Heard you missed me... I'm back!

We went from North Carolina to Maine via a one night stop in Albany. I had hoped there would be time to touch base with my family but we got there so late that only a small group of my friends ventured out to take us to dinner and keep us awake far too late.

The next morning we all overslept so my hopes of visiting ZOMBIE PLANET too bad really, I love the smell of rulebooks in the morning.

I hope the family and friends I missed out on won't be too angry with me.

We reached Maine and my sister-in-law's place by late afternoon and while the guys relaxed and puttered around the women went out shopping. I had a chance to play with my sister-in-law's MacBook.

I want one!

(And plan to get one this month...)

I checked in on emails and twitters and stuff and then settled down to have dinner.

When the wedding day came there was the standard chaos, my daughter stained her flower girl dress within seconds of putting it on. Things were misplaced or left behind- in the case of my undershirt that wasn't to bad, in the case of the wedding dress... that caused some mayhem.

Finally the moment of truth came and my sister in law was married and now on her way to the happily ever after she more than deserves. She made a lovely bride - and my wife as the wife was utter hawtness as the matron of honor. If I hadn't already been married to her I would have asked her for a date at the reception.

Also at the reception we received many compliments on my daughter's lovely calico print dress, except that it wasn't calico print it was just that my daughter kept staining it again and again as the evening went on until she started leave a trail of gravy behind her.

The next morning came far to early and after a completely non-nutritious breakfast we were on the road again, the trip back was more direct but we still had to stay overnight in a motel and I realized over my continental breakfast that I had turned 42.

Of course all I have to do is remember slow dancing with my wife at the reception to feel young again.

Price Breaks and Heartaches: part sixteen

The story you are looking for has been relocated and retooled.

PRICE BREAKS AND HEARTACHES can now be found here.

If you can't find one of your favorite chapters don't worry, it'll be back!

Fully Employed But Half Awake

This is not simply a blog entry, oh no.

This is part of today's struggle a delaying tactic if you will.

I am still at work and about to fall asleep at my desk.

mmmmmmm... sleep....

It wasn't that I stayed up to late, I am nothing if not responsible. It's just that I was awoken by the sensation of my face being furiously licked and sadly the culprit was not Jessica Alba or Judge Marilyn Milian but my big eyed dog Jake. I patted Jake on the head and ushered him away. Then I tried to get back to sleep but it was no use, I had been awoken. I checked the clock radio, it was three AM. I groaned audibly and pounded my fist against the mattress. The minor commotion disturbed my wife and half-awake she grumbled "You're supposed to do that in your office."

Awkward.

So now here I am, struggling to stay conscious as the workday ticks by slowly... numbingly... soothingly... so soothingly...

just a few minutes... I'll just close my eyes for a few minutes...

But no! I can't do that. That's the trap, I know that if I close my eyes for what I promise yourself will just be a moment the next thing I know I'll find myself waking up from lying face first on my keyboard, my face slicked with my own drool. I drool a lot when I sleep, I drool like Paris Hilton at a rich douchebag convention. Besides I know the minute I nod off my boss or any number of corporate underlings will come wandering into my cubicle for one reason or another.

So I sit here typing away, pausing only for the occasional blackou-


mustn't... black... out...

...or steal dialogue from Frank Miller comic books.

I'm no stranger to falling asleep at work, it doesn't matter what the job I had I feel asleep there at least once. I once fell asleep while manning a cash register in the middle of an afternoon rush. All I know is that I started to get drowsy at 1:30 and the next thing I knew it was 2:45- I still have no idea what happened during that missing hour and fifteen minutes but oddly enough my cash drawer was perfectly even that day. I rare occurrence for me.

When I worked in an office supply store I would frequently drowse off in an office furniture display while 'straightening it'- I guess it was kind of practice for now eh kids?

and my dreams, brief and disturbing... am at home dreaming of my job or at my job dreaming of home?

And I really do dream of work an awful lot really, maybe that's why I'm so comfortable sleeping here. Maybe its just getting even, maybe its just a sign of old but where I once dreamed I was a character in a particularly Freudian episode of Doctor Who or the X-Files I now dream that I'm on a quest to figure out where the latest productivity meeting is. Where I once dreamed of banging away on Cindy Crawford or Angela Lansbury I now find my dream self trying to bang a toner cartridge into a dirty photocopier- a dirty dirty photocopier. Where I once dreamed I was a long haired Adonis I now dream that I am a long haired Adonis with a clip on tie.

why is it the more tired I get the more offensive and surreal my material gets, like a tiny Nazi riding on a mule wearing a spangled turban...

It is an amazing and cruel thing to be perfectly awake at 3 AM watching infomercials and dead to the world at 3PM when you are supposed to be enhancing shareholder value. I try to give my energy a boost by having sugary snack, there are no shortage of sugary snacks around my workplace. I believe it is an insidious plan by my corporate masters to make us too bloated to leave our cubicles. I can almost see my future self so bloated that he cannot move from his ergonomic chair, kept alive and working via a company that pays us in insulin. Of course we will passing the savings on to our customers.

barely awake now... dreaming of Nutty Buddy bars...

I promise myself that when I get home I'll go straight to bed but that's a lie; dogs need to be walked, then re-walked, my daughter needs to be made to do her homework - reason is rarely effective , the threat of waterboarding has been a rousing success, my wife will most likely yell at me for gently mocking her on the Internet. And really I shouldn't mock her because of all the women I have made love to she is the only one that never shouted "What the HELL are you doing?"

Oh yeah. She's a keeper.

My daughter's homework is a major stumbling block as well, I don't remember my homework being quite so intricate when I was nine years old. Then again I did have to take my classes in the boiler room with the other 'creative' students. Now once my daughter gets focused she does great but getting her to that point seems to take a long exhausting time. Before I know it it's 8:30 and time to take out the garbage and maybe clean the catbox, sure it might make more sense to do those chores in reverse but that's just not how I roll.

Before I can go to bed however I first spend some time with the missus then try to add a write a few pages. It could be anything, my blog, my writing, my ever growing enemies list.

You bastards know who you are.

Then I go to bed but I know I won't make it through the night, something will wake me up at 3 AM even if it is the sound of my own snoring.

waking up now ...I can think again...

Well I managed to stay awake, the brain activity involved in working on this little project is just what I needed.

Of course now that you're read this there is a good chance I've put YOU to sleep.

Suburban Wormholes and Plainer Things

Suburban Wormholes and Plainer Things
by
Al Bruno

"How can all the butter knives be gone?"

Is it marriage? Parenthood? Ageing? Now don't get me wrong, I lost stuff back in the old days too, but it was never so bad and so irritating. Nowadays things just seem to disappear. I sometimes think wormholes are the only rational expiation, somehow tiny pinholes open up in the fabric of reality and snatch away things from us and deliver them to some other place. This is not an original thought, this is from Douglas Adams but at times I think he may have been right.

"Where is my shoe? I can only find one shoe."

Now lets just confirm here that this is not one of my many rants about my loss of hair (But why God WHYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY?) this is about those magazines your sure you left on the table, or those darn nail clippers that you know should be in the junk drawer. Where do these things go? How can we be so certain they're in one place when they're really in another? Of course this can cut both ways. For example, somewhere in my house there is a digital stopwatch but I don't know where it is. I only know that at around 4 AM it bleeps for 60 seconds. I have been awoken by this sound many times, usually with a panicked cry of "Fries are up!"

Regardless of what I may or may not scream I frequently stumble out of bed and go crashing around the darkened kitchen trying to find the source of the noise. I look in the junk drawers, behind the washing machine, under the fridge, even under the sink. I don't know where it is, I only pray that when we move again we leave it behind instead of somehow inadvertently packing it and taking it with us again.

"Well where did you leave the library book? It’s overdue."

The umbrella, the remote control, that envelope with the directions to the barbecue- all gone. There’s no rhyme or reason to it. At least if it was valuables and shiny things we could suspect it was thieves, at least if we found chewed up stuff under the bed we could blame the dogs and if it was dollar bills then my wife would know I was going to that strip club again.

But no, it’s always accessories, it’s always things you can set down and turn your back on. No one ever loses televisions, boxes of cat litter or spare tires. Trust me, I’ve been trying to lose my spare tire for years.

“Your car keys? How could you lose your car keys?”

And the more important it is to your well being the harder it is to find again. Dear reader, I am a man on a quest, an eternal quest to see where he left his glasses this time. I think I understand why Elton John wore such audacious eyewear- so he could find the fucking things.

Medicines are pretty easily lost too, sometimes my Prozac is in the medicine cabinet, sometimes I leave the bottle in my desk drawer or the kitchen counter near the fishbowl. The only exception was during my month of kidney stones, I don’t care how woozy I was I knew right where those sweet sweet vicodin pills were every moment of the day. I think once I got into a fight with the cat because he was standing too close to them.

Of course the cat won- but I was crazy and stoned, what did you expect?

“Ok just stop and try to think about where you had it last. Don’t give me that look…”

I might suspect that this happens because my wife, daughter and I all move stuff when we’re cleaning up after each other but I would be lying to myself if I did. My daughter and I never do any housework, it’s sad really.

Once my friend Greg once gave me a Stone Temple Pilots CD, I thanked him by juicing up his D&D character’s stats before the game started. That night I opened the cd case and saw it was empty. Now a few hours and orcs ago I had looked right at the thing but somehow it had vanished. I searched for hours but it was gone. I keep the empty case in the closet and check it every once in a while to see if the CD has come back but just like the Stone Temple Pilots record sales, it most likely never will. See what I mean about those darn wormholes?

Speaking of role playing games, I lost one of those without a trace as well. It was Over the Edge by Robin D. Laws. I was sure it was in this one box in my closet but when I went looking for the game all I found was some old party supplies. If you know anything about Over the Edge you’ll probably find that hauntingly appropriate.

“I just bought soap. Don’t tell me we’re out, we can’t be out.”

Moving was the worst, the sheer amount of stuff that was somehow lost simply staggers the mind. We lost some clothes, some pots and pans, stuff like that. I suppose it is a natural consequence of trying to pack your entire house into a single rented truck on a Sunday afternoon with a few drunken friends.

What hurt was losing some of my favorite Clive Barker hardcovers- Imagica, Weaveworld, Cabal and The Great and Secret Show. Those aren’t just books folks, those are entire worlds trapped between two dust jacketed cardstock covers. I could hold those books in my hands and remember the places I was when I was reading them, the things I was feeling, the girls I was striking out with…

“Will someone call me? I don’t know where my cell phone is. Yes I know it’s in my briefcase but I don’t know where it is either.”

So you go on a mad search for these missing things, these AWOL items. You pretty much tear the house apart; lifting couches, throwing cushions and sometimes going through the garbage. You get crazier, you start to accuse your spouse and children of moving things, of plotting against you. The clouds of dust you disturb sting your eyes and soon enough you doubt your own sanity. How could you lose something like that? Why can’t you just put leave your rings on the nightstand or your nose hair trimmer in the medicine cabinet?

“Oh there it is… what the Hell is it doing there?”

Sometimes you never find what you’re looking for again but most times you find the remote under the ottoman, the keys under the car seat and your glasses on the lazy Susan. Nothing dramatic, nothing strange, you’re just another person with more stuff than sense.

I have seen the wormholes and they are us.

Claw and Order: Another Somewhat Real Life Adventure of Al Bruno III

Oh where can I begin, how can I begin to tell you about the exhausting events of this Thursday?

I was clean shaven, dressed in slacks and a crisp white shirt. Now I wasn't dressed up for work, as far as I'm concerned I could show up for work in my feety pajamas and not care what they have to say. This was traffic court and I was going to try and get out of a fine.

I suppose on some level it was morally wrong for me to try and get this ticket reduced, after all the officer did have me dead to rights. Yes my license plate had expired. Yes it was several months overdue. My only excuse and defense was that the car was in my wife's name and only she could do the renewing.

Actually it sometimes disturbs me to think of how much of my finances and property are in my wife's name. It had been done for expediency and because I had a bad habit of trading my paychecks for magic beans but it had led to a situation where my missus could ruin me financially with relative ease. That's right dear reader, my wife can not only beat me up she can also render me homeless as well.

Somehow that makes her all the more sexy to me for reasons only my therapist could understand.

So I headed in to traffic court, I had the directions all printed out and I gave myself plenty of time to get there but sadly Mapquest can be a cruel mistress and I found out far to late that I had parked several blocks away and been sent in the wrong direction. I like to think that for years to come the owners and employees will tell stories of the well dressed bald man that stood near the lunch counter shouting "I object!" whenever he was asked what his order was.

Well I made that last bit up, but I did get myself good and lost that day. I managed to get to the courthouse just in time, relatively speaking because when I got to the courthouse I found a line stretching out into the parking lot. Apparently the courthouse only used one of its entrances so every person entering could pass through a metal detector and get a good wanding as well.

Ah well, its been years since I had a good wanding.

So there I stood in the rain, surrounded by equally grumpy people with sweaty citations in their hands. Some smoked, some spit and conversations rippled up and down the line.

"...how long do they expect us to wait out here?"

"That's security man, They gotta make sure no one is carrying weapons or nothin'."

"Damn that Bin Laden."

"Why would Bin Laden attack a courthouse in North Carolina?"

"Because he hates our freedom."

I waited in the cold, trying to distract myself with thoughts of the warm embrace of my wife. Maybe we would have a chance to spend some time together. Of course not every conversation was so deeply political, some were personal.

"...and then I told him I wasn't havin' the fuckin' restraining order lifted until the sonovabitch gives me my Christian rock albums back."

"What the Hell for?"

"Have you heard that shit they play on the radio now? I don't want my babies exposed to that kind of fuckin' filth."

The line moved sluggishly, the people that had brought babies with them shifted anxiously in place, some customers saw the line as an opportunity.

"...and then I have to come back here again next week."

"What for?"

"Minor possession, I had a dime bag. Luckily they didn't find the oxy I had hidden in my shoes."

"You get that from the same dealer?"

"Sure."

"All my guy has lately is codeine and Tylenol three."

"We should totally exchange our dealer's numbers."

"Hang on let me get my Blackberry."

"Sure, hey what are you here for?"

"I'm trying to get this restraining order removed. My ex is all up in my face about some CDs she thinks I took."

"BILLY? IS THAT YOU? YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO STAY 100 FEET AWAY YOU MUSIC STEALING MOTHERFUCKER!!!!"

After about an hour I got into the courthouse, one intimate wanding later I was in line to get into the courtroom. Once I was in the courtroom they directed me to a bench and told me to wait. The procedure was simple, the Assistant District Attorney called you up and tried to negotiate a plea bargain and if no agreement was reached they set a trial date. It was a lot like LAW AND ORDER except without the murders and dramatic music.

When my turn came I was able to explain and show her some paperwork. More paper work was needed before the charges could be dismissed or downgraded and a continuance was scheduled for next month. I really wasn't happy with that but the clock was ticking and I still had to get to work.

That done I walked the half a mile or so back to my car and headed in to work. As I got settled in Mr. Kupua asked me how I was doing and I answered quite honestly, "I feel like kicking someone's ass today."

He regarded me strangely and headed back to his office. That didn't worry me. Being regarded strangely comes with the territory of being Al Bruno III.

The first part of my shift went by smoothly but I was feeling a little worn out, and that was either because I had gotten up about three hours before my usual time or because my subconscious was trying to save my sanity from the doldrums of my job. I wondered what my wife was doing. I really hoped we might get my daughter to bed early. I wanted to spend some quality time with my missus.

Stay in school kids, stay in school.

When break time came I headed into the bathroom and splashed some cold water in my face. I took a moment to examine the face in the mirror before me; the expanding wattle, the baggy eyes, the aggressive baldness. Who was this middle aged man and were had the kid I used to be gone? I don't think I it would bother me so much if not for the fact that I still don't feel like a grown up. When I stop being foolish and silly? When would I be financially wide and secure? When would I stop masturbating?

But lets be honest here, my only real hope at this point is for financial security.

When I headed out to my desk Mr. Kupua was waiting for me, he told me we had to take a meeting. I could only worry that my hobby of writing blog posts like this one instead of working had finally caught up with me.

Oh wait. hang on while I minimize my screen.

...
......
.........
............

Ok we're back.

So I followed Mr. Kupua to his office and I found Mr. Wisakedjak waiting for us. I became acutely aware of two things, first of all that each of them was at least 15 years younger than me, the other was that they both looked pretty damn serious.

Now as far as the age of these guys, that didn't really but me. I had never really chased the whole management thing, mostly because I was well aware that my inability to not roll my eyes and groan audibly when things like "Competitive Synergy" were said would get me fired pretty damn quick.

Now as for why they were so darn serious? I started to get worried, really worried, left the Christy Canyon DVD in the player and my wife found it worried.

"Please sit down Al." Mr. Kupua said.

I nodded, "Sure sure."

"Uh, that's my seat."

"Oh sorry."

I sat on the other side of the desk and tried to stay calm and not fart audibly.

"Now Al," he continued, "I have asked Mr. Wisakedjak here to be a witness to this."

"A witness to what?" I asked, "Did I win something?"

If anything Mr. Kupua became more serious making me more worried, after all this was good material I was using on him not like the stuff I do here.

Hey come on readers, its free after all, what did you expect?

Anyway, Mr. Kupua handed me a sheet of official looking paper and said, "You have taken the required course on workplace violence haven't you?"

"Uh, sure." I looked to Mr. Wisakedjak for a little help but his expression was stony, and not the good kind of stony but I have heard rumors about him.

"Well Al, what you said earlier about kicking ass constitutes a terrorist style threat to your co-workers."

I was dumbfounded, "What?"

"I think the training video was clear about the boundaries of what constitutes an act of battery."

I cleared my throat to try and clear the trembling from my voice, "Well first of all I think that a workplace violence training video starring Chuck Norris sends a mixed message of the highest order but also you know I was joking. I joke all the time! I'm quippy!"

Mr. Kupua tried to cut me off, "Now Al..."

"I am! Just check my resume! It says 'hard working, dedicated and quippy'!"

"Al please don't act like this. By your own admission you are aware of the policy."

Mr. Wisakedjak nodded, "You should be thanking him, he would have been within his rights to fire you."

Mr. Kupua frowned, "Very true, as it is you will be on a 90 day probationary period."

"After you take the mandatory sensitivity training."

Let me correct myself, I wasn't dumbfounded before. NOW I was dumbfounded,, "Sensitivity training? Sensitivity training? I am sensitive! I'm more sensitive than the nipples of a 12 year old boy."

Mr. Wisakedjak groaned, "Now that could constitute sexual harassment."

"You know Al, when I read in your file that you were an H.R. nightmare I thought they were joking." Mr. Kupua said.

Why does every employee file I ever had say that? is it my jokes? My easy going attitude? My smoldering sexuality?

"I need you to sign this write up form please." Mr. Kupua pushed the sheet of paper towards me.

Mr. Wisakedjak handed me a pen, "All things like this must be documented."

I could feel the office closing in around me, I was sweating and my gorge was rising, As I took the pen and signed the form I thought of my daughter, my wife, my pets and my web page. If I lost this job what would I do? This was a bad economy and I wasn't sure I would be able to fake another useful skill set with a tarted up resume.

With the paperwork signed I slumped back in my chair my posture defeated, "Listen I'm sorry guys. I never meant to cause a situation like this. I'll do my best to behave more professionally in the-"

I was cut off by the sound of a shredder. Mr. Kupua had just fed my write up form into it. I blinked. That was all I could do.

Both supervisors broke into laughter. "If you could have seen your face!" Mr. Wisakedjak wiped tears from his eyes.

"Huh?" I said.

Mr. Kupua said, "We reeled you in like a marlin man."

And then I realized it was a prank, or as those of you without gray hairs would say I had been punked. "Why would you do such a thing?" I asked.

"Now we're even for the time you unplugged my keyboard."

"And for the time you filled my lunchbox with rubber spiders." Mr. Wisakedjak added.

So they had gotten even. Good for them. In fact we all had a good laugh about it once I finished throwing up into Mr. Kupua's wastebasket. In fact I was smiling when I got home but I stopped smiling when I walked in the door because my dog Jake was having an episode.

Now we have 1 cat and 2 dogs. The cat is a reclusive black furred ball of fur with fierce eyes and a comic overbite, my daughter named him Fango B. Jango. The we have our two dogs Jake and Maddie. Maddie is an exuberant Lab mix that has been a constant source of amusement and property damage, we've had her since she was a puppy. Our other dog is Jake and we rescued him from a shelter, he's an oversized rat terrier with a trimmed tail and Marty Feldman eyes.

When we got Jake he was three years old and he had almost died of malnutrition and heartworms, the shelter had begun the process of bring Jake back from the brink and we finished it. Now I love Jake, he is my buddy.

But Jake to put it simply has issues.

He is terrified of being picked up, of certain hats, of pit bulls and stray cats, and of strange men standing too close to my wife and daughter.

So I got home to find the bedroom door closed and Jake acting frantic. I called for my wife and she called for me from behind the closed door.

Hmmmm. I thought, Is my daughter over at her friends house for the night, or her grandparents? Are there marital relations in my future?

Oh dear reader I was looking forward to this after the day I had suffered.

I threw open the door expectantly and I heard my daughter scream, "Daddy NO!"

She was holding a cat I had never seen before on her lap. Was is the operative phrase here because Jake came charging in the room, barking wildly with his hackles raised. The cat hissed and darted under the bed. This drove Maddie out from her hiding spot under the bed. A hissing, barking, crying, shouting cacophony filled my bedroom.

This was not the pussy I was hoping for.

A Little Something For Daddy

A Little Something For Daddy

by

Al Bruno III

The problem is that the local shopping mall has no bookstores and no place that sells horror movies on DVD so when the Bruno family and I head out there I find myself bored beyond reason or worse. Both my wife and daughter get stuff on these trips but I never do, I mean I'm not greedy but it would be nice to get a little something.

The first thing you notice as you walk into the mall is one of those crane games, you know the kind where you try to free one of the twenty or so stuffed animals crammed into the thing using a metal claw with the grip strength of a geriatric on Quaaludes. My daughter is fascinated by these machines and left to her own devices I think she would sacrifice her entire college fund trying to win a misshapen replica of SpongeBob Squarepants stuffed with shredded magazines and used Chinese diapers.

This time we managed to get away with simply sacrificing one or two dollars but my daughter always voices some disappointment that I can never win one of those things for her. Truth be told I never even try. It's one of her uncles that has a real talent for those things, he can usually empty one in the course of an hour but let's be honest here it's his only marketable skill.

That obstacle bypassed we stopped for a bite to eat, the food court is clean, well lit and surprisingly rat free. Laugh all you want but over a decade ago when I worked at one of Albany's larger malls the food court had a real problem with rodents; and these being New York rats they frequently carried switchblades.

A quick sodium filled meal later we made our first stop a ladieswear store. I am not uncomfortable in such places because I spent a summer working in women's clothing... but I never really learned how to walk in high heels.

Nyuck Nyuck.

Most women's clothing stories have chairs near the changing room for the men to sit in and contemplate their lives of quiet desperation but I didn't get the chance to in one of them because I was busy chasing after my daughter as she rummaged through the spin racks full of beads and baubles near the main register. She likes to try on everything- at once. My choice is not an easy one; do I let my daughter have a good time or get a jump start on this afternoon's tantrum? Eventually I give in to the withering gaze of the clerk manning the register but not before my daughter looks like an explosion at Cyndi Lauper's house.

My wife called me over and asked for an opinion on a blouse.

"Why don't you pick whatever one you like best?" I said.

"Come on," the Missus chided me. "Your opinion matters. Do you prefer the blue or the yellow?"

I paused for a moment considering, "The blue. Yes, the blue works best I think."

The Missus held each blouse up, nodding, "No. I don't think the blue goes with any of my outfits. Yellow is more my color anyway."

"I'm just glad I was able to help." I turned back to see my daughter trying to climb onto one of the shelving units.

One blouse, two pairs of slacks and an apology later we headed for another store but this time it was so the Missus could find a new handbag. It had been over three weeks since she'd changed purses and you could tell that the strain of it was beginning to wear on her sanity. My daughter started fussing that she wanted to go to look at toys so I had her stand near the front of the store as a kind of impromptu time out. As my daughter glared sullenly at the world the Missus remarked to me that she couldn't find any purses that really caught her eye. I suggested that she just use one of the older ones she had piled up in the hall closet.

Once I was out of time out we took my daughter to the toy store so she could 'Ooh' and 'Ah' over the bits of molded plastic. These days Hanna Montana was her drug of choice but she was also starting to get into all those other tweener bands. I couldn't stand the stuff. I mean what happened to kids' music? When I was growing up we had real bands that spoke for an entire generation like The Banana Splits, Jose and the Pussycats and The Brady Kids.

Laugh if you want but do you think the Jonas Brothers could survive being lost in outer space? I think not!

The Missus and I decided to let my daughter get a new doll, after all she hadn't tried to disassemble the apartment's electrical system in almost a week. Yeah she is kinda spoiled but I want to have these moments to remember when she's a teenager and she hates my guts.

The last stop on this little excursion was the beauty salon. The girls wanted to get their hair done and that was fine, except that I knew I would find myself sitting there trying pass the time reading by Cosmo and Modern Bride. The articles were kind of OK but all the perfume ads made me want to sneeze.

The hairdressers were all young and gossipy, the salon was dead so my wife and daughter got immediate service. About halfway through her rinse the Missus suggested, "You know there's no other customer's why don't you get a haircut? You need one."

She was right that I did need a haircut, the sides and back were a ragged mess but as always the top of my head looked like a satellite photograph of the deforested areas of Brazil. Long ago all hopes of a comb-over had been lost so I had taken to shaving my head on a semi-regular basis. There is an old saying that when a balding man shaves his head its like saying "You can't fire me I quit!" So be it.

In the interests of saving money I sheared my head using the clippers we had bought for doing maintenance on our Persian cat's fluffy black fur. This was before we learned that trying to shave down a cat was about as advisable as opening a Fredrick's of Hollywood in Amish country.

"Come on." The Missus said again, "This way I won't be cleaning hair out of the bathroom sink for days."

"Sure." I said, "Why not?"

"Hi I'm Kara." A red haired Chinese girl led me to one of the chairs and asked, "You want me to trim the sides and the back?"

"No." I explained, "Just shave it all off."

"What?" She draped the vinyl cape over me and around my neck.

"Just take a pair of clippers and shear my head down until its like a GI JOE doll."

She looked at me like I was crazy, "You want your hair like an action figure?"

There was a brief moment where I sobbed with the realization of how old I was but then I gathered myself up again and explained, "Just take a pair of clippers and take it all off maybe leave half and inch or so."

"Oh OK."

"You have done this kind of thing before right?" I asked.

"Well your only my third or fourth customer since I got out of beauty school." She explained.

The clippers buzzed to life, I took one last mournful look at the curves of my ears and she got to work.

Thankfully my beautician's hands were steady and the blades of the clippers were clean and sharp.Soon enough my head looked like a farm fresh egg with a light coating of brown mold. "There you go." She ran her fingers along my scalp, "It feels nice."

"Thanks." I said uncertainly, "You do good work."

"Hey Kristy! Kitty!" She called over to one of the other girls, "Come here and feel this!"

My wife and daughter were freshly coiffured and waiting at the register while three college aged hotties took turns rubbing the top of my head telling me how much I looked like that Private Pyle guy from that old movie. However it didn't take long for their amusement to wear off and they all headed off for a collective cigarette break. Kara pulled the cutting cape from around me and announced, "Ok you can get up now."

"No," I said, "No I can't."

A little something indeed.