So, here's a hint for what I bought you.

Sometimes people deserve a present,

a gift or whatever you call it.

You can wrap the small box

in the comic section,

putting The Wizard of ID

and Beetle Bailey on top

because they're the only funny ones.

So, now that your copy of the Lexicon Devil seven inch,

or your red cashmere scarf 

or the movie tickets are wrapped,

handwrite a card.

Not something phony you fought

a plumber and a cornerback to get.

Something meaningful,

with words crossed out where you misspelled marriage

or used the wrong your.

Keep them guessing.

Don't drop hints, 

that's the hard part.

I drop hints 

like backtrack bread crumbs

and it always fucks me over

in the end.

So this time, I'm going to give you something

you can't wrap

or fit in a bag 

or buy online.

I think I'll give you me beacuse

I am a present you can open

again and again.

Riding tandem leads to love.

To me,

it doesn't make much sense

that I try and describe

how I feel about you

and maybe how we feel about each other

through poetry.

Words are inadequate

when you're sitting across from friends

piling up breadsticks and neatly placing

cups of sauce into rows

and after everything on the table 

looks like a commercial shoot:

forks and knives held in loose fingers

like drawn weapons,

children are doing the laugh-track laughter,

even the lighting makes you feel phototropic.

A friend who's been gone for months 

navigates a straw around ice cubes

and tries speaking through a mouthful of ice tea:

"How're things with that girl, the new one?"

My stomach stomach starts to hurt,

the "standing in line, holding it too long" hurt

that also doubles as the

"love makes you hurt inside your stomach" hurt.

"We're great. We ride our bikes around the park."

He puckers his lips and swallows tea,

"That sounds about right... bike rides lead to love,

at least, that's what they'd lead you to believe."

I stared down at the sauce

and felt like our relationship might need a second opinion

from they,

or something.

I think,

because what my stomach feels

and what he said were so right

and so perfect because they weren't planned,

unlike those bike rides.

Oh, look how steep that drop is.

So, how about we play mother and child and I can tell you what I learned today?

Sound good? Alright.

**

You need to save that Fudge Round and eat it after the chicken pita is just crumbs and the bag of chips is just a bag split open at the bottom. This is the part of the week where I eat lunch at 10. That way, I don't get hungry at work.

Okay, that last part was a lie. I always get hungry at work. There's also a point during my day where I look at the clock and force myself to find things to do. It's the lull, the tide is fifty yards out part of the day. The store is empty and all you have is one running Xerox humming and dropping the bypass tray down so it can hold 1,000 copies.

I stock pens, I dust things without dust. Sometimes I'll go in the bathroom, sit on a toilet and send text messages. Yesterday, I pretended like I was sending packages to a bunch of different countries and cities and got myself a shipping rate. Don't send anything to Africa. It's way expensive.

**

Some people write fiction well. Other people write poetry well. I can't do either. Raymond Carver could do both. I think that's why he's one of my favorites.

Bam. That's proof. That's a fantastic poem. Don't even try talking shit, because you'll end up frustrating yourself .

Remember those two collections of Carver lit I bought a few weeks back? Yeah, those. I'm still chugging along. It's been enjoyable. I've found myself able to read them and go, "Uh huh, I like this," when something exciting happens, instead of, "Oh yeah, I see what he did there." At some point, I'd like to get back to the second one. Not right now, though.

**

You love that.  We both love that.

So, I am listening to this album right now as loud as my laptop speakers will get without hissing and belching white noise. It makes me think of three things:

1) This being the most bad ass album in the entire world when I was 15.

2.) Dan Bailey. Him and I are so about this album. I think Nate Logan is, too. We cruised around Muncie and talked about this album while we bought beer in Friendly Package.

3.) This is still one of the most bad ass albums ever.

Come on. I can barely handle that shit.

**

When I drive my new car, it's like nothing else outside of the car is evening happening. There's no sound. Things don't move. Other cars can't pass me. I feel like I'm driving a missile and every time I park, it detonates. Shrubs wilt and splinter, people turn to dust and the wind carries them into separate piles of widows, widowers and orphans. 

I walk inside, do whatever business I had, then continue driving. My car screams like danger and loss.

That's just fine with me.

**

The Bulls lost last night. It's okay. I have the rest of my life to wait patiently for another NBA Title. 

**

This is the time of year where everyone is all like, "Ohhh man, it's time to graduate." Wah wah, cryin' like babies.

Already done ittttttttt. Miss it, though. I wanna' walk back into the Robert Bell building with some anthologies in one hand, a water in the other. I want to sit at a desk and talk about texts. Then I want to walk back to a small apartment with low ceilings, call some friends and blow out the candle I left lit all day. Blowing it out and watching smoke squeeze out an open door or cracked window is the best feeling in the world.

Can I go home and change first?

"You destroyed the things I loveeeeeeee."

Mr. Krabs just said that on Spongebob. He is seriously the biggest asshole of all-time. What a greedy prick.

**

The Kentucky Derby is this weekend. It's never been anything to care about. People need to look at it like sex: regardless of how exciting it is, it's going to eventually end. Probably in three minutes. 

**

The Touch and Brush? Jesus Christ, people are lazy. It upsets me because you know the jerk who invented that thing got a huge payment when some stupid company bought the patent rights. Now he's driving around in a Mercedes and tipping ladies at the strip club with fives instead of singles. 

**

It's the first day of May. Go celebrate.

Everything I love cannot fit in a bag.

There are so many things going on in my life right now it feels like when you're at Sears and you're watching the huge display of big screens and they're all on different channels, but you still feel like you know what's going on in every single show.

**

I'm gonna go 700 Club on ya' ass!

That really doesn't mean anything, I guess. Isn't the 700 Club a Evangelical TV show? I think that guitarist from Korn was on there. Awww, too bad that 'K' isn't backwards, writing Korn without it just doesn't seem authentic.

Wikipedia might clear that up, but I'm too lazy to do that kind of research right now.

**

I'm thinking about people right now. I want to visit Muncie and my family in Chicago. I want to go to a Cubs game and make a beer last all afternoon. I want the sun to set while I'm on the beach with people I love and not care that my shorts are getting wet or my sandals are floating away because you can buy another pair at Old Navy for three dollars.

Just forget that was your favorite pair of sandals, okay?

I do things that make the man on the moon blush.

I had a story festering for weeks. It was like that dead animal you pass on the road everyday on the work commute. Nobody comes and cleans it. It just becomes less and less. On Tuesday, it's minus some lungs then the next day half a face and less and less flies because there's nothing else for scavengers to eat. Birds swoop in to peck at fur and pebbles.

That was my story, roadkill. Now it's something. A draft, 600-ish words. It's the bear in the cave, head parallel to a skid of flint. Just resting. It's about a man who transports livestock and poultry to slaughterhouses across the country. 

Exciting isn't the word to describe the narrative, but it is the word to describe how I feel to be writing a piece of fiction again. I feel like that widow who's giving sex another chance.

**

There are times when you just need to sit there. Maybe you're brushing your cat, maybe you're at working pushing buttons or tuning a guitar or reading the Bible. I don't know. But you need to just stop and think.

I did this today and realized that I'm happy right now. At this very moment, I'm happy. You need to remind yourself of this because math and talking and shaking hands are just going to muddle things. 

**

I'm thinking about growing a fu manchu. Should I?

I wanted answers everywhere I went

Therefore,

somebody sat in a cubicle

and punched numbers.

They crunched, used equations

and slide rules,

took dozens of coffee breaks.

Finally,

everything they thought 

for weeks

was shoved into the box

and wireless internet was born.

**

That was a poem. I like looking at it and being able to identify it as such. 

You can tell a lot about a person just by knowing what kind of porn they watch. Are they the kind of dude/lady who just scours those free websites and watches the minute clips? Or does that person totally buy the subscriptions? 

We need more of the second person, mainly because sooner or later, they're going to share some of those full-length vids with you. It's called generosity. This is the era of high definition, folks! Leach those people. Get their 1080p anal scenes or whatever other crazy shit they're into. Bananas-in-the-snatch dominatrix fellatio or whatever else.

I read Sam Pink's blog today and was completely satisfied. While reading it, I felt like I was watching a mother breast-feed in public for my personal arousal.

There are several things I'm working on right now. Poems and songs and resumes and everything else that fits neatly in other categories. I can't wait for you to see the end result and go, "That'll do."

Because it will do. Do a lot. You're going to regret a lot of things. So now, I'm gonna go all NOFX on you and say, "So long and thanks for all the shoes."

Some potential voicemails plus other things.

Hi, thanks for calling Joey's phone. Sorry I can't answer it. I'm busy trying to jump up and touch the ceiling in every room in my house with varying results. I either need another growth spurt, lower ceilings, or madder hops. Leave a message after the beep.

**

This is Joey's phone. Next time you get pulled over for speeding and the officer asks you how fast you were going, pull your sunglasses to the tip of your nose, equip your best Cockney accent, and say, "That really depends... how fast were YOU going?" Chances are he'll freak the fuck out and just run back to his car, arms flailing and just cry in the seat and wave his cars at passing traffic. Leave a message.

**

Music is going to make you feel better. I promise. If you have a rash or a swollen prostate or whatever, it's like a handful of pills the doctor puts in your roast beef sandwich when you're not looking. 

Moving to a house soon. Maybe sometime in May. Maybe sooner, probably later. I'd say May or June. I'll be living with my two favorite people in the entire world. Two people who I'd donate organs to or sponge bathe them if they were incapacitated. I would split atoms or drink from a dirty glass filled with day-old coffee for these two people.

I bought two collections of Raymond Carver stories last week while I was on a break at work. I walked over to the Boarders on Fourth Street and rummaged. I hate they way their collection is organized. Poetry and fiction are intertwined. Poets and fiction writers were living all over each other. Their words were touching and it was just impossible to make decisions. Well, until I saw Raymond Carver's cache. When I get paid on Friday, Annie Proulx will make a few charitable donations to my bookshelf.

Oh no. I was just wowed with sleepiness and I have work in an hour and a half. Shittttt.

I'm going to make this tile floor spotless

Alright, so there's this burning inside of me. It's not a rash or an STD or other illness. Not appendicitis or cancer or something else. I really don't know what it is or what it pertains to. I think it's a good thing but have spent the last few days trying to discover what is it or where it's coming from.

I should know my body well enough. Obviously, I don't. There needs to be some sort of map or diagram to help me figure this out.

**

I told a customer at work that I was a writer and they asked enough questions to fill up those buckets maidens took to the well each morning. Three times. I enjoyed that. She asked who my favorite writers were and I gave her a few. Then she asked if I had noticed that Actor's Theatre, the place that my work shares a large, living all over you building with, was sponsoring a play about Wendell Berry's life. I said yes. I plan on seeing it sometime soon. It's based on his poems.

This got me thinking about somebody getting a hold of all the poems I've ever written and turned them into a play about me. Immediately after that, I called a few people and picked their brains. I needed to know if this had any substance. Could it turn into anything special or something that would woo ladies or win me a large trophy or a broach or lapel pin in the shape of a quill or ANYTHING exciting. 

Everyone writes for fanfare and if you're sitting there telling yourself otherwise, you're just full of clam dip.

Supplement. The essential ingredient of clam dip:

No MSG? Madison Square Garden?

**

Everyone who reads this blog knowsssssss that it's National Poetry Month, and if you're a good lil' writer, you're scrounging up words from other poems and your online thesaurus and churning out a poem a day. 

Me? Not so much. Maybe 7 poems this month. Although, I have been thinking about poetry a lot more this month. I bought some collections, some chapbooks. I've written poems for people and thought about writing exchanges.

**

Speaking of "those things".... Dan Bailey has a book coming out later this year. I mean, seriously? I love Dan Bailey the way somebody loves their meticulously maintained lawn or the couch downstairs with a body print in the cushions.

**

This blog is over, I'm going to go hug my girlfriend.