she was supposed to bring her oil change in for a oil change, 15,000 miles ago. She's missed about 4-5 oil changes since she's had her car. They look at it, and tell her she broke a rod in her engine. That's never good, breaking something in your engine. It costs about $2000 dollers to repair. They were like, "Were gonna cheak to see if your still under warente, but....we don't think so. They had the car for about 2 1/2 weeks. They sent a oil sample to detroit to get it annalized and all this stuff. Their trying to find a way not to pay for it, because she violated her warente. Meanwhile were driving my little crappy car all over the place. Commuting to work together, bla, bla, bla.
Were driving up to her parents house and the battery light comes on and I say, Gee that's not Good, the battery light's on. Last time that happen, the altanator died and wasn't chargeing up the battery. "That seems odd", and of course I din't say "We should go right home. So we keep driving an hour up to her parents house, course it dies half way up there. Were in the middle of now where, car died, no battery. I know it's the altanator. What can we do? We have no car to get to work tomorow. Were in the middle of no where. We called AAA, There gonna come to tow us, tow me back to the place where I got my car fixed. We still have no car. We have no way to get home and no way to get to work the next day. We call her parents, her parents are not helpful. No car rental places are open. It's like, "What the heck do we do?" We get in the tow truck with the tow truck guy to go back to Prinston, where the car gets fixed but it's like still 20 min away from where we live. Were driving down there and all of a sudden he just stops. And runs into this car rental place. And Luckily he knew a guy in the car rental place. Who open up the store just for us, and rented us his last car. Our Credit Card didn't go through. So he lowered the price, and ran it through again, so it could go through. SO we got the car, And now, well it's actually Jenny's Credit Card. Nothing bad happen in the end but it was sad that both our cars were broken down in the shop. Here's the clincher. We get home in the rental car, The guy tows the car to my house. Jenny gets a call from the place where her car is. They told her, "It turns out it's gonna be covered in the warenty. So you only have to pay $50 bucks and we'll fix it." And I call my place, "It had a lifetime warenty, I never seen it happen before. "Yeah will fix it for nothing, It will be ready today, sorry for the inconvenyence." Thanks very much. A happy ending for my car story's had to happen sometime. One little thing I might add to this story that really made it a happy ending. Had fate gone the other way. My car's broken down on the side of the road, The battery totaly ran out, so theirs no hazzard's on or anything. Were waiting in the gas station for the AAA guy to show up. A cop pulls up to my car. My car was inspeced but failed. It failed inspection many mounths ago and I never got it fixed cause who care's it's a peace of crap. So the cop pulls up and I know if the cop sees I've been driving my car around for 5 mounts unexpected, he's not going to be the happiest camper in the world. SO I go running over there, About a quarter mile down the street to try to intercept the cop. The cop's getting out going over to my car, I'm like,
"It's okay, a AAA guy is coming. I've allready called him, it's okay. " "So you called them?" , he replied. "Yeah, I called them, the battery died that's why the hazard's aren't on. There on their way, I called them about 20 min. ago. They'll be here soon." "Okay, I'll guess I'll stay right here till they get here, unless I get any calls and hang out so noone smashs into the car. All right and thank you very much, and he got into his car and never noticed that my car was not inspected.
On Sunday, Marshall, Jenine and I, on a spontaneous decision, went to
Atlantic City.
Wow. All I can say is, wow.
There were so many people, so much noise and so much money.
There's nothing like seeing a table covered in stacks of money,
watching a dealer guy spin a wheel, and then reach his arm out and
sweep thousands of dollars down a hole. Then a few minutes
later, the table is coverend in money again.
On the main strip, there were more places named "Cash for gold"
than were selling food!
There was some big promotion, where you had to do something
to get a chance to crack this safe's combination. The safe was
constructed out of thick glass and inside was 20 million dollars
in cash! It was a pile of 100's, about as big as a single bed. It was
so amazingly excessive, it was almost abstract.
I played a dollar here, and a dollar there in slots, before we found
the card tables. I love all the little routines that the dealers had to
go through. Also, how everything is super controlled. Decks are
changed constantly. Everytime a new deck comes in, the dealer
has to verify that every card is in there. The tables we were hanging
around were only $5 - $10 chip tables. We didn't poke around
too much to find the $100 tables. I don't know if they'd want us
hanging around to watch them play, anyway.
So, I wanted to play something, and we found the "Money Wheel".
I knew that it was a rip-off, but at least it was simple, friendly,
and we understood it. So, I got 20 bucks worth of $1 chips and
started betting randomly. Both Jenine and
Marshall borrowed a chip and won. Then they were playing with
their chips. So, there's this 45 area. And if you bet on it, and it
comes up, it pays 45 to 1. So I got this feeling and put a buck on
45. I told the people next to us that 45 was gonna come up next.
They said, "We've been here an hour, and haven't seen 45 come
up yet." Well, given that many cosmic type things were aligned
right then, 45 came up! Jenine and I started dancing around thinking
that I had just won 45 bucks. Then the guy running the table
pointed out that there was a "Joker" 45 and a "Bally's" 45. I had
of course, bet on the wrong one. Had I known about that previously,
I probably would have bet on them both. *sigh* So, I continued
to place chips down, until I was out. In the end, I didn't win a
single time. PPPTTTHHH!
So, lesson learned. And pretty cheap too, considering.
Just wait till next time.
PART 6 Dreams and plans
Leaving the Garden state
I think about the Christmas Eve when Geoff and Val announced
that she was pregnant with Xavier. I can remember the pigtails in
Val's hair. I can remember the look on my Aunt's face and the
sound of her scream. I remember the excitement and joy while
everyone was still in shock. Then i realize that it was FOUR years
ago.
I'm coming to realize more and more, that the time we have is
so precious. And so i wonder, as i sit in a cubicle, why am i here.
Not "here" in an existential sense, but here at work. With the
money i make, i can get a nice car, (some of the other people
here, younger than me, are driving BMWs) a nice house or a
partment, and good food. If you know me at all, you know i'd
much more likely spend my money on trips to Manhattan, covering
my walls with black paint or fur and CDs. Either way, it doesn't
matter. These things have always provided a modest amount of
pleasure, but is it really worth sacrificing 50+ hours a week? How
about the stress, the lack of sleep and the lack of independence?
So, if these things don't make you very happy, i ask again, why
are we here?
The answer i usually get is, "Well, you've got to eat, right?
Where are you going to sleep without an apartment? What
are you going to do with all your time?" And so, while i don't
have a concrete answer for all of these, i aim to find out by
trying it.
So, i'm leaving Midi. I'm leaving New Jersey. And i'm also
going to leave the USA for a while. Come May, Steve, Ben,
Jenine and I are going to begin our Trip. We've all been saving
money and will continue to do so until May. We're going to
purchase a van jointly and drive through Canada and the United
States.
What are you going to eat?
Well, in the beginning we plan on just eating simply. Beans,
rice, pasta whatever. There are also discount grocery stores
in all of the cities around the country that sell government
excess and stuff. Retail grocery stores also throw out quite
a lot of food, and so i'll be getting out my old dumpster
diving stick and getting back in practice. I may also go back
to eating meat and go fishing.
Where are you going to sleep?
We're only going to stay where it's warm, so as it gets cold,
we're going to head south. We'll have good sleeping bags
and a tent. If it's too harsh outside, we can always sleep in
the van.
What are you going to do?
I'm not totally sure. That's part of the reason for going on
the trip. I know that this is NOT what i want to do, and so
i want to explore and find out what is out there. I know
that i'll be learning to play the various musical instruments
we're bringing as well as keeping a journal and improving
my writing. What i'm most interested in, in terms of growth,
is meeting all kinds of people along the way. Whenever i
hang around interesting places, i always seem to find cool
people that always have something interesting to say.
Besides that, i think that just exploring and spending time
with friends will be enough. We'll see.
How long are you going for?
I'm not sure. It could be three weeks. It could be thirty
years. There aren't very many definite plans. It's not as
much a vacation as it is a life-style change.
I realize that to many of you, this sounds like you're
back in the Sixties. The vegetarian, "peace, love and
understanding" feelings, as well as the loathing of corporate
giants are pretty much the same views that were held by
many people back then. I have always wondered what
happened to them. Why did they change? And why
are they so unwilling to understand people who feel that
way now? If the general populous was more open to
discussion and examination, we might find out, but most
people would find questions like that too "personal" or
"intruding". I guess they either feel guilty about
something they're doing, or simply don't care about
improving our situation.
This is the first time in my life that i've sat down and
really thought about what i believe about the way i
should live my life. Then, i came up with an answer,
about what i want and what is right, and now i'm
working to make it happen. It feels good, and alive to
be doing the thing i want to do. I've always been
envious of the people that "do stuff". You know, the
people that are motivated and strong enough to do
the things that they want to do. Now i'm becoming
one of those people, and i have to say, it's pretty good.
So, feel free to ask me any questions you might
have, or point out any major flaws with the idea or
philosophy behind the Trip. As most of you know,
i'm always open to Discussion. .
So, we''re planning this trip, around the country. It should really be called
a journey. I plan on covering at least as much mental ground as physical.
We have a few places that we'd like to go, but no real plan on how or
when to get there. My mental/spiritual journey should follow a similar
path. Right now I'm working at this "good job". I'm making money.
I have a car and an apartment. If I chose to, I could buy nice clothes,
get a better car. Of course, there's a price to pay for all ths. I have to
be in this office for at least 40 hours a week. Two thousand hours a year.
How many years??? This however pales in comparison to more subtle
prices I pay on a daily basis. The multi-media firm I work for produces
training programs for companies. Are these good, nice and responsible
companies? The price I pay is not asking. Don't ask, don't tell. We don't
want to know what you do, we just want your cash. We really
don't care who you're screwing over to make your money, as long as some
comes our way. And I'm part of it. I might as well be the sweat shop
operator. The one that poisons the river. Stress, weariness, eye and
back strain and two whole weeks off are among the benefits of a job like
this. Many people have offered me the rationalization, "Well, what can
you do? You gotta eat." And this trip is my answer. If i can find a way
to live without working at these places, and live happily, then when i'm
complaining about the environment or something, and someone tells me,
"What about you? You're just as much to blame as everyone else." I can
say to them. "No. That is incorrect. I am no longer a part of that system.
I am self sufficient without those corporations. I am no longer a part of
"the system". But that ain't easy. But if we are successful, i can hold myself
up as a model and show people that there is another way. Whether they
want to see another way, remains to be seen. If they did, they would
probably already be looking for it.
While all this seems idealistic, i am driven by the simple fact that
OUR WORLD DOES NOT HAVE TO BE THIS WAY. If people can exist
that are trustworthy and honest, then the world can exist that way. I don't
accept the lame excuse that "people will always be greedy". Forget that. So,
what, are we just going to accept that our lives will always be the dirt-hole
of some greedy bastard. I refuse to lie down quietly and die for them.
Hey everyone.
I need to take a break from my heavy "work" schedule and since there's nothing in my
inbox, i figured i'd send out an update on The Trip planning.
The Date
May 21st is the last day of work for Jenine and I. Ash (Steve Ericson) has already
quit and is waiting anxiously for the rest of us to catch up. With only four weeks till
our lease runs out, there's a lot of pressure to get everything packed and moved.
Van
Still no van. We've done quite a bit of searching, but it's pretty difficult to get cars
checked out by mechanics when you work during the hours that the mechanics
are open. Every vehicle we've gotten checked out has had too many things wrong with
it.
People
Surprisingly, still four of us going. Me, Jenine (known as Jennie once we're out of Midi), Steve
Friedman, and Ash (having two Steve's would be too confusing)
Midi
Whew. It's pretty crazy here. Jenine and i are on the same team with one other guy, Nirav.
We had one project manager for a while, and we didn't think that he'd have too much trouble
holding on when 2/3 of his team leaves. But starting friday, a new guy took over. He's not
just new to our team, it's his first time being a project manager anywhere.
He's obviously still frazzled and confused. How/if he's going to be able to handle us leaving,
only time will tell. Friday is when we both put in our two weeks notice.
Jenine
Right now we're on an upward swing in our relationship. We came dangerously close to
breaking up for a while, but through honesty and communication we've stuck together.
More to come soon....
---
booya
^. .^ %
@
VV VV
Sheesh, only three more weeks of working here. Yippee!! and yet there's sooo much we
have to do. Jenine was crying about giving up her cats last night, with good reason.
They're like her children, and she's going to have to give them to someone she doesn't
know, possibly a shelter. ick.
>>
I now have a new respect for the 70's. I'm going to cover my walls in fake fur. We'll see if that
actually comes about, but i'm going to at least dream about it for a while.
"I like nonsense, it wakes up the brain cells. Fantasy is a necessary ingredient in living, it's a way of looking at life through the wrong end of a telescope and that enables you to laugh at life's realities." Dr. Seuss
Aaron's Car Woes Part 2
I haven't committed a crime. What I did was fail to comply with the law.
-David Dinkins, New York City Mayor, answering accusations that he
failed to pay his taxes.
>>
>WHERE DID YOU GET THAT FROM??????
Some forward of famous quotes. I'll forward it to you. But don't
send it back to me or i'll send it to you 100 times with a bunch
of other stupid forwards.
So i've got this friend, Bill. We were friends in High School and
through college. We mostly hung out in the summer, since we
went to different schools. But he's always been a slacker when
it comes to keeping in contact. For the past 4 years, or so, we've
all hung out on New Years and at the end of summer in Cape
Cod. The Cape Cod thing didn't happen this year. Some
of us have been tryingt to contact him for a while to no
avail. I sent out an email to all of the New Years people
and never heard back from him. I was pretty much fed up
with him and almost gave up on him. So, my clock got
unplugged and i needed the time. Steve and Jenine
weren't home, so i decided to call someone that i hadn't
called in a long time. I called Bill and he was home.
We ended up talking for about 2 hours. It was really
cool. I just felt so much like you then. He was telling
me that he really likes my updates, even though he
never responds to them. AHH! I know how you
feel now!
Hello all.
I promised some among you that i would
begin writing more frequently, and i've
already broken my promise, , , oh well.
hey,
You go on and on and on during school about how you'll keep in touch and that I probably won't and now look what happens. this'll make letter #2 from me and what have I gotten from you? 3 post cards that say "hi, this is mark. California is cool." that's it! and I get a letter from that is photocoppied and no personal letter! you jim! send me a letter! I talked to heather today and she tells me that you got a job, and then she tells me that you got laid off. I never even heard abot it at all ! I even sent you a stinking stamp!!!!!!!!!!!!! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!
Ok enough gripping . still no job. I'm waiting to talk to this guy from a factory, but still no word. my parents are getting annoyed. I saw my mom getting up yesturday, as I was going to bed at 5:00 am. she told me to get a job. so anyway send me a letter you bum. here's another stamp.
your cool, always original, guarenteed to please, hypo-allergenic, friend Aaron.
You know, i was thinking about how we haven't talked in a while, and how i should contact you.
I, of course, did nothing about that.
That was a pretty funny/cool message.
HEY! I've never had a movie that I considered to be my "favorite" movie. Just a bunch of good
movies. Well, that has all changed since seeing, "BARBARELLA" Queen of the Galaxy.
(Starring Jane Fonda)(released in 1968)
I'd tell you that you can see it because it is rated PG, but since Barbarella is topless through
a significant part of the movie, i don't think you'll like it. I have no idea how this movie got a
PG rating.
It was the most entertaining, creative movie that i've ever seen. AND, the main villian in the
movie, is named Duran Duran. This is where the band got their name!
You know how grown-ups are always saying, "Rock and roll/san fransisco/new york/politics/whatever isn't the same as when i was young. Back then it was bla bla bla. We're going to say the same thing about the internet in 20+ years. Back in my day, the internet
had no laws. Everyone could have a web page. It was a place where free speech existed again and no one knew quite what to make of it. And it was FREE!
-Eddie Blake
“The stories are Pretty freakin funny. Especially the car stuff. I almost busted out laughing at work reading them.” -Eddie Blake
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