Fitting In

How’s my hair? I should shave, yes, I should definitely shave. Do I stink? I probably do since I have been moving all day. I look fat in this shirt, don’t I have something a little more slimming, like stripes?

All this crap sounds silly as I write it but I’ll admit that I thought every single thought as my family and I moved into our new neighborhood. It’s just human nature. And just for the record, it’s not the shirt that makes me look fat; it’s the fat that makes me look fat.

Sure I want to be accepted, who doesn’t? When you check out a neighborhood for the first time you are not only looking at the house that you might buy but you are looking at the neighbors as well. Is there anything on there houses that scream bat shit crazy, don’t live next to me? Are there a group of rusty barrels in an alley way that look about the right size to hide a body in? How will they react when my dog takes a shit in their yard because let’s face it, eventually that’s going to happen.

Basically, you don’t want them to be a nutjob that gets his jollies by throwing hams over your fence.

As a kid we had a neighbor somewhat like this. He shot my cat right in the head with a pellet gun, killing it. It turns out that my cat jumped his fence and beat the shit out of his dog, a 50 pound bastard. In true Hoss fashion, my cat jumped on the dog’s face and clawed the shit out of him.

Normal people would see this and think Gee, my dog’s a pussy. But this neighbor decided that the best course of action was to shoot my cat in the head. That’s the kind of neighbors we are trying to avoid. Which shouldn’t be too hard since we are not living in southern Arkansas where the biggest day of the year is Armadillo Days. Yes, you actually eat armadillos that have been painted read, that’s good eating. Most other people would have called this road kill but we called it fine dining.

After choosing this house and being here for a grand total of 5 days we are starting to pay attention to those around us a little more and I’m sure they have been paying attention to me as I can sense their eyes undressing me every time I carry something heavy, my muscles glistening, my buttocks tightening.

This is our second move in 2 months. The first move my wife’s company paid for which meant I got to be the full on union worker for a day and calmly lean against a stump and critique how they were moving me. And of course since someone else was paying for it I got all the bells and whistles. Sure, full insurance incase of Hurricane, we’ll take it even though we are moving to the Midwest.

But the second move I basically had to do myself because the company only moves you once. I don’t feel so bad now getting the deluxe super tanker truck with the air conditioned boxes and wetbar in the back

. So I rented a big truck and got a dolly and started the heavy lifting into the house that has stairs because any house that my wife picks out that I move into myself always has stairs. She is looking at “living space” and “flow” when she picks out a house while I’m hoping that a good chiropractor is near by. But you do what you have to do to take care of your family even if it means hefting an elephant up a flight of stairs while juggling flaming tiki torches.

When I pulled the truck into the driveway of our new home I took a look around and got a little nervous. I knew that eyes were just beyond the shades of the other houses looking at me. I looked at there extremely well groomed lawns and their swimming pools. I looked at their freshly painted houses. The first thought I thought was “I bet they think I am too poor to afford movers.”

I have no idea why I thought this or why it made me embarrassed but it did. This affected my whole move. Instead of taking my time I practically raced up the flight of stairs daring injury to thwart me. Anything and everything went straight into the garage because that was quicker.

But then I got to thinking that if I stack everything in the garage then we couldn’t pull our cars in. Which meant that we would have to leave our cars parked in the driveway which would immediately peg us lazy and sloppy neighbors and I didn’t want this judgment either. So after putting every thing in the garage I then moved it into the house, by myself.

Halfway through I tripped in the front yard and now believe that everyone here thinks that not only am I fat and lazy slob but I am a fat and lazy slob with no coordination. At that moment I decided that I would move everything into the garage, close the garage door, then move everything into the house away from prying judgmental eyes. I may need mental health treatment for schizophrenia.

This continued for three days and I even refused to move my patio table to the actual patio on the second floor because I didn’t want my neighbors seeing me lug that thing up the steps. I vowed to do that in the middle of the night.

Insane I know, but you really just can’t help it. You do some pretty stupid things when you want to make a good impression.

Luckily though, I think that I have permanently ruined that first impression so that I don’t have to worry about it anymore.

After the second day of moving, while my family was still living back in the hut with the meth addicted cockroaches I decided to try out our brand new Jacuzzi tub.

This is a new experience for me and was a must-have in our new house. All the real furniture had yet to be moved and everything else was still in boxes. No worries though, I had the house to myself and figured I would just walk around and air dry after my foray into that sweet muscle relaxing heaven. I jumped in, grabbed one of my few remaining beers and settled down. I sat there with a big fat chaw, letting my dip cup float in my own filth, enjoying the pulverizing massage my back was getting. Life was good and I thought we would be happy here. I knew that my wife would never let me drink and dip in the tub so I was taking full advantage of this.

Eventually I got out after about 45 minutes and started walking around imagining what the house would look like when we fully moved in. Everyone does this when moving in. What goes where, what color will that be painted, which room can I watch porn in without getting busted by a toddler, you know, the basics.

I looked outside into our backyard and imagined my children playing out there. Sipping my beer, I started to feel ownership. I also noticed that my neighbors were having a pool party, perhaps one day we’ll be invited. That would be nice.

It wasn’t until I walked away and started putting my pants on that I realized that I was looking out a second floor window with the light on behind me, wearing nothing and drinking a beer. Second day in and I have flashed the neighbors at their pool party.

I have no idea if anyone saw me and my man glory. I didn’t hear any screaming but that could have been just from shock.

Hossman has come to your neighborhood, what better way to introduce myself than looking like creepy Flashing Jim.