Hello Mr. Putin

I almost died today. I was sitting in Cafe Fresh Bagel, enjoying my toasted egg bagel with olive cream cheese and sneakily listening to/ignoring the college freshmen girls blabbing next to me when a chunk of bagel posted up in my windpipe. At first I thought it was no big deal and figured I would wait it out and just breathe, but when the breaths wouldn't go to my lungs I knew it was time to worry a little bit. Still, I was in the bagel shop that I go to too many times a week and I for sure was not going to make a scene in front of the bagel girls unless I absolutely had to.

As my eyes started bugging out and my face started turning red I tried to discreetly cough/clear my throat without sounding like I was the loser who doesn't know how to eat a bagel without choking. A strange, slightly disgusting and definitely audible sound escaped from my throat, but with it came the bagel piece, which I speedily rechewed and swallowed successfully. If anyone heard it they dismissed it as the kid sitting alone with paint all over his clothes just being weird again. I took a couple silent gulps of air and thought about how good it feels to breathe, finished my bagel and Dr. Pepper and left.

Update

The girl was found at fault in my accident. I guess that happens when you pull out into traffic on a wicked narrow street. I am bulletproof!

High Fidelity

It's bound to happen, really. After a while people tend to just move on. They move on from everything they've known and held dear, from old friends and old homes and old jobs. Even old lovers are bound to move on eventually. I guess it just sucks sucks being the one who hasn't yet. Especially when she's moving on to a friend of yours. And there's not really anything at all you can do about it. They both know it hurts you. They both know they shouldn't. But they do, and they keep going, and they share the happiness that only brings you pain. What else can you do but sit in the basement bedroom of your grandma's house playing war with your high school friend, wishing you could forget but knowing you never will. Knowing that in a way you don't want to, that feeling the loneliness even as you're getting drunk with your friends is the only thing you have left of her, and you can't give that up just yet.

Give Me Tobacco Or Give Me Death! Or at least monetary compensation for my estimated losses.

I don't care about politics. I really don't.

That said, I am devastated and infuriated to learn today about the PACT Act that was passed in July by Congress. The PACT Act, or Prevent All Cigarette Trafficking Act of 2009, does pretty much what the name tells you it does and prevents the "trafficking" of cigarettes via telephone, the mail, or the Internet. While I don't smoke cigarettes and am not particularly fond of them, I have become more irritated recently by the continued assaults on tobacco companies by people who hate the idea of a tobacco being used by anyone anywhere in America or the world and who want to see "Big Tobacco" destroyed and used as filler for divots on golf courses. They need to relax.

Still, I wouldn't care too much about the law or even know about it if it stuck only to the trafficking of cigarettes. However, it seems that Congress is strongly opposed to the idea of a college kid making a few extra bucks from his dorm room, because the Prevent All Cigarette Trafficking Act also extends to prohibit the sale and distribution of smokeless tobacco via mail, telephone, or Internet. This is where we have a problem, and where I am facing a loss of money that I was expecting to make this semester and the demise of a business opportunity.

I sold tins of smokeless tobacco last school year in my dorm. I bought the tins from a tobacco site online for half as cheap as convenience stores near my school sold them. I then charged slightly higher than the convenience stores and rounded up to an even dollar amount. My customers were happy because they saved themselves the walk to the store when they needed a buzz, and I was happy because I was selling tins for twice as much as I paid for them and was making a nice profit. I've been eyeing this semester as a big one for business, with plans to expand my marketing scheme, target market, and inventory, and looking at what should have been some nice spending money to make up for my Summer of Negative Money. However, I am now forced to put all my eggs in one basket with another business opportunity that I am undertaking with my Italian one-time roommate. We won't talk about that here.

I demand my liberties back. I demand to be allowed to buy tobacco on the Internet for cheaper than average prices, have it shipped to my school's mailroom in discreet US Postal Service boxes, and sell it at a fair price to my nicotine addicted classmates, occasionally indulging in a tin of my own if the situation calls for it. Repeal the PACT Act! Repeal the PACT Act!

Friday Night Plans

Moving books from old bookshelf and bedroom to new bookshelf in basement. Organizing books in some order only I know. Having a pretty good time with it. Big ol' nerd.

Countryfest tomorrow.

Wait What?

Can you add me on your MSN or yahoo ?

Katie ...... August 14 at 1:00pm Report

hey, i was just browsing on FB and came across your profile. i liked what i just saw :) You should add me on msn or yahoo so we can chat!

My MSN address is angie_manning5302@hotmail.com and my Yahoo is angie_love63@yahoo.com.

By the way i normally ignore msgs from strangers so just say it is you from FB if you do msg me :) !

PS. if ur lucky i will give u a link where i get crazy on webcam :)

kiss

Sent via Facebook Mobile

Friday Night Plans

Music and reading The Hunchback of Notre Dame. You?

And now a mustache too.

Transcript from Aircraft Accident Investigation report:

1906 hours
Valentich: Melbourne, this is Delta Sierra Juliet. Is there any known traffic below five thousand?
Melbourne: No known traffic.
Valentich: I am... seems to be a large aircraft below five thousand.
Melbourne: What type of aircraft is it?
Valentich: I cannot affirm. It is four bright... it seems to me like landing lights.

1907 hours
Valentich: Melbourne, this is Delta Sierra Juliet. The aircraft has just passed over me at least a thousand feet above...
Melbourne: Roger.. and it... it is a large aircraft? Confirm.
Valentich: ... er unknown due to the speed it's travelling. Is there any airforce aircraft in the vicinity?
Melbourne: No known aircraft in the vicinity.

1908 hours
Valentich: Melbourne, it's approaching now from due east towards me...
Valentich: (open microphone for two seconds)
Valentich:...it seems to me that he's playing some sort of game... he's flying over me two... three times at speeds I could not identify...

1909 hours
Melbourne: ... roger... what is your actual level?
Valentich: My level is four and a half thousand four five zero zero...
Melbourne: ... and confirm you cannot identify the aircraft...
Valentich: ... affirmative.
Melbourne: roger... stand by...
Valentich: ... it's not an aircraft it is... (open microphone for two seconds)
Melbourne: ... can you describe the... er... aircraft?
Valentich: ... as it's flying past it's a long shape... (open microphone for three seconds)... cannot identify more than that... it has such speed... (open microphone for three seconds)... before me right now Melbourne...

1910 hours
Melbourne: ...roger... and how large would the... er... object be?
Valentich: ... it seems like it's stationary... what I'm doing right now is orbiting and the thing is just orbiting on top of me... also, its got a green light and sort of metallic like... it's all shiny on the outside...
Valentich: (open microphone for five seconds)... it's just vanished...

1911 hours
Valentich: Melbourne, would you know what kind of aircraft I've got? Is it military aircraft?
Melbourne: ...confirm the... er... aircraft just vanished...
Valentich: ... say again?
Melbourne: ... is the aircraft still with you?
Valentich: ... approaching from the south-west...
Valentich: ... the engine is rough idling... I've got it set at twenty three twenty four and the thing is...

1912 hours
Melbourne: ... roger... what are your intentions...
Valentich: ... my intentions are... ah... to go to King Island... ah... Melbourne that strange aircraft is hovering on top of me again... (two seconds open microphone)... it is hovering and it's not an aircraft...
Valentich: ... (17 seconds open microphone)...

First Pluto, now this?

http://blogs.smithsonianmag.com/dinosaur/2010/07/22/new-study-says-torosaurustriceratops/

And I now have a mullet to go along with my beard.

Small McDonald's French Fries

"Did the bastard leave?", the fat lady in the ugly dress asked me and the terrified girl next to me.

"No, ma'am, I'm the bastard."

"..."

I was driving down the newly narrower Chapel Street, where my mom had been in a minor car accident a week ago. I had just bought a sweet tea and small fries from the McDonald's down the street and was thinking about the time you and your family came to Mass for your sister's graduation and we drove around and you bought (with my money) small fries from the same McDonald's and I ate them all and you were fake mad then real mad. I had my fiberglass twenty four foot extension ladder in the car with me, sticking out the back the way I always put it because tying it to the roof takes too long and is actually less safe. I was stuck in a lonely memory and couldn't see out my right window because of the ladder. I could see out the left window, where there was a woman in a pink shirt on a bike who looked like she might cross the street. She would soon appoint herself as the citizen witness.

When I looked back at the road, there was a white Lexus driven by a young girl in front of me. I saw a quick look of terror on her face, put all my weight into my sometimes functioning brakes, and gave her a nice bump on the back left tire. Great. I pulled over in front of the gas station, creating a parking space because I had just been in an accident and didn't care where I parked. Two auto body guys came out and asked if I was ok. I was. I ran across the street to where the girl had parked and found her talking to the pink biker woman, writing some stuff down on the back of what appeared to be a printed out prom picture. The girl said she was ok, almost cried, then composed herself again. I nearly hugged her and told her it's alright, but those sorts of things aren't really acceptable from sweaty, bearded, paint covered strangers.

Neither of us really knew what to do, so we exchanged names and phone numbers and apologies. She said she was seventeen and was home from the Cape for the night. After the fat lady called me a bastard and walked back into the laundromat I decided it might be time to leave. The girl and I exchanged nervous laughs. I extended my hand to her, told her "Good accident I guess," and ran back across the street to my car.

I guess it was bound to happen eventually. I'm more lucky than good at this driving thing.

Facebook Message Apologies to Strangers

Hi (name), I met you yesterday up at Saco River. I don't mean to be a creep, but at some point during the night my drunken asshole self at some point during the night decided to steal the sunglasses off your head. I feel kinda bad about it now, especially since I can't tell if they're wicked expensive or knock-offs, so I figured I'd see if you wanted them back. Sorry.

My bad if this is the wrong (name).

Sneakily a favorite movie

I like that Ben Affleck and Matt Damon wrote and acted in it, and that Ben's brother Casey is in it too. Best friends write a screenplay, demand to play the leading roles, and get their younger brother a role in it too? It's as American as you can get.