I’d just like to thank the folks who built this (rented) townhouse for putting a smoke detector at the apex of a 15-foot ceiling, so that when the battery starts to die after midnight, you get to realize you have no way to get up there and shut it up.
On a message board, someone asked to hear drinking stories. This is my best one:
My brother was working as a banking consultant and was on a months-long gig in Mexico City. He got free flights to/from the US every few weeks as part of his perks, and since I’d never been to Mexico, he flew me down, and we went out with some of the Mexican banking bigwigs he knew, all of whom were about our age.
We were touring the high-end tequila bars, when one of the Mexican bankers turns to me and says “wow, you really can drink for an American.”
Famous last words: “Oh, I was in a fraternity in college and lived in a fraternity house for four years. I can probably keep up with you.”
I said this. To a Mexican. About tequila.
Apparently, no one could tell I was drunk the rest of the night (I really can drink — it also helps not having any inhibitions to lose) and while I can’t remember any of it, apparently I charmed the hell out of a number of English-speaking Mexican beauties.
Finally, 17 shots and several hours later, we head back to the hotel. I get out of the cab and fall straight forward, onto my face. My brother and a bellman get me up to my brother’s room.
I proceed to stand in the middle of the room, looking at the wood-paneled walls. I open my mouth, and vomit comes out horizontally, painting all four walls as well as the four-poster king-sized elevated bed. My brother gets me into the bathroom, where I repeat the process.
My brother, who has a meeting in the morning, stays up all night cleaning the room with expensive towels.
I wake up at 4 p.m., feeling like someone has taken a hacksaw and cut through my forehead, halfway into my skull.
My brother still speaks to me, which speaks more of brotherly love than anything else he’s ever done.
Given how this blog began, it seems appropriate to eavesdrop again on Josh Friedman’s great blog, which had been about anything but cancer, but life tossed the screenwriter a major plot-twist, unbidden:
I do not believe in God, and I do not believe in fate. The last two months have been tough on this particular atheist, but as an infinite monkey I have little choice but to bow down to the powers of natural selection and mutation, even when it’s happening inside my own body. There are those who suggest a greater power must be looking out for me. But the greatest power I know was doing last minute post-production on Munich so I didn’t bother calling on him, either.
I do believe in poker. I was addicted to cards, and so I quit. But they converted me to their ways. I believe in math, random chance, probability, and mostly, luck. Professional card players understand that poker is short-term luck (good and bad) eventually balanced out by long-term skill. Living, more likely, is long-term luck balanced out with occasional bouts of short-term skill. In this case, the luck is all mine and the skill belongs to those who found my tumor and took it out.
I did not fight cancer and I certainly did not beat cancer. One night cancer came and grabbed me hard by the arm, yanked me down the stairs and stood over me on the landing while I begged for mercy and waited for the rain of blows to come. Some did, enough for me to know I couldn’t have withstood the whole barrage.
And then without explanation it disappeared. And let me live. Like some monsters do.
Incidentally, if you don’t normally read I find your lack of faith disturbing, it’s probably the most interesting blog out there, for my money. Other than, you know, mine, which is riveting.
 Jenn and I went to the new Wendy’s at Main Street and I Avenue for lunch today.
This is a bigger deal than it might seem. Hesperia used to have a Wendy’s years ago, but it closed down long before I came here. I think the building, closer to downtown, might still be vacant, I can’t recall. There’s now one far, far to the west, at a truck stop on I-15 (Main Street traffic makes it further than it might appear to be), but that’s hardly convenient (and, frankly, it’s hard to drive past In-N-Out to get a hamburger somewhere else). As a result, Jenn is crazy for Wendy’s. My medical tests in 2004 taking place in Apple Valley had a silver lining: “We can stop and get you Wendy’s after.” (I had a real loss of appetite at the height of my first sarcoidosis episode.) I just like them because they’re a lot less common out here than they were on the east coast.
In any case, the new location is open, and has the cleanliness and customer service that you typically only get when the regional managers are in the kitchen with you, training everyone. (That’s not totally true, though: The Baker’s across from In-N-Out at Main Street and I-15 has tables you could perform surgery on and astonishingly good customer service, particularly for a fast food restaurant.) Wendy’s has moved away from the old fashioned classified ads on tables and as wallpaper and the new store has an interesting (although not necessarily convincingly functional) use of smoked glass to divide the relatively small eating area up.
Since everyone’s just getting trained up, none of Wendy’s limited time items are available, but everything was tasty and delicious. It’s very nice getting another option on Main Street. Naturally, it comes just as Jenn and I are talking about eating better and working out again in the new year.
- Speaking of sarcoidosis, it’s been a little more than a week that I’ve been on the Prevacid NarpaPAC and so far, it’s been great. No heartburn whatsoever, either from the painkillers or otherwise, and while it hasn’t completely eliminated my joint pain, it’s made a significant dent in it. This looks like a good solution until my situation gets dramatically worse.
(Jenn’s sister Kelly’s daughter.)
“PBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBBLT!”
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