April | 2012 | johnozed

Tuesday Afternoon by the Moody Blues is playing. It’s probably the only Moody Blues song I like, or at the very least, the one I like the most. I heard it constantly growing up in the 1970’s, on WNEW-FM. I eventually worked with Justin Hayward on something in the 1990’s (maybe it was a Moody Blues thing) and though I never got too close to him, engineers told me the guy was basically toast.

Back at the cigar shack today, no despair happening. A good day with Bradley and Jerry Vale with Zack buried in the office under a mountain of paperwork. Sales were fair, nothing great. It’s only the third of the month and we’re on par with last year, though I think the home chateau might be hoping for higher numbers.

It’s been quite a nice spring day outside, I was able to enjoy a slightly damaged cigar and read some more Kurt Vonnegut during my lunch hour. Bill has been super phenomenal lately. He’s singing the national anthem again before the Mets game at CitiField on April 22. I’ve already put in my request for a day off. I am hoping it does not rain. Still any time spent with Bill is time well spent.

I had some good customers today. Sometimes you get some really good ones, others are not so good. Some are pleasant and some are dicks. Today it was all pleasant. It is early yet, a little over an hour left, leaving the dicks, plenty of time to make their uncircumcised appearances. Jimmy Seltzer is here, playing the role of my favorite customer. He remarked on the good mood I am in. ‘Just riding that manic high’ was my explanation.

Even some customers who get on my wick didn’t bother me that much today, some even going so far as to be somewhat pleasant. Now ‘Take The Long Way Home’ by Supertramp is playing. A guilty pleasure for me. I loved Even in The Quietest Moments’ and Breakfast in America’. Jerry Vale just mentioned seeing them at the Garden for the Breakfast in America tour. I mentioned that they broke up soon after the tour, right after they reached the top.

In some ways it’s like Harper Lee. I watched a documentary on her and Margaret Mitchell last night on PBS. I like the Harper Lee documentary more, having read To Kill a Mockingbird and seen the movie countless times. Miss Harper Lee only wrote that one classic book. Never came out with anything else.

Not that she had to, but anything that she would have done would be compared to Mockingbird, and that would near impossible to duplicate. So I guess she did the right thing, cutting out at the right time, much like Supertramp. Is that a stretch or what?

Now there is a little over a half hour left in the cigar shack. the Eagles are playing ‘One of These Nights’ yes I am going down memory lane and dragging Jimmy Seltzer and Jerry Vale with me. I guess I am lucky since they’re not complaining.

Now I am home, still in a good mood. Bill of course is almost always in a good mood, and stayed up for me to come home. Now he’s in bed and I am in front of the computer. Maybe it was the multivitimin. Or the Shepherd’s Pie I had for lunch. Or spring fever. Anyway, I’m running with it. Or walking briskly.

Anti Samsung protest near cigar shack. Photo taken with a Samsung smartphone

Stevie Wonder – Outside My Window

A Monday and a day off. Quite nice, overall though there was a bout of despair, earlier in the day. I don’t understand it, I enjoy having a day off but the past 2 times I had a day off I was miserably depressed. Last week I took a Xanax to deal with it, this time I merely got out and walked around.

Last night wasn’t so bad, I was tired enough to go to bed about an hour earlier, like a little before midnight. At 12:20 I was out of bed and surfing the net. I did fall asleep but I was awoken by my own snoring. At the usual time that I go to bed, 1:00 I was able to fall asleep. I slept alright and woke up this morning feeling somewhat rested.

I went out with some shirts for the dry cleaners and a visit to the supermarket, where I saw the mighty Isis on my way out. Coming back home and after breakfast is when the despair crept in. But it was a beautiful day, a bit windy but alright to go out and run the errand I needed to run.

A while back I bought a Timex watch with a leather strap and after wear and tear over time, the leather strap started to fall apart. I held it together with a rubber band but it looked unsightly. Last Friday I was in midtown and stopped by a shoe maker and had the band replaced with a metal band, sort of like a Speidel watch band, but it wasn’t.

I liked it and that was all that mattered. On Saturday while working at the cigar shack, I looked at my watch and saw that the watch band was hanging together by a metal thread. All it took was for me to touch it when it fell apart. I guess I was fortunate that I was standing still and not walking on the street or something like that.

I tried but I could not get it together, unable to connect one part to another since a piece was missing. That meant I spent several moments looking at my wrist and wondering what time it was. Waking up was difficult since I wear the watch to bed and usually check the watch to see what time it is, rather than actually lifting myself from the bed to look at the alarm clock.

So much easier to lay there, one eye open with my trusty Timex watch one inch from my eye so that I could see its face, so blind am I without my glasses.

I anticipated some difficulty with the shoe maker since it was a cash transaction and no receipt was given or asked for. So I took the bus into Manhattan on my day off and walked over to 39th Street, off of Sixth Avenue. I walked in and they seemed busy, but the guy behind the counter sort of remembered me. Must have been the codpiece I was wearing.

I explained what happened and he took the watch and opened up a box filled with metal watch bands. Finding one that best suited my machismo, he set about taking off the old watch band and putting on the new one. It took about all of five minutes and I was soon back on the street where I ran into my old Rasta pal, Jesse.

After a brief chat it was a walk to the Path train which I rode reading Kurt Vonnegut and listening to Carole King on the iPod. It was a beautiful, yet breezy afternoon and I am glad I was able to get out and enjoy it, if only for a short while.