Friday, November 07, 2008

FUCK YOU CALIFORNIA

Right in the lungs. You passed Prop 8? You evil, bigoted hypocrites. How dare you legislate discrimination in my country. You make me ashamed to be American.



I add my fickle finger of fate to that of Joe In Vegas and Heather.
There's my wedding ring. That represents 22 years of marriage. I've upped it with the tattoo I got that represents my permanent commitment to my family. I put all that behind my convictions here,. I will not tolerate this bullshit in my country. Repeal Proposition 8 NOW.

Monday, November 03, 2008

quaint vignettes from my charming rural idyll

My husband is the type of man who might just happen to have a whoopee cushion on him at any given moment, sadly. He is also the kind of person who thinks it's real funny to gives said cushion to his four year old grandson. Who subsequently ran around for the rest of the evening frapping it loudly at people and then collapsing on the floor in hysterics. This made it difficult to follow Antiques Roadshow (shh, honey, quit farting for a second; grandma wants to hear how much the Victorian nipple electrodes are worth!) until his mommy took it away from him. And started farting it at people and collapsing in hysterics. This proves a. that there is such a thing as genetically heritable disposition, and b. we are a real classy group.

Despite the rain, this leaf season has been unusually brilliant. The deciduous trees that color up look as though they are artificially lit. I took a few pictures outside:
Welcome to the view out my front windows as of yesterday afternoon! Let's start by looking northeast from my front porch. What ARE they growing down in that white barn?

...moving ese...the twin to this tree used to stand in the middle of my driveway.

...southeast, toward Tweaker Hill (or Kendall, as its known on maps)

...and straight south.
Let's give my zillion dollar view a big hand!!! This view is one of the many reasons I keep saying that Bill Gates has nothing I want. And I'm serious about this too. CALL THE SALVATION ARMY BILL. REALLY. NO REALLY QUIT IT BILL. GO AWAY.


Remember the pumpkins?
...the full horror becomes apparent after a week out in the weather.

...This is the Opie tree looking spectacular with a wild and crazy black cohosh coming up through it

...and this is my favorite little magnolia stellata going off like fireworks.

Now that we have worshiped the glory that is my view, lets take a quick rip through the galley, shall we? Yes, lets!

The best thing about being my age is that I finally know how do some things with a certain degree of expertise. It's taken me years to finally get to the place where I think that I know a little bit about how to make bread, for example.

Out of everything I've set myself to do, learning how to work with fermentation and grain flours has been the one that turned out to be the trickiest. You can produce a pretty and edible loaf of bread on your first time out provided you can follow a recipe carefully, of course. But to really turn out something that can stand up to an informed opinion means years of practice. You have to develop a knowledge of your materials, tools and even climate with all five of your senses. The only way to do that is to just plain make a whole fuck of a lot of bread. And eat a whole lot of bread, and read about bread, and baking, and flour, and yeasts, and talk about bread, and basically turn into an obsessive with a bread grudge.

At first, when I was around 10-11, I was afraid of the breadmaking process. The dough is all...weird. It was messy and floury. But I was bound and determined that I was not going to be defeated. My grandmother used to make bread every three days from the time she was eight years old for heavens' sake, and she worked with salt batter, sourdoughs, wild yeasts and nonstandard flours!!!! If a barefoot kid in a covered damn wagon could make bread in an iron pot then I damnsure was going to make some bread too.

Making bread is a basic human skill. Once you get into it your realize that you make bread by feel and by intuition moreso than by recipe or technique-once you dig your hands in you can understand how a bunch of pre-literates could have come up with it. The ability to make fermented (and thus easily digested and long-keeping) protein food out of grains is the one thing that separated us forever from the hunter/gatherers. Making bread is how civilization started. People think its agriculture? Oh lord no. Agriculture is just planting seeds in convenient places; good lord, robins do that. Mice do that. Civilization started from the need to settle near the supply long enough to not only plant, guard and harvest a crop, but to husband the final product through its different stages of refinement as a food, document the changes, record the amounts, and store it. As beer.
Yup.
Bread was not the intended final product. Bread was just a stage on the way toward making beer. Which proves that our ancestors were smarter than we are.

Because I am only partially civilized, I just make bread. In this case, challah.
...with a scroungy old Yummy Biker finger serving as a prop there upper right.

This is the best loaf of bread I have ever made in my entire history of making bread, and its also my favorite bread in the entire world. This, friends, is a challah for the ages. A resplendant challah. A perfect challah. Usually its braided, but this time I wanted it for toasted sandwiches so I left it loafy (which is a word because I said it was.) The next time I make it I'll braid it, because I'll be celebrating. Do you know why they braid it? So you can pull it into nice pieces and throw it. Yes. This is a fact. Apparently, you hand bread to people who are mourning. You chunk bread at people who are celebrating.
Consider yourselves chunked at!

Monday, October 27, 2008

UPDATED: Suggest that funky music, white boy!

UPDATE:
OH YEAH! ITS STAYING UP AAAAAAAAAAAAALL WEEK, KATS AND KITTENS! MAYBE EVEN LONGER!!! SO DIG OUT THEM 8 TRACK TAPES AND DUST OFF THAT MP3 PLAYER! SEND IN THOSE PLAY LISTS!!!!


Wow! One failed music meme = a whole weekend listening to your excellent musical suggestions (and a few real stinkers, but hey, we can't all be ballerinas.)

OK. Y'all have suggestions. And complaints.

"Why didn't you include brit faves 'The Overproduced Sellouts' singing "I Got Drunk And Sat On The Side Of The Road And A Policeman Talked To Me'?






Where's 'Rabies Vector' by 'Alvin and the Chipmunks?












And what about the Iggy Pop version of 'Unchained Melody'? "


Fine. I have a comments lounge....use the sucker. Feel free to include as many suggestions, links and titles as you want!!! IMPROVE THE AIRWAVES HERE AT RANCHO FIRSTNATIONS...AND AROUND THE GLOBE!!

What music should we REALLY be listening to?

Friday, October 24, 2008

My taste rules; your taste is sorryass at best

It is a very strange experience to find that someone whose taste you usually admire likes weird music.

Not that the stuff wasn't listenable....some of it...I mean, at least it wasn't 'Madman Across The Water' while you're stuck in an elevator, right...but yeah. I was so puzzled. I ALWAYS like this guys' suggestions. About EVERYTHING.

I shot the dude an e-mail accusing him of fucking around.

He wasn't.

"Its difficult! Try it!" he retorted. 'It' being, come up with the names of 100 songs by 100 different artists right off the top of your head that you like.

Hell yes its difficult; mainly because I never remember the names of songs. Still, you aren't going to know what I mean if I go 'that one by those guys that has that 'DA DADADADA rrrrrOOOOOW' kind of guitar riff in the middle' since that describes most of the songs I like anyway and thats no help for a whole variety of reasons, so I had to resort to YouTube, Amazon Music and my own music collection. I did try to be honest at least as far as trying to find the songs I had in mind. And the different artists thing? Yeah, fail. I cheated the terms of this meme all to fuck. Send the meme police.

Don't ask me where this taste came from. I grew up in the middle of a suburban wasteland that rang to the tinny sounds of Donny Osmond and the Monkees. My parents liked country and western, show tunes, Lawrence Welk and Scandanavian folk music.

So here you go, heres a few of my favorite ditties. Do try and have good speakers; change the batteries in your hearing aid...pacemaker too, come to think of it. Things may spontaneously combust. And watch it with the John Lee Hooker; the love of God will come down upon you heavily and you will be slain in the Spirit.

_______________________________________

Nine Inch Nails: Only, Closer, Capital G

JOHN LEE HOOKER: Bad Like Jessie James, Hobo Blues, Boom Boom, Crawlin King Snake, Serve Me Right To Suffer, Boogie Chillun, Tupelo, I'm in the Mood, Need Love So Bad, Big Legs Tight Skirt, Chicken and Gravy, Gonna Use My Rod, 1 Room Country Shack, Red House

Allman Brothers: Midnight Rider, Whipping Post

Foghat: Slow Ride, Honey Hush

ZZ Top: Asleep in the Desert, Nationwide, La Grange, Manic Mechanic, Chicago

Steely Dan: Chain Lightning, Show Biz Kids, Black Friday, Do it Again, Kid Charlemagne, Jack of Speed, Any Major Dude, Pretzel Logic

Curtis Mayfield: Superfly

White Zombie: Grease Paint, Return of the Phantom Stranger, Blood Milk Sky, Children of the Grave, The Devils Rejects, Let It all Bleed Out, 17 Year Locust, Foxy Foxy, Meet the Creeper, Death of it All

Rob Zombie: Brickhouse, More Human Than Human, I'm Your Boogieman, Living Dead Girl

Mandrill: Fencewalk

PFunk Allstars: Give Up the Funk, Up For the Downstroke

Earth, Wind and Fire: September, Shining Star, The Way of the World, Gratitude

Slave: Great American Funk Song

Funkadelic: Get off Your Ass and Jam, Good to Your Earhole

Ohio Players: Love Rollercoaster, Fire, Funky Worm (thats like seven cans of shaving powder; man, thats funky!) Skin Tight

War: Slippin' into Darkness, The World is a Ghetto, Cisco Kid, Lowrider

Robin Trower: Everything. no seriously, everything the man recorded.

Edwin Star: War, Funky Music, Turn Me On

Robert Johnson: Crossroads

Leadbelly: Where Did You Sleep Last Night, Goodnight Irene

Lightning Hopkins: Baby Please Don't Go, Mojo Hand

Blind Willie Johnson: Dark Was The Night, Cold Was the Ground

George Thorogood: I Drink Alone


Rare Earth: I'm loving you, Celebrate, Born To Wander, Big Brother

Al Greene: Lets Stay Together (may cause spontaneous orgasm)

Joe Cocker: Feelin' All Right, Love the One You're With, Unchain My Heart, Lets Go Get Stoned, Delta Lady, She Came In Through the Bedroom Window, The Letter

Sly Stone: Thank You For Letting Me Be Myself, Hot Fun, Dance To The Music, Family Affair, If You Want Me To Stay

Rufus and Chaka Khan: Tell Me Something Good, Sweet Thang, Once You Get Started, You Got The Love, Rufusized, Stompin at the Savoy

Creedence Clearwater Revival: Born on the Bayou, Grapevine, Hey Tonight, Late Night Drive, See the Light, Green River, Run Through the Jungle, Down on the Corner, Graveyard Train, Up around the Bend, Keep on Chooglin, Midnight Special

Standells: Dirty Water

Aretha Franklin: Chain of Fools, Respect, I Never Loved a Man, Natural Woman, You Send Me

Alice In Chains: Rooster, Them Bones, Man in the Box

Neal Young: Just too many

Led Zep: Ditto

Hendrix: Oh yeah

...there. That oughtta school ya.

Tuesday, October 21, 2008

Stickin' shit on other shit and calling it Art

...But first, the Rancho FirstNations Halloween Pumpkin Spectacular!!!!

From left to right:

Scary Face, by The Goonybird
Domo, by The Lucky Bastard
Opies' Butthole, by FirstNations (after Kurt Vonnegut)


_____________________________________

OK. Here are some FirstNations collages.

This is an example of the refined technique. This one was made from hand-tinted papers (MY hand, chillun) The colors are actually a lot more saturated than this but its early morning here and the light is all white and reflected so its washed out. Deal.
Does it have a name? NO IT DOES NOT HAVE A NAME. WHAT ON EARTH WOULD YOU NAME THIS? CHUCK? DONALD? WHAT? Fine. It's named 'Donald'. Are you happy? Meet fricken' Donald the collage.

This whole wall is a collage.

I always wanted to do a work using a single color with just the textures and edges as the prominent features. It is navy blue here....other times it's indigo or black, and gives back a single color. In the morning light, or in any reflected light, suddenly the pattern becomes evident-not jarringly so, but enough to make you go 'wha...?" and look closer.

This is a collage in a frame, hanging on another collage that is on another wall. ITS COLLAGE OVERKILL AT RANCHO FIRSTNATIONS! WE'RE KURAAAAAAAAAAAAAZY!

The one in the frame actually has a name; its called 'Newgrange'. (Points given to anyone who can guess why.) The wall is just old civil war era sheet music that I fell in love with and had to use. It has no name. It is a nameless wall.

Here is one that hangs out in the Yummy Bikers garage.(Yes, he has framed art in his garage.)

This one is made out of old thrashed, rat-chewed Easyrider Magazines that Lame George gave us right before he was incarcerated (the first time.) It's done using traditional collage technique, which explains the lumpiness.


This is the door to the spray booth in the garage with a little Sponge Bob figurine stuck to it.

Yes I did that too. Because everyone needs an illuminated door in their garage.

Here is another old school technique collage.

Its made out of this lady's old cookbook and recipe collection that I scored at an auction preview. Two of the recipes are X-rated pass-along folklore things; 'How To Make An Angel Cake'. I think its charming!

Same technique. Another womans old recipe collection. I scored this one at an estate sale.

At first you think 'what kind of heartless asshole would sell something like this? This is a treasure!' Until you look at the recipes and realize that gramma made things like cherries and black olives in Jello.
I'm dead serious. Thats one of the recipes here.

So yes, not heartless; prudent.

Friday, October 17, 2008

Indigo Clam Residence, Brasierre Container Furious Of Porcupine!

I've been working on presents lately, and I have a backlog. CB, MJ; I have not forgotten you. They're in the works.
_______________________________

THINGS TO MAKE AND DO!!!!!


Let's all make a collage the FirstNations way! Not the regular normal way, because that way is all assy. This way rules and is studly, because it is durable and because I made it up and tested it and it just rules, ok?


Here's what you'll need:

AN IDEA.
No seriously. If you're like me and you love old paper ephemera, you have boxes of the shit just waiting to be made into something. To begin, then, get out all your boxes and sort through your papers (which will be a fun afternoon in itself!) with an idea in your head. The key here is GO IN WITH AN IDEA IN YOUR HEAD.

Ask yourself: "Self? What do you feel like you want to do a picture about?"
Now sometimes you'll have an answer ready: "I want to do a picture about the color blue" or "I want to do a picture about things that are jungly and warm".

Now, with this idea uppermost in your mind, go through your papers one by one and think "Does this match my idea?" and if it doesn't, put it to one side. If it does, save it out.
Then go back through the save pile again, with the idea in mind, and cull and adjust. By this time all the papers you have looked at will have begun to suggest a final appearance to you. This is so fun that you might spend days just dinking around going through all your cool papers. Well, if you're me.

Now: Decide if you still like the idea. Sometimes you won't.
Don't do it.
If you do still like it, now think: Do I want to do this suggested appearance?" Sometimes you don't.
Don't do it.

Both these things happen. Go with it. Do not force it. Otherwise you won't like what you did, and it will bother you. If you go ahead and make the collage you'll just put it away because it bothers you, and then some random person will come along and say they like it and THAT will annoy you and you'll give it to them just to get it out of the house and they'll hang it up and every time you go over you'll have to see it and that will annoy, bother and irritate you.

Now sometimes you just want to do a picture about something but you don't know what. This is when you get some of the best results, weirdly enough!

Go through all your papers and save out the ones that just appeal to you for some reason. Then arrange them on a big table (out of the draft!!!) and let them lay there while you glance at them as you walk by. Rearrange them if the spirit moves you.
Suddenly an idea will suggest itself.
Sometimes it will just get bothersome, and you'll put it all away again.
Sometimes, you just find that you really like the arrangement for some reason, and you do it, and then months later the underlying idea will suddenly come to you when you look at it, and you'll go "Huh!"

Here is how to assemble it so that it lasts for one million years (dog years)

For the ground-
1 sheet of luan panelling, flat, no pattern*. You can cut this stuff to size by scoring it with a stanley knife or even an exacto and then crack it off around a doorway or over the edge of a table.

1 bucket of premixed sheetrock mud or joint compound, untinted (you can tint it yourself with water based tempera if you like.)

1 large bottle of Elmers CARPENTERS glue-not the white school stuff. The white school stuff is disgusting and rubbery while the yellowish Carpenters stuff dries really rigid and sands easily.

Water

A flat throwaway house painting brush-a small one, like for indoor walls. Not a huge one.

Medium grit sandpaper

CLOTH rags-NOT paper towelling.

Method for preparing your ground:
Cut the luan to size, sand the edges and clean the surface. Make sure it is completely dry. Now, look at it and judge the natural bow. The side that bellies up toward you will be your work side.

Mix up 1 cup of the joint compound with 1/4 cup of Elmers Carpenter glue and some water until smooth. You want it to be exactly as goopy as condensed cream of chicken soup is right out of the can, or like standard latex housepaint.

**Glop up a brushload of the mixed compound and begin painting it on the luan (remember, belly side up.) Cover the whole surface uniformly. Be fairly generous; cover the entire sheet to a uniform depth. Neatness does not count here; coverage does. Err on the side of too much.

Dry in front of a fan overnight-first the front, then the uncoated back. Set it up off the ground on some books so the air can flow around it.

Sand the dry surface to a uniform smoothness, first top to bottom, then side to side. Dust off the crumbs and then go over it again lightly with a damp rag to pick up everything. This is the point where I usually stop, because this gives you a nice 'toothed' surface that your papers will adhere to very well.

You can always add a dab more wet compound to fill if you need to; just let it dry for an hour before you try and work it.

Sometimes you might want to use a very flat surface (say, you're using stains or something.) To achieve this, wet a rag or sponge until its not dripping but still pretty wet, and then burnish it over the surface in circles lightly. Keep checking it in an angle of light that skips off the surface and will reveal any remaining flaws. It will still be porous when it dries, but it won't have a visible 'grain'.


The luan should have dried more or less flat now with the coating on it. If it still bellies out toward you a bit, so much the better! The papers you apply will draw a bit as they dry and pull it flatter.
______________________________________________


Surface supplies:

Water based clear polycrylic finish, eggshell (or whatever lustre you like)

Elmers Carpenters glue, mixed 1:4 with water (this can vary; that's just ballpark)

Premixed tempera paint, water based (you can use this to tint the adhesive, the finish, the papers or the ground. I also use instant coffee granules. Seriously. You get a perfect 'aged' look with it.)

Fine grit sandpaper, for breaking up finishes and creating effects

Throwaway brushes (NOT foam; it crumbles)in varying sizes-flat and artists tips-for applying adhesives, finishes and manipulating wet papers

Clean, non-linty rags for dabbing up excess finish and adhesive, also spills-you'll have 'em.

An absorbent dropcloth (I use an old flannel sheet doubled over)

A large box fan with adjustable speeds

A standard blowdryer

optional: chopstick, palette knife, old butter knife or popsicle stick, exacto knife-for moving and manipulating papers and creating effects.

PAPERS:
This is up to you. To begin with, try and use papers that are made of the same material and that have the same thickness because thats just easier to deal with. Start with old newspapers to get a feel for the medium. You lose nothing and it turns out cool!

Magazine pages have a coating on them that needs to be sanded lightly on the glue side to help them stick better.

Some papers are not colorfast; the inks will bleed. Sometimes this is a cool effect. Sometimes it will ruin everything. Tear off a tiny corner and get it wet to see if the color runs before you get it all wet.

Once the papers are perfectly dried, you can sand over them to get various effects, like to feather out an edge or fade an image, or reveal a layer beneath, or make it take up tint heavily. It's fun and it makes a huge mess!

Note: all papers will stretch out when they get wet. When you glue them down, burnish out the wrinkles and air bubbles with a wet artists brush, working from the center out in all directions, also pressing out excess glue. This is a very light operation; don't reef down hard on it. It's wet paper and it will fall apart, you know! Dab up the excess glue with a dry rag.
The cool thing is, though, that once they're stretched out and glued down, they stay that size even if you get them wet again. You can glue layers, letting things dry in between times, and it won't ruin it!


TO BEGIN:
Coat the entire surface of the prepared board with the Elmers glue mixture. I work north-south first, then let that dry and go over it again east-west, and let it dry overnight.

That is called 'sizing' the surface. What that accomplishes is to give you a surface that will dry at the same rate of speed and draw as what you apply to it. It is also easily repairable... if you stick something on that you don't like you can just lay a wet rag on the mistake until the glue gets wet again, then peel the mistake up. Let the area dry again by hitting the place with the blowdryer.

Method:
Exactly the same as papier mache (to a point.)
Run the papers through the glue solution, let them drip off for a second, then apply them to the surface. Brush out the air bubbles (use a damp brush and work from the center) and dab off the excess solution with a rag. Stop every now and then and let things dry a little in front of the box fan.

Here is where it differs from papier mache, though: Do NOT let all your papers lay in a bowl of adhesive solution and soak! This can make some papers dissolve, plus you can get a nasty surprise if one of them has a water-soluble ink and it runs and tints the rest.
One at a time, run each paper through the bath by itself, let it drip then stick it on- you can repair it quickly while its still wet by just wiping it off with a dry rag.

The actual assembly can take a few days. Luckily, this is the really fun part.
Let each layer dry overnight before starting the next one, or else you can get an effect where suddenly huge slabs of the work lift off the surface.

Once you are finished, coat the perfectly dry piece with the water-based polycrylic clear. This stuff is safe, but it reeks bad, so have a fan going and be prepared to open a window.

Let it cure for one week. Then take and seal the back of the board with the polycrylic.

And you're done! Now you have a lovely decoration.

_____________________________________________

*I've worked with heavy card backing, but this usually ends up lumpy and if I wanted 1st grader art on my walls I'd mug a 1st grader for some. To get it to lay flat you have to cure it under a weight for a week at a time between layers and thats just annoying....then the first time you boil water or it rains it will get lumpy again anyway. So, yeah.

**Why, Nations, why? Why do I gotta do this crap? Why can't I just stick the papers right on the wood? Why?
If you have a very damp day followed by a very dry, hot and windy day, the surface collage (now one continuous plane that draws in multiple directions) can actually draw up and pull itself off the luan (wood is made of long lignin fibers that only draw along the length of the grain.) I've had it happen.
By coating the board with the compound and glue mixture, what you're creating on a microscopic, oversimplified level is kind of a shock absorber. The addition of carpenters glue to the joint compound sticks the compound firmly into the luan AND prevents the compound from crumbling! THIS IS SCIENCE! ISN'T THAT COOL? YES IT IS.

Tuesday, October 14, 2008

Red Whale Shark Has Strange Playings: Majorcan Gambit!

This is part of something over at UJ, but its something thats been bothering me enough so that I thought I might throw it open to debate over here, with a little rewording. I was curious enough about this that I asked the Stainless Steel Amazon, and even between the two of us we couldn't couldn't come up with much of an answer. So I turn it over to you:

The last time I looked at a straight porn video was waaaaay back in the 'Flesh Gordon' days. All that shiny lip gloss and polyester was enough to put me off the genre for 30 years. Seriously. 30 years.

Enter the Internet, and amateur porn videos. I finally conquered my trepidations recently and looked up a few.

Oh my.

Things have certainly changed since the days of Seka and Traci Lords. Here are two things in particular that I noticed after a 30 year absence:

1. Whats with all this smacking people on the butt? All of a sudden, apropos of nothing I can figure out, people are smacking each other on the butt in the middle of the proceedings.

Now to me, this looks suspiciously 'hip hop music video'. Someone thought it looked all sly and G and thought "Hey, I'll 'bust that move' on 'my ho' next time we're 'freakin'! And film it! AND POST IT ON XTUBE! Then the world can see how sly and G I am too!" Or I could be way off base here and I need to hop on the ol' smacky train before it leaves me at the station.

2. Our couple are in the middle of a tender interlude. Everything seems to be going well. Suddenly our hero grabs his johnson and starts bouncing it off his lady friends face. Or butt. Or whatever's within whapping distance.

Ok. Does this elude anyone else? Because I am at a total loss here. I have no idea whatsoever what this is supposed to signify. Nobody seems to enjoy it particularly. This is supposed to convey what to the observer exactly? I know one thing for damnsure: it didn't come from real life. You guys know exactly what I mean, too. You stop suddenly in the middle of the proceedings....? let alone pull some lame dorkyass stunt like that; you won't live to see daylight.

So there you go. Random spanking and weiner whapping. Where did it come from, why do they do it? And most importantly: What. The. Fuck.

Saturday, October 11, 2008

More fun with geraniums!

Since that last post was such a riproaring success, ya bakeheads, I thought I'd share this recipe with y'all.

Back in the day I knew a group of four orphan brothers who had inherited a huge estate. Money and housing taken care of for the rest of their lives, they all decided to live off the grid and go completely alternative, and so they did; the fact that they lived in the middle of an upscale suburb notwithstanding. They ripped out all the landscaping and planted corn and other *ahem* vegetation, cut off the electricity and phone lines, set up several distilling operations for things like fuel grade alcohol, booze grade alcohol and 'et cetera'...tore out the central heating and switched to wood heat and cooking, bought an old gasoline generator and used it to run their amps (they had a band!) and keep the plumbing thawed out in the winter, had honeybees, made mead, wine, vodka, brewed beer, made bread...these guys were like fricken' GODS.

One of the things they made was something they called 'keef'.

Now with a name like that you kind of already get the feeling its going to fry a few braincells, right? Well, it really wasn't keef, it was a kind of homemade cut plug made out of geraniums. They'd knock a chunk off and smoke it through a hookah. Delicious? Oh my God, it was absolutely sybaritic. I've never smoked anything as enjoyable...not only for the effects but also simply as a smoke. If you've ever smoked a fine tobacco through a hookah you have some idea of what I mean...this stuff was just WONDERFUL.

As best as I can remember, the method went something like this:

Large mature leaves, washed, separated into 'fingers', dried flat and cured (in other words, let to dry until they get kind of leathery)

Homemade dry blackberry wine...specifically, the bottom 1/4 of the fermentation with the dregs in it. (Stay with me, it doesn't end up tasting like candy at all.)

equipment:
cheesecloth,
a wooden butter press with lid, (oh look it up)
1 brick,
broad, shallow baking pan
-all of this should be surgically clean, including the brick, which can be scrubbed off with bleach water and then baked for a couple of hours to sterilize it.

Method: soak the cured leaves in the thick dreg blackberry wine (how long I don't know. Presumably at least overnight.) You can up the alcohol by tipping in a little vodka. This is just to help sterilize the mixture and sharpen up the taste. The alcohol burns off.

Your butter press should be sitting in the broad, shallow baking pan. It MUST be scrupulously clean. If you're using a wood press, this will turn it purple and flavor it permanently, so be forewarned. Do NOT use an aluminum press.

Line the butter press with cheese cloth.

Take the leaves out of the wine. Let the excess drip off, then lay flat in the bottom of the butter press. Continue this process, alternating the direction of the layers, until all the leaves are used or the butter press is filled.

Place the top on the press and set the brick on top of that.


Set this all aside to a very dry, warm place with good air flow. The brothers used the top shelf of their woodstove. Cover the whole operation with another single layer of cheesecloth to keep dust and bees out.

In a couple of days, lift the 'cake' from the butter press using the cheesecloth liner. In the meantime, dump out any collected juice in the pan and wash it out. Turn the cake over and return it to the butter press. (You can now switch out and use a clean cheesecloth to line it if you're worried about it; and if the stack falls apart, just re-stack it. You don't have to, though.)

Replace the lid, the brick and the cheesecloth covering and let sit for another few days.

Once it has stopped weeping fluid you can take it out of the butter press and just let it sit in the clean, dry pan, wrapped in cheesecloth, with the brick on top. Turn the cake over every day.

This is done when you have a nasty looking black block of hard ick. it will look like old leaves that have been sitting in a pile for a few months, only drier, and it will smell like blackberries (and be kind of pliable, as I recall.) If the cheesecloth sticks you take a damp rag or clean damp sponge and dab it on the stuck places until it loosens.

To use, cut a corner off and set it on fire. I mean, please. You know.

It sounds nasty, but it smokes GREAT. I would go so far as to say it's an epicurean experience, in fact. The brothers would sometimes mix this with fine smoking tobacco, opium, honey oil or hash, and truthfully it was best with a little bit of fine tobacco.


I can't vouch for the complete accuracy of this method, although I'm 90% certain I've got it down here. The brothers always said that the method is the same as for making homemade cutplug chewing tobacco. I wasn't able to find a 'recipe' for that online but its gotta be out there. If you have the straight 411, please, don't Bogart that info, my friend! Share it with us in the comments lounge!

_______________________________________

Hey kids! Do you have any favorite geranium recipes? Please leave them in the comments lounge! Maybe we can do a 'Flatbutt Tribal Party Cookbook'!

Tuesday, October 07, 2008

Harvesting Geraniums with FirstNations!

One of the onerous tasks associated with growing geraniums is stripping and grooming. Now by that I do not mean what you think I mean; no, I mean getting naked and actually taking a bath instead of spritzing on a half gallon of Chanel and calling it French. Actually no, I really mean getting the product market ready. For most people this means getting naked and calling a Frenchman to harvest your geraniums for you, which doesn't make anyone happy and is not sanitary. This is where technology can help you.

Anyone with access to a machine shop and scrap steel can make this simple, elegant and highly effective tool which can handle everything down to the daintiest bud:
This highly technical tool is called: a piece of metal with some holes in it.

The one I saw was made out of 1/4 inch thick stainless steel angle stock. The draw holes had first been bored on a drill press, and then the guy had taken a mandrel and gauged them out wider by whamming it through from the back of the face plate (he made four different sized holes.) Using a mandrel also makes the burr on the outer side crown up nice and high, which is what you want. To finish he simply took a rat tail file and filed the crowns nice and sharp. And there you have it!

You can clamp this to a table, or use nails or screws to attach it to your work surface. It cuts off the leaf material like a knife; you get very little waste. (Hint: to be really effective, the stems should first be de-budded and then drawn through top first, against the curve of growth.)

The tinier holes stem the buds neatly. Feed them through stem end first; duh. The lower portions drop off and the top pops off in one piece.

An unexpected side benefit of this tool is that you can periodically scrape off the face of the draw plate with a razor or exacto and collect honest to crap hash. Yeah, it will be harsh because of the chlorophyll and frag. Knock a couple bucks off the price. It's still bonus cash, and it has the added benefit of not having passed through the hands of a nine year old kid who wipes his ass with his fingers.

I hope this has been helpful. I know I've spend many an hour bitching and clipping hunks of skin off the sides of my fingers wishing I had a goddamn clue, so I offer this as a public service to those of you who labor in ignorance as I once did. You'll still have to do a little scissors and clippers work, but nothings perfect; and there won't be any Frenchmen involved. Yay!

Monday, October 06, 2008

Quaint Vignettes From My Charming Rural Idyll

This year, because of the mild conditions, the farmers around here have yet to harvest the feed corn. I guess the upside of that is that I haven't had to put up with the truly godhorrid stench of silage being trucked around-and I have no idea what that shits about either; it seems like they make it, and then they drive it around the county for a couple of weeks for no good reason that I can figure out. Maybe it likes to go on car rides. Maybe driving it around for a couple of hours is necessary to the whole silage process. What I do know is that the stuff smells absolutely disgusting. Worse than pig shit, worse than rotted liquid pig manure even, worse than whatever that Parmesan-foot-ass stuff is that they spray on the fields in July. And if anyone could identify just exactly what that stuff is for me I would appreciate it. But anyway....

The smell of silage defies description. It smells worse than the dump. Really. You know how if you spend enough time at the dump you eventually stop smelling it? Not so with silage. Its one of those smells that you can taste, and if you get a strong enough whiff of it you gag-not even as a disgust response either; you don't get the chance to register disgust. Its involuntary. You're driving along having a nice chat with your buddy and then a truck goes paHEURGK! HUAAARP! *BURP* ...yeah. Men dig that.

Around here a kid can drive farm equipment on the street. I suppose there's a special permit involved or something; all I know is that I envy these kids. Maybe the Fates conspired to keep me out from behind the wheel of large equipment, though, given what I was like when I was younger (i.e. EVIL) and Lord only knows what I would have got up to with a corn auger under my command. Actually I know what I'd have done; I'd have headed straight toward my grade school. Drove that mother right through the parking lot; grind through all those Datsun subcompacts and Toyotas RRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRkshhhhCRUNCKCRACKGADOON! SSSSSSBOOM! SCREEECHcrunchmangledestroy! Then hammer down straight toward the main office, locked on target, lasers charged and ready; and bury that bitch full speed right up to the rear wheels. Hop out of the cab at the last minute, of course, before it goes up in a huge ball of flames FOOM! with all them big freakyass pointed things flying off and then aw fuck, man, here they come all twirling down back out of the sky eeeeeeeEEEEEWOOOOOOOOOOM!
Right through the main boiler! DIRECT HIT!
Meanwhile I would stand across the street and watch it all go stern skyward...take a majestic half turn...and then silently sink beneath the chill dark seas. And I would laugh a grim and icy laugh- heh heh heh heh heh!-light a panatella, turn, and ride my horse off into the desert.
AYIAYIAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA! wa wa waaaa...
(that's The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly music. keep up.)

So yeah. Better off that I don't get a corn auger for Christmas this year.

I keep trying to talk my husband into getting me one of those little mini backhoes like landscapers use? But he says that all I'd do is go around digging holes. Well, duh, yeah, that's what they're for.
"In the middle of the night. At random," he adds.
But here again; duh, that's what they're for. If you had a mini backhoe, wouldn't you? Who'd complain? Someone wakes up because their dog is barking and you're out in their front yard in your mini backhoe digging a hole, what? Like they're going to even call 911? "Yes, hello, 911? It's 3:am and there's a native American in a mini backhoe digging up my landscaping?" Please. No way. Especially if it was modified so that flames shot out from underneath it, and had big telescoping spider legs that would unfold out of the sides with pinchers on the end that had black poison dripping off them that would hit the ground and stuff would dissolve into glick and smoke would come up? See, no. You'd have to be pretty stupid to try.

Thursday, October 02, 2008

Purple Manta A Terrible Eye Power Shooting Out

All over the world women are paying big bucks to buy brand new boobs. Generally speaking, significantly bigger boobs.

Do any of these poor women realize that once they have their brand new gazongas in place that they will no longer be able to find a decent place for them to live?

Because welcome to the real world, my darling. Now you HAVE to wear a bra. It is not a prison sentence. Its just that those honeys get a little unruly and its distracting for everyone involved. But hey, though, wasn't that the point? That's perfectly OK. Big boobs are GREAT. They are friendly. If they were people they would lend you money probably, or feed your dog while you go on vacation. They're nice. That's why people universally agree on the superiority of large breasts like them.

Tell ya what, though, gone are the days when you can expect to to waltz into the Jr. Miss department at K-Mart and grab the first thing you see that appeals. And no more 'buy three get the 4Th free!' No, now you will have to take out a bank goddamn fucking loan simply in order to purchase ONE bra. ONE.*

And what will this lonely, sad, AFFORDABLE bra look like?

No slinky, pretty fabric, or colors other than white, tan and black.

No more lace. No more bows. No more satin, ruffles, embroidery or prints.

Generally speaking it WILL NOT BE any larger than a 44DD. Not and look human, anyway. No, anything you purchase from about 38C on up in your typical retail outlet will look like a surgical appliance.**

It will not be comfortable.




...hickory? HICKORY? bad enough it went around blinding midgets and children; egad. i suppose we should praise Jesus they don't make them out of wood any more too.


If it is comfortable, it will not fit correctly. In this case it will be either 1. a cupless, vestlike 'sports bra' and as such will function so as to compress your luscious orbs into one large sweaty amorphous loaf of boob, or 2. a sports bra with what is jokingly described as 'shaped cups' and one hundred million seams that will flatten your yummies into big fat round manhole covers and allow them to bloop out from underneath when you reach up high.

An affordable bra will have seams. Yes I know they make moldable synthetic fabrics with multidimensional stretch. I know that this material even comes in graduated dernier and can be woven to accommodate complex curves and varying degrees of stress. This rare, scarce, high-tech miracle fabric is called Spandex. Bicyclists get it. Swimmers get it. Other women get it, even...women with tiny little motionless nubbins stuck on their chests like postage stamps. They get it with lace. In colors.

You do not get it.

You get one-way stretch, immobile satinized foam yamulkes, or heavy percale. And it has to have seams. You need SEAMS. Enjoy your new FRANKENBRA.

Your new affordable bra will be pointed. Oh yes! Because all boobs are pointed. Everyone knows that. Hell yes. Particularly the big ones. If you have boobs they are POINTY. It is a LAW.
...pick one: is this a 1. porcupine 2. group shot from the republican national convention 3.a sea urchin 4. a lot of sea urchins and porcupines at the republican national convention, or 4. woodstock

If yours aren't, too bad ya fuckin' mutant. Your bra is made to either accommodate the boobage of NORMAL women (the ones with 1950's danger tits or that extra little miniature yurt on the end there) and to TRAIN THE BOOBAGE OF THE ABNORMAL INTO THE PROPER POINTY SHAPE. Refusal of your boobs to comply with this mandate means that you have to run around with two empty crumpled up little strangenesses on either side of your chest up under your shirt that make you look like you got into an unfortunate chemical accident. But see, if you had NORMAL POINTY BOOBS this wouldn't happen ya freak.




The reason for this is simple: The cups of your new giant bra have been designed to house a species of giant clam.
... boob clam! nana nana nana nana, boob clam! nana nana nana nana, boob clam! boob clam! boob clam! BOOB CLAAAAAAAAM!

Large boobs look like giant clams. Its true. They do. Go look. Large size affordable bras (I'm talking to YOU, PLAYTEX) are apparently designed by people so grossed out at the though of anything over an A cup that they figure that anything bigger can just live in a grocery bag or a phone booth, or fuck it just go live a doorway like a wino or something; who cares. Ew. At any rate the closest the designers were able to bring themselves to 'big boob' was 'giant clam.' Deal.

Science has shown that giant clams don't need lace, or colors, and they like lots of fabric. Actually they NEED all that extra banding to restrain them during their frequent fits of GIANT CLAM FRENZY so they don't go all crazy and eat scuba divers. Notice how you never see any scuba divers near the plus-size bras? They are SCARED.

Because masses of flesh are not rigid, big boobs need something called 'side support' in order to keep them from kicking back with a beer and a newspaper and relaxing into your underarm region. This is not fatness; this is physics. Do not become alarmed. No salesman will call at your home. But then too; don't get all upset because when you're driving your car you have to steer with your elbows held out to your sides like airplane wings either. Not that this would happen if you had a bra with side support; but no, you do not DESERVE side support because if a woman with fritatta-titties does not need side support then YOU DON'T EITHER.

Oh OK fine. Here. Here is some side support.

There. Isn't that better? What we've done is sew a kind of a pockety thing in the side there and then stuck a bendy little strip of plastic in it so that when you sit down it bores a hole up into your armpit. THAT IS SIDE SUPPORT. REALLY. IT IS. YOU LOVE THIS AND IT WORKS PERFECTLY. LALALALALA WOOOOOO ICANTHEARYOUICANTYHEARYOU WOOOOO

Oh, and here...scaffolding. Because we can't have them things all going buttwild crazy shootin' up the dern town... So here. Have two pieces of metal shaped like the letter 'C' that aren't really attached to anything and serve no structural purpose whatsoever. That rust, and twist into weird shapes when you sit down, and set off metal detectors at security checkpoints, and make huge blisters underneath your arms, and abrade giant 'smiles' of raw skin beneath each tit when you sweat. What, are you mentioning moldable soft synthetics again? You heartless big titted cow. Do you know how many six-year-old bra wire inserters you'd be putting out of a job???

Remember: when you have big boobs, you are fat. Oh, you might not be able to see it. You might not even be able to get all that fat to register on a scale...but its there, honey. Every affordable bra you buy has also been designed to accommodate your presumed hippopottamaic girth. You will be able to invite a poor friend with big boobs in with you and you can wear it together! Tell everyone you're conjoined fraternal twins.

Because elastic is made from an endangered species of petrochemical which can only come into contact with the skin of the flat-chested, your shoulder straps have to be constructed from either steel pallet banding or a delicate scrap of shiny ribbon with a vicious little jagged dealie halfway up the middle masquerading as an adjustment thingamawhatzis. It will not stay in place. Don't go expecting it to because it won't. As soon as you sit down; ZOOP right down over the shoulder. You should never sit down. Or bend over. Or reach for something in front of you. Or overhead. Never, never do any of these things. Expect to spend the balance of your life hoisting at one side or another like Loobie May Cornpone, which is both attractive and sexy.

The most difficult part of this for me to get my head around is that you'd think most bra designers, being men, would kind of have a vested interest (get it? HA!) in keeping boobs happy. Honestly. Really. Tell me how the same sex that designed this:

...also designs this:

Give me a fucking break here. Please. I mean PLEASE. The next time any of you swingin' dicks starts in whining about women just remember it's your fault for designing crappy bras. That's right. Throw me a decent foundation garment that fits right and doesn't look like something your grampa had to wear after his rib fracture and maybe I'll be a little easier to get along with *tug, shift, yank*

And I'll tell you what: Don't you even have the goddamn gall to whine when no boobs want to live in substandard housing like that and they start migrating south! You would not live in a house designed the way a bra is designed! Oh no! You now what a person would look like who lived in a house built the way the average bra is designed? That person would be shaped like a giant clam, and the house would be shaped like a tepee, and the giant clam would be so big that it would have to lie curled up in a ball in the bathtub with one foot in the toilet. No wonder the boobs are migrating! They want a better life! Save the whales? Fuck the whales! SAVE THE TITS!





__________________________
*and you'll end up, more than likely, in a specialty shop. Here in America, expect to pay an average base price of 35.00 for something you wouldn't be ashamed to be caught in. Not any miracle of fashion, either...just something that looks like your average Bali b-cup, maybe with a little lace, in lavender. And if you want something truly designed with your shape in mind? Internet, honey. PLUS SHIPPING. And pray to God it fits like they said it would when it gets there. Honestly, what the fuck? They can bodymap someone as butt-ugly as Gene fucking Simmons and make a miniature doll-thing of him that's photographically exact down to the hair on his ass - and yet we're still having technical difficulties designing a stretch garment for a couple of complex curves?

**ok now. you gonna come up on me with "well, at wal mart you can buy up to 145 WW and they're reasonable and they come with hello kitty on them too so HA." because a. bullshit. seriously. go take a look at the percentage of large bras in stock there at wally world. how many companies? warner and playtex you say? uh huh. and how much do those cost? um, about 5.00 MORE than the next size down, huh? apparently us awesome gals are taking vital textile resources away from the more deserving with our big ol hooties. PROVIDING you find any in stock. PROVIDING your local wal-mart even carries them because lemme tell ya babe, the one in bellingham DON'T. in eastern washington? yes. three of them. I am not going to make a goddamn 200+mile pilgramage on the off chance that the tard in the bra department has done her stocking the night before, just in order to purchase a cheap bra, because that defeats the whole cheapness concept, fucks with my carbon footprint and YOU STILL END UP WITH A FRANKENBRA DESIGNED TO HOUSE GIANT CLAMS!!!!!! HELLO KITTY IS NOT ADEQUATE COMPENSATION HERE!!!

Sunday, September 28, 2008

UPDATED: Shock the Monkey

UPDATE: awwwww, too long? thats ok! i'll just leave it up for a NICE LOOOOOOONG TIME so everyone can enjoy it when they have time. We aim to please here at Paul!
kids, you want fast thrills go hit an amusement park. you want pseudoscholarly discussions of sweat, botanical neologisms and men in turbans then sit down and keep your hands inside the car while PAUL is in operation.



this one goes out to the recently married Chaucers' Bitch! Congratulations my darling! Here is a lovely tale for you to read together on your wedding night.

CAUTION: CONTAINS ADULT SITUATIONS, LANGUAGE, DUFFEL BAG
______________________________

DR. EMMANUEL BRADY: private notes, fat soluble lipids

Despite the findings of quantum physics certain phenomena related to the human mind can in fact be explained by mechanical processes. For example the human sexual response is largely due to a simple, mechanical process which occurs in the brain. You see, certain neural receptors are shaped in such a was as to admit only a certain molecule, and nothing but that molecule. Very much like a key in a keyhole, amusingly enough, given the titillating Jungian associations that the image conjures. Ha!

In the case of the sexual response this particular molecule is produced in the human apocrine glands. In a condition of arousal, or at least, a condition of just having come back from the gymnasium after their lunch break without having showered first, these compounds fill the air in a cloud, much like a blizzard of fruit flies around a bowl of overripe bananas and oranges and whatnot, waiting to stuff themselves right up the nose of any passing inhale-ee who will then experience an embarrassingly ill-timed boner and have to hide it behind a sheaf of files and walk about bowlegged for the balance of the afternoon.

The sexual response in also partially a learned behavioral response. It is! Its all conditioning, you see. An organism first primed into expectation of certain stimuli by the receipt of the proper chemical 'hint' learns through trial and error that a particular activity or activity set will more that likely lead toward an erotic reward. After a few repetitions of same there you have it, that organism is trained. Reproduce the stimuli and ding! The bell rings and Pavlovs' dog ejaculates, and should at that point in the proceedings be hit with a rolled up newspaper to make sure he doesn't do that in the house again. In the case of a human subject it means that the approach of the clock hands ever closer to the 'twelve' and 'one' positions causes a sudden increase in blood flow to the groin region irregardless of whatever activity that subject might otherwise be engaged in. Hypothetically.

As was my mentor Dr. Gordon Wasson, I too am a firm believer in the controlled use of psychotropics. Purely as an aid in making those sudden intuitive leaps of creative reasoning that so often propel the willing explorer of the mental frontiers into Nobel Prize territory, of course. However unlike the good Doctor I eschewed the mycological path, and was instead an acolyte of the poppy.

It was during one of those dreamy interludes spent lapping at the perfumed bosom of Madame Yen Shi that I first evolved the following hypothesis: a person who could control the precise regimen needed to incite the brain might evolve a method whereby he (used editorially, of course) could produce all kinds of interesting effects without having to raise the least bit of..shall we say...sweat.

My assistant Ms. Phail was a lovely girl. Entirely uninterested in me whatsoever. No, I was simply the beige gent in the lab coat who signed the check that made it possible for her to purchase highly indecent items of underclothing, such as the delightfully scanty balustrade of lace which forced her bosoms up into to delicious vanilla orbs which jiggled like kittens down the front of her lab coat whenever she moved suddenly, such as, when another person happened to brush up against her in an entirely inadvertent fashion.

Repeatedly I sought the embrace of my papaveracaeian beloved in hope that my supplications would earn me the necessary inspiration and finally, after a prolonged bout a' soixtante-neuf with my stern Yellow Mistress it did indeed. It would be a relatively simple task to capture the necessary cerebrostimulant compounds and render them into a concentrated state. The introduction of this solution to a selected subject would no doubt inspire an overwhelming subconscious biochemical response. If one were to use that preparation in conjunction with a ritualized series of operations aimed toward training the already- susceptible subconscious mind, the outcome could be tailored to whatever the operator desired. In this case 'outcome' being equal to 'show me her beaver'.

Unfortunately any further development of this idea was brought to a halt as I was forced to spend some weeks in hospital with an uncomfortable case of epigastric paralysis requiring an unfortunate, painful and rather humiliating surgical procedure. Furthermore, the notes I'd taken turned out to be an indecipherable mass of hieroglyphics. Nothing quite dampens the urge to translate same than an inflamed rectal incision.

Finally intellectual curiosity overcame my native reluctance to experience another bout of peristaltic inactivity. And so, stitches removed, all systems go as it were, I armed myself with three quarts of vegetable juice cocktail and a gramme of black resin, raised my lighter high in the direction of the Mystic East and chased the dragon once again...this time directly to the Rosetta Stone. Excelsior!

I had a fine collection of state of the art equipment that I'd liberated from the clutches of my academic overlords tucked back in an unused corner of my apartment. Soon I was turning my every private hour toward the development of what I amusingly christened my 'Ms.Phail cocktail'. Ha!

My first efforts were based on the theory that the fastest route into my assistants knickers would be to concoct a solution in which our amorous secretions were already combined; priming the pump as it were. One readily available source of half the necessary compounds would be found in the ladies room, although sorry to say, after an incident back in my second year at university there wasn't going to be any more of me lurking around those environs. Then I hit on the idea of raiding the contents of her purse. Certainly ladies carried all kinds of things about with them loaded down with their charming by-products...? And so, one afternoon I sent her down to the Administration annex on some routine task and, armed with a nail file and the unquenchable spirit of scientific inquiry I jimmied the lock on her desk drawer.

This provided me with a few things; a lipstick I didn't think she'd miss, a few crumpled tissues...but no. No, it simply wasn't enough and I certainly couldn't stand about waiting for the silly cow to remove her diaphragm, not after the incident in the airport at Brussels. No, I'd simply have to secure a larger supply of the necessary organic lipids someplace else.

Ah, but then I remembered. My charming assistant belonged to the local gymnasium, didn't she. Of course.

Once I'd crunched the electronic lock on her car I was able to open the boot and there was her gym bag pretty as you please. I took a fast look around and then drew the zipper down carefully.
The sudden vision of her that rose like a tormenting flame in my mind was enough to render this simple operation into very potently charged terms, as well as to cause me to pop an almost instantaneous log.

I buried my face between the canvas flaps. I felt the coarse plastic edges of the zipper as a kind of delicious 'duffel dentata' that my imagination described in shades of scarlet, caressing the sides of my face in an inviting way as I inhaled the delicious, womanly perfume of her unlaundered sweatclothes.

This had the most aggressive effect imaginable on my now-rampaging libido and in a moment I had drug the unsuspecting bag over the front edge of the car boot where it dangled invitingly, its slattern, wanton gap a lascivious 'v' of invitation. "There, you filthy bitch," I snarled, inserting two fingers roughly into its aching depths. "Now moan like you want it!"

Clumsy with need I hurriedly released the furious demands of my turgid manhood from the confine of my trousers and thrust it savagely between those canvas lips. Immediately I groaned in orgasm, spewing the viscous yogurt of my man-seed; jet after jet of superheated lava emerging triumphantly from the earths very core; deep, deep into the quivering, greedy chasm of her sweatshirt.

"Doctor Brady?" I heard a stern male voice at the far end of the parking garage calling. "Sir? Can I help you?" Hurriedly I did up my flies and scurried away.

It looked like I was back at square one: collection of my own product. Ah well. Setbacks are to be expected, I suppose.

The first thing I did was purchase the services of a very nice Asian lady who depilitated the entire surface of my body from the neck down using some kind of adhesive. I found this a uniquely painful and humiliating process but one which I gladly suffered for the sake of the outcome.

For the next week I wore a garment made from a deionized hyperfabric comprised of a chemically inert substance which absorbed and preserved within its weave every particle of my precious secretions. Before I donned this erstwhile cocoon I purified the surface of my skin with a dilute solution of iodine. Then into the garment through the long slit up the front, on with the suit and tie and over it all a nice clean lab coat and within a matter of minutes I was sweating like a large and very foul boar hog.

Of course during this time I avoided introducing anything into my system that might adversely effect my scent. I lived for the next week entirely on distilled water and rice cakes, one of the most horrifyingly awful things I have ever put into my mouth I might add, forgetting a certain regrettable episode involving the neighbors dog.

After a week of collection the garment was finally removed-much to my sudden regret; I had become quite fond of its moist embrace- placed into a steeping chamber filled with a therapeutic-grade carrier oil and heated to 79 c . I checked and checked again, desperate to make certain that each element was precise and in its proper order. Yes, perfectly and precisely yes; down to the special container fixed in place beneath the tappet, sealed against the contaminating atmosphere, waiting to receive the first precious, wanton droplet of my primal pong.

Studies showed that certain compounds contained in frankincense, myrrh and cloves produced a marked increase in the oxygen content of the brain, and that in turn gave rise to an increase in the output of neurostimulants which homed in on the centers of gustation and pleasurable response. I set to work concocting a melange of these ingredients, and after some experimentation I arrived at a combination that wasn't too terribly ecclesiastical. Quite nice, actually, in a Tutankhamenish, Valley of the Nile kind of way. I then added a hefty dollop of my own homonid essence, my personal stock as it were, and set to work surreptitiously perfuming her environs.

Some on the receiver of the telephone at her desk...a little on the back of her chair where she'd rest her hand as she drew it out...a bit on each armrest...a wipe down the length of each pencil and pen in the holder...the handles of the drawers...aaaaaaaaaand a few daring droplets on the seat of her chair, just because. I also treated all the surfaces in her work areas and sprinkled a bit inside the first few pairs of sterile gloves in the box nearby.

"Are you wearing some kind of aftershave?" she asked the next morning. I ignored her, although inwardly I rejoiced. Excellent!

"I'm going to go check and see if the night crew changed the animals bedding..." she continued, heading toward the next room.
I looked after her retreating form wearily.

-No no no no no good heavens NO, man; she's keying on an animal level. This is a limbic response! Precisely what you intended! And here's you not providing the necessary positive pleasure ritual. You idiot, of course. You have to reinforce the aroma with positive stimuli. But what?

"I've put your samples into the separation unit for you," I said cheerily when she returned.
"But they weren't' meant to go in yet," she said, hurrying to the chamber and looking worriedly at the readout. "Well there's that batch fucking spoiled," I heard her mutter.

Hm. "Well now no matter," I said, struggling to inject a hearty, cheerful note into my voice. "That's easily remedied. What's a few more bits of whatever?"

"The deceased was sent to the crematory last week, Dr. Brady" she replied. "I don't expect we'll be getting many more gastric samples from that quarter."

"Well. I'm sure...." I decided a change of subject was in order. "Did I happen to mention that you....your work, that is....its quite, you know...satisfactory."

She looked at me quizzically.

"...yes. Well. I've been....considering giving you a raise, you know," I continued. "Say, oh, another dollar an hour, hm? Yes, just the thing! A dollar an hour!That's another..."

"...forty dollars a week," she said.

"Yes yes I know that. So then. Would you like to....go out to lunch to celebrate your raise?" I said. Excellently played, Brady, excellently played! "...I'll pay of course. Of course! Its my, I invited, well yes. So then! To lunch!"

_____________________

" Did you know," I said, leaning in across the table conspiratorially, "That the vomeronasal organ of the dog is capable of detecting over seven million different molecular compounds? Imagine that kind of information being fed directly into your brain every time you inhale! The implications are staggering actually," I continued. "No wonder dogs never developed much of a cortex; they hardly need it."

"They certainly wouldn't back at the lab," Ms. Phail murmured, taking a sip of her coffee. Inwardly I smiled. I'd already taken the liberty of dosing it with a pure form of my special concoction and as I watched it pass her lips my imagination took flight on scarlet wings. Yes, dear lady, take it. Take it all. And swallow. Good girl.

"Yes, but what I mean is, with that much visceral, actual molecular material being fed directly into the limbic regions you'd simply be in a continuous state of analogue response to your surroundings," I said. "There'd hardly be any need for higher cogitation. That is of course if the necessary chemical precursors were in place, you know," I laughed. "Of course."

"Of course," she said, glancing down at her watch. Ah, I thought, now there's an opportunity missed; the back of her watch would've made a perfect application site. "Isn't that how ants work?"

"Yes yes, quite right, exactly. A perfectly ordered miniature society. No internal strife, none of your angst ridden teenagers running about dressed like Victorian corpses....no no no." I smiled down at her. "You know,that's a very acute observation. Yes, quite incisive."

"My parents bought me an ant colony for Christmas one year," she said. "That was on the box it came in. All about how ants communicate. " She looked around and sighed.

"Delightful. Of course we as humans have the ants put to shame when it comes to mank...we're capable of producing someplace in the range of 5665 different aromatic combinations in our sweat. Now of course all that has first to be distilled through the decompositional labours of our friends the Staphylococci. That's what produces the dreadful foul, rank stench you notice when you've been exercising. Activity raises the body temperature of course and that rouses our microscopic passengers into an absolute frenzy of activity, which is all to the good considering the subsequent increase in waste secretions oozing out of our pores, particularly in the axillary and genital regions. By the way, did you know, you have the most remarkable eyes?"

She turned both of them upon me and blinked several times rapidly.

"Oh yes, quite," I continued. "Tell me, have you ever tried drugs? I mean illegal ones, of course. A little MDMA at a rave party perhaps? Smoked some 'grass'? Hm?"

"Now really," she began. I held up my hand. "No no no no no, now Ms. Phail I assure you we're all adults here. I myself am not adverse to the occasional 'trip'. Oh no. Do you find that shocking?"

"Actually not in the least," she replied.

Earlier I'd taken the liberty of tipping the waiter heavily for turning his back a few seconds while I poured a few grammes of my 'elisir d'amor' on her order. Now I thrilled as he placed the steaming plate before her. My face displayed no trace of emotion, of course. She gazed down at the plate and I saw her brow furrow. "Whats this?" she asked.

"Fettucine alla beurre", I replied.

She took a hesitant bite and chewed thoughtfully. I watched her mouth, that splendid mouth like a strawberry. A lush, wanton, trollopy little strawberry aching to be filled with my

"Is this something Greek?" she asked. "It tastes like goat."

I gestured at her plate. "Don't lets be provincial. Eat up."

My heart was now positively hammering against the walls of my chest. I watched her as she devoured her portion.
Soon, Ms. Phail, you will be devouring mine.

"So as I was saying....yes. Drugs. Recreational drugs. Controlled substances. Did you know, for instance, that as we speak I have a quarter ounce ball of raw opium up my jacksie?"

She grasped for her napkin and began to cough.

"Not to worry dear lady, I am long acquainted with Madame Dragon. I can assure you you have nothing whatsoever to fear from me inasmuch as I would much rather roam the fertile, perfumed oases of my inner landscape during these interludes than engage in any coarser delights. Although I admit to having given more than a passing thought to...oh what do they call it nowadays..." She looked at me anxiously through the light of the candle that flickered between us. "Oh dear. A hallway? A strip mall? A....a landing strip,that's it! Your taco. Oh now don't blush; you shouldn't wear a skirt around the lab if you don't want people dropping things on the floor and looking up it. Or sit at your desk all splayed out as though you were about to take a run at the pommel horse ," I gestured in an illustrative manner "...wearing those kite-shaped little scraps of cloth that pass for girls pants nowadays. Heaven only knows what your father would say if he knew you were dressing like that; I'd thrash mine within an inch of her life if I had one. In fact I wouldn't mind reddening your bottom for you, Ms.Phail."

"Please put your hand down, people are looking," she hissed.

"And what pray tell is exactly wrong with my hand Ms. Phail?" I asked, leaning close, feeling the heat of the candle like the flaming breath of a dragon. Small crumbs of eyebrow fell to the table as she reached out and pushed me back into my chair.

"Actually its not so much your hand as you flicking your tongue at me from between your fingers," she continued in a whisper.

I felt a surge of blood infuse my nether regions. The experiment was working better than my wildest dreams had anticipated! "You are indeed a woman of rare discernement; a woman of many parts; all of them eminently suited to being painted a la Motherwell with the product of my loins; my love-custard, if you will. Tell me, Ms. Phail, have you ever had a wine bottle inserted up your

Suddenly I found myself in the back of a cab.

"Good Lord would you please stop licking the windows," Ms. Phail muttered, pulling me back from the glass. "You don't know whose been licking them before you. Please just sit back and try and calm down."

"Madame, I am unable to calm down when my very atomic structure rages in a violent maelstrom of lust," I announced. "Sir, attend your driving," I added, and the cabbie turned away. "He wants me," I whispered. "It's the heat of the East that rages in their blood. These turbanned Lotharios will penetrate your ringpiece quicker than a rat up a drainpipe."

"Please be quiet," Ms. Phail pleaded. "Honest to God. What do I have to do to get you to shut up?"

I announced my intentions by tearing aside the twill that hid my glory. "There is your Golden Fleece Ms. Phail!" I exclaimed. "Ignore that! I can find another button! No don't scrabble about on the floor after it its only a button! Ms. Phail, I command you to stuff my weenie up your hooha!"

"Oh dear," she said.

"Miss, please. We have a cop on horseback directing traffic up here," the cabbie said. "Please find some way to keep him quiet. I can't have him screaming about his weenie like this in public."

"Oh dear," she repeated. And with that she took me in her delicate hand.

I howled like a war-dog, a dire wolf, some distant primeval ancestor of the savage male species triumphantly braced against the hindquarters of its mate!!

"Please, sir, just shut up and let me wank you off," she muttered, pulling at my love muscle as though she were hauling anchor out of the black muck of Rangoon Harbour. "Just sit back. close your eyes and for the love of heaven SHUT YOUR GODDAMN PIE HOLE."

"Evoe! Your resolve is but a dialectical hymen concealing your throbbing need for my ding dong! Ope wide your piscine portals to the hammer of my sex, Ms. Phail ere I impregnate you with a glance of my eye! Join me in coition! Let me ravage the ridges and vales of your oral sanctum! Let me fling the hollandaise of my love against your vaginal vault!! Let me "

"Miss, please! I cannot remain employed if I receive another chit against my operators license," the cabbie pleaded.

"Oh God help me, alright...move aside you lummox. I can't..."

Her lips descended, fell, drew closer, and finally closed around my peepee!

VICTORY AT LAST!

Suddenly my throat closed and I struggled to draw breath. A wave of venomous heat rose up my chest, up my neck and over my face like a thousand stinging ants. "I.....I can't seem to...."

"Oh fucksakes, what now," I heard her mutter as I faded into black.
__________________________________


"I'm afraid you've had a mild heart attack," the doctor informed me. "You seem to have experienced a massive anaphylactic response to your own sweat, as far as we can determine..." the doctor shook his head and sighed down at the chart in his hand. "We don't see this type of thing very often, I'm afraid. I must say I've never seen a case of urticaria this extreme either. You came in covered in actual blisters. Hopefully you heal well; there shouldn't be any permanent scarring associated with the event....although I see here that we've had to sedate you nearly to the point of coma to keep you from mastu....hm." He looked up at me quickly. "...and I see you're going to need a skin graft. Well then. Hm." he looked around awkwardly, handed the chart to a nearby nurse and hurried out into the hallway.

When I was finally able to return to work I found a notice of transfer waiting for me. Under the circumstances I was not entirely displeased.

Until I read it.

I was being moved completely out of the forensic research department. I was, in fact, to be relocated to another wing entirely.

It seemed I was the new head of Egyptian Antiquities.

Oh dear.