The Story of Soggy Toast....in Ten Parts...Part Eight...Addendum

Part Eight Addendum: the Purple Shriveled Pickle

I felt that it would be important to add this little tidbit, if for no better reason than getting to use the word "tidbit", and also due to the fact that it's not entirely true that everything in the past few weeks has been of the mixed blessing variety. There is a really good thing to share as well:

My brother and his girlfriend, Corinne, recently announced their engagement! This is awesome because they, in my opinion, are really good together and because I already have come to view her as a sister.....a purple-haired sister that listens to shitty pseudo punk music....but a sister nonetheless. And I'm NOT about to publicly chastise her right now due to the fact that she's going to go see Hank Williams 3 tonight with the other retards.

Please feel free to use the above links to give congrats to the happy couple if you feel the need.....add them to your friend's list, send them angry letters about things that they have nothing to do with or send them money to help get started drinking early tonight.

In other news, the internet connection seems to be up again finally, after being down for the past several days; I have the entire day off and plan to finish up the last two posts of this directionless ten part series that I originally intended to have all posted within two or three days after starting....then I will start a series of One part series posts, because that makes more sense. My feet itch, just thought you all should know.

The Story of Soggy Toast....in Ten Parts...Part Eight

Part Eight: the Mixed Blessing Blood Trail

So, yeah. I haven't kept up with this here bloggy machine thing that well as of late, nor have I been very good at keeping in touch with many friends, acquaintances or those that I don't even really like but scare me enough into pretending that I do lest I find myself forced into race dialing 911 while they swing a rusty nail-studded bat around my room while screaming unintelligible phrases about the "little piggies"! (You know who you are!)

So, I suppose a little list of current events is in order:

A plan was finally formulated to acquire my possessions from storage (including my car). This would have taken place the first week of August. The key-word here is "would".

My brother and I were recently asked to leave the condo we are/were living in in Westminster by our landlords, who I suspect made this decision while on one of their many coke-addled benders. At first we were given 30 days and the story that they planned to sell the condo....that turned into 12 days and a story that they needed the time to fix the place up for other potential renters. After much protesting and threatening of legal recourse, it turned back into 30 days...and so on. At this point I really have lost track of how much time we have and what the new reason behind the decision is, and I couldn't really give a fuck. This is what put the "would" in the previous event.

Before I left Pennsylvania I took everything I still owned out of the storage place that I was renting and put it into the corner of the small unfinished room of the basement in my folk's house. Now, due to an error on the plumber's part when the house was being constructed, the drain in that room had to be plugged because it was a slightly higher elevation than the others and caused slight problems with the toilets and what not. This would only ever be a problem if, let's say, one of the two water-heaters not five feet from where my stuff was, exploded and then proceeded to spray unchecked for 12 or so hours. I don't know the full extent of the loss, and probably won't for the next few days, but I do know that so far the casualties include my bed, the desk, the drawing table, my matte-cutter, framed artwork (mine as well as others that were bought or given to me), all my crescent board, my case of Arches Paper, an undetermined (as of yet) number of books and the entire contents of my portfolio. The lone water heater also took out my parent's basement basically....including their bar, bathroom, some furniture and all the carpet. What a soldier!

I was described, many years ago by the parents of one of my close friends, as insouciant, which has become one of my favorite words. For the most part I'd like to believe that that is true, but that's not to mean that I don't suffer from the same moods as others, just that I usually do a good job of either hiding it from everybody or knowing when to avoid people altogether, usually only my close friends or those that have known me for years being able to see through the façade.
Luckily, this fact still held true during all of this, for I honestly believe that had I somehow found myself as coke-addled as my landlords, I would have been picked up by the police in Denver for publicly punting babies!
As fun as that would have been, I have also learned in all my years that the downsides to things usually come with upsides in the same package. Luckily this holds true with all of the events listed above.

My folks apparently have great Homeowner's Insurance, and even though we don't know the full extent of the damage as of yet, we have been assured that everything will be covered....I just wish I could see the representative's face when he learns exactly HOW MUCH some of this lost stuff was worth.
This promised sum affords me the ability to not only stay in Colorado (which I really thought I'd have to leave after the many conflicting announcements of when and why we were being expelled from the condo) but to move into Denver far earlier than I originally had planned to, which is good due to the fact that I really can't stand Westminster!
This also puts acquiring my stuff and car back into motion, just slated for the end of August now instead of the beginning. And let's face it....it's looking like I'll have less to move now! Ha!

I think I just shit blood in my pants......

Not Part of the Soggy Toast Saga.....

About two or so years ago, my girlfriend at the time and I were witnesses to a horrible scene on Bardstown Road while trying to enjoy our chai teas outdoors, that is, we saw a medium sized dog get struck by a car. The car must have only swiped him for he was very much still alive, yelping and circling in the middle of the busy street, before laying down out of fear or shock. We both were trying to get out into the road, waving down traffic in order to do so, when a second car ran completely over this dog! It didn't even seem like the car made any attempt to swerve or slow down even....it just let both tires roll this poor dog like a rag doll. Nor did it even stop afterwards. I will maybe give them the benefit of doubt that they didn't have time to see the dog before striking it, but there is no possible way they couldn't have known that they ran it over.

I'm bringing this up tonight because I remember the wave of anger and awe I felt then thinking about how people could be so fucking heartless and uncaring.

Tonight, I was driving home from work in Denver on 25 North. There is a long curved ramp from this Interstate to get onto 36 West, which I was in the process of navigating when I witnessed a van, maybe two car lengths in front of me, change lanes directly infront of two motorcycles. Actually, more like changing lanes INTO the two motorcycles, to be more precise. One of the bikers managed to control his braking fishtale and swerved into the left lane (luckily unoccupied at that time), but the other biker started sliding sideways. The car infront of me quickly changed lanes to avoid what was about to happen, and I got the front row seat of watching this biker finally roll once, still with his bike, then roll face first into the concrete barrier at the side of the ramp (no, he was not wearing a helmet, of course).....went limp as a doll, rolling along side the gutter, and his bike then running him over. I came to a stop in the shoulder not ten feet from where he laid on his back. Amazingly, he was not only still alive, but conscious, and I ran to him while dailing 911. I did my best trying to tell him to just lie still and that an ambulance would be on it's way soon, but he was in a great deal of pain, and his head was split wide open on the right side and partly caved in.
His partner ran to us and helped in trying to keep him calm, and luckily a passing off duty nurse and EMT stopped to help as much as they could. The ambulance and police finally arrived and took over, and it was then that I finally realized that the van that caused this accident never stopped....NOR did the people directly in front of me who witnessed the whole event as well!

I don't really know what I'm trying to say with this blog. I feel sick! Not only for what I witnessed, of course, but for the fact that these people could drive away like that! What could possibly be in thier heads to make them that way? Are we who stopped to help THAT different in make up?
This poor guy's friend kept thanking me for calling 911 as if it was an unheard of thing to do, the police as well thanked me in that same way for the very same act!

The dog that got run over twice, over two years ago, did survive, and seemed like it would do well. I doubt I will be able to say that about the biker.

I'm going to drink myself to sleep now.

The Story of Soggy Toast....in Ten Parts...Part Seven

Part Seven: Being Windy like a Peanut

It has come to my attention recently that many cities across the states now take part in what can best be described as a Zombie Mob Day. A day where hundreds of people dress as zombies and wander the streets as if the rapture were happening now.
There is a part of me that really wants to support and possibly participate in such events, seeing as how the idea of the living dead has always been one of my favorite horror/creature subjects, and the wave of excitement that comes over me thinking about how finally the idea of zombies are becoming more widely accepted as a genre all it's own, thanks to such films as 28 Day Later (not entirely zombies, I know) and the, in my opinion, brilliant rethinking of Romero's Dawn of the Dead, as well as from Max Brook's books The Zombie Survival Guide and World War Z. But, at the same time, I almost feel as if I might be the only one who sees the dangers in such acceptance and with such events as the Zombie Mobs taking place.

One of the main reasons, in my opinion, to document and study the history of mankind and societies in general, is to learn from it. In other words, to learn from past mistakes. As individuals we are able to do this almost unfailingly. Hit a baby with a taser gun every time it tries to pet the salivating dog and eventually it'll stop trying, and most likely grow up with an unbelievable fear and hatred of dogs....but that's just a funny side effect.
As a collective we seem almost unable to do this. Hit a group of babies with a taser gun every time one tries to pet the dog and they'll blame one another, try to ban heavy metal and video games, but they'll keep trying to pet that damn dog! And will someone stop ringing that fucking bell?!!

Now, to bring this back to the subject of Zombie Mobs I'll give you all a few examples of where we should have learned better. First, Halloween....which gave people born with the condition known as "Rubber Face Syndrome", or as I like to call it, "Soup Face", a day that they could come out and mingle relatively free from blatant stares and persecution. The second, Mardi Gras....which introduced topless dancers into polite society.
And while both of these examples are relatively free of serious society altering side effects, they should at least give people pause to think about what could possibly happen when the undead feel free to join the masses of the living. I mean, just think about the number of people, in Florida especially but in other states as well, that had already been dead for sometime but still managed to vote for Bush in the past two elections!

Next I plan to combat the Tooth Fairy, who's very concept introduces children to prostitution by teaching them that it's not only ok but easy to sell your body for money.

The Story of Soggy Toast....in Ten Parts...Part Six

Part Six: the Sounds from Behind the Toilet

...In which we find our hero duct taped to a wall of the room filled with flesh eating eels. Will he survive? Stay tuned and find out.