It's been a few days since I've written because the Sleep Center gave me more hours. They know I'm willing to work day and night because I'd just as soon be there as any place else, so sometimes I work days, sometimes nights, and sometimes like last night I finish my shift and just hang out behind the building.
There are some woods behind the Sleep Center, and I built a couple nesting boxes to see if I could get lucky and attract a Great Horned Owl, Rachel's favorite bird. The Great Horned never came, but an Eastern Screech Owl did come, so sometimes after my shift at night, especially when I know Sammy is working the late shift at Arby's (which is just a few blocks away), I'll sit in a chair against the outside of the building and listen until Sammy shows up.
When Sammy does show up during his break, he generally tries to imitate a bird call or scare me by pretending he's two people speaking about how to murder me. Last night he had Boyce with him, and they must not have got their stories straight, because I heard Sammy whisper, "How should we kill him?" and Boyce responded with "Buuuuuurd....I'm a buuuuuurd...Buuuuuurd...," as though birds sing and call by announcing their species in English. And they certainly don't do it to pelvic grinding which Boyce added for no reason.
I pulled out the two extra folding chairs I keep for them behind the dumpster and they sat down with me. A few weeks ago Boyce had got a letter that he was a potential juror, and yesterday afternoon he got a letter saying he needed to go to the courthouse for an interview. Boyce and Sammy decided to switch places, so Sammy is going to the courthouse instead.
This isn't entirely unusual. All three of us have fake drivers' licenses with each others' names. We know each other's social security numbers and mothers' maiden names, so we can impersonate one another in almost any situation. We started doing it in our early twenties when we learned that Sammy had already been impersonating us with fake id's for almost seven years. Sammy told us he started doing it when he was seventeen and would buy beer with an id that said Boyce Lancaster. He wouldn't even drink the beer. He'd sell it to some middle schoolers or, all by himself in the parking lot, he'd throw it at the ground as hard as he could and then jump rope the spinning, spraying can. Once he gave a 24-pack he bought to a crazy homeless man. The homeless guy looked at him weird, and Sammy said he was the devil's messenger, and that although these looked like beers they were actually liquid damnation made of hot sand and splinters, just to see if the guy would still open one. He did, but what really thrilled Sammy, was the homeless guy offered Sammy one, too. Sammy loved that he never could tell how the homeless guy meant it.
Sammy used fake id's with any clerk who previously looked at him wrong because of his missing fingers. He'd never tell the clerk later that on three successive nights he, a seventeen year old kid, was Cyrus Wetherbee, Samuel Clifton, and Boyce Lancaster. He just wanted to prove to himself that the clerk was a fool.
Boyce doesn't want to do jury duty because he's got his wife and kid, and he needs to spend a lot of his time with them. Boyce is married to Charlotte, and his son's name is Boyce Jr. Sammy is happy to get away from Arby's for a while, and he likes to self-dare about how often he can use unusual words in social situations. He's already promised to use the words "bodacious" and "fetal development" five separate times each during his interview at the courthouse. Boyce told him he'd buy him a round if he can find a way to say, "bodacious fetal development" in a sentence. Sammy is very excited to try.
We stayed behind the Sleep Center a little longer to wait for the Eastern Screech Owl to come but it never did.
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
Friday, June 26, 2009
In Memoriam: American Music
It's not an easy day to blog after yesterday's death. It's unfortunate that only once people have passed do we think about how they've affected all our lives. Whenever I hear about a passing, whether it's of a good person or bad, I always think about what Rachel would say: "To the dead all is forgiven."
June 25, 2009 is going to be remembered in the history of American music. When a person this important passes, you don't forget it. When someone brought so much joy to people's lives on such an intimate level it shouldn't be shrugged off like some old feather. When a person like this spent so much time giving music to people, providing comfort for others' most important and difficult moments, it deserves to have the attention all the media is giving it.
You might ask yourself if all the national attention this is getting might be a bit ridiculous. After all, we didn't all have a personal relationship with such a person, did we? No, but we're celebrating an important person. Let's raise a glass then to Erma Louise Pittman Ellis of Cranberry, West Virginia. To quote her obituary, "She was known in Raleigh and surrounding counties for her music ministry on WOAY TV and Radio and was part of the Skelton Trio. Louise sang with the trio and individually at more than 2,000 funerals over a span of 50 years. She lovingly shared her music to comfort families during their time of sorrow." Certainly someone worth the whole country thinking about.
http://www.register-herald.com/obituaries/local_story_175223217.html
June 25, 2009 is going to be remembered in the history of American music. When a person this important passes, you don't forget it. When someone brought so much joy to people's lives on such an intimate level it shouldn't be shrugged off like some old feather. When a person like this spent so much time giving music to people, providing comfort for others' most important and difficult moments, it deserves to have the attention all the media is giving it.
You might ask yourself if all the national attention this is getting might be a bit ridiculous. After all, we didn't all have a personal relationship with such a person, did we? No, but we're celebrating an important person. Let's raise a glass then to Erma Louise Pittman Ellis of Cranberry, West Virginia. To quote her obituary, "She was known in Raleigh and surrounding counties for her music ministry on WOAY TV and Radio and was part of the Skelton Trio. Louise sang with the trio and individually at more than 2,000 funerals over a span of 50 years. She lovingly shared her music to comfort families during their time of sorrow." Certainly someone worth the whole country thinking about.
http://www.register-herald.com/obituaries/local_story_175223217.html
Thursday, June 25, 2009
Sammy and Boyce
Ate lunch yesterday with Sammy and Boyce on the curb of the Kentucky Fried Chicken. Sammy, who works at Arby's and always gets us free food, asked us if we couldn't eat on the curb of the KFC next door so he could say that he went some place different for lunch. It was a nice day. Boyce gave some house sparrows bits of curly fries, even though he knows I don't like that.
At one point Sammy pulled apart a piece of roast beef that hung over his bun, and he held it up in the air. He said he thought it looked like one of those ultrasounds of a baby. He asked Boyce if it was a boy or girl, and Boyce told him it was meat. Sammy asked me if birds eat roast beef. I didn't even respond because I knew Sammy was going to give the roast beef to the sparrows no matter what I said. A few of the sparrows fought over the piece of ultrasound baby roast beef, and one of them flew away with it to the other side of the parking lot. Look at that, Sammy shouted, Baby Alice can fly!
Sammy Clifton is the only person I know who both reads constantly and has lost fingers to a hatchet on two separate occasions (one involved attempting to split a walnut in half, the other was from his brother). He's distantly related to Charles Brockden Brown, who's an old writer. He's tried to make me read a lot, the same way Rachel tried to make me religious a lot. Neither have really stuck, and all I do is make up the details that I can't properly remember. Once I thought Sammy was going to have an aneurysm when I said, "Captain Eh-rab." If you saw all the books he's read you wouldn't think he works at Arby's. But then when you saw he only has eight fingers you might think it all balances out.
I met Boyce when he punched me on the school bus. He climbed on the bus, asked who Cyrus Wetherbee was, and then walked up and slugged me in the side of the neck. Someone told him Cyrus Wetherbee was making fun of his mother. It wasn't true, though. I never even heard the name Boyce Lancaster before. He apologized and asked if I wanted to borrow some of his old Christmas records. That seemed just as weird as punching me in the side of the neck. When I asked him why he punched me there, he told me that it's not right to do wrong to someone's teeth. I think he'd cut a man's heart out before he hurt his teeth. Boyce has an enormous music collection, mostly old records. He listens to the music because he likes the album covers. He says that means he's got some pretty terrible music, but it always looks nice.
When I told Sammy and Boyce I was going to write this blog they thought it was a good idea. I told Boyce I'd link to some of his favorite record covers.
After lunch Sammy went back to work and Boyce gave me a ride home in his locksmith van. Sammy called me later that night to apologize about giving roast beef to the house sparrows. I told him Alice was passing through some sparrow's cloaca as we spoke, and he wouldn't stop laughing. He made me call Boyce and tell him that. Boyce didn't laugh until Sammy said a cloaca was another word for the bird's crapper. It's also the canal the egg passes through, but I didn't want to ruin their fun.
At one point Sammy pulled apart a piece of roast beef that hung over his bun, and he held it up in the air. He said he thought it looked like one of those ultrasounds of a baby. He asked Boyce if it was a boy or girl, and Boyce told him it was meat. Sammy asked me if birds eat roast beef. I didn't even respond because I knew Sammy was going to give the roast beef to the sparrows no matter what I said. A few of the sparrows fought over the piece of ultrasound baby roast beef, and one of them flew away with it to the other side of the parking lot. Look at that, Sammy shouted, Baby Alice can fly!
Sammy Clifton is the only person I know who both reads constantly and has lost fingers to a hatchet on two separate occasions (one involved attempting to split a walnut in half, the other was from his brother). He's distantly related to Charles Brockden Brown, who's an old writer. He's tried to make me read a lot, the same way Rachel tried to make me religious a lot. Neither have really stuck, and all I do is make up the details that I can't properly remember. Once I thought Sammy was going to have an aneurysm when I said, "Captain Eh-rab." If you saw all the books he's read you wouldn't think he works at Arby's. But then when you saw he only has eight fingers you might think it all balances out.
I met Boyce when he punched me on the school bus. He climbed on the bus, asked who Cyrus Wetherbee was, and then walked up and slugged me in the side of the neck. Someone told him Cyrus Wetherbee was making fun of his mother. It wasn't true, though. I never even heard the name Boyce Lancaster before. He apologized and asked if I wanted to borrow some of his old Christmas records. That seemed just as weird as punching me in the side of the neck. When I asked him why he punched me there, he told me that it's not right to do wrong to someone's teeth. I think he'd cut a man's heart out before he hurt his teeth. Boyce has an enormous music collection, mostly old records. He listens to the music because he likes the album covers. He says that means he's got some pretty terrible music, but it always looks nice.
When I told Sammy and Boyce I was going to write this blog they thought it was a good idea. I told Boyce I'd link to some of his favorite record covers.
After lunch Sammy went back to work and Boyce gave me a ride home in his locksmith van. Sammy called me later that night to apologize about giving roast beef to the house sparrows. I told him Alice was passing through some sparrow's cloaca as we spoke, and he wouldn't stop laughing. He made me call Boyce and tell him that. Boyce didn't laugh until Sammy said a cloaca was another word for the bird's crapper. It's also the canal the egg passes through, but I didn't want to ruin their fun.
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
The Dream about the Letters and the Turkey Vultures
When people wake up at the Sleep Center, they often talk to the attendants about what they dreamed, even though normally the attendants don't care what they dreamed. No one is there to get their dreams tested. From what I understand, that is what the Last Judgment is for. I still like to listen to people's dreams, though.
Last night I sat on my stool in the closet and listened through the wall as a woman told her dream to the attendant named Mark who was unplugging the woman. She said that she walked down a busy street and kept finding these beautiful glowing letters of the alphabet. Every time she picked one up (and apparently this was often) she felt like she learned something valuable. But then she'd take the letter and throw it in the air where turkey vultures would eat them.
(My ears naturally perked up when I heard about turkey vultures. It took everything in me not to open the door to the closet and tell her that unless the glowing of the letters was due to putrefaction a turkey vulture wouldn't eat them, ignoring the fact that turkey vultures do not live in urban areas, nor do they eat things people hurl into the air. Were these letters even organic material that a bird could ingest????? You know, there's a reason people don't put pen caps and nickels in bird feeders.)
I'm thinking about carving a hole into the closet because I was curious as to how the attendant was regarding this woman's dream. The woman went on and on: then I took the letter F, and I felt like the world would be better if we just loved each other, then I threw it in the air and a turkey vulture ate it. Then I took the letter A and understood that sharing is better than having, then I threw it in the air and a turkey vulture ate it. Then I took the letter C, and I felt like nature was just wonderful, and we should take care of it, then I threw it in the air and a turkey vulture ate it. Then I took the letter E, and I felt like we need to be thankful for what we have, then I threw it in the air and a turkey vulture ate it.
I couldn't stop wanting her to shut up, and I would have liked to have known what the attendant thought of her. The attendant, Mark, is not my friend, though. Even though I didn't like the woman who had the dream, I nevertheless sketched her dream when I got home, which is something I enjoy doing. If I died and someone went through my journal, they would probably think I loved drawing "dream-like" things. Which I do. So I just sketched the turkey vulture with the glow-letter B hanging from its beak. No way was I putting that woman in the picture. Turkey vultures could crap a more coherent story.
Last night I sat on my stool in the closet and listened through the wall as a woman told her dream to the attendant named Mark who was unplugging the woman. She said that she walked down a busy street and kept finding these beautiful glowing letters of the alphabet. Every time she picked one up (and apparently this was often) she felt like she learned something valuable. But then she'd take the letter and throw it in the air where turkey vultures would eat them.
(My ears naturally perked up when I heard about turkey vultures. It took everything in me not to open the door to the closet and tell her that unless the glowing of the letters was due to putrefaction a turkey vulture wouldn't eat them, ignoring the fact that turkey vultures do not live in urban areas, nor do they eat things people hurl into the air. Were these letters even organic material that a bird could ingest????? You know, there's a reason people don't put pen caps and nickels in bird feeders.)
I'm thinking about carving a hole into the closet because I was curious as to how the attendant was regarding this woman's dream. The woman went on and on: then I took the letter F, and I felt like the world would be better if we just loved each other, then I threw it in the air and a turkey vulture ate it. Then I took the letter A and understood that sharing is better than having, then I threw it in the air and a turkey vulture ate it. Then I took the letter C, and I felt like nature was just wonderful, and we should take care of it, then I threw it in the air and a turkey vulture ate it. Then I took the letter E, and I felt like we need to be thankful for what we have, then I threw it in the air and a turkey vulture ate it.
I couldn't stop wanting her to shut up, and I would have liked to have known what the attendant thought of her. The attendant, Mark, is not my friend, though. Even though I didn't like the woman who had the dream, I nevertheless sketched her dream when I got home, which is something I enjoy doing. If I died and someone went through my journal, they would probably think I loved drawing "dream-like" things. Which I do. So I just sketched the turkey vulture with the glow-letter B hanging from its beak. No way was I putting that woman in the picture. Turkey vultures could crap a more coherent story.
Monday, June 22, 2009
Welcome to the Bird Casino
I know what you're thinking: aren't we all "blogged" out? So many "people" giving opinions and yet none of them are any wiser or refreshing than a book of quotes that you take on a midnight swim. That's why I began the Bird Casino. I've been keeping a journal for years, so why not put it online for strangers to see? I hope you learn a little about me, and a whole lot about yourself. Come along, won't you?
On this inaugural post I thought I'd just write about myself for a bit. My name is Cyrus Wetherbee. I do part-time custodial work at the local Sleep Center. It's a place where people come to get their sleep analyzed when they aren't resting well because they're in physical pain, having trouble with medications, or unable to silence the pounding of the Great Kettle Drum of Grief after they accidentally caused the death of a spouse (it could have happened to anyone, Mr. Biddlestein!).
Here is a list of things I love that are not bird or gambling related: the Green Bay Packers, reading, practicing my boomerang, sharpening stuff, listening to bird calls, learning about where Indian reservations are, watching people's hands, interpreting people's dreams, picking berries, and blackjack. More than anything though, I love Rachel, even though she doesn't know. Don't worry, I highly doubt she'll ever read this.
I should probably mention that if you're looking for a blog that gets into religion, politics, sports, birds, and gambling...then you found it! Seriously though, it's going to be about Rachel, too. Love is what makes us human. Though I do think dogs, apes, pigs, and some species of birds are capable of love (the jury is still out on you, cats!). All of those animals though are unable to use language like we do. To be fair, honeybees and hammerhead sharks use a very unique, complex language. But they don't love. So again: to love and use language is to be human. Oh, Rachel.
On this inaugural post I thought I'd just write about myself for a bit. My name is Cyrus Wetherbee. I do part-time custodial work at the local Sleep Center. It's a place where people come to get their sleep analyzed when they aren't resting well because they're in physical pain, having trouble with medications, or unable to silence the pounding of the Great Kettle Drum of Grief after they accidentally caused the death of a spouse (it could have happened to anyone, Mr. Biddlestein!).
Here is a list of things I love that are not bird or gambling related: the Green Bay Packers, reading, practicing my boomerang, sharpening stuff, listening to bird calls, learning about where Indian reservations are, watching people's hands, interpreting people's dreams, picking berries, and blackjack. More than anything though, I love Rachel, even though she doesn't know. Don't worry, I highly doubt she'll ever read this.
I should probably mention that if you're looking for a blog that gets into religion, politics, sports, birds, and gambling...then you found it! Seriously though, it's going to be about Rachel, too. Love is what makes us human. Though I do think dogs, apes, pigs, and some species of birds are capable of love (the jury is still out on you, cats!). All of those animals though are unable to use language like we do. To be fair, honeybees and hammerhead sharks use a very unique, complex language. But they don't love. So again: to love and use language is to be human. Oh, Rachel.
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