"Scares Away the Rats" ....Pt. 2!

First, I have to tell you about the plane ride. Glory of glories, I was sitting next to someone with post-nasal drip. The term "post-nasal drip" has never made sense to me. When did "pre-Nasal drip" happen? Now we're suddenly over it?

Anyway, if you ever find yourself sitting next to someone who feels the urge to snort his snot back up into his nose every couple minutes, don't make the situation more frustrating for yourself by counting the time that has elapsed between each snort. Just do the normal thing and listen to music on your iPod really loudly for seven hours or until he falls asleep.

By the time the digital version of the plane is hovering over Dusseldorf, I am comatose. When we arrive in Berlin, I am practically dead. Suffice to say, It takes me a bit of time before I settle into my life in Berlin. I am SO jetlagged. Not like the kind of jetlagged where you go to sleep really early one night and wake up really late the next morning and feel groggy but drink an espresso and get over it, but the kind of jetlagged where you lay incapacitated in your hostel bed for almost three entire days, only taking little breaks to down a gatorade and grab a croissant.

The short Italian man in the bunk above mine seems to share my restless sleepy temperament. With every twist and turn, every change from cadaver to fetal to cadaver and back again, he seems to move in a synchronized fashion. We are like the Naavi in Avatar, communicating through bedspreads and steel springs instead of hair. It is uncomfortable, and awkward, to see him in the morning, standing above me and putting on deodorant, his crotch in my face, knowing he'd heard me whimper a little bit the night before as my exhausted body continued to refuse to fall asleep.

The hostel room smells like dudes who smell like rotting Subway sandwiches. And halitosis. And death. The first thing I do after I've roused myself into consciousness is go and get a drink. It's 9 am but I can hear bleeps and bloops emanating from a locked wooden door about fifty feet away from the hostel entrance. I sit down in the bar and order a vodka orange juice from the supermodel bartender. She pours half a glass of vodka into my drink, mixes it with orange juice, asks me for three euros and then runs off to dance suggestively with a woman who looks like her sister. Then someone offers me acid. It's 9 am! This is, weirdly, the moment when I fall back in love with Berlin.

I wander dazedly out of the bar and spot two gays kanoodling over espresso. I stare at them as I'm walking and almost trip over a bike. There are old ladies schmoozing, tatooed hipsyers locking up their bikes, tall, skinny women riding bikes with little wooden carts filled with screaming children attached. I welcome myself to Europe.

I sit down at a restaurant and order a salad. "Salad? Do you speak English?" I ask the waitress with the requisite amount of shame one should feel for not knowing the language in a place you have flown thousands of miles to live in. "No, I don't speak any English," the woman says to me in perfect English. Then she smiles. "What do you want?"

I'd bought a German to English translation book written by Rick Steves- a proud monolinguist -but half the book was about beer. I could ask for an obscure lager but was still at a loss when it came to telling someone they looked sexy. However, I was actually enjoying not knowing the language. Life is so much more exciting when all you have to work with are the wild gestures and emotive facial expressions of an out-of-commission mine.

After ordering, I look at the pictures in a German newspaper sitting next to me. "La la la," I think to myself as I stare at the pictures.

The man next to me feels around his butt. It suddenly occurs to me that I am not reading some newspaper left to the population by a benevolent cradle-to-grave socialist country for general perusing, but this man's newspaper that he bought with his own cash money. I apologize and give it back to him, miming the universal expression of regret.

My food arrives but instead of eating it, I stare into the crowd of people sitting lazily about, munching on croissants, talking, laughing. "This is the life!" I think to myself and renounce all the epiphanies I'd had in New York about the importance of hard work and dedication.

I end up staying at the hostel for over a week. Staying in a hostel for such long periods of time is kind of like enrolling yourself in an international speed-dating service. Everyone starts with the typical questions ("Where are you from? What are you doing here?") but eventually you find yourself courting new friends and romanticizing their home countries. "France, wow, such a beautiful country," you say, attempting to conjure memories of the trip you took with your family when you still claimed you were straight.

Eventually, I meet two Israelis who seem fun.

"Hey, you're a gay right?" one of them asks me.

"What do you think of this shirt?"

"I think it's fucking ugly. Wear that one," I say.

"Hey, all right! That was a good tip, man! Yeah, you're good!"

I feel comfortably bitchy around them. The boys have a series of catch phrases they repeat, probably because they don't feel like coming up with actual English sentences around me.

"I don't give a fuck," is stated was frequently and emphatically as in a reality television show. South Park episodes were quoted with reverence. This was going to be a long night.

One of the first things we do is visit Alexanderplatz, home of Berlin's television tower. Soaring much higher than the space needle, but crowned with an orb that looks like Epcot, the building initially looks like a piece of space junk that just happened to land in the capitol of Germany.


TO BE CONTINUED!!!

Oh, By the Way...

The reason I haven't been writing here is because I've been writing over here. Come read about art!

Hallo, Vas Is Up?

i cannot stop trying to sound like bruno here.

it all started with a music poster which said "vas is worldmusic?" i thought the poster was so silly (because, uhm, world music is world music, aka "music of the world" aka "music made by non-white people") so i started thinking in my head "vas is worldmusic" like all day long because it was bizzare and also i'm trying to learn german so i could file it under the part of my brain that was reserved for "new and exciting information". but i can't stop thinking in bruno's accent. which is actually a fairly accurate depiction of a flamboyant gay german accent.

besides old people and babies (such classics) there are many other things i enjoy laughing at here. i was horrified to find german country music at a gay club, but after i'd sat around for a while i just found it funny. it's amazing to hear the german accent in a dolly parton type song.

some things also get amazingly lost in translation. there's an asian restaurant here called "rice queen" which, in america, is a derogatory term for an older gay man who likes younger asian boys, though i doubt the owners have realized that. the restaurant (i kid you not!) is right next to another restaurant called "papa no." it kills me.

people from every corner of the planet live here. french people are probably my favorite. watching french children eat food is hilarious. they are so dainty with their forks! such cultured children, even at a young age. how do they know how to hold their knives. christ, they even rest the fork and knife on the plate after they're done. when i try doing that, the fork and knife fall to the ground and i laugh because this is what american people do: we fuck up and laugh. these kids are something else, though.

there are sex shops EVERYWHERE. there are like five gay saunas next to my apartment. i went once and stared at the porn on the walls and left. good story right? another time i asked the man behind the counter if i could buy a bottle of water and he looked at me like i was an alien. i want to think of a good gay sex club joke. i want to find something funny about sex shops, but maybe theyre actually just kind of sad? yeah, that might be true.

germans LOVE techno. everywhere sounds like a gay club. i'll be eating falaffel at a schwarma shop and have a gay club flashback mid-bite-of-chicken because the turkish owner of the shop is in lurv with an obscure lady gaga remix.

germans are lazy. relatively speaking. either that or americans are workaholics. i oscillate between thinking one is true, then the other, then both.

germans are effortlessly creative. this is what i've decided. at some point in their lives, some representative from MOMA sat them down and told them how to decorate their living rooms, then they traded a blowjob for excellent fashion advice from michael kors, and then they decided they were "over" all that and created living rooms and wardrobes that were somehow even more sophisticated than anything in america. seriously, i walk into apartments and i feel like i'm a model in a catalogue. i want a life.

germans roll their eyes when you say you're an american, but there's still a lot of love there. you just have to talk about obama and the differences between red states and blue cities. then you're in.

i need to learn german.

i miss u!

Scares Away the Rats

"A gay," the woman chewed the word over for a minute. "A Jew. A gay Jew."

"You are Jewish, but you are also a gay," she explained to me. A lengthy pause. "Vow."

The drunken elderly lady stared deeply into the infinite and confounding space between her face and mine.

"Vas is innn your book bag?"

"A book."

"Vow."

I resisted the urge to feel flattered. Usually, when people remark on my specialness, I blush, thank them, and try to impress them with more fun facts (most people won't press if you tell them the third nipple is on your butt). But I was a tough New Yorker now. I didn't divulge my life story to just anyone.

My childhood friend, now behind the bar, made a bug-eyed face at me. I could tell she was debating over how much she wanted to help me out and how much she wanted me to experience the crazy she deals with every day.

"Izzz zhaatt soccherr?" the woman asked, pointing at a screen depicting men kicking balls on a field. She threw her body against the back of her chair in mock shock. "Is Spain in zee orange shirts?"

I went back to reading my book and when I turned around, she was slumped in her chair, almost falling off. I shot her a concerned look and she laughed at me. I turned back around.

"I'm sorry," she said. "I'm sorry for making fun of you."

Then she fell off the chair.

"Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god what do I do?" I called to Jane.

"She falls down all the time."

This was not the first moment I ended up relishing because it felt like Authentic New York.

Later that day, after I had transformed myself into a quintessential cliche NYC tourist - buying a soft-pretzel, humming Alicia Key's "Empire State of Mind" song and meandering around M&M World - I arrived back at my friend Julia's place in Crown Heights. It was around 1:30 AM and a gaggle of Jamaicans were still playing chess under a "No Loitering" sign. Julia was such a pro at having guests over that she didn't even look phased by the fact that I was coming home so late. She held the door open for me and a haggard looking man who said he required apartment entry so he could "go find his girl." He followed us up the first flight of stairs and then wandered into a dark corner.

When we reached her apartment, Julia pounded the floorboards with her bare feet.

"Scares away the rats," she explained, matter-of-factly.

This deeply impressed me.

Okay, so I was not on the "Sex and the City" tour of Carrie Bradshaw's favorite vabrator stores, but I'd still spent a portion of the day like a naive outsider, praying I'd see Liz Lemon's character in Rockafeller Center. These were the kinds of experiences that made one feel like a clueless Midwestern tourist. Witnessing Julia's fairly nonchalant attitude towards rodent infestation, on the other hand, gave me the realest picture of the city yet.

Excusing moments after branding them with the "authentic" label was something I had also done, exuberantly, while hanging out with my friend Stephanie. Stephanie had seemed harried and had big dark circles under her eyes when I visited her in her diminutive apartment in the East Village but I quickly convinced myself that she was having a totally enviable New York experience. The dark circles were proof of this. I had not a shred of compassion for her; she was living the dream.

I had always held fast to the idea that traveling permanently altered your internal hard-wiring, and now my wires had been re-arranged into a large F circuit, for failure. Failure to become an authentic, hard-working, stressed out New Yorker.

Just as it had taken me a long time to come to grips with the fact that simply setting foot in Chelsea does not a more fabulous gay man make, I was slowly coming to grips with the fact that simply meandering around the streets of New York was not turning me into a more interesting person. I'd have to get one of those job thingies. But what were my skills? The greatest thing about living in Seattle was that I didn't really have to prove myself. If I lost my job, I'd have to move back in with my parents. But I didn't mind watching Oprah on their couch. Unemployment in New York meant being eaten alive by pigeons in some Bushwick alley. Not applying myself was not an option.

The next morning I took the subway back into the city. As I strained to listen to an episode of "This American Life" over the screech of the train, I began to think of ways of simulating a New York life in a less expensive city. Maybe I could rent an apartment under train tracks in Philadelphia, open a bagel shop that doubled as a comedy club and pay people to be slightly rude to me.

I must admit, at this point in the story, that I hadn't expected to fall so masochistically in love with New York. My plan, essentially unalterable due to the price of plane tickets, was to leave New York for Berlin in a week.

"Why Berlin?" I can still hear my mother's voice in my head. I had traveled to Berlin a year ago and had loved it but couldn't find a way to explain my love to those in what that they call the "Post-Holocaust" generation. Like an Arab in love with Noah's lox shmear, mine was a culturally-inconvenient adoration. You should have seen the expression on my mother's face when I had handed her the Lonely Planet Berlin guide book.

"Look at all the great shopping!"

"This is a page on Hitler's bunker."

"Oh my god."

Let's get one thing straight: I do not have a Hitler fetish. Let's get another thing straight: the shopping in Berlin is incredible.

After a week in New York, I packed up my bags and headed for JFK with Julia. As she fiddled with her car's iPod, narrowly missing a crowd of Hasids, I attempted to prepare myself for this new lederehosened leg of my trip.

Traveling from Seattle to New York meant preparing myself for the smell of human feces, rotting garbage and the crippling anguish of monetary-inferiority complex. Traveling to Berlin, on the other hand, meant preparing myself for sophistication-deficit disorder.

I tried to adopt a cool but detached look in the airport security line that signaled someone who was over it. I imagined that, if any Berliners asked me what I thought of Obama, I'd reply "I like him, but let's not make a religion out of it." I'd be in the clear unless Germans watched Bill Maher.

Still, it was hard to concentrate when I was having panic attacks about being rendered mute. I still knew no German! I didn't even know what came after "drei" ("drei-et-un"?) Worse, I had adopted a patronizing attitude towards the language. German just made me giggle!

....TO BE CONTINUED!

Like a Pervy Nancy Drew

Last night I read Edith Zimmerman's blog out loud to a few friends. Everyone was yelling at me to stop because the pacing was philistine - like something you'd find in a really stupid campfire story that goes on and on and isn't so much scary as it is boring and weird - but then came the shocking and outrageous and pretty creepy punchline, and that really sorted folks out. I laughed, because the story WAS dumb, but proudly and self-consciously so, and everyone stared at me silently before resuming their activities. So you're just going to have to trust me on this: her blog is stupid hilarious (the best kind). Here's one story that made me howl.

ghost!!!!

Right as I was drifting to sleep, a thumping noise in my bedroom startled me awake, and I gasped. “Who’s there?” I said, sitting up and pulling the covers tight around me. “Who’s there?!” Just then I heard another thump, but this time the thump was followed by a long, slow creak. I know that creaking noise, I thought to myself, That’s my closet door opening! So I looked over and saw that my closet door was opening! “Oh my god,” I whispered—the door seemed to be opening by itself! Finally the creaking stopped and the door was completely open. I held my breath and for a second nothing happened, but then a pale, transparent oval floated out from the darkness within, and it had two empty holes for eyes and a long empty gash for a mouth. It was a ghost!

“Oh my god,” I said. “Oh my god, oh my god, what do you want!?”

The ghost said nothing and just floated around my room, going back and forth, causing all the papers on my desk to flutter to the floor, and my drapes to flap in the wind. Then he came over to the side of my bed and just hovered there, staring down at me with his empty eyes, with that same unchanging expression. “What do you want?” I whispered. “Oh my god, what do you want?! I’ll give you anything. Money, jewelry—whatever you want. I’ll suck your dick, just please don’t kill me!”

So he pulled out his ghost dick and… well, I’m still alive, I’ll say that much!

Haaaaaa...ewwwwwwwww! (hewwwwww?) Edith (who really is so wonderfully weird) also selects and comments on the funniest and most interesting internet memes for New York Magazine's Culture Vulture. You can check out her posts here.

Against the Homosexual Lifestyle?

Force the gays to marry!

Music Dump Wednesday!

Fake Blood:





Janelle Monae:





Vampire Weekend:



La Roux:





Chordettes (Squeak E. Clean Remix):



Robyn:



Annie:

Lindy West on the Food at Sasquatch

It was humiliating enough sitting at a picnic table outside the media trailer, hot and alone, eating my Domino’s* personal pizza. The pizza was lukewarm and encrusted with tar and sadness. It had “ham” on it. I finished the pizza, and shifted my weight to the side to swing my leg over the bench. At this moment, I realized I should have checked my watch, for it happened to be WORST THING EVER O’CLOCK. As I leaned to the side, toward the very edge of the bench, the entire picnic table and bench apparatus TIPPED OVER SIDEWAYS AND PITCHED ME TO THE GROUND IN A TANGLE OF SHAME AND DIET COKE. Hey, everyone on earth! Check out the amazing 900-lb woman! I detected the smell of a Domino's personal pizza somewhere within a 200-mile radius, so i had the sheriff saw the wall off my double-wide and haul my brontosaural girth over here so I could stuff this tarry grease-puck in my face! Oops! Not knowing what else to do, I panicked and yelled, “I’M SUPER DRUNK RIGHT NOW SO I DIDN’T EVEN FEEL IT.” The worst part is that that wasn’t even true.

* By the way, isn't it Domino's that's doing that ad campaign about how their pizza used to be garbage but now it's really, really good? Hey, Domino's! You know what? "Good" isn't really in your wheelhouse. Maybe you should try something like, "Domino's Pizza: At Least It Was Borderline Free!" Or, "Domino's Pizza: Shut Up and Eat It, Fatty." Just a thought!

Read the rest here. I am offended that people are just now realizing that Lindy West is a hilarious genius. The woman has been funny since funny was pooping in diapers and kicking the back of your seat on long airplane flights.

Thank You, Gods of Comedy and Romance, For Having Sex and Giving Birth to the Newest Episode of 30 Rock

I was getting worried about 30 Rock. Liz's single lady jokes were feeling flat. Tracy's shenanigans just weren't cutting it. But the newest episode, in which Liz must attend two separate weddings and Jack has to choose between Avery and whats-her-face-with-the-hilarious-Boston-accent is totally. fucking. hilarious. For one, Liz finally finds someone who likes her (THANK GOD RIGHT? It was getting very unrealistic that every man in New York City hates a wonderfully self-deprecating single lady in her thirties). Add a drunk Kenneth into the mix (he's just the sweetest thing even when he's trying to be mean) and you have an episode that actually allows its characters some emotional growth while still retaining the belly laughs. Also, Cher accents in male characters never gets old. Watch here.

Today in Awesomeness

Sam Lipsyte's new novel "The Ask" has been getting a lot of praise everywhere, and that's because it's a beautiful, hilarious, amazing and heartbreaking new book. I just finished it last night, in bed, still sick with some weird fluey thing. This part caught me by surprise...a rare meaning offering in a book which ardently resists the preachy. I'll share it here because it resonated so much with me. It's a conversation between the main character of the book, Milo, and his son.

I took a knee on the sidewalk, clasped Bernie by the shoulders. I'd seen fathers kneel like this in movies, standard posture for the rushed essentials, the Polonius rundown. A little too in love with itself, Don might judge the moment but that didn't diminish its necessity. Bernie might not understand what I told him today, but he would carry the words with him forever, and with them, me.
"Listen," I said.
"Yes, Daddy?"
"Squander it. Give it all away."
"Give what away? My toys?"
"No, yes, sure, your toys, too. Whatever it is. Squander it. Do you understand?"
"Not really."
"Don't save a little part of you inside yourself. Not even a scrap. It gets tainted in there. It rots."
"What does?"
"I can't explain right now. Someday you'll know..."

In the spirit of this passage, a part of me wants to give away the plot of the whole book, but you'll have to check it out here instead. What do I love about this passage? Oh, everything. I love Milo's self-conscious fathering. I love how everything adults say is lost in translation. I love the random stream-of-conscious writing Lipsyte attempts when writing the kid's character. I love that Milo is so bitter, and he knows it, and he wants it to stop but doesn't know how. I love the message of squandering it all, and I love the way it sounds like it might actually be a bad thing, and that that's because we've cast it as a bad thing, when it's really the greatest thing. I love how the moment pops out of nowhere, the way really important moments tend to always pop out of nowhere, and how it ends quickly because it's so rare for two human beings to ever have an epiphany on the same deep level at the exact same time.

Yesterday

I spent the first part of yesterday in a frenzy about my upcoming trip to Berlin. I now have, like, 12 books on the city. I am completely aware that I am romanticizing the fuck out of it and yet I can't help but stare at all the modernist art in the books and read about the city and it's people and history and think, fuck: I must go. But I'm not usually the person who just goes with feelings like this. I'm not the dude who says "I must go" and then actually goes. I'm much more the person who'll have the thought "I must go" and then immediately analyze why I'm thinking this way. So it still feels foreign to have the thought, "I must go to berlin" and know that really, in three months, I will be there.

I've been doing a lot of thinking about Seattle and my place in it. I'm annoyed by these thoughts. I really would like to not be constantly analyzing this sense of place, and the conversations I've been having about the city are frustrating, to say the least. I think we leave certain situations is because, at some point, the conversations we're having with ourselves while we're there are no longer satisfying. They're frustrating. We're not so much leaving a place as leaving the idea of a place we've defined, redefined, battled with and resigned against in cynicism.

I hung out with "S" last night. It felt so comfortable to be around him. I've developed a self around him that feels so familiar. I'm bawdy, I'm crazy, he doesn't mind. I tease him relentlessly but he can take it and he teases me right back. And yet, I'm so keenly aware of how familiar this role is to me - the outlandish, sarcastic gay friend with the bitchy opinions about absolutely everything. He's mostly me, but missing the vulnerability. The vulnerability comes from taking risks, and I'm not taking any right now. I'm living a very safe existence in an environment I've known since a child.

S and I trade Jewish shticky humor in front of his new girlfriend. We can truly become caricatures sometimes. I'm the pushy hypochondriac with the dysfunctional home life, he's the obsessive backseat driver. So S and I are driving with this new girlfriend of his, and she's laughing in all the right places and totally appreciating the weird performance art of our relationship. And now that we have an audience, I feel like our shit is just amplified. We tear into each other. We laugh dark laughs.

We drive down 45th, in terrible stop-and-go, until we reach the freeway. We're going to a party in Seward park...a mansion there, to be exact. My friend, M, just threw a multicultural performance at Garfield High School (sorry about that word), and her party she says, via text message, is gonna be "crackin."

When we arrive at the house, it's clear we've got the wrong address. No one's there. It's Seward park and silent. Not to get all law-and-order on your ass, but some places here give me the heebie-jeebies. It's so eerily quiet in parts of Seattle. An Israeli I once dated compared Seattle to a massive country club. He of course lived in Madison Valley, so take it with a grain of whateverrr but I latched on to this idea for a while. A part of me thinks he was just trying to be a dick and I also think our conversation was built on a bullshit premise, since he was always trying to say things to provoke me, and yet I've wrestled with it for a while. Stuff does happen here, but it's in specific areas, with specific people, it doesn't last long, it's usually not too rowdy and it's over before you know it. The way it's documented on Facebook probably makes it look more fun than it actually was.

Anyway, the party turns out to be somewhere else, so we have to drive back into the city. We take Lake Washington Blvd this time, and it's a scenic drive. The topic turns to cities and parents and professions and bits of local history. We drive by Kurt Cobain's old house.

The party we find is alienating for unexplainable reasons. It has all the right ingredients of a party - beer, loudly-talking attractive people - and yet something is off. It's cliquey. And when I say "it's cliquey" I mean, we missed out on something everyone else in the room seems to know. Some shared truth or sense of place or something.

We leave soon after, and drive to S's place. We smoke. We watch Hulu, talk Youtube. Bonding has become a trip to everyone's favorite cat videos. But there's some real joy to be shared here, and it's not entirely easy for me to feel cynical about it. We end up watching "Food Inc," a film I'd kept starting and stopping in the course of eating a burrito. The burrito won before, but tonight I was hooked, with a few reservations. The film was shocking, of course. But it was also kind of dumb, and annoying. The whole food debate in this country is so young and full of anger and sensationalism. I'm just as pissed as anyone about Monsanto and Wal-Mart and Con-Agra, but I'd like to watch a doc about it all that doesn't pander to my fears. I think, at times, the film shot itself in the foot by being way too heavy handed.

I ended up back on the blog, reading an old post I'd written about dining alone in Seattle, back when I was hell bent on becoming a professional writer a la Jonathan Franzen. It was painful to read. When I wrote it, I was still so high off my trip to South Africa that I was able to be pretty objective about my life in Seattle. I had hope there was another life waiting for me somewhere, so I didn't mind being harsh and honest about the one I currently had.

Truth be told, I haven't changed much since then. I'm still waiting to leave again. I want to feel that objectivity about some other new place. I want to make myself a stranger again. I'm not sure I'll be able to pull it off, but I figure I owe it to myself to at least try.

New Idea!

So, you know how there's no money in the journalism biz? I have a new idea! Hey guys! How many times have you tried a diet and failed? I know I have!!! But not on the "Get Nervous" diet. On the "Get Nervous" diet, we send you one horrifying image, sound clip or video a day in the mail that shocks you so terribly you just have to poop! What will it be today? A writing deadline you just missed? A video of the Alaskan Way Viaduct falling to pieces? Or how about a hot person online who wants to talk to you but has a slutty tattoo? In Steven Blum's "Get Nervous Diet" we tailor our pictures to your greatest fears! Ever get overwhelmed by all the choices at the local Office Depot? We've got a picture for that! Think you'd poop if you won the lottery? Of course you would! We'll play a prank! We've got a massive library of your every fear! Rachel Ray, scabies, the inside of Northgate Mall...you literally won't ever stop pooping!*

*Steven Blum is not liable for any medical problems you may encounter from too many poops.

(Or you could just send me $20)

Unpublishable

Me: Hi.
Interviewee: Michael Pollen.
M: Shut up! How would you describe the food here?
I: Farm-fresh.
M: Go to hell, you clone! What do you really care about?
I: Sustainability.
M: MMMMMMk. So, let's talk about Italy or some shit.
I: Pompous digression .
M: Well that was unprintable. What about that recipe?
I: Esoteric, wonky aside 5 people will understand.
M: Cool. What if I crack a joke right now?
I: Grand pronouncement on the intersections between food and life. Unpublishable meaning-offering. Opinion held by 6 billion people.
M: NICE! Well, I think I've got enough here. I'll call you if I have any follow-ups!

Steven Re-Discovers Television

I'm at the folk's this week. After not watching TV in forevz, it is suddenly right here saying "What's up? Wanna buy a boat? Wanna stare at some jewelry while I speak in the voice of death?" Non-cable television is just as boring as ever but now it's in high-definition so it can bore me with every pore in Kathy Goertzen's face. Jay Leno just played a clip of a "Beer Pong Champ" flipping a ping pong ball into a cup of water - a spectacle to which Leno could only respond, unironically, with a short "wahoo!" (I miss Coco, Leno's like the grandpa who fails at feigning interest in your life). Then I switched the channel to Law and Order and its maudlin string section was trying to lure me into some lurid sex-crime spectacle, but I just wasn't ready to see a naked lady in a dumpster. So then I turned the TV off. The whole living room is pretty much arranged around the television so it feels weird now to sit in it and NOT watch television. The TV is all "Don't you want some age-defying makeup?" But the more I watch, the less of an anthropologist I become. I prefer the trash in small doses through a monocle. I'm sure you can relate.

To My Parents' Poor, Suicidal Kitty Cat

Poor, poor suicidal kitty. Why are you all alone in my parent's bedroom? Why don't you ever come out to play? Don't you know that I love you? I just called to say that I do, I do. Poor suicidal kitty cat. Remember that time when you jumped off the dining room table - during Shabbat, mind you - and flung your head into the window even though it was nighttime and there were no birds visible? You made us all scream, especially my mom. I love you but you always look distracted by something. A bad thought? I just want to hold you and nurse you like a child. Why did you ruin all our furniture? Why do you keep vomiting on our couch? Poor suicidal kitty cat...for some reason I don't feel like writing to anyone but you. Maybe that's because my friends don't want me to talk about them on a blog and I haven't figured out how to write fiction.

Do Seattle Public Elementary Schools Serve Real Food?

If you haven't already seen "Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution" show on ABC, I'd really recommend checking it out (you can watch the first two shows on Hulu here). In the show, Oliver attempts to change the eating habits of the most obese city in the United States - Huntington, West Virginia. Oliver, who's from Britain, is famous for re-vamping the British school lunch system and, since the kids there ate crap, and the kids here eat crap, and because kids who eat crap tend to grow up into adults who eat crap, the show focuses mainly on Oliver's attempts to re-vamp Huntington's school lunch program, which is filled to the brim with crap. At Huntington, they serve frozen pizza for breakfast. Lunch is chicken nuggets with a side of goop. Then the kids gulp it all down with florescent pink milk.

The visuals of these kids eating all this crap is enough to make anyone's stomach turn, because if you grow up not knowing what good food actually tastes like, how can you not get fat and end up with diabetes? The show got me wondering: what kind of meals are we serving kids in Seattle public schools? Is it real food, or does it just sound like real food? You'd think Seattle - home to farmer's markets, co-ops, and plenty of upscale restaurants that make a point about serving only farm-fresh food - would have enough people concerned about food to not serve our kids total crap.

Tonight, I took a look at the Seattle Public School's "Nutrition Services" website. There, I found a page that listed all the food given to Seattle Public Elementary Schools this month. A lot of it looks potentially yummy and healthy (fajita chicken, beef teriyaki, penne marinara) but a lot also looks dubious (chicken "drummies," fish "nuggets," mozzarella cheese breadsticks). Who ever heard of breadsticks for lunch? And where is this food coming from? What is its shelf life?

There's a part of the website labeled "nutritional analysis" with a bunch of dead links. However, I was able to find nutritional info on March's lunches. It's what you'd expect - hot dogs bad, salad good - but I couldn't find any information on suppliers, sources, or anything like that. On a good note, it looks like a lot of these meals contain a range of healthy sides, like baby carrots, grapes, even jicama salads - which is definitely a step above Huntington's pizza with a side of roll and corn syrup. Grapes are usually born on vines and carrots - last time I checked- can't be created in a laboratory (although I'm sure there are some rogue GMO carrots running around out there).

Even though I have a better sense of what kids are eating in Seattle schools, it would be interesting, and important, to hear a Seattle Public School official explain where this food is from and how it's prepared. Does the food just sound appetizing (the way school lunches always sound appetizing)? Or is it the real un-frozen, un-fucked around with food we need to be feeding our kids? In the next few days, I plan on tracking down someone and seeing if I can find an answer...

Spring Cleaning

Hello. This post is brought to you by two lesbians playing catch with their dogs, a child pretending he is nauseous on a tire swing, a bench that’s half-rotted and Spring. It is finally Spring. I feel like I just got sprung! I feel like saying “I feel like” is really annoying so I’m going to stop now. But seriously, dudes. Even newspaper reporters sound more chipper in print now that the sun’s out. Something has fundamentally and seismically shifted. It’s the most dramatic seasonal change I’ve experienced thus far in Seattle. I also have this break from school and time to digest my thoughts. Perhaps too much time. Also, too much time to stare at clothing in stores and think about buying it. Uh oh. I’m feeling more honest with myself, which is really the only place to be (or not…hold me). These are a few of the things I’ve been thinking about (lists comfort me, so you only have to hold me a little).

1. I’m not so sure how to feel about this one, but my brain has become a series of witty zinger status updates. Either that or my brain is like a comments thread on the world’s most derivative blog. It just oscillates between the two, with little warning. Soon there will be an iPhone app that will pick up on our brainwaves and send our best thoughts to a status updater and we will never have to experience this oscillation ever again. This will be a joyous day.

2. I am re-evaluating situations where I literally have to take my brain out of my skull and put it in a pretty pink box (the kind for gay brains). This happens to me a lot. At work, at school, at home. I would appreciate if my job could be “sitting on my ass getting stoned and watching the September Issue.” That actually requires like 75% of my brain. Okay “god”? You got that?

3. I have re-discovered alcohol and boys. This means I occasionally transform myself into a huge queen and make out with everyone. Boys are weird. I'm not sure if I'm looking for a relationship. God do I love queens, though. And bitches. I met the fucking biggest queen bitch a few nights ago and I feel like I’m still riding high off the encounter.

4. I just saw "Greenberg". It was meh, but I think that's what it intended to be, so it succeeded. I mean, it was like one of those "important movies" people will probably talk about for a while, even though they didn't really like it. You can't really like the movie unless you detach yourself from Ben Stiller's problems and absorb it like a comedy, but I found that impossible. So I ended up both relating to and detesting the main character, coming to know my own inner asshole just a bit better. It was weirdly therapeutic, and also depressing.

5. I've been reading way too much about the health care debate. Sometimes it makes me nauseous. I literally commented on a Fox News article I thought was "fear-mongering". I think it got deleted somehow, because when I went back to check on it and see how folks had responded, it wasn't there. They can't do that, right?

Today in Surviving Seattle

This afternoon, the Stranger dropped their 2010 Economic Survival Guide - which was hilarious and wonderful - but they left a few things out. As a freelancer, I'm even poorer, and I'd like to fill those holes right here (ew, sorry). These are the ways I save my monies.

I Go to Public Parks

People in Seattle often seem to forget that "West Seattle" exists. It's sad, but true. Coming back from Alki the other day, one of my roommates was all "Alki? I've always wondered what that was..." then she stared off into nothing and I had to revive her (she's from California). ALKI IS SO PRETTY, BITCHES! 'Specially right now. Beaches cost nothin', sand is free! Flock there.

I Eat Cheap-Ass "Ethnic" Food and Stuff My Face at Happy Hours

I second Saigon Deli's deliciousness. Presse is also fairly cheap for smaller, brunchier items. Ramen is a bit pricier than Pho, but more filling. Tolouse Petit's happy hour is amazing - probably the best in Seattle - and Bastille's aint half bad either.

I Use the Free Interwebs in the U-District

Did you know the interwebs are free in the U-District? They are! You can even sit out on the lawn and stay connected (I just did this!). Go grab something from Saigon Deli with fish sauce, sit on a grassy knoll and cruise Hulu on your laptop. Perfect!

But I Don't Want to Sit, Alone, With A Laptop On A Sunny Day

Walk down Brooklyn till you hit the water. It's nice down there.

I Walk in the Woods

The Ravenna Ravine is scary silent during the day. Huge trees loom over you, a babbling brook babbles and somewhere nearby you can hear medieval nerds playing with plastic sticks. It's disquieting, and quieting, all at the same time. It's also the most isolated place I've found in a residential neighborhood. I know, I know- Seattle is already isolating. But if it's not isolating enough, check out this park!
I Take the Light Rail for Fun

Take it to Columbia city, get off, walk to Full Tilt, play ice cream, eat video games, listen to music, you know...the usual. Bonus: you can laugh at all the Escalades parked outside and the fact that, a night, Columbia City means people yelling at each other for no reason and jumping into the middle of the street without an "okay" signal. It's crazy down there!

I Get Paid to Speak English

Becoming an English teacher is easy. Not the "literature" kind, silly. That's harder. But it's easy to volunteer at Seattle Central Community College, teach immigrants how to read books, and eventually get paid to do it. Show up enough and they'll start paying you. If it happened to me, it could happen to anyone. It'll get you out of the house, feeling good, and making a dime.

Oh, So You're An Even Bigger Do-Gooder?

Woah there, okay. Here's what you do: you work at the Crisis Clinic. Now, I know what you're thinking: "Steven! Isn't listening to other people's problems for hours and hours totally sad?" Well, yes and no. Their problems ARE sad, but the experience actually makes you a better listener. It gives you ideas for stories. It makes you feel less alone, and useful in the best sense of the word. And, the next time a job interview lands in your lap, you'll get it because you'll have Ira Glass-level listening skillz.

I Don't Pay for Shows

Why pay for a show when you can just say you're "press" and get in for free? People rarely check because they don't want to embarrass themselves. Why should the press have all the fun? Try it!

I Started A Blog

So far, it's made me fifty cents, but maybe you'll have better luck? I Can Haz Cheesburger and Fail Blog both started in Seattle. Clearly, we're a bored city. Try and find a theme for your blog and stick to it (I've found this impossible, and that's why five people read my blog). And remember: the internet is the new Manhattan. One day you're in, the next Heidi Klum is kissing your cheek goodbye, so don't feel too bad if you're not the next youtube overnight. Eventually, people will click on your ads and you'll start making some cash.

Well, I guess that's all for now. I feel like my advice is less "how to survive in Seattle" than it is "how to become more like Steven Blum," which I'm actually totally fine with. Bye guys!

Oh My God, It's Allison Janney and A Llama!

No Gay Man Would Wear That Scarf

It's All Here, Baby

Find many more ways to irritate your friends here.

I Went to an Art Opening this Weekend

And it was quite good.

"Saving Private Ryan" as Summarized By the Folks at "This Recording"

Despite the fact that Jews are dying by the millions in camps across Europe, it ends up being a lot more important for everybody's peace of mind that one goy be rescued by a squadron of morons.

Read the whole thing here.

What Happens In Seattle

Seattle's never been the suicide capital of the country. That title actually belongs to Las Vegas, as explained in an article in The Believer. It's a good read, though I think you need a subscription to access the whole thing.

Take Your Roller Coaster to Work Day

The object of "Roller Coaster Tycoon" was to build roller coasters on your computer that made people barf, but only a little bit, and not so much that they passed out and died.

One day I made the mistake of showing my elaborate pixelated theme park to an ex-friend who painted one roller coaster pink, called it "Steven's Gay Coaster" and made all the trains crash together.



At school, I was comforted by drawing the same roller coasters over and over again on my notebooks. While my fellow male classmates were busy drawing pictures of boobs, I was trying to figure out how best to draw a corkscrew go over a lake behind a mountain.



When I was twelve years old, I joined a fan site for a roller coasters called "Roller Coaster Enthusiasts of America." They sent me a ludicrously shiny laminated card I still have hiding somewhere in my desk.

The folks at "Roller Coaster Enthusiasts" were against government restrictions on roller coaster heights and they believed roller coasters were safe and shouldn't be regulated like liquors and cars. "Safer than riding your car to work," I'd read in forums, and I agreed with them. Like a religious nut, I was completely prepared to argue with anyone who believed otherwise.



You could split the roller coaster enthusiasts into two camps; those who liked roller coasters for the "extreme experience" and those who liked rides that were "themed" like a Rogers and Hammerstein musical. I happened to fall into the latter camp. My ultimate dream was to become a Disney Imagineer and live in the set of the Pirates of the Carribean ride and watch all the boats go by. I could have made friends with an animatronic goat and eaten food from the Bayou.



The largest theme park, the theme park of my dreams, lay in a fairly innocuous stretch of land in Sandusky, Ohio. When I was twelve I would have chopped off my arm to go to Cedar Point. The place had roller coasters everywhere. One took you to the bathroom while the other brushed your teeth. There were sprightly young launch coasters and rickety old geezers and everything in between.



Instead, all I had to stare at was the Seattle Center Fun Forest Coaster; a pitiful mess of blue steel that dove into itself a dozen times before swirling around like a flushing toilet.




All the action was in L.A. I imagined Los Angelinos laughing and drinking cocktails on the beach before strapping themselves into a nice, shiny roller coaster for relaxation after a hard day at work.



For Hannukah one year, I received a Knex roller coaster kit. I assembled it all in one glorious weekend in our upstairs. Our cat, whom I'd named Snowy but everyone had been lazily referring to as "kitty," stood guard over the loop-de-loop, swiping at the descending coaster like it was a mouse on wheels.

I was alternately upset that she might ruin the tracks and pleased that she added to the "theming" of the ride. Perhaps I could call it "The Cat" and pretend she was an animatronic cat.

Months later, our non-animatronic cat tired of chewing our rug and began chewing and then throwing up parts of the Knex roller coaster. My parents would come home and find a mound of kitty barf on the rug with little pieces of yellow track in it.



My obsession with roller coasters was replaced with a musical theater obsession and then an obsession with boys and college. But I never really forgot those wild roller coaster days

About six months ago, I drove from Seattle to San Fran to visit a friend. As I was leaving the city, I saw a sign for Six Flags Marine World and, impulsively, I took the exit, paid for parking, and waited in line at the entrance.

I giddily skipped through the turnstiles, feeling that same sense of wonder. In line for a floorless roller coaster, I watched insurance ads on a flat screen TV.

The roller coaster was fun, but it hurt my head, and I stumbled out dazedly, wondering if I'd had an aneurysm.



The kids around me looked drunk on life. Before anyone offers you a cigarette and before you've had your first rum and coke, the real sign of adulthood is getting to ride on the big kid rides. It's really the only legal high at that age.

Now I'm a big kid and, as you can probably guess, it just doesn't feel the same.

"Now Will Him Over Here With Your Garbage Bag Eyes"

Deven Green is back!

Horrifying Youtube of the Day

Help! I'm trapped in a musical and I can't get out!

Pretzel Pose

I am not a fan of group activities. That's why I don't live in China. Take that, ghost of Mao! I reject you! I totally deleted all your text messages! So I was apprehensive about going to a hot yoga class in Greenlake. I don't like when people yell at me to correct my posture unless they are Wii Fit's computer animated trainers and they balance their critiques with motivational remarks like "Great form!" and "Way to go!" Even when Wii yells at me to "Straighten up!" I barely blush because, after all, I'm standing in front of a television in my basement.

Also, I am against Yoga culture. Namaste my ass. Yoga's whole "calm" aura is really grating. I don't believe people who do Yoga are really as calm as they say they are. I think some of them have issues that are not necessarily resolved by turning their body into a pretzel.

But I couldn't pass up I Love Hot Yoga's 10 session trial (just 30 bucks for a month of unlimited Yoga!). Some things, I figure, you really just have to give a try. As I waited outside the doors of the Yoga studio apprehensively, I scanned the faces of the departed for signs of heat exhaustion or mortification.

The studio was as dark and hot as a mother's womb. The women in the studio were on their backs, breathing heavily and purposefully as if they they were trying to rid themselves of evil spirits.

"Will people please make space in the front of the room?" the yoga instructor asked us in a slight guilting tone, as if we were already members in her moderately dysfunctional family.

I bent down and tried to touch my hands to the floor. It hurt a little bit, and I came back up. I've always treated my body as fearfully as one treats stray dogs or drunk Australians. "Are you sure you can do that?" I'm constantly asking myself.

Still, I did all the bends. I became a pretzel, a cadaver, then an airplane, a boat, a tee pee, a lounge chair, a tree with a penis, and the statue of liberty. My face got sweatier and angrier than a woman giving birth to triplets. On multiple occasions, I thought I was about to die. "This is it," I thought, "and the last thing I'll ever see is that nonsensical Lululemon logo."

By the end, I smelled like a sailor but I felt supernaturally relaxed. So relaxed, in fact, that I sat outside a Starbucks and stared at a cute boy until he stared back. I got his number.

I am now a fan of group activities. Sorry for ever doubting you, Mao. The only way to really burn ass fat, it seems, is with a slightly scary Bikram instructor standing over you and correcting your posture in a room that's 103 degrees.

I'm Graduating Soon

Can you believe it?? CAN YOU?? I CAN'T! I was just talking to my friend Jeremy about this. I was having a very wayward youth moment. Forgive the Daria-esque deadpan. "I've gotta do stuff when I graduate, you know... be things." "You don't have to graduate to be things" "Yes I do Jeremy, that's why I spent so much money on this."

But seriously guys. The following is a tentative list of future accomplishments:

cure youth in asia
save the pigeons
cut twigs on all the trees so they don't bring hurt to people's eyes.
teach old people how to sext
bring back the clog
eliminate all awkward pauses, fill in the dead noise with lady gaga's bad romance
cure death

It's going to be hard. But that's why I'm getting my B.A. in English.

Inside the Head of the Racoon Down the Street

Hi. I am a racoon. I know you are not. I'm just going to sit. So still. Right now. By the door.

Oop. You just moved. I was just moving my head because you moved.

Hi.

Your house is bright. Your garbage: So yummy. Was that organic chocolate? I'm full or I'd eat your leg. Mmmmmmmm.

Leg.

Was that your friend practicing her ridiculous dance by the window? She looks like a hooker.

I'm a conservative racoon.

Are you going to walk towards me or away from me?

Oh well, I'll tell you anyway. Today I was listening to NPR and it made me angry. Someone British was talking and it made me realize how much I hate Americans. Whenever a Brit is talking to an American, it's always just so much clearer who's the moral one! Anyway, they were interviewing this man about this great tragedy in some third world, an American by the way, and he kept on saying how he was so enamored by the way these poor people had held up despite the crisis. They had such nobility, he'd said. As if all poor people have nobility. My head wanted to explode! Hadn't he read all those essays in the back of "Heart of Darkness!" DISUGUSTING! If I could sign language some grotesque emotocon I would!

By the way: I don't respect your life.

I saw you watching that Buddhist film last night. I saw you wanting to laugh. And you call yourself a multiculturalist! Your whole lifestyle is a sham.

I know you mistrust me because of that thing I have going on around my eyes, but really you should mistrust me because I don't respect your life.

Sigh.

I'm done.

But you really are a silly people.

All I do is eat your garbage....

La, la, la.

You're still looking at me.

Do you think you're just staring at two disembodied floating shiny fireflies?

Those are my eyes.

Okay. Well. If you're just going to stand there, I'll continue.

Now I'm no intimidatingly muscley man myself, but I'd say you need to exercise more. I can tell. I see those shoulders. So hunched. I know, I know. You think it's more complicated than that. You think that happiness is some magical combination of funny SNL clips on Hulu and good books and bars with cute boys and the right cologne...but really you just need to work out more.

If you lived in the Himalayas with those Buddhists you watch in movies, you'd feel naturally energetic and happy every day because you'd be picking wheat and tying prayer flags and things like that. But you don't. That's why you're a mess.

(Racoons don't feel guilt. I don't regret just saying that. BTW!)

Also: okay. Now I know I'm going to sound like your mother (if your mother was a hip therapist who understood cultural phenoms like facebook and the debilitating power of the internet) but seriously, no more endlessly thinking about what kind of status update you want to write and then refreshing your Gmail inbox obsessively to see if someone's commented on your facebook status update. Have a little more self-respect. Phew. I really had to say that one.

Why can't you be more like that girl who played the fat girl in Precious? You saw those interviews. She has self-respect.

Basically, I wish you were a black woman.

Are you about to lunge for me? I hope you know I just stepped back so I could spring forward with renewed vigor and appetite for human flesh!

You're getting closer. You know I have friends in the honeybucket next door? I do. Really. You heard that story about how we ganged up on that old lady in Florida and ate her hair? We'll totally eat your hair. No more Mr. Jew Hair!

Oh, you're getting the mail.

Oh, and now you're gone.

So silent now.

So at peace.

Now I feel bad.

I think I need a more creative job where I can vent my frustrations through some kind of art. Not even for the attention. I just don't like being this angry all the time.

I'm going to go make a bath and listen to Feist.

Yes, I'm a hipster racoon. Bitch, don't even start.

Jersey Shore Season Finale Recap

This is what a feminist looks like.

Unless you've been plugging your ears and screaming "lalalalala!" when anyone speaks the words Jersey Shore, you surely must know about that gaggle of Italian Americans who live in a beach house, drink vodka smoothies and punch pedestrians who look at them funny.

You must also know about their star, Snookie - the legal midget with a self-tanner mustache and Amy Winehouse beehive bun who dances by herself on beach boardwalks to attract muscle men she affectionately calls "Juiceheads."

Last night's episode, the season finale, provided much of the expected shaudenfreude. Everyone yelled at each other for an hour because of various things - snookie yelled (and cried) because she ran into an ex while dancing embarrassingly alone on a boardwalk, one man with a metallic rose on his shirt yelled about this dude he punched in the last episode, and Jenni (Jay Woww) yelled because, for some reason, all of the hot muscle men failed to come to the beach boardwalk that day.

One lesson I took from the show was this: if you have muscles on your body, you can pretty much have a relationship with anyone in the world. What a grossly inaccurate impression of life you consistently provide, MTV! For example, Mike "The Situation," who has shoulders longer than a piano (and is what, forty years old?) found a bikini-clad 18-year-old girl on the beach and then proudly announced to all viewers the two of them would be dating for the next four months. See, she has an "eighteen year old ass" and he has a Bally's body, and really isn't that all you need to make a relationship? In the world of MTV, yes.

The show ended on a sweet note. To comfort Snookie about her boy problems, all the boys sat on her butt like it was one huge whoopie cushion. Then Mike, "The Situation," made out with her face in a hot tub. Snookie- the little cherub - sat in the hot tub and laughed. Because she felt self-conscious after all that kissing in front of millions of viewers? Because she saw semen floating in the water? "Don't think", said the editing. "Just stare at her boobs."

And then it was over.

Besides making me feel like I needed a cigarette (preferably one filled with crack), the show didn't have much affect on me. Somewhat surprisingly, I didn't feel violated, nor depressed about the state of humankind. Compared to the Jerry Springer Show, Jersey Shore is Oprah- all it did was make me laugh and feel all warm inside.

Los Angeles

"EWW! EWW EWW EWW!" screamed my roommate Zara from downstairs. Zara was on bathroom duty and today was the day she had chosen to clean the black mold in our bathroom.

I'm not a particularly morbid person but black mold makes me think about my own demise. Maybe it's the name: black mold. Sounds like black plague, black licorice, Black Sabbath. Black mold is the queen sheeba of terrifying things. If all upsetting things you rarely think about were graphed on paper (randomly choking on a strawberry, developing a severe allergic reaction to snickerdoodles just as soon as a plateful ends up on your table) black mold would surely rise to the top of the Y axis, and beyond, because it fucking flies in the air, is invisible, and can make you hyperactive while hurting your brain.

I was contemplating this the day I flew from Los Angeles to Seattle. I was flying Christmas day and the airport was empty except for smatterings of Jews and Asians. We should start a club, really. And then I spotted my fellow Seattleites: a huddled mass of fleece jackets and stiff shoulders gathered to the right of the terminal, in the one area with no sunlight.

I opened an LA Times and picked at my wilting Starbucks panini. I was not in a particularly flirty mood. I was thinking about mold and my own demise. And then I heard this over the P.A.:

"Mistah Blum! I repeat: Mistah Blum! Will Mistah Blum please come to gate 75?"

Read that in the voice of a sarcastic drag queen and you'll understand the thrill of what happened to me. Was this gorgeously flaming homosexual flirting with me?

I'm not a good flirt. At gay bars I look combative. I pick the pettiest corner and wait until I see someone who might have something sardonic to say. After I've extracted enough social commentary to fill a novel, I go about the seduction process.

I'm not sure if I've ever been a good flirt. After coming out, I look back at my childhood and think "who was this boy and did he flirt?" Everyone asks you, after you've come out, if you ever liked a girl, ever, ever? No, I didn't. So who did I flirt with when I was a child? I'm not sure. Dolls? Maybe dolls. That sounds quite sad. I hope I didn't flirt with dolls.

"How are we today, Mistah Blum?"

"I'm good,"

"Would we like an aisle or a window seat today, Mistah Blum?"

"Window please."

"Are we traveling alone, Mistah Blum?"

"Yes we are."

"It will be sad to see you leave, Mistah Blum."

"Stop it! You're embarrassing him!"

"No, this man is a celebrity! He wants the attention!"

"I don't want to leave L.A."

That last line of mine was a risk. I admitted it: I didn't want to leave L.A. I was flirting the only way I know how to flirt: by being painfully honest. In Europe, they loved it. Here, it tends to freak people out. But not this man. "You could stay at my place." he responded. I seriously contemplated the offer, then laughed. He was offering me a way out and I pretended I didn't notice. He knew I didn't want to leave L.A. He knew I couldn't not be honest about that. In fact, he seemed to like it.

Still, I shut it down.

"Thanks, but I have to go back to, err, school."

Lamest response ever. I didn't even sound excited about it. It was like rejecting a free Disneyland trip for a dentist appointment.

The plane was a noticeably more somber affair. I sat next to a woman who's eyes never left her Stephen King novel. She shut the window as if she didn't want to be reminded of the swaying palm trees waving goodbye.

If I could do it all over, I think I would have taken him up on his offer. He told me he lived in West Hollywood. It could have been interesting.

"It's Giving Me This Great, Weird Hope Right Now"

My friend Anna sent me a youtube today. I hope you like.