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12/31/09 Empty Ever After
Hey Welcome to the eighth New Years Eve edition of the Famous Bill Bitner's Famous Newsletter (NOT blog). Wow. Next issue we'll be starting our ninth year together you and I. Lord help us all. This is also GBH Issue #251, last issue slipping by me as GBHI #250. Two hundred fifty issues. That's a LOT of bullshit, boys and girls. The year 2010 fast approaches, the year when Jupiter turns into a star or something like that, I never really did understand, or like much, that damn movie. Jesus on a hot buttered biscuit with hot sauce and gravy. I rememeber when 2010 seemed like the distant future. Of course, I remember when 1975 seemed like the distant future. First day or two of fourth grade, September 1965- cos in those better days school didn't start till after Labor Day- we had to write that stupid and worthless busy work theme "What I Did On My Summer Vacation". I don't really think so. Billy instead wrote this story that took place ten years in the future- 1975- about these explorers who land on this uncharted isle and while they're mucking about all of a sudden this big eye opens in the side of the volcano in the island's center and the island comes to life and eats them, one guy makes it as far as the surf with his leg bit off but the sharks get him- it was as crazy violent and bloody as eight year old (wouldn't turn nine until December) Billy could make it and it went over about as well as you might imagine. The teacher, Miss Delany, this hard ass old spinster, sort of like Aunt Bea if she'd been a Marine gave it back and told me it was "inappropriate" but she'd give me a chance to turn in another one if I stayed in for recess to write it. I felt like telliing her that was the only damn theme I had in me and if it wasn't good enough for her then she and her dried up old crack could take a flying fuck at the moon, but instead I said "okay" and stayed in at recess and wrote another story this one about a kid who was really a were-Komodo Dragon- I'd just read a book about them over the summer- who got pissed off at his teacher for making him miss recess and so did terrible things to her- "terrible things" is what I wrote, actually, "TERRIBLE THINGS!!!" because one, I figured I was already on shaky ground, probably best not to get too specific, and two I couldn't think of anything terrible enough, cos I was super pissed off, not so much at missing recess but that she hadn't appreciated the brilliance of the living island story which was a hell of a lot better than all those "I went to visit my Granny Spunkins" clunkers all the other kids wrote. I waited while she read it already edging toward the door cos I knew a trip to the office was in the cards, where I could catch up with my old buddy- not- Mr. Mitchell, the principal, aka That White Haired Cunt. Shit, nowadays they'd call the cops and send you to the bughouse for writing something like that- which reminds me of a letter I'll get to in a minute. But she just sort of smiled and shook her head and said something about my "imagination" and that was that. Amazingly she turned out to be one of the best teachers I ever had. I won't say she indulged me, cos she was a genuine hardass and indulgence wasn't in her nature, but she did realize I was bored out of my fucking mind in school and a bored Billy is trouble for all, so she let me go to the library to read once I'd finished my math or whatever. (SHE WAS PROBABLY AFRAID YOU WERE GOING TO TURN INTO A KOMODO DRAGON AND DO TERRIBLE THINGS TO HER)
(WITHOUT A DOUBT. YOU'RE KIND OF SCARY AS A FUCKING HUMAN) I'm not human. What I was reminded of up there was a recent letter where someone noted in reference to a remark in some previous NL- I just write 'em, don't ask me to keep track of 'em- "I never heard jail called 'the sneezer' before". You obviously never spoke to my Dad, or were around when he was lecturing me, as in "Bucko, if you don't change your ways you're gonna spend the rest of your days in" and here it would be either the sneezer, the pokey, the calaboose, the big house (that sounded pretty good till I figured out it was just another word for lock-up), the guardhouse, the brig, something that I'm pretty sure was him trying to pronounce "penitentiary", something else that sounded like "fiddle"- I swear, I never could figure out exactly what he was saying- and a bunch of others, everything but "jail" or "prison". Have I mentioned lately how much I miss him? Got a lot of stuff recently in the mail bag, I guess folks being off for the holidays and catching up, I don't know. I'm just gonna quote one cos it kisses up, where Bill's asked to "please, please keep writing your NL"- like I could stop, it's the electronic equivalent of that damn wrestling- cos "you are a true character in a world of dullards." We all know how Bill loves his flattery, he also loves his words, and I love you, NL letter writer- maybe, not sure if you're a guy or a girl, if you're a guy I just like you as a friend- for using the marvelous word DULLARDS. You could have used assholes or idiots or dumbfucks but instead you chose dullards. And thusly made my day. I see the smoke from a revolver Some more letters while I'm thnking on them, multiple Nervous Nellies- excuse me, concerned readers- have been ragging on me for the night of way drugged drunken/driving excess recounted last issue. No, I am not trying to kill myself, either through drink/drug excess or crazy driving-DUH. Just out for a good time. I will admit driving in that condition was stupid and irresponsible- but suicidal? You buggin'. Seriously. I am indestructable. Trust me, cos in all honesty I believe this with all my heart and you may as well, for better or worse, and it IS the absolute truth- I am fucking INDESTRUCTABLE. End of story. People keep asking how my Mom's doing, I'm not sure why. Not that it's not okay to ask and give a shit, that's fine, it's just that it's a wasted question cos she's not getting any bettter, trust me. And isn't going to. Poor Sarah and Rob went around with her the other morning simply trying to get an answer as to whether the coffee my mom was making was decaf or regular- she answered with "It's Maxwell blend" etc., etc. for five minutes, never did say whether it was decaf or not. She asked me today if I'd take a basket of clothes down from her bedroom to the washroom for her. Of course, but when I go up to her room there are three baskets of clothes on the floor- she'll leave clean clothes unfolded in a laundry basket for days, so I don't know which basket it the one she wants taken downstairs. I'm guessing the one closest to the door so I point and ask- Bill: Is this the clothes basket you want taken downstairs? Naturally when asked a simple yes or no question she replies by listing the contents of the basket. Mom: Well, there's some towels in there and some sheets- I pick up the first basket. Bill: Do you want this basket taken downstairs? She just fucking gawps at me. So I take the first basket downstairs where it still sits untouched. I realize there's no point in letting it drive me crazy. BUT IT STILL DOES. Bill's brain isn't much better. Remember how I was all about reserving library books over the Internet? Went to reserve some more the other day and had completely forgotten my PIN number. Yeah, the same number I'd already used over thirty times, the same one I'd used JUST THE DAY BEFORE. Gone like the fucking wind it was. Like the fucking WIND. Scary. I had to go to the library and have them scan my card and tell it to me, and get this. Apparently this is the second time I've had to do this- and I don't even remember the first time. As I've said before, good thing I don't worry about shit, or I might be worried. (MAYBE YOU DO GET WORRIED AND THEN YOU FORGET) That's reassuring. Finally had to take my computer down to Joe's cos it locked the fuck up, also the noises it was making were frankly disturbing. And as I said to some in a recent e-mail, if the end isn't here it's damn nigh, cos I was able to take Kat's old computer that I was using down at Al's (yes, he's still alive, no, I have no explanation for it) and hook it up here- I must've been possessed, I know- and get it to work, which is what I'm sending this out on tonight. What's the difference between a hillbilly and a son of a bitch? The Ohio River. (I GOT ONE. WHAT'S IRISH HELL?) What? (THERE'S NO WHISKEY AND THE WOMEN HIT BACK). Hope everyone had a good Christmas. Here it was- okay, which is far better than it could have been. Sarah and Rachel both came in Wednesday night, Sarah has healed up so much you can't believe. Again, a heartfelt thank you goes out from Bill to whomever's responsible. This was the ninth Christmas since we've all been together as a family- holy FUCK, where does the time go- and really Christmas 2000 wasn't all that great either, Loretta not being exactly sweetness and light that holiday season, or even acting like she wanted to be in the same universe with the rest of us, our hero in particular. Guess even for a practiced deceiver like herself it's hard to fake Christmas cheer with someone you're about to rip the heart out of and screw into the ground financially. And no, I'm not all that wouind up about it anymore- I've set aside both pen and sword- but facts remain facts, which is a lesson someone I won't mention needs to learn. Just because you don't want something to be so doesn't make it not so. Try jumping out a fucking window and then saying "I don't really want to believe in gravity so I won't" and see where it gets you. (SPLATTERED) Exactly. Fucking splattered. Danny came out to see the girls Wednesday night, we drank some beer, Christmas Eve day we watched the latest Harry Potter movie here at the house- I'm not the biggest fan, I mostly just like them cos the girls do but I will say these movies are tons better on the big screen- they left at 3 pm to go do holiday stuff with Loretta's family and I hit the leftover beer, a mere ten, then drank a fifth of Absolut- bought it once again when I was going to do this hardcore death match shit in Ohio and needed some blood thinner, then went and forgot it here- and was crashed out by 10 pm which is exactly where I wanted to be. Christmas Eve hurts a lot more than Christamas Day although none of it hurts like it used to. I don't really have the fire in my belly or angst in my heart from past years, I just feel fucking- empty. Christmas we went up to Lori's even though every year I vow it's the last time, it wasn't horrible, the food was good, although don't eat the deviled eggs- not saying why, just saying- back early cos Rachel had to get back to Princeton, she had to be at work at 7:30 the next morning. Sarah, Rob and I went over to Joe and Laura's Christmas night to visit with them and Joe's sisters and brothers in law, good people, very nice to see them all again, Kathy's opening line to me was "So, other than being larger than life what have you been doing?", good one. Drank a pomegranate martini- just one, it was quite good but DFZ was working the next night- and smoked a couple of Joe's Christmas cigars for him. Present wise, Rachie got me a couple graphic novels, X-Men Noir, pretty good, and Green Lantern Agent Orange, pretty confusing. It's a prelude to the Blackest Night stuff which I've been reading up at Chris's but all these muticolored Lanterns -too much. Sarah and Rob got me a fifth of Wild Turkey 101, which leads into- What's Bill drinking? Not the WT, believe it or not, haven't even cracked it yet. No, I haven't been sick. Much. Went to Kroger today- Wednesday, I guess it's yesterday now, I'm going to keep calling it today- and got some Bass and Guinness for New Years Eve, and a case of Yuengling to drink this afternoon. Started at 4 pm and drank twelve by 6 and then took a nap cos I hadn't slept at all the night before- I haven't bothered talking about the damnable insomnia in here for years, I assume by now we all take it as a given, same as the wrecked knee pain which thankfully hasn't been too bad of late, thought the left one did buckle on me in the match Saturday, too bad I didn't drop one of those fucks on their head- got back up around ten pm and started this- it's 1:15 am as I type these words- and after a couple Fuze drinks to rehydrate am now drinking some fairy boy TT tea. Some hair of the dog would no doubt help quell this headache but I have shit to do later today that will be harder done if I'm up the rest of the night pounding beers. Hopefully after this issue goes out I'll be able to get some sleep. Hopefully. What's Bill been reading? Bunch of library stuff, couple new noirs by the critically well regarded- lord love a duck, I've already forgotten her name, this is getting so fucking old- someone, Die A Little and Bury Me Deep, good but veering a little close to romance/noir for me (although 30's era characters in DAL drink gin, beef consomme and black pepper, yow, Doug must've been mixing for them), bunch of Lovecratian stuff, The Hastur Cycle, Children of Cthulhu and Cthulhu 2000, sort of affected my brain for a while- (MINE TOO, INSTEAD OF THE ABDOMINAL STRETCH, DID YOU SEE ME PUT THE SNAKEMAN IN THE SHINING TRAPEZOHEDRON THE OTHER NIGHT?) - I sure did, with my three-lobed burning eye, also read Flaming London, The Magic Wagon and Zeppelins West by Joe Lansdale, okay, and Retro Pulp Tales edited by him, a big disappointemnt not living at all up to its title, Floodgate, okay mystery in post Katrina NO, a book where these mystery writers talk about their series characters, no big insights there, an appreciation of Robert Bloch where all his writer friends talk about how cool he was (I can't believe he's been dead since '94, seems like just the other day I read his obit) and The Fear Planet, a bunch of his SF stories, The Max, a Hard Case crime paperback by Bruen and I Forget, well written but far fetched, and an omnibus of the four Von Bek novels by Micheal Moorcock. Also got from the library Night Stalker/Night Strangler, the former is the better movie but Strangler has NL fave Joanne Pflug- not sure why she was never a bigger star, she was a good actress and dead sexy as hell- as well as the phenomenally endowed Carol Wayne (who later drowned, go figure, although I've heard she was murdered). I'm unbearably clever What's Bill been listening to? Gary Glitter (1) Goblin (1) Go Gos (3)- inherited in the divorce, but I will admit to liking a couple of their songs- (SHE GOT THE HOUSE AND LATER THE KIDS, YOU GOT 3 GO GOS CDS. WHO WAS YOUR FUCKING LAWYER?!?) -Golden Earring (1) Grand Funk (1) Grass Roots (1) Grateful Dead (4) Grin (2)- Love Or Else, I fucking hear you Nils- Guadalcanal Diary (2)- criminally underappreciated band- Guided By Voices (3) SAHB (3) Hawkwind (11) Head Of David (1)- I must've shoplifted this drunk, I've never heard of these guys, don't remember buying this CD, and they suck- Heart (2) Jimi Hendrix (6). In DFZ news, Sarah, Rob, Rosa, Ron and the wonderfully named Tom Collins went to Parkersburg Saturday where the DeathStars were trying to get their MWA tag belts back from the douche bag duo of M.E. Howerton and the Snakeman. Naturally it was a horrible cluster fuck, I swear Lou fucking Thesz couldn't pull a good match out of those assholes. DS over by count out. I'm not going into detail about the finish other than to say it involved Jock kidnapping Snakeman's 8 year old daughter from ringside. No, I'm not kidding. As for this DFZ retirement shit, not gonna happen. I've enjoyed slowing down the past few months, and my knees and shoulder have certainly enjoyed the break. but I'm going to have to kick it back up here soon cos bottom line, I need the money- and it's not like I really have any 9 to 5 options, not that I'd take them if I did. Gonna start working for Tommy Gibson down south, nice guy when he's sober, also Logan is getting Apex going again, already got himself another TV hook up (told him if he's planning on shooting TV at 9 am on Saturday again count me the fuck out, he swears it will all be in the afternoon, we'll see, he's not exactly Abe Lincoln in the honesty department), already booked for 12 shows each in January and February, 15 in April, March kind of open cos I'm not sure how long we're going to be in Mexico. Since DFZ works off a guarantee- I quit working off the door years ago- this will be some decent bucks. Better than decent, actually. Monster sales remain good, God bless you all. Thing will be out sometime this spring, I'll keep you advised. It being the NYE edition and all I feel I should close with some introspection and reflection but I just don't have it in me this year. Or maybe just a funny story. As I've heard numerous times over the past few years, a lot of the humor has gone out of the NL. I concur. A lot of humor has gone out of my life, not to mention the world, with the passing of my Dad, I don't have his crazy ass to keep us all entertained anymore- sorry, but I simply can't invent the crazy ass shit he used to do and say- and I maybe have a darker edge myself, if that's even possible, since his death. If I didn't have this pouding headache I'd relate a funny story now to carry us into the new year, about The Killer Pop Tart, it being fresh in my mind as my Mom was talking about it at Christmas, but if I stay up any longer I'm going to have to start drinking again to kill the pain, and as I said I have things to do today, it's a heavy lift day- drunk, sober or hungover I keep to my schedule which is why I'm me and you're you- couple people to see before I stop in around 4:30 or so back out Harmon's Creek for a NYE drink with Jack, and from there to Joe and Laura's for a big seafood dinner and NYE party. Next issue it'll be Killer Pop Tart time, swear. (I CAN'T WAIT) Blindly, blindly I was glad to come See you next year. Bill
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There are places I'll remember 
Would that I could. I'd be one bad fucking were-Komodo dragon.
