It's Politically Incorrect To Say Indian Summer?

It's DECEMBeR and I'm still raking leaves at work! I don't know why I got such a late start on them this year. I've been raking them on and off for the past few weeks. I started off good but then I went on a week's vacation around Thanksgiving. Then it started getting cold and rainy, so I put it off. Yesterday it wasn't raining but there was a light dusting of SnOW on the ground; regardless, I decided to go outside and rake. The leaves were soaking wet; it was cold and my fingers were numb. The leaves were damp and heavy and there were all these damn twigs and STICKS mixed in with them, making my life ever the more difficult as I raked and raked and raked until I heard a CRACK! And that's when I realized my rake had broken in half! HAHAHAHA!! For a moment I wondered if the leaves were just too heavy and wet; then I wondered if perhaps I was just too big and STRONG to be raking leaves, that it was inevitable that the rake would break due to my fearsome work ethic and over-exertion of my bulging muscles. But, no, I think the rake was just a piece of crap, honestly, and it was on its third or fourth year of raking. Today, my boss brought in another one and I am JUST ABOUT FINISHED. Finally. It's always soooo sad when I rake leaves. I feel bad for the crispy, dead, brown little guys who, not so long ago, were green and bright as soothing summer water ran through their veins. The sun shone brightly upon them as they frolicked upon the limbs amongst their leafy little buddies and now they are all DEAD and WET and they are causing my rake to break the way I'd like to snap Old Man Winter's neck!

Actually, when I first started raking these leaves about three weeks ago, the weather was extremely nice for November. It was sunny and warm. I was at my apartment complex one morning during this period, taking some garbage out to the dumpster, when one of building's maintenance men started chatting me up about how nice the weather is. At one point during this rather normal but inane, pointless conversation, I didn't really know what else to say so I said, "So, what do they call it when the weather is this warm in November? Indian Summer?"

And to this the oh, so righteous maintenance man said, "Yeah, that's the UNPOLITICAL thing to call it." He wasn't really outwardly condescending in his tone, but man, what a way to sour a conversation with a near-stranger by implying that I was somehow being insensitive to Native Americans! Or that I was some sort of vulgar, ignorant person. To tell you the truth, I didn't give a crap what this maintenance man thought of me. I was just being polite by having a conversation with him about the stupid weather, anyway. As far as I could tell, though, he was a damn gringo or "Pale Face" just as I am, and I don't know why he felt the need to "correct" me the way some pedantic losers like to correct people about their grammar all the time.

I just said, "Oh, I had no idea that 'Indian Summer' was offensive to Indians. What, is it sort of like how they get pissed about sports teams having names like the Atlanta Braves, Florida State Seminoles or Washington Redskins?" He just sort of chuckled and said, "Yeah, something like that" and was I like, "Okay, see ya dude! Nice talkin' to you!" (NOT) I then promptly walked away from the fucker, admittedly wondering if it really WAS considered UN-PC to use the term "Indian Summer," because I'd never heard that it was before. I looked it up online real quick and didn't really find anything substantial. There are some vague ideas floating around that say calling nice weather in the Fall an "Indian Summer" is related to calling someone an "Indian Giver" when they ask for a gift back that they bestowed upon someone, implying some sort of "fakery" or "trickery" on the person's part (as in a "fake" summer), but for the most part I think the maintenance man was full of CRAP. If I ever meet an actual Native American who says this offends them and why, and their explanation sounds reasonable, then maybe I'll change my perspective and think about not using the term "Indian Summer" anymore, I guess, but until then I leave you with:

"Indian Summer! Indian Summer! Nanny Nanny Na Na!" LOL!

Black Friday, Hamburger, and the Underwear Mom Gave Me

Thanksgiving this year was the first time I'd actually CELEBRATED Thanksgiving in any real form or fashion in quite a few years. It admittedly made me feel good to take part in the holiday and, waking up yesterday morning and having the day off from work, I felt this urge to do something for BLACK FriDAY, not wanting my holiday cheer to end! Of course, I don't really have the money to be one of those people who go to Wal-Mart, Circuit City, Best Buy, or any of those other stores, getting in line at 4am and taking a number to get a good deal on a stereo, flat-screen TV, I-pad, lawnmower or what-have-you. What I DID think was more within my budget was to go to the nearest supermarket to see if I could get a good deal on some HaMbUrGeR!!

My mother had given me a little money when I was home for Turkey Day-- $100, actually (!!!)-- and she made a point to tell me not to squander it. I managed to pay my phone bill with about $60 of it, bought a few packs of smokes with about $20 of it(sssshhh, don't tell her!), and I needed to make sure I spent the remaining $20 on something she would approve of. All this past week I've been eating fucking TURKEY, the white and brown meat of some fucking BiRD and what I really needed was some RED MEAT in my belly! Mom had made numerous remarks while I was home about how skinny I was getting so I'm sure she'd be happy with me buying some hamburger (especially if I got a good deal on it) to put some meat on my bones!

She had also inquired as to whether I had been wearing underwear lately. She had bought me a six-pack of tighty-whities for Christmas last year and, being someone who much prefers going commando, I didn't have the heart to tell her that I'd used all that brand-new shiny white underwear she'd bought for me as napkins to wipe the hot sauce off my face as I ate tacos! LOL! But I started thinking that MAYBE, just maybe there was still a pair of those underwears left, that I hadn't used all six as a napkin, and how cool would that be to be able to wear a pair of the underwear my mom bought me while I go to the grocery store to buy hamburger she would approve of with the money she gave me? And sure enough, after rummaging through my closet for a bit I discovered one pair of the underwears she had given me for Christmas, one that had somehow escaped my insatiable, irrational urge to wipe my mouth with! Hahahahaa! So over my privates and buttocks it went, fitting tightly and snuggly as I wore them to the supermarket in search of some BiTChIN BLaCK FrIdaY DeALS ON RED MeaT!!

But when I arrived at the meat section of the grocery store I found there were actually no deals on hamburger at all! As a matter of fact, as I looked at the prices and fondled and examined the various packages of meat, I saw that they were running the same SCAM that they always do. For the past few years I've noticed that you can no longer just get a POUND of hamburger anymore! They always have the quantities weighed out as a tad bit more than a pound, forcing you to buy more than you really need. They sell them in quantities like 1.35 lbs of 1.45 lbs, 1.25 lbs, etc., which is annoying because all the dishes I make require simply ONE POUND of hamburger! Hamburger Helper=1 pound; tacos=1 pound; spaghetti=1 pound of meat to mix in with the sauce, etc., and when you are poor like me having to spend that extra 60 cents to a dollar or so on excess hamburger simply angers me to no end! I've been meaning to actually confront someone at the grocery about this fucking racket they have going on, but suspiciously, and not surprisingly, whenever I look around the meat department there is never anyone around. Needless to say, My BLaCK FriDAY was ruined as I felt that, while other people were out and about getting good deals on nice, sparkly things, here I was at the supermarket getting ripped off on something so mundane and drab as hamburger!

I Feel So Cold And Naked Without My Dressing

I just returned from a rainy, wet, miserable walk to and from (it takes me an hour both ways) the free food kitchen here in town to eat me some fucking FREE TURKaaaaaYY!!. Hell yeah! And no, I didn't go there to get a "warm fuzzy" in my heart from volunteering to help feed the poor and hungry, do their dishes, help cook, serve, etc.-- I went there to fucking EAT! Hahahaha! I went to get a "warm fuzzy" in my beatific BELLY, if you know what I mean. I don't know, it just felt like the right thing to do. A good way to feel the real Thanksgiving spirit is not by helping your neighbors or by helping to feed the hungry. It's by being one of the hungry and taking what they give you! There's nothing better than a cold, miserable wet walk across town in the dark, chilly November air, along deserted sidewalks and roads, across abandoned intersections, until you arrive at the food kitchen soaking wet. You stumble to where they are serving the food and just say, "I'll take a little bit of EvErYtHinG!" They had turkey, sweet potatoes, dressing, mashed potatoes, gravy, and all kinds of luscious desserts. They even let me take home a free sack of potatoes! It kinda sucked having to carry them home, though.

To be honest, though today kind of sucked, I had a fairly normal, decent Thanksgiving with my family this past weekend. Due to some issues having to do with half my nieces and nephews staying with their biological father every other year on the actual Thanksgiving Day, we celebrated a few days early so the whole family could be there. It was actually the first time I'd been with my family for Thanksgiving in at least 10 years. It was a nice time, I guess. My family is pretty conservative so I got to hear my Mom talk quite a bit about Jesus and the End of The World. She has always been one to go to church here and there, but the past few years her religious fervor (or as she likes to call it, her "Faith") has really seemed to escalate. She says it is from simply reading the Bible; for the past year she has been reading it from front to back and is now nearly finished. I've always been interested in religious and apocalyptical stuff so, even though I don't really share her views on alot of things, it was fun to see her so passionate about something.

Jesus seems to have blessed my Mom and Dad with alot of new stuff since I was last home. They have this fucking HUUUUUGE high-definiton, flat screen TV, a new computer, and two other new TVs in two other rooms. They already had one of those older-model big-screen TVs the last time I was down in December. I admittedly was enamored with the big flat-screen upstairs, just sat there staaaaaring at the picture wide-eyed. On Sunday morning I sat there talking to my mother and watching her favorite preachers on the TV while she cooked the Thanksgiving Feast. Later on in the day, though, at the risk of seeming anti-social, I scurried rather rat-like down stairs to watch football on the old TV downstairs. Despite my family's conservative nature, their unabashed patriotism (there are more than a few American flags decorating their home's interior), it seemed like I was the only REAL AMeRiCaN there who actually wanted to watch football!

It seems my family has trained the little conservative minions well. At one point we were all sitting around the kitchen table. My Mom or Dad was talking about how much they hate the government and dislike Obama, when all the sudden three or four of my little nieces and nephews overheard us while they were playing and said, "Yeah Obama sucks!" LOL! And these kids are no older than 10! I guess they were just parroting what they hear the adults around them saying all the time. What is funny is how my family, ALL of THEM, my two sisters and their families included, all seem to be doing quite well. I mean, it just seems kind of funny to me to be sitting in this kitchen. The table is COVERED with food. In the room next door is this new $1,500 TV hanging from the wall. There are seven kids running all over, all wearing nice clothes; a couple have nice cell phones; they've got the latest video games, etc.; Mom and Dad's driveway was filled with their and my sisters' families' nice, big trucks and SUVs, and my family is obsessed with how evil the government is and how the End of the World is Near! LOL!

Lipstick-Stained Butts Aren't Worth Fighting For

So for various reasons, the past couple years I've been living in pretty much ABjEcT poverty. I've been surviving on working just a part-time job as a porn-store janitor and supplementing it with the (very) occasional temporary job (selling glowsticks at carnivals, front desk clerk at Motel 6) and occasional sales of my "Obama Taco Underwear" paintings. I'm a semi-regular presence at local community kitchens where I get free food. I have next to zero disposable income and doing things like eating out, shopping, doing anything social that requires money, etc., are pretty much out of the question. I have the mindset where this doesn't bother me as much as it would alot of people, but man, the worst thing about being broke all the time is trying to support my insatiable CIgArEttE HaBiT! I simply can't afford them, but yet I simply can't quit either.

One of the things I've come up with to solve the problem is smoking what I call "Billy's Blend." My first name is actually William; people call me "Bill" (but you can call me "Taco," lol). And "Billy's Blend" is made up of a mixture of the tobacco wrought from all the cigarette butts I pick up in public ashtrays and on the street. Yes, I do this; it's disgusting, I know. In most instances, when I pick up a cigarette butt from the ground, I tear the tobacco from the filter and, once I've found enough butts to make a whole cigarette doing this, I roll the tobacco salvaged from the various types and brands of cigarettes into a paper and smoke it. So I'm not smoking it straight from the filter of some stranger. That is UNLESS I find a cigarette butt that is at least 3/4 the size of the original cigarette-- in these cases I often just say fuck it and start smoking it straight from the filter, germs be damned. I especially like smoking from butts that have LIPSTICK on them so I can imagine I'm sort of somehow indirectly touching lips with some hot chick, sucking on her lipstick-stained cigarette butt the way I'd like for her to suck on my . . . . . BURRITO? LOL!!!

Hey, baby, I got your little butt in my mouth but what about your other butt, the BIG JUICY one? Hahahaha

So yeah, it's fucking sad and pathetic. And these "Billy's Blend" cigarettes are sometimes so awful tasting that when I smoke them I feel like crying or putting a gun to my head. I don't even care who sees me picking these butts off the street anymore. I've gone up to public ashtrays in front of convenience stores, the library, hotels, etc. and there will be people standing right next to them. I just say, "Hey, what's up?" if anything at all as they watch me picking through all the butts, occasionally saying things like, "Oh that's a good one there!" like a jeweler would hold a prized diamond up to the light. Sometimes someone will throw a butt down on the sidewalk right as I'm approaching and they'll see me pick it up.

I've also thought about this marketing idea. I could go to all these different cities nearby, picking up cigarette butts and blending all the tobacco into these plastic sandwich bags, have the butts organized by the cities I get them from. Sell them to people on the street who are as desperate as me for tobacco. I could have "Chicago Blend," "Indianapolis Blend," Cincinnati Blend," etc.

No one said anything or seemed to care or be offended by my picking their nasty used butts up off the ground and smoking them until TODAY when I almost got into a fight with some customer at work. I went outside to rake leaves at work this morning and I saw a cigarette butt lying on the ground. It was about 3/4 of a cigarette so I was like, hey my lucky day! I automatically popped it into my mouth and lit it, started smoking away. After taking about two puffs off of it some guy comes out of the store. He looks down on the ground where I'd picked up the butt, appearing bewildered, like he was looking for something. He then kind of shakes his head, looks at me and asks me for a cigarette. I look at him and say, "Nah, I don't have any, man, this is my last one," referring to the one in my hand. He looks at it and says, "Hey, that's my cigarette! I left it out here a few minutes ago before I walked into the store!" And this dude was some scumbag. He was getting all angry and I could tell he was willing to physically fight me over this fucking cigarette butt.

I just act dumb and say, "Nah, man, this ain't your cigarette," but I knew that it was. I could just tell, but I was dumbfounded and shocked that this guy was actually wanting the cigarette back that he had thrown on the ground 10 minutes before!

"It's a fucking Winston 100 Ultra Light," the guy said, "right there there in your hand. That's my cigarette, I left it on the ground planning to get it when I came back out!"

I was pretty agitated. Not only was I being called out on picking this dude's cigarette butt from the ground, I was being put in a position where I had to GIVE IT BACK TO HIM OR FIGHT HIM OVER IT! I decided this shit just wasn't worth fighting over or getting in a physical altercation with a customer and potentially in trouble at work over, so I just handed the guy his dumb fucking cigarette butt and said, "Here, take it then." I don't know, the whole experience just made me want to quit smoking more than ever. Luckily after having to give the guy his butt back, I looked over a few feet away by the dumpster and found another butt that was just as big. I managed to smoke it all the way down this time without some fucker coming up to me and CLAIMING IT.

Tacos, Not War: Veterans Day Musings

My mom called me yesterday after listening to the radio where they urged all their listeners to call a veteran and thank them for their services. LOL. I thought it was touching and sweet of her and told her I appreciated it, even though there are and were a lot of veterans who sacrificed more than I ever did. I was in the U.S. Navy from 1988-1992. I did spend 6 months of that time in the Persian Gulf, home-ported in Bahrain on the USS Lasalle, during Desert Storm, and I do technically qualify as a "war veteran," but man, I was never in fear of my life once. I just sat on a ship in front of this computer watching radar blips on the screen. And I served as the secretary for some crusty, gruff old commander, typing out messages for him all the time. I smoked alot of cigarettes, drank coffee and beer; masturbated in my bunk at night; cleaned bathrooms and watched Phillipino bands sing bad American pop songs in hotel lounges. It was boring most the time and, with the exception of the handful of times I got to have sex with prostitutes at my ships' various port calls, I fucking hated my time in the military.

I was a troubled 17-year old kid who did too many drugs in high school. I did barely graduate high school but my parents didn't have a whole lot of money and felt it was a bad investment at the time to pay for my college, and they were right--I wouldn't have lasted a semester. So I didn't really have much choice but to join the Navy or some other branch of the military, like a lot of guys in my family did.

I barely even had to handle a gun. I didn't even come close to doing what a lot of the ground troops go through in the Army and Marines in places like Iraq and Afghanistan. That stuff is terrifying and intense and, though I find the motivation behind America's wars questionable in that they are painfully obvious campaigns to benefit banks, corporations and war profiteers, I do respect anyone who goes through that type of human experience. I'm proud of the fact that, though it was four of the most miserable years of my life, I did make it through my entire 4-year contract. I lived up to my word and got an honorable discharge. But I am not even close to being in the category of those who engaged in actual combat, and it's important for me to make that distinction. Though I do appreciate the fact that I can justifiably say, "I served and you didn't you fucking hippy!" there are so many jerk-offs out there who lie, embellish or exaggerate their military service to garner some sort of respect or benefits that they don't deserve. I spent my GI Bill benefits long ago and don't feel anyone owes me a damn thing anymore.

Thanks, Mom. I do love you and it was genuinely sweet of you, but thanks are best served for the guy in the wheel-chair, the guy sitting in a hospital bed with his legs blown off or the thousands of poor soldiers rotting in the ground because of the greed of oil companies and other corporate avarice.