Usually Saturday Morning Is The Only Quiet Time In Milwaukee

I’m eating breakfast, Albanian sausage, at Megan’s Café in Cudahy. It’s a nice place—a little storefront L-shaped room. I like places like this, but the only bad thing is there is some kind of video game—a guy is constantly playing—but at least it has no sound—and there is a video poker machine—and the worst thing—there is TV with the sound on—and some ridiculous Saturday morning show—at least it’s not as bad as CNN, but almost—it’s a reality TV show for kids—what the fuck!

I was riding here on the bike trail this morning, and it’s 10 am on a Saturday morning, and there's some kind of running event going on, I guess. I come to the turnaround—a couple of guys with an orange cone in the middle of the bike trail, that the runners go around and then back the way they came. But the weird thing is that these guys have a CAR on the bike trail, a gasoline powered generator chugging away, but the loud noise THAT is making is drowned out by LOUD MUSIC blaring though portable PA speakers—some kind of Top 40 contemporary disco bar crap. Why? Isn’t the point of going out on a weekend Saturday morning on the bike and walking trail—through the woods—away from the roads and cars—is to be AWAY from cars and exhaust and noise? Why in the world would you put giant speakers out here blasting music so that it’s like you’re in a bar? You can go to the bar LATER!

WEIRD COINCIDENCE

I was watching a DVD of THE PRISONER which I got from the library. I haven't seen that show in a long, long time. It's not quite as weirdly magical as I remember, at least the first three episodes, but then I saw something that CHILLED MY BLOOD. In, I think it was, the third episode, I noticed, in his room, above his TV, two little golden lion statues, and they looked EXACTLY THE SAME as the golden lions on that magazine I was writing about yesterday, which I recycled. I wanted to get the magazine to compare them, so when I came into the office I checked the paper recycling bin outside where I dumped my paper when I left last night. But it had been picked up already, so the magazine is gone! But anyway, I’m sure the golden lions are the same! What does that mean?

LEADERSHIP SUMMIT

Okay, I haven't gotten around to talking about the magazine I found at the laundromat. It says: "The Connection" on the cover, almost hidden, and then LAS VEGAS, in a crazy font, and the Leadership Summit 2005, in a red stipe. There's a strange picure of a golden lion and some yellow lightbulbs, some lit, some burned out. There is a table of contents, over the golden lion again, with cryptic chapters like: New Ring Earners, New Platinum Jacket Earners, and Golden App Award Winners, and Did You Win Big? I page through the magazine. Most of it consists of lists of names, and the states they are from, under headings such as: "Top Producers," "Top Recruiters," "Executive Directors," and "Players Club." Again, the golden lion. Okay, the back of the magazine comes with an earnest portrait of a guy from Fayetteville, NC who is quoted under his photo: "My lifestyle has changed a lot because I have time and money freedom! I like the opportunity to help others become successful! That's my life mission!" And then there is a kind of generic photo of a modern office building at night with brightly lit windows, and next to that it says" Profiles of Success." I think the whole thing is some kind of a cult. There is a phone number there where you can order "your" copy. Then there is the address of the person who this magazine was sent to, a small town in Illinois. The name on the mailing label is simply "Lee." It's all pretty creepy. I'm going to just throw this damn thing away!

LUNCHTIME

I'm at lunch, downtown, midafternoon, and everything is all wrong. Everything feels weird today. I know it's not me. I am not causing that woman at the next table to sit there crying. I'm not imagining it. It's not me. Though I DID wake up on the wrong side of the bed. It wasn't even like I was trying to sleep, when I got up this morning at 5 am, having gone to bed at 10 last night. I was just trying to relax and read, but I couldn't even do that, because even before it got light, the noise started outside, and not just the average noise, but the disturbing, insane noise. First the usual cars and airconditioners, cars racing down the alley, garbage trucks, then the motorcycles, but not just the mufflerless harley's, it's high pitched whine of those racing motorcycles, but where, exactly, are they racing? To work? Then there are the usual morning sirens, but this morning there are more and more, all the different varieties. There must be a big fire somewhere. Then there is the helicopter, it's hovering right up there where I can see it. What's it looking for? I look out and can see the US Bank building, there is no smoke billowing out of the side. But the sirens continue, the helicopter keeps hovering, so I finally get out my little radio. First there is the traffic reports, seven minutes to here, twelve to there. Then I hear sports reports on EVERY area team. Finally the news, and they say there was a fire on the roof of an apartment building downtown. It's not too serious, though, so that's good. I'm glad there are all the firetrucks responding and all that, but what is that helicopter there for? It's not a police helicopter, it's a NEWS helicopter, and they're not there to warn us, or help us in anyway. They are there to get the story, see the burning bodies fall from the building so that they will have exclusive footage on the news, helping their ratings, selling advertising time. The helicopter isn't there to do anything but create entertainment.

I know it's laundry day when...

It’s laundry day, which comes only once every year or so, so what am I complaining about? It’s early Friday morning, and it’s apocalyptically windy outside, it’s going to thunderstorm, the world is going to end. The sky is dark, and it's very depressing. No one is on the street. I am the only one walking, though about 7000 cars pass me as I walk the six blocks or so to the laundromat. There was one guy out on the street, but actually walking ON the street, not the sidewalk, which is usually a bad sign. He had flipped out. He is holding one fist in the air and chanting in an otherworldly voice that kind of sounds like a Canadian goose. While my wash is going, I stop in the pharmacy for some bananas and milk. I’m eavesdropping on the Italians as usual. It’s really easy because we’re all at the same, big round table. There are usually a dozen or so older Italian guys from the neighborhood, I assume. Usually all men—an occasional woman. Some guys never say a thing. Usually it’s a few guys doing all the talking. There’s a guy telling about his trip to Venice. The one woman says, “You’ve got to write all this down, or you’ll forget it.” I immediately notice that sentiment, I like this woman. Later, she says, “Why do guys always come back from Italy with chains?” I’m not sure exactly what she’s referring to, I wasn’t paying attention. I think they were talking about younger guys. Anyway, I think it’s not that often that people use metaphors at all anymore, is it? Maybe there are some common ones all the time? I’m going to think about it. I’m going to pay attention for metaphors for a couple of days and see if I hear any... then get back to you. I’m going to listen to conversations for a few days. Back at the laundromat, I happy to get away from the smooth jazz of the pharmacy, only to be immediately depressed by the classic rock of the laundromat. I remember how Doug was just saying that every time he’s been at this particular laundromat he’s had to suffer through “A Horse With No Name,” and it makes me realize that if I hear that terrible song today, at least, his comments will neutralize it, but now with that thought in mind I realize that I won’t hear it at all. Instead, it gets stuck in my head, worse than if I’d actually heard it! I keep trying to figure out what that one lien is: “In the desert, you don’t remember no pain, cuz there ain’t no one for to give you no pain.” What the fuck?!? There is a guy in the laundromat with running shorts and a t-shirt and flip-flops. Men think going to the laundromat means that they can wear ANYTHING, the excuse being that it’s laundry day. But that’s not really true anymore, men think they can wear anything anytime anymore, and I’m not excepting myself from this criticism. And especially in the summer. I’m so happy when summer is over so you don’t see men wearing flip-flops out in public anymore. Anyway, this guy is okay, even though he’s wearing the kind of shorts men wear so their dicks will “accidentally” fall out at some point. But the worst thing is that he’s got on a t-shirt that says something on the front as well as the back. On the back there is simple text, two short sentences, the first says either: “Juicy stories.” OR "Juicy Steaks." I can't be sure which it is. Right after that it says, “Set to music.” Which is it, juicy stories, or juicy steaks? I’m trying to look closely to see, but the guy gets all self-conscious and looks over at me suspiciously, so I look away. Hey, if you’re going to wear a t-shirt that says something on it, you’ve got to expect people are going to try to read it, right? Then I hear a Fleetwood Mac song and I go into a depressive tailspin. This is the moment that Fleetwood Mac has finally put me over the edge. It’s not always the same song, but always one from the “Rumors” album, or the one before. I still own both of those, but I’m going to do something symbolically cleansing with them or something, like throw them violently against the wall. I can’t take it anymore. But still, how many times in my life will I have to hear these songs again? Maybe I should count, keep track from this moment on, how many times I hear a song from one of these albums in public. Maybe I should do some heinous act every time I hear one. Not some bad, destructive, or hurtful thing. I don’t believe in that, but something else. It’s can’t be an act of good will or generously, though, because that would like rewarding Fleetwood Mac. Really, it’s nothing against them, it’s the people who keep playing the fucking things. Anyway, that’s a good question. What act could I commit, that had some significance, some good even, but be an act of protest and defiance? I’ll figure something out. No I won't. I’ve got all that going through my mind, well actually the angry version, as I push the buttons for the dryers, walk away, and then after going for a few seconds they inexplicably STOP. Is this planned into their operation? Is there a convention where laundromat owners go to buy dryers, and some sweaty leisure suited slime dryer salesman explains how profits are increased by these dryers that sometimes just turn off for no reason and you have to go push the button again. It’s not just my imagination, either, because it happens EVERY TIME I’m at the laundromat, and with many of the dryers. I’m seething with anger at this point, but still try to enjoy the experience at the laundromat, by reading whatever there is there to read, which I usually do. There is only ONE thing today, it’s a glossy magazine that says: LEADERSHIP SUMMIT on the cover, very strange. Okay this is a whole new subject, I’ll get to this later. Yeah, right, later. I’m carefully folding shit when “Running On Empty” comes on through the inescapable ceiling speakers, and I flip out. I quickly shove all my laundry in my bag, wet still even, wrinkled, unsorted, maybe missing sock mates, and rush out the door, having been effectively pushed over the edge, over the edge, over the edge.