we can be happy underground

So a spot of news for anyone following my current job quest I have news. I actually start at Petco next week. I now have two brutally early shifts gaining me a total of 16.5 whopping hours. It’s a start. I felt like an idiot though when I called and they told me they were planning on calling me on Saturday anyway. In the mean-time and during I guess I will continue with helping out around my folk’s house.
In the front yard today I noticed that all the oak leaves that came down last night were all sticking straight in the air point side up. It looked like a graveyard, each leaf a last testament to something. I had hoped to attach each marker with something significant but the combination of the grass and the oaks only made me think of squirrels. And so it really seemed like the graves were in honor of all the small woodland creatures that are going to meet their own personal Waterloo’s this Christmas season. (Or if you prefer; the small woodland creatures fated to meet the elephant.)
As an aside to that did anyone else study the Oregon Trail much or play the video game perhaps? My wife who grew up in Michigan missed the whole deal. For us growing up in Oregon that was just part of the package. “You shot a Buffalo and recovered 800 pounds of meat. You can carry 12 oz. If you continue hunting in this region the game will become scarce. John has died of snakebite.” Sorry about that I waxed nostalgic and ran into some trouble coming back.
Things have been low key for me; I have spent the last bit reading A Dirty Job by Christopher Moore. It’s a really good book and I honestly must say he is a very good author. Not only is he witty, relying heavily on the highest form of humor absurdity but his plots are fairly interesting and well constructed (i.e. Fluke). He is something like Douglas Adams. Though I must admit I doubt there will ever be another equal to Douglas Adams, the man was a genius. Moore does a similar style of humor though and it’s good. If you like both authors I recommend you take a look at Leave It To Psmith by Wodehouse, you’ll love it its hilarious. I was thinking today about a book I read at Borders one night that tried for the same feel as the above authors. It was called Ogre Company and though the concept wasn’t bad it just wasn’t that funny and the plot lines weren’t well handled. It almost made me sad. I mean you could tell the author tried to make the book work and I know writing isn’t easy so it’s sad to see someone try really had and then have it fall through anyway. I guess I can sympathize with failure despite effort because it’s a fairly regular thing for me
Actually on the topic I always feel bad when I see a new small specialty store open up in a location that has doomed several others. I guess I just see the store as an embodiment of someone’s dream and I can see the figurative steam roller on the horizon on its way to flatten the person’s hopes. I carry my dreams as intangibles inside my head and use them to fill daydreams. I suppose we all have to get used to the fact that in life we will if lucky get to live some form of our dreams if the whole of them are usually impossible. To quote Fight Club “We've all been raised on television to believe that one day we'd all be millionaires, and movie gods, and rock stars. But we won't. And we're slowly learning that fact. And we're very, very pissed off.”
Well maybe I’m not pissed off. I am just resigned to my limitations and determined to be the best man I can be without trying to pretend that they aren’t there.
Speaking of being pissed off I need to go so I can get home on time.
Good night all.
Hypothetically Yours,
Jeff “I didn’t know it was loaded” Eckmann