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Easy to lose track of time

Considering it had been a relatively sunny day, I was thinking dark thoughts. That didn't seem completely inappropriate considering I was drinking dark beer and the sun had set before I'd ordered my first.
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Considering it had been a relatively sunny day, I was thinking dark thoughts. That didn't seem completely inappropriate considering I was drinking dark beer and the sun had set before I'd ordered my first. Drinking dark beer and thinking dark thoughts seemed to be parallel threads in a dark universe, or so I reckoned, one blending seamlessly into the other, both seeming bottomless as I stared into infinity three feet in front of my nose.

I was wallowing in a malaise in Dusty's after another day exceeding guests' expectations — assuming they weren't expecting much — trying to remember what day of the week it was, and whether we'd just slipped through Christmas, New Years, or both. A blur of faceless holidayers möbiused through my mind shuffling their snowy, wet feet across memory neurons leaving no impression, but confusing delicate remembrances soon to be muddled in the soup of my personal history.

How many days had it been since I'd had a day off? Trying to count, I got tangled up in fascination with my own fingerprints. Better to just carve notches in Bobbi's table. No, that could lead to close encounters with sharp objects. Best to just forget, call it a lot and order a refill.

It was after Christmas. I remembered opening presents. More distinctly, I remembered skiing Christmas morning in more snow than I'd ever seen on Whistler Mountain all at one time. Faceshots the length of Dave Murray, straightlining Tokum to keep from losing momentum in thigh-deep — was it really thigh-deep — snow. Watching boarders drop into fluff-filled gullies and have to swim back to the surface, struggling as though they'd fallen into pools of quicksnow. Oops, that was a different year. I'd had to work Christmas day this year.

It must have been after New Years too. Right, another work-day. Think... think. After New Years, but definitely before Martin Luther King Day. Okay, I've narrowed it down. I know I can solve this problem if only I can break out of this funk. Think upbeat thoughts before it's too late or karma's gonna catch ya boy.

"Whatthehell you starin' at, bro?"

It was the sound of karma catching up with me.

J.J., ever generous with my tab, ordered another beer for me, notwithstanding mine was nearly full, and one for himself as he swung his bulk onto the banquette beside me.

"What day is this, J.J.?"

"Day after yesterday, dude."

I didn't need another riddle and I wasn't sure I needed to see J.J. There's never a good time to be sneaked up on by J.J., but solitary, reflective moments crash to a particularly abrupt halt when he appears. J.J. Geddyup — Whistler's only private eye — embodies intrusion. His disheveled appearance is intrusive. His herky-jerky locomotion is intrusive. His voice is pure intrusion. The stale smell of unfiltered French cigarettes clinging to his personal atmosphere is intrusive. And his personality was intruding on my dark serenity like a dentist's drill poking into the pulp of a live tooth.

"No, seriously. I've lost track. What day is it?"

He pulled back the sleeve of his tattered fleece — Whistler Mountain hamburger logo Lift Ops uniform, circa 1990 — and started punching buttons on a watch the size of a can of tuna. It looked expensive and multifunctional and I itched to ask where he'd gotten it, but figured knowing the answer might make me an accomplice.

"Shit, I know this thing knows, I just can't remember which button to push. Wow, barometer's falling..."

"It's rainin' outside, J.J. You don't need a watch to tell you the barometer's fallin'."

"Might be the seventh."

"The day, J.J. What day is it?"

"Sat." An almost binary answer.

Makes sense. Hockey had been droning in the background, much to the chagrin of the small but vocal contingent of good ol' boys from Florida who'd protested when the big screen flipped from some football game to Canada's pastime.

Having lost interest in his watch, J.J.'s attention was diverted by a half-eaten bucket of gone cold French fries left behind on the next table. He pulled the table over, not being able to reach the bucket and not embracing the idea of actually getting out of his seat, and noshed in earnest on congealing frites.

"So, any New Year's resolutions?" he asked.

"Oh, the usual. Be a better person, write more cute dog and cat stories, give accurate directions to tourists, stop using incandescent bulbs, put some polish on my surefire Start Smoking Seminar idea."

"I like that one."

"I thought you would. Money back guarantee. Attend my two day seminar and I can get you smoking and keep you smoking. Ought to appeal to the in-your-face crowd as well as the failures that can never finish what they start. What about you?"

"Never make promises I can't keep. Although I did give passing thought to resolving myself a new job this year."

"Getting tired of the spook business?"

"Not much business left. Even the insurance companies have dried up. Since the "regulators" stopped caring, they just ramp up their rates, blame terrorism or ice in the tundra or something even less likely and wallow in the dough. Least that's my theory. Whatever the reason, there's not much PI business to be had."

"Whatcha gonna do?"

"Been thinking about teaching."

Had he been sitting across the table, instead of beside me, the spray as I spit my mouthful of beer out would have showered J.J. "Teaching?"

"Uh-huh."

"I don't know how to put this to you but generally, schools like to hire qualified teachers. What exactly would you be teaching?"

"Security, dude. Who's more qualified than me?"

"Last time I looked, they weren't teaching security at the high school."

"Truly true. I'm thinking ahead. If Whistler U's gonna be focused on resort management, they're gonna need a security department. I'll be Dean."

"J.J., there's a fine line between thinking ahead and wishing on a star. I know there have been a lot of people jumpin' on the Whistler U bandwagon, especially during the election, but let's face reality here. There's no plan on the table, just a lot of smoke and mirrors, there's no real momentum behind building a campus in town, and until the proposed site changes, we're still looking at a donkey, not a race horse."

"Huh?"

"You can call it a university, you can call it a retirement campus, you can call it a high level think tank if you want, it's still a real estate play that needs rezoning to move forward and even with a pro-business council, the chances that land'll be rezoned for anything like a university are less than the chances I'm buying you another beer."

"Funny, I was just about to order one."

"Funnier, I'm out of here, dean."

"That's not funny."

"Coulda fooled me."