.: It is nearly 4am.

.: I went out to my father’s house, to assist in some needed renovations.  I was exhausted like a mother fucker, and Chuck (who came with me, being the more mechanical of we two) was sick with a cold and likewise exhausted.  But assist we did, and came home around an hour and a half ago.  I would have been in bed minutes later, but I have not been on the internets in a proper fashion in what feels like weeks.

It actually may be weeks.

.: I cleared my desk of clutter a few days ago, in order to have a nice working environment in which I could happily work.

This was pointless.

My toys are askew.  There is an empty drinking glass in front of me.  There is a plastic ice-pop wrapper propped up against a book in what seems to be an effort to keep the sweet, sticky red residue from contaminating my desk.  Apparently, my keyboard has joined in the effort, as I find that parts of it are mildly dripped upon with sweet, sticky, red residue.  There is none on the desk, so the book and keyboard are apparently doing a fine job.

I am bitching.  But not bitching. I have had children in the house, and have allowed them into my inner sanctum. I have Maryellen here, and her computer will not link up to the internets no matter how many ice-pops I offer it, so she must use my computer (and is welcome to it).  My daughter comes down to use my computer (or a computer, since she usually uses Chuck’s as it has ‘Windows’ and I run Ubuntu).

Tomorrow, I will clean my desk again.  I will throw away the ‘quarter water’ container that I used as a very occasional ashtray, which is now crammed with cigarettes and nicotine tea.  And I will hang a sign on my desktop which reads:

‘Please keep Mondo’s area clean, as recieving a punch in the colon by a barbed-wire fisted baboon may offend’.

And I will hope that someone smiles and does not take too much offense to that.

.: I pinched my nuts in my zipper.  That hurts more than I remember.  The Dude will inisit it is a lesson to cease going commando.

.: Speaking of The Dude.  He has Facebooked.  I seriously wonder why he would have done this.  Maybe he’ll tell me.

I tried to see him the other day at the B&N.  He had called to see if I wanted to meet him for a cup of coffee, just as my family walked through the door.  I told him I would call him back.  Which I did, to tell him that I didn’t want him to think that I wasn’t going to call, and that I would call him again.

Which I did not.

When things finally settled enough for me to be comfortable with an escape, the phone was tied up and I was out of minutes on my cell.  So I just went over to the B&N.  There was no Dude, so I bought a cup of coffee and went home and thought of how unreliable I must seem to my friend as I drank my coffee.

.: There is a reason I have not added any funds to my cell phone.  I have reached a point again where my usage outweighs my intended usage.  It’s a pain in the ass to find I am out of minutes, and must purchase more.  So I have decided to just sign up with an actual plan.  I will have minutes out the ass.  I will have unlimited text messages and email.  I will have a camera and mp3’s.

And I will pay for it.

And another little hold-out piece of me will die.

.: And here is a picture of me when no little pieces of me were dead.  Thanks to Terrence, who posted it on the Facebook from where I stolded it. I’m the one in the center, in the cammoflauge.

.: And that is how the world is at 4:22 this morning.  Have a good day.

.: I have just cleaned up the deep13 area and sat down at the computer.  Listening to Mike Watt on the last.fm and just having read the new Freakangels.

.: Speaking of Warren Ellis (writer of Freakangels), I have finally read his novel Crooked Little Vein, which I picked up months ago when it first came out.  I didn’t read it because it sounded a lot like a story I was writing at the time, though not quite.  I didn’t want to let it influence or discourage the just forming story, so I put the reading on hold.  At this point, the story has enough life so that it’s breathing on it’s own and blinking it’s eyes at the harsh light, so I decided I really wanted to read the damn book already.

And it was damn good.  And familiar.  Because Warren Ellis writes like an exotic chef.  All of these strange animals you’d never consider eating.  And you eat them because you’re really hungry for something new, and you think yo yourself as you’re chowing down, ‘tastes like chicken’.

But really good chicken.  And then you find yourself hoping that he hadn’t fucked the taste of chicken into it, because that would be just like him.

So read Freakangels on the internets.  Read Crooked Little Vein in your bed/easy chair/commuting vehicle (as long as you’re not driving)/ Barnes & Noble cafe.

.: Still no pictures of the work we did at my brother’s house.  Mostly due to laziness on my part, coupled with the fact that Chuck’s camera is away somewhere now that we have a two year old in the house.

.: I think I’m getting myself a real cell phone plan.  Some of my favorite people like to do nothing but text because they apparently can text all they want, but have limited minutes and no house phones.  Besides, I guess it’s about time.

.: I really need to get cracking on the second story arc of Jedi Jesus.  I’m also considering doing a more ‘mature’ web comic and having my mother draw it.  She was asking questions in that vein, and my art abilities suck from almost never being used (and when they are, usually used for evil).

.: Speaking of Jedi, I’m missing out on the ‘Clone Wars’ with an old friend tonight because I don’t check my email often enough.  I’ll have to get in touch with him soon, because I really enjoy his company.

.: I’m going up to smoke and get more coffee, and then if I come back downstairs, I’ll probably be doing some writing or website work, so this is all you get tonight.

.: When the fuck will someone else post something?  I’ll get on their cases.

AB

Hey all.

Got back from NC very early Monday morning.  Been slammed with stuff ever since.

For starters, Gantor and baby Gantor are back in Kingston.  So it’s been a little bit of hanging out with them.  Gantor’s network card doesn’t work, so I spent some time trying to fix that up.

And then work.  Coming back to work was like chewing razor blades out of a rabid weasel’s belly.  I am only now on Friday afternoon, getting to the last of the sorting of the crap that was dumped on my desk while I was gone.

I shouldn’t even be here now.

On the internets, I mean, not at work (much as I wish otherwise).

But I may post them promised pics tonight.  And I should have an easy day at work on Saturday, so you may hear from me then.

AB

.: I’ll post pictures on my return to New York.  We’ve been spending the past three days gutting my brother’s kitchen and putting up new cabinets. 

Can you say pain in the ass?

I knew you could.

Still, I really don’t mind doing this.  I wish I could do more, but my knowledge is limited to the gutting parts and I’m just a lazy bastard in general, so a project like this really kicks my ass.  Even when it’s occasionaly fun.

It’s about 11:15pm and we’ve at least got — I gots interupted. We’re going back to work, so there you go and with any luck, you may get a drunken post in the middle of the night tomorrow, and then a return home with some pictures on Monday.

AB

.: Made it down to North Carolina in about 12 hours from Brooklyn.  Which isn’t so bad, considering the requent stops and the fact that we crawled through New Jersey and Delaware for quite a bit before actually moving.  My sister and my daughter got to sleep most of the trip away, my mom dozed off quite a bit, Chuck dozed off and on and I slpet for about two solid hours from 3:30-5:30am.

And not much has happened since.  We had some IHoP for breakfast, came back to my brother’s, slept, got up and had some dinner.

And Wii.  I played Wii.

Never played the Wii before.  I made a Mii which didn’t quite look like me but as a Wii Mii I guess I could have done worse.  Actually, I thought it was pretty good until I saw John’s and Chuck’s.  Theirs looked really good.  My sister Cheree was whomping everybody’s ass off at Wii Baseball.  Until I played her.  I beat her in both games of a doubleheader.  The first game I won with a homer in the bottom of the third (it’s only three innings), and only allowed her one hit.  The second game I got a no-hitter, and then scored with two back to back doubles in the third.

So, despite my Wiinadequacy, I was the one to shut my sister down.  So there! 

It’s good to be down in North Carolina, although part of me misses New York, since Gantor has just arrived there.  But I suppose I’ll see her soon enough.  Her and baby Gantor.

Tomorrow we begin ripping apart John’s kitchen to put up the new cabinets.  Should be fun. 

And I mean that.

AB

.: “Maryellen is in Georgia,” said I.

“So is Russia,” said the Dude.

Gantor is on her way back from Florida.  It’s a secret, so don’t tell anyone.  Anybody who shouldn’t yet know this doesn’t read my blog, so I feel reasonably comfortable posting it.  She did have some car trouble, causing her to stay a night in Georgia.  The alternator went on the Mercury, but as I write this, she is now underway again (actually, spending the night in North Carolina).

.: I’m leaving for North Carolina myself tomorrow.  I’ll be heading down to my brother’s house, to visit his lovely family and to help him get some stuff done.  I won’t be going down alone.  Will be traveling with my brother, mother, daughter and sister.  Should be fun.  If by fun I mean like the sort of fun people who pissed off Vlad the Impaler had.

I exaggerate.

.: I missed the very Kerri birthday dinner tonight.  This bums me out and I seriously must make it up to her upon my return.

.: List of people I neglect to call daily when I really, really mean to:

• Andrea
• Sister Fran (my sister, not like, a nun or something)
• Joe & Jen
• AJ
• Andi
• My cousins.

That’s a short list, so if you weren’t on it and this upsets you, butch up.  I also have a list of people I really, really mean to email.  I won’t share that here.

.: I have now not had coffee with SleepJunky in ages.  This is a serious breach of the Universal Order and must be corrected as soon as possible.  I also really miss Son of SleepJunky and should really stop being a stool and go see them.

I also miss Gantor and baby Gantor, but I will see them in about a week.

.: I have decided to bring the laptop and microphone to my brother’s house, where we will record the first of the commentary tracks.

I’m also bringing plenty of paper and stuff, so that I can spend some of my vacation working on Jedi Jesus and doing some Bad Napkin Arts.

.: The Dude is worried about the zombie situation in America.  I concur.  He also feels that my daughter does not take the Zombie threat seriously.  She is too wrapped up in vampires and werewolves for his taste.

I got her ‘Twilight’, by Stephanie Myer.  It’s a girl meets vampire love story that the kids seem to be into these days.  I hope she likes it.  I hope I do not.  I don’t want to get wrapped up like I did with that Potter kid.  Though I really did like them Potter books.

.: I am so seriously behind on my comic book buying, that I fear I will easily spend over a hundred bucks the first week of September when I am able to buy them again.  And that’s if everything I want is still in the bins.

.: There may be less random thoughts coming Monday.  Depends on how sleepy I am after arriving in NC.

That is all.