06/13/2004 - 4:23 a.m. | it smells like a dentist's office in here

First, some things I missed. One, in my haze last Sunday night/morning, I took this big cardboard triangle that I had received my Amanda Bynes poster in and scrawled "BAZOOKA CANNON" on it in sloppy block letters. One can only imagine my thought process and resulting actions at the time. Two, apparently Seann William Scott (Stifler from American Pie) was at the party. I should have asked him what The Rock is really like. Three, stop e-mailing me viruses, Bill. Thank you.

I know, the intervals between entries just get longer and longer, but I swear I had my reasons. The first night I thought was too boring to write about, and the second two I couldn't quite get my brain to think, so I had to wait on them some. But it looks as though tonight will be boring as fuck, so lucky you, right?

I guess I very quickly developed a subconscious defense to how boring my days are by making my nights as fucking dumb and interesting as possible. But let's start at the beginning so that I can prove myself wrong, all right? I believe it was Wednesday that I decided that God was trying to get me to pray by cosmically fucking me in the ass. The other theory is that karma does indeed work, except that there was some sort of mix-up, and I keep getting Spritz's instead. So I get up, already fairly down, and I lurch outside to get my pills. GUESS WHAT Of my bike, there is only a tire remaining. Well, fudge. We've learned yet another lesson in the game of life, haven't we? Don't just lock the tire to the bike rack, asshat. I guess that brings us up to three now. I should be depressed, but everytime I see a single tire locked up with the other bikes, I start giggling frantically. Anyway, I drive to the thing (Truly, my penchant for detail is amazing) sit for hours - minutes possibly - and they give me 12 pills. 12. See in a week then, shitheads. And then the rain begins. So I do my other errands and shit and get back to check the mail. Seems I was a day late in payment and I have thus been dropped from the course. Frantic phone calls, failed attempts at online registration ("You have not completed the requisite of SQTRU C" - No, seriously), and more phone calls later, I'm back in. I had more complaints, I think, but I've grown tired of this, and you no doubt did minutes earlier. Only masochism drives you on! Well, let's proceed then!

It was a nice short day at work (Wait, I used to have those?), but I was still pretty grumpy at the time... I don't precisely remember why. No doubt it was some sort of "I don't have a girlfriend" thing, which you may or may not argue with. Man, in some ways, I am just like a fragile pubescent woman. If I don't at least have the notion that some person of the opposite gender around me isn't at least attracted to me in passing, I get all depressed. God, I would be such a slut. Fuck. Thank God we dodged that bullet. Anyway, since I was pissy and Chikondi was all whiny - and since I have also decided that I will assume power in this world of Machiavellian intrigue known as Inside Scoop - I told her that she could leave like 2 hours early and that I would just clock her out later. You are a bad person. Yes, but look how my stock is rising. Mostly it just left me with more time where I could scrawl bitter thoughts about attractiveness and its role in evolution. But more on that later! Jennifer came, I got salty fried rice and felt a little better. That's all I want these days. I should just get a fucking salt lick. YUMS Yeah, I don't remember what else. Oh yeah, I was actually called and told to leave early, but Jennifer wanted me to stay and make sure she closed OK, so I just stood there and watched for hours as she cleaned and did everything else. A curse on my existence. No, I'm asking for one I mean. And it came in the form of a fish dinner at Steak 'n' Shake a few hours later. Where did that brilliant idea come from? From the source of all such ideas, of course. Ryan Spraetz. Followed by driving across curbs and parking lots in his SUV. Finally the pile of useless had a use. OK, Nate. Focus.

Thursday was my day off, but I am far too punk for that. I got extra prepared for my interview at Hot Topic, putting together just the right match of mismatching clothes with Chuck Taylors and leftover Avril supplies. I know, should have made some paperclip piercings or something, and Spritz had the brilliant idea that I draw on a sessy neck tattoo like George Clooney in From Dusk 'till Dawn, but there was just no time. Besides, it's all about personality (cough). I'll work on the tattoo as soon as I get the time. So, the interview was fine, fun, whatever. Odd how all social interaction is beyond me, but how I am the fucking king of interviews. I imagine it's how most guys get laid - they just know exactly what they need to say to win the person over. The first girl who interviewed me was standard chubb-chubb goth, but the second girl was soooo cute with her early 90's grunge look and penciled-in eyebrows. She seemed very familiar, like maybe she used to babysit me in Aurora or something, and I might even have risked asking her out if it weren't for a) the button on her ID thing that may have insinuated she was gay (dunno) and b) some aside about her fiance. But! She did say it would be sexy if I got a navel piercing, and it's making more and more sense in my mind. Sorry, grandma. Anyhow, I was charming and and polite and funny and responsible-sounding, and there's almost no way I won't be getting this job (Second interview's on Monday). What then? "Uh... Family emergency, gotta go home all summer... Cancer. Bye!" The perfect escape.

We'll just skip the part where I browsed office supply stores and read Harry Potter for hours because even I know that those are too boring to be allowed. Spritz and I went to cute Thai place which is like an Ikea ad sprung to life. Real chicken scares me, though. Identifiable parts are a severe no-no. And shall we get a bunch of Korean dramas about fashion models where we don't know what's going on? Yes, we chould do that. We were once again planning on going to the Danville stripclub, but then I got a call from Heather, and I decided it was prolly best not to fuck up my in with these people, so I held us back. I know, me for once. And I couldn't even really bring others along because it was mostly Buckle only. Oddly. We hit Courier beforehand, and I was already in one of my "Hassle America!" moods (Once insinuation got old, I flat out told the waitress that Kyle and Spritz were gay), so it was the perfect time to drop me off at the party.

I think parties are mostly about attitude. If you've got a few fun people at the party (drunk or sober), the other fuckups don't matter so much. I am one of those people :P As soon as I walked in, a lo-carb beer was thrust at me. WHAT EXACTLY ARE YOU IMPLYING! Then came hellish Jaeger Bombs, which taste like cough syrup gone horribly, horribly wrong (I know, insert your little jibe here; I've earned it) and then I just kept grabbing warm shit from beside the fridge to prove how much of a man I was. Heather would occasionally come over, and we'd dance and scream 90's favorites together (Everyone was sickeningly impressed that I knew all the lyrics to Blues Traveler's "Hook") and then Shawn would come over, and we'd yell shit at one another. I like them very much so. And my new favorite is Gibby, this guy who started working at the Buckle after me. He was all cute and feminine and funny and he could drink disgustingly well. Although I knew well the answer, I had to ask if he was gay, though, and it made me so sad to find out he was. Not because he likes men or whatever - more power to him for that, whatever - just that... he probably won't pass his genes on, and that's stupid because he's so damn cool. I mean, maybe he'll adopt or something, but he's not the type that should. This was my whole evolution and attractivity thing. Thanks to advances in medicine and technology and shit, the human race really doesn't stand much chance of further evolving for a while because we are all on fairly even ground. The only thing we have left to thin out are the ugly people. Problem is, horny uggos keep pairing up with one another in desperation, and I'm not sure how we deter that (besides genocide, and that's on my "social gaffe" list). So, for the good of society, people like Gibby should spread their seed as much as possible (the nature) and people like me should adopt little Asian girls and teach them to stomp around in little rainboots and pretty much punch everything they can in the groin (the nurture). I am more fun than you, almost certainly. The cops kept getting called on other apartments in the building; as the youngest there, you'd think I'd worry. Naw... I just planned to push that horrible little midget too much eyeshadow overtanned overblonde screechy psycho at them and leap off the balcony. God damn, what an annoyance. Like, lots of people can't sing, right, but most of them are at least sort of unobtrusive. Shame and all that. This girl was LOUD and so, so off-key and off-tempo and everything. She even fucked up other people singing, so I kept telling her that she was the worst I had ever heard. Subtlety would have gone undetected, and that's not what I was trying to gain here. More pleasing still was this guy I had not met before named Jared. All night long I kept talking about how he had lost 40 pounds on the Subway diet no matter where the conversation turned to. "Man, I love peppermind schnapps!" (Me too) "As much as you love 7 sandwiches with 6 grams of fat or less?" I think he threatened me with physical harm; I offered him a teryaki chicken footlong as collateral.

There were quite a few other people I made fun of, but that's getting old too, so we move on. I started talking to this girl Kim, and I guess I decided to immediately skip over the part where I try to be extra polite and nice and go straight to where I start randomly insulting people. I know, that probably sounds bad, but if you look at past examples, that's how I always operate. I used to be so nice to Shelly - now I pretty much have to kick her in the junk to feel like the day is complete. I think it was about the time I started calling Kim "cuntwhore" that she began pouring beer on me. "Only because you can't think of a similarly scathing nickname," I said. I tried to help her through the process, but "douchebag" is still sort of weak. Still, all nicknames kind of lose their flare once you explain them. "So, I guess that would make me some sort of a sack of vaginal cell secretions? Clean ones, right?" Then I poured beer on her, too. We were friends, OK? Anyway, she kept talking about jumping in the pool, and though never drunk enough to think it was anything short of a bad idea, I'm certainly never smart enough to back down from any sort of vague challenge, so up and over we went. Trespassing and all that (I was a ninja! One flying leap!), SPLASH, "Oh God, why did we do that?!", peeing in respective bushes because we couldn't go back inside. And it began to rain. We sat on the porch and talked about how cold we were from then on. She lived in St. Jo and had to be up to babysit in Champaign at like 7 the next morning, which was a huge, useless commute for her, so I offered to let her spend the night at my place. OOOOOOOOOHHHH. Yeah, fuck off. Like I've been trying to tell you little shits for ages, rarely are my intentions ignoble. I don't use code when I can help it, and I would very much like to be an honest guy, so I will call you cuss words, and I will ask to sleep over when I really mean sleep over. So, she drove back (Let's not think of that, 'k?), and we marched through the misery and were all cold and giggly upon arriving, and then we passed out. The end. Nate's virginity remains intact. Or without tact, whichever you prefer.

And it's just back and forth and back and forth and back and forth and back... I woke up, went back to work, ate more salty fried rice, filled so, so many bins with candy, and my mind honestly begins to go hopelessly blank. I met the new girl, Kara Wilken, who is far more talkative (which is to say "prettier") than Jennifer. Then again, Jen has started talking to me a lot more when we work together, but I worry that tonight she was mere moments away from asking me out. "So..... what are you doing tonight?" "Um, nothing. Gonna hang out with my roommates probably. What about you?" "Oh, I dunno... I wanted to see a movie, but I don't really want to go alone..." "...." "...." "That's too bad." Which is out of character, I suppose, since I am so attentive to details normally, but I will make a few exceptions here. Egad. I know, I'm shallow! I freely admit it, though, and I never expect anything to come of it, so hopefully most disasters will be averted. Anyway, one might almost say I am looking forward to work tomorrow, even if it is open to close. Bloody hell. God, I'm trying very hard to think of what I did with myself at that place for being there for so long. Jane went to this candy expo this past week and came back with this sack filled to the brim, saying that we should all take as much as we want. I don't need told again. My favorites by far were the Haribo Pico-Balla, which are gummis made purely from the weird white stuff they have on the bottom of gummi frogs, but it would appear they are only made in Germany, so I guess I've had my first and last bag. Also, did you know that behind the Farm and Fleet up on Cunningham - well, behind it, I guess - is like the only factory in the world that makes the inside of lightbulbs? The tungsten... or whatever? (Doesn't know what he's talking about) I dunno why that interests me so much, but I would really like to break in there and take lightbulb core samples and sell them on the black market. I bet security is light! LOLOLOLOL

I'm so manly when I mop. I flew over to the theatre to meet Dank so that we could catch an opening night show of Garfield: The Movie. Only 79 more times to go. Fuck. Now, despite any "good taste" I may report having, I feel I have an unusually high tolerance for bad movies. I've sat through pretty much every terrible movie I've ever encountered - from the hilariously bad ones to the mediocre boring stupid ones - and I've never had any desire to walk out of any of them. Except for Garfield: The Movie. Now, I didn't, because Dank was there, and we kept whispering, "I hope he's dead" back and forth whenever something slapstick happened, and that was funny, but it was the most dangerously close I ever got. How fucking bad? I can't even describe it. I mean, it really can't be defined. There are a lot of little things - bad dialogue, idiotic story, stupid Black Eyed Peas song (twice? more?), terrible "comedy," Jennifer Love Hewitt - but somehow it is so much worse than that. I read Ebert's review of it today, and I've never been so enraged at criticism before. 3 stars? THREE? I am thinking of sending a letter to Bill Murray, rescinding his Oscar from me because of his involvement in this project. Forgive me. It's like the overblown Pitchfork review of the Ludacris cover by Travis Morrison... except I kind of like that shit. Fuck off.

Chronologically, this is what I'm writing last, so I have to tread carefully. As soon as I got home, Spritz leapt up, and we got ready to go to the strip club. Yes! The long-awaited hour approacheth! Kyle reluctantly signed on as well, and we drew straws to see who would drive. OK, no we didn't, but that would've been cool. Anyway, Kyle was driving, and Spritz and I were gonna get adequately smashed so as to possibly enjoy being in what could only turn out to be a wretched shithole. Spritz appeared to be going under halfway there, but maybe that was just 'cause he didn't know as many Old 97's lyrics as me or Kyle. We got into Danville, which was just like a big pile of nostalgia for us. "Oh, look! We're lost again! And there's the Arby's that isn't 24 hours!" We stopped at a gas station, and I was elected to ask the guy directions (I mentally refer to them as "confidence building exercises"). So I go, "Could you tell me how to get to Lyons Street or whatever?" And he's like, "Ohhh... Goin' to the Play Pen, huh?" Nod sheepishly. He tells me where we need to be and then adds as I'm leaving, "Oh - and ask for Sabrina! Tell her Rick from the Speedway sent you." You've fucking got it, Rick. So, we drive further and further from Danville Proper and probably crossed some railroad tracks because all of a sudden we were definitely on the wrong side of them. Among the business establishments we passed were the Hillbilly Meat Store, Jin Jung Spa (a.k.a. "Handjobs Galore!") and Gross Burgers. All good signs. We arrive in Belgium, start down this road through all these trailers and shit, and all of a sudden, we're there. There are certainly a lot of perverts here. A guy gets out of a taxi. What the fuck is going on? We've just recently admitted that all three of us are terrified. Dive in. Shorts $7.99.

The stoned fellow who searches us for guns probably would not have noticed if I were carrying a rocket launcher, so I felt a real sense of security. At least the manager guy taking tickets was exactly like every stereotype I could have ever pictured for that type of person. Balding, greasy, mustache, sweaty, creepy, etc. "Please don't touch my wrist when you put on the bracelet. Please don't touch my wrist when you put on the bracelet." Oh, damn. Some giant black guy in line in front of us started yelling about a box of condoms ("oxycondoms?") blah blah blah gibberish word. What the fuck are we doing here? So, we get inside and yep. Naked women. Woop dee shit. There are two stages - the main one and the cleverly-named Birdcage. Because there are birds in it, if you know what I mean! ;) ;) So we bounce back and forth between these two areas, starting a safe distance away by the Birdcage. We shoo as many waitresses away as we can and just try to get used to our environment. There is a woman eating pizza watching as a woman is pulling dollar bills off of a guy's face with her vagina. This is an entirely different world from the one you or I occupy.

It's already pretty obvious that these are not the prettiest women in Danville (or, hell, what if they are?), but our minds are not fully opened until we daringly move to the stools right next to the main stage. It would seem that not many people do this, and I started to maybe figure out why. The infamous Sabrina was the first lady to come out. Already, we are starting to confer, just in case we're missing something. "So, wait... she's kind of gross, isn't she?" "Yeah, I think so." Oh, well. Here she comes. Kyle and Spritz made a noble effort to be serious throughout the evening, but I was in no condition for that. Actually, I'm not sure I would ever be in a condition for that, seeing how carelessly I take my sexuality (just a stunningly hilarious notion, am I right?), but this sort of ugly thing comes out - the infamous Sabrina! And she's got some fiiiine scars! - and she kind of ignores me because I keep laughing at her, but I think she smashed both Kyle and Spritz into her vagina, which looked less enjoyable and more painful in my mind. They both sheepishly tipped her, but I have to give Spritz big style points for smoking a big, gross, nasty cigar all night long. It does create the perfect image. Street cred.

Despite the MC's rousing attempts to rile the audience, I think a lot of the people there weren't deluding themselves about the ladies employed there. "Do we have any PUSSY LOVERS here?!" *scattered applause* "I can't hear you! Can I get a 'hell yeah?!'" I think I put most of my energy into my "Hell yeah"s, so that he would feel better. Because I would feel miserable. And it was an excellent opportunity to practice two-fingered whistling, although in hindsight, I should probably not have put any fingers near any oriface for the rest of the night. I didn't eat or drink anything, and I tried not to touch too much, but I would not be surprised if my veneral disease count jumped up by several dozen the next time I went in for a checkup. Anyway, it wasn't that the girls there were so, so disgustingly ugly - they were just all a little unpretty and had a few cellulite issues here or there. I guess that's supposed to be the deal: They act like they're sexy, and we act like they are as well. I suppose this means that I was breaking crucial rules as I kept cackling at pretty much everything the whole night long. Occasionally a girl would try and gyrate my way (I suppose I should be insulted that they didn't do it more), and this would put me in absolute hysterics. And their sexy little instructions. "Put my legs up on your shoulders." *smash, smash* Oh, what the fuck? I was practically falling out of the chair by the time this happened. Full-on donkey laugh. "Dude, shut up!" whispered Kyle and Spritz. "You're gonna get us kicked out of here!" Is that really such a huge deal, fellas? Good point. From then on, however, whenever one of the, er, "dancers" started to get a little too close to me, I'd use my one power - that of the tip - to send her off to some other guy. Yes, you go grind that horrid old man. Or the redhead. I can laugh at that. Tries not to think of demeaning. Tries very hard.

The staff was all fairly excellent, I must say. The one bouncer weighed about 700 pounds and seemed most likely to kill a person by secreting butter on them. And actually, I dunno if this one guy was on staff, but he kept saying, "I love my job!" as the girls did... whatever to him. Maybe he's the Female Body Inspector as so many novelty t-shirts seem to indicate *shakes head* How bizarre. OK, stop here for a moment. It might seem like I am bashing on this place a lot, with its black lights and seedy smoke and gross women and fucking ass rock, but in all honesty, I had an awesome fucking time. Like all truly great things, it walks the line between a wonder and a horror with absolute precision, and I cannot wait to go back and be scared shitless again. Confidence grows as time passes, and I found I was the only one dancing to the music, and I was looking forward to another girl approaching because this time I would be ridiculously confident and act like I was reveling in their sweet, sweet coot. They seemed to have caught on to my plan, though, and I believe they wanted to focus on the other men trying to conjure erections and failing terribly terribly terribly. Whenever one girl was too gross, we'd switch to the other stage. In the case of the two who were both absolutely disgusting, we'd just hide in a corner and shut our eyes. I guess my behavior must have kept away the ladies during the free lapdance portion of our evening, which is unfortunate because I totally would have tipped over the five dollars to get the special pass to the "Afterhours Club" or whatever. I mean, seeing the misshapen vagina of these beast demons is one thing - getting blown by them is a whole new ballgame.

We stayed through an entire rotation of beauties and then some. There was a break and then the foretold coming of Malibu Barbie, the main event or something! Hope, we said! Perhaps she will not make us want to scrape out eyes out with keys and laugh as the warm aqueous humor runs down our faces. We move in to the main stage, which seemed to have gathered a much larger crowd, except for those weird tables of the really creepy guys who still kind of just hang back and watch. Y'all freak me out most of all. So, a bunch of the bouncers come lurching forward, carrying this black wooden coffin. Oh, this looks like Malibu all right! They set it down and some lame pyrotechnics later, out comes the lady of the night, devil costume, etc. Just another kind of gross, middle-aged woman - her fake boobs were bigger than the others, though, and I think that made her queen. So, she starts strutting around and kind of handing out posters or something, but hands aren't really involved. She kind of sticks it between her legs and then forces it into the mouth of some waiting guy, and wasn't anyone else at least a little disturbed by the blatant homoeroticism of the whole thing? I bet that's how they stay sane, these dancers. They make us do slightly queer things just to keep themselves amused. It's what I would do. So, I'm sort of half-paying attention, mostly watching one of the bouncers over by the coffin as he fiddles around, maybe trying to make another fire, I dunno. He made me laugh, though. Meanwhile, the drunks are definitely getting friendlier. Besides the usual white yelling guy, here comes our black oxycondom friend from the door! He starts shoving us around and yelling in pure gibberish. I think he hit Kyle. Whenever he backs off for a while, we all scream and start making plans for a speed escape. "If we really need to run out, no questions asked, just yell 'Garfield!'" we yell over the insane, strobe-y din. As far as codewords go, that one is pretty bitchin'. After the man began foaming at the mouth and had assaulted each of us (thereby displaying that he wasn't even make distinctions anymore), we decided to call it a night (which was a secret disappointment for me - no, not 'cause of the guy!) and wind our way home, with stops at Possum Trot and I dunno what else. It was clear and yet vague, and I couldn't really explain too much else to you. Oh - I did have a question, though. Although my feelings were fairly obvious, I assume, I asked Kyle and Spritz if they had been aroused at all throughout any of the evening. "Are you kidding?" they said. "I am the opposite of aroused. If I were to see a woman right now, I would be disgusted by her." Then all is going to plan. Slep.

I worked from 1 to 9:30 today, which I guess is actually what real grownups do. Well, minus the hour break... but I used that to run home and shower. And see, I didn't have time to shower because... well, this is a two-parter, and neither of them make much sense. Part one is that somehow I got incredibly dyslexic over the course of the night. I woke up today and looked at my watch - several times, mind you - and decided it was 3 o'clock. "Oh fuck," I thought. "I am so God damn late for work!" And I started to lurch out of bed and even shave or something, and then I finally realized maybe five minutes later that my watch said it was 9 o'clock, and I was just batshit stupid. Right. OK, so that didn't really make me late. I just wanted to tell you how dumb I was. What made me late is that once I got up, I felt like I really had to pee, but when I tried to pee, no pee was coming out, and I was all worried about kidney stones or a urinary tract infection or some shit, so I sat around drinking water and trying to squeeze a few drops out. I was not at my most rational, I'll give you that. Anyway, I stumbled in wearing the same clothes as yesterday, smelling of smoke and possibly crusty vagina. Fuck your looks, Jane. I've got bigger problems. OK, no. Last night, at the very limits of my wacky sense of humor, I put up an away message asking anyone who wanted to do me to give me a call. Two calls: My parents and Ducky. It was nice to talk to Ducky, though. We miss each other :( He's in Texas now, which sounds exactly like I picture Hell ("Hot and full of Mexicans"), drilling for oil or mining diamonds or something. I didn't understand. It's stupid that guys are easier to talk to than girls, but then, I am usually the most randomly pissiest of guys I know, so I guess it makes sense. Anyway, might visit him in August. "Fuck Mississippi" is my motto. Jane has started telling me deeply personal things about her life, and Nate Walsh is getting freaked out. "So, maybe wanna sort the stuffed animals again?" Gaaaah.

I pretty much make it my goal in life to outfact people. I mean, besides the fact that I can now sing along with every single song they play on the radio and that I know the code, location, and flavor of every single thing we sell (now I'm just bragging), Jane was telling me something today about chocolate allergies, and suddenly my brain dredged up a real nugget that I had totally forgotten about. "You know, the reason a lot of people are allergic to chocolate isn't what you'd think. See, the thing they're really allergic to is this certain protein found in the exoskeletons of some arthropods, insects mostly. There's actually loads of them in pretty much everything we eat. If you hunt around on the internet, you can find this list that the FDA has of the maximum amount of insects parts and rat hairs and junk that are allowed per quantity of food products. And it's definitely a lot more than zero." Then, gauging her reaction ("I'll never eat chocolate again"), I told pretty much told anyone else I could for the rest of the day. The little "shut up" voice gets quieter and quieter the longer I work. For instance, I ran out to get chai from Gloria Jeans, and as I was walking by American Eagle, I heard them blasting "Rock Lobster" so I ran in really fast, did this frenetic go-go dance for about fifteen seconds, and then sprinted out. A little bit of madness for you. And then ridiculous sword fights between the aisles. I make reading fun! Work, I mean. My favorite part of work is on Saturday nights when our little power pop radio station starts playing all these club mixes. It suddenly becomes infinitely more inappropriate in the store. Damn you, sped-up version of "In Da Club." Embarrass me in front of all those black girls when I start doing spastic robot. Somewhere along the line I decided that my presence was a gift (pun, haha) to the world, so I only rarely give out real Nate smiles. To melt the hearts of the women. And distract them from zit-face. I've nearly beaten my way through this, with only one huge break for more fried rice (NO 1 WOK) and like 32 of the 40 greatest celebrity feuds. Go go go! To bed.