It’s The Little Words

The boyfriend had forgotten to pay his Sears card, and since he isn't here, he asked if I would run down to the store to take care of it. Not a problem, I've done it before. So it was off to Sears, "Where America Shops™".

The Sears here is awful. It's a giant slab of Soviet-era concrete. And it's attached to the ugliest mall in America, Valley Plaza. From the street, the mall looks like a medium security prison and has almost as much charm. It was a very sorry spectacle when we first moved here. Several of the anchor tenants had gone belly-up leaving boarded up hulks at two ends and inside it was endless corridors of dark, vacant retail spaces. Over the past two years though, things have improved... slightly. They added (yet another) Target and one of the vacant department stores has been turned into the world's largest Forever 21. As if the world needed a mammoth Forever 21. At least it filled up some space. It looks like a lot of the stores have been rented so the mall doesn't seem so much like the set of a post-apocalyptic film anymore. And the powers that be have embarked on a beauty makeover and finally ditched the old logo, which looked like it was made of human bones...



But, back to Sears...

I knew from previous experience that there's only one cashier where you can pay your bill and it's located in the garden department. Mid day on week day the store is always dead and I figured I'd be in and out in no time. Then again, I didn't factor in... Bakersfield.

I rounded the corner into the garden department and there at the cashier was a line of 8 people and some sort of dispute at the register. It had clearly been going on long enough for a line to form, so as I took my place in line I tried to get up to speed on the what was going on.

Here's the deal...

The man at the counter was trying to buy something. What, I couldn't tell you. What we did know was that it cost $8, or rather, it would've cost $8 but it was on sale. We knew it was on sale because rung up on the register was $4.80. And therein lies our dispute.

"The sign said 50% off!" insisted the man.

The clerk calmly informed him the sign said "UP TO" 50% off. His particular item was only 40% off.

"No it didn't!" said the man.

"Yes it did" said the clerk.

"No it didn't!" said the man.

"Yes it did" said the clerk.

"No it didn't!" said the man.

"Yes it did" said the clerk.

This back and forth had obviously been going on for a long time before I arrived.

The clerk pointed around the store to all the sale signs, all of which clearly said "UP TO 50% off".

"They're all the same, they all say 'Up To'" said the clerk.

"Not the one where I got THIS!" yelled the man.

Just then, another clerk showed up and I thought "Thank God", at least she'll be able to take care of all of us".

No such luck.

The first clerk turned to the second and said "BRING ME THE SALE SIGN FROM THE FASHION DEPARTMENT".

"Fashion" and "Sears" - two words that should never be used together.

Clerk #2 disappeared and a few moments later came the sound of a metal rake being dragged down a sidewalk, the clerk dragging the metal sign stand across the tile floor. She slammed it down next to the register and clerk #1 jabbed her finger at the words "UP TO".

Not to be outdone, the man jabbed his finger at "50%".

"UP TO..."

"50%!"

"UP TO..."

"50%!"

"UP TO..."

"50%!"

Back and forth they went, each practically punching the sign. It wouldn't be long until one of them actually broke through.

I should point out that this was all over 80 cents, the difference between 50% off and 40% off.

By this time, I was the only one getting visibly perturbed. The seven people in front of me all stood there like sheep. You see that a lot here. If this dispute dragged on for days, they would all still be standing there.

Finally, the yelling stopped and there was an uncomfortable pause. And then man suddenly said...

"Then I don't want it. I AM NOT PAYING FULL PRICE!!!".

And he stormed off.

Elapsed Time: 20 minutes. And probably another 20 minutes before I even arrived on the scene.

I am counting the days until we move because truth be told, I have had it UP TO here with these people.

Where The Rubber Meets The Road

I learned long ago that while the boyfriend is amazing at so many things, he isn't to be trusted with selecting an evening's entertainment.

Mostly this pertains to the movies we watch, but not always. Just a few weeks ago, without any hint of irony, he mentioned that his former employer was offering free tickets to the Monster Truck Rally, if I was so inclined. I was not.

But it's with the movies where he really sucks.

The final straw, the low-point in an already disastrous record came a couple of years ago when he was dispatched to the video store to pick up "Dreamgirls" and came back with "The Host", a slapstick, Korean monster movie. Featuring Kang-ho Song as Park Gang-Doo. I'm sure you've heard of it. It was so unbelievably bad, we couldn't stop watching it. Which normally wouldn't be so bad except the film was like four hours long. In Korean. With subtitles. "But on the box it says it's like 'Jaws'" he protested. Yes. On the box, someone you've never heard of from a website you've never heard of compared the film to "Jaws", probably in a sarcastic way. And that was enough to lure in the boyfriend. Ever since then, he's been banned from picking movies.

Until this weekend.

He was really only back here for one night. He arrived so late on Friday we went to bed shortly after the awful local news. And he had to leave again yesterday afternoon, which left Saturday as our only real day together. He cooked an amazing dinner, as always, and as I was cleaning up I uttered the fateful words...

"Honey, why don't you find something for us to watch?"

As the phrase left my lips, I regretted it. It didn't take long before I realized just how much I would come to regret it. Becasue the film he quickly found for us was...

"Rubber"

"An old tire appears in a California desert, and under its own power it begins rolling down the road, stopping and starting as it pleases. The notion that the tire can operate under its own power isn't half as remarkable as its other talent -- the tire has telekinetic abilities and can make things explode at will, including human heads. The evil tire goes on a killing spree after its affections for a beautiful woman (Roxane Mesquida) are thwarted, and local lawman Lt. Chad (Stephen Spinella) steps forward to investigate. Meanwhile, a handful of people aware of the tire and its actions are watching it from a safe distance until they're poisoned by a mysterious villain; one of them (Wings Hauser) manages to survive, and is looking for some revenge of his own."



It was French.

I tried to change his mind, but no such luck. I wanted to be with him, so I gave it the old college try, but when half the cast was killed by a poisoned turkey carcass about an hour in, I turned to him and said "I'm going back to work... let me know how it turns out." Not that I cared. Sixty minutes of my life I'll never get back.

About 30 minutes later, when one of the female cast members tried to seduce the tire, he threw in the towel too.

And then we went to bed.

Date Night in Bako.

Sunday Inspiration

True Crime

"Oh my God, the smell..."

The boyfriend was driving back last night and was calling from the outskirts of town.

Yes, the smell. Of Bakersfield.

Truth be told, living here, I don't really notice it all that much anymore. I think as a defense mechanism your brain just shuts down your sense of smell if you live here because in all honesty I can't really smell anything anymore. But you don't have to be gone long before your olfactory senses return, a day or two at most. Of course, it makes re-entry into Bako all that much more trying, as the boyfriend quickly discovered last night.

"I need to take a shower" he said when he arrived, a common feeling here.

It was around 11pm and while he was rinsing off I turned on the local news.

I long ago came to accept the fact that this city is a lawless wasteland, like "Deadwood", but the news last night was particularly gruesome:

Baby killers.

Elderly woman stabbed to death.

Police shoot a teenager.

Torture.

Meth labs.

And on and on and on.

Not to mention the tragedy of the stolen Marie Osmond Collector Dolls. Oh, the humanity.

But by far, the best story of the night was the "cat burglar":

"I was just bored and decided I wanted to be a cat burglar," Slivers told 23ABC in a jailhouse interview. "So I kicked in the window and tried to steal the lion but it was too heavy, so I stole the cat."

"I took the leopard to my hotel. I then decided I wanted the dingo so I went back and took it. I took it to Jack In The Box because I wanted to have breakfast with it."

Live here long enough and that actually starts making sense.

Shazam!

Behold, the Awesome Power of The Gays.

If there was a gay superhero, his super power would be obvious...

GENTRIFICATION POWERS ACTIVATE!

Yesterday, I met with a realtor. We weren't going to make the same mistake twice and use the agent we bought the house with. We could fill a Chuck E. Cheese ball pit with all the balls she dropped on the sale. Instead, I called the listing agent. We had been impressed with her and we figured she was familiar with the house and it's myriad... challenges.

"Oh my God, it doesn't even look like the same house!" she exclaimed when I met her at the door. She marveled at the transformation we'd brought about. It just goes to show what you can do with a little imagination and 60 gallons of paint. And a chainsaw.

We just want out and would be fine breaking even, but after taking a tour of the renovated house, she assured me we'd walk away with some money, probably something around ten grand. Who'd a thunk it?

There are some issues, of course, first and foremost the gaping hole in the ceiling. She gave me the names of some contractors she uses and the plan is to get that taken care of in the next couple of weeks and put the house on the market around Valentines Day.

"I just can't get over what you were able to do!" she said.

Thank you Ma'am, it's what we do.

And so, to the people of Bakersfield, I say our work here is done. You're welcome.

Profiles In Courage

I was in the kitchen when there was a sharp knock at the front door. The dogs started yapping and ran to the narrow, floor length window in the entryway to see who was there. It's their little window on the world. I was only a second behind them and when I looked out I saw the mailman.

Fleeing.

Running down the front walk.

By his actions you'd think he'd just left a bomb at the front door.

I quickly scooted past the dogs and out the door and called after him "Helloooo".

He spun back around. The fear on his face melted away once he saw it was only me. Turns out he had a registered letter, final docs from the boyfriend's former employer.

"I wasn't sure anyone was home" said the mailman. "And then I saw the dogs and I wasn't going to take any chances."

Really? My dogs?

My dogs are about the size of a loaf of bread. They look more like plush toys and are just as threatening. Unless it's possible to be licked to death, they pose absolutely no danger. Plus, they were behind glass. And the mailman was terrified of them.

So much for "Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night..." because if you have a dog, no matter how small, in this neighborhood you can kiss your mail good-bye. The guy seriously needs to put on his big boy pants or get out of the business.

Come to think of it... where's our usual Mail Lady? The one who drinks? I haven't seen her in weeks. Maybe she blacked out in her mailbag one too many times and finally checked into rehab. I hope she's OK.

The Empty Nest

I've had some whirlwind weeks in my life but it's safe to say this one takes the cake.

Last Thursday we were still searching for path out of the dead end of our lives in Bakersfield and today, not quite one week later, the path isn't just clear but the journey has already begun... today was the boyfriend's first day on the new job. The early reviews are in and it's a night and day improvement. He loves it.

He had hoped to take some time off before beginning the new gig, primarily because he hasn't taken a day off in over a year but also because to say there's a lot to do here is an understatement. But they needed him today and he wasn't about to question it. Yesterday he spent the day packing some things and by 5 he was gone. He'll be staying with my folks during the week and coming back here on the weekends.

The bizarre thing, to me, is that it was almost exactly a year to the day that we found ourselves in exactly the opposite situation. I found myself leaving unexpectedly to look after my folks after my mother's heart surgery and it was the boyfriend who was left marooned alone in Bako for a month.

We've known all along that this would have to be this way for the immediate future, but that certainly doesn't make it any easier. He hasn't even been gone a full day and I miss him desperately. If I thought I was living a lonely existence before, now I'm really going to be put to the test. He was my only human contact.

At least I have the dogs. That's some comfort.

A House Is Not A Home

"Hey! Come check out the fireplace on this one."

It was the boyfriend, checking rental listings for the OC on the laptop. Old habits die hard.

It would appear we aren't going to have a problem finding a place to live. My preference would be to downsize drastically, edit all the crap out of our lives and move light, but no one ever listens to me. I suggested that when we moved to Bako and when we moved into this house, to no avail because, as I mentioned, no one ever listens to me.

We thought about somewhere in the South County, closer to the beach, but the commute for the boyfriend would quickly grow old and the prices are a little out of our league. Besides, that would be uncomfortably close to my sister and her nefarious web of Mona Vie pyramid schemes. There would always be the danger of a surprise knock at the door and a fresh case of snake oil, and no one wants to chance that. So we're looking more in Northern OC, closer to my folks and all my long lost friends.

And then there's this house.

I knew from the start this house would end up being an albatross around our necks, but as I possibly mentioned before, no one ever listens to me. So we've been mulling our options over the past few days and so far we've whittled it down to four.

The first would be to just walk away and give the house back to the bank. Half the houses in Bakersfield are owned by the banks, so what's one more, right? It has a certain "clean slate" appeal to it, at first. But then you realize the boyfriend would be slapped with a Scarlet FICO score for the foreseeable future (this house is in his name), and considering my credit is still in the dumpster from the loss of the LA house, this option isn't really doable. One of us has to have a working credit score.

Option Two, a personal favorite of mine, would be to torch the house, take the insurance money and flee. Lord knows there's enough dodgy electrical work in the house to plausibly pull it off. Sure, it's illegal, but I prefer to think of it as "out of the box" thinking. Then again, I've watched enough CSI to know that even the dunderheaded BPD would probably figure it out. The first clue would be the vacant lot we'd leave behind since we wouldn't even bother to rebuild.

Option Three would be to rent the house out. The going rents in the neighborhood are several hundred dollars more than the mortgage, so the thought of having a little mad money every month was exciting. Not to mention the mortgage interest deduction the boyfriend would enjoy. But everyone we mentioned this to has been aghast. What if we get deadbeat renters? they ask. Something to think about, for sure. I see all the eviction notices posted in the neighborhood, walking the dogs. The chance of being stuck with a mortgage AND a rent AND facing a months long eviction process is beyond frightening. Even if we didn't get deadbeat tenants, the chances they'd trash the house and steal everything that isn't nailed down is real. My parents once had a rental house and finally sold it in disgust when the last tenants took everything including the window screens. Whatever profit we'd make would probably go into re-carpeting and painting the house every 12 months. And let's not even think about potential problems. In the year we've owned it we've dealt with everything from possems' to plumbing, flattened fences and rodents and roaches. Three guesses who will be dispatched to deal with the future ones? And there will be future ones, you just know it. Not gonna happen. Once I leave this town, I never want to come back. Ever.

Which leaves us with Option Four... SELL. And sell cheap. Breakeven cheap. And we can probably do it. The house had sat on the market so long because the front was so overgrown it looked like it was being reclaimed by a jungle and every flat surface inside was covered in Grandma Moses floral wall paper. We quickly took care of those issues, and now the house looks quite nice. Once we patch the gaping hole in the ceiling, it should be good to go. The only potential problem would be if prospective buyers had a competent home inspector, unlike us. But then the boyfriend had a brilliant idea... let's make using our corrupt, inept home inspector a condition of sale. Works for me.

Tomorrow it's time to start calling some realtors.

Overheard In Bako

"I want it elegant, like 'Dynasty', but still have a working garage door. Y'know, so we can still store the bikes."

One of my neighbors, consulting with a contractor in her open garage, discussing it's imminent conversion into a Parisian Salon/motorcycle warehouse.

Take This Job And Shove It

Although the boyfriend was offered his new job on Friday, it wasn't entirely a done deal. His hiring still needed to be signed off by the General Manager, who was out of town on Friday. If we've learned nothing during our exile it's been not to count your chickens before their hatched, so it was a little bit of a tense weekend. Not that we expected it to fall apart, but then again, you never know.

So when the decision was finally approved yesterday there was only one thing left for him to do... quit.

There have been a couple of times in my career when I found myself in miserable jobs working for tyrannical psychopaths and in both cases I lined up a new gig on the sly and relished the final confrontation when I could finally tell the boss to fuck off. Not so the boyfriend. He stressed about it all weekend and when the time finally came yesterday, he did the noble thing. He quit over the phone, taking a non-confrontational, "It's not you, it's me" approach.

To each their own.

I'll still be stuck here for awhile wrapping up our affairs and the time will finally come for me to inform the locals my services are no longer available. I'm pretty sure I'm going to handle it differently.

That’s So Bako

We were driving back into town yesterday afternoon and I was mulling over ideas for my first kindler, gentler, countdown-to-escaping Bako post. The passing storms had cleared out the air and the skies were blue and you could actually make out the town from miles away.

We exited the highway and were driving down White Lane when we ran into a police blockade. The entire street was blocked with police cruisers and the ever helpful BPD was directing traffic into an adjoining neighborhood. Why the street was blocked we couldn't say, but it was Sunday, so if I had to guess I'd say "armed barricaded suspect".

Dozens and dozens of cars were funneled into the residential neighborhood. Like all the neighborhoods here, it's designed like the Sunday crossword puzzle with countless dead ends and practically no exits. For the next 20 minutes we crissed and crossed the neighborhood, along with everyone else, desperately looking for a way out. Finally, quite by accident, we found an exit to a major street and within a couple of minutes we were home.

Walking up the front walk I noticed leaves all over the place. While we were gone, there must have been quite the wind storm. Which was obvious when we walked into the backyard and found this...



This was the "good" fence. When we bought the house, it was clear all the fences were in bad shape. We couldn't afford to fix them all, so we focused on the "bad" fence, which faced the street. The one Rodrigo rebuilt with such skill. This fence, we had hoped, would last a little while. We were wrong.

There wasn't much we could do about it on a Sunday afternoon, so we just settled in for a nice evening at home.

And then the power went out.

After a few minutes it was clear it wasn't coming back on anytime soon, and it had already grown dark. The boyfriend and I broke out the candles and started placing them throughout the house. We passed each other in the hall and shot each other knowing glances and I could tell he was thinking the same thing as I... arson.

"Really officer, it was a candle, the power was out, it was an accident..."

If only we had had more time to plan.

After a while, the power finally came back on, and came on with such a surge it blew out the satellite box. We called DirecTV, desperately hoping it wasn't fatal. It wasn't smoking or anything, which I took as a good sign, and after spending an hour on the the phone with tech support, the boyfriend was finally able to troubleshoot it and get it back up to speed. Unfortunately, by that time, we had missed "The Real Housewives of Atlanta".

I swear, this town is just cursed.

Mean Streets

We spent the weekend in the mountains with friends, celebrating our sudden good fortune and waiting for snow, which never came. At some point the dinner conversation veered to the subject of this blog.

"It used to be funny, but now it's just mean" one of my good friends remarked. He shall remain nameless. Robert.

Well yes, point taken. But tell it so someone who cares. If you want unoffensive good fun, go here.

Here's the deal... I started this blog a week after we moved here because I was suicidally depressed and couldn't afford a therapist, not that I would've wanted a local one even if I could afford it.

As horrible as the situation was, I tried to see the humor it. It was easy to be amusing back then because we were delusional and honestly believed this was going to be a very temporary aberration. We were so sure our stay here would be brief, we were reluctant to sign a year lease on our first place because there was no way on God's green earth we would still be here in a year. Our stay in Bakersfield would soon be nothing more than a funny cocktail story...

"You think Turkish prisons are bad, well, let me tell you about the time we lived in Bakersfield..."

Then one year turned into two and it stopped being so amusing.

I think the turning point was the opossum.

So, try as hard as I might, the anger and bitterness and resentment and desperation and loneliness crept into the blog and yes, it became mean. So shoot me. You try living here and staying cheerful. I defy you. Besides, I never imagined anyone would ever read all of this, it was just my little journal of despair.

But that's now all in the past, bygones.

I did decide over the weekend that in the weeks remaining here I'm going to try and be a little more charitable. It's the least I can do. If I have any regrets at all about the blog, it's the language. I've been dropping altogether too many F-bombs. The other day, on the morning news, some old fart was on saying that cussing is a mark of low intelligence, but what the fuck does he know? All the same, I'm going to try and clean up my language for the time remaining. I'd like to go out on a high note.

Greetings From Bako

Sunday Inspiration

When You Wish Upon A Star

When you wish upon a star
Makes no difference who you are
Anything your heart desires
Will come to you

If your heart is in your dream
No request is too extreme
When you wish upon a star
As dreamers do

Fate is kind
She brings to those who love
The sweet fulfillment of
Their secret longing

Like a bolt out of the blue...

And it was a bolt out of blue, let me tell you.

They say all good things must come to an end. And it turns out, mercifully, so do all the awful, miserable, soul crushing things. By which I mean our Bakersfield exile.

We're moving.

I know I vowed 2012 was the year we were getting the fuck out of Dogpatch, come hell or high water. But I didn't count on it happening in the first 20 days.

All of my work, for the better part of the past year has come from LA. I teach in LA. I could have moved back to LA months ago. The fly in the ointment was the boyfriend's job. We couldn't do it all on one income and without a solution to that issue we were stuck like a truck in the mud.

And it's not like he hasn't been trying. He's been blanketing all of Southern California for months with resumes and applications with absolutely no luck.

Thursday morning he was having a particularly awful morning with his tyrannical boss and called me to say he was going to quit. I talked him off the ledge and he channeled his energy to something useful... Craigslist.

He found a just posted job and immediately shot them a resume, they called back within ten minutes and set up an interview for today. He called in sick and went for the interview and as of 4pm today, he has a new job. Paying three times what he was making in Bako. And the best part of the job? IT AINT HERE. WE ARE LEAVING.

The job's in Orange County, where I grew up. It's funny... growing up there we always referred to living "behind the Orange Curtain", as if it was some ass-backwards, provincial, know-nothing, reactionary right-wing cesspool. Now, having lived in a ass-backwards, provincial, know-nothing, reactionary right-wing cesspool for over two years, Orange County looks like the fucking Promised Land.

Details to come, it's all still too fresh.

There is a downside, of course.

It will mean the end of this blog. That makes me sad, actually, it's been unbelievably therapeutic. I suppose I could keep it going wherever we land, but the reality is the vitriol is the charm and I can't imagine hating anywhere in the world with the white hot intensity of the hate I feel for Bakersfield.

But fear not, nothing is happening all that soon. The boyfriend may have to relocate to the OC (and stay with my parents, which is it's own potential minefield) while I stay in Bako settling our affairs. I can't imagine we'll make the "official" move until around April Fool's Day, which seems entirely appropriate.

So until then, the blog continues, unchained.

Now I feel no need to be so nice.

Lights. Tunnels. Action!

I need everyone to think good thoughts this afternoon...

Into Each Life A Little Rain Must Fall. Very Little.

There is a rhythm to life here in Bakersfield.

You start out with high hopes and quickly cycle through to bitter disappointment and end finally at unconcealed rage. It applies to everything - local clients, restaurants, what appeared to be a short check-out line at the market. And so too, it applies to the weather.

Bakersfield is really West Death Valley and only gets about 3 inches of rain a year. Currently we've gone 60 days without so much as a drop of warm spit. So last week when the computer models started to show storms moving into the area for this weekend, we started, as usual, with high hopes. We could potentially expect up to an inch of rain, we were told, which would be a deluge of Biblical proportions for Bako.

By Tuesday the bitter disappointment set in as the predictions had dropped to a quarter to a half an inch of rain.

And now, this morning, the best guess is for a "trace". Not even enough to wash all the farm dirt off of... everything.

And sure enough, I'm pissed. But not surprised. That's just life here.

Rebel Without A Log

I'm a sucker for a wood burning fireplace.

I know that isn't environmentally conscientious, but I don't care. As far as I'm concerned, a house isn't a home without a real fireplace. None of these pussy push button gas logs for me. Every place I've lived in the past 20 years has had one and the boyfriend feels the same way.

Of course, a fireplace is what lead, at least partially, to our current situation. The home we bought back in 2005 had a stunner of a fireplace, an architectural wonder. It was so amazing it blinded us to the house's glaringly obvious structural issues. By the time we had finally corrected all of those, our savings had been drained and we had no safety net when the bottom dropped out of the economy. Hence, we live in Bakersfield.

But even here, we wouldn't do without a fireplace. The rental we first moved into had one. And when we were looking for houses, a good fireplace was a must. And this house certainly has one. It actually looks more like a giant pizza oven, but that's half of it's charm. It's so large you could probably roast a whole pig in it.

If you could ever use it.

It works, of course. It's just against the law.

Bakersfield has notoriously bad air pollution and the winter months are the worst. So from November 1st through sometime in March or April, when the air gets particularly bad, wood fires are banned.

We haven't had a fire since Thanksgiving. The air has been spectacularly bad, even for Bako.

Now, mind, you, it's only in the winter months when the ban is in effect. During July and August, when it's 112 degrees even after dark, you're free to have as big a fire as you want, any day of the week. That's thoughtful of them.

Ordinarily, not being able to have a fire would be nothing more than an aesthetic loss. But the night time temps have been dipping into the 20's and in case I haven't mentioned it in awhile, half of our house is open directly to the rafters. One whole half of the house is a meat locker after the sun goes down. Just trying to kept the house heated to the low 60's means the furnace is running 24/7. Our power bill last month was $400. So a fire would be greatly appreciated.

We've cheated of course. Lit the occasional renegade fire when it got particularly cold. What was the worst they could do? Well, it turns out they can fine you and they even have an anonymous tip line where your neighbors can turn you in. If we've learned nothing else in our time here it's that our neighbors are an annoying pack of snitches. So, no fires.

But yesterday, the skies parted, literally, and and the air was deemed merely "unhealthful", which meant we could finally have a roaring fire.

As I stared into the flames last night, nursing a glass of wine, my thoughts turned to insurance fraud and I began to wonder just how difficult it is to get away with arson. Not that I would do it. Just exploring all the options for leaving this place.

Leave It To Beaver

Evidently, there's a problem with beavers.

Building dams down on the river, flooding the bike path. I saw it on the news last night, but of course, there's no link on the website. Which is a shame, because it was hilarious. I've never seen so many people freaked out by beavers. Those kind of beavers, I mean.

Seriously, they should be happy about anyone building anything in Bakersfield. Maybe we can put them to work on all the half-built, unfinished subdivisions.

Handy Tips For Working From Home

Throughout my career there have been occasional stretches where, through absolutely no fault of my own, I have found myself "between jobs". And during those times, to keep the lights on and the bills paid, I've found myself working from home. In the past, it was usually only for a few weeks or months at the most and it wasn't long enough to lose my basic business skills or develop bad work habits.

But now I've been working from home for over a year, and it would appear this is the way it's going to be for the foreseeable future, and while there are obvious benefits (and lack of benefits), there are also numerous pitfalls and slippery slopes and I've developed these tips to help others who may find themselves in the same situation.

#1. Remember To Bathe.

This would appear at first to be a no-brainer, but after a couple of months you'd be surprised how easily this one can slip through the cracks. You sit down at the computer with your morning coffee to check your email and all hell has broken out with some of your projects and you find yourself having to immediately put out some fires. Before you know it, it's noon or 1pm and you realize you haven't yet showered. It's tempting to think "Well, the day's half gone and there's always tomorrow...", but don't. Just don't. If you have a significant other, this one is easy to keep in check because before you know it, they'll threaten to leave.

#2. Remember To Shave

Kind of goes with #1. Personally, I've always hated shaving. Lucky for me, the 90's rolled around and the two-day stubble, hipster grunge look became fashionable and I could get away with only shaving a couple of times a week. But when you work from home and you never see your clients, it's easy to think "Why Shave at all? They'll never know I now look like the Unibomber." Don't fall into this trap. They Amish don't use computers, and you do, so don't look like one. Again, If you have a significant other, this one is easy to keep in check because before you know it, they'll threaten to leave.

#3 Wear Clothes

Working in your underwear has a certain appeal, especially during the hot summer months. Or maybe sweats or gym shorts. But, at the end of the day, it's unprofessional. It will also impact your feeling of self worth, especially when you're doing your billing. You will find yourself asking yourself "Was this job really worth $1000 if I did it in my boxers?" So avoid this problem by wearing clothes, preferably something with buttons. If it's held up by a drawstring or elastic, it's probably not appropriate. And don't wear the same clothes every day no matter how much it cuts down on the laundry.

#4 Set Boundaries With The Dogs

Dogs don't understand the concept of "working from home". No matter how many times you explain it to them. And they are masters of guilt. If you aren't careful, you'll find yourself on the floor with a tennis ball wondering where the day went. What I do is set aside a half an hour of play in the morning, and another in the evening. And in between, I ignore them. I ignore the constant whining and the growing mound of chew toys piling up next to my desk. It was rough at first, but they've now settled into a daily routine of quiet bitterness and seething anger and shitting on the carpet. But mostly they sleep.

#5 Set Boundaries With The Clients

When you work from home, almost all the clients assume you have a drive-up window and you're open 24 hours. You need to disabuse them of this notion right off the bat. You may think it's showing drive and initiative to answer their drunken texts and emails at all hours of the night, but it doesn't. What it does show is you're a sucker and before you know it you'll be working the graveyard shift more nights than not. Besides, they'll more than likely disavow their drunken midnight requests and refuse to pay for the work you spent til dawn working on. Now, on occasion, real crises do develop over night, which will lead you back to tip #1. It's all interconnected.

#6 Keep A Regular Break Schedule

Yes, the boyfriend has sadistically stocked the pantry with all manner of junk food and it's right down the hall. That doesn't mean you get a "break" every 20 minutes. Before you know it, you'll be as big as a house and not fit in your desk chair.

#7 Avoid The TV.

This isn't an issue for me anymore because the TV is clear across the house and there's never anything on. But early on, in the other house, it was as I allowed myself a daily break for "The View". Elizabeth Hasselback quickly solved that problem. But then there was always the siren call of Judge Judy and Oprah. Don't fall for it.

#8 Practice Your Social Skills

If, like me, you have absolutely no verbal contact with other humans during the course of your day and you're daily vocabulary is now limited to "Who's such a good boy?" and "Walkies!", you'll want to practice basic social skills like speaking. Nothing worse than sounding like a moron on the off chance a client calls.

#9 Happy Hour Still Starts At 5:00

You may be having a bad day and there's a box of wine in the fridge and, yes, it's always 5pm somewhere in the world, but don't drink on the job. It's unprofessional and you'll end up sending some emails you regret.

#10

Educate Your Friends And Loved Ones About Working From Home

No, I don't have time to wax the floors or bang out your wedding invitations because I'm "not doing anything".

Greetings From Bako

The Holiday That Shall Not Be Named

Speaking of dates which pass without notice here in Bakersfield, today is Martin Luther King, Jr. Day.

The reason it's a non-event here is pretty obvious. For all intents and purposes, Bakersfield is the Lost Tribe of the Old South, part of the Confederacy in spirit, if not proximity. Living here, it's easier to believe you're in the middle of Alabama, not California.

If "The South" is your thing, you'd like it here. It's Mississippi without the humidity. For the rest of us, not so much.

Sunday Inspiration

Random Good Things About Bakersfield #24

I don't really have anything but it just occurred to me it had been months since I wrote something nice about Bakersfield.

So, let's see... thinking..... hmmm........ Ok....

Bakersfield is centrally located.

It's not much, but it's something. And it's true... within a couple of hours, in any direction, you can be someplace nice.

Really nice. Really, really nice.

And I think of those places ALL. THE. TIME.

*sigh*

Some day...