Conditioning Yourself

The old man locked himself out of his room again.

One time he locked himself out butt assed naked. He had to knock on his neighbor's door and ask for a teeshirt so that he could go downstairs and get a passkey to his room. Now he's dressed I suppose. I wasn't outside to witness it this time.

I got up and got online for awhile before I put on my new nightshirt, grabbed a towel, soap and razor for the showers. I stepped outside of my door, and Paula's crows were flying past. They were cordial, saying good morning. I was the same. I was also in my nightshirt, naked underneath. I felt fat and dumbo-ish. I wonder if others see the same? I wonder if the crows saw that? Did I see one of them laugh! I don't know. No.

The trains zapped me down to the SHOUT OUT right on time. The SHOUT OUT was small, not many in the audience, but very adept readers. Awesome jobs done. I like SHOUT OUT's like this that are just comfortable little gatherings. It draws people together better than the bigger, more packed shows. Although, anti-social me does not do well in comfortable little gatherings. I like to put away the cables and mics and break down the stage. We end on time. As the next band starts to filter in the stage is cleaned and ready.

I shamble outside to find my clique gathered together in our after party huddle, bullshitting, toking, laughing. That's what we do. We stroll up to the pizza parlor, our favorite in fact, which has an obscenely long line because the service is so poor. It's not that the pizza is all that great, it's very good actually, but not worth standing on a line for fifteen minutes to get at one. But we do all the time because we're hop headed and dealing with the munchies.

As we get no less than twenty paces from the long line of people waiting does the heavens open up and a torrential downpour strikes, sending us to run for cover in a door alcove, and cower against the falling storm. It was an angry rain that lasted for ten to fifteen minutes, and then it was gone. I dashed out to find the pizza line gone, and the few inside of the cramped establishment already had their pizzas. It was time to eat in a hurry. In moments, still too long a wait for the insanely slow and inept service, we have our pizzas and are standing out on the curb eating.

In time, the group of us peel away leaving my brother and myself heading to Starbucks. As we enter the establishment one of the counter girls shouts: "Poetry men!" when she sees us. OBSIDIAN asked her how she knew and she informs him that it was because I told her the last time we were here. She wanted to know what we were doing behind the laptops for hours when we get here. We sit and drink coffee and work on personal stuff. I for my part try not to write e-mails because I am a little bent from the trees.

Still, I did crank out one. Not good. Not good at all.

I work off the effects of my high and work on the Handbook, and then scratched the surface of this blog post, but my brain could not form words. I was just that cloudy. Shit, that's funny. I don't know why...it just is. Soon, it is time for us to close up shop and head out. Both OBSIDIAN and myself napped some of our time at Starbucks, our high knocking us out. But when it's time to go, it's time to get up and get the fuck out. We stroll down to the end of the block and parted company. I take the number 1 home and up into my room.

It is somewhat cool. I like that. It's not hot. I turn on my EVAPO- RATIVE air conditioner. I learned that today when looking over the R2D2 looking device and found, on its front, a window in the shape of a large blue teardrop. Why a teardrop? I check the window. On it's top read MAX, on the bottom LOW. Hmmm. I look over the device, pull off the intake cover and removed the air filter from inside finding underneath it all, a water reservoir which was empty. On the back it reads: EVAPORATIVE AIR CONDITIONER. The way it works is that it uses evaporation to take the heat from the air passing through the filter. To do that means it needs water like a camel.

I fill her up, close her up and turn her on. The air comes out, I don't know if it's any more cooler than without the water, but one thing is for certain, it claims itself to be an air conditioner. I turn it on tonight to see if there is a difference in the air temperature. It did seem cooler for some reason. I mean it is a viable technology. Some places cool entire buildings through these air conditioning systems.

I crawl into bed, tired and high, ending another day.

Hobobob