so there is a local ad campaign going on right now trying to get people to buy the local newspaper. and they have people talking about how they “get it” every day. with such phrases like “my grandparents have been getting it for 45 years”. and the popular (in a woman’s voice) “i get it at work on my desk”. the sad thing is, i’m sure there are quite a few people who clicked the website just to find out how to “get it” every day for themselves. i can only imagine the cry of despair that must have gone up when the majority of the desperate perverts out there realized they had been duped by a not so clever ad. at least *now* they finish the ads with the fact that it’s about a newspaper. but i still wonder what exactly is so sexy about a newspaper…
ok, it was actually 5:30pm but i had a small moment this afternoon. i was waiting in the office of my apartment complex cause ups left a package for me in the office (it wasn’t actually for me, it was for the people who moved out of my apartment FOUR MONTHS AGO — but i digress). anyway, i was waiting there for the office girl to grab my package (so to speak) and this other girl comes into the office from the pool area. she was freshly toweled off with the towel around her waist and also came in looking for a package. our eyes met across the office and we both had a “whoa, he/she’s cute” kind of moment between us. she came over to where i was standing and we started talking. she laughed at my incredibly corny and terrible jokes. she said her apartment number like three times, but not to me, even though the office girl already knows what apartment she lives in. unfortunately we didn’t get too much further than just talking, but our complex has a pool party tomorrow and she might be there. 
i know i’ll be incredibly lucky if i see her there tomorrow, but i’ll take it as a sign that things could go farther if she shows up. 
well, two things have me somewhat upset today. first is president bush’s new plan for “securing” our border. the gist of it is that he’s going to be sending national guard troops down to the border with mexico to “stop illegal immigrants” but yet he wants us to believe that these troops will only be there to assist border patrol with infrastructure and won’t actually be making arrests.
yeah, right. and i’ve got a nice big bridge for sale right here.
does anyone else see the problem with sending thousands of soldiers to the mexican border? regardless of what their mission is supposed to be, i highly doubt we’ll be seeing them for only one year like bush says. after all, his plan sounds very familiar to the same one he’s trying to use in iraq, and we see how well *that’s* going. send in a bunch of troops to “train security forces” and then the troops can come home once those security forces have been trained properly. hmmm, it hasn’t worked very well over there, i don’t see how it can be any easier to do here. and the worst thing is, we’ll be paying for both of these operations for years to come and in the long run we still won’t be any safer, and we still won’t have curbed illegal immigration.
in fact, the only real way to curb illegal immigration is not to stop people from coming in, but to force companies to pay good wages for their jobs. the only reason they hire illegals is because they know they can get away with it. if the illegals get caught, does the company get in trouble and/or fined for hiring illegal aliens? no, the illegal workers get put in jail and then deported. the company ends up getting a slap on the wrist in the worst case scenario and then they hire more illegals when the government is no longer looking their way.
and speaking of work (nice seque, eh? ), our new office manager is really pissing me off lately. over the last two weeks she’s been doing parts of my job, or telling me how she wants me to do my job instead of actually letting me do my job the way it should be done. i was working on a project which i thought was a pretty simple task, then she made it out to be above and beyond what it should have been and of course her proposal was rejected. but then it falls to me because i’m the one who put in the time and effort on it so i feel like it’s reflecting poorly on me. and then tomorrow i’m supposed to be having a meeting about “goals and meeting objectives” 
that’s the part that has me nervous, because every time i’ve ever had this kind of subject on the job it usually leads to my dismissal. i think i’m pretty safe for now, but i also know i can’t take much more of her trying to tell me how to think and what to do. i know she’s supposed to be my manager, but she needs to manage and not micro-manage.
ah well, thankfully i can vent to nobody in particular here. and judging from my counters it’s literally nobody reading me, but whatever. it’s all good. i know when i finally get some large volume of readers that these early pages will be much more valuble as an example of my “early” work 
you’re bringin on the heartbreak
well, it’s amazing the things you take for granted when things are going well for you. i woke up today thinking i had a pretty good night’s sleep but about an hour after coming to work my heart started skipping a beat, and then after that i felt exhausted all day. which really really sucks, cause i had my heart set on going to see this brazilian band tonight, but i am definitely not going out tonight. i may even go to sleep by 9:30 the way i feel tonight. this doesn’t usually happen to me unless i get zero sleep, and that just wasn’t the case last night. so i am not sure what the problem is. maybe the last few weeks of work are catching up to me? i don’t know, but i hope i’m back to normal tomorrow…
with the kind of humidity that made you feel like you were in some giant outdoor pressure cooker. The weather was threatening to bring a thunderstorm like nobody had ever seen, so he got up and went for a walk before things started to get ugly.
He went past all the familiar cars parked in their usual spots, their oil slowly dripping out from underneath to leave a slick puddle on the asphalt. Across the parking lot, someone was sitting in their truck with the windows down. He gave a quick glance in their direction and kept moving.
At the end of the block he turned right, walking past the women gossiping on their balcony, their voices blending with the sounds of the night. The air had an earthy, musty smell to it. Like the smell that usually signifies rain on the way, mixed with the mounds of dirt from where big bulldozers had ripped up the sidewalk. He walked past a relic carved into the sidewalk. “L A R R Y + H E I D I” it proclaimed for all the world to see, its edges rounded from many years of weather and pedestrians grinding it down. He wondered if it ever worked out for Larry and Heidi, and whether they got married and had kids or if she took him for half of what he owned including the house. Or even if it lasted much longer than a few weeks after one of them carved their love into the sidewalk so many years ago.
The broken sidewalk twisted past the ravine which was especially dark on this night. Feeling somewhat detached, he tried not to concentrate on who might be hiding down there in the dark, waiting for someone to come down into the shadows. The sound of traffic woke him from his reverie and brought him back to the present. He continued on down the sidewalk, past the four way stop where some macho driver with too much testosterone tried to impress someone by taking their left turn too hard and making their tires squeal. Nobody seemed to notice, and even fewer were impressed.
Suddenly he heard a light jingling sound which seemed to come from all around and nowhere at the same time. Looking around, he saw a tiny dachsund playing with its owner. The dogs little legs were churning at top speed as it jumped down from a small ledge and ran after the ball. Even from across the street he could see how ecstatic the little dachsund was to be playing ball, despite such a small area to play in. “I wish I had brought my camera,” he thought for the 248th time that day.
Continuing on, he came to the top of a long steep hill. He thought how nice it would be to have some kind of wheels to roll down this hill at top speed, the wind flying in his hair. But then he realized that he would still have to climb up this hill, or one just like it, on his way back so he was suddenly grateful for having just his legs to keep him moving. At the bottom of the hill, he saw a dead snake lying in the gutter, its dessicated body curled up as if it were waiting to turn around and start going the other way. He thought how unfortunate for the snake it was that it met such an untimely end.
Turning back, he walked past a small darkened grove of trees just on the edge of a large construction zone, big orange barrels and flashing yellow lights contrasting with the still, peaceful dark surrounding the trees and the sounds of the wind whispering through the branches. A car pulled up and let out a girl who ran over to the newspaper machines and grabbed one of every free paper available. Her friends watched as he walked by, suspicion showing on their faces as if it were a crime to walk on the sidewalk after dark. He ignored their looks and passed them by.
“I should really be writing all this down,” he thought to himself as he made the turn towards home. “This would make a great story if I could just remember it all since I didn’t bring any pen and paper with me on my walk. Not that I could write very well while walking….” He climbed the stairs leading up to his apartment and stepped into a cool blast of air conditioning and made his best effort to enjoy it. He settled down on the couch and turned on “The Simpsons” for an episode that he probably saw at least 15 times already.