I was fourteen when I met Pignaceous. I remember that because it was the day after I got my period. Mama says, “Darlene, you a woman now. Those boys at school are gon’ smell that on you so you best keep those legs closed, missy!

“

It was a humid day, that day I met the pig, and I was walking home from school. Now, on these walks home, I always got to pass the bus depot.

Lots of unsavory characters loitered outside, flicking ashes and wagging their tongues at me; but on this one day in particular, this humid day, a pig-man stepped away from all those derelicts and offered up his hankie so that I may mop my sweaty brow.

I thanked him. He tipped his hat to me. Turns out Pignaceous, that was the name he gave me, was a sheriff over in a Hawaiian town. Said that damn town got drowned in piping hot lava, all the way from the post office right down to the tobacco store.

Next thing I know, Pignaceous is walking home with me.

Next thing I know after that, Pignaceous is eating supper with my folks and me.

And next thing I know after all that, I’m waking up to find Pignaceous eating my folks for breakfast.

Now, I don’t mind so much, not like you’d think. See, Ma – well, she been known to swat my behind with a wooden spoon. ‘Specially now that Mother Nature made me into a Woman. She’s just certain I’m gon’ go and get myself knocked up by some boy on the AV squad, even though I been telling her time after time that those boys don’t look at anything that don’t got a hard drive and a CRT glare.

And see, Pa – well, he been known to get good and drunk off the sauce, real rot-gut brandy, and leave his boot prints on my behind from time to time.

‘Specially if I be forgettin’ to pack his pipe before he gets home from work.

So see, I don’t mind so much to see that fuckin’ pig tearing away the flesh from their bones like us country folk eatin’ barbeque ribs on the Fourth.

Now, Pignaceous, he DOES mind. He’s worried I’m gon’ turn him in, ruin his hearty morning eats. But I say to him, “Pig, you listen here. I fuckin’ hate my folks. You want to ravage their flesh? Be my guest. Can I get you the Ketchup?”
—————————————————

This photo captures the creepiness that can only be found in a vintage Sheriff Pig. Give him your change before he serves you up at the next Hawaiian- style Person Roast.

Who doesn’t enjoy a nice luau?

This photo measures 8×8. It is printed professionally on fine quality metallic paper

9 comments

 

Giraffe did something stupid back in ’87. This something was so stupid that the stupidity of it all landed him in the back of a paddy wagon, with a gang of hobos picked up for thieving milk from tipped cows. Giraffe’s corneas were searing from the teargas. Giraffe done deserved that though, seein’ he done something so stupid in the first place.

In time, that Giraffe found himself apart of a chain gang, digging ditches along a deserted stretch of highway. Some folk say the ditches had
something to do with irrigation, but my pop always told us he was certain the warden was lookin’ for somethin’. Bones, teeth, some kind of people
remnant.

Giraffe told pop he always imagined that if he were on a chain gang, he’d be equipped with one of those litter spears. Not a rusted shovel. He also didn’t imagine that he would really be chained to the other prisoners, and darn if that didn’t make for some awkward moments. Like when Jimmy Sardine would whip out his manhood and start wackin’ the everlovin’ shit out of that fucker.

The way pop tells it, Giraffe thought that he might have just enough slack in his share of chain to reach the relaxin’ floral chair that the warden lugged out that day from his office, where he sat on his pimply ass, shouting out racial epithets to the various hues of the incarcerated. But after tearin’ up three beef and bean burritos doused with a heavy blanket of Tabasco sauce, the warden found himself scampering off to pinch a runny loaf behind an abandoned bait shop a quarter mile away. Pop says Giraffe waited until the warden was nothing more than a red blob on the horizon before shuffling over to the chair. He just reached it.

But Giraffe, he ain’t careful enough. That warden came back, soiled gutchies and all, and caught him goldbricking in that pretty floral armchair, and suddenly, Giraffe wasn’t so much digging them ditches as he was decomposing in one.

4 comments

 

 

The night before Thanksgiving, Henry stayed up until 2:00am, rifling through his grandma’s recipes like a normal man rifles through porn. I don’t know what he was looking for, considering that I procured an entire feast worth of gourmet recipes from this little thing I just heard about recently called the Internet. Of course Henry found something wrong with every selection: Too-expensive-ingredients (“That will cost more than the turkey!”). Lack of industrial kitchen. Not enough education completed to comprehend recipe wording.

In the end, he settled on:

• Smashed rutabaga with gingered pears
• Turnips gratin (hello new edible husband)
• Scalloped corn
• Meatless stuffing
• Mustard mashed potatoes (“OMG Tyler from the Food Network made them!”)
• Sweet potato pie

 

Oh, and that over-hyped turkey bullshit that everyone is always buzzing about.

 

 

My contribution to the day was taking Chooch to my dad’s house so that Henry could cook in the highest, most divine level of tranquility. Now, I only see my dad on holidays. Shame on me, sure, I know. But it’s awkward because our relationship was once more strained than the ab muscles of a man attempting to suck his own dick. Technically my step-dad, he legally adopted me when I was in the fourth grade. We engaged in non-stop battles of wits and psychological warfare for the entire duration of my teenaged years. Then he and my mom divorced and ironically, we now get along famously; and in an incredible twist, he was the only family member who talked to me while I was pregnant.

 

 

Corey, who was staying there while home from college, failed to tell him that Chooch and I were coming over, so my dad was genuinely shocked when he saw us on his doorstep. It was probably 75% of an act, but he seemed happy to see us and proceeded to dole out peanuts, JuJu Bees and cans of pop. He even gave me some Bagelfuls to take home, complete with single-serving packets of cream cheese. A trip to his house is always like a mini-grocery trip.

 

 

While he cooked, I made sure Chooch didn’t fall down the basement steps, eat paint chips, or break any of my dad’s classic car memorabilia, while Corey acted disinterested in our presence and my other brother Ryan napped on the couch. I got roped into sitting down for dinner with them, wherein my dad immediately picked a fight with Ryan, who evidently didn’t load his plate with enough food. “I told you not to eat all day!” my dad steamed, to which Ryan grunted, “Jesus Christ, Dad, I only ate some cashews!” My dad countered with a surly, “I saw the cheese you opened up in the fridge!” at which point Ryan hunkered down lower over his plate which seemed plenty decorated to me.

 

 

In an effort to break the ice, I chirped, “These mashed potatoes are really good, daddy!” He muttered that they were too runny, but really, anything tastes delicious when the butter ratio is 50/50.

 

 

Corey and Ryan didn’t speak at all throughout the painful meal, and I’m sure they were just thrilled at how kind our dad was being to me. He even noticed my hair and enthused about its aesthetic merits for just a note longer than natural.

 

I love my dad, but I was glad that I had a legitimate reason to shirk my way out the front door. Tension, it just doesn’t sit well with me.

 

 

Dinner at my house was supposed to be at 7, so that those who had other dinners to attend (Janna, Corey and Blake) would be newly starved by the time they came over for seconds. However, Henry’s tardy ass didn’t serve shit up until EIGHT O’CLOCK and everyone was bored, angry, hungry. Look at those mugs on Janna and Corey. You’d think they were watching a slide presentation of Henry’s mom dusting her ceramic kitten collection, that’s how glazed with ennui they are.

 

 

Sensing that a revolt was on the rise, Henry served up deviled eggs for us to stuff our mouths with while he frantically finished cooking.

 

 

For some reason, Henry was really impressed with himself. He kept boasting that the eggs were deviled with STONE GROUND MUSTARD. I’m not even sure what that means. They tasted regular to me, like he could have squirted in a quick fart of French’s for all I know. Something weird clearly went on in my house while Chooch and I were at my dad’s, because no one gets THAT excited over deviled eggs.

 

 

Finally, the moment for feasting was upon us, and we all loaded our fancy paper plates with mounds of seasonal slop. Blake pretty much questioned everything aside from the turkey, which was easily recognizable (good job, Henry). I explained to him that I wanted to eschew the expected and serve new twists on tradition. “You mean, you wanted my dad to make things that even YOU can eat,” Blake corrected. And oh how we laughed. (As I silently wished for Blake to choke on a turkey bone.) (Just kidding, Blake.) (No really.)

 

 

As I tore into my plate, I realized Corey didn’t have a fork. “It’s OK,” he promised. “I don’t mind waiting. I’ll just have a roll.” He paused, considering that statement, before holding up his broken hand and adding with the slight hint of chagrin, “Though, even THAT is a challenge.” He should have been giving less lip and more thanks for the fact that he has a hand AT ALL.

 

Later, he momentarily lost his appetite when he mistook the really expensive paper napkins to say “Joyous Fetus” instead of the much less interesting “Joyous Fetes.” We all laughed, but I don’t think Henry understood what was going on because he probably doesn’t even know what “fetes” means.

 

 

We’re so classy that we used our best plastic serving bowls. Not even TUPPERWEAR. Just generic, microwave-ravaged plastic. And there’s the gravy that burnt Henry’s hand and thank God it did because I really enjoyed hearing him cry about it all night long. I thought his mom was going to rush him to the Veteran’s hospital. I could almost see Henry’s mind churning: “Remember what they taught you in the SERVICE, big guy. You will pull through this! YOU WERE IN THE AIR FORCE, GODDAMMIT.”

 

And then Henry’s mom called Janna a myriad of other J-names (Janet, Janice, Joanne) but never Janna, and swore she hated sweet potato pie before admitting that she had never had it. Now she’s had it and likes it, though I maintain that Henry’s version (apparently it was EMERIL’S RECIPE, what a fucking carving knife to my heart) tasted unlike any sweet potato pie I’ve ever had. Ever. Like, no semblance at all.

 

 

Overall, I thought it was pretty good for our first time hosting a holiday in my ridiculously small dining room. I know I had fun, and Blake and Henry’s mom seemed content. Janna basically looked like she had just finished watching a double feature of “Benji” and “Old Yeller,” and Corey just looked bored as usual. The shit Henry made was good, and even the gravy was vegetarian. I learned later that my mother translated Corey’s spot at my table into meaning that — oh my god — he’s on MY SIDE. And this is exactly why I was happy to do my own thing this Thanksgiving.

 

 

Last night, I yelled, “I can’t wait to have Christmas here too!” but Henry remained curiously silent.

 

EDIT: I WILL NEVER COPY AND PASTE AN ENTRY FROM WORD EVER AGAIN. FUCK.

9 comments

My grandma has been in a nursing home for the past few weeks. They say it’s temporary, that she’ll get to come home once she gains back use of her legs (I attribute her muscle deterioration to my aunt Sharon, who kept her holed up at home like a prisoner and would often forbid me from visiting). I hope these things are true, and that if she does get to return home, Sharon will clean up the mess that she and her dog have made, so I hear from a little birdie. (I’m talking mounds of dog shit left to amalgamate with white shag carpet, THAT kind of awesome mess. Oh, Grey Gardens indeed.)

I visited my grandma in the home on two occasions, but she seemed tight-lipped, paranoid, anxious for me to leave. But yesterday, I met my brother Corey there and was relieved to see that Sharon wasn’t around to monitor things.

Corey and I walked down hallways which smelt like we had stumbled inside a walk-in medicine cabinet. Every so often, I caught a whiff of Desperation and Lost Memory, too. It scared me.

Reaching my grandma’s room, we found her asleep. Not wanting to wake her, I turned to a nurse who was across the hall, watching us curiously (Corey and I are kind like Durrr and Duhhh when we’re together, donning deer-in-headlight visages and stumbling with suspicion) and said, “That’s our grandma in there. She’s sleeping. What do we do?”

The nurse exclaimed, “Jeannie? That’s my GIRL! She so FUNNY. You know she funny right?” I agreed and when she turned her back, shot Corey a “wtf, grandma’s FUNNY??” look. He just shrugged.

The nurse woke up our grandma, and I braced myself, I clenched my asshole, I waited for it. But she seemed pleasantly surprised to us. And then she spent the next hour regaling us with the goings-on of the nursing home residents. She seemed coherent, happy, genuinely pleasant. I can’t remember the last time I saw her like that, smiling and being so chatty. Especially following my grandfather’s death, she has a tendency to be quite snippy and anxious to throw jabs. She loves to remind me that I’m a disappointment of colossal proportions.

But on this day, she seemed entertained by my life updates. She asked about Chooch and her eyes held real honest-to-God pride when she looked at pictures of him on my phone.

There was one hairy moment when she brought up my mother and our current stand-off. “She gets tears in her eyes when she talks about you,” my grandma lectured. Oh I bet. Tears from having one less person to borrow money from.

The subject was quickly changed to Anna, the resident Sophia Perillo. “Oh, you have to meet her, she’s so funny! We all sit around waiting to see what she’ll do next,” my grandma said, laughing at the thought.

I recalled some wheelchair-bound lady parked at the nurse’s station when Corey and I had arrived. I got the sense she was a real spit-fire, so I said to Corey, “Maybe that was Anna asking for juice when we walked by.” Then to my grandma, I asked, “Does she have white hair?”

My grandma looked at me dumbly and Corey mumbled, “I think they ALL have white hair, Erin. It’s kind of the trend.”

Then her ninety-something roommate started coughing up something so tragic-sounding, I can only guess it was her ghost. And that was our cue to leave.

8 comments