beautiful, funny, sad & true

I had a funny dream the other day, in which I was out with a guy friend from real life and a girl and guy with whom he works.  We were at a pub drinking a bunch of beers, talking and laughing and all of a sudden the girl was talking about plumbing, and her faucet.  When she said the word ‘faucet’, I laughed and gestured toward my friend, “Or FLAUCET, as he used to say.”

By way of a snappy comeback, my friend pointed at me and told her, “Yeah, well one time HE said that he was gonna give me a hand job.”  Everybody laughed and I said, “I reMEMber that!  My sixth girlfriend and I used to joke about that all the time, so that’s why you weren’t surprised when that came flying out of my mouth.”

The girl turned to me and asked, “Sixth girlfriend, huh?”

I said, “Yup,” and then launched into a long, supremely boring story about her and me that even I wasn’t interested in listening to, so I cut it short and said, “What can I say?  I like shock value.”  My friend laughed a little, and then everyone went back to talking about whatever subjects we’d been talking about before, and continued to drink our beers.

* * * * *

Incidentally, my friend really did think the word was ‘flaucet.’  I don’t know why he thought that, and neither does he, but I’ve always found it amusing.  Also incidentally, my sixth girlfriend reads my blog, and she even has her own that’s listed in my blogroll.  But we certainly never joked around about hand jobs, nor have I ever offered (or wanted) to give my friend one, so I have no idea where that particular subplot came from.

Anyway.   All that’s neither here nor there.

Today is Thursday, which means that it’s Donut Day at work. It’s a simple concept, if you’re not familiar with it. On a pre-determined day, donuts arrive at the office, as if by divine providence. When I first started working there, the donuts were late one day, and everyone was freaking out. I asked my friend, “What is up with this place? People freak out if the donuts are even a few minutes late.” Nowadays, I have to admit that I’m one of the restless natives. If I have to wait for my donut until the unacceptable hour of, say, nine o’clock, you’d better look out, because heads are gonna roll, et cetera. Thank gawd that didn’t happen today, but something else funny did happen.

There were a handful of people in the break room at the same time this morning, getting their donut fix. One was our head manager–who isn’t the most popular person in the place–and another was a really attractive woman in her mid-twenties. The manager saw the woman grabbing a donut and commented, “Hey [woman's last name], I didn’t think you ate stuff like that,” because she’s really thin.

She replied curtly, “Yeah, well, they don’t do anything to me, so–” shrugged her shoulders, smiled a little, turned and walked out of the break room, ending the conversation. The manager stood and stared out the window with a funny, faraway look in his eyes, and I could see that he was daydreaming of the two of them sitting on a sofa somewhere, sharing a plate of donuts in front of the TV, then rolling over, putting the plate on the floor and settling in for another hand job.

Last night I went to another of Tossed In’s play readings. I have to be a little more secretive about this one, because it was comprised of plays that either haven’t been performed publicly before, or were works in progress that are still being written. But I think last night was my favorite night so far.

On my way over, I stopped at InexpensiveOrganicGroceryWhereHippiesShop. Just before I got out of the car, my friend Blaine called. He asked if I had time to talk. I said, ‘of course’, and we proceeded to talk for a few minutes until I went into the store. I bought what I needed and came back out, only to find that I’d left my keys in the locked car. Thpffft. So I called FamousInsuranceCompany and got their after-hours answering service. I told the girl I’d locked my keys in my car, so she started calling locksmiths in the greater Portland area. “Locksmiths?” I asked.

“Yes,” she said. “They can help get you a new key.”

“Did you already check for towing companies?”

“Oh. . .no, I didn’t. FamousInsuranceCompany doesn’t have any business partnerships with any towing companies, so you can use whichever one you want. You may have to pay a fee, though.” Grrrrr. So I gave her the name of one I had used before, and she found the number, saying, “Okay, they should be there in about thirty to sixty minutes.”

Ten minutes later, the guy showed up. He had my car open in about twenty seconds, took a look at my insurance card and found that I do indeed have roadside assistance, so this visit was free. “Oh yeah, FamousInsuranceCompany has a special deal with us; we do everything for them.”

“Really?” I asked. “That’s great! I was told that they don’t have any partnerships or anything, and that I’d have to pay you, and maybe I’d get reimbursed.”

He laughed. “Who the heck did you talk to?”

Long story short, it turned out to be really super easy, took a fraction of the time I was estimated, and didn’t even cost me anything. I was expecting to have to give the play reading a miss, but ended up going, just a half-hour late. And boy, was I glad I did. Besides the plays being great, Tossed In surprised me by bringing me a DVD full of Jon Brion music he’s been stockpiling. Some of it I already owned, but the majority of it was live recordings and home demos and all kinds of other cool stuff; a treasure trove, really.

Tonight may very well be Laundry Night. It was a little tricky finding clean things to wear this morning. I got up ridiculously late, but I still might have made it to work on time, except that I made the mistake of reading my e-mail first, and my friend had sent me a link to a hilarious video. Curses, FamousVideoSite! Why must you have everything imaginable?

I finally joined the frickin’ twenty-first century and signed up with OnlineDVDRentalCompany the other day, so I should be getting my first one today; “Who Killed The Electric Car?” The documentary section on there is gigantic. I’m very excited about that.

That’s a ten-four, good buddy. Put the hammer down.

Over and out.