I'm Studying You

Time-wasting...and a global warning.

It's almost the middle of August in The 'Lo, so riddle me this my brothers and sisters: why are all the fans in my place set to the "off" position, most of the windows shut, and I awoke from a short nap covered in a more thick than thin blanket; and why is it positively chilly in the shade when, at this juncture of the calendar, I should be a dripping mess of sweat and road crumbs that stick to you after you've tossed a football around for an hour? The first meteorologenius that utters "Global Warming" is gonna get a barage of iceballs loaded with rocks aimed at their mouthpiece.

So how did I manage to kill time last night? We went old-school. After getting some sustinence in the form of donated Arby's "food", Jake, Winkz and K-Wol came over for a friendly cutthroat game marathon otherwise known as Monopoly. Winkz pretty much housed us, but I had the (im)moral victory of the evening. The highlights:

Jake's the first one out after a rash of bad luck, followed by K-Wol, who's mortgaging faster than an overzealous loan marketer like a scandal waiting to happen. K-Wol folds his assets into the bank and accuses me of costing him the game, which I kinda did but at the same time he proposed and/or agreed to some lousy deals.

Me vs. Winkz and the matchup seems almost even except for one little detail: while I've got a comfortable amount of cash, homeboy has scored all the loot in Free Parking. He must've hit it for almost $3k. I've got multiple houses and B'way and Boardwalk and the yellow properties; he's got hotels on the orange properties. K-Wol is livid now, saying I screwed him out of almost $4k in a shrewd Railroad deal.

Railroad-gate Scandal, Part 1: Off the bat, K-Wol snaps up two RR's and is foaming at the mouth for the other two. I land on it and the bidding begins. I convince him to pay for it and give me an extra $400 for it-deal. Not more than a few minutes later I landed on the last unsold RR and you think K-Wol had just seen a naked woman for the first time, so I knew if I got creative with this, I could totally use this to my advantage. After a few minutes of mediocre wheeling and dealing, and trying to determine what properties could be exchanged, he caves and goes "I'll buy it off you ($200) AND give you $800 on top of it." Good deal, right? Hahahahaha...who wouldn't take that? Me. This kid sitting in my chair, that's who. I told him I'd take his offer...only if I got immunity from having to pay him anything the first 5 times I landed on any of the RR's. Jake and Winkz roared, as if I had just hit K-Wol over the back with a steel chair and punched his grammama. This, to them, was an unprecidented manuever. But the lure of at least being able to take money from the other two was too good at the time.

Railroad-gate Scandal, Part 2: I think K-Wol's brushcut grew an inch or two during the game, and not because we played all night. The first two times I landed on a RR he got all cocky and excited, only to be reminded of the immunity deal. Oooohh was he pissed. The third and fifth immunities came when I pulled the Chance and Community Chest cards that said "Report to the nearest railroad and pay the owner double the rent". That sent him over the edge...throwing stuff, threatening (jokingly) to flip the table, raising his voice and hating on me for not making $1400 on me and overpaying sickeningly for the two RR's. But like I said earlier, he struck the deals...he agreed. He played himself.

That game took a good four hours, if not more. I went to bed around 3:30am but didn't fall asleep until maybe 6am. Woke up a tired groggy mess just after 9:30. Not the ideal night of rest.

Didn't do anything most of the day but try to call the Unemployment people. After following their paper instructions and battling through the menus with their touch-tone voice of Satan, I'd get to a message that said "We're sorry. Due to a high volume of calls, we are unable to answer your call at this time. Please try your call again later." How about kiss my ass, hire some people to take the calls you're so inundated with, and reinstate my benefits you snotty wankers, so I can pay off each four minute waste of a phone call on my bill when I go over my minutes because you're not in my My Faves 5. Rotten douchetools. I swear.

Whew. Now I feel better. I'm gonna go put something on the hip I Bo Jackson'd earlier playing catch... I bent down for the ball, heard a slight pop, and I'm back to walking like an amputee with arthritic prosthetics. Which should make straightening up the house all the more fun for about the only bit of good news this week... Pop Diesel is stopping by at his usual time (around noon, maybe earlier) to drop of a few things. I didn't think we'd be going away this weekend anyway because this week is the county fair and sunday is Fair Military Veterans Appreciation Day so he gets in for free. So who knows, maybe we'll hang out a bit this weekend. Anyway, y'all have a good weekend and take advantage of all the immunities you get. Peace.