Episode 52 - Purple Raining Beer Cans

It was October 1981. I'd been living in SoCal about a month. Some friends and I drove out from Palm Springs to see the Rolling Stones in concert at The L.A. Coliseum. I don't remember all the opening acts or the order in which they played but Prince was one of them; he may have been the first band up. 

We were sitting pretty far from the stage so it was a little hard to make out all the details but Prince walked out with his band, carrying his guitar and wearing a black leather trench coat with what appeared to be nothing on underneath except for ladies lingerie. 

Remember this was a Stones concert. 

The Rolling Stones.

In 1981.

A guy was wearing lingerie.

Now, I applaud the Stones for recognizing great talent and giving a newcomer a shot, but, unfortunately for Prince and his band, the audience members at that time, at least those who found themselves within beer-can-throwing distance from the stage, weren't quite as enthusiastic as Mick Jagger and Keith Richards were about having some skinny 23-year-old dude dancing around in ladies lingerie, no matter how talented a musician he might be. 

As they began to play, Prince and his band were forced to stand about 30 feet or so from the front of the stage to avoid being hit by the beer cans, half-full styrofoam cups, and assorted other food stuffs and objects that came flying at them from the drunks in the front of the crowd. After playing about 2-1/2, maybe three songs while dodging projectiles, Prince said into the mic, 'Fuck it', or 'Fuck you', or 'Fuck something' and walked off the stage with his band. 

I remember a stage hand or security guard or someone yelling into the mic something to the effect of, 'Why don't you come up here on stage and see what it's like?' Well, sure enough, some drunken idiot accepted the challenge, pushed his way through the crowd, climbed over the security wall, and pulled himself up onto the stage. Upon his arrival, he thrust his arms into the air and did a little victory dance, like he thought he was Rocky Balboa and he had just reached the top of the stairs. Unfortunately for this dumb-ass, the security guards appeared to be not so much fans of Rocky and boxing as they were fans of Hulk Hogan and Pro Wrestling. A very large member of the security staff promptly relieved the guy of his 'Rocky moment' by applying what can be described as 'part bear hug, part half-nelson' and threw the idiot in a very un-Rocky-like fashion down the stairs that led to the side of the stage. From the contorted heap in which he landed, with his limbs pointing in all kinds of directions, this brave 'warrior for the preservation of masculinity' was picked up off the floor by two more large members of the security staff who enthusiastically 'assisted' him onto his feet and behind a wall out of view, where he presumably was blackened and blue-ened a little bit more before being either handed over to the cops or maybe he was escorted (meaning thrown, literally) outside the Coliseum where his ability to view the Stones in concert would be seriously compromised. 

Being products of the '70's and hailing from Small-Town Pacific Northwest, where some of us might have heard of Prince, but didn't give two shits about him at the time, we all sort of sneered at the 'weirdo in the lingerie' and chuckled about him being 'booed off stage'. I can't speak for my friends, but a few years later, when Purple Rain was released, I, along with millions of others, realized Prince for the incredible talent that he was.  I've been a fan ever since.

Remembering the Stones concert in '81, I've always regretted that we were robbed of an opportunity to witness greatness and possibly a little bit of history (we will never know what he had planned for us and what we missed out on) by a bunch of idiots who were so blinded by bigotry and intolerance they were unable to recognize and unwilling even to give a chance to a genius who simply wanted to stand in front of them and give them the gift of music. It seems often to be the case, though, does it not, when a new genius first emerges, that they are laughed at, dismissed, and even attacked by the ignorant. 

Someone famous once said, 'The fool on the hill sees the sun going down and the eyes in his head see the world spinning round.' It is the genius, the one who truly understands, that is regarded as an idiot by the masses who don't. 

Rest In Peace, Prince. Despite a few potholes and some fools along your path, your genius was eventually recognized and you made the world a better, more beautiful place.

4/21/2016

Day after day
Alone on a hill
The man with the foolish grin
Is keeping perfectly still
But nobody wants to know him
They can see that he's just a fool
And he never gives an answer

But the fool on the hill
Sees the sun going down
And the eyes in his head
See the world spinning round

Well on the way
Head in a cloud
The man of a thousand voices
Talking perfectly loud

But nobody ever hears him
Or the sounds he appears to make
And he never seems to notice

But the fool on the hill
Sees the sun going down
And the eyes in his head
See the world spinning round

And nobody seems to like him
They can tell what he wants to do
And he never shows his feelings

But the fool on the hill
Sees the sun going down
And the eyes in his head
See the world spinning round

He never listens to them
He knows that they're the fools
They don't like him

The fool on the hill

Sees the sun going down
And the eyes in his head
See the world spinning round

JL, PM

Episode 51 - Fifty Shades Of Dookie

WARNING!  THE FOLLOWING BLOG POST CONTAINS GRAPHIC DEPICTIONS OF DISGUSTING, HORRID, VILE, (and for some people, I won't say who) SEMI-EROTIC THINGS.  SO STEP INTO YOUR BIG-BOY PANTS AND PROCEED FROM THIS POINT WITH CAUTION.  (And don't say I didn't warn you...!)




Dropping a deuce.  Laying some cable.  Busting a grumpy.  Dropping the kids off at the pool.  Growing a tail.  Pinching a loaf.  Freeing the hostage.  Squeezing a steamer.  Visiting Yoda.  Launching a torpedo.   Releasing the Cracken.  Letting Punxsutawney Phil out to check for his shadow...

Whichever charming euphemism with which the seductive male might choose as a method to beguile his lucky lady by announcing the particular activity in which he will be henceforth engaged for the ensuing 5 to 10 minutes, I'm pretty sure the medical journals advise that the presence of a dark red liquid in the punch bowl after 'launching a torpedo' is generally accepted as 'not good'.  So, after a rather concerned phone call to the doctor, I was advised to pay the good man a visit.  As Yoda would say, 'Left work early, I did.'

Now, I'm a pretty relaxed and open-minded individual, but I gotta say, there are few things in life that bring quite the same flavor of anguish as the words, 'I'd like to do a rectal exam.'  Maybe I'd feel better about it if, instead of coming right at me with, 'I'd like to do a rectal exam,'  the doctor signaled his intentions in a more sensitive fashion; something like, 'Ah, crap, now we gotta do a rectal exam.'  Maybe he could hem and haw some, throw his notepad on the counter in frustration, check the hallway like he's hoping to find someone else that can do this thing.  He could do something, as though he's trying to think of any possible other way of accomplishing this task.  Maybe he could hesitatingly stretch those rubber gloves onto his hands. Possibly throw in a 'Let's just get this over with.'   Please, if there are any doctors reading this, let me walk out of your office afterwards with the impression that that was a duty that you didn't have any particle of enjoyment in the performance of it.

Nope.  Not this time. Not this doctor.  All bedside manner flies out the window.  It's rubber gloves in record time and it's 'Drop everything down to the knees.'  And here we go.  And not gently, either, I might add.  Those rubber gloves are not... teflon...

The result?  Oh, yay!  Colonoscopy time.  I just did one three years ago, now we gotta do it again?  Doctors, man.  It matters not that you eat the healthiest diet on the planet, that your blood pressure is 100 over 60, you're not over weight, you don't smoke, you barely drink, and that you do yoga three times a week.  You hit your 50's and these guys are just dying to get you alone so they can shove cameras up your ass.

The next week and a half, my existence is one filled with dread for the upcoming inevitable.  But, this being my second time, it's not really the fact that I'm about to have someone fly a drone into my lower intestine; I'll be happily unconscious for that little chapter.  It's the prologue, the preparation one must bear beforehand.  The two days of starvation that must be suffered.   The cleanse.  That's the stressful part.  So I decide to make the best of it and keep a log of my progress.  WTH, if I have to suffer, so must anyone reading my blog.  You're welcome...

Colonoscopy Log -

6 AM - Has anyone seen the size of this jug of liquid they make you drink? WTholyF? I used to carry something just like this in my truck in case I ran out of gas. Eight ounces every ten minutes? For the next three hours?  For the love of god, how is this even possible?  They know water poisoning is a thing, right? They know it's possible to drink too much liquid?  Geezuss, a blue whale couldn't ingest this amount...

7:30 AM - Half-way through the giant vat of toxic salt water and I realize now why it's possible for a human to drink such a colossal amount:  Because it doesn't stay in your body.  This is horrible.  I'm a human garden hose.  How can it possibly be medically ok for any human to endure this?  A path has been cleared of clutter between the kitchen counter, where the giant vat awaits, and the bathroom, like when a dog, repeatedly taking the exact same route through your back yard, will wear a path in the grass.   'Scuse me. Gotta go again...

9 AM - Defying the limits of human capability, I have somehow managed to finish drinking what can only be described as putrid ocean water from the 30 gallon drum prescribed by Dr. Sadistic. 'Human Garden Hose' doesn't quite convey the effect that this endeavor has on the body. 'Human Pressure Washer' comes closer. I just want to turn off the spigot and eat something.  Anything.  I'm so empty I'm hollow...

10:30 AM - It''s now been 90 minutes since polishing off that salty cocktail that is so common among 55-year-old males, The Colon Cleanse. I haven't eaten solid food since a small bowl of grits yesterday morning. Despite earlier evidence to the contrary, the spigot on the human garden hose apparently is not, after all, connected to an infinite source and now seems, finally, to have been shut off.  However, my empty cavern of a body has now been invaded by some gurgling alien entity from Planet Starvation.  I must exist in this condition for another three hours until I check in for my appointment with Dr. Daterape.  All I can think about is pizza...

12:30 PM - If all goes as planned, I will soon leave the house with my female escort.  In 90 minutes I will be out like a busted black light and in the sadistic hands of my violator, Dr. GoProbe. If he decides to also go down my throat like last time, I can only hope he will first wipe off the scope with a clean towel.  Food, god.  Please.  Food...

1:45 PM - My female escort arrives to drive me to my doom.  Doughnuts dance through my hallucinations as we back out of the driveway.  Maple bars.  Coconut sprinkles.  There's a Dunkin' Doughnuts at the end of our block but she drives the other way.  I hate her.  In ten minutes we are approaching the office where the unspeakable will be perpetrated.  To think there are countries in this world where the doctor and myself would be stoned to death for what we are about to do...

2:30 PM - The paperwork has been filled out and my woman has left me here in the waiting room by myself to return later when it's all over.  Apparently, the fact that her man will soon be turned into a human stick-puppet and have his insides roto-rootered after being rendered unconscious with an injection of some mysterious brew, all that is less important to her than the free soup her company is offering their employees for lunch today.  As she was leaving, I said I would see her soon, but I couldn't stop the phrase, 'some people's kids,' from popping into my head as the door to the exit closed behind her.  Was she running?  All right, then.  Her colonoscopy will come one day and I'm gonna enjoy me one giant goddamn bowl of lobster bisque while she's in there...

2:45 PM - The door to the dungeon of death creaks open and I am summoned by name to receive my sentence.  I enter into what can be described as some kind of macabre conveyor-belted machine where the 'yet-to-be-reamed' patients are lined up in wheeled beds on the left, and the 'already-been-reamed' patients, in varying degrees of grogginess, are wheeled out through swinging double doors and lined up against the wall on the right.  Several ladies, wearing pastel smocks, are running back and forth, telling the groggy, 'Don't be shy, you gotta let it out.'  I don't ask.  I assume I will learn what that means later when the conveyor belt plops me against the wall on the right.  One of the pastel smocks cheerily instructs me, 'Everything off but your socks.'  She hands me a light-weight gown and 'shinks' the curtain closed. I do as I'm told.  I lay onto 'my' bed and the cheery smock-lady covers me with a cotton blanket that feels like it was in the dryer just seconds prior.  So, it's not all bad.  But what's on the other side of those double doors...??

3:00 PM - A smock sticks an IV into my vein and places her hands on my bed near my feet.  The conveyor belt lurches, and I am rolled into another room where an asian nurse is smiling.  The doctor enters and seems surprised when I speak to him.  'Hello!'  He looks at the nurse, who explains, 'I haven't started yet.  He gives her a 'Hmm' and walks out of the room.  Chatty fella.  I glance around.  The room seems a little small to allow for the team of surgeons I imagined was necessary for the upcoming task so I ask the nurse, 'How many people are in the room when they do this?'  'Just me and the doctor,' she answers.  In my day-to-day life my mouth almost always works faster than my brain.  This time, however, my brain leaps out in front, leaving my mouth in the dust, and my thought at this moment is, 'Didn't Michael Jackson die because there was no anesthesiologist?'   But the roofies are kicking in, the room gets fuzzy, and before I can form the words that will express my concern...

5:00 PM, Post Rape - I have returned home. I remember the clock reading 3:10, and an asian nurse telling me to roll over onto my left side. From that position I was beamed instantaneously through the time portal into recovery, against the wall on the right, where the clock said 4:20 and a blonde nurse was telling me to roll over and fart or else I couldn't go home. The phrase, 'You asked for it,' flashes through my mind as I proceed with an effort that would've made my parents proud, had they been foghorns.  The smocks responded as though they were pleased with my effort but I'm not so sure they don't make you do that just so they can have funny stories to tell their friends. Fortunately enough my woman returned right then (apparently she and her coworkers had finished all the soup) to drive me home where she prepared fried rice, tonkatsu pork, and eggs. My date-rape with destiny is over.  Finally, I can eat food!

Epilogue - No polyps, no bleeding or blockage, nothing wrong in any way. I am the possessor of a completely healthy Chunnel. So, what's the take-away from all this? It is this: if you don't want Dr. Mengele doing any off-shore drilling, so-to-speak, on your premises, so-to-speak, then it might be wise to remember that you ate grilled beets the night before and that the dark-red liquid you see on your dookie is just undigested beet juice, and is not blood after all. 

Beets...

Crap...