Comic for Monday, July 31st, 2006

Posted: 7:28 am, Monday, July 31st

It's a girl, people. Geez. Everyone did too good of a job observing the shirt - I had this strip planned from the get because of my unfortunate tendency to always, always, always be under-dressed for the equation. Also, I notice that I reversed the image, no doubt because of the fact that I most often see it in the mirror. Meh.

So, 2.0 and I were Upstate this past weekend, hanging with my parents and then 2.0's friends from high school, on Willet Street, right around the corner from the Mobil station my dad owned back in the 70s and 80s. We've decided we quite like Albany, all of which blows my mind since I wanted nothing more than escape back in the day. Lark Street, though, is quite nice. Oh, yeah, it was kind of funny that my friend Reina wrote in on Friday, since I was hanging about four blocks from her house, I think. So, by "kind of funny," I mean, "I'm a tool for not giving her the heads-up." Well, the class reunion is in a few weeks, so we'll give it all another shot. Also, I wasn't much fun all weekend, because I had precisely zero use of my left leg. Why is this, you may ask. Well, the softball game I skipped the Hold Steady's free show for on Thursday night? Worst single softball game of my life. I don't know if I had vertigo or something, but my depth perception was nonexistant and I didn't get to a single damned ball out in left the entire game. Ran right under one, never broke back on another, thought one was going to drop about ten feet in front of me instead of three inches. Then, after flying out twice, I finally get a solid liner, and get on base. Next hitter advances me to second, then next hitter gets a seeing-eye single to short right. The third base coach tells me to take off for home, I bite for just a second before realizing the girl is holding the ball, and break late. I slide under the tag, but get called out anyway. The real pisser is that, because it's a public park, they cement home plate into the ground. Unfortunately, it's been raining a lot and it's kind of late in the season, so a lot of the batter's box has worn away. So I drive my left knee smack into a concrete block, and am left with a bruised, seeping, bloody knee all weekend. Yummy!

Oh, I got off-track. We had a good trip Upstate - a leisurely day around the Hilltowns was really kind of nice. We spent some time with the Altamont Enterprise, the local smalltown paper. Check out this letter to the editor, in full:

To the Editor:
Write a letter to The Enterpise - it pays. A short while back, I wrote a letter bemoaning the fact that they don't make watermelons with seeds anymore.
Some days later, my wife, Anne, and I were sitting in our living room, talking friends. The doorbell rang.
On the front steps stood our good friends, Lou and Susan Domonico, each carrying a huge watermelon. It seems that after many, many phone calls all over the area they found a place that sold honest watermelons with seeds.
Needless to say that thanks to The Enterprise and our good friends, my grandson and I had a spittin' good time.
Charles V., Altamont

Small-town America: fuck yeah!

I also read about this site in the Enterpise, a history project covering my tiny little town Upstate. Actually, it's the next town over from mine, and even then, my mailing address is the next town over from *that.* As a result, I have about eight places I tell people I'm from. It's confusing. And small. Regardless, I haven't gotten much of a chance to check that out yet, but I'm kind of looking forward to it.

Big week coming up here in Five Bucks World Headquarters - Sleater-Kinney's fare ye well to New York on Wednesday, and then the Reggie Ho Wedding Festivities commence on Thursday. I have no web preview of Reggie's wedding, but I do have this page of Sleater-Kinney rocky goodness for everyone. Hey, look, including some B-52s! Jack funny.

Today's nightmare comes with a heapin' helpin' o' anime.

bullfrog

Happy Birthday, MJ!

Jeez, dropped the ball on that one. Wasn't your fifth annyiversary about ten days ago, too, Mudge?

Now, the tab quote. So many possibilities, but I'm going to go with Jimmy Cerrano in 'Midnight Run.'

I'm wrong, aren't I.

Zero

i just moved upstate to albany a month ago to an apartment on state at willet. small world. working in marketing & headed back to grad school for a masters in business administration. sammy's transition from prospect park to washington park has been seamless.

Checking in... b-day today, and Fifth-a-versary on 7/21. Thanks to MNP for keeping Frog on task. The presence of a new infant keeps us from doing anything too wacky, but we did find a pub in Dayton that has a cider on tap and poors a good guinness. The brains, they were swimming.

I played hoops this morning, and was feeling nice and young. Spry. Fit. Then I think I tweaked something while lifting Ben into his car seat. Old. Decrepit. Ups and downs, I s'pose.

Walked down the hallway here at the office. Then turned around 180 in order to make another fivebucks post.

My anniversary is 7/20. Not 7/21 as above stated.

I'm pretty sure that JJ doesn't usually read.

Sheesh, take one half-Friday off and there's a mountain waiting for you Monday morning. I'm the lynchpin, I tells ya.

Zero - the tab quote is from Sleater-Kinney's One More Hour.. The whole line is don't say another word about the other girl, but I think I've used that and didn't want to do a total rerun. Lame, I know, but unless I'm actually listening to music as I'm writing the top line, I almost always blank on something for it. Why wasn't I listening to music? Because I was listening to Van Buren butcher the sixth. I figured a rerun would be better than a report on that carnage.

Dave - Jack funny. What a beautiful area it is right there on the park - when I was growing up, I don't remember it being that nice. (Of course, nothing in the 80s was all that nice.) I recommend the corn-beef brisket at Justin's for brunch - I cannot believe I didn't order it myself, I've lost the fast ball.

Ha! Nice one, MJ. I've never been able to remember your anniversary because of the switch in dates - it was originally going to be the 21st, right, but changed when you moved venues to Dayton?

it's not too bad. over all ALB has been a mixed bag. actually the slow pace is bothering me. so is commuting. it's a big adjustment from NYC. it's going to be at least a 2-year commitment for me to get ahead in regards to grad school. speaking of brunches, we've been having them over at my place since the move every sunday.

Yes, there was a switcheroo. And yes, your early-morning calls to the basilica were indeed a wasted effort. I do feel bad about that. Remember how early 9:00 a.m. used to be on a non-football Saturday morning?

No worries, MJ. Sesame Street kept me entertained until that bullshit Elmo's World nonsense came on the last twenty minutes.

I kept trying to tell 2.0 that while we could get a bigger apartment for less money in Albany, our commute costs would go through the roof since we'd actually use the car for more than driving from one side of the street to the others to avoid tickets. The MTA, she's spoiled me.

that's been a plus; going from a 1-bed in windsor terrace for $1600 to a 2-bed, 10th floor apt with city & park views for exactly half of that (and no extra charge for the bulldog! - when we started looking for apartments in the capital, we've been told either no, or we'd have to pay a $500 non-refundable deposit for having a dog). you're paid less here, but strangly enough, i have more money in my pocket and the cost of living is a lot cheaper. if you have one car for the both of you, you can get by with about $100 a month on gas, that's with driving everyday 30-50 miles a day with a good, non-SUV car.