Author (#32)December 2005 Archives
Saturday morning will arrive as usual. Eater X will wake up at sunrise with a bottle of pills in one hand and a spent can of whipped cream in the other. Thirsty and hungry but too tired to move his legs, Eater X will raise the half-empty can to his lips and suckle the tiny bit of rich, flat cream that can be coaxed from the canister without the aid of its now departed nitrous oxide. Eater X will look like a baby sucking on a bottle of milk, and the angels who watch over him from their angel cloud up in Heaven will coo at the sight of a grown man made young again by an innocent thirst for something nourishing and sweet.
"Hey, God!" they'll cry musically to God, who sits on God's Cloud a couple of clouds above theirs. "Look at Eater X with his bottle. He looks just like a baby. Isn't it sweet?"
God will mute His television set and take His eyes off of the screen just long enough to look at Eater X as he sucks a few more drops from the stingy can of cream.
"He certainly does look cute," He'll agree with a chuckle. "But, golly, he looks to be in pretty rough shape. I mean look at his eyes! I've never seen eyes so glassy and puffy! I think he should sleep a little longer. Don't you?"
The angels will look back down at Eater X for a moment and carefully study his swollen face. They'll confer quietly with each other and take turns speaking and nod politely in acknowledgement of points well made, and after a few minutes of earnest discussion, they'll smile and shake each others' hands and break from their huddle and shout up to God harmonically that Yes! Eater X might benefit from a few more hours of sleep.
Upon hearing that a consensus has been reached, God will place his giant hand into the tiny pocket-in-a-pocket of his blue jeans and pull out a pinch of magic sand, which he'll sprinkle lengthwise over Eater X's recumbent body. As soon as the sand has settled upon him, Eater X will close his eyes and quickly fall asleep again.
Eleven hours later, at precisely 6:20 pm, Eater X will wake up for the second time that day. Refreshed from the extra sleep, he'll roll out of bed and rush up the stairs to his bathroom, where he'll shower and shave (or not) and dress. Twenty minutes later, he'll emerge a handsome and much cleaner man.
At 7:00 Eater X will leave his apartment to take a walk through the city and buy himself a dinner. His friend Joe, who's known socially as "The Mayor," will call him on his cell phone to say that he and the rest of the CT crew are on their way and will be in New York and ready to drink by 10:00. Eater X will thank Joe for the update and hang up the phone and turn south down Eighth Avenue.
At the corner of Greenwich St., a homeless man named Stanley will approach Eater X and ask him what time it is. "Time to eat!" Eater X will say. "Have you eaten today? C'mon! Let's go." Stanley will follow Eater X to Famous Original Ray's Pizza, where Eater X will order two large pizzas and two beers and sit and watch as Stanley eats and drinks them both. Stanley will finish both beers and one large pie and place the second pie in a box to go.
As they exit the restaurant, Eater X will turn to Stanley and hand him a $5 bill and a $1 bill. "President's Day is only 7 weeks away!" Eater X will say with a smile as he points to the portraits of Lincoln and Washington on the fronts of the bills.
"God bless you," Stanley will answer. "You're a good man."
Stanley's compliment will go straight to Eater X's head, and Eater X will feel smug and complacent until Monday morning, when he'll realize that Wait a minute! he hasn't done anything charitable since Saturday night, at which point the faded glory of the good deed done will become a persuasive reminder of the urgent need to do another.
At 9:00 and back at home, Eater X will sit down on his couch with a 12-inch sandwich and a tall boy of Coors that he plucked from a six-pack that lay sideways on the top shelf of his refrigerator. When he's finished his dinner and drunk his beer, he'll grab a second beer from the fridge and nurse it until his friends arrive from CT, right on time at 10:00 just as "The Mayor" had predicted. As soon as they've armed themselves with beers for the road, the four of them will jump into a cab and head to the East Village to celebrate the new year and drink.
About twenty minutes before midnight, Eater X will excuse himself from his group of friends and the ladies they've corralled over the course of the evening and walk the length of the bar in search of a girl to kiss at midnight. Unlike his friends, who'll secure their ladies early, Eater X will purposely wait until the very last moment to begin his search because he knows what no one else there knows, that unless it's his fate to meet the perfect woman that night, he has about twenty minutes of good material before he starts to bomb. For example, Eater X couldn't meet a girl at 11:00 and hope to hold on to her until 12:00 because by 11:20 or 11:30 at the latest, she'd get bored with him and want to leave. If Eater X were to meet a girl at 11:00 and hope to kiss her at 12:00, he'd have to excuse himself from her company with the promise of finding her later, figure out exactly how much of his material he'd already gone through, and then meet up with her again at exactly as many minutes to midnight as remained in his routine. If his timing were even a little bit off, the whole plan would fall apart.
At 11:51 Eater X will spot a very pretty girl standing by herself in a crowd of people by a booth near the window. He'll walk up to her and start talking, and the two of them will hit it off. Nine minutes into his routine the clock will strike 12:00, and Eater X and his girl will kiss.
And whatever happens next is anybody's guess because The Whaler's not forecasting past midnight.
Gift #1. Do not buy uncured bacon when you're nursing a hangover. It doesn't taste like bacon as you know it, and you'll feel like you've hit rock bottom when you find yourself pouring salt on top of each slice. Have you ever seen Boyz n the Hood? Do you remember the scene in which a crackhead offers to suck Trey's dick for like five bucks? Disgusting, right? Yes, well, when you're pushing a slice of bacon into your mouth with one hand and simultaneously salting it with the other, you're gonna feel about that low.
Gift #2. This is actually a piece of advice that my friend Dave gave me. I've regifted and given it to you because most of my advice sucks. Seriously, everything The Whaler knows about life you probably already figured out years ago or knew intuitively. (The Whaler's slow on the uptake.) In an email, Dave warned me not to order Domino's Steak Fanatic Pizza:
Whaler, I think I recall you saying that the Domino's Steak Fanatic Pizza was looking pretty good on TV. Well, we ordered it yesterday during the Cowboys' shit-show, and we all agreed it was the worst pizza we've ever had, even though we ate it all. The steak tastes like dog food, and there's no tomato sauce, and the best part is they don't use mozzarella. They smother it in white American cheese. I really didn't expect much from it. In fact, I thought it would probably sort of suck. But no tomato sauce?? That really threw me. And the American cheese was just fucking comical. I was seriously laughing as I ate it because of that cheese--really tasted like Kraft singles.
Gift #3. Never ask a cop for his autograph because you think it will make your friends laugh. You'll only make the policeman angry, and the three of you will likely spend the night in jail on a bullshit charge. Eater X can explain this one a lot better than I can. Just don't ask him about it in front of his parents.
Gift #4. If you make the mistake of asking a cop for his autograph because you think it will make your friends laugh and you're in Dallas and the cop arrests you and places you in jail for the night, hire Grant St. Julian as your attorney. Although you'll never see or talk to Grant St. Julian in person, he'll make the charges against you disappear. And he'll only charge you 50 bucks.
Gift #5. Do not eat three ounces of raw chicken because you optimistically believe that Surely somewhere there must be a piece of raw chicken that doesn't contain salmonella. Drill this into your head: POISON CHICKEN DOES NOT DESERVE THE BENEFIT OF THE DOUBT! No matter how healthy you think you are, you will get sick, and it will suck. If you decide to eat the raw chicken anyway, set aside at least three days to recover. You're gonna need 'em.
Merry Christmas. I want a new harpoon.
He's eaten strange things and gross things and many fancy things that many people think are strange and gross. He refers to anything odd he's already eaten as a Gateway Food because once he's tried it and justified the tasting in his mind, he's far more likely to eat a stranger food if the opportunity arises. It's a slippery slope he traverses.
Eater X can rationalize eating almost anything at least once because he knows that somewhere someone has found something to be delicious. "If it won't kill me, I'm in," is his motto.
Some day Eater X would like to eat alien, which is why he fully supports, on a strictly Rah-Rah! level, the funding of NASA and the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI). Some day, when Eater X finally conquers his chronic case of acute poverty, he'll write each of them a generous check. In the space that reads "Memo," he'll write, "Starving!!!" and draw a picture of a famished Eater X to inspire them when they're frustrated.
He also fully supports DNA research, like the kind that inspired Michael Crichton to write Jurassic Park. Scientists commonly refer to DNA as a code, but Eater X prefers to think of it as a lengthy menu. If someone can ever figure out how to recreate extinct species, Eater X will scrape together what little money he has and become the first entrepreneur to open a Jurassic restaurant. There dinosaurs will be among the featured dishes, and the question, "Does pterodactyl taste like chicken?" will finally be answered.
Eater X doesn't have any qualms about eating endangered species. He understands that doing so might anger a few bleeding hearts, but he thinks it'd be a great way to make a name for himself. Tonight on Conan: Nicole Kidman, Jessica Alba, and the Guy Who Ate the Last Sea Cow! In a perfect world, in a world with Jurassic Park technology, Eater X won't have to worry about angering anybody with his choice of meals. Every animal, quite literally, will be fair game. If the last California Condor winds up on his dinner plate some night (gasp!), he'll simply grow another in a test tube (sigh).
Until recently monkey was the only meal that might have made Eater X pause. For years he'd been wondering, "Is it cannibalism to eat a fellow primate?" And then one day a friend asked Eater X what he'd do if he were stranded on a deserted island. "Would you eat people?" came the question. Eater X thought long and hard about the implications of a brief diet of people meat. Courts, he figured, would probably consider the island to be a mitigating circumstance, and he'd probably go free if he promised never to do it again. So after what appeared to be a moment of careful consideration, which was really just a dramatic pause, Eater X sheepishly admitted that under some strange moon and perhaps wearing a disguise, he might eat human flesh, which immediately made the monkey morass moot. Tonight if you were to place a piece of monkey on Eater X's plate, he'd give pause just long enough to render an appropriate toast. "Thank you, Dr. Zaius!" it would begin.
Three years ago Eater X sat down to a dinner of lion meat, which he'd purchased as a Christmas gift for his dad. It made him feel powerful in the same way he imagined a vigilante might feel after bringing to justice a wanted man; Eater X was eating the medium-rare flesh of an animal that he morbidly hoped had once eaten another human being. "This one's for that guy!" he thought to himself as he took his first bite and discovered that revenge is sweet, indeed, and even sweeter washed down with a dark beer.
At some point during the meal, Eater X and his dining partners discussed which other animals each of them would eat. His stepmother, who is not possessed by the desire to eat all of God's creatures great and small, suggested that she draws the line at animals she thinks are beautiful, like calves and lambs and horses. Eater X respects her decision to eat only the ugliest creatures, and he thinks that some day the animal kingdom might be more handsome because of her, but he won't be basing his diet upon beauty alone. He told her that he'll eat almost anything and then without a segue added tangentially, "I believe we're all entitled to change our minds." It was a veiled suggestion that she might want to consider changing hers because someday when he captures and kills and cooks the world's only unicorn, he'd like to fetch her a plate.
Some day Joe Hayduck will sell an astounding 53 Lawn Knome (sic) Nativity Sets in a single day at work. It will represent the store's entire inventory of Lawn Knome Nativity Sets except for the broken half of another nativity set, which will sit in the far corner of the store waiting to be sent back to the manufacturer for replacement. One of Joe Hayduck's coworkers, Mike Maple, will look at Joe Hayduck with amazement and the tiniest bit of envy. "How the heck did Joe Hayduck sell 53 Lawn Knome Nativity Sets?" he'll ask himself while scratching the top of his head with his finger.
As the owner of Mike Maple's Lawn Knomes, Mike Maple will be aware that a young man in Nagoya, Japan, holds the world record for Lawn Knome Nativity Sets sold in a single day, 53, and that Joe Hayduck has just tied it. Mike Maple will look at the broken half of a nativity set sitting in the far corner of the store, and then he'll look at Joe Hayduck. He'll realize that with two hours still left in the workday, Joe Hayduck has a chance to set a new world record. Though he'll believe that nobody will ever buy half of a Lawn Knome Nativity Set, he'll hope to encourage his friend to break the record anyway. "Hey, Joe Hayduck!" he'll call out to Joe Hayduck from across the room. "I bet you can't sell this half of a nativity set," he'll say. "I'll bet you a hamburger you can't do it." If Joe Hayduck can break the record, Mike Maple will be happy for Joe Hayduck because Joe Hayduck has been a good friend and a great employee. If Joe Hayduck cannot break the record, Mike Maple will enjoy a free hamburger. Mike Maple is hedging his bets. Either way he'll be happy.
Joe Hayduck will look at the broken half of a nativity set, and then he'll look at Mike Maple, and then he'll think about the half-pound hamburgers they sell at the diner down the street. Joe Hayduck won't have eaten anything all day because he'll have been so busy selling 53 Lawn Knome Nativity Sets. His stomach will growl at the prospect of a warm, greasy meal to fill it. Joe Hayduck will consider the bet for about a half a second and then shout out to Mike Maple, "Okay! You're on. You've got yourself a bet." And then Joe Hayduck will begin focusing his mind on the task at hand: selling the broken half of a Lawn Knome Nativity Set. Joe Hayduck will gaze into the mirror hanging on the wall behind the cash register and talk to his reflection. He'll remind himself of difficult sales he's made in the past, like the one to the lady with the irrational fear of Mike Maple Lawn Knomes. "She was a toughie!" he'll think proudly. He'll tell himself that he can sell that broken half of a Lawn Knome Nativity Set. And then he'll close his eyes for a moment and imagine exactly how he'll do it.
At the end of the day, two hours later, when Joe Hayduck and Mike Maple are closing up the shop, they'll look over to the far corner of the store where the half of a broken nativity set had sat. It won't be there anymore; Joe Hayduck will have sold it.
And as news of Joe Hayduck's new record spreads slowly throughout the country, competitive eaters will find themselves inspired by Joe Hayduck's success. They'll be reminded of another young man from Nagoya, Japan, who holds a world record for eating hot dogs, 53.5 in 12 minutes. Though that record had once boggled their minds, suddenly, because of Joe Hayduck, it won't seem unbreakable.
Sometimes when Eater X wakes up he'll wonder where the heck he is even though he really hasn't gone anywhere. Sometimes before Eater X opens his eyes he'll think that he's still in his boyhood bed in his boyhood bedroom in his boyhood home in Simsbury, CT. Sometimes seconds later but still before he's opened his eyes, he'll have only the faintest idea that he's actually downstairs in his bigger bed in the bedroom of his New York City apartment. But he'll keep his eyes closed anyway so that he can further explore the moment, trying to understand what it is about his particular position, his particular direction, the particular temperature and moisture and smell of the air, and the particular arrangement of the rays of sunlight shining through his eyelids that remind him so much of a place he last slept years ago. And he won't quite figure things out. He'll just smile respectfully and with his eyes still closed at the power of his mind to transport his soul so vividly from one place to another.
Sometimes after Eater X has just spoken to his mom on the telephone, he'll think back to his freshman year of college and to how she fought off a very advanced case of cancer and lived. Or he'll think back to his junior year of college, two years later, when an aneurysm burst in her brain and nearly killed her. She shouldn't have even made it to the hospital that day, and she shouldn't have survived the aneurysm even after the doctors began working on her, but she did. Eater X will remember what his mom told him then about visualization and positive thought and about the roles they played in her survival, and he'll marvel not only at her spirit but at the power of the mind to affect something physical in those who believe that it can. His mom may seem kooky at times to him and his sister, and they may tell her on occasion that she is, but they're only teasing her. She's not a fool. She knows things and suspects things that deserve to be further explored.
She's one of the reasons that Eater X is shifting his focus and changing his game. Whereas as in the past Eater X's approach to life and to competitive eating was always decidedly Western and physical, he's beginning to realize that his future may lie in something more Eastern and intangible.
What exactly does that mean? I guess only Eater X knows, and he hasn't given me much more than a vague explanation.
"I don't know, Whaler," he said to me, as the two of us stood in his kitchen the other night spitting mouthfuls of chewed up Total cereal onto a hot skillet in a vain attempt to create a low-fat, high-fiber tortilla with 100% of the recommended daily allowance of 12 essential vitamins and minerals. "I guess it means living life hard, taking it out and playing with it instead of just putting it on a shelf and admiring it from a safe distance like it's some sort of fucking artifact; savoring every story, every sensation, every emotion, and wallowing in some of them a bit too long as long as I think that I'm learning from them. But I really don't know. I just know that there's something bigger out there, a level of understanding that can help me to live life better and fuller. The wisest people, the people I admire most, know something about life that I don't. I can hear it in their voices. I can see it in their eyes. And I think they know it because they never stopped learning and exploring themselves."
It sounds absurd, at least a little bit, to think that Eater X can eat more hot dogs because he tells his mind to tell his body to do so, but I wonder if maybe he's right. Hasn't he already witnessed the power of mind over matter? And hasn't he heard a very credible testimonial? I think Eater X thinks he has.
So if you see Eater X coming out of somebody's church one day or meditating in the park with a sherpa, or if you see him crawling down the street drunk or high or (gasp) even sober, or if you see him in the library reading a book that hasn't been read in centuries, don't think to yourself that he's lost and confused and wasting his time. Think instead that he's doing his homework and busy finding his way.
My roommate, Jennifer, is taking me to the Sesame Street Christmas party next week, but only on one condition: that I shave my very ugly beard before we go. It's a demand that seems a tad excessive, and I stomped around the room a whole lot when she first made it. I hated what she'd said. I hated being at her mercy.
At first I tried to reason with her. I asked her why the beard must go. I thought perhaps I could pounce on a flaw of logic and save it, but I was wrong. She answered simply and irrefutably, "Because it bugs me."
Confounded and angry, I stormed out of her room without a word, veins popping out of my forehead, steam spraying from my ears. And then I ran into my bedroom and threw myself onto the mattress and cried and fell asleep.
I woke up two days later with tears crystallized on my cheeks and flakes of drool caked around the corners of my mouth. I stunk of sweat and bad breath, and my clothing bore deep wrinkles from my slumber. I took a shower and brushed my teeth and got dressed and sat down at my desk to think about what she'd said. I studied my beard carefully in my reflection in the window. I didn't mind what I saw; in fact, I rather liked it. I'd always thought of myself as a clean-cut kid, and I was sick of that thought because it seemed too plain and too common. With my beard, for the first time in my life I could see an engaging irony in the layers that defined the appearance of my face.
But Jennifer didn't agree, and the fact my beard was two days bushier only strengthened her resolve. "Shave it!" she said upon coming home from work that evening, "Or else!" And with her finger she made a cutting motion across her neck, which, come to think of it, didn't make any sense at all. Upon hearing her ultimatum renewed, I ran into my bedroom and cried.
(switch to Present Perfect tense)
It's Wednesday, and I've decided to shave my very ugly beard because I cannot think of any way to save it. If I'm going to pound beers with Big Bird and smoke cigarettes with Elmo, it simply has to go. (God! It fucking hurts to write that.)
I have informed my very ugly beard that its days are numbered, and I cannot say that it took the news well. My beard, which has grown so big that it now talks in complete sentences, protested passionately at first. It cited the favorable results of several focus groups that I'd organized while growing it, and it spoke eloquently about the onset of winter and its own insulating effects. "You know there'll be wind?" it said slowly at one point, as if I were stupid. "Your face will chap." And I didn't know how to respond because deep down I knew that my beard was right.
"Beard," I finally said to it, a teardrop falling from my eye. "My hand has been forced. I have no other choice, and I'm sorry. I'll be shaving you on Sunday."
My beard just stared at me.
I wanted to say something to it, anything to placate it because I could sense how small and helpless it felt. But I knew that if I searched for words that couldn't be found and spoke for the sake of speaking, I'd say something stupid that I'd later regret and back myself into a corner from which I couldn't escape. So I just stared back at my beard. And another tear fell from my eye.
Minutes passed as we looked at each other in the mirror, and then at last my beard broke its silence with an attitude that was refreshed and mature. "Well, I must admit, Eater X, we have had our share of good times, haven't we?"
With relief and a sheepish smile I answered, "Yes, we certainly have."
My beard continued, "Can I ask you something, Eater X?"
"Anything, beard," I answered.
"Would it be too much to request a last supper?"
I paused for a moment before answering. I wanted to think things through. I wanted to be certain that by accommodating his request I wouldn't encourage in him a false hope for the future. I thought about all that we'd been through together. I thought about how well I knew him. I had too much respect for my beard to deny him his dying wish. "Of course you can," I finally said.
"Well, then," my beard answered in a satisfied tone. "I'd like it to be meatballs."
(switch to Simple Future tense)
I'll be at Carmine's Restaurant in Atlantic City on Saturday, competing in the Tropicana World Meatball Eating Championship, but I won't be competing for pride and honor, which usually draw me to the table. I'll be competing for the sake of my beard, paying it back for all that it's done for me and sending it off with a flourish. I'll massage meatballs into the hairs of my beard so that my beard enjoys every moment of the contest. Will it cost me? I guess it probably will. I probably won't swallow many. But I don't mind making sacrifices for somebody else, at least not once in a while. It's the part of good living that teaches me about values and humility. They're lessons I've sorely needed.
And maybe the meatballs will stain my face red in the process and give me a four-day tomato sauce beard, comeuppance for my roommate, Jennifer.