It's Friday morning and I'm scared shitless. Today is orientation for the work release program. Orientation is every Friday. You can't begin work Release without being in orientation first. They just called the names for people to go to orientation and I was not one of the ones called. I jumped out of bed, dressed, and ran to the guard station anyway. I told the guard my name and he called to see if there had been a mistake. No mistake - I was not on the list for orientation. He said I'd probably just be in the next class. I asked him when the next class was. He said it was at 8:00 AM...
...Next Friday morning.
So I don't have to spend TEN days in jail before going to work release, I have to spend SEVENTEEN days locked up. Things just got real shitty real quick. I'd like to call my attorney ow my wife or SOMEONE! I can't wait another week!! My wife and kids need MONEY for food and bills! Hell, if I miss another week of work, I might not even have a job to go back to. Well, the others are walking away now, and I'm here. Looks like I'm here to stay.
Ahhh. That's MUCH better. It only took me four and a half hours, but I got it straightened it out. I called my wife who in turn called Numbnuts. Numbnuts called the judge and left a message. In the meantime, my wife found the number of the director of the work release program and got in touch with him, explaining our situation. He called Numbnuts and Numbnuts told him if I didn't get back to work by Monday My family would be the ones to suffer when I lost a 40-50,000 dollar a year job. I'm flattered, but I don't make quite that much. Lie or no lie, I got the work release. They called me in and had me fill out the forms and I should be in good shape Monday morning when I get out of here and go to work.
Regardless, all I'm waiting for now is a laminated photo ID and a call from my boss confirming employment. My wife is calling my boss to make sure he got the message to call the lady and verify employment.
On a lighter note, I got to move my personal property from the lockup property box into a locker in the Work Release changing room. It was nice seeing my normal clothes again. I wore my ball cap for a few minutes just for fun. I also pulled a sneaky. I reached inside my computer bag and grabbed a pen. As I went back in the dorm, the guard frisked me, felt the pen, but assummed I had it before so he let it go. He also didn't look at it. If he had he would have noticed it wasn't the standard BIC pen we're allowed to have, it's the Pilot precise V5 Extra Fine Rolling Ball pen. A fine writing utensil, If I do say so myself. Due to my lack of smoking lately, I also noticed that my t-shirt REEKED of cigarette smoke.
RANDOM NOTE - Here's something that pisses me off. In the community room, sound echos like all hell due to the high block walls, concrete floor, and little to no content in the room. It sucks when I try to watch TV because when ANYONE says anything you can't hear the TV. If you turn up the TV, everyone practically yells so you can't hear a damn thing. It really sucks when someone watching TV and someone talking have a volume war getting louder and louder, and I'm trying to talk to my wife on the phone. I might as well hang up on her without saying anything, because she can't hear ME any better than I can hear HER.
Well, dinner is passed and it wasn't too bad, though ugly. It was like a stew kind of thing over rice. Enough salt and it was edible. Since I've been in here, I've got this annoying knack for losing shit. In cell block B at the Criminal Justice Center (CJC), I lost my washcloth. When I first got here, I lost my towel. I left it hanging to dry in the other cell back at the other end of the building. A little while ago I went to the shower and found out I had lost my shower shoes, or "flip-flops", as I was raised to call them. Oh fuck it.
I showered barefoot, which is against the rules, but sometimes you gotta break the rules. I then dressed without underwear so I could wash all my whites at once. I need more clothes. The 2 boxers, 2 shirts and 2 pair of socks just ain't cuttin' it!
Every morning this week, after breakfast, I hear people break the silence with randm, yet violent laughter. It donned on my what they're doing. They're listening to the Bob and Tom Radio Show. Those guys rock. They're hilarious and I have to find a way to get a radio so I can listen to their show. I need somethig to keep me awake from 4 AM on. It might as well be them.
Today, just after I finished panicing over thework release thing, I started reading a book. That was 8:10 AM. I finished the 228 page book at 11:45 tonight, marking the first time since 1992 that I read a book in its entirety in one day. the book was Ronald Kessler's The Spy In The Russian Club. It's a biography ofGlenn Souther, an all -American boy who grew up in a modest midwest neighborhood, then joined the Navy, got top secret security clearance and decided to be a russian spy. It's a good book, but the next to last chapter brought up a few issuews that hit close to home. I'll discuss that maybe tomorrow. It might take a COUPLE of entries to tackle that one.
I thought it was a really good non-fiction book, though.
Maybe tomorrow I'll read Mary Higgins Clark's Pretend you Don't See Her. Another inmate recommended it to me. Till then...
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