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Okay, okay, I know this blog was cheery for a while, and it seems that I was blessed with more readers since. I promise that I just need to work some things out of my system. Go hold and pet a bunny, it is therapeutic. As for me, well, I feel I need to do a sympathetic purge for y'all, and purging aint pretty (thanks for the inspiration, Guggs). Call me a cross barer, but it's the least I could do for you. Maybe I'm going too far with the morbid stuff, or maybe I'm just getting started. I just can't help sabotage myself, put a spanner in the works, if you will. I'm just a li'l bastard, sometimes. Let's pretend a little and see what happens. (spins a bottle) This post isn't about me, however. It is about you. It is a post that recognizes the pain that you went through. It may be a graphic picture, but it happened to you and this might not actually represent the total pain, loneliness, and betrayal that you went through at that time in your life. If I could put your heart back together again, I would. If I could thaw your winter, I would. If I could just get you to smile more...well, I might be able to do that, at least. I know I'm nothing more than a series of amusing pixels to you, perhaps. But, there are some who really know me and have witnessed my ability to soak up pain, be it physical or emotional. I'll clean up your mess if you'll let me, but you are too smart for that. My ego and my pride is already screwing things up in my own world, so why screw up yours?
It turns out, after all, I'm a terrible Jesus and an even worse Lucifer. The bottle stopped spinning, and it is pointing at me. I will step back and absorb what I can. Rip my heart out, so you can know what it feels like to be on the other end for a change. Maybe, this will hit that magic button in your mind and make it all better. But, if you can't get over the pain still, then please forgive me for thinking so highly of myself. I'm only human. Let's start over, fresh. Some Lyrics of Patti Smith come to mind as well: Pissing in a River Pissing in a river, watching it rise Tattoo fingers shy away from me Voices voices mesmerize Voices voices beckoning sea Come come come come back come back Come back come back come back Spoke of a wheel, tip of a spoon Mouth of a cave, I'm a slave I'm free. When are you coming ? Hope you come soon Fingers, fingers encircling thee Come come come come come come Come come come come come come for me oh My bowels are empty, excreting your soul What more can I give you ? Baby I don't know What more can I give you to make this thing grow? Don't turn your back now, I'm talking to you Should I pursue a path so twisted ? Should I crawl defeated and gifted ? Should I go the length of a river [The royal, the throne, the cry me a river] Everything I've done, I've done for you Oh I give my life for you. Every move I made I move to you, And I came like a magnet for you now. What about it, you're gonna leave me, What about it, you don't need me, What about it, I can't live without you, What about it, I never doubted you What about it ? What about it ? What about it ? What about it ? Should I pursue a path so twisted ? Should I crawl defeated and gifted ? Should I go the length of a river, [The royal, the throne, the cry me a river] What about it, what about it, what about it ? Oh, I'm pissing in a river. T.G.~I thought that some of you might get off on a bit of this more emotional material. I hope it does something for you. I'll make with the funny in time...."DANCE MONKEY!!!" Yes, master. P.S. For those paranormal freaks, check out the thin vortex streaming across the picture on the right.
(Edited since first posted).
Here I am, somewhere in medieval times. I'm not talking about the restaurant, either. I believe my name was Bolderick the Butcher. Here I am in one of my famous "It's a living" moments. I don't know how all of this got started, the executioner's gig, but I do know this: once you've severed one head, you've severed them all. As you can see I'm a bit lost in the moment, thinking about Guinevere and going for a hay ride with her after work. What goes on in the hay wagon stays in the hay wagon. It all ended up with us getting all knackered and cream crackered. Best day of my lives. I wonder who Guinevere is now. I wonder if I'll meet her again. Will I know her if I see her? There are times when I feel that I've known someone from somewhere before. This has happened to me often, but it has always been those poor souls that I've beheaded in the past. Guinevere, I know you're out there. I don't have that bloody axe anymore. It's been replaced with a keystroke--words. They aren't as wieldy as the axe, but are much deadlier. Maybe, just maybe, we are not in a cycle of reincarnation, but we do some nocturnal dancing. One of the first attempts I made at writing a novel dealt with this subject. I got to page one hundred and fifty one. I thought it was utter crap and put it in the round file. Since then, I tend to write stories in my head over and over, kind of like reincarnation. But, I revisited that old idea the other day: When we dream, we are hooked into a giant subconscious network. I'd like to think that our spirits roam and mingle with other spirits when we sleep--not leaving our bodies, but connected by some sort of endless umbilical cord. Now, who do I dance with? Who are my nocturnal lovers? Who are my nocturnal friends and adversaries? What would happen if I could control this massive, underwater world? There are some of you that I would love to reach into my monitor and shake hands with, slap five, and give a friendly Indian burn to. There are others that I'd like to try other things with. But, maybe I already have danced with you--there beneath the water in the giant, ballroom belly of Jonah's whale. Just maybe... I'll be roaming. Let me know if you see me 'round.
I am famous for having weird dreams. I could do a rather large post on the subject, but I'm so tired that I could fall off my own ass right now. So, I'll just type until I can't stands it no more. Shit, I'm turning into Popeye! In this dream I was at the dentist. I went into the room to get my checkup and the dental assistant asked me to take my jaw off and set it on the table. She really didn't say that, but that's what the understanding was, like that was the normal thing to do. So, off with my jaw. That little bubblegum-mushing bugger started vibrating on the stainless steel tray like it was a cell phone. It frightened me, so I asked the assistant what was wrong with it and she said to look in this one particular molar. The molar was the size of a soup bowl now, and had all this black, hairy tar floating around inside it. I told her that I couldn't see past the filth and she cleared out the cavity. Down in the bottom of the cavity was my spine. I was partly disgusted but mostly amazed. I reached down into my molar, grabbed my spine and lifted it up. When I did this I found that I also rose along with it. I did this a couple of times, then the assistant did it as well. This was beyond weird. Maybe, this comes from huffing too much starting fluid when I was a teenager--dude, I'm an eeeeagle!
This scripture is for the times that you just ate at "La Tormenta"--a real restaurant, by the way--and your GI tract knows just how far away home is. Read with care: Jeremiah 4:19-21 King James Edition My bowels, my bowels! I am pained at my very heart; my heart maketh a noise in me; I cannot hold my peace, because thou hast heard, O my soul, the sound of the trumpet, the alarm of war. Destruction upon destruction is cried; for the whole land is spoiled: suddenly are my tents spoiled, and my curtains in a moment. How long shall I see the standard, and hear the sound of the trumpet? (He bows before his audience), Hope it isn't prophetic
(Edited. since first posting).
You've got this strange effect on me, And I like it. You've got this strange effect on me, And I like it. You make my world seem right, You make my darkness bright, oh yes, You've got this strange effect on me, And I like it. And I like it. And I like the way you kiss me (with comments), Don't know if I should (write what's in my sick head). But this feeling is love (love you guys), and I know it, That's why I feel good. You've got this strange effect on me, And I like it. You've got this strange effect on me, And I like it. You make my world seem right, You make my darkness bright, oh yes, You've got this strange effect on me, And I like it. And I like it. And I like it."Strange Effect" written by Ray Davies (The Kinks--best group ever) with words in parenthesis by The Grunt.Come on now and give us a kiss!
When my stomach acid starts up, I know my neck will start to get tense, as well as my lower back. A careful assessment of my state of mind determined that I had to blow off some steam, de-stress, unwind, whatever. So, I decided to go to a few places that I haven't been for a while. First stop: That scary military surplus compound/store out in the sticks. I don't know why I find this place interesting, but I do. Sticking out like a sore thumb and not giving a shit about it can be satisfying and funny. It was there that I found a good source for rip-stop army fatigues (non-cammo) and waffle stompers. One time I even bought a bag of radio knobs. I thought they looked cool and was going to toughen up the look of my system with them, but they turned out to be huge. It didn't work out, so if any of you need a bunch of battlefield radio knobs, I'm your man. Back to the story, there's a section where all the hillbillies and whatnot's can get their IFA on. I generally steer clear of that section and go straight to the scary part: The outside surplus storage area. There's so much dangerous and useless crap it's mind boggling. I'm holding out hope for a chance to find a JATO or two--you know, those rockets they use to help the big cargo planes take off on short runways. I had plans to re-enact an urban legend about strapping those to a car, but the program "Mythbusters" beat me to it. There wasn't much to look at today, however. They had fenced off the good stuff. So, I went inside the warehouse. Inside I found a large bin of, you guessed it, chest spreaders! I knew there was a reason for going there. I was planning on boning up on my open-heart surgery this weekend. Down a bit further, I found a section featuring used military parachutes. There was a notice above the inventory stating, "No returns on parachutes." No shit? How would you like to be the unfortunate soul who has to find this out the hard way? A dead man can't return anything; therefore, if you have the return department turn you down, you've probably already been effed for the rest of your short, crippled existence. On the plus side, I thought that I had met Larry the Cable Guy there and then promptly gave him the rods-up (English finger). Anyways, Ron (Tater Salad) White is way funnier--if you're into that humor, and that's about the only one of those guys I can stomach. Second Place: The park. A good walk in the park is always necessary if you're going to unwind. It was there that I thought up a rather crude invention: Playdough Workshop for Dogs. If you've never played with Playdough as a kid, then I am moved by your exodus that you endured from Siberia. For the rest of us, Playdough had that workshop that you could squeeze the Playdough through a template that would make all these different shapes of extruded dough, i.e. star, square, leprechaun. Anyways, this idea hit me right after I stepped in a big pile of dog shit. This is what happens when someone gives you the idea to look out for bird shit and your attention is diverted from the ground to the sky (thanks C). So, I thought that it would have been a more positive and entertaining incident if I had stepped into a pile of sausage-lengthed, star-shaped dog poo. How this invention would work is still a mystery to me, and it's going to stay that way. Anyways, I can't see a humane way to implement the device. Third Place: The old Union Pacific Station. A good haunted location. I almost got my ass kicked by a ghost there, once. Also, my other grandfather (not Vern) worked for the UP railroad, so it reminds me of him. I loved him and didn't get to see much of him before he died. So, I like to look at the old cars and locomotive engines and think about what life was like for grandad out working 16 hours a day in the railyard. It was there that I noticed some hobo and gang graffiti. Some of it was cool and some of it not so much (swastikas and other stupid racist shit). But one tag intrigued me above them all, it just said "Hobo Frankenstein". Who in the hell, or what rather, is Hobo Frankenstein? That name's the shit! I thought that my moniker was good, but I can't, and neither can any of you, top Hobo Frankenstein. So, my new life goal is not to do a film with Bollywood starlet Priyanka Chopra, but to meet Hobo Frankenstein. This day is not over. I still have time to hang out behind a Mexican restaurant, which is hilarious fun, highly recommended. Who knows? I just might bump into Hobo Frankenstein.
There was a young man named The Grunt. The young man had always wanted to have special powers, but nature seemed to give him the "short" end of the stick. Then one day a magical fairy came to visit The Grunt. "Who are you", the young man asked the strange being.The magical fairy replied, "I am Willowkins, the saucy merman. I'm full of spunk and magical wonder."Bewildered, The Grunt probed further, "What are you doing in my joss room, queermo?"Slightly offended at The Grunt's somewhat hateful tone, Willowkins replied with a little spice, "Fine, I was going to give you three wishes, but now you only get one, you meanie! Harrumph!!!"Becoming intrigued, The Grunt pondered the possibilities of having one wish coming true. Well, I could wish for invisibility. Then I could rob banks, haunt the White House, and watch naked girls shower. Nah, what about if I wished for world peace? Well, where's the fun in that? Uh-uh, I think that if I could have one wish I would want a super power. Yes, that's it!Willowkins waiting patiently asks, "So honey, what'll it be?" After a considerable pause, Willowkins bursts out with head shaking attitude, "I haven't got all day, hon. This girl's got to get her manicure on.""Alright, alright...don't flip your sea shells, missy. I got my wish all figured out.""Well?""Okay, do you know that one cartoon, 'Apache Chief'?""No, not really. Please explain for me, why don't you?"
The Grunt then excitedly explained, "Yeah, here's this guy, right? He's just this regular, loin cloth wearin' Indian dude, but when he calls out 'Inuk-Chuk' he grows to be like a hundred feet tall and shit!"Willowkins starts to giggle, "That's the stupidest thing that I've ever heard. Did your mother have any children that lived?""Yeah, um...no, what?" A little frustrated with Willowkins riddle, The Grunt continued, embarrassed, "Well, I was thinking that you could do the same thing for me...." The Grunt pauses, pointing down with nudging eyes, and says in a high whisper, "But, you know...for down there."Willowkins pursed his mouth, then gave The Grunt a sly wink, saying, "Ohhhh...It's not your length that matters hon; it's your amount of girth that'll move the earth. Don't you know that my little clam-bake cupcake, hmmn?"The Grunt, in no mood for games any longer, replied, "It's my choice, my wish. Give it to me, now: I say my magic word of choice, 'Shazam', and it makes that Six Million Dollar Man sound 'bananananah'. Then it just gets all huge 'n' stuff. Sweet dude, this is gonna be totally killer!"Willowkins thinks over details that factor in beyond the simple man's desires and decides that a quest is in order to teach the young man a lesson about getting what you asked for. "Okay beanie, I'll grant you this wish, but only if you complete a quest.""Yeah, sure. I'll do whatever to get on with the phallongulating." The Grunt then trailed off mumbling, lost in his fantasy world, "Oscar my boy, you seem a little frail today. Let me Excaliberize you, 'Shazam!!!' My, what big teeth you have..."Willowkins interrupted The Grunt's daydreaming, and continued, "Well, are you done? Can we continue? Good. The quest that you must go on is a perilous one. You must go to the desert, find the ancient petroglyphs and decipher them. They'll guide you in The Fiery Furnace, where you'll be tested."So, having all the necessary information that he needed, The Grunt then asked Willowkins, "Dude, can you like give me a lift to that place you just talked about?"Willowkins beamed, "Of course, you silly sausage. It's the pink Miata outside."Willowkins and The Grunt left the smelly joss room with it's billowy, incense fouled linens and hopped into the fabulous pink Miata with a Kylie Minogue mix tape playing the whole way down.When the twosome arrived in the sweltering desert, the enormity of the rock and sand scared Willowkins, who grabbed the nearest knee not of his own and excited The Grunt, just a little."Well, mister, this is where you get off." Willowkins' eyes grew moist with dewey drops of gay emotion, bit his lip, waved his hands in front of his chest, then added, "Come here you bitch" and gave The Grunt a makeover hug and kiss."Alright, oh, that's enough now...gotta get going. Don't put that there!" The Grunt said his goodbyes, turned to the west, and was off on a walkabout.
The ancient petroglyphs were not that far away. Willowkins had given The Grunt good directions and he arrived there in no time at all. One thing about The Grunt, he doesn't like to read, but he likes to look at pictures, so deciphering the petroglyphs was second nature to him.Hmmn, The Grunt thought to himself. If this is correct, there is a glory hole located within The Fiery Furnace. This is where I will be tested. But, it also says that El Diablo lurks within its maze. I'll have to watch out for that guy. Pressing forward, The Grunt saw a fissured mass of rocks in front of him: The Fiery Furnace.
It was there in The Fiery Furnace that The Grunt had to remember the directions from the petroglyphs. Turn right at the rock, go down to the funny looking rock, ten paces kitty corner, then up and over the next rock. Behold, the glory hole. 'Tis a beautiful and sensuous thing. Finding himself in a rather amorous mood, The Grunt did what came naturally to him and climbed up and mounted the glory hole.
At first, it was smooth sailing. They don't call it slickrock for nothing. The Grunt then remembered that the petroglyphs promised him his magic powers would be granted in The Fiery Furnace. It was how he used them there that would determine if he would be worthy enough to take them with him back home. It was then that The Grunt decided to try out his magic word and impress upon Mother Nature who's cock crows the loudest, "Shazam!!!" (bananananah). What happened next was terrible. "I'm Stuck. What the hell is that thing? Holy shit, it's...it's Oscar!"
Not knowing what to do, The Grunt tried furiously to do the prom date pull-out maneuver. No luck, he had become fused solid with the rock. His magnificent hammer had suffered a heavy dose of Phallis Petrifius and he would surely die if he could not get free. At a total loss of how to remove himself from this jam, The Grunt called out for Jesus. Nothing happened. Then, remembering something from a Simpson's episode, he called out, "Save me Jebus". Just then a mysterious dark figure appeared before him, or rather to the side of him, due to obvious hindrances. The Grunt frantically asked the dark stranger if he was Jebus. The dark stranger said, "El Diablo at your service, sir."The Grunt replied, "Close enough."El Diablo said, twisting his moustache, "So, what seems to be the pickle, if I may ask?"The Grunt broke down in a girlie sob, explained, "I got my pee pee caught in the sandstone whoo-ha, and now I can't get it out."El Diablo then worked through the scenario in his head and offered The Grunt a deal, "You know, I can help you get it out of there and back to normal size if you do one thing for me in return.""And I get to keep my special powers?""Yes, you get to keep your magic fun telescope.""Anything, please, I'll do anything.""Alright, here's the deal: you have to give me your soul in return for getting you out of there and retaining your power.""No deal, buster", The Grunt said defiantly."What, you no likey the deal? Come on man, it's just your puny soul I want. You get to keep Excalibur there, too."The Grunt thought about this long and hard, then longer, harder, and faster. Well, what good is an enormous wiener if the only thing it's good for is scaring people and breaking my back? What was it that Willowkins said? Oh yes, "It's not your length that matters hon; it's your amount of girth that'll move the earth." His fond memories of little Oscar came flooding back to him: the sandbox, underneath the bleachers, Rosie Palms and her five little sisters, Julia Childs. It was something that he took for granted. He had flown too close to the sun, and now his wings of wax could not melt any less ironically. I don't need a giant wangdoodle after all. I''m just fine the way I am. Thinking quickly, The Grunt came to a compromise with El Diablo: Have lunch with him and listen to boring stories from hell. The Grunt would be free, but lose his special power. He, however, would keep his soul.
The End?
I think your boss is looking at you right now. You better get back to work.
It's been one of those days. I got out a bowl to make toast. What the hell's wrong with me? I think having a picture in my mind of Janet Reno with a shlong has distracted me: thanks Crystal. I promise a story is in the works.
What's all this white stuff doing on my lawn?
My pants are falling down. My pants are falling down. Hi-ho the merry-o, My pants are falling down. The belt's moved in a notch. The belt's moved in a notch. Hey-ho all systems go, The belt's moved in a notch. Wearin' those old jeans again. Wearin those old jeans again. Oh the luck, I need to cluck, Wearin' those old jeans again.
It seems that Blogger won't let me in to some of your sites. Have you guys been posting naked pictures of old people? Anyways, I've picked up the "Tales of an Irresponsible Time Traveler" again. That's a notice for the three people who used to read it, and the one lady who gave me way too much information about herself in the comments section. If you're new to that one, you have to start reading from the earliest post, then work your way through to the top.
I'd like to talk about Butt Effin' Egypt, or more commonly known as the desert. Pictured at the top is a nifty man who paid me fifty bucks to play hide 'n' go seek. He said that the field glasses and rifle were only for show. That's me pictured below. Fortunately, I know of a lot of good hiding places and this really nice old couple gave me a ride home, with a stop at a local choke 'n' puke for frosty chocolate milkshakes. I never found out if that nice man ever had a clue where I was. Anyways, I thought that it'd be fun to do a list: a list of things to do in the desert. - Hide a dead body
- Shoot stuff with guns. It's kewl!
- Find a dead body
- Poke said corpse with a stick or fancy umbrella.
- Wear a trucker's cap without any irony involved.
- Recreate the battle of Gettysburg with jack rabbits.
- Watch yokels burn nerve gas incompetently.
- Fall in one of thousands of unmarked mine shafts.
- Fall in two mine shafts, if the first one is shallow.
- Let a body part (your choice) dangle in the wind.
- Fart, belch, pick your nose without any guilt or shame.
- If you have no shame, please put your pants on now.
- Blue staters can live out their wildest red state fantasies, say, by burning an effigy of a secretly despised liberal icon. I mean, will somebody please burn Barbara Streisand, anyone?
- Red staters can "act" out scenes from Brokeback Mountain, for research purposes of course.
- Lay right down in the sagebrush and ____________.
- Drink beer and leave the cans right where you finished them.
- Dump toxic waste: dorm room couch, paint, grandma.
- Do the American Idol version of finding the next David Koresh, Ted Kaczynski, or Timmy McVeigh.
- Do the most absurd thing possible: I like to disguise myself as Margaret Thatcher and fool the country folk into paying their poll tax, TV license, and after I get their money, I call them all poxy bastards. Wait a minute, this has nothing to do with #19.
- Get poked by a stick or a fancy umbrella.
Did I miss any? I'd sure like to hear any of your suggestions.
Why is it when ever I try to improve my diet and eat better it's free candy, donut, Mountain Dew day at work? Oh, and fifty people are having birthdays and there's cakes, muffins, eclairs, and old ladies on the street corners giving out Snickers bars, fresh baked cookies, and Jolly Ranchers: why? As I watched the premier of the Sopranos on Sunday, I noticed that I'm starting to look like Tony Jr., but with a full head of luscious hair. Dammit! So it's come down to this: eating better and exercise. It's no longer the days of being twenty one, skinny, with my nice rack of Fabio buds forming from all my bench pressing. All this is maintained while surviving on pizza and shooting up Jolt cola and freebasing pig fat. Now, my greatest fear is that if I don't nip things in the bud, I'll have to start wearing a "bro". There was a time were I could do full days, back to back, of skiing moguls and still be ready for whatevers. I'm a better skier than I was back then technically, but having to wipe the knee cap off your goggles can be a bit stomach churning. I think that the final straw for me was a restaurant serving some corned beef and cabbage, in honor of St. Patrick's Day. I had to get it. Yes, I willingly bought and ate corned beef and cabbage. You would not believe the shit I went through after consuming that poison, literally. Plus, that cabbage filled my belly with so much gas, it was like I was being prepped for a laparoscopy. Reminds me of a scene from Monty Python's The Meaning of Life, where they feature a Catholic family living somewhere in Yorkshire and they sing about how every sperm is sacred and something like this, "...because, God won't let me wear one of those little rubber things around my cock." Okay, not that part, but this one seemed apropos, (mum, doing the washing up has a baby, sans the usual labor pains and noises--baby plopping to the ground) "Will you get that, Deirdre?" Only if it were that easy. Damn pepto didn't do anything for me. Well, I think that I went a little off track there. Not my usual coherent rant. Anyways, I hope that today I can maintain.
This one should porbably be posted on my other blog, 120 db's, but what the hell. I've been listening to Lou Reed's album Transformer over and over this weekend. I played that song "Perfect day" this morning at least fifteen times. I'm trying to set the tone for the rest of the day and hopefully the rest of the week will follow. "You're gonna reap just what you sow."
This is a self portrait. It's a charcoal piece, with some chalk highlights in places. It is unfinished: Something about finishing it scared me, so I stopped. Pulling that face was my instructor's idea when she took my photo (to create more lines), of which was used as my reference. The eye on the right (my left eye) was almost shut and in the shade. That's why it is darkened out. The eye on the left (my right eye) is all you need to know about this piece. That is the part that I nailed. The rest I had a hard time getting right. I wouldn't be satisfied with the way this turned out, but that eye makes it work. You've also been treated to my real name. Now, all my mystique is gone. I feel like I'm looking into a mirror when I look at this piece. The mirror reflects all my rage back at me. This was my last work while I was at college. I got interested in psychology and never returned to this period. This is a good thing. Between psychology and various writing and literature classes, I picked up on new skills and gained specific knowledge that drives my passion for real story telling (not hoity-toity literary crap). I think my artistic talents are better suited for what will be my stories to come. P.S. I'm not a fan of pictures of myself, so this will probably be all you'll see of the elusive Grunt. Also, I'm not a mean guy. I promise.
This is a pastel that I did sometime ago. You'll need to click on the image to get the full detail of the work. Whitley Bay is East of Newcastle in Northern England. I love this place. I love the Geordies (although Geordies are really from Wallsend and Newcastle). This work was derived from a picture that I took. It's more of a mood piece, incorporating some skewed perspective. This is my favorite work of mine. It takes me directly to that place every time I look at it. Ironically, I'm a terrible painter.
Childhood: The start of a journey where everything goes right or wrong and determines the trajectory of the rest of your mortal life. This is how I feel sometimes. I mean, there was the time when I was four, hanging out with my brother and his friend, that my bro's friend decided to get rid of me by handing me a Hustler mag and told me to go show it to my mom. I did, but after looking through it perplexed, finding a layout of a woman that looked like my mother, then going to my mother and saying, "Mommy, this lady looks like you." I got my hide tanned after that (Yes, I got physically whooped by my parents--it was all the rage back then). Talk about the Freudian ramifications of that event, sheesh! Then there was this other time where my brother, fourteen at the time, stole my dad's Cadillac, and I was stupid enough to go along with him. My brother was the type of teenager that would babysit us kids loaded, throw grapefruits through cop's windshields, or if bored start fires. He's totally changed, since.
Continuing with our story, So here I am, four years old, and riding around with my 13 year old brother in a "stolen" Caddy (if you knew my dad then you'd know that if you took anything of his, even if you were family, you were a thief). So, my brother decides that driving through orange groves and doing donuts in vacant lots would be fun babysitting activities. It was fun, until we ran out of gas in a vacant lot, just off of Central Avenue in Phoenix.
My brother used his best judgment and left me in the car all by myself and then went home, got ripped, then forgot about me and the car. It wasn't until my mom came home and started wondering where the car was (my dad was on a business trip) that my brother remembered what had happened. No one wondered where I was. So, the bro runs back five hours later to the lot and finds me singing songs from the Muppet Movie to myself in the car. See, I was having a good time after all. Changing gears now, these experiences ultimately led to some serious problems in my life. First, I have no idea just exactly what that "incident" with the mag and the spanking did to me, but there's no way around that sucker--I'm sure it screwed me up some. Second, Fozzy the Bear still appears to me in times of crisis. Very troubling stuff here. However, fears can be overcome, somewhat. I have had phobias of fish for a long time and I can't figure out where this one started. I'd literally go into shit tizzies if I had to touch a fish. Now, I am an avid fisherman, who secretly hopes not to catch fish. It has been my way of confronting fear. I still throw shit tizzies when I have to touch fish; I just do it quietly, now. So, what about Sammy Davis Jr.? Back in the old neighborhood in Phoenix, there was a kid named Dougie. Dougie had an underdeveloped eye the size of a pea, but had a regular sized eye socket. He had a special glass eye to put in his socket. Dougie wanted friends. Dougie thought that I'd make a good friend. This is Dougie's way of making friends: chase you down and pin you, take out his glass eye and spread his eyelids out so you can see the "pea". He'd also rub the glass eye on your face, chase you around with it out, and other fun stuff. You'd think that this would be enough, but no, there's one more character to this story: Danny. Danny lost his eye in an accident and had to get a glass eye. Danny was in my first grade class. Danny liked to torment me with his glass eye. First of all, he never washed the damn thing, so it looked like he had greasy oatmeal caked on it. Plus, Danny liked to stick tissues on his eyeball. They'd just hang there...ewwwww! So, what were the consequences of being exposed to these guys and their glass eyes? Well, first off, I would sometimes work myself into a panic thinking that one of my eyeballs was going to fall out. I even used to feel like something would take over me, like the devil, and make me poke my eyes out. I know this sounds pretty silly, but we are talking about phobia here, and phobias are by definition irrational.
So here I am, a kid, watching something with Jerry Lewis on the TV, then who else joins him on stage but Sammy Davis Jr. It was at that point that I noticed that one eye didn't track with the other eye: it was just sitting there. I felt instant panic starting from my heart and throughout my spine. My whole body tensed up, and I ran away into my room, hiding in the closet. Then it's "Wakka wakka!", Fozzy Bear dancing and singing right in front of my eyes until the pain goes away. It's the same deal with that Sandy Duncan lady. Damn Wheat Thins commercials scared the shitola right out of me. I've had some suspicions on Forest Whitaker, but me thinks he's just deformed. So, how am I now? I got over the eyeball phobia when I was around twelve. It's scary how childhood trauma or even seemingly benign events can alter the personality. It shapes us, makes us who we are. We can go to therapy and try to desensitize, erase, and think rationally about our fears. I think that I've at least got the eyeball one under control. But one thing, just in case: I better be close to a "safe" closet if I happen to hear "I gotta be me" again. Wakka wakka!
I've got to give a shout out to my loyal blog mates. You guys have helped me a great deal in keeping this blog thing going and keeping the quality top notch. I would have been content to try this out for a while, say a few months, then just kept on writing little stories in my head.
The thing that has been great is the new crop of Grunt Ahoy readers. I love you guys, too. I just wish that you were able to catch legendary posts such as "Weasel Killer", "Ghost of Abraham Lincoln", "New Swear Word", "Duh Okay and the Case of the Fishy French fries", and "Cheeseball's Revenge" just to name several examples . This is classic Grunt Ahoy and I haven't quite made my way back to form, yet.
I've been going through a creative slump and decided to try out new things and I think that I'll keep it mixing in things like this from now on. I just want to make sure that you new readers check out my archive. Don't take my word for it; hopefully, some of my long time readers will list their all time Grunt Ahoy favorites in the comments section and you newbies can check them out. Also, it's time for the lurkers to surface, at least for this post: Grunt Ahoy role call y'all.
I got busted. Tonight, I went to one of my many favorite Mexican food restaurants and was confronted by the lady who owns the place. First, a little history for you. She knows my name and I've never told her it. When it's been a long time since I've been there, she asks me where I've been and why I don't come around more often. She always remembers what I ordered last and thinks that's what I'm going to order again; in fact, she even knows what I haven't tried on the menu. I know I'm a good tipper, but there's something more going on here. So, I go in there tonight right before closing time and she looks at me accusingly and says, "Oh, you haven't been here in a while." Followed with, "What have you been doing?" I just acknowledged her question with, "Yeah, it's been awhile...how are you?" She showed me to the table and looked at my brother and me with a boiling hurt saying in her thickening accent, "My sister says she saw you guys' truck down the street at El Burrito. What were you guys doing there, huh?" She stood there burning a hole with her eyes to sear the betrayal right into my soul. I really felt bad. I don't know why I should feel bad, but I did. It was like I had cheated on her. This is some screwed-up Woody Allen shit right here, I'll tell you. The only explanation I could offer this sweet lady was that I like their chili Colorado and that her restaurant doesn't serve it. Her reply, "How come you don't ask me? I can make you chili Colorado right here." The sad part of this is that the closest thing I got to a woman right now is this jealous old Mexican lady. Oh well, at least I'm well fed.
I know that I've been writing some heady and serious (for me) posts lately. But, I'm dead serious about this one. No, this is not another riff on the somnambulist theme. What happens is that I wake up every morning lately feeling as though someone's been punching me all over my body, especially the kidneys. I know that several, if not all of my readers have Fight Club as a favorite movie/book. What if...hmmmmn? I guess that if I start making soap then I should worry. Another theory that I have is that I am a superhero, but only on a subconscious level. I sleep then transform into Nocturnal Man. I help save people from succumbing to sleep apnea, crib death, or embarrassing wet dreams (cold pack to the crotch). The bruises come from bumping into things, because it's dark at night. The reality is that I'm probably falling out of bed again. I used to do this all the time as a kid and it would hardly ever wake me. I'd just climb back up unto the top bunk and continue sleeping, never remembering what had happened. If it weren't for my big brother witnessing it, then I would have never suspected anything. I even once fell from the top bunk and hit the back of my head on a chair on the way down. My brother said that I got up, rubbed the back of my head, circled around a few times moaning, then went back to bed. I bet you're all asking yourself, " why didn't his brother just give him the bottom bunk?" Sleeping under my brother's fat ass would have been more dangerous. There's only so much stress that bed could handle and I wasn't very keen on finding out that way. So that's my current situation. I'd like to hear from you, my readers, as to what you think is going on with me. I welcome all your zany theories.
