Nonculture

4 Asbach colas, 2 captain/colas, 4 vodka orange, 1 scotch.  That is the roadmap from tonight.  So far.  Work’s been suckin’ blah blah, plus they’re talking about laying people off again, so why not…just, why not.  The fact that it’s Monday night is irrelevant.

I do have an untouched bottle of Bacardi left here by a friend, but I’m debating the rations of ice left and what they should be spent on.  Somehow, Bacardi never comes up in the top spot.  The scotch is top shelf, but I’m putting it on top of this sweet mixer, which is probably a mortal sin.  A proper mouthwash with it solves that, but it also nearly makes me gag.  The burn going down is excellent as usual, but the fucking taste in my mouth is as bad as the stale, smoky air trapped in this fucking cubbyhole in the apartment; and like work, it all truly makes me want to throw up.

I’m house hunting, which is unreal in itself.  I’m keeping my 13 year old bimmer on the road with electrical tape and brake fluid bottles every week, but it’s working.  Apparently there’s a loophole in the home buying system where they don’t care if you can get a car loan – fuck it, they’ll give you a house!  So, sure, I’m qualified, and looking.  My agent has so far sent me every house in the motherfucking ghetto, but to his credit, they’re fairly nice houses.  I think I’m going to go outside the box and get something in a decent neighborhood; if I have to lose the pool to do it, well, y’know.  Life is tough.

Shit, a fucking house.  I have trouble getting 300 dollar unsecured credit cards.  Say what now?  But, to be honest, I’ve rebuilt all of that bad 20’s anti-credit, and am now a responsible citizen.  Maybe they can smell it on me.  Or maybe they can smell the fact that my credit score has jumped over 100 points in two years.  Either way, they need to get their noses out of my ass.  Maybe they smell me giving up.

I’m semi-under the grid.  Being completely off the grid would be awesome, but outside of winning the lottery or walking down to the labor pool every day at 7am, I don’t see a way to pull it off.  The labor pool isn’t that bad; I did it for a while.  You walk down, sign up, and wait for a job to come up.  Sometimes you wait for an hour or two and you are shit out of luck, but if you do get called, chances are it’s some kind of new shitty job in some new area with some other shitty boss.  The variety isn’t all that bad.  The work, maybe, but like today being Monday, that’s irrelevant for this post. 

I’m sure that made sense somehow.

Unless you are homeless or extremely good looking, you probably have heard about the supercollider whatever that they built in France, and the theoretical danger it poses.  They finally got it cooled down to “space” temperature and the day it turns on approaches.

http://www.lhcountdown.com/

When they turn this thing on and it creates a black hole the size of a silver dollar, it is going to eat everything and we will all be slowly pulled into France.  I know, everybody’s worst nightmare, because once you enter the borders of France your will to fight against the pull of the black hole will just evaporate and you will try to surrender to the black hole.  Unfortunately, black holes don’t take prisoners.   Still, you might want to buy a beret and a mime outfit, because I hear those are popular where we all will be going.

So, you may want to rethink your life real quick like, then go ahead and do all of those things you’ve been putting off.  Me, I’m going to finish this drink then pour another and watch the chaos from my porch in my overpriced run down apartment.  Because I’m already living the dream; I have it all.

It’s summer, a time to hang out with your friends at BBQ’s and enjoy the sun and drink beer.  Then either puke or make a pass at somebody’s wife and get punched in the face, whichever way you roll.  And what can make a BBQ better than friendly drinking outdoor games that involve everybody and get you shit faced as fast as possible? 

Nothing, of course.

So here is a review of the summer BBQ games that you might be enjoying over the next few months if you have any friends, and some notes on them.  Notes on the games, not your loser friends; nobody cares about your fucking life enough to take notes, sorry to break it to you.

Beer Pong

America’s frat house favorite, Beer Pong is a game that will get you fucked up right quick, especially if you have bad hand eye coordination.  You use a ping pong or ping pong-like table and set up plastic beer cups in a bowling pin shape on either end and try to throw a ping pong ball into the beer (half full).  If it goes in, you or your teammate have to drink the beer.  Pretty simple.  There are other rules about whether you bounce it off the table or throw it right in (it’s easier to throw it right in, plus the opponents can swat away a bounce…but a bounce is worth 2 drinks) – and there are other rules but the main point to hit on with Beer Pong is that it is actually fun, especially the drunker you get.  It is also the most unsanitary game on the planet because the balls bounce off of the table and all over the place, but what are you, some kind of germ pussy?

Beer Pong hint:  You can try throwing at the same time as your partner and have one of you choose to bounce it.  Distract the other team with a regular shot, then a split second behind it have the other team member bounce it in.  Also, if you are interested in a girl at the party, ask her to be on your team then either tank it so that she has to chug beers fast, or compete honestly and try to win to keep the table.  Because you are going to be drinking regardless, and it’s proven that girls are actually very good at this particular game.  I don’t have any science to that, just going from experience.

Cornhole

Throw the bean bag into the hole.  Take a drink or hand out drinks accordingly, however you want to do it.  I’ve played this, but it was set up on my dogturd mine field of a yard, so a hint with this one would be not to own a dog.

Washers

This surprisingly complicated game, for being invented by someone with obviously a lot of free time and washers and pvc pipe on hand, is actually a lot of fun.  Much like the other games, you and your partner stand at each box half (though opposite sides) and you try to throw your 4 washers into the box, into the pvc pipe in the middle, or land it on the edge of the box.  Each is worth different points, and certain points wipe each other out, and so fucking on.  This is easy to set up, or even build yourself, if you have a lot of free time and washers and pvc pipe hanging around.  Otherwise get it on Amazon, like the rest of these.

Washers hint:  Try throwing the washers with a backwards spin, this seems to make them stay in the box more.  And don’t play on concrete around children; that was a mistake.  Metal washers bounce off of concrete.

Top Toss

Somebody I know owns one these, though not the fancy NASCAR one, but it just sat to the side the entire BBQ and nobody showed interest in it.  Probably because it not only looks difficult even if you are sober, it also looks stupid.

Nonculture Drinking Darts

This is a homegrown invention, aka a Nonculture premiere.  Set up a dartboard outside – on the garage door or wherever.  You play a regular game of cricket (3 each of 15-20 plus bull…wiki it).  Also, set up cups underneath the board in whatever pattern you like.  Because as the beers go on, darts will be falling.

Here are the drinking rules:

DART IN MUG ON FLOOR = DRINK WHOLE DRINK

DOUBLE = PASS OUT 1 DRINK

TRIPLE = PASS OUT 2 DRINK

BULL = SOCIAL, EVERYBODY TAKES 1 DRINK

DOUBLE BULL = EVERYBODY TAKES 2 DRINKS

LOSING BY MORE THAN 9 HITS = TAKE 2 DRINKS

LAND A DART ON LEDGE = TAKE A DRINK AND PASS OUT 1 DRINK

 Darts hint:  I recommend only playing steel tip darts on real boards, not electronic darts.

Happy drinking.

I dunno, I guess this is the way the day was supposed to wind up.  My girlfriend has been wanting to throw up Japanese food and Chardonnay all over bums at the crosswalk, and I gave my last two smokes away to some couple at Monkey Bar for some god fucking unknown reason.  I probably gave it to them because I just got paid and I feel rich for a day, and they were out, and why the fuck not.  Now, I’m not only wishing I had those two cigarettes, I’m wishing I had the chairs, and was at the bar, and maybe even wasn’t myself right now.

I’m at that corner of Central and whatever that godforsaken street Casey’s bar meets Central Avenue is.  Most natives know that sinkhole.  There is a bus stop there; usually filled by cabs, bums, drunks, people you don’t want to see at any given hour.  I am in this sinkhole now, having crawled here after slithering out of the elevator of Monkey bar, through Slingapour’s outside bar, and across bum park.

My usually reliable mental case of a cab driver hasn’t shown up, and Faith has slid down to her ass on a traffic light pole, wanting to spew all over passers by.  I’m left with her goddamn Prada purse that I bought her on sale in my hand while her eyes glaze at the passing rims, and I have a half broken cigarette in my mouth that I’ve pulled from my pocket that I’m desperate to light.  I’ve got plenty from my paycheck in my pocket, but at this moment, it doesn’t help me fix my cigarette, light it, get the cab here, fill my drink, help my girl throw up…fuck, I don’t know what the sequence is.  I don’t know what I want the sequence to be.  I guess I’m old now; part of me wants to be home too.  The magic mental midget cabbie carpet should be here already to whisk us home, where the girl will fall asleep in her panties on top of the covers and I’ll stay up writing, drunk, to try to say something interesting about something.

So, here I am, in about that situation. My usually reliable mental case of a cab driver and I got in a shouting match in the driveway because she didn’t like the puking in the cab.  But my girlfriend, it turns out, is very handy with a plastic bag and puke.  The cabbie couldn’t argue with no spillage, so she decided to argue with the possibility of spillage.  Which is a pretty thin argument, but as I mentioned, all of her marbles arent’ there.  So we went round and round, arguing in the driveway about the possibility of my girlfriend having puked on something in her precious cab.  I like those arguments.  Because I win them.  Even with slightly challenged people.  Maybe especially with.  Maybe only with.  I dunno.  I don’t count.

I don’t know what I want the sequence to be.  That’s honest.  Just let me be the DJ.  Let me hold the mouse to the iTunes forward button while it is on random.  Sometimes it has fits, and those fits are unbearable.  Sometimes it chooses exactly what you want, but exactly what you want ­isn’t exactly what you want halfway through.  We’ve all been there.  That song that’s great that turns bad.  That song that has great memories that turns into something else, that turns into regrets, into streams of things that could have been, could have been paths of totally  – whoa, this is getting off on fifty tangents here.  Alright, enough left field for one post. This should come with a disclaimer but, shit.

 A few friends and I have had many discussions on weeknight drinking and the best way to pull it off.  How to avoid hangovers, how to make it in to work without getting pulled over, etc. 

Our latest one was about stinking of booze at work and how to avoid detection.  You gotta realize the stink stays with you all the next day.  There are three ninja steps to pulling this one off:

Douse

Distance

Deflect

Spray on that cologne, pop those tic tacs, make sure your clothes are clean – Douse the alcohol coming through your pores.  It sounds like common sense, but don’t just do it in the morning, you need to keep a fresh application of distracting scents going all day.  Make sure you are at least 2 plus feet away from your client at all times if possible.  Always talk with the least amount of breath you can manage exhaling if you can not Distance.  Deflection can be particularly tricky; it involves settings like elevators where you are forced to be in close contact.  In these situations you need to slightly shift your person so that any perceivable alcoholic odor is transferred from you to the person next to you.  This can confuse others as to who is still drunk at 8am.  It takes practice, but be sure to throw in a confused looking eyebrow at all times; this lets people know you are in on the smell and it can’t possibly be you.  Looking at the corner of the ceiling and the wall isn’t a bad ploy either; it makes you look like you are trying to determine the source of something.

Keep these steps in mind, and you should be successful at surviving the sweat out.

The hell of another on call is over.  For those of you looking to get in to the IT field, let me assure you, when they say you’ll be working stupid hours, they aren’t fucking around.  Burnout is a word used a lot, and many times I think I”m close.  Sometimes I want to do an American Beauty and roll up on a fast food joint and tell them to give me the job with the least amount of responsibility.  But that would mean no more cigars, switching to generic rum, and if you want a woman worth a shit, they also usually give a damn if you can play the game.  At least in the American culture.  So I plod on, fixing shit that shouldn’t break to begin with, and not giving a rats ass about computers in general, except for what they can do for me. I put the time in early on; I ate and shat computers to get my foot in the door.  Now I’m kicking back whenever possible and wondering how a salary that would have been astronomical to me 8 years ago is barely enough to support my borderline childish, bachelor lifestyle.  I can’t do Vegas every month, but if I wanted, I could do the gambling boats.

 I only got drunk once while on-call.  I make it a rule not to drink while on it, but this on call was extended to two weeks.  I almost made it.  Friday I got blasted and fired off a pissed off email to my boss about how fucked up the system was.  For those of you with a hankering for the drink and looking to get into corporate culture, here’s a bit of advice:  If you don’t have the proper supplies around, don’t go on a binge.  Mixing rum, then white wine, then an entire bottle of shitty, uber-sweet champagne that just happens to be lurking in the back of the fridge isn’t a good idea.

But, fuck it, I still have a job, and I still manage to write every now and then.  It’s the old stereotype-that-is-completely-true:  work sucks the creativity right out of you.  Those great ideas you have about what you will write/paint/compose during work all turn into faint shadows by the time you take off the shoes, yank on some jeans, and pop a beer.  TV or the internet or a game or porn are just too convenient as distractions.  There’s something to be said for those who cut off their outside stimulus for the sake of their art. 

Who wouldn’t like some shack with a typewriter/easel, no distractions, maybe a cute little foreign girl who doesn’t speak your language so that you can nail her without having to talk to her, who also brings you groceries (aka liquor) every now and then and cleans the place up for you for peanuts a month?  Though I suppose to make that a monetary reality your sabbatical shack would need to be in Borat land, or something. 

Only eight or so full edits to go on the existing ones, and only nineteen or so more to be written for the next self-pub project, a short story collection.  Fuck.  Where’s that shack?  Where’s the drive thru?  Why haven’t I found that stress-free, self sustaining artsy lifestyle?

Because, like everyone, I play the game for safety and security.  I don’t forsake my TV and internet for my art.  And that is why you will never see my name on the top of the bestseller list.  And don’t leave a comment about how Stephen King wrote is early stuff while teaching; teaching doesn’t count, because it’s not doing.  Teachers only work like, 100 days a year or something.