Hello. This is my Blog.

Well, here we are. I'm blogging. Gosh! I had no idea how bright it was here in cyberspace. And look at all the post-it notes. They're everywhere! You see, I actually blogging from the past. Right now it's 1980 and Ronald Reagan just creamed Jimmy Carter in another debate. Carter plays fair, Reagan hits below the belt. We'll see who wins.

Well the big news is I quit my job today. I was working at Willie's Shoe's in Alameda as a stock clerk. My mom made me get the job after I got caught over at Brian's house smoking pot instead of staying for 7th period.

I've been working at Willie's for nearly two weeks. Willie is an obese ex-con. Dad always wants to show his support for Willie's rehabilitatioin by buying shoes at Willie's. Willie is always very polite to my Dad. But Willie runs numbers and makes book, you know-a bookie. Some shady characters usually hang around the stock room takling to Willie. My second day some thug showed up while I was sweeping and I overheard him tell Willie he couldn't pay something like six hundered dollars.

Willie, who probably weighs in at 280 at about five-ten, hit the guy so hard he fell over right on to my broom. In an instant I could see the outline of one of Willie's rings embedded in the guy's cheek. Then, as the guy picked himself up, the ring print started to bleed. He ran out the back door and drove away. Willie looked at me and said, "Don't worry kid, you'll never end up like that. As long as your're smart." Willie ran his hand over his fat pink fist, as if one blow to the guy's face might not have been enough. "He'll be back kid. He'll be back. Or he'll be dead! Ha! Ha! Heh! Ha!" The he put his hand on my shoulder, "You won't be telling your Dad about this now will you? Wouldn't be good for business now would it?"

But today I was trying on some loafers and I forgot to take them off becasue they were so comfortable. Willie caught me and told me he'd take it out of my pay. Considering the fact that Willie pays about three dollars for each pair of loafers and he was going to take it out of my pay at retail ($48.50), I tried to negotiate. Willie and I came to an agreement-I'd leave with the loafers and not come back to work, and he'd forget about paying me.

No one at home noticed my brand new loafers, except for my older sister Trish who threatened to tell mom if I didn't promise to go back to Willie's and get her a pair of those really ugly pink shoes she's be coveting since I got the job there.

Trish picked me up from Willie's shoes on her way home from Chorus rehearsal. She's really uptight and is always telling me what a good singer she is and how many boyfriends she's always having sex with. I told her if she made me steal the shoes from Willie's I'd blab to Mom and Dad about the boyfriends. So she said, "They already know and you can tell them whatever you want. I'm eighteen."

"Well, I may be only thirteen, and I may be a virgin, but I'm not stealing those ghastly shoes and if you mentioin the loafers to mom and dad, I will tell about a certain trip to Lake Tahoe." She shut right up.

Dad had to replace the transmission in the Mercury Monarch about three weeks ago. He was pissed.

It all started as a birthday present to Trish. Dad let Trish have the Mercury for the whole weekend as long as she only visited people's houses we knew AND she couldn't leave the city of Oakland. Trish promised and made out this elaborate itenerary which had so many stops at friends houses on it, Dad would never be able to check up on her. Her last stop before she got home was supposed to be Joan's house.

But Trish lied. She and Joan had told Joan's parents that they were going to a slumber party and the two of them drove all the way up to Lake Tahoe so so Trish could pick up some guys and Joan could be with her boyfriend Charlie. Charlie goes to Sierra Tahoe College. He's a creep, but his little brother Ed is in my Chemistry class and he told everyone in lab how his brother had like seventeen orgasms while he was having sex with Joan. That's how I found out about the Tahoe trip.

Anyway, Trish drove Dad's Mercury Monarch all the way up to Lake Tahoe in second gear and ruined the automatic transmission. When Dad got in the car to go to work on Monday morning. He got about two miles before the car stopped working. He was as mad as I'd ever seen him when Trish got home from school that day.

Trish had lied through her teeth about the whole thing. She kissed dad on the cheek and told him not to worry. Then she blamed one of my older brothers who'd had the earlier that week. "I thought something felt funny on the way from Fenton's up to Lisa Warnke's house at 3:45 on Saturday. Maybe you should ask Michael about it."

It was a good thing Mom wasn't around because she can tall when any of us lies. But Mom was off in New York, singing with Marilyn Horne at a retired-opera-singer's recital at Carnegie Hall.

So I'm off the hook about the hideous pink shoes, but I'll have to make something up about quitting my job. Back at Brian's house, Brian offered a little advice as he passed me a joint. "Tell your mom Willie tried to molest you. Then you'll never have to work again." The idea did have it's merits but I think my folks would have gone the "Pressing Full Charges" route on that one. I want to keep a cordial reltationship going with Willie. He's a good business man. Besides, the notion that Willie would be able to get near me is preposterous. I can move much faster.