So I am 19 years old and fucked up on mushrooms in my dorm room, and in the next hour I am going to call my mother to tell her that I found God. In the next few months, I am going to fail out of school. In the next few years, I am going to become the stunning display of skin and bones in front of you, but before that, I was 19 years old and fucked up on […]
Ebola? I spit on your Ebola. Let me tell you about the plague that came to Europe 668 years ago. It is known to history as the Black Death, and we think it killed about 200 million people worldwide. In 1966 the Rand Corporation did a study for the U.S. Government. They were asked to look at natural disasters in history and find one that came closest to thermonuclear war. The Black Death is what they picked. Now, the thing […]
There’s this scene in the 1995 film “Now and Then” where a rival boy group, The Wormers, go skinny-dipping. The leader of The Wormers is Scotty Wormer, played by a then 12-year-old Devon Sawa. At one point in the scene you can clearly see Sawa’s bare ass as he runs away from the camera and into a lake. This scene was rewound, paused and squealed over at every sleepover I attended in the late ‘90s. The same year “Now and […]
Control is very important in scientific experiments. But for me, the most nonscientific person I know, there is one instance where control is a necessity, where minimizing as many variables as possible is the number one task at hand. I speak of the weigh-in, the moment when you step on a scale and wait for a number to appear. It’s like waiting for a slot machine to complete its rolls so you can see what matches up – your jeans will […]
Technology is so great, helping me stay connected, helping me build my business, helping me… find dudes to date. A match.com date is like spinning a giant wheel of fate and then click click click wink. I start talking to a downtown consultant who loves to brew beer. His photo shows that he is athletic with kind eyes and that he has his shirt on (please men, stop with the selfies in the bathroom). His emails do not mention his […]
Are you sick and tired of friends and learning? Do you feel overwhelmed by the immense pressure of having your day planned out for you? Have you had enough of the selfless adults who dedicate their lives to your development in return for poverty-level compensation? Then have I got something for you. The new school year is here, kids, and it’s not going away. But what if I told you that there was a way to make less school? You’re […]
I kept my mouth shut and threw bananas. When I did this I made money. More money than I had made in my life. I was 22 years old, just out of college, working a summer job as a Teamster in 1980 making $10.33 an hour and didn’t want to do anything to lose this golden goose of a job or get my ass kicked. I was a laborer on Chicago’s South Watermarket working from 1 am to 11 am. […]
“I’m leaving your father.” It’s Christmas Eve 2005. I am in love with a man who told me, right before I got on the plane home to Chicago, that he loved me but didn’t “love” me love me. He is beautiful. He smells like Old Spice. I live in Los Angeles. This pretty much automatically means I am miserable.
I grew up in a long line of drunks. And no, not that Russell Brand kind of drunk. “Oh yeah, brilliant. Cheers. Let’s all drink Champagne. Oh, dance with me, PUPPET!” No. Charm is for the British and the rich. I come from a clan called HUUUUFFFFFFF; the onomatopoeia serves my people well. We are prone to Old Milwaukee and sucker punches. We are the violent, loud kind of drunk. The best kind! My family is so drunk the police […]
