New York Scribbles

[mccutcheon]

I'm one post away from 3,000.

(I think you get the idea here)

[mccutcheon]

Ahhhhhh, the sweet 3,000!!!!!

Thank you, hold me tight, let's do it again before we share a smoke.

[mccutcheon]

It's the 4th of July and I'm listening to the Galaxie 500 song 4th of July all day. I'm on my own for the holiday but unlike the song where he gets drunk, looks at the Empire Sate Building and pulls the shades so he doesn't have to see the sky, I plan to make the best of it. I have a few beers and I go up to my roof.

The explosions over the NYC horizon are amazing. The best fireworks I have ever seen. It reminds me of Spiderman for some reason, or some sort of Superhero moment. We have the pyrotechnics of the Justice League.

I'm the only one on the rooftop. I think all my neighbors have friends and are in the Hamptons or doing something better than being alone. That is, until a couple comes walking up and joins me.

It is dark and I don't want to startle them, so I say hi. I think they acknowledge me but all they do is nod back in the dark. Then they make their way to opposite corner of the roof.

I want to be social, so I say “Pretty cool.�

“Yeah.�

They aren't that talkative. Then they start to make-out and I begin to feel like the third wheel, but this is my countries' greatest day. I have a right to stay and watch the bright colors exploding over the east side of Manhattan. I drink my beer and get lost in the entertainment.

Then the girl clears her throat, “Emm.�

“Yeah?�

They finally want to talk to me I think.

“Well it's like this,� she says, “It's our anniversary and we were planning on having sex up here, ya know, as the fireworks were exploding overhead. Would you mind leaving?�

Who the fuck gets married on the 4th of July? I spend the rest of the night getting drunk with the shades pulled. And I never even looked at the Empire State Building.

[mccutcheon]

going places you never been before
See I was gonna stay home and stay sober tonight. Not that I go out a lot. But staying sober was gonna be a challenge. But instead I wrote 5,000 words on my second novel sitting naked and sweating in the humidity, with bottles of wine and bottles of beer for when I got too drunk, and a pack of Marlboro Lights- and no I didn't stay sober but I jacked off 6 times enjoying the large size my cock. I have a pretty penis. When I became hard I was thinking of a mouth or pussy I could satisfy. At the age of 35 I understand ‘use it or lose it' when it comes to the prostate. I have never gone to a doctor. Besides I like to come.

WOW WHAT A BAD WAY TO START THIS ALL OFF. TRUST ME IT WILL ONLY GET WORSE.

Too long and over worded, perverted, but what the hell. This all goes crazy.

I do have a great cock the way pretty girls have pretty pussies. I'm not saying that ugly people have ugly genitalia but take it from a guy who has had sex with all sorts of gorgeous and disgusting girls-- let me tell you life is just proving once again how unfair it is- a pretty face= a pretty pussy. To get back at all of us, the pretty girls with the pretty pussies aren't the sexiest people. No, the other girls, who make an effort, will fuck you better. Trust me. Pretty face= Pretty pussy= bad sex. Most of the time. Like all shitty rules it is broken. And if you get one of those hang on to it, or stay inside of it.

Not so pretty girl= great sex= but then you have to deal with her unpleasantness. A pretty girl with a pretty pussy can be a total bitch or she can be submissive. It is up to you to judge what is worse or better. I don't care. I'm out of the game.

And before all the emails pour in saying I'm as bad as Dan Savage, let me tell you I just don't care. I'd sleep with you all. That is a lie unless you give good head. But back to my bad behavior- as one email stated I would sleep with anyone. Or I would hate you all. Or I would love you all, again the way Marky does: I'm self-medicating.

But this is Pax Acidus the board of bad behavior (I'll get to the reason later) so you kinda know what you are in for. And I ain't no PC writer after my time at the Daily Cardinal in Madison, Wisconsin -where I was first published. Yeah journalistic wise, but also that daily paper was the first to print my stories once a week.

I worked my fingers into the ivory colored keyboard tonight and blasted Joy Zipper and The Fiery Furnaces on vinyl (and if you are reading this when I'm dead – you might say who cares, well back in time kid, it was hard and expensive to find these LP's…yeah see you in Galaxie 500's heaven, but I was sweating and typing away naked with coming and going hard-ons and you who are reading this present day, like the day after I wrote it might ask why the fuck does he bother? Not to jack off, but write. Well like I said it was always going to be scribbles. Just like this.

But here is the thing. My column might become syndicated. And the editor said to me, ‘Ya gotta be prolific.' I said, ‘ baby, lately all I do is jack off but don't worry, if it comes down to it I'm not one of those clowns who won't wear a condom.'

After being explained my miscomprehension, I got down to writing and jacking off. Without the latex. The rebel in me is testing what I can get away with. If any of you care I'll let you know where I'm picked up.

PS- Some of my short stories are also gonna be published in a couple of NYC mags around town. Nothing big like Cosmopolitan but Martino if I owe you money let me know.

Martino I love you. You were the first person to ever believe in me and, like I said. I love your Kraut ass.

This is an after hours post. So take it like that.

Martino meeting you was wonderful. I would have given up if it weren't for you. And than also L., who said she loved me and though she is living with a boy from a NYC band you might have heard of, I can't name names and now there is Tom who I think is the greatest addiction to the Pax Acidus family since Tragic Pixie.

I'm good/// I'm shit. I'm drunk. I'm thinking of you Van Gough. But writers write and who else can say the quality of what they wrote – combined today I did 10,000 words in all- the veins and in novel format and revising short stories and posting on the best web site in the world? Doest it matter that 9,000 are disposable?

Maybe and maybe not? They stand there. Those words. And this is my one nightstand to NYC SCRIBBLES. I'm going regret it in the morning, but hell I'm naked and damn the sweat and beer are going through me.

See Martino in the Burnt Roof of Mouth novel--- Van Gough is a metaphor for the perfect artistic expression. Besides the boys are American.

Have I mentioned I love you and I am naked? I think I have. I will come to visit you soon. All I need is a jogging path and a beer hall. –And a keyboard. It doesn't have to be ivory colored.

NYC Scribbles- I'm feeling like Stephen King. If I stop typing I will die and the quality of the writing is shit. Got to go die somewhere. LOVE YOU ALL AND YOU MARTINO!!!!!!

Hemmingway was once asked when do you know it is good? He said the next day when you read it before anyone else does. I don't have that option.

see you all in the sunlight.

[mccutcheon]

What a bunch of BS. Oh well maybe next time.

[mccutcheon]

Heard on the corner of 18th and 1st:

How are you?

I'm good, I'm good today because my brother threw the girlfriend out and I'm documenting every minute with my video camera.

You can imagine what this woman looked like. [/quote]

[mccutcheon]

I'm sitting in a hole in the wall café on 20th sipping espresso and reading the Portable Dorothy Parker. The Big D knew her New York and is known for her short stories of stunning wit. I'm mostly known for my short stories of diminished wit.

The distinction between us is wide. She was a woman. I'm a man. She is dead. I'm alive (at least half of the time.) She had friends and relations who would sit around, get drunk and talk literature into the wee hours of the night. She went to fabulous parties. I sit alone in my apartment and drink and write and wonder with my wine stained keyboard what could be, what should be, what will be the end of me.

Dorothy wrote stories about the shallow classiness of New York Women. While I- walking down the humid summer streets of Manhattan am just shallow. I'll marvel at the lack of clothing the New York Women are wearing. Wow look at her, she sure makes good use of that bra, the cup over-flowith with flourish. The straps are pulled taunt over the shoulders. That brassiere is getting a work out today. And the next woman, showing all the cleavage there is to see and I love the way I can see the blue veins of her boobs. And then there is the next chick and I've only gone a block, this black girl is so hot in the heat she can't be bothered with a bra at all. I'm glad I have sunglasses on as the bouncing candy raisin nipples are coming my way. The sunglasses help with the staring, but she must notice the drooling. Hope she thinks I'm just some dim wit.

See, I ain't too smart and I don't get out much.

But life does come with changes. And one change that happened for me this last week is that my friend Myke said I should put NYC Scribbles into a blog format. And so with his kindness he made this happen. Not that I'm leaving Pax Acidus. That would never happen. The Pax site is sorta my life. If only all these words could make it to the pritnted page.

So, this is the first post with Myke in mind. I'm not too sure I really know what a blog is, and I'm really not too sure I really want to know. I do know that this is the first time that they are letting bloggers into and cover the DNC in Boston. And the solemnity soluble significance is?

I was wondering. If Dorothy Parker were alive and writing today, would she have a blog? I kinda think yes. And if not. I really just don't want to know.

[mccutcheon]

My bro is leaving for China tomorrow with his wife.

Bon Voyage.

On tv people are on drugs and dancing to Fat Boy Slim. It's either that or I am on drugs and dancing to Fat Boy Slim and the tv is off and it is my reflection and all in my mind.

Soul Train solo.


Groove is in the heart.

[mccutcheon]

It all started outside a truck stop...

Here is the first bit to one of my new stories--proving that lack of sleep and too much country music don't mix:

The only food I've had in the last two days is spoiled macaroni salad. Oh yeah, and the lime wedges in my 47 Coronas. It is a hot humid day as I sit on this New York apartment rooftop. Lucky for me I'm in my skivvies and have Hank Williams on the radio.

I watch the Manhattan women walking through the sidewalk heat waves. With my binoculars I get a bird's eye view of the beads of sweat trickling down their cleavage. As I grab another beer from the ice bucket I wonder how I got here.

It all started with a transvestite whore outside a Phoenix truck stop.

[mccutcheon]

Lately I have been doing nothing, nothing much, fuck all. I get naked and lie in bed and sweat through the sheets. I shit myself and have it for breakfast. I could wring out my stench if I had the energy. The only thing I have been doing is to me.

I watch the rats climb the walls. Sometimes they jump through hoops of fire. Sometimes they scrounge the black bugs that crawl into my orifices. I scratch at sores until they bleed enough to make little pools that turn to crusted flakes on the hardwood floor. I lick up the dried lifeblood to make it moist again- a muddy paste in my mouth. I gouged my eyes but gave up before loosing my sight. I have to see. The TV is on. I do this while still alive and young and living in the most socially active city in the world.

For the last two months I have been on a King of Queens kick. If I'm being generous and had enough wine- the first bottle of the night usually does it, I fool myself into believing King of Queens is the kind of socially conscious situation comedy of working class big city life Mike Leigh would make with artistic intricacy if he was from the States. Besides, Arthur- What a supporting character.

When the TV is on I know I'm nowhere. I should be able to tell these patterns of depression. After Tara died I promised myself that in her death I would live every day to the fullest. I stayed devoted to this wish made upon a deathbed. Even though she was in a coma and I said it in silent prayer – a prayer I didn't keep but there were many I asked for during those harrowing two days that were never answered. So I reneged by lying on the couch, living on a diet of 5 gallons of boxed Chardonnay and individually wrapped Starbursts a day- this was before Starbursts developed the new wild sweet and sour flavors; so you know I was suffering.

And I watched Frasier every night for 6 months. If I was being generous and my St John's Wart was kicking in – it never did- I told myself Fraiser was an intelligent television show that delved into the psyche we are all afraid to look at. Besides, Niles- what a supporting character.

Upon that deathbed promise I swore never to be a supporting character. So what am I doing home tonight while I am supposed to be DJing? Why can't I socialize without being sober? Why can't I leave the house without crying? Why do I love you until you love me? Why can't I have sex? Why am I so horny?

(I'm not looking for these answers- it is just part of the piece. Even though it didn't call the Wolf on a cell phone.)

I am usually such a good self-medicater. So good I shun all advice and self-help malarkey. Please don't try to help me. I would rather die.

Doctor-Doctor I need a good nights sleep. McCutcheon you sad lazy idiot, get off your dumb derriere, get off your bad ass buttocks.

Not tonight.

But tomorrow I am going to Coney Island. And GOD, for my mental health do I hope it will be okay.

[mccutcheon]

So after writing the last post I checked my email and this was in the inbox.

"McCutcheon - do you know that you are beautiful? What I
wouldn't give..."

Yes, well. What I would give.

[mccutcheon]

Blitzkrieg Bopping to Coney Island with Lester Bangs on the Brain. A! O! LET'S GO!!!

My trip to Coney Island is a little shorter than expected. I never make it past Canal St. I have two beers in the Union Square Park and then go underground to wait for the Q train. It takes its own sweet motherfucking time showing up for our blind date.

When it finally does arrive I sit down and realize my slight beer buzz is wearing off already. My hangover is coming back. I have more beers in my backpack, but the train is crowded and brightly lit. Not the best drinking conditions at ten in the morning. At the first stop I get off.

I want to find an alley and open a beer but even the alleys are full of plastic shoes pushers and fake watch salesmen. Tourists are more than happy to lose their money. Kitsch/slash/ spend all your cash.

I mosey through Tribeca and soon get bored. I decide to sit outside of the court buildings and city hall. I wrap my beer in a brown paper bag from a trashcan and drink the remaining pilsners.

Do I feel like a bum? You might ask if you were still talking to me. Hell no- I feel half alive and besides this beer is great. The bums can't afford the astounding Urquell golden goodness.

Sitting on the park benches around me are a few clerks and civil servants and the typical bland office workers munching on pre-packaged lunches. A woman on my right takes off her baize coat that matches her baize skirt. In the space between the buttons of her white pressed blouse I notice she isn't wearing a bra and I catch a glimpse of her naked breast. And what an impressive mamma it is.

Maybe she isn't bland after all. Just because she is a slave to the 9 to 5 and works in an office and wears matching outfits probably picked out the night before doesn't mean she isn't full of passion and burning desire and that she isn't just waiting for a guy like me to open her up to all the pleasures of the sexual realm. Maybe she isn't wearing panties as well.

I lean over and smile.

“Hi. I was on my way to Coney Island but as you can see I didn't make it.�

She stops masticating her sandwich mid chew. She looks at me.

“You on your lunch break?� I ask thinking we could go somewhere for a quickie.

She swallows hard. I smile again.

“Leave me alone you drunk,� she says.

“I'm not drunk. Just tipsy.�

“You are a disgusting bum,� she says getting up and walking away.

“I'm not a bum,� I call after her. “Bums don't drink Pilsner Urquell.�

I lift the green bottle from the brown paper bag and hold it up for her to see but she just keeps walking and doesn't turn around. I finish the bottle and decide these aren't my type of people. I head back up to the Lower East Side.

By the time I get to The Bowery I'm thirsty again. Walking through Nolita will do that to a guy. I go have a beer at CBGB. Of course I can't help thinking of the music that has transpired between these famous walls. But even more I think of Lester Bangs who wrote all about it and was known to spend all day and night at the bar. Lester is a hero of mine and I wonder what it says about me having a hero like Lester.

Lester was before my time but CB's ain't like it used to be. At least not from the gossip I've heard and read about. The beer is set at tourist prices. The bartender is a wannabe hipster, a snotty girl who doesn't like my presence.

Her smart-alecky sneer says – ‘Take your substance abuse problem somewhere else.'

That ain't rock and roll. But then we come about it at different ends of the spectrum. I've been living my wasted life for two decades. In five years time this place and her job will be just another memory, a rite of passage phase and she will be back in Connecticut living the suburbia bliss with a few good tales to tell of her youth. She will tell these stories before she is old, a dying sold out soul. I don't care. She never understood it in the first place. But fuck the future. I won't be around to see it. I want to drink in peace now. Maybe a little conversation will help.

“Isn't it tragic about Robert Quine?� I ask.

“Who?�

“Robert Quine. He played guitar with Richard Hell.�

“Played guitar with who?�

“He also played with Tom Waits and Lou Reed. Never mind. The present sure ain't the past, huh?�

“I guess so,� she says.

“Hey, I feel like listening to Public Image LTD's The Suit. Can you play that?�

“What's that?�

“Forget it.�

Her smart-alecky sneer says – ‘Take your bad taste craziness somewhere else.'

I down the pint as a couple walks in. They are British and the bloke has a shaved head and a Ramones' T-shirt on. He buys the wife a pair of CBGB panties and a CBGB shower curtain. I exit to Joey Ramone Place.

I stagger to Kim's Video on St. Marks. Looking through the independent DVD section I spot a film called ‘I Went to Coney Island on a Mission from God, be back at 5.' It's about a geek and a crippled drunk who go to Coney Island to look for their homosexual loony Latino childhood friend. That is the movie for me.

[mccutcheon]

Nat P is on the cover of the new New York Time Out. I shiver everytime I pass a news agent. But then I would because she is Nat P.

I want to know who the girl on the new Kings of Convernience record is. But then I would.

Is Nat P our Nat Wood?

It is all wood.

Nat P makes my wood float above water.


Sorry.

[mccutcheon]

I'm off today and I have all of New York City at my disposal. I've got some money because I just got paid. I could do anything I wanted in the best city in the world. But there are heightened terror alerts so do I really want to risk it.

The terrorists are winning. If I think this way then maybe they have already won. No, I can't let them dictate my behavior. I have been wanting to see Spiderman 2 but if I get blown up while watching, well that is cutting it a little too close to the superhero world for me.

I could head to a museum, but do I want to deal with the extra slow lines and the body cavity search before entering? Not really. I had a blueberry bran muffin and three cups of coffee for breakfast so I don't want to be prodded down there. I think I'll avoid that mess.

Maybe I'll head to Ryan's for the $3.50 pints, $2 shots of Jager and some air conditioning that works. No one would bother messing with Ryan's. Besides I played 2 ½ hours of tennis this morning already and I need to cool down. I found my air conditioner on the street- and you know those faucets that pour brown water from the tap- well my air conditioner is sorta like that- only it blows lukewarm brown air. I need to escape this heat.

Owe! Owe! Owe! Happy Mondays covered the Bee Gees Stayin' Alive. Let's go somewhere and fuck a while.

[mccutcheon]

I'm in a weird place right now. I'm writing this from the toilets in Giant's stadium- but I meant I'm in a weird place in my mind. More on how I ended up in a New Jersey shitter later on. How is that for foreshadowing?

I feel the world is starting to pass me by. I missed my chance. This became clear after Calgary lost the Stanley Cup Finals. The Flames were underdogs so their vast accomplishments only fueled their support. All of Alberta, hell all of Canada was going crazy for the Flames. When they lost in the seventh game, I called my good friend Trevor who lives in Calgary and had been attending the playoffs. It was a somber moment, I was even a little scared, but to be a gentleman I had to offer my condolences. That's what friends are for. I expected Trevor to pick up the phone weeping. Instead I was greeted with a levelheaded comment. “They had a good run�, he said. “It's not the end of the world.�

To steal a phrase from Kurt Vonneget, getting genuinely upset about anything in sports is like dressing up in a suit of armor to attack a hot fudge sundae. Now that's all fine and good for your Seattle sports fan who is accustomed to years of losing and prefers a latte and sushi at the ball park anyway, but Trevor and I lived and died by our teams- he for the Flames, and me for the green and gold of the Green Bay Packers. So what had changed?

Earlier in the year Trevor and his wife Camilla were blessed with a beautiful baby boy named Jake. And when these miracles come into your life the suits of armor are no longer needed. Or so I'm guessing. It's the only way for me to explain Trevor's new founded insanity. It's either that or he was heavily sedated.

Well, I don't even have a girlfriend, and no kids that I know of. So it was time for me to start supporting my own creation; my writing. I was upset for not living up to my potential. A hard thing to do when most of what I achieve is accomplished with a sloppy un-profound look of dismay on my face- it's done by mistake.

But I had to give it a try, enter into the business of the business with gusto. I sent out a letter and the first chapter of my novel to six agents in the city. So far I have received four polite rejections. I curse them all to hell, of course. I hope all their kids are born with small penises, and that includes the girls.

I knew it would be like this. Trying to find the right agent is going to be like finding true love- I'll have to send out a lot of letters- whore myself with one night stands- until I find someone who understands. Because it is very hard to find the perfect match were all the parts fit.

Lately I have been reading the latest fiction. And I don't want to sound like sour grapes but I think most of the prose out there is lack luster and I am finding it hard to get through a single new book. I used to read all the time, finishing books in a day or two. Now I get a few pages in and that creeping feeling starts sinking in like ‘man this is utter crap'. I might not have the ability to write, but have I also now lost my ability to read? If that's the case it's going to be a hard adjustment, losing a first love always is. I'm hoping this all-encompassing ennui is down to my lowly state of being the past few months.

Yesterday I snuck into see a movie. I got there too late for Spiderman 2. The only thing playing was The Notebook. I had no idea what The Notebook was about except that it stared Gene Rowlands and was directed by Nick Cassavetes, both related in their own way to the late, great John Cassavetes –wife and son respectfully.

In the audience of this matinee show sat four little old ladies. So I thought, oh it's going to be one of those movies. And sure enough it was a period piece love story that spanned from before World War 2 to present day. And it took place in the South. Man, this is going to be like that piece of shit Prince of Tides.

By the end of the film all four little old ladies and me were bawling our eyes out. The women were probably crying for lost love and age and death while I was crying for my lonely soul. I had fallen in love with the main actress, Rachel McAdams who is talented and the sexiest woman alive. Tears washed down my face. I'm going to die alone without ever finding that love that lasts. I'm wounded. I'm just an untalented sap who is drinking myself to death.

Luckily the feelings didn't last too long. The city wouldn't let it. I walked outside into the stuffy humid Union Square air. I bought a ESG six-pack of Love at a deli and drank it as I walked up to the Port Authority. Once there I looked around. There is a part in my novel, a scene toward the end that takes place here. Hmm, I reflected: fiction and reality working inside of me all at once. The six-pack was working. I finished the last two beers and got on a bus for Giant's Stadium.

When you have nothing in your heart, and agents aren't interested in your work, and the city around you is under a terror alert, it helps to have European football.

Liverpool beat Roma 2-1 and Michael Owen got the winner with 5 minutes left. It was only a friendly, but sometimes only a friendly is all you need.