Two More Stories About Death

(To read the first two stories, go here.)

III.

I'm usually a pretty easygoing tenant. When renting a new apartment, I don't care about cracked wall tiles or leaky pipes or street noise. But I would appreciate being told in advance if the premises are haunted by the former owner's ghost. Just put a line in the lease, that's all I'm asking.

When the Dame and I moved into a lovely (if overpriced) three-bedroom house in Sonoma, just blocks away from downtown, it never crossed our minds that it might already be occupied by a spectral squatter. But during the first month, we'd catch fleeting glimpses of an old man picking lemons from a tree in the back patio. And some nights we'd hear footsteps out in the hallway, or the sound of a distant voice humming softly to himself.

"Oh, that's just Stanley," our landlady said with a laugh meant to sound casual. "Did I forget to tell you about him?"

She had.

KEEP ON READIN'

"He's been around for awhile," she told us, as if it was public knowledge. "He built the house back in the 1900s and lived here for most of his life. Come to think of it, he even died here. In your bedroom, as I recall."

There is nothing comforting about a sentence like that. My mind raced with the grim possibilities. Had it been a murder-suicide? Ritualistic torture by a cult of sadistic White Album-misinterpreting hippies? Every corner of our bedroom now seemed like a murder scene. Did the end table with a stack of unread New Yorkers once contain a big, gushy pile of Stanley's entrails? Was the framed Chicago Art Institute poster on the wall conveniently covering the almost imperceptible splotches of Stanley's splattered brains?



"Oh no, no, nothing like that," our landlady assured us. "He died of old age. Almost made it to 100. Stanley was such a sweetie. And still is, from what I've seen of him. Don't worry, he's completely harmless. He's a friendly ghost. Unless he doesn't like you."

It was all beginning to make sense. Our landlady had told us stories about the previous tenant, a rich and spoiled son of a local sommelier who left under mysterious circumstances. During his brief stay, he called her at all hours of the night, complaining that somebody was peering into his bedroom window and muttering vague threats. She suspected that he was on the "wacky tobacky," but now it didn't sound so much like drug-fueled paranoia. Stanley had simply decided that he didn't care for his new roommate. So he did what ghosts do; he scared the shit out of him.

It wasn't reassuring to learn that our on-site manager was a poltergeist with a track record for evicting boarders who didn't live up to his standards. If he wanted to get rid of me, it wouldn't be difficult. He wouldn't have to make a grand gesture like writing "GET OUT" on the walls with blood. If I so much as felt a cold breeze on the back of my neck, I'd be driving in my underwear towards the California border within a matter of seconds. I am what they refer to in the paranormal research field as "a big fat pussy."

But I hoped it wouldn't come to that. If our landlady was correct and he was a friendly ghost, then we could probably avoid all conflict if we just played by his rules. The problem is, we didn't have the faintest idea what his rules might be. Would he be annoyed if we let the dirty dishes pile up in the kitchen sink? Would we invoke his wrath if the bathtub wasn't spotless? The Dame soon lost interest in sucking up to Stanley, but I didn't want to take any chances. I started wearing a necktie and jacket around the house, got rid of all my hidden porn, and just to be safe, played an endless loop of Scott Joplin records. Sometimes I even left a plate of cookies in the hallway, in case he got hungry during his early morning rounds.

"He's not Santa Claus," the Dame reminded me.

"Shhh," I whispered sternly. "He'll hear you."

In the summer, we hosted neighborhood barbeques in our back patio almost every weekend. During one such soiree, I was introduced to a woman who claimed to be a psychic and spirit medium. I watched her all night, waiting for her to say something about Stanley, or at least nod in his direction. But if she spotted him, she wasn't letting on.

"So, any ghosts around here?" I finally asked her, trying to sound nonchalant.

"Well, there's an elderly gentlemen over there," she said, pointing towards Stanley's favorite lemon tree.

The Dame and I exchanged worried looks. I was about to ask for details when the psychic mentioned that Stanley wasn't alone. He was in the midst of an animated conversation with somebody who, given her description, sounded a lot like my father.

"My dad is here?" I asked, slack-jawed. That's funny, I thought. I kinda figured he'd come back as a beagle. Hearing about my dad's ghost was weird enough, but then the psychic went on to tell me about my grandfather, and my first Playboy editor, and just about everybody I knew who had died over the last twenty years. They were even a few crashers, including somebody who either lived in a monastery or was too lazy to change out of his bathrobe. If she was to be believed, the dead people at our backyard party far outnumbered the living.

"That's actually quite common," she told me. "Spirits are everywhere. It doesn't matter where you go or what kind of privacy you think you have, there's a good chance that there's at least a half-dozen ghosts hovering around you."

I'm still not sure if I buy any of it. But it was nice to hear that my dad was making new friends. And to this day, I can't take a crap without announcing to the empty bathroom, "Alright, everybody out!"

IV.

The knocking started around 7am. When we didn't answer, my mother cracked open the door of the guest bedroom. "Rise and shine, you two," she whispered in her most soothing morning voice. "I made some coffee and there are hot scones in the kitchen. Oh, and grandma is dead."

My mom has a talent for delivering bad news as an afterthought. In my line of work, we call it burying the lede. "I made your favorite brownies. Oh, and I may have ovarian cancer." "Your cousin just got into a great prep school. Which reminds me, your father and I have decided that we're not paying your college loans."

The Dame and I jumped out of bed and ran downstairs. My dad was standing in the living room, frozen in mid-stride, as if he'd forgotten where he was going and what exactly he was supposed to do next. He saw us and pointed towards grandma's room just a few yards away. The doors were open and her body was laid out on the bed, exactly as they'd found her, her tiny head still peeking out from under her favorite quilt, the one that always smelled (at least to my nose) like a pungent combination of mildew and vanilla.

She'd died in her sleep, my dad told us. They hadn't noticed at first because, as we all knew, she tended to look like a corpse when she slept. (As kids, my brother and I were fascinated by her eerie ability to seemingly stop breathing during a nap, and we often debated whether she was hiding from predators.) But after repeatedly trying to wake her, they realized that it might be actual rigor mortis and not just her usual morning stiffness.

My dad and I held onto each other and cried. With tears still streaming down his face, he looked at me and said, "She was a bitch, wasn't she?"

"She was," I nodded. "A colossal bitch."

We both burst into laughter. Not because it was such an inappropriate thing to say, but because it was a relief to finally say the word out loud. She was a bitch. The kind of bitch who scowls at babies and undertips waiters. The kind of bitch who accuses her son of turning up the thermostat in an attempt to kill her and steal his inheritance. The kind of bitch who assumes that her grandson recommended Harold & Maude because the septuagenarian leading lady commits suicide on her 80th birthday, which is clearly a subliminal message that she should off herself at 80. The kind of bitch who, on the last night of her life, reminded her daughter-in-law that she was a disappointment to her.

We were sad that she was gone. But... well... when a 94-year old woman dies in her sleep, in her own bed, without any suffering or illness, leaving a family who has had quite enough of her bitchy attitude, thank you very much, the last thing you'd call it is a tragedy.

It took only minutes for the paramedics to arrive, followed closely by the coroner and funeral director. While the medical professionals examined her body, the director tried to console us. "I'm so sorry about your grandmother," he told me, and it sent a shiver down my spine. Not because of the sentiment, but because there was something about him that reminded me of Jonathan Frid from Dark Shadows. His words had a whispered menace, and he held on to certain vowels just a little too long. "So sooooorry about your graaaaandmother." Also, as far as I could tell, he didn't have a neck. When he turned to look at you, he had to bring his entire body with him.

The cause of death was determined to be "natural causes" and the body shuffled away. The whole process happened so quickly that I wondered if they thought they were being timed. Were funeral homes now working on commission? Was it like Glengarry Glen Ross? "First prize for bringing in the most bodies is a Cadillac Eldorado. Second prize is you're fired." But when I wandered outside, I began to understand the need for haste.

The street was filled with teenage girls brandishing pom-pons and practicing their high-kicks. A farmer was roughly pulling a pygmy donkey into position on top of a float that vaguely resembled a pink birthday cake. A man dressed as a large brownish blob, either meant to be Mr. Potato Head or a cancerous testicle, tumbled to the ground as he tried to find his equilibrium.

I stood on the front porch and stared out at the chaos. The Dame came out and handed me a cup of coffee.

"Is there a parade today?" She asked.

"God I hope so," I said.

We watched as my grandmother was carried into the waiting hearse. As if supplying a soundtrack to her departure, the birthday donkey brayed in protest and Gloria Estefan's "Conga" blared from speakers mounted in a convertible Hot Rod.

"Feel the fire of desire
As you dance the night away
Cause tonight we're gonna party
Till we see the break of day"

When we ventured back inside, my mom told us that what we'd just seen was a parade - or at least the staging area for a parade - and not the Fellini hallucination I'd feared. With little else to do with our day, we decided that a parade might be just the thing to lift our spirits. So we walked downtown and sat in the grass with our neighbors, none of whom had any idea that we'd just lost a family member.

When the parade began, we laughed and passed around a milk jug filled with wine and voted for our favorite floats - a tie between the retirement home, which we agreed should be renamed "Praying for the Sweet Release of Death", and the local Jiffy Mix factory, in which truck drivers threw mini-boxes of pancake mix at the crowd like projectile weapons. After awhile, we got so caught up in the excitement that we completely forgot why we'd been sad in the first place.

And then my mom saw her.

"Look," she said, pointing into the distance. "There's grandma."

Sure enough, there she was. The hearse, which I'd personally witnessed my grandmother's body being loaded into just five minutes earlier, was slowly driving down Main Street, somewhere between the marching band and the cowboy cavalcade. The neckless funeral director was behind the wheel, waving at the crowd and throwing miniature Butterfingers at the children.

He spotted us and smiled broadly, exchanging a meaningful gaze that seemed to say, "Yes, I know and you know that there's a dead body in this hearse, but let's not ruin everybody's fun by drawing attention to it, okay?"

So we just waved back and quietly said another goodbye to my grandmother, and tried to ignore the absurdity that a woman who had gone out of her way to make everybody around her miserable was being given a bon voyage parade, with dozens of strangers she'd never met cheering for her and applauding her as she made her way towards her final resting place.

Children were sprinting towards the hearse, grabbing for the falling candy and narrowly avoiding being crushed by the front tires. "Y'know," my dad said, "she would've hated all this attention."

"Probably so," I said. "You think this is what hell is like?"

He just snorted, trying not to seem too amused. We watched as the hearse was surrounded by snot-faced prepubescents, pounding on the windows and howling for more treats. Fueled by sugar, it didn't seem unreasonable that they might roll over the hearse and pull grandma into the street, thrashing at her body like a pinata.

We could've said something. But who wants to be the one to spoil a parade?

Two More Stories About Sex In Which No Actual Sex Takes Place

(To read the first two stories about sex in which no actual sex takes place, go here.)

III.

As a teenager, I was very good at masturbation. Very good. I could make it last for several hours or pop one off while brushing my teeth. When I opted to take my time, I drew on a rotating cast of fantasy guest stars both real and fictional. Everyone from Annie Hall to Heather Godbout, a cheerleader at my high school, took part in an astonishing array of sexual acts. Thank god it was all in my imagination, because at least some of what they did to me and most of what I did to them was probably illegal.

The uncontested leading lady of my masturbatory dramatis personae was Jeanne Fine, a porn starlet who had top billing in almost every adult film of the 80s. There was something about her that instantly appealed to me. Maybe it was her bee-stung lips or her jet black hair or her assortment of tattoos. Now that I think on it, I'm pretty sure it had something to do with her ability to swallow a 10-inch cock. To my 15-year-old brain, that was grounds for a marriage proposal. Or, given the utter improbability that I would ever meet her, at least ejaculating enough DNA to fill a small swimming pool.

During one muggy summer evening, I was alone in my bedroom and taking matters into my own hands. I was thinking about Jeanne Fine, as I was want to do, and imagining the unmentionably filthy things we might be doing to each other. I was just seconds away from splattering my genetic material on the nearest flat surface when a very uninvited image forced its way into my brain.

The Hulk. The Incredible Hulk. The green dude with the torn shirt and the pulsating biceps.


KEEP ON READIN'! MIGHT AS WELL, THERE'S NOTHING ON TV. TRUST ME, I CHECKED.

When you're straight, the last thing you want to be thinking about as you're stroking your own penis is a scantily clad and alarmingly muscular dude. It kinda ruins the mood. But more than that, it calls your entire sexuality into question.



"Is everything okay?" My mother asked when I finally came downstairs for dinner. "You look like you've seen a ghost."

What could I have told her? "Well, it's a funny story. I was just jerking off and fantasizing about a porn star who, given my frustrating inability to say anything to the opposite sex, has become my constant sexual companion over the last few months. But today, apropos of absolutely nothing, I started thinking about the Hulk. Now, I don't think I'm actually aroused by the Hulk. It had the opposite effect on my erection that might be considered a warning sign of impending homosexuality. But it still rattled me. I'm worried that I've made an unintentional association between brawny male comic book heroes and pleasuring myself, which is counter-intuitive and could have an averse affect on my entire sexual development."

But I didn't say any of that. Instead, I just announced that I wanted to sell my comic book collection. She was delighted, and said something about putting the money into a savings account for college. I didn't care about any of that. I would have given them away. I just wanted the damn things out of the house.

The next morning, we made plans to drive to a used comic book store downtown. She helped me inventory my collection and carefully load each comic into a box. "Gosh," she said, examining my mint condition copy of The Incredible Hulk #181, the one from 1974 where he battles Wolverine. "I never realized before how much you liked this green guy."

I said nothing, but inside I was seething. "What is that supposed to mean?" I wanted to bark at her. "You think I'm gay? You're gay! Maybe you're gay, huh? Huh? Ever think about that?"

IV.

When a beautiful and naked woman is lying on top of me, I tend to notice the most obvious things. Her breasts, for instance. Or her ass. Or even her hipbones - which, if sex was a ride at Disneyland, are the biological equivalent of a safety bar. But this time, I could only focus on her shoulders. I was fascinated by them. How had I never noticed before just how sexy a woman's shoulders blades could be? While her hands continued to roam and explore, I kept my hands on her shoulders, captivated by the way the muscles would tighten like a shrug and then relax like a sigh. Everything we were feeling at that moment was summed up so perfectly by her shoulders. "Yes, yes, yes.... wait, no, I don't.... okay, yes, yes, yesyesyesyes... no, no, hold on."

She slammed her fist against the mattress. "Goddamnit," she growled. "Are you sure you don't have a condom?"

I did have one, actually. It was hidden in the side pocket of my suitcase. But I never mentioned it. It seemed better this way. If we never had sex, she'd never find out that I sound like a muppet when I'm having an orgasm. I wouldn't come too soon, or too late, or not at all. I wouldn't have to worry if I was trying enough positions, or finding the perfect rhythm, or if I'd been furiously rubbing a finger against her clitoris or something else entirely. This was safer. It had all the sweaty anticipation of fantasy without any of the letdown of reality.

After writhing against each other became too frustrating, we got dressed and left the hotel. I didn't live in San Francisco, but I wanted to impress her with my knowledge of the city. In a quest for sushi, we ended up getting hopelessly lost and wandering down a street populated mostly by transvestite prostitutes. I held her close, as if she needed protecting from the hookers. But they just smiled and gave us knowing winks.

"I appreciate your assumption that we're lovers," I wanted to tell them. "That means a lot, especially coming from a hooker. In your line of work, I'm sure you can smell sex on a person a mile away. But really, it's not what you think. She and I... well, it's complicated. I'm not even sure why I feel the need to explain it to you. Hey, just out of curiosity, do you tuck or snip?"

We never found a sushi restaurant - which is as absurd as saying we couldn't find a pizza joint in Chicago. Instead, we ate Italian food and planned our Vegas wedding. We laughed as we discussed the midgets and punk-rock strippers and sideshow freaks who would take part in our nuptials. She'd wear ripped fishnets, I'd wear shorts. It would be perfect.

We put a lot of faith on one night at a Holiday Inn, especially given the utter lack of fucking. But sometimes intimacy is more powerful than sex, promises more intoxicating than orgasms. Her vagina could've been a sexual cyclone for all I knew. But it was the way she looked at me, the way she held onto me for dear life and seemed to want me more than anything she'd ever wanted in her life, that made me want to carry her across a sea of transvestite hookers and pledge things that might not make so much sense tomorrow.

We stumbled into a pub just a few blocks from hooker central and sipped warm beer and asked each other questions we meant rhetorically.

"So what do we do now?" She asked.

I just looked at her and smiled. I hoped she'd see significance in my gaze, even if the truth was considerably more vague. I placed a hand on her shoulder, feeling the muscles tighten and surrender to my grasp, and wished time would stop.

(To read two more stories about sex in which no actual sex takes place, go here.)

Two Stories About Death

I.

I came home from school and my parents told me that the cat was dead. There was a lot of crying; weirdly, more from them than me. It wasn't because they were particularly fond of the cat - he was overweight and aggressive and as my dad liked to point out, "an asshole" - they were just worried about me. They assumed I'd be devastated. I was the one who'd brought the asshole cat home in the first place, and the only one in our family who spent any time with him. I was sad that he was gone, but not nearly to the extent that my parents had braced themselves for. It wasn't the kind of sad that permeates your bones, or makes you want to sob until you're dry-heaving. It was more like the "Oh my god, I can't believe they canceled The Six Million Dollar Man" sad.

My dad calmly repeated what the veterinarian had told them. My cat had Feline Urinary Syndrome, which caused blockage in his urinary tract. It was a difficult decision, he said, but they finally decided to put him to sleep, if only because he was in such excruciating pain. He explained where the body would be buried, and how he'd actually lived a very long and happy life, at least compared with the average feline life span.

After he'd covered all the medical details, we just sat in the living room and said nothing. We weren't about to discuss the considerably more ambiguous topics of souls or an afterlife. As a family, we were already pretty skeptical about the idea of a heaven for human beings. So it was agreed, without anybody needing to say it out loud, that a kitty heaven was kinda retarded.

DON'T FEAR THE REPEAR, KEEP ON READIN'

When my parents were satisfied that they'd done their best, I wandered upstairs to my room for a nap. I sat on my bed and stared at the ceiling, trying to convince myself that I was fine, just fine. I didn't need any "he's with the Baby Jesus now" platitudes. But this was the first time that anybody close to me had died, and I wasn't sure how to make sense of it. During my ten years on the planet, my only exposure to death of any kind was when Obi-Wan Kenobi took a light-saber to the gut in Star Wars.

"Is that how it happens?" I wondered during my first of many, many screenings. "When somebody dies, do they just disappear completely? And does everybody get to come back as a spirit and visit your friends on the ice planet Hoth, or just if you were really, really good?"

I eventually figured out that Star Wars isn't the most reliable source of information. But there wasn't anyplace else for a guy to get a concise overview of spirituality, or at least enough spirituality to get by. I didn't need all the answers, just enough to take the edge off.

With few other options, I laid on my tiny bed and tried to work it through on my own. It seemed easy enough. I just had to conjure up a mental image of the earth and pull back like a camera, until I had an unobstructed vantage of... everything. It'd all become clear if I just got a good look at the nuts and bolts of the universe. So I watched as the earth got smaller and smaller in my mind, becoming one of many planets, until it was just another speck in the vast canvass of the galaxy. And then even our galaxy began to diminish, swallowed up by bigger solar systems and black holes that seemed to stretch on forever. Soon anything even remotely recognizable was gone and it was all just black and emptiness that went on and on and on and...

I gasped for air, like I'd been swimming at the bottom of a pool for a little too long. My heart was racing and I was suddenly very, very cold. I didn't realize it at the time, but I'd just experienced an existential panic attack. I took a good, hard look at the void, and sure enough, it was a whole lot of nothing. And let me tell you, it was fucking scary. Weak-in-the-knees, pit-in-your-stomach, face-to-face-with-the-meaninglessness-of-existence scary. Given that the most stressful part of my day usually involved wondering if I was going to be picked last for dodgeball, it was a lot of information to digest in just a few minutes.

I waited until I was able to catch my breath again and my heart didn't sound so much like bongo drums. And then I went downstairs and watched Young Frankenstein with my dad, and laughed and laughed and laughed.

II.

When I was fourteen, a girl died at my school. Well, she wasn't at school when it happened. She was at home, sleeping in her bedroom, in the middle of the night. There was some electrical problem - an overloaded light socket or something, I don't know - and the house went up like a bonfire. Nothing was left but a mountain of burning embers, and not a single person got out in time, including Cindy.

I didn't know Cindy very well. I knew of her, mostly as the first girl in our class to get breasts. It was the hot topic of conversation for almost a month. "Have you seen Cindy's breasts?" Personally, I didn't see what all the fuss was about. They weren't much bigger than pencil erasers. But nobody was more proud of her mammary seedlings than Cindy. It became part of her identity. She even added a pair of naked boobs to her signature - as a fleshy double-dot to her "i" - which made her very popular with the boys during yearbook-signing season.

I wondered if her breasts were the last thing she thought about as the flames engulfed her. "What a gyp!" I imagined her thinking, as she cradled her tits like a mother protecting her infant twins. "I didn't even get to own these things for a whole year!"

My parents and the other adults in the neighborhood talked about how tragic it was. For all of the victims, of course, but specifically Cindy. "She was only fourteen," they'd remind each other in hushed whispers. "Such a tragedy. Nobody should die that young." I didn't understand their logic. To my mind, her age wasn't the tragic part. It was the skin-burning part that had the biggest impact on me. When the temperature in your bedroom hits a balmy 500 degrees and your flesh starts melting like the Nazis at the end of Raiders Of the Lost Ark, isn't age irrelevant? I just couldn't imagine anybody sitting in the middle of a raging inferno and thinking, "Wow, this really, really, really hurts. But at least I'm thirty."

They let the entire school skip classes to attend Cindy's funeral, even those of us who didn't know her. It never occurred to me that letting the actual friends and family mourn in privacy might have been in better taste. Like my fellow students - many of whom, like me, probably couldn't have picked Cindy out of a line-up - I had no intention of missing the social event of the season.

The night before the big event, I couldn't sleep. It was all too exciting. I'd never been to a real funeral before. I wondered if wearing black was mandatory or just strongly encouraged. And would there be an open casket? I had no clue. Was that even possible, given the circumstances? What would she look like? A wax mannequin from Madame Tussauds left next to a space heater? Maybe just a pile of green goo, like the monster from The Blob?

Alas, the funeral lacked the theatrics I'd been hoping for. There was no body on display, and much more crying than I felt comfortable witnessing from my peers. Those of us relegated to the sidelines - who, for all intents and purposes, were funeral crashers - tried to keep a low profile. We huddled in the back and quietly remembered whatever there was to remember about Cindy.

"Y'know," a guy named Todd casually announced to the group. "She gave me a blowjob once."

My jaw dropped. I was shocked - shocked! - that anybody would confess to something like that. And at a funeral, no less. But a smattering of guys sitting nearby confirmed his story.

"Yeah," a gangly high school sophomore agreed. "She could suck the chrome off a trailer hitch."

Apparently, had she not been cut down in her prime by a house fire, Cindy was well on her way to becoming the school slut. Her oral skills were legendary, spreading joy everywhere from the YMCA parking lot to under the football stadium bleachers. Given the lurid details offered up by her one-time lovers, it wasn't just breasts that gave her an edge over the competition. I'll just say this: her funeral is when I first became acquainted with the phrase "balls deep."

A line had been written in the sand, evenly dividing the funeral guests between those who had been blown by the dead girl and those of us who hadn't. I tried to laugh it off, but something about this new information bugged me. At some point during the service, a priest invited us to file past the dearly departed and pay our final respects. I loitered just a little too long next to Cindy's urn. The weight of the moment had finally hit me, and I realized that this wasn't just about missing a day of school or gossiping about the exact temperature necessary for a human body to melt. A life had been snatched away too soon, and there was no way we'd ever get her back.

"I'm sorry that I never met you," I said to her ashes, though only in my head. "I know this probably isn't anything you care about, especially after what you've been through over the last few days. But, well, I just found out that you were giving away blowjobs to anybody who asked and... I don't know, I kinda wish I'd made more of an effort to get to know you."

Somebody told me later that it looked like I was crying. And maybe I was. Life isn't fair, especially when you're fourteen and the only girl with a corroborated reputation for giving blowjobs has been burned alive and you're only just finding out now. I mean seriously, did I need another reason to believe that God is a humorless, sadistic prick?

(To read two more stories about death, go here.)

An Open Letter to Iran Concerning Its New Porn Worker Execution Policy

Hello, Iran.

So I hear you've got some issues with porn. Actually, word on the street is that you want to make it illegal. Your parliament had a meeting last Wednesday and apparently decided that the production of a pornographic film is a crime punishable by death. Is that right? I just want to make sure I've got my facts straight. And is it true that the vote was 148-to-5 in favor of shooting all porn stars in the back of the head? Wow. That's a pretty overwhelming victory. What happened to the five guys who were pro-porn? Did they stand up and give a really inspired speech like, "What this nation needs is more chicks with dicks and hot cum-gargling action?" I mean before they were taken out back and stoned to death.

Normally, I try not to pay much attention to what's happening in your country. It's kinda hard to take you guys seriously. I don't mean any offense but, c'mon, you host a convention for Holocaust denialists and it's only a matter of time before you get a reputation as the world's Shemp Howard. But this kooky porn law was difficult to ignore. See, the thing is, I'm part of the adult film industry. Okay, maybe not so much anymore, but a few years ago I made my living writing porn screenplays. And when I left LA, I wrote a book about my experiences called Fast Forward. Have you heard of it? Doesn't Iran have a Powell's yet? Well whatever, I'll send you a copy to pass around. I wouldn't recommend loaning it to Ahmadinejad, though. He doesn't strike me as the kind of guy whose epitaph is gonna read "He loved to laugh."

KEEP ON READIN'... NOW WITH 34% MORE HYDROGENATED OILS

I'm not mad at you for waging war on porn, Iran. You aren't the first and you certainly won't be the last. I don't know if I'd agree that all pornographers are "corrupters of the world," but I guess it comes down to perspective, right? You think ankles are a sex organ and I once ate nachos while watching a bukkake video. We'll just have to agree to disagree. But our cultural differences aside, I'm flattered that you want to pass a bill outlawing porn. Maybe I'm just a glass-half-full kinda guy, but I haven't been this excited by anti-porn zealotry since Ed Meese. You seriously want to execute porn stars? Why not just send a blank check to Porn Valley? I don't know if you're familiar with the phrase "free publicity," but that's basically what you're giving the world corrupters you claim to despise. When you make Jenna Jameson and Rocco Siffredi look like Bonnie and Clyde, you're actually making them seem more sexy and dangerous and desirable. I hate to be the one to break this to you, Iran, but martyrdom works both ways.

But your questionable logic and lovable overreaction aren't the reasons I have a beef with you, Iran. What pissed me off is when your parliament listed the "main elements" of a porn production, and then only mentioned producers, directors, cameramen and actors.

Excuse me? Aren't you forgetting somebody, Iran? (Coughs, points to myself.) Hello? The writers?

Please don't tell me that you're one of those sniggering pricks who feigns surprise whenever somebody tells them that porn is scripted. "You mean somebody actually writes that crap? (Muffled laughter.)" Ha-ha, very fucking funny, Iran. Yes, pornos have screenplays. They're not literary masterpieces, but somebody has to tell Johnny Horsecock what to say before he puts his balls in Jenny Faketitty's mouth. You think those double-entendres and pizza delivery puns are being improvised? I'm not sure if you've heard, but viagra doesn't improve one's ability to ad-lib snappy dialogue. Porn actors are retards and writers are the short bus that takes them to retard school.

Y'know, this is just so typical, Iran. Even here in godless America, porn writers get no respect. Care to wager a guess how many writers are recognized each year by the Adult Video News Awards? Two! We get two lousy awards! There are something like sixteen different awards for gangbangs, but only two fucking writers walk away with a statue. Any idea who gets less awards at an AVN ceremony than writers? Fem-Dom Strap-on Videos. That's the message the industry is sending to their writers. "We consider your creative contributions to be just slightly more valid than female actresses who penetrate the assholes of their male partners with strap-on dildos."

Let's take a closer look at your list of porn accomplices worthy of corporal punishment. You put actors at the top of your list, and I'll happily agree. Sure, the men and women who exchange viscous fluids on celluloid deserve most of the credit. I have nothing but respect for what they do, and they've earned preferential treatment at Muhammad's chopping block. Do you have any idea what it takes to get a boner on cue? Especially when you're surrounded by strangers, all of them staring at you and judging you? I can't imagine what that must be like. From my experience, erections can be fickle. Honestly, I'm shocked every time I get one. There are just a myriad of ways it can go wrong.

Like, okay, here's a story I think you'll enjoy, Iran. Back in the mid-90s, I was at some exclusive health club in Chicago with my writing partner and his dad. It's the kind of place where you can only get a membership if you're super-rich or semi-famous, and my writing partner's dad just so happened to be both. So we're sitting in the steam room and who should walk in but Mr. T. You know who I'm talking about? The black dude with the mohawk from Rocky III. You must've gotten that movie over there by now, yeah? So Mr. T walks in and we're all naked and he says, I assume in jest, "I hope none of you white boys are planning on getting a hard-on. I know I'm pretty to look at, but that ain't an excuse to start saluting me with your peckers." We're all laughing and making it very obvious that we're in on the joke. But he's planted the seed of fear in our heads. You know what I'm talking about, Iran? I wouldn't have thought twice about it if he hadn't said anything. But now it's like the inverse of erection anxiety. Worry about trying to get a boner and it won't happen, but worry that you will get an erection and blammo, you're sporting wood. Even though I'm not in any way attracted to Mr. T, I'm panicking and telling myself, "Don't get hard don't get hard don't get hard please don't get hard."

Later that night, I'm trying to have sex with my girlfriend, but I've done such a stellar job at psyching myself out of a chubby that I'm still completely flaccid. She's stroking it and rubbing it and at one point even slapping it, and still nothing. The possum isn't coming out to play. She asks me, "What am I doing wrong?" But what can I say? How do you tell your girlfriend, "It's not you, it's Mr. T?" How do you say something like that without her thinking, "Ooookay, guess my boyfriend is gay?"

I don't know how porn actors do it. Even if they're not being haunted by thoughts of Mr. T, their erection self-control is awe-inspiring. I'm telling you, Iran, those infidels are the heart and soul of this business. So yeah, go ahead and kill them. I don't begrudge them their infamy. I'll even give you the directors and producers. Bunch of immoral sleazebags and smut-slinging heathens. Round 'em all up and send 'em to the internment camps.

But it really chafed my ass when you included cameramen in your porn jihad. Have any of you even seen a porn film, Iran? They just point the camera at the genitals and push record. That is not what I'd call cinematography. A monkey could do it. There are no Vittorio Storaros working in this industry. And besides, are you really sure you want to be thinning the cameraman herd in your country? Don't you need as many as you can get? If you kill every cameraman who took a day's work to shoot Ass-Munchers Volume 17, who'll be left to shoot the hostage beheadings? (Oh, wait, my bad. Those have nothing to do with you, do they? Wink, wink.)

When you make a public indictment against the adult film industry and purposively leave out writers, you're slighting a lot of very talented people. It'd be like an American politician saying, "The terrorists must be destroyed, and by terrorists I mean the Sunnis," and you're all like, "Yo, how 'bout a little love for the Shi'ites, bitch?" You see what I'm saying, Iran? This kind of hurtful talk can have a negative effect on so many careers.

Here's a perfect example: Last year, I was hired to ghostwrite Ron Jeremy's autobiography. You know who Ron Jeremy is, right? Fat dude with the mustache and gigantic schmeckle? Ring any bells? Well, Ron was such a nice fellow that he actually gave me a byline. This didn't require me to do any publicity for the book, but I did what I could, like the occasional radio interview and bookstore reading. Now, let's say that Ron wants to promote his book over in the Mideast and his publisher decides to send me with him. Yeah, yeah, I know, the odds of that ever happening are infinitesimal. I'm just talking hypothetically, okay?

So I'm guessing that Ron wouldn't get more than ten feet across your border before he'd "disappear," am I right? Oh man, I bet you'd just love to get your hands on Ron Jeremy, wouldn't you, Iran? A Jewish porn star with a big dick? That's gotta keep you up at night. Or do you think he's just another hoax like Auschwitz? My point is, your boys from the Islamic Republic would likely meet us at the airport and immediately throw Ron into the back of an unmarked truck. And of course, I'd assume that I'm joining him. But while I'm covering my face and screaming, "don't shoot don't shoot," under your current porn law, your sergeant would just look at me and shrug and say, "Our orders don't say anything about a writer. You're free to go."

There's only one word for that kind of behavior, Iran. Insensitive. You think that doesn't bruise my ego? What do you think would happen if I showed up to the bookstore after Ron gets dragged away to be beaten to death in some underground cell? "Ladies and gentlemen, please give a warm welcome to Eric Spitznagel, a writer deemed by our glorious government to be unworthy of Allah's wrath." How much of the audience do you suppose would stick around for the reading? Not many, Iran. Even the ones with pipe bombs strapped to their chest would be gone before intermission.

Well, I've got a message for you, Iran. I am good enough. I may not have corrupted as much of the world as Ron Jeremy, but I've done my share. When Ron insisted that we include a chapter in the book about safe sex, which consisted mostly of advice like "slap your dick in warm water after sex and you'll never get an STD," I never protested. And when my publisher for Fast Forward asked to include my unproduced porn screenplay "BUTT CRAZY" in its entirety as an appendix, I never said, "But what about the children?" I said, "Fuck yeah! Let's corrupt a few more young and impressionable minds!" For all you know, there might be a Muslim kid somewhere thinking, "I was gonna go to the mosque tonight, but I think I'll just stay home and read Spitznagel's latest attack on morality." It's a long shot, but it could happen.

If you don't do it for me, Iran, do it for the hundreds of porn writers who need the recognition. Even if you don't want to condemn any of us to death, then at least consider adding an addendum to the bill. Something like, "And as for the authors of these porn atrocities, we shall remove their right hands as punishment for composing such degrading and filth-ridden and yet strangely compelling sin scripts, all praise to Allah." C'mon, Iran, how hard is that?

I thank you for your time.

Eric

Two Stories About Sex In Which No Actual Sex Takes Place

I.

At first, I didn't know what I was looking at. It seemed like something was missing. It was just a hairless mound which, based on what little I knew about human anatomy, should have contained a penis. Emily held her dress aloft like it was a boat sail and she was waiting for a gust of wind. She gazed at me expectantly, obviously awaiting some kind of reaction, even though neither of us had a clue just what that reaction should be.

Lacking any other ideas, I stuck out my tongue, wagged it at her and screamed, "Rock and rooooooll!" I had no idea at the time just how dirty that was. I was just following the script.

My uncle had decided it would be funny to dress me up for Halloween like Gene Simmons, the blood-spitting, fire-breathing bass player from KISS. We spent most of the day getting the makeup just right, and creating a costume with bat wings and platform boots. He used a sharpie to add a thick coat of hair to my otherwise depilous 8-year-old chest.

When I joined my friends for trick-or-treating, they were speechless. They watched in slack-jawed wonder as I showed off the stage moves that my uncle had taught me. I could do the guitar-solo-air-kick and the mood-enhancing-crotch-thrust and sing roughly one-third of the songs from the KISS Alive album.

"God of thunnnnnder and rock n' rollllll," I sang in my high-pitched prepubescent squeal. "The spell you're unnnnnnder, is gonna rob you of your virgin soul!"

KEEP ON READIN'... BECAUSE THE FIRST STEP TO RECOVERY IS ACCEPTANCE

If I had any idea whatsoever what I was saying, it would've been ironic. Instead, it was just cute. Well, depending on who you talked to. Some of our neighbors thought it was cute. Others made it abundantly clear that they were not in any way amused by my one-boy performance of "Love Gun" - especially if they were Episcopalian. (Strange, I know. Do all Episcopalians have phallophobia?)

As the evening stretched on, the crowd eventually dwindled down to just me and a girl named Emily, who had never so much as given me a second glance until that night. But now she was standing uncomfortably close and trying to hold my hand. During my performance of "Detroit Rock City," as I flicked my tongue and punched at the air with my codpiece (actually just a plastic ice cream bowl from Dairy Queen), Emily came to the conclusion that I needed to see her vagina. Immediately.

When I told my dad about it later, he just laughed. "I suppose you'll want to buy a guitar now, right?"

"Oh yeah, right," I said, pretending to gag. "Like I want more girls flashing their privates at me. That's just gross."

"Give it a few years," he told me with a wink. "You'll be learning the chords to Led Zeppelin songs just so more girls will lift their dresses for you."

That was the only thing my dad ever told me about sex. Rock musicians get lots of pussy.

II.

I've long been warned that long distance relationships are a terrible idea. But I thought we'd be different. We were two writers. With just a little creativity, I thought, we'd find ways around the lack of physical intimacy. It would be difficult but not insurmountable. Necessity is the mother of invention.

It began with phone sex. At first we were timid, scarcely able to do anything but moan softly. But in a matter of weeks, we became pros at linguistic smut. On some nights our mutual masturbation sessions would drag on for hours, evolving into a foul-mouthed poetry slam. When not muttering filthy suggestions on the phone to her, I devoted entire afternoons to looking up new and more surprising erotic adjectives. Anybody's penis could be throbbing, but when I told her about my "oscillating" cock, I could tell from her quickened breathing that she appreciated the effort.

But I was a hack amateur compared to her. She was in another league. If everything she told me about her vagina was accurate, she either belonged in a side-show carnival or under medical observation. Her brilliance wasn't in the clinical details. She was an artist. She could string together words in ways that sounded like music. Very, very dirty music. And her reservoir of sexual inspiration seemed to be bottomless. She could do twenty minutes alone on the vein that ran down my shaft.

But even the best phone sex can get old if you do it too much. We needed something fresh to keep things interesting. So we added an element of danger. We started calling each other only when we were out in public. It made our discussions hotter, but also considerably riskier. It was one thing if I was sitting in my car in rush hour traffic, where dropping my pants would likely go unnoticed by my fellow commuters. But Whole Foods wasn't the most convenient place to discover that I had a tremendous erection. The other shoppers didn't know that my girlfriend had just described to me, using language that's still banned in much of the South, what she wanted to do to me with her tongue. As far as they could tell, I was just a little too into Cap'n Crunch.

The same logic applies to the public library - specifically, the fiction section, row ln-po. Though you may never see them, rest assured, there are other people nearby, and they'd like to enjoy their literature without overhearing whispered dirty talk, especially if it involves what you intend to bury your face in.

Soon even that got dull. We needed to take it a step further. But what's left after phone sex at grocery stores and government buildings starts to feel tame? When even sending a text message like "wanna guess where my finger is?" while the other person is visiting their grandmother barely registers as a 2.0 on the erotic richter scale?

Well, obviously. We sent each other pictures of our genitals.

When photographing your penis with the intention of giving it to somebody who has seen your penis many times but not as recently as you might like, it's easy to get caught up in a hopeless pursuit of perfection. A wide-shot made my dick seem too small, too much like a boiled shrimp. But a close-up just made it look ferocious, like a character from Destroy All Monsters. I wasn't asking for a lot, just an aesthetic that combined the breath-taking severity of the Washington Monument with the goofy and lovable schlongs of a Manon Cleary painting. Something that an art critic would be able to stare at for hours, never quite able to grasp all of the complexities. Or if nothing else, something that would inspire my girlfriend to say, "What's it gonna take to get that inside me as soon as humanly possible?"


It took several days but I finally settled on 10 photos. They weren't perfect, but they at least demonstrated an artistic perspective, if only as a study in form and color, which made them worthy of a place in the canon of Eric Spitznagel penis self-portraits. A canon which, as of this writing, contains only 10 photos.

I sent her the photos and waited anxiously for a response. My initial fear was, of course, rejection. "Wow, I let him fuck me with that? How did I ever get so desperate?" But then another paranoid thought sent shivers down my spine. I had just given an assortment of genital photos to a woman I'd known for less than three months. For all I knew, there was already a Flickr account with the title "Spitzy's Junk." Sure, you wouldn't necessarily know it was my penis unless you recognized the tiny mole just below my... well, I've already said too much.

I worked myself into such a lather that when she finally called, it took me a moment to realize that she wasn't asking for a ransom. Instead, she told me, without skipping any of the minutiae, exactly what she did to herself while looking at the pictures.

A few days later, she sent me photos of her own naked body. I came so hard, I fell out of my chair and nearly gave myself a concussion.

(To read two more stories about sex in which no actual sex takes place, go here.)

Imagined Internal Monologues (part 2)

PAPAGENO: Okay, there he is. Just shut the fuck up and let me do the talking.

PAPAGENA: I told you, I already have a relationship with the kid. He trusts me.

PAPAGENO: Are you kidding me? You're delusional. As far as he's concerned, you're just a plush toy with respiratory problems. You're fooling yourself if you think he gives two shits about you.

PAPAGENA: Well at least I've made an effort to meet him. All you've done is suck up to the boss. Have you even listened to yourself? It's embarrassing. You sound like a house slave. "I sho' does 'preciate da chance ta shine yo' shoes wit my tongue, Massa Spitznagel."

KEEP ON READIN'! WHAT, YOU GOT SOMEPLACE BETTER TO BE?

PAPAGENO: I know what I'm doing. Just play it cool and we'll have this kid eating out of our hand.

PAPAGENA: Hey, do me a favor and try not to hump him.

PAPAGENO: Excuse me?

PAPAGENA: Oh right, like you've never raped my neck while I was trying to sleep on a beanbag chair. Whatever, dude.

PAPAGENO: I don't know what you're talking about.

PAPAGENA: Just try to keep the lipstick in your pants for once, okay?

PAPAGENO: Do I really need to remind you that you're the reason we've been banned from the living room?

PAPAGENA: What? You took the crap on the rug. I was just trying to get rid of the evidence.

PAPAGENO: By eating my poop?

PAPAGENA: Hey, don't knock it till you've tried it.

PAPAGENO: That is just revolting. What is wrong with you? What neurons aren't firing in your brain that've made you think poop is an acceptable source of nutrition?

PAPAGENA: You raped me!!

PAPAGENO: Please, can we not fight? I told you I'm sorry. It won't happen again.

PAPAGENA: I'll believe it when I see it.

PAPAGENO: I don't even know what I'm doing. It's just instinct. I'm certainly not enjoying it, if that's what you think.

PAPAGENA: Do you know what it's like to have the folds of wrinkled fat around your neck violated by your own adopted brother? Do you? Do you?

PAPAGENO: Jesus Christ, do you smell that? I think he already crapped himself.

PAPAGENA: (breaths in deeply.) Mmmmmm.

PAPAGENO: How has he lasted almost an entire year without being house-trained?

PAPAGENA: Everything's changed. The boss doesn't have any real power anymore. This is just a puppet regime. The baby is pulling all the strings now.

PAPAGENO: Oh, come on! That's just a conspiracy theory. You don't know what you're saying.

PAPAGENA: Haven't you noticed what's been happening around here? It couldn't be more obvious. Does he have to poop outside? No. Does he eat his meals out of a bowl on the kitchen floor? Never. Does he get showered with attention despite his unwillingness to humiliate himself with antics that can only be described as self-effacing burlesque? Most certainly.

(Long pause.)

PAPAGENO: Holy shit. What the fuck are we going to do?

PAPAGENA: There's nothing we can do. Just try not to make any waves and let the leadership know where our loyalties lie. This is no time to be harboring any Nat Turner fantasies. Insurrectionists have a way of disappearing.

PAPAGENO: I'm just going to pretend that I know what any of that means.





PAPAGENA: This was all your idea.

PAPAGENO: Just shut your trap and smile, will you?

PAPAGENA: Do you have any idea how humiliating this is?

PAPAGENO: Oh, right, like that's a first for you.

PAPAGENA: Fuck you! I hold you completely responsible for this.

PAPAGENO: What is your problem? Do you seriously not understand why this is a good thing?

PAPAGENA: How is this good? Have you even done your research? Do you fucking know what a "Yoda" is?

PAPAGENO: I know that it has big ears. And it makes the boss laugh.

PAPAGENA: I thought it couldn't get worse than the goddamn ballerina costume they used to make me wear. But this is just... I don't have the words. It's a personal insult.

PAPAGENO: You're such a freaking baby. This is a huge step forward for us. We're back in!

PAPAGENA: I think the fake ears are starting to cut off the blood supply to your brain.

PAPAGENO: You, my friend, are in dire need of a reality check. The world has changed. We don't have the same job security of ten, twenty dog years ago. Whether you want to believe it or not, we've become expendable. They could cut us loose at any moment. But the new kid seems to have an inside track, and I intend on following his lead.

PAPAGENA: I just don't get it. I could've sworn he was actually running the show. But then he lets them dress him up like the village idiot, and now I don't know what to believe anymore.

PAPAGENO: There's nothing to believe. It's all chaos. Black is white, up is down, it's meaningless. But I do know that our only hope for survival is to assimilate and blend in.

PAPAGENA: I'm sorry, I can't do it. The price is just too high. I can't be a part of this charade anymore. The moment I get out of this monkey suit, I am gonna take a big stinky poo in their bedroom and eat it until my entire fucking face is a nutty brown.

PAPAGENO: Your funeral, pal.

Imagined Internal Monologues (part 1)

For almost a decade, my brother and his wife lived with two Pugs, which they named Papagena and Papageno. (Yes, after the characters in The Magic Flute .) In April of 2006, they gave birth to a son.

The Papas were not amused.



Excuse me? Are you fucking kidding me with this? Okay, fine, I get it. You're not happy with my work. Message received. But there was a better way to do this, y'know. We could've talked about it first. I thought I made it very clear that the lines of communication are always open. You didn't have to go behind my back and hire outside help. That hurts me. Not just personally, but professionally.

KEEP ON READIN'! NOT THAT I'D KNOW IF YOU DIDN'T, BUT STILL... BE A PAL!

So this is what you went with, huh? Okay, uh... I'm not trying to cast aspersions, but have you taken a good look at him? He's almost entirely bald. Yeah, I know, I thought it was cute at first, too. But it's been a few weeks and he still hasn't grown a proper coat. He reminds me of those Peruvian hairless breeds. Don't get me wrong, the "no fur" look works for you, but that's why you're the boss. Not just anybody can pull it off. I realize that I'm not one to talk. Yes, I'm getting older, and I'm not as aesthetically pleasing as I was as a puppy. I've heard all the jokes that you and your lady friend like to make about me. "Papagena looks like Marty Feldman with pink eye." Ha, ha, very funny. No, really, it's okay, I'm a good sport. I know I'm not winning any beauty contests. But at least I had a few good years before I started to fall apart. What's his excuse?

I wish it was just the creepy lack of hair, I really do. But I've been watching him for awhile now and, well, I'm only saying this as somebody who has been involved in this organization for a few years, but I honestly don't think he's got what it takes. Have you noticed that he hasn't moved more than a few inches since you brought him home? There've been no long walks in the park or festive games of tug-a-war with your favorite socks. He just lays there and cries his tiny pink head off. And it seems to me that you've been going awfully easy on him. During my first month on the job, if I so much as barked in the wrong decibel I'd end up out in the back yard all night. But like I always said to the other dog, "He's tough but fair." And I stand by that. You were always very good with discipline but... I hope you take this as constructive criticism... I'm pretty sure that the kid has been pooping inside. I'm not trying to suggest that you've gone soft but... I just think you need to consider how this reflects on your ability to govern.

I know what you're thinking and no, I'm not threatened by him. I'm well aware that the new puppy always gets the most attention. But if you compare his job performance with mine, I think it's pretty obvious who comes out on top. If you throw a squeeze toy, does he run after it? Has he expressed an interest in playing "Gimme That"? I haven't even seen the little fucker break a sweat yet. I don't mean to be a hypocrite. I'm the first to admit that I do more napping these days than aerobic activity. But even when I'm sleeping I try to keep you entertained. You know how my snoring sounds like a jet plane with serious engine trouble? You think that's just because of my deviated septum? No, I do it for you. All I want is to make you smile.

Okay, fine, fine, I've said enough. You know where I stand on this.



So... I suppose you think you've got it pretty sweet, don't you? You've been coddled and pampered from the moment you showed up, and your food dish is an endless trough of delicious people food. Well, enjoy it while it lasts, baldie. The good times aren't gonna last forever. I should know. Before you came along, I was the resident mollycoddle. All those handouts you've been stuffing down your fat gullet? They used to be mine. The boss and his old lady were giving me whatever I wanted, whenever I wanted it. I mean, sure, I didn't have my own dining chair. I'm still not sure how you pulled that off. But I was enjoying a full menu of culinary options, and not just whatever happened to fall off their plates. I wouldn't eat anything unless I saw one of them eat it first. It's like they were my personal food taster. I'm just saying, don't think you're so special.

Have you ever heard of the egg tax? Oh man, it was brilliant. Me and the other dog - Papageno. Have you met him yet? Good kid. - we came up with it. We somehow convinced the boss that whenever he cooked an egg, he had to fry one for us or we'd freak out and run around the apartment and howl at the top of our lungs all afternoon. I know, a pretty obvious scam, right? Like I'm seriously gonna waste an entire day protesting the lack of eggs in my diet? But the beauty of it was, we rarely had to follow through on our threat. We just put on a show the first few times - y'know, caused a ruckus that he wouldn't soon forget - and after that, he figured it was easier just to give us the eggs rather than take a chance of a repeat performance. After awhile, it became a conditional reflex for him. He doesn't even think about it anymore. He was like a Pavlov Dog. Ha! Kinda ironic, right? Y'know, I always thought there was a screenplay in there somewhere. Pavlov Dogs turn the tables on their oppressors. "Who Salivating Now, Bitch?" Million dollar idea. But oy, who has the time to write?

Anyway, where was I? Oh, right, food. They never believed us down at the dog park. 'You're getting fried eggs?' They'd say. 'In your dreams.' But the proof is in the paunch, my friend. Every week we'd come back to the park looking a little fatter, moving a little slower, breathing a little heavier. You can't argue with results. And it wasn't just the eggs. We were getting bacon and pasta and bananas and tortilla chips and cookies. If they stocked it in the kitchen, we got a taste. A few more years of eating like that and I would've become a diabetic. Do you have an idea what that means? A diabetic! For dogs, that's the American dream! Fat and immobile, with little or no circulation and veins the consistency of warm butter. What more could anybody want from life?

But then you had to show up - completely uninvited, I might add - and all of a sudden the well dried up. We're back to eating gruel out of a can. Doesn't matter how much we cry, we can't even get a fucking Wheat Thin out of them anymore. But strangely, you never seem to go hungry, do you? And what really chaps my ass is that you're not even making an effort. You just sit there like a useless lump until one of them feels sorry for you. Did you come up with a con like the egg tax? No. You don't seem to know the first goddamn thing about begging. See, that's what's wrong with you kids today. You're just lazy. No work ethic at all. "Waaa-waaa, I'm a baby, give me food, waa-waa." You've forgotten that you have to earn it.

You're seriously not going to share anything, are you? Fine, you don't want to show respect to your elders, that's your prerogative. Keep cramming your fat fucking face with people food. Hope you choke on it.

Personal Ads I Assume My Mother Must've Answered, Considering Her Choice of Boyfriends Lately

Single white male, 60-something but looks much, much older, seeks female for companionship and free nursing care. Interests include extremely short walks through the back yard, planning vacations that will eventually be cancelled at the last minute because of my undisclosed hip problems, and bedrest. I also enjoy exotic cuisine, as long as it contains no spices whatsoever (my bowels are finicky) and is placed in a blender and rendered into a soft, easily digested mush. Must appreciate the irony of dating a man with chronic heart problems despite having lost your first husband to a massive heart attack. I will eventually die of an undiagnosed brain tumor, but not until you've dated me long enough to feel a sense of responsibility to take care of me as my body slowly fades away. After six months, I will be confined to a wheelchair, which will make things extremely inconvenient for you, especially when your sons visit, who don't particularly want to hang around the house all night and watch you spoon-feed pudding to a dying man. Towards the end, you'll be changing my diapers on an almost hourly basis, but you'll feel comforted that we had at least one or two weeks of bliss, if you don't count the doctor visits and the amount of time you spent massaging my aching joints.

KEEP ON READIN'! UNLESS YOU WANT TO TAKE THIS OUTSIDE. WELL, WHAT'S IT GONNA BE, PUNK?

* * *

Recently widowed man seeks recently widowed woman for a curiously-timed romance. We'll meet at a bereavement support group and begin dating almost immediately, despite having buried our respective spouses just weeks previously. My interests include public displays of affection, especially when the neighbors are watching, and introducing myself to your friends, many of whom just want to offer their condolences for your loss, as your "new boyfriend". I also enjoy wearing your husband's clothes, particularly when your eldest son comes home for Thanksgiving. He'll take one look at the slippers on my feet and instantly recognize that they once belonged to his father, and the remainder of the evening will be filled with awkward conversations and strained silences. Oh, and if at all possible, I'd prefer that he didn't know I'm living with you until I've already moved most of my personal effects into your bedroom. My children will resent you, assuming that you're trying to replace their mother, and I expect your children to treat me likewise. When we eventually marry, our family will attend the wedding and pretend to be happy about the whole thing, but their thinly-veiled hostility will be pretty obvious to everyone except us. After exchanging vows, we'll shake hands rather than kiss, which will strike everyone as a little odd. They won't find it odd, however, when I leave after just a few months. Your son will always wonder what happened to his dad's slippers, but he won't ever ask you about it.

* * *

Single male of indeterminate age seeks single woman for casual dating and inappropriate behavior. I am comfortable with my body and expect your family to feel the same. After 5pm, I could be naked at any moment, often without warning. Your son's wife should expect, on at least one occasion, to walk into an unlocked bathroom and see me completely nude. It's no big deal to me - I don't have any hang-ups about your relatives feasting their eyes on my man-junk - but it may likely traumatize her. Also, I should mention that when I make number 2, I don't close the door. Is that going to be a problem? Our relationship will eventually become rocky, and I'll decide to send a letter to both of your sons, assuring them that I have honorable intentions and promising to be "the best lover your mother ever had." It will never occur to me that "lover" may not have been the best word, as neither of them are all that interested in the quality and consistency of your orgasms. In fact, they'd rather not know that we're having sex at all, much less that I know exactly where the clitoris is and how to use it. And it won't help matters that I've claimed to be the "best" lover you've ever had, which implies that I'm better at pleasing you than their father, may he rest in peace, and what I'm really saying is, "Your daddy didn't know how to fuck like I do." And the more they think about it, the more it'll eat away at them, and they'll have vivid nightmares of me hovering over your bed, buck-ass naked (which, due to my tendency to be nude whenever possible, will not require much imagination), muttering sleazy come-ons like, "Mama Spitznagel, why don'cha back that ass up?" It'll haunt them long after we've stopped dating, and they'll never be able to tell you why their faces go beet red whenever my name is even mentioned in passing. If I really wanted this relationship to work, I'd probably think twice about being so thoughtlessly explicit with your sons, who are still mourning their father and still carry around the socks he was wearing when he died, and the last thing they need are details about your sex life, because even thinking about you with another man makes them want to cry. But I'm going to tell them anyway, because that's the kind of dude I am.