the day after yesterday | johnozed

Well sad to say Clarence Clemons has passed away. Can’t say I am much of a Bruce fan, not like my siblings but I do appreciate his oeuvre. I grew up listening to Bruce’s first three albums and by the time the rest of the catalog came out my brother Frank and sister Annemarie had moved out so I wasn’t hearing much from their end. Brian was still around but by that time I was more into Punk/Post Punk/ New Wave.

Still those first three albums are embedded in my DNA. I only saw Bruce live once, and that was on the Born in the USA tour at Giants Stadium in East Rutherford and that was more like a rally at Nuremberg in the 1930’s without the Leni Riefenstahl cameras and certainly more enjoyable.

It was sad news to come home to, to say the least. The day at the cigar shack was not as busy as it was hoped. I made it in on time, no pick pockets on the bus. That enabled me to get an egg sandwich on my way to the shack. It was a beautiful morning as I walked up the avenue. In the shack were Calvin, Thomas, Jerry Vale and me. It was a mellow day. Thomas once again showed his extraordinary skills as a salesman. No $3000 humidor sales going on for him but still his numbers were impressive.

Calvin ranked at number two and I was in third place. Calvin had the strange idea to have Jerry Vale work a register on a day like today. It wasn’t constantly busy but there were a few flurries. It would have made more sense to have Jerry Vale learn during the week when things are a lot slower. Thomas pointedly told Calvin it was a bad idea and Calvin stood there dumbfounded, which made Thomas’ voice become louder and shriller.

The blood on the carpet was finally cleaned up but there was a mysterious crack in the door to the lounge. No one knows how it got there, and if they did they didn’t own up to it. People walked through with a rare delicacy afforded to brutes going in and out of the man cave. And a stalker came into the store. Not my stalker. Last I heard of her she was still scouring the east side looking for me or someone with my name.

No this was Calvin’s stalker. She hadn’t been seen around in a while apparently but I was stuck with her and got along with her just fine. As far as I knew she didn’t pay much attention to me, but she definitely stared at Calvin whenever he came into view. Calvin did his best to be invisible and he generally was for the time she was in the shack.

Now it’s Saturday night, I’m home, Bill isn’t. He was not driving down to Atlantic City this weekend, instead having call backs from previous auditions. I don’t mind the quietness, but still it would be better if he were here, driving me crazy. Not writing tomorrow so don’t ask. I would like to read your blogs if you have any. Send me the linkage suckas.

It’s a Monday and it’s a day off. It’s been a pretty mellow day, last night I took off my wrist watch before I went to sleep. I always sleep with it on but last night I wanted no ties to the real world or real time. It worked well, and waking up was certainly different. But I got out of bed and started the day nicely.

Some coffee, some bagels and a nice breakfast. I decided to just clean up the apartment today, which meant mainly cleaning up the table next to the desk on which this computer rests. Lots of mail and bills that needed to be shredded. I did that for a while, filling up a few bags of shredded paper. It was certainly a better way to start the day than yesterday.

Yesterday started out alright, met Bill at the bus stop for a few minutes before I boarded. Bill had just gotten home from driving a bus to and from Atlantic City. It was too short a time but better than nothing. The bus soon filled up somewhat. I was sitting in the middle of the bus, across from the back door.

Next to me was a guy who promptly fell asleep after a minute. It was crowded as we drove through the tunnel. As we were exiting the tunnel there was a commotion. A passenger, seemingly from Europe accused a black man of taking his wallet.

The black man said that it was his wallet and the European yelled for him to show it then. After a very long minute the black man said he was sorry and offered the wallet back. The European said he was going to call the cops. The bus approached the bus terminal and the ramps leading up to the gates had quite a few Port Authority police on them.

There was a construction project going on and the cops were there to make sure no cars were going through as well as making sure the buses would queue up correctly since there was only one ramp available. The bus driver signaled the police and they came over to see what the problem was. Both the European and the black man got off the bus to tell their sides of the story.

Other buses passed us going in and out of the bus terminal as we sat on the ramp for about twenty minutes. After that the European got back on the bus apologizing for the delay and outside the black man could be seen walking up the ramp in handcuffs with a Port Authority police officer on each side. It was a strange situation, since there was no escape for the black man.

We were on a bus in traffic and there was no way off the bus until we got to the gate. It seemed to me that he almost wanted to be caught. Needless to say I wound up being late for work and texted Bradley to let him know. It was only about 15 minutes but I do not like being late at all.

The day was a breeze and it was fun competing with Bradley for top sales. At one point I was in the lead by about $30.00 but I wasn’t having that. It was too close a margin and I have to admit I became a shark, greeting customers as soon as they stepped into the cigar shack.

At the end of the day I was in the lead by about $300.00. I did lose the coin toss and wound up having to close, but since it was a Sunday and the cigar shack closes early on Sundays- I really did not mind.