the igloo habitat

day 3
Originally uploaded by ruelloehr.

This week has been yuck a roo. Too much worky work and the a.c. decided to die as the mercury rose into triple digits. Sometimes it's just more than a guy can take.

I realize now that I need to optimum temperature in order to sleep. I'm talking cold, like 68, so I can invoke the quilt principal. This is why I hate sleeping at other peoples houses. I dated a girl once who didn't have a.c. I had to drop her though. I made a lame excuse, but the real reason was she didn't have a.c. at her house. I slept over a few times, but couldn't take heat. Sometimes I wonder if things would have been different had her home been equipped with central air. It's a funny thought, at least to me.

So yesterday was sort of the culmination of my frustrations and I was rapidly approaching my yearly meltdown stage. It was about 11 pm and I had just gotten back from playing volleyball, cracked a pepsi open, and sat down on our newly shampooed carpet to watch the peoples court.

Tattoed brother: Hey, uh, Fred peed on the floor and I threw your jeans on top of it because the landlord was here.

(I pick up my jeans, the legs are soaked with piss)

Angry me: Why did you use my jeans? Why not a towel?

Tattooed brother: The landlord was here.

Angry me: Thanks a lot, dick. Why didn't you clean it up? I spent 300 bucks on a carpet shampooer, you should help me get a return on my investment.

Tattooed brother: The landlord was here.

Angry me: That was eight hours ago.

Tattoed brother: I was tired. I needed a nap.

Angry me: Fred, get evan.

(Fred leaps into action, runs and bite the tattoed brother on the arm)

Angry me: Good boy. Stop peeing on the floor.

sketchdump164

sketchdump164
Originally uploaded by ruelloehr.

shopping list

Guitar

AMP

Drums

slight levels of insurance fraud

So there's another hurricane or something and it looks like the fallout is headed our way. Tattooed brother said, "We should park our trucks under tree. Maybe some big limbs will fall on them." (My truck is rapidly approaching the shitty stage and his is already there) "Why is it that the first thing you think of is scamming the insurance company?", I asked. "Well duh, it's how we were raised."

I couldn't argue.

Everybody has skills, my family is quite versed in the art of getting the most possible out of the insurance company. I won't go into great detail here as some of it is on the borderline shady level, but one event does come to mind.

Back in the day tattooed brother ditched his firebird wrinkling the right front fender. The neighbor, Barry, was in autobody school and offered to a paint a new one for him. Let's just say it turned out horrendous. Not long after the firebird was furiously struck by a grey haired lady whose vision was on the decline. Naturally the damage was quite extensive to the right side up to but not including the front fender. The next day I walked out to the parking lot of the family store to see a father, uncle, grandfather and pre-tattooed brother complete with hammers, various sized pieces of lumber all putting dents into the front fender.

"What are you guys doing?" I asked.

Nobody said a word, they all just turned and grinned the same grin that families often share.

------------
I decided today that I am bored with sitting in my living room and playing guitar by myself. I'm going to by a Fender Telecaster and find a punk country band to join.

I lost the morning and then I lost the afternoon.

sketchdump 163
Originally uploaded by ruelloehr.

I've eaten my last skillet sensation.

Garlic chicken, that's the one that did me in. With the first bite, I knew something was amiss. My body began alerting me to cease and desist, although I chose not to heed the warnings. 15 minutes later things went from bad to worse. The garlic taste was seeping up in my esophagus and lingering in my mouth. I tried to wash it down with some water, but the garlic chicken prevailed. I won't go into further details but just be sure, I'm done with pre-packaged food.

We considered calling stupid to fix the stove, but the house was too dirty. Instead, I went to Bed Bath and Beyond and bought a toaster oven. I hate shopping there. It's filled with girls buying dumb, useless things for their apartments. Boys are truly much more efficient (at least I am). The BB&B experience is both sad and unfortuanate. Occasionally, you will pass another male who happens to be in tow of his significant other. They tend to walk with their heads pointed downard and at the last second he will look up and meet your eyes with a glazed, beaten look, as if saying, "Sigh....I know. It's come to this." I try not to look, affording them some dignity, but it makes me want to scream, "What are you doing here picking out drapes??!? It's not right, man. This is not your place."

I continued on....

For a moment, I caught myself looking at a complete silverware set. "Look at that. Spoons. How nice would that be?", I thought. Reality quickly consumed me though. I cannot spend 30-100 dollars on silverware. It goes against every principal I hold dear.

So I just bought a toaster oven instead.

That being said, I now feel like a 9 year girl old cooking in a ready bake oven, luckily, my manhood is quite secure and it's not quite so threatening.

So you can see, dear friends, things are good. I scored a free ticket to a George Carlin show this Saturday and I ran two miles today before my brain hemmorage kicked in. The house is stinky, we forgot to take out the trash last week, and yesterday the air conditioner quit because we had never changed the filter. Things are as they should be.

sketchdump161

sketchdump161
Originally uploaded by ruelloehr.

sketchdump 162

sketchdump 162
Originally uploaded by ruelloehr.

day 2

day 2
Originally uploaded by ruelloehr.

The font is a barrel of monkeys. Paintings like this are fun and fast. I worked on it today while I watched a zombie movie. Truly a state of bliss.

After a year and a half we can now in our home we can now bake. Did I call Mr. Furley and have him fix the stove. No way, I say. A code red cleaning extravaganza would be required. Instead, being the geniuses we are, we bought a little baby toaster oven.

I backed cupcakes and put sprinkles on them.

Having a deeply rich catholic background, I considered myself quite lucky to come across a Catholic sex - ed book circa the 1960's era. The illustrations are epic and are will make fine gawdy wall art. Here is the first of two, obviously not completed. 

the hot chick bomb.

I often poke fun at my athletic schools or lack thereof. Today is no different. Since I packed my SUV and headed to the lone star state nearly two years ago, I've been in search of a Volleyball league to join. One recently came up, just in time to replace Christian softball I might add; I quickly scrambled to pull a team together.

In a clever, yet hasty email deluge I assaulted my friends with plees to join my team. To my shock only a few showed interest. To say the least, I was crushed although not yet defeated. Thus, I turned to craigslist.

Your probably familiar with Craigslist, but just case in case your not it's a messageboard where you can buy a car, get an apartment, or find somebody to shit on your face. It truly runs the gamut of society.

Within hours I had my team.

An open gym was scheduled on Sunday and I was ready to play. I walked in and quickly surmised the situation. It seems evil-doers had broken into the Town Lake YMCA and detonated a hot chick bomb.

Things were looking good.

Our first oppponents approached the court. Nearly all females, none less then 6 foot, I smelled a ringer. My volleyball skills are based on the laws of random. The ball hits me and then goes in random places. Luckily I'm comfortable with this.

We rotated and I found my spot in the front line. Across from me, a 6'2 spiker who I am quite sure was on the pro circuit. If I had to guess, her name was Helen or Ingrid or something Nordic like that. The ball was set into motion. Now, I usually sing Metallica songs to pump me up while I am playing and today was no different. Just as I was getting into the heavy part of enter sandman, Helen/Ingrid backed up and began a dash for the net. "Oh shit..She's gonna spike me in the face as a result of her frustration with the male gender." I had no choice but to run up, close my eyes, and jump...so I did. A thousand wasps hit my hand. I opened my peepers and quickly realized I had just blocked the supa-spike. I looked at my team, all who were staring at me like, "Holy shit. I can't believe he did that."

I would never trade any of my skills for athletics but, I have to admit, doing stuff like that is pretty sweet.

Still on a helga blocking high I returned home. Evan was standing on the chair wearing his toolbelt.

R: "What'cha doin?

E: "I'm mounting brackets on the wall to hold positionable speakers."

R: "Oh. I blocked some tall chick's volleyball."

BEEEEEEEEEP

R: "Hey, what is that?"

E: "It's my studfinder. I just got it. It works pretty good."

R: "Let me see it."

E: "I know what your gonna do and it won't work. I already tried it."

R: "Let me try."

(studfinder is tossed my way)
(I press it to my chest and it emits a loud beep)

R: "Seems like it works"

E: "How'd you do that?"

(studfinder is snatched from my grasp and pressed against his chest)
(silence)

R: "Obviously I am a stud. Duh."

sketchdump160

sketchdump160
Originally uploaded by ruelloehr.

Life drawing.

cheesesticks and paddles

Every neighborhood has a proverbial bad influence in its midst. Ours was Barry Dempsey. He was a year older than me, short, chubby and nothing short of hilarious. He was the sort of guy you smoked pot with for the first time, the sort you knew would never do a whole lot, but when he did, it was epic. In retrospect, nearly every action of criminal mischief I ever participated in was at his side.

One of my first memories of Barry was walking home from Loge Elementary school with him. He pulled out a camel non-filtered and started smoking with the ease of seasoned professional.

Barry: "I got paddled today. You know how we supposed to get three cheesesticks? The lunchlady only gave me two. I said, 'Where's my other cheesestick?' She said, 'You don't need another one.'.

Ruel: "That got you paddled?"

Barry: "Nah, then I said, BITCH, GIVE ME MY FUCKING CHEESESTICK!. That got me paddled."

I was in fifth grade.

By his own words, when Barry got bored he became destructive. The summer of 1994 must have a been a doozy of a boring summer. Barry unleashed a torrent of vandalism the likes of which had never been seen. His parents didn't pay a lot of attention to him and his house was easy to sneak out of. This led to his new found love for the art of neighborhood rearrangement. This was where he walked around the neighbor hood at night and took items from one home and place them in the appropriate location at a home down the street. He was especially good with clothes on clotheslines. He would remove somebody's laundry, take it down the street and clothespin it up on somebody else's line. Yard ornaments and decorative lighting were also always good targets.

We had an old junior high school near my home which had been abandoned. On one night of sneaking out, we made our way to the petrol-pantry where we knew "Cack" was working and would sell us cigarettes. It didn't really matter if "Cack" was working or night as Barry was a master shoplifter, but we were fairly honest. We made our way back to the junior high to sit on the steps and smoke. I looked in the distance and saw the cherry red ember of Barry's camel hovering in the night.

"Hey you guys, come here, I've got an idea."

That spelled trouble.

The old junior high was built into a hill. From the top of the hill you could climb onto the roof of a storage building that stood above the basketball courts.

"Help me get this rock onto the roof."

It was real heavy so it took three of us to hoist this huge rock up.

"Now go stand back and watch the light."

Above the basketball court was a dusk to dawn light. We heard some grunting and thuds as Barry rolled the boulder across the roof. He positioned the rock above the light and gave it a push. The rock tumbled down and decimated the dusk to dawn light. Now it was about 2 in the morning in a small Indiana town. The only noise was crickets chirping until that rock hit. A small boom accompanied by a fireworks show as a shower of sparks flew across the night sky filled the air.

I looked up and Barry was gone. He could always run pretty damn fast when the need arose, despite being a pack a day fat kid. Slowly all the nights in the neighborhood began to come on. We bugged out.

Barry's dad had an assortement of hot rods. You know, tricked out cars and trucks. Needing a vacation his folks took off and left him alone for the weekend. Naturally, we all spent the weekend at Barry's house. It was a Saturday evening, none us could drive yet and we were trapped in house with no parents.

"Hey guys, I've got an idea."

Uh oh.

Barry: "Let's go cruise green, we'll take the hot rod." (Green = greenriver road, a big strech surrounded by shopping malls in a larger town near us where bored midwestern kids would go on the weekend, getting to go there was a treat)

Ruel: "YES! That's genius, but we'll have to find someone with a license to drive us."

Barry: "Nah, I'll drive, after all, it's my hot rod."

I was 14, he was 15. He had a learner's permit so maybe that counted for something.

After a fabulous lawless night, we awoke the next morning to the sound of a lawnmower. "WTF? Dempsey's mowing grass?"

No, it turned out that Barry woke up, quickly became bored. He went outside and turned on the garden hose and watered sections of the garden creating a mudpit. We walked out to see him driving the riding the lawnmower (which sank a little more each time) through the mudpit of the garden.

"What are doing?"

"I'm muddin' the rider."

Genius.

Barry eventually found the snort, or the snort found him and things sort of when downhill from there. I ran into him once a few years ago but he wasn't the same guy.

american iron

hogg
Originally uploaded by ruelloehr.

I walked out to the garage to do some laundry, you know, cause everything was dirty. Sitting in the center politely surrounded by rubbish was a fat ass custom chopper. "I wonder how that got here? We've been robbed, but in reverse."

"Evan! There is a very expensive looking motorcycle sitting in our garage. Did you steal it?"

"No, I'm storing it for a guy I work with. His wife kicked him out. He asked me to go to his house and help him get some stuff. It was sort of wierd though. Nobody was home and as soon as we got in he started literally running around grabbing stuff. As soon as I saw the running, something maybe think that this may not be so legit. Anyway, I'm gonna keep it here for awhile."

"If I sit on it will you take a picture of me?"

"No. You're wierd."

someday i wake up early and make pancakes

sketchdump159
Originally uploaded by ruelloehr.

I got home from work, cooked a sensation, and settled in to learn a Breeders song and watch Gene Simmon's school of rock. Not long after though, an obsessive thought began to fill my head,

"Go buy some tshirts off the internet."

"Ok.", I said to no one in particular.

7 minutes and 35 bones later I have new tshirts on order.

"Now get those tickets to see Henry Rollins!"

"Ok.", I said again.

For both purchases I was required to use my super security number. You know, it's the digit number printed on the back of the card.

How is that so secure? It's really a dumb concept. Why didn't they just put it on the front with the rest of the numbers. Surely evil doers are smart enough to turn the card over.

I have a theory about the security number. I think it's bad planning. I think so many people got credit cards they ran out of numbers. I can hear the converstion now:

"Bob, we're in some serious shit here. We're out of numbers. What are we gonna do"

...

...

"I've got it. We'll just add a few more."

"No, that will never work. We are out of room. That big number takes up the whole front of the card."

...

...

"I've got it. We'll put additional numbers on the back. The we will tell everyone it is a security measure to ensure there safety. Nobody will ever know we ran out.

"Bill, your a genius."

sketchdump158

sketchdump158
Originally uploaded by ruelloehr.

Real big and real fast. We cleaned the house today. After throwing out all of the old stuff in the refrigator we were left with a bottle of ketchup and half drinken bottle of water. A trip to the store promptly ensued and we finally bought light bulbs. Somehow I blew a small fortune this weekend on trivial items and fast food.

It was worth it.

In an effort to get a good night of sleep and to wake up in the morning and make it to the gym, I purchased an alarm clock (first one I have owned in years) which plays white noise. In this case the white noise sounds like a woodland forest with crickets and stuff. I'm really excited to try it out.

In the morning it plays church bells. This will be a good way to start the day.

Overheard at my house

E: I went into the computer room to fuck with the router. There's a giant spoon and empty applesauce snack pack on your desk.

R: Yeah, I got hungry and couldn't find any spoons. I had to use that giant one.
It scooped up all the applesauce in one shot. It's very efficient.

R: I can't find any spoons. Did you throw them all away? We were down to two.

E: Ummm. Yeah. They were uncleanable. It would have required a sandblaster.

R: I'm 27 years and old only own 1 giant spoon.

E: (laughing furiously)

E: I bought plastic ones.

sketchdump156

sketchdump156
Originally uploaded by ruelloehr.

wretched and yet sublime

I haven't been mean for awhile. It's been festering.

Some nights are destined for the wretched, but when they are salvaged, perhaps they became the best nights of all. A few days back I made Friday evening plans with a friend to spend the evening downtown. Upon making the plans, I immediately decided that it would probably not be so fun. It seemed to me that staying in the confines of my formica paneled home would be much more fitting. I contrived a plan for escape but at the last minute decided that it would not be in my best interest to welch.

I hate welchers.

So downtown I went. Upon my arrival I quickly surveyed the scene. All of my worst suspicions were confirmed. The destination, a piano bar with terrible musicians playing Jimmy Buffet songs for an aging crowd.

Truly eek.

I saw my friend with 4 strangers. She waved hello and I quickly sureveyed the scene. 2 strangers looked ok. The other two strangers:

Ouch.

Stranger 1: A 35+ man decked out in white linen. If he wasn't converting to Islam something something was drastically wrong. His date, way too much makeup and knew all the lyrics to the bad songs.

It can never be said that I'm not a trooper. I endured it for as long as I could. Each table was equipped with a pad of paper and pen for making requests. Desperately, I wanted to snatch the paper and pen and do a few quick sketches, however, linen man beat me too the punch.

Did he make great sketches? Oh no. He quickly scribbled down the following:

AC/DC back in black

With horrible penmanship I might add.

That was my queue (sp?) . Luckily, I knew another gang was about and a quick phone call proved me right. The night was salvaged with some great friends at a cool place.

I drove home at 1 am, the windows down, the a.c. on high, and the check engine light casting an orange glow upon my dashboard. I was greeted at the door by and an orange dog who humped the orange covers on the couch for 3 minutes and then looked at me and took a shit on the floor.

While I'm not fond of dogs shitting in my house or the after smell that comes with it, I couldn't really complain. Things had turned out alright.