Wow. He amazes me.

My Uncle has wanted to get his ten-speed bike out of the garage and fix it up for a long time. It got buried with things that other people put on top of it... It's in there, I saw it. It's going to take forever to get it out of there. It will happen though.

Picture "Sanford and Son's" salvage yard crammed into a 20 x 15 foot area. Not good.

The house is clean. None of the messy stuff was his fault. I can tell what is his doing. Everything is precise.

We've been talking for weeks on the phone and in person... I bought him a bicycle. The exact one he wanted. It's always sold out, you can't even find it on the net. "Not Available". I found it last week.

<----->

You can beat me up later, I'll let you. I just bought the bike you wanted.

(I want it myself! I like it better than mine. It's kind of heavy though.)

<----->

Are you sure? You can't see. I'll find you a bike. If I find out you're trying to ride the damned motorcycle it will disappear. You can fix it up, rev up the engine and take it down the block, maybe. I'll put it in a storage facility where you can't find it, but you can visit it as often as you want. I won't steal it from you, I just don't want you riding the damned thing.

<----->

I can ride a bike Bryan, you don't forget how... look at the sidewalks here, I'd be safer on a bike than walking. Once everybody leaves for the day to work, camp or school, nobody is here.

He's right. Nobody is there at certain times of day. Safe for him to ride a bicycle provided he can stay upright.

So I got him a new bicycle. The stupid man and the blind man assembling a bike...

<----->

He found the coffee can full of allen wrenches in the garage. Oh! Here they are!

I'm tossing wrenches onto the porch by my knee... Dude, there are like twelve of these and they're all the same!

<----->

We finally got the bicycle assembled. He wheeled it into the driveway and hopped on it.

Hmmmmmm. I have to adjust some things. It's pretty good though.

<----->

I'm sorry I didn't get a picture. I was too worried about him cracking his head open though.

He hopped on the bike and rode it across the lawn. He was a little off balance but he did it. Twice. He was better the second time.

<----->

Please, please, please! That was amazing, but do practice runs while somebody is here with you, please. I love you, I don't want you killing yourself on it.

<----->

He really can't see. I've watched him. Carefully. He isn't faking it.

<----->

I ended up missing the 9:56 bus home even though I was way early and it should have come by 10:10. I know where to park myself to catch these buses... The next bus doesn't come until after 12 am. It was starting to thunder and there was what looked like heat lightning, drops coming down...

Flip. Press, press, press. Can I come back and stay? "Yup, you can stay. Come on back."

<----->

Boom! Crack! Boom!

See! I would have ridden my bike home, fuck the bus, but in that?

<----->

He tried to feed me this morning.

I took the bus straight to work.

"Like my outfit?"

Didn't you have that on yesterday?

"Yup."

Shuffle Songs.

My iPod has 12,074 songs on it. No, that's not a typo. 12,074. I like most of what's in it, so I just leave it on "shuffle" most of the time. The other day it went from Metallica to John Denver to Cher, Soft Cell, Pink Floyd, Patsy Cline, Van Halen... I never know what it's going to play next.

The road is long
With many a winding turn
That leads us to who knows where
Who knows when
But I'm strong
Strong enough to carry him
He ain't heavy, he's my brother.

So on we go
His welfare is of my concern
No burden is he to bear
We'll get there
For I know
He would not encumber me

If I'm laden at all
I'm laden with sadness
That everyone's heart
Isn't filled with the gladness
Of love for one another.

It's a long, long road
From which there is no return
While we're on the way to there
Why not share
And the load
Doesn't weigh me down at all
He ain't heavy, he's my brother.

He's my brother
He ain't heavy, he's my brother.

(The Hollies version of He Ain't Heavy)

I was sitting in the park I recently found when it came on... near the sculpture that resembles my Mom and the others so very much. I burst into tears. Nice. Real nice. Fucking iPod. I was ready to chuck it into the river.

<----->

I remember this. It was just after we got back from a giant family vacation to Williamsburg, VA. There were seventeen of us. I was nine...

My Uncle was fourteen when he got diabeaties. Even the people at the hospital thought he was going to die...

He passed out and got rushed to the hospital.

My one Uncle picked him up and carried him to the car. He was sixteen I think.

<----->

My Grandmother kind of yelled at him...

You can't carry him!

He ain't heavy. He's my Brother.

More stuff.

These live in my Uncle's yard as well. They're very pretty, no? I took those the other day. I thought he was in the house sleeping... one of my sane relatives stole him away... at least he was relatively safe... Ha Ha. Relatively safe. Too funny.

He might have been hiding from me as well. I dunno. He seems to enjoy my company... but he's also very polite and kind, it's not like he's just going to tell me to fuck off.

Since he didn't answer the phone I sat on his porch and cut up the boxes that were by the garage so the recycling people would take them away.

I was disappointed that I didn't get to see him, but I got some sun and exercise.

After I got home it was still early so I rode my bike to the park near my house. I didn't even know it was there until recently. Everyone I've run into there is behaving themselves too. What a novelty.

This doggie just wanted to play.

I have a sunburn today, It's very odd. It's swollen. Apparently yellow ink attracts more UV rays or something, the only part that's been affected is the yellow part. (the moon) The black bits and the blue bit are normal. Very odd. It's usually covered though and I rarely go out in the sunlight to begin with... It's a vampire bat. (In case you haven't been paying attention, that's not a new one... I've had it since I was 18.)




















Anyway... there's this large bronze sculpture in the park. I cried when I saw it. I didn't even have to count the figures. I went back and looked at it today.

There's one for each of them... as they were and still are.

That's my family. All the Aunts and Uncles. (The Wicked Stepsisters are not pictured.)


This is my Uncle. It looks almost like he did at that age.





















You'd have to see the actual sculpture. The sun went in and out... some of my pictures make it look positively grotesque. Hmmmm. It was meant to look that way I think. They look like happy children... but if the light changes, or if you look at a different angle they look tortured.

Yes, that's my bike tire. Ooops. That big black thing? That's salvaged history, it's a ship mooring thing-a-ma-jig.

Since I was out and about I went to the cemetary. Yes, the cemetary. It's right by the park. I've always liked it there, it's peaceful. When I was a kid somebody dared me to sleep there overnight. Did I? Sure I did. I couldn't prove it though, my friends got bored and left.

What was there to be scared of? None of the people buried there would have risen up and caused me harm... if their spirits were still hanging around there they would have protected me, and still would I'm sure.

I visit now and then. I'm always careful not to step on anybody and if I do I apologize. Sometimes I see something I want to look at and I end up stepping on someone. It's a very old cemetary. The records don't go back far enough... there might be Revolutionary War casualties in there.

While I was walking around I really needed to sit down and have some water, it was terribly hot. I sat on a man named William. Sorry Sir, I need to sit, I hope you don't mind...


I doubt any spirit/entity/person that might still be hanging around there would mind me visiting. It makes me feel peaceful, and I'm sure they don't get too many nice visitors.

A nice day.

(This post got eaten by the computer demons. It was almost perfect, I worked on it for days/hours... then it went away. I don't think I'm up to fixing it and putting it the way it was... I'll try. *puts music on shuffle* Nobody reads this crap anyway. I like it that way. Whatever.)

My pictures get bigger if you want to click on them.

These live in my Uncle's yard. I'm not sure who planted them. The cat who sort of adopted him... sort of lives behind these.



It's a very sweet cat. That's my Sister's backside you see there.


Here's more pics of his yard. I told him it's wonderful and that people would pay thousands of dollars to get theirs to be that way.

It isn't overgrown... it's natural. There isn't any real grass. It's all very lovely ground cover plants... nobody planted them there. It doesn't even need mowing.




















These appear here and there. I have no idea what they are. Somebody I work with has them in her yard. She hates them, they run rampant in her yard.

This next pic was a bare patch of dirt when I was a kid. My Uncles and all their friends used to play basketball there. Look at it now.




















I have no idea what kind of moss it is. Small pretty starburst things. That's a buttercup in there, they're all over too, just randomly. No idea what the leafy plant is either.


Here's my artsy pictures of the basketball hoop.

This will never fall down. I remember it going up. Full size regulation. Steel poles sunken in concrete. It took days and days to figure out exactly how to do it properly.




*sigh* I want to get him a basketball. He can't really see the hoop... but if he walked around the yard... he'd know the right spot just by the way the ground felt.

*swoosh* Score!

The trees would need a trim though.

Here are some diner pix. He likes to go to this place... I do too. Great food and plenty of leftovers.

The beer is mine.







I think I may have a new photo obsession. Food. That's my rice pudding there. It looked gross. It was delicious though.

Aaaaaahhhhhh!!!!!!

I was sitting here talking on the phone with my Uncle last night/this morning (it was 2 am or something) and here comes the cat... it jumps up on the bed and grins at me, as if to say, Look what I got for you! (I know I'm not crazy, cats do grin, if you have one you know what I mean.)

<----->

I gotta put the phone down, the cat finally caught that freaking mouse he's been after.

Uh, ok. I'll wait.

Aaaaaahhhhhh!!!!!! Aaaaaahhhhhh!!!!!!

<----->

It was still alive and running around the bed, I had to catch the darned thing myself before the cat got to it again. I think Death By Flushing is more merciful than what the cat would have done to it.

Mice don't freak me out. I've had pet mice, I even kept a plain old regular mouse as a pet... What's kind of freaking me out is the odd blurry image in that picture. (No not me you asshole.) What the hell is it?

It's nothing that exists in that room. It's not dirt on the mirror or anything on the camera lens.

What the heck is wrong with me? I put down the one phone, grabbed tissues and snatched the mouse up by it's tail... and I grabbed my cell and took a picture. I don't imagine that's exactly normal behavior.

Hmmmm. Normal behavior. I was never normal to begin with. Here's a picture of my feet while sitting in the bathtub. Nope, I'm not exactly normal.

<----->

My Sister is taking me to see my Uncle today, I'm taking him out for dinner. Hopefully there won't be any suprises like last week when the Wicked Stepsisters suddenly appeared.

<----->

Holy Shit. I just counted the time in my head... then I had to write it down just to be sure... We were on the phone for about eight hours last night.

Road Trip! (circa 1981)

I found these the other day... I got to visit Washington D.C. once upon a time, many eons ago. It rained the whole time. We didn't even get off the bus. Didn't get to see anything really.
We just rode around in circles for hours in that damned bus. In the rain. It started to stink in there.

I'm not pictured... the blonde kid is Timmy... the one with his finger up his nose is Fat Matt. No idea who the others are.

Twelve hours on a smelly bus in the rain. What fun.

Here's a cartoon. If it's too small click on it, it gets bigger.

My new bike!

I haven't ridden a bike in ages. 8 years I think. I'm so darned sore.

I have a bike in my Dad's shed, I asked him to extract it from there 5 years ago. That never happened. It probably needs all new parts anyway... so I got myself a new one.

You really can't find a normal bike anymore, they have insane spring shocks all over the bike, and none of the gear shift levers make any sense at all. This one is kind of normal.

I had to take it on the bus to get it home. (I now know how the bike racks on the front of our city buses work, a very nice bus driver showed me. I've had it on and off the bus a few times) Since I was on the bus anyway I went to visit my Uncle... long ride. (I swear, I rode about 20 miles on city buses Monday, not kidding)

I called him from his front porch, no answer... so I tried the door... and the cat attacked me! Shhhhh!!! Quiet Oreo! He's sleeping! (This is the fattest and meanest cat I have ever had the pleasure to meet)... so I snuck out quietly, looked at my bus schedule hopped on the bike and headed off.

I get to the next place I know a bus will stop, in front of a church, plop myself on the grass and look at my cell for the time... New Message. Press, press, press. "Hi, just calling you back.".... Press, press, press....

"I'm at the bus stop. I was just in your house! Oreo attacked me! She knew I didn't belong there." Did she bite you? "No, I have my skateboarder sneaks and my jeans on, she'd have a hard time getting thru those." I thought I heard you come in but I was asleep and then I played the machine so I wasn't sure If I was dreaming or what.

Had to hang up, you can't easily attach your bike to a bus and talk on the cell. Arcturus called soon after I got home and was done dragging the bike into my kitchen. It's always nice to talk to Arc.

This bike has gotten quite a work out in the past few days. So have I. The seat pops off easily so I brought that in after I locked it up outside of work this morning. Wanna take a seat? lol

Ok, that's enough wordage.

I do love him very much. If I could only just screw him back together so all his parts worked..

Hey! Where's the check? Who paid this time?

Check? Did you see a check?

I didn't see one, did you?

No, I didn't see one. That's just crazy talk.

<----->

He knew it was me again. I had it all planned out... the owner had my credit card, the bill was never supposed to appear.

It didn't, but near the end of the meal the waitress mentioned that the owner had to ask me something. How stupid is that? She could have just stood behind my Uncle and motioned at me. The plan was that I'd wander off to the bathroom and sign the slip on the way.

He knew what was up immediately. He's blind not deaf and he isn't stupid.

<----->

Bryan! Did you pay again? Can't I pay?

I didn't see a bill, did you see one ****?

No! There Wasn't One!

Come on guys, I feel bad. Who paid?

Dude, you're not paying!

<----->

She wasn't very subtle was she? She spoiled my whole evil plan. He is not buying us dinner. We take him out to dinner it's on my tab.

**note** The portions are rather large, but the pics make all the food look grotesque. Each meal can easily feed two people (we always take the leftovers home), that's why he likes to go there, his meal can turn into two or three. He has leftovers, I now have a yummy lunch and my Sister does too!



The beer is mine. He's eating rainbow sherbert for dessert... we had rice pudding. I should have taken a picture of that, I bet that would look really gross.

He's not really supposed to have that, there's way too much sugar. He knows how to balance what he eats though.

<----->

I forgot to tip the waitress. It usually gets added to the bill, but that's only if you want to give a tip. It's not automatic. I had my Stster stop before she dropped me off at home to say thank you, whoops! sorry, I forgot... but her shift was over.

I don't know how the staff splits the tips there, do they split them? Next time she get's double, slipped to her discreetly, in cash. That way she gets to keep it for herself. She is rather nice and quite attentive.

<----->

Next mission: Go look through all my DVDs and find the two he want's to see. I know I have them, finding them is the problem. Hell, I'll buy new ones if I have to.

He'd like to see the new Spiderman movie too. That'll have to wait unill the Spiderman furor dies down though. I gotta take him to that. He can actually see it if it's on a screen that size.