Philosophy

I was reading Stephen King's On Writing the other day and one of the quotes he uses in the beginning of the book is "liar's prosper" attributed to anonymous. I have really struggled with that concept for the past month or so. I do not exactly live a puritanical life but I do try to be honest with the "emphasis" on try to be honest. I am not going to steal from anyone, I am not out to hurt anyone, and I do have to wonder why anyone would want to do that to me.

A person can justify any of their actions to help themselves sleep at night or maybe they have such a complete lack of a conscience, they can do whatever they want to, and it does not bother them at all. I do not think I swill ever understand the lack of consideration people have or their total immorality. It is a debate I could have for the rest of my life and still not understand.

The Law Of Averages

You would expect that the Law of Averages would dictate that something would go right for me once in a while. I am not even talking fifty percent of the time or no where near that. I would settle for the average of The Mendoza Line which for you non-baseball people is twenty percent.

Physical Therapy on my shoulder is not going as well as I think it should. After four weeks I can scratch my nuts and put on my t-shirt. The job opportunities are really rolling in with that skill set. I work with my team of therapists one hour a day three days a week doing these goofy ass exercises that I think they come up with just to see how silly people look while doing them.

I get a letter from my place of employment today telling me that since I am broken down and can no longer do what is required of me, they are going to offer me "alternative placement" in an equal or lesser position. I would be willing to guarantee it is lesser. I have 24 hours to accept whatever position they come up with whether it be janitor or what or I will be terminated. The letter I received came registered mail and it clearly states that my signature is required that I received this letter. My roommate found it sitting in a chair on my front porch. I did not know it was there.

Shortly after I received this letter, my girlfriend decides to have a meltdown and calls me up. She is only speaking in "blubber speak" and I cannot understand a word she is saying. I don't speak or understand "blubber speak" so that was a very short and frustrating conversation. She then decides to hang up on me. I consider myself a very giving and understanding person but I have reached my limit for the day.

Strange Dreams

Every once in a great while I will have a strange dream that is just too good and too strange not to write about. Last night I dreamed that I had traveled to Russia with some kind of tour group. We were in St. Petersburg and I was paired up with some girl in the tour group. She was smoking hot and had the sexiest Russian accent. We were getting ready to tour this one building with the rest of the group and I realized I had left my camera back on the tour bus. I really needed my camera. I was standing there looking at all of the gleaming church spires and everything of St. Petersburg and thought I may never get here again, so I went back to the tour bus with this girl to grab my camera.

The tour bus was packed full of packages and luggage so I had to unload about half of it to find my camera. I finally find my camera and I set it on the ground beside me and repack the bus. I had a hard time getting everything back in there but I finally did it. I turned around to get my camera and it was gone. I start panicking and I see someone carrying away the empty box that is was in. I chase him down and say "That is mine. What are you doing with it?"

He identifies himself as a Russian KGB agent and he tells him in a thick Russian accent "The camera is long gone. It is worth very much money on the black market."

"How do I go about getting it back? That is my damn camera!"

About that time the KGB agent sees two guys walking down the street, and he yells something at them in Russian. They respond by pulling out two AK-47's and start shooting. Me and the girl dive to the ground and I shield her from the bullets by jumping on top of her. (She was hot and it is my dream. I should get to play the hero in my own dream.)

The KGB agent pulls out an AK-47 and returns fire killing both of them. The agent then takes off down the street, running towards a man dressed like Santa Claus. The Santa Claus had a long, flowing white beard and he was sitting in an ornate, shiny bright red sleigh filled with Christmas packages. The girl and I jumped up and ran after the agent.

Santa pulls out an AK-47 of his own and starts shooting and tries to take cover behind the sleigh. The girl and I once again dive for cover. After a brief firefight, our super agent quickly lays Santa Claus to waste and it is over.

The agent walks back to us and tells us that our camera is probably in a pawn shop near where Santa had left his sleigh. The black market for cameras such as mine is huge in Russia and bring big money on the black market. Me and the girl went in, quickly found my camera, and I claimed my camera. The girl and I quickly caught back up with the tour group. Just another day in the life of a Walter Mitty wanna be.

Via Con Deniro

Loosely translated, Via Con Deniro is Latin for "go with the money." When you get to be my age, money seems to be the motivating factor as to whether a woman will go out with you or not. I have been on a lot of these dating websites where the woman says that she is looking for love, a nice guy, a man who will treat her well, and blah blah blah.

Let me introduce you to another Latin phrase (one of my own creation) "pantus loadius." This basically means what a pant load and somebody just filled there underwear with a big load. The first thing a woman and actually this could apply to men too, notices is the looks. Then comes the profile. If you mention anywhere in your profile that you are "independently wealthy", your inbox will be blown up. If you mention that you are a retail lifer, should have been a character in Revenge Of The Nerds, and do not own a house near a lake, pond, or even a small creek, then your inbox will collect dust and more than likely be inactivated by the dating website.

There are two ways you can handle this. You can use the late comedian Sam Kinison's philosophy of "Fuck the truth. Lie your ass off." That may work for the first date or two but the truth will soon come out. Maybe you will get laid by then. You can't hide the truth forever.

If you choose the honesty route, you had better prepare for a lot of alone time, develop a fondness for porn, and get used to talking into the clown's head for the happy meal of your choice. I would also stay off the dating websites because you are going to attract psycho's like it is a bad episode of Supernatural.

A Kick In The Nuts

There are times in life when you just get completely blindsided and I have slowly figured out that the majority of these blindside hits are going to come from family members. By the time you realize what has happened, it is over. I am still stunned by this turn of events and it came from a place I did not know existed. I became suspicious about a month ago but hearing the facts of the matter are much colder and much different than just being suspicious. Bam! There it was in black and white. Events like this have happened way too much over the past couple of years. I must be the most trusting, gullible person on the face of the earth to continually believe that people have the best of intentions and they would not do this to me. Bam! There it is I am trying to pick up the pieces and examine my options. There are none. Game Over.

Fried Green Tomatoes

A woman I was dating about nine months ago made me sit down and watch Fried Green Tomatoes. I had never seen it before and I might have been the only guy on the planet that had never been forced to sit down and watch that movie. I would have to question the manhood of any guy who wanted to watch that movie on his own. Fried Green Tomatoes was your basic tear jerking, chick flick that revolved around a hair salon in a small town.

Now that I am dating a hair stylist, I have come to realize that there is more drama that goes on inside these places than should be allowed by law. It is usually only women that work there and that is a recipe for disaster. Put a few women inside an enclosed space like a hair salon and it gets more catty than the cat habitat at the local zoo. I know more about these other women than I ever really wanted to. I know more about their relationships, they come to me for advice (who am I? Dr. Phil), and they all want to hang out with me.

I offered to dole out some spankings when the other women needed it but that idea was quickly frowned upon and I was told how disgusting I was. In my defense, I do give good spankings.

Physical Therapy

I have been undergoing physical therapy for the past week and it is the usual mixed bag of people- therapists and customers. We have the old and the young, the smartasses and the dumbasses, and the grouchy old SOB's and the young and hot.

The guy that owns the place has been my therapist of record until the other day. The other day was when this young honey walked in- dark hair, slim figure, nice body, and very pretty. The young lady was missing something that the rest of us seemed to have- slings, bandages, and braces. I do not even know why she is there but the owner has made her his pet project like he is training her for the Olympics.

When she walked in, I ceased to exist, as far as therapy was concerned. I was immediately passed down to the underling therapists and eventually ended up in the hands of a student intern. I am not saying that the intern will not eventually be good but right now, she is pretty clueless but at least she had nice, soft hands. I might as well go to a massage parlor in Charlotte which, to be honest, was my first choice anyway. I would get more attention and a happy ending.

I can't say I blame the old guy because I probably would have done the same thing. My customer service philosophy has always been "help the honey's." I guess that customer service philosophy can extend to any business model.

In Defense Of Strip Clubs

The latest strip club under attack from law enforcement is Platinum Plus in Greenville, SC. Law Enforcement officials conducted the usual "undercover" investigation much like officials in Charlotte, NC did about two years ago. The officials in Charlotte targeted the dancers themselves and arrested them. The officials in Greenville learned after Charlotte's mistake and targeted the club and the club owner.

Greenville has a history of trying to get rid of the strip clubs down there. They repeatedly targeted Diamond's and eventually shut it down about 15 years ago. They charged Platinum Plus with running a prostitution ring, dancers performing oral sex in the VIP rooms, and a list of other infractions. There is more oral sex and sex for that matter that goes on in the parking lot of Wal-Mart's than goes on in strip clubs. I do not see law enforcement officials sitting out in the parking lot of the local Wal-Mart investigating that or even thinking about shutting them down.

I only caught the tail end of an interview with the owner of Platinum Plus on TV last night and I am glad they are going to get their day in court. I honestly do not believe that law enforcement officials want that. It might expose the investigation for what it was and that is that Platinum Plus was guilty before the investigation ever started. Is Platinum Plus going to get a fair hearing? Probably not.

A Hot Nurse

It finally happened. After seven major surgeries, fifteen procedures, and hundreds of doctor visits, I finally got a hot nurse. It happened when I had my rotator cuff surgery last week. I usually get the nurse that is old, grouchy, and has a goatee better than mine.

The nurse comes downstairs and called out my name. I saw her rounding the corner and I thought "she must be here for someone else." When I heard her call out my name it was shoulder be damned, I jumped over two rows of chairs and a coffee table (a slight exaggeration there) just to make sure she was not going to move on to the next patient.

My nurse was late twenties, very cute, and had a nice body, but of course was married to a Doctor. My relationship was only going to last about four hours with her anyway and about three- fourths of that time I was going to be unconscious, so it really didn't matter. Most guys have a "nurse fantasy" and there are porno websites devoted to such fantasies (not that I have ever seen any of them).

After my surgery was over, the nurse was processing me out so I could leave and she referred to my girlfriend as my "friend" while my girlfriend was sitting there. I do not know what kind of shit I had been talking to the nurse before my girlfriend showed up on the scene but I got to hear about the nurse's comment all the way home. I believe a man should get a free pass for whatever he happens to say while under the influence of anesthesia.

I did learn one harsh reality while I was under "Nurse Goodbody's" care. Just because she is a hot nurse, does not mean she can start an IV. By the time she got done, my hand looked like a pin cushion and she had to call another nurse in to do it for her. A week later my hand is still swollen and hurts like hell from where Nurse Goodbody used it as harpoon practice. As my grandfather used to say "all that glitters ain't gold." My update to that is "but it sure is pretty to look at."

Inspiration

I found out the other day that a friend of mine's wife was interested in writing. I was pretty sure that I was not her inspiration and she confirmed that when she said "but I am not writing about strip clubs." I told her that strip clubs was the newest genre of writing. I like to refer to it as "50 shades of singles." My friend and her husband thought that was pretty funny; her, not so much. I believe she will probably be pretty successful with her writing career; me, not so much.

Stephen King has always said that even if he never made a penny writing, he would still be doing it because he enjoyed it. The fact that people read it and he makes money at it as a double bonus. With that being said, I will take my loyal following of 16 on Google Plus and continue to write. I do believe that most of my followers are ex-girlfriends checking up on me to see if I was saying anything about them but like Stephen King made reference to, they are still reading it. I might have the smallest following with the largest amount of hate mail.