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 Guess It’s American

A Saturday in the cigar shack. Not a bad day as far as I am concerned. Thanks to a Chilean Sea Bass I’ve done quite good as did the store. There was a bit of a “to do” today. A customer bought a humidor that was marked down and asked if he could pick it up later in the week.

Bradley who had done the sale said ‘Sure, no problem’ and it wasn’t a problem since we had done this for various customers in the past. The customer came in today to pick it up and Bradley and I went crazy looking for the humidor. The customer decided to go home and would pick it up some other time.

Bradley and I kept looking but let’s face it, the cigar shack isn’t that large and one of us would have found it eventually. Thomas and Zack had been working in the cigar shack’s walk in humidor yesterday and that’s where the purchased humidor was last seen, where Bradley had left it, in a shopping bag. I suggested he call Zack and Thomas to see if they knew, perhaps they had moved it without telling anyone.

So Bradley did text them and Thomas replied that he had no idea. No word from Zack. Bradley had the idea to check the video tape and sure enough, there was Bradley placing the humidor in the walk in humidor. He checked the following days and there was a morning, Zack was the only one in the store, and it was a bit busy.

A well dressed guy walks around and goes into the humidor by himself while Zack was helping customers in the front of the shack. The well dressed guy looks around the walk in humidor and also checks to see Zack being busy with other people. The guy checks the bag, not really seeing what it was and seeing that Zack was still quite busy, picks up the bag and walks right out of the store, right under Zack’s nose.

Bradley and I couldn’t believe it. So brazen, this guy just walks in, looks around and just steals a humidor. The customer that it was sold to was understanding and the whole thing needs to be resolved on Monday, a refund or another humidor. That will be decided by Zack and the customer. I was infuriated as was Bradley and Jerry Vale.

I don’t recall seeing the well dressed guy before, but with a closer look, he could be someone that someone had seen before. Really douche bag behavior. It put a damper on the day but I do have to say that Bradley, Jerry Vale and myself were glad that it did not happen on any of our shifts.

There will be some tightening up I am sure, perhaps there will be no more ‘one guy working solo until the afternoon shift comes in’, since this did happen with Zack working solo, waiting for me to come in. I’m off tomorrow so I won’t have to deal with it until Monday.


"what's taters Precious?"



03 Shoplifters Of The World Unite

I Guess I’ll Miss The Man

It’s been a weird day. Interesting and a little bit entertaining but overall generally on the weird side. I can’t really say why exactly, perhaps it was the melatonin I took last night as a sleep aid. Not easy going to sleep and definitely not easy waking up. Bill was supposed to do his volunteer work for Felipe Luciano this morning, meaning that he needed to be out of bed at 3:30 this morning.

At 7:45 he was kissing me goodbye. Didn’t quite make it. Too many interruptions in the night. So he has to be back on whatever medication he needed to be on. He’s not driving tonight so I am happy that he will be home when I get home. I love coming home when he is home. He is so exuberant and genuinely happy to see me, much like I am when he comes home and I am the one who is waiting.

The cigar shack has been doing alright. Today was Zack, Bradley, Thomas and myself. And I was mainly off the floor counting items and putting away new stock. My numbers are down a bit but Thomas and Bradley keep mentioning that I am way above what I was expected to make, so I have a cushion of sorts and get no sympathy from either Thomas or Bradley.

It was warm enough or so I thought when I went to lunch, so I got myself a nice cigar and sat on a bench near the park like I usually do when it is warm out. Of course my timing was off and after 15 minutes of sitting in the sun, the sun moved further west, creating shadows that made the temperature drop considerably.

So reluctantly I went to the man cave to finish my cigar. I sat there reading Uncut and listening to a playlist I created modelled on songs that I initially heard on WPIX-FM in the late 1970’s as well as other songs that would fit. I ended with Blindness by the Fall which is actually a song I first heard on a car commercial. I suppose Mark E Smith got paid.

A little over an hour left in the shack. Thomas and Bradley are long gone, leaving Zack and myself. Jerry Vale came in after his other job to sit and have a cigar. I had such a good time last Friday with Bill at the Fab Faux birthday party that I couldn’t help but look back and wish now was then. It doesn’t happen that way, I know but still I was wistful.

Jimmy Seltzer stopped by the cigar shack with an interesting proposal of which I am game. It was said in passing but when hear more about it I will more than likely do something about it. So hungry right now. Should have had more for lunch than a crappy hot dog but no, I wanted to sit by the park. I will live, I have food at home. I just have to make it home.

Now I am home and Bill isn’t. I was hoping he would be here. Oh well. Looks like I will be the one with open arms waiting for him when he walks through that door. Still, I am glad to be home.

And yes, the fat fuck himself, Chris Christie vetoed the state legislature that approved same sex marriage. Coward.



What is Love