E-mail: Brian7Morris "at" hotmail.com Archives March 2002 April 2002 May 2002 June 2002 July 2002 August 2002 September 2002 October 2002 November 2002 December 2002 January 2003 February 2003 March 2003 April 2003 May 2003 June 2003 July 2003 August 2003 September 2003 October 2003 November 2003 December 2003 January 2004 February 2004 March 2004 April 2004 May 2004 June 2004 July 2004 August 2004 September 2004 October 2004 November 2004 December 2004 January 2005 February 2005 March 2005 April 2005 May 2005 June 2005 July 2005 August 2005 September 2005 October 2005 November 2005 December 2005 current Blogs Mandapants farkleberries Uranium City Records The C.M. Sienko Foundation Storyteller Musings Solotarian Views Lynne Wiora Tek Poker News Blog Some Biscuits Evil Eye Emporium Niggling Doubts Pressure Release Sara as Mommy runswithscissors Defective Yeti Afternoon Delight trancejen The Terrarium Bird Nird Slipperily Tofu Hut Stereo Gum Links Fixed Gear Gallery Get Crafty This is Grand Featherproof Books Gapers Block Chicago Bird Watching	No one must know my terrible secret... House of Noh! Sunday, May 30, 2004 This morning on Three’s Company the dean of Jack’s cooking school selected Jack to represent the cooking school in the California Technical Schools Annual bake-off. The dean put a lot of pressure on Jack, too. I guess that Jack’s school has a long standing tradition of winning first place in the annual bake-off , and the dean had accumulated a whole display case full of trophies for blue ribbon cakes and strawberry torts and other baked desert items, and the dean was enthusiastic about getting another. This year‘s bakery item, the dean informed Jack, was to be mouse pies. With this much pressure on Jack’s shoulders, the few days before the contest were pretty much filled with aggressive sexual harassment of his roommates, baking prototype pies, and not much else. Unfortunately, just hours before the contest, while Jack was putting on his disco blazer and best bellbottoms to wear to the contest, Janet found Chrissy in the kitchen, already having eaten a slice of the pie that Jack has finally perfected and had planned on entering into the kitchen! But look, I know Chrissy takes a lot of heat for not being the brightest at times, but it wasn’t her fault. I mean, she and Janet had each been eating Jack’s prototype pies over the days leading up to the contest, so how was she to know that this specific pie was Jack’s final version that he was planning on entering into the contest? Regardless, without time for Jack to bake a new pie for the contest, both Janet and Chrissy were loathe to tell Jack about the loss of his pie. Fortunately, Janet came up with an idea. She and Chrissy enlisted Mrs. Roeper’s help to go to a store and buy a pie (incidentally, it appears that Mr. Roeper’s love-making skills are sub-par, although Mrs. Roeper was talking in innuendo so I can’t be sure), and then Janet kept Jack out the kitchen by employing a variety of comical hi-jinxs while Chrissy replaced Jack’s pie with one that Mrs. Roeper had bought at a store and disposed of Jack’s original pie, by eating it. The pie switch successful, the next scene found Jack, Chrissy, Janet, the dean of Jack’s cooking school, the judges, bystanders, and the Roepers among the many pies laid out on tables at the pie baking contest. (The unexplained presence of the Roepers at the pie-baking contest seems to be a small plot hole that I am willing to overlook). Just before the judges were to begin judging, Chrissy’s conscience got the better of her and she told Jack about the pie switch. Jack’s integrity as a chef compelled him to withdraw the pie from the contest, but the dean of the cooking school, bent on winning the baking trophy for the glory of his cooking school, was decidedly against withdrawing the pie from the contest. In the ensuing struggle over the pie between Jack and the dean, the pie was accidentally thrust into the face of the dominant judge, a Mr. Hoffman, owner/chef of Hoffman Bakeries, who sought his revenge by throwing a pie back into the face of the dean. The dean sidestepped and the pie hit Mr. Roeper in the face. After that it was a free-for-all, culminating in a climactic three-pie-strike to the dean, followed by a crown-chakra smothering pie smash by a leaping Mr. Roeper who had crept up with a pie behind the dean unawares. So there was a pie fight. Nothing special in second-rate television, I know, but the reason that I remark upon it this morning is because it did seem special this morning for some reason. Normally, my work weary, all jaded and cynical self would have probably seen the pie fight coming during the first scene in which the dean described the baking contest to Jack. Great! I would have thought sarcastically, half an hour of forced lead-up and deodorant and no-credit auto loan commercials progressing to nothing more than a contrived pie fight. But not today. Today everything seems fresh and new and it wasn’t until after the first salvo of pies had been thrown that I even realized where Three’s Company was going with the pie-baking contest, and I was like, “Holy Shit! It’s a pie fight!” This is the kind of morning, I’ve decided, based on my wonderment with this Three’s Company episode, that I need to do something for myself. I need to do something to improve my life. And this won’t be like all those other resolutions that I made and didn’t keep, like how I had resolved to pack a delicious tofu sandwich to take to work everyday made from a delicious homemade tofu loaf that I planned to make on weekends. Or to do more cooking with a cast-iron skillet. Or my plans to go find some film for that old Polaroid camera I bought at that thrift store so that I can FINALLY get around to taking some grainy pictures of my wang to leave rubber-banded in the silverware drawer of my apartment when I move out. Or, impressed as I am by the lightness and breathability of the material, construct a bicycle helmet out of scabs. See, all these good ideas! Maybe it’s because I’m just tired all the time from work, or maybe it’s just because I’m lazy, but I just haven’t had the time to do any of these things. I’ve made homemade tofu a grand total of one time, and I ate it all before the weekend was over so there was no workday sandwich making there. I don’t even own a cast-iron skillet. I’ve got no idea even where to begin looking for old grainy Polaroid film for that old camera. And that scab helmet thing, well, people say it’s just impractical, but I wouldn’t know because I haven’t even taken the time to give much thought to its construction. However, now that I think about it, a scab helmet would have its downsides. Knowing me, I’d probably start picking at it and wiggling it around as soon as it got a little loose on my head. And I’d probably pick it off a day before it was ready, leaving a little round bloody spot on the very top of my beluga whale-shaped skull that would congeal into a scab beanie that people at the office would probably see me absent-mindedly picking at while I read westlaw printouts at my desk whenever they’d walk by my office. And then I’d have to find someplace bigger to keep scabs than that old paperclip box in my top desk drawer in front of my letter opener next to that half-pack of gum that’s been there since I moved into that office. Okay, so I haven’t done any of the above things that I planned on doing. It’s time to accept that about myself and move on. Because today is fresh and new and different and I’ve got a plan that I’m going to stick to. From here on out, I’m going to point at people when I say goodbye to them (and no, I’m not going to cock my thumb like my pointing finger is a pistol or something because I’m not some kind of tool!). Joe A. and I have been seeing a lot of people pointing at others in the ground floor lobby of our building at work, and we both agree that a goodbye accompanied by pointing at the person is something that people do who are cool and know it too. Brian 5:41 PM (0) comments Wednesday, May 19, 2004 It always takes my coworker friend Joe A. a long time at the cash machine in the lobby of the building that we work in. The reason is because Joe A. always forgets his pin number at a critical point in the transaction. Now that I think about it, it’s really sort of a ritual that we have. Whenever we go out to get lunch together, Joe hits the cash machine in the lobby and I wait for him to the side and at a courteous distance, checking out all the bicycle messengers looking for really old and out-of-shape ones that I can use in my mind to strengthen my belief that I haven’t become too old or too much of a desk nerd to become a successful bicycle messenger (I saw a really old one yesterday, totally sweet!), when Joe A., after inserting his card and pushing a few buttons, looks up from the ATM at me with shock and surprise on his face and exclaims, “I just forgot my pin number! I can’t believe it! I can’t believe it! It’s gone! It totally slipped out of my mind.” Then Joe A. decides that he has enough money anyway and we leave the building and go to Subway or something. Of course, without fail I take the incident with the ATM as justification, during the entire walk to Subway, to tell and cajole Joe A. that he should write down his pin number on a piece of paper in his wallet. But not just one pin number, I think that he should write down a lot of pin numbers. That way, just in case his wallet fell into the wrong hands, only he would know which pin number was correct! Although I never fail to then describe my own personal wallet pin number system, I don’t advocate its use to beginners (and I number Joe A. among them, at least until he FINALLY decides to write down a bunch of false pin numbers on a little card in his wallet). But if any of you, my readers, think you might be up to it, here’s a description of the advanced theft deterrence device that I invented inside my wallet: right below the clear plastic and above my drivers license I’ve got a little slip of paper that came with my bank card and its got my pin number right on it! See, a petty footpad who absconds with my wallet would know that he or she shouldn’t try to use my bankcard in an ATM and press a lot of random numbers trying to get my pin number right, because there’s always a chance that Go Go Inspector Gadget manacles would issue from the cash hole and grab hold of the rogue. Petty footpads and wallet thieves know this. But when my pin number is right there, no wallet stealing rogue could resist that! It’s like this desk night clerk at the hotel that my ex-girlfriend used to work at. He had been confronted about using the computer behind the reception desk to look at internet porn during the nights shift. And each time he swore that he would never, ever, use the computer behind the reception desk to look at porn again. I think he really meant it too, because when I was bored and hanging out there at the hotel sometimes my ex-girlfriend would let me track his progress in the computer’s records from site to site the previous night. The desk clerk’s shift began at 9:00pm, and I could see that he always started really strong toward keeping his promise, he really tried, going only to sites like sportscenter.com, motleyfools.com, and musclecarparts.com/Chevrolet, but then he would begin to waver around 10:30 or so, spending some time on sites like hotornot.com and hownuderu.com until at about 11:15 or so when he would cave and start hitting sites like monsterods.com and asianympo.com. Inevitably, around 1:00 in the morning he would visit maturefatties.com, for between five to seven minutes, which is that site that I believe contained the images that would finally sate him, judging by his progression to sites back to sportscenter.com and so forth afterwards. And so you see, the obvious pin number in my wallet is the brilliance of my system, because finding such an obvious pin number in my wallet is like that hotel clerk viewing monsterods.com right at 9:00pm! Although the wallet thief knows, intellectually, that he or she shouldn’t attempt to use an ATM, the wallet thief’s reaction to that obvious pin number would be the equivalent of that hotel desk clerk going right to maturefatties.com right at 9:05pm, and he or she would dash right over the nearest ATM machine. But SURPRISE you crooked wallet thief! That’s not my real pin number! That’s the old random pin number that the bank sent me and now that I’ve customized my number that’s night the right pin number anymore! What’s more, that’s not even my real bank card! I lost my bankcard somewhere, that bankcard is just an old card that I found in the creepy basement of my apartment! Sucker! Brian 12:53 AM (0) comments Saturday, May 01, 2004 I’ve got another story about the el. I know what you’re thinking. “This guy’s last entry was a story about the el! All this guy ever writes about is the el!” It’s okay. I deserved that. I forgive you for thinking that about me because it’s true. All of my stories lately are about the el. But see, here’s the reason: All I’ve done for, like, the last two years of my life is to ride the el to work, work, then ride the el home. At work nothing ever interesting ever happens, it’s all about typing furiously, eating lunch like a filthy animal at my desk, and tense negotiations with the duplicating department (how am I supposed to know what kind of tabs are “custom?”). And my home life, I mean, you don’t want to read about what songs Mr. Kitty and I sang together substituting “meow” for the lyrics or what I ate for dinner or the quality of my bowel movements, do you? So that leaves the el, which is the only place that anything interesting happens to me. During a summer recruiting lunch last year that went awry I explained this to the luncheon goers – that the el is only place where anything interesting ever happens to me. I thought that the fight I saw about a year ago on the el would be a good summer recruiting lunch conversation. It turns out I was mistaken, but during my description of the event through interpretive dance, probably because I was too busy furtively tip-toeing and twirling, and leaping, Leaping! LEAPING! I didn’t notice people rolling their eyes and looking uncomfortable in their business casual and displaying other obvious body language cues that would otherwise have alerted me to the inappropriateness of my performance. Apparently, I embarrassed myself. But you, you my gentle reader, you would forgive me one too many stories about the el. Wouldn’t you? Okay, here’s my story. It’s about that tall skinny guy who walks from car to car with a plastic cup and a blind-person’s cane begging for money and saying stuff like “Please help me. I am blind. Please help me,” in a funny voice while bugging out his eyes and pretending to be blind. It was probably about six months ago that he started his act. At first, it must have felt to him that he was sitting on a gold mine. He’d tap tap tap through the cars with his eyes all bugged out talking about how he was blind and how much courage it took for a blind guy to walk from car to car while the el was in motion (indeed!) and how he needed help, and everybody was giving that dude money. Like, he was probably grossing twenty bucks a car and after a three hour shift of that he must have had money coming out of his ears. He was making so much coin that he was probably drinking Harlan estate, having his soiled jeans custom tailored, and buying debentures in obscure tech start-ups just for shits. In fact, after his first week I noticed that he had cast aside his regular sized begging cup and was using a discarded super-sized cola cup from McDonalds to hold all his begging proceeds. I saw him on the el a few days ago though, and it appears that his bubble has burst. He made a pass, tap tap tapping, through the car I was in, and there was already a tinge of desperation about him. But when he got to the end of the car and nobody had given him any money at all, he turned around and made another pass through the car, scolding every one of us for our selfishness and saying some really hilarious things: “God bless you! God bless all of you! I’m saying ‘God bless you’ even though none of you deserve God’s blessing! If God was here, he would want you to help a blind man out. I’m blind! Do you understand how difficult and dangerous it is for me to make my way from car to car! Yet, nobody has given me any money! You make God sick!” “How would YOU like it if YOU went blind?! What if YOU went blind and YOU needed money so YOU had to walk from car to car even though it’s dangerous but then nobody gave YOU any money?!… How would that make YOU feel?!… How about this? I’ll save you the trouble! I’ll save you the trouble of going blind and then walking from car to car on the el and having nobody give you any money and I’ll tell you how it feels! It feels bad! It would make you feel really, really bad!” “It is very dangerous for a blind man to walk from car to car while the el is moving. I’m not doing this for fun! I’m not doing this for my health! I’m doing this for money! I would appreciate it is at least ONE PERSON appreciated the fact that I am making my way from car to car and just ONE PERSON gave me some money!” Finally, this one guy gave the blind beggar some money. I was watching closely, and I think that in his rage, the blind beggar slipped. I think he began shouting “Finally! Thank you! There’s ONE PERSON on this train that cares about the blind!” in a scornful voice just a few seconds before the coins hit the bottom of his cup and a real blind person would have become aware of the alms. I’m watching that purportedly blind guy like a hawk in order to gather conclusive proof that he’s not blind so I can stop feeling just a little bit guilty about thinking his act is really, really funny whenever he makes his way through the car. Brian 6:09 PM

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Sunday, May 30, 2004

This morning on Three’s Company the dean of Jack’s cooking school selected Jack to represent the cooking school in the California Technical Schools Annual bake-off. The dean put a lot of pressure on Jack, too. I guess that Jack’s school has a long standing tradition of winning first place in the annual bake-off , and the dean had accumulated a whole display case full of trophies for blue ribbon cakes and strawberry torts and other baked desert items, and the dean was enthusiastic about getting another. This year‘s bakery item, the dean informed Jack, was to be mouse pies. With this much pressure on Jack’s shoulders, the few days before the contest were pretty much filled with aggressive sexual harassment of his roommates, baking prototype pies, and not much else. Unfortunately, just hours before the contest, while Jack was putting on his disco blazer and best bellbottoms to wear to the contest, Janet found Chrissy in the kitchen, already having eaten a slice of the pie that Jack has finally perfected and had planned on entering into the kitchen! But look, I know Chrissy takes a lot of heat for not being the brightest at times, but it wasn’t her fault. I mean, she and Janet had each been eating Jack’s prototype pies over the days leading up to the contest, so how was she to know that this specific pie was Jack’s final version that he was planning on entering into the contest? Regardless, without time for Jack to bake a new pie for the contest, both Janet and Chrissy were loathe to tell Jack about the loss of his pie. Fortunately, Janet came up with an idea. She and Chrissy enlisted Mrs. Roeper’s help to go to a store and buy a pie (incidentally, it appears that Mr. Roeper’s love-making skills are sub-par, although Mrs. Roeper was talking in innuendo so I can’t be sure), and then Janet kept Jack out the kitchen by employing a variety of comical hi-jinxs while Chrissy replaced Jack’s pie with one that Mrs. Roeper had bought at a store and disposed of Jack’s original pie, by eating it. The pie switch successful, the next scene found Jack, Chrissy, Janet, the dean of Jack’s cooking school, the judges, bystanders, and the Roepers among the many pies laid out on tables at the pie baking contest. (The unexplained presence of the Roepers at the pie-baking contest seems to be a small plot hole that I am willing to overlook). Just before the judges were to begin judging, Chrissy’s conscience got the better of her and she told Jack about the pie switch. Jack’s integrity as a chef compelled him to withdraw the pie from the contest, but the dean of the cooking school, bent on winning the baking trophy for the glory of his cooking school, was decidedly against withdrawing the pie from the contest. In the ensuing struggle over the pie between Jack and the dean, the pie was accidentally thrust into the face of the dominant judge, a Mr. Hoffman, owner/chef of Hoffman Bakeries, who sought his revenge by throwing a pie back into the face of the dean. The dean sidestepped and the pie hit Mr. Roeper in the face. After that it was a free-for-all, culminating in a climactic three-pie-strike to the dean, followed by a crown-chakra smothering pie smash by a leaping Mr. Roeper who had crept up with a pie behind the dean unawares. So there was a pie fight. Nothing special in second-rate television, I know, but the reason that I remark upon it this morning is because it did seem special this morning for some reason. Normally, my work weary, all jaded and cynical self would have probably seen the pie fight coming during the first scene in which the dean described the baking contest to Jack. Great! I would have thought sarcastically, half an hour of forced lead-up and deodorant and no-credit auto loan commercials progressing to nothing more than a contrived pie fight. But not today. Today everything seems fresh and new and it wasn’t until after the first salvo of pies had been thrown that I even realized where Three’s Company was going with the pie-baking contest, and I was like, “Holy Shit! It’s a pie fight!” This is the kind of morning, I’ve decided, based on my wonderment with this Three’s Company episode, that I need to do something for myself. I need to do something to improve my life. And this won’t be like all those other resolutions that I made and didn’t keep, like how I had resolved to pack a delicious tofu sandwich to take to work everyday made from a delicious homemade tofu loaf that I planned to make on weekends. Or to do more cooking with a cast-iron skillet. Or my plans to go find some film for that old Polaroid camera I bought at that thrift store so that I can FINALLY get around to taking some grainy pictures of my wang to leave rubber-banded in the silverware drawer of my apartment when I move out. Or, impressed as I am by the lightness and breathability of the material, construct a bicycle helmet out of scabs. See, all these good ideas! Maybe it’s because I’m just tired all the time from work, or maybe it’s just because I’m lazy, but I just haven’t had the time to do any of these things. I’ve made homemade tofu a grand total of one time, and I ate it all before the weekend was over so there was no workday sandwich making there. I don’t even own a cast-iron skillet. I’ve got no idea even where to begin looking for old grainy Polaroid film for that old camera. And that scab helmet thing, well, people say it’s just impractical, but I wouldn’t know because I haven’t even taken the time to give much thought to its construction. However, now that I think about it, a scab helmet would have its downsides. Knowing me, I’d probably start picking at it and wiggling it around as soon as it got a little loose on my head. And I’d probably pick it off a day before it was ready, leaving a little round bloody spot on the very top of my beluga whale-shaped skull that would congeal into a scab beanie that people at the office would probably see me absent-mindedly picking at while I read westlaw printouts at my desk whenever they’d walk by my office. And then I’d have to find someplace bigger to keep scabs than that old paperclip box in my top desk drawer in front of my letter opener next to that half-pack of gum that’s been there since I moved into that office. Okay, so I haven’t done any of the above things that I planned on doing. It’s time to accept that about myself and move on. Because today is fresh and new and different and I’ve got a plan that I’m going to stick to. From here on out, I’m going to point at people when I say goodbye to them (and no, I’m not going to cock my thumb like my pointing finger is a pistol or something because I’m not some kind of tool!). Joe A. and I have been seeing a lot of people pointing at others in the ground floor lobby of our building at work, and we both agree that a goodbye accompanied by pointing at the person is something that people do who are cool and know it too.

Brian 5:41 PM (0) comments

Wednesday, May 19, 2004

It always takes my coworker friend Joe A. a long time at the cash machine in the lobby of the building that we work in. The reason is because Joe A. always forgets his pin number at a critical point in the transaction. Now that I think about it, it’s really sort of a ritual that we have. Whenever we go out to get lunch together, Joe hits the cash machine in the lobby and I wait for him to the side and at a courteous distance, checking out all the bicycle messengers looking for really old and out-of-shape ones that I can use in my mind to strengthen my belief that I haven’t become too old or too much of a desk nerd to become a successful bicycle messenger (I saw a really old one yesterday, totally sweet!), when Joe A., after inserting his card and pushing a few buttons, looks up from the ATM at me with shock and surprise on his face and exclaims, “I just forgot my pin number! I can’t believe it! I can’t believe it! It’s gone! It totally slipped out of my mind.” Then Joe A. decides that he has enough money anyway and we leave the building and go to Subway or something. Of course, without fail I take the incident with the ATM as justification, during the entire walk to Subway, to tell and cajole Joe A. that he should write down his pin number on a piece of paper in his wallet. But not just one pin number, I think that he should write down a lot of pin numbers. That way, just in case his wallet fell into the wrong hands, only he would know which pin number was correct! Although I never fail to then describe my own personal wallet pin number system, I don’t advocate its use to beginners (and I number Joe A. among them, at least until he FINALLY decides to write down a bunch of false pin numbers on a little card in his wallet). But if any of you, my readers, think you might be up to it, here’s a description of the advanced theft deterrence device that I invented inside my wallet: right below the clear plastic and above my drivers license I’ve got a little slip of paper that came with my bank card and its got my pin number right on it! See, a petty footpad who absconds with my wallet would know that he or she shouldn’t try to use my bankcard in an ATM and press a lot of random numbers trying to get my pin number right, because there’s always a chance that Go Go Inspector Gadget manacles would issue from the cash hole and grab hold of the rogue. Petty footpads and wallet thieves know this. But when my pin number is right there, no wallet stealing rogue could resist that! It’s like this desk night clerk at the hotel that my ex-girlfriend used to work at. He had been confronted about using the computer behind the reception desk to look at internet porn during the nights shift. And each time he swore that he would never, ever, use the computer behind the reception desk to look at porn again. I think he really meant it too, because when I was bored and hanging out there at the hotel sometimes my ex-girlfriend would let me track his progress in the computer’s records from site to site the previous night. The desk clerk’s shift began at 9:00pm, and I could see that he always started really strong toward keeping his promise, he really tried, going only to sites like sportscenter.com, motleyfools.com, and musclecarparts.com/Chevrolet, but then he would begin to waver around 10:30 or so, spending some time on sites like hotornot.com and hownuderu.com until at about 11:15 or so when he would cave and start hitting sites like monsterods.com and asianympo.com. Inevitably, around 1:00 in the morning he would visit maturefatties.com, for between five to seven minutes, which is that site that I believe contained the images that would finally sate him, judging by his progression to sites back to sportscenter.com and so forth afterwards. And so you see, the obvious pin number in my wallet is the brilliance of my system, because finding such an obvious pin number in my wallet is like that hotel clerk viewing monsterods.com right at 9:00pm! Although the wallet thief knows, intellectually, that he or she shouldn’t attempt to use an ATM, the wallet thief’s reaction to that obvious pin number would be the equivalent of that hotel desk clerk going right to maturefatties.com right at 9:05pm, and he or she would dash right over the nearest ATM machine. But SURPRISE you crooked wallet thief! That’s not my real pin number! That’s the old random pin number that the bank sent me and now that I’ve customized my number that’s night the right pin number anymore! What’s more, that’s not even my real bank card! I lost my bankcard somewhere, that bankcard is just an old card that I found in the creepy basement of my apartment! Sucker!

Brian 12:53 AM (0) comments

Saturday, May 01, 2004

I’ve got another story about the el. I know what you’re thinking. “This guy’s last entry was a story about the el! All this guy ever writes about is the el!” It’s okay. I deserved that. I forgive you for thinking that about me because it’s true. All of my stories lately are about the el. But see, here’s the reason: All I’ve done for, like, the last two years of my life is to ride the el to work, work, then ride the el home. At work nothing ever interesting ever happens, it’s all about typing furiously, eating lunch like a filthy animal at my desk, and tense negotiations with the duplicating department (how am I supposed to know what kind of tabs are “custom?”). And my home life, I mean, you don’t want to read about what songs Mr. Kitty and I sang together substituting “meow” for the lyrics or what I ate for dinner or the quality of my bowel movements, do you? So that leaves the el, which is the only place that anything interesting happens to me. During a summer recruiting lunch last year that went awry I explained this to the luncheon goers – that the el is only place where anything interesting ever happens to me. I thought that the fight I saw about a year ago on the el would be a good summer recruiting lunch conversation. It turns out I was mistaken, but during my description of the event through interpretive dance, probably because I was too busy furtively tip-toeing and twirling, and leaping, Leaping! LEAPING! I didn’t notice people rolling their eyes and looking uncomfortable in their business casual and displaying other obvious body language cues that would otherwise have alerted me to the inappropriateness of my performance. Apparently, I embarrassed myself. But you, you my gentle reader, you would forgive me one too many stories about the el. Wouldn’t you? Okay, here’s my story. It’s about that tall skinny guy who walks from car to car with a plastic cup and a blind-person’s cane begging for money and saying stuff like “Please help me. I am blind. Please help me,” in a funny voice while bugging out his eyes and pretending to be blind. It was probably about six months ago that he started his act. At first, it must have felt to him that he was sitting on a gold mine. He’d tap tap tap through the cars with his eyes all bugged out talking about how he was blind and how much courage it took for a blind guy to walk from car to car while the el was in motion (indeed!) and how he needed help, and everybody was giving that dude money. Like, he was probably grossing twenty bucks a car and after a three hour shift of that he must have had money coming out of his ears. He was making so much coin that he was probably drinking Harlan estate, having his soiled jeans custom tailored, and buying debentures in obscure tech start-ups just for shits. In fact, after his first week I noticed that he had cast aside his regular sized begging cup and was using a discarded super-sized cola cup from McDonalds to hold all his begging proceeds. I saw him on the el a few days ago though, and it appears that his bubble has burst. He made a pass, tap tap tapping, through the car I was in, and there was already a tinge of desperation about him. But when he got to the end of the car and nobody had given him any money at all, he turned around and made another pass through the car, scolding every one of us for our selfishness and saying some really hilarious things: “God bless you! God bless all of you! I’m saying ‘God bless you’ even though none of you deserve God’s blessing! If God was here, he would want you to help a blind man out. I’m blind! Do you understand how difficult and dangerous it is for me to make my way from car to car! Yet, nobody has given me any money! You make God sick!” “How would YOU like it if YOU went blind?! What if YOU went blind and YOU needed money so YOU had to walk from car to car even though it’s dangerous but then nobody gave YOU any money?!… How would that make YOU feel?!… How about this? I’ll save you the trouble! I’ll save you the trouble of going blind and then walking from car to car on the el and having nobody give you any money and I’ll tell you how it feels! It feels bad! It would make you feel really, really bad!” “It is very dangerous for a blind man to walk from car to car while the el is moving. I’m not doing this for fun! I’m not doing this for my health! I’m doing this for money! I would appreciate it is at least ONE PERSON appreciated the fact that I am making my way from car to car and just ONE PERSON gave me some money!” Finally, this one guy gave the blind beggar some money. I was watching closely, and I think that in his rage, the blind beggar slipped. I think he began shouting “Finally! Thank you! There’s ONE PERSON on this train that cares about the blind!” in a scornful voice just a few seconds before the coins hit the bottom of his cup and a real blind person would have become aware of the alms. I’m watching that purportedly blind guy like a hawk in order to gather conclusive proof that he’s not blind so I can stop feeling just a little bit guilty about thinking his act is really, really funny whenever he makes his way through the car.

Brian 6:09 PM

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