Karl impersonates a beat poet:

Seven a.m. Saturday. I’ve been up since five. Did the grocery shopping last night and then Tyler came over to drink gin and talk shit. Haven’t done the Tyler hang out in some time. He made the basement offer that Mary has also made: to keep my stuff until I land somewhere. It is very good to have good friends looking out for you.

My ex Stephanie, the one with the dogs who lives in Florida, drunk dialed me… several times. I love that about her. Drunk in her garage listening to tunes while her live-in-ex watches TV in the teacher’s salary can’t afford to move out-house, “I wanted him to get drunk in the garage with me, but he just wasn’t interested, so I’m calling you”. They bought ocean-going kayaks together, but now she must paddle alone.

She lives just north of Melbourne and lost significant portions of her roof in the last gale. She is sick of teaching high school biology and has applied to be a support staff person in the F.B.I. – Tyler was F.B.I. before law school, they let him keep the gun; a fact his neighbors have come to regret. Scene: engagement party – three a.m. - Karl passed out drunk on couch in garage (made up especially for this purpose) – Tyler and others in driveway of said garage discharging Old Bessie into the side of the hill, all on large, not so rural property. Yes, we do ride the edge of occasion.

I think maybe we read too much Hunter S. Thompson when we were young and now gonzo journalism and the crazy wisdom school of happy accidents has somehow become our praxis. On two occasions I have emerged from New Orleans wondering how exactly I had retained my skin. These, and other stories will be forthcoming, as soon as I can remember them.

It’s raining. Visiting hours at the hospital aren’t until much later. I could go junking! That’s a great idea! Nine a.m. on a rainy Saturday is a prime junking time target. I’ll head on down to the Sunni Triangle on the edge of the West End and hit Goodwill, St. Vincent’s, and the Sally. A man with a van is a man with a plan and no worthy item shall be ignored, for when we are lost to ourselves in this capitalist mudslide it is on the edges of the homogenized that we shall find the mirrors of the self.

Please explain that philosophy.
Kantian Aesthetics
Art allows the Noumenal (truth big T from a neo-platonic realm of forms)
To rupture into the Phenomenal (the world of everyday stuff)
Objects of a certain sort gots more art and more heart in um
We are oft looking for the ever-changing self
We catch glimpses reflected in what we like
The further off the beaten path we seek
Away from homogenized mass culture
The better shot we got to hit ground via what we found.

I wish I could get a job where I could be honest. Be who I am.
Pretend
Pretense
Pretension
Tension
Pre-hypertension

That’s the attraction of bartending, if you get the mix right then it’s honest smooth.