I hope everyone had a great Memorial Day weekend, I know we did. We spent the majority of it out on Lake Murray drinking beer and floating around in the water. Not a bad way to spend a weekend, if you ask me. On Monday, we took Melissa’s dad, Tim, out on the lake with us. I don’t know Tim all that well, since he lives close to an hour away, so I was looking forward to getting to know him. I had no idea what I was in for.

Even not knowing Tim all that well, I already like him for two reasons. One, he shares the same love that I do for Clemson football. Two, his daughter is hot and she seems to plan on keeping me around. On top of all of this, I found out Monday that he and I have one of the same nemesises (nemesii? What the hell is the plural form of nemesis?) Ben Tanner. Ben Tanner is the local weather guy here on WIS (the local NBC affiliate.) Actually, while I enjoy picking on Ben Tanner, I harbor no true ill will towards him. Tim, on the other hand, hates him. I would not be surprised to see Tim punch Ben Tanner in the face if they ever meet.

Somehow or another, Tim found out that Ben Tanner went to the University of Georgia. Tim said, and I quote “Yeah, you have to be careful when you drive through Athens. If your windows are down someone will throw a meteorology degree into your car.” Clearly, Tim thinks that Ben Tanner is an absolute idiot. Oh yeah, another thing – Tim and I both hate UGA, although to be fair, 99% of the South Carolina population also hates UGA. It’s one of the few things that Clemson and USC fans can agree on.

All of that aside, I think Monday went well. Tim and I had a few beers together, went tubing on the lake, and just generally relaxed in the sun. I can think of worse ways to spend a day off...

Aside from that, nothing too new is happening here. I have a ton of stuff I keep promising to write about and do, but working two jobs is keeping me fairly busy. I’ll try to play catch up at some point over the weekend.

In the meantime, let me know what you’ve all been up to.

JT out.

I was going to write about some odd dreams I've had this past week. I always sleep fitfully at best when I'm staying in a hotel room, so that combined with the fact that I fell asleep watching Adult Swim almost every night probably had a lot to do with my dreams being bizarre. The main problem I'm having is piecing together what I remember of the dreams into something that makes sense, or at least a vague storyline. Otherwise I'll wind up sounding like William Faulkner, and no one wants that.

Instead of trying to make sense out of something so nonsensical (like understanding why people choose to speak French,) I will just describe the flashes of dreams I recall. If anyone wants to analyze them, feel free, but don't be too disturbed when you figure out how messed up my head is.

I was staying in a mountain cabin with my parents and extended family. My maternal grandmother, who I have never seen take a drink of alcohol in my life, proceeded to get smashed off of my Uncle Keith's homemade wine, and started chasing me around with a knife, throwing pies at me. I ran outside, and was suddenly at a truckstop, and hitched a ride with someone to get me the hell out of there.

Kyle, Melissa (the new/old girlfriend...it was getting old typing that out all the damn time) and I were at a USC football game (USC is Clemson's biggest football rival.) Kyle and Melissa kept trying to get me to wear a USC shirt, and I didn't want to. It felt like betrayal, or being French. I threw the shirt down on the ground, and when Kyle picked it up, it was a USC football jersey. He handed it back to me, I once again refused to wear it, and threw it down again. When he picked it up for a second time, it was a wedding dress. Then an angry guy started chasing us for being in his seats, and the bleachers did that Scooby-Doo staircase thing where they collapsed and turned into a slide, dumping us out on the field. We crashed into the marching band, which made everyone angry, and we had to run for it.

Melissa and I were staying at my paternal grandmother's house, but parts of it were blocked off for some unknown reason. My ex-wife's brother and his wife came to live with us, and took up residence in the kitchen.

My dogs were gigantic (or I was tiny, not sure which) and I couldn't get them to understand that jumping on me hurt really bad.

That's about it, but here are a couple of pics of the dogs, I just realized I've never posted any.



This is Mason. He weighs about 108 lbs, and is a big sweetheart and scaredy-cat.

This ia Marley. She weighs about 35 pounds and is hyper as hell. If she doesn't like you, she will kill you.

Coming up soon: pictures from our first house party, and updates on the new J-O-B. Have a great long weekend, kids.

JT out.

I meant to post on Sunday, mentioning that I would be MIA this week. I've been out of town training for the new full-time job (don't worry, I'm keeping my nighttime bar job as well.) I got to go back to Greenville for training, which is where I lived for the past six years until moving back to Columbia last May. It was cool to see some old friends, but I was amazed at how much things changed in a mere twelve months.

It used to be that I couldn't walk through the door at Chief's without seeing a familiar face or two. The entire 4 days I was there, I didn't run into a single person I knew by chance, and I felt out of place at all of my old haunts. Still, I love Greenville and the upstate of SC. How could I not? Clemson is only a few minutes down the road. Anyway, I'm back in town, and with plenty of stories, but I'm exhausted, so I'm going to save them for tomorrow.

Glad to be home...

JT out.

The new/old girlfriend and I went to see Villanova play again last night. I can never get enough of these guys, and the somewhat recent addition of Jeremy on drums has been huge. That kid can drum, period. Not to take anything away from B, Bobby, or Able, but Jeremy is insanely good. Anyway, all that aside, I've been meaning to write about this for a while. I grew up with B Conner, no matter how big his band gets, I know he'll always just be B Conner to me. He's always in an upbeat mood, and is insanely talented.

JT out.

Why am I so hungover on a Wednesday afternoon*, you ask? Well, in all truthfulness, most of you reading this probably aren’t all that surprised. After a month or so, I’m leaving my nighttime job at the Village Idiot. I’ve been offered a great new full time job with a nice salary, car allowance, etc, and I’m not sure my new full time schedule will mesh with my part-time bar schedule. Brian, the owner of the Idiot, is a friend of mine as well as my boss, and I don’t want to leave him in a bind by calling in whenever I’m going to be running late or not coming in due to a conflict with my day job.

Which brings me to this: I told everyone last night that it was my last week, and Asher, Cap’n, and Jimmy all insisted on taking me out drinking. In fact, they started out by buying me drinks while I was still technically working. Brian was feeding me beers while I was helping clean up and close out, and then the shots started. Oh dear God, the shots. You, my dear readers, may not know this, but I rarely drink liquor. My track record has proven, time and time again, that it’s best when I stick to beer. Last night was no exception. I was feeling no pain when we left the Idiot and walked over to Chubby’s 2 x 4 down the street, where we had a few until they were starting to close, so we proceeded to a private bar down the street. None of us are members at Durkin’s, but they let service industry people (servers, bartenders, cooks, etc.) in regardless of whether they have a membership.

Long story short, I wound up at the new/old girlfriend’s house at around 4 AM. She, of course, was happy to see me. Who wouldn’t be pleased with an unexpected visitor at o-dark thirty in the morning? I’m just lucky that I’m the one who owns a gun, not her. I barely remember her getting up to go to work that morning. After much careful reflection, here is what I realize: it’s time to go. I’m not as young and spry as I once was, and staying up that late puts a big ol’ hurtin’ on me the next day. Also, when I start singing along and nodding my head to songs by DJ Unk (Two Step, Walk It Out) I’m clearly working in a bar that I’m too old to work in. I’ve also determined that, other than Brian and his wife, I’m the oldest person there. So, Village Idiot, it’s been real, it’s been fun, and it’s been real fun, but I’m out. Let’s stay friends, umkay? BFF? Stay cool this summer? TTYL? LYLAS?

That being said, I attempted to watch Borat on Tuesday. To everyone who is constantly quoting this movie and talking about how great it is: What the hell?! I could barely sit through 45 minutes of it, and that was only because I kept waiting for the funny part. If anyone can tell me at what point in the movie I should start laughing, I’ll be more than happy to start it up there. Otherwise, I’m convinced that Hollywood and all of my friends are playing some type of extremely expensive, very elaborate prank on me by pretending that this is a comedy. Ha ha, you got me, assholes. Now give me back 45 minutes of my life I wasted, or a sixer of PBR, whichever is more convenient.

JT out.

*This was started yesterday, just finished today.

I don’t think I’ve ever written about this before, but since September my dogs have been living at my parents’ house. The rental house I first lived in had a fenced in backyard, but it needed a lot of work and cleaning up, and I never got to it before sewage problems forced me to move. The next house’s backyard was only fenced in on three sides, and my landlord never got around to finishing it as he had promised because I found this house to buy and moved in less than three months.

However, Kyle and I finally got a lot of work done to the backyard here, and I brought my dogs over to stay yesterday. It’s great not having to drive 45 minutes one way to see them and take them for a run, and they’ve also scared off the creepy stray cat (we named him Fred) that had been lurking around our house. It was a long day, and it was hot as hell out moving the doghouse and setting the kennel up, but it was well worth it. It’s great being able to come home and see them since they always cheer me up.

The new/old girlfriend and I went to a wedding shower last night. Nothing unusual there, we’re both at that “mid-20’s” age where most of our friends are getting married. Ah, who the hell am I kidding?* She’s at that “mid-20s” age. I’m more along the lines of that “Hey! I am too still in my 20’s! Watch me do a keg stand naked!” age. My friends are just marrying younger women, no surprises there. We’re getting a bit old, and attempting to retain our youth by retaining younger women. Bravo.

We then came home, and my friend Neil came over with a girl he’s been seeing and we proceeded to get drunk. Then, Neil and I decided to make beer batter and start deep frying vegetables and dill pickles (we deep fry anything that sits still long enough here in the South.) I’m not sure exactly what time we decided to call it a night, Karen brought over some strawberry flavored vodka, and we proceeded to take many, many shots of it in between beers.

Bear with me kids, Uncle T is getting ready to get a bit sappy. The point of all of this rambling is this: I’m sitting here, hungover as hell, with my head pounding, heartburn, and the inside of my mouth tasting like a raccoon crawled in there and died last night. However, over my left should as I type, I can hear the new/old girlfriend breathing as she sleeps. I can look to my left out of my window and see Marley and Mason waking up, stretching, and getting their first drink of water for the day. I couldn’t be happier.


*I realize that, grammatically, that sentence should read “Whom the hell am I kidding?” but that sounds retarded.

After spending a weekend at the beach, pretending it was warm and swimming in frigid waters, I'm definitely itching for summertime. Long days spent on the lake, tooling around on Ashley's pontoon and sipping on ice-cold PBRs. It's especially bad because it's rather cool and windy out today. Despite the fact that I want to drive around with my windows down and the sunroof open, the weather is not cooperating.

Other than that, life is pretty quiet around here. Everything is great with the new/old girlfriend, no more death-defying stunts as of yet, and I'm spending most of my nights working at the Village Idiot these days. I truly didn't have much to write, but felt guilty for not updating in a while.

JT out.