On Sunday, September 10th, 2000, Ron Bork wrote an entry in "Ron Bork's Diaries," the first of many penned over a period of almost eight years, all published in The Avocado Papers. Bork's interests were wide and varied. He wrote about all of them here, from workplace bribery to pre-eaten McDonalds food; from the definition of "stealing" to why someone would FedEx a dead mouse to someone else; from what it feels like to get a butter knife stuck in your throat to Hamid Karzai; from whether Georgia was a slave state during the Great Depression to what it felt like seeing Saddam Hussein driving a taxi in New York. It's all here.



September 10, 2000 Not much today. Went to work. Had lunch with Pete; he threw up just as we were sitting down at T.C. Binge's. We hadn't even eaten yet. Long walk back up Sixth to give my shoes a chance to dry, nice enough day, whatever, but sort of feeling a little down though, not sure why... Haven't gotten much sleep recently, I guess is partly why, because I'm not down as much as just very tired. The Akron people called in the afternoon, had to deal with their shit, the bastards. Fuck them. I told Richard that I was probably going to do some filing and that he might not see me for the rest of the afternoon, and that's what I did. Got a paper cut while doing that, practically bled to death; I probably would have, actually, except for the fact that I didn't actually bleed all that much. It was just a paper cut.Then back here. Watched a few Caroline in the City tapes. Talked to Maury on the phone a little (he's having career issues again), then bed. Posted at 8:56 PM, 9/10/2000



September 12, 2000 Saw Steve Schneider at Duane Reade this afternoon. He was buying shaving cream, or so he said; I tend not to trust a word that comes out of his mouth. Donald doesn't either. He's got his hair all spiked up now; apparently decided to abandon the Clark Kent look. Now he looks like a Muppet.Also saw Marie, who has definitely put on a few pounds. What do you say in a situation like that? Here's what I said: "Fookin' hell, Marie, ya look like ya put on a few pounds." I thought that maybe saying it in an Irish accent would make her think I was joking? I don't think she did. Which was fine, because I wasn't joking. Which I told her. She kicked me in the stomach. Posted at 8:38 PM, 9/12/2000



September 14, 2000 Going to the store today to buy food. Just yesterday I purchased some pickles. Which are interesting, pickles, for a number of reasons. The first being that while they are definitely vegetables (think about it: what else would you call them), the unavoidable fact is that they are infrequently referred to as such. This is perhaps not as disconcerting as it sounds at first glance, if only in the sense that you don't think of birds as meat, even though that's what they are. Meat with wings.Is it me or is it getting colder out? Yesterday I was saying to someone, "Damn, it be cold." I dunno. The one thing I can say is that if I don't get a winter coat soon I'll have to keep wearing my fall jacket until I get a winter one. Is it me or are more and more people wearing pants? Which I think is great -- "Gotta love pants!"I have to vacuum my apartment soon because it's getting to be not funny. Here's a "puzzler": if you have to buy a vacuum before you clean your apartment, how come you don't have to buy an apartment before you clean your vacuum? I always like to think about things like that. Posted at 10:16 PM, 9/14/2000



September 15, 2000 Not you're average day. Not if you don't think that seeing Mr. Brian Doyle Murray at Blockbuster isn't an unirregular event. He was singing that "song of a pizza man" song from Pulp Fiction.Further to my last entry, I haven't vacuumed my apartment yet, but I did do a pretty good job last night of ruining the remote control for my TV after a particularly moving episode of Walker, Texas Ranger.I saw Spring Chicken, Summer Squash in 1985. Which I thought was probably the best film I'd ever seen. So if you're trying to get a feel for me, that isn't a bad place to start. I guess some of my other favorite ones would be like Shove it, Pal and Zero Charisma, those types of films. Cat, Dog, Dog, Cat. Mick Fickerton, his stuff always gets me. Posted at 10:34 PM, 9/15/2000



September 17, 2000 Will someone please remind me to go to The Olive Garden one of these days. This is apparently the place where real Italians go to get food made the way you get it in Italy.Hey, why is everyone picking on George W. Bush. I feel that we, and I guess that by "we" I don't mean "we" but "the liberal news media," hold our public officials to higher and higher standards. If we want our leaders to be extensions of ourselves, and maybe that is what democracy is about, then I couldn't place Europe on a map if you held a gun to my head. Should we be intimidated by our leaders? Posted at 11:14 PM, 9/17/2000



September 18, 2000 I have a scalp infection. Yes I do. Ugh... what a drag, you know????? I saw Dr. Ick today. He gave me -- actually he gave me a prescription for -- a salve that I have to work into my hair/scalp every night, that I have to put on a bathing cap on over before I got to bed otherwise all the salve gets everywhere. If I don't start using it every night, evidently I'll start growing scales on my head. Posted at 8:42 PM, 9/18/2000



September 20, 2000 Woke up to Maury Povich ringing my doorbell this morning -- he and Connie were making French Toast or something and needed eggs. Whatever -- they're such a strange couple, but more power to them, I guess.Going to Atlanta tomorrow. Posted at 11:44 PM, 9/20/2000



September 23, 2000 Sorry not to have written yesterday, travelling most of the day. Trying to do this every day (diary), but it doesn't always work out. Atlanta is fine, but wouldn't want to live here -- the "lost city" and all that; so sad. Ran into Jimmy Vomit in the lobby downstairs this morning, though -- weird to see him after so long, and here of all places. Not sure he's [hang on, room service is here...]Jimmy -- yeah, weird to see him after so much water under the bridge, etc. They say that time heals all wounds, but he has the same infected-looking abscess thing on his upper left (right?) ear as he's had for as long as I've known him. Whatever. Diane probably drips stuff into it when he's asleep to keep it from healing. Knowing her. (Diane also here in Atlanta; they're not staying in this hotel, though, thank God.)Here' something I've been thinking about recently -- Prunes. What are they. Posted at 11:06 PM, 9/23/2000



September 24, 2000 Back in NY. Good to be back. When I was young, I thought that the Brady Bunch lived in Baltimore. I have no idea why. Anyway... Beautiful day today. The kind of day that makes you want to rip all of the skin off of your own face.Where I was, in Atlanta: I'm the webmaster for this company Toiletsinc that rents portable washroom facilities. So Atlanta was sort of a convention for the sales/marketing-related people who work at Toiletsinc in the US and I think a few Canadian offices as well? Posted at 9:49 PM, 9/24/2000



September 26, 2000 If you breathe oxygen in and carbon dioxide out, then where does nitrogen come from (or go)? Here is a poem I wrote recently:I like my pottery (the plate, the bowl, the mug) to beglazedwithphlegm.It's never been my view that poetry should -- let me put it another way. Good poetry should make one uncomfortable -- challenge one's idea of what is acceptable to say, do, think. Glaze with. Like biting into a dirt burrito. Because once I got a chicken burrito at McDonalds and the chicken inside had clearly been already chewed by somebody. Deal with it. Posted at 10:54 PM, 9/26/2000



September 27, 2000 Si, senor, I grow mucho tired of this parteekuler type of dog poop, as they say in Europe. And it's not about the new forms, which I can deal with. But it's the whole deal (sorry for the incoherent entry; more on this topic soon). Posted at 7:40 PM, 9/27/2000



September 29, 2000 Someone sent me a thing about how the Government is planning a bill that will allow the phone companies to charge a fee for long-distance e-mails. Coming from the same, whatever, organization that wants to have the U.S. Post Office get a commission on every e-mail you send or receive. This sort of thing is getting more and more typical of the Government. The internet is freedom of speech for All, and in taxation of these freedoms I will not as an American be party to.Lunch today with D.T. and Jon H. at the Russian Tea Room. D pissed off about something. Had seven orders of cole slaw and D.T.'s fries -- ugh. Whatever. Need to start exercising again soon... Took D train home, which got stuck in the tunnel between 14th and West 4th for 25 minutes. Got out finally and it was raining; slipped and smashed my collar bone on the sidewalk, but OK now. Why is everything harder in N.Y.? Posted at 11:13 PM, 9/29/2000



October 1, 2000 Saw Steve S. this afternoon -- isn't it weird how you don't see someone for months and then you see them twice in, like, a month??? That can't be coincidence. Also Janine was in the neighborhood since she was having her brain operated on, so she stopped by to pick up the special cat food I got for her in Westchester (or for Max, obviously). Posted at 10:16 PM, 10/1/2000



October 4, 2000 Forgot to shave my arms again this morning, but caught it before I got to the subway. Donald called me at work from Palm Beach to shoot the shit a little. He's so sad, the poor bastard. He has everything, but of course he doesn't; he doesn't have Barbara. I feel for him, but Jesus! Get over it. He's torturing himself. He said he'd never had it like that before. I told him that he could do better, has done better a bunch of times. He thought I meant Jesse Helms -- that should give you some idea of the state he's in, and has been in for like a week... Posted at 11:53 PM, 10/4/2000



October 5, 2000 Donald FedExed me a dead mouse this afternoon. It was for "priority" delivery, you know, next business morning, but for some reason it didn't come til after lunch. Obviously a cry for help... Even his signature wasn't "him": not the confident "D. Trump" scrawl; more of a sort of illiterate scribble. I think he's still hung up on B.W., but what do I know; he never tells me anything anymore. Neither of them do. Posted at 11:53 PM, 10/5/2000



October 6, 2000 Dr. Ick thinks the problem (scalp) is that I shouldn't be using dish detergent on my hair. I'll try anything at this point. He was certainly right about the cottage cheese last summer. Sometimes I think it would be good to have someone cave in the back of my head in with a polo mallet. Sometimes I wonder what my brain stem would look like between two pieces of glass. Sometimes I think about what would happen to a squirrel if you put it in the dishwasher on the pots-n'-pans cycle. Sometimes I read the "J" section of the Manhattan phone book into the door intercom very loudly. Sometimes I put my tongue into a light socket to see if it's working. Sometimes I dress up like John Quincy Adams. Sometimes I mix cat fur in with my cereal. Sometimes I clean my ears with a power drill.Ha ha ha, not really. Posted at 10:28 PM, 10/6/2000



October 9, 2000 Supposed to have played golf with JS this morning but he broke his skull last night. He said, "Ron, how the fuck am I supposed to play golf with a fractured skull." I said, "John, I've got a busted nose; I'm losing a quart of blood a day here." I don't know why I said that, but I think he saw my point.Lunch with Liz, who smelled like a fucking brewery. We went to Jamesohn's. She had the veal, which was weird because Jamesohn's doesn't serve veal. I had a plate of Liz's stomach lining. Reading A Touch of Newark by Jonathan Stench -- was never a fan but this is a good one. Posted at 11:14 PM, 10/9/2000



October 11, 2000 More fun with the lint brush tonight. Also finally got Andrea the blind-date candidate on the phone. Me: "Hi, Andrea? This is Ron Bork, Donald Trump's friend?" Her: "Oh, hi Ron. Donald told me about you." Me: "Yeah, only the good things, I hope?" And sort of like that. We're doing something next Tuesday -- have to figure out what. Maybe a movie. Posted at 10:29 PM, 10/11/2000