Confessions of a Starving Artist

Je suis avec stupide.

For those of you did not know, I’m taking French classes.  Six hours a day to be precise, thanks to good ol’ Uncle Sam’s priorities for this Québécois Yankee Doodle Boy.  I’ve had French before, two semesters in college and three more back a bit further in high school, but those were hardly accurate representations of my academic caliber.  To be more precise, they were the only “C”s that I received in high school, and two of four “C”s that I received while at Xavier; I guess this makes me just an “average” Frenchmen.  The other medicore marks being Shakespeare and my Senior English Seminar: Feminism, Readership, and The Gaze.  (I did my senior research paper on a gender study of Fight Club and the value of misogyny, just to spite the prof… who was kind of a cunt…)  Nonetheless, I am finding those five seemingly wasted semesters to be priceless in my continued Army career.  With this (apropos) crash course in language over the next several weeks, I find that I am moving with the current thanks to my mundane background in with le monde francophone.

What is surprising is how much the language and the culture is really just blowing away others around me.  Some of these fellow Soldiers and Officers, who were supposed to have been screened for language aptitude, and drowning in the white water foam of the very same currents that I am so leisurely floating down.  Honestly, I didn’t know what was keeping these individuals back; ineptitude, I assumed.  Ah, but the basic Guttersnake assumption is usually wrong, especially when it is simply assuming that I am superior, which almost always turns out to be not the case.  Rather, it is a matter, I think not just of language background, but background in general.

Our instructor is a little old French lady by the name of Mdm. Jacqueline.  Jacqueline, though she will not under any grounds give up her age, does look strikingly like my mother except shorter; someone who I had for both math and science in middle school.  This makes learning easier (on some deeper psychological level, I’m sure), and I think that I seem to shed some of my learned Officer drone when in that classroom.  Besides that, Jacqueline has been teaching Soldiers and the like for goodness knows how many years, so her temperament is one of, been there, done that, had the baguette.  That is to say, nothing is really taboo.

As you can imagine, one can only study French for so long before one needs a break, a change of topic, or a cafe latte.  Therefore often times we as a small class will attempt to way-lay Mdm. Jacqueline with questions on, what else, French culture, both Parisian and African in nature.  This is where I a realized that some of my collaegues were lacking in the simple lack of common knowledge that I (and perhaps you) take for granted.  Discussions on the Gendarmerie led to my having to explain Posse Comoitatis and its history within our own country, and how European countries do not have such a stature of limitations.  Further, we talked about why the Europeans (namely the British and the French) have such a fascination with the American Cowboy figure; a strange obsession that would probably confuse most Texans, that has mostly to do individualism than it does masculinity.  Lastly today, and possibly the funniest, was the topic of homosexuality in France, it be a historically Catholic country, and then digressing into the history of homosexuality in Europe and then Rome and Greece.  At one point, I think it was all too much for a very macho young Specialist from Boston to take following the Patriots loss to the Colts last night.  He broke out laughing in a kind of sad confused hysteria that I could not diagnosis.  Nonetheless…

My point to this short little tale is just that again from time to time I have this little realization that I am situated and grounded in perhaps a very big world.  One that is big even in those places that we find to be the most familiar.  For the most part we see those that look like us, dress like us, and in some cases, even speak the same language as us to be the same as us, and when they do something that has history, cultural meaning, or regional importance that makes them different, we write it off to being either weird, wrong, or in the worst case, something that we just do better than in our own way; such as I have admittingly done in the last few days as before noted earlier in this post.  One of my Jesuit professors said once that there is no need to explore the world is you have no idea the type of trees that grow in your own backyard.  There could be a grain of Truth to that.

And I don’t feel the least bit Justified, either…

At first, I hated Justin Timberlake.  I considered him to be a pre-packaged white version of a youthful Michael Jackson or the gay metrosexual cousin of Eminem, if you will.  When he was just “the cute one” from N’Sync, all I could think of was, didn’t see this all before… when it was called New Kids On The Block?  Then Justin bursts out on his own with album, “Justified”, which left me with a wealth of material for puns and jokes that lasted well into 2004… and beyond as you can see.  Mr. Timberlake was on top of his game, banging ex-Mickey Mouse Clubber, Britney and Christina as well as reappearing in my poster section of the local FYE only this time sans the boy band.  Regardless, I am not hating.  I simply said, good on you, and quietly realized that this gentleman had a lifespan Hollywood cool guys.  Hey, Fred Durst banged Britney and Christina and he went away… one could only hope the same would be said of Mr. Timberlake.  Then he went and did it.  He started “dating” Cameron Diaz. 

At first, I really hated Justin Timberlake for doing this.  The other two pop-whores, well; my feeling is let those who feel that the world is their stage breed for our entertainment and when they are past the level for teens to want to masturbate to their image in a magazine in Maxim or FHM then their fifteen minutes is up.  However, Cameron is classy.  She’s real and down to earth, perhaps a little ‘blonde’ from time to time, but hey, so what.  Nevertheless, her and Justin dating seemed… I don’t want to say ”desperate” but rather “coerced“?  I felt like the little crooner was just ‘playing through’ this hole, if you’ll pardon the pun.  But again, I let it go on.  Then he went and did it.  He brought sexy back.

At first, I hated Justin Timberlake all over again, him and his new hit.  …then something akin to the Grinch’s heart growing three sizes (that day) started to happen - I started to like it.  Hell, it got damn catchy.  I realized that even though I thought it was right here with me, it turns out it was gone; and he brought sexy back… for me.  (now if someone can just find where I left Jesus…)  I realized also, that Justin had been dating Cameron for a year plus, maybe two at this point.  I starting to re-evaluate my position on this guy.  Maybe he ain’t all that bad.  Maybe he really is a good dude after all, and I could possible let this guy hang out with me.  And for about a month there, I was rolling with JT as my homie.  Then he went and did it.  He allegedly slept with Scarlet Johansson.

So now, I hate Justin Timberlake in a ways that are reserved for Red Sox-players-turned-Yankees and thieving Republican politicians.  Scarlet is mine, do you hear me, Justin Timberlake?  Mine!  It’s bad enough that you have to walk all over your new home-boy like that by taking a swing at his girl, but you treat sweet, innocent Cameron like the last years have meant nothing?  You take your sexy back, sir, you take it right back where you found it because we here want nothing to do with your scandalous cheating sexy ways!  We’ll have none of it!  Come on Scarlet, we are leaving…

… you look her in the eyes, Justin, and tell her the truth about what you’ve done… look who you’ve hurt in the eyes!

Getting into America’s retail giant through the back door…

It’s true, I’ve seen it with my own eyes.  This post actually should have been written right after it occurred, exactly one week ago tonight, but due to the nature of my dodgy-at-best Time Warner internet / cable service (get a dish, you will thank me later) I was unable to place my exact feelings of shock and awe converging around this matter onto this forum in such a timely manner.  But tonight, after a bit of a late scrape at the gym and two rounds of Jeopardy over a veggie salad at Carrots, the health bar in my spa, I found myself re-living the experience on the way home.  So I figure between the now time and the drinking time that will occur this Friday night, allow me to recount last weekends realizations.

It started simple enough: a man in search of sheets and 2% milk.  Unfortunately, this search did not convene until ten-thirty at night, and naturally, when one needs nearly nothing at an hour that is anything past formal, there is but one place to turn: chez Wal-mart.  I said to myself, I’m not in the mood to go out anyway, so let’s just go knock-out some late night house-hold shopping and get some groceries, that way I could have my entire Saturday to myself.  So, dressing casually, I head off to Wally World with a bit of a sense of apprehension.

This is not some sort of sixth sense, mind you, for I had no idea what was held in store for my poor innocent self.  No no, I was more worried about conventional dangers.  You see, I had been warned prior to leaving out that evening that the parking lot area of the local Wal-marts have a tendency to become a bit ‘rough’ on Friday and Saturday eves.  They become home to those be-damned ’soup-ed’-up Honda and Hyundai Too-Fast-and-Too-Furious rice rocket drones who seem to congregate around these super-fast autos only to gawked at each others piece / ride and their buddy’s extensive ‘bling’ with hoods up and sound systems blaring.  Correct me if I am wrong, but I’ve never seen a single sexy Asian female go up to that group of retards, let alone enough sexy Asian females to go around.  Overall, just seems to be a bad strategy.  Also, the highly trained men and women of the Wal-mart security forces seem to be unable to stop the vandalism and drunken brawls on late weekend nights that not only break out, but seem to develop like a storm out over the Atlantic; that is to say, they take some time and you can practically track them on radar.  Those were my concerns about this shopping venture; so as a precaution I parked far to the rear of the lot and made sure that I would be home before midnight.  Seemed logical. 

There were no Vin Diesel wannabees nor drunken reprobates lining the outside of the store.  My greeter greeted, pleasantly enough, and my cart did not have to go into the shop for a re-alignment anytime soon.  So far, so good.  First stop was a quick swing over to toiletries to get some small items of little consequence.  However, it was here that the alarm went off.  No alarm that could be heard throughout the store; no this was an internal alarm that something was perhaps out of place.  No, I had not wandered into the feminine products isle, and no, a robbery wasn’t about to take place.  This was a much finer-tuned alarm.  This was my gay-dar.  And it was screaming like five alarm fire.

I noticed to the front of me in the deodorant isle were three men in their early-twenties, dressed like they were going to (or were at) some new wave club in the mid-eighties, complete with faux-hawks, tight pants falling off the hips, and minor traces of make-up.  Even more so, the all talked like Jack from Will&Grace and handled the expensive conditioners like old pros.  My first thought was, huh, those guys are really flaming gay… I’ll bet they are headed to the club.  Funny thing; they didn’t really look old enough for the club.  So I move along to the home decor area of the multiplex… and the alarm doesn’t stop for a friggin’ second.

Don’t get me wrong, its not like it was just an entire super-store filled with gay men with me locked inside shopping for drapes and valences trying to move about with a level of inconspicuousness akin to a James Bond film.  Occasionally I would see, say, two nurses who just go off shift getting a door mat that was just the right color; or an older, lower-middle class black couple who must work odd hours shopping for God-knows what; or even once an oversized Korean family packing several carts with Huggies and whatnot in bulk; but for the most part, by and large, I saw a lot of gay men.  Some were very young, high schoolers even.  Some were older men, clearly scraping bottom.  Some were in pairs already, others came in larger groups.  Anyway you want to slice it, I realized very quickly that this was a marked time and gathering place for the gay community of Fayetteville… and within an Army town, in the South, that sort of information must be more closely guarded than the location of Osama Bin Ladin himself!  I had discovered it.  And I was alone.

It took me about ten minutes to put all this together, about the time it takes to get from the deoderant to the half-priced DVD bins.  Unfortunately, I was asked if I need any help three or four times between the two points, but not by any uniformed sales representatives of the Sam Walton corporation.  Needless to say “alone” perhaps wasn’t the word that best described my situation; rather, I was “single”.  But I, being the bigger person and by no means homophobic, stood my ground… and hid-out in the towel isle until most of ‘them’ had moved on.  I know that I shouldn’t have, but I felt a bit uncomfortable around that large of a gay male community, but that wasn’t all of time.  Moreover, it was probably because as I male, I have a pretty good idea what our minds are thinking about at that hour on a Friday night, alcohol or no.  To be sure, was a worried about getting jumped or worse?  No.  But to say I wasn’t uncomfortable, well… I think that we could say that I understood even more clearly than before why a sexy Asian would not just go approach the said rice-burner boyz that I was talking about early, n’est ce pas?

So after sneaking around more or less like a downed WWI pilot from the beef jerky stand to the green tea section to finally the cashier, I have a final revelation thanks to my on-point gay-dar3000 system: even the employees tonight are gay!  Not all of them, but some definitely were.  My cashier for instance was about two-hundred and fifty pounds of homo-tastic, complete with rainbow charm bracelette and “We’re here, We’re Queer, Get Used To It!” button on his vest.  But then again, I’d bet you have to be quiet daft to not realize what shade of pink the store was bathed in on certain nights of the week or month, however regularly this establishment is used as the hook-up point.  I was laughing out loud at just how funny the whole thing was as I left the store, wondering, maybe even the eighty year old man who is checking my receipt to make sure I didn’t shoplift is actually checking out something else in hopes that he can do some shoplifting of his own.  Regardless, it’s a riot.

So this week, I made sure I got all my Wal-mart needs on Thursday.  I would prefer not to have to go through that silliness again for a while, and if I do, I’m bringing a buddy, nay, a partner along with me to share in the joy and perhaps look a little less wanton to all those lusty sailors home on shore leave.  One thing is for sure though:  as rolled down the length of the parking lot to my car, amid the newly arriving Civics and Accords, past the three homies sippin’ a 40 oz of Colt45 each, I realized that I had confirmed something that I had thought for years - Wal-mart is indeed full of fags.

From zero to lame in just five post-college years…

Of the great money pits of life, I have kept a spring in my step that lifts me clear of the majority not unlike a favorite pop culture icon of mine, Mario and Luigi, jumping clear over a seemingly unclearable cavern to a Princess who probably waits for her man in another castle.  Such bottomless paycheck chasms include one’s first car.  Those of us can remember the gripping urge to finally ‘pimp yo’ rides’ when we finally got to purchase that ‘94 Honda Accord or ‘96 Dodge Neon.  However, the majority resisted, and to our betterment, as failure results in eighteen inch rims, mayhaps a bumpin’ sound system, but overall about six months to a year of debt.  That is, if your good with your maxed credit card payments.  Another big leap we take as our mustachioed heroes may include becoming a Trojan to the proverbial clothes horse or clubbing (swinging?) lifestyle, which, I’ll admit, I did fall into for a while.  But I’m happy to report, that I never went beyond my checking and always set aside some cash for the savings.  Finally, the other obvious ‘GAME OVER’ for most Mario’s out there… actually finding the princess.  And marrying her.  Most of you can figure out that I haven’t made that error with respect to my financial well-being yet.

There is, however, a bit of an unseen pipe land here, if you will, a bit of a warp zone to a level that I was trying to avoid, and yet desperately wanted to play.  Video game metaphors aside, I’m talking about home ownership, and it’s a son of a bitch. 

You think your ready.  You set aside some money; no, better than that, you set aside a butt load of money.  You find a sensible ’starter’ home that fits your needs and budget.  It’s in a nice neighborhood (check…); it has a garage for that nice car that you resisted pimping out too much (check…); it has a little more room than you need, but that’s okay because it might not always be just you in this house remember? (planning for the future; smart,.. check…); it has a study so you will be focused on work (responsible,.. check…); it has a deck so you can invite the neighbors and friends over (social,.. check…); it has a pool (wait… does that count as pimpin’ yo’ crib?  no, it was already there… so check…); it has all that a young professional could want.  All that is, except furniture.

Noteworthy: there are many other monetary distractions to first-time home ownership, and I’ll probably mention them later, but for now, the topic is furniture.  Because therein lies the checkbook.  Little fix ups around the house, even big fix ups, are relatively inexpensive comparitively, simply time consuming, which also is another post for another time, but furniture grabs you buy the debt cards and just starts to withdraw.  One finds one’s self, for the first time in my case, with an interesting dilemma:  you want to get the good stuff, just like you did with the car, the clothes, or the woman, but this time you got to get a lot of it.. or refrain from a lot of it.  Further, you’ve got to be more or less consistent, throughout the home.  I mean, I suppose I could sink a few grand into an entertainment center, a 60′ LCDTV, and an Xbox360 and with whatever is left over get a couch from Goodwill and an inflatable mattress from Wal-mart, survive on beef jerky and iced green tea, and leave two of the three bedrooms for dumbbells and porn storage.  Hell, I’m a bachelor, nobody would fault me for that.

C’est la vive, I cannot.  Time to grow up, as some dad other than mine would say, and perhaps I should listen outside of family this once.  After all, unlike a car, or a new blazer, or a woman, this investment of time and money might actually improve its worth with time.  So you shop.  And you shop.  And you shop like you’ve never shopped before in your whole life.  In the case of furniture and home shopping, you bring a notebook everywhere.  Those of you who perhaps were married prior to owning your own homes probably either completely took a back seat to this process after the home was closed on, or at best, shared the joy of decorating.  Oh no, not this snake.  You other bastards do not know that thrill of Bed, Bath, and Beyond on a Saturday or the exuberance of asking a male clerk what exactly a ‘douvet’ is, and further, having your pronunciation corrected.  How many had to bring there own tape measure to the furniture store to save time because you had more than one to go to prioritize?  And can someone please offer a suggestion on how to match wood textures that are already in the room at home with those that you may buy in the store? 

The money crunch, thankfully, is one that only has to be done once, because, quite frankly, I have no idea how long it would take me to get to that start point again.  Word of advice, you blissful renters out there; you will never have enough money to move in swiftly.  Accept that, and be prepared to suck for the first six months.  You will sleep on the floor, you’ll be ashamed to bring girls back to the bach pad, and you’ll wish that you were still renting.  Most of all, you’ll miss the man you’ve cursed more than you did your own parents when you where in high school:  your landlord…  ’cause he ain’t coming this time, kiddies!  No no, you break a window, that’s on you.  Your hot water heater blows up in the middle of the night, then tough tittie, ms kittie!  You take a crap so big that it clogs your toilet and screws your septic system… well, you get the idea.

Back to furniture; its a funny thing to shop for.  First of all, all these people work on commission so your given a personal best friend when you walk through the door who shows you everything.  For the most part they are older men and women who are very knowledgeable and frank about what they are trying to sell you, which is good… provided that you must first realize that one in five isn’t being frank about anything and that you know jack about nothing.  Remember, the last piece of furniture you probably got was from a Wal-mart boxed set you assembled at home to house your discount DVDs.  Every once in a while though… you get a hottie attendant.  Always married (and sporting a rock so big its a wonder they can hand you their card), these individuals have my had attention undividedly, and usually keep me in the store far longer than I need to be looking at things I don’t need.  Hell, if they hid those damn rings, I might even buy something I didn’t need.  Makes going poor almost fun… like strip club.  But I digress.

So realizing that you only have a limited amount of money, the question now becomes two-fold.  One what is most important to the feathering the nest; and two, how big and expensive do I want the nest to be.  Obviously, these questions feed into each other.  Every store you enter you think, hmmmm, I would love this massive sofa / loveseat / ottoman in my living room, but just for wine parties, or, hmmmm, oh my gosh this oak entertainment center will fit up to a 66″ HDTV and has outlets for surround sound!  I would never have to go to the movies again; or best yet, hmmmm, I could sooo use this dinette set with the wet bar.  Who the heck are we (and by we, I mean ‘I’) kidding?  I’ve never had a wine party in my life, a 66″ HDTV would having me filing for bankruptcy in two months, and a dinette set?  I don’t even have six friends to warrant the place settings!

So like all other things relating to being a young mature adult (or as I am coming to refer to myself, a young capitalist) it becames a matter of pose, restraint, and foresight.  Think of homeownership just like buying that first car but multiply it by five.  The payments, the spit-shines, the accessorizing, the upkeep, the “surprises”; all by five.  But you know… its worth it.  I am enjoying being as busy as I am, and trust me on this one, brother, you learn a lot in the process.  Might be embarrassing (like the ‘douvet’ thing), might be aggravating (like demanding a comprehendible answer as to ratio of price to thread count from a Linens’n'Things employee), might be just plain annoying (like realizing when you get home that there is only one panel in a drapes package… why do they do that?!); but the endstate is totally worth it.  You sleep in your bed, your nest, your cottage on the hill, your kingdom.  Best of all, nobody can come in that you don’t want to.

“…but I could be wrong; I have been before.”  - Guttersnake Proverb

Has anybody here seen my old friend Carson… can you tell me where he’s gone?  Has anybody here seen my old friend Chad… I just turned around and he’s gone.  Sadly, even parody-lyrics of this magnitude barely etch the surface of my disappointment with my and your home-town heroes, The Cincinnati Bengals.  The last thing that I remember is going into training, leaving my boys in orange with a record of 4-0.  Just goes to show, I leave the kids alone for just thirteen weeks and all Hell breaks loose.  One has to hang one’s head and wonder just what a fan has to do.  Actually shell out money and go to a game?  The worst piece of all of this is that my mother succeeded in her Christmas mission to find her boy the perfect gift: a NFL jersey belonging to a very hard to spell certain number 84.  Oh well, I guess I’ll get to wear it next season…

On an even more humble note, I was reviewing my picks for this season, which I penned some seventeen weeks ago and was shocked to note that I was fallible for yet another sporting season.  Based on my outcome of the savant-like incantations of the 2006-07 NFL season and the 2005-06 NCAA Men’s Basketball season, it would be fair to assess that I know more about how to perform open-heart surgery than I do about collegate and professional sports.  Honestly, I think I might delve down to picking Notre Dame to make it to the Rose Bowl or become a Cubs fan as I seem to be on that general route to great under-dog guesswork.  But not today and not this season.  In retort, I rise up and will here give you in futile effort the G.Snake’s NFL playoff picks - who I like and who I don’t.

However, before all that, let’s examine who’s not there.  Obviously Cincinnati is at home enjoying some leftover eggnog and Skyline Chili with the family, but what about the others.  Denver, at a record of 9-7, is denied a playoff birth after being handed a nasty loss in OT.  Wait, what’s that… Kansas City goes forward but Denver stays, even though they have the exact same record in the exact same division?  Sorry, somebody has naked pictures of the commissioner’s wife for that to go down.  Green Bay broke even at 8-8 even with a team that is more broke themselves than Enron or MC Hammer.  8-8… the same record as the Bengals, Panthers, Rams, Jags, and Titans, all superior teams… all whom are better in my meager opinion than the NY Giants who with an 8-8 record find themselves in the playoffs?  Look, I know there is more than this run than numbers, but if it was simply on win / loss, somebody would have to make damn near a presidential address to the football nation to explain themselves.  Bottom line here is the numbers are not indicative of team play this year, not on a lot of levels and with a lot of teams.  Joe Gibbs and The Washington Redskins deserve a lot more credit than 5-11.  A hellavah lot.

Moving on.  AFC.  Like I said, it’s not about numbers.  I’ll give you an example; quarterback rating.  Two weeks ago Philip Rivers, at the end of the first quarter, was one-for-ten with nine yards and a touchdown.  This gave him a quarterback rating of eighty-something, I think.  This system is the NFL equivalent of No Child Left Behind.  And its not the only one.  So don’t look at records, bogus ratings, or individual stats.  I am looking, instead, at history - and that means Pats.

Even though I am originally from New England, my grandfather says that I am not allowed to be a fan because a true Patriots fan was cheering in Foxboro when Samual Adams was still on the side of the helmet.  Regardless, New England has year after year put up a team, not players, but a whole team that wins Super Bowls.  Sure all the numbers and whah-zoo ESPN crap might point to San Diego, but Philip Rivers is shaky and the Patriots can stop their run, Billy B. says so.  Baltimore could be something, but I’ll still give the edge to experience of Tom Brady.  The Jets should be awed by the entire eastern seaboard for making it this far, but seriously; Chad, it’s been fun… now it’s time to go home.  You know my feelings on Kansas City even being here, and as for The Colts?  Look for Peyton Manning to choke in before or during the AFC Championship game.  Again, I am going on history here. 

The NFC is the weaker of the two conferences this year, and it will show in the game play leading up to the Super Bowl.  The only two teams that are worth missing church for are New Orleans and Chicago.  Dallas still has issues, quarterback issues, and The Eagles’ starting line-up has more holes in it than a rugby team photo.  To be fair, Seattle could be a sleeper, but I doubt it, and The Giants and The Jets should be both playing West Side Story in The Big Apple by the end of the first round.  Chicago is tough, there is no denying it, but the ghost of Mike Ditka is just not enough to surge against what is coming out of The Big Easy this year.  The Saints are looking to make history this year; first time in the NFC Championship, first time in a Super Bowl, first time as Super Bowl Champs.

History.  Maybe I am just hoping, but wouldn’t a Patriots v. Saints game just be the most emotionally charged Super Bowl in years?  One team looking to be an honest to God dynasty, four rings in seven years if my math is right, and the other looking to do something that has never been done before from a city the entire nation has been watching.  Anything less would be, well, boring.  These are the two toughest and most exciting teams to watch, pound for pound, and not only do they both deserve to be in to the big game, but they are going to prove it.

But I could be wrong; I have been before.