Monthly Archives: March 2012

I Have Friends in Holy Spaces

Well I am home. I expected to get home later since a staph meeting was scheduled much to the dismay of Thomas and myself. I also had to go to work an hour earlier than usual which did not make me happy at all. I did sleep really well last night but that did not help with waking up in the morning. After a valiant struggle I was able to get out of bed and do my usual routine before heading out into the cold.

And it was quite cold this morning as I waited on Bloomfield Street for that 12 bus to Manhattan. Indifferent crowd on the bus an hour earlier. No one I knew so I just stared out the window, alternating with the smartphone. The cigar shack was dead yesterday and today promised to be the same only with a staph meeting being the cherry on top.

So for the first hour it was Zack and myself. Zack was ensconced on his office doing things and after a while he came out and told me that he had a lot of work on his hands and the staph meeting isn’t going to happen after all. I must have had a shit eating grin on my face as I explained to Zack that I didn’t mind about that. I told him that I understood that he is at the cigar shack all the time (except for weekends) and that I was not looking forward to getting into work at 10:30AM and not leaving until possibly 10:30PM.

Things picked up somewhat, proving that Mondays are not necessarily Sundays. Thomas came in and we clashed a few times. I do have to take a step back sometimes and realize that Thomas is only 25 and has so much more to learn about life and things. On the other end of the spectrum, Bradley and Jerry Vale were in today as well, in jeans and definitely not in a suit & tie like Thomas, Zack & myself.

They were working in the stock room cleaning things up so no need for fancy clothes. The day went along in an alright manner. I had a nice lunch at the diner, a Ma & Pa special and read the New Yorker. Back at the shack an hour later, actually a little bit earlier than an hour since Thomas was complaining about how hungry he was and how he didn’t want to have lunch at 5:00. I was about 10 minutes early so he was able to head out himself and saving me from hearing his whining about how late it was. It made a difference.

Bradley and Jerry Vale were done with their project and helped out with the unpacking of boxes. I found a nearly full box of cigars nestled in the area were we keep our empty cigar boxes. It was the second time that happened. Apparently someone has been putting boxes of cigars hidden among the empty boxes, perhaps hoping to steal them. Zack was surprised at this and I asked Bradley and Jerry Vale about it and they had no idea so that means whenever we give away our empty cigar boxes we have to make sure the boxes that get picked are truly empty.

With no staph meeting that meant I was able to leave early tonight, I was in early and Thomas was closing. Zack asked that I stay in case it gets busy but since it was not busy at all I left at around 8:45, roughly a half hour earlier than usual.

Uneventful bus ride home, and I listened to James, a band from the UK from the 1990’s that Eno produced. I never heard this particular album, Wah Wah but it’s very good.

Who cares if I am 15 years too late?


05. [Say Something]

I Have A Dream

A Saturday in the cigar shack and I am happy to be here thank you very much. It’s also Fake Patrick’s Day in Hoboken. I believe I was at one of the first Fake Patrick’s Day parades in Hoboken in 1991,but headed down to Manahawkin instead. That was a trip in itself.

Each year in Hoboken it has been getting worse. Drunken twenty somethings roaming the streets going to bars and pubs and house parties and peeing or vomiting on the streets. This year since it had gotten so out of hand, the powers that be decided to cancel the parade hoping that it would curtail the drunken behavior.

Well that caused a bit of a to do, some people (idiot clergy included) saying it was defaming to the Irish, how unfair it all seemed to be. So Mayor Dawn Zimmer decided to host an Irish Heritage day on Pier A, which I have no idea what that meant. Still it should have kept her political enemies quiet, but no it didn’t quite work that way.

Mayor Zimmer’s enemies have stopped short of blaming the fire at 3rd and Washington on City Hall, since the fire department had a few trucks helping a fight a fire in Jersey City. The fire was put out but the firestorm towards Dawn Zimmer raged on.

A gathering was held last night at a local bar to help the victims of the fire, and even that was under attack from the old school Hoboken politicos, saying that the money was going into the pockets of the organizers and not the people who were the victims. Even with the Rotary Club involved they still spewed their nonsense.

In any event, I am happy to be out of Hoboken today, though I am anticipating some difficulty getting home. I do hope I am wrong. While waiting for the bus this morning I saw groups of young people carrying cases and six packs of beer and funnels heading to house parties.

Julio took it upon himself to text me about how disgusted he was with these young drunkards. Of course he is disgusted. He has a kid now and does not want Alexander to see adults behaving badly. Julio could not help but compare us to the youth of today, annoyed with the youth going to pubs at 10 in the morning dressed in green. I reminded him that we were ourselves, probably green back in the day and leaving Maxwells at 10 in the morning. He didn’t respond to that text which leads me to believe that I might have hit it too close to home.

Thomas is antsy to get out of here. He came in at 10:30 this morning which means he leaves at 8:30 and now it is 8:27. And now it is 8:30 and Thomas has flown the coop, leaving me as a solo. Not a good idea since I just had 2 guys in the humidor and 2 other people came in to look at some pricey items.

I couldn’t leave the guys in the humidor since everything is within reach and fits into pockets too nicely. So the people looking at the big ticket items were ignored and left, leaving me with the 2 guys who just bought individual cigars. That’s the nature of the beats I suppose.

Now I am back in Hoboken. A 15 minute wait for the bus back to Hoboken wasn’t so bad. I killed the time playing solitaire on my smartphone. The ride was uneventful until we got to Hoboken where the drunk girls got on, dressed in green and looking a bit green around the gills.

I got off the bus at a stop early so as to avoid the pub near my usual stop. It’s a rowdy pub most days and on Fake Patrick’s Day night it promised to be even rowdier. So I got off at 8th Street and of course there was a belligerent drunk outside the 8th Street Tavern, some kid drunk off his ass looking for a fight. Any fight with anyone.

Sirens were approaching so the drunk kid vanished with his friends who were doing a terrible job staying out of trouble. I’m home now after stepping around a few puddles of puke, none the worse for wear. Glad to be here and also glad I’m not in my 20’s anymore.



02 African Night Flight