Saturday, November 29, 2008

Civil War

I've never seen an actual tapestry in real life but I imagine owning one would bring me great pleasure. I imagine it would have a majestic viking death scene woven completely from human hair. I also imagine that it would hang on a rod that was several inches away from the wall so that I may stand behind it and giggle. I imagine that would be a pleasant hobby.

Thursday, November 27, 2008

Happy Thanksgiving America

In a preemptory strike against your budding ridicule and rage over my not contacting you in the past week, I submit:
1. You've done just fine without me.
2. My writing opportunities were gravely blighted by the rigors of hosting guests
3. I've got the deathplague and I feel like poo.

Since last thursday I've been hosting Marissa Kay, who spent her thanksgiving break visiting Bend. This is actually where she was born, so I was but an ancilliary excuse, her focus being to see her relatives that live out here. I'm not proud America, feel free to use me in this way. As long as I get to see you I promise I will be satisfied.

We spent the week in a delicious mix of deviant sloth and hedonic activity. One day we wandered around downtown, one day we got lost in the Deschutes national forest. One night we had dinner with Marissa's grandma, that same night we bar hopped with her biological father. The day after that we remained in bed for many hours, cursing the gods for our discomfort. Other days we explored Boyd cave, a miles-long underground lava tube excitingly near the ranch, and did some sport climbing at inclimb at the old mill. Other activities included avoiding Steve-o, who is back for the holiday, and as crabby as ever. Since I was scheduled to work a morning shift every day this past week, I had the dubious pleasure of getting up early and working with miniature monsters on the rock wall while my guest slumbered peacefully in the fortress of solitude. This sleep deprivation, coupled with a poor diet, and various unhealthy activities is surely to blame for my current state of chi disbalance, resulting in a horrid cold.

While uncomfortable I must admit my raspy voice can only be described as sultry. Sexual sultry. Since my Fortress is once again solitudinous in nature, I bid you an excellent Thanksgiving day. I return now to my nerd novel.

Noteworthy Events:
1. I was introduced to a gentleman by the name of Paul Evers this week, who is the president of TBD advertising, a local ad agency that does work with several beer brewerys. He gave me his card and instructed that I get a hold of him for a meeting. I know what you're thinking. You're right. Dream jobbbbbbb.

2. I think i'm leaving the fortress of solitude, and moving into a place in town. My landlord is becoming unreasonable.

Thursday, November 20, 2008

Pimpin ain't easy

I need my pants ironed but Jami won't wake up.

Saturday, November 15, 2008

I will be the one that enjoys my weekend

Ohh hello. I didn't see you there. It's kind of creepy really. You looking at me like that, judging me with your hungry dead eyes. You're just jealous because I not only have a gnarly couch, I also had a sick weekend.

Thursday night after work I enjoyed an excellent exhibition of musical prowess, harmony, and showmanship. The heavy metal band from outer space Gwar played a concert in Bend. It was like angels came down from heaven and sounded their celestial trumpets. Their melodic warbling was undoubtably responsible for both physical and spiritual epiphanies among all in the audience. The newest testament of the bible will tell of this occasion, when hundreds of unspoiled virgin maidens immaculately conceived, and in their belly grew the unholy spawn of rock. You probably don't know who Gwar is, unless you're a terrible person but if you are, and you do you understand. If you don't allow me to explain. Gwar is the worst/best/worst band ever, they dress in hilarious monster costumes and play horrible music and put on an outrageous show. Thursday night they also premiered a new snowboarding video called Down with Humans or something like that. I don't remember the details, my face was literally rocked off.

Friday dawned bright and warm, so around 11:30 I met my buddy Trevor and his friend Chris and we went mountain biking. I got a good taste of what it means to live in Bend. After a ten minute drive out of town into the national forests, we hit a huge area that has been excavated and cultivated by biking enthusiasts into a mountain biking paradise. There are trails marked in the ski park style with blue squares and black diamonds, and these contain various hazards and terrain. There are ladders, and rock drops, and berms, and table tops, and moguls, and road gaps, and steps, and jumps of every variety possible, all designed to be as terrifying and dangerous as possible. I'm more than comfortable on a bike, but this place was intimidating, not the least because of the monstrous little kids in attendance. You know the type, you see them most often at ski resorts whipping past you as you eat pow, or shredding the skate park as you hold onto the side rail hoping to keep your borrowed roller skates underneath you. They have been enjoying the sport since they were barely old enough to walk, and are completely comfortable hitting 40 foot jumps while you show off the 2 inch wheelie you just figured out you can do to your friends.

They feel so at home that its make them terrible to share the park with. Whenever they would congregate on the trails, instead of off to the side, or at the end like a normal considerate human being, I would barrel through them at high speed, most often completely out of control with a large part of my inner self hoping to run a few down and mangle in my knobby tires. They did nothing to build the park, us big people did, and yet they act like theyre entitled to its entire expanse at all times. Maybe I'm intolerant. I prefer to think they deserved the periodic moments of terror I injected into their degenerate lives.

Either way the kiddie hunting got me all fired up for two wheel action, so when we were forced to call it a day after Trevor popped a tire and Chris' bike disintegrated completely, I shot back to the ranch in minitruck II and stole Steve-o's chopper. I thrashed that until the sun went down and my ungloved hands went numb on the handlebars. After warming up with some watery store brand beef soup Jami and I went and saw the new Bond film, Quantom of Solace.

It was alright.

Wednesday, November 12, 2008

who's laughing now?

I bought a couch today! It's HIDEOUS!

I've been so busy recently, rocking 12 hr shifts at work, visiting CT, hammering out pages of nerd novel that I've been neglecting my own basic needs. Today I made the effort to change that. In recent weeks, I've been enjoying my cartoon watching from a folding beach chair, having lost my beloved futon under questionable circumstances.

I know what you were all saying, laughing behind my back. You thought you were soooooo superior, with your "furniture" and your "comfort" and "basic human necessities". Well who is laughing now friend!? WHO!?

I'll tell you who. It's me. I am the one who is laughing. From my couch. With red flowers and green diamonds. That might just be because I febreezed it so heavily that I assume I'm doing long term brain damage however.

My quest for comfort began this morning on the interweb. Craigslist mostly. One must always research and prepare before embarking upon a life changing journey. Lets be honest however, my craigslist search culminated in me looking at hilarious photos involving orangutans. Most of my internet searches end this way.

Feeling myself thoroughly prepped for departure I left the fortress of discomfort, made a pit stop at the gym to become titanic in stature, and then stopped by BMC to consult the locals. They reported to me a potential couch sighting at a place called Pickit liquidations. Ohh friend I tell you, if you ever visit central oregon, put this location on your must see list. It was Amaaaazing. I felt like Gonzalo Ximenes de Quesada finding the mythical El Dorado. Instead of a city of gold however, I located a barn full of crap. The exterior of the place looks like a junkyard, I actually drove by it before realizing that was where I wanted to be. There is barely room to park in the parking lot it is overflowing with so much glorious junk. The interior is even more packed, with spidery alleys between looming stacks of guff. There is little system of organization, just all sorts of interesting gizmos and doodads. This is the type of place that keeps people like the mythbusters going, I guarantee it has every single thing you could ever possibly be looking for. You just probably wont be able to find it. I tell you, I had a hard time focusing on my original needs. Were I a weaker willed individual, I might still be lurking in that maze of rubbish, glassy eyed and smiling. I did end up finding a couple of couchs and chairs, but they had a look that said if you sit on me, I guarantee you'll end up with crabs. I regretfully tore myself away.

Serendipitously Steve-o called me at that moment, and after hearing my dilemma told me of a thrift store he knew about. With adventure in my heart and courage in my veins I made the trip across town. I located the store with ease, walked in and BAM! Fell in love. There she was sitting all sexy, showing a little leg, facing away so I knew she was a tease. At 7 feet tall, she was a little longer than I was planning on, but you know me, i'm an adapter. She looked young, probably born in the 90's, but in this state its anything goes. I took a closer look. Hilariously ugly pattern? check. Clean looking? check. Big enough to sleep on? check. Good like-new shape? check. Cheap? Check. I was intruiged. But then I noticed one last detail. Be still my heart. It had a hide-a-bed. The rascally fluzie, she'd won. I bought her.

Getting her up into my fortress almost killed me, and might have done permanent damage to Jami Lee, but at least I have a couch now. I just can't decide what to do with it first. Should I sit on it? should I lie down? should I put a thing on it? or just watch it from afar? The dance has begun.

Sunday, November 9, 2008

Birthday weekend day two

Spark notes version. Saturday Nov. 1 Max gets to airport around 7. James brannan and kuehl pick him up with beers. We drive to UConn to kidnap Shady. James collects Shady while I shower at Marissa kays. James brings Shady to our old Apt where I appear triumphantly. We all go to He-brans, where we are met by Lastinky, the Giant and pablo francisco. I realize now that none of my friends have real names.

Our night is filled with debauchery and sin. It ends with us all walking through the nighttime city. I am covered in blood. James is the one bleeding. He has no shoes. Bry periodically tackles us all. Mally B goes crazy. The giant is red in the face bones. We are a caravan of fools.

Sunday we go to the Bizzle. We surpise Cino at work. (Pier 1 of course. He works at several. Has been since highschool. God bless him) He is surpised to see me. Nearly faints. drops some expensive looking unnecessary pier 1 crap. Hugs all around. We make sure he will join us at Big mommas after work.

Then we go, you guessed it friend, to Big Mommas. She is also surprised. Gives me 1 million hugs. Feeds us all. I spin the Camarbro for a bit. Friends arrive. The guys toss the football around, and wobble through the front yard on the dirtbike. Shady gives us all another show of his two wheeled talents.

Eventually all good things come to an end, even birthday weekends. I say goodbye to my dear friends, and return to the UConn with erica and shady. Shady and I watch a terrible movie in a terrible movie theater, just like old times. I spend the night at Marissa Kays, and in the morning she brings me to the airport. I make the biggest poo ever. Then I return to the sweetest of states on the best coast.

Wednesday, November 5, 2008

My Birthday Weekend, part 1

And so it came to pass that the Giant and Adventurous Maximus did contact each other last week and plan a most secretive rendevous. We decided that instead of purchasing birthday presents for each other, we would go halves on a plane ticket for me to come home for the weekend. My requirements were thus. Big Momma not know about me coming. Cino not know about me coming. James pick me up at the airport with beers.

Halloween night I was invited to a party at Heather's house. You remember Heather, she is the girl I work with that I cannot decide is pretty or not. I am still reserving judgement on that one. Since I had to leave Bend by 4am to catch my flight out from Redmond, I was uncertain whether I would attend. At the last moment I made the right choice and met up with Trevor and some guys to go over. I dressed up as an outlaw biker. That is to say, I wore nothing out of the ordinary. At Heather's party I was underimpressed with both the costumes and the people inside them. They wanted to play beer pong, but had no ping pong balls so I suggested a friendly game of flip cup. They wanted to know what that was. I died a little inside. Since I do be so very magnanimous in nature I taught them the proper way to play both team cup and survivor cup. Then I taught them how to play electricity. Both games proved to be popular. Heather was a gracious hostess, making many delightful snack treats and providing beer drinks after mine had run out. Around midnight I bid my new friends adieu and wandered back to the ranch where I showered, ate and packed my bags. Then I made the drive to the airport.

My flights from Oregon to Connecticut were nothing special, although the planes were all pretty empty so it was nice to have some room to lounge. This ended up being a stroke of luck, because sitting upright in those economy chairs turned out to be the only naps I would get for the duration of my trip. Tune in next time to see what crazy adventures were engaged in once Partius Maximus returned to the old country.