I just popped two Tylenol PM caplets a couple of minutes ago. I expect my ability to compose grammar will degrade rapidly… starting now.

The problem is that I have too much to tell you. I almost tripped over Lily Tomlin’s feet at the HBO after-party the night of the Emmy’s. (I’ve been told that these so-called “Emmy’s” are an award they give to people in the television business, but I wanna do some fact-checking on that before I present the data as true.) I also caught Glenn Close bopping her shoulders when the band began playing Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believing”.

Why do you Earthlings go so ga-ga over that song?!


The boyfriend snagged us a chauffeured Audi. This fuggin' car had red, lit-up buttons on everything. Like, even the buttons had mini-buttons on them. I was intimidated. I don't like to think the car I'm riding in is smarter than me.

At a certain point we ended up in Anna Paquin's limo and headed over to the TV Guide party, just in time to miss Kanye West. I sent Kanye a box of Violet Crumbles to make up for it. It's his favorite candy bar. For Thanksgiving last year, he assembled the entire meal - turkey, stuffing, yams, Waldorf salad - using ONLY Violet Crumbles. It was an innovative and delicious meal and everyone who attended enjoyed themselves until we suffered diabetic shock and passed out drooling stomach bile.

Okay, some of that last paragraph is untrue.

Melissa Logan’s birthday party was two nights ago. I was there after a few rounds at The Advocate’s 40th anniversary party. William Baldwin was there, and I wasn’t sure if his standing across the room and paying no attention to me whatsoever was his idea of a come-on, but what else could it have been? The poor man just can’t come to grips with the fact that I am happily committed to Corey.

Normally, when I get off work at Amoeba Music on Friday evenings, I rush home, remove most clothing, scold my cat for not accomplishing anything while I was gone, fix myself a salad and watch some DVD (right now it’s the original “Twilight Zone”, season 3) before attending to any writing projects I have, after which I cuddle up with my iPod and listen to David Sedaris until I either fall asleep, or the Grays abduct me for a night of cavity-probing and “Small Wonder” re-runs (they love that show).


However, last Friday night I was abducted in a different way.

Logan had called me earlier and asked me what I was “doing” that night and I, like a fool, said I had no plans. (My boyfriend was in Canada at the Toronto Film Festival.)

“Well,” she said, sounding particularly devious, “You’re coming with me and Karen and some other Amoebites to see Hall & Oates at the Hollywood Bowl.”

She paused then, and I think she was waiting for me to squeal with delight. Instead, I quietly waited for a punchline to what was obviously a whimsical joke. When no punchline came and I realized she was telling the truth, I started to choke.

“Are you okay?” she asked.

“I think you gave me throat cancer,” I answered.

What had started as a moment of fantasy between a few co-workers had organically morphed into a large-scale field trip to the Hollywood Bowl. Karen had managed to secure a bevy of tickets and transportation. (I think she has mafia ties.)

I am not alone.

I wrote the above sentence then leaned to my right, peering into what once was my kitchen and is now something resembling Dresden after the bombing.

And so it goes.

How this guy has managed to cram a huge ladder into a kitchen so small I barely have room for the second Pop Tart included in the packet, is proof that he is no amateur. (This is what I tell myself, hoping for the best.)

Sonically, I am hidden deep inside my iPod, which just made a seamless transition from Marvin Gaye & Diana Ross’ duet album (titled, mysteriously enough, “Diana & Marvin”) to that inescapable Amy Winehouse record. Every once in a while, on average twice a decade, I find myself enjoying the same album as the rest of the country. Such is the case with “Back to Black”. It makes for boring copy though; I mean, do we really need to hear anymore talk about it?

The answer is “no”, and thankfully there’s a workman in my kitchen providing us with stories.

Last week, amidst my well-documented Vicodin haze (I’m feeling much better these days, thank you), I walked home from Amoeba, as I always do (unless Patti Smith is performing), for lunch.

Whereas normally I am greeted by the meows of my “cat”* I instead walked into a scene from “Brazil”.


Ruling out the possibility of a suicide bomber (I realize they go through a lot of training, but I live on the fourth floor of my building) I found, amongst the sea of bric-a-brac, cleaning supplies and dishware - normally so organized in my kitchen - a lone man doing to my sink and walls what I imagine Jeffery Dahmer would do to a dinner guest.

And I’ll say this about myself: I really am polite. Even when faced with an un-announced stranger tearing my home apart, I start with a simple hand-wave and “Hi,” – waiting for the appropriate social cues from the other person to indicate we can proceed to a conversation. Perhaps about the weather, last night’s game, or maybe why he’s mistaken my kitchen for a newly discovered Egyptian tomb.