Fly fly away

I am so excited to fly home tomorrow and see my friends and family, I can barely contain myself. I've been feeling the home pangs pretty strong lately. My only regret is that it's almost the last time I could be spending with Nicole before she moves to New York. I wish she was joining me on my New England jaunt, but I guess you can't have everything...
this will probably be my last post until New Year's Eve. Happy happy!

Riding the Blamehorse

Nicole and I have been playing sneaky games of racquetball at a fancy tennis club in Madison, the Cherokee Country Club (we pretend we're members.) Yesterday, our gameplay was de-railed at the pinnacle of an intense match. Why? The Blamehorse.
You see, the night before, we had both been a bit, um, loopy. Our conversation was all over the place, but we remember this clearly-
We invented something called the Blamehorse, he was twice as big as a regular horse and wore a helmet and he was a member of a crew team, rowing in the regatta. We remember this vividly, as well as the fact that he was featured on a series of inspirational posters. "Blame-pass it on."
So we know everything about the Blamehorse except why in the world he was invented. It made us sit on the floor of the racquetball court for at least a half hour, trying to recall our psychedelic train of thought from the night before. I'm still bothered.

Nicole

A co-worker just e-mailed me these lyrics to an old song by the band Point Blank. I thought it would be very romantic to post the lyrics here.

I hear you're goin' through some changes
I hear your friends all turn their backs on you
And now you're hangin' round with strangers
Now just be careful who you're talkin' to

Oh Nicole, my sweet Nicole
Oh Nicole, sweet sweet Nicole

You started lookin' like a burn out
You're lookin' like you just stayed up all night
You're lookin' like you've been turned out
The way your actin' girl it just ain't right now

Oh Nicole, my sweet Nicole (2 x's)

You know you really drive me crazy
You upset me with your wicked little smile
You started lookin' kind of spaced out
You drive a man stark ravin' wild

Oh Nicole, my sweet Nicole
Oh Nicole, sweet sweet Nicole

Speeders Anonymous

Yesterday I had to go to Defensive Driver Training because my employer thinks it's bad that I got 4 speeding tickets this year. Can you believe they're trying to impose their uptight morals on my bohemian driving style? outrageous.
I've taken this course at least twice before because it is completely ineffective and I will never stop speeding. you hear that, fat cats? never!
yesterday's class was particularly amusing, kind of the Breakfast Club meets Anger Management. We were all there because our employers forced us to be. The motley crew consisted of 3 cabbies, 2 USDA workers, myself and an EMT. some highlights-

-the butch lesbian cabbie who couldn't stop bragging about road rage and streetracing motorcycles and getting 12 tickets in 2 weeks. the uptight soccer mom instructor was not amused by us egging her on.

-the lily-white instructor asking the one black guy if he had taken the class before because he looked familiar. "no ma'am we just all look alike."

-during lunch break, me and one of the cabbies were vying for the same lane and got all aggressive until he cut me off and squealed off in his El Dorado. when we came back after lunch, we did not make eye contact. clearly the class made a huge impact on our driving habits.

Beetle Bobble

It's been said I have a knack for coloring my stories. Would anyone believe me if I said that a ladybug has been doing drunken laps around the rim of my mug for two days straight?

Fish Fry

wisconsin is king of the friday night fish fry and I'll miss it sorely when I leave. beer, coleslaw, french fries, fish that's delish, slurp.
nicole and I are extreme connoisseurs of this local tradition, going to brightly lit churches and seedy saloons alike in our hunt for the best. Tonight we'll use a gift certificate from my secret santa to visit Sal's Friendly Tavern, supposedly the best fish fry in Portage. I wish nicole would hurry up and get here...

as a side note, I attended a minnesota fish boil once, the ugly cousin of its wisconsin counterpart. puke-a-rama.

Tommy Seebach!!!

Great Dane

Tommy Seebach, Danish pop star, crafted one of the most unintentionally hilarious spectacles known to man, and I am honored to share it with you here now (right-click and save it to your computer for best results):
rock!

Sunday morning I was kinda hungover and I watched the video at least five times. After awhile it started to take on new meaning, I started to understand the subtle nuances, the ebb and flow. I was very impressionable and at some point it took over my psyche, I kid you not. By nightfall I could do Tommy's special dance.
I like the video because it is so innocent, from a time and place where irony is irrelevant and the dance is eternal.

Here's an excerpt from one fan's eulogy to Tommy:
The last few years of his life was one long struggle to maintain his life as a musician, but the offers he got were only in small places like bars and clubs.In 2001 he collapsed with a heart attack caused by the alcohol abuse which started in 1993. After a long time in hospital, he got back on his feet again playing the music he loved, but the time as a cult figure was over. He didn’t get the recognition he deserved. The love and the joy for the music was still there, but the record companies no longer had faith in in him.Tommy Seebach probably ended his life as a very lonely and bitter man. But he will forever have a place in my heart, as a Eurovision fan.

Almost Famous

Let me take this opportunity to tell one of my stories about rubbing elbows with famous people without gaining residual glamour or cool.
Eldon Henson went to Emerson College the same year I did and lived down the hall from me. Everyone thought he was cool because he had been one of Disney's Mighty Ducks.
We were not friends but we got drunk a few times and watched old Kung Fu movies.
Eldon was tough, I think. He always told stories about how rough it was growing up in Southern California and how he had always had to fight for survival and how most of his friends were dead or in prison and how getting fucked up helped him to forget. Try as I might, I had no idea how to relate to him.
Now he has big roles in indy flicks like Manic and medium roles in Hollywood trash like The Butterfly Effect and O. Bastard.
I live in rural Wisconsin. Read my story on how the coroner's shower doesn't have any hot water. Then tell me whose life is more fulfilling. Seriously, tell me.

Eldon Henson.
Laugh away, friend I never had. Would it be so funny if you knew I was asked to be in The Butterfly Effect but I turned it down because that movie is the suckiest?

cheers and jeers

cheers to:
everybody from my company who battled with a bout of karaoke friday night- it was a virulent and dischordant strain but we put up one heck of a struggle. of particular note was my impassioned version of "Welcome to the Jungle," where I was joined onstage by a large rocker for a screeching falsetto duet "my serpentine, -tine, -tine!" also impressive (no bias here) was nicole's muy sexy performance of perennial favorite "Poison Ivy."
jeers to:
the crew of hoochies and beefheads who staged a public orgy onstage while my shy co-worker struggled through soft country ballads.
cheers to:
racquetball- it's all I want to play. honorable mention to the Lussier(?) Family YMCA in Madison.
jeers to:
campy movies. nicole and I watched Plan 9 from Outer Space last night. yes the special effects and dialogue and plot were so bad they could be good. but I realize I don't have the temperment to sit through a whole movie's worth of irony. I get antsy.

Ho Ho

I received my first Secret Santa gift today-
Sitting on my chair when I got in was a yellow manila envelope with J E S S E spelled in magazine letters. Inside was a a computer printout of a black and white photo of three little black boys hunched on a suitcase. It was folded and stapled like a card. On the inside was a silly rhyme about how it was the first day leading up to a very special day. There were also Reese's candy bars in the envelope, which are delicious.

I gave my first Secret Santa gift today-
My recipient (and I do not use that term lightly) is a mousy middle-aged woman in the sales department who I have never noticed before this nutty game. Her questionaire, designed to help me pick out gifts, said she liked "looking at guys butts," "guys abs," "anything chocolate," and "eating lunch."
Cleverly using one of her clues on music preferences, while taking note of her interest in the male abdomen, I sent the lady an e-card of country star Kenny Chesney displaying his abdomen.
It was a free gift and I knew she would titter about it with her dim-witted ladyfriends while they eat breadless sandwiches and talk about stretch marks (I assume.)
Um, also...I think that statements like that should probably disqualify me from further involvement in office games.