April
12, 1999. Monday
Sigh... Remember those days, back when you were 22? I thought those
days would last forever. So young, so carefree, so naive in the ways
of the world... Whatever happened to that guy? He had a real lust
for life, a genuine love of the world. Drive, ambition, he wouldn't
let anything get in his way. Remember those days? Those romantic
nights? When life and love seemed a mere breath apart? That
night of the big storm... The boat capsized... And you awoke in a
strange, unfamiliar room, yet felt completely at ease with the young cabingirl
who soothed your head and comforted you, warming your breath with hers...
And
then, just when it seemed like you couldn't bear it anymore...then... then...
No, no... it's time to look forward...
So I turned 23 on Saturday.
The event came and went without much fanfare. I've felt 23 since Berry turned 23 in January I think.
My knees are going, my back hurts, candy doesn't taste as good anymore... basically, I'm an old man. But I suppose that's only from a kid's standpoint. Although that's the view I usually take, when I look at it from, say, a middle-aged man's point of view, I'm just a kid. Why can't i just be happy with the way things are. I suppose in the grand scheme of things, I am. But i'm tired of being "Ok." "hey, greg, how ya doing?" "Ok. I'm Allright." Sure, I don't have many real things that I can complain about. And that's what bothers me. I either wanna have lots to complain about, or I want things to be better than I could've ever imagined. I'm tired of this "allright" shit. I wanna be better than allright. Ok, i've got that out.
Anyhow, I spent the remainder fo Friday prior to leaving Lexington
bumming around town. I got a haircut, went grocery shopping, and chatted
with my former girlfriend Rebecca, who now lives in the former HoneyComb
Hideout. I suppose you could say it was nice to talk to her,
especially after not seeing her for a year. still, i didn't have
that much to say. We talked about the future, and I asked her about living
in the same neighborhood as Mr. T. I also ran into Liz, my previous
girlfriend. She informed me on Saturday via telephone that she heard that
the Shittiest House on Earth is built right next to an old slave cemetary.
That's one nice thing the North has over the South. No big slave
cemetaries. Just desecrated Native American burial grounds. I went
out to Jed's
place in the woods and shot BB guns for a while with his two neighbors.
Then i went and finally found Rodzilla in Tucker
Hall.
So Rodzilla and I finally managed to get out
of Lexington by 10:50 on Friday night. She drove most of the way. I was
pretty tired, but she shoulda been even more tired since she got up around
4:30 that morning and didn't go back to sleep. I drove for the last hour
or so and i could barely manage to stay awake. So you can imagine
how upset she was on Saturday morn when i tried to get her up around 9am
so we could go to Baltimore. So i left her alone and checked email
and watched tv for a while and then we finally got out the door around
10:30. It was a pretty glorious day. Not a cloud in the sky, just
a beautiful spring morning. A little chilly though. But when
we pulled into Baltimore, things were looking ok. Getting ticktes
to the game proved a lot more bothersome than i'd hoped. My previous experience
with scalpers in Baltimore should've warned me though. When i went to a
game in Boston, the scalpers were all standing conveniently on the bridge
over the highway leading to Fenway Park. No problem there. There
were very few police around. In Baltimore, there were at least 4
cops on every corner. So we circled the park for a while trying to figure
out where the scalpers would be. So be basically kept an eye out for shady
looking people standing by themselves. We finally found one, and
he was not a inconspicuous as I would've hoped. The cops were standing
right there, and he's screaming to his boss or whatever at his boss is
screamin "where they at!?" and the cops are right there. In all the
confusion i gave him a hundred bucks instead of 80. Oh well. I was
figuring on that much anyway, The game itself was a little boring.
I pitcher's duel mostly. the only run was scored in the first inning.
But it was fun nonetheless. A good day to be at the ballpark. Although
it was pretty fucking cold once you got out of the sun.
At the Ballpark, and in Baltimore in general, I noticed a very high frequency of bad moustaches. I for one think there's barely one good moustache, but there were some horrible dirt-staches all over the place, starting with the rednecks in front of us. Unless you're old, a moustache without beard simply will not do.
Moustaches I Approve Of (and even disapprove when they're gone): Rollie Fingers. Wilford Brimley, Tom Skerrit, Bert Reynolds, Tom Selleck, Mike Schmidt, "Worf" from Star Trek, and that guy who plays the coach in Major League, James Gammons i believe.
We ate dinner at the Cheescake Factory in the Inner Harbor. A very busy,
touristy place, and we had to wait a long time to eat, but i didn't feel
like wandering too far. Plus, the food was pretty damn good. Rodzilla
picked most of it, and I trust her as far as food goes, and it was pretty
tasty. Plus, she paid, so how i wasn't gonna argue. The only bad
thing that happened over dinner was the appearance of a really large women.
She had the physique of the Penguin from Batman Returns, and was
wearing tight black spandex pants, and what appeared to be a leopard-printed
unitard underneath. The woman was disgusting. She had short-cropped dyed
red hair and whorish blue mascara caked on beyond belief. Of course, i
took a picture of her as she stood outside with her little radio. And of
course, Rodzilla admonished me for it. But people like that deserve to
be mocked. I know it. You know it. Hell, the woman probably knows it. But
Rodzilla was pretty disturbed, especially when my photo-op brought the
woman to the attention of the tables surrounding us. When we left the joint,
she was still a little upset. But when we got out, the woman had started
dancing. so we both had to chuckle at that, and Rodzilla admitted
grudgingly that that deserved to be mocked. But she also felt sorry
for her because she was pretty sure that the woman had some sort of mental
problem. In Lexington, there' a man who does almost the same thing.
He sits around with his boombox to his ear, grooving and bobbing and dancing.
Sometimes i don't even think there's music playing. But at least he doesn't
wear FUCKING SPANDEX when he does it. Anyway, i may put the picture up
when it gets developed, although Rodzilla was angry at me mostly because
she knew that i took the picture just so i could put it on my webpage.
That't not entirely true though. In 1994, when i was returning from Spain,
I had someone take a picture of me and this lumbering beast of a woman
because i was convinced she was the ugliest woman in the world. I
know that's really mean, but trust me, if you'd seen her... I just
like pictures of the weird and freaky. So sue me.
Anyway, we were pretty beat after that, so we just returned to the DC area
and crashed for the rest of the night. I actaully go a little sunburned.
On Saturday night, I had a very vivid series of dreams about my grad school
admission chances. It was very much like the last time when i had
all those separate dreams that told me that i got in, and every time i
realized it was a dream something would try to fool me that it wasn't.
Except this time, all my dreams said that i didn't get in. The first part,
i got a thick envelope, and a key. I thought great, a thick envelope means
they're sending me all sorts of forms, and the key is probably to my room.
I opened the package, and inside was all the stuff i had sent them when
i applied, and a note saying that they couldn't offer me admission and
were sending all the stuff back, and i should send them that key to let
them know that I got all my stuff. That was a stiff punch in the chest.
Anyway, the rest of my night's sleep was filled with similar humiliations.
I even had an episode where Newman from Seinfeld was there, and
he
got into this school and I didn't. I even gave him the "Newman!"
I think this all stemmed from Rodzilla throwing away my lucky soap that
had been in my shower for months. Nothing bad had happened while
I had that soap, and even when it got down to a dried-out sliver, I kept
it under my new bar of soap. When I got in the shower on Saturday night,
it was gone. I can't believe she discarded my lucky soap. Right down
the drain.
Well, she left yesterday. All in all, a very good weekend. We went
into Georgetown for lunch and went to Barnes and Noble so she cold buy
some books for her spring break reading. I decided i'd give reading
one last shot before swearing offa it entirely, so i borrowed one of the
books she bought, a collection of Kafka tales. The only thing i know about
Kafka is what i hear from Rodzilla and James,
and it's referenced so often that i figure i should know at least something,
so i'm gonna try and read Metamorphosis this week. But I'm not betting
the farm that it'll get read. But i'll at least give it a shot.
Speaking of shot, it should be noted that while i was weaving my way through
the traffic and slight rain at Dulles Airport yesterday, Rodzilla socked
me in the eye. I made some passing comment or joke that she took mild offense
to, and she tried to playfully hit my face. She often complains of having
zero depth-perception, and I'm inclined to believe her, because that was
probably the hardest i've been hit in the face since... well, the last
time she hit me. So let it be noted here that if anyone has a history of
abuse in this relationship, it's RODZILLA. any action by me has been
provoked. I wonder where you draw the line between provocation and
motive?
DA&R
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