The Diary of A Simple Man
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Below are the 20 most recent journal entries recorded in the "Peter Maranci" journal:[<< Previous 20 entries]
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09:15 am
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Weirdness, continued
It turned out they didn't have either of the pastries that I wanted. So I got a muffin. That and my coffee was on the house, and they said the pastry would be free next time, too. I also got about fifty apologies, none of which were necessary.
That much cheerfullness is hard to cope with, particularly early in the morning when I'm as tired as this...
Current Mood:  tired
Current Music: Tom Waits - I Don't Wanna Grow Up
Tags: consumer, food, weird
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08:56 am
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Fresh City is freaking me out
It must be some sort of promotional thing. Wait, I'll back up.
Jeeze, I'm tired. I went to sleep on the late side, around 11:15 last night, but that doesn't explain it. Waking up this morning was like waking up dead. I slept on the train, and when I was walking through Ruggles, I suddenly discovered that my zipper was wide open. This was not a dream.
I mean, I'm so tired this morning that I can barely function. So I went downstairs to Fresh City to get some real coffee, non-decaf. Incidentally, the girl who implied that I was a thief doesn't seem to be there any more.
Anyway, I'm walking in a half-daze towards the pastries to see if there's anything I like. As I'm walking, one of the girls behind the counter (about fifteen feet away) smiles at me and calls out "How are you doing, sir?"
Startled, I answered "Good morning! How are you?" and continued to the pastries. There was nothing that really grabbed me, though. As I walked back to check a couple of small pastry platters by the cash register, a man in a red embroidered Fresh City jacket walked up to a customer in a business suit, said something like "Hello, sir, thanks for coming in today!" and shook his hand. I started to suspect that something was going on.
Jesus. I'm so tired that I'm actually saying these words as I type them. I probably sound insane!
Anyway, there were no pastries that interested me by the cash register. A man who was sitting nearby jumped up and asked "What are you looking for?".
"Oh...a cinnamon swirl, or an apple strudel, maybe," I said. He told the girl to bake me one, and she said it would be ready in ten minutes; then he told her that the pastry would be "on him". I thanked him, said I'd be back, and left. I'm feeling pretty freaked out, but I guess I should go back.
Weird, weird, weird. Corporate-enforced false bonhomie always makes me feel weird.
Current Mood:  weird
Current Music: Tom Waits - I Don't Wanna Grow Up
Tags: consumer, food, weird
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03:17 pm
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Yuck!
I didn't know this product existed:
Would you eat it? I wouldn't!
Current Mood:  amused
Current Music: Tracy Chapman - Telling Stories
Tags: food, weird
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08:58 am
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Taking the Christ out of Christmas
Someone over on Askville asked "When was Christ removed from Christmas?". I couldn't resist answering...
Christ was removed from Xmas in a two-step surgical procedure on November 17th, 1952. First, an incision was made along the dorsal seam of the holiday. A set of custom-built expanders were used to keep the incision open. Then, a pair of forceps specially crafted for the occasion by the Business Roundtable were used to extract the Christ (already in a moribund state) from the internal chamber. The process went relatively smoothly, and once complete the incision was closed, surgically stiched, and healed normally. The result was a healthy non-religious commercial holiday, able to serve as a regular stimulant for the American economy.
I'm not sure what was done with the Christ. It might have been disposed of as medical waste...or possibly it was picked up from a dumpster and swallowed by a passing evangelical movement. If so, I'm afraid it metastasized into a cancer of the right wing. In any case, none of the original Christ remains in the now tumor-ridden movement.
Merry Xmas!
I was tempted to make a reference to that Japanese monster movie where a homeless boy, a survivor of Hiroshima I think, found and ate the deathless heart and brain of Frankstein, only to grow into a Godzilla-sized Japanese Frankenstein. But how many people remember that movie? Not many, I'll bet!
Current Mood: amused
Current Music: Dresden Dolls - Pierre
Tags: askville, atheism, humor, religion, weird
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02:16 pm
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Strange place
For the last couple of days I've been listening to the first disc of The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway over and over and over...
Current Mood: weird
Tags: music, weird
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08:22 am
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TSA
Apparently the government is considering an enhancement for airline security. It's a bracelet that every passenger would be forced to wear while on the plane. It would contain all their personal data, and act as a flight boarding pass. Removing it while in flight would be a crime.
And, oh yes: it's got a built-in shock device that can be used by TSA and airplane personel to stun passengers at will, immobilizing them for several minutes. As an added bonus, it can be used as an interrogation enhancement.
Can you believe this shit? I'm sure Obama will "reluctantly" support it, too.
Current Mood:  angry
Current Music: They Might Be Giants - Idlewild
Tags: politics, weird
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08:16 am
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Because
Salvatore Minella is at his favorite restaurant, dining on salmon. But he doesn't know that this particular salmon was a magic fish; she could talk. Her name was Ella.
Ella did not ask the fisherman who caught her to let her go because she couldn't speak English. She could only speak Fish. In any case, she wasn't feeling well that day. She was badly infected with Anisakis nematodes.
Current Mood: quixotic
Current Music: Cream - Strange Brew
Tags: fiction, humor, weird
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12:07 pm
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Waterfall from a closet
On Friday Boston was hit with a pretty powerful thunderstorm and violent downpour.
How violent? Violent enough that water came pouring out of several mechanical closets at my work, on the sixth floor. One of them is less than 20 feet from my desk, so I grabbed a video:
That's my voice warning people to avoid the water (although I'm sure they all knew not to touch it - call it a parental instinct on my part. Or maybe arrogance). It was probably safe, but in my old job water leaked out of an electrical closet, and they had to shut the whole building down for a week or two. A maintainence guy told me later that we'd been lucky; there could have been an explosion that would have wrecked the whole building.
Anyway, they cleaned up here and there was no problem. I wish the phone had picked up the sound better; it really sounded like a waterfall run amok inside that closet.
Current Mood:  thoughtful
Current Music: The Cranberries - Ode to My Family
Tags: video, weather, weird
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01:45 am
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Big accident after midnight
I had to go pick up a friend at the bus station in downtown Providence tonight; I got the call just past midnight. I'd been expecting her earlier, but the bus was running late. It was raining and dark, not my favorite weather to drive in even when I'm not dying of sleep deprivation.
So I took I95 down. As I was getting off the 22A ramp - a long, gently curving ramp that most people take at high speed - I suddenly saw a huge accident in the road ahead. A white car was upside-down in the middle of the ramp, with broken glass and debris everywhere. It must have happened only seconds earlier, because I was the first on the scene. People were dragging each other out through the windows of the half-crushed car. It was two girls and a young man; there was no visible blood or injury, but injuries still seemed likely.
I put on my hazards, kicked some of the debris to the side of the ramp and dialed 911. Fucking AT&T! I got a tone and a "This call cannot be completed as dialed". What's the point of having 911 if it doesn't work when you need it? Fortunately someone else was able to get through to the police.
Some guy came up and asked me to move my car so he could get past. "Drive around me" I said. He did, with loud popping sounds as he drove through the broken glass. Another car followed him. A few people were trying to comfort the passengers from the car, who were making the usual sounds of distress - not screaming, just sounds of lamentation. I noticed that the girls from the car were wearing remarkably revealing dresses - not torn, they were designed that way. Is tonight prom night?
I couldn't figure out how the car had gotten upside-down. There was a loop of another ramp almost directly overhead, but the guard rail was undamaged.
I was shaking, to be honest. The ramp was pretty much blocked up (there's a lot of traffic in downtown Providence, even after midnight), so I shouted that we should clear a path for the police and ambulance, and went carefully around the crash site myself. I avoided the worst of the glass and didn't hear any popping sounds. Picked up my friend and came home; on the way we passed the crash site from a distance, and I could see flashing police lights.
What a weird experience!
Current Location: Home
Current Mood:  drained
Current Music: The Cure - Friday I'm In Love
Tags: life, weird
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10:19 am
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The World Is Too Weird
Ever heard of "fainting goats"?
I'd never heard of them before this morning, when I read a comment that the media was acting like fainting goats over Obama's "bitter" comment. It was such an odd phrase that I had to look it up.
When startled, these small goats basically faint and fall down. The thing that kills me is this line from the wikipedia article:
In the past they were used for protecting livestock such as sheep by involuntarily "sacrificing themselves" to predators, allowing the sheep to escape.
For some reason that thought makes me sad.
Current Mood: sad
Tags: humor, link, weird
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12:04 am
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Beyond Sanity
If you weren't born in the mid-1960s, it might not be possible for you to understand. But for a while, American culture was truly...different.
Example: this full-length episode of Lidsville, by Sid and Marty Kroft.
When you see Charles Nelson Reilly dressed up as Slutty Bunny, mating with Raunchy Rabbit, you'll know that you've entered an alternate reality. Nonetheless, it's safe for work - unless your boss objects to psychedelia. 
Sebastian watched it with me tonight on YouTube. I don't remember seeing it before. I stared, aghast? amazed? stunned? as Sebastian laughed himself into hysteria.
A few other Sebastian notes: It has been a month or so since we gave up putting the safety gate up at the top of the stairs at night. It was time.
He went to an exhibition called "Mad Science" at our local library a few weeks ago. It was awesome! Not schticky, as I feared. The guy was funny, had some cool experiments, and really explained about science. The kids absolutely loved it, and so did the parents. I've never heard so much cheering and applause at the library - it was amazing.
Lastly, Teri bought Sebastian a new set of Superboy pajamas, complete with cape. Unlike his previous one this one isn't a proper replica of the actual Superman/Superboy costume, but Sebastian loved it anyway. Here's a photo:
I don't know if she'll see it way down here, but happy birthday, ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) zarhooie! Although I'm sure you'll have one whether I wish it or not.  Still, every little bit helps - right?
Current Location: Home
Current Mood: tired
Current Music: Lidsville Theme
Tags: sebastian, video, weird
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04:04 pm
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Fred Phelps in Franklin?
Saw a guy wearing an Australian/cowboy hat standing on a street corner in downtown Franklin, MA today. He was holding a large sign that said:
GAY FASCISM
OUT OF OUR
SCHOOLS + GOV.
I wonder what that was about?
Current Location: Home
Current Mood: thoughtful
Tags: weird
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09:30 pm
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Yellow
Late this afternoon around 5:30 or so, Teri and I noticed the damnedest thing. The light outside was bright yellow, in a totally unnatural-seeming way. It was almost brassy.
Last night we had an astonishingly violent and noisy thunderstorm, so now we're wondering whether we'll have another tonight. We lost power that night, incidentally; Sebastian woke up and fussed a little about the noise, but wasn't too upset overall.
Current Location: Home
Tags: sebastian, weather, weird
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11:15 pm
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CDC Survey
Answered a 20-minute phone survey from the Center for Disease Control this afternoon. They surprised me when they asked how often we go to church. What does that have to do with disease prevention? I wonder if the Bush people have been tinkering with the CDC mission and politicizing the bureaucracy. Wouldn't surprise me.
Current Location: Home
Current Mood: thoughtful
Tags: weird
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11:15 pm
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BOMBS!
On the way home tonight, my train stopped at Walpole. Everyone was ordered to pick up their belongings and get off the train while the police searched it with dogs. It was cold as hell, so no one was pleased about that.
We stood around while police with dogs searched the train, went through the crowd, and inspected the undercarriage of the train. It was cold, cold, cold.
For quite a while no one told us anything, but finally a conductor told some of us that there had been ten bomb-like devices found in the area, and that possibly some threats had been phoned in. Five of the devices had turned out to be hoaxes, but they were still checking the rest. The whole goddamned thing seemed surreal. All the passengers (and there were a lot of us, it was a full train) gossiped and bitched about the situation. One guy near me didn't even have a decent coat on; he was freezing.
There was a TV crew and reporter down the platform. I noticed that the dog was a big brown one, very friendly-looking; its tail was wagging like mad. That kind of ruined the Gestapo feeling I'd been working up (as it happens, I'm reading The Great Escape right now). At one point the dog came right up to me, and I was momentarily imagining that the cops would think I had a bomb...but it kept going.
I called Teri, told her what was going on, and said I'd call her back once I knew more. After about fifteen minutes I called her back, and loudly said "Hi honey! They just started the strip searches, and..." which got a big laugh from the crowd. At that moment the police let us get back on the train. So all in all we spent about twenty minutes standing in the freezing cold.
Turns out that it was some sort of promotional thing for Aqua Teen Hunger Force, a show I sometimes watch. Turner Broadcasting, the company responsible for it, have apologized. But there's no email address on their contact page, and somehow I suspect that's a new development.
Current Mood: sleepy
Current Music: Howard Jones - Things Can Only Get Better
Tags: commute, weird
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09:24 am
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Access Denied
To my amazement, the journal of one - and only one! - person on my friends list is now being blocked by the censoring software that my company uses.
It's nakedfaery.
Weird, huh?
Wait, I just figured it out - I'll bet it's because of the "naked". Argh...that's so stupid!
I hate nannyware.
Current Mood: exasperated
Tags: weird
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11:17 pm
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Offal?
Offal. I had lunch today at a place that had "Plate of Offal" on the menu.
Really. And it wasn't a joke.
It was a company lunch at "Eastern Standard" in Kenmore Square. Very fancy, somewhat expensive. And they had offal on the menu.
I had to ask.
"It's made from the parts of the animals that people don't normally use," said the waiter, "like brains."
I considered ordering the meatloaf, but it seemed to me that "meat" in that context could include offal. So I stuck with the pasta.
Current Mood: tired
Tags: food, weird, work
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12:15 pm
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Strange Dream: Homer Simpson
Damn, my dreams can get strange. Particularly lately. This morning I dreamed that Homer Simpson was knocked up into the air, ending up stuck behind the jet of a large jet plane. A creature something like the gremlin in the The Twilight Zone was dancing around on the roof of the plane, except that it didn't look anything like a gremlin; it was more like a flesh-colored blob with an evil cartoon face.
It kept turning up the fire from the jet and burning Homer to cinders. Finally it reversed the jet for a minute, sucking Homer in and grinding him into ashes. The ashes spewed out of the engine and down into the ocean, reforming into a tattered Homer on the way down. As he splashed down, he just missed hitting a huge ocean liner...but the plane didn't. It sliced through the ship, dividing it neatly in half. The halves rapidly proceeded to sink, along with the plane, creating a massive whirlpool. Passengers screamed in terror. As Homer was sucked into the funnel, sharks cruised in and ripped him apart.
Damn, my dreams can get strange.
Tags: dreams, tv, weird
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02:12 pm
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Explain, please
I want to know: why would someone cover a toilet seat with toilet paper, and then walk off and LEAVE the toilet paper there?
I mean, I understand why they'd put down the toilet paper, although there were perfectly good disposable seat covers available. But why, having presumably used the facility, would that person leave the toilet paper in place?
I mean, what were they thinking? Did they think that the next person to use that toilet would be delighted by an unexpected gift?
It would have taken less than half a second to sweep that paper into the toilet where it belonged. But they didn't bother.
I swear...sometimes I just don't understand people.
Current Mood: bewildered
Current Music: They Might Be Giants - John Lee Supertaster
Tags: rant, weird, work
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10:11 am
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Yuck
This is the creepiest article I have read in many years.
Men, you're not going to like this one. I'm still shuddering.
Tags: links, weird
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