" /> BRAINPAN LEAKAGE » ohio
  • 30 People In The Bathroom…

      0 comments

    There’s this terrific Joe Walsh song called, “Shut Up.”

    It starts out telling you about how he gets invited to a party by some folks who are friends he never even met – this is something that happens to celebrities I’m sure, because it happens to me on a regular basis, and I don’t even consider myself a celeb. Just, “kinda maybe possibly known to a few folks who happen to read.” At any rate, the second verse goes something like this:

    Well I followed their directions and arrived a little late
    I had a couple Chardonnays and started feelin’ great
    I said I hate to interrupt, I’ll be right back I gotta pee
    30 people in the bathroom started talkin’ to me
    They could not shut up (can’t shut up)
    (can’t shut up)
    I said HEY…shut up (can’t shut up)
    They could not shut up

    As it happens, this particular verse strikes somewhat close to home…

    You see, everyone makes an assumption that I am Pagan. I understand why, I mean, after all, I write a series of suspense thriller novels about a Witch and I include real, live Neo-Pagan dynamics in the stories. I do book signings at Pagan festivals and bookstores, and… well… I did used to consider myself Pagan. For better than 25 years, in fact.

    However, I haven’t self-identified as such for a handful of years now. There are some very specific reasons I no longer identify as Pagan – and none of them have to do with religion – but that’s a whole different blog. Maybe I’ll write it some day when I feel up to dealing with the ridiculousness that will ensue.

    Suffice it to say, while I don’t call myself Pagan these days, I’m still Pagan friendly and really doubt that will ever change. After all, when I did call myself pagan I was friendly with people in other religions, and still am. No reason for that to be any different.

    Oh, and before anyone starts spreading rumors, no, I didn’t convert to some mainstream Judeo-Christian path either. I simply identify as a Free Thinking Secular Humanist where “religion” is concerned. But, as I said, that’s another blog.

    This blog is about people in the bathroom…

    You see, I do a lot of book touring, a good segment of which involves pagan festivals and stores. 95% of them are absolutely wonderful. 5% of them are unbelievable horrors. Believe me, I have stories… Some of you may have even heard a few of them.

    However, even with the 95% that are wonderful, things can happen. These things are generally not in the direct control of the event organizer or store owner, and fortunately, can tend to be funny in retrospect.

    For instance…

    There’s a great – and I do mean great – store in Newark, OH called Violet Flame. Heather, the owner, treats her visiting authors like royalty. You have a nice private place to sleep, access to a steam bath, she is an amazing cook, and on the last night you are there she holds a shindig in your honor – usually with a band, BBQ, and booze. Guests come and join in for a chance to visit and mingle, as well as a chance to have a laid back, informal convo with the guest author/authors.

    It’s a blast, and by far one of the best gigs I do. I love going there. But, even there things can happen.

    Back to that “for instance”…

    There we were at the shindig. The band was playing and I had even spent a little time behind the mic, crooning with them. They are great guys, because even though I can’t carry a tune in a bucket even if I have help,  they let me get up there with them anyway. Probably because it’s fun to watch me make a fool of myself, but hey, it’s become a tradition…

    So, as with any party where one is swilling 14 oz cups of  fermented malt beverage from an iced down keg, I had to go to the bathroom. Unfortunately, I was pinned down in one corner of the deck – figuratively… I mean, I was blocked in, but not really pinned down if you get my drift – by a couple of oddballs who had wandered into the party from a house nearby. It was obvious that they had already been partying plenty themselves. At any rate, they found the free beer, and then found the “famous author.” My ear was being bent and my legs were starting to cross as I did the potty dance.

    Eventually, the need became great enough that I pulled a Joe Walsh. Yes, I did in fact say, “I hate to interrupt, I’ll be right back, I gotta pee…”

    And, with that, I made a bee line for the bathroom inside the house. Now, that should really be the end of the story. I mean, I had escaped the drunken wingnuts, and I was also about to empty my bladder.

    But no… If that was the case this would be a boring blog.

    The way Heather’s bathroom is set up, there is a shower room, and a toilet room. I entered, closed the door, then went into the toilet room and closed that door as well. All good, right? Wrong. No sooner had I unzipped, unfurled, and begun to unload, the hinges on the toilet room door creaked.

    Figuring it was someone unfamiliar with the setup, I called over my shoulder, “Occupied! Just a minute!”

    This was when I almost watered the magazine rack. I didn’t, but I came close.

    You see, the female of the wingnut team that had cornered me on the deck  had followed me into the bathroom and she now slipped her arms around me from behind and began to hug me, whereupon she announced in my ear, “I want to be pagan with you.”

    At this point I had tied a square knot in Wee-Willy-Winkie in order to halt the flow of used beer, and was trying to stuff things back into my pants as fast as I possibly could.

    “Lady, I’m trying to pee here!” I shouted. “What the hell are you talking about?!”

    “You Pagans are all about orgies and sex, right?” she slurred. “Well, I want to be Pagan with you.”

    By now, even though my tank was only half empty, I had retracted my hose and was twisting out of her grasp, while simultaneously closing the pod bay door (please, Hal).

    I didn’t shake, I didn’t flush, I didn’t wash my hands. I just yelled, “Not happening!” as I bolted for the door and rushed through the house.

    Drunken wingnut chick was yelling, “Come back,” (seriously) as I exited onto the deck and made a beeline into the yard. I located Heather and immediately told her what had happened. By now, frootloop girl is coming out the back door looking for me, but luckily I didn’t have to deal with her anymore. In that moment, Heather muttered, “fuckin’ chica,” as she stalked off, and that was the last I saw of crazy bathroom woman.

    By the way, did I happen to mention that besides being a bookstore owner, festival organizer, and fantastic cook,  Heather is also an ex-cop?

    Nope. I’m not kidding…

    More to come…

    Murv

  • Fly The Friendly Skies?

      0 comments

    Continued from: You Want Blonde Or Brunette On That?

    Part 4 of 4…

    I’d like to take a moment to point something out to everyone. As I mentioned in the first installment of this little travelogue, I have a blast every single time I visit Heather and the gang at Violet Flame Gifts (VFG). No two ways about it, and this time was no different. Great folks, great food, great time had by all. If you are ever in the area you owe it to yourself to visit VFG, or even swing by their website. They truly are amazing.

    However, I think you will all agree that me going on and on about what a great time I had is nowhere near as funny as me twisting off about the silliness that occurred getting there… And, as you will soon see, back home…

    As is the custom, Saturday night at VFG after a successful store event involves a party. Much food, in this particular case some killer BBQ’d ribs along with all the trimmings prepared by Grillmaster Max, and much alcohol to wash said food down your gullet. And, as is the custom, I usually imbibe enough to be the beneficiary in receipt of at least a mild hangover the next day. No exception this time, although the hangover was probably the mildest I’d ever had in my life. It was really just one of those “oogly” feelings as opposed to the standard day after maladies.

    And so, late Sunday morning, following a killer brunch prepared by Devin and the gang, we were off to the Columbus airport. Our goodbyes said, Dorothy Morrison and I checked in our luggage, grabbed our boarding passes, and headed for the security checkpoint.

    cpap
    I’ve mentioned in the past that I am dependent upon a CPAP (continuous positive airway pressure) machine when I sleep, and following suggested protocol I always transport it in my carry-on. These days, due to the heightened security, CPAP’s and I am sure many other medical devices as well, have become the bane of a traveler’s existence. It seems that someone decided such devices required an extra round of testing whenever presented at airport security. This always means that I end up standing off to the side while they swab, inspect, detect, look over, test, and otherwise run my machine through a mass spectrometer. While this takes a few extra minutes each time I check in, it has never been a major problem.

    Until Columbus…

    My first indication that something was up came while I was stuffing my feet back into my shoes. Instead of the friendly chirp usually emitted by the test equipment, my ears were pierced with an angry electronic squeal, followed by the surprised voice of the five foot nothing TSA agent wielding the swab.

    “Sir, we’ve had a hit on your CPAP machine.”

    I was equally surprised in some respects, but in others, not so much. I mean, after all, a CPAP is a little air pump with filters in it. It sucks in air on one end, and then blows it back out on the other. It’s bound to pick up some manner of foreign particulate of some sort at some point. It just stands to reason.

    I finished putting on my shoe and said, “Okay. So what do we do now?”

    She didn’t hear me because she was too busy putting herself on instantaneous red alert since I was obviously some sort of terrorist or something. Seconds after she began shouting and waving, a whole host of blue shirted para-military rent-a-cops descended upon me as if I was Bin Laden himself. I began to wonder just exactly what their million dollar spectrometer had told them my CPAP contained.

    Not wanting to be tackled, I stood perfectly still with my hands in plain view and asked again, “What do we do now?”

    The youngest of the private sector, government sanctioned SS clones stared very intently at the readout then barked, “Have you taken any medication?”

    Well, that query in and of itself answered one of my own unspoken questions. It wasn’t so much that they thought I was a terrorist. They thought I was smuggling drugs. What kind of drugs they thought I was smuggling I have no idea, but whatever it was had them awfully excited.

    Still, being an honest and helpful sort I replied, “No, but I did drink a large amount of alcohol last night before going to bed.”

    tsa-2Instead of simply dismissing the alcohol as the cause, the kid immediately took on an attitude. He sneered at me, then adopted an unnecessary sarcastic tone as he said, “That wouldn’t cause this. We’re going to have to search you.”

    My out loud voice said, “Yes sir, no problem.” However, it’s a good thing they haven’t perfected a mind reading machine because my inside voice said, “Listen up you little asshole, I’m old enough to be your father and if you take that tone with me again I’ll beat you senseless with that wand then stuff your happy ass into the X-Ray machine.”

    Now, here’s the fun part. The kid didn’t seem particularly pleased that I was being cooperative. In fact, it seemed that the more cooperative I was, the more he became convinced that I was the leader of some kind of international drug cartel that was using Columbus, Ohio as a base of operations. The next thing I know I’m standing there with the “two by two, hands of blue” dude from Firefly, and he is announcing that he is going to search me. He tells me not to move then starts to explain this process, whereupon I take it upon myself to make a suggestion.

    “Shouldn’t we move out of the way?” I said, interrupting him.

    At this point I now have a dozen passengers stacked up behind me who have cleared security and who want to get to their gates. Unfortunately, Mister Blue Hands and I have the narrow passageway blocked. He stares at me, thinks about this for a minute, and then says, “Yeah. Maybe we should move so people can get by.”

    Again, my inside voice opened it’s figurative mouth and echoing inside my skull I heard, “Well Duh… Figure that one out all by yourself there Skippy?”

    The kid is standing next to the spectrometer and watching all this. It’s obvious from the look on his face that he is working up some kind of “I’m gonna get a medal” hard-on because he thinks he’s caught himself a dangerous drug smuggler.

    Now that we had moved out of the way, bluehands started to tell me again how the procedure works. Before he made it halfway through the first sentence I spread my feet apart and held my arms straight out to my sides. He screwed a quizzical look onto his face and asked, “You know how this works?”

    My outside voice said, “Yeah, I fly a lot so I’ve seen it done.” My inside voice screamed, “Anyone who’s ever seen an episode of a cop show on TV knows how this works you moron. Just get it over with. And, just so you know, If I have to endure this anyway, I’d much rather have the hot blonde gal over there on the other security line grabbing at my crotch instead of you.”

    In retrospect I suppose knowing how a pat down works made me look guilty, especially given that the TSA kid who was daydreaming about a commendation damn near soiled his britches in excitement when I automatically “assumed the position.”

    And so, I was subjected to a full pat down while the wide-eyed five-foot nothing member of the federal rent-a-cops tore my carry-on apart. I have to say, it was kind of amusing when she started looking through the viewfinder on my camera like it was an alien artifact. But, I think what tickled me most was the abject confusion she displayed upon finding the vacuum sealed retail package of pepperoni sticks I carry just in case I’m ever stuck on the tarmac for 4 hours in an airplane that can’t move. (Don’t laugh. It’s actually happened, and I hadn’t had dinner that night.)

    Those really confused her. I mean flat out confused. I hate to think what would have happened if she had opened up my notebook and started reading the handwritten portions of my latest manuscript.

    But, anyway, when the search was over the supervisor kid seemed a bit disappointed. It was pretty clear that he thought he’d captured a hardened criminal who was stupid enough to smuggle drugs in a carry-on bag. On top of that, when they gave me back said carry-on bag, everything had been shoved back into it in such a haphazard fashion that it ended up taking me twenty minutes to straighten it out. And, on top of that, I had to ask them to return my CPAP machine. Yeah, go figure.

    But, it gets better…

    The excitement now behind us, Morrison and I strolled down the concourse to our gate, checking out the restaurants along the way since it was approaching lunchtime. For the next hour, and even right on up until we boarded our flight, the blue shirted TSA kid kept popping up everywhere we turned. I’m fairly certain he was following me.

    It’s too bad this didn’t happen around Thanksgiving. If it had, then I would be able to write a 17 minute long, forever enduring folk song about it, and then go hang out with Arlo Guthrie. (I wonder if he gets searched by the TSA?)

    But do you want to know the real kicker? We finally boarded the airplane, this time an Airbus 320, and as soon as we were in our seats the pilot came over the loudspeaker with a familiar piece of news. It seemed the auxiliary power unit was malfunctioning, we had no air conditioning, and that instead of sending someone to Sears for a DieHard battery, he had bribed some guys in yellow vests and earmuffs to give us a jump, just as soon as they could find where they stashed the cables.

    I kid you not.

    Maybe I should start packing jumper cables in my carry-on. Wonder what the TSA would think about that

    More to come…

    Murv