Let’s get the down and dirty over and done with. It’s Tuesday we are talking about, so there ain’t a whole lot to say about it anyway. The grocery shopping excursion went without incident. Got back home and did the usual neighborhood walk (4.5K).
Swan spent the afternoon with one of her girlfriends, so at beer o’clock I made a solo journey into town.
I plopped down at Sloppy Joe’s and enjoyed my first beer of the day. A couple of other acquaintances stopped by, and we exchanged some brief chitchat. Swan joined me there about an hour later, and we shared some chicken wings as we sat and watched the world pass by. When it was time for a change of scenery, we paid a visit to the Alaska Club. Owner Jerry is back in the USA for a while, and the bar was devoid of customers. When Jerry’s around, there are pool tournaments that bring in the regulars. We didn’t stay long ourselves. I suggested Green Room for the nightcap, but when I poked my head in the door, I saw the place was packed. Turns out there was an end-of-season pool tourney taking place. So, we walked on down the road to Cloud 69.
Our regular waitress, Sheryl, was absent once again. So, we were served by a waitress I had noticed before, but never interacted with, named Barbie. After a bit, Swan asked me to buy a lady drink for Barbie. Sure, why not?
If you look closely, you might notice that Barbie looks more like Ken wearing Barbie’s clothes. Yes, Barbie is a bakla. Not my thing, but no reason to be rude about it. Barbie and Swan seemed to get along well. And commenter Aaron knows where to find her now.
Reminds me of the story about a guy named Tom who was dating a bakla. We all knew the truth, but Tom thought otherwise. I asked him, “Why do you think she’s a real girl?” Tom said, “I don’t know, John. I can just feel it inside of me.” Bada bing!
So, we ended our evening with the girl with something extra and headed home.
It’s still February 2014 in the LTG archives, and in this post, I recount how my brief time on the high school cross country team came to an end. It’s a little sad looking back on it now, considering the lifetime of other experiences. And I do wonder if my coach hadn’t been an asshole or if I wasn’t so stubborn, how different my life might have gone. Leaving high school athletics behind opened the door to me becoming a pothead. Many other bad decisions flowed from that one.
Facebook memories included this post from twelve years ago:
There was a big earthquake in Cebu yesterday. That’s too far from here to have had any impact. Reekay is somewhat closer in Bohol, and in today’s YouTube video, he shares some thoughts on the experience.
And you knew these were coming:
October has arrived, and with it the expiration of my current lease on this house. No worries, I’m signing a new one today. Paying the rent a year in advance takes a bite out of my savings, but I’m still above water. For now.
“Yes, Barbie is a bakla. Not my thing”
The lady doth protest too much!!
Some of those baklas can be super rough…..
Case in point……
https://imgur.com/a/tTpBef5
Nasty!
Dr Greg Williamson, ladyboys, along with girly bars, are (as John has frequently said) not John’s thing. Just because he ends up at girly bars on a nightly basis and has relations with trannies is not his fault at all.
Let’s all show one another the respect we all deserve, please. No need for false accusations when the denials are out in the open.
The grocery shopping excursion went without incident.
Think back to BOE #6. What’s the point of subscribing if you’re not gonna learn?
and in this post, I recount how my brief time on the high school cross country team came to an end.
Same rule broken here.
Leaving high school athletics behind opened the door to me becoming a pothead. Many other bad decisions flowed from that one.
A moment of objectivity. If it’s any comfort, you’re still stubborn and still making bad decisions, but it’s your life, and this only my opinion. God knows I make my own bad decisions.
Paying the rent a year in advance takes a bite out of my savings, but I’m still above water. For now.
I doubt you’ll ever have a financial emergency that requires the price of a US house from you. But you’re ready for that, I assume.
Re: Dr Greg’s URL – Look at those guns.
John, as both a marriage counselor and an alcohol/narcotic rehabilitation specialist, have you thought that possibly Swan solely attends these establishments just to humor you?
The bible tells of Eve tempting Adam with an apple, but in reality it can work both ways. You give Swan a comfortable life. Her alternatives are likely significantly worse. Is it possible she comes with you to girlie bars and brothels just to keep you happy lest she risk angering you and derailing her good thing?
It didn’t seem like she partook in visiting such places or daily drinking before. You are, with due respect, an old fart and have been around the block a million times In your case, drink up, I say…..you may knock a couple of years off your life expectancy, but at least you will do so with a smile on your face.
But….judgements aside, is it wise to bring her down the same path?
I don’t mean to sound pompous or accusatory, but do you think it may be a better choice to keep her away from the drink?
Best regards,
Yvon (We met at DHL in Yongsan many years ago just in case you are wondering who I am)
John mate my mate says Barbie’s a banger mate but sadly mate he says that pic of you showing ya true colors from Dr Greg is a no-go mate sorry to say it mate but I agree with my mate mate cheers mate cheers
And John mate Kevin Kim is right mate ya gotsta learn to hyphenate ya phrasal adjectives mate otherwise you’re just gonna look dumb when you write in English mate cheers mate cheers
Wow. First you stole Swan’s heart (and sobriety apparently), and now you’re stealing her dresses. I did not have you being trans on my bingo card today. At a loss for words here….
Aaron, the hyphen-ate my homework.
Yvon, thank you for taking the time to share your thoughts and concerns regarding Swan with me. Rest assured, Swan does not overindulge (usually no more than two glasses of wine per night). I also always give her the option of not accompanying me to the bars, but she seems to enjoy herself.
Just so you know, Swan’s previous love was a restaurant/bar manager. They were together for seventeen years before he sadly passed away. So, Swan was visiting the bars with him long before she met me.
I sent you an email and would love hearing from you about how we met all those years ago (ah, the email address didn’t work. Feel free to add me on FB if you’d like to get reacquainted.) My memory is not what it once was, but I loved my time on Yongsan and always enjoyed my visits to the Dragon Hill Lodge.
Kevin, I’m a Substack subscriber because, as a friend, I want to support your endeavor. Try as I might, I am, and always have been, a failure grammatically. I can see now that “grocery-shopping” should have been hyphenated. I’m a little confused about where I screwed up the second sentence. Cross-country? Except I’m referring to the sport of cross country running and was never hyphenated when I participated. Or maybe I should have written high-school. Yeah, I’m a waste of time.
Yeah, but avoiding that bad decision in high school might have presented me with the opportunity to fuck up in new ways I’ve never thought of. Oh well.
Yeah, unless the US government shuts down, I’ll be alright. I want to be a bit more responsible this year and set aside the rent each month so I have the lump sum ready next time.
Dr. Greg, if that’s how you choose to see me, rock on!
If you reread BOE#6, you know what I said about hyphenating “high school.” Yes, when “cross country” is a phrasal adjective, you hyphenate it. You have to stop using non-reasoning like “I never saw it hyphenated back then.” You have to know the rule, otherwise you’ll keep making the same mistake over and over. If people at your high school didn’t hyphenate the phrase back in the day, then they were wrong. Simple as that. It’s not that you’re getting old and forgetful; you’re just lazy and refuse to study. If you made an ounce of effort, you might improve, but I suspect that folks like you don’t make much mental effort unless they’ve got electrodes attached to them. So, no worries—relax and just go back to drinking.
What’d you have for breakfast five days ago?
Kevin, I have no idea what I had for breakfast five days ago. I had a nice sausage and egg muffin today.
Re: hyphenation
John may just be ahead of his time. Language and grammar usage are always evolving. For example, I read somewhere that in ~1900, the words “today” and “tomorrow” were written to-day and to-morrow. In 2025, I don’t think that anybody would write them like that. Maybe same with cross-country/cross country? LOL
Brian, I’m not sure if the times are changing, but I’m pretty set in my ways. In high school, it was always written “cross country.” As in, “The cross country team will be competing in the Pasadena event against numerous other Southern California schools.” What’s next? Base-ball and foot-ball?
I just did a search for the definition of cross country running and about half of them don’t use a hyphen. Go figure.
I agree with your usage of cross country. Ran all through high school and four years of college, and never once did I see it written as cross-country. Sometimes, it was written as X-country, and occasionally I would see the hyphen applied there, but that was about it.
Thanks for your support, Brian. I think context makes a difference when it comes to hyphenating ‘cross country’. “Mom, I’m driving cross-country tonight.” “Mom, I made the cross country team!” What say you, Mr. Kim?
I didn’t see this exchange until just now. The rule is clear: hyphenate phrasal adjectives when they precede the noun they modify. So in your example, “Mom, I’m driving cross-country tonight,” are we looking at a phrasal adjective that sits before the noun it’s modifying? What noun is it modifying?
If you and Brian both grew up seeing poorly written English, that doesn’t make the English any less poorly written. Excuses like, “Well, we learned it as…” or “We never learned that…” don’t cut the mustard.
Brian writes:
Language and grammar usage are always evolving.
As I’ve also written many times. But this doesn’t mean there are no rules and conventions. And change usually happens because of the sloppy people who keep ignoring the rules; their errors propagate, and the erroneous language becomes the “accepted” way of doing things. That’s why splitting infinitives (“to boldly go where no one has gone before”) is no longer considered improper except in the most formal English. Linguistic evolution almost always tends toward the sloppy and curt because people are mentally lazy. Witness text-message English.
See more here.
Kevin, I stand corrected.