Gertrude Part Four: Further Proof That STD’s Are a Fake Boogeyman
26 OctAt this point it’s almost like “what do I have to do.” I’m the Whitey Bulger of herpes, flagrantly committing crimes and then dodging punishment for decades while walking around with my hugely recognizable face in a heavily populated city. What do I have to do to get an STD. I mean, maybe this girl– there could still be an incubation period. When did I start fucking her– probably like a week before this test. So no AIDS would have come through or anything.
But what the fuck would SHE have to do to get an STD. It’s easier for girls to get it than guys, right? That’s what they tell you in sex ed. Sixty per cent of new HIV transmissions are women, eighty seven per cent of new syphilis transmissions are women, blah blah blah… That’s what they tell you in health class. They also tell you there’s a big chance that if you fuck someone unprotected you’ll get an STD. So fuck what they said in health class. I’m not gonna believe anything that came out of that shit anymore. I’m gonna go back to my childhood understanding, based on speculation from an ass porn mag given to me by a hobo, that a baby is made when a guy puts his penis into a girl’s butt and pees. Continue reading
How Was Your Day
23 OctI was awake. There was a bird outside my window performing a miracle. He had memorized the calls of dozens of other birds after hearing them just a few times and was performing them flawlessly. Some of this bird’s brain cells die in winter and grow back in spring in time for him to learn new songs. Discovering this fact led scientists to conclude they had been wrong when they’d said your brain is just slowly dying. In fact it can build new skills and learn new ways of being for your whole life. It was revolutionary. There is hope for us all. I was annoyed at the bird for waking me up.
Cigarette. Honey Nut™ Cheerios®. Coffee. Read things on the internet. Take a shit. Always a good one; I haven’t had a bad shit in years. Hot shower. Another miracle worn into banality by enjoying it every day. The hiss of warm water, the warmth like the womb. Safe and private. I washed my ass at least seven times. Car. Radio, NPR. Old people talking about old time musicians no one gives a fuck about. Or no– about people who were once in those dead old time musicians’ orbit. How on Earth does anyone give one single fuck about the guy who served as the archivist for Ira Gershwin, brought to you by Mercedes Benz of Southern California. The only way this could be less interesting is if they interviewed the archivist for the archivist of Ira Gershwin. “The Dow” is up seventeen points. Again, who gives a fuck. That tells me absolutely nothing. Continue reading
Business Review: Automobile Club of Southern California
21 OctAt the AAA office. The staff is helpful, courteous and efficient. If you are not a member of AAA, go fucking join AAA right now. Call their number and a helpful, courteous and efficient person will explain to you in plain language exactly what you need to do to join and the benefits you will attain. If your car breaks down, they will tow it somewhere for free. If your battery dies, they will come give you a jump for free. If you have a flat tire, they’ll come change it for free. Their staff that you talk to on the phone will be unrattled and actually know what the fuck they’re talking about. The tow truck driver who shows up will be a nice dude from somewhere interesting who won’t try to jack you for extra money. He will commiserate with you over your car trouble and put whatever music on the radio you want as he drives you to a mechanic of your choice for free.
You will receive a complimentary biweekly magazine with travel tips and day drive ideas tailored to your local area. Like, this is what you should check out in San Juan Capistrano. When the swallows are there and how you see them. What local restaurants are suitable for the type of person who reads their local AAA newsletter, whom I infer to be between 60-75 and not wanting to do a great deal of strenuous exercise. There will be an open letter in the front of the magazine from some higher up in AAA, who looks like the principal of Council Bluffs High School in 1955. Or the Undersecretary of Agriculture from the Eisenhower administration. He will spout platitudes about AAA’s mission of quality service and the long sterling history of delivering such, from the early days of cars you had to crank to today with added support for hybrids and natural gas vehicles. Alternative fuels are an important part of our energy future and the Auto Club is committed to ushering in this new era of environmentally sound driving. Letters to the Editor support these claims of excellence, and herald the newsletter’s usefulness. Dear AAA Westways Magazine, thank you for your recent tips on San Juan Capistrano. The swallows were beautiful and the AAA recommended motel was a real gem. Sincerely, Frank and Lois Gildersnatch, Whittier CA. Continue reading
The Foot Tattoo
16 OctThe foot tattoo makes her seem more accessible. Such a person makes poor sexual decisions. No impulse control. If you have a tattoo on top of your foot, you have no concept of such a thing as “the future.” Having this poem written in script on your foot, a poem I can only assume is something unbelievably stupid, is now and is always going to be an awesome idea, the way to a dog consuming an entire roll of toilet paper will always be an awesome idea.
¡¡¡REMISSION!!!
15 OctYou know that feeling when you’re having a shitty day at work and people are assholes and you have no money and the car you just bought is now beginning to show signs of a flawed cooling system, but you just tore off a new piece of ass the night before so nothing can really get you down? Well, Nikol’s cancer is in remission. So nothing can get me down today. Also, I tore off a new piece of ass. But mostly it’s Nikol.
Nikol’s cancer is in remission. I never even thought about her cancer, when she had it, unless some big shit like surgery was happening, or it was right after her hair fell out. Unless it was in my face. She was sick, but she’s always sick, because she can take a handle of Von’s brand whiskey to the head and does tons of drugs; she’s the kind of person who texts you “I just took 30 tylenol PM’s and I’m going to die” and you can just laugh it off because she can eat pills that would make a billygoat puke. She’s a tank. But you could never tell if she was just hung over as fuck or if it was, you know, terminal illness. She wasn’t one of these cancer talk people, cancer cancer cancer all the time, my treatments, my symptoms, my positive thinking program, my misguided attempt to use alternative medicine from Mexico that will only accelerate my death. You didn’t think about it. Continue reading
Goodbye Greta
13 OctThe head gasket was blown. I drove it too hot, and now the engine is dead. Repairs too unwieldy to do on my budget. The coolant would just boil over in 10 minutes.
Also, there was a sound like a rake being dragged across the undercarriage when you made a hard right turn. Or too hard a left turn. The front windows didn’t roll down. Or they did, but they would just drop into the door at a diagonal. The stereo was stolen. The driver’s side seat belt didn’t work; you’d have to reach over and stick it in the passenger side and if you had a passenger you’d have to entwine their seat belt with yours and explain this rather unsafe-seeming process to first dates you were getting to go back to your house. The sunroof was stuck closed. The back rear window was always open about four inches because I’d replaced it myself while drunk; I had shattered it with a rock when I locked my keys in the car. Also drunk. Unbeknownst to me the left rear door lock didn’t fully lock and I could have just opened the door. The hood latch didn’t open. Or it did, but you had to reach into the innards of the car with vice grips and yank on the hood latch cable. Eventually the cable would have come off its moorings completely and snaked into some impossible rusty depth of the body and the hood would have been sealed shut. The brakes were going. The master cylinder. The vacuum pump was going. There was no heat. There was no air conditioning. There was not a god damn motherfucking thing you could do about it when it was a hundred nine degrees and the car, with half its windows not rolling down, was like a greenhouse, and you were basically microwaving yourself getting in it on an August day in Los Angeles. It didn’t want to start when it was cold. The starter just cranked over and over and over, first slowly, then quicker and quicker with a horrible metal-on-metal grinding until it turned over and spat out a huge and weirdly stationary cloud of white smoke that smelled like parts of your car that you really need burning, and then you had to lay on the gas for a minute or else it stalled out when you put it in gear. It needed a paint job. I always meant to get a paint job over that worn out silver that looks like primer gray. The signals didn’t work; they didn’t flash and you had to flip the lever up and down by hand trying to keep a rhythm. I got a ticket for a burned out license plate light and it was impossible to fucking fix because every time you tried the bulb just got sucked up into some weird hole behind the impossible-to-get-your-fingers in soot covered bay for the license plate light. Continue reading







