Ugh. My headaches are back. Just when I thought I was rid of this accursed affliction, ugh, they’re back. But I get ahead of myself. Around middle of last year, I got into the wonderful sport of underwater hockey. I was having so much fun that I really wanted to be really good at it. So, since I don’t know the concept of “moderation”, I trained like a 21-year-old trapped in a 40-year-old body. I pushed my limits in holding my breath, until one particular breath hold, I surfaced, gasped a deep breath of cool, chlorinated air, and realized I was heady and a bit dizzy, with a mild throbbing in my head that was growing steadily stronger. That was the start of this cross wrapped in barbed wire that I have been bearing for more than a year now. I’d get the most debilitating headaches that would sometimes last a whole day. It was most severe the first 6 months, but the intensity and the frequency have both tapered off as the months passed. But every now and then, they’d be back, knocking on my door, like unwanted relatives that you have no choice but to tolerate. They drop by just regularly enough to refresh my memory, in case I have forgotten just how excruciating pain can be. How painful are my headaches? On bad days, it feels like liquid razor blades are running through the arteries in my head. The pain starts out on the right side of my neck, and I feel like I’m passing jagged kidney stones and thumb tacks, only in the bloodstream in my head. And the throbbing! Like thousands of steel mallets thundering on the inside of my skull, pounding on raw, pulsating veins. Here’s a visual representation of how my headaches feel:
Tiny demons pounding and hacking at your head is pretty much close to how it feels. I decided to write this while I’m squirming with pain to give this post some justice. I tried everything — pain relievers, acupuncture, massage/hilot, supplements, you name it. Lordy, some relief would be nice for 2008…
Meet Isis, my female Persian cat. She’s not the usual peke-faced Persian, without that scrunched up face usually associated with the breed. But nevertheless, she’d always win in cat shows, eventually winning enough points to become a champion. Inevitably, I had her spayed, since it’s the responsible and humane thing to do for responsible and humane pet owners. It’s actually healthier for the animal, and true enough, Isis got healthier, she got heavier, and her fur just got thicker and fluffier than ever. Actually, she got so ploofy that she ended up with double the hair she originally had. Therefore, the point of this post. We weren’t prepared for the grooming requirements for such long hair (bad pet owners!) Eventually she ended up with huge balls of matted hair everywhere on her body! It got so bad that when we brought her in for professional grooming, they said there was no choice but to shave off all her hair except the hair on her head and her tail. Her crowning glory shaved off! It was heartbreaking and hilarious at the same time. When we saw her for the first time, we didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. It was called the “lion cut”. Presenting: my shaved pussy.
In case you’re wondering what this picture is all about — yes, it’s an elephant eating a Christmas tree. In Germany’s Zoo Dresden, they feed leftover trees to elephants, camels, deer, and sheep in a traditional New Year feast of discarded Christmas trees. One of the most revered symbols of the most celebrated holiday in the Christian world, the great Tannenbaum, ending up ignominiously as herbivore excrement in a matter of hours. That sort of puts into perspective all the holiday hullabaloo that many people get into a frantic tizzy about – that in the end, stripped of all the glitter and tinsel, it’s all really just bull**it (or in this case, elephant poop). I’m sorry to be scrooge-ing on the eve of a holiday that is sacred to many. In fact so many people are grinch-ing (a synonym of scrooge-ing) during Christmas that it has become such a cliche to be NOT into the season. I actually think it’s more rebellious now to subscribe to the Christmas Spirit since the majority have already joined the “yule-ain’t-cool” movement. It’s like a backlash to the backlash. The truth is, I don’t feel the holiday cheer. I want to get it over and done with. I can’t wait for life to be normal again. I feel like it’s all about the money and my wallet is like a ravenous beast with a hungry, gaping maw. The kids will probably play with the toys you gave them for about 10 minutes, then move on to a bigger, better toy, and forget about who gave them what. And I do NOT want to deck the halls with boughs of holly. Deck them yourself and leave me out of it. That said, I really still want to believe in Christmas the way I solemnly did when I was much, MUCH (as in decades) younger. Just because I feel that Christmas has become a mandatory celebration, (Whappack! “Look lively, you lily-livered riffraff! Rejoice and celebrate, whether you like it or not, you mothercluckers!”) it doesn’t mean I don’t subscribe to what it aspires for. It’s actually a noble cause, to want to annually remind people of the “good” stuff — the basic “good”ness of human nature, “good”will for all mankind, blah this, blah that. It’s the translation from doctrine to deed that seemed to have lost its way. So I’m a scrooge not because I don’t believe in Christmas, or what it stands for, but because I can’t seem to re-live the enchantment that held sway over me in my youth. I still believe in it, I just can’t seem to feel it, no matter how hard I try. It’s like Yuletide impotence, I can’t seem to get the spirit up. But the fight is far from over! I will feel the Christmas Spirit again even if I have to take emotional viagra to do it. Maybe if I look at sexy reindeer pictures over a glass of Sarsi with egg? Merry Christmas Everyone! (I mean it, REALLY!)
A news item we did the other day said that more and more people are googling themselves. So I did. And boy, what a motley crew popped up on my screen! First, let me show you some of the many Chico Garcias I found on the net:
It’s tough when you get stabbed in the back. Especially if you didn’t expect it (which is the very essence of backstabbing, because if you did know about it, then it would be frontstabbing, right?), it’s a disconcerting feeling. It’s extra insidious, because when you see them, they’re all smiles and warm and friendly, then the moment you turn your back – you’re talked about, you’re made fun of, and you’re minced meat. And the ones who do it best, are usually the LAST people you would expect to plant hundreds of tiny daggers in your back. They never attack you upfront. The cutting down happens in small increments, little by little, one passing “harmless” comment about you after another. The character assassination is never done in an obvious manner, they’re too clever for that. They poison the minds of others to hate you in such minute doses that the hapless brainwashees actually think that they have arrived at this conclusion on their own, with no prodding from anyone else. It’s like putting half a drop of arsenic everyday in someone’s coffee. They’ll never know what hit them. Here’s a tip: if someone is talking trash to you about other people, TRUST ME, you’re not exempt from this. They talk about you to other people, the way they talk to you about others. Don’t let anyone dictate to you, who to like and who to loathe. This is the conclusion they arrived at. I’m not even saying they’re wrong. Hell, maybe they’re right! But make your own conclusions about people, based on your own experiences! What may apply to one person doesn’t necessarily apply to everyone else. If their relationship was permanently marred by whatever conflict, most likely, you probably had nothing to do with it. So, how do you know when people are saying things behind your back? When you enter a room and everyone suddenly goes quiet, like there was a vocal brownout. When the same people are extra, EXTRA friendly and solicitous to you after the incident (it’s called “guilt” or “spin control” or my favorite, “covering your ass”). When people who used to be cool with you are suddenly aloof, or wouldn’t talk to you in view of the others. When you hear people mouth sentiments that are obviously not their own, but they betray the fact that they picked it up from somewhere (or someone) else. When people are extra curious about your personal life, as if to confirm a rumor they heard passed around. When they ask you questions, as if fishing for an answer that would display a lack in either intellect, discriminating taste, or good judgment. And when they find one, they feast on it, like a school of lampreys, ripping at the rotting flesh of their carcass prey. When people you hardly know have such an allergic reaction to you, as if the mere mention of your name sends them ptui-ing, to get the awful taste out. And most delicious of all, when someone actually rats on them, and recounts to you the nasty things that they’ve been saying about you, word for vicious word. So busted, so wicked. But like I said, I don’t discount the chance that what these people say are accurate to a degree. Maybe they’re right, but maybe they’re wrong too. My beef is, they don’t give others a chance to discover their own feelings about people, because they are “fed” how to feel about them. As if the worst thing you can do is to like the people they have decided to communally hate. But to be fair, there is a veeeeeeery fine line between merely stating an honest opinion about others (which is everyone’s right) and all-out campaigning against them. Who is to say which is which? Only God can be the judge of our hearts’ truest intentions. I’m not here to finger specific criminals, I just want to discuss the crime. We have all been guilty of this at one point or another. Just because I write about it, doesn’t mean I’m comfy on my high horse, faultless of the follies I have written about. But the hope is, when you feel the sting of how it is to be on the receiving end, you remind yourself that once, you were the aggressor too, and that therefore it’s imperative you refrain from indulging in the urge again, the next time you feel the itch to tear somebody down. I guarantee you won’t be a happy camper if the same is done to you. That’s why I admire people who hear whatever others have to say, but who can filter all the information with an objective sieve, and reserve for themselves the right to deliver the final verdict. They’re not sheep in a flock, or germs in an infection. They wield something that sadly, very few exercise these days – independent thought.
All my life, I was the textbook loser. Especially when it came to lotteries and raffles. I swear, I NEVER won anything in those things. Even as a kid I’d be the eager beaver when it came to filling out raffle coupons, foolishly excited at the idea of winning something out of sheer luck. But through the seventies and the eighties and the nineties, I won pretty much oodles of nothing, tons of zeroes, and millions of diddly-squat. For me the apex of my rotten luck was one year, during an RX Christmas party, when we were having our company raffle. There were 2 people left, and there were 2 prizes left. It was just me and another RX jock, and the remaining prizes were a kick-ass TV, and 1,500 worth of GC’s from a hamburger joint. I really thought I was going to take home a brand new TV. Guess which DJ ended up with the crappy GC’s? A fortune teller even told me once, “you’re not lucky in raffles or any other kind of gambling.” Duh, ya think? Even in love I had no luck. Even the losers thought I was a loser. It didn’t really bother me anymore, I eventually just treated it as a disability, like a limp or a missing finger. But then strangely, out of nowhere, it just turned. In the early 2000′s, we were at a Coke event and the grand prize in the raffle was a boombox. When they announced the winner, it sounded like a foreign word – it sounded to me like, “Bambalaboogah!” The experience of hearing my name announced as a winner in a raffle was so alien to me that I couldn’t even recognize my own name! After that, I’ve started winning in raffles – nothing major, like a car or millions in the lotto, just simple prizes – but at least the curse seemed to have been lifted. In different raffles, I’ve won a watch, a toaster oven, free gas, a DVD player last year, and just last Friday during the RX Christmas party, I won a portable DVD player! And it’s just so weird that people now generally consider me lucky (or for my enemies, “a lucky bastard”). But I guess the biggest sign for me that the tide has finally turned in my favor, is hitting the jackpot with the biggest prize I have ever won to date — finding my one true love. Naks!
Oh. My. Golly. Gulay. Last December 7, 2007 was a night to remember (Yes, Shalamar, you heard me right). We thankfully got tickets to the Vertical Horizon and I swear it was the best I ever had (hehehe…yup, it’s going to be that kind of post). They give you everything you want and then some! I’m still here, almost a week after, still unable to accept that it’s over. How I wish the show would go on forever. Matt Scannell, you’re a god. Okay, okay, enough! Better judgement and a modicum of good taste demand that I quit this juvenile fawning (Fawnition? Fawninity? Fawnshop? Lordy, I’m in a cornball mood) and get down to business. We got to meet and greet the band, which basically means a photo-op, 2 pics, then out we went. Wham, bam, thank you ma’am, not even time for a cuddle and a ciggie. Still drunk and giddy on the fact that we just occupied the same room and shook hands with the band, we proceeded to our seats to catch the tail end of Rivermaya’s set with their new lead singer. Then, Jamie Kennedy came on stage and we were surprisingly (sorry Jamie, we had REALLY low expectations…) laughing our heads off! He won me over the first minute because the guy is simply hilarious. With the crowd sufficiently fluffed, the time was then ripe for Vertical Horizon to take center stage and to give us, what for me was the best rapport between performer and audience I have ever personally witnessed. I’ve watch bigger, more famous acts, but the connection in this show was really palpable. So much love going back and forth, to and from the stage. And did I mention that we really enjoyed ourselves? We even called up a friend in the U.S. so she could listen to 2 songs – “Best I Ever Had” and “I’m Still Here”. So here’s my humble homage to a band I now respect even more than before. Hat’s off to you, Vertical Horizon!
Technically speaking, Gizmo, is a mogwai. That’s what you call them when they’re cute and fluffy and furby and shmooshy. If you expose a mogwai to sunlight, it will die. If you get a mogwai wet, they painfully multiply into lots of mogwai. Now, if you feed a mogwai after midnight, that’s when the fun begins. They form cocoons and emerge as evil reptilian versions of themselves, called gremlins, leaving murder and mischief in their wake. Love reminds me a lot of these creatures. If you’re vigilant and you give it the constant nurturing it demands, and you keep it away from the things that are bad for it, then you’ll be pretty much on the okay side. But once you become lazy with your duties and you become careless, then you let your guard down and you start making mistakes. Love can’t care for itself, you gotta put in the work. Before you know it, you’re feeding it with the wrong stuff, and you have on your hands a monster ball of pubes (okay, okay, gremlins aren’t furry, they’re scaly. I just wanted an excuse to write the word pubes). I just find it weird that love is like that. Sometimes all it takes is the smallest detail to spell the difference between cuddly and demonic. Only problem is, unlike gremlins, love isn’t in the realm of fantasy. It’s something that could potentially mean a lifetime state of bliss, or a life sentence of hard labor. It’s a knee-slapping riot to see those creatures wreak havoc on some mythical village up on the silver screen, but it ain’t so funny when the mayhem is playing out on a daily basis in that real town called, “mylifesville”. The light at the end of poop chute though, is that unlike the critters in the movie, the capriciousness of love is reversible. Jekyll/Hyde, Bruce Banner/Hulk, mogwai/gremlin, or whatever your pop reference may be, it’s basically the duality of everything in life. Love is neither more of one nor more of the other. It’s a buy one, take one deal, and it’s really up to the people concerned as to which one they’ll have to deal with more often. Love can either fill the canyons in your soul, or it can have you staring at the great abyss that your life has become.
Last November 28, Wednesday, we had the pleasure of interviewing over the phone, the lead singer of Vertical Horizon, Matt Scannell. It made me think about all the other artists I ever interviewed in the many years I’ve been doing radio. So here they are, as far as I can remember, the stars (some still burning brightly, while some have snuffed out) who have crossed my path through the years, and some of my comments about them. In no particular order (chronological or fame-wise):
