This is called a Have-A-Heart Trap. If you--like me--have mice, you put some nuts in one end and when the unsuspecting mice enter into the other side, it crawls towards the nuts, tipping the balance and shutting the trap door behind them. There's holes in it and the mouse has a little snack while it waits for me to wake up and let it loose outside. Humane, right? Much cleaner than cutting them in half with the conventional, spring loaded dull-guillotine, right?
Notice--if you will--what I just noticed about how I've been setting them up. The way I've had it--and I swear I'm not a mean guy--the mice enter into the trap (I've caught three), eat a little snack--maybe even clutch it in their jaws and bring the walnut back to their starving micelets back at the nest--before turning around to watch the door shut right in front of them as they take their first step.
It's really no wonder they're always so urine-soaked the next morning.
A woman came into Amanda's expensive clothing store today here on the beach in Deleware, as women with alot of money are want to do in this area. She picked up an item (let's say a handbag) that cost somewhere in the aread of $200. The price did not shock her.
However.
She liked the product very much, but then her daughter (looking to goad her moronic mother) flipped it over and presented it to her, "Oh, mom, you can't."
The woman turned to Amanda as she put the product down and said--as if her country depended on her, "I'm boycotting the French."
About a year ago, Ben and I had this other restaurant scam idea: We'd find a place a half hour from anyone we knew and both apply on different days and show up with the same story. My was that I was born in the US to Irish parents, who brought me back with them for most of my child hood, untill I came back to go to college. Ben's would be similar, but his parents were English, if I recall correctly.
The story would explain why we had such thick accents, but perfect social security numbers and working papers. People like foreigners to serve them food, and we would thus make alot of money in tips. It was one of those plans that we thought of, and never did anything with. (There was a lot of discussion over whether we should pretend not to know eachother, but instead have a rivalry: "Imperialist wanker!" "Bog-fucker.")
Tonight I'm going to try something different, but with the same goal$. I'm going to tell my tables that my name is Elvis.
The plan: get a job to pay off speeding tickets, desire to own things, etc.
Setting: Expensive Mexican restaurant within scootering distance.
Specs: I moved to Deleware this week, which brings me into a whole new realm of lying about shit. I realized this yesterday as I filled out the application for a local mexican restaurant: not only does not one know me or how old I am, but they've never even heard of anything on my resume. Realizing that the coffee shop I used to work at closed for good, I decided to ham up my responsibilities. "Waited tables for three years, made drinks [I say drinks, boss thinks Tequilla; I say drinks, I mean lattes], incoming employees trainer."
There was no space for a phone number on the past experience section, so I decided that instead of noting that I delivered pizza in highschool, I wrote down the correct Pizza place back home, but mentioned that I was their Chef. This lie had two safeties in it: 1) To lie about duties, but to be truthful about name, location, and number of years employed, means less to remember or trip up later. 2) Saying I cooked pizza means nothing to a mexican restaurant, and I have an excuse when it later comes out that I don't know my way around their kitchen.
I find it very important to lie about background info because then you don't have to go through all of that "paying your dues" business. Tonight was my first night and twice someone said, "Go ahead and give that to Brendan, he's waited tables for three years."
Realizing also that they would never check up on me I included The Chart House Restaurant from back home on my application, a business that also no longer exists. I put this down so that I could sound better, act like I knew how to handle a big restaurant, and pretend to know something about seafood. Again, all skills that employers like to see, but would help me not at all in a margarita place like this.
The only nice pants I own are a pair of checkered chef's trousers from the salvation army. I wore them tonight, as I probably will most nights. The boss said, "Oh, nice pants, you must have worked at a fancy place before. Did you guys use a tray? You'll get the hang of it."
Today I'm supposed to be moving to Deleware to begin my new life, but I'm waiting for the fucking UPS guy to come.
The joy of the internet is that I know exactly where my unarrived package is, rather than sitting at home wondering. But either way it's not here and I have no idea why, but I do know that it spent the night in Boise, ID, before its long weekend in Louisville, KY. This package will begin a chain reaction that will get me my computer in working order, my stuff packed to move, my new life in another of the thirteen original colonies.
On saturday I went to the Olde English show at Bard College. Since I became a college-person three years ago I've been searching for something to throw my time away in (see posts below) and whenever I see Olde English perform, I really wish Ben hadn't thought of it first. Of course, I would never blatently copy him like tha--
7/02 10/02
Last show was rather humorous, and I enjoyed it very much. The word everyone used for this show was "solid" and so I'll go ahead and steal that. This show kept a really steady beat, which is both good and bad. By the middle of last show people were ready to beleive anything, as evidenced by the fire alarm that went off in the middle of the show but did not stir anyone from their seats. That is a beautiful thing, but hard to sustain or recreate. This show was more about solid single sketches, and the way they were carefully woven into the show like a good mix-tape.
What I liked alot was that I no longer had to favor Ben's sketches. We have very similar senses of humor. But this time around I found the others just as awesome. The Doctor Seuss story "The Trouble With Tenure" by Suzanne and Adam, "Billy's Report Card" by Dave.
As a group their timing is now perfectly in sync, and I can tell they're all internalizing a sketch metronome, and I wish I were there learning it.
I also tend to favor the writers when noting sketch genius, but then I forget that some people like Raizin are just funny, and the crowd likes everything they say. People who do not even know where Bard college is have seen him on the internet and will repeat his line "I work at the zoo... I wash the hippos," in conversation.
Sadly I missed Ben's Dream Sketch--which by its description sounds like it would have been my favorite--it involved split camera work of him in the front seat of a getaway car arguing with himself as a bank robber with a fake mustache over why he took so long to get out of the bank (reportedly: "they didn't have any bags, so I had to go to the grocery store, and they said I had to buy something to get a bag, so I had to go to the bank to get money to go to the grocery store to get a bag to...")--which I think Raizin and Ben wrote, and I hope they put it up soon so I don't have to keep ruining it by third party paraphrasing.
Other genius worth noting: The Special Edition Director's Commentary of Joel's Last Will and Testament ("If you're watching this video, it means that I am dead..." audience saddens before voiceover begins: "Hey, I'm Joel, I wrote, shot, directed...") Again, hilarious premise, added to by a mix of editting and freestyle: moments later, while Joel is crying about having the greatest family ever, party-guy roommate Raizin busts in with Heinekin bottle on forehead, "Dude, check it out, I'm a heinecorn", Raizin's voice over joins Joel's "..I'm dead too now, that was my 20th beer that day.."
1) On wednesday I turned 21. This was very exciting for much of my family (note ethnicity). Having enjoyed the company of my older brother's extra driver's license for many years now I felt little in terms of new freedoms. Instead I found myself initiated into a new demographic, a new marketing grid. Now I flip through magazines and notice ads that I previously would have given no more notice to than those promising office solutions or winning mutual funds, thinking "...hmmm, Tangueray, huh?"
2) My dad's aunt died this week. I knew her very well, but due to the size of my family, she was more of a friend of my grandmother's than an aunt. The wake was friday, at the funeral home, a dry affair. There were probably a hundred people there, 2/3 of which were cousins of mine. We had to introduce ourselves with full names, and then explain which great aunt was our grandmother in order to delineate. The funeral saturday was presided over by a man we came to call Father Mayor Quimby--his voice a dead ringer for his cartoon counter part--and every time he spoke, you could see my family doubled over in mute laughter ("...dear citizens of Springfield, we are gathered here today..."
My mother returned from the communion line and told us there was no wine to follow. As my remaining small aunts kneeled down, my mother leans over to say "Man, I didn't even get the chaser. I mean, you need a little of the hair of the dog that bit you, am I right?"
The older Irish generations of my family are so short. ("How short at they Brendan?") They are so short they all used to live in trees and make cookies. Standing next to my generation, which averages about 6'-6'2" they appear to be shrinking.
Father Sam Adam's Light presided over the reception (10:30 AM) and most of my family was half in the bag before lunch.
3) My moped starts and runs now. I'm currently waiting for the muffler putty to dry, but before that it sounded as though I had fixed a seat and handle bars onto a chainsaw. My brother bought a riding mower of the same vintage and took the blades off it this week. His has four speeds, and mind doesn't have first gear. So we're matched up enough to race--which we do--because I have to kick start the bike and then get some Fred-Flintstone speed before jamming it into second gear.
5) I took the front seat out of my car when I moved out of my school apartment, so that I could ride home with my bike inside. Once packed, I was able to marvel at what early twenties loser I've become, as I padded in my macintosh and snowboard, searching my mp3 player for some predictable sub-hit.
So that happened. I realized last night, as I tried to swindle campus security into getting me the janitor's extensions cords so that we could run them 200 feet from the laundry room to the tennis courts ("Yeah, it's for school.") that I miss this shit.
I've been in college three years and this was the first time I even came close to having anything of an opus. Back in highschool < a href="http://www.picniclightning.net">Ben and I ran an undergound newspaper in much of the same fashion: never sleeping during finals, having few conversations that don't relate to the project, and never being too tired to enjoy people laughing in large groups at something you helped make.
My re edits of the movie still make me happy to think about, and by the time mine went up there were close to two hundred people sitting in the dark (we unplugged the tennis court lights, even the safety bulb). In many ways it felt like a long payoff after months of work inasmuch as a movie I had co-starred in a year ago went on later in the night.
The openning, which I will try to get online today, still excites me to think about:
Clapping subsides as lights go down and all stare at black screen, Neco's "These Days" from Royal Tenenbaums begins, screen fades up to a slow motion plastic bag blowing on the ground. ("...I don't do too much talking these days..") slow motion man runs up and picks up the plastic bag and drops it, slow mo gets slower. Repeat three times, then man comes on, picks up bag and throws it high in the air, but it gets stuck on his hand, camera looks up in the air to follow it, then pans down to find man (me) slow motion shaking the bag off hand. Fade to black. "Welcome to the Film Festival" blinking throughout.
I need something else like this to take me away from school work next year.
Despite how happy it makes me to look at my new scooter (above), I should mention that I'm having a really shitty day. So, please send me comments and tell me how spectacular my bike is.
My film fest got rained out today, which is fine because I managed to majorly fuck up my movie in the editting process. I've been focussing on it and the novel for so long that my friends hate me. Since I take college with a grain of salt, very few see "intensity Brendan" and I end up really offending people when I treat our conversations like deletable video clips.
Also, I've been editting so long that tonight at dinner a women across the room said "Right, oh my god I know-- oh my god I know..." And I thought, Shit! unloop.
The best I can figure about the bike is that in 1966 Sears decided it wasn't selling enough tools and decided to build small motorcycles with parts that can be unscrewed with a good flathead. It's also oddly layed in dry dirt. I fear it may have been dug up after the Taliban fell.
10/02
