Another evening blurred: UPDATE

Occasionally, my drinking habit bites me in the ass. Whether I crash my bike and break a rib, lose my camera, wake up in a puddle of puke, or whatever... sometimes my drinking, how shall I say... sometimes my drinking impedes my ability to function like a normal human being.
And Tuesday night was no different.
It seems, as I only realized this last night, that I forgot my bicycle at the burger stand on the way home on Tuesday. We go to the bar, I have a few drinks, a few more, I ride to the burger stand while others walk, we buy beers, and then I walked with everyone back to my house. And I completely forgot about my bike.
Needless to say, I no longer have said bike.
And I feel awful. I mean, it wasn't even mine. I was just borrowing the bicycle.
Now, I have no bicylce. I some girl a bicycle.
All I have is a stinking shit pile of embarrassment and regret.
Terrible times, indeed.
I'm on the wagon from this moment forth. That's my penance.
God have mercy on me.

Another evening blurred

Jesus, what the fuck happened last night? It was just suppose to be dinner with friends. Then I don't know what happened. I remember playing foozball and kicking ass and getting free drinks at the gay bar and then some French man called me an asshole and my friends said it was time for us to leave. Then... let's see... oh, we hit up the burger stand and bought forty beers and a gang of us went back to my place for a James Brown dance-a-thon. Then people started passing out and Hansi and I kept draining beers talking science and philosophy and suddenly it was seven in the morning.


I can't believe I got out of bed today. I actually made it to work!
My co-worker Guillermo is laughing at me. He says, "You look like shit."
I say, "I feel like shit."
He says, "And you look bloated."
I say, "Fuck you."

Treviso Poker Circuit: The Final Table.

We had our final poker night last night. The Treviso Poker Circuit at Casino Rivero...
We've been playing almost weekly for the last nine months, and all in all it's been quite a rivalry. With five seats and two wild-card positions, last night's double-header seemed the appropriate way to conclude this year's tournament.

At the final table:
Hansi "countin' cards" Raber
Guillermo "straight face" Rivero
Daniel "false idol" Hirschmann
Mark "capitán huevos" Argo (pictured)
Ann "no bluff" Poochareon
Juan "princess" Ospina
and myself, Andy "lay off the juice" Smith

Generally, the house has a distinct and suspicious advantage so going into the first game last night we all keep a keen eye on Rivero. Soon into the game, Argo dropped Poochareon on a flopped straight and Ann tossed her chips across the table before storming out of the room. Hansi soon followed losing on a poorly played high card.
Then it was Rivero, Argo, and myself (Ospina and Hirschman having a seat at the final table already). Tensions were high as it seemed Rivero had higher stacks than Argo and me. And sure enough, after trading stacks for a few hands, Rivero took me out. He went all in, and I called. Like a sucker. Like a moth to a flame Rivero pushed me out of the game.
Not long after that, however, Argo took Rivero down with a well-played two pair. The house doesn't always win.

The final table, one last game: I was very serious. I was determined. As the year's statistics read, I had a five or six game streak in the first half of the year, but couldn't seem to find it again for the rest of the year. And indeed, Argo had come up on top for most of the recent games. Yet again, Rivero had the house advantage.
Game on!
Poochareon dropped out almost immediately. And after a few hands Ospina seemed to have the highest stake while I had almost nothing. Raber took a big pot, then Argo after that. I went all in on a pair of sevens and survived. Hirschmann was the next to go, kicking a screaming after a losing a two-pair split down to the high card, which he didn't have. Chips circled the table for a while after that until Rivero and Argo went head to head. And Rivero took it.
Four remained: Raber, Ospina, Rivero, and myself.
Hansi folds on the flop and on Fourth Street Rivero goes all in. Ospina calls. I call too.
I took them down, knocked them both out, giving a significant advantage against Raber's meager stack.

Argo presented the cash prize of 70 euro and Raber and I went hand for hand, not much chip movement. Raber went all in on three different hands but each time I folded, not having the cards. The fourth time I called, and Raber took it, but I still held a bigger stack. A setback, that perhaps Raber could take advantage of? No. I went all in on the next hand, Raber called, and that was it.

I collected my winnings.

Thus concludes the Treviso Poker Circuit.

Make it stop!

I can't stop sneezing! I wanna die! Seriously, I think I've sneezed every four minutes this morning. What's wrong with me?
Atisshoo!
There! I just sneezed again!
Why me? Why this torture?
Supposedly, sneezing is caused by a bacterial build up in the throat, lungs, or nasal passages. Pollen, pet dander, dust mites, these things make you sneeze too. You sneeze to get that shit out of your system. But really, enough already. I've sneezed enough this morning to expunge a dust mite for every fucking grain of sand on this planet.
Researching "the sneeze" I found that the nose can mistake other things for nasal irritants. Stong odors, sudden chills, bright lights, and orgasms can make you sneeze. Great.
Oh, I also found a sneeze fetish forum. Fantastic.

I don't give a shit about what makes you sneeze or who gets off on sneezing. What makes you STOP sneezing! Someone help!
Atisshoo! Atisshoo!

Ok, wait, here it is, how to stop sneezing:
- Swallow your saliva when you feel the sneeze coming. Do this repeatedly until the feeling goes away.
Done. Doing it. I'll never stop swallowing my saliva.
-Hold open your eyelid. It is almost impossible to sneeze with your eyelids open.
Ok. I'll never blink or wink again.

I think it's working. I haven't sneezed in like six minutes! This is great! I feel l like a human being again. Finally.
But I sort of miss it. Now I want to sneeze! You never know what you had until it's gone, so true, so fucking true!

Oh God, why have you forsaken me?

Stay focused. Get Serious.

I pretty much drank away the weekend. Again.
And yesterday's rainy weather made it real easy to sleep in, watch a movie on the couch, take a nap, eat some pasta, make some phone calls, and watch another movie before calling it a night.
Hell, even this morning I went downstairs planning on riding my bike to work and discovered that my bike was gone. Some motherfucker stole my bike!
No. After about two seconds of rage I realized I had left it outside my friend's house on Saturday night. Duh.
I gotta ease off the juice.
Because really, I only have so many weekends left here, before I return to the states. And I have a long list of all the things I want to do before I leave. It's mostly writing and artistic endeavors but some of it is personal. Like... I think I'm going bungee jumping on Thursday. That's not on the list, but I thought I'd mention it.
Just having a definitive end to living here, working here, having a specific departure date has, as they say, lit a fire under my ass.
I've been slacking a bit. Sure, we launched the first issue of Chief Magazine, but I haven't had time to help Percy upload pics of our August adventures, and I've been slacking on this blog a bit. Not that Boraxx hasn't, in fact, he still owes me two drinks, and drinking at his expense on Friday night was pretty sweet.
I don't know exactly where I'm going with this guilt-ridden diatribe. Is it a pep talk? Is it an excuse?
No more excuses, that's what I'm telling myself.
But wait. Camilla comes to visit tonight. And if I know anything I know I'll be drunk again before you even read this.
It's not easy. The nature of being a writer calls for isolation. Writers can only produce (and often be happy) when isolated. For a drunkard this can be a challenge.
And I accept this challenge! Speaking for alcoholic writers around the world, I vow to battle my inner thirst and hold tight to my priorities. I vow to write and create each and every night. I vow to stay committed to the A.P. SMITH TCB MONTH OF THE CENTURY.

Cheers!

Life is better on holiday

I want to go back on holiday! I've been back for like two weeks now, and I think I deserve it.
It's raining today and I'm so far behind on some of my shit that I don't even want to start catching up. I want to swim in the sea and get drunk and eat squid. I don't want to be at work.
Maybe I'll quit.
Maybe I'll quit and run away to the coast where I'll recruit an army of child pick-pockets and live in a dry-dock boat near a secluded cove.
What if I took up a life of crime, starting with stealing a car and rampaging across Europe robbing and beating the elderly?
Criminals work, sure, they have "jobs," but c'mon, you and I know they're not working. They're not working like you and I are working. Or at least you. I'm at work now.
And this is what I'm doing.

I've seen the face of the Devil.

Last Friday there was another one of them outdoor "Party in da Park" shindigs. And like other parties before this one it raged on into the night, well past any reasonable or even sensible amount of drinking and gallivanting.
There was a riot in my brain the next morning.
And sitting with Hansi that morning we tried to piece together the events we could barely remember. Here are some of the questions we asked each other:

"Where the fuck did that dog come from?"
"What would you have done if you didn't find your shoe?"
"Remember when you crashed your bike?"
"How many girls did you cram into that tube with you?"
"Was that before or after we performed our ballet to 'Tiny Dancer'?"
"Is that why I have this lump on my head?"
"When did you lose your toenail?"
"Where the fuck did that dog come from?"
"He was there?"
"What?????"
"Who were those people?"
"But really, where the fuck did that dog come from?"

He was called The King for a reason

I almost didn't come into work today. I was up late last night, had crazy dreams, and woke up around 11am. And sometimes going in late is worse than going in at all. At least that was my philosophy.
But not anymore! This month, the ninth month of the year 2006, is officially THE A.P. SMITH T.C.B. MONTH OF THE CENTURY.
This month I will work my ass off, take no shit, leave no survivors, and smoke those rats right out of their holes. Or something like that.
Really, I've just been living it up all sweet and easy for the last month and now it's time to get back on the gravey train. School is starting, the summer is winding down, and we're all a little older.

And that's a promise.

God Bless Gerard Damiano.

Let's take a moment to reflect on the wonderful world of puppet pornography...


The film is called "Let My Puppets Come." And it's awesome.
I first saw it at a midnight screening in Seattle like eight years ago and recently found half of the film buried bewteen old porno clips on my hard drive. And it's just as good as I remember it:
Puppet on puppet action, dog on puppet action, pornstar on puppet action, it's got it all.
It even has a storyline: "The three chief executives of Creative Concepts Systems & Procedures Brothers Unlimited Inc. of New York are in hot water as their latest venture has been a huge failure, and their Mafia investor, "Mr. Big", wants his $500,000 within 24 hours, or else. So Jimmy, a courier who over hears their plight, suggests they make a porno movie as an easy way of getting back the lost money."
Of course, as you can imagine, hardcore hillarity ensues.
"Let My Puppets Come" came out in 1976. That's 13 years before "Meet The Feebles," and 20 years after the show "Sam and Friends," which is considered the birth of Jim Henson's Mumppets. But "Let My Puppets Come" is not a Jackson vehicle nor a Mumppet film. It's directed by Gerard Damiano. Yes, Damiano, who direceted the infamous "Deep Throat" and "The Devil in Miss Jones," not to mention "Naked Goddess" and "Naked Goddess 2" and "Young Girls in Tight Jeans" and "Slightly Used" and "Candy's Little Sister, Sugar," and, the 1969 classic, "We All Go Down."
And Damiano doens't hold back with "Puppets", using the same gusto and talent that made "Deep Throat" the highest grossing fuck film of all time.
Highlights of "Puppets" include a nurse blowing a dying man complete with messy puppet cum, a singing penis and dancing vagina, Little Louie played by the late Louie De Jesus aka Louie Short Stud (real person, little person), and the extremely life-like puppet dog lipstick cock...

And I looked high and low for some video clips of the flim but it seems the puppet porno has not yet penetrated the world of YouTube. If you have clips, or the entire flim (I only have the first 25 minutes), please let me know.

Seriously.