5/8ths is better than half.

Getting unplugged is always something I look forward to. Finally that stupid pest of a pump is someone else’s problem and I no longer have to worry about the hose getting caught up and yanked from my port. Finally I can start to flush out the poison. Finally the pain and discomfort can start to clear up.

Four days of constipation followed by a couple of normality and then finally a storm of diarrhea. Still it beats the last time I visited Portland and got food poisoning. That was a fun trip. Except for that first day in Portland. And the week or so of cramps and shits.

You know what I fucking loved about Portland? Powell’s books. A book store that takes up a full block. And it was packed on a rainy Sunday. For that Portland, I will forgive you for all the conversations I had to endure with strangers.

Maybe it will help that my dosage has been cut by about a fifth. I’m not really noticing much of a difference in my daily symptoms. Moderately cold things still hurt to the touch. And let me better define cold. I don’t mean the depth of an arctic winter level of cold, where your hands would freeze, blacken and drop off. I mean this thing came out of the fridge, normally I could handle it for hours with not a jolt of pain – now my hands and throat are stinging.

Hey, that room temperature water that is so blandly tepid? That is going to make your throat feel like it is seizing up. And you better let that yogurt sit out for a while before eating it. This week, amongst others, I was set across from a Vietnam vet. We didn’t interact, but you get to overhear things about other people’s experiences regardless. I’m bitching about discomfort when it comes to the cold, but he had the total package, fatigue mixed with loss of appetite.

Hard to complain about my stomach pains as he fights a bigger fight. I am relieved that my path isn’t that much more difficult. I don’t know how much willpower I possess to force myself to eat when I really am not feeling up to it – not if our positions were switched.

I had a conversation in my off week with a fellow partaker of the chemo drugs. We swapped symptoms before my nurse returned and passed on the platelet counts. Or, if it doesn’t fade, this could be my life from here on out. Forgot to ask if his eyes really hurt when he sneezes, but on the whole we had a venn diagram of shitty experiences to compare and contrast. I could be facing two years of sensitivity to the cold. Two years before it might fade.

Permanent nerve damage indeed.

We had storms over the weekend. Storms and hot weather. Hot and humid weather. The kind of weather that made me happy that my roommate had plans that meant not being in the apartment, leaving me free to lie about in front of a fan in me undies. Yeah, that is almost a brand endorsement.

The miasma of weather did a fine job of robbing me of what little sleep I managed to claim. Friday night, fifteen minutes after falling asleep I awoke to discover that heart racing against the incoming storm. Adrenaline rush. But it did manage to get me up in order to close the windows.

Get me up and then keep me up. That is the worst. Not being able to get back to sleep. Come Monday I am usually exhausted. I don’t feel physically fatigued. Maybe a little less stamina than before. But for the weekend of and a few days after chemo, I’m nearly dead to the world as my brain fogs up.

Did we have plans on sunday? A true pity for I shall be sitting about listlessly whilst napping.

I’ve finally shaved my head. I had grown tired of it looking like our national forests after the Republicans auctioned off all the timber rights at a bargain price. Looking at myself in the mirror at work, where I have “better” lighting, was just depressing. Vainly attempting to keep something from slipping through your fingers seemed a mite pathetic to me.

This is the first time in my four decades of existence that I have ever had my hair this short. Now I look like a cut-rate Lex Luthor. Though I am slowly getting used to the sight. Maybe this year I’ll dress up as Henry Rollins for Halloween. Though I’m going to need to do a lot more push-ups to get something like his physique.

How am I? I’ve had better years.

But I find that I’ve had worse years. But Epicurus said that even in the depths of illness, pleasure outweighed the pain. I find this to be true, but I do have manflu cancer and chemo.

No, I’ve had a couple worse years. The second to the contender being a few years back when the company I worked for expanded drastically, while refusing to take on more help. I spent so many 12+ hour days working open to close to help keep up. And failing. I made six grand in overtime that year as my days were: get up shower and then eat, go to work, and then come home eat and go to bed.

Taint much of a life. But I did manage to make a dent in my student loans.

I spent a year being angry at our management for not doing something to rectify the situation, Why would they ignore that problem? Sometimes it still pisses me off. It is in my nature. But I have learned to quickly let it go. It doesn’t mean anything.

The worst year of my life came after I graduated college. Not that first 12 months, but the twelve following. The first year after graduation I spent most of my days writing. I would go to bed in the morning excited for the coming day, and then get up excited to get back to work. It. Was. Awesome. After I got my morning’s writing done, I would usually go for a walk. Summer or winter, the same. Then come home and write some more.

I was going to be a professional millionaire novelist.

Except that never happened. I put in the hundreds of hours of work to create this thing. And nothing ever came of it. One of the two biggest disappointments of my life, one that I’ve whined about more than once here. And will probably bitch about again.

After that grand year of hope, I ran straight into the wall of nope. I moved away from the city that I had lived in all through college. I found myself in a place that I didn’t in the least care for. Do you want to publish my novel? No. Do you want to publish my novel? No. Slowly that dream was just wrenched out of my hands as I realized I was never going to be able to afford to write full time. There was no escape.

I got a job making a cut above minimum wage for a pharmacy with a high turn-over rate. Seriously it was around 20% at the height of the fucking depression. I spent my days taking boxes out of boxes, putting stickers on them. Taking those stickers off of the boxes, and applying new ones, putting them into other boxes and then putting different stickers on the other boxes. I worked in shipping. The job was absurd and boring and pointless. It ate at me. I was making just enough to survive as my student loans crushed my soul.

They say to take what you want and pay for it. It took me ten years to pay for college. It may have been worth it.

I became the head of my department. Not through skill but more by winning through default. Al that meant was I got $0.32 more an hour and bitched out by management that ignored me when I made requests to make the job easier.

I was depressed. A lot. And fell back on my drug of choice, MST3k. That always made me feel good again.

Hail the crew of the Satellite of Love.

Moving on. Or not.

Today I was asked by my co-worker how I put up withe the  laziness and stupidity that I am surrounded with while on the job.  He was surprised that the co-workers just seemed to mindlessly wander around and disappear like the randomly spawned positron pair at the event horizon of a black hole(shit yeah I've been reading physics books!).

Simple, said I:  I daydream about dropping everything, loading up my Aveo(I assume I bring get one small suitcase and an extra pair of socks) and moving west.

What will I do for a living?  They asked.

Simplier:  With the assistance of my cat Zuul, I will travel between small towns and solve mysteries/fight injustice/drink smoothies.  Like so many 80s television protagonists before me.  No case will be too small, so long as it is pitched by the beautiful love interest of the week.  I may even consider getting a proper van.

If you have a mystery or injustice to solve, Zuul and I may be out there. Unless it's taco night.  Then you'll have to wait.  Unless you're a buxom beauty and also have tacos.  Then step right on up.

Fear us evil doers.  Fear us.

Reflections from Walden Pond

To future adventures.

I've not gone out for much excitement(for what approaches excitement in my life) lately, instead it has had to come to me.  As much as the temporary jolts of adrenaline can be considered an adventure.  But driving the equivalent of New York to LA and back every month rather quiets any desire I might have to travel in the short term on my days off.  Besides that, many of my friends are busy in their own lives, so travel companions are difficult to find.  Already drive alone five nights a week, and have no desire to do so on the weekends as well.

For the last several months of my resumed employment, I have been listening to audio books during my long car rides to fill some of the emptiness. Well at least on the way out.  Often on the way back I listen to music or just sit in the silence and let my mind grind away on the question of the day.  When the drudgery is neither dangerous and depressing it descends into a deep dull.  How's that for alliteration?  But I've complained about it enough about it in the past.

So far since January my listening list is as follows:  The Wheel of Time, all 13 books.  Then some of Mark Twain's travel journals.  Caesar's Legion.  I made a vain attempt at Descartes' Dissertation on Reason(this did not go well as most of it seemed to be the author talking about himself.  More than that, at least one of the readers sounded terrible).  Now I'm returning again to Walden.  The mood struck me so.

Walden.  My English teacher in my Junior year of high school was obsessed with the book and its author.  We spent an eternity wrapped up in four or five weeks working through the rambling work of Henry David Thoreau and Ralph Waldo Emmerson.  I hated it, as my love of reading involved mostly science fiction and fantasy novels.

Many years, and one boring job that I hated later, and I decided to give Walden another chance.  This time though, I would go with the audio version as I worked that boring job that I so hated.  Have you heard of librivox?  Got to Librivox, they are awesome.

That was in 2009.  The first half of the book tickled me greatly and I revered the man's words.  The last half, well he just wanders about in no particular direction.  Some of his stops are interesting, whilst the rest I could easily skip.

For those of you who have never heard of the book, it consists of the naturalist Henry David Thoreau's rambling narrative about his two years of experience in the woods.  Back in the 1840s he built a small shack on the shore of Walden Pond in Massachusetts and lived a rather care-free life.

Were he alive today, Walden would effectively be HDT's blog, as he writes about everything that crosses his mind.  From his observations of the natural world down to his views and thoughts about the nature of what the nature is of living a good life.  Some of his thoughts and words resonate deeply with me, while others are just nattering opinions. Still, you take what you wish from the giant soup of human thought as you mix together your own sustenance and leave the rest to burn or rot.

I wonder if this blog will be my Walden.  I suppose I could work to make it so.  If I manage some deeper thoughts.  But how has HDT affected my own thinking.  How have his thoughts struck me?  Here are a few quotes that I quite enjoy.

1) As if you could kill time without injuring eternity.

*To my thinking, this is a reminded of how much time we spend waiting for life.  I don't know if that was what he had intended with the statement as this brilliant line jumped out at me as the surrounding context faded back into the bushes.  I answer with “I do not wish to kill time, but embrace her.  Alas she slips away so quickly.”

I try to fill my days with as much meaningful work as possible.  Usually I fail as I am tempted away by funny cat videos.  It has been a week or more since I last picked up my zombie novel, or any other story.  As it is, I am squandering my existence with the struggle to survive.

2) Do not be too moral. You may cheat yourself out of much life so. Aim above morality. Be not simply good, be good for something

3) I have never found a companion that was so companionable as solitude.

* As an introvert and a hermit, this one rings very true for me.  I spend about 22 in every 24 hours in a given work day in near complete solitude.  But there's a difference.  I have a phone and the internet.  If I wish to connect with someone I always can.  Loneliness is easy enough to stave off in that fashion.  What I wish is for more meaningful human contact.  As it is many of my good and interesting friends are far off.  As an introvert with a touch of social anxiety, it is difficult(read this as near-impossible) to refill those ranks, leaving a hole in my life. It does not help that I am very picky in the people with whom I wish to associate.

Glorious solitude though, and the bent of freedom that in bestows.  My thoughts are my own as is how I spend my time.  HDT also has a quote on that thought that I shall do my best to paraphrase:  A man who travels with a companion must wait for the companion before he may leave.  A man who travels alone is his own master.

Regardless, we all need companions, even a hermit.

4) Books are the carriers of civilization. Without books, history is silent, literature dumb, science crippled, thought and speculation at a standstill. I think that there is nothing, not even crime, more opposed to poetry, to philosophy, aye, to life itself than this incessant business

5) The price of anything is the amount of life you exchange for it

*This quote is ingrained in my bones, and has been for a number of years.  I often ask myself whether the object or experience is worth the hours of labor that it took me to get that money to pay for it.  Often the answer is no and I rightly move on.  Others, the answer is still no, but I ignore my gut and fork over a piece of my life for that shiny whistle(to mix analogies and bring Ben Franklin into the conversation).

The man is quotable and he gifted humanity with hundreds of such nuggets of gold.

I've so far in my life been content to be a grunt and work for my daily bread.  No thinking in my job, just simple monkey work.  My jobs are usually just a series of tasks, where I have few responsibilities.  This is really all I trust myself to do.  I fear the possibility that I'll be given a task that I am not equal to and be overwhelmed.  Call this an insecurity in my own skills.  I little understand the big picture in many endeavors of business or finance and the like.

I really hate the idea of being forced to focus on a task that doesn't really interest me.  I just wish to explore the world at my own rate and pick my own direction.  As Tolkien said, Not all who wander are lost.  Is this laziness?  I've completed some seven novels, two dozen short stories and a play.  They are not brilliant masterworks that will inspire future generations for centuries to come.  But they were fun and they are mine and I trust myself to accomplish that much.

Previously I was not bothered much by doing grunt work in low end jobs.  They allowed me my free time.  But then my co-worker has been talking about his life.  He lives in a trailer with his wife and three kids and has worked odd jobs all his life.  He seems happy enough and content, but I don't feel that I wish to follow that route.  But at the same time, I really don't have a mind for business.

Should I like to have a wife and kids?  I think that would be an excellent adventure in itself.  Life would be interesting.  Or maybe the wife and freedom from the duties of offspring.  Whichever.  Both seem to me fascinating possibilities.  After all, I've already experienced being alone.  Let's see what the universe brings.

There is another failing, waiting on the universe and fate.  It is half of why I play the lotto on occasion.  Waiting for Fortuna's kiss.  But the bitch ain't a'comin.

For now, I have simple dreams that seem to be out of my reach.

To be continued.

Rider in the Storm

Fortune smile upon me, for the boatman Charon makes no change.

I don't care for driving at night. Oncoming headlights are wearing on the eyes. There is always that stream of bright lights that washes out the rest of the world. Two or three hours of that, makes for a poor evening. What you can see comes from that small bubble of light racing in front of you to illuminate the road. Just the road ahead, no further. So the scenery is usually lighted buildings and billboards. Oh how well I know the billboards that run the length of my route.

Finally there are the unseen dangers. In this part of the world at least, there are a lot of critters waiting in the wings to suicide by throwing themselves at your vehicle. Critters be dumb and numerous. I've not yet hit anything, luckily, but that's not for the lack of suicide squads what have tried. So far my nearest miss involved 3 feet of empty air between my fender and a bounding deer. Louis, you want to talk about deer again?

You know what makes driving at night better? A snow storm. Snow began falling early afternoon, and temperatures began to fall before night. The snow began to stick, the wet stuff. Slick. Ice. The snow wasn't too heavy, but it did diminish visibility some. There was one point in the afternoon as I drove into the storm when I thought my vision had suddenly begun to dim. It was like the house lights in a theater as a movie starts. I nearly panicked.

Wind too is usually a part of a storm. Driving in the wind? That also sucks. It doesn't seem to matter if the vehicle is large or small, a powerful gust can throw you around the road. I think wind is almost as dangerous as slippery roads, especially when driving at highway speeds. At least you can see the snow on the ground. There was wind that night too.

Compound all of that with a large cargo van with rear-wheel drive. So much more surface area for the wind to catch hold of. And poor traction to push the vehicle forward. I've only ever been in a single car accident, it involved riding in a van through poor weather at night. Said van spun out and then rolled over the edge. That was nearly a decade ago. Have you no idea what I'm talking about?

Though my knowledge of the universe is imperfect and I can only make deductions at any given time by my experience, I shall still try and explain:

Rear-wheel drive vehicles are when the engine is used to power the rear wheels (actually usually just one rear wheel as I understand it – my information might be obsolete or incorrect though.). I believe the problem here is the lack of weight over those wheels and the difficulty for the tires to get proper traction on the surface, especially when the roads are slick with ice. Thus, when you stop at an intersection, lo and behold when you go to accelerate, the wheels just spin unhappily.

This, I believe is the problem. And it leads to the wheels spinning, which can result in fish-tailing. Fish-tailing is when the rear of the vehicle swerves back and forth of its own volition. Not a pleasant experience when you're traveling anything above 20. Much less so when you're out on the highway at any speed. I imagine that this loss of grip was what sent so many of my fellow fools off into the ditch.

If I'm wrong, feel free to pipe up.

Every day I pass at least 4 billboards advertising the lotto. You know, at 11 at night, when headlights are blaring in your face, with the knowledge that you're going to have to do this again tomorrow and every night five nights a week for the foreseeable future, well those 1 in 100,000,000 odds seem like a good bet. Maybe that's their plan. This week the jackpot was 350,000,000. The mind moves quick to ponder what being rich would be like. What one would do with a few(or a great many) million dollars. Think those happy thoughts. Hope is what gets we the fools through the day.

I was an hour late to start on my route. Cycle(the monthly supply medications) was due for one of the larger clients and my company had recently divested itself of the truck that was used to haul larger deliveries(rather, this one delivery monthly). We instead started a new practice of renting a van once a month for that particular delivery(or maybe they're buying a van). But it is a new process and there was confusion – primarily that U-haul charges for mileage, where as their competitor Enterprise doesn't. After I picked up the van, I pointed this fact out – about a half hour before go time, right at the height of rush hour. We got rid of the first van and rented a second – $.59 a mile over the course of a 300 mile round trip is some heavy cash. Not exactly a conducive to good business.

We ordered a second van. I got to do the old switcheroo. Picking up the second van involved trudging through rush-hour traffic at the city's most busy intersection. I won't make that mistake again. The agent at Enterprise was delighted that we shared the same first name, and he mixed small talk with business as most reasonable people do. I lack the skill/ability/talent/inclination to make small talk. Just cannot do it, or make myself interested. Questions, those wonderful things that get the ball rolling, just do not occur to me. I am quite content to remain silent and think about candy. I can however engage in conversation when someone goads me along, I can answer questions and even show some whit. I just cannot make myself engage with a stranger.

Much to my disappointment, though not surprise, I found that neither of the cargo vans had a decent sound system. I don't expect top of the line speakers or whatever. But a line-in or cd player seems to be about standard. I was left with a radio for the duration. 8 hours is a long ass time to listen to NPR. Yes, I am a pretentious prick who listens to NPR. Normally I listen to music or Audio books when working. They both help the hours pass.

So, I got a late start. This isn't too terrible, if you believe in the theory that the rush-hour will pass you by, or at least thin out. It usually does during my normal route. Traffic starts slightly heavy, though flowing constantly, and then lessens as the evening grows. Usually. In ideal conditions. Or even less than ideal conditions. But it had been snowing for the last several hours and the highways hadn't been plowed completely clean. Most folks were careful. And the dumb ones were in the ditch. I swear, I saw more cars off the road that night than on all of my other trips combined. The wreckers must have made a killing and the highway patrol was kept busy all through the evening.

I have driven through worse weather. Twice I drove through a blizzard But that was when I was still profoundly stupid. Now I'm just moderately stupid. But

This night, there was a stream of slow moving traffic extending from both of my bumpers, kind of like a giant millipede that was just sputtering along. For a few short minutes I briefly hit my top speed of around 45MPH. Which then dropped down to around 10, with the average running around 35. Most nights I can happily cruise along at 70. Faster even, if I feel rushed. But I usually don't and feel that abiding by the limits are fair enough. 2 or 5 extra miles per hour won't make much difference in the course of a night as to when my route ends.

I ran into a strange effect of the conditions. There were times where I couldn't seem to make myself go over a certain speed. I spent the night with my foot on the accelerator pedal – where usually I opt to use cruise control. I often find myself getting swept up and following the flow of traffic whenever I have to feed the engine manually. Cruise control helps keep this impulse at bay, while freeing me up from keeping an eye on the speedometer. A feature that came in quite handy when I was young and just getting the hang of driving.

Now, mind, had I been in a smaller and more manageable car I would have gone a bit faster I think. No where near highway speeds, but I imagine that I would have been willing to broach 50 on some parts of the trip out. Though I still would have kept the cruise off. No point in tempting Fate further and being struck down like those other fools. A man cannot spin fantasies about wealth or romance if he's dead. Or worse, in one of the facilities my company services. Some of them deal with auto accident victims.

Needless to say though, it took twice as long as usual to arrive at my first stop. Really – that is the general theme of the night. I usually get back home around 11pm, and this time it was 3.30 AM. Just a recurring theme of the night.

I was met with an avalanche of Pity from the people I encountered at my final stop. Given, usually I get there around 8.30, and it was now fast approaching midnight. They make you go out in that? One asked me. While another said that she had been wrong before in thinking that her job sucked – not when she saw what was expected of me. Maybe they were wondering if I would be remanded into their care before the end of the night.

I hope not. Not that. Not ever. Though the irony makes me laugh now. I think I would weep later.

Anyhow, that last stop went rather smoothly, cold as it was. And soon I was on my way back home. Another long drive was ahead. This time I managed to get all the way up to 50 MPH at a few points. That is, until those heart jolting shots of adrenaline kicked in when suddenly the rear of the van would begin pulling to one side or another.

I'm not a coffee drinker and the headlights were grinding away at my eyes like sandpaper by the end. I was happy to be back in town safe. All that remained was to gas up and drop off the van before going home and finding my blankets. Sadly, I lost my credit card. I have a habit of placing important objects such as my glasses and keys into the same place. That way I never lose them. Same goes with the cards and their place in my wallet.

I must say that I was surprised to find out that the card wasn't in the proper place. Very surprised. I practiced some of my vocabulary of harsh language and jumped back into the van to head back home. The rest could wait until morning. (I found the card, it WAS in my wallet, but in a different slot. I blame a combination of the long night and general stupidity on the part of the user).

I would say that overall, the experience has driven me to think deeply about what I want out of life. This is not the case though. Generally I know what I want out of life. I just don't know how to go about making those dreams come true. My imagination doesn't extend to finding that necessary path. Some seem well out of my reach as I keep treading water. I feel like that stupid van, my tires are spinning while I sit still. I hate it. This leaves me feeling unfulfilled. Ennui is a close friend.

Hack Novelry part 2 Errata – an addition to yesterday's winding path of whining.

So, I explored different avenues with getting my work published. Here, I had something that I made, a world that I slaved over and lived in for months at a time, and it was just sitting on my harddrive collecting sub-atomic dust. One day it occurred to me to see whether or not I could upload it to Amazon for the Kindle as an independent. The answer was yes. They required a steep 65% cut of the profit at the time.

E-Publishing of course has its pros and cons. Like about everything else on the planet. I like the phrase 'double-edged sword'. It cuts both ways. The positives and negatives are also heavily intermeshed, with reasons showing up on both sides of the list, depending on how one looks at these things.

Pro: No middlemen, you go directly to the public, there are no publishers or agents, thus you get a larger share of the profits. That seems to be me the highest Libertarian ideal of the free market in action – though I'm not a Libertarian. No editors, your story stays exactly as you envisioned it.

Con: No editing, no assistance with cleaning up your prose, and you only have one set of eyes (unless you have a horde of willing friends – most of my friends are busy, uninterested, or both), to catch mistakes and help add that layer of polish. Lack of resources or expertise – you're forced to market it yourself. Lack of reach, no inexpensive print books(I prefer print to electronic). There isn't anyone out there actively working to pimp or improve your story. You're alone in the world to fend for yourself. I find myself needing feedback, a seperate set of eyes. It is difficult to envelop the entire story in my mind. I cannot see the forest for the trees as they say.

Woohoo I just brought out another tired old adage!

There are, out there in the vast wilds of the internet, services that will create a physical copy of your book. I've tried it – and sold somewhere around 3 copies(I have a feeling that at least one of those was a friend of mine). I don't blame people for not being interested, the first version had a lot of formatting issues and I'm the sole editor, so you can safely bet that there were mistakes aplenty. In fact, I've myself purchased nearly as many copies(2) as proofs.

As it is, I am a one man show. I create my own blurbs – which I mentioned I lack skill in doing. I've slathered together my cover art, some of which I am proud of visually, though I'd rather a real graphic artist uses their skills.

I started out and my sales tactic was to upload and wait. In the mean time I'd Calculate how many sales I will need to quit my shitty job and take up the gauntlet full time. The mathematical principal worked out to the answer “Way more than you're getting fool!”

The independent ebook author's dream seems to involve a deep hope that eventually someone will find your work, and then rave about it on their blog – prompting others to buy and rave. A word of mouth campaign. I'm just waiting for the likes of Simon Pegg or Penny Arcade to magically show up out of the chaos. So far, the wait has been long, and I honestly don't expect it to ever end. Magical Thinking and all that.

Really, if wishing and Magical Thinking worked, I would be a billionaire Ninja-Wizard who lived in my underground compound with a cadre of brilliant and beautiful geek women of all different flavors. The so-called author of “The Secret” can cram it into all of their various orifices. And then pack it in with a chainsaw.

Really though, how does an independent get the word out? I want to be fair and honest, no hype or bullshit. I hate, HATE, advertising. I also hate approaching strangers and just talking about my work. How is the blog different? You're coming to me if at all. Once again, I'm just tossing this up in my little point on the web. I like to think of it as a recording of me talking to myself.

Amazon has offered a service where one can give their books away free. Wooh? Well, if it gets you some buzz, why not?

But once again, how do I go about capturing an audience to spin my tales? I've been told that the stories are great. The characters are interesting and enjoyable. Sure, all of that was from my mom, but a mother must be Objective when talking about her kids prospects right? Pfah. Actually, after a year of complaining that she didn't get a copy of zombie 1, and receiving one, the Mom still hasn't gotten around to reading it(she doesn't like zombies). - all relevant compliments have come from outside of my circle.

The high point of December was receiving a letter from a fan wondering if there was going to be a zombie 5. How simple it is to raise hopes and spirits. A few positive words from a stranger is all it takes. Yes, I have plans for zombie 5, but other stories have gotten in the way. Especially after my hopes flagged over the first four books not going anywhere.

I just need to keep pushing onward. To find the energy to finish the projects I'm working on. The time to write the ideas that I have bumping around in my head. This is slow going.

I'm a driver, I'm a winner. Again.

I cannot say for sure if the Universe loves me or hates me. I think that my being inspires some sort of twisted passive aggressive love-hate mania in whatever cosmic force that drives reality. Last march, my job disappeared and I found myself rather suddenly unemployed. This happened about a month after I first bought into the brand new Health Insurance plan. I was insured for a whole month!

There was of course the downside of things. No income. I did happen to receive unemployment benefits for a few weeks. I live in Michigan and the economy here has been in the hole for as long as I've been alive. I actually was employed on the strength of my sister's performance. She's intelligent and hard working and they decided to hire me as well. I'm a bit dimmer but driven to keep busy, and I took on every task that was thrown my way. I've written about the experience previously.

But they were re-organizing and my position disappeared. So it goes. The only thing that burned me was that the company kept a sleazy, unreliable... I have more

I took the time to read and write and work on other projects. I revised novels 5 and 6 and then wrote and revised novel 7, along with a double-handful of short stories. There were also loads of books and regular exercise. I re-discovered the joys of the local library. I built up my post apocalyptic survival library. All while looking for work elsewhere in the country. It felt great to be productive again. I was living on natural time, life was mostly good, if a bit uncertain.

My co-worker calls this delightful state of being “Pretirement” as she postulates that we'll never actually be able to retire so we might as well take advantage of our brief periods of unemployment whilst we're young. I do not disagree with this supposition, though I'm optimistic that one day I'll at least be able to get my writing career going to the point where I can support myself doing something I love. Still, I embrace my unemployment with glee, even as I try to avoid it.

Sometimes it feels as if the universe is giving me a taste of what life could be like. Like an extremely subtle demonic temptation. Sell your meager soul and live the dream of the hack novelist!

So we come back to the original statement in this post. I was offered a job as a driver full time running a route that I had occasionally covered during my last stint in their service. They hired me back. More pay. Different hours. No data-entry. I get to drive a car with a manual transmission – another topic previously hit upon, a skill that I picked up while working for this company.

Sweet! How fortunate!

I mean, I've already got some fun anecdotes. One dude in a wheelchair said that he loves me. I thanked him for that. I mean, there are other sources(beautiful women) whom I'd rather hear that declaration from - who hearing utter it might make my decade. But you take it where you can get it, so I thanked him and moved on.

But here we go. I do live in the state of Michigan. The weather is cold and we tend to get a lot of precipitation due to the fact that we're surrounded by lakes. In the winter we see this in the form of snow, sleet and freezing rain. I've come to realize a new functioning law in the universe. If I'm driving and there is a chance that it will snow or rain that night, it will snow or rain that night. Of the less than 10 days that I've been working, the weather conditions have been adverse for at least 80% of the time. But, Michigan, winter. Blah blah blah. This is all expected. A given. A fact of life to be complained about despite all the rest.

There were a couple incidents last night that really made me wonder if I offended creation by turning down some pact that I was just unaware of.

So far in Driving I've nearly been creamed by a cop car and have had a couple other close encounters to brag about. Part of the risk of driving at night. But yesterday, the universe re-introduced the ever looming threat of Deer to be the bane of my existence.

Deer. Louis CK is quite explicit about his feelings for them – and I feel that he has some valid points.

Last night, after leaving my third stop, I came across a herd of five does(a deer, a female deer) off to the side of the road. They were blocked by a tall fence that hemmed them out of some person's property and they see my car flying down the road in their general direction. As usual, they decided to break and run, right in front of my car, at the last second. - this is after long hesitation that allows me to come closer and closer. The company car that I drive is a Chevy Aveo. A Kleenex box on wheels. I don't need deer to throw themselves at me and crumple my ride. I missed the dumbest member of the herd by about three feet as it waited until the very last second to run across my path.

Luckily, I saw them early and was able to slow down. Fucking stupid deer. We need to breed wolves that can only digest white-tail deer flesh and set them loose on the herd.

Now for the figurative deer encounter. Same night maybe 4 hours later. My run was over and I had punched out and was driving home for the night while I was driving along in my own sweet ride – a white 96 Chevy Lumina that is somehow still able to start and drive, though a growing percentage of mass is represented by Iron Oxide. It's a round-town car, as it tends to vibrate uncomfortably whenever is passes the threshold of 60mph. I call it the Drift, and it gets mention in my Pharmacy novel.

Back to deer encounter 2. I was rolling along homebound on one of the main streets around 11pm and thinking about climbing into bed and going to sleep. Suddenly a car darted out of the cross street right in front of me. And then the driver stopped dead and froze, creating an impromptu roadblock and an excellent implement for an action movie chase scene.

Luckily my breaks still work, which surprises me, or I'm sure that Drift would have dissolved and burst into a ball of fire.

The silver lining? I wouldn't have to worry about paying my student loans back. Well, back to another evening of living dangerously.

In Greece, people use large wooden horse to get into Troy. In Michigan they use horse to get out.

The world of Detroit is akin to a planetary nebula. That's where a star about the size of our sun goes through its final death throws, expands to the size of a red giant, kicks off a ring of gas and dust and then finally collapses into its final form, a white dwarf. White dwarfs are cold and dim(relatively) remnants of extremely dense matter (they're the size of the earth with the mass of the sun) that no longer work as nuclear furnace. For all intents and purposes they're corpses that have retained some body heat. Detroit is like this. I think. Detroit, burned bright for most of the last century and now it's a remnant. While the suburbs seem to expand outwards forever. But it all looks about the same. Cookie cutter extruded mass of suburbia. It is a strange thing, we in America consider ours to be a melting pot culture. We are a microcosm of humanity. But when you get down to it, any city built in the last fifty years looks exactly the same as all of the others. Block after block, this maze runs. If you were to fall asleep in one of the suburbs of Detroit and awake in the outskirts of Indianapolis, I doubt that you would notice. We are diverse homogeneity, and I hate it. Our cities tend to grow more and more uninteresting with each passing decade. What brings this on? I got to spend the weekend in Troy Michigan, doing Data Entry for a pharmacy that was switching software. I spent 17 hours transferring patient records by hand from the old system to the new. Then afterwards I got to see a little of Troy. Worst Vacation Ever. The Onion has a wonderful story titled something like 'College Senior hopes she can turn love of Data Entry into Career in Data Entry.' Wonderful Satire. But for anyone who doesn't know, data entry is simply taking information from one source and inputing it into a computer database. It can be described in a word, Tedious. If I had to look forward to a future of Data Entry, I think I would open my own veins. If I had to The pharmacy was an interesting place, as these things go. They seem to have moved recently and were in a rather disorganized state. Fine, that makes the environs that much more interesting. A bit of clutter is nice and homey. Even if such isn't the ideal way to run a business. But as the weekend passed, the crew got things slowly squared away. It is a strange thing to drive two hundred miles and find things are similar to my own corner of the state. The Pharmacy in Troy seems to use the same distributor as does the two I've worked at here in town. So they have the same stickers on the same medication bottles. The drugs arrive from the distributor in the same dark blue, light blue, green and grey bins. One difference was somewhat cultural. On the west side of the state, it's a haven for Conservative Religious folk endemic in our nation. Christians mostly. Where they have religion at all, most are protestant. Black, white and brown seem to be the most prominent groups. The Troy Pharmacy was mostly, as was implied earlier, of folks who hailed form the Mid East. English and Arabic seemed to flow together, just like with Spanglish. Evil made the statement that it is disconcerting to hear a sentence almost entirely of one language that seems to flow around a single word from the other. They are like tantalizing scraps for an outsider to try to piece together the conversation from the bits and pieces that you understand. But anyone has heard Spanglish is familiar with the concept. Fascinating how two languages seem to inhabit the mind together. As someone who is unilingual, I wonder how multi-lingual folk engaged in the exchange decide when to flit back and forth. When do you decide that the German word for Panties isn't good enough, so you have to drudge up the Swahili equivalent? I would love to know how these choices are made and how conscious they are. But as someone who absolutely sucks at memorizing (I'm lazy and a language is made up of tons of sounds and their meanings that need to be memorized), I doubt I shall ever have the experience myself. Back to the office. It was a basement, a dungeon. Large and spacious, but lacking windows. I do love having natural light, it makes me feel human. I was lead to a cubical, mostly empty except for a chair and a computer. With a brief description of what I needed to do, I was left alone with a stack of papers. Behind me was a fellow who was listening to what seemed to be a religious broadcast. About Jesus and Islam. I'm not sure if it was pro-Christian, or trying to get Christians and Muslims to work together. From what I heard, it sounded like a little of A, while maybe trying to convert Muslims. The Preacher was performing a monologue about how important the prophet Jesus is to Islam, and how many Muslim kids are named after him, and maybe how the grass is greener over in Christianity. Has anyone else had an experience like this? Luckily I had my iPod. Oh iPod, you are one of the greatest inventions that humanity has yet devised! So, Data entry is how I spent my days in Troy. With a bit of religiosity and Metallica smattered within. How about the evening? We had a fine dinner of Olive Garden. I forswore the never ending pasta bowl, or whatever they call it. The food is of course tasty. But you can get it anywhere. According to Google there are at least three in the city where I reside. It'd be like visiting New York and patronizing Pizza Hut. Just get out, walk down the block, and find a good local restaurant! Though, I have no clue what sort of food Troy/Detroit might be famous for. There are a lot of Middle-Eastern folk, so Mediterranean food and Indian are my best guesses. - In our defense though, We're cheap and we had a gift card for Olive Garden. Free food isn't something Evil or I often turn down. Evil and I stayed at a place called the Candlewood Suites. Which was both awesome and lame. It's a hotel aimed at long term guests, and comes with a full kitchen, living area, and bedroom in each suite. Pretty damn cool, if somewhat old. Our suite had an aged television and a video-dvd player, which I expect is about par for the course. The kitchen is fully stocked with utensils and the inn offers a washing service gratis, as well as the free video lending library. But at the same time they seem to be rather laid back. Kind of how I would imagine a youth Hostel to be. I visited the video library, an eclectic collection of dvds and vhs tapes. I don't know who put it together, but they REALLY liked Steven Seagal. Vern has nothing on these folks, Though mostly it was Golden Era Steven Seagal. And I had already seen all the movies. Then there were the mysterious Bollywood tapes. They were encased in a plain white cardboard slip-case and had equally plain text on some tape denoting the name of the film and the major players. Tempting as these mysteries were to explore, I ended up folding to my inner historian and choosing The Assassination of Jesse James ETCETERA, a historical docudrama about said man and event. Three hours long it was, so I never got to the part about the assassination. Only that James and the people around him were fucking dicks. That was enough for me to hope that the Yankees would come back through and put a torch to that part of Missouri. Sunday saw more data entry – followed by pay and release. Freedom to leave Detroit. Judging by the traffic flowing out from the city, I am not alone in that sentiment. Most people were flying out of the city, like it was infested with zombies and on fire to boot. 80MPH+. Swerving like mad. One fellow we saw barely slowed down when they got off the highway and onto a ramp. It was good to be free of the city and on our way back home. Next week, Travers City Michigan.

Meeting Crazy Number 2 - Electric Boogaloo!

So, more in the realm of both driving the manual, and meeting the crazies. I'm an office monkey by trade, I was hired to pick up the slack where needed. That is my job, deliver mail, run to the bank, pick up office supplies, clean the office, data entry. Whatever task doesn't have a specific position to cover it, I get to do it. Fine, it keeps my day a bit varied and a little free. And thus a little more interesting.

Thus, when called, I get to step in for our delivery driver, head across the state and drop off some supplies at a facility that the company services. (or even drop off supplies in town)

All the patients in the facility are victims of car accidents and have, among other things, suffered head trauma and brain damage. Some of the residents are a bit on the crazy side. Most have been rather friendly. The sister says that the most depressing instructions she's ever read involved a cream that stated 'apply to stumps'. That's the kind of place I get to visit. I'm much more careful around cars these days, whether it's driving or just crossing the street. After dealing with people who are no longer what they were, I don't want to end up the same way.

And please don't bring up the one-eyed man who doesn't like to wear his glass eye or eye-patch.

I must say that I am spoiled. My aged Lumina has cruise control. Cruise control is nice on long car trips, you set it and the car stays at a constant speed, going up or down hills. I was rather disappointed and surprised when I hit the cruise button in the company car and nothing happened. Even after I pressed it five more times. Hey, it could have just been a short, we don't exactly have a top of the line luxury car. Nope, no luck there. I discovered the next morning that there's a master switch on the steering-wheel I didn't know about that turns the cruise control on and off. Once again my ignorance has defeated me

I was in for an evening of cramped muscles and watching the odometer. Huzzah!

The night was a little longer, and the drive a bit shorter for the lack of Cruise Control. Usually I try and keep within about five miles of the speed limit either way. For that trip? I tried to keep it under 80. It's a funny psychological glitch that drives people to join the herd. Countless times during those four hours on the road I found myself unconsciously accelerating as another car passed me by, or sped up on my tail. These pressures are a bit easier to ignore when the car runs itself. Instead, I have to confront my sheepish tendencies. Bahh ha ha ha!

Somewhere around 2 or 2.5 hours and one cramped leg later, I made it to the facility. Didn't get lost, or turned around this time. Only took three trips to memorize the path.

On the way back to the car I was accosted by a man taking a smoke break. Judging by the sound of his voice, he probably smokes at least five packs a day, and has done so since he was five. On the odd days, he takes a bottle brush to his throat, just for that little extra touch. Anyhow, he called me Hippie. To which I can only respond "That sounds like me!" The long hair and all you know. Well, what followed was a five minute lecture on the evils of the Johnson and Johnson Corporation. It appears that J&J have started putting all sorts of nasty additives into their products - Battery Acid being one of them - all in order to create "Male Pattern Baldness", since it didn't exist before the J&J company was formed.

Tell that to the bald whore-monger Julius Caesar. (He suffered from Pattern Baldness, for those of you my two readers, who don't get the reference) Et Tu Juilui?

Why would they do this? You ask. This big corporation Well J&J make Rogaine, and they have to pimp it somehow. So if the tobacco industry is focusing on making cigarettes safer and more addictive, then why the hell not? Listed on the ingredients for my bottle of shampoo are several chemicals whose names I can't pronounce - except for the word acid - I ain't a chemist, for all I know they stand for dirt and the life blood of a virgin.

So, I was introduced to a new conspiracy theory. Sweet. I love conspiracy theories, the crazier the better, they're fun. He also told me what kind of shampoo to buy. I didn't catch the name, sorry, but it's expensive and comes in liter bottles. So, go forth and buy random expensive shampoos so that your hair doesn't melt. You heard it here first.

After this encounter, I've decided to wear my kilt more often. That way I don't get called Hippie, or if I happen to grow a beard, Jesus. With a Kilt, long hair, and maybe the beard - I'll be a highlander. I might have to carry a sword too. But the fashion-folks always say to accessorize properly. And maybe the crazies will avoid a dude packing a broadsword(my skinny ass would just look comical hauling about a claymore)

Some 12 hours later, I was called on to make a local delivery. It was to an older gentleman who was hooked up to his oxygen tank. Now - I commend him in choosing freedom and comfort. Pants are confining and uncomfortable. But good sir, since you've gotten rid of pants for those very reasons(so I am assuming, since I didn't bring the topic up in conversation) would it not be better to have switched to boxers. Or maybe a kilt. I'm sure there must be some black folk in Scotland by now, you could swing it.

***(Please don't swing it, at least while I'm around)***

So, am I building up Karma for something really good? Or working off something really bad?

My half-assed adventure in learning a stick

Ding! Did you hear that? This toon just went up a level. Rank two Office Bitch! That's me! Wow, all that time spent camping the filing cabinet finally paid off! And what do I get? A new skill point! Sweet! Where do I spend it? Another rank in filing? Or maybe I could up my stats in Computers: Basic and finally figure out where they put the Any Key.

“Mike, the company car, it is a manual. Do you know how to drive?” She asked.

“No, said I. I maxed out automatic.”

“Well, you'll want to fix that yes? Manual driving is requirement for class. You need skill. Driving for getting stuff is your job.” Goddamn class requirements. I was going to invest in some Shmoozing With the Boss, or Sleeping With Your Eyes Open. Hell, there's always the old standby Looking Busy. But that's what happens when you roll up an Office Bitch. Isn't it just?

Just gotta check that description one last time... By taking this skill you will be proficient operating motorized automobiles using the manual transmission. These vehicles have a lower sticker price, and are more fuel efficient. Besides, chicks dig a dude who can drive a stick!

I dropped my solitary skill point into Operating Manual Transmission.

There are two ways to attack this problem. Procrastination isn't one of them. The first being to find someone who knows how to drive a manual and say, “Hey you! You know how to do this! Teach me!” That's the mentor route. Pretty shiny!

I've seen Karate Kid. I know that finding a qualified teacher is the better way to go.

But then I've seen porn too, and know that hot chicks answer the door in lingerie and offer the pizza boy sexual gratification in exchange for free pizza. Well, guess what didn't happen when I played the delivery driver campaign?

Yeah, I went with option two. I Googled it. There are a surprising number of videos available on the subject. So I dove in. Got the fundamentals. A picture is worth a thousand words? Well a video is worth a whole freaking library baby. I was ready.

The company owns a tiny, blue car that probably gets amazing gas mileage. The company owns it. Not me. Now they were sending a Low Level Peon out to try to learn a new skill in this dangerous machine.

Step one, push the clutch pedal to the floor. Start the car. Step three, select gear. Reverse. I wanted to back up. Now, how the fuck do you get this thing into reverse? Those inside, between the gales of laughter at my Noob Status, took pity on me and sent out a low level teacher. She kindly pointed out that there is a trick into getting into reverse. With that hint, the car started to move.

First gear! Time to go forward. About three whole inches and then the car stalled.

The man who normally drives the car is a Level Eight Delivery Driver, with at least a dozen ranks in Creepy Old Dude. He leaves the car smelling like smoke and the radio set on Glenn Beck. The radio in this car is a funny one. Pushing the volume knob mutes all sound. For the time being. Which means, that every time you start the car, the radio comes back to life, and there's Glenn with his usual manipulative crazy noise. Everytime the engine stalls, it needs to be restarted.

And there's Glenn with the crazy in his head.

The carrot and the stick. Girls love a dude who can drive a manual, that's the Carrot. Glenn Beck is the stick. Or a douche. Go, Mikey, Go! Learn fast and you will be rewarded. Fail to improve and you will suffer the consequences! Glen flogged me onward. One would think, towards improvement.

The carrot and stick method didn't work that well. After about the fiftieth stall, I punched the radio. Glen beck didn't shut up. I did take one point of damage to my hand. That's what you get for attacking an NPC in town I guess. I conceded defeat for day one. And then less so for day two.

Finally, I enlisted the help of Mister Miagi. His was an air of unerring Zen as he sat calmly in the passenger seat and in a kind and cheerful way, pointed out why I was a grade A doofus who would never know the love of a woman(for women love men who can drive a manual). Oh, and that the car was stalling because I wasn't giving it enough gas. And yes, It was fine to leave the clutch a little way in while I started to accelerate and the slowly ease off.

Huzzah! I finally qualified for rank one!

If I were an utter nerd, and I am, I would describe my skillz with a manual as such: Say instead I squandered my single point on something useless like proficiency in short swords. Say, that

“All right, that is the sharp end. I point that at the monsters. Or, here abouts, the small woodland creatures. Ouch! What the fuck? Oh, right, keep the sharp end away from myself. I'll have to keep that in mind. Check this out. Ah, shit, dropped it. Ouch, how did I cut myself? Stupid pointy end, why is it so sharp. Hey, it has a scabbard!”

And so forth.

So, I can get out of the Parkinglot. Where are the girls?