Italian bistro & sushi bar, 9:08 p.m. - My leopard spots, let me show you them

This was supposed to be Saturday's entry – except that the flesh-eating, dung-encrusted maggots at Crumbcast have seen fit to throttle the pipes that power the tubes of my IntarWebz and I have been shut out of offering my brilliance. There is a conspiracy afoot, I tell you.

OK. I'm perched in a high stool at a white linen tablecloth kind of café-bistro-sushi-bar type place.

Why do people think that pasta and sushi go together? Just because the whole damn planet thinks that raw fish and vinegared rice is nice doesn't mean that I want to stare at someone pfaffing around with chopsticks while I'm trying to enjoy a nice glass of wine and eat some pasta. Italian does not go with sushi.

And I'm not talking "Asian Fusion" cooking here. I'm perfectly aware of what fusion is. This is a bistro that serves pasta and has a sushi bar. It's like a shotgun marriage and you're not sure if they're going to manage to do either one of them well. I don't like sushi. I was raised to cook food before you eat it. My eggs are scrambled hard, my burgers well done. I don't eat food raw because that's how you wind up with diseases of 57 syllables and become a case study that shows up on an episode of "House."


Why am I here? Because I had to go to work on a Saturday and I just couldn't take the place any more. I'd love to be slugging back a bottle of champagne (the whole bottle, thank you very much) or a bottle of white wine, but I can't afford either and I have to drive home anyway. God. I really, really, really need to get hammered soon and let go of some of this anger and frustration.

Anyway. I'm sitting outside because it's cool and fresh and brisk and I don't want to be around the "see and be seen scene" inside. Plus, it's loud up in there and I can't take any more loud right now. I might haul off and clock a bitch with my computer. Plus, there's the bonus of sights.

This bistro-sushi-bar thing is about two doors down from a movie theater in a strip mall, so I get to see all sorts of things. I've never seen people actually take a giant tub of popcorn home before – like in those NetFlix commercials (or was it for some widescreen TV) – but this fat man and his Q-tip-haired wife are sure as hell doing it. I mean, really, did you NEED that much popped corn flavored with butter-flavored grease in the first place? And now you're TAKING IT HOME? Is there a round two on the sofa?

The bread here is fantastic by the way. This charming Hispanic man keeps bringing baskets and baskets of homemade garlic knots and this fresh, crusty loaf stuff. I wish they had some sort of butter other than those rock-hard square bricks, but I'll survive. The bread is wonderful – one of the first nice things to happen to me all week.

I think it's gonna rain. It's gonna rain. It's raining. Oh lord it's raining.

Somehow, you would think that the population here is composed of either sugar or else is all first cousins to Elphaba, the Wicked Witch of the West from the way they carry on over the potential to get splattered with a few drops of water.

One old woman sends her man out to get the car – he gets the car and promptly drives a good ten feet past he pickup point – forcing her to RUN THROUGH THE RAIN to get into the door. Nice one old man, nice one.

The showers also provide a nice "stop and look" point for me to observe the fashion. There's a matched pair of mother-daughter wannabe models – both overly bleached and cosmeticized. The daughter is nothing but legs and is working every inch of her leather jeans – and baby – those legs GO ALL THE WAY UP. She's got extensions in – I can tell because her hair just doesn't hang quite right. Her mother – although it might just be an older friend – is trying valiantly but failing to pull off the blonde in a leather skirt look. It's nice people watching though.

And leopard seems to be the fabric d'jour this year. If one old matchstick had on leopard, I must have seen it on twenty. Tunics, jackets, trims – it was like an African savannah out there – all shades too. That reminds me – I need some leopard curtains for my cubicle.

OK. My pesto chicken alfredo is here. Ciao.

Panera Bread, 9:08 p.m. – It is noisy and hard to concentrate and my day was crappy

I’m sitting at the outside patio of a Panera Bread. Score. More free WiFi. I really need to make a list. I wonder if the WiFi here stays open after the place shuts down? I wonder how safe I’d be. I could sit in the car. That would look shady though. Still, free WiFi. Anything is better than the icy grip of the Comcast minions. Anyway.

It is really hard to concentrate here because of the traffic noise. It is made even worse because there’s a really noisy group of teen-agers off to the right of me laughing it up. I must be fifteen feet away and I can hear most of their conversation. I don’t think they bought anything from Panera Bread either.

There’s a dirty white Chevrolet van cruising the parking lot. I hope there aren’t any child molesters inside.

There’s a hot Asian girl going into the ice cream shop near here. Banging hair. I wonder if she’s going to be in a Bond movie or something. Every action movie coming down the pike nowadays has a hot Asian girl in it.

Anyway. These kids are loud. Think “Hollywood café scene” background noise loud. There must be three different conversations happening all at once. I KNOW OH MY GOD I TOLD YOU SO I TOLD HER TO GO WHAT DID YOU SAY? IS THAT WHAT SHE SAID OH MY GOD I TOTALLY THINK SO. SHE WENT DOWN STAIRS AND SAW THEM. Le sigh.

Now there’s a motorcycle zooming up and down the road. Zip. He’s in the parking lot and gunning it again. Somebody needs attention. I guess someone’s mummy didn’t talk to him enough.

THEY WERE JUST SCREAMING AT EACH OTHER AND THROWING THINGS. I REALLY HOPE SHE BREAKS UP WITH HIM. I HATED HER ANYWAY.

Every now and again I get a hint of the soft jazz that Panera has playing. I guess the kids have to come up for air sometime.

Back to me. I’ve had a really crappy week so far. I have an enormous project due soon. The pressure is not making me a pleasant person and is actually my mental and physical life.

I’ve had a headache nearly every day this week – and today I woke up around 5 a.m. with a migraine large enough to blot out the sun. I rolled over in bed and prayed for it to go away. No such luck.

Every move was agony. I got up and stumbled to the bathroom and threw up and managed to make it into the kitchen – which is where I hide my stash of migraine pills.

Don’t ask. I keep all the pills in the kitchen so that I remember to take them as part of the morning routine. Otherwise, I forget and bad things happen. Anyway. I knocked back one migraine pill and a handful of aspirin and managed to stagger back to the couch.

I sort of lost the hours from 5 a.m. – 7 a.m. I remember turning on the TV and finding “Tin Man” on my TiVo. I don’t remember much about it other than the fact that the flying monkeys flew out of a tattoo on some lady’s boobs. At some point I went back to bed.

I woke up at 10 a.m. Work was calling and someone was asking “Are you OK?” That’s pretty much how my day has been. I feel like I need a good solid month in a health spa or something to decompress – and the time is just not available right now.

Anyway.

I think there is an ant crawling across my foot. I’m not wild about nature in general or in specific as a matter of fact.

I DON’T KNOW. WHAT DO YOU THINK? HA HA HA. OH MY GOD THAT IS SO FUNNY I LOVE HANGING OUT WITH YOU MAN. These children are seriously annoying.

Two women further off are seriously trying to have a nice dinner. They keep looking up and giving the kids looks that would melt concrete blocks. The oblivious shields are in full effect though. Oh to be young and not have a care in the world.

OH MY GOD. The white Chevy van is back. If OJ is up in that mother I’m going to turn the computer around and start broadcasting live. No such luck. The driver looks like an old fat white man.

A really fat kid got out. This little piggy needs to be up in fat camp. Predictably, he’s going to the ice cream shop. I love America. I just freaking love America.

Peace out. Tomorrow is another day.

Sonic, 11:44 p.m. – There’s a boy making dirty gestures with caramel sauce

I’m sitting on the patio at the Sonic. I can find a WiFi network from this sketchy mobile home park down street, but it is password protected. Le sigh.

Damn. How long does it take to bring out a soda and some cheesecake bites? Ize be havin’ a sweet tooth tonight.

Some country music is wailing out over the radio. Sonic FM in the house!

You know, it is kind of nice out here – if I didn’t feel like I had to keep turning around and be looking for skeezy characters or listen for bullets and be afraid of a knife in my back. The patio is well-lit, the people inside can see me and I don’t think I’m in imminent danger - but I still feel kind of unsafe.

The cheesecake bites are pretty good. They’re a little bit over-fried, but err to the tasty side. The apple-caramel dipping sauce could use some work (I prefer the raspberry sauce from Arby’s), but other than that, I’d give them a solid B.

Land sakes a Cthulu. White peoples in the house. Urban professionals from some office. I guess they’re out on the roam. They ordered cheesecake bites too.

One of them – a preppy white boy type wearing slacks and a polo shirt, stole some dipping sauce from his friend. He’s dipping his finger in the sauce. He’s running his finger around the sauce container. Now he’s making faces and licking his finger. WORK IT! WORK IT!

Way to go man, way to go. Sex it up. Sex it up. Way to act like a grown up. That was the most mature thing I think I’ve seen all week. And it’s only Wednesday. Well, almost Thursday now.

The DJ for Sonic Radio is just waaaaaaaaay to cheerful. And he screams.

There is a gray Toyota that has been parked at the drive-thru window for at least five minutes. What the hell did they order? A whole cow with a side of tots? I love tater tots.

Hmm. Only one skinny white boy in the Toyota. I hope he doesn’t have a heart attack when he eats that order, whatever that was.

We’ve switched to something thrashy/slammy/guitarish on the radio now. “Crushcrushcrush,” from Paramore. I kind of like this.

The Sonic staff is here for the midnight shift. Poor dude is banging on the window trying to get inside and no one wants to come open the door. BANG BANG BANG. Seriously. Somebody need to come to this door or he’s gonna break the window.

OK. He’s in.

The preppies have left. I’m the only person here. Me and the DJ apparently. If I keep coming to the Sonic I’m going to turn into a country music fan.

There’s a red Chevrolet pickup at the drive-thru. Nothing else to say, just a red Chevrolet.

You know, there’s a lot of trash out on this patio. Would it kill them to come out and spray it with a hose or run a broom around a few times a day? Or would it kill the customers to actually pick up after themselves? There are mints, straws, ketchup packets, etc.

OH MY GOD. Those freaking chipmunks are singing some insipid promo on the radio.

All I want for Christmas is for Alvin, Simon & Theodore to go die in a fire. Seriously. And I loved the “Chipmunks” as a child. Heck, I even liked the Chipettes.

Man, let me tell you, that “Chipmunks” movie is SERIOUSLY going to blow major chunks. Think two buckets of chicken and then a bottle of tequila chunks. The only thing that could be a bigger bomb than the live-action Chipmunk movie is Dick Cheney target range. And then only if you’re a Democrat!

CALL IN YOUR REQUESTS AT 866-SONIC. This man needs to stop screaming. No one is this chipper at midnight. He bothers me worse than that crazy heffa Delilah that hosts the soft-rock & talk-about-your-problems show.

I’m having trouble with inspiration tonight. Maybe it is this ugly pseudo-modern lawn furniture – which is none too clean, mind you. Maybe it is this TOO DAMN LOUD music. Maybe it’s just the fact that I’m tired and cranky and really need a good night’s sleep.

Finally. Some good music. It’s the Go-Go’s and “Our Lips Are Sealed.”

Just in time.

Play me out, Belinda Carlise!

Peace, Love and Understanding!

See you all tomorrow!

Crispers, 7:32 p.m. – Rocking through the 1980s

Whoever picked the music for this Crispers has EXCELLENT taste. I’m sitting on their patio, enjoying a soda and slurping their free WiFi. Bananarama is banging out that 80s classic “Cruel Summer.”

Life really doesn’t get any better than this.

It’s a cool fall night, there really aren’t any bugs and the air is crisp and lovely.

Too bad there is almost nothing happening at the Crispers.

I like the plaza this Crispers is in. Unlike the other store, this one is set back from the road a bit more and is next to a Sweetbay grocery store. The parking lot is quieter.

The real traffic noise comes from a big intersection that unfortunately seems to attract people trying to gun it through the stoplights. THANK YOU MR. MOTORCYCLE. PLEASE PUT A HELMET ON. OR NOT. SPARE US YOUR STUPIDITY NEXT TIME.

Now we’re onto Crowded House and “Don’t Dream It’s Over.” “Hey now, hey now. Don’t dream it’s over.” Sigh. I miss the eighties. They had the best music EVAR.

The preppy manager at this Crispers is a super-go-getter type. He’s totally working the room here. He’s greeting every customer as they come in, walking them through the menu, then going around through all the tables. Very cute too. Think a younger, less Hollywood alcoholic Josh Hartnett – with bigger ears.

Take the nametag off and you’ve got husband material. Well, if he quits the Crispers job and goes to Hollywood and starts making movies like “Pearl Harbor,” “Wicker Park” or something.

FINE YOUNG CANNIBALS ON THE RADIO BABY!

WOACA ALERT!

Today’s specimen is accompanying her aged mother out for some flatbread, some salad and some soup.

My god. Thomas Dolby and “She Blinded Me With Science.” It is classic 80s rock all over the place up in here!

Back to the WOACA. She and Grammy are hamming it up with Mr. Josh Hartnett Food Service over there. WOACA is wearing a scoop-neck that exposes way, way, way too much breast for a 50-year-old woman. She really needs a hot-oil treatment for her hair – that, or stop over-bleaching it. Her old-lady mother has a humpback that would do Quasimodo proud. She’s making a valiant attempt to cover it up with a knitted blue afghan. In reality, she’s making the problem worse by screwing her hair up in a bun. Think minaret on top of a pyramid. Yeah. It’s that strange.

Could this woman that is taking out the trash be making more noise? Seriously lady. Plastic does not make that much noise. Also, that shade of red lipstick clashes with your blouse. PS: Those pants make your behind look HUGE!

It’s the Pretenders with “Show Me.”

It is so nice out tonight. I could sit out here forever. The traffic noise is starting to impede though. One of the main roads through town is about 20 yards away – and the smell of gas and oil and that metallic road tang is right at the back of my throat. It is definitely impinging on the ambiance here.

REM is going to play us out tonight. Peace out.

Minute 22: We’ve had a startling development. A huge Doberman just wandered up. It looks very lost. And it wants food. It is very nice, but very scary.

I'm leaving for real now. This dog is creeping me out. Getting all Cujo up in here.

My laundry room, 11:58 p.m. – You spin me right round baby, right round!

All I can hear is the thump-thump-thump of the dryers at my apartment building’s laundry room turning my clothes round and round.

I love my building. It is ancient – for Florida anyway – and has tons of charm. None of the apartments are exactly alike and it is painted in those funky pink and yellow stucco colors. I just don’t get a washer/dryer in my apartment.

This means I have to schlep everything downstairs every so often – usually in the middle of the night – and deal with the cranky washing machines and other people’s lint. One washing machine has – I guess you’d call it a ‘quirk’ although it is more of an annoyance – and always takes exactly nine minutes longer to finish the soak cycle than the other one. I always have to remember to get that particular one going first and then sort my clothes for the other washer – otherwise it screws up the timing on Wash/Dry in unison.

I’m writing from the picnic bench on the downstairs patio. It’s a sad, broken-down picnic bench that saw better years during Bush I; actually, this is a sad little patio. It is more or less a morgue for dead grills. There is probably charcoal in there from the Cambrian.

The less attractive lawn furniture – the ones that can’t get dates – is consigned here from the upper deck patio as well. Being mostly plastic, it just blows around during storms. There isn’t really any shade, unless you count the ugly hedge dividing my building’s back yard from the old-people subdivision next door.

Miraculously, I’m able to get a fairly decent 41% signal on my wireless network down here – even though I’m three apartments over.

The noises of the night are held in abeyance – or else drowned out by the clunk clunk clunk of the dryer. I just heard someone’s air conditioner kick on briefly – but that’s pretty much it. No frogs tonight – thank you Shiva!

The morning dew is starting to fall – I can feel my T-shirt getting heavy with condensation; the wood of the picnic table here is also a little cold and slightly damp.

The smell of the air is damp and kind of earthy – and every now and again I get a whiff of the metallic tang coming out of the laundry room. There is absolutely no breeze. Everything is completely still – as if frozen in smoked black glass as I look out across the back lawn. I’m sure there are tons of bugs moving around – but as long as they stay off me – we’re cool.

I can see stars. Not a lot, but they are definitely out tonight. Thinking about the great big world out there only makes me feel small. I’ll switch gears now.

Only 30 minutes left to go on my laundry. My landlady claims that she doesn’t make any money off of the laundry room – but I fail to see how that’s a possibility when we pay $1.25 to wash and a quarter for every twelve minutes on the dryer. And the dryers are old and cranky – so if you have a decent-sized load – you need to shell out at least $1.

One of the things I love about my building is that it has been heavily landscaped in a sort of “wild Florida” style. A lot of the trees are mature and I love the fact that I can see palm fronds waving outside my window. The planting along the front walk is also overgrown and lush – it really does a lot to hide the fact that it’s really just a parking lot with some old funky apartments.

Ugh. I’m getting a chill. I’m also getting a little bit wet sitting out here – I can definitely feel the damp in my pants.

Time to go. Peace out, later bye!

My patio, 12:36 a.m. – This frog is driving me insane

I usually wait to write post titles until the end of the post, but this frog is just going on incessantly.

I tried to write before midnight, but one of my neighbors came out and wouldn’t leave. I guess I’ll just have to back-date this post.

The night air is wonderfully cool and refreshing. Tropical Storm Noel is stirring up the tropics and there is a cool front somewhere off to the west, so Florida is getting a wonderful blast of wind and cool air. It has been windy all day.

It has been so windy in fact that the patio furniture on the upstairs landing at my building is scattered all over the place. The sunbrella is upside down, bereft of its moorings and most of the chairs are blown back against the back railings. Some of the cheap plastic lawn chairs were actually blown over. It looks like a child simply swept a path through a play area.

I love the wind. It feels so good outside. This frog is driving me absolutely insane though. CROAK CROAK CROAK CROAK CROAK CROAK. SHIVA PLEASE SHUT UP AND GO AWAY.

Someone’s air conditioner just kicked on. I wonder if it was mine? I’m famous for running my air year-round. My electricity bill is fantastically high.

I can’t see the moon from where I’m sitting, but I remember from the newspaper this morning that it is supposed to be “gibbous waning,” or whatever that is. I can see it now if I crane my neck over the building. Looks like a little more than the bottom half of a moon. Very shiny and bright.

I’m lucky in that I live in a neighborhood without a lot of light pollution. There is a nightlight across the street, the nightlight for my apartment building and the nightlight for the row of houses behind me. That’s all I can see at the moment. Those and the light of my MacBook are enough for me to write by.

Every now and again I can see the flashes of a radio tower off in the distance. There’s something broadcasting out of a warehouse in the industrial area near hear. It flashes red at regular intervals, just like Rudolph’s nose.

I have a cold, so I really can’t get a sense of what’s happening in the olfactory department right now. There’s a lot of greenery around my place, but not much in the way of night-blooming flowers or plants.

I am really enjoying the still of the night. That’s so cliché. I should try this on a Saturday night. The apartments across the street are sort of low-rent. The ones next door are FOR SURE low-rent. I came home around 2:30 a.m. last Saturday and there were five sheriff’s deputies parked outside frog-marching people out of the house, searching through cars, looking for something.

The light throws interesting shadows on the floor and on the walls of the building too. The upstairs patio can be reached by stairways on either side and is really just a flat concrete landing on top of the old garage and laundry room. There’s a mishmash of plastic patio furniture and some burned-out grills up here, so we call it the patio. It’s really just an empty spot too small to have built another apartment. Still, it’s nice to have.

The wind is blowing again, stronger now. Every time the breeze picks up it gives me an atavistic shiver, a little chill if you will. I work indoors all day and go from building to building to climate-controlled apartment to mall to Starbucks to bookstore to apartment. Maybe it is good that I’m taking the time to sit outside and be at one with nature.

THAT FROG IS GOING TO KILL ME. I SWEAR TO GOD I WILL HUNT IT DOWN AND MAKE FROG LEGS PROVENCAL.

There’s a car turning into the parking lot now. Someone other than me is having a late night. I wonder who it is?

Meh. I’m so nosy. They turned into my half of the parking lot. There are only a few possibilities in that direction, as two of the six units are empty and I’m up here. That leaves what? Three. One of the others is an elderly teacher. She might have a second life I don’t know about. Heh. That would be good.

No sign of the person yet. Maybe they snuck by me.

Strange noises coming from below now. Hmmm. Sounds like the door to the laundry room. If I don’t’ update tomorrow …..

OK. My time is up. Thank you, and good night!