A Year In Pictures Following The Break-Up

Another Otis holiday: Gandy Gras, a Mardi Gras party hosted by Gandy ("Make sure there's no beer in the picture, I'm Presbyterian").

Gandy: Who's ready for King's Cake? Now, I usually get all my ingredients from Jerry Lee's but it blew down in the hurricane, so I had to improvise a little. I couldn't get purple for the top, so it's green, gold and FEMA blue. Also, I couldn't find a King's Cake baby in time, so, instead, there's a Colonel Mustard piece from the CLUE game in here.

I'd never had King's Cake before, but my slice had the yellow CLUE game piece, the baby, baked into it.

Me: What does it mean exactly? I get good luck?
Shelly: Yeah. You're lucky all year. The year Brendan got it every play he was in was Jeff nominated. The year I got it I beat cancer.

At the end of the night I left Colonel Mustard at Gandy's place, in case he wants to play a game of CLUE, but hopefully the luck followed me home.

# posted by Arnie : 11:46 PM  4 comments

A much-needed haircut. Brilli isn't open on Mondays but Jana (who's great) sometimes comes in and cuts hair when the place is normally closed. It's odd getting your hair cut in an empty salon, quiet and almost solemn.

I'm not a very good haircut conversationalist, so I mostly listened to tinkling non-intrusive salon music, the kind that seems natural under the noise of a bustling salon, but seems melancholy in a big empty space.

"Music always makes me feel like I'm in a movie," Jana said.

Annie Lennox kept singing that this was "the saddest song I've got" and if it were a movie someone would be dying or maybe just riding an elvish boat to the Grey Havens.

My hair looks great, by the way. Thanks for asking.

# posted by Arnie : 10:46 PM  14 comments

Nick and Katie's dual birthday party at the Huettenbar.

Hansen: Uh oh... here comes the blogger.
Me: Quick, someone do something poignant.
Young: But do it in a way that can be expressed in a picture.
Me: Who has a confidence I can betray?

Later, Nick and others started tickling Meador until he collapsed to the ground. Becky, his girlfriend, had to fight people off of him.

I missed most of this, but grabbed my camera when I heard Meador jokingly yell, "Why are you people my friends?"

# posted by Arnie : 11:02 PM  4 comments

Backstage before the Whirled News Tonight show, Glynn gave me a stack of 2 cent stamps.

Glynn: I saw on your blog that you were using two 37 cent stamps to mail stuff. I got these but realized we pretty much pay for everything on-line.

Thanks, Glynn. I only have two 37 cent stamps left, though, so now I'll have a bunch of extra 2 cent stamps. Maybe I can throw them all on one postcard.

# posted by Arnie : 10:53 PM  1 comments

But wait, what did I do for Valentine's Day?

My rehearsal was canceled so the girl and I went out for Chinese food. The girl's fortune read, "New and rewarding opportunities will soon develop for you." I cracked my cookie open and it was empty. No fortune.

"That's weird," the girl said. "Does that mean you have no future? Well, you can share mine. This one will be our fortune."

Luckily, I'm not superstitious.

# posted by Arnie : 3:46 PM  3 comments

Last night I went out to Goldies with Tom and Steph. They still haven't found the "D" CDs they lost during their move.

Tom: It starts with my last Ray Charles CD and goes almost up to Bob Dylan. I keep thinking of CDs in-between there that are missing. Decemberists. Death Cab For Cutie. Nick Drake. Bell Biv Devoe, filed under Devoe.

As usual we talked a bit about high school. Tom talked about the time he jumped up on our friend Andy's car hood in the school parking lot.

Tom: I don't know why I did it. It left a huge dent. We spent an hour trying to undent it.
Me: I feel like a lot of high school was spent jumping on things.
Steph: But not girls.
Tom: Uh... no.
Me: No. Not girls.

# posted by Arnie : 10:26 PM  5 comments

A friend and a friend-of-a-freind have decided to try to set Young up with a friend-of-a-friend-of-a-friend (got that?). Reportedly, she Googled Young and thought he looked cute and seemed funny in an interview he'd done.

"Interview?" Young said, after hearing this. "I've never done an interview. A funny interview?"

So, he Googled himself, which he claims he's never done before.

"Oh no."

Thanks to an unfortunately "wacky" bio he'd used for a show years and years ago, the first thing that comes up when you Google Young's full name along with "improv" and "Chicago" is "____ Young: How's My DICK Taste?"

# posted by Arnie : 8:06 PM  8 comments

I'm too lazy to buy two cent stamps so I used two 37 cent stamps to deliver my credit card bill. I make sound financial decisions.

# posted by Arnie : 7:14 PM  10 comments

After work on Friday, Chris let slip that every other Friday he does something called LARPing, which is apparently Live Action Role-Playing. He dresses up, goes to an art gallery and pretends to be a vampire pimp named Madison Moore.

Chris: My powers include giving the stigmata and disappearing.
Me: Wait, how do you do that? I mean, at the thing, how do you disappear? Do you just say it?
Chris: There are gestures for everything. If I cross my arms like this, that means I disappear. If I walk around like this no one can see me.

We grilled him on this stuff for over an hour. He was a good sport about it.

Chris: Tonight is sort of a late Valentine's Day Celebration, so I have to bring the food.
Me: You mean real food or...
Chris: No, since I'm a pimp I bring in people for us to feed on. Not really, though. It's part of the story.
Me: Is there ever real food, though?
Chris: Sometimes someone brings pizza.

We kept thinking maybe we should change the subject but we couldn't stop talking about it. Thea claimed she wanted to go. I said I'd consider checking it out after my mustache came in.

# posted by Arnie : 9:30 PM  7 comments

Mom continues to regularly send me pictures of Will with captions written from his point of view. They're great and I love getting them. She's not, however, above slipping her own agendas into Will's dialogue.

"I wish that Uncle Arnie would send us a picture of this girl he's dating seriously!?!?!"

Mom has always said, "I don't know where you ever got the drive to write. Certainly not from me. I hate writing." But I don't know that that's exactly true. Her e-mails to me, as Will or as herself, are full of stories and observations.

When I was in Jr. High I used to handwrite little one act plays for a yearly children's playwrighting contest. Mom was kind enough to type them up for me on her word processor, but I was always horrified later on to find that she couldn't resist punching them up with a few of her own jokes.

"Well, when you're old enough to type, you can tell it however you want," she'd say, a little hurt at being told her jokes were corny. And then she'd put the script in the mail, mom-jokes and all.

# posted by Arnie : 2:14 PM  1 comments

Seriously, winter, stop.

# posted by Arnie : 12:42 PM  2 comments

Jellyvision.

Brian has been trying to grow a mustache all week, but yesterday someone finally noticed. Somehow this led to the idea of an office-wide mustache-growing contest.

So, March 10 is the big day. Which is also, coincidentally, N's birthday.

# posted by Arnie : 8:25 PM  2 comments

I'm worried about the Mini Flea.

I'm at work during their posted business hours, but for the last two nights the festive pennant string has been laying dejectedly on the sidewalk. When I looked in the window I noticed that the same Sunkist can has been sitting on the same table in the center of the shop for days.

Somebody buy a used halogen foor lamp fast!

# posted by Arnie : 1:31 PM  2 comments

Back when I started this photoblog, Hansen said, "I can't wait until you start dating. It'll make for great reading."

I wasn't so sure.

Then when I did start going out on dates again, in October, I wrote, "Dating is easy!" and joked that by November I'd be writing, "Dating is hard!"

Well, it's February now and dating is easy. Maybe too easy. It's a slippery slope.

Recently, the girl I've started dating seriously, said, "Remember when I said that it didn't bother me that you don't talk about me on your blog? Well, it's started to bother me."

And she said, "People keep asking me why you haven't mentioned it."

And she said, "It sort of makes me feel like I don't exist."

And you might be wondering why I haven't talked about it too. All I can say is it seems riskier to talk about something new than to talk about something that's ended. I keep thinking about the angry e-mail Mom sent after she discovered this blog, and how the picture of her at the graveyard made her write, "I kept thinking... that doesn't belong there." She's probably right.

But this girl does exist (you do exist, hello). And she is important to me. And I might have some committment issues, but luckily, not quite as many as my blogs does.

She also said, "A number of people have even told me that they think we'll eventually break up because of the blog."

# posted by Arnie : 8:04 PM  4 comments

I got a bag of Jumbo Red "Cinnamon" Jelly Beans in the mail from Mom for Valentine's Day. Very sweet.

A couple days ago she sent me an e-mail with this at the end:

"i have 2 new girls for [tutoring]. i've thought a great deal about my 4th grader, this week. she said something like, 'i'm the most hated 4th grader in this school. i'm probably the most hated student in this school. it started last year. my last name is hooks and they started calling me hooker. . .' she was saying that she has things thrown at her all day long. . . like crayons hitting the back of her head. kids can be so cruel. with valentines day getting so close, you hope that kids will not do something mean next tuesday. if they don't cancel [the tutoring program] for parties, i might try to give her something small for valentines. it used to break my heart at [the jr. high where I used to teach] when some kids felt so bad that they didn't get a carnation. sometimes i bought carnations for kids and just signed it from their secret friend. . . that would keep them guessing and they were happy. have a great weekend."

# posted by Arnie : 9:15 AM  8 comments

Today Mary, Thea and I got Jellyvision baseball caps, which we asked about and were very excited to receive, despite the fact that none of us wear baseball caps.

# posted by Arnie : 8:51 PM  3 comments

A brainstorming list of bowling team names for last Friday's work party. I forgot to include 'Bowl Money, Bowl Problems.'

# posted by Arnie : 3:42 PM  0 comments

While we're looking at pictures of me at other people's weddings, this is one of my favorites. Allie and I at Julie's wedding. I'm not sure what I'm saying, but Allie doesn't find it all that funny.

Yesterday was Allie's birthday.

# posted by Arnie : 4:39 PM  4 comments

A very belated Jellyvision Holiday Party. Drinking, eating, bowling and later, for some, kareoke.

Winner of "Best Bowling Team Name" (as decided by the bartender): Ten Pin Lizzy

Winner of "Best Bowling Score For a Writer That's Not Andy": Me

# posted by Arnie : 11:54 PM  3 comments

Jane watches 'Dora the Explorer.' Nick DVR-ed an episode that he wanted me to see because it involves the monkey character (Boots) having a "special day" where he gets to pick everything they do that day.

Boots: My special day? MY SPECIAL DAY?!
Nick: Why can't you be that excited when it's your special day, Arnie?

LATER

Young: Why does Boots just have boots on, but Boots' Daddy wears a full suit?
Nick: Because he's got a job.

# posted by Arnie : 7:23 PM  0 comments

Blog saturation point.

Trupe pointed out that his friend, Quinn, who apparently lives across the street from Young and I, saw me taking a picture of the Mini Flea while he was getting ready to take a picture of it himself for his own blog.

We both posted something about it on Monday, even though we took the pictures on Saturday.

Trupe: (via e-mail) You were standing in front of his home, so you technically stole his vantage point and any witty insight therein.

# posted by Arnie : 7:38 PM  3 comments

Otis rehearsal. Piero, our coach, showed us a CD he'd gotten in the mail yesterday from his "ex-psuedo-high school girlfriend." She'd burned him a copy of a mix-tape he'd made for her in high school, including little introductions he recorded before each song.

"That's sweet," I said, "to send you that now. A little strange too."

"It is and it isn't," he replied.

It wasn't until later, after rehearsal was well over, that I realized it was his birthday.

# posted by Arnie : 11:32 PM  0 comments

As of this weekend, the empty storefront next to our door is now The Miniflea Resale Shop. We are on day 3 of their grand opening which mostly involves a dry erase board advertising "Free Hot Dog All Day" and a strange pennant string rectangle.

I'm sure the idea is for the rectangle to be festive and inviting, but instead it is weirdly isolating, like crime scene tape. Our front door is also in that rectangle, so, for better or for worse, we're in this together.

# posted by Arnie : 7:38 PM  0 comments

I hadn't responded to Nick and Katie's Superbowl Evite, so I woke up this morning to a voicemail message from Nick.

"I'm not making this up. Yesterday, unprompted, Jane started asking, 'Where's Arnie? Where's Arnie? Is Arnie coming?' I said, 'I don't know. He might be coming tommorrow, actually.' Then, today, she put on her coat and scarf and got out her little rolling suitcase and went to the front door. When I asked her where she was going she said she was going to 'Arnie's house.' So... it's pretty imperative that you come by today."

# posted by Arnie : 11:28 PM  1 comments

Among the framed pictures of me at weddings that I found in my unpacked boxes was this one of N and I at Tom and Steph's wedding. It's a nice picture, but obviously I'm not going put it up anywhere. That would be strange.

Apparently, though, it's not strange to have a blog about a breakup, so I spent fifteen minutes taking pictures of the picture, trying to get the flash to exactly obscure N's face. In retrospect that's creepier than intended. There's a 'Back to the Future' quality to it now, as if she's disappearing from the photo.

# posted by Arnie : 5:15 PM  3 comments

Young: (doing dishes) My friend, Kenner, called. He wants me to go with him to this Roller Derby fundraiser party with him. I don't know.
Me: You should go. You could date a roller derby woman.
Young: Yeah, that's just what I need, more crazy women in my life. Ones that beat the shit out of each other.
Me: Go! Get the crap kicked out of you by a hot roller derby girl.
Young: I should stay in and clean. The floors are disgusting.

That's when I realized that I should probably be the one doing the dishes. It's certainly my turn. Instead I took Young's picture.

# posted by Arnie : 4:32 PM  3 comments

"Saw your blog. I texted you the day you left your phone. No mention. I will remain anonymous."

# posted by Arnie : 7:15 PM  1 comments

Despite loving to take pictures, I never put them up. Going through my many unpacked boxes of random stuff I found the few framed pictures I do have, mostly gifts, and mostly pictures of me in or at other people's weddings.

# posted by Arnie : 10:02 PM  0 comments