On My Toes for the Storm

While driving home from my daughter’s dance recital tonight, I saw multiple lightning bolts and heard loud clasps of thunder that reminded me of the lightning strikes preceding the alien invasion in the remake of the movie The War of the Worlds. Tonight’s storm was a spectacular display of determined electricity, sideways rain, and hurricane-strength wind gusts. I watched in awe inside my car’s cabin while motorists bowed to the storm and snarled traffic to a crawl.

The beaten road turned into an obstacle course. On a seven mile stretch, I dodged a down electrical wire, a quickly flooding road that my car barely scooted across, two sizeable felled trees on an access road, and a can’t miss cursable detour due to road construction. It was a harrowing journey home but I tried not to sweat the small stuff. My daughters danced wonderfully.

Male Carrier

I bet this homeowner doesn't let the mail get backed up.

Act Accordingly

"We're all on our way out. Act accordingly.”

-Jack Nicholson’s character in The Departed.

I lost my first lead role as an actor due to my selection as a Camden County Superior Court juror for a criminal trial. Nevertheless and without regrets, there is nothing as eye opening an experience as serving as a juror then having that honor dethroned by being held up on the city streets of Camden.

Walking alone to a greasy spoon for lunch may have been my first mistake but the snaking line at the hot dog cart stretched like concertgoers waiting for tickets to go on sale. Across the street from the courthouse, a straggly man canvassed the Commerce bank parking lot. I tried to walk by him but I must have looked like an easy mark. He approached me using a line about not giving him respect while flailing a salutation that may have been gang related.

The man demanded, “Forget the respect. I am going to need your money.”

Now I have forever told myself to hand over my valuables without a fuss, if ever robbed. Inexplicably, I stopped in my tracks and did nothing of the sort for no good reason.

I growled, “You demand respect then my money? You better get the f$&k out of my face before I rub your tattoos off on this sidewalk.”

His tough guy demeanor disappeared. He slouched, kind of like Gumby left out in the cold rain. As I walked away, I took one peek over my shoulder to see if the would-be robber was charging me.

He only whined in his tracks. “Ah man, why do you got to do me like that? Why do you got to be that way?”

On my way back to the safety of my juror’s box, I thought of the irony of doing my civic duty and coming within a frankfurter of being the victim of a crime myself. I did a convincing job acting even though relegated to being a juror with only lost acting wages. How do I know my acting was par excellence? Well, I was scared to death!

The Eleventh Commandment

The Vatican recently issued the Ten Commandments of Driving but they may have forgotten the almighty eleventh blanket warning. Human beings have come along way from the days of stoning obnoxious chariot drivers.

No Tailgating

If this vehicle is powered by baked beans, we can reduce our dependency on oil. Emissions are another story all together.

Soul in a Bowl

The culmination of life amounts to the indelible imprint on our soul. I see no other explanation than humans being an intelligent model designed by a higher power. From the moment we arrive on this earth, we squirm free but are subject to physical boundaries and its nagging mortality. Gravity and the laws of the universe begin to press on us in a mad mad world.

I have never prescribed to one lifetime being enough time to get things right down here. Reincarnation seems plausible for it would mean the marriage of one soul to many lifetimes. I believe that our thoughts are not only real things but they are as important as our actions. For this reason, I believe that life also occurs on a subconscious level. Reactions to past thoughts become our fate, destiny, and karma. An individual’s fate is simply the rebounding effects of previous choices remembered by its soul. I believe the soul of each individual has purpose driven fate.

We live for today but ultimately we are here for a better tomorrow. In the meantime, souls have debts to pay over the course of many lifetimes. God is not keeping tally with a scorecard. God has created us as free will beings exercising our own destiny. We are small worlds unto ourselves and entire universes effecting each other in an ever-changing matrix. Contrary to crime and punishment sociology, sin is really crime against ourselves. Since our conscious mind is not always in tune with our subconscious, it is up to each individual to derive purpose and meaning from free will choices. The green green grass of our soul wants it that way. Time and space do not matter as much as we have been conditioned to believe in this measured existence, for poor choices can substantially derail the development of an infinite soul.

What is with all this heavy introspection on Freudian Slips? I just got to thinking of my purpose driven life while scrubbing toilet bowls in an interfaith church for supplemental income.

A Cinderella Story

An enamored fellow with Cinderella in 1998.

Lie to You

Pick out the isolated lie among the truth.

A bow can be taken for the lie found.

1) When I earned my masters degree, I worked full time as a custodian.

2) I once was on a Tv show that aired against SpongeBob SquarePants.

3) I was engaged to a print media model who later appeared nude in a porn magazine.

4) I have witnessed UFO’s.

5) As a teenager, I could drink a half gallon of beer in ten seconds.

6) I can eat a whole pizza pie in one sitting.

7) I once watched Star Wars The Empire Strikes Back six times without interruption.

8) In a court of law, I am undefeated as my own pro se attorney.

9) I have seen ghosts.

10)I once held two full time jobs and the hours coincided.

11)I played in a ping-pong tournament with my opposite hand.

12)A US patent is in my name.

13)I went out on a first date on Friday the 13th and saw the movie Friday the 13th.

14)My BA degree parchment reads from a school that wasn’t in existence the year I graduated.

15)I was featured as a newspaper comic strip.

It's Always Sunny on a Samed Named Set

The Fx network is bringing back its critically acclaimed laffer sitcom, It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia starring Danny DeVito, Charlie Day, Rob McElhenney, Glenn Howerton, and Kaitlin Olson for a third season. The upstart series has been described as Seinfeld on crack. It is the most successful comedy on cable TV in recent years.

I jumped on the irreverent bandwagon with episode 310 “The Gang Goes Invincible” by landing a part as a featured extra. In my fledgling acting career, this is my first television sitcom. The episode should hold footage of me trying out for my favorite football team, The Philadelphia Eagles. The irony of being in a television parody of the movie Invincible which I acted in is pure irony. Being invisible for the final cut of that movie Invincible seemed parody enough. Moreover, this wonderful thing called life has assembled a reprised role for me wearing shoulder pads and a ragtag #96 Eagles uniform for a national television audience.

My memories of the experience are sunnyside Seinfeld cracked. Slinking my way to the holding area at 7:15 AM in the morning, the incomparable Danny Devito waddled by me on the way to his trailer on the set. With the cast and crew parked along the roadside for a camera swing, actress Kaitlin Olson(pictured above) asked for an escort to a public bathroom while dressed like a man for her wacky scene. Growing-up faithfully watching The Wonder Years, I never imagined sitting at the same lunch table with Fred Savage and listening to him talk shop in his iconic voice as if I were an equal. Summarily, anytime you wind up sharing a seat on a bus with Philadelphia 76ers Beefcake male cheerleader Latino Jesus Rivera, you realize you are in big company with little room for anything else.

-Joseph Tornatore on the TV set of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia.

Tickets Available at the Door

-This is my rebuttal for the friend of mine who wants to see me at Sundance Film festival.