Monday meandering

Rather than give you the substantial blog I've been writing in my head for more than a week, I've got some frenetic Monday morning musings for you. And the more I wait on that bigger blog, the more experiences enrich the final product. So no worries, mate.

I love living on Circuit Avenue. I woke up at 10 this morning for my first day off after a 12-day stretch without a free day (also worked 70 hours in seven days last week -- and people following me on Twitter and Facebook, I promise this is the last time I'll spout this stupid fact). Before eating breakfast or doing anything morning-ly, I tossed on some gym shorts, an old T-shirt and some flip-flops and sauntered down to the bank and the post office.

Leaving my house, I remembered I've wanted to note on here that we don't lock our front door. Ever. And we live on a very hopping street. Um? Not sure if this is the norm around here -- probably not since no one in our 12-person house is an actual islander, but it feels like it goes hand-in-hand with the let's-be-casual-we're-livin'-on-an-island-ooh-yeah-we-jammin' attitude. Oh well, I'm not freaking out about it -- just hoping you've forgotten where I live and you don't have the ambition to hunt back through this blog and find out and come rob whatever riches you can discover in our house's common areas; i.e. the kitchen and weird living room.

Stepping onto Circuit Ave., I saw a guy that looked nothing like John Krasinski but nonetheless made me think of John Krasinski walking down my street. If someone did one of those little charts of a brain for me, there would certainly be a small piece of the pie dedicated to celebrity sightings, a field I am severely unversed in. Anyway, I pictured it being John Krasinski (Jim of "The Office" if you've stubbornly refused the above-offered link) and imagined my reaction being a casual, gun-shaped finger point, the gesture saying without words and with ultimate slickness, "Ayyy, you're John Krasinski!" and continuing my walk down the street, smilin' and whistlin'.

Hopefully I can keep my cool to this degree when I actually do see some stars here. If I see some stars? No, when. Stay optimistic.

The bank where I opened a savings account (your bank is probably not on this island -- accept it) is directly next door to the post office. Makes for a nice one-two, bing-bang-boom experience. The post office was actually a great experience this morning. There's usually a brief wait to check your mail (I have general delivery -- the post office doesn't deliver to my house) and up ahead in the line, the postal employees congratulated some old fella on his birthday. I was thinking, wow, that's local service. Pretty cool they knew his birthday.

I got to the window, slapped my MaineCard down on the counter after a nice "Hi, how ahh ya?" from the lady and asked her for general delivery for Zach Dionne. The woman started rifling through some cubbies and a guy deeper in the mail room goes, "Is that Zach?" I said yeah, and he held up a package he'd just found for me, saying, "Hi Zach, how ya doin? Good timing!"

If you don't get how cool that is, never mind. I love New England.

Going to play tennis with Marcio de Brasil. First time on an island court!