Halloween and a few updates

(Originally posted on MySpace on Thursday, October 04, 2007)

Halloween was always my favorite holiday while growing up. I loved getting dressed up in a scary costume and walking the neighborhood at night, knocking on people's doors and collecting a bounty of treats for my efforts. As I grew older, I stopped trick-or-treating around the neighborhood, but I still celebrated with decorations, parties and the occasional costume. These days though, I don't put up decorations and I never go to parties. It's been years since I've worn a Halloween costume. I'm usually not even home for Halloween and when I am, few kids come by looking for treats. (This year I'll be just outside of Fresno, seeing Thurston Moore play a special show at a pizza parlor.)

Halloween has become a victim of a changing society. Kids aren't safe anymore. You never know when some nutcase is going to do something to harm them. And then there's always a group of religious crazies complaining about it every year. It's really not a holiday for kids anymore and adults just don't seem to know how to do it justice. It's too bad, because it sure was a lot of fun in those days of old.

But even though I don't really celebrate it any more, it's still my favorite holiday. I really don't celebrate any holidays that much anymore, but I still manage to find a way to nod to Halloween, if only with wearing a lapel pin on my shirt or coat. (This year's favorite is one of a vampire bat with Mickey Mouse ears.)

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And a quick update on my clinical research group. I had my first Screen Visit this week and thought I passed on to the second one. My blood pressure was a bit high and that almost disqualified me. But I convinced the doctor to try again a few minutes later and this time I passed, although it is still a bit high. I don't like that and will be taking measures to bring that down. I haven't been eating well this summer and there's has been lots of stress, especially with my messed-up arm caused by that bungee jump. It's healing, but a lot slower than I'd like it to. But more on that in a week or two.

I found out that this study might take up to 17 months if I keep qualifying after each visit. It's to test a new medication and how it affects human sperm. I had to give my first semen sample and I have to say that it was kind of strange to have some lady take me back to their video library, where I got to pick out a porn movie to watch, then have me locked in a room until I buzzed them that I was done. Yep, it's weird and a bit awkward, but I don't embarrass easily and it all went off without a hitch. It was then that they told me that I might also be disqualified if my sperm aren't the perfect sperm that the research group is looking for. I know that it really has nothing to do with anything, but it would be quite a shot in the ego to be kicked out of the study for imperfect sperm. I was keeping my fingers crossed, but a few hours later, I was called and told that they weren't up to snuff, so I'm out.

Oh well, I made $150 and it's one more thing I don't have to worry about.

Oh, whom am I kidding? I think I'll go open a bottle of gin and let my ego drown out its sorrows. (And just what are perfect sperm anyways? I doubt I'll ever get an answer to that, although looking at a picture of Peter Sarsgaard, I know what might lead me in the right direction.)

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There's also a quick update on my Lydia Lunch blog from two weeks ago. I actually heard from my old friend Marcy, who informed me that Lydia lived here in L.A. in 1980 and then moved to London in late 1981. That would mean that I had to have met her in 1980 and not 1983 as I originally stated.

It would also seem that Brian (Kid Congo) didn't go to New York with us. He was already there, having taken the bus out there with L.A. punk-scenesters, Trudi and Helen. I think I now remember that, as I recall Brian telling us a story about going to a party with Debbie Harry. They were in a cab talking and then suddenly Debbie said, "Look, there's a llama" and Brian looked out the cab window and there was a llama walking down the street. That just seemed so…New York at the time.

I also remember going to see Johnny Thunder's Heartbreakers live and having a very drunk Debbie Harry approach us because Brian was with us. She asked me if I lived in Los Angeles because she recognized me from being in the audience at their Whiskey A-Go-Go show. That was with Tom Petty and she remembered me because I was one of only about 50 people there and I was at the front of the stage. Being at that show (the Whiskey) would also lead to a friendship with Gary Valentine several years later when he left Blondie and moved to L.A. to form The Know.

Just a few small details, but it fills in the blanks a bit and provides me with a reason to tell yet another story.

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And that's it for this week. I'll be back next week with something. I hope it will be my bungee jumping story, but it might be a Gay Days report. It depends how I feel over the week.