~ FRAGMENTS ~

There probably is a good reason for it. I'm busy managing stress and angst at the same time. I've been at it for the last three weeks and Xmas is staring me right in the face. I got my friend Tom an ebookman for Christmas. Hopefully, he'll like that. He can download whole text files and then pour them through the thing. And he can get audiobooks and pump them through the thing too. The trouble with trying to get him gifts is that it's impossible to get anything for him cause he already has everything in the world he wants. Boys with toys... it's tough to get guys with money anything that means anything. I'm just filling my head with uncertainty because I'm pissed at getting stuck with work on a Sunday. What crap. I left DJJ because of being overloaded and now I'm falling into the same trap here. Got that ole sinking feeling. Maybe I should just pack it in and retire for real. That and I miss Elaine... and my kid... and Mary Alice... and all the rest of these wimmins (as the Gutrumbled guy says) who fill up my loose change kind of existence. Poor Bobby.

But I feel as if the holidays are rushing up on me. Probably because I'm worried about my damned car. The automatic transmission seems to be shifting oddly. This is a lousy time for that thing to crap out on me. And it's cold! What the heck is that all about? I may have a new guy to work on things down here in Winter Haven. There's a guy over on Ave. G named David who helped me with the overheating problem about a month ago that I liked. I'll take it to him tomorrow and see what he says. Interesting... home isn't home until you can find a mechanic you trust to work on your junk. Until then you find yourself strategising about how to get the broken car back to Winter Park. Jeez. What a life.

In the meanwhile I'm fooling around posting old pictures of dead girlfriends. Where did that come from? I should have thrown all that crap out years ago. Thought I had... but noooo. Keep picking at the old scabs and sure enough, you find yourself bleeding. Pictures of Joanie. She was an old old friend. Prescription junkie mostly... I remember her sitting in my mother's Buick cooking up a Dilaudid. I used to call her the Queen of the Number 4s. I'm still amazed that I drifted through that period of my life without ever actually doing any drugs. Nope... but I had all these junkies around me. Ah, the 60s. I guess if I hadn't gotten into the service I would have probably joined Joanie and Hurricane Lorri. Click... you're dead. Strange that I'm thinking about those girls now... years and years later.... all that madness and wasted life. What was that old Neil Young song? I hear you knocking on my back door... I hear you baby can I have some more... Oh, the damage done. I suppose it's because this job that I've got now is just weighing me down and making me aware of other people's stupidity. Like the waste of being a junkie. Joanie was a good woman, an talented and creative musician, a danger to herself but to noone else. Ah.. forget it Bob. She's dead.

I just hope this job isn't gonna turn into another monster like DJJ did. It creeps up on you... mostly taking over your free time... just this once you know... but then you find yourself losing a Saturday here and a Sunday there and eventually you find yourself working 7 days a week shorthanded and you begin to feel like the world's biggest jerk because your personal space becomes narrower and narrower until you just vanish. What I need right now is enough time to get over to the coast and check on my boat. Need to see if the damned thing is still afloat. But nooooo.... I have to wander around Winter Haven looking for pin headed parents who can't seem to abuse their children during regular business hours. Buncha idiots. And... one of the allegations that I got this morning is about an incident that is 3 months old. Three months! What the hell is that all about? And why call it in now? I just don't get it.

Bob