A Violent Case of Blue Balls

Just returned from a whirlwind jaunt to NYC. First time I've been back since I left in January, and in a lot of ways it felt like I never left. The bustle, the cold, the dirtiness, the glamour and the style - it's a familiar cocktail that's still fresh in my mind. And though I had a lovely, lovely time visiting my old city and especially spending time with my dear friends, I realized how much happier I am out here in California. There's a feeling of freedom I get here that I never had in NYC. I just always felt so...stifled there.

But that's not what this post is about. Nay, this post is very important. This post is to recount the very strange events of the late night and early morning of Saturday, October 22, 2005.

It didn't look promising to begin with. Friday had been a late night on the Lower East Side. Many vodka cocktails were drank, many cigarettes were smoked. Saturday was cold and rainy and generally the kind of foul day when all you really want to do is curl up on the couch and watch mindless movies and eat warm foods. But when one is only in NYC for 60 hours, one does not have that luxury. One must buck up and make the most of a shitty situation.

So I hauled myself up off the couch, quite painfully I might add, and my girls Clarice and Miss Emily and I braved the driving rain, thunderstorms and lack of available cabs and hit the town. We left our cohorts and fellow merry makers from the night before Anne Y and Ann G at home - as seasoned New Yorkers, they knew we were in for nothing but empty wallets and ruined shoes.

It started off on shaky ground. We had a very New York meal at a global tapas restaurant in the E. Village - small, weird food in a "sultry" (or so said the review) atmosphere. A foursome of ambiguous sexual orientation sat next to us. The waitress had a sexy accent. The chef asked us to tell our friends. Par for the course. After that we headed over to Puck Fair and met up with my friends Allison and Keasey, true New York girls about town. They regaled us with stories of backhanded smacks (foreshadowing?) and a dude with "malevolance" tattooed across his back. In retrospect, I believe this conversation may have set the tone for the night.

Puck Fair was too loud and full of bridge and tunnel types, so we headed across the street to Pravda for a russian vodka cocktail and in hopes of chatting with eurotrash types. No such luck, although we did run into a dude who was hotter than Jude Law and was the subject of much gawking from our party. But Pravda was somehow not right either...no Eurotrash, too many financial types who thought they were rockstars, and weird vibes coming from some very young seeming dudes. Not our scene. So we finally retreated to the East Village, with the intentions of hitting Niagara and possibly 7B later on. Ideal grounds for flirting with dirty rocker types, right up Clarice and Miss Emily's alley. And mine too, I guess.

Within minutes of arriving it was on. The bar was crowded and I looked over at this guy who was ordering for himself and his friend and started to talk shit. I accused him of ordering a Bud on ice and he took it in stride, proving me wrong by holding up a Johnny Walker Black. So we start talking to these two guys, and find out they are both from Portland. Stephen, a black dude with dreads and horn rimmed glasses similar to mine, claims to be in working in fashion design (in Portland? Ok) and was visiting his friend Tannen, a short brown haired indie looking white boy who had only recently moved to NYC and is a landscape architect. They were both very cute and charming and funny and they took many shots of Jager (I blame Clare) with us. It was good times. Clare was hitting it off with Tannen, I was hitting it off with Stephen, Miss Emily was crunk. We headed over to 7B for the hell of it. It was a veritable dive bar tour. I believe there was another Jager shot at 7B. There were no Strokes there but many people who looked like them. I can't remember at this point whether I was drinking vodka or beer. The bar closed, so we jumped in a cab and headed back to Chelsea to apt 5C. We clambered up all five flights and brought the proverbial ruckus with us - Miss Emily couldn't quite get the key to work and is reported to have been yelling "I've been evicted, oh my god they evicted me" or something to that effect.

We get in and Mlle E instantly commandeers the stereo. She's playing Kanye West at full volume, and despite repeated entreaties, will not turn it down. Again, reports indicate that she keeps saying "this is SUCH a great song," and is met with the reply of "yes, but it still sounds great if you turn it down a little." At one point I go over and turn it down myself and she looks me dead in the eye and turns it right back up. I give up after that.

Meanwhile, in the kitchen Clare and Tannen and Stephen are drinking beers and smoking cigs. There's some random making out going on between the revelers. But it's late and I've only had about 10 hours of sleep over the last few nights, and I don't want to make out with this dude any more than I already have, so I break the news gently to my gentleman friend and tell him to peace out. Due to the packed house (keep in mind Anne and Ann are there too, ostensibly sleeping), I also make it clear to him that he can't stay with me. He takes it well and is a perfect gentleman, and thanks me for a good time. And with that I head back to the bedroom and am out within minutes.

Unbeknownst to me, back in the living room Clare and Tannen are on the couch, not really making out but sitting very close together. And Anne and Ann are up trying to tend to Miss Emily, who has passed out on the floor of her bedroom with her head in the closet, and to get water and suchlike because they have been so rudely awakened. Stephen, probably feeling weird about the sober pajama clad ladies in the room and the fact that he had been dismissed, starts telling Tannen it’s time to go. Tannen, who is clearly on the verge of passing out, has no intention of leaving, but Stephen can’t give up because he’s staying with Tannen back in Williamsburg, and has no idea how to get home. So it starts to get heated, and the f-word is bandied about, and Stephen starts to rudely tell Tannen to “put on your distressed Vans, dude, they’re old school, and let’s get out of here.” Tannen apparently is not taking kindly to this and reaches up from the couch and BITCH SLAPS the glasses off Stephen’s face, and they go flying across the room. Stephen looks stunned for a split second and then immediately responds in a vicious fury, jumping on Tannen and rapidly pummeling him with at least five swift strikes to eye/face. Eyewitnesses later describe the scene by ramming their fists sharply into their palms to recreate the sound. In the midst of this Anne Y (a petite lady, no taller than 5’) grabs the glass topped coffee table and moves it out of the way of the fracas. And somehow Clarice, in an attempt to break it up, receives a broken pinky finger. But within seconds it’s over, leaving the entire room dumbstruck. Stephen gets in a few choice words like “that’ll teach you to knock a man’s Gucci glasses off his face,” and Anne tells him to get the fuck out of her house. He responds with “you’re just lucky I’m not packing, cats in Portland pack!” before his retreat.

Back on the couch, Tannen’s eye has already swollen shut and Clare’s pinky looks like it has become detached from the rest of her hand. (Alas, there were brilliant drawings of the hand and the eye on the paper table cloth at lunch the next day that I truly wish I had saved and scanned in for this post.) The next hour is spent in a wash of fading adrenaline as Clare alternates between swabbing the boy’s wound (he is bleeding profusely from a cut under his eye) and trying to solicit an apology for the broken digit. (Which never came.) At one point Tannen’s phone rings – “it’s my girlfriend, I have to take this.” Also Stephen keeps calling from downstairs asking when they can go home. Tannen: “dude, this is really fucked up, females are injured up here, maybe you should come back up here and we should talk about it.” (Anne and Ann: "NOOO!") Tannen at one point gets up and looks in the fridge for something to eat, and at one point cracks a beer, all the while leaving bloodied Kleenexes strewn about.

And eventually at around 7, the night draws to a close.

I don’t know if I’ve done it justice, but the best part is, this is just the most recent in a long line of sordid tales. Oh, do we know how to pick them.

So this one goes out to my girls in NYC and the ATL…who has more fun than we do? No one, that’s who. I love you all and can’t wait for another weekend of debauchery and malfeasance soon. Mexico in 2K6?? We're turning 30, yo. xoxoxoxo