Nothing New at York as I rode the train home everyday in the first year I lived here; here in the greatest of great places. Nothing New at York as I'd ride the train into and out of the station that no one seemed to get on or off at. Nothing New at York, always assuming suspecting that those few people I never saw get off or on were, special. Nothing New at York... I somehow always knew someday, there'd be, something...
I hesitate this, pause it, until I remember that it was the wind rustling the pages of this open book that alerted her to me. It was these sappy splatters that made her know me and say hello. There is no public or private today, the day after the most important bridge walk I have ever walked. A walk from there to here; a walk in the howling wind and cacophony of a city closing down it's day and starting it's most wonderful evening. Wash your hands and spray on some pretty perfume; Sappy, happily sappy... a lifetime on a windy bench, just inside my blessed Brooklyn, two green chairs pulled closer than a 1000 years of roman bathouse history and two bottles of bunches of grapes... the promise of peaches. Snap shots more clear than the fastest paper could ever hold; little stones in plastic boxes, a stone on the shore, asked for and handed me by a skilled stoner, ancient tools that only special hands can know. My head spins from glimpse to glimpse, two chairs, a sip, a rest from the conversation for a breath, for smoke, a stare and then more kind words, all the while just simply completely utterly, wonderfully, comfortable... Next, Peaches.
Something New at York. I'll no longer ride looking for the people, who I know, who are special, and who are not there. I walk down the pillared isles of this empty place, spinning around half to dance, half to see if I've been followed. A blast of shiny steel, the sound and the rush familiar to every morning on this most surprisingly familiar of mornings. Sitting in the sunshine on the shore beside this greatest of great places, dawn... There is something I've always known, Something New at York, me thinking of nothing but you.
yo, leave home the book of rules!
Wednesday, March 30, 2005
Monday, March 28, 2005
There goes the neighborhood...
Current mood: happy
Woke up late Sunday in a very good mood. Very good mood is putting it lightly, how about fantastic mood, how about best mood I've been in in quite some time, how about best mood ever... tough to rank a good mood. The morning started with listening to all the recorded enquiries from the night before, text mail, voice mail, email. To put it mildly and keep it privately, the night ended at and with very good Karma.
Jen got the first call for coffee. Re-parked the car and headed out to the Green Street Cafe. Our second of what would be many "bump intos" was Dave's dog. She looked rather unhappy lashed to a lamppost, barking at another dog across the sidewalk, so I gave her a few petty pets and huggin' squeezes. Of course, as soon as I was through with that, she started barking again. Dave came out with a chair, coffee and smoke. It being after 12, Jen and I stayed in for wine. As it would be the case that day, on the first smoke break, Amy wandered up along with Dylan, Paul then a tossled haired Dan. Obviously, their night hand ended lately, I was happy I hadn't followed them out of the Mark at 5:00 after my bouncy night cap.
We all split up with various things to do, shit, shower and shave, some off to Dan's parents for Easter Dinner, others off to bed, me... a slow long wonderful walk about my beautiful home in Greenpoint. Stops on stoops for thoughts and smokes. A trip to the beach to look at the city, a wander over to Amy's to see if she was ready... home to read email, pretend to work and a quick nap...
There goes the neighborhood...
I live in a small town populated by what seems to be a disproportionate number of 20 something / 30 somethings... Oh, I have my older gang, the thieves, dealers and regulars from when I bartended at what most of the 20/30 somethings like to call the murder bar. I constantly run into these pals while outside the Mark, tuggin' and a puffin'. These folks are the rock-hardened locals who for the most part have grownup; lived their entire lives in Greenpoint, well OK, extcept for the 5 to 10 they lived upsate, the ones who have stayed put. The yungin's on the other hand seemed to have entered a season of constant in motion...
Jen moved out of my place, from Freeman to Huron; Dylan, couching it at Amy's moved to my place from India to Freeman; The kids, Sally and JP moved right the heck outta Greenpoint and down to Bay Ridge [they will be missed]; a few folks who are now friends who haven't quite recorded themselves in my name brain, notably the Jewish guy who moved into the apartment Jen and I looked at last year; and the guy I'm told looks like Beck; moved from parts unknown to Freeman and Green respectively; Amy moved from India to Commercial; and Ian after splitting with Dawn moved from Freeman to Amy's old place on India... Oh, and Rusty, one of the rock harders' house burned to the ground on Thursday... I'm certain, it being spring... there will be a few more moves before this season is over, hopefully continuing to be due to simple matters such as break ups and restlessness rather than, fire.
Living in what must be my 37th loft, or apartment in the 24 years since my first one, all this seems vaguely familiar. As the neighborhood continues to accept refugees from Williamsburg and the city; Greenpoint is starting to feel more and more familiar. At a nice pace, it's becoming like some of the great neighborhoods I lived in Toronto, more bars, coffee spots and restaurants. Of course, it's not the bars, coffee spots and restaurants, it's all those folks you'll meet outside the coffee shop on Sunday morning, when your smile is too big to be commented upon, when you're just a bit less tired and worn out than your pals are; when your riding the fumes from the fantastically, ecstatically wonderfully lovely night you had the night before that ended at and with good Karma. The old and new friends you bump into at just about the right time; the friends you're just plain old happy to be living amoungst.
Woke up late Sunday in a very good mood. Very good mood is putting it lightly, how about fantastic mood, how about best mood I've been in in quite some time, how about best mood ever... tough to rank a good mood. The morning started with listening to all the recorded enquiries from the night before, text mail, voice mail, email. To put it mildly and keep it privately, the night ended at and with very good Karma.
Jen got the first call for coffee. Re-parked the car and headed out to the Green Street Cafe. Our second of what would be many "bump intos" was Dave's dog. She looked rather unhappy lashed to a lamppost, barking at another dog across the sidewalk, so I gave her a few petty pets and huggin' squeezes. Of course, as soon as I was through with that, she started barking again. Dave came out with a chair, coffee and smoke. It being after 12, Jen and I stayed in for wine. As it would be the case that day, on the first smoke break, Amy wandered up along with Dylan, Paul then a tossled haired Dan. Obviously, their night hand ended lately, I was happy I hadn't followed them out of the Mark at 5:00 after my bouncy night cap.
We all split up with various things to do, shit, shower and shave, some off to Dan's parents for Easter Dinner, others off to bed, me... a slow long wonderful walk about my beautiful home in Greenpoint. Stops on stoops for thoughts and smokes. A trip to the beach to look at the city, a wander over to Amy's to see if she was ready... home to read email, pretend to work and a quick nap...
There goes the neighborhood...
I live in a small town populated by what seems to be a disproportionate number of 20 something / 30 somethings... Oh, I have my older gang, the thieves, dealers and regulars from when I bartended at what most of the 20/30 somethings like to call the murder bar. I constantly run into these pals while outside the Mark, tuggin' and a puffin'. These folks are the rock-hardened locals who for the most part have grownup; lived their entire lives in Greenpoint, well OK, extcept for the 5 to 10 they lived upsate, the ones who have stayed put. The yungin's on the other hand seemed to have entered a season of constant in motion...
Jen moved out of my place, from Freeman to Huron; Dylan, couching it at Amy's moved to my place from India to Freeman; The kids, Sally and JP moved right the heck outta Greenpoint and down to Bay Ridge [they will be missed]; a few folks who are now friends who haven't quite recorded themselves in my name brain, notably the Jewish guy who moved into the apartment Jen and I looked at last year; and the guy I'm told looks like Beck; moved from parts unknown to Freeman and Green respectively; Amy moved from India to Commercial; and Ian after splitting with Dawn moved from Freeman to Amy's old place on India... Oh, and Rusty, one of the rock harders' house burned to the ground on Thursday... I'm certain, it being spring... there will be a few more moves before this season is over, hopefully continuing to be due to simple matters such as break ups and restlessness rather than, fire.
Living in what must be my 37th loft, or apartment in the 24 years since my first one, all this seems vaguely familiar. As the neighborhood continues to accept refugees from Williamsburg and the city; Greenpoint is starting to feel more and more familiar. At a nice pace, it's becoming like some of the great neighborhoods I lived in Toronto, more bars, coffee spots and restaurants. Of course, it's not the bars, coffee spots and restaurants, it's all those folks you'll meet outside the coffee shop on Sunday morning, when your smile is too big to be commented upon, when you're just a bit less tired and worn out than your pals are; when your riding the fumes from the fantastically, ecstatically wonderfully lovely night you had the night before that ended at and with good Karma. The old and new friends you bump into at just about the right time; the friends you're just plain old happy to be living amoungst.
Saturday, March 26, 2005
One L Michele - Part One of Many Many More
OK, enough of the guys for a while, time to hit a hard one. Besides, I gotta get this one down before it gets paved over with false memories brought on by all the similar things that have happened since it. OK, the guys have been fun, but feel I'm risking being falsely identified as the faggot [and you KNOW I mean that politely], the craptastic sapalicious anal-izer of all things that happened last night at yesterdays bathhouse... Anyhow, this is an avoidence, you see me avoiding this, why am I avoiding, well because boys and girls, this is the big one, the extremely personal one. Actually...
I'll preface this 'part one' prologue this with a couple of warnings for the squeamish amongst you. Firstly, turn back now or cover your ears and duck; if you do decide to proceed, do yourself a big favor and download a big old load of big assed gee-tar ballads. Vintage 70's super groups would likely serve you best, launch them, crank it and, well well well just sit back and enjoy a tale so wo-full, well, it'll just break your heart.
Fooling with you, really it's just the standard fare tale, young man moves to the city, meets young girl, takes young girl for a wife then proceeds to hang with the transsexuals as the young wife begins fooling about with her art/business partner who just so happens to share the same name as the young man who moved to the city. You've heard it, lived it all before, it's a story told day after day after day in all those books you see the secretaries reading on the subways, on the way to and from work, dreaming of Fabio, settling for guys like me. Avoiding it still, see that, yes, I am avoiding it still, but, well here we go...
Part One –Mushy Meetings:
Part one starts out in the usual place. A guy with an open heart, waiting to fill it with the excitement of a movie and a first kiss. It had been two years since the end of what he thought should have been that previous thang that shoulda just kept right on going. Two years, two problems, firstly, I believe we are meant to bond, so an open heart creates a sad loneliness that just aches day in and day out; secondly, as my buddy Rick said so eloquently once... two years, "I had stored up enough god damned jizz to shampoo a small brown bear". Two years, is a very long time in your twenties [of course, now in my forties, two years is barely enough time to read the paper and gulp down a coffee for breakfast].
So, there I was, all lonely and horny, beginning to shed my flea bitten artist habits... still living like and with a couple of artists but focusing more on money making, and obviously, money spending. I am pretty sure money plays a big part in this one...
I had been working at this place that colorized black and white movies [dare to jar that memory open and I'll be sitting at this here computer, typing furiously for the next seventeen and a half years]... Colorization, I was changing Jimmy Stewart, Orson Wells, Emory Parlle and Peter Lore from beautifully toneful bits of black and white history into mushy noise reduced globs of ill picked and poorly placed colorfully soulless saps that were to dance dollars into the hands of the folks who then would re-secure the rights to these now brutalizingly colorful 'shows' that were once old movies that had fallen into public domain.
A full 75% of my co-workers were either Ontario College of Art grads or Ontario College of Art dropouts like myself. I had worked my way up to upper management, one L Michele became an Art Director. In other words, she picked the colors and I told all my old art school pals where, when and how to stick them.
There's a side story here... Before taking the plunge, I had been eyeing one L Michele for quite some time. I was ready to ask her the scary question, but then she applied for a promotion, a promotion to that Art Director gig... It being mostly my decision on who would get the gig, I felt it highly inappropriate to ask one of the candidates out on a date the day after I had interviewed her. It took a god damned month for me and my partners in this crime to come to a god damned decision, a whole month on top of those danged two years... run little brown bear RUN.
So there I was, ooogling a gal, AND getting good advice from her pal that I was, indeed being ooogled back. Couldn’t ask her out so what to do, what to do but what the heck, throw a party. Money was good, it was time to show off that this hunter and gather at the young old age of 24 or something had hit the nutpot, sorry, had, nut the jackpot and had enough extra dough-ray-me to invite the gang over and feed them from the cooler he filled mostly himself. By the way, sorry kids, this is actually how we all spoke back in Canada a way back at that turn of that century we called the late 1980's, early 90's. We wuz speakin' post punk hallalua glory be god that the cowboy didn't blows us all ups before weze all got the chance to make and spend all this money talk.
Relatively, I had it good, I was living in about 2000 square feet with a couple of pals; the sign on the door of these 2000 square feet read "The Parkdale Sports Fishing and Hunting Club". Indeed, what else to do but throw a party, invite the gang, invite the job candidate, play it coy but get and give some insider info so that when the decision had been made, the question could be asked... The party ended up being the weekend before the Friday we finally hired one L Michele for the job.
There's a sweater, a drafting table and phony ploy from a great old friend mixed up in this story as it heads off to the in-between time between Saturday's party and Friday's decision... Let's see if I can remember which came first and who did what to who now. But first, an intermission, an interlude and a bit of advise to those twenty something year olds who might be planning to throw thier own party... One, plan your parties in early spring so the chicks wear, then discard their sweaters strategically about the house; Two, be sure to invite all peoples who have spoken kindly, highly and often about all the goodness you have offered humanity; and thirdly, if you have a microwave, hide your alarm clock, otherwise, drunken experiments that destroy both may easily ensue. Fucking Twenty Something Year Olds... that was a perfectly good alarm clock!
More on parties in the late eighties, you gotta know the context kids. Remember at this time DJ’s hadn’t yet been invented. Most of the good ones were still tossing the ball on whatever playground it was they grew up on. Club drugs were still being prescribed as relaxants to couples undergoing marital counseling, heck there really weren’t any clubs, well at least not the hanger sized snake pits full of hopped up happy kids that came a few years later. OK, OK, ya ya there were clubs, but to us these were just fading sweaty places, uptown, halls full of aging Ginos and Ginettes, drinking happily named drinks and dancing to tired out old disco dreck. This was a moment in-between. This was the time that all the stuff I had come of age with, stuff like punk, [I mean real punk, not this emo crap the kiddies swoon to these days], stuff like heroic painting and The Dukes of Hazard etc…. This was the exact moment all these things dried up and blew away. My hog hair bristles sat idly glued into each of their individual paint pots. We had grown up and grown out of a whole big bunch of things; conversly, we hadn’t quite grown into something else, quite yet.
Our party was mus-ikked by pre-recorded mixed tapes. Songs would have easily included our old favorite punky-dunkalicious standbys [I'm so bored of the U.S.A], and the stuff we were listening to, in this in-between time; Hank Williams, Ema Sumac, maybe some Roy Orbison. To old for the Smiths, to young, well too fucking young and fucking meaninglessly few in fucking numbers [fark you I AM gen-X], to have anything that was really fuckin' ours. I do recall it being a really good party though.
So yes, one L Michele dropped by to pop a few beers from that cooler. She came wearing a light blue sweater, I spoke with her and her friends a few times, I kept an eye on her to make sure none of the other hunter gatherer types were angling in on what I wanted quite badly at that time. Ways back then we were a much more polite lot, at least my gang anyhow. Oh, there were a few, lte's call 'em, young Turks, jerks who had histories of bagging and bragging, but it just didn't seem to be “the thing” with my crowd, my polite crowd. Maybe it was just the Art Schoolish overly read overly left pedigree and/or the fact that sexy feminism hadn’t quite percolated itself into the form of lipstick lesbians and lady friends who NOW like to bag and brag like the big boys themselves. I had wary eyes on one "bag and bragger" who was spending attention on one L Michele; one L Michele handled herself quite handily...
When the party was over [most likely sometime early Sunday afternoon], amid the beer bottles, cigarette butts and the usual layer of post party scum, we found, a nice light blue Sweater.
It’s always fun to be picked up. Matter of factly, I think this is the case in most cases. Oh I don’t know, I have on occasion, thrown my growl into the ring, I have gotten all he-manny, attempting to snag the “what I wants” from moment to moment, but honestly, growing up with punkish childhood angst and Art School ethos, just didn’t leave me with the tool required to dive into the frat boy pool and compete for the super lovelies. Stick with what you know, let them come to you; uber passive aggressiveness; sickly charm a little compassion and a little empathy… I had one L Michele in the bag, I was now in possession of her light blue sweater.
…AND with that, this is the END of part ONE of many… Tune in next time, when the we'll examine just how the light blue sweater, drafting table and phony ploy from a great old friend lead us directly to the wasted, or rather the years of growth and experience, eight great years, eight years that I will just have to ask you… just WHAT did you do… Eight years, was a vey long time, I think it may deserve Parts 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 and, maybe 7 and 8, and in all likelihood… 9.
My god, NO, we're not talkin' "best years of your life"... just good years that helped fill the gap between, well between then and now.
I'll preface this 'part one' prologue this with a couple of warnings for the squeamish amongst you. Firstly, turn back now or cover your ears and duck; if you do decide to proceed, do yourself a big favor and download a big old load of big assed gee-tar ballads. Vintage 70's super groups would likely serve you best, launch them, crank it and, well well well just sit back and enjoy a tale so wo-full, well, it'll just break your heart.
Fooling with you, really it's just the standard fare tale, young man moves to the city, meets young girl, takes young girl for a wife then proceeds to hang with the transsexuals as the young wife begins fooling about with her art/business partner who just so happens to share the same name as the young man who moved to the city. You've heard it, lived it all before, it's a story told day after day after day in all those books you see the secretaries reading on the subways, on the way to and from work, dreaming of Fabio, settling for guys like me. Avoiding it still, see that, yes, I am avoiding it still, but, well here we go...
Part One –Mushy Meetings:
Part one starts out in the usual place. A guy with an open heart, waiting to fill it with the excitement of a movie and a first kiss. It had been two years since the end of what he thought should have been that previous thang that shoulda just kept right on going. Two years, two problems, firstly, I believe we are meant to bond, so an open heart creates a sad loneliness that just aches day in and day out; secondly, as my buddy Rick said so eloquently once... two years, "I had stored up enough god damned jizz to shampoo a small brown bear". Two years, is a very long time in your twenties [of course, now in my forties, two years is barely enough time to read the paper and gulp down a coffee for breakfast].
So, there I was, all lonely and horny, beginning to shed my flea bitten artist habits... still living like and with a couple of artists but focusing more on money making, and obviously, money spending. I am pretty sure money plays a big part in this one...
I had been working at this place that colorized black and white movies [dare to jar that memory open and I'll be sitting at this here computer, typing furiously for the next seventeen and a half years]... Colorization, I was changing Jimmy Stewart, Orson Wells, Emory Parlle and Peter Lore from beautifully toneful bits of black and white history into mushy noise reduced globs of ill picked and poorly placed colorfully soulless saps that were to dance dollars into the hands of the folks who then would re-secure the rights to these now brutalizingly colorful 'shows' that were once old movies that had fallen into public domain.
A full 75% of my co-workers were either Ontario College of Art grads or Ontario College of Art dropouts like myself. I had worked my way up to upper management, one L Michele became an Art Director. In other words, she picked the colors and I told all my old art school pals where, when and how to stick them.
There's a side story here... Before taking the plunge, I had been eyeing one L Michele for quite some time. I was ready to ask her the scary question, but then she applied for a promotion, a promotion to that Art Director gig... It being mostly my decision on who would get the gig, I felt it highly inappropriate to ask one of the candidates out on a date the day after I had interviewed her. It took a god damned month for me and my partners in this crime to come to a god damned decision, a whole month on top of those danged two years... run little brown bear RUN.
So there I was, ooogling a gal, AND getting good advice from her pal that I was, indeed being ooogled back. Couldn’t ask her out so what to do, what to do but what the heck, throw a party. Money was good, it was time to show off that this hunter and gather at the young old age of 24 or something had hit the nutpot, sorry, had, nut the jackpot and had enough extra dough-ray-me to invite the gang over and feed them from the cooler he filled mostly himself. By the way, sorry kids, this is actually how we all spoke back in Canada a way back at that turn of that century we called the late 1980's, early 90's. We wuz speakin' post punk hallalua glory be god that the cowboy didn't blows us all ups before weze all got the chance to make and spend all this money talk.
Relatively, I had it good, I was living in about 2000 square feet with a couple of pals; the sign on the door of these 2000 square feet read "The Parkdale Sports Fishing and Hunting Club". Indeed, what else to do but throw a party, invite the gang, invite the job candidate, play it coy but get and give some insider info so that when the decision had been made, the question could be asked... The party ended up being the weekend before the Friday we finally hired one L Michele for the job.
There's a sweater, a drafting table and phony ploy from a great old friend mixed up in this story as it heads off to the in-between time between Saturday's party and Friday's decision... Let's see if I can remember which came first and who did what to who now. But first, an intermission, an interlude and a bit of advise to those twenty something year olds who might be planning to throw thier own party... One, plan your parties in early spring so the chicks wear, then discard their sweaters strategically about the house; Two, be sure to invite all peoples who have spoken kindly, highly and often about all the goodness you have offered humanity; and thirdly, if you have a microwave, hide your alarm clock, otherwise, drunken experiments that destroy both may easily ensue. Fucking Twenty Something Year Olds... that was a perfectly good alarm clock!
More on parties in the late eighties, you gotta know the context kids. Remember at this time DJ’s hadn’t yet been invented. Most of the good ones were still tossing the ball on whatever playground it was they grew up on. Club drugs were still being prescribed as relaxants to couples undergoing marital counseling, heck there really weren’t any clubs, well at least not the hanger sized snake pits full of hopped up happy kids that came a few years later. OK, OK, ya ya there were clubs, but to us these were just fading sweaty places, uptown, halls full of aging Ginos and Ginettes, drinking happily named drinks and dancing to tired out old disco dreck. This was a moment in-between. This was the time that all the stuff I had come of age with, stuff like punk, [I mean real punk, not this emo crap the kiddies swoon to these days], stuff like heroic painting and The Dukes of Hazard etc…. This was the exact moment all these things dried up and blew away. My hog hair bristles sat idly glued into each of their individual paint pots. We had grown up and grown out of a whole big bunch of things; conversly, we hadn’t quite grown into something else, quite yet.
Our party was mus-ikked by pre-recorded mixed tapes. Songs would have easily included our old favorite punky-dunkalicious standbys [I'm so bored of the U.S.A], and the stuff we were listening to, in this in-between time; Hank Williams, Ema Sumac, maybe some Roy Orbison. To old for the Smiths, to young, well too fucking young and fucking meaninglessly few in fucking numbers [fark you I AM gen-X], to have anything that was really fuckin' ours. I do recall it being a really good party though.
So yes, one L Michele dropped by to pop a few beers from that cooler. She came wearing a light blue sweater, I spoke with her and her friends a few times, I kept an eye on her to make sure none of the other hunter gatherer types were angling in on what I wanted quite badly at that time. Ways back then we were a much more polite lot, at least my gang anyhow. Oh, there were a few, lte's call 'em, young Turks, jerks who had histories of bagging and bragging, but it just didn't seem to be “the thing” with my crowd, my polite crowd. Maybe it was just the Art Schoolish overly read overly left pedigree and/or the fact that sexy feminism hadn’t quite percolated itself into the form of lipstick lesbians and lady friends who NOW like to bag and brag like the big boys themselves. I had wary eyes on one "bag and bragger" who was spending attention on one L Michele; one L Michele handled herself quite handily...
When the party was over [most likely sometime early Sunday afternoon], amid the beer bottles, cigarette butts and the usual layer of post party scum, we found, a nice light blue Sweater.
It’s always fun to be picked up. Matter of factly, I think this is the case in most cases. Oh I don’t know, I have on occasion, thrown my growl into the ring, I have gotten all he-manny, attempting to snag the “what I wants” from moment to moment, but honestly, growing up with punkish childhood angst and Art School ethos, just didn’t leave me with the tool required to dive into the frat boy pool and compete for the super lovelies. Stick with what you know, let them come to you; uber passive aggressiveness; sickly charm a little compassion and a little empathy… I had one L Michele in the bag, I was now in possession of her light blue sweater.
…AND with that, this is the END of part ONE of many… Tune in next time, when the we'll examine just how the light blue sweater, drafting table and phony ploy from a great old friend lead us directly to the wasted, or rather the years of growth and experience, eight great years, eight years that I will just have to ask you… just WHAT did you do… Eight years, was a vey long time, I think it may deserve Parts 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 and, maybe 7 and 8, and in all likelihood… 9.
My god, NO, we're not talkin' "best years of your life"... just good years that helped fill the gap between, well between then and now.
Thursday, March 24, 2005
This is NOT a Diary
It was a day... I do not want this, this to turn into a diary, a teenage diary of sadness and angst that all those little girls go through and write about in those little key locked books… BUT today WAS a day,
As you already know, your ‘days’ usually start the night before.. as mine did. Met with the x for a few drinks over witch she could finally explain the goofy assed stories she’d started to pepper me with on Friday, Saturday, Sunday… three way love machines on a Friday morning with the guy I really hope steps up and takes responsibility with her…
This is not a dairy… This is NOT me talking about waking up late after creeping out my pals about how happy I am with the friends I am meeting… This is NOT the daily journal of little things that happen to me, this is about those three words… this is a project, two projects which I will… I will, I will promise as strongly as an any atheist who carries the bible his mom sent him last Christmas, in his pocket can. Carried NOT to feel GOD, but to feel the concern of his mother… I swear on this bible these projects will be completed.
Fun year, good friends… good new friends, WHO I am now probably scaring the firkin be-jebus outta…
Oh, and it was just that, a day… a day with too much work and way not enough… what… compassion, empathy… joy… I do believe it is time for this ol’ fu, to go to…
As you already know, your ‘days’ usually start the night before.. as mine did. Met with the x for a few drinks over witch she could finally explain the goofy assed stories she’d started to pepper me with on Friday, Saturday, Sunday… three way love machines on a Friday morning with the guy I really hope steps up and takes responsibility with her…
This is not a dairy… This is NOT me talking about waking up late after creeping out my pals about how happy I am with the friends I am meeting… This is NOT the daily journal of little things that happen to me, this is about those three words… this is a project, two projects which I will… I will, I will promise as strongly as an any atheist who carries the bible his mom sent him last Christmas, in his pocket can. Carried NOT to feel GOD, but to feel the concern of his mother… I swear on this bible these projects will be completed.
Fun year, good friends… good new friends, WHO I am now probably scaring the firkin be-jebus outta…
Oh, and it was just that, a day… a day with too much work and way not enough… what… compassion, empathy… joy… I do believe it is time for this ol’ fu, to go to…
Monday, March 21, 2005
What does this Smell Like? -- Part I
I woke up this morning in a kind of haze… but honestly, it’s not about this morning and the things I did last night. Sappy sentimentalism has been coursing through the veins for months. Long walks, bridge walks visits to the places I first visited on my first visits to this place I always wanted to live in… I have lost my memory of how it all used to smell.
I have this vague memory of the tingly excitement I would feel as I got off of the bus, train or plane and the dove head first off the deep end into this place. I recall a tradition where I would immediately hit a bodega, buy a beer in a bag and drink it seripticiaously as I walked through midtown thinking whoa, mudda fucka, I’m walking the streets of the greatest place on earth, drinking a beer on the streets where nobody gives a rats ass about me OR the fact that I am doing this or that, god bless the 80's.
My first trip here was a twelfth grade Urban Geography field trip… I carried about 60 spliffs across the border and triped on ‘cids the whole way down. I got an 80 on my notes and saw “West Side Story” while tripping and holding my first Ultravox album in my arms, waiting to puke on the Eddison’s roof while looking at the wooden rockets that hold the water that bathe us and feeds our thirst.
That was high school… Art School brought me here at least 5 more times between 1980 and 1984…
What did it smell like?
It did not smell like the aroma of Seattle brewed coffee… It did not smell like garlically pesto… It smelt like a great big pile of lubrication, lubrication, grease that makes things go. It smelt like garbage, great big pile of garbage… it smelt like the sweat of COOL people doing COOL things. It smelt like the big ol’ place I knew I’d someday come to help myself to the ultimate newness, freshness and excitement. I needed to vindicate the urges some folks in my life have always told me to avoid.
We’re four months away from my fifth annivesrary… although I have completely enjoyed integrating myself into the greatest place on Earth… I have also mourned the loss of the excitement I used to feel when I came… this being the Zenith of all places, I wonder if I’ll ever know that feeling again, I mean, I’m not going to London, Paris or Ho Chi Min city thinking, well this, that, there will be the place I will define myself.
I got it, I have it… I read my books on the V and wish these mother fuckers would stop holding the door open so that I could get to work. I walk the streets of the West and East Villages, Williamsburg, Cobble Hill, Coney Island, Clinton Hill and Greenpoint; as I am walking home a citizen, rather than, as an excited tourist.
It’s good… It’s bad… I miss the way it used to all smell.
I have this vague memory of the tingly excitement I would feel as I got off of the bus, train or plane and the dove head first off the deep end into this place. I recall a tradition where I would immediately hit a bodega, buy a beer in a bag and drink it seripticiaously as I walked through midtown thinking whoa, mudda fucka, I’m walking the streets of the greatest place on earth, drinking a beer on the streets where nobody gives a rats ass about me OR the fact that I am doing this or that, god bless the 80's.
My first trip here was a twelfth grade Urban Geography field trip… I carried about 60 spliffs across the border and triped on ‘cids the whole way down. I got an 80 on my notes and saw “West Side Story” while tripping and holding my first Ultravox album in my arms, waiting to puke on the Eddison’s roof while looking at the wooden rockets that hold the water that bathe us and feeds our thirst.
That was high school… Art School brought me here at least 5 more times between 1980 and 1984…
What did it smell like?
It did not smell like the aroma of Seattle brewed coffee… It did not smell like garlically pesto… It smelt like a great big pile of lubrication, lubrication, grease that makes things go. It smelt like garbage, great big pile of garbage… it smelt like the sweat of COOL people doing COOL things. It smelt like the big ol’ place I knew I’d someday come to help myself to the ultimate newness, freshness and excitement. I needed to vindicate the urges some folks in my life have always told me to avoid.
We’re four months away from my fifth annivesrary… although I have completely enjoyed integrating myself into the greatest place on Earth… I have also mourned the loss of the excitement I used to feel when I came… this being the Zenith of all places, I wonder if I’ll ever know that feeling again, I mean, I’m not going to London, Paris or Ho Chi Min city thinking, well this, that, there will be the place I will define myself.
I got it, I have it… I read my books on the V and wish these mother fuckers would stop holding the door open so that I could get to work. I walk the streets of the West and East Villages, Williamsburg, Cobble Hill, Coney Island, Clinton Hill and Greenpoint; as I am walking home a citizen, rather than, as an excited tourist.
It’s good… It’s bad… I miss the way it used to all smell.
Saturday, March 19, 2005
What is up With Doc?
Current mood: grateful
You must know by now, where you meet the best of your friends. You meet great friends at school, often life long friends. You meet good friends at work, sometimes you’ll even know these people for a year or two after you quit that damn assed job… Outside of that, unless of course you’re the church going type, the best friends you meet will be the peoples you meet at your local bar [or simply your local in my world].
I have and have always had a number of “locals”. Matter of fact, and this is already a future hummm in progress, fact is, I always have at least four or five locals on the go at any given time… heck, the other day, I realized I had become a regular at a bar at 23rd and 1st, O’Connels, only because it’s right near the NYU Dental Center, and doink, I’m there once a week, I have a Local for my trips to the Dentist... [free shot of Jamison when I pop in post-op with a face swollen and stuffed with cotton]. I digress, the story of all my locals is on the burner, keep your eyes and ears posted… I promise a serious slew of twisted tales… BUT, wait, this little ditty isnt about locals, it is about one of my most favorite Irish/Bostonian dude-guys [thanks Wade], Doc.
The place I call my Manhattan local is a place called the Swan. OK, here’s the thing, it’s been my Manhattan local for over six years now. The x introduced me to the place mere moments after I met her. I’ve been hitting the German taps at the Swan since, since well, over a year before I moved here. A local is a place you frequent, I frequent the Swan less and less these days, I mean, it’s not twice a week like it once was… I frequent the Swan now… primarily to see Doc.
Doc’s is an older gentleman [the term gentleman survives today only to describe gentlemen like Doc], he’s older, I believe he’s 69.
Let’s get these facts out of the way; Doc is 69 he’s a Vietnam Vet, he has been awarded both a Purple Heart AND a Bronze Star [more on that later. For my Canadian, and now Italian friends, the Bronze Star is the third highest decoration one can achieve in US military service]… He’s a Vet, he’s a retired NYC plastic Surgeon, he’s gay, AND he is the best damned Republican I have ever had the pleasure to meet.
Doc and I struck up a conversation long before nine eleven… Doc and I became good friends on the basis of my complete non-homophobic ability to kiss him on the lips every time I saw him, and our ability to carry on a conversation that went way beyond the limits of Rush Limbaugh into the nether worlds where Doc and I would meet on the great plains of democratic [non-partisan democratic mind you] enlightenment. Doc is a true American argument… I mean, c’mon, he’s not only gay, a decorated Vietnam Vet, a Republican, he’s also from the Land of the evil, cursed family that tried to hoodwink this country into the belief that booze running flaming wackos… ooops, sorry, Doc is from Massacheustis [the place I cannot not only not pronounce, but cannot spell].
The brief history of Doc as I have managed to glean from those rare moments he’ll talk about himself… He was born to middleclass Irish folk up in Boston, AND he has the accent to prove it. Haven’t heard much of his childhood story, but some how he got himself through med-school. It was back in the sixties, he somehow knew, he’d have to serve; an old prof who was stationed at some camp down in South Carolina, got him assigned down there, but when that sheltered assignment was up… he requested to go to Nam [he had the opportunity to do Germany, but he REQUESTED to go to Nam].
He honestly hasn’t told me much about being a warrior/doctor. He’s mentioned that he saw action, a lot of action. He once told me a weird drunken story about this cove he’d often swim in and how he rescued a small child from the currents and the sharks, how he stitched up this boy after the boy had been bitten. He has yet to, but we have an agreement that he will one day tell me how he was awarded his Bronze Star. It is a story, a date, I am very much looking forward to.
It gets a bit sketchy, but he returned from Nam… and skippity-skip-to-lou a whole whack of stories I have yet to hear later, he became a renowned plastic surgeon in the one place outside of L.A. where plastic surgeons are regarded as absolute gods, NYC. Again it’s sketchy, but I can tell you this by seeing his old apartment, he was living the 1960’s / 1970’s Halston lifestyle…
Sidebar, Halston was the King of NYC in the late 60’s early 70’s, his fashions and scents put him leap frog years above that silly white haired boy who had a loft he called a factory down in the heroin ridden scum town they called… Art. Nope ladies, Halston was NYC in the 60’s and 70’s AND Doc’s old apartment stank of Halston… mirrored walls, zebra print bed sheets, red shag carpets and 100’s of thousand little glass figurines… every where. Not to mention two cute as doodles little doggie dogs who survive to this day at 16 and 18 years of age.
Doc has told me stories of being pulled over by cops in Toronto while breaking red lights in his big old solid gold Roles Royce… He 'Falls' with his pal Trudy [heir to the scientist who invented no more tears and sold it to Johnson and Johnson], he 'Falls' with Trudy at Villa Desta [along with Donettelo et al]… he’s a once a year Winter regular guest at the Bermuda Beach Club… He has introduced me to friends, good friends, who own restaurant chains who get chauffeured around town in classic, 70’s era stretch Mercedes Benz limos. He has told me all these stories, and, the way he has told them, I have never once felt belittled, or subrogated to another class. Doc, my good dear friend, knows the value of friendship… I will leave it at that.
Actually, no maybe I won’t… Here’s a story of good friendship. Last Christmas as I was, in a forgetable state, Doc gave me the greatest compliment a friend could give… I had a whole big whakin’ pile of problems on my plate… I wandered into the Swan and went through them with Doc… Gordon, he said, you don’t need to go to your AA meetings… you don’t have a problem, he said, you just have to do what I do and take a month off whenever you’re feeling out of control… Gordon, he said, go to the NYU Dental center [across from the VET] on first Ave, they’re cheap and they will fix those problems in your mouth… Gordon he said, you and Jen will remain good friends… and, you’ll meet someone soon… we then proceeded up Park, him drinking, while me holding him upright as I was, well at his advise taking a month off. True, utter beautiful friendship.
The compliment came when he told me, Gordon, 'the nice thing about you is that you do not present your problems as problems… things to be attempted to be solved by your friends.. You do not have drama, you have issues; issues are so much more easily manageable'. I took this compliment, stuck it in my heart and promised myself I would stick on it until the day I die… Doc has issues himself; he presents them to me as issues, I discuss them with him rationally, and while I am with him, I refuse to express the concern and dread that I actually feel the moment I walk out of the Swan and onto the L train… nuff said about that.
I have a vague memory of the things I wanted to get up to as I started to write this stuff about my good friend Doc. I think I may have wanted to write about our non-arguments over politics and the general state of the Union [over which Doc and I have buried hours!]. He’s a Republican, I’m a Canadian [and we’ll leave it at that]… We see eye to eye on about 90 percent all issues, and share both 2 of our 3 most favorite Presidents… we argue only at the point where he believes in the Gomorrah theory of the US of A, and where as I see a country, empire, epoch, not yet even beginning to take it’s place in the beautiful history of mankind… Funny thing is Doc and I will argue intensely while holding almost exactly the same position…
I wanted to write about these conversations, but as I got into writing this, I believe I may have started to realize, that although the stuff you “talk” about with your friends may be important, it really is the beautiful opportunity to talk WITH your friends, share the shit, the luck of having someone close, dear and on your wavelength that makes it all important… Craptastic Sap Master, Signing Off…
Love you guys!
[PS, I take pride in giving my younger friend bits and pieces of advice, AND I revel in the advise and examples of life living they give me… to my older friends, Doc, Paul, Fred to name but a few, I am honored, FUCKING HONERED, to have their friendship, and to have axcess to their wisdom…AND am beholden to passing the wise advise they give me onto these younger friend of mine]
Meanwhile, I continue to live as, or like a Potatoe.
You must know by now, where you meet the best of your friends. You meet great friends at school, often life long friends. You meet good friends at work, sometimes you’ll even know these people for a year or two after you quit that damn assed job… Outside of that, unless of course you’re the church going type, the best friends you meet will be the peoples you meet at your local bar [or simply your local in my world].
I have and have always had a number of “locals”. Matter of fact, and this is already a future hummm in progress, fact is, I always have at least four or five locals on the go at any given time… heck, the other day, I realized I had become a regular at a bar at 23rd and 1st, O’Connels, only because it’s right near the NYU Dental Center, and doink, I’m there once a week, I have a Local for my trips to the Dentist... [free shot of Jamison when I pop in post-op with a face swollen and stuffed with cotton]. I digress, the story of all my locals is on the burner, keep your eyes and ears posted… I promise a serious slew of twisted tales… BUT, wait, this little ditty isnt about locals, it is about one of my most favorite Irish/Bostonian dude-guys [thanks Wade], Doc.
The place I call my Manhattan local is a place called the Swan. OK, here’s the thing, it’s been my Manhattan local for over six years now. The x introduced me to the place mere moments after I met her. I’ve been hitting the German taps at the Swan since, since well, over a year before I moved here. A local is a place you frequent, I frequent the Swan less and less these days, I mean, it’s not twice a week like it once was… I frequent the Swan now… primarily to see Doc.
Doc’s is an older gentleman [the term gentleman survives today only to describe gentlemen like Doc], he’s older, I believe he’s 69.
Let’s get these facts out of the way; Doc is 69 he’s a Vietnam Vet, he has been awarded both a Purple Heart AND a Bronze Star [more on that later. For my Canadian, and now Italian friends, the Bronze Star is the third highest decoration one can achieve in US military service]… He’s a Vet, he’s a retired NYC plastic Surgeon, he’s gay, AND he is the best damned Republican I have ever had the pleasure to meet.
Doc and I struck up a conversation long before nine eleven… Doc and I became good friends on the basis of my complete non-homophobic ability to kiss him on the lips every time I saw him, and our ability to carry on a conversation that went way beyond the limits of Rush Limbaugh into the nether worlds where Doc and I would meet on the great plains of democratic [non-partisan democratic mind you] enlightenment. Doc is a true American argument… I mean, c’mon, he’s not only gay, a decorated Vietnam Vet, a Republican, he’s also from the Land of the evil, cursed family that tried to hoodwink this country into the belief that booze running flaming wackos… ooops, sorry, Doc is from Massacheustis [the place I cannot not only not pronounce, but cannot spell].
The brief history of Doc as I have managed to glean from those rare moments he’ll talk about himself… He was born to middleclass Irish folk up in Boston, AND he has the accent to prove it. Haven’t heard much of his childhood story, but some how he got himself through med-school. It was back in the sixties, he somehow knew, he’d have to serve; an old prof who was stationed at some camp down in South Carolina, got him assigned down there, but when that sheltered assignment was up… he requested to go to Nam [he had the opportunity to do Germany, but he REQUESTED to go to Nam].
He honestly hasn’t told me much about being a warrior/doctor. He’s mentioned that he saw action, a lot of action. He once told me a weird drunken story about this cove he’d often swim in and how he rescued a small child from the currents and the sharks, how he stitched up this boy after the boy had been bitten. He has yet to, but we have an agreement that he will one day tell me how he was awarded his Bronze Star. It is a story, a date, I am very much looking forward to.
It gets a bit sketchy, but he returned from Nam… and skippity-skip-to-lou a whole whack of stories I have yet to hear later, he became a renowned plastic surgeon in the one place outside of L.A. where plastic surgeons are regarded as absolute gods, NYC. Again it’s sketchy, but I can tell you this by seeing his old apartment, he was living the 1960’s / 1970’s Halston lifestyle…
Sidebar, Halston was the King of NYC in the late 60’s early 70’s, his fashions and scents put him leap frog years above that silly white haired boy who had a loft he called a factory down in the heroin ridden scum town they called… Art. Nope ladies, Halston was NYC in the 60’s and 70’s AND Doc’s old apartment stank of Halston… mirrored walls, zebra print bed sheets, red shag carpets and 100’s of thousand little glass figurines… every where. Not to mention two cute as doodles little doggie dogs who survive to this day at 16 and 18 years of age.
Doc has told me stories of being pulled over by cops in Toronto while breaking red lights in his big old solid gold Roles Royce… He 'Falls' with his pal Trudy [heir to the scientist who invented no more tears and sold it to Johnson and Johnson], he 'Falls' with Trudy at Villa Desta [along with Donettelo et al]… he’s a once a year Winter regular guest at the Bermuda Beach Club… He has introduced me to friends, good friends, who own restaurant chains who get chauffeured around town in classic, 70’s era stretch Mercedes Benz limos. He has told me all these stories, and, the way he has told them, I have never once felt belittled, or subrogated to another class. Doc, my good dear friend, knows the value of friendship… I will leave it at that.
Actually, no maybe I won’t… Here’s a story of good friendship. Last Christmas as I was, in a forgetable state, Doc gave me the greatest compliment a friend could give… I had a whole big whakin’ pile of problems on my plate… I wandered into the Swan and went through them with Doc… Gordon, he said, you don’t need to go to your AA meetings… you don’t have a problem, he said, you just have to do what I do and take a month off whenever you’re feeling out of control… Gordon, he said, go to the NYU Dental center [across from the VET] on first Ave, they’re cheap and they will fix those problems in your mouth… Gordon he said, you and Jen will remain good friends… and, you’ll meet someone soon… we then proceeded up Park, him drinking, while me holding him upright as I was, well at his advise taking a month off. True, utter beautiful friendship.
The compliment came when he told me, Gordon, 'the nice thing about you is that you do not present your problems as problems… things to be attempted to be solved by your friends.. You do not have drama, you have issues; issues are so much more easily manageable'. I took this compliment, stuck it in my heart and promised myself I would stick on it until the day I die… Doc has issues himself; he presents them to me as issues, I discuss them with him rationally, and while I am with him, I refuse to express the concern and dread that I actually feel the moment I walk out of the Swan and onto the L train… nuff said about that.
I have a vague memory of the things I wanted to get up to as I started to write this stuff about my good friend Doc. I think I may have wanted to write about our non-arguments over politics and the general state of the Union [over which Doc and I have buried hours!]. He’s a Republican, I’m a Canadian [and we’ll leave it at that]… We see eye to eye on about 90 percent all issues, and share both 2 of our 3 most favorite Presidents… we argue only at the point where he believes in the Gomorrah theory of the US of A, and where as I see a country, empire, epoch, not yet even beginning to take it’s place in the beautiful history of mankind… Funny thing is Doc and I will argue intensely while holding almost exactly the same position…
I wanted to write about these conversations, but as I got into writing this, I believe I may have started to realize, that although the stuff you “talk” about with your friends may be important, it really is the beautiful opportunity to talk WITH your friends, share the shit, the luck of having someone close, dear and on your wavelength that makes it all important… Craptastic Sap Master, Signing Off…
Love you guys!
[PS, I take pride in giving my younger friend bits and pieces of advice, AND I revel in the advise and examples of life living they give me… to my older friends, Doc, Paul, Fred to name but a few, I am honored, FUCKING HONERED, to have their friendship, and to have axcess to their wisdom…AND am beholden to passing the wise advise they give me onto these younger friend of mine]
Meanwhile, I continue to live as, or like a Potatoe.
Wednesday, March 16, 2005
The Next BIG Thing... Perhaps
As things were going horribly wrong last night, well OK, no more horribly wrong than any other night recently, I stumbled across what may just become the coolest idea EVER! I found myself chatting with [heck I can't remember names so we'll call 'em] June and Raymond. June was a younger gal, dreaming of moving to Montreal to focus on her passion for photography. Raymond, an ex-Los Angelean was nursing a sore back he had hurt while doing a finish carpentry job. The conversation swapped back and forth between my standard dirge rant against French Canadians, how Toronto would make a far better choice; and stories about hanging doors and knocking together cabinets with my father. I saw Zelig again for the first time a few weeks ago, scared me as much as it did the first time I saw it.
The great idea came from Raymond. I'm not certain whether he claimed to have actually done this, he described it as though he had. Essentially, when he jumps the train home from work, he scans the crowds; like the pea in the roulette table wheel, he eventually fixes his gaze on that certain someone. To call this person his "victim" is kind of creepy, so we'll call this person his victim. The victim unknowingly has become the pace setter, the paper thrower, the rabbit at the dog track, that unlucky Ethiopian selected by his pursuers to breaks in front early then fades at mile 23. Getting to the point, lets call the game "Stalk-Walking", please if you have a better idea, that one wreaks of the whisky-soaked head it just came out of.
Anyhow, Raymond claims he quietly watches these people. Rides the train with them to their stop. Discretely follows them home, to work, or wherever it is they're heading, kills them then steals their belt buckle... wait, sorry, that's not it, right... He essentially follows them home then walks on by as they head in, you know coincidentally like. He'll head on a bit, then bend his way back home. Connect two random dots that otherwise have no need to be connected. Place yourself at random somewhere in this massive place, wander through it unscripted in a play that's been started by a complete strangers simple desire to be at home.
My heart races at the thought of giving this it's first tug.
I'm certain, I'll pick some dude, some dude who could under any circumstance beat the living crap out of me. This would be far too dangerously rude a stunt to pull on some young woman who may already have some built in paranoid defense mechanism which alerts her to jerks like me. So, I'll follow a thick knecked dude out to Morning Side; or I'll follow Mr. Ti-quon-doh out to Flushing, Jamaica; or maybe I'll take the L and follow someone out to New Lots, New Lots, one of those places I know only from waking up in shaking my head saying Gord, not again, not again, frik I gotta pee!
So, off I go, sounds like a Friday after work kind of thing to do. Remember, if you do someday get the funny feeling that that weird old guy IS following you, don't worry none, it's probably just Gord or Raymond, a couple of old "Stalk-Walkers"... Man, that's dangerous advise, better bet: Mace Me! I'll say hello to Brooklyn for ya. Oh, and if you're wondering, I once walked from Greenpoint to Bay Ridge incorporating both the Manhattan and Brooklyn Bridges into my route... Outside of say a few places, say Far Far Rockaway there ain't no place these pins can't get me back from... In other word... no one is safe.
The great idea came from Raymond. I'm not certain whether he claimed to have actually done this, he described it as though he had. Essentially, when he jumps the train home from work, he scans the crowds; like the pea in the roulette table wheel, he eventually fixes his gaze on that certain someone. To call this person his "victim" is kind of creepy, so we'll call this person his victim. The victim unknowingly has become the pace setter, the paper thrower, the rabbit at the dog track, that unlucky Ethiopian selected by his pursuers to breaks in front early then fades at mile 23. Getting to the point, lets call the game "Stalk-Walking", please if you have a better idea, that one wreaks of the whisky-soaked head it just came out of.
Anyhow, Raymond claims he quietly watches these people. Rides the train with them to their stop. Discretely follows them home, to work, or wherever it is they're heading, kills them then steals their belt buckle... wait, sorry, that's not it, right... He essentially follows them home then walks on by as they head in, you know coincidentally like. He'll head on a bit, then bend his way back home. Connect two random dots that otherwise have no need to be connected. Place yourself at random somewhere in this massive place, wander through it unscripted in a play that's been started by a complete strangers simple desire to be at home.
My heart races at the thought of giving this it's first tug.
I'm certain, I'll pick some dude, some dude who could under any circumstance beat the living crap out of me. This would be far too dangerously rude a stunt to pull on some young woman who may already have some built in paranoid defense mechanism which alerts her to jerks like me. So, I'll follow a thick knecked dude out to Morning Side; or I'll follow Mr. Ti-quon-doh out to Flushing, Jamaica; or maybe I'll take the L and follow someone out to New Lots, New Lots, one of those places I know only from waking up in shaking my head saying Gord, not again, not again, frik I gotta pee!
So, off I go, sounds like a Friday after work kind of thing to do. Remember, if you do someday get the funny feeling that that weird old guy IS following you, don't worry none, it's probably just Gord or Raymond, a couple of old "Stalk-Walkers"... Man, that's dangerous advise, better bet: Mace Me! I'll say hello to Brooklyn for ya. Oh, and if you're wondering, I once walked from Greenpoint to Bay Ridge incorporating both the Manhattan and Brooklyn Bridges into my route... Outside of say a few places, say Far Far Rockaway there ain't no place these pins can't get me back from... In other word... no one is safe.
Try Something New... STICK with what You Know!
Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... Stayed out of the corner bar tonight...Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... not picked up the call from my dear friend Frankie... Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... stayed in Canada... Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... not have said yes when Sally invited me over to hang with her and JP... Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... tacked, roll tacked, on the lull... shit, shit, shit, as it hit the lee side of the island; I could've won the race and become a serious sailing dude rather that someone who, just, you know, likes to sail... Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... studied a bit harder, did less, you know... and well aced all my finals...Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... painted 2' by 3' instead of 6' by 12' back in the O. C. and A DAZE... saved a hole lot of dough the g'vment gave me and instead of droping out, dropping it, stuck with it and became the perfect assholes grant sucking... all my art school buddies, stickeny stuck it with it it, friends are now.
Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... stayed in Canada... Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... bought a snow mobile... Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... dressed more warmly and not have moved SOUTH, and met the perfect friends I have met... Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... been a school teacher... remember, cant... teach... AND I definately can't these days... Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... decided I was gay, OR at least happy... Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... stayed with my wife Michele, had babies, and cursed the day I met the woman who, was... the... best... Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... ignored the facts...
Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... left 7A... Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... said yes to the offer of garlic bread... Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... turned around and said, nope, tired, sleepy, rather than, HEY last night did CK ones... I has gotta four hundred dollar a night room, overlooking a picture of Marlyn Manson... Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... enjoyed that all by myself... Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... Something about Mary...
Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... Stayed with the folks... Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... been happy where I wuz... Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... stayed safe with my fingers clenched firmly on the edge of the big... ol' frighteningly horrid, bottemless WELL called love and relationship... Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... We can't, WE do not have the ability, nor the where-with-all fortitude to do all the things, the things we know we, we are so damened good at.... AND YET... WE ARE SO GOD HONESTLY NOW...
Regrets, I've had a few;
But then again, too few to mention.
I did what I had to do
And saw it through without exemption.
Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda...
Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... stayed in Canada... Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... bought a snow mobile... Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... dressed more warmly and not have moved SOUTH, and met the perfect friends I have met... Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... been a school teacher... remember, cant... teach... AND I definately can't these days... Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... decided I was gay, OR at least happy... Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... stayed with my wife Michele, had babies, and cursed the day I met the woman who, was... the... best... Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... ignored the facts...
Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... left 7A... Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... said yes to the offer of garlic bread... Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... turned around and said, nope, tired, sleepy, rather than, HEY last night did CK ones... I has gotta four hundred dollar a night room, overlooking a picture of Marlyn Manson... Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... enjoyed that all by myself... Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... Something about Mary...
Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... Stayed with the folks... Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... been happy where I wuz... Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... stayed safe with my fingers clenched firmly on the edge of the big... ol' frighteningly horrid, bottemless WELL called love and relationship... Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda... We can't, WE do not have the ability, nor the where-with-all fortitude to do all the things, the things we know we, we are so damened good at.... AND YET... WE ARE SO GOD HONESTLY NOW...
Regrets, I've had a few;
But then again, too few to mention.
I did what I had to do
And saw it through without exemption.
Shoulda, Woulda, Coulda...
Monday, March 14, 2005
Murray's Coming to Play Poker Thursday
On November thirteenth Felix Unger was asked to
remove himself from his place of residence. That
request came from his wife.
At some point after this date, say December or January, Dylan K. was asked if he might like to get off his good friend Amy’s couch and explore the idea of, well, you know, sleeping on the floor of a pals place that smelled like the thirteen circular ashtrays of hell… If he’d like to explore the idea of, maybe, once again, well, you know paying rent and having some reasonability.
Deep down he knew she was right. But he also knew that
someday he would return to her.
…and return to her he would. You know sometimes I have to ask… Do I have a roomie? Most times I have to call, Yo, Amy, you’se seens the D? Yo, youse see ‘im, tell ‘im ‘bouts da dough… ya knows? Hey Amy, how you doin'?
With no where else to go, he appeared at the home of
his childhood friend, Oscar Madison.
I ain’t no childhoods fren [end character]… OK, ya ya, sometime at the Mark, we all act like, me ‘specially, like we’re 17 and/or half years younger than we actually are, but hey… that’s only normal. I mean, me, Dylan, Amy, Jen and the rest of the cast… we have secrets. Or do we? We have dark patches of deep brown that seem to swirl around the tab that somebody, one of us, both of us, OR all of us, AND, that mystery man from Columbus seemed to plunk down for us. Somehow, it always seems to get done [thanks Jen]
Sometime earlier, Madison's wife had
thrown him out, requesting that he never return.
Well, I see it more as Jen’s mom’s offer, but we will not get into that here, at this time… in this, this time of tribute…
Can two divorced men share an apartment
without driving each other crazy?
Crazy? Hmmm… well, I do believe our pals Adam and Izabel saw to it that that diagnosis had already been well established. The Hotel admittance room with, Nurse “Lazy Eyed George” and his gurny-boys Paulo, Flacko and Slim had already got this boy down, out and sent to 1st Ave.
Can two… divorced/single guys of disparagingly difference in ages, experience, tastes, intelligence [Dylan went to Brown], hehe [said the Art School Flunky]… AND talent for picking up the… garbage, and doing the dishes; can these two guys “share an apartment without driving each other crazy”… cue Woody Woodson!…
[thanks to Danny, great Corn Beef and Cabbage, your i-ree eys and beutiful mum are deserved... ont a great big thanks for sticking that theme song deep inside the bowels of my somewhat honorarily deserved inclusion on some future liner notes on that next Disclaimers CD... "Yo, Seat'l, dis one goes out to our 'ero in Br'lyn... Go'g, we'll send a car arounds, when they release yo...YO!]
xo
remove himself from his place of residence. That
request came from his wife.
At some point after this date, say December or January, Dylan K. was asked if he might like to get off his good friend Amy’s couch and explore the idea of, well, you know, sleeping on the floor of a pals place that smelled like the thirteen circular ashtrays of hell… If he’d like to explore the idea of, maybe, once again, well, you know paying rent and having some reasonability.
Deep down he knew she was right. But he also knew that
someday he would return to her.
…and return to her he would. You know sometimes I have to ask… Do I have a roomie? Most times I have to call, Yo, Amy, you’se seens the D? Yo, youse see ‘im, tell ‘im ‘bouts da dough… ya knows? Hey Amy, how you doin'?
With no where else to go, he appeared at the home of
his childhood friend, Oscar Madison.
I ain’t no childhoods fren [end character]… OK, ya ya, sometime at the Mark, we all act like, me ‘specially, like we’re 17 and/or half years younger than we actually are, but hey… that’s only normal. I mean, me, Dylan, Amy, Jen and the rest of the cast… we have secrets. Or do we? We have dark patches of deep brown that seem to swirl around the tab that somebody, one of us, both of us, OR all of us, AND, that mystery man from Columbus seemed to plunk down for us. Somehow, it always seems to get done [thanks Jen]
Sometime earlier, Madison's wife had
thrown him out, requesting that he never return.
Well, I see it more as Jen’s mom’s offer, but we will not get into that here, at this time… in this, this time of tribute…
Can two divorced men share an apartment
without driving each other crazy?
Crazy? Hmmm… well, I do believe our pals Adam and Izabel saw to it that that diagnosis had already been well established. The Hotel admittance room with, Nurse “Lazy Eyed George” and his gurny-boys Paulo, Flacko and Slim had already got this boy down, out and sent to 1st Ave.
Can two… divorced/single guys of disparagingly difference in ages, experience, tastes, intelligence [Dylan went to Brown], hehe [said the Art School Flunky]… AND talent for picking up the… garbage, and doing the dishes; can these two guys “share an apartment without driving each other crazy”… cue Woody Woodson!…
[thanks to Danny, great Corn Beef and Cabbage, your i-ree eys and beutiful mum are deserved... ont a great big thanks for sticking that theme song deep inside the bowels of my somewhat honorarily deserved inclusion on some future liner notes on that next Disclaimers CD... "Yo, Seat'l, dis one goes out to our 'ero in Br'lyn... Go'g, we'll send a car arounds, when they release yo...YO!]
xo
Saturday, March 12, 2005
Dog Food AND Other Survival Tips for the Old Single Guy
I love to cook. Unfortunately after some serious alone time after the demise of my marriage and a six year relationship with an x with an extremely limited palette, my cooking skills have gone somewhat atrophied. The x and I never really established that true couply lifestyle. Oh we had a few couply friends, but the dinner party routine never seemed to stick with any of them. The wife and I on the other hand were extremely couply. Heck, I remember one weekend we spent all day Sunday making hand made gnocchi with our couply Italian pals, turning their entire loft into a gnocchi churning out production operation, come to thing of it, outside of the making wine, we turned the place into a typical Toronto Italian garage, roasting red peppers and eggplant, jarin' em' up in oil; gnocchi and tomato sauce. I think we came out of that weekend with enough homemade Italian food to last us well beyond the rest of our married days.
Like I said, the x, on the other hand, although she did like most Italian foods, anything more adventurous than red sauce and mozzarella cheese was a push. Oh, I did sneak in a few good pork chop nights, cooked a few roasts, even developed and perfected a "Glop" recipe that she'd eat a bit of; but her idea of dinner was generally either a pizza slice or a plate full of mozzarella that she'd melt in the microwave throw a handful of salt on and scoop up with tortilla chips. Hey, eat what you like, I'm not judging... Me, I unfortunately slowly drifted into a too lazy to cook stooper of "gut filleing", making "gut paste"; dollar store mac and cheese, maybe dolled up occasionally with a handful of frozen peas. These days, I'm struggling to find my way back to having a more adventurous relationship with my kitchen.
After a few months of single guy-dom, I have managed to clear enough room in my bomb damaged Kitchen, I mean, literally we're talking about 15 trash bags full of whatever it was we'd been piling in the room for three years or so. I mean, there was essentially a path to the microwave, and another to the fridge. She has taken most of the tableware, dishes and whatnot, the stuff she did leave was piled "college dorm" style in the sink, on the counter and all over the stove top. My last super essentially sat there petrifying into some sculptural reminder that I was alone, often drunk and in a pretty surly, "Man not this Fuckity Fuck Fuck, AGAIN", mood.
I think it was a good two months, the weekend that I'd taken a day off work in order to drive her to the Airport in Philly so she could go on the holiday to St. Croix we had planned; the holiday from which I had been scrubbed from the itinerary as it involved bunking with her parents, and my being there may have caused a week of discomfort during their five week stay. Oh well, Presidents Day I turned that into a four-day weekend and proceeded to get my Kitchen "glop" ready again.
This is not about "glop", this is about an even tastier invention [invention, well OK, that's a bit of a stretch], this is about "Dog Food". “Dog Food” happened last week when the funds dried up. A temporary draught in dough based on the untimely withholdings of funds from contracts and pals who, in their defense, just had some unfortunate family issues to contend with; no anger on that front, just another bump to hump myself over.
Anyhow, I found myself with ONE less pork chop and CAN of beans that I'd been dreaming about for most of that afternoon. I didn't really feel like dining on pickles and ketchup... I did however have some frozen hamburger, AND to my surprise a half a bag of frozen corn... Sidebar, a very good friend of mine once had a business plan for this type of situation. He wanted to come up with the programming for a site where you'd essentially type in every ingredient you had on premise, select a mood press a button and have returned to you, voila, a few dozen recipes for the evening meal. I wonder what recipe this site would return me after typing in two pounds of ground beef, a half bag of frozen corn, kosher pickles, a bottle of ketchup and some Lea and Perrins. I guess it would, in all likelihood come back to me with a recipe for "Dog Food".
I'll get off my high "old single man" horse here for a sec, and admit, that the old single man lifestyle isn't all that unique. I mean, it's almost identical to "third year college dude" life [you know after you move out of the dorm]; or the "I just got that first good job and I'm booting all my roomies out" life.
Many of these things I now know are simple derivatives of the "barely married" life I had with the x, and the tips, like how to make "Dog Food" could easily be helpful to some of the young couples I know.
Old Single Gal life, well, I'd never ever hazard a guess on just how crazily complicated that must be. Maybe one of you ladies could share a recipe for melting mozzarella on a plate, throwing salt on it, and scooping it up with tortilla chips.
Anyhow, here's my tip for you today, I've refined it somewhat [made a new batch last night], here's my recipe for "Dog Food", gratis.
Ingredients:
1 Onion [optional, as fresh anything is kind of a dicey proposition these days]
2 Pounds of ground beef or pork, or 1 of each if you don't mind mixing your barnyard pals in a pot.
2 cans of tomato paste
6 pack of Pabst Blue Ribbon
1 decent sized bag of frozen veggies
1 Jiggery Joo of Lea and Perrins
1 quarter sized pile of salt
6 or 7 Marlboro ultra lights
And whatever spices you like and managed to hold onto after the break up [optional]
Instructions:
First, clean just enough dishes from the pile to cook, stir and later eat your "Dog Food" from. You'll need a cutting board [if you went for the onion option]. A knife, or a hammer perhaps to reduce the onion into a more edibley sized pieces. You'll also need a good sized pot/frying pan. I have this old vinyl record sized deep dish frying pan that pretty much serves all my cooking needs regardless of the menu. OK, next step, cut or smash the onion into small chunks and toss 'em into the fry pan, oh you'd probably want to grease the pan up with a nice virgin Olive Oil first. Forgot to mention this.
One thing I learned from Alton Brown on the Food Network. Olive oil is the Single Old Guy in the kitchen's best friend. It takes the heat, doesn't smoke, and does a good job hiding the smell and taste of cooking things that are approaching or at their expiry date. Maybe I assumed that everyone knew that you should have at least a bucket full of Olive Oil on hand at all times.
OK, cooking "Dog Food"... OK, onions are on the fry; next step light up a marly and pop top a tin of beer, you've just completed some of the most serious cooking chores you've completed in months, a small celebration is in order.
Next Step: while the onions are frying, tear the plastic wrap off the top of the Styrofoam meat packets... wait 'till the onions are kinda, well sweaty, caramelized perhaps, ok, until they're almost, just almost blackened. Toss in your meat.
Now, you might want to crumble the meat into the pan, think bite sized again. Ground meat has a tendency to "hamburgerize" into meatball like chunks when cooking, so a last little grind of the ground will go along way down the road when it comes to good eatin'.
Meat is on the burn. I usually put a lid on the pan at this point, grab another beer and give the pile a chance to cook through. But, hey, the lid is optional, hey the smell of cooking meat [mmm cooking MEAT], a beer and a smoke, honestly guys and gals, if they sold that scent as an air freshener... well, you get the picture. When the pile is cooked through; you'll know this after chopping up the bits of meat you failed to grind thoroughly earlier, it's time to dump in the tomato paste [oh ya, sorry, you will need a can opener].
Tomato paste, Tomato paste on it’s own is NOT food. Lick the fork after scraping this goo out of the can and you’ll quickly realize this. Although the cans of tomato paste I use list the ingredients as simply, “tomatoes”, which we all know ARE food, the paste of the poor tomato is impossible to eat. Tangent, DO NOT use tomatoes sauce, crushed tomatoes or whole tomatoes. Remember, we’re making “Dog Food”, not “Doug Soup”. The paste, when combined with the other more edible foods, simply binds the flavour, oils and spices into a cohesive… Tomatoes paste takes “Dog Food” from schlop to dinner.
We’re almost there. We’re now at the point where the remaining four beers, your spices and four or five Marlboro’s come in handy. We’re at simmer time. One, you have to let the paste and meat simmer for a bit, time to chuck in some spices and simmers some more… Knife a hole in the veggie bag, toss, stir and simmer. Simmer, simmer, simmer for an hour, two hours, heck pass out and let the whole thing just sit there on the stove top… It’s only “Dog Food”…
You know, I like food that gets better with age. “Glop” tastes ten times better the next day. “Dog Food” likewise gets better and better the longer the veggies, meat oil and spices get to mingle all dance hall like. On the nights I cook these feasts, I’ll maybe have just a small tinee tiny bowl.
These are meals meant to feed me on all the nights I don’t feel like cooking. These are the pots of goo I call my bestest friend after that bad day at work. These are the great big covered pots of six minutes in the micro while I’m watching the Simpson’s; Meal in a bowl, don’t think about nothing but my most recent obsession, I can feed myself… meal. After all you ARE an OLD SINGLR GUY; cooking everyday, well that just takes time away from more important things, like drinking, your book, and TV. OR things like fear, dread and angst… HUH, wait, Have I reverted back to my punka roots?
Tip today, cook “Dog Food”… Next weeks tip, “How much Cyalis is enough Cyalis for the Old Single Guy”, and/or “How Strategically Wearing the Odd Piece of Women’s Underwear Can, Indeed, Get You Through the Next Lonely Saturday Night You Spend with your 20/30 Something Pals at the Corner Local”.
Enjoy Your Dog Food!
Like I said, the x, on the other hand, although she did like most Italian foods, anything more adventurous than red sauce and mozzarella cheese was a push. Oh, I did sneak in a few good pork chop nights, cooked a few roasts, even developed and perfected a "Glop" recipe that she'd eat a bit of; but her idea of dinner was generally either a pizza slice or a plate full of mozzarella that she'd melt in the microwave throw a handful of salt on and scoop up with tortilla chips. Hey, eat what you like, I'm not judging... Me, I unfortunately slowly drifted into a too lazy to cook stooper of "gut filleing", making "gut paste"; dollar store mac and cheese, maybe dolled up occasionally with a handful of frozen peas. These days, I'm struggling to find my way back to having a more adventurous relationship with my kitchen.
After a few months of single guy-dom, I have managed to clear enough room in my bomb damaged Kitchen, I mean, literally we're talking about 15 trash bags full of whatever it was we'd been piling in the room for three years or so. I mean, there was essentially a path to the microwave, and another to the fridge. She has taken most of the tableware, dishes and whatnot, the stuff she did leave was piled "college dorm" style in the sink, on the counter and all over the stove top. My last super essentially sat there petrifying into some sculptural reminder that I was alone, often drunk and in a pretty surly, "Man not this Fuckity Fuck Fuck, AGAIN", mood.
I think it was a good two months, the weekend that I'd taken a day off work in order to drive her to the Airport in Philly so she could go on the holiday to St. Croix we had planned; the holiday from which I had been scrubbed from the itinerary as it involved bunking with her parents, and my being there may have caused a week of discomfort during their five week stay. Oh well, Presidents Day I turned that into a four-day weekend and proceeded to get my Kitchen "glop" ready again.
This is not about "glop", this is about an even tastier invention [invention, well OK, that's a bit of a stretch], this is about "Dog Food". “Dog Food” happened last week when the funds dried up. A temporary draught in dough based on the untimely withholdings of funds from contracts and pals who, in their defense, just had some unfortunate family issues to contend with; no anger on that front, just another bump to hump myself over.
Anyhow, I found myself with ONE less pork chop and CAN of beans that I'd been dreaming about for most of that afternoon. I didn't really feel like dining on pickles and ketchup... I did however have some frozen hamburger, AND to my surprise a half a bag of frozen corn... Sidebar, a very good friend of mine once had a business plan for this type of situation. He wanted to come up with the programming for a site where you'd essentially type in every ingredient you had on premise, select a mood press a button and have returned to you, voila, a few dozen recipes for the evening meal. I wonder what recipe this site would return me after typing in two pounds of ground beef, a half bag of frozen corn, kosher pickles, a bottle of ketchup and some Lea and Perrins. I guess it would, in all likelihood come back to me with a recipe for "Dog Food".
I'll get off my high "old single man" horse here for a sec, and admit, that the old single man lifestyle isn't all that unique. I mean, it's almost identical to "third year college dude" life [you know after you move out of the dorm]; or the "I just got that first good job and I'm booting all my roomies out" life.
Many of these things I now know are simple derivatives of the "barely married" life I had with the x, and the tips, like how to make "Dog Food" could easily be helpful to some of the young couples I know.
Old Single Gal life, well, I'd never ever hazard a guess on just how crazily complicated that must be. Maybe one of you ladies could share a recipe for melting mozzarella on a plate, throwing salt on it, and scooping it up with tortilla chips.
Anyhow, here's my tip for you today, I've refined it somewhat [made a new batch last night], here's my recipe for "Dog Food", gratis.
Ingredients:
1 Onion [optional, as fresh anything is kind of a dicey proposition these days]
2 Pounds of ground beef or pork, or 1 of each if you don't mind mixing your barnyard pals in a pot.
2 cans of tomato paste
6 pack of Pabst Blue Ribbon
1 decent sized bag of frozen veggies
1 Jiggery Joo of Lea and Perrins
1 quarter sized pile of salt
6 or 7 Marlboro ultra lights
And whatever spices you like and managed to hold onto after the break up [optional]
Instructions:
First, clean just enough dishes from the pile to cook, stir and later eat your "Dog Food" from. You'll need a cutting board [if you went for the onion option]. A knife, or a hammer perhaps to reduce the onion into a more edibley sized pieces. You'll also need a good sized pot/frying pan. I have this old vinyl record sized deep dish frying pan that pretty much serves all my cooking needs regardless of the menu. OK, next step, cut or smash the onion into small chunks and toss 'em into the fry pan, oh you'd probably want to grease the pan up with a nice virgin Olive Oil first. Forgot to mention this.
One thing I learned from Alton Brown on the Food Network. Olive oil is the Single Old Guy in the kitchen's best friend. It takes the heat, doesn't smoke, and does a good job hiding the smell and taste of cooking things that are approaching or at their expiry date. Maybe I assumed that everyone knew that you should have at least a bucket full of Olive Oil on hand at all times.
OK, cooking "Dog Food"... OK, onions are on the fry; next step light up a marly and pop top a tin of beer, you've just completed some of the most serious cooking chores you've completed in months, a small celebration is in order.
Next Step: while the onions are frying, tear the plastic wrap off the top of the Styrofoam meat packets... wait 'till the onions are kinda, well sweaty, caramelized perhaps, ok, until they're almost, just almost blackened. Toss in your meat.
Now, you might want to crumble the meat into the pan, think bite sized again. Ground meat has a tendency to "hamburgerize" into meatball like chunks when cooking, so a last little grind of the ground will go along way down the road when it comes to good eatin'.
Meat is on the burn. I usually put a lid on the pan at this point, grab another beer and give the pile a chance to cook through. But, hey, the lid is optional, hey the smell of cooking meat [mmm cooking MEAT], a beer and a smoke, honestly guys and gals, if they sold that scent as an air freshener... well, you get the picture. When the pile is cooked through; you'll know this after chopping up the bits of meat you failed to grind thoroughly earlier, it's time to dump in the tomato paste [oh ya, sorry, you will need a can opener].
Tomato paste, Tomato paste on it’s own is NOT food. Lick the fork after scraping this goo out of the can and you’ll quickly realize this. Although the cans of tomato paste I use list the ingredients as simply, “tomatoes”, which we all know ARE food, the paste of the poor tomato is impossible to eat. Tangent, DO NOT use tomatoes sauce, crushed tomatoes or whole tomatoes. Remember, we’re making “Dog Food”, not “Doug Soup”. The paste, when combined with the other more edible foods, simply binds the flavour, oils and spices into a cohesive… Tomatoes paste takes “Dog Food” from schlop to dinner.
We’re almost there. We’re now at the point where the remaining four beers, your spices and four or five Marlboro’s come in handy. We’re at simmer time. One, you have to let the paste and meat simmer for a bit, time to chuck in some spices and simmers some more… Knife a hole in the veggie bag, toss, stir and simmer. Simmer, simmer, simmer for an hour, two hours, heck pass out and let the whole thing just sit there on the stove top… It’s only “Dog Food”…
You know, I like food that gets better with age. “Glop” tastes ten times better the next day. “Dog Food” likewise gets better and better the longer the veggies, meat oil and spices get to mingle all dance hall like. On the nights I cook these feasts, I’ll maybe have just a small tinee tiny bowl.
These are meals meant to feed me on all the nights I don’t feel like cooking. These are the pots of goo I call my bestest friend after that bad day at work. These are the great big covered pots of six minutes in the micro while I’m watching the Simpson’s; Meal in a bowl, don’t think about nothing but my most recent obsession, I can feed myself… meal. After all you ARE an OLD SINGLR GUY; cooking everyday, well that just takes time away from more important things, like drinking, your book, and TV. OR things like fear, dread and angst… HUH, wait, Have I reverted back to my punka roots?
Tip today, cook “Dog Food”… Next weeks tip, “How much Cyalis is enough Cyalis for the Old Single Guy”, and/or “How Strategically Wearing the Odd Piece of Women’s Underwear Can, Indeed, Get You Through the Next Lonely Saturday Night You Spend with your 20/30 Something Pals at the Corner Local”.
Enjoy Your Dog Food!
Friday, March 11, 2005
On Your Mark, Get Set... Get Sappy
There is a little place where your shit shines like gravy. A little place where the swirling vortex of fun spins directly into the old wooden door of one small room. I small little room full a hap happy wobbly people. The happy wobbly people I, time and time again have called my pals. In this little room in this little place one can hear the greatest news, or a sad old story. On those rare occasions when I stop flapping my own gums long enough, I've heard the best stories I've heard in quite some time. Oh, a lot of the stories are about just how shit-shiny the gravy is, but others do take you squeaking and squirming into that wonderful hole in your head where you store the seriously secret sap that you've saved to spread on only the most perfectly browned and tender toast.
Big City Lights?
What, are you joking. We live in a tiny little village, smaller than the tiny little village I grew up, even smaller than the villages I like to visit when visiting family. Matter factly, when the country mice come to visit ol' Uncle GoGo, they marvel at just how many people I wave hello too, how many folks I stop to chat with. I don't have the heart to tell 'em that life can be fuller on foot, and that they'd wave a lot more if they'd leave the cul de sac camp site more often. In all honesty, The cul de sac camp site, load 'em up a drop 'em off drive bys life style is one I often pine for. Trading for a wave from my own cute as buttons tiny hockey superstars for a wave from my pals in my little place, could be as fine for me as it is my family. Maybe.
But, I've made my breakfast, buried about as many chances as most anyone ever gets, and lay down comfortably on the bed on the floor I found on the streets of this little tiny place. I'll wallow happily on my streets, and sit by the shore from time to time trying to recall the shape of the howling noises that screached out of the vortex that spun me into and out of the little room full of wobbly friends who put up with handfuls of this sap from that hole in my head where I keep secrets like this one. Love you guys, it has been, is, and will be fun watching come in and out of that old wooden door. See you tonight?
Big City Lights?
What, are you joking. We live in a tiny little village, smaller than the tiny little village I grew up, even smaller than the villages I like to visit when visiting family. Matter factly, when the country mice come to visit ol' Uncle GoGo, they marvel at just how many people I wave hello too, how many folks I stop to chat with. I don't have the heart to tell 'em that life can be fuller on foot, and that they'd wave a lot more if they'd leave the cul de sac camp site more often. In all honesty, The cul de sac camp site, load 'em up a drop 'em off drive bys life style is one I often pine for. Trading for a wave from my own cute as buttons tiny hockey superstars for a wave from my pals in my little place, could be as fine for me as it is my family. Maybe.
But, I've made my breakfast, buried about as many chances as most anyone ever gets, and lay down comfortably on the bed on the floor I found on the streets of this little tiny place. I'll wallow happily on my streets, and sit by the shore from time to time trying to recall the shape of the howling noises that screached out of the vortex that spun me into and out of the little room full of wobbly friends who put up with handfuls of this sap from that hole in my head where I keep secrets like this one. Love you guys, it has been, is, and will be fun watching come in and out of that old wooden door. See you tonight?
Wednesday, March 09, 2005
A Perfect Evening - A Nail in the Head
One of the more perfect evenings, or unfortunately too often these days, start of an over the top perfect evening, is to divert from my normal route home; jump the L instead of the V-G and head over to Zaplodzky's on North 6th in Williamsburg. Two dollar Ying Lings, Lisa the pretty bartender and an mp3 jukebox that always seems to be playing the exact song you want to hear at that exact moment. I started my evening at Zaplodzky's last Friday.
Started it in the usual fashion, sat there drinking the cheap beer, reading the book the lovely Ms. Veronica had send me that day. Veronica is truly a magic friend who, although she's on the other side of the country, seems to be acutely tuned to my every mood, and seems to know exactly just what I and need exactly when I need it. She had sent me the book I was reading at Zaplodzky's. The book arrived the exact day I had finished my last book, AND reading a slightly left, perhaps more libertarian, definitely cynical jab at all the right wing pundits I've been following since long before that last circus we called a Presidential Election was exactly what I needed to be reading at this very moment. So far this book is a bang on good time!
I sat there, reading "Skipping Towards Gomorrah", and investigation of American contradiction with how we talk/rant on about the seven deadly sins and how we actually live with respect to these sins. Greed/gambling, lust, sloth, hey these sins have been very good to me in the past, eh, pride and envy well, OK, others, I can do without. Anyhow, as I sidled up to the warm wood of the beautiful wooden bar, I gave a quick, sorry fella glance to the guy next to me, basically politely telepathically mentioning I was there for a read rather than a chat. [not mention, I still hadn't quite got used to talking with the new chompers, enough said about that]. I was getting close to the end of my third beer, my usual limit, I mean $2 a beer, a $4 tip, a $10 ride all done within the two hour limit required to still make my free transfer on the B61. I was finishing up the last beer when something struck me in the conversation my neighbor was having with Lisa. I decided that this would be a good conversation worth busting in on.
Busting in on a conversation, politely, is a talent I'm quite proud of, wink. There was an easy in here as he was chatting with Lisa, not only the bartender, but also a friend; bartenders and friends make great springboard to leap from into the warm refreshment of a good bar-convo. They'd been talking professions, what caught me was this guy's claim to being a circus freak. Hey body modification was on the top of my mind that evening, so thought I might learn something. Unfortunately, although he is good friends with "The Enigma", and knows "Lizard Man", he himself was not a modifier, well nothing beyond the standard issue tats and earrings. No, my friend was a pounder... a driller, a cutter and a lifter
He had a wonderful selection of scars [well healed] where he carved himself up with shards of glass. He told great little stories about pounding nails up his nose, or how he'd drill into his nose with a power drill. You may have caught this act, I'd caught stuff like this on TV. We talked for a good hour, and about three more beers, so much for that transfer. He told me how most of his gigs were between acts at Metal shows, and that he was making a perfectly good living off this. His best crowds were in the Midwest, his best story was of how he once dissed a heckling dude by picking his girlfriend up on the jumbotron, getting a little back stage pass action...
I guess I'm not really going anywhere with this frikin empty story. I've been sick the last three days, and well, I just had to get back to monkeying around with these little dirty keys again. It's good therapy, almost as good a therapy as a perfect evening at that perfect little bar talking to perfect strangers. I'm obviously taking the L train home tonight.
Started it in the usual fashion, sat there drinking the cheap beer, reading the book the lovely Ms. Veronica had send me that day. Veronica is truly a magic friend who, although she's on the other side of the country, seems to be acutely tuned to my every mood, and seems to know exactly just what I and need exactly when I need it. She had sent me the book I was reading at Zaplodzky's. The book arrived the exact day I had finished my last book, AND reading a slightly left, perhaps more libertarian, definitely cynical jab at all the right wing pundits I've been following since long before that last circus we called a Presidential Election was exactly what I needed to be reading at this very moment. So far this book is a bang on good time!
I sat there, reading "Skipping Towards Gomorrah", and investigation of American contradiction with how we talk/rant on about the seven deadly sins and how we actually live with respect to these sins. Greed/gambling, lust, sloth, hey these sins have been very good to me in the past, eh, pride and envy well, OK, others, I can do without. Anyhow, as I sidled up to the warm wood of the beautiful wooden bar, I gave a quick, sorry fella glance to the guy next to me, basically politely telepathically mentioning I was there for a read rather than a chat. [not mention, I still hadn't quite got used to talking with the new chompers, enough said about that]. I was getting close to the end of my third beer, my usual limit, I mean $2 a beer, a $4 tip, a $10 ride all done within the two hour limit required to still make my free transfer on the B61. I was finishing up the last beer when something struck me in the conversation my neighbor was having with Lisa. I decided that this would be a good conversation worth busting in on.
Busting in on a conversation, politely, is a talent I'm quite proud of, wink. There was an easy in here as he was chatting with Lisa, not only the bartender, but also a friend; bartenders and friends make great springboard to leap from into the warm refreshment of a good bar-convo. They'd been talking professions, what caught me was this guy's claim to being a circus freak. Hey body modification was on the top of my mind that evening, so thought I might learn something. Unfortunately, although he is good friends with "The Enigma", and knows "Lizard Man", he himself was not a modifier, well nothing beyond the standard issue tats and earrings. No, my friend was a pounder... a driller, a cutter and a lifter
He had a wonderful selection of scars [well healed] where he carved himself up with shards of glass. He told great little stories about pounding nails up his nose, or how he'd drill into his nose with a power drill. You may have caught this act, I'd caught stuff like this on TV. We talked for a good hour, and about three more beers, so much for that transfer. He told me how most of his gigs were between acts at Metal shows, and that he was making a perfectly good living off this. His best crowds were in the Midwest, his best story was of how he once dissed a heckling dude by picking his girlfriend up on the jumbotron, getting a little back stage pass action...
I guess I'm not really going anywhere with this frikin empty story. I've been sick the last three days, and well, I just had to get back to monkeying around with these little dirty keys again. It's good therapy, almost as good a therapy as a perfect evening at that perfect little bar talking to perfect strangers. I'm obviously taking the L train home tonight.
Saturday, March 05, 2005
Bite Me, No, Really, Bite Me
Current mood: jubilant
Feeling like a million bucks. No, feeling like six million bucks. I’ve been Lee Major’ed, Steve Austin’ed… A man, barely alive. I am being rebuilt. Listen, I’ve always been a fan of body modification, nose jobs, liposuction, face lifts, tummy tucks, you know if that’s what you want, well go raise the dough a git ‘er done. We have the technology. Be all that you can be.
Feeling like a million last night as for the first time in, well almost a year. Finally I could talk to folks without feeling self conscious about the crap they’d be seeing if they glanced into my mouth. Now, I’m not getting ahead of myself. I still have a mouthful of trouble, but I no longer have to feel like some washed up third string American Industrial League hockey failure. I got me teef!
Self esteem is funny business. Especially when it comes a crashin’ on the shores of vanity. I mean, I was always taught not to fuss and bother ‘bout such things. How I look; not to worry about what picture I’ve posted on my front page at myspace. I mean, that’s girly girl stuff. Let’s go cut up that lumber son.
Maybe it IS vanity, but man it feels nice that, at least at first glance, I can talk to people I do not know and know that they’re not calculating the big black gap in my lower jaw in their immediate impression, often an important impressions. How many meetings over the last months have started with “…sorry, had an accident, getting some work done…”, some little self deprecating jab; some little bloob to make us all feel at ease 'cause one of the men in the room was, incomplete.
Now here’s the vanity… I have always applauded body modification, I’ve been modifying mine for over 41 years now. Last night I sat at Plodzky’s down on N 6th. I sat at the shiny brass taps, reading my new book. Every once in a while, I’d take a look up and glance at the choppers in the reflection of the tap rig. Came to a very simple conclusion. Fuck spending thousands on fixing these rotting useless god givens! They’re all coming out, I’m gonna be a “Fixidenter”, bitches.
I’m going to have my young man Vincent at NYU, forcep these little brown beans into the hopper, into the un-documented history book of Uncle GoGo’s sorded history of bad habits, poor diet and various abuses of substances not offially recognized by the FDA. I'm going for the Brad Pitt chompers, HOLLYWOOD brights... maybe I'll have 'em all made of golden.
Straight as pins, white as the snow before it hits the street of Brooklyn. "No, YOU had wooden teeth". I am so excited, I am so frikin' relieved... I've adapted to a prostetic. I've had no rejection issues, I'm ready to get myself under that knife, start carving up all these things that have been bugging me for years and years and years... Time to make the make over ladies. Watch out, here comes the super GoGo!
Hey, what's this? An email... 'bout whats it... penis extension... oh ya baby, watch out for super GoGo, watch it!
Feeling like a million bucks. No, feeling like six million bucks. I’ve been Lee Major’ed, Steve Austin’ed… A man, barely alive. I am being rebuilt. Listen, I’ve always been a fan of body modification, nose jobs, liposuction, face lifts, tummy tucks, you know if that’s what you want, well go raise the dough a git ‘er done. We have the technology. Be all that you can be.
Feeling like a million last night as for the first time in, well almost a year. Finally I could talk to folks without feeling self conscious about the crap they’d be seeing if they glanced into my mouth. Now, I’m not getting ahead of myself. I still have a mouthful of trouble, but I no longer have to feel like some washed up third string American Industrial League hockey failure. I got me teef!
Self esteem is funny business. Especially when it comes a crashin’ on the shores of vanity. I mean, I was always taught not to fuss and bother ‘bout such things. How I look; not to worry about what picture I’ve posted on my front page at myspace. I mean, that’s girly girl stuff. Let’s go cut up that lumber son.
Maybe it IS vanity, but man it feels nice that, at least at first glance, I can talk to people I do not know and know that they’re not calculating the big black gap in my lower jaw in their immediate impression, often an important impressions. How many meetings over the last months have started with “…sorry, had an accident, getting some work done…”, some little self deprecating jab; some little bloob to make us all feel at ease 'cause one of the men in the room was, incomplete.
Now here’s the vanity… I have always applauded body modification, I’ve been modifying mine for over 41 years now. Last night I sat at Plodzky’s down on N 6th. I sat at the shiny brass taps, reading my new book. Every once in a while, I’d take a look up and glance at the choppers in the reflection of the tap rig. Came to a very simple conclusion. Fuck spending thousands on fixing these rotting useless god givens! They’re all coming out, I’m gonna be a “Fixidenter”, bitches.
I’m going to have my young man Vincent at NYU, forcep these little brown beans into the hopper, into the un-documented history book of Uncle GoGo’s sorded history of bad habits, poor diet and various abuses of substances not offially recognized by the FDA. I'm going for the Brad Pitt chompers, HOLLYWOOD brights... maybe I'll have 'em all made of golden.
Straight as pins, white as the snow before it hits the street of Brooklyn. "No, YOU had wooden teeth". I am so excited, I am so frikin' relieved... I've adapted to a prostetic. I've had no rejection issues, I'm ready to get myself under that knife, start carving up all these things that have been bugging me for years and years and years... Time to make the make over ladies. Watch out, here comes the super GoGo!
Hey, what's this? An email... 'bout whats it... penis extension... oh ya baby, watch out for super GoGo, watch it!
Friday, March 04, 2005
UN SANE
Current mood: Disgusted
Jiminy crickets, it would appear the time has come to let all of this just frikin' go. I get new teeff today, and this is just about the best thing happening at the moment. Imagine that, new teeth, lets all go out and celebrate. Yes, indeed, lets all go out.
I went out last night... at just about the exact time I should have gone to sleep. Sleep, now that's a novel idea, can someone please describe to me just how one goes about getting sleep. This elusive elixir called sleep has now alluded me for two solid months. Or perhaps, I've been alluding it. Yes, maybe this is all self inflicted, maybe I really am, as many of my friends claim just a chicken fried retard, a frikin' douchepoodle wallowing in my own luke warm musty gunky bath water.
un sane
How is it this old carcass of mine knows to drag itself off the couch each morning to trudge-trundle itself down the garbage strewn street... down into the dirty ol' hole? How is it that I do this against all desire to just stay there wrapped in my comfy cosy blankets in front of the big ol' TV that plays nothing but all the shows I am just dying to see? Where did I learn to light a cigarette with my eyes closed? How come there's always a beer with a twist off cap or an easy open pop top tin tab sitting in my fridge box? Who put this love in my belly?
AND who stopped playing the songs I really really really liked?
A long time ago, I used to think of the things I was going to do. I still do, but now I seem to spend almost as much time thinking about the things I have yet to get to. I find this to be quite frightening. While at the same time I am encouraged by the fact that I seem to be doing more, I am also weighted down by the constant dread that there just may not be enough time. Time is something I need to eject; now is the time... now is the time to go rooting around the ol' CD pile and find that one song that used to, and will, once more, make me sad enough to be happy again. [insert silly Joy Division rotunda HERE, bitch]
I really do miss feeling that brick-bat-in-the-face feeling of someone else's despair, feel the kitten whipped sting of some kid "joe singa song writer's" boyish "I just lost my gal" babble. I'd like to dump this foolish hidy-ho crap that's been clouding an old old mind with thoughts of things way long past... things so over cooked they smell more of rotten punk-assed dirty socks than... than well, green fucking eggs and ham.
Get it?
This is done, go away now.
Jiminy crickets, it would appear the time has come to let all of this just frikin' go. I get new teeff today, and this is just about the best thing happening at the moment. Imagine that, new teeth, lets all go out and celebrate. Yes, indeed, lets all go out.
I went out last night... at just about the exact time I should have gone to sleep. Sleep, now that's a novel idea, can someone please describe to me just how one goes about getting sleep. This elusive elixir called sleep has now alluded me for two solid months. Or perhaps, I've been alluding it. Yes, maybe this is all self inflicted, maybe I really am, as many of my friends claim just a chicken fried retard, a frikin' douchepoodle wallowing in my own luke warm musty gunky bath water.
un sane
How is it this old carcass of mine knows to drag itself off the couch each morning to trudge-trundle itself down the garbage strewn street... down into the dirty ol' hole? How is it that I do this against all desire to just stay there wrapped in my comfy cosy blankets in front of the big ol' TV that plays nothing but all the shows I am just dying to see? Where did I learn to light a cigarette with my eyes closed? How come there's always a beer with a twist off cap or an easy open pop top tin tab sitting in my fridge box? Who put this love in my belly?
AND who stopped playing the songs I really really really liked?
A long time ago, I used to think of the things I was going to do. I still do, but now I seem to spend almost as much time thinking about the things I have yet to get to. I find this to be quite frightening. While at the same time I am encouraged by the fact that I seem to be doing more, I am also weighted down by the constant dread that there just may not be enough time. Time is something I need to eject; now is the time... now is the time to go rooting around the ol' CD pile and find that one song that used to, and will, once more, make me sad enough to be happy again. [insert silly Joy Division rotunda HERE, bitch]
I really do miss feeling that brick-bat-in-the-face feeling of someone else's despair, feel the kitten whipped sting of some kid "joe singa song writer's" boyish "I just lost my gal" babble. I'd like to dump this foolish hidy-ho crap that's been clouding an old old mind with thoughts of things way long past... things so over cooked they smell more of rotten punk-assed dirty socks than... than well, green fucking eggs and ham.
Get it?
This is done, go away now.
Tuesday, March 01, 2005
100% Sap FREE Content
It has been pointed out to me recently that my wee stories have been becoming, well, just a bit to sappy. The Sacrin content has elevated these little dities to the point were one has to wash the sticky goo from their hands immediately upon reading. OK, I can take this, I mean, I guess I can drop my bid to be the Greenpoint representative at the upcoming city wide Sap-Master Sapptastic-Man competitions... I guess I could just up and stop trying to find my feminine side. I guess I could let my pubes grow out again, get 'em stuck in my fly a few times and grow back the snarling angry-man that we all so knew and loved... Sure thing there bubs, I'll start standing erect, stop mopin' about in a constant state of maudlinistic despair. As of today, I'll start eating my toast raw, drinking my beer warm and my whisky straight. I'll dig out my old porn collection and start falling asleep to that rather than those documentaries by Ken Burns I've been falling asleep to recently. I'll pay closer attention to Leni Briscoe and turn off Law and Order the minute Sam Waterson's character opens his trap [even though we do see eye to eye on at least the death penalty].
You know, the best damned Cuban Sandwich is definitely being served up at a little place on 25th Street between 6th and Broadway. I believe the place is called "The Spanish Restaurant", of course that could easily just be a sign telling you what it is. This place is a classic, a classic midtown lunch joint with a counter a small seating section in the back and take out and delivery flying out the door faster than you can say "there goes another illegal alien riding a shitty bike". I prefer the counter where the dance of the 17 waitresses spins out of control inches from your food, the salsa blares only to be droned out by the near constant barking of orders in a Spanish so raunchy I'm assuming even they're using it incorrectly.
Now, this sandwich, this Cuban sandwich is the best I have had anywhere I've been in the world. AND, unlike all you Yankee-doodle wing-nuts, anywhere in the world for me includes Cuba. So listen up. This Cuban sandwich isn't of the frilly willy variety, this bitch is 100% pure hardcore lunch-eating goodness, read, no frikin' AVACADO!
It's got your pork, your ham, your cheese and pickle, BANG, that's it, LUNCH. It's made honestly, I mean the pork looks like it was carved off the roast with a hammer; the ham perhaps somewhat more delicately hacked off the bone with a dull tree-saw. The roll is an honest chunk of bread, crushed and burnt to perfection under the weight of the griller. And when I say weight of the griller, I mean the guy grilling the damn thing pretty near sits on top of it; these puppies are flat, fresh and filling.
So, if you want a good Cuban Sandwich, I mean really want one, you're a tard, a complete frikin' tard if you go anywhere else. Myself, I doubt I'll ever eat lunch anywhere else again. I mean, I'm what you call a super-regular... I fell in love with a steak sandwich at a little diner in Toronto one day, afterwhich I ate lunch at this place every workday for four and a half years. Hey, when I got a new job in a different 'hood, I made a point of going to this one diner for that one sandwich at least once every weekend. Matter of fact, the first time I went back to Toronto after moving here, it'd been two years, I went into this place to order the sandwich, the ol' broad at the counter looked at me, asked why I hadn't been around for a while and asked me if I wanted my usual steak sandwich.
Best damned Steak on a Kaiser, Best damned Cuban on earth, guaranteed no sappy content. My cheeks are clenched so tightly right now I'm afraid I'm going to suck a hole through my gitch just getting this damned thing out. 100% sap FREE content indeed.
You know, the best damned Cuban Sandwich is definitely being served up at a little place on 25th Street between 6th and Broadway. I believe the place is called "The Spanish Restaurant", of course that could easily just be a sign telling you what it is. This place is a classic, a classic midtown lunch joint with a counter a small seating section in the back and take out and delivery flying out the door faster than you can say "there goes another illegal alien riding a shitty bike". I prefer the counter where the dance of the 17 waitresses spins out of control inches from your food, the salsa blares only to be droned out by the near constant barking of orders in a Spanish so raunchy I'm assuming even they're using it incorrectly.
Now, this sandwich, this Cuban sandwich is the best I have had anywhere I've been in the world. AND, unlike all you Yankee-doodle wing-nuts, anywhere in the world for me includes Cuba. So listen up. This Cuban sandwich isn't of the frilly willy variety, this bitch is 100% pure hardcore lunch-eating goodness, read, no frikin' AVACADO!
It's got your pork, your ham, your cheese and pickle, BANG, that's it, LUNCH. It's made honestly, I mean the pork looks like it was carved off the roast with a hammer; the ham perhaps somewhat more delicately hacked off the bone with a dull tree-saw. The roll is an honest chunk of bread, crushed and burnt to perfection under the weight of the griller. And when I say weight of the griller, I mean the guy grilling the damn thing pretty near sits on top of it; these puppies are flat, fresh and filling.
So, if you want a good Cuban Sandwich, I mean really want one, you're a tard, a complete frikin' tard if you go anywhere else. Myself, I doubt I'll ever eat lunch anywhere else again. I mean, I'm what you call a super-regular... I fell in love with a steak sandwich at a little diner in Toronto one day, afterwhich I ate lunch at this place every workday for four and a half years. Hey, when I got a new job in a different 'hood, I made a point of going to this one diner for that one sandwich at least once every weekend. Matter of fact, the first time I went back to Toronto after moving here, it'd been two years, I went into this place to order the sandwich, the ol' broad at the counter looked at me, asked why I hadn't been around for a while and asked me if I wanted my usual steak sandwich.
Best damned Steak on a Kaiser, Best damned Cuban on earth, guaranteed no sappy content. My cheeks are clenched so tightly right now I'm afraid I'm going to suck a hole through my gitch just getting this damned thing out. 100% sap FREE content indeed.
