I was twenty six when I started my relationship with Julia. She was more or less your average twenty something trying to make it in New York. A Southern transplant with dreams of acting, having a cute lifestyle, and smoking weed with celebrities, Julia was gregarious and charming. Recalling it now, I have no idea why she had any interest in me. Especially since I am quite sure that through a mutual friend she had heard the story of how I once declined a blowjob in favor of finishing the Jimmy Neutron movie. She was undoubtedly regaled with more stories of my foibles too, including but not limited to: the time I got a friend's dog high and tea-bagged it, the time that I made a mold of my penis using a make-your-own-dildo kit and gave it to a friend for her birthday, and the time that I tried to ice skate using my friend's boxers which were stained with skid marks.
Nevertheless, she approached me at a party and we hit it off. Well, perhaps that is jumping the gun a bit. She seemed to like me; I, however, was struck with doubt and serious trepidation. Julia was rather vapid, not in a personal or intellectual sense, but in a corporeal one. Julia was a ghost.
Now, I don't reckon myself a bigot; however, a childhood full of Scooby Doo and X-Files nurtured in me a healthy skepticism when it came to supernatural beings. For all I knew, Julia was actually somebody's creepy uncle dressing up as a ghost in order to scare me out of my apartment so he could buy the land and open up a vintage sex toy emporium. It's happened before. Even if she wasn't, I was as green as ectoplasm when it came to spectral dating. What if I offended her (do you have any idea how many "Boo" puns I tell)? What if I couldn't please her sexually? What if she wanted to haunt me?
Despite all this, Julia and I embarked upon a long friendship-cum-relationship-cum-affair-cum-cum. Things were not easy at first. We had to overcome the many obstacles familiar to interdeath relationships: the intolerance of a prejudiced society, the lack of shared physical sensation, my obsession with ghost yoga, and, most importantly, our differing opinions on the movie film Ghost (A movie I considered to be a cinematic triumph, but Julia lambasted as a vulgar appropriation of ghost culture). Still, we endured and those very points of contention which had once threatened to tear us apart worked to strengthen our relationship.
Things were great for a spell. Julia opened me up to an entire world of ethereal experiences I had never known before. We're talking ghost booze, ghost rolly backpacks, ghost lacrosse, and even ghost butt plugs. For my part, I tried to remind Julia of the finer points of life before death, i.e. unremitting suffering. However, just like a drunk novelist's charming tale about a pedophile, shit was about to get uncomfortable.
It is difficult to pin point when all the trouble started. Some said it was Julia's developing addiction to seltzer water and masturbating on chatroultette. Others claimed it was my obliviousness and general lack of enthusiasm for Ghost Food Not Ghost Bombs (Julia's favorite cause). Regardless, it all came to a head one night in late July. Julia had gone to a party while I stayed at home. Spun on adderall and a Black Snake Moan quintuple feature, I endeavored to wait up for my beloved phantom menace.
Sometime around 4 AM Julia returned home sloppy and blitz on a variety of ghost pills that would give pause even to the illegitimate child of Kesha and Hunter S. Thompson. I confronted her. In a series of escalating insults and emotional revelations, Julia and I had it out. She accused me of being an unsympathetic loser with a terrible butt. I brought up her self destructive behavior and our foundering sex life. "You never possess me anymore! Are you possessing other dudes on the side?!" I never got my answer. Crying and yelling Julia vanished. To this day, I do not know what became of Julia. Yet, occasionally I feel a chill in the air and find the majority of my personal belongings floating in my toilet.
Sunday, April 28, 2013
Wednesday, April 24, 2013
Thespians and Wrestlers
The curtain rose on what Reginald Philson thought was surely going to be a disaster. A respected theater critic and longtime proponent of hobo derision, Reginald arrived at Body Slam: The Musical bearing with him the accouterments of a scathing review: one monocle for the inspection of costumes and stage design, one hyper-caffeinated octuple espresso shot in order for him to focus on his analysis, one notebook and two pens, one black, one red, the black to write notes on the play, the red to make wry comments about his original notes, five warheads for their peculiar ability to make Reginald scowl in a way he was no longer physically capable of due to his life-long affinity for that particular countenance - these five warheads were to be allotted out through the course of the play or taken all at once as a grand gesture of his distaste in the production - and finally one pair of gloves to be put on when he clapped in order to muffle the sound of his applause.
His instruments arrayed, Reginald sat in the front row holding his pen to his notebook with surgical focus. The stage was completely dark. Reginald peered into the blackness only to be temporarily blinded as four pillars of flame appeared. The flames arose from the four corners of a wrestling ring, revealing an announcer. He spoke, proclaiming the main event and ushering in the contestants. Each man had his own unique entrance, each sauntering to the stage, each indulging in a series of lewd gestures, and all accompanied by theme songs of their own choosing (they were both, however, Kid Rock songs).
Scribbling hastily, Reginald began to pick apart the play. He decried the pyrotechnics as dangerous, he blasted the announcer as a defective tit and the wrestlers as effete maggot dicks. He wrote of the ring that it looked as if it were some prototype for a concentration camp. With cramping hand and wilting wit, Reginald leaned back, hoping to be inspired by this theatrical atrocity.
In the ring, the two foes set forth on elaborate musical soliloquies. The first, one Jeremiah Johnson, (wrestling name Stank Finger) a trailer park saint and admirer of butts, lamented his womanizing ways and checkered past, which he described as being "like a checker board fucked a leopard and gave birth to a monstrous half board game/half animal with more squares than a man could know what to do with." For him, wrestling was an art, the beauty of which was capable of assuaging his tormented soul. His competitor, a certain Delonte Parnell, (wrestling name Da Nurse) lashed out against a society which marginalized him and also Sears for not letting him use the $73 left on his expired gift card. A radical activist through and through, Delonte nevertheless had to hang up his revolutionary cap in favor of a nurses uniform and wrestling mask in order to pay the medical bills of the agoraphobic, OCD, IBS, diabetic, and anorexic Faulknerian man-child that was his uncle.
Winded and dismayed from their own soliloquizing both men took defensive stances at opposite ends of the ring. Unconsciously Reginald leaned forward. The bell rang, but the wrestling did not begin. Delonte and Jeremiah instead stood up straight, careening their necks to survey the imaginary crowd. The announcer clambered back into the ring. "Fight!" he said. "You must fight! If not for yourselves, then for me! And if not for me, then for Brian! He's a really good dude." Unfazed the two wrestlers stood motionless. The announcer continued, "Come on! It's Brian's birthday for god's sake!" Still they did not move. "Well, if not for Brian, than for them" the announcer spread his arms and with an exaggerated gesture he indicated the crowd.
Stank Finger walked slowly over to the announcer and put his hand on his shoulder. "There's no one there" he whispered. Whipping his head around frantically, the announcer scanned the crowd. He paused looking out across the audience. The announcer seemed to be staring past the stage, past the fourth wall, even past the many sphincters of the true audience, right into Reginald's soul. The announcer collapsed to his knees and grabbed his head, shaking and weeping uncontrollably. Da Nurse removed his mask and put on his stethoscope, sauntering over to Stank Finger he placed the listening end upon his chest. Titling his head, Da Nurse listened for a heart beat. He removed the stethoscope from his ears and looked into Stank Finger's eyes. They nodded in unison and then embraced. Suddenly the lights were cut. Reginald feared that it might be some kind of terrorist attack designed to strike at the very heart of this nation, i.e. community theaters.
That was, however, not the case. Instead, the lights came back on and a bunch of people dressed up in large heart costumes came out dancing to the Hilary Duff hit "Beat of my Heart." With intricate and often perilous choreography, the hearts, whose arms were subsumed in their massive costumes, pranced around the stage, kicking and attempting to do jazz hands. All the while, Stank Finger and Da Nurse chased them down. With body slams, power bombs, clotheslines, and boots to the face, the two wrestlers eviscerated the assembled host of hearts, leaving some apparently dead. Again the lights cut out.
Reginald chewed on both pens in dire anticipation. He heard much movement on stage, but could not see what was going on up there. Finally, the lights came up on a very different scene. A middle-aged man with a night cap slept, tucked into a large bed in a small bedroom. The door at the end of the bedroom burst open, revealing another middle-aged man carrying a tray with breakfast on it. He walked slowly over to the sleeping man, placing the tray on the ground before touching his leg and saying, "Richard. Richard, wake up."
Richard sat up startled. He grabbed the other man by the arms and said, "Oscar, I've just had the most marvelous dream! It was a vision for a new play!" Oscar shook with delight. "Ohhh, what will you call this vision of yours?" Richard stroked his chin vigorously and then snapped his fingers. "Oklahoma!" The curtain fell.
Reginald sprang to his feet as if he had been shocked. He clapped, wept, jumped, and hollered as if possessed. Blowing snot rocket upon snot rocket onto the stage as if they were bouquets of flowers, Reginald attempted to integrate what he had just witnessed into his critical mind. With a running time of 18 minutes, it was perhaps the shortest production he had ever seen. A revisionist history of theater encapsulated in a dream cliche with entirely anachronistic elements of contemporary wrestling. Reginald could not think. Compelled he tore his note book in half and, still weeping with joy, he pulled out his five remaining warheads. Unwrapping each of them, Reginald dropped trou and shoved all five up his urethra in an act of penance...or something.
His instruments arrayed, Reginald sat in the front row holding his pen to his notebook with surgical focus. The stage was completely dark. Reginald peered into the blackness only to be temporarily blinded as four pillars of flame appeared. The flames arose from the four corners of a wrestling ring, revealing an announcer. He spoke, proclaiming the main event and ushering in the contestants. Each man had his own unique entrance, each sauntering to the stage, each indulging in a series of lewd gestures, and all accompanied by theme songs of their own choosing (they were both, however, Kid Rock songs).
Scribbling hastily, Reginald began to pick apart the play. He decried the pyrotechnics as dangerous, he blasted the announcer as a defective tit and the wrestlers as effete maggot dicks. He wrote of the ring that it looked as if it were some prototype for a concentration camp. With cramping hand and wilting wit, Reginald leaned back, hoping to be inspired by this theatrical atrocity.
In the ring, the two foes set forth on elaborate musical soliloquies. The first, one Jeremiah Johnson, (wrestling name Stank Finger) a trailer park saint and admirer of butts, lamented his womanizing ways and checkered past, which he described as being "like a checker board fucked a leopard and gave birth to a monstrous half board game/half animal with more squares than a man could know what to do with." For him, wrestling was an art, the beauty of which was capable of assuaging his tormented soul. His competitor, a certain Delonte Parnell, (wrestling name Da Nurse) lashed out against a society which marginalized him and also Sears for not letting him use the $73 left on his expired gift card. A radical activist through and through, Delonte nevertheless had to hang up his revolutionary cap in favor of a nurses uniform and wrestling mask in order to pay the medical bills of the agoraphobic, OCD, IBS, diabetic, and anorexic Faulknerian man-child that was his uncle.
Winded and dismayed from their own soliloquizing both men took defensive stances at opposite ends of the ring. Unconsciously Reginald leaned forward. The bell rang, but the wrestling did not begin. Delonte and Jeremiah instead stood up straight, careening their necks to survey the imaginary crowd. The announcer clambered back into the ring. "Fight!" he said. "You must fight! If not for yourselves, then for me! And if not for me, then for Brian! He's a really good dude." Unfazed the two wrestlers stood motionless. The announcer continued, "Come on! It's Brian's birthday for god's sake!" Still they did not move. "Well, if not for Brian, than for them" the announcer spread his arms and with an exaggerated gesture he indicated the crowd.
Stank Finger walked slowly over to the announcer and put his hand on his shoulder. "There's no one there" he whispered. Whipping his head around frantically, the announcer scanned the crowd. He paused looking out across the audience. The announcer seemed to be staring past the stage, past the fourth wall, even past the many sphincters of the true audience, right into Reginald's soul. The announcer collapsed to his knees and grabbed his head, shaking and weeping uncontrollably. Da Nurse removed his mask and put on his stethoscope, sauntering over to Stank Finger he placed the listening end upon his chest. Titling his head, Da Nurse listened for a heart beat. He removed the stethoscope from his ears and looked into Stank Finger's eyes. They nodded in unison and then embraced. Suddenly the lights were cut. Reginald feared that it might be some kind of terrorist attack designed to strike at the very heart of this nation, i.e. community theaters.
That was, however, not the case. Instead, the lights came back on and a bunch of people dressed up in large heart costumes came out dancing to the Hilary Duff hit "Beat of my Heart." With intricate and often perilous choreography, the hearts, whose arms were subsumed in their massive costumes, pranced around the stage, kicking and attempting to do jazz hands. All the while, Stank Finger and Da Nurse chased them down. With body slams, power bombs, clotheslines, and boots to the face, the two wrestlers eviscerated the assembled host of hearts, leaving some apparently dead. Again the lights cut out.
Reginald chewed on both pens in dire anticipation. He heard much movement on stage, but could not see what was going on up there. Finally, the lights came up on a very different scene. A middle-aged man with a night cap slept, tucked into a large bed in a small bedroom. The door at the end of the bedroom burst open, revealing another middle-aged man carrying a tray with breakfast on it. He walked slowly over to the sleeping man, placing the tray on the ground before touching his leg and saying, "Richard. Richard, wake up."
Richard sat up startled. He grabbed the other man by the arms and said, "Oscar, I've just had the most marvelous dream! It was a vision for a new play!" Oscar shook with delight. "Ohhh, what will you call this vision of yours?" Richard stroked his chin vigorously and then snapped his fingers. "Oklahoma!" The curtain fell.
Reginald sprang to his feet as if he had been shocked. He clapped, wept, jumped, and hollered as if possessed. Blowing snot rocket upon snot rocket onto the stage as if they were bouquets of flowers, Reginald attempted to integrate what he had just witnessed into his critical mind. With a running time of 18 minutes, it was perhaps the shortest production he had ever seen. A revisionist history of theater encapsulated in a dream cliche with entirely anachronistic elements of contemporary wrestling. Reginald could not think. Compelled he tore his note book in half and, still weeping with joy, he pulled out his five remaining warheads. Unwrapping each of them, Reginald dropped trou and shoved all five up his urethra in an act of penance...or something.
Wednesday, April 10, 2013
Cult Calling -
Ring, Ring!
Donnie: Hello? Mom?
Mom: Donnie! I'm so glad I got in touch with you.
Donnie: What's going on, mom? I don't have a lot of time right now.
Mom: Well, your father and I just wanted to tell you about our trip to Germany. Also, we miss you.
Donnie: I miss you too, mom, but can't this wait? I'm supposed to be helping with the ritual.
Mom: You and your rituals! Can't the synchronized drinking of lethal poison wait a minute for your poor mother?
Donnie: No, mom, it can't! The overseer is all over my ass today. I already have two dress code violations! Not to mention that I accidentally mixed the blood of the innocent with the blood of a deranged hooker. The overseer says we may not even be able to perform the ritual today because of me.
Mom: Ohh my, I never thought this cult would be so strict. It sounds like YOU were the one who went to Germany!
Donnie: Not cool, mom! Nazi jokes are offensive and worst of all not topical!
Mom: Call down, sweetie. I meant nothing by it. I had a lovely time in Deutschland with your father. The sun was hot, the beer cold, and the frauleins busty.
Donnie: This is exactly why I joined a cult, mom. To get away from you and your irreverent humor. I don't have time for this.
Mom: Well, you could have just went to college like all the other kids. But ohh wait, you didn't have "time" in high school to study.
Donnie: I didn't go to college because I didn't want to! Cults are way better than colleges anyway!
They provide the networking opportunities of a fraternity, the vocational training of ITT, they have a great theater program, and all at a fraction of the cost! Ohh and I got a scholarship! You should be thanking me that you haven't gone broke from paying for my school!
Mom: Your father and I won't be thanking anyone when we are living in a nursing home and we have to beg the neighbors' son for money. He's going to be a lawyer, you know.
Donnie: Lawyers don't get to summon demons, mom.
Mom: I don't know what good a demon will do you when you're out in the street.
Donnie: The overseer says that once we summon the evil demiurge Asag the streets will run with the blood of the innocent.
Mom: Who is this overseers who knows so much? Has he even met this "Asag?"
Donnie: He is a she, mom, and she knows because it was all foretold in the Annals of Silius the Depraved.
Mom: Ohhhhhh, I see. This is about a girl.
Donnie: It's not like that....
Mom: You're just like your uncle! You have a priestess fetish!
Donnie: Stop it! No, I don't!
Mom: Fine, just don't come running to me when she wants to use your taint shavings as an ingredient for the mind-numbing gruel.
Donnie: Mom, I really have to go.
Mom: Wait a minute. Your father wants to talk to you.
Dad: Donnie?
Donnie: Hi Dad.
Dad: Donnie, we're going to be switching our phone plan. Your sister wants unlimited texting so we're changing to Sprint.
Donnie: Okay.
Dad: We're going to have to trade out your current phone for a different model. You've got two choices. One is one of those flippy phone things and the other one has a touch screen. The guy at Radio Shack told me that touch screens are the big thing these days.
Donnie: Sure, that's fine, dad. Whatever.
Dad: The touch screen phone is $30 more expensive, though.
Donnie: I really don't care, dad. Either one is fine.
(Strange chanting)
Donnie: Shit, they're starting the ritual. I have to go now, dad.
Dad: Wait!
Donnie: What, dad?
Dad: It's your auto insurance. Your premiums are going to go up unless you speak with the insurance agent.
(Blood curdling scream)
Donnie: Shit! I'm missing the sacrifice!
Dad: Donnie, before you go I have to tell you one last thing.
Donnie: Yes?!
Dad: It's your taxes. You're going to have to do them on your own this year.
Guttural Voice: Tra amd uk rikomesae ek mesr ik!
(Screaming and laughing)
(click)
Dad: Donnie? Donnie? - (to mom) I didn't even get to tell him about the all the ketamine we've been doing recently.
Saturday, April 6, 2013
Celebrity Match Up!
Directions: Match the celebrity with the historical atrocity which most closely encapsulates his or her personality!
1. Tim Allen A. The Children's Crusade (1212)
2. Ginuwine B. The Sepoy Rebellion (1857)
3. Hayden Christensen C. The Bay of Pigs Invasion (1961)
4. Guy Fieri D. The Ems Dispatch (1870)
5. Kenan and Kel E. The Third Great Awakening (come on, America!)
6. Shanon Doherty F. The Asiatic Vespers (First Mithridatic War 88 B.C.E)
7. January Jones G. The Second Defenestration of Prague (1618)
8. Orson Welles H. The Whiskey Rebellion (1791-1794)
9. Tyler Perry I. Thuggee Murders (1356)
10. Kesha J. The First Sino-Japanese War (1894-1895)
Answers will be posted next week! Stay tuned!
PS - Hint: Orson Welles is the physical manifestation of the Whiskey Rebellion.
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