I'll be in San Diego until Saturday.
No posting until then.
Don't forget me.
RG...out!
I didn't know that there was a convention at St. Arbuck's.
I mean there had to be something going on because not only were every table and every chair occupied but there was a long line of customers which seemed undiminished in spite of the fact that people were coming and going with a precisioned regularity.
The din of conversation was loud enough that when coupled with the in-store music you had to raise your voice to be heard.
And people did just that.
Raised their voices.
My wife and I sat in two overstuffed chairs in the corner--grateful for any seat let alone the best seats in the house--reading the morning paper, leisurely sipping our beverages and quietly observing the scene.
To our immediate left, no more than two feet away, were two young women who had just met (both in their twenties and dressed for business) talking animatedly about their respective companies and the deal that had brought them together on this mid-August morning.
About the same distance to our right was a pretty young woman in her twenties, stylishly coiffed and dressed who had just managed to snatch the recently vacated table.
She checked her watch, glanced toward the door and retrieved a folder stuffed with what appeared to be very important papers from her briefcase before sitting down and powering up a laptop computer while at the same time scrolling through information on an iPhone and tossing back a quick drink of her Caffè Americano.
"Are you Stephanie?" hailed a loud male voice from the front of the store.
The woman turned toward the source and saw a tall, slender man of middle age with thin, straight gray hair the condition of which caused me to wonder whether he had been up all night or had simply gotten up too late.
Walking energetically toward her he held out his hand and said, "My name is Mark. I've been looking forward to this meeting."
She said, "Hi, I'm Stephanie."
It would be the last words she spoke for the next forty-five minutes!
Suddenly my entire attention was captured by what was unfolding before my eyes.
I couldn't believe it.
In one of comedian Brian Regan's best routines he describes one of these creatures but I hadn't seen one outside of captivity for a long, long time.
Right there not more than three feet away was a genuine Me-monster!
The creature sat down, his loudly articulated monologue drenching the poor girl in an unrelenting stream of narcissistic, self-absorbed drivel.
"Yeah, I and me, me, me, and I, me, me, me, ME, ME, MEEEEEEEEE!"
You get the picture.
My wife, slack-jawed and staring turned toward me and said, "Is that what I think it is?"
Pressing my lips into a tight smile I simply nodded my affirmation.
By the time fifteen minutes had passed the two aforementioned young women to our left were having trouble holding a train of thought together as the loud-talking fellow's spiel made it nearly impossible to do anything but listen in as he regaled his audience with story after story of his exploits.
We learned that not only was he a medical doctor, but he also had an MBA, owned several companies, wasn't married and thought himself quite youthful in appearance.
At one point he said, "I know I look like I'm 26, but I'm really 50."
My wife and I looked at each other; the two women to our left looked at each other; turned and looked at us with eyebrows raised in a sort of unspoken, "Can you believe this guy?"
To her credit, Stephanie didn't laugh for the man looked every bit of fifty, probably more like fifty-five.
As his voice droned on and on my emotions went from shock over seeing a genuine Me-monster on the loose, to fascination, to disgust and finally to pity.
Taking a long hard look at the man I saw something in his eyes that radically changed my perception: it was an onrushing cold front of fear and he was desperately trying to avoid its incessant advance.
He must have sensed me staring for he shifted his eyes my direction and actually halted the monologue.
I smiled genuinely at him, and his whole countenance changed as he returned my smile and gave me a small wave of his hand.
Turning his eyes back to Stephanie I heard him say, "Do you have any questions?"
Did she ever!
We sat there for a few more minutes, long enough for me to reflect on what had just transpired.
When we left he looked up, nodded and smiled as if we were old friends and I thought that if I could spend even an hour with him I could probably understand what made him the way he was...a "Me-monster," or just a terribly insecure man whose life was anything except what he most desired who kept fear at bay by doing the only thing he knew.
RG...out!
"You got a birthday coming next week," Eddie said affirmatively as we stood in line braving the morning crush of caffeine starved patrons at our favorite St. Arbuck's.
That would be Eddie Washington, my disgustingly good-looking, African-American best friend.
I said somewhat sarcastically, "How nice of you to remember."
Turning his head to stare at me he said, "You implying that I have a history of forgetting your birthday?"
Now, what you must understand at this point is that it is a well documented fact that while Eddie Washington is one of the best jazz drummers on the planet, his capacity for recalling important dates like birthdays and, sadly for him, anniversaries is sketchy at best.
"You're right," I said turning the sarcasm up a notch. "That was the old Eddie who, for the record, is not to be compared with the new Eddie who has a memory as crisp as a new hundred-dollar bill."
We inched forward in line bringing us to within a mere twenty-five feet of the counter.
He said, "You know, sometimes you just plain mean-spirited when you haven't had your coffee."
"Mean-spirited?" I said incredulously. "Mean-spirited is when you say hurtful things that have no basis in fact. Are you disputing the fact that you virtually never, as in NEVER remember birthdays or any other important events?"
"Wasn't it me who asked the question about your birthday next week?" he said defensively.
"Yeah, but that's only because you were there yesterday when someone asked me when my birthday was."
"That had nothing to do with it. I already had it down in my Blackberry," and he pulled the device from his pocket, dialed up the calendar and thrust it toward me.
Sure enough right there on his calendar it said, "R.G.'s birthday."
I smiled thinly, looked into his eyes, leaned forward a little and whispered, "It's the wrong date."
"What?" he exclaimed and pulled the Blackberry close to his face. "That's not possible."
"Why?"
"Because I got it from..." and his voice trailed off.
"Last year's calendar?" I provided for him.
He looked at me and as we inched forward a little more said, "Hey, at least I'm tryin'." And after a brief pause added, "But you're going to be fifty, right? I mean I at least got that much right."
I slapped him on the back, smiled broadly and said, "Fifty it is. And I'm buying coffee."
I'm actually celebrating the 38th anniversary of my 21st birthday, but who's counting.
RG...out!
One day last week my son was watching MY three year-old granddaughter, Ocean while mom was away.
He was in the front room of their second floor beachside apartment and Ocean was in the back bedroom.
Suddenly, he heard her screaming.
Not a typical, three year-old scream--like a tantrum, or fighting with baby brother--but one that said, "Daddy, I'm going to die!"
He raced through the apartment and through the door of the bedroom and found that she had somehow pushed the screen out of the window and was half-way out.
He grabbed her and pulled her back inside and was quite angry with her at first for doing something so foolish and disobedient because he and my daughter-in-law had told her over and over again not to mess with the screen.
After his emotions had cooled, and she had stopped crying, he asked her to explain what had happened.
Here's what she said:
"The happy stranger caught me before I hit the car." (He looked and there was a car parked directly below the window.
He said, "The happy stranger?"
"Yes," she said. "The happy stranger saved me and sat me back on the wall and told me to be a good girl...and the angry stranger was mad."
As she said this, my son began to cry because he remembered that when he had heard her scream it sounded as if the scream were coming from far away and was retreating...as if she were falling.
I'm not sure how to explain this.
One thing is for sure--a three year-old doesn't typically make up stories like this, and especially not OUR three year-old, especially when she was nearly out the window and nearly falling to her death. But if her story is to be believed, there was an "angry stranger" who wanted her to die, and a "happy stranger" who prevented it from happening.
I don't know...you tell me.
RG...(very gratefully) out!
The teenaged boy held a Blackberry Curve close to his face, thumbs flying over the tiny keyboard, all-consumed by the composition of what I imagined to be a very important text.
I mean it had to be.
He hadn't looked up from his labors for a good ten minutes.
I was whiling away a late afternoon in St. Arbuck's on a Las Vegas summer day that was hot enough to make you want to live someplace else.
Of course, now that I think about it just about every summer day--beginning in May and running through September--could easily carry that designation.
I sat in a sort of contented boredom wishing/willing my Muse to appear and gift me with sufficient inspiration to kick-start a novel that had unfortunately and tragically died at the end of page 87.
Apparently, however, the Muse was occupied elsewhere for nothing came to mind except the notion that I should be laying on the sand in La Jolla instead of sweltering under an unforgiving, unrelenting desert sun.
My boredom was interrupted by the entrance of three young ladies all in their early teens.
Whatever they had been talking about was abruptly and suddenly forgotten when as one their eyes came to rest upon the texting teen to my left.
Since I hadn't really had more than a cursory look at the lad I seized the opportunity to check him out.
Right away I could tell that he would grow into a handsome man--thick brown hair shot through with sun streaks worn in a longish style; high cheekbones and full lips that women seem to find so attractive in men now days; a good profile and clear complexion.
He glanced over in my direction which gave me a chance to see his eyes, which were, of course, blue.
I mean how could they not be blue!
He smiled and jerked his head quickly back as if someone had been standing directly underneath his chin and had given him a quick poke.
It was a filial greeting known to men everywhere and one which I returned eagerly and quickly.
The trio of young women stood where they had stopped whispering back and forth about where they should sit.
What they were really doing was trying to decide which table would provide the best line of sight to my suddenly quite popular fellow customer.
I said, "You writing a novel over there or something?"
At first he looked puzzled and then held up the Curve and said, "What, this? Nah. I'm actually texting my girlfriend."
The girls finally settled on a table that was, perhaps, ten feet away, sat down and immediately began to, well, over-communicate. What I mean is that while they may have been talking to each other the purpose of the conversation was completely and totally crafted for my new best friend's benefit who, for the time being anyway, was totally ignoring them.
It suddenly occurred to me that I was utterly invisible to those three.
And I was fine with that.
I said to the young man, "You two getting along okay?"
Compressing his lips he sadly shook his head and said, "She's just all over me about stuff that I enjoy doing that doesn't include her."
"No! Really?" I said dramatically as if I couldn't believe my ears.
"Yeah. I mean, check it out. Bobby and I play World of Warcraft every Tuesday night. We've played it way before I even knew she existed. But now, every time Tuesday afternoon comes around she starts in on me with, like a flood of texts about am I gonna come and see her, can she come over to my house, are we gonna hang out at the movies..."
One of the girls walked slowly by our area on her way to the condiment table, casting a brief yet hopeful glance at the young man.
He didn't seem to know she was even there and said to me, "I don't think I can have a girlfriend who won't let me be myself...you know, let me do what I do even when it doesn't involve her."
With the irony fairly dripping I said, "Uh, yeah, good luck with that."
The table of teens suddenly erupted in raucous laughter which finally got my young friend's attention.
For a few seconds anyway.
"Man," he said, "girls are so weird. Like those three over there."
Following his gaze I said, "What about them?"
"They've been trying to get my attention ever since they came in," he said shaking his head and smiling.
"Ah," I said. "So you noticed."
"Dude, how could they have been any more obvious!"
I said, "So, how old are you?"
"I'll be fifteen my next birthday," he said proudly.
"And when is that?"
Smiling shyly he said, "Uh, like in a while."
One of the young ladies walked hesitantly in our direction and stopped in front of his table.
"Hi," she said nervously. "One of my friends over there wants your phone number so she can send you a text."
Peering around her he said, "Which one?"
Her face reddened and she said, "Uh, well, all of us," before bursting into giggles and fleeing back to the safety of her friends who immediately huddled up as if concocting a new strategy.
He turned and looked at me with all the weight of his fourteen years of worldly wisdom resting on his shoulders and said, "I get that all the time."
"I bet you do."
Suddenly sticking out his hand he said, "I'm Myles, by the way."
"RG," I said while shaking his hand.
Jerking his head toward the girls he said, "So, you think I should cut them some slack?"
Glancing at the three I said, "I thought you were trying to work something out with your girlfriend."
He looked down at his Blackberry, pressed the "send" button and said with a smile, "What girlfriend?"
I laughed and realized that Lowell was right: "If youth be a defect, it is one that we outgrow only too soon."
RG...out!
On the advice of a neighbor I started recording an Audio Book of Snapshots At St. Arbuck's.
Wow!
It's way harder than I thought.
I spent all day recording today and only got three chapters done.
Since there are 46 chapters at that rate it's going to take me...uh...a long time.
Of course I'm doing them a bit like old radio dramas with sound track, sound effects, etc.
Way fun.
Okay...gotta get back in the studio.
RG...out!
"And don't forget the flour. Last time you forgot the flour! Sometimes I think you'd forget your head if it wasn't attached."
The little boy listened only partially to his mother's voice which, when she was in a mood like this, took on the qualities of a fork scraped across a dinner plate. He hated that sound. Not that he disliked his mother. It was just that being the only child left at home out of a family of six kids, and the only boy at that, he had few options when it came to avoidance. Truthfully even when his sisters had been home he was always the one singled out to run "errands" for his mother. She called them errands but in reality an errand was anything she didn't feel like doing. Anything.
"I didn't hear you, James Edward. What did you say?" she hollered from the screened in porch.
James, or Jimmy to his friends, hadn't said anything. What she wanted was for him to say something like, "All right, mom." Or, "Yes, mother." Something like that just so she'd know he was listening.
"All right, mom. I won't forget."
He stood in the street outside their simple house under a summer sun that felt as if it were burning his skin through the long-sleeved shirt she always made him wear whenever he went outside.
"Now you hurry back. I don't want you dawdling."
He didn't really know what dawdling meant but he supposed it had something to do with him stopping at the pharmacy to look at comic books and eat candy. Jimmy loved candy and he especially loved Cherry-a-Lets. But not as much as he loved comic books. He figured he could probably spend an entire day just looking at comics if Ralph, the pharmacy owner, would let him.
A southwest wind sent a flurry of dust-devils racing past the wheels of his cart that he always pulled behind him when going to the market for his mother. It had become an every day thing lately. Sometimes two times a day and one day last week she had made him go three times. Of course that had been the day he had forgotten to get the flour so that third trip technically didn't count.
At the end of their little street he glanced behind him to see if she was still watching. She usually watched until he got out of sight. Today, however, the porch was empty. Jimmy thought that a bit strange that she wouldn't watch until he turned the corner like she always did. It actually made him feel kind of funny. In fact he almost turned around right there and went back to check up on her, but in the end he decided to just keep going.
His route took him past the old Wells Fargo Bank; the city water plant; the hardware store where you could buy hay for horses and corn meal for chickens (along with just about every other thing you could ever imagine needing for livestock); past the diner where they served the best root-beer floats he'd ever tasted; past the pharmacy and then the small grocery store where everybody knew his name, where he lived, and everything else there was to know about him.
Some of them even claimed to know where his dad was, which was a sore subject with him because he hated his dad and hoped to never see him ever again. When he asked his mother what had happened to him three years earlier she just said he'd, "Run off." Sometimes he wondered what a person did when they ran off. Whatever it was, though, he was pretty sure it wasn't good given the looks on the faces of the adults when they talked about it. And they talked about it. He figured small towns didn't get much news and when something like that happened it could keep people going for a while.
With his cart loaded down with everything on his mother's list--and you can bet he'd checked it twice, just like Santa Claus--he started the long trip home dreading the mile and a half walk through the hot sun.
Passing the pharmacy Jimmy slowed way down and looked through the window at the magazine rack. Right away he could tell that there were a lot of brand new comic books. Comics he hadn't seen. Looking up the street toward the clock tower that was easily the tallest structure in town he realized that if he spent fifteen minutes looking at comic books he could still get home before his mom would begin fretting.
He parked the cart where he could see it through the window and went inside, straight up the aisle to the candy and picked out a Cherry-a-Let after squeezing and hefting a half-dozen or so. You had to be careful with candy because just because it said it was a certain size on the wrapper didn't necessarily mean it was really that size. He had actually proven this to be true with his old friend Bradley. But Bradley's family had moved away last year and there was no one left to corroborate his story. That was okay because he knew it was true.
Ralph, the pharmacy owner peered down at him from behind the counter smiling as if he were genuinely glad to see him. And he was. In fact he and the boy were good friends.
"So, you gonna squeeze in a few minutes at the rack, Jimmy-boy?" he said, winking conspiratorially.
"I thought I would, if that's okay with you," Jimmy said as he handed over the fifteen cents for the candy, which was highway robbery in his book because he could remember when it had only cost a nickel!
"Got a new Spiderman in just this morning," Ralph said in a loud whisper as if it were a secret that only the two of them were supposed to know.
Jimmy's eyes lit up and he hurried toward the rack and immediately searched for the comic finding it in just a few seconds time. Spiderman. Good ol' Spidey. He wondered what sort of evil he'd save the world from this month. But when he opened the book, the first page was torn almost completely away which meant that a good portion of page one AND page two were missing. How in the world was he supposed to know what the story was about with the critical first two pages gone? He grabbed another one--same thing. And another and another. They were all the same.
He looked around as if to spot a potential culprit, but besides Ralph, he was the only one in the store.
Jimmy was just about to go and tell Ralph the bad news when he heard a soft knocking coming from the direction of the big plate-glass window. Turning slowly he saw something that made his heart stand still. It was Leroy Marshall, the meanest kid in the neighborhood. He stood with his face pressed against the glass grinning from ear to freckled ear, his unruly shock of bright red hair looking as if it had electric current running through it, and in his hand were the torn pages from all ten Spiderman comic books.
Jimmy got really mad. Madder than he'd ever been. All he wanted to do was to take one of the torn pages and stick it in his pocket for safe keeping while he stuffed the rest down Leroy Marshall's throat, which was probably a bit unlikely since Leroy was two years older, at least a foot taller and quite a bit meaner.
Later on he would wonder why he did what he did, but in that moment there was no room for logical thought, only action.
He got up and pushed through the front door which dinged pleasantly to let Ralph know that a customer had entered and shouted, "Give me those pages, you creep!"
"Why don't you come and get them," Leroy shouted as he took off running, laughing loudly as if it were just the funniest thing.
Jimmy hesitated, but only for a second and then was in full pursuit, the cart full of groceries and his promise to his mother temporarily forgotten.
So...I'm not really sure where this is going, but it was fun taking it this far. Any ideas on how this story concludes?
RG...out!
What is the meaning behind your birth name?
Submitted by turtlegod.
RONALD--Of old Norse origin and means, "Powerful; rules with counsel." It is a Scottish form of Ragnvald that was introduced to Scotland by Scandinavian settlers and invaders and wasn't widely used outside of Scotland until the end of the 19th century.
RG...out!
So, a long, long week of recording is finished.
I'm posting an audio track of one of the songs.
The artist is a 17 year-old from Seattle named Brittany Rose.
I think she has an amazing amount of potential.
But that's just me.
Should you happen to agree...leave a kind comment and I'll pass them on to her.
The song is called, "I Will Be There," written and produced by moi and recorded at RiverSongs Studio in Las Vegas.
RG...out!
There is a natural disaster headed your way. You get 4 standard sized canvas grocery totes to fill with valuables and provisions to bring with you to a safe place. What would you put into your 4 bags and why?
Submitted by dejablu503.
You know, I actually think about stuff like this from time to time, so I have a ready answer. In order I would...
1. Stuff the first one with important papers like birth certificates, passports, house and insurance stuff...especially home owner's insurance stuff because it's stuff you need no matter your location.
2. Family photos/memorabilia/selected items of jewelry because they cannot be replaced.
3. Laptop, external hard drives and storage devices because intellectual property and all manner of records are stored therein.
4. Clothes, shoes and as much underwear as you can cram in because...well, if you really need to know the "why" on this one, you're probably in way over your head and need to stop reading.
RG...out!
