Love on the Metro

You see them drifting through sliding glass doors and slinking up and down stairs like a sweet sultry perfumed fog.  Wispy silk haired apparitions they are, vanishing just as abruptly as they appear.  Their presence sets your heart ablaze and elevates your body several inches above the dingy urine soaked platform you were standing on.  But like a cursed elevator with a snapped cable, you soon plummet back to earth as they blend into the endless sea of passerbyers.  You lock eyes with one of these ghosts for just a moment in a vain attempt to slow down time, and perhaps deeper entrench yourself in a love that will surely never be fully realized.  What is it you do, smile, wink, nod, or blink?  The more time that passes the more pain you will feel when she has finally vanished.  In a matter of seconds you have harnessed the universe and just as quickly allowed it to slip through your fingertips.  You will  never see her again, and all hope is lost.  The gaze you and that elegant specter once shared will be forever lost somewhere in the vast Metro tunnels far underneath a foreign city.  You will wander the dusty tile corridors for all eternity, lost in lament and gloom, until it happens all over again at the next stop.

Just a bench full of hapless souls, eagerly awaiting a train ride full of lovelorn sexual frustration and confusion.  Photo:  Carson Lee

The Happy Highway Handbook

The Happy Highway Handbook is a rough guide for learning how to cope with those never ending white lines in the road.  Find comfort floating around aimlessly in airport terminals and breathe a deep sigh of relief instead of dread during take off.  Relinquish control of your own life and succumb to the great expanse of the open road.  You are not taking the journey, the journey is taking you.

 

  
I am not a marble ledge in Boston, perfectly polished, waxed and prepared to withstand years or torment.

I have not the emotional or physical fortitude to live on a New York rooftop and party forever, although it sounds mighty enticing.  I appreciate my days equally as i do my nights.  I can only blend them together for short periods of time.

 

I am partly New Jersey, a purgatory I long for, but cannot claim as my own.

 

I can own Philly as the introduction to the final resting place for my disjointed brain and scrambled soul.  Between cheesesteak and regret lies an Airbnb full of Sloppy Joe memories, and sorrow.

I owe part of my soul to Delaware the hell are we, and what the hell purpose to we have here.  Twas the smoothest ground since leaving San Jose, and boy are my eyes tired.  I crossed a bridge who's name I cannot remember, but who's image I won't soon forget.

I am mostly Baltimore.  Those places previously mentioned provide an effemerial charm that can be stripped apart by a visit to one Baltimore Liquor store.  Season the rim of your own life with Old Bay and sip from the crusty chalice of mankind.  Nothing befits me like a smashed out window residing comfortably in a dilapidated Baltimore shack.  I am no different than any of those other windows, I just happen to have been subject to a few skillfully thrown rocks, and we all belong to the same brick building. 

The Reverse Lost Phone Paradox

The following has been transcribed from a text conversation occurring relatively soon after said event.  Begin transcription:
I got a cool story for you
kinda
I go to Cinebar and consume some (many) beverages.
During which time my mind becomes a little hazy.
I awake this morning my be, like I do most mornings.
It is a very comfy bed mind you.
I check for my belongings, wallet, phone, keys, and such.
And to my surprise not only do I have my phone, but a second phone and a gold leaf phone case.
After some careful detective work I discover that this phone belongs to one of the owners of San Jose Barbell.
I plan on holding the phone ransom in exchange for a gym membership.  Mad gains and lifting to the max!

Hahahahaha omg (laughing/crying emoji).

I am a firm believer in proper presentation.

Steppen into the Future

I have neglected The Clog with remorse likened to that of a hangman's, but still I want my fingers to hit the key with the eagerness of a race horse.  May the blog lords forever grant my soul mercy for failing to post anything in the highly revered month of December.  Ha, I jest, burn me at the stake for my insolence.  The old ways have been trampled over, and even dust is starting to gather on the dust that has gathered on the traditions once held so sacred.  Sacrilege paves the way for righteousness and new monuments shall be erected from the dried bones of those past Clog entries who gave their flesh for the new order.  I think I need to take a deep breath, brew a fresh pot of coffee, and write a book review.

 

Today I am pairing a cup of Sight Glass coffee, made from unmeasured and improperly ground beans, with Herman Hesse's novel Steppenwolf.  It should be noted that Siddhartha, another work of Hesse's, heavily influenced me during my gloriously awkward and angsty teenage years.  The damn book basically made me toss away all my petty cares and become a Buddhist, ok maybe just an antisocial skateboarder.  Steppenwolf focuses on a middle-aged man going through a spiritual crisis wherein he believes his psyche is divided between passive human tendencies and the wild animal urges of a wolf.  Am I hinting that an early onset midlife crisis is tearing my soul apart?  Is the wise and all knowing Herman Hesse going to deliver me from my plight as he once did over a decade ago?  Has The Clog overstepped its bounds and become way too heavy?  How the hell should I know, I am barely scraped past forty pages of this thing.  Steppenwolf has yet to quell my self-destructive urges, and I hardly think it will, but it makes me question myself every time I feel too complacent in life and decide to embark upon a drunken rampage through town.          

The Enemy of my Enemy is my Friend

I know it is wrong to find joy in the misery of others, and being a man filled not with spite or malice, it irks me so to revel in the downfall of the Los Angles Dodgers in the 2017 World Series.  Allow me to preface by saying I have several friends who are Dodger fans, and I wish them nothing but good health and happiness, however I loath their team.  I have been spoiled in recent years with three San Francisco Giants World Series victories, but the days of watching my beloved orange and black march confidently through October seem to be a thing of the past.  Normally once my team has hung up their bats for the season I turn the channel to football, or some obscure horror film I've watched more times than is psychologically healthy.  But with my arch nemesis making a strong run at the World Series title, I decided to succumb to my most malicious desires and cheer for the demise of my enemy.

   

With relatively similar colors as the Giants, I could root for the Houston Astros.  Orange in October just seems right.

Leaves blanket the ground, ghouls haunt the yard, and somewhere in Houston a bar is erupting with the screams of Astros fans as they become one game closer to doing the impossible.  

Yuli Gurriel not only came in clutch for his team, but also was captured on national television giving the most childish racist gesture to Yu Darvish.

The bar may be different, but the game remains the same.

Yuli is a character, one we will come to find both charming and excruciatingly annoying.  

In 2012 I could not be happier to see the once proud Justin Verlander knocked off his pedestal by two Pablo Sandoval home runs.  Several years down the road it was nice to witnes this man get a taste of redemption, at the expense of my foe of course.  

One day after Halloween, with the series extending to seven games, and myself with a malt liquor ravaged brain the Astros put the final nail in the Dodgers' coffin.  My arch rival died quietly amongst various bottles of vodka and gin.  I did not cheer victoriously, for my team did not win, but I sat easy in my chair knowing that neither did my enemy.  

Friday the 13th

I really ought to shave, but perhaps I will write a poem instead.

Twas Friday the 13th

and all through the city,

fires rages to the north

it truly was shitty.

The casing of my sausage

had just sprung a leek,

did I even have mustard

things truly looked bleak.

poisonous fumes in the lungs

cut like a knife,

but for Brandon we know

red park is life. 

The haze starts to lift

as back nose blunts are slid,

and troubles of the week

soon shall be rid. 

Cupcakes and wine

to cap off the night,

perhaps Friday 13th

would bring me no fright.

Could I be wrong

or maybe half right,

is this the next morning,

or still the last night?

Is your Emoji Organic?

The picture below contains an image known as an emoji.  I have been intrigued by emojis as of late because of their innocent appearance and comical nature.  They are primarily used in text messages as a replacement for words or phrases to convey a wide range of emotions.  Emojis can be interpreted in many different ways and often contain subtle innuendos, usually of the sexual nature.  No emoji demonstrates this better than the eggplant.  It is used primarily as a phallic symbolic rather than an actual vegetable.  Have we as a society lost touch with mother nature and the cornucopia of edible delights she offers us?  Instead of a wholesome eggplant we see a dick, or in place of a vitamin packed peach we envision a ripe luscious ass.  I suggest a retreat from the perverse and a resurgence agricultural awareness.     

Beware of the wolf in sheep's clothing.  Know the difference between the flesh world and the digital abyss that is your text message screen.  

It may be a little discolored and slightly less robust than its emoji brother, but this is an eggplant you can reach out and actually touch with your bare hands.  Go ahead, grasp it tightly with your hand. 

Alright enough fondling the eggplant, time to peel, slice, egg wash, and flour.

Hot oil coats the eggplant and results in crispy majestic medallions.  

All it takes is a layer of eggplant, sauce, cheese and repeat.  

And here we have emoji, shit I mean, eggplant parmesan.  Smash your phone against the coffee table and pour yourself a glass of wine, because you are now human.