Of Gutter Twins, Cock Rings on Strings, Sage Advice from Best Friends,

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Originally uploaded by bridgeportseasoning.

First, I can't wait to read Tankboy's review of the Gutter Twins show Friday night at Metro. My Cliff's Notes on the show? The lower half of my body became a simmering cauldron of hormones ready to explode.

Met up with another old HotHouse friend Friday night at Raw Bar, who was meeting a girlfriend for drinks. 'Course, once I drop in and order a beer, my dumb ass greets them by throwing the Shocker. It turns out the friend used to work at Raw Bar years ago; we might have even run into each other. And yes, it was run by gangsters back then, too. Only they were Persian, not Russian. But both have the same female bartender archetype: pneumatic, deep tan, and "blonde."

Anyway, after leaving Metro I had to top the serious ours of Maker's Mark those bartenders were serving. So it was on to the Wrigley Field Taco Bell. All I can say is that I hope the staff there is getting hazardous duty pay for manning the Fifth Circle of Hell on a weekend.

The following morning I got a call from Sue at 9, telling me the memorial service for her friend Earl started at 11. I cleaned up the best I could and met her downstairs. The service was in Gurnee, which meant that I was driving, so the mocha came in handy.

At the service there was a woman who was walking around with a necklace that looked like a cock ring knotted on a shoelace. And it might have been, for all we know. Haven't you ever convinced someone to wear something that wasn't its original intention?

The service was amazing, with lots of funny stories about Earl from friends and family. Then we drove to Kenosha for food and drinks at Earl's last job. Four words: Bell's Amber on draft.

The ride home was spent with the two of us just talking, as we do. Sue and I are like siblings, and her advice is usually spot on. So I finally laid out my anxiety of dating again to her. You know, just stupid kid shit like refreshing the e-mail program to see if a message came through, or waiting until a week or so to place a call.. And it felt like a relief when I was reminded that that can be normal, but that doing something like getting blitzed at Metro the night before was a good thing to remind me to have fun in the meantime. Not that I wanted to dump on her, but she usually knows what to say and the two of us don't bullshit each other. Then we ripped on cock ring lady some more.

I dropped Sue off with her boyfriend and drove her car back home. Heading south on Milwaukee, I stopped behind a PT Cruiser with vanity plates. Strike one on the plates. Strike two: the plates described the driver's career. Which is all well, but if you're an editor, you might want to get a vanity plate that spells the word correctly. Otherwise, when I see a plate that reads "EDITER" I have to question just how solid of an editor you are. At the very least, it shows a lack of objectivity.

I just find vanity plates to be, well, vain. When I bought my first car while in school in Florida I applied for vanity plates that read "SMEGMA" as a joke. I almost got 'em, until someone at the Florida DMV picked up a dictionary and decided that driving around in a Mazda 323 with license plates embossed with the medical term for dick cheese might not go over in the Bible Belt.