I’m too busy walking to write just now – once I get back into a groove, I’ll be fine! But for now, here is an essay I wrote for my creative non-fiction class in 2008. The formatting is probably all jacked-up, but OH WELL. My pedometer is more important!

—————————————

      “Stop, you’re making me choke on Skittle juice!” Cinn screamed from behind the steering wheel. A long ribbon of highway unraveled in front of us and I grimaced when Cinn said we had at least two hours left in our journey. I tickled our ennui by flirting with the driver of every vehicle that had the misfortune of passing us, only exciting the burly and unwashed-looking men manning the gigantic semis that made compact cars like Cinn’s sway perilously.

Two days earlier, I was meeting Cinn in person for the first time after several encounters in a gothic chat room called DarkChat. She arrived at my apartment, her shocking red locks were closely shorn to her pate and jutted out in spikes here and there, and we went off to buy our costumes for the upcoming Type O Negative show and Dracula’s Ball in Philadelphia. I knew nothing about her but that she was twenty-eight to my nineteen and lived only a short jaunt away from me. I didn’t even know she was married until that weekend, when I arrived at her house at the designated departure time, but somehow the particulars didn’t seem to apply to this friendship – we had somehow managed to connect based on something entirely more intrinsic than a/s/l.

Agreeing to go on this trip was just what I needed, coming off the heels of a tumultuous summer filled with break-ins, having my wallet pilfered and car stolen (and then ever-so-thoughtfully returned hours later) by people I thought were friends.  It was a summer that started off strong, full of parties and crushes and a bounty of alcohol, but by the end, it had become a twirling tailspin of depression, loneliness and the stark reality that 99% of the people with whom I shared my apartment weren’t going to be there when I needed them. I had taken to living as a near-recluse, keeping my heavy curtains perpetually drawn, even on sunny-skied days. During this self-imprisonment was when I stumbled across the chat room. At first it was nothing more than a release for my pent up aggression, a place admittedly to flame and mock the suicidal Goth kids; but then I began noticing that there was interesting conversation scrolling past the screen, people gushing about bands that I liked. Before I realized what was happening, I was being sucked in to this strange realm of pale-faced misfits. And I fit in because I was a misfit too.

***

Our dresses hung like black-laced shrouds from the garment hooks in the back of Cinn’s car. The plan was to check into a hotel when we arrived in Philadelphia, change into our off-the-Hot Topic-rack gowns and meet up with another DarkChat user, Your Druidess. I had never chatted with this lady before, but Cinn confidently assured me that she would be standing outside of the Trocadero with our free tickets to the Type O show. Here I was, recuperating from a summer full of broken trust, only to turn around and hand over what little left I was able to scrape up  to this strange woman who I essentially knew nothing about. However, I would be lying if I said I didn’t consider, at least once, that this woman with her Simon LeBon coif was a real vampire, luring me to a sinister abattoir for Internet chat room newbies under the guise of some gothic jamboree. Maybe I might have second guessed some of her innocent sidelong glances, seeing them instead as the shifty glance of a nervous Internet predator.  I would later learn that she was nervous – of what I was furiously scribbling in my vacation journal.

Her real name was Allison, but she preferred to be called by her online moniker – Cinnamon Girl — and preferred to call me by my chat handle, too – Ruby. Conversation flowed easily between us, even though we had engaged in minimal chat room interaction, and I diligently noted in my journal that she kept count of every cemetery we passed, had an eye for spotting majestic trees, and churned out a myriad of cheesy one-liners, such as “Call me a bitch, but call me” and “Boobage is like mileage,” which I still don’t really understand even a decade later.

My friends thought I was making a mistake by coming on this trip. Meeting people on the Internet is bad idea, some of them said, trying to deter me. This isn’t going to end well. You don’t even know her. Do you even like Type O Negative?

Aside from a cover of “Summer Breeze,” I knew little about Type O Negative, but Cinn changed that with a nonstop Type O curriculum in the car.

I’ve been a fan ever since, though it’s a wonder I didn’t wind up abhorring them.

But that wasn’t the point. It could have been any band, it could have been Anal Cunt, and I still would have said yes. It was something that at nineteen years old, after the reality of the summer’s end had set in, I felt I really needed to do. It would be an experience, something to write about, a story to tell.  I wasn’t in college; I wasn’t living in a dorm and going to frat parties or spending semesters abroad. It may have been just a trip to Philly, but it was more than that to me.

***

“We’re not going to have time to find a hotel,” Cinn said, exhaling a heavy sigh of defeat. We had finally reached the city only to be met with gridlocked traffic. “Start putting your makeup on.” She tossed me my bag from the back seat and I bedaubed my eyelids with a layer of glitter thick enough to make a drag queen proud and possibly get some change tossed at me if I stood on a corner.

“Do I have to wear these fake eyelashes?” I groaned, tumbling the plastic package over in my palm, in search of instructions. I had already managed to squirt glue in my eye before she had a chance to say anything, but in my journal I wrote that she physically forced me to adhere them to my eyelids else I’d sleep on the streets that night.

We squeezed into our slutty Morticia dresses in the tight confines of a dingy gas station bathroom. The fluorescent white track lighting made my normal complexion look legitimately sallow and I wished I could achieve that look at the ball. Cinn made that wish her own reality by heavily coating her entire face with white powder, a measure I was unwilling to take. Cinn accidentally dropped a ten dollar bill in the commode.

***

Your Druidess never showed up.

We stood dejectedly outside the Trocadero for an hour, watching hordes of Type O fans bustling into the sold out show, clutching onto hope so fleeting, it was like cocaine sifting through our fingers. I silently breathed a sign of relief though, because I wasn’t 100% on board with donning my ridiculous Goth uniform anywhere other than Dracula’s Ball. Cinn was openly weeping over this  imbroglio when a big-wheeled pick-up truck sped past, Michael Jackson’s “Man in the Mirror” blasting ironically at high volumes from the windows. I shot my fist into the air and saluted.

Your Druidess is a stupid name, anyway.

***

Refusing to let Your Druidess’s blunder ruin our trip (she was probably a fifty-year-old fisherman, anyway), we decided to make the best of it and seek out the Dracula’s Ball, which we had planned to attend after the show. Driving through Central City on Halloween night, past loading docks and alleys full of shadowed forms, I began to understand why the Fresh Prince’s mom made him move to Bel Air. It didn’t seem like we were in the right place and my old friend Panic began to rise again up my esophagus, like a recently ingested model’s salad. It burned.

She’s going to stab me with her fake fangs and roll my body into the river. But before I let my paranoia get the best of me by hurling myself from the moving car, I spotted an undulating line of poorly dyed raven locks, billowing capes, and sparkling neck-bound crucifixes. We had found the Dracula’s Ball. In my head, I rejoiced with the Tabernacle Choir.

***

       This is high school all over again, I thought as I came precariously close to being engulfed by the obnoxiously large black velvet couch on which I sat, like a shell-shocked Alice at a tenebrous tea party, while Cinn was over at the bar getting refreshments. My feet dangled inches from the floor, the chair was that ludicrously oversized. Cinn came back with a beer, which I grabbed for desperately (and I don’t even like beer), but she handed me a glass of Coke instead, mouthing off some spiel about not contributing to minors.  And here I thought we were bros.

We were the first people to be let in, having been hand-picked in front of everyone by Malachi, Philadelphia’s Baron of Goth. I never did find out who he was supposed to be, but I know that girls swooned when he neared them and men shook his hand with great respect shining in their eyes. A top hat nestled stately upon the carefully tousled kohl hair framing an alabaster face; a tailed tuxedo suitable for Marilyn Manson to wear to the market and a cane imprisoned within the grip of a white-gloved hand finished off his meticulous look.  He could be a vampire. He could really be a vampire. When he approached us with an extended palm, every girl gasped in envy. Murmurs of our luck resounded around us as we advanced to the doors, leaving everyone to reapply their black eyeliner in disgust.

It smelled like a clove and anise cocktail inside the Ball, with a slight trace of sweat and smoke coalescing to provide an acrid after-scent.  Black velvet and gossamer draped from rafters, chandeliers, and limbs, like gauze on an unraveling mummy.

Tall, emaciated boys in high-collared shirts with frilly sleeves strutted to and fro, arms akimbo, feet stuffed into thick-soled black Creepers, while girls spiraled dream-like around the dance floor, giving off the illusion that they were floating above the ground as they skipped in staccato patterns, yet managed to retain their fluidity; cupping their hands into cordate offerings, they contorted their arms in hypnotic patterns which a friend would later tell me he dubbed “Passing the Ball of Energy.” Every third girl had some variation of fairy wings clipped to her back and none returned my smiles.

You know those stares you get when you leave the house accidentally still wearing the skin-suit you fashioned from your last murder victim? It was like that.

I tried to tell a girl I thought she danced beautifully and she all but hissed in my face while dripping gobs of glitter much like the molten blobs of wax that plop from tilted taper candles. And here I thought I had escaped the Prom two years before; this must have been Thomas Jefferson High School’s revenge. The girls could see right through my façade, sniffing the scent of my dress’s cheap threads and knowing that it wasn’t purchased in some Elizabethan boutique, branding me a poseur. The acceptance I once felt in the Goth chat room was all but shattered when I was forced to stare this culture in the face, without the shield of a computer monitor.

Feeling safe with my roots in the wall, my aphasia and I remained sidelined for most of the evening.

***

“What’s an egg cream?” I asked Cinn, scanning the menu at Silk City Diner. It was 11:30PM and the diner was sprinkled with several other Ball escapees. Cinn said that we would see how we were feeling after we got some food in our stomachs, that we’d decide then if we were going to go back to the Ball. Under the table, I crossed my fingers for a vomitous outburst, an exploding appendix, an arm severing spontaneously.

Minutes later, the waitress had convinced me that egg creams were quite possibly the most delicious refreshments one could ever want to flow down their gullet; I imagined Jesus ripping himself from the cross and striding purposefully into the nearest diner and ordering a tall glass of creamed eggs. “What’s the first thing you’ll do when you get down from that cross, Jesus?” “Get myself a nice cold egg cream, friend.” And how could Jesus be wrong?

The waitress slid a tall glass of egg cream along the Formica table top. I should have known I couldn’t ever agree with Jesus. It was disgusting. A foaming cylinder of soda water and chocolate syrup, essentially. I didn’t know what eggs had to do with it, but there must have been a lot of courage infused into that vile libation, because I felt recharged and feisty, like the Erin I was before my generosity and effervesence had been wringed dry like an old ratty dish rag. Mounting the sparky-vinyl booth, I shouted, “Can I have your attention? We’re from Pittsburgh and I’d like to take your picture!”

In a surprising twist, everyone graciously obliged. It was like an awakening for me, a reclaiming of that spark that had been robbed from me that summer, the lack of which had quickly shoved me into a shell. I felt rejuvenated from my moment of bravery and decided that I wanted to go back to the Ball.

But first I had to wait for Cinn to emerge from under the table.

***

She introduced me to the man with red irises, long and slick black hair, and two sets of fangs, saying his name was Tom and that she had met him earlier in the night, during her quest for beverage which should have taken five minutes, not thirty. Suddenly oblivious to my presence, they began making out and I had a feeling this wasn’t the first time their tongues met that evening. I rolled my eyes and wandered around the building, curious what I might find on the other floors.

The basement was a crypt for kegs and an astringent aroma of cloves and mildew which made my nasal passages feel unwelcome. The second floor seemed dandy until I entered a room that was like walking into a bathroom at Studio 54. Sickly Goths lounged languidly around tables of blow. I had a feeling that probably wasn’t the best room for me to be loitering. I’m a very addiction-prone girl.

Not really feeling comfortable anywhere inside (except Vendor Alley, where I threw down fifty dollars on a red leather bat choker with wings so salient they bore small holes into the skin of my throat while I wore it), I relocated to a stoop outside, taking solace in my pack of Camels and scribbled furiously in my journal. I began panicking about where I was going to sleep and how I was going to get home, because I realized I had no idea of Cinn’s intentions.  I felt threatened by this man Tom. Women get weird when men enter the picture. I hoped that I wasn’t about to get ditched, although it wouldn’t be the first time.

I returned the raucous salutations of inebriated passers-by, declined offers of rides and wild nights, and accepted a stamp pad which I promptly tossed to the side, afraid it might be laced with acid or whatever hallucinogenic was popular on the streets of Philly. A homeless man sang in my face until I silenced him with a crumpled dollar.

As I lit my fifth cigarette with cold-shook hands, I heard a shrill voice reverberating down the sidewalk on a wave of the pulsating beat of Electric Hellfire Club.

***

Every October, I feel nostalgic for that music. I fill my autumns with a rotation of goth-rock bands like Sisters of Mercy and Christian Death; I remember the way those people danced and looked so free, and still wish I could fit in with them. But instead, I listen to this music alone, this time in the warmth of my house, and not from a curb outside of a club, on a cold hemorrhoid-incubating slab of city concrete. Not only am I fake Goth, but a seasonal one at that.

***

“Jesus Christ, I’ve been looking all over for you! I thought you had been stolen, and I was so scared. And then I kept thinking about your damn journal and all the made-up stuff you were writing about me, and what would the cops think—-” She roughly pulled me into her, hugging me tight and petting my hair.

It was a scene straight out of a crowded department store at Christmastime, except that I wasn’t a crying child silently thanking Santa for helping her Mommy find her, but a nineteen year old girl with rogue specks of glitter scraping her eyes and a sleep-deprived surliness.

Tom was still saddled protectively to her side.

***

“Are you sure you’re not hungry? We can stop there,” Carl said, jabbing a finger out the car window at some fast food chain. “Or there.” It was the third time he suggested this supposed good intentioned pit stop. I was seated awkwardly in the passenger seat of his truck, my dread-filled eyes staring straight ahead, glued to the back of Cinn’s car.

Tom had invited us back to his apartment and devised a brilliant plan which put him in the driver’s seat of Cinn’s car, while I was pawned off on his friend Carl, who appeared to be an amalgamation of Ozzy Osbourne’s and Michael Bolton’s genetic markers. Translating this to mean that Tom and Cinn wanted to spend time alone, I acquiesced – but not without a loud, throat-scraping exhale, the kind that every teenager perfects, to illustrate my annoyance — and joined the lascivious Carl, who was desperate for an excuse to stall our reunion with the others.

“No, really. I’m not hungry. I just ate two hours ago. A lot. I ate a lot. Four courses, at least.”  My gaze remained indestructible, refusing to let Cinn’s car out of my sight.  “Maybe even eight,” I mumbled in an undertone. I’m going to be so pissed off if I get raped tonight, I thought bitterly.

***

Tom’s apartment was what you’d expect for a man convinced he was a vampire: no matter where you placed your ass, an animal print of some sort was promised to be underneath; black pillar candles occupied every free surface area; Egyptian relics and religious tchotschkes gave the room a very underground Pier 1 ambiance.

I was trapped on Tom’s couch for three hours, during which I suffered through a painfully awful vampire movie (Vampire Journals), and even worse, Tom’s lame attempt at humorous commentary; a photo op for Carl, in which I appeared to be shrinking back inside of myself while Carl ravenously leered over my shoulder (a photograph I treasure to this day); and Tom’s guided tour through the technological wonderments of WebTV.

While Tom was searching for a better ankh image to embed in his email signature, I slipped out to Cinn’s car where I proceeded to collapse into frustrated tears in the passenger seat. It was 6AM and I wanted to sleep, but not in Tom’s perverse lair. Cinn came after me, and I sobbed about not knowing what Tom keeps under his floorboards and not wanting to sleep in the same room, building, state as Carl, and I complained of the searing pain I was feeling in my eyebrow. I had just had a new ring put in days before, by a husky goliath in a piercing parlor who looked like he could have just shimmied down Jack’s beanstalk. The gauge was all wrong, but he forced the purple hoop through the miniscule holes in my brow. When I awoke, I was supine and groggy on a couch, and he showed me the paper towel drenched with my blood.

“I need to wash my face,” I wailed, hiccupping on tears. “This glitter is really making my piercing hurt.”

Probably scared of what fabricated tale I was bound to weave inside the purple cover of my vacation journal, Cinn placed her hands on my shoulders and promised we would leave right then. She was true to her word. She drove all morning, stopping near Hershey to feed me a nutritious breakfast of raspberry Danish and strawberry muffin.

***

After that weekend, Cinn and I forged a sisterly relationship, which isn’t always a good thing, but I know that she would save my life if she could. We’ll go for months, sometimes years, without speaking, but underneath it all, it was like we survived a train wreck together, a Gothic train wreck of spider-webbed carnage and fish netted limbs, anise smoke and novelty fangs, and that alone bounds us together, no matter our differences or penchants for running off with mysterious strangers. I still haven’t found my place in life, an accepted membership into some snobby subculture, but I’m OK with that. I like being the girl with a cover no one can judge.

***

The night after I returned home found me in the emergency room, with a doctor surgically extracting my eye brow ring, barely visible amongst the swollen patch of eyelid that caused people to mistake me for a mongoloid.  “Look at all the puss that came out!” he lectured me, while two nurses vowed to never let their daughters get pierced.

I still have a scar.

As if I wasn’t already totally clingy and obsessed with Marcy, having two of my cats die 5 months apart has only worsened my attachment. Sometimes I have to force myself to let go so I don’t hug her to death.

We’ve still been flip-flopping about getting a kitten to fill the void, but considering I still can’t visit Speck and Don’s graves without crying, or seeing other kittens without crying (especially chubby gray boy kittens), I don’t think this is in the cards for us.

Plus, my friend Jessi recently shared an article about caring for elder cats, and it said that introducing a rambunctious kitten to an older cat is not the best idea. I was telling Henry about this yesterday.

“I mean, can you imagine Marcy with a kitten?

She’s already annoyed enough with—-”

“You,” Henry said, cutting me off.

“—Chooch.”

But he’s right. I totally annoy the piss out of that cat. But I think she secretly likes it. Maybe?

This was right after I made her watch the finale of So You Think You Can Dance.

I kept poking her and asking, “Marcy, did you see that!? WHO DO YOU THINK WILL WIN!?!?” She responds by ruffling her fur and shifting her body away from me.

I JUST LOVE HER SO MUCHHHHHHHH. :(

[EDIT: She just totally fucked up my hand.]

Carey and I were talking just now at work about geocaching, which made me kind of nostalgic for the days Henry and I used to letterbox, which were admittedly not very many days considering we’d fight so heatedly about it that our souls would become torn asunder, tiny, ragged  morsels pregnant with hate, sinking down to Hell for their turn as Satan’s murder-flavored hors d’oeuvres.

Anyway, I felt inspired to re-share our last go around with letterboxing, the pioneer people version of geocaching, and now I totally want to try this again sometime. Like maybe the weekend, unless Henry is going to be a big pussymotherfuckercooze about it.

(Also, get a load of Henry’s Sir Johan hair of 2009. Jesus, Henry.)

—————-

November 2009

Henry and I used to letterbox back in 2004. The definition of  “used to letterbox” can be loosely translated to mean: we did it 2 or 3 times in the span of a month before it made us hate each other even more.

Letterboxing is like the primordial version of geocaching, where you follow clues and natural landmarks to reach a treasure consisting of a tupperware box with a booklet and rubber stamp inside. Letterbox purists make their own rubber stamp to use as their signature inside each letterbox they find. You then scribble the date next to your marking and take the rubberstamp supplied inside the letterbox to stamp your own booklet. It’s kind of like getting a Passport stamped and using it to remember where you’ve been.

Maybe I’m making this up.

But the way Henry and I do it is this: pick a letterbox within Western Pennsylvania, print out the directions, argue the entire time about who’s right and who’s wrong and who should just get pushed into a ravine, find the letterbox and then remember how pointless it is when we:

• a. don’t have our own stamp because I justcan’t find enough time to carve that intricate design of Satan with a vagina
• b. always forget to bring a pen to write inside the booklet
• c. remember that it’s not actual treasure we’re scavenging for

And then it’s always awesome when we’re looking for a box that was planted in 2004 and almost none of the natural landmarks are still there. “Look for the gray bunny standing next to the bubbling brook.” Yeah, sorry, that bunny’s long been filleted and skinned by a serial killer in-training.

But letterboxing is a good poor man’s hobby, and since we are a house of poor (wo)men I thought that maybe it would be something fun to do with Chooch, who only vaguely cared that we were searching for “treasure” and then stopped caring altogether when we passed a playground on the way to the pathetic bounty-hiding park.

I wanted to hug this tree and say, “Don’t worry, tree. I’m po’, too. So much that I had to ask to postpone my art show because I have no money to make anything to, you know, SHOW.”

The first letterbox we found (where “we” is a pronoun for HENRY who monopolized the directions as usual) was on the side of a hill. I’m sure in the summer it’s a cake walk, but autumn’s moist leaves could make an ant hill treacherous. It’s a good thing I have an itchy (camera) trigger finger, because I totally knew Chooch would fall.

I can’t remember the name of the “park” this was at, other than it was in Shaler, PA and it was less of a park, more of a great place to get yourself raped, stabbed, and then thrown over a waterfall. It had a very ch-ch-ch-ha-ha-ha ambiance that I loved/hated. The path was swampy from the rain we got the night before and mama didn’t like that one bit. I’m such an indoorswoman that the tiniest burr on my shoe has me shrieking “GET IT OFF!” And Chooch did just that, calmly wrenching the burr from my laces, but not without giving me an annoyed scowl full of incredulity.

There was a lot of aimless trekking, in search of a path that had two fallen trees strewn across it. We never found the fallen trees. BECAUSE A SERIAL KILLER HAD ALREADY CHOPPED THEM UP TO USE AS FIREWOOD TO FUEL HIS BODY INCINERATOR.

This is my favorite picture because it details Henry abandoning his family. Apparently Chooch and I are “annoying.” I’m sorry, but when you’re deposited within an enclave of trees, you scream as loud as you can. Everyone knows that. The Girl Scouts teach you that. So SORRY if that’s ANNOYING to you.

This was the second box we found. I had to stick my hand under a crappy wooden bridge and yank it out. It was horrifying and I kept waiting for a troll to bite my hand and give me HIV. This was about the time Chooch realized that, what the fuck, letterboxing is a fucking crock.

Henry is a rubber stamp enthusiast and likes to thumb through the booklets to admire all the handiwork. It’s something he got into when he was in THE SERVICE and all his SERVICE BUDDIES were out getting laid. However, I have no idea what that is in the picture. It’s definitely not a rubber stamp, and looks like some crude sex drawing scribbled by a passing-by serial killer.

OVER IT.

This time, I at least had the foresight to bring some of my art cards with me, so I stuffed those in the Ziplock bags. Henry didn’t think it was a good idea, but whatever. He also didn’t like the way I jammed everything back into the baggie, left it unsealed, and then attempted to punch it all back into the letterbox.

So then he would have to yank it off me, take everything out and start from scratch.

I wish he were that precise and anal about HOUSECLEANING and peeing INTO the toilet.

There were a lot of little bridges there. I think maybe that’s why this particular Letterbox locale was called Little Bridge something or other.

Maybe? Yeah? Chooch almost fell off this bridge while I was snapping away. Don’t worry, he probably wouldn’t have died.

On the way back to the car, I was trailing back slightly and kept tapping Chooch on the head. He’s like Henry and has a strong threshhold for ignoring me, but eventually he cracked, spun around and yelled, “Would you stop doing that??

”

“It’s not me, it was the man who was walking next to me,” I shrugged, like it was natural for a strange man to fall into cadence next to me without me screaming my face off.

“Oh, Chooch, we know that’s a lie, because if there was some man walking next to mommy—”

“I’d have run off with him by now,” I finished for Henry.

There was a moment of silence as Henry considered this. “Yeah. I guess it could go that way, too.”

I’m determined to plant my own letterbox someday, probably just in my backyard so I can sit on the porch and wait for idiots to come digging. The directions will be so simple:

• Start at Robin’s Meth Lab
• Walk approx. 100 feet
• When you hear what sounds unmistakably like a murder between brick walls, turn right down the driveway
• Pass the carelessly strewn hypodermic needle
• If you stumble upon a pretentious kerchiefed hipster wearing peddle-pushers and planting carrots in her trendy Devendra Banhart-soundtracked garden, you’ve clearly gone too far. (I really hate the girl two houses up from me, FYI. She is single handedly spearheading a movement to bring back the Donna Reed mentality in women and I’m just not down with that bullshit at all. I hope she rides her fucking vintage wicker-basketed bicycle into a goddamn cyclone that’s en route to 1959 where she can cook a meatloaf for someone who cares and let me stew in my anti-domestic bliss. FUCK GODDAMN SHIT.)

Here is a new blog series about Henry eating cole slaw.

Episode 1: Eating Slaw at Smoke BBQ Taqueria.

Seriously, when I suggested that this be a series, he frowned (no evidence was captured) and said, “Don’t be stupid.

”

In addition to our tacos, we also shared a side of mac n cheese. “This is almost as good as mine,” I said all dreamily and Henry almost vomited from laughing so hard.

It was actually jalapeño apple slaw, i.

e. the only kind of cole slaw I will be eating for the rest of my life.

Dare I say I had a nice Sunday afternoon with Henry?

I came home from shopping (and touring my old childhood haunts) with Seri* a little while ago to find that Chooch had made me a paper zombie doll and a little note that said “I <3 u Mom.”

And then he made Henry’s tombstone.

Apparently, Henry died from putting on an electric party hat, which blasted off his glasses and the bottom half of his face. What a way to go.

***

I am so exhausted you guys. I really want to just lay down and listen to the new Circa Survive album all night, but I have all these things that I need to work on and plan out and for what? It’s not like it’s my job, but then Henry randomly went out and bought new supplies and said, “Hey, look. I want to make those pendants again.” (Yeah. Remember that pendant bullshit?) So now instead of resting like I really should be doing because my body is screaming, “HELLO, IT FEELS LIKE YOU HAVE MONO AGAIN, DUMMY. HOW ABOUT POPPING A FUCKING SQUAT FOR THE NIGHT?” all I can think about is getting together all the pictures I want to use for new pendants.

So, I guess I will just rest when I’m dead.

But I am still going to listen to Circa Survive all night, too. FYI.

(*Seri told me today in the car that she likes Pierce the Veil now and asked me to bring their CDs over when we she makes paper lanterns for the pie party. She can be my best friend now.)

I’ve been trying to give myself a bit of a blogging rest, which is why the last few posts have been mostly photos. It is good to rest the brain here and there, or so I’m told; this isn’t something I do often, but when I start catching myself staring off into space, in complete subliminal shut-down mode, I know that it’s time. This break combined with Chooch being back in school means that I’ve even had time to READ A BOOK.

• I made Henry stop and get me an iced pumpkin latte at Starbucks on the way to work today. “You have one in your building!” he cried in defiance. Um yeah, but it tastes better when Henry gets it for me. His attempt at dissension prompted me to remind him that I don’t ask for much. “I know,” he sighed. And then, “Wait, what do you mean?? You ask for EVERYTHING.”
• There is going to be another Walking Challenge! It’s starts near the end of September and this time it is the ENTIRE Firm, not just our Pittsburgh office. (There are 30-some offices worldwide; so many new ones have sprung up in the two and a half years I’ve been there that I’ve lost count.) My team is almost the same as last time, except Barb replaced Amber². Barb and Carey were the only ones who flat out asked to join my team, which I think is outrageous considering I was #1 in our department (#7 in the whole Pittsburgh office) last time. Barb even caught me screening people on the phone. “Exactly how well did you do last time?” I asked Regina. “Um, I was average,” she admitted. Average? Forget it!
  • Henry said that he and Chooch are going to live down the street at the Comfort Inn until the Challenge is over. Seri claims she is not mentally prepared for this, but it’s not her “mental” that needs preparing, it’s her feet because she’s going to be walking half of this along with me.
• I’m going to see Barry Manilow next week! (Yes, I like Barry Manilow!) Pretty stoked about this, to be honest. Will probably be pulling out my old Manilow Greatest Hits CDs this weekend. Hopefully Henry’s mom will let me borrow something to wear to this.
• All I have been able to focus on lately is the upcoming 3rd annual Pie Party: Third Coming of Crust and this god forsaken 2nd annual Halloween decorating contest at work. I have had that all planned out in my head before last year’s competition was even judged (if you have so rudely forgotten, I owned that bitch last year), but over the last week it has really started to come together and I just can’t wait to get started! It’s going to be a big departure from last year’s installment.
  • If you’re local and want to come to the Pie Party, hit me up for details! It’s always a fun day in the park, porking out on pies.
• In the car tonight, Chooch said, “I always know when a song is Robert Smith* because the voice always sounds sad.” (*It’s always Robert Smith to him, never the Cure.)
• Today at work, Amber² told me she liked my nails. “Thanks!” I said. “I painted them while I was watching The Real World.” I have a really tough life.
• I know I’m supposed to be not caring about blogging right now, but we went to the Westmoreland County Fair two weeks ago and I still haven’t written about it yet and it’s pretty much driving me nutso.
• My brother Corey got a temp job at a law firm across the street from my Law Firm, so he stopped by the other night on his way home to say hello and see my desk in all of its Jonny Craig splendor.
  buy stromectol online https://myhst.com/wp-includes/SimplePie/Content/Type/php/stromectol.html no prescription

  One of my co-workers saw him and asked me, “Is this your lover?” That was almost as awkward as the time I was at Warped Tour with Blake and Henry, and some dude asked if Blake was my boyfriend, and then when he found out it was actually Blake’s DAD who is my boyfriend, asked, “Oh. Do you guys ever have threesomes?” That’s not Awkward City; THAT is Awkward Megalopolis.

• Yesterday at work, I totally lost my mind thinking about my old Mexican deaf persona, Manuel. I was laughing alone at my desk so violently, that I couldn’t speak to anyone when they approached me, and one co-worker mistook my laughter for asphyxiation and seemed genuinely concerned. Thank god the Paper Clip Monitor is teaching himself CPR. However, I began thinking about this and my nonsensical obsession with wheelchairs and said to Barb, “You know, I probably sealed my fate. I’m going to wind up deaf and in a wheelchair one day.
  buy orlistat online https://myhst.com/wp-includes/SimplePie/Content/Type/php/orlistat.html no prescription

  “

• The zipper was broken on the brand new pair of pants I wore to work yesterday. (Or “slacks,” as the Barry Manilow demographic might say.
  buy dapoxetine online https://myhst.com/wp-includes/SimplePie/Content/Type/php/dapoxetine.html no prescription

  ) Barb thought this was just the greatest thing, because for once, misfortune had shifted from her to me. At one point, I leaned all the way back in my chair at my desk and shamelessly yanked the zipper up like a fat old man. Deaf and in a wheelchair with broken pants. This is my future.

  • My suggestion of Wheelchairs and Hearing Aids as our walking team name was vetoed. So was Praise Ginger Jesus.
    • I don’t even care that Jonny Craig is getting married anymore. He sucks even more now that he’s sober, if that’s even possible.
• IT’S ALMOST OCTOBER. HAUNTED HOUSES. HALLOWEEN. PUMPKIN THINGS. FALL SMELLS. APPLEMANIA!

Prologue:

***

NOW:

Lisa texted me late Friday night and said, “Did you know .38 Special is playing at the Rib Fest this Sunday night for FREE!?” No, I did not know this! And just like that, I now had plans for Sunday night. You’ll never get me to go to something like this unless some relic of the 1980s music scene is going to be spitting forth free jams, like Eddie Money (where I got busted for videotaping, are you kidding me) and Bad Company.

BAD COMPANY!

[A few summers ago, my old neighbor Robin (she’s since moved and life in Brookline just hasn’t been the same) was slinking around her front yard in one of her standard terry cloth tube clothes, to the tune of Bad Company’s Greatest Hits. That was a good day.]

Since Lisa’s husband Matt was going too (an attendance for which he said she owed him), Henry said he would go too so his mom came over to babysit and we actually had one of those date things. Lisa’s friends Carrie and Wes met us down there too, so we had a legit posse which made me feel safe against all of the Steelers propaganda. (It was at Heinz Field, probably the closest I’ll ever get to that place considering my extreme dislike of football.)

At one point, I realized I had meat sweats, which was impressive considering I don’t eat meat.

But if anything was going to convert me, it was going to be the goddamn Rib Fest.

OMG, it smelled so good.

OMG and so many trophies! How can you argue with trophies?!

And then Henry spend $5 on a black cherry old-fashioned soda for me, can you even believe it? I only had to beg him for 10 minutes and then point out all of the other men who supplied their ladies with flavored wets in a tin cup.

Wow, it really was a date, you guys.

And since Henry was surrounded by barbequed flesh, about to see an age-appropriate band, he couldn’t even PRETEND to frown.

Pork samples keep my man placated.

The King of Meat! He was my favorite person there, even after he creepily demanded that Lisa take his picture with me after this. I was like, “Oh no, I couldn’t possibly—” but then his meat-hand was around my waist and I was all, “Oh! Ok…”

He made me feel like my cleavage was on point, so I made Henry go back and patronize his booth for some mac n cheese and cornbread.

I just don’t eat enough cornbread, and that’s a goddamn shame.

We soon realized that .38 Special wasn’t coming on until 9:00, two hours later than we thought. So we walked down to Rivertown, where Lisa, Matt, Henry and our waiter Mike held my hand as I took babysteps into beer-liking.

In my 33 years, I have not once been able to drink beer without clamping shut my nose. But a co-worker suggested Summer Shandy, which I just had Saturday night (along with a Lemon Berry Shandy), and while it took me 2.5 hours to drink it, I DRANK IT GODDAMMIT. And it was not too bad.

Mike kept pushing me to get the Woodchuck Fall, but hard cider is always my fall-back when I go to bars and all my normal friends are drinking beer like it’s water. So I got some Belgian white thing which wasn’t very bad but I still had to drink it slowly, and then I eventually just gave it to Henry (after drinking more than a third of it!!).

With Matt and Henry shaking their heads in the background, Lisa let me try her IPA; my tastebuds promptly curled up and died, reanimated and gnawed off the back of my throat.

(I am open to your beer-sampling suggestions, my friends. Just remember that I have a very weak and girly ale palate.)

Since I’m not a beer-drinker, that was enough to get me a little buzzed, so I was even more stoked for .38 Special. Plus, this enabled me to better fit in with my beer-breath brethren.

“We’re going to see .38 Special now, aren’t you jealous?” Lisa said mockingly to Mike the Waiter.

“Actually, I kind of am!” Mike said. “‘I Want You To Want Me’, right?” he offered as proof that he knew who we were talking about.

No, Mike. That’s Cheap Trick.

.38 SPECIAL!!! Oh my god, it was so much fun! The crowd was a perfect cross-section of middle-aged couples reliving their youth, from aging biker-babes now with literal saddle bags to 50-year-old men in polo shirts and khaki shorts clinging to their yuppie-youth. Before the show started, Lisa and I were talking about the last time we them in 1998, and how long ago that was.

“The last time I saw them was in 1980,” Henry said dourly, and we all got a good laugh at his age. Oh god, I hope he wore a Confederate flag belt buckle with his bitchin’ Adidas shirt.

(To give you some perspective, Lisa and I would have been 1.)

Lisa and I were so amped for the first 30-45 minutes, even during the medley of songs we didn’t know. Three songs in, I turned to her and shouted, “I don’t remember there being two singers!”

She just shrugged.

Henry even made physical contact with me numerous times, like we were a real couple or something. It was amazing, but then I realized he probably felt more comfortable doing so at a show where he was part of his own generation.

Then a mid-40s drunk couple drunkenly pushed past us and began drunkenly dancing and copulating through their Coors Light-sloshed boat clothes. I guess Southern Rock is the next best thing when there’s no yacht rock shows going on in town. The woman was unattractive, squat like a troll, and dressed like a nondescript mom. The man had on a white polo and jean shorts and looked like he probably worked for an insurance company or sold swimming pools. They were extremely amusing to watch as they staggeredly gyrated against each others’ clothed genitals, and the woman kept doing these washed-up stripper body rolls which was vomit-inducing in and of itself, but when she dragged one sultry hand down the man’s back, across his ass and then IN BETWEEN HIS LEGS, I had to look away. The look in her eyes was crying out, “PORN DIRECTORS! LOOK AT ME! OVER HERE!” and I felt sleaz(ier) by association.

I started to record this lascivious display, but then they moved on, becoming engulfed by the crowd. I thought it was because she caught me taping them with my phone, but I think they just felt it was time to unleash their classic rock burlesque show on fresh eyes.

This sums up the set list:

WOOOOO ROCKIN’ INTO THE NIGHT!

WAIT, THIS ISN’T STILL ROCKIN’ INTO THE NIGHT? OH, THIS IS ROUGH-HOUSING? WHY DOES IT SOUND JUST LIKE ROCKIN’ INTO THE NIGHT?

WOOOOO I HAVEN’T RECOGNIZED THE LAST 4 SONGS THEY JUST PLAYED!

YESSSS, FANTASY GIRL!!!

OMG, PLAY CAUGHT UP IN YOU, ALREADY.

I DON’T KNOW THIS SONG. That’s because it’s Lynyrd Skynyrd. I STILL DON’T KNOW THIS SONG.

OMFG CAUGHT UP IN YOU!

I WONDER WHICH OF THESE SONGS HENRY LOST HIS VIRGINITY TO?!!?

OMFG HOLD ON LOOSELY!

I also learned that Henry knows A LOT about .38 Special and was answering all sorts of questions for us. Like when there was this somber moment in between songs while the one singer was talking about his brother and then we realized, “Wait…his brother was Ronnie Van Zant?!?” and Henry was like, “Um, yeah!” And then when they sang, “Second Chance” and Lisa and I exchanged confused looks and shouted to Henry, “Wait, this is .38 SPECIAL!?” He said yes, but we didn’t believe him. Lisa was even trying to Shazam it at one point, when Henry sighed and showed us his phone. If GOOGLE says it’s so…

I always thought it was a Steve Perry song. I guess I shouldn’t have made fun of the 21-year-old girl in front of me who said, “And ‘I Want To Know What Love Is’!” when John Burnett from KDKA got on stage and rattled off a number of their big hits when introducing the band.

(I’m still dwelling on this a day later. “But it doesn’t even SOUND like them!” I cried just now to Henry. “That’s because it was sung by their keyboardist!” he shouted irritably, ready to close this chapter.)

Then we were subjected to a five-minute drum solo in a song that was written for the Super Troopers soundtrack, and Lisa and I both started to taper off. But they hadn’t played “Hold On Loosely” or “Caught Up In You” yet, so I remained firmly planted in my spot.

Does a song on the Super Troopers soundtrack (appropriately named “Trooper with an Attitude”) really need a drum solo?

Of course, they saved their two biggest songs for the end. When they sang, “Caught Up In You,” I thought I was going to die. Memories of driving around, waiting for the classic rock radio station to fulfill my request.

(I used to call CONSTANTLY asking for it; one time they played “Hold On Loosely” and I was supremely disappointed, but let’s face it, that song is pretty fucking great too.)

Lisa whipped out her hair brush and serenaded me and all of a sudden I was 18 again, with a 47-year-old man pressed up against me. Yep, sounds about right.

The company was quality, the music was fun and nostalgic, and the people-watching was prime. I really needed that night. After Henry came back from taking his babysitting mom home, he admitted on his accord that he had a lot of fun, and even THANKED me for forcing him to go.

You guys: HENRY HAD FUN.

I mean, of course he did. He was surrounded by smoked meat, Southern Rock, and had a girlfriend who was STILL younger (and with better, less reptilian skin) than most of the other women around that stage. What could have possibly been bad about that? Clearly, we need to add .38 Special to the imaginary set list for our Never-Wedding.

Henry’s heyday, reflected upon his eyeglasses. I get the biggest kick out of seeing him in his own scene.

***

I wondered out loud why it was taking Henry forever to wake up this morning.

Chooch said, “Um, he’s probably TIRED. He was with you for a LONG TIME last night, probably somewhere he didn’t want to be.”

For once, son, you are wrong!

Today is Chooch’s first day of 1st grade at a real school! Good riddance, Catholic bitch-moms*! Goodbye, daily heart palpitations! Sayonara, judgmental glares!

Oh. Sorry. Didn’t mean to make this all about me.

(*This is not directed at all Catholic moms. Even I am technically Catholic. Just the Catholic BITCH-moms from Chooch’s old school.

You know, the ones who follow “God’s Word” SO WELL.

Their example is the reason I consider religion to be a joke.)

Do you know how many kids came to Chooch’s birthday party last year? 4. Because those 4 kids have parents who didn’t hold my blog against Chooch. Almost no one else even RSVPd. Punish the kid for his mom’s sins. That’s awesome.

Chooch was so excited this morning.

He had orientation the other night and is thrilled to be going to a school that, oh I don’t know, looks like a school. And his little buddy from next door is in his class, so his dad suggested that we just alternate walking them both up the street to school. I am so all about that. Any day where I don’t have to put on a bra pre-8:00am is a good day.

No more tuition stress, being looked down upon, and feeling like the heathen outcast. And trust me, that was way before any of the blog drama happened, and I stand by every word I wrote that they so vehemently disagreed with – if you don’t want called out for being a dick, then don’t act like a dick. There’s a thought!

There is really nothing like a good, fresh start.

A few weeks ago, Bridget approached me with a prank proposition. The prank would be aimed at her Work Nemesis, Brad. They used to work together at another place too, so their history is rich with jovial (we think) jabs and ridicule. When Brad first began working at The Law Firm last winter, Bridget made it her job to point out his uncanny resemblance to a Leprechaun (and then proceeded to tell him to watch out, because I like gingers; ONLY JONNY CRAIG! GOD!).

Brad’s office is pretty sparse, save for five empty picture frames. People ask him all the time, “Why do you have blank picture frames in your office, Brad?” I never really listened to his explanation, but it was obvious to me that this was his ploy to suck poor, unsuspecting Law Firm staff into some boring conversation.

I think in Brad’s head, photo-less picture frames = interesting.

Bridget decided that they needed filled with terrible pictures, and she came to the right person because she has a law degree, and is therefore smart. She knows that my sole purpose for breathing is to wreck people’s days with devious shenanigans. Also, it’s pretty well-known that I ain’t got much else going on in life. I already knew that he hated clowns (I interofficed him a picture of John Wayne Gacy as an initiation to The Law Firm), but I needed to know more. Bridget said he hates yogurt and that she once chased him around with some. We also tossed around the idea of filling them with pictures of Brad’s ex-girlfiends, because Bridget is ruthless.

Bridget made me friend him on Facebook so I would have access to his photos. I mean, we all know I’m a creeper, but poring through pictures of Brad at a wedding, Brad with his girlfriend, Brad looking like Tom Hulce from “Amadeus”, Brad at another wedding made me feel super sleazy.

Still, I needed one more picture to make but I had run the clown phobia into the ground by that point; thank god he posted on Facebook last weekend about his crippling fear of horses.

Jackpot.

Of course this also inadvertently became Henry’s burden to bear, since our printer at home is broken so he had to print the final products out at work, which caused several “THESE ARE ALL WRONGGGG!” (completely civil) discussions.

Then came the arduous task of getting him out of his office long enough to fill the frames.

First, Lauren was going to take him to get coffee, but then said, “I already went to get coffee with him this morning; he’s going to think I’m hitting on him!”

Wendy was busy. I asked A-ron yesterday but he changed his mind after he saw how busy Brad was pretending to be. So I went to Chris and said, “Bridget and I need to get Brad out of his office. Please do something.” So then all of a sudden, because CHRIS asked him, A-ron was on board. Barb said she’d help me stuff the frames. Bridget was our look-out.

In the end, I think it took 5 attorneys to get one attorney out of his office.

There’s a joke in there somewhere.

A-ron called Brad and asked him to come to his office, which is only right around the corner, so we knew we had to make this fast. That and the fact that A-ron called me and said, “Make this fast.”

I watched Brad start to walk down the hall, then he changed his mind and went back into his office. However, Barb didn’t see him go back and nearly barged right into his office until she saw me frantically signaling that he was still in there. God, way to go BARB.

(I’ll be kind to Barb and not tell the story of how she completely ruined a prank that Lee set in motion two weeks ago, also involving Brad. But just so you know, SHE COMPLETELY RUINED IT.)

Finally, it was a go. We worked so fast that I bent a nail back AND cut myself on one of the stupid picture frame prongs. (All for you, Bridget!) But it was all worth it when, 10 minutes later, Brad leaned back in his chair and found himself looking straight into Pennywise’s eyes.

I think my favorite part of this whole debacle was when Sean came over to ask me a question at the precise moment Brad left his office for the second time, and I shouted, “I CAN’T. NOT RIGHT NOW!” and almost fell out of my chair on my way to snatch the picture frames. Sean’s face went from surprised to utterly-disgusted in .5 seconds flat, then he retreated with a wave of his hand, like he was physically erasing the whole display.

God, nothing makes me feel more alive than a good prank.

Henry’s reaction to my serious statement that I could survive without him. He reminded me of the time he took a Faygo-related business trip to Detroit for two days (otherwise known as The Dark Period of 2007) and I quickly retracted my statement.

(Then Circa Survive came on and he went back to frowning.)

When making weekend plans with Seri, we tossed around the idea of going to the craft store, maybe a cemetery.

Or!

We could go to Prabhupada’s Palace of Gold in West Virginia, I hinted.

My suggestion was met with a resounding “Yes.” A day at an Appalachian Hare Krishna compound? Who could say no to that?! (Don’t answer that.)

The Palace is located in its own town of New Vrindiban, just outside of Wheeling; it’s reached by a series of seemingly infinite winding country roads, the kinds with curves so sharp it makes you think you’re going to plummet into a gorge if you do anything more than 15 MPH. (In other words, do not drive while receiving BJs on this stretch of asphalt, my friends.) It was farm house, cemetery, church, farm house, cemetery, church, farm house, cemetery, church for 8 miles. But it was OK, because I made a CD full of Chiodos, Circa Survive and Sade especially for this trip.

(You’re welcome, Seri.)

My gas light went on literally right as we passed what would be the last legit gas station for miles and miles; I was a little worried, but for most of the drive we were behind a rusty pick up truck, the bed of which was occupied by a lawn mower and a teenage boy, and I was sure they had a gas can in there somewhere, too. (I mentioned at one point that I thought the kid was pretty hot, and Seri rejected my opinion.) The further along this road we traversed, the more sure I was that we weren’t going to be stumbling upon a gas station any time in the near future and once we broke down, probably all of the men in the pick up truck were going to eschew rescuing us in favor of raping us and making us cook them sloppy joes for the rest of our lives.

Eventually, the curvy country road turned into a pot-holed path coiling through the wooded hillside; we promptly lost service on our phones right after Seri called Pete to see how long we could sustain with the gas light on.

(For the record, he told us we were fine, but I think that’s because he wanted to laugh at us after our ride home to Pittsburgh in the back of Henry’s juice van.)

I decided to defy Pete and turned around in the gravel driveway of someone who certainly had at least two decomposed bodies propped up on milk crates in their basement and was definitely sitting in stretched out underwear on a stained futon, skinning a possum for tonight’s pot roast, and drove back to the first curvy road where we had passed a small, no-name, one-pump gas station.

(You’re welcome, Henry.)

It was the kind of gas station where the overall-clad attendant blows into a ram horn to alert the nearby hill-dwellers that city folk are on their way, get yer slingshots ready and yer inbred dicks lubed.

Except that this gas station accepted credit cards. But that probably just means they’d use a phone instead of the rams horn.

The old lady clerk had to come outside and help me pump my gas, at which point the entire pump started churning and clanging, like there were tiny mountain men inside of it, peddling wooden unicycles to make the gas spurt out of the hose.

I should probably check my bank account at some point to make sure I didn’t get overcharged so some West Virginian gas shanty could buy a new sign for the shop.

Or, you know, a sign.

We headed back to the curvier, hillbillier of the two roads. This time it was four miles of trailer, forest , abandoned house, trailer, forest, abandon—OMG DEER!

, pot hole, trailer. (Roadkill is implied.) We were basically writing Tobe Hooper’s next movie for him.

(You’re welcome, Tobe Hooper.)

(Please get Elizabeth Olsen to play me.)

One last curve in the road and there it was, the Palace of Gold. We entered a door at the far end of some strange wall that looked like it belonged on a Spanish villa, not some Taj Mahal knock-off, and crunched across the long gravel walkway until we reached the steps to the palace.

And that was our first indication that the palace, while a gilded architectural fairy tale from the road, was actually in quite a state of disrepair.

“Nice moccasins,” said everyone in Williamsburg.

I may have posted this before but I just found it on my LiveJournal yesterday and died at how similarly dramatic Chooch and I are.

Case in point, Henry abandoned us today to help our friends at Castle Blood, and you would have thought he told us he was leaving for a job in Alaska.

Then Chooch and I were bickering when Henry was on his way out the door.

“She won’t play with me!” Chooch wailed to Henry.

“Yeah, because he’s being a dick!

” I cried in defense.

Henry just stood there, assessing the situation with a disappointed look, and said, “Jesus Christ, it’s like I’m leaving two ten-year-olds.

”

WHAT? WHY DOES CHOOCH GET TO BE OLDER?!

Anyway, the day quickly unraveled, but that’s a post for another day. (Like, tomorrow.)

Kids at a creepy/rockabilly/steampunk car show.

Went to the Creeprod Car Show yesterday in Lawrenceville, which was spearheaded by the brain trust that is Trundle Manor. Pete and Seri came with us, so we had a combined set of three boys under the age of 7, and this event was decidedly not kid friendly so I don’t know what I was thinking. All three of them got screamed at by some fat slob when they came within a foot of his car; for someone who was so protective of it, he sure was REALLY FUCKING FAR AWAY, drinking his brewski and slurring Yinzer-slang with his buddies clear on the other side of the fence.

This happened kind of early on, and it made me mentally check out.

Gayle had a booth there, right across from a guy selling lamps made out of animal bones and right next to our old neighbor, 1950s HOMEMAKER OMG I FORGOT ABOUT THAT BITCH. (*She is mentioned at the end of the post I linked to.) Now I know what she was sewing all those times I was washing dishes and saw her from the kitchen window sitting behind a sewing machine: really stupid 1950s HOMEMAKER aprons.

I took refuge under Gayle’s tent and talked to her for awhile and got to meet her fiance, Jeff, who was very nice. At least they didn’t yell at the kids.

All Chooch cared about was that there was sticker inside this car (Trixie, the official ride of Mr. ARM and Velda Von Minx) of a naked broad.

Henry’s Blue Collar Gang sign? I have no idea. I think he was actually counting nickels with which to buy a soda pop. And Pete? He was quietly bartering with the Parenting Overlords to just take the rest of his will to live and be done with it.

Ugh. God only knows.

Drooooool.

Really, what stands out the most to me when I think about yesterday was when Chooch was petting someone’s dog and said to the owner, “My mommy had a cat, her name was Speck, and she used to give my mommy high fives.”

Broke my goddamn heart. It was all I could do not to burst into tears right there on the street, mere feet away from a dancing rockabilly crackhead.

Chooch was actually kind of moderately good, until he became obsessed with being thirsty. God, isn’t it enough I grew the kid? Now I have to replenish his fluids too? Parenting is so hard.

Post-car show Wendy’s with a trio of monsters. I’m not a big fast food person (just a regular big person), but I had an oatmeal raisin bar thing that was just delightful.

Yesterday was just plain weird, and not in the good, typical Erin-way.

Can you believe I went to an amusement park and have very little to say about it? It’s not even that I didn’t enjoy myself at Waldameer last weekend, but I think it’s because I tried to be “smart” by taking some preventative Dramamine even though I have never really had a need for such measures. Sure, as I get older, I have to space the spinny rides; no more jumping off and getting right back on the Tilt-a-Whirl. And sometimes I might have to have an extended stay on a bench while I try to kick the cold sweats. But my motion sickness has never been so bad that I couldn’t ride something.

But still, I took some fucking Dramamine and it proceeded to completely ruin my day. I was so tired and irritable, it was unbelievable. And when I went on the Ali Baba, after harassing Chooch until he finally broke down and rode it with me, I spent the whole ride swallowing bile. Chooch, on the other hand, ended up loving it.

The main reason I wanted to go to Waldameer was to ride through the Whacky Shack. I love dark rides more than roller coasters, and this one didn’t disappoint. It was like being transported back to the ’60s with all the psychedelia and old school drug store Halloween props. I loved it so much. And I should note that the line for this ride, by mid-afternoon, was longer than the lines for the two wooden coasters. Erie peeps know what’s up.

I think this was my favorite part. As we rode through each door, the sound of a beating heart played above us.

I wanted to live there! Look how stupid Henry looks.

Stupid Henry looks stupid.

Across from the Whacky Shack was another dark ride called Pirate’s Cove. It was a walk-thru and had the unmistakable dank stench of your Aunt Martha’s basement. Oh, it was like getting a whiff of my childhood and I loved it! During one part that had us walking through a serpentined queue in a black-lit slanted room, I said that I thought it felt familiar to me.

“Yeah, because the Noah’s Ark at Kennywood used to have a room like this,” Henry said ruefully. I can’t believe that it’s been so long since stupid Kennywood desecrated the best dark ride in the world that I couldn’t even remember that. In fact, so many parts of the Pirate’s Cove seemed similar after that realization, that we wondered if the two were made by the same company.

(Here is an article not written by this hack about Noah’s Ark .)

Oh God, don’t I wish.

I kept seeing signs for French waffles, which sounded absolutely delightful, because I like waffles and I also like French.

French vanilla.

French kissing.

French prosthetics.

French porn.

French dressing.

French furries.

French furries filming salad dressing porn.

Then I did that thing where I get all pouty and spoiled-bratty when I say I’m hungry and Henry has the nerve to ask me what I want when he should KNOW WHAT I WANT since I’ve done nothing but say things like, “I wonder what the fuck a French waffle is?” all goddamn day. Fuck!

So I finally got my damn French waffle with a generous coating of powdered sugar.

“Go sit down and eat that,” Henry said patronizingly, and just to be a walking Fuck You! montage, I thrust the waffle to my mouth and bit down faster than I could realize that the waffle wasn’t actually as soft and doughy as I imagined, but crisp and thin and the pressure of my aggressive mastication presented quite a pickle when it caused the other end of the fake breakfast staple to flip up and smack me in the mouth, sending puffs of powdered sugar ALL OVER MY FACE, HAIR AND CLOTHING.

There was that incredibly awkward moment where it felt like everyone inside Waldameer had stopped dead in their tracks and were mocking me along with the entire country of France.

“I told you to sit the fuck down before eating that,” Henry sighed. “Good for you.”

It totally wasn’t even worth it and I started whining about how I should have just stuck with funnel cake and no, I can’t just go ahead and get some funnel cake because I’m too fat, how dare you, Henry.

If you happen to walk past my house and hear me mercilessly heckling all of the French athletes in every Olympic event, know it’s perpetuated by a waffle.

Henry broke his “no spinny rides” policy to ride the Tilt-a-Whirl and acted like a goddamn hero about it for the rest of the day. OK, Henry. We get it. You were in the SERVICE and can withstand a slight brain scrambling. Jesus Christ.

(Speaking of Henry being in the SERVICE, I was watching the Olympics the other night which is basically all I do now—be thankful if you don’t follow me on Twitter—and it taught me that the invasion of Grenada was real & not just some SERVICE story that Henry made up to look cool.)

(Speaking some more of Henry being in the SERVICE, I’m trying to get him to find his dog tags so I can wear them ironically.)

Chooch rode the bumper cars with Henry, so he had a successful experience this time and will probably never ever want to ride with his asshole mom again.

Oh, yeah! Speaking of not wanting to ride with his asshole mom, when we were in line for the most boring wooden roller coaster of all time (the Comet), Chooch was very vocal about how he wanted to ride with DADDY, not MOMMY and he kept saying it over and over again to the point where I was sure all the people around us were beginning to interpret that as, “I don’t want to ride with Mommy because her heroin needle always pokes me when I sit too close.”

Just utterly embarrassing.

So when it was our turn, I ran all the way to the front seat figuring that if Chooch really wanted to ride in the front like he kept saying, he would have no choice but to sit with Dreaded MOMMY. But that little shit was like, “Oh. No thanks then. I guess I’ll just sit in the SECOND SEAT with Daddy.”

What a jerk. AND ON MY BIRTHDAY WEEKEND! (Don’t worry, I said that at least 87 times that day.)

There was another coaster there called Ravine Flyer which was made from some of the most active ingredients in evil. I rode it alone because Chooch wasn’t tall enough, and I was super anxious because there was a sign there that said something about all single riders congregating to the middle and finding other lone riders to pair up with, like some strange roller coaster singles mixer, and what if I couldn’t find some other pathetic single rider? As luck would have it, there was some older man a few people behind me, so we ended up standing together in one of the queues.

But then, when the next coaster pulled up, I got into the far right seat and he didn’t get on after me! I was so offended that this piece of shit stranger didn’t want to ride with me. I know I’m Chubs City, but I don’t have fucking lesions, for Christ’s sake.

What a fucker.

And that roller coaster ended up being a major son of a bitch, so it would have been nice to have had a warm, fat body next to me to hold on to, that’s all I’m saying, asshole.

Really, that coaster was terrible. It might have been the roughest, fastest ride I took on wood, and yes I meant it that way. I didn’t even scream or put my arms up — I just sat there in my seat, completely stunned.

When Henry and Chooch were in line for the Whacky Shack, I got a text from Henry that said, “Jonny’s strung out near the entrance.” I almost died when I saw this guy, because he does kind of look like The Jonny Craig DelGrosso’s Doppelganger. Oh Jonny Craig, how you haunt me everywhere I go.

Then we stood in line to get lemonade behind some dumb bitch who apparently ordered an extra-colossal lemonade for an entire Girl Scout Troop, I don’t fucking know, but it seemed like the poor apathetic Waldameer kids in the little refreshment oven just kept churning out one giant cup after another, like Groundhog Day Part 2: Perpetual Refreshments. I kept thinking, “Why are we still standing in this line?” but I was too Dramamined to do anything about it.

Well, would you look at that. I guess I had things to write about Waldameer after all.

That is all.