“You don’t have cats. I like that.”
- Billy in The Departed

7:54 a.m.: Wake up wishing I could actually get under Rihanna’s umbrella.
9:44 a.m.: Have to make a stop on the turnpike on the way in to work and when I go to use the restroom I am literally blown away by the new hand dryer. If you’ve ever been on an airstrip when a jet turns its engine over that’s exactly the way this turbo dryer sounds.
9:44:47 a.m.: And works.
9:44:51 a.m.: It’s instantaneous. Whoosh! And your hands are dry. It’s so fast you’d think it was sucking the moisture up instead of flash drying your hands. It’s…
9:45 a.m.: “Miraculous, isnt’ it?” the maintenance guy says. It’s the future I’ve always dreamed of, I say. There’s none of that…
9:45:21 a.m.: “Rubbing your hands together like you’re a Cub Scout in front of a rain-soaked campfire?” maintenance guy says. “We’re the only stop in the region with one of these. All the rest are being tested in Maryland. People are coming from miles around. There aren’t too many other attractions in South Florida.”
9:46 a.m.: There’s Harry Potter in 3-D at the Muvico and this! I say heading back to the sink to wet my hands again.
9:46:13 a.m.: Whoosh!
9:46:20 a.m.: And again.
9:47 a.m.: “Tell a friend,” maintenance guy says.
9:47:14 a.m.: I’m going to tell the whole world!
10:17 a.m.: A few minutes after I get to work I notice Andy in accounting suspiciously tilting up an empty Mountain Dew bottle. And I can see his eye peeking through the spout like it’s a … telescope. Maybe I’m just being paranoid.
10:18 a.m.: There, he just did it again. He’s spying on me. The bastard is spying on me.
10:18:40 a.m.: Hey, I say. Stop spying on me. “What?” he says. Don’t be zooming in on me with your Mountain Dew bottle. “You’re paranoid,” he says.
10:19 a.m.: No, I already considered that, I say. I’m not. You’re spying on me through a Mountain Dew Bottle. “Get out, I’m just drinking this,” he says holding up the bottle. “See.”
10:19:19 a.m.: Damn it. He just did it again. There’s barely a hint of yellow at the bottom. It’s residue. Listen, I say, I don’t care if you’ve got a soda pop telescope going there just stop fish-eyeing me with it. Go look at the sun.
10:20 a.m.: “Oh, that’s a cool idea,” he says heading out.
11:04 a.m.: Art guy is illustrating one of his new inventions – a commuter roller coaster that would operate from West Palm Beach to Miami. “I took the Tri-Rail one day and everybody is sitting there zonked out drinking coffee and doing Sudoka. Then I pictured everybody on a roller coaster heading to work - newspapers flying in the air, coffee splashing into people’s hair, laptops crashing off treetops.
11:05 a.m.: I look over his shoulder. Oh, I like the 4- mile corkscrew between Boynton Beach and Delray, I say.
11:05:30 a.m.: “Check out this face-down drop into a fog-filled hole right out of the gate in West Palm, he says trailing his finger across the route. “That’s followed by a 170-foot dive into an underground tunnel before the ticket taker even makes the rounds. Hold on to you lattes, motherfuckers. We’re about to drop of the face of the earth…or Pompano Beach. Whatever.”
11:06 a.m.: “Between Commercial and 595 I’ve got 17 inversions followed by 6 miles of loops based on stunt pilot acrobatics,” he says. “At the Glades interchange we’re topping at 245 feet. You’ll be able to see as far as Bermuda to the east and gator wrestling at Swamp Billie’s to the west.”
11:07 a.m.: Do you have to be 48 inches tall? I ask. “No, no you can be two inches tall on this badboy,” art guy says. “A potato chip could ride this thing and not have to worry. It’s revolutionary.”
11:54 a.m.: Marketing guy, who has been unable to sell or lease out a condo he ijnvested in 2005 is begging me to take his afternoon shift at the condo. What are you talking about? I say. “Oh, I thought you already knew,” he says. “I been renting it out by the hour now. You know, for sexual laisons. Woman cheating on their husbands and stuff.”
11:55 a.m.: You’re like one of those hotels that charges by the hour. That’s gross. “Hey, hey, he says. “This is nothing like that. This is like the boutique version of that. I’ve got an espresso maker for God’s sake. You can make waffles or panini sadnwihes afterwards. It’s more like a quaint bed & breakfast & fucking establishment.”
11:56 a.m.: Nevermind I thought you’d like to make a quick $200 for a couple hours of babysitting. Babysitting. You just take the money, run the debit cards or whatever. Help out with the CD changer if need be.
11:57 a.m.: “It’s a sweet deal,” new guy says. “I manned the station last Wednesday. Sat around the kitchen reading Jane magazine and eating almonds. Got up to get someone a towel once. That was it.”
11:57:14 a.m.: “:Forget it,” marketing guy says. I need some who can be discreet. I don’t’ know if you’re even capable of being discreet.
11:57:34 a.m.: Oh, I can be discreet, I say adamantly. I’m the king of discreet. “There’s no such thing as the king of discreet,” he says. “But I’m not getting into that with you . Can you be there by 2 p.m.? The key is behind the fourth chili pepper on the string of lights around the front door.”
11:58 a.m.: Chili pepper lights? Oh, this is some high-class oper…”Yes or no?”
11:58:04 a.m.: Yes.
12:20 p.m.: Go to lunch and eat alone.
1:34 p.m.: Drive through marketing guy’s complex three times before I spot the chili pepper lights on the third floor.
1:42 p.m.: Getting situated in the kitchen and trying to make an iced coffee when a woman with blazing red hair comes reeling through the door. She sticks a wad of cash under a candy jar on the counter, says tell Mark I’m already in the bedroom when he gets here. Will do, I say.
1:43 p.m.: She stops at a mirror in the living room and starts adjusting everything about herself. Her hair, her eyes, her lips. her breasts, her pantyline. I sometimes get upset when women do this in front of me, like they’re fixing themselves up for everyone but me. But in this case I do not care.
1:44 p.m.: Look for the almonds.
1:50 p.m.: Guy comes in carrying his suit jacket in his hand. “Someplace I can hang this?” he asks. Sure, I’ll take it, I say.
1:51 p.m.: Check his coat.
1:52 p.m.: Is Heather here already? Oh, I don’t’ know. I didn’t’ get her name. “I’m Gregory,” he says. Mmmm, I thought she’d said she was waiting for a Mark. I’ll be right back I say.
1:53 p.m.: Knock lightly on bedroom door. Red-haired woman opens it a crack. Did you say you were waiting for Mark? I ask. ‘Cause there’s a Gregory here. “Oh,” she says sounding a bit disappointed. “All right , send him in.”
1:55 p.m.: Put my ipod ears in and read a book about cave diving. I would love to try that but I know one of my tanks would get stuck between two boulders and then I’d eventually be a skeleton with a big scuba take on his back and the flippers would look so big on my skeleton feet after 10 years or so.
2:22 p.m.: Heather bursts out of the bedroom and dives into the refrigerator. Her hair’s aflame and she looks like she’s been through a maelstrom or the 4-mile commuter corkscrew between Boynton and Delray. Every inch of her has been unadjusted.
2:23 p.m.: She’s wearing a tiny robe and her legs are an army of frecklses battling at the knees. “Where’s the Capri Sun?” she says. Oh, here they are.”
2:24 p.m.: She eyes me and the iPod and asks if I’m listening to BonJovi. No, I say. “Do you think their new album sounds country?” she says. I don’t’ really know what they sound like, I say. I just know Bon Jovi is cute.
2:24:17 p.m.: “Yeah,” she says heading back into the bedroom.
2:36 p.m.: Only about ten minutes go buy and the pair leave together without even saying goodbye to me.
2:40 p.m.: A younger lady dressed in all pink taps lightly on the door and then lets herself in. She gives me her debit card and gets a glass of green tea. “I always use four ice cubes,” she says plonking them into the drink one at a time.
2:41 p.m.: She takes off her shoes and puts them up on the kitchen counter. “My feet are sad today,” she says.
2:43 p.m.: I go back to reading my book. “There’s no cats here. I can tell,”.she says. “A cat has never lived in this apartment.”
2:48 p.m.: A scruffy haired guy comes in and pink lady jumps up. “Here’s my man.”
2:51 p.m.: They rush off to the bedroom and then the guy immediately comes out with just a towel on his waist and he’s got it low so it shows the bony part of the that’s so sexy.
2:51:41 p.m.: “Any chance we could get some extra pillows?” he asks. “She wants to be propped up a ceratin way. She’s fussy like that.”
2:52 p.m.: Let me see what I can find? I say heading toward the hall closet. “Oh, and we need four more ice cubes,” he says trailing behind me. “The fuckers melted,” he says.
2:52:21 p.m.: This is not the future I’ve always dreamed of.