Thursday, March 30, 2006

My Black Thumbs May Be Turning Green

Everyone loves the first warm day of the year. Although the spring season has already officially begun, Thursday was the first beautiful day that I had seen all year.

I was lucky enough to had already scheduled to be off of work that day. My friend, who owns his own landscape company, asked if I would assist him on one of his jobs. Lucky for me, I accepted.


On our way to the site, I asked what exactly the job entailed. I guess I should have asked before I accepted, because he told me that we were mulching a hill side. My first thought was to jump out of the car faster than a kidnapped woman on Vicodin, but I calmed down and was blown away by the site once we arrived.

The home that we worked at was located in the Indian Hill neighborhood of Cincinnati. Majestic homes, long drive ways and grandiose lawns are the standard in this area. I'm sure it says that somewhere in the community's by-laws. This neighborhood has resided such famous Cincinnatians as the late Marge Schott-Unnewehr and President Douch, I mean Bush has attended several fundraisers hosted at homes in Indian Hill.
The home that we worked out overlooked Marimont. The views were great and the weather was perfect. Too bad it was my job to move over 120 bags of Black Hardwood mulch. I'm sure the name of the mulch did not prompt my friend, the owner of the landscape company, to pick it.

What ever...

Mystery Sperm Doner Stikes Again

I'll start this as Sophia Petrillo began every one of her stories.

Picture it,
Sicily, (I mean, Durham, North Carolina)
The beginning of spring, two-thousand and six

Forty-seven severally sexually frustrated members of a college lacrosse team.
One attractive female (damn) exotic dancer.
And enough alcohol to keep a small Nicaraguan village liquored up for days.

Does anyone see where this is going?


When I read about these events, immediately I felt that this may be the fall of the great institution of higher education. I always try to have an optimistic view of the legal system, but there is a quiet, but persistent voice inside of my that tells me that if there is any prison time given to the perpetrators, it will be minimal.

And you wonder why there are so many who distrust the legal system.

what's really weird is the fact that only forty six of the forty seven players were required to give a DNA, making them possible suspects. The student that was not required to "give up his boys" happened to be African-American, and was not required because the dancer said that her attacker was white.

Were there any Asian or Hispanic members on the team?


Wednesday, March 29, 2006

Anatomy Of A Love Lost

Think back to the first time that you ever fell in love. The first time his lips touched yours and made your heart melt. Remember one of your first dates. You and your new beau took in a movie at Newport on the Levee and after the movie, spent close to an hour making out in his car on an empty Newport city back-street.

Ahhh...those were the days.

Needless to say, it is also permanently engraved in your mind the day when your world came crashing down around you. The day when the one that you thought you would be with for the rest of your life no longer wanted to be in a relationship with you.

"Hoop-shirts and penny-loafers Batman! What are you going to do now?"

Despite the fact that you are going to have to find a new apartment (if you guys live together) and how much it is going to cost to pay for the deposits of the phone, internet and cable services, do not get caught up in the break-up woes. Jealousy and revenge are sweet, but it is so unbecoming of the true aficionado of class and social grace that you know that you are (or at least you think you are).

The truth is, the reason why there are so many ugly break-up stories floating around Cincinnati is because neither of the two people involved (or three, depending on how freaky you are) know exactly what types of emotions are going to erupt when one decides to end a relationship. Speaking from experience, there are 3 distinct phases to a break up that a jilted lover will go through before they move on with the rest of their life. I do realize that each situation that initiates a break-up is different, but in general, these are the 3 emotional phases to look out for.
If you know what to expect, maybe that next break-up will not end up with you spending a night in the Hamilton County Detention Center, missing your left Timberland boot and wondering where everything went wrong.

PHASE 1: Where did the love go?

The first phase is usually the most difficult to get past and the one that hits you the hardest. During this phase, your heart feels like it has just gone through a cheese greater and was plopped back into your chest, still ripped and frayed. During this phase you repeatedly try and talk to the one who used to love you about the reasons why he kicked you to the curb so readily. Because of the nature of the beast, this could end up two different ways. He will tell you the reasons or he will not. Either way, you will be jousted into the 2nd phase weather you want to or not.

PHASE 2 Find ways to change yourself to get him back

After a couple of pints of Grater’s Ice Cream and long nights of being a wall flower at the Dock, you start to think about ways of changing yourself to become a better person. You look deep within yourself to find the things about you that you are ashamed of and dislike. You concoct broad and unrealistic ways of reinventing yourself so that the one that just asked for the keys to his apartment will take you back into his open arms.

PHASE 3: Acceptance

Hopefully, this mantra of self delineation will bring you to the conclusion that he does not want to have you as a lover any longer and that maybe you are better off without him, for the time being. You should take this as a diving board. Weather you want to dive back into another relationship, or maybe pick up another degree at the University of Cincinnati. Whatever you want to do, this is the time to do it.

In the back of your mind, you are always going to hope that the man of your dreams comes back to his senses and wants you back. If that happens, make sure he knows that this fly-by-night cavalcade romance can not continue if he truly wants to revisit the relationship.
By chance, if it is the other way around, keep it in your mind to leave him be and let him find his way. If the way that he finds leads him back to you, then you two were truly meant to be.

Let him fly gurl....let him fly!

What do people expect?


I have tried to start each of my weekday mornings with a leisurely thirty minute jaunt at Coffee Emporium on Central Parkway. I spend the thirty minutes people watching, proof reading writings created by others or ripping through the pages of my current read, entitled, Freedom In this Village. This morning, I edited Chapter Four of the novel I am writing.

Anyway...

On my way to Coffee Emporium, driving, I crossed Liberty St. via Sycamore and at the intersection of Orchard and Sycamore streets, there was a man, who looked to be in his mid-thirties, violently waving down traffic that was moving south on Sycamore. The black S.U.V. just in front of me was hesitant to stop, but did so out of the kindness of their heart. Not passing the S.U.V., I waited to see if it was some sort of emergency. In reality, I was just being nosey. The man spoke to the driver through the passenger side window for only a few seconds and then the S.U.V. sped off, leaving the stranger in the middle of the intersection, thanking the driver with his middle finger. Seeing this, I had no intention of stopping and was thanked in the same manner, along with the white station wagon that followed.

What do people expect?

Even if you are in dire need of help (which didn't seem to apply in this situation), it is less likely that a stranger is going to offer you a hand to repair a flat tire or offer his services to help jump your dead car battery if they have witnessed you offending a person that does not or can not stop and give assistance. I know that it is frustrating not to get help when you really need it, but clearly the person was not a downtowner, and may have not been aware of how to ask for help.

In a more rural setting, the average Joe may be more willing to stop for an up-turned thumb than most downtowners would be. There is not a common look for a person who resides downtown, but this stranger's worn baseball cap, faded blue jeans and confrontational demeanor told me that he "was not from around these here parts". I am sure this is why the stranger was more upset than he should have been, but that didn't persuade me to for go my morning escapade at Coffee Emporium.

When in Rome...

Tuesday, March 28, 2006

BLOG: The Other White Meat



This is such a strange word for something that has seemed to have taken over the world of the internet and self publishing via the web. Also, it amazes me that so many who are fluent in computer-ese have little idea as to a blog's function or purpose. Just last night, my friend's fiancé, who I would not call computer illiterate in the least, asked me, "What is a blog?"
I have recently become somewhat addicted to the "act of blogging". A few months ago, I was so hooked on the fact that I could express my views and have it read on the internet that I created a blog that looked much like an online magazine. I wrote very structured articles on issues that plucked a nerve in me and happenings that I thought people would like to read about. Looking back, I realize that blogs are not meant to be so structured and stylized. This, coupled with the fact that no one left any comments, brought me to the conclusion that this way was not the best way to run my blog.

Blogs can tell a lot about a person. Searching the myriad examples of this newly prophesied medium, I have found blogs chronicling daily choices of underwear to the gritty quips of a young, up and coming male porn star. Not to leave out everything in between. Also, inspecting the blogs that people follow can tell additional volumes of a person's interests, beliefs and personal convictions.

As I return to letting my thoughts flow from my brain, through my fingers and become immortalized in this new style of expression, I thought I would set up a blog that parallels a more traditional blog.

So instead of writing a prelude to my current life filled with the varied details of my past life such as my (virtually) fatherless childhood or my convoluted stint in the US Army, I will present to you a list of some blogs that I follow on a daily basis. Hopefully this will give you a better perspective of the past that I am from, my current mental state of mind, and the future life that I would like to lead.

These are just a few that I follow (the ones that are not mentioned are not appropriate for some viewing audiences). If you have a blog that you think will tickle my fancy, let me know. As you know, with any addiction, the hunger never dies!