Entry Interregnum

My loyal readers (well, friends that are bored at work) are demanding an update. I’ve been lazy lately, and really busy at work, and I’ve been having difficulty getting inspired. So I’ve decided to throw caution to the wind, and just crank out something. Don’t worry about Thanksgiving, I’ve got notes on Parts II and III, as well as the Sunday (we’ll just call that the Massacre at 13 Coins). But until I can get all that pulled together here are some tidbits from recent days.

Secrets. Here’s a tip for those of you (you know who you are) who are trying to keep secrets. If you have a secret and want to keep it, the last thing in the world you do is post on your blog that you have a secret. All of my friends think I can’t keep a secret, and that I tell everyone everything that I know. Exhibit A, of course, is this blog. But the first step in keeping a secret is not telling anyone you have a secret. So yes, I babble all sorts of embarrassing stuff about my friends. But how do you know I talk about everything? Exactly, you don’t unless I tell you I’m leaving stuff out. And I don’t say one way or the other, that’s how I keep from being badgered into telling things that really should stay secret. I know we all learned this (or should have) in 3rd grade. Not to lecture (well ok, I’m lecturing) but if you can’t keep secret the fact that you have a secret, how can you keep the actual secret? And has the word “secret” lost all meaning for you too, after I used it so many times?

Lies. Lies, to oneself and others, are crucial for some people to get through their lives. Setting for a moment aside the notion that truth is better than lies, people that habitually lie need to track them and make sure one lie, or the occasional bit of truth, doesn’t contradict a prior lie. Case in point: before moving to Issaquah a month ago, JPK had occasion to tell Matty that he’d bought a new dining room set. Which isn’t a big deal, in and of itself, but this purchase was used as an excuse by JPK. Then this week, JPK posted a pic on his blog of a dining room set he and Ross just bought. There are 2 explanation: they decided to replace a month-old dining room set, or JPK lied last month to get Matty off his back. My money’s on the latter, and the lesson is that if your life is substantially composed of lies, you need to stay on top of them.

Intentions. Tuesday night was our last Spanish class. To celebrate we went out for a beer afterwards at R Place. It was just Paul, Matty, and I. Paul’s been sticking to soda lately, Matty had a flight in the morning, and I had an early meeting with a cranky supervisor. Plus, class had gotten out early so there was plenty of time to have a beer and get home by 10 pm. We had one, then another, then Matty wanted to go to Madison Pub. Paul said, “You always say one, and it always gets out of hand.” Well surprise, he was right. Paul went home and Matty and I went to Madison Pub. We had a beer with Mike Meola (who was playing darts with a cute boy named Keo) and had a long political chat with a guy who used to be my barista in the Columbia Tower. Then, for a change, we went to Manray and ran into Jerome and Good Mark. They were finishing a bottle of white wine, so Matty bought them another round, beers for us, and two or three rounds of shots. Sigh, good intentions be damned. I got home at 1 am to a cranky Carlos.

Passage. Last Friday, Woodsy and Jimmy broke up. While I’ve been acquainted with Jimmy for longer, Woodsy is more of a friend and so I’m on his side on this one. Plus, I think Woodsy did everything right. He was open to having a boyfriend, honest about what he wanted, and realistic about the relationship. At least from what I could tell. I was hopeful that this would work out for him, although not terribly optimistic based on Jimmy’s track record. As an outsider, I’m not privy to all the dynamics of the relationship, but in the final days it seemed Woodsy was being poorly treated, and there’s no need to put up with that (don’t tell Carlos). So in the post-breakup ritual we’ve all been through, Woodsy is drinking himself senseless and sleeping with anything that moves. Buy him a drink, and get one for the guy he’s working too.

Missed. How many times has this happened to you: you’re riding your motorcycle down Aurora at 50 mph, when a car pulls in front of you and you go over its hood and skidding on your face down the road? Happened to my friend Tony last week, and he came out of it with a shattered left arm and a nasty concussion, but he got to enjoy a week at Harborview. In the meantime, I was on the bus the other day. We stopped outside Ross, the driver let people on, and then he closed the doors. Except not everyone was on. A woman was partway thru the doors and she shrieked like a hyena going bezerk when they started to close,. I wasn’t paying any attention, so it took me completely by surprise. A guy got killed on that bus outside my office a few months ago, so any acting up on the bus freaks me out. When she yelled, I was halfway under my seat before I realized it wasn’t a shooting. So Tony and I each had a near miss, although Tony’s was much worse than mine. I’m glad Tony’s ok, I’m glad I didn’t wet my pants on the bus, and I’m glad you all missed my blog.

Thanksgiving, Part I: Curse of the Stoned Cherub

Thanksgiving is that wonderful time of year when we sit down with our friends and family to give thanks for all of our blessings. I have celebrated the past 2 Thanksgivings at Matty’s, with Adam responsible for coordinating our delightful Thanksgiving feast. And although our cup doth truly run over, there is just one blessing I would add to our annual celebration: once, if only once, could Adam please not get baked until AFTER he’s finished the GODDAMN stuffing?

We all remember last year, when Adam cooked. He was preparing a fairly impressive meal, when he decided to take a break to spend a little quality time down in his room. He came upstairs for a snack, and ended up falling asleep before he could finish the stuffing. We celebrated the holiday stuffing-less. This year should have been much easier: Matty picked up all the food from the Columbia Tower Club the day before, and Adam just had to turn on the oven and throw in the containers according to a set of instructions. Couldn’t be easier. Except for the fact that you would need an oven the size of a crematorium in order to cook all the food according to the instructions. The alternative, which was easy enough on its face, was to put the turkey in a smaller roaster to save space, fit the stuffing in the oven at the right time, and heat the vegetables and potatoes on the stove top. Gravy in the microwave, and we’d be eating like the Pilgrims did before they pissed off the Indians.

But Adam, everyone’s favorite houseboy-cherub, tossed the turkey in the oven and waded into the champagne (and God knows what else). By the time we needed to heat up the rest of the food, he was listing to one side in a Barcelona chair and giggling like a 14 year old who just discovered you can huff whipping cream canisters. I wouldn’t speculate on his state of mind, but he was plowing through the hors d’oerves like he hadn’t eaten in a week. Not one to miss a meal myself, I took matters into my own hands and got everything heated up, incurring a big nasty cut in the process (I’d had a bit of champagne myself). We all sat down to a lovely meal, including stuffing which had to be microwaved (it didn’t get in the oven in time to get hot) but seemed passable anyway. Adam ate his fill and went to sleep.

Next time, Part II of our three-part Thanksgiving Entry.

The Old Gray Mare

My plan for Wednesday was get to work early, bill 10 hours, and head home for a quiet night before Yuki arrived for the weekend. With the holiday and a houseguest, I was bound to be busy. Plus, Monday night had wiped me out and Tuesday night wasn’t particularly restful (more on that later).

But the day started with me sleeping in, and dragging into work at 9:00 am. Billing 10 hours would require staying until at least 8 pm, maybe later, and I just wasn’t up to it. I resolved to work until 6:30 pm and call it quits.

By 2 pm Paul was at CC’s and texting every 5 minutes. He had taken off the afternoon and was there with Evil Mark, hitting on Murch and trying to wipe out CC’s stockpile of vodka. You can imagine my response. I’m weak under the best circumstances; plus I was hung over, and it was the last day before a long holiday break. I was helpless. I fended off the craziness as long as I could, but at 4:30 I shut down the computer and headed out of the office.

It was pouring rain when I got outside, so instead of walking home to get the car, I decided to take a cab. Cabbing it is never easy in Seattle, but at the end of the day downtown, in a rainstorm, it’s impossible. I ran down the block to the Hotel Monaco, huddling under awnings with rainwater streaming off my bald head, and finally got a cab after a couple of cab-hailing duels with the hotel valets (who are all really cute). A $5 cab ride got me to my garage (the amount is important later, because I’m cheap) and then I grabbed the Benz and raced up to CC’s in the downpour. Paul was calling and texting the whole time, becoming decreasingly coherent until he just repeated the text message, “Come” over and over. As I was pulling up he called and threatened to close his tab (that got me going, remember I’m cheap) so I told him to order me a beer and raced inside. The entire odyssey, from office chair to barstool, took 15 minutes. It was 4:45 pm, not quite time for cocktails.

I greeted the boys, and settled into my Mac & Jack’s and the usual chit-chat. My peace and quiet lasted all of 5 minutes. Yes kids, before my beer was even half done, Paul was draining his final vodka-soda and announcing we had to go to Mark’s house. “What’s at Mark’s house,” I asked. “Beer,” came the reply, and apparently Murch’s promise he’d come over after his shift to tend to Paul and Evil Mark’s “bars.” Murch heard this and just gave me a big loopy grin; I couldn’t blame the guy for telling a little white lie to get the drunken doofuses out of his bar. But dammit, I had left the office early and took a $5 cab ride to hang out with my friends at a BAR. Not go to Mark’s house and watch them pass out on the couch while they waited for some bartender to “drop by.” And it was barely 5 pm on the night before a holiday. Carlos had class until 8:30, and the evening had been shaping up to be busy and fun.

Being spineless, I caved. Mark and Paul ran off, and I finished my beer and chatted with Murch. He just flirts because it gets him tips, but tonight it had messed up my evening and I was cranky. I left him a buck (he even flirted with me a little) and headed down to Evil Mark’s.

Of course, Evil Mark didn’t HAVE beer, he had to go GET beer. When he got back we all cracked one open and stood around the computer looking at pics of Mark’s old internet tricks. And about halfway thru the first bottle, things got interesting.

Paul’s packed on the pounds, and the girl can put away drinks with the best of them. But to paraphrase a song from my childhood, the old gray mare’s liver ain’t what it used to be, so many years ago. Paul got half that beer down and lost the power of speech. Lost it. One minute he was babbling, his mouth locked in a grin like the Joker from Batman, and the next minute his jaw was clenched tightly shut and his eyes were pointing two different directions. He was swaying and drooling just a bit, and when I asked him if he was ok he couldn’t answer. He just stood there, swaying a little in his work clothes with a bottle of Rolling Rock locked in his left hand. Finally he nodded, crookedly.

I have to say, I was concerned. I’ve seen Paul so drunk he couldn’t crawl up a flight of stairs (the weekend on the coast), but I’ve never seen him unable to talk. We finally got his knees unlocked and got him to sit down. Mark, always the practical one, said “Well he’s still awake so he’ll be fine. I’ll getcha another beer.” It was 6 pm. On a Wednesday.

Woodsy came over shortly thereafter, and Matty swung by on his way home from work, but my evening was done. I said my goodbyes, extracted a promise that someone would get Paul either home or to the ER, and went home to make dinner. Who thought that finally getting Paul to be quiet would be so disturbing?

The Night That Time Forgot

I’ve never seen the old movie, The Land That Time Forgot, but I’m familiar with the premise: it’s a story about explorers who discover a place dinosaurs have escaped extinction. The movie used primitive stop-motion dinosaur action (based on the clips I’ve seen), but the moral comes thru loud and clear: humans and these beasts weren’t meant to mix. When it happens it’s disastrous for all involved. That, I think, makes it a fitting analogy for what happened last Monday night.

Monday night started out innocently enough: Paul, Curtis, Matty and I met at Madison Pub for an after-work drink. Adam appeared after a bit, and then Mike Meola (Mike insists that he didn’t have sex with that boy, Ben), and finally Woodsy arrived. Then Ryan G. (better known as Tuesday Night, named for the night we met him) appeared with his boyfriend and a group of cute young friends.

Maybe I’m working the analogy with the movie a little too hard, but I consider Tuesday Night and his posse to be the explorers who let loose the beasts. Until they arrived it was a typical night: a bit of ribbing for Paul and Curtis about their relationship, some good-natured kidding with Mike about Ben (remember, Mike says he did not have sex with that boy, Ben). We were tipsy but not drunk, having fun but heading home to boyfriends and dinner and maybe a little TV. Who’d think the monsters would come out?

When you meet new, cut young guys the first thing you do is introductions. We introduced ourselves, asked the boys about their jobs, and mentioned boyfriends in passing to put them at ease. Then Matty said, “I think we need shots!” Always the faithful lieutenant, I did a quick headcount, ran up to the bar, and returned with 11 shots for the crew. I asked the bartender for something medium-strong but palatable, and boy did he come thru. Those shots went down like Kool-Aid and hit like Jaeger. In for a penny, in for a pound, right? We had another round, and just because it’s not done until it’s over-done, a third round.

This is where things get fuzzy. By the third round we’d had some attrition. Paul had disappeared, and Mike (who insists he didn’t have sex with that boy, Ben) was playing darts. And to be frank, I had stopped noticing anyone else but the new guys, Matty, and Curtis. Inexplicably, when I returned with our 3rd round of shots, Curtis’s oxford shirt had been ripped mostly open, and his undershirt had been ripped in half. He was looking a bit dazed and annoyed. Of course, all of this could only mean one thing: Curtis wanted to be pants-ed!

Always one to oblige a friend, I passed around the shots, and immediately started removing Curtis’s pants. To make a long story short, Curtis had had enough. He whacked me upside the head, grabbed his coat, and left. Needless to say, it didn’t hurt much because I was waaaaay past feeling any pain. At this point, Matty suggested to everyone that it would be fun to go sit in the hot tub. Although I had no intention of joining them in the tub (Carlos would explode, and not in a good way), I’ve never been one to keep cute, young guys from relaxing in a hot tub. We all proceeded to Matty’s house where everyone got naked and soaked for awhile before going home. Well, except Mike (who didn’t have sex with that boy, Ben). Mike is a good boy and would never climb naked into a hot tub with a bunch of naked guys. He borrowed someone’s underwear.