let's get together and feel uncomfortable

spine tv has been steadily adding a bunch of very cool films to it's archives. this is my favorite so far.

potato loves potato:

one jump ahead of the breadline!

Cave of Wonders (Aladdin Remix!) by DIRTY LONG LEGS

eli finally sent me the link to this amazing aladdin remix he made in n.y this summer. it's like some sort of turban clad fist pumping middle eastern school trip to corfu final disco party in my ears.

your beard....is weird. nice rack though!

After just returning from a night out in which I was systematically persecuted and shunned for my lack of Halloween photo-bloggery, here I am. but let it be known that i write this entry under grumpy faced protest, and shall not reach for my thesaurus at any point.

As a lusty 'Halloween in new york' aficionado, I was so sad to be in no-dress-up-no-fun-times london last year. as of late, my days have been mostly preoccupied with crying and hallucinating, so i had no time to construct my planned (sexy) Hamburgler get up. In fact, as recently as friday, I was fully exposed as a normal civilian, deeply fearful of the line of accountants and substitute teachers brewing outside of 'Ricky's', their inner 'pimp' and 'slutty army cadet' menacingly close to coming out and acting crazy! I was pretty much reliant on there being enough weird shit on the floor of my apartment to improvise.

Slipping into something far less comfortable, on Friday night Jeff and I went to a vampire themed haunted house. When eli lived in new york he 'worked' (essentially sat in the ball pit watching scooby doo and lamenting his daily hangover) at the childrens halloween house next door. The company that puts it on does do a top notch job, but I do hope that somebody reminds me next year that it's essentially the single worst way you could spend your money and time. It was jumpy and claustrophobic and generally a disgusting scene. I think i shed a single petrified tear when, at one point, we were pulled from the back of the group and locked in a foggy room with the scary easter bunny from bill and ted. the only reason we survived at all was because our 10 person group was largely made up of 14 year old virgins who were clearly much more palatable to the bloodthirsty demons than me and jeff's mutton tummies.

after consoling one another that we would never get those 20 minutes of our lives back, we went to see the movie 'paranormal activity', which was essentially the blair witch project in an ikea showroom bedroom, but served it's purpose in creeping us out at bedtime.

Back to the question of the missing costume.

as you may have noticed, jeff has got some serious man beard action going on. I am a huge fan. most others are not, and are not shy about telling us. my dad, who has met jeff a grand total of 5 times, spent an entire day of relative unemployment constructing this little beaut and sending out a mass email. it was a marvelous demonstration of embarrassing dad humour meets embarrassing dad technology. smooth. I was secretly impressed at the wonderful inappropriacy of it all, although was previously unaware that the radically religious had a monopoly on facial hair:

Jeff, of course, got a huge kick out it and started excitedly googling images of a middle aged billy joel for his counterattack, before i put a stop to the madness of it all.

anyway, beards, yes. beards are awesome! we are avid fans of www.beards.org, what with their tips, tricks and success stories, and are slowly but surely becoming accepted into the grizzly arms of the local beard community.

problem solved. face glued. eating impossible. smiling improbable. streets of brooklyn rendered uncomfortable. halloween is GO!

on halloween itself we went to the n.y knicks home opener. the game was by far the most fun i have ever had at a sporting event (of which i am a clearly seasoned expert). even though the knicks lost in the end, they delivered the most disney scripted come-back imaginable. I guess in the end the moral of the story was that friendship is more important than winning, and all the high fives and chest bumps in the world can't make up for a good old fashioned hug from somebody who really cares. to win would have been cool, but to comeback was king.

then we met up with the homies for a hoedown. i mostly creeped out in the corner and drank out of straws....

"my two dads"

our little dom dom came for a visit from l.a. we are so very proud

(his costume was a two bit thief and vandal with questionable decision making skills):

it was a teenage wedding for ip and marty:

hands down, best costume for the night went to vic as the chinese delivery guy, complete with raised backwards cap, fortune cookies and personalized smart crew menus:

even though i hate chinese food, i ordered the peking dick with rice and a side of unicorn blood pudding, the service was shaky at best:

simone was 5 and 3/4 and pierre was drunk:

john cusack had a tough night though:

just say no to prop 8:

weeping with pain, I spent the cab ride home trying to separate fantasy from reality and face from beard. feeling like I had taken part in some sort of MTV preventative measure show where they force a broody 13 year old to live with a screaming fake baby for a week, I was filled with a deep sense of empathy. never again will I take jeff's facial decisions lightly. eating an egg salad sandwich with that shit on your face is no fucking joke.

it ain't easy being beardy.

fleshlights items in space

i briefly spoke last week of a photo shoot involving a homemade rocket ship. well, i just got the shots back and they are pretty pretty. the photographer (whom i've mentioned before, but never had the pleasure of 'working' with till now) is mookie's delightful lady friend Meghan McInnis. a lot of her projects of late have been incredible mosh pit punk rock shots, so i think she quite enjoyed a mellow day of sequins and fairy lights.

In addition to wanting to have meg take photo's of me, I also felt like I owed her one. The last time I saw her we were at a 10 person dinner to celebrate our friend Chummy's 30th birthday. Chummy is one of my favorite people, in and out of the poker community. he is a despicable self-hating 300 pound tattooed jew with serious sex and gambling addictions, and yet, one of the few people I can absolutely depend on as a friend. He's currently working on a couple of film scripts in the hope of getting out of the various holes in which he dwells. anyway, jeff and i are huge chummy fans, and wouldn't hear of it when he requested to just be left alone to jerk it and self harm on this momentous occasion.

so i took it upon myself to organize a big fancy steak dinner with some of the more likable and funny degen's the city has on offer. For his birthday present, jeff and I bought Chummy a 'fleshlight' (immediately trumped by leif's gift of a leopard print snuggie). Chummy was notably uncomfortable for all the wrong reasons upon opening our gift: "uh, yea, i already have a sort of homemade version of this....i don't really like it". but watching jeffy squirm while trying to find out if the sex shop had one in stock really started my day off right.

Anyway, the dinner was a huge expensive seafood tower platter success until i, in an impressive move, projectile vomited lobster all over my tits, neck, dress , feet and every surface of the fancy bathroom. Megan, a staunch pleather clad vegan, quietly help me pick the stinky half digested animal parts from behind my ears whilst I (still outrageously inebriated) giggled and stumbled around puke mountain.

I remain completely mortified every time i summon the image, but am sort of thankful that it accelerated our friendship (meghan's and mine, as opposed to the lobster) to this happy place.

we had a lot of great shots on our fun photo day, but i thought that these ones made a nice little "maybe space isn't as boring as i first thought" story:

johnny video!!!!!

HAZZAH!!!! I can't believe we made this silly pile of funtimes all by ourselves. today, my 'Johnny' video premiered on SPINETV.NET (a byproduct of leo and leo's FREESHITSALTGRIT). This is the begining of a very interesting project, and I am forever grateful to be a part of the family. if only all days could be this fun.

watch it big!!!!

credits:

johnny: by moxie and eli block

produced by: leo marks

directed, filmed and edited by: leo leigh

art direction: pat laurie

advert music by: the badical

cat of the day

death by douchebag

as you may or may not have noticed, I have pretty much completely stopped writing about work on this blog. it became really frustrating half writing the poker anecdotes and having to come up with complex pseudonyms every time. I couldn't possibly write well under the watchful eye of 'ridiculous bob' or 'wild nipple al' for fear of possible tip injury and eventual unemployment. To quench my thirst to remember these stories forever, i have started writing little candid (if not a little purple) short stories from my shifts. i have hidden them somewhere clever.

If the Mafioso ever dies (whacks) out in this fair city, I'll unleash the stories prior to my own departure, probably in the form of a comic book. until then, i shall continue to avoid life consequences which end with words like 'trunk', 'cement' and 'the hudson river'

tonight was one for the books (quite literally). whilst i can't describe the incredible demonstration of utter dochebaggery and complete mastery of fuckfacery, here is a picture of what me and my fly fingernails thought of today's stupid shift.

and i think it's gonna be a long, long time....

it's been a tummy churning week. i can't find ava, my wondrous web designer. I really hope everything is ok with her, as she is usually so on point. i sort of needed the site up yesterday, so am a bit panicked about what to do till i hear back from her. also, the video is sooooo nearly done, we are just waiting on the charity of an kindly animator at Spine tv to finish the animation for the beginning. Leo Leigh did a wicked job of editing it. 5 minutes of nonsensical magic.

apart from aspiring towards a restraining order, there's really little i can do but pester these dear folk, who have donated so much of their time towards my nonexistent career. as a distraction, i am building a spaceship for a photo shoot tomorrow. i figure i could always do with some more pictures for imaginary press, and this particular photographer is quite special (more about her in the next post)

however, after inhaling a packet of biscuits yesterday and realizing i don't have any clean knickers, i'm not exactly feeling photo ready, but i'm trying to set myself up for productive and fun days whilst i attempt to wade out of this grim head space.

it really is sort of amazing that i managed to wrangle this together without leaving the house at all. i still need to fill the middle with fairy lights and patchwork so it looks like a proper hideout for alien cubs, but it's getting there. wherever there is.

previously, on blog.

I just wanted to jot down my rather flimsy hypothesis that the creators of lost are planning to 'hijack' multiple non-lost shows to explain it all in the upcoming final season (and -fingers crossed - beyond). I have so far watched 3 episodes of 'flashforward' on abc (which is quenching my thirst, but fails as a sufficient surrogate), and every episode thus far has introduced a different actor from lost - albeit as an entirely different character. There are lots of weird parallels between the two shows including - but not limited to: the main character being a troubled but heroic doctor, a well meaning recovering drug addict, massive catastrophes, curious increments of time and their mysterious meanings, evil forces, out of place animals (kangaroo - from crashed sydney plane? and polar bear), asians...i could go on and on. Even the title 'flashforward' was taken from an episode of lost in which the awning of a funeral parlor was a rather obvious anagram for flashforward. I also read that Desperate Housewives is planning a plane crash onto their silly little street, with the airline in question being oceanic. (Shame I'll have to introduce myself to that little abomination just to stay in the loop).

how fucking epic would it be if my favorite show infested and infected every inferior show that followed it? It would be that much closer to penetrating real life!!!! Every time we get on a plane jeff and I say 'if the plane goes down I'll see you on the island', half hoping really. Real life is so boring. I want to push buttons and solve riddles and touch sawyer on his naughty bits.

If I'm wrong....it was a nice try.

If I'm right....you can find me dancing on the stairs in my clever clogs.

UPDATE: after writing this all on my lonesome, i did myself some googling, and a million spoiler forums came up. something i missed in the premier of flashforward was this billboard for oceanic airlines, boasting a perfect record (pre lost crash perhaps?).

also, the date of the flashforward's (april 29th 2010) could very well indicate the finale of lost.

no. i don't want to get a life. i want to erect a cork board and connect theories with pieces of different colored wool. i think it would be a wise way to spend my days.

cocktails over cathedrals

regarding geography, i am usually a lovely shade of mellow.

at the end of this 8 day trip to aruba however, i cried genuine, silent, sad little sunset tears. jeff started off by laughing at me, but quickly realized i was completely dreading a return to n.y life, and all it requires of me.

wah wah wah! call the wambulance!!!

not to dwell on the miserable, let me try to recreate some of the magic that was last week.

"jeff, quick, pretend you love me in front of the concierge"

resulted a nifty upgrade to the honeymoon ocean suite.

i've never been on a Caribbean resort style holiday before. i think from now on i shall always choose cocktails over cathedrals. culture is overrated. our days were speckled with poker (i won 4k on the first night and did nothing else of interest the rest of the week) the most ludicrous turquoise bathtub of an ocean you've ever seen, the hitchhikers guide to the galaxy, sloppy pina colada hotel sex and fisticuffs with annie duke - who turned out to be a giant cunt.

that sort of sounded like i had wild westin sex with annie duke's giant vagina....

clarification much?

jeffy went in the ocean for the first time in 18 years.

it was tricky because his leg was ridiculously buoyant and hard to control, but exciting because he was able to pick me up and spin me around so i could pretend we were starring in a sandals advert. in an attempt to increase his body weight so he would float less (which made complete scientific sense at the time) jeff drank an absurd amount of alcohol in the form of two local beers: amstel bright and balashi.

one day we rented a car with dave and explored the island a bit. aruba is extremely overdeveloped which means that sadly, there is more than one pizza hut on offer. beyond the awesome beach and incredible food it's not all that interesting a destination, but for whatever reason, the locals are the friendliest people i've ever encountered. when we got lost looking for 'baby beach', we asked a local dude with no teeth and a jerry curl mullet, who essentially looked like the aruban eazy e, if he knew where it was:

'yes yes the beach for babies...ummm...you go downstairs (points east)....no no wait i make the mistake, you go upstairs (points west) yes upstairs!!! i take you upstairs now, please you follow me in my red little car!!!'

we got to baby beach in time for sunset. me and dave swam out and were still only waist deep about 300 feet from the shore which was sort of frustrating. we caught up with a little local boy who was squealing through his snorkel 'they are biting me. eek!'

....it was devastatingly relaxing.

eating breakfast on our balcony was both salmony and plagued with potential death.

the creole 'sushi roll' from a tiny local restaurant called gostoso made with crab, shrimp, salmon and plantain was one of the greatest things we've ever eaten. jose, the owner and chef talked us through the menu and made that meal the best of the trip.

we never once feared for our lives there.

it was fun knowing a big bunch of somewhat likable poker players on the island. we did have a good time going out for 10 party meals, getting wasted on cherry-colada's poolside, and bar hopping with the local jail bait. on the night pictured below following my piano karaoke purple rain tribute to a standing ovation (eli's wildest dream) and a heated battle between 2 semi-professional miss pacman players, jeff and i foolishly accepted a ride home from a local dude called victor whose intentions and sobriety were entirely questionable.

we knew the severity of our mistake when he explained his commitment as our friend for life and presented jeff with a small glass pyramid paperweight and a pen on a string from a mayoral election. thankfully, he was too fucked up to remember to murder us before dropping us off at the hotel entrance.

i'm a fucking idiot

on the last day, we took our hangover abourd the jolly pirates boat for a spot of queasy snorkeling. jeff jumped in briefly, but was a bit nervous and jumped back out again. i saw thousands of amazing disco fishes (one of which bit me on my wrist) and a scary sunken world war two vessel complete with squid and vengeful ghosts. this escapade was a massive accomplishment for somebody who genuinely believes that jaws might come out of the plughole in the bathtub.

the boat had an open bar which we chose not to partake in, but it was fun to watch one mexican dad overindulge, steal the captains pirate hat and plastic sword and run around the boat giggling and poking strangers.

the closing party for the poker players blew us away with a surprise set by the dan band. all the fuckin' single ladies was epic, but their classic rendition of total eclipse pretty much summed up my end of holiday mood. "oh jesus, once upon a time i was falling in love, now i'm fucking falling apart".

trust me to come home with a sense of utter hopelessness instead of a suntan.