Strange Encounter

Something happened to me yesterday that makes me think that I get weirded out too easily. I was at one of my favorite restaurants, O’Zone, about to enjoy a calzone when a woman walked up and said hi and invited me to her table. Now, in this town, when people walk up to you, they usually have an agenda. Often, it involves religion. I have somewhat strong views on personal beliefs mainly that one shouldn’t try to force beliefs upon others. Oddly enough, that’s not what this woman had in mind.

The first thing she did after saying hi, introducing herself (unfortunately, I’m horrible with names, so I can’t tell you hers), and shaking my hand, she gave me a hug. That was weird, I thought. Then, she sat down, and offered to buy me a drink (I don’t drink, so I turned her down). We had a short conversation where she tried to get me to do a few strange facial expressions before she gave me another hug, blew me a kiss, and returned to her table.

People might think that she was hitting on me, but I saw her leave with a guy that looked fairly close to her. Then again, she did just hug a stranger twice. If she was hitting on me, she came on both too strong and too weird, at least for me. Maybe it was too weird because it doesn’t happen that often.

Very Stupid Things

A couple of incidents last night made me wonder what was going on with the world. The first happened as I was driving on a winding road called Scenic Highway. As I crossed over Interstate 10, I saw two cars sitting in the right lane waiting to turn onto the interstate. The strange part of it was that the light was green, so they could go at anytime. When I got closer, the lead car suddenly turned left in front of me. I hit the brakes fairly hard to keep from running into him. Unfortunately, the guy kept going, apparently heading for the Dairy Queen on the left side of the road. Due to cars waiting to turn left, he couldn’t see oncoming traffic, and a car slammed into him. For the rest of the night, I thought about that and said to myself, “What a moron!”

The second event happened at about midnight. My neighbors have been getting on my nerves with loud music and shouting at odd hours of the night. Last night, just as I was about to drift off to sleep, I heard what sounded like someone using a power tool of some sort. I went next door to tell them to stop, and, when they opened the door, I discovered what they were doing. The noise was from a vacuum. Yes, they were vacuuming at midnight. Personally, I’ve never wanted to do housework late at night, but I could be in the minority (I doubt it). I’ve kept this issue fairly quiet, so to speak, but it might be time to talk to the property manager.

Florida: The Bankrupt State

As a state employee, I’ve heard all of the gloom and doom talk regarding the budget for this year. At one meeting, the big boss basically said, “Don’t expect any raises, equipment, or more hires. The state’s hurting, and so are we.” This gave me the impression that the state of Florida would do it’s best to cut the fat and that the state’s income, which comes from sales and property taxes, wouldn’t be touched as far as their levels.

Those thoughts changed when I saw the sample ballot for the Presidential Primary on January 29. Along with the presidential candidate selection, there is a proposed amendment for the Florida Constitution that would lower property taxes. Now, I understand that people like having lower taxes, but to do this at a time where the state is crying about being in so much financial pain just seems a bit hard to swallow. I would think people like having state services, too, although I could be wrong about that.

I would like to think that the people of Florida will look at the proposed amendment and say, “Wait a minute! We can’t do this right now!” I expect the people to say, “Lower taxes? Sure!” Let’s see if the state declares bankruptcy next year.

It's the Fog! Run Away!

Winter on the central Gulf Coast can be quite confusing. Last week was the coldest it’s been in a while. Today, it was up in the high sixties, and tomorrow it’s expected to be in the seventies. It’s no wonder that, whenever I look at the flu map for the United States, Florida (of all places) tends to have a high number of sufferers. With temperatures fluctuating by thirty to forty degrees between highs and lows on a regular basis, I’m surprised that more people aren’t sick.

Of course, illness isn’t the only thing that comes with wild temperature swings. In the summer, our relative humidity is usually at eighty percent or higher. In the winter, it drops to around thirty percent on a cold day and fifty to sixty percent on a warmer day like today. So, what happens when temperatures drop quickly in a humid area?

Fog. Heavy fog.

I just returned from dinner, and I’m glad I didn’t have a problem. There were times when the road seemed to disappear in clouds. I went for a walk and discovered that my visibility was somewhere around a quarter mile. This isn’t the worst I’ve seen though. There is a road near my parents’ house that I’ve seen fog so thick, I nearly came to a stop trying to pick my way through it. Fortunately, that doesn’t happen too often.

So, when I head home tonight from work, I hope there’s no one crossing my path on my short drive. I might not see them if it’s too foggy.

Big Voice

I had a musical awakening tonight as I was driving home from work: I really like Sara Bareilles’s music. Some background first:

I first saw the video for “Love Song” several weeks ago. Frankly, I wasn’t that impressed. The song had probably one of the best first lines I’ve heard in a song, but, other than that, I didn’t really like it. I felt that her voice was somewhat thin, and I didn’t see me purposely looking for her music.

Then, two weeks or so ago, I was at Chris’s office (yes, the same one mentioned in My Very First Post). Along with giving me a Christmas present (a keychain that can show digital pictures), he gave me Little Voices in a trade. The first track is “Love Song.” The CD gets MUCH better after that. I think there are at least four or five songs that would’ve caught my attention and made me want to learn more about Bareilles. If she keeps making songs like “Vegas,” I think greater things can be expected from her.

Blocked Writer

So far, 2008 hasn’t been bad. Of course, it is only January 2, so things might change in the coming weeks. I’m back at work after the long break, and I’m glad to be back. I’ve discovered that I don’t have much of a life without my job, and the three weeks or so off were boring.

What do I have to look forward to this year? This is the year I plan to be published, if anything because it didn’t happen last year. Perhaps I should explain:

In April of last year, I had a great story idea. So, I started writing. One year and seventy thousand words later, I was finished. Getting it published as a novel seemed the next step, so I decided to get an agent. Now, I understand that agents probably get query letters from aspiring novelists daily, and I realize that they probably can’t read through everything in a timely manner, but it’s frustrating to spend so much time on something and being unable to get them to actually read it. It’s annoying to wait six weeks for a response and getting a preprinted rejection that says, “we didn’t read it because we don’t know who you are.”

Perhaps I should just be more patient and wait for the more positive responses to come. I would love to get a letter that said, “we’re not going to take you at this time because of issues with your writing. For example…” In any case, I have good feelings about this year. This is the year I get published.

My Very First Post

Welcome to all of you who’ve stumbled upon this blog. I’ve decided, in this first post, to explain why I’ve decided to start a blog. To those who care, it’s a short journey.

At the end of 2004, I started a website called Juantans Speaks at the urging of Chris, a friend of mine who wanted to see me do something on the web. The site was filled with blog-style posts on many subjects from politics to sports and more. I updated it for about six months before real life stepped in and ate up all of my free time. The site finally died in December 2005.

Recently, Chris has been on me again to do something online. He recommended this place because he knows that I’m lazy. After several months of waffling, I finally put this together. I plan on making this thing prettier, but, for now, I’m going to leave it be.

What can you expect to see here? I don’t know yet. Most likely, you’ll see references to my life and things that bother me. Politics, both local and national, are fair game, but I’ll try to keep things light.