I was driving down Broad towards the Kroger. Nice, smooth, well-marked blacktop. Four lanes open to diesel free traffic. Shiny glass and metal office buildings and new construction dotting the roadside. Green, manicured lawns. Fountains.

When I arrive at the grocery store, the shelves are sure to be stocked and the cashier will undobutedly be speaking to me in a language I can understand.

I'm trying not to let the fact that I've got to go back to Tralfamadore in five weeks bother me. I'm just trying to appreciate all of the little things that make the Home Planet great in the short time that I'm back.

A conversation I just had with the guy who walks our dogs:

"Now watch where you put your hands because I just put some flea medicine on the dogs' backs."

"That will not work here. You are putting capitalist flea medicine on your dogs! We have hardened communist pulgas here!"

I started laughing.

"No, it's true. One time I was with a client and we put two of your capitalist flea medicines on his dog. They just stood up on the dog's back and laughed at us saying, 'Give me some more! I want more!'"

I was down in Tralfamadore Vieja past dark, in parts of town where I probably shouldn't have been, trying to test the capabilities of my new Rebel XSi.

I was past the point of caring and sauntered in to an open air restaurant for a disgusting Bucanero cerveza.

The moment I sideled up to the bar, I knew the locals had pegged me as a mark.

I don't know quite what gave it away. Was it the cargo shorts, the ratty, sweat-stained Florida visor, or the $1,000 camera hanging around my neck?

There was no way to tell them that I actually lived here and knew all of their tricks, so I just rolled with it.

When the bartender brought me my beer, I asked him how much I owed him.

"Dos cincuenta?!" I almost spat out my first swig. "Es demasiado, Señor. ¿No soy tourista, entiende?"

He was unimpressed by my gutter Spanish. "Dos cincuenta."

As I paid the man, I noticed a well-dressed chap furiously scribbling on a piece of paper. I knew what his gig was, too.

I tried telling him I didn't want him to draw my picture, but he kept scribbling away.

I began pulling a couple of bones out of my pocket to pay him off.

"Now listen," I told him as he drew, "I'm going to pay you, but at least make me look good. Don't make me look ugly, O.K.?"

He started babbling something that I couldn't follow, and I took the opportunity to snap a couple of pictures of him in a low light setting. I was finishing my beer when he pushed the finished product across the bar towards me.

It looked like the type of shitty doodling some 13 year old would inscribe on the brown paper bag covering of his textbook. Right next to "Guns + Roses Rulz!"

I pushed it back at him. "Gracias, Señor. Usted puede tener lo." You can have it.

I handed him a couple of bills and started walking out the door.

"You don't want it?" he asked in Spanish, somewhat hurt.

"No, it's O.K. You keep it. Yo le dije que no me haga feo." I told you not to make me look ugly.

Worse than ugly. The person in the picture looked NOTHING like me. And he also made it look like I had wild stalks of hair shooting out from all over my face.

Shit, I shaved on Friday.

One phrase popped into my head as I contemplated the monstrosity he had created.

Ding ding. Here comes the shitmobile.

This place is SO lame.

Even the people who are supposed to have a modicum of talent rely upon the pity of gullible tourists rather than any true artistic capabilities.

When there's no competition, everyone is free to be equally sucky.

Our rooster, Tito, is a cocky, mean bastard.

He chases his smaller cousin, Dora, around the yard, chases the pit bull off the front yard when she's sunning herself, bites at my daughter's candy colored necklace, pecks at my feet when I let him out of his coop, and shits all over the place. A genuine Menace II Society.

My wife says that's what roosters do and that they're like that.

It's such a pain in the ass to hunt him down at the end of the day to put him up for the night that I generally just wait until I know he'll be asleep on one of our lawn chairs in the front of the house, then quietly open the front door, sneak up and tackle him.

Last night I was really tired. I just didn't feel like going through this same old bullshit again. It was beginning to feel like Groundhog Day. Every day was the same.

I found myself thinking aloud, "Didn't I just do this?"

So I decided I was going to let him sleep outside.

He really likes that. It makes him feel like a big man. He huddles down on a lawn chair (and promptly poops all over it), while his little shadow, Dora, cuddles up beside him for protection.

Everything was perfect until I heard his wings beating against the glass window and he started crowing. At 11:30 at night. Repeatedly.

We have neighbors, you know.

I quietly slipped the key in the front lock, then dashed outside and grabbed him before he could escape.

As I carried him and Dora under my arms like footballs back to their coop, I quietly admonished him for his behavior,

"You had it all, Tito. You could have slept outside all night. But you couldn't keep your big yap SHUT. It's your own damn fault, you know."

Tito just struggled with his wings pressing against my arms and looked around nervously with his crazy side-view rooster eyes for a means of escape.

All aboard. Next stop - Miami. Again.

Back to Bizarro World...

No post tomorrow.

Have a fun 4th.

7:30 AM. Coconut Grove.

Miami.

Florida.

Walking to the Starbucks from the hotel to get the wife a "Venti Chai Latte with Cream".

Barrista out front sweeping the sidewalk. A woman sits at a table while her sausage dog pulls on the leash tied to the chair.

Early morning joggers listening to their iPods out running in the humidity.

A sportily dressed middle-aged fitness buff with calves the size of cannon balls walks into Shaq's 24 hour fitness facility.

A valet rushes over and hands over the keys to a Mercedes SLK300 to a waiting businessman.

This is a nice place.

I wonder if you people know how lucky you are.

364 more days to go.

5 AM. Can't sleep anymore. Just happy to be in Miami.

We went to Whole Foods and almost bought their entire produce section. Abby was so excited she started eating the grapes straight from the container while riding around in the cart.

Can't get a good variety of fruits or vegtables on Tralfamadore.

When we got to the hotel room, she took off her clothes, ran around stark naked eating watermelon, cantaloupe, and strawberries, excitedly burbling, "Mmmmmm!"

Poor baby.

Do you want to know one of the cruelest injustices of living on a planet like Tralfamadore?

While you're there, you pretty much live on a starvation diet 'cause there's no food. So your stomach shrinks to accomodate.

Then you come back to a place like Miami and want to pig out, but you get stuffed on the bread platter before your main course even arrives.

One American meal is sufficient to last you the entire day.

That, my friends, is what I call cruel and unusual punishment. I tell you whut.

For you Replacements fans out there, check out this live set I found from a hard to find 1989 compilation titled "Shit, Shower & Shave".

Those guys were funny.

P.S. We're glad the Oakton Astros are O.K.

Stupid women driving Jeeps should not run red lights and T-Bone other Jeeps. Especially when there are little children inside.

** Photo by Abby.

Well, come Wednesday we'll have been on this stinking rock planet for exactly one year. That calls for some perspective.

Thought I bitch and complain about this place a lot, there are some things about it that I actually like.

So without further ado, her's my Tralfamadore pros and cons:

PROS:

1. No traffic. Nobody can afford a car.

2. The pineapple is amazing. Like candy.

3. The people are really friendly. When they're not trying to rip you off.

4. I can watch the scene where the girl explodes from "Cloverfield" over and over again on my pirate, errrr, I mean "Free To Air" satellite system since they're running it on pay-per-view all month.

5. I'm getting to spend a lot of quality time with Abby and Mrs. Astro. There's really nothing to do here and no real reason to go outside.

6. Ummmm....

7. Did I mention the pineapple?

CONS

1. See below. ↓

I was carrying 237 lbs. of supplies, including three Whoppers with cheese that my poor, pregnant wife had humbly requested when I flew out of here on Friday.

The Customs guy passed my backpack through the x-ray machine, then asked if I had any food items in it. I did, but I hadn't been able to get the necessary paperwork to allow me to bring it in the country.

That's right. You have to ask them to bring in essential food and living items since none of them are available on the local economy. You spend hundreds of dollars at the Miami Costco, pack everything securely for international travel, schlep it to the airport, pay hundreds of dollars in overweight charges, deal with the TSA idiots at MIA, and then try to talk Tralfamorian authorities into letting you keep your hard earned booty.

And every time you fly in, the rules here are different.

One day you'll fly in from Miami and they'll let you through without a peep. Other times, they'll drag you over to the stainless steel tables and make you open everything up until they tell you that ribs can't be brought into the country because your paperwork says "pork" when it should say "costillos de cerdo".

My blood pressure shoots through the roof every time the plane lands in anticipation of the forthcoming stupidness.

So this time the guy asks me if I've got any food in my backpack and I decide to throw him a bone to distract him from the real goods. I say, "Yeah, I've got some food. But it's just these three hamburguesas con queso from Burger King."

I've always made it a habit of stocking up at the airport BK or Pizza Hut so I can have one last decent meal while I'm here. I've never had a problem before bringing them in, but too late in this instance I realize that hamburgers are made of MEAT.

The Customs guy points me over at two functionaries of the veterinarian and agricultural department and I know I might be screwed. I still think I've got a shot, but am honestly more relieved that I didn't get the full bag search that would uncover all of the other food goodies I've got on me. I walk up to the table with the two severe looking vets and try to play up the humorous angle to see if I can make it out of here alive and with my burgers.

"Hi, he told me to come over here. I have three cheesburgers from the U.S. That's not a problem, is it?"

The two look at each other. The woman speaks first, "Si, it is a BIG problem."

I almost laugh at her because I think she's joking, but I quickly realize she's not.

"Really? I thought I could bring a cooked hamburger in?"

The man speaks. "No, Señor. Tralfamadore is a sanitary island. It is very dangerous."

Now I'm pissed.

"Oh, I see. Tralfamadore is a sanitary island. Your system of health is much better than the United States. Is that it?"

"I'm sorry, Señor. You must dispose of the cheesburgers."

He points to a green-lidded biohazard container and I angrily chuck the burgers in.

I stand around for a few seconds waiting for them to tell me they were done with me, but the two continued to stare until someone else was directed to speak with the male employee.

I figured it was safe to leave, so I started walking away from their booth. The female inspector called me back over.

"Señor! Señor!" she whispered.

"What?" I replied.

"I cannot talk very loud. Please come here."

I walked over, sure she was going to ask to see the two balls of port wine cheese spread I had in my bag.

"Yes?" I asked.

"Señor, I must speak very quietly, but I would like to go to the United States. You work with the Americans, yes? You can help me."

"What?!" I asked incredulously.

She continued. "I really would like to go and see my family in the United States. I'm sorry. My English is not very good. You can help me get my name to the front of the line? It takes many years and I cannot wait."

I decided to answer her in English, knowing she wouldn't be able to follow.

"You just made me throw three cheesburgers away and now you want me to help you get to the U.S.? You're nuts."

"I'm sorry. I don't understand. My English is not very good."

"No. The answer is no. I won't help you. Have a nice day. Goodbye."

"Please, Señor. I don't understand. My English is not so good."

I decided to answer her in Spanish and tell her that I didn't work in the section that made those decisions and that I was sorry I couldn't help her.

Then I stormed off in a huff.

Argh...

It's not any fun when the people who have you bent over a barrel and then have the nerve to ask you to scratch their back while you're at it can't understand why you're screaming at them.

I'm getting just a little tired of this place.

Still got my cheese balls, though.

Mail came yesterday.

I finally got that March 24th issue of TV Guide that I've been so long waiting for.

Wheeee...

Mrs. Astro said the other day she was talking to the wife of a colleague who told her that her neighbor had taken to throwing his trash and used condoms onto the yard in front of her house because he doesn't like Americans.

The colleague's wife then promptly went out, found an old man who spent his days walking up and down Quinta sifting through garbage for knick-knacks and valuables, and offered him a job of cleaning up the mess in front of her yard every day.

The old man got down on his knees and thanked her for giving him such a grand opportunity.

His pay? One Tralfamadorian peso ( $1.08 ) per day.

Mrs. Astro also said that she was looking out the window yesterday and saw another one of our local dumpster divers reach into one of the plastic neighborhood garbage containers, fish out a discarded box of orange juice, and start drinking from it.

It's really kinda sad when you think about it...

But seriously, Spider-Man versus Darth Vader? Who wins?

Trafalmadorians are great people, don't get me wrong, but sometimes they annoy the crap out of me. Sure, they'll give you the shirt off their back and they'll bend over backwards to help you, but they're also rude as shit, have no manners, and will rob you blind if you give them a chance.

Two examples:

Went to the supermercado in Flores to buy some liquid cleaner. This was the second store I had to go to a store that morning because, hey! who knew only certain supermarkets carry liquid cleaner. One stop shopping this ain't.

So I get to the register and place my four bottles of cleaner on the counter and the woman goes to reach for a bottle at the same time I set one down. The tiny plastic bottle tips over, lightly grazes her hand, and then falls over.

I quickly apologized in Spanish, but apparently I'd breached some unwritten rule of Tralfamadorian etiquette.

The woman at the counter starts vigorously rubbing her hand and shoots me a look like I'd just kicked her dog.

It was the same place THIS happened, so I was really in no mood for it.

I looked at the woman square in the eye started barking at her in English,

"WHAT? What is your problem?"

The woman continued to give me a sullen look and I continued to stare, inviting her to say something.

When she gave me my change I pointlessly blurted out something about her needing to work on her attitude and "customer service skills" and walked out the door.

Later that night I was meeting up with some colleagues at a tavern in Old Havana. I wasn't quite sure where the place was, but it is fairly well known, so I asked an overweight middle-aged female security guard for directions.

She starts acting all coy and tries getting cute with me, and I'm all like, "Listen, it's a very simple question. Where is the German tavern? There's only one. So just tell me. I don't have time for this."

I finally get the information out of here, but she still wants to chat. I try politely breaking away, but she latches onto my arm with her hand, pulls me off the sidewalk, and starts telling me how I'm very handsome and she can get me a pretty girl for cheap.

I lift my ring finger, tell her I'm married, and try walking away. She brushes that off and again clasps onto my forearm with her meathook and tries dragging me off to meet her daughter. Or something.

This time I break away from here with a bit of violence, point my finger at her and say, "You touch me again and you're gonna get popped. Right in the neck."

I hear her cackling evilly behind me as I quickly trot away.

Like I said, I'm kind of getting sick of these people.

It was 10:30 at night. With visions of sugar plums and the lackluster American Idol finale fresh in my head, I plopped into bed and began to read a few pages of my A.P. Hill bio before I turned in for the night.

Abby had been asleep for two hours.

Just then the doorbell rang. Insistently. Three times.

I was up in a flash and headed downstairs. As I fumbled with the front door keys, Mrs. Astro handed my a four battery mag light. Piggy waited expectantly, and then shot through the opening like a thoroughbred when I managed to get the door cracked.

A few minutes later I was back inside calling members of our guard force and asking them to come out and check up on us.

"Well, that was weird," I said.

"Who was it?" asked Mrs. Astro.

"Just some prostitute," I said. "Apparently there are a bunch of houses on our street that let people rent rooms by the hour. She thought ours was one of them."

Good to know.

The other day one of my colleagues asked me if I wanted to go out and get some Chinese with him.

There's only one restaurant in this dinky little city that's any good, and I'd been craving some MSG's all week.

We drove into Barrio Chino and all of the shops were closed. No electricity, the signs said.

Disappointed, we stood in the middle of the dusty, crumbling street and tried to decide what other options we had. None of them sounded promising.

We drove all the way across town to a paladar, but the sign on the front door said they were closed, too. We then drove to a joint called "Vistamar", but the sign on its front gate said they were closed for "reparaciones".

It was beginning to look like a gawdang, full blown conspiracy.

We finally were forced to go to the cafeteria at the Teatro Karl Marx. Service took an hour and a half. The waitstaff was rude and unfriendly.

The food wasn't very good, either.

I've said it before and I'll say it again - these people wouldn't know whether to shit themselves or go home if someone ever opened a McDonald's here.

In fact, if someone was really interested in change, they should think up some plans about how to air drop a pre-fabbed Starbucks or two with free Wi-Fi into this place.

Then it'd really be game over, man.

Game over.

Bloom

Sweet Lousiana Sound

Recently, I made the first major change to my workout routine in at least five years.

Because I'm such a lard ass big-boned individual, I've been having some serious heel pain issues that are directly attributable to my running.

I've always had skinny (but strong!) legs because I never spent much time in the gym working them, so about a month ago I decided that the key to all my problems was to confront my deepest darkest fear and begin doing squats.

This means that rather than run four times a week and lift upper body once, I lift legs three times a week, upper body once, and run once.

The gyms here on Tralfamadore suck and there's no gym culture. That is to say, nobody really knows what the fuck they're doing in there.

When I first started spending more time in the gym, I felt it was important to try and set a good example as a stranger in a strange land and cut people some slack when it came time to their violations of gym ettiquette.

I'd patiently wait for them to finish before asking them in Spanish how many more sets they had, I'd give them 10' of personal space to work out in - even if the gym was crowded, and I'd offer to let them work in with me if they appeared to be hanging around and waiting.

Now, I just don't care.

I'm so sick of these people. They seem to do everything in their power to deliberately piss me off.

They lay their towels on pieces of equipment they're not using and then walk away from the area for half an hour, drink coffee and smoke 5' from the gym entrance, invade your mirror space, play lousy slow-tempo music over crappy speakers, and generally just get in my way and annoy me.

In retaliation, I've taken to deliberately trying to conform to every steroetype they have of the prototypical loud-mouthed, ugly American.

I play my iPod superloud and then walk around the gym playing air guitar and mouthing the lyrics.

I grunt a lot, never use a towel, sweat all over the equipment, and slam my weights together. I haven't gone so far as to start shouting out the amount I'm about to lift ("300! YEAHHH!!!"), but that might not be too far around the corner.

Worse, I've let my inner monologue loose.

I no longer attempt to communicate to them in Spanish and simply assume that they all speak English like the rest of the civilized tribes of the world.

"Hey, how much longer you going to be on this thing?"

"You almost finished?"

The worst part is, I'm completely non-discriminatory to whom I mouth off to. There are a lot of non-Tralfamadorians who work out there and some of them speak English.

I was on the floor doing some leg lifts, completely blocking access to the treadmills, when this Euro-trash looking businessman-type walked up to me and pointed at the hip abductor machine behind me.

This guy looked like he might have known his way around a gym, but that didn't stop me from shooting my mouth off and talking to him like he was a turd.

"You want to use THAT?" I asked him in English.

"Yes," he said pointing.

"Fine, go ahead," I said. "But that's a girl's machine. Only girls do that."

I stalked off, giggling at my own insolence.

One day while I'm defenseless on my back doing French Curls, somebody's going to drop a 45 lb. dumbbell on my head and then it won't be so funny.

A dirty, white, sore-infested Bichon Frise waddled up the sidewalk towards me on my way in to work. It lifted its leg, marked its territory against a crumbling concrete wall, then kicked its heels and continued on its way.

I stared at it, aghast.

There is no way a dog like that should even exist on the streets of this city.

They're the Tralfamadorian equivalent of the little baby alligators that some kid makes his Dad buy him on the way through Florida, and then promptly flushes down the toilet.

Ferral lap dogs.

I got an e-mail the other day from an old high school chum (shout out to Big Z! w00t w00t) in which he reminded me that I was right now living in a very unique and special country in a very special time period and that I was seeing things that very few people saw.

It made me recall all of the conversations that I would have with my other colleagues when I was studying Spanish who would always remark upon hearing that I was coming here how much they envied me and how excited they would be if they were assigned here.

At the time, I would just say, "Yes, regardless of what happens, it is a unique time to be there and should be an interesting two year tour."

The other day I made an appointment with a barber to come over and cut my hair. He arrived at my house on a moped with his clippers and mirror in a bag on the back seat. He cut my hair in the driveway while I sat in a plastic lawn chair and chickens chased each other around our yard.

That was certainly unique.

You know what else is unique? Going to a grocery store and not being able to find shit to eat. Or finding that the store is now carrying cans of Skittles which costs $19.71. Or that a bottle of olive oil costs over $25.

That's unique, too.

You know what else is "unique"?

Living in a city of 2.5 million people that doesn't have a single restaurant worth going to twice.  So is going to the pool and seeing 70 year old men having their hairy backs massaged by 18 year old girls wearing a skimpy thong, stripper heels, and hair braids.

That's pretty damn unique, too.

If you ever find yourself living in some shitty foreign country one dark and stormy night, when the earth quakes and the poison arrows fall from the sky, and somebody tells you to cheer up because you live in such a "unique" place, you just tell them what ol' Vance Astro says:

"Uniqueness is overrated. I'll take prosperity and a decent cheeseburger over that any day."

Go Hokies.

An old woman in a faded green Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias uniform is standing outside of my house as I open the gate to back the car out.

She stares long and enviously at my car. "What the F are you looking at?" I ask.

Down at the end of the road, a man is arm deep in a dumpster, trying to fish out something, anything of value. A little boy in a crisp white shirt and the obligatory red kerchief of the Young Pioneers tramps sullenly down the road on the way to school.

I turn the radio on. Nothing but anniversary reminisces of the great victory over the Yanquis at Playa Girón, and the frothy mouthed rantings of nuestro grande amigo, Presidente Chavez.

I catch a bit of a musak version of the theme from "Flashdance", then dejectedly turn the radio off.

As I hit the Malecón, a wave washes over the promenade and the sea spray temporarily blinds me. I hit the wiper fluid button on the Blazer, but there is none and all it does is smudge the sea salt over the glass.

I turn the corner onto Calzada and the rising sun makes it impossible to see through the windshield. I grope along the street by feel and hope I don't run anybody over.

A chicken darts across the side of the road near the parking lot. A long line of people snakes around our building, hoping against hope they'll be able to walk out in a few hours with a slip of paper that says, "Aprovado!"

It is 7 AM. And the sun has charred the other side of the world and come back to us and painted the smoke over our heads an imperial violet.

It is 7 AM. And you are listening
to Tralfamadore.

There are small, incremental changes afoot here, and sometimes you don't notice them until someone points them out to you.

Back in the day (all of 9 months ago when we first go here), the only mass transportation you saw were the hump-backed camello busses and some gargantuan pieces of diesel-spewing farm equipment converted into mass transit.

Lately, we've been noticing a whole slew of new Chinese made Yutong busses on the main roads of Tralfamadore. There's also been a significant decrease in the number of scantily clad young women hitchhiking along Quinta.

My driver came and picked me up and made me listen to Radio Rebelde, with its constant Morse code beeping and announcing the time every minute on the minute. After getting stuck behind one of those aforementioned busses, he decided he'd had enough.

"Man, it used to be that I'd get on the road and there wouldn't be any traffic at all. I could hit every light. Now? Look at this place? What's going to happen when they actually let the people of this country buy their own cars? This place will go crazy."

It still only took us 15 minutes to get to work. If I were in Beijing, that wouldn't even give me enough time to make my way out of the parking lot.

I guess I could be altruisitc and ferverently hope that the poor citizens of this country get the cars they need and stop having to rely upon bicycles, horses, carts, and mopeds to get where they're going. But I'd really just prefer that things don't get any more crowded.

At least until I leave.

Since Mrs. Astro got back, I had to give up my ride.

No more driving around Tralfamadore like Speed Racer. You happy, Dad?

So since I ain't got no wheels no more, I had to beg and scrounge for a ride from one of my colleagues.

Juan pulled up in the white Blazer a couple minutes after 7. I threw my bags in the backseat, took a deep breath, and hopped in the car.

"How you doing this morning," he asked.

"Oh, just fine," I said. "Another day in the Worker's Paradise."

We both laughed. I thought that line was pretty clever.

Hey, cut me some slack. It's tough enough to get motivated on a Monday without having to think up some snappy crap for this place.

In the morning when I'm driving to work, I see all of these locals out on the median strip on Quinta working out. They're either running, power walking, or using the stone benches to do elevated push-ups or dips or other exercises.

When I was in the 82nd back in the day, I was deployed to Panama for two months to guard thousands of Tralfamadorian refugee balseros who had been picked up at sea while trying to make it to the U.S. They were being detained by President Clinton until he could decide what to do with them.

He eventually sent all of them back here. What a guy.

Anyway, even then I was impressed by how seriously Tralfamadorians took physical fitness. Every morning they'd be out there in the hot sun, behind the razor wire fences, working out, doing kick boxing, lifting rocks...

As I drive around this city, I always see someone playing baseball, soccer, running, doing calisthenics.

And then it hit me. They're not working out because they love sports. They're working out because there's nothing else to do here. And they have no jobs.

How else can you go for a long run at 7:30 in the morning if you've got to be at work at 8?

I wish I had that kind of time. But not their poverty.

Speaking of which, yesterday, I let our pet rooster out of his pen so he could get some exercise. As soon as the door was open, he came flying at me with his feet - like in a cockfight.

Cheeky little chicken.

I decided to take a different route home yesterday in the desperate hope that I could find some unseen part of this decrepit city that still might interest me.

I was parked in traffic, waiting on a light and looking at a map I had on the passenger's side seat, when suddenly there was a rapping against my side window. I glanced out of the corner of my eye and saw a woman holding up her hand and pleading with me to either give her a ride, some food, some money...

Who knows.

I didn't even move. I just kind of flicked my fingers at her and mouthed, "Go. Away."

After she left, I felt kind of guilty. I'm sure that's not what Jesus meant when he talked about what one did to the least of us, so, too, did we do to Him. But I was tired. And this place annoys me.

I wore my sweater vest today 'cause it's cold. I know they're all going to laugh at me.

I had the car stereo up to 11.

Johnny Hickman was wailing about being chased by Death and having the Lonesome Johnny Blues.

I was riding the bumper of a light blue licensed telephone company truck who had his turn signal on for the last mile but was still straddling the middle and right hand lane.

He finally moved over enough to pass, so I blasted past him and then scooted over into the gloriously empty breakdown lane.

I punched the gas and left the tangled knot of slow-moving, diesel spewing traffic behind.

I was hauling when I hit the General Calixito Garcia roundabout, so I positioned myself to hit the apex of the curve on the outside lane, then blasted across and hit the apex on the opposite side, shaving tenths of a second off my time.

As I gunned it through the straightaway before my turn to the parking lot, I thought of the immortal words of Ricky Bobby:

"I wanna go fast."

This morning while driving to work I saw a guy driving up Quinta on a riding lawnmower.

When I got to work, I pulled into the dusty parking lot where they let us store our cars and two chickens ran past me.

Yesterday, I did something I've neglected to do for 24 years: began lifting legs.

Now, I'm really tired and don't feel like putting much effort into charlando about this place.

You should read this article instead.

It's the best summary of what life is like here on Tralfamadore that I've found thus far - especially the part about eating uncooked hamburger meat, smoking a fat cigar, and then washing all of that nastiness down with a sickly sweet mojito.

Yup. That's this place in a nutshell.

I think I'm going to be sick again...