(from the files) 200. i'll take that as a big no

keaton poked my stomach with her finger.
she said, you know you’re getting’ a little belly there.
i said sarcastically, well that’s a nice thing to say.
she said, oh come on, i’m just teasin’.
i said, so i guess i can tease you someday should you find yourself burdened by a four lane broad street booty.
next thing i knew a frozen prok chop sailed right between my legs, missing the boys by a fraction of an inch.
i said, i'll take that as a big no.

1000 and a half: a tribute to JD Salinger

This is actually a true story: My tribute to J. D. Salinger (as told by Holden Caulfield)

1000. Farewell

This time it's the fat man who sings (click here to listen).
Oh baby!

999. a final word on blogging

i've been at this blog for over two years.
i think posting a 1000 posts qualifies me in some capacity to have an opinion about this endeavor, a more astute opinion than let's say my friends benny or andy, who think blogging is for mental patients (their words, not mine).
for me personally, blogging is vane, self-indulgent and so not like me when i'm disconnected from the network.

this particular blog though has become just a little more than an exercise in ego.
it's been a place to get my inside out.
not that anyone else cares.
but i do.
it's something that can't be helped.
it's in my wiring.
mom is a professional impressionist artist, one brother a professional jazz musician, another owns a restaurant, another a dealer of music collectibles, and dad was on his way to play short-stop for the yankees (if my stinky little ass didn't come along).

as for me?
much like dad, i did the expected thing.
college, job, marriage, house, job, job, divorce, job, job, marriage, kid, condo, job, townhouse, job, house, divorce, job, relationship, condo, no job, no condo, job, move-in, no job. 
well, i guess maybe not exactly what was expected.
but pretty close.

and all the while, all i ever felt was the funny.
can't explain it.
hell, if thirty years of corporate lockdown couldn't knock the humor right out of me, nothing could.
what was a guy suppose to do?

well, this guy needed to let that humor out and this blogging thing was just what the doctor ordered.
unclogging through blogging.
it's better than a colon cleanse for sure.
and now i'm unclogged.
it's all out.
all the time.
and i can't put a lid on it.
not yet anyway.

so where was i?
oh yeah, blogging.
yup, it's all a bit narcissistic if you ask me.
then again, almost any shared expression of our inner self could be considered so.
but i guess to some it just comes naturally.
i'm possibly such a person.

someone once asked me when told i was a blogger, "why do you think anyone would want to read your blog?"
i had no answer at the time.
now, a year and a half and hundreds of post later with a modest readership at best, i still don't know why anyone would.
maybe the question has a wayward implication.
that somehow there is a shallow sense of self importance in all of this.

well, i do remember challenging myself on this very point.
almost quit altogether.
but i didn't.
i didn't because i needed to express myself.
that's why i blog.
because i've never been able to keep the funny in.

and while this is my last official written post of Cranelegs Pond (number 1000 will be an audio post), i have other blogs chugging along and a new one that picks up from where this one is leaving off.

so i guess this is my paint brush, my guitar pick, my kitchen.
this is my blog.

998. a final word on a couple of destinies

contrary to keaton's firmly held belief that it is her destiny to become a mermaid and swim the untamed oceans, baring her bold bronze breasts beneath her thick sea foamed tresses, sunning upon a lonely, green rocky outpost, where only the fortune of a steel-blue-eyed glance from a chiseled Nordic, Green Peace fighter who spies her beauty from the bow of his modest, weathered warship and wrecks in longing upon her jagged, unwelcoming atoll awaits, only to become lovers in a life of sea adventure, endless passion and the occasional jellyfish sting; contrary to all that, it is my simple destiny to vacuum and dust until she returns after discovering this little alternate mermaid lifestyle of hers isn't all it's cracked up to be.

997. about counseling

i've been thinking about this lately.
i've been to counseling of various sorts at least four times throughout my human being career.
i've always have been a big supporter of it.
but i'm not so sure anymore.

i mean, where has it gotten me?

i'm still weepy during sleepless in seattle.
i'm still petrified of heights and spiral stair cases.
i'm still obsessed with hockey fights.
i'm still concerned about how to split an eight slice pizza three ways evenly.
i'm still avoiding conflicts at every turn.
i'm still a tattle tale.
i'm still not able to deal with bully bosses.
and i'm still delusional about my calling.

on the bright side, i have gotten a better grip on this partnering thing—the takeaway being "always answer with questions", like the counselors do.

keaton, "do i look fat in these jeans?"
me, "why do you ask?"
keaton, "i don't know. i just feel fat."
me, "why do you feel fat?"
keaton, "just because."
me, "just because why?"
keaton, "oh nevermind."
me, "who nevermind?"
keaton, "you!"
me, "how does that make you feel that i should nevermind?"
keaton, "ya see? now i can't even remember what i asked."
me thinking, whew!

personally, i suspect much of this improvement on my part is a mirage, sustained only by keaton's reluctance to come to her senses.
at least that's the scuttlebutt i hear on the street.

oh well.

996. once upon a time

once upon a time, i thought i was hercules.
to prove it to myself, i stuck my dad's prudential ten year anniversary metal ruler between the radiator coils and using supernatural leveraging techniques, bent it.
i showed the results to my younger brothers.
it scared them.
but only recently i learned not for the obvious reason, that i had in fact become hercules.
it scared them that i was nineteen and their older brother.

i was what i guess they considered an odd egg—bad for girl business.
personally, i just had a furtive imagination.
whatever, i still bent it.

995. about love

(as i close in on the magic 1000, i have few moments left to weigh in on love. my avoidance has ended.)

love can strike quickly and without warning, or grow slowly and with great deliberation.
it can be frivolous and fun, or stern and labored.
it can erupt for strangers, or blossom with friends.
regardless when or for whom it does, it can be beautifully fragile and softly shortlived like a butterfly, or rock solid and coldly cured like cement.
all the while privately endured, mutually shared and publicly judged.

it's something so unpredicatable isn't it?
prized by some.
dismissed by others.
 
well, for better or worse, good times and bad, i have little choice but to pursue it mightily.

994. fixing the english language

it's about time we started to fix the english language, with all its misspellings and broken rules.
it doesn't have to be all at once.
maybe five fixes a year for starters and see how it goes from there.
and at the top of my list is straightening out "lay, lie, lying, laid, lied, lain" and that whole mess.
my recommendation is to scrap it all and use the damn rules.

lay (to place down): lay, layed, and had layed (like "play" for chrissakes).
lie (to tell an untruth): lie, lied, had lied
lie (recline): change it to "lay" and its new rules (most of us already do it that way anyway)

and while were at it, could mississippi just change the damn spelling to the way it sounds: mrs. sippy.

others?

993. it's cold

the kind of cold that blues my gloved fingers tips numb with stinging alarm.
the kind of cold that severs my ears with the precision slice of a paring knife wind.
the kind of cold that would rip any trace of color i might have paid for on a tanning bed if i were the sort.
instead it turns my pale to gray.
in fact, it burrows and nests all life gray, leaving the landscape barren like a black and white photo of a fruitless still life.
freezing cold.
as james joyce might call it, scrotum tightening cold, to which i'd laugh if it were not for the frozen grip it has on my jaw.

but i am thankful.
for it is all enough to let me joy in simple warmth, the sigh of my dog, a bowl of soup and the gentle touch of someone i love.
some things i too often take for granted.

992. bob's best and worst of this decade

it's that time of decade when we all think about the best and the worst.
well, to be honest, i didn't have to think very hard.
and i must say, my choices are like bookends to a troubling ten years.

the best of the decade came at its close.
the election of barack obama, especially after enduring the bush years, was one for the ages.
it was almost up there with the birth of my son, which based on my propensity to produce sperm who prefer floating to swimming, had about the same chances of occurring, maybe even less.

a distant second was the unbelieveable super bowl win by my beloved giants over the new england patriots, which brings me to the runner up to the worst of the decade.
my beloved hated giants again.

It was a 2003 playoff game against the san francisco forty niners, up by 24 points in the third quarter.
the fork was stuck in the lowly niners real deep.
they were done.
nothing to do but apply the steak sauce.
except, no.
they weren't done.
they had the giants right where they wanted them, celebrating.
by the end of the fourth quarter, it was all niners.
39-38!
the giants lost and i lost three nights of sleep.

but that was child's play compared to the worst of the decade.
no, it wasn't 9/11  nor the first or second bush elections.
no, it wasn't even the "preparation h" toothpaste incident.
not even the giants dumb game this past weekend could dislodge this decade's number one worst event in bob's life .

you have to go way back to the beginning, specifically August of 2000, to find it.
that's a long time ago.
it's the beginning of the decade for crying out loud.

the winner is (or loser i suppose) ...
richard hatch's crowning achievement as the first survivor show's winner.

i don't want to talk about it.
i get ill whenever i do.
it's like it just happened yesterday.
the only good thing i can say is that the lying bastard finally went to prison.
but i feel no relief.
he will always haunt me.
how could that dumb doctor vote for him!
i'll never forgive him.
never! ever!

not even barack's election can sooth the pain i carry deep in my soul.
"never forget" is all i can say!
never forget!

991. bad time for daydreamers

if you are serious about your daydreaming, then you know this time of year is bad for business.
what with the short days and all.
it's really quite an imposition.
a person worth his daydreaming salt, needs more than ten hours of daylight to imagine how to spend a potential power ball lottery win.
after taxes of course.
at least i do.

990. "it's the sad, saddiest day of the year"

as much as christmas is the "hap, happiest time of the year", the day after is the "sad, saddiest day of the year".
thank god for new years to snap me out of it and trigger the countdown to next christmas.

now you'd think at my age one would just get over it already.
but noooo!
every year i put a lot of hard work into my joy.
and just like that, it's over.
it's depressing.
and i don't need much to go down that path these days.

we gotta make this longer.
that's all there is to it.
at least two days.
better if a week.

you know what i mean?

989. kitchen issues

keaton asked, where are the olives that were here?
i said, already put away hon.
keaton said, but i wasn't done with them yet.
i said, oh, well i thought you were. sorry.
keaton asked, what's that in your hand?
i said, um, that garlic seasoning i love.
she said, no! no seasoning! you want to season? here! add a lttle cracked pepper to the potatoes.
i asked, not even a little?
keaton said, no! no little! in fact, give me that before i do something you'll regret.

i looked around for something to do.
a minute passed.

then keaton asked, where's the bowl i had on the counter? it was just here a minute ago.
i said, washed and put away my love.
she said, but i didn't even use it yet.
i said, well doesn't that beat all get out.
then she slapped her hands on the counter and said, you know, you are like the dog that can't be taught to sit.
i said, yeah, i guess i am sort of a free spirit, if that's what you mean.
she said, no. no it's not.

988. thanks tiger! thanks for nothin'!

you see?
i just don't know what say any more.
you think you know somebody for years and you find out they live a much more convoluted life than you ever thought possible.
i'm talking about tiger of course.
thank god his wife was swinging at him with a one iron.
any other club, and he'd be pushing up fairway rough sure as shootin'.
only god can swing a one iron.

dumb golf jokes aside, as the woodwork occupants continue to scurry out in numbers approaching the distance to venus, i have to wonder when did he have the time?
and how for chrissakes did he keep them under the covers—so to speak?
that's more astonishing than his golf game quite honestly.
almost laudable.
in a weird way, okay?
and i said "almost", which means "not quite".
so i'm not singing his praises okay?
i'm just sayin', that's all.
hell. i backed the car into a tree when keaton found a dish i broke hidden in my underwear drawer.
under these kind of transgressions there's no telling what i'd do.
probably back it up clear to the pacific ocean.
from new jersey.

but then again that's why he's tiger and i'm bob i suppose.

well, if anything, he single handedly has put skepticism back into fashion.
no one is safe from the turned up brow of scrutiny.
and i'm not good with the brow turned up already.
i always feel guilty of everything.
even stuff i had nothing to do with.
it's what i do well.

so this scourge tiger has brought down upon us is going to be just swell for a couple of years.
swell like an eye smacked by a frozen pork chop.

is there no end to my miserable state?