I’m not a blasphemer, more of a blastibia.
A lie for a single pageview
“When people think of “confessional” or “intimate” music, they often picture a guy fingerpicking an acoustic guitar, but I think sitting and whispering into your computer is even more weirdly intimate, or has the potential to be.”
I imagine Will Sheff alone in the dark. I imagine him hunched over. I imagine him whispering into a computer microphone, those old ones from the ’90s, white and plastic. I imagine that the room is windowless. I imagine him sitting for days, whispering steadily, sadly, his back beginning to ossify in its hunched position. I imagine a single stained bulb. I imagine that his hair grows, but otherwise the scene remains permanent throughout eternity, outside heaven or hell, just one windowless room in which Will Sheff whispers forever and ever, his hair growing shaggy and imperceptibly.
[Lovestreams.]
I’ll pretend, I’ll pretend
There is a mouse in my kitchen.
My roommate alerted me to this fact. She knocked on my door while I was writing, requesting that I end the wee tim’rous beast’s life.
A number of thoughts ran through my head.
- I look awful in a t-shirt and an old pair of soccer shorts. My hair is a mess because I slept on it. Not that it matters, since she’s my roommate and I have a rule about this sort of thing and I’m entirely certain she’s not interested, but she is also a quite attractive young woman of about my age who has a cute French accent, being as she is from a part of France that produces cute accents in attractive girls in their early 20s. It would be nice to not look like a lazy slob.
- I am the kind of person who prefers his first contact with dead animals to come between two sesame seed buns and slathered in barbecue sauce. I do not hunt, despite having had opportunities to learn, and I generally avoid picking up dead animals if I can help it.
- I need to fucking move.
She cited my gender in her assertion that I should kill it. I reminded her that this is the 21st fucking century; she can kill her own goddamn mouse.
I did, however, take the opportunity to scare the shit out of her. She had seen the mouse run under the dishwasher, so we got the broom and started poking under there. I yelled; she flipped out; I rolled on the floor laughing.
Abandoning the grand hunt, I returned to my room to continue working.
The mouse came back.
This time, it was not scurrying along the floor, but invading the much more sacrosanct area of the counter. I was called in again, being the bloodthirsty hunter that I am. It had apparently found some space between the stove or behind the microwave or something. She armed us with pasta colanders to trap the creature.
Naturally, I use the tension to scare the shit out of her again. Because it’s funny, and because I’m an asshole.
In the midst of this though, I think maybe I sorta kinda maybe saw something brown move across the stove in my peripheral vision. We carefully move away the items on the side of the counter where I believe it may have run to.
Nothing.
We move the microwave. Nothing.
At this point, I make the decision to cede the kitchen to the mouse. It has won two battles. It will surely bring reinforcements. We will survive on dried and canned foods only. We will walk around the house if we wish to access the back patio. We will no longer use the restroom past the kitchen. Besides, the water runs in the toilet if you don’t jiggle the handle right, and we rarely remember to do so, and I’m sure that’s not good for the utilities bill. It is a tenuous peace for now, but if we respect his lands, perhaps it can last.
[The Big Roar.]
Our new world guidelines
(not rules!)
LI-ON GREVIER – When All Hope Has Wanned
Hey guys and girls,
Guess what? This is our post-apocalypse! The Mayan calendar really did end! Forget the world as you know it. It’s over. This is our time now. I know it’s confusing: there were no raging hails of brimstone and no wingless angels falling slumped to the earth and no swarms of locusts or African killer-bees pockmarking our pristine, L’Oreal‘d skin. However, don’t be fooled. It is happening. We are soaked in the gasoline now. We are waiting for a struck match to be held to our cuffs, our arms ablaze. Fiery collared shirts windmilling in the streets. Together we are Patient Zero. Sitting, each of us, on Ground Zero. One collective digit. So to this, I propose a few New World guidelines (not rules — I’m not the ruler, I mean, unless you guys wanna vote me in as the ruler and, if so, well, okay, I guess, but don’t feel any pressure or anything):
- Let’s adopt a universal language. Just so you could, like, call Somalia or something and be all, “Yo! Somalia! What is up?” and there wouldn’t any confusion or whatever. Maybe call it Humanglish or Peoplese or something.
- I propose we strike the term ‘celebrity’ from our New World lexicon. It’s a cruel word. The beginnings of social divide. It does us no good and in the long run will get really silly. We’ve seen this. Also, it is really hard to become a celebrity without resorting to nefarious means or plastic surgery or a sex tape.
- I’m unsure about this one, but we should probably be naked most of the time. Less shame. More titties. That might just be me, though.
- Everybody should watch The Shawshank Redemption when they’re cognitively aware. It’ll help with our ideas of friendship, justice, injustice, the importance of hope, and why Morgan Freeman should be the voice inside your head narrating your thoughts.
- We’ll have schools, right? I know people don’t necessarily like school but it’s important and, well, alright, if we have schools let’s stick to the important lessons: How To Play An Instrument, How To Deal With A Broken Heart Without Using That Instrument To Soundtrack Really Shitty Poetry, and How To Not Let That Adolescent Heart-Breaking Haunt You In Adulthood And Adversely Affect Every Mature Relationship You’ll Ever Attempt. Also: How To Make Scones (I still don’t know!)
- We shouldn’t bring our smartphones along when we hang out at parties. If your friend is texting you all night, well, they should have come to the party. It would have been fun! More importantly, it is too easy to ignore people looking to have a conversation when you have a Black Hole of Disinterest waiting to be pulled out of your pocket. Sometimes people are boring, I know, but maybe ask questions until there’s something there to talk about.
- This is more of a request: can we stop with ‘reality’ TV? Reality is everywhere. It feels weird putting it in a box. Go outside. Or stay indoors and talk to your sister or your partner (who is probably on his or her smartphone anyway) or play with your dog or something. Buddy is lonely.
- No rulers! My feigned disinterest earlier was a ruse! A clever ruse designed to trick you into thinking “Hey, maybe this guy should be the ruler! He seems to have some good ideas and a way with words and he is also very handsome!” I know, I know — it is hard to ignore. Alas, we must stay strong! We no longer need hierarchy. We will simply pin ideas to a message board (possibly the Great Wall of China, since I’ve always heard it can be seen from space and that could come in handy down the line) and when those ideas have run their course or are no longer socially relevant, we will simply unpin them! Easy! As our sensitivities change, so will our ideas! As long as they are for the betterment of our collective beauty and intelligence, we can not err!
- Above all: we oughta just be kind to one another.
If we follow these guidelines, our New World should be just dandy.
Made some cash on the side so we could get the fuck out
Herman Dune – You Could Be A Model Goodbye
Thoughts on visiting a strip club for the first time ever:
- I walked in, paid the $8 cover, and there, in front of me, were real, fleshy titties. Naked, exposed titties. That’s fun.
- I blushed into the darkness for about the first half hour.
- The general setup: The bar snakes up and down a dim room, and one to three topless dancers inch along (it’s hard to move quickly in six-inch heels on a ledge four feet above the floor), stopping at each guy and gyrating/wiggling/wriggling ostensibly seductively above him. When not on the bar, the girls put on tops and sell jello shots and try to sell lap dances.
- The first girl who talked to me was a woman. She was old. I felt bad turning down a dance. Sure, strippers get fawned over all day at work, but they also deal with a healthy amount of rejection. Rejection sucks, whatever the form. Later, the ugliest shot girl told me the rest of the girls say she’s too nice to work there. That was sweet of them. We need to rationalize rejection somehow.
- In strip clubs you have to talk to more people than I was expecting. Instantly a flock of girls come crowding around, pressing their breasts into your shoulder, offering jello shots, offering dances. I guess I thought I could sit back and enjoy a show without too much pestering, which was pretty naive of me, considering how they make money. But what does one chat about with strippers? Usually I just ask a bunch of questions when I meet strangers; people love talking about themselves. But I realized that might not work in this setting when I asked one’s name and she pointedly told me a stage name (“I go by Boots here”). There’s also the awkwardness that comes from chatting chirpily with someone who wants to sell you something, and you both know it. It’s artifice. Those poor girls, trying to chat me up as I’m busy taking mental notes and really only there so that Rat can forget the ellipsis-toss game that is happening.
- The best conversation I had was with the bartender. Three Dos Equis in I remembered that I had forgotten to tip him, so I hit him with some back-tips. He brightened up immediately. That was his first night back at work after knee surgery. He’d been on crutches for five weeks, thanks to an old college injury. Don’t laugh: he was an all-American bowler and his sliding foot built up residual damage. He was nice. He would walk by and give me the ‘ok’ sign to make sure I was good on drinks. At one point he put clear plastic cups on each of a black girl’s tits, then turned to me and said, “It’s good to be back.”
- I lied. The real reason we were there was because going to a strip club was on my bucket list. I’ve been mildly obsessed with my bucket list recently. There are plenty of reasons, I suppose, none of which apply here. But I do want to note how quickly people accept a bucket list as reasoning for just about anything. “Why would you go to a strip club? Oh, it’s on your bucket list. Well alrighty, then. Have fun!” “What could possible interest you in Cuba? Ah, it’s on your bucket list. Awesome. Send me a postcard.”
- Overall, the experience tucked neatly into the intersection of sexual, seedy, and awkward that I had been told to expect. One image that will likely linger: one of the white girls squatted down in front of me and wiggled her ass. There, several inches from my face, I could see a friction rash on her butt cheeks. The memory is mildly prurient, but also awkward (‘Should I tell her?’) and exceptionally gross.
- Some journalism: On a weekend, up to 50 girls work the club. Monday had a considerably slower shift. In Louisiana, girls have to wear panties. Google was unclear about which states (it might be divided by counties) allow bottomless clubs. The girls skirt this rule by letting their thongs ride low, about halfway down their asses. There are three rooms off the main bar. One is an open room where you can get lap dances for $20 a song. The VIP room costs $30/song. To get into the “Party Room” it varies by dancer, but hovered around $300, $75 of which went to the bar. What the girls will do and how much it costs varies as well. Beers cost $5. Boots was — quelle surprise — putting herself through college (dance major).
- I spent a little over $50: $16 for my and Rat’s cover, $15 on three beers, and myriad ones fumblingly tucked into garters. All the girls had a special strap to hold their cash, mostly on their thighs but some on ankles and wrists. I imagine too many patrons used to drunkenly yank while slipping bills into panties, but that’s pure speculation. I forgot to ask.
- When the girls dance at the bar, you are eye-level with their ankles. Looking up had the sensation of sitting in the front row at a movie theater, neck craned awkwardly. I came to the conclusion that breasts — magnificently sculpted artworks that they are — are least attractive when viewed from the bottom up.
- The strippers actually didn’t do any stripping. They were already topless when they went out to dance. What I’m saying is that this wasn’t a striptease. I don’t know, that felt an important distinction.
- I spent most of the time there between flaccid and quarter-chub. Beforehand I wondered if it’s awkward to get a boner in a strip club, just like I have googled traditional practice for when you get a hard-on at a nude beach. It ended up not being a concern.
- “Is that guy a regular?” I asked one of the girls, pointing to a gray-haired man across the way. She hadn’t seen him before. I asked because he had three of the four hottest girls crowded around him, and was laughing and touching them familiarly. At one point, he licked up a girl’s leg, over her crotch, and up her other leg, which she had extended above her head. He held another by the stomach and kept trying to finger her. She kept his hand out of her vagina, but was laughing. He motorboated yet another. Movies had always told me you weren’t allowed to touch the strippers. None of the male staff members I saw seemed the mind, and by the way the girls were giggling, they were egging him on. I never saw him go in for a dance.
- I was very bored very soon. It quickly becomes over-stimulation if you’re not going to buy a dance. I felt roughly about the club as I do about casinos. I have sat at many blackjack tables with friends, even though I don’t gamble. I understand the appeal: there’s that rush, in this case prurient, that lures people. But mostly I just counted my ones disappearing, like I tend to calculate my cost-per-minute ratio the few times I have gambled. Unless you’re willing to invest a larger sum than my writerly wages can sustain, those vices are fleetingly entertaining.
- “We’re agreed to never talk about this again, right?” Rat said as we drove home. I asked why. “I have liberal guilt,” he said. I was confused. “Like Catholic guilt or whatever, I feel guilty about things liberals are supposed to care about.” That made sense to me.
[BBC Sessions.]