Milo Yambags. I'm having trouble typing cause it stabs my humor nerves just right. Milo Yambags. Might possibly be the absolute perfect name ever. I'd love for my street soldier name to be Milo Yambags. Snicker. Fucking Milo Yambags. I just can't function, loss of all motor skills when I say Milo Yambags.

Snerk.

Also, the hawk in Bryant Park that mistook a chihuahua for a rat and eviscerated it kinda tickles me too. I love the mutts. I prefer my pooches hefty enough to wrassle. I've always called the toy pups "rat dogs". Yapping and nipping at your heels. I think the hawk agrees with me. I feel for ya lady, but you got a loyal rat wearing a collar. And ultimately, bird food on a leash.

Soon you'll see the all caps year title we've all come to love and expect. Relax, don't shed any hair. Just wanted to finish up the current segment of this insanity with one last thing. Chewing minutes off the clock at the jobby job this morning. Day ten of twelve days straight of slavin. I decided I will go to the Cooper-Hewitt Design Museum on Sunday, my first day off in a while. Anybody wanna come? Eh, scratch that, I'd prefer peacefully erasing my grumpy alone. I think.

YEAR SIXTEEN: Interest in playing sports chumped. Punching a clock, kickin it old school, working stiff drankin and puffin replaced it. Sewing the seeds of a fine beer gut at sweet sixteen.

Favorite spot to get twisted was behind the wall. Three blocks from my house. Behind Glaser's drugstore was this helvetica sparse castle rampart style wall. Brick blockade to keep the alleyway sights away from the residential neighborhood. Giant L, on the corner of Gannon and Berick. One side, a brief grassy knoll, with plotted sugar maples. The other, a recessed backway of a small shopping center. Almost underground, as the streets inclined upward, and the dugout blacktop plot underneath. Perfect drunk cover.

Burning spliffs and draining fifths of Old Turkey. Maxing on the hood of my homie's Buick. Taking leaks in the corner, while cranking back the last fumes of whiskey. Stumble home stupid, loudly rapping Doug E. Fresh's "La Di Da Di".

I had taken my financial situation in my own hands well before this. Funny enough, the hood was becoming gentrified just as I was in need of cash. Fresh influx of yuppies with loot. Was banking as the "help", since twelve you'll recall. Got it into my head I needed to see my income on printed checks. Parental signed work permit when I was fifteen, the beginning of the summer, just before I turned sixteen. Just above minumum wage sweat.

First Federal Frank and Crust Company. Silly name for a silly pizzaria in the Galleria food court. Throw on the apron son, youse a cook now boy.

Kinda fucked, but I had a decent time earning substandard wages. Wore my tuckus out, slinging pizza in front of those giant inferno ovens. Arms elbow deep in murky water, scrubbing pans, hands bumping against chunky food floaters. Coming home smelly. Just straight up manual labor. Felt good.

Boxes of frozen dough balls would cycle through there. Thawing them out in single plastic containers, dabbled with vegetable oil, stacked six high in low level fridges. Slap one out onto the middle of the hydraulic pizza dough press disk. Machine was kinda cool. Stuttered baritone air pump exhaust as it squished dough flat between two metal plates. We were admonished for showing off and tossing the pizza dough in the air to expand it. Did it anyway, customers had a clear view of us from the pickup line. Quicker than tugging at it anyway.

Made out with this tiny little hoodrat, Bonita Applebaum chick. Step into the walk in freezer together, or out back in the underground enclosed delivery platform, hands flying all over the place. She was somewhat scrawny, bonier than I like, but she was a light skinned Black chick, and that was my particular flavor of fantasy back then. Fingered her pie a couple times under her Dickies. Never got in them drawers officially however. Ripping the sheets apart alone at night.

I sustained a few injuries at that joint. Never filed for any compensation. Fucking stupid that.

Tip of my left pinky was dangling off the digit. Blood pulsing out in glubs. Missed the one edge of the pepperoni tray as I slid it into the fridge. Tried to catch it, and sliced right through my finger on the thin metal bracket. Few black stitches and I was back on the job next day with latex cots on my pinky. Miniture condoms. The entire crew had a ball with that.

While cleaning the tiles above the oven, one of the more retarded cooks opened the door right on my exposed upper arm. Jumped back quick, like a doused cat. Looked at the idiot, then the oven. My peeled off flesh bubbling and cooking on the hot metal. Arm blistering up. I will say I was fascinated by the skin layers growing back in pebble like buds. Still have some discoloration today.

While hoisting boxes of paper cups up in the storage racks, standing on a shaky wooden chair, I wrenched my ankle. The chair gave way. All my weight landing on the side of one leg. Having silly sports training, I decided to tough it out and walk it off. Worked another six hours with my leg throbbing. Woke up next day, couldn't slide my Air Jordans on. Foot swole up like a bloated dead whale. It lets me know when thunderstorms are coming now. Am honored with a trick body part. Predicts the weather better than tracking the fuzz on caterpillars.

But the shit was my money. I did what I pleased with it. Polo shirts and vinyl Nike jackets. B-Boy Addidas olympic sweatshirts and the Pro Model caps. Filled my boom box with a heavy rotation of BDP, Eric B and Rakim, NWA, and whatever else that was nothing but hip-hop back in the day. Always had toss in and re-ups for booze and bags. Never missed a movie at the theater. Candy, comic books, and chronic. Didn't save a dime. Damn consumerism imp. Sucking the exhaust pipe of a bunch of corporations. White trash kid not knowing how to act with his sad pile of cash. Madison Avenue had me on a trying to be cool smack down.

Except for the comic books. Don't front. Comic books are still sweet sweet papery bits of heaven. Guard my stacks with a pitchfork. Grrrrrrrrrrrr.