June 14 - Business Solutions

While waiting at a bakery for a cake and cookie delivery, I read Geoff Emerick's book on engineering the Fab Four. I definitely need to read another book about The Beatles instead of the Studs Terkel book I checked out from the library.

After all, the golden rule of writing is "Read what you know."

While I read, the company that would receive the sweet treats grew impatient, and my boss contacted me about the status of the baking. I used my pager (yes) to inform him that we were waiting for the apricot cookies to cool.

I continued reading.

Business.

When making large deliveries to big, dumb skyscrappies, sometimes an escort will be employed to make sure you don't steal important plans or pens. My escort on this cake delivery was a mild mannered man in his late twenties. He's always been nice to me.

Today on our freight elevator ride he opened up to me about his personal life.

"Females, man."

His ex-wife is giving him hell about not buying enough summer outfits for their infant daughter. I remained empathetic and neutrally male, and said things like "can't have it both ways" and "that's a lot of money". Then I delivered the cake and the cooled apricot cookies and returned to my simple life.

A magazine about money was sent on a direct service to a mental ward in Evanston. Most of the patients walked with a slow or broken gait. A man in a suit and combed hair approached the main lobby receptionists, a gaggle that hadn't had a giggle in some time. As I walked the magazine to the administrative office, I heard the man in the suit calmly and firmly declare, "Fuck you" and walk out.

Then it was time to go out to Niles to pick up 40 cartons of pre-made catered meals for a fancy fat ass conference at a fancy fat ass downtown hotel. The client said one van would be able to take them all. Upon arrival, it was discovered that we could only fit 12 cartons in my van.

Business.

Communication.

Synergy.

Incentivize.

Virtualization.

So I lugged as much tangible crap as I could through real-life crap traffic to the crap 'n' mortar hotel in sixty actual minutes.

At the loading dock, I spoke with a man through a tiny sliding window, and informed him that I was here to deliver some-

"Yeah, yeah, I'll call them," I heard under the noise inherent to loading docks.

I tried to give him more information about what I was delivering and to whom it would-

Shuck.

The window slid shut.

I unloaded the cartons and sat in the van waiting and reading.

A few chapters later, I went back to the loading dock attendant and asked him if there had been any word on this delivery I was making.

He seemed agitated.

"How am I supposed to know?"

I told him I thought he was going to call upstairs.

"How am I supposed to know who all this is for?"

He talked to me like I was an idiot.

I was an idiot for thinking that the loading dock attendant would have anything to do with the goings on in the loading dock.

I calmly explained that I had heard him say earlier that he would make a call to find out about the delivery.

"Is that what you heard?" he laughed.

Shuck.

I used to get upset by these things.

I'm actually getting better at handling it.

Here's the key: I get paid to wait.

So I called my boss, told him what was up, and waited and waited for the fatso hotel to get its shit together. Eventually while I was deep into my book, two guys barked at me sharply.

"IS THIS ALL!?"

"WE WERE EXPECTING A TRUCK!"

I told them they should have hired a company that uses trucks, and offered a crocodile apology.

Eventually they warmed up to me.

We were all participating in a grand clusterfuck, and they decided to laugh it off.

I even laughed.

And waited additional twenty minute$ for someone to sign for the delivery.

No one ever did.

Verdict: Win

June 13 - PRF 4

I got up early though.

This way I could make the shuttle to the PRF BBQ on its last day.

And wouldn't have to worry about my precious mommyvan being graffito'ed by Sooge Knight and all those crazy Humboldt Park G-funk El Rukns out there on the west cizzoast.

It was a quiet Sunday midday when the PRF shuttle pulled up, and I joined two guys on the way to the venue. We were the first to arrive, and helped clean up after last night's festivities.

Apparently I had missed a great night. All the bands proved their worthiness while actual crowd surfing occurred, both by the audience and members of Police Teeth. Then during Bottomless Pit's set, Steve Albini arrived, fresh from a 14th place finish in the World Series of Poker. He karoaked some Cheap Trick (I think, I wasn't there).

But the cops arrived, too. Apparently the neighbors didn't appreciate the flash photography coming from the roof of the BBQ.

Some people don't like being photographed by outsiders.

Other people don't like feeling as if they are part of a zoo.

Still other people don't like when outsiders bring the cops into their neighborhood.

So sometime in the middle of the night someone threw a brick through the window of the venue.

The guy who owns the venue arrived to find us cleaning.

He's a tall, coiled wire of a man with Minor Threat tattooed on his ethics.

When he found out about the window, he made us clean more and constantly and now.

Suddenly I found myself on a day off being forced a broom and ordered to sweep.

I swept a hallway that hadn't seen a broom since the Korean War.

Others mopped floors for the second and third time.

More people trickled in, carrying snacks, meats, and beers.

Their hungover grins became quizzical stares as they were put to immediate work by the 2.13.61 drill sergeant.

After sweeping 14 pounds of dirt, all created last night by the PRF BBQ, I sat down with a beer and a root beer, ready to relax at a barbeque.

The owner spotted me and handed me a mop.

"You wanna help out?"

By now, I had watched five other people mop that floor.

But I did not wish to be the BBQ asshole.

So I wrapped my tongue taut around my mind like a tourniquet, and learned the honor of discipline from a scattered, stressed out, art space owner with misplaced anger issues.

And I mopped that same floor again.

Knox from The Columbines, carrying some sort of workload, noticed my handiwork.

"You look like the saddest person in the world."

Meanwhile Karkoa soundchecked, a yard away from the wettest, most clean, unclean floor in a ghetto art space.

Because I was two-fisting root and beer, it also looked like I was picking up errant cans to throw out. While hiding from the fucking wigged out owner in the equipment room, the tattooed tornado eventually found me and some other guys. He handed me some more cans to throw out, full of beer currently being used.

"We gotta get some order in here! Who's a musician in here?!"

Most people escaped, but he was able to lasso one unlucky soul with yet another broom. I think the poor kid was even visiting from somewhere far away. The bands were ready to start playing any minute. Then he turned to me.

"Are you a musician?"

Yesss.

"Which of this stuff is yours?"

None of it.

"Then get out of here!" And he annoyingly shooed me away.

Thankfully the bands started playing and the concept of fun cautiously emerged for the first time all day. The owner remained by the front door, scrubbing the walls furiously. Occasionally, he would pull aside the PRF organizer in order to scream at him.

I got the fuck away from that miserable miserable creation.

Upstairs sat the coziest lair, a low-ceiling lounge of couches and poker. I spent some time up there drinking beer and watching the poker entertainment. I drank a lot of beer and now can't remember some of the great conversations I had with people from all over the board.

I do remember The Columbines set. They played my favorite Columbines song "Letter From Omaha" and dedicated it to drunk me. Then a marvelous 12 year old girl got behind the mic for a Cramps cover that made every band I've ever heard look silly in comparison.

It's fun being drunk and hungry. So I ate a sausage. It was spicy. I kept drinking. Then I fell asleep in the lair on a couch. Alan tugged my foot from a hallway through a hole in the wall.

"It's time to play!"

The Bitter Tears would be closing the barbeque.

I had the best stupid idea for a costume. I would drape a shirt and pants to the front of my body and duct tape it around my joints. Kind of like a paper doll.

Unkind of.

Meanwhile John looked dapper in his Clockwork Orange get-up and Alan looked like a Queen Elizabeth Jimmy Buffet zombie centaur. Mike recycled his winter cabin pajama theme from yesterday. I remember sweating and feeling fat. These were accurate feelings, as I later had to untag Facebook photos of me from the night.

Completely useless after the set, I shared a strange slot in John's car adjacent to his cumbersome 88 key Rhodes. My haircut absorbed headlights in the back window while my ankles hung limply out the passenger window. I looked like a pissed-on pile of hay, smelled like a dead mouth full of spat chaw, and felt like a rebuilt transmission leaking fluids again.

But as Glenn Danzig once said in Passaic, New Jersey on Christmas Day in 1981: "Fuck it, I had fun."

Verdict: Win

June 12 - Granola Bars & Metro No'one

Hey, I got up at 6am!

My spooky alarm told me to.

Because, like an idiot, I had agreed to do this entirely stupid van job earlier in the week.

And it's Saturday.

And no one should be up at 6am.

Not even the newspaper man.

Because no one gives a shit about Saturday news.

And nobody reads a newspaper anymore.

But there I was.

Up like a jerk.

On four hours of sleep.

I made one lousy trip down my stairs with a two wheeler topped with individually wrapped granola bars and loaded them into the van.

Destination: Douche Bag Street Art Festival

I did this again.

Then I did it again.

It seemed early to be bumbling down the steps one clunk at a time with all this stupid fucking bullshit.

It seemed too Saturday morning just after dawn to be doing this stupid fucking bullshit.

It seemed completely uncourteous to my neighbors, who were enjoying this little thing called rest.

But I made another trip.

And even one more.

I was about half way through loading the van with stupid fucking goddamn fucking granola bars when my annoying fucking cellphone rang.

It was Yvette.

She's the overnight driver.

She had the other 72 boxes of fucking granola bars for the fucking art fest.

"Tony. When were you planning on getting there?"

I told her around 7:30am, when they wanted us to be there.

"They said they wanted us there no later than 7:30."

I told her I was doing the best I could.

I almost told her about my fear that the planet would explode if these individually wrapped granola bars arrived at the douchebag art festival slightly after 7:30.

But instead, I closed my shitty cellphone and lugged the two-wheeler back up the stairs.

And made five more trips up and down the steps.

By 7:15 the van was chock full of nutritious garbage.

I raced down to the art festival.

At 7:32 on the donkeydick dot I pulled up to the douche bag art festival.

I was two minutes late.

I let go of the steering wheel and held my arms up in front of my face.

I braced for the inevitable self-destruction of the earth.

But.

The world remained intact.

The planet did not explode.

No one died a flamey flamey death.

In fact, the client wasn't even there.

Wait.

So I could have gotten four and a half hours of sleep?

We piled the boxes under a tent.

The sky grew dark and foreboding.

It seemed mad.

Like it wanted to explode.

But the sky is the world's assistant, and it doesn't quite have that power.

I went home for an unhealthy breakfast.

Then I loaded my drums into the van and heading for the Metronome Festival.

The Bitter Tears were scheduled to open the day's live music festivities.

When the earth wasn't looking, the sky rained all over the festival.

It was still mad about those granola bars being two minutes late.

I don't mind rain.

In fact, I love it.

If it rained every day, I would be a happier man.

And I would have less wrinkles from squinting.

And less skin cancer from my twelve consecutive years working outdoors.

Unfortunately, most of the world doesn't like the rain.

They don't like getting wet for some reason.

Yet most of these rain haters shower on a daily basis.

Logic aside, when it rains, people don't attend outdoor music festivals.

So The Bitter Tears played to no one.

"What kind of songs does asphalt like?"

The set itself was good.

It was nice to play my own drums for the first time in over a month.

The drying rain drops seemed to like it during their short lifespan.

With a triumphant set under our belts and VIP wristbands adorned to our wrists, we headed toward the VIP tent to indulge in the rumored buffet. Only, we couldn't find the VIP tent. Three people pointed us in three different directions.

Nothing.

We spoke to some festival coordinators.

"Food is coming!" they scowled.

They were clearly annoyed with us.

Starving and glossed in post-show cake-up residuals, we waited some more.

A Latin band was beating the hell out of a wooden box.

We gave up on waiting for food.

At a vendor, we spent a total of $714 on an Italian sausage, a hot dog, and a corn dog.

In front of the register sat a plate of homemade potato chips, piled into a Jenga-like pyramid.

"Are these complimentary?" I inquired.

"Those are just a display. But people actually eat them!" said the cashier, still in his very early twenties.

I told them they seemed inviting.

"I mean, if you wanna eat 'em, fine. But they've been sitting there all day."

The day had just begun. They couldn't be that bad.

"You make it seem like if I decide to eat one of these chips, then I'm an idiot."

They decided to keep quiet.

I plucked a chip from the Rubik's Magic Snake of fried potatoes.

They were stale.

"I see what you mean."

I went home, ate take out Mexican food, drank beer, watched TV, and fell asleep before the sun did.

Verdict: Loss

June 11 - PRF 2 & Death In Yellowstone

Hungover, I had to skip this morning's set of thrust-crunches, 4-count burpees, and plyometric medicine ball training. Right when I was just starting to get buff again.

A neighbor boy poked a vuvuzela out his window and blew a swarm of sour flatulent bees at the end of the year school traffic.

"What the hell was that?"

Work was stupid. It always is when you're hungover.

"Duh. Look at me. I'm having trouble forming thoughts."

Also, the weather was being a dickhead.

All 88 degrees and Nam humid.

The simple ingredients for a trying day.

Earlier in the week, I had agreed to do this nightmare run for today.

I took out the seats in the van, and went down to 35th and Sacramento to pick up 72 boxes full of individually wrapped granola bars. It filled the entire vehicle.

The 800 pounds of granola bars are to be delivered tomorrow morning by 7:30am at a street festival in a douchey part of town.

No problem!

In the meantime I'll just keep them in my van overnight.

Oh wait.

Oh shit.

Godammit.

Tonight I have a show with The Nurse Novels.

In a crime-ridden part of town.

A van full of boxes sitting unprotected in the ghetto is not my idea of awesome.

It looked as if I was going to have to bring them all into my apartment.

The first five trips up the four half-flights of stairs with my two-wheeler weren't too bad.

The heat only made me grimy and cranky.

Around this time, Lauren and her smart ass friend Mike were walking home from their lunch date when they spotted my ornery asshole. Mike had just spent four months living on a cruise ship, performing two shows per week and getting paid handsomely. He eyed me and my two-wheeler stacked with boxes.

"Are you moving out before she gets home?"

It was a good joke and I laughed as best I could.

Lauren peaked into the van, now half full of boxes.

"Oh, it's not as bad as I thought it would be."

A drop of sweat stung my eye.

In the apartment they were greeted by a wall of boxes that now lorded over the kitchen. I was only halfway done. Mike, who smelled hard work ahead, immediately vanished. Lauren was kind enough to help me with the remaining five trips up and down the stairs in the nauseating heat for a bunch of fucking granola bars.

"Controlled by a grain. A fucking grain," Rollins yelled.

At least I was getting some exercise though. I'm sure Henry would respect that.

Salty kisses were Lauren's only reward as I needed to head back downtown to deliver two more stupid envelopes to some Loop jagoffs. Then I could immediately begin the never-ending night. There would be no shower.

Lauren and I drove up to Canada to pick up Tom from Nurse Novels. As there were no seats in the back, he sat on the floor as we drove toward the sun for an hour in sticky traffic.

The PRF BBQ was being held at an art space on the west side.

Thanks to Chicago's mandatory segregation laws, this neighborhood was almost entirely black and poor. The mayor likes it this way. I'm not sure if the residents do, but that's their problem.

Chicago Avenue was torn up and alive with activity. It was the hottest, most humid day of the year. So everyone was out walking in traffic. It made me think of that old Chinese proverb: Heat make people think they're car.

We received many stares and glares as my inherited late model soccer mom van shuffled through the ghetto. The van was left uneasily on a side street full of people admiring it.

I met up with the organizer of the BBQ, a guy known on the message board as Marsupialized.

Marsup is an outspoken man with a wicked sense of humor that has pushed many forum members' buttons in the past. He has since mellowed out over the years, and is more selective about the use of his bite.

Worried about the safety of the van, I made this observation to him:

"This is kind of a rough neighborhood. I'm parked on the side street over there."

"It's not so bad. I've parked here a few times before."

"In a 2006 mini van?"

"Well," he said underneath, "then don't drive a mini van."

It was nice to see that Marsup's still got it. Hopefully I'll still have it, the van, by the end of the night. Hopefully, I'll also have it, some dinner, too. And soon!

Lauren and I didn't eat, figuring we'd do that at the barbeque.

To our befuddlement, no one was grilling, nor was there any food to be grilled that evening.

Just a spread of two large eggplants, a bag of salad, some strawberries, four bags of Doritos, some hummus, and my contribution: a tupperware of burnt almond-stuffed, bacon-wrapped dates that cost me $30 to overcook. I grabbed a few handfuls of chips, and a baby carrot.

And 26 beers.

Fuck it.

Eat later.

Die now.

Live forever.

Skate or die.

No fat chicks.

Dr. Zog's Sex Wax.

If you're too young, you're too old!

Mark Shippy's new untitled side project played a broken opus to the smoky, sweaty inverted church. I watched from behind the drummer, watched his feet a lot. And Shippy's noodles, his fingernails capped with little finger condom picks. I liked their mess the best.

Before karoake, The Nurse Novels played. We did alright. A guy fell off of a ladder during "War". The kids slow danced to "Sea Day". Some straight guys kissed each other until they crashed onto the sketchy floor. It seemed like there was some ironic sex in the air, or whatever that stuff was we were breathing. We left the stage dripping and dehydrated. People seemed to cheer about it.

I would have like to have stayed for the remaining foodless barbeque festivities, but I had double-booked myself that night. Chris Bower had asked me to write something inspired by Death In Yellowstone, a literary mis-masterpiece of cautionary death tales from Yellowstone National Park. Reading it was a grim treadmill of facts and finger wagging, covering deaths from falling into geysers, bear attacks, stove explosions, and stagecoach tramplings. I was assigned the chapters on accidental shootings, murders, suicides, along with missing and presumed dead.

The venue for the reading was a spot called Ray's, a speakeasy of sorts. The only old man in the old man bar was Ray, who shook my hand with the one that wasn't smoking a cigarette. Lots of people smoked in the small bar adorned with...well, I don't know. I had been nervous all night about performing and put on my pre-show blinders. I don't remember much about the decor other than I liked it and I felt comfortably terrified.

Having missed the first half of the reading while at the BBQ, I just sort of winged my reading. Lots of friends were there, including The Bitter Tears and friends, allowing for a supportive environment.

The pieces went over well, I thought. I revived my crotchety cowboy character for the chapter on murders, and people seemed to laugh at him (to his dismay). I learned a lot while reading my own material aloud to a group of people.

I learned that:

* I should read through the piece aloud more than just once or twice behind the wheel of the van

* I judge my performance while it's happening and take myself out of it

* I sometimes rest my gesturing hand in a position that makes it look like I'm taking a piss

* my hair, when it's humid and wet, resembles Hitler's hairdoo

But I did it, right?

Completely exhausted, we got 1am Wendy's from a drive-thru, dropped Tom off up north, and crashed at home around 2.

In four hours I would have to get up for some more of that fantastic manual labor.

Verdict: Win

June 10 - PRF 1

In Chicago there is a recording studio called Electrical Audio.

It is run by Steve Albini.

On its website there is a forum.

I have been a member of this forum since 2004.

It has provided me with information on how to put out vinyl records, lessons in touring etiquette, gear information, and an endless scroll of musical minutiae with a disciplined smart ass streak.

There used to be a lot of fights on the board.

You know.

The internet.

Most often it was entertaining, the way girl fights can be.

I mostly troll.

Last year a large contingent of the board got together for the first time to throw a barbeque.

We met the faces behind the avatars, the bold posts, the virtual black eyes (cyber-shiners).

About 30 bands played.

Some might call it a "cult" or a "sausage party" or, based on the hundreds of dollars spent at the Paulina Meat Market, a "sausage cult".

But it was great.

Hot food, loud music, warm beer.

The occasional woman.

Even Steve Albini showed up.

This year the premier rock forum is throwing another gala.

Tonight, the first of four consecutive nights, began at Quenchers.

I rode my bike down, enjoyed the music, caught up with old friends, and drank a box of beer.

I even got to ride back home drunk, my ears ringing with six bands worth of fun.

It's just beginning.

Verdict: Win

June 9 - Baby Baby Baby

It's time to get back to doing sit-ups and push-ups and curls in the morning.

And eating better.

And losing this little tour gut.

I am way out of shape, and had to abort my second set of push-ups.

Baby steps.

Shit-in-diaper baby steps.

Really slow day today.

3 runs total.

That's Pullman era money.

A new driver, Eric, had left his lights on.

The car battery was dead at Wells and Van Buren.

I was asked to give him a jump.

It was 4pm.

With Wells closed to the Eisenhower, and construction crippling all flow, the afternoon rush crawled like the world's stupidest baby. The city appointed a traffic director to stand at the intersection and yell at everybody.

I explained my situation and he worked with me on it.

He held up traffic (as if anyone would notice at that point) so I could make a big horseshoe U-turn heading the wrong way on a one-way to face Eric's car head-on.

We jumped his car skittishly. This procedure still makes me timid. It conjures up nightmares of sparks, exploding engines, shrapnel, screams, blood, tourniquets, hospitals, funerals.

But none of this happened to us today. Instead, I performed my good deed of the decade.

Now I can continue being an asshole baby for the next nine and half years.

Phew!

Verdict: Win

June 8 - Racist Rapist

The phone went off a little after 5am.

It was work, and they needed me to go downtown for a hot one going up to Kenilworth.

Same guy I delivered to a while back.

At 6:30, I found him doing something to a lawn mower as I approached.

"I've been thinking about you."

Rich people are weird.

I went back home for breakfast. Our bathroom ceiling had developed these rusty looking cysts and blackheads. The maintenance man, a friendly scarecrow of a man, would be operating on these all day. So Lauren joined me for the morning portion of work.

It was nice.

During a brief lull, I read her my pieces for the upcoming Death In Yellowstone reading on Friday. Her notes proved helpful, and I learned a lot hearing it aloud.

I will be covering four chapters that night:

Deaths from Accidents or Self-Defense

Murders

Suicides

Missing and Presumed Dead

Fun stuff. For one of the chapters I'll be reprising my cowboy character that was created on a road trip through Wyoming and later refined at The Annoyance and aboard The Norwegian Jade.

It rained all day, making for a lazy lazy afternoon.

With no work going on, I went to Reckless Records. TJ from Rush Limbaugh: The Musical had given me a closing show gift certificate to the store. Unfortunately, I had to piss the whole time I was there, and record stores, like thrift stores, are notorious for not having facilities for customers. I held on and danced, though not to the music.

Found some good stuff: off key wedding band versions of surf and flower power tunes courtesy of The Jalopy Five, Santo & Johnny rip-offs Dan & Dale ("The Sleepwalk Guitars of..."), a Les Paul and Mary Ford compilation, Chuck Berry's "Promised Land" 45 on Chess, a Laverne & Shirley record produced by Michael McKean, a reading of "Casey At The Bat" by Johnny Bench and "Peter & The Wolf" by Tom Seaver with the Cincinnati Pops, and an erotic aerobics record from the mid-80's.

I ducked into a bar to use the bathroom and ended up with a Guinness in front of me. It was only $3.50. I read liner notes and watched the rain until the old man down the bar got enough liquid courage to get racist. Everything was going well. He talked about sports mostly. Then the guy started testing out little racist quotes he had heard "the blacks" say. It was like he was flirting. The bartender, a guy younger than me probably, gave a curt "yeah" and got silent. But then the man said he had a lot more of those and wanted to share.

Hey.

We aren't gonna get raped by your racism.

Zip it, old timer.

I went home early.

I started early.

I went to bed early.

Verdict: Win