Let's Continue That Tour of Spitzy's Home Town

(To take the first part of the tour, go here.)

Sorry, I should've known that we wouldn't be able to get a beer this early. Because what time is it? 4pm? Yeah, heaven forbid anybody in this town be seen with an alcoholic beverage while the sun is still up. Then Jesus might be watching, right? Well, fuck me for wanting to take the edge off. If I'd thought ahead, we'd be brown-bagging it. But I guess for now we'll just have to make do with coffee.

As luck would have, there's a bakery down the street that just so happens to be another stop on our tour. I worked here for like a month when my best friend's father owned it. It was the easiest job I've ever had in my life, probably because I didn't do any actual work. My grueling three-hour shifts mostly involved eating the day-old donuts and gabbing with the owner's son. Sometimes I wonder if I was at least partly responsible for putting him out of business.

And we all know what happened next, don't we? Wait, sorry, I forgot you didn't grow up here. Well, a lesbian couple moved to town and bought the bakery. Within a few months they were even turning a profit, which is more than my friend's dad accomplished in a decade. Everybody in town loved the new and improved bakery, even though they still whispered the word "lesbian" when mentioning the owners.

"They make such good scones. And you'd never guess they were... " voice drops, hand shields mouth as if to protect the word from lip-reading children "...lesbians."

KEEP ON READIN'! IT DON'T COST NUTHIN'!

They had a pretty good run for three or four years. But then they forgot the most crucial rule of running a bakery. Even if the residents of a small farming town accept your alternative lifestyle, they're not going to keep lining up for your muffins when somebody gets a mouthful of armpit hair. See, here's the thing: Andrea Dworkin could get away with shaggy pits because she didn't bake cookies for children. But when you're working with flour and milk, you need to either trim those stanky hedges or sew yourself some armpit hairnets.

Long story short, the bakery went under again. I'm not sure how long the building was empty before somebody decided to test the third-time's-a-charm theory. So the town got their bakery back, and it hasn't seen another scandal in almost fifteen years. Of course, some people think the new owners have gotten too complacent. My brother won't even come here anymore because he hates their coffee. I believe his exact words were "undrinkable swill." And I can't disagree with him. The coffee is terrible. But I think that's why the locals like it so much. It's a metaphor for their lives. The only way to survive in this town and not go nuts is to accept mediocrity as a lifestyle choice. If your standards are too high you're just going to be disappointed eventually. So every morning they get out of bed and walk down to the bakery and enjoy a piping hot mug of liquid resignation. Mmmm, that bland flavor means that this is as good as it gets.

* * *

So I guess you're probably wondering, "Why exactly did you bring us to a graveyard?" Well, maybe it's just my family, but I've never been anxious or uncomfortable in graveyards. I mean sure, some of them can be depressing, but only if they're located next to a major interstate or a suburban mall. If your final resting place comes with an unobstructed view of a Panda Express, you were either a really rotten person or your family despised you, possibly both.



But some graveyards can be beautiful, like this one. Surrounded by lush trees and with a panoramic view of the Bay, I can't think of a better place to be laid to rest. We've got a family plot right over there, though I haven't decided yet if I want to be buried here. It sounds nice in theory, but... well, let's say you were going to buy a house, and although you loved everything about it, there's a contractual stipulation that you have to share it with your parents and both sets of grandparents and several dozen relatives you never met. Now imagine you had to live in this house forever.

That's basically what I'd be doing if I allowed my earthly remains to be buried here. I don't claim to know anything about how the afterlife works, but I'm not taking any chances. I don't want an eternity of awkward graveyard dinners with my ghost family and conversations that never get further than "So... what's new with you?"

I think of this graveyard less as someplace I might like to end up someday and more like a less intrusive way of checking up on my old neighbors. Two laps and I've pretty much learned who's dead and who's still alive. So much more convenient than picking up the phone or attending some god-awful party that I'll be stuck at long after I've gotten the information I came for. Every time we come here, there's always at least one shocker. My brother and I try to split up - better to cover the most ground - and eventually one of us will shout something like, "Oh my god, remember our bus driver in seventh grade?" and the other will come running like a frat guy to free booze.

The only problem is that there are far too many Kalchiks in this town, so it's often impossible to determine with any certainty if we actually knew half of the people buried here. We both went to school with two guys named John Kalchik (weirdly, they're not related), and in this graveyard alone, there are at least six dead guys named John Kalchik, ranging in age from 8 to 108. It's difficult not to wonder sometimes if this entire town was one big in-breeding experiment that the Spitznagels were never invited to.

Y'know, doing an inventory of the recently deceased neighbors in your former hometown can really work up an appetite. Anybody feel like getting something to eat? I'm buying. We could grab a sandwich at... no, that's closed... okay, how about- ? Wait, no, they're closed too. Uh... hmmm... give me a minute, I'll think of something...

* * *

I am shocked - shocked, I tell you - that this place is still open. I could've sworn it went belly-up like all the others. I guess this town still needs at least one greasy-spoon burger joint. For a second there, I was worried that my old hood had given up on colon cancer. Yeah, as if, right? Well, gang, I hope you brought your appetites and a spare colostomy bag. Do you think a burger needs bacon like a public school needs government-enforced prayer? Do you like your bleu cheese dressing with just a splinter of iceberg lettuce? Do you believe that velvet paintings of hobos facilitate digestion? Well then lower your veiny and translucent ass into the nearest booth, 'cause you're in the right place.

This is crazy. I think the last time I was in here, it was with my dad's mistress. That seems like an eternity ago. Anyway, anybody feel like splitting an order of onion rings?

Wait, what? Oh, the mistress thing? Yeah, I don't even know if that's true. I just remember having dinner here with my brother and dad and some woman who definitely wasn't my mom. I think my mom was visiting her parents in Florida at the time, and for all I know, my dad taking a strange woman out to dinner was completely innocent and defensible. But when she came back there was a lot of yelling and door-slamming. And at some point she took me aside and asked me leading questions about the apparently clandestine dinner.

"Did it look like he was having fun?"

This made absolutely no sense to me. "Of course he was having fun," I said, a little too defensively. "We were all having fun. It was fancy burger night!"

She didn't come right out and ask me if there was any funny-business going on, but I could read between the lines. My mom's head was aflutter with conspiracy theories. And she may've had grounds for her mistrust, I didn't know. All I could tell her is what I saw. I probably came across as too protective of my dad, too willing to throw myself in front of a moving bus to save him. But I was as honest with her as I could possibly be. Maybe the "we all had fun" line sounded evasive, but I didn't intend it in a Bill Clinton "That depends on what your definition of 'is' is" kinda way. If I could go back and do it all again, I'd come right out and tell her, "If you're asking me if she blew him between the salad and the main course, no, I did not witness such an exchange."

For the next few weeks, my dad slept on the couch in the living room. When they thought my brother and I were out of earshot, they lobbed threats at each other like grenades. Every so often we'd get hit with shrapnel. Words like "move out" and "divorce" came tumbling at us, scarier because of the lack of context. But they told us nothing. Dad kept his distance, and my mom would only say, "I don't want you to lose all respect for your father."

And then one day, as abruptly as it began, the fighting stopped and my dad returned to their bedroom and the topic of affairs and sneaky dinner dates was unceremoniously dropped.

I never saw ol'-what's-her-name again - the woman that my dad may or may not have slept with while his wife was away. If I'd known just how significant she would become in my family's secret history, I would've watched her more closely when I had the chance. I think she had brown curly hair and wore hippie sundresses and sandals and smelled of petulia. That's pretty much all I could tell you about her. Obviously, she's not predominately featured in any of our photo albums.

My brother and I have discussed what might've happened that night more times than I'd like to admit. We've never talked to our mother about it, but we have talked about talking to her. We're waiting for a window of opportunity. We're ready if the perfect conversational segue should present itself and we can finally ask her the Big Question. But you can't force these things. You can't just charge at her and say, "Did dad ever cheat on you?" These things need to be handled delicately.

I'm not sure why I need to know, I just do. For a long time, my brother thought I was being a masochist. "Just leave it alone. What does it matter? It's in the past. Forget it." But now even his curiosity has gotten the best of him. Maybe it's because our mom is getting older and life is fragile and we realize instinctively that we're running out of time. You can't retrace the footsteps of your past if all the eye-witnesses are gone. You don't want to be the guy shaking the 98-year old woman with dementia who thinks you're Teddy Roosevelt and screaming, "I need answers, damn you! Answers!"

...

Y'know, let's skip the meal. I'm not hungry anymore. Looks like they've opened the bar. I could use a beer and a shot... and then three more beers. Who's with me?

* * *

You wanna another Pabst? I got another six-pack in that bag over there. No, seriously, help yourself.

So I know we've already covered this part of the tour, but I think it's worth a second look. Did I mention that I grew up in this house? I did? Well, whatever. Lots of important shit happened here. I mean, not on the front stoop, but inside. I'd show you some of the highlights if I could figure out how to jimmy these locks. I don't get it, I've been down here screaming for half-an-hour. How can they fucking sleep through this racket? Just let a brutha come in your home for five freakin' seconds so he can make peace with the demons from his past, that's all I'm asking. I'm sorry if midnight isn't the most ideal time for you, but it seems I forgot to have my fucking secretary call you with a complete itinerary of my fucking emotional breakdowns!!

Sorry, sorry, sorry, I didn't mean to yell. It's just been one of those nights, y'know? I really had high hopes for this tour, but everything just went to shit before I knew what was happening. Half of what I wanted to show you isn't even around anymore. That corner store I was telling you about, where my brother and I bought comic books and smoke bombs? It's a pharmacy now. Last time I went to the Christmas Cove Beach I saw a condom floating in the water. Summer camp? Gone. Replaced with condos. Sledding hill? Torn down to build another wing on the hospital, which of course closed down. Can you believe that? We don't have a hospital anymore. A hospital! We're not talking about a restaurant where you can throw peanut shells on the floor. This is where you go if the bleeding doesn't stop, or if you notice that your spouse is much bluer than usual. The nearest hospital is now an hour to the south, but I'm told you can get medevaced during an emergency. In other words, you better be goddamn sure those chest pains aren't just indigestion, because when you call 911 you're paying for a fucking helicopter.

Honestly, folks, I can't think of where else to take you. There's Nipple Hill, but I don't think I could find it again unless I was driving in a jeep with a pair of Old Money Brooklyn Jews, one of whom might've been a drag queen, soused on box wine. That's a long and complicated story, I don't want to get into it now. There are the rich gay guys who own the B&B down the street, but that's another sad tale. Have you ever been walking through your old neighborhood after burying your father and it's late December and it's snowing and the houses are all lit up like Vegas strip clubs except with more fluorescent mangers than boobs. And as you and your family are wandering aimlessly, still in a haze from grief, you pass the home of the eccentric gay couple that just moved to town, and you notice that they've decorated their yard with a life-size mannequin of Santa Claus, who appears to be dropping his pants and preparing to take a big, steamy dump in the snow. You point and laugh at the absurdity of the Christmas tableau, and somebody mentions how much your dad would've loved it, and they're right, he would've been the most vocal in his appreciation, and probably would've walked straight up to the house and rang their doorbell and told them how fucking hysterical their shitting Santa lawn ornament was and the next thing you know you're spending Christmas Eve with rich gay guys. But as you think about this and exchange forlorn looks with your brother and mother, you begin to realize that there's something kinda sad and pointless about it. Is that really your father's legacy, as the Guy Who Would've Appreciated a Santa Crapping Joke? Is that the best you can come up with? He's dead and now he'll never be able to enjoy getting brown-nosed by some obese Christian icon? Is that all his life was worth? Obviously not, but in that moment, just hours after lowering his urn into the dirt and saying your final goodbyes, it feels vaguely depressing that this is how you and your family have decided to remember him.

Shit, I'm sorry. It wasn't supposed to be this way. I thought this tour would be fun. I thought it'd be like Huckleberry Finn but without the racist subtext, full of adolescent mischief and white picket fences. But I'm just so fucking weepy tonight. It may not matter anymore, but this was all a lot better the first time around. I wasn't some maudlin kid beaten down by life. There was - will you throw me another Pabst? Cool, thanks - there was so much to this town that I haven't been able to do justice. I just... I just need to think for a minute. It'll come back to me. And then we'll... uh...

Fuck.

Okay, hold that thought. I'm just gonna talk to these cops and see what's up. They've got that hostile "you're drunk and disorderly and trespassing on private property" look on their faces, but I think they'll come around when I tell 'em what my day's been like. Don't go anywhere, okay? I'll be right back.

Useless and Far Too Personal Simpsons Trivia

You do know what tonight is, don't you? It's Simpsons Movie Eve!

In just twenty-four short, sleepless hours, my pasty white ass will be seated at the Century Centre 9 in San Francisco, ready to be one of the first to hear "D'oh" in THX, the way god (or whatever deity is responsible for Matt Groening) intended.

Do you remember what it felt like when you saw Star Wars for the first time and that crazy cursive title splashed onto the screen and the orchestra blared the opening notes and the hair was standing up on the back on your neck and your nipples were so hard they could've cut glass and you weren't sure why because there wasn't anything remotely erotic about any of it but you knew that something had changed for you today and just by being in this dark theater with so many other people feeling the same excitement you could tell that you were witnessing the creation of a cultural zeitgeist, or at the very least a generational line in the sand, separating Us and Them, those who understood and those who just sneer and shrug and say "I don't get it," and even before the opening credits ended you knew that you'd be walking out of this movie a different person, maybe even a better person?

That's exactly what I'm expecting to feel on 12:01am Friday morning.

Even if the movie tanks, I'll still be leaving with a big, sloppy, Nelson-post-"ha-ha" grin on my face. Because if the plot sucks and the jokes fall flat and it desecrates the memory of my most cherished TV addiction, at least I'll have seen Bart Simpson's schmeckle. So worse case scenario, it's still win-win, right?

As I sit here in the Century Cinemas lobby and try to not feel completely foolish about being a 38 year-old adult male who has dropped everything just so I can be the first in line to see a freakin' cartoon, I've decided to devote today's blog to The Simpsons. Specifically, Simpsons' trivia. Even more specifically, Simpsons' trivia that occasionally gets more personal than you ever wanted to know about me.

Let's get to it, shall we?

DON'T HAVE A COW, KEEP ON READIN'!

* * *

Bart's full name is Bartholomew Jojo Simpson. Milhouse's full name is Milhouse Mussolini Van Houten. Krusty the Clown's full name is either Herschel Schmoikel Krustofski or Herschel Pinkus Yerucham Krustofski, depending on which episode you believe.

* * *

I have a great-aunt in upstate New York that I see several times a year, and I still refer to her as "You know, what's her name. It starts with a P."

* * *

Homer, Marge, Lisa and Maggie are named after Matt Groening's parents and younger sisters.

* * *

If you mention to a friend, "We should find out where Matt Groening's family lives and break into their house and steal the real Homer's tighty-whiteys," she'll look at you like you're nuts. Even when you insist that you were just joking and even if you went through with it, you probably wouldn't wear Homer's underpants, she'll still never look at you the same way again.



* * *

In the German version of The Simpsons, Üter Zörker is from Switzerland. Because apparently the Germans haven't noticed that their children are morbidly obese and wear ill-fitting lederhosen and eat marzipan candies packed full of iodine.

* * *

Donald Sutherland, who appeared in the episode "Lisa the Iconoclast", also starred in the 1975 movie The Day of the Locust, where he played a character named Homer Simpson. Coincidence, or did I just blow your mind?!

* * *

I once ended a friendship because the person in question stared at me blankly when I asked her, "What was your favorite line in The Simpsons last night?" I also continued a friendship with somebody possessing a personality that could best be described as a "mouth-breathing cretin" because he once said to me, "I'm only an alcoholic 'cause I want to be more like Homer Simpson."

* * *

Of Cletus Spuckler's numerous offspring, my favorites (in name alone) are Q-Bert, Condoleezza Marie, Birthday, Rubella Scabies and Crystal Meth. I think Crystal Meth is such a spectacular name for a kid that I'd seriously consider choosing it over my long-standing favorite, Colonial Worthington Toaster Spitznagel. I think what I'd enjoy most about naming a kid Crystal Meth is that the initial reaction among my friends and family will be abject horror, and then they'll confront me about it and I'll feign ignorance until somebody finally says, "It's just not appropriate to name your kid after a methamphetamine," and then I'll burst into laughter and say, "Oh, wait a minute, I get your confusion. I wasn't referring to the drug Crystal Meth. He's actually named after Cletus's eldest son. You know, the slack-jawed yokel from the TV show The Simpsons." They'll think about it for a second and nod and say, "Oh, okay, I get it. Well, that's better, I guess." But you know what? They won't think it's better at all. If anything, they'll think it's much, much worse.

* * *

I do not know, nor do I care, where Springfield is located. But I am reasonably sure that the writers are fucking with us. In the episode "A Tale of Two Springfields", the town is split into two area codes, 636 and 939. If this information is accurate, this means that half of Springfield is in Missouri and the other half is in Puerto Rico. Obviously, that can't be the case. In another episode, somebody mentions that Springfield is 678 miles from Mexico City and 2,653 miles away from Orlando, Florida. This is not geographically possible. I know these things because I looked them up.

* * *

It no longer surprises me that I don't get laid anymore.

* * *

The official motto of Springfield is "Corruptus in Extremis". Back in the early 90s, I knew a guy who wanted to get this tattooed on his right bicep. I'm not kidding. We showed up at a tattoo parlor in Chicago at 2am but they wouldn't do it because he was too drunk. It was probably for the best. Not because he would've regretted the tattoo later, but because this dude was kinda a moron. Anybody who saw this tattoo might've mistakenly believed that he was somebody with at least a modicum of intelligence and an adorable obsession with Simpsons minutiae. He had none of these qualities. He was the kind of guy who'd walk up to a woman at a party and say, "Yo, don't have a cow, lady, just put your balls in my mouth," and think he was being clever.

* * *

I read somewhere about a Ned Flanders cult in Britain, where the members dressed up like Ned because it gave them a fetishistic thrill. I even mentioned it to Simpsons scribe George Meyer when I interviewed him for The Believer Magazine, and we shared a good laugh at their expense. But after several years of telling people about this cult and just blindly accepting the details of my hazy memory, I tried googling it again and couldn't find any evidence that an organized gathering of Ned Flanders role-players ever existed. Is it possible that I made up the entire thing, or even more disturbingly, dreamt it? I don't know much about dream interpretation, but I can't imagine it's a good sign when you regularly dream about an army of identical mustached Christian men.

* * *

An ex-girlfriend once offered to dress up like Lisa Simpson for my birthday. But she got upset with me when I pointed out that, while her costume was technically perfect, her skin wasn't even close to yellow. I meant it as constructive criticism, but she took it as an insult and indication of a deeper dissatisfaction with her.

"So it'd make you hot if I looked like I had malaria?" She screamed at me before storming out of the room.

She was missing the point, but whatever. For at least eight minutes, it was the best sex I've ever had.

* * *




Bart's birthday is April 1st. In the episode "My Sister, My Sitter", Lisa reveals that she is two years and 38 days younger than Bart. So this would make her birthday February 22nd. My birthday is February 20th. I've often thought that this would make an excellent ice-breaker in the oft chance that I ever met Lisa. We'd laugh about how weird it was, and I'd make some charming comment about how we could celebrate our birthdays together if we ever got married. And then we would get married, after she realized that we were soul mates, and every year we'd tell our yellow kids the same story, about how I won the heart of their mom with some silly comment about a shared birthday, and they'd roll their eyes and say "Ay, caramba!" or whatever catch-phrase their uncle was teaching them this week.

* * *

Yes, I know that cartoon characters don't exist. I was talking hypothetically. Lightnen up, douche-nozzle.

* * *

Hans Moleman has been killed dozens of times on The Simpsons. If I was able to choose the exact nature of my demise, and it somehow had to correspond with a Moleman death, here are my top three:

1) Catching on fire after my huge eyeglasses become a magnifying glass.

2) Having Montgomery Burns drill into my head, thinking I'm the Lucky Charms leprechaun because of an ether-induced hallucination.

3) Blown up by an eclair meant for Homer.

* * *

I read somewhere that Ralphie was named after Ralph Kramden on The Honeymooners, and he was originally intended to be more Kramden-esque; kind of a louder, smaller version of Homer. To give you an idea of just how much this information hurt me, imagine that I am a Christian, and I just learned that the original version of Jesus Christ was meant to be more overtly Jewish - his last words along the lines of "S'tut shreklekh vey!" - and more handsy with Mary Magdalene.

* * *

I never cared for The Honeymooners, but I would've thought Jackie Gleason was at least mildly amusing if he'd ever said anything as brilliant as, "Me fail English? That's unpossible!"

* * *

The Comic Book Guy's real name is Jeff Albertson. Weirdly, I once knew a dude in Chicago named Jeff Albertson. He was not overweight, balding, or to the best of my knowledge, obsessed with comic books. While he was aware of The Simpsons, he was not a fan, though he was the first to tell me that Kang and Kodos were named after Star Trek aliens. So maybe he and the Comic Book Guy had more in common than a surname.

* * *

In the episode "Rock Bottom", in which Homer is accused of sexual harassment, the show ends with a list of apologies that scrolls by in a blur. Unlike anybody with something better to do (i.e. turning off the TV and having meaningful contact with other human beings), I took the time to pause on each and every frame and examine the carefully-constructed gags. My favorites include:

Styrofoam is not made from kittens.

The word "cheese" is not funny in and of itself.

The Beatles haven't reunited to enter kick boxing contests

If you are reading this you have no life.

That last line gave me pause. Maybe they're right, I thought. Maybe sitting alone in a darkened apartment and patiently dissecting the hidden jokes in a TV show about underachievers isn't exactly the same as breaking cryptographic code for the Nazi resistance. Perhaps, as the writers had so cruelly reminded me, I really didn't have a life. But a few seconds later, the same episode gave me this hopeful message of solidarity:

The people who are writing this have no life.

Well of course. The creative staff clearly understood that they and their audience were the same cultural outcasts. We were one and the same. We had an alliance, forged on a wink and a nudge, based on our mutual appreciation for the pointless inanity of existence and the hilarious vacuity of the universe. If we were sad, pathetic excuses for humanity, so were they.

A few months after making this revelation, I interviewed George Meyer (see above). But we didn't become best friends. Quite the opposite. He sent me copies of Army Man, which was kinda sweet, but we haven't talked since. Sometimes I wonder if he even recognized me as a kindred spirit, or if I was just another journalist who dragged him to a crappy Chinese restaurant in North Hollywood and asked him why The Simpsons writers love hobos so much.

* * *

Principal Skinner'a prisoner-of-war number in Vietnam was 24601. In a weird synchronicity, this is also Sideshow Bob's prison number. As I learned the hard way, playing 24601 is no guarantee of a Lottery jackpot. Believe me, I've tried. Many, many times, in many, many states. Don't waste your money.

* * *

Also, forget Homer's PIN number, 7431. Suck it, Chicago Powerball.

* * *

A humorous but otherwise deceitful episode of The Simpsons revealed that Lisa's email address is smartgirl63_\@yahoo.com. This is a fabrication. Whoever is actually at that address, I'd like to apologize yet again for my last few emails. They were intended for somebody with spikier hair and snarky vegetarian-Buddhist beliefs and a subscription to Non-Threatening Boys Magazine and, well, decidedly more fictional. Please ignore my request to send me your panties. Unless you've ever uttered a line like, "Only two synonyms? Oh my God, I'm losing my perspicacity!" In which case, would you consider marrying me?

* * *

Of the many, many, many fictitious stores featured on The Simpsons, I am most fond of the air conditioner store called "It Blows." In fact, if I was forced out of the journalism racket and opted to pursue a career in kitchen appliance sales, I wouldn't think twice about opening the first It Blows franchise. But then I'd wake up one morning and realize that I sell air conditioning units for a living, and my son is named Crystal Meth, and my entire life is pretty much one big copyright infringement lawsuit waiting to happen, and after a night of binge drinking and underage prostitutes, I'd either shoot myself in the face with a sawed-off shotgun or decide that there must be more to life than post-modern irony, and like the antihero in Tom Waits "Frank's Wild Years," I'd burn down the house and start over.

* * *

That said, I would probably still open a novelty shop called Yuckingham Palace. Because fake vomit, even without The Simpsons connection, is always funny.

* * *

Marge and Lisa have four eyelashes, and Maggie has three eyelashes. God has five fingers, and everybody else on the show has four fingers. Add these numbers together and you get 16. The Rosicrucians believed that nature consisted of 16 elements, and according to some Numerology texts, the number 16 "destroys only what is already rotten; it is almost always a destruction for good, regardless of how unpleasant it may seem when it happens." If you don't find this a shocking insight, it may be because you didn't just do a one-hitter with a guy with a glass eye in the alley behind the Friar Tuck's pub in Chicago.

* * *

I went to see Ice Age 2 just for the chance to see The Simpsons Movie trailer. That isn't nearly as cool as it sounds. I tried to tell my friends that it was just like the time I bought tickets for a Jeff Buckley show just to see opening act Soul Coughing and then left before Buckley took the stage. But you know what? It's wasn't like that at all. After the Buckley show, I ended up having sex with a random goth girl in a bathroom. After Ice Age 2, I went to a Cinnabon in the mall and had a lemonade chillatta.

* * *

When my mother called and told me that my father had died, I didn't know what to do or say. I think I went into shock. I seem to remember dropping the phone, like it had suddenly become very hot, and looking at my wife and saying, "My dad's dead." After that, I just tuned everything out. She was crying and I wondered why I wasn't and my body went limp like a marionette whose strings had just been snipped. At some point I wandered into the living room and collapsed onto the couch, trying not to think, unwilling or unable to make sense of what had just happened, and listening as my wife made the necessary calls, telling the people who needed to know, and yelling at whatever poor sod happened to be working the late shift at United reservations hotline.

I don't remember if I turned on the TV or if she did, but I have vague recollections of watching The Simpsons. I wasn't really paying attention, just staring at the familiar yellow faces, comforted by the white noise of jokes I'd heard countless times before. It was something approaching normalcy.

The pain was closing in fast. I could see it surrounding me. I could smell it in the air. It was circling me like a shark, searching for a way in. But it couldn’t touch me. I’d made damn sure of that. I’d shut out the lights, locked all the doors, closed up shop for the day. If it wanted to burrow its way into my chest, it’d have to wait until normal business hours like everybody else.

I distinctly remember Homer saying, "Weaseling out of things is important to learn. It's what separates us from the animals ... except the weasel." And I remember laughing, though not because it was funny. At the time it seemed eerily significant, though I'm not sure why anymore. I wasn't thinking clearly, and The Simpsons made it easy to fade away. It was like morphine. I needed to be numb, and for a few gloriously inconsequential minutes, Groening's animated dementia made me forget. It even made me forget that I wanted to forget. And for at least one sleepless night, that was enough.

* * *

Bart's locker combination is 36 24 36. Don't bother trying those numbers on the roulette wheel at the Golden Nugget casino in Las Vegas. Unless you want to call your mother and ask for an emergency $300 wire transfer. Trust me, there's no way to explain how you lost the money without sounding like a jackhole.

Let's Take a Tour of Spitzy's Home Town!

Oh man, this is gonna be great. There's so much to show you, I don't even know where to begin. Can you believe I grew up in such an adorable small town? I know, crazy, right? Just wait till you see the tree house, still standing after all these years, or the Corner Store where my brother and I bought comic books and fireworks, or the river that ran through town where all the neighborhood kids would fish on hot summer nights, or the home of Carl Roberts, the guy with a reputation for farting zucchinis out of his butt. Kinda reminds you of a Norman Rockwell painting, doesn't it?

Well, not the zucchini farting part. I guess that doesn't really qualify as classic Americana.

Honestly, though, you should've seen Carl in action. He'd stumble out of his house, drunk as Sinatra after slapping around Mia Farrow, and stand in the middle of the street, farting so loudly that it sounded like an air siren. And then, as I and the other neighborhood kids watched in slack-jawed horror, a zucchini would mysteriously appear in his pants, trickling down his leg like an internal parasite before finally landing on the cement with a moist ker-splat. Nobody knew how he did it - we could only assume voodoo was required to make a zucchini emerge unblemished from a human rectum - but we never cared to solve the mystery. Carl was our Houdini, and the less we knew about his secrets, the better.

I'm getting ahead of myself. We've got a lot to see before we get to that stop on the tour. If you're lucky, Carl might still be alive and he'll agree to an impromptu performance. Getting excited? You should be.

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

* * *

Okay folks, we're startin' with the big guns. See that house in the distance? The one with the cobblestone brick walls and the swing in the back yard? Yep, that was my childhood home. Well, at least until my dad got a new job and we moved to Chicago, when I was just a hair over 13. I like to think of it as my pre-masturbatory abode. Anyway, see that window on the second floor to the left? That was my room. Pretty sweet, huh? You can't make out much from this distance, so you'll just have to use your imagination. I'd love to give you a guided tour of the inside but, well, that's never ended well.

Trust me, it's not worth the trouble. I know from experience. I tried it again just last year. My brother and I knocked on the front door and told the new owners that we'd grown up here, and they graciously invited us inside. But the house wasn't the way we remembered it. That should be obvious, I know, but it always comes as a surprise.

"When we lived here," we'd announce to our hosts, "the couch was over in that corner, and the TV was next to the bay windows."

At first they just smiled politely, but before long they became defensive and even combative. "Is that right?" They'd ask, smirking at our every decor correction. "Well, things change, don't they?" To be fair, the festering hostility was almost entirely our fault. We considered even the slightest alteration as a personal offense, a flipping of the bird to our childhood memories. We just assumed that our home would be preserved, right down to every rusty nail and last piece of kitchen silverware. Perhaps we were biased, but we sincerely believed that our home would be frozen in time, like a museum display or Lincoln's log cabin. When we discovered that they'd torn down a wall to turn two bedrooms into one large master bedroom, we were so horrified that it very nearly came to fisticuffs.

Motivated by existential panic and an innate fear of our own insignificance, we scoured the house for evidence of Us, and discovered a tiny scratch on one of the bedroom doors that had somehow escaped the revisionist history of paint. We huddled around it, ignoring the not-so-subtle hints from the new owners that we'd overstayed our welcome, and debated every possible explanation for the scratch, coming up with hundreds of potential origin tales and giving its backstory far greater weight than it probably deserved. We examined it and photographed it and traced a finger around its edges, like anthropologists trying to piece together the clues of an ancient civilization.

So yeah, it's probably for the best if we just skip that part of the tour. It'd just be a disappointment. If you're like me, you'll leave feeling vaguely unsatisfied and thinking, "I kinda expected everything to be much, much bigger." I totally know what you're talking about!

* * *

The big abandoned building to your right - yeah, the one with the badly dilapidated sign and the for-lease ad in the window - that's our family's favorite restaurant. Well, not anymore, obviously. It closed down after we moved away, but during the 70s and 80s it was the town's biggest hotspot. We had dinner here pretty much every weekend, as did most of our neighbors. The food was okay, I guess. It was typical Midwestern fare. Burgers the size of bumper cars and everything else deep-fried until it met the community standards of culinary conformity. My brother and I were more impressed with the video games in the back than anything they served on a plate, if only because shooting at asteroids didn't give us quite as many chest pains. But our parents - every adult we knew, actually - they all loved this place. They couldn't get enough of it. And y'know, I think I've finally figured out why. It had nothing to do with the Guess-Which-Vegetable-We've-Fried-Into-Oblivion appetizers or the shrimp that looked (and tasted) like pencil erasers. It was the peanuts.

This was one of those restaurants where you could throw peanut shells on the floor. I know that because, to this day, my family still refers to it as "the place where you could throw peanut shells on the floor." That is our one memory of dining here, and judging from the way my mom's face lights up every time she mentions it, it's a good memory. I can still vividly recall the shocked expressions of my parents and their friends when gossip began to spread about the strange new bohemian eatery that had opened downtown.

"You can litter!" They told each other, giggling with excitement. "You just throw your shells on the ground and they don't care. They want you to do it. Oh my gosh, can you imagine such a thing?"

At that point in my life, I don't think I'd ever seen adults experiencing so much pleasure, so much unmitigated bliss. You'd think a floor covered in peanut shells was just a notch or two above a Roman vomitorium in terms of sinful extravagance.

I don't know if I'd ever really thought about what that meant until now. I always thought of my parents as happy. But when you're five or six, any adult who isn't yelling must be happy, right? I can't imagine what it must've been like to be in your 30s and living in a town this size, which has a population barely bigger than the average daily attendance at a suburban mall. You're pretty much cut off from civilization, and your only contact with the outside world is the crap on TV or whatever mom-and-pop restaurants haven't gone out of business yet.

Would it have been any different for me if I'd stayed here? Would I have been the kind of guy who thought to himself, "I hate my fucking insignificant, soul-sucking excuse for a job, and I'm one bad migraine away from ending my loveless marriage and the snot-faced satan spawn we produced with a murder-suicide. But I can find the strength to go on because I've deluded myself into thinking there's something liberating about a restaurant that lets you discard your snack refuse with the nothing-left-to-lose abandon of a Dickensian orphan. I want to watch those shells waft gently to the floor like my abandoned dreams, and then I want somebody less fortunate than me, perhaps even somebody from my high school who dropped out after failing gym, to pick up those shells with grubby, unwashed hands, preferably while I'm watching them with an arrogant sneer, thus allowing me a fleeting sense of self-worth, and maybe tonight I'll be able to fall asleep without drinking quite so many highballs."

Wow. Suddenly I'm very, very depressed. Let's move on, shall we?

* * *

Ah, here's something that everybody can enjoy. The Willowbrook Ice Cream Parlor - which, no surprise, closed down. Did everything go out of business when the Spitznagels left town? Weird. Anyway, before the Willowbrook became a coffin for my adolescent memories, it enjoyed a brief heyday as the town's prepubescent Plato's Retreat. Except instead of casual sex with strangers and STDs, it had ice cream and arts-and-crafts projects. Sounds innocent enough, I know, but the Willowbrook was so thick with sexual tension that the pheromones alone could've powered a hybrid car.

Or maybe it was just me. I asked my brother and he doesn't remember it quite the same way. But this place will always be synonymous in my mind with pre-teen erections. Sometimes I can close my eyes and still see them, the girls with their newly curvaceous bodies, once so easy to ignore but now absolutely hypnotizing. Oh god, I would've followed them anywhere. They were like the Pied Piper of Hamelin and I was just a dirty, horny rat. They'd lure me and countless other neighborhood boys to the Willowbrook, where we'd practically fall over each other for the chance to buy them ice cream cones. I wasted entire afternoons watching them eat those obvious phallic symbols, running their tongues across the frozen confections with just enough slow deliberation to make us believe we were looking at something really, really dirty.

Even if my brother never joined the unwashed masses at the ice cream brothel, I know for a fact that he visited the craft hut, located just below the parlor in a difficult-to-find burrow that would've felt confining to a Hobbit. Under the disinterested tutelage of a few retirees, kids could make their own leather belts or jewelry out of petoskey stones. I assume you have no fucking clue what I'm talking about, right? A petoskey stone is a fossilized coral that can only be found on the beaches of northern Michigan, and the locals collect them like they're priceless artifacts. Let me put it into perspective: This town has no hospital, one grocery store that isn't open on weekends, and three stores that specialize in art made from petoskey stones. We were raised to have childlike deference for these stones, to revere them as a national treasure and horde them like they had actual monetary value. You can tell you're dealing with a Michigan native if they think it's perfectly normal for a married and childless adult, not suffering from any emotional problems or mental disabilities, to devote an entire weekend to hand-crafting a miniature version of Rodin's The Thinker made entirely out of petoskey stones.

While my brother busied himself with leatherwork - making his own belts and wallets and vests and wristbands and more leather clothing than anybody outside the BDSM community has any reason owning - I made necklaces for girls. Not girls I was dating or girls I wanted to date or even girls I admired from afar. I just wanted to be ready when I met her, whoever she might be, to pull a necklace or a pair of earrings out of my pocket and win her over with a seemingly spontaneous romantic gesture. But because of the geological state pride instilled in me as a kid, I sincerely believed that all women wanted jewelry made out of petoskey stones. It never occurred to me that when you give your lady friend a fossil on a string, what you're basically telling her is, "I am either a clueless hick or the cheapest boy you've ever known, probably both, and allowing me to touch your private bits might not be the best idea." It'd be one thing if I was dating a paleontologist who didn't know any better, but most women between the ages of 8 and 89 do not consider a petoskey stone to be a precious metal. Who knew?

I just wish somebody had shared this valuable piece of information before my family moved to Chicago and I gave my very first girlfriend a petoskey stone necklace and she looked at it like I'd just handed her a turd on a stick. I still think that Michigan - not just the retired women who ran the crafts store at the Willowbrook but the entire fucking state - owes me a public apology. I blame them for my inability to have a healthy relationship. Is it any surprise that I'm still so clueless about the opposite sex when I came of age surrounded by well-meaning but criminally irresponsible adults who convinced me that the only thing women want more than driftwood art or clay ashtrays is jewelry constructed from stones that easily weigh more than their head?

Fuck this town. Seriously, everybody here can go fuck themselves. I need a drink. Anybody else need a drink?

(To take the second part of the tour, go here.)

Scenes From the Spitznagel Family Reunion

I've only been here for two days and already I want to punch my 15-month-old nephew in his fucking mouth.

It really isn't Teddy's fault. He is, as I mentioned, just a spit over a year old. You can't expect a kid with his dearth of experience to be a clever conversationalist. But even so, I think the other adults have been giving him too much credit. Teddy's latest linguistic brain-tickler involves pointing at a random family member's head and announcing, "Hat, hat, hat, hat, hat..." This would at least qualify as adorable if he were occasionally accurate. But more often than not, he'll point to somebody who isn't actually wearing a hat. And even more embarrassing, he'll scream "hat, hat, hat" while pointing at the dog, or a tree outside, or the front tires of our car. The odds that what he's gesturing towards and the words coming out of his mouth having any correlation whatever are just slightly better than winning the lottery.

"Hat, hat, hat, hat," Teddy howls proudly, his arms flailing wildly as he gazes up at the nearest adult for approval. I give him no such satisfaction.

KEEP ON READIN'

His parents aren't nearly as concerned as I am by the inconsistencies. They're more interested in whether Teddy can recognize actual human beings - like, say, his mother and father. Every few hours they'll lead him on another drill, pointing to each other and asking, "Who's that? Who's that?" If he correctly identifies them as either "mama" or "dada," they squeal in delight and award him with applause and hugs. When he points at a lamp and say "dada," they laugh as if this is some shared joke.

Once satisfied that their son could pick them out of a lineup, they throw the rest of us a bone. My mom, they remind Teddy, is his gramma. And then they turn to me and say, "And that's Eric."

For some reason, this gets under my skin. I'm just "Eric"? Don't I deserve a familial moniker too? Why not Uncle Eric? It at least gives me a context. Otherwise, how does he know that I'm not just some college friend crashing with an overly generous foster family while I "work my shit out"? Is that not the most obvious conclusion, even for a kid who sees hats everywhere? They might as well be the Cunninghams and I'm the Fonz. I'm the dude who lives in the guest apartment over their garage.

"Oh, don't worry about him," they'll whisper as I raid the refrigerator yet again. "That's just Eric. He's been here so long, we almost consider him family."

When I confess to feeling slighted, they're quick to apologize and make up for lost time. The rest of the afternoon is spent grilling Teddy with this new information.

"Look, there's Uncle Eric," they say, feigning delight every time I so much as get up to take a piss. "Look, look! Uncle Eric is here! Yaaaah! Uncle Eric!"

Teddy barely notices, but when they manage to get his attention, he glares at me with a raised eyebrow, as if my very presence offends him. He looks at me like I'm a drunk at church. Actually, no, that's not quite it. Have you ever been at a college party and there's a guy there who is clearly too old? He's not a professor and he's a little too gray around the temples to be a student. Nobody tells him to leave, but you and your friends are a little creeped out by him and you try to avoid any direct eye contact. When you do glance in his direction, you give him an icy stare that makes it abundantly clear he's not welcome.

That's how my nephew looks at me. Like I'm a 30-year old guy at a fraternity kegger.

I suggest that it might be time to leave the insular confines of the family cottage and visit the rest of our relatives. This is, after all, supposed to be a reunion. We've come up with flimsy excuses to avoid them over the last several days, but we can't keep shunning them forever. Tom, my mother's brother, has invited us over for a chili cook-off, which sounds like it could be mildly entertaining. Tom and his wife spend their winters in New Mexico - where he's purchased several buildings and is well on his way to becoming, by one sibling's estimate, a slum landlord - so we're unreasonably optimistic that the chili will contain at least one spice.

The Larkins (my mother's side of the family) are not known for their culinary talents. They want their food the way god intended it: quick and uncomplicated and without any fancy extras like, say, flavor.

Dinner, we're told, is at 5:30. We arrive at 5:40 and they've already eaten.

"Where've you been?" They ask us. "We waited as long as we could, but we were starving."

I shouldn't be surprised. My family has never understood the concept of leisurely dining. They eat every meal as if somebody intends to take it away from them. They're like raccoons perched over a trash can. They cram as much as they can into their mouths, certain that at any moment somebody is gonna run over with a flashlight and chase them away.

We're directed towards a pot in the kitchen, which contains just enough chili for each of us to have a very, very, very, very small bowl. We're scraping the pan for sustenance, and I'm grateful for every spoonful. Because I know these people, and I know that it's not a personal insult that they've invited us over to consume the nutritional equivalent of U.N. rations at a refugee camp in Sudan.

But what does confuse me is why they still bother trying to deceive us. Why call it a chili cook-off? A cook-off implies that there'll be two or more chefs competing for a prize, which couldn't have less to do with this gathering. Given that only one man - my Uncle Tom - spent any time in the kitchen, and judging from what I tasted of his chili concoction, his efforts involved opening a can and heating the contents over a lukewarm stove, what exactly is the "off" part of the equation? Or is it just a title they came up to fool us, or maybe fool themselves, into thinking the evening would be more fun than it actually was?

I wouldn't be surprised if it was self-deception. My parents used the same trick to coax my brother and I into washing the dishes, convincing us that it was a competition. Well, they'd convince me. My brother never bought any of it.

"Ha-ha!" I'd yowl at him, polishing the last of the crusty pots and pans as he sat in the corner. "You totally forfeit! I win! I win!"

He'd just roll his eyes. "Whatever, dude."

After finishing our thimbleful of chili, we retreat to the car and return with our contribution to the feast: the dessert. We decided on S'mores, partly because it required no preparation, and partly because Larkins are always impressed by S'mores.

"How faaaancy," they tell us, their expressions somewhere between delight and indignation. "Who won the lottery?"

During our first few reunions, I just assumed they were mocking us. Bringing S'mores to a party is basically saying to your host, "Oh wait, is this not a summer camp? Will we not be eating mac-and-cheese and learning how to make Native American wood carvings? My bad." But I eventually learned that there isn't even a hint of insincerity in their reactions. They honestly believe that S'mores is a treat reserved solely for multimillionaires and Hollywood celebrities. To this day, I'm still flummoxed by their confusion. What ingredient in the S'mores recipe puts the confection out of their economic reach? Is it the graham crackers? The marshmallows? Maybe the chocolate which, last time I checked, was still affordable to people who don't wear monocles and Monopoly-style black top hats?

If I'd thought about it for more than a few seconds, it wasn't really a mystery. The Spitznagels and Larkins don't resist S'mores for financial reasons. We avoid desserts - even desserts readily enjoyed by people who live in swamps and enforce their property lines with a shotgun - because our DNA is wired to be wary of anything pleasurable. Whether it's food or sex or wealth or vacations that last longer than 24 hours, we're just not genetically comfortable with anything that might tickle our ventral tegmentum. It's the only thing about our family that's even remotely religious, except our denial of earthly pleasures doesn't come with the promise of an afterlife or a place at the right hand of an omnipotent creator. We enjoy misery for the sake of misery. We're a family of piss-drinking Gandhis without any of the social conscious.



I still don't entirely understand the origins of our self-inflicted deprivation. Is it cheapness? Well, sure. Give us $20 and we'll bury $19 in the backyard and then use the rest to buy a big jar of budget mayonnaise from the local dollar store. Does it come from a fear of judgment by our peers? Oh, hell yes. I have been told, on more than one occasion by every single member of my family (except my brother and his wife), that it's unseemly to let a stranger see you using the expensive jam. Because.... what exactly? They'll report us to the jam police? Because jam should be saved for the coming apocalypse? Because someone will catch you or, more alarmingly, punish you for rewarding yourself with fruit preserves?

I wonder if that's the definition of hell for my family, to have some outsider witness us taking more than our share, or hording anything that a sensible person would immediately stuff into an airtight pickle jar and hide in the basement?

But above all else, it comes down mostly to a terror of retribution. Nothing that feels good can possibly be healthy for us, either morally, legally or physically. And if we required proof, we need only look at Uncle Bob. Asthmatic, diabetic, overweight, his body riddled with cancer; Bob exists as the family's cautionary tale. He ate too much and drank too much and smoked too much and just look at what happened to him. At every family dinner, they watch Bob's gluttony and exchange disapproving glances. But they also love his excesses, because he gives strength to their willpower. "There but for the grace of god go I," their forlorn eyes announce to the room. And so they pick at their food like sparrows, certain that even one bite too many could result in cardiovascular disease and Type 2 diabetes.

Over the years, I’ve learned that there are two ways to survive my family get-togethers. The most obvious – favored by my brother because it draws the least amount of attention – is to tune out the craziness. Let your mind wander and think about something more pleasant, something far, far away from this clan of dysfunctional carnies and their Manson Family values.

Or you can just do what I do and make a lot of smart-ass remarks at the expense of your relatives.

There was a time when I was given free terrain to mock anyone and anything. My jokes weren’t always in good taste, but even the more thin-skinned of my relatives would say nothing, as if I was the cousin with Tourette's that they had to tolerate. But this summer, they've stopped pretending that I'm funny. They don't even smile anymore when I make a perfectly valid observation like, "Have you noticed that when grandma holds Teddy, she looks at him like the elderly villain in a German fairy tale where children are eaten?" And heaven forbid that I tell Uncle Tom that his cowboy hat makes me think about how he'll soon be on the receiving end of Jake Gyllenhaal's saliva-filled palm.

I'm sure it doesn't help that I've been teaching Bob more dirty words. The man is like an obscenity parrot. He has a staggering memory for filth. He can barely remember whether he or my mother is the eldest sibling, but he can still recall the exact day that I told him about rusty trombones.

"Anybody got a toothpick?" Bob asks. His yellow eyes have the glint of somebody about to say something really, really horrible. "I think I got some smegma stuck in my gums."

The entire family turns and glowers at me, their expressions practically screaming, "J'accuse!" I suppose I should apologize, but honestly, I'm not sorry for teaching him that word. Everybody else in this damn family just comes down on him. "Bob, stop smoking so much!" "Bob, don't eat that stick of butter!" Not me. Let Bob be Bob, I say. I have sympathy for a guy with purple legs who can't stand up without grunting like a Tauntaun. If learning an unnecessary fun fact about genital secretions makes his life a little brighter, then I'm proud I could be the guy to make it happen for him.

Before long, the family has ostracized me. Some are inside washing the dishes, and the rest are huddled around the remaining S'mores like farmers in some crappy sci-fi flick, poking at a smoldering hole in the ground with equal parts fascination and apprehension. I've been left alone to sip the rest of my flat beer in privacy and, I can only assume, get the hell out before the cops come.

"You know what'd be a great idea," I say to nobody in particular. "Let Aunt Cathy have another glass of wine. Then she can tell us more about how much she enjoys being naked in a hot tub."

I hear laughter behind me, and I realize that Teddy has wandered outside to find me. He's laughing so hard that spit is bubbling from his mouth, and he's having difficulty maintaining his balance.



We look at each other, and it's like that scene in a movie where the childless middle-aged guy is forced to hold a baby and they stare at each other with mutual curiosity and the middle-aged guy sees something of himself in the baby or realizes something profound about himself for the first time in his otherwise jaded and self-involved life and a once popular Baby Boomer song plays in the background to signify that this is a pivotal moment of character development.

It's just like that. Except for me, unlike the movie, I ruin the moment by saying something really inappropriate.

"So have you picked a favorite great-uncle yet?" I ask him. "Let me guess, is it the guy who thinks that New Mexico real estate must be a good investment because it's so cheap? Oh, wait, no, no, it's gotta be the guy who is currently eating a frozen pie over the sink with a wood spoon."

Teddy laughs again, almost doubled-over he finds me so funny. I know he probably doesn't understand anything I'm saying. But I secretly want to believe that we've forged a connection, bonding over the mutual understanding that our family is off their fucking nut. I imagine a time, in the not-so-distant future, when Teddy and I seek each other out at these stupid reunions and make commentary from the sidelines, perhaps sitting in matching lawnchairs, passing a flask and making snarky comments that nobody finds nearly as funny as we do.

"Hat, hat, hat, hat," Teddy says gleefully, pointing at my hatless head.

"I hear what you're saying, old man," I tell him, sliding down to the ground with him and putting an arm around his tiny neck.

Actually, I have no fucking clue what he's saying. But for now, it doesn't seem to matter. I'm like Bogart at the end of Casablanca, except my Louis is a midget prone to shitting his pants and possessing the conversational skills of a stroke victim.

Still, it feels like the beginning of a beautiful friendship.

Open Mouth Kissing With Allen Ginsberg

I don't typically respond to memes. Actually, I don't respond to any demands for personal details from my life. (If you haven't noticed, I'll give up the dirt eventually, but only if I think nobody's paying attention.) I'll tell you what, if I'm on a quest for a biblical relic and you're a troll guarding a bridge, then I'll answer your questions three. Otherwise, move along, there's nothing to see here.

But not long ago I got an offer I couldn't refuse, and I don't mean that in a Luca Brasi sorta way. Susannah Breslin and Katie Schwartz, two writers I respect to a ridiculous degree (they string together words in ways that make my hands go clammy and my eyes dilate like a prepubescent boy in heat), both asked me - almost simultaneously, mind you - to take part in a meme called "8 Things You Don't Know About Me". Well, what choice did I have? I couldn't say no to either of them if the question was, "So listen, I may have killed a drifter last night. Do you have a shovel and a spacious trunk?"

KEEP ON READIN'

I'm not really well-versed on how memes work, but I'll do what I can. First things first, I've been told that I need to repeat the rules for some goddamn reason. So here they are:

1. We have to post these rules before we give you the facts.
2. Players start with eight random facts/habits about themselves.
3. People who are tagged need to write their own blog about their eight things and post these rules.
4. At the end of your blog, you need to choose eight people to get tagged and blah blah blah, you know how this goes by now, right?

Okay, I've just finished half a bottle of red wine and I'm no longer wearing pants. Let's do this thing...

1. For most of my adult life, I've claimed that the first record I ever bought was The Stooges' Fun House. My friends have often pointed out that it's a suspiciously punk rock choice for somebody who grew up in rural Michigan, but I've never wavered.

Well, I can't continue sheltering myself in this down comforter of lies. It's time to come clean. My first album was not Fun House or anything else by The Stooges. It was, in fact, Bill Cosby's Hooray For the Salvation Army Band.



Did you even know that Bill Cosby put out an album of songs? Actually, he made two - the other being the even more ill-advised collection Golden Throat - and I owned them both. This is embarrassing on many, many levels. First, Bill Cosby is about as far from indie-rock credibility as you can get. Even in the genre of comedians-turned-rock stars, his musical talents don't put him in the same league as Eddie "Boogie In Your Butt" Murphy.

But here's where it really gets mortifying. As this was my first foray into rock appreciation, I wasn't yet aware that singing a song doesn't necessarily mean that you've also written that song. And so, in what remains the most shameful memory of my short life, I, at the tender age of nine-ish, argued with several of my more musically-knowledgeable friends (many of whom owned the entire Stooges' catalog) that Bill Cosby was the original lyricist and composer for "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction."

That alone would've been justification for a group of skinheads to kick me in the kidneys with their combat boots until I pissed blood for a week.

2. Because I occasionally interview celebrities to pay my bills, some people mistakenly believe that I have a lot of famous friends. This is simply not true. I have dined with famous people and drank with them and sometimes even visited their homes. But I have never taken a spontaneous road trip with them, or spooned on the sofa with them while watching The Breakfast Club, or called them in the middle of the night "just because I need to hear your voice."

There've been exceptions, of course. After interviewing a certain female comedian of some repute - no, I'm not going to tell you her name - we stayed in touch and became fast friends. I even invited her to be my "date" (no kissy face, just free booze) to a black-tie gala in New York, hosted by a fancy schmancy glossy magazine I was trying to write for. She was on her best behavior for most of the evening - no small feat for a woman who makes her living being a smartass - but when I finally mustered the courage to start schmoozing the magazine's editors, the very people who could make or break my journalism career, she decided to have some fun at my expense.

Just as the editors were beginning to warm up to me, she ran over and threw her balled-up panties squarely at my face. "Who the fuck do you think you are?" She screamed, loud enough for the entire party to hear. "You can't bang me in the bathroom and then just ignore me all night! You're a fucking asshole, Eric Spitznagel! An ass-hole!"

She was joking, of course. No "banging" had occurred that night, either in the bathroom or otherwise. But I couldn't say anything in my defense. I've spent enough time in comedy circles to grasp the basic rules of improv, and one of the biggest is "don't deny." Even in social situations, comics never deny. It doesn't matter if a comedy bit is clearly designed to humiliate you in front of your potential employers, saying "what the hell are you talking about?" would be considered a grievous offense, and she'd likely lose all respect for me. But if I said nothing, the high-powered editors I wanted so desperately to impress would think I'd just had public sex in the company lavatory.

After she stormed off (not before slapping me a few more times for good measure), the editors kept staring at me, their eyebrows raised, wondering how I intended to explain myself. I just smiled, picked up my friend's panties, placed them in my jacket pocket, and continued our conversation.

I'm not sure if it's a coincidence, but they hired me to write my first feature the following week.

3. Here's another tale of celebrity weirdness that (until today) I've shared only with a select few trustworthy friends.

Back in the early 'aughts, I was in New York interviewing a popular comic-actor for another fancy schmancy glossy magazine. I'm not going to reveal his name because this isn't a gossip column and I have a soul. We were having brunch at an uber-exclusive supper club in the Village - the kind of place where membership requires either a seat on Congress or a three-picture deal with Miramax - when we both recognized somebody familiar sitting at a nearby table. Again, I won't tell you exactly who it was, but I will give you a few hints. She's blonde, she's dumb as dirt, she's so skinny that even Karen Carpenter would tell her to eat a damn sandwich, and there's absolutely no reason she should be famous.

So we're both staring at her, wondering how such an avowed hussy managed to get into a seemingly high-class joint, when we realized that the other person at her table was also strangely familiar. He almost looked like... Allen Ginsberg. The grey beard, the bald head, the flirty eyes; if it wasn't Ginsberg, he could've passed for his doppelganger. But was Ginsberg still alive? We weren't sure. We both agreed that Ginsberg was one of those authors, like William S. Burroughs or Charles Bukowski, that we just assumed had died, but it wouldn't surprise us in the least to learn that any of them were giving a book reading tomorrow.

So the one-time cast member of a popular sketch variety show called over the scraggy no-talent amateur porn star with whom he had a casual friendship and asked, "Hey, who is that dude at your table? We think it's Allen Ginsberg." She looked at her guest and shrugged, scarcely able to suppress her boredom, and said, "Oh, I don't know, he's just some guy." We grilled her for specifics and she finally admitted, "He's a poet or something. Isn't he old and creepy? I mean, as if, right?"

And that's when I told the endoskeleton wrapped in a thin sheath of mediocrity that if her dining companion actually turned out to be Allen Ginsberg, I would gladly give him an open-mouth kiss. She was, to put it mildly, not amused.

4. For a very brief period during my late teens and early 20s, I was convinced that I wanted to be an actor. I was so determined to follow this career path that I even spent a summer studying Shakespeare at Oxford University in England. I learned two very important life lessons that summer. One, I do not have the attention span necessary to memorize even a single page of Shakespeare. I don't care how many people tell me that his plays are filled with subversive satire and craftily-hidden dirty jokes. I don't have the mental capacity nor the patience to appreciate it.

I don't like Shakespeare for the same reason I don't pan for gold in California rivers. I am far, far, far too lazy.

The other nugget of self-knowledge attained at Oxford is that I apparently don't know how to drink. Before flying across the pond, I'd lived in Chicago for a few years, so I was reasonably confident in my ability to pound pints with the best of them. But then a 16-year-old British boy, who'd barely sprouted enough pubes to fill a shot glass, drank me under the goddamn table! That's the kind of experience that'll make a guy look in the mirror and wonder, "Who am I? When did I develop the tolerance of an Orthodox Mormon?"

Thankfully, I received personal drinking instruction from one of my fellow students at Oxford, who also happened to be a Russian exchange student (this was in 1989, a few years before the Soviet Union cried uncle). She introduced me to Stolichnaya, which, if you've never tried it, basically tastes like slightly less acidic gasoline. She also tutored me on the proper way to enjoy Russian vodka, which if she was to be believed involved spitting it in my face and demanding that I call her a blyad while we had very loud and violent sex at 4am in the courtyard of an English university.

5. There are few things that annoy me as much as somebody calling me "big guy." Even if you're a close friend and you're just trying to be informal, it still makes me wince. First of all, learn my fucking name. And secondly, don't say "hey, big guy" when what you're really thinking is "hey, you fat piece of shit." While you're at it, why not just flick one of my man-nipples and see if it jiggles? The sentiment is basically the same.

6. If I may shamelessly crib from Dave Eggers, on the sexual-orientation scale, with one being perfectly straight and ten being perfectly gay, I am probably a four. I might have qualified as a three or even a two if weren't for this troubling evidence:

a) As a young boy, I had absolutely no interest in organized sports. Basketball, baseball, football, I hated it all. But that alone wouldn't be enough to tilt the scales of my sexuality, as many a heterosexual athletic loser can attest. While I couldn't have cared less about bats, balls or anabolic steroids, as a teenager I still opted to decorate my bedroom with a poster of George Brett of the Kansas City Royals. Why did I make an exception for this one player? Was it because Brett is considered one of the greatest third basemen in the history of major league baseball? No, not really. I just thought his haircut was cool.



I probably should have kept this information to myself. When I offhandedly mentioned it to my brother, he couldn't have looked more dismayed than if I'd just announced, "George Brett is my favorite player because of his big, juicy, uncircumcised cock."

b) At some point during my mid-teens, I allowed my mother to photograph me while sporting a funky mustache, wearing a black turtleneck sweater, and holding a cat. No, I'm not going to let you see the photo. Are you high? Do I seem like a glutton for punishment? Okay, I'll show you a small fragment, just enough to prove I'm not kidding...



See what I'm talking about? If at any point in your life you think it's a good idea to be photographed with a mustache and black turtleneck while holding a cat, you're pretty much announcing to the world that you're here and queer so we best get used to it. If I didn't know me better, I'd think, "Well, there's a man who will eventually open a bed-and-breakfast in Connecticut with his life partner and volunteer on the weekends at the local community theater." Tell me you're not thinking the same thing.

And lastly....

c) I told an undeservedly popular starlet with the healthy glow of an Auschwitz survivor that I would open mouth kiss Allen Ginsberg. And I was only being 87% ironic. Maybe I just really, really like "Howl." Or maybe I'm as gay as a suitcase full of rainbows.

7. I don't have a kid, but if I did, I'd name him Colonial Worthington. Boy, girl, it doesn't matter. Their birth certificate is gonna read Colonial Worthington. I'm completely serious about this. Think about it: When you hear the name Colonial Worthington, what immediately comes to mind? Probably a mustachioed English aristocrat who smokes a pipe and wears an ascot and speaks in a thick, almost indecipherable "harrumph harrumph" British accent. He probably wears a safari helmet to social functions and has a personal library filled with dusty, leather-bound books and belongs to at least one secret society. Now, imagine that same cultural stereotype but as a baby. Yeaaaaaaah, that's the stuff. Starting to come around now, aren't you?

My stubborn refusal to consider baby names other than Colonial Worthington is, at least for the handful of women I've dated long enough to discuss children, something I would delicately call a "relationship deal breaker." Even the Dame, who has been surprisingly tolerant of my eccentric tendencies, is slightly baffled by my attachment to this name.

"You want his first name to be Colonial?" She asks.

"No," I tell her. "Colonial Worthington is his entire first name."

"So what’s his middle name?"

"I don’t know. Maybe Toaster.

At this point, the Dame usually sighs. "So his full name would be Colonial Worthington Toaster Spitznagel?"

And that's just one of the myriad of reasons why it would be a bad idea, maybe even dangerously irresponsible, for me to become a parent. You need more proof? You know what I'd find perfectly acceptable and even fall-on-your-butt funny? If my kid kicked down the door on her first day of kindergarten and announced to the entire class, "Goddamn it stinks in here! Who forgot to hose down their pussy?" If that ever happens, you can bet your sweet bippy that I probably coached her to say it.

A civilized society would never entrust a child to my care, because I would treat her with the same innocent fascination and adolescent curiosity that I once had for Star Wars action figures. My parenting style would boil down to "what hare-brained scheme can we try today?" I've always thought it'd be fun to dress a kid like a hobo. Not for Halloween, but for his everyday clothes. Maybe a trash can with suspenders and a rusty pan for a hat. And on the weekends we'd go for something a little less formal, like a potato sack with holes cut out for her arms and legs. What, you don't think I'd actually go through with it? Is that a dare? Just you wait.

8. So I still need one more fun fact, right? Okay, let's see... uhhh... well, I was on a beach the other day and I found a rock that kinda looks like Pac-Man.



So where does that leave us? Oh, yeah, I'm supposed to "tag" eight other bloggers. Well, I'm sorry, I just can't do that. Not because I don't want to pass along this meme project like a frat boy sharing his herpes not-so-simplex with an unconscious lover. I just have an aversion to saying "Tag you're it". It makes me think of running and screaming and chasing, all things I try to avoid whenever possible.

And then there's this: When I was a kid, a bully at my school ruined many a recess by shoving the smaller boys (i.e. myself and a few other nerds) into the mud and hollering, "Tag, you're it!" Most of the other kids dutifully participated in his forced games of tag, but I always ignored him. And then one day, after a particularly hostile tagging, I wandered back inside, sat at my desk in the empty classroom, and wrote a short story about an escaped mental patient with meat thermometers for arms. The plot was deceptively simple; our hero chased a bully into the forest and stabbed him through the heart, screaming, "Tag, you're it!!" Then he pulled his thermometer arm out of the limp bully's chest, licked off the blood with his tongue and said, "Mmmm, the perfect temperature... for murder!"

Huh. Looks like I just revealed nine things you didn't know about me. So there you go. Bonus points.

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle: The Vonnegut's Asshole Interview (part two)

(To read part one, go here.)

VONNEGUT'S ASSHOLE: It must be such a unique experience to watch your books grow old, becoming dusty artifacts with yellowing pages. Does that make you sad, or remind you that literature really is the only source of immortality?

SIR ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE: I suppose you could say that it is a unique experience, in that it doesn't seem to follow the natural order of things. Usually an author is gone before his works are, so it could be said that he is survived by his own books. But in some cases it is the reverse, as with myself. I'm afraid that I haven't given it a lot of thought, having so much more to ponder than what has become of my works. I will admit that at one point betwixt the time of my last passing and now, I did notice that these books were still gathering dust in many places and was amazed.

VA: Are you ever curious to find out who still reads your books? I've always wanted to loiter in bookstores and, when somebody picked up one of my books, follow them home and study their reactions. I guess you'd literally be able to do that.

ACD: (laughter) Wonderful! What an amusing idea. Though this would certainly make for a fascinating experiment, I have not had enough time whilst on earth to even conceive of such a thing. It is enough to know that my books are still being read at all. As you may recall, especially in later years, I was writing about things that weren't totally popular with the masses. My interest in spiritualism was in some ways my Waterloo as an author, in that so few people at the time could appreciate it. But I continued writing, hoping that in time some would come to see that we all had more relevant things to consider than whether Sherlock would solve the crime this way or that way.

KEEP ON READIN'

VA: After all these years, do you still care who your readers are?

ACD: Oh, but I do care, in the sense that I hope that whatever is gleaned from these books is yet of some use and service, if not amusement, to the readers. This last concern is much more weighty in my mind and heart than any care about my personal popularity as an author. This is why I can't even say that I'm flattered that you've chosen me for this interview, though I am most grateful that you have seen fit to give me a window through which I can yet get some of my thoughts across to you all on the earth plane. If I could say anything further, it would be to enjoin you all to enjoy your lives as much as possible, in that in the enjoyment process one often finds what one is, and is not about, at the core of one's being. I know this may sound a bit frivolous or even flippant, but there is a deep tone of truth to it, as yet unsuspected by the masses. The reason that one enjoys anything usually hides something there to be learned in this vast schoolhouse of earth.

VA: You had a brief friendship with Oscar Wilde, isn't that right? While you admired his work, you didn't necessarily care for his unorthodox lifestyle.

ACD: The truth is that I see now that I really didn't know Mr. Wilde as I thought I did. His inner nature - his "soul" if you will - was invisible to me then. And so now I question whether I really did know the chap. I would say no. Although I did enjoy his company on various occasions, I don't know that I could be said to have been his friend for this very reason. How can you be a friend to someone who you don't really know and whose lifestyle you disagree with? I was still under more misunderstanding about this issue of his lifestyle, and I presume you are referring to his homosexuality among other things, and so couldn't really know the man himself. I was too busy judging the things that were being said about him, my own thoughts included in this motley crew.

VA: Do you still see him occasionally? Has Oscar mellowed in the afterlife?

ACD: I have come to know him very well I would say in the afterlife as you call it. I have found him to be one of the most kind and refined souls that I know. He now busies himself with helping one of the great spiritual masters who work with the children of the world. He has graciously forgiven me for the ways in which I maligned him during our previous lives, and when our paths cross we are happy to greet each other and usually take the time to commune. As to whether he has "mellowed," I believe he has. And this is only because here he has no need to fight for his life or defend anything in particular.

VA: How about your old pal Edgar Allan Poe? Do you keep in touch with him?

ACD: What can I say of such a soul save that he bore the brunt of a life that wasn't easy. I haven't had the opportunity of discussing much of anything with him, seeing as how his return to the spirit world wasn't too far away in time from the time I took my last earthly birth. We've been like two ships passing in the night, I'm afraid. He did make a point of meeting me at the end of my last earthly life, and did so in a very unique way.

VA: How do you mean? Was he giving you creative advice?

ACD: In a manner of speaking. He made many suggestions to me about the character of Sherlock Holmes. I didn't know until much later in that life about the reality of the spirit world or anything about it, so it wasn't in my thoughts that anyone could be helping me along from the other side. It was he, in fact, who suggested that Mr. Holmes might partake in the recreational use of cocaine.

VA: So it was Poe's idea to make Holmes a junkie?

ACD: Not in those terms, but yes. I remember considering it as a rather novel idea, and one that just might prove valuable. Let it be remembered that in those days, I was working my way through medical school, and also that cocaine wasn't seen as it is today. I do believe it was actually legal to purchase it at the apothecary shop. At any rate, it didn't have the stigma attached to it today.

VA: Speaking of changing cultural mores, what about characters like Zambo, the monosyllabic and brutish black slave from The Lost World. While that may have been an acceptable stereotype at the time, in hindsight do you regret your lack of racial tolerance?

ACD: This is and continues to be one of the main reasons that I do not have much to say about my erstwhile writings. I consider most of them, with the exception of some of the more historical pieces like The White Company, to be reflections of the person I was then, with all his attendant shortcomings, flaws of character, blind spots, and ignorance of so many things. When I regained to the world of Spirit, from which point all is seen more clearly if one desires unto clarity, I was appalled at so many things about my most recent self and his life. One of the major sources of pain and humiliation was that of my writings. I saw clearly how terribly close-minded and prejudiced I had been, and with every turn of the page there seemed to be some other unconscionable word or reference to deplore. It wasn't long after this point that I gave up on reviewing most of my work. I had to be coaxed into accepting what all must accept once back in Spirit, that on earth we are expected to make mistakes and do. Which is why I can be asked this question about Zambo and not flinch out of embarrassment. My views have changed considerably since those days, and thank God for the Plan of Evolution in Life. I believe in the innate equality of the races and the sexes, and of all creatures on earth, including some that you all do not even believe in, such as your mythical Loch Ness monsters and your Bigfoot myth.

VA: I'm sorry, what was that again? Did you just say Loch Ness monsters? As in plural?

ACD: Yes, you did indeed hear me correctly. Both are very real creatures, and yes, there are more than one of them. The reason that you can't seem to catch them in your traps or by your guns is simply that they are multidimensional and so aren't always in your dimension. It's been at those times when they have been seen by witnesses, who are telling the truth as far as they can.

VA: Do you ever feel cheated that you never lived long enough to enjoy modern conveniences like laptop computers? It's made writing so much easier.

ACD: Ah, but I didn't miss them at all. What if I told you that I was privileged to witness the invention of that thing here in the laboratories of the spirit world where all things are first worked out before they are released to one of your inventors on earth?

VA: Uh... I'd say that I didn't believe you.

ACD: But it is so. In the initial experiments that I observed, the prototype to these lovely little things called laptop computers had parts that were too heavy for a machine of that size, so these had to be reduced. Others were found to be too intricate in their wiring to be usable for more than a few months before the wires inside would begin to melt or lose their effectiveness. Others made were too small, believe it or not, and were not found to be useful for that reason, not to mention the danger of having them swallowed by children or pets.

VA: Okay, I have to be honest. You lost me. I could buy the ghost mentors and the Loch Ness monsters and the sprawling afterlife libraries. But I'm reasonably sure that spirits had nothing to do with laptops.

ACD: In that you would be incorrect. There are certain souls on this side of life who have not taken incarnation for centuries due to their commitment to their work, whatever it may be. And some of those who seemingly invent these various contraptions are these same souls.

VA: Before we end this thing, would you mind whispering a few story ideas to me? Just something to get me started?

(Silence.)

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle: The Vonnegut's Asshole Interview (part one)

Sir Arthur Conan Doyle is probably best remembered as the creator of Sherlock Holmes. The author penned dozens of stories about his eponymous character, published in The Strand Magazine between 1891 and 1905, and a novel entitled The Hound of the Baskervilles. But Holmes was only one small part of Sir Doyle’s prolific writing career. He published 50 books during his life, spanning such diverse genres as historical romance, science fiction, military history, and spiritualism. He was one of the most popular pulp fiction writers of his time, delighting readers with tales of mummies, dinosaurs, ghosts, and classic characters like Brigadier Gerard and Professor Challenger.

And then, on July 7th, 1930, he dropped dead.

KEEP ON READIN'! NO? WHAT'S IT GOING TO TAKE? OH, YOU'D LIKE THAT, WOULDN'T YOU?

Sir Doyle’s story is an all too familiar one. An author achieves prominence only to be struck down by the icy hand of death. Every year, hundreds of writers pass away, bringing their literary output to an abrupt halt. And after that, we can only guess. Sadly, there isn't a religion or spiritual belief that addresses the fears that haunt most writers during the wee hours of the night. Namely, does death mean an end to the written word? When we leave this mortal coil, will we also be giving up books and all things book-related? Are earthly pleasures like writing and reading reserved solely for the living? The only person who could feasibly answer such unanswerable questions would be an actual dead author. Someone like, say... Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

This exclusive interview with Sir Doyle was conducted with the assistance of Arthur Pacheco, a psychic and trance medium from Hawaii. Pacheco has been regularly communicating with the dead for almost 20 years. Unlike many psychics, he goes into a trance and allows departed souls to speak directly through him, using their own voices and their own words. Mr. Pacheco purports to be on friendly terms with Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, who has been his main "spirit guide" since the early 80s.

The following interview took place during several sessions over the course of six months. Sir Doyle – or “The Old Mustache,” as he frequently called himself - spoke with a thick British accent, and was prone to hearty laughter, often apropos of absolutely nothing.

VONNEGUT'S ASSHOLE: Are there books in the afterlife?

ARTHUR CONAN DOYLE: Absolutely. One may continue to read in the disembodied state indeed. In fact, the possibilities for such activity are much more expanded than on earth; and our libraries here, for they exist, are of many different types. You go to some when you are seeking knowledge of the past, say, and to these you would think yourself into some time period to be able to view the truth about what actually happened, instead of just reading somebody else's version of the same.

VA: So the living only have access to the fake history books, and we won't get to read the real history books until we die?

ACD: Unfortunately, that is true. I am privileged to be able to access the Akashic Records, those indelible records of how things really were at any place in history, and the discrepancies one finds are amazing and at times appalling. To see how the news of events were deliberately changed to suit somebody can be a very sickening experience. Well, I used to think so when a new arrival anyway, but now I realize what a normal thing this is, to change the version of what really occurred to suit the king or the pope or the person in power who had most to lose, should the truth be accurately known. Now this is all old hat, and I'm surprised when it isn't the case instead of when it is.

VA: Akashic has got to be one of the afterlife's biggest draws. But what about fiction? Do you read mostly novels written by your peers, or have you checked out anything by modern authors?

ACD: I should say that what I myself prefer to peruse isn't found in anything that my peers on earth would have or did write. They lived in a place and time as purblind as my own. Indeed, what could they ever have to say that can't be found here and now in a much more expanded fashion? No, I must admit that I have found much more interesting material than anything on earth could provide for me.

VA: Is there anything you can't find at this mythical library?

ACD: No. One can even go and read about oneself, even if on earth you may not be a famous personage. Imagine that! For instance, you yourself, Mr. Spitznagel, have quite a dossier on you and your activities, before, during, and after this interview.

VA: Seriously? Have you read it?

ACD: I only include this to illustrate how informed things and people tend to be here. And yet, this information isn't to be relayed to the one it describes. Just because we can access such information isn't to say that we are at liberty to reveal it to anyone on earth unless specific permission has been obtained.

VA: Can you just give me a few chapter titles? Back cover blurbs? Anything?

ACD: There is a way this can be done, but it usually entails circumstances that are far too complex to deal with in a communique like this. Furthermore, this isn't the topic we've agreed to discuss herein, now is it?

VA: Many authors have a difficult time letting go. Even long after our books are published, we'll continue revising and editing our words, as if somehow just one more draft would make it perfect. Does that impulse disappear in the afterlife or does it become stronger than ever, especially now that altering your books is no longer possible?

ACD: The answer must be a resounding yes. We, as erstwhile authors, do indeed experience the yearning to rewrite our works. But it isn't so much a matter of rewriting our plots or storylines in more dramatic forms as it is to rewrite our works in light of the vast amount of new information that we have gained about life itself and our roles in this grand play. It also includes the desire to be of greater service to one's readers than merely to entertain them.

VA: Does it ever bother you that your literary career is completely behind you? You'll never again know the pleasures of writing a new story or creating a new character.

ACD: Many of my peers have gone on to higher ground and greater pursuits than any they followed on earth. I am not quite at liberty to give you details, but I can tell you that most people who chance to be authors in any given lifetime are usually given much help from this side of life from the authors already here.



VA: Wait a minute, are you telling me that living authors are being given writing advice from the afterlife?

ACD: That is exactly what I mean to tell you. So-called dead people regularly provide help to many on earth; though this help from heaven goes unnoticed for the most part. It is the same with just about any profession. In other words, doctors here, or those who were on earth, are the ones you can see at the sides of doctors on earth, ofttimes whispering suggestions and directions. For statesmen it is the same, accounting for the fact that many a current statesman or woman has a hero in the same field, usually their mentor. And on it goes. For instance, it may surprise you to know that my old friend Bram Stoker was actually being advised during the writing of his famous gothic novel Dracula.

VA: How exactly does that work? If you're given creative guidance from the afterlife, does this mean you're expected to return the favor when you die? You mentioned Bram Stoker. Is it safe to assume that he's collaborated with modern authors in the vampire genre? Somebody like, say, Anne Rice?

ACD: Ah, Anne Rice. I have been fascinated to watch how her story has unfolded. She was once alive as a member of a household that was terrorized by real vampires in Europe, and it is not only her subconscious memory of that life but her current involvement in things not openly known that account for her involvement and the execution of her vampire novels today. Talk about good plot lines. Her's seem to hold together fairly well, don't you think? Either she's unusually clever or she has someone, perhaps invisible, helping her. I think the latter is the case.

VA: So this spirit that's advising her, I guess that would make him, in every sense of the word, a ghost writer.

(Long, uncomfortable silence.)

VA: I'm sorry, that was a terrible pun, wasn't it?

(Another long, uncomfortable silence.)

VA: You're often cited as one of the founding fathers of pulp fiction. What do you think of modern pulp writers like Stephen King? Are you impressed with where your literary heirs have taken the genre or slightly underwhelmed?

ACD: I am impressed with the lot. Far be it from me to speak in terms of being a critic, literary or otherwise, but it is not lost upon me that there are always hurdles and challenges to be overcome by any who essay to reach and possibly teach the public at large. As a writer of yore, I can only feel a certain sense of solidarity with these intrepid souls and wish them the best. Since arriving here, I am now very much more aware of a type of Law of Necessity that determines what receives publication and what does not. It is what the public most has need to read next that is what determines what gets accepted by publishers, though these individuals are often the last to know this.

VA: In other words, if an author doesn't get his or her book into print, it doesn't necessarily mean that it isn't good. It may simply be that the universe has other publishing plans?

ACD: In a sense, yes.

VA: Well, that's certainly comforting.

ACD: I have only praise for anyone who take on the role of writer or author. Did you know that writers are leaders as seen from our point of view? The writer is a leader indeed, in that he carries a torch of a particular type, and believing in his own topic he dares to lead others down the lanes of what can eventually be their own enlightenment.

VA: Let's talk about mummies.

ACD: (long pause) Very well.



VA: You more or less invented the walking mummy genre. You published a short story called Lot No. 249 in 1892, a full five years before Bram Stoker's The Jewel of Seven Stars. Yet Stoker is often credited with writing the first horror story involving mummies. Does that still get under your skin?

ACD: Bram and I had discussed the idea of mummies coming back to life over cognac several times. On one particular night, he went on and on about this grim subject almost ad nauseam. Our parting remark was simply that it would be interesting to see who would write about it first. I beat him to the punch, that's all. Later, when he wrote his piece on it, I feel that he elaborated quite a bit to what I had merely touched upon in my story.

VA: Come on, you can say it. Stoker is a dirty thieving bitch.

ACD: I have no animosity towards my friend Mr. Stoker. He attended my second wedding as my guest, and neither before this event nor since have I ever had anything but respect and good feelings for this man/soul.

(To read part two of this interview, go here.)

The Beat Generation

Hello, friends.

I'm in northern Michigan for the week, partaking in the promised Spitznagel family reunion. As much as I'd like to be spending the 4th of July holiday sitting in front of my computer and churning out more funny-make-'em-ups for you, I owe my family at least a little uninterrupted face time.

But don't despair. I'll be back next week with more personally embarrassing anecdotes from my life past and present. Until then, here's something to tide you over.

60ish LITERARY EUPHEMISMS FOR MASTURBATION

1. Blurbing yourself

2. Burying the lede

3. Challenging Alexander Pushkin to a one-handed duel

4. Coaxing Salinger to come out and play

5. Coming up with a gripping plot twist

KEEP ON READIN'. OR, BARRING THAT, JUST HOLD ME.

6. Conjugating the verb

7. Cooking up a big oily batch of Victory Gin

8. Dangling your participles

9. Deconstructing The Fountainhead

10. Dipping your madeleine into Proust's tea

11. Finishing the first draft by hand

12. Freelancing for the glossies

13. Getting just a little too into pictures of Dorian Gray

14. Giving it a first pass

15. Giving the protagonist some internal conflict

16. Giving your narrative a Faustian theme

17. Having a strong opinion in your writing workshop about the power of symbolism

18. A Heartbreaking Wank of Staggering Spunkage

19. Hiding Rushdie from the Muslim assassins

20. Hunting for treasure in Injun Joe's cave

21. Interrogating JT LeRoy and his five accomplices

22. Jack Kerou-whacking

23. Joining the Beat Generation

24. Launching a ship to the holy city of Byzantium

25. Listening to Portnoy complain

26. Looking for clues with Tintin and Snowy

27. Mangling the English translation

28. Mixing your metaphors

29. Much A-Goo About Nothing

30. Oliver's Twist

31. Palahniukin'

32. Paying extra for the hardcover

33. Paying the bills with a hack novelization

34. Paying yourself in contributor copies

35. Picking the pull-quotes

36. Pinning Garp with a Half Nelson

37. Polishing Nick Hornby's head

38. Pottering your Chamber of Secrets

39. Print-on-demand

40. Proofreading the galleys

41. Putting out Polyphemus' one good eye

42. Putting the "wad" back into "Henry Wadsworth Longfellow"

43. Querying the editor

44. Rattling your stick inside a swill bucket

45. Reading poetry aloud

46. Recouping losses incurred by the Publishers Group West bankruptcy

47. Saying yes, yes, oh god yeeeeees to Ulysses

48. Shooting at Joan Burroughs with your flesh musket

49. Shooting your own author's photo

50. Signing the first edition

51. Skimming the Cliff Notes

52. Slapstick (or: “Lonesome No More”)

53. Spanking the Monkey (sometimes known as "Spanking Arthur Waley's translation of Journey to the West ")

54. Splitting infinitives

55. Stocking the remainder table

56. Tap-tap-tapping at your chamber door (only this and nothing more)

57. The other lonely impulse of delight

58. Touring Rosings with Mr. Collins

59. Transforming Gregor Samsa into a monstrous vermin

60. Using the passive voice

61. Varnishing your Booker Prize