Monthly Archives: June 2010

I’m Coming Down

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Written the night before as I am working the late shift again. It was an interesting day again. I opened the store after having Wednesday off.

Don Birch had opened at 9:00, a half hour before me. Marcus came in after me. It was a little bit busy, but when Raymond showed up at 11:30, there wasn’t enough busyness to go around. I took lunch at 1:00, Marcus was soon off for the afternoon going wherever it is that he goes.

I said I would see him tomorrow and he replied that he might be back. He says that often enough and never comes back. I had a decent cigar after eating lunch but felt a bit of a chill as I sat on a bench by the park.

I decided to head in when the cigar extinguished itself and finished it in the back room. No World Cup on the flat screen, but rather boring old golf. Fifteen minutes later I was back at work behind the counter.

Raymond mentioned that with Calvin off today and Marcus away from the office I could have easily relaxed for a few more minutes instead of rushing to finish the cigar. I didn’t mind. The afternoon crawled a bit and I thought I might have been getting sick.

Mind over matter I said to myself and had a banana shortly afterward. I did feel better after the banana. I eat a banana almost every day that I work. Sean, the part time employee was a bit late coming in and Raymond, Don Birch and Sean almost immediately fell into sniping at each other.

I wisely stayed above the fray. When Calvin and Marcus are out, they do something called Round Two, which is basically a chance to sit in the back room and have a small cigar and relax. It was Raymond and myself in the back room when Don Birch who was supposed to watch the counter, decided to go to the lavatory while Sean maintained the humidor.

Raymond was a bit upset at that and went to the counter when Marcus came back, surprising everyone. Don Birch had left the lav and told me Marcus had returned. My timing was perfect as I was also talking to a customer in the back room when Marcus came in with some representatives.

No one was caught sitting down, least of all, me. My three co-workers stood around the counter and continued sniping at each other while Marcus and company sat and smoked and drank in the back room.

I didn’t feel comfortable hanging around the counter so I opted to check the inventory in the humidor. Eventually Marcus’ fiance came in and a few minutes later Marcus and company with the fiance headed out and the three co-workers continued sniping.

This is how it is at the Cigar Shop. It will more than likely be repeated on Saturday when it will be the four of us again. This time Marcus and Calvin will definitely be away. And we can dress casually. Not because Marcus and Calvin won’t be around but on weekends we can dress in a nice shirt and trousers.

Tonight, I made it from the shop where I work to the bus terminal in 17.8 minutes, thanks to Beck.
I may not write tomorrow since it’s been so ling since I’ve taken a day off from writing. Still, if something happens then I more than likely will write. But if not, then I won’t.

I might be hanging out with Walt Turske.

I’m a Wicked One

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Walking to the Path train Tuesday night after work, I walked through Times Square. I know it’s a tourist trap but I’m usually plugged into my iPod and smoking a cigar so people generally stay away from me.

And it’s the quickest route to the Path train, what with the pedestrian plazas that have been created in Times Square. The plazas north and south of Times Square are generally empty and people stay on the sidewalk.

I came up with a completely off the top of my head statistic, that for every 20 tourists, there are 4 to 5 people trying to convince them to head over to the comedy clubs. I don’t know the success rate of getting out of towners into these places to pay a cover charge with a 2 drink minimum.

The people who are trying to get the tourists in are usually young comics performing this duty so that they could get a spot in the evening’s show.

I also noticed a few young American women in head scarves. They are what I guess to be, recent converts to Islam. Why would a woman what to commit to a life of subjugation? I also realized that it was my awakening to Islam, that convinced me that religion, all religion is truly absurd.

I knew of a woman years ago, a friend of a friend who converted to Judaism. And her name wasn’t Judy so that really didn’t make sense. Why do such intelligent people decide to believe in an iron age sky god?

True, it is their lives to live and not my business and I usually keep my thoughts to myself, but I decided to take this opportunity to state my case.

I myself was raised catholic and thought I’d see god in a sun beam peering through the clouds, not really thinking it was just a sun beam peering through the clouds. In Paramus Catholic, my high school we had to do research and write a paper about different religions.

I was given Lutheranism to research and found myself agreeing with what Martin Luther had to say. That started my drift away from catholicism. I eventually became an agnostic, doubting the existence of a god.

Then when 9/11 occurred, that sealed it. I was an atheist. The crime, the violence done in some idiot god’s name, by the even more idiotic followers was just disgusting and I realized that religion just drags down the human race, and prevents it’s growth.

Growing up, basic questions that I asked could not be answered. Questions like, ‘if a group of people live good lives and treat each other well, why would they go to hell if they didn’t do anything wrong and never heard about Jesus or Mohammad or whatever?’

It’s such a racket and Karl Marx was right when he wrote, ‘Religion is the opiate of the masses’. In the 1980’s I amended that in a fanzine that I used to contribute to, and wrote, ‘Mass is the opiate of religion’.

Perhaps someone else wrote that before I did, but I don’t know or didn’t know about it.