Netflix suggested watching the Muppets Movie, so I did.

I was kind of surprised since this does not seem to reflect my usual watching habits at all (action movies). But it’s so crazy, it’s actually pretty funny. I loved it!

Location: Dunkin Donuts, Roanoke, Virginia

Overweight customer: “How much is in a half- dozen? Is it 12?”

Whoa!

I dreamed last night that our old house in Virginia had been remodeled. The remodeling job was really crazy and the sedate blue Colonial had turned into in a hot yellow- orange stuccoed place with weird patterns of windows and a shiny purple and green sculptural glass roof.

Anyway, so I drew a picture of the before and after. Why not? While I was finishing it up, a ladybug visited and walked through a blob of wet ink and then went on a short journey around the drawing.

Here’s a closeup:

Today we went to Best Buy. It was fun playing with the iMac.

We also went to the Thomas Kinkade store.

Surprisingly, I couldn’t hate the Thomas Kinkade paintings. (It could have been because yesterday I screwed up my back at the gym and today I was feeble. Not really because I am getting old, it WAS Friday the 13th and I am constantly getting exercise related injuries.) The paintings are superficial and too pretty and as Mike pointed out, they are full of contrived rather than genuine emotions. But they do have some nice areas.

And sometimes they work.

For example, Nascar Thunder. This painting works. It’s over the top with the colors and the drawing is weak, but I like the subject matter.

You can get a copy of Nascar Thunder from Thomas Kinkade’s website for $795.

Today I went to Home Depot at 8:30 AM to buy some Masonite to paint on. The problem is Masonite comes in 8 foot by 4 foot sheets so they have to cut it for you at the store. They don’t let customers use the saws and you cannot get around this because you have to type in a code before the saw will turn on.

I had forgotten how crazy the Home Depot workers are. They were absent from the Masonite-cutting area so I had to track them down near the paint section. One fortyish guy in coveralls and one of those orange Home Depot vest/apron things told me that they “don’t cut Masonite, because the saws don’t work on concrete.” I politely replied that Masonite is a kind of hardboard. Eventually I discovered the Masonite-cutting guy was in the bathroom and was expected to be there for the next 30 minutes, so instead a lunatic cashier attempted to cut my Masonite. It quickly became apparent that he had no experience with the power saw.

It didn’t work out at all. The resulting bits of Masonite were all the wrong sizes and shapes, and they did not possess any right angles. The crazy worker tried to convince me to buy them anyway, employing various passive-aggressive sales tactics revolving around the central idea that at least he had TRIED to cut the Masonite correctly. I declined and stumbled, shellshocked, from Home Depot. I went straight to Lowe’s (Lowe’s does not carry Masonite in this area) and bought pre-cut hardwood panels to paint on. More expensive but much more restful.

“I can’t believe your neighbor parks in your spot!” shouted my crazy downstairs neighbor’s unpleasant mother yesterday, when she showed up to clean his roach infested hellhole of an apartment, as she frequently does on Sundays.

She was talking about me, of course. I heard her since I was sitting on the porch enjoying the sunny 60 degree weather. That is unusual for February around here.

Her son hears voices and is heavily medicated, so he doesn’t have a car. I think that means his parking spot is officially up for grabs.

Besides, I was only parked in his spot because somebody had already parked in mine.

UPDATE: When I got home today, I parked in my designated spot. I looked over at the numbers painted in the parking lot and realized that during this entire incident, I was actually parked in my OTHER neighbor’s spot. Nobody was parked in the medicated guy’s space AT ALL!

Today we went to the Western store, where I tried on rhinestone belts while Mike looked at cowboy boots.

This one guy- fifty years old, unshaven, six foot, two hundred fifty pounds, in Carhartt overalls, wearing baseball cap, stared at me for a long time but I avoid eye contact in places like that. Eventually he built up the nerve to drawl, “Son, the guys’ belts are OVER THERE.”

I was still interested in the belts though I stopped trying them on. I lingered.

“They do seem kind of over-the-top,” I replied.

Last night I dreamed I was in Ethics class and this is what the professor- a fiftysomething blonde battle-ax- gave us as our ethical scenario:

Here’s your scenario:

You are in a room with a desk. The desk has a hutch. Your roommate is sitting at the desk. He or she is using your computer. Inside the hutch there is a tiger. You have a choice. You can either eat your roommate, or you have to open the hutch and let the tiger out.

What do you do?

Here’s some more information:

The tiger drives a Porsche.