Part 2: “I feel like I’m in a meth documentary.”

Remember how I was all worried about family members finding out about my little space on the innerbunny? Don’t gotta anymore, because they found me. Not sure how I feel about it; on one hand, I’m relieved, but on the other, I’m freaked out because I’m concerned that I’m going to start censoring myself, and that’s not the point of this exercise. Really, I’m hoping they’ll be like they know it’s here, but as long as I’m not talking about them (which the rule is, if someone tells me not to talk about him or her, they don’t get talked about), they’re not going to feel the need to be here. Or maybe they’ll grow to understand and maybe even enjoy my little rants against the universe. B-Dubs (aka my small brother) said he’s cool with it, and I can’t even tell you how moved I was by that. But either way, it is what it is.

And now, back to our regularly scheduled programming:

Part 1: “Ohmigod, he looks like Don Knotts!”

Do any of y’all know how the Serbs make their green beans? I covered Slerb Fest tonight over at St. Sava’s, and I don’t know what they put in them to make them so tasty, but damn! Or could it just be that it’s been that long since I’ve had real home-cooked grub, because I totally inhaled the whole meal.

Speaking of Slerbs, I guess I should tell you about the utter debacle that was Mer’s visit. On one hand, I’ve gone over and over and over it so many times in the last week that I really would just kind of like it to fade away, not to mention I don’t want to waste any more energy on fucking Zook, who’s officially proven he truly is the most worthless, useless waste of flesh on the face of the planet. But like most things in my life, you just can’t make this shit up.

Given the choice between discovering that someone you like and respect is really a complete jerk-off and discovering that someone you thought was a complete jerk-off is really someone you should respect, I’ve discovered in recent days that I’d much rather discover someone’s a jerk-off. Much, much easier to stomach. Is that weird?

I’m still gearing up for the “Zookathon” post to tell y’all about my disastrous week of utter hell, but I’m still rootin’ around in this EE business. First impression: kinda cool and totally digging that I have smileys now and shit. Much more user-friendly than MT, though I liked my MT, too.

Since I couldn't possibly make it up on a good day, y'all want to hear the latest about DtR!?? Of COURSE you do.

My assignment yesterday was to cover this one fire department that was giving a little boy a whole bunch of gifts to lift his spirits after he'd been bitten by a dog, so I'm sitting there with the chief and his crew getting backround on the sitch when I asked the little boy's name. The chief said "so and so." I thought, "Huh. That's DtR's last name, and we're in the area where DtR lived," so I asked what street they live on. The chief said, "such and such," so I asked if the boy's mother's name is Whosit and, well, whaddya know!?? I was like, holy shit, I haven't seen these people since DtR and I broke up 15 years ago, how weird is THIS going to be, right?

Not one bit, oddly enough. The little boy, who's a little doll, went out to talk to the firemen, and I walked up to Whosit and said "Fucking Whosit," and she squealed and was like, "OhmiGOD! How ARE you!?? Blahblahblahblahblah!" And so after the firemen left, she, her husband and I shot the breeze for awhile. Hope y'all are sitting down, because here's the big news: DtR's married again. Got himself a youngin' this time -- she's 23 to his going-to-be-39 -- and, according to Whosit, may have been divorced about an hour before he got remarried again. Also, while she loves her brother, he's a lying sack.

No. Get out. Imagine my sur-prise. (yawn)

So I told her before I left that mark my words, he's going to read my story, and I'm going to have an e-mail sitting in my box by time I get out of bed.

So the Gay Games Opening ceremony last night:

4 freaking hours

I mean, I know this is an historic event and I'm all about it, but come. ON. What did y'all do, just pick every LGBT thing you can think of and throw it against the wall to see if it would stick!?? Because there were about four dance routines too many up in there, and they all highlighted that one guy that you usually end up wanting to pick off with a blow dart. You know who I'm talking about: The one who skulks around doing a low-rent Michael Flatley impersonation without the tap? Yeah, that guy. I hate that guy, especially since it looked like he was wearing gray leopard muscle pants. And what was up with all the maudlin songs and readings!?? I thought it was supposed to be all about getting people happy and fired up and ready to compete, not jump off a cliff. Jeez. But aside from the overall length of the program, it really was exceptionally cool seeing all the athletes from around the world storm Soldier Field. Favorite moments: The lone athlete from Uganda (woo!), seeing Indiana better represented than The Baby and I expected, and then seeing the state of Illinois send maybe 20 people total and actually believing that was all there was until the very end, when Team Chicago exploded onto the field with at least a thousand people. Mad cool.

Meanwhile, I was on Garden Walk duty this weekend, where I found the two houses I want for my very own. One was a darling little cottage house in Gary's Miller section no more than 500 feet away from the lake, and the other this behemoth in Schererville that looks like something straight out of Tuscany with a garden that surrounds the property and extends halfway onto the cul-de-sac. At 6,500 square feet, the latter house would be a little too big for my tastes, though, so the Miller house would be just enough for me.

Well, the opening ceremonies, anyway -- B-Dubs just talked me into going with him and The Baby. The after-party is all them, however, as 1) I'm not gay, and 2) I'm not young and in possession of the stamina needed to stay out until 6 a.m. dancing to techno anymore. And in order to avoid a repeat of last time, we have a plan so that I'll get to take my leave.

So to the wonderful people who're going to Ogmeet this evening, I extend my regrets but promise that I'll be around for the October hookup no matter what. Promise.

Got 'em up about a month and a half ago in an antiques store when I went down to Lowell and my assignment got rained out:

Best part? They're vintage Ray-Bans. Even better? Got 'em for $8 freakin' bucks, man! Tara's Sean laughed at me when I wore them to my boss' 4th party, but I think they're cool. And the pic is me (natch) with The Baby being retarded at Pride. So far, it's the only one where I think we look even remotely alike. As usual, no making fun of my ginormous head and 25 chins.

So tonight's assignment had me at court awaiting the ruling of this guy who amassed 278 charges of animal neglect -- they weren't ALL animal neglect; many of them were code violations, but still -- and I ended up aiding and abetting two bonafide tweakers that amazingly enough aren't related to me. You might be wondering how the hell I ended up doing that. Well, allow me to start by saying that although I realize a courtroom is not the best place to see society's finest, this particular courtroom was, like, whoa with the dregs. And because the courtroom is so small, about 50 of them were standing outside waiting to be called in. I was talking to another completely cracked-out broad who of course has this juicy story to tell me about how the law won't give her back her kids (I'm guessing it's ultimately because she's a crackhead, but I got only bits and pieces of the story since she's now slightly agoraphobic after her car accident and needed some Xanax real bad) when these two other women kept coming in and out of the courtroom looking for a phone. I lent them mine. The story went that they needed to go back to the one's dad's house to cash a check at a bar for the fine the one was going to have to pay for whatever her charge was, which I kinda wondered about since the judge usually gives people between 30 and 60 days to come up with the scratch, but whatever. So the one asked me if I would take her to the old man's house so the other one wouldn't get nailed for failure to appear, and since I had at least an hour to kill before I'd get to talk to who I needed, I said all right.

So the whole car ride, the woman, who was way skinny, yapyapyapYAPPED nonstop about this, that and the other between thanking me profusely and saying my name over and over so she wouldn't forget it. Among the things she told me: She's bipolar, and that's why she can't pass the test to get her license; her friend back at the courtroom just got diagnosed with breast cancer after being hospitalized with an infection for having the wrong false teeth given to her (wha? Yeah, that's what I thought.); and that her friend's dad is a former city mucky-muck who had a stroke and that she and the daughter are taking care of him. Anyway, we get to the old man's crib, a shithole flophouse above the ol' family store complete with all kinds of detritus, and the woman has him write a check for $100, but then chides him for writing it out of an account that has his and his other daughter's name on it. Half-naked and a whole lot disoriented, the poor bastard writes then another check while telling me of how he used to be a city mucky-muck. I then take her to a bar to cash the check, and then back to the courthouse, where she met back up the daughter. When I told them I couldn't give them a ride, they walked off across the street and suckered some other guy. This was after she told me mucky-muck's daughter was too weak to walk from the wrong false teeth infection or the cancer or whatever.

And so I thought to myself, are all drug addicts the same? Do they all clamor desperately for attention, good or bad? Because these two were no different than Crackhead.

Or even if it does just sorta, we wear it because it's cool. Below, the newest edition to my concert shirt collection (and no laughing at my gigantic head):

I was sitting here in the office where the view's obstructed from the giant plum tree the landlords have yet to prune this summer, and there's this gurgling noise like it's raining, but I couldn't see anything, and then when I went into my room to see if I could hear it there, I couldn't. So, I was like nah, it's not raining, but then I looked out the window and saw that the streets are wet and there are puddles with raindrops. Strange. It's gotta be raining.

Except it's not raining:

In about six hours, I'm going to be sitting in the United Center watching the goddess of all things pseudosacreligious with BFKAS and B-Dubs. My baby sister went last night and said she was freakin' phenomenal, but I just can't seem to get myself psyched up. For 135 bones, this better be good.

Because I'm still waiting for my scrub and hand cream, and I ordered it a month ago. Hellooooooo, people.

So other than having to drop $150 on two new tires because my alignment ate the others, notta lotta is still going on up in Chez Broad, except I? am wearing my new green cargo pants that I couldn't get into two months ago when I bought them, huzzah. Haven't really done anything in particular to make that happen one way or another, but I'll take what I can get, thankyew. And they're not even stretchy pants.

Because how is it that I did NOT know that one of my pretend celebrity boyfriends, John Mayer, dated Jennifer Love Hewitt?

Why do I always look like such a tard when I take pictures of myself?

Tonight, as a follow-up to my American Idol story from last year, I was forcedassigned to watch the finale and then talk to some of the people I interviewed for it to get their reactions on the winner, and wouldn't you know that the one bitch I was able to get a hold of who told me she'd be home watching it conveniently wasn't home, therefore making me suffer through that crap.

(Based on her iciness when I talked to her this afternoon, though, I'm not entirely surprised. She probably thought my story last year was going to be all about HER and it wasn't. But it's not like the paper cared about Idol that much, anyway -- not when there's murder and mayhem afoot -- so joke's on you, beeyotch.)

Yeah, so Poppy called it that Taylor "thank-God-they-put-tight-pants-on-him-tonight-so-he-couldn't-jump- around-like-Snidge's-nefew-doing-his-poop-dance" Hicks would be the next sucker, based on the fact that the winners so far have been 1) a lithesome brunette, 2) an overweight black male, 3) an illiterate black woman and 4) a blonde who pretended to be a pop star but who really is a country star, and that with all the money the AI people have invested in the show and its hype it would have to be staged, but c'mon, people! He BLEW! Couldn't sing a note all damn night. Not even Toni Braxton could help him out, but then again, she sounded like ass, too. And I would've completely loved the Clay Aiken segment, were it not for ol' Clay sidling around like this one gay theater major I used to hang with in college when he was trying to channel Gary Oldman in Bram Stoker's Dracula. Longer hair becomes ol' Gay ... I mean, Clay.* But Prince is now dead to me.

Anyway, when it's not ass-humid out and my hair isn't all frizzed up, remind me to post a picture of my awesome new haircut. Picture a cross between Louise Brooks and Emo Phillips, and you're close.

Over at Greta's waiting for a load of laundry to dry (gotta have some fresh towels on hand for my grrrl upon her arrival tomorrow, after all), but when I was trolling around MySpace earlier (I know, I know, I said MySpace is for the young, but that doesn't mean I can't look. It could be research. You don't know) I totally came across a couple of guys with whom I went to high school way back in the day. Now, I know them as Goran and Dejan, two of the hottest and most popular guys in school, but y'all might know them as indie band extraordinaire THE GUFS!

I KNOW! How could I forget that!??

Well, it's easy when they're too cool for NWI and play places like The Double Door and Milwaukee Summerfest instead of McCool's and Rosie's, but even though Dejan and I were in college together, it's not like we were super super close or anything, so you know, you lose track of people and whatnot.

So anyway, I thought for fun I'd add Dejan to my buddy list to see if he might remember me, and whaddya know? He totally does! And -- AND -- he still has a review I wrote about The Gufs from, like, '92 when they played at the Elbo Room! That was the night I picked up this John Cusack lookalike (with Larry, my date, standing right there); "London Calling" was playing in the background, and I was wearing a black mock turtle and put black eyeliner only on the top lid for dramatic effect. How fucking funny. Of course, thinking about how twee and unrefined my writing was back then, I'm kind of weirded out that he still has it, but still. I'm going to have to look in my old portfolio, because I'm sure I still have it in there.

Jooools, you must pick up on this band as well as Goran's solo efforts! I'll bet you would love them.