I found Jesus

No, really, I did.

I was going over to Kroger's late last night for some milk, and he was sleeping in a dumpster next to the lot where they tore down the Burger King and are putting up a bank.

He asked me for a dollar.

I thought to myself, "What would Jesus do?"

Then realized, sadly, that this little self inquiry, which I have used as a sort of Zen parable to guide me all my life, would no longer function for me, because, clearly, the answer was "Sleep in a dumpster and panhandle for cheap Ripple."

It bummed me out.

No pun intended.

Okay. This morning... wait. Let me mention, one thing I've noticed, whenever I take a call at work, is that when people start out with 'okay' or 'well', it's always going to be a bad call. It's like they are nerving themselves up to plunge in with the badness. Start out with 'okay' or 'well', and it's never going to be a 'could you tell me a balance on the account' or 'can you give me your fax number'. Nooooooo. 'Okay' or 'Well' always presages 'I called three months ago because my check stub clearly states that $4,617.23 has been withdrawm from my 2005 pay for my dependent care account, but when I check my balance online it only shows $4,592.56. Now I have been calling on this for three months. This is my money. When are you people going to get this straightened out?'

Or something worse.

Anyway. This morning, we were more or less asleep at 7:15 or so when we heard big clunking footsteps on the floorboards over our heads. This was bad enough; Supergirlfriend has already written eloquently about how much we'd been enjoying having the rest of the house empty around our large apartment; someone moving in over our heads is something we've dreaded for a long time.

But then they plugged in the industrial strength sand blaster and went to work, apparently directly over our bedroom.

Then SuperAdorable Kid woke up.

Now, it's on like Donkey Kong.

So I hoisted my weary bones off the mattress, pulled on an old bathrobe, and with my hair disheveled, no doubt looking rather homicidal in general, I ambled upstairs and pounded on the door. THUD THUD THUD, went the side of my rather sleepy fist.

So the industrial strength sand blaster shut off and footsteps ambled over to the door, and the door opened, and there stood... our landlord, Mr. Happy.

That's not his name.

"Sorry, buddy," he said, smiling in his bluff, cheerful manner. "It won't happen often."

Now, Mr. Happy is this big fairly young (thirties) good looking former high school football jock who has stayed in shape. He and his brother (who co own and manage this building) are both very very Republican. He's always been very pleasant to me, but, you know, I'm a long haired bearded middle aged very liberal hippie/commie looking geek and I'm sure on some level I just totally freak him out. But he kind of freaks me out, too. I'm sure it's his perfect teeth, or something.

Now, I'm not going to try and do a dominance display on, you know, an obvious SS member who happens to own the building me and my family live in. But SuperGirlfriend, on the other hand, has known this guy, his brother, and his father since they were adolescents (that's the connection that led to us getting this apartment) and she don't play.

So I said, "Well, whatever, but you woke up the kids and you woke up SuperGirlfriend, and she was going to come up here but I told her I'd handle it."

I fancy his cheerful smile cracked, slightly, right at the edges, and the pupils of his eyes contracted slightly, but he just repeated, "Uh, well... sorry. I... I was over here at 6, and waited as long as I could but... it's got to get done."

So I went back downstairs and said "He's all yours, baby."

That was an hour and a half ago.

He just brought us donuts.

Perhaps I should spell it 'doughnuts'.

Anyway, you don't mess with SuperGirlfriend. Especially on the day we have to give the SuperKids back to their dad for two weeks. She's already traumatized enough.

See, this kind of ties in to that whole thing I mentioned in my last post. Our landlord is a Republican, and he's a businessman, which, in his mind, simply excuses him from common decency. Could he have come over and done this prep work during the week, when we'd all have been up and probably out of the house by 7:15, or least, awake? Sure. He's a landlord, he makes his own schedule, and, leaving aside the fact that we're paying a premium to live here, he's actually friends with one of us. To my mind, he not only could have, but, clearly, he should have.

But he's, you know, a member of the Power Party, and for them, it's never personal, it's always business. Business excuses everything. He has paying customers moving in tomorrow, he needs to get some work done, and all considerations of, well, consideration can be resolutely shoved to the side.

It's like Gandalf stated in my previous entry. If it's Big Business, you can lie, cheat and steal. You can shill a product you believe is worthless. Anything goes, because, you know, you're not being a thoughtless, selfish asshole. Instead, you're competitive and ambitious. You're Trying To Get Ahead.

Why, it's actually... Professional.

Republicans, of course, have little sympathy for an ivory tower critic. I myself have no idea what the fuck the phrase 'ivory tower critic' actually means, but I must admit, I find it delightful that, apparently, to Republicans, simply the two words 'ivory tower' seem to equate to some insult so abhorrent and obvious that it doesn't require explanation -- I mean, what's next? 'Yew tahlk lahk a college boy, yew owlhoot -- slap leather!'?

I guess I'll just have to remain an unprofessional ivy tower critic who doesn't 'get' that being an unpleasant, inconsiderate asshole is, in reality, all about being ambitious, competitive, and professional.

Or something.

Say, while I'm rambling, I have this comment from Kalinara that showed up in my mailbox but hasn't yet appeared on my blog. Which is weird, but, you know, life is like that sometimes. Anyway, in it she indicates that various things in the entry (it was 'Self gratification part 2') have crossed limits she didn't even know she had, and she probably won't be back.

Which makes me sad. But, still, I have to reflect that, if I've shown Kalinara limits she didn't even know she had, and then helped her push through those previously unexplored parameters, then I have become sort of her spiritual mentor, and taught her something that she will keep with her all her life.

Of course, I'm baffled as to what was in that entry that so pissed her off, since I was very very nice to her...

MAOTE: Dude, I told you that reference to Yu-Gi-Oh cards wasn't going to help.

ME: Yeah... okay... I didn't know they actually collected them... ::hanging head::


Much later post script: Gandalf dropped back in again and had a long blathering comment in this thread about how I'm an asshole and conservatives are fabulous and big business is tremendous and I don't know what the fuck all else because just skimming it was giving me a headache. It doesn't matter; Gandalf isn't welcome in my comment threads, so I deleted it.

However, I did want to note that he says he isn't 'Dave' and he also says he wasn't ever 'Elric' someone, so... whatever. Apparently the conservative idiot who doesn't write very well but who is obsessed with seeking out my work on the internet and writing lengthy tedious refutations of it that I posted in my previous entry isn't the same conservative idiot who doesn't write very well who is obsessed with seeking out my work etc etc. I don't know. But he says so, and now you know he says so.

I sure seem to be running into a lot of whiney idiots who are obsessed with my opinion lately, though.