Syllabus #107

I spent the first full day of my summer vacation performing an exorcism by way of guerilla landscaping. 

See, the haunted house nextdoor to ours was held in the grips of an unholy force that was spreading unchecked - a bamboo forest.  The bamboo was creeping into our yard, threatening our foundation.  I razed that shit, one stalk at a time, and sprayed it with enough Roundup to create a superfund site.  I'm not proud of that part, but also I don't want that demon weed compromising the structural integrity of my home.  (Also, sidenote, I did get permission from the caretaker guy who doesn't own the place but periodically checks on it for the absentee owners and makes sure the guy squatting in the 2nd floor apartment of the other haunted house two doors over hasn't burned down the joint.)

It took hours in the blazing sun, but I channeled my aggression for all the BS I had to endure throughout the past year and I handled that shit.  Two hours deep into this labor, it occurred to me that I forgot to have coffee that morning, and I was deriving all my energy and life force from pure rage.  When the deed was done, I was glad to have access to a dumpster to dispose of all the cut bamboo.  After a water damage abatement crew came and gutted the house after the pipes burst over the winter, they left a bright orange dumpster full of moldy drywall and soggy carpet sitting in the driveway.  It's been a couple months and it has taken on the piquant odor of sun-warmed dog feces from all the people who walk their dogs and toss their poop bags in there.  Here's hoping the bamboo masks some of the dog shit smell. 

I capped off the first day of my hot girl summer by doing a New Yorker crossword puzzle in pen and getting in bed at 8:30.  Who's living their best life now, Oprah?*

*Still you, girl.  You have a private chef to craft innovative seasonal signature cocktails for you and Stedman and Gayle to enjoy on the porch of your Hawaiian estate.  I poured myself a glass of rose out of a box and sat on my porch next to a dumpster full of dog shit.  The only thing tethering us together across the cosmos is that my porch/dumpster is 5 blocks away from your dad's barbershop, and I'll be damned if that doesn't mean something.**

**You're right, that is meaningless.

A tree grows in Nashville

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I'm here for all Mare of Easttown cultural criticism. 

Woman lives in man's closet in Japan for a year, gets caught when he finally notices his food is disappearing.  I saw this article the day after I found a mysterious half-empty 12-pack of Busch beer under our porch.  It was slightly weathered and dusty but clearly was placed there within the past few months.  I texted the article to Andy from within the browser and then opened up my text messages and accidentally sent the following sentence to my mom:  "What if somebody is living in our crawl space and using the underneath of the porch as their food storage and that's why that 12 pack of beer was there"

I told Andy not to go for a long ride on a stomach full of hot chicken but did he listen?  

Just hideous 

Sounds like a real anti-climax 

Analog Reading:

Finished Selfish Shallow and Self-Absorbed.  It me, all three.

Also finished Notes from the Bathroom Line.  It was amusing.

Reading Festival Days, and essay/story collection by Jo Ann Beard.  Wow the writing is fluid and beautiful and so well crafted as to seem effortless, but the topics are a little brutal and heavy and sad.