One For The Road

The mantra these days is "You're lucky to have a job", and so I am, even though it requires a daily commute of roughly 70 miles and about two hours to maintain marginally gainful employment.

It's a long, dull drive, and to pass the time I'll try anything to amuse myself. It's hasn't been easy, especially since the radio broke, so there's no telling where the small, sad portion of my brain that still tries to function will wander. And sometimes, it gets help from the wrong places.

Why just today, my darling offers up, by way of apology I think, this tidbit to ruminate upon: "I'm sorry to be such a dry ball".

I'm getting into the car to go to work, and I'm served THAT. In 53 years, I have never heard that expression. Silently, I struggle to put it into some frame of reference. The first thing I come up with is: Dry ball= vasectomy, a ball bereft of sperm? So I reply, "Some might consider a dry ball the best of all possible worlds". He laughs, sort of, and I drive away, wondering what the hell he meant. About a mile down the road, a distant memory tugs at the very back of my brain. Wait, could that refer to the sex act? Ew, gross. And what did he make of my reply? Some kind of witty quip about how nice it is not to chafe? And this is why men and women can not communicate. Christ.

Ten miles later, I pass a billboard with a colossally lame anti-drug campaign on it. "TADA"...Teens Against Drug Addiction or some crap like that. I can do better than that, just give me a mile or so. Yes..."FAGOTS"...Friends Against Giving Our Teens Substances. I know, to be linguisticly correct it needs another "g", but hell, cut me some slack. I'm trying to drive.

Oh god, what's the special "shake of the month" flavor at the drive in? Licorice? Yeah, that one's gonna sell. If the shake is 80 proof.

Oh look, the price of gas is up twenty cents a gallon from when I drove home last night. Goddamn, I KNEW I should have filled up yesterday! Fucking Free Market Economy!

Holy Shit, it's someone trying to cross the street in that stupid crosswalk, with the signs and curbs and posts and big white lines that clutter the landscape so much you can hardly see anyone trying to cross. Smart people jay-walk, if they know what's good for them.

Now it's clear sailing, except for the closed bridge, the flaggers, and the entitled jerks that have the god given right to constantly cut in front of you then slow down if you leave more than half a car length between you and the car ahead.

Only twenty more miles to whip myself up into a full blown Cranky Codger Frenzy before I get to work. Good god, I've finally gotten on my own nerves to a point where I want to wrap myself in newspaper and leave me in a back alley dumpster. How long, oh lord, how long?