A Week in Taipei

Part 1. Airport Security

Our business is locks. Gunlocks to be precise. Large stainless steel and cast aluminum hinged and handcuff style locks painted black with internal electrical components and red and blue solenoid wires sticking out of them designed to secure shotguns and automatic rifles in police cars. We are traveling to Taiwan to meet with our current manufacturer as well as many potential manufacturers of a new lock designed for the general public in America. And we are carrying samples of these bulky, ominous, wired devices in our carry on luggage as we cannot take the chance of checking the bags and arriving in Taiwan to discover our luggage has been sent to Kuala Lumpur.

But we’re not going to Taiwan. We’re going to prison. I’m certain of it. We’re what every single one of those narrow-minded, overpaid, and otherwise utterly unemployable idiot airport security screeners has been looking for since nine eleven. My employer, with whom I am traveling, is a balding, gray haired, wild-eyed Eastern European who speaks with a delightful and extremely discernable Hungarian accent. I’m tall, possess a large build, have crew cut hair, and could easily pass for ex-military. If John Woo called down to central casting for villains to duke it out with Bruce Willis in Die Hard 4, they’d send us up.

“Was dat in yo luggage?” The fat Aunt Jemima looking screener hollered at me in Logan Airport.

“A gunlock.” I reply nervously.

“Huh. I been seein’ a lot of those go through lately.” She exclaims while calling over her boss.

Bullpoop you incompetent twit, I think to myself. You just saw the one that was in Laszlo’s luggage that passed through the scanner not thirty seconds ago. You know, the one you just pointed out to your goons before they hauled it away. Nobody is stupid enough to travel on airplanes with these things except us. And we’re not stupid, we just have to travel with them in our carry on bags because your incompetent troglodytic knuckle-dragging baggage handlers would send them to East Timor if we checked them.

The goons get me, too. The look on the poor black fellow’s face when he opens up the packaging of the lock in my luggage is absolutely priceless. His eyes just keep getting wider and wider. He actually starts to hold the lock at arms length as he fiddles with the ratchet arm. Then he sees the red and blue wire leads sticking out of the bottom, and shoots me a look of abject horror. It is all I can do to keep myself from yelling BANG! Fortunately for me, my fear of federal prison overcomes my natural instinct for hilarity, but I’m laughing my bum off on the inside.

After lots of huffing and grunting and mumbling between themselves, and repeated explanations to two security guys and their supervisor, - they confiscate my aftershave, shaving cram, and tooth paste,- you know, so I can’t blow the plane out of the sky in a brilliant burst of Old Spice and sparkling minty freshness, -and send me on my way.
“You’ll wonder where the airplane went when you carry on your Mentodent” jingles through my head as I put the box with the gunlock, screwdrivers, solenoids, circuit boards, and just about everything else you need to really blow up an airplane back in my bag and head over to where Laszlo has just finished doing the same.

“I lost my toothpaste.” I say to him.

“Yeah. Me, too. And shaving cram.” He replies. “ The man actually unroll the tube with only a tiny little bit of tooth paste in it and reed the side that it was too much to take on. Like 4.2 milliliter or something. But they was no 4.2 milliliter in the tube. It was rolled way, way up. Like almost empty.”

I just shake my head. There simply are not words to describe the stupidity that is airline security. Then again, perhaps they thought the plastique was hidden in the shaving cram. We got on with the activating elements of our nefarious explosive plot, but not the C4.

“Oh well. At least we kept the gunlocks.” He shrugs with a grin, and we proceed to boarding.

The plane lumbers across the tarmac of Boston’s Logan International Airport, turns slowly onto the runway, and like a like a startled rhinoceros, roars to life with a thundering surge of energy. It rattles and groans and heaves and rattles some more until just at the very end of the runway, it lets out a heavy sigh, shakes off the cumbersome earth, and rushes upwards into the endless expanse of the evening sky. We speed away from looming twilight of the east coast, across the near-unfathomable expanse of America, up across Canada, on our way towards California all that was audible was the soothing, sleepy hum of the enormous engines, and the occasional clang of the fasten seatbelts sings. Los Angeles is a light shining in the darkness. We race towards the light. Halfway across the country, the darkness overcomes us.

The flight is not crowded, and relatively turbulence free. This surprises me. Of the many times I’ve crossed the country, the westward flights are always turbulent. Turbulent to the point where I clutch the otherwise uncomfortably confining armrests of the airline seat and begin making deals with God in my head along the lines of “ oh please, please, please, please, please pleeeeeeeeaaaaaaase just let this stupid flimsy cylinder packed with soft pink mushy people make it the ground in one piece, and I’ll think of something really nice to do for You after we land. Like maybe kill off a small indigenous population and build a big church where they used to cut each others hearts out and dance around naked worshiping the sun. Or moon. Or whatever it was they happened to be worshiping at that particular point in history.

No deals with the Almighty this time. Just a peaceful, eventless flight. I sleep catnap through most of it.

At LAX we deplane and walk nearly half a mile to Terminal Three for International departures. It’s unusually chilly, and we move quickly, stopping only to peer into the windows of the empty police cars parked against the curb, to see who’s gunlock they’ve deployed.
“Not ours.” Says Laszlo as we pass the first cruiser.

“That’s ours! Ha!” He exclaims triumphantly as we pause to peer into the second cruiser.

We smoke a few cigarettes, then enter the terminal and make our way towards Malaysian Airlines. They took away our lighters at Logan, but Laszlo has a pocket full of matches. I guess you can't light shoe-bombs with matches. There are throngs of Asians, Indians, Japanese, Koreans, Mexicans, Taiwanese, and foreigners or every exotic size, shape, and color except European jockeying for position in the serpentine lines that wind there way to Continental, China Airlines, Malaysia Air, Air Mexico, Angkor Airways, Airways International, etc. It’s hot in the terminal. Midsummer in New Hampshire hot. I’m already a foot taller and much whiter than anyone else in the terminal. I check the board. Five flights to Taiwan all departing within forty minutes of each other. We’re still nearly seven thousand miles away, and already I can feel the vibrant economic life of the island acting like some gargantuan magnet pulling us across the Pacific.

Security is relatively hassle free. The black fellow running the scanner has a sense of humor.

“What’s this in your bag?”

“ A gunlock for police cruisers. We have them manufactured in Taiwan, and we’re going over to meet with our supplier.” I reply as nonchalantly as possible.

“Where’s the gun?” He smiles.

“In the LAPD cruiser parked out front.” I reply with a grin.

He lets me through.

We have several hours to kill before the flight leaves, and we take turns watching the luggage, reading, and sleeping on the floor of the terminal. As boarding time approaches, we are immersed in a veritable ocean of Asians. No one speaks English. Even the security personal address us in what I can only assume is Chinese. Across the narrow hallway from me squats a Muslim. Not just your ordinary run of the mill normal American kind of Muslim who just happens to be Muslim, but a certifiable died in the wool right out of down town Saudi Muslim. He is dressed in the flowing white robes that you see on television, and has one of those small skullcaps on his head. He alternates between the prayer beads on his right wrist, and reading from the Koran. I have a decent vantage point, and can see that it’s in Arabic. I let my prejudice get the better of me, and think: lovely, blown up on the way to Taiwan. And the gallows humor of an NTS investigation that reveals me to be the bomber with all my solenoids, wires, screw drivers, printed circuit board, etc., hits me, and a chuckle a little.
747’s are an absolute triumph of engineering. It’s been over a decade since I last flew on one, and the sheer size of the craft itself delights me. How on earth something this large manages to fly is utterly astounding. Actually, the fact that anything manages to fly astounds me. It’s magic. Just like electricity. Sure, I understand the scientific principles of both flight and electricity, and can probably do a half-decent job of explaining them to schoolchildren if necessary. I can even wire an outlet, and have flown probably a hundred thousand miles over the last fifteen years. But despite all of my globetrotting, deep down inside where things matter most, I’m a simple peasant.

In my heart of hearts I know that it’s witchcraft that makes electrical devices work. Or maybe lighting hits the ground, is collected in a big pool, and travels through the power lines into our homes. Just like indoor plumbing. Probably the government is involved in some great conspiracy to keep us simple peasants from discovering their treasured lighting pools. It’s really the only that makes any sense out of the American public school system. They devised it to indoctrinate children with the belief that there’s actually science behind electricity, not the secret lighting lakes.

Actually, I might be a little flexible on the electricity theory. Being a product of the American public schools myself, I’ve not entirely freed myself from years and years of indoctrination.

Flying, however, is witchcraft. Try as you might, there’s not arguing me out of that one. Every time I get on an airplane, I know that deep down in the bellow of that lumbering air bound beast lurks some hideous hook nosed hag constantly sacrificing a chickens and offering up whole burnt offerings to propitiate the gods of the sky.

We depart Los Angeles at 1:20 AM. 4:20 New Hampshire time. The flight will last 16 approximately 16 hours, and we will travel on the cusp of night itself as the planet rotates. Rosy fingered dawn will chase us five thousand miles, and not catch up with us until we are more than halfway across the Pacific Ocean. When we land in Taipei it will be 7:20 in the morning of the next day. I explain to my children that I am traveling into the future. That I will be twelve hours ahead of them when I arrive in Taipei, and not only will I travel through the air, but the time itself. How’s that for witchcraft, huh? They shrug it off as just another fairy tale made up by dad. Oh well, I’ve earned they incredulousness with tales of swamp beasts that devour bad children, and flying snow monkeys that will carry them away if they ever wander into the forest in winter.

“We hava cheekun wit a pasta and Ahfredo sauce or a vegahtahrian curry.” The lilting sing-song of the stewardesses accent is a wonderful treat. We’re flying Malaysian Airlines, and the stewardesses are all delightful Asian beauties wearing a most intriguing uniform. It’s an exotically colored cross between a kimono and a dress. Short-sleeved with a full length skirt, it projects both refinement and utility.

“Chicken, please.” I ask while discarding the hot wet paper towels the flight crew has distributed to all of the passengers. This is new to me. At first I am not sure what to do with the hot wet towel, as the idea of distributing them on an airplane has never crossed my mind.

The meal is actually good, and they serve drinks free of charge. I stick with 7up, but even the whiskey, wine, and beer is free. Unlike American carriers that charge upwards of five dollars for a drink.

I settle in for a long flight after the meal and burn through Tobias Wolff’s In Pharaoh’s Army,- a wonderfully written account of his tour of duty in the terrifying poopty mudhole that was south Vietnam before and during Tet . I watch Letters From Iwo Jima, - an equally powerful film about the trials and tribulations of the Japanese soldiers abandoned by their government to fight to the very last man despite the fact that an American victory was all but inevitable. Two hours from Taipei airport the first land we see on the horizon is the tiny speck of Okinawa, and I mull over my recollections of William Manchester’s book Goodbye Darkness.

As a man in his early twenties, Manchester fought his way across the Pacific until finally exiting the war on that tiny speck of land, so horribly injured words cannot do justice to his sufferings. As his plane lifted off from the ravaged landscape of Okinawa to return him to the States, the shin bone of the man standing beside him was still imbedded in his back. All that remained of the young American friend who took the full brunt of the shell that finally freed them both from war's iron grip. There are very few books like it. It's the kind of war memoir so laden with raw emotion and vivid imagery that you actually feel the boot-trampled dust gritting between your teeth, and the sickly sweet smell of decay lingers in your nostrils when you finally finish reading. A book so magnificent, you don't set it down, — as your eyes scan the final sentence on the final page, it burns itself into a tiny pile of ash in your open hands, and disappears into the winds of time, leaving you with an empty, aching hole where your heart used to be.

It strikes me that on my first trip to Asia, I've spent most of my time immersed in texts and videos in which Americans slaughter Asians, are slaughtered by Asians. I am superstitious, and this cannot be a good thing. There's a design in everything. Fine, fine... deny your inner God-fearing savage, convince yourself there is no Creator, I don't really care. But we all catch occasional glimpses of the master plan, despite our intellectual convictions. Perhaps not in every meaningless decision, but the design often becomes perfectly evident, — if not perfectly clear—, during those sparse mind-opening, transitional moments in our lives. I'm hoping this isn't one of those revelations.

I have to piss.

My teeth are getting fuzzy.

We've been traveling for over 20 hrs now, and I figure a dry-brush is better than nothing. I'll score some toothpaste in Taipei. I grab my tooth brush, and walk carefully through the darkened belly of the beast towards the lavatory. The witch downstairs is a good witch, not a bad witch. No turbulence. No embarrassed landing in the lap of some unsuspecting fellow traveler when the floor drops from beneath your feet. I reach the head, and look around. The Certifiable Died in the Wool Right Out of Down Town Saudi Muslim is standing directly behind me. "Great." I think. He's chosen this moment to begin his Jihad. He's mistaken me for the Air-Marshall. Makes sense. Tall, white, Khaki pants, baggy jacket, ball cap. If I were to pick the guy with the concealed, legal firearm, I'd pick me, too. At any moment he will retrieve a box-cutter concealed in his naughty places, slit my throat, and begin his one man Jihad.

I muster up my inner Ninja and turn to face the inevitable.

"Dude," he blurts out, " do you think they'll let us walk around in Taiwan? My legs are damning killing me."

"Probably." My reply reveals no emotion, no sign of wariness.

"Cool." He says.

"Got any toothpaste?" I inquire.

He retrieves minuscule tube from one of his billowing pockets. It's a flight legal tube. Not enough in it to take down the plane, but certainly enough for my purposes. The tables have turned now. Stupid Muslim. You have just given me the last element I needed. You may have a better beard and a Koran, but now I'm the guy with the bomb.

"Viva el Christo Rey!" I shriek while gripping him in a right handed bear hug. My left hand jams the tiny tube into my pocket, contacts the gunlock solenoid, and with a hollow thump and an effervescent spray of minty freshness, I send us both into virginless ethereal, Christian paradise, where we sing praise to the Almighty Christian Creator for all time.

Ok, not really. But it's fun to imagine that we nominally practicing Christians could totally surprise the hell out of our fundamentalist Muslim rivals that way. And this is just some dumbass 19 year old kid from Berkley with extraordinary facial hair heading off to Kuala Lumpur. He'll no doubt be back in the States in three months with dysentery or cholera. Or maybe he's the next John Walker Lindh.
Oh well. Screw him.
Not my problem, and he's not worth wasting a Crest bomb on.

I give the toothpaste back, thank him, and settle in for the remainder of the flight.

31 Things I've Learned in 31 Years

1. Dogs are indeed better than cats. But they require commitment and constant attention. People who insist that cats are better tend to view themselves as intellectuals, usually do not like children, have either too much or too little disposable income, and do not make good drinking buddies.

2. Ten years ago I was infinitely smarter than my father. He's grown much wiser, while I've become much dumber.

3. The ability to drive stick, shoot a gun, and balance a check book are far more important criteria by which to judge women than a pretty smile and nice boobs.

4. That most annoying attribute of the male species which causes us to go weak in the knees, lose total cognitive function, and all but drool on ourselves when a pretty girl smiles at us doesn't get better. It gets worse.

5. Yes. Men really are thinking about sex every 1.7 seconds. Even those of us who try to disguise it by being sensitive, good listeners, engaging in meaningful conversation, or any other facet of adult like behavior that doesn't involve thinking about your num-nums. Or we're gay.

6. There are plenty of Nancy's in the world, but real men have two emotions. Anger and nothing. If we're not angry, there is nothing happening upstairs. If we're dancing drunkenly around a bonfire with our buddies, we're not happy. That's just euphoric rage.

7. It is no longer possible to throw two cans of refried black beans, a bag of frozen corn, half a jar of salsa, and a handful of shredded "Mexican" taco cheese in a pot, consume it, and not suffer near immediate, and dire gastrointestinal consequences.

8. Life doesn't come at you fast. It's actually rather slow and predictable. It's only the things you were too ignorant, or too negligent to prepare for that hit you like a freight train.

9. Toddlers become increasingly more charming the more you age. The shrieking, temper tantrums, and otherwise annoying behavior that vexed you at 25, is absolutely delightful once you know that it is only a phase.

10. People die. Suddenly and unexpectedly. You may never have a chance to make amends for the hurtful things you said. Think about it the next time you end a conversation on a sour note.

11. Those useless, well-dressed, student-council type, preppy jackasses in high school really did grow up to be politicians and lawyers. They're still well-dress, preppy jackasses, and they're just as useless.

12. The Gov't is totally damned. Changing the political affiliation of the Commander in Chief, — or blaming all of the current administration's shortcomings on him—, isn't going to change things. The whole lot of them need to be fired.

13. Because someone speaks with a foreign accent doesn't mean you're smarter than they are. Do you speak two languages? Three? No? Then it's safer to assume they're smarter than you. STFU. Maybe you'll learn something.

14. Racism is the safe-haven of shallow, self-absorbed, insecure idiots. Stereo-types are damn funny though. If you can't laugh at the nacho cheese joke, — regardless of race, color, or creed—, then you need a mental enema. Or perhaps you should consider a career with the ACLU.

15. Decent looking men who can cook, — and I mean really cook, not whip together a pseudo-shrimp scampi drenched in a two dollar bottle of Newman's Marinara Sauce with a $10 dollar bottle of wine because they're trying to get their dour, disappointed, materialistic wife in the sack on Valentine's day—, were probably painfully shy in highschool, probably didn't play varsity sports, but were nevertheless clever enough to discover an alternative method of bedding cheerleaders. They're worth talking to. And will almost certainly make good business partners. Unless they're also cat lovers. In which case they're gay.

16. Men who can bake, — and I mean really bake—, are gay.

17. Friends are important. The best ones are the ones you don't have to see or talk to for months, even years at a time, but they'll show up out of nowhere when you need them.

18. Only couples without children can pull off the whole "soul-partner we share everything, go everywhere together, everything is equal" load of imaginary Valentine's day marketing gimmick bull poop. The rest of us do indeed need our space, need our friends, and sometimes need to keep things, — even semi-important things— from our spouses. But we're OK with that, though we sometimes envy your brought to you by De Beers lifestyle.

19. Money is a means to an end, not an end in itself. When you fight about money, you're really fighting about the fact that the end you seek is a little further off. Focus on the end, and not the immediate lack of money, and you'll discover a way to make more.

20. Take the time to randomly help out others. What goes around really does come back around. Call it karma, charity, whatever. Someday you're going to need that favor.

21. Anyone who says "what doesn't kill you only makes you stronger" is an idiot who hasn't really lived. You should shoot their knee caps off, and maybe burn down their house. Then they'll realize that whatever doesn't kill you, wounds you deeply. And that you live with those scars for the rest of your life. What separates the survivors from the rest is the way in which they live with those scars.

22. Sometimes getting drunk and falling down is a good thing.

23. Be kind to the little creatures. It's a reward in and of itself.

24. Make every effort to avoid mediating in a confrontation between friends. It will only come back to bite you in the bum later.

25. When you encounter a new person who dominates the conversation, act stupid. Ask leading questions, and let them talk. It will put you in a position to take advantage of them later.

26. In the same vein, allowing someone to talk down to you because you're younger than they are is a sign of wisdom. You'll have that stupid-old person's job in no time.

27. People who don't read regularly have stopped exercising their brains, and can be easily confounded, defeated, left in the dust. The same way people who don't exercise their bodies can be outdistanced.

28. You're children will have issues. It doesn't matter how perfect of a parent you are. It's more important to love them for who they are than it is to fill their lives with all of the semi-meaningless activities that every other parent in town is engaged in.

29. You are not the person you think you are. That is not George Clooney looking back at you in the mirror. It's far more important to focus on your personality than it is to spend time on your looks. The packaging ages, it's what's inside the box that matters.

30. Old vehicles are an indulgence, not a way of life. You know you're being financially irresponsible by keeping them running, but that's OK... It's one of the minor pleasures that make life worth living.

31. I still don't know how I got here, why I'm here, or where I'm going. Check back in another decade or so.

An Old Friend...

A decade ago I swore off Tequila.

It's the devil.

I married a girl because of it.

That said, a dear friend brought a bottle to my house a few weeks back, — a bottle which I promptly lost, because it was one of those nights—, anyway, I discovered it hidden up in the eaves of the addition we've been slowly putting up on our shoe-string budget.

It is beautiful. There's a clarity of mind that shots of straight Tequila possesses that I used to associate with Jack Daniels. But Jack has become an old, worn out, annoying sort of friend who brings nothing to the table but misery. Jose on the other hand has brought something special tonight.

You know, I've often spoken about how drinking lets one touch the Devine. You have a few and "poof!" you are communing with God.

The problem is that alchohol is a deceptive mistress. As are most mistresses, but that's a subject for another post. You drink a bit, and you are suddenly God-like, ethereal, in the Garden with all of the tame, happy, non-meat eating animals. And Alchohol whispers: " if you've drunk half the bottle and feel this good, you'll feel twice as good if you drink the rest."

Bitch.

So you drink the rest, and you end up falling all over yourself and trying to explain to your spouse that you "really, really, loooovadflakdflakdsjf 'love' them"... then you pause to pee or puke... and come in and start over again... and if they're understanding they let you do this, and quietly sort of hug you, — at arms length—, until you pass out. And in the morning they start to bitch at you, but realize in your booze-fueled frenzy you managed to do the dishes, the kids long-division homework, and set-up the coffee machine for the next day, and they leave you alone.

The problem with booze is this: a few drinks, and you craddle the face of the Creator in your hand. A few dozen more, and the ugliness that is man burbles to the surface and you are left alone, out of control, and wallowing in your own filth.

Well tonight I am at that point where I shall be wallowing in my own filthy, unworthy, and incontrollable anxiety and despair. But I'll post this before tossing back another shot of the glorious gold liquid and sitting down to watch Keiffer Sutherland torture Arabic sounding American actors on the national past-time now known as "24."

I’m Having a Crisis of Faith... and a Beer

I spent the last seven years working for a family run Catholic publishing company. We were saving the world, and the Catholic Church from itself. We were indeed more Catholic than the Pope. We sold books, traveled around giving talks, raised money from old women under the auspices of preserving Catholic traditions. We were busy saving the miscellaneous detritus that the institution they loved had cast off over the last three or four decades.

Somewhere along the line I stopped believing.

I don’t think it was the homosexual scandals. If you’ve spent any time in the industry in the last couple of decades, then you’ve known about it for a lot longer than the media has. It's always been the deep, dark, ugliness scratching away at the veneer of piety.

I remember an acquaintance remarking about how you couldn’t go to the drinking fountain in seminary without someone reaching out to grab your ass.

That was fifteen years ago.

I think maybe it was just the slow realization that I was immersed in an institution like any other non-profit, politically motivated group with no viable product to offer that makes loud, angry noises about how they know what’s best for people, yet people don’t see the need to pay for their services.

I despise politicians, activist organizations, and other "humanitarian" groups that have the answer to all of our problems, yet can’t seem to run financially viable operations. Maybe I’m just a die-hard capitalist, but it rubs me the wrong way...

Humorous interlude now-

So I’m hanging out in the house with the baby right now. She comes ambling up and announces:

"Daddy, I popped!"

She’s at that age where announcing to the world every time you poop your pants is actually a sign of intelligence. I think to myself, how cute... popped... she meant pooped, but that’s OK. Then I look over at her...

"Holy fuck! You did pop!"

And there she stands in a stinky pile of that explosive kind of diarrhea that blows out the bottom of your pant legs and through the top of your turtle-neck. The kind that only one year olds in diapers get, and is invariably filled with raisins and frozen peas.

"Don’t move!" I scream, diving for the baby wipes, as she scampers away.
Full tackle. Poop everywhere.

Why is it that kids think its funny to started squirming and trying to run away when you finally get the diaper off and are cleaning them up? Hey! That dumb old balding bastard is finally mine to toy with... Watch this! I’ll wriggle and wipe poop all over his hands. Then you finally hog-tie them, get them cleaned up, and are about to pierce their ankles and leave them on a hill to die of exposure, and they batt their eyes and cuddle up to you...awe... heart melts, and they get to live to poop all over you another day...

Anyway, I’m done with Catholics for a while. I can’t even step into a church without getting palpitations and feeling hair follicles forcibly ejecting what few strands remain on the top of my noggin. This is a point of some minor contention in my mud hut, and will doubtless lead to many a shouting match in the future. It’s not that I don’t still hold to the fundamental tenets, it’s just that I need a break. I want to be a person in the world who just happens to ascribe to a particular set of beliefs, and not one who ascribes to those beliefs and is constantly broadcasting them to any and everyone they encounter.

We’ll see how it goes.

For now, I’m going to have another beer.

Girls are Pretty and Nice as Long as They're Dancing Naked and not Talking

Many apologies for not posting in the last six weeks. I was kidnaped by a neighboring tribe, and forced to preform horrendous sexually deviant acts with livestock... It was an initiation rite of sorts, and now I am there household god.

Seriously, I quit my job of the last seven years, and took a new position at a manufacturing company that caters to the law enforcement market.

The downside is that I actually have to learn a new market, company, distribution network, etc.

The upside is that I can now walk to work, I’ve traded in desk accouterments of bibles and icons for MP5's, Colt Sporters, Benelli Pumps, and I can smoke in my office.

I have also inherited an office dog by the name of Cornelius who puts Cerberus to shame.

Seriously, this is a gigantic, vicious, jet black Great Dane who lives only to devour small children, cowardly office workers, and the UPS guy. Now I’ve known this dog since he was a puppy, and I made it quite clear to him that I taste like hollow-point bullets. You bite me, I put one through your head. Just like the last one that bit me that’s buried in the back yard.

So every morning I show up with a pocket full of processed cheese and little chicken bits.

We’re getting along swimmingly.

***
Christmas was grand. Miles of trekking around to the folks and the in-laws and boxes upon boxes of really annoying flashy blingy siren type toys. Too bad they stop working when the batteries run out.
***
We had our annual post-Christmas bash two weekends ago. There were horses, and a man on fire, and I killed a guy with a trident. Or rather we murdered a few dozen handles of Captain Morgan, had a big fire, and wrapped it all up around 5:00 am on a Sunday.

Which leads me to the headline...Life needs more pretty, naked, dancing, mute girls,... and less Church.

Or at least once or twice a year.

The War Against Tibi

...is over. I lost.

Very bad things are happening in my head right now. I'm between jobs, and clinical depression is hitting hard. It's been seven years since I made a move, and I forgot how I take to my bed for days in between careers, etc.

More on that later. There's another freaking Rocky movie coming out? Has Hollywood totally thrown in the towel, or what? Seems like every other movie coming out is a remake of something done thirty or forty years ago.

Except for the Passion of the Christ. That was one of the best comic remakes of a two millenium old story I've seen in a long, long time.

The Hills Have Eyes

Life in our country village is quaint, remote, charming, and sometimes outright terrifying. Like when you're running down the road at five in the morning, wearing only your tighty whities, waving a heavy caliber semi-automatic handgun at a fox that just tried to raid your chicken house and your neighbor drives by on his way to work.

“There was a fox, see?” Pointing to the woods where the only thing visible is tendrils of mist rising from amidst the trees.

“Ayuh.” He replies, and drives off.

And you pinch yourself to wake up, and don’t wake up. You’re already awake. And standing in the middle of the road in your underwear with a pistol and all you got from your neighbor was an "Ayuh."

That’s the terrifying part.

But even scarier than that is how closely the other villagers are watching you. They don’t stress enough in anthropologist school the scrutiny you’ll face when you move into tribal lands and adopt native customs.

Every village has a busybody, too. Ours is named Kathleen, but we call her the Town Crier. She spends each Saturday and Sunday visiting everyone’s teepee, peering into their homes from the threshold, and then gossiping about what she's found out with the neighbors in the next teepee.

She just called me on Sunday to find out what she could do to help us. Why she was calling is beyond me. The last time I actually spoke to her I was chasing her off my porch, gesticulating wildly, and making exaggerated claims about how much money I made. Evidently, it is customary in this village to dump large black garbage bags full of discarded clothing on the doorstep of any family that has three or more children. Obviously these breeders must be unfit parents who cannot afford to keep said offspring in clothing, let alone feed them.

So she calls because it is quite evident to the rest of the village that I have taken to my death bed. They hadn't heard any power tools running or seen me on the roof working on the addition we’re building, so something tragic must've happened.

I politely let her know that Theresa was out of town, and that I’d been riding herd on this gaggle of children of ours. Hence, -no work. Just Barney, puzzles, getting my can kicked at chess by a six year old, lots of Tibi and Kom Putii worship, and endless treks in the minivan of wonders back and forth to Girl Scouts, basketball games, church, etc.

Allegedly she and her husband are moving up north, and there is in fact a for sale sign in front of their mud hut. I'll miss Steve. We've spent many an hour commiserating over a bottle of fermented goat beer. But I don't believe she's leaving. I can't imagine any man patient enough to spend the remainder of his natural years stuck on a mountainside in Bethlehem alone with that woman.

She vexes me.

Oh I am terribly vexed.