Not Out Of The Woods

• I'm Feeling Much Better
• 7 Dollar Monday

 Not so much physically, but in my attitude, I'm feeling better.

I woke up with the tightness in the back of my neck which used to reside there, back before the water only fast, and the resultant dietary changes that followed it.

I had bags under my eyes, as I brewed some coffee.

I could almost tell that this would "work its way out," after I got up and stretched and started to move around.

I can understand the people who say things like "growing old sucks," if it is because of the way I got out of bed -like an old man.

Lifting my head off the pillow to turn it toward the clock caused me to groan, due to the stiffness and lack of range of motion.

Taking a few seconds to make sense of what the hands of the clock were telling me was another clue.
It was 1:30 PM, the time that I seem to always wake up at.

I had 4 dollars and 20 cents on the little table in front of me that had been barren the previous morning.

Cat Fed

I wanted to get one more can of food for Harold and did, while picking up bananas and a couple oranges for myself. This leaves enough to get fresh batteries for the spotlight.
 
It felt like a moral victory to have been tipped 7 dollars over the course of 2 hours of playing Monday night. It was 3 dollars from one guy, and 2 dollars from 2 others; amounts that told me I was sounding better than what would garner the standard buck as a tip.

Two of the tippers told me that I sounded good, and had broken off and returned to me from their groups of about a half dozen after they had walked past.

This still is not going to keep me in strings and batteries for the spotlight and an eventual new harmonica, but it fed myself and my cat. I'm still one bad night away from disaster; but that comes with the territory.

Harold the cat got a 37 cent can of Dollar General "Friends Forever" brand food, not on a bed of dry food, but times are hard.

Myself, I stopped at the Banks Meat store and got $1.76 worth of ground beef, which I mixed into my nominal meatloaf recipe, making it more legit.

And, I bought a pack of rolling papers for a dollar, so that, should I continue to dabble in smoking by picking up butts here and there, I can at least remove the filters that have been in someone's mouth and re-roll them. Spending 7 dollars a day on a pack; I have quit that as a habit.
The Job

I found a labor place right up the street that holds promise in finding me a dish washing job for a while or something. Even though I know that my best bet would be to talk to one of the guys that I have seen 100 times, standing outside a restaurant in his manager outfit smoking a quick cigarette. He would have seen me 100 times walking past with my guitar on my back and might at least hire me over some random person based solely upon that....


I haven't heard from Sherman, my friend in Baton Rouge through e-mail, or by Facebook. He might not check his e-mail daily and his Facebook account seems to be lying there pretty much fallow.

I will probably just go up there when I have the means, and drop in on him. I don't imagine he would object to my crashing there a couple nights while I pound the muddy pavement looking for flood cleanup work.

I have learned a valuable lesson about July and August in New Orleans, and the wisdom of preparing for it by filling my silo with strings, batteries and harmonicas and food in the pantry.

But, as I sit here, it's almost time to go out and try to maintain. I will drink some oat milk, spend a dollar on the cheap batteries that last only 2 nights; and then go out there.

Good news is that Tim, my caseworker is going to bring me to a food bank type of place tomorrow, and should I lay a goose egg tonight, there will probably be at least some tuna fish in a box that would come from a food bank type place that I can feed Harold the cat with.

I haven't figured out what to do about the cat if, and when, I go to Baton Rouge...