I Have Been Away

 I promise to sober up and start posting again, probably starting tomorrow...

Not Having Posted For About A Week Changing Demographics Of Readership
That was a lot to spit out, but, here I have not really posted much lately; but; about a week ago, I wrote the following, intending to post it then, but not doing so until now;
IT may shed some light upon the fact that I am not blogging much, lately.

It's 8:09 PM, on this Sunday; the day after the night when I got a 100 dollar tip, and a 20 dollar tip; and besides that, just 8 single bills; due to the fact that I "fell off" sharply after the fifth of Cabernet Sauvignon, followed by the half pint of gin caught up to me.
The weed which I had bought for 5 dollars off of one of my past nemesis was probably not a hindrance; as the 100 dollar tip came in the usual way; from a group of young African American rappers who were smoking themselves, and were thus on the same plane as I.
-clarification: they were smoking weed, too, not their own bodies.
I got back to the apartment, and had a hard time in the morning; when counting and accounting for money; remembering where the money that I had spent went.
I determined that it had been a 128 dollar night; but I wasn't sure if I had purchased a half pint of Jim Beam "fireball" before getting on the street car; or if that had actually happened the night before. The empty bottle in my trash shed some light there.
This morning, I read some more of the book about smoking cessation, which was in the bin of books in the room full of bins of things here at Sacred Heart Apartments.
I really think that God works through these people, who are "caseworkers" by trade.
Tim, my caseworker (who is a big fan of Neil Young -the artist whom I was first compared to, when I took up playing the guitar and singing, back when I was 15) told me that there was a bin full of books in that very room the other day.
I went and looked and found, as if it was written in my soul, a book about hard disk recording for musicians; smoking cessation, and the history of the world, and several other subjects, the acquisition of books on the subjects of which were on my itinerary.
Everything that I seek knowledge upon, in order to have a facility in sprinkling my songs with references to; ala Elvis Costello, seemed to be there.
I struggled to open the doors along the way to my apartment without upsetting the load of books in my arms, after leaving the book room.
The smoking cessation book make

Utter, abject misery, since I have resumed drinking...

s a lot of sense to me, and I have had less of a desire to smoke since opening it. It is "The Easy Way To Stop Smoking," by Alan Carr (who is probably dead now, but not from smoking).
Juicer Sold; Good Grief
I went out to the Goodwill, looking to spend 24 of my 128 dollars on the juicer which had been there, the Jack LaLane "Express" juicer. It was not there.
I later discovered that there were people who were in the business of buying stuff up cheap at places like the Goodwill and then, yeah, selling them somewhere online for profit.
I was in there just a few days later, and there was a middle aged black lady, who was punching her phone as she held a particular globe in her other hand. She obtained the information that the globe was an x? dollar value, while it was only being sold for 10 dollars at the Goodwill, and she snatched it up; even after I tried to inform her of the dissolution of the Soviet Union and the globes deficiency in that regard.
So, that is what happened to the juicer, I'm sure of it, which was going to restore me to health. Someone came and compared the $22.99 price tag on the thing against the fact that a new one is at least 85 bucks, and snatched it up; then put it on the online market. Pretty clever. I've thought of the idea before; of course. I once thought about going into the Big Lots in Jacksonville and taken an inventory of everything in there and then offered all of their products online; especially the extremely discounted ones. It probably would have wound up being a pain in the ass; but I thought of the idea; sure did..

..
I wouldn't have sold much stuff in America, where anyone can go to the corner Big Lots and pay the same prices; and I probably wouldn't have sold much overseas where the currency might be stronger, but the shipping cost would negate it...
I'm sure that the juicer was bought by a Goodwill Skeezer (one of the worst kind).
Goodwill Skeezers, I will call them.
I then walked an exploratory route, up Tulane Street, where I had never been before, finding a Dollar Tree Stores store, which is about a mile from my apartment.
I bought toilet paper, another jigsaw puzzle (though I lamented the fact that they were a "true" dollar store, where everything was truly just a dollar, and I was only able to get a 250 piece puzzle at that price; I would have paid more for a 1,000+ piecer) a drawing pad, scotch tape (to stick things up on the walls like my push-up goal chart (3,000 this month or bust) a pack of football cards (you never know where O.J. Simpson may be hiding) a scented candle (laying in a hot bath with an aromatic candle burning while listening to soft music was just so hard to arrange while I was living under the Natchez dock that I feel like I need to pounce upon the opportunity) a corkscrew (if I am not going to quit drinking wine for a while, why torture myself by having to hack the cork out of the bottles with knives?) some Dermasil Lotion, some green tea, some stir-fry Oriental vegetables, some fish oil, and some salt-free seasoning.
It was like 12 bucks, and I hope to go out and recover the whole amount on this Sunday night, which is already getting old (8:40 PM -damn daylight savings!)
Sunday "dies" earlier than most nights; I guess reaffirming that there is indeed a God.
So, I am going to eat and then go into the Quarter, with little more than the hope of recovering what I have spent today.
0 Dollar Sunday
Having pushed the clocks ahead one hour Sunday morning; had me startng my day correspondingly late; and night was falling by the time I had left the Dollar General Store and made my way to Rouses Market for a bottle of sake.
After I got into the quarter and scored a small sack of "the really good," I almost instantly encountered David the water jug player.
He had been upset with me because of that night when I bought the huge bottle of Absolut vodka off of the guy for 20 dollars and hadn't offered him any of it.
I had to explain to him that, at the time, I hadn't wanted to break the seal on the brand new bottle, because it was an 80 dollar value, which I had gotten for 20 bucks; and I entertained notions of selling it at a profit; plus, I had already had plenty to drink on that day; which was my first night of drinking after 15 days dry.

He accepted that explanation and we became friends again; but I hung out with him for so long, that midnight was approaching by the time I was ready to head to the Lilly spot; and so I decided to call the whole thing off; because Sundays can be pretty dead at that hour; and I was playing pretty sloppily, having hung out with David, sipping vodka for a couple hours.
Monday
It is Monday and it is raining lightly outside; the temperature is in the 60's, though. The clock just struck 4 PM.