Do you know what I did this weekend? Do you? I spent the majority of the time sleeping. Sunday I dozed until 11:30, in between bouts of mediating peace bwtween Madeline and Spencer.

My most effective peace inflicting technique is to cuddle with them. Madeline on one side, and Spencer on the other and tell drowsy stories that trail off into snores. Hey, if we can have 'Legend of the Drunken Master,' in which our martial arts hero can only fight when drunk, we can have 'legend of the sleepy story teller.'

There was an evening when I was practicing my patented sleepy story telling technique, laying on Molly's bed with children clustered around and on top of me. I was well into REM sleep, and so had entered the world of the story. "...And then their Dragoon got up-"

"What!?" Molly sat up and almost screamed. "They have a dragon?"

"Uh, yeah honey, the Dragon......Zzzzz."

Yesterday (Monday) I worked hard at my appointed tasks at Zappos.com (the best place to buy shoes, damnit, now buy some shoes!) then took the bus home. Overwhelmed with exhaustion I staggered into the house. Or tried.

I was unable to make it to, let alone through, the door. First a naked and ice cream coated spencer attacked me with cries of 'Daddy, Daddy!' And then a partially clothed and equally dessert drenched Madeline got to me with similiar effect.

Heather looked me in the ey, the good eye, not the one I use when I am programming, and asked "Any questions?"

No Siree Bob, I am not having any questions. Unable to imagine the evening, I started a pot of water for noodles, and then corralled Spencer (tried to get both of them) and took him up to cuddle and read stories. We worked our way through Mr. Putter and Tabby walk the Dog. It is not revealing too many secrets to say that Zeke, the Dog, was not a very good dog. To liven things up, we practiced taking naps whenever Mr. Putter and Tabby were forced to slumber by the misdeeds of Zeke.

But enough...I am just beating the bushes in avoidance of the real stories, the deep heart felt feelings that wrench at our fabric of-

Bullshit

Oh okay. Just tell the stories.

My Recent Existential Crisis Merging into My Fight at the Gas Station

I am old enough to know better. Really. I am old enough to understand the intrumentation of my own self. I feel hungry, so I eat, thirsty so I drink, Horny so I ...enough. And yet I know nothing at all. Really. Nothing. The last couple of weeks (this is before the solstice) found me frustrated and listless and revved up and unsettled.

I was forced to work at home a week ago Friday when I realized that if I left the house that there was a rather good chance that I would be forced into actions that would not be in my best interest. The realization happened after I entered an internal world of doubt and paranoia when a telemarketer called and asked for 'Roger Gibson.' There must have been more than that, but all I recall is that I developed a paranoid fixation over that particular telemarketer using that specific, and wrong, name. Maybe it was a 'Manchurian Candidate' sort of thing, where 'Roger Gibson' was my special code name, and I was supposed to take the microfilm and put it into a cannister that looked like a nostril and then stick it up my nose to escape the agents of K.A.O.S.

Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck.

(And I'm not just saying that!)

And then I discovered blessed relief. Some time before the Solstice the gates of reticence released and I spewed the resevoir of contained confusion and internal knots out onto Jonathon. He took it all far better than any one has a right to expect. If he wasn't such a self-professed evil person I would think him one with a sainted touch.

Here was the grand realization: when I feel knotted up, and frustrated, then it is time to examine causes. It seems that I regularly get myself knotted up, trying to think through complete solutions to complicated situations. I can't think your way out of a crisis. The simple answer is the threadbare mantra 'if what you are doing isn't working, then do something else.' (Note: not 'if what you are doing isn't working, then spend a bunch of time thinking on something else to do').

And then that was that. There were more details, like the way the realization caused me to jump up and down and try to rassle to the refrigerator (it was a draw-I had the moves but the 'reefer' had the reach, and 20 pounds on me).

It was so much easier in my youthage. All of my friends were tangled within their own webs of doubt, so when it got to be too much we would take off, south on 101 in rush hour traffic, sticking our heads out the sun roof and windows to yell 'Sixty Nine!' and 'Boogieamos.' Then we would get to some empty spot, usually deserted desert and we would enter into debauchery!

Absolute chaotic rule smashing decadence. At least that is how it felt. It felt that we were the most transgressive fuckers who ever went out into the desert and smoked dope and drank half a bottle of tequila.

Sorry for the digression. But really, straight tequilla, no chaser, is no digression. After the Zappos party I went home with Matt and BA and tried to watch Seven Samaurai and teach BA how to drink Tequila straight, with no chaser. The key is to drink a big enough snort that it makes you shake your head, uncontrollably, as a dog does after being in water. Too small a sip and it just tastes like merde, and too much and you will surely pass out or barf, or pass out in your barf.

Oooops, I ran out of time, again, without getting to the gas station fight. Damn.