His hand slid into his pocket and shook it. There was only the occasional sound of colliding metal. There wasn’t much there.

The hand returned from the pockets carrying the contents: a piece of paper and two shiny nickels.

“At a nickel a thought I can only afford two, but I do have two nickels to rub together.” These idioms were humorous and depressing at the same time. They offered a verbal poetry to his scene of dismay.

Just yesterday it seemed like he was on top of the world. Things were going swimmingly financially and he had made every right move. He was able to fully enjoy the fruits of his labor and today he couldn’t afford the thought of ending his own misery.

His life, whole world had become rubble and ash, along with his hopes and dreams. How could someone go from indescribable joy to immeasurable distress over night?

From home owner to homeless, steak dinner to starving and well groomed to well… even he was disgusted by the thought of what he was wearing, sweat soaked and covered in soot.

“The pain is still too near.” He told himself. “Can’t allow myself to make rash decisions right now.”

“You cannot afford to have any decisions. You are broke.” His subconscious retorted, sending him back into the flames of his own grief. The burning in his chest returned.

His head sunk back into his hands, smearing the dirt on his face again.

“Just sleep and let this all fade away.”

He curled up into a ball amidst the smoldering ruins of his own life. He never woke.

“I don’t know why we are writing these.” He said as the pen danced across his paper.

“They are for us.”

“See, that is my point. Why are we writing letters that we are never going to send? It’s kinda crazy.”

“They are supposed to help us. They are an exercise.”

“They’re dumb.”

“You’re upset. The letter will help you express your anger and work through it.”

“You’re darn right I am upset. Aren’t you?”

“I am writing a letter too.”

“I guess it wouldn’t do us any good to send it anyway, the fascists.”

“Here you go.”

“I am being serious. You have seen what has been going on. How else can you explain it?”

“You’re unlucky?”

“Fifteen tickets in the past month. That’s more than just unlucky.”

“You were parked in no parking zones for like 12 of those.”

“Yeah but the people around me weren’t ticketed, just me.”

“Okay, you’re not unlucky. The people who park around you are lucky and you are just dumb. There, is that better?”

“But this last time you were parked next to me.”

“You weren’t guilty this last time. We were parked where we were supposed to be.”

“I know what is going on here. They think I don’t but I do.”

“Here we go again.”

“They are targeting me.”

“No they are not.”

“Yes they are.”

“Maybe it’s a coincidence.”

“Maybe not. 15 is not a coincidence. It’s a pattern.”

“It’s unfortunate. I will give you that, but you are just being paranoid.”

“I am being reasonable.”

“You are still parked in that same illegal spot!”

“You bet I am. I am not going to take this hostile treatment.”

“But you have earned the hostile treatment.”

“You know who I am man? I am Rosa Parks.”

“You are not Rosa Parks.”

“Yeah I am man, peaceful protest.”

“Saying a tenant of a person’s belief doesn’t make you that person.”

“I am not literally her. I am like the modern day Rosa Parks.”

“She was fighting the remnants of slavery and discrimination. You are fighting to park in a no parking zone.”

“Among other things.”

“You don’t think the comparison is a bit much. She fought injustice. You are essentially fighting justice.”

“How is it justice that I am being singled out.”

“You aren’t. I got a ticket the last time too.”

“You are a last ditch attempt at a cover up. I am too clever to let that fool me.”

“You are too much of a fool to let that clever you.”

“What?”

“Yeah. That didn’t work out quite as well as I thought it was going to.”

“Okay. I am done with my letter. What do I do with it now?”

“You can either keep it or burn it or throw it away. Do whatever you want with it, whatever makes you feel better.”

“Can I post it on a blog?”

“I guess. There isn’t really a wrong move here.”

“Will you post it for me?”

“No.”

“Why not, man? You know I cannot type that well.”

“And you are not going to get better at it if I do all of your typing.”

“You suck.”

“Yeah, I guess sometimes I do.”

“Yeah, me too. I guess it wasn’t cool to say you suck, cause you mostly don’t.”

“Yeah. I think I am going to grab some dinner from the DC. You coming?”

“Seriously, the DC? Dude I have told you like a thousand times that you shouldn’t eat there. Remember?”

“Yeah but it is covered by my room and board and I am broke.”

“Me too. Guess I will have to risk it for tonight.”

I have done some preliminary research for a concept of a pirate story. I am thinking of using Captain Kidd, primarily because he is a notable Scottish Pirate with a legendary buried treasure. My main concern with that is he has been to overdone. Or maybe that is just because I tend to read classic books like they are going out of style.

I really want a Scottish pirate because I want to write in that voice. Also, I have picked a port in Scotland that I think can coincide with the whole story line but I am apprehensive about using Kidd. I guess the truth of the situation is that I need to talk with Ben R about it. He has become my literary conscience. I am not sure if he wants that. He may have accidentally fallen into that one.

Okay so here is the concept, or at least as much as I am willing to share right now. The port is a known place for pirates to go when they retire, those who made it. Practically everyone has either been on a pirate ship one way or the other. Recently Britain put out a law in that town that if anyone talks about committing a crime they are punished for the crime they confessed to. So the whole situation is hush - hush.

The local who is the enforcer of said law is the son of a man who only went out to sea for a very brief time. Didn’t have the legs for it everyone says, but nobody really talks about it. The dad doesn’t talk much about it and just relies on what other people say about him.

That is the set up. Pretty mundane but there is a good foundation there.

Here is the stressor. Captain Kidd gets taken into custody and now there is talk of his treasure. Some one blurts out that the dad sailed on the Adventure Galley (Kidd’s Ship).

There is a bit more to it than that but I don’t want to give the story away.

Needless to say that there is a hunt for the treasure. That is where the whole intrigue lies, but there is something different standing in their way. I may have shared too much but I would appreciate some feedback about wither or not Kidd is too over done.

The truth is I like to use lore and existing Myth and rework them into something more hashed out or perhaps just something more interesting to me.

Also has the whole Pirates of the Caribbean killed the pirate story for a while. I am thinking it either made it more popular or killed it. I am leaning towards killed it after the last movie. But who knows. Maybe it can be revived.

I have been considering of late what I want from or for this blog. I have been doing it for a couple of years now and realize that whatever my original intention I have stopped carrying about blogging a while ago. So do I continue with it in a new direction or do I shelve the TWH project and move on to something different.

I remember starting the blog. I had some friends who blogged, a majority of them for a creative outlet to their one-of humor. Others used it to work on and out their beliefs and others I am not even know certain why they were doing it, perhaps to try their hand at writing.

For me it was mostly the humor aspect. I thought I could offer something funny and in my own voice, unadulterated by the self imposed and situational guidelines that life tends to offer. Yet, with everything I wrote I would find myself worrying about what people might think. I have never really written a complete humor blog with disregard for its reception.

Over time I began to turn the whole thing into a tidbit blog consisting of things that struck me on a given day or ideas that turned my fancy, never giving purpose or a goal to the whole masquerade. I would take small political jabs, safe for me and relatively ambiguous and then some generic completely dissonant chatter. None of which was in the very least satisfying creatively.

It all comes back to what I wanted from the blog. A small part of me thought it might be a venue to write and express myself all while using the whole thing like a homework assignment for me, bettering my writing and working on my own style and voice. To that end I think the blog has been a great success.

I enjoy writing and not just the meaningless banter of a blog but stories. I really like to tell a story and weave the plot and characters. I have done a few short sorties into the world of storytelling on my blog and a many more than that off of the blog-o-sphere.

It turns out I want to be a storyteller, a novelist. That is the goal that if I had come to years ago it would be hard to fathom what exactly this life would look like. But Ted Was Here might be a great deal different, if in fact it would be at all.

The name was something weird that came from my head. I thought it would be funny to have a name like what one might find in the stall of a road side gas station’s bathroom. I have come to believe it isn’t a title but a hope. That people will know that I was here. That my life might have some purpose or story that in and of itself was worth remembering; that I might have a legacy.

It is with that in mind that I am going to attempt a switch in direction and purpose for my blog. I am going to work on my stories, a few of the short ones at first, and have them posted up here. I am also going to be trying to get them published in Literary Journals. I have decided to make the fledgling attempts to move myself into the world of the author. The posts will be less frequent but I hope longer and of more enjoyable substance.

As always thanks for reading, thanks for allowing me to work on myself and in the end find what it was that I was looking for.

Me.

It might be more accurate to say his whole economic team.

Happy Saint Patty's Day. Take that Saint Valentine.

I got your Blarney Stones right here.

If you were think how cool it would be to get some front row seats for the new Yankee stadium when it opens you had better make sure that you leave you legs at home. Otherwise you have better be a free floating vapor apparition.

The union guy installing seats should probably be forced to go back to school and do a little more training.

New From Nestle its the Nestle Mortar. Attack your taste buds but with a short range and high-arcing delicious trajectory.

The Nestle Mortar is relatively simple and easy to operate. The mortar consists of a tube of cookie dough which the "Taste Gunner" drops into the barrel. A firing pin at the base of the barrel detonates the explosives that fires the tube of dough while dispersing and cooking the small cookie dough shrapnel globs. The barrel is generally set at between 45 and 85 degrees angle to the ground, with the higher angle giving shorter firing distances.

The mortar barrel will be able to launch cookie dough, cookie dough ice cream tubes, pre-cooked cookie tubes and grenades.

Nestle Mortar: Launch Some Flavor

If you don't find this funny you are dead inside.



Aside from his overwhelming charity, Shaq's commercials make him hard not to like. He acts the way we all want to.