Meet Sparrow, an average man passing an average life…
Saturday, June 23
Lunch today was the usual Saturday Past Commanders Club luncheon, so named even tho current commanders are welcomed (forced) to join…The speaker was a thugish looking guy and I had rock-bottom expectations for him initially, thinking all he could do was grunt…I was wrong…His name was Von and it turns out he did eight years in prison for killing someone while driving drunk…He got his act together in prison and had a successful mortgage business and was a motivational speaker…I ended up liking him but, crap, dude, someone died because you got sloshed and took the wheel…I was rather fascinated looking at him because I don’t think I’d ever seen someone who killed someone like that.
The Past Commander’s Club gave out $1,000 to various Legion programs and in pretty short order, too…As soon as Tony gave the finance report announcing we had $1,002 in the bank we had several motions issued and seconded and approved giving away $250 to four programs, leaving us two bucks in the bank…Fortunately, Von contributed $200 and they passed the hat and collected $300 more so we are solvent again.
The lunch was OK…Not great…The usual salad and pasta and sauce and meatball options they have every year, tho I would like to note the cheesy breadsticks are not completely without merit…Not Breadsticks of the Year, but no trail markers, either…I sat next to a fellow sailor named Mitch…I thought Mitch was my age but when we compared service dates he was in when I was born and it turns out he will 70 next week…I couldn’t believe it; he looks my age…He said it was genetic, tho physically he said he was feeling it and when I asked him to pass me the coffee he took great care, saying his hands weren’t what they were supposed to be.
New officers were elected at the afternoon session, but there were no surprises and I think only the Sergeant-at-Arms race was contested…I did second the nomination of my friend Lou for one of the six junior vice commander spots…I kept it brief…I said this was not the first time I’ve nominated or seconded the nomination of Lou and it would not be the last because Lou will always have my support for whatever he chooses to run for and that he was knowledgeable about our Legion as he was enthusiastic for it and that no one is entitled to your vote as much as Lou is…As it was, there were only six candidates for the six positions, so everyone was elected by acclamation, but it wasn’t too bad a seconding speech if I do say so myself.
After the end of the afternoon session and before the banquet I went and bought some boots…I’ve been wearing the same kind for the past few years and I usually order them online but the outfit has a store here in town and it was fairly close by, so I had plenty of time.
I get there tho and they want $109 for them…Hell, they are $89 online…Or so I thought, so I get out my phone and look it up and sure enough, they’re $89…Actually, they’re $89-$69 between some sizes appear to be on clearance…So I take the box up to Kim at the checkout stand and show here what the deal is, and can I get the $89 price, which isn’t unreasonable…She takes my phone and looks at it for longer than I think it should be taking and I remind her it’s right there and she says pleasantly that she was seeing if she could get me the $69 price!!!…I am not making that up!!!
Christ, I didn’t even think of asking for that because I was happy with $89 but God bless this girl…I made the sign of the cross and said I will shut up now and let her do her work, which made her giggle…In the end, she did sell them to me for $69, which was very nice of her.
As usual, I can’t wait to get home…I miss the cat and the lawn will need watering and I want to see of the weed killer has worked yet and see if the robins are still in their nest.
Sparrow’s Sleep Log: ???? Friday until 0730 Saturday…I have some zero clue when I got to sleep Friday night…It’s not that I was so obliterated I couldn’t remember, I just couldn’t be bothered to note it…I do know I slept like crap, tho in no small part because the water in my wing was shut off for some repairs in the middle of the night…A marvelous time for this to happen, what with Sparrow sleeping off a drunk with cotton stuffed in this mouth and waking up to use the can every couple of hours dying of thirst besides.
The Diary of a Nobody is a novel. All elements are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Anything else is a coincidence.
The Diary of a Nobody was inspired by the 19th century British novel of the same name.
Read Gaylon’s latest: We The People: Making America America Again at www.GaylonKent.com
