Riding Where They Don't

Riding a bike in Seattle makes you something of an anomaly, especially if you’re not dressed in spandex and trying to go as fast as you can. But even so, you feel like you’re part of some kind of community—even one that’s a ragtag collection of often-drunken cyclists—and you usually have a sense that although you’re in the minority of travelers on the road, you’re not some strange visitor from outer space come to steal people’s land and deflower their daughters (not that such thoughts never cross your mind, particularly when you get right-hooked by some guy in an SUV taking the high-school girls’ soccer team to the mall.)

Out here, though, in the suburbs of Minneapolis, where we’re visiting our friends on the far side of Thanksgiving, you ride a bike and it’s like you’re all alone, pedaling around on roads that haven’t seen human-powered two-wheeled transportation since the time old Ole Larson ran out of gas on his Harley and had to push it half a mile to the gas station at the mall.

That’s not enough to keep me from borrowing my host’s old Specialized mountain bike and do my usual Sunday morning cycle to a nearby coffee shop—this one, a local Starbucks knockoff in a shopping mall about three miles away—but it is sufficient to make me hyper-aware of how surprised car drivers are to see me coming up on their left as they ready themselves at intersections for the lights to change before flooring it off into traffic.

I managed not to get run over, which struck me as something of an accomplishment, although there was a point, at a four-way intersection by the mall where I pressed all the crosswalk buttons and succeeding in activating every pedestrian light, thereby holding up cars for a good ten or fifteen extra seconds, where I could tell that their drivers wouldn’t have minded rolling over me, deflowered daughters or not.

Fear of Flying Not

I’ve never quite understood the fear that some people have of flying. The only aspect of air travel that really scares me is the prospect of getting stuck between two hugely fat people who kick their shoes off smelly, sweating feet, while a little kid sits behind me and kicks the back of my seat all the way through the flight.

Oh, and I always get a bit anxious on the trip out to the airport, and going through security, especially when I haven’t checked bags and might be carrying an item or two for a vacation time safety meeting, makes me a little nervous, too.

But once I’m on the plane, in my seat, with a book in my lap, I usually feel pretty okay. The prospect of dying in a flaming airline crash doesn’t bother me so much—I suppose it could happen, but if it were to, it would all be over relatively quickly, and the likelihood of what really frightens me—being maimed and incapacitated so I’d be unable to do all the kinds of things I like to do—seems pretty low.

It’s my understanding that what really freaks people about is the aspect of losing control; those who have a phobia about flying don’t like that there’s nothing they can do to make a difference, that their fate is completely in someone else’s hands.

Frankly, I kind of like that. It’s not that I have a death wish or anything—I’m planning on living well into my 10th decade—but to me, there’s something sort of reassuring about the fact that if were to meet my demise on an airplane, it wouldn’t be my fault at all—sort of like an assisted suicide without any of the troubling ethical baggage that could be construed as going along with it.

Of course, I’m writing this while sitting in the airport lobby; we’ll see how I feel on the puddle-jumper I’ll be boarding.

Waa-aah!

Is it just me or are more and more people these days being bigger and bigger titty-babies?

It just seems like all these adults are whining about not getting stuff that—while they might in some sense deserve—they don’t really have much justification to expect.

And it’s not just Republicans in Congress, it’s a perfectly reasonable folks who are otherwise no more annoying than any others of us.

I don’t know what it is—so I’ll blame in on the internet and cell phones, naturally—but whatever, I continually be surprised with the sense of entitlement people have about what strikes me as relatively minor stuff.

By comparison, I myself am all stoic and self-possessed even though I have huge complaints to make—notably, of course, that I didn’t get my invitation to last night’s White House State dinner! Not that I would have gone, mind you, even though the meal was vegetarian, but it’s the principle of the thing, the principle being, waa-aah! Who’s the titty-baby now?

Being the country’s most highly-acclaimed writer of 327-word essays should, I think, count for something, but I guess not; that’s what comes from speaking truth (or at least truthiness) to power—which is just what I was doing last night as I yelled at my battery pack, hah!

You see how easy it is to fall into the habit of complaining? Not that I’m complaining about that, I’m merely pointing out what others have failed to notice—even some of those who DID eat Roasted Potato Dumplings with Tomato Chutney off of Castleton china and Lenox crystal.

I suppose I could be grateful that I wasn’t asked (or that my invite got lost in the mail, that’s more likely), because, apparently, the after-dinner entertainment included a performance by the National Symphony Orchestra, conducted by none other than Broadway has-been Marvin Hamlisch.

Not that I’m complaining, but I might lost my pumpkin pie tart with caramel crème at that.

Sad and Lonely

I used to be all for living alone. In my late teens and twenties it was by far my preferred mode of habitation.

I had a sparsely furnished one-bedroom apartment in Hollywood during the early 80s where I wrote unproduced film scripts and bad poetry while standing up at the IBM selectric typewriter I kept perched on my $39.95 Aaron Brothers drafting table.

When I moved to Santa Fe, New Mexico in ’84, I lived in a furnished guest house by myself for a year before moving into a small apartment whose tables and chairs I bought in one afternoon at the local food and drug superstore.

What I enjoyed best about solitary living was the way everything would always be just as I left it when I went out and came home (except on the days the cleaning lady would come, but then it was even better) and how I could eat whatever I want, whenever I wanted, usually standing over the sink.

The comedian Larry Miller used to do a bit about living alone and how strange ideas would start to seem normal, like, “Hmm…I wonder how I’d look if I shaved my entire body,” and while it never quite came to that for me, it was interesting to see which of the social norms and niceties you’d be apt to abandon when no one was around to see; the bathroom door, for instance, becomes fairly redundant, as does washing out one’s coffee cup after each use.

Good times.

But now, I’m having a little taste of the solo life with Mimi and Jen gone ahead to the Midwest since Saturday, and I’ll be damned if it isn’t all sad and lonesome at home alone. Sure, it’s nice that the only pair of shoes I ever have to pick up are my own, but I miss the pitter-patter of their owners’ feet way more.

Eating over the sink is still cool, but just not enough.

Wet

In Seattle, if you don’t ride your bike in the rain, you won’t be riding your bike very much—at least, (if things are typical) in late November and all through December, not to mention most of January through July.

Last night, I went out to hear some music—the band Head Like a Kite, who were more like a clever performance art ensemble than the funky groovemeisters I expected them to be—and I almost didn’t, given how steadily it was pissing down from just after dark all night long and well into the morning through the time I went out for my usual sunrise coffee and pastry and beyond.

The standard for wetness is achieved for me when I have to don my shoe covers: lots of time, the damp can be managed with just wool, which is pretty ideal for the misty drizzle that typifies the season in our part of the Northwest. If it’s coming down a little harder, I go to my Gore-Tex rain jacket; if it’s still worse, out come the nylon pants; finally, then it’s the overshoes, whose dorkiness is so manifest, I prefer to hold them out as a last resort.

But fashion succumbs to practicality fairly quickly when the heavens open wide, and so I set aside most qualms about bagging myself all up from head to toe before I set sail last night. Consequently, I arrived at the club reasonably dry on the inside, even though everything I was wearing on the outside was sopping.

In fact, I got wetter taking all my stuff off and stowing it than I did while I was riding, which really made me think that—as a public service—nightclubs should be forced to have coat checks. As it was, you had all these people ranging around the show in their puffy coats and ski caps—which probably put something of a damper on the dancing, too.

Damper, hah! That’s funny.

Tidy

Jen and Mimi have gone on ahead to the Midwest, where I will meet them on Thanksgiving day to partake of the feast (and a feast it will no doubt be) in Madison, with my sister Deb and her family.

So I’m home alone for a couple of evenings and it sure is quiet around here with just me and the dog. There’s also not much to do, it seems, even though I have school projects and plenty of grading to tackle if I feel so moved—which, surprise!, on Saturday night, I do not.

So, mostly, I occupy myself by wandering around the house tidying things up. What this entails primarily is restacking stacks of things, putting books and dishes away, and even, from time to time, dusting off a countertop or bookshelf—nothing that would really count as cleaning; it’s more like organizing or reshuffling; mainly, though, I think it’s probably a little bit of OCD mixed in with anal retentiveness and control-freakism, shaken gently.

I’m one of those people who keeps his desk as clean and clutter-free as possible; my standard line when others remark on this is, “Well, I’ve got a messy mind, so I like a tidy office.” And that’s essentially true, I would say; I know, for instance, that when the papers and books pile up all over my work surface, it makes me sort of nervous. I start to feel like my external environment is getting too close to what’s going on inside me.

And that’s when it’s time to toss stuff in the trash and get out the cleaning spray.

I think part of my weirdness about this has to do how freaked out I was as a kid by some of the homes of people I came collecting at for my paper route.

One guy had newspapers and magazines piled ceiling high throughout his apartment; talk about a cluttered mind; I can’t even bear to think about it.

Bike Pile

It has always made me happy to see a pile of bikes outside a joint, especially my own neighborhood version, and tonight was no exception.

I got to continue the discussion I’d been having earlier in the evening during class about the greatest good for the greatest number and the problem of how Utilitarianism seems to commit you to accepting injustice towards the few in service to the many, which is just, I fear, what happens to any of us who end up giving more than our share—whatever that is.

And then I got to admire the manner in which our next destination was set out for: like some sort of hive organisms, we buzzed around for a while and then set off, following the rider in front of us; that was fun.

And then, we got to hang out under a cherry tree whose spidery arms against the indigo and chalk sky illustrated how thoughtfully planned was the fantastical setting.

Afterwards, and just as we regrouped somewhat painfully, the tailwind seemed to cup me from behind all the way across the Cut and then up around the University to farther than I would have gone without such meteorologically-induced momentum.

And then I was reminded of how fruitless it is to fear the weather yet to come at this time of year, for on the way uphill from the water the rain was slanting from behind and I was sure I’d be paying for it on the way home.

But get this: after just one drink, I started south and already it was warm and dry again, just like the evening started off.

That was all part of the night’s lesson for me, I think: if the utilitarian principle tells us that acts are right insofar as they maximize overall happiness, it follows that usually, the right thing to do is maximize the size of bike piles and elongate (within reason) the length of bike rides.

Lottery Paradox

It was a happy event for an unhappy reason: a party at the Pike Place Brewery with a raffle to raise money to help beloved bike mechanic and all-round swell human being, Val Kleitz, pay for his cancer-treatment medical bills.

Bittersweet, you’d call it, but the good news is that, according to Val himself, he’s on the mend, feeling stronger, and perhaps best of all, back on the bike already and pedaling with renewed vigor.

All the local bike shop royalty was there: Alex from 20/20, Aaron from ABR, Bob from Elliot Bay, Kent from BikeWorks, Eric from JRA, and probably lots more who I either didn’t see or don’t know by sight; if a bomb had hit the pub last night, you wouldn’t be able to get a dropout realigned or a threaded fork cut in Seattle for who knows how long.

I drank more beer than was prudent for a Tuesday evening and got to be all bike-nerdy with other fans of Val and had some good laughs when, during the raffle, Alex W., who’s always busy with something, won like four or five different prizes out of the ten or so that were drawn for.

This is what happens, apparently, in a raffle, when you buy way more tickets than anyone else.

One of the standard puzzles in epistemology is lottery paradox, where, since you know for any ticket you hold, it’s unlikely to be the winning ticket, so it’s reasonable to believe you won’t win; however, that belief will be true of every other ticket, even though you know that one of the tickets will win. Thus, taken together, your set of beliefs is inconsistent. You’re justified in believing about each ticket “This ticket will not win,” while simultaneously believing “Some ticket will win,” in other words, which is contradictory.

Unless, of course, you’ve got a tableful of tickets spread before you; then, there’s no reason to believe you won’t totally clean up.

It's Here

Today was the first day that my bike commute home from Bothell (well, actually just to the UW-Seattle, where I’m taking a class Monday nights) was like I expect it’s going to be pretty much for the next five months: chilly, wet, and dark…and not really all that bad.

My gear got pretty soaked and the waterlogged arms of my rain jacket leaked all over my long-sleeve wool shirt, but the foul weather kept the riff-raff of the Burke-Gilman trail, which made for pleasant, if somewhat lonely riding.

Plus, the millions of shades of gray in the sky set off the muted colors of the last few remaining leaves on the trees ever so poignantly; it makes for such a delicious flavor of melancholy that it’s all I can do to not start writing poetry—a strange bit of synchronicity since I was reading something in Kierkegaard today where he talks about how the poet has to embrace pain so he will have something to wax poetic about.

Which I guess is sort of what we in the Northwest will be experiencing until next July or so rolls around: all the rain will make us that much more introspective and thoughtful—that is, until it doesn’t, probably around early December at the latest.

The main thing, I think, is not to get defeated by the endless precipitation; last night, I was contemplating a ride of less than a mile to the store to pick up a much-needed six-pack; I looked out the window and seeing sheets of rain illuminated by the streetlamp, decided against it. But then, I thought, “No! I’m not made of salt! I won’t melt!” and so hopped on the 420 bike and pedaled to the store.

And the thing is, it wasn’t so bad at all; I got a little wet, but it wasn't nearly at lousy outside as it looked. And I had that six-pack to keep me company while I dried.

Between Books

I’ve been on kind of a lucky streak with books since last spring, when I finally read Edward Abbey’s The Monkey Wrench Gang. I found it not only wry, amusing, and wildly entertaining, but also quite poignant from the standpoint of its perspective on environmental destruction and natural spirituality.

Soon after that, I enjoyed T.C. Boyle’s A Friend of the Earth, which has to be most delightful post-apocalyptic tale I’ve ever come across.

During the summer, I took on at least one important novel, Steinbeck’s East of Eden, as well as Faulkner’s short masterpiece, The Bear.

About a month ago, I was floored by Dave Egger’s novelistic non-fiction tome, Zeitoun, which had me weeping quietly on the bus as I read its last few pages.

Then, because I’d been reminded of it by reading The Book Thief, I re-read, over the last few weeks, nobel-prize winning Gunter Grass’ The Tin Drum, which—although it got a little long around page 500 or so—blew me away with its narrative voice and metaphorical import.

On Friday, I sat on my ass for a couple hours devoring Nick Hornby’s About a Boy, which was much more charming, complex, and nuanced than I expected it would be.

So yesterday, after having done all my Saturday chores, and made a few preparations for the upcoming school week, I looked on my bookshelf for some recreational reading, but nothing really caught my eye. I spend a little bit of time with Wittgenstein’s Poker, the historical account of the time Ludwig Wittgenstein allegedly threatened fellow Cambridge philosopher Karl Popper with a fireplace iron, but it didn’t really do it for me. I also read Logicomix, the graphic novel about the foundations of mathematics, but that only took about an hour to finish.

So now, I’m sort of stuck between books, although I did pick up at the library Hesse’s Siddhartha, which I haven’t read since I was seventeen; otherwise it’s the Times magazine.

As Advertised

The promise was that at least a couple people would be offended, and it was probably more than that, although I’ll bet fewer of those on the bike ride and more of those who worked at the joint, especially when people started hula-hooping.

The Hooter’s Casino itself is strangely wholesome; pretty much the most erotic thing going was Derrick getting down with his hot wings—(right up there on the offensive scale, too)—and since their gambling features only cards, no dice, I was happy to just drink beer and puzzle out American foreign policy with the Major and the evil librarian.

Above all, I was delighted to have caught up with the ride after last week’s failed search and frankly, surprised that I actually knew the way there, over the bridge and along the Duwamish trail to south South Park. I had almost given up when it became apparent that here in the 21st century, nobody answers their phones, they just ring back—which doesn’t really work when you’re calling from one of those drug dealer-proof pay phones in Pioneer Square that blocks you from speaking on incoming calls so that you just stand there holding the receiver helplessly while the person on the other end goes, “Hello? Hello? Anyone there?”

And it would have been particularly offensive to have missed out on the first return visit of the season to the hidden hobo fire pit—which I never could have found on my own—where Joeball fell from the trees and tore a big old rotten tooth of a post from the ground and burned the hell out of it.

Once again, lack of beer eventually impelled us from the site, just in the nick of time to keep open the kitchen at the Orient Express restaurant, where we were installed in our very own Blue Velvet-inspired private karaoke room.

The place was so perfectly creepy, I could only stay for two songs.

No offense.

Veteran's Day

Last week, there was a New York Times piece about this guy who claimed that the luckiest year to have been born among those lucky years of baby-boomer prosperity was 1957; having come into the world myself at that time, I’m not so sure. I always thought I got gypped by not being in the heart of the boomer years; all those hippies eight or ten years older than me got the Beatles and LSD; my class got the Bee-Gees and angel dust.

That said, there is one aspect of being a child—at least a boy child—in the United States sprung from the womb in the year of our lord nineteen-hundred and fifty-seven: I was the first group of 18 year-old males who didn’t have to register for the draft.

And while this made the year or so I’d spent attending Quaker meetings on Sunday mornings in hopes of being able to establish conscientious objector status all for naught, it is something I’ve always been thankful for. Not that I would have been likely to have been called up and sent overseas (that’s what student deferments were all about, right?) but still, at the very least, it gave me the freedom to drop out of college the first time after a month and hitchhike across Canada without that being a way to avoid military service.

All of which is to say how much my heart goes out to men and women in the military on this Veteran’s Day; I’m grateful for their service to our country even though, I have to admit, I’m not entirely sure what that service is supposed to be doing all of the time.

The promise of the Obama administration, I thought, was that we would get straight answers to the question, “Why are Americans being sent overseas to die?”

I sure hope that, in the spirit of today, that the President explains soon what we’re going in Afghanistan and why.

(Almost) One Hundred Percent

Joe Mallahan, the on-leave telecommunications executive committed to “driving efficiencies” in the public and private sector, conceded the Seattle mayor’s race yesterday to former Sierra club activist and dedicated bicycle commuter Mike McGinn; hooray.

Besides this being a win for fans of two-wheeled transportation everywhere and a victory for the little (bearded) guy over the forces of corporate greed and CEO business-speak, it also represents for me, an unprecedented occurrence in all my more than 30 years of voting.

Every single candidate I cast my vote for and all the ballot measures and initiatives I supported (or opposed) won (or lost) as the case may be.

Even the one I was most passionate about (usually a sure sign that I’ll end up on the losing side), the terribly wrong-headed, selfish, and misguided Proposition 1033, which would have effectively eviscerated the Washington state budget and totally devastated higher education and social services from Spokane to Bellingham went down in flames, even though as recently as a month or so ago it looked like my fellow citizens in the Evergreen state might, out of cluelessness, greed, or an inability to find it on the ballot, actually push it to victory.

And even though it turned out to be closer than I expected, Proposition 71, the “all but marriage” measure in support of what I can’t see how anyone doesn’t construe as ensuring a basic human right for gay people managed, mainly with the support of folks west of the Cascades, to prevail.

Plus, in the race for King County executive, the better candidate, Dow Constantine, clobbered the more photogenic, former TV news anchor and Sarah Palin-wannabe, Susan Hutchison in a race that surprised me with how close it wasn’t.

So, I don’t quite know what to make of all this success; I must be turning into the establishment or something.

In fact, the only race in which my candidate didn’t prevail was my write-in of Derrick (Ito) for sheriff.

Easy

Shades of gray and green, lots of yellow; that’s what caught my eye.

I liked seeing many things today, none the least a brother and sister in profile.

I had hoped to ride west to buy raffle tickets for Val’s sweepstakes, but there was little traction for the idea, especially after the fellow mechanic left. So, I got to stand around on a porch catching my breath and cooling off, but then, what a fine tour for a visitor, starting out so pleasantly with a walk across the locks and a climb over the bridge and up the path to Magnolia.

Things got interesting on the Elliot Bay trail where the first of the afternoon’s mechanicals was dispatched with efficiency and verve. We saw an eagle and a ship called the Arctic Eagle, I think.

The attitude I tried to cultivate—in keeping with the New Orleans breakfast theme—was one of being the big easy to please; I didn’t always succeed, especially when impatience overtook me, but mostly, I was perfectly happy to be perfectly happy with whatever was happening.

Except, of course, when I could have strangled that guy for being such a loudmouthed American male, but maybe I’m just jealous I’m not so young—although probably not.

I was especially impressed with how game people were for carrying on; I was all ready to stop and start on a beer before we’d even made it out of Pioneer Square, but I was glad that more ambitious heads prevailed and that somebody else had a phone to get details I would simply have despaired of.

I got to scream in a long group going through the I-90 tunnel and ride first with a headwind and then later with a tailwind across the bridge.

But probably my favorite moment was when we walked into the Mercer Island “Louisianathon” and got to crack up at the very idea of such an event with nothing but white folks

Soul Picture

The highly-influential (and probably bi-polar) 20th century philosopher, Ludwig Wittgenstein, is quoted as saying, “The best picture of the human soul is the human body.”

I think what he probably meant—given that he also said, “philosophical problems arise when language goes on holiday,” and was someone for whom words that weren’t seen to have some way, at least in principle, of empirically testing their meaning were, strictly speaking, meaningless—was that the term “soul” is best rendered in everyday speech as referring to a person’s observable physical characteristics.

And I think I mostly agree with this, except for when I look at myself and see someone staring back at me from the mirror who doesn’t really resemble the person I imagine myself to be. This though, of course, is not usually a phenomenon I experience when observing other people, for whom physical presence is indeed pretty much all I can use to make judgments of what their “souls” look like.

So then, like this morning, when I’m sitting in the coffee shop having my usual Sunday AM coffee and scone, and I cast my eyes around and see all these middle-aged Seattleites bundled up for autumn, I have to conclude that their “souls,” like mine, are all feeling a bit soggy and gray—not that this is a bad thing, but it is one that reflects the overall somber mood of these last few days, rife with reports of crazed gunmen shooting cops and soldiers, rich people getting richer, and pizza pie plates overflowing.

And then, to top it off, there’s the terrible news that beloved local bicycle mechanic hero, Val Kleitz, is battling cancer, and it’s no wonder that a person’s “soul,” (specifically mine) wants to do nothing else than crawl back into bed, pull the covers over his head, and shiver gently with flu-like symptoms he seems to be having.

Or maybe it is the weather or perhaps just another Sunday without a Steelers game.

Limits

I’m interested in the idea of what’s necessary, so limits tend to intrigue me.

327 words, for instance.

Tonight, I tried out “just one phone call allowed.” What I liked was not knowing what was going to happen. What kind of sucked was how lonely it’s been.

In philosophy class, we wondered about when it’s reasonable to hold a belief even if it isn’t, strictly speaking, rational to believe it.

My example tonight is, I guess, “I believe if I pay attention and don’t move too quickly, I will run into the bike gang.” Even though it didn’t come to pass, none of the adventures I ended up having tonight would I have had, had I not had that belief.

So, there was good reason for having it, even if I had no prior proof that it would be a good idea to have.

Although even now, I’m not sure.

What I do know is that I’ve got to pay attention early in the evening so as not to keep getting hit by cars: I forgot that 2nd Avenue was two ways and almost got creamed pedaling off only looking right.

And I was also reminded that it always pays off to stop at the bar in question and have a beer. If I hadn’t failed to do that the first time I arrived at the Hulu, the bartender might have remembered where people rode off to.

On the other hand, had I known, I wouldn’t have ridden south to Goldies under cool clear skies, nor would I have left in time to get caught in the hail and thunder storm that even managed to knock out the power in my neighborhood, Leschi, where, with lines buried underground, we never lose electricity.

Except that it seemed so right to have these blocks around here enshrouded in darkness to share in the commemoration of the great loss that occurred in my neighborhood last Saturday.

Peace. Be safe. Enough.

Leaving Lost Wages

I lost my wallet the other night with eighty bucks in it, my credit and debit cards, driver’s license, two library cards, and some school pictures of Mimi, which, in the end, I miss most. Moving around through the world these last few days without that familiar bulge in my pocket, but more to the point, without my official documents has, for some reason or other, made me feel slightly unmoored, giving rise to more than the usual amount of self-doubt and introspective recrimination, causing me to ponder as I pedal, with greater frequency than is typical, what the hell I’m doing with my life and whether any of it matters in any meaningful or even authentic way.

I keep thinking of that film (which I didn’t even really like at the time) Leaving Las Vegas, in which Nicolas Cage plays this guy who goes to Sin City to drink himself to death, and I wonder, why not? What difference would it make? Who gives a damn what I—or anyone—does? On what grounds is it any better to go to work and make a living than it is to simply throw in the towel and sink into oblivion?

Oh, I know it’s important to be a responsible father and husband and to remain a contributing tax-paying member of society and all, but as long as your don’t become an undue burden to family, friends, and fellow citizens, then who cares?

All of us exist in a complex, interwoven web of social and familial connections and no doubt have some sort of responsibility to contribute to the overall well-being of others, but at the same time, can there by anything so wrong about just wanting to disappear and have the zipper pulled closed?

If I didn’t have to do anything, I’d probably do nothing, but maybe it’s just the prospect of going to the DMV to replace that lost license that’s got me feeling this way.

Fun, I Guess

Here’s another reason I’m glad I’m not a world-famous actor or something: there I was, in the parking lot behind the Old Rainier Brewery, wearing a blonde fright wig in a Hooters girl costume, complete with 44 triple-D balloon breasts, slightly more than slightly tipsy, peeing against the wall of the building. That’s when it occurred to me that this would make a killer photo on the TMZ website, and I—or my publicist, probably—would have a lot of explaining to do.

As it was, I was able to complete my business in relative anonymity and return to the Halloween party with no one the wiser about it…until now.

So, all in all, it was a pretty fun evening of dress-up, but I am kind of glad it’s over and I can return to less elaborate costuming—as soon as I manage to remove the semi-permanent dye that Jen applied to my lips in my effort to achieve some degree of character authenticity to go along with my outfit.

I managed to achieve full-on bacchanal status quite early in the night, well before arriving at that almost tipsy stage, as I succeeded in losing my wallet for real somewhere outside the first party. In my defense, if I need one, it’s all because of having no pockets; I should have stuck the thing in my pantyhose, but that left too much of bulge.

Now I see why women wear purses, although I’m not sure I could have found one to match my white tennis shoes and orange hot pants.

And then, to top it off, there’s no getting through to the bank this morning to cancel my credit cards; no doubt the day after Halloween is among the more popular—if not the most popular—day for discovering you’ve misplaced your shit. Perhaps New Year’s day offers some competition, or the day after St. Paddy’s.

At least I’ve got an extra hour to wait on hold.