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1/27/06 Motorhead (You Can Call Me)
Hey All right, boys and girls, after I don't know how many issues of this thing- we're up in the one seventies somewhere- lets try something we haven't tried before, an NL under the influence of something other than alcohol or green tea (or white hot rage, or melancholia, or just pure fucking wrong headedness . . . ). Right now I'm speeding like nobody's damn business (which is exactly what it is, by the way- nobody's damn business), let's see if this one comes out any more or less coherent than usual. Although personally I don’t expect much difference, I've done many of these things so very buzzed in the past . . . Why is Bill doing speed tonight? We can get into it in more depth later, but basically just to survive. Even freak of fucking nature that I am, I got more going on than I can keep up with right now without a little outside amplification. Things are pretty much the same here at Fort Apache. My Dad continues to get stronger, physically, he can now sit himself up and lay himself down on the couch unassisted, no small thing considering he's a fidgety son of a bitch, and before he could do this, every 32 seconds when he was downstairs it was either "Bill, raise me up," or "Bill, lay me down"- "I'm gonna lay you fucking OUT, you don't be still"- and get OFF my ass about how I speak to my Dad, number one, my Dad is not some delicate little flower whose feelings are easily bruised by harsh language, TRUST ME, and two, he fucking asks for it. I went off on him like a motherfucker the other morning about 4 am, he was having a restless night- I'm back in there with him again, I don’t wanna talk about it- he'd been driving me fucking bat shit all night, finally he wanted me to get up at 4 in the morning and fix him a hot dog omelet- his breakfast of choice right now, we'll have his ass back to 204 in no damn time- and he got really hateful with me when I explained to him- nicely, I swear-that the kitchen was closed, and how he needed to go to sleep before something heavy fell on his fucking head. As usual when thwarted he gets all damn evil and pissy, spewing about how lazy and worthless I am and that was pretty much that, I came flying up out of that bed, where seconds before I'd been exhausted nigh unto death, and cussed him with a fervor and inventiveness that impressed even his crusty (in more ways than one) ass. And let me tell you what, it felt GOOD. I didn't threaten him with a return to the nursing home, or any punk bullshit like that, cos he's not going back, I wouldn't have it for one thing, his stroke will neither beat nor break me, thank you very much, and I think it'd be weak as shit on my part to try and scare him with that, also I don’t think you should make threats you can't or won't back up, like I've seen many a parent do. Also, you shouldn't threaten with the ultimate shit, I used to know a married couple who every time they had a disagreement, one or the other of them would come out with, "Oh, I'm gonna divorce your ass". I always thought that was so stupid and destructive, you should never say something like that just cos you’re a little pissed. Or even a lot pissed. You say it when all hope is lost. I lost track of these people ages ago- lets see, 27 years this May, actually, I'd say that qualifies for "ages", they were still married then, but I bet they aren't now. Then again, neither am I. Anyway, after this screaming tirade about what a horrible mother fucking ingrate he is, how he is without a doubt the shittiest person on this whole damned planet, and he'll be lucky if he doesn't end up with a pillow coming down over his face as his last sight in this world, does my Dad get all heart sick, weepy and hurt? Fuck no, he just pokes his lower lip out like a little kid and goes, "You don't have to get so damn worked up". And he quit bugging me about hot dog omelets and (finally) went to sleep. My Dad's feeding tube got temporarily clogged last week- don't try to put Milk of Magnesia through one, no matter how loud someone's howling "I gotta poop NOW, or I'm gonna BUST!" (it's all them fucking hot dog omelets), before we got it unclogged with some Coke, I suggested- Bill: There's some Drano under the sink. Dear God. He was okay with getting a belly full of Drano, just don't melt the plastic tube. He's fucking priceless. He's been doing this goofy ass mental shit lately, I don’t know if he's really nuts, or just fucking with us, for a while last week he insisted we call him "Pharaoh"- during this time he was calling my Mom "Venus", and me "General Grant", no I am NOT making this up, earlier tonight he says to me-
And so it goes. This is as good a time as any to apologize for all the typos last issue. I'm telling you, my brain is on bad shape. Heard from Ron, who complimented me on dealing with all this shit with a "wonderfully effective rage", let me tell you what, big guy, being mad at the goddamn world is the only thing that's keeping me going right now. That, and snorting Dexadrine (and drinking whiskey, a hell of a combination). Ron's mom has just moved in with him and it sounds like she has plans to stay, which could well be even worse than my situation (no reflection on your Ma, Ron), just that it's easier to run away from home, than it is to kick a parent out of your house. Al also continues his decline, he's pissing on pretty much everything that's not nailed down now, and it seems to be catching up with him, it used to be, a couple months ago when he'd piss the bed I'd know it immediately, cos I'd hear him holler, "HEY, how'd this bed get WET!" and I'd go in and flip his mattress and change his sheets and douse him and the bed with Febreeze- ("What's THIS shit?" "Takes the wrinkles out of your shirt" "I'm not WEARING a shirt" "Go to sleep, Al") but now he just pisses and lays in it, or he did Monday night, anyway, the smell was so rank it woke me up, he didn't want to get up, and trust me, I didn't want to fool with it, I was dog fucking tired, I am all the time anymore, but I couldn't let him lay in that mess all night- also I couldn't stand the stink, I got him up and in the shower while I cleaned up- Al protesting like a mother fucker the whole time, "Yes you DO stink, you're covered in piss, get in the fucking shower, Al!"- between him and my Dad the past few months I've changed more fucking bed sheets, and seen more old man ass, than anyone should have to. Al scraped his shin on the outside steps, I guess sometime last week, it happened when I wasn't around, the fucking thing got infected. I'm sure having piss running down his leg a couple times a day didn't help any. His leg was all swollen this morning when I got up, looked terrible, so I took him to the emergency room, not like I fucking wanted to, but what could I do, we sat there four interminable hours before we got some Augmentin and our release, and it was four hours of- Al: Boy, my leg hurts. Wonder what the hell's wrong with it? Ad infuckingnitum. I tried once to liven things up when he asked what was wrong with his leg, but as so often happens when I try to get cute, it backfires in my fucking face- A: . . . wonder what the hell's wrong with it? Al starts rubbing his stomach and getting genuinely worked up. A: You have to be kidding me. God help us all, it took me ten minutes to convince Al he wasn't going to have a baby. "BUT YOU SAID-" Al's obviously lost a lot head wise recently, he never talks about the past anymore, I never thought I'd miss his constant, repetitive reminiscing, but dammit, I do, when I try to ask, hey, Al, tell me about when you were in the Navy he goes "I was in the Navy?", pretty sad, fuck, he thought he was gonna have A BABY, after we got back to his house and I was giving him all his pills before I left he said, "What's this", I said, "Lunch, it’s the future now, all we eat is pills, don’t you remember?" and instead of laughing and telling me I was full of shit like he would have done a year ago, he just went, "Oh yeah, I forgot . . . future, just eat pills now . . " Al said to me while we were at the hospital, "I think I'm about at the end of my rocker". I think you are too, Al. What's Bill been watching? Not much. They're really pushing that new Jenna Elfman show, been seeing a lot of commercials for it. What's that you say, have I watched the show itself, who the hell do you think you're talking to, no, I haven't seen the show. Still, Jenna's a seriously fine looking woman, only 34, I'd tank that shit in a heartbeat, how the hell'd I miss her all this time (yeah, thanks for you who let me know her previous show was "Dharma and Greg", and special thanks to you, lavalamp69, who told me it was "Karma And Greg")? Must be the network TV thing is all I can figure, I saw a commercial the other day for the hundredth episode of a show- "Scrubs", fucking whatever, it looked dire- that not only have I never seen, I've never even fucking heard of. I don't normally discuss sports in here, not really being that interested, but the shitting Steelers are in the Super Bowl, so I can guaran- damn- tee you I won’t be watching the damn thing. Not that I would have anyway, I can't remember the last time I watched a Super Bowl, maybe the last time the Redskins were in it . . . fuck pro sports, truly, they're all crooked as fuck (same with college), at least in wrestling we let you know the fix is in (Super Bowl III was RIGGED, I DON'T CARE that you don’t want to believe it). Still . . . the fucking Steelers. I know Jason is a big Steelers fan, and I love the boy dearly, but I don't think there's another team in all of pro sports- not the Cowboys, not the Raiders (who eat shit to a man), not even the fucking NEW YORK YANKEES (who I once idolized as a kid in the days of Whitey Ford and Mickey Mantle, who's the closest I've ever come to having a crush on another guy, he was beautiful the way he played center when he was young, before he destroyed his knees, thanks for NOTHING you dog's asshole George Steinbrenner)- that I hate more than I do the Steelers. I didn't always feel that way, in fact until I was a senior in high school I actually liked the Steelers, even had a Steeler patch on the pocket of a pair of my jeans (which also had pro sex, drugs and drinking patches on them, shit you couldn't wear to school today if your Dad was the fucking President, forget getting drunk in class on "orange juice" that was 3/4 vodka, or fucking in the stairwells at lunch). Then, my senior year (of high school, which sort of drills my age into my head, last spring someone was showing me a baby picture of herself, the old kind before all this digital crap, that had the developed date on it, and I thought "God in heaven, I was a senior in high school when this photo was taken", anyway we’re talking 73-74). That year Columbia Gas transferred a lot, maybe 40- 50 people, from their Pittsburgh office down here to Charleston, a bunch of them settled in Cross Lanes, and damn near every one of 'em was a turd with eyes. Seriously, what a bunch of fucking PIGS, loud, obnoxious, hating it here and wanting to put down WV at every opportunity (like fucking PITTSBURGH is something to brag about?), get OVER your weak selves. I hated 'em, and other than a couple exceptions, I hated the kids they sent to Nitro High School. I liked Rick (this is the same guy who wanted me to help rig his election at Marshall, and whose sister I fucked, back in issue whatever), and his Dad was a nicer guy than most of the Pennsylvania pricks, but he was still a Pittsburgher, I was over at their house once when he was going on (and fucking ON) about Iron City beer, and how retarded WV was (this was back in the days of the 3.2 laws, young 'uns) cos you couldn't get it here and (being drunk, myself ) I told him "You only drink that piss cos it comes from PITTSBURGH, if it came from anywhere else you'd pour it out on the damn ground. FUCK Iron City beer" and you'd have thought I'd blasphemed the Pope (which I also did once, much later, in their house, these folks being pretty devout Catholics and I've always figured, you know, go for the throat- or the nuts, or their Bible, if they like to thump it, nothing's sacred when I'm pissed) he tossed me out of their house, toot sweet, and wouldn't let me come back for quite a while. I should have told him, "A year and half from now your damn hot eldest daughter is gonna know me balls deep, and then tell me I'm the best lay she ever had, Iron City THAT, old man", but of course I didn't know it at the time, so I couldn’t very well throw it in his face. And he was pretty mad, so it's probably best that I just left like I did. Still, FUCK Iron City beer. Goddamn piss water. These dicks coming to town coincided with the Steelers getting good, so we all had to put up with their public carrying on about how great their home town team was, and how much everything around here sucked. I HATED these fucks, and I'm not even from WV. The worst of a very bad lot was this great lard ass of a man, voice like a fucking foghorn crossed with a donkey, lived up Pioneer Drive before it became like this own little city in itself- you been up there lately, holy shit- he also had a hot daughter- they were plentiful, children, back in the day- and I was in his home a couple times, though not like you might think, I remember after the Steelers won their second or third Super Bowl, he was in Kroger HOLLERING across the whole damn store to some other PA fuck, Steelers this, Steelers that, and at that moment I decided, ANYTHING this guy likes, I will hate, always, and I've never been able to stomach the Steelers since. This guy . . . he was an egocentric fuck, his name was Paul, so he named his daughter after himself, Paulette, and as he was carrying on in Kroger that day I just wanted so badly to burst his fucking bubble and tell him, "Hey, your daughter's a fucking nymphomaniac, dude, she's pulling trains down at Marshall pretty much every weekend, and a lot of the cars on those trains are WV boys, so SHE obviously doesn't share your distaste for this state, does she, seeing how often she has a mouthful?" But again, I didn't. Actually, I liked Paulette, she had some of her Dad's abrasive ways, but she was also a cutie, blond, blue eyes, petite, and apparently just a fuck machine. I say apparently, cos I don’t know from personal experience, more's the pity. The times I was in her house were when Loretta and I were double dating with her and Moose. Moose has been mentioned in here some- in fact, I'll scan in a picture of he and I back in these very days for Joe to include-but I've left a lot of our adventures out so far, since they involve, among other things, a fairly serious run in with organized crime-hey, I'm still here to talk about it, how's organized crime doing these days?- we'll get to them in due time, boys and girls. Joe knew him (we're talking Moose here, in fact he quite genuinely saved Joe's life one night when I was furious with Joe for puking in my car and all over my {8 track} tapes, and was going to leave his passed out drunken ass to freeze fucking solid in the gutter- Loretta was all for it, Moose is the one who talked me out of it, cos buddy, I was hot), he was a hell of a guy, and he just became smitten with Paulette after we ran into her in the Hole and exchanged a bare minimum of words, not much more than "Hi Paulette, Hi Bill, This is Moose, Hi Moose, Hi Paulette", Moose asked me to set him up, "Dude, you don’t need set up, just show her your dick and ten seconds later she'll have it in her mouth". Moose didn’t like hearing that about this sweet looking child he'd become instantly infatuated with, and we almost came to blows over it, which would not have been a pleasant experience for our boy Bill, cos Moose was a total fucking bruiser- not that I wouldn't have gone with him, me having this temper problem and all, just that it's likely I would've come in second.
As mentioned, Loretta and I went out with them some that fall and winter (when she and I were first dating, happy days), both here and in Huntington, we had a lot of fun together, the four of us. Then, sometime that spring Paulette came in one weekend while Moose stayed in Huntington for whatever reason, and let herself get seduced by this guy she graduated with (she was a year behind me), Ronnie Workman. The prick was just looking for a piece of ass, and in pursuit of that, really fucked up something nice, but Paulette always could have said no, too. So, Moose calls me all tore up, he and Paulette have broken up, "Fuck man, that's terrible" I say, and it was, cos they both really brought out the best in one another while they were together. He didn't tell me why they split, and I didn't ask, but he wanted to come to Charleston and get pounded with me, I'm all about that, come ahead, brother, I'm here for you. I had no idea he was coming to town to look for Ronnie Workman. He gets here, we hop a few bars, I'm actually drinking a good bit more than he is, around midnight we're in The Roaring Twenties- I hear people talk about it now like it was a big deal, it was a fucking shit hole, trust me- and Moose taps my shoulder. M: You know that guy over there? Moose set his drink down (we were drinking whiskey sours, been a LONG time since I've had one of them), I'm clueless, I figure he's going to take a leak, walks over to where Ronnie is chatting up a couple girls (I never knew what girls saw in him, but see it they apparently did, at least until this night), and throws what to this day remains the single most brutal punch I've ever seen in my life. I still almost get sick seeing it again in my mind. Ronnie was standing a good six feet from the wall when Moose hit him with the sucker punch from hell- I'm sure Ronnie didn’t have a clue in this world who Moose was- and the next thing I know Ronnie's head's been knocked all the way through the fucking wall. In the second or two it took Ronnie to collapse I thought Moose had somehow actually knocked his damn head off. God. Fisticuffs don't normally perturb me, but this was something else. Then Ronnie dropped, boneless, and I thought he was dead, swear to God (he wasn't, but his skull was fractured, and he was never the same after, and you know what? Fuck him.). Moose kneels beside him and starts pounding him in the face. Everyone in the damn place is just staring, gobstopped. This was not your typical bar fight, this was some serious shit. The Twenties had a well deserved reputation for having bouncers who'd fuck you up (from behind, like as not, as they did another friend of mine, Dana, who ALSO got a skull fracture, and was also never right afterward, so avoid skull fractures I'd say, unless you NEVER WANT TO BE THE SAME AGAIN), but none were the least bit in evidence this night- probably found something real important to do in the back while Moose was busy pummeling. I ran over to Moose- leaving a perfectly good whiskey sour on the table that I never did get to finish- and started trying to pull him off of Ronnie- it was like trying to pull one of those big embedded rocks out of the ground, the kind where the part below the surface is the size of a Cadillac. It was like Spiderman trying to subdue the Hulk, and I didn't even have any web shooters to gunk up his eyeballs or anything, at one point he just shrugged me off, casually, and I went about 15 feet before I landed. I finally got him in a serious choke hold, just grinding my forearm right dead across his windpipe, trying to get his attention, and kept screaming in his ear, "We have to get out of here!" Finally, he looks at me, dead eyed. M: What? And we did. Walked to his car, and nobody followed us- Jesus Christ, would you have? Moose dropped me off at my house, where I sat up all night waiting for the cops to kick down the door, and drove back to Huntington. Ronnie spent something like a week in the hospital and, as noted, was never quite the same afterward- this isn't my observation, but from other guys I knew who knew him a lot better than I did, like Torch, who used to manage the high school basketball team with Ronnie and for some reason liked the fucker- like I said, I never did, he was a liar and a back stabber and a sneak long before he fucked up Moose and Paulette- although again like I said, DAMMIT, she could have JUST- SAID- "NO". I don’t know if he sustained any real brain damage, or if it was just the spiritual shock of being beaten that badly. Moose was never arrested for it, or charged in any way. And the cops never kicked down my door. Not over that, anyway. And also like I said, I never jumped on one of those Paulette trains back at Marshall. Gang bangs have always made me uncomfortable, unmanly as that may sound. They're just not something I'm good with, even if the girl's willing (and if she's not willing, or too drunk or buzzed to consent, it’s fucking rape and all the guys need to go to jail, seriously). Sex mad boy though I be, I just don't feel right about 'em. However, I did participate in one- ONE- again back in high school, and since we're tripping way hard down memory lane right now, this is how it came about. I was out "running around" as we used to call it, which meant driving around drinking beer, and for those so inclined, smoking dope, and looking to see what we could get into, one Friday night, four of us, Stan Miller, who I ran around with a lot, good guy, and Paul Walker, with whom I seldom did, and Mark Samples, with whom I never did except this one time, I put him in a class with Ronnie Workman, and I have no idea now why he was with us this night, he just showed up in Stan's car when they picked me up. Not sure why the four of us were together that night- it's been 32 years- but somewhere during the evening Mark suggests why don’t we take a trip up prosaically named Ho' Holler- it's there on Rt. 25, between Dunbar and Nitro- and jump on this girl Veronica, who lived up there, and who would pretty much do all comers, hence giving the holler its name. I'm not so sure, as out of the four of us in the car I'm the only one with a girlfriend, but I'm also drunk, so I'm not that hard to convince. We pull up in front of Veronica's house- she was like 19 or so, and lived alone- to find another car had just pulled up in front of of us, also with four guys in it, and with the same thing in mind. After a bit of discussion, and some Sharks Vs. Jets posturing, it's decided we'll all just knock on her door, as opposed to fighting over it. Hell, as one Mr. Bitner reasoned to all, if she'll do four, she'll do eight. We knock- I'll admit to being a tad hesitant at this point and so hung back a bit, I couldn't imagine eight guys knocking on some girl's door and saying, "Hey, we're here to fuck you" being greeted with anything other than a shotgun- but, I'll be damned, she lets us in, ands it gets pretty surreal from there. I expected her to be a skank- I know, I know- but she was actually kind of nice looking, in a hard sort of way. She lined us all up and I found out pretty quickly who was the fucking meat in this room- and it wasn't Veronica. She went, "Okay, you're first, you're second, you third-" through six of us- I was picked second- and when she got to the last two guys, she went, "Sorry, you guys are out of luck." I don't know if six was her limit- talking about her later with another guy who'd been there a different night, he said he was part of a group of 11 who all went to her room, so who knows- or if she just didn't like something about them. The rules were pretty straight forward, she went back to her room and turned out the light, we'd go in one at a time in order, no turning on the light, no foreplay, just climb on, do your business, and climb off. No, it wasn't romance, and no, I have no idea what she got out if it, other than the obvious. Condoms weren't required, or even mentioned, but I put one on anyway- I think I'm the only guy who did, if the guy ahead of me had strapped on, maybe I wouldn't have, cos I hate the fucking things, but he didn't- don't ask me how I could tell- so I did- and even though she said no foreplay I kissed her some anyway, it's just my fucking nature, and she didn't seem to mind it, we're going at it and I started thinking about Susan, the girl I was ostensibly dating, man, I can't believe I'm doing this, drunk or not this is pretty shitty of me, I'm just a damn- good lord, this girl can FUCK. And she could, could Veronica. And for all you fair play proponents out there, this was on a Friday night, by Monday afternoon I'd already been busted. One of the guys in the other car went around school Monday morning first thing talking about this big gang bang he'd been at Friday- this was one of the guys who got turned down by the way, fucking wanker, he was the only guy who spilled the fucking beans, everyone else had kept their damn mouths shut, even that idiot Mark. But old Mike, he has to start blabbing, and then names started coming out, and mine got out, and around, and . . . I knew there was probably trouble when guys were coming up to me starting around second period asking me how the gang bang was, I knew there was definitely trouble when I couldn't find Sue anywhere at lunch (we weren’t in any classes together, she being a junior). I was walking to my car after school feeling pretty much the heel, when here comes Susan, eyes fucking blazing, and as she gets close to me she draws back her hand and I know what she's about to do. Bill: Don't hit me. She hesitates a second, but keeps her arm drawn back. B: I know you're mad at me. But seriously, don't hit me. I had my own fist clenched at this point. She gives me a look, like "What a piece of shit you are", but at least drops her hand. I felt pretty fucking small, and I do again as I type this. I should have just sat out on the couch and drunk beer with dickhead Mike and (at least HE kept his mouth shut) Donald, and never gone back to Veronica's room. It wasn't worth it. B: I'm sorry. Yeah, well, THAT wasn't the right answer. Susan was one of those very pretty girls who thought that all she had to do was lie back and look pretty, the one time we'd had sex- which was not her first time, though you'd have thought it- hadn't been big fun for either one of us, she'd complained early on that I was messing up her hair- of course I'm messing up your hair, and I don't intend to stop there, Jesus Christ, girl. We really weren't all that compatible, I just went out with her cos she was pretty, and a cheerleader, and it was a prestige thing. To be honest with you, I'm not really sure why she was going out with me either, other then when I was a senior in high school I was a good looking boy, with a sharp car, and, believe it or not, money, and girls did very much seem to like me. K: WAS SHE BETTER THAN ME? No help for it now. B: She FUCKS, dammit. You just lay there. I thought her eyes were blazing before. Shit, now she had atom bombs or something going off in there. She drew her hand back again, palm open. B: You know what? Go ahead. I deserve it. Man, I didn't have to tell her twice. She slapped me so damn hard it spun me around, and brought tears to my eyes. God BLESS, that was a slap. Then she walked off, and that was pretty much the end of Bill and Sue. However, it has a semi happy ending in that I saw her again maybe 7- 8 years later at the Kroger in St. Albans, I was in there buying beer, what else, and ended up in the checkout line behind her. She spoke to me first, I honestly hadn't recognized her, she'd put on lot of weight, didn't look much anymore like the fine young cheerleader she'd been not that long ago, I remember bemoaning in my mind as she walked off, "How could you have DONE that to those fine, fine legs?", but we talked and she was very pleasant- wasn't too thrilled to find out I'd married Loretta, she didn't like her for some reason she never specified, but told me I could have done better, NO SHIT- I felt compelled to apologize again for how we'd broken up- she really did deserve better from me- and she was sweet enough to forgive me (even gave me a hug and a little kissy on the cheek). So you guys should too. Forgive me, I mean. I should be tired Man. I think speed makes you go on and on about the past, that's what I think. What's been happening lately, like since the 70's? Well, what's Bill drinking? Wild Turkey right now, sparingly, or as sparingly as I can, anyway, cos I'm all out of beer. Let me tell you what, you can damn DRINK some beer on speed. Or at least I can. Found that out Saturday- actually, I found that out Tuesday, about Saturday, more on that subject later- as well as tonight, I had two six packs of PBR here, plus, I don't know, 4-5 cans left in a case of Bud, they all went down the pipe earlier this evening, I'm not really feeling all that buzzed- okay, BULLSHIT, I'm feeling tremendously buzzed, but it's this great, amped up buzz, feel like I could keep going at this for hours, actually, I have been, it's no worries for Bill right now, and I have to tell you (and Martha Stewart, hey, I wonder if she does speed?), that's a good thing. A very good thing, as long as I don't explode or catch fire or something. I got a recent e-mail from DF Sean, he had gastric bypass surgery about a month ago. His weight had gotten up to 350 pounds- Jesus, I can't imagine, I remember him when- and he just couldn't seem to throw it off no matter what he did. I'm still a whole lot more about diet and exercise than someone going in and fucking with your God given guts, but if this works for my boy- says he's lost 35 pounds since the operation, good for him- then I guess I'm okay with it.
What's Bill been listening to? A bunch of old cassettes, just like I did about this time last year, cos I've been driving my Dad's car the past few weeks and all it has in it is a cassette player. As I think I also mentioned around this time last year, I bought literally hundreds of cassettes when I was working for Abraxas, I was averaging 40 hours a week in my car, and that last full year- '95- when I was the sole Court Liaison for the entire state, some weeks it was more like 50-60, this was around the time when a lot of music stores were cutting back, or getting rid entirely of their cassettes so every week or two I'd stop in one- I had the whole fucking state to choose from- and buy a dozen or so to listen to in the car. I don’t ever remember paying more than a quarter for any single cassette- maybe fifty cents- I'd go to the 3 or 4, once 10, whoopee- for a dollar bins and pick out anything I knew was good, plus anything that looked interesting. As I've said before (using that phrase a lot this issue, I know) those Abraxas- 2/91 through 3/96- years were really good ones for me, and the girls for that matter. And Loretta put on a damn good face at the time, even though she claims now to have been so miserable then, but I swear, that’s her Stalinist revisionist history thing going.
Anyway, I've been listening to the cassettes alphabetically, I'm up to the G's, which has been over 60 some cassettes, but a disappointing number of them wouldn't play, or wouldn't play AND got all wrapped around the heads, cassettes were never known for their longevity, and a lot of them were old when I bought them. Just today I was listening to Game Theory, excellent pop, sometimes it gets a little too twee, but the good stuff, like "Penny, Things Won't", ""24", "Erica's Word" and the wonderful "Crash Into June", is very, VERY good, you know how music can take a person, especially this one, back in time (and since I still don’t have my fucking TIME MACHINE) this tape takes me back, vividly, almost painfully so, to Rt. 50, I first listened to it going back and forth to The Industrial School For Youth at Salem from Abraxas one sunny spring day- you want the year, it was '94- perfect for this type music, I rolled the window down and let the air- not too hot, not too cold, but just right, Billylocks, and thick with that spring smell, all fresh grass and emerging flowers and sunlight- I swear to God on days like that I can smell the sun- and I remember being really happy with my life, blissfully unaware of my impending fate a few short years up the road. Also listened to GBH, which is short for Brit speak term Grievous Bodily Harm, sort of equivalent to our malicious wounding or felonious assault- both of which, ironically, I've been charged with at times I never did it- honest to God, ask Joe- and both of which I've committed, and was never charged for. As always, it's a funny fucking world. These guys were actually still calling themselves Charged GBH when these two albums, "City Baby Attacked By Rats" and its even better sequel, "City Baby's Revenge" came out in '82 and '83 respectively, so I probably should've filed them with the C's but I didn't, so fuck me. GBH were a good band- still going, too, they were in the latest issue of "Loud Fast Rules"- (YES, IT DOES) -that I read recently, GBH were punk, or post punk, whatever, they were good at the heavy riff thing, but they also had at least a rudimentary grasp of dynamics and melody as well, so they played actual songs, not just the same old indistinguishable ramalama bullshit over and over. I probably could do without the faux aggro in their stance, since in real life I doubt they were any more deadly than my Aunt Ruby- maybe not that, she knocked hell out of me once with a frying pan hot from the stove, I come from violent people, or maybe I just made them that way, I know I used to get on people's nerves no end when I was a kid- (WHEN YOU WERE A KID?!) -whatever, all I remember is her gritting out through clenched teeth, "Child, I have HAD ENOUGH" and then we were going to cookware city. Hot cookware city. Wonder what Alton Brown would have to say about that? "The best pan to hit an obnoxious kid with-" Fortunately she didn't burn me, but she did put a sizable, if temporary, dent in my damn head box. And don't judge her too harshly, I hadn't been good all day, and right before she clocked my ass I was telling her to hurry her bony ass up and fry me some chicken, I'm HUNGRY, woman. I wouldn't take that shit from a five year old, either. Back to GBH, they also have some unintentionally hilarious lyrics, especially in the (I guess) anti-war "Vietnamese Blues"- Viet Nam already being quite a bit dated by '83, guys- like "I just got back from Viet Nam/Where I shot a baby in a pram". In a pram? A PRAM? Give me a break, you fucking Limey goof ball. Funny song, though. I was reading "The Advocate" the other day- yeah, the gay mag, I'm a well rounded boy, found out that Leslie Gore is gay, I never knew that, puts a whole new set of images in my head now when I think of "It's My Party"- (NOT TO MENTION "JUDY'S TURN TO CRY') -ha, really, but then later on there was this article cracking on some gay celebrities for not being gay enough. That kind of shit just gets right up my ass, so to speak. These groups who are all whacked out about all the prejudice and oppression they face, then going all militant on their own people, bitching and pointing the big finger cos someone isn't black, or feminist, or gay enough for 'em. Motherfuckers, don't preach tolerance out of one side of your mouths, and then do the bitch out thing out of the other. Not and come hang out with me, anyway, cos personally, I don’t care how black or feminist or gay you are or are not, be your own damn true self and let everybody else be theirs, okay? Just don't be getting on my fucking nerves, or I'll take a hot frying pan to your head. What else has Bill been reading? Pretty good mystery, Rendezvous At Kamakura Inn, set in Japan, well done, most of the novel takes place at this snowed in Inn in northern Hokkaido, I've been snowed in a couple times in my life and always loved it, I remember- I'm telling you, I don’t know if it's my current wired/drunk condition or what, but the past is ALIVE in my head right now, even more so than usual - when Loretta and I got snowed in at our- technically my, but she moved in on her 18th birthday and we didn't look back- apartment up on View Avenue in Fairmont, I'm sure many of you are too young to remember it well, or weren’t around here then, or have never been here, whatever, but the winters of the late 70's here were bad ass, cold and snowy, both to excess, I remember during our snowed in period (January '78) Loretta and I could look out of our window and see the big time and temp sign on the top of the bank, and it never got above 0* (I don't have a degree thing on here), and sometimes at night it went down to like -18*.
What else can we talk about? How about dream corner, we haven't talked about any dreams lately. Had a killer dream night before last- I didn’t get any sleep at all last night at Al's after he woke me up with his piss stench, I'd been asleep maybe half hour at most before that, which is (one reason) why I'm speeding now (the other is cos I like it), had this dream that I'd gotten hired to be like this forest ranger type guy, summer job, I show up and my "trainer" is this blinding hot girl, and our first assignment is this hike and overnight stay- somewhere. I'm ALL about it, it was great, this girl was being all flirty as we're walking through the woods, we start to climb this big hill, she's in front and I'm checking her ass out in her tight hiking shorts (her ass looked just like Natalia's from TSOA, same shorts), she says, we'll stop for the night at the top of this hill, and as it's still daylight, I'm thinking "Maybe . . " and then she turns and gives me this look, and its not maybe. We get to the top of the hill and instead of the cabin, or tents or whatever I'm expecting, there's this big, domed cage, maybe 60-70 feet across, we're talking circus sized. I can see things moving around inside of it, but can't really make them out. Ranger girl, (she didn't have a name in this dream) opens the cage door and goes inside. Bill: We're supposed to sleep in a CAGE? I start to follow her inside, but as I get closer, I can see what's inside the cage with her. Man, this was some nasty shit, and I'm a sick fucker for having these ugly things in my mind. There were these skull faced apes, with fangs, and these ostrich like birds with the necks and heads of enormous vultures, and these hideous crawly things, with snail like shells the size of footballs, and long necks, topped with cat heads dripping slime, all of these things just reeking evil. Fucking YUCK. RG: Come on in. She starts taking her clothes off and she looks FANTASTIC, I start searching in the grass around the cage, she keeps trying to coax me inside- RG: Come to me. And then I spot something in the grass. It's a Thompson submachine gun, these things must represent my own personal idea of Excalibur or something, cos whenever I'm in trouble in a dream and I happen to find a weapon- which happens maybe one time in ten- it's always one of those wonders. It always even has the 50 round drum on it, too, shit, it's probably always the same gun. I pick it up. RG: Can we talk? I start machine gunning the fuck out of all those abortions in the cage- I figure I'll kill them all, THEN fuck the girl- but she starts turning into one of those fucking zombie yeti things, so I shoot her too, thinking, why is it ALWAYS like this, it starts out hot asses and promises, and it ends up monsters and bloodshed. I have no idea what a dream analyst would make of all this, and I don't care. Holy fuck. To quote Regis, I'M GOING CRAZY HERE. Okay, DF news and then out. When last we left our intrepid, and quite peckish, Death Falcon, he was preparing to pop Scuffin' Hillbilly- who swears his legit stats are 6'6'', 325 pounds, I don’t think he's that big, but whatever- to defend Danny's honor. Didn't happen, not that Tuesday, anyway, me and Danny have just a KILLER match with Flex and the Scuffler, our best tag match by far, ever, tore the house fucking DOWN, we went over 20 minutes cos the crowd was going berserk, I've gotten heat before but never like this, after the match Flex goes, "You guys have something, I don’t know what it is . . . but people hate it." And they do. So I show up for the TV taping the following Saturday all unsuspecting, my first match is me and Hillbilly solo, and- this is all reported to me, as I truly have no memory of Saturday- I get concussed as fuck somewhere early in the match. Danny says he thinks it was from a knee to the head. Sounds right to me. However, even brain damaged, the DF is no one's patsy. Later in the match he broke the Hillbilly's nose, bloodily, and on camera. Danny says he thinks I did it with some "flying shoulder thing"- he still hasn’t mastered wrestling terminology, obviously. I don't care how it got broke, just glad it did. In our second match Danny and I tagged against Hillbilly and Kid, and apparently I concussed Kid when I knocked him out (legit, and according to Danny, deliberately) with a flying head butt for the finish- again, on camera. I honestly have no recollection of any of this, and can't wait to see the tapes myself. My head was hurting fit to fucking crack Sunday, I knew it was a concussion again from that familiar cotton wool brain feeling, even before Danny told me about it when he called to check on me- but this headache was off the fucking scale. Apparently being concussed was just the tip of the iceberg as far as my head pain went. While going to Oak Hill this Tuesday, Danny filled me in on my Saturday, told me I wrestled on speed Saturday morning, no surprise as that was my plan, but apparently after the matches I snorted two more capsules, so I could stay awake and drink all afternoon with Brian, who was coming to Charleston to hang out for a while till the XMCW show that night. I was worried that I had run my mouth to Brian, but Danny said no, Brian and I'd gotten along famously, and I believe it, I'd already got a very complimentary e-mail from Brian on Monday, saying, "Thank you for busting your ass for my company, I love what you do, cos when I watch it, I believe it. These boys with their choreographed dance routines are the rage now, but you go out an WRESTLE, old school". Very cool, Brian's also been around for ages, worked for both the WWF and WCW, it's nice to be appreciated by someone who knows their shit, especially since busting my ass for his company is destroying my brain now as well as my knees and shoulder. Unfortunately, Saturday, I ran my mouth to Danny. Danny's concerns about, "Bill, really, you took a terrible hit to the head, you don't need to be snorting MORE of that shit, or drinking so much"- he said I drank a 12 pack in about an hour an a half, I don't doubt it a bit- were greeted with "Shut the fuck up, or I'll kick your fucking ass". The worst part though was when Danny and Brian were talking about "In The Ringer 2", which Brian is going to produce, and which Danny wants to make before the DFZ movie- fuck, we should be on the tenth or twelfth DFZ movie by now, DFZ Vs. Chubby Checker On The Moon or something, this was the first I'd heard of this plan and- let's say I didn’t take it well. Things are kind of strained between me and Danny right now- apparently I cussed him like I would my Dad on Saturday, and threatened to kick his "half pint"- I know, man, I KNOW- ass more than once, but as for my part, I'm still kind of- no more than kind of- pissed about this "In The Ringer" shit taking precedence- he's even wanting to use some of the DFZ movie Africa footage in it, is that supposed to make me like the idea better? Cos if so, it doesn't. I was also worried about how I was going to deal with Miss Photographer Girl, cos she was not going to stop, in fact she'd started buying me shit, some wrestling books and stuff, when Danny let me know Tuesday that I already took care of it on Saturday. Oh FUCK, I'm thinking, please, not another Bill on a tear shit mess to deal with . . . B: Jesus . . how bad was it? I don't either Danny. I don’t either. Well, this has gone on well beyond the limits of any human endurance. Good night, and good luck, boys and girls. Motorhead I'm fucking unbreakable, unkillable, indestructible, for all time. BELIEVE IT. I do. World without end, amen. Later Bill Hey, who wants a hot dog omelet? It's about that time . . .
|
Can't
get enough 
D:
You just see that red headed duck fly across the room? 
Well,
I set them up, as much as needed done anyway, this would have been April
of- Jesus, Joseph and Mary- 1976, and they dated for most of a year. Moose
was damned good to her, he truly loved and respected her, and she seemed
to respond to it, settled down and was all about the Moose, and God help
the guy who tried to bring up her past in front of him. It was kind of
sweet to see. It was also, sadly, too sweet to last.
I've
been trying to eat well myself here, but its so fucking hard in this land
of swill, I've been subsisting on brown rice, tuna and raw carrots for
weeks now, but its starting to get kind of boring. Think I'll eat some
SPEED AND WHISKEY instead. Although I don't actually eat the speed, I'm
still snorting it, and I'm thinking I may need to find a new delivery
system, cos every time I snort this shit it feels like it's burning a
fucking tunnel all the way to the back of my skull. Pervert that I am
though, I actually kind of like that sensation, there's something about
pain, or any really strong sensation, that appeals to me. And let me tell
you what, snorting it puts that shit to you RIGHT NOW.
To
digress a second, for some odd reason Loretta gave me a bunch of old
photos of me and the girls when they were in picking Sarah up a few
weekends ago. I have no idea what prompted this, I presume some misguided
attempt to be "nice", it was just a random assortment, and just
a fraction of what she still has, I figure these are all doubles, but
they're all photos of the girls during that Abraxas time frame, and I was
struck when looking through them- until I had to stop, cos there was shit
in my eyes- just how fucking happy the girls were in all these pictures,
these weren't just for the camera smiles, these kids were smiling all over
their little heads. Without any comment from me, my mom was looking at the
photos a few days later and she had exactly the same reaction I did, she
said "The girls look so HAPPY in all these old photos," and then
she had to stop looking at them cos she started crying. Hey, not that I'd
been crying when I looked at them, I got something in my fucking eye. And
damn Loretta (and me) forever for fucking up those sweet little girls
lives.
We
spent that entire weekend, actually, Friday night till Tuesday morning,
under the covers, we'd cuddle and snuggle and all that girly shit, I don't
care, I like it, I never have been just a wham bam kind of guy (unless
that was all I could get), we'd read- and how gay is this, sometimes I'd
read to her, sometimes she'd read to me- cuddle, make out, talk, drink
some soup, or hot tea, or whatever I'd crawled out from under the covers
long enough to fix us, talk some more, make out, make love, talk some
more, make love again, sleep, wake up, repeat . . . it was as good an
experience as I've ever had. I felt safe, and loved, and content, three
feelings I'm not all that familiar with, although I'd certainly like to
be.