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Fairytales for a Practical Princess - 2008-11-30
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7:12 a.m. - 2003-06-29
Friday night's graduation was all a high school graduation should be; overlong, boisterous yet boring, earnest clichéd speeches which made me pray that none of the 6 honor grads who spoke was planning a career in writing, teary in places, and like every school function I’ve attended so far- chattering neighbors who ran their teenage mouths the WHOLE time, even during the National Anthem. Alex joined the traditional hat toss and someone stole his hat and tassel. We went to 7-11 for celebratory Slurpees (Alex’s request, he was parched). Ran into the Vroom Vroom Boys there. We have one neighbor within shouting distance, Fat Anthony. Fat Anthony divided his house into 3 apartments in addition to his own turf some years back. Last summer new tenants moved into one of the flats. City folk. A mom and two teenage sons. The boys, disgusted with being up here in the sticks, spent last summer STANDING in the middle of the road and forcing drivers to swerve around them. Yeah, we be bad. A few weeks ago the boys got a car. Night and day for almost a month now the two brothers have been racing the engine and practicing their burn-outs. Much squealing of tires and brakes. They wind up their high pitched sewing machine on steroids engine until the noise is a shrill “ERRRRR-EEEEEEEEEEE” which makes our cats ran around frantically and cough up hairballs. Elder son has found some thugs...excuse me...FRIENDS to hang with and they bring THEIR cars over and they all vroom together. When the friends leave, even if it’s 3:00am, there is a cannonade of horns. “BEEEEEEP! Bip Bip BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP!” This same homage is given each and every time one of them passes the house. You can take the boys out of the Bronx, but they’ll recreate it wherever they go. It’s the “Fast and Furious” combined with “Dumb and Dumber”. We haven’t made a stink because we’re outta here soon, and anyhow Fat Anthony and his tenants do their best to be even MORE unpleasant if we say anything. So the Vroom Vroom Boys were at the 7-11 and offered the still gowned, but cap-less Alex sincere and impressed congratulations. Alex has said the younger boy occasionally gets on the school bus, but once at the school attends no classes, preferring instead to hang out in Reefer Corner and impress the other loungers and cutters with his “I’m a bad mo-fo” attitude. I think it startled the Vroom Vroom Boys to see an actual high school graduate in the flesh. Yesterday was more party shopping. Sam’s for the meat and ice cream. Helped Mike do some setting up at the new house and then left to hit a stained glass craft show. I’ve been wanting to get some stained glass panels to hang in the windows of the stairwell. Depending on the style, they’d afford as much privacy as curtains, but would be more interesting and much prettier. Most of the stuff at the “show” was crap. Trite sun catchers, ugly lampshades and such. But the show was sponsored by an actual stained glass studio and the proprietor was terrific. She and I talked some about what I wanted. She does commission work and seems like someone I can work with well. I took her card and then went back out to the “show” and bought the only interesting thing I saw. It’s a garden piece, a chest high wrought iron dealie with a stained glass inset of a sun. Very cool. All the salads are made, as are the deviled eggs. So now there’s just the cake to pick up and the piñata to fill. We’ll get everything set up in good time. I sure as hell hope we don’t get a lot of no-shows. It’s likely though. Yesterday Wolf went to Eddie’s birthday party at (where else?) Chuck E Cheese and was one of only two guests who showed. Poor Eddie. Also poor Eddie’s parents, they get charged for a minimum of 6 kids regardless of the actual number of guests. And Chuck E Cheese ain’t cheap. As if you couldn’t tell by the jaundiced tone, I’m hurting big time. Some spasticity and tremors, but mostly just achy and ouchie. I haven’t been sleeping well and the nightmares aren’t helping. This morning’s was a doozy. I bolted awake around 4:00 and was too freaked out to try to sleep any more. While waiting for the sun to come up I’ve been playing Tanglewords and smoking. My effort to quit got derailed a little by recent events. I still don’t smoke anywhere except here at my computer, but the number of butts I have here has been running pretty high. Wolf came out of his room a few minutes ago announcing he’d wet the bed. Sigh. Nice omen, eh? I got him cleaned up and snugged him down in my bed to catch a few more zzzz’s. 5 hours until show time. Wolf and his boys are going to Parrrrr-TAY! When it’s over I’m going to have a nice quiet nervous breakdown and hopefully get some rest. ~LA Today’s Pick: “Boogie Oogie Oogie” by Taste of Honey
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