Monthly Archives: April 2008

Eyes Wide Open

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Last night. Let’s see, what did I do? Talked to Harpy on the phone. That was fun. Besides that not much else. I vented my spleen last night and that was a wonderful exercise. Over 800 words in a half hour. All I need is a fire under my butt apparently. And Tom Chin makes a nice face plate for an ignited fart. As giddy as I felt initially, dread soon entered the picture.

Bill was here last night, he came in after the first half hour of Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead, by Sidney Lumet. That was harrowing and ultimately disappointing. And a most unsatisfying finish. Has Sidney Lumet lost the plot? I hope not, though I have to confess I haven’t seen many, if any, Sidney Lumet movies. I know, ‘How could you consider yourself a film buff when you haven’t seen Family Business? The Wiz? 12 Angry Men?’ I guess I’m just not ‘that type’ of film buff.

Oh well, life goes on. Tom Chin still walks the earth. No more room in hell I suppose. Once again it was nice to wake up next to Bill. I’ve been getting up before him and out of the apartment while he still lays in bed asleep. Got to the office, no one there. Did the usual crap and also started to update my resume, selectively omitting my few months at Golden Staffing last year. I figured it wouldn’t look good, a three month gig, on a resume. Tom Chin even ragged on Padma who they are letting go. He’s such a jerk.

I thought of the jobs that I had from day one. I actually applied for a job at Alexanders Department Store in Paramus since they had a pretty good record department. But that was not to be, I was going to work at HBJ, where my mother worked as well as both of my brothers at various points in their lives. After going from part time to full time I left HBJ and moved to a company called the 1330 Corporation that put up displays in dentists offices around the country. That didn’t go well at all and soon left and tried to go back to HBJ but they wouldn’t have me back.

I then got a job as a messenger for a company called En Route, then got a job for an accounting firm called Friedman Alpren and Green. Then I worked for a friend’s fast food joint on Second avenue in the city called San Loco. Steve Fallon got in my head and told me I would be better off going somewhere else and wound up working for Rupert Murdoch for a few years courtesy of Errol Stewart. It was there that I met Harpy and Pedro. I was also working at McSwells at night as a bar back, then as a door person, then as a DJ among other things.

McSwells continued as the Murdoch job ended and I worked at Take One Video where in a chemical haze I gave videos away for free to my friends in similar states of mind. That ended badly and I got a job at Rizzoli books in Soho. That also didn’t last once they instituted a dress code. Thanks to Justin Luchner I got a job at Skyline Studios just as they were starting their decline. After that ran into the ground I moved laterally to Right Track Recording for a few years and then moved over to Arif Mardin’s production company.

That didn’t last long so I moved to Arista Records, then to A mastering house called the Lodge, run by Emily Lazar who was somewhat nice. I didn’t know where I fit there and jumped back to Arista. After the Arista gig ended I moved to People Magazine which was fun, but not steady work. Then onto Staffmark, where I thought I would be able to help people get jobs when I realized I hate people. Moved to an even worse situation after being unceremoniously dropped by Staffmark to a place called Adecco. Floated around as a temp after that and the night I moved into my apartment in Hoboken I was able to get a job at Putnam Lovell aka Wanker Banker which is where this blog initially started.

One of these days I’m going to do something about all these jobs. One of these days….

A-E-I-O-U

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Last night was rather nice. Bill came home and Juan stopped by. Juan was in town for his mother’s birthday and being the good son that he is he attended the festivities. What a good boy. He came over while I was watching John Adams, the final chapter. I knew how it ended, I just wanted to know how they were going to handle it. Little known fact, both John Adams and Thomas Jefferson died on the same day.

That day was July 4, 1826, fifty years after the Declaration of Independence. It’s been said that John Adams’ last words were, ‘Thomas Jefferson survives!’. I had heard that before and noticed they had included that in John Adam’s deathbed scene. Still with all that going on, I enjoyed Juan’s company as well as Bill’s. It was almost like old times. And by old times I mean a year or so ago. So old times, like time itself is relative I suppose.

After John Adams joined his dear Abigail we watched The Big Gay Sketch Show on Logo. Logo is the gay channel and we hardly ever watch it. I felt some levity was in order after all that. Bill enjoyed it guffawing throughout, I chuckled, Juan stared. I don’t know if Juan liked it or thought it was funny. Not cerebral comedy, but not pie in the face comedy.

Then we watched The Guide to Recognizing Household Saints. An unwieldy title and we missed the first half hour. It was ok, though it took me a while to figure out they were flash forwarding back and forth, Shia Le Beouf as the young Robert Downey Jr. We all agreed that Robert Downey Jr is hot and we wouldn’t have any problem getting him in bed, provided he was willing.

Juan left before it ended, having to drive back to Trenton and school today. I went to bed shortly after that, Bill staying up to watch who knows what. It was nice last night, sleeping with the windows open, but this morning was quite chilly. I was up at 6:00 and off to work, in the office at 8:00 on the dot. The office was empty, I was in a good mood setting things up.

People came in, unhappy it was Monday again but willing to get to work. I even saw Ronald Wanker, former owner of Wanker Banker on the street outside my building. Chatted with him for a few minutes, he complimented me saying that I was looking good. Bangin’ isn’t in his vocabulary.

Oh that Tom Chin, that thorn in my side, that shard of glass on the beach. Tom Chin had a colonoscopy last week which unfortunately went well. He is sure to live a long time, because like that Billy Joel fella once sang, ‘We didn’t start the fire.’ no wait, it wasn’t that. It’s Only The Good Die Young. Yes it’s gotten to the point where I am quoting Billy Joel. Interpret my state of mind if you will.

Today’s drama come courtesy of Tom Chin. First he started with a crack about the files that he couldn’t find back in January, the files that were in my desk when I was out sick. I let it slide. One of my tasks is to itemize the bills when they come in the mail. Today there was a phone bill. It was overdue. This is were it gets weird. Tom Chin has the worst handwriting known to man.

In March a bill came across my desk from Tom Chin, on it was written what looked like ‘un-auto pay’. So on March 13 I called the phone company and canceled the auto pay. Things have been tight financially and I figured this was a way that he was trying to save money for the company.

The overdue bill went to Tom Chin with my notation on it mentioning that March hadn’t been paid. He came over to my desk, saying why wasn’t this paid? He never canceled the auto pay. I showed him the note on the previous bill and he said it was a note to the bookkeeper, that the bill was ON auto pay.

His handwriting is so terrible, and with the fact that an ‘O’ is always a closed circle, this had the appearance of a ‘U’. He went off, yelling, ‘What the fuck is wrong with me? My handwriting isn’t illiterate!’ I told him it wasn’t illiterate, it was illegible. I spent the last half hour on the phone with the phone company trying to reinstate the auto pay. It should be taken care of on Wednesday when the bitch ass Tom Chin will be out.

He’ll also be out on Friday as well. The odd thing is, I didn’t get upset. Other coworkers came up and asked what that was about and I should them Tom Chin’s note, asking if they thought it was an ‘O’ or a ‘U’. They all said ‘U’. I didn’t get upset, I finished my job for the day and walked out of the office, enjoying my Padron as I walked west across town. I couldn’t help but think how Tom Chin must have felt, finally developing a functional scrotum.

In other news, I read over the weekend that men who masturbated a few times a week in their twenties greatly reduce their chances for prostate cancer later in their lives. I know I definitely had that covered then. Hopefully Tom Chin was brought up to believe that was a sin and being a good catholic never did that sort of thing.

Oh and Annemarie finally saw the History Boys DVD!