Hipster Staring at a Manhole Cover

           I was driving along. It was a nice sunny day. I had the top down on my convertible. I was speeding along when I saw a man in the cross walk. He was a younger man in his twenties. I came to a stop and waited for him to cross. He was walking real slow, like so many youngsters tend to do nowadays. He had his head down. He was wearing a baseball cap and had a beard. He was moping across the street. Lollygagging. He looked pathetic. I waited and checked myself for patience. I was in complete control of myself until the kid suddenly stopped in front of me. I thought maybe he dropped something, but no, he didn't. He was checking a manhole cover. My blood pressure went way up. He finally figured out he was being a nuisance and continued across the street.
            "You flipping moron!" I yelled as I drove past.
            I looked in my rear view mirror. The kid was giving me the finger. I raised my arm and flipped him off. That was a fair exchange, I said to myself as I drove away. 

Bolano

            I'm reading a lot. I'm reading a book by Roberto Bolano, The Savage Detectives. It's a long book, six hundred and some-odd pages. My first impressions of Bolano were good, but then I was annoyed with his incessent need to name drop. He'd fill whole pages with names. Latin American writers mostly. If ever you want to learn about Latin American writers, read the first two hundred pages of The Savage Detectives. He stopped doing it and his stories got better. That's what writing is to me, good stories. Some people have them and some people don't. Bolano had them and he didn't pussyfoot around when he told them. I like that. Bad writing is like a meandering joke. It's not very entertaining, and at a certain point you'll lose interest in it. 
            There's an honesty to Bolano. He's not afraid to reveal the intimate elements of his characters. It's hard to be honest. It's a little easier in the third person. "She smells bad" is easier to say than "you smell bad."  
            

The He-Man Woman's Haters Club

            I went to an open mic to try out a new song. It was the typical He-Man Woman's Haters Club, not a female in sight. When a woman does walk into the bar she practically gets a standing ovation.
            But on this night there seemed to be a bunch of guys who showed up for the free hotdogs. I sat down and ordered a beer. I was babying it. I don't like to drink too much before I get up. I've made that mistake before. A barrel chested fellow sang a song about tits and ass. He kept repeating tits and ass over and over again. Tits... and ass. Then he'd break into the chorus. "What ever happened to songs about pussy?" A smile came to my face. It made me laugh.
            It was my turn to sing. The room was restless. People were stirring about while I was plugging in. I'd lost them before I had a chance to play a note. I blew into my harmonica, and the audience came back briefly. I got through the first song. I flubbed some words at the end, but nobody seemed to notice. A guy with a round belly started to talk to me between songs. "You kind of sound like Bob Dylan. You're Irish right? Yeah, I can tell you're Irish."
            

Max the Rip Off Artist

         My sister's car failed a smog check. I took the report to Bill the Smog Guru so he could look it over. He sat down at his desk and disappeared behind the clutter.

            "She took it to Max! Why'd she take it there?" he asked.

            "How am I supposed to know?"

            "He's a rip off! I use to send all my bad customers to him! If a customer had a bad attitude I'd refer them to Max. I'd tell them, I charge sixty dollars, but there's a guy down the street who will do it for thirty, and that includes a smog certificate. Max would complain bitterly, Billy, why are you sending me so many bad customers? You said if I was busy to send them to you. The real reason was because Max would sell gas caps for thirty-five dollars to old crippled ladies."

            "He tested my sister's car with the check engine light on."

            "He's an idiot!"

            "He said she had to fix her car at his shop to get a free re-test."

            "He's a test only shop! He's not suppose to work on cars!" Bill was getting red in the face from agitation. "What we ought do is let him fix the car and show up with a camera, then report him to Bureau of Auto Repairs, that's what we ought to do!"
            "You mean a sting operation?"
            "Yeah, you show up with a camera and get footage while he's working on the car."
            "I think it's a better idea if you show up with the camera."
            "He knows me. He has no idea who you are!"
            "I still think it's a better idea if you show up."
         
         
         
         

Lord of the Kiln

           Bill the Smog Guru was a teacher's assistant for a ceramics class in the early seventies. Most of the students in the class were women who wore blouses that looked like smocks, with not a bra in sight.
           Bill convinced the professor to reconfigure the class room so that the pottery wheels were at opposite sides of each other. That way he could wheel a chair down the center aisle and assist the students as needed. But it was just a ploy to look down the ladies' blouses one after another.
           As a teacher's assistant Bill wielded a considerable amount of power. It was his job to place the pottery into the kiln. All the students wanted their work to be placed in the best spot possible so it wouldn't crack. If you were nice to Bill you'd get a good spot. The women in the class began asking Bill out to dinner. In exchange for a good spot in the kiln, Bill would get a night out with a lovely woman, a free meal, and seven beers. 

Square Dancing

            I was at a local music festival and wandered into the Women's Club. It was a nice place. It was an older building, turn of the century, with wood floors and a small stage.
            A three piece fiddle band got on stage. There was a square dance caller. He organized the crowd into a circle, and within minutes people were square dancing. I saw smiles on the faces of the dancers. It looked like a lot of fun.
            The next song came on. It was a completely different square dancing configuration. Do you want to dance? my friend said to me. Had I said no I would have regretted it.
            We got on the floor and followed the instructions of the Caller. And in just a short time we were turning to the right, stepping in and out, peeling the banana. It was fun. You can act as silly as you want when you square dance. The kid in me came out. Everybody was spazzing out. It was the perfect opportunity to act like a fool.
            I looked around the room. It seemed every walk of life was represented. I got to thinking square dancing could be the cure for the world's ills. 

West Side Not the Best Side

            I went to the west side to buy bouzouki strings. I have no navigational skills when it comes to the west side. All systems turn off west of Robertson leaving me in a state of confusion. There's something about that part of town that doesn't make any sense to me. There are freeways where they're not suppose to be and boulevards that turn into dead ends. It's a mess. I'm the son of a World War Two Air Force navigator. I take pride in my inner compass. But the west side has elements of the Bermuda triangle. I find myself making U-turns just to survive. It doesn't help that everybody seems to be in a rush.
            I found the music store I was looking for. There was a helpful salesman. He was a real calm man. It made me wonder what he was doing over there. There were some nice guitars for sale. The guitars I liked were no less than five thousand dollars. Two weeks pay for a washed out lawyer. 
            I left the music store and began the hunt for a freeway entrance.