Happy Blarghidays...

The bond that links your true family is not one of blood, but of respect and joy in each other's life. Rarely do members of one family grow up under the same roof. - Richard Bach

The holidays always seem like a trying time, especially when it comes to family. Is it due to a recent death or a crippling disease? I guess that depends on how you look into it. If a constant barrage of arguments and drunken disputes is a normal thing for you then skip this post.

My family consists of many people that believe everyone else in the world can read their minds. If this was true life would be so much easier. Mix in alcohol and it's close to playing Russian Roulette. Especially if you're players have angry or violent compulsions when drinking. To say the least, it's not one of my more favorite activities during the holidays. This year I don't have the luxury of working and missing out on all the fun.

When you do electrical work your entire life, you don't look forward to getting home and doing more electrical work. So when you deal with people that argue with you and possibly get violent while drinking, the last thing you want to do is deal with them at home. It's a completely different ordeal. Complete strangers and family are two different values all together. You're less likely to flag a cop down when you're dealing with your family unless it is an extreme situation.

Blend in the opinion that something is wrong with a person because they don't drink or "party" and now they have fuel. The constant "Oh, you're just too good to drink with us", or "Come on pussy! Drink!" starts out funny and turns into annoyance quickly. So my typical holiday has been; show up, eat, exchange, and go to work. Quick, efficient, to the point and I get to miss out on all the fun. This year the option will be; show up, eat, exchange and go do something more entertaining, like go to a friend's house to watch that holiday movie that's on a hundred times a year.

So there's my big holiday excitement. Hope your's is much more of a jolly good time.

-Be Safe.

New Year's Eve...

It's New Year's Eve and your going out in style!! Drunken Style, that is..

Please re-visit the Don't List to help your night go smoother.

Remember, a lot of people are out tonight. A lot of drunk people that are more idiots tonight than ever. There's also a lot of thieves out tonight too.

Ladies. Keep your hands on your purses at all times. One of the stupidest things you can do is imagine that you live in a world that someone won't steal your purse.

Men. Keep your hands to yourself and your mouths shut. No one wants to know if you think your tough.

Have fun but be safe by all means.

If you see a long line at your favorite establishment then take very good care of the doorstaff if you want in. It's New Year's and even if you might be special on busy nights, you might not be special tonight. Besides, the doorstaff is already dealing with enough crap to be nice, so be extra nice to them.

Be safe, have fun and I'll see you next year.

New Day..

I've never really understood the big deal about New Year's Eve. Maybe it's the cynical part of me coming to the surface again.

New Year's has always just been another night to me, nothing very special.

It's a big night for the bar industry. A night that everyone goes out for and almost everyone is wasted for. The city offers special rates for public transportation and the cab companies sometimes give deals for the wasted. All done in good ways so people get home safe and aren't stuck passing out in alleyways. It also keeps some of the drunks off the street so sober people like myself aren't in such danger of driving home.

When I was a kid growing up the family got together with close relatives and we all hung out at another relatives house for New Year. These days we're all lucky if we see each other once a year. I never really saw the big deal about New Year's then either. Other than I could stay up past midnight.

Everything has been pretty busy this past week. Everyone is starting to get used to the cold so now they're coming out more. This weekend has been busier as well. People have Monday and Tuesday off so it's like an extended 4 day weekend. Which means it's busier for me too.

I guess time will tell as to how busy Monday night is. Usually there's a private event on New Year's, not this year. Business as usual. It's always better to have a private event for New Year's. Less drunk walk ups means a better time for all.

Be safe this year. If you go out, don't drive. If you must drive. Don't drink.

Ho Ho Ho...

Ah Christmas time... Such a slow night of nights.

The neighborhood looks like it should be a scene from a horror movie. Desolate and only a few lights on other than the street lights. I'm just waiting for the zombies to start moaning and stumbling their way in.

Of course that never happens. That would be too much excitement for such a day.

Later in the night we'll get a few alcohol induced zombies. They're not as fun as real zombies. It's not like I could bust their heads open and save the world. Well.. No... I couldn't.

Hope everyone's holiday went better than planned.

Be safe.

Just a bow and nothing more....

"Did Santa talk to you yet?"

"Who?"

"Santa Claus..." The woman standing before me was quite the looker. She was about 5'6" and had all the curves in the right places. She filled out the curves in almost perfect proportions.

"Why would he talk to me?"

"Well, I told him that I wanted you for Christmas."

"I'm a little busy for Christmas but I'm free after work tonight."

She smiled, "Oh, I've always wanted to get my presents early." She reached up and rested her hand on my chest. "Well, I guess I'll just wait for you inside then." She reached for the door to the establishment.

"You should do that. First though, I need your i.d. before you go in."

She reached into her purse and pulled out her i.d.. I took it and looked at it, the birthdate was 1-5-87. "Hun, you know your not old enough to come in here right?"

She smiled and gave me a subtle wink, "Oh, I'll make up for it later tonight."

I stood there looking at her. I looked in through the door and noticed a guy standing inside. He was giving her the thumbs up then thumbs down sign as if asking, "Are you getting in?"

I looked back at her, "Sorry hun, I'm sure it would have been wonderful but your gonna have to wait a few days before you come in."

"Oh, I gave you the wrong one, that's my sisters," she reached into her purse again and pulled out a second i.d. "Here, this ones me."

I look at the second i.d., "This isn't you." I slide the i.d. into my pocket.

"Yes it is."

"Really? Different last name as your sister? It's slightly possible. 6'2"? Not possible. To top it off, the i.d. expired 3 years ago. It's not you."

Her face dropped. The smiled eroded into a frown, her eyebrows dropped and her eyes squinted. "Oh, you would of let me in if you didn't see these huh? You fuckin perv!" Her voice became louder as it went on.

As she was talking I raised my hand in front of her face. With my fingers straight I closed them together so they met my thumb as if symbolizing her mouth to close like a puppet. I think this angered her because she just kept talking. Then it was my turn to be loud.

"Hey! Listen. If you were old enough to come in, I'd let you in. I didn't start this conversation. You did. Don't write checks with your mouth if your ass can't cash it. Walk away, we're done."

She just kept talking. So every time she started to talk I'd hold up my hand and add in a "Shh". Then the door opened and the guy that was standing inside stepped out.

"Hey man, how come my friend can't come in?"

"Because she's 20."

"What? She was just in my bar. She's old enough."

"Guess you better learn how to spot fakes."

The guy turned around and walked back into the establishment. The girl started to walk away and I had to add my 2 cents. "Keep talking to Santa maybe he'll get what you want for next year." I smiled and waved as she walked off.

She turned around, yelled "Fuck you!!" and gave me the 2 middle finger salute.

I stood there wondering if I would have fallen for that if she had given me the other i.d. first. Anythings possible especially when your wanted as a Christmas gift. Can't let Santa down, ya know?

Time in a Car...

A couple days in the car and we pull into a another big city. This one is much bigger and is riddled with much more notorious individuals. I've often thought about coming to a city like this with it's history of mobsters but part of me has always told me that it'd just get me in trouble.

The weather here is about the same as the weather back home, cold and wet. It's much more windy here though. A couple days in the car with my friend and we got here safe and sound. Then it only took us another hour or so to find parking once we found my brother's house. Every where you look you see lawn furniture in the streets. People saving their parking spots now that the snow has been flying. Don't tell anyone but I did move one to take a spot. I just put it across the street in an empty spot though. Sometimes it's fun to be Loki for a day...

Spending that much time in a car with a person can either make or break the trip. You never really know how much you can stand a person until your locked in a car for a long time. It's a lot of one on one time and no way to escape. You get to see what you have in common and any reasons why you might want this person to disappear off the face of the Earth. You get to see things about a person that probably wouldn't come up in every day situations.

We made it to my brothers and got everything inside and unpacked. In a few more days we'd be off to our parents house. I finally got a break from everyone the next day when my brother's girlfriend and my friend decided they should go shopping.

"No, don't let him on your computer, he'll never get off that damn thing!"

I slightly smiled and raised my right index finger to the temple of my head and rotated it in a circle and then lowered it and pointed at my friend behind my other hand.

"Seriously, he won't..."

"Oh I know, who do you think is the geek between us?" My brother has a splendid way with words.

My brother and I stayed home and here I am updating this as my brother watches tv. He knows about the blog and helps keep it private, I think. Once again, that's paranoia sinking in... Once they were off it was time to try and update.

So there's a bit of an update. Soon we'll be off to do the traditional early Christmas and I'll be back in time to keep the kids at bay. I think we're going to actually go out to a few of the clubs around here this weekend. Should be interesting to see what some of them are like.

Ah, the holidays... so great.

Blogs & the holidays...

With the holidays approaching so does a lot of travel time. So I may not be able to update as frequently as I'd like to. So I jumped on the Twitter band wagon so I can do some small mobile posts.

You can keep up with my mobile posts at: http://twitter.com/mike_drmn

I also put the Twitter widget on the left of the page under the Recent Comments.

Twitter is very easy to use and it's a good way to keep up without a computer around. I haven't jumped into the laptop area just yet and it's pretty hard to carry a desktop pc around on your back. So with all this said I'll introduce you to a few other blogs that you might like as well. This way you can keep up with them until I can get back on to a regular post basis.


Kimchihead

I just started reading Kimchihead a couple months ago. I really like the way this guy writes.

His style is like the old gritty detective stories that you might associate with from the 1940's. He's very descriptive and the entries he posts are like stories all in their own. There's a slight backdrop of insight and a lesson in each one. Some of the stories even pull at the strings of the heart.


Clublife

Clublife has been a blog that I've read for a long time. It actually gave me the idea to start up this blog. I hate to say that I'm following someone's example but everyone does at some point. I'm not out looking for a book deal but I'm glad that he found his. We're similar in some senses but the environments are different.

So if you want to see another doorman's perspective jump over and read his. The archives are well worth reading. In fact, you might want to start with his oldest posts first.


Blogdiggidy!

Angie T brings you Chicago. Her posts are usually humorous and she has an undying love for a certain politician. Throw in odd posts of comedians and her own insight and you have a great read.


If you want to check out any of the blogs that I check up on, feel free to follow the links in the link section on the left. I need to go through and clean house though.. Some of them seem to be collecting dust. Too bad, I really enjoyed reading them. I can understand though, there have been times that I've thought about hanging up my keyboard too.

I'll be posting infrequently until the holidays are over.

Have a great holiday and I'll probably be back before you know it.

Be safe.