Months ago I placed the following picture of me in the company directory at work:

I put it in there almost immediately after Mike took the picture. I’d almost forgotten about it, mainly because I don’t spend any amount of time looking myself up in our company directory. I figured if our managers could put pictures of themselves with their kids in, I might as well be wearing an eyepatch, stocking cap, and smoking a (tobacco) pipe.

And I am.

Anyway, people finally started noticing it recently (and then a training class I had looked me up in it), and I’ll be walking to a drinking fountain or something and they’ll say ‘hey man, I saw your picture’ and then chuckle. In the back of my mind I keep thinking about when people used to say ‘I saw that picture of you’ and it meant that they saw the pictures of me running across the spillway at the Coralville Dam or the pictures that Keef had of me when we had that ill-fated kayaking adventure at Scattergood. Ah, November pond water on my testicles was never so cold. In fact, I believe that adventure was the first time that I have ever had 1)pond water, 2)cold pond water, 3)November cold, cold pond water- on my testicles. I sank the boat. I’ll take the credit. I think everyone knew that I would do it.

She’s on her cellphone in the taxi based straight out of her mind.

She tips the driver $20, says ‘mind if I get high?’

The driver shakes his head and hands her a glass pipe

straight from the glove compartment.

Well, all these seedy tweakers- man, I’ll never understand

that midwestern love for speed.

It’s in their kitchens & their cars & the alleys & the bars

Jagerbombs and methamphetamine-

sounds pretty sleazy.

She’ll drink you right under the table-

That’s a girl to stay away from.

Doin’ foilies in the stall of the ladies’ room.

She says she wants to go dancing.

She says she wants to get crazy.

She’s already ten steps ahead of you.

Now she’s smiling at the bouncer who doesn’t bat an eye-

She’s dancing with some dyke who’s dressed up like a guy-

And wall to wall it’s a mess of laser lights and desperate people being desperate and trying to get high while their friends sit at the tables just trying to make it through the night-

It’s dollar draws and buy-one-get-one shots, but ladies still drink for free. Hey ladies- you better watch your drinks.

Every single night there’s a happy hour.

Every single night there’s a last call.

There’s bar bands & one night stands & long skinny cigarettes

…Empty shot glasses

Dollar bills damned to the jukebox where they play the same old songs every single night.

I get to wear ties to work now.

I got promoted on Monday to an Operations Trainer position at West. I’m off the phones for good now- for the most part. I got a raise. I get weekends off. And today I went to my first meeting in corporate environment ever. Everyone had a tie. We all shook hands. We all had legal pads and took notes. It was surreal. The whole drive to the meeting I was laughing at myself in my car about driving to a meeting for work.

Anyway, enough about my neurosis. Let’s examine something I started wearing this week that by itself looks utterly ridiculous:

This is a v-neck undershirt. For the most part, I’ve always been fairly against the v-neck t-shirt. I decided to try v-neck undershirts because I thought that maybe with less fabric up around my neck, my collared shirts would be more comfortable. Well- turns out I was right. So I’ve been converted. I still think they look ridiculous.

I was trying to fall asleep last night but there was this loud noise outside of my sixth floor window that sounded exactly like a helicopter. Moreover there was a bright light that kept occasionally reflecting into my window. I thought that was totally ridiculous and looked outside.

You know, just to make sure it wasn’t aliens. I’m sure there are aliens in my neighborhood. They just aren’t the kind that fly.

But it sounded more like a helicopter so I looked out the window and sure enough, it was. And it had a search light. And there were sirens headed up the block and turning in all directions- black and white cars everywhere. I’m used to ambulances while I sleep. Not an abundance of cops in a hurry.

I wonder if they found who they were looking for. They sure made an awful goddamn racket.