#11 The Second Great Flood

It's a lonely night on Chat Roulette. How is everyone in the world meeting the Jonas Brothers on here? Do I capitalize Brothers, was that correct? Is that the band name or is it like people referring to me and my sister Melanie as the Mel sisters? Nobody refers to us at all, but. Those boys need to go to class.

Anyway. My kitchen flooded today. I was genuinely excited to do the dishes, true blue ambition. They were piled high on account of the large pot and the dish of the slow cooker.
As I was drying a plate, I noticed a considerable puddle in the corner. I opened the far door from where the water was pouring, and followed the trail back over to the sink, beneath which the trash can (empty, I never use it) was overflowing with muggy water. I've had trouble with the drainpipe before, but I thought I could just... slide the metal ring back into place and wiggle for good measure. Worked for a while.



For a while I lost my phone. Nobody should ever talk shit about social networking sites because Facebook Chat saved my life and soon my phone rang from the crack in the front door.

I called my building manager and he said, "Your what?"
"The pipe! Maybe it's missing a nut or something I don't know!"
"The pipe? Do you mean the drain?"
I don't know if he was honestly confused or just messing with me, but he was laughing amiably.
"Something broke."
"I'll be up in a few minutes."
As I waited for him, I hid a few unclean dishes and bottles of cooking oils in the cupboard, instead of putting them where they belong in the pantry next-door. I extracted water out of the trash can with an oversized mug until it could be wedged from under the drain and emptied into the bathtub.

My building manager is extremely cool with me every time. I like him a lot, he is very easy-going and friendly, and I feel safe with him living here. Once I thought it was a good idea to walk through the scene of an angry drunk being arrested. He steered me to the left and said, "Why don't you use the backdoor, hon." I think I'm a child to Bob and that amuses him. I am a child though.

I can overcome the embarrassment of my crazy apartment if there's an emergency and I need to call him. If he was a jackass, I don't know, I'd probably just bow my head in shame and let the building flood. He was there when the water heater in my bedroom burst and soaked everything in the room, and he installed my air conditioner when I called to ask what the hell I was doing. The air conditioner is honestly the biggest emergency I've ever had in this apartment. It's brutal up here in the summertime, I have forty-two windows.
The building is a hundred years old. The hardwood floors and kitchen appliances are new, but I have the electrical outlets of primitive America. 95% charming.

As he was fixing the drainpipe, I told him I had planned to light some incense in the kitchen but then he showed up. He replied, "You do know I'm in here every three months with the Terminix guy, right? You're not fooling anybody. But thank you for opening the window." He also said the Terminix guy comments on how messy my place is, and Bob alleges that he replies, "Yeah, but it's a fun mess." He says my apartment is nothing compared to some guy's downstairs; I "just have a lot of stuff and nowhere to put it," and apparently this mystery guy is a fire hazard to us all. He said he could build some shelves for all the books consuming the corner of my living room floor.

Other than forgetting about the yams behind the toaster and creating a scene of fruit flies like something from a horror film, I'm not foul; I just put things on top of things and make precarious towers of things on the corners of every furniture piece. Watch those elbows.

It was a good opportunity to tell him how much I love it here, and how many compliments I hear about the apartment layout (not what I've done with the place) and the backyard. Just because I'm poor doesn't make the price of rent any less incredible. I should treat it better. If I can take a break in my writing to blog, I can take a break to tidy up more often. At least pull all those miscellaneous objects burgeoning from the sock drawer.

I just stood up to close the window and realized my jacket and the lap of my pajama pants are damp, which is a feeling that makes my skin crawl, damp clothes.
The church bells are ringing in the distance at 9:21 pm.

Soundtrack to the most tragic character I never made up on purpose

He is alone in a watchtower. Fog whistling in. Thoughts of big-bearded women in his head, gypsies dancing. Deep circles under his eyes, sunken, cigar smoke. A goatee like a thicket of ants. His wife has left him, he loves his kids on auto-pilot, he taught them to love God, he is sexually distraught for a mechanic. He's exploding cigarettes. Jameson forgot the egg nog. Greasy-kneed cargo pants. White and sad with a twelve-pack at his sneakers. There are no Christmas lights here, it's black. Jaundice headache starving. Blasting broken blues music and head banging weepily to it, long blonde slithers up and down. Bony shoulders. He's there overnight and his t-shirt is stained.

Hemingway wrote, "It is awfully easy to be hard-boiled about everything in the daytime, but at night it is another thing."

I will be honest

I watched this whole thing. All 21 minutes. Even through the theme song. It's unbearable, and this guy is never getting laid. He was pretty upset by the graphics in the 1980s.

However... biblical video games are fantastic. Biblical Candy Land, Noah first-person slingshooting cattle to death, Mother Mary carrying towers of soldiers on her head, Mother Mary throwing baby Moses in the water, true or false quizzes without questions...

Be gentle

I am going to be a brilliant filmmaker too. This was a very low budget production.



Edit: Hey xtranormal.com where's my blockbuster hit?? Banned.

Nothing personal

Our feelings of love are adequate in quality and quantity. I consider us a satisfactory match. You are a sufficient lover. We will competently pass another 365 days. I look forward to demonstrating these emotions again in the future. Thanks in advance for your consideration.

Regards,

Lay low, Celine

I go to a website to stream "Last Time Around" by Lay Low, and I click on the play button, and then it's Celine Dion's "Because You Loved Me."

What's the worst lag I've ever had? Trying to click the PAUSE II button on that fucking song. It could not have been worse if it was Shania Twain. The hourglass endured all the way to "You touched my hand, I could touch the sky."

I am always the last to know

Once upon a time, there was this guy I dated off and on. Tall and gangly and, despite his braces smelling like putrefying lo mein all the time, a handsome and charming fellow when he was not cackling. I do not miss your cackle. You did lose the braces and start brushing, though, and that was kind of you.

And it is to you I will continue to delegate this message. From me.

I GET IT NOW!!!!!!!!! I learned today what it is you've been trying to do all these years, flopping around on your heels like a trained seal and quivering those wild jelly bones all over the place. It is called the C-Walk. You may have heard of this if you are not white and sheltered and busy with Joan Baez records.

I apologize. It's a dance.





You didn't look like that... That's a nice thing to say, right?