Pennsylvania Welcomes you

So,
Allentown?
It's real.
It's not just made up by Billy Joel.
It's a real city with buildings and people and a dry ice factory and everything. Except the steel and coal joints are all shuttered.

It's like, I  used to think all groundhogs came out of hibernation in early February,  then I find out it is only one.

Punxsutawney Phil.

And even that is a sham. It is not even hibernating, they push it out of it's hole.

And if it dies, they just get another.
Go figure.


Then I find out folks here can tell the difference between Mennonite people

and Amish people

I still have a lot to learn.

Smoke um if ya got um. Or not.

So,

I was in Dollar World today, and the Freeland PA police chief was in front of me.

He wanted to buy two Monster™ drinks.

And a pack of smokes.

The tattooed, pierced-all over-the face girl behind the counter unlocked the cabinet and brought out a pack, and said "Is this the kind you want?"

"Yes, thank you"

"OK, I will just have to see some I.D." she said to the guy with a badge, gun, mace, taser, baton and hand-cuffs.

He said you are carding me? She said "Well I have to, there is a cop in the store." (him)
He said that he left his wallet in his car back at THE POLICE STATION.

She unlocked the case, put the cigarettes back, locked the case and put away the keys.

"You're kidding me"

"Nope. No I.D. no smokes. Period."



I don't think I would like very much to be a passenger in her car any time soon.

odd and ends again.

Ok
So getting back into the blog thing (Blogging is not writing. It's just graffiti with punctuation.
- Dr. Ian Sussman:
 Contagion (2011)
Anyhow, I see this tree when I am on South street, it is in the woods. Where else would a tree be? well this one is special.

 

That one. See it? 

Lets get closer:

Someone carved it into a small totem pole.

Out in the woods.

Go figure.

Another note; 

The whole time we lived here I have seen a rock formation that goes down into a sort of pit or something. It looks sort of like a lava flow, but I am sure there were never volcanoes in NEPA.

Then I saw what was up. 

for six months I have tried to get a picture. But it is like Bigfoot.

Today I got a Bigfoot quality photo

 There. See it?

It is a cement mixer dumping unused cement down a ditch.

I think that in New York, Connecticut or California you would get off easier if you kidnapped and killed a child rather then dumping waste cement into a ditch.   

We do things differently here in NEPA.

 Last,  

The computer guy (fixing a workstation for me) said that there are a lot of heroine junkies in town and they rob homes when the people are away.

Mrs. Maher said, "good thing you are home a lot" 

I said,  quietly,

yes.

I am.  

Sometimes things just do not connect

I know it has been a while, but the holidays and family and stuff.

So,

I was up at Weis, the big supermarket in the Hazleton Quad City area, and I asked an employee where I might find cheese cloth.

"Cheese? Cloth?"

Yes, it is used in the kitchen for baking and straining.

"Hold on a sec, Hey Joe do we have cheese cloth?"

"Cheese? Cloth?"

Ok, It is not cloth made of cheese, it is like gauze but not used for bandaging, you use it like a sieve.

For straining stuff.

"A sieve. 

No. 

We don't carry that here. Try Lowe's."

Look, Lowes is a hardware store, cheese cloth is used in cooking. Do you know what a sieve is?

"Um, no, but I think they have that at Lowe's, try over there."

<Whispers at the bus stop
I heard about nights out in the school yard
Oksana Baiul

Oksana Baiul

Gin Blossoms, c 1993>

Same planet, different lyrics.

 

I used to work with a woman that had a friend that had a brother that thought those were the words to that song. 

When ever I realize that I am talking to someone in the same language but we can not communicate I think of that song. 

OK, Let me get this straight, Lowe's, the "Home improvement warehouse" has a baking section?

"Yup, They have that cloth thing you are looking for."

I found it on my own. Isle 7, between the Teflon frying pans and the sieves.