"I *@/$!*>/* the Spiders on the Wall..."

I realize I'm probably a hundred years behind the times on this one, but this made my entire week.

I just wish I could have been in the room when Anonymous Stoner put all the glorious dots together and realized how amazingly twisted each and every episode of Sesame Street becomes when specific verbs are consistently replaced with a 'bleep'.

Fucking genius.

More About the Homeless...

(Yes, same tune.)

Maybe it's just been on my mind: the homeless and their technical status, or lack thereof. Whatever the reason, this morning it seemed like the Common was fucking littered with possible homeless people. I don't mean that in a derogatory way. I mean that the PHP were scattered, everywhere, in strange locations, in a way reminiscent of what occurs when my housemate's Boston Terrier gets into the bathroom trash. Okay, calling PHP trash is not the point. I'm just going to move away from that to get to the real point:

The crazy array of PHP this morning included one dude who was not only 'possibly' homeless, he also appeared to be 'possibly dead'. Like, as I passed by I tried to focus on his ribcage-area to see if it was rising and falling. I couldn't tell. I figured he MUST be alive, given that there were approximately 600 people around, including a bunch of dudes with hard hats on working on the historic cemetery wall against which his corpse-like personage was smushed. But what if EVERYONE assumed that? He looked like, seriously uncomfortable*.

What are you supposed to do in that situation? Call someone? The police? I don't want to call the police. Because if he's not dead, and he just passed out there, in the Common, all wedged against a wall...he probably had some weird shit happen to him last night, you know? He'll have enough to deal with when he wakes up, I don't want to cause an extra headache for the poor dude. His head probably hurts enough.

I am constantly haunted by the feeling that I skipped school the day They explained all The Rules.

*This bugged me out enough throughout the morning that I went back to check on him at lunch. He was gone. Which, I realize, means nothing. If anyone happens to learn the fate of the passed out Hispanic gentleman of medium stature wearing a grey t-shirt with a leaf stenciled on the shoulder, would you please let me know?

Rolling Like the Homeless...

Do you ever spy someone wandering around the city, and then find yourself unable to determine whether that particular individual is homeless, or if they've just been travelling for an extremely long time and are having, like, a really tough go of it?

.

It happens to me almost daily. It doesn't help that I walk through Boston Common on my way to work every morning - a place populated by peoples in various states of homelessness, as well as hippies, students, demonstrators of ranging passions, tour guides dressed in colonial garb, worker bees eating lunch, wild children, harried nannies, and lost tourists evidencing different levels of distress.

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So I mean, there's really no way to know, with certainty, whether that dude is homeless, or if his luggage just totally sucks and he had to wrap his suitcase with twine somewhere in Iowa after the group of German house musicians he was hitch-hiking with parted ways. And that lady might be homeless, or she might just be having the worst time finding the airport EVER. And what is THAT DUDE's deal? Why is he sticking his entire head in that faucet? To wash it? To get water? Because he isn't able to do those things indoors? Or because it's been approximately 400 degrees for most of the summer, and one's hydration-situation can get pretty dire in a hurry? Oooh, although that's no reason to be sleeping on a piece of cardboard under a tree! Wait, but is someone filming you? Fucking Emerson kids.

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So then...what is homeless, anyway? What are the parameters? Why do I obsess over this stuff? Especially when it completely, totally doesn't matter? Because, in the end, you can't determine that kind of status with any real certainty?* I guess it's better than obsessing over something I saw last night on E News. Or what Frances Rivera was wearing on the Real News, even though that is admittedly, really fun to obsess over.

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You know what? All I can do is control my own actions. I'm just going to buy some really top-notch luggage and hope I avoid confusing people. You all can choose your obsessions accordingly. Just...don't let those Emerson kids record your image for too long, okay? I think they might be trying to capture your soul.

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*I take that back, I think. Because if all of your shit** is in a shopping cart, that's a pretty reliable indicator of...domestic flexibility.

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** If 'all of your shit' translates to 'garbage bags full of aluminum cans', then you have bigger problems than I'm ready to address right now. I'm sorry.