Life Without Running Water
November 5, 2007 
Well what an interesting way to end my weekend. I come home from a long day of work and watching sports to find out that my house is out of water.
I walked home from my friend’s place and in the distance I can see four or five real huge dump trucks with yellow lights flashing and lighting up my entire street. When i finally reach the pavement of my street I find myself standing in a huge pool of water and as I get closer to my house the water becomes deeper. When I reach the front yard of my home I see a bunch of guys digging a big hole into the sidewalk of the house across the street. Apparently while my neighbors were out enjoying the Bills’ game at Ralph Wilson Stadium the main water pipe in front of their house exploded causing a huge flood on my street. Not to mention that all of the neighboring houses were completely out of water as well.
So when I arrived at my home I continued on with my normal Sunday afternoon schedule. Basically what I do is I will exercise for about an hour, take a shower, and have a snack. What I didn’t realize at the time is all three of these activities usually require water for me to do them. When i exercise I prepare myself a nice cold water bottle. When you take a shower you pretty much need water, common sense really, and I usually prefer a tall glass of water with my snack.
I figured that I could go on with my Sunday schedule without water. Simple enough right? Not quite. I pretty much forgot that the water was out about four different times. I would keep on walking up the sink during my exercising, grab a cup, and try to turn the faucet on. Basically what happened was the sink would make a very loud and strange noise, which was a rude reminder that the water was still not working. I felt like an idiot every time I did that. Yet I continued on with my afternoon activities. I figured that the longer i exercised the more time it would give the guys working on the broken pipe outside to get the water fixed for me to take a shower after. So i exercised a little bit longer than usually and went to the nearest sink to test it out and see if the water was working. Of course, not a single drop of water came out of the sink. Plus, now I had to go to the little boys room to take care of some business. Well without any water the toilet doesn’t flush. So I trekked myself outside and picked out a nice pine tree next to my garage to tinkle on. So this is what life was like way back in the day huh?
Well here I am now. At least the electricity is working. I have not showered since yesterday morning. Since then, I have gone ice skating, worked in a parking at at the Bills’ game, hung around with my friends, and did some exercise. Lets just say I don’t smell very terrific and I just feel dirty. Hopefully I will wake up tomorrow and have the water running. If not I just won’t go to school. I figure nobody will want to be around me if I have not showered in over two days.
Parking Cars at the Bills’ game
October 22, 2007 
I’m a senior in High School so naturally i am low on cash. A friend of mine offered me a job to help park cars in a gravel lot near Ralph Wilson Stadium during the home Bills’ games. He said it would pay ten bucks an hour and that i would work about four to five hours on a given Sunday when the Bills were playing at home. He also said I would even get to be home in time to catch the last three quarters of the game. How could i refuse? Ten bucks an hour to wave a little red flag in the air and tell people where to park their cars. And i get to be home in time to catch most of the game. Sounds easy to me!
It pretty much is the easiest job in the World. I basically pick a nice place to plant my feet, wave my little red flag in the air, and send the cars in the direction my boss wants them to park. Could it be any easier? I mean they could have a monkey stand there and do the exact same job i do and it would only cost them a banana for the monkey to eat. Instead they have me stand there with a red polo on and point cars in the direction where they should park with my trusty red flag in my hand.
Today i pretty much goofed off before the large crowd of cars piled in. When someone asked me where to park i would reply and say, “Just park between the lines or park between those two rocks over there.” Pretty sarcastic of me because the entire parking lot is made up of gravel and rocks and there isn’t a single chaulk line for parking. Nobody really took my remarks too seriously. Actually, the people i told those statements to got a good laugh when they realized how dumb the statements really were.
Most of the people there get really into the tailgating. While I’m standing around waiting for a car to come they’re having a blast getting all hyped for the Bills’ game. Let me tell you its torture when you haven’t had any lunch and the people next to you a whipping up some BBQ chicken.
If there’s one thing i love about Buffalo its the people that live here. There are over 80,000 people at the stadium to cheer on a team that hasn’t gone to the playoffs since before the turn of the new millennium. They are so united and absolutly love there Buffalo sports’ teams, and i will admit i love the Sabres and Bills too. Year after year they break our hearts but we always come back to root for them a again the next season. They people there are also really nice, except when it comes to fans of the other team. Sometimes they’ll offer me a beer or get all up in my face and scream, “GO BILLS!” A group of fans took an old Willis McGahee jersey and burnt it. All around the people there were having a great time. Not to mention the Bills won the game which sent them all home happy.
Maybe for one of the upcoming Bills home games i will buy tickets and take a day off from parking cars to enjoy the tailgating experience for myself.
