A Small Victory

Previous chapters here

V: Pissing in the Wind

Today marks day one of Exercise Plan V.75.2. I’m going to make this one work.

I’m supposed to start the day off with a long morning walk. Not one of those power walks, where a person walks so awkwardly they look like a crazed puppet. No, just a regular, albeit brisk, walk through the neighborhood. Two miles tops.

5:30 a.m. and I head outside. I'm surprised by both the warmth in the air and that it's not as dark as I anticipated at this hour. The birds are chattering, the squirrels are fighting over something dead in the road and there's a light rain falling, which is fine with me. I walk.

I’m thinking, this is so nice.. Peaceful. Relaxing. I’m excited at the thought of doing this ever morning. Getting in touch with nature and my thoughts and the world around me. I used to do this, many years ago. I try to remember why I stopped.

I’m a mile from home and I remember. I have to pee. My sister always says I should have a catheter inserted. I can't go more than half an hour without having to pee and I've already had two cups of coffee and a quart of water. I am a mile from home at six in the morning, and I have to take a piss. Badly.

I stand on the corner and resist doing the pee-pee dance. I go over my options. There are none. It's not like I can knock on someone's door and ask to use the bathroom. Maybe if I was on my block. But I’m on a foreign street that’s splayed with splits three times the size of my own house, all with stone steps and iron rails and a very “don’t bother us” air about them. Especially at six am. There are no stores open yet. I stand there cross-legged like a three year old and contemplate my fate. I think the birds are laughing at me.

It starts to pour. Out of nowhere, the sky opens up and drops a few buckets of liquid on me. The sound of the heavy drops hitting the pavement makes my bladder long to be emptied. Drip. Drip. Drip. Bladder water torture.

I start to walk east, even though my house is west, because I am stuck on one of those winding streets with no outlet and now I have to go the opposite way and all around before I can head back home. The downpour thins out to a steady drizzle. .Drip. Drip. I curse the skies. I look to up and I swear that one mocking cloud is shaped like a toilet bowl. I cringe. My bladder screams. I walk.

I find that if I walk fast, it exacerbates the situation and the urge to pee right there on the sidewalk, right in front of 242 Oakley with its concrete Virgin Mary, gets stronger. But if I slow down, I will never get home. I eye the huge hedges surrounding the house to my right. No. No. I cannot resort to that high school antic of peeing in someone's yard. I'm not a drunk teenager. I am a sane, sober adult. I. Will. Not. Pee. In. Someone's. Bush. Drip, drip, drip goes the rain. My resolve shrinks.

Ok, why am I doing this again? Why am I out here with the birds and the squirrels, while everyone I know is still snoring under covers? Because I want to lose weight, comes the pat answer. Because I want to be firm and trim. Really? I’m talking to myself now. Literally. Out loud. Maybe, just maybe, the only reason you’re standing out here wishing you had a cork for your crotch and thinking about peeing in your neighbor’s topiary is because just yesterday Brenda and Carla were standing outside in their size two jeans and clingy shirts and Carla was laughing about how she had raided her teenage daughter’s closet for clothes to take to Aruba? Hmmm? Could that be it? Yes, yes, I say and the birds scatter, and the squirrels roll their eyes at me and I think they’ve probably heard it all before. I want to go home. I want to go home and eat a giant cranberry muffin slathered with butter and put on my size ten jeans, after I go to the bathroom.

The sun starts to break through. Bright pinks and reds make their way through the line of clouds and behind the shades of sunrise is a brilliant blue sky. Vanish blue. The kind of blue that the toilet water in your mother's house is. That kind of blue. I cross my legs.

I go north one block and then turn west and I am headed in the right direction at least. I try not to think about toilet bowls. The wind kicks up and an empty Poland Springs water bottle flies by and hits me in the shin. Water. Liquid. Pee. I step in a small puddle and the sound of my foot hitting the water is amplified in my head. Someone's automatic sprinkler goes on. Water, water everywhere and not a toilet in sight.

I can finally see the side street I have to turn down. I'm close to home. My teeth are floating at this point. I remember how my mother used to say "I have to piss like a race horse" and I start wondering just how much a race horse pisses. This makes me walk faster, almost break out into a winning trot and my bladder jiggles and wiggles and begs for mercy. My eyes are watering.

Finally, my house is in sight. I chant out loud "please don't let anyone be in the bathroom, please don't let anyone be in the bathroom" and I sprint the last few steps, over the porch, down the stairs, into the house where, thankfully, my bathroom door stands wide open, waiting for me. I don't bother closing the door. I just pee, sighing orgasmically.

I go to the safety of my living room, cross "morning walk" off of my exercise list and think about buying a treadmill. Or a dozen cranberry muffins and a pound of butter.

*by way of explanation, for the one or two reading the chapters: these stories are being posted without any kind of form and as I write them, which is not the order in which they will eventually appear, hence the fluctuation of time from chapter to chapter. Also, these are what I call cold chapters. Tense, voices, etc. may change later on.

Posted by me at 08:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)

Previous chapters here

IV: The Woodchipper Whines on Wysteria Lane*

I get up at 4:30 a.m. most days. The first thing I do is throw on a sweatshirt and go outside. It's bitter cold out these days, but I find the coldest days produce the greatest sights in the sky. 4:30 a.m. is a great time to be out. The stars are incredibly clear. It is quiet, so quiet that when the train blows by the station about eight miles away, I can hear the horn wail. I can hear squirrels rustling through the trees and someone's garbage can lid being scraped down the street by the wind.

There are very few lights on in the surrounding houses. Not many of my neighbors are up at this hour, and for a few moments, I feel like I own the world. I walk around the yard, and head into my aunt's garden next door. There are statues in her garden, angels and mermaids and odd shaped animals and sometimes, in that early morning fog of thought, I wonder if I am dreaming or really standing outside.

Today I look up and see a huge, full moon. White, thin clouds move behind it and the light of the moon causes the clouds to become luminescent. As the clouds move, they give the illusion that the moon is racing across the sky. I remember when I was young and thought this to be true, that the moon moved with the clouds, the stars chasing it an stellar game of tag. I watch this scene until my neck hurts from looking up. By now the sky is getting a little lighter and the birds are starting to wake.

The inner enclaves of our suburb are still lush with trees. On the perimeters of the blocks, on the main roads, the trees are mostly gone. But here, in the nest of houses clustered together, the trees still stand. They are huge and foreboding in this light, their bare branches reaching out to the sky. The shadows make them seem a bit frightening, and when the squirrels bounce on the branches and make the trees shake, it looks as if those limbs are admonishing the squirrels for waking the tree.

I am in awe of those trees and the regal way in which they watch over our land. How long must those trees have been here to be that tall, that thick? They were here before the houses, before the land shifted from woodland to homeland.

Across the street, five trees are being sacrificed for the O’Leary’s sun room extension. Carole O’Leary stands out on the sidewalk, hands on hips, a look of pride on her face as if she chopped down and hauled off those trees with her own bare hands.

I’ve been standing on my stoop for hours, watching the tree killers, watching Carole bark out orders, all the while pointing my camera at them. “Look at Annie, always with the camera,” I hear Carole say during a lull in the woodchipper whine. I want to record this, to capture the moment when a beautiful landscape turns into suburban blight. When it’s all said and done, when the trees are dust to dust, I put the lens cap on the camera and walk across the street.

“I never thought I’d get rid of those damn things,” Carole says.
“I liked them,” I counter.
“You would.”

Kaitlyn, the littlest O’Leary, stands on the front steps, staring her mother down. Her cheeks are splashed with dirty sawdust tears, her hands scratched and raw from when they had to physically pull her from the tree she was hugging.

“Kaitlyn liked them, too.”
“Kaitlyn’s five. She doesn’t know any better.”

I cluck my tongue at Carole, the way my grandmother clucks her tongue at me when I’ve said something utterly, wholly stupid. The woodchipper starts its whine again and I don’t hear what Carole says to me in response.

I break from my moment of recall and look up at the trees again. I wonder if they are angry at what has become of their forest. Then again, they only look angry at this hour, in this season. On summer afternoons, with children climbing their branches and exploring the hidden forts the leaves make, the trees seem happier.

When it gets too cold to stay out anymore, when my breath makes long trails of steam in the air, I walk back through the garden, avoiding the stares of the angels and mermaids, and pause by my door. I point my camera at the sky, trying to capture 4:30 a.m. the way it looks in my mind. The moon, the clouds, the flickering stars, the statues and trees that seem to possess souls. I know it will never look on film the way it looks in my head. Nothing ever does.

*by way of explanation, for the one or two reading the chapters: these stories are being posted without any kind of form; my idea is to have the story take you from Annie's childhood and young adult years on Wysteria Lane right up to present day and her family home on Sycamore, though the present day stories will not be as many as the growing up stories. Anyhow, the chapters are being posted as I write them, which is not the order in which they will eventually appear, hence the fluctuation of time from chapter to chapter. Also, the voice telling each chapter won't always be Annie's but that will be made obvious. Work in progress, and all.

I've also changed my mind about how to present the story, which means I'll probably change the title and rework what's already been posted. I have an idea. A good idea, I think. If anyone out there is in the publishing industry and would just answer a question as to whether the idea is good or not (and I promise not to ask you to read a full manuscript or drop it on your boss's desk or anything like that) please email me. Thanks.

Posted by me at 06:03 AM | Permalink | Comments (5)

I was just about to write a post/list when I realized I already did that list about a year ago.

And then it occurred to me that I have nothing left to say. I've been calling it in for at least a week. Sleepblogging, if you will.

Time out.

There will be fiction here daily and most likely photos and reminders to go visit 100 words. So if that's your kind of thing, you're welcome to stop by. Other than those things, I've got nothing. My lists have run dry. My desire to look up interesting links has waned. And today, as I was driving home from work with the sun roof open and all the windows down and my too-long hair whipping around my face and Journey's "Don't Stop Believing" on the radio, turned up to maximum volume, I knew that I was one "streetlight, people" away from losing my mind.

If and when I find something interesting to blog about, I will. I'm just not going to force myself to do it every day. Too much like work. Too much like making my brain do things it doesn't want to. Not enough like summer.

Journey on the car stereo, cranked up with no sense of shame? That's like summer.

Posted by me at 04:48 PM | Permalink | Comments (23)

Stemming from a discussion about coin-op games last week (or the week before), I made this Name That Coin-Op Game image.

Each image represents a a coin-op arcade game from the 80's. Some of the images are cropped from screen shots of the actual game, some from the title screen and some from the logo that appeared on the game cabinet. Some are easy and obvious, others a bit more obscure.

I've been working on this for a week. I lost the paper where I wrote down all the answers. You're on your own.

click for bigger.

One note: I really like making these games (I also did one for father's day) -if you want to suggest other categories for me to create games for, feel free.

Posted by me at 09:48 AM | Permalink | Comments (14)

(Previous chapters here)

III: Ben Franklin and the Magic 8 Ball

Arleen is having a sleep-over tonight. I hate sleep-overs. I hate leaving the comfort of my own house, my own bed, my own stuffed animals that protect me all night. I know, I’m too old for that. But I have a feeling that when I’m old and decrepit, like twenty years from now, I’ll still be sleeping with Bunny and FooFoo.

I can’t take Bunny and FooFoo to Arleen’s house, but I can bring my own pillow, which smells like the toasted English Muffins, which smells like home and that should get me through the night. I don’t tell anyone I get homesick, even when I’m just two blocks from home and I can see my house from Arleen’s bedroom window and if the light in the kitchen is on, I can see my parents moving about, pouring a drink or getting a snack. Somehow, seeing my house from the distance of someone else’s house, seeing my parents or my sisters mill about the rooms when I’m not there makes me feel worse instead of better. It makes my family feel out of reach.

I go to Arleen’s despite not really wanting to. I lug my pillow and a plastic bag with pajamas and clothes for the morning. Mrs. Green greets me with surprise. “Annie! I didn’t think you’d be here. You never show up for sleep-overs!” I manage a grin a I squeeze past her. I hate Mrs. Green. She’s as wide as my father’s Lincoln and smells like she’s got bits of old food stuck between her fat rolls. She wears bright, floral printed house dresses that my mother calls mu-mus, but my sisters and I call moo-moos. The difference is all in the pronunciation, how you draw out the ooooos. The moo-moos make Mrs. Green look very tent-like and I imagine one of the Green kids crawling under the moo-moo with a canteen and sleeping bag.

The rest of the girls are already upstairs. I can hear the buzz of their whispers and giggles and as I round the stairs and head for Arleen’s bedroom door and I can tell by the tone of the buzz that there’s an argument brewing.

“I know there are such things as ghosts because my father saw the ghost of his father right after he died!”
“That is so stupid!”
“Are you calling my father stupid?”

I step into the room, throw my pillow and bag on the bed and slip right into the fray.

“My mother saw a pair of dancing shoes fly across her room.”
“WHAT?” This is said both collectively and incredulously.
“Uh huh. She saw red ballet shoes fly across her bedroom when she was just nine years old and the next day she found out her aunt died during the night.”
Lori snorts, “What does ballet shoes have to do with her aunt dying?”
“Her aunt was a ballerina.” I say this with an air of smugness. Lori, who is just about to say something stupid to rebut me, clamps her mouth shut. All the other girls sit there with their mouths hinged open. I do know how to make an entrance to a party.

“I’ve got goosebumps.” Tammy rolls up her nightgown sleeve to show us the prickly rise of flesh on her arms. “Let’s talk about something else.”

Arleen jumps up. “Ooh, I forgot. Mom bought me a Magic 8 Ball today!” She grabs the 8 Ball from her dresser and immediately everyone encircles her, touching the ball, wanting a turn with it. The next minute or so is a flurry of teenage hands, shaking, turning, grabbing.

“Will I marry Bobby Sherman?”
“Does Paul Carey really wet his bed?”
“Does my mother hide the Christmas presents in the attic?”
“Does Christie Sorrentino stuff her bra?

All the pat answers show up; Outlook not so good. It is decidedly so. Outlook good. Ask again later (which means ask two seconds later). My reply is no (which means try again). My older cousin has had one of these magic balls for months now and the cube of predictions circling in the blue goo holds no special interest form. What’s more interesting is the questions my friends ask and their reactions to the answers. As if this stupid paperweight of a toy can really predict the future?

Oh, I know. Like two months from now I’ll be standing in my cousin’s room, shaking the ball when no one is looking and asking it if my tits will ever grow. Outlook not so good.

Arleen comes up with a grand idea: We’ll ask the Magic 8 Ball if ghosts really exist. This lead to another discussion about all things supernatural. We talk about ghosts and vampires and shadows under the bed. This leads to a mini-fight, pitting those of us who believed in things that go bump in the night against those who are quite sure that the res of us were out of our minds. Or heathens. Arleen stands up and shakes Magic 8 ball.

“I’m going to ask it. We’ll settle this once and for all.”

I want to say: How will this settle anything? If you don’t believe in ghosts how likely are you to believe a toy? But I hold back. Once the 8 Ball told Lori she would get a kiss from Ray Cortland before the year was over, its power became undeniable, belief in ghosts and goblins or not.

Are there such things as ghosts?
Arleen shakes up that 8 ball with the same vigor that her father shakes martinis. Better not tell you now.

Well, that gives Tammy the heebie jeebies. She surmises that if the all powerful 8 ball does not want to tell us, its because....because.... ghosts are already in the room!

I grab the 8 ball from Arleen.
Are there spirits present here?

We hold our collective breath as I shake the toy, the blue goo forming foaming bubbles that obscure the words for a few seconds. And then the bubbles subside and the answer was revealed:

Yes - definitely.

Shrieks. High-pitched, teenage girl, glass-breaking shrieks.

Lori (whose mother hands out religious tracts to trick-or-treaters and tells Lori she will go to hell just for thinking about boys), grabs the 8 ball out of my hands and flings it across the room. Obviously, the thing is possessed because not only does it not break, but there isn’t a scratch or dent on it when Arleen retrieves it from under the bed.

The noise of the heavy 8 ball rolling on the wooden floor, plus Lori’s hysterical whimpering brings Arleen's older sister Cammie to the room, storming in, demanding to know what we’re up to. Lori’s crying by this time, and she announces to Cammie that we’re playing games with the devil. Lori points to the Magic 8 ball.

This thing? Cammie laughs. You think you can call out the devil with this stupid toy? Hang on girls, I've got something better for you.

And so we spend the next few hours learning the proper way to read an Ouija board. Well, most of us. Lori goes downstairs to sleep on the couch, away from us devil worshipers.

The Ouija board doesn’t hold the same mysterious aura for us as the 8 ball. It’s too easy to manipulate and Arleen’s a horrible speller, so we knew when the the triangle disc points to there being GOHSTS in the room, Arleen has something to do with it. Cammie senses our growing boredom and decides to go one better. We’re going to have a seance.

We decide to call upon on the ghost of Ben Franklin. Cammie figures we should start with someone benign and, besides, we were doing the Revolutionary War in school, so maybe he could help us with a few questions.

Lesson: Never call upon the ghost of Ben Franklin when the weather is ripe for a thunderstorm. No sooner does Cammie say (in a deep, spooky voice) Ben Franklin, if you are here, give us a sign, then a bolt of lightning lights up the night sky.

Wow. Five 13 year old girls screaming in unison can drown out thunder! I mean, Ben Franklin. Lighting. We all got it. It was a “sign” that made perfect sense.

I saw him, I saw him! Grace, a mousy wallflower of a girl who had remained quiet until now, is pointing towards the window, where the curtains are now billowing in the wind and the tree branches are scraping against the glass. He was there! I saw his glasses! He was smiling and it was evil! Ben Franklin is...THE DEVIL! Apparently, Lori’s evil-lurks-everywhere disease is contagious.

It’s chaos for a few moments as we all scramble to the window, looking for a sign of a bespectacled Satan. He’s nowhere to be found.

We start arguing as to whether or not Ben Franklin actually appeared at our sleep-over, or whether Satan appeared disguised as Ben. No one questions Grace's sighting; she saw something. Afer all, she’s the smartest among us and would never steer us wrong.

I decide to settle the argument the easy way. I grab the Magic 8 ball off the night stand and give it a shake.

“Was Ben Franklin here?”
Without a doubt the ball answers.

“Is Ben Franklin the devil?”
Don't count on it.

I have to say, that answer is a bit disappointing. The mere thought of Ben Franklin being an agent of Satan is too delicious to not believe.

[For the one or two of you following what I'm doing here: I've decided to put the chapters up as I write them. Later, everything will go on a separate page, in a more cohesive form, with more of a storytelling feel to it - rather than a set of short stories or vignettes, I will tie this all together as a full novel. For now, it's piecemeal]

Posted by me at 07:37 AM | Permalink | Comments (5) | TrackBacks (1)

We just spent about five hours and a wad of money in this place. Who knew fighting zombies, shooting AT-AT Walkers, bowling in Tokyo, invading space and dancing up a revolution could be so exhausting?

I took over 100 pictures. I uploaded a few to Flickr and I have to say, an arcade is a great place to shoot photos if you're feeling colorful and artsy and whatnot. This one's my favorite:

www.flickr.com More of asv's photos

Posted by me at 09:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (7)

'Brainstorming', the buzzword used by executives to generate ideas among their staff, has been deemed politically incorrect by civil servants because it is thought to be offensive to people with brain disorders.

Instead staff at the Department of Enterprise, Trade and Investment (DETI) in Belfast will use the term 'thought-showers' when they get together to think creatively. A spokeswoman said: 'The DETI does not use the term brainstorming on its training courses on the grounds that it may be deemed pejorative.'

Sources inside the department said there was concern that the term would cause offence to people with epilepsy as well those with brain tumours or brain injuries.

Maybe "thought showers" is offensive to people who don't take showers. Maybe it's just offensive to people who aren't over-the-top politically correct jackasses. Seriously. How far can this be taken? Eventually everything will be deemed offensive to someone. We'll all be turned into mimes.

I'm practicing my offensive gestures just in case.

Posted by me at 11:26 AM | Permalink | Comments (32) | TrackBacks (1)

Annie Cohen ran inside, yelling at her mother to call 911. "I said 'Why?'" recounted Julie Cohen. "She said, 'There's a baby in the yard.' I said, 'Whose is it?' She said, 'It's mine.'"

Dumbest. Family. Ever.

Posted by me at 10:33 AM | Permalink | Comments (18) | TrackBacks (1)

8am on a summer's morning during a rain storm looks exactly the same as 4pm on a winter's afternoon right before a snowstorm.

This is the kind of thing I think about while stuck in traffic.

Posted by me at 09:50 AM | Permalink | Comments (7)

Over at Comedy Central, Joel Stein has two lists: Five '80s Stupid Guy Comedies That Hold Up and Five That Don't.

I'm not sure what Joel means by "stupid guy" comedies. Is he referring to the fact that stupid guys watch them, that there are stupid guys in them or that....ah, here:

The worst part is when guys force loved ones to watch their favorite old movies. And for our generation, that means '80s comedies. While that sounds tough, remember that our grandmothers had to sit through Gene Autry films....So which dumb guy comedies can you subject women and children to safely?

He never really defines what a "stupid guy" movie is, does he? He goes on later to say that John Hughes movies that don't star John Candy or Chevy Chase don't fit the bill and I'm beginning to think that Joel makes shit up as he goes along.

If Mr. Stein thinks that the movies he listed are guy movies, then he knows very, very little about women, especially women who did any part of their growing up in the 80's. Judging from this, Stein probably thinks that only guys laugh at fart jokes. I personally know this not to be true. But anyhow. The lists. We'll ignore Stein's need to bring gender into the mix, and we'll instead call our lists Five 80's movies that have held up over time and five that haven't. Because here at ASV, we ALL think Airplane! is funny.

The first list is hard, because there are so many, and I going to include Hughes movies, because I am not Joel Stein.

• Better off Dead
• Sixteen Candles
• Airplane!
• Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure
• This is Spinal Tap

Honorable mentions: Ghostbusters, Coming to America, Heathers, Fletch and the ubiquitous many, many more!

Update: How could I forget UHF and Johnny Dangerously (fargin iceholes!)?

Five 80's comedies that DID NOT hold up over time (you had to have liked these movies at one point in order to qualify - don't just list movies you hate or never found funny)

• Stripes (the movied dies as soon as they get the camper)
• Animal House (oops, came out in 1978)
• Bachelor Party (I watched this movie several times just because one of the characters wears a jacket with my hometown high school on it)
• Ferris Bueller's Day Off
• Porky's

Honorable mention: National Lampoon's Vacation, Pretty in Pink, One Crazy Summer, Back to School, Valley Girl, any Police Academy movie.

Update: Keiran is going to make me admit it. I tried to keep it a secret. Yes, I still laugh at Revenge of the Nerds. There. I said it.

Bonus update! Today is John Cusack's birthday! Gee, I'm real sorry your mom blew up, Ricky.

Posted by me at 07:07 AM | Permalink | Comments (40)

Chapter 1 here.

II: "The Family" on Poppy Drive

People are under the impression that my father is in the mafia. I don't know what it is. So, we’re Italian. And he drives a huge and wide Lincoln Continental with spokes on the wheels and real leather seats. And he has a construction business. Yea, works with cement. People just assume that all those facts add up to I’ll make him an offer.

This has been going on for years and I don’t deny the rumors. I no longer confirm or embellish, but I don’t deny. I just raise my eyebrows or whistle when anyone asks about it. It’s too much fun to have people think that my dad could order a hit on them if they ever got on our wrong side.

Mom gives me a lecture on the whole thing. She doesn’t like being associated with the Mafia. She thinks it makes our family look ugly and vulgar. I tell her it’s just my friends. No one else believes it. Their parents don’t believe it. The principal doesn’t believe it....

“The principal?” Mom wears a wide-eyed look of shock that turns her cobalt blue eyelids into crinkly frowns.
“He mentioned it in passing.”
“Young lady....” I drift off. I can’t help it. It’s like the words “young lady” are the secret to turning off the part of my brain that hears adults speak and everything mom says is just a low buzz.
“......understand?”
“Uh...mmhmm. Gotcha.”

I am vaguely aware that she wants me to put a stop to the Mafia rumors. I reach back and poke my brain a bit to see if it can dislodge some of what she said and it functions as sort of a mental sausage maker; it packages everything mom just said to me and spits it out in one neat little package, which isn’t hard because it’s the only word-package mom ever makes in situations like this: “What will the neighbors think?”

I always want to ask her why she cares so much what the neighbors think. Half of them are related to us anyhow and they know all of our secrets and bad habits and dysfunctions. The other neighbors - Spider Lady, the Carrs, the Masons, the people who always leave their sprinklers on and waste our natural resources, the couple with the hot nephew, the Bergs - why would anyone care what they thought? They were an odd collection of hermits and religious nuts and swingers and cult leaders and....

It occurs to me - I have an almost grown up like thought here for the first time in my life - that maybe that’s all rumors, too. Maybe the Carrs aren’t Moonies. Maybe the Masons don’t see Jesus in their coffee cups, maybe Spider Lady isn’t really a witch. The hot nephew is real. I can attest to that myself. But who knows about the rest of the stuff? Maybe Spider Lady had a daughter like me once and she started the rumor herself that her mother was a witch and the rumor carried through the years and by the time the girl was in high school everyone in the world thought her mother was a witch so they came and took the girl away from her mother and tried to burn Spider Lady at the stake but she bolted the doors and shut the windows and spent the rest of her days mourning the loss of her only child and yelling at people to get off her lawn. Maybe. Is that how I want my parents to turn out? What if the real Mafia got wind of this rumor? What if some “family” thinks my father belongs to a rival family and they try to kill him?

I start to panic, the way I always do when my thoughts get ahead of my actions. I slow down the brain process by holding my breath and doing the nine times tables. When I’m done - I have trouble once I get past nine times five - the runaway thought train has come to a halt. But I know what I must do now.

I grab the first person I see, which is Nick, at the bus stop.

“You know, just so you know, ummm...my dad isn’t really in the Mafia.” I’m staring at a clump of dried November grass while I say this. I don’t look Nick in the eye, because it was Nick I told the most outlandish pretend Mafia stories to. Like the one about having to scrub blood and bits of flesh out of the trunk of the Lincoln one Saturday and how I did such a good job that some guy named Uncle Carmine gave me twenty dollars and let me see his gun.
“Right. Did he kill someone last night, so you’re trying to cover for him?”
“What? My father, kill someone? Nick, you know my father would never hurt anyone!”
“What about Evan Cameron? He threw him on the ground and then stomped on his hand!”
“Well, Evan knocked down my snowman on purpose. And that was like ten years ago!”
Billy Campbell shows up at the stop and Nick dismisses me.

This goes on all day. No matter who I try to confess to, they laugh and say “Yea, right. Whatever.” No one believes me. My father has become this larger than life figure, a godfather or at least sidekick to godfather who makes cement shoes for a living and sends enemies to sleep with the fishies.

I come up with this plan to have a bunch of people over after school to watch tv and hang out. I’m convinced that if they spend some time in my nice, normal, non-Mafia home, and see my parents do nice, normal non-Mafia things like watch the news and play Yahtzee!, they’ll be convinced that I’m a liar, my sisters are liars and my parents are just nice suburban folk who eat tuna casserole on Fridays and play cards on Saturdays and wash the car on Sundays. Boring. Normal. Routine.

I tell my father my plan. He doesn’t really care about the Mafia stuff. He thinks it’s a big joke and says my mother has no sense of humor when it comes to her maintaining our reputation as Norman Rockwell family. A reputation we never had, I might add. My mom suffers from delusions of Rockwell.

I get my sisters in on the plan. I convince them to tell their friends to come over, too, because the rumors have trickled downward from tenth grade to eight grade to third grade. Lenore, my youngest sister, hasn’t helped matters any by telling her teacher that our father wears pointy shoes and puts us in the kitchen corner and kicks us when we’re bad. She’s going to be trouble, Lenore. I feel sorry for my mom. Mafia rumors are going to be the least of her worries if Lenore doesn’t reign in her storytelling.

We ask dad to please explain to our friends that he is a law-abiding citizen. I think that’s the only way they’ll get it, if dad actually speaks up about it.

“Of course,” my father says. “Of course I’ll help put an end to that disgusting rumor. My reputation is on the line!” He pats us all on the head. I think he’s proud of us.

We all meet at 7-11, where I buy soda and several bags of chips, and then we march back to my house, a crowd of about ten kids all together. I’m nervous. I want so much to end this charade, to put a rest to the jokes about horse’s heads and bodies in trunks, to make my mother stop worrying about what the neighbor think. I feel like I’m doing the right thing, a grown-up thing and this gives me a sense of instant maturity. I may start wearing high heels and reading the business section soon!

We get to my house and I suck in my breath. Our friends have only an inkling of what’s going on. I’ve spent the last two days trying to undo all my lies, so they know I’m up to something, but there’s chips and soda with the 4:00 movie in it for them, so they’ll suffer through my lecture. My father is going to be so proud of me, I think. I am singlehandedly saving my family from the ruination of their good name and social status as perfect suburbanites.

The door is locked. Odd. I ring my own doorbell.

My father answers the door. He’s wearing a pinstripe suit and guido hat, looking like a cross between Al Pacino and Al from Happy Days. My friends giggle, some actually snort as we clamor into the kitchen. My father says, in an affected accent that’s half Brooklyn and half caricature, "I can't stay. Gotta go make some cement...,” wink, wink...“If ya know what I mean.”

Everyone, stares at him with wide eyes and slack jaws. Dad grabs his car keys off the counter, puts a scowl on his face and said "I catch anyone drinking anything but soda in this house, I take ya for a ride, capisce?" He struts out of the house, obviously confusing John Travolta with Al Pacino.

I feel a surging hatred for my father and I want to run after him, scream a million curse words, kick him in the shins for what he just did, for ruining everything I set out - so maturely - to do.

Everyone’s laughing. My friends, my sister’s friends, even my mother. Nick is doubled over, holding his stomach, heaving out great gulps of hysterical air. His laughter sounds like horses dying and normally I find that funny but now, now I was too mad, I was....

“That was the worst Mafia impression ever!”
“Yea, that was so LAME!”
“Hey, the movie’s starting and it’s Vincent Price week!”
Everyone runs into the den.

I grab a handful of chips and lose myself in The Fly.

[For the one or two of you following what I'm doing here: I've decided to put the chapters up as I write them. Later, everything will go on a separate page, in a more cohesive form, with more of a storytelling feel to it - rather than a set of short stories or vignettes, I will tie this all together as a full novel. For now, it's piecemeal]

Posted by me at 06:37 AM | Permalink | Comments (8)

Apparently some time in between my last open mic night and this one, I gained a couple of assholes as readers. Or maybe they were here all along and just decided to make themselves known. Or maybe I'm just too trusting of this interwebbie thing.

The longer I blog, the more things happen that make me not want to blog anymore.

Open Mic night has been cancelled. Thanks to the those who posted before this.

Posted by me at 08:11 PM | Permalink | Comments (14)

[To particpate in open mic night, go here]
-----

My mother revealed to me that she was a lesbian when I was eleven years old.

That was kinda weird. It was done during a quiet conversation conducted on a boulder overlooking a pond, which made the conversation seem cliched even during the apex of the emotional impact [Mommy, you're shocking me--and you're making me feel like the lead in a bad afterschool special--the double whammy].

Unsurprisingly, this conversation followed a lengthy period of, uh, intense conversations between my still-married parents, all of which bloomed from some mysterious seed of conflict that had remained hidden from me until that moment of disclosure.

I know what you're probably thinking--who cares who your mother was sleeping with? That's a valid statement; it wasn't the nature of the long-held secret so much as the extent of the long-held secret. It wasn't that it was a bad thing, it was that it was a big thing that was a secret, fundamental part of her. I would say that the long-term implication was not the creation of any hostility issues with respect to sexuality or gender, just the submerged fear that no matter how much I think I know someone, I might not know them at all. There is always the chance that they are going to rip off their Mission Impossible mask with a "ha HA!" and simply surprise the shit out of me.

Other than that, I am completely psychologically healthy, natch. And there's your Open Mic therapy session of the evening.

Anyway, the important lesson of the story is: If you want to tell your kid something important, don't focus on choosing proper aesthetics for the setting. Otherwise, it just seems a little forced.

Did anyone else ever have an awkward hand-on-the-shoulder-well-I've-got-some-news-for-you-Jimmy talk?

Posted by at 07:00 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

I don't know what made me think of this story when you said talk about your childhood.

Shumpy

I am going to show my age here but that is ok. When I was a kid about 6ish - not sure which summer it was... anyway

On Sunday's after church services one of the families would have the other church people with kids over and we would all do dinner/snacks whatnot and the adults would chat and get caught up with one another while the kids played outside.

This was a nice Texas summer and wasn't too hot. This particular night it was being held at the Whitehouse. So it was the Whiteboys (me & my brother) and several other kids running in the backyard.

We were playing tag. I wasn't it but I was being chased pretty hard. I jumped up on our log rack - my father used to keep several chords of wood stacked against the back fence.

Now this was something that I had done many times before. 'It' was chasing me. Right now I can't remember who it was. No matter. They jumped up on the logs hot on my tail.

Now this log pile stretched a good five to ten yards (depending on the year). While in mid-stride somehow my foot got caught between two logs and immediately wedged in there.

This threw me - face first - into the pile. With all my speed (yes, I was fast back then) I took a chunk out of the faceplant log with my front couple of teeth.

I hit so hard I bit through my lower lip and one of my teeth became wedged in the log. Not kidding. It was a bloody mess. Scared all the kids, myself included.

I can't remember seeing that much blood come from my own body ever before. Yeah I was freaked out. Also I still had to extract my foot from being wedged in between the logs.

The kids all came to help. When I was pulled free, my top right front tooth was hanging THROUGH my bottom lip by the root. Nasty.

We went inside to find my mother and father. Now remember this is Sunday evening/night. They freaked out. Mom cried. Who was going to fix me? I was broken. Well luckily there was a church lady who piped up and said she had a new dentist for her kids and happened to have his card in her pocket.

This was a young new dentist but he had his home number on the business cards. She called him. He was home! and he agreed to fix me up.

We went in to his office and he clipped the root sowed up my lip - with anesthetic. And basically made it all right, best he could at the time.

When my mouth had healed up after a week or so I had to go back to see him and get what they called a "spacer". This was basically a retainer with a fake tooth wired on it so I wouldn't have a gap in my grill all the way until my adult teeth came in. It looked pretty darn real.

The retainer/tooth was cemented into place but I would chew or pick at the cement until I could pull the thing out. It was pretty cool. I'd freak all the little girls in school out at lunch by taking out my tooth. It was a source of fun for several years. Of course, I would get in trouble taking it out if an adult saw me but it was worth it to see the looks on people's faces.

I still have the scar on my bottom lip twenty five years later. And that nice young dentist that opened up shop on a weekend night, what happened to him you ask? I still go to him. Also, somewhere in a box at my folks house that fake tooth still sits to this day.

Posted by at 06:18 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Anyone else see this over at Drudge (second best sight behind fark)

http://www.news.com.au/story/0,10117,15739502-13762,00.html

They were able to bring two dogs back from the dead. First Canines then People. Look out Yankee Fans Billy Martin will be back in no time.

Posted by at 06:03 PM | Permalink | Comments (5)

All my free time at the moment is being spent reading or writing. When I'm not doing one, I'm doing the other. I'm reading seven books at once because seven different voices, narrative styles and genres make for seven times the inspiration. I write every day, I always have; but I haven't had the drive to write like this, the passion for it, the love of and belief in what I'm writing since the early 80's. I must go with the flow.

Because I probably won't be back at the blog tonight, I though you all might like to fill in for the evening. Yes, the open mic night is back. And there's a theme: Childhood. Nothing specific, it's pretty wide open. Just write something. Think about your first kiss, your favorite song in fifth grade, the street games you used to play, your funny uncle, being scared at your first horror movie, getting stuck in the clothes dryer, summer vacation - whatever!

Update: I changed my mind.

Posted by me at 04:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I've been trying to track down a copy of one of my favorite childhood books, The Night They Stole The Alphabet by S. Joslin.

It seems to be out of print, though I can buy a copy from Amazon marketplace for $75 - more than that if I want a copy in decent condition. How much are childhood memories worth? More than I can afford, apparently.

If any of you ever run across this title at a garage sale, used book store, library sale, whatever, I will be forever indebted to you if you pick up the book for me (if it's a reasonable, garage-sale type price).

Can't hurt to ask people to keep their eyes open for me.

Posted by me at 11:40 AM | Permalink | Comments (9)

Courtesy of my buddy Todd.

Posted by me at 11:05 AM | Permalink | Comments (5) | TrackBacks (1)

First, they came for Tigger.

Then they came for Piglet.

I bet John Hurt is really regretting his stint as Narrator right now.

Posted by me at 10:16 AM | Permalink | Comments (10)

[a work in progress that has yet to be edited, chopped, rewritten seven times and tossed in the recycle bin. ].

Part I: Introduction

The Sycamore block starts at Cypress with the Pumpkin Man’s house and wends its way north for a slightly twisted quarter mile, ending at Alder with the House of Honda. There’s a small, enclosed world in this one little block, the nuances of which are visible only to those who live on it.

Unlike so many suburban blocks where the homes are all duplicates of each other, set apart only by the gilded numbers hammered onto the garages, Sycamore is a hodge-podge of houses. Perhaps 50 or 60 years ago it was one of those cookie cutter enclaves, a street of one story cottages seemingly made for small, nuclear families, cramped for even 1.5 children. As the years went on, the look of the block changed. People may not have had much larger families than before, but they had more things and wanted more space for their things. So they blew out walls and added on to fronts and backs and when they had no more room to push out, they pushed up and added on dormers with vaulted ceilings and spiral staircases and windows large enough for everyone to see in without meaning to.

Over time, Sycamore has become a tapestry of styles. Cathedrals are buttressed by make-shift splits, which are flanked by lengthy ranches, all interspersed with clumps of original cottages, untouched, un-pushed, unadorned with additions. There’s brick and siding and stone, enclosed porches and high, cement steps that are insurmountable in winter, circular driveways and blacktop mini-lots stuffed with three or more cars, full-on topiaries with sheared rabbits and unicorns and lawns that grow nothing but browned out fluffs of crabgrass. It’s the suburban version of a melting pot.

When we moved to Sycamore the real estate agent, as well as several acquaintances, led us to believe we'd be living on a quarter mile strip of PTA paradise. Block parties, get-togethers, families gathered on porches on summer nights, drinking home-brewed ice tea while their kids chased fireflies - you can have it all on Sycamore!

It took only a week or so before we figured out the dynamics of the block and realized that there were no barbecues or late night porch talks in their future. Was it us? Did we somehow exude an odor of “not yet ready for manicured lawns?” Was it our kids? Our lack of pets? What? What was it that was keeping the welcome wagon of Sycamore away from our house? Where was my fresh baked pie and invitation to sit on someone’s porch? I started to develop a complex. I spent hours standing in my front yard watching the gatherings down the block, trying to figure out why we weren’t fitting in.

I am - yet again - staring wistfully at the cluster of women gathered on the lawn of 412.

“Looks pleasant, doesn’t it?”

It's my next door neighbor, a nice woman with a nice husband and three nice, strapping young lads, none of whom are ever home long enough to make friends with. Their lives consist of constant trips to sports games, their house only a pit-stop. Their black SUV races into the driveway, spits out one son and his baseball equipment, swallows up another son and his hockey equipment, and disappears again. Today, Karen is home, taking a break from being a one-woman cheering section. She smiles knowingly at me. “It always looks better than it is, you know.”

“I thought it would be different,” I say. “I thought they’d welcome us with open arms and we’d join their clan. I mean, I knew most of these women already. I’ve lived in this town 40 years. I move on their block and they stop saying hello to me? What’s that all about?”

“It’s not you. No one on this end of the block has ever penetrated the invisible walls of The Seven.”

Start at the Cypress end of Sycamore, on the east side of the street. Walk four houses north. Count of the houses from there - 1, 2, 3, 4. Stop, cross the street and walk back south, counting off again. 5, 6, 7. Stop. And there you have it, The Seven. Seven houses that make up the gut of Sycamore. Not the heart; that belongs to Hyde across the street, who is teaching me how to prune my Japanese Maple. And not the soul; that belongs to the Pumpkin Man, whose yard bursts with orange every fall, who opens up his gates for anyone and everyone to have their pick of the pumpkin patch. No, those seven houses are the gut, the place where things churn and roll and turn to acid. Well, maybe it’s not the gut, but the Digestive Tract of Sycamore doesn’t flow as well.

They have a tribe of children between them, all over-fed and under-mannered. They are hulking, brooding brats, always hopped up on the steroid known as privilege, which their parents feed to them in large doses. As in, you are privileged. You are special. You don’t have to follow the rules of social decorum or the niceties of society because you are privileged. We RULE!

The tribe hangs out in the street, playing basketball, kickball or this odd game in which they just stand there in the middle of the road while you try to pass in your car. They take turns glaring menacingly at you, or waving to you in a mocking, sneering way until you maneuver around them and make your way home. The mothers stand around and watch this, gathered around the hydrangea bush at 413 like cackling witches at a coven. Either they don’t see their tribe engaged in the game of Bully the Neighbor, or they don’t care.

I stopped driving down that end of the block. I had enough of pebbles being kicked up at my car, of balls purposely thrown at my windshield, of gargantuan sized twelve year olds banging on my trunk. I had enough of driving past the parties in progress, watching the witchy women turn their heads as my car rolled past and turn back again without so much as a wave or a nod. They’re holding Margaritas and Pina Coladas and standing around in their short shorts and halter tops, their 40 year old bodies stuffed into their teenage daughter’s fashions, and when they laugh, I imagine they are laughing at me and my jeans/sweatshirt combo, me and my brownish lawn and children who aren’t hulking androids, me and my lack of margarita making friends to share my non-existent porch with. A barrier has been erected starting at 412, an invisible electric fence that shocks me every time. I finally figured out, a year later, to go a different way and avoid the shock. I’m a slow learner.

I pull out of the driveway facing the other way now, and Karen waves to me, her husband waves as he packs the car with football equipment, Hyde waves as he shuffles around his yard, the Asian kids with the souped-up cars and thumping beats wave. I may never have Margaritas on a front porch with these people, but at least they have the courtesy to acknowledge my existence.

When I talk to my friend about this, my friend who lives in another town on a tree lined street where they all take turns with the snow blower in the winter, she laughs.

“Do you think your street is unique? We have four houses at the end of our block that I want to dynamite. They refused to join our block party last year and had one of their own the day before ours! Their kids have made a conscious effort to ignore mine since they were little. It’s like there are two different worlds on the same block and we’re not allowed to enter theirs.”

I give this more thought. I ask a few more friends about their block dynamics and get the same answers from almost everyone. This is suburbia, one woman tells me. What did you expect?

I spent most of my life living on a street that was crowded with relatives. Our yards were connected, our lives intertwined. But we opened those yards up to everyone. Every kid on that block became part of our family. I thought it was like this everywhere. I suppose I grew up insulated, cocooned from the rest of the world. To me, suburbia meant running barefoot through the grass with your cousins, huge pasta dinners on Sunday afternoons, parents who would never let their children be rude to neighbors. Social stratification was reserved for the school playgrounds; at home, on your block, you treated everyone the way you wanted to be treated. You pretended to like that jackass who pulled your hair in the hallway because how else would we have enough kids to get a basketball game together? You tolerated the bitchy girl, the smelly boy, the kid who picked his nose and ate it because these were the people you lived with, the people who made up your kickball team, who told the best jokes, who always had firecrackers in July, who ran barefoot through the grass with you in a race to get to the sprinkler first. On school days, you went back to hating each other. At home, on the block, you were one. I spent my whole life thinking this is how it worked, this is how suburbia was defined.

I was wrong. Not only wrong, but deluded. I let the cotton-candy visions of my childhood block out all the horror and terror of growing up suburban. My mental battle with the Sycamore Seven has stripped away the fluff and sunshine of my childhood and, in many ways, has made me question the dynamics of all the groups I’ve belonged to in my adult life, from PTA to Mommy and Me to the book clubs and workplace committees.

Suburbia isn’t a place. It’s an affliction.

[The stories that follow are all fictionalized accounts of my life in the suburbs. All names and streets have been changed to protect myself.]

Posted by me at 06:55 AM | Permalink | Comments (8)

Just go back from Borders. If you don't hear from me for a while, this is why.

What are you all reading?

Posted by me at 06:43 PM | Permalink | Comments (46)

In the past, when the Yanks lost to the Mets I would get pissed. The fan rivalry (as well as the rivarly within my mixed NY baseball team family) made it that way.

In the past, if the Sox reached first place with the Yanks trailing this many games behind, I'd be pissed. Or at least upset.

I just don't care anymore.

It's not like I'm a fair weather fan whose team is losing so she gives up. Not like that at all. It's the team that's given up.

How can I put my heart into rooting for a team that has no heart themselves? How can I get passionate about a team with no passion of their own? The Yanks are dishwater. Mediocrity. Watching them reminds me of going to a concert only to discover your favorite band is just going through the motions. You walk out displeased and every time you put their CDs on, you realize that your intense love for them has weakened, simply because they have weakened.

They haven't weakened in talent - look at that lineup. So what is it? Why are they playing as if nothing matters? Why does watching a Yankee game make me reach for the remote more often than not? Why can't I stir up any of the Yankee passion I've had since I was a little girl - passion that I had even in the worst years of the modern Yanks?

I care less and less that they are drowning in the standings and it's almost the All-Star break. I care less and less that the Sox are ahead of them. Normally on a summer day like this one, when they Yanks and Mets are playing, I'd have the tv hooked up in the backyard, beer on ice and the family coming over for some good natured fighting. At some point during today's game, I'll be in a movie theater watching zombies.

Same difference, no?

Posted by me at 03:42 PM | Permalink | Comments (13)

If Mondays are list days, then Saturdays are now survey days. I should come up with a daily theme schedule. Would be a hell of a lot easier than thinking up topics every morning.

Anyhow, I'm putting together a CD for a friend who wants to wallow in his misery. The stipulations are: no country songs, no disco, no novelty ballads, no overtly manipulative sad songs (like the christmas shoes garbage). Just some rock and roll/metal/goth/teased-hair power ballad/emo songs that will make him curl up in a fetal position and cry like a bitchy little girl before he heads out to find a cross to nail himself to.

Posted by me at 11:02 AM | Permalink | Comments (38)

Yea. That's about all I've done this morning. We're gearing up for a hot and humid one today. You know it's going to be bad when two minute after stepping out of the shower you already feel like you need another. Heat, I can deal with (though don't like). Humidity? Sucks donkey balls. Big, honking donkey balls.

It's going to be an A/C kind of day. Which means that no matter what I do today, I'll be hearing the sound of money being sucked into the bottomless pit of my electric bill. It's funny what happens when you become a home owner. You start hallucinating that dollar signs have wings and they fly overhead, out of the house and into someone else's bank account every time you turn on an appliance or turn up the heat.

I need to move somewhere where it's 73 degrees every single day of the year.

Oh, I did do something else! I wrote a story. I have to say I kind of like this one. I haven't been all that happy with my efforts lately.

Posted by me at 07:47 AM | Permalink | Comments (7)

Have you seen the Cruise/Lauer interview? Don't just read the transcript - watch it.

And then come back here and tell me what kind of crazy Tom Cruise is. I'm thinking somewhere around...batshit.

Posted by me at 03:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (54) | TrackBacks (1)

Well, kind of. Here are their answers. No go find your answers in this thread (in case you are senile like me and can't remember what you wrote a couple of hours ago) and count up how many matches you made on each question.

If you would be so kind, please write in the comments which ones you matched and which blog panelist you matched, so I can make a final tally of which blogger had the most matches. Why? Why not?

The questions were:

1. The cave man said, "I just went to a very unusual wedding. A dinosaur ______(ed) the bride."
2. Lex Luthor is so evil... (How evil is he?) He's so evil he lowers the moral standing at a ____________convention!
3. Urban Legends sure have changed from when I was kid. Yesterday, I was told that Lindsay Lohan died when she mixed Pop Rocks with ______________.
4. "I just had to take out the appendix of the Jolly Green Giant. It wasn't easy. I had to use ____________.
5. Dick Cheney has been asked to join the SuperFriends. He will now be known as Captain__________.

Bonus _________Balls

Panelist answers:

Tanya:

1. gave away
2. Michael Jackson convention!
3. ipecac.
4. a forklift
5. Gigantor

Bonus: Blue

Hubris

1. did the Electric Slide with
2. truthout.org
3. spermicidal jelly
4. Sprout as the anesthesiologist
5. Dockers Bulge

Bonus: Undescended XXY Jamie Lee Curtis

Allah:

1. gave away
2. NAMBLA
3. Ipecac
4. a salad fork
5. Coronary

Bonus: Blue

Roxanne:

1. ate
2. Republican
3. heroin
4. can opener
5. Chickenhawk (the political kind; not the gay kind)

Bonus: Ben wa

Maine:

1. ate
2. sports agent
3. Caffeine-Free Diet Coke with Lime.
4. lightsaber.
5. Himmel.

Bonus: Blue

Mikey:

1. was the ringbearer for
2. Illinois Nazi
3. diet pills
4. melon baller
5. Coronary

Bonus: blue

Thanks so much to Mikey for letting me host this week. We'll be back at his place next Friday. Hope you all had as much fun participating as I did playing Gene Rayburn. I think I'll keep in character and go sexually harass some young, big breasted woman wearing a mini-skirt and go-go boots. Or maybe I'll just go drink a bottle of gin with Bret Somer and stick a paper bag over her head while I drill her.

[I guess the porn affect hasn't worn off yet.]

Posted by me at 01:24 PM | Permalink | Comments (13)

Speaking of horny, I think all that porn talk last night had an affect on my writing.

Posted by me at 10:06 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Every Friday (or most Fridays) I play a blog version of Match Game over at Mikey's. This week, I'm giving Mikey a little break and I'll be hosting the game here. I have a stellar panel all lined up and their answers are already tucked away in a secret location, guarded by two pit bulls and a Gary Coleman.

For you youngsters who may be unfamiliar with how the game works, Match Game was a tv game show that aired (the best version, anyhow) back in the 70's. There was a panel of six celebrities that were given a fill-in-the-blank sentence, and their job was to try to match what the contestants put in the blank. It was a very simple concept and sounds a bit boring. But, when nearly all the questions had possible suggestive answers and that alcohol was served to the celebrities during taping, boredom rarely came into play. The frank sexual jokes, the constant flirting, the obviousl drunkeness of the panelists, the way they smoked right on camera, the innuendos of host Gene Rayburn - Match Game was one of the highlights of my childhood. I would rush home from school every day to make sure I was in front of that tv when the show started. And while I did get most of the jokes back then, they are so much more enjoyable - and shocking - now (in repeats on the Game Show Network). What they got away back in the day would give half this prudish nation heart attacks today.

The questions I came up with aren't that great (honestly, I found three of them in a Google search). If I had more time (read: If I remembered sooner that I promised to cover this week) they might have been better. But what really matters is what the contestants and the panel make out of the questions, right? And YOU are the contestants, so it falls on you to make something good out of this.

Let me introduce you to the panel:

Update: by popular demand, the theme song!

Ah, no. Wrong panel. Here we go:

• Tanya
• Allah
• Hubris
• Roxanne
• Maine
• And, the originator of blogger Match Game himself, Mikey

As far as I know, none of them are washed-up, alcoholic, chain smoking, horny celebrities. Well, I can't vouch for the horny part. Or can I?

I'll put the questions up now, and your job is to fill in the blanks. If you want to be outrageous/funny/offensive as possible, go ahead, but keep in mind that the true spirit of the show is to try to match as many panelists as you can. Or at least hope the panelists didn't try to be outrageous/funny/offensive.

Ah, what the hell. Do what you want. But I will crown a winner - the person who gets the most matches - at the end of the day. There's no prize, but you get all that adulation and shit. What? Sure you do.

Are you ready for Match Game '05?

1. The cave man said, "I just went to a very unusual wedding. A dinosaur ______(ed) the bride."
2. Lex Luthor is so evil... (How evil is he?) He's so evil he lowers the moral standing at a ____________convention!
3. Urban Legends sure have changed from when I was kid. Yesterday, I was told that Lindsay Lohan died when she mixed Pop Rocks with ______________.
4. "I just had to take out the appendix of the Jolly Green Giant. It wasn't easy. I had to use ____________.
5. Dick Cheney has been asked to join the SuperFriends. He will now be known as Captain__________.

Bonus Round:

There's liquor in the green room. Help yourselves, lose your inhibitions and leave your answers in the comments.

The panelist answers will be posted this afternoon.

And feel free to link. More traffic equals more funny answers for you to enjoy!

Posted by me at 06:13 AM | Permalink | Comments (39) | TrackBacks (1)

Just a reminder that I won't be live blogging Hit Me Baby tonight due to the asscrapitty level of the acts this evening.

Also, I will be glued to the television, watching this, which just may shape up to be this generation's Reefer Madness.

In just a few mouse clicks, good-natured student and athlete Justin Peterson (Jeremy Sumpter) went from your average hormonally charged teen to an Internet porn addict. He puts his future and family into total turmoil by letting curiosity turn into obsession.

OHMYGOD, Justin's got the PORN! He..he...touched himself!

And if they think they are going to hammer home the "Masturbation is an evil epidemic" point with their viewers, one only needs to read the Lifetime message boards to see 5,000 "The guy playing Justin is SOOOO HOT!!!1!!OMGWTFILOVEHIMHEMAKESMEWET!!" comments to see that Lifetime is unwittingly adding to the crime wave of masturbation and porn surfing that they are trying to stop. Oh, the irony, Lifetime. The irony!

Yea, this is going to be good.

[this is not to say that porn addiction isn't a problem for some people, but cliched, badly acted made-for-cable-tv movies are always ripe for the picking. Hey..you...with the hair palms....I see what you're doing....bad monkey!

Update: You have to read this. Now. Ohmylord, the movie uses the phrase virgin vaginas. I told you this is going to be good. (link via Allah)

Ok, apparently part of this movie deals with how much the kid puts on his parents' credit cards for porn. HELLO?? FREE PORN? It's everywhere you want to be!

Update:

This movie is horrible. HORRIBLE. I think it's about to break into some weird incest sub-plot. He's going to do his mom, I know it!

I mean, he has a hot mom, a girl that won't put out and a whore sending him porn. No wonder the guy is diddling himself to anonymous naked chicks!

AHA! We have discovered the real issue of this movie. It's not pornography. It's not masturbating. It's that the mother is a driven, overbearing, frustrated bitch who is pissed that her son is not living up to her expectations. Also, if you masturbate, you have to wait two hours before swimming.

Oh my god, this fantasy sequence in the pool - nothing will beat this. NOTHING.

REEFER MADNESS, BABY!

I just can't torture myself anymore. I turned it off. That whole gym shower scene was too retarded for words. Yea, high school guys are gonna beat up on another guy for being into porn. They would be asking him for passwords, high fiving him and maybe giving him a little something on the side.

Really, the only thing this movie needs is "I learned it from watching you, dad. I LEARNED IT FROM YOU!'

Alright, they've got twenty minutes to wrap this up.

And I bet it's not going to end with hot mom/son/girlfriend action.

After all this, he doesn't know how to do it. Either that or he feels bad for cheating on his right hand. And look what he did to the poor whoresluthobag. She banged her head, dude.

Now the mother is freaking out at the computer.

WE'RE BEING BEING ATTACKED BY POP-UPS! FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, SAVE US!! OHMYGOD THE PORN IS IN THE HOUSE! IT'S. IN. THE. HOUSE. GET OUUUUUUUUUUUUUUT!

MY SON'S PENIS IS DESTROYING OUR FAMILY!

(Ok, this Fruit of the Loom commercial ROCKS)

OM