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No Train. No Life!

Thursday, July 26, 2007

Anna, TX

Man, I think that it may be storming or flooding here in good ol' Teja!!!

We really need to distance ourselves from people in budding relationships and marriages since this fucking entire year has been like X-mas. What with all the bills, weddings (6 [from what I counted in my head]), baby showers, birthdays, pets' heads falling off. I think that if we have friends getting married soon, we should become enemies and not get invited to wedding and then reconcile after the fact.

Speaking of pets, I think it's rather ridiculous, but somehow fitting, that we get the cheapest pets known to mankind and they end up all getting sick and have to take them to the vet and need to be separated and become really expensive to maintain. I bet if we got a goldfish, it'd live forever and need to be hooked up to an oxygen tank and go in twice a week for dialysis or something.

Wednesday, July 25, 2007

Iowa,

So I finally got a good long run to keep this next check big, which is good because of all the stuff we need to get done with this next check.

Besides Justin's wedding, we had stuff planned prior and now there's more due to some changes.

The first being that Jeanne was going to stay back and we'd move our stuff out of storage and into the mom's place and she'd sort things out and get a local job and save money for an apartment and a car. Meanwhile, I'd finish up on the road with current company until beginning of September so I'd have my year experience, hence opening up more opportunities for local jobs. Also, while Jeanne would be home, that would keep a steady income as with the trucking, you go through some slow times and breakdowns and it just keeps us always climbing out of a hole.

Like, we'd be behind on our payments and start catching up again and just when things are fine, something happens and we're back where we started and that's been going on for far too long. So we figured that with one steady pay we'd always stay, at the very least, up to date and at the very best, we'd be getting ahead.

We worked out a lot of our budget and decided to do so and I actually got a job sort of lined up. I need to get an endorsement to my CDL but it's supposed to be easy and once I get that, I'd let the guy know and I'd get the job and it'd be M-F only with nights and weekends and holidays off and I'd just be doing runs in Omaha and Council Bluffs.

So that's what it looks like now and I hope it all works out. If worse comes to worse, I could just get this job back or look for another local one.

Also, I think we're spending X-Mas in Vegas so me family will meet Jeanne finally.

Monday, July 16, 2007

Laurel, DE

I'll give it to the people of Deleware that they are very nice people. Hands down, even with their driving. Traffic seems to flow effortlessly even when there's a lane closed ahead. You don't have people speeding past until the very last minute to try and get ahead of everyone else. I noticed it a mile ahead and switched lanes and immediately was followed by everyone. And I'm the type of person who likes to safely cut people off who try to get ahead so I'm always looking out and when I did, all I noticed was an empty right lane and everybody behind me. No back up whatsoever.

Anywhere else there's traffic for miles just due to a closed lane because mother fuckers don't know how to fucking drive and think they need to get ahead of it all.

Once in Wyoming there was a truck on fire a little past exit 6 going westbound and the Interstate was closed off and all you could see for miles was trucks and trucks on exit 3 and 6 and for miles just sitting. Once it cleared, within minutes we were flowing smoothly and I noticed that most of the vehicles were trucks who were letting each other merge appropriately and everything flowed smoothly and within three minutes, the congestion was done and everyone was on their way.

Speaking of, what's the protocol when you're in a place, say, Pine Grove, PA and there's a couple in the booth that's just staring at you like you've got an arm growing out of a melanoma lump in your neck? They were staring at Jeanne, hard-core, and then I came out of the bathroom and ordered two coffees and while waiting, I notice he and his ugly wife staring holes through us. I kept making eye contact and they wouldn't budge. What do you do without starting a fight or beign confrontational? This happens quite often. I think I'm going to start being aggresive towards them. Even if we did have said deformity, you still don't stare that long and hard at people unless you want your fucking head kicked in.

While we're on the subject of heads, the other constant thing that always happens and happenned again recently, is people who start their conversation with me by asking if I speak good English. For the obvious reason that's a stupid way to start a conversation, especially when I'm already talking to them in perfect fucking English. But the thing that gets me worse than that is when I am talking to them after the first question and talking perfectly. Words are flowing through like water and I don't hear or can understand what they just said and they fucking use hand gestures and talk slowly like doing the steering wheel motion and slowly saying, "You know, a taxi cab?"

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Thursday, July 12, 2007

Alabama, near the stateline

Saw Wonderland last night. Super good stuff. Added to that was a second disc that a the John Holmes documentary.

I got excited mostly because Paul Thomas Anderson was on it and the first thing he said on it was, "If it weren't for John Holmes I wouldn't have a job this year," which was when Boogie Nights came out.

I was confused. I read somewhere that Paul said that the movie wasn't about the Holmes, but continued to watch. The more you see and learn about the Holmes the more you see aspects of Boogie Nights even down to scenes in movies and interviews like when Wahlburg and Reynolds are talking and Wahlburg says that he lets him block his own scenes and stuff and Reynolds says, "I don't let him block his scenes." But it was the Holmes and his director (the Chinese guy, sitting there looking like a lizard) doing the same scene but replacing them.

I finally realized that the movie wasn't about the Holmes but inspired, because many things in the documentary were in the film but distributed to many other characters and Dirk Diggler wasn't fully what Holmes was, but it was the guy who couldn't handle success and got out of control on drugs and was insecure about himself and his big dick and that was the only thing he was known for. The way that he made the character different made him more interesting to me. The craziness that came from Holmes and his convoluted life is what gave Boogie Nights the amazing masterpiece that it was.

The actors, in themselves, are great characters and I'd pay to watch them sit at a bus stop for two hours.

I could go on about this, but I'm super excited. I've been wanting to watch Boogie Nights again for a long time, being one of my all time favorite films, and now more than ever, I need to see it again...I can't get it at a truck stop, though.

I wonder if they released the John Holmes series on DVD? I'd like to watch those.

I started reading this Dennis Miller book that I bought for $.59 at the thrift store and I don't like it. He gets irritating very quickly. Every two or three sentences he has to throw in those goddamn references and it starts getting very obscure and makes it seem as if everybody in the world knows who or what he's talking about.

Just the amount of times he uses them, which happens to be every other sentence, is irritating enough, but then it gets to a point you have no idea who the fuck he's talking about. It's like me going to anybody and be like, "...yeah. It's like, uh, Jack, uh, Johnson, getting pushed on the swings by, uh, Patty Albright...and the thing about immigrants..."

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Wednesday, July 11, 2007

Oxford, AL

En route to Fairburn, GA for a delivery tomorrow afternoon. At a truckstop next to a Wal-Mart Supercenter and pay day is tomorrow, so we can do some grocery shopping in the morning.

I just noticed that there are these 7 oz. beers at the truckstop. I think those are the stupidest things ever. It makes no sense. Why not just drink half a regular six-pack? I hope those go away. What if you called your friend to pick you up a six pack on the way over to your place and it's after hours by then and he gets there with this mini-six pack? That would suck. Heads would have to roll.

Gonna watch Wonderland tonight.

Tuesday, July 10, 2007

Little Rock, AR

"There's very little rock in Arkansas."

Man, oh man! Rollins just released dates for his upcoming spoken word tour.

Super stoked, sort of.

Hopefully things work out well on the financial, personal side, as the things have been going slow this past month. But I hope that Jeff and Margaret would want to see him in Chicago so we could all go together.

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Monday, July 09, 2007

I forgot, Ben Weasel has a new, digital-download only album out now.

I really need to get a Peaches album for the road.

Just read Tommyland. Good and bad things. The bad thing is I've realized an amazing trait in Tommy Lee that I've overlooked.

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Kansas

In Kansas, four miles north of Oklahoma and trying to view the Weather Channel to see what's in store for the evening, since the clouds are dark and low and winds are kicking up exponentially.

My newest enemy at the moment, besides this stupid slow internet breaking up the internet connection, is fucking Splenda. I've always hated it from the start just because of its association with the fucking Atkins diet.

My aversion towards it faded for a while just because I was never near the lo-carb deal and people of that persuasion but I've recently been bumping into it all the time.

I have been annoyed how everything there's sugar in it. Things that don't need to have it, has it. High fructose corn syrup and sugar and now Splenda.

Everything had (and still has) sugar or high fructose corn syrup in it and now it's all fucking Splenda.

Canned peaches for the road, fucking Splenda. 3/4 of the yogurt section at the grocery store is fucking loaded with that fucking shit as well.

I wish all these fuckers would die! People are dumb and companies are fucking stupid and ruin everything. I hope they find something about Splenda that mutates your kids like that drug in It's Alive or all these people's hearts explode or something.

I get to drive in rain all day tomorrow.

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Thursday, July 05, 2007

St. Joseph, MO

Jukebox: Nothing

Had a great time in Omaha and even though I knew we'd be sitting in Omaha all day tomorrow with nothing to do, it was fine. Jeanne's friend, and our trucker-guy-to-ask, came over to the truck stop and hung out and gave us some really great tips and let me know what an idiot I am for not ever checking the wattage on our coffee maker to see if that was the reason it wasn't working. The most obvious thing and it never occurred to me.

So the next trip to Omaha I need to get a power inverter and get jumper cables and cut jumper cables to attach the non-battery touching side to the inverter. Then we'll have coffee and other stuff.

Left Omaha before "Arrested Development" Season 3 came in but at least I have something to look forward to next visit.

This visit, though very packed with stuff to do, was great. The wedding was good and was better because Shane and Andrea were there. Haven't seen them in months and at that time in years. They are getting married this coming Saturday so I have to get them something and make sure to hang with them next time we're here.

So after the wedding we looked at the receiving line and snuck around it and talked about how great it is that we don't have to wait in that line and we should get going to the reception now and start drinking. Then Kevin Jones found me and reminded me that I'm family now and I'm wanted for pictures. D'oh!

So an hour and a half later we got to the reception with a pricey bar. It was funny at first (as it always is to be in a nice place and see how ridiculously priced the drinks are, just because of that) but not after trying to get drinks and having to really, more than ever, budget your evening. I did manage to get a free drink.

The first night there was bad because Joe had this huge, half full bottle of Jack Daniels and took it to Charlie's for their post-rehearsal dinner party. I woke up the next morning not knowning where I was but realized I was at Joe's and apparently Headley had to help me in and, for his effort, got his pants ripped by Joe's dog.

Speaking of Joe's dog, the next morning, or day, I was fucked up much of the whole day. I had to force myself to puke and then eat. This is worth noting as I do not ever get hangovers. No matter how much I drink and how little sleep, I get them once a year or something. So after wasting a day getting myself together, we took Charlie's son Wes to see Ratatouille. Great movie.

There are too many good movies out right now that I want to see. Like Ocean's Thirteen, Live Free or Die Hard, Transformers, there were a couple more that I can't think of right now.

I hung out at Nate's place on Monday night with Head and Robert came later and Micek, who lives there, came home and hung out for a while after hanging out with Matt Stamp on his birthday. We just hung out for a little while and Nate was all happy about having a computer and just getting free music and made some discs to play on the stereo and I noticed a disc titled Klaus Nomi and asked about that.

Nate immediately took off the mix he was playing and put that on and Robert told me that I'd love it and did. Nate burned me a copy and it's definitely getting heavy rotation on my player.

Can't wait till next time in town as it's Justin's wedding and we get to see everybody at one place and just have fun. We have no appointments then so I'd like to hang with Shane and Andrea and Mike D. Speaking of, Mike D called yesterday to tell me that we (the Japanese) no longer hold the hot dog eating title.