mmmcdxlii

I think now is a good time to up the ante

Isn’t it good when we up the ante?
Isn’t it good when we give ourselves
higher goals? Yeah, so now that we
have talked to Google and Apple
and T-Mobile and the person talking
to his dolls on the sidewalk of Howard
Street and been accosted by the
lady who works at the front desk of
the apartment complex in which
we live, and now that I have been so
maturely yelled at by her for asking
her to kindly let me know if she works

here in my apartment building simply
because I did not recognize her and
there was another lady standing
next to the front desk office who
had just been asking to see my
key (this was new), and now
that I have zero dollars and
zero cents and see no end to
this plight for quite some time,
and now that I’ve once again and
so publicly begun a fundraiser
in hopes to get a buck or two — 
just in hopes a couple are so
inclined and have the capacity

which I do not, and now that it 

has been determined that despite
the fact that I was sold a brand
new iPhone (already having a
brand new one) by some lady at
T-Mobile, and yet now am 

being told despite triple- and
double-checking all of the
price points during the phone

conversation in which I was

sold the device that instead of
paying a reduced amount of
half the price for one phone,
I’ll be paying logically more
for a very long lease for two
phones, and why would I 

accept such an offer without

double- and triple-checking

that my ears were not playing

tricks on me, and now that four
managers have told me that
there is nothing I can do to get
out of this and now that the
original phone I had did turn
out to be a factory dud (no
fault of my own) and now that
I just had my Moderna booster
shot which put me in bed with
aches and fever through most
of yesterday and some of today
and since most everything that
I am telling you has transpired
today, this morning and afternoon
and evening and night, and now
that I won’t have access to my email
until Tuesday or Wednesday, so
it is likely not a worthwhile venture
to look for a job until after then
anyway, and now that I have told you
that I have probably lost all of the
weekly unemployment, that which
has allowed me to survive the
pandemic and being laid off
in March of 2020 because of it
and now that i have told you that
the job I had which I thought was
the coolest back at the end of Sept
ember was removed from me because
“I’m not a good fit,” was removed

from me because I “would really hate
it and I’m not psychiatrist but you
should be in a theater somewhere
as corporations are clearly not for
you” when I have happily and quite

successfully worked in many corp
orations big and small in the 30
years of my paid career and how
could he have a clue about me any
way, the geezer gave me only 8 days
to prove I could do the job, and
I proved I could no matter what bull
shit he said to try to convince me that I 

could not, so, well, now that you know
all of this you know what a pickle I’m

presently in and probably have some
idea how I’m doing, despite upping my

ante to as top notch as i could muster but
now there seems to be the utmost need
for the ante to be upped in an even more
resounding fashion and the question is how
much does it matter how much one ups the
ante, how much sweat, tears and crazy work
must one give to the all-too-often good-for-
nothings who deserve nary a notched increase
in whatever ante you think you can up just to
get ahead of the lousy game — just you all wait 

until my next opportunity, so many good things are

going to come of it, all that history to help and happi

ness and new experiences and fun times will be the order
of the day every day.  just you wait.  and so what if it doesn’t?