In The Zone

"I should have seen the signals and stopped, what a flop! Now I see the way it ends. I'll let her turn me down and say "Can't we be friends" Jamie Cullum from "Can't We Be Friends"

The nurse must have been crying all night based on the puffy appearance of her eyeballs. Normally this shocking display of emotion from my dealer would warm my heart like a puppy fetching a steak bone, her misery is usually my adulation, but I have been feeling a skosh more human as a late, which reminds me that I need to get my meds adjusted. So in an altruistic effort to show a glimmer of compassion I asked her what was causing her blues. She informed me that her latest victim told her that he only wanted to be friends with her. My hysterical laughter obviously wasn't helping her feel better, but come on, guys don't have the "Friend Zone."

I know I'm gonna earn some chauvinist pig points for this one, someone may even bring up the "misogynist" word again, but I've had some time to think about the "Friend Zone" and the times that I have been relegated to it. I won't claim to speak for all men, just myself, and my experiences.

I have friends that are female. The capability for me to spend time with someone and not want to hump their leg like a Shitzu does exist. There can be conversations that don't involve the slightest whiff of sexual theme, granted that's about as rare as steak tartar, but still it's possible. But I never fully rule out the idea of being physical with that person. I may not be attracted to them physically, or on a one or two occasions I just find someone that I know I won't be compatible with intellectually, but I always think in the dark recesses of my testosterone fueled brain that if the circumstances were right, I'd take a run at her. I'm not sure if females share this quirk with me. It's not that I don't believe that women can act in sexually irrational way, I just don't know. Do they? Do they think that almost every man they have the least bit of commonality with is a possible sexual partner?

And I do believe that there are women out there that don't have a "Friend Zone" Women that try not to put Baby in a corner. Whether it be a bad current situation or don't find them physically desirable, but still care about them, enjoy their company, and don't close the option door. They may not answer that door when I knock, but they don't fully consider me sexually neutral. And I postulate that most women will say they are of this order. Which I, remember just me, thinks is a bold faced lie on most accounts. They have a "Friend Zone"

What I'm really getting at is this: Why does the "Friend Zone" exist at all? Time changes people, all people, male and female. The woman that I didn't find attractive last month might now be more desirable to me as I've gotten to know her better. I know that I am a different person today than I was when I started this here campaign. Different things are important to me, people I used to find undeniably attractive I now could never imagine being intimate with, and there are others that I wish I would have paid more attention to. If I enacted a "Friend Zone" these changes wouldn't allow for chemistry, so why is it still around?

Do you have a "Friend Zone"? Been in it? Lived there? Will you help me to abolish it?

Dixie Cup of Love: Abolitionists.

Power of Green

"But green's the color of Spring. And green can be cool and friendly-like. And green can be big like an ocean, or important like a mountain, or tall like a tree." Kermit The Frog from "It's Not Easy Being Green"

The nurse accidentally slipped on a slightly used condom as she entered my super soft padded walled room. She showed amazing dexterity for a gal who does her best work in the prone position, walking only suits her until she finds a John, I mean a date. Looking down at the implement of her near annihilation, seeing the prophylactic strewn on the floor like unwanted banana peels, she turned her gaze to me, as f I was responsible for leaving the slippery spermicidal balloon in her path. I swear I could see the vein in her forehead throbbing to what could only the the best of "Tainted Love" by Soft Cell. I thought she was gonna freak out, turn green, and start ripping her clothes to shreds, Hulk style.

If I turned into the Hulk every time someone pissed me off I would have a serious shortage of clothes. Think about what the poor bastard has to spend on Tough Skins every month. Not like one yearly, before school starts, shopping trip, I would be shopping for dungarees in bulk. And sadly, it wouldn't be me getting all pissed off over the social ills of the world, fuck no. Cut me off in traffic, I need a change of clothes. Step in front of me with an empty shopping cart at Wal-Mart, and two seconds later I'm heading to Mens Wear to get new sweats. It would seriously be a burden.

But would the ever expanding wardrobe budget be off set by the utter coolness of a jade skinned freak out? Sure it would impress the ladies, I mean if just getting me angry would force my body to triple in size, surely a well timed use of teeth during foreplay would only engorge Mini Hulk, right? And we all know what a pain in the ass parking is during the holidays. One kick to the giblets and I could throw that Hummer taking two spots over the JC Penny and halfway to Macy's.

Pros and cons would exist on both sides of the gamma radiation experiment. But as a tortured soul, Banner, would never see the pros. The negatives for him would outweigh any possible good that could come from being the Hulk. His rage leads to random destruction, which only ends up leaving him feeling worse. A cycle of unbreakable inertia. Atomic and the Jew may ring in here with a time line in comic continuity when the random destruction came under control, but by then the damage was done. That's the dichotomy that the first Hulk movie failed to capture for me. Maybe I missed it, maybe it wasn't there, maybe Ang Lee should stick to period dramas. I don't know.

Today, Edward Norton, one of the finest actors on the planet, takes on the role of the human form of the UnJolly Green Giant. Will this Hulk movie suffer the same fate as the first? Will the franchise die? Not to worry, even if it does suck like a Hoover upright, at least Dark Knight is still coming out later this summer. Thank God Christopher Nolan knows what he's doing.

Is there a Hulk inside of you? What brings it out?

Dixie Cup of Love: The Wonderful minds of Stan Lee and Jack Kirby.

I Suffer from Allodoxaphobia

"I smell the fear that rains inside, the thought of children who must oblige. To tainted dreams and polluted seas, the missing moon and melting trees. A mist of doom and clouds of pain. A toxic waste and an acid rain" Lenny Kravitz from "Fear"

When the nurse came in this morning to narcotize me I found myself suffering from what the Asylum, psychiatrist would call pharmacophobia, which is the fear of drugs. What I should have been diagnosed as having was bartonophobia, the fear of evil psychotic surgically enhanced nurses as named for Clara Barton founder of the American Red Cross and perhaps a witch. Okay, I could be wrong about the witch thing, but my nurse is definitely worthy of my fear.

Fear is a funny thing. Not funny in a haha, makes me pee a little kind of way, but more of a how can that actually terrify anyone kind of way. Take uranophobia for example. Now, necrophobia or the fear of death, I can understand. I get that. But uranophobia? It's the fear of Heaven. Seriously. It's such a common affright that they had to come up with a name of it. Or what about bolshephobia. Knowing that the Russian dance troupe called the Bolshoi Ballet exists, I thought, what man doesn't have a slight trepidation when it comes to ballet, but then I learned that pirouettes and arabesque's have nothing to do with it. It's the fear of Bolsheviks. Really?

Ballistophobia is the fear of bullets. Would that be a box of ammo sitting on a counter or a small metal projectile zooming through the air with the goal of ending my life, because one of those things I'm afraid of. The other is just a box.

I don't suffer from epistemophobia because if I did then this blog wouldn't be written. Knowledge, after all, is nothing to be scared of. Pretty sure that I don't suffer from cypridophobia, parthenophobia, or eurotophobia either, because I don't get the nits in front of hookers, virgins or female genitalia. There really is a terror for every occasion. I don't have Judeophobia cause I like Adam and the Weinsteins, but I do have a touch of theophobia which is just a general bugaboo against religion in general.

Though as I did research on this I realize I am coming down with hellenologophobia, no not the fear of Helen Slater, the Legend of Billie Jean rocked, no it's the fear complex scientific terminology. It's quite possible that I suffer from oprahophobia, which is the fear of black women that want to rule the minds of other woman. And, though I didn't know it had a name I also suffer from anuptaphobia which is the opposite of gamophobia. I could tell you what all that means but it would lea to your sophophobia.

Basically, I'm scared of snakes, reptiles, wooden roller coasters, and Keanu Reeves movies, other than that I'm as sane as Lizzie Borden. Relatively speaking.

Got phobias?

Dixie Cup of Love: The Reaper.

The Hourglass

The nurse had enough delays. She wanted to hear how the Michelle story ended. Some of you might not even remember the beginning, so here is a link to: The Hourglass Syndrome. With my shackles keeping me under the nurses watchful eye, I had no choice but to make with the rest of the story. Don't be sad, I thought, be glad that I ever got to know her love, even if it was not meant to last. I continued...

This friend of mine knew the minute he saw me that life was about to throw me a twelve to sex curveball that was definitely gonna make me look like a fool in the batters box. when I drove up to his house with Michelle in the passengers seat two things became as clear as crystal. I was now sleeping with a married woman and it wasn't gonna be a one time thing. This game was gonna be the hardest that I had ever played.

So, I alluded to the fact that the love of my life was married when we met. What I left out was where her husband was. As far as I knew he was on Mars, but I learned that he was on an aircraft carrier doing his duty as a member of our Navy. Mind you that this was pre 9-11 and the rspect that we had at the time for our fighting men and women wasn't at the level that it is today. I say this to aswage my own guilt, there is no lower snake than I. He was out defending my right to persue my happiness with his wife. And with him out to sea for the foreseeable future, the girl was mine.

Michelle and I dated like there was nothing standing in our way. We spoke of the future, we made love in an all consuming fire of passion, we laughed, and we fell in love. Not I fell in love, no, we did. It was the first time I said it to someone who meant it when she said it back. One conversation that I will never forget involved where we would go on our honeymoon. There were serveral destinations on the board, but we finally agreed on Montego Bay, Jamaica. All we had to do was get married and start living life, oh yeah, and she had to deal with that one thing.

In November, right around Thanksgiving, the time came. We were standing out on the rocks at the jetty at Seal Beach when she informed me that he was due home in one week. The conversations from that moment on got more and more intense. Twice we fought after sex that week, not fights built on anger, but frustration. The big talk was looming over both of our heads. With two days remaining before the ship pulled into harbor we sat down for our last face to face conversation.

We stared at each other for almost a half an hour without saying a word. It was unnecessary. I knew what she was going to ask and I'm pretty sure she knew my answer. I loved her. I wanted her. I had dreamt of marrying her and honeymooning in Jamaica. But when she finally got to asking the question the reality took over. She kissed me, then while holding my face in her hands she asked "What do you want me to do?" My deepest, no only, but my deepest regreat was the speed with which my answer escaped my lips. "You cheated on him, what makes you think you won't cheat on me?" Truth. Honest, brutal dagger all in one statement. She drove away. My love.

You can ask or relate however you want.

Dixie Cup of Love: The One That Wasn't

Enchantment Under the Sea

"Dance with me my dear, on a floor of bones and skulls. The music is our master, the devil controls our souls. Swirling and swirling with the music all our turning, swaying to the sounds of a demonic beat." TSOL from "Dance With Me"

Just before I was set to drift off to sleep last night the nurse came into my room in a stunning strapless gravity defying gown with a fragrant purple orchid corsage covering most of her plastic surgery. It was a sight that my stoned eyes wasn't at all sure was real upon initial glance, but the angry look on her mug was all the assurance I needed, reality can be exquisite from time to time. What was the occasion, I pondered? Was she a hell spawn Bridesmaid for a fellow succubus? Was she the first prize in a Dirty Whore Auction with the proceeds going to some wretched charity? No. The reality was far more entertaining. For the sum of $1000 she was going to be the prom date of a local high schools Chess Club founder. As I billowed laughter I thought of my own prom.

Here's something you need to understand about high school, my luck and skills with the feminine side of the locker room is the same now as it was then. Once in a while the blind squirrel gets a nut, but for the most part I'm an abject failure when in comes to the dames. A hideous combination of lack of confidence and unsightly body mass. So for me prom was an event to be scorned, shunned, laughed about, and in quiet alone times cried over. Alright you caught me, I never cried over it, but I certainly wasn't interested in attending the "Night of 1000 Rufie's" celebration that the alma mater prepared for a whopping $75 a bid. I'm sure if I tried I could have scrounged up a date, but why throw $75, plus dinner and a limo, at a girl who was obviously not going to be the pick of the litter? No I left my dance card empty. Besides Wayne and I had a better plan.

The only reason Wayne and I ventured to the Hyatt in Long Beach that night was that we had heard the most provocative rumor. Don was dyeing his hair blue to match his date, and future wife's, dress. A fashion statement that bold would rival Bjork showing up to the Oscars in the Duck dress. It was something that had to be seen.

The thing about the Hyatt is that the old MHS prom was on the second floor and you had to take an escalator to get there. Of course to keep riff-raff like Wayne and I out the escalator was being guarded like it was the Vestal Virgin stronghold. You had to pay for a bid to get up the magic moving stairway and of course be in "proper attire". We were in jeans and T-shirts, I only wish that TshirtHell.com was around then because this story would rock so much harder if at the time I was wearing a shirt that said "I fucked the Olsen Twins before they were Famous" (yes, I own that shirt). Regardless, we didn't look like a couple of Dapper Dandy's so the escalator to Heaven wasn't open to us, but the service elevator took you right to the main room if you had the sack to try it.

When the doors opened the look on Vice Principle Dick Pierce's face, okay it was Richard, but come on what would you have called him, but his shock was worth the possibility of expulsion. After being seen by a very scant few, though enough to make it known that the prom had indeed been crashed, we were escorted back down to the lobby where we were greeted by Christine Anne Basch, guidance counselor extraordinaire. She smiled the grin of a woman proud of her little mischief makers, but then scolded us as was her job. After assuring her that we meant no harm, we just wanted to see Don, she slightly hesitated but then she relented as always. She went and found him. As he descended down the escalator like a blue haired Republican at a fund raiser, we applauded then left those who were $75 lighter in the pocket to enjoy their paid for memory and premeditated date rape.

What was your prom like? Who did you go with? Was it worth it?

Dixie Cup of Love: Christine Basch.

A Very Special Episode

"Stars in the sky, they tell me what to do. I don't care about your city or your fat income. I don't care about your Vanity Fair or your fucking sitcom." Iggy Pop from "Starry Night"

Yesterday there was some commotion here at the Asylum. One of the other patients, you really didn't think I was all alone in this head of mine did you? Well, one of the others got the wrong meds and everything got locked down on a suicide watch. It was touch and go for a few minutes, until a wiser person than the wrongly medicated patient talked him off the ledge, then the wiser man cracked a joke about his wife's cooking. We all laughed and after a half an hour it was over. The nurse came back in to usher me to the land of night terrors with an Ambien laced Dixie cup. And I slept in total peace.

Those were the good old days of television. Back when 30 minutes and a laugh track was enough to solve even the biggest of problems. Sometimes it required a special guest star like Davey Jones or Bob Goulet, but for the most part it took them simple discovery that there had been a misunderstanding. That's how life was supposed to play out according to sitcoms. Even when they jumped the shark.

M*A*S*H lasted longer than the Korean war, true story. Not every episode was hysterical either, some where what they used to call "very special episodes." Hearing those words in a promo spot meant that one of the following things would happen: A) Someone would develop and overcome a drug problem. B) A character that had everything to lose would lose it. C) News would arrive at the 4077th that someone's loved one had passed away, be it Henry Blake or Col. Potter's horse.

Cheers would have special episodes too. Ones about Sam's alcohol problem or Carla's kids. Then there was the death of Coach. That one stung, I won't lie. But they would quickly rebound with Woody Boyd and without him there would be no Kelly Song.

I used to be forced by SuperMom to attend family dinner on Sunday night at my Grandparents. Dinner was always, without fail, followed by the tedium of 60 Minutes, trust me when you're a kid that show felt like 180 Minutes, but when it was over it was time for "All in the Family". My Grandfather would roar with the laughter of a lion at Archie Bunker, primetime racist. But it's the show I will always remember watching with a single scoop of plain vanilla ice cream, even the dairy treats were Aryan on Sundays, at my Grandparents house.

Over time my own taste would form. I would consume Different Strokes with great vigor. I would have crushes on many members of the Facts of Life cast. Find hipness in the geeks of Square Pegs. Wish I was a member of the Keaton family, or the Cunningham's, or even a Brady. I would laugh at Ted Knight yelling at JM J Bullock and never thought it got old on Too Close For Comfort. They were good shows, true entertainment. Far superior television than a bunch of metro sexual kids trying to be Pop stars. Especially when it was a very special episode.

What was your favorite sitcoms?

Dixie Cup of Love: Dick Van Patten, best TV Dad ever.

Joined at the Coda

"All these double knit strangers with gin and vermouth and recycled stories, in the naugahyde booths with the platinum blondes and tobacco brunettes. I'll be drinkin' to forget you. Lite another cigarette and the band's playin' something by Tammy Wynette" Tom Waits from "Warm Beer and Cold Women"

She was singing along to her Ipod as she be-bop-a-lulaed into my room for a breakfast of pancakes, sausage, and a Dixie Cup of multi colored pills, of course there were no pancakes and sausage, but doesn't that sound good? What got me thinking was the look on her mug as she bounced around the room like Richard Simmons rolling on Exstacy. Whatever song she was listening to was reminding her of something wonderful, and quite possibly erotic, based solely on the swing of her hips flipping up the edge of her little skirt for the quickest glimpse of her lacy underwearings. As I tried not to stare I got to thinking about the songs that get me thinking.

I knew that it would be impossible for me to list all the songs in my life that are permanently linked to specific people, places, or things. There are too many songs, too many faces, and too many alcohol sodden memories. But there are a few that would be prominently featured in the soundtrack of my life story. For example:

Kodocrome by Paul Simon. I'm not the only one that's gonna have this song tied to the memory of "Love Hurts", my second play. The show itself was so amazing, well acted on all fronts, I dare say well written though large sections of it were lifted from other sources. The Presidents speech from Independence Day, Oren Ishii's declaration to the heads of the Yakuza, Kevin Smith films a plenty, but each night the show opened with Kodocrome and it will always take me to that time in that place.

Two Princes by the Spin Doctors, yes the Spin Doctors. It was a favorite song of Kelly and I's jukebox wars at Lucky John's. Every time I hear it I wonder what would have been if I had the skills to break her down, get her to fall for me, but alas the heart wants what the heart wants and hers didn't want me. But that stupid song will always remind me of Kelly, well that and the Animaniacs tattoo on my back.

You Can't Always Get What You Want by the Rolling Stones is forever attached like conjoined twins to Don and Wayne. It brings back assorted flashes of high school, driving to Hollywood, Rocky Horror Picture Show, Alondra 6, Jack In The Box, and all kinds of weirdness in one song.

American Pie by don McLean is like the closing credits on the Minnesota saga. It instantly takes me back to the porch of my cabin looking out at Cari and Angie getting some sun on the dock. It was such a wonderful time in my life, and the song was really the perfect ending.

Lastly there is Heaven by Canada's biggest failure Bryan Adams. The meaning behind that one lies in the deepest recesses of my memory and I'm not ready to unleash that demon yet.

What song's make you remember the important events?

Dixie Cup of Love: The Songwriters of the World.

PS - Tom Waits will forever remind me of Wes and Mark Adams, two guys that have had a profound influence on my life.