I was at my real estate agent's office today making an offer on a house, and what struck me above all else was how top-heavy my agent was. My god, how is he able to stand erect, I wonder. He's of retirement age, perhaps 60-65. He's not fat, but he does seem to have a substantial upper body frame, an exaggerated rib cage, and an oversized head. I imagine beneath his clothes the sort of upper body many older men have who were once physically fit but who now inhabit the empty shells left behind decades of wear and tear, picked free of muscle and fat, leaving loose skin covered in a thick coat of gray hair. Picture a naked Ronald Reagan, old men lying on Florida beaches beside recliner chairs holding their nattering old wives. The most striking thing was not so much the substantial upper body, which evokes for me a hallow turkey carcass after Thanksgiving dinner, but the complete absence, even negative "presence," of an ass. He has no ass! Where is it? When he stands it suggests a hollowness that might result from a bad chain saw accident in which muscle and flesh were removed and did not grow back, a freakish indentation where flesh ought to be. And of course this entire assemblage of bloated rib cage, wagging folds of loose skin and hair, and a pumpkin head, is supported by little more than two thin puppet legs that move like stick figures in a stylish stick figure musical animation. One half expects him to pull out a cane and top hat and do a song and dance number whilst grinning half-moon smiles in a ghoulish display of campy burlesque, after which he'll retire to his leather chair and ask me in his usual tone of lethargic indifference whether I've reviewed the homeowner disclosure form. All of this serves as strong motivation to continue with my weekly regiment of heavy squat sets and lunges, this in an effort to retain my ass as long as I can. I like asses. I won't go so far as to say that the ass makes the man, but it's not far off.

I did a quick calculation yesterday of the income I need to sustain myself. I need less than $24,000 in net income. Let's say that a third of my gross income goes to taxes. That means I can live easily on about $36,000 gross annual income. That can't be correct.

While writing this I heard back from my agent on the offer I made on the house. The seller made a counter-offer raising my offer by $10,000. Not a freakin' chance in hell, I think to myself... but then I start saying, hmmm, maybe I could counter his counter... My offer was $190,000 with a seller concession of $5000. He countered with $200,000, with the seller concession intact. My counter to his counter is $190,000, no seller concession. Final! It comes to a difference of $5,000, but I have a feeling that it's enough to be unbridgeable. Funny. Should I even make the counter? I was actually quite torn about offering it in the first place, suspecting that he'd reject my seller concession out of hand. There's time to think on it. The seller, to bolster his position, cites the fact that the house was just assessed at $195,000. Somehow I don't trust these city assessments, whoever does them. Damn it all!