February 2005 Archives

Cool Whip--and I am being completely serious here--is the worst food on the planet. If space aliens crashed to earth and from their ship we pulled mysterious alloy tubes of bright, glowing pellets--more colorful than our eyes have ever seen--bright, glowing pellets of unidentifiable alien foodstuffs… I would eat that before I ate Cool Whip.

Fresh off the heels of the renowned StellaStyle mix Chicken Cutting Board, I have created a new song out of everyone's favorite psuedo-doctor, Dr. Phil.

It's called You're the Scientist (Listen Up) and I hope you find it as hilarious as I do.

Who knows who my next target will be? Michael Jackson? Jean Claude Van Damme for my good friend Adam Wekarski? We'll see. We'll see.

If you haven't noticed, it is Wednesday and there are three new shorts over at Ribcage! Love, me.

But, you see... I've spent all morning on THIS. I warned you all that I would mix soundclips from the new family episode of Low Carb and Lovin' It into a techno song. I call it Chicken Cutting Board (Stella Style)...try not to let it drive you insane!

Still, this episode is hilarious to me. Filled with hilarious sound bites that I swear I'm going to splice into a techno song this week.

Anyhow, there have been some changes over at Ribcage. There is a new store! There is a way to show your love! I worked for hours and hours on it, so I hope you can at least pimp out a button for me! You know I love you. More than half of the items are at cost too... It's not for the money.

Also... I posted a story and an ad for the site on the library's bulletin board yesterday. Then I went through the fiction shelves, stuffing Ribcage postcards in my favorite books. Hit up fifteen or so, before running out of postcards. How long do you suppose it will take for those books to be checked out? A year, for some, I'm sure. People in Connecticut actually have money to BUY books... who figured?

But not tonight! Tonight we ordered from a cell phone in the movie theatre parking lot, picked the food up on the way home. We were starving, oh boy!

So we started scarfing this food down. And it was good, oh boy! It's always good from this place, let me tell you.

Then Elise found the fried roach in her fried rice! Mmmmm, mmm, good!

Everything was ruined. I thought I was going to be sick. Elise was saying, "I'll eat something else... don't worry." Meanwhile, I'm eating fried rice too and you know they cook that shit in giant batches. Plus, it just doesn't matter... there could be roaches in EVERYTHING. They could have an infestation. I was sullen. Sad. Devastated. My food was so good and now it was full of cockroaches. And this was the good chinese restaurant in town! The only one that delivers. Can we ever forgive something like this? Can we ever go back?

Well we DID go back... to ask for our fifteen dollars refunded. To buy a second dinner elsewhere. God, I hate that kind of shit. The asking of the money back. And we walk in, the food in our hands... only to find a long line of customers... how do you tell the man behind the counter that you found a roach in your food, right in front of a line of people waiting for potentially infested food of their own? You'll ruin everyone's dinner that way! So we waited and waited for these customers to get their food and leave. I know, we're too nice. Finally though, the guy gave us our money back without any questions. He was a nice guy. His food is infested, but he's nice.

We settled on friggin' Wendy's, because nothing else is close by. I ate one of their terrible salads and it was terrible and it certainly wasn't Chinese food. They forgot to give us our fries, because they wanted to make our night even worse. We had to drive back to town a second time to claim what was rightfully ours! And of course the woman was a complete bitch to Elise, making a comment about how easy it is for us to rip them off like that! As if we were fatasses that weren't happy with our two fries and came all the way back to cheat them out of a third!

I guess fast food work makes you bitter... I wouldn't know.

There is a new commenting system there as well, because I love feedback!

Well... it rained here and it rained cold, so we stayed in.

We ate fat free bologna sandwiches with veggie cheese on spelt flour bread, reduced fat potato chips with ranch dip made from tofu sour cream, and then topped it all off with soy ice cream sweetened only by fruit juice.

Valentine's Day comfort food style. Valentine's Day for a guy with a wheat intolerance and a girl with a lactose intolerance. It was beautiful.

We watched Before Sunrise because it seemed fitting. Funny thing... the back of the case hailed the movie as, "A valentine to young love."

There is something new over at Ribcage today in honor of said day.

And there will still be a new story on Wednesday, of course.

I love you.

Ben Lee's new album Awake is the New Sleep is the best album I've heard in a long, long time... and I've heard the new 33 track Eels double album. That's amazing as well... but Ben Lee is beautiful.

Yesterday we bought a few luxory items... new lightbulbs that burn cooler and brighter than normal ones... new pillows made from NASA memory foam. We were feeling pretty good about these things.

And then Elise cut her finger on the lightbulb package. One of those plastic blister packs that are sealed to the hilt and require scissors to open. Anti-theft packaging from hell. But it was such a little cut, like a little paper cut. Still, I saw her blood. I hate seeing blood. I ran upstairs like a baby screaming, "I wish blood didn't exist!" And we all had a good laugh.

Then I stepped on the cardboard the pillows came in and cut my little toe open, right on the joint. Didn't even know it happened for half an hour. Then I felt a tickling and grabbed my toe, pulling the cut open wider and ruining my day. Now I'm walking around with curled toes. Anything to never do that again!

And so began the worst nightmare of a night we could have ever had!

You see, 20/20 had an exclusive interview with Corey Feldman, where he was going to reveal the shocking truth about his friendship with Michael Jackson. E and I were eagerly anticipating this. We had a bag of trail mix all lined up for this.

An hour before go-tiime, we stepped outside onto the front steps. Anthony and ConnectiKelly were out there conversing, waiting for Jeremy to finish primping himself. Murphy's in Stamford (a bar) this, Murphy's that. Jeremy eventually appeared and the three of them got in a car, pulled out of the driveway.

It's nine at night and, with still an hour to go until Corey Feldman's shocking truths, I was ready to come inside and do a little work on my book. All I wanted to do was work on the book... I was in a mood, I tell you. So I grab the doorknob.

It's locked, locked, locked. I turn around to catch the tail end of Jeremy's car speeding away. Folks, it's nine at night and thirty degrees outside and we're locked out of the house.

I try all the doors. I try the windows. I try anything to get in the house.

THEN. Elise realizes that her car is unlocked! Her car is actually unlocked! It is this stupid moment of hope, because you see... we certainly don't have the keys to actually start the car. In fact, there's absolutely nothing in the car that can help us. Our cell phones are in the house. We decide to ask a neighbor for help. For a phone. ConnectiKelly is the only one of the three that just left that has a cell phone. We don't know her number. It's saved in our cell phones. Our cell phones are in the house.

Still we walk across the street to use a neighbor's phone. It's now almost ten at night, but we luck out, knocking on the door of the nicest Polish people in the world. They sit us down, offer us tea and a phone and a phone book. Their gigantic poodle is quite friendly.

I call my father. I'm not sure if he'd have ConnectiKelly's number, but I call him anyway. Voice-mail. Then I open the phone book. Murphy's in Stamford... OF COURSE! I ask for Kelly, thinking that she's been around here a lot longer and that if anyone, the bartenders would recognize her. They scream through the bar, but they're not there. So I describe what they look like and ask the guy to tell them that they locked their friends out of their house, in case they ever show up. Then I call O'Neils pub, because it's very possible that they went there, instead. Nothing. I leave the same plea with that bartender. Then I call the Brewhouse. Again, nothing. Then my father again. Still nothing.

The Polish people offer us tea or Polish coffee. Polish coffee, they said, is made with the grinds right in the cup, so you have to let them sink to the bottom before drinking. This didn't sound very appetizing and all I really wanted was to get out of these people's house.

One of them talked to us about jazz music for quite some time. Then he insisted on reading us his poem. I'm not joking, you know. He ran off, returning with an 18 stanza, 5 page poem. Then he proceeded to read it to us. Stopping to ask if we got this and that metaphor. Poems fly over my head, you know. So I really had to force myself to listen. It wasn't bad actually. A little showy, with such big words... but not bad.

Then we talked about Bush and God and other horribly touchy subjects that I certainly didn't bring up. But this guy shared much of our same views, so all was good.

Then there was the Josh Groban song. We all sat quietly and listened to an entire Josh Groban song at his request. That part of the night was maybe the most awkward.

I tried my father again. Finally, he picks up.

He gives me directions on how to break into the house. One of our giant picture windows in the Florida Room is rotting to the point that it no longer locks. He's broken in through it before. He urges me to be careful though... because it's rotting to the point that the entire window could fall through and break. And then he says, "If the window falls out and shatters, don't worry... just get out of the way."

So we go, envigorated. We'll be in the house in no time!

No kidding is this window rotting! I'm trying my best to not disturb the window frame, but the wood is crumbling, practically dissolving in my hands. But I finally grab it and pull. The window starts opening. But it's stuck at the top. The wood must be swollen. It's stuck at the top and so I have Elise stick a screwdriver inside and slide it up higher and higher to break the seal. It's still stuck, but with a little leverage from the screwdriver halfway up the seal and a tug on the bottom, I'm sure I can get the top to pop open. So we go for it. And I tug.

The sound was deafening, you know. Glass was falling all around me. I broke the fucking window. I jumped out of the fucking way. I looked up at what had happened. It was devastating.

This window is eight feet tall and so expensive, I'm sure. And now it's in a pile on the ground. And the frame is still holding these gigantic, dangerous shards all around. We broke a window and it was still impossible to get into the house.

We would make such horrible burglars.

It was the stress, the tension, the pulling of the glass at the bottom, but not the top that did it in. It was really stupid of me.

It was my blood running down my hand. I was still in shock from the window and didn't feel any pain. I saw that I was bleeding, but didn't much care. I just wanted to get these Polish people's screwdriver out of the pile of glass and return it to them, defeated.

I didn't want them to know that we had failed. I didn't want them to offer me anything else. I just wanted to wait outside in the thirty degrees for my brother to get home with the key. I just wanted to chain-smoke.

But of course the Polish insisted that we come back inside. I hid my bloody hand in my jacket. The last thing I wanted was for them to see that, they would insist on helping me wash, disinfect and bandage it. I guess it was a pride thing. So I hid my hand from them. The cut was so tiny, I swear. Its bleeding was far more impressive than it should have been.

I called my father back and broke the news of the broken window.

Then the Polish people offered us a place on their couch until our friends got back, or all night if we wanted. Then they went to bed. And we were alone in these other people's house.

At midnight we let ourselves out, it was too awkward. We spent another thirty minutes or so in the back of Elise's unlocked car, huddling for warmth.

And then Jeremy pulled up.

This morning, we finally got around to the Corey Feldman special. Michael Jackson showed him porn and pictures of genitals with venereal diseases. I just thought I'd end on that little bit. Michael Jackson with his hush high-pitched voice sitting next to a young Corey Feldman. "Look Corey, look at these gross diseases."

It's a whole community with a forum, profiles with before and after pictures and a blog for every member to update everyone on their progress. It's pretty darn nifty.

And it's had twenty people sign up in less than an hour.

I put this shirt on in Florida, mind you. Mind you, I've showered three times since then, but still.

I got the idea standing in Elise's mother's renovated bathroom. So Linda, you got a beautiful new bathroom, and I got a beautiful new story! Thank you!

And thanks for reading everyone!

If corporate disregards it, I'll just keep this offer handy for the future and we'll go see a free show when we eventually move down. Better than nothing!

I'm collecting pictures for my book! You'll get photo credits, most certainly! And you'll get your photos back, I promise.

So, please?!

I am not sure if this is the right email address for this kind of email... I wanted it to get to the GM, but there was no address listed. I tried to speak to a manager in person but I was herded out in a crowd. Anyhow...

I've been to your venue dozens of times. Lived in Orlando up until last year when I moved to Connecticut. I still received the event calendar emails and always read them just in case. (Don't get many great shows up here in Conn.) So I was excited to see that three of my favorite bands were playing a show together... I was ecstatic. My girlfriend and I planned a trip back to Florida, centered around this very show. Bought plane tickets. Bought tickets to the show.

The show was this past Saturday... the fifth. Bright Eyes, Neva Dinova and Jessie Sykes.

I would have written this email earlier, but didn't fly back home until last night.

Our day started off great. We ate at the HOB restaurant with a group of friends. Jumbalaya and all that good stuff. It was great as always. No complaints. But then we went into the concert...

The concert was a disaster. I'm not sure if you can speak to anyone there that was actually at the show, but if you can... ask them one question... could they even hear the music? Because we couldn't. Neva Dinova and Jessie Sykes were entirely lost amongst the noise of the crowd. It was awful. I felt horrible, especially for Jessie. This poor woman with an acoustic guitar and no one can hear her so no one listens and instead just talk more and more, making the noise louder and everything worse. Bright Eyes had a full band, so it wasn't as bad, but when they stripped down to softer songs they were completely drowned out as well.

Now, I understand that it is impossible to control such a crowd. I wouldn't be writing you this email if I didn't think that part of the situation could have been avoided. I mean, I've been to shows at HOB where I've been kicked in the face by a crowd-surfer and those sort of things are completely unpredictable and we all move on, but... this past Saturday I watched as time after time... waitresses sold drink after drink to people that were clearly drunk. They walked around upselling alcohol, only making a bad situation worse.

Though, most of my visits to HOB have been great, this is not the first time that this has happened and I let it slide before, but I can't again. A few years back, I spent thirty dollars on a ticket to see the Eels open for Fiona Apple. I didn't care to see Apple, was only there for the Eels... was surprised to see that it was only the lead singer and an acoustic guitar doing the tour. That was great, or so I thought. His set lasted all of seventeen minutes and he walked off stage pissed. In between each of the four songs that he played he berated the audience for being too loud and drunk for him to concentrate. And he was right. A month later he did an interview and said that he would never play another HOB again, that he's tired of clubs that are more concerned with the selling of alcohol than the show itself. And he was right again. So, that night when he walked off stage, I walked out as well... like I said, I had paid my thirty dollars only to see his set... all seventeen minutes of it.

So I bit my lip that time, but I refuse to do that again. I would like some compensation for Saturday's show. It's not that the show wasn't worth the money, it's that the show wasn't worth my time OR the money. There was no point in my being there. Straining to hear the music past the crowd was more work than pleasure and I wish I had never gone. I felt stupid for having come all that way, from Connecticut to Florida, just to torture myself in your concert hall.

My Ticketmaster order number was 15-57935/FLO.
The tickets were $53.25 for my girlfriend and I.

Thank you,

Today, I wrote four pages while further structuring and organizing things. It's coming together nicely... this time. I'm so happy to be happy with it. I was miserable the first attempt, which is what led to the eventual scrapping of something like twenty-five pages. The new draft is over thirty now and E has only worked six days, I believe. That being the only time I honestly work on it. I'm trying to change that though, I swear! Still, this is an incredible rate folks.

Oh yeah... and also... I wrote a story today. Of course. It's short, but sweet and I hope you enjoy!

I have to go cook dinner before E gets home. Freaking housewife, I swear!

And then I should pack. I should definitely pack. Airport in the morning. Florida beckons! So have a wonderful day! And hopefully I'll stay updated while I'm down.

Apparently this man died and they cleared out his house, sent all of his stuff to the family. In his stuff there was a taped up box that the family cut open. Inside the box was a severed human leg. An unidentified man's leg! Now they're investigating of course.

Now families that find gigantic porn collections in the houses of their dead relatives can breathe easier. It's just porn, folks. It's not an unidentified severed limb, for god's sake!

This woman was a kleptomaniac and I'm sorry, but it was hilarious. "When I was caught, they pulled from my purse: a bottle of bleu cheese dressing, children's fun bubbles, red wine vinegar, three DVDs and a cassette. (pause) I had the money to pay for all of it." And of course there was re-enactment footage of all of these things coming out of a purse, one by one. Bleu cheese dressing!

But then this guy came on... he left his wife sleeping in bed to go to work. In the garage, his car wouldn't start so he jumped it with his wife's car. Left and worked all day. Came home to find that he had forgotten to turn his wife's car off; had shut the garage door behind him. His wife was still in bed and his two dogs were on the ground... all dead. It was terrible.

Freaking house wife, I swear.

Thursday, the two of us are off to Florida... T H U R S D A Y. I'm looking forward to the Bright Eyes concert and the vacation from writing. Though, I am having a lot of fun with this diet book now. It's hilarious at times.

We have to leave the animals in my brother's care, because my parents are off to I Forget Where, for some appearance. They've been all over the country this past month, by the way. Seems they're always flying out to somewhere now that the book is in stores.

Also, my father is doing a signing at the Barnes and Noble here in Norwalk, which is pretty damn cool. Home-town signing.

He wants E and I to go to South Beach at the end of next month for this huge food and wine festival. I would love to go, but I'm not sure E can get more time off work in the same month as this trip on Thursday. Apparently though, most everyone from Food Network will be there. Emeril, Rachel Ray, Iron Chef's Morimoto, Bobby Flay, Mario Batali, Giada De Laurentiis, Anthony Bourdain and more, more, more. Most importantly though... they've booked my father two suites! Free room service... Free everything.

All else is well... E works the next two days... much alone time to write.