gay for a day

Last week I promised my wife that Friday night would be my swan song. This is a tongue-in-cheek commitment to 86 all vices and clean up my act. She reminded me that I've been singing swan songs the past 7 years and have enough material to put out a greatest hits record and launch a world reunion tour. It's true, I have battered the swan song concept to death, which is why it's sort of an inside joke now. In fact, I can hardly utter the words to her these days without giggling like an obnoxious child.

Not one night last week did I drift naturally, peacefully to sleep. Instead I passed out after too much of this or that. When the going gets tough, sometimes the tough self-medicate. At least that's what yours truly did every night last week starting with Sunday. I know, as a father of two I should be ashamed, maybe even fitted for concrete shoes and tossed into the Potomac for such behavior. Well, all of us adults (hopefully all of us) figured out once we crossed a certain age threshold in our lives that our parents are fallible and generally don't have all of their shit together. In other words, they are human, not necessarily the super heroes we used to place on pedestals. Now don't get me wrong - I am not lobbying for parents' rights to do damage to themselves and shirk parental responsibilities by any stretch. I would not even say I did that since I did not imbibe last week until the kids were down for the night. Regardless, I was in a bit of a funk and skidded on the slippery slope last week. It happens to the best and worst of us, I guess.

Not lost in that haze was the awareness that I should pull over to the shoulder and get it together, which brings me back to the latest swan song remix on Friday night.

My friend Joe had tickets to the Nationals game. They were hosting the Braves, but I couldn't have cared less since I was mostly interested in checking out the new ballpark and eating unhealthy food. I'm a baseball fan - the Cardinals come first - but this early in the season it's more about the experience than the game itself, at least for me. The best part about it, probably the earmark memory for me, is that I got to be gay for a day.

Joe is gay. That label would be otherwise completely irrelevant in my book - I don't really say my "gay" friend Joe or my "white" friend Sam - except for that fact that it's sort of relevant in this instance. As a side note to that, Joe might be the biggest sports fan I know, which seems to be unique for a gay cat. In any case, we met at Joe's house late afternoon to get the drinking and smoking started. He went out to the car, and I lagged behind. When I rolled out the door, he was sitting in his VW Cabrio with the top down. I hopped in and said something like, "We are so gay together today."

On the ride there, which took a mere 5 minutes, the glances thrown at us proved that passers-by considered us a gay couple. When Joe turned on and cranked the discotheque mix at a stoplight next to a car full of meat head marines near the barracks on 8th Street I looked to the sky and cackled. The dirty looks of judgment we caught from these dudes were priceless. I can honestly say that for a second there I experienced a faux moment of gay pride, despite the fact that I am clearly not gay. Well, my wife says that I am just gay enough. So maybe there is a slight percentage of gay in me. So be it.

The rest of the night was a mess. We didn't last past the 3rd inning, and I have foggy memories of Joe spilling onto the floor at Five Guys near the ballpark. Whatever. None of it really stacks up the ride there.

What a swan song...except that I got drunk as nuts the night after at a dinner party. Such is life these days.

escalator rage

you ever have one of those mornings when you want to time warp back to college, draw the shades, rip bong hits all morning, and let indifference wash over you? i had one of those today. a wave of chaos built up around monday, crested on wednesday, and crashed our shore this morning. it's nothing new really. i mean, working parents with two kids and a meathead chocolate lab - that scene automatically lends itself to a dust storm now and then. so i get and accept it. that does not mean i am always cool and collected, which brings me to an incident this morning.

en route to the gym, i rolled out of the house, leaving the symphony of a whining 3-year-old and screaming 3-month-old behind me. i was close to jumping out of my skin. the icing on the cake was potting soil and flowers strewn about the front porch and yard. apparently a gaggle of squirrels went medieval on the asses of the flowers my wife and the jackal planted last week. needless to say, this added more edge to the morning. basically i was a time bomb, and the only thing that would diffuse me was some arcade fire on the ipod and a steady dose of cardio.

i work out at the washington sports club in the bowels of the chevy chase pavilion. the creature of habit that i am, i park in the same spot in the garage, next to the hotel elevator, and shuffle down the same escalator to get to the lower level. today was no different, except for the crusty, crotchety, curmudgeon of a woman wearing crocs and high-water, pleated khakis who decided to walk right on my heels to the escalator and down it. now, i don't walk at a snail's pace by any means. i've lived in the city 10 years, so i maintain an urban gait wherever i go. apparently that was not enough for her. neither were the two or three quick glances i threw over my shoulder to signal enough with the fucking tailgating. basically she left me no choice but to stop on the moving escalator and call her out.

do you mind?

huff. i'm in a rush to get to work. sorry. (in a very put-out tone)

i can feel your breath on my neck.

huff.

looks like you left your social skills at home in your rush out the door. now how about some personal space?

sorry, lady whoever you are. you became my scapegoat today. wrong place at the wrong time, i guess. but you know, you kind of earned it. and that outfit is likely to draw the ire of others who cross your path today. so, good luck with that.

every whisper, every waking hour

rem's new record, accelerate dropped today, so with a blend of anticipation and dread, i rolled to the borders near my office and picked up the cd/dvd combo. (not that i expect to watch the dvd much, but it was like $4 more so what the hell...) i know itunes and other such mediums are more efficient and the wave of the future, which seems to be now, but for certain bands i still buy the hard copy material. somehow i feel like i'm remaining true to my fan hood, not to mention i like to check out the art work on the inserts.

to date myself, rem has been an obsession of sorts for me since 1986. i remember the days of michael stipe flying around the stage, his arms and ass-length braid cutting the air like an old switch your baptist grandmother might have torched you with when you were a child, of course after you cut said switch from the crabapple tree in the back yard. i digress, but it's not a terrible analogy since back in the early days, there was much angst to do with southern baptist guilt and defining one's self in light of that in their songs. after all, they originated and headquartered themselves in athens, ga for so many years, so how could the bible belt not flail into the collective stream of consciousness on occasion?

i must admit that i ripped off many of stipe's on stage dance antics when i fronted a band for four years in college. hell, i even incorporated a megaphone into the act, which he did a lot in the late 80s and early 90s. belting out lyrics into a microphone via megaphone is something i would recommend to anyone. it's a rare opportunity that fucking screams "rock star," even if it's in the framework of a college band getting by on covers and a few tragic originals.

well somewhere along the line, the band lost its mojo or plainly stopped giving a fuck. the last 3 or 4 records were unremarkable at best and forgettable at worst. it seemed like suddenly michael stipe transcended music to become just a personality, a diva maybe. don't get me wrong - i think anything the cat does is interesting, creative, and intelligent, and it would not be terribly far fetched to say that he falls onto a short list of man crushes. but his thing stopped being music, and music is what brought him to the dance, yes? it almost pains me to say these things since i have such an allegiance to this band and the ripples they have created in the artistic world. that said, i am thrilled about the reviews i've picked up so far and can't wait to check it out, tomorrow morning at the gym.

yes - it would be fantastic to soak it up tonight, but it's bath time, then there's where the wild things are, down by the bay, goodnight moon, and the very hungry caterpillar to read.

how cool would it be to read the bedtime stories through a megaphone?

hmmmmm, yeah, not really cool at all, right...

happy birthday jack!

overheard, over-analyzed, and overindulged at the jackal's 3rd birthday party this morning:

endangered squeaky voices

the party this year was almost a carbon copy of last year's brunch affair with a few remarkable exceptions. and as i mentioned last year, throwing these events in the morning flows with a certain logic my friends get. now understanding it and pulling it off after you and your wife killed over half a bottle of scotch along with a couple cigarettes the night before are two different things. somehow i pushed through, only puking in my mouth 2.5 times, and tackled the morning errands, which landed me at that depressing friendship flower shop on wisconsin, next to cafe deluxe, the same place i scored the balloons for the 2 year affair. when i walked in i thought i'd browse the flowers and maybe bring more home to compliment some decorating my wife had already done at home. it wasn't a long shot for this guy to know my name since i rolled in 10 minutes after they opened. he told me the balloons were ready (27 of them - 9 red, 9, yellow, 9 white - to go with a fireman theme the jackal decided on) and quoted the price of $60. that cued an immediate U-turn away from the flowers. sticker shocked, i was.

in any case, a couple of father friends of mine were asking me about the party favors, taking mental notes. see, since we're all generally improvising this parenting bit, we tend to ask the right questions and absorb pertinent information that will make life easier. in other words, short cut hints on how to keep the kids happy and maybe even occupied for a few more minutes per day, while we maybe catch a breath of fresh air and maybe a smoke, are always welcome, and encouraged. so i relate the helium story, and one tells me there is a helium shortage in our world these days.

probably old news, but new news to me. since i don't have much need for balloons or a high pitched voice, i couldn't really care less. still, i had to laugh at the fact that this otherwise irrelevant crisis pinched me a little today.

moon bounce

we are now the not-too-trashy-but-apparently-trashy-enough owners of a moon bounce. i pulled the trigger online last week and amazingly did not experience as much cognitive dissonance as i expected, at least not until my friend dave reminded me that "the economy is taking a shit and you're buying moon bounces." my retort was that someone has to try to keep things moving, so i'm doing my part.

the kids naturally loved it and got their wrestlemania on. i recall only one report of heads colliding, which is not so bad. oh, and someone told me i could advertise the thing on craigslist and rent it out. probably won't happen, but can i really say i am above it now that i went so far as to purchase one of these gorgeous monstrosities in the first place?

presence or presents?

so like any kid, the jackal loves gifts. before i get to that, i should address my perspective on gifts and birthday parties. my wife and i sort of debated this topic after she launched the evite initially. see, our friends are terribly polite and considerate and wonderful. i think the same of their kids. now that kids have entered the scene, we're all figuring out how to integrate them properly. the thing is, most of us are integrating them into a world much different from the one we came up in, especially in fiscal terms.

my first 8 years, believe it or not, we're headquartered in a trailer park. my single mother and i lived in arnold, missouri until she remarried and relocated us to st. louis. jack is growing up in one of the most high profile cities in the world, in a pretty solid neighborhood, equipped considerably compared to this guy 30-ish years ago. the circumstances of our growing up could not be more different, which tells me i am doing something right.

my point is that sometimes we can be all thumbs about incorporating our kids, given that the circumstances are new, and still get the job done right. to that point, often you wonder when and where to say "no gifts please" when announcing a birthday party. we've said it before, and our friends still show bearing gifts. likewise, friends say "no gifts" and we ignore them.

here's why: it's a birthday party. kids absolutely love gifts (we did back then). and none of us are in bad financial shape.

i completely get the whole concept of suggesting "no gifts" and respect the politeness of the gesture. i also catch that it can spoil them, et al. still, the kids are great and they get this once a year.

well, in the end we decided not to edit the evite, and he got way too much stuff, leading us to hide half of it, fearing him being overwhelmed and scatterbrained.

that is to say, we can completely see both sides of the matter.

[hands thrown into air]


cute, not subtle

speaking of way too many gifts, a pile of them in the corner of the dining room had a tractor beam like the death star because i noticed the jackal drifting toward it on many of my passes through the room. we'd told him to wait until everyone left since we thought it might spark a lord the flies re-enactment. that didn't stop him from asking (nagging) me or his mother about it.

jackal: mommy, i want to open one.
mom: no, remember...when everyone leaves.
jackal: (turns to woman mommy is hanging with) can you go home now?


dog farts

really thrilled that my friend joe brought that raunchy bone filled with processed meat for our dog baci. at the time it was funny the way he wrapped it in birthday gift wrap and tricked the jackal with it. not so funny is the way baci farts like a senile old man since he devoured it. not only do they echo, they gag you. the gift keeps on giving. thanks!

(happy belated birthday, meathead!)

throw-away line of the day

hideki matsui, a japanese, new york yankee, outfielder also known as "godzilla," married in a secret ceremony in nyc recently. creepily, he announced it and shared only a pencil sketch of his new wife as evidence of her existence, evidently in an attempt to protect her privacy.

the best part of all this is the throwaway line the new york post used in the story, as if it's some passing comment that should give no one pause for any reason:

Matsui, also known back home for his large collection of porn films, said he and his wife have been planning their wedding for a year. He began dating her during the 2006-07 off-season. He said the nuptials took place in New York City at an undisclosed chapel.

fantastic..

in absentia

My abs have gone straight to hell. At least that's my speculation. To be honest, I don't know where exactly they went. All I know is that they are no longer here and that I miss them terribly.

Without so much as a "Dear John Basedow" note, text, or Facebook message, my abs bailed on me. I half expect to see them on a milk carton some day soon.

Spring is here, and soon I will be at the beach. Vanity has not escaped me, despite my age, so I'm on a mission to find them. They are Harrison Ford and I'm Tommy Lee Jones. To take the lame Fugitive analogy a step further, they are truly innocent. The hernia is the culprit. Being ordered to lay off any core workouts 5 months prior to hernia repair surgery and 6 weeks after did me no favors.

So it's back to the gym and avoiding eye contact in the locker room. Just how I love to start the mornings. I guess it beats the hell out of getting on that Basedow train. Fitness Made Simple, and Creepy. I mean, look at that guy. The scary thing is, he probably gets laid all the time.

It must be the abs, damn it.

writing the b-sides

more often than not many post ideas that hit me ultimately become farts in the wind. by the time i get around to weaving them into something intelligible, they have lost their potency, their ability to offend, so i chalk it up to another day with nothing said. my wife sometimes asks why i have not posted recently and reminds me that it doesn't have to be war and peace every time i sit down.

great blogger = shitty parent? good parent = shitty blogger? these are questions i live and breathe. so be it.

as i mentioned last year, i am haunted and best represented by the junk drawer. to be fair, i should express that in the plural sense due to the fact that i am the shameful owner of about 6 junk drawers, if you include my desk at work. since i have so many in the literal world, it probably makes sense to to have at least one in the figurative dimension. so,now and then i think i'll throw a random mess of stories, anecdotes, bad jokes, and whatever else hits my radar screen. here goes nothing...

i had you at "fuck"

recently i took a new client out for drinks after work and in the course of the night experienced an epiphany of sorts. something i believe i always knew in the back at my head occured to me in fluid words, and one of those words happens to fall onto my list of favorites - fuck.

we decided to catch beers at lia's, the only nonchain restaurant that's worth a damn in chevy chase where i work. i have a dilemma with the place since it's owner, chef geof, and his wife, nora o'donnell, both sort of irritate me, but i can't knock the setting or food, especially for chevy chase. now normally i'm straight after the liquor when i sit at a bar. really, i can't stand beer and typically do wine only with dinner. otherwise it's a splash of club soda on whatever color liquor i've chosen. but at happy hour with a complete stranger - fully suited while you chose dark jeans with a blazer that day - you can't hit the hard stuff.

in any case, about 30 minutes and 3 beers into chatting with this guy, who turns out to be a solid cat by the way, he suddenly hatches a sentence with "what the fuck..." i can't believe the rest of what he said totally escapes me, but it didn't matter after all. after all, can you blame me?

i had this cat at "fuck." once a stranger becomes your buddy and drops that f-bomb, he's down. you two are tight just like that. enough said.

it reminds me of a great eels lyric in "dirty girl":

i like a girl with a dirty mouth, someone that i can believe...

that reminds me of a plug- eels are playing this sat (3/29) at a venue i've not checked out but plan to downtown called the sixth & eye historic synagogue. i've caught them at 9:30 twice and have to say they put on an ethereal show. it's fierce.

so, as i was saying, when my suited friend threw down the "fuck," what did i do? i turned to the bartender and ordered a scotch. what else?