The Bloggy Blogface!

   The first time I watched The Jetsons , I was eleven years old, and I thought they were pretty neat. The way they zipped around Orbit City in their flying cars was a great departure from the way we used to travel. My parents owned a light blue station wagon then, where we'd all pack in and head to burger and ice cream places like Jumpin' Jacks in the summer, or the mall on Saturdays. They loved taking the back roads which meant the slowest possible way to get to all the places, so my sister and I often took turns riding in the back cargo space, sometimes both fitting back there. My sister, at the time, was taller than me, with her lanky frame taking up most of the back space. Watching George, Jane, Judy and Elroy fly through the skies looked way more appealing than getting jabbed in the ribs with my sister's foot. The Jetsons were not my initial depiction of futuristic things back then. That belonged to the inside cover of my mother's high school yearbook. Her ye...

Tucked away inside a storage bin at my parent’s rented garage sits a thick red book. Its pages lined like graph paper, I used it as a writing journal for a good portion of the 2000’s. The entries begin in July 2003, at a Starbucks on the north shore of Long Island. They begin there as that is where my thirteen-hundred mile trek wound up, all the way from an Amtrak station in Little Rock, Arkansas a day and a half earlier. I chose the train because it was relatively cheaper than flying, and I had some time on my hands. It is a long trip, and one where you have to change trains at least twice. My first train switch occurred in Chicago. In the couple hours I had in between rides, an old friend stopped by Union Station to say hello and catch up in person. It had been awhile since we saw each other, mostly due to our geography. Not that distance made our friendship challenging, but she was probably never going to leave the midwest, and that was perfectly fine. Myself on the other hand, e...

I am a former Quad City DJ's dancer suffering from tennis elbow. Ask me anything! Hello! I am here to take your questions. Apologies in response time, it has been difficult to type these days. But, I’m going to try! This will be fun. Remember the Quad City DJ’s? Choo-choo!  Question 1. Jeff from Davenport! Are you from the real Quad Cities? My mom went to a school in Bettendorf named after Herbert Hoover. Do you know him? Answer: I know of President Herbert Hoover. However I do not know him personally, nor your mother, nor anything about the Quad Cities. I actually lived my life in southern Vermont, and never heard of the Quad Cities. Anyway, the band I danced for that caused me irreplaceable elbow nerve damage is called the Quad City DJ’s. They’re not from your neck of the woods. At least that’s not what they told me. Maybe one of these days I’ll come out there to visit. Maybe I’ll go by train! C’mon ride that train! Question 2. Kacey from Valdosta!  How did you get...

Back when I used to love cereal, or maybe thought that was the only thing we were supposed to eat for breakfast, I had a strange routine. The cereal cabinet was home to no less than four different varieties: Golden Crisp, Life, and Frosted Flakes always took up residence there, with at least one other brand mom wanted to try. I think my favorite might have been Cinnamon Toast Crunch, and sometimes my parents would get it for me, but I wasn't terribly devoted to it. I'm sure I just preferred it so I could drink the sweet cinnamon-sugared milk afterwards. I also liked Cocoa Pebbles, as it created every kid's favorite chocolate milk. But I didn't like how both Cocoa and Fruity Pebbles got soggy fairly quick, so I didn't opt for them much. Peanut Butter Crunch was another favorite, until about the time I realized it was murdering the roof of my mouth. I'd slurp down a couple bowls at the kitchen table, a small fixture in such a narrow space that I wrote about bef...

I was once part of a company that eventually went out of business. The process was a quick one, from changing key leadership personnel to total liquidation in a span of roughly three years. As part of the management team, I was made privy to the stories coming out of the corporate office, but was told not to tell anyone under me, who were full and part-time hourly employees. It was a little surreal because I had just helped open a new branch of our company out in California. The new staff there was pretty thrilled and anxious, and we all had a pretty wild and fun time bonding while transforming an empty warehouse-size building into something amazing. Alas, the excitement of that new location would be very short-lived.  The first real instance where some of us in management realized something fishy was going on was the sudden end of a marketing partnership with, at the time, a budding online organization helping sell our products. That same company just last year enjoyed a ...

  Once every couple months, I get fed up with the squeaking storm door and spray some lubricant onto the hinges. Sometimes I'll put a little straw thing at the opening, in order to keep the lubricant a steady stream onto the afflicted area. Other times I am either drunk or lazy and just wing it without the straw. If it sprays the area, good enough for me. They're just door hinges, right? The strange thing with this door's squeaks is that it elicits a different sound after every elapsed period of spraying the hinges. As if the hinges wish to sing me the songs of their people. At first I don't mind the melodic sounds of metal rubbing against one another, but once it begins sounding like a screeching hyena top forty jam, it's time to take action. Since I tend to uproot every few years, I've yet to find the comforting sounds that reassure me this place is alright. The closest thing here so far might be the faint noises of church bells some six-hundred feet aw...

   A friend and I talk from time to time through various messenger applications. She is married with a few young kids, and works typical weekday hours for the state government. As a parent I'm she has her hands tied for quite a long time after work. Picking up kids from here and there, helping with dinner, eating, cleanup, family time, then tucking everyone into bed at a reasonable hour. We'll speak late, for her anyway, up until a time where I don't hear from her anymore. Usually between ten and midnight, but closer to ten. She doesn't tell me she's falling asleep, doesn't tell she's checking up on kids - she just stops typing. We'll either reconnect the next day, or whenever. Sometimes she'll apologize then, but she really doesn't have to. This friend and I have known each other for awhile - about fifteen years to be exact. As our lives have kept us apart, we've been able to use various forms of social media to connect and check in whene...