Dear Joe,

Ah, the life surreal.  Nothing like wearing the weirdness like a greatcoat as I sip bad hotel coffee and muse over where the last few years have taken me while watching ice flow around old tires stuck in the bottom of the little creek below my window, glass rattling with commuters and jake brakes. The frustration of my truck breaking down has faded into the mild annoyance of coffee breath and ripe skivvies as I scramble for mantras of serenity. At least I didn't have to fight off bezerkers for my fat tank of gas.  I am finding it interesting to go from the hoi polloi of the service to what I'll affectionately call "civilian speed" and hang out with a cast of older country folk where every service desk at the Ford dealership has some sort of anti-Obama chatchki or biblical quote.  Praise the Profit!  As for me, I guess im used to an occasional breakdown. My problem is I'm now sans Gunny to fix for me while I'm on the radio bitchin' about those worthless scratchers up at battalion.  For now, I'm a captive audience and that shifty-eyed parts manager lurking behind the stack of Chinese made retreads looks like the kind of oily sumbitch with a penchant for off track betting, gin rickeys and a wicked cigarillo habit, so I'll be lucky to get out of here unbloodied.  I'm surprised, after spending a cold night camped out in my truck in their parking lot, that he didn't offer me a complimentary night in his Uncle's "hostel" up in the hills where I would mysteriously disappear and locals would later claim sightings of a naked man dancing around a silo wearing my head for a hat.  Bah, maybe I'm just starting to get paranoid.  Must be from drinking all that coal slurry that passes for tap water round these parts.  Even I'm starting to ***** about "those bastards from the mining company and their cronies in the statehouse!" while sitting around the counter in my bib overalls.  Yeah, I gotta get outta here before the metamorphosis completes, 'cause Elvira with the sensible shoes and widow's pension was pouring coffee and eye raping me like I was a pair of compression nylons on sale.  Hopefully, my journey will soon take me to the land of the serpent mound and black ice, but only after I make an offering to the UMWA acolyte jangling my car keys and brandishing a rhinestone studded blackjack, whispering to that swarthy parts manager, who I swear is a dead ringer for that closet jaish al-Mahdi shawarma vendor we cussed at in Fallujah.  *sigh*