today i woke up and, without hesitation, began checking off items from my list of final preparations before departure. there is a pile next to my bed of stuff that needs to be packed. i drove to the car wash on route 10 and paid the measly six dollars for a basic wash. then i vacuumed the inside of the car. twenty minutes later it started raining. a wasted six dollars, i must admit. the floors look less dirty, the trunk is barren, the space in general feels more comfortable. for a while there, it seemed as if the car was filled with this wafting cloud of grime and sickness that permeated day in and day out. perhaps this is because, since i purchased the volvo in 2001, it has never once been cleaned or washed.
along with my sister, i went to the bank with a ziplock bag filled with dollar coins. they directed me to this machine that was designed for children to dump buckets of change. the machine was named penny arcade.
after depressing the touch screen i was directed by penny to insert my change. then i was asked to guess how much change there was, to the dollar. i guessed $135, knowing full well that was wrong. after ms. arcade started tabulating my money, she informed me that i had “filled the bag!” and was going to win a prize. a commerce employee came over and started dumping out the contents of the machine and, as we joked about my prize, handed me various coins that were unrecognizable. there were some german marks, a button, and a funplex batting cage coin. then he tried to close the machine and penny began complaining that her stomach hurt. he re-opened the machine and realized that one of my silver dollars was breaking the damned thing, so he gave it back. then i cashed in my receipt ($142.55. odd, considering i had only dollar coins) and gave the foreign coins to some little kids waiting online who, in turn, dumped them right back into the machine! ah, the circle of life.
i had jp lees with melissa, my last meal in new jersey. i went to the apple store and purchased osx tiger. now i’m installing it and downloading some audiobooks for the ipod. so far i’ve packed away a bunch of books i have already read (because they’re either good or relevant), and some i have not:
bob dylan – chronicles volume 1
sun tzu – the art of war
douglas adams – hitchhiker’s guide to the galaxy
howard zinn – a people’s history of the united states
william s. burroughs – naked lunch; vaudeville voices
jack kerouac – on the road; the dharma bums
chuck palahniuk – haunted
ernest hemingway – for whom the bell tolls; the old man and the sea
hunter s. thompson – fear and loathing in las vegas; the art of journalism; lecture at boulder university
fyodor dostoevsky – the brothers karamazov
al franken – lies and the lying liars who tell them
david sedaris – naked; me talk pretty one day; holidays on ice
steve martin – pure drivel; the pleasure of my company
john grisham – bleachers
plus some old time radio shows. mostly episodes of coast to coast am with art bell.
tonight i have a send-off with friends. tomorrow no update. my next missive will come courtesy of the wi-fi connection at my hotel in ohio. godspeed.
