Grain Belt Beer and Pot

I thought I had written about this before, but I searched my blog and I cannot find any reference to this story.

In the early fall of 1971, I found myself sitting in a huge old barn just off of Interstate 80 in Davenport, Iowa. I wasn't sitting there alone. It was a beautiful autumn evening and there were a group of us hippies in that barn. One was strumming a guitar, another was drumming on some boards, and a visitor also with a guitar had joined in.

Very cheap beer.

The reason we were in that barn was to tear it down and sell the barn boards, which were a big fad back then. The barn was impressive, probably eighty years old and built by hand. We had been there for over a week, taking each board off of the giant hand hewn beams, one at a time. The barn was about fifteen miles from our hippie farmhouse, so we were camping out in it most of that week. Before our little hoedown, it had been determined that we needed beer. So I, along with another guy, walked about a quarter mile to the gas station at the end of the I-80 interchange where we could buy some Grain Belt Beer. Now my memory of this evening is a little sketchy, it was forty four years ago. What I do remember is a small group of black guys at that gas station, and one of them was talking on the pay phone. It seems that the vehicle they had been riding in had broken down out on Interstate 80, and they were now stuck in Davenport. We struck up a conversation with the guy who had been on the phone and invited him and his buddies back to the barn for some beer and pot, which explains why my memory of it all is very fragmented. The one bit of memory that I do have of that evening is that the vehicle the black guys had been riding in was a tour bus, and the guy who had been on the phone when we were at the gas station was Curtis Mayfield. I know what you're thinking, "Alan was so stoned, he probably hallucinated the whole thing."  I did not hallucinate this, and I did get to hear Curtis Mayfield in a barn, in Davenport, Iowa, accompanied by my hippie friends. 

 In case you never heard Curtis Mayfield.

Lindsay Lohan

On a cold winter day forty years ago, I came home one evening and opened the door to find a kitty cat sitting on the stairs waiting for me. I didn't have a cat. Upon a little investigation I found out that my tenant, Mike Waters, had found this cat and decided that I was the perfect person to give it to. Fine, I opened the door to my apartment and let her in. I called her kitty, eventually changing it to Amanda, after Amanda Blake, the original Miss Kitty. Amanda moved to California with me, back to Chicago with me, and again to Florida. I estimate that Amanda was around twenty years old when she died. Over the years I added Nina, Carlotta, Fat Kitty, Lindsay Lohan, and Britney Spears to my home. Up until Lindsay and Britney, all my cats lived in my house with me. Unfortunately for Lindsay and Britney, my and Mark's allergies sentenced them to a life in the back yard. I simply couldn't allow them inside.

Lindsay left us yesterday. I took her to the vet because she had a bloody paw and nose. I returned home without her. I honestly have felt sad and shed tears over each and every one of my cats that have passed on, but Lindsay was different. She lived outdoors and I never really bonded with her other than the moments I fed her and brushed her. So Lindsay is now gone, but I am not all that sad. I'm not sad because Lindsay is better off where she is now. No, not kitty cat heaven. Lindsay is at Abandoned Pet Rescue. Lindsay is sitting inside, in air conditioning, with a bowl of food in front of her, with access to complete healthcare, along with about thirty of her new friends. I can't take Lindsay with us to Chicago. She's an outdoor cat, and I don't think she would last one winter in Chicago. So while Lindsay is sitting pretty at APR, Britney is still living in the backyard all alone, without her girlfriend. Nobody to hang out with except lizards, possums, and raccoons. But that's okay, she'll soon be with Lindsay and she'll receive a big welcome Just like Lindsay did. When I walked into the large cat room with Lindsay and put her carrier down on the floor, all of the cats in the room swarmed around her giving her a big friendly welcome. They'll be just fine there. 

Now if you don't think Lindsay and Britney will be "just fine" at Abandoned Pet Rescue, you can go there and adopt them. Just as long as you let them live inside, in air conditioned comfort.

Alan Makes a Chocolate Malt

I love chocolate malts. Baskin Robbins used to make a very good malt for a reasonable price before they merged with Dunkin Donuts. Now all the Baskin Robbins ice cream is sold in Dunkin Donut shops, and if you ask for a chocolate malt it's as if you're speaking a different language. Which you usually are. Now if I want to get a chocolate malt I have to go to one of those snooty ice cream specialty stores that seem to think a malt is some kind of exotic concoction that demands an equally exotic price. Mark is acutely aware of my love of chocolate malts. He often stocks the kitchen with all the ingredients I would need to whip up a very decent malt, which dovetails nicely with his plans to keep me fat so nobody else will ever look at me. 

Monday night Mark left me all alone with just the dogs and some vanilla ice cream, chocolate syrup, and powdered malt (The malt must be powdered and not that liquid crap). From inside the freezer the ice cream beckoned like Homer's Sirens. My will was crushed. So I pulled the blender out from under the counter and loaded it with vanilla ice cream, milk, chocolate syrup, and the powdered malt. Enough to serve at least two, maybe three people. When I flipped the switch, the blender burst into action with a loud whir. Seconds after that, a very startled creature leaped out from under the blender, bounced off of my leg, and skittered across the floor and out of sight. I have no idea what it was, it moved so fast that it was all a blur. All I know is that it was about two inches long, dark colored with a long tail, and it had claws. I know it had claws because I could feel them on my leg when it bounced off of me. I stood there for a moment after screaming like a five year old girl, wondering what the hell to do. Where did it go, what was it, how would I catch it? Slowly the realization came to me that I still had a gigantic chocolate malt sitting on the counter, and all worry of what the hell that beast was melted away. Just like the malt that would soon be in my tummy. So somewhere in this house is a four legged, two inch long thing, with a long tail and claws. I can't wait until Mark finds it.

Gaslight

Poing!

"There, did you hear that?"

"Hear what? Alan, what are you talking about?"

"That noise. It sounds like some kind of electronic device."

"I didn't hear anything."

I heard it, I most definitely heard a noise coming from somewhere in the house. It sounds like some kind of warning or attention signal from something. I've checked the moisture detector under the air conditioning unit, the smoke detector, my cell phone, all the rechargeable devices that are plugged in around the house, but I've found nothing. If only it would make that noise at a steady rate I think I could find it. Unfortunately it only does it every fifteen minutes or so. I've tried to just sit and keep quiet for twenty minutes, but that is hard to do around here with two crazy dogs, three if you count Mark.

Poing!

"Mark, there it is again?" I call out. Mark has left the living room where I always hear the noise, saying he has better things to do.

"I didn't hear any goddamned noises. What the hell is wrong with you?" Mark yells back from the bedroom.

I know better. There is nothing wrong with me, my hearing isn't that bad. So I decide to get my flashlight and go around the house and re-check every electronic gadget we have.

"Mark, where's my flashlight? I've lost my flashlight. I'm always losing things, aren't I?"

"What, what are you blathering on about?"

"My flashlight. I need my flashlight to go around and check all the devices."

"You mean that flashlight, the one on the table next to you?"

Suddenly, I'm beginning to not trust my memory at all. I was sure I had looked on that table.

Poing!

That Nasty Little Hole

Oh my god it feels so good, I can't stop myself. I know that I shouldn't keep going, but it just feels so damn good. I am such a bad boy. Deeper, deep into that nasty little hole. Goddamnit I love digging in my ears with a Q-tip.

It's one of those things that you realize as you get older. Taking a quick, neat poop, sleeping all night without having to get up to pee, and scratching that itch deep within your big, hairy ear, can sometimes be better than sex. Scratching the inside of my ear is one of those things that I know is very bad, yet I constantly find myself doing it, involuntarily sometimes. The worst is when I use a toothpick. I'll be sitting there watching television after dinner, picking at my teeth, and invariably the damn toothpick ends up in my ear. If it is long, narrow, and fits in my ear, it's been there. I think it's the psoriasis that causes my ears to itch so badly, so I now rub some hydro-cortisone in there on the end of a Q-tip. Unfortunately doing that feels even better than doing it with a dry Q-tip and I end up digging in even harder. The good thing about that hydro-cortisone Q-tip, it works. In the end it does clear up the itching for a couple of days. Clears it up until I find myself watching television a few days later, and digging in my ear with the business end of a house key.