01/02/2006 - 9:54 p.m. | we all have our gifts

Gotta make these six months as much like a novella as possible, right? We�re going back now to� weekend before Halloween, when Missy visited. Another rather boring weekend, considering the circumstances, but we�ll still probably get like six pages out of it. Glorious.

I was at work Thursday night when Missy showed up, so she came to meet me there. I got a blowjob in the lab. I got jizz on her expensive blue sweater. Frown.

Now, you might recall me complaining that Missy is a little� less than spontaneous when it comes to our sexual forays. I guess I decided, then, that if she didn�t do it, it didn�t necessarily mean she didn�t want to. And, as such, it was my responsibility to get the ball rolling. So to speak. So the computer lab incident is what we call a successful experiment.

A word here on my sexual inadequacies. I am only able to �cum,� as it were, by way of mouth hug or low five from a lady. An explanation: This is not to say that Missy is bad at sex. I enjoy the experience well enough, but during the, uh, sex act, I am entirely too focused on her enterprise to really think about myself. I�ve had orgasms before, lots of them, and while they are nice and all and clear my head (hurr), I find them rather uninteresting as compared to what she herself is doing, moans and facial expressions and all. Roughly, it makes me feel good to make her feel good, so I focus all my efforts on that. Self-esteem is much more important than my own little semen spray, which is why it would be so devastating to learn she was faking it� which she no doubt is. Anyway, since I am thinking about her, making lists, whatever (often I wonder what it is like being a girl having sex� I imagine it�s just like being poked in the arm a lot), I am certainly not using the insane amount of concentration it takes to heave myself towards climax. Thus, why the mouth hug is better. Not because it necessarily feels better or because of the various sadistic urges a lifetime of pornography has given me (probably� I mean, I am aware that she doesn�t like it, is sort of pained by it maybe, and I do sort of enjoy it better when she is on her knees, but this brings me no closer than anything else), but simply because I am not expected to do anything but, you know, get off. So I start thinking of the most depraved shit I can, and I still only barely get there. I don�t know why just the feeling of her mouth on my dong doesn�t do it, or the fact I could watch her like a real life porno, but I have to bury myself in thoughts to actually get the job done. And usually it�s thoughts of someone giving me a blowjob, which is totally idiotic and recursive (especially when I use thoughts of Missy giving me a blowjob while Missy is giving me a blowjob), but you have to go with works, or else Missy would be hospitalized with lockjaw. So there�s that.

Have to stop a moment to listen to some Barenaked Ladies. They did a song for the Disney movie Chicken Little but had to refer to themselves as BNL as a result. Damn the man.

Otherwise, it was a pretty damn slow evening at the lab. We played hangman and listened to the horrible clonking from the one radiator, and that was about it. When work was finished, it was cold, and we had to get home quickly, so there was only one solution: Bikemobile. No more idiotic plans to get the other person up on the handlebars; Missy took the seat, and I stood up and pedaled for all my might (which is to say, very little) through the cold night, screaming all the way at the people we passed, �Bikemobile, motherfuckers!� My legs were burning by the time we made it back, but I did it. One step closer to masculinity, I�m sure.

It was one of those back-and-forth good news bad news situations for a while. The Rhett Miller concert was the next day, but because it was 21 and over, she had already pretty much resigned herself to coming early and sitting around by herself (for whatever reason). But then Shelly offered up her old ID, wherein the picture is so bizarre-looking that it could be pretty much anybody, and suddenly Missy was all about being back in the show. At the show. Unfortunately, by the time we figured all of this out and she tried to get a ticket, the show was sold out. So she didn�t go and was suddenly depressed all over again because her hopes had been up, only to get dashed once more (Incidentally, it turns out she probably could have made it anyway, as they still had a few extra tickets when we arrived� but who could have known?) Anyway, my role was dealing with the rollercoaster of her emotions throughout this ordeal, counting the minutes to where I got to go anyway. You might suggest that I should have stayed behind with her, but I don�t really want to get hosed for her ridiculous plan. Sorry.

There was some stuff (an awkward little meeting with my psych group, but that�s just our wicked dynamic), and then Shelly and I were pulling together to go. Dank and Kyle were already up in Chicago for a job interview somewhere (GE? Oh wait, I don�t care), so we just had to meet them in time. Hilariously, we took Shelly�s dad�s truck, currently in Shelly�s possession as the broken ass window on her Grand Pricks wouldn�t go up. More on that in one of these. It is one pussy-ass motherfuckin� truck, I tell you what. Would sooner do backwards flips down a hill than climb up it, and it prolly gets as shitty mileage as I do, but she was driving, so I can�t complain. Got us some nasty Munchies (you know, the mindfuck of cheese things � Doritos, Cheetos, etc. � and some nasty fucking black sheep dry salty pretzels. Man, why then even put those in there? No one wants that shit. Everyone digs around them � especially Shelly, the little cherry picker. Myself, I got a improbably high percentage of them, but consider who I was traveling with). The car had no CD player, no tape deck, so it was me frantically scanning the radio the whole way. As I recall, there was a plethora of rather solid bad 80�s rock and so on. I actually downloaded a Mr. Big ringtone for my phone. It was� well, imagine you knew somebody who was a prodigy at making MIDIs and then you beat him over the head with a bit of wood until some stuff started to come out of his ears and then suppose maybe you asked him to compose a ringtone for you based on the Mr. Big song �To Be With You.� The talent was there, mind you, but it was hidden under a thick veil of brain hemorrhaging. You would have liked it.

We arrived with little trouble (although the parking spot we choose later earned Shelly a fifty dollar parking ticket) and went inside to meet Dank and Kyle, who still had on their business casual attire. Tee hee, cute. The place is called the Abbey Pub, and they weren�t lying. This was some hole-in-wall drinkhole shitheap, which just happened to have a pretty nice little music venue attached to it. They even had a couple of surly charming old Irish guys who hung around and yelled shit at you (although I am not fully convinced they were hired character actors). �Shut the fuckin� door,� they�d scream at us punk kids rogue 40 year olds as we waited in the small ass vestibule to get inside the venue. We were standing next to some woman who I guess recognized us (or rather our signs) from previous shows. I sat around thinking about this for a while last night, and I eventually decided that her skin reminded me of like a rubber glove filled with, say, sand and vomit� and then squeezed so that is starts to swell� except that instead of swelling like a normal glove, it was some sort of special glove that, when squeezed, developed the texture of coral. Hm, yeah. Why can�t any hotties come to these shows (Missy Barmann excepted)?

Actually, there was a group of some nasty ho�s there, who seduced their way into the thing first and then spent the whole night downing cigarettes and light beers with great fervor. Fairly repulsive, I might add, but nothing doing on our old friend the fucking half-troll.

So, I would say we were within the first ten or fifteen people in the venue. I�m pretty sure. But some of the few people in ahead of us was this fucking epic tallass rotund beast in an enormous blue Old 97�s shirt (I would expect him to be that guy) with, I dunno, this weird half-baldling, half-greasy bowl cut sort of look that did nothing to complement his wad of dough head. However, I didn�t have anything against him at the time. I hadn�t really noticed him, except the passing anger that he was against the stage and I was fucking not. Anyway, he was a couple feet away from the stage, which was fine to start with � I mean, the show hadn�t started and not everyone is as desperate as me � but once things did get going, he didn�t move forward. Two damn feet in front of him (probably could have squeezed all four of us up there), and he wasn�t moving forward at all; in fact, he kept trying to move back and earn more prime real estate for himself. The thing was, Dank was standing right next to this guy, facing the opposite way (so that they were back to back) and the troll just kept pushing and leaning on him, trying to gain more ground. And Dank, who is like the nicest, least intrusive person in the world, was just kind of taking it, until we were like, �Dude, push back, man! What the fuck is wrong with that guy?� So, this goes on for a while, until Dank is practically buckled under this ogres advances, when finally his wife mom turns around to yell at us. I might have to verify this conversation later on, but it was something like, �Could you please just give him some room?� To which I had a rare flipout and went, �What the hell? You�ve got two damn feet in front of you! Take some of that room? What�s wrong with you?!� To which she replied (Did he ever speak?), �You�re the only people in here leaning on anyone else!� which is just the sort of line we are going to mock you about forever and ever. So Dank conceded (slightly) and this fucking idiot (Kyle pointed out that he looked vaguely like Dauber from �Coach�) kept that bubble in front of him the whole time. And, through my rage, I started to wonder if something really was wrong with him. Maybe he was claustrophobic; maybe he was deranged and thought his stomach was much, much bigger than it actually was. I mean, he was big, but not that big. Maybe his invisible girlfriend was there, and he didn�t want to crush her. But from then on, we all pretty much spoke a little too loudly about how both of them were retard scum of the earth, using the mom�s line as often as possible. (Example: Kyle would take a drink. �DAMN IT KYLE YOU�RE THE ONLY PERSON DRINKING IN HERE!�) And when he did slip forward into his hole for the briefest of moments, I wanted to fucking punch him in the back of his fat neck (which I had been staring at the whole time) and yell, with as much forced enthusiasm as possible, �Oh! So you can fit up there! Way to go!� I fucking hate everybody. Except Zebra Cakes, the roadie (as Kyle dubbed him). I love your ass.

I just got a can of Fresca. Lovely.

Opening act was this guy named Griffin House, who I must admit I thought was the name of the venue. My bad, dude. He was pretty cool and weird, though. He had this picture of a woman crudely taped to his guitar and when someone asked who it was, he goes, �Oh, that�s Diane Lane. I�m in love with her. I wrote a song about it.� Which he promptly sang. It was totally the picture cut off the VHS box for Under the Tuscan Sun, I�m sure of it. His first song was the best, though, the one about his family. Imagine him screaming, �Whoa, it feels so good� to have your blood in my veins!� and then imagine the rare expressions of intermingled shock and joy that Kyle gave each other during this rendition. So fucking creepy! Song could be about motherfuckin� vampire just as likely. Shelly and Kyle bought the CD, which I guess isn�t nearly as good, but how could it ever, ever be?

Finally, Rhett came on. I�d never seen him in a solo show before (although that should have come first), but it proved everything I�ve come to learn about him. He is not much of a guitarist, but he makes up for it with charm, dancing, and the fact that everyone there loves him to death already. To be objective, if I saw this punk playing at a bar in Champaign alone, I would be like, �Lord, what a hack!� But luckily his cred came first and now I�m paying 30 bucks to see him. He was also bombed out of his mind on something. He drank something from a plastic cup, and by its particular color, I would have to guess it was white wine (which is still pretty fucking cool) but not enough to account for how many of his own songs he knows so poorly. Whatever, though, he would just brute force his way through them, and the audience would laugh and cheer because he�s already won us over. A few highlights: He played �Question� in French, with just a horrible, horrible accent, so that was pretty outstanding. And he did quite a few songs from his forthcoming album, including one that I alone in the crowd somehow knew all the words to (and yelled, of course). People were looking, and even Kyle was like, �How the fuck do you know this?� I have no real answer for that, except to say that I am the ultimate fanboy. Sickening.

Kyle and Shelly had a pretty stream of booze flowing through them pretty much throughout the show, so by the later songs, they were definitely a little lit up. Shelly especially. She was dancing all up on Kyle, and lord almighty it was bordering on the pornographic. Shelly took off her nice form-obscuring sweater, leaving little more than a flimsy tank top to keep her boobs from flopping around. Behind closed doors, kids, please! I had to look away to avoid projectile vomiting on the back of Dauber�s thick neck (not that he wouldn�t deserve it, though). Although, if my facts and figures are correct, GE320 hadn�t ended (the strangest euphemism yet) and fucking was still probably paramount on both of their drunken minds. So it was excusable. Nasty, though. Which is why I continue to write about it.

In the last half hour or so, some very, very drunk college guy stumbled up right next to me and proceeded to make a very loud ass of himself for the rest of our time there. Concrete examples are a little dodgy right now, but I believe he may have been yelling � screaming � gibberish instead of lyrics, as well as bellowing something at Rhett during a break about his purchased Old 97�s shirt (he was also that guy) and how �this shit was makin� records� or something equally articulate. He also said (and I quote), �WOO!� excessively. I looked on in real fear.

After the show, we went outside to patiently wait for Rhett, as we had been trained to do, learning about 20 minutes later that he was talking to people inside where it was nice and warm. We went back in to see him, already pretty much resigned to the fact that he would never, ever be our friend, and did the usual picture and autograph thing. I explained the whole Missy thing to him, and he wrote her a note telling her to �get old already� or something cute like that. So I�m not an entirely horrible boyfriend all the time. Plus, tired of the same old poses, somehow Rhett and I are configured such that we are reaching for the camera like a superhero strike team. It�s pretty badass � although it would be moreso if my eyes were ever open. Also, Dank farted, and it was fucking ludicrously bad. Like sticks in my memory for two months bad.

Theoretically, I was to drive Shelly�s truck home with her, but I am way too much of a pussy and would rather endanger their lives than attempt that shit, so Kyle drove, and I rode with Dank, who seemed about ready to pass out himself. I remember we stopped at a gas station somewhere along the way, and it was like entirely black people, and us. So, Dank was getting a soda, and I was kind of looking around (watching the cars circle and the four year old girl out with her daddy at like 1 in the morning) when somebody says hi to me. I say hi back, and they�re like, �What�s up?� So I go, �Oh, I�m just waiting on my friend. Guess which one he is!� pointing to the crowd up at the register and the one tiny pale Jew contained therein. Well, I thought it was funny anyway.

We met Kyle at the White Castle in Kankakee, Shelly passed out in the truck still, and we all had us some nasty hamburgers. Actually, that�s not true. I had a goddamned fish sandwich and so many stupid Chicken Rings I don�t even want to think about them again. Except to maybe get some Chicken Fryz from Burger King and surround one with enough Rings to turn it into some sort of super Chicken Rod. Because that would be pretty cool when you think about it.

Made it home, reeking of grease, and Missy didn�t even seem that upset, so that was a plus. I guess when you have someone�s soul for all eternity, what�s a single night here and there? Sigh.

The next day we did the usual Halloween stuff that people who actually like holidays love so damned much. We drove out to the orchard (I didn�t even know we had an orchard) and took our picture in the same wooden cutouts that everyone else did (and promptly put up on facebook) and got lost in the little kids� maze and got kettle corn and all that shit. Admittedly, I am not so coldhearted as to not love apple cider that comes in cute little plastic apples with flip off tops, but that is the limit of my good cheer. We then went out to the meadow to pick out pumpkins, as Missy wanted to carve one (and because I had smashed Shelly�s on tequila night, if you�ll recall). �A wagon?� I said. �Fuck wagons!� But that was a pretty regrettable decision, as the pumpkins we did finally find (most were rotten and smashed apart) were a fair distance away. And the lone we did see out there had been abandoned for a reason. Its back tires were broken, meaning I had to drag the thing like a sled, ignoring the taunts of those who saw me cussing and lurching along. �Did you break that, hurr hurr hurr?!� Good one, you old faggot. I hope heart disease STRIKES YOU DOWN!

Apparently, while lost in the maze that even six year olds were just sprinting through, I guess we got spotted by Hot Michelle, entirely without my knowledge, leading to roughly the following conversation somewhere later on:

HM: You didn�t tell me you have a girlfriend!
Me: Must have slipped my mind.

There were possibly a hundred better answers I could have had, but I am still greatly pleased with this one � even if it may have led in part to the fact that we haven�t really spoken or seen each other since. At least we can�t blame Spritz!

Missy and I went on to Courier for our meal. I had this nasty southwestern wrap thing that I picked and ate all of the chicken out of. Pause here for tirade: Why do you waterheads insist on adding so much lettuce to everything! You too, Jimmy John�s. I know, I know � it�s cheap filler to make your shit look bigger, but it doesn�t add anything to the sandwich. In fact, it takes away from it! I fucking hate lettuce! Actually, let me correct that: I hate iceberg lettuce, which is all you cheap bastards use anyway. NO ONE IS BEING FOOLED BY YOUR TACTICS. NO ONE.

All right, then what? Came home, Missy and Shelly carved their pumpkins while I looked on in disinterest and then, since I think Kyle was crashing for like two days straight and Spritz was� wherever Spritz was, it was up to us to make our own fun. Somehow this equated to alcoholic apple cider, which Missy and Shelly painstakingly crafted from recipe. For my own, I was a bit more� precarious in my measurements. A bit more brandy here, ten cinnamon sticks there, sure some more brandy why not, a whole goddamn lemon�s worth of juice, more brandy still. Coming from a line of Italians, I�ve always been of the opinion that recipes are fags and that you should cook by sight and by taste. Unfortunately, I only did the former part of the equation, because the foul brew I cooked up tasted like a warm lemony kick in the small intestine. I downed as much of as I could, though, because the plan was leaning towards haunted houses and that was not something I wanted to experience sober.

To share in our enjoyment (as well as to drive our tipsy butts) was Dank, which we figured automatically meant Zouie as well. Now, I�ve never taken issue with Zou, but apparently Shelly who, like Jesus, seriously loves like all people, has some serious problems with the boy, which she let loose in a rant lasting right up until the point where he walked in the door. It�s funny � the specific characteristics people point out in the people they dislike usually aren�t that far off from people they call their friends. When does that line get crossed exactly? Like, all the things she pointed out as distasteful about Jared � e.g. the fact that he�s negative, the fact that he eats anything offered in excessive quantity, the fact that he�s cheap � are all aspects that I myself have in some reasonable degree. Yet somehow Shelly likes spending time with me and hates having Jared around. Again, useful things people should study: the hate threshold test. Someone give me a grant.

We rolled out to Rantoul (of all places) just in time to stand in line over an hour in the cold, waiting to get into this so-called �Fear Factory.� There was one barrel of flame, but we were very rarely near it, which meant a lot of huddling around in a circle. They had the remake of The Texas Chainsaw Massacre on, but that�s roughly as entertaining as watching Jessica Biel�s tits bounce, so there you go. Eventually, we noticed the guy in the Jason mask (you know, the one that chases you out of the place with the de-chained chainsaw) peeking over his area, trying to freak us out. Nothing better to do, I tried to get his goat, calling him James or Geoffrey or something. �James, where did you go, lad! You do not have a proper hockey stick then!� The girls directly behind us joined in, much more mercilessly, raising Jonathon�s ire to the point where he started chucking water bottles and things at the fence in front of us. But then he would have to come get them if he wanted to throw them again, leading to a whole new set of taunts. �Well, don�t throw them if you still want to drink, silly Jaoquin!� I�m not sure how it escalated because I would run and hide whenever Joseph came running, but all�s I know is that somebody got out a fire extinguisher and hosed those girls (and thus, uh, everyone) down with that foul-tasting powdery lung fuck. I�m not sure about the legality of that sort of thing, and I�m sure we all have lung cancer now, but at least it shut those girls up. Meanwhile, we can only hope that this will become a recurring element in my life, like Ruby Tuesdays or losing every damn valuable thing I own.

At last, it was our turn. I designated myself leader, as I saw this less of a fun event, and more as a training facility for when the zombies finally do rise up and start tearing new ones. Can�t be all jumpy when that happens, can I? Anyway, knock-off Elvira gave the rules (�No swearing at the performers.� Swearing in general was fine. We all gave it a try. �Balls!�), gave us our guide, and then set us loose in the mediocrity. The first half was about as expected (although it did smell like a mechanic�s shop, adding a whole new air of mystery!!), but the latter was at least interesting. We were thrown into this pitch black maze, guideless, and all the walls were made of Vaseline-covered trash bags or something. If you were afraid to touch the walls, I guess it would be difficult to find your way around (and thus, scary), but I figure I�ll be knee deep in undead corpses soon enough, what�s a little petroleum jelly? I led in a rather businesslike manner, but it couldn�t be helped that I had a train of retards behind me, retards who could somehow get lost walking a straight line and then would start yelling in terror. Oh dear, the penalties of leadership. We made it through OK, though, and somehow sneaked through Jake�s lair unscathed. Close one, guys! Sorry, I won�t be pretending to be scared when chunks of gray matter hit me in the face; why should I do it now?

Somehow no one wanted to stop at the Rantoul Long John Silver�s for an afterparty. I just don�t understand you guys. And I have no idea what happened Sunday.