 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 |
|
   |
| april 1st 2005 as i begin to write this, i have to ask myself: why do all my stories involve booze? which begs the second question: does it really matter? answer: i think not. casey and i begin our journey last night at the mercury lounge. the merc, as we call it, is the favorite hangout of the merc players, as we call ourselves. our merry band of actors, directors, writers and nutballs like to lounge around (appropriately enough) and drink ourselves into oblivion. the merc happily obliges us. settling my tush on their comfy new bar seats, casey orders a drink (whiskey? rum? i can't remember. you'll see later on why not.) and i ask basil, my man behind the bar, to surprise me. i'm in a mood, indefinable as of yet. we chat with vasillis, the owner, during which basil puts down something sort-of salmon-y colored in front of me. i take a sip and immediately, reflexively close one eye. if you've been around me often enough while i've been imbibing, you're aware of the three surefire signs that i'm getting schnockered: 1. i can only see when i've got one eye closed. i don't mean i go blind, but with both peepers open, the world looks a bit dali-esque. 2. my tongue goes numb. sometimes my gums, and a few times my lips. but apparently my tongue has the lowest tolerance. 3. i start to use big words. not like i don't already, but i really lay it on. the bigger the better. there's just something about saying "indubitably" while buzzed. i can't explain it. the fact that it has me squinting at one sip tells me one of two things. i'm either going to have a great evening which i'll remember for the rest of my life, or i'll have a rip-roaring evening that i'll not remember at all. i ask basil what's in the drink. he replies that he can't remember. he just started pouring things into a glass and didn't keep track. this is why i love basil. rip-roaring it is. this drink is perfect, i think. matches my mood to a t. i make plans with vasillis to have a party at the merc for my birthday. birthday is on the 28th, party on the 30th. i get quite excited at the prospect, as i've always had a good time at the merc (with the exception of several cuban adventures). i see before me many drinks, great music and the company of my closest friends. by the way, you're all invited. we are only there long enough for one drink, which is quite a feat, since drinking at the merc is like eating lay's potato chips... it's nearly impossible to have just one. but casey and i are on a mission. our directive is to pick up pete when he's done at work and get him trashed. pete is directing cementville right now, a play about female wrestling. it's pretty kick-ass. he's also a travel agent, and has had a grueling day sending people off the the far corners of the world. hence, booze. casey wisely asserts that in order to get pete drunk, we will need to buy our own bottles and keep it a private party. pete can drink. alot. that's why we get along so well. we stop and pick up some rum, vodka and mixers. i splurge on the good vodka, as i've been having the week from hell and needed some "happy time" myself. we pick up pete, and we're off to headquarters (h.q. for brevity's sake). h.q. is the name for pete and morey's place, as it is almost always open and lends itself quite well to spontaneous mass gatherings. if you are looking for someone, most likely that's where they'll be. we walk in to find jesse there and macy gray on the player. both of these things make me very happy. jesse is also happy by our appearance and our alcohol. we're just one big goddamn happy crazy family. life is good. i try, but can't resist the pull of macy gray. dancing around the living room, i imperiously state that i need a drink. now. casey, my unofficial personal bartender, whips me up a nice vodka cranberry and i keep on keepin' on. for those of you who have seen me dance, you can recognize three distinct components: 1. lots of arm waving. people have sometimes called it arm "flailing," but i have my doubts. i don't seem like the kind of a girl who "flails." 2. latin inspired footwork. oh yes, i'm a regular female ricky martin. the only problem is, i'm ricky martin in his menudo heyday. cute, but awkward. 3. the occasional stumble. it's true, i have the worst sense of balance in the known universe. a day isn't complete if i haven't fallen down at least once. so i'm prancing around, swilling vodka, and we decide to play risk. i know, but it seemed like a good idea at the time. if there is one game in the world that i love above all others, it is risk. i own the original version, as well as the lord of the rings (lotr) version, which is my favorite. i just love using an army of orcs to storm the ramparts of minas tirith. ah, the blood. the gore. gives me chills in the best possible ways and places. however, since we've played so much on that board, it was beginning to get a little stale. so casey and morey had drawn several maps of their own, using the lotr territories, but mixing them around, adding sea ports, changing sites of power, etc. a new challenge. there's nothing that this girl likes more than to solve a puzzle. we set up the game on a new board (i think one of casey's) and get down to the business of world domination. yar. for those of you unfamiliar with lotr risk, you can have up to 4 players. 2 armies are good (eagles, rohirim and elves) and 2 are evil (cave trolls, nazgul and orcs). good armies are green and gold and evil armies are black and red. i prefer playing with the evil black ones. it's so much fun to pillage with them. i call them "the black hand of sauron." however, i don't always get to pick. so several games ago when i had to be the red army (still evil, mind you), i started calling them "the red elbow of saruman." appropriate, yes? anyway, this game i'm the elbow again. i get lucky. i'll state that right now. i'm fully aware that due to the random circumstances of cards dealt, rolling first for placing and playing order, i'm in a superior position due solely to chance. having said that, i feel pretty smug at my prowess in taking full advantage of the situation. troop placement and early missions accomplished leave me with the entire northern part of the board. all hail the mighty red elbow. i'm also rolling like a mo-fo. take that, ya thug. libations are still being consumed at an alarming rate. my elbow grows all-powerful, and it becomes apparent that it is only a matter of time before the rest of middle earth gets crushed underneath. we decide to call the game in my favor. i rule. (at least i think that's what happened. if it's not, and you know better cause you were there and not quite as smashed, have a little pity and allow me my dreams.) at this point, cementville is over and people begin trickling in. i say a little prayer of thanks for my foresight in getting the good vodka. i'm trashed and enjoying the hell out of myself. more people stop by. and more. and more. it doesn't stop until there are about 25 of us milling about in various stages of drunkenness. i sit at the table and have a conversation with doug for a long time. we talk about the task ahead of us in producing a night of blitz and about marketing ideas for our next season. i'm positive that what's coming out of my mouth is pithy and decisive. in reality, i probably sound like charlie brown's teacher in the cartoons. wah-wah wah-wah-wah wah. oh yeah, i'm feelin' every inch of my coolness now. doug nods and replies like he can actually understand me, though, so i must not be too unintelligible. either that, or he was as far gone as i was. i turn to morey and strike up a conversation. we talk about very important things as well, at least as far as i can tell. the evening ends as i drive home, probably a little too drunk to drive, but it's not far and i can do the route blindfolded. i stumble to bed, barely remembering to set my alarm, and dream of things that probably shouldn't be mentioned in such a public forum as this. waking up, hazy and disheveled, i haphazardly get ready for work. as i walk out the door of my apartment building i pull on my sunglasses and feel pretty pleased with myself, until i realize that i never did figure out what my mood was the night before. getting into my car and lighting up a smoke, i toss the nagging feeling aside and inhale. deeply. the sun is shining, i think, and look at my red pants, worn in honor of my victory mere hours before. long live the red elbow of saruman. april 2nd 2005 waking with the sun in my eyes, i slowly blink myself to consciousness. another gorgeous day. looking around at my apartment, i resolve to clean the place up and do some laundry. sometimes i can be such a pig. minutes later i'm on the phone, calling my pals to see if anyone wants to go get breakfast. ah well, i think. well intentioned but short-lived is the story of my life. i yam what i yam. fully intending to take advantage of the spring that has finally arrived, i pull on my red summer skirt and sandals with my green jacket. i'm as good to go as i'll ever be, so i head over to doug's for appetizers. we walk to willalby's, causing a ruckus (as usual) and drooling in anticipation of the feast to come. willalby's (wby's) is our favorite breakfast (brekkie) joint. it became something of a tradition to get brekkie there on saturdays when i moved to willy street a couple of years ago and met the pack i hang with now. we're all pretty heavy-duty carnivores, and nothing satisfies the craving for meat like a jaunt to wby's. it can sometimes take up to two hours to get your food, the waitstaff are nutters and the place is tiny. nonetheless, there is a particular charm to the place, and we've been going there so long that they don't mind us grabbing a pad to write our own orders (usually in crayon) for the kitchen or going behind the counter to get more coffee. in other words, a nirvana for folk such as we. after we order and begin the crossword (a group endeavor that has also become tradition, along with reading all our horoscopes out loud), casey launches into another praise-filled review of sin city. he had told me about it at dinner the night before, and i determine i need to see it right now. as in pronto. we check the listings, and decide the 1:30 at eastgate will do us just fine. doug says he'll come along, but pete craps out on us. silly man, i think. the day is made for movies, and i want some popcorn. but he won't be budged. i call peter and anna, thinking they would enjoy such an outing. anna doesn't answer, but i get peter on the line. he's catching brekkie at cleveland's, another stellar joint, with his roomie debbie. i inform him that we're going to see a movie, to which he says something like "tell me it's sin city. tell me it's sin city." i affirm, and he's in. perfect. i love saturday mornings. we pick up peter and head over, driving the back way on the highway. i've got my window down and keep rolling my hand over and over in the wind. a grin is perma-fixed on my face and i'm feelin' fine. we arrive and peter pays for my ticket. i offer to buy concessions, although when we get to the counter he won't tell me what he wants and i'm in no condition to be making decisions, especially ones that potentially involve chocolate. after several false starts, i go with my original craving for popcorn. we find doug and casey sitting in the front row of the back section (it will make sense if you just think about it for a second) and sit our asses down just in time for the previews. i love previews. these were exceptionally bad, for the most part, which saddened me. i quickly got over it, however, once the movie started. i'm not going to talk to you about the movie. all i'm going to say is that you need to see it. i mean, really need to see it. wah. that's all i can say. wah. go see it. on the drive back we say many things, all of them some form of how awesome the movie was. i have doug drop me off at h.q., as my car is there, as well as my guitar, and i wanna pluck something in the worst way. i sit on the back porch steps and play the hell out of the only song i know. pete is preparing the apartment for the cementville cast party later on, and i feel vaguely bad about not helping, but not bad enough to actually help. having already ditched cleaning earlier, i wasn't about to start the vicious cycle somewhere else. the place is looking good, so i rationalize my way out of aiding and keep playing. aahhhhhhh. somehow hours pass and i'm sitting at the table feasting on ben & jerry's and listening to pete shower while casey washes dishes. it becomes a bit harder to convince myself that it's okay to be completely fucking lazy, but somehow i manage. i don't move. i'm so proud of myself. jeremiah from cementville walks in, and though i don't really know him at all, and since pete's in the shower, i offer him a drink, playing temp hostess. he tells me he doesn't drink anymore. oops. casey gets him some juice while i resolve to not play emcee at a gig that's not mine. i can't be responsible for the potential fallout. i think that maybe this is an omen that the day has turned. i'm right. the place is soon packed, and i retreat to the porch. however, i've not been home to change, and it's gotten considerably colder. my tootsies become chilled rather quickly, and i head inside, wandering, feeling a bit out of place. my indefinable mood from the night before comes back in full force, and i escape to the porch again, admonishing my toes to suck it up. i'm not always good in a crowd of people. i like gatherings where i can sit and talk to one person, and mingling's never been my forte. usually i'm able to get through it, but tonight, somehow, they're all closing in on me. i can't even bring myself to go inside and ask pete for my keys, because then people will know i'm leaving, and i don't want to go through all the leave-taking shit. i ask casey to do this for me, and wait while he tries to find pete. he comes back out and starts going through my purse, finally finding them. somehow in the course of the afternoon pete dropped them in there and didn't tell me. so now i'm pissed that i've been standing out in the cold longer than i had to be. i say a few brief goodbyes to the people on the porch and head down the stairs, realizing once i'm down there that pete didn't tell me where he parked my car. i yell up to the porch at casey. he knows what i need without having to ask, and says "in the lot across the street." mumbling my thanks, i practically bolt down the driveway and hustle my butt into my car. i sit there for a minute, just breathing, then start the heap up and get myself home. i sit on my couch for a good 45 minutes, relishing the silence and chain smoking like bette davis. the lights are off, and the muted conversations of people walking by outside become my only link. i think that maybe tomorrow i'll hermit myself and figure out what's going on inside my head so i can be done with it. and although i can't see the mess around me as midnight comes, i know it's still there, and think ah, hell. maybe the boys will be up for risk tomorrow. april 11th 2005 from the merriam-webster dictionary: bender: noun 1. one that bends 2. spree spree: noun 1. an unrestrained indulgence of an activity - especially binge, carousal binge: noun 1a. a drunken revel 1b. an unrestrained and often excessive indulgence this was my weekend. ah hell, it was my entire week. since you last heard from me, dear readers, life has taken a turn for the surreal. i will not go into detail here, as sensitive issues are at hand. or in hand, as it were. if you are one of the lucky (or doomed) people who are around me during the following events, you just might hear about it: 1. lunar or solar eclipse. possibly both. simultaneously. 2. pigs flying while they're in hades freezing their feathers off. 3. republicans admitting they're just a big fat bunch of lying wusses. if you're not around me when these events occur, sorry charlie. ya aint gettin' nuttin from me. but i can tell you that i did drink. alot. hooey, boy, a-whole-helluva-lot. so much, in fact, that i have decided that i'm off alcohol. that's it. i mean it. no more hootch for this hoochie-mama. finito on the ole' boozerino. ix-nay on any more oonshine-may. liquor shall not come near these luscious lips again. at least until thursday at pete's birthday party. which is at the merc. which is where i got into lots of trouble last week. by the by, when i say trouble i don't mean "something bad." i mean "yowza." yup, yowza. which brings me back to what i can't talk about. damn. so instead of a play-by-play, i was going to regale you with musings on my dream last night. and i tried, i really tried to make sense of it all by writing it down. but it didn't work. so, you'll just have to go to sleep unsatisfied tonight. sorry to be such a tease, but i can only say one thing in my defense... i'm not bad, i'm just drawn that way. april 13th 2005 things that have actually come out of my mouth in the last week: 1. just let me get my clothes on and i'll be out the door. 2. such creamy goodness. my goodness, creamy creamy. 3. i believe i'll have the "polynesian pleasure." things that have come out of other peoples' mouths in the last week: 1. i've decided to become a collector of aprons. - anna 2. they all wanted me to convert. and then have sex with me. - potter 3. would you like some light reading? "backdoor babes," perhaps? - morey april 15th 2005 so pete's birthday party was last night, and i actually remained pretty well-behaved. shocker. i mainly sat at the end of the bar, talking to a select few and sipping my drink with reserve and decorum. okay, fine, slurping my drinks with revelry and debauchery. occasionally i would make a foray into the throngs of well-wishers to say hi to those i don't see regularly. on one of these trips i caught anna as she was leaving, and in our subsequent conversation, she brought up an interesting phenomenon called google whacking. having never heard of such a thing, anna proceeded to tell me that it's where you enter two words into the google search engine with the intent of receiving as few matches as possible. i'm pretty sure that's what she said, but it just might have been the ouzo talking. anywho, being a word nerd of the highest order, i was immediately intrigued. so what do i do first thing this morning? google whack. i was amazed at by the fact that entries such as albatross knickers yielded 4,000 results. so it was a little harder than i thought, but you know how i like a challenge. i got the hang of it after a bit, and wanted to share. please note that some of the combinations below would make awesome band names. my best five, with match result numbers afterward: 1. surinam stilettos - 135 2. porcine haberdasher - 64 3. gonorrheal solidarity - 36 4. cumulonimbus toboggans - 11 5. nefariously potsticker - 0 that's right, ladies and gents. i finally hit upon a two word combination that yielded no results. i guess i'm just a little too cool for school. so try it. you'll like it. i promise. meanwhile, everyone gear up for my shindig on the 30th. i've gotta go catch up on my bruce sleep. april 18th 2005 this is one of my favoritest poems ever. it's been on my mind recently. enjoy. Heat Lightning in a Time of Drought from The Never-Ending by Andrew Hudgins My neighbor, drunk, stood on his lawn and yelled, Want some! Want some! He bellowed it as cops cuffed him, shoved him in their back seat -- Want some! -- and drove away. Now I lie here awake, not by choice, listening to the crickets' high electric trill, urgent with lust. Heat lightning flashes. The crickets will not, will not stop. I wish that I could shut the window, pull the curtain, sleep. But it's too hot. Want some! He screamed it till I was afraid I'd made him up to scream what I knew better than to say out loud although it's August-hot and every move bathes me in sweat and we are careless, careless, careless, every one of us, and when my neighbor screams out in his yard like one dog howling for another dog, I call the cops, then lie in my own sweat, remembering the woman who, at a party on a night this hot, walked up to me, propped her chin on my chest, and sighed. She was a little drunk, the love-light unshielded in her eyes. We fell in love. One day at supper the light fixture dropped, exploded on the table. Glass flew around us, a low, slow-motion blossoming of razors. She was unhurt till I reached out my hand -- left hand -- to brush glass from her face. Two drops of blood ran down her cheek. On TV, I'd seen a teacher dip a rose in liquid nitrogen. When he withdrew it, it smoked, frozen solid. He snapped one petal, frail as isinglass, and then, against the table, he shattered it. The whole rose blew apart. Like us. And then one day the doorbell rang. A salesman said, Watch this! He stripped my bed and vacuumed it. The nozzle sucked up two full, measured cups of light gray flakes. He said, That's human skin. I stood, refusing the purchase, stood staring at her flesh and mine commingled inside the measuring cup, stood there and thought She's been gone two years, she's married, and all this time her flesh has been in bed with me. Don't laugh. Don't laugh. That's what the Little Moron says when he arrives home early from a trip and finds his wife in bed with someone else. The man runs off. The Little Moron puts a pistol to his own head, cocks the hammer. His wife, in bed, sheets pulled up to her breasts, starts laughing. Don't you laugh! he screams. Don't laugh - you're next. It is the wisest joke I know because the heart's a violent muscle, opening and closing. Who knows what we might do: by night, the craziness of dreams; by day, the craziness of logic. Listen! My brother told me of a man wheeled, screaming, into the ward, a large Coke bottle rammed up his ass. I was awed: there is no telling what we'll do in our fierce drive to come together. The heart keeps opening and closing like a mine where fire still burns, a century underground, following the veins of black coal, rearing up to take a barn, a house, a pasture. Although I wish that it would rain tonight, I fret about the heat lightning that flicks and glitters on the horizon as if it promised rain. It can't. But I walk outside, stand on parched grass, and watch it hungrily -- all light, all dazzle -- remembering how we'd drive out past the town's light, sit on the hood, and watch great thunderheads huge as a state -- say, Delaware -- sail past. Branched lightning jagged, burst the dark from zenith to horizon. We stared at almost nothing: some live oaks, the waist-high corn. Slow raindrops smacked the corn, plopped in the dirt around up, drummed the roof, and finally reached out, tapped us on the shoulders. We drove home in the downpour, laughed, made love -- still wet with rain -- and slept. But why stop there? Each happy memory leads me to a sad one: the friend who helped me through my grief by drinking all of my liquor. And when, at last, we reached the wretched mescal, he carefully sliced off the worm's black face, ate its white body, staggered onto this very lawn, and racked and heaved until I helped him up. You're okay, John. You've puked it out. "No man -- you're wrong. That worm ain't ever coming out." Heat lightning flashes. No rain falls and no thunder cracks the heat. No first concussion dwindles to a long low rolling growl. I go in the house, lie down, pray, masturbate, drift to the edge of sleep. I wish my soul were larger than it is. copyright 1991 april 20th 2005 just like spring to pull a fast one on me. sunny days, warm nights, and flashes of rollerskaters and lovers on the corner as i drive by on my way to nowhere special. then, without warning, gloom, rain and sweaters. bleh. what an inauspicious start to my birthday week. but i got flowers today. yellow daffodils. completely unexpected, and very much welcome. thank you. as peter recently said, “it’s the mating season.” yup. so, in the interest of keeping things fresh, i’ve decided to get a little more interactive with my blog. tell me, dear readers, what is it that gets you going? trips your trigger? blows your hair back? warms your muffins? are you a fan of pda, or do you think that should only stand for “personal digital assistant?” what songs rile you up? what scents finesse your pheremones? what sights make you slobber, and what tastes titillate the hell outta ya? let’s summon summer, with all the heat, sweat and stickiness that it brings. sign in my guestbook above and let your desires be known. april 22nd 2005 freedom. i can taste it like the first bite into a ripe mango, soft and sweet and running down my chin. i am about to set off on an expedition: an archeological dig of sorts, where the main goal is to unearth something full of power and almost forgotten. The trek will be spiritualistic, hedonistic, and hopefully a helluva lotta fun. i have nine days to sift through the dross, peel back the layers, and reveal the prize. myself. so if you don't hear from me for several days, dear readers, be assured that i am in the middle of my excavation and will check in as soon as, well, i feel like it. other than that, i can make no promises. wish me luck. off i go. |
 |
 |
 |
|
|
 |
|
| april 05 blog |
 |
| it's always good to visit the past... i just wouldn't want to live there. |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|