The Diary of a Nobody 2013/2014

90 The Diary of a Nobody

and drop off stuff…Today we only had to drive to town midway be-
tween our town and Town A, which saved us over and hour-and-a-
half.

This is almost interesting: we had finished our last stop in town
and were heading out…As usual, I radioed Freddie on Route 1 to tell
him our ETA and he says they are already doing their final stops in
Town A …At least I think that was said…Freddie is Hispanic and has
a heavy accent and the Nextel isn’t crystal clear so sometimes you
finish a conversation with Freddie and not be entirely certain what
was said.

Key is pick out a couple of keywords and go from there…I coulda
sworn I heard Freddie mention the town that’s halfway so, in a burst
of optimism I casually asked if we are meeting them there, because
there’s no point in driving to Town A if we don’t have to.

Also key is never ending a chat with Freddie without knowing for
sure what you discussed and this is best accomplished by the asking
of a question whose only possible answer is yes or no, so I asked if we
were meeting them in the halfway town and Freddie came back with
yes so that settled it.

Three more basketball games tomorrow…Also, The Wife has indi-
cated hotcakes will be on the menu for Sunday.

February 15
Had to redo two jump balls today…This is rare…Jump balls are

pretty routine, but on one Dave threw the ball so high up it was bounc-
ing off the rafters and the girls standing with their hands on their hips
waiting for it to come down , and the opening tip for the boys game
resulted in a held ball, so we had to jump again.

Dave made a tactical error in the locker room (actually the nurse’s
office) before the girls varsity game, wondering which ones of us was
the referee for our games.

Bad move, because Pete and I immediately conspired to make
Dave the referee for both varsity games.

Not that being the referee is particularly taxing… The R, as he’s
known, does have to check the scorebook before the game, not to men-
tion conducting the pregame meeting with captains and coaches… He

February 2014 91

is responsible for designating which official will toss the ball for the
opening tip…Usually the R will do this himself, but every now and
then he may delegate this responsibility, usually to a younger official
just for funsies…He is also the only one authorized to forfeit a
game…But that’s really it…There is really no reason to shirk referee
duties, except for the thrill of passing it off on someone else, so with-
out missing a beat I informed Dave “you are…both games.”…Pete im-
mediately and with perfect timing, nodded solemnly and said “yeah”,
which seemed to seal it.

For his part, Dave shook his head and said he recognized the error
of his ways right off the bat…Pete told him he should’ve just asked
one of us if we had the cards ready, referring to the cards we give to
the coaches before the game that have our names on them and pre-
sumed we were the R’s for both games.

The school really knows how to take care of us officials…I got there
about an hour early for my first game, the girl’s JV game, and the
second I entered the gym I was greeted by an administrator, who es-
corted me to our changing room, where our checks were waiting for
us…A short time later a cooler of water was delivered and after the
first game enough pizza to feed the fleet was delivered.

Pizza presents a conundrum…On the one hand, you are grateful
they thought of you…Really…They don’t have to provide any-
thing…Plus, pizza is good…On the other hand, boy, pizza is a lousy
pregame meal…It goes straight to my hips and makes me feel like I
weigh 500 pounds, not too good when you’re waddling up and down
the basketball court.

The games were uneventful…Some of the visitors wore fluorescent
yellow sneakers, which made them look like a team of highlighters,
but that was about it.

After the games I went to the Post bar to help out with bingo…We
had a pretty good turnout, too, about three dozen aged from eight to,
literally, 103, and everybody had a good time…I even called numbers
for the second hour, which was pretty fun.

92 The Diary of a Nobody

February 16
DO NOT CHANGE THE BLADE IN THE RAZOR WITHOUT TELLING

SPARROW!
This is to avoid Sparrow slicing his face, which has been known to

happen even when I personally put the new blade in and while today
wasn’t a complete bloodletting, ol’ Sparrow did cut himself a little to-
day.

This time The Wife put the new blade in, God bless her…I was
expecting the old, sorta dull blade, which still produced a serviceable,
more or less pain-free shave, and the fresh blade caught me by sur-
prise…The damage wasn’t too bad.

Further inspection showed it was a new type of blade, too…The
Wife had bought our usual blades, but in the package was a compli-
mentary upgrade…It has four blades…I don’t know why it has four
blades…The old three blade razor did a great job and despite the free
sample I don’t think we’ll end up forking over for four blades…We
simply not four blade people.

Hotcakes returned this morning, after a two week hiatus for bis-
cuits and gravy…I’ll be honest, I’m hoping for a biscuits and gravy
return next week, though.

February 17
The cat was rewarded for over two years of service as Family Cat

with some new dry food…The new stuff comes in a blue bag and, like
the old food, it’s designed for cats ages 1-6, but this one is geared for
“Indoor weight and Hairball Control”…I’m not entirely sure what the
difference is, and the cat has declined comment so far.

The old cat food was in an orange bag.

February 18
Temps have been rather warm lately – above 40 today, and there’s

still a month till the Spring Equinox – and on the route today we saw
the first short shorts and mini-skirts, both worn by young ladies en-
titled to wear them, which was really good for morale, especially since
it will get cold again fairly soon.

February 2014 93

God, I love unseasonably warm temps…I know you do, too.
It was so warm, in fact, we had the a/c on in the doily truck…I am
not making that up…The truck is basically a metal box and retains
heat rather well, and Brian is out delivering doilies and actually work-
ing up a pretty good sweat, so I kept it cool in the truck for him.
The Wife made chicken salad for lunch, too…The Wife has won-
derful throw-anything-together-and-it-tastes-great skills…There
could be crackers, motor oil and lint in the cupboard and you would
rave about the results, and today’s chicken salad had mayo, peas and
rice in it…Probably not the most traditional recipe, and in honor of
the warmer weather she even added a refreshing orange.

February 19
The Wife will be gone for ten days early next month, off visiting

some family...The Wife and I, despite our advancing ages, have not
been married all that long and I was a bachelor for a very long time
and the question is not if I will revert back to the old bachelor tenden-
cies, but how long it will take.

Bonser and the rug rat were over for a visit last night and Matt –
who you will recall works bingo cards and pull tabs at the Post bar –
immediately went to work taking action.

Bonser said it wouldn’t even be a full day before clothes were on
the floor and The Wife pretended to despair that the dog wouldn’t be
fed regularly, a topic that also seemed to interest the dog.

Matt initially offered Saturday night (The Wife leaves Saturday
morning) as the before/after time the first box of macaroni and cheese
would be consumed, but he changed it to Monday after both Bonser
and The Wife pointed out – probably accurately - I would probably be
dining out those first two nights which naturally led to speculation as
to where…Matt promised to have a full slate of action available before
The Wife left.

I could do a lot of damage in ten days…Left to myself I am not
particularly neat.

94 The Diary of a Nobody

February 20
Bonser and the rug rat over yet again last night and Matt said he’d

been doing some work on action he is going to offer while The Wife is
away. Sample bets – which Matt insisted would be for entertainment
purposes only, of course – included an over/under on the number of
meals I would eat over the sink, the average length of time it would
take dishes to get done and the amount of clothes on the floor, both
as a whole number and the percentage of clothes actually worn…Ac-
tual figures weren’t thrown out, but initial guesses tended toward the
high side.

Bonser is trying to talk me into going to a political convention with
him next month…It’s the state convention of the third party we belong
to…He drug me two years ago and though some attendees had a va-
cant stare and lacked recent evidence of bathing, it was interesting
enough.

February 21
The Wife made another salmon salad for my lunch today and whoa

baby, this was the best yet…I know it’s only February, but I’m calling
it Salmon Salad of the Year…Good luck topping it…Included this time
were some jalapenos – not too many, because they make me fart – and
even some dried tomatoes, which really pushed the whole matter over
the top…Homemade lunches on long days are starting to make Brian
a bit jealous…Brian doesn’t have a wife at home, merely eight or nine
ski bum roommates, and the only stuff he’s ever seen eating comes
from convenience stores and he said today he’s got to get himself a
wife, too…I told him make sure it’s a good one.

In other news, the cat has changed our morning routine a bit…Re-
call she had taken advantage of my morning constitutional by allowing
me to pet her, however now she favors me with petting time right when
I get out of bed…She senses my initial stirring and I can usually see
the silhouette of her standing up at her bed and when I throw my feet
over the side of the bed there she is, demanding pets before I even get
to the can.

February 2014 95

She still joins me for my constitutional, too, although now she su-
pervises matters from the sink or, as likely as not, the towel rack.

February 22
The Wife was at my games today and she provided proof officiating

is the second most misunderstood job on the planet, right behind
crack whoring.

The first game, girls JV, was tedious…The game was not an exhi-
bition of precision and skill, it was 32 minutes of fouling…On the way
home The Wife said the crowd was not at all pleased we were calling
so many fouls…The Wife said most parents thought we were calling
so many fouls because we liked the attention.

Let me tell you something, we weren’t pleased with the game, ei-
ther…We don’t get paid by the foul call…Given the choice I’d rather
let the kids play…It’s JV basketball for Pete’s sake and nobody paid
to see Sparrow show off his microscopic knowledge of the rule
book…I’d would’ve preferred to call just enough fouls to maintain good
order and discipline, but not this game…We could either call fouls or
we could break up fights…You have to ref the game that’s being
played.

The varsity game was pretty good…Daryl came in with a full scout-
ing report, saying it was going to be a close, well-played game with
both teams pressing the whole way…So it came as some zero surprise
the home team, which needed a win to make the playoffs, led by 20 at
the half…

The game basically ended with eleven seconds when I called an
intentional foul on the visitors…The penalty for an intentional foul is
two free throws, plus the team that was fouled gets the ball back…The
defender made no attempt to play defense, she merely came up and
pushed the dribbler in an attempt to stop the clock, which is pretty
much what the intentional foul rule is designed to prevent.

After the game The Wife wondered if we were going to stop at our
fave pizza place, which, rather conveniently, we would pass on the
way home…The fly in the ointment was The Wife had to be somewhere
at a certain time and we really didn’t have time to go, sit down, order,
eat and make it home in time.

96 The Diary of a Nobody

This is why I love my The Wife…We looked at each other and,
plainly on the same wavelength, we both simultaneously wondered
why we shouldn’t call them in advance, warn them of our impending
arrival, and place our order.

That should be it…The playoffs are this week and I’m eligible, but
I’m not expecting anything…Assignment come out Monday and Tues-
day.

February 23
Guys will like this: Sparrow had to beg to help with the lunch

dishes today!!!...I am not making that up…The Wife had spent the
morning baking a cake for a gathering she went to so she made classic
SOS, ground beef gravy with homemade biscuits for lunch…No, I don’t
know where the sausage was, either, but it was nice reliving the clas-
sic SOS days, which anyone who has spent at least 20 minutes in the
service can appreciate.

Anyway, I am not very handy around the house, and The Wife ac-
tually considered my request to help with the dishes at length and
demanded a guarantee nothing I washed would require rewashing be-
fore allowing me near the sink.

February 24
Got an email from the high school state office today discussing

playoff officiating policies and whatnot, but no corresponding assign-
ments, so I don’t know if they went out to all officials actually working
the playoffs or merely everyone who’s eligible to work the playoffs.

February 25
Playoff time!!!
Playoff assignments came out for this weekend and I’ve got me two

games in the small school regional tournament!
I’ve got two games Friday night, and one Saturday, and Saturday’s

is a championship game, with the winner going to the state tourna-
ment and the loser wondering what it would be like to go to the state
tournament.

February 2014 97

This will be a complete fiasco…I have to arrange for a day off from
work Friday, which shouldn’t be too tough, and remember The Wife is
leaving town this weekend, flying out Sunday from the big city, which
is on the other side of the state from my games, but we’ll make it work.

February 26
A very long day yesterday…It didn’t help we had our Tuesday route

adjusted…On Tuesday’s we drive to Town A, a couple of hours south
of us, to pick up the doilies for our route…Usually me met Route 1,
but today we started meeting Route 24 for reasons that apparently
are super top secret because we weren’t told why…We also picked up
a couple of stops in Town A, which Route 1 had previously serviced.

That really wasn’t too bad, tho…We did have to hit the road an
hour earlier, but we were out of Town A earlier than we met Route 1,
but I was delivering doilies today and I am not as fast as Brian…I
usually drive on Tuesdays, but Brian wanted a break and, honestly, I
enjoyed the break from 14 hours behind the wheel.

It was warm, too, and I was breaking a pretty good sweat, because
there are a lot of doilies to deliver on Tuesdays and probably had some
BO going, but I’ve learned from experience the ladies aren’t completely
adverse to a working man, in uniform, that is a tad rank.

After we dropped our stuff with Route 25 Brian went into the con-
venience store and got a hot dog…After he returned to the driver’s seat
he opened the box and almost immediately issued an expletive…It was
dark and hard to see exactly what happened, tho it was a word we
don’t normally use here in the diary.

What happened, partner?
My *&^@& bun broke!
Brian is infamous for the amounts of ketchup used on his conven-
ience store hot dogs and even in the dark I could see him licking his
hands.
You’re not going to wipe it off on your pants?
Nah, I’ll lick it off.
Then you got lick all over your hands. That’s what pants are for.

98 The Diary of a Nobody

Brian ignored my wisdom, tho.

February 27
The Wife is adjusting to the change in her schedule with typical

good humor…We were going to have date night Saturday before mak-
ing the drive to the airport for her Sunday flight, but with my playoff
games Friday and Saturday all that is shot.

We pulled out today after work…This isn’t completely inconvenient
because Thursday’s we’re off a bit after noon, so we got to our hotel in
time for dinner…This is a really well run event and at check-in I was
given an envelope that had a check for my game fees, mileage and per
diem, a pass for The Wife, plus my schedule and directions to my game
sites.

Games tomorrow are in the early afternoon…Two regional semifi-
nals and a title game Saturday…It’s not the world championship, and
there are a billion Chinese who couldn’t care less, but I am very
pleased…It’s going to be a good couple of days.

February 28
You might think that a pair of regional semifinal games would be

enough to get the ol’ nerves going, but you’d be wrong…It was as if we
were doing regular season games...The Wife said it was because I’m a
championship game official now and I can’t be bothered getting
worked up over mere semifinal contests, which was pretty funny.

The first game was routine…One team established fairly early on
they were just a half-step quicker and a bit better than their oppo-
nents and the result was never in doubt…There were zero close calls,
either…Everything could be called from the nickel seats and our main
job was not to stay out of everybody’s way.

Game 2 was a major division game, boys, and featured a private
school against a public school and both teams had black kids, which
we don’t see at home because our small towns are not the most diverse
places in the country…Let me tell you something, this was the fastest
paced game I’ve ever worked….They were running up and down the
court like it was the state track meet and they even played above the

February 2014 99

rim from time to time, which you really don’t see at home, where they
seldom even play above the net.

It was not an easy game to officiate, either, because it was not
particularly well played…Neither team was passing or shooting the
ball well at all and they really weren’t playing great defense, ei-
ther…The crew did a really good job, though, of establishing what we
were and were not going to put up with from the get-go, including me
calling a double foul very first time down the floor which caused both
my partners to achieve and maintain a state of arousal…It didn’t make
the players play any better, but when you take control early nobody
is surprised when you blow your whistle.

Championship basketball tomorrow!!!...My first ever…To ensure I
sleep well, maybe I should get good and loaded tonight.



March 2014

March 1
A great day. No doubt about it.
We had the second one of the day, the small school boy’s regional

championship game.
My partners were Vince, a tall, completely bald guy and Eric, who

central casting would send if you called looking for a referee.
Vince was the referee and took control of the pregame…We covered

a lot, from when and how we would take the floor (15 minutes before
tipoff with a confident tho not cocky bearing) to how we would leave
the floor at the end of the game (with alacrity, leaving the same way
we entered).

In theory, all officials in all areas do things the same way, but
invariably there are differences, so Vince, the referee, took control of
the pregame. We covered primary coverage areas, dead ball proce-
dures and procedures for last second shots, free throws and throw-
ins.

Good thing, too, it turns out all three of us cover last second shots
differently…We do it according to the book, with the official opposite
the scorer’s table making the ruling…Vince’s association has who-
ever’s area the shot is in make the call, while Eric’s association has
the official on the scorer’s table side make the call.

This is why you have a pregame, to get this sorted out because it
would blow to have one official rule a shot was good, while at the same
time another official comes out waving it off…Vince decided

Vince has been around…He does other sports, too, and today was
his 17th high school championship game…Erik has had a few, so I
was the only one doing his first one

Eric told me not to worry…He said odds were the game was going
to be routine and if it wasn’t, it will so well played it will an easy game
to officiate and all we really had to do was plug in the hard work and

102 The Diary of a Nobody

good attitude that got us this assignment and we were in for a good
day of officiating.

Eric was right…Both teams knew how to play and were very dis-
ciplined and while the game was close the whole way and while I was
nervous before the game, once it started it was just another game.

Good thing we covered last shot coverage because the game ended
on a last second shot that yours truly ruled was no good.

Team A got a basket with about ten seconds left to break a tie and
here comes Team B streaking down the court…They make a couple of
passes and this kid takes a shot from the top of the key and the buzzer
goes off before he releases the ball.

It was close…But I was right there…The play had my complete and
undivided attention and the buzzer sounded before the shot had been
released and as soon as the horn went off I blew my whistle with an
authority that would’ve cause Hitler to achieve and maintain a state
of arousal and ran to the middle of the court waving my arms indicat-
ing the shot had not gotten off in time…As I was doing this shot went
through the basket which could’ve caused a problem had nobody
known what I’d called, but I was all over it; there was some zero doubt
what I was calling.

With that the game was over and we ran off the floor…We had
covered that, too, in our pregame…There was no reason to stick
around…My call was not subject to appeal…We could not consult a
replay monitor and were weren’t going to take a vote…I’d decided the
shot wasn’t released and now one team was going to the state tourna-
ment and another team wasn’t…You really aren’t thinking about that
when you are making the call, but that is the way it worked out.

In the locker room Vince smiled and said I nailed the call and Eric,
who was underneath the basket and didn’t see it smiled and said he
figures I got it right because I’d nailed every call all game…This led to
an interesting feeling…Literally 30 seconds ago we were out there un-
der the bright lights officiating championship basketball and now we
were just three guys sitting around after our day’s work.

The game, tho, was televised and about ten minutes after the game
a staff member comes in smiling broadly…He said the call had been

March 2014 103

dissected more than a dead frog in biology class and it was not re-
leased in time, so Sparrow nailed his game deciding call in his first
championship game.

The Wife said I nailed it, too and she had a hug for me and she
said she was proud of me, that the whole crew had done great.

That was a lot of fun…I wonder when I’ll get another one, cause
boy, I had a ball…A splendid day.

A long day, too…After the game we drove across the state to stay
in another hotel before The Wife flies out tomorrow.

March 2
Home. Finally, after a weekend that was as exhausting as it was

triumphant…Got The Wife on the plane to go visit some relatives and
since I was in the big city the opportunity to dine at Waffle House, a
particularly toxic yet iconic chain I love dearly but which The Wife has
some zero use for.

March 3
Back to regular life…The burner on the coffee pot appears to be

broken.

March 4
A very long day at work…Almost 16 hours…There were several key

factors, including pesky Doily Dispensing Machines (DDM) that gave
us trouble.

The first was a new DDM we had picked up this week that the
branch neglected to send instructions for, so Brian was obliged to ra-
dio the branch for on-the-spot, step-by-step instructions and the
whole deal took 40 minutes.

Which was short compared to our last DDM of the day…This took
50 minutes because the combo for the lock we’d been given was wrong
and usually this isn’t a problem but the lock copped an attitude, oblig-
ing us to wait till it decided it wanted to work again.

Then the weather turned on us…It started raining in the afternoon
and as the temperature dropped it turned to snow which wasn’t a
problem in town, but on the mountain it was snowing and windy and

104 The Diary of a Nobody

visibility was squat and the road hadn’t been plowed yet and it was
pretty slow going….Funny thing was, tho, on the back the snow had
moved on and the road had been plowed.

I was grateful for that because The Wife is gone, of course, and the
dog was cooped up all day and I am pleased to report the dog did not
do any business in the cabin…I had worried about this, tho not too
much because except for ralphing once or twice, she’s never done
poops inside.

March 5
Well, it didn’t take long to revert to the bachelor life…It started at

the grocery store, where I bought mac and cheese, bread, hot dogs
and an industrial sized jar of mayonnaise.

I also bought a new coffee pot…Recall the old one had the burner
go out…With The Wife gone it was completely my decision, too, and I
could see no reason to spend anything more than was absolutely nec-
essary to purchase an implement that will turn ground coffee and wa-
ter into a hot, morning beverage and I am pleased to report I got out
for a bit more than ten bucks, tax included…It’s a pretty basic model,
but it does have Sneak-A-Cup Technology, key for Sparrow, even if I
don’t use it all that much.

March 6
Another clustermess at work. It’s 7am or so and I’d just gotten up

and was sitting farting around with this diary when the phone rings.
I don’t recognize the number and I tend not to take unscreened calls
so I ignore it, tho I suspect it’s work.

I was right. Roberto, one of the 17 supervisors we seem to have at
the big city branch leaves a message wanting me to call him.

This can’t be good, and it isn’t. He asked if anybody had told us
yesterday we were supposed to meet Route 1 in Town A to pick up a
special delivery for a bank.

Well, no, I told him, as a matter of fact no one had…And it was too
late to go to Town A, we had to go to town B, which meant we had to
drive 45 minutes west, 90 minutes south, pick up the doilies (known
as liability in the trade), drive back, do our route, and then drive and

March 2014 105

hour and a half east of town to drop the special delivery off. I didn’t
get home till after 6pm.

Needless to say, with The Wife gone, dinner was eaten over the
sink. I just did hot dogs, too. I couldn’t be bothered to make mac and
cheese.

March 7
Yesterday’s long day and today’s usual long day meant the dog

was very lonely and she did not take this well at all.
She ralphed in six (6) different places and even pooped in two

places, meaning Sparrow spent just over an hour and a half cleaning
up ralph and poop.

This was gross…The hell of it was, I only got the first three puke
spots at first…I cleaned up three pukes, and the poop, and took the
dog out in case there was any more to follow and we got back in the
house and the smell was still strong and I looked and found three
more.

March 8
Bonser and the rug rat over…Bonser is trying to get me to go to a

political convention at the end of the month…We both belong to the
Minor Party, a group of misfits who dare to believe government exists
to provide for the liberty of its citizens…I ran for Congress two years
ago but lost in the primary to a guy who ran no campaign at all…He
didn’t even have website…As political debuts go, that’s about as bad
as it gets, losing a third party primary to someone who didn’t even
have a website.

Anyway, Bonser is encouraging me to run again, if not for Con-
gress then the US Senate…I told him I couldn’t even win a primary
two years ago, why in the hell would they want to nominate me for the
US Senate.

March 9
Officially, I suppose I am pro-Daylight Savings Time…I haven’t

given it a whole lot of thought, but today I am complaining.

106 The Diary of a Nobody

There was no alarm clock to wake up to today, but immediately
upon getting up I was an hour behind schedule because it wasn’t
6:30am, it was 7:30am and I’ve learned it is best to take care of the
animals before tending to myself.

The cat was out of food and water and her box needed attention,
then I went down and took the dog out…She wanted some exercise,
too, so she brought her indestructible plastic ball for me to throw
around while she goes potty…Our neighbor Allen was out with Goldie
and Goldie and our dog are kinda indifferent to each other, so Allen
and I chatted while the dogs pretended to ignore each other and the
next thing I know half the morning’s gone and I’ve done squat and
Casey Kasem is already into the Top 20 on the classic edition of Amer-
ican Top 40 I like to listen to and I felt I was catching up all morning.

The Wife reports she is spared the Daylight Savings Time fiasco
because Arizona doesn’t bother with it.

March 10
I’m getting kinda sick of hot dogs, so I completely lost my mind

and got some baloney.
Fried baloney is really good…My fave fried baloney memory, and I

know you have yours, is at a minor league baseball game in Louisville
years ago where they have a fried baloney cart.

I also bought a custard pie at the store.

March 11
I don’t think I can get any lower than this: a turkey sandwich and

custard pie for breakfast…Everything was, of course, eaten over the
sink, and I didn’t even cut a piece of pie, merely ate it out of the tin.

March 12
One more day…I timed the mac and cheese perfectly, too, so the

last box is eaten tonight.

March 2014 107

March 13
The Wife’s home!!!...Finally…I followed her orders and didn’t clean

anything, either…I probably wouldn’t’ve cleaned anything anyway,
just so, you know, she felt wanted when she got back.

It was good to see my wife again…I missed her.

March 14
Very good day…Since The Wife is home I had a good breakfast

before a long day at work, she made me a good lunch and we had good
roads and I managed to not move like an old man so we got home at
a decent hour, too.

March 15
The next time I agree to referee seven (7) middle school basketball

games in one day, stop me...Seven is a lot…I’m pretty strong and phys-
ically fit and it wasn’t too bad, but I lost interest after game five…For-
tunately the games started every hour on the hour and we were on
schedule the whole time.

What was funny is the guy who was my partner for games four
through seven, inclusive, didn’t call a foul for the first two games!!!...I
am not making that up…After the first half I shrugged it off…I men-
tioned it to him after the first game and he said he didn’t really see
anything and I said OK…I mean, it’s an off season middle school bas-
ketball tournament, no the world championship, so what the hell.

Late in the second game tho, I told him look, now I’m doing your
work, too, so let’s blow the whistle…Even if you’re not sure blow it and
call something…He started calling fouls in our third game together.

Editor’s Note: We are not certain what happened to the entries for
the rest of the next couple of weeks. The Diary picks up on March 30.

March 30
Received notification that I was nominated for the US Senate by

the Minor Party today.

108 The Diary of a Nobody

I am not making that up…A lot of people who run for the United
States Senate form staffs and campaign well ahead of their party’s
state convention and crap to earn the nomination.

Fuck that noise, as we used to say in the Navy…I couldn’t even be
bothered to go to the convention and I still earned the nomination. I
would provide details of what happened but I wasn’t there so I don’t
know…Bonser didn’t bother to go, either, so he was no help, tho he
said it was probable no one wanted the nomination, which isn’t too
good for morale, but I’m on the ballot and you’re probably not, so what
the hell.

I was in a parking a lot when an email from the state vice chair
told me to print the attached form and get it back to the state Secre-
tary of State pronto. The email, from a gentleman named Nick, didn’t
say what I was nominated for, though I had told the party I would fill
out a ballot if they needed a candidate for either Congress or the US
Senate…I mean, what chance would there be of that happening???…I
figured even if there wasn’t any interest somebody would take it
simply for the ballot access…I was wrong.

Also, I wasn’t immediately sure if I was the nominee or if I would
be subjected to a primary, until I got home and printed out the form.
It was a form I didn’t recall signing two years ago when I ran for Con-
gress and lost in the primary…Besides, at the bottom the Applicant’s
Affirmation said, in part, “I accept the nomination” which seemed to
settle it.

So, I’m a third party candidate and it appears I was nominated
because no one else wanted it and I have neither the time nor the
money to run, but I’ll take it.

April 2014

Tuesday, April 1
The Wife made a sign for the campaign!!!..She made it out of note-

book paper and a marker…It says:
Your chance to make a difference
Vote Sparrow To Your
United States Senate
The usual long Tuesday at work…I told Keck, who works Route

22, the route we meet at the end of the day, about my candidacy…He
was excited and said there were Libertarians at the branch.

Bonser said there was a lot to do…The website from the 2012 loser
run for Congress has to be updated and press releases for newspapers
written.

I also got a haircut.

Wednesday April 2
Saw Joann at the bank today while on route and I will go in to-

morrow to open a Sparrow For US Senate bank account…We had to
do the bi-weekly Southern Manitoba run today, so there was no time
to do it after work.

Ordered campaign business cards today, too…They’re green, with
a pic of yours truly in the upper left, “Let’s Talk Liberty” below my
name because that’s the official campaign motto, plus my web address
and contact info…The phone number is my personal cell because I
don’t have a dedicated campaign line yet…Bonser wanted to think he
had a say in their design so he insisted on looking the order over be-
fore I placed it, but I was pleased and I’m the candidate so it was good
for him he liked them, too.

Thursday April 3
Opened the Sparrow For US Senate bank account today…Joann,

who called me young man even tho it is not possible for her to be too

110 The Diary of a Nobody

much older than I am, took care of everything…The initial deposit was
$100 of my hard-earned money…Joann said the price for checks
through the bank would require me to bend over and take it in the
shorts, so I will order those myself, and my debit card and PIN will be
sent separately within a week.

With a bank account I was able to set up online contributing,
too…I already had an account with the company, so it was pretty easy.

So far a paper in the southern, central part of the state is the only
newspaper to run my news release so far…The local paper isn’t even
too interested…Today’s lead story was some sewing store in town
helping people mend their clothes, so plainly they have a lot to cover
right now.

Tuesday April 8
A long day at work…Brian wanted a break from delivering, so I

hopped, as we call it in the trade…There were a lot of doilies to deliver,
too, and it was an enjoyably physical day.

I had a lot of time to think about my stump speech, and I recalled
a quote from Gerald Ford about government being about as good as
concerned and conscientious citizens bother to make it, which is a
heck of a quote, if you ask me….I will find a way to work it in.

Wednesday April 9
Earlier this week I emailed the Minor Party office asking for money

and organizational support and I haven’t heard back yet.
Bonser said he wasn’t surprised and that I would’ve gotten the

same result putting my request in a bottle and throwing it in the
river…I pointed out this campaign started from scratch, we are the
third shoe on a two-legged beast and there really is no reason for an-
yone, even our own party, to take us too seriously right now.

Had a nice chat with our neighbor Jax today…Jax was a supporter
of Sparrow for Congress two years ago and she is really on board with
Sparrow for US Senate…I gave her a stack of Sparrow For US Senate
cards to pass out and that I could really use her organizing a meet
and greet for us.

April 2014 111

Friday April 11
Since I delivered Tuesday I drove today…It’s a 500 mile day and

that’s a bit longer than I like but we had good roads and made pretty
good time.

Again I celebrated Apple Fritter Friday…The convenience store
doesn’t have Apple Fritters of the Year, but they’re not crap, ei-
ther…Every apple fritter has merit.

Saturday April 12
Got first umpiring assignment of year today…Dave, the coach of

our Post’s baseball team emailed and asked if I would do the plate for
the Memorial Day opener…I said sure.

This will be my first game of the year…I declined to do high school
ball this year because the state association decided to pass out rule
books this year, even though we paid for them…They said this was
because there was only a minor editorial change to the rules this year,
which is a crock, because now the new guys don’t have rule books,
which is putting them in a lousy spot.

Well, the fact there isn’t much baseball up here and I can really
only work on Saturday had something to do with it, too.

Memorial Day is a busy day…The Post puts on a very moving cer-
emony at the cemetery at 8am, complete with changing of the guard,
rifle salute, flag procession, the whole nine yards, then we also do the
color guard at the baseball field…After the game there really isn’t a
good reason not to retire to the post bar for a couple of cold ones.

Sunday April 13
No biscuits and gravy for breakfast!!!...The Wife and I actually dis-

cussed this and decided that was a lot of calories and we decided to
give them a break for a few weeks…I actually made breakfast, of all
things…I made carrot juice and oatmeal, which is a really healthy way
to start any day…Not as tasty as The Wife’s World Champion Biscuits
and Gravy, but still not too bad, plus Sparrow got big bonus points
just for making breakfast, which I am not very good at.

112 The Diary of a Nobody

The Wife and I also put the new campaign tablet to use, working
on campaign videos…Neither of know much about it, but I put a suit
on and she fussed with the lighting and pointed the camera and we
taped the script to the tablet so I wasn’t looking down at notes.

Bonser was pissed we did it without him, but as I told him he
wasn’t there…He came by later and watched it and said it wasn’t too
bad, really…Some fine tuning and we can get a YouTube channel up
and running.

Monday April 14
Brian and I got an email from the branch today concerning two

safety milestones we are close to reaching…The first is we are within
a month of going a certain amount of time without a truck being in-
volved in an accident.

This is news…Our trucks get hit a lot, mostly while were parked,
rsand to go a significant amount of time without this happening, or
us plowing into a sign or a median or something equally stationery, is
pretty good.

The other milestone is a certain amount of days without an in-
jury…This is good, too…With all the large boxes and bags of doilies
we’re throwing around someone is always getting nicked…The email
noted that if we reach each milestone the branch will host a BBQ for
us employees, but since we live three hours from the branch and can’t
make a BBQ on a workday, they will send us a gift card or something
like that.

It would be fun to show up at the BBQ, tho…Maybe if one were on
a short day…We could be there by late afternoon.

Got the campaign debit card in the mail today!!!...It says Sparrow
For US Senate on it, with Sparrow directly underneath it…I had al-
ready received the password last week, and I went in to see Joann and
see activated the card and set up a password I selected.

Thursday April 16
You might recall last December the Post provided an honor guard

for an event by a local conservative institute. This was mainly notable
for the open bar that saw Sparrow consume a lot of champagne.

April 2014 113

The invocation was given by a reverend from Louisiana named C.L.
Bryant…I am not the most religious guy in town, but I was rather
impressed with him.

I did some research and Rev. Bryant is a liberty guy, too, so I
emailed him through his website, mentioned last December and my
candidacy, and asked for his support.

Thursday April 17
Sparrow for US Senate might have gotten a break today.
Earlier this week I had asked Amy, a party board member, if she

knew anyone who could get me on radio shows in the big city…I need
all the help I can get and I was on the radio ages ago, in another life,
really, and there are enough talk shows out there someone would be
desperate enough to have the Minor Party US Senate candidate on.

Turns out Amy does know somebody and today I talked with Nia,
who had a long career in radio and now has her own media consulting
business…She’s a member of the party, too, after a long time as a
Republican.

Friday April 18
Did the Friday route in record time today…We got in a bit before

six, and our old record is right at six.
Brian said he has reserve duty coming up in May…This was a pain

in the arse when he went on deployment for what turned out to be the
entire month of July last year…I had to drive to Town A to pick up a
partner every day and let me tell you that got old real quick…So I did
some figuring…Figuring in the cost of fuel and my time, it costs the
company, more or less, $200 for me to go pick a partner up and take
him back to Town A…So Chas, the branch manager and I talked it
over and he agrees this is not the most efficient use of company re-
sources, not to mention Sparrow’s time and it would cost the company
less to have a partner drive up in a company van or, better yet, put
him up in a hotel for a week.

In campaign news, I’ve got my first speaking engage-
ment!!!...Bonser said he’s arranged for me to speak to the Young

114 The Diary of a Nobody

Americans for Liberty chapter at the state university on May 3…He
said he is also going see if he can rustle up some more engagements,
too.

Saturday April 19
With the weather changing The Wife and are getting more ac-

tive…She bought a bike…I would’ve bought one, too, but I tend to run
into things and fall off, so biking is not the best alternative for Spar-
row.

I did get off the duff an did some interval training at the high
school this morning, tho…They have a FieldTurf field that is really
nice for something like this…The deal is you walk the length of the
football field twice then sprint it once, walk it twice and sprint it once
on continue like this until you pass out…

I did ten sprints…The first one was half speed and so was the sec-
ond and the remaining eight were at what I am currently passing off
as full speed, which isn’t really all that fast, and since I hadn’t really
done anything like this since the end of basketball season, the last
two were a challenge…

It was a great morning for it, too…A bit above freezing, but I have
enough cold weather officiating gear to make this nothing to worry
about.

Sunday April 20
Like we did last year, The Wife and I attended Easter services at

the Lutheran church in town this morning…Not only that, we got up
early, just like He did, and went to the 6:30 sunrise service.

I have solid Lutheran street cred, having grown up in the church
and it’s pleasing to note the liturgy hasn’t changed all that much…”I
by virtue of my office as a called and ordained servant of the word”
and “…in the same manner also he took the cup” were as familiar as
they were when I was a boy…I am not a religious man anymore, but I
found that comforting for some reason.

The Wife, tho, remains a strong believer despite my evil influence
and she likes Lutherans so much she said she might go regularly….I

April 2014 115

pointed out that yearly is regularly, tho it isn’t, of course, all that of-
ten.

Services, of course, were followed by Easter breakfast…They didn’t
have quiche this year, tho, like they did last year…Being Lutheran,
you don’t complain about that, you merely shrug and say well, I guess
there wasn’t meant to be quiche this year and, perhaps, hope they’ll
remember it next year.

Monday April 21
The Wife is part of a prison visitation group, and the group visits

the county jail on Monday nights…There generally isn’t a lot of crime
here, but there is an inmate who left her three-year-old alone for al-
most 24 hours while she worked and got laid and the kid died, which
is about the biggest crime they’ve had since we moved here a couple-
three years ago.

Tuesday April 22
The first poll results of the campaign are out…The two major party

candidates are neck and neck in the mid-40’s while Sparrow For US
Senate came in at seven percent.

Seven percent!!!...This figure caused Bonser to achieve and main-
tain a state of arousal usually associated with porn stars…He said
seven percent, for some a complete loser with zero name recognition
who is from a party that usually gets one percent of the vote was a
triumph, and lays a great foundation for the next few months.

Got a nice contribution from a cousin today, too…The bank ac-
count is a bit over $700 now.

Wednesday April 23
If you are going to donate to Sparrow For US Senate, I would like

to request you send a check…That way I don’t have to the fees the
company I utilize charges for accepting online donations…Thank you
in advance.

116 The Diary of a Nobody

Thursday April 24
Saul the Trainer came to town for 45-minute safe driving refresher

course…For those of you keeping score at home, that’s a six-hour
round trip for a 45-minute class…He met us after the route was done
and we had the class in the truck, actually.

Bonser over…He says there is no reason Sparrow for US Senate
should not be visualizing success…He cited the poll results, which are
still causing him to achieve and maintain a state of arousal, plus the
fact we still have yet to run into anyone who thinks our country is
doing good, plus the fact liberty, my only real issue, is going over well.

Friday April 25
Brian actually started his three weeks off today, so his dog could

get some surgery done…The surgery is costing $3,500 and he makes
what I make and we don’t make enough to drop three-and-half large
on dog surgery without bending over and grabbing our ankles, but he
said he didn’t have a choice, he certainly wasn’t going to put him
down.

My partner was Mark…We usually see Mark on Tuesdays as he
drives the route we meet to drop our stuff off with, and Mark is a
patient and good driver, and he doesn’t get sick driving in canyons
and passes like the driver from 2-3 weeks ago…He also doesn’t yap,
so it was a quiet day at work.

Saturday April 26
I did not do too much today, but Bonser said he’s been hard at it

emailing Tea Party groups around the state, pestering them to let me
come speak to them.

Sunday April 27
Barbecued some steaks yesterday…I had wanted to go out to din-

ner, in leisurely preparation for the long three weeks, but The Wife
talked me out of it…So I picked two champion steaks up at the market
and she cooked them…Our neck of the woods being our neck of the
woods, it shouldn’t surprise anybody that it started snowing a bit as
soon as we lit the coals…The steaks were really good, too, and I was

April 2014 117

in bed reading myself to sleep before dark, so my quest for a leisurely
Sunday was neither arduous nor unrewarded, which is a line I stole
from a Gore Vidal.

Monday April 28
The three long weeks begin today…Dustin, one of the 17 people

we answer to at the branch, said he found no takers for spending a
week at company expense up here despite the fact this one of the most
beautiful places on the planet, so I will be working 60 hour weeks for
the next three weeks.

I didn’t mention that on Monday’s, Wednesdays and Thursdays
they could send someone up in a company van and save me eight
hours a day, but we could use the money…I’ve mentioned this before
and if they don’t think of it on their own, that’s their problem.

Today’s partner was a kid originally from Bosnia…I can’t pro-
nounce, much less spell, his name, but he was a big, husky kid who
looked even bigger because he wears his bullet-proof vest…A natural-
ized American citizen, he had a lot of questions when he found out I
was running for the US Senate.

Tuesday April 29
Regular readers of this crap know that sometimes work can be a

complete mess.
It was today…I headed out to meat Route 24 in Town B, about

2:15 south and west of here, to pick up our doilies and, because Brian
is gone, a partner, and on the way Route 24 radioed me and said your
partner, Billings, was told the wrong time to report for duty and would
be brought by Route 21 an hour or so later.

That started the Cavalcade of Lateness rolling…Recall we picked
up a couple of stops in Town B…On the way to the first, a Doily Dis-
pensing Machine (DDM), Mr Billings thought my “continue around the
roundabout and bear left” actually meant “head east on the Interstate
towards the East coast” and the next exit was three miles down…The
DDM took forever because 1) I had never worked it before, Brian usu-
ally hops on Tuesdays, and 2) no DDM instructions are ever entirely

118 The Diary of a Nobody

correct and I spent no small amount of time on the horn with the
branch.

We got out of Town A around noon, over an hour and a half later
than usual and when we got back to town I radioed Dustin, one of the
17 people we seem to work for at the branch, we were going to need
help and Dustin said he would dispatch Route 21 to help us out…We
usually meet Rt 21 after our route is done in Town B, about an hour
south, and a bit east, of town.

They get here and take two of our last four DDM’s…It’s about 7pm
or so and, of course, our truck breaks down…Our ass end is dragging
and who the hell knows what is wrong because Mr Billings is about
as mechanically disinclined as I am…We talk it over with the branch
and we leave the broken truck in the parking lot…Another driver will
come up with another truck tomorrow and we will get a mobile me-
chanic to look at it and see what the deal is.

Billings and I had numerous funny exchanges…One came when
we were driving down a street to DoilyMart to deliver their doilies…Mr
Billings informed me his GPS was showing DoilyMart was off to the
left when, in point of fact, DoilyMart was still a quarter mile or so
ahead…Helpfully, I pointed this out to Mr Billings and, hilariously, at
that instant a DoilyMart semi – with ‘DOILYMART’ in real big letters
on the side – made a sweeping right turn into its parking lot.

That’s probably it, where the truck pulled in.
You mean there? Where the truck with DoilyMart on it went?
Yeah. Where the truck pulled in.
That is a brilliant fucking observation, Mr Billings.
While all this was happening I was blissfully unaware Sparrow for
US Senate got its first mention in the big city paper!!!...A blogger
named Lynn used last week’s poll results to wonder if Sparrow could
be a spoiler in the race…The quote she used was from the release
Bonser sent out after I was nominated, but no matter…The die are
cast…Or is cast…Something’s cast, goddammit, even if I’m not sure
what.

April 2014 119

Wednesday April 30
We got off pretty easy today…Matt, a strapping young kid, drove

another truck up…We met in the parking lot with our broke dick truck
and soon enough Martin the Mechanic showed up…We greeted each
other warmly because regular readers of this crap know this was not
Martin’s first time making a field repair to our truck…Some valve or
line broke and he fixed it and it was as good as new…The mechanic
at the branch had Matt drive it back so he could get some mainte-
nance done on it, so we have the smaller truck, probably for a week
or so.

Since I didn’t have to drive Matt two hours to drop him off, I put
my unexpected afternoon off to good use and did some writing for the
campaign website…I wrote about the poll results from last week, and
I think I got a few laughs by mentioning that the polls that didn’t in-
clude me as one of their options were utterly without merit and not
worthy of consideration by anyone…I also wrote about a botched exe-
cution down south.



May 2014

Thursday May 1
Bonser says we are a go for our first campaign appearance of the

season: at the state university, where I will be talking to the Young
Americans for Liberty chapter.

Bonser said the young man organizing it he might invite the Dem-
ocratic and Republican clubs and I said hell, invite the socialists and
communists, too…If liberty isn’t on their radar, I’ll put it there.

Friday May 2
The branch sent up Mario Andretti as driver today…Good gravy

we made good time…We were in Town A before 4pm, a PB for me, and
tho it took a bit to hook up with Route 21, I was home before 6pm,
which was nice.

There has been a lot of time spent on the road this week, and I
have spent a good portion of it working on my remarks for Saturday.
Nobody really wants to hear me talk for too long, but I decided after
some brief biographical remarks, I’ll talk about how important young
people will be to this election, and to the future of our nation.

Bonser said some research shows there are 485,000 voters under
26 in this state and enough of them voting for Sparrow can make this
a very interesting three-person race…More so when you throw in all
voters under 30…Exact figures aren’t available because the secretary
of state classifies voters 18-25 and 26-40, but there has to be at least
750,000 voters under 30 in this race.

Bonder’s probably right…I haven’t talked to everyone under 30 in
this state, but I’ve talked to enough of them to know none are very
pleased with their country right now.

Actually, it’s a four-person race…A doctor from the big city who
isn’t any more pleased with our government than I am has announced
his candidacy…He’s running as an independent, which means he will
have to get some number of signatures to be on the ballot.

122 The Diary of a Nobody

Saturday May 3
For someone with essentially zero political experience, I am not

nervous at all about today’s opening salvo in the US Senate race for
our great state…I’ve got some thoughts written out and I am not too
bad an extemporaneous speaker and my message is liberty and
Bonser announced he is ‘more or less’ certain I won’t a complete ass
out myself and The Wife wished me well.

Sunday May 4
Oh baby, yesterday was a triumph…I am not making that

up…Bonser had told me not to worry, you’re a liberty candidate and
you are talking to a group of students who went out of their way to
join a liberty group and not to worry about being well-received.

That really wasn’t my worry, honestly…I was more worried about
my speech…Actually, I was more worried about my mind…I could not
help thinking about standing in the grocery store forgetting what I had
come for, and I was top-secretly worried that might happen here.

The worry was needless…Not only did I remember every point I
wanted to make, in more or less the order I wanted to make them, but
the mind was humming on all cylinders and I even threw in some stuff
that wasn’t in the original plan…

I talked a lot about the role of young voters…This state has about
3.5 million voters, and roughly 485,000 of them are between the ages
of 18 and 26 and I said if every voter under 30 voted this election they
could name the score…Their candidate – hopefully Sparrow – would
win…All they had to do was unite, and as an example I cited water.

A few drops of water is what? Nothing, really, just a few drops of
water. But united water is what? It is a stream, a river, a torrent, it is a
compelling and decisive force.

I don’t know where the ‘compelling and decisive’ line came from…I
am not Confucius for Pete’s sake, but as I said, the mind was hum-
ming on all cylinders…I told them that even tho there were just a few
of them in the room, there was no reason they could not unite and
become a compelling and decisive force, too.

May 2014 123

We also talked about a flat tax and drone strikes and how liberty
is the solution to every problem this nation faces.

It was a lot like reffing basketball…The mind was completely fo-
cused on what needed to be done and I was doing it…I wasn’t nervous
and I didn’t stammer – never a given with ol’ Sparrow – and that kind
of focus is kinda fun, actually.

Monday May 5
Back to a normal life after this weekend’s triumphant campaign

appearance…Life’s funny…You can’t referee championship basketball
or run for the United States Senate everyday…Some days you get up
and earn a living.

I did that today…Got up real early, too, because recall Brian is still
off adjusting thermostats for his Air Force reserve duty and I have to
drive to Town A to pick up a partner, who turned out to be Melis, the
Bosnian kid from last Monday…Melis was kinda disappointed be-
cause we didn’t have the same truck we did last week…Recall our
regular truck was sent in for maintenance last week…It has a large
compartment where everyone sits…It is large enough for a hard work-
ing doily deliverer – like me, for instance – to stand straight up in…Our
replacement, however, has a separate compartment for both the driver
and deliverer and communication is thru either the intercom or shout-
ing at the top of your lungs.

Tuesday May 6
A second straight clusterf*ck Tuesday!!!...I don’t understand this,

Brian leaves for three weeks and the whole goddamned route goes
directly to hell!!!

I started out at the usual time, to head to Town B to pick up both
our doilies and my partner…About halfway there Route 24, the route
we meet, radios to say they are broke dick on the side of the interstate,
obligingly yours truly to head east on the interstate for a bit over an
hour to meet them…Fortunately, and conveniently, they had pulled
over on an off-ramp so doily transfer was rather easy, tho I did have
to drive the wrong way up the off-ramp a bit to make this happen.

124 The Diary of a Nobody

So by the time we get everything transferred, and it took a while
because Tuesday is our busiest day, and we got back to Town A, it
was noon before we got to our first stop…Usually we have our Town A
stops done before 10:30, so we were historically behind schedule.

It gets worse…At 5pm, now no more than three (3) hours behind
schedule, we’re broke dick in the parking lot of a bank outside of
town…Melis, who appears to know what he’s talking about, thinks
we’ve busted a water pump, which is believable because you need ga-
loshes to traverse the bank parking lot from all the water and anti-
freeze we’ve dumped.

Fabulous…Our dear friends at the towing company come and get
us and Route 22, who we usually meet in a town an hour south of
here, comes to visit us, too…They pick up Melis and the doilies we
were unable to deliver in town and the truck is sitting at the garage,
hopefully to get fixed Wednesday.

This was really inconvenient for the branch…Tuesday’s deliveries
have to be made Wednesday…This involves driving the doilies up from
the branch…This requires two (2) people…The branch is not over-
staffed, nor do they have a fleet of trucks on standby, waiting to be
called in to service…After some scrambling, it was decided to send two
people up in another truck…I will meet them in town, do the route,
and they will head back to the branch with the doilies we picked up
to be delivered to the branch.

Now that I think about it, this is a fiasco for everyone but Spar-
row…I get to sleep in tomorrow and do not have to make two four hour
round trips to pick up a driver….I should be home by mid-afternoon,
instead of early evening.

Wednesday May 7
Since we still had to finish our deliveries and Doily Delivery Ma-

chines in town that we didn’t get to Tuesday, the branch had to send
two guys up, one to drive and the other to make sure the driver didn’t
haul off to Vegas with the goods.

May 2014 125

Matt drove and an Ethiopian named Heleke was the
guard…Heleke, or something close to that, it was kinda hard to un-
derstand, is about 28 and emigrated to the US after winning an im-
migration lottery a few years ago…He was kinda hard to understand
because English is his third or fourth language…All he really did was
sit in the back with me and make sure no one took me captive…He
seemed impressed that I knew Ethiopia shared a border with Finland
and New Zealand, and that its capital was the Sudan.

Our truck got repaired, too…A hose busted…An easy repair for
our old and useful friend Martin the Mechanic.

Thursday May 8
I was elected commander of the Post last night…This was not a

bulletin, of course. Stanko the Adjutant has been engineering this for
several months…Buck, who served with General Washington in the
Revolution, had decided 80 years as commander was enough and eve-
ryone else seemed content to let Sparrow take over and I was happy
to be elected.

My first official duties will come on Memorial Day, when we hold
our annual ceremony at the cemetery. In the past I’ve carried a flag,
usually the Navy flag, but now I will be presiding over the ceremony.

Friday May 9
The cat has been sleeping with me for most of the last couple of

weeks. As always, she curls up at the end of the bed, more or less
between a knee and a calf.

Saturday May 10
Hit the campaign trail today, as assorted Minor Party candidates

hit the road to visit three towns in the western part of our state. Also
on this caravan of political misfits were the MP governor, lieutenant
governor and attorney general candidates, plus Travis, who is running
for Congress from the 3rd District, and a couple of state legislative
candidates joined us in their towns.

The turnout was small at all three places, frankly, but as Bonser
pointed out a few people are better than zero people. He also said any

126 The Diary of a Nobody

spoke might lead to the hub, tho we were both kinda disappointed no
one was moved to contribute to the campaign.

I did not have as much time as I did last week, but I was able to
talk about my plans for a flat tax, a free market for doctors and health
insurers and how this nation would be better off leaving other nations
to conduct their affairs without interference from others. As usual, no
one really disagrees with any of this and I, again as usual, I was left
with the impression that if a major party candidate had the courage
to spout this kind of logic, they would be elected by acclamation. The
public is simply starving for logical leadership.

To look the part of United States Senator as much as possible I
wore my navy blue suit, pink shirt with a dark blue tie that had little
pink and light blue boxes on them.

Sunday May 11
As noted last week, cat has been sleeping with me for the past

couple-three weeks…I really like this…Some research shows cats only
sleep where they feel safe, so this is a nice compliment.

She’s actually done this in the past, but stopped to sleep in the
bed The Wife made her…She’s switched it up a bit, tho, sleeping in a
corner of the bed, instead of between my legs.

Got a mention in the paper from one of the towns we appeared
in…No pic, tho, which is too bad, because I was wooing them in the
pink shirt.

Monday May 12
Work was delayed a few hours today…Melis was driving a com-

pany van up from the branch this morning and he encountered some
weather and a flat tire and he was about three hours late getting to
town.

That’s all right with me…I didn’t have to wake up at four in the
morning and drive eight hours round trip to pick him up and drop
him off…Not only that, the big news is the branch is putting him up
in a hotel for the week, so the sixty hour weeks are done for now.

May 2014 127

Tuesday May 13
The long Tuesday’s aren’t done tho…Today was a whopper, 15

hours, which is a couple of hours longer than usual.
I will be glad to have Brian back next week…He usually delivers

on Tuesdays and is, at least, an hour faster than I am.
At least nothing broke down, like the previous two Tuesdays…Tho

long, it was an otherwise routine day…There were lots of doilies to
deliver today.

Wednesday May 14
You know, I really just want a normal day…I have a wife I am not

seeing all that much and I am not running for the United States Sen-
ate for the hell of it...Maybe tomorrow will be normal…Today wasn’t.

But it wasn’t in a good way…Melis came and picked me up and we
were heading to the truck when he said Dustin, one of the 17 people
we answer to at the branch, called him this morning and wondered if
we could meet Route 25 and get our old truck, 112030, back…The
plan was for me to go down by myself after the route, since the truck
would be empty and there would be no need for two people.

Exactly why Dustin didn’t call me directly and decided to go
through the Bosnian consulate here in town wasn’t immediately clear.

As it was, I didn’t go down by myself…By chance we had to make
the Central Manitoba run today, and it would’ve been a pain to come
back to town and then schlep another two hours to Town A…Dustin
didn’t know this, obviously, but saw the light when I explained this to
him, so Melis and I headed down and all in all I didn’t get home till
after six.

It was really nice having 112030 back…A lot had been done…The
oil had been changed, of course, as well as other standard mainte-
nance stuff, plus the valve that caused our ass end to collapse two
weeks ago had been replaced and the windshield washer fluid dis-
penser is working again.

It’d been out a while…Over the winter a block of ice froze on a
feeder line – or something like that, I have zero mechanical skill – and
broke it off…Brian said he could fix and maybe he can but he never

128 The Diary of a Nobody

got around to it…It wasn’t that big of a deal in winter, but now bugs
are starting to crash against the truck…We had a squirt bottle of
washer fluid in the truck that we could spray on, and that was all
right, I suppose, but it’s good it’s back up and running.

They didn’t get everything, tho…My banana peel sticker is still in
the same place…That’s comforting.

Thursday May 15
After three weeks of whining about it, I finally got a normal day…In

at nine, out a bit after noon, which actually is a bit earlier than nor-
mal, so it wasn’t a normal day, not that I am going to whine about
that.

Since Melis is away from home this week, we had him over for a
BBQ…I burnt the hot dogs, too…They weren’t completely inedible and
you couldn’t use them as a heating element for cooking something
else, but they weren’t all that great, either.

I asked Melis about his name, thinking it might be steeped in Bos-
nian tradition or something like that…Melis shook his head and said
his grandmother picked the names of his brothers and cousins and
that it rhymes with their names and I said he could’ve been named
after some laundry soap or something.

Then he took a phone call. We were sitting on the porch and in-
stinctively he got up and walked a few steps away, despite the fact I
don’t speak Bosnian and could no more understand what he said had
he been speaking, well, Bosnian…He laughed when I mentioned this.

Melis also noted he has a cousin playing on the Bosnian team in
the upcoming World Cup, that there is no tradition of baseball in Bos-
nia and that water polo is really big there, too.

The Wife is splendid is situations like this…Despite the fact we
only made hamburgers and hot dogs, the spread – my charred hot
dogs notwithstanding – was fit for a king.

Friday May 16
This was a normal day, too…Long, but normal…Melis drove down

to Town A and met me there so he didn’t have to come back here at
the end of the route and then drive back to the branch…We’ve actually

May 2014 129

done this before once or twice…It doesn’t really matter, the truck is
empty, so if we are robbed the bad guys aren’t getting any doilies.

I give myself big points for maintaining continuity in personal hab-
its while Brian was gone…For a while now I have been enjoying an
apple fritter on Friday’s, at the Town A convenience store where we
meet Route 1…They’re not Apple Fritter of the Year, but I really like
apple fritters and these are pretty good, so Apple Fritter Friday has
remained a habit even – especially – during these troubled times with
Brian gone.

Brian texted and said he’d be back Monday as sched-
uled…Good…I’m ready for normal again.

Saturday May 17
One more funny from Melis Week…The branch sent him up in a

company van…Melis noted there weren’t any windows on the back
part of the van, which he said made looking for chicks tough because
the van looked like something kidnappers would use, although I
pointed out a real kidnapping van wouldn’t have a “How’s My Driving”
placard on the back.

Monday May 19
We might be running into a problem Memorial Day…Actually,

there are no mights about it…We have run into a problem Memorial
Day: both our ceremony at the cemetery and our Post baseball team’s
ballgame are scheduled to begin at 11am.

Dave, a Post member and coach of the team made the sched-
ule…Our team always opens with a Memorial Day doubleheader and
I suspect he thought that was the game time last year…It wasn’t…It
was 1pm last year, and we had to hustle to make that because in
addition to yours truly umpiring the game, we also provide a color
guard and generally drum up a pretty young lady to sing the national
anthem.

I don’t know why we didn’t catch this earlier…I suspect we are all
getting old and thought the ceremony started at 8am or so, which it
doesn’t because it’s started at 11am since the end of the Revolution.

130 The Diary of a Nobody

Tuesday May 20
Well, solved my first problem as Post Commander quickly…I am

pleased to report Coach Dave got the game moved to 1pm, so there is
no longer a conflict with our Memorial Day ceremony at the cemetery.

Wednesday May 21
The cat continues to sleep with me…This continues to please me.

Thursday May 22
Rehearsal for the Post’s Memorial Day ceremony tonight at the

cemetery tonight…
Rehearsal is almost as big a tradition as the ceremony itself…Not

only was there a good turnout from the Post, but the Boy Scouts were
there, too, to put flags at the graves of the 298 veterans buried
there…There are even three veterans of the confederate army…We put
American flags on their graves on the theory the confederacy was
never a real country, just a group of malcontent rebels.

Stanko the Adjutant brings a cooler of beer, too, and since the
goddamned wind stopped blowing we hung around and drank brew-
skies.

As usual, in any group of veterans, the lies started flowing in fairly
short order leading Ron, who had led the BS off and was immediately
greeted with intonations about the veracity of his exploits, not to men-
tion the civil status of his parents at the time of his birth, which led
him to lament:

The first liar has no chance…
Then towards the end Gar had a funny…We had been talking
about the Second Amendment, a popular topic amongst veterans, and
someone asked about my position on the matter, which is support
without qualification or restriction, although I’ve noted I currently de-
cline to exercise my Second Amendment rights…Soon some were talk-
ing about the merits of assorted types of pistols and whatnot and as
we were all heading home Gar pulled out his 357 and noted that Ted
Kennedy’s car had killed more people than his weapon.

May 2014 131

Friday May 24
Looked into buying a car today…Recall mine was wrecked last De-

cember when I hit a goddamned deer coming back from a basketball
game…We decided to take the insurance settlement rather than get
another car…This has left us with only one car, which hasn’t really
been all that inconvenient, but our bank let us know we were eligible
for a pretty good rate on a loan.

My bank, well, one of my banks, we have accounts with a couple-
three, let it be known they were not completely averse to selling me a
car loan.

So I spent a good portion of my time at work looking for a
car…Brian drives on Friday’s and I spend most of my time riding in
the passenger seat waiting to spring into action delivering doilies so I
have a lot of time to kill.

My bank’s app is really useful, too…I entered how much I wanted
to spend and other criteria, like how many miles I want my car to have

Found one that interested me, too…An SUV with less than thirty
thousand miles…It’s a 2005, which is kinda old, but some research it
had one owner and hadn’t been involved in a wreck. Unfortunately, it
was four hours away, but it’s the second decade of the 21st century
and that isn’t as big a deal as it used to be…I wasn’t able to do much
more than calculate loan and insurance payments, tho, and I told The
Wife I would do more work on this tomorrow.

Saturday May 24
Well, hell…Despite their avowed enthusiasm about getting the

Sparrows a car loan, the bank got snitty.
Recall the car is a 2005, but the mileage is really low, less than

thirty thousand miles, and I’ve had good experiences buying cars with
low mileage…The price was right, too, so I was interested.

The bank, while certainly appreciative of the low mileage, could
never get over their age issues…They wouldn’t loan the total amount,
which meant Mr and Mrs Sparrow would be out-of-pocket a little bit,
which goes against everything I stand for buying a car…Then they
said look, bend over because you are taking this interest rate in the
shorts.

132 The Diary of a Nobody

So I said no…A buck is a buck right for the Sparrows, and I told
The Wife we won’t do anything that isn’t a good deal and I am not
paying eight percent interest for a car loan when I don’t have to.

The girl at the dealer, Nadine, was angry, too…We had been work-
ing together most of the morning and she vowed to find us something
that worked for us…To show my solidarity in the matter, I even ap-
plied for a loan with her.

Sunday May 25
Bonser over…He has a meeting setup with a video teleconferenc-

ing company for Wednesday that he says may be just what we need
to hold online town hall meetings… Our state is not small, and we live
in a remote corner of it, and this would be the best way to meet the
most people, especially those tech-savvy young voters Bonser insists
will be key in November.

The downside to being a third-party candidate is it is tough to be
taken seriously…The Wife says I look like a Republican in a suit and
Bonser agrees, saying if I had major party backing we’d be knee deep
in contributions and appearances, tho he noted having liberty solu-
tions to our nation’s problems isn’t really in step with either party
right now…For my part, I agree I do look good in a suit.

We are not complaining about the difficulty of being a third party
candidate…We are on the same ballot the big boys are on and we are
doing what we can with what we’ve got and if we keep on this spirit
we will eventually be in a position to take advantage of any break that
comes our way.

Lost in the cacophony of running for the United States Senate and
my first Memorial Day ceremony as Commander is the fact Gary and
I are supposed to umpire Monday…

Unfortunately – or fortunately, depending on your view of the mat-
ter – it is looking more and more doubtful our Post baseball team will
open its season tomorrow…It is raining, pretty good, now, has rained
for the past couple of days and is likely to rain tomorrow, and the field
isn’t one of those field turf deals that can take a flash flood and still

May 2014 133

be playable…It’s a typical city park, with an all dirt infield, no less,
and probably won’t be playable.

Monday May 26
Up early…As I write this The Wife is still sleeping and the weather

is nice…As we’ve noted here, tho, anything more than scattered
clouds gives fits to the weatherman, so who the hell knows.

Right now, one forecast calls for clear skies for our ceremony and
rain right about game time and temps in the 50’s, while another calls
for clear skies all day and temps in the 70’s, so who the hell knows.

I’m back, after a long, splendid day…My first Memorial Day cere-
mony at the cemetery, always key for a new Commander, went darn
near perfectly…After almost constant fussing the past couple of days
the heavens favored us with a perfect day.

The day actually started at the Post with coffee and donuts and
the camaraderie of our fellow veterans…What is really nice to see is
our Post getting some younger vets in…This is good…I am pushing 50
but not only am I one of the new breed in the Post, but I am even
called “son” from time to time, which is kinda funny…But there were
a handful of new members there, and they are all well younger than I
am, which is good to see.

The ceremony had an honor guard, a rifle squad, a flag detail, a
changing of the guard ceremony and even three local singers singing
Amazing Grace and America The Beautiful. The cemetery has a vet-
eran’s memorial in the center, featuring a flag pole and a small mon-
ument.

Buck, the Immediate Past Commander, myself and Bob the Chap-
lain marched in…We were actually led in by Rick, who used to be in
the Army Old Guard and is key to this ceremony…Then the rifle detail,
the color guard, the Civil Air Patrol detail and the flag squad marched
in…Buck led off with a history of Memorial Day and then I followed.

Here were my remarks…They were provided for me, and came
from a Legion manual…I actually did edit them somewhat for brevity
and they followed Past Commander Buck’s remarks, which mainly
talked the history of Memorial Day.

134 The Diary of a Nobody

Again we are assembled to honor those who have gone before us.
We honor the memory of those who gave their lives in the service of their
country and of those who have also gone to their eternal rest.

May the ceremonies of today deepen our reverence for our departed
comrades. Let us remember the men and women we come to honor to-
day sacrificed all for their country, and now lay under quiet sod or be-
neath murmuring waves, resting in peace.

When their country called they left their loved ones, family, friends
and community. No horror of the field, sea or air could beat them down.
They fought for us, and for us they fell. Now, with one accord and in
deepest reverence, we do them honor.

Comrades, on this Memorial Day let us pledge ourselves to emulate
their sacred service not only to our country but to our community so that
those who rest in hero’s graves may not have died in vain. Let us stand
with bowed heads in solemn memory of our heroic dead.

The chaplain will now lead us in prayer.
For reasons I am not entirely sure of, we don’t use a microphone,
so key was speaking loud enough to be heard by everyone without
shouting, which I appeared to have succeeded at.
After the ceremony it was off to the ballpark for some umpiring.
Recall that I have not officiated anything since my triumphant
championship basketball game in February…I usually do high school
baseball, but didn’t this season for a couple of reasons, so these would
be my first baseball games of the season.
Since I’m now Commander of the goddamned Post, I took the plate
for the first game…The Post provided its usual honor guard and Chris,
one of our new young members, even sang the anthem and did a
pretty good job at it, too.
Our team got the season off to a great start, sweeping the double-
header and neither game was particularly close, either…I was calling
strikes from the start, too, just like always, and except for leaving my
lip balm in the car the first game went well.
Well, except for the home run I called a double…I am not making
that up.

May 2014 135

Here’s the deal…This kid hits a fly ball down the left field
line…There’s a chain link fence out there – not to mention a grass
berm immediately behind it - which any umpire will tell you can cause
problems because there is some zero contrast, making it difficult to
tell whether the ball bounced before the fence or after clearing the
fence.

This was the case here, with ol’ Sparrow being the only one in the
park who thought it bounced over, and when I put the batter-runner
on second base I started getting the kind of crap you only get when
you’ve really blown one…It’s not so much loud as it is heartfelt.

So I went out and asked Gary if he saw it…He really shouldn’t
have, his responsibility in this situation is to make sure the runners
touched their bases and that’s what he was doing so he was no
help…The coach was out there wondering, with some firmness, how I
could make that call and I told him I had the ball bouncing over and
that was really that.

And it really was…I was the covering official and it’s my call…If I
got it wrong – and Gary later said the defense even said it flew and not
bounced over the fence – then I got it wrong…The sun will still rise in
the east tomorrow.

Tuesday May 28
I was thinking today was going to be the usual routine day that

follows a great day until we were heading out of town at the end of our
route to meet Route 25 and it turned out to be another great day.

We were coming down the mountain on the other side of the
pass…It was mostly sunny but it was plain it had rained recently and
we were greeted by not one but two rainbows ahead of us.

This was only the second time I can remember seeing double rain-
bows, and only the third time I could remember seeing the end of the
rainbow.

We came really close to catching them, too…A couple of times I
yelped “Look!!!...They’re right there!!!”…And they were, too!!!...Right
there…Once on the left and a couple of times dead ahead, close
enough to almost reach out and grab.

136 The Diary of a Nobody

We never caught them, tho…Came close…Gave them a good run,
but both rainbows remained elusive.

Now that I think about it it’s probably best we didn’t catch the
rainbows because if you catch your rainbows today, what are you go-
ing to do tomorrow???...I mean, you still gotta get up and make some-
thing good happen for yourself and if you’ve already caught your
rainbows, what’s the point???

Wednesday May 28
Bonser was not happy with the newspaper’s coverage of Memorial

Day…He was hoping for a nice of pic of the new Post Commander, but
instead there were only a couple of shots of my read end…The Wife
says I have a nice read end and we shouldn’t be complaining, but
Bonser insists the paper is bound and determined to ignore me.

Bonser also reported our online town hall test run was moved to
Thursday…He said the company was upgrading the system and there
was no reason to test drive the old model.

In other news, the car we had our eye on was sold…Oh well…The
Wife and I discussed it and decided the right deal will present itself in
due course…We’ll be patient.

Thursday May 29
Bonser over and we spent some quality time with Russ and Dave

going over the benefits of signing up with their company for hosting
our online town halls.

It’s pretty easy. You log in and sit in front of your webcam and talk
to people…Even I can do that…The service is free for up to 25 seats
and is reasonable for up to 250 seats, but more than that starts to
cost and once you get up to the capacity we hope to have it starts to
cost some real money, however if we have that kind of attendance we
should have a corresponding amount of contributions to pay for it.

Bonser whined that you couldn’t have both a video session and a
phone-in session at the same time, but Russ assured us that capabil-
ity is coming within a month.

May 2014 137

Bonser pointed out we are midway thru the second decade of the
21st century and online town halls will be key…Donations have been
lagging mainly because – outside of merely being on the ballot and
having a website - we haven’t given anyone any reason to donate yet
and Bonser said this will get us out there.

Afterwards The Wife and I went and soaked in the hot
springs…She is volunteering there in landscaping department and on
the days she works we can use the facility and after so many hours
she will have earned us a year-round membership…I love my
wife…The landscaping there is really nice and it’s not easy work.

Friday May 30
For the first time in several Fridays I did not have an apple fritter

at work...This shocked some, but I’d simply had enough apple fritters
for the time being…I was hoping for one of those sour cream donuts –
which are actually my favorite – but couldn’t find one and ended up
having a muffin, which was all right.

Saturday May 31
As I have noted from time to time here The Wife is a splendid

cook…She demonstrated that again this morning…She made hot-
cakes and we were kinda low on syrup, usually a catastrophe on par
with the Great Flood, but she said not to worry, there was some cream
cheese in the refrigerator and why not mix it with some honey and see
what happened???

I’ve learned over the years to butt out whenever The Wife is in the
kitchen…She is simply too good at taking disparate ingredients and
turning them into something tasty.

Good gravy, this was good…Five stars, easily, without ques-
tion…When the public gets wind of this the maple syrup lobby is going
to have to get to work to have anyone use it anymore…It was so good
I found myself wondering exactly how mankind has managed to mud-
dle thru its collective existence without the benefit of The Wife’s Cream
Cheese Honey Spread on their pancakes for so long.

In other breakfast news, The Wife and I have an ongoing argument
about the proper way to serve eggs with hotcakes...I am on record as

138 The Diary of a Nobody

favoring two sunny side up…The Wife thinks this is gross and prefers
her fried eggs to resemble a catcher’s mitt.

So today The Wife is frying my eggs and I happen to be right there
and boy, they are frying up just perfect…I point out they are mere
seconds away from being ready for Plate Insertion.

Done???...I just put them on!!!
I assured her, again, they were almost ready to go.
They look like snot!!!
The hotcakes were ready, too…They had been plated…Again I
mentioned the readiness of the two eggs in the frying pan…Turning
her nose up she said:
Look, why don’t I just crack the eggs in your mouth???
The Wife is also funny…A funny wife who can cook is a good com-
panion.

June 2014

Sunday June 1
One of the signs you are lousy cook comes when your offer to make

Sunday breakfast for your wife is treated like a threat.
Almost immediately after I offered to make breakfast, The Wife

went tactical in the kitchen, producing a hearty morning meal, com-
plete with toast that featured the last of yesterday’s cream
cheese/honey spread.

I would’ve preferred the cat not lick most of the cream
cheese/honey spread off of my toast, but she likes it, too and to stop
here from dining with me will probably cause her to kill me because
could never be bothered to tell her no.

Monday June 2
The carnival was in town this weekend and The Wife and I went

Saturday night…I don’t know why, but I enjoyed myself…We’re too old
to move really fast, which means we stand to get injured on any ride
faster than the carousel and between the games The Wife played and
eating like crap the sixty bucks we brought was gone in about nine
seconds.

Tuesday June 3
The cat has stopped sleeping with me for the time being, having

found other accommodations in the loft. She has, however, resumed
taking my morning constitutional with me.

Bonser says we are a go for our first online town hall. Preparations
have gone as far as they can without an audience.

Wednesday June 4
Part of my duties as Post Commander include going to the state

convention…It’s in a couple of weeks and it is so far away it is actually
on the plains and not in the mountains like we are…It is, actually, as