EVERYBODY (EXCEPT DANTE) USED TO BE A TEACHER OF MINE

TIRE TROUBLES

Today has been shaping up, so far, to be quite a droll day. This morning, as I got ready to get back into my car to go home from 7:30 Mass at O.L.Mt. Carmel in Pittston a guy came over to me & told me that my tire_driver's side in the back_was flat. I went next door to the gas station, having already needed gas anyway. The kid who put the gas into the car said the same thing. I made sure I asked him if the air pump was working & could he give me quarters with my change? Those machines charge $.75 & don't take paper money. All has worked out quite well since then so far. Oddly, that happens to me at least fairly frequently these days. I must be the victim of some kind of a rubber curse or something. Well, the moment of truth will finally & at last arrive. I shall have to lector at 5:00 p.m. Mass this afternoon at O.L. Sorrows. It's been a long time since the last time I lectored at O.L.P.H. I don't suppose I shall be all that bad at it. At least this morning it looked as if we could count on yet a whole nother rainy day up ahead of us. Yesterday & last night there was a violent but short electrical storm. This day in history: 1929. Jacqueline Lee Bouvier Kennedy(Jackie 0) was born. She invented the pill box hat (remember that groovy Dylan oldie?) & was related to Marge Simpson.

BRIC A BRAC A FIRECRACKER SIS BOOM BAH !!

Bugs Bunny Bugs Bunny Rah Rah Rah!! on his sixty seventh anniversary. My friend Cindi from Newblog told me about that. She's the one who hepped me to Bert's big day yesterday too. Today the weather is awfully warm. Tomorrow I shall be getting my very first ever chance to lector at O.L.Sorrows. I was a lector for very many years at O.L.P.H. but this is a whole nother world around here. I'm assuming it will be a mere bag of shells for me though. That's my WHERESGEORGE map. The blue states are where I've gotten fewer than five hits. In the green states, I've gotten between five & ten hits. The red states have gotten over twenty hits. It's a swell game & can even end up becoming quite addictive for anybody who doesn't watch his step. This morning Danny came over for a grand total of about a half second to give me the frame he promised me for my picture. At this library they've finally gotten another computer installed. Maybe that will help me avoid getting kicked out of here within only an hour.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, BERT

Happy Birthday, Bert. Yesterday was a fairly busy time for me. I spent around twenty minutes on the phone_and I hate phones!!_stuck with some political survey. The main bulk of it was about Chris Carney. Last night, I saw Godspell, the early seventies musical based on the Gospel of St. Matthew. I came this close(my thumb & forefinger are touching.)to not bothering to watch it but I'm happy I saw it. It was very interesting because it showed the World Trade Center in its very early days, long before the Moslems blew it up & murdered all those people. I really didn't recognize any but three of the songs. I guess all those songs I still have rolling around upside my head must be from Jesus Christ, Superstar. Today's the anniversary of a fairly big accident I had back in the nineties. I got a card from Daren's mother. She gave me another really nice picture of Daren . Saturday would have been Daren's birthday & everybody really misses her.

GETTING WARMER

The temperature's been going up over the course of this morning. It's been a really nice, quiet day so far. In general, life these days has been pretty uneventful. My father & Uncle Frankie are planning to take advantage of those Yankee tickets tonight unless their bad_weather curse kicks in. I've never liked sports anyway so I don't care. Steve promised to send me an e.mail from Europe this weekend. I've been getting quite an awful lot of hits from Wheresgeorge lately. There was too much going on in Wyoming's library today so now I'm in West Pittston's. It's much quieter here, at least right now. In Wyoming, they have an electrician fixing the wiring in the ceiling. This one's only slightly farther away. I've been vaguely thinking of trying the one in Wilkes Barre one of these days but the parking over in that general area absolutely stinks. At this library they have no parking lot but I at least get to park in the neighborhood.

NICER DAY

Today's shaping up to be quite a much nicer day than yesterday. I even got to cut the grass. My father & Uncle Frankie wanted to go to the big Yankee (Scranton/W.B., that is) game last night but it was rained out for the second time. They took a chance anyway though, & ended up being able to get Larry his shirt. For some insane reason, people around here & in N.Y. are Yankee fans. I'm still plowing my way through that Dostoyevsky book. Aaah, there's nothing like a good dose of Russian existentialism to relax a guy. I've always agreed quite completely with many of the things he espouses in his novels. It's just that he's a little more intense than most people are used to. Liberals don't like this side of me, but I'm the western culture guy & he's one of my favorite moments in western culture.

RAINY DAY & MONDAY

The weekend at Elaine's worked out really well. Now she & her family can all relax. I most certainly really enjoyed it all but I'm always very happy to get things over with. The trip home was very nice with no traffic. We even ran into Mary Ellen & Joe in the parking lot of McDonald's. I was supposed to mow the lawn bright & early this morning but it started raining. The temperature turned out to be about eight or ten degrees cooler than we've been used to lately. I've finished A Confederacy of Dunces & started re_reading The Brothers Karamozov. Long books get me crazy but this one has always been a favorite of mine. It really puts the brain cells to work. I've been trying to become as well read as possible. Hey, you never know when it can come in handy. There are quite a whole lot of extremely seriously obnoxious little screaming young uns in the back of the library today. Something must be going on about them. I see Jo Anne & her family are back from their annual trek to California. It's good to find out that everything worked out really well for one & all. On Saturday, at 5:00 p.m. Mass, I shall get my very first ever chance ever as a lector in my new parish. We soon shall get to see how things work out.

THE BIG WEDDING ADVENTURE

Last night most certainly worked out quite well for one & all. The church was absolutely packed with standing room only. The reception was really good. I got the filet mignon. I stayed up entirely too late. It's not a habit I should ever like to get into. I took the shuttle back to the hotel with Gino & Michelle, Java & Jennifer, KrissyKrissyKrissy & Ed. Gino & Michelle nudge nudged me into staying up way the hell later than I should ever have otherwise wanted to. I got a very violent headache from two martinis, food, crowd, etc. Maria, after a long pointless lecture about my carelessness, finally gave in & gave me the satisfaction of a pill to take. I dissolved it on my tongue. I went to bed around midnightish. This morning, I'm supposed to meet the Ronald at around 9:00 a.m. to go to Mass at Sacred Heart. There's some kind of convention, I should suppose, going on around here. There are dozens of people here together wearing name tags of some kind. Everybody in their group's black. Mary Ellen finally got the coal to take up to Karen. It's too bad we can't stick around long enough to get a chance to swim in the built in pool. For favors, they gave each of us a champagne corkscrew & bottle topper. Now that Larry's not constantly hovering around peeking over my shoulder I may write whatever I want.