VANTUCKY pt.3

Back in Vancouver, somewhere. Cece’s talking to her Mom on the mobile. An intersection is rapidly approaching. She’s looking out the same window as me, so I know she sees it. Then, just as we’re about to pass under the traffic light in the right lane, she says “Oh yeah, we should probably turn left right here.”

The radio’s playing some happy Jazz swing I ain’t never heard before. Its good, not like that schizophrenic ego-istic garbage everybody pretends they like.


 “Sooo, should we turn around then?” Intersection’s shrinking in the rearview. She’s still on the phone, “No, no, its okay, keep goin’. We’ll just go this way.”  

Now every intersection is a suspect. I look over at her, without saying anything - I ask if I should turn and if so which way.  She gives me the universal karate chop hand motion for ‘Just keep going straight.’ I guess there’s like fifty different ways to get to any one place in Vantucky. 

Another intersection is growing out of the vacant lots. Whose she on the phone with now? I look over at her. Now she’s using the universal right hand turn motion like a flight deck controller using hand signals to guide an F-15 ready for take-off. Funny. All she needs is a pair of orange cones and a jumpsuit. The mobile phone conversation doesn’t skip a beat.

Lots of uncut grass in the Couve. A landscapers wet dream.

We’re headed to “The Furkin’ Frog.” As soon as I heard the name, I wanted to be there. Now that I’ve been there, its definitely not as 'furkin’ cool as it sounds. It's just Applebees with a cooler name.. Two tall glasses of Bass beer and some Fish and furkin’ chips later, I felt purdy content with life in general.  

Midway through  telling on myself these two Mexican-ish dudes choose to seat themselves right next to us. It was funny. I love random shit. They were seated so close to us, we might as well’ve pushed our tables together and introduced ourselves. So we finished up and got the furk out of there. 

‘The Icehouse’ actually looked about as cool as it sounded. A real top-notch bottom-rung dive bar. Complete with all the trimmin’s. Biker dudes. Alcoholics. Skankily dressed middle-aged women with their ass cracks and tits hanging out as they straddle li'l Mexican dudes right by the entrance. Some lesbo singing that gay L7 song on the  karaoke sound system. Porn glued to the bathroom walls. A real full meal deal of a dump. 

So, I got my ass-whooped up and down the pool table. On four separate occasions. By two different females. Definitely not my proudest moment. Later on, I accidentally wandered into the women’s restroom. Two chicks were pointing at something glued to the wall in there. It took a second to register. Again, not my proudest moment. 

We eventually headed back to Cece’s condo. She wanted to play board games. Slim was there, he just looked bored. Someone told a story about his new girlfriend mauling a male stripper in Vegas not long ago, and trying to shove her tongue down his throat. He was thrilled. If I remember correctly, to Slim’s girlfriend’s credit, she did not at all agree with that version of the male stripper incident. It didn’t help matters much that his girlfriend’s friends kept calling him by some other dudes name. 

So we played this game called ‘Would you rather?’ For example, “Would you rather have one eye or a tail?” Then people try to guess which one you would rather. I knew a bunch of Isreali’s in China who loved this game. They were sicko’s though. 

Anyway, it's some non-essential character named Ingred’s turn and the question was, “Would you rather be able to see out of only one eye or would you rather be able to only breathe through your nostrils?” We experimented. After careful consideration most of us were of the opinion that the use of one eye would be much more desirable then ‘nose-breathing.’ Try it. Imagine if you were trying to have a conversation or making love and you could only breathe through your nostrils. Anyways guess you had to be there. 

To top it all off, we went to church on Sunday. It was good. Reminded me a lot of church on Sunday. Maybe that’s not such a bad thing. Going to church was actually like the icing on the cake. Pastor dude was cool. The message was non-applicable to me which is always a relief. Makes me feel like I'm ahead of the curve. 

So, it was really good times but I'm getting tired of talking about it.

I came to visit Cece in Vantucky not knowing what to expect. And for all my ‘What If’s’ I got:

Hop N Shop. Rose Fest. The Hungry Lion. Coronas. Vacant lots. Numbered roads. Boring chalk-toned two-story buildings. Mr. Indian Lover. The Fantastic Orbiter. Honey Buckets. Cindy’s or Kathy’s or whatever. Cece. Bee. Redhats. Ruby. The Furkin’ Frog.  Grandma. The Oakridge Boys "Cadillac Pussy". Hula-hoop Slim and his aqua-teal dunks. Sara. A pretty good waitress with really bad make-up. The Icehouse. Beef stew.Vodka. Orange Crush. Wheat. Starch. Church. Dry couches. Head aches. Open-air showers.  Pissy pant legs. Pabst in a can. Fish in a toilet bowl. Fish and furkin' chips. Bass beer. And I wore the same t-shirt the whole damn time. Selah. 

(Now re-read this out loud, screamin’ at the top of your lungs, breathin’ only through your nose.) 

written May 31, 2008