My friend Evonne and I are currently at Wendy’s, drinking wine, eating fruit and cheese. We messed around with the Psychic Circle for awhile, and it gave a shout out to Jonny Craig, y’all.

And that is what I’m doing on this fine Saturday night.

I also learned tonight that there are different kinds of grapes, more than red and white, and the ones I like are GLOBES.

I was on the phone with Henry yesterday when he asked if we were sending out Christmas cards this year.

“I don’t know,” I answered, followed by a suspicious, “Why?”

“Because it’s been a really long time since we sent out Christmas cards,” he said. I started thinking about that and realized the last time, not including the year I sent out homemade serial killer cards to my LiveJournal friends just to be an asshole, was in 2003.

That was kind of a long time ago.

We didn’t even send out “Our Baby Is Cuter Than Your Baby” cards for Chooch’s first Christmas.

“Can we put Jonny Craig on it?” I asked eagerly.

“Goodbye,” Henry said.

“Robert Smith was on our last one!” I wailed in argument.

“I don’t want a druggie on my Christmas card,” Henry growled.

So I guess we’re sending out separate Christmas cards this year. Holla at me if you want one! butgavincantdance@gmail.com

Here’s the last/only Christmas card we made. Thank god we only have FOUR cats now. Jesus Christ.

That was a pretty shitty card.

Chooch’s class is going to Heinz Hall today for some little kid symphony bullshit and guess who’s a chaperone? This stupid bitch. So instead of finally writing about jury duty and the last of the haunted houses (celebrating my blog’s birthday all last week really fucked shit up), I’ll be trudging down the street with a pack of screaming kids, riding in a trolley with a pack of screaming kids, and then sitting through a (shortened, thank god) symphony with a pack of (hopefully not screaming at this point) kids.

Then I get to come home, turn around and go right back downtown for work.

THIS IS PUTTING A SERIOUS DAMPER ON MY LADY OF LEISURE ITINERARY.

While I’m doing that, you should enter my giveaway.

Peace out, girl scout.

I think I’ve listened to this pretty much all day by this point. It makes me feel like I’m swallowing my heart. I can almost not hear my big-mouthed child saying “MOMMYMOMMYMOMMYMOMMY” in the other room.

On the phone this morning with Henry, I was spazzing out about a horrible dream I had about Jonny Craig, in which he was so much of a crack addict that he was beginning to lose his teeth. Even now, when I shut my eyes, I can see him with his mouth open all wide as he’s singing, and he’s missing a front tooth and the one next to it is all snaggled and he looks like he should be selling blow jobs at a truck stop in West Virginia, not touring the country with a Scene-popular band. (Except that in real life, he’s not even doing that.) And when this was happening in my dream, Sandy was there with me, seeing it all for herself and in my head, I was thinking, “Oh god, oh fuck no.

Why does he have to be flapping open his crack-obliterated maw right now in front of SANDY? She’s going to torture me with Photoshopped portraits of his new tooth-lite look.

” I was really panicked about this, not worried that Jonny Craig was about two hits away from stealing from kids (oh wait), but panicked because Sandy was going to make fun of me.

Henry laughed disgustedly. “That’s not so much a dream as it is reality.”

“YOU DON’T KNOW THAT’S HE’S LOST ANY TEETH YET!” I cried in defiance.

In other parts of my dream, I was on a cruise with Andrea, but the cruise ship was actually just a docked Motel 6 which at some point we were driven off of by Romanian gypsies so of course I woke up with my extreme yearning to travel to Romania rejuvenated. This clearly means that Andrea is supposed to go with me.

I’ll start looking at itineraries, Andrea, while you get your palate primed for some placenta pie.

ROMANIA 2012, HOLLA.

I should be en route to Columbus, Ohio right now to see my beloved Dance Gavin Dance, but since their singer Jonny Craig is such a class-act and got arrested a few weeks ago, the rest of the band canceled the tour. So instead, I’m sitting at home watching some of their old live videos on YouTube and driving Henry nuts.

Chooch even let me rest my head solemnly on his shoulder for a few seconds. That helped. Except that he had peanut butter on his cheeks, which then got in my hair.

Fuck you, Jonny.

WAIT NO, NEVER MIND, I STILL LOVE YOU, JONNY.

The crowd in this video is priceless.

(I finally made a Jonny Craig category for my blog. It’s going to take me hours to tag all my Jonny posts. Good thing I have the night off work.

Because I would NEVER do anything blog-related from work.

)

Thanks to everyone who contributed to last week’s blog birthday party thing! It was a lot of fun to go back and read the posts that my friends favorited and who knew Henry was going to come through at the final hour. I hope you guys enjoyed it.

And now the giveaway is finally here!

I wasn’t lying this time!

To recap the bounty:

• 5 eyeshadows and 1 blush of your choice from My Pretty Zombie cosmetics = $33 value

• a custom Somnambulant painting from the skullz0rz series = PRICELESS. J/K, probably like $20

• a set of 5 zombie notecards from my non compos cards shop = $15 value

• one 8×8 lomography print on metallic paper of Trudy Stufflebean from my Appledale Snaps shop = $20 value

• one mp3 CD chockful of all the bands I mention on here constantly.
• random last minute miscellanea.

So go! Enter, and enter often! There are tons of different ways to get extra entries, like by submitting a sketch of Henry! (If you’re one of the awesome people who already sent me one, you can already check that off as one entry.

) Comment on the posts that my friends chose as their favorites last week – each one counts as an entry! And if you’re a dude, you should still enter.

You never know when you’ll be entering a drag queen pageant and then you’ll really be glad you have 5 shades of hot, glittery eye shadow at your disposal. Or just give it your wife/mistress/daughter/mistress’s daughter/bus driver.

Just, thank you. Thank you so much for reading my stuff and making me feel nice. You guys rule.

Giveaway ends on Saturday.

Goddammit, all I wanted to do was go for a nice, leisurely family stroll around our crappy town, but dum-dum Henry left the keys in the house and started flipping out about how it was my fault because I rushed him out of the house.

I was like, “Why can’t we just go for a walk and worry about this later?” which apparently was not a Great Idea based on the look of utter incredulity Henry flashed at me.

Chooch and I carried on like cackling assholes while Henry tore apart the garage for suitable items to MacGyver a battering ram. I mean, I guess if he hot-glued together all of his old porn VHS tapes from the SERVICE, he might have something to go on.

He ignored my suggestions of calling the landlord or heaving a cinder block through the window and instead considered using a can of gasoline to burn down the front door.

I’m surprised he didn’t go next door to ask Hot Naybor Chris for a breaking and entering consultation, considering those two once helped the gas man break into our neighbor’s house in order to shut off his gas before our house exploded.

Yeah, this has promise.

“What? I coulda done it. If only I had remembered to eat my individually-wrapped prunes today.”

“NOW I HAVE HEDGECLIPPERS! THESE WILL HELP! I WILL MANICURE THE WEEDS INTO SILHOUETTES OF MY REPUBLICAN HEROES WHILE STARING LONGINGLY INTO OUR FRONT WINDOW.”

These are some of the things Henry said while Chooch and I buzzed around him like flies on a bear:

• THAT’S ENOUGH!
• YOU’RE A LOT OF FUCKING HELP.
• GO SOMEWHERE AND PLAY!
• THIS IS ALL YOUR FUCKING FAULT. I DIDN’T EVEN WANT TO GO FOR A WALK!
• FML FML FML FML FML
• YEAH, THIS IS REAL FUCKING FUNNY.
• AND I JUST KNOW I’M MISSING “SHE’S CRAFTY.” MOTHER!
• YOU ASSHOLES CAN JUST STAY OUT HERE! I’LL FUCKING WALK TO WORK. AT LEAST I HAVE THOSE KEYS.

Oh God, Chooch. DON’T POKE THE BEAR!

…or KICK the bear. Henry almost gave Chooch “orphan” status after this.

Meanwhile, I found this fucker in the garage. WTF kind of creepshow is this!? I wish I had had it for my Murder Desk at work.

I was trying to chronicle this episode from all angles, which did not please the man one bit. He made like he was going to grab my phone off me and beat me with it, enlightening me on what it must be like to work for TMZ.

After fifteen minutes, Henry succeeded in prying open the window with a pair of pliers. Now you know how to break into my house and steal our cats. Seriously, it’s all we’ve got in there. Cats galore.

Just don’t forget to bring a small child to catapult through the window. (I mean, at least he’s going IN a window and not falling OUT of a window, right?)

You know that fucker is going to go to school tomorrow and tell his teacher about how his burglar parents made him shimmy up the side of a skyscraper.

Moments later, the house keys came whaling through the window straight at Henry’s face. Chooch rules.

“ENOUGH ALREADY.”

Reassembling the window.

And he did it all so he could go on a walk he did not want to go on in the first place. In this picture, I think he’s texting his boss: OMG I IS A HEROE. I NEED DAY OFF.

I always say that if it weren’t for Barb, I probably wouldn’t have lasted very long at The Law Firm; she made me feel welcome from the get-go, showed me all the ropes, and by the end of the my first night it became extremely clear to me why she’s pretty much everyone’s favorite in that department. Since April 2010, she has quickly become one of my favorite people of all time and has let me cry about my asshole family to her on countless occasions, which skyrockets her out of the plain and ordinary “co-worker” category.

Here are her picks!

So here it is: the Big 4. It seems like it’s been so much longer that my life has been out there for all to see. Oh it has, ever since Erin started live journal sometime in the early 2000’s.

From the very beginning she has known that “I DO NOT LIKE MY PERSONAL LIFE OUT THERE”. But that didn’t stop her from posting about me. Now comes the 4th birthday of OHE and she asks me to think of 5 posts that I find are my favorite, that seems easy enough, but then I also have to write about them (another thing I hate, Writing) and post it as a guest blogger. Sounds fun and exciting to someone who hates to write, and I have been putting it off since she asked me to do it.

Unlike most of you who read OHE I happen to be in almost every post, except the ones that involve Jonny (I hope I spelled the asshole’s name right). I have had pictures posted of me in a dress, tutu and makeup. (Almost forgot the wiener pics, my favorite.)

She pretty much posts everthing I do or say that would make me look bad or embarrass the fuck out of me.

Examples:  Christmas Eve, Part 2: Henry’s Big Gay Secret

You would think this would have nothing to do with me

She just loves my service years, and not for good.

 I have only cracked the surface of my life altering embarrassing moments that she has exploited to the fullest. So you see why I have such a hard time picking 5 posts that are my favorite for the 4th birthday of OHE. I don’t think I could narrow it down to that few, but according to her I don’t read it. Do I really have to read something that I live day to day, sometimes that very same day, sometimes a week later?

Yes, I do have to read it,  not daily like she wants me to, but I do get around to it eventually. Usually after she starts whining and hounding me to. I wouldn’t miss reading how I made her life a living hell or one of our many trips that suddenly have things in them that I don’t remember happening that way. Granted she does write about the good stuff but who wants that, that’s boring.

Man I hate to say this in an open forum where it can be seen by all and will be here for ever (A lesson Erin has not yet mastered and if she does, people will stop reading). But I have gotten used to all the ridicule and embarrassment that she puts me through on a daily basis, my life being out there for everyone to see and read about. There is only one reason that could have happened, that I could become numb to it all:

Because over the past 10 years Erin has become my best friend and love of my life. So here is to many more years of Henrying for all to read.

Thanks for reading

I have known Alyson since, what? 2005 at least. We met on LiveJournal and she came all the way from New Hampshire for my baby shower a year later. I’m grateful to have had several chances to spend time with her over the years and we’ve been kicking around the idea of planning a winery trip next year, which would be amazing on so many levels. She has been a constant source of support and encouragement for me, in all aspects, not just writing; and she is also one of the few people I have met in my life who understands what it’s like to listen to music and feel like your entire body and soul is a giant cavity being swished with bourbon, and that going to a show is like our version of fucking Sunday mass.

It’s a huge honor that Alyson took time out to write this for me.

***

So, I have been thinking about your greatest hits, and I am finding that the ones sticking in my head the most are the ones in which you write about your Pappap, the ones in which you attend shows and Warped Tour, and the Christina ones because you are so completely real about the giant fuckshow that friendship was, without blaming anyone. You just tell the truth. In that one and in everything you write.

I re-read the Pittsburgh Warped Tour one and was like, wow. This one.

I love your posts about music. Your passion for music runs so deeply, it hurts, and you make us feel your pain, and it’s beautiful.

Also, the Manuel ones make me laugh to the point of tears. Your writing always makes me feel something; it was your writing that made me want to know you, after all.

1. An Old Person’s Perspective of Warped Tour: A Boring Interview with Henry J. Robbins

2. Henry’s Downhill Battle Mountain

3. The Christina Chronicles: The Worst Memorial Day Weekend, Part 1 – The PB&J

(I randomly chose those two on behalf of Alyson as an example of the music and Christina categories.)

I’m totally honored that Dusti wanted to contribute to my little dog and pony show I’ve got going on this week. I met her by chance via a Craigslist ad I placed in 2008 looking for victims to animal mask-up and photograph, and ironically, she was a Castle Blood denizen at the time.

It only took 4 years, but we finally met up for coffee a few weeks ago after years of e-cordiality. I’m happy to call her a real life friend. Thank you for making me a little misty-eyed before Chooch’s parent/teacher conference, Dusti!

***

I’m not actually sure how long I’ve been reading your blog.  Our paths crossed on LiveJournal pre-2007 (obviously), and I’d have lost you to WordPress were it not for the joy of RSS feeds.  (Your LJ name* bewildered me a little, but I loved you anyway.)  (And your LJ is older than mine by 5 months or so.  We may have to have a girl fight over that.

I’m not sure yet.)

(*Vagynafondue, ya’ll!)

*Anyway*.  This all means I’ve been sitting at my computer watching your online evolution.  But my gut reaction to, “What do I love about Erin’s blog?” is, “The photos!”  (You were expecting to hear, “The inmate penpal stories,” weren’t you?)  But it was your Mad Photography Skillz that made me initially contact you in ’08 (oo, you almost mentioned me in your blog yay! The Chuck Saga).

Anyway.  I friggin’ love these.  And I friggin’ love that you’re someone that has kept animal masks in your trunk Just In Case.  And I continue to hope that someday you will put me in a ridiculous animal mask, too.

Bunny Mask:
https://www.ohhonestlyerin.com/archives/7783

When Animals Wed:
https://www.ohhonestlyerin.com/archives/1292

Mmmmmmmonkey:
https://www.ohhonestlyerin.com/archives/701

Bunny in the Cemetery:
https://www.ohhonestlyerin.com/archives/686

And this is probably my all time fav post (and I don’t remember if anyone else has listed it and if they haven’t I don’t care I’m doing it again so there)…
Undead Abduction:
https://www.ohhonestlyerin.com/archives/9139

Whilst I love your amusement park posts and of course your haunt reviews, it’s the photo stuff that I remember the most.

You’re wicked talented.

(..Shut UP.  You ARE.)

One of the items in the THANKS FOR READING giveaway will be a custom version of this painting:

If you win and don’t like it, it would probably make a good door stop or fireplace kindle.

Hopefully that gives you incentive to keep reading and enter.

If not, I can maybe throw in a Henry-prepared casserole and some through-the-kitchen-window Polaroids of Hot Naybor Chris.

Tip: the giveaway possibly has something to do with the old blog posts my friends have shared on here throughout the week.

You don’t think I’d make this EASY do you? Pop quiz all the way!

I’m so glad that my blog waited until the week of its fucking birthday to break. There are error messages galore and I’m sure this is somehow Henry’s fault.

Blame Henry ’11.

(Which reminds me, I still need to make those buttons.)

Anyhow, while I’m at work decompressing from a long day on a juror panel (I didn’t get picked, but that’s a story for later), I figured I would round up the posts that some of my friends have picked as favorites and share them on this here blog. You know what’s nice? Not having shit to do. Thanks guys, for doing all the choosing for me!

***

1. The Gingercrack House : picked by Chris, my new haunted house friend!

My first exposure to OHE was a link to your blog about Trundle Manor about a year ago when I was researching TM in one of those “how the hell don’t I know about this place already” fits. I enjoyed the insight as well as the writing style.

Then came the first Castle Blood Matinee article, which I still think is the best thing that has ever been written about us. The “hyperbole that rings true” struck a chord in all of us and we literally couldn’t wait for a visit that year. (I write a lot for the attraction and am VERY nit-picky when somebody else puts something in print, and this one raised the bar for all other articles.)

Omitting anything personal in the blog due to bias, I would say that my favorite things are the fair/amusement park trip reports because they relate so well to what Kari and I do in our spare time and the adventures play out in a similar manner. The stand-out exception to all of this is the “Gingerbread Crack House” story, which I loved from start to finish and wish that I had been so clever as to come up with that particular gem of an idea.

2. Alisha’s Secret & Turning Religious : picked by Brandy, whose blog you should be reading.

I can’t tell you exactly what it was about this post but when I read it I was instantly hooked.  and I can prove it with this post. It’s been a little over a year now that I’ve been reading your blog; one good thing to come from Blog Frog.

The following 3 were chosen by my brother, Corey:

3. From the Photo Album (totally forgot about this)

4. Signed, Sally (Sadly)

5. The Cure Pilgrimage, Part 2: Pat’s Pizzeria

6. ROBIN : this was chosen by the inimitable Sandrababy, who inspired the second part of it in the first place.

Well, why don’t you just take me to a buffet and ask me which is my favorite dish?! My dear, every one of your posts shines by itself. Even when you expound more than once on a particular subject, I find you are never repetitive. Do you realize how difficult that is to accomplish in the often unforgiving world of writing? Quite simply, I adore you. I adore your family. I adore your art. I adore your superfunk nail designs. Just…everything.

Oh, alright. My favorite LJ post was when I asked you to make Henry take a pic with your cracktastic neighbor (the one with the Bozo hair), AND YOU DID. How I laughed. How I still laugh! Poor Henry.

 7. If You Ever Wanted To Induce a Heart Attack : picked by Kara, because she laughs so hard she pees a little every time she reads it, so now I want you all to picture Kara with a soggy crotch as you read this.

Happy birthday, little blog.

Hello, I’m on my jury duty lunch break. The valiant Henry was waiting outside the courthouse, casually leaning against a lamppost, to take me to lunch.

ISN’T HE NICE. Otherwise, I probably wouldn’t have left the jury room.

“If it weren’t for me, you probably wouldn’t have left the HOUSE yet,” he said with a scowl.

This is not far from the truth.

So far it has been super interesting.

I brought a book and the new issue of Alternative Press, but to be honest, I’m too captivated by the CRIMINALS sitting in the front of the room to do more than gloss over a few sentences.

I’ve already been questioned for one of the cases and it was extremely scary and my palms were sweating and even though they were like, “THERE ARE NO RIGHT OR WRONG ANSWERS” I answered everything and then screamed to myself, “OH MY GOD THAT SOUNDED WRONG.”

And I know I’m not a fan of cops, but there is one CILF that keeps coming into the room.

More later. I have serious business to tend to.

Clearly.