Bnuzleb

obviously elswhere?

2008-08-02T07:13:00.000-07:00

check redingreen.blogspot.com for some possible new stuph

We Branded a man in Vermont (pt.2)

2006-07-21T12:04:00.000-07:00

I kept telling myself that he would never really go through with it. by the time he got through that case of beer he'd be passed out, or too drunk to hike into camp.

"Hurry up!" he barked. "I got to get back to Jersey by friday!"

"you have to let the the brand get red hot first." Red cajoled. "otherwise, it won't leave a scar."

here i was trying to weasel my way out of piercing this guy and Red agrees to brand him. like he needed any more encouragement. it's a scary thing when I look around camp and I'M the most responsible one there. Red has dreads down to his ass, multiple brands and like twenty piercings and i'm thinking there's no telling WHAT he's gonna do to this guy.

somehow i was elected as the designated handholder. the guy said he wouldn't feel any pain but there must have been a little, he kept squeezing my hand when the brand struck.

we didn't have a true brand, of course. we used a troll pole that was hammered flat on one end. a troll pole is the pole you use to stoke the fire. the person tending the fire is the troll. ususally the end is bent almost closed on one end anyways, it helps concentrate the air when you blow on the fire.

"Put my wife's initials on there." yelled the drunk. "then maybe she won't be so mad about the nose ring."

or that's how it started, anyways. after a few strikes he decided he wanted her whole fuckin' name on there. each time we had to stick the troll pole back in the fire, stoking it with a second troll pole until it was red hot. i'm sure there was some chick there that was feeding the fire but i can't recall her name either.

finally, we finished the branding. all told i'm sure it took a couple of hours and about ten strikes, i was pretty delirious from the all-night drive and i can't be sure.

i wasn't gonna be the one to remind him about the nose ring. i was hoping between the case of beer, sleep deprivation, mile-long hike and branding that he would forget. no such luck. he insisted i go back to the car and get the stuff to do it with.

i tried persuasion, stalling tactics, even 'forgetting' the stuff in the car. still, he was adamant. if he was still awake when i got back from the lot, he'd have his piercing. i started off, shaking my head as i walked down the trail.

oh, well, i thought, at least it wasn't a tatt. you can take out a piercing.

(to be continued?)

We branded a man in Vermont

2006-06-23T12:26:00.000-07:00

this is for the rainbow family.

he wanted us to do it, of course. i don't believe in that kind of thing normally but a deal's a deal, and he'd already fulfilled his end of the bargain.

"Are you sure you're not too drunk to do this?" I asked. I know, STUPID question.

"You're gonna brand me and then pierce my nose!" he replied. Actually Red was the one that agreed to brand him, I had nothing to do with that part. I had agreed to pierce his septum for a ride to Vermont though. Shit I wanted a ride so bad I would have agreed to give him a Prince Albert if I had to.

"don't worry," he continued. "I broke my back a few years ago and i won't feel a thing. disconnected nerves and all that."

He picked me up in New Jersey, the staties ran me off the highway so I found a rest stop to sit out what became one motherfucker of a rainstorm. and there I was, soaked to the gills, out of money, and just about out of luck. Fuckin' Jersey, one of the first states to outlaw hitchhiking. assholes. A t-shirt I saw there kept coming to mind for some reason;

"Welcome to Jersey. Now go the fuck home."

home. there's a thought. I like to think that I can be at home anywhere, but the rain had washed away what little was left of my Taoist philosophy.

I couldn't wait to get back to Vermont and sit next to a warm fire, put up my tent, and settle in. we were camped out in a prime spot, plenty of wood to burn and water, too. little springs with flecks of fool's gold where you could drink right out of the ground. I never knew water could taste so good!

"Where you goin?" I was so lost in thought I didn't see him coming. I still can't remember his name.

"Vermont"

"You're on the wrong side of the interstate. I'm going the other way."

"I know, but it doesn't matter. Staties'll just run me off again anyways."

"Can you drive?"

"Sure."

"How about this? I'll give you a ride to Vermont. but you have to give me a piercing like that." he said, pointing at my nose.

"You want me to pierce your nose?" I couldn't believe what I was hearing. this guy didn't exactly look like the type to pierce any part of his body, let alone go for 'el toro.' he was clean cut and shaven, looked like he was on a business trip or something.

"Yea. why not? my old lady will probably kill me but fuck it. it looks cool."

"Deal." I agreed. the alternative was to sit there sopping wet for god knows how long, what was I supposed to do? I figured that even if this guy was stark raving mad, it was still better to be in a warm, dry car with a lunatic then to sleep another night out in the rain.

he popped the trunk so I could put my backpack inside. then he pulled out a case of beer.

"You drive, I'll drink." he said, tossing me the keys as we got in the car.

to be continued...

it's not you, it's me

2006-05-24T14:55:00.000-07:00

i might have something you haven't seen up at http://redingreen.blogspot.com, i resurrected it.

i have no internet at home or work anymore so i haven't been blogging much. and i left my laptop in portland and etc.. etc..

just in case anyone was wondering

fair's fair

2006-04-05T13:22:00.000-07:00

i'm in california baby, it's rained on me for a week, i think it's my karma for leaving the rainy willamette valley for texas a while back, now the rain is getting back at me.

i feel like a dumbass for deleting all my blogs, and my old myspace account, now i've lost touch with a few people and that was not my intention, if you're one of those people my deepest apologies, hopefully i won't be having such a paranoid episode again.

this is east of the sierras near mojave, we thought we were going to go through reno but that was too snowed in and we were afraid we'd kill the car so we ended up turning around. pulled that trailer all the way in though, redid the coils and shocks on my rear suspension because i was almost scraping the ground, nothing that 400 bucks wouldn't fix though. the other vehicle needed a new radiator in mojave, other than that it was a pretty good trip. note to self, get another mummy-type sleeping bag.

i feel good about the move, when this weather breaks and the sun comes out i'm going to be STOKED!

The Inaugural and Official Misti Purple 69 meme

2006-03-08T05:29:00.000-08:00

Here are the rules, in honor of the legendary blogger mistipurple (who is obsessed with the number 69) this idea has been kicked around but I'm making it official.

1) the person tagged may not post until their 69 meme gets 69 comments (if you must post something, just post date the meme so it will stay at the top of your blog)

2) the person who gets tagged is somewhat voluntary, it's whoever comments the 69th comment on this tag.

Real old bloggers never die

2006-03-07T07:27:00.000-08:00

i'll stop now, promise

The Texas Horny Toad

2006-03-06T20:35:00.000-08:00

the first time I went hitchhiking my first ride took me two miles and gave me three beers. I figured at that rate I would get shit-faced, but not really get anywhere.

Oregon to New Jersey, or at least that's what I was thinking. an angel came to me that day, what better omen than seeing some pretty girl as you're walking down the highway, leaving on a 2000+ mile journey. funny, she had never given me the time of day before. maybe seeing me leaving made her all mushy, she wished me luck and kissed me goodbye.

at least I made it out of town, I thought, sticking my thumb out in search of my next ride. It didn't take long, a semi pulled up and popped open its door. my dog, an 80 poundish Rott, was terrified, but somehow I wrestled him up into the cab and hopped in.

the trucker introduced himself as Glenn, he didn't tell me his nickname until later. we made small talk and shot the shit, turns out we were both from Texas, he was from San Antone.

he had the whole stereotypical redneck look. Jeff Foxworthy mustache, trucker cap, and a mullet to boot. NOT the kind of crowd I usually hang with, but for some reason we became fast friends. We drove all the way through to Wyoming that night, swapping stories and plans, he telling me about his wife or girlfriend in Washington, I told him I was going to Jersey to see a friend and just get out of Oregon for a while.

"Mind if I have a little smoke?" I asked, after we had been on the road for a few hours. he didn't mind but he didn't want any either, probably didn't want to fail his next piss test.

turns out he was actually going all the way to New Jersey, fucker was gonna take me all the way there, too. he even said he'd teach me to drive the thing, unbelievable. too bad I never got the chance.

he had some good methamphetamine so he got me high at a rest stop, the first time I'd ever tried it, we smoked it off of tin foil, sucking the smoke up through a toilet paper roll. It definitely worked. I was bright eyed and bushy tailed for the duration of the trip, even though we didn't get to Little America until almost dusk the next day.

"You're gonna like Little America," he said, "They've got strippers, hoes, gambling, all kinds a shit."

green as I was I believed him. If you'd ever been to Little America you'd be laughing your ass off right now, all they had was one quiet little bar with one bartender, no waitresses, and only about five truckers sitting around. I quietly asked him where all the action was, reminding him of what he told me. the bartender heard me, I think, and gave me a dirty look. we had already had a few beers in the cab before coming in and I was probably talking louder than I thought.

one other thing. I had brought a vial of liquid LSD along for the trip. while we were catching a buzz before heading into the bar he said he wanted to try some, that he hadn't had any in years. I obliged and double dosed him, but he said he wanted more. I think in total we each took four or five hits.

after a few rounds in the bar, we started frying pretty hard. it started feeling a little too weird so we got some grub and headed back out to the truck. we hung out for about another hour, finished our chicken wings and jojos or whatever and basically just tripped. this was some pretty pure shit, and don't forget about the multiplier effect. we were drunk, high, frying, and sleep deprived all at the same time. it was to the point where I didn't even know WHAT I was looking at half the time, so when he tried to convince me the couple in the truck next to us was fucking, it took me a while to call him out on his bullshit.

Glenn was a little more wound up than me, and being hopped up on meth probably wasn't helping any. at one point he got out of the cab and walked around the whole truck. I saw him kicking the tires in the reflection of the rear-view mirror, then he got back in for a while, got out again, the second time he didn't come right back. after a few minutes I started getting a little worried. I felt WAY too high to go looking for him so I stayed in the cab and just hoped for the best, giving up on him after a while and laying down in the back. in retrospect I probably should have gone looking for him, or never dosed him in the first place. I’ve since learned that some people need babysitting when they're high and/or drunk and come to expect it, back then I didn't know any better.

after an interminable eternity, I heard, guess what, a radio squawking outside and saw someone flashing a flashlight around. I heard some yelling, one voice was distant, the other sounded closeby. after what seemed like another eternity, someone opened the door.

"Anybody in there?" shouted the officer. I was terrified, laying there trying not to breath, weighing my options. I decided it was either make myself known or wait for them to come in and find me, which would be worse.

"Yeah?" I replied weakly, wondering if somehow I could get them to just go away. that turned out to be wishful thinking.

"You mind stepping out of the cab for a few minutes?"

"Am I under arrest or something?" thinking if I wasn't I really didn't have to do anything they said. again, wishful thinking on my part.

"What? Do you wanna be under arrest?" barked the cop. "Ok then, yea, you're under arrest!" I just love it how the police have a way of bending the law around to suit their needs.

I reluctantly got out and confronted the Wyoming state trooper. he didn't look like much, guess they don't see too much action out there and it doesn't matter if you're old and out of shape. he had me walk out in the open by the squad car, where his fat partner is grilling Glenn, who has somehow lost his shirt and is standing there wildly gesticulating and telling the guy god knows what.

somehow I talked my way out of it, mostly just going along with what the cops were saying. yea, I just met the guy, yea, I don't know, I guess he had too much to drink. I was so fucked up myself I don't know how they let me go, my pupils must have been as big as dinner plates. it probably just comes down to the fact that I wasn't the driver and they didn't want to process me. Glenn got taken away in an ambulance and probably spent the night in the drunk tank, I hope he didn't lose his license but he probably did. I had gotten his cell number but I could never get a hold of him and I never saw him again.

an old haiku from a deleted account

2006-02-15T06:27:00.000-08:00

let it be enough

for the wind to caress you

because I cannot