In Which We Speak in Tongues

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In Which We Take a Trip

 

I was reminded of the following story by this charming illustration I stumbled across on Tumblr.  It is a sheet of blotter acid from back in the day.

One fine spring afternoon many years ago, a gang of miscreants with whom I worked on a small newspaper in New Orleans and I went off to spend the day at a cabin near the beach in Gulfport, Mississippi.  It was a tiny structure teetering on the brink of being a shack with a great big screened porch.  

These sort of shabby, but not chic, little joints were all over the Gulf Coast in the halcyon days of my youth.  They were comfortable but nothing special, usually sort of musty, and frequently built by somebody's grandfather with whatever crappy supplies he had lying around.  Putting any more effort or money into construction of something that was just going to get knocked down by some hurricane was regarded as laughable.  They were often referred to as The Camp.  I'm sure they are pretty much all gone by now, either flattened by, again, a hurricane or replaced by some ridiculously elaborate McMansion, which was also inevitably hurricane doomed. 

I'm sure this particular The Camp came fully stocked with crabbing nets and flounder gigs and probably some rod and reels for surf fishing because all of these places had those.  Oh and coolers for beer.  Definitely coolers for beer.  This one was pretty standard with a big front room with a kitchen in it and then a bathroom and a couple of bedrooms.  The first thing you did when entering was open all the windows to air out the mildewy smell and then immediately shut them all so you could turn on the air conditioner.  

The whole point of our expedition was to get there and get loaded by taking some LSD.  Since I'm easily amused, I always liked acid.  I enjoyed taking a break from the physical reality and the hallucinations which took my tiny little brain for a drive were always colorful and pretty.

The cabin had a huge hot pink azalea growing right next to it, actually taller than the roof.  Once I was tripping (like a million screaming monkeys, as we used to say,) I spent most of the afternoon sitting on the screened porch and staring up into the magenta flowers.  I eventually had to go pee and in walking across the main room to the toilet and back, I got lost.  You know why?  Cause I. Was. Loaded.

Hoohoo.  Good times.

Boys who look like they would be a good time: 

Tyler Otto and his lovely buttchops.

Glenn Isner, another one of those skinny-big-dick combos everybody finds so darn attractive.

And yet another.

Jadsen, from over at AllAmericanGuys, where the models all have sweet asses, but no last names.

Massimo Arad, daddy in the dunes.

Oooh, spooky.

Another mononymic beauty, Mathias and his low hanging fruit.

Look, a love story for Pride month.

In Which We Take a Little Trip

 

You know, for a respectable old widow, I certainly talk about recreational drugs a lot.  I swear it is not my fault, the medical establishment simply thrust them upon me.  What can I do?

Perhaps you remember a couple of weeks ago, I was dealing with episodes of depression brought on by my withdrawal from opioids.  Dr Google assured me that was normal, but that they could go on for quite a while.  I talked to my physical doctor and she recommended ketamine.  Multiple jokes about raves ensued, but I went along with it.  The depressive episodes had been very unpleasant and I was willing to roll with whatever chemical might kick their little butts.

I was skeptical because I am skeptical of everything, but my chiropractor is all for The Wonders of Ketamine and recommended the website he uses.  And if you can't trust some guy who cracks your neck regularly, who are you going to trust?  So I signed up on the website, downloaded their app (because of course there was an app,) and got ready for my k hole.  

But before I could do that, I had to 

• Speak with a clinician for my intake, 
• Choose a Guide (The list had all their qualifications, but of course I picked mine based on his picture like I was scrolling through fucking Grindr)
• Select music for my trippin' session from their playlist (I am not making this up)
• Specify your intention.  You cannot go into this with the idea that you'll just see what comes up.  Oh no, you have to have a purpose, an objective and you have to write it down where the clinician and guide can look at it and make sure that you are intentional enough.  Trying to explain that you are not a very intentional person will not get you anywhere.
• Deal with numerous surveys, checklists, reminders about the surveys and checklists, and just random impertinent questions.  They seemed to worry about my suicidal ideation a lot.  A.  LOT.  I have no suicidal ideation, but all these surveys apparently didn't want to take my word for it.
• And plenty of other hoops to jump through.  The whole thing reminded me of an overly complicated party game where the rules need to be explained in detail, repeatedly.

Anyway, I finally settled down to take the first dose, but first I had to arrange for my Peer Treatment Monitor, which is a fancy way of saying a responsible adult who could make sure I didn't wander out of the house wearing my underwear on my head.  Since I don't know any responsible adults, I roped Super Agent Fred into the role.  The irony of that idea was not lost on either of us.

I knocked back the dose (encased in two large-ish tablets I had to hold in my cheeks to dissolve like a goddam chipmunk,) laid down in my room with the curtains drawn and the ethereal ersatz Brian Eno music quietly playing and waited to see what might come up.

HOLY MOTHERFUCKING MOTHER OF CORN COBS.  I got really high.

In my youth, my wayward youth, I had quite a bit of amusing experience with LSD, but that had not prepared me for how absolutely, blitzingly high I got with this. Plus acid takes a while to kick in, whereas the ketamine obliterated me within moments.

I saw god. Literally.  They didn't have much to say, but they seemed nice.  I left my body and soared through Someplace Else.  I understood the entire cosmos.  Look, you're just going to have to take my word for it. Trying to describe this is like trying to describe an orgasm; words are just insufficient.  

I loved it.  It was never scary or overwhelming but at the same time it was very profound.  I went from considering death and dying, the grief I still have about R Man's death, about surviving AIDS to wondering why my feet are always cold.  I covered a lot of ground.

The whole thing only lasted a couple of hours, but they were quite a couple of hours.  Afterwards, the company insists, pretty firmly, that you journal your experience.  I hate people using the word "journal" as a verb.  But I'm a good sport so here is my journal much of which I wrote whilst trippin':

• No wonder people like this so much
• The physical aspect of this is much more profound than I expected
• At one point I needed to get up and pee but my legs didn't work
• It allowed the Gary who is in charge to take a break
• I have slipped the mortal bounds and am one with the cosmos
• Part of me wanted it to last longer (come back, come back, come back) but part of me was glad when it was over
• It was very nonlinear, first I was here and then I was there

Yeah that's the kind of state I experienced.  Even after the session timed out, I felt like I was a second behind what I was doing.  Every gesture or sentence seem to come from somewhere out of my control.  It made me wonder, who is running this show?

Anyway I've done one more since then and enjoyed it and have four more to go.  Has it helped?  I'm not sure honestly.  The episodes of depression I was experiencing that were the reason of this whole circus have been random and so I don't know if they are done or if I just haven't had another one lately.

Naked guys:

Chase Stobbe and his lavish nipples.

Anonymous buttchops.

Blonde hotness David Ciachek

Cory Evans is very pretty.

Always glad to see Zac Beech and his charming rump.

I wish I was friends with Henry Kvil.

I appreciate photos that include the subject's name, cause I can only remember so many naked guys.

I am pretty sure I have featured this guy recently, but you really can't see too much of an ass like that.

Anonymous ginger beef.

Free to a Good Home, One Secret Agent

Sister Mary Legs in the Air, Magda and me at the sketchy remains of my house in New Orleans, largely held together by blue tape.

Had I known what lay ahead of me just a few short hours later, I would have taken the chance to bury Fred in the backyard, dead or not.

The scene: mrpeene's tasteful French Quarter hotel room, 4:30 AM as he bustles about, preparing to depart for San Francisco, becoming increasingly edgy as his calls to Secret Agent Fred go into voicemail, an exercise with Fred which is absolutely pointless.  One might as well write notes, seal them in old bourbon bottles and throw them in the Mississippi.

Finally, short lived relief as Fred calls in..  Short-lived because Fred's contribution is nothing short of gibberish.  I could swear the phrase "argle bargle" is mixed in with the rest.

mrpeenee: "Queen, where are you, I know you are not packed, the car is waiting downstairs and we have to go."

Secret Agent Fred: "aq;fhpovxcmsurg;dsajhfpentmbvhsd;dfhs,mfvhsf,snf.    Argle Bargle."

mrpeenee, his voice raising with his blood pressure: "What?  Bitch what are trying to say, where are you?  This is the time I really am going to kill you and leave your body behind."

Secret Agent Fred: "aq;fhpovxcmsurg;dsajhfpentmbvhsd;dfhs,mfvhsf,snf."  and then, possibly, " I'm right outside the hotel."

mrpeenee, knowing full well better than to take this at face value, goes out on the balcony and sees no one resembling, even slightly, Fred. "Queen, I don't know where the fuck you think you are, but it is not outside the hotel.  You get here NOW or I'm leaving you behind."

Just then, I hear Fred's dulcet tones coming into range and, sure enough, there he comes, shambling up Chartres street, still babbling into his phone.  At that point. I leave off talking into the phone and just start screaming threats and slurs down at him.  Fred is completely oblivious to many things, including the fact I am standing twenty feet from him so he stays on his phone.  Kids these days and their darn gizmos.  Despite the early hour on our very quiet street there are a great many onlookers taking this all in as some kind of colorful New Orleans street theater, like something out of Tennessee Williams.

Secret Agent Fred: "Drop a quarter in it, bitch"  I admit it, a phrase that has certain insouciant charm, but is not helping anything.

I run downstairs and grab Fred, still blabbering into his phone, and drag him past various street vagrants, neighbors, the house porter and the car driver, whom I assure, "We'll be right back."  He seems unimpressed.

Also unimpressed is the hotel night manager who only asks "Are you checking out?"  No, fathead, we're rehearsing for the Golden Girls reunion.

In Fred's room. I order him to take a quick shower.  He refuses and I explain he smells like he's been rolling on the floor of a not very nice bar, a point which seems all too possible.  I finally yank his shirt off, give up on his pants since his belt seems to be welded shut and just give him a once over with a wash cloth and cold water, just to be mean.

As I frantically pack his suitcase and scream at him to get his goddamn clothes on, Fred takes the opportunity to critique my packing style by pulling out everything I'm able to stuff in, announcing "I want to wear that."

I honestly have no idea how I got him out the hotel and into the car, but finally, we are on our way and Fred entertains our long-suffering driver and me with the details of his evening's divertissements.  Choice snippets of my replies to this follow:

"You got punched in the face AGAIN?"

"Why would (our friend ) Levee hit a woman?"

"MUSHROOMS?  When the fuck did you have time to eat mushrooms?  How can you be tripping?  We have to get through security and on the plane in less than an hour."

"Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaargh"

The last thing our driver said to me, as he bid us adieu, not doubt glad to be rid of us?  "He is never getting on that plane."  Believe me, this was not news to me.

Amazingly we did, in no short thanks to my constantly hissing "Zip it" to Fred, who wanted to befriend every authority figure we encountered.  I can only assume the goons at the New Orleans airport have all seen plenty worse in their time.

God, they assure us, is a mill who may grind slow, but grinds incredibly fine and Fred got ground as finely as possible since airlines had cancelled our flight and wound us up hanging around the Dallas airport for SIX HOURS during which Fred mostly moaned and whimpered and I clarified that it was exactly what deserved.

When finally, finally, we got home Fred allowed as he thought he would stay home the next time I went to New Orleans.  "Who invited you?" was all I said.

Truly, it's a good thing I love the old thing because I can't tell you how many times drowning him in some mens room toilet seemed like a sensible idea.  It's so nice to be home.

More Thanks. Lotsa Thanks.

Oh, hay.  Do I still have a blog?  Waddya know?

Do you remember Thanksgiving?  A couple of weeks ago?  Some friends and I went down to Big Sur to spend the Feast of Fat in this place that was astonishingly sumptuous.

This is the view from the backyard.

To paraphrase Oscar Wilde, "I find it harder and harder every day to live up to Northern California's excessive prettiness."  Sometimes it's sort of oppressive, much like what I assume dating this guy might be like.

I made turkey and cornbread dressing and gravy, all of which was totally delicious, if I say so myself, and our friend J made pulled pork for sammiches, which was even more tasty and the place even had a dance floor where mrpeenee demonstrated the moves that made him the terror of bars throughout the 80s

and there was a giant soaking jacuzzi tub for after dancing.  All fabulous.  And that's when the cocaine came out.

Oh my little schnitzels, I haven't done any coke since Ronald Reagan was president, but it turns out I can still snorfle it up like a Dyson.  My co-miscreants, all of whom are considerably younger than me and were not around for the Liza Minnelli years were most impressed.  Apparently they had fallen for my respectable facade all these years.

Equally impressive to them was at the very end, when there was only smallish pile left and someone (NOT ME) spilled water on it.  I had only the briefest pause before I announced "I'm licking that up."  Who wants to waste cocaine?  It was one of those decisions you make that even as you're processing it, you think "Probably not the best idea," but that doesn't stop you.  And besides the feeling returned to my tongue by the next morning.  Pretty much.

A lovely Thanksgiving.

Everything counts in large amounts.

Dolls, Dolls, Dolls

I may have mentioned before I have a bad back.   Much badness of back, in fact.  I deal with it by complaining (the main reason for this blog) and lots and lots of daily vicodins.  Vicodin is a miracle drug composed of hydrocodone (yay) compounded with either Tylenol or ibuprofin (so very not yay.)  I alternate between the two to avoid poisoning myself because, well, because I don't want to poison myself.

Everything's fine until Walgreens fucked my refill last week and suddenly I'm left with only the Tylenol one and I'm reduced to taking half the dosage I usually do.  I was worried about some withdrawal nightmare like that scene in Lady Sings the Blue with Diana Ross in the bughouse. EEks.  But no, because I am apparently tougher than Diana Ross and Billie Holiday combined.  Or maybe I am not shooting heroin.  Could be.

Anyway, what actually happened was all the little aches and pains from being a crotchety old man rose to the surface; everything I've bumped or bruised or banged up has come back to haunt me.  Ow. Ow. Ow. Owowowowowowow.

When I meditate, I concentrate on each part of my body in turn, start with my head and work down to my feets.  Typically what little focus I can scrape up is distracted by random thoughts like

• Do I need more orange juice?
• How come the professor couldn't fix the boat to get them off Gilligan's Island?
• How hard would it be to spread a rumor on the web that MJ from Infomaniac is really a man?
• Is Saki scratching the leather chair?
• What's that noise?

Things like that.

Now, each body part has to compete with all the ouchie ones.  I'm trying to concentrate on my right shoulder and my left little toe chimes in to remind me I broke it thirty years ago falling naked down the stairs of a bathhouse in Seattle.  Shouting at it to shut up is one thing when I'm here at home alone with the cat, another completely when I'm in the steam room at the Kabuki spa.

Finally, after several very firm discussions with the pharmacist, I got all my doses back in a row and the sun is all shiny and I am back to slowly destroying my liver and kidneys.  Get to work, slacker bitches, that's what you're there for.

If I had more muscles, they would just ache more, so it all works out in the end.

Remember When You Were Young?

Secret Agent Fred and I shared a most amusing afternoon recently with an old friend from mrpeenee's long gone wasted youth.  We were tucked into tea at Neiman's; it was, as I pointed out, the very heart of the One Percent Land.  Tea at Neiman's only made the conversation even odder: surrounded by the most respectable of matrons and the Very Good handbags, we traded preposterous stories about our druggy past.  Preposterous because among other things, he claimed I showed up in Austin on a visit once baring nitrous oxide whippets.  While it's true there was a time when I found whippets most amusing in a conscious altering sort of way, the idea that I would cater them is not worth considering.  I was poor in those days, sweetie, how on earth could I afford exotica for my friends?

My biggest problem debunking claims like this is my memory of those times is patchy, at best.  Sieve-like is probably a more accurate adjective.  So when these wild tales about long gone shenanigans erupt, my whole defense consists of spluttering "I did no such thing."  No one at the table even pretended to believe me.

Speaking of drugginess from days gone by, let us consider this newish, bang up version of Pink Floyd's Shine on You Crazy Diamond.  The song manages to hit both the tune's motha-o-gawd-I-am-tripping-like-a-thousand-screaming-monkeys effect and also a nod to the very bluesy sound those incredibly white English bands were shooting for in those days.  Pink Floyd, Cream, Traffic, Rolling Stones, everyone wanted to be Blind Willy Lead Foot Pig Meat Johnson.

I like it.

It's a peenee Life

Darlings, I have had the most wonderful day.  I hope you all did too, because I am a giving and loving type.  It certainly didn't start out as as a wonderful anything.  I woke up with a terrible neck and shoulder ache, the result, no doubt, of being too giving and loving.  Or probably from sleeping in a weird Z shape because of Saki.  Fucking cat.

Anyway, I decided to take some extra Vicodin, which I try not to do since I take so much regularly, it seems excessive.   Possibly because it IS excessive.  Still, desperate times call for desperate Vicodin dosages, so I knocked back a couple and climbed on top of my Cold Pack.  Do you know of the wonders of Cold Packs?  It's a little pillow filed with antifreeze you keep in the freezer and when your back aches, you lie on it.  Heaven. It's the best thing for bad backs since, I don't know, ever.

And then as I was lying there I suddenly realized "Man, am I LOADED."  Vicodin wins again.

But wait, it gets better.  "How can it get better?" you ask.  Impertinent dog.  It got itself better because after floating around in a drug and anti-freeze induced haze, I decided to go to the Kabuki Spa and have a massage.  One of my favorite masseurs, Gabriel, who is large and vigorous and does this foot thing that is the besty thing your feet will ever have, ever, was available, so I was set.

In the steam room there was this charming tiny Asian man with the most perfectly proportioned muscles.  Take your left hand and curve it as if you were describing the circumference of a coconut.  Now take your right hand and do the same thing.  Now put your thumbs together.  Amazing, you just made his ass!  Mmm baby.   Making it even more flagrant was the crisply drawn tan line of a eensy little Speedo. Where someone so small would find one is beyond me.  One assumes he either shops in the boys' department or ladies wear, and I'm not sure which possibility is more alluring.  Luridly alluring.

Better than this.  Imagine.

Also, the Latino guy with hair like black silk cascading in a ponytail down to the small of his very muscular back.  Yes, it's true.

So, to recap, drugs, ice packs, cute naked guys and a great massage.  It's a wonderful life.

Focus Darling, Focus

This is my life in the shell of a nut: I just spent much too long crawling around on the floor of my tastefully decorated bathroom trying to find an ativan I dropped on the white marble tiles, which, while I think beautiful, are the perfect camouflage for a small white pill, all the while Saki the cat, agitated by a really bad youtube video of the 2009 Night of a Thousand Stevies drag show, darts around trying to figure out what the game is.

Really, the only thing missing was porn.

Sweet Dreams

I understand other, lesser mortals regularly have dreams about being faced with an exam or class they have not prepared for, Anxiety Dreams they're called. I can't remember ever having one, which probably says less about my anxiety level and more about my casual attitude towards education.

The only dreams I ever have that fit into a category are the walking-around-Kmart-in-my-underwear ones and ones where I have some task to do that starts off simple and gets more and more complicated and less accomplishable. Sort of the OCD of the unconscious.

Last night I had a lovely one wherein I was chopping up lines of cocaine. Let me point out I have done no coke since George Bush the First was in office and yet my sleeping mind decided it was time to revisit ancient history. I was always a very tidy drug abuser and meticulous about the preparation of coke rails. They had to be evenly spaced and the same size and no messy debris between them. Okay, so maybe my OCD is not restricted to my dream state.

Anyway, in this dream I had an enormous mound of nose candy to deal with and it kept getting bigger and then I realized there were multiple piles. Oh, the burden. Plus someone in the next room was playing Living La Vida Loca and I was annoyed, which sounds much more realistic than an excess of cocaine does.

All the while I was busily railing up, I was anticipating not actually snorting it, but tidying up the leftovers with my index finger and then rubbing it on my teeth and gums. That is actually another element of reality since that was a step I always included when I did coke. I loved the way it tasted.

Anyway, I never did get it all lined out in the dream, but when I woke up I immediately remembered the time I took a bunch of cocaine to a friend's wedding to help celebrate the nuptials and how, more than thirty years later, she's still mad she didn't get to indulge cause she was busy getting married. Set your priorities girl, that's what I say.

You know what goes good with cocaine?

Muscley partly naked young men and Bordeaux cookies.