How To Get Caught By The Police (Part Two: The Aftermath)

(If you have not read the previous post you should do so before you read this.)

There are those moments in everyone’s lives where just as everything seems to be falling to pieces the world regains its composure and at very least offers you a slightly less fucked circumstance. Said moments are rare and magical and should be cherished. Not unlike the exceptional occasion where you drop your beer and by the grace of the gods you manage to catch it or it lands on the ground right side up. In a matter of moments our walls had come crumbling down upon us. Although I didn’t know it at the time I would escape this predicament relatively unscathed.

The back of a police cruiser is not built to be comfortable. The hard plastic seats are constructed with purpose of reminding you that you have somehow managed to blow it so badly that you are no longer worthy of anything soft. The words of the officers who had taken us into custody seemed to be chosen by the same premise. Nothing soft here, only hard words meant to frighten. Declarations meant to inform you that you had chosen the wrong path and that there is heavy price to be paid for walking the road of the one percenter.

We were taken to the parking lot of the nearest super market where we were made to wait for our parents who had been called at three in the morning and made aware of their children’s indiscretions. While we waited the officers did their best to instill the fear of god and prison in us. Unfortunately for them I did not believe in god. I did however believe in prison and despite my cool exterior I DID know what they did to soft little boys like us in prison. I prayed only that it would be my mother to come retrieve me. She would be understanding and comforting.

My heart sank as I watched my father pull into the parking lot. He was livid and only half awake. As far as my father’s disposition went this was a deadly combination. He had been woken at three in the morning out of a dead sleep and he was obviously not happy about it. It had been a long night it was apparently not ending any time soon. He stepped out of the truck, greeted the officers and proceeded to initiate a conversation which would solidify his place in my mind as the single coolest parent ever known. The officers made him aware of what had taken place in the soccer field at Star King. He stood stoic, silent, listening as the officers rambled. It was at this point that one of the officers dropped what he suspected to be the major bomb.

“Did you know that you son is smoking marijuana?”

“yeah.”

“And don’t you think there’s something you should do about that?”

There was a pause that seemed like an eternity of time and space spreading out before me. Then it happened.

“My dad couldn’t have done anything to stop me from smoking grass and I suspect that I can’t do anything to stop him.”

I looked over at my dad flabbergasted at his response and then to the officer in charge who seemed to be more dumbfounded than I. This was not how it was supposed to happen. Upon being informed that your child has been consuming illicit drugs you are supposed to fly into a blind rage. The officer at this point was supposed to be restraining my father from brutally beating some sense into me. Things were not going according to plan. I folded my arms and smirked. Victory was mine. My dad did fly into a rage. However it was not of the physical variety and it was not directed at me. He launched into a long winded, high volume diatribe regarding being woken at three in the morning on a work day for “nothing”, tax dollars wasted and rapists and murderers that needed catching. I was right. My father was angry but not at me. Not for taking drugs, not for drinking booze, and certainly not for being picked up by the police. We drove home in silence which was only broken when he turned to offer me some advice.

“Be more careful next time.”

I later learned that the exchange between Roric’s dad and the police was not unlike ours. Unfortunately for Mac however his parent knew how to play the part properly and they played it well. They had taken the officer’s business card and for the next year or so would wave it front of Mac’s face for almost any reason. He was promptly checked into rehab and there he learned about more powerful effective drugs.

I guess when it comes right down to it they really only caught one of us that night. We did learn some lessons that evening but despite the best efforts of the police they were not the lessons they had intended. We learned that cops really are dicks, Never let booze go to waste no matter how cheap and you can not hide from a helicopter under a tree.

How To Get Caught By The Police (Part One: The Chase)

I’ve asked around quite extensively and it would seem that precious few sixteen year olds can say that they’ve been chased down by helicopters, handcuffed and thrown in the back of a cop car. However god, the petty and vindictive son of a bitch that he is found it best to bestow me with such an experience.

It was another average night for my friends and I. We had played a show for some five-hundred ravenous undergarment tossing fans and planned to round out the evening with a sound dose of drugs, drink and debauchery. The only thing different about this night as opposed to any other was where we chose to perform the latter of these tasks. More often than not our elicit activities were confined within the soundly constructed walls of one of out Carmichael homes. It would seem that this night however we were full of youthful defiance and a well honed belief that we were invincible. We had decided that the best arena for the under aged consumption of mass amount of drugs and alcohol was Star King Middle School. Nestled safely within one of the many sub-suburbs Star King was not unlike any other middle school found in Carmichael. Unfortunately unlike many of the other houses of education found in the area Star King had recently experienced a rash of vandalism. It was this unknown fact that would prove to be our undoing.

In a decision that we at the time found to incredibly wise we chose to set up shop at the far end of the property. On the bleachers where hundreds perhaps thousands of parents had sat to watch their children play soccer we set out to become thoroughly inebriated. Even then we knew it to be impossible to have an acceptably good time without the proper music to awaken the slumbering soul. A boom box was brought forth to amplify what we found to be the great music of our era. I’m sure now that any house within earshot (of which there were quite a few) found their quiet bedrooms filled with the less than soothing voices of Ben Weasel, Fat Mike and Joe Queer. However the assurance of a sound nights sleep for a few squares was the least of our concerns.

We were sixteen year old gods rollicking on the field of battle that is adolescence. For almost three hours we worshipped at the throne of hedonism and all were welcome to the plunder. Stacks of Natural Ice piled chest high, uncountable bottles of Boones Farm representing every color of the rainbow and sandwich baggies that in grade school had once housed peanut butter sandwiches were now overflowing with the finest marijuana a high school campus could provide. We had made ourselves kings and even went so far as to provide the court with crowns. For as anyone who has wasted a respectable amount of their lives drink cheap booze knows that a twelve pack box fits perfectly over ones head. However it would seem that our reign was not meant to last. Perhaps we had grown too vain with power. Perhaps we hadn’t offered the gods proper tribute. Regardless of what brought about our fate, in the end our empire would be inexplicably crushed.

Like a specter of doom a helicopter rose on the horizon and adorned with an empty twelve pack box on my head I mused,

“Wouldn’t it be funny… If that helicopter was here for us?”

Before the quip could complete its escape from my lips the heavens broke open and the light of judgment shown upon us. In simpler terms the cops wrecked our fucking party. The ensuing moments were absolute chaos. Perhaps it is because I was thoroughly fucking hammered but all I remember are glimpses of moments, flashes and Oliver Stone jump cuts. Although I do recall vividly that the officer manning the helicopter’s loud speaker was a godless condescending cocksucker. From the height and perspective of the helicopter it was undoubtedly a ridiculous site. Within seconds all twenty of us has scattered like so many pieces of drunken shrapnel. I now understand the vague and primal concept of fight or flight. The moment that spotlight dropped down upon us it was every man and woman for themselves. Like very one of my friends I chose to run like hell. Had I chosen fight what would I have done? Should I have thrown my beer can skyward in an attempt to bring down the helicopter? Ultimately, running was most likely the best choice. Eleven years later I now realize that there was a third option open to us. We could have, I suppose, stayed right where we were and waited to receive our fair and just punishment. However there was no way I was going out like that. Outside of running my first instinct was to hide. Although it seemed logical at the time I now know that you can not hide from a helicopter under a tree. I pressed myself against the nearest trunk certain that the canopy of leaves would offer me the cover I so desperately needed.

As I looked out on the seen before me I witnessed Mac perform an act I will forever admire him for. He had been caught dead to rights in the unforgiving glow of the spotlight. In one hand he held a half drained bottle of Boones Farm, in the other a cigarette. He looked up directly into the light. He then looked over to his bottle of Boones Farm and then his cigarette. He finally turned his eyes to me and then in complete silence, without a single word being spoken we had a conversation.

“What should I do?” his eyes pleaded.

My eyes told him to run.

“What about the Boones. And the cigarette!?”

As I shot him the glare that told him to forget about it I could tell he had already made his decision. He turned his head skyward for but a second assessing the situation. Then while bathed in light with determination the likes of which I had never seen he proceeded to chug the rest of his Boones Farm, take one last drag of his cigarette, toss them both and run. It was a bold and defiant move. One that unmistakably declared,

“I paid three dollars for this booze and I’m not letting it go to waste!”

Upon Mac departure the helicopter turned its attention to me. The tree which I was certain would provide my solace was immediately awash in light. A smug voice came through the loud speaker,

“I can see you down there smart guy! DO NOT RUN!”

I hadn’t run far enough or fast enough. I knew I had been beaten. I was instructed to return to my vehicle and I did so. Upon my arrival I was greeted by Mac and Rorick, their faces drenched with sweat and fear. Police cruisers descended upon us. Out of twenty they had brought down only the three of us but we would be made to know who was in charge. We were bullied threatened and ultimately cuffed and thrown in the back of a cop car. As we departed an officer leaned in and asked,

“Do you know what happens to soft little suburban boys like you in prison?”

Ever the defiant little son of a bitch I responded,

“No, what happens to soft little suburban boys like us in prison?”

Next Time

How To Get Caught By The Police (Part Two: The Aftermath)

The Old Ice Pick Through The Hand Trick.

I’m sure they were only trying to do their best. But what in god’s name were my parents thinking. By the time I was 18 I had seen more of the sick and depraved than some men twice my age could ever hope to see. I can sit comfortably at the age of 27 knowing, that I’ve stood within the gates of Sodom and Gomorrah smacking and sodomizing vile flesh and taste testing the broad range of perversions that IS the totality of experience. It was some time in my 12th year that I boldly declared to my parents that I was to be a musician. I’m sure they were somewhat dismayed at the idea of their little boy moving into a vocation that had precious few opportunities for financial solvency. However it was far to late in the game to back down off of the “You can do anything you want to do if you put your mind to it.” trip. It wasn’t long before I was spending four or more nights a week at a local music venue. And despite everyone’s best efforts to shield me from the dark underbelly of world of live music, like a dog I managed to stuff my nose anywhere it smelled bad. And boy did the Cattle Club ever smell bad. To this day when I get a whiff of the sickening smell of sour beer and stale cigarette smoke I feel like I’m home. This lifestyle almost immediately became a detriment to my schooling. I found no reason to go to bed at a reasonable hour so I could wake up and go to school the next day when there were so many drugs to do and so many beers to drink. Perhaps this isn’t quite the proper mindset for a fourteen-year-old but given the opportunity I wouldn’t change a thing.

There are occasions, which have permanently etched themselves into my consciousness; Bare breasts and acid trips, fist fights and blowjobs, being hit on by grown gay men and oversexed straight women, breaking and entering and brush fires. In four short years I garnered a lifetime of experience. Some days I wonder what exactly my parent where thinking when I came home at four in the morning reeking of booze. What did they say to each other when I walked in the door obviously frying my ass off on acid? All I can say is that I’m truly fortunate that my parents raised me in the fashion they did. A child of lesser intelligence and a poorer grasp of what the world was really about would have ended up in jail and or spending the rest of their empty lives in a drug induced haze. As it is my teenage debauchery was just a faze which I grew out of much in the same fashion another child of my age may have grown out of playing with toys (something I’ve never grown out of). These days I rarely ever drink and the last time I took acid I was 20 and I spent the entire night in the fetal position on the floor. Many of the kids I knew who were pulling down straight A’s are now drunks or crack addicts. I suppose the moral of the story is to get your kids on drugs as soon as possible so they can get that shit out of their system.

I would be hard pressed to convey my favorite story of my Cattle Club years. But if you held my feet to the fire I could say that one of the most entertaining is a great little yarn involving the greatest bartender I’ve ever known, an ice pick and massive quantities of booze.

I've sat down at a an incalculable number of bars all over the world and been served by at least as many bartenders none of which have come close to holding a candle to my absolute favorite drink slinger. Keith was an amazing bartender. Two Parts philosopher, one part councilor, four parts preacher and three parts John Wayne. Adorned with an Abe Lincoln beard and thinning hair Keith dressed in a kind of hobo sheik that would never have worked on anyone else and almost didn’t work on him. I would often wonder if his closet was full of freshly washed plain black shirts riddled with holes and cut off black denim shorts or did he just wake up wearing the same clothes he wore all week neglecting the approval of a mirror as he walked out the door. Did he sleep wearing the same black All Stars with the sole desperately clinging on at the heel or did he buy new pairs and liberate the oppressed sole from the rest of the shoe so that his right foot could “breath”? Keith was a religious drinker. I don’t mean this in sense that he drank at the same time everyday or something benign like that. He viewed being an alcoholic as a religion. He would often make references to “the alcohol gods” as if he had velvet paintings over his bed and prayer candles emblazoned with their images. If upon pouring a drink a drop or two would hit the bar he would mumble some sort of incomprehensible prayer to himself and trace the sign of the cross over his chest. I have seen few Christians or Catholics with the kind of devotion that Keith held for the alcohol gods. And much like any good Christian if pressed you would be made aware how gravely serious he was about his beliefs. One night well after closing time Mac and I sat at the bar with our manager Jon drinking ourselves silly. At some point our conversation turned to those poor souls who could recite beer label credos from memory. Keith was quick to point out that he had spent some time in the navy where he had gained the ability to recite the Budweiser label in its entirety without error. I found this to be truly stunning. Not that he could recite the Budweiser credo that actually seemed perfectly characteristic. It was the fact that Keith had spent time in the Navy. It seemed almost implausible. As far as knew they didn’t have bars OR bartenders on naval ships. Jon scooped up a Budweiser and insisted that Keith prove himself to us. Keith tipped back his head in a state of rapture and spoke,

"This is the famous Budweiser beer. We know of no brand produced by any other brewer which costs so much to age and brew”.

Jon winced and turned the label to Keith. You could almost see his heart sink. Any committed alcoholic worth his weight in hops knows that it’s “brew” then “age” and not the other way around as Keith had stated. You could see that he was shamed and heart broken.

“I must pay penance”, he mumbled toward his shoes.

Being the malicious son of a bitch that he was Jon was more than happy to help and he would make sure that paying this penance was not easy because as anyone who has spent the night on a filthy bathroom floor knows the alcohol gods are vengeful and unforgiving. Jon stepped behind the bar, retrieved the largest glass he could find and proceeded to fill it with everything. I don’t mean that he mixed a few different beers in one glass. I mean that he put EVERY liquid that was behind that bar into a glass. Beer, mixers, hard alcohol, dishwater and more. Keith took the glass dropped to one knee, whispered a prayer to himself and drank the whole glass at once. Up until that point I had never seen Keith with so much as a buzz and now it was painfully obvious that not only was he buzzed but unequivocally drunk. Everything seemed to be just fine until I heard him say,

“You guys wanna see put an ice pick through my hand?”

Okay, this is not the kind of question that should be answer lightly. On one hand if you answer yes you could conceivably be held guilty of aiding an individual who is unquestionably inebriated in making a decision which could lead to injury or worse. On the other hand, when will someone ever offer this kind of performance for free again?

“Yes…Yes I DO want to see you put an ice pick through your hand.”

For all of us in attendance that night it seemed like an innocuous enough task. Sure! You just jam that fucker through your palm…Right? Well, apparently we were all wrong. With the point of the pick pressed into to the flash of his palm Keith proceeded to slam the handle into the top of the bar in an attempt to drive the metal rod through his hand. He didn’t seem to have much trouble getting it through the palm of his hand. It was the flesh on the top of his hand, which was proving to be more resistant to puncture. Because of this the pick coming through the opposite side of his hand was creating a kind of flesh tent on the top of his hand. Unwilling to relent Keith continued to twist and push the handle of the ice pick occasionally swearing and turning his head to me with a look that expressed absolute disbelief that the flesh of his hand was putting up such a fight. Eventually, fed up with his vain attempt he grabbed a lime knife looked up at me and chuckled,

“Why didn’t I think of this sooner?!”

Jeez I don’t know. Everybody knows that when you’re trying to mutilate yourself with an ice pick you should always cut a slit in the top of you hand first. They teach you THAT shit in grade school. In seconds it was over and Keith spent the rest of the night with that ice pick sticking right through his hand as if it was the coolest body modification a middle aged hipster could ask for. After a few more hours it was obvious that we should leave before someone could offer to drive something metal through his scrotum. As we were walking out the door I turned around and saw Keith hunched over the bar furiously scribbling onto a cocktail napkin. Contrary to my better judgment I asked,

“What are you doing?”

Without looking up he replied,

“No big deal. I just figured out infinity that’s all”.

“Oh” I said,

“Is that all?”

How to damage your child in one easy step.

My family was never one of those “pet families.” You know the type. Folks who name their animals with handles normally reserved for humans. The kind of families who will mercilessly let their dog or cat rot to pieces rather than having it dispatched in a more human way simply because “He’s a part of the family.”

Not that we didn’t like animals, it just seemed that we handled them in a far different manner than other families we knew. We seemed to have a revolving door of cats coming in and out of our house. We never actually went out and bought one or picked one up out a box marked “free kittens.”

“He adopted us,” my father would say.

Looking back on it now, I’m fairly certain that at some point in his life my father was jilted by an unfaithful family pet. He would keep these adoptive cats at emotional arms length by simply referring to them as “Cat.” Once when I was bout 12, we were adopted by a black cat with long vampire like fangs. I declared that we would name him Bella as I had just come off a Universal monster movie jag. It wasn’t long before Bella was just another “cat.”

As much as my father seemed to pretend that he had no connection to these animals I would come out into the back yard and find him conversing with another in a long line of “cats.”

“Where the fuck have you been Cat?”, He would ask as if it were a woman who had come home at 4:00 in the morning stinking of cologne.

After a days absence he would ignore Cat as if he was teaching the animal some sort of lesson for his or her transgressions. However, it wouldn’t be long before he was stooping to rub his putty knife behind the cat’s ears.

Perhaps it was his attitude a sort of self fulfilling prophecy but often the cats WOULD leave him for someone else. Once a cute and well-mannered black and grey cat disappeared for a few days. After some time she came waltzing into the back yard and my father played the same old game first yelling at her then turning his back as if his heart had been torn out. After the initial pain had subsided, he bent down to show his cheating bitch some affection. It was at this point that he could be heard screaming from the back yard, “What the fuck is this!? Where did you get this shit!?

Much to his horror the cat had been adorned with a collar presenting his name as Whiskers and ever worse…. A bell. She had been fucking around behind his back and actually had the nerve to show up wearing a gift from the adulterous piece of shit who had stolen her away. As far as I know that was the last time her ever opened his heart to a cat again.

Considering the fact that my father believed that house pets were nothing more than animals who could fend and provide for themselves it came as no surprise that he was almost never willing to spend any money on them. And he wonders why they always left him? Consequently our cats were never spayed or neutered and even worse he would often insist that he was perfectly capable of putting an injured or sick animal out of its misery. It would be this twisted belief that would often lead to interesting and horrifying situations.

When I was about 12 we had a male cat who was nothing short of apeshit. While in the house he would tear around the living room in circles moving at incredibly dangerous speeds. Behind the couch, under the TV, around the rocking chair. Round and round for hours at a time.

“Maybe we should have him neutered,” my mother would suggest as the cat tore over her yet again tearing a chunk out of her arm in the process.

“Bullshit,” my dad would volley “That’s a fucking waste of time. He’ll calm down when he gets older.”

Because they we’re free to come and go as they pleased this cat would often take off into the neighborhood with his swollen balls and invariably come back bearing the evidence of a tussle with another male cat or sometimes a small dog. Small chunks out of an ear or a couple of scrapes across the back but never anything life threatening. Fortunately for him, it was never anything that required veterinary attention. One evening as we sat watching Twin Peaks, my parents patiently listening as I laid out all the evidence which pointed directly to Laura Palmer’s true killer, we heard a sound which was not unlike an infant being drowned in pudding and gravel. It quickly became apparent that ‘Cat’ had gotten in a fight with something large and angry. A creature with no shortage of teeth or claws had handed ‘Cat’ his ass and it was almost certainly beyond being reattached.

There were copious amounts of blood flowing from a number of gaping crimson wounds. A missing ear, flaps of skin tenuously hanging from bits of sinew like ornament from a Christmas tree. It was the first time I had seen any gore of this caliber that wasn’t projected on a movie screen. I was all at once nauseated and fascinated. From the safety of my bed I listened to the cat scream all night long. Once morning had come my mother insisted that the cat be put out of its obvious misery. She pleaded in vain for the cat to be taken to a “proper facility” where they were “equipped to handle this sort of thing.” However, my dad would have nothing of it.

“fuck that! They’ll just charge me some sort of bullshit service fee. I can handle this myself.”

It was at this point that he hoped in the truck and took off for the hardware store to “equip himself to handle this sort of thing.” I had visions of hacksaws and blowtorches’ long-handled sledgehammers smashing cantaloupes. Unfortunately the reality of his plan would prove to be far more horrifying. Upon returning my dad carried two canisters of aluminum phosphide which in later years I came to know as nerve gas. My father explained to me in a matter of fact tone that this was the kind of stuff that golf courses used to control the gopher populations and was the most humane and painless method available for the dispatching of mangled cats in the home. Being a painter my father always had a large surplus of plastic five gallon buckets and was instructed to retrieve one from the shed.

“Paint can. Gas chambers,” it seems a natural progression to me. Considering that the next ten to fifteen minutes was one of those childhood defining moments which you desperately try to forget but always manage to remember I now envision it from a third person perspective as if I were watching a film about the kind of things you should under no circumstances expose your child to. In a few swift movements the gas canister was ignited and thrown into the bucket, quickly followed by the cat a plywood lid and a large. The promised quick and humane death was long and horrific we both stood paralyzed watching the bucket quake and rattle as the cat aware of its imminent demise threw its self about the confines of the bucket screaming as only a creature can when it knows its death is at hand.

After what seemed like an eternity the bucket grew silent and stopped moving at which point I allowed myself to exhale.

“Fuck!” my dad proclaimed. “That was a whole hell of a lot easier than I thought. Saved myself 15 bucks too.”

He looked down at me.

“Let’s dig a hole.”

Death Before Dating

Invariably throughout ones life you will cross paths with individuals who’s very being could not have been scripted any better than if they had been created lock and stock by the most creative script writers the world has to offer. I have been fortunate enough to intersect with said persons on a regular basis in the course of my life. One such character was Stuart Richardson the Third. It seemed that from childhood Stuart was destined to be of the colorful variety. Perhaps, had he been allowed to keep his birth name which happened to be the decidedly bland Todd he may have been a less interesting character. However, as fate would have it he would have an entirely different destiny. It would happen that in his fifth year just as young Todd Richardson was begin to cultivate a stronger sense of self just as any child would do that death would intervene. Upon the death of Todd’s grandfather Stuart Richardson the First his parents, caught in the rapture of a sudden fit of irreparable sentimentality thought it best to carry on the family name. Rather than waiting until they brought forth a second son, (which they managed to do a few years later in Kyle Richardson) they chose to erase young Todd’s identity and begin anew.

“Your grandfather has died. Secondly you shall hence for be known as Stuart Richardson the Third.”

Granted this is some fairy heavy shit to lay on a five year old, however in the grand scheme of things I am sure that this event had no more damage on Stuarts psyche than any number of parental debacles which we all must endure as humans as a matter of course.

I met Stu in high school. It was at this point in his life when he began to sew the seeds of an interesting and sometimes entertaining internal dichotomy. It would seem that Stu was beginning to have a hard time marrying his fascination of lower class culture and his inarguable upper class up bringing. Perhaps this is why Stu was drawn to me. I could often glimpse a deep and unexplainable longing in his eyes whenever he came to my house and was presented without fail at least one dilapidated car in the driveway which did not run and which no one had the desire to make do so. I would listen as he spoke wistfully about someday renting a house with a car sitting on blocks in a dead and oil soaked front lawn, of filthy shirtless children running about unchecked and being looked down at by the neighbors. However, regardless of his deep infatuation with white trash ethos he still held strong allegiance to his parents who had reworked his identity for him so many years ago. He focused his attention to fine art of mechanichry of which his father hardily encouraged him. I’m sure assuming that it would be something that an adult Stuart would do with his time off from his well paid and secure state job which would offer him vast amounts of expendable income. Unfortunately for Stuart the Second this preoccupation would soon grow to be an obsession and a steadfast part of young Stuies identity.

When Stu wasn’t working on his cars we were going to see punk shows, drinking and smoking ungodly amounts of marijuana. In hindsight I find it incredible that were not arrested on a more regular basis. Even when Stuart wasn’t getting himself into situations which were unequivocally illegal he was finding his way into incidents which were amazing and often downright bizarre. Fortunately for my catalog of life experiences from which to write about I was there on more than a few occasions either watching mouth agape or actively participating.

More often than not while we were in high school the situations Stu found himself in were pertaining to the procurement of women and the hard fought battle to attain intercourse. There was not much within the bounds of minimal good taste that Stu wasn’t willing to do to get laid. Perhaps it the way in which he persistently requested a “Suckjob” or the frequency with which he pushed drinks on his victims in hopes to lubricate the path to intercourse which often left the young lady becoming “too drunk to fuck”. Regardless it would seem that he didn’t start getting enough of what he desperately desired until he stopped trying so desperately to make it happen.

One occasion which I found then to be endlessly amusing took place the night of a high school dance. Stu had managed to secure himself a date as had I so we chose to go together. His excitement was quite simply uncontainable and it radiated around him. Truth be told was quite happy for him and it seemed that his consistent badgering of the farer sex had paid off in a date with a lovely young lady. As we prepared ourselves for the evening I was at some points quite certain that Stu would burst with anticipation. He vigorously applied copious quantities of deodorant from armpit to elbow as he endlessly and nervously rambled on in regards to this young lady’s unequaled beauty and unmistakable desire “to fuck”. Once Stu had dressed himself in the finest threads a thrift store would allow he straightened his bow tie, slammed a couple of beers to sooth his jangled nerves and announced that he was quite ready to pick up his charge for the evening.

It was decided that we would pick up his date first. As I drove us to the girls house Stu continued to make the case that THIS girl was the ONE. Frequently turning to me with a devilish grin to tell me that, “she’s gonna get it!” Frankly I was starting to believe it. We stopped on the street in front her house. Stu grabbed the rear view mirror with a complete lack of grace and pushed around his grease soaked hair. I lit a cigarette and Stu was out the door. He was half way up the walkway before I could even begin to offer some advice on the way to go about greeting his date. After my first cigarette I got out of the car and lit another logically assuming he was inside meeting the girl’s horrified parents. I shivered as I imagined the terror I would undoubtedly feel if I were a father and some young greasy punk reeking of cheap booze and cheaper cigarettes came to take my little girl away from me with the obvious intention of relentlessly violating her.

Just as I began to shake my waking nightmare Stu came walking back down the walkway, alone. It looked as if he had been hit by a truck. In a matter of a few moments his entire demeanor had taken a three-sixty. The girls father, I rationalized had doubtlessly forbidden her to go any where with this primate. I felt a huge wave of sorrow for Stuart and of relief for the young girl which had unknowingly dodged the flesh bullet. As he walked toward me Stu held up a piece of paper. Flabbergasted he looked me in the eye and said, “She killed herself!”

I grabbed the paper from his hands and proceeded to read the poor young girls last words.

“Just my fucking luck” Stu said as he lit a smoke and leaned against the car, “I find one that wants to fuck and she goes and fucking kills herself.”

I looked up from the note and gave him the look I reserve for guys that ask me if I’d like to have sex with a baby.

“What!?”

According to the note it seemed as if the girl just could not go on any longer. It appeared sincere enough but just as I began to ponder the odd concept of leaving a suicide note to your homecoming date I got to the part where she informed Stu that unfortunately, she was not going to be able to attend the dance with him as she was planning to be deceased.

Stu spent the rest of the evening drinking massive quantities of Natural Ice and regaling anyone who would listen with his tale of woe.

Unsurprisingly we later found that the young lady who had ended her life so early was not only very much alive but apparently quite well adjusted. Well, just maladjusted enough to break off a date by feigning suicide.

Scanner Darkly

I Love Dick, I cant get enough. When I was quite young my father took me into his room and showed me HIS Dick, He had tons. I've been a Dickhead ever since.
Ok, now that I've gotten that out of the way lets move on. I started reading the books of Phillip K. Dick when I was about 13. I immediately fell in love with his work. At the time I wouldn't have been able to tell you what made his books so great. However in the years following I believe that I've read enough shitty sci-fi stories to indentify what makes Dick's books work so well. I have come to believe that the key to great science fiction is in the characters and the emotion. The sci-fi that neglects to handle these key elements properly and or believably seems to feel like nothing more than historical science to a world that never existed. Dick's stories are chock full of thick emotion and its this character handling and its precisely this which makes Scanner Darkly work as a film. A film based on Phillip K Dick's stories have not come this close to justice since Blade Runner.
The flow of the film is much like the all but patented Dick story outline. The first half of the story builds a reality and allows you to become comfortable with it. Once you've become complacent and comfortable with this reality all hell breaks loose. The film much like the books leads you into a vertiginous sense of confusion most often felt by the main character. All that you had been encouraged to believe is a lie. The threads of the story fray and spread leaving you with a sense of mild discomfort as your characters world crumbles around him. Just when it seems that you AND the main character cant take anymore the story slams back together in a coherent reality which is nothing like the one that you started with. The film handles this format quite well. As Arctors world slipped into oblivion I felt his disillusionment and discomfort, it may have even been stronger had I not known the reality that was forthcoming.
My only complaint with the film would be the injected humor. They handle it quite well and it even works most of the time. However I did feel that it detracted from the overall dark and depressing tone that a Dick story should have. Not that it ruined the film. I just remember thinking "This shouldn't be funny. This is a really SAD story". Had Robert Downey Jr. not done such a good job with the humor it would have felt obtuse and added on. As it stands however, it DID work.
All in all, I believe that "A Scanner Darkly" takes its place next to "Blade Runner" as the well done Dick movies.

Now if you'll excuse me. Im going to go lay down on the couch and curl up with some Dick.

Vinyl retentive

I love shopping for records with an unbridled passion that is usually reserved for such primal activities as sexual intercourse. Its speaks to a baser need that is buried somewhere deep in my core. Something left over from simpler more barbaric times. It’s the thrill of the hunt. Sometimes you get rabbits and sometimes you take down the fucking mammoth but you rarely come back empty handed. If you did you would somehow be less of a man, unable to provide aural sustenance for your tribe. There is a certain moment when you’re out on the field of battle when things can turn vicious. Consider this: Your flipping through a record bin which has been filled seemingly at random. You must weed out the unworthy game from the truly amazing kill. You look to your right and notice another hunter. Most of the time (for myself at least) this doesn’t pose a problem, yet occasionally you realize that this fellow primate is hunting the same game as yourself. You realize your working your way through fields, which were once rich with the type of game that you and your tribe thrive on. However this hunter has picked the fields bare. You are at odds. There have been occasions where I wondered if I could take this hunter out and hide the body before an employee realizes that Ive just killed a man over a Kinks or Standells record. Perhaps I was born too late maybe I’m a relic from a time I never lived in. However, know this: If you see me in a music store don’t touch my records or Ill fucking kill you!

Not unlike a swift kick to the ovaries

I didn’t think that this stuff required qualifiers yet as of late I’m beginning to think I may have been wrong. It would seem that sarcasm does not telegraph in text as well as I had hoped. In regard to my previous post I received a few emails with varying degrees of eloquence essentially stating that the sender was disappointed in me. Allow me to clear this up right now. I was expressing my disdain for this way of life by presenting somthing written in the first person of one of these sad one-dimensional individuals. "A good hard fuck" is NOT the only thing that makes me feel alive....... Its just one of them.

Welcome to the meatmarket culture...

There are hundreds of thousands of us stinking of desperation and cheap cologne, stuffed into hip little bars all over your town. Our inexplicable loneliness is matched only by our unending need for validation at the hands of the opposing sex. Look into our shallow vapid eyes. Do you honestly believe that anything but a "good hard fuck" will make us feel alive? Do you really think that intelligence or stimulating conversation has ever been on, or ever WILL make the list of requirements? Sure, It comes right after a huge set of tits and the four hour massive erection. The only thing that has EVER made us feel alive is the trading of poorly veiled sexual innuendos and the grinding of vile stinking flesh. We've dismissed the concept of cerebral stimuli to the realm of the glitterati intelligentsia. We are the culmination of the cultivation of the most base human instincts.