like a Polaroid picture

i didn't plan on getting quite that drunk.
and i definitely didn't plan on going to the Palace.
i've never understood dance bars, all loud and cramped and shitty music and the only way to communicate with someone is by grinding your ass against their ass.
i prefer talking.
i'm good at communicating with my mouth, though it's often just random, sarcastic vulgarities, linked together with profanity (and peppered with a dash of grace and humility.)
but not last night.
last night i communicated with my body.
i shook my skinny, white ass.
like a motherfucker.
onstage.
in front of 200 people.
with my shirt off.
that's right, i was a contestant in the Palace's infamous Hard Bodies/Sexy Legs contest. the other contestants just got up there and flexed, pimping their precious muscles, trying desperately to impress the female population.
not me.
i ripped off my shirt and went intergalactic.
breakdancing. rolling around like a wounded, dyslexic coyote. i even did some one armed push-ups to mock the toughies.
it must have been appalling to watch.
(he's so pale! look at the bones! weird nipples!)
but apparently, being pale and twitchy was the order of the night.
i made it to the semi-finals.
and the second i got offstage, two girls i've never met before in my life grappled onto me, screaming "you were so awesome! omigod!" someone bought me a drink. i danced with a hundred different people and got a million high fives.
instant fanclub.
all these years of publicly making an ass of myself finally paid off.
common sense and decent behavior are dead to me now.
i'm going to act a fool everyday for the rest of my life.
to quote Sleater-Kinney on their brilliant new album, The Woods (cough, out now on Sub Pop, cough, cough):
All you want is entertainment,
Rip me open it's free

sneakin' in the hospital

what better to do on a cold, miserable Thursday night than sit in Rogue's Roost, spill draught beer on yourself and enjoy lengthy discussions about sexy eye games, the merits of British humor and the sublime foxiness of the Golden Girls.
(apparently, Rose is the hottest.)
eventually the crowd thins and the cash goes dry.
then what?
well, if you're an eager beaver like myself, you sneak into the Old Infirmary on Queen St. which isn't as difficult as it sounds.
climb some junk, scale a fence, presto.
and since the building is half demolished, one can easily hop in an open window. and land in three inches of water. once inside i discovered the lower floors were severely flooded, due to weeks of unyeilding rain and the gaping holes in the walls.
i grew weary of the wet feet business and decided to head upwards.
(the innards of the building have been totally gutted. how fitting, a hospital getting opened up and having it's insides removed.)
i trudged upward as far as the stairs could take me and then proceeded through a mammoth opening in the side of the building.
welcome to the roof baby.
the view would have been worthwhile if not for the typhoon like weather conditions. but, i was in a good mood, so i strolled about for a while, taking in my washed-out city.
then i decided to take in my new sneakers, and i noticed that i wasn't standing on the roof at all; i was standing on ('in' no longer applied) an old hallway with an intricately tiled floor.
a floor that was not designed to be a roof.
never meant to face the sky and taste the weather.
but, since everything above this floor had recently been razed and tossed down below, i elected it the New Roof.
and i stood there for a while.
high above the streets.
a million dollars taller.
king of my stinky, dilapidated castle.
but, i was a hungry king, and eventually had to defect from my throne and head to Jessy's.
three jumbo slices for five bucks?
you're crazy.
let's party.

tarpit

i just knocked my goddamned sunglasses into my goddamned dirty ass fishbowl that hasn't been cleaned in weeks.
now my sunglasses reek of lukewarm fishwaste.
"The Fish" was not amused.
and i've discovered something else "The Fish" doesn't like.
eating tobacco.

insane-o

i ran into a very strange man on Hollis Street today.
he was a shady looking character and he was clutching something tightly against his chest. it appeared to be a box of laundry/dish detergent but i couldn't be sure because it was badly weathered.
he had his back against the brickish wall of some building and was trying to stand up on his hind legs but kept falling over because A) his feet were skidding on the loose gravel, B) he refused to loosen his grip on the detergent and C) was obviously not in a completely stable state of mind.
so i figured i'd do my good deed for the day and at least get buddy on his feet so he could stagger off to go conjure some orcs in the park, or whatever it is these people do.
i approached him and asked if he needed a hand.
with the reflexes of an electrified squirrel, he twisted around (shielding his precious detergent) glared at me, and screamed "i'm perfectly sane! it's you! it's you!" in a very damning tone.
i knew he was lying, but decided to leave anyway.
exit stage left.
have a good one buddy.
i'm not here to judge.
go eat some more detergent.

complain-o

Mother Nature is dead.
and apparently she's been replaced by Captain Shitty.

organ grinder

my body is a perfect machine of poor timing.
as many of you know, i'll be throwing a party this Saturday at the Smith Street lair and have been making preparations as such.
but, per usual, along came a snag.
a few days ago i had a slight tickle in my throat. i assumed it was from screaming the chorus to Deadly Sinner at top volume while drunk every night for the past week. but then, it quickly turned into a severely irritated throat. perhaps i'm ill, i pondered. then, the night before last, just like magic, it happened. from the time i fell asleep to the time i awoke, my tonsils had doubled in size.
(for those of you who don't know, my tonsils and i have shared a checkered past: two winters ago they swelled so much they almost completely blocked off my throat hole. the doctor said A) those are the largest, most infected tonsils i've ever seen on a living human being, and B) you were about an hour away from needing an emergency traecheotomy. let's continue..).
so, realizing the imminent tonsil ass-fuckage, i unleashed my counter-attack. a blitzkreig of Aspirin and Vitamin C; i'm talking fistfulls, ten at a time, every half hour for the past two days.
dangerous? possibly.
clever? not really.
effective? hell yes.
i've won.
symptoms are disappearing.
energy returning.
Jagermeister rising.
i can't, i won't and i don't stop.

Barrista

this is an ode to the beautiful, hard working, coffee slinging young women across our fair city. they are the unsung heroes of our day to day lives and they deserve our respect.
this is my way of saying, Thank You.

jump start my morning with your caffeinated smile
join me on the sofa, talk books for a while
as i watch your little hands, fixin' my fritata
you move with skill and grace, a queen of boiling wata
dip my fingers in your jar
adding to your tips
maybe meet you after work
lick the latte from your lips
i read your nametag, but that's not enough
you smell like coffee but i bet you taste like love

Barrista

i'm sick and tired of this counter in between us
lather up your body with my non-dairy creama's
java-caffa express, deluxe moccachino
me and my matress, gotta get you in between-o
dark hair
tight jeans
wanna take you home
watch you grind my beans
can't sleep
need help
girl you really steam my milk

Barrista

the shakes

ever drink way too much coffee?
i've been going non-stop all day.
i'm not even that hyper or talky-talky-talky, i just feel really fucking weird. like a quivering mass of undercooked pasta is crawling about inside me, pulsating to some kind of progressive-jungle beat that i'm obviously not enjoying.
it's like i took acid or something.
not heavy acid.
maybe like a child-size dose of acid.

hygiene tip #82

unlike coleslaw, a peanut butter and jam sandwich should be eaten before, or after, getting in the shower, not during.
unless of course you're using rye bread, which will yeild a higher resistance to the force of the water.
but really, who puts peanut butter and jam on rye?
rye is for smoked meats.
also: the practice of snacking while taking a shower increases the risk of neglecting to de-soap your crotch.
and then you'll just have to get another shower.
or stay soapy.
whatever feels better for you.

by the numbers

ok, so we all know there are a lot of crappy bands out there with numbers (#'s) in their names.
or their names are numbers.
or whatever.
this annoys me.
probably because most of these bands are of the "boy band" or "shitty 'mall punk' band" variety.
putting a number in your bands name is basically deciding right from the get go that your band is going to suck. i could sit here all day naming terrible bands with numbers in their names.
seriously, make a list. scary isn't it?
instead i'll do everyone a favor and name the ONLY bands with number names that do not, even remotely, suck.
here goes:
Nine Inch Nails
MC5
Death From Above 1979
2 Live Crew
Buck 65
Blackout 77 (ok, they kinda suck)
Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five
the Jackson 5
the soundtrack to the movie CB4
Butthole Surfers

good watchin'

don't let the barren wasteland of summer reruns get you down; check out these hot new Reality Television shows:

Hobo Wedding
Gay My Dad
The Amazing Blind Schizophrenic Race
Mystery Baby-Swapping
Eat a Hobo's Sock
Blowjob Taxi
Fight My Out-of-Control Teen (For Cash!)
Who Wants To Marry a Pedophile?
Hey! This Isn't Coffee!
Extreme Daytime Streaking
Celebrity Eat a Hobo's Sock

open season

know what i hate?
letters that open with the phrase "we regret to inform you that blah blah blah, because we're a bunch of profound, well-informed assholes who can't possibly allow you to violate our precious institution with your revolting brand of shenanigans."
i'd love, just once, to get a letter relaying something positive.
something mildly encouraging.
like, "mad props, Gillis!"
or, "here's five thousand dollars!"
fuck it.
they won't stop me.
i'm crashing the gates, bitch.
economy style.
right after i feed the royal monkeys.

let there be desk

that's right kiddies, no more posting from a compy on a wobbly milk crate. the old iMac finally has a proper desk, which was a remnant of Ron's recent migration to Tobin Street (god rest his metal soul.)
but i'm not here to talk about desks or Ron or metal or Tobin Street. i'm here to talk about milk crates; the lowest commom denominator of the furniture world. for the first time ever, i have a bedroom that is 100% milk crate free.
sure there's one just outside my door to hold my rekkids, but i'm not flaunting that one around pretending it's furniture. and my life is still heavily populated with MC's. i currently own four of these puppies (one black, one brown, one yellow, one red.) when i'm at work, my only seat is a stack of two milk crates. they are still an everyday occurrence.
when i was in high school we had a cabin in the wooded area behind Mark's house, almost completely furnished with crates. at the peak of one memorable summer we had accumulated about thirty of these durable, plastic bad boys. we saw the need for our friends to have somewhere to sit while visiting us in the woods, and we catered to this as quickly and cheaply as we could.
we also, unwisely, invented a sport that involved someone standing on the (severely unstable) roof of the cabin while the others remained on the ground. the goal of the ground folk was to try to knock so-and-so off the roof by hurling milk crates at him. we called it Crate Wars. we obviously were in great need of girlfriends at the time. that or less powerful hash.
anyway, the point is, if we had replaced all of our milk crates back then with Ron's old desks, we'd all be dead.
and you'd be terribly, terribly sad.