Work Journal, 11/30/2006- 10:10 AM

Are you there God? It’s me, Margaret. I am bored as hell. I have played 67 games of Freecell in the past 2 days while at work. There is nothing, absolutely nothing to do. I know that it sounds great to be able to get paid $12 an hour to sit and twiddle thumbs, listen to the iPOD, drink hundreds of cups of coffee, but really it is driving me overwhelmingly batty. I can’t handle it any more. I realize that by bringing this up, you may be tempted to kill me or someone I love in a particularly hideous fashion, or drop an anvil on my head, or have some maniac run in with a machete and hack one or both of my legs off before taking a bloody, pin-worm infested shit on my face as I lie there bleeding, crying, and cursing you, but that’s not necessary. I was just wondering if you could send some work my way before I completely loose it. Just some POD items, or a Quickturn job… something that will get me to the end of this day. Yesterday I spent 3 hours in a texting discussion with Dr. Avalanche about the merits and facets of Tony Danza’s longevity. I peed 12 times, fell asleep at my desk for what I believe was no more than 2 minutes, though it could have been 2 hours and I doubt anyone would have noticed. I made a fleet of paper airplanes using the templates in Microsoft Word. I walked 3 laps around the warehouse pretending to be looking for something that had no name and in actuality never existed. I wrote an apology e-mail to my sister after she called me a prick in response to a characteristically off the cuff message I sent her about not sending me forwards. I put myself into 4 different moods one after the other just to see if I could (I used the iPOD for motivation: Anger (Unsane), Sadness (The Cure), Happiness (Madness), and Insanity (Boredoms), the final being the easiest considering I’m barely holding on at this point what with all the coffee and inactivity). I feel like one of those otters at the zoo that go nuts and run back and forth in their cage wearing a rut in the concrete floor.
So far today I have checked my e-mail 13 times, made 2 pots of coffee, and gone to the bathroom 4 times (I’ve only been here for 2 hours and 45 minutes). I marked up a printed out spreadsheet with pens and highlighters and opened said spreadsheet so that if anyone comes in I can pretend like I am studiously reworking my inventory list. I have wandered out and read every word in the main and metro sections of the newspaper, which is going to make my lunch break pretty boring. I texted reworked Alabama lyrics to my mom in an attempt to mock her for liking ‘Oakey’ music now after she such a vociferous opponent of it for the first 19 years of my life. She was not amused. Later on in the afternoon I plan to vacuum the insides of the copy machines, as the paper dust has been building up, but I’m waiting for someone to notice I haven’t done anything for hours before I start in the hopes of being able to drag it out until 3:30.
This is killing me…

The End is NIGH!

Today the New York Times announced that Tony Danza will be stepping into the role of Max Bialystock in Mel Brooks’ work of madcap genius The Producers.
Now, I have announced this before, either through a case of mistaken identification or through heavily caffeinated hyperbole, but this time it is true... the 7th Seal is set to snap like a new born kitten’s spine under the weight of a size 15 steel-toed work boot. As soon as Tony takes the stage for the first time, all lines will be drowned out by Earth shattering Trumpet Blasts, the Thundering Hooves of Pestilence, Famine...K-Fed...? The WB?
Whoever it is, things will decline quickly and we will be bathing in the blood of our loved ones, and burning in eternal torment.
Of course, I could be exaggerating. I may merely be a panicky old lady with a penchant for Pop Culture Idolatry (Thou Shalt Not Defile the Throne of Mostel!). If this is true, and the show does go on, Apocalypse-free, then another issue comes to mind.
I am wondering if Mr. Danza is capable of playing a character whose name is not... Tony. As far as I can remember, and granted my knowledge in the area is far from extensive, for every semi-successful and flat-out bomb he has ever had his hand in, his name has been Tony. That doesn’t go very far in dispelling my notion that he is, though probably a good guy, nothing but a bone-headed Italian stereotype character.
I brought this up to my good friend and prolific texting partner Dr. Avalanche and he pointed out that Tony may have not been named Tony in the film "She’s Out of Control" with Amy Dolenz (daughter of greatest drummer in the world Mickey Dolenz).
First and foremost I was appalled at his ability to recall this ridiculous bit of Shit-Cinema trivia without having to resort to a Google search. This from a man who could, in great detail and plied with whatever alcohol or pills you could pilfer from Grandma, go on at great length about the merits of... well, I don’t know... something about e.e. cummings, Tom Brokaw, and/or Miles Davis’ "In a Silent Way" album.
What I am trying to say is that he is an incredibly intelligent fellow who never ceases to make me feel stupid or shame me every time I open my mouth (as an aside, it is truly unfortunate that his parents opted to name him after the Sisters of Mercy’s drum machine). All of these smarts and then he can pull up a fucking AMY DOLENZ/ TONY DANZA reference, right out of the ether (a.k.a. his ass), like it’s nothing. Times like that I wonder if he isn’t some sort of idiot savant. As a defense he claims that he owns "She’s Out of Control" on DVD, the Criterion Collection no less, and that he got it from a well-meaning yet insane aunt and he hadn’t gotten around to selling it yet. As they say in places where people with all of their teeth are considered ‘show-offs’: That Dog Don’t Hunt.
But that is why I love him. Let’s just hope that this praise from such an esteemed source (insert mocking laughter) doesn’t go to his head.
So, with this new question as to whether or not Tony Danza has ever been able to answer to another name other than Tony, I turned to my good friends at www.IMDB.com for some answers. Briefly, as my battery is about to die and I forgot my cord, here’s what I found.
He has appeared in roughly 27 Films, a lot of them being the cataclysmically retarded and always disappointing MADE FOR TV movies (that is not counting the phenomenal "The Day After" which scarred me for life... and I only saw the previews as a child). He has also been in a ton of TV series episodes. Only in 4 roles, apparently the only 4 I’ve ever seen, has his name been Tony. Though there was one Tommy and one New York Cab Driver. Those must count for something.
So I stand corrected.
Tony, I apologize for the assumption that you can only answer to the name Tony, regardless of the role (imagine if I was right though, and he was cast in some Shakespearian gibberish... wait, were there Tonys (Tonies?) back then?).
That said, Mr. Danza, take heed: I still insist that the world will end if you do not back out of this engagement in The Producers. Nature will not abide.
(By the way, his name was Doug, Doug Simpson, in "She’s Out of Control.")

I hate Dave Eggers!

"Our mouths are all over each other. All the talk of plans and new worlds... We sit upright as we kiss, and at first we kiss like friends, with our eyes open, almost laughing. But as our hands start moving, we begin to believe, and our eyes close, and our heads turn this way and that, we’re kissing each other but so much more, kissing like warriors saving the world, at the end of the movie, the last two, the only two who can save everything– and because we are too post-drunk tired to keep our heads upright with our eyes shut, we recline, and soon the towel underneath Meredith is just a crooked snakeskin and we have taken off our pants, the air cool where we are now bare. And sex, inevitable, will make us more powerful. A manifesto consummated under this great sky, the approval of the pounding sea– "
-Dave Eggers
A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius

It was reported that, upon reading this passage, Pinky Royale exclaimed:
"Huh? Whu..? Are you fucking kidding me?!"
S/he then threw arms up to the sky and yelled:
"That’s it, I’m never writing another word again! Ever!"

The Liver Weeps...

The other night was a friend’s birthday, we’ll call her Chanth. Yes, Chanth will do nicely.
Anyway, a few of us went over for a mellow dinner and high powered and horribly offensive B.S. session. Chanth’s roomie, we’ll call her Leen, had decided to make her a birthday shot, something called a Disco Ball. She had found it in some goddamned book, Miss Charming’s Book of CRAZY Cocktails. "Over 200 Outrageous Drink Recipes to Turn Any Night into a Party." In reality it is full of a bunch of bullshit drinks christened with names that have little or nothing to do with what they are for the most part. How a bunch of sugary, vomit-inducing liquors combined in a martini glass and called a Tom Cruise are in any way related to anything, to any facet of Tom Cruise is beyond me.
Anyhoo, I’ll save the book review for another time (don’t hold your breath). The Disco Ball was a shot of Goldschlager thrown back with a mouthful of Pop Rocks. I admit I was intrigued but Leen only shoplifted 2 airplane bottles of the ‘Schlag so it was just gonna be her and Chanth. The drinks didn’t go down smooth. Chanth only dropped about half of her shot (she’s not much of a drinker) and the Pop Rocks were killing her, all watery eyes and exploding mouth. It didn’t look fun.
Eventually they got the cursed drinks down and I believe a vow was made to never make a Disco Ball again. Happy Birthday, next year we drink Draino!
I was in the mood so I told Leen to go into the kitchen and make me a dare shot with the tequila she had and whatever she had lying around. I know she has a cruel streak and I was feeling like being punished. I sucked Chanth’s boyfriend (BF) into my self-destructive tendencies and called for 2. Leen disappeared, no doubt dredging up a bunch of shit she probably had every right to hate me for but had never acted on. Now was her opportunity to exact her revenge. She disappeared for a few minutes, malicious giggles fluttering from the kitchen. She came back and handed me a shot glass filled with a dark, milky brown substance. BF’s shot was a milky white substance. I knew that sniffing the contents would present aromas that would more than likely hold me up from just drinking the cur’sed concoction. I figured she wouldn’t actually try to kill me. I was pretty confident that she didn’t have any ipecac in the house, so all this really would be was gross at best, revolting at worst.
I threw it back and was viciously kicked by:
A) cheap tequila
B) lots and lots of...MSG
Jesus, it sucked.
BF shot his and things teetered on vomit for a tense few minutes. He wasn’t as much of a team player as I had thought and looked as though this type of game was not something he was planning on partaking in ever again.
It’s hard for me to find friends who will destroy themselves with me in juvenile and disgusting ways.
After his eyes stopped watering and the pinched, puckered look of disgust and loathing left his face we were clued in by Leen as to what it was we had just swallowed.
I had tequila and a bullion cube–Maagi to be specific, for old times sake (oh Senegal, how we miss you at the strangest of times). Gross, sure, but nothing I couldn’t handle. Sure I wouldn’t order it in a bar but it sure beat lung butter and Crisco mixed with tequila.
BF on the other hand, and to everyone’s surprise, got the shitty end of the stick by group consensus. His was tequila and oyster juice. That is just rude. Once you start mixing fish products into drinks I think a serious and incredibly precise line has been crossed.
What I learned, I suppose, is that Leen doesn’t hate me as much as I thought she did, and that Chanth’s boyfriend has been leaving the toilet seat up or something of the sort to incur her wrath.
On a related note, back in August it was Leen’s birthday. Once again, alcohol was involved. We went out for buffalo wings then came back to the house to drink a box of PBR in cans (when you have a lot of guests, you gotta go cheap. I hide the good beer in the toilet tank when people come over). Someone... OK... I got the bright idea to shotgun the cans for "old times sake." Unfortunately the times were so old that no one really remembered how to do it.
Was it necessary to shake the can?
Did you just stab it and suck?
Did you have to pop the top on the can before the stabbing?
After?
Did it all shoot out or did you have to suck or squeeze the can?
The first thing we had to do was find the proper stabbing tools. I had a couple of screw drivers, a pocket knife and some thumbtacks. The tacks were deemed by all present as too small, so the screwdrivers and knife were selected.
People choose their own preferences. BF (OK, I suppose I take it back. He is a sport. He just hates oyster juice) opted to shake the can while the rest of us just went for the stab, open, and suck, squeeze, whatever technique.
It was not a graceful scene.
A handful of what some would refer to as adults (27-32) spraying beer all over the place and sucking it out of a hideous wound inflicted on an innocent can. We were like vampires at a Born Again Virgin Jamboree...? (Sorry. I suck at analogies.)
The beer did not, as we were expecting, come spraying out like a punctured artery. No, after the initial spray that covered everyone and everything it just dribbled down shirt-fronts and breasts and wasn’t all that eager to leave the cylindrical and asinine confines of the Tall Can (oh, the Tall, a harbinger of good times, bloody knuckles, and more often than not, a wicked hangover). We ended up having to squeeze them dry-ish. Strangely, with a hole popped in the bottom it was not that easy to get all of the beer out. I suppose we just got impatient at the suckling of the cans like tin teats, so they were thrown with great ceremony and fanfare over shoulders, and new beers were opened, the proper way, and nursed(ish) for the duration of the night.
This wasn’t really a new low, just an old low revisited. It’s funny how something that was so fun as a teen turns over the years into something so wasteful and ridiculous. You begin to realize later on down the road how much of being a teen was sheer spectacle, practiced or demonstrated to get just a little more attention from people who will later end up dead, in jail, or long forgotten.
Praise be to Allah that we never have to go through that disaster again.
But the night goes on, all drunk and lazy-eyed, and terrible things fall from mouths that were born innocent, imbued with hopes of greatness by parents who would shake their heads sadly if they were to witness this, us, all of it.

Bar Journal, 2006

:All drunk and solitary on a stool, indulging in far too many $2 baby pitchers of PBR that taste uncomfortably like hot dog water.
:Unluckily the low levels in the bank account dictate that I have limited choices of the nation’s brews on this fine and crooked night.
:Luckily after 2 pitchers the taste buds retract into some heretofore unnamed sheath system to escape the hideous flavor, the cheap and potentially carcinogenic carbonation.
All of my energy is concentrated on avoiding looking at the TVs that hang on either side of the bar. The screen to the right is playing some absurd and stereotypically homoerotic sport, and the one to the left is subjecting us to some cur’sed Sam Neil movie that, under normal circumstances, would compel me to go and do something else, like turn the channel, walk away, or shave my kneecaps off with a planer.
But those are not viable options, and the dual assault of the Cyclopean beasts are proving to be more than I can handle. The left TV is muted and in spite of that, or thanks to it, I am getting into the plot of the film, and to the right, with no idea which teams are playing, where they are, and what their motivations are, I am rooting for the maroon uniforms. My attention is broken only to order another beer or look towards the jukebox and nod approvingly when Neil Diamond comes on (did I put that in? Maybe. Probably. Jesus, gotta ease up on the drinks. What am punishing myself for?).
Give me any room in the world with 15 people in it and I bet $10 that if you play "Sweet Caroline" at LEAST 6 of them will drop whatever it is they are doing or saying and sing the "BAH, BAH, BAH" part (Sweet Caroline, BAH, BAH, BAH, Good times never seemed so good!). I stand by that. Go ahead, challenge me.
It’s a slow night at the bar. It’s always a slow night here. That’s why I like this place. No matter what is going on in town, no matter how packed all the other bars are, this one can always be counted on to be quiet. The bartender leans lazily behind the counter smoking a cigarette, watching the TV with about as much energy as I am.
What is she thinking?
Does she hate everyone here?
She seems nice enough. This is the point of intoxication when I have to make a concentrated effort to not end up unconsciously gazing at a woman who has caught my eye. It’s not that I’m particularly lecherous, I just take a glance and then my mind wanders to related or ridiculously unrelated subjects leaving my eyes and face pointed in such a direction that I’m surprised it hasn’t been kicked sideways and inside-out yet.
This lady, the provider of my drinks, the collector of my $1 tips, she has got maybe 3 good years left in her if she leaves tonight... right this instant.
10 minutes ago under optimum circumstances.
She is attractive, but she was hot, and you can see the rapidly forming age lines becoming deeper with every drag, with every beer served up. She’s got 30 years under her black studded belt, but spending her nights in this hermetically sealed chamber of smoke, alcohol, gamblers (the lotto machines are never empty) and alcoholics will push her up to 65 by the time she’s 35. The clock is spinning faster for her than for other people that work in places that see sunlight, fresh air, hope, and dreams. I want to grab her by the arm and guide her forcefully, carefully out the door and send her to a place where whatever verve she was born with can sync back up with her for her remaining years. Because she is cute in a "capable of kicking my ass" kind of way and no one likes to see a rose covered in shit.
Christ, here we go. Look, here’s how it is:
Men, when drunk, think of only one or two things (self-pity isn’t a thought but an involuntary program like blood circulation and REM sleep, so it doesn’t qualify as a thought). Mainly, they think about sex, which is funny because the only thing sadder, sexually speaking, than a drunk man trying to perform is... well, nothing. That is actually the saddest thing in the world. Granted, that is a coming from the POV of a man, but I think a lot of women would agree with me, as would all men, when I say that it would be easier to laugh at a baby cocker spaniel being beaten to death with a claw hammer than it would be to watch a drunk man pull off half the shit his brain tells him he can do.
But there goes my brain, not planning anything, just wondering things.
How is she in bed? Loud? Bored? Violent? Tender?
No, not tender.
She might be verbally abusive, in a challenging way. It all ends with a sigh and a cigarette. I have a plan to never be with a person who smokes in bed. The slothful, lazy cunt in me considers the bed a sacred placed and stinking it up with cigarettes seems sacrilegious. It’s probably the only thing I consider holy, a bed. Draw your own conclusions from that bit of Royale trivia if you are so inclined.
I wonder these things about a lot of random people, what they are like during the sex act. People on the bus... well, mainly people on the bus since that’s where I spend a lot of my time going to or from work. Excitement is my middle name. I wonder this about some friends as well, but not all of them (don’t freak out, you’re not one of them, unless you feel slighted by the exclusion, then I know all about that thing with the knitting needles and the dog biscuits, I know you make a high pitched trilling noise during orgasm and are unbelievably ticklish for the first 20 seconds post-love explosion).
So I sit and wander through hazy, sometimes sexual, but usually idiotic and cluttered hallways of my mind so very thankful of the fact that no matter how under the influence I get I know better than to stray outside of basic pleasantries that relate to ordering beers or saying, "Sorry, I don’t smoke." Don’t try to be charming or funny or engaging. Just sit there and keep on drinking, dwelling on the void, looking at some fixed anonymous point until that silent alarm goes off inside the brain that tells you to up and go home, the night is done. Unfortunately that alarm hasn’t worked for me, ever, so last call is announced and I drink up, leave another $2 tip for good measure, zip up the sweatshirt against the harsh Portland night and head home.