Tempus Fugit

I can’t believe it’s Sunday. The week swooped by so fast, and I’m exhausted. I’ve spent the past two days switching out my Summer/Spring wardrobe to my winter one. The past few nights have dropped down to the 40’s so of course, I pack up most my transitional stuff—the weather appeared as if it was going to whoosh in to winter and bypass Fall. All of my shoes etc. are now packed away. I sit down in the living room, click on NY1, and the weather report pops up. I’m being told that the rest of the week is going to be in the 60’s to 70’s. I refuse to struggle with that stuff again.

I had a very quiet two days. This is a good thing, as my weekend was actually Thursday and Friday. And boy, what a weekend that was. Ouch!

The week started off mellow. Had a date with J. Tuesday night and laughed my ass off. It’s nice to hang with a boy who gets your obscure references and flings back a few of his own. Met up with him at Croxley’s. It’s a bar in the East Village that has a very unprepossessing front. Walk in and it looks like a very dark Irish pub. There’s another room, that’s barn-like and oh yes! They have an uncovered smoking lounge in the waaay back. Nice, very large patio with ashtrays. It was if Bloomburg wasn’t the mayor.

We sat out back, smoked, drank and chatted. On the way to the subway, J leaned over and kissed me. While he’s kissing me, a homeless guy walks up to him, pats him on the back and yells out, “Go for it my brother!” Naturally we break apart, and start laughing. This happened a few times with different homeless people. Okay, I don’t walk up to them and heckle, so why are they doing it to me.

I like J. He’s a bright, funny guy. He’s just a tad too tall. His 6’3” to my 5” 2 ½” is um, a bit uncomfortable and he made a couple of short jokes, rested his arm on top of my head etc., Also a bit of a sloppy kisser. So, if we go out again (and I do merit him a second date) gotta do the teaching to kiss thing. Ugh. I’m all for enthusiastic kissing, just not the type where I have the urge to wipe my face off with a few towels.

Thursday day I get an email from my friend Michael about a party at Lot 61. Michael Creagh is a fashion photographer and if I do say so myself an amazing one. He’s got an original and fresh eye and ought to be shooting for JANE or Vogue or some other high end mag. He had just shot a cover and a ten page editorial for 944 magazine and they were throwing a party for him. Open bar and reserved tables for the crew (friends).

As I was opening the door to get in (why do so many restaurants and bars have those insanely heavy front doors??) I thrust the iron front door into my left foot. I’m not seeing stars; I’m seeing planets, constellations, the whole works. I forgot how friendly pain is, and how it just wants your entire body to join in the fun. I have no idea how I managed not to scream out loud (probably embarrassment), and hobbled into the place.

I see Michael and he introduced to me a few of his friends who were all ready there. It turns out that a few of them worked at the same mag where I met Michael. This incredibly wacked out bunny decided she wanted to create a men’s mag, and talked people into working for her. I saw an ad and applied for the Entertainment Editor position—that’s how I met Michael, he interviewed me.

I went to one editorial meeting, realized the woman was a complete and utter loon and left the “project.” I realized that not only did she not have a budget; she didn’t have a completed business plan. She had one person who said he was going to give her money for a start-up, but I don’t think either of them realized that it takes $20 million to get a mag moving if you want to do it right. So, she had a lot of ideas, wanted articles written, photos shot, reviews for things done, but no definite deadline—because she didn’t have a dime. You don’t need content for a press kit to show advertisers and publicists. You couldn’t tell her anything and she never did the homework. I don’t have time or inclination for mental masturbation, so I split. Unfortunately, there were people who bought her stuff hook, line and sinker. They spent a lot of their free time and money of their own to do photo shoots etc., with no actual mag in sight, and were waiting for payment. Never, ever work for free.

I ran into some of them at Michael’s party. We gossiped madly about F________ and what a twisted person she was and laughed about everything. Heather has been approached about designing her own line of clothes. She’d be moving from stylist to fashion designer, that’s a pretty good move. I talked a lot with Yuni her boyfriend. He’s an art director and hilarious.

I hope she didn’t get jealous. I wasn’t flirting—just chatting away. For some reason, I’ve always gotten along with guys. It wasn’t until 2 or 3 years ago that I started to acquire a lot of female friends. Most of my life (with the exception of a brief spate of time in college) I’ve had boy friends.

I guess that’s how my brain is wired. When I was little and watched a James Bond movie, I wanted to be him. I love being a girl, am hetero, but really am into “boy” things. Maybe to me, boy stuff signals adventure and fun?

There was a time when I was little that I wanted to be a race car driver, an astronaut, a marine biologist (almost went to college for that one), a roadie, a sound engineer; all these things are “boy” things. It’s sad that we’re in a new millennium, and the stereotypes are still going strong. You can’t just be what you want to be, you have to assimilate yourself within gender lines. No wonder I’ve always felt like an outsider, I never have. Then again, I’ve studied Kung Fu, a bit of fencing, and have screwed up my knees in hockey, so I am obviously going my own way. I also danced for nine years; me and society—a peculiar dichotomy.

My mother made sure that my brother knew how to cook and that I would be able to fix blown fuses, shovel the walk and put stuff together without reading the directions. When I was in college, I’d periodically call up with a new and bizarre career move, and her reply was usually, “that’s nice.”

I wasn’t allowed in the kitchen a lot as a child, due to the fact that I accidentally blew up a toaster oven, burned Formica (I had no idea that you couldn’t put a hot pot on it), and other ahem, incidents. I have since learned how to cook and am lusting for a mandolin.

Getting back to Thursday night, Yuni and I hung out, chatted about relationships, life etc., I found out how he and Heather met. It’s a cute story. He had been married for a year, was in the process of getting a divorce and had gotten a call from one of his married friends. The friend was bemoaning the fact that they never hung out, got drunk and did the crazy things they did when they were single. So, the boys met up and proceeded to get completely toasted.

They went to another bar, Yuni bought a drink for his friend, who took one look at it and put his head down in defeat. Heather walked in, and Yuni offered it to her. They’ve been together ever since ( 2 1/2 years).

There was an open bar, a lots of lovely, lethal vodka drinks (bartender one more madras please!). It seemed that every time I turned around, another one had followed me from the bar or the waitress. Met a hysterically funny tiny Asian boy. I say tiny, ‘cause he’s the same height as moi. We were dancing in the aisles between the banquettes, making very catty remarks and “fake” flirting. Think of a petite version of Jack and Karen from Will and Grace . The music was fantastic and the dance floor horribly lame.

For some reason, unknown to me, and yes, I still can’t figure out why, I decided at one point that it would be easier for me to crawl on top of the banquettes to get my purse, as opposed to asking someone to give it to me. The crawling forwards was easy. It was the crawling backwards that confused me.

The overhead projectors were showing Michael’s cover, editorial and other photographs of his stuff. It was quite heady. I kept tugging at him and saying. “Look! Look!”

I have no idea how I made it home. I’m not sure how I was able to walk to the subway. I know there was no way in Hell that I was walking a straight line. When I got home, I leaned against the doorway of my bedroom and noticed that the walls were spinning. They were moving in time to the music in my head. This was not a good thing.

When I got up in the morning, I finally had the courage to look at my foot. My left toenail is buckled and broken. There was blood seeping out from under the nail. No pedicures for me for awhile. I hobbled and wobbled like a weeble most of the day.

Friday night was the Machine Gun Fellatio concert at the Pussy Cat Lounge in Tribeca. Went with Ivan and Roxanne.

The Pussycat Lounge has a strip club on the first floor and a space for bands on the second floor. We found the balcony, and watched the band from up there. Talk about a vantage point—we saw everything.

Machine Gun Fellatio http://www.machinegunfellatio.com/ is a cross between an out of control cabaret act and rock n’ roll. The female lead singer’s name is KK Juggy. She’s the demented love child of Marlene Dietrich and Jeannette MacDonald. KK wears a wig (?) that looks like it ran away from a 40’s movie with wardrobe to match. She does cartwheels in heels and strips.

The male lead singer is Pinky Beecroft, there’s something about him that recalls Bryan Ferry. I think it’s the dark hair and natty crushed velvet suit.

Pinky is the keyboardist who strips down to nuttin’. Well, at one point he did attach a poo bear to his penis. At one point he’s dancing on top of the speakers,

There are 7 members of this Australian band, if you know anything about Ozzies, they're just a crazed group of people. I’m not going to give a descrip of each member, just go to the website. Their music is a cross between Gilbert and Sullivan on acid and funky rock n’roll. Watching them is addictive. If they were here for another night, I’d catch them. I don't say that very often about a band They’re exuberance is infectious as is their music, play wildly with taboos and if you call getting beer spit on you by KK, audience involvement. They’re loud, dirty, silly and should be on Broadway and playing on the radio. Friday night was the only time I’ve ever seen an MC demand that the band do an encore,the audience concur,so they did two. They should have done more. You’ve never heard country until you hear them do “Butter My Ass.”

During the show (when I thought it was safe) Roxanne and I ran out for a cig, we come back, KK is only wearing pasties and they’re playing the Muppet theme song. I look over the balcony at the mayhem below and think I spot my editor. I think it is, but am not sure; I’ve only met him once. It looks like him, but…I’m hoping I can spot his tattoo on his wrist, but of course that’s the wrist that’s covered up by his jacket.

After the show is over, Rox and I go out for a smoke and bump into Kip. We all go back up and hit the bar, there’s my editor. I introduce Kirk to Kip, Rox and Ivan. Kip looks at Kirk and says,” You know we’re both cc’ed on the sample sales alerts PJ sends out.” They look at me and start laughing. Shouldn’t shopaholics stick together? I tell Kirk that when I spot cool designer clothes for my boy friends, I email them the URL and if I knew his size that I’d do the same for him. He just shakes his head.

It’s funny how shopping brings everyone together.

I can’t remember how, but we all trooped down to the strip club. It’s Kirk, me, Kirk’s friend, Kip, Roxanne and Ivan.

The last time I was in a strip club, it was in Hallandale, Florida in ‘97. I was dragged there by Chad Smith (Red Hot Chili Peppers) during an interview, and the place got raided. The décor of that place was sad. Lucite, beige walls and brown shag carpeting thrown together in a cavernous space. It had that 70’s bad design feel. I had to sit there and watch Chad have lap dances. The DJ played killer music, but kept talking over it. What’s the point of playing music if you’ve got to screech all over it??

The strip club at the Pussy Cat is a very long and narrow room. The dancers attempt to dance on a narrow walkway. No poles, no flashy lights, but good music and no one stomping on the lyrics.

At one point, I’m standing between Kirk and Kip and we’re rating the dancers. Some of them were lame; they either didn’t know the difference between erotic movements or thought that the obvious was sexier. Some of them were so somnolent; I wondered if you touched them, would they fall over? A few of them stood with their faces to the mirrored wall, and didn’t do very much. What’s the point in that??? A few of them looked like they were performing very bad yoga.

But, a couple of them wore some very cute outfits that I could see wearing to a club, and some great shoes. I now understand how dancers/strippers can wear these insanely high heels. They don’t stand in them. They’re crouching, lying on their sides, doing leg lifts, anything but standing on those suckers.

The end of the evening, Kip and I out of the bar, perched on a tub of water bottles,at the deli next door, bullshitting away. Talking about stuff that you talk about when you're slightly silly with drink.

I started to take the subway home, but couldn’t take how slow it was moving, hopped out on 14th street and took a cab all the way home.

Crawled into bed around 3:30 or so.

Of course the phone rings in the morning. Why not? It’s only Saturday and I’ve been out most of the night. It’s my friend Cris; she’s giving me the latest update on Libby’s wedding plans. Libby’s wedding is a year from now, and she has almost all the details tied up. I think she might make an excellent general.

Okay, I’m up. I’ve made coffee and I have work to do. Oh no! I’ve run out of cigs. Crap! So, I decide to get cigs, the next thing I know I’m at my favorite thrift store on W 96th Street. The place has top notch designer goods at sickeningly reasonable prices. I ended up buying two pairs of shoes, five pairs of pants (one pair of theory, and one valentino in that pile) and a skirt for $15.00 Like I really need them.

The funny thing about that shopping expedition is that I thought I’d need a couple of pieces to make outfits out of what I bought. Stuff like blazers, skirts and sweaters to go with them. As I’m taking clothes out of the various suitcases, I start finding items and start crossing them off my shopping list. I think I could shop my closets and find something I’ve forgotten I own everyday of the week.

I haven’t done laundry in a month—mostly due to the fact I hate laundry, but I also have soooo much clothing I don’t need to do it.

Finished the big switcheroo and went to the market. I’m standing at a corner, waiting for the light to change, and a guy says to me, “For sale?” “Excuse me,” I say and look at him. “Is that (points to my granny cart) for sale?” “Are you an idiot? Do you think I’d be walking down the street trying to sell anything? Did I say anything to you?” “Oh sorry.” Hello, I’m right across the street from the market. Did he think I was taking my cart for a walk? Wouldn’t I be yelling “for sale” or something??

Good news, Stef just got her first review of her book and it’s a rave! Words like “addicting” “couldn’t put down” and “can of astrological whoop ass” were all over the place. YES! YES! YES!