Update On My Surgery

I’d like to apologize to everyone for not keeping you updated on my pending surgery. Don’t worry, I’m fine. I’m fine. I didn’t mean to keep you in the dark. I know it can be excruciating when you don’t get regular updates concerning the stricken individuals in your lives. One tends to think the worst in those situations. I’m sorry to have put you through that.

As I discussed in a post a while back, I have a condition called Latent Epiglottial Profuius. This is a rare affliction, genetically bequeathed through the ages to only maternal descendants of Theodorus of Samos who also happen to be paternal descendants of Rowena, the Stertorous Saxon. Only J. Craig Venter knows why, for sure. And he won’t tell anybody.

Most people who suffer Latent Epiglottial Profuius lead normal lives until around their mid thirties. By this age, the epiglottis of the victim starts to sprout small nubs, which, over time, develop into streamers of flesh. This does not cause the patient discomfort, but in rare cases may cause death. In some people, the flesh streamers do not stop growing and get swallowed, still connected to the epiglottis. The stomach begins digesting them, and the stomach acids climb the flesh streamers to the epiglottis and beyond – the poor wretch essentially eats xeself alive from within. It’s a terrible, truly horrific way to die. Luckily for me, the growth of my epiglottal flesh streamers has stopped at about 5.86952 cm, which is normal.

The most apparent burden of this condition is the effect the flesh streamers have on the subject’s voice and speech quality. The strain the weight of the flesh streamers puts on the throat causes the epiglottis to take on a conical shape. That, coupled with the wheezing characteristics inherent in the streamers (of any kind, not only the flesh variety), causes the voice to take on a quality not unlike that of a New Year’s Eve party horn. Although, the tonality varies among patients. My flesh streamer affected voice, for example, because of its jaunty tenor range, and the unique concaving structure of the combination of the inside of my cheeks and my palate, sounds more like the muted trumpet heard in Cab Calloway’s Blues Brothers version of Minnie the Moocher. It’s gotten to the point where people can barely understand what I’m saying, mostly due to the “wah” distortion caused by the muting influence. To offset this muting “wah”, I added another level of muting, manually, using the toilet plunger from my bathroom, in a “wah” pattern inverse to the natural one caused by my cheeks/palate/streamer configuration. This has worked famously, but the rash that soon developed around my lips demonstrated that I should have used a new plunger. It’s not easy living like this, but I survive, especially with the help of friends who have pitched in and bought me a leather plunger holster hand made by a blind, retired plumber named Yasni.

As nurturing as the plunger has been toward my handicapableness, I don’t want to live this way for the rest of my life. Hence, the need for surgery. Since this is such an unbelievably rare condition, no standard medical procedures exist to relieve those in my state. So I must resort to experimental operations conceived by medical school dropouts, who write varnish awareness manifestos and carve tongue depressors out of salt licks, and live in back rooms of frappe’ houses. I met one of these unwanted healers at a crowded dry dock, and she enthralled me with tales of her method of de-tentacling squid. She assured me the same technique would work to rid me of my fleshy streamers. But, she did warn me that most of the squid she worked on had died, and then asked me if I was afraid of death. I replied, “Sort of.” To which she acquiesced, “Alright, you’re in!”

I am currently waiting for her to fit me into her schedule.

I’ll let you know how it goes.

The Heathen, the Snowman, Judy and the Christmas Spirit

It’s not easy for a heathen. Putting up with the Christmas season, that is. Every year it gets more and more difficult to participate in the festivities in good conscience, without feeling like a hypocrite. Growing up, I had been brainwashed with all the season associated myths: Santa Claus, good will toward men, the birth of a savior and the importance of over-spending to maintain a strong economy. When the root myth fell apart for me, the business about birth of a savior, the other more fun ones slowly became tarnished to a point where they weren’t real anymore, either, and Christmas Day began to seem like just another day to me.

Consequently, I have been going through the motions each year for the benefit of the children – all of the children of the world, but mostly for my daughter. While she no longer believes in Santa Claus, and I’m not sure what her official stance is on the Jesus matter (I’ve been doing some of my own brainwashing on her to combat the brainwashing from her mother and CCD . I lost religion in the divorce, but it doesn’t mean I can’t talk some sense into the kids on the side. I converted my son, but I think that had more to do with church being a boring drag than anything else.) she’s still into Christmas because of the presents (both giving and receiving), the decorations, the merry making and the good will toward men. Even the good will toward men gets to me every now and then. I try to appreciate it but, I have two issues that get in the way. First, why can’t there be good will toward men all year long? Why do we have to amp it up around Christmas and then piss on each other the rest of the year? Second, why can’t we have good will toward women, too? It’s almost as if women are treated as second class citizens in the Christian belief. I don’t know how you ladies put up with it. I wouldn’t. Somebody may need to slug the pope right in his dangling rosary beads. Just a suggestion.

As I was saying, I did feel a little bit of Christmas spirit this year because of the good will toward men, I mean, toward EVERYBODY notion. It started after I watched Meet Me In St. Louis when Judy Garland demanded in song that I have a merry little Christmas. It was magical. Oh baby, my heart strings, they were a-zinging. What a voice! What a star! What a cutie! Too bad she ended up becoming a horrible, pill-popping, drunk skank. But I did what she sang. From there it slowly built each day as I was pushed around by mean shoppers, honked at by harried drivers and trampled upon by the dire state of our economy. The more negative vibes I endured, the more I heard Judy sing in my head and the more the spirit grew. For a time I was able to cloak my disdain for the mythical pillars that created the season with the very feeling of warmth only this time of year could muster. It was almost as if I was falling in love with nobody in particular. Or maybe I was merely a necrophilic pool boy for the dusty corpse of Judy Garland. What’s the difference, really? I would find out later it was just gas from eating too many holiday burritos. But I enjoyed it while it lasted.

Bemused amidst a billow of holiday glee, I nabbed the daughter and braved the winter warlock to purchase new holiday decorations. We went to Menards, the most Christmassy place on Earth. Each year I buy at least two new pieces of decoration – one for inside the house and one for outside the house. We became the proud owners of a mischievous plastic light-up snowman for the front yard and a nineteen inch, fiber optic holiday moose to help guard the Christmas tree in the family room. This was going to be the best Christmas of the year!

The new trimmings’ acclimation into our team of decorations started out well. The sleeping holiday-talking Homer Simpson and holiday-decked-out My Size Barbie appreciated the help the moose gave them while guarding the tree (this is the fourth year in a row we’ve had no attacking incidents on the tree, by the way), and our plastic light-up Santa Claus seemed happy to have somebody his own size to stare down. But then, something strange began to happen. Each morning we found the snowman lying on the ground in a different spot in the yard. I had secured him to the ground the same way I secured the others. It hadn’t been windy. None of the other pieces were out of place. I couldn’t figure out what was happening, until one morning when I leaned over to pick up the snowman, I slipped in the snow and landed face to face with the him. His breath smelled like an old boot full of whiskey sitting in the sun for six hours and Slim Jims. Our snowman was a drunk!

I did not tell the kids, fearing it may ruin Christmas. But I couldn’t have a drunken snowman desecrating my lawn. Plus, I could tell my plastic Santa wasn’t too happy with him. I couldn’t lose my Santa. He pulls the whole front lawn decoration motif together. The last straw was when the snowman began trying to corrupt our cute little plastic light-up Christmas penguin. What would the cast of Happy Feet think? So, I sat the snowman down and gave him a stern talking to. I wasn’t sure it helped because all he did was stare at me with a mocking grin the entire time I scolded him. To my surprise, he remained standing in his spot the next couple of nights. It looked like I got through to him. Owning a drunken snowman is no different than raising children. You just need to love them and show them the way. And sometimes buy them stuff so they shut the hell up and leave you alone.

I thought all was well, so one night I planned some time for myself and headed out to a local pub. I was having a grand ole time whooping it up with the fellas and enjoying the holiday cheer. Later in the evening I happened to be wooing a fine lady at the bar. As we talked we moved closer and closer to each other. Right when I was about to move in for some sugar plums, I made the mistake of looking to my left. I don’t know why I did it – I just sensed something. There was the snowman standing on a bar stool staring at me. The sugar plum moment was destroyed. I could tell by the glazed over look in his eyes and by that maniacal smile that he was shit-faced again. I asked him what he was doing there. He said nothing. He just stared. Couldn’t he see I was with a fine lady? After a few moments of silence, I turned my back on him to try to pick up where we left off. The fine lady looked at me and said, “Your friend seems pretty drunk. You better take him home.” FOR THE LOVE OF JUDY!!! Realizing the sugar plums had gone stale, I closed my tab, which I noticed had eleven shots of whiskey on it that I had not ordered, grabbed the snowman by his radiating nose and dragged him out to the car. We didn’t speak a word to each other all the way home.

A few days later when my daughter came home from school, after being at her mom’s house for a few days, she asked me why the snowman was duct taped to the bush. “It’s an ancient Armenian tradition to bring good luck in the new year.” “Are we Armenian?” “We are now.”

Fortunately, my Christmas spirit survived the drunken snowman’s follies, but has faded since I stopped eating the holiday burritos. The important thing is that I had a loving holiday season with my family. And I now have a fiber optic moose, who has become a pretty good pal. And we will always have Judy.

Von Is The New Meat

Thought I'd challenge you to start off the new year with a rather lengthy post. Pace yourself and it may last you through all of 2009....

Somehow back in the 80’s I acquired a number of albums from bands with “meat” in their name. It probably started with the Meat Puppets. Added a Meatmen (NSFW) record. I’m sure a Meat Loaf record regrettably found it’s way through my collection. And finally I discovered a little indie record with a handmade album cover from an odd ensemble calling themselves Meat Joy. Since then I’ve added some mp3’s from The Meat Purveyors, but I’m not counting those – vinyl only.

But I digress. Everyone knows that I review the annual Lovehammers New Year’s Eve show for my first post of the year. Even when I’m not there. Unfortunately, I seemed to have rankled a few hungover Hammerheads last year because I guess they were expecting an actual review of the show (what were they thinking?) including a set list and pictures of Marty. Because we know there aren’t enough of those out there.

So here’s my review. The lines for drinks were too long. Dot Dot Dot was annoying, but everyone was too drunk and paid too much to care. The Lovehammers rocked even though they haven’t played together in several years. And lots of women held up their cellphones all night either giving cell-certs to their far away friends or taking crappy cellphone pictures.

As you can see I’m generally cranky and don’t like people so I don’t have many friends. Even my wife left town for the week so she wouldn’t have to ring in the new year from the shadows of my disdain. So I hopped in the Sid-Mobile and drove up to Madison, home of The University of Wisconsin and unknowing coeds. The Sid-Mobile is kind of like the Batmobile except it doesn’t go as fast and doesn’t have nearly as many options. But it gets bitchin’ mileage, so cut me some slack.

The High Noon Saloon in Madison was hosting a bevy of bands, including my buddies The Von Ehrics. I could go up there and bug them as much or as little as I liked, hear some new music, do some people watching, and be otherwise free of any social niceties or responsibilities.

I rolled into town a little early so I could grab a bite to eat, and decided to check out the Brass Ring joint next door. It just happened that Gabe and Jeffery were there playing pool, so I caught up with them and ordered a Madtown burger for my last supper (of the year). It was a little light on the advertised Canadian bacon and if that had truly been my last supper I probably would have been pissed. Even Jesus might have sent it back. Also a little pricey, but not enough to get their High Life confiscated.

Eventually we headed over to the Saloon where the band gave the doorman the thumb pointed in my direction. I thought that they were possibly issuing a club restraining order against me, but as it turned out, in a moment of holiday charity they had deemed me worthy of “the list” and saved me the $12 cover. They must have also vouched that I was indeed 21 years of age as I didn’t have to show my ID even though I don’t look a day over 56.

We had missed the first band – The Hussy. A two-piece with a girl on drums and a guy on guitar, prompting obvious comparisons to, yes, The Carpenters. You know, assuming that Richard played guitar instead of piano. Sounds original – I hope it works out for them.

As I was hanging out at the bar, a guy caught my eye. Not because I’m gay, but because he was wearing Chuck Taylors. And overalls shorts that were too small for him. And makeup including lots of eye glitter. I was both hoping and fearing that he was part of the next band. Hoping that this wasn’t some random patron’s NYE ensemble, but fearing I would have to watch a band that included him. Sensing my unease, the guys invited me back to the green room, a small room next to the stage about the size of a foosball table. Where we were soon joined by overalls guy and a cast of other assorted characters gathering up props such as balloons, homemade train car cutouts, and foam disc shooters. I’m sure The Von Ehrics have seen lots of stuff on the road but as overalls guy bent over to tie up his shoes, I’m pretty sure it was the first time Jason has had a guy wearing glitter makeup and singing show tunes shaking his ass in his face. At least I hope it was. I also got to see a girl change clothes from a 50’s style homecoming dress into a ninja outfit. Even I can’t make this shit up.

After hearing a few songs from the green room, I left the guys to plan their set list and decided to check out Screaming Cyn Cyn and the Pons. Surprisingly, I was not as annoyed as I was entertained. It was as if you took the B-52’s, mixed in an episode of Pee-Wee’s Playhouse, and added a touch of Devo and the Suburban Lawns. I actually enjoyed the Cyn Cyn’s song Set The Table and wish I had it on video. Oh, wait, the magic of youtube. I don’t think I’d drive two hours to Madison to see them again, but if they were playing in the neighborhood and there weren’t any good games on TV I might venture out to see them. And I'd definitely show up if Cyn Cyn set a spot at the table for me.

Next on the bill was Ouija Radio. I had high expectations for this band – pretty cool name, normal looking drummer, white-guy dreads on the bass player, and a Leather Tuscadero for the new millennium on guitar and vocals. And they pretty much delivered some straight-ahead, high energy, in your face rock and roll. If they had been playing Arnold’s Drive-In down the road in Milwaukee, the Fonz would have approved and probably taken front-woman Christy Hunt out after the show. Then there would have been the emotional episode where she has to leave town to tour in support of the new Von Bondies record, but the Fonz has to be cool with it because music is her passion. And rhythm is the dancer.

The Von Ehrics were up next and here is another thing I love about them. They pretty much booked the show knowing that they wouldn’t have their equipment with them. They had flown to Madison the week before to record their new record for Crustacean so only had one guitar, one bass, and a bag of drumsticks. They knew they could depend on the generosity of their fellow musicians to hook them up, and the other bands on the bill proved them right. It was a regular Hallmark moment. I shed a tear but I think it was just the smoke hanging in the air.

As they were setting up someone alerted Jason that midnight was approaching so he improvised a countdown using his cellphone and probably got it within a minute or so of the actual time. He ain’t Dick Clark, but these days neither is Dick Clark.

I was forewarned that the set had the potential to be a train wreck as they hadn’t played since the summer, but other than a couple small hiccups I couldn’t tell the difference. It’s not like they were playing for the admissions committee at Julliard. They were playing a loud and fast set for a bunch of drunks that wanted to ring in the new year loudly and fastly. Done deal. Even a group that looked as if it had been delivered from The Island of Misfit Revelers had formed a wonderfully dorky pseudo-moshpit. If you want more details on a Von Ehrics show, check out my extremely long-winded, wildly digressing post on their 2007 World Tour. Otherwise just trust me when I tell you not to miss them if they come to your town, and even better, buy them a beer and be sure to introduce yourself. Also make sure they have a place to crash, and while you’re at it buy a CD and a t-shirt so they can fill their tank with gas. It’s very little to ask before Miley Cyrus takes over this fucked up world.

The little green room was getting crowded with the ghost of New Year’s bands past, present and future, so I made sure not to overstay my welcome and stayed out in the bar to check out the next set from Brainerd. Was Paranoid in your album collction in the 70’s? Do you still have it? Was playing Metallica at your wedding reception part of the negotiations with your ex-wife? Are you still mourning the loss of Dimebag Darrell? If you answered “yes” to any of those questions, you’d probably feel right at home at a Brainerd show. I can’t tell you the difference between thrash metal, death metal, black metal, power metal, doom metal and precious metal, but Beavis and Butthead would approve and would probably steal a Brainerd t-shirt.

By this time the remaining revelers were more sauced than the crowd at the annual La Tomatina tomato fight. A guy in a Packers touque stumbled up to me and just stared at me as if he were trying to figure out whether I was a streetlight or Shania Twain. Immediately thereafter a girl walked right into me as if I weren’t an obstacle that needed to be avoided. Had I not been there she surely would have walked into the pole behind me. She stopped, grabbed my arm, tapped my beer bottle and pointed it toward my face and then wandered toward the door. Another girl was passed out on the pool table – I’m sure you can find the photos on Facebook somewhere. Even though The Zebras still had to play that evening, I decided to call it a night before I ran into any of my new friends on the road. Or have them run into me. Besides, I’m not sure I could handle the spastic, fun, discordant, deconstructionist art-punk-metal that The Zebras promised to bring. I wasn’t in the mood to have anything deconstructed. Nothing personal.

So there you have it. The Von Ehrics. The Von Bondies. Von Iva is coming to town soon. Not to mention the Von Trapp family, Ludwig Von Beethoven and Von Halen.

Yep, Von is the new Meat.



Happy New Year, Y'All.

We Suck, Therefore We Resolve

As we all know, most people suck. This is why so many of us make resolutions each year, in the hopes of not sucking the following year. But, we always do. We may not suck the same way we did last year, but we suck all the same, yet differently. If people stopped sucking, they would stop making resolutions. Like you, I'm tired of sucking the same way I've sucked for the year that was 2008. The following resolutions are how I would like to modify my suckitude for 2009. Feel free to copy off me, if you would like. We could be suck buddies.

I resolve to chew thoroughly every bit of corn I consume so as not to see them again at a later time.

I resolve to ignore.

I resolve to field a team instead of constantly teeming a field.

I resolve to sit patiently while the doctor reapplies the cement.

I resolve to ask questions while shooting, instead of just shooting first.

I resolve to take three hundred and fifty-third in the Lottery.

I resolve to be more attentive to my self-preservation needs (which is not a euphemism for masturbation, although I'm sure that will play a role).

I resolve to put the stink back into elegance.

I resolve to live life as if there were no tomorrow, nor yesterday, nor even today.

Urinalysis

Lots of stuff going on and lots of posts being shelved until I get a chance to catch up. I’ve been busier than a one-legged man who’s really busy. When I was in Texas they seemed to have much better metaphors for stuff. Like days when it would rain harder than a cow pissing on a flat rock.

Speaking of which, they don’t have any flat rocks at work to demonstrate so I usually just head down the hall to the men’s room when I need to see a man about a horse. When jockeys say that I guess you never know whether they’re really going to see a man about a horse or just using it as a euphemism. Since I don’t work with horses or have enough room to keep a horse at home, you can assume that I’m off to take a leak if you ever hear me say that. Not that I would ever say that. But I did have an intern once who had a merchant marine background and insisted on telling me every time he was going to “hit the head.” Even when I told him he didn’t have to alert me each time. He stopped just short of saluting me. After he graduated from the Academy the only job he could find was driving a casino boat in a circle, so he ended up working for us before he went crazy and took a bunch of blue-haired granny gamblers on a joyride down the Des Plaines River. But I digress.

Believe it or not, the cow pissing on the flat rock was not a digression. I intended to extol my good hygiene and how militant I am about hand washing. The problem is that I think I’m washing or rinsing a little too violently because on more than a couple occasions I’ve recently splashed significant amounts of water onto my pants (or kilt if it’s not too chilly out). Then I end up returning from the men’s room looking like I pissed all over myself and in severe need of remedial lessons in going #1.

I may have to start wearing an apron.

Knute Rockne, I Am Not

It’s finals week here in the Rub abode. At least for my son it is. And he’s actually been studying! Once I determined he was not an alien replacement organism, I patted him on the head, gave him a cookie and said, “good boy”. Not knowing how to respond to my behavior, he took the dog’s lead and licked himself. I’m all about positive reinforcement – canine and human alike.

This morning he seemed a little groggy. So, I gave him a two liter bottle of Jolt Cola and a bag of Skittles for breakfast. He still seemed punchy. What kind of a parent would I be if I sent him out to take two finals in such a tepid state of mind? I had to rile him up.

To get his mind cranking a little, I asked him about what he expected to be on his tests. He replied with a snotty, “Everything - they’re finals, you know.” No need to be a dick, asswipe. I devised another line of questioning specifically designed to entice the capillaries feeding his brain, to which he replied with a Gatling gun-like round of “I don’t know” responses.

Since brain tickling seemed like a lost cause, I decided to rev up his mind through psychosomatic irritation. I began punching his arm, daring him to get mad at me, to get mad at the tests. “Don’t take crap from those tests, dirtbag! You can take them! They’re just words on a page. Are you gonna let harmless little words get the better of you? You gotta show those words who’s boss! You gotta get mean! You gotta get ugly! You gotta smell bad! You gotta take a relaxed yet alert posteur and draw consistent and deliberate lines and curves with your yellow number two pencil! YOU GOTTA GRAB THOSE TESTS BY THE BALLS AND RIP THEM APART!”

“I’m going to miss the bus.” And he left.

Then I remembered he wasn’t very good at comprehending figurative language. Luckily, he never listens to me. I think he’d get a zero for a ripped up final. But if he did listen to me, literally, I would be interested where he grabbed the tests before he ripped them apart.

The Passive-Aggressive Cleaning of George

Two of my sisters think I’m fat. They didn’t come right out and say it. They conveyed their opinions of me through the ancient art of passive-aggressive gift giving. Most people do it. Husbands give their wives sexy nightwear in hopes of transforming a tired mom into a skanky cock gobbler. Wives give their husbands power tools to give them something to do other than thinking about tooling for anus. Bosses give their employees squishy stress relieving squeeze toys because they had them left over from the trade show and can’t use them next year because they were stupid enough to put a date on them, which isn’t exactly a passive-aggressive action, unless you interpret it as a measure to distract the workers from the lack of bonuses dispensed so they don’t waylay the bosses in the parking lot, in which case it is both passive-aggressive and lily-livered. Doctors give their nurses free rectal exams because, well, why not? There is nothing wrong with a friendly rectal exam. And sisters give their brothers a hard time whenever possible. Gift giving is no exception.

In the past year and a half, they have each given me a George Foreman Lean Mean Fat Reducing Grilling Machine as a gift. Is it because I’m a bachelor on the go, and have little time for culinary activities? Is it because George Foreman used to be my favorite boxer? Is it because they are concerned about my health? No, it’s because they think I’m fat and want to make fun of me. I get it. I need to reduce my fat intake. That’s fine. I can’t argue with them. I’m a little chubby – but only around the fat areas of my body. My ankles are in good shape. They’re like race horse ankles. And you should see my sleek elbows. One would wonder why I am not a professional elbow slash ankle model. I know I wonder about that.

Insult or not, the George Foreman grill is an effective cooking machine. It renders steaks a perfect hue of pink, detoxifies rancid chicken in a succulent manner, crisps corn flakes to a delectable singe and vaporizes little drops of water when I’m strapped for entertainment and have no cash for the bar. But, the grill has one annoying flaw. It doesn’t self clean. My oven does, why can’t the George Foreman grill? What is the difference between an oven and a grill? Wanna go camping? Not only does it not self clean, it is a pain in the ass to clean.

The cleaning instructions suggest waiting until the grill has cooled before cleaning, purporting some precautionary piffle about avoiding burns and skin grafts. The problem is the cooling time is also animal fat petrifaction time. By the time the grill becomes a safe temperature to clean, the left-over meat residue has chemically melded with the so-called non-stick surface. Removing it is like trying to grind the scuz off Paris Hilton. As a joke, they include a molded piece of plastic to help scrape the charred meat scum. It cracked in half the first time I tried using it – and that was only to carve a totem pole out of a banana. It would probably disintegrate if I tried using it on the petrified animal fat.

I was about to drop the grill into a vat of Ocean Spray Cran-Salami juice until I read, in large bold letters in the instructions, Do Not Immerse In Water Or Other Liquid. Not only did that ruin the light show for my Accompanying Flavors of Cranberry Juice Festival, it destroyed my hopes to turn the George Foreman grill into my new favorite bath toy. This, of course, has nothing to do with the cleaning of the product, but I felt it was important to mention at this time because I figured some of you were wondering about it.

Ultimately, it takes about fifteen minutes of dousing and scrubbing to clean the grill. In my world, where cleaning after cooking either involves the dish washer or the garbage can, that’s the definition of pain-in-the-ass. Consequently, I don’t use the grill often. I set aside the first one I received after using it once without cleaning it, and forgot about it, only to find it a few months later underneath the couch. Who knew the George Foreman grill could also be used as a Petri Dish? They may want to incorporate that feature into their brochures. The grill my other sister gave me is still clean. And it’s still in the box. That’s the best way to keep it clean.

Now that I think about it, George Foreman is fatter than I am. The grill must not help people lose weight. Maybe my sisters weren’t trying to torment my fat. Maybe they wanted to torture me through excessive cleaning aggravation. They know I only clean enough to keep my kids from drowning in soot. Either way, I admire their dastardly ingenuity. You got me. Nice one.

Fanny: An Interpretation

Fanny
by Edgar Allan Poe

The dying swan by northern lakes
Sings its wild death song, sweet and clear,
And as the solemn music breaks
O'er hill and glen dissolves in air;
Thus musical thy soft voice came,
Thus trembled on thy tongue my name.

Like sunburst through the ebon cloud,
Which veils the solemn midnight sky,
Piercing cold evening's sable shroud
Thus came the first glance of that eye;
But like adamantine rock,
My spirit met and braved the shock.

Let memory the boy recall
Who laid his heart upon thy shrine,
When far away his footsteps fall,
Think that he deem'd thy charms divine;
A victim of love's altar slain,
By witching eyes which looked disdain.

Why did Edgar Allan Poe write a poem about somebody's ass? That is what I thought when I read the title of this poem - Fanny. Poe, it seemed to me, had too much class to write about something so trashy. Although his other works tended to concern the macabre and the psycho-gruesome, his approach had seemed sophisticated. The fact is that old Edgar was a guy, and that "class" was feigned. You knew at some point his true nature would surface. And surface it did; in the form of Fanny. It's not a pretty sight.

Guys like women's asses. If we had the talent, I'm sure we would all write a poem or two praising them. Since the majority of us aren't as gifted as Poe, our verses are manifested in whistles, howls and grunts. Sadly, our efforts aren't as appreciated as of those who can paint with a quill. Fanny is no more than a primal grunt from Poe as he wallowed in the inescapable truth of his maleness.

After reading Fanny I was confused. Not one mention of a butt; not even a cheek. This surprised me, because the word "ass" has many words that rhyme with it: bass, class, gas, glass, lass, mass, etc.. It should have been simple to write a poem using all of those rhymes, not to mention the plethora of rhymes that go with butt, buns, tush, rump, rear end, derriere, gluteus maximus, buttocks and, of course, pooper and turd cutter. Yet, the words in the poem did not seem to live up to the title. I felt disappointed. Instead of giving up, I decided to dig deeper into the hidden meaning of the words on the page. To my delight, Poe, like the master that he was, came through for me.

With most poetry, the meaning is never blatant. Hence the need for interpretation. I gouged the lines of verse to discover Poe's true perspective on the posterior.

The poem presents itself in retrospection of a man looking back on his younger years when he tangled with his attraction to "Fanny", as described in the third stanza: "Let memory the boy recall". The event encoded in memory must have taken place some time in the past, "when far away his footsteps" fell. Obviously, he met someone with a remarkable backside, and he confused his lust for the butt with love for the person who wore the butt. He "deem'd thy charms divine". Literally translated, those charms were an ass made in heaven.

The second stanza describes his first rendezvous with the "Fanny". This gets a little disgusting, so bear with me. Remember, I did not write this poem. I am merely an observer. Also, keep in mind that Poe was bent toward the degenerate side.

In this stanza, he finds himself in the Arctic (I will explain why later), as evidenced by sunburst through the clouds in the "midnight sky". Sun and midnight rarely commingle unless you are near one of the earth's polar regions during the summer. My hunch tells me he was in the north; that's just the kind of guy Poe was. The appearance of the cloudy sky provokes his memory of the initial look at the bung in question: "Thus came the first glance of that eye." In many circles (at least the ones with which I am familiar), the anus is referred to as "the brown eye". Why Poe chose to use this uncouth analogy, one can only guess. So, I will.

At this point in the interpretation process, it helps to have knowledge of the personality of the author. Poe was not very smooth with the ladies. He had a hard time meeting them. One covert strategy he employed was to climb into the pit of the ladies outhouse, pretending to be searching for a lost wallet, with the hopes of initiating a chance encounter. As he was extremely shy, he generally went unnoticed as he floundered in the sewage, too afraid to fulfill his scheme. From this vantage point, Poe had direct view of "the brown eye", if you will. It was during one of these endeavors that he spotted the "eye" of worship and became infatuated with it. You could imagine how the lighting underneath an outhouse might resemble that of a northern evening sky, so I will not offer a graphic description. It is this parallel that stimulates the author's memory to this occasion.

The power of his infatuation or his "spirit"..."like the adamantine rock" vanquished his normal apprehensiveness as it "braved the shock". He pursued and seized the ass and the woman to whom it belonged. Like most relationships based on carnal attraction, this one failed. Focus switches from the single "eye" (her tush), which originally enticed him, to the "witching eyes that looked disdain". Disdain brought about when she finally learned of his cesspit meanderings, which also explained his interesting aroma. He should have known he could not keep his squalid past a secret forever. My guess is that one of his buddies, hopped up on mead, haphazardly blurted it out at a party. She dumped him, leaving him "a victim on love's altar slain".

With a broken soul and pain in his heart, he traveled to the North Pole to introspect. The first stanza begins at this point. After appropriating some of his pent up aggression on the skull of a swan, he takes time to reflect. As he listens from a distance to the wailing of the broken fowl, his retrospection begins. He realizes that the swan's "wild death song" (probably "Killed By Death", by Motorhead) echoes his waning state of being. "Thus trembled on thy tongue my name." I'm not sure if swans have tongues, but it doesn't matter. The metaphor works, and he probably got extra credit for using a personification. It would not have been as effective if he chose to write, "Thus trembled on thy BILL my name". That would have been silly, and Poe would have lost all credibility.

We now know what Poe is telling us. It's an idea that has been around for eons and can be summed up with the old proverb, "Don't let the little head do the thinking for the big head." This philosophy is never a main ingredient in a successful relationship, although it works well as a garnish. Poe's greatness allows him the ability to expand on this adage: "...unless you don't mind becoming distraught, moving to the North Pole and clubbing water fowl".

William Byrd: A High School Report

William Byrd was one of the most celebrated English composers of the Renaissance. He was born in 1540, underneath a milking cow. He had begun as a musician at an early age. He was so young, in fact, he whittled a flute in his mother’s womb out of one of his newly generated femurs. Later in life his leg would play beautiful music when he stood pantless in the yard on a windy day. He sang in the Chapel Royal during Mary Tudor’s reign which placed him in the best choir in England. He was the worst one in the choir, but it was still the best choir. It looked the same as the best singer on his resume’. He had trouble hitting the middle E #. Because of colon polyps in his throat, his voice would skip right over it. William was 18 when Mary Tudor died and her half-sister, Queen Elizabeth, succeeded her. Elizabeth was only her half-sister because the other half of her was her cousin Murray’s half-uncle. It was a strange family. In his middle 20’s Byrd became an organist and a choir master of Lincoln Cathedral, and lived at 6 Minister Yard in the Cathedral house. This is significant because most Lincoln Cathedral organist lived in the boat house, but he was probably given better quarters due to his role in the choir. He was the first to incorporate show tunes into the mass. The Clergy apparently had to reprimand him for playing excessive length services, although he did continue to write music specifically to be played at Lincoln even after his move to London. They never played that music, but he wrote it for them, anyway. William Byrd married Juliana in 1568, and had at least 7 kids. He lost count after a while because he wasn’t really trying to have kids – he was just trying to have sex, but the damn kids kept coming out. After being named a gentleman of the Chapel Royal in 1572, he moved back to England. Prior to that he was considered a churlish brute of the Chapel Royal and didn’t feel he could show his face in England. He worked there as a singer, composer and organist for more than 2 decades. As an inside joke, he always set a bouquet of tulips on his organ, just to lighten his mood. He wrote a large amount of Anglican Church music for the Chapel Royal, and they were toe-tappers, to be sure. In 1593 William moved with his family to the small village of Stondon Massey in Essex and spent the remaining 30 years of his life there. From a very young age, Byrd was fascinated by stone hills. Moving to Stondon Massey completed him as a person. On July 4^th, 1623 he died and was buried in an unmarked grave in the Stondon Churchyard. He didn’t want anybody looking at him when he was dead. How embarrassing. William Byrd’s life is interesting because of his association with the Roman Catholic Church and his work in the court of the Anglican Queen Elizabeth I. Yes, that was VERY interesting. Unbelievably interesting. So interesting, in fact, that when somebody speaks of his life at a cocktail party, I always say, “My, how interesting.” William Byrd was a great composer, a talented man and should be remembered for a long time. But he won’t be, unless people are forced to keep writing stupid reports about him.

To Those Concerned I'm Spending Too Much Time At The Polish Bakery

Sometimes it’s better to be lucky than good.

I rolled into town on my road trip Sunday only a little behind schedule due to the snow and in time to catch the Bears game. The weather was crappy, so I asked the pixie-like front desk clerk (pixie-like as in the mythological creature, not the Black Francis type) for a recommendation on my quest for a decent sandwich and a screen to watch the game. She smacked her gum a couple times and sent me two doors down to the sports bar in the neighboring hotel.

Hotel sports bars, as a rule, suck. They’re like the finance department at an auto dealership. Like the sushi platter from Costco. Like the Cubs in the playoffs. Like the scrambled eggs at a breakfast buffet. Like a no-smoking sign on your cigarette break. Like a traffic jam when you’re already late. Wait, I think I’m getting away from suckitude and into irony. And I digress.

But the snow was blowing sideways and I didn’t feel like driving so I skipped across the parking lot to check it out. There was one other patron, a creepy fat guy sitting square in front of one of the two big screens. The décor reminded me of a joint that the Charlestown Chiefs might frequent after a game (see Slapshot, circa 1977) and did not appear to have been updated since that era. I grabbed a white leather lounge chair at the bar and inquired if the kitchen was open. I didn’t understand the mumbling barkeep but he handed me a couple pieces of paper that looked like they were spit out of an ink-jet printer several years ago. I ordered the special Hawkeye burger and a diet coke and nodded in response to the incoherent comments the barkeep made during the game, while a few other creepy guys filed in and filled the grimy, yet groovy chairs in the lounge.

Then they walked in. Number one was tall and wearing spike heels that nobody had business wearing in this weather. But she must have been well acclimated to the cold since she wasn’t wearing underwear either. I know this because when she bent down to the bar to get her drink her dangerously low-rise jeans dropped into the danger-zone revealing nothing but the top half of her bare butt.

Number two was wearing proper shoes, but was also apparently well acclimated to the cold because her shirt was… well, I know what it was but I don’t know what it was called. I wanted to say camisole, but when I looked it up it wasn’t what I thought it was. Okay, I did further research and I guess it can be called a cami, but I’ll also have to add relaxed fit and, well, wonderfully slutty. The cami can be your secret weapon - it looks sexy on its own with jeans or worn with a shrunken cardigan, tie-front sweater or fitted blazer.



I overhead some of the exchanges with the barkeep, and it turns out that by not going to the strip club down the street to watch the game that I, by total chance, ended up going to the bar where dancers from the club hang out. Which means I got to enjoy the scenery and watch the game without some topless harlot trying to sell me a table dance every 30 seconds.

It’s just too bad the burger sucked.