Coin-op Purgatory

Coin-op Purgatory

LEXINGTON, Mass. (Feb. 6, 2010) - Greetings from the Lexington Laundry Village. A coin-operated purgatory seemingly designed to correct any visions of grandeur from a week prior. I deserve this.
Laundromats - like bus stops and motor vehicle registries and court houses - serve a purpose to shave away at a person's sense of dignity.
This is a gray Feburary day. And not just the skies: From the salt of winter, the "black" top is gray; the "red" brick is gray; and even the fire engine that just passed has been powdered gray. And my eyes just fell on some guy's XL men's briefs dropped on the asphalt...they too are gray.

Nobody opens a laundromat because they love to help people get clean clothes. They open laundromats to make money without having to work. There is no wi-fi; there are not even power outlets. This dispatch is being typed only after I scoured the place for an outlet. (This is a skill I've developed with nearly 20 years of event work.) They tried to hide the power outlet near the ceiling, so my laptop is presently being fueled from a heavenward cord.

And folks in laundromats are not pretty. We're all here in various states of desperation and frustration. And we're all dressed rather poorly. It's not like singles troll for love in laundromats - unless one is on a college campus - as these folks are in a destitute demographic. What's odd is the mechanical silence; nobody talks. It's hard to strike up a conversation while carrying your fudge-striped undies across the room.

My re-entry home from the Czech Republic has been less than celebratory.

My poor wife had been stranded by me with a case of bronchitis and a car that would not start in near-zero temperatures. My plan to attend the Cyclocrossworld.com party was aborted after we learned our 13-year-old daughter, Emmy, had been fending off a 39-year-old online stalker in a virtual reality site called There.com. We got the police involved and spent 90 minutes in the station.

I got the car started but the washing machine broke. Even my day today started with Ginger, our dog, barfing on the rug. Eeesh...

And for added fun I had a disciplinary hearing for my job at Best Buddies International to discuss my "behavior." I cannot discuss the details due to confidentiality but it did reveal that somebody in my work environment simply did not like me.

I've never experienced such a thing; why would they not like ME?

Again, I deserve this. The Czech Republic - where EVERYBODY liked me and the cars worked and the laundry was done - is simply not real.

So I got through that, enjoyed a great event that I helped plan for Thursday night but I missed Madison's pinewood derby due to my poor aptitude in scheduling. And then after some bouncing about Friday for work, I find myself here in the Lexington Laundry Village. The new car battery and the washing machine fix should just about wipe out our checking account.

So this blog of mine was sparked to life to write about a trip to the 'cross worlds. But the true impetus of this blog came as a result of the incessant talking to myself while living by bike.

Heretofore, we'll move on to those observations.

I'll try to spice it up, from here, you know, write about sex or something. Thanks for reading.