My* Dog

It's about time that I wrote a bit about Google (aka Googs, Googley Puff, Googley Poo, Googmeister...) the dog - the one that lives with Colin and I.

To begin, I will explain the asterisk. I am not a dog person. Don't get me wrong, I don't dislike dogs... I quite enjoy romping with them, scratching their bellies, playing fetch, and having them accompany me on walks in the woods. It's just that... well... for me all of these joys don't outweigh the dirtiness, the jumping, the slobber, the barking, the destroying of personal effects, the pooping, the humping and the continual need for affection and attention. Therefore, it was with mixed feelings that I replied, "Oh. Great." to Colin's announcement (over phone) that he and Jonathan had brought home a puppy. I was still in Indiana at this point, and since I hadn't yet met the dog named Google, I tried to have an open mind. But this was not going to be my dog. So, when I title this post "my dog" what I am saying is that despite my occasional grumpiness toward him, I still do my part to feed him and play with him. (And when attractive women are met in passing: "Why, yes. He is my dog.")

Now that I've said all that - and dog lovers everywhere are amassing to write angry letters to me, condemning my hateful language - let me describe all of the cute and cool little personality quirks of Google's that have so won me over (to him, at least, not the entire dog nation).

Jonathan and Colin gave Google his name because before he even came home with them from the shelter they had dreamed of owning a dog with the informational capacity of the internet. Now the running joke is that while he is somewhere in the j's, memorizing the internets, he hasn't yet learned English and so his vast knowledge is somewhat useless. (He is a smart dog in other ways, though. In the first week I was in Colorado we made him a good-sized adjustable hurdle and taught him the command "jump." He can also, sit, stay, "slap you some skin," and accurately find and fetch any generic-looking rock that you huck into a field of sage brush.


Actually, Google loves rocks so much that even if you don't throw one for him, he'll find one he likes and start kicking it around with his front paws (like one hiking a football) while yelling at it. Believe it or not, this can be annoying. One way to get him to shut up is to pick up the rock of his present attention and throw it. Then he promptly fetches it and the cycle repeats - only you've now been sucked into his game. A further testimony to his brilliance. (Sometimes we would try to explain his eccentric actions by theorizing that Google was secretly a world-renowned geologist. He would fetch a rock, start yelling "Look, look! I found a brilliant specimen here, practically flawless!" Then we would throw it, he would get pissed, bring it back, yelping, "No, you fools! That is a priceless fossil! You can't just throw it! No no no!!) One scary downside to his fascination with rocks is that one must be careful to throw them very far away. Google has gotten so good at reading the flight paths of frisbees and rocks and the like that if he gets a good enough head start (or if you don't throw it far enough) he will try to catch the rock in his mouth. OUCH! We try to avoid this.


Other quirks: He likes to eat lying down. We attribute this to laziness. He also likes to pass out in the most uncomfortable-looking positions possible! Most dogs I've seen lie on their stomachs and their feet tuck under or sprawl. But Google like to lie on his back, contort his spine and then put his head and legs wherever they look like they shouldn't go. And he does not reserve these bizarre shows for the evenings. No, he will follow you around outside all day, but the moment he enters a building with you he passes out. It's as though he is a computer with a power save mode and once inside his mouse is no longer being moved. Only messing with him (or going back outside) can possibly rouse him. And mess with him we do. Favorite games include wrestling, hugging, running around the house really fast and wheelbarrow races.


But as much fun as Google can be, what has struck me most in these past few months of getting to know him is what a responsibility he is. In the words of a friend, dogs are essentially "practice babies." They want love and attention, they can be a financial burden, they can wake you up at night, they can poo in places you don't want them to poo and they can even die if you screw up one little thing even once. Yep, Googs is a real bundle-o-responsibility. He's also taught me several good lessons in patience. Often after leaving him at home unattended for varying lengths of time (sometimes as short as 45 minutes!) I will return to find the living room in shambles and various possessions of mine in various states of chewed-up-ness (I've recently given him the nickname Shiva). I want to punt his whiny ass into the cow pasture, but then I remember that he will have no idea why I'm doing it. So I bite my tongue, pet him and vow to remember to lock him outside (and all of my shoes inside) next time.

At times like that I can't help but make the comparison to having a child to care for (he/she didn't know that those were Daddy's important books). He has so many needs, and attention seems to be at the forefront. It has been a real challenge for me to find the energy to play with him when he's bored, and when he whines for attention or tears stuff up it certainly tries my patience. In fact, if I couldn't assure myself that any future kid of mine would be physically incapable of chewing through a Chaco sandal strap (and half of War and Peace in the same sitting!), I'm not sure that I could maintain the notion that I want to have children some (far, far off) day. I guess my future children also have a leg up on Google in that they will be able to learn to read, talk, joke and eventually keep me entertained in my old age...

But on the whole, Google's all right. He's a pain in the rear sometimes, but he's mostly cool and fun to have around. And I do try to get him back whenever I can. In fact, when I imagine that I'm his big brother - rather than responsible parent - I feel much more justified in messing with him and occasionally ignoring him as long as I still remember to feed him...

I'm Dumb: Scene II

Believe it or not, I'm still a dumb person. I know it's been a while since I last commented on this aspect of myself, but after this afternoon's adventures I couldn't help but remind you all (How many is "all" these days? I'm predicting single digits, but sometimes I like to pretend that I'm writing to an expansive audience that just can't wait to hear what crazy $hit will happen to me next...) just how dumb I can be.

As a brief prologue to this afternoon's events, let me begin this paragraph by titling it Chapter XVII: In Which Matthew and Guinnevere Continue to Bicker and Finally Seek Out Relationship Counseling. So, I forget when my last car update was. I believe I had already mentioned putting too much oil in, discovering a rear wobbling, then having it not start and towing it to the shop (thanks boss' pickup truck!) to get repaired AND having one tire blow out en route. But only the broken off exhaust pipe was repaired then (oh, did I forget to mention that?). I drove back from the shop on my donut, eventually bought a new tire and finally: Gwen was good to go! To celebrate Colin and I hopped in and cranked some tunes on the way to frisbee!... oh, wait, it was still really wobbly. If I let go of the wheel it the whole car would violently veer to the right. It was kinda scary. Gwen was sent back to the infirmary for the time being. Now it just so happened that early this morning I had to drive Colin to the Grand Junction airport. I brilliantly decided to drop my car off at the local Kwiki Tire on the way to have the alignment problem fixed. Driving back from Junction, I got a call. "Mr. Rody? Yeah, we got your alignment squared away. But, uh, two of your tires - they look to be the same brand - the tread is about to come clean off of 'em." Crap. "And it's probably good to replace the other just for good measure, right?" He said I might be able to get away with not, but sooner or later it would go. What the hell. If I go for that extra tire, I thought, maybe I can completely pay for my car over again!! (Despite all the emoticons that our generation has to offer, I still have yet to see the "sarcastic double exclamation point." Someone please figure that one out.) The work was quickly done, and I could pick it up any time this afternoon. Great. Now, fast forward to the end of the work day.

I had talked to Lance at lunch and asked if I might get a ride into Delta to pick up my car. He said, sure, someone could take me. I said I could also ride my bike if it was a problem (though I hoped it wouldn't be, as it would be a good 15 miles in a fairly short period of time). At about 3:45 I noticed two cars pull in the driveway. They looked like tourists. I wondered if Lance would be needing to give a tour. We would need to be leaving soon (sooner if I had to bike), as the garage closed at 5:30. I called Lance. (Yes I'm too lazy to walk several hundred feet.) He didn't pick up. Anna? Nope. Evan? Nope. Anna called back. Could you take me to Delta? She had just come from Delta. Frick! And now they had family plans. Maybe I could work something out with the on-farm grandpa (Lance's dad). Nah, easier to not. The clock was ticking.

15 miles, mostly downhill. I could average at least that, right? So if I left... now! I could make it. I ran up to the house, remembering to recieve my instructions for the next day, since I would be running the place myself with everyone else taking Evan to college. [Okay, Anna... stop talking... need to go...] Back to the house. I packed enough water to survive. Helmet, glasses, air in tires... check, check, check. I left my driveway at 4:45. I decided to not do the math and just pedal really, really hard.

The first leg of my journey was easy enough as it was straight down the side of the mesa. And it was a rush! My speedometer long ago stopped working, but I estimated that I was going around 40 mph... but even going slower I was making great time. I'll be at Kwiki in no time. And then I turned onto the highway, straight into that confounded dry, hot, dusty desert wind. Even going slightly down hill I could not have been going more than 13 or 14 mph. My estimates got more and more pessimistic: Maybe I could still make it. Maybe I could still make it if I called ahead and said to stay in the store until I got there 10 minutes late. Maybe I could find enough sense to turn around NOW and save myself the extra mileage on the bike ride home...

I pressed on. The wind did not abate. I hit construction. I had thought about the construction before I left - in terms of bikes being able to fly by slow-moving cars on the shoulder. But wait... construction narrowed traffic down to one tiny, gravelly lane for at least few miles. MAN I'm dumb. Even if I could avoid getting hit, my tiny little road tires would bounce me to kingdom come! The time had come to deviate from the original plan (but when had I been following that?! And what was that plan anyway? Something like buy a nice reliable used car - Civics are good - and drive it to its death with no car troubles ever...).

I approached a long line of stalled cars. I rolled to a stop next to the first pickup truck and stuck out my thumb. No luck. I'm only going to Austin. "Sorry I can't help. Good luck mi hijo!" The target of my next attempt was an SUV, empty in the back with a young male driver. "You going to Delta?" "Sure, hop in." That was easy. And the rest is history. I negated some "dumb points" with some hard-earned "improvisation points" and "meeting cool new people points." James, a young paramedic, was my savior, and he was even cool enough to drive me directly to the garage (we pulled in at 5:26). I thanked him profusely and promptly got slapped in the face by three new tires of negative money. Oh well. At least my car was totally good to go. It's smart to fix your car, right? More dumb points negated.

Oh yeah. But it seems that I neglected to anticipate how sprinting furiously on a bicycle - while totally out of shape - would affect my frisbee game later that evening. I guess we can't all be smart...

Opportunites, Missed and Taken

This afternoon, as my plane made preparations to carry me on the first leg of my 3-flight trip home, an announcement was made that perked up my ears. Springfield, MO was experiencing thunderstorms and in order to prepare for a potential trip to Arkansas instead, my plane would have to extend its time in O'Hare long enough to take on more fuel. So much for having a comfortable buffer of time between flights. Several minutes later the announcement was made that with the addition of the extra fuel our plane was now officially "too heavy," and volunteers were asked for to exit the plane, fortunately still on the ground at this point. These volunteers would of course be recompensed with a seat on the next available flight as well as a voucher for a round-trip ticket to anywhere in the contiguous United States. My heart jumped up into my throat and started pounding abnormally. Here was my chance - a free ticket home for Christmas! And at this juncture, the genes I received from my mother hijacked my go-with-the-flow brain and started thinking of everything that could possibly go wrong with this plan: I could miss a whole slew of connecting flights and be stranded in Missouri long enough for the bump to lose its worth, my employers could be expecting me back today and have me slated for something extremely important the following day... and before I could conjure up images of tyrannosaurs in F-16s blowing up the airport minutes after seeing my once plane take off, two other people volunteered. Poop.

I hate it when I don't act on opportunities. Sometimes, like in this instance, I just don't act quickly enough - my mental every-possible-scenario-figurer-outer simply can't process with the speed necessary to decide something is in fact a good option before it ceases to be an option. (This frequently gets me when it comes to spontaneous acts of altruism - Do I pick up the hitch-hiker? Do I tip the street musician? Do I help the lady with the papers flying everywhere? ... Too often the answer is, "Well, too late for that one, I guess.") Other times, I chicken out entirely - working up the nerve to ask for a date, taking a ridiculously cool job (yet one that would require a longer commitment) and so forth. I'm getting better about making the most of my opportunities, but I still pass up enough that I routinely kick myself in the butt and resolve to take the next opportunity I get.

One particularly memorable missed opportunity occured within the last year. I had given myself a late Christmas present and splurged on a good seat to the concert Bobby McFerrin gave when he came to Sauder Hall at Goshen College. During the entire performance I sat enraptured by the sounds coming from this man's voice (and body!). Bobby has a vocal range of many octaves and has the ability to sing the melody of a song while simultaneously humming out a bassline and singing various harmonies. And the whole time I was sitting there thinking, man, I would love to be him and do this stuff for a living. And during the songs in which he called for audience participation, I remember thinking how fun it would be to just sit around and sing with this phenomenal musician. And then, as if God was speaking from the heavens (Bobby's talking voice is low), he invited someone down to stage to sing something - anything - with him (he is also an extremely skilled improviser). And instantaneously my soul was sprinting up to the stage. But my [bleepity-bleepin'] mind didn't let me. What if I couldn't think of anything to sing? What if I messed up a song if I did think of one. What if I myself tried to improvise but then utterly failed? And so I didn't go up. Three times (he extended the offer twice more). And though I did end up going when he invited a large group (to make up a choir), that day I was the maddest I have been at myself in a while. Screw inhibitions! I thought later. They only lead to sitting down and watching others have all the fun in life (and occasionally keep you from foolishly killing yourself)! And I resolved - as I always do - to not let another such opportunity pass itself up.


Really, though... I think life is much more rewarding when you don't let little nagging doubts prevent you from taking amazing opportunities. After watching the movie Yes Man I was struck by the message it seemed to be sending (though I didn't really care for the film itself). In it, Jim Carrey played a very boring man, challenged by a friend to literally say "yes" to everything, and his life was completely opened up to a world of possiblities because of his actions. There are always exceptions where it is still wise to exercise caution - as the movie pointed out in the end - but as a general policy it's good and life giving, seized opportunities begetting more opportunities and so on.

On these thoughts and more I reflected on my way to Springfield, then Denver... and it was while waiting to board my flight to Grand Junction that I heard those magical words, "Passengers on flight [number], we're sorry to announce that we've overbooked this flight..." If I didn't act this time then I might as well give up on myself now and save myself the trouble. My phone was already in my hand calling Lance as I popped up and headed for the counter. "Yes, I'm willing to take the bump. Let me just quick make this call." Lance only encouraged me and gave me his blessing. All right. No qualms about taking yet another vacation day. I surrendered my boarding pass right then and there. And now I'm sitting on my nice double bed ("I'm sorry sir, but I'm giving you a double. All the kings are booked."), looking over at my other nice double bed, digesting my free supper, and preparing to get my beauty sleep before my flight out tomorrow. And I have in my pocket a voucher that will fly me home (or, to one of them, at least) for Christmas. Cha-ching!

Small Town Community

My glorious and anything-but-restful vacation is soon coming to an end, and presently I find myself with a few hours of down time found within a nearly constant barrage of coffee dates, breakfast dates, hang-out times and all of that fun stuff. Part of the reason for this mayhem is that I am in Goshen (my place of residence for five years, up until 3 months ago) for a wedding that took place yesterday. And weddings draw friends that you haven't seen for a while (my conspiring still-single friends and I joked about making sure we married off all of our other mutual friends at regular intervals so that we could continue to find excuses to fly/drive long distances to see each other). So I've been doing lots of catching up with other out-of-towners, all former students and classmates.

BUT as it turns out, living in a small community for even as short a span as 5 years gives one a great many connections, and I've been startled to walk down the streets of Goshen and know about half the people I see (as well as where they live, who they're related to and so forth). The highlight reel from my few brief days in Goshen:

• Going to see the local bluegrass band - The Goldmine Pickers - I recognized two of four members as regular customers in the bakery where I once worked and said a few words to each. (One I used to see regularly on the mill race, walking his dog, as I skied by.) Another band member I recognized as the son of two other fun customers at the bakery/restaurant.
• At the farmers market yesterday I met up with one vendor friend and caught up. She gave me a tip on a good U-pick blueberry farm and then offered some free cucumbers. I then proceeded to another stall, said hi to another vendor, bought some delicious sungold tomatoes, found out that he and his wife grew the flowers for the wedding I was getting later for, and that one of their farm employees was the same guy who was a classmate of mine... and playing the prelude for the wedding on his classical guitar.
• While walking around town with one friend, we stopped by a house to see another friend. We walked in and through - without knocking - and found the friend outside, eating with his parents. The dad - a contractor and my employer last summer - said hi, and the mom - my former song leading professor - invited us to some apple crisp that she was just bringing out to the table.
• This morning I woke up in the basement of the house owned by two former housemates (happily married as of last spring). I proceeded to walk four houses down and eat breakfast with a good friend (now living in Virginia) who was in town for the wedding and staying with her sister and brother-in-law. At about 11:30 I got a call that the brunch organized by my old Sunday school class was under way. I said goodbye to my friend and walked directly across the street to the house of my former pastor (also the officiating minister at the wedding) where I ate a delicious brunch and caught up with many good church friends.

So many friends and acquaintances... I'm almost overwhelmed. And yet, it's comforting to know people and to be surrounded by a community of people that I trust and am familiar with. And perhaps part of why I am overwhelmed now is that I recently moved to a very rural place in this country. And it's been a good three years since I've really had to make friends (I'm kind of out of practice). So as a result, I often find myself feeling somewhat isolated from community out in Hotchkiss. And I miss Goshen. Yet, maybe it's okay (or arguably good) to leave such a community in search of who I am (and how I react to a world when on my own... or with two (now one) dear college roommates). And really, I am starting to make friends and connections where I am now, so perhaps I am finding out what I kind of already knew: there is community everywhere - you just have to find it and invest in it. The only tricky part, as brought up in a recent conversation among friends, is how to reconcile the contrasting urges to explore the world and find a community. But I will have to wrestle with that later since I just got a call telling me that yet another hangout session is about to begin...

This One Dude I Met (WARNING: extreme length advisory)

[At this point I would like to make a shout out to my good friend Reuben and his renowned Fair Street tales...]

Foreword: I am about to embark on an adventure that is a family camping trip in the Adirondacks of up-state New York. Though these trips are often wild and crazy and the expectation of coming back alive is never certain, I am not writing this post as a last-communication-with-the-world note. No, in fact the reason is somewhat of a story in itself, a story that goes like this:

Once upon a time I found myself on a greyhound bus going from Denver to Grand Junction. This happened (as all of my bus rides seem to) as a result of going somewhere (in this instance, Denver, to get a ride to a Nebraska wedding) without having a definite plan for getting back home. On the bus ride I happened to be sitting next to a very... unique man - one of his many interesting qualities being that he talked for practically the entire duration of the 5-hour trip. And when I say "he talked," please note the lack of indirect object. At times he talked to me (or to anyone else he could find), but even when he could find no one's gaze to meet with his own, he would continue his rambling speech, saying what I perceived to be whatever came first to his head.

At first I was amused. Then annoyed. Finally, as a survival instinct, perhaps, or maybe in following my make the best of the situation mentality, I became intrigued. I kept my crossword puzzle book in front of me, but turned my attention from the yet empty squares and stumping clues to the words pouring forth from this man's mouth, like popcorn from an overflowing kettle. My pen scratched furiously, now recording as many as possible of these disconnected thoughts in the margins of my crossword book. To the observant onlooker, my actions were by no means discreet, but I did not fear detection. I simply wrote, a scribe for his unwitting dictations.

How is this relevant to the necessity of me writing this now, you might ask? It so happens that presently I only own one book of crossword puzzles, the same that contains my hastily scribbled notes. And this book is accompanying me on our backpacking trip. And it will likely rain... and be wet. And I do not want to risk any situation other than this man (whose name I never learned) being immortalized forever in the pages [?] of my blog. And so, without further ado, please enjoy the musings of This One Dude I Met, as recreated from my personal notes.

[For purposes of continuity, or lack thereof, and accurate portrayal I will attempt to mimic in my writing his manner of speech, minimalizing my own thoughts and questions and relying mostly on things he said. I will make a few small notes when they help with context.]

Look a'that hill up there [very tiny, with condos at the bottom]. Wouldn't you like to take a snowboard down that hill. That fence would probably stop you, though. Or maybe the highway. I wonder if you could get enough air to make it to the highway. Wouldn't you like to have been in New York during 9/11? I hear there was a lotta gold under them towers. The took all the gold from Ft. Knox and put it down there in the basement. And all those firefighters who got to go around through the rubble afterwards. Man I woulda liked to be there. Think of all a that gold. Look at that train there. Once I was riding a freight train down in Louisiana, but it stopped right in the middle of a big swamp. The tracks up ahead were all blocked from the hurricane. The train just sat there, and I got all ate up by mosquitos. Man I hate mosquitos. They bit me all over, just swarms of 'em. They had to take me to the hospital afterwards. How did all that snow get up there [on the moutains]? Is it gonna melt and snowball down, in a big snowball the size of a house? And how did the injuns live up there, back in the day? Did they have to wear warm stuff - big parkas and all - to live in the snow? Man, wouldn't you like to throw something off the side of the grand canyon, like a big 'ol jug of wine or somethin'? Just kinda toss it over the edge? It would just fall and fall and POP! That would be a rush. When's the next smoke break? Is that a balloon up on that hill [referring to a large, oval-shaped mansion on top of a hill]? Or is it a house? It's not a UFO [matter-of-factly]. They can't hide in the forest. They're either in the skies or under the oceans. The reason they come to Earth in the first place is 'cuz out where they're from they don't have gravity. They got all sorts of crazy stuff on their ships - particle accelerators and what not. I read some books on all that stuff, quantum physics and Einstein's theory of relativity and all. That's how they generate their power. But they didn't know about gravity, so when they flew by Earth they just kinda got sucked in. And the reason the hafta stay under the oceans is to recharge their power. Look at that mountain there. Bet there's a lotta gold in it. All the real gold's deep in the mountain, not on top... there's still alot in there. But I wouldn't know. I'm no geologist. What's that? The radiator? If the radiator needs water we can all pee in it. Do you think it's possible for the boulder the size of a house to come down the mountain and land in the river? It'd make a big splash. I wouldn't like to be in the house, though! They got a choo choo train down there [in the valley]. Old one too. Did you see them goats? Must be homeless. They were dirty. I hear their horns are ivory. I'd cut 'em off with an axe, or a hatchet. Do you think you could take a bungee cord and jump off one-a them trees? Might hit your head on a rock, though. That wouldn't be any good. I think the bears must be hibernating now. I haven't seen any get hit on the road yet. Is that the driveshaft? ["No, it's the rumble strip."] Oh, I thought it was the motor. It's a long way to the nearest town. We might have to roast an antelope or something. If we need a fire, I know howta make a hand warmer. An old hippie told me on a freight train. You just gotta take a big can - like a coffee can - and put a toilet paper roll in it and fill it with kerosene. It just soaks it right up and it's a good little hand warmer. Even Rambo couldn't get through them woods. How many miles is that? I can't tell. Are those pine trees or douglas fir? Are there little Christmas trees too? Where are the pine cones? How big are the pine cones? I want one-a them big pine cones. You think I could find one in the city somewhere, like in the public library? I sure don't wanna go out in the woods lookin' for them. There might be poison ivy. I don't got medicine for that. Yeah, I'm riding out to LA now to get my ID. I'm from Indianapolis, but I need my ID to get food stamps. I didn't wanna be born in LA, but I didn't have any say in the matter. I wanted to be born in Indiana! Now I gotta go get my birth certificate so I can get food stamps. There's no jobs there, but I'm just a mooch anyway. I had to go there once before to get my birth certificate. Wouldn't'a worked either. I guess you gotta have some other sorta ID, social security or driver's license or something, but I don't have none'a that. The clerk there in LA told me I needed some other kind of ID, but I slipped him 2 fifties, and he said that'd be fine. I got lucky there. Can't those trucks just shift down to neutral or reverse or something? Do you hafta downshift? How many brakes does a semi got? If they all go out, they're really up a creek! Man, we can't stop to smoke for a minute? Makes a guy so angry. I almost wanna rip a fart in the aisle and light it, all the way up to the front! 'Course that's not possible. I don't understand them crazies - the ones that stock up on guns and then go and shoot everyone. Those are the people who lost all their money in the stocks - didn't wanna take it out. They shoulda put their money in the [as if letting me in on a secret] B-A-N-K. Look at the shocks on that car. I saw this one movie. It was a Wyann Brother's movie. In this one part an old lady was driving around in this car with them bouncin' shocks. These guys pull up in a Cadillac with the bouncing shocks too, and they've got gold chains with dollars signs and one's got a gold tooth. And they're like, "What up, Grandma?" And she flashes some gang sign [here he tries to make several gang signs with little success] and says, "What up, nigga?" I don't know what that means. I don't understand that rap stuff. But it was funny. There's some nice granite. I'd like a piece a' that but only 'bout this big [he indicates with his fist]. Don't wanna take it from the side of the mountain, though. It'd probably pull the whole thing down on me with my luck. Startin' to feel kinda sick. Back in the Navy, on the boats you could get sick pretty easy. We'd sleep on hammocks so as not to get sick. They would be real comfortable and you wouldn't get sick as long as you'd sleep on them and not a bed, but most people don't know that. All these problems we got with crime, it's because of the dope fiends. If I was a dope dealer, I'd slip some poison in - every poison you can think of - rat poison, cyanide. What's that one with the skull and crossbones? ... Anthrax! I'd put anthrax in, put in everything - bad case of poison ivy, crab lice... They smoke it and I'd give it away for free - kill all the dope fiends. That'd stop the crime problem. That's my outlook. It was the dope fiends that got my birth certificate, y'know? I had three... no four hundred dollars cash, rolled up in tin foil in the back of the fridge. But they didn't even touch that! They went right for my birth certificate, even though it was under my mattress. Now how did they know to look there? I figured no one would find it there. But they broke in and took my birth certificate. I hear they go for a hundred bucks on the street - probably used it to buy crack. The police said it was dope fiends that stole it, probably. But they didn't take my money. I even had another 300 dollars I hid away behind my bathroom mirror. I got that money from this one pond up at the mall. People gotta throw quarters on this platform thing to try to win a free TV or something, so there's all these quarters laying in the water there. So I come in there when no one's around with this pillowcase and a dust pan - like you sweep into, ya know? - and I filled up that pillowcase 4 times! I took all those quarters to the supermarket where they got one a' those coin machines that give you cash, I didn't wanna mess around with banks or nothin'. It came out to a thousand dollars! The guy told me they only had three hundred dollars cash but could write me a check or something. I just told 'em to keep the rest. I didn't wanna mess around with checks or names or anything. That's where that money came from. Can't be too safe, though. There's sneak theives too. They come in a steal stuff right out from under your nose. I'm on to them though. One time I come home and I notice that my toilet seat's up. But I never leave it up - the toilet's for poopin' in, not peeing. The sink's for peeing in. I always pee in the sink. The neighbor downstair always shouts up, "Hey! Is someone peein' in the sink up there?!" An' I say, "Nope!" but of course I really am. I don't know how those sneak theives get in, though. One time I figured it might be up the fire escape, so I went out and jumped on it 'til it falls off. The landlord was like, "Did you break that off?" but I told him, "no, I just stepped on it once and it musta been loose 'cuz it just fell right off." One time I made a test, right? to see if there was theives comin' and snooping around my place. I found an old safe - like you store valuables in - down in the alley. I couldn't carry it up the stairs it was so heavy, so I had to pull it up, with pulleys and all. I couldn't figure out the combination, but I set it right there in my living room with the dial set to zero. And sure enough, when I came back the next day the dial was moved and there was scratch marks - like from a knife - next to it, so I know there was sneak theives in my apartment. I just don't know how they get in. Hey, are you gonna eat the rest of your candy bar? Thanks. I haven't eaten since yesterday. When are we gonna get a smoke break anyway?...

And at some point, not even intrigue could compete with the fatigue of both my hand mind. I listened some as he carried on, my memory buffer completely full. And as I sat there I thought, wow, this is the kind of person you encounter in novels and wonder how the author creates such characters. It was then that I had the realization that such great characters are not fabricated; they are met... on park benches, at bars, on greyhound buses... And the aspiring author had the foresight to capture these people's essence in his/her mind's eye. And at this point in time, I resolved to purchase a digital recorder for future such occasions. And while I may never write novels or other such works of literature, I do enjoy writing creatively. So when my short story involving Frank, foe of the dope fiends arrives, you will all know my secret...

Afterword: I waivered on the fence for a bit on the subject of whether or not to post on this. On the one hand, this dude's story is a bit sad, and I felt a bit guilty for "taking notes" and making light of his situation. But then I reflected on his seeming contentedness with life, and decided that he would not mind. Rather, immortalizing him in this story was one small thing I could do for him, aside from giving him half of my candy bar...