Tom Jordan's Homepage

Tom's Page

I have an interesting, yet unassuming life and enjoy sharing it, so why not here? Now you can visit anytime, even if I am asleep. Please let me know you were here.

You probably came here because we share experiences or interests. My interests have usually led me out on a limb, somewhere unpredictable, in bizarre circumstances. I have always been this way. I am sure there are other people that laugh at themselves like this. I would like to know all of them, yet I don't meet very many.

Some information on my page describes situations where laws or commandments were broken. I am not trying to create evidence to be used against me, so let's start with a disclaimer: Everything here is a lie, never happened, and I'll deny every bit of it.

I'll add content to this web site just as soon as something cool happens.

--------------------------------News ------------------------------------

I am working on new recordings, mostly brand new material. Follow this link!

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Table of Contents

Here are things we can talk about:

Pages Describing my Obsessive Behavior	USS TUNNY Homepage (SSN 682)
	Sumo
	Temper Temper Homepage
An apology to anyone I ever pissed off
Phases you might know me from
Showtime -It's a wonderful life

An Apology to anyone I've pissed off

Part One, "Live and Learn"

I owe a few people apologies. They positively influenced my life, and I didn't understand what was happening at the time. These feelings are commonly called regrets. My regrets take the form of emotional baggage that I would like to unload by relating these feelings to the affected individuals. I am sorry. Please drop me a line and let me explain what happened.

Part Two, "Acknowledging my shortcomings"

Usually I am not a caring and considerate soul. I'm not particularly respectful of other's feelings. I find global love for humanity is too time consuming and burdens my functional existence. Does my shallow thinking and irrational behavior needlessly limit my perception of what others are capable of? Or, maybe I unfairly underestimate the talents of people I come in contact with? Sure. It's happened.

But I don't have the patience to be a sweetheart all day. Instead I react to facts which are readily available - right in front of my eyes. People have told me I insulted them or was not thoughtful enough. A few times I was called an asshole or told that I just want to be the center of attention! Gee, I didn't want to been seen that way.

I have tried to correct my behavior using the following methods:

1. Concious effort to be more respectful to others, and improve my listening skills.

2. Avoiding people who talk to me like this.

Generally, # 2 is the only one that works. So, if you feel that I am occasionally short tempered or inconsiderate, Get off my fucking back. Go away! Go away! I don't want to hear about it. You're wrong and beneath me. Go away!

Part Three - Resentment

There are people I have known who trampled on my determination and taken advantage of my careless and naïve nature. I owe these people a giant ass-kicking. I wish I had known what ASSHOLES YOU ALL WERE when you were right in front of me.

Part Four "Extending an offer for clarification"

If you are reading this and have ever known me, and suspect that I either

1. Owe you an apology or

2. Might latently hate you,

Then please email me for quick confirmation. Mostly, I'm at peace with everyone - but there are a handful of loose ends.

tomj@flash.net ß feel free

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Phases you might know me from:

Old friends, you may recognize some of the stages I have gone through. Do you recognize us, or yourself, in any of these?

1. Sweet kid - Before I got into anything, ages 0 to 12. I said sweet and goofy kid things to people and sometimes stole stuff at school, but generally was a suitable reservoir for whatever hope any grownup might have wanted to inflict on a kid. Often told I could "grow up and be anything I wanted." Which I never understood, not really. I had small pets, a younger sister, and divorced parents, including a usually drunk dad. I was the oldest sibling, trying to make sense of it all. I didn't like being a little kid.

I sat and thought for a few moments about some apartments that my Dad lived in. The apartments are being torn down: here is what it made me think about.

Negotiating the sidewalks, buildings, facilities and passages through the Eastgate Apartment complex now in my mind. I have had dreams that use the place as a backdrop, to replay some sort of kid (either walking or on a bike) and interaction dramas. I have seen these apartments in my memory, and neglected to trace the steps in real life because there was nothing I left there. But, maybe there was something intangible. Remembering the layout and ability to travel about the neighborhood (from one extreme geographical point - McDonalds to the other - 7-11). This was the acceptable range that I could travel on my bike. During a time in our modern era that kids rode largely unsupervised, trading the luxury of free time for experiences that were sometimes fun, sometimes weird, always naive, always universally available to each of us. Any kid, with no money at all, could venture around this neighborhood and investigate its contents to the full satisfaction of curiousity. Much like a dog would do, poking ones head and interests into each cubby hole, sniffing around, and moving on, or remaining for as long as time could be filled. For example, the latest business to open up in the nearby shopping strip, the latest promotion at McDonalds, a good concrete slope (can become a bike jump ramp) near Southwest Title Company, the mystery of huge cardboard boxes or discarded items in the apartment dumpsters. These were all examined without regard to the number of hours spent, and in no hurry to move into the next obligation.

A kid with a calender from McDonalds with a free item each month on a tear off coupon? You bet. This might mean that in January, maybe a free small hamburger. In February, a free fried pie. If it was free, I was there. You can bet that I would slowly, methodically make use of all 12 coupons, waiting for the next month to arrive, the next payoff.

Hovering about the pool area, studying the way the bushes grew next to the steel fence? I did that. I still know how the fence looked, I know how far the bushes grew away from the fence posts. Where they were entangled, where there were spaces. How sharp were those leaves? I knew.

How about those big wooden structures that were part of the landscaping, maybe erosion control? Just blocks or something. I knew the cracks, by studying them. I knew where the ants walked.

Recovering Coke cans from the clear, plastic trash bags that overflow at the regular swimming pool trash cans? Yup, broke em open. Squashed the cans, collected them to recycle. Dive the big dumpster? I can do that.

Spent hours in The Bedroom Shop, talking to the employees there, looking at the brochures, playing with the promo materials. Digging rocks out of the adjacent grocery store wall. The Bedroom Shop had a icon thing that was a sleepy guy's head, in a nightcap with red and white stripes. They had a paper mask of that sleepy guy, on a single wooden stick where you can open his eyes and hold the mask over your face. I must have messed with those forever. "Hey, do you want me to go through and poke all their eyes out for yall?" Seriously, I hung around this store for hours.

I didn't have this sort of latitude in Mesquite at this age, living with my mom. It's due to the City of Garland's inability to zone correctly that we were living in mutilfamily dwellings adjacent to dozens of businesses. On top of that, the Eastgate Apartments weren't just a group of apartments, they were more of a vibrant community. For example, there was a heated swimming pool in the winter, organized Bingo games in the social center, our own Soccer team (the Eastgate Gators) with teams in every age group. pool tables, and these hundreds of people out participating in it all... opening those coke cans, discarding them... or swimming, or whatever. People were out. Kids were out. I wasn't really expected to be anywhere "in the house". I was outside "playing." Sometimes "playing" meant exploring the laundry facilities.

Those hundreds of people now gone, the apartments are being demolished. The community and its buildings are empty. Even more dramatic, that place in time is gone. That era when kids roamed is over, at least for me, and maybe for all time. Now that the Amber Alert System has replaced it, I don't know if kids wander in this way anymore.

On a more personal note, I don't wander like that anymore myself. I'm always late, everywhere I go, so I can't take time to put playing cards in bike spokes. Or wonder what is going on at the pool, or how to methodically acquire another free small hamburger.

Coming soon - The Biggest Hill in the World and the Fossil Fantasy.

2. KISS freak (age 12 to 15) - Primary focus on KISS, though love of KISS and many other bands continues to this day. But there was no possibility of my ever shutting up talking about KISS, or dressing up as KISS at Halloween, or trying to learn to play Beth on violin, or any of several formerly goofy little kid things.

3. CHEAP TRICK freak - age 15 to 18 - My primary focus was on Cheap Trick and attending Cheap Trick concerts. I had fallen into a better crowd of friends. (Kevin Archer, where are you?) Kevin knew I was musically inclined (I was in band and orchestra). During one of my convulsive and powerful 'air guitar' sessions, Kevin suggested I should learn to play a real guitar. I thought it was a great idea, and I bought a 6 string electric Memphis sunburst. This decision eventually DESTROYED MY TEENAGE YEARS, as I was unwilling to concentrate on anything else.

4. Rock star, "The Potentials" during High School- I must mention the Ramones and Sex Pistols here, but I preferred writing my own songs or co-writing songs with my bandmembers. We practiced late at night (after school, and my Jack In The Box shift) in a rented a mini-warehouse. The mini-warehouses had no authorized electrical wiring, so another mini warehouse patron showed me how to jumper wires the service across a lock box... hot wiring from the pole. Thanks, mini-warehouse-neighbor! This was glorious, but nothing lasts forever, and eventually some assholes broke the locks and stole everything from our warehouse... During this period we recorded a studio cassette tape that I am ashamed of to this day.

Click thumbnails to see Potentials .JPGs

5. Rock star, "The Potentials" in an apartment - The Hungry years, age 18 to 20. In Mesquite, and later Dallas, I had many, many roomates, including dozens of people and thousands of roaches. Both apartments are gone, they were torn down, now parking lots occupy each location. I feel somewhat responsible for rendering these places uninhabitable.

Click thumbnails to see apartment .JPGs

My Bed

Mike in bed

Fridge

There were typically four people living in our apartment (whoever was in the band at that time) and we made 4 track tapes and dreamed of greatness. I kept journals during this time, they are miserable, what a bunch of ranting, filled with desperation and hope. For income, I usually worked in fast food restaurants. This served 2 purposes: Free food, and allowed me to steal money for amplifiers... Not that I'm proud of it, but I felt it served a higher purpose.

I managed, wrote music and played for the Potentials in these crude conditions. I wrote dozens of songs - only a few were worth keeping - songs which evolved during Temper Temper. We recorded some low quality tapes, and fought with each other since we were young and dumb and living under the same roof. The hostility came to an end one night when the other three bandmembers quit the band and moved out. I was surprised; I had not expected they were going to leave, and I felt suddenly very alone.

6. Rock star, "Temper Temper" - Age 21 to 23, Dallas, Texas. My answer to the question, "What did YOU do with your new Commodore 64 computer system? We had a data base." And we had P.A. equipment and we had demo tapes. Finally, the music took some shape, and the musicians were competent.

I think our music was great... I loved this band.

We played gigs, made tapes, but still didn't earn enough cash to buy groceries on a regular basis. When it was obvious we were destined for poverty, I asked the guys to move, but nobody would leave Dallas. They all had commitments, and I had committed myself entirely to the band.

I felt like the sole loser in the pack. I needed marketable skills, like all the other kids had.

Follow this link for Temper Temper details.

7. International traveller - Age 22. I met about 10 Brazilian people living in North Dallas, working at Rockyano's pizza restaurant. These people were cooler than my American friends, they liked to laugh and had seen something of the world. One girl went back home, and invited me to visit her someday in Brazil. It took all my (last paycheck from Stewart Title) money, but I went.

In Brazil, I met another girl (my friend's cousin) and fell desperately in love. We went everywhere together in Recife, Brazil - WHAT a vacation. This girl, Lucia, gave up everything she knew to come to Dallas.

When I returned to Dallas, my roommate had squandered the rent and electricity money I'd left. The lights were off and he had moved. Good to be home. In the following months, with my combined Godfather's Pizza and Temper Temper income, I couldn't provide Lucia with 1 decent meal a day. Then somehow we were pregnant. I needed marketable skills, really, like all the other kids had.

7. Sailor, US Navy - Age 23 to 29. I had NO IDEA I was going into the Navy until I got off the bus in Orlando to begin Boot Camp. It started out as ''what if' and I just kept agreeing. My entrance scores were ok, I was dazzled by the techno-career field image of working in a Nuclear Power plant, so I just kept signing my name. I had never seen either a Nuclear Power Plant or a ship or known anyone who had been in the military. My entrance into the Navy was poorly thought through. In retrospect, it was just what I needed.

Anybody who has been to boot camp will tell you, "It's all a mind game." I didn't believe it, I didn't understand it. I WAS SURE MY COMPANY COMMANDER HATED ME. And not me specifically, all of us, but I didn't want anybody to hate me, so I gave it a real effort. Running was the hardest thing. I had only run a few times in my life (misdemeanors, mostly, and I always got caught), so I looked like a goofy dork in boot camp. I could barely keep up, but at least I wasn't the slowest or the fattest. I lost 42 pounds, no kidding, in 8 weeks. It was at boot camp I went from boy to man. That's for sure. They shaved our heads and insulted us and I relied on me for the first time. I was pitifully unhappy, but determined to finish it.

I entered the Navy as a Nuclear Power plant operator trainee candidate. Which means that you'll learn about physics and eventually work in a shipboard nuclear power plant if you can keep up with the study program and stay out of trouble. The training routine is predictable for all Navy nukes; school, another school and then work as a trainee in a functioning Navy (land based) power plant before reporting to a ship or submarine. We managed to complete this, my little family: Lucia, me and baby Jennifer.

We moved to Bremerton, Washington where I caught up with my submarine USS TUNNY (SSN 682) midway in her re-fueling overhaul. About a year later, Tunny moved back to her homeport in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.

The process of living as a Navy family was difficult for us, as it is for everybody who goes to sea for a living. I left my daughter, Jennifer, crying on the pier more than once. As the deployment date comes closer (sometimes leaving for months at a time) you can't always make the kid happy - and when it's time to leave then YOU HAVE TO GO. Then you're stuck down in the boat without resolving anything. The kid is panic stricken, the yard didn't get mowed, the car needs work, there's no money in the bank but your ass is going to sea. Bye Honey, Good Luck. Folks, if you can comprehend this you know why I didn't re-enlist.

Onboard Tunny, I had the opportunity to visit lots of cool places in the Pacific, and a few dull ones.

Going to sea was bad, but pulling into port was good. Homeport is best.

Follow this link to the USS TUNNY Homepage for my submarine stories and pictures

8. Generator Set Tech / Currently - Age 29 to 36 - I worked for a company that manufactured Generator Sets. This was such a weird job. In this small company, nearly none of us had College degrees and it really didn't matter. We designed equipment, copied, tried new things, failed sometimes and succeeded sometimes. Basically, coming into this company off the submarine, I was well qualified for the work, they needed somebody like me. The employee personalities were unbelievable, weirder than television. For example, Russ fired his mom. Twice. One guy there (an employee that I supervised) named his KID after me.

Towards the end, I had learned enough about computers and instrumentation to put together a computer controlled generator set. This was a good idea in 1997. To make a long story short, we patented the thing and sold thousands of them to the Army. I taught some Army operator classes. It was fun. The company moved to Tulsa, and I didn't. I offered to transfer to a branch in New Orleans, but the management declined to keep me after reading my 3 page rant about what idiots they were. Which I had accidently left at the bottom of a Word document that was supposed to be very professional. Oh well, it was true.

What I learned from this was - a computer can receive input signals (like voltages) and control output relays. This really applies to any process, so that the computer is using the sensors (ears) as the inputs, its brain (software) to evaluate the conditions and the relays (like arms) to cause actions. My experience with generator sets was only one example of that. Since then I have worked at a couple of places (cell phone testing and semiconductor design), and used the same principle to control processes. I haven't found a good place to call home / haven't found an ideal job for me. And, without a 4 year degree, most businesses won't even take my resume. I guess this is a lesson you should learn... you've been reading my web page, and you know the order I did things - High School, Rock Band, Marriage, Submarine, Work. You don't see much about college there. Nowadays, working full time, it would take me years to get a degree, plus raising kids. I did it in the wrong order, and I am always afraid that I will have a hard time finding a good paying job without a degree, no matter how smart I am.

9. Divorced, Stupid Guy - Another phase in my life started in my mid 30s. As my marriage to the Brazilian girl became increasingly "unpleasant", I decided that something had to change. I met a girl in the Navy Reserves that seemed really cool, and I weighed the options. Man, I was adopted and my parents got divorced when I was in third grade. I had promised myself long ago that I would NOT do that to my own kids. But I did it. It was partly selfish of me, and partly unavoidable. I gave up on the marriage, and I really rarely give up on anything. What was stupid about this? I probably did and said things that got me into hot water, and NO I am not going to repeat here just so you'll be amused. I've decided that most mistakes are based on a lack of experience. And I'd never been divorced before. And I guess people got hurt. But the change, the end of the marriage, that part was right.

10. Another marriage - I married the girl I met in the Reserves, we eventually bought a house, and my daughter moved in with us. That's about the way it is now. We do ok, although we now have different problems than I did bfeore (with the first wife). Our problems are less intense and she is easy enough to live with. Sadly, most of my current problems are still generated by the first wife... From speaking with people that went through divorce, this is common. There is a dark side to a second marrage, it's pain from the first marriage, and that lost opportunity, the unrealized home that becomes sort of haunted in our soul. But, I am glad I did it. Thinking about divorce? I have, too. Plenty.

It's accurate to say that, over the course of our lives we make decisions that seem sensible one day, and then live with the consequences a long time. And, one-by-one, this paints us into a corner that you never escape. Marriage is that way. Having kids is that way. Careers are that way. I guess if you're alive, you are doing ok. After that, there is very little reason to keep score. I'd like to take the lessons from my first marriage, and from my old jobs, and use them to predict the future. I think - if I could do that - I might never do anything ever again, out of fear that it's all going to suck eventually.

11. Do I define myself by the jobs I have held, the marriages, my kids, or something else? Does self perception mean anything? My kids live in a world where they move from Taco Bell to MTV, unaware of the requirements of keeping the house warm, food in the fridge and a snuggley friend to laugh with. I have a hard time balancing their world so that they don't feel much pain or want, but also so that they don't disregard my effort, thinking that everything will take care of itself. Our lives are filled with so much risk, so many possibitites that we will suffer the consequences of our risk. That they will suffer because I couldn't buy them more security. And I probably live in the same protective bubble, not thinking what could happen to us next.

You can tell, from my tone, that I am getting older, more afraid of life. More respect for the frail circumstances that keep us safe and together. That's experience. As I get older, will I realize more about the limits of our world? Not every person can become president, we can't all do well. Some people will fight to find normal health or peace in life. A hundred years ago, people struggled with these limits in life, and then they all died. Anonymous to us. Struggling to make a better life, and I don't even know their names, or what their luckiest day was, or what they hoped for. My worries, in the end, will be lost, too. There's really not enough women, roller coasters or sushi in the world to make up for that.

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Showtime -It's a wonderful life:

If my life flashed before me in a few seconds, here are the scenes I would like to see, in order:

1. 1976 in my babysitter's yard after school - Walt Holly beat me up - I don't remember the reason. My only grade school scrap. I remember how hard his knuckles felt, like little rocks. Anyway, he pounded me, and my nose was bleeding and he felt I was beaten so he walked off. I stood there in the front yard as he walked away and yelled at him, "OK then, it's a tie!" Not a good brawler, but desperately wanting to win. Or at least not be beaten. An act of mercy that Walt didn't turn around and finish it, to shut me up! I still had some honor, and just stood there yelling bravely.

2. Uncertain year (sometime between 1973 - 1976) in the middle of a street in Mexia, Texas - Every time I visited my grandmother, this family of neighboring drug fiends would intimidate and harass me (and sometimes my older cousin, when we were together.) One day, after years of torment, I guess I snapped. I just grabbed the delinquent nearest my age and finally pinned him down and had him by the shoulders, beating his head against the blacktop road until his mother broke us up. He never spoke to me again. I was so happy.

OK, I drove through Mexia recently, and it's East Sumpter street. Here is a photo of the area, exactly where I was beating that kid's head on the blacktop road.

No, I didn't "cause" the cracks in the road. I think time did that. This road has looked like this as long as I can remember.

3. 1980 - Sneaking out my window and walking 4 miles across neighborhoods and empty fields to meet (my best friend) Sonny Strait in the middle of the night. We recorded jokes and Monty Python impressions with a portable cassette player in the middle of the night. We called these meetings "getaways". This was back in the days when it was safe to walk across Mesquite, Texas at 3 AM, and the worst thing that could happen is your parents might find out. Interesting to hear from an old friend Renee (Watson) Polychronis - she pulled the same kinda late night visits with her buddy Kim. Renee's quote, "hard to believe it could be done without ending up on a milk carton"

Sonny was my longtime favorite best-friend. One day he wore an orange Mork suit (from Mork and Mindy) to our Algebra class, told bad jokes and performed his overworked Mork impression. What a couple of nerds - we were unstoppable. We picketed Jack In the Box when they got rid of the clown. There was no idea too immature. Sonny and I had unbridled silliness and the world was entirely too funny.

4. 1980 Dawn C's Mustang front seat after the football game - Dawn, I am sorry, I had no idea what you were trying to do.

5. 1981 - Garage band on Virgie Joe Street, at Roy's house. Why were 4 'hardly talented' kids in Mesquite, Texas trying so hard to play "Anarchy in the UK"? These were the days when you might scratch up a Ramones record without fear that it will never be replaced. So much free time and so little obligation.

6. 1981 - Jack in the Box swing shift with Jerry Lumsden - Four scenes, all true. I am grateful to Foodmaker Corporation for empowering high school juniors with unsupervised control of a restaurant. You can do ANYTHING YOU WANT on the swing shift at a Jack In the Box on the weekend. The customers are drunk and Jerry and I were unleashed.

a. "Do It Yourself Breakfast Jack" - A drive through customer came through and ordered a Breakfast Jack. Jerry's response was, "Will that be a do-it-yourself Breakfast Jack?" the drunk said, oh, sure. After he paid, Jerry handed the bag to the customer which contained a whole uncooked cold egg, a piece of cold ham, a slice of cheese and a cold bun. The guy took it and drove off. Jerry is the king of suggestive selling.

b. I saw her, and she didn't recognize me. In the drive through car - my customer - was the girl who got me FIRED from my last job at Braum's Ice Cream. She had seen me giving away Braum's food to my friends, told the manager, and just like that, my promising career with Barum's had come to an end. Bitch. And now she was here, in my drive through. Luckily, my instincts took over. I calmly told her it would be a few minutes, and went back to the sink area and pissed in a cup. Then I poured the piss all over her simmering egg on the grill. It made a terrible stink as the egg cooked. Then, when the egg was ready, I made her hell-bound breakfast jack, and it went into the bag, and her waiting hands. Here ya go!

c. Walk in freezer "Egg-Toss" - If you work somewhere where there's a walk in freezer, here's some fun you can have. While one of your friends (Jerry) is in the freezer, open a door and throw an egg in the recirculating fan. The fan screen will break the egg, splattering its contents across the fan blades, which whirl them all over the freezer, covering everything. This entire event occurs in about one second, and your friend will be cold and eggy.

d. Last Song - Here's a little advice. If the Assistant Manager is due into work, it's 5 AM and breakfast should have started already, don't let her walk in while your playing guitar (with amp) behind the counter and your friend Jimmy is singing in the intercom microphone. Especially if customers are waiting in the drive and you couldn't hear the little bell dinging because of the amp. It's embarrassing, and there's no excuse good enough.

7. First Bath after boot Camp - Embarassing, but true. I had been so mind-fucked during boot camp. They constantly told us how useless we were. Quote, "If anybody wanted you, you wouldn't be here." After graduating boot camp, I flew home for a week before moving the family to Orlando (my first school).

On my first day back home, most of the brainwashing was still fresh. I could fold my underwear correctly, etc etc. At boot camp, we took showers (not baths) and the showers were 'open' where you just stood there nekkid in front of everybody else in the shower. Not very glamorous. So when I returned home and got a bath - what luxury. Lucia walked into the bathroom while I was in the tub sitting there like a retard. She asked what was wrong with me and I said, "I don't know, but I don't feel like I deserve a bath."

8. Cab with Chuck and sumo wrestler - Inport Tokyo, Japan. Because I love sumo, I knew about the neighborhood in Tokyo called Rygoku, where the wrestlers live and train. Whenever the submarine visted Japan, I rushed to this neighborhood to visit the stores and try to get into the wrestler's stables (workout gyms), dragging somebody from the boat with me, my friend Chuck Kahl. During one visit, we were having a bit of trouble finding the stables, but saw some young guys who were obviously wrestler trainees.

I approached these guys, not speaking much Japanese at all, and told them I was looking for stables, and would like to meet Akebono. They understood this well enough. The wrestlers hailed a cab, designated one of their group to host me around, and gave him about 50 bucks. Away we went, twisting through neighborhoods I had never seen before. Chuck and I were in the back seat, we couldn't understand anything the wrestler was saying to the cab driver. About 20 minutes later, Chuck turns to me and says, "Gee, Tom, I don't even know where I am." And I (overexcited, as usual) replied, "Yeah Chuck! We're in Tokyo, lost in a cab with a sumo wrestler. Ain't it great?"

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