Time: NOT on your side

Today was a long day, I was outside delivering mail for a good five-to-six hours with no real break. 

It's difficult to stop for a while delivering in the winter. The worst thing you could do is actually warm up, because you have to brave the frigid temperatures which causes a demoralizing cycle of readjusting to your surroundings. Simply eliminate the unnecessary warming up periods and you will amaze yourself that when you are comfortable in the cold, the more it doesn't bother you as much. Believe me, that is the mantra I chant in my head to continue on.

I have a quiet hatred for people that have nothing better to do than to wait for the letter carrier. For the most part they insist on starting a conversation that just goes nowhere before it even starts.

There are, of course, exceptions to this rule of mine.

On one hand is Miss Evelyn. An elderly black woman who spends most of her days in the common area looking outside and being overly miserable. At first, she would barely look at you and simply grunt when you hand-delivered her mail. Over the many months, she has warmed up to me immensely. It is a true testament for anyone to know that being pleasant and respectful to people goes a long way.

See, I would see Miss Evelyn everyday and would always greet her with a "hey, how are you?", and after my deliveries are finished for the housing area, would tell her to "have a nice day". It is now at a point where I make an effort to get her to laugh or at least smile when I give her excuses to why she didn't get mail for that day.

She wears her life on her face. I feel responsible to make sure she has something to look forward to daily in her later years.

Anyways, so I am at an apartment complex in town stuffing the boxes with a paper salad of bills, magazines, and circular promoting night classes at a local High School. All the while, my cold-as-rock fingers are getting cut up due to the jagged mailboxes.

Out comes this man wanting his mail. 

During the summer I see him everyday and we talk while I sort out the mail for the building. We discuss the weather, as all older people do. We talk current events, and within only a few minutes, I hand him his mail and I am off to finish up. 

I see him today and I notice that his Parkinson's disease is getting the best of him. He is at a constant state of unrest. To the point where it makes me uncomfortable just watching. It's a case of being unable to be of any help.

After saying thanks, he turns to go inside. As he does so, he drops a letter. Trying to recover before he notices, I snatch it up and handed it back to him.

"Thanks", he says again while dropping another letter. At this point he begins to rumble at himself in disappointment. Without hesitation, I bent over and grabbed the letter. As he was thanking me, I just had this image of him as a younger man. Being a member of the Boston Police, I couldn't help but picturing him in his earlier days cracking a youth in the mouth for disrespecting him.

And now time had thanked him by imprisoning him with this awful affliction.

"Oh, don't worry about it. Have a great day." It came out automatically. Like something had to have been said.

It was the only thing I could say.

While Maury Pants meows

Tonight I have nothing really to write about. I am only writing and publishing this as an effort to have a continuous stream of writings. Not only am I really not achieving anything, I don't even know if this is going out the the people of the internets.

Today my Streak for the Cash ended at seven wins, twenty shy of winning one million dollars. I like the concept of Streak. You just head over to espn.com and you get a choice of games and you select the outcome. The more consecutive wins you attain, the closer you are to winning the cash. With that said, I am looking forward to topping my streak with an even better one.

My cat, Maury Povich Pumpkin Pants (MP3, for short) is quite the loud meower. I suspect that the lack of cat food in her dish may be the cause of this apparent meowing, but I cannot be too sure.

MP3 (pictured left) is an avid hunter/gatherer. Maury's prey? Field mice and cyborgs. She (yes, she is a she) rules, even though she can be a bit pushy and manipulating at times. Cheers to you, MP3!

So there it is. After I am done importing my U2 albums, I will lay on the couch and watch an episode of The Wire on DVD. 

Do bundle up tomorrow as it will be quite frigid. And yes, the sand castle building competition scheduled for this weekend has been postponed until further details surface.

"Idol"ing Around! huddla-huddla

It's that time of the year where the ice and snow have taken the fine denizens of New England hostage. A time where the days and nights all meld together in a frigid infused time continuum of hostility and lost hope. With everybody longing for warm weather and - God willing - sunlight after 5 PM, all we have readily available to us hopefuls is American Idol.

Now, I haven't been a fan of the show for many seasons, and it doesn't seem that I will be joining the masses in watching week after week. But after hearing about this go-getter who in a flurry of passion and dejection offed herself in front of judge Paula Abdul's home, I was on board for this year's competition faster than you can say "Soul Patrol"!

From what I can gather, the season started off in Phoenix, Arizona where a stadium packed with thousands of young and wistful contestants show off their singing talents to the usual FOX camera crew and the three judges you have all grown to know and love. Before you go and tell me that this is the same old song and dance, I will tell you this my friends, the geniuses at American Idol have enlisted the relatively unknown Kara DioGuardi to act as the fourth judge. I can't contain myself. Seriously, I am bubbling with anticipation!

So for those not in the know, the premise is this: a young contestant will perform for the judges, and if they perform well enough, will go off to Hollywood (dawg) and will have to pass yet another test of performances before moving on to the final stages to where the singer will basically grovel to the viewers while singing drag show revue worthy renditions of popular songs. To the lucky finalists, they will be held restricted to pursue any creative outlets due to the iron-clad contracts they must sign in order to be featured on the show.

This season looks like it began just as similar to season's past, where the usual roster of strange and wacky no-singing hacks are displayed on parade while some people who can sing in key get peppered in to remind you that, yes, this really is a competition. While I don't understand why the producers keep showing the real lousy performers, I do get that they keep these people in order to drive ratings and they seem to have people talking about the show. But seriously, the more they show these common-sense dropouts who are desperately looking for their shot at fame, the more they are encouraging this type of behavior. 

Which leads me to Bikini Girl. What better way to drive the point home than her? I am sure she's a nice gal and probably is a real cut-up once you get to know her, but it's honestly an advertisement to whore yourself out in order to get the attention of everybody in the room. While she didn't have much clothes on, she should have covered up her performance with something to keep us from listening to it. Luckily, there was a payoff at the end where after winning her "golden ticket" ambushed Ryan Seacrest with a well-placed smooch by the pool. Poor Ryan couldn't squirm away and you could see him almost vomit after being plagued by "yucky girl germs".

For something to go to bed with a smile on your face, a heartwarming story of a legally blind man who dreams of becoming the next American Idol. Despite my hopes of him stinking up the joint, Scott MacIntyre actually did a good job, for a blind guy. Who knows what's in store when he moves on the next round, let's hope that choreography and pyrotechnics are not involved in it.

Scott MacIntyre, world sun-stare record holder.

Well, that's is enough for now. Will I keep interest long enough to keep posting updates? I am not too sure, but I can tell you this, I was losing interest at a rapid pace while writing this, so the future looks bleak.

Blog Test Extravaganza!

Well, here it goes. Stay active and keep checking here. Eventually you will be a pleasant witness to my writings - some good and some obscure and downright wacky, none of which humorous in the slightest sense. Keep it locked.