"Late December Back in '63 (93)"

I saw The Jersey Boys the other night. For those of you who don't know, it's a musical about Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons, and it was incredible.

Here's something I didn't know until I saw this thing: "December, 1963 (Oh What a Night)" is about the songwriter getting laid for the first time. I was suddently reminded that the song was our prom theme in high school. Now, getting laid and proms were not "themes" for Dr. Kenneth in high school, but I'm sure it was for some. What I don't get is how the adults approving this, having grown up closer to the time of the song coming out, let this devirginizing* song to get through.

How about you guys? What was the theme to your prom? Did you go? How awesome is that song, with or without the knowledge of its lyrical content? Anyone remember a song associated with their devirginization?**

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*Not a word

**Still not a word

Gancey Life Lessons to Make Your Life a Little Gancier

Here's some things I learned over the past couple of weeks:

1. I've been taking pictures of tourists for 9 straight days, and I learned this: Asian Indian men love them some striped shirts. It's really an incredible phenomenon, but I can't believe it took me this long to notice it, given that my workplace is saturated with Asian Indian fellas donning the darned things.

2. I went to a shit-hole karaoke bar the other night, and I learned some things there too.
A) My buddy does a VERY funny version of Strokin' by Clarence Carter.

B) When the staff member manning the karaoke machine is piss drunk, it leads to some karaoke catastrophes.
C) When a guy wants to sing "Africa" by Toto and "Manic Monday" by the Bangles comes on instead (see point B), it is not nice to say, "Sing it anyway, pussy!"*
D) It's always good to have your cell around to take down a memo when something you think is real funny is going down, like a drunken Hispanic guy making an ass of himself. Here's what my phone memo said, and I'll break down what I meant by each thing, since it took me a while to piece together just what in the hell I meant:

"Honey bunny for hard for the money" - This is roughly what he was singing after taking the microphone away from whoever was supposed to be singing "She Works Hard for the Money" by Donna Summer. It was his own little breakdown during an instrumental part, and it kicked ass if you ask me.

"On mic, clear he didn't speak English." - He did have a thick accent, and based on his "honey bunny" line, I really don't think he spoke a lick of English.

"Kak shorts, sneakers, and striped polo." - That is what he was wearing, the shorts were real short, and the socks and sneakers made it look real nerdy.

"Hiked up shorts and did Flashdance." He did jack up his shorts and do the Jennifer Beals/Chris Farley, Maniac run in place.

D) Guys like that are what karaoke is all about. People who sing fairly well and take themselves seriously are actually a bigger embarrassment than the Mexican Michael Sambello.

3) Here's something I learned about women: When you want to say something romantic to your girlfriend, even if the two of you watched Wonderland the night before, don't text her this:
"I love you more than John Holmes loved tooting up countless rails of cocaine and beating a guy to death with a led pipe."

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*I yelled it, I didn't even know the guy, and I wasn't even drunk. Not yet, anyway.

I went to the suburbs yesterday to visit my parents because my dad wasn't feeling well. While my mom took him to the doctor, the dog and I jumped in the car and made a Dairy Queen run so they would have a nice treat waiting for them upon their return. It was a very suburban moment but loads of fun, and I remember that Tender by Blur* was providing the perfect accompaniment. While waiting for my blizzards and trying to tune out the obnoxious kids (one was saying the Cubs suck and the other said "so does your mom"), I was thinking about who I might run into. The sad thing is that the only people I'd likely see would be a friend's parents, since most of my friends had long since moved away. As I further waited for my bits of Oreo to properly grind up, it occurred to me that lots of the families had moved away too. I didn't know squat about this town! I'm surprised the DQ was still where I left it.


My dad did bump into one buddy's mom who still lives on the same street - our street. It's weird cause he lived on the same street as me, had the same first name, the same initials, was always tall with blond hair like me, and our poor teachers were always mixing us up. Then, as my dad is talking with his mom, she reveals that his first son has the exact same name as my nephew (which may or may not be Brendan Kenneth), who's middle name is named after me.

Kind of bazaar, but it wasn't that little coincidence that was on my mind that afternoon. I got to thinking about hanging out at his house when we were kids. His mom was a real sweet lady with one of those soft soothing voices, and she used to come into our school to sing folk songs with her guitar. The only song I can remember was "He's Got the Whole World in His Hands," because I used to picture some mammoth guy clutching the earth like a Wilson basketball. I know now that the song is likely talking about God having the world at his disposal, but being raised atheist, it didn't occur to me that the song meant anything deeper than some enormous dude spinning the world on his finger like a Globetrotter.

Dad seemed like a great guy when you were a kid. I remember my buddy and I would draw these robots with upside-down triangle bodies**, and dad would eat onions raw like apples and fart. One probably enhanced the other, I suppose. I can even remember two key phrases he'd say when ripping ass:

1.
The Dad: Did you see that lightning?
Son: No, there's no lightning.
Dad: Are you sure, cause I think I hear some thunder (that's when he'd start in with the onion farts)


2.
He'd sing, "Lights out. Uh-huh. Blast, blast, blast**" (And he'd fart on all three blasts. That still impresses me.)

As a kid he seemed like a great guy. He likes farts, and so did I! He was also unreal at Space Invaders on Atari. I always just tried to stay alive, blasting those critters as the crept closer and closer to my canon, as they moved faster and faster, especially those guys a few rows up who did progressively more intense jumping jacks. Friend's Dad would remain calm, handling his business with the aliens, and never missing a chance to blast that mother ship that would float by at the top of the screen, racking up Boo Koo points.

Now I realize that raw onion consumption, flatulence, and alien blasting does not make for a good father. My dad was one of those guys who figured out an unbeatable pattern on Pac-Man, but he still managed to be a great dad. He still is, and he's perhaps an even better grandfather. It turns out this guy's dad drank quite a bit and left the family, probably for another woman. I think he was living in Michigan for a while. I remember my buddy saying he went to visit him, and he nearly killed he and his sister in a car because he was so lit.

I guess my point to this goofy post is that I wish I could see things through a kid's eyes, and just enjoy people without my preconceived judgment, cynicism, and skepticism. It just seems like even the couples who seem happy eventually break up. Heather Locklear and Richie Sambora calling it quits was a crushing blow to my sense of hope.

Okay, Seven Readers, somebody break me of this lack of faith. Tell me about a happy marriage you know of - one that's so happy that just being around them for five minutes is enough to make you sick to your stomach.

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*The only thing that makes the song not perfect for that day was that he's singing about the night, but listening to it now, I realize that it's actually the perfect song for this post. Either way, you'll have to pause my music player on the right before playing the videos.

**Where is Mysterygirl when I need someone to draw one of these robots for me?

***The fact that this video says 1990 on it really threw me off, but then I found that it's actually from 1984. Yes, I'm old. Does anyone remember this song? Anyone else fart to it?

****There is no fourth set of asterisks, so don't look for it, especially you, Chud, but I just wanted to take this time to say that I'm going to work on sectioning off all in depth music stuff into the asterisks. That way my posts won't get too music-ish. If people want overly music-ish stuff, then they can read the asterisks part. I'll try, but I know there's no avoiding letting music seep into the meat of my blogs.

Holey Underwear, Batman! OR For Sale: Secondhand Underwear, So-So Condition, Only One Previous Owner

Do you ever get real lazy about doing your laundry and start dipping into the deep, deep reserves of scrub underwear? I'm talking scrubs off the nether regions of the bench that never get any playing time, not unlike mid 1990's Chicago Bull Ed Nealy*, affectionately known as "The Lunch Box." That's right, Ed. I'm likening you to my crappiest of undergarments.

This week I had already used up all the gym shorts I go to for makeshift boxers, and I was down to the . . . final . . . pair. They are a pair of white boxer briefs, bordering on tighty-whities, with so many holes that it looks as if someone dropped an M80 firecracker into them, which I hope never happens to anyone, especially if they are in said undies at the time. There is one especially gaping hole in the undercarriage, allowing my, well, undercarriage, to dip right out of those bad boys. That's right. Zero support, not at all functional, but so very, very lucky. I'd never want to get lucky in them. That's a task for my designer drawers, the Scottie Pippens of the world. Then again, you always get laid when you least suspect it, so odds are I would get some the night I'm wearing my Ed Nealy's.

During an uncomfortable train ride in my holiest of drawers, I was reminded that somewhere along the line I picked up the notion that the holey undies are one's lucky undies. Why? Is it possible that this concept was born out of the Great Depression as a means to make people feel better about not being able to afford proper under garments, kind of like when you tell a bride it's good luck to have rain on your wedding day, just to keep her from having a conniption and punching a maitre d'? Probably not, but when I say "born out of the great depression" I feel like I'm putting my history degree to good use, which helps me sleep at night.

How about you, seven readers? Do you have lucky underwear or underwear of any significance? I guess what I'm saying is, "All right, people I hardly know. Tell me something special about your undies!"

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*I couldn't find anything on the internet to verify that he ever had that nick name, but trust me, it was his nick name, at least on my block. I did, however, see that on the night Jordan scored 69 points, he called his mom to tell her that he and Mike combined for 72 points that night (2.7 was his average, so he kind of went off that night. Must have had his lucky undies on). Also, I could only find one picture of him on the web, and it was protected. I'm just trying to give the man his props, compare him to my whitey-tighties, and post it on the web. Where's the harm in that?

Openings and Mammary Glands

I had a friend in college who honest to God thought that Dr. Dre (yes, two Dre posts in a row) was not saying "Bitches ain't shit but ho's and tricks," but "bitches ain't shit but holes and tits."

Funny, yes, but the lyric almost works better, because his intent was putting down women; So why not break them down to the body parts he finds useful? I mean, I don't support that logic, but if you're a mysogonistic gangsta rapper, it makes perfect sense.

Have you ever heard Ben Folds sing that song? He really sings it with conviction!


There's also a new post of mine at The LC, if you want to swing by there.

Dr. Dre's "Keep Their Heads Ringing" came "buck buck buck buck booyaka shan"'ing onto my ipod yesterday while I was riding my Nishiki* to work, and I thought about how my mind can get on tangents from just about any lyric. I'd like to share with you this Pop-Up Video (TM) from the recesses of my mind with my thoughts in italics. The lyrics were cut and pasted without permission from songlyrics.com, and other research was done at various places on the internet, again, no permission at all.

Spoken intro:
Yeah, whattup, this is Dr. Dre
The party's goin on

Thank God it's Friday

The doctor is not only suggesting that Friday is as good as any to get a party "goin' on," but the day also refers to the film Friday, for which this song appeared on the soundtrack. I recall seeing this film at the University of Illinois, where my good friend was going to school. He insisted that it was really funny, and I was torn between trusting his opinion, which I often did, and thinking that he was smoking a bit too much of devil's cabbage. Turns out it was funny, and it remains highly quotable to this day, with or without the aid of the cheeba.

["Buck buck buck buck booyaka shan!" - KRS One" rpt 4X]

The fact that it was ex Boogie Down Productions MC, KRS One lending his voice here was news to me. I wish I could tell you just what in the hell "booyaka shan" means, but I'm sure it's pretty cool, solely based on how excited Mr. One sounds about it.

Chorus:

Keep their headz ringin (ding ding dong, ring-gading ding ding dong)
repeat 2X

Onomatopoeia is when a word that when pronounced sounds like a noise something makes, like "bow wow" or "woof woof." I remember in my high school Spanish text book the dogs said "guau guau" I'll have to keep that in mind next time I fuck around and try to speak Spanish to a dog.

Hey you, sittin over there
Say what?
You better get up out of your chair
That's right
And work your body down
Yeahhh...
No time to funk around, cause we gon....
Funk, you, right on up
So get up, get a move on, and get your groove on
It's the D-R-E the spectacular
In a party I go for your neck so call me Blackula

This is in reference to the film Blacula, the 1972 Blaxploitation cult classic. Do you think Blacula was pissed that he got called Blacula, since being an immortal, blood sucking vampire should have been more significant than the color of his skin? Before he sucked a white guy's blood, I bet the nerdy white guy was like, "Hey, a Black vampire! Say something funky-fresh before you bite me!" I should have stopped at the last comment. Oh well. We forge ahead . . .

As I drain a nigga's jugular vein
and maintain to leave blood stains so don't complain
Just chill, listen to the beats I spill
Keepin it real, enables me to make another meal
Still, niggaz run up and try to kill at will
But get popped like a pimple, so call me Clearasil

That was a little free advertising for the zit cream Clearasil. However, Dr. Dre is a doctor, so he could probably get his hands on some of that serious shit you see on the infomercials late at night. Don't some of those before shots look a little beyond acne, like maybe rickets, leperse, or whatever Seal has/had?

I wipe niggaz off the face of the Earth since birth
I been a bad nigga, now let me tell you what I'm worth
More than a Stealth bomber, I cause drama

A stealth bomber costed $1.157 billion in 1998, according to aerospaceweb.org, or something like that.

The enforcer, music flows like a flying saucer
Or a 747 jet, never forget
I'm that nigga that keeps the hoes' panties wet
The mic gets smoked, once you hear the beat kick
With grooves so funky, they come with a Speed Stick

Did you know that it takes me roughly a half hour to pick out deodorant these days? I have to take off the caps to make sure it's not the white flaky kind that gets stuck in my pit hair or the one that squirts up little sections of gel, because that crap runs out too fast. Then, I have to choose between arctic blast, winter storm, sport traction, double d., and triple unleaded sonic pit-fucker. Then, I have to find which one fits these qualifications and is two for five bucks. It's not easy. If only I were worth as much as a stealth bomber like Dr. Dre, and then I could pay some schmo to worry about my pits.

So check the flavor that I'm bringin
The motherfuckin D-R-E, will keep their
motherfuckin headz ringin

Chorus

One-two for the crew, three-fo' for the dough
Five for the hoe, six-seven-eight for Death Row
Mad niggaz about to feel the full effect of intellect
So I can collect respect, plus a check
Now I fin' to, get into to, my mental will take care of this business I need
to attend to cuz my rent's due
And this rap shit's my meal ticket
So you goddamn right I'm gonna kick it, or get evicted

Wait, I thought he was worth more than a jet? Shit, I never bought the "Friday" soundtrack. If I got Dr. Dre evicted, I'll never forgive myself . . .

I bring terror like Stephen King
A black Casanova, runnin niggaz over like Christine

For those of you who don't know, that's a great, and by great I mean great if you watch it with a 12-pack, 1980's movie about a crazy car that has a mind of its own and runs over teenagers.

When I rock the spot with the flavor I got
I kick plenty of ass, so call me an astronaut
As I blast past another nigga's ass that thought he was strong
But I smoke him like grass, just like Cheech and Chong
When I flow, niggaz know, it's time to take a hike
Cause I grab the mic and flip my tongue like a dyke

By that statement, the doctor is likening the tongue action of his rapping to a "dyke's" ability to yodel in the gulley, since they all have the same equipment, thus making them more vagina savvy.

I got rhymes to keep you enchanted
Produce a smokescreen with the funky green to keep your eyes slanted
So check the flavor that I'm bringin
The motherfuckin D-R-E, will keep their motherfuckin headz ringin

Chorus

Debonair with flair, I scare wear and tear
without a care, runnin shit as if I was a mayor
But I ain't no politician, no competition
Sendin all opposition to see a mortician
I'm up front, never in the back drop
Step on stage and get faded just like a flat top
Your rhyme sounds like you bought em at Stop N Go
Dre came to wax you so, just call me Mop N Glow
Many tried to, but just can't rock with
I'm 6-1, 225, a pure chocolate

At the time, the doctor was an inch shorter than me, 35 pounds heavier, and far chocolatier.

Your chances of jackin me are slim, G
Cause I rock from summer til Santa comes down the chimney
Ho ho ho, and so, as I continue to flow
Cause yo, I'm just a fly negro
So, check the flavor that I'm bringin'
The motherfuckin D-R-E will keep their motherfuckin headz ringin.

Chorus

Okay, that will do it. That was exhausting! That's probably what you're saying if you're still reading. Sorry . . .

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*Nishiki is the brand of my second-hand, piece-of-shit bicycle, but I bet you thought it was a crotch rocket.

Summer in Chicago: Thanks for the Swass, I Mean the Memories

It's like a million degrees in Chicago today. It's the kind of weather where you're just saturated in sweat, and you can't shake it. So, I must love my seven readers to sit my swassy* ass down and blog, when all I really want to do is dump Popsicles into my shorts and rub Fla-Vor-Ices (TM)** on my nips.

Irish Kids: My summer job means a new crop of Irish kids working with us. Those kids are a lot of fun. Too much fun. Whenever I'm a train wreck the next day, all I have to say to someone is, "Freeking Irish kids." My plan this summer is to not get to know any of them. In fact, I won't even look any of them in the eye or speak to any of them directly unless I absolutely have to. Stay away from me with your demon rum, you pasty devils . . .

Dog Person?: The lady wanted to get one more drink after we had already had a couple of bottles of wine at dinner. I didn't think it was too good of an idea, but then I drove by the biggest shit hole bar you ever saw. I'm a sucker for a dump bar, and this one was right up my alley. We walk in the place, it's quiet, and there's literally no customers. We got talking to Boyd, the charming bartender with a Southern accent who looked to be around 60-years-old, and out of nowhere, Gancer's Lady says to Boyd, "You look like a dog person." To which he says, "Well, I don't have a dog. I don't like them all that much, but I guess if I'm a dog or a cat person, then I guess I'm a dog person." I nearly fell off my stool when she asked him that, and then it was even funnier when he responded that way. Guess you had to be there . . .

The Chicago Cubs Have not won a World Series since 1908. Right Now, in 2008, the Cubs Are the Best Team in Baseball: Yes, if you do the math, if we don't win it all this year, it will officially be over 100 years since we did. I went to the game last night, and we really look like a major league ball club. Today we*** got a home run to tie it in the bottom of the ninth, and then got hit by a pitch for the win. These guys are finding ways to win every day and everyone is contributing, which is what you see from teams that . . . Let's just move on before I fuck it up.

Consider That Azz Backed Up: As I crank up the old iPod in my car the other day, I was really excited to get out of work; So excited that it didn't dawn on me that Back That Azz Up by Juvenile would not be a good song to play when you're parked by a school with a bunch of kindergarten through eighth graders walking home with their book bags. God willing, they didn't hear any of these lines, or what's worse, hear that I knew the words:

You got a stupid ass yeah, make me laugh yeah
Make a nigga wanna grab that, autograph that
I'm sweatin in the drawers yeah, hard and long yeah
Wanna walk it like a dog yeah, break you off yeah




That's quite a stanza, but how about this?:

Them titties sittin nice yeah, I wanna bite yeah
I could fuck you right yeah, all night yeah
Wanna bring it to my house yeah, on the couch yeah
Knock the pussy out yeah, get them out yeah
I wanna see these hoes yeah, bend it low yeah
Let me run it in the hole yeah, and let me know yeah

I felt like an idiot thinking that some kids might have caught my white ass playing that, but I was laughing when he said that "run it in the hole" line. Shit, I'm laughing now.

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* The definition we're looking for is NOT the one credited to Sir Mix-A-Lot

** You might call them Otter Pops (TM) if you grew up in certain areas, but either way, they're nice on the nips on a day like today.

*** I know that we didn't do anything, but that's just the way that we talk about our beloved Cubbies out here, so deal with it.

Kids Say the Deuchiest Things

I'm getting into full swing of my summer job, which sometimes means partying with people way younger than myself. Actually, the party I went to last night was at the same house as the party in a previous post.

I was making some observations while positioned on a balcony where, for whatever reason, very few guests ventured. This amounted to box seats for watching deuches in their natural habitat, and they came out in all variations . . .

Hula Deuche: There was a girl spinning a glowing hula hoop around with her whole body, using a slithering motion. All right, actually, that was more cool and sexy than it was deuchie. She got a golf clap from The Gancer.

Mouse Trap Deuche: A guy came storming out onto the balcony to ask for a "small rubber band" to jerry-rig a portion of the game Mouse Trap. I'm sure he was in college, but he looked 14. In his hastiness, he hadn't noticed that he locked himself out, but the rubber band was his chief concern. I felt like calling his parents to tell them that it looks as if their son has got into some heavy drugs, he's slipped into a Milton Bradley induced dementia, and his deuche baggery has reached alarming levels.

Deuchie Host: Actually, she's a good kid. I saw a big drum and asked if it was some sort of jungle juice. She told me that it had been numerous gallons of "pink pantie droppers," but it was now reduced to a few boozy pieces of fruit. Beer was scarce at the party too, but I was happy to celebrate her birthday, in spite of that and her suck-hole friends.

Deuche of the White Rhino Variety: He was a trendy black dude with a headband and, I'll say it, pretty eyes, and he looked a little like Lenny Kravitz, another big time D. Bag. He had me pinned into a corner of the kitchen, and he was going on and on and on and on and on about how pot will be legalized in the next ten to fifteen years, because of something or other about the government - perhaps based on something he had heard in his poli-sci class earlier that week. I then heard him throwing out some prices for some of his products. $50 for a bag of very "dank" pot and $65 for white rhino, or something like that. I'm so out of it when it comes to pot. I think he became aware of that when I said that I wouldn't mind seeing "dope" (I actually used that word) legalized, but I just can't picture it. Like, you walk into a liquor store and say, "I'll take a sixer of bud and some white rhino dope." He said something like, "Why do you call it dope? That implies anyone who smokes it is a dope." I would never imply anything like that, although, this guy certainly was.

My point is that kids are so sucky these days. Just to the right of the hula hoop girl, there was a hippy drum circle, and I think I saw a sitar. A sitar! Maybe kids have always sucked, but I just wish they weren't so trendy, and would just be themselves. I talked with one real cool kid for quite some time, who was celebrating not getting fired from his fish aquarium job (his "weed money job"), but other than him and maybe one other guy, it was a backyard full schmucks.

If I ever have kids some day, I'll be sure to tell my son, "At the first sign that you are becoming a d. bag, I'm punching you in the crotch. If that doesn't work, you're off to military school. If that doesn't take the deuche out of you, then I'm taking away your sitar.

Ninja Rap and Useless Crap

1. The chorus of Humpin' Around by Bobby Brown sounds exactly like the guitar riff from Dancing Days by Led Zeppelin. I'm not sure if I would have noticed it, but there was a Zep. tribute album out at around the time with a version of Dancing Days by Stone Temple Pilots. I think Bobby should have given the the Zeps full credit, got Jimmy Page to play the guitar, and just called the thing Humpin' Days.


Speaking of Bobby Brown, and I often do, I just saw the video of On Our Own, his contribution to the Ghostbusters 2 soundtrack. It's a pretty bumping song, but why the rap in the middle with awful lyrics about the awful movie? "Grabbed their proton backs on their backs, and they split?" Another bad movie rap around that time came when Vanilla Ice lent a hand to the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Secret of the Ooze soundtrack with Ninja Rap*, complete with an oh-so-stupid chorus of "Go, ninja! Go!" The shit literally "oozed" off that record. MC Hammer cut an equally moronic record called Addams Family Groove, which was anything but "proper."**


You know some rich white guy came up with the idea to make these songs, thinking the kids would think it was cool, but no kid over the age of 8 should have thought any of those songs were cool. Furthermore, none of these artists should have performed them if they had any notion of self-respect. You'd never see NWA doing a Little Mermaid Rap. "Go, Mermaid. Go, Mermaid. Go, Mermaid. Go! Go land yourself a prince without the benefit of your voice, beeyotch! Hans Christian Anderson up in this muthafucka!"

2. I was talking to an African American fifth grader who, in private, informed me that there is a staff member (not this one) who "always be pushin' up on the ladies." That's my new favorite phrase, and I plan on saying it 13 times this weekend alone.

3. When I feel miserable, everything I write about seems so pointless. Even more so than usual.

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*I left the Youtube of Ninja Rap going during a mellow track by Travis, and it was real interesting. I smell a collaboration! Mellow, mellow, RAP!

**That was for my main-liar Cherry.

Something occurred to me yesterday as a hairy guy rubbed my back . . .

. . . and that is this: Once you zone out, the sex of the masseuse does not matter. Sure, the first few minutes of a dude lathering me up in lotion was a little off putting. Yes, when he'd really dig into my pressure points, he'd let out a heavy breath, and that was a little gross. However, he let me bring a CD, so by track three of Radiohead's The Bends, I was in my own little world.

I should explain. This was my Polish immigrant landlord giving me a rub down. Just kidding. Actually, it was a complimentary massage I got after my last session of physical therapy for my pinkie.

So, what else is going on with The Gancer besides deep tissue, homoerotic massages?

1. I'm teaching again, and loving it again.
2. I'm still trying to write whenever I can. I'm really pleased with how my Goofy Rock Names piece came out.
3. This summer I'm going to try to ride my bike and play volleyball* for more hours than I drink.
4. I've been dating the same gal for almost half a year.
5. I went to the Liar's Club last night. The Naked Guy was there, and I really wanted some friends, who were first-timers, to see him flop around for a bit. To get him to do the naked dance, one needs to request his song. It wasn't looking good, because there was some guest DJ who only played techno shit. I tried to put in a request with him, but he pretended not to notice me while he fiddled with his knobs and played shit song after shit song. My buddy said the music sounded like it was made by a robot who had to go to rehab for being a sucky robot. I said to Naked Guy, "Hey, Naked Guy. You going to get good and naked this evening?" To which he replied, "I don't think they have a techno version of my song," his song being It's Getting Hot in Herre by Nelly. Alas, there would be no nakedness.

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*I had to offset the other picture with this one, so everyone can enjoy a butt, except Morrissey, who's asexual, but he doesn't read anymore. The picture reminds me of an Asian Indian gal who was always in the same league that my buddy, HLP, and I played in. When she'd get ready to return opposing serves, she'd bend over, and her rear end would pop up ever so slightly. HLP would say, "she's presenting." I swear we weren't perving on her, much, because everyone would notice this, boys and girls alike.

I've always thought I could write snappy dialog, but I'm not good at formulating a story. Here's a random chunk of dialog I wrote, for which I have no story. Hope you enjoy it.

Scene: The protagonist is out at the bar, horribly drunk. He walks into the bathroom and saddles up at the only available urinal. The man to his left, the only guy in the bar who may be drunker than him, swaying as he pees, pisses slightly outside the allotted space of his urinal. The two have a conversation while they pee, looking straight ahead at the wall behind their respective urinals

Protagonist: Wow, watch where you're pissing there, Foster Brooks.

Stranger In the Men's Room: Who the fuck are you calling Foster Brooks? And just who in the hell is Foster Brooks?

Protagonist: He's the stereotypically drunk guy from the Dean Martin Show, but I wouldn't expect a popped collar beat-off like yourself to know that.

SMR: The Dean Martin Show? Sorry I didn't pick up on your old-ass, old man reference, old man. Fucking old guy at the bar talking the shit and shit. You got the puniest dick I ever saw too.

Protagonist: (never breaking his stare from the tile wall ahead of him) One, why in the hell are you looking at my penis?

Two, I'm a grower not a shower.*

Three I guess sort of relates to one, but didn't anyone ever tell you that you never look anywhere but straight ahead when you're pissing next to someone in the bathroom, whether that person be your father, uncle, step father, long-lost brother, Michael Landon, or a complete stroke with his collar popped, like yourself?

Four, why in the hell are you looking at my penis?

SMR: (laughing and still swaying) Dude, that didn't make any sense. You're all over the place with those numbers and your old man lecturing.

P: You're all over the place with your piss. That's a rule you should have learned way before the Look Dead Ahead at All Times rule, but since you failed that one so horribly, it shouldn't come as a surprise that you never learned the most simple of all urinal rules: Get all your gosh damn pee into the cotton-pickin', fuckin' urinal!

SMR: (shaking his thing and putting it away) I'll piss wherever I please. You plan on doing something about it, old guy at the bar?

Protagonist: (also finishing up, now turning towards SMR) For starters, me and my little peen can give you the mushroom stamp** of a lifetime on that Cro-Magnon five head*** of yours. Not even one of the skanks in this joint could be wooed back to your apartment when you're wearing that little seal of approval.

SMR: You ain't stampin' nothin'. Now, why don't you get back to your seven and seven, or whatever it is you old guys drink.

(The protagonist laughs to his side, and then tries to get in a sucker punch. He misses, but SMR does not, since although piss drunk, he's bigger, stronger, younger, and been in more fights. He hits Protagonist dead in the face, knocking him back into the stall door, and his ass falls down to the piss soaked floor.)

SMR: (Primping himself on the way out the door) I'll take a rain check on that stamp.

Protagonist: (Wiping blood off his lip) Hey, consider that an open invitation, Foster Brooks.

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* Here's a link to that definition.

** Here's a link to a definition of the mushroom stamp.

*** Here's yet another link to the definition of five head. Urban Dictionary should be paying me to link all these. I just got those sick fucks 12 more readers!

Ladies and gentlemen, I give you Foster Brooks:

The first thing I noticed as the lone white guy at a Black funeral was

. . . that the family all wears white. Some of the suits were kind of cool, like the little seventh grader's, who was the only person in attendance who I knew, while others were more of the pimp-daddy variety. I was picturing a wake situation, where I come in, say who I am, I'm sorry for their loss, shake a few hands, fake like I know how to give a prayer, and be on my way. Instead, everyone was seated, the family was all spread out, so I was standing on the side waiting for a window when a good amount of family members were by the casket. It was then that a woman approached me and asked me to be seated because they would be "beginning" soon. I told her I was all right, but she still yelled at one of the white-suited youths to fetch some more chairs. I remained standing, looking for that window, when the same woman approached me, motioned for me to follow her, and sat me in one of the chairs lined up along the aisles. I'm very pleased to know that this many people came to honor her, but I'd be lying if I said that the aisle seat didn't make me, being the only white guy there, stand out even more.

The aforementioned seventh-grader is one of my students. He lost his mother, who is really his aunt, but she's been raising him as his legal guardian since he was eight months old. I gave him a hug when I saw him, and he asked me if Miss So-And-So "and all them" were there. I said I hadn't seen them, but that I'd keep an eye out for them. I actually could say with certainty that they weren't there, because I would have seen them due to their whiteness. I just didn't have the heart to tell him, nor did I think it appropriate to point out just how easy it would have been for him to tell if they were in attendance.

A preacher dude, who was one helluva public speaker, came out to give the introduction, getting it off to a most rocking start, with the organist and drummer punctuating certain key phrases with bombastic flourishes. I really didn't know much about this kid's mother, and I wouldn't really know much more about her until four or five rocking songs into the night. With the funk based guitar and danceable beat, I'd liken this overqualified church band to hey-day, George Clinton's Funkadelic, the more rock oriented counterpart to his more famous Parliament. One particularly rousing number had the melody of Wilson Picket's Land of 1,000 dances with the Na-Na-Na's replaced with "I got a prayer" over-and-over. It was slammin'. Moments later, three of the deceased's sisters got up to the stage to say a few words, but before long they were breaking into song, which I thought odd at first, but then I just couldn't help but be amazed that they were singing it a cappella and very well.

As strange as it sounds to tell you, this funeral was right up my alley, but even with a band as tight as Funkadelic and a pastor as excitable as James Brown was in the church scene of The Blues Brothers*, I still didn't feel compelled to dance down the aisles like some of the folks there. Don't get me wrong. I don't think that they are in the wrong for handling the affair in any way they see fit. Hell, if a toga party helps people get through a tough time, I say pull off those bed sheets, turn on Louie Louie by The Kingsmen, and grab a hold of a bottle of Jack. It's just that I'm not used to that type of funeral, and I didn't feel it right for the rogue white guy no one knew to dance up and down the aisles. Plus, although I did crack a smile a few times watching little kids dance, I was really, really bummed about this poor kid losing his mom. However, as I bobbed my head and allowed the music and the vibes of the room to soak in, I began to feel really, really good, somehow. I may find myself on the west side of Chicago next Sunday for a 5:00 mass. Fuck it.

Maybe all the stuffy white funerals I've been to over the years have it all wrong. Maybe the next funeral I go to I'll put on a pimp suit and turn that mutha' out. Maybe not, but after this experience, I'll certainly be more open to new and interesting ways to approaching the grieving process.

What's the most interesting funeral you've ever been to, be it as a result of the culture of the family or just one that was noteworthy in general.

*As I watched the sermon at the church, I couldn't help but think of that scene in Blues Brothers, and it occurred to me that it really wasn't that far off from the real thing, only without the people doing flips.

Breakin' Up Is Hard To Do

How long does a couple have to be broken up for it to be counted as a break up? I would argue that if it is patched up within 24 hours, then it doesn't count. What do you think?

Kisses To My Favorite Bar

My latest post is at The Liars Club, a Chicago based blog that myself and a few other bloggers contribute towards. Please come by, because readership over there is poor, mostly due to inconsistent posting by all four members, who seem to have drinking, bunsen burners, baseball, and DJ Major Dad, respectively, as their priorities.

The Liar's Club got its name from the best bar in Chicago. It is a watering hole that will always hold a special place in my heart, as well as my liver. I haven't been there in a while, mostly because I've been dating someone seriously for the past four months and so has the Heterosexual Life Partner (HLP)*. It just isn't a good place to take the lady for a cocktail, and it doesn't work as a guys with girlfriends' night out spot, because the music is cranked to such a deafening level, that you can't converse, catch up, etc.** The one time I did bring my girlfriend in there, I almost said to one staff member, pointing to the girlfriend, "This is why you guys haven't been seeing me around lately."

Here's one more bazaar tidbit that speaks to my love affair with that bar: Every time I drive by it, if I happen to get off at the Fullerton exit when the Armitage one is backed up, I do the thing Sammy Sosa did after catching fly balls, kissing two fingers, touching them to my chest, and pointing towards the dirty, LC facade.

span style="font-weight:bold;">*The other day, HLP said to me, "Imagine if just one of us were dating someone for this long? How miserable would that other guy be?" We both had a laugh, because, sadly, it's true.
**If the bar doesn't work well in either of these functions, then I guess you can sort of fill in the blanks as to what capacity it did function for us, and don't say for wooing each other, because I acknowledge that it sort of reads like that.

"Happy Trees" and a Shit-Load of Boats

I just got back from a field trip with my parents to The Art Institute of Chicago to see an Edward Hopper/Winslow Homer exhibit. I have a whole new respect for Hopper because he liked chesty women, cold couples who were indifferent to one another, and he seemed to be a bit of a peeping tom. As for Homer, that guy just really, really liked boats. I was talking about that with Niner, who said the guy must have gotten up in the morning and said, "I'm going to paint me some boats today," and paint boats he did. Lots of 'um. I shot through those boat pictures like crap through a goose, but there were people stopping to study each and every one. I just don't get that . . .


Your turn, seven readers: Do you guys like art? I seem to only like the ones where the people depicted tell a little story, or it allows me to make one up, usually one with espionage and/or kinky shit. A little kinked-out espionage never hurt anybody. I just don't dig on the bowl of fruit or landscape paitings, unless the "happy trees" are being painted by the guy on TV with the white-man afro.

I stopped to get gas today, and the guy behind the counter was reading Playboy Magazine. I didn't see the cover, but I recognized the usual, full page cartoon depicting Santa Clause getting laid. The girls in the Playboy cartoons all want to do Santa's fat ass. This I've always known, and I accept it. What's new to me are gas station attendants "reading" Playboy at 8:30 in the morning.

Is this okay?

6 Cheeses? Uh, Surely You Jest, You Nimrod!

So, Gancer Girlfriend and I are watching a commercial, and a pizza joint is boasting a 6 Cheese Pizza. I tell her there's no way in hell there are 6 cheeses on there, cause I can't even think of six cheeses that would be good on a pizza. Naming off a few, I ended up at Gouda, and who in the heck wants Gouda on their pizza? We looked it up online, give us a break, there was nothing else to do on a Sunday afternoon, and sure enough, there are, in fact, six gosh damn cheeses upon that pie: Mozzarella, Parmesan, Romano, Asiago, Provolone and Fontina. I then decided that the odds are slim to none that the people working there know what six cheeses adorn their over-cheesed pizzas. Gancer Girlfriend thought that the nimrod on the other end of the phone would know.

The bet begins . . .

Winner buys the Chinese food we would order with our next call, because we'd sooner order a six blends of pickle juice pizza. In fact, the image of that disgustingly cheesey concoction of crappola ruined the notion of pizza for us all together.

To determine the winner, a phone call was to be made to said pizza joint.

1. If the nimrod can't name the six cheeses, she buys.
2. If the nimrod can rattle off all six right away, I buy.
3. If the nimrod asks someone else or looks it up to get the answer, then we would go Dutch.

Here's how the phone call went:

Nimrod: (unenthusiastically) Such-and-Such pizza, can I help you?
Gancer: Yeah, quick question: What six cheeses are on your Six Cheese Pizza?
Nimrod: Uh, I don't know. (Long Pause).
Gancer: Well, I just need to know that real quick, and I'll let you get back to whatever it is you're doing that's more important.
Nimrod: Uh, hold on.
(Moments Later)
Nimrod: Uh (nimrods say "uh" a lot), Mozzarella, Parmesan, Romano, Ass-ee-ah-go (slowly sounding it out wrongly, like the profile faces on Electric Company), Provolone and Fone-tine-uh (again, Electric Company-Esque).
Gancey: Okay, partner. That's all I needed. Have yourself a wonderful day!

So, we went dutch on some Kung Pau chicken, Moo Shoo chicken, hot and sour soup, and a smoothie she ordered that tasted like a Pina Colada, which made me sing "Escape (The Pina Colada Song,)" which she only knows from Shrek, which made feel old, but not as old as I felt trying to describe that the Electric Company was like a Black Sesame Street, or that Morgan Freeman starred on it.

My Beloved Seven Readers, in your comment, after you're done telling me what a colossal dork I am for actually making this call, of course, tell me if you've ever heard of Fontina cheese.

PS: Get a load of that Pina Colada song video. He might be the least cool rocker I've ever seen from his Blue Blocker Sunglasses, to his tucked in Member's Only Jacket, to his khakis, and right down to his white sneakers, just to top it off. For that get-up alone, never mind his dance moves or general dorkiness, If he didn't have a hit record, he wouldn't be "makin' love at midnight," or any hour for that matter. Even with the hit record . . . Yikes.

The Lost Island of Misfit Blog Topics

Either I have the most crippling case of writers block of all time, or I'm just coming up with the worst ideas ever. I'm going to share some of these awful notions with you today, so I won't be tempted to ever use any of these.

1. I jokingly offered to be a sperm donor for a lesbian friend of mine, because I want a baby without a wife or responsibility. Actually, when you break it down, I'm a damn good surrogate father candidate. I'm tall, healthy, athletic-ish, and decent enough looking. I'm not smart, but my parents are, so there's a good chance my kid would be. I figure that I've produced loads, pun intended, and loads of sperm since the early to mid 1990's, and finally it's going to pay off. I could be the proud sort of father of a baby boy or girl, who I'll get to see every now and again, but I will not necessarily be obligated to love or support him/her financially. I just whack it, hand over the joy juice, they turkey baste it in there, or whatever, they do all the parenting, and I just keep doing what I've always done. Whacking it.


2. I got halfway through a piece about how much I love it when the Liquor Sample Lady is at the grocery store when it dawned on me that it was stupid, boring, and made me look like a booze hound. Seriously though, there's nothing like a snort off some fancy-schmantsy spirit you'll never buy to make shopping feel less like a chore and more like a bar. Why can't everything be a little bit more like the bar? Okay, so I am a booze hound. What's it to you?!?

3. My Hollywood buddy is working on the set of Boston Legal, and I asked that he update me on what Captain Kirk has for lunch every day. He seems to be a fan of the turkey chili and cornbread, if you must know. He also likes nailing green chicks from distant planets, which I find can work up an appetite.

4. More shit about my beloved nephews. My parents always have a bottle of oil and vinegar on the table for salads, and one nephew quite accurately pointed out that it looked like a "potion." His mother and I half convinced him that it was a shrinking potion. He tried some, and he's all, "See, it doesn't make me shrink." I told him, "It will kick in soon enough. You'll know it's working when it looks like we're all getting bigger." The fact that I get my jollies by screwing with a kindergartner's head is probably another reason my fatherly duties should remain strictly surrogate in nature.

5. This idea is actually quite good, but I decided it's a little mean and maybe a little evil. I was skipping through completely random blogs, planning to publicly make fun of a particularly stupid one on my blog. How caddy, right? The blog that was most likely to get ripped was one run by a couple, and dedicated to counting down the days until their upcoming wedding in Napa Valley. There are only a few posts so far, and they all suck. Their profile picture is the two of them and their dog. There's nothing worse than when you get a Christmas card from a couple and they're cuddled up with their stupid dog. I'm going to send out a card with a photo of me and my mailman just to throw people off. Anyway, I get the sense that when this couple's fabulous, scenic, Napa wedding is in the books, they'll be like, "Okay, now what." With any luck they'll have a new blog counting down the days until their divorce. Now that would make for some good reading. I hope it rains on their wedding day and the grapes in the wine go bad, giving the wedding party and all the guests the worst case of the green apple quickies they've ever experienced.

Sometimes, All I Need Is Imaginary Ice Cream and to Love You.

When you were young, did you ever lay your big wheel* or bicycle, preferably big wheel, on its side, spin one of the wheels around using the pedal, and tell a friend that the ice cream store was open for business, or some shit?

I thought this was just something we did on our block, maybe due to all the led paint we ingested, but I came to find out people from other suburbs of Chicago and surrounding Midwestern cities also ran imaginary ice cream shops. Then, just today, I was IM'ing with SO@24 and Laughing Through My Chardonay, and they were both proprietors of big wheel ice cream joints in parts of California and Kansas, or wherever Chardsy is originally from.

This blew my mind, because the whole game is just a dumb concept. What does a spinning plastic wheel have to do with ice cream? Every 31 Flavors I've been to has a long, but not at all round, counter where people select the flavor on the other side of the glass that they want on top of their cone, bubblegum perhaps.** I know not of spinning wheels of flavors, do you? Who was the cool kid on the block who started doing this, and how did it take off nationwide? If I recall, it was not a game I'd play long, as it would usually play out something like this.

Neighbor: Around it goes . . . and you get . . . Mint Chocolate Chip!
A Young Dr. Ken: Uh, great. This is dumb. Let's go dine on some delicious paint chips.

The game's tendency to be over soon after it starts is kind of like when you grabbed a dandelion and said, "Momma had a baby and her head popped off," as you "popped" the flowery part of the weed off with your thumb. Once the head popped off, you were off to find another baby or do something else, perhaps something a little less sick and twisted. I mean, come on, popping baby heads off? I really shouldn't make off like I wasn't a little twisted too, since a neighbor and I used to play Lightning Bug Home Run Derby with those fat, red wiffle ball bats. Those poor little guys just kept lighting up and giving away their position. They didn't stand a chance against Ryne Sandberg and Jody Davis***. At least nobody got hurt at the ice cream parlor. Not mine, anyway.

I poked around the Internet a little on this matter, and it is speculated that grabbing that big wheel pedal and turning it is to signify cranking an old fashioned ice cream maker. Others believe the spinning wheel of flavors is an homage to some shop in San Francisco that had a wheel customers could spin, and on it were the titles of fifty flavors available daily. If you ask me, even if one or both of these facts are true, it still doesn't explain how something so darned stupid made its way across the country.

Readers, please tell me in your comments if you did or did not play the Big Wheel Ice Cream Parlor Game. Also, for extra credit, drive your bike to work, get down on the floor with it, spin the wheel, and say, "Ice cream! Get your ice cream here . . ." See who laughs, who gets nostalgic, who looks at you like you're nuttier than squirrel poop, who fires you on the spot, and let me know that too.


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* I was thinking that someone should come out with Big Wheels for adults, but instead of in the style of A Team, Transformers, or G.I. Joe, have them decorated for Grey's Anatomy, The English Patient, Brokeback Mountain, or whatever else adults watch.

** I remember getting bubble gum ice cream and thinking it was so cool, even though the frozen, hardened collection of gum bits I had accumulated were giving me lock jaw. My parents would always say how gross and stupid it was, and now, as an adult, I see the light.

*** He and I are still Cub fans, and those are still our favorite players of all time. I can't speak for him, but for me it has to be the Lightning Bug Home run Derby connection. Jody was a lifetime .245 hitter, so how else do you explain how this scrub remains so near and dear to my heart?

Groomsmen or Boozemen?

In their tuxes, on the walk to the church for their good friend's wedding, a conversation somewhat like this went down . . .

Gancy: I'd like to not be a vision of drunken buffoonery at this wedding.
Heterosexual Life Partner (HLP): You mean like the one where you ended up doing your date in her car in the parking lot of the hotel, only to open the car door and barf naked.
Gancy: Yeah, something short of that. I thought at the time it was my civic duty as a groomsman to set a grueling pace for the other guests, like an out of control pace car of fun.
HLP: And now . . .
Gancy: Now I'm 31.
HLP: Yeah me too. Did I tell you that at the last wedding I stood up in I grabbed the microphone and sang what I later learned was a horrible rendition of That Loving Feeling by the Righteous Brothers, only the Top Gun version?
Gancy: "She lost it," huh?

HLP: Yes. "I hate it when she does that." What's worse is that it was supposed to be a sing-along, like in the movie, but I wouldn't relinquish the mic. I guarded it with my life. I even did the "Baby, baby, I get down on my knees for you-ou" like the Black guy. What was his name again?
Gancy: Sundown
HLP: Really? God, that's racist. Anyway, I'm with you. Let's go classy this time.
Gancy: Yes, like gentlemen. Just because it's open bar, doesn't mean it's open season for shots, double fisting, and doing the electric slide with our ties wrapped around our heads.
HLP: So, tonight we're gentlemen? Shake on it?
Gancy: Done

Shake hands they did, but only one of them held up his end of the bargain.

HLP was a class act, in comparison, but Gancer got blind drunk, jumped into the center of a dance circle, did a ripping air guitar version of the solo from Let's Go Crazy by Prince, and in the process, at just the right moment of his performance, much to any guest who saw its simultaneous disgust and amazement, with his picking hand, somehow shot the base of his wine glass across the room without cutting himself.

Okay, next wedding it's class all the way for this guy.