Author Archives: johnozed

About johnozed

I'm 50+ years old, 210-ish#, 6'2", reddish blonde, blue eyes with glasses (and without) masculine, funny, relatively intelligent, enjoy the company of assorted friends and family especially sordid friends and family. I love music, reading, writing, conversing, laughing, going to films, shows, concerts and smoking cigars. And I also enjoy looking nice in a suit and tie. Looking more like Lewis Lapham than Tom Wolfe. I'm sure there is more, but we'll just have to find out when I write about it. In a lifetime relationship with partner Bill Vila.

Chelsea Hotel # 2

It’s Tuesday. Didn’t write last night. Came home late and quite tired. I spoke with Annemarie on Sunday and told her I wasn’t going to write Sunday, but I was able to knock one off in about 20 minutes. Last night, exhausted, just couldn’t do it. So here I am, no frills. Did anyone notice I didn’t write? Maybe Harpy did, And Song and of course Annemarie. I don’t think Bill reads this every day, same with Juan, they’re the catch up kind, they’ll read a week at a time maybe, if I’m lucky. Everyone else is invisible and possibly nonexistent.

So what’s new? I got new glasses and I’m not used to them and I’m not sure if I like them. I should like them I paid enough for them. The old glasses, so dear to my heart and so close to my eyes, were a bit scratchy and obscured my vision. These glasses aren’t rose tinted, though I wish they were. I originally went to Lens Crafters across the street from my office one lunch time. I looked around, found some nice frames, but no one was willing to help me. Then a woman walked in and the sales staff were willing to help her. So I walked out and wound up at Cohen’s Fashion Optical, which was not as nice as Lens Crafters but they were willing to help me out. And willing to help the money out of my wallet. It’s a good thing I have insurance or I would be paying through the bridge of my nose.

Work has been interesting. I have a new assistant, Mary Tully. She’s nice, looks a bit like Uma Thurman. I couldn’t tell if she was overweight or pregnant and I dare not ask. It’s illegal to ask anyhow. She’s pregnant. She told me. I didn’t ask any more questions. I’ve been trying to find projects for her to do which are usually my cast offs. Today I had her call the security company that I got into hot water with back in May. I had her tell them that I was shipped off to Iraq should they ask. They didn’t ask. I figured if I was out of the picture, they would be more likely to actually help out the company.

The trouble was about how they sent some key cards to 900 Third Avenue, when they should have gone to 800 Third Avenue. That’s what set this idiot, Jeff off, yelling into the phone about how they deal with bigger companies than ours, when I mentioned the fact he sent the cards to the wrong address. Now that’s what I call security. Basically he acted like he was doing us a favor, rather than doing business as usual. I called up the owner of the company when this all went down and he of course took Jeff’s side. No, the customer is only right in their eyes if you’re a Fortune 500 company. That lights a fire under my ass towards making my company the best company, to be so successful that we could crush All Slime Defecation services.

On the home front here in Hoboken, Bill is stressed, understandably about his parents. His father, being in the nursing home is eating up their savings since his insurance has run out. His mother needs to be supervised so she takes her medication. She takes it, then forgets that she’s taken it and freaks out about it which freaks out Bill. The neighbors are worried about her too. So he has two parents that need to be monitored all day and night. And he still has to sleep on a sofa bed designed by the Marquis de Sade.

Hard to believe next week is Thanksgiving. Bill and I are headed out to Garfield so that should be nice. I need to remind Bill to load up on his allergy medication since they do have cats.

There’s a commercial for the New York State lottery that they’re showing, various people lip syncing to an Al Jolson song, Sitting on Top of the World. It’s so creepy, especially when they get to the guy with powdered sugar on his mouth, singing. I don’t know why but I find it makes me uncomfortable. Maybe it’s because I haven’t won the lottery. Yet.

And now, some pics.

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The NEW Me

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WTF?

Mashed Potato Time

Sunday. And a quiet and cold day it is. A truly lazy day. Didn’t do much of anything today. Just chilled out, and napped quite a bit. A lot was recovery from last night. Juan finally made it over and many beers were consumed. Sleep was good but uneasy. Bill and I watched Talk to Me starring Don Cheadle. He bought it earlier in the day and surprised me with it. Still a good movie, we had seen it in the theater over the summer when Billie was up from DC. Billie remembered Petey Green since Billie grew up in DC when most of the story was going on. Don Cheadle sounds a lot like Billie sometimes, working that DC accent. ‘I may be crazy, but I’m not that crazy’. And Bill and I loved the woman who played Petey’s woman.

It was an uneasy sleep like I said, due to the beer. But still I slept. Bill was up and out, first to make sure his mother took her medication, then to go to church. I stirred around 11:00 which wasn’t so bad. Needed food and on a Sunday morning food means bagels. So after showering and some coffee I headed out into the cold morning. Beautiful day, but cold at 36 degrees. Also needed some more groceries, and that was achieved with a minimum of speech. I was grateful that I didn’t need to actually speak to anyone since I wasn’t in the mood. I was hungry and a bit hungover which could be a lethal combination to mess with.

Came home, ate some breakfast, washed some dishes, read the papers and took a nap which was interrupted by my sister Annemarie. Her husband Rex may have been in the background in a documentary on the Sundance Channel about food co-ops. At least that’s what brother Frank told sister Annemarie. I didn’t see the show but I will keep an eye out for Rex if I ever see the show. According to Annemarie, she had taken me to the food co-op when I visited Arcata in 2001 but I wasn’t too impressed and preferred the supermarket, which sounds like me. Probably couldn’t find any crap at the food co-op and the supermarket was more exotic to me.

After the phone call I tried to nap some more, but really couldn’t. So I’m reading the newest Mojo magazine with Led Zeppelin on the cover. I wouldn’t mind winning the contest to see them perform in London. Not that I’m much of a Led Zeppelin fan. I like maybe 15 of their songs which I’ve compiled on my iPod. But still if I won, me being selected out of the millions of entries, it would be a kick to get to London for free. Ahh but who would I take? Perhaps one of the readers of this blog? That’s about five candidates, one or two of them, that I know of would be able to go with me. But I’m getting ahead of myself aren’t I?

Here’s some pics from today, all taken from my bedroom window. Lazy!

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and now, some foliage
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