Amateur Day

In other words, happy St. Patrick’s Day.

I’m always kind of ambivalent about St. Patrick’s Day, probably because I’m not Irish.  And this seems to be one of those days, like New Years Eve and the NFL playoffs, that people feel obligated to go out and get completely shit-faced drunk.  So I usually don’t do anything for St. Paddy’s.  I do enjoy the jokes though…

I used to have an “Onion” day calendar that had a particularly good bit for this day:

I particularly like #2.

I hate crowded bar rooms in any circumstances and it’s especially annoying on St. Pats.  My only salvation would be to take Sitcom Kelly with me.  She has experience in clearing Irish bars.  Once she was visiting Ireland and enjoying some drinks in a nice local pub.  One of the locals asked her what she was doing in Ireland.  She answered, “I want Irish babies!”

This was after the stampede.

Anyway, here’s a little something I’m posting as a public service to those of you determined to go out tonight anyway.  I worked long and hard copying this over from my Dad’s email, but nothing is too good for my friends!

A GUIDE FOR YOU FOR ST. PATRICK'S DAY

IRISH BEER TROUBLESHOOTING GUIDE
SYMPTOM	CAUSE	CORRECTIVE ACTION
Feet cold and wet	Glass Being held at incorrect angle.	Rotate glass so that open end points toward ceiling
Feet warm and wet	Improper Bladder Control	Stand next to nearest dog, complain about lack of house training
Beer unusually pale and tasteless	a. Glass empty. b. You're holding a Coors Lite	Get someone to buy you another beer
Opposite wall covered with fluorescent lights	You have fallen over backward.	Have yourself leashed to the bar
Mouth contains cigarette butts, back of head covered with ashes	You have fallen forward	See above
Beer tasteless, front of your shirt is wet	a. Mouth not open b. Glass applied to wrong part of face	Retire to restroom, practice in front of mirror
Floor Blurred	You are looking through bottom of empty glass	Get someone to buy you another beer
Floor moving	You are being carried out	Find out if you are being taken to another bar
Room seems unusually dark	Bar has closed	Confirm home address with bartender. If staff is gone, grab a six-pack to go and hit the nearest fire escape door. Run.
Taxi suddenly takes on colorful aspect and textures	Beer consumption has exceeded personal limitations	Cover mouth, open window, stick head outside
Everyone looks up to you and smiles	You are dancing on the table	Fall on someone cushy-looking
Beer is crystal-clear	It's water! Somebody is trying to sober you up	Punch him
People are standing around the urinals, talking.	You're in the ladies' room	Do not use urinal!  Excuse yourself, exit and try the next door down the hall. Try to get phone numbers before exiting. (optional)
Hands hurt, nose hurts, mind unusually clear	You have been in a fight	Apologize to everyone you see, just in case it was them
Don't recognize anyone, don't recognize the room you're in	You've wandered into the wrong party	See if they have free beer
Your bedroom is painted gray, has a concrete floor and an interesting steel door. Toilet may be conveniently located next to your bunk	a. You're in jail b. You're in the navy	Sleep it off, you can always get out tomorrow. Don't talk to your new roommate, and under no circumstances sleep on your stomach
Your singing sounds distorted	The beer is too weak	Have more beer until your voice improves
Don't remember the words to the song	Beer is just right	Play air guitar

I swear, we Italians gotta start some better traditions for Columbus Day.  Bocce tournament anyone?  There’ll be wine…

Search for Reality Pt 3

Now we swing from the tawdry to the mundane.

You know how I like to keep tabs on what Internet searches bring people here to my site?  It seems that over the last couple of days, I’ve had some more corkers.  I just wish I knew what the hell people were thinking when they search for this stuff.

I’m also kind of bummed because I know they must be disappointed when they land here and it’s not even close to what they’re looking for.

Like the person from Brazil that was searching for “shit knockers.”  Was he looking for someone that someone that knocks shit around?  Or really messy boobs? 

Perhaps I should get him together with the person from Colorado that searched for “evil butts.”  Although being from tree-hugging, granola-eating Colorado, they were probably talking about cigarettes.

Someone from Morgantown WV searched “forced diaper boys,” and landed on my babysitting/diaper changing post.  I have to guess that they were pretty disappointed with what they found there.  You know, when I discovered that search, I swear I could hear the banjo music playing in the background.

Most of the bizarre searches are sex related and I hadn’t really gotten many of those until I posted those last two stories.  You may have noticed that I changed the operative term from “Bow-Chicka-Bow-Wow” to “Bow Chicka-Wow-Wow.”  I did this intentionally because I kept getting searches for various plays on “Bow-wow,” like “bow wow sex story” from Illinois, and “bow wow kiss & tell story,” from Sheffield, UK.  I should probably forward those IP addresses directly to the ASPCA.

My “Three-Way of Love” post pulled in this search from Indianapolis: “2 girls riding each other w/ one girl.”  That’s so specific, yet I have no idea what the hell he’s talking about.  Perhaps he’d have better luck taking after this guy from North Carolina, who searched for “pregnant drunk sluts.”  Perhaps I should have directed him to “Bitchburgh.”  (Just kidding, Mindbling.  Please don’t hurt me.)

I have to really wonder about the Mormons.  I got this search from Provo UT, “accidental attack wild huge rack.”  Either those are song lyrics, or this guy needs to go knock on some doors to work his shit out.

The Swiss are certainly not neutral when it comes to senior citizen sex, as attested to by this search from Zurich, for “nasty horny Grandpas.”  Yodel on this, baby!  And leave my little Grandpa alone!  He’s not that kind of guy… he’ll tell you himself!

A couple of more searches just defied explanation.  Someone from Victoria BC searched on “Googly-eyes Canadian.”  Looking for Dudley Dooright, maybe?

One Googly-Eyed Canadian, at your service!

Someone from Tennessee searched on “Stop off & buy a lighter.”  They hit one of my concert stories, but what I want to know is what someone could possibly have been looking for.  Was the searcher a traveling Bic salesman?

Someone from New Hampshire searched for “Civil war people looking worried.”  Again… so specific.  But it cracked me up because I’ve probably done something similar when looking for a picture to accompany a post.  Like the girl-in-car pic in the last post.  I think I searched under something like: “smiling drivers.”  Perhaps that site owner was as entertained as I am.

But for as specific as that civil war search was, others are cryptic to the point of being incomplete.  Like the guy from Sydney Australia who searched for “my dad did,” and found my $#!* My Dad Did post.  But in this case, was he answering a “whodunit” question?  Or was it more like “my dad did” not have sex with that woman?

Sometimes there are spelling issues, like when the guy from South Africa was looking for “who killed 2puck.”  He may have been trying to solve the mystery of rapper Tupac Shakur, but all he got here for his trouble was a healthy dose of Pittsburgh Penguins.

The most intriguing search I found actually hit pretty close to home.  The search was from Helsinki, Finland (home of the Syndrome) and he was looking for: “Mangela Fera Factor.”  This was actually a search for my cousin Angela who was on Fear Factor, whom I talked about a couple posts ago when she had her baby.  I have to be impressed by the Google’s search prowess, because I didn’t even mention “Mangela,” plus the dude misspelled the show’s name.

During the Fear Factor episode, Angela’s partner Zack mentioned that he calls her “Mangela,” because of her athletic prowess, especially in throwing a football.  Girl can wing it about 40 years.  She was throwing bombs all over the parking lot when we were together in Miami for the famous Hurricane Game.  I was surprised that Google could pull all that together.

Angela was not terribly pleased that Zack dropped that nickname on TV, which was now spread all over Pittsburgh.  In fact, when she came in to work the day after the broadcast, someone had taped an “M” in front of her office nameplate.  She’ll probably be even less pleased that I just dredged it up again.

But speaking of my dear cousin, she did me a solid by providing me with a nice clean segue into a closing and otherwise unrelated bit.

She emailed me pictures of my aforementioned Grandpa, not being nasty and horny, but supervising the making of ‘polenta’ aka “mush.”

I’ve never been to the polenta feast, so I followed up with Angela to get the scoop.  Here’s her report:

The "mush" (polenta) gets eaten straight from the wooden board.  First, it has to be boiled and stirred for a long time under Grandpa's strict supervision.  Once the mixture of water and cornmeal is thick enough, it gets spread with the big wooden stick onto the large wooden board.  Next the sauce is placed on top and spread all over the mush.  It is a special sauce with meat and mushrooms and so good!  Then meatballs and sausage are gathered in the center of the board on top of the mush/sauce layers and then Parmesan cheese is sprinkled over the whole thing.  People gather around the board with only forks and wine glasses. 

The traditional rule was this:  you had to eat a trail to the center before you could get a meatball.  Also popular is eating the mush to form the shape of the U.S. and particularly the southern panhandle states.  

My mom told me a story about a time when they were eating mush in Grandma and Grandpa's dining room and some people came to the back door, I think asking to use the telephone.  She said when they came in and saw the table they looked shocked at seeing the mush feast in progress!

I am not sure how often our parents ate mush, but I think it originated as a cheap way to feed a lot of people.  Now my parents have the board and the stick, and they host the mush feast about once a year, usually in February.  It is a good, cozy meal for cold weather.  Today they would call it "comfort food" but we just call it mush. :)  Below is a poem I wrote about the race to get the first meatball, just for fun.

Mush Race

O meatball centerpiece,

soft pyramid of treasures

hand-rolled and soaked

in velvet red tradition.

I long to reach you,

first, before the others.

Before we taste the golden

depth of our journey

and forget about the race.

Man, I have to get out there for one of these.  And I will totally kick some ass getting to one of those meatballs!   Game on!

As you can see, even at 95, Grandpa can still wield the Polenta Pole.

Grandpa with grandson Greg.

Now these pictures are from 2007.  I just happened to have them in The Archives:

Spreading the mush is a manly task!

This is what the final result looks like.  I’d hate to have to eat all the way in from the end of the table.  I'd never win the race.

Thank you to Grandpa and Angela, for this fine tutorial!

Ciao!  (Or maybe in this case… “Chow!”)

The Summer of Bow-Chicka-Wow-Wow

In the last post, I told you how, after several years of quiet lusting, I finally got it on with my hot blond roommate, “Diane,” (so named because her demeanor often reminded me of Diane Chambers from “Cheers”) once my girlfriend and I had broken up. Of course, the fact that the Ex-Girlfriend still lived there did complicate things a bit. (If you haven’t read the last post, you should probably do so before reading this one.)

Now that the ice was broken, Diane and I went to town every chance we got, meaning, “whenever the Ex-Girlfriend was out of the house.” Lucky for us, that was most of the time. If she wasn’t in class, she was working with her Community Theater group or Children’s Theater. Even though we were broken up, (and I mean really broken up, not “on a break” like Ross and Rachael), we really didn’t want to cause any bad feelings or pain.

So that meant I had some anxious moments. Diane loved teasing me when other people were around.  Like I’d be in the kitchen with the Ex-Girlfriend, and she would walk through wearing nothing but her nightshirt. When the Ex-Girlfriend's back was turned to her, she’d pull up her shirt and flash me the beave. Then I’d have to try and keep my composure, lest I have to explain a reaction to the Ex.

We didn’t tell anyone at work what was going on either. Everyone knew we were roommates, but no one knew anything else. So sometimes, we’d both be up in the cash register island, and if I were standing in the passageway, she’d pretend she had to squeeeeze by, so she could rub her ass against my crotch. She’d walk away, tossing a smirk over her shoulder.

Our shared commutes to and from work were unbelievable. Most of the time, whoever wasn’t driving had their hand in the driver’s pants. Other drivers nearby must have thought it was strange to see someone looking so happy to be going to work.

One night, on our way home, she said, “Turn left over there,” pointing to a small road leading off the 4-lane highway. As we drove down the narrow road, the pavement turned to gravel, which then turned to dirt. Next thing I knew, we were in the middle of a farmer’s field. I don’t know what he was growing there, but I knew what I was growing. She said she knew this place from her younger college days. I didn’t doubt it.

So there we were, in the middle of some field, getting it on atop the hood of her car, about 200 yards from I-75. I don’t know if the passing trucks were laying on their air horns for us, or to warn errant drivers in front of them. All I can say is that there was a lot of honking going on.

We visited that field several times throughout that summer. And if we were home late, we could always chalk it up to a problem with balancing the registers when we were closing up.

One night when we were all at home, Diane asked me to go with her to get some cigs  I agreed, so off we walked to the gas station down the block. On the way back, she said, “Lets go this way,” motioning for us to take the long way around the back of our block. Then, as we were going along, we passed a hedgerow in front of a large house.  

She said, “Let’s see what’s behind here,” so we walked around behind the hedges. She dropped to the ground and pulled me down with her, where we proceeded to have some wild, front-lawn nature sex, about three feet from a public sidewalk.

By the time we got back home, the Ex-Girlfriend was about to start calling the hospitals. Diane made a beeline for her room so she could check her pants for grass stains. I told the Ex that Diane was having a tough time at work and we needed to talk about some things, so we took a long walk around the block.  (Remember, cell phones weren’t invented yet. People actually left the house, and you couldn’t contact them until they came home again.) Knowing I’m such an awful and awkward liar, I tried to work as much truth into the story as possible.

But what I was learning with Diane was that danger-sex in public places was an awful lot of fun. The risk of getting caught made the act so much hotter and practically irresistible…

There was one time, though, that I came thiiiiiis close to getting caught with my pants down.

Diane and I were having a go at it in her back bedroom while the Ex was at rehearsal. Now let me describe how our place was laid out. If you came in the door, the living room was in front of you.  If you turned right immediately, you’d go through the kitchen into a hallway. My bedroom with the Ex was on the left. The bathroom was the next door on the right, then Diane’s bedroom was the last door on the left, adjacent to my bedroom.

So we were right in the middle of some hot monkey love when the front door was flung open and the Ex announced, “I’m home… stop fucking now!”

That wasn’t the alarming part because that’s what she always said when she came home. But this was the first time that it applied. She almost always got a ride home from rehearsal, and we were counting on hearing the car pull up. But this time, she walked home, so we never heard a thing until it was too late.

Uh-oh.

Immediately, I yanked out so fast I’m surprised the Ex didn’t think I was opening champagne in there.  We were under the covers, and my shorts were around my ankles. I desperately tried to pull them back up and get out of bed. I could hear her approaching, but my shorts were caught up in the covers and my ankles, and they weren’t moving.

This was very bad, because while the Ex wouldn’t think twice about our being alone on the bed, being under the covers with my pants down would be another matter. But try as I may, I was unable to quickly get myself right, and all I could do was resign myself to the huge commotion that was about to be unleashed.

Except… instead of coming all the way down the hall, the Ex turned right into the bathroom to have a pee. With the precious extra minute, I was able to pull my damned shorts up, get out of bed, and get myself, er, presentable. I was walking down the hall right as she came out of the bathroom. She never suspected a thing.

I, however, damn near had a heart attack. It was so much easier to just do it behind the bushes.

At the end of August 1985, we all moved out and went our separate ways. I still saw Diane at work, of course. I had my own apartment about a mile away. It was cheap, primitive, and low-rent, but it was all mine and I loved it.

Diane made it over only once, where we tore one off for old time’s sake. By then, she was starting to get on my nerves at work, with the “pretentious” stuff. I also started sniffing around this other girl, so Diane and I kind of drifted away from each other. Eventually, she left the store to go and get a real job, befitting her degree. By mid-1986, I moved to Cleveland to manage my own store.

I ran into Diane one more time in the 80s, at a wedding of a mutual friend. She was with a guy about 15 years older than her. I heard through the grapevine later that she had been engaged to some other guy who had left her at the altar. I felt terrible for her. I was really hoping she’d found some stability and happiness.

Then in 1991, I was working in Albany, NY, when out of the blue, I got a call from Diane. She was living in South Carolina, and she’d gotten my number from a mutual friend. I was thrilled to hear from her. By that time, I’d had a couple of disastrous relationships while living in Cleveland, before moving to New York, where I knew exactly no one. I was bored, lonely, and not really loving my new life.

After a couple of phone conversations, she invited me to come visit her in SC. I didn’t have a whole lot of cash, but I had enough for an occasional plane ticket, so I jumped at the chance to go on an adventure.

Thinking about it right now, 5 years doesn’t seem that long, but at the time, it seemed like a whole lifetime since we’d last seen each other. Maybe it was because we were both light-years away from the lives we used to lead. 

I really had no idea what to expect when I got there. Would she still be smokin’ hot? Would she still dig me? Would there be hot monkey love? 

When she picked me up at the airport, I thought she looked good. She’d put on a little weight, but she wasn’t the only one. I sure wasn’t the long, lean kid I was back in the apartment, either. Still, I wondered what was in store that weekend.

I got my answer at Burger King.

It was about 9 PM, and I hadn’t eaten since lunch, so she stopped by the BK drive-thru on the way home. While we were in line, she asked me to get a coupon out of her glove compartment. When I opened it up, I saw a long strip of condoms, all attached together like lottery tickets.

From my point of view, that’s exactly what they were, and every one was a winner.  We spent the weekend sexing each other up just like we used to, albeit with a couple more rest stops. When I floated back into my store on Monday, my staff was unanimous.

They said, “If we knew a weekend like that would make you this easy to work with, we would have gotten you laid months ago.”

Diane and I spoke only a couple more times by phone after that. I know she moved out to Colorado for a while, then I heard she went back to South Carolina. I’d moved around a lot since then, too, so neither of us had each other’s contact information. I’ve never heard from her again.

One of the things she told me when I saw her in South Carolina was that she had been diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis. She seemed perfectly fine to me at the time, but I wonder a lot about her now.  Annoying or not, she’s always had a fond place in my heart.

In fact, while Brill was still alive, whenever I’d go out to visit him and Rik and John, someone would invariably bring up her name. Long ago, we’d all compared notes and found that we shared many similar experiences with her. And it was all good. It was like a bond between us. Then Rik, Brill, and I would raise a toast. 

“To Diane!” we’d say, and smile slyly to ourselves; each of us recalling some nasty little tidbit from our memory banks. (Because he was married so young, our buddy John was the only one of us who was never with her, so he’d sit that one out.)

You know, when one girl has been with each of three guys who are lifelong friends, and there was never any bad blood about it, you know she must have been pretty special.

Cheers, Diane.  You are truly unforgettable.

The Bow-Chicka-Wow-Wow Story

As you may have read in the previous two posts, I moved into my first apartment after I graduated from college. I moved in with my girlfriend and a mutual female friend, who I’ll call “Diane.” I’ll tell you why in a bit.

I met Diane when I was a sophomore. We were both taking the same radio classes, so we often did production work together. (And that’s production, not reproduction.) I had a huge crush on her right off the bat.

Diane was a pretty blonde with fair skin and an hourglass figure; a narrow waist and curves in all the right places. She always looked great. She dressed well, nice hair and makeup, the whole bit. She was smart, fun, and funny. She was also very sexually adventurous. She made no bones about loving sex, and whenever she wanted it, she just went out and got some. No excuses, no regrets. 

I totally wanted some of that.

But she was always going for those jocky, cocky, Type-A personality guys, of which I was most definitely not. I was still very shy and was just starting to come out of my shell. But while I may have been doing more attention-grabbing things like radio work and hosting talent shows and stuff, I was still very shy and unsure about getting with the ladies. I had no game whatsoever. 

There was one time we had a radio production assignment together, so we booked a studio together one evening. We decided to bring wine and cheese and make a party out of it. I thought it might develop into something sexy!  (Of course, at that age, I would have thought going to a beginner's piano recital might develop into something sexy.)

It turned out that we ate the cheese, drank the wine, and worked on our assignment; that was it. It was fun, but not what I’d hoped for. I think I tried to ask her out that night, or shortly thereafter, but she kind of gave me the brush. Meanwhile, she continued to see her rotating cast of jocks and Type-A pretty-boys. We remained friends and continued to work together. She’d sit in on my radio show and I’d guest on hers. She was a cast member for the radio soap opera spoof I wrote. 

So, going into this apartment, I had no reason to worry about straying from my girlfriend. This was especially true after I got to see how she actually lived. For someone who was always so well put-together in public, she was a mess at home. Her younger brother, I learned, nicknamed her “Grubby.” It fit. But it was cool. If you can’t relax at home, where can you relax? But what I’m saying is that I wasn’t exactly following her around the house.

I call her “Diane” here because while she was fun to hang with, she also had this pretentious streak that reminds me of Shelly Long’s character from “Cheers,” Diane Chambers. 

She loved talking about things for the sole purpose of letting you know that she knew all about them and you didn’t. It could be very irritating. But it’s the kind of thing a guy can overlook when the girl is smokin' hot.

One of her troubles there was that while she was in graduate school, her stream of boy-toys seemed to dry up. At one point, I introduced her to my best buddy, Brill. (He was most definitely NOT a jock or Type-A personality. He was a lot like me, only scrawnier.) They dated for a while, and all was well.  OK, except when they were having all the loud sex, because we shared a bedroom wall. I remember one night, after they wrapped up a particularly boisterous episode, the Girlfriend and I sat up in our own bed and gave them a round of applause. Diane was pissed, but Brill came out and took a bow. We threatened that the next time, we’d burst in and hold up score cards: 5.8… 5.6… 6.0…

The next problem was that Brill got tired of the 40-minute drive to come see her. I tried to reason with him, telling him that I made that drive every freakin’ day for four years, and I wasn’t even getting laid!  How bad could the drive possibly be?? 

But Brill was unswayed, and they kind of drifted apart after that. While they were drifting, another buddy, Rik, started coming around. There was one night we knew that he spent the night in her room. The Girlfriend was all pissed off because she didn’t like Rik and thought he was butting in on Brill.

In actuality, they had spent the night talking. But another time, they figured that if they were going to catch all the hell about sleeping together, they might as well actually do it.

Meanwhile, our life trundled on. I got Diane a job at my record store, so most days we would commute together. After work, we’d come home, crack some wine, and adjourn to her room to hang out on her king-sized waterbed. When the Girlfriend turned up, she’d join us as well. It was never an issue that we were “in bed.” The waterbed was much more comfortable than our second-hand furniture in the living room.

Like I said in the last post, the Girlfriend and I decided to split up in early June. And since she was paid up through the end of the lease in August, I said she should just stay until the end, since we all still got along. We still slept in the same bed, but that was all that was happening in there. 

One night, Diane was complaining about getting a sunburn on her back, which was lobster-red, and asked me to put some lotion on it. I went into her room, she lay down on the bed with her arms up under her pillow, and I hopped up onto her butt to rub in the lotion. One thing I learned in college was how to give a good back rub, so it became more of a rub down than just spreading lotion. A couple of times, I’d let my hands kind of dangle around the side, for a little side-boob action, just to judge her response. She really seemed to be enjoying it, and I definitely noticed. The Ex-Girlfriend was still over there in our bed, so I was certainly not going to start anything. But it did send my mind spinning.

The next afternoon, when we got home from work, the Ex-Girlfriend was out at her play rehearsal and Diane went to her bedroom. I changed into my shorts, without bothering to put a shirt on, which was normal for me in the summer. Diane called me in to put some more lotion on her back.

Again, she lay face down on the bed and unfastened her top. I sat on her behind and began rubbing in the lotion with long strokes. I gave her some of my best work. My massages usually go one of two ways: either the recipient gets all turned on or she falls asleep.

As I warmed the next application of lotion in my hands, I wondered which way this one would go. As I began to work in the lotion, I noticed that she was rolling her hips in time with each stroke. That set off the alarms in my head, and all systems went to red alert.

A conversation soon  began between the two little guys on my shoulder, Horndog Bluz and Shy Bluz:

HB: Dude!  Do you feel that? She’s rubbing her ass against you! She wants it!

SB: No way, man.  She’s never wanted me before. She’s just enjoying the massage.

HB: Come on… this is Diane… you know how she is. Go for it!

SB: But what if I make a move and she freaks out? It’ll be really awkward  I’ll never be able to face her again.

HB: Don’t be such a fucking pussy. You’ve wanted this chick for four years. Now’s your chance, man, you’re practically humping her ass right now.

SB: But…

HB: Do it! Do something! 

SB: Shit.  You’re right.  But what do I do?

HB: You’ll think of something…

I began working the side-boob maneuver again. Her hip action increased. The time was right. I gave a couple more long, slow strokes all the way up to her shoulders, and on the last one, I leaned in and lightly kissed the back of her neck.

I’ll tell you the rest tomorrow.

OK, just kidding.

When I kissed her neck, she promptly spun around onto her back, revealing her naked, shapely self, and kissed me square on the mouth.

Jackpot! Or I should say, “Honeypot!”

We spent the rest of the afternoon ravaging each other like crazed weasels. I couldn’t believe my good fortune! This hot chick, the one I’d been sweet on for so long, was finally rewarding me for my years of patience. Halle-freakin-luiah! It may not have been a "Come to Jesus" moment, but we sure came somewhere.

Afterward, we considered whether we should say anything to the Ex-Girlfriend. I knew it would cause nothing but drama because she would immediately assume we had been banging each other the entire time we lived there, if not longer. She would NOT take this well. We didn’t see how any good would come from full disclosure, so to keep things peaceful in the house, we figured we’d keep things on the down-low.

But I knew the next couple of months were going to be very interesting…

...And I will tell you all about them in the next post because this one has gone on long enough.

Riding on the 3-Way of Love

My last post was about that feeling you had, as a young person, about your first apartment… how awesome it was, no matter how shitty, just because it was yours.  I also talked a bit about my actual first apartment, which I shared with my girlfriend and a mutual female friend.

Then in a post on That’s Church, Ginny asked what things we’ve never had.  In my responding comment, after a couple innocuous items, I mentioned “a three-way” (just to be a wise-guy).  Then blog friend/real friend Cassie asked in a comment on my last post, why I hadn’t done so.  (As if it wasn’t hard enough finding one girl that wanted me, let alone two at the same time.)

As it just so happens, that ties into the story I wanted to tell tonight (plus in the next post).  The events surrounding that first apartment I had, off campus in Bowling Green, were event-filled and bizarre, to say the least.  To start, I have to talk about that particular girlfriend.

At the end of my junior year, during the intense year-end partying following final exams, I kind of paired up with a girl I worked with at the college radio station.  She was a sweet auburn-haired girl, whose home was about 2 hours away, outside of Cleveland.

All that summer, we wrote to each other, looking forward to when we could see each other again.  It didn’t really work out, though, despite my best intentions, because on the first day of my senior year, I found myself thunderstruck by someone new.

This girl came charging into our Commuter Center Community like Bette Midler on acid. As a senior that year, I wasn’t expecting to be chasing freshmen, but this chick was a real piece of work.

To describe her, start with Kathy Griffin. This girl wasn’t a redhead; she had longish blond curly hair.  She was shorter, but with a huge rack. But the voice and attitude were all Kathy Griffin.  She was funny, lively, audacious, a real wild card. I liked her immediately. I’m always drawn to the flakes strong personalities.

We flirted throughout the first month or so… I had to convince her to finally dump her on-again/off-again dick of a boyfriend and throw in with me. 

We started dating and were, on-again and off-again ourselves, before we finally became an official item. Her family lived in Bowling Green, so she was a “townie,” unlike me, who drove in daily from 40 minutes away.

We dated through the end of the year until I graduated. As it was becoming increasingly troublesome to sneak into her family’s house after her Mom and Dad went to work carve out time alone, we decided that maybe we should move in together.

To help smooth the way, I asked her to marry me and bought her a (tiny) diamond ring. (I swear, the things guys will do for poon…) Somehow, she got her parents to grudgingly go along with the plan, and as I said in my prior post, we moved into a converted garage/apartment about a mile from her family home. Because she was still in school and I wasn’t making much at the record store, we asked a mutual female friend to move in with us, and the three of us set up shop.

When I mentioned the 3-way at the top of this post, you’d think I’d have been talking about the Girlfriend, the Roommate, and me.

Not even close.

I came home one night after work, and the Girlfriend had one of her Theater friends over. They were drinking wine and shooting the breeze in the living room. I’d never met her friend before; she was very cute. So I poured myself a drink and joined in the conversation.

I remember at one point, I was sitting on the arm of our loveseat, and the friend needed to pass by.  There was plenty of room in the pathway, but still, as she passed, she kind of rubbed her pubic bone against my leg as she brushed by.

I was like, “What’s this chick doing, marking territory?” That couldn’t have been an accident. (I asked the Roommate about this later, who agreed it wasn't accidental, adding, “We girls are very particular about where we rub our snatch.”)

But the Girlfriend seemed not to notice. In fact, we were all sitting together, very close, laughing and carrying on. There was a lot of nudging and arm-stroking going on, and NOT by me.

Somehow, and after almost 30 years later the details escape me, we three ended up in our bedroom sitting on our bed. Next thing I know, I have a different girl licking each ear.

I’m thinking, “Holy Shit!  They must have planned this whole thing out! I’m about to get very, very lucky tonight!”

I took great care to make sure I did exactly the same things with each one. If I kissed one, I then kissed the other.  If I rubbed one girl's arm, I rubbed the other's. I did not want to risk upsetting anyone with the appearance of more attention.

Then, abruptly, the Girlfriend pulled back and said, “Why don’t you go down to the gas station (on our block) and get a bag of ice?”

I said, “OK, sure,” and hopped up (eventually) to go get ice. I didn't want to leave, but I also didn't want to say "no" to anything, lest it affect the prevailing mood. Meanwhile, I was racking my brains trying to figure out why she wanted ice. I made it down to the gas station and back in record time, all the while wondering what would be going on when I got back, and what they had in store for me. Then, when I came back in the door:

Nothing.

They were back in the living room, with an aura of “awkward” permeating the atmosphere. The night petered out from there, much to my chagrin.

Later, I asked the Girlfriend what the fuck just happened in here? Did they have a secret plan worked out?

To my surprise, she said no, it just happened. And as I suspected, once things started heating up, she had second thoughts and started getting jealous, so she pulled the plug. It was probably the wine that made her do it in the first place. Girlfriend was not much of a drinker.

Gah!  So close yet so far.

Anyway, our arrangement was doomed to failure right from the start. Surprisingly enough, it had nothing to do with the roommate. The Girlfriend and I were as different as night and day, and it started with our upbringings.

Her family was a complete matriarchy. She and her Mom ran their house. Her poor dad wasn’t much more than an afterthought in the scheme of things. He tried to chip in on what was going on from time to time, but they pretty much ignored anything he had to say.

In my family, Dad made the rules. Mom and Dad were usually a united front when it came to us kids, but Dad was the Hammer. When he spoke, we snapped to, lest we incur the wrath. So in MY house, I was not content to let the women rule the roost. I could accept being a one-third partner, but I’ll be damned if I was just going to roll over and do whatever the women wanted to do.

There were other issues, of course. I was into sports and loud rock & roll. She didn’t care about much more than the Theater and show tunes. I took her to see the Stray Cats play at our school once, and she refused to even stand up (when everyone else on the floor was standing.) She just sat there and waited for the show to be over.

Like I said, she didn’t drink much or party at all. So at the first Barn Party I took her to, she spent the night sitting under our bar, reading a book. It’s hard to have a good time yourself when your significant other goes out of her way to show everyone how much fun she’s not having. So, for most of the following parties, I stopped bringing her along. I’d go back home for the party myself and spend the night in my old room. It was much more peaceful that way.

She quarreled with my parents, she hated my friends… once the shine was off, we found that we were completely mismatched for each other.

So we had moved into that apartment in August of 1984, and by the beginning of the following June, we’d pretty much had it with each other. One afternoon at a park (at a family reunion), we had a long talk while sitting on a grassy hillside. We gracefully came to the mutual conclusion that moving forward and getting married would be a huge disaster, and maybe we should call it quits while we still liked each other. It was the most graceful breakup ever, and still the best one I've ever had.

She said she’d move out immediately. I told her not to… she was already paid up through August when the lease expired, so why not just stay until we all left? Since we were on such good terms, why not just ride it out?

Boy, did I ever regret making THAT offer…

Next up: The Summer of Bow-Chicka-Bow-Wow!

Apartmentalizing

It’s sad that we have to lose our sense of wonder and become jaded adults.

Remember how amazing it was when you first got out of your family’s house and into a place of your own? 

I moved out of the family house in pretty good order.  I commuted to college so I never dealt with dorms or off campus housing.  I knew I had it good at home… remember, we had The Barn.  And I was basically a pretty responsible kid so I didn’t really have any restrictions on my comings and goings.  I could have stayed much longer.  Hell, if we’d have had a bathroom in The Barn, I could have lived out there.

But after I graduated college, I figured it was time to flee the nest and strike out on my own.  Plus, I really wanted to shack up with my girlfriend.  So we engineered a pretty decent plan, even though it had to be semi-secret.

Well, the secret had to be kept from HER parents… mine were fine.  They were probably thinking, “One down and two to go.”  But while I was a newly minted college graduate, she was only a (college) sophomore, an only daughter and the baby of her family. 

So from the time I graduated, we began buying various house things, like dishes, sheets, towels, kitchen utensils and stuff like that.  We stored it in our attic at home until she could break the news to her folks.

We found a nice little place to live right there in Bowling Green.  She lived in town and was still going to school there, and I certainly liked the area.  Hell, as a commuter, I hardly got to spend any time outside the campus, so I liked hanging out there.

The apartment was a converted garage.  It was set back from a main house (which was also divided into a couple apartments).  We had 2 bedrooms, a living room, dining room and kitchen.  It had everything we needed.

The only problem is that I was the only one working and I couldn’t afford the place by myself, so we had to find a roommate.  As luck would have it, we had a mutual friend that was going to grad school there.  I knew her from my radio-TV-film classes and the college radio station.  We used to sit in on each other’s shows.  My girlfriend knew her from doing Community Theater.  (The Girlfriend was a theater geek… she acted in plays and directed the local children’s theater.)  So it was decided that we should all throw in together and that’s exactly what we did.

It was kind of like the old sitcom “Three’s Company,” except I didn’t have to pretend to be gay and I got to sleep with one of them.

The year we spent there is worthy of its own post, because it was, how should I put this… “eventful.”  (See, I never told the Girlfriend that I used to have a huge crush on the roommate when we were in school together.  While I never got anywhere with that at the time, I nonetheless didn’t see the upside to mentioning that little fact.  )

Hell, living with two women, the inside of the bathroom was only a rumor to me… something I’d heard about but had never seen for myself.  And there was always a tug of war going on about something… who messed up the kitchen, who had to clean what, who ate whose leftovers, what to watch on our only TV… it was constant drama. 

One time the Roommate made a crock-pot full of chili, then forgot about it.  For days.  It cooked all the way down to crust.  And then she still never did anything about it, so the Girlfriend picked up the whole thing and left it in the Roommate’s bedroom.  (Where it sat for another couple of weeks.)  And I STILL had to listen to the girlfriend complain about it.

Before 12 months had passed, the Girlfriend and I had broken up (amicably) and I was boinking the Roommate.  (Like I said, this place is a post or two by itself.)

So with all that going on, this place really didn’t seem like “mine.”  I was just a bit player there, so by the end of our lease, I got out of there like a bat out of hell.  I moved into a small efficiency apartment right up by the record store where I worked.

It had a kitchen with a counter, a living room and maybe a dining room if you divided it up, one small bedroom and a bathroom.  It cost me like $180 a month.  But best of all, it was mine; all mine.

That changed everything.  I mean; I didn’t have jack shit… I had a bed, a love seat, and matching chair from The Barn, a wrought-iron book case that served as a stereo stand, a 24” TV, my desk, and a couple of peach-crates full of records.  That was it.  And I felt like I’d hit the jackpot.

Same stuff, different apartment.

I’d come home from closing the store, crack a beer, sit in the chair and just look around.  I’d think, “Oh man… this is MY place.  I actually have a place.  Maybe I’m a grownup now.”

It still felt funny, thinking of myself as a grownup.  It was while I lived there that I first got called a “man.”

I was at work and told some kid we were out of something and he yelled across the way, “Hey Mom, that man said they’re out of Def Leppard.”

I was like, “What ‘man’?  I just told you… ohhhhhh…”

Suddenly I felt like Muddy Waters.

“I’m a M-A-N, man!”

It’s funny how those feelings are fleeting.  No matter how many more things you accumulate, or how much bigger a dwelling you have, it’s not quite the same as that first taste of adulthood.

I also it was there that I learned how to cook.  First, I had to unlearn what I learned about cooking from the Girlfriend.  (No, a can of peas does NOT require a half-stick of butter.)  And I can thank my brother for teaching me how to make a steak.  He caught me making one in an electric fry-pan, the way Mom used to.  (Note: never let the vegetarian cook the steaks.)

Ed said they made steaks at his frat house at Ohio State all the time… “Use the oven broiler… 5 minutes on one side, 4 on the other… done!

Boy, did THAT ever open up some opportunities.  Until that moment, I had no idea that you could make your own steak as good as the ones you got in restaurants.

Anyway, I lived there for about 8 months, before I up and moved to Cleveland to go manage my own record store.

Moving away from your home, to a town where you know no one?  Now THAT’s when you become a grownup.

And then you learn that sometimes being a grownup is over-rated.

One From the Family Archives

Many thanks to all that commented on the picture of my grandpa in the last post.

I’ve written before about my other grandpa, my mom’s father, who was the Storyteller; a larger than life tour de force of jokes and songs.  He was the guy I wanted to grow up to be.

I wrote a bit about my dad’s father before, too, in a post about going to my cousins’ wedding.  In it, I said:

My dad’s father is old school Italian and all of 93-years old.  (Then.)  He’s so old school that outside The Old School, they have a statue of him.  He’s as staid and buttoned down as my other grandpa was flamboyant.  He doesn’t say much but when he does, it’s usually something good.  So after about 10 minutes of talking to my cousin on video, she asked him, “In conclusion, do you have any words of wisdom for your grandson, the groom.”

Grandpa said, “Tell him that if he takes after his Grandpa, he’ll be fine.”

While Grandpa was good at handing down life lessons, they didn’t always take hold.  Like gardening, for instance.  As I mentioned in a prior post, my dad did not inherit his father's gardening skills, hence the golf clubs used for tomato stakes.

Grandpa’s garden was a work of art.  He grew enough stuff to stock a salad bar all summer long.  This is what it looked like:

These shots were from 1992, so Grandpa was in his mid 70s.  At this point, he was taking it a little bit easier.  You can tell because the tomato stakes aren't exactly the same height, nor are they all painted the same color.  But what you can’t see are the boards laid down between the rows, so he could walk between them securely and care for each plant.  Also note the grapevines at the top left of the first picture and the fig tree on the right of the bottom picture.

As for weeds?  There were no weeds.  Ever.  I think that whenever a weed dared poke up out of the ground in Grandpa’s garden, he’d stick his head out the back door and go, “Hey, what’choo doing over there?  Get outta here!”

The weed would zip right back into the ground.

Grandpa got shit done.

As I wrote about yet another time, he was instrumental in helping us remodel our Barn, directing Dad, my brother and me on how to put a new ceiling and interior walls into an ancient and unevenly built barn.

Another tradition that took hold: the Post-Mass Shots.  Even though my family gave up going to church, we’d still go whenever we went to visit Grandma and Grandpa.  I wasn’t crazy about going, as I was having my own serious doubts about the Catholic thing, but realized that it was the least we could do, to make our grandparents happy.

Once we got back to their house, Grandpa brought out the shot glasses, for a couple of “eye-openers.”  (And I was so pleased once I was old enough to partake in this ritual!)  We’d do one shot, then Grandpa would say, “Well, we have to open both eyes, don’t we?”  Then he’d pour us each another shot.

“Sal-ute!”

If you'll notice, Mom and Grandpa have little shot glasses shaped like beer mugs and are holding them by the handles.

Would you believe I get my height from my mom’s side?

As usual with me, I have an ulterior motive in telling you all this.  I want to tell you a story from the family archives, one my dad has told for years.  Because it’s been a while since I’ve heard it, I might not have every fact lined up, so Dad, a little leeway here, OK?

In Coraopolis, the little town outside Pittsburgh where my dad grew up, there were train tracks that ran through it.  One of the treats we kids enjoyed when visiting our grandparents was watching and listening to the trains rumble by all day long.  They were usually freight trains, presumably shipping steel and other goods involved with steel production to and from the plants located on nearby Neville Island.  I’m sure that trains were as fascinating to my dad, when he was young, as they were to us.

One night, when my dad was, I’m guessing 15 or so, he and his friends got picked up by the town police for hopping on and off the moving railroad cars.  As one might expect in a small  town in the 1940s, they weren’t formally “arrested,” but the cops took them down to the city jail for holding while they called all the parents.

Dad knew he was screwed.  He knew that his dad would not come get him out of jail.  Grandpa used tell him, as a warning to stay out of trouble, “The police pick you up and put you in jail, you can stay right there.” 

Grandpa didn’t play.  He didn’t have time for that kind of foolishness.

So one by one, Dad’s friends’ parents came by to pick up their sons.  And one by one, they led their boys out, usually by the ear, leaving Dad to sit in the jail cell.

“Come on, you know your dad will come get you.  He wouldn’t leave you here all night.”

“Nah, he’s not coming.  No way he’s coming, he said so himself.  I’m going to be here a while.”

Finally, the last of his friends was picked up, leaving Dad there alone to get comfy in his new accommodations.

Then, some time around midnight, to my dad’s great surprise, Grandpa showed up.  I'm guessing Grandma made him go.  He didn’t say much, as he took him home, but he didn’t really have to.

Message delivered:  “Knock that shit off or you’re going to have to get used to that view.”

Now I won’t say that from that point forward, Dad went on to live a squeaky clean childhood.  He did, however get better at not getting caught.

Grandpa, enjoying the 3^rd decade of his retirement with his son, who is enjoying the 1^st decade of his.