Dean Koontz and the Shitty Update

Last post of February and, man, will I be glad to flush away this month. Quick update on the bathroom situation I spoke about in last week’s blog: some of the shit got under the linoleum in the bathroom and hallway, so I had the flooring replaced. The guys who came did a fantastic job. Their boss was a douche, though. The guy showed about fifteen minutes before his crew and told me, “I had to hire Mexicans, so you might wanna hide your jewelry.” In case you don’t know, I live in the south, so this is par for the course. Dude had a set of balls on him, though, because he’d met my wife and he still said that shit. (In case you don’t know, my wife’s black.) I shook my head and walked away, leaving him to his measurements. I know some of you will ask why I didn’t fire him on the spot, and the answer is simple: had I told him to leave, his crew wouldn’t have been paid for the day.

Anyfuck, here’s the before and after.

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They had to remove the toilet to lay the new linoleum. The smell when they lifted the toilet…motherfuck, that was nasty as hell.

Completely off topic, someone just emailed me (literally just checked my mail while I was writing this and found her message) and sent photos of her high school yearbook. Seems she had Dean Koontz as a teacher. Here’s the photo she sent:

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That’s wild. He looks so young and talented, absolutely nothing like himself!

I’ll stop.

Thanks for the pic, Babette.

Other than the flooring situation, I’ve had a fantastic week. Thank you to everyone who sent words of support and tales of solidarity. Made a rough situation a little more sufferable. I’m just glad my bathroom no longer smells like an outhouse. My poor daughter (Autumn) kept going to my mother’s house to use the bathroom because every time she used ours she got sick to the point of vomiting. I’m happy to report back that she can now use her own bathroom without her meals returning.

I DNF’d three books this week. Couldn’t get into a single one of them. One of those was written by an acquaintance of mine, so I won’t be mentioning it here. It wasn’t bad, it’s just not my thing. Doubt I’ll even return to it, but I’d try something else from them in a heartbeat. The other two were MR. SPLITFOOT, by Samantha Hunt, and ZOMBIE, by Joyce Carol Oates. I will retry MR. SPLITFOOT when I’m in the mood for dense writing, but I’ll be donating the Oates book. I’ve tried reading it six times and I’ve finally learned my lesson. The  book is written in an experimental style, where some sentences start with ampersands (these things &) and to be honest it fucking annoys me. Do y’all have any pet peeves like that? Any formatting or usage you can’t stand? I know some people hate italics. I have no idea why, and it doesn’t really matter, because I have plenty of things that irk me that might otherwise seem like a nothing-burger to someone else.

I finally picked BROKEN MONSTERS, by Lauren Beukes, off the shelf. I loved THE SHINING GIRLS but I’d forgotten just how good her writing is. Anyway, I’m enjoying the mess out of it right now. I’m still reading THE HUNGER to Chelle, and we’re liking it, but it has to go back to the library before the end of the month and there’s no way we’ll be done by then. I’ll likely go ahead and buy it so we can finish. It’s not something I foresee myself rereading but it’s a solid four stars right now.

Does that mean I haven’t finished a single book this week? Yes, yes it does. It sucks, but sometimes life gets in the way. Having your bathtub fill to overflowing with shit definitely deserves all of your attention. Meaning, it’s not something one can overlook for long, ya mean? Instead of reading, I’ve been speedrunning Resident Evil 2. I’m currently stuck on the Playthrough A’s final Birkin battle. It sucks, but I have faith I’ll beat him within the week.

How y’all been? Lemme know in the comments below.

E.