Bruce’s Online Journal

“I write because I don’t know what I think, until I read what I say.” — Flannery O'Connor

Week of April 9, 2001

April 12

I suppose it depends on where one lives, but I kinda like this global warming thing. Okay, so the winter did start a little early and we got 50% more snow than average, but if that’s the price to pay for this, well then sign me up!

As you may recall from other years, my definition of the first day of spring is the first day I can walk around outside in a t-shirt without getting chilled. That was Sunday. My definition of the first day of summer is when I can have all the windows wide open and am uncomfortable attired in more than gym shorts. That’s today. Not bad when you consider there was still ice on the pool cover six days ago.

As I write, it’s late afternoon and 84°F (29°C), the windows are wide open, there’s enough breeze for the wind chimes and there’s an occasional puffy cloud overhead, (I had to fix that. Overcast came out of my fingers by habit.) and I’m wondering where I packed all my gym shorts.

So I’m at least shirtless and sockless. I’ll have to find my damned shorts.

That’s better. There was a pair stashed way in the back of the dresser drawer. Of course they’re a little tight…

In any event, a shirtless day it is. Did you know that here in frumpy old Rochester it’s legal for those of the female persuasion to be topless in public? While I agree fair is fair, personally I’m glad it’s still quite uncommon.

Now that I’m thinking about it, my definition of summer is the first night I can leave all the windows wide open. That may be pushing it a little tonight. It’s supposed to drop to the mid 50s and begin to rain. Still, it’s a fine day.


Mark and I don’t usually take our meals together. We have different feeding habits and both maintain irregular schedules. This afternoon I was thinking, I could go for hamburgers cooked on the grill, and maybe a macaroni salad. It just wouldn’t be right do be grilling away on the deck with the scent wafting through the windows. So I offered.

“How would you like to join me for hamburgers cooked on the grill?”

“That sounds great,” he replied. “I’ll run out to the store and get some salads.”

“Well I think I have everything right here to make a macaroni salad.”

“Okay, I’ll tell you what. You make the macaroni salad and I’ll run to the store and get us a couple of steaks.”

Knowing a good thing when I see it (or hear it), I stopped the negotiations right there. “While you’re in the shower, I’ll start boiling the water.”

The mac salad presently is chilling in the fridge, and there are two nice, thick New York strips waiting next to it.


I’ve been feeling a bit of depression for the past several days. Project “A” that I wrote about a while back is done. I’ve tweaked everything I can tweak, adjusted everything I can adjust, and I’ve barely been able to keep up with the e-mails full of glowing praise. Yet, I’m feeling down.

My psychologist noticed it right away today. I had to explain to him that whenever I finish a really consuming project, I go into a bit of a funk for a couple of weeks. “It’s not like my usual depression,” I explained. “I get different flavors of depression. I’m familiar with this one, I know what causes it and I know it’ll pass in a week or two.”

He expressed concern that I’d lapse into using or become suicidal. I assured him he didn’t need to worry about anything of the sort. I didn’t go into it with him, but the last time I had this was after I finished the site redesign here, back at the beginning of August. I had this “post-partum”, for lack of a better term, depression on top of that whole big one. I lived to tell and to thrive. There’s no reason why it won’t happen again. I’ll just mope about and sigh a lot for a few more days.

But I’ll tell you, the weather today has me hankering for a beer. A nice, tall, cold, frosty glass of orange juice somehow isn’t quite the same.

Although now that I think about it, I had a trigger and a craving for the other stuff earlier this afternoon. I’d gone to the library to return one book and pick up another that I’d reserved. The I had to wait 20 minutes for my next bus. No problem, on account of the weather. It was nice to stand around Main and Clinton without shivering for a change.

I was just enjoying the physical feeling of the nice weather. I wasn’t paying any attention of the other people, or the pigeons or anything. Then these two guys walk by.

One said to the other, “Yeah, man. I can get you a couple of nice, fat twenty bags. How much you want?”

The thought immediately flashed through my head, Yeah, I’ve got a couple nice crisp twenties on me right now. I’ll take two.

I shook my head trying to clear it. And I need a stem too. I got an extra five to cover that.

What the fuck? Where did that come from?

Oh forget the stem. I think Mark has a radio I can cut the antenna off of.

Yeah, just what I need. Get kicked out of Mark’s house for smoking crack and bad grammar. Cut the antenna off of?

It went back and forth like that for a good five minutes. Then the bus came and it disappeared entirely, as quickly as it came. I only remembered it because I reminded myself that a nice, cold, frosty bottle of John Labatt’s finest would take me right back there, PDQ.

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