19. April 2009 by Joe Gergen.

I was at a flea market yesterday.  A rough sea of goods bumpy enough to induce sea sickness in even the toughest of consumers.

I am at best a horrible consumer, possibly an abomination, but the intriguing nature of what goes on at a flea market keeps me strong.

I was not only intrigued by what others seemed to find fascinating but what I seemed to find fascinating.

I am drawn to old musical instruments. Why? I can’t play any of them, except for the fiddles.  Most of the are in states that would render them unplayable. The cost of fixing them would exceed the cost of buying a functioning one. Though I did buy an old cello once and had it repaired. It does looks really cool. It is currently playable but met all the conditions above. I am not even a collector kind of person. Why did I buy it? I have no idea. Though yesterday I did see an old glockenspiel looking thing.

You know maybe it’s just a desire to save the instruments. Let them live to be played another day.

Maybe it’s more interesting what I am not drawn to. I am a furniture designer and maker. Not even remotely interested in old tools. And there are lots of them at a flea market.

I forgot the point that I was making. I get so overwhelmed i can’t remember any of the stuff I saw there. It’s all one big amalgamated blur. Maybe that’s the point.

Though I did buy something yesterday. Some new eyewear. They are more geared to my artistic side. I couldn’t quite get myself to go uber hispter but it’s a start. We’ll refer to them as my Dieter glasses. You know, Dieter Sprockett. 

Linda and I always joke that I need to be more artsy, hipster in order to sell more furniture. I said I should change my company name to Furniture by Dieter. People would buy it because it sounds more hipster. So now I have Dieter glasses and the next step is Dieter clothing, though I am really sure I can’t fit into any of those skinny leg ’60s pants. Dieter is coming.

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9. April 2009 by Joe Gergen.

I was traveling again this week. Travel means airplanes and hotels and broken patterns. I tend to get dehydrated when I travel. don’t drink enough water.

So one morning this week I wake up to my alarm, sit up quickly and notice blood running from my nose fairly profusely. I am not alarmed. This happens.  So I walk calmly from the bedroom to the bathroom. I’m holding my hands to my face to stop from bleeding all over, not having anything else to staunch the bleeding. I turn the light on in the bathroom grab a pristinely white towel and proceed to bleed all over it.

I felt bad about bleeding all over the white towel, but what was I to do. So I eventually stopped bleeding and took a shower and got ready to leave. Now remember, it’s early. I have had no coffee. No food. I’m hurrying a bit.

So I go into the bathroom one last time  to blow my nose and I turn to leave the bathroom and go to turn off the light. Of course, I finally notice the smear of blood down the wall and over the light switch. I’m like, crap, I can’t leave a smear of blood down the wall. Who knows what the maid is going to think. I’m going to come back that night and have CSI swabbing the hotel room down. No way. So I quickly grabbed a wash cloth and wet it down and cleaned the blood off.  I figured there was nothing I could do about the bloody towel and wash cloth.

On a non-bloody note, I was at a book store the other day and walked by a rack of magazines. One of them had a picture of a nice looking woman on the front with the headline, or so I thought, of “Untimely Makeup.”  Now what the hell did that mean? At first I thought it was referring to putting on makeup without enough time and having disastrous results. I’m thinking it’s a self-improvement thing you see on the covers of women’s magazines all the time you know, like “Fives ways to have great hair” or “Find a man in three months” kind of thing.

No, hold on, I’m thinking, that is not it. It’s more like makeup betrayals. How women got caught having affairs because they started wearing more makeup or paying more attention to their makeup and those around them noticed.

But maybe it is self-help. Because right after the stories of discovered affairs comes a section on “Seven ways to disguise the sexier makeup you are wearing for your lover.”  Because what would be the point of dragging these women’s failed affairs through a magazine if there wasn’t a plan to help other women avoid their fates. Brilliant!

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