September 1, 2007

It was our five-year wedding anniversary. We finished dinner and headed down to the Lava Lounge. As anticipated, Greg was there tending the bar, drunk again. He’s remarkably functional when he’s drunk. I don’t know if he’s necessarily developed an especially high tolerance. I believe that he’s simply gotten proficient at working while inebriated. Perhaps it’s a combination of the two. I ordered a double of Knob Creek, on the rocks. Greg poured me what must have been a triple. Some ice and bourbon clear up to the lip of the glass. My wife got some bizarre sort of girlish cocktail. He neglected to charge us. Initially I thought this was because he was being nice, but then it occurred to me that it was more likely because he simply forgot to charge. I wasn’t about to remind him. I saw it as an anniversary gift. Then the free shots started. Glenlivet for Greg and I. My wife got a complicated girl shot with a weird, playfully obscene name which I can’t remember. A beautiful man I had never seen before entered the bar. Greg seemed to know him. I’m not really very gay, but I can identify a gorgeous man when I see one. Pale, blue eyes, striking features, curly light brown hair, sideburns, clean-shaven, about 6’ and lean, lots of nice, well-done tattoos. He was wearing a yellow polo shirt. He had a small pizza under one arm, and he sat down beside me to eat it. His name was Nathan. He and I talked about literature while he ate, while Greg talked with my wife. He had excellent taste: Henry Miller, Charles Bukowski, Hunter Thompson, William Burroughs, and lots of writers I’d never heard of. We were all showing off our tattoos and talking. He was familiar with Occam’s Razor, and thus understood the tattoo on my shoulder. Periodically one of us would dart over to the Internet jukebox and add some songs to the playlist. I played “Albatross” by C.O.C. Everybody approved. I followed it up with “Fairytale of New York” by the Pogues. It got even more approval. Greg and Katie started singing along with parts of it. There were more free shots. I followed the Pogues up with “First We Take Manhattan, Then We Take Berlin” by Leonard Cohen. Greg got so excited that I thought he was about to offer me a hand job. He declared at that point that we were brothers. There were more shots, and more toasting. We all became family. My next song came on, “Captain Jack” by Billy Joel. Everybody more-or-less approved politely, except the other bartender, who pulled it. That was the last song that I played. Nathan had to go. Katie had to tend to other patrons. The conversation began to disintegrate, and it was time to move on. Somebody played “Africa” by Toto, and they all sang at our backs as we walked out the door. We walked down to the Moose, and didn’t see another soul that we knew.

Armpit Hair

Everybody, without exception, should shave their armpits. Armpit hair is disgusting on everybody, male and female. I fail to grasp how feminists find it empowering to let their armpit hair grow. Would it be empowering to not wipe one’s ass after a healthy bowel movement, or not brush one’s teeth after eating? I am not an excessively vain man, but I do shave my armpits. It's just good hygiene. It reduces odor dramatically, and there’s nothing empowering about human stench. That just sucks. The claim that such hair growth is natural, and that the act of shaving it is both unnatural and amounts to some sort of indication of self-hatred or sense of shame is utterly ridiculous. Wiping your ass after a bowel movement is unnatural, but it’s a great idea. Brushing your teeth, likewise. The practice of female armpit hair growing just seems like a misdirected conviction. There have got to be more effective, more compelling ways of moving forward an ideology.

Girl Shaving

I don’t understand why women (or men for that matter) shave off their pubic hair. Stop that. You look ridiculous without it. Personally, I like the spot right below a woman’s navel but right above the goods. Bush is great. I’m especially fond of it. Women shouldn’t shave that off. It’s nice when the lips are shaved, but I enjoy a groomed patch up front. Not too long or unkempt, but definitely there. A little bit of curl is nice. It’s like a flag that announces your presence. You should have a national anthem to accompany it as well, something powerful and inspiring, but still human and sensitive. A foreign policy, treasury, and public education system might be overkill, but a little round tummy above it is a nice bonus.

Looking At Women

I was sitting over my coffee in a quaint little independent coffee shop. It was the kind of place that attracts a very liberal crowd of varying economic backgrounds. The crowd was a typical mix of people very deliberately trying to play the role of artist and/or intellectual. My wife had left the table to go to the ladies room. A good-looking woman walked past, and I took a good look. I don’t think she noticed. I was polite about it. The coffee and the view complimented each other wonderfully. The guy at the table opposite me seemed to notice though. He looked up from his coffee and book, and shot me a dirty glance through his wire-rimmed spectacles. It must be shitty to be too enlightened to ogle women. I never want to be so intellectual that I forget how to get a hard-on. Sure, people are people, but people are also objects. There’s nothing morally wrong with objectifying women, as long as you don’t forget that they’re people first and objects second. Everybody has to exist as an object in order to exist as a person. It is a simple fact of being. Existence precedes essence. There’s nothing wrong with reveling in what’s there. There’s nothing unintelligent or demeaning about admiring it. Asceticism is a value of religious zealots, not intellectuals. When my wife returned from the ladies room, I told her all about it. She laughed at me.

Wishing For More Steps

We got dinner at the Penn Brewery. They make excellent beer. They tend to mostly make lighter beers. Pilsners, wheat beers, IPA’s, and amber lagers are their thing. I drink almost exclusively stouts, porters, and occasionally barley wines. I don’t match my beers to my food. I drink dark beer with everything. I can drink lighter beers, I just prefer not to if it can be avoided. So I got a pilsner. Even a well-made pilsner tastes like fizzy sweat. This one wasn’t too bad. The food at this place is the real draw. The food is awesome and the portions are huge. The air was cool and bright, so we sat outside in the courtyard. The courtyard is nestled in an alcove between two buildings. It’s filled with long, picnic-style tables. Excellent ambiance, beautiful evening. I ate way too much and had two beers. It was great. There were lots of people coming, going, and eating. I didn’t pay much attention. When we were just about done, a woman and her man walked in. They both looked to be close to 40, but not quite. They weren’t too remarkable, except for the fact that she had the most incredible ass I’d ever seen in my life. It wasn’t too muscular, or too fat. It was the perfect balance of the two. There should have been a blue ribbon on it. That’s a difficult balance to hit. If a woman’s ass is too muscular it’s not quite right. If it’s too flat or flabby, it’s not right either. This ass looked like a perfect handful. It looked firm, heavy, round, and low-slung. She obviously wasn’t wearing any underwear. Strangely, she was wearing kakis. You don’t often see hot-looking asses in kakis. This one was an exception. They were skin-tight, like they had been airbrushed onto her. Spandex khakis, maybe? Is there such a thing? The shape of her ass was simply magnificent. Better than the food, beer, or combination of the two. I stopped chewing. I’m pretty sure I wasn’t the only man there gawking blatantly at this woman’s ass. I’m pretty sure every other straight man there was doing the same thing. I didn’t even make an attempt at subtlety. My whole head, neck and shoulders turned to watch her walk by. I didn’t feel too bad about being that obvious. When you parade around an ass like that in tight pants, it would seem apparent that you want it looked at. They must not have liked the picnic tables in the courtyard, because moments later they walked back past, into the building to go eat inside. She walked up the steps, and I watched again. It was even better this time. I only wished there were more steps.