According to Fox News, N*Sync minstrel Lance Bass's seat on the next trip to the international space station has been replaced by a cargo container, as he failed to cough up the required $20 million in time. The question I want to know is, if we can raise $10 million, will the Russians shoot him up for us? The return trip seems counter-productive...  ¶ 12:16 PM 0 Comments

A worrisome story in the Washington Post concerning the recent murders of soldier's wives fingers combat stress and the anit-malarial drug Lariam as possible factors. The Post story carries this gem of a quote:

But not all of the soldiers involved in the killings at Fort Bragg saw combat, and thousands of other soldiers at other bases have taken Lariam and not killed their wives.

¶ 10:33 AM 0 Comments

Starting Spetember 1st, a bizarre sociological experiment of most uncertain provenance will begin taking place in the lower end of South Boston, on a quiet residential street whose main form of hooliganism consists of double-parking. By equal parts accident and design, I, always your fearless misadventurer, now find myself living with two roommates, bad enough in itself, and in this case they are both female. Like some dreadful reality show we have all signed our names to a Contract which commits us to one year of communal life.

It seemed like a good idea at the time. Both of my prior roommates decided they would vacate at summer's end, and I was not yet prepared to face the task of moving. My next-door neighbor "Cholly" suggested that adding a female to the mix for the 2002 season might improve both the general hygiene of the apartment, and my social life to boot.

Like most guys, I pondered this suggestion rationally: guys have mostly guy friends, so girls must have mostly girl friends. If I have a chick for a roommate, odds are I will occasionally get to meet her friends, some of which will be single, thereby increasing my chances of getting some nooky. There were many factors yet to consider; suffice it to say I didn't consider them much.

The first one came easy. A girl who lived literally around the corner called, and came over to look at the place. The doorbell rang, and I was pleased by what I saw when I opened it. Late 20's, professional, clean, attractive. She romaed the place for a few minutes, and pronounced it marginally acceptable, then began toa address some specifics. She asked about the hardtop for my Jeep, which has for two years now taken up most of the porch. "Oh, that belongs to my roommate," I said. She asked about the pile of stuff in the corner of the kitchen, which consisted at the time of empty whiskey bottles, salvaged parts from a mainframe computer, assorted tools, and expired aeronautical charts. It is in fact so old that at the bottom of it one can find the beginnings of a rich topsoil, and I have begun entertaining offers from local archaeologists to excavate it. "Oh, that will be out of here by the end of the week," I said.

But she had a suprise of her own. "You said in your ad that pets were negotiable. I have a cat, would that be okay?" This was it- the moment of truth. In my email inbox were dozens of inquiries from men with asian names starting graduate school in the fall and desperate for a room, any room. I could in a split second fill my two spaces with such persons and think not another thing of it. But experience had taught me that this rosy scenario had a cloudy lining. I had one such roommate, four years before, who cooked every meal religiously using a wok filled with enough oil to bathe a camel, half of which by the end of the session would have splattered its way onto the floor or nearby walls, nearby being defined as the same block. To add injury to insult, he also insisted upon taking with each meal a daily constitutional of strange leafy greens which, when cooked in the flaming oil, released a substance I can best describe as mustard gas. Every man in the house cried like a baby and ran for the cover of the nearest bar. No, no Asian grad students for me. But I digress...

Given the choice between living with a research scientist for Al Qaeda and a cute girl with a pussy, I chose the latter. All I will say at this point is that when Faust sold his soul to the devil, he received 24 years of limitless power in return. As befits the pattern of my life, which can be summarized as an endless volley of minor insults hurled at me by a mischievous God, the problems began even before she, or any of her visitng friends, moved in.

First, the apartment needed to be painted. Second, it needed to be cleaned. Third, it needed to be fumigated. Fourth, she needed to shut the fuck up. But those things were minor compared to the fifth demand. Actually it was the thirty-second, but that's beside the point. As it stands, my partment has two floors, the top floor consisting of a full bath and the two empty bedrooms. My new roommate decided at that point that it would be optimal if I would find anotehr girl to occupy the top floor.

This too sounded like a capital plan. With two girls, I would double the amount of single friends that would be coming through. And according to the guys in the locker room, girls living together frequently get into arguments and pillow fights which result in most of their clothing being ripped off. Plus there would be the possibility for extra income from my most innovative idea yet: a live streaming camera on the internet. Thanks to the low cost of email, I could advertise this groundbreaking idea around the world in seconds, become a millionaire, and buy an apartment with a parking space on Beacon Hill. If I was that kind of guy, that is, and I am not, except maybe just a tiny little bit. Still, I stuck to the plan.

Once again, I failed to consider the consequences.

At the present moment my apartment looks like a Pottery Barn store preparing to open. My comfortable old sectional sofa, which can be carried in and out of a city apartment by one person, now rests in the living room of a stewardess I know, who promised it a good and loving home. In its place is a love seat which thankfully is off-white and not off-pink, and an empty space where a sleeper-sofa will go, once roommate #1 (let's call her Janet) figures out a way to get it into the apartment. I am guardedly pessimistic regarding her chances. Short of the television, everything I own has been removed from the common areas, replaced by nice furniture which was bought new in the last year or two and cleaned on a regular basis. It is all very bright-looking. This must be what it feels like to get married and have your wife move in.

Moreover I am utterly aghast at the sheer volume of trinkets and baubles that Janet has. She moved here from an apartment one block away, and hired a moving company to do it, and I see why. Actually the funny part is that they managed to break more than a few items, which they blamed on "rattling around in the truck on the drive here." We were so close to her old apartment, they could have put the truck in neutral and rolled it over. But back to her stuff. She has enough furniture to equip a small hotel, and enough kitchenware for a restaurant. There are boxes everywhere, and therein lies a problem.

Without thinking through the consequences, I agreed that Janet could replace all of my stuff in the common areas with her nicer stuff. But see, this was on Saturday, and trash day, helpfully, is Friday. As most of you know, every September 1st, Boston undergoes a migration equalled in its frantic scope only by that of the great Wildebeest. Despite this well-known fact, the city's approach to the issue is to dispatch inspectors to issue fines, rather than trucks to simply pick it up. Still, Janet insisted that we move my stuff, known now as "trash," to the curb, so that she would have room to bring her stuff in and put it where she wants it.

So I did it. But of course, by Sunday morning the neighborhood committee was buzzing, and I was being nominated for Enemy of the People #1. So, you know what I had to do? Bring all the trash back inside and stack it up on the porch, where I had first suggested it go not one day sooner. Husbands can at least expect the occasional roll in the hay out of such a deal, but so far I am being treated little better than a rented mule.

That aside, Janet has also at least started to warm up a little bit. I think we started to bond after she asked my opinion of her bedroom layout. I do not remember the last time anyone thought to ask me for interior design suggestions (of anything other than a toolshed that is), and the fact that she actually liked my suggestions is a cause for some concern on my part. Could living with two girls actually turn me gay? I browse the internet, repository of all mankind's wisodm, for an answer, an authoritative study, even uncorroborated rumor, but find nothing.

Around 5pm on Sunday, my other new roomie, let's call her Chrissy, shows up. Her father and a friend have driven her up, and this is much mroe civilized: they have a mattress tied to the top of a Blazer, and about a dozen boxes. I can deal with this. A few words about Chrissy. This is the first time I;ve met her, and she seems quite nice. However, she is a chiropractor, and I feel about chiropractors the same way I feel about witch doctors. A major part of this experiment will be seeing how I make it through a whole year without letting this on. Yes, I am in denial.

To be continued...  ¶ 5:16 PM 0 Comments