gummi bear, winged snake, and karaoke

Hmmm....this is the first time that I do this so, here it goes (I apologize in advance for the manic and tangential nature of this blog):

I was sitting not 2 days ago with a certain girl I'm lucky to know; she will henceforth be know as Gigi. So, I was sitting at Cafe Brazil with Gigi, and we ordered something to eat because we were pretty fucking hungry. Just as the food came, (and, mind you, we have the slowest-ass waiter on the planet), we received a phone call from another very good friend--Amy. Amy was having a particularly bad day at work (on the verge of quitting and/or having a stroke), and her Jeep would not start, so we were going to pick her up about 30 minutes away. I have not eaten that quickly since I choked when I was 12 and my dad had to perform the Heimlich maneuver on me. I felt like I was at a ?pie/hot dog eating contest.

So, we eat as much as possible under the aforementioned circumstances, and are off to Mansfield, the town where Amy works. On the way, I noticed this strange building with bizarre colors, minarets, and spires. In some way (I'm not sure what, really), it made me think of the Renaissance Fair. According to Margaret Cho, former star of the ill-fated series "All-American Girl", there is apparently some weird connection between the Renaissance Fair, leather sex, and Star Trek. Not that there's anything wrong with any of those things; just not really my cup of tea.

This is what brings me to Gummi Bear and Winged Snake. I used to tutor when I was in college. The job was very frustrating and not worth the pay. The tutorial center was a unique sort of environment. The director of the center often emotionally labile, quite possibly on the verge of tears--and, he was boinking one of the tutors there whom he had "saved" from a bad marriage or some scenario of that sort. Anyhow, I digress (I'm about at tangential as Gigi on that day).....I used to love to make up names for people. There was one tutor who was kind of quiet, rotund, and fairly pleasant--she was Gummi Bear. There was another very thin, quiet (almost sneaky) female tutor with a slightly slutty disposition--she was Winged Snake. So one day I'm just sitting in there mindin' ma business, and I can't help overhearing Winged Snake and Gummi Bear talking about going to the Renaissance Fair on a bus with some random group of people. I seem to recall an invitation that I hastily declined. As I look back, I'm quite pleased that I didn't go. I can just imagine Winged Snake whipping poor Gummi Bear, covered in oils, with a miniature cat'o-nine tails. In a state of almost revolt, I mentioned this to Gigi, who of course laughed.

We arrive in Mansfield and Amy's Jeep is dead--I mean fucking dead. It's one of those Jeep Liberty's benevolently known as the "Gay Jeep"; it's seen it's fair share of drunkenness and puke in it's day. Anyhow, we decide to get drunk; it was also coincidentally my brother's birthday (the one you can thank for introducing me to this blog page). So we go to Amy's house so that she can change into normal clothes (not scrubs). I raid her liquor cabinet and come away with a 1.75 litre bottle of Bacardi light rum. I was disappointed that Amy did not have vodka. Nevertheless, I asked Gigi to drive to the nearest Sonic so that I could purchase a strawberry slush and a plastic spoon. I'm quite certain that there will be video of this on youtube thanks to Gigi. Then we go to a bar and drink one beer only to leave because we are cold. We then visit another bar that "happens" to have karaoke. Earlier in the day, Amy told me that it would make her happy if I would sing karaoke with her, so I told her that I would (because she was having a really bad day). I drank about hmmmm ?4 Stella Artois beers and a couple of shots of tequila and Goldschlager. This was not enough.

I am terrified of karaoke. Always have been. Once when I was 24, I got practically naked on stage in this bar in Chicago for some contest or another (yeah, I was really drunk then, too). Needless to say, I think that I would have preferred repeating that experience (although thoroughly embarrassing) to singing karaoke. I tried to back out of it, but I promised Amy, and she is a damn good friend. So, at last, we were on stage. I decided that I could not sing solo, and we had to perform a duet. I figured we were in no shape to try something like Bob Dylan/Joan Baez, so we opted for "Picture" by Kid Rock/Sheryl Crow. It was more difficult than I thought. I wanted to quit, but I had already started. I think Einstein's theory of time dilation kicked in for a second because I swear that was the fucking longest 4 minutes or so that I have spent in at least 7 years. I was utterly humiliated. I wanted to die; however, the crowd seemed to like us because we received a tremendous applause. I think this was also recorded by the now infamous Gigi; at this moment I am unable to relive the tragedy.

But, in the end, we had fun, and no one was permanently disfigured, and no small animals were tortured. So I guess it was more of a victory than a loss.

Ok, I sure many of you are tired of this long-winded and erratic blog. You can thank my brother, Jesse and Gigi (I was inspired by her plunger story). I think I'm going to call it a night. I'm emotionally drained at the moment.