TALES OF FAIRFIELD COUNTY: GOIN' SPOOKIN'

Just another Saturday night in Fairfield County.

The squeal of tires peeling out cut through the silence of the night like a bone saw through a cadaver’s chest. To Duffy it was a trumpet’s blare heralding a night of intoxicant-fueled adventure, and with his pal, Root, at the wheel the evening was pregnant with possibility, dude.

They’d been prowling the privileged back streets of Westport in search of any sort of diversion; slutty girls in three-sizes-too-small Led Zepplin T’s who might sloppily suck their dicks if plied with some peach schnapps, scoring a connection for booger sugar at the local arcade — provided they could get past the rinky-dink security set up by that faggot gangster pedophile who owned the place and had kicked them out two weeks previous for booting beer foam and half-digested light-bulb-warmed pizza all over the Space Invaders console — , spray-painting pejorative graffiti against their high school administrators on the outer wall of the high school's field house, spraying accelerants into mailboxes and sparking them up, ragging on all those fuckin’ homos and dykes coming out of the Brook Café…

Man, any of that shit could happen and be awesome, but the boys needed something special. Really special, but what’d be totally fucking perfect?

The repeating strobe blur of affluent suburbia’s demi-mansions looming, all bright and ostentatious in front of them, swept swiftly past and smeared across the windows as they faded into the rear, only to start over again. The glow-in-the-dark orange of the too-close full moon.

Yeah… The acid’s wrestlin’ with the pot, and with a backseat cooler full of beers and hard liquor, there was a whole world of epic thrills to be conquered. They were fuckin’ heroes, man, scouring the badlands for boredom so they could kick it in the fuckin’ ass! All they needed was a sign from the gods of partyin’, and their task would be made clear.

The car wound its way through the labyrinth of Valley Road, and it took all of Root’s skills as a drunk driver to keep it on the right side of the street. Rounding a sharp corner, the pairs' addled vision spotted a white-lipped nigger in what looked like a foxhunting jacket holding out his arm, offering a rusty metal ring. And wouldn’t you know it? Fucking coon isn’t getting out of our way, and he’s mockin’ us, standin’ like a fuckin’ faggot!

The car swerved into a shrub arrangement in an effort to avoid running over the stupid spook and Root killed the engine with a bitter flick of his wrist, twisting the key free from the dash. He half-leapt, half-fell from the vehicle onto the lawn and hollered, “What’s yer fuckin’ problem, boy?” at the ebony figure. Then the boys realized it was just a cement lawn jockey, but it was oh-so-much more than just that. It was their sign. Tonight they would head out of Westport and go spookin’!

As Witchfinder General’s imaginatively titled “Witchfinder General” bansheed out of the car’s speakers, their Camaro crossed the Saugatuck Bridge, nearing the border of Norwalk, specifically South Norwalk. The place was totally without morals, man, and stuffed with all the spooks they’d need for their little bit of entertainment.

Spookin’ was a game of timing and skill, definitely not for pussies. The object was to find a nigger, drive up right next to him and yell, “Hey, nigger!” as loud as possible, and then haul ass. You had to haul ass because otherwise the spook might haul you out of the car and kill you. Then they’d fuck you, and whatever else they do to lead up to one of their cannibal feasts. And for the really brave, the perfect way to spice up spookin’ was to drive as fast as possible after a likely boogie and chase the fucker, even all over the sidewalk. And who cared if you fucked up one of their lawns, or fences, or even a front porch? Their houses were all fucking rat traps anyway. And if you hit one of the chocolate folks, the local cops couldn’t care less; just one more of them offa the streets so they don’t have to bother with arresting them in the first place. It was a win/win any way you looked at it.

As the last of his twelfth Coors trickled down his gullet, Duffy tossed the beer can over his shoulder, adding to the mountain of discarded aluminum in the back seat, and began rolling a fat joint. He sparked the end and inhaled deeply, eventually passing the illicit smoke to Root. A navigator needed to be sharp, and a good hit was just what the doctor ordered. Root sucked down several lungfulls, washed them down with a slug of peach schnapps, and complemented the thick liquor with a beer chaser. Soon now, very soon…

Duffy slapped Root on the shoulder and pointed to a teen spook on the sidewalk ahead of them. Root smiled like a Jack ‘o lantern and gunned the engine. With a roar, the Camaro accelerated at the kid like a shot, and the wide-eyed smudge ran for his life.

Knocking over trash cans, Root and Duffy whooped and hollered as the car bore them on their hunt, every nerve alive, every sense sharp; so sharp that the boy they pursued looked like three people, and when all three lined up the target would be had.

The kid dove over a flimsy picket fence and landed face first into a soggy bag of raked leaves, narrowly missing being clipped by the speeding Camaro. The car halted, and the boys stuck out their heads to yell, “Hey, nigger!” Laughing, they peeled out into the street at eighty miles per hour, looking over their shoulders through the rear window at the spooked spook.

The boys were thrown forward by the sledgehammer impact as the front end of the Camaro wrapped itself around the street lamp they swerved into. Duffy’s football-thug bulk torpedoed through the windshield, crushing his skull and shredding the flesh from his face, his corpse rolling to an eventual stop in the garbage-strewn street. Root’s teeth were savagely wrenched from his mouth and dispersed into his esophagus upon making contact with the unyielding steering wheel. His neck snapped back and he began to choke on the blood and dental fragments.

Soon the Camaro ignited, and the unconscious Root's flesh fused with the now-molten pleather seat cushions.

Just another Saturday night in Fairfield County.

TRUE LIFE ADVENTURES: FUN, FROLIC AND FLATULENCE AT THE NUDIE BAR (1995)

Let's set the Wayback Machine for 1995 and the bachelor party of my brother from the Marvel Comics Bullpen, Darren Auck.

Darren lived in the New Jersey 'burb known as Manville — which he affectionately referred to as "Squirrelville" — the kind of not-quite-hillbilly area in the north where flicks like MOTHER'S DAY and LET'S SCARE JESSICA TO DEATH take place, remote in location and secluded enough for really bad things to happen to wayward passers-through and have no one be any the wiser. And there I was, a six-foot black Manhattanite, stepping off the train into an area where I was likely to find myself as the main ingredient in an award-winning batch of homemade chili.

I waited at the train station for Darren's pal Gary to pick me up and reflected upon the vast green fields and decaying, abandoned farm houses I observed through the train's window while on my way in from the Rotten Apple, and noticed how little traffic there was on the main road. I half expected to see a horse-drawn carriage pull up and its driver attempt to trade me some hand-crafted bee-garters, possum-flensers, Chippewah trout marmalade or some other such rustic gewgaws, but the place was too devoid of life for even that.

Eventually Gary arrived and we began our drive to Darren's abode, a domicile located yet further into the backwoods of Squirrelville, past drooping overhangs of dying ivy and the rotting facades of barns and long-deserted homes that had finally succumbed to the rigors of age and disrepair, giving up the ghost and collapsing in upon themselves. As we journeyed on I noticed the locals all seemed to walk the streets in a state of dazed stupefaction, sort of like Mayberry by way of George Romero, some equipped for a day's fly fishing and stopping off at the lone, aged gas station to purchase live bait from a rusting, refrigerator-sized monolith that looked like one of those old, barely-functioning coffee and hot soup dispensers once so common at roadside rest stops as found during hellish family road trips.

Taking in the Twilight Zone-ish ambiance I looked at Gary and asked, "Are there any black people in this place?" to which he responded, "There are now."

When we got to Darren's place we waited for the rest of the bachelor party brigade to arrive, passing the time with a few beers and a couple of hits off of some questionable hand-rolled "party favors." After about an hour we were ready to depart, so the motley crew of Darren's old friends, assorted drunks and comics-biz compatriots piled into a van captained by Michael Kraiger, our designated driver and tall, handsome type known around the Marvel Bullpen by the horny staffer females who'd drop by to check him out as "the Lumberjack." (And for the record, Darren was "the Cowboy," thanks to his lanky build, laid-back manner, and southern accent. Plus, he kinda looked like the guy from the Village People.)

The van took off and headed down the highway toward our final destination of Allentown, PA and a nudie bar called "Erv's," but before we got there we had to stop off and stock up on enough liquor to make a longship full of Vikings hesitate to join us; Erv's was one of those places that only served really crappy beer, Heineken being the best you could hope for, so you had to bring your own hard stuff. (Liquor, that is.) The guys in the crew were all hardcore party juggernauts after my own heart, so the inevitable gallons of tequila were acquired, along with a goodly helping of assorted vodkas, bourbons, and a couple of bottles of Jaegermeister for good (bad?) measure. Only one errand then remained and that was to wisely fortify our gullets with food before the ancient-Rome-style imbibing commenced.

Our merry little vehicle drove into a Burger King parking lot in some nameless no-man's land, and we scarfed down the flame-broiled goodness with gusto, our cannibis-activated appetites thankful for surcease of the hunger that inflamed our hive-consciousness. The two bacon double-cheeseburgers sat in my belly like cement, but I was glad of their presence in anticipation of them helping to offset the imminent effects of the debauchery to come.

Once finished with my meal, I went outside for some fresh air and ended up standing not far from the van, right next to the entrance to the drive-through window. A car pulled up to the speaker and as soon as the father finished ordering food for the slavering pack of children that filled the station wagon, all of their eyes turned toward me and they stared like I'd just grown an extra head. Puzzled, I tried to figure out what I had done to cause them such interest; did I have a foot-long booger trailing from my nostril? In my stoned state had I taken the pickles from my burgers and affixed them to my nipples like sour, vegetable matter pasties? Did I have on a t-shirt emblazoned with "Never Trust Anything That Bleeds for Seven Days and Doesn't Die?" Was my cock hanging out of my jeans?

And then it hit me.

I wandered up to car, smiled, and amiably and said, "Hi! I'm a Negro!" at which point the family drew back as if I'd thrown an open bag full of rattlesnakes through the driver's side window, swiftly rolled up their own windows and hauled ass out of sight to grab their sack of food. I laughed my ass off, and so did Gary who had seen the whole incident. As Daffy Duck so wisely said, "What the hey? I gotta have some fun!" And after that the van took off once more, Man...Or Astro-Man's "Reverb 10,000" blasting out of the speakers and lending just the perfect skewed soundtrack to our odyssey.

It was nighttime when we finally made it to Erv's and its sleazy vibe reminded me of the title strip joint in the teen sex-comedy "classic" PORKY'S, what with the garish exterior lighting and loud, greasy bump-and-grind tunes issuing from within. After hauling our coffin-sized cache of booze into the place, we situated ourselves about the bar and began drinking in earnest, all the while ogling the pretty sorry herd of wobbly, gyrating go-go gals. Several of these chicks looked exhausted, wasted on horse, or both, and I kicked down shots of Jose Quervo in rapid succession to adjust my mood to a place where I wouldn't care how fucked up the performers were. But, to be fair, this wasn't exactly the farm team for the Bolshoi, so I pretty much had no choice but to let it go.

After about forty-five minutes I began to feel a part of the drunken, fleshly excesses happening all around me, the Cuervo and multiple beers finally working their magic. I was actually rather bored by the whole thing, but I was there to represent on what would supposedly be Darren's last night out with the boys — little did I realise that his blushing bride, Danielle, was just as much of a reprobate as Darren, so future nights like this were in no way out of the question — so I soldiered on, trying to garner some kind of titillation from the girls, an effort that utterly failed thanks to me not finding heroin addicts attractive, even if they did take the stage in huge, nerdy glasses and a Catholic schoolgirl's uniform which were both soon to be gone like a ball gown on prom night.

As previously stated, Irv's was not a titty bar, but a full-frontal, "you can see her kidneys" sort of establishment, and the well-marinaded crowd of crusty, senior citizen regulars were happier about it than pigs in shit, their eyes filled with visions of not-so-tastefully-splayed pink "luncheon meat," a humid tableau of what would have been otherwise mouth-watering labial bits pulled open in what looked to be a painful display of gynecological odds and ends, bringing to my mind the results of a med school autopsy where you see the organs in close, explicit detail and don't connect them at all with the individual whom they were attached to. Just glistening, steamy, disassociated parts.

I've never been very comfortable in titty/nudie bar or bachelor party situations for a few reasons:

1. I find such places to be degrading for the most part, their audience of leering men fueling an industry predicated upon despair and an easy way for the girls to make fast wads of cash since they don't really need any sort of training — we men are not necessarily all that discerning when presented with cute nekkid chicks — and they're (usually) born with all the equipment they'll ever need to do the job.

2. I enjoy seeing real dancers really dance, and while there are certainly women in the bump & grind biz who have that ability, they are few and far between thanks to an audience that doesn't give a fuck whether a "peeler" can actually move, just so long as they can stare at her juddering boobies.

3. Many of the men who frequent such establishment come from the most depressing level of the mating game's food chain and are not comfortable with interacting with women outside of a titty/nudie bar setting, an effort that requires cleaning up their acts a bit — both in terms of appearance and personal hygiene — and having the confidence to take the risk of being rejected. In the strip joint environment they get what they want, no questions asked, and delude themselves into thinking that they have the power. Try talking to one of those girls when you've run out of fivers to stuff into their G-strings, and lets see how far you get...

4. And speaking of money, I find it a flagrant waste of moolah to hand dancers untold amounts of cash and not even get any pussy out of the deal. I have taken women out for dinner, a show, and after-show drinks for less than half of what I've seen some guys shell out at go-go joints on a nightly basis, and the women I took out were not only great conversationalists and lots of fun to go out with, they also quite willingly shared their bodies with me and, in some cases, stuck around for a few days for more tender bedtime fun (and my famous morning-after breakfast skills). I'll take that over blowing cash for no results any day!

5. The thing that bothers me most about go-go joints in general and the ones in NYC in particular is an atmosphere that sometimes sets off my most primal of danger signals; I was at one bachelor shindig where the entertainment rather graphically performed a catalog of non-simulated sex acts upon each other and then proceeded to take on any guys who were willing to pay for play, all of which was presided over by their graying, fifty-something "manager" from the most marinara-steeped depths of Bensonhurst. I knew several of the attendees, but those I didn't know had the vibe of wolves that had survived a very hard winter and were in need of prey. Any prey. And some of them even took up the entertainment on their offer, undeterred by the girls' obvious state of heroin-induced euphoria. That sordid display was the last time I attended a bachelor party, and I have scrupulously avoided them ever since.

So taking all of that into mind, you can imagine that I was not exactly having a good time.

Just as I was about to regret not having brought a book to read, my eye was caught by an athletic blonde who hit the bar's central runway looking far more alive and full of vigour than her co-workers, her every movement commanding the dance floor with a cheerful and ballsy exuberance. She strutted down the catwalk with the attitude of one who was in on the joke, channeling the spirit of Tex Avery's Red Hot Riding Hood cartoon character — no easy feat considering that the sound system blared out Foreigner's "Cold As Ice," a tune not exactly conducive to sexy dancing — and flashing dazzling smiles accentuated by her crystal blue eyes.

Tex Avery's indelible Red Hot Riding Hood.

She paraded around the bar for a couple of circuits, slowing only to allow the coffin-dodgers access for bills to be stuffed into her garter belt, and when her appointed rounds were done she lay down upon the bar, legs spread at nine and three in an impressive display of limberness, touched the tips of her thumbs together and pointed her index fingers toward the ceiling, framing her dolphin-smooth pubic mound with her hands in a gesture that simulated a sports arena goal. Responding to what must have been a familiar signal at Irv's, the grody old patrons fumbled with their foldable currency, shaping their bills into paper footballs of the type seen while waiting for time to pass during after-school detention, and in no time the pretty blonde's cooter was showered with the most impressive display of raining artillery since the bombing of Dresden. None of the grubby green missiles arrived with enough force to penetrate her most private of regions, but she did get to keep every bit of cash that accumulated, and she kept the oldsters smiling and entertained. During all of this she laughed her ass off and smiled at the codgers, each of whom looked so loyal to her that I'd bet they would have shoved their canes and walkers straight through the sternum of anyone foolhardy enough to try to do her harm.

That thought did much to relax me — along with the steady stream of tequila and Piel's — and as I was kicking back my latest beer, the sweaty performer stepped down from the bartop, pulled up a stool right next to me and began to towel off without a trace of modesty. She turned toward me and asked, "Could you hold on to this for me?" as she thrust her damp towel toward me and began to comb out the sweaty tangles in her hay-hued tresses (don't ask me where she got the comb from).

By this point I was drunk enough to find nothing odd about some random, blonde naked woman talking to me as if I'd known her bare-assed self my whole life, so I politely draped her towel over my leg and asked if she could use a beer. "Oh, God, Yeah!" she enthusiastically responded. "I'm fucking parched! Thanks a lot!" I paid for her beer and handed it to her, at which point I introduced myself, and when she shook my hand she almost identified herself by her real name but caught herself in time, instead saying, "Pleastameetcha! My name's Arizona. 'S where I'm from." I nodded, and we resumed drinking.

Arizona then regaled me with tales of her misadventures while working at Erv's to fund her college education — "Screw student loan payments!" she cried — and if she was to be taken at her word the scurvy assortment of geriatrics that drooled all over her (and themselves) were a harmless lot, described by her as "kind of like your dirty old grandpa," and they really didn't bother her in the least. She admitted that the nudie gig was nothing more than a means to an end, something that she would move past once she was done with school, and then on to bigger and better things. The conversation then got truly animated as she started rattling off books she'd enjoyed between her sets, and she revealed herself to be quite well-read. After that we chatted about art, movies, music, and a whole bunch of other shit, and I finally began to enjoy myself. I didn't even notice that Arizona was naked after about three more beers, so that either says a lot about how wrecked I was, or how much I should start investing in boxed sets of the complete recordings of Liza Minelli and Barbara Streisand.

Arizona kept her shit together, but the effects of the beers began to creep up on her, as became apparent when she began loudly heckling her fellow dancers. One dancer in particular staggered out onto the runway in an obvious state of narcotic submission, barely able to stand on her stiletto heels, and attempted to boogie down to the highly inappropriate strains of Tavares' "More Than A Woman." This pathetic sight struck both myself and Arizona as hysterical and we soon had our arms about one another, singing along with the falsetto voices in the most irreverent of tones, earning us nasty looks from the dancer and a hurled tinfoil ashtray from one of the old coots.

Suddenly I heard a loud, burbly rumble, audible over the general din and emanating from my stomach. Yes, my bacon double-cheeseburgers had decided to fight back in protest against the other abuses I'd put into my body over the course of the last few hours, so I excused myself and headed for the men's room, leaving Arizona to continue the mockery by her lonesome. Squeezing my asscheeks together with Herculean strength, I pigeon-toed it to the can and launched myself toward the nearest stall.

Upon entering the bathroom — a stenching, dilapidated pestilence factory that could easily have been transported from the Black Hole of Calcutta — I noted a six-foot long trough filled with ice, a measure that in no way cut the harsh, ammonia stench of old man piss. I turned away from that reeking trench and spotted the lone stall, which was, to my abject horror, missing a door — presumably to deter any Onanistic fun — meaning I would have to drop trou and let my ass do its Vesuvius impression with no hope of privacy as I hung onto the well-worn seat for dear life while the tremors had their way with me. Nonetheless, the bomb had to drop.

As I sat and agonized, discovering religion that I didn't know I had as I prayed to any and all benevolent deities for mercy, the main door burst open and a wobbly old geezer meandered in, staring straight into the stall and directly at my tortured mug. "Vzzzasgcvkxdrblmnd!" he said while fumbling with his belt and fly. Then it dawned on me: Grandpa was getting ready to whip out his gnarled old piss-pipe and relieve himself.

All. Over. Me.

In blind panic I began to scream and howl, "NOOOOO!! NOOOOO, YOU DRUNK OLD FUCK!!! THE TROUGH IS BEHIND YOU! JESUS CHRIST, IT'S BEHIND YOOOOOU!!!" all while impotently kicking at him with my black jeans and boxers down around my ankles, and a huge turd hanging out of my ass like I was a goddamned angel fish. Grandpa cocked his head, stopped whipping out his tadger and exclaimed, "Whuffukkayadooninair?!!? Fuggnjergoff..." before turning around and melting patches of ice with his foamy, golden bounty.

My body then went limp and my upper half fell to one side, supported by a rickety, graffiti-festooned wall.

I soon finished my bombing mission, tidied up, and rejoined Arizona at the bar, flattered that she was concerned when I took off like a shot. We then drank away the rest of the night while Darren and the rest of the party began to wind things down, but before we left, Arizona treated me to a freebie photo of the two of us so I would have a souvenir of our weird-assed evening.

Looking back at it now, I wish I'd thought to get Grandpa to pose with us.

The ride back to Squirrelville went by in a blur, the tequila and beer having long erased my understanding of linear time progression, and I forget how it happened but I ended up actually getting a lift back to my apartment on Manhattan's Upper West Side, safe and sound and able to collapse in my own bed, soon to face a monster hangover the next afternoon.

Every once in a while I wonder whatever happened to Arizona. I hope she's doing okay and has left the flesh palace behind in her memory, discarded with other jobs from youth such as Burger King hostess, veterinary cage-mucker, and paper route deliverer of GRIT.

THE SECRET WORLD OF WOMEN

Ladies, I love you all for a million reasons and am forever grateful for my ability to be able to hang out with you and have you feel completely comfortable, so much at ease that you let loose and just be yourselves, shedding the veneer of ladylike comportment and revealing your secret, vulgar wench. For you guys out there who don’t realize it, women may at times chastise us dudes for our tasteless and/or “gross” behavior and project outrage over such mannish ways offending their tender sensibilities, but lemme tell ya that chicks are far, far worse in their bluntness and take-you-there discussions of their bodily functions, secretions, excretions, and hairiness. I've complained about being on the receiving end of this over the years, but as of the other night I officially give up and accept my fate.

Since I was in my tweens, for better or worse I’ve been given access to the secret world of women thanks to being a pretty good listener who can offer a decent piece of advice once in a while, and because my presence gives some of them a guinea pig to see just how much estrogenic candor even a supposedly enlightened male can take and at times that free pass into the earthier realm of feminine discourse has given me both pause and great amusement. For instance, when it comes to talking about their monthly, moon-related woes, some women use such charming euphemisms as “the drip,” “chumming” — as in “Yeah, I’m chumming and the Great White’s on it’s way,” with Great White being a brilliant nickname for a tampon or sanitary napkin — and “flushing out the pink sink,” but I particularly love a blanket term for women coined by a waitress I know. She refers to herself and other females as “bleedies,” and the first time I heard her say that I nearly snarfed the beer I was drinking out of my nose and onto the waitress’ mouth-watering rack.

The mention of their own equipment in terms that de-eroticizes the female form is quite sobering and it makes me remember that a woman’s body is not just some strokeable, fuckable rec room of smooth skin and jubbly bits, but also a biological machine heir to malfunctions and aesthetic/olfactory unpleasantness and mundanity just as annoying and repulsive as those experienced by guys, only women deal with such matters in a more realistic and function-oriented way. My friend Nina, a terrific lady I met during my notorious collegiate years, was needlessly critical of her physical attributes and once referred to her breasts as “udders,” thinking that they were in aspect more like the mammalian appendages found on common farm animals in general and goats in particular. I stopped short at that statement, bewildered by her harsh self-deprecation — I’d sneaked a peek at her goods more than once when she’d leaned over in my face, and I thought her girls were quite enchanting — but then her words clicked in the more analytical hemisphere of my brain and I said to myself, “Ya know, she’s right. Technically speaking, they are udders.” All horny thoughts that I could have had died instantly on the vine and I flashed on an image of Nina, all bespectacled, stoned, and smiling, her visage fused with the form of a she-goat in some barnyard or children's petting zoo, a Dr. Moreau-style chimera/humanimal whose udders wobbled to and fro like a rubber glove filled with ball bearings.

Absolutely no boner for that one, folks. But the ultimate boner killer goes to a discussion I witnessed the other night, a boozy exchange that gave me an all-new and all-horrifying term that I just have to share with you.

I was out with two women, a blonde and a brunette (who shall both remain nameless), who had both been imbibing quite heavily over the course of the evening, and when we piled into a cab bound for Brooklyn the brunette of the pair began to question whether or not she should go to visit her boyfriend, her concerns stemming from the fact that she was having her period and suffering from a virulent urinary tract infection; this had been briefly discussed earlier in the evening and the blonde, who didn’t like the boyfriend, suggested that the brunette should give it a miss. I volunteered that such issues could be worked around, a point that put the brunette at ease, and we left it at that while we pursued the night’s other distractions.

So we’re on our way back to Brooklyn and I’m in the back of a cab with these two bombed chicks, when the brunette begins to whine about her need for a proper seeing-to and how it conflicted with the current sorry state of her Good Place. She moaned on and on about “but I’ve got my period,” or “I’ve got a UTI,” all while her head kept flopping over onto my shoulder and chest. That wouldn’t necessarily have been so bad if the two of them hadn’t then decided to regale me with tales of the many times they’d been kicked out of taxis before arriving at their destinations thanks to them puking all over the cab’s back seat. They drunkenly guffawed at the time the brunette had to copiously vomit into the blonde’s handbag and how they both had to scoop up the puke and chuck it out the window as the car sped across the Manhattan Bridge, the brunette vomiting endlessly all the while.

As visions of myself getting covered in half-digested hot dogs, gin, and single-malt whiskey flashed in my mind, the gynecological debate resumed, this time with the blonde taking command and offering that no guy would want to see the brunette in the condition she was in; “Look at yourself! You’re fuckin’ wasted, you’re slurring your words and you look like a fuckin’ retard. And now you wanna go see this guy and you’re all fucked up down there, and you’ve got your period, plus a UTI, and you’re gonna put your boy through that? You know what you’ve done? You’ve fuckin’ tripe-bagged him, dude. You’ve fuckin’ tripe-bagged him! No guy wants to be face-to-face with that shit! Jesus!”

Yes, “tripe-bagged.” In other words, getting nailed in the face with gory butcher’s waste.

I have to say that at the same time as it’s completely stomach-turning, as a wordsmith I had to admire the term for its one-hundred percent effectiveness in conveying both the blonde’s point, and for its ability to conjure up an image of how H.P. Lovecraft may have perceived an issue of HUSTLER (I know HUSTLER doesn’t depict pussies that look like they’d been hit full-throttle by the Superchief, but you get my point).

So we eventually dropped off the brunette (she of the slaughterhouse vadge) and relegated her boyfriend to an evening of being “tripe-bagged.”

Tripe and onions. Uh, I'll pass...

And on that note, do any of you have more such charming turns of phrase that I can add to my lexicon? What other horrible shit have you been holding out on me? Please feel free to write in and contribute!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The blonde genius behind "tripe bagging," and pals.

A FORMATIVE INFLUENCE

I've been fascinated by the history of witchcraft since I was eight years old, at which point I acquired a copy of Peter Haining's superb WITCHCRAFT AND BLACK MAGIC (1972), part of the Knowledge Through Color series, via (believe it or not) the Scholastic Books program. 

Remember, kids: Knowledge is power!

It was a serious book on the history of witchcraft, mostly as seen in Europe and early America, and it pulled zero punches in describing all of the nastiness  that anti-witch crusaders wanted the general public to believe, and it even included reproductions of ultra-graphic woodcuts and pamphlets outlining assorted tortures administered by "professional" witch-hunters and agents of the Spanish Inquisition, so you can imagine what an education it was for this eight-year-old. From that formative influence I developed a taste for horror stories about witchcraft, especially those that hewed close to what was historically believed to have been practiced by real witches, and being awakened to the fact that the anti-witch hysteria and persecution was perpetrated by misogynistic criminals who feared wise women did nothing to diminish my taste for the sub-genre.