Work & Twisters

It's an interesting day at work. Work takes my mind off things so I can't wallow in my depression, so I like being here. the problem is the tornado sirens are going off. At first people said they were just testing them since we're going to get severe weather. Since Miss Montez had just brought me my computer I pulled up the national weather service and said, "There's a tornado about 15 miles away."

Usually sirens going off means the lunch crowd will be almost nonexistent. Plus there are apparently plenty of people here who although they've spent their entire lives in this tornado prone area, they freak out. I'm all for cancelling lunch service if only so I can get ahead on everything else and leave early. I don't get to leave if the lunch service is canceled even though I'm saucier at lunch. I just get to go back to my kitchen and do the rest of my work.

Ah, the sirens stopped! But the rain has started.

Oh wait, sirens again. Yeah, I'm all for no lunch service today if only to save all the plates the jumpy servers will be dropping.

Awake

No, today is just as bad. Possibly worse.

Sleep

I just want to hide in bed and sleep.

I want oblivion for a little while.

Maybe tomorrow will be better.

http://www.foxnews.com/video/index.html?playerId=videolandingpage&streamingFormat=FLASH&referralObject=3634156&referralPlaylistId=playlist

At three minutes they finally ask about the real problem. It's two women kissing.

And later, don't make us feel bad about eating meat.

I'm not a member of PETA. I eat meat, I work in a restaurant. I've killed live animals in prep for dinner shift. But as for the ad campaign, it offending people seeing these sexy people blah blah blah, I always wonder about the people who are so offended by seeing things like that. Do they go to the mall? I've been two two malls in two days and both malls had stores with giant photographs of women in lingerie as well as males and females getting intimate with each other. But I don't hear people protesting these, even though one of the shops is directly across from a children's clothing store.

But PETA's not behind those pictures trying to tell anyone they are doing something bad. Those pictures of naked people are telling the consumer they can be beautiful too, so it's all right. And people can always claim they don't have to go to the mall and see those window displays. But I bet if a single one of those displays had a tiny little sign attached to it that said basically "stop doing something you enjoy because it's bad" people would suddenly demand those displays be removed.

so you want to be a writer?

if it doesn't come bursting out of you
in spite of everything,
don't do it.
unless it comes unasked out of your
heart and your mind and your mouth
and your gut,
don't do it.
if you have to sit for hours
staring at your computer screen
or hunched over your
typewriter
searching for words,
don't do it.
if you're doing it for money or
fame,
don't do it.
if you're doing it because you want
women in your bed,
don't do it.
if you have to sit there and
rewrite it again and again,
don't do it.
if it's hard work just thinking about doing it,
don't do it.
if you're trying to write like somebody
else,
forget about it.


if you have to wait for it to roar out of
you,
then wait patiently.
if it never does roar out of you,
do something else.

if you first have to read it to your wife
or your girlfriend or your boyfriend
or your parents or to anybody at all,
you're not ready.

don't be like so many writers,
don't be like so many thousands of
people who call themselves writers,
don't be dull and boring and
pretentious, don't be consumed with self-
love.
the libraries of the world have
yawned themselves to
sleep
over your kind.
don't add to that.
don't do it.
unless it comes out of
your soul like a rocket,
unless being still would
drive you to madness or
suicide or murder,
don't do it.
unless the sun inside you is
burning your gut,
don't do it.

when it is truly time,
and if you have been chosen,
it will do it by
itself and it will keep on doing it
until you die or it dies in you.

there is no other way.

and there never was.

Charles Bukowski

How Are You?

People are just being polite when they ask "How are you?" Most aren't even being polite. They're being obligatory. [Don't know or care if I used that correctly, but you now what I mean.] Most people when they answer it, simply say "Fine" or "Good" and then the conversation commences.

Friday it would have meant a lot to me if someone had simply asked "How are you?" when I first came online in the afternoon. I would have said, "Fine" and not said any more than that, because I would know the person didn't really want the details of my day. I just wanted to be asked.

I just deleted all the details of why I wanted to be asked because I didn't want to sound like a whiner or that I was trying to get any sympathy. Just, take my word for it. Even if you don't care, always throw out that "How are you" or "How's it going?" The answer you receive may be just as perfunctory, but just asking the question might make a difference to someone.