Recuerden Sus Marcos Por Favor

People,

Jimmy is at it again.


So yesterday I had to drive to Carson for an extras job. Now, whenever I’m booked for one of these things, I have to call some hotline that tells me where to go, what to wear and who to ask for to check in. I almost never know the name of the project, whether it’s TV, film; I have very little to go on. For this job all I knew was that I was supposed to be dressed hip and trendy and was being paid in cash on
site. Already it's sketchy.

I was directed to go to the Home Depot Sporting Center in Carson, which is basically a baseball and soccer field extravaganza. There were no signs directing me where to go, and I didn’t know the name of the project anyway, so I had to drive around a bit to find ‘the crew’.

Apparently everyone in Carson drives an early 90’s Toyota Corolla, lowered, with a spoiler and several decals to remind you that the car is, in fact, a Toyota. Also, they are all painted colors which I’m sure were not offered by the dealership, colors like highlighter lime and orange.

I found the group I was looking for, a large contingency of Latin men and women standing on a soccer field. Everyone was dressed, per instruction, ‘hip and trendy’. This clearly means different things to different people. I stood near the group, within earshot of anyone who looked important and pulled out my book.

Rule of non-union extras work #38
Always take a book.

Suddenly I heard someone talking to the group of Latin persuasion in an authoritative tone. Obviously this person was in charge. She was telling us what we were going to be doing that day. I cocked one ear, leaned in and gave it my all, but I couldn’t quite make out what she was saying. I moved closer, took a few steps nearer my ‘hip and trendy’ associates. Still, I couldn’t quite get what was going on. And then it hit me. It was like a bolt of lighting.

She was speaking Spanish.

I looked around and realized that everyone was listening intently and nodding with agreement, laughing occasionally at her Latin jokes, and already practicing what I’m sure were dance steps she was conveying orally. I was at a total loss. I quickly came up to here and said I didn’t speak Spanish. She said:

Como?

So for the rest of the day, I felt like I had been dropped in the town square in Argentina with no guide. I listened with mock understanding when the director shouted over and over:

Muy importante recuerden sus marcos primeros.

I knew whatever it was I was supposed to be recuerding was very important, but that was about it. I never did figure out who this Marcos person was, or why he was so pivotal to the shoot, but I took it all in stride. By the end of the several hour ordeal, I gathered that I was in some kind of Latin commercial, probably to air on Univision, selling something. That is really all I got. I know it had to do with an envelope that the lead actors were passing around in front of the camera, but even if I had seen what was written on it, it would surely have been in Spanish. Elusive as the product we were pitching was, I felt by the end of the day a certain kinship with my dark-skinned compadres. We were made to shout ‘Unate!’ over and over as a group, and by the final shot, I really felt like I meant it. Whatever it meant.

Jimmy the Background Artist

People,

Good morning, one and all. I know it has been some time since I wrote to you. Some have said, 'what happened Jimmy? We want to know what is going on with you.' Well, the sad truth is, porn was too small a world for me. The megalomaniacal boss who couldn't spell also couldn't afford to pay me a salary. So rather than stay and be tortured for free, I decided to go in search of another field of work.

Boy did I find a gold mine.

Not an actual gold mine, as in, a job that pays, but rather an untapped mine of riches beyond my wildest imaginings. It is the world of background actors. Atmosphere. Extras. Or as I like to call them, 'All-About-Eves-In-Training.'

I have been looking for work for two months now so I have been forced to take it when it comes by. This means occasionally driving to Malibu to work for 8 hours for minimum wage with people who you wouldn't let baby-sit your dog. Just yesterday I was in Malibu working for some prank show we'll call 'Girls Behaving Inappropriately.' It 'stars' a gaggle of stupid bitches that run around pulling pranks on late teenage people who are on welfare or just out of prison. The people they find for this show are real winners. Laureates. But the prize is not with the 'stars' or the people being gagged.

The money is in the extras.

I have never met scarier people. They are so serious. They are all talking on their cell phones unceasingly, as though they were trading time sensitive stock. They talk very loudly at all times and always tell people on the phone in a rehearsed offhanded tone, 'oh I'm on set.' They are keen on starting conversations with such winners as:

'How many shows have you done?'

'This is my 35th time working.'

'You may be wondering what 'slate' means. You'll hear it a lot on set. If you need me to explain that and other terms you need to be familiar with, just let me know.'

All of these things have actually been said to me by a 'background actor'. I should clarify that these jobs I have been relegated to are non-union. This means that the person who is going to explain what 'slate’ means also has no idea how to get into SAG and probably never will. The particular girl who gave me the jems above mistook our day together as perfect strangers at a cocktail party for a session with her therapist. As we are forced to have real conversations to appear 'realistic' for the gag, I am forced to hear anecdote after anecdote about this girl's pitiful existence:

'I started out in Vegas helping a casting office cast RUSH HOUR 2. We cast all the background actors. It was real exciting, probably the most exciting thing I've ever done. So when I got to the set, people were asking me all sorts of questions, needing direction or help with their characters. It really made me realize what fame must be like for people like Al Pacino or Tony Danza. People just coming up to you asking for your input, or wanting your photo. I don't think I could ever do it. It's just too much. I do, however, know that I'm going to be super rich somehow. I'll probably have like 6 homes. And Jet skis. I love jet skiing. Although I only just got into it because I have a real allergy to milk which causes my legs to break out in horrible rashes. So I usually wear really thick tights. It was hard as a child but I just got used to it being a part of me, part of who I am. I'm the girl with the welts on her legs, and if you don't like it, then you can go fuck yourself. I'm not gonna change who I am for you! So yeah, once I went off dairy, the welts went down a little, so I figured I'd take up jet skis. Wait hold on, that's my cell. It could be my agent with another job....


So Jimmy has a new title.

Jimmy the Background Artist

The Bus in LA

My car is broken. It ground to a halt a few weeks ago and ever since I have been forced to find another way to get around Los Angeles. I considered my options:

1. Walk – Out of the question. Even places that are close are too far.
2. Teleport – Impossible, though not for long. I’m very up on all the technological advances. Once it’s available though, it’ll probably be out of my price range.
3. Public Transit – Demeaning yet feasible.

So the bus it is. It took me a few days to figure out the best routes to get to and from my office, but I’m fairly adept now, and I’ve learned a valuable lesson: the busses in LA are not like the busses in San Francisco or New York, or even Beirut for that matter. The cross section of people on the LA bus is rather, well, upsetting. All people on the bus in LA fall into one of the following categories:

1. Old People
2. Crippled People
3. Poor People
4. Crazy People
5. Me

Now wait, you’re saying. That’s impossible. Surely there are other kinds of people on the bus. How can EVERY rider fall into such a small list of descriptors? Unfortunately, quite easily. If Capitalism were a swamp, the people on the LA bus would be the scum at the edges, the sludge on the bottom. Let us take these groups one at a time to further understand the horror.

Old People

Elderly people who use mass transit are basically hip replacements waiting to happen. They say it takes a village to raise a child, but it takes a busload to save a grandpa from impending surgery.
Number of elderly people I have caught in my arms as the bus lurched forward or stopped suddenly: 7
Number of times I have seen an old person actually fall on the bus: 2
Number of elderly riders who have sat right next to me while smelling like mothballs and formaldehyde: 1

Crippled People

This category may seem mean-spirited or unnecessary, but I assure you, the crippled community is a well-established subset of bus riders. If you are on crutches, use a cane or are missing a limb you will surely be on my bus. Blind people, people in wheelchairs, and even a person in a total body brace (swear to god) have all been on my bus. The level of hatred one can build up against such a person is directly proportional to the amount of time it takes for a crippled person to get on the bus, reach into a pocket, fish out change or dollar bills and feed said money into the bus meter. This process can sometimes cause other riders to cry out, “COME ON!’ as they watch some middle-aged woman with a red-tipped walking stick rubs coins together to determine how many quarters she is holding.

Poor People

This category is really just a nice way of saying Latino and Black people. Really. All the white people on the bus are either old or crippled, and all the Asians are clearly visiting from out of town. The poor people often get on the bus and then fish around for change long enough to ride at least 3 stops for free. It is at this point that the driver will invariably have to kick them off, usually with much fanfare.

Crazy People

Do you have conversations with yourself? Outloud? In public? Do you like to swear at old ladies? Do you spit ferociously? Do you have a pension for throwing up and then staying put? Have you recently brushed your teeth with something like Ajax or Tide? Then you just might be crazy enough to be on my bus. It is the sure mark of a crazy person when one hears uncontrollable laughter coming from the back of the bus and one turns to find a tiny Latina woman staring at her shoes and cackling. If she glances at one, one would be wise to pick a point on the horizon and focus. Meeting the gaze of a crazy person is not a meeting that should be taken lightly.

Me

I am usually sitting next to the most extreme variety of passenger imaginable. I do my best to keep my headphones on and the music loud. This produces a curious effect: the environs are scored to whatever I happen to be listening to at the moment. Therefore, occasionally, a little old lady loses her footing and tries desperately not to die of a nasty fall to the tunes of Evanescence’s “Wake Me Up Inside.”

By this time, you might be thinking, “some of these categories seem as though they could overlap. What if you had a crippled old person or a crazy cripple?” The answer is, of course, that people certainly can and do cross categorical lines, but certain descriptors trump others. If you are old, and crippled, I deem you old, as that seems more liable to kill you. If you are poor and crazy, I deem you crazy as crazy will get you beat up much faster. If you are poor and me, I deem you to be me as poor is boring.

Endangered Species

I am a big fan of hamburgers. I am not a big fan of salamandergers. This is a timely and beneficial preference. Having never been one who is exceptionally kind to or interested in animals that are not easily put between two pieces of bread or slathered with a nice white wine and mushroom sauce, one can imagine my lack of interest in a newly published study about the apparently rapid extinction of many of the less palatable of God’s creatures. While I am glad that our market economy allows for people to go around counting reptiles in Bolivia and call it ‘work’, I am less than impressed by their alarmist stance. As with all studies known to man, this one relies heavily on numbers, digits that, in my estimation, have always received an undue amount of attention. The following excerpt is rife with fear-mongering and should be read with a literary grain of salt:

The World Conservation Union, which is a coalition of leading conservation groups, [has finished a] report [called] "the most comprehensive evaluation ever undertaken of the status of the world's biodiversity." Among the findings:

* 15,589 species (7,266 animal species and 8,323 plant and lichen species) are now considered at risk of extinction — an increase of 3,330 species since the 2003 Red List. The increase is largely due to the fact that scientists have finally been able to assess all of the world's amphibians.
* One in three amphibians and almost half of turtles and tortoises are known to be threatened with extinction, along with one in four mammals, one in five sharks and rays, and one in eight birds.
* The numbers of threatened species are increasing across almost all major taxonomic groups.

A few salient points may be drawn from the information given.

1. Though turtles and tortoises seem on the brink of extinction, the report makes no mention of cows, chickens or pigs. Dinner, it seems, is safe.
2. Lichen has never been a good substitute for lettuce and therefore will not be missed.
3. I have been putting off my scuba-diving certification until ALL the sharks and rays die, and apparently, I have not long to wait.
4. Though the number of threatened species is on the rise, the number that I am familiar with has not changed and, therefore, is of little concern.

I propose that people who want to go around counting things should count things that actually matter in real life as opposed to things that matter in biology class. I have done this and come up with the following figures:

*13,472 gay men are on the list for 367 weekend parties in the Hollywood Hills. This figure is up significantly from last year largely due to the fact scientists were able to assess all of the men who were on the list plus one.
*One in two gay men on the list will not actually show at the party they are on the list for, but will instead attempt to crash a better party hosted by a bigger closeted celebrity.
*One in four gay men hosting parties in the hills are employing seven of every ten gay men working as bartenders and tray pass waiters.
*One in three gay men on the list have had or are about to get veneers.
*Two of every three gay couples is attending a party in the hills with the express purpose of finding a single gay man who is not on the list plus one, in order to take him home. One in six of said single men who will go home with gay couples are hoping to make the situation semi-permanent because sleeping with a gay couple is easier than getting a job.

Bushwhacked

Sorry ladies,

I know you were looking forward to getting all those third trimester abortions in clean hospital rooms, but you are just gonna have to do it in the back of a Chevy Cavalier like all the women who came before you.

Sorry gay people,

I know that you were looking forward to getting divorced legally and collecting alimony/palimony from your ex-lover-husband-wife but you are just gonna have to remain 'Girlfriends' and 'Boyfriends' like the second class citizens you obviously are.

Sorry Black and Hispanic people,

I know that more of you than ever turned out to cast your ballot, but you are going to have to wait for Barak Obama to get just a little bit older before you can expect your voice to actually count. Until then, I suggest you continue racking up personal debt and working for minimum wage and no benefits. Or move to Ohio. Or Florida. Come to think of it, you oughta just continue to have lots and lots of kids and then ship them out to swing states so that in 18 years, minorities can be disenfranchized all across this great country of ours. Floridians shouldn't get to have all the fun. Blacks can be just as unhappy in Wyoming.

And, of course, sorry enlisted people,

I know you expected a better reason to go and die for your country in places you can't easily pronounce, but you are simply going to have to come to the understanding that Iraq is more important than North Korea because Iraq ensures that your wife or husband back home can drive that SUV he/she always wanted. If North Korea had something valuable that we wanted, like oil, or celebrities or Neilson Markets, we would definitely send you to die there instead.

The Musical

I have just finished watching a special on viewer-supported TV about the history of the Broadway musical. Dramatic pause for realization that this is a very gay moment. Jazz hands, head pop and-uh-five-six-seven-eight. The show got me thinking. I’m going to write a Broadway musical. If Kander and Ebb can do it, if Stephen Sondheim can do it, if Rogers and Hart and Hammerstein and Gershwin can do it, then darn it all, so can I. All I need to begin is a really good idea and dedication. Or a passable idea and Hal Prince. Or a terrible idea and Disney. Any one of those combinations ought to do it. But each of them requires me to actually think for a while about some idea, some concept. How about:

A down and out young gay guy goes on a safari guided tour in Africa to find himself. Men have let him down, God has forsaken him; he is generally seeking answers to life’s questions. While he is ‘on tour’ he has all these ruminations and revelations about his life, daringly brought to life by the various Serengeti animals. Think The Lion King with a gay guy as the star. Just before the end of the first act, the gay guy realizes that he is actually AT The Lion King on Broadway and has been daydreaming because he was so bored. The curtain goes down on our show just as The Lion King goes to intermission. We return for the second act to find our gay hero looking for himself on the streets on New York. He rides red line downtown and strolls through the village, collar turned up toward the God that forsook him earlier in the show. As he walks down 8th Ave., he meets the eye of a devilishly handsome man in a Prada suit and hand made shoes. The two of them sing their meeting and discover that both of them are wearing taps. A very large chorus number ensues, in which every gay man in lower Manhattan finally gets to show off his one-footed wings. Our down and out gay hero, now smitten and largely distracted from his existential quest, goes home with his paramour, who we discover is actually one of the Producers of The Lion King upon arriving at his ‘flat’ in the west sixties overlooking the park. The posters of the show, signed by cast and flanked by Tony Awards plunges our gay hero into a tailspin. They sing their breakup before they ever have sex, thus sparing our audience of tourists and old people a gay sex scene set to music. Our gay hero flees out into the street and is once again lost in the tide of life. The final scene is a powerful solo sung by our hero about the irony of life. I call the show The Producer. I would have called it The Gay Guy, but since The Producers did so well with their name, I figured, why fuck with formula?

A down and out gay guy goes on a wild ride of self-examination on a single night carousing the bar scene in San Francisco. Tired of men, he meets a hip and beautiful young woman who is waiting for a gay friend of hers to show. They sing briefly and she makes a sexual advance because that’s the kind of fag hag she is: she falls in love with gay guys. Our hero sings a beautiful aria wherein he debates whether it is time to finally give women a try. By the end of the song, he is laughing jubilantly, having found his inner peace in the advance of a woman. He walks out of the bar alone with a new click in his step. Everyone knows a girl can’t change a gay guy. It is the shortest musical ever, lasting exactly 12 minutes. It will be a huge hit because I will save all sorts of money due to its length, but it will sell out for years because every tourist will be holding out hope that one night, he will finally say yes to her advance. That way they call all go home and tell their uncle that he CAN change if he just meets the right girl. I call it How to Succeed on Broadway Without Really Trying.

A down and out gay guy decides to join the cast and crew of a Carnival Cruise Liner as a part time waiter, part time entertainer. He is quickly swept up into the dark underworld of cruiseliner boozing, shore leave flings and throwing guests’ luggage overboard when no one is looking. All the musical numbers take place on a stage within the stage ala Cabaret. Our hero meets and falls quickly in love with his bunkmate, a striking young Thai fellow named Tam. Tam is golden brown and limber from all his work with Cirque du Soleil. Just as we hit the end of act I, the cruiseliner strikes an iceberg. The curtain falls after a thunderous first act closer in which Tam refuses to believe that such a horrible thing could happen when he still has 4 months on his contract. Our hero is forced to go back to the cabin alone, packing for two, out of love. The second act is a lot of people running around in denial that the ship is going to sink. Tam and many others are lying out on the pool deck catching the rays. We have a huge musical showstopper in which a team of synchronized swimmers does a beautiful water ballet while our hero tries to encourage people to get into life boats. the ship eventually sinks with Tam and many others on board, people who were utterly convinced they were never going to get their money back from their travel agents. I call it Thai Tanning: A Cautionary Tale.

Porn Morning

Good Porning everyone.

I would like to take this opportunity to share with you all a bit of my day. Think of this as an episode of Mr. Roger's neighborhood, only in this episode, Mr. Rogers gets naked, revealing his hairy chest and scary legs, and then he goes over to the post office to give the mailman an erotic massage.

Oh, and Lady Elaine is doing instructional voiceovers.

For the last two days I have been screening DVD copies of porn for quality purposes. I have seen videos involving gymnasts whose clothes mysteriously disappear mid-flip or right before the splits. I have learned that rubbing your thumbs in a counter clockwise motion around your partners ass bone (yes, you have one) will keep him on a plateau of sexual arousal whereas rubbing in a CLOCKWISE motion will move him toward ejaculation. This is useful information people...write it down.

I have even seen a porn in......get ready......3-D. Yes, it's true....gay men were not content with standard porn that stays in the television where it belongs. They needed a more complete sensory experience. And so I had to watch a porn with those Captain E-O glasses and experience the porn coming right at me...no pun intended.

And then, inexplicably, the credits roll on a background of....stars and planets....as though you were getting an erotic massage on a space station.

People. What is going on here? Why are these gay men doing this? Why is 2-D porn insufficient? Why is there a brass 4-poster bed in space?

I feel like I am in that episode of Friends where Joey and Chandler get free porn and begin to be mystified when everyday situations do not end in some delivery girl offering herself to them.

Did I mention the music? It's Asian fusion Casio synthesizer. I could go on and on. But unfortunately, I have to get back to work.

Confidential Work

I just finished interviewing for a new job as the personal/executive assistant to a person who owns a business. I wish I could say more, but if I get the job, I will be required to sign a confidentiality agreement, thereby limiting my ability to mine for material my crazy work environs. I dare not even say whether this person is a man or woman, nor what industry this potential job is in, as any connection whatsoever between myself and this person in writing will constitute, I’m sure, a violation of the impending confidentiality agreement. Indeed, this will be the one and only written record of said job if, in fact, I get the gig. If such job becomes mine, I will be forced to write such enticing missives as:

Today I went to a place with four walls and a ceiling where I worked for approximately the same amount of time as many of my fellow Americans tend to work on any given day of the week. On this day I performed many tasks set before me by my boss that were challenging yet fun, demanding yet doable. Over the course of an average number of hours I made out-bound and fielded in-bound phone calls about various subjects relating to my work. At a certain point in the day, I retired to an undisclosed location for a meal where my boss regaled me with a story about a trip to another country wherein my boss encountered several wacky characters that took my boss on a wild ride through a famous city in a car of undisclosed make and model. At several points in the story I was thrown into fits of laughter, followed by bitter tears and finally sublime enlightenment about the meaning of our existence. Sadly, none of the details leading to those emotional experiences can be related here. After our midday meal, I returned to our place of business (I neither confirm nor deny that it is either an office, or a residence, or some other form of building) where I continued to do the tasks at hand. By the end of my day, I had accomplished many of the things I set out to finish and accumulated information that would lead me into my next workday. I either drove or walked home, or took some form of public transportation.

You can see how boring that would be to read. I suppose I could amend my style and make it more like a fill in the blank situation. Then at least I could just say what I wanted except for the exact words that were guarded by confidentiality:

Today I went to noun where I was greeted by proper noun. proper noun said that I was doing an adjective job at my work thus far and gifted me with a noun, animal. I verbed and said that the noun, animal was simply too adjective for me to verb. But after a few more adjectives, proper noun was victorious and I accepted the noun, animal, as my own. Once afternoon came along, proper noun had a meeting scheduled with proper noun, heroin addict. Proper noun, heroin addict, was late for their appointment and I was forced to verb until proper noun, heroin addict arrived. Once I got the two of them settled into the noun, I offered our guest a noun, or a noun, and our guest countered that a noun would make a better offering. I verbed under my breath and verbed quickly back to my noun. Once back at my noun, I realized that my new noun, animal, had verbed all over my bosses new noun. I verbed adverbially and then gritted my nouns as I verbed up the noun. just another noun at the adjective noun!

Hopefully I’ll get the job. But if I don’t, at least I can look forward to keeping my vocabulary.

Jimmy the Photography Salesman

9:35am – I am sitting in a giant warehouse that passes for a photography studio.  70 or 80 hopefuls will come through the doors today, expecting to be photographed and made into stars.  Many dreams will be crushed.  Some will cry.  Those that don’t cry right away will be pushed over the brink by my prices.  I glance at the receptionist.  She is bossy and wears a skirt that is pink and shredded at the hemline, apparently on purpose.  I consider telling her that her skirt is ripped.  I decide against this course of action.  She is responsible for bringing me each victim and I don’t want to piss her off.

10:45am – I am sitting across from my first ‘client’.  He is 5’6”. He is Indian.  He is hairy.  His collared shirt cannot subdue his chest hair, which is making a play for my keyboard.  I casually pull the keys closer to me.  His chest hair counters and almost takes control; at the last I am successful, but only because my arms are longer than his several hairy strands.  Jitu Patel is his name.

“What kind of work are you looking for?” I ask.  Standard question.  Hopefully he wants to be a model, because that means he will have to buy lots of pictures.

“Well, I’m just starting out, so anything really.”

“Are you a guild member?”

“What’s that?”

We have now come to a critical crossroads; those who don’t even know that the guild exists are much better prey.  I go in for the kill and come out with a glossy color headshot and three 9X12 prints for his ‘portfolio’.  Price tag: $320.00.  Sap.

11:30am – I am sitting across from sap #2, an elderly Russian immigrant who wants me to understand that she speaks Slavic, Russian, Croatian and English.  She has with her two suitcases of clothing.

“I’m not to be sure how much I was to bring, so I bring this two cases of suits.  Some dresses, one very pretty, from wedding party, and also one of sequins.  Shiny is good, yes?”

This is almost too easy.  100 color headshots later, the Russian is shaking my hand and thanking me for this opportunity.  Somewhere in Heaven, an angel falls.

12:36pm – I am sitting across from a very homely young man, wrinkled and aged before his time, a real Steve Buscemi in training.  The problem here is that he actually has a resume.  With stuff on it.  And at the top it says in a very matter-of-fact font, SAG/AFTRA/EQUITY.  Damnit.  This is the tough sell.  How do you put the toothpaste back in the tube?

“So tell me Paul, what kind of work are you looking for?”

“Well, I’ve been working a lot on CSI and The West Wing, single camera shows like that.  But right now I’m really trying to get into film.  I just had a screen test for a feature but I don’t think I got it.  Small part opposite a name actor.  But that’s the breaks eh?”

I’m in big trouble here.  He knows terms like ‘single camera show’ and ‘screen test’.  How can I convince him that he should become a model and get a zed card?  Thankfully, I don’t have to.  At this very moment my ‘associate’ Pam comes up and introduces herself as Paul’s new booking agent.  Before he can retort that he already has an agent Pam looks at the proofsheet of his photo session and proclaims, “you’re so good with the camera.  Have you ever thought about getting into modeling?  You could really do a lot of print work.  I would love to get a nice 4-look zed card of you as soon as possible.”

A bit more smoke is blown and Pam flits off confident that she has just closed the sale for me. Instead, Paul is already gathering his things.

“Well, I’m not gonna spend any money with you guys.  I thought this whole thing was free.  I already have headshots.  I’m just here to take advantage of the free photo session.”

6:42pm – My last client is a thin, wiry black boy in his early 20’s.  He was recently discharged from the military – the navy – and is currently wearing a pair of jeans that no man should ever wear, tight, bedazzled and cream colored.  His voice is high and soft, like a geishas.  Obviously gay.

“I just want to dance and sing!  But I had to wait until I left the military.”

“So are you prepared to spend a few hundred dollars on headshots?”

“No, but that doesn’t mean I won’t spend a few hundred for some head!”  He giggles furiously and cups his hands over his mouth. “Seriously, I’m a real good sin-ger and I know I’ve got the whole package.”

I’m concerned that when he stands his package is going to come clear through his pants.  I decide against ripping this one off as he seems to have enough problems in life.  This is my moral compass.  I only scam those as I think can handle it.  Plus, I’ve seen enough packages to last me a lifetime.

Darkie the Foster Child

From the time I was little, I have been confused and confusing when it comes to my ethnic background. Children on the playground would ask me questions like, “why are you so dark?’ and ‘how come your brother is white and you’re not?’ and ‘what language to you speak?’ I remember wondering as a child whether my mother had fucked a neighbor or the mailman while my father worked nights as a grocery store stock-boy. Family portraits look like that scene from Sesame Street where 4 children stand in four different boxes, all throwing a ball, except for one who is twirling a baton. The screen would go dark in just that one box, and that baton-twirling boy would be singled out: one of these kids is not like the other, come on, can you tell which one?’ Technically I’m white, whatever that means. I’m not a fan of being labeled something that can also be used to describe a type of bread, but the long answer is too much work. My parents have fair skin and my brother and sister have blond hair and green eyes. So it always comes as quitea shock when people realize that I, brown-eyed, olive skinned and angular, am related to my freckled kin. Such situations inevitably lead to the age-old question, ‘where the hell are you from, darkie?’

“Jimmy? Oh he’s Middle Eastern I think. Something like Sudan or Jordan or some shit like that.”

“What, Jimmy? Oh he’s Guatemalan. And a little Irish.”

“I think Jimmy’s a Mexican but don’t tell him I said that.”

And of course, many people think I’ve got a little black in me. And I’m not convinced that that isn’t true. But the bottom line is, I look ethnic, other, not white, not boy-next-door, not even country-next-door. I am so exotic that no one has any idea where I could have come from. “What are you, Egyptian? No? Mongolian? No? How about Italian? This is a good game! Gimme a hint!”

The truth is, I’m mostly German with a splash of other European nation states thrown in for good measure. It’s my 1/64th Spanish ancestry that has taken my visage hostage and created me in the image of the Moors invading Spain. Try fitting that in the checkbox on a government issued document.

I often wished as a child that the ridicule I received on the playground – Adopted! Adopted! Ji-iiiimy’s adopted! – was in fact true, and that I had no genetic relationship whatsoever to my white parents. I fantasized that one day, there would be a knock at the door and my real parents, the bronzed Lord Edward and Lady Sara, would be standing there, ready to reclaim me after what had obviously been some horrible misunderstanding. Lady Sara would unpin her hat and say, “that’s our child! You filthy people let him go! Edward, honey, tell the Driver to pull the limo around the front. We’re leaving this instant! Jimmy, darling, gather your….no, never mind. Nothing you have here will be necessary where we’re taking you. No, don’t worry about your toothbrush. We’ll buy you one when we get to Madrid.”

I imagined that I would be whisked away on a jet to a lush country estate where I would be given my own wing of the mansion and a pony. Breakfast would be served on Silver, like in the movies, and there would be a bell pull by my four-poster bed so that I could get the servants attention whenever I wanted. But sadly, this was never to happen. Though I often eyed large black cars with suspicious hope, I never met my fantasy parents. Instead my mother would say to me, “Don’t fool yourself buckaroo. You’re my kid, 100%. It took me 13 and a half hours to get you out and I’ve got the stretch marks to show for it. And you’re the only one of you kids to give me stretch marks too! No, you’re definitely mine. Now quit staring out the window and help me tie your brother to the highchair so he doesn’t squirm out again.”

I shared a bedroom and a set of bunk-beds with my younger brother, who was forced to sleep on the lower bunk so that he wouldn’t fall to the ground from a great height. “I swear that brother of yours is such a wiggle worm, he could dig a hole to China if you let him nap in a sandbox! Now help my put up the bed rail!” At night, I was rocked to sleep by my brother’s continuous twisting and turning, movements that sent our entire bunk bed gently swaying in an invisible breeze.

Wiggle Worm and I took the school bus to school when he got big enough to go. I would be forced to chaperone my 1st grade brother to his class every morning. Most teachers thought I was my family’s foreign exchange student and couldn’t understand why I was in charge of seeing Wiggle Worm safely to class and back. “Those parents are making that poor colored child baby-sit their 6 year old. It’s so sad. Someone should report them to Child Protective Services.”

Whatever our relationship now, Wiggle Worm and I were the best of friends; the most brotherly one can imagine when we were children. Only 2 and a half years apart, we had many of the same friends for much of our growing up. We spent time skipping rocks on the man made lake near our apartment or climbing trees and throwing pine cones at passing cars while snacking on honeysuckle weeds. We forged toy bow and arrows from bamboo and string to shoot at birds. We gathered neighborhood children for giant games of hide and seek. We took cardboard boxes and slid down grass hills at breakneck speed. And all the while, I was thinking “This is all well and good now, but when my REAL parents come, I’m gonna have a real bow and arrows with which I can hunt pheasant, and I’ll skip diamonds over the surface of my own private pool. And pure honey that comes from my own private beehive will be brought over to me in a tiny jar marked with a Fleur de Lis and I’ll spread it over graham crackers that the cook made special for me.” My reality was being overshadowed by my imagination more and more. Every time someone said to me, “Child, where did your parents GET you? Are you a foster child?” I retreated a little further into my life with Lord Edward and Lady Sara. To the question, “who’s your REAL dad?’ I often thought to respond, “Why, Lord Edward of the realm of Fauntleroy of course!” but instead would be forced to say, ‘that guy over there driving the beat up pick-up truck. That’s him. He has to sleep during the day because he gets up late to go open boxes at the supermarket. Sometimes he brings them home though, and we get to slide around on them, my brother and me, so I guess he’s okay.”

As an adult, I have learned that I am more like my parents than I ever thought would be possible when I was young and throwing pine cones. It turns out that my mother had a similar fantasy world that she felt more painfully than I did my own. And my father is still somewhat dizzied by the fact that he had three children by the time he was 24. And so sometimes it’s easier for my dad to say, ‘yeah, I don’t know who that guy is. He looks a lot like my son, but he’s way too old to be. Plus I think he’s black.”

The Coalition of the Spilling

Atlanta, GA - In a move today that stunned the White House and the leaders of many Communist nations, the newly coined Coalition of the Spilling invaded the state of Georgia in what it called a mission ‘to stave off the genocide of unborn American citizens that has been all but enforced by the Democratic Party of The United States.’ Military forces from some 7 nations that included France, Italy, Swaziland, Belaruse, Burkina Fasa, Yemen and the former USSR province of Uzbekistan arrived in a kit plane over the airspace of Atlanta Georgia early Tuesday morning. It is not yet clear exactly when or where the Coalition was able to build their kit plane, but speculation has led American law enforcement to follow up leads both on the island of Cuba and the Florida State University campus in Florida. The kit plane landed on the green swath that leads to the NIH building complex in the early hours on Tuesday. The 9 man coalition exited the plane carrying what looked to be brooms, mops, vacuum cleaner attachments and nine millimeter sidearms. The coalition met little resistance from scientists as it entered the NIH complex, establishing a beachhead of sorts at the large double doors to the main building. The Yemenise and Uzbekistani men were left to stand guard while the other 7, led by the two French, carried out a seek and destroy mission that involved locating and destroying all liquid Nitrogen tanks containing human embryonic stem cells. Only hours after their Commando-style landing, the Coalition of the Spilling had overturned an estimated 2 large tank-looking objects, tearing away any tubing attached and emptying their contents onto the floor. One source close to the NIH, speaking on condition of anonymity said, ‘I haven’t been inside since the invasion began, but based on the reports I’ve been hearing, it sounds like they may have overturned some vats of soup in the NIH kitchen. I’ve been in that kitchen once or twice and believe me, under the right circumstances, I may have mistaken the Split Pea for embryonic stem cells too.’

By nightfall, the Yemenise Soldier, rumored to have needed a bathroom break, was seen leaving his post, much to the dismay of the Uzbekistani. Negotiators were then able to establish a line of communication with the invading coalition via the lone door ward and have begun disseminating what they think is the underlying policy for the invasion.

‘It’s clear that the Coalition went into the NIH to liberate unborn fetuses with inadequate resources. Reports have put the number of women troops in the coalition at 3, maybe less. We know the Swazi and at least one of the French are women, but two or three wombs is just far too few wombs to get all those embryos out alive. Far too few wombs,’ said Special Forces Commander Jason Tarkington of the Atlanta SWAT team.

Tarkington was able to confirm that the overturned vats were indeed chicken noodle soup. It has also been claimed that the lives of at least two NIH scientists as well as the life of the coalition force from Yemen have been lost in this military operation. The Coalition has released a statement to the world clarifying their aim:

‘We nations have a clear-defined duty to rid the world of oppressors of humanity and we will act according to our moral and ethical compass. The United States poses imminent threat to untold numbers of unborn fetuses and we must not be deterred from sparing them destruction. Though we have found no unborn fetuses to this point, we will not be discouraged; our search continues. We will stop at nothing to save all unborn fetuses from destruction, even if it means we must sacrifice the lives of our own men and women to do so. We will not be dissuaded by The United States’ campaign of disinformation that ‘embryonic stem cell research is much more prevalent in the private sector’ and that we would be better served to examine and infiltrate publicly traded companies that deal in biomedical research. The number of Coalition lives lost is a small price to pay in this just and noble cause.’

Direction Man

The sun creeps over the palm tree and smog skyline, hits my forehead and draws a bead of sweat down my brow to the tip of my nose. I reach to dab it away. This early morning heat is more than I anticipated. Though my daily commute now consists of what may be called ‘a short walk’ of 15 minutes from my apartment to my office, I find that when I arrive at work, it is though I have just run a marathon wearing a plastic garbage bag. I adjust my Capezio dance bag and count down the minutes. I squint from behind a pair of sunglasses at the pavement ahead. I know what will happen on my way. It always happens, this coming moment, this transformation. One minute I am my normal, smallish self, trudging along toward the light, the next I am metamorphosed into something greater than the sum of my parts, some Oracle of information on two legs, a neon signpost of the mind, pointing the way for wayward citizens. I become Direction Man.

Today it is 9 minutes into my journey when I am summoned to my higher calling as Direction Man. With superhuman hearing, I sense a car approaching me from behind, traveling slowly, erratically, touristly. I lower my eyes and scrunch my neck down into my shoulders, an imaginary shell for my tortoise head. The car approaches cautiously. It rattles with the distinctive sound of a car made before the invention of fuel injection. I quicken my pace and furtively gaze ahead for signs of another pedestrian, someone with whom I can share this impending burden. There is a group of gardeners standing a football field’s length ahead. I begin to trot. Surely I can reach them before it’s too late. The car behind me rolls on and before I can duck into a garden or alleyway or sinkhole, it is upon me. a multicolored Chevy of some dubious origins bearing four occupants, all wearing hair from the early 90s, pulls directly along side me and squeaks to a stop. I can feel the blood boiling inside me, the inevitability of this moment. I am The Hulk, choiceless and afraid. Direction Man need only be summoned and I will be him.

“Excuse me! Can you tell us how to find the Hollywood Sign?” Just like that, Direction Man springs into action. He turns his torso, gleaming in the sun, to look at the lost travelers from afar, raises his glasses to look directly into their eyes and grows a smile a tour guide would be envious of. “We’ve been circling the neighborhood since 8am.” Four pairs of expectant eyes wait on Direction Man’s next move. Their plans are in his hands. Lucky for them, Direction Man has never met a geographical puzzle he couldn’t solve. He takes a breath and, as if reading it from a book, says, “Yes, you simply take this road which you are already on, continue east, which would be into the sun, and travel for approximately three miles. Once you have reached Beachwood Canyon, you must turn left, which would be north, and make your way into the beautiful Hollywood Hills. The sign is well guarded but as long as you have no untoward intentions, you should have no difficulty in accessing this glorious landmark of considerable history and meaning. Good day fair citizens. Now I must be off as there are many more folk just like you in need of help finding places of interest like Hooters and the freeway.”

A small gesture of thanks is all Direction Man needs. The car speeds off armed with a renewed sense of hope and disposable cameras with flash capability. Direction Man follows after them with his eyes, needing no sunglasses to dim the warmth of the generous rising sun. The smile he grew blossoms into fullness and then, in one fluid motion, withers and fades away.

I am so sweaty. I have lost four minutes. Why is it so bright? I pull my sunglasses down from head and over my eyes. I stand still for a moment to let my eyes adjust. Finally able to see clearly, I continue on. Damn you Direction Man! Damn you and your sense of duty, your sense of human compassion, your sense of…direction! I frown purposefully, regaining my inner equilibrium, my own sense of bitterness and suspicion of others. Bruce Wayne and Clark Kent shouldered light and fluffy burdens compared to the weight of my own alter ego. Direction Man can never be stopped or killed or put to pasture. Every inquiry only makes him stronger.

The Barricades of Freedom

I am walking into the lobby of a many storied office building on Hollywood Boulevard.  The building sits along the Walk of Fame across the street from the Grauman's Chinese Theatre and the L. Ron Hubbard Center.  I alight into an elevator car, press the 8th floor button and watch the doors woosh closed.  A few seconds go by and the car does a little dance, up and down.  The doors woosh open and I step into a new lobby, the lobby of my new office, my new job.  I swore I would never do again what I am about to do, but circumstance often overrides ethical fastidiousness and I have caved under the economic pressure.

My new job is telemarketing for a business called Watch That Talent.  Watch That Talent is not an agent or a manager or a casting director or a production house.  It is a very large,very dirty office space on the 8th floor, filled with and managed by society's rejects.  As I walk into the suite my nostrils are overcome by the smell of Cheetos, Diet Coke and poor dental hygiene.  My new 'Boss' is a Hispanic man in his late 30s, straight out of the video game Vice City.  He looks like an extra on Miami Vice.  His pants are loose-fitting, pleated and dart at the ankes.  His shirt is a Hawaiian print in blue and pink.  On his neck is a tattooed serial number.  I'm fairly certain that it is not only decorative, but that it used to serve a function.  Images of Jean Val Jean from Les Miserables fill my head, and I hear the song One Day More, but this time the lyrics are in Spanish.  Una Dia Mas!

My boss, Vice City, uses words like hesitational and motivationer.  Training for this job included a sppech from Vice City in which he said, "people are like hundreds of times of more likely to sign up if you can get them over their hesitational problems and stuff.  You have to be the motivationer in the situation and stuff.  Like tell them what is real and what is totally not real.  And stuff."

I pass through the rows of cubicles and find one that suits me.  Vice City told me that it didn't matter where I sat so I take a seat near the window. It occurs to me that the phone I am about to use for the next six hours has been used by hundreds of people before me.  I am totally going to get Pink Eye.

My job description is simple: call hundreds of potential models and actors who live in Tujunga and Valencia and convince them that they should become one of my 39,000 clients this month.  For the low price of $29.95 a month, I can gaurantee people named Yuma or Shunt or Gramach that they will be submitted for auditions.  Some of our 'Clients' have actually asked for our help by sending us their "headshots".  I have included one for your amusement that needs no punchline.  The background is particularly attractive.

I am sitting next to a man with the fewest number of teeth I have ever seen on a live person.  I imagine his toothless mouth using the phone I am on, perhaps on a day when I am not here and I cringe.  I am literally on overload.  The amount of material here is so great, I am having trouble keeping focused.  I am in a nightmare that is inside the head of a child in a horror film that is being shown in a small town in Idaho.

One more day before the storm
And the barricades of freedom!

On The Hunt

I am Poor. P-O-O-R, Poor. I am Single. I am Horny. While being any two of these things would not be a problem, all three is quite a predicament. If I was poor and single, but had no sex drive, perhaps I could spend all my efforts making scientific discoveries that would lead to wealth and boyfriends. If I was single and horny but rich, I could just buy hookers of the first class and satiate my singleness and hornihood all at once. If I was poor and horny but in a loving relationship, my partner and I could face the harsh realities of this world together while making it on the kitchen floor. As it stands, the closest I have ever been to scientific discoveries is figuring out how to make pasta sauce from flour, water and red food dye. Hookers are way beyond my reach – and dirty – and boyfriends are more elusive than the Yeti, hiding in the snowdrifts of life, making footprints for me to follow down dark paths where men will never be found, only swirling snowflakes.

Perhaps I should get a job. I hesitate however, because a job will require that I be someplace at a certain time, sit in a specific chair, have some kind of phone extension. I’ll have to set up a voicemail box, buy a Rolodex, wear a tie. I hate conformity. I scoff at authority. Memos and office politics make me woozy. I once hated an office job so much that I quit by sending my letter of resignation to the entire company staff worldwide, including the board of directors, a letter in which I slandered my boss, the CEO, and call him ‘sad, fat and narcissistic.’ The company was a publicly traded company on the Australian stock exchange; the CEO was a veritable Aussie celebrity. My letter was published in no less than two top-tier newspapers the next week in Sydney. Forever I will be able to say that that was the first time my writing was published. I should look into getting a tear sheet of those articles.

Or I could get another job in the service industry, which would be tantamount to suicide. I was never as good at bringing patrons soup and bread as I let on. The way I told it, I was the best waiter in all the land, winning waiter awards in waiter competitions with games like Carry All Those Scalding Plates While Running and Chase That Patron Out To Get Your Tip Money. No, sadly, the service industry has no place for me. I don’t much like people, and the first tenet of the service industry is ‘thou shalt get along with all people whether thou hast been spat upon, ignored or spoken rudely to by them or not.’

The biggest consequence of not having a job is considerably less access to Things That Require Power, Gas And/Or A Working Phone Line

Things That Require Power, Gas And/Or A Working Phone Line

Beep Beep Beep. The number you have reached has been disconnected or is no longer in service. Please check the number and try your call again. If you need help, dial your operator.

We are all familiar with the message; three tones of increasing pitch, a strange woman who sounds like your grandmother telling you that something has gone horribly awry in your dialing process. Whenever one is greeted with such an omen it can portend one of only three things: the person you are calling has forgotten to pay his or her bill; the person you are calling has entered the witness protection program without your knowledge; you have actually dialed wrong. I can claim some personal experience with the first of these three possible scenarios. Occasionally I have ‘forgotten’ to pay 7 or 8 phone bills in a row which then leads someone at the phone company to throw some giant switch labeled ‘Jimmy’ into the off position. Friends and family then have to either call my cell phone or send smoke signals to get my attention. Sometimes I have even dealt those closest to me a One-Two Punch, neglecting both my cell phone and home phone simultaneously. My cell phone is prepaid, in order to avoid such circumstance, but all too often one may hear me answer my cell and say, “Hi (insert name here), I know it’s you but I can’t talk because I’m down to 4 minutes of talk time. Let’s catch up in the fall when I have had a chance to work out a payment plan with Verizon.” In such instances it would be wise for my inner circle to assess just how many times they have heard me say, “I’m not really hungry, I just ate on Friday.”

As I look for a job, the real challenge will not be finding the right employer, or writing the right cover letter. Rather, I will have to convince my potential employers to give concise directions to their office as I can only dedicate 2 minutes of talk time to each call.

“So you would like to see me for an interview? That’s great. What’s your address? What time would you like me there? Is it difficult to get there? On the Freeway? Wow, I didn’t realize that you were so far from me? Do you think maybe we could meet halfway? I’m not sure I have enough….uh….no, don’t worry with giving me directions, I’ll just ask around. Your company sounds great. I’d love to hear more but I really have to go. Why? No reason. I just really have to go. Now. No, I don’t have time to hear about the position. Can we just do that in person? Yeah, that would be great. So where would you say the closest bus stop is?”

Climb Every Mountain

I am standing three deep at the bar trying to get any bartender’s attention. My right foot is lunged forward in a very small space between two hulking gay men. They collectively weigh 350 pounds of pure muscle. Each is wearing a fitted tank top with a witty and slightly crass saying on it, one written upside down, intended for the reader to read while sitting on the face of the man wearing it. I cannot get more than my foot in between them as their shoulders are a rolling hillside of sinew, fibrous tissue and veins running down into the canyon of their backs, solid and firm. They are both drinking green martinis in up glasses and laughing in high-pitched voices about Something Britney Said on Stage. They have perfect, blinding teeth. I watch as the nearest bartender comes sauntering up, looks right at me, then through me to a hulking tank-top-wearing Mary slightly off my right side. A drink order is shouted over me at a considerable decibel level and I am left to wonder how much longer I will think this evening was a good idea.

The Hooker with a Heart of Gold is standing just a pace behind me. He is in a pale orange tee that is fitted and plain, devoid of any saying upside down or otherwise. His shirt would be an ocean on me. I catch his eye and raise my brow to say, “I can’t believe this is taking so long.” He reads my mind and approaches the bar. We do a little bar dance that involves a bit of casual groping, a quick inhale of his scent and exchange places. The Hulks are still at the bar sipping their cocktails and debating Britney’s Boobs. What size are they now? HHG makes his move. In an astounding feat of gay plate tectonics, HHG’s rolling shoulder hillside crashes into and becomes a part of the Hulks’ mountain range. They all three acknowledge each other, share a brief laugh about cup size and HHG slips past the fault line of their conversation right into perfect position to order our drinks. The five minutes I wasted are made up for in just under 45 seconds. It pays to bring shoulders like that to a gay bar.

I suggested that we go out tonight. It has been more than three weeks since we have seen or spoken with each other. Either he called me or I called him; whichever you believe makes no difference. We talked for a bit and then I asked him if he would like to get a cocktail to catch up. He counter-offered that we should go out together to find guys. He stressed that this would be an activity shared amongst friends. I took a moment to assess my pride. As we are barely seeing each other I didn’t see the harm. I figured it was like going out alone with a safety net; if I come home without a single catch, there will be something in the freezer that we can defrost and devour. So I agreed. I bought a bottle of Vodka. I drove to his house. We made a drink and chatted. About an hour of nothing particularly important brought us to the point we are at now.

I take the drink HHG has ordered for me out of his hand. He leaves some cash on the bar, passes through the valley he created between the Hulks and returns to my side, slipping his arm around my waist.

“See anything good?” he asks.

“Not particularly,” I reply. This is not a lie either. I have been scanning the room looking for something I would rather have wrapped around my waist. Thus far I have come up with zilch.

“What about you?” I ask, “any takers?”

“Nah,” he says with a wink.

Oh, I’m on to you HHG. I know your little game. If you think I’m gonna be the first to break, you are messin’ with the wrong ‘Mo. I smile and say, “Well, it’s early. Give it time. I’m sure you’ll find someone.”

I once told HHG that I rarely go to bars with my gay friends to look for a quick fling. Not that my past isn’t peppered with such sundry incidents; I am simply now more interested in having a conversation with the people I came with. He acted incredulous and promised me that the next time we went out he would show me how to get back in the saddle. Back on the horse. Back to the shore.

We are floating in a sea of men all wearing the same tank top. The waves of dance music combine with the waves of men’s cologne to create a sensory experience that is overwhelming and disorienting. HHG and I have spent the entire evening talking to each other. We have not met a single new person. “Come on,” he says and puts his empty drink down on the nearest table. As he reaches across me, his chest comes close to me and I again am enveloped by his less obvious yet more attractive scent. Perhaps it is just familiar. I am struck by how easy it is to be so enamored of one part of a person. I have barely scraped the surface of HHG only because I have become so incredibly involved with it. I only see the very top layer of him. I am a one eyed man with no visual cues for depth, no sense of foreground and background. I see only what everyone else can see.

We escape the rollicking music and discussions of Britney’s Ability to Throw Her Hair Around and make for a quieter place where we can…

There are people who climb mountains to study what is at the top. Some climb because it makes them feel like they have achieved something few have or ever will. As I lay next to HHG I consider my motive. It is action. The opposite of rest. To be moving in a direction, some direction, that feels like up even with no clear understanding of what is at the top, or how far down it would be to fall. I want to be higher than I am, more than I am, standing on something firm and solid that I can stick a flag in and claim, an expeditioner. Discovery. A new and better view from a place I’ve never been. I just have to remember to be careful on the way down.

There is no Santa Claus

I have a Dirty Email Address. It’s the address I use when I’m forced to register for a porn site. It’s the address I use whenever I have chatted online with some strange guy. I won’t tell you what it is, but I assure you it involves both wit and double entendre. Surf any gay website and you will have a good idea what it may be. Most guys online are GUYWITH9INCHES or HOT4UNOW. Mine is equally dorky. I simply don’t want every porn site in Malaysia sending spam to my regular address, filling my inbox with suggestions that I need Viagra or that I should visit “Tammy” at her cam site right now because she is waiting for me. And even though no one has my Dirty Email Address (DEA) it is always mildly exciting when I open it. Perhaps there will be a message from the perfect porn site, or a correspondence from that fling from days gone by, begging to meet just one more time, or maybe The Hooker with a Heart of Gold will have called on me, eloquent and romantic, signaling the next round in our torid affair. When I invented my DEA, I never imagined that I would actually use it for correspondence with anyone but it seems I was wrong because HHG has only ever had my DEA. He has used it several times to ask me important things like:

“what are you doing tonight?”
-HHG

or

“Free tonight?”
-HHG

or my favorite

“You online now?”
-HHG

The answers have generally been “you” “yes” and “no” in that order. I usually check my DEA about once a week or two just to clean out the spam and make sure it stays active. Today was the day for that, and I typed in my dirty password like a child on Christmas morning, wondering what would be under the tree. The inbox screen appeared and HHG had sent me an email. This time though, it wasn’t a veiled invitation to his massage table or a virtual love letter filled with missives about his undying hunger for my body, it was a forward, warning me and 25 other people not to lick stamps or envelopes because “CNN reported that a woman in an envelope factory licked an envelope, cut her tongue, was infected with cockroach eggs and subsequently gave ‘birth’ to live roaches via her tongue when a doctor inspected the ‘infection’ only days later.”

Thanks God for that email. I was about to start a day working for the Kerry campaign licking envelopes and mailing them out. HHG is the most considerate fuck buddy I have ever had.

As I contemplated what to do about this public service announcement, I calculated the number of days that had passed since I last heard from HHG. It turns out that it has been 18 days. 18 days since we were in very pleasing, if compromising, positions with each other, 18 days that included two unreturned phone calls from yours truly, 18 days that included no activity with my DEA until this. A cockroach egg warning. Don’t lick stamps lest you get infected with roaches. This is the gay equivalent of buying your wife a toaster for her birthday. The minute you begin sending your gay fuck buddy email warnings about urban myths, all the air has gone out of your relationship. I should say that for a microsecond, before I opened the email, I was actually glad to hear from him. I figured it would be one of his regular warm, wordy messages inviting me in for an exciting evening:

“Fuck tonight? Call me.”
-HHG

But no. Sadly, I was given a toaster on my birthday. At this point he might as well be some old college friend on the east coast that I never see. He could be my Jewish grandmother who is tech savvy and warns me about everything, if I had one. He might as well be any one of you, with my regular email address. There was nothing sexy, or enticing about warning me about roaches. That email was the kind of gift that needs no wrapping, the kind you hand over in the bag it came in, tag still attached. The PRACTICAL gift. “This is something useful, something you can put to use.” That was the email that made me realize there is no Santa Claus.

Batteries Not Included

A typical day for me involves a certain minimum number of false starts when attempting to leave my house. I am what one would refer to as ‘scatterbrained’, ‘addled’ or ‘geriatric’ when it comes to knowing where my personal affects are. Things like my keys, my wallet, my sunglasses, my shoes, my cell phone, my bag, all seem to go missing right when I am five minutes late. I have been known to run around my house in one shoe, searching for my wallet which is, of course, in my other pants pocket, while brushing my teeth and attempting to make a phone call to say that I am running late. It seems my brain can make a list of all the things I need to do in order to get ready, but can’t actually get any of them done. I end up short circuiting, trying to do three things involving my mouth all at the same time. I will frequently find one article, say my cell phone, at the expense of another, say my sunglasses, which I previously had and then set down in the exact place I found my cell phone. It is not uncommon for all the things that need to go in my pockets to be found in the furthest corners of my apartment, as though they were sci-fi pieces to some secret weapon the forces of good never want reassembled.

Once I have gathered them all – usually in a pile on the kitchen table; it helps me to see them all in the same place at the same time – I am able to put them into my pockets and make my first attempt at leaving. Invariably, I will be in the elevator going down from my third floor apartment to the parking garage when I realize that the secret item on today’s list of ‘Things I Will Need Out There’ is not with me. This time it is my Capezio dance bag which holds an assortment of books, scripts, Advil, glasses cases, pens and the portable CD player for my car. As soon as the doors open at the garage level, I am joined by my neighbor, a heavy set man, and his dog. I do not get out but instead ride all the way back up with him. “Forget something?’ he wonders aloud. “Yeah,” I say and shake my head as if I can’t believe I could be so forgetful. In truth, this is only the first of what will probably be three tries at getting out of the house.

I exit the elevator, trudge down the hall and enter the apartment in search of my Capezio bag, which I know is sitting on the floor in my bedroom. As I walk into my room, I trip on a considerable pile of laundry and angrily rip my sunglasses off of my face and fling them onto the bed. Now that my eyes can see better, I grab my bag, triumphant, spin on my heels and march right back out the door, down the hall and press the elevator button. As I hear the elevator whirring and climbing, I realize that I have forgotten my sunglasses in my room. The elevator is on its way but I can’t go out without my sunglasses. I race down the hall, fumble for my keys, unlock the door, run into the bedroom, miss the pile of laundry, grab my sunglasses and make for the front door. Just as I am locking up my apartment I hear the elevator doors open. I turn and run, but time is against me. Another neighbor has taken advantage of the elevator; I am just in time to see her through the quickly closing doors. Impatient, I decide that rather than wait for the elevator again, I will take the stairs. I cross back down the hall, past my apartment door to the other side where the fire exit is. Down two flights of stairs, out one door, across one hall, down another flight of stairs, through another door and I am back in the parking garage. Feeling relatively certain that this time will be the one, I make it all the way to my car, which is parked in the tandem space that I share with my roommate, who is not home. I get in, sit down, fuss in my bag for my portable CD player and plug it in. I turn the car on and zip out of my parking space.

It is at this moment that I realize that my CD is not playing.

And then it is at the exact next moment that I know why: I robbed the CD player of its batteries the previous night when my TV remote died.

Exasperated, I move the car back into my parking space. I throw my bag and CD player into the trunk – I drive a convertible and therefore can’t leave them in the cabin – and race to the elevator. This time I decide to wait. I push the button. I wait. And wait. I can’t hear the elevator moving. I push the button again. I wait. I breathe a heavy breath and go flying back up the stairs, across one hall, up two more flights and onto the third floor. Inside, I grab the remote, open it up, shove the batteries into my pocket and leave the now empty remote on the couch. This trip down to the garage I forgo the elevator all together and just use the stairs.

And of course, once I get all the way down, disaster has struck; my roommate has arrived home in the split seconds that I was either upstairs or in the stairwells. Her car is now behind mine, blocking it. Fortunately I keep a spare key for her car on my key ring. I move her car, move my car, move her car back into the parking space and finally, finally make it out of the parking garage.

I make one pit stop immediately in which I turn off the car, unlock the trunk and retrieve my CD player, insert the batteries and hit play. The music blares and I am off.

Three minutes into my drive, my cell phone rings. It is my roommate. “I thought you were home. Your car was parked downstairs.” “I was,” I reply, “but we missed each other I guess. I took the stairs.” My roommate chuckles. “Ok. well, I’ll just see you when you get back. Oh and, hey, what happened to the remote?” she asks.

The Tattoo

6:45AM – Hooker with a Heart of Gold is sleeping next to me. We are on his new bed that he bought at least in part to please me. In truth, he probably waited to buy the bed until there was a person like me to manipulate, someone he could convince through massage oil and wicked smiles that the new bed was purchased with someone else’s comfort in mind. Louse. I am wide awake. I am concerned that my car is parked on the wrong side of the street. Street cleaning begins in just over an hour. If I am on the wrong side, this night will have cost me $35.00, and it won’t even go to the hooker. This seems inappropriate at best. I consider changing my position in bed, regaining my left arm, which is currently wrapped tight around HHG’s remarkable midsection in a left facing spoon. He has a death grip on my left hand close to his chest. He breathes deeply and silently. I try to breathe with him. He squeezes my hand a little tighter. I have no feeling in my left hand. I also have no feeling in my right arm which is smashed somewhere between my chest and his back. I gave up looking for it about 15 minutes ago. I hope I am not parked on the wrong side of the street. I hate tickets.

6:48AM – This is ridiculous. I should just move and get comfortable. If I don’t do it soon, I will not have a viable hand with feeling with which to maneuver into another, more comfortable position. HHG continues to breathe slow and deep. I am staring at the back of his head. This new bed was supposed to make it feasible for me to spend the night over here. Instead, what has happened is, HHG has decided that 100% of the sleeping time will be devoted to Siamese Sleeping. It is like we are one body. And since I have no feeling in both arms now, we essentially only have two arms. Odd. I continue to stare at the back of HHG’s head. His new tattoo is slightly alarming. He shaved his head last week and got a giant dragon tattooed on the back of his scalp. It is black and green. It is literally stretched from ear to ear. Our relationship wavers precariously for a moment: when physical attraction is the basis for a relationship, one would be wise to consult the second party before tattooing imaginary creatures on one’s head. I decide to mention this when he wakes up. I have an itch on my forehead and no working arm with which to scratch it. Oh my God. I itch. I itch I itch I itch. I am totally parked on the wrong side of the street, I know it.

7:00AM – I have wrenched free of HHG’s vice grip and managed to turn the other way, legs curled up, blood returning to my arms. HHG shifts around for a second, realizes that I have moved and turns to spoon me from behind. He reaches around my less remarkable midsection in search of my right hand. I play a bit of cat and mouse before he finally finds it and laces his fingers through mine. I glance down to see my knuckles turning a opalesque white. I realize that while it is indeed a great comfort that the mattress is made of memory foam, it would be significantly better if my entire body was Tempurpedic. I imagine myself for a moment remade completely in a bone colored foam that gently depresses when pressure is applied and lightly springs back when pressure is lifted. I have an itch on my left knee now. I will never reach it.

7:45AM – I have either fallen asleep or passed out. When I awaken, HHG has released me from his clutches and is now splayed out on his back, legs wide, arms above his head and wide, a perfect X when seen from above. I am curled tightly in the fetal position on my side of the bed, just to his left. Thank god I’m small like I am. I turn toward HHG and decide that his remarkable midsection is too desirable to be let alone. I take a deep breath, reach my left arm across his body and nuzzle into his neck. His left arm comes down on the top of my head and he leans his head into mine just a bit. Our breath is exactly the same. Inhale. Exhale. He opens his eyes. “How did you sleep?” he asks. I consider for a moment. “Just fine,” I say. “But I’m worried I’m parked on the wrong side.” “You’re perfect just where you are,” he says. “ I meant my car,” I clarify. “That’s fine too,” he says. He turns toward me so that he is on his side, completely engulfing me. My face is mashed into his remarkable midsection. Our breathing has changed. His is still long and deep, mine is thin and through my only working nostril (the right one is mashed against, well, you know). My right arm begins to go numb.

8:45AM – I am pulling on my socks. Very dignified. Shoes from last night. They never seem right in the morning light. HHG is feeding the cat. The tattoo on the back of his head is staring at me. Dragon wings spread open wide, talons, tail, fire breath. In a month or so, when his hair grows back in, I won’t be able to see it. It will be hidden away, under his dark, coarse hair. But it will still be there. Just under the surface. Breathing fire.

Jimmy the Porno King Vs. The Hooker with a Heart of Gold

Jimmy the Porno King Vs. The Hooker with a Heart of Gold

In the strictest sense, I am not dating the Hooker with a Heart of Gold. Dating consists of getting to know someone in several parallel ways simultaneously, perhaps in the bedroom, in the kitchen and in the study. Figure out how a person fucks, how a person cooks and what or if a person reads and you can fairly well determine your base level of compatibility. If you are cooking Rock Shrimp with a light white wine sauce over a warm spinach and feta cheese salad, and he is cooking something that comes in box labeled at least, in part, ‘ A - Roni’ then you are probably not entirely compatible. If you are reading a non-fiction book about General Relativity Theory and how it relates to the quantum world, he should not be reading Maxim; better that he didn’t read at all.

The Hooker with a Heart of Gold (HHG) and I initially met two months ago over the Internet. The gay Internet is like a gay bar without all the cumbersome dialogue involving things like whether one smokes or not and first names. When I first met HHG, we decided our relationship was best explored through naked fun and not much else. The problem arose directly after our first encounter; it was clear only minutes after the smoke cleared that we had set some kind of record, won some kind of award, been nominated for something. High fives were exchanged (straight guys – do not attempt this in a similarly victorious situation; your female counterpart will hardly appreciate it) and then names and phone numbers. We decided that our naked fun status had been elevated and we would no longer be able to compete in the Olympics due to our professional standing. Needless to say, we have been getting together regularly to practice.

We played out several scenarios involving dim lighting, mood music and a massage table which I will be more than willing to gloss over. Being supportive of your ‘Mo friend is one thing; picturing him in a compromising position is quite another.

And this is where the trouble started; but before I take you over the edge, let me give you some description of the HHG so you can keep it in your mind.

HHG stands 6 feet tall and weighs in somewhere around 180. He is between 35-40. He is Cuban or something similar. I know it sounds like I am describing a liquor store robbery suspect, but from here on out I have more information. If we were dating I would inquire further; as we are not, I am content to guestimate. He is a personal trainer. This is to say his body should be used to advertise all sorts of home gym equipment. On more than one occasion, I have had to pinch myself to make sure I hadn’t imagined his physique. Dark hair, darker eyes, you get the picture.

The trouble is, he tried to date me. Imagine. My booty call trying to date me. He started inviting me to MOVIES, and out for drinks IN PUBLIC. He HELD MY HAND and asked me to SPEND THE NIGHT ON SEVERAL OCCASSIONS. Obviously, this threw me for a considerable loop. Under different circumstances I wouldn’t have thought twice about dating HHG, but when first names and ages come after giving up your amateur status in the bedroom, one must think about ‘How Far This Thing Should Be Taken’

How Far This Thing Should Be Taken

I am willing to go out on movie dates and ask all the questions about family life and favorite color, but I expect a modicum of reciprocity. On several occasions I have called HHG and left a message that was not returned for 3 days or more. In a Bedroom-only relationship, this is not a problem. On or about the third day I decide ‘we are just fooling around and no more should be thought about it. But then HHG will call to ask me HOW MY DAY WAS, and invite me over for A GLASS OF WINE. Neither of those phrases contain the verb ‘disrobe’ and therefore are inadmissible in a Bedroom-only relationship. And so just when I think I can ask a little bit more of HHG, he decides to be unavailable for days at a time. I would dismiss the whole thing were it not for the awards we are currently up for in the bedroom. Once you finish a project, it is only ethical to market it all the way through red carpet season.

You must be wondering through all this, “Jimmy, we understand your plight, but why do you call him The Hooker with a Heart of Gold? Surely he’s not a hooker, I mean, not a real one!’ The answer to your question is, unfortunately, I’M PRETTY SURE HE’S NOT. He is after all a personal trainer with a ridiculous body, a massage table in his house, a private gym and sketchy scheduling. Anyone who has seen the back pages of a gay publication knows that dozens of ‘Massage Therapists’ are really just fancy titles for Working Boys. But here I am, two months into a strange non-relationship with HHG. If we ever decide to have some real conversation, maybe I’ll ask. Then again, maybe not. I suppose if HHG really is a hooker, I should be flattered; he hasn’t asked me to pay for it once.

Jimmy

The Long Beach Pride

“Good morning, Gay Days Hollywood.”

This is how I have to answer the phone at my current job working as the assistant to an overworked, overwhelmed first-time event producer. The event is not worth going into, but suffice to say it is pretty gay. As part of my work schedule, I was forced to go the Gay and Lesbian Gay Pride Festival in Long Beach this weekend to work a booth and promote our event. If you have never been to Long Beach Gay Pride, count yourself lucky. I learned several valuable lessons and several lessons that, while I can’t find an application for them yet, surely will come in handy one day.

1. Lesbians don’t own mirrors. If they did, they would never leave the house.

2. Kilts are not sexy on anyone, especially a 65 year old leather daddy with a paunch and stick legs.

3. If you are offended by the smell of burning pork, do not attend. I tried to escape it for hours before finally giving up. If I were Jewish, I would have had to write away to get my foreskin back. I’m not sure who you write to about that, but I’m sure once they got a whiff of my pork-smoked clothing, they would want me to give up my membership to the ‘chosen people.’

4. Drag is dead. Poor drag queen. Droop your head in shame. Your makeup is a mess and I have better cleavage.

5. There are only 3 attractive homos in Long Beach and I have already slept with all of them.

6. Fags and dykes are so desperate to find acceptance in this world that they will line up in a parking lot at 9AM on a Sunday to attend what is essentially an Orange County Fair minus the Christians. But never you fear; Gay and Lesbian Christian Alliance has a booth set up right next to the Dildos-R-Us tent. You can stick something up your butt and immediately be forgiven only five feet away.

7. Contrary to the ‘Queer Eye’ image of quick-witted fags in designer duds zinging each other playfully while casually jockeying for the down camera position, most fags are actually overweight, balding and slightly drunk, even at 11AM. By 4PM most fags take their shirts off whether you want them to or not. And believe me, you don’t want them to.

8. Los Angeles is the ‘Pretty People' capital of the world. Long Beach is the ‘Who Cares if I’m Pretty, I Have This Steak and Cheese Sandwich’ capital of the world.

9. For some reason, the Gay and Lesbian community is like a garbage disposal in your sink; people who have failed to find a sense of belonging in every other major oppressed group eventually find their way to a gay pride festival. Maybe they are excessively tan; maybe they never gave up Mohawks; maybe they are black on the outside and white at heart. Gay Pride is like the garbage disposal of fringe society; whatever you can stuff through the opening, we’ll take it.

The week before the festival, I did a favor for a friend of mine by doing an extras job for his independent film. My friend is a big ol’ Jew and I’m a big ol’ Mo. We like to tease each other by calling each other Kike or Fag. It’s fun. So when he wrote this small line about a gay guy in a ridiculously tight shirt, naturally, he thought of me. The scene was an office scene, in which I wear a skin tight lycra shirt. The joke in the short scene is that ‘skin tight lycra is not appropriate in the office, or anywhere.’ I didn’t have to say anything; I just had to react to being scolded for wearing what was essentially a Bike racing shirt to the office.

I tell you this to illustrate my final point. Upon arrival at the Gay Pride Festival on Saturday morning, my boss opened up a box of shirts and said, “we’re all going to wear these shirts that I had made up. Here, this is a small…put it on.” And of course, it was a skin tight Lycra Shirt with the words “Gay Days’ on it. Like that wasn’t obvious already.

Jimmy

The Bard and Porn

Happy Tuesday,

12:21pm - Our offices sit on the street level right on Santa Monica Blvd. Occasionally large trucks drive by. You know, the ones hauling huge loads of whatever. Lots of noise, pollution, etc. So Lesbian #1 in accounting sits right at the window that faces the street. Her phone on her desk is 12 feet from the pavement at any given moment. Occasionally truckers use something known as a CB radio. In our Internet times this may seem like an obsolete method of communication but, I assure you, it is not short in the entertainment department.

Lesbian #1's phone always picks up the short wave transmissions of truckers in the midst of conversation as they pass by. The intricate workings of the trucking industry are played through her speakerphone and bounce off our 5 foot vaulted ceilings for all to hear. Today's gems included:

"What the hell are you hauling? Come back." BEEP
"I'll bet you're hauling some good shit. Come back." BEEP
"What the fuck are you hauling faggot? Come back." BEEP
"I'll bet you're a nice faggot aren't you faggot. Come back." BEEP

Now I don't know about the rest of you, faggots and otherwise, but I don't know that I would necessarily respond to someone who repeatedly called me a faggot. Except for Karri of course. But what gets me is that even while harassing this other trucker, the trucker still uses the 'come back'. Doesn't that seem like stabbing someone and then handing them a towel for the blood?

Also, today, I was asked to model a few items for our website. Necklaces, tank tops, muscles shirts, etc. After I finished laughing, I stood up and said no. Then I laughed again. Then I went back to my desk and cried. Why is my job like a tragedy every day? Only Shakespeare had to ever deal with such tragedy.

A hole dug ever deeper than mine eyes
Have guessed to be the nether most descent
Into a silent spiral of despair
From which no boldened brigand might escape.
If ever ‘twixt my palms sat wisdom’s seat
I think it were a day I never joined
But played in merry fields made of dreams
Forgetful of the setting sun and moon.
The days of porn are ever drawn around
To tug and tear my poles into the ground.


Jimmy

The Jism Club

People,

On the eve of war I am fighting one of my own; the war of good taste.

8:30am - Why do all of my most heinous sex stories occur before the decent hour of noon? A morning meeting has determined that something is wrong with our new frequent porn buyers club, 'The Jism Club'. The Jism Club is jittery. The Jism Club is jaded. The jism club is not buying our new porn.

--ACTUAL QUOTE--

" The Jism Club used to buy loads and loads, buttloads of our new stuff? What happened?"

-President of Porn


--ACTUAL RESPONSE--

"The Bush War happened."
-Coworker

It seems Iraq and the threat of VX Nerve Agent has deflated the porn economy. Everywhere across America, closeted, married bears are putting their hard earned cash under the mattress rather than into the economy.

--ACTUAL SUGGESTION--

"We don't have enough regular communication with our customers. What we need is information going in and out, in and out, in and out! (Heavy breathing)"
-President

It should be noted that the heavy breathing was due largely to allergies, though illicit thoughts could not be ruled out as a suspect.

If only Iraq was my biggest concern.

Jimmy

The Tard in Porn

The Tard in Porn

They say that being retarded is something you are born with, but I think you can
catch it. I guess it really depends on the kind of retard you are. If you are
the ‘Tuesday’s With Morrie’, Oprah Book Club retard, then it’s definitely
something you were born with and destined to overcome through a montage
involving learning to tie your shoe, riding a bike and looking through a
telescope for the first time. But, however, there is another kind, more
insidious because it looks on its face to be something similar but proves in the
end to be completely different, uninspiring, unsympathetic and incredibly
dangerous. This is the kind of retard that doesn’t get the balloon tied to his
wrist at restaurants. This is the retard we all can refer to as ‘tard’.
Completely normal from birth, the Tard develops essentially like a normal child,
reading more or less with his class, playing in the sandbox, roller-skating and
climbing trees. But it is at some point, still undetermined by science, that
the Tard takes a severe turn for the worse. What can be confirmed is that there
is no causal relationship between tard-ness and any factor in the tard’s
environment that would set off the catastrophic chain reaction that inevitably
occurs within the tard’s brain. This is to say that a normal person in the same
environment would not become a tard. It is endemic to the tard’s make-up that
his responses to stimuli in his environment are poorly designed for no good or
explainable reason. This is the first good history indicator of a true tard.

Most tards go into porn. It is unclear why this is exactly, but nevertheless it
is a tried and true fact. Once they get into porn, they start ordering people
around and reading their email when those people are at lunch or in the loo. So
I generally have to open a word document and write my emails from there, copying
and pasting very quickly into Hotmail before I’m spotted. But it’s even
suspicious still, because I’m often not writing lengthy paragraph shaped things
for work, mostly because no one here could read them. So what happens is:

I.I have to write like this
a.In order to avoid
i.Detection.
II.If it looks like I’m
a.Outlining something for a meeting
i.Then I can fly under
1.The
a.Radar.
Lesson number 32:
When a Tard is standing directly in front of you, and therefore staring at the
back of your monitor, he cannot see you uploading your email from Word.

Lesson number 33:
When a tard asks you to ‘revise’ a letter for him, which he is sending out to a
customer, it will invariably end with a sentence like:

“thank you and looking forward to doing greater business as we grow to do things
in business together with you for the future of our business relationship
together. Thank you. Future.”


Jimmy

Jimmy and the Giant Gay Party

Jimmy and the Giant Gay Party

Once upon a time there was a gay boy named Jeffrey. He wanted all his friends to get together for a party where they could drink, do drugs and casually have sex with each other without fear of reproach. So Jeffrey rented a few rooms at a small clothing optional hotel in Palm Springs for a weekend over Easter, and thus was born the White Party. White Party is the largest orgy/drug fest in the land. It began back in 1989. 15 years later, it has become a destination weekend for all the gays with hot bodies and expendable income. Palm Springs is still its home, only now, Jeffrey rents out entire resort hotels for up to 15,000 guests. The Palm Springs convention center becomes the centerpiece party, and sex and drugs are still to be had without fear of reproach, only now the competition is much stiffer.

This year, I attended White Party for the first time, and though I didn’t get laid, I did meet lots of potentials. My dance card is filling up as they say. I arrived Friday in Palm Springs and checked into my hotel room with grand schemes in my head and trashy underwear in my suitcase. As it turns out, I never wore any of the underwear I brought and the schemes I had cooked up weren’t nearly as dirty as they could have been. It turns out that gays only love three things: sex, drugs and dancing. White Party brings these three loves under one roof, making dance floors into orgies, hotel rooms into crack dens, Gay boys into men. Beginning at 9PM on Friday, there was a dance party to go to every hour of the day until Monday at noon. Some of it was fabulous, some of it was ghetto fabulous, and some of it was just ghetto. There were themed pool parties, themed after-hours parties that began at 3 in the morning and themed outfits worn by many guests. Obviously there wasn’t much eating. When you are on your second 8 ball of coke and your 5th Ecstasy pill, the mere mention of food is nauseating. I had my ‘last supper’ at 6pm on Friday, took a disco nap for 45 minutes, spent two hours getting ready for the opening party, did a few lines of blow, filled my bumper with the rest of my nose candy and went off to get off.

I underestimated how much sex you can have in 72 hours. When the most clothing anyone is wearing is a Speedo and a cockring, it is hard not to accidentally get laid, even while you are waiting in line for say, a bottle of water. I was felt up, groped, fondled, violated and generally used at least 14,000 times, but all in a good way.

The first night of dancing: boys all hopped up. Beds all messed up. Hair all done up. Eyes all fucked up. As dance parties go, fairly tame. My friend Adam met a fireman who was 6’3” and 200 pounds of pure muscle. They went off for a quick romp and were back in just under 90 minutes. Apparently they weren’t the only ones getting busy that night because the next day, Saturday, the hotel confiscated every single blanket and bedspread in the entire hotel. All the beds were left with plain white sheets. I guess it’s easier to get shit stains and cum out of something you can bleach. Adam thought housekeeping just wasn’t finished with their job. But it turns out they were anticipating him getting an entirely other kind of job that night. It was a preemptive strike:

“Hello, housekeeping.”

‘Yes, excuse me, I’m in room 1309 and I think housekeeping didn’t finish our room. We’re missing our bedspreads and blankets.”

“Oh, yes sir, they did finish. We were told we had to remove all the bedspreads. From all the rooms.”

“What? So no one has a blanket or bedspread? In the entire hotel?”

“No sir.”

(Pause)

“Well, why not?”

“I think you know why sir. (Pause) Is there anything else?”

“Well, what do we do if we get cold?”

“I don’t know sir….I guess you could try huddling close together. That’s what got you in this position if the first place.”

I didn’t sleep at all Saturday night. I was dancing until 9AM and then I HAD to go straight to the pool to lay out, watch the boys in bikinis and get a beer. It was mayhem people. Sunday was spent lounging by the pool trying to get my eyelids to touch for a moment. I had stopped blinking altogether by about noon and soon gave up trying. I had a bottle of Visine in one of those beer hats with the tubes running down the sides, but instead of going into my mouth, they splashed gently into my eyeballs. It was very Clockwork Orange.

The last event I went to was the Tea Dance, an outdoor dance party beginning just before sundown and running into the early evening. It was in a large field just a block from the hotel. The party planners had erected an enormous dance floor and installed a giant Ferris wheel. If you have never ridden a Ferris wheel while high on Ecstasy, you oughta give it a go. The only thing about this party that rubbed me the wrong way was the field itself. It was made largely of dirt and hay, wood chips and condom wrappers. I was confused as to why all these fabulous queens felt it was okay to run around at a Renaissance Fair, but apparently they were all too cracked out to notice.

On the drive home I thought to myself, ‘gays are pretty cool. Sure they get Syphilis a lot, and make a lot of grandiose hand gestures and do a lot of illegal drugs and wear inappropriate bathing suits, but damnit if they don’t know how to have a good time!’

Jimmy