Category: In General

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Well then. Let’s get started.

So. Things. Things over time.  Since my last post  ive taken some time to get some things laid out. Ive done more experimenting in the kitchen ( and paid the consequences and fines thankyouverymuch), Ive bought a new phone with a new camera that I’ll be learning how to use right here, and ive been very diligently not living – not doing the things i need to be doing that would fill these pages and ive certainly not been telling you about any of it. But I did buy a tiny little keyboard so. Lets just call my stalling done and get to work. Ive been out and about enough to take some photos, but ive not added new content- ive not added much of anything in fact because i feel stalled. And I wasnt sure what would bring me out of that. Im not even sure now, I just.. well.. I felt the need to come clean about the gaps. I dont know why they happen. I wish they didnt.

Heres two things.

Thing 1. Coffee. I had a not great day. Two of my favorite people got angry with me over what was at best a misunderstanding and the result was me almost spending a friday night alone- accept a good friend of mine took pity on me and brough me hugs. Then got us both out of my apartment into the air for coffee. And we could have had coffee anywhere, but she took us out into the wind and the traffic and the closing starbucks crowd which is to say, two people.  It let me push my senses against familiar but not known things. The feeling of an order taken wrong, prepared wrong, but with skill- so it tasted okay. The grating feel the sound of high rining metal on metal makes in the rythmic pulse of dish washing, more practice pushing through everything else, to focus on what i wanted to focus on. I needed that. Shelly is pretty good at making me do the things i need to do to make me feel better and fooling me into thinking shes not doing it on purpose. I can appreciate that. As a bonus, she gives wonderful hugs, and I needed one. Kudos.

Thing 2. House Warming. Matt and Brittany Warmed their home and invited me to join them and their friends and family. That was nice. But it was a LOT of people and if youve been paying attention or are psychic you know that I am not always comfortable in large groupe of people im not familiar with. But it got way better. Familiar faces, Brittany’s fantastic food wizardry, and the kindness of strangers. Eventually it got much better and I was sad to go, but hey, duty.   I went by my parents who lived a few neighborhoods over and saw my mom and dad and my nephews  and we took a drive and during conversations with them, It became apparent that my newphew knew things I wish he didnt have to know. (I talked about it on facebook and I try not to double dip) I love seeing the fam, but that left me a little dimmer than when I got there. But I guess thats whats necessary now.

That wasnt so bad.

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I didnt write that last one

But if youve been paying attention- you noticed a changed! Blog is in a totally new site altogether. AND Im talking about more stuff! At least theoretically. I havent decided on what to do with the old posts so for now theyre all just here. They need  tags I guess. So you can search for them since i plan to start generating content on the regular. I mean, the timing will be regular-ish. My experiences and voice are anything but.

Im at a Starbucks. Its 7.. ish. It has been a LONG time since ive seen the morning coffee people at starbucks. But I remember them. The elderly gentlemen who trade stocks or summon genies for money and seem to have a perpetual need for the bean in the morning and nowhere they need to be, Mothers, Daughters, commuters who need a fix, one delightful woman who met me eyes, offered me the biggest smile and mouthed “Good Morning!” at me. Im assuming. I hope thats what it was. My headphones are on and im projecting a positive bias. Theyre all still here. Somehow, they kept churning out the bean juice and new iterations of the same people have been crankin on in and out while I was off doing other things. Thats.. comforting and not. Everybody wants to matter- I want my absence to mean things. Sometimes it does- sometimes when i need it to it doesnt. Barista #3 certainly didnt notice. My head bobs subtle to U2 in my headphones and im in Starbucks on a Sunday morning after work writing in my blog.  While.. all the things in this world are happening- im doing this. so. at least theres that.

K. Time to go. We aint done quite yet, feet.

Songs to post by:

U2 “Stay (Faraway, So Close)”
Counting Crows “Raining in Baltimore”

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The Flower in December

“I made a golden promise that we would never part
I gave my love a locket and then I broke her heart

and then I broke her heart’
-Tom Waits “Innocent when you dream”

Ive taken to wearing hoodies out on the deck of the Normand Flower while it speeds off into the blue headed for a tiny little platform out in the gulf.
Sometimes, my job requires that I pack a bag and then spend some time as a ‘mechanical systems engineer’ ala Val Kilmer in Red Planet. Everybody else has these super specific jobs to do, I make sure the toilets flush and the airlocks dont open- or, more to the truth, that are product is collected and deliverable to the client at the end of the job. (I say ‘our product’ to be all secretive and make me look all hawt to all the women who read my blog.) It’s usually bad food, close quarters, 12 hour days and no weekends- but the view is sometimes amazing. For instance. At night out in the middle of the gulf, the stars are not shy at all. Light pollution is a rare rare thing and typically, If you choose wisely where to stand you can gaze at stars you havent seen since you were a kid in that ill-equipped astronomy class in primary school. You know the one.

While Im out I typically have a little downtime to work on whatever I see fit and THIS time around I have done some blog upkeep- written a tiny tale, written a slightly risque’ longer piece and gotten pretty wrapped up in calling myself a writer again. Loosely. There are times when I find myself just incapable of coherent thought. But I push forward blindly until it feels right again.  Cause. ya know. American.

That quote in the open is from a Tom Waits song Ive been listening to while Im out on the back deck watching our wake.  Or while I was wandering around the dock looking for where our equipment was dropped off in the rain and shivering. Or any time I feel generally crappy and want to wallow in it for another 3 minutes and 9 seconds. Music is the coat that protects me from the elements. Its my seatbelt when im driving too fast. Its my blanket when the monsters prove my parents wrong about their existence.  A great many very memorable times in my life have been laid a soundtrack by my brain either on accident or not. That might be a bad thing, or a good thing- but it’s my thing.

Heres another thing. Ive decided on a new ritual for when I go offshore. While Im offshore, I’m not going to shave. at all. And when I come back from the dock looking like Tom Hanks in the latter half of Castaway, Im going to find a full service straight razor barber and pay him heaps of money for the most relaxing shave my face has ever experienced. Rose petals should rain down around the chair while a fat itallian tenor sings about the virtue of upselling a pedicure. I expect to not need the happy ending after this shave.

I’ll let you know how it goes

ps: My ipad has been a trooper out here. as a pdf reader and general work assistant it has been invaluable. Apple gave me a couple apple stickers, so I feel I owe them a free plug. Youre welcome.

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Wait, what?

This is a picture!My unconscious body can get me showered and dressed, drive me to the DART parking lot, and put me on a train. Not the RIGHT train, and there can’t be more than 2 red lights or I get confused; but it WILL get me on A train. Where I get off is a function of how soon I wake up. (Which is generally a function of when the nice officer prods me for a ticket.)

By the time my brain went through POST* I was on the orange train speeding into downtown. That’s not unusual but required a transfer to get to my final destination but I DID notice something odd. There was.. a color scheme I wasnt participating in.  Younger people mostly, all wearing the same shirt. Well- different shirts of the same color and type. Not all wearing the same shirt cause where would they all sit? I dont remember a school on the train line, but wouldnt that be cool? I would dig that for maybe the first few weeks. Imagine the possibilities! I mean, some horrible ones too, but what a social experience! Teaching (hopefully) kids to navigate public transportation and interact with each other to accomplish a common goal. That goal being to get somewhere youre trying to go. I think thats pretty worth it. It’d need to be really safe and maybe some kind of system should be in place to discourage abusing the means of transportation- but still. Wor- wait, Here’s my stop.

*P.O.S.T.  Power On Self Test

—[ Excerpt from my P.O.S.T. ]—

Jabari  – Standard Earth model Class: Human- Loadout B

.Memory check
.Sensor Suite to active
.Social scene detection – compare sensor data to stored horror movie and social scene presets……..
.Limb check
.Clothing check
.Dead body proximity check
[Self Aware]
.Loading morning startup routine
!Begin “Day”
—————————————

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Pretty Little Mindreader

At the bus stop

I met a mindreader on the train.

At first, I wasnt sure thats what was going on. I just thought it was a weird coincidence that as I was talking in my head to the pretty redhead at the front she glanced up and locked eyes with me for a minute. But then I knew. And we had a conversation. It went like this.

Me: OMG! She can totally read my thoughts! It’s probably rude that I’m talking about her in the third person. But I mean, I could hardly be blamed this is my head- im here all the time so this is just how I talk to myself. I should be allowed a little time to adjust. And plus, How could I be ready for a mindreader out of the blue? I barely have control about the thoughts im *supposed* to have control over! This is just like when people come over to visit but i havent cleaned up. Except they have a key. And the walls are made of glass. And it’s 3:27 am. I am COMPLETELY unprepared. What happens when I start thinking about kittens? Or baboons? Or kittens ON TOP OF baboons! Do I get a pass for all they stray errant weird or inappropriate thoughts I havent learned to control yet? I hope not. Cause she.. (you) are probably a really nice person. Youre probably remarkable even. I bet you play jazz in the evenings while you cook amazing meals and gaze thoughtfully out over your balcony at an amazing view. Or that you painstakingly craft models of sailing ships with a detail most people never even notice. Or maybe you bake wonderful treats for your neighbors to enjoy while you chat about nothing at all before you all go to work. I could really use someone like that in my life..  Let’s start over. My name is Jabari, I think it would be really nice if we got to know each other. I’m headed to work right now, but if you have some time tomorrow morning we could chat again, maybe have some coffee and talk about life on the train or something like that?”

Mindreader: …

Me: …

Mindreader: …

Me: …Bitch.