what was that? is that all there is? who is this? this is it.

Sitting here in 2020 looking back to the WTO festivities of November 30, 1999 it was like a whiff of the future: a premonition.   It’s easy to say in hindsight or maybe that was just a whiff of tear gas. 

Happy Birthday Steve. It feels like your golden birthday was just the other day or maybe it was a lifetime ago. Sitting here in 2020 timelines are out the window. 

In the 1970's, an English mailman still delivers his parcels on a bicycle.

...The prime motive for using bicycles in every country except the United States, is always economics, because the bicycle is the only inexpensive way to transport people from home to work or school. Most bicycle owners in time learn to do their own running repairs, and it is not a drain on their earnings...

pulled from page 117

THE BICYCLE that curious invention 

Sybil and Stephen Leek

1973

"the art of getting by" Mark W photo

On vacation in this lockdown shutdown shitshow blackout wipeout rainstorm fuckfest that is 2020 I’ve had a chance to catch up on things I haven’t been able to get to like placing this book I've had for years on the table and then making a cup of coffee and flipping through it like a coffee table book. It's a keeper.

In addition I was able to make this list:

Tony Danza

Tony Hawk

Tony Soprano

Tony Randall

Tony Romo

Tony Parker

Tony Award

Tony the Tiger

Tony Toni Tone

Toni Braxton

Toni Morrison 

Toni Basil

Toni Kukoc

Tone Loc 

Tone Deaf

It's the most wonderful time of this fucked up year so I like to get stuck on Toni Braxton in that red turtleneck. In addition I'd like to say I savored a bottle of Corona but it sucks in such a way that can only scratch the surface symbolically 2020 as I played Goatfish again and again with Junior and Junior Junior I sucked it down and hardened the fuck up. 

Then in a rare moment of alone time I cut a fat line of diatomaceous earth and snorted it through a rolled up $2 bill 

When my breathing started to return to normal I stuffed a ceramic bearing up one nostril and a steel bearing up the other and beared down to compare the bearings’ sphericity. The results are still coming in or blowing out.  Which reminds me to remind you that when you place your Mad Fiber wheel order make sure to specify which bearing you prefer. If you leave that field blank an extra $3000.00 will be added to your order which will never be fufilled either way any way one way or another. 

Finally I took a moment to reflect and share here and now

What did you do today? 

Outside the Center for Urban Horticulture I stood in the rain with a half inch of standing water contained in each shoe. Rain dripping off the brim of my Double Darn cap and onto the bundle of mail I was about to deliver. I briefly contemplated the difference in footprints created by shoes that are merely wet on the surface and shoes that are filled with water. Taking a moment to consider the squishy sounds soaked Sambas make on the clean dry flooring of empty locked down buildings. Just then an actual human exited the building and said “man, even though it’s raining, you have the greatest job around” and I smiled beneath my wet disposable mask and said “right on” 

A couple hours later I took a picture because it'll last longer on the loading dock at MolES when the rain let up,  the sun came up and we were getting dry. Almost let a pickup truck nearly pass us by. 

Essentially essential until you’re not then you’re fading into the background another anthropomorphic grey zombie in the distance non-essentially mushy muzak cover of a Tears for Fears song vague memory lost with a jpeg attachment in a footer of a string of reply-all emails stacked too deep to dig through.  

there's a room where the light won't find you

holding hands while the walls come tumbling down

when they do, I'll be right behind you

stepping back out into the rain humming and or mumbling the wrong lyrics because the mushy muzak version on the elevator was all instrumental it’s so far gone it’s almost subliminal but the smell of that girl in 9th grade comes back for a second and I have to ask how my brain jumped from here to there and back again

point of view

peek a boo

put ‘er there 

president emeritus 

profile design

product placement

vector

tensor

scalar

droolinator

tongue depressor

gag reflex

acid reflux

a wee bit of

puke in my mouth

should we talk about the weather?

ask me about wardrobe decisions

overthinking the second guessing

And you may ask yourself, "How do I work this?"
And you may ask yourself, "Where is that large automobile?"
And you may tell yourself, "This is not my beautiful house"
And you may tell yourself, "This is not my beautiful wife"

gas powered   leaf  blower

turn clocks back one hour

it's not just the smell of piss

actually         it's full-on piss

as well as shit 

mucus & blood & vomit

welcome to the U-district

find a penny    pick it up