Christmas in Calamityville

Most of the time I wear my badge proudly; it perches illicitly on my pocket like a motel-room purchase on a credit card statement. Sometimes it falls off. Sometimes it catches the glare of the sun and reflects my features to the heavens, announcing my wonder (and confusion). Mostly, it just watches the world stand still while I sift through the crumbs of my daily bread. There are times, however, when it slips inside my pocket to rest. This normally happens when I am done with work and tuck it in so it isn’t swinging in all directions and rubbing things the wrong way.

It doesn’t appreciate being tucked.

I drove over to the gym after work on Monday. I approached the door, bedecked with handheld accessories, athletic shoes to complement my athletic stance, and a bag full of workout clothing. In my pocket, the aforementioned piece of plastic with a pompous personality. With my hands full, I am at a loss for what to do to access the building. At first I consider putting everything down, but then I ideate and decide to bifurcate from that stupid idea, opting instead to press the card to the reader through the lining of my pants. I lean against the building, but my hips are too low slung to reach the reader. I lift my leg up, so that I look like a dog marking his territory with the musk of the misinformed, but my badge slides away from the reader and inches closer to the area marked Private Access. Next, I swing my leg open, touching the inside of my knee against the wall, so that now it looks as if I am attempting to mount the sexless and decidedly impassive card reader. This almost works, but in order to spark this particular electronic happy ending, I have to thrust upward against the wall. The door beeps; I realize I have no available hands to open it, but a man steps up from behind me and opens it for me with an amused flair. I briefly lose interest in living.

At some point during my time at the gym, perhaps even while I was pushing my dignity through the business end of a nutcracker, Lily Pad’s pad was getting robbed. Thousands of dollars of goods were taken but the neighbors saw nothing, and the thieves were bold enough to attack during the day. I couldn’t fall asleep last night after hearing Lily Pad say that the police didn’t really have any ideas on how to follow up on the crime. Into the wee hours of the morning, I poured over satellite images of his neighborhood, marking points where lookouts would be posted and where they likely loaded up the goods. There is an access road running along the pond behind his house – a great place for a getaway vehicle. I would like to ask the people at the end of that access road if they saw anything interesting, but I likely won’t. I think I’ll let the cops not do their job.

Before that late night of detective work, I went over to Brandon’s house to help load up the Budget truck he had rented to move back to Michigan. I put to use my excellent moving skills: twisting couches around corners, tossing hutches through tight spaces, and pinching mattresses in such a way that they practically carry themselves. I still remember the first time I ever helped anybody move. It was a lady from church and I was maybe eight years old. She bought everyone pizza after, and I fell in love with being helpful. The next time I volunteered to help someone move, I kept a keen eye on the relocater, waiting for them to order food for everyone, and started to get nervous when the vehicles were packed and my stomach started to throw punches. I remember asking, “When are we getting the pizza?” and getting shoved roughly aside and told how inappropriate I was being. Since then, I have always harbored some suspicion toward people that are moving, but my suspicions turned out to be merely passing pigeons last night, as it was agreed upon early that we were working in return for grub. I demolished a large container of sweet-n-sour chicken with my deft chopsticking skills, which I picked up from Zhang it!.

Mike and I have a late date (10:30 PM) tonight to checkout a possible living arrangement procured through the online intercourse haven known as Craigslist.org. There are some nice three bedroom townhomes not a stone’s throw from downtown Chapel Hill, and a nice young fellow is looking for two more to round out his chic adobe abode. It isn’t adobe, it’s brick, but I can never say “No” to anagram soup. Anyhow, the guy is coming back from D.C. tonight, and understands that Mike and I are jonesing to sign on a place, so he told us to come over late tonight. I plan on keeping my back to the wall, as usual, and I told Mike to bring a gun, so we should get out of there safely. If I don’t come back, however, split up my things accordingly. All I ask is that my EEYORE mug gets donated to charity. Which reminds me of the time in high school when Bert and I went around asking for donations to the Battered Women’s Club instead of the Hooved Animal Rescue. Needless to say, we got more donations than anyone else.

In a quirky turn of events, I went to pay my cell phone bill with Alltel yesterday and instead of owing them $80, they owe me $220. So, if someone out there put three hundred dollars on my phone account, declare yourself and I’ll treat you to an ice cream, because there is no way I’m calling up Alltel to complain. If it was a mistake on their part, then it is literally Christmas in July. And I heard Summer Santa doesn’t really care whether you’re naughty or nice.