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Wednesday, December 21, 2011

Woman of My Dreams

Yes. Natasha Fatale. How could I not love her?

For some inane reason, I was thinking Rocky and Bullwinkle today. They were a staple of my childhood and since I'm almost grown now, I thought I'd Google them to find out the deep nonsense that they're made of. Well, I only read Natasha's bio. After "knowing" her better, I didn't really care about the rest of the R&B crew. Here are her stats. Really!


Natasha is a spy for the fictional nation of Pottsylvania, and takes orders from the nation's leader, Fearless Leader (and occasionally the rarely-seen Mr. Big). Natasha usually serves as an assistant or accomplice to her fellow spy, Boris Badenov. Like Boris, Natasha also delights in performing various criminal misdeeds. She seems to be a bit more intelligent, or at least more thoughtful, than Boris, and often points out flaws in his plans or voices slight contempt for his bungling, to which his customary reply was "Sharrup you mouth, Natasha." Also, Natasha does say "SHARRUP YOUR MOUTH!!!!" to Boris in one episode, as their car goes over a cliff in The Treasure of Monte Zoom.

Her past is something of a mystery. According to the Rialto Theater's Moosebill for Downhill: The Musical (the table of contents for Rocky and Bullwinkle & Friends, The Third Season), she is the only child of Axis Sally and Count Dracula. A former Miss Transylvania, she was expelled from college for subversive activities. She traveled from Transylvania to the United States at the age of 19, landing in New York, where she spent two years posing for Charles Addams and as the party girl who pops out of the big cake at embalmers' stag parties.

She met Boris Badenov in 1948, when they were both arrested for throwing rocks at Girl Scouts hawking Girl Scout Cookies. Immediately smitten with her charms, she and Boris have been partners in crime ever since.

In her spare time, Natasha raises tarantulas and is the National Chairman of the Society to Restore The Real Meaning of Halloween.

Usually, Natasha's and Boris's misdeeds are thwarted by Rocky the Flying Squirrel and Bullwinkle the Moose. She refers to them collectively as "Moose and Squirrel."

Natasha is almost always shown in a purple dress, but in the last season it is often red.

Catchphrases -

Natasha's main catchphrase is referring to everyone as "dollink" — that is, "darling" as spoken with her thick Pottsylvanian accent (a mock-Russian accent) — an homage to actress-socialite Zsa Zsa Gaborand her habit of calling everyone "darling" (or in her Hungarian accent, "dahlink").


She was originally known as "Natasha Nogoodnik".


Okay, so she modeled for Charles Addams and she's the only child of Dracula? We were made for each other!

Wednesday, December 14, 2011

Chaotic Posting Schedule

I know, I'm here - I'm not - I'm unreliable. I'm in a cocoon period. Sharing my weekly exploits seems to bite me in the ass, so I'm waiting for something solid to happen. I'm expecting some kind of slow down/relatively docile period soon. I've been here and there, up and down, Bed & Breakfast and not. Incredibly uncontrolled year.

Once again, I feel like I'm making a bold move and moving toward...something comfortable and real. I'm doing everything in my limited power to buy a house with my "girlfriend." She's actually waaaay more than that. Besides, I'm over 50 now, "girlfriend" isn't a word I should be allowed to use anymore. We want this house almost as much as we want Canada and the US to erase those imaginary lines and become one (taking the best ideas from both countries and blending together seamlessly). Americanada? Canaderica?

So far, it ain't easy. Realtors, owners, lenders, a mishmosh of dumb shit stands in the way. I am not deterred. I am focused on making everyone involved ONE with me. There is a point where all parties converge. I am steering toward that point.

My next dining room?
Perhaps.


Tuesday, November 8, 2011

Murmuration

We are fantastic and amazing and wonderful. Yet, we still have not learned that nature is so much more.

Sunday, October 16, 2011

It's a Shitter, right?

Well humans, here we are. Part of me wants to blame American's for this but the rest of humanity has allowed us to get here. Another part of me wants one of these. I'm torn between being totally appalled and wishing it was more affordable ($6400.00).

Saturday, October 1, 2011

Nojo?

I'm ashamed to admit that I seem to have misplaced my Mojo. I haven't written anything of consequence in a couple of years. I've finally gotten comfortable enough to call myself a writer and now I can't seem to do it. I am in the midst of trying to force myself to write (for the umpteenth time!). It ain't workin'.

I have a novel planned out in my head and it's filled with people I like. Why aren't they talking to me? Why aren't they pushing me to tell the story? I depend on them. I need them.

Is it possible that they need me? Do I have to reach inside of my mind and pull something out? That's not the way it's worked to this point. The characters tell me what to write, not the other way around. Maybe now that I've hit middle age, I have to do things backwards.

Okay.

Reach inside. Reach inside. Reach inside.

Wednesday, September 21, 2011

Tanya at 10:45pm on a Tuesday

So, I went to a video store last night. Sounds like a lie. Who the hell goes to video stores anymore? Well, I did it for old times' sake. I used to go there all the time, then...Netflix got me. I felt bad about not going and supporting the small business guy. I went, is what I'm trying to say. For some reason, I spent a long time there and somehow got involved in a conversation with the video store guy about how the American and European economies are faltering and the Chinese economy is prospering. What the hell? Anyway, the door opens and a lovely young woman walks in and hands the video guy her driver's license. He looks at it and asks her what she wants. She takes it back, staggers backwards, knocks over a stack of videos, burps, then staggers out the door onto the sidewalk. The video guy and I look questioningly at one another.

Damnit, I'm a father! I had to go out and care for this child. Two young men (in their mid 20's) were kinda corraling her. They were also kinda laughing at the drunk chick in the terribly short skirt and low cut top that was barely covering her upper torso. This is so how bad things happen. Tomorrow's headline - "...And She Was Sold As A Sex Slave In..." She lilted to the left, fell to the sidewalk, and rolled toward the street - busy street for a Tuesday night! I grabbed her and sat her on the curb. The two guys got a bit more serious. They told me that she had just been kicked out of a cab. There was vomit on her arm and her eyes were completely vacant. I asked her for her cell phone, which she couldn't produce. Great.
I asked her for her phone number. She gave me an area code that I'd never heard of, followed by not enough numbers to be a phone number. I asked for her address and she gave me the same not quite enough numbers. She handed me her driver's license, which had a Berkeley, CA address. I was born in Berkeley. It's about 400 miles away. At least I got her name. Let's call her Tanya. I had one of the guys go through her purse to find a phone. He practically dumped it out but no phone appeared. Again...great.

I didn't want to call the police but I knew the time had come. I stood out in the street, looking for a cop car. We were only three blocks from a police station but not police were in the vicinity. Great. I took out my phone to call them, when what did my eyes behold? Tanya pulled a phone out from God-knows-where. I asked her for it and she dropped it on the curb. I took it and called the last number that she called. It was her mom. Great!

I'm now talking to a woman who's beside herself with worry. She's in Berkeley, of course. She told me Tanya's address and asked me to take her home. Nope. I assured her that I would get her daughter home safely but I wasn't gonna put a 22 year old, insufficiently dressed, dead drunk girl in my car and take her anywhere. I called the next number on her phone and got her roommate. I gave her our location and began the "10 minute" wait for pick-up. Tanya threw up about nine gallons of mystery.

Tanya now finds her second wind and wants to go a-walkin'. And a-talkin'. I had to physically restrain her because her shoes were pointed toward the street. Sweet little drunkie poo didn't care for being cared for. Now, the racial epithets start getting hurled. "Take your hands off me, you f-ing"...well, you know. That lasted about eight loooong minutes. To the ignorant passerby, this didn't look kosher. The really awful thing about it was, maybe 15 people passed by and no one said a word. I was a man holding a scantily clad young woman while she screamed "let me go!" What a world.

20 minutes later, friends show up and whisk young Tanya away. I made sure to tell them to call her mom and give that poor woman some peace. I shake hands with the two guys. I hope for the teachable moment for them and her. Maybe they can all save someone else some day and pay it forward. Teachable moment, pay it forward - two new age cliches in one paragraph, yah!

Lovely party, thanks for coming!

Saturday, September 10, 2011

Wednesday, September 7, 2011

Horse Shit!

You also need trust - money - honesty - security - commonality - commitment - and an enormous amount of patience. I'm sure I've forgotten several details necessary for love to occur.

The devil is in the details.

Monday, August 29, 2011

First Day of School

Today (8-29-11) is my son's first day of school. How the years pass. Seems like only yesterday that he was sitting on my lap watching "Sesame Street." Guess it really wasn't yesterday. At some point, everything good that happened in your life seems like yesterday. The bad stuff gets buried away and either never happened or happened a long long time ago. This short video seems like a long long long time ago. Guess it was. We were in the kitchen and he was reciting the tongue twisters, "She sells sea shells by the sea shore" and "One smart fellow, he felt smart". Try 'em yourself.
Today is his first day in college. I believe that I am an old man now. My youngest child is in college.

Tuesday, August 23, 2011

Allergilove

So...
you are in the prime of your life. You are healthy, strong, and beautiful. You meet the love of your life. You have everything in common. You feel pure, unadulterated love in every fiber of your being.

Every time you touch/kiss/make love to your soulmate, you break out in hives or bouts of sneezing or difficulty breathing or cramps or vomiting. There is no medication for your condition. What do you do?

Friday, August 19, 2011

How Was This Achieved?

This was taken around 1930. Buster Keaton was genius but how did he pull this off?

Saturday, August 13, 2011

Did You Know About This?

I've been here on Earth my whole life and I've tried to keep my eyes open most of the time but I don't remember this happening. I mean, I'm sure it did happen because there's a photo of it but...how did I miss it?

Monday, August 8, 2011

What the Hell is it With Me and Old Men?


Last week, I was in a funk. A funk that had already lasted more than a week. Sullen, quiet, stupid. That didn't stop me from shopping for crap that I don't need though.

I'm standing in a relatively long line at the 99¢ Store. For those of you who may not know what that is, it's a large store filled with essentials and unnecessary crap, all at a grand total of 99¢ per item. It's also filled with people that you probably wouldn't talk to at any other time in your life. A store that you leave feeling like you've gotten some good deals but you go right home and take a shower because of where you had to go to get said deals. Anyway, 200 year old man standing in front of me with a handful of odd things. Milk, urinal cake, rat traps, cookies, etc. You know, the norm. Two people from the register, he turns to me and in a very loud voice says,

"Two Amish women were picking potatoes one autumn day. The first Amish woman had two potatoes in her hands. She looked at the other woman and said, "these potatoes remind me of my husbands testicles", and the other woman said "are his testicles that big?" "No," she commented, "they're that dirty."

The store gets kinda quiet. I raised my eyebrows a bit. This guy told me another 20 extremely filthy jokes in rapid succession. No pause, no wait for the laugh, rapid fire dirty jokes. The place was like a tomb. Women covering their children's ears, cashiers mouths open wide, teenagers stifling giggles. Everyone looking at me like I was making this guy do this.

Finally, it was his turn at the register. He continued rattling off the raunchiest stuff ever while they rang him up. His stuff came up to a bit over $8. I told the cashier that his bill was on me.

How could I not? How much should it cost to be uplifted? I think around $8.

Rupert

A small swarm of grasshoppers blew through my apartment complex last week. All babies. One landed on my deck and stayed a while. They were all too small to fly out over the building once they flew in. Over the next few days, they were all crunched underfoot except Rupert here. No, I didn't name him Rupert. That's what he said his name is. Do you think I'm so stupid as to name a grasshopper?Now, he and I share salads.

Thursday, August 4, 2011

Still Not Happy?

I spent $20,500 today. $20,500 cash all at one time! Raise your hand if you did too. Thought so. Not excited at all. My life is still on the gloomy side and a new car just isn't doing it for me.

Note to self - if you're going to spend a ton of money, do it when your head is in the game.

This is not my car but it is exactly like my car. Gonna get some happy soon.
On the way to happy. Before long, happy will be consuming me in its warm embrace.

Wednesday, August 3, 2011

Pursuit of the Maladies (Repost for Reni)

At the gym recently, I went to my locker after a nice long Jacuzzi. Felt like a hundred and forty-seven bucks. Warm, relaxed, on top of the world. When I got to my locker, I saw that it was surrounded by three older gentlemen. Coincidentally, they had returned to their lockers simultaneously and the gym gods placed their lockers at odd and uncomfortably close angles to me and mine. They were at various degrees of undress or dress - I couldn't really tell what was going on. All three were north of seventy and seemed not to notice one another or me.

What the hell, I squeezed in there somewhere and began dressing. I was one leg into my underwear when the man to my left seemed to drop every stitch of his clothing all at once. He was unbuttoning his shirt one minute, the next he was stark naked. I'm not sure about the existence of God but I do know that God didn't make this guy in his current form. From his waist to his toes, he was painfully thin. This waist-down-man appeared in dire need of a combo plate of something fattening with a double dessert thrown in for good measure.

From his waist to his chest an anomaly of Biblical proportions was going on. It is my belief that he was smuggling three watermelons and sixty-five pounds of rice in his mid-body cavity. His stomach wasn't distended because distended is a 9 letter word and that doesn't cover what was going on there. I have no idea how his spindly legs supported the mass above them. Then, like some Penn & Teller illusion, he tapered down and had the most sunken chest and gaunt face you've ever seen. I looked into his eyes and wanted to order that combo meal again.

If I had to guess his age, I'd say that he was 74. His feet were were at least...Pleistocene. On top of that, with everything the guy did, he made a loud comment. He pulled on a tee shirt and sighed, "Oh boy!" Put on his watch, "Good heavens!" Little dab of deodorant, "Whoa!" Every movement came with a statement.

Okay, get those socks on and get moving, Brian!

I closed my eyes and put my socks on very crookedly. I stood up, pulled on my pants and began to hurry in dressing. Something wasn't sitting right in my head. I wasn't grossed out and trying to escape this surreal moment. I...I don't know what it was. I needed to get going. That's when I noticed for the first time a rhythmic whistling behind me. I don't know how I had gone so long, taking it for granted. What did my brain convince itself the sound was? A strong breeze in a pinwheel factory? Why didn't my brain alert me to this sound before? Was it overloaded with other subject matter at the moment?

Okay, turn around and look at the last guy. Shit, you know you have to have the full compliment of aged men, so get it over with. Decrepit trifecta, here I come.

Completely gray, sweet looking guy just getting dressed. Extremely old guy. Probably near or on top of 90. Probably once had skin covering his body instead of this ancient parchment. Apparently unable to admit or emit air without problem. Lung issue. Damn shame. Still...one might expect wheezing, not whistling. Hard to breathe, I get it. Pursing your lips with each inhale and exhale makes a whistle though. Who am I to judge, especially when I have no idea what the guy's issue actually is? Still...

All I could think about was, "I'll bet dogs are friggin' following this guy all day long." Cruel thought. Stupid thought, bad boy. Awful really. Still...

Okay, get the hell out of here now. Throw on the shirt and hit the road. The unknown feeling had crawled up my back and was preparing to strangle me from behind. The locker room was feeling crowded suddenly. Time to go.

Old Guy #4!!! What the hell? Where did he come from? He'd somehow mingled his way into the middle of things and he was staring right at me. Gray head and full tangled beard. Kinda like Rasputin without the evil scowl.

You know how someone gets your attention and they hold it and you can't look away because you know something's about to happen? Like they're about to tell you something of great import. Yeah, well he had me like that. He took a step closer and smiled.

"Five more fucking days until fucking Christmas! Whuddya have to say about that?"

Well put. What could I possibly say about that? There is no comeback for a statement like that in a room filled with mostly naked, infirm older versions of myself.

That's it! I now knew the name of the creeping feeling that was stalking me in this warm and moist room. The belly and bruises and curved toes and crap lungs were the contrary gifts of age. All I have to do is keep waking up and these things will finally catch me. None of us can outrun the pursuit of age and illness. One day, not too far from this moment, a younger man will look at me and feel the need to run. I hope that he is as fleet of foot as he thinks he is. I know better but I wish him speed.

I nodded to the "fucking Christmas" guy and walked slowly out of the locker room and up the flight of stairs to my car. Those stairs are still my friends now but the day will come when I will dress slowly in the locker room too, trying to avoid the not so easy trudge up those stairs.

Five more fucking days! Christmas is coming for us all.

Merry Christmas!