(Why) Do I Want This job?

Well, I probably want this job because I have this lingering fear for future financial security pounded into me by the many corporate powers successfully to infiltrating and influencing the cultures I subscribe to. In my heart, I know I want to just get stoned, walk up and down the beach, collect materials from the land and build a self sustaining house, or battle bad guys in a post apocalyptic wasteland. That, however seems like it belongs more in a post titled (Why) Do I Want A Job? rather than one titled (Why) Do I Want This Job? I suppose I want this job, in particular, for a few different reasons. None of said reasons are bullshit, might I add.

At first, I didn't want to write so much because I thought "What employer wants to spend the time reading such a drawn application?" Then I answered my own question: "A good one."
[insert your company name here]                            is a company I have respected even since back when I lived in the basement apartment under a head shop in the Daytona Beach, while I struggled to find a balance between idealism and reality, while I was learning the best tools for sustaining creativity are awareness and response. That is important to me above pay, benefits or any other perks you may have to offer.
After I had enough experience to answer "What kind of work do I find the right gratification in?" I learned a more important question is "Who do I really want to work for?" After realizing the importance of that question, it seemed I was the only person I wanted to work for. I have started my own small business dealing in media production. I wanted to help artists produce their art and expand their audience all the while providing the collective audience with relative resources to question aspects of their lives they may not otherwise examine. I still do, but now I know how difficult it is do alone. If I do not get this job, I believe my skill set and knowledge will, when coupled with hard work and endurance, be enough to continue to bring this vision to life. However, to become part of the team at [insert your company name here]                           means that I can not only do what I love to do, but I can also forgo continuing to struggle to launch and develop a small business by joining forces with someone well established who's work I hold with high esteem.

Deadlines are a beautiful thing, even when they're subject to change. That may read sarcastically, but it was written with sincerity. I love riding roller-coasters; I almost get the same thrill from pulling creative strings with intelligent design to pull a project together. Guiding a team to success is something I am very comfortable with. Not only do I get to do that working for [insert your company name here]                           , but its a requirement.

All the while I get to have some space to manage my time and juggle my tasks in my own effective way. There's a lot to do and a lot to keep an eye on. I can cover it. In fact, it will give me the means to focus on something, or many things, which is exactly what I need. I am ready and able to do what's go to be done to bring the work of [insert your company name here]                           to the people who deserve it.

Editing writing and video are passions of mine. It turns me on. I'll stay up all night editing, and when the morning comes, I'll feel like a new man. I also love traveling, and being level with the locals in strange places. I love remaining calm and defusing tense situations with dangerous potential. I love an audience. I love being subtle yet firm when appropriate, as well knowing when to remain passive and finally knowing when to shut the fuck up and just do it. Working with [insert your company name here]                           gives me the opportunity to utilize these aspects of my experience and personality.

These and other things and other things went through my head as I constructed the second page of my resume. As far as I'm concerned, it's the first time I've ever made an honest resume, because it's geared towards doing something I really enjoy doing for a company I want to do it with.

By the time you've read this, I've already sent this off to several choice digital media production companies, each with their own unique cover letter. 

Unfortunately, you are not always necessarily your choice's choice. While I am somewhat impressed and proud of my experience and resume, competition is fierce. I will be surprised if I hear any response from any companies.  Since most companies won't even send you a templated email to let you know you've been rejected, let alone a personal message with reason, I will stay in some limbo of curiosity, wondering if human eyes other than my own have even read my resume.

Fuck it dude, let's go bowling.

I call bullshit

You work
during the days
to determine how you will
spend your nights

awake and working
sad and lonely
worried and thinking
sleeping peacefully; resting

you work
during the nights
to determine how you will
spend your days

asleep and hungover
securing the future
lounging in paradise
jailed; living death

will you die alone?

How to Drive a Motorcycle

 Pop a tire? Find a patch.
Squeaky breaks? Careful with that gas.
Take a spill? Get back upright and hold on tight.
Won't start? Check your shit, wet your hands with spit, try it again.

The road is open, long and narrow. The wind is in your hair, and the motor is screaming. The wind grows stronger and your ass eats the sea. Someone pulls in front of you and hits the breaks. Lay off your throttle, squeeze the clutch and kick it down a gear with your heavy boot. Take a quick glance and see where there are now cars. Now lay off the clutch and PUNCH that throttle hard. Grip the pavement with your back wheel into the left lane. Look to your right and smile big as you flip the folks in the car that cut you off. Your ass is hungry for more seat, and as the wind blows harder it makes a sound like a mating call for your hair. As your engine screams into high RPMs, shift back up a gear. As you watch the car that pulled in front of you grow smaller in your mirror, be open to anything the road may have in store for you.

"I think its time for you to leave."

I am a mess. The only thing in this life I seem to take responsibility for are the words that fall out of my head, and sometimes even that is a stretch.That's not really true; when I do the crime, I pay the time. Unfortunately, I see crimes to be as much of a load of subjective flim-flam as I find sins. If I don't believe any god has the will or reason to denote me as a sinner, I certainly don't believe generations worth of words and decisions of "powerful" men in control of state forces have any ability to call me a criminal beyond there their own judgmental label. No god nor court will truly judge me.
Yes, we must note it is however, true that when they find it appropriate, they may kidnap me, you, or anyone else they deem advantageous to their control over the general populations. After keeping us in cages, we will be brought into a well-furnished room and the basis of what they call their "judgement" will be a mockery of every human right they ever told us we had. In reality though, the only rights we really have are the ones we decide to have. When someone violates a right you know yourself to have, have they committed a crime? Do you judge and punish them, as the state does you? Do you rely on the state to judge and punish them? How do you judge and punish the state when they violate your rights?
Without thinking about answering any of those questions, and bringing my rant to an end, I'm going to review the high points in the most recent extent of life I have encountered, having not recently been hit by a bus on a motorcycle, shot in the head (well, that did almost happen), or otherwise had my lease in this body terminated in this dementia-- I mean dimension.
First, I graced the Magic Kingdom in Walt Disney World Facilities, Orlando with my presence. Not just my mental presence either, I was physically there. Families and couples from all over the world have the proof of my even have proof of my fourteen hour occupation fun filled facilities they have there in the form of delightful photobombs. My face now travels the globes in the bags and pockets of tourists of all shapes and sizes.
I traveled with my family, and inside the facilities we found much enjoyment. Some rides were pleasant, others were exciting. The ice cream and emu legs were delicious. My only complaint is my family and I intermittently hunted for alcohol for over three hours before we were informed with a smile that the entire Magic Kingdom block of the Disney Facilities is "dry." I can assure you, during my future occupation of Walt Disney World Facilities, I will be spending more time in the "wet" facility block known as the Experimental Prototype Community of Tomorrow, or EPCOT.
After returning to the scumhell city that is Daytona Beach, with virtually no Federal Reserve Notes to my name, I spent a day drinking on the beach with my family, and enjoyed sushi at night, by way of their hospitality. I went out to see my friend's reggae show in the Seabreeze district, and used a little of my remaining Federal Reserve Notes to knock back a few beers. Being a little buzzed after the show, I visited my friends at the coffee shop. A man was there with acid and beer. I had a few beers with him, and he gave me some acid for later. I took it, and had a strange evening, spending a couple hours in a transcendental meditation.
"Meditation not medication!" I've heard many people say that in many different tones, and I always think to myself after I hear it: "A little bit of everything in moderation." The next day, after that weird shit they called acid began to wore off, but still awake and feeling a little awkward in my skin, I grabbed a four pack of Yuengling tallboys and a couple of fellow dirty crazies like myself came to Daytona from Deland to visit the studio. One wanted to discuss a business initiative he would like to share with me, and the other wanted very much to get drunk. We resolved both matters before I was persuaded to come back to Deland to feast and drink at night and shoot guns the next day. It sounded like the recipe for just the type of weekend I wanted in my mental recovery from visiting the Walt Disney World Facilities.
We fulfilled reservations for a large group and at the hospitality of my friends, on the condition they chose what I ordered, I enjoyed a dinner of fried liver and onions in a Turkish or Hungarian or some ethnic eating parlor of the likes. While this all may not seem very exciting, after dining we went downtown. Coincidentally, a musical festival was going. Some of my musician friends were producing music for crowds on several stages there, so I broke from the pack and headed to catch of their shows. I hungout with my buddy and the rest of the group caught up to me before long, and the night whittled away into a lull of good music and good people having a good time, all the until after closing time. While we were leaving the bar, a man came from the street, yelling at one of the bar staff members about a bartender who he claimed had stolen twenty of his Federal Reserve Notes. The two yabbered back and forth at each other, until right after the angry man put his hand on the staff member's shoulder. POW! The staff member punched that motherfucker right in the head and the angry man's body jerked out straight, and he fell straight backwards from the impact of the punch with the stiffness of a board. Unconscious, the man was unable to make any effort to catch his backward fall and hit his head made a nice sound on the pavement. The staff member dragged the man to the street and climbed on top of him. Meanwhile, people were yelling that the angry man's female company had just also been knocked out cold about one hundred feet away. The scene of chaos was an interesting environment. I knelt down next to the staff member to get a close view of anything he might do the man, and some people said they saw him continue to beat the man he was on top of, but I saw no such thing. Eventually, the man awoke, and the staff member climbed off of him. The woman he was with also regained her composure and was able to stand and the two of them made their way to their car, which was parked in a gated lot. Everyone cooled down, and seemed to disperse until the angry man made one last comment before getting into his car. In an instant, the staff member was yelling again, and he had a crowd of people behind him, looking like they were all ready to kick the angry man's ass, and the angry man bowed his chest and Mexican gang members came out of nowhere baring switchblade knives. Buzzed and interested, I went towards the conflict to observe what might happen. Small fights broke out, and while it seemed nobody was looking, the angry man and his woman tried to slip into their car so they could haul ass out of the situation. Others saw this happen, as well, because before the car doors could be shut, there was a small mob of people prying the doors back open, grabbing inside, trying to pull the angry man back out. Suddenly, one of the Mexican gangsters brandished a large pistol. Looking frantic and confused, he pointed his weapon at anything that moved while everyone scrambled to disappear. Even the other Mexican gansters all took off, one dropping a switch blade which is now in the possession of my friend's girlfriend. I stood there watching, until the gun found its way to be pointing at my head from about six yards away. I decided then that if it would be in my best interest to clear that area with the others. I showed the gunman a peace sign with my hand and ran out of the parking lot. The gunman jumped into the car with the angry man and his female company, while the staff member shut and locked the chain-linked parking lot gate. The angry man backed up until he had just enough room to gain speed, then proceeded to ram the locked gate with his car and running over a man who had been standing in one spot for some time like a deer in headlights. We stood around, smoking cigarettes and watching the aftermath of the even for about fifteen minutes before it was finally time to leave. The man who was hit by the escaping car was eventually met by an ambulance and likely fine, and although a little blood was shed, no lives were lost during the event, and it must be mentioned the music festival was great. My only complaint is while I was running in the opposite direction of the gunman, I had a pack of cigarettes in my breast pocket which was lost. By the time I realized this, I was already somewhere else drinking a beer. Nonetheless, I went back to the crime scene to scan the ground to see if my weed remained in the pack of cigarettes unscathed. While I found several packs of cigarettes, I did not find mine. I did, however, find the audacity to ask the staff member if had seen a pack of  blue American Spirit cigarettes lying around. Why would my pack be the only one missing?
"Oh, you mean the pack with the weed in it. Yeah, the cops have it as evidence in case the driver threw it out the window. I'll let them know it was yours."
"No, actually that wasn't the pack I was talking about, mine had cigarettes in it, but thank you." I left the area quickly.
The next day was spent shooting targets with a .50 caliber rifle on a bipod, walking around with a 12 gauge pistol grip pump action shotgun practicing my close-range home defense protocols, and practicing my longer distance aim with a semiautomatic SKS and .40 cal pistol. I'm sharing that in case I ever have a daughter's boyfriend who happens to stumble across this nice little blog.
By the next day, I had completely run of Federal Reserve Notes, but my tax refund came in. I went to the bank, and told them to give me the paper Federal Reserve Notes which my account specifies I should be able to receive. They did so, which is nice. What would happen if a bank ever said "No, we cannot or will not give you the paper Federal Reserve Notes your account specifies you should be able to receive from us." I think a public disturbance would ensue, which is amusing, since the Federal Reserve Bank often takes buying power away from the Federal Reserve Notes while they are either specified as yours in your account or in your property as paper. There is little difference between denying you access to a volume of your Federal Reserve Notes in the first place when compared with the reality now when the value of your Federal Reserve Notes are decreased in your possession. Yet there is no public disturbance while this theft occurs, and people say, "the economy is not so good," and "the market is down." I'm sure humor can be found in there somewhere, instead of disillusion.
I had a good meal, then got some pot and smoked it. Stoned, I went to my buddy's coffee shop. They were drinking wine, and making music on a keyboard-synthesizer and singing into the microphones. I was intrigued, and offered a coffee cup of wine, which I gladly accepted. I gave the shop proprietor ten Federal Reserve Notes which I had borrowed from him when I was ten dollars short for picking up new tires for my motorcycle. We smoked more weed. I a little xanax. We continued to drink wine. We smoked more weed. I took a little more xanax, and this cycle continued into the early morning. It wasn't long before my inhibitions were down, my speech was slurred, and I was operating on a very impulsive level. I remember talking to an older woman from a band, looking at her, and asking bluntly, "hey, do you wanna make out?" There was silence for a moment. "Yes." I remember caressing her. I remember talking to a writer about recording music behind her spoken word monologues she composes. My next memory comes from the bathroom of the establishment. The door opened and the proprietor looked in and said "Oh my god. I brought you pizza."
My pants were around my knees, and I was clinging onto the hips of a pantless woman, bent over with her shirt and bra cups scrunched up around her neck and her tits hanging out. It was the crazed out singer/songwriter I mentioned in my entry back in February of this year titled "Music & Cough Syrup." Before the shop proprietor turned around, a spray came from between the legs of the bent over woman. "What the- you just squirted all over me!" She looked over her shoulder at me, straightening out reaching for her pants. "I've never done that!" she said. The shop proprietor shook his head and turned around letting the door close. It was just a moment before my pants were on and I not long behind him. "Here's your pizza," he said, handing both the woman and me a delicious slice of pizza served on a paper plate. I scarfed mine down like a monster. He then produced ten Federal Reserve Notes and said, "take this." I looked at him smiling, not realizing it was the same ten Federal Reserve Notes I had given him earlier. Smiling, since someone was handing me Federal Reserve Notes to put in my pocket. I asked him what it was for, and he said, "You're out of cigarettes, and you gave the writer ten dollars because she said she's coming back. Its been a couple hours, she might not come back," and then he paused for a moment before adding: "and I think its time for you to leave."
"You want me to leave?" I asked him.
"Yes, I need you to go. I will get your ten dollars (that's what he calls Federal Reserve Notes.) back from the writer, you don't have to pay me back. Just go. "
I agreed with him, I had not meant to stay that long, but yet the shop proprietor had never asked me to leave before. I have seen many people get completely fucked up out of there mind doing very fucked up things in that place, including cutting themselves or painting their own feces on the walls (that was the singer/songwriter, actually.), and never have I seen anyone be told they need to leave. I wondered why me, why now. I know the shop proprietor has some kind of weird, special feelings for the woman, wanting to be a fatherly lover to her. He often wears a hat she gave him which reads "World's Greatest Dad." I have witnessed her on a four day, sleepless cough syrup binge, fucking someone on a couch by the stage in the shop, only to immediately go fuck the proprietor in another room while she was still wet from the first dick, just to go climb back on the first dick when the proprietor was out of steam. I silently questioned to myself why this would be different, but decided it didn't matter and left the shop.
My next memory comes from back in my studio, chain smoking cigarettes, drinking beer I bought earlier that day, reading a transcript of a conversation between the shop proprietor and the woman with the fiance with whom I have an intimate relationship. She had sent the transcript to me, the heading stating: I want you to read this.
The conversation included the shop proprietor telling her I was talking about oral sex with the singer/songwriter, and when my lady friend asked why that was any of her business, the proprietor said its OK to talk about oral sex, and he said he needed to come talk to her about it. When she said she was not going to talk about oral sex with him, he went to the pizza shop where she works (hence him giving us pizza). After he returned he told her we ate our pizza after we came out of the bathroom, invoking my name and only implying but not saying I was having bizarre, fucked up sex with the singer/songwriter, he had been trying again to get an emotional rise out of my lady friend and make her feel vulnerable. She again informed him it was none of her business what I was doing, and told him what he was doing was intentionally mean and making her uncomfortable. He tried to carry on the conversation, crafting the following messages to make he himself look vulnerable and confused, with sexually devious intent. She ended the conversation with him and then sent it to me, telling me to have a look, and telling me after I had read it that she knows I have a love for weird experiences, but this would not do. I agreed with her and told her I'd take care of it. I called the shop proprietor and told him that what he did was unacceptable and unfriendly. I then told him I would not be spending any more time with him inside or outside of his shop, and our friendship was over. "We'll see how you feel about that when you're sober," he said. My feelings have not changed with any of the various levels of sobriety I have encountered since that morning. I do not take kindly to anyone targeting my special lady with any kind of malicious intent.
That is how I will conclude this recollection of my last five day bender. I have renewed my application for Federal Student Aid, and I will be considering resuming my acquisition of a Bachelor's degree. I have a bright feeling about the future. Hopefully it will be well executed.  Until then, live long, prosper, and don't do anything I wouldn't do.

Money

Some people think money is a joke to me, and it is. Some may say that's only because I have it, and I'd appreciate it much more if I didn't.

Let me say this: I've had it, I haven't. I care to, and I care not to. I love what you can do with it, and I hate what it can be used for. The very mention of money gas such an influence that even after the words are uttered, it seems to exist even if it didn't before it's mention. It can be the difference between naked and hungry and a warm meal to be embraced by.

How much money is your mind worth?

Sequence of Events

May 2013 - (ten months ago)  -  graduate from community college with my associates degree

June 2013 - (nine months ago)  -  receive acceptance letter into public university. Sign up for English / creative writing classes to pursue BA. Turn 25 years old.

July 2013 - (eight months ago) - receive increased student loan approval letters.
Aquire art studio. Get rid of apartment.

August 2013 - (seven months ago) - University classes start. Move into dorm on campus to pursue studying writing and begin working towards earning credentials to start pursuing career after college. Drive across state to art studio on weekends to create art and think outside the box.

September 2013 - (six months ago) - Go to classes. Some lectures are interesting and insightful, others are pointless and designed and exist only to fill time because you paid for them and your course of study requires them to exist. Most classmates are 18 years old and will never be the kind of writers they dream of being because their main interests, hobbies and passions in life involve watching crappy television shows and they will mainly lack genuine life experience until they die. Their most traumatic experience is the death of a family dog. They do not think for themselves, or outside the box, and the university is not teaching them to think outside the box, taking their money (and my money), putting us in debt, giving us no promise of careers in the future, giving us little valuable information, and promising to give us a piece of paper we can tell everyone we earned if we remain docile and keep being proponents of their system. I do not have much time to spend in my art studio, even on the weekends.

October 2013 - (five months ago) - I stay very busy on the university campus. I have many tests to take and papers to write. Tests on shallow facts I am supposed to memorize so I may forget later; Papers conformed to "neat" creative styles I am told to adopt and use. Deciding to conform to pre-conceived styles and guidelines are not my idea of a creative process. Nor is being tested on my ability to memorize and regurgitate various facts chosen by someone else. As I am expected to participate in my classes, I share my opinions and views. I open some eyes and furrow some brows. I am told I have a bad attitude. I begin to fail my classes. The few friends I have made living on campus all begin to shun me and keep distance. My teachers begin to shun me. I make it a priority I begin to spend more time at my art studio during the weekends. Soon I begin to spend time there during the week, too, writing and exploring my own creative process and studies, instead of taking tests, writing shallow papers for shallow reasons, and being shunned and ridiculed. I am absent for more and more class. I have alot of fun and I gain alot of experience. Art is created.

November 2013 - (four months ago) - I write, I paint, I record music, I edit video. I continue to study the artwork, style and creative processes of various artists, of my choosing. I am in a creative art conducive environment that I have shaped. I am asked to produce a band's first music video. The job doesn't pay, and it has only a budget of fifty dollars, but the band has a decent following and will be great learning experience as well as a potential gateway to paying jobs in the future. I spend large amounts of time racking my brain trying to figure out how to turn my art into a paying profession since the university failed to do that. I officially withdrew from my classes. And begin staying in my art studio, with no kitchen or shower, all the time.

December 2013 - (three months ago) -  Time is flying by. I'm working on several art projects. The music video shoot I agreed to produce takes alot of energy to plan, but I want it to meet its full potential to satisfy the band, the audience and myself. The video shoot goes very well, there are several hang ups, but we get past them to capture excellent, unique video in a unique venue with a great cooperative crowd. Still, no jobs are paying. The video will take two or three months for me to edit, and I will be out of money by then. I do not stress very much, hiking things will work themselves out, opportunities will present themselves and I will do my best to work well with them so I may sustain my artistic life without having to get a shitty corporate job that will wear me down and stress me out. I feel very in tune with the world around me.

January 2014 - (last month) - I start writing this blog.

February 2014 - (this month) - The end of the month is here. The power is off in my art studio as of this afternoon. I am still behind a month on the rent, and I have no money for the next month's rent due in the next couple of days. Obviously, I could have made more sound financial decisions and have avoided running into this bleak period of instability and uncertainty of what the future holds. Its stressful, and I'm not sure exactly what I'm going to do yet. After the initial shock, and beyond being able to shake the feeling of fucking up, being irresponsible and generally failing at life, a feeling of rock and roll creeps in.
Anytime I've gone shopping for music equipment, I always start by exploring the local pawn shops to marvel at their vast, cheap selection. I always try to picture the sort of musicians that hawked any random, sad looking piece of equipment on the shelf. Looking at the various articles, I wonder what sort of life these crazy musicians could be bringing them to the point where they bring their equipment to a scummy little store to sell at notoriously shameless prices. Now here I am, surveying my equipment to select what I only use intermittently and may bring in the most, little amount of money from a pawnshop to at least get my power back turned back on, while at the same time pondering how many days I may float my rent buy paying it with a rent check whose routing numbers are more than less illegible.
Bike Week is coming up very soon here in Daytona Beach, which has granted me an interesting, well-paying work opportunity I will be taking advantage of. I have also secured a small, freelance internet television broadcasting gig.
Gradually the feeling of despondency fades. Everything in life, always comes to a balance, even if sometimes its awful and taxing. Every action has an equal reaction, and even inaction is intense action, The only life that does not get to experience these qualities of life are the those led by the securely neutral lives. The backbone of society, standing solid and unswayed while we, the limbs, flail around in a mania. Opportunity is everywhere, and I will keep writing, no matter what.
One day, maybe I can find opportunity to be paid for writing.

Music & Cough Syrup

I sat in a local coffee shop a few days ago, stoned and pondering my way through the evening.

I thought:

• I should not have to submit to authority or be put in a cage every time I do something police don't like.
• Police traffic stops violate my "rightful" freedom. In the words of George Clinton: freedom is free from the need to be free.
• Nothing I have ever voted for has passed into policy. Nothing, and that is fine. The voting system here in America is ultimately corrupt.
• Fuck, I'm stoned.

I pulled my mind together, stood up, and took a look around. There were a couple of lesbians entwined on a couch next to me, feeling eachother's tongues with their own, letting out deep moans. Buried underneath them was a young man, a grin naturally stuck on his face; he was stuck in ecstatic coma. Together, the three of them make up a whiny, emotional folk music band. I would never complain about their presence, it added a nice touch to the atmosphere and makes it easier for me to relax.

As they occupied the couch, lusting on each other, I heard one of them talk about the drugs they were on. They had ingested extraordinarily large amounts of cough syrup to achieve an altered mental state. It worked. The stuff had them fucked up and out of their minds and was likely responsible for their open sexual behavior.

They, the band, had a musical performance scheduled later that night. It was to be a quick, private musical set to compete in a local battle of the bands. There was a prize for the winner, but nobody had a clue what it was.

The ladies got off the couch and tried to figure out how much time there was before they were supposed to play their show. The young man stayed on the couch, with an expression on his face like there were still a couple of hot chicks laying on top of him making out.

Four hours remained until their music performance was scheduled to begin, and it came to light the trio had not performed together in over a year and had no collaborative knowledge of what songs they would, or even could play together.

They talked needing to practice before they played in front of any large groups of people. There was a hint of frantic fear and desperation creeping into their voices, and instead of practicing, they decided it would be better to go to a bar and try to hustle a few drinks and loosen up before their show. The manager of the coffee shop said he would drive them in his car and he asked me if I would stay and watch the shop in case anyone showed up at the door. Not customers, just anyone who happened to come knock on the door. Someone said a drummer might come knocking.

I have been good friends with the manager for years, and I was accustomed to overseeing the shop in his absence.

Everyone left, and I cranked up a little Slayer on the in-house music system.

Before long, there was a strong tapping coming from the glass enterance door. I moved the piece of plywood that blocked the enterance from curious eyes that may happen to be walking down the street. On the other side of the glass, standing in the light rain and cold wind was a large, round man of his early thirties, dressed all in black. His short, stringy purple mohawk stood at attention. Through the glass, I asked him, "Who are you?"

"Lucifer!" I heard him reply.
"Wait.. What?"
He told me his name, but I still had no idea who he was or why he was doing there. Some had told me a drummer may come. I wondered if this was him.
"Do you play drums?" I asked.
"No, I don't play any instruments. I wish I could, though."  he replied.

Having always been a man full of risk and short of caution, I decided to unlock the door and welcome the man to come inside. He said one of the girls had contacted him over the internet and told him to come over. He walked several miles through the cold rain to arrive at the shop. I told him the girls had gone somewhere and I was the only one around at the moment. He didn't seem surprised they had forgotten them. 

We hung out and listened to music while making bullshit conversation, trying to kill time. We slipped into a stoned-out mental state where time had no purpose. I have no idea what this man's state of sobriety was, but he was coherent and seemed to be mostly there upstairs. That is more than I can say for many of people I encounter through my day-to-day adventure that is life. As we talked, we smoked some pot and threw any problems we had in life towards the netherworld. We waited for the shop manager to return with the band, and by the time they they arrived, it was two or three hours later. One of the girls that had been making out with the other on the couch was no longer, and the two remaining band memebers had somehow gotten even higher.

"I don't know how I'm supposed to go onto a stage," one of them said to me in passing, as they came back into the coffee shop. "People are going to look at me and I'm going to have no idea what to do." He was right, the words out of his mouth and the look on their faces led me to believe cough syrup was rotting the two strange, alternative folk singer's minds out like hungry worms of the brain.

I walked into the back to pour myself a cup of coffee. The remaining woman from the band followed me, As I filled my coffee cup, she came up behind me and grabbed my hair and pulled it. Hard. It made me lean back and put me into a submissive position. She licked my face and rubbed her crotch on my leg. She didn't ask me, she told me to give her a kiss. "No," I told her. "I'm not going to kiss you. You've got a gig in just a little while, and you've no idea what you're going to play,and yyou're fucked up in the head. Go get prepared" If I had been feeling a little more frisky or incredibly sad or disgruntled about something, I probably would have let the sado-masochist beast I keep inside of me come out and play and done some very naughty, nasty things to her. I thought instead about the woman I am currently having a lovr affair with. She is someone else's fiance, but my feelings for the woman run deep. This other woman, the crazy bandmember who was tripping balls and grinding on my leg while pulling my hair in a coffee shop couldn't hold a candle to the other woman who actually consistantly keeps my stomach full and my balls empty.
I pushed the woman off me, and there was a new person tapping on the glass door. The manager of the coffee shop went to the door and moved the plywood to see who was tapping. It was another member of the band. This one, a bulky older man. wearing a backpack, was not tripping balls like the others. He was carrying a large djembe drum, looked like a seasoned musician who was ready to play music.

He took a good look at the two bandmates standing before him, who were laughing uncontrollably. He asked me if they were on something, as if it weren't obvious. "Of course they are," I told him. He opened his backpack and pulled out a zip-lock bag filled to the top with fluffy, bright green pot. It smelled delcious, and my stomach grumbled like the smoke was somehow going to end up there instead of my lungs. Hoping to calm his tripping bandmates, he packed a bowl and passed it around. Their staged performance for battle of the bands competition was supposed to begin in less than hour.

The bowl went around, and several joints were also rolled and passed. The two who were tripping finally were calming down a little and picking up their instruments to try making some music. 

They each had a guitar, but one only had three strings, and the other had a broken neck. This led them into a chaotic fit of pacing around the room and mumbling to themselves. They were confused by everything around them. The time they had been scheduled to start playing came and went. Not long after that, however, the tripping singer/guitarist girl stopped her pacing mid-step in the middle of the floor, straightened her straightened her posture, and had some sort of moment of clarity causing her to exclaim:

"Alright! It is time for us to go!" Everyone stared at her for a second in silence, trying to figure out if she was serious or not. Someone asked her about the lack of functioning instruments,  It made her eyes go wide and it looked like she was going to have some sort of violent outburst. She took a deep breath, though and it was easy to tell she had to make a strong mental effort to keep herself orderly.

"We'll find instruments when we get there," she said.

People gathered their things and made their way outside to the cars. I picked up my skateboard and was going to avoid baring witness to the potential trainwreck that was on its way to the stage by heading back to my art studio, but it was cold, windy and raining; not good skateboard weather. I hopped in a car with the guy with the djembe drum and headed with the group to where the event was being hosted.

We arrived. Someone led each of the band members who were tripping balls by the arm through the rain. We found our way inside and there was a large stage set up in the back. There already a band on it and they were rocking out.  "Finally, you're here!" 

Someone handed one if the singer/guitarists would were out of their minds on cough syrup an entry form for the competition. She stared at it with a blank look. "I have no idea what this is,what it means, get this out now my face." She passed it off to the other one who has out of his mind. He held up in the air. The woman who was in charge of the event and judging looked at them, half unsurprised by their obvious mental state and half in annoyed disbelief. "Really?" she asked. She asked the manager of the coffee shop if he could fill it out for them. Although amazingly stoned, he was relatively sober compared to the members of the band except for the djembe player, who was somewhere else in the bar, trying to hide the fact he was associated with the group out of embarrassment of their state. 

He didn't want to perform with them in the competition for fear of soiling his name as a musician here in Daytona Beach, where word spreads quickly between bars about which bands are good and which are a joke. When the band was ushers up to the stage to play, though, he picked up his drum and followed them because he didn't want to hurt and possible chance he had screwing the female singer/guitarist later after the performance. 

I ended up filling out the entry form myself. It asked for the band name and contact information, which I filled out to the best of my ability. Where there was a space to write the "band's tagline, " I scribbled in "Worth the wait... and so much more." 

Up on stage, people working the event set up microphones for the vocals and the drums. They offered cables to plug their guitars into. The girl in the band walked up to one of the microphone stands and said over the speaks: "There are no instruments we have brought."  The woman who was hosting the event let out a deep sigh and looked like she had reached her limits and was about to kick them off stage and out of the bar. One man who had played earlier saw this and looked amused and like he wanted to see what other antics this band had to offer if they stayed on the stage. "I havea guitar you guys can use, " he piped up. "I don't know what kind of music you plan on playing, but here, give this a try." He walked up to the stage and offered them a hallow-bodieded acoustic/electric Flying-V apparently to share between the three of them.

The chick grabbed it and passed it to her fellow singer/guitarist who was sitting on stage next to her atop a bar stool tripping balls. He took it in his hand and held it in his lap like he had never held a Flying-V before. I found out later that he hadn't hadn't when he asked me "what was with that guitar and it's pointyness?"

While he sat shifting it around in his lap, trying to figure out a comfortable way to hold it, she spat out a long string of crazy psycho-babble into the microphone. 

Everyone in the bar looked a little unsettled and confused by the lack of music and the surplus of awkward vibrations coming off the stage. 

"Play some music or get off the stage!" the event manager yelled at them, sending the two with microphones into a giggling fit while the man with the djembe stared at the ground, pretending he was somewhere else and nobody could see him. The event manager rose out of her seat and began walking towards the stage to pull them off.

Suddenly, the young man holding the guitar pulled himself together and found a huge burst of energy that sent everyone in the bar to sit upright and look straight at him while he struck a musical chord on the guitar and let out a loud, harmonic, vocal wail. Now that he seemed to have everyone's attention, he looked around the room in an awkward moment, making eye contact with as many people as possible and giggling to himself under his breath. The low giggle, amplified by the microphone, rolled out the speakers across the bar and sent chills up people's spines making many shift in their seat uncomfortably, slightly disturbed. 

Suddenly he burt out into a song he had obviously played many times before. He sang with extreme emotional conviction in his voice and strummed the guitar and slid his hand up and down its neck like he was softly molesting it. The sound coming out of it said it liked being molested, though, and his voice lulled the guitar and everyone in the bar into an accepting submission. The event manager walked back and sat back in her seat at the judges table.

The music brought tears to some people's eyes as it was so emotionally charged. The man with the djembe held excellent rhythm and it tied all the music together. After four or five songs, the band manager told them to exit the stage, and someone from out group came and ushered the two of them to sit at the bar. Some people bought them drinks and tried picking them up for reasons ranging from sex to music, but they were too messed up in the head to do anything other drink, smile, laugh and nod.

It was late, still cold and raining. I rode back to the coffee shop with the djembe player to take a nap and wait for the rain to stop. The two band members came back, too. I fell asleep drifted to sleep listening to them have sex on a couch a few feet away from me, and I woke up to the female trying to forcibly remove my pants and and get her mouth wrapped around my cock. I tried to stop her, but Im only a man, and eventually I gave in. I took her shirt and came all over her little brown tits.

Everyone else was asleep, so I came back to my art studio and began writing what you have just finished reading. 

Until next time, don't do anything I wouldn't do,  and be sure to subscribe by entering your email on the rightside of the top of this page.