The fair season once again. By now I have it mastered. Where not to park to avoid getting bird pooped, the best time to go with the fewest crowds or no crowds at all (I’ll never tell), and how to stare forward no matter how huge that woman who just walked by’s breasts were.

This year’s highlights included me holding a one-week-old-kid, seeing two (2!) Clydesdale erections at the Budweiser tent, and riding the ferris wheel with my precious, funny-faced Sugar-Britches.

Lowlights included my quick study of the cooking demo guys, the bummed out old lady at the cotton exhibit got all pathetic and political about the cheated Texas cotton industry, and my constant tripping over motorized Rascals operated by people rendered handicapped by their own fat.

The usual freak show, minus the baby animal petting zoo. (This almost ruined the whole thing)

A co-worker comes to you to ask you how well you know another co-worker.
You know him as a genuinely nice guy, with an absentee and tardiness problem.
The co-worker suspects he’s been drinking this morning.
He asks you to smell his breath.
He is unclear as to what the results of this experiment will be.
But he gives you the opportunity to refuse this mission if you so choose?
What do you do?

My teacher asked me for permission to leave.
‘Remember when you took the package, and I supported you when you when you wanted to go to Mexico?’
‘Yes.’ I grinned, remembering how everyone in the office looked at me nuts, but for him. His eyes got all sparkley and smiled deep into the ground and to the south.
‘Well, I want you to support me when I want to leave, when I want to go.’

I’m not sure what to say. His skin has been a farm of squamous for months. I have been motivating him through the appointments; scheduling, re-scheduling, and scheduling them again. There are too many to keep track of which dime sized patches were big serious, and which were basal nothing, but I know the geography of each little demon. The hands and arms of my teacher that guided me through my kata, my one steps, my sparring practices, are being scrapped and burned, singed and stitched.

‘I just get the feeling that life is too short. Maybe I’m just over-reacting with all of this mortality shit.’
‘I’m sorry, I don’t think you can over-react to it.’

I am asking the page to tell me what to do. Perhaps I am egoist to think that my wishes matter much for this man, but I don’t know where in my heart to send him.

‘Choose your goal, and know your home and then we’ll talk about you going.’ I resolve
My eyes get salty and sloshy to think that maybe they are the one and the same.