March 9, 2008

• Family Chaplain.

  Yep, that’s right.  I have become the family chaplain.

  How the hell did this happen?  I mean, seriously.  Two nights ago, at the dinner after my grandpa memorial service (thanks for not showing up, now I hate you), I was sitting around eating eggrolls.  They were delicious eggrolls and I also had 2 whiskey sours which made them even better.  It’s synergy, or harmony, I don’t know.  Maybe harmnogy.  Yah, something like that.  Anyways.  I’m happily eating and chatting with my brothers, when my dad rushes over and says something like “Grob you gonna, wait, will it be alright if you do the…”  This is then interrupted by my wonderful uncle, who then lets the entire large ensemble know that I was to lead us all in prayer.
  Now, to be honest, I am a big fan of prayer.  However, my brutally honest head on pillow prayers are pretty different than the whole praying in front of a large group of people prayers.  Thank goodness for my improv training (yes, I did have it!  It was with second city… you’ll hear about it in the June 23 2008 blog post).  So I actually had quite a nice prayer.  Then my brother informed me that I’m the family chaplain from now on.  Haha, oh Joel, you jokester.

  So, then next day at the luncheon after his daughter got baptized… “And Rob would like to lead us in prayer…”

  SON OF A BITCH!

  Well, not that I really minded that much.  But give me at least 10 minutes for me to organize my thoughts. 

  

  Walter (cont)

  
  

  Walter had
  just finished chatting with some guy who had bought some really nice equipment,
  but really didn’t know how to set it up. 
  Capper (the guys screen-name) just wanted to be able to see people that
  were coming and going into and out of a shop. 
  The difficult part was that the camera had to be invisible (not hard) he
  had to be in an isolated area with a wireless video screen (also not hard) but
  the light outside was very bright, while his location inside of the shop was
  very dark.  Walter helped out Capper, got
  all of his monitors working, and the guy was delighted.  Walter always had a paypal account at the bottom
  of his instant messaging window.  He
  thought it was a good idea when someone asked “how much do you charge” for his
  advice.  Walter had never really thought
  about that.  He just liked it when people
  looked to him for advice.  He had spent
  most of his life being looked down upon since he was an overweight, visually
  displeasing blob.  Now people actually
  sought him out.

  CAPPER:
  “Thanks man!  This stuff is a pain in the
  ass if you haven’t used it before, you know?”

  DOODLES:
  “No sweat, got it all workin’???”

  CAPPER:
  “Like a charm.  What do I owe ya for the
  help?”

  DOODLES:
  “Same thing I charge everyone else, whatever you can spare.  If you don’t have anything, it’s cool.  Lemme know if you got any problems”

  CAPPER: “K,
  thx again!”

  DOODLES
  “peace”

  Hah, “no sweat”
  Walter thought, well, that was not the complete truth.  His air conditioner still wasn’t
  working.  But before going downstairs to
  get a fan, his screen popped up that he had a new email.

  He checked
  the email.  It was an autodeposit into
  his Paypal account… of 1000 dollars from J. Capp.  Holy crap. 
  That was worth the time of advice. 
  300 bags of doodles for 2 hours work, not bad. 

  With the
  excitement of payment, Walter thought he’d check in on a few emails that he was
  trailing from some interesting people at Colorado State before getting out of
  the heat of his room.  The most
  interesting had been from some gothed out punk, who kept talking about “the
  auction.”  This guy, Dale, kept trying to
  be dark and withdrawn and acted more like a spoiled teenager then the angst
  riddled youth he tried to portray.

  An email
  from Dale to one of his friends (Cyrus) explained in an urgent tone how his
  father was going to this “oddities” auction. 
  These underground auctions usually sold various goods that were
  confiscated, stolen, or just up for sale for people of a different sort.  The attendees at such auctions, according to
  Cyrus, were people like gypsies, Occult members, and your normal crowd of weird
  people you never want to meet in a dark ally (or a lit one for that
  matter).  What made Walter snort in
  hippo-like glee was that no one was ever supposed to know where or when these
  auctions occurred.  The email went on to
  explain how journals of Voodoo were sold and how potions with magical results
  were provided.  The note went on and on
  but nowhere in the note did it say where the auction was to take place, only
  that Dale’s father found out when, and that he was going to get to go along.

  • 5:17 pm
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