No

How cool is it to spend all Saturday at your office? Not cool at all.

Mother's Day Gift

So my Mom for mother's day wants some sort of cold bandage treatment in order to lose weight. That's fine with me: different people, in different parts of the world, of different ages and gender and marital status, and with different children -some of them more fucked up than others-, would want different shit when their special day comes. I do understand, and I ain't gona judge or approve or disapprove what my very own mother wants and doesn't want. Shit, but why do I have to foot a big chunk of that bill, ah?

No I don't fucking care that my paycheck comes in dollars while my sisters are cashing their checks in other -weaker- currency. Yes I'm single and don't have major bills to pay; but if my sisters can't contribute enough is because they have been spending money that they are not even going to receive in the first place, while I've been a very financial responsible dude. And well my mom and my dad have been spending their mutual funds and retirement plans as if that thing would last forever, and as I told them the other day: "at this pace that money is gona run out soon, and I am not going to pay for you both to keep living like the fucking royalty". They said that I was talking "non sense", but I learnt in college and while studying my MBA that money doesn't grow in trees.

All the money they have grew like a palm tree you know, over a life time of hard work and wise investments; but now they are spending it like a coconut falling towards the ground. Whenever you guys run out of Euros and Dollars, and once your real estate is gone, I'll quote Nelson Mandela when he said "Don't call me, I'll call you".

But for the time being, in order to avoid conflicts and judgments and all that shit, I opened my bank account and sent them their stupid money for a stupid gift. With that very same cash, I could have bought at least an iPod, among other goodies. But now that I'm at it, my mom is sixty years old and happily married to my dad, what the fuck is she thinking about by getting into fucking expensive treatments for loosing weight if she's already slim for a woman her age. How about just eating less crap and perhaps drinking more water?

I know that I'm crying over spilled milk because the money is already gone, but if I don't say it out loud here in my little blog, where? Calling them and tell them this very same words? I should my friends, but that would not be a pretty picture: imagine the shit hitting the fan and Jean-Francois right in the middle of it all. Not pretty at-all.

1 9 9 0

In the early summer of 1990 I was on an airplane on my way to the US for the first time. Fifteen years ago, fifteen years younger, barely sixteen years old and full of anxiety and anticipation.

I left my girlfriend in tears at the airport, with a very sweet kiss on her lips I promised her that I'll love her for ever.

My parents weren't sad at all, we had so many problems earlier that year, that they thought it was a good idea for me to go away for a full year, learn English, have some fun on my own, break other people's shit, and somehow "grow up" a little bit.

My sisters didn't go to the airport, they preferred to stay home and sleep. Weeks later I would learn that my room had been looted by them; my beloved Nintendo wasn't working due to some Coke that they accidentally spilled on it, and all my porn magazines that I so carefully kept hidden where in the trash can. My tapes featuring Ginger Lynn where save in the house of my best friend, thanks God.

Summer of 1990: Seems like yesterday, even today, almost fifteen years later.

I was sent to Eastern Kentucky, to a small town lost in the middle of nowhere. I had to live in a farm with sheeps, goats, cats, dogs, a couple of wild horses and a little brother called Donny, among other animals.

The second week of my stay a reporter from the local newspaper came to the school to interview me. Even though I couldn't speak English, we talked for an hour and it was enough for her to fill half the front page with my comments. A picture of a very smiley Jean-Francois appeared besides it and made me an instant celebrity in the "region". One Saturday later that summer, I was walking in the one and only McDonald's of the town and a couple of old folks were on their way out, so I opened the door for them. The old guy turned his head to say thanks and "recognized"me from the article in the newspaper. My first venture into "celebrity land"; years later, when I was going back to South America from China I was gona become a celebrity again, but for a whole different reason. I could've skipped that second part my friends, jail is not a nice place to be.

Shit man, I still can't believe it: Me, a city boy living in a farm for a whole year; and even more so I made it in one piece and actually had fun. Well, not "city-fun", but more like "country-side-fun", which is kind of different and very particular, but fun nevertheless.

Once I started understanding the language and making myself understood, came the girlfriends, the concerts, the problems with my host family, the weed with those country boys, the driving around with my neighbor talking shit, the porn through his satellite dish, the "parties" at the high school, and so on.

I always asked myself during that year why the hell I was the only one, among all the exchange student in the program, who was sent to such a little town? To such a hole in the ground?. The rest of my friends where in large cities, with plenty of concrete, shopping malls, people, buildings and shit, but not me. Why?

The answer came many months later when we all meet at the end of our year as exchange students. In my little town, no one could speak my native tongue, not even the foreign language professor at the high school. So my only option was to learn English in order to make friends and to find my way around. All my friends from the exchange program always found in their big cities someone who could speak our native tongue, so their English wasn't as good as mine after that year. I was not only fluent, but had under my control all the slang that a hot blooded country side Kentuckyan could come up with.

Not to mention that fucking accent that took me years to get rid of.

A bit Hungry

I eat like a pig. I mean, even though I eat a lot, I do have very good manners when I'm sitting at the table: for example, I don't talk with my mouth full and hate when people do it; I don't chew with my mouth wide open so that you can see what's going down my throat; I don't bite the bread, I take a little piece, spread a bit of butter on top, and then eat it; if I'm going to drink water or soda or whatever, first I wipe my mouth, and then I drink it; I always keep the knife clean and needless to say, I don't leak it; and when I'm done I put both my knife and fork in the "finish" position among other good manners. But still I eat like a pig, meaning "I eat a LOT".

Back home while I was growing up I always filled my plate twice, and if it was something that I really liked, even three times. My grandmother was always happy to invite me to eat because I'll eat every single thing that she would put on my plate, and then will ask for more. My parents where also kind of happy to see such a healthy boy, and even though I was always in trouble and they were giving me hell for everything, when it came to eating a lot, they didn't mind; and were even amazed to see how their little red haired boy could eat so much and not gain weight. My sisters were always on a diet, which was fine, as it meant more food for me. I recall this one time that I was invited to a friend's house to spend the night, and the next day for lunch I ate my "average" portion; years later my friend "confess" to me over some beers that his Mom got upset because I wiped out everything and then asked for more. What can I say, I was a hungry child.

But now I'm a man and I'm still hungry as hell. And even though I used to enjoy eating all that, now is not that fun anymore. I still like to eat a lot, absolutely, but now that I'm on my own I am the one who have to cook and pay the grocery bill, and that shit ain't cheap my friends. I could be saving big bucks if I was to eat half of what I normally eat. However, I know that my metabolism is going to slow down at some point in the future and a little belly will pop up, and then I'll miss those good old days when I had all my hair and could eat anything.

I would say that my secret to not gain weight is that I don't eat sweets -I'm sweet enough. I don't care for sugar in my coffee; or whipped cream, or ice cream, cookies, cheese cakes, chocolate, candy, croissants, muffins, key lime pie, pecan pie, apple cobbler and so on. When I go to a coffee shop to get my caffeine and I see by the counter all those sweets, not a little tiny desire crosses my mind to get any of that. My trips to the Chinese buffet down the street from my condo are a different story: when the thin chinese manager/owner sees me walking in, he shouts to the kitchen to go ahead and replenish everything 'cause "that red haired guy from the condominiums is here and the bastard looks fucking hungry". I pile up on everything but sweets, maybe a little bit of fruit at the end, when there's pretty much nothing left, cheap bastards.

Tonight for dinner I had an order of cinnamon sticks from Pizza Hut, perhaps the only sweet shit that I eat. I had it together with a glass and half of whole milk, fuck that skim milk that tastes like water. But it gave me a headache, actually made the headache that I've had all day worst. Maybe is that I've been mixing all this drugs for the allergies lately, trying to make a cocktail that will let me sleep at night and feel like a champion during the day, and it somehow backfired. Well, just to make sure that there's enough chemicals in my system in order to finish me off once and for all, I just had an alka-seltzer.

Anyway, what I really wanted to say is that I saw Diana today and I'm gona pick her for school tomorrow. So simple, yet so complicated.

To Miss

To miss someone is a tough feeling, a hard stuff to put up with. To wish to be with someone that is not there, with you, is hell my friends. Phone calls, letters and e-mails are not a good substitute and they act like a drug: get you high for a moment but then you want more, and then more and more and more. The only medicine for that is the company of whoever you miss.

I miss a lot of people, friends, girlfriends and lovers. Miss places and situations, cities and countries, miss rides and lunches, miss clubs and pubs, I even miss the sunsets over Tiananmen Square, or the Temple of Heaven. I miss walking hand in hand with the one I once loved. Miss South America with all its flavor, chaos and rush. I miss phone calls from my friends with plenty of plans and stories. Even though I saw Steffi last Sunday -yesterday as a matter of fact- I miss seeing her and being around all that endless energy that she projects. I miss my friend Stephan and his wife, such a nice people. I miss Sandra and my good old friend Daniel back in South America. I miss Rejane, and wonder how's life treating her. I miss Emma, dancing with her, and talking endlessly in a little café in Paris.

I also miss Diana, and wonder what life would bring to us. Even though she's here with me, just a ten minute drive from my condo, I wonder if one day she'll be just a distant memory of my love life. A life that looks more and more like a scary movie, full of shadows and corpses, and a couple of witches chasing me down with an axe in their hands trying to cut my head off.

I miss Sabrina as well; miss Mickey, Mike, Sasha, Anika, Jurgen and Biggi. I miss Ami and all those sweet kisses that we once shared. Miss the snow and the red and yellow leaves from autumn.

And again, I miss Diana.

On Tennis

I love tennis, what else can I say? I just plain-O-love it! that's perhaps the best sport on the face of the planet; maybe not the more physically demanding, nor the most difficult to master, and perhaps not even the most beautiful sport, if you can use that word to describe physical activity, but nonetheless the best sport on the face of my planet.

In the countries where I grew up, tennis is a very elitist sport. Down in South America there's no such thing as 'public tennis courts', you either have enough money to join the country club as my parents did, or you learn about tennis from a TV set. And in some of those clubs where I used to go with my friends, there was even a 'dress code' in order to be able to set your feet in the tennis court. You could wear like 'light' colors if you were just playing with your friends, but if there was some sort of tournament, you have to wear white from head to toe, no exceptions. I remember that the girls use to wear little white mini skirts, together with tight white t-shirts when they were playing. After a game the spectacle of seeing them all sweaty and stuff in their white outfits was awesome. Well, actually it wasn't that awesome now that I think about it, I grew up playing tennis and seeing them like that, so it was kind of 'normal' to me.

In China you could find ping-pong tables in parks, but not tennis courts. I remember I used to play at the French Embassy with my friends -until I got a beautiful girlfriend and my priorities changed of course. I played with her a couple of times, but when you're in your early twenties and the hormones are going through the roof you just have one thing in your mind, and no, it's not tennis. When I left China I gave my good-old racket to my girlfriend among other things. Ah, the things you do when you're in love! Back in South America when I faced the high prices of tennis rackets, I realized it wasn't a wise decision after all. At that time our love hadn't survived the realities of time and distance.

I play tennis with my landlord today, and we bet next month's rent.

No, the truth is that we didn't. I could've kicked his ass without major problems; now that his wife is pregnant he has also putted a lot of pounds himself and was slower than ever. I joked with him, asking if he was planning to look just like his (bitchy) wife while pointing to his big belly. He replied with a very polite "fuck you". But maybe I'm wrong, because when it comes to money that rat could kill and eat from the dead body, so its better not to talk about money on the tennis court.

I was feeling like crap today, not only with this allergies but also with a back ache that is killing me, and some other shit going on these days. I know that it wasn't any good for my back to play tennis, and also being expose to all that pollen and besides the lawn in my complex was mowed today so now I'm sneezing and blowing my nose again. But tennis makes feel better, it lifts my spirit and helps me forget stuff. While I'm hitting the ball I can really concentrate myself and direct all my energies on my drive, my backhand and on putting the balls right in the corner where my overweight landlord can't reach them. I always ask him after hitting a couple of great balls "Am I playing too hard for you?", he looks at me and gives me the finger. And to be fair he also has his moments when he hits a ball that I just can't get, and I also give him the finger.

And the best thing about playing tennis, is the hunger that I develop. Once I'm done playing I have to satisfy my usual appetite -which is enormous-, and my tennis appetite. This post isn't this long just because I had a lot of shit to say, but because I have to keep myself busy while my dinner is ready, otherwise I'll eat everything half-cooked.

But the beast is awake now and every word that I type looks, tastes and smells like food. Food. FOOD! FOOD!

Whether things are ready or not down in the kitchen, I don't give a shit. I am ready! Adios!

Sunday

All these crappy medicines that I'm taking for the allergies, are making me feel like shit. Not allergy-shit, but more like slow-thinker type of shit. People talk to me, and it takes quite a few seconds to process the information and then answer them back. Even writing this post is like if my brain cells were taking all the time in the world in order to come up with almost nothing.

Yesterday I went with cute Steffi to Barnes & Nobles to have a coffee and chat, but the first tall cafe au lait did nothing to wake me up. Only after the second cup of regular coffee, things began to speed up. But if my excuse was that I was taking medicines, Steffi didn't have one; and she had two tall Cafe Mochas, with extra whipped cream in both. Man at the end of the day she was like ready to start climbing the walls!

We just sat around the travel guides, checking out countries and regions and talking about traveling adventures and experiences. Then we went to her car to listen some of her "French Hip Hop", and then to mine to listen to some Cafe del Mar. Of course, once you listen to it, your life changes completely, and she loved it. So much that she borrowed my golden collection of Cafe del Mar, and by the look in her eyes, she's not planning to return it anytime soon.

I got a CD of her French Hip Hop, and after listening to it all day yesterday, I'm ready to give it back to her. The other CD that I borrowed, some kind of American techno, is not even good as a paper weight.

Decision

I got an e-mail today from my Mom asking me for even more things that she wants me to buy -for her, of course. I call that Glut; and insatiable appetite for stuff, not necessarily food, but just stuff that you have to have. She's gona be disappointed.

She also told me about a cousin who's getting married next August, and told me to "get ready to attend the ceremony" I'm sorry, but my face is not going to appear in the family pictures. Another disappointment.

I made up my mind, and things are going to take a bit longer this time. I can hear some drama coming down the pipes, but this is about me and my future, not about them. This was a difficult decision, but I'm sure if things work the way I hope, it'll be the best thing to do at this point in time.

Now is time to use all the skills that I've developed as a writer, while working in this blog, and tell them about my decision. I won't go into the details, as there's where the devil lies, but I'll give them a big general idea for them to digest.

They asked for it

I had twenty five sorties today. Fully loaded most of them -well, not as full as few weeks back, but pretty full anyway. Some of the Ammo was the good stuff: laser guided and intelligent bombs; a couple of them were loaded with nukes; and I also did some minor chemical attack in few of my flights.

Who was the lucky people who got my payload? I don't give a shit, I assume they were all bad people and if they were there, then they deserve what they got. I, however, gave them a big smile before opening the doors were all those bombs were. I also had my iPod cranked all the way up with that heavy trans that I got from the internet, adrenaline rushing through my system for hours at a time, and I laughing and bombing fucking people. Oh man, they deserved what they got.

Tomorrow I'm grounded, but Sunday. . . You better start digging your trenches 'cause, I'm gona come down hard, bitches!

Morning Coffee

• Tall cafe au lait: $1,95
• Tall Caramel Frappucino: $ 3,95
• Taxes: $0,51
  
  
  
  
  
  Beautiful Company: $Priceless$

I clean it!

One of the first items that I got when I moved to my condo was a coffee maker. A little one, just for me and for those lucky ladies that I invite every now and then, and then kick out right after their "morning coffee". I'm a pretty cool and polite guy you know, and to kick them out late at night after I've got what I wanted is not good manners. Sometimes I even hold them all night, telling them nice things. I even let them borrow my towels and even my toothbrush the next morning. The towels are always thrown into the washing machine right away with extra soap and bleach just in case, and as for the toothbrush, I don't even bother throwing it in my trash can, it goes straight to the dumpster.

My little coffee maker has been sitting in the far right corner of the kitchen, right below a long narrow cabinet that stores filters and ground coffee. I have a tea spoon that I use to measure my daily doses of caffeine and that put right beside the container with the coffee. As you can imagine, putting the spoon, day in and day out, in the same place for over a year there is a spot with coffee all around it. Every morning I say to my unconscious self that I have to clean it, but after more than 365 days there were more good wishes than actions on this issue. Until today.

I finally clean it, and it took me no more than one minute to wipe the surface with a wet rag and then rinse it. Now it looks pretty clean.

I'm just wondering, once I get rid of these allergies and get back on my feet so that I can start bringing all those lucky girls again, should I tell them about this little story?

Tsing Tao

The season didn't started with the first game, 'cause this ain't baseball. It didn't started with the pre-season games either, as I ain't talking about football. The season started with me sneezing and blowing my nose. Spring, that's what I'm taking about my friends.

Short after that, all those over the counter drugs came in and the sun has been shining down on me with different tones of blue and green. People's faces disappear when they get too close, but if I turn my head a little bit I can see them out of the corner of my eye. Some of them think that I want to give them my profile, but I quited match.com several months ago.

My nose is completely blocked now, so I can't blow it or sneeze anymore, which is a relief. But I started coughing late at night, and then early in the morning; and throughout the day as well. There's a taste of blood in my mouth on whatever comes out of my throat and lungs, but when I spit on the white walls of my condo, there's no red. Well, just a little bit, but nothing too serious as to request a blood transfusion.

And nothing that a good visit to the Chinese Buffet down the street, together with few Tsing Tao Beers wouldn't cure.

[Mental Note]

Sometimes is just not a good idea to return a phone call. Specially when you're dead tired, wearing your pj's and ready to get under the blankets.

Shit!

Now I'm all dressed up and ready to go out. But still, I'm fucking dead tired and sneezing like crazy.

I Try to Count'em

My parents question me; my sisters question me. My friends question me, people that I know, question me. People that don't know me, question me; people that I don't like and that I know I'm not liked by them, question me. Questions is the only thing I get.

When I help myself to bed and close my eyes late at night, questions start to pop-up in my head. One after another, one deeper than the other, the next one asking for more details than the one before. I try to wrap all those words and letters in wool and pretend that they are sheeps. I start counting them. When there's three zeroes to the right of the dot, I cancel them and start fresh again. Just like I use to do when I took accounting in college. I eventually fall asleep.

In my dreams, words and letters wrap in wool mix with real sheeps and angry mobs. They carry sticks and pitchforks, rocks and axes. Letters Z, H and A are at the head of the group; letters Q and R are always the laziest, lagging behind everyone else -even behind the baby lambs. They all chase me, try to get me, to get me dead or alive or asleep, but I always get away.

I wake up and is time to blow my nose, take my medicine and go to work.

The Big Plan?

I believe that when you really want something, the whole universe conspires so that you can succeed. And by the same token, is there such thing as coincidence? or (almost) everything happens under some kind of big plan for us all?

I do believe there's this big plan for us all. However, I still don't understand how this part of my life fits in the whole plan. In other words, I haven't figure out yet where this idle existence that I'm leading these days is taking me to. And even more so when the hell "things" are going to get straight, so that the light at the end of this long and dark tunnel can finally be seen.

Or is it maybe my "big plan" to blog until the end of days about this dark tunnel. I fucking hope not.

To Fall or not to Fall

Even though Jean-Francois' life is pretty fucked up these days, one thing that he doesn't have problems with is falling in love. And that even amazes me.

That's perhaps the reason why all those long distance relationships that I've had throughout my life and my different trips, haven't survived the test of distance and time.

Rain

Today started for me like any other day on early April: sneezing, blowing my nose, swearing and drinking a big-O-cup of coffee to kill the effect of those beers I had last night. After going through plenty of work on top of more work and meetings and e-mails and shit at the office, came a short break for lunch and then more work, mails, meetings, phone calls and even more shit. Think of that little time that I had for lunch like a grilled cheese sandwich: being the cheese my lunch break which melted with the whole wheat bread that is my work, and at the end you couldn't tell what was what.

Later in the evening, those gray clouds that have been forming over the Appalachian Mountains, where all the die-hard red necks of North Carolina inhabit, moved to the piedmont. Then those clouds came down on us with furious anger, buckets of water rushing towards the ground, thunders splitting the night, and all that rain washing away the pollen that has been making my life miserable. For several hours I felt brand new again, opening the windows to let all that air free of green stuff now, come in and take away the bad energy that has been floating in my condo. I even felt like going to the parking lot to jump and play and enjoy the water, but the last time I did that (yes I was drunk) I got a cold that lasted for two weeks, so I refrained myself. Deep in my heart however, I went outside like a six year old boy playing like if it was the first time ever to see water coming down the sky.

Now all those clouds are gone. They kept going on their slow journey for the coast to make life miserable to the sun-tanned red necks that live by the Atlantic Ocean. And the rain has stopped in Charlotte. With the last few drops still falling on the city, that pollen that somehow escaped the rain, started going up into the atmosphere again and making Jean-Francois' life miserable one more time. And things are going to get worse overnight, I can feel it in the my nose.

But the truth of the matter is that I don't give a shit about that; I got Diana's phone number today and I'm gona pick her up tomorrow to go to school. And that very simple tiny detail, a ten-digit number written on a napkin, made my day!

The Delivery Guy

I was in the office today, working hard as always, and around few minutes past one o'clock went downstairs to get something to eat real quick. On my way back to the ninth floor where my corner office (a.k.a. cubicle) is, a Pizza delivery guy jumped in the elevator. He was carrying a black box full of warm pizzas; I bet you could store around ten of those babies in there. He pushed the bottom for the mortgage division of the HSBC Bank up in the twelfth floor.

This guy was all sweaty, and even though you could tell that he was tired after carrying that heavy box all the way from the parking lot, it surprised me how much energy he had. I, together with the other two executives that were in the elevator, who had been working behind a computer all morning with plenty of coffee and AC, were far from this guy's energy level. Kind of odd, I would've thought that it should be the other way around.

That made me think for a second that besides being warm out there today, cars are usually warmer; and if on top of that you put ten warm pizzas in a car, that thing would be like a sauna in there. But still, this kid was apparently enjoying more himself with all that hassle, heat and physical work that we did inside our offices.

It just made me think, you know. Maybe it comes down to your attitude and behavior towards what you do in life than anything else. Perhaps is not just getting what you want, but wanting what you've got -just like the song.

I Burned My Hand Today

And there's a little blister in my index finger. The good thing is that it is in my left hand, and I'm right handed, so I guess that's good.

I Like to Sneeze

Thanks to all the people that have sent me all those e-mails and letters and postcards, telegrams, cards, hand written messages, flowers and even condolences. Also I appreciate those who sent me their best wishes including the "F" word, thinking that the good old Jean-Fran was gone for ever, because he didn't write for a few days. All those thousand of readers who flow into this little corner of the internet in order to learn what is up Jean-Francois' ass that day, need not to worry: I'm still alive and kicking. A little busy these days I have to confess it, the business of delivering pizzas is not an easy one my friends, not even in the Bible Belt with all these churches and white bread people around. Not to mention this warm weather that has been coming down on us with all those beautiful flowers and green trees, and all this pollen that have covered all the sins of this town with a fine green dust.

This handsome foreigner, due to that season called Spring, has been drugged day and night. But no, God forbid, not any illegal stuff has been up my nose or into my lounges or through an IV thing, oh, no. Unfortunately I'm talking about all those medicines that I'm talking in order to keep my environmental allergies at bay, and that so far have been working at intervals. I could be fine one day and miserable the next; in the morning things could be all right, but in the evening when I have to look my best because is when I go to the gym, the sneezing starts and doesn't let go. Some days I'm just fine when suddenly I have like a sudden attack of allergies that make me sneeze for a dozen times with such power that I believe parts of my lounges end up in my Kleenex, and the rest of the day things are ok.

Few months back I got in Costco a whole thing of toilet paper that contained like fifty rolls or so; and the last couple weeks I've been through maybe half of them, not due to a change on my diet, but because I use them to blow my nose. I just can imagine the face of those guys, that according to a commercial on TV like to dig up the trash of other people in order to stole their identity, when they run into my trash: they'll go like "Man, look at all this empty toilet paper rolls. This dude was without doubt full of shit!" If they only knew.

And life keeps going, some people eat while others see them eating; and others are eaten. Oh, and you could say the same using the verb "to shit".

On the Pope's Funeral

The Pope's funeral and its majestuosity gave me an uneasy feeling. Somehow the teachings of Jesus go in the opposite direction of what I saw for a week.

Something or someone called God created everything that is in this planet and beyond. All the suns, galaxies and cosmic dust was created by him. Also, all the green and blue in this planet, as well as its main creation: Human Beings. Kind of odd, I know, that God's main creation was so destructive by nature against other creations and against its peers mainly. But God also gave man a brain and put there a whole lot of interactions, feelings, ideas and logic in order for us to make our own decisions. God made sure there was plenty of good things inside our head and quiet a few bad, so that we could lead a life long struggle on what is good and what is not.

After several years of letting human beings roam the earth freely, God realized that things were going south. There was a lot of wars, famine, people were not loving each other, man were killing man -and woman and children and animals and trees and so on- and they were not respecting God the way they should have. Whether we wanted or not, God got his hands dirty with dirt in order to make the first human being and then took a whole rib to make its masterpiece: a woman. Strange enough, I was born with my both ribs, but well, that's just a detail. So things were not right here on earth, so somehow God produced a son and whether his son agreed to it or not, he was sent to boot camp, in other words to earth.

So God's son came to earth and was named Jesus and his mission was to live as human but with super natural powers and show everybody what was the whole point on being born, grow up, have children, spoil them and then die. Jesus taught all of them who had enough free time in their hands such things as love, respect, forgiveness, meditation, and maybe some dance steps as well. He never wrote a single word on paper, but everybody around him had very good memory and later on they wrote the memories of Jesus and published it.

Something went wrong and Jesus, God's only son was killed. Not in an accident but in a very messy trial that resemble those held in Guantanamo Bay and was tortured like if he was in the Abu Grahib prison; and finally, after hours of kicking the hell out of him and according to Mel Gibson, he finally passed away. I believe it was kind of hard for God himself to see all this bullshit down here; everybody making Jesus' life hard and stuff, and the man couldn't even used his super powers at that time. I still don't know why God didn't just erased the earth and went back to the drawing board.

And also Jesus was sent to a very frigging poor family and he was born in a barn. There was a horse and a mule that provided heat and three guys that brought gifts but that weren't enough for Joseph and Maria to retire. Cheap bastards. And then the poor Jesus died poor and in the middle of an angry riot.

That's odd.

The Pope, as far as I know, is somehow God's envoy to earth, his ambassador. He is the one who has to spread the word of God and the teachings of Jesus. Not that we had to get the poor old man up in a cross without water and let him die, of course not. But such a magnificent funeral that resemble more an emperor's dead than God's envoy is kind of odd. And wass up with that mansion-country where all the top executives of the church live and work, ah? That thing is far from being the barn where Jesus was born and doesn't compare to the house were he lived.

Something is kind of odd in this picture. Why would God let his only son go through so much shit, but the Pope gets away with the mansion? And not just the Pope, but also all these churches here in the Bible Belt where I'm stuck at right now too; each one is bigger and prettier and taller than the next and the people drive even bigger and better cars than the one down the street in order to go to mass.

Something, somehow is kind of out of place in this whole picture.

On Those Little Details (1)

The entrance to the coffee shop had two glass doors, one of them permanently locked. On each side there's a glass window that resembles a clothing store, and on top of the doors there's also a large window. Even though the whole front of the narrow coffee shop contains five glass panels, the door-wide bars to push the doors open make them look like if there were seven glass panels all together.

That was a very simple detail that many, if not all of the dozens of visitors that came in every day, ever noticed neither cared about. Even though you have to pull the door handle to get in, and then push a bar on the other side of the door while holding your coffee to get out , the truth of the matter is that each door is made of one solid glass panel, and not two. A small detail, so simple that in neither of the different licenses and permissions requested by the city to operate such a business, it is mentioned. Not even in the very detailed plan of the Fire Department there's a word of this imperceptible fact.

But the robbers could've done better by looking a bit closer.

Under the Hood

Today when I was heading back home from work, the "check engine" light came out. It started blinking at random intervals, staying on while I stopped at a red light, blinking when I stepped on the gas, and then it turned off when I stopped at the next red light, but then it started blinking again. In other words the damn light was coming out, and there's something going on under the hood that I both want to know what is, but at the same time don't want to pay for such "knowledge".

The first car I had here in the US was a Mitsubishi Eclipse, and that little baby's dashboard at some point looked like a Christmas tree: every single light was coming out and I had to spend endless hours and buckets of cash trying to fix it. Eventually I gave up and got me an Accord.

Honda is perhaps the most reliable car brand and my Accord was always right there, ready to go and come back wherever I wanted to. One day my friend Yujiro sold me his customized Nissan 240sx for a couple hundred bucks and I was planning to sell it for its fair market value and make 3,000 bucks in such transaction. But I made a mistake: I took the Nissan for a test drive one Sunday afternoon and while waiting for the green light at a lonely intersection I said to myself "Let's see what this puppy can do" and I stepped on the gas. After that day I never looked back and pretty much gave the Accord away to a friend of mine.

Now I have a little red missile with a monster under the hood, but with the damn "check engine" light coming out.

Oh! my good old Accord, where are thou, brother?

He Was Wearing a Big Sombrero

I found myself working as a photographer in a very important and fancy party, hired by a very nice and outgoing young girl. I was to be given a VIP pass and my duties were to blend with everybody and take pictures of the whole event. There was this very famous singer of Rancheras who was driving around in a small golf cart and his Mariachi was following him on foot. As he drove around the whole property, singing, women of all ages were following him like crazy, hugging him and trying to kiss his hand and stuff.

One of the Mariachis was a girl I went to college with; back in those days I spoke to her a couple of times but never saw her again. Actually never thought about her until I saw her playing the violin in that party with a mini skirt.

I saw a lot of people with digital cameras, video cameras and with their own personal 3.2 megapixels camera taking pictures. Flashes were going off everywhere even though it was daylight and digital memories were made twice a second. I didn't take any pictures, even though I was in the middle of the action and saw a lot of things going on. This woman hugged the singer and he grabbed her butt; she gave her a grim look and then he turned to another lady who just wanted a picture with him but he said what her room number was and that he was gona be waiting for her later that night all naked and wearing only his big Sombrero.

I ran into the girl that hired me and she asked "How are the pictures going?" and I said great and she said that she couldn't wait to see them; she also asked me if I was having a great time and encourage me to go and get some drinks at the bar. I was using my Cannon Maxxum 50 which uses film and I had only two pictures left from previous shootings: with an 800 color film of twenty four expositions, the little screen was showing the number twenty two. I had taken zero during the party. But when she approached me I realized that if I was hired as a photographer my duty was to take picture regardless of all the other cameras.

Even though we were kind of outside, I somehow manage to go outside and took one picture, not before being interrupted by a guy in a business suit telling me that he was one of the architects that putted together that mall. That big Hacienda looked now like a shopping mall on a rainy Monday morning: empty. My parents came by and I asked them to please hold my camera while I rushed across the street to a bar to buy some film. It was night time and the bar's sign above the main entrance was turned off but there was plenty of people drinking and dancing inside.

As I approach the entrance a big Gorilla dressed all in black asked me for my pass. I remembered that I had it in my wallet, but when I reached for it, it wasn't there. The pass was a pun that had been written on a dollar bill that I used earlier that day to buy gum. Never chew it, but I remember I got it.

When I came back my parents weren't there waiting with the camera, they were gone. As I cross a door to one of the outer Patios I run into some friends that I haven't seen for ages, and they say that they were there for the funeral, that it was going to take place shortly, right at noon. As I turned my head around, the whole placed looked now like the club house of a cemetery. We hugged, chatted for a while, but then they just left without saying good bye. I felt kind of odd.

Down the hall the party was still going, outside was dark and there was plenty of young people with fancy clothes walking up and down, talking on their cell phones and holding little plastic glasses with cocktails. I saw the girl who hired me and I was afraid she would see me without the camera and she would ask me about the pictures. But she said that she was leaving in a couple of days and that she would've like to see me before that. The tone of her voice and the look in her eyes told me that she wanted something else than the pictures. She was very cute, but she felt lonely and I guess I came across as a nice guy to her. I thought about my schedule as pizza delivery guy and waiter and remember that all my days were full. I give her a wink, and told her that we could work something out. I left saying with my eyes that I had to take more pictures.

As I walked down the hall without camera, pictures, film, or my VIP pass, several ideas came crossing my mind on how to get my hands on some pictures. Maybe I'll get the e-mail address of everybody and would ask them to send me the pictures, maybe I'll speak to my Mariachi friend from college and will arrange a private session with the Singer himself, maybe. . .

I wake up from my nap and it was 5:51 PM. Instead of being all relaxed and stuff I was worried and confused, not knowing what to do. Then I decide to do what any fucked up person would do: I started blogging.

One Hour and Thirty Eight Minutes

That's the length of the phone call I've just had with Steph. We spoke about a whole variety of topics, from the very broad shit to the very detailed bullshit.

In other words, there was shit all over, but that kind of shit that keeps you laughing non stop and saying "Oh my God! and covering your mouth with your hand while holding the cell phone with the other and then having to move your cell phone from the right to the left ear 'cause it was warm and like in the middle of a story you have to plug your cell phone 'cause the battery is low and you keep coming up with more shit and more laughs and more stories and then some more just to top it all off. And imagine that this one time, when she was like six years old she ran away from home and spent the night up in a tree and when I lived in China this and that, and back in high school such and such, and no kidding and yeah no shit and hahahahah and then some more hahahaha and then it was like back in the days you wouldn't believe what happen and what happen? tell me and oh man! I can't fucking believe it and hahahahah and more hahaha and then it was like shit! we've been talking like for an hour and then it was like after a blink it was like already hour and half and shit you know I have to wake up early and finish writing this e-mail and blah blah blah and then some more hahahaha and then it was like ok, let's count till three and then we hang up and bye bye and well. . . bye.

I Should've Known Better

Not to drink Tequila like if it was holy water. I wish I could drill a hole in my head and let all this pain out.

And wass up with all this Tylenol Extra Strength that I've taken and that haven't even made a dent in my headache? Bastards!

Digestion

I had pizza for dinner last night: thin crust with mushrooms, chicken, green peppers and extra cheese. I ate that thing with an appetite that remind me of the time when I was young, restless and handsome.

But today, after an all night waking up and falling asleep again while trying to digest that pizza, I feel tired, old and in need of a good shave and some shampoo. And some more sleep of course.

On Brain Damage

If one day Jean-Francois becomes no more than a lamp in a corner, unable to eat, talk, listen, disagree, wipe his own ass, go out in a drinking spree, make love and French-kiss by his own, please let him go. If one day he has to be plugged to any machine in order to be kept in this planet, please remember how much he liked to watch "MTV Unplugged" and do the same: unplug him.

If one day he can't chew those ribs from Ruby Tuesday's that he likes so much; or if he can't have those two pounds of pasta with a ton of Parmesan cheese on top of it for lunch; or if he can't kiss and tell anymore; or if you don't know what the fuck Jean-Francois wants because he just can't say a full sentence without sounding like a new born, please, cut the electricity and let him go to hell once and for all.

If somehow you unplug the good old Jean-Fran and he doesn't passes away, do not stick anything in his arm or his stomach in order to feed and hydrate him -unless is plenty of Vodka and Redbull, of course. Just leave him in a room with the Playboy channel on and check back on him few weeks later when it starts to smell like if something rotten was in the room.

If you have a doubt about Jean-Francois' condition and the doctors, fortune tellers and witches don't know what's wrong with him or if he would ever wake up again, don't hesitate; unplug him and let him go. If you think that Jean-Francois wouldn't have liked to live like that, or maybe if you believe that he would have liked to just wait and see if there's any chance of him getting better, let me tell you one thing: you and I don't know what the fuck is going on with me, so just go ahead and unplug me. If that was the right decision, then you'll earn kudos in order to go to heaven, if somehow I could have gotten better and you screw it up, don't worry: I'll be waiting for you in hell so that we can go and hang out there.

If my parents or siblings or girlfriend or wife or perhaps my husband (who knows?) or if maybe the courts and Congress and the President and everybody says that I have to be kept in this world, you just call animal control and tell them that I'm a mutation of a German Shepperd and to please take this few greens and put him to sleep or just go and get rid of him. Throw him in a dumpster if you wish but I advise you not to take his kidney out and try to sell it because he liked to drink too much and that thing must be pretty much fucked up beyond recovery just like his brain.

And I dare you to call the TV cameras in and make a three ring circus out of poor Jean-Francois. If that happens I'm sure I'll get better immediately, waking up and walking to the nearest gun shop and starting a killing spree around town and causing such commotion that everybody would agree to put me in the electric chair right away!