Fear And Loathing At The Dealership

I desperately needed a new car.

My Battle Wagon, my beat to hell, bloody-faced version of Mel Gibson from “Braveheart” was on it’s last leg. Like Sir William Wallace at the end of that film, it was on it’s back, having it’s guts ripped out for an audience.

To compound things further, I had to use it to haul my equally non operational/dependable motorcycle back to Maine. It’s here that I decided I should test the strength, not only of my vehicle’s suspension and chassis, but my relationship with The Lady as well.

We’d been meaning to get to Maine since June. Schedule conflicts, etc, kinda made that impossible. She works in an industry that, in the summer months, doesn’t give a lot of time to take off, whereas I, being military, only have a certain amount of time I can be gone for. Literally, things need to be scheduled well in advance if we want to do anything fun for an extended period of time.

So I asked her a week or so ago if she wanted to come with me to drop the bike and the truck off at my parent’s place, all under the assumption that I would be getting a new vehicle of some sort by the end of the few days we’d be up there. She agreed, obviously not knowing what she’d be getting into.

Because, how better to test your relationship with a woman than by taking an ill conceived road trip to your parents house in a vehicle that may or may not die on the three hour drive there?

The trip started off with drama, of course. She drops her car off at her mother’s, for fear that it’ll be towed if we leave it unattended at the parking lot for too long, and we ride over to our house. I want to be on the road no later than noon, because it’s a haul and especially in my little fucked up S-10, it takes a lot out of me when I drive for long extended periods. The science behind this is that the sooner we’re on the road, the sooner we’re off.

But, The Lady doesn’t want to go to Maine without any cash on her. I don’t blame her. Her boss, however, doesn’t have her pay check ready. Also, apparently, he’s too cheap to have direct deposit.

I mean, it’s only the second half of 2008.

But the situation is fine for now; I still have the business of loading my Triumph into the back of my truck. I head out to my truck and bike, take the ramps out, set up everything. When it’s all said and done, I realize that I’ve really only given myself about ten feet of space to work my bike up the 45 degree angled aluminum ramps, with only about six to seven feet of bed space in the back of the truck. I would literally have to gun the shit out of my bike to get it up the ramp (because worst case scenario would be me not getting enough speed, getting the front wheel up in the bed, but then the ramps kicking out, making me fall backwards and ultimately underneath the 500 lb bike, breaking my spine.). I back the bike as far back as it’ll go, which is on the edge of payment and a grassy area, and start to rev it. I keep working the throttle and clutch, goosing and feathering it, and when I feel the rear tire start to spin on it’s own, with my hand clutching hard down on the front brake, I give it as much gas as I can.

White smoke starts to spew from the tire, as she begins to screech on the pavement under me. I can feel the back end starting to swing a little to the left and I adjust my body weight to compensate. Come on, I think to myself, nice and easy, straight shot up the ramp.

This is the most nerve racking thing I can think of doing. The ramp is so light and the bike is so heavy. My tail gate could literally snap off at any moment and send the bike straight down at a high rate of speed, crashing it’s fairing and forks into the back of the bed and sending me over the handlebars and through the rear window of my cab. With the smoke and screeching building, I drop the brake and clutch at the same time and launch forward towards the ramp.

I hit the ramp, and for a very brief moment I’m fucking airborne. There isn’t even time for me to really register this thought before I crash back down into the bed, my front tire kicking a giant dent into the back of the cab, below the window. The tire’s still screeching and smoking, throttle’s stuck open, and the horrible sound of an engine trying to tear itself apart is filling the air.

I clutch in, kick her down to neutral and straight up before putting down my stand and shutting it down. I look back over my shoulder, breathing heavy, sweat in my eyes, as the ramp is flat on the ground, no longer attached to the back of my truck.

“Jesus Christ,” I pant. I dismount, and shakily put the tie-down ratchet straps into formation and compress my forks for the ride. Behind the truck is a littering of spent burnt rubber shavings from the tire.

I give myself a second to relax, breathe in and breathe out, calm my shaking hands. Just then, The Lady rounds the corner and I paste on a smile to try to hide the “Holy Shit” look that I’m sure I have anyway.

“Boss Man doesn’t have the checks,” she says. She’s pissed. If she gets on this ride with me, she’s going to be a total tyrant, if this is the attitude she’s going to start with. She’s already stressed out about an extended meeting of my parents (she previously met them for about five minutes when they came down earlier in the Spring) so with all that going on, I didn’t want an upset stomach from her belly aching, if you dig.

“Hey,” I start. “I don’t want you stressed out. This trip is going to be a lot of stress, and I don’t want you starting off this way.”

She gives me a look, and a sigh.

“I’m not stressed at you, it’s just Boss Man is a douchetard,” and she goes on for fifteen minutes explaining past experiences in how she’s been upended on pay checks and such. She ends with “I love the guy, he’s been great to me, but for all I do around there, all I’m asking is that he pays me on time.”

We go to her bank, and then hit up a Burger King, and we’re on the road.

Things mellow out after a little while. She’s reading one of my Palaniuks, curled up in the seat wearing only a string bikini top and a pair of sweats. I’m in shorts and flip flops, Calvin Klein t shirt, sunglasses, singing along with classic rock hits on the ipod, getting her exasperated looks from over the tops of her sunglasses.

We have to shout to talk to each other, the truck is that bad and loud. The whole body rattles and shimmies and humms when you get to highway speeds. What makes it worse is that with the weight of the bike in the back pressing down on the suspension and whatever else is up under there, the ball joints whistle.

“We’re gonna make it, right?” She asks after about forty minutes into the three hour drive.

“Yeah, of course,” I say confidently. In my heart though, I wonder if it will, and I worry about how the hell we’re going to get a tow with the bike on the back, should we need one. I smile, and this seems to put her at ease, so she nods off. The whole time, like a Buddhist meditating, I constantly chant “a few more miles, a few more miles, a few more miles” in my head.

Apparently the mantra worked, because we eventually pulled into my parent’s driveway that afternoon.

Dad was in the driveway, spraying off a motorcycle engine with a hose. Rain was due any second, and with his giant fox tail of a beard, he squeezed The Lady with one arm while battling me back with the hose in his other hand. We embraced as well, and got to catching up on things, as we all began cleaning up my Shit Wagon.

Time was of the essence, while on the road, I had called a local Honda dealership because I found a pair of Ridgeline pick up trucks on their website I was very interested in seeing. I thought that maybe calling in ahead of time and setting up an appointment would be the best way to go. Give them an idea of who I was, what I wanted, and how important time was to me. If I was the type of person who made appointments to see vehicles, I would obviously be treated as a person who took time as money.

Or so I thought.

We made our appointment on time, and checked in with the receptionist at the front desk. What amazed me the most about every dealership we’d go to from here on in, was how busy they were. Every where you go, you hear about car dealerships crying for help from the public. They’re basically giving cars away, because no one wants to spend money on a gas chugging SUV or pick up. I’m surprised that it hasn’t disintegrated into “buy one get one free” extravaganzas.

So, the place had more than enough people walking around both in the lots and inside the show room. We were told by the receptionist that the salesman we made the appointment with was with a customer, but was wrapping things up. We were allowed to take a seat in a small waiting area, and someone would be with us shortly.

From the jump, as soon as we walked into the place, The Lady was on edge. She glanced upward nervously, and when I finally asked her what the hell her problem was, she simply pointed to the balloons.

You see, at these dealerships, they want to present a festive and party atmosphere. They, those in charge, think that they, the customer, will not buy a vehicle if the scene is similar to a funeral home. They play up the celebratory, party vibe, thinking that if consumers think it’s a party, they’ll want to drop hard earned cash - and potentially fuck up their credit - with a new or certified pre-owned vehicle.

So it was the balloons that were making her nervous. I forgot to mention The Lady has a crippling allergy to latex. This has somewhat been the bane of our relationship, if you’d believe it. Most condoms are made of latex, and the non-latex varieties are extremely tight fitting. Imagine trying to stuff a week’s worth of clothes into a tiny gym bag, and you’ll get what it’s like for me to get myself into one of these specialized prophylactics.

Over our heads were giant-sized balloons in patriotic color schemes of reds, whites and blues. Over sized balloons hanging low over our heads had The Lady ducking and sinking nervously into her vinyl seat. I tried to distract her with some strategy talk:

“Ok, hey, listen,” I began. “When we get in there, and start haggling over price and payments… don’t like, hit me, or get shocked if I start acting like a total asshole towards the guy. I’m not saying I’m going to insult him or anything, but if I start to get a little weird, don’t show our hand by making it seem that that’s not how I am all the time, you know?” And she got it without me having to explain it at all.

“Oh I know,” she says, “I know how to act in public.” And I smile and she sinks a little more into the seat, looking skyward.

After about half an hour, the other side of the time-table I gave the salesman on the phone (when I called and made the appointment, I stated “between four and four-thirty,” and what I was told was “perfect.”.) we were both getting antsy. No one had even approached us, not another salesman, not the receptionist, and certainly not the guy I made the appointment with. I made a big deal out of looking down at my watch, and our conversation about how long we’d been waiting grew louder and louder.

All the guy had to do was come around from his office and say “hey gang, sorry, this is wrapping up here, thanks for waiting, why don’t you get a cup of coffee I’ll be right with you in ten minutes,” and we’d been fine. I was very much interested in looking at these Ridgelines, and possibly purchasing one on the spot, to hell with haggling over price. But no one, in this entire PRIME HONDA DEALERSHIP paid us any mind.

As we were considering just getting up and leaving, my cell phone rang and it was my mother, who was just getting off of work. I explained the situation to her, how we’d been sitting for so long without anyone even talking to us, and she couldn’t believe it.

“You wanna see them jump,” she said, “just stand up and head for the door.”

“I know, I know, but,” I glanced back down at my watch, “I’ll give them a few more minutes,” as the time closed in on the 45 minute mark.

The final straw came when, off the street, a pair of Somalis walked in and were seen immediately by a sales person, as two well dressed and respectable white persons sat in total disbelief!

“That’s it!” Started The Lady, “we’re out of here,” and we both stood, walking out the door. I let loose a pissed off tirade about how shitty a business PRIME HONDA, ON THE SACO AUTOMILE, US RT 1, SACO MAINE was. I was also crushed, because I had set my heart on those Ridgelines.

Being that there were about a hundred more dealerships within two miles of where we were, we simply climbed back into my sad and pathetic truck and started driving north bound. On the right hand side of the road a little ways down from the Honda dealership, was a Toyota dealership.

Before I go any further, I want to make clear I wasn’t solely in the market for a foreign car. It just so happens that the deals I saw online, and the things I heard about certain manufacturers made it easier for me to check out their inventories, say, than that of a domestic car maker. And besides, all the vehicles allegedly made in the US, by US car manufacturers, are actually manufactured in Canada and Mexico.

So we pull into the Toyota Dealership, which was also owned by the Prime Auto Group, and started to just mill about in the lot. They had a lot of 09 Tundras, V8, all-time four wheel drive that they were doing everything but just giving away to every swinging dick that stepped foot on the lot.

We were soon approached by a very rat-like in appearance man named Richard, or Rich, or Dick, however you want to slice it. He had a prominent uni-brow with one long hair sticking about half an inch from the center of his face. His eyes were dark and beady, teeth a horrible mash of stained ivory in his mouth, with a badly gelled comb-over, onion breath, and all the charm of bloated pig stomach. He asked me, as any salesman would, what I was interested in.

“Well, I’m looking for a full sized truck, 2006-08 maybe … it doesn’t have to have all the bells and whistles, you understand, but it has to have some of the basic modern conveniences, like, … power windows, doors, .. keyless entry, … oh and it has to be black. That’s important.” And he took this all in, nodding, and he started to immediately push the $31,000 2009 Tundra, as if what I just said floated out into the atmosphere and missed him completely.

“We have a great buyers allowance on these,” as he leads me over to a row of brand new OPEC supporting machines. “You can get up to 6,000 off the sticker, with 0 down and 4.9% APR financing, if you’re credit’s good.”

“Ah huh, but uh, that’s still pretty much out of my price range, Richard,” I say to him. He nods and invites us inside.

We sit for a while, hashing out what I want. I mention how we were at the Honda dealership just before hand, and how shoddily we were treated over there. I even show him the internet print-offs of the Ridgelines, saying that’s what I was most interested in seeing.

“Well, you know Jim,” he begins, leaning in smugly from his side of the desk, “being that this is a Prime dealership, I have access to those Ridgelines, it’s all just a matter of finding which lot their at…”

“Really?!” And the hook gets set. He gets up and says he’s going to have them located and we can go check them out. I feel renewed, thinking everything’s going to work out. I smile at The Lady, who’s psyched that I’m in line to get what I want. While the salesman is off dicking around, I get another call from my mom:

“Yeah, we bounced over to the Toyota Dealership up the road. Come by if you want,” I tell her. My whole plan is this: My mother is a tenacious negotiator when it comes to car buying. Her last three vehicles she purchased, she sent the salesmen away crushed and crying and unemployed in that order. She’s a heavy hitter who takes shit from no one. She’s my big gun, my secret weapon, my Ace in the hole. I’m calling her in to lay down heavy artillery while I get my captured comrades out of the POW camp.

The salesman, Richard comes back with some print offs, keys and a dealer plate. I let him know what he’s in for when my mother shows up.

“You don’t even understand,” I begin. “My mother is like the bad cop to my good cop. You thought I was bad… you’re gonna wish it was only me you were dealing with when she shows up,” and he thinks I’m joking. He laughs, and at the same time, an actual Saco cop walks through the show room, short, pointy face, Mediterranean skin tone.

“Hey,” the salesman calls after the cop, “which one are you, the good cop or the bad cop,” as he plays on the joke. The cops stops, completely unaware of the conversation we’re having without him, and shrugs.

“I’m usually the bad cop,” he says. Under my breath I add “He’s probably also the bottom, too.”

At about the same time we head outside, my mother shows up. She’s an unassuming, gray haired office drone, who smiles every time she sees me. We hug in the dealership lot and then she turns and hugs The Lady. We all collectively climb into a waiting Buick Skylark and go across the street to the Nissan dealership where the Ridgelines are waiting for us.

“Your mother hates me” says The Lady out of no where when we’re away from my mother’s hearing. I look at her stunned.

“What?! What makes you think that?”

“Body language. I also accidentally called her ‘Mary’ on the phone a little while ago. I think she’s holding that against me.” My mother, pleasant as she is, is very old school. I had told The Lady about this previously, that she should address my dad as ‘Charlie’ and my mom as ‘Mrs. N-’ until told otherwise. The Lady claims I never told her this, or told her something different entirely. I know for a fact I brought this up months ago. I glance back at my mother, smiling, staring off at different cars, holding her bag and walking around the lot somewhat pigeon-toed, with an oblivious smile on her face.

“Don’t be so damn neurotic,” I hiss at The Lady, “make nice with my mom!” And the asshole salesman comes back, as he’s located the Ridgeline I wanted to see.

It’s an ugly gun metal gray and looks nothing like the print off I got from the computer. The inside is plain, and although minimalist is what I go for, this was just … too… minimalist for me. There was just a lot of empty space on the inside. And for it being an 2007 model, it already had 67K miles on it.

I almost half expected lemonade to drip from the exhaust pipe.

“I can’t say that I’m all that impressed,” I tell Richard. Truth be told though, the center console was fun to play with for about a minute, because it morphed and transformed into different configurations. One was like a cd case rack. Then it donned on me, that no one keeps the thick cd cases in their vehicles anymore, let alone actually listens to cds. I was heartbroken again over the Ridgeline.

“That’s ok,” he starts. “Let’s just drive it over to our other dealership and we’ll see if there’s anything over there that catches your eye,” and we take off down the road some more.

He takes us to their Ford dealership and shows me again, the gas hungry V8s. One he shows us even comes with it’s own plow rig and blade. At this point I’m getting tired of his ineptitude.

We drive back to the Toyota dealership and I off-handedly mention something about a sedan, because I heard the Camry’s were good on fuel. This started a whole new … dialogue with this fucking greasy asshole. He tours me around his lot, showing me over priced Corollas and Camrys, one pair being three years old, dented and scratched and showing visible rust. I let him know in plain language that I’m not awed with what he’s showing me.

“Let’s just take this one for a ride,” he says as he pulls out the keys to the Camry without the massive driver’s side door dent in it. We all climb in, and I make it a special point to drive like a total asshole around the back roads that I used to patrol (the dealership bordered the town I used to be a cop in, and the little ‘test track’ lapsed into the outskirts of said town.).

We get back to the dealership and again, I yawn and complain that he’s not impressing me at all. I then go on to tell him that we’re getting tired, we three, and I’d been on the road for three hours and had just spent three hours dealing with him, so we were calling it a day.

This asshole. He gets this look on his face like I just broke up with him. As if, instead of “hey, we’re tired of your fucking miserable excuse for cars, and you’re epic failure as a salesman, so we’re going home to rest now,” we’re saying “hey, this isn’t working out, we can’t see each other anymore, we’re breaking up.”

I have never before seen such a lack of professionalism.

“Why?” He says to me, almost in half a whisper. I stare at him, wide eyed in disbelief.

“Because, you’re not showing me anything that I want.”

“Well, how do you know what you want?” He asks, as if he’s trying to get some psychological leg up on me.

“I know what I don’t want,” I say, “and you’re showing me a lot of that. I told you what I wanted: A full sized pick up, 2006 through 08, modern basic accoutrements, V6, and it had to be BLACK. You haven’t even shown me one black vehicle yet.” He nods absently.

“Ok, I got one last car to show you, just give me five more minutes of your time, and you can go.” And I look back at my family, the two most important women in my life, and I sigh and say ok, and walk over to a display with him., leaving them to wait and starve a little while longer.

He walks me over to a black Scion TC, the equivalent of Pampers Pull Ups for autobuyers. The Scions are Toyotas geared towards 18-21 year olds who love a lot of flash and don’t care about substance. We both stare down at it with different expressions on our faces; his is adoration or some form of it, and mine is general boredom.

He starts his pitch script “What do you think, rad right?” Rad?!

“Uh, sure.” I couldn’t sound any more uninterested.

“Now, here’s what I want you to do, what would be an ‘Awesome Deal’ on this vehicle” he pitches. I pause for drama, and give him my pitch.

“Awesome deal? …I’ll give you 9 for it.” It was stickered as a 2009 for 16900.

“Whoa, well, wait, I mean, let’s be realistic.”

“Ok, realistically, I’d give you…. Maybe… maybe, 9-5.” And he develops heart burn.

“Let me go talk to my guy in the office and see what he thinks,” and he starts to walk back inside.

“Look, let me save you the trouble, Rich: I’m not interested in this car. When I woke up this morning, my mind set was on a full sized pick up. In the very far reaches of my mind, I was thinking sedan, but that was like, the outer most limits of my thinking. I wasn’t even thinking Scion this morning. So don’t try to shoe-horn me into this car, I don’t want it.” And I get that look from him, as if I only just said “I’m not taking you to the prom.”

“Ok, well, I’m sorry then, but… you still have to talk to my manager. I won’t get paid if you don’t talk to him.”

When I was in high school, we had a substitute teacher named Mr. Finley. Mr. Finley worked at a car dealership full time and subbed part time, for a goof. On one day, when he was supposed to be handing out a test or something, he instead gave a lesson on car buying. What not to fall for, what a good deal looked like, what was bullshit, etc.

One thing Mr. Finley talked about was the “let me get my manager before you leave” trick; which is when they bring in their heavy hitter, their big gun, their bad cop. It’s not really a manager they bring out, but their high pressure salesman. The back breaker. The guy who’s going to make you feel like a total shitbird for wasting “his employee’s” time by not buying a car. When you have a tough nut to crack, you break out the big nut cracker.

I saw this coming a mile away.

“Ok, Rich, I’ll be right here,” I said. He gives me his most professional rat-faced smile and goes back into the show room. I turn and bolt for my truck.

The Lady is sitting with the passenger side door open, smoking one of her American Spirits, and she looks up at me through her giant round sunglasses.

“What’s the matter?” She asks with a look on her face that really wants to ask “did you just hold up a bank?” …That sort of panicked, catch-me-up look.

“We gotta go, get in,” I spit. She tosses out her butt and stamps it with a sandal, and we tear ass out of the dealer’s lot, presumably with Richard running after us, yelling for us to stop.

I wouldn’t know, I wasn’t looking back.

That night, feeling utterly disappointed in my lack of ownership in a new car, but feeling triumphant that I was able to stave off the advances of a dipshit salesman, we all sat around eating Chinese from a local restaurant. My mom and The Lady had a chance to talk, as did dad and I. And then we switched when The Lady needed a post dinner smoke and dad followed her outside (it might have been the low cut shirt and bra combination she was wearing…)

Feeling the tension from earlier still coming off The Lady, I straight up asked my mother what she thought of her.

I knew this was a dumb thing to ask my mother, because mom is in the business of making her only son happy and content, even if that means lying to his face. Unfortunately for my mother, I’ve become quite adept at picking up her tells when she’s lying and when she’s not.

I mean, I was a cop for Christsakes.

“So mom, really, what do you think of The Lady?”

“She’s wonderful,” and I squint, looking at her face. “What?”

“Nothing, go on,”

“Well, she’s beautiful, and smart,” still all very generic, nothing specific. “I like her aura, how she looks at you. She loves you James. You two have such a good chemistry together, it really shows through. I catch her looking at you when you’re not paying attention and she doesn’t realize it. She adores you. It’s all over her body language.”

My scans for deceitfulness in my mother’s face find none. I let the skepticism go from my face. At the same time, The Lady and my dad return from outside, and we do the dishes together. When that’s done, we both call it a night and retreat into my old bedroom, now my father’s room.

We watch a little tv and I offer her a backrub. We’re very at home with the door closed. I lean in for a kiss, she rolls on to her back and we start to do what couples do with the lights off.

“We have to be quiet,” she whispers up to me between kisses.

“No, I know,” I whisper back.

“I really don’t want your parents to hear us having sex,” she hisses, all seriousness in her voice.

“I. know.” I say back in the same seriousness. My cock poking her through her PJ pants. We kiss and disrobe each other.

We both agree over breakfast at a little Main Street Diner called Jonsey’s the next morning, that there is no way in hell my parent’s DIDN’T hear us going at it. Twice. In my father’s bed.

Hell has a special section for sons like me.

While at Jonsey’s we play a game of hangman on a sales flyer for a Ford Dealership up in Westbrook, about a twenty minute drive. While The Lady tries to decipher “I Like Big Butts And I Can Not Lie” I notice that this particular dealership has 2009 Ford F-150s for 200 bucks a month, as advertised. Fuck it, I think to myself, what’s the worst that could happen?

As if she read my mind and answered for the both of us, The Lady says “We’re so not going back to The Cape in your ratty S-10.” And I realize then, that we’d better check out this dealership, stat.

We arrived on scene a little after nine in the morning and wandered around the lot. We were met by an older grandpa type named Bob. When I showed him the flyer (discretely covering the hangman phrase with my hand) with the circled stuff I was interested in, he brought us over to where they kept them.

“They’re very bare bones,” he starts in a grandfatherly way, “no power anything, manual stick, no carpeting. They’re really designed for Government and Commercial use, you know?” I think back to my rotting S-10, and decide that there’s no way in hell I’m going back to a similar situation. Stick shift? No power anything?

So I lay it on Bob, the same way I laid it on Rich: “Well, I’m looking for a full sized pick up, 2006-2008ish, power doors, locks, keyless entry, that whole bit. I’d like it to be a V6, maybe an extended cab… you know? Oh, and it has to be Black. That’s important.” He nods along.

“Well, let’s see what we got out back,” he says. He gestures us to follow him down out back to where there’s a whole row of F-1- and 250s. My eyes immediately lock on to one in particular.

“That one.” And I point to it. “Tell me about that one.”

“Well,” Bob starts, “it’s a 2005, uh, only 24K on it, power everything, regular cab, flare side, all weather tires,” and he goes on. What’s got my attention the most is that it’s all black.
“That’s it, that’s the one,” and I look at The Lady. “That’s it.”

She’s happy for me again, and we go inside where I’m slapped in the face and stabbed through the heart at the same time. In the middle of their show room, inexplicably, there’s a Triumph Daytona 990, a 2009 model, just hanging out. My knees buckle a little and I drag myself over to the negotiation table.

We hash out some numbers, mostly what I’m looking for for payments, etc. He goes over to his boss and comes back with a slip of paper and slides it in front of me.

“Well ok Jim,” he begins, adjusting his glasses as he talks, “with 3000 down, and the 800 we’re giving you for your truck on the trade in (about 1000 more than they should’ve given me… figure it out…), you’re looking at this for a monthly payment, which is right where you want to be,” the only problem with that was I had nothing to put down.

That’s not entirely true. I had about 800 dollars in my savings that was exactly that, savings. I just didn’t want to touch it.

“Well, I wasn’t uh, you know, planning on putting anything down…” I say sheepishly. I start to feel a slightly tinge of panic, thinking I might be in over my head. Without hesitation, The Lady speaks up.

“He has 1600 to put down,” she says with confidence. I was about to turn to her and say ‘Bitch, you know I ain’t got no 1600 dollars!’ But it then dawns on me, that she’s going to float me the cash for the down payment right out of her pocket.

Looks like my mother was right after all.

I protest for a second, and she kicks me under the table, hard, right where the calf muscle and tibia meet. I wince and smile.

“Uh, I actually have 2200 I can put down,” I say, after I figure that if she’s going to put up 1600, I might as well put up 600 of my own. Bob goes back with the new figures and I shoot The Lady a look.

“You better know what you’re getting yourself into,” I say to her.

“I do. I’ll just make you sign a promissory note… say, you have to pay it back over the next two years? That way, I get to keep you around for the next two years.” She smiles.

I can’t help but be in love with her.

Bob comes back with the updated figures. We all agree that it looks good and we should get the financing started. I tell him that we’re going to need to hit up my bank to get the cash for the down payment, because she left her check book at home and needs to wire transfer the money up. Bob’s so cool that he lets me take the truck I’m going to buy with me to do these errands.

The Lady calls her bank and she’s told that she has to be present at the bank in order to make the wire transfer go through. I think this sounds a little odd, but I don’t say anything, and we happily drive down the highway back from Westbrook to Biddeford. We get to my bank, and she calls her bank back. Now she’s talking to someone else, and they’re saying she has to be present at HER bank, not mine. We’re left standing dumbfounded in the bank parking lot, looking at my new truck slipping away.

“You sure you don’t have your check book in your bag at my parent’s house?” I ask her.

“Yeah, no I know it’s in the apartment. I left it on the nightstand, or your desk.” I curse. I suggest we drive the truck over to my parent’s house to show it to my dad and see if he’s got any suggestions. And by “suggestions”, I mean “money.”

We get back over to my parent’s house and dad gives the truck a once over. He’s impressed, though being a Chevy man, he won’t admit to it.

“If I were a Transformer, this is what I’d transform into,” I tell him, about the truck. I then tell him about the story of the down payment and he nods solemnly.

My dad has a weird knack of being condescending at the wrong times and not knowing it. I probably do the same thing, but being that one’s unaware when doing it, it’s hard to tell if I do it at all.

“Well Jim, maybe it’s just not meant to be, you know?” He says this right in front of the truck. We all decide that I should call the dealership and let them know the situation, oppose to just stealing the truck outright.

“Hey,” I call Bob’s personal cell phone, “it’s Jim with the truck. Yeah…. Yeah… Yeah, well I just wanted you to know that we’re coming back, but that we couldn’t get the wire transfer from her bank on the Cape. She has to be there in person I guess? Yeah…. No yeah, I’m coming back with the truck. I am. Yeah, like right now. But could you tell the guy doing the financing that the numbers are going to be a little different? Also, tell him I’m coming back with the truck right now. Like, right now.”

When we get back to the dealership, Bob’s super understanding. These things happen, he says. It’s the finance guy who’s shitting a brick.

Apparently this isn’t the usual finance guy. He’s like an understudy, he’s short, slimy-looking like Richard was, highly caffeinated and likes to shake hands a lot, and all weird, with his hand cocked out to the side, which requires me to look at his hand to line up the shake, oppose to looking him in the eyes, like I’m used to. All of this makes me increasingly nervous.

When we finally get down to it, we’re crushing out numbers and it comes down to about fifteen dollars more a month than what I want to pay. But I suck it up and pick up the pen. I’m literally a breath away from owning this truck (or at least holding it while the bank owns it) when this shark starts talking about the Extended Warranty.

“It covers everything, from tire blow outs and towing, to broken glass and mechanical malfunctions. You can bring it back here for almost everything, all for what I like to call, the cup of coffee a day,”

“Well, what’s the price of a cup of coffee these days?” I ask.

“About 2.55,” he says. I laugh.

“That’s some cup of coffee. No wonder Starbucks is closing stores.” The humor is lost on him.

“When you add it up, your monthly payment, with the extended warranty, which covers your truck for the next three years, is going to be X” and “X” represented about 75 dollars more a month than the 15 dollars more than I wanted to pay, period.

“No, I can’t swing that. I still have to pay gas and insurance on this thing. That’s not do-able.” I tell him.

“But you’re protecting your investment,” he starts.

“But this is redundant. I have insurance for a reason, as well as AAA. And this dealership’s policy is a lifetime warranty anyway, as long as I bring it back here when something goes wrong. You’re basically asking me to spend money on nothing.”

He gets noticeably upset. “I don’t think you understand, Mr. N”

“No, I don’t think you understand. I Don’t Want It. How can I be more clear?” He swallows hard, shut down and then prints off a page with all the things the warranty would be covering. With a big green magic marker, he rights DENIED across the front of the page, then under it, he strikes a line with an X next to it for me to sign on. With a lot of strain in his voice, the midget says:

“This here is just for our records, to show that you were offered this program, but have denied it.” And I sign extra big.

There were a few last loose threads, like getting the car detailed and a window button looked at, but after 6 hours, I was done. The truck was in my name.

We left the dealership, exhausted by victorious. The truck got a professional detailing and I had a guilt free conscience. I was flying so high that I even let The Lady smoke inside the truck on the drive home.

Unfortunately, my mom had to work late so we didn’t get on the road til much later that night. She didn’t get a good look at the truck because it was dark out. So I made sure I had The Lady take a picture of me and the truck that afternoon after I got it home. I then took the picture and made it her computer’s desk top wall paper, and shut the computer down, so she would get a surprise when she turned it on.

Here’s the picture:

Also, The Lady hates that t shirt. Yet she was the one who packed it.

Epilogue: It turns out, her check book was in her bag the whole time too. Oh Well.

It Was Probably Penned Ten Years Ago, Anyway...

If you've found yourself in ear shot of a radio that plays horrible Top 40 hits, I'm sure by now you've heard the 'Attention Whore Anthem' "I Kissed A Girl (And I Liked It)" by Katy Perry.

I don't have a beef with this song for it's "controversial" overtones. Honestly, the whole idea of two girls kissing is about as shocking as "Girls Gone Wild" on VHS. Actually, after you listen to the lyrics a few times, you kinda wonder if the song wasn't written back in maybe 2000 or 2001.

My beef is primarily with the fact that it's a terrible song, sung so badly that the engineers had to mix in synths over the vocals (ala Cher's last gay dance club hit "Believe" back in ... what was it, like 1996-7?). The only thing floating this ridiculous her-tongue-in-her-cheek ditty is the fact that it's about two girls kissing.

Two girls kissing. So? Honestly, two girls kissing is pretty much played out. Go to any bar on any weekend night and you'll see two girls kissing. Tune into "Gossip Girl" on the fucking WB and you see two girls kissing. You'll even see maybe three or four girls, drunk, faces in a circle, kissing each other. Why do they do this? It's because they crave the attention of men.

Guys, and I'm really only speaking to you impressionable fellows, like my roommate, who have some rose-colored vision of how the world works: Just because two girls kiss doesn't mean there's going to be a threesome, with you in the middle of them, calling yourself a lucky bastard with the world's biggest shit eating grin on your face. I know this for a fact. Two girls kissing is basically the 2000's version of a drunk girl flashing her tits around the bar. She's starved for attention, daddy never loved her, and she wants a man to look her way. That's all.

Honestly, a song about two girls kissing is about as sexy as Warrant's "Cherry Pie" video is now-a-days. Maybe I've just gotten older, or... something, but faux-dykes don't really get my wheel turning. It's like thongs. Thongs were all the rage about ten years ago. Hell, there was even a song about that too. But now, I don't even really like them anymore.

Maybe I'm on to something here: Write a horribly catchy pop song about something taboo, and it (the taboo-ish behavior) will officially die.

Technically that's not true. Back in like, 1996 or something, a little known one hit wonder named Jill Sobule sang a much more controversial-at-the-time song about kissing a girl, called "I kissed a girl." It was a sweet and innocent song, as I remember, sang by a petite blonde Jewish girl, that was going behind her husband or boyfriend's back with the brunette neighbor.

Hot.

The new... "I Kissed a Girl" has all the charm of a dead stripper.

My other issue with this, if I can get a little conversative right-wing on everyone... but this song is obviously aimed at young girls. No... self-respecting 20-something lady is going to be wearing cherry lipstick unless she has little girl fantasies. When I hear this song, I'm somehow reminded of the girls I went to middle school with, which.... creeps me out probably a little more than it creeps you out reading that last sentence.

Kids, between the ages of like, 10 and 14 experiment. It doesn't matter if you're a girl or a boy, if you're gay or straight or just a little curious. Everyone's curious, Ryan. Little dudes want to see what other little dudes cocks look like, girls want to kiss their best friends while they play tea party in the little fort made of couch cushions. It's nature. We're curious creatures. This is why we humans would never survive in the wild.

A tree branch snaps in the distance. A herd of wild gazelles book it out of there. If it were a herd of people, half of the motherfuckers would wander on over towards where they heard the branch snap, and subsequently be killed by hunters.

To compound my arguement, my beleaguered roommate wandered into the watch room and I asked him his thoughts on the topic at hand just now:

"Hey, what do you think of that Katy Perry song?" I asked.

"The," he starts to sing "I kissed a girl, and I liked it-t-t.. the taste of her cherry chapstiii-iick!"

"I think it's cherry lipstick,"

"No, it's cherry chapstick."

"Ok, but what do you think of the song, like, does it turn you on, does it disgust you - what, you're the target demographic for this type of common American media bullshit,"

"What does that even mean?"

"Nevermind, give me your thoughts on the song."

"Well," he starts, "I used to think the song was sexy, you know? But then, one day when I was walking across the K Mart parking lot, I saw these two eight year old lesbians singing it, arm in arm. That kinda grossed me out."

And there you have it.

Undoubtedly the song will live on in some mild jaded infamy as a song that soared high on lesbian-fantasy wings for a short period of time. It'll be the choral for strip club lapdances and karaoke duets amongst drunk college freshman girls. There is nothing we can do to stop this. We should just let it wash over us like... like... something else gay.

Though it begs, would Mtv play a video about two dudes kissing? I venture not.

Also, Katy Perry.... not that hot. Really. And nothing's worse than two not-so-hot girls kissing for guy's attention. It's sad. Not hot, but sad.

What The Guy Sitting Across From Me on The Bus, Reading 'Maxim' Magazine, Is Probably Thinking:

Dude.

Dude.

DUDE...!

Oh my god, dude, seriously, this chick is so fucking hot. Look at her tits, and her legs and her ass. Damn. I wish I could find a girl like that. And she looks so natural too. 'Maxim' girls are so REAL. They don't air brush their models, no way.

I mean, I guess there's a number I can text and she'll get it, but it'll probably go through some sort of screener or something and get all fucked up in the process.

Let's see, what else is in here...

Wow, this chick is hot too. Where does Maxim find all these hotties, seriously dude? I mean, I live in this big city and I never see chicks like these. They must all live out in Long Island or something. Wow, look at this car on page 57. If I had a car like that, I could totally bang a chick like the one on page 93...

Let's flip ahead to the fashion section. Or should I say fag-tion section. Heh, seriously, who wears this shit? See, this is where Maxim gets it all wrong. Girls don't want a guy who dresses like he's attending some board meeting or something. Chicks want a dude who keeps it real. Like how I keep it real with my t shirts and jeans and Adidas sneakers.

Oh, the best part, the joke page. Hahaha, 'what did the lesbian vampire say to the other lesbian vampire? See you next month!' Hahaha, where does 'Maxim' come up with this stuff, seriously dude!

This has to be the best men's magazine ever. I mean, it's the only men's magazine I've ever really looked at. I mean, I looked at a 'GQ' one time at the doctor's office in the waiting room, but it seemed kinda gay to me. But 'Maxim' gets me. Maxim knows what every 19 year old needs to be told. Without Maxim, I'd probably never score hot chicks.

Or have the chance to, I mean.

Oh, what's back here... an Axe Body Spray sample. Dude that smells awesome! I'm so going to buy that shit at the Duane Reade next time I go in to pick up my allergy perscription. And I'm going to make sure I spray half the bottle all over myself too, just to make sure people can smell it and be like 'oh my god, what's that awesome smell?' from across the room. And then I can be all like "it's me dude, that awesome smell, it's me."

It's orangy dude, like an orange grove. That's probably what California smells like. And Cali's full of chick's dude. Hot ones.

Is that dude reading over my shoulder? What the fuck dude! Get your own 'Maxim', you dick... that's so not cool -to read over someone's shoulder. He's going to try to steal the pick up tricks in here and talk to that brunette up front over there before I do. Hold on, let me just finish reading this... It says I should 'break the ice' with a joke. Apparently, chicks like it when you insult them right off the bat. I should say something like 'Your hair looks better up,' or 'that's really not your color' because it takes them off their guard and it's better than 'hey can I have your number because I think you're hot,'

It also says something in here about only paying for the first date, and unless she brings you home for some 'hot bangin' after the first date, all bets are off. Ok, phew, ok, is she looking over here... wait, let me ... ok, no, I think she's checking out that other guy. Or did she just miss her stop? Or is she looking at the cover of the 'Maxim' to see Jennifer Love Hewitt's picture? I don't know.

You know what, I'm not going to talk to her after all. She's not nearly as hot as the Hometown Honey on page 122.

It Doesn't Say "Stop" Fucktard.

Jim's had a busy week at work, so his posts have been thin at best. We on his editorial staff forgive him. I mean, the less he writes, the less we have to run around fact checking, and the less legal has to do, period.

Anyway, enjoy his rant. -ed.

I hate driving in this ridiculous state.

If you've grown up in New England, outside of Massachusetts, you'd freely associate terrible driving with any car with Mass plates. You see those white and red tags anywhere, even in-state, and you know that there's likely an asshole behind the wheel.

First before I go any further, let me state for the record that I'm a horrible driver. It's because I think every time I get into traffic I'm manauvering around the track at Darlington International Speedway. I tailgate, I don't use my signals, I speed, I make lane changes at the last second. I freely admit to doing these things.

What makes me a hypocrit to a certain extent is that people in this goddamn state do not know how to YIELD. What compounds this fact is that every ten feet on this fucking Hook, there's a fucking rotary.

Let me play out the scene as it typically unfolds in front of me: I'll be driving home from work along this one particular stretch of highway, and I'll be approaching this big rotary. There will be about five cars ahead of me, and I'll look towards the left, where traffic on the rotary should be coming from.

But there's no traffic. Nothing. Maybe a lonely fucking tumbleweed will be blowing across the road, but that it. It looks like some post-apocalyptic waste land.

And yet, I see break lights. I see a shit ton of red lights, lighting up, and the guy out front of everyone, with his MA tags, has come to a complete hault.

IT'S A FUCKING YIELD! DO YOU KNOW WHAT THAT MEANS?! IT SURE AS HELL DOESN'T MEAN STOP, BECAUSE IF YOU WERE TO STOP, THERE'D BE A FUCKING STOP SIGN, YOU INFECTED DICK!

So naturally, everyone slams on the breaks and it causes a back up in traffic. It's enough to make me want to go down to the zoo, kidnap a monkey, crack open it's skull, scoop out it's brains with a melonballer, and then proceed to poop into the skull cavity.

The way a rotary is supposed to work is that everyone just... goes. You just enter traffic seamlessly, and then leave traffic when you get to your little exit. You leave, someone else gets on. Granted, this isn't always the case, because large volumes of traffic can hinder the easy off and on of a rotary, but when there's zero traffic, you should just GO.

I see this as a problem too with highway on ramps in this state. Granted, they're ridiculously curved (like my cock) so seeing on-coming traffic is a little tricky, but coming to a complete stop at the yield sign at the end of the ramp is dangerous.

I'm going to be coming in behind you at about 65 mph, my cell phone in my one hand, a Dunk's ice coffee in the other, screaming at my roommate who for the 18th time this month has forgotten to do his share of the dishes, all while getting blown by my girlfriend to a soundtrack consisting of nothing by 80's hair metal, turned up to 11. I'm not expecting you to be sitting there, meagerly waiting your turn to join the fucking circus that is driving in Massachusetts, I'm going to be a Tomahawk Missel and your back end is going to be some Insurgent's asshole.

Just get out there, that's what I do. I come screaming around the corner at a high rate of speed and just say "fuck it." They have breaks, and it's a yield. Granted, I'm supposed to be giving way, but there's nothing there saying I'm to come to a complete stop- as far as I understand traffic laws. And I was a cop.

Best Of: June 2007

This was one of Jim's first "Fear and Loathing" pieces, which is generously ripped off from Hunter Thompson, as far as style was concerned. He's argued that he's paying an homage to the late cultural icon, where as the rest of us on the editorial staff call it blatant plagiarism. Anyway, with Jim out of the office for the next week or so,(work related stuff at his OTHER job...) we thought it would be appropriate to run this old post this weekend because it is La Kermesse back in Maine through Sunday. Enjoy- Ed.

All names have been changed to protect the guilty.*

If you live in Southern Maine, passed through on your way some place else, or are vaguely aware that what some consider to be a suburb of Boston, is in fact a totally different state, you might've heard of the little shin-dig the locals up this way call "La Kermesse."

I don't know what the name means, but I can tell you it's a big French festival complete with rides for the kids, poutine for the people who know what the fuck that is, and a beer tent. The festival itself is preceded by a "block party" on Thursday night, followed by a parade that will open up the fair grounds come Friday afternoon.

Basically, it's an excuse for people to be drunk in public. Not that anyone who lives in the greater Biddeford area really needs an excuse to do so.

So over the last few years (aside from the fact I was living in New York) I've pretty much stayed away from the neon colored orgiastic culmination that is La Kermesse. I really have no desire to see people I went to high school with, whether they're doing better off than me or not, nor do I want to run into the citizens of Biddeford on the whole.

But last night, Thursday June 21st, I found myself smack-dab in the middle of the fray, on the York Street Bridge with some friends, most of whom I didn't even know two hours prior, standing and looking at fireworks through blurry bloodshot eyes, and surrounded by Parliment smoking, stroller pushing, tank-tops-with-skinny-arms having trash. How did I get here? Allow me to illustrate.

I get home from the office at about five, and my pocket buzzes just as I'm pulling off of 95 at the Biddeford exit. It's my friend *John*, a guy I went to high school with and is probably the most genuine guy I know, other than Hokie. He asks if I'd be interested in hanging out, and at first I'm thinking he's putting a card game together, and being broke, I say I'm going to pass.

Instead, however, he asks if I want to go to the fireworks "and shit" tonight. I totally forget that it's the La Kermesse weekend, only passing the giant fucking yellow billboard at the 95 on ramp everyday, twice, for the last two weeks. I say sure, and get a time, and proceed about my evening per usual.

I have dinner with mom which is just pizza out of the box. I manage to burn the roof of my mouth.

I get to John's house a little after 1930 and park in front. He calls from the window to come up stairs and I do so, only to find his drunk younger brother sprawled out across his bed, jabbering on about something. He's dressed head to toe in American Eagle and sports a frat-boy tan. I'm not exactly sure what's going on, because John's busy playing Counter Strike on his computer and his mom is yelling at his brother, who's managing to be at his most incoherent.

Apparently, John's little brother just got home from college for the summer. And he's totally shitfaced.

So that being said, I dig into my back pack and produce a can of PBR and sip on it as I wait to see what's going to happen for tonight. John escorts me out, and his mother calls out that she doesn't want his younger brother getting outside. Dumbly, I stand at the door, with it wide open, as like a cat, the little brother scampers out into the bright wilderness.

We go down into John's basement where he has a pool table, as well as other assortments of entertainment displayed about. It's like your grandparent's rumpus room, if this was the 1970s and people still had rumpus rooms. Or even put those two words together. You know what I mean.

Low ceilings, beer cans littered about, a used and tired looking punching bag propped up against a far wall. The door to get in is never locked and requires a leaned in shoulder to pop it open. We stand around, discussing his younger brother's lack of alcoholic tolerance.

"I told him not to come home. I sent him a text. 'You're shitfaced, mom's home, don't come home'" John says as he works some chalk on to a pool cue. I sip my beer and nod along, thinking back to my kidney destroying first year of higher education. At the time being, John's little brother is sitting, splayed out on the back yard, telling everyone who asks if he's ok that he's in fact, twenty-one years old.

"Dude, you gonna be good?"

"I'm twenty-one!"

"....Ok..."

This brings us to John's other two friends who show up at about this time. *Jerry* and *Dan* know John from college and I guess all play musical instruments together. Dan's a tall dark haired guy who still looks collegate and Jerry's built like a keg, and reminds me somewhat of a guy I went to high school with. Both of these guys are cool shits.

A game of billiards breaks out and John hooks his iPod into a stereo and we take turns talking about stupid shit that guys talk about when they play billiards. Who we've fucked, who we want to fuck, how fucked up we are, how fucking gay something is, how fucking gay you are, and how fucking gay we all are. It's a regular round table of fuck patois.

Suddenly, John's mom appears downstairs, visibly upset. She states that the younger brother has "taken off" up the street, with some female friends of his. She wants him back at the house, pronto.

Allegedly, according to John, his brother started drinking around four in the afternoon when he went to a friend's house, and came back stumbling. He's not much of a guy; he's probably 6' even and 150 lbs tops. Also, he's only eighteen, and although belongs in a fraternity, probably can only muster to hold down four Bud Lights at the most. Also, he probably likes to kiss men (John's words, not mine)

Like an crack army assault unit, myself, John, Jerry and Dan climb into John's Mazda and tear off down the street looking for his brother. It doesn't take us long to come up on him from behind, as he's leading a pack of about four high school aged girls down the hill towards the festivities below. He's weaving all over the side walk, hands out to his sides, head lolling from side to side.

John, who is also a former Law Enforcement Professional, expertly puts the car up on a sidewalk blocking his brother's path from furthering. We all step out of the car as if it was planned. We look like something out of a cheesey cop drama on syndicated television. One of the girls in the pack that was behind the little brother even exclaims to no one:

"Wow, you guys are like a SWAT team!"

You're fucking A right we are, missy.

John makes contact, and Jerry and Dan are quick to block the brother in like a wall of flesh. There's a little bit of a confrontation with a young girl who's obviously on something, but I take her aside and keep a perimeter. The girl says to me "I'm not scared of you guys, my dad's a cop."

"So are we."

"Oh."

With some explanation on my part and some coaxing on John's part, we snatch up his brother and pull off down a side street and get him back home. Where he will pass out sitting on a toilet ten minutes later.

Fast forward to later in the evening. The other gentlemen and I have been playing billiards, shooting the shit (shit patois), and throwing ping-pong balls at water filled cups on a ping-pong table. At some point in the evening, purely due to my inebriated state, I produce my scrotum and announce that I've seemed to have gotten gum on my shorts.

This psyches out Jerry, and leads Dan and I to take the title of Supreme Champions of Beruit, 2007.

John then receives a call from a girl he has some history with, and I encourage him to have her come over. My thoughts are that if she gets here, gets drunk enough, we could probably run a train on her.

Seriously.

*Celeste* shows up about forty-five minutes later, and she's your typical cute college girl. Nothing remarkable or unremarkable about her at all. Cute body, cute face, cute personality. John puts her on "myspace picture duty" as we continue to play Beruit.

Soon after, five strong, we make our way down the hill into the pit of sin, all while glittery explosives go off over our heads. The entire time the five-some is together, we're busting balls, laughing, clutching our stomaches, and weaving all over the road as we walk. People are lined up on both sides of the street, heads tilted skyward as they watch the pyrotechnics from their properties.

Almost as if, years ago it had been planned out, we pass by the sewage treatment plant as the entrance to the lower downtown area of Biddeford, where the "block party" is being held. All around us, carnivale-style games, people, food, etc surround us. The booms and sizzles of fireworks rain down on us from over head. The air is coated slickly with a haze of residual burning Marijuana, and it makes your skin feel greasy. Cheap looking, broken people shuffle their dirty-faced children past us. Each one of them clutching a plastic sword and swinging it expertly at crotch level.

We weave through the crowd and make our way to the bridge. Along the way we, inevitably, come across people we know- high school people, teachers, neighbors, etc. A guy I haven't seen since early on in college, comes up to John and I and puts us both in a head lock and squeezes. He goes on to tell us that the next day is the day he's signing his papers to be released from the Army. I tell him good luck with that.

We get offers to go drink at bars and parties and so on. But the collective mood of the five-some is to march back up the hill to John's, play a few more games of Beruit, and possibly clusterfuck.

Seriously.

We weave our way back through the crowd, heading back the way we've come. The fireworks are over now, with a substandard "grand finale" which lit up the sky like it was day time, and twice as loud, and suddenly I become aware of the increased police presence.

It seems all around us, cops in polos and standard uniforms, with ear pieces for their radios have materialized out of thin air. There's probably a ratio of every three people, one cop. It's startling.

Jerry is probably the most drunk out of everyone, and as we pass some carnivale-style games, the chatter starts to pick up.

One game involves a small inflatable pool filled with water containing rubber duckies. I'm not sure the premise of the game but that's exactly what it is. As we pass by, Dan says to Jerry, something like:

"I'll give you twenty bucks if you jump into that fucking pool,"

Of course, Jerry turns him down. It's going to take a considerably higher amount of money for him to engage in such baffoonery.

"Dude, back me up!" Dan slaps John on the chest and John grudgingly agrees to go in on twenty bucks as well. Now the dare's up to forty.

All eyes turn on to me. I look around, knowing that I don't have even ten dollars to my name, because I just paid all my bills today, I nod absently, and the crowd seems to go wild.

"Sixty bucks dude! Just jump in!" And Jerry still throws up the block.

This whole time, the only voice of sobriety and reason is Celeste's.

"You're so going to get arrested. There's cops all over the place," and this seems to hit home with Jerry immensely.

"Yeah dude, I don't want to get arrested on this dumb shit," He says and starts to balk, heading back towards John's house.

To be completely honest with you, gentle reader, I don't know why I chose the words to say at that particular moment, but maybe deep down, I wanted to see a little chubby guy jump into an inflatable pool filled with little rubber duckies. Maybe my dark side came out of me at that instant. Maybe I wanted to see if he'd get arrested, based purely on my deeply routed curiosity. Maybe I just wanted to call his bluff.

I lean over, touching Jerry's shoulder, placing my lips next to his ear lobe and say this:

"Do this, and you'll be the stuff of legends. People will talk about this for the rest of their lives. People you don't even know, but they're standing there, waiting for you to jump into that fucking pool. You'll be remembered forever. This is your legacy."

And with that, Jerry's eyes glazed over. A slow, goofy grin spread across his fat Donkey Lips lips and suddenly I glanced down and saw that he was standing in stocking feet, his shoes somehow coming off.

You see, men strive to leave a mark on this world, no matter how big or small. We want glory in all shapes and forms. To us we live for the conquest. This is why men climb Mt. Everest.

The psychological erection I gave him proved the jolt he needed. Much to the protest and physical strikes I was taking from Celeste, Jerry turned and started at a good trot towards the inflatable pool, some fifty yards back. We all stood watching in mixed disbelief, drunken grins pasted on to our faces, all of us chanting in unison "he's not really gonna..."

And then, he goes sideways in midair.

That's when I turned away, shocked, scared, knowing he was about to be swarmed upon by a mass of trigger happy Nazi, Nixon-esque Biddeford Cops.

What felt like an eternity passed as we four stood looking at each other. John starts to walk off, turning around only to say "I cant be caught up in this, I just applied to these guys like a week ago. Call me when you find out what his bail's going to be, and I'll come down and bail him. But I can't be here for this."

It's Dan who stands tall on behalf of his friend Jerry, stating "dude, we can't ditch him," and Celeste is quick to agree. Admittedly, my feelings were with John, and I teetered on the edge of staying or going, my vote being the decider.

But then, out of the crowd, as if it was the end of the film "Rudy" our pudgy counter part and La Kermesse Carnivale Terrorist remerges, soaked head to toe, jogging back to catch up with us. A roar goes out, as we collectively welcome him back, slaps on his back, hugs, and "holy shits" had all around.

Jerry ends up scraping his knees, and as he takes a seat by the sewage treatment plant, he retells of what happened:

"I fucking jumped in, and this guy, this guy grabs my collar on my shirt and goes 'you're not going anywhere' and I tried to run, but this cop comes up to me and goes 'do you have three hundred dollars for bail?' and I say 'no sir,' and he asks me my name and I tell him, and that was it." And for as simple of a story as it is, we're all huddled around our new hero in total awe.

"That was some pretty stupid shit," he finishes. He also makes it known that he wants his money ASAP.

We climb the hill back to John's house where things eventually wind down. Jerry and Dan decide to go out to Old Orchard to meet up with some other people to retell the tale of the night. Celeste, expertly deflecting my drunken horny advances, decides to go home ("I've gotta get home," she says "You can come back to my home," I come back with, "it's a home....") and I pick up my bag, wish everyone a good night, and manage to drive myself home without getting pulled over.

...And that's why I don't go to La Kermesse.

My Roommate Doesn't Listen

I'm sunburnt, so that makes me cranky, which is exactly the catalyst I need to write about my idiot roommate.

For the first few months we've been living together, I've been really trying to help him score. And by "score", I mean just talk to a member of the opposite sex. And by "talk to a member of the opposite sex", I mean, be able to approach a woman without one of the following happening:

-Him freezing up.

-Him coming across crazy/creepy.

-Him sexually assaulting someone.

I've been successful and not successful at the same time. Successfully he hasn't sexually assaulted anyone, but he hasn't even so much been able to approach anyone either. Numerous times he's made mention in the living room he's going to go down to the local dance club only to drive there, sit in his truck looking at the people going inside, and then turning around and coming home. When he comes home he says "you should've seen the girls going in!" which will prompt me to say "did you TALK to any of them?" and he'll say "No."

Today, as I was attempting to rearrange my room, he walks in with a cup of Cherry Garcia and starts in on this gem:

"So I went to Barnes and Nobles today and I started to flip through some of the like ... 'Relationships for Dummies' books and stuff. I think I figured out what my problem is," and I stop making my bed and turn and look at him.

"And what did you figure out?" Fooling myself into thinking that he's about to reveal something utterly Earth shattering about his psyche or inner mental workings.

"I just lack confidence..."

Now, I've only been telling him this for MONTHS. Ever since I met this kid, he's the least confident person I've encountered. I've told him repeatedly that he just needs more confidence, that all his problems root out at the fact he isn't comfortable in his own skin. I've done everything I can to help boost his confidence, from giving him frequent compliments about his strengths (he's genuinely funny -albeit a little crazy- good looking, tall, and when he calms down a little bit, he has a very engaging personality) and pushing him to expand the limits of his comfort zone by putting him into ever increasingly uncomfortable situations (such as bringing girls over to him or dragging him to different places/people/events and making him look like an ass, all in an effort for him to get over himself.).

His problem has always been this lack of confidence, which is upheld by some sort of standard that he's supposed to be this cool character. If I could break him of this line of thinking, he'd instantly become more comfortable with himself.

If I can let me ego talk for a second, I think he wants to be me, or at least model himself an avatar that's like me. He always sees me being a cool customer, etc. But the fact of the matter is, I'm not cool, I'm not comfortable in my own skin, I'm highly self conscience with a lot of insecurities. The difference between he and I is I've learned how to hide those negatives or turn them into positives. He wears his insecurities like a Cosby Sweater.

It took me YEARS to develop some sort of confidence. So I don't expect him to have a metamorphosis overnight, but I at least expect him to try.

And seriously, what's sadder than a guy going to the movies and dinner by himself all the time in order to "meet people." HELLO ASSHOLE! YOU CAN'T MEET PEOPLE WHEN YOU WON'T EVEN TALK TO THEM!

I liken him to a novice ice skater, who is out on the ice for the first time. They want to do everything they can to stay upright, for fear of falling. All they need to do is fall on their ass one time to see that falling on your ass doesn't hurt, it's just a little embarrassing. And even then, 9 times out of ten, someone will be there to help pick you up, because we've all experienced falling on our asses, and we all know what it's like. He is not special. None of us are.

What my toe-headed roommate needs to do is fall on his ass, hard. Then he can skate all day.

So when he told me that he read a book and self diagnosed himself as a self-conscience social misfit I nearly lost my shit. I spiked my pillow cases and turned on him.

"Hello! I've only been telling you that for months! What the fuck dude! Is this thing on! Is this thing on!" And I mimic a microphone, blowing into it and tapping it on the head. He just stares. "Did you buy the book?"

"No..."

"Well thank god for that," I say and pick my pillow cases back up, sighing. "Why are you so afraid of getting hurt?"

"Because I don't want to get hurt?" He says back. I can understand his fears, but they're baseless. He's never been hurt in his life. He's forever a flincher, the kind of guy who will always flinch back when he's scared or tense or nervous. He needs to unclench his fucking ass, and start hearing what I have to say to him.

Buyer Beware

For the longest time I've been a huge proponent of actually paying for the music I download. I understand how incredibly stupid that sounds, when at any given time, day, place even the most inept person behind the controls of a computer (hi dad!) can find and download their favorite hits for free.

I've always had the mind set that you get what you pay for. There's a reason why the shitty "on sale" power drill is on sale, and the Makita is 300.00 USD. The same principles can be applied to Wendys and White Castle, Sony and LG, Disneyworld and Busch Gardens.

These things are better, won't break down on you, won't give you horrible spraying shits that coat the bowl is fecal spatter, and won't make your kids wonder why you're such a dead beat. The extra you're paying for is convienence, the ability to be rest assured that things are going to be ok.

So when faced spending 99% of one dollar to download a song, I don't see it as a huge deal. I've always figured that for the price of a dollar I was not paying for a song, but guarenteeing that what I was getting was a quality download of the exact song I wanted, without some dickweed teenager's trojan virus-laced coding within my copy of Busta Rhymes "Pass The Couvousier (remix.)".

But the downside to paying a dollar for a song off of iTunes is that shit adds up quick. Like the proverbial Lays Potato Chip, you can't have just one. I started to look at my credit card receipt (which I use to download music from the iTunes Store) and noticed that the bulk of my purchases from iTunes was hovering around about 10 to 15 bucks a month. And when you're dropping triple that on gas every two weeks, plus groceries, etc, it's quickly realized it's an unneeded expense.

So I started to ask around about free downloading sites or "torrents." Which ones were good, which ones to stay clear of, etc. The Lady turned me on (...) to uTorrent where you get a host of five or six other torrent sites that feed off of each other through one search. She downloaded it to my beleagured Dell laptop (I also trusted her because she was running pretty much the same programme on her beloved iMac book) and started to rob the music industry at mousepoint.

This wasn't my first foray into the world of illegally downloaded music; as mentioned before I had dabbled in this practice well before the days of iTunes. If you're reading this and are under the age of 21, you probably have no clue that Napster at one time used to be 100% free, and spawned warped and horribly virus-ridden children in the form of Morpheus, BearShare, LimeWire, etc, not unsimilar to how Gaea spawned the Greek Gods by slicing open Chronus's ballsack.

These programmes fed off the "Peer2Peer" networking system which allowed you to download files from multiple people or "sources" at once.

Have you ever been to an orgy? I have (hi mom!), and it's not as cool as you'd think it would be (if that's your thing) because it's literally a clusterfuck. People stepping all over each other, not knowing names or even faces, just literally fucking each other over to get what you want. And as we all know, unprotected sex with multiple people - as in transmitting files indiscriminately - can lead to viruses. This has always been a major concern of mine, on both the literal and figurative fronts.

So I left the "free" world of downloading music (and I say "free" with quotes because really, nothing is free, what you skimp on with cost of a download, you pay for with some Asian nerd wiping your harddrive at the price of 65.00 USD an hour) and started to pay for it. Whatever, it's only a dollar.

And there were considerable advantages to paying for the download: It didn't take literally all day (or multiple days) to finishing downloading a song or album. And when the song or album finished, you weren't left with some piss-poor quality, purposely mislabled, recorded-in-a-basement garage band/wanna-be rapper.

Nothing is more irratating than searching for Ice Cube's 1994 album "The Predator" and coming back with some cock-smoker's own personal rendition of "It Was A Good Day."

All in all I've found that using a torrent isn't that bad. I haven't had a lot of issues with the downloads, only that the reception is spotty and it takes, at it's fastest, up to an hour to download some stuff. I do miss the point-click-download-play function that made iTunes so great, along with the album art, because I'm incredibly impatient and have an ever decreasing attention span.

I'm curious to see if with gas prices going up, will iTunes do something to prevent more consumers from jumping ship as I have? Will they recognize that people in their targeted demographic (which would be iPod owners, which is virtually everyone) pass on filling their iPod in leu of filling their tanks? Someone should call up Steve Jobs and present him with this problem so that we (and by "we" I mean, Me. Capitalized. That's right.) can get the best of both worlds. Either start having gas stations hand out free iTunes gift cards with every x amount of gallons pumped, or Apple can start handing out free gas cards with every dollar amount purchased on iTunes.

It'd be win-win for everyone involved.