and the steam can start getting out and I can start to think again. It’s like, something in my head just snapped, and I don’t mean in an I’m-about-to-go-postal way, but in an I’m-incapable-of-rational-thought way and, up until five minutes ago, I don’t know how I was even able to function.
* * *
I forgot what I was going to say, but I’m pretty sure it was brilliant. It’s like I’ve got all these brilliant thoughts swirling around in my head, but they’re like these slippery fish, and I don’t have a net, and I’m trying to catch them like a grizzly catches salmon, only I don’t have the claws or the sharp teeth, so I can’t catch any of them and they just keep swirling, swirling, swirling.
* * *
How cool are these stain rings on the side of your tub from setting down your cup of coffee every day? Does that mean your coffee cup leaks or you dribble when you drink? You should clean those someday.
* * *
Your tub’s full. While you’re waiting for the oven, it’s a good time to shut the lights out in the rest of the apartment and light some candles in here, huh? Yeah.
Apparently lighting candles makes you think in second-person.
And sing.
Except the song you’ve got in your head is Iggy Pop’s “Lust for Life,” which sucks because the song’s ruined because whatever cruise ship company it is still plays that song in their commercials. And they totally misrepresent the song, that’s what sucks; all they sing in the commercial is “lust for life, lust for life, lust for life,” like it was written for families who want to run on beaches and go jet skiing and rock climbing and putt-putt golfing but, in the song, he’s singing about liquor and drugs and stripping and a bunch of other stuff that nobody would want their adolescent daughter doing, whether she’s on vacation or not. Stupid cruise ship ass munchers.
* * *
Is it toxic when you burn all the dust and crap sitting in the top of the candle?
* * *
Note to self: The oven probably heats up faster when you actually turn it on.
* * *
That salty residue at the bottom of a bag of chips—I’m thinking specifically of Tostitos Bite-Sized Corn Chips—somebody should totally market that. Just put it in a bag and sell it—call it Salty Residue—I’d totally buy that. Just design some kind of packaging that allows for convenient pouring into one’s mouth so you wouldn’t have to snorf it all off the front of your shirt like I’ve been doing for the last couple minutes.
And they’d probably have to sell it at head shops, but that’s okay.
* * *
Without the water running, it’s so quiet that this cockroach crawling up the shower curtain sounds like an elephant. Maybe not an elephant, but definitely something way louder than a cockroach. And then I about had a heart attack when I thought I kicked a snake, but it was the extension cord, so everything’s cool because extension cords don’t usually bite.
* * *
The landlady’s playing her music again. Or still. Maybe it’s never stopped and I just don’t notice it anymore. “Ah Moe ah me toe phone ah Moe ah meat oh phone ah Moe ah me toe phone ah Moe ah meat oh phone ah Moe.”
I thought I understood it for a second, but I guess not.
* * *
Why do I have an extension cord in the bathroom? It’s not like I’m using it for anything. It’s just sitting on the floor giving me a heart attack.
* * *
I totally forgot what I wanted to remember and all I can think about is all the stuff that Viking Boy was saying at work the other day. How the goals everyone sets for themselves—to be rich, or famous, or to save the world—are all arbitrary and stupid when you realize that you’re living on this tiny mole in the armpit of God, waiting for all the pure energy of the whole entire universe to get simultaneously in synch and make this beautiful white implosion and then explosion and then the big bang and everything starts all over again. It doesn’t matter what you do, or how you do it, or who you do it to, because you’re just this tiny part of this infinite kaleidoscope that is the universe.
* * *
Replenishes Colored/Permed/Dry/Damaged Hair
Massage into wet hair, lather and rinse thoroughly. For complete revitalization, use Herbal Essences Replenishing Conditioner with Hawafena to enhance the natural health and feel of your hair. Finish with Herbal Essences Styling Products.
* * *
Maybe you have ADD. You’ve passed—or failed, depending upon how you look at it—all those ADD or ADHD or OPP tests online that say, “If you score where you just scored, you definitely have ADD or AHAD or whatever. You need prescription drugs, man, that’s the only thing that’ll save you.” (Survey courtesy of your caring friends at Glaxo Smith Kline, Merck and Pfizer.)
Ooh, the oven just beeped. Time to put in the bacon.
* * *
Where were you? Oh, yeah. You don’t know.
* * *
You’re either too stoned or not stoned enough to concentrate; you’re going to base your actions on the not-stoned-enough theory.
* * *
Yeah.
* * *
Okay, I just figured out how karma works: say the universe consisted of just the people in this apartment house. The way it is now, if a new guy forgets a box of fabric softener sheets in the laundry room, somebody else will take them, and then the new guy with the fabric softener sheets will assume that’s the way the universe works, so he’ll keep somebody else’s roll of quarters and then the quarters guy will steal my brand-new jug of Mountain Fresh Tide and the first thing I’ll think is, Oh, that’s what I get for leaving a brand-new jug of Mountain Fresh Tide in the laundry room where anybody can steal it.
My question is, Why can’t it go the other way? Why can’t we get positive karma to go around? What if nobody stole the new guy’s box of Bounce? And then he’d leave the quarters and the quarters guy would think, Hey, somebody left my quarters, so I won’t steal this brand-new jug of Mountain Fresh Tide. And then eventually people would expect to find their stuff where they left it and the landlady could throw away the “Not responsible for lost or stolen articles” sign and everybody would help everybody else find their stuff because that’s what we’d want somebody else to do. And I could do laundry a week later and my Mountain Fresh Tide would still be there.
All we need is one person who doesn’t steal everybody else’s stuff when they leave it in the laundry room.
I’ll start as soon as I make up for my Mountain Fresh Tide that some dickface stole.
* * *
Is it just my imagination, or are my eyebrows really growing inside
