$1.00 Lunch

Yessiree folks, it's entirely possible to eat lunch for $1.00. You needn't spend between five and eight dollars on fast food. You needn't spend upwards of $20.00 at an actual restaurant. Nay, dear reader, you too can quench your noontime hunger for a mere buck.

Four words: Banquet Fucking TV Dinners.

Yup, that's right. These babies are regularly on sale for a jaw-dropping $1.00 each. And variety! Let me tell ya, there must be 25 different dinners to choose from. Salisbury Steak? Check. Fried Chicken? Check, in two flavors (original and Southern fried). Beef Stroganoff? Check again.

My personal favorite? Turkey Meal, or as I like to call it, Fakesgiving Delight. You get a dollop of mashed potatoes, a scoop of peas, and then there's the mouth-watering centerpiece: three, count 'em, THREE slices of processed pseudo-turkey (hilariously, one slice is darker than the other two, presumably to imply actual dark meat), covered in gravy atop a bed of stuffing (or, as they say down south, dressing). I keep a loaf of bread at work (for toast in the mornings, which is a cheap breakfast alternative), so I usually add a piece into the mix… you know, for that "buttered roll" effect (sopping up the leftover gravy is a fun way to end the experience). I find myself missing the cranberry element (more expensive microwave turkey dinners do include it), but it's worth the sacrifice when you're only dropping a measly Washington. Beggars, as they say, can't be choosers.

For the truly famished, one shouldn't waste valuable cash on higher-priced "Hungry Man" dinners. Simply eat two regular TV dinners and you're good to go. In fact, the truly adventurous might just feel compelled to eat two DIFFERENT dinners in one meal. I've done this, so I can attest to the genius of this approach. Mix 'em and match 'em, find the best culinary combination to suit your tastes, and dive in.

I can hear the dissenters already. High fat content, you say. High sodium content, you cry. Bah. It's a fucking dollar, folks. You can't have your cake and eat it too. What's more important, your health or your wallet?

;-)

2008: A Shit Odyssey

As I sit here at my desk, drowning my sorrows in Teddy Grahams and Reese’s Pieces (two great tastes that taste great together), it occurs to me that I haven’t updated my blog since New Year’s Eve. Well, there’s a reason. To be blunt, 2008 has sucked balls so far. I can’t recall a worse month in my entire life.

2008 started off with a bang on New Year’s Eve. My 14 year-old son Isaac and I had a fight, and he moved out. I should mention that he was living with me half the time, and with his mother half the time. He’s now living with her full time. Christ, I never thought something like this would happen. I mean, you go through your life, and you take certain things for granted. I always assumed my kids would stay with me (in fact, I kinda thought they’d end up living with ME full time at some point). Isaac and I have had our clashes here and there, but I didn’t expect this. It’s been almost a month, and I still don’t quite believe it. I’ve talked to him a few times since, and he’s now expressing an interest in visiting me on weekends. Visiting! I’ll now be the “weekend dad” I swore I’d never be. It’s been a paramount goal of mine to always be there for my kids, and to be a good dad. Well, I’m clearly not the great dad I thought I was if my son only wants to “visit” me. This has been heartbreaking, to say the least. Nothing in my life has been worse.

And then there was the Amazon writing contest. Note that I said “was.” Yeah, my novel was rejected in the second round. So much for that. Seems inconsequential next to the Isaac situation. Everything does, actually.

So let’s recap: I’m not the great dad I thought I was, and I’m a failure as a writer. I’d drink to forget, but my goddamn gout acts up whenever I drink too much (I spent most of last week limping around like a fucking gimp). I put in 8 hours a day at a job in which I literally have twenty minutes worth of work to do each day (which therefore results in intolerable levels of chronic boredom). My convertible leaks, and it’s been raining like crazy. 2008: A Shit Odyssey, in spectacular Technicolor 3-D, now playing exclusively inside my head, over and over, darkening my moods, invading my thoughts, depressing the hell out of me. All I want to do is sleep, but I can’t even do that for more than a few hours at a time.

And hey, this is only the first MONTH of 2008. What other horrors await me over the next eleven months?

My 20-year high school reunion is this year. Oh Christ.

On Pins and Needles....

...is what I'm not. Seems odd, since by rights I should be climbing the walls, bug-eyed and twitching. But I'm not.

Let me explain: I entered my novel in Amazon's Breakthrough Novel Award contest a few months ago. The little 396-page bugger made it through the first round, so I was officially became of 5,000 qualified entrants. The next round will eliminate 4,000, leaving the top 1,000 to duke it out in further rounds, and this illustrious top 1,000 will be announced.... today.

But am I tripping? Am I freaking out with anticipation? No. It's just another boring-ass day here at work. In all honesty, I don't expect to win this competition, so it's not worth a bunch of nail-biting and frenzied pacing. If it's meant to be, it'll be. But hell, even if I'm NOT eliminated today, I'll still be up against 999 other wannabe writers. Still lousy odds. And that's the BEST case scenario.

Not worth stressing. If my novel gets eliminated, I'll just try getting it published the old-fashioned way: selling my soul to the devil and blowing whoever I have to. *Yawn* I'm on my lunch hour right now. I think I'll take a nap.