The E=MC5²

Do you remember the days when you could get 10 free record albums just by writing a fake name on a Columbia House Record Club coupon and dropping it in a mailbox?

The card gave a  few choices of favorite musical styles. If I recall, I think the list was pretty limited, the choices being more or less : Rock, Soft Rock, Classical, Jazz, Country, Pop, R&B and maybe Disco, since this was the 1970's after all.

You pretty much had to go with plain-old 'Rock' back then. 'Soft Rock' would get you laughed at by your friends- they were way too cool to admit that they liked The Carpenters as much as you did.
Today is different. I'm a DJ and I'm almost terrified to discuss genre  for fear of seeming completely clueless. There are more genres than there are bands- and there are a LOT of bands!

Me: What kind of music do you play?

Coolster: Oh, it is combination of emo, crust-core, mixtape, shoe-gaze, twee metal and new rock, but with lots of  ambient darkwave 8-bit alt-folk elements, and of course, some spoken-word  psyche-salsa  beat breaks.

And then they'll play a song and it'll sound a lot like an old 1980's Casio playing the same beat over and over while a couple male voices yip and yap in the foreground and amplified guitars fall over and break in the background. And when I ask the Coolster how they got the neat  guitar sound, he'll tell me it was sampled from some old record he stole from his Dad...he thinks it was called Lou Reed's Metal Machine Music. Some old dude he'd heard about somewhere.

Aaargh. Don't kids today know anything about musical history?

I bet none of them remember  prototypical Math-OCD band, The E=MC5².


Formed at MIT in the late 1960's The E=MC5² was comprised of a rotating cast of students and professors who understood that all music is somehow math-based, even if the math is sometimes a bit faulty. They also took a lot of acid and talked far too much while they were tripping, and before long,  a now-unknown 'core' group found themselves undertaking the daunting task of converting the numerical value of pi  to music.


The band spent their formative years in an abandoned schoolhouse, surrounded by chalkboards, cheap guitar amps, lava lamps  and blacklight posters; members would drop in and out as academic arguments, exhaustion, intellectual misadventures  and heavy drug use took their respective tolls, but according to legend they persevered through all obstacles: switching to acoustic instruments  during blackouts, changing locales as as the authorities chased them from one condemned building to another, a haggard, bearded  and discredited physics professor slapping a bongo in 3.14 time while zealous students chanted numerical litanies in order to keep the song going until a new venue could be found.

The descendents of the original members are still playing , currently doing the latest in a decades-long series of farewell tours.  As of this writing, the The E=MC5² hold the unofficial World Record for the longest continuously performed musical composition of all time, with their trademark opus 'Pi-Eyed'  clocking in at an amazing 38 years, 6 months, 10 days, 11 hours and 12 minutes. Thirteen minutes now, since they are still playing!

Today's show will be a tribute to the madness that is the The E=MC5²: We'll hear a carefully selected two-hour excerpt from the decade-spanning classic 'Pi-Eyed' , including a fabulous moment in 2008 when the late Captain Beefheart came out of his hermit-like retirement to sing a nine-hour duet with Amy Winehouse, who wasn't dead yet.  Legend has it that Canadian rockers Rush are playing the background musical parts of this segment, but everyone present was either senile, wasted or currently dead, so no one will ever know for sure. A wayward guitar solo was once credited to Eric Clapton, but upon being asked,  he quickly assigned the blame to George Harrison, who had been dead for years at the time.

With some luck, there might be time to play some other songs, but you'll have to tune in to find out, won't you?

WRIR 97.3 FM...the fun starts at 1PM 8/13/2011.

Warning: Adult Content

One of the most common ways to lose a reader's  interest is by making gratuitously prurient appeals to their  curiosity. Or by writing about sex.

If that doesn't drive them off, try pictures.

I don't know what it is about sex that people find so boring, but even my therapist changes the subject when I try to talk about it, so I'm guessing most people think about doing the fucking in the same way they think about doing the laundry- you feel better afterwards, but geez, what a boring chore, right?.

I think I must find it interesting simply because so much of it is new to me.

I didn't exactly mark the date on my calendar, but I think I gave up on the fucking either during my third or fourth year of cocaine abuse or it maybe it was during my first year of snorting heroin...all I know is that something that had once been very important to me had become irrelevant, if not impossible. And it stayed that way for a long, long time.

But before my gear started failing there were more than a few incidents that left me wondering if I was a truly horrible person. I mean, I was a hardcore drug-addict/alcoholic criminal living the rock-n-roll club life, but I was still a good person , right? My eight-balls always weighed out, and hey man, sorry about last time. I slept with my best friend's girlfriend more than a few times among other things, but I was still a good person, eh? Please ?

If you are a young man and your dick stops working for an extended period of time- months, not days- there is probably something else wrong with you. Like maybe you've been drunk for ten years longer than anyone should stay drunk. That was me in any case and eventually alcoholic withdrawal landed me in ER for a surgical holiday. Luckily I was in a coma for the worst of it, but when I was released I was pretty shaky emotionally, plus I was morbidly obese and dangerously hypertensive and that combination is pretty much a buzz-kill for sexiness.

A hundred years or so passed and I was finally in shape again and eventually I met a woman who felt like doing the fucking with me, the only problem was her boyfriend. She didn't care so much about that as I did- I had made up my mind that I would never again mess with 'taken' women.

A hundred years after that, my woman-friend broke up with her boyfriend and we finally got the chance to do some of the fucking. Let me tell you- that fucking stuff is a whole lot of fun, I kid you not. I don't know why it gets such a bad rep in our society or why no one ever mentions it. You'd think there'd at least be movies about the fucking, or a website- or something. Anything.

For quite a while I managed to keep my promise and  restrain myself from doing the fucking with any married women.

My misguided adherence to a fragment of chivalric code led to a heartbreak that unsettled me much more than I knew- than I know, I'm still in therapy, after all- and led to some ill-considered retaliation by sexual proxy. Why should I say 'no' just because of some stupid vow that I never took, right?  

That thing is there for the taking and if you don't take it, some other dude who isn't so squeamish will.

So do it, said-the-devil-on-my-shoulder. Twisted my poor arm, he did.

Let me put it like this: if I am traveling and I have known you for less than an hour and you manage to work your husband's impotence into a discussion about the pasta we are sharing, I'm going to use a rigid  baguette for emphasis when I invite you back to my hotel room to do the fucking.
When you tell me you have to go to your car first, I will assume that you are actually bailing out through the back exit, so don't mind my look of surprise when you return fifteen minutes later, carrying a gym bag.

If I have known you for two hours and you are showing me the bag of fetish gear that you carry in your car, I will assume you have done this before and I'm not exactly the first one to wreck your home, so to speak.  And you know, this is kinda fun. I can't believe it bores your husband so much...maybe that is why you keep the restraints and flogs in your car, so you don't bore him into being even less interested in the fucking than he already is.

My uncle is only "allowed" to listen to Sports Radio when he is in his car sans aunt, so maybe men think the fucking is boring and confusing in the same way women think NFL Football is dull and stupid, and women keep their whips and cuffs hidden so their men don't go narcoleptic or die of boredom. I must be easily amused , because I'm feeling sorta enthusiastic and my demonstration of that enthusiasm is making you smile beautifully, so maybe I'm not such a bad guy after all. Or at least not totally boring.

The next day lunch is skipped and it is back to the hotel for some more of the fucking. I make a joke that we are a couple of whores because we are on-the-clock, getting paid to do the fucking.
Ooops. You want me to call you that again? And again? Sure. Not a problem...but...what comes next, uh, uh. Not doing that. Nope.

________________

Next : Resolve is for losers.

Train In Vain

I should have known better than to accept Ellen's invitation. I was working as a temporary clerk at a law firm where Ellen was a senior partner. Part of my job was tracking down old court records and case files for her and she wound up being so impressed with my alphanumeric derring-do that she sent me an email inviting me to lunch. I guess she must have won the case or something, because her email had smiley-face emoticons all over it, which was kinda weird to see coming from an old lady.

And Ellen was really old, like maybe forty or even forty-five, at least twenty years older than me. It was like being invited to lunch by one of my mother's friends, a neighbor that Mom always half-jokingly warned me not to take candy from. I always wondered what she meant by that. Or I used to, anyway.

Don't get me wrong. I mean, I sure was glad to be getting a free lunch and all, but I was afraid that my girlfriend Gloria or one of her friends from school would see me out with Ellen and think that I was dating some old chick. Plus,at work  they make me wear khakis and long-sleeves that
cover up my tattoos, so it would be a double-whammy of uncool if some hot art-major chicks saw me.

I considered the risk of being spotted, trying to do that 'look before you leap' thing that Dad always yells about, except he says it like 'look before you fucking leap, you stupid piece of shit' and we aren't allowed to cuss at work, so I tried to keep my thinking clean.

After some pre-leap looking, I decided I'd be safe as long as we didn't go to Starbucks, since half my class seems to work there, including Gloria's best friend Dan. Dan is a big, good-looking guy, but he's gay, so I don't get upset when she kisses him or stays at his house for a week or two. They have never come out and told me, but I'm pretty sure that Gloria just pretends to date Dan so people don't know he's gay. It works too, because I think I am the only one who has figured it out.

Like, Gloria isn't really my official girlfriend right quite yet, I just know that she really digs me and that one day we'll hook up for sure.

See, the last time my band, The Sickening Thud, played out, Gloria was the only person in the whole town that came out to see us play- she was the only person in the whole club except the manager and the soundman- that's how much she digs me and my band. She even came out from behind the bar so that she could listen to us play while she stacked the chairs on top of the tables and I bet anything that she woulda listened to our whole set if the the douche-bag soundman hadn't come up to the stage and told us  that he was closing early because there was no audience and that we owed him fifty bucks and that it would be an extra hundred bucks if we wanted to finish our set.

We were so busy packing up our gear that Gloria didn't have a chance to make her move on me, so she left before we did, which kinda sucked. Plus it cost me 25 bucks because me and our singer Matt  are the only dudes in the band with jobs so we wind up paying for everything.

Anyway, fate would have it that me and Gloria had about a zillion mutual friends on Facebook, so I sent her a request and she friended me right back the next week! So now all I needed to do was let nature take its course. Unless I got busted  being seen with Ellen. Not that there was anything dirty going on, but it would look funny, ya know what I mean?

Well, I didn't have to worry, because Ellen took me to The Open Flue, which I think sounds like a cool bandname but is actually an expensive high-class restaurant. I had  applied for a job there during my freshman year, but they wouldn't hire me because of my tattoos unless I wanted a job as valet. But then they turned me down for that, too. They said it was because of my driving record, but I think it was really discrimination on account of my tats.

I gotta admit, the food was top-notch excellent stuff. I asked for a hamburger but Ellen ordered a steak for me instead. I told the waiter that I would like french fries and he told me that they did not normally serve french fries, but that he could get the cook to prepare some for me. Pretty classy, eh? And it was yummy too. I had a coke, but Ellen had at least three glasses of wine. She really was reminding of Mom's friend by then.

Ellen told me that she had won the case- it was something to do with a railroad- and the client had given her a train-set as a gift and that I looked really strong and healthy and would I mind coming over to her house to help her put her choo-choo back on track? I didn't know how strong you had to be to put together a toy train, but I guess I musta looked like Superman or something to her on account of her being old and maybe drunk too.

I also figured she meant for me to help her after work or something, but it turned out she meant right then, so after she paid for the meal, we took her Jaguar - that same one- way over to the Belle View part of town, which is big-time rich people territory. She had a giant house with a circle driveway that  had a dancing bird statue in a  fountain inside the circle, which was cool even if the water in it looked a little green and mossy and wasn't really a fountain, since it wasn't moving.

Inside her house  was like the inside of a house you would see in one of those boring dental waiting-room kind of magazines, except it isn't boring in real life, it is more like scary- like what if I accidentally broke something or got something dirty or something like that happened ? I'd be broke forever paying for it.

Ellen said the train was in her dressing room, which had open floor space to set it up on. I figured a table would have been better, but she is my boss and technically I was still at work, so I said ok.

Sure enough, there was a really super-deluxe train set still in the box. It was sitting on top of a dresser drawer. Most dudes probably don't even know what a model train set is, much less how to set one up, but Dad had one and I sorta knew how they worked. I placed the box on the floor, knelt down and looked at the contents. The track was a simple oval loop, it would be easy to snap together.

"Can you handle it?" , she asked. I told her sure I could , no problem.

" Great. I need to change clothes, so don't turn around."

No problem, the train would keep me busy.

But she must've forgot that there was a double-sized wall mirror directly opposite me and that I could see her in the reflection as she undressed. I noticed how slow and careful-like she was taking her clothes off and wondered if she was afraid of wrinkling them and that my mom had some tricks for getting wrinkles out of clothes, but the train distracted me and I didn't pass on mom's wrinkle advice or look at the mirror for a few minutes even when Ellen told me that I had a nice ass.

How could she tell through my khakis? I guess she was just being nice.

"You can look now", she said. I looked.

Ellen didn't look like a lawyer anymore. She was wearing a black shiny outfit that looked like something Catwoman would wear, except a lot less so. I'm embarrassed to admit that it gave me a boner just looking her. I stayed kneeling down on the rug, facing away from her so he wouldn't see me like that.

Not to be to gross or anything, but khakis are lightweight fabric and don't hide boners very well so I didn't want to stand up right then, except she asked me to help light her cigarette for her and took a look right at my privates. Then she put here hand down there and I'm not really gonna say much more because I feel like I really let Gloria down  over what happened.

The next time I see Gloria, I will have to confess about what happened and ask her forgiveness and hope that she still might want to go  on a  date or something even though I'd cheated on her before we were a couple. Love is funny like that.

But Ellen kept making me do stuff and I kinda couldn't stop even though I kinda felt embarrassed about all the 'stuff' , Eventually she fell asleep and I noticed that she'd finished two whole bottles of wine since we got there, so I figured she'd be asleep for a long time and I could finally finish setting up the train. That is when I looked at the clock.

It was nine o'clock and I had to have Dad's car back home by ten and Dads car was still parked at work. I tried waking Ellen up, but she just mumbled some dirty words and went back to sleep.

I should have looked before I leapt, but instead I wound up fishing the keys to her Jag out of her purse . I was going to drive it to work, get dad's car, drive dad's car home and then walk back to work and get Ellen's car. Hopefully she would still be asleep and I could finish putting her train together. The big problem was that instead of driving from  work back to Ellen's house, I wound up hitting a mailbox about a half-mile down the road from there, which is where you found me.

If you let me make another phone call , I'm sure Ellen will be awake by now and she will clear this whole thing up.

.

The Rocket

Alec Long missed his mother. On the summer between the fifth and sixth grade of school, Alec had traveled from his grandparent's home in Maryland to visit her for the first time since she had moved away.

Alec's parents had divorced when he was still a baby and after the split, his mother Gina had moved Out West to live with an older man named Carol. Apparently his mom had married Carol years ago, but that marriage had been short-lived and the only thing Gina had to show for it was the rather old and battered Mercedes sedan that Alec was currently sitting in.

The car itself was parked on a desolate stretch of private dirt road somewhere on the sprawling Wyoming ranch of Mr. Simm, a cattleman who owned the bar where Alec's mom served drinks. Mr. Simm's bar was called the Jolly Roger and sported a faux 'pirate' theme. There was a fake pirate ship in the parking lot which Alec thought  was funny because the nearest ocean seemed to be at least ten million miles away from the tedious desert landscape surrounding Evanston, the little oilfield town where his mother had settled after her second divorce.  

That is stupid, he had laughed to himself, there aren't any pirates in the desert.

Alec didn't like boats.

Most of Alec's young life had been spent with his father's parents, as his father Jeff had taken a job as a steward on a cruise ship two days before Alec's premature birth and was, as his grandfather was fond of saying, lost at sea, although he wasn't truly lost like a Robinson Crusoe shipwreck; Jeff just didn't come home very often and when he did , he tended to show up drunk and stay that way until he left. Which was usually sooner than later.

Last Christmas Jeff had given his son a small bag of brightly-colored toy plastic dinosaurs and claimed that he had brought them special all the way from China, see, it says so right on the bag. Alec knew better but he had been so glad to see his father that he didn't mention seeing those same dinosaurs last week, pegged to the wall at the local 7-11, right next to the store's comic-book rack.

Those same dinosaurs were keeping Alec company as he waited for his mother to return. She had followed Mr. Simm's pickup truck as it drove over the half-graveled road, the Mercedes lurching crazily as it bounced on the uneven surface, headlights casting frenzied searchlight beams into the plume of dust left in Mr. Simm's wake. Mr. Simm is always in a hurry, Gina had told her son, but this car can't go that fast on this road.

After a few miles of turbulent driving, they saw the headlights of Mr. Simm' s Ford. He had turned around a few hundred feet ahead of them and stopped. His headlights flashed twice and then went dark. Gina stopped her car, turned off the engine and opened her door.  

Wait here, honey. I need to talk to Mr. Simm for a little bit. I brought your comic-books with us- they are in the backseat, so sit tight until I get back, OK?

Alec wanted to tell her that it wasn't OK. He wanted to tell her that he was scared, that it was dark outside and he couldn't see anything and that if she left now he knew that she would never come back for him. He wanted to tell her that he knew dinosaurs didn't really come special from China just for him. He wanted to scream.

OK, Mom, he said.

Alec clambered into the back and rummaged around in the small red cooler Gina always traveled with, pushing aside the ghastly yellow cans of Coors beer until he finally came up with a chilly can of Coke. He opened it and carefully placed the curled metal tab in the car's ashtray. One of his schoolteachers had told Alec that baby squirrels often strangled on metal pull-tabs that careless people threw out of their car windows. Alec didn't want any part of that.

He had already read the comics at least a dozen times but there wasn't much else to do, so he flicked on the dim overhead lamp and started reading The Amazing Spider-Man again. It was the issue where Peter Parker discovers that the evil Green Goblin is actually his best friend's father. In it, the Green Goblin accidentally gets killed while fighting Spider-Man and now everyone-including Peter's best friend Harry, the New York police and Peter's sickly Aunt May- blames Spider-Man. Peter has to listen to his friends and family talk about how rotten Spider-Man is, when the whole time Peter is Spider-Man. Alec sometimes felt as if his own family secretly hated him. When he thought about his parents, he always wanted to cry, although he also wanted to be strong, even if it was the secret kind of strength like what Peter Parker had, the kind of strength that no one else could ever know about. So most of the time he didn't cry, even when he felt like it.

The  comic story made Alec sad so he turned to his favorite part of the book, which was an advertisement for Estes model rockets. One of Alec's classmates owned a model rocket and had taken Alec out on a launch not long ago and ever since then, Alec had been asking his grandparents for a rocket of his own. He wanted a Saturn model, it was excitingly complicated-looking, with multiple engines that would ignite in stages, just like real thing. In his imagination, he painted the rocket in red and blue patches with black webs , just like Spider-Man's costume, and named it AF-15, after the first-ever Spidey book, Amazing Fantasy #15.

Maybe you can get one for Christmas, Granpa had said. But not sooner, we don't have money for trifles. Ask your mother when you get Out West. Maybe she has triflin' money.

After Alec arrived in Wyoming, Gina asked him if there was anything special he wanted. He showed her his tattered mail-order rocket catalog with the Saturn model circled in red magic marker. Gina whistled. 

That is a lot of money. How about ice cream? Do you like ice cream?

He was ashamed of it, but he started to cry when Gina asked him if he liked ice cream. He really wanted that rocket and he hadn't seen his mom in forever and she couldn't even give him the rocket he had been dreaming of for so long. And suddenly Gina was crying too and Alec didn't know why , only that the grown-ups he knew seemed to cry a lot more than he did , and he was just a kid. She hugged him and said I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm sorry in a whisper he could barely hear.

I am like Spidey, I am sad and everybody I love hates the real me, but I am strong and I don't cry. But he did cry.


Later, Gina told him that she had talked to Mr. Simm and that he was going to help her buy the rocket for him, the best rocket in the whole catalog, with extra engines, parachutes and decals and a deluxe electronic ignition kit that used a large battery to light the missile, not the cheap and unreliable fuses like Alec's friend had used.

Alec didn't know why Mr. Simm wanted them to drive all the way out to nowhere to talk about rockets, but the grownups in Alec's life were always going off to talk to each other in secret places, usually right before they dumped him off with a relative or family friend for a while. Alec didn't want to live with Mr. Simm, rocket or no rocket. He waited in the car, wondering where he might be tomorrow.

For a while, Alec's dinosaurs had an imaginary argument  over which toy would be the first one to ride the rocket into space. That lasted for a few minutes and then he looked again at the rocket advertisement while he finished his Coke. Time passed until he had to step out of the car to pee.

After he was done he stared through the moonless night toward the low shadowy bulk of Mr. Simm's Ford. Without thinking, he crouched and started creeping slowly towards it, walking just off to the side of the road. As he neared it, he could hear faint strains of country-music coming from the cab He couldn't see inside from where he stood, so he snuck closer and stood on his tip-toes, peering diagonally across the truck bed and through the rear cabin window. He remained there for a few minutes.

When he got back to the Mercedes, his mouth was parched dry and he felt like he might choke on the spongy mass of his own tongue. He reached into the cooler for another Coke, but there weren't any, just a half-dozen Coors lazing in the dirty, icy water. Alec had tasted beer before, of course, and found it disgusting, but there was nothing else, so he popped the top of the nearest can. Out of habit, he placed the ring in the ashtray, then he steeled himself and took a small sip, then another, larger one.

It tasted very good to him.


.

Fancy Wash

I slept until nearly 8 a.m. today, which is very late in the morning for me, though that hasn't always been the case. I've always enjoyed being awake just before dawn, only for much of my life I was enjoying it from the other end, staying up all night and going to sleep just as the sun rose, instead of waking up while it was still dark. In either case, I think the quiet hours tend to stir the muse into action. I like to play my guitar in the post-wee hours of the morning, which was odd the first few times I did it, but is part of my routine now. Coffee and guitar make waking up worth the effort. Unless I'm feeling down, that is.

It took nightmares and laundry to wake me up this morning. I dreamed that the Maryland police had found some fault in the service of my 1999 sentence that caused me to be taken back into custody and forced into an alcoholic rehab center. In my nightmare I had just guzzled whiskey and punched a cop, so maybe it was a good time to wake up. And since I was up, I might as well do the laundry and get that out of the way.

The door to the laundry room was ajar, and I wondered if someone had beaten me to the washer. I wasn't prepared to open the door and see my imaginary friend Fancy. It had been two years or so since the last time I had seen her. Back then, she had eloped with my imaginary cousin, the depressive Dee and they had run off together into an imaginary sunset. That was fine with me. They weren't missed.

"Hi", she piped cheerily, as if this chance meeting were nothing unusual.

"You don't exist", I replied. "I am going to close my eyes. When I open them, you will be gone."

"Hi again!"

"Shit. What are you doing here? And where's Dee?"

She produced a suppositious handbag out of thin air, fished a figmental cigarette from within it and affixed it to her illusory lower lip, where it dangled, invisible and  unlit.

"Dee is probably asleep on the sofa. When we met, we used to have sex on that sofa, but looking back on it, I think he was just using me as a way to get closer to the couch, because he sure does like to spend time with it and not so much with me. Anyway, I'm back because he doesn't need me and you do."

"Um, OK. I'm sorry about Dee, but what did you expect? And I don't need you."

"Yes you do. Do you have a light?"

"Fine. Could you check the lint filter in the dryer while I separate the wash? I need a few things from the store too. No."

" That isn't what I meant", she said, transferring the unseen cigarette to her phantasmal hand.

"For what, then? Surely there are better literary devices than you ", I told her, immediately feeling bad about doing so, weakly adding "no offense" to my statement.

"None taken. Anyway, for starters there's that one thing...", she trailed off.

"You live in my head. You know how I feel about that."

"Well, you know what they say about good intentions and the Road to Hell."

" 'They' are some bubble-headed,  untraveled idiots," I responded, "only a naive optimist would believe that the road to Hell would be paved at all. The Road to Hell is a muddy wagon-rut, strewn with sharp useless bits of glass and gravel and dotted with holes deep and treacherous  enough to hobble a horse or snap an automobile axle in half. The Road to Paradise, however, is just on the other side of this here boulder. All you have to do is push it to the top of this hill and all your problems will be solved."

"Wow,man, that's  like, really heavy." She blinked her absent eyes in affected astonishment.

"Don't make fun of me."

"Why not? You're hilarious. Anyway, look at it like a weather map. There's a giant hurricane right...here...and in the center of it is..."

" The 'eye'. A calm center", I interrupted.

"I was going to say ' a massive earthquake' , and if you would let me fini..."

"Earthquakes aren't weather."

"If you would let me finish. I'm just saying that if you want to build a shelter from the storm, maybe you shouldn't build it on land that is liable to split open and cough up  brimstone clouds and giant scorpions with the heads of men."

"Fancy?"

"Yes?"

"You don't like me very much, do you? And the Endtimes touch is a bit-over-the top."

"Gee, ya think? Anyway, I never put much weight in prophecy. It's just bad poetry and subject  to poor interpretations;  relying on prophets to map the future for you is like trying to discover the secrets of the Universe by watching a Doors tribute band do a cover of The End. My friend."

" Hmm. I hate to say this, but I agree with you. I would take that one step further and say that it isn't smart to believe anything that anyone tells you, ever."

"Especially yourself, " she commented.

"Especially myself, yes."

"And you really believe that?"

"Don't set logic snares for me, I know that trick. And of course I don't really believe that. Life would be unlivable if I were to think that way. And if tomorrow didn't hold some faint promise, I wouldn't be washing my socks, now would I? Domestic chores are the first victims of hopelessness, after all."

" So you are doing the dishes next?"

"Don't get carried away."



.

Street Hassle

So I'm standing on the corner, selling flowers and Rolex knock-offs for my Temple, when I see a young woman walking arm-in-arm with a waddling elderly streetperson of indeterminate age and gender. The older person has stringy gray hair and is wearing a stained yellow frock, a reddish Ace Hardware baseball cap and a pink windbreaker over a heavy frame, it resembles a greasy, shambling Easter egg walking on tiny, toothpick legs; the petite younger woman is wearing a little black dress and looks exactly like someone I used to know.

I can't quite place who it is, though, or how we knew each other. It's on the tip of my memory, just out of reach.

Ah. June. That's her name. The last time I saw her was a hot summer  back in 1980-something.  We were visiting her dad on his farm and on our last night there we liberated his cattle. Well, technically we were trying to liberate the horses from the barn, but once we opened the stall ,the horses didn't seem to be interested in finding their freedom. They just sorta shuffled back and forth and looked at us like they wanted carrots, not liberation. We must have left a gate open on our way out or something, because the next day we heard a report on the local news about some stray cows that had fallen off the highway overpass and blocked northbound traffic during morning rush hour. Her dad sure was pissed but I don't think he ever knew it was us.

Anyway, June's doppleganger catches me staring . The saggy, eggy person attached to her  unexpectedly calls me by name. Sensing my confusion, the older person tells me their own name. It's June and the younger look-alike is her daughter, May, who has just graduated from college.

After an initial shock of recognition, we hug. June reeks of cigarettes and cat piss but her daughter smells like fresh laundry and  untapped sexual potential, so I ignore June and devote my attention to May.  
Would she like to buy a flower for my Temple?

"What 'Temple' is that, exactly?", she asks me.

"Um, the inner one", I reply.

May raises one sleek eyebrow. "The inner one? What does that mean?"

"Well, we haven't actually built it yet. That's why we need to sell these flowers. To build the Temple. I have some nice watches too, if you are interested."

"Ah. I see. Well, it was nice meeting you", she says, her tone indicating that it wasn't. My eyes linger on her rounded moon-pie derriere as May walks away, June in tow.

"Ahem!"

The interruption startles me and I turn around and see another familar face, this one belonging to Officer Sal Sterling, a local beat cop and my part-time nemesis. He's fondling one of my Rolex clones with his chubby hands. The cheap, glued-on plastic lens comes off.

"You broke it, you bought it", I tell him.

He ignores my remark and tells me he's investigating a report of stolen flowers. It seems that someone walked away with a freshly planted bed of pansies from the grounds of the Children's Hospital. Sterling followed a trail of  flower petals and dirt clods to my table.  
What do I say to that?

"He went that a-way", I say, pointing at nothing.

"Who?", asks the fat cop.

"The  Flower Bandit, of course. Look, he dropped a twenty dollar bill", I exclaim as I drop a twenty on the sidewalk at Sterling's feet.

Sterling pockets the crumpled note, telling me he'll check it for fingerprints later.Then he walks away, hot on the petaled trail of the Flower Bandit.

Some Truth To That

Sunday afternoon the station sponsored an appearance by Harry Shearer, the voice of many Simpsons characters, including Mr. Burns. Mr. Shearer has been in show business and journalism for a long time- including Saturday Night Live during the Reagan years- and he was also one of the minds behind the classic '' mockumentary film, Spinal Tap, a movie now celebrating it's 25th anniversary.

It wasn't sold out, but he drew a decent crowd:

Inside the Byrd theater.:

Mr. Shearer is the purple and white blob in the middle.

Harp and alcove:

___________________________________________________________

In other news: I'm still broke.

 I was telling a female friend  about my job troubles and of my fear that I would soon be living on the floor of the radio station. She told me not to worry, that if it got bad, she had an extra couch, plenty of  space and that I was welcome to stay with her as long as I needed. Her place, she told me, seemed "sorta empty" since her boyfriend moved out after their break-up earlier this year.

Break-up? Hot damn!  

I'll move in, fix her a lovely supper, let her win a few games of Scrabble and then we'll fall in love and live happily ever after.
Sounds like a plan, I thought.

"Thank you, I might wind up needing a place to stay pretty soon", I told her before rushing home to set about the business of getting evicted from my apartment...it is not a  difficult thing to accomplish, but I didn't feel like waiting the customary 60-90 days...I had an invitation, after all.

Well, it's a good thing I dropped by to visit my generous friend before I got myself kicked out of my current home...in my fevered mind, I had imagined a much different scenario than what I saw at her place.

Her Extra Couch:

"You can park behind the sofa", she advised me, "just be sure to push the trash cans out to the curb on Thursday mornings before the garbage truck comes. You can use the mattress if you want- I threw it out when my boyfriend gave me the crabs, but it has been rained on a lot since then, so it might be clean now."

Hmmm, I thought, the only thing worse than returning to my old job would be to spend the winter holidays living outdoors on a lice-infested mattress in the backyard of an unrequited love interest.

I return to work on Monday.

Ringing Fancy

I don't need Caller ID in order to trace phone calls from my imaginary friend, Fancy. All I need do is lift the receiver, tap a button or two at random and the rest is easy.

Briiing!

Fancy answers on the fourth ring, although I'm certain that she could have picked up earlier. It would be just like her to coyly let it ring a few times, simultaneously masking her enthusiasm and creating the illusion of her being busily engaged in something other than waiting around for the phone to ring.

"Hello?"

"Hey."

"Hey, yourself. Wow,this is a switch- I never expected you to call me. How did you get this number , anyway?"

"I made it up."

"Right,right...so , what's going on? Does this mean you forgive me for dumping Dee?"

Not long ago, Fancy had eloped with my suppositious cousin Dee and things, predictably, had not gone well for them as a couple. The incident had also strained my friendship with Fancy and we had lapsed into a long, uncommunicative period. I don't know (or care) what became of Dee.

"Forgive? Ha!", I laughed, "You should get a medal for dumping him- after they let you out of your padded cell for marrying him in the first place, that is. What the hell were you thinking, anyway?"

" What was I thinking? Ya know, that is a really strange question to ask of an imaginary friend. Anyway, did you call me to pick at my scabs or does this conversation have a point?"

"Yes...it...", I struggled for the words, " I need a sponsor."

"A sponsor?", she asked, mis-interpreting my words, " I thought the radio station stopped paying commissions on sponsorships. Besides, I'm not a business- I'm figmental, remember? A paycheck from me isn't going to help you very much."

"No, not that kind of sponsor. I meant like in AA- the person that you call when you feel like drinking again. What they do is..."

"I know what they do," she interrupted, " but why do you need one? You hate AA and you never feel like drinking. Do you?"

"Well, I did feel the urge- for a moment- on Thursday. After they pulled the surprise lay-off on us , I felt so utterly bereft that I had to resist the temptation to pick up a bottle and a twelve-pack on the way home. I made it OK, but jeez...it was scary the way it just kinda jumped out from nowhere...the need is a lurker and a damn sneaky one at that."

"Like a troll. From under a bridge, I mean."

"I get it. Yeah, like that."

"You called your brother?"

"I did. He was cooking dinner and his succotash was burning, so he couldn't talk. I wish I hadn't called him, actually...it just made him worry."

"Call your friend?"

"Yes. Things aren't good for her at the moment. Plus, she's really mad at her mom right now."

"So you called your brother, but he was busy with succotash, so you called your friend and they bitched about their mother to you?"

"Well, they each have their own problems and that's a bit over-simplified, but yeah."

"What's the complaint about the mother?"

"That she lacks empathy and compassion."

"Oh. Well...why didn't you just go get some ice cream or something? Find some chocolate on sale ."

"Well, I 'celebrated' my new job with a week or so of binging on donuts, ice cream and day-old bakery goods- the sugary kind of baked goods- so now I need to lay off the sugars and fats for a while."

There was a pause while Fancy digested this tidbit.

"Wait", she finally replied, " let me make sure I hear this correctly. You felt the urge to drink- which you know will immediately wreck your entire life and probably kill you inside of a month- but you didn't want to eat ice cream because it might be bad for you? You have really lost your edge when it comes to self-destruction."

"Well, I don't want to self-destroy my cholesterol. It was perfect last time I checked. Oatmeal really does work, you know."

"Dude, I don't think you need a sponsor."

"No?"

"No. You just need to stop agonizing over things that you can't change. Do something constructive with your free time."

"You're right. Perhaps I'll practice writing dialogue."

Another awkward silence. I could feel Fancy wincing on the other end.

"Um, yeah. That, uh, sounds like a g-great idea, really... it does. But do you think you could practice on someone else? I'm kinda busy here."

Riddance

I paused as I approached my front door. There was a sound from inside my apartment that stopped me in my tracks.

There is a laughing woman in there, I thought. This should be interesting.

The laughter ceased as I put my key in the lock. I heard a second, muffled voice utter a single syllable. Uh?

I walked in and found my imaginary friend, Fancy, in my kitchen. She was shoving something into the trashcan and looked a bit flustered.

" Hey", I said, "you still have a key? Remind me to change the locks. What's in the trash?"

"Oh! Hi! Nothing!"

"Right." I removed a pizza container from atop the trashbin and saw what it concealed.

"Fancy, why is there a box of arsenic in my trashcan? Are you trying to poison me?"

She stammered and her reply was interrupted by a quiet voice from the other room.

"No", it spoke, "the poison was my idea. I thought it would be a quaint touch."

It was my metaphorical cousin Dee. Dee is invisible and no one is really sure what sex Dee is. It's sort of a moot point anyway...it's hard to imagine anyone getting horny with Dee around. Dee has a sort of natural downer effect, curbing all the earthly appetites of anyone in the vicinity. I have had to force myself to eat during Dee's visit, and sex hasn't exactly been on my "to-do" list lately. I want to sleep, but can't. All the natural urges are capsized and corrupted by Dee's presence.


"Quaint? You thought poisoning me would be quaint? Are you psychotic?"

"Yes", said Dee.

"I sifted the rat poison out of your oatmeal", chimed Fancy as she held up my flour sifter," it's safe now!"

She looked guilty. Guilty?

"Hey", I asked, "what else are you two up too besides plotting to murder me? "

"Hrrmm", mumbled Dee.

"Um, er", started Fancy, " we were gonna tell you, just as soon as we were done poisoning you. I mean not poisoning you. Anyway, Dee and I sort of hit it off, if you know what I mean, and one thing led to another..."

"We want to get married", interjected Dee.

"Married? Is that even possible?"

"Not in this state", replied Dee.

"Oh. Yeah, that sucks. It'll be a long time before Virginia changes that law...hey, does that mean you are a w..."

"I meant not in this condition", explained Dee, "I'm supposititious."

"That you are", I agreed, looking through my invisible cousin and finding my imaginary friend.

"You want something?" , I asked her.

"Yes. I want permission. To go away."

"Permission? You don't need my permission."

"Yes, I do." I knew this was true as soon as she said it.

"Very well. Go. And make sure you take Dee with you. "

"Oh, I will. He's dreamy."

Yet Another Fancy Call

*Ring*!
*Ring*!

The novelty of living in a battleground state is wearing thin, I think, reaching for the telephone. I am getting truly sick of political calls.

Leave me alone. I can't imagine how anyone could be 'undecided 'at this point, but I assure you I'm not one of them. I can't give you money either. Go away.

"Hello?"

"Hiya! How ya doin' ?"

It's my imaginary friend, Fancy. She always calls when I feel out-of-sorts but she never really cheers me up. Sometimes I think she doesn't like me very much.

"Oh. It's you. What do you want?"

"Jeezus, why are you so cold to me?", she asks, " you never want to talk to me anymore, you never give me your full attention...even now, you are blogging while I'm trying to co- moon-uh-cate with you", she concludes, her voice changing into a petulant whine at the end.

"You are mocking me."

"Maybe. Seriously, though: How are you feeling?"

"Me? I don't know. Confused. Calm.Anxious. Sad. Angry. Happy. Hurt.Hopeful. Depressed. Lucky.Hopeless. Loved. Loathed. Precious. Worthless. Ask me again in five minutes, I'll have more."

"Dude, I don't think I can talk to you for five minutes. You're a real downer. What say we slip around the corner and go get drunk? You'll feel better after we get hammered. At least I will, anyway."

"Fancy", I reply, "you know I don't drink anymore. I can't. It would kill me."

"Well. I guess you can cross "hopeless" off of your list. If you were truly hopeless, you'd be drunk right now...you sure you don't want to grab a Shot Anna? I bet Big Gee would let us run a tab."

"Well. I guess you can cross "hopeless" off. Replace it with "clueless". And yes, I'm sure I don't want a Shot Anna. I have a radio show to get ready for."

"Suit yourself. It's your life. If you don't want to waste it by drinking yourself to death, I can't stop you from not destroying yourself."

"Um...er...right, I think."

"But something's bothering you, isn't it? "

"Yes. It's something that one of my real friends asked me."

"What?"

"She asked me what I used for a support system. I don't go to AA meetings and I don't have religion, where do I find strength when things get bad?"

"And?"

"Well, right now I'm blogging about a conversation with my imaginary friend. It makes me wonder if I haven't gone and invented a whole new kind of crazy."

"Hmmph. Don't flatter yourself."

Fancy Strikes Again

I don't recognize that phone number but I know the ring. It's my imaginary friend, Fancy. I don't want to answer it but Fancy has a siren-like quality to her, as compelling and irresistible as an air raid warning.
I pick up the phone and wait for the bombs to fall.

"Hiya! Long time! How ya been? News bad enough for ya?"

"Hi Fancy. Long time, yeah. I've been OK. You never call when I'm happy, so I guess I must be miserable now."

"Are you saying that I make you miserable?", Fancy asks. She sounds hurt.

"Yes." Ouch.

"Fuck yeah! I still got the touch!" Her tone of pain becomes one of triumph. I've been played.

"Look, you didn't call me just to prove that you can drive me nuts," or did she?, I suddenly wondered to myself, "so there must be some point to this call."

"Yeah, it's about the Republicans."

"The Republicans?"

"Yep. Well, them and the Democrats. I don't know what to call them...Powers That Be? The Illuminati? Military-Industrial Vampires? Anyway, the Evil White Men (EWM) who run everything are making their move right now and it's going to work, mark my words."

"I hate agreeing with you but I think I do. Explain."

"See, right now, America's in trouble. It's not in trouble because of the falling markets, it's the fear of the falling market that's the trouble. Fear is driving bad decision making. The same people who caused the mess will get hired to fix it. I can tell you how that's going to pan out: breadlines, soup kitchens, dust bowls, angry grapes..."

"Damn, girl. You sure do cheer me up. Thing that really scares me is that the McPalin ticket is a set-up, that the-EWM- wants them to lose the election- Obama will inherit two unwinnable wars, a looted Treasury and the very real possibility of being the Head of a broken State and the Republicans are throwing 2008 to regroup for 2012. Obama may or may not be a good President, but he'd have to be a great one to get us out of where we are going and I no longer sense any greatness...by 2012, the public will be broken in wallet and spirit, desperate enough to vote for just about anyone- by 2012 Sarah Palin will be an experienced Governor and campaigner. She will run on a platform of faith and values, reprising Bush's 2000 themes, which will work again...we will elect the neo/ theo-con Christian dictatorship that we, as a people, deserve."

"Well, yeah. Even if she blows this debate, she'll have four years to work on the spin...voters won't get any smarter but she will. Rove will still be here, the PNAC hasn't gone away..."

"God Rest your soul, Uncle Sam."

There's a pause as Fancy and I share an imaginary moment of virtual silence for the grandest illusion of all, The American Dream.

"Oh, right", she picks it up," I wanted to give you shit about your dreams."

"My dreams? You mean the one where I'm dating a 21-year old Nina Hagen and we escape from East Germany by joining a musical circus and after we get married, she inexplicably changes her name to Greta Drake and starts smoking crack on stage...that dream was pretty cool until she started getting high and seeing ghosts...it was creepy."

"Um. As your subconcious, I gotta say that there are somethings that I don't really wanna hear, alright? Your Nina Hagen fetish is best kept to yourself."

I make a mental note to do a Nina Hagen post soon.

She continues, "I was thinking a little less dramatic and metaphorically than that. Basically, if you are to dream properly, you need to return your balls to their sockets."

"My what?"

"Your eyeballs. They need to go into the sockets in your face so that you can see where you are going. Right now you have them shoved so far up your ass that all you can see is tomorrow's shit."

"Wow. I thought you were going light on metaphor. That one was pretty icky. But , yeah, I see what you mean. I'll be OK. It'll be worth being happy just so I don't have to listen to you anymore."

"Hhaha", she laughs giddily, hurting my ear,"I am so fucking good at my job. Bye for now!"

Click.

Fancy Returns

This morning the phone at my work "desk" rang for the first time in the three weeks that I've been here. I thought it might be my boss with an assignment, but it was merely my imaginary friend, Fancy.

"File room. Allan speaking."

"Hi! Hi! Hi! How are ya? How come you never call me anymore?"

"Oh. Fancy. Hi. I'm fucking great. I never call you, ever. You call me, is how it works...how did you get this number anyway?"

"Nevermind that. I have some news that you are dying to tell me, don't I?"

"Fancy, there is a reason that I never call you. It's because you rarely make any sense."

" Oh, don't be so dense. You know what I'm talking about, don't you?"

I did, but I didn't want to make it that easy for her, so I played dumb, waiting for her to go on. She didn't say anything.
Sometimes she doesn't have to.

"Do you mean the new job that I'm trying to get?", I asked as a diversion," they seemed totally gung-ho last week, the Firm checked my references; they even told my old boss that I was their leading candidate, so I placed a follow-up call this morning and was told that they weren't making a decision until at least June 30th, which sorta contradicts what I was told last week..."

"Oh, you silly man. I don't mean the job. I mean the other thing. You know."

Jaysus. I knew exactly what she meant. How much does she know, I wondered to myself.

"Oh...right. You know about that? ", I queried lamely. Fancy has a way of knowing things about me. I have long ago learned to stop questioning the how of it.

"Well, I know the general details, but I wanna hear more. I'm nosy like that."

"Um. OK. I have this friend, right? And we have been..."

"Ooo! Oooo!", interrupted Fancy,"Is it a girl? It's a girl, isn't it? Oooo!"

"Well, yes...as I was saying, we have been writing and talking for almost a year and a half..."

"Oooo! You like her, don't you?"

I'm never going to finish this sentence. This must be what it is like to talk to me, I thought.

"Yes, I do like her. A lot. Unlike you, she brings out the good in me."

Fancy let my little jab pass and proceeded with her typically intrusive questioning. I did my best to answer without embarassing myself. After a few minutes she paused, mulling over what I had told her.
Then she laughed for nearly a full minute. I could feel my ears turning red.

"Hhahahaa...you hung her picture up on your desk? That's priceless! You are such a softie. And those other things you did? Man, that's...well, you have it bad, is all I'm saying. I wish someone would *edited* and *edited* for me. How come you never *edited* a *edited* for me?"

"Honestly? Because I don't like you very much."

"Oh, poo. We both know that isn't true. You can't live without me."

"OK. I'll concede the latter point. But that doesn't mean that I like you."

"Suuurrre....", she drawled, mocking me,"still, I can't believe that you * edited* a * edited* for her..."

Oh, man. Was that too much? It felt like the right thing to do. Fancy was making me nervous.

"Uh, would you stop mentioning that? It's supposed to be a surprise and this is a public blog. I'm getting tired of editing your remarks...and, uh, er, um...do you think I did OK with it?"

"OK? I'd say so! I'm actually really jealous of her. And of you. It's so sweet that I think I'm going into diabetic shock."

Christ, I thought, my imaginary friend is making fun of me.

"Geez, Fancy", I said, " I told a real friend and they were happy for me-for us. The least you can do is stop making retching sounds, ya know?"

"Oh, I'm just having fun. Don't be so sensitive. Besides, you know what's going to happen, don't you?"

"No. What?"

Then she told me. Her words sounded quite familiar.

"Fancy, that's mighty strange," I replied, "only a few people know the whole story and they all say the same thing."

"Ha! I knew it! It scares you, doesn't it?"

"No", I lied.

"Liar. You can't lie to me. I know you too well."

" Yeah, yeah...OK. It terrifies me. A little. My friend feels the same way. We have talked about it."

More laughter. When did Fancy develop a sense of humor?

"What the fuck", I felt compelled to ask," is so goddamned funny?"

"You know what I just told you? Some people spend their entire lives wishing for that. You? For you, it's your deepest fear. That's kinda crazy, if you ask me."

"I didn't ask. And yeah, it is a little crazy. So what?"

"So nothing. I'm just jealous, is all. Now I know why you never call me anymore."

"Fancy," I repeated, "I never call you. You call me...that is how it works."

"Well", she huffed," you be that way. Someday you'll come looking for me and I won't be around."

"Somehow I doubt that."

"Doubt which part?", she asked, "that you'll look for me or that I won't be around?"

"Both", I answered, hanging up.

Fights of Fancy

I wish my imaginary friend would find someone else to talk to. I've blocked her IM and email many times, but she just creates more accounts and renews her attempts to drive me batshit crazy. Now she's got my number and she's not afraid to use it. Her ability to sense my moods is uncanny- she can tell when she's not welcome. That is when she calls.

I had a great but tiring weekend- two radio shows and a recording session with local Irish troubadours Poisoned Dwarf, who were a treat to record. They'll be the featured artist on an upcoming radio program...details to follow...anyway, I was trying to catch up on the news- which doesn't seem to have changed much since 1988- when Fancy rang.

"Hi!"
Oh shit. She's perky today. I'm not loving the perky.


"Hello. What." It's not a query.
Perky, meet Surly.

"I just wanted to tell you that I'm glad the Mormons didn't kill you."

"The Mormons?"

"Yeah. The tornado that just missed you, the truck that almost smooshed your brother. The Mormons were behind those."

"Fancy", I say with exasperation," that tornado missed me by twenty miles."

"A tornado is a lot harder to aim than a truck."

Then she drags up an incident from my past that I wish had stayed forgotten. As a very young man, I lived in Park City , Utah, which was sort of a Utah Green Zone for non-Mormons; the LDS would lob weekend missionaries into town like black-jacketed mortar rounds. If you were unlucky, a pair of these white-shirted projectiles would hit your front door on Saturday morning and ask you to donate 10% of your income -for life- to the Mormon Church.

I was very unlucky. For weeks, the Mormons attacked. I usually felt pretty rough every morning, Saturday being no exception, and I resented these intrusions. At first I was semi-polite, no...thanks...goodbye...slam...but they persisted. They'd send fresh faces- one kid looked over my shoulder and saw my guitar, asked if he could check it out. Nice try. No.

One cold Friday night I filled a large saucepan with water and carried it upstairs to my bedroom.
The next morning, I heard the knock of Mormons. I opened my bedroom window- the one above the front door- and dumped water on the missionaries.
Keep coming back!
They came back. I don't live in Utah anymore.

"How did you know about that?", I ask Fancy after she finishes telling my story.

"It's all in the Mormon archives. With pictures and audiotapes. I gotta say that long hair is not a good look for you."

"Fancy, you are full of shit."

"Really? Do you remember what happened later? The shoot-out? The brawl? The ski chase? There's a bullethole in the hood of your parka where they almost got you."

"Yeah...well, that hole is from a joint. The wind blew it out of my mouth and it burned a hole in the side of the hood. I never had a shoot-out with Mormons. I don't even ski. If you really had access to the archives, you'd know why I left. You'd also know that I can't discuss it."


"Yes, I know", she conceded, " but there are other things that you can discuss. This church, for example. It's the one in Texas where the authorities took custody of the kids. I'm sending you the pic now. Does this look like a happy place to grow up?"



"Geez, yeah...if you are Stalin. Or The Joker. Are they digging a moat around it? It looks incomplete without a moat. Is the climate in El Dorado suitable for alligators?"

"Yes. Did you know that Texas Child Services has found thirty-one underage girls who are pregnant or have already borne children? I'm guessing that DNA tests will prove that these girls
were raped by adult Fundie Mormons. It's a shitstorm for the Prairie Bhurka crowd."

"Hmmm", I mulled this over, "that's awful. Those poor kids are screwed-up no matter what happens next."

"I know", she replied.

I hate it when I agree with Fancy.

"I don't think this will end the FLDS, though. They'll just move again...perhaps to another country. Is Guyana still a country?"

"Yes", said Fancy. Then she fell silent.

I hate it when I agree with Fancy.

Cymbal Systems and Simple Symptoms

Mike called me today. He wrote a song last night and had recorded the drums...would I come over and play guitar on it?

Sure. That sounds fun.

I went over to Mike's and set up my guitar- he gave me some headphones to put on. Mike clicked a button and the 'phones filled with the sound of drums...an odd beat he'd recorded earlier.

I started playing.

Sour notes and shattered chords spilled everywhere. It was a mess.
Stop. Rewind. Try again.
Screech.
Again...I was getting nowhere. Something was wrong.

"Mike", I said," I have no idea at all what you want me to play. Can you give me at least a hint?"

He looked at me as if I were crazy. What did I mean? Just play something...ready? Rolling.... Chaos ensued...chaos and failure. Everything I tried sounded terrible.

"What the fuck?", inquired Mike.

"Just make something up," he explained(doing air guitar), "like do veet veeeet veeet during this part and then whhooom slowly here, where the vocals sound like they should be (even though they aren't) , then go sorta dunn duuuun dun dun- all downs, y'know? in the third part ...and then hit the accents on the break and go back to veet veeeet veeet -and again to where the vocals should be- and then go whhhaaawhooooh....go whhhaaawhooooh four times at the end- there's a solo there and then end on veet. Got it?"

"Dude, I have no idea what the hell you just said."

I was stumped. Mike stopped the song.

"Man, you used to be able to make songs up...just make something up. Damn, you used to do that all the time- what the hell is wrong with you?"

I didn't know. I was frustrated. I'd been itching to play- I've had a lot of time to practice and I have a lot of fancy new guitar tricks to show off...without thinking, I started playing a manic, crazed improv, sans drums...hey check this out, I betcha didn't know I can play ten zillion notes per second...boodeley-boodeley-boodeley...whaawhhoooh! Shameless, it was.

"There! That's exactly what I want!", exclaimed Mike.

"You want heavy metal histrionics ? I'm cool with that. That stuff is a lot more fun to play than it is to listen to."

"No...not that stuff... jam like you just did, except with veet veeeet veeet etc instead of the Van Haleney thingie."

Then it clicked. This sort of thing, veet veeeet veeeet, used to make perfect sense to me...I would just make something up and repeat the process until there was music. For years I did this...one really shouldn't need more than a solid beat, some absurd pantomime and a few whaaawhooohs to make rock and roll.
Duh.
How could I forget that?
After a few hours we had the arrangement for the whole song worked out...I can hear the parts, it's just a matter of rehearsal and time. Veet, dunn duuuunnn , whahhawhhooom and all the rest still make sense to me- more than ever, really...contrary to popular legend, drugs and alcohol do not generally improve one's playing...I am much better at going veet veeeeeet veeet than I used to be- a good thing- I mean,what's the point in having an electric guitar if you don't go whahhhawooom boodeelee boodelee boodelee boowheeew?
It's not difficult or complicated, it's just a matter of attitude really.
Duh.
How could I forget that?

"Jeez", said Mike," I told you it was easy."

Yeah. It is. I keep forgetting that.


A month or so ago, I was invited to ...uhm...play music with a female friend that I have wanted to , ah, er... jam with for a long time...finally, I had my chance. I hadn't played music with anyone for a long time and I didn't know what sort of tunes that this particular person favored, so we found ourselves playing a standard 12 bar blues improv- again, it's a lot more fun to play than it is to listen to, if you hear what I'm saying...anyway, this was a good start except for one thing:
I couldn't get my....er...guitar to um...stay in tune, if you know wot I mean. My bar had no whammy...I had a form of stage fright, I think.

Finally, I had to admit to her that I was baffled. It had been so long since I had played music with another person that I had forgotten how to do everything, including tuning. Especially tuning. I would need some help.

"Don't be ridiculous," my friend said. "You just go like this...and this...there. Seems familiar now, doesn't it? Why don't you try singing a cappella for a while?"

Well, I put my mouth on that money and hummed a heavy metal version of the Star Spangled Banner until Old Glory saluted again, ya know what I'm sayin?
Duh.
Playing music is easy. How could I forget that?
Fuck the blues- we wrote some new songs...it's not complicated. Just make something up, oh yes...use your imagination. Whahhwhooohaoobweee! Repeat until music.


The difficult part comes after the song is over. By the time my friend and I had, um, rehearsed a few times, I thought we were a band. In my head, I started making plans for shows, tours...new CDs of songs yet unwritten- I was convinced that I had some great ideas and we were gonna make it big. I shared these dreams with the person I thought was my new band-mate, my star-in-the-making.

That's nice, she said, but she is a solo act. I could 'sit in' on a song here and there, but she didn't want me-or anyone- in her band right now. Too busy and all that...there were a lot of very valid-sounding reasons given.

That's fine, I said. I even believed myself when I said it.

And I might have still believed it if I hadn't been told that she is currently auditioning guitarists.
Some very bad ones, I might add. Not that I'm bitter.

Mary and Matthew

I stood on the crest of a moonlit hill, looking down at the sea of graves that separated me from my lover and I asked myself a question.
Is this worth it?
I didn't know, so I hopped the low iron fence and started across the cemetery that served as a short-cut to Mary's house.

Our house, but not for long.

------------------------------------------------------------------

I met Mary when I was 19 and she was 30. It was at a club that no longer exists. She was short, auburn-haired and rather plain-looking; a brooding, neurotic drug dealer with a violent temper and a half-wild wolfhound named Gwen. My kinda gal.

I don't recall what was said when we first met-the music was horrible and loud- our first words were probably: "what? huh?" , but she grabbed my hand, pulled me out of the crowd and announced her intentions very clearly. We walked to her nearby house and , three or four months later, she decided that I should move in with her. I was living in a Dude House at the time, so I was ready to accept this offer. I told my roommates to rent my room to the next Dude in line and my belongings started making their way to Mary's home, one backpack at a time. Neither of us had a vehicle, but I didn't own much that wouldn't fit into a rucksack, so the move was made one day at a time, over the course of a month.

In the 30 days before I moved in I started not noticing a number of things that I should have noticed...Mary, for instance, had plenty of her own cocaine- yet mine was disappearing at an alarming rate- and Mary, who was a cook at a fancy hotel during the day, suddenly started working a lot of nights- but with no extra pay to show for it. In fact, the more she 'worked', the more money she had to borrow from me and the more of my blow vanished. Hmmm.
But I was 19 , stupid and unwilling to accept the fact that my girlfriend was trying to destroy me. And herself.

One afternoon I noticed a strange new painting in her living room. There was something familiar... had I seen it before?. I asked Mary about it. She gave me a curious answer:
"Oh, that. My friend stole that from the Museum. I'm holding onto it for him until things cool down."
It started to dawn on me that not only was my girlfriend a drug dealer, she was also a criminal.

-----------------------------------------------------------

The day before the move was complete, Mary called me at a friend's house.

We need to talk. Now.

Why?

I am in trouble. We are in trouble.

Are you calling from jail?

No. Just come over now. We won't see each other again until Sunday and this can't wait.

When I reached the other side of the graveyard, I crawled through a well-used hole in the chain link fence and stood at the end of Mary's street. I made a slow, circling approach, looking for police or FBI vehicles...the neighborhood looked normal. Mary didn't.

Mary looked insane. Her normally narrow eyes were wide with cocaine intensity as she told me the news: She was pregnant. I thought we'd been careful, but...

Wow. I was only 19 and I had some serious misgivings about making a lifetime investment with a woman who was revealing herself to be more and more dangerous every day. I was terrified, my mind was wrapped in tentacles of fear and doubt...this wasn't happening...couldn't be...oh, my God...
Suddenly, I knew.

Am I the father?, I asked.

I don't think so, she replied.

------------------------------------------------

With those words still ringing through my head, I found myself on the squalid basement doorstep of my friend Matt, who lived nearby. Matt was a junkie and he had knowledge that I needed.

"Matt, I need you to show me how to shoot up."
I threw a bag of coke on his table.

"Whoa...why? Are you sure? What's going on?"

I started telling him the whole sorry tale, but he stopped me.

"I know", he said. " She has been coming over here with that guy and shooting up. I didn't know it was your stash. Sorry."

"Wh...why didn't you tell me?"

"What would you have done?"

I thought about that question. "I probably would have hit you", I answered.

"You see?", said Matt.

"Well, fuck that bitch...just show me how to use the fucking needle and I'll be on my way- you can keep that bag." I had plenty of coke, more than enough to OD, which was what I wanted.

Matt looked at me and for a moment the jaundice seemed to lift from his eyes.

"No. I won't help you with this. Look at my life- is this what you want?"

As if on cue, a large rat crawled out of his kitchen sink and into a cupboard. It acted as if it knew the route well.

"Allan", he continued," nothing is worth this. Mary is a lost cause. I am a lost cause. Don't be a lost cause. Don't get into this shit...I will not help you do this. Put your coke back in your pocket and stick it up your nose or up your ass, but you are not sticking it in your arm, not here."

---------------------------------------------------------------

I didn't see Matt again for over ten years; I assumed that he had died, but he hadn't. During an afternoon stroll , I passed a house and Matt was perched on the porch, painting the windows. There was a ladder leaning against the side of the building.

"Climb on up!"

So I did. Matt had been clean for years and he looked great. He was getting married- or maybe he already had- I forget the details, but his life had turned completely around. Things were looking up for him.

I was doing pretty good too...I hadn't done coke for years and the drinking hadn't caught up with me yet. I was enjoying life. It was nice to see Matt. I had something to tell him.

"Matt", I said, "you saved my life back then. I never told you that, but you did. I don't know how to repay you."

"You don't", he told me.

"You don't?"

"No", he tried to explain. "I didn't do that for you. I did that for me. You don't owe me anything."

I didn't quite understand that at the time, but I do now.

It's never too late to say thank you.

Thank you.

Noise War and Peace

I'm currently cat-sitting for a new friend of mine while he travels abroad...prudence dictates that I not post pictures of his vacant home on the internet; suffice it to say that his domicile has an honest-to- gosh yard, complete with a real front porch- a front porch that would be at home in the Appalachian foothills- a sittin' porch. A pickin' porch.

It was on this porch, however, that I learned that my musical prowess does not extend to the mandolin- I think I have a total of about ten ounces of body fat and it's evenly distributed amongst my clumsy, blundering fingertips... Electric guitar is much more suitable for me.

And bass. I love me some bass- I have an old 1960's Gibson SG Jack Bruce model that is so sweet and ergonomic that it almost plays itself-about half of my songs were composed on that bass -although my bassists often improved on my lines, freeing me up to work on guitar nitwittery.
That was one of the best things about being in a good band...I'd bring a rough sketch or recording of a song to rehearsal, introduce it to the band and we'd try it- often it didn't sound anything like my original vision- it would sound better. Less often, the tune would fall flat- this was usually the fault of the song, not the band...some of my songs sucked...anyway, back to my original point, which was...fuck, I dunno, sumthin' about guitar...or bass?

*************************************************************************

Some vaguely bass-related advice: Don't engage in 'noise wars' with people you can't beat.

Many years ago, myself and several other guys shared a second floor apartment- the dudes living above us were the real-life models for Beevis and Butthead and they liked to play their Poodle Metal music loud. Really loud, through a full-sized PA.
Louder than my guitar amp- I had a Fender Twin and I couldn't hear myself practice- seriously loud.
War loud, it was.
One night it became so bad that I grabbed my baseball bat and went upstairs and waited for the song -Pyromania, I think- to end. Then I started bashing the metal door as hard as I possibly could- I had left three massive dents by the time I heard footsteps approach and a wary shadow moved behind the peephole.

What they saw through the fish eye lens was a 19 year-old me- shirtless , sweaty, drunk, beet-red and holding a Louisville Slugger. Smiling.

"Open up.I want to adjust your stereo."

They didn't respond, but the tunes stayed off for the rest of the night.

It quieted down for a bit after that, but the bad upstairs behavior soon resumed.
At 19, I fancied myself to be quite the 'large-A' Anarchist; about the last thing I would have considered was calling the Police for anything...but in this case, I didn't have to.
The authorities came to me.

I was weighing narcotics on my triple-beam scale when the FBI knocked on the door. I thought it was a customer-fuckin' coke-heads were always early, beat the joneses, ya know- so I walked down the hall and answered the door without stashing my gear.

I was greeted by two FBI Agents, a youngish black guy and an older white man- in hindsight, they looked like the guys from Men In Black, but that hadn't been filmed yet- who informed me that they were doing a background check on Beevis, who had apparently applied for a position in Law Enforcement. Did I know Beevis?, they asked, was there anything about his character that I'd like to comment on?

"Well, he really likes loud music. Those dents in the door upstairs were made by me, trying to get his attention- you have to knock really, really hard for him to hear you."

The agents were taking notes.

"I see. By loud music, do you mean they have lots of parties? Crowds, meetings, gatherings...that sort of thing?"

"No, I think it's just the two of them, although they may have had company last night. They threw a sofa out of their window- it's still in the alley, go look."

This, swear to Godzilla, was 100% true. My roomies and I were watching TV the previous evening when we saw a large piece of furniture plummet past outside, narrowly missing the fire escape.
It was a couch and it wound up smashed all over the cobblestones below us.
Messy and dangerous.

"A sofa?", asked a dumbfounded Feeb.

"Well, it was actually a sofa-bed. That's why I think they had help. Those things are too heavy for two dudes to throw."
I helpfully described last night's incident.

"What...what did you do when you saw a sofa fall past your window?", asked the younger agent.

"Do? What do you mean, do? "

"Did you call 911?" , the agent elaborated.

"No. Why? It was just a sofa- it wasn't on fire or anything-besides, the whole upstairs smelled like pot smoke and I didn't want to cause trouble. There are drug dealers in this building and some of them are crazy."

This got their attention.

"Drug dealers? In your opinion, is Beevis involved in drug activity?"

"I don't know. All I know is that it aways smells like weed when they are home."

After that interview, I felt pretty certain that Beevis wasn't going to get his badge...although I sadly suspect I may have been wrong.

Much more recently, my new neighbors decided to have an impromptu house party...they arrived home shortly after the pubs closed at 2AM and decided to celebrate their drunkenness by playing the same disco-dance song over and over and over, screaming and laughing the whole time...I don't know the song, all I could distinguish was the bass line and the beat, which repeated endlessly for hours while I vainly tried to sleep...I briefly considered visiting next-door, but I was afraid that I might show an alarming lack of tact...better to remain calm, I thought...I used the extra waking hours to pick out songs for my radio show...

...throughout my entire two-hour show, I could not get that goddamn bass line out of my head.

When I got home from the station, it was barely 9am and the noise next door had stopped. I imagined that my neighbors had finally drank enough to pass out and were eventually going to wake with some pretty sizable hangovers...I, however, was wide-awake and sober and I could clearly hear the ghost of that bass-line; loud and insistent- the buried heart of a murdered man.

An exorcism was called for.

For my ritual, I summoned the demi-god Gallien-Krueger, who , at 100 watts, is surprisingly loud.
Especially at full volume.

I pointed the bass speaker at my neighbor's bedroom and played the fucking monotonous chromatic bass line from their favorite song over and over and over and over until I heard the sound of people stirring.

This took about two minuteS.

Then I stopped and took a long, uninterrupted nap.

Later, I tried to play the cursed bass riff...and I couldn't recall it.

Success!