The Jigtastic Journal of J. Na Na

After a deplorably sedentary weekend and boosted by an after work Vivarin, I took a late night stroll through downtown last night. I used to take them all the time when I first moved to Nob Hill. You don’t really appreciate the nuances and details of downtown when you’re worried about catching a bus back to where you live, or dreading the hour plus commute home. So, I walked down Market, past two offices at which I’d interviewed when I’d first moved to SF. Whenever I pass by those places, I always hope that they’ve folded or closed or burned down because they didn’t hire me. This one place, at which I gave what I thought was a great interview, actually sent me a rather smarmy letter declining my hire. I think their building is vacant now, which puts me at peace. I also walked by this pastry shop that doubled (or doubles) as a club downstairs. It was called Romper Room (Hello? How ’90s raver kid can you be?), and it was a new club I went to one night after Universe, stumbling up towards Market three sheets to the wind. I ended up going home, drunk goggles firmly attached, with this rather gory guy. I passed by the street where Learn It! is, one of the few dot-com survivors that teaches people Excel, Acrobat, Access, etc., where our department once spent the day doing an Excel training (although I daresay having lunch downtown was more informative and fun). I went to they Hyatt because I had to pee, and didn’t realize they have this whole arboretum level that looks like heaven. I felt like a criminal trying to find a place to poo, and swore they would kick me out any minute, but made it in and out in due time. I passed by the Transbay Terminal, which reminded me of my days living on that godawful Treasure Island. I would end my cracked out nights at the End Up around 4:00, wait around in the dead still night for the late night bus to come, and hightail it home. I went by Mel’s Diner, where I once ate after seeing "Heartbreakers" with my trick at the time in 2000. And where J. Co and I dined after seeing "Dreamgirls" in 2005. And there’s a reason I’ve only ever eaten there twice. And then I passed by this guy I’ve had this crush on for a few years near Westfield Shopping Center, and he looked at me. I’m not sure it was all that great of a look since I’d a) been without night firming creme lotion for a week, and was probably lookin’ a bit shook b) had run out of the good daytime creme because the Body Shop temporarily recalled it c) wasn’t wearing any self-tanner; and d) had run out of hair gel, and must have looked wind-torn and misbegotten He probably thought, What a shame! But what the hay. Not like I stand a chance with him in a million anyway. Happy 3-dayer, folks! Can’t wait ’til it’s friggin here.

It was a distinctive experience, to put it mildly, to awaken yesterday morning, run the shower, and feel the rush of water brought in directly from the center of the Arctic region coming through my showerhead.  Unabated.  And from the faucet.  So while I waited and waited for it to warm up with time awastin’, I eventually relented, and just scrubbed myself down like some hobo in a gas station and went to work with bed head.  Dead sexy.

I’ve never really gone to the park that’s right across from Grace Cathedral and that famous hotel right near where I live.  I pass by it all the time on the way home from work, and people always have their dogs out. 

So, after I’d gone to the grocery store Saturday and gotten off the bus, I went in, sat on a bench, and started reading.  Immediately, a beige bulldog left its owner, trotted right up to me, jumped onto the bench, and adopted me.  It was the most adorable thing ever, especially since I’m accustomed to the affectionate-on-a-whim mentality of the nefarious Sugar.  The dog’s owner was yapping away on her cell phone, so I just petted the dog, who occasionally turned up and started licking my face.

Hallmark moment, you guys.

What’s up with China?  Lip-synching little girls and underage gymnasts?  Straighten up, Chungwa.

I often wonder how much of Sugar’s cat hair I’ve unintentionally ingested in the year and a half we’ve had her. 

Hanson or the Jonas Brothers?  I actually wouldn’t mind taking on all six.  At the same time, no less.

Remember when Minute Maid came in a black carton?  What were they thinking?  The juice of death that goes perfect with your breakfast?

One morning the other weekend, I woke up and went into the hallway and noticed the light was on in J. Co’s room.  Ice-cold fear shot through me, as she’s been on vacay in Peru for the last month and I’ve been on my own.  My eyes went wide as I realized my greatest fear had come true: someone had broken into the house.  I crept down the hall, listening for sounds, and prepared to open the door, expecting to find some crackhead, deshelved transient rifling through her things.  I steeled my nerves, prepared for the worst, and pushed upon the door with a whoosh…. and was met with a sun-dappled, person-free room.  The sun had come out, and filled the room with light, and I was safe for another day.

Friday night, Dasch and I did the End Up, which was once called Fag Fridays on Friday nights, but now is called Ghettodisco.  One of my favorite local DJs, Hawthorne, usually spins, but instead it was some guy who kept doing shout outs during the night.  Which I don’t quite like.

For example, there was some song about "being free" and he would say over the mike, "Is everyone feelin’ free tonight?" (cue drunken whooping and hollering).

No thanks, you guys.

But I suppose being the old man I am, and something of an End Up alumnus, I was bound to compare the night to the nights of old.  And while it was cool to chill with Dasch, dance to a few great house hits, and sip on sex on the beaches, it was something of a far cry from dancing the night away on a double-sided tulip as in the early 2000s.

Saturday, as I stepped out of the apartment preparing to take a load of laundry downstairs, our next door neighbor–I think her name is Julie, although I don’t really care, ’cause she’s a bit nosy, is married to this rather hot Asian guy, and has this adorable little son, so she’s obviously a chief member of the Fuckin’ Lucky Club–asked me point blank, "Do you guys have fleas?  ‘Cause we have fleas, and we don’t even have a cat anymore."

I got the gist and implication of her comment right away.  But Sugar is an indoor cat, and fleas come from the grass and the fields.  And J. Co and I barely even like to go downstairs, much less into nature, so we couldn’t have heralded in such an infestation.

"No," I simply responded to her.

"I sprayed all right here," she noted towards the entrance of her apartment, her inference becoming an outright accusation, and her rudeness climaxing. 

Maybe you should dunk your kid in some flea dip, bitch.  Children who play around in the playground and the forests and the wheat pastures or wherever they go are much more likely to contract some sort of vermin or disease than folks who stick to the cement safari.

Just a thought.

I remember sitting down with my two straight-laced, straight girl roommates my junior year of college and watching the exciting premier of Madonna’s "Frozen" video in 1997.  There was all this fervor over Madge joining forces with William Orbit and coming out with this new electronica sound.  And of course, it was Madonna, so who wouldn’t be interested?

And you remember the "Frozen" video, right?  The one where she looks like some new-age love child of Morticia from "The Adams Family" and some character from "The Grudge", set against this evening blue, mountainous landscape.

Well, we’re watching the video, and within the first minute, during which Madonna falls back and breaks into a flock of blackbirds as the song begins to crescendo, straight girl roommate #1 (her high school’s prom queen–no joke) asked aloud, "I wonder if she’s ever done drugs?"  To which straight girl roommate #2 immediately replied, "I was just thinking the same thing!"

To which I thought, My, how small minds think alike.

How big a dent in your brain must you have to assume that anything so innocuously surreal or interesting is the byproduct of drug abuse?  Mind you, the video’s director may have popped a few tabs of LSD in his lifetime.  And Madge has admitted to doing at least E in the past.  But nothing is more unerring than people who walk the straight and narrow and see nothing of the periphery of the world, always assuming that that which they don’t see or ever encounter is dangerous and criminal.

It’s a very see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil way of life, and it’s bland as bullshit if you ask me.

Some bastard-ass piece of shit stole my comforter and a nearly-empty bottle of detergent at the laundromat on Saturday.  The nearly-empty bottle of detergent, I was willing to part with.  And the comforter, which was oversized, somewhat stained, and ready to be replaced, was no deep loss either.

But it’s the second time I’ve been robbed at the same local laundromat.  It’s what happens when you leave stuff there too long.  But I’d been overburdened with 3000 pounds of groceries when I’d gotten home, and figured it could wait.

So, I put my non-pilfered load of laundary into the dryer, went home, located a chance bottle of quarter-full detergent, and poured into it the following:

1. 2 cups of Draino (maximum strength)
2. 1 cup of bleach (ultra whitening)
3. a 60 second stream of Raid bug spray (ants, roaches, and spiders)
4. a few globules of my super-stainy brown eyebrow dye (otherwise I look like an albino)

The consistency, I have to say, was surreptitiously divine, and smelled sweet as could be.  You’d never know that what lie within that quaint purple bottle bearing daisies and Snuggle the Cuddle Bear promising a fresh, clean wash reminiscent of a bright, spring morning actually bore a fabric-obliterating concoction of devious proportions.  I then walked back down to the laundromat, left the bottle there, and took my load home.

I hope whoever takes it is crushed.