Ramblings of a Madman

Ode To Max

My nephew turns sixteen years old today.

Holy sh--.

I don't have children, so Max has been the closest thing I've had to raising a kid.  Since he was three years old, we've spent time together every week, hanging out, laughing, playing, making fun of each other.  I can honestly say it's the most rewarding thing I've ever done.

I've never known anyone I'm prouder of and prouder to be involved with.  He's an exceptional human being.  Smart, caring, genuine, open, giving, funny.  Also frustrating, mystifying, and aggravating.  He's everything I could ask from a nephew and then some.

When he was about 4 or 5, we'd compete to see who could say the grossest thing possible.  The only rule was you couldn't swear.  It's amazing how disgusting you can get when you're competing with a preschooler.  He got me pretty good a couple of times.  If I could remember any of what we said, I'd relay it to you, but you kind of had to be there...

I also remember tossing him in the air when he was a kid.  He called it "No you don't" because one time he was trying to get away from me and I grabbed him and said "NO you don't..." as I threw him into the air like a Cabbage Patch doll.  He loved it and begged me to do it again.  Every time I tossed him I had to say "No you don't," and every time he'd ask me to do it again, only toss him higher.  He never got tired of being shotput into the air like a sack of potatoes.  When he was little, I got so much air under him a few times I was afraid he wasn't coming back down.  His mom watched us maybe twice before going in the house and shutting the door, only slowing down long enough to threaten me with disembowelment if I dropped her son.  Max loved it though.  The higher he went the better he liked it.

His mom...not so much.

We played that game for 6 years.  We finally stopped "No you don't"-ing when he got to 100 lbs.  That's when I said "No I don't."

I also remember taking him to the beach in Ventura when he was maybe 4.  He was scared to death of the waves, but I picked him up and carried him out into the surf anyway.  We'd go into the water up to my waist or my chest, with him in my arms, and a wave would crash over us and he'd scream and I couldn't tell whether he was screaming happy or screaming terrified.  It turned out to be both.  We stood out there for what seemed like forever.  We'd start to get cold and he'd want to go back to shore, and then a wave would hit us and he'd scream and say, "let's do it again!"  This went on for about 3 hours.  One of the best days of my life.

Amazing kid.

He can play piano, draw, design a website, and write.  He loves "Anime" (Japanese animation), subsequent to earlier obsessions with "Gargoyles", "X-Men", and his first obsession (my favorite), "Thomas THE Tank Engine."  The little blue engine that could.  And did.  Over and over again.

And now he's growing up.

I worry about his future.  Actually, I worry about everyone's future, including mine.  But I know he'll be okay, because he's got a good heart and a great attitude.

In the meantime, I still have a couple of years left to tease, harass, torture, ridicule, and in all other ways make his life a living hell.

After all, what else is an uncle for?

Happy Birthday Max.

Love Uncle Bob

In Search of a Castle

I've spent time the past three days engaged in my favorite Southern California pastime - looking for a place to live.  I'm so happy I could scream...

It's easy to conclude that looking for an abode is my favorite activity, because it seems to be the thing I've done more of during the past 15 years than anything else.

Since I moved to Los Angeles in April of 1991 (that's going on sixteen years to the mathematically impaired, or about 137 in dog years - apparently I'm the one who's mathematically impaired...), I've had 18 (soon to be 19) different addresses.  That's not a misprint.  The post office is issuing me my own rolling zip code.  They're also awarding me 'mail forwarding status for life' - quite an honor when you stop to think about it.

Why in God's name would anyone move 19 times in sixteen years - especially someone who was not a) actively engaged in military service, b) part of a witness protection program, or c) clinically insane?  Since there is no d) answer I can think of, I'm at a loss here - and I was there when it happened.

It gets more enlightening when I count up the number of jobs I've had during the same period.  That would be twenty five (as in the number between 24 and 26).  Actually I worked for 2 companies twice, so technically I've only had 23 different employers in the past sixteen years.  I don't want you to get the impression I've been unstable or anything.

What's really remarkable is that people keep hiring me.  Sometimes they even pay me.  I love this country...

So what's next?

Since I have a hard time doing what people expect me to do, I'm actually considering keeping my day job for awhile this time.  At least a year.  And building a business on the side.  And maybe buying a house (my mother just fainted).  Having a family (I just fainted).  Keeping the same phone number (okay, now I'm freaking out pretty much everyone who knows me - it's okay, just breathe - maybe I should step into this stability phase a little more slowly - give everyone a chance to adjust).

In the meantime, I just discovered that to rent a 2 bedroom apartment within the Los Angeles city limits, in a neighborhood where I don't need to wear Kevlar to and from the front door, I need to pay approximately $7843 a month in rent (actually I included utilities so it's not as bad as it sounds...) - which just happens to be my take-home pay, so I'm all set...oh, wait, that's what they were paying me at the last job I left because the CEO was a psychotic nincompoop - but at least he's been with the same company for more than a year.  So he's got that going for him...

I don't want you to think I'm complaining because I'm not.  I'm just...tired.  Tired of chasing.  Tired of building.  Tired of generating a new dream every year or so, and then convincing myself it's going to work this time.

I look at people around me and I see stability, comfort, connection, a sense of accomplishment.  I look at myself and I see a man with a resume the size of the Direct Connect Yellow Pages.  Or I'm like VISA - I've been everywhere you want to be (plus several places I can confidently tell you to avoid).

So what's the answer? 

I'm not sure, but in the meantime, I've got to go.  I'm guest speaker at the Southern California Renter's Association.  They're giving me a Lifetime Achievement award...

We'll Have a Gay Old Time...

In the time-honored tradition of Saturday evenings careening off the Bizarre-o-Meter in Los Angeles, I spent the balance of last night at a gay karaoke bar in Long Beach.  Just when I thought life couldn't get any weirder...

Things actually started out fairly normal.  My friend Laura emailed me earlier in the week to say she'd be in town from SanFran and would I like to raise her spirits with a bit o' country dancing.  Actually, I think the message she sent was more along the lines of "Hey loser - if you're not still recovering from your Geritol-induced stupor Saturday night, how about seeing if you can keep up with me on the dance floor..."  Ah, the respect I inspire in friends and loved ones...

Being the mild-mannered, docile type that I am, I accepted her gracious invitation and mentioned she might want to bring steel-toed shoes just in case I happened to step on her toes all night long - on purpose.  Obviously a fun time to be had by all.

Things got a bit complicated when my buddy Darnell called to say he was having his birthday at Miceli's in Hollywood that night, while Laura had promised to hang with her brother's "gay buddies" in Long Beach earlier in the evening.  However, nothing was to keep me from my appointed rounds of making her put her money-maker where her mouth is on the dance floor, so we worked out after-dinner dancing plans and all was set.

Din-din with "D" and his pards went off without a hitch.  Intelligent people, intelligent conversation, great atmosphere, and an older-than-God Italian waiter belting out nightclub standards at the piano (and carrying it off quite well I might add - serious set of pipes on the old geezer - actually, who am I kidding - he's probably my age...).  Darnell had tiramisu for the first time.  Everyone left the restaurant fat and happy and I called Laura to firm up Plan B.

Slight hitch.

It seems her "gay friends" were taking none-too-kindly to her plans to ditch them and kick up her heels at a cowboy bar, and had resorted to threats of physical abduction and forced guzzling of alcohol to keep her planted in Long Beach with them (never mess with gays when they're in party mode - they go into full-on 'gang-bitch' mode at a moment's notice and are NOT responsible for their actions).

Being the understanding type, I told her, "Screw them - who's more important - your gay friends or me?"

Long silence on the other end of the line...perhaps a different tack was in order.  "I'd love to drive 40 miles in Los Angeles traffic at 10 o'clock on Saturday night to hang with your queer buddies - what's the address?"

Since I had an hour's drive ahead of me, I had plenty of time to reflect on previous 'gay party' experiences - both of them - and steeled myself for queenie mayhem at the other end of my journey.

My first concern was how would I find her - let's see, tall, leggy blonde with dazzling smile surrounded by hordes of gyrating, estrogen-inflated males, screaming orgiastically to "La Vida Loca" - on second thought, she shouldn't be too tough to spot.

My next concern was whether I could keep up with the party crowd - I'd already imbibed the better part of a bottle of red at Miceli's, recommended by Methuselah, our waiter, and was pretty sure that any further intoxicating intake would put me under the table faster than Clay knocked out Liston in '64.  And there's nothing more humiliating than being called out by pansies for being a lightweight (not that I've never had it happen before).  Also, having seen West Hollywood shindigs before, I wasn't entirely comfortable with being passed out in a crowd of alcohol and sex-crazed gay males.

Finally, there was the prospect of karaoke.  Now, I'm not exactly a shy guy, but my singing voice is something akin to "geese farts on a muggy day"  (to coin a phrase from the inestimable Leo Kottke).  The embarrassment factor was climbing, increased by the concern of what might happen if they actually liked me.

So by the time I got there, I was steeled for pretty much anything, except reality, which turned out to be considerably tamer (and ultimately weirder) than anything I'd imagined.  I was surprised, relieved, and even a little disappointed...

Laura introduced me to her friends.  "This is Scott and Leslie - they're straight - so you can talk to them.  Patrick and Jeff are 'together' (raised eyebrow) - just so you know.  And Pasquale is as queer as a three-dollar bill."  I must have had a tattoo on my forehead that read "Homophobe - beware!"

Things started out fairly interesting - I was hit on by 3 men in the first half hour or so, including an albino-looking black dude about half my size who came up and goosed me while I was standing next to Laura.  Not being accustomed to this fairly un-subtle approach from a guy, I tried a polite conversation starter with him, which went something like, "What in the HELL do you think you're doing?"

He was completely unfazed - "Are you with her?"  Clutching Laura like a life preserver, I told him yes, while giving her a look that said, "If you double-cross me on this, I will haunt you for the rest of your life."  She leaned over and whispered something I couldn't hear to the guy and he laughed and went away.  For all I know, she punked me and told him I had 14 types of venereal disease.  Regardless, he stopped pinching my ass.

The rest of the evening turned out to be pretty quiet.  The only overt same-sex action I observed was a pair of lezzies listlessly dry-humping on the dance floor, and since they could both charitably be described as "Rubenesque", 'it weren't no thang.' 

Laura's friend (first person she introduced me to, and, I'm embarrassed to admit, the only person whose name I promptly forgot) spent the rest of the evening explaining to a rapt audience how he could cut a pattern from scratch "just by seeing it and knowing how the dress was going to turn out" (Leslie, the straight girl, was mesmerized with awe and admiration), as well as giving a forty-minute dissertation about his self-administered 2" haircut that day, completed at great pains because his hair "just wasn't right."  You can't teach skills like this.  According to Laura, bad hair days are the secret ingredient binding gay males and straight women together.  Considering my current 'follicularly-challenged condition', I'll have to take her word on that one...

Laura played "clean the clock" with all comers at the pool table (apparently straight men don't eat quiche and gay men don't shoot pool), and the crowd went into a frenzy when an Hispanic lad, tipping the scales at a mere 280 or so, belted out a rendition of Cher's "Do You Believe in Life After Love".   By far the high point of the evening, it brought tears to my eyes.  Laura told me, "You know you're in a gay bar when they start singing karaoke to Cher."  If they'd done "Xanadu" by Olivia Newton John, my life would have been complete...