What Did I Say?

It seems that I haven't posted here in a while, which has not been for lack of silly and useless things to say: it's just that I've been rather drunk for a while. And before you ask, it's not with love or life or any of that shiny happy fluffy clouds and furry pink bunnies shit. Nope. It's all about the booze for old Uncle Fondleberries.

Sure, I've managed to get to work, pay some bills, and perform other activities of daily living, but I did it all with my pants on backwards and my zipper down. What is the sound of one butt cheek clapping? Grasshopper: get more beer.

Wait, what did I say? I ask that question every morning after, slightly excited but slightly more afraid to learn the answer.

Waiting for Godot-Guffman's Parents to Finally Succumb to Cirrhosis of the Closet Drinker's Liver

There is a small part of me that wishes that phone calls with my parents were normal. That is, that there would be a beginning, a middle, and an end that didn't involve one or more of us being drunk, and that there would be meaningful and understandable dialogue. This is never the case.

Here's a bit of what I can remember of a recent phone call with my parents.

The scene is the dining room of Lord Fondleberries lovely seaside home in a north shore subburb of Boston, MA. It is late but not bed time late.

Lord F is fairly well sloshed on cheap, old wine. He's on the phone, long distance, when the call waiting kicks in.

The phone: Annoying digital beep. Fucking annoying digital beep.

Lord F pulls the phone from his ear to look at the caller ID window: The parentals. Shit. Double shit, fuck, shit, and more shit. Fuck.

Uses internal voice Now, I know that Heather wants this call to be from my wonderfully oedipal mother. She wants my mom to say that she's got the perfect color theme-matching dress for the wedding, and that it's not teal, or mauve, or, fuck forbid, white, and that it doesn't have a sweep that would require no fewer than four midgets to carry it down the aisle. This would certainly end Heather's anxiety about my mother making a rediculously dramatic scene. Alas, I just know that this isn't the case, so I ignore the beep.

Lord F finishes the current conversation and hangs up the phone. Minutes later . . .

The phone: Ringgggg! Ringggg! In Samuel L. Jackson voice Hey, I said, Ring, bitch! The caller ID displays the parentals.

Lord F: Awww fuck.

More ringy, ringy from the phone.

Lord F Uses passive aggressive voice: Huh-Hello?

Dad Uses Darth Vader Voice, sans heavy breathing: Son. This. Is. The Father.

Lord F thinking he's using his internal voice, but speaking aloud: Awwww fuck. Why is it him? It can't be. He only calls when my ass needs to be on the line (read: beaten) for some pro-fill-in-the-anti-Republicunt-blank-here-shit, and he needs to tell me so. And I haven't marched for any Liberal causes lately, well, I am voting for Hillary and/or Obama in 2008, but he can't know that. It fucking can't be him. Suddenly realizing he's talking out loud. Oh, shit.

Dad: Huh?

Lord F: What? Nothing. I mean, huh-ehem-hi. Dude. (Dude?! I called him fucking dude. Shit, my liberal ass is fucked.)

Dad: Hi, son.

Lord F uses his internal voice internally thank fuck: Praise shit, he's hammered and didn't notice that I called him dude. Yay me! I'm slipping that in at least once more. Dude. Heh heh.

Dad slurring wildly now: Son. I need your help.

Lord F also slurring: Ok, go ahead.

Dad: Our credit card's been robbed.

Lord F uses internal voice: Our credit card's been robbed? We have a credit card together? And it's been broken into? Wait, he must think he's talking to my brother. They did give my 28 year-old brother a credit card for Christmas last year. It must be that.

Dad slurring: Son? You there? You hear what I say? It's been robbed into. On the internet. In London. Hello?

Lord F somewhat confused and/or pissed, and definitely drunk: Well whaddayou want me to do about it, I can't fix the internet, ya know. You better cancel that card, though. Understand? Shut it down! Now!

Dad: What? Cancel it?

Lord F: Shut it down, man! You have to get on that. Now!

Dad: Ok . . . ok . . . o . . . k. Slurps Jack Daniels and sighs.

Lord F: You get that? 'Cuz they'll get your bank account number and take all your money. Mumbling now. And I'm not taking you fuckers in.

On Dad's end of the line there is loud whispering and the sound of ice swirling around in a glass and hitting the side of the glass (chink chink).

Lord F: Shit. Mom.

Dad: Son. I'm handing you to the mother. Tell her what she needs to do. Laughs. You know me, son, I won't remember this in the morning, you know? It's my age. Not as spry as I used to be.

Lord F internal voice: You were spry? So many creepy and gross thoughts.

Dad: Ok, I'm putting your mother on. Shouts Mom?

Mom slurring so much she's barely intelligible: Hel-- Ha-- Helllllo?

Lord F: Hi.

Mom: Ok. How you? Good. Laughs.

Lord F because he's drunk, he can no longer mask his Boston accent: Look. Mah. Dad says yaw cahd got robbed.

Mom giggling: Mmmm hmmm. Sips from a glass.

Lord F: Can you hear me?

Mom: Yup. I think you are too.

Lord F: What? Jesus.

Mom: Why? You know what I love you ok?

Lord F: Yah. Great. Look, you gotta listen, ok?

Mom sighs and tries to shake of her drunkenness: Ok. I yam.

Lord F: Ya gotta go ta the website and shut off yaw credit cahd, ok?

Mom: Huh?

Lord F speaks slower and consequently slurs more: T o t h a s i t e. Cancel. Yaw. Cahd.

Mom incredibly confused and drunk: Where's your father? Dad? Dad?

Lord F: No Mah, he said to you wants to remember. Ok? You gotta do it, he can't anymore. Ok?

Mom: Yup. I got it.

Lord F: Got what?

Mom: I'll be the website for your father and he'll do the cahd. In the morning, ok? He's so sexy, I like him for it. You know what I'm saying?

Lord F: What? Good god, I don't need to hear that. There's not enough therapy in the world for me to hear that.

Mom: Wha?

Lord F: Listen, did you get what I said, about the cahd? Close it down at the website. Call me in the morning. I'm going to bed.

Lord F hangs up the phone and passes out face down at the desk.

Drinking and Baseball

Here's a quickie to keep the theme going: I couldn't be happier about the arrival of my fabulous new Drinking / Red Sox shirt . . .



It works so well with my sausage (and peppers) fingers. L O L.

Go Sox!

I wish my genes were jeans, so I could wash them and make them seem new again

Yeah, so, last night I drank a bottle of wine I had opened four weeks ago, and sat at the table taking oversized bites off a block of expired Romano cheese to satiate my appetite for being, well, a growing middle-aged drunk guy. As the t-shirt says, "Life is Good". I wish I had the waist line of the stick figure on that shirt. Alas, I am said middle-aged and growing drunk guy.

Both of my biological(?) parents are closet drinkers, as in they don't drink to their full potential in public settings, but get them home---in a taxi that I had to pay for or after a drunk driving accident, whichever comes first---and sobriety is just another word that starts with a letter of the alphabet that their combined fourth grade education never got to. I question the biology, as there is still some faint glimmer of hope that a sane and caring couple will step forward and claim me as their long-lost child. If any of you tries to take that hope away, I'll cut off your balls and/or tits and mail them to you.

As should be obvious from the first line of this post, I seem to have picked up my parents' affinity for all things alcohol (and most things of little to no dietary quality). I sat, braised in a cheap wine that was almost entirely grape flavored vinegar by the time I got to drinking it, and I wondered how far the proverbial apple actually falls from the genetically mutated tree. In my case, the apple never fell, it was plucked and made into apple wine. Yay, booze! You see, when it comes to my second favorite pass time (after reading of course), I'm certainly out of the closet. Let's see:

Drunk at parties: check
Drunk at shows: check
Drunk at ballgames or while watching ballgames on tv: check and check
Drunk at your house: check
Drunk at my house: check
Drunk at work (but only during thirsty Thursdays, beer hour Fridays, and at lunch): check

Well, it would appear that I've got the bases fully covered, as it were.

Still, I can't help but wonder what things would be like if I had different parents. Perhaps I would have turned out like this



Alas, as you all know, I turned out like this



I'm working on a follow-up to this post, a transcript based on what I can rememeber of a phone conversation that I had with both of my parents while the three of us were sloshed. I think there was plenty of international intrigue, political scandal, general villainry, and Darth Vader. It should be incoherent at best. I'm looking forward to it being a huge flop in the blogosphere, much like the rest of my posts.

Sunday and Not Drinking?

Sunday. Again. Online. Again. But I don't feel the usual shitty.

My skin is slightly pink. Eyes: wide open. Hands: no shakes. Breath: toothpaste fresh. And what the hell is this feeling of awakeness?

Sitting here at the desk, typing, I closed my eyes for a brief moment and all the things I think I could accomplish flashed before me. There I am vacuuming. And singing. And there I am grocery shopping: chicken, vegetables, milk . . . milk for fuck's sake. On the senate floor: "Mister President, end this war." Oh, there I am in a field, twirling, arms spread wide to the sides. "The hills are alive with the sound of I'm not hung over."

What the hell is all of this energy? Is this how people who can handle their alcohol consumption and set three-drink limits feel? Is it how people who get more than two hours of sleep each night feel? I'm frightened.

How the hell did this happen? We did go out last night. We did see Dane's jazz quartet. I did embibe. But I only had two drinks. I wasn't sloshed. I held no fewer than three conversations without slurring words or my eyes drifting apart. I drove home sober. I undressed and put my clothes away rather than in a pile on the floor; then I put on pajamas and got into bed.

And then something happened in Whoville that hadn't happened in seventeen years: this drunk grinch went to bed, and slept. For eight hours.

Now it's the next day, and I'm not hung over. What will I do with myself?

First, I'm off to get coffee. Then, who knows.

Perhaps I'll take up smoking.

Drinking and Saturday

Saturday. Again. Online. Again. Hung over. Again. I'm finally getting used to the hang over yellow skin, half-closed eyes, and ass dry mouth. It's the tiredness that sucks. The problem with drinking too much and not sleeping is well, the next day. And shit does the next day always come much too quickly.

Heather will have me cleaning the house soon. So I'm enjoying the slacker time while it lasts. I like having a clean house, but would rather have a small army of brown people clean it for me. All the neighbors have various teams of people who show up once each week with vacuums and cleaners and paper towels and various undocumented dialects. And poof. Their house is clean. If only keeping up with the Jones' didn't require so much cash. Perhaps I'll steal one of these little brown cleaning dynamos and keep him in my basement for my own private use. Alas, I do not believe the Jones' would allow one of their cleaning staff to disappear. This is too bad, I hear they make fabulous mojitos.

Tonight we're heading to the Peabody Essex Museum to see my friend Dane sing. That should be swell, and will likely be served with at least several martinis. This will inevitably turn into a hang over, and the next day. I'm afraid of change, so this pattern of drinking and the next day might be just what I need. Either that or some good old fashioned monkey lovin.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

It is much later in the day. And we haven't yet cleaned the house. In fact, we haven't done much of anything. Heather's not feeling well, so she'd gone off to watch the telly. I joined in a while ago and caught the end of The White Rapper Show, which was followed by Snoop Dogg's Rags to Riches special. I am now convinced that fat white chicks should not go out in public, much less rap with New York beeyatch-like accents on cable television. I have to pay for cable, so I should get what I want. And I do not want fat rapping white chicks. This reminds me of the t-shirt with the "no fat chicks" logo. Holy shit, I hope that I'm not becomming a Texan.

I don't believe that Jesus is the saviour. I don't believe every American must own a gun. I have at least one black friend. I hate George W. Bush and, well, conservatives and neoconservatives and the religious right and the rest of the republicunts. Phew. I'm not a Texan.

I fucking hate VH1: it is the most evil shit fucking channel in the history of television, and it should be stopped. But I'm not the guy to put an end to it. I'll leave that for someone else. All I ask is to be texted when it's done.

I believe we're still heading out tonight, which means that I should at least wash some clothes. And take a shower. I'd rather not leave the house smelling as I currently do.

Damn these hang over blues. I'm not sure if hang over is one or two words or whether it should be hyphenated. I don't much care at the moment, so it will remain two words as I have typed it.

The alcoholic's conscience is kicking in: I should probably take a night or two off from the sauce. It's not likely that I'll heed this advice. But it sounds like the right thing to do. For my liver. And my increasingly distended stomach. Oh, and Heather might like it if we made it through a conversation without my speech slurring or my eyes going wonky.

That's all for now. I've got a few blogs to check up on before logging off for the night.

A Seatbelt, A Shot of Windex, and My Crotch

Last night, while drunk and driving home from dining out, I was heard saying, "it only has to look like it's on". I was referring to my seatbelt.

I'm normally a safety conscious driver. I put on my seatbelt before starting the car. I am aware and considerate of other drivers. I use the directional to signal upcoming turns, even when turning into my driveway. When I'm lit and driving, however, anything goes. I fancy myself a cannonballer at such times. Dah, Dah, Dah! Captain Chaos!

Last night, after slinging back a few (including what I am fairly sure was a double shot of Windex with a splash of lemon juice in it), the Captain appeared to chariot me home.

I was skillfully swirving over the yellow line and back while hiccupping madly, when I saw straight ahead the flashing blue lights of a police car. Realizing that I was a) hammered, b) driving (and rather fucked uppedly so), and c) not wearing my seatbelt (which would tack an additional twenty dollar fine onto the ticket I was sure to receive), I reached over my shoulder for the seatbelt. I managed to grab the belt, yank it across my body, and fasten it securely to my crotch at the exact moment I passed the police car.

From the passenger seat (yes, I was endangering more than just my own life), I heard, "Jesus Christ! Buckle it for fuck's sake!"

I replied, "I can't, but fuck it, it only has to look like it's on."

Luckily, the cop was preoccupied on the opposite side of the road handing a ticket to another driver. And I wasn't drunk. Ok, I was.

See you on the roadways.