Morning Campers,

As the subject says, I am almost done.  Almost done working these nights and weekends and the horrible, horrible, well-paying overtime.

So this summer, I will be poorer, but much, much more accessable/available.

I'm heading to NC for Memorial Day weekend.

Heading back to NC week of June 9th, continuing to Florida to pick up my daughter, then back to NC before coming back to NY.

Plans:  I want to take Angela to a Mets game, and to a Yankees game. Both in their current original stadiums, people welcome to join us.
Also planning on some other city trips, museum/planetarium, parks, possibly Shakespeare in the park if it's of sufficient coolness for a 12 year old skateboarding/science girl.
I'd also like to catch up with a bunch of friends and family.

And there will be drinking.  Probably mostly at Snappers.  Out of towners welcome.  Angela will be at her grandmothers or aunt's house these nights, so no worry about embarrasing yourselves in front of her.

Also some more internets projcets will be bearing their fruit this spring, once I am done with the hours in the oil industry.

Later,
AB

Yes, I have barely graced the internet with my presence this past month, despite all of the things that demand to be commented on. And yes, I am posting tonight with news of the death of my cat, Squitter.

I am not, nor ever have been, a cat person. I don't care for them generally. I like dogs.

Squitter was different. I adopted her under shady circumstances, in which I once feared for her safety. Regardless of whether my grounds for feeling such were valid, I felt that way at the time and kept this strange cat under my roof.

She had many of the qualities that make a cat a cat. But somehow, at the same time, she seemed to be a bit better than most of the breed. The entire time I had her, for instance, she never bit or scratched a human being. And there were times, with children manhandling her, where she could not have been blamed. She liked to have you rub her belly, and unlike most cats, who seem to offer the chance simply to get your hand where they can easily get four sets of claws into you, she genuinely enjoyed it.

She was easygoing. Almost too easygoing for a cat. We thought that the tattoos in her ears were a indicator that she was once a lab cat, forced to endure terrible experiments to make her a killing machine, but upon her escape, decided to just absolutely relax.

Killed some mice, and a rat. God bless her.

And I named her after diarrhea.

I didn't know it at the time. 'Squitter' was just a word that I said to cats. All cats. So it seemed natural that I would name a cat that. It was while playing Balderdash, that we discovered the meaning behind her name. All the made-up answers had to do with cats (or specifically, my cat). When the answers were read for us to guess at which was the right one, the only one that had nothing to do with my cat was one word. Diarrhea.

She took it in stride.

She moved with me from Brooklyn to Kingston. I think she liked Kingston better, since she liked to be outside, and K-town is a much safer place to let your cat roam.

For 10 years, we lived here, watching roommates come and go. Squitter and I were the only two people (yes, she's people now) who maintained permanent residence at Green Street (soon, she will have me beat. I will be moving soon, and she's now buried at the side of the house, with some flowers and a stone to mark her spot).

She was old. Had one tooth in her head. For the past few months, she had been getting pretty sick. I would tease her 'Why won't you die?'. And then I would feel bad, probably because part of me was serious. She wasn't doing well.

A couple of weeks ago, she vanished. I was a little worried, but mostly because if she were going to die, I'd rather know where she did it. I didn't want to not know where she was, and I didn't want to stumble across her body while trying to hunt down some strange odor. Then she came back. Word on the street was that other people were feeding her and the like.

I felt bad for them, because I found one food that she would not almost immediately throw up. I don't think they went through the trouble. Though I'm sure they had some messes to clean up.

Last week, I stopped seeing her altogether. I heard rumors that other people had seen her, but I took them with a grain of salt, until Gantor told me that she had actually come in the house.

Today, as I prepared to finish somework in the basement, she came home. She looked terrible. I wasn't mean to her, but I was a little short. Hurt, perhaps, that I'm worrying about her and she's just la-de-dahing around the neighborhood.

While I was in the basement, Squitter jumped up on the table, and died in what I hope was peace. She came home to die, and for that I'm grateful.

I will miss her. She was a good cat, considering what she was.

And she wasn't much of a cat person either. Maybe that's why we got along so well.

AB

Oh, I'm not shitting you. No, my children.

Yes, my current favorite song is the one from the iPod commercial. Yes, the fucking iPod commercial.

It's called 'Flathead' and it's by The Fratellis.

The song was stuck in my head. It was cool, had a good beat and it's catchy, god damn it.

So I downloaded the fucker.

And the song is good. The whole song. All good.

So now I'm listening to the whole album, 'Costello Music' and so far (4 tracks in), I'm very pleased.

Check it out. 'Flathead' is the song on my profile, so you can hear that here.

And the fifth track is starting out nicely.

Listen, fuckers.

That is all.

The top friends are brought to you today courtesy of Brooklyn, NY.  Everyone here is someone I know from Brooklyn.

So, you know, fugghedaboudit.

Okay, each week I am going to highlight a different group of people on my Top Friends.  This is so you all get some air time. 

Not that most of you give a flying fuck.

So... this week:  Family and people close enough to be family... judged by the fact that I have lived with them for some amount of time and still care enough to not have them sexually assaulted by rabid baboons.

I can only hope they feel the same way. 

So, here I am at work.  Fucking KOSCO.  It's Labor day, I have nothing better to do, so I suppose it's all good. 

Alright, I have plenty better to do, but here I am.  Trying to get caught up on paperwork so that I can breathe easier for the next couple of days. 

Maryellen had her baby.  Dulcinea.  I love that name. 

Why am I avoiding doing any personal work lately?  i.e.: writing.  What's up with that?  I'll have to put myself back on schedule this week.  Vacation too long and I get cobwebs in the corridors of my mind.

Shit.

That is all.

I made the drive to North Carolina yesterday.  650 miles or so, ten hours of driving. 

Here with my brother John and his family.  The kids are all great and almost make me wish I had some. 

Of my own, that is. 

So if anyone is looking for me, you can find me here @ myspace.  I'll still be posting to Ill-Literates, but you can't really reach me there.  Well, I suppose you can leave comments, but they should be topical.

Later

AB

So here we are again, over a month since the last blog here.

I like beer.  I know, I said that just a few moments ago.  May be the reason you're reading this post.  I said it again though, because I want to share that.  I like beer.

I'm drinking a beer right now.  12 ounce can o' Bud. 

Fucking MySpace don't have no Wanda Jackson on the search for what I'm listening to.  So now you know that too.  I like Wanda Jackson.  Rockabilly.

And beer.  I like that too.

    So many hot girls want to be Interweb Buddha's friends.  They want me to check out their web-cams.
    Interweb Buddha is lucky lucky.

... but I know you missed me.  Bitches.

Ordinarily I wouldn't resort to the word "bitches".  But today is special.
Run down of my day, despite the fact that there is no reason you might care.

Up at the crack of dawn, still got to work 15 min. late.  That tells me something.  I'm starting to hate going to this fucking job.  It might get better when they hire more help and get the fuck off our backs, but I doubt it.
Work:  This involves a lot of profanity and random shouting.  They think I'm not right.  They're correct in this assumption.

Leave work at 3, so I can run home and grab Angela and Maryellen.  Run out to Wal-Mart to get Angela's new glasses.  From there, over the bridge to Red Hook for her last dance class before summer break.  While she's there, check cashed and quick stop for a light bite before picking her back up. 

Back to Kingston, gas up, get Angela a sandwich and run up to Boiceville for my niece's graduation from 6th grade.  I never make it to things like this, so it's important to me that I get there.  This is the new and improved Mondo who will make it to things like this from now on. 

Watch a 6th grade graduation ceremony.  I can hardly see my niece behind the other kids.  Didin't realize how small she is for her age until I see her with all of these mutant giant children.  Applaud a lot for kids I don't know.  When my niece is mentioned, we make some noise.  I love her smile when we do this.

From there, drop Maryellen and Angela back in Kingston, wait for Chris and the kids to meet me at the house with Drew and Chuck so that we can go to Applebees for dinner.

Burger was pretty good.

Bullshit with Drew and Chuck until 12:30 in the parking lot.

Mondo goes  home.  Posts blog.

That was my day, and I am still a miserable bastard.  But that's my struggle.