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.

I Have Seen The Rain

2 Replies

Today has been a good day. I was off and I didn’t over sleep too much. 15 minutes was about all I needed and 15 minutes was about all I got. Bill was up and out hours before I got out of bed, leaving me with a farewell kiss and a pot of coffee to remember him by. He makes the best coffee. There were no real plans today except for laundry, a trip to the supermarket and the dry cleaners as well as a visit to the bibliothèque. It all went well I am happy to report.

A walk around Hoboken after the library included a stop at the local record store where I got the latest Mojo & Uncut Magazines from a very indifferent guy behind the counter who was more interested in labeling the latest used dubstep cds than being helpful. On the way out I saw Bill Ryan who used to run the late great record store Pier Platters. It was a brief ‘hello how are you doing’ said in passing. Good to see him though, I see him maybe once a year rather than almost every day like it was all those years ago.

The building that was on fire a couple of weeks ago is now down to two floors left. It’s been a steady demolition and the streets around the building are still closed to traffic. I think the benefit that was held this past Friday went well and clothing and other items are still being donated via the Rotary Club.

It was a beautiful day on Hoboken, the sun was shining on a clear blue sky but it was also quite cold. It was good to get out this afternoon. I was going to stop by the Guitar bar and say hello to Mr. Wonderful, but it was after school so the place would be busy with kids taking lessons or parents waiting to pick up their kids. I did make it back home and watched some TV which I eventually turned off and opted to hear music instead.

There was a plan to meet with my friend Lois tonight and pick up some socks that she has. But once I got home I was pretty much settled in and luckily able to meet with her on Friday instead. Now Bill is home and I can’t type for shit. No really. It’s taken me quite a while to get this far. So many typos which you won’t see since I will correct them all before it goes online. It’s so much easier to surf the net or read friends postings on Facebook than it is to write.

Once again Dorothy Parker’s axiom rings true, ‘I hate writing but love having written’. And that applies right now to a project that I am going to be involved with. I have the ingredients but need to get started on it. And the five ideas I have are subject to change as are the subjects themselves. I know I can do it, I have done it already. Some tightening up, some clear headedness and of course time is the main requirement.

No distractions. Bill and I watched a Spalding Gray DVD the other night and Spalding spoke of being in a writers colony, the McDowell Colony, where he was afforded the time and space to work on his project. Of course I do not have the access to such an environment but it would be nice. But right now the artist colony is where I am at, right in front of the computer. It’s not where you’re from it’s where you’re at.






I Have Friends in Holy Spaces

Leave a reply

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]