OF BIRTHDAYS, BOOZE, AND BURLESQUE BROADS

Yours Truly, showing appreciation for animal print pumps.

This Monday night saw the celebration of my friend Erin's twenty-sixth birthday, first at the Commonwealth bar and the majority of the debauchery occurring at Lucky 13, an ultra-sleazy Brooklyn dive that features cheap drinks, lurid exploitation flicks running on the place's two video monitors, a jukebox filled with about 98% heavy metal, and a pole on the bar for when the ladies feel like getting their drunken freak-dance on.

Erin, da Viking metalhead boithday goil.

Once our general group of loons and reprobates was assembled, we departed Commonwealth for the far more distasteful confines of Lucky 13, a small dive festooned with all manner of horror movie memorabilia and other pop culture tchotchkes, much of it signed by the actors and actresses involved.

The bar at Lucky 13.

Two shots of Lucky 13's walls (that's my pal Suzi with the camera).

The reason we were at the place, other than the relatively cheap drinks and vile atmosphere, was a burlesque show that featured an assortment of loopy bump 'n' grind cuties in sexy/goofy outfits, and while we waited for it to get started we downed round after round of mind-altering, liver-destroying intoxicants, all while wishing Erin a happy birthday. Other than myself and Suzi, the party included this motley crew of once innocent young ladies, now ruined by the ways of drugs, drunkenness, dick, and heavy metal music.

Left to right: Jill, Gina, Kate — who seriously reminds me of a hippie-era version of Supergirl — and the birthday girl.

Erin & Jill, deep in the clutches of the party godz.

When the show got underway, the first of the peelers was an attractive redhead who delivered a giddy and downright weird nervous bride act, shaking and smiling like a mental patient as she shed the various layers of her wedding gown.


I'd say there were about a half dozen performers gracing the stage and/or pole that evening, but my favorites, after the bride, were a pleasantly plump cowgirl who shook her stuff to a Patsy Cline tune,

and Mary Cyn, a willowy thing who took the stage in a straightjacket from which she attempted to escape.

Alas, Cyn was no reborn Houdini, so she required assistance to vacate her restraints,

and once freed she exploded into a lusty routine of gyrations that took her from the platform to the bar top, where she worked the pole with merciless abandon to the incredibly (in)appropriate strains of Buckcherry's "Crazy Bitch."


Her act was fun enough to begin with, but what sent it over the top for me was her dingy pair of Chuck Taylors, lending her the aspect of some wanton bastard daughter of the Ramones.

I mean, when compared to the other somewhat standard footwear found on the assembled peelers, Cyn's choice was both audacious and refreshingly silly.

What's cooler, Chucks or "Fuck Me!" pumps? You decide!

All too soon the show was over, but that didn't stop the performers from dancing about the bar in various states of undress, passing around the hat for donations, working the pole, and generally having a good time, and their infectious attitude worked its magic on the crowd as we got more and more crocked. Inevitably, I had to take my leave and drain the weasel, and in the bathroom I was delighted to find a piece of grafitti that tells it like it is,

and a light switch guard bearing the likenesses of the Crazy Babysitter Twins from GRINDHOUSE.

By the time I returned to the group of inebriated ladies, Kate kindly obliged to show me her Motley Crue thong while simultaneously trying not to slip off the bar stool,


as well as proudly displaying the impressive ink on her back.

Erin represents for metalheads everywhere.

By the time things finally wound down, Cyn had collected quite a few bills from appreciative patrons of the arts and kindly left her stunning arse uncloaked by a skirt or any other article of attire that would have detracted from its excellence.


I just wanted to bite her, I swear I did.

Finally I fell willing victim to the beer and tequila coursing through my brain and decided to wander north, there to curl up and slumber secure within the confines of the Vault of Buncheness.

The world at nearly 3AM, as seen through a haze of beer and tequila.

I bade Erin farewell and again wished her a happy birthday, and once she got into her cab I walked home, the exercise serving to burn off some of the liquor's effects. Thank the gods that I had sense enough to take Tuesday off.

GREAT MOVIEGOING EXPERIENCES: CAROLINE BRENNAN ON SEEING THE BOURNE IDENTITY IN MOROCCO

This past Saturday night I stopped in for a couple of rounds at the barbecue joint and found myself at the bar sitting next to one Caroline Brennan, a fun and hella cute regular who can spin an hilarious yarn without even trying. She also happens to live with Carly, my favorite naughty pixie, and when the two of them get together, look out!

Anyway as we sat and chatted while my man Marius ably tended bar, we noticed THE BOURNE SUPREMACY playing on the restaurant’s TV. We sat mesmerized by the violence for a few minutes and then Caroline turned to me with a bright-eyed expression on her face and said, “Wanna hear a great story about seeing THE BOURNE IDENTITY, you know, the first one, in Morocco?” I pondered that one for a few seconds, asking myself “What could possibly be so interesting about seeing any Hollywood flick in a foreign country? Same flick, different land, and that’s about it.” But, as you’re about to find out, Caroline had quite a story to tell, so I’ll let her take it from here:

Caroline Brennan, guest raconteur.

In the summer of 2006 I was living in Fez for two months, studying Arabic, and one day I was bored out of mind so I decided to go to the movies with my roommate, Erika. The movie theater we went to was built back in the French colonial days and hadn’t seen a lick of upkeep since then. I’m talking totally decrepit.

The marquee said THE BOURNE IDENTITY was playing, so we tried to get in but the aged staff wouldn’t let two unescorted females in, especially not two unescorted white females, so we had to go in led by some old lady who walked us to our seats in the dark theater. And although we got there on time for the movie, when we went in the film had been on for at least a half hour, so we had no clue what was going on. Plus, the fact that it was dubbed in French and subtitled in Arabic didn’t help much. Oh, and everything was covered in dust, so the old lady took out a cloth and wiped off the seats with a cloth, for which I gave her a tip worth roughly twenty cents.

As we sat and tried to watch the movie, we realized the audience was full of teenagers who’d come in to use the place for making out, so whatever happened to be playing on the screen was irrelevant. Adding to this was an old man, a vendor with a snack cart, walking up and down the aisle with a cowbell, all the while trying to sell stuff.

Eventually the movie ended, but it just abruptly ended in a place that didn’t seem quite right, with what looked like random credits stuck on, and even those turned out to be unfinished. But before we could even process that, suddenly some Indian movie appeared on the screen, some random piece of third world hardcore porn produced in India. My roommate and I sat there confused while the teens in the audience continued messing around, completely ignoring the onscreen fucking.

This went of for four hours. I swear to God, FOUR HOURS, and when it finally ended everyone got up and left, the staff of the place not even bothering to turn on the lights. As Erika and I left through the lobby, we saw the staff had hung around to see how the two foreign chicks had held up.

If you ever got to Morocco, I can tell you where the theater is!

MORE חנוכה FUN!!!

HAVE A BITCHIN' חנוכה

To all of my Chosen friends, loved ones and readers-

Happy חנוכה!!! I'm not going to spell it in English because I've seen at least three different spellings and no one seems to be able to settle on just one, so why not just spell it old school, as in seriously old school? So חנוכה it is.

And in the spirit of the season, as well as continuing one of this blogs many threads, namely comic books/superheroes, here's a great moment with my favorite of Marvel Comics' big guns, Ben Grimm — aka the Thing of the Fantastic Four — reacting to a supervillain's surprise at learning that his rocky orange ass is Jewish:


And then there's this item, something I must track down on eBay:


And don't forget to check out DISGUISED AS CLARK KENT, Danny Fingeroth's informative and engrossing book on Jews, comics, and the creation of the superhero, definitely a worthwhile addition to your comics history bookshelf.


Anyway, may your eight crazy nights rock most awesomely!

ON THE SIDEWALKS OF NEW YORK: RANDOM WEIRDNESS

Here's a selection of shots I took during my wanderings of this city's boroughs. Nothing truly spectacular, but whaddaya want? They cant all be gems.

Brooklyn's Fulton Mall is a several-block expanse that caters to a largely Balck and Hispanic clientele, providing an array of stereotypical fashions, bling-bling, and unhealthy food, and every now and then while I'm there my eye will be caught by something truly odd, such as this almost-close-enough-to-be-copyright-infringed Spider-Man hoodie sweat jacket.


It's adult-sized, zips closed over your entire head, even providing the bug's eye goggle lenses, completely obscuring the wearer's features. Jimmy Palmiotti summed up my thoughts exactly when I showed it to him and he observed, "Future bank robber."

This notice is from the window of Non-Stop Discount, one of those stores where everything costs less than three bucks and every item of clothing is guaranteed to burst into flame or disintegrate the second you get it home.


Apparently bed bugs are a big issue in the area, and considering where it is I can't say I'm surprised in the least.

I was just talking about this upcoming movie with my buddy Chris Gazelli last night, and we're both dying to see it, even though it's practically assured to suck out loud. At least the trailer was violent as a motherfucker, so it may be at least entertaining...


This ad heralds the coming of a film that presages the Apocalypse.


B-boy rodents. Jesus fucking Christ...

And while we're on the subject of hideous rodents, this restaurant in Queens proudly displays the availabilty of deliciously prepared Guinea pigs — yes, you read that right — hopefully served sans fur.


Here's NYC underground scene legend Scotty the Blue Bunny, MCing a rather eventful burlesque show at Park Slope's Lucky 13 bar.


From that same night, here's a shot of the extremely bombed bartender blowing Gene Simmons-style fireballs, indoors, in a bar with a ceiling covered with brittle and old paper rock & roll posters. Needless to say, I was right near the door when I took this one.


On another utterly bizarre evening I ran into Scotty the Blue Bunny again, this time out of uniform and merrily sporting a t-shirt proclaiming one of his favorite activities.


From my barbecue joint days, here's one from the Superbowl night when my boss and I learned exactly why you should put an apple in a pig's mouth while cooking it; the lips pull back, revealing a horrifying rictus that's exactly what I expect to see when I inevitably walk through the entrance to Hell.


Here's a shot of Brooks, one of the characters who roam the streets of my neighborhood. He's an ancient alky who's almost never seen without a Budweiser in his hand or at his feet, and when not seen cheerfully walking around and waving hello to everybody while slurring "Alright!" to all within earshot, he's usually to be found sleeping in a chair in any one of three apartment building entrances on President Street or Fifth Avenue. I assume he lives in one of the buildings, but for the life of me I couldn't tell you which one.


And what better way to end this little gallery than a seventeen-year-old shot of my friends JAG, Mr. Fun and Laura-Laura, having fun in a long-defunct Park Slope bar back in the days before its current state as a hive for yuppie families and trust fund kids?


Ah, the joy of my misspent youth...

MY GOD, HOW I LOVE THE JAPANESE

The two guys seen in the picture below blew my mind when I first saw them on a VHS tape entitled JAPANARAMA some years back, and the untranslated comedy bit that featured them was surreal to the point of brain-melt.

It's shit like this that belies the perceived image of the Japanese as a nation of stoic, conformity-minded drones, and, having seen JAPANARAMA and other equally crazy examples of their culture's humor, I gotta tell ya they're a bunch of hilarious motherfuckers (even if I don't necessarily understand the jokes). Their humor ranges from being as bizarre as MONTY PYTHON'S FLYING CIRCUS all the way to the depths of the most peurile slapstick and scatological bits I've ever seen, and I relish every second of it.

And if any of you learned and erudite readers out there in etherland have any explanation for the this bizarre superheroic duo, I beg of you to write in and tell me exactly what the fuck's up with this.

OKATSU THE FUGITIVE (1969)

This third installment in the LEGENDS OF THE POISONOUS SEDUCTRESS series is a major disappointment after the excellence of its predecessor, QUICK-DRAW OKATSU . It's pretty much a remake of the previous film, even starring Junko Miyazono as a master swordswoman named Okatsu, but not the same character she played before (?); at the end of QUICK-DRAW OKATSU our heroine was a wanted fugitive, so wouldn't you expect a film entitled OKATSU THE FUGITIVE to be a direct sequel, especially since the film that came before it was a hit and the Japanese are not by any means sequel shy?

This new Okatsu is again the blade-proficient daughter of a swordsman, and when her father threatens to expose the vicious corruption of a local magistrate he's tortured in an attempt to get him to reveal the whereabouts of a written document of the magistrate's offenses. When he won't talk, his wife and daughter are hauled in by the bad guys and the wife is thrown to six hardened criminals for a bit of gang rape (which thankfully doesn't occur, but she does get alarmingly manhandled), and after that moment of extreme bad taste dad kills his wife and then himself. Unfortunately Okatsu then falls victim to the evil magistrate and is raped, then thrown into a basement dungeon. With the aid of her sleazy fiancee, she escapes — killing several swordsmen in the process — with the document hidden in her mother's elaborate (and very pointy) hairpin and sets out to avenge her parents, not realizing her fiancee is in league with the bad guys. After that the film becomes a lackluster and very much by the numbers samurai revenge flick that could have been written with little or no effort by anyone who's ever seen one of these things, and ends up a staggeringly generic item that will be forgotten about five minutes after the title that reads "The End." That's a real shame because the level of quality found in QUICK-DRAW OKATSU lead me to expect a hell of a lot more from all involved, and after this I can see why the series stalled out. TRUST YER BUNCHE!!!

FUTURAMA: BENDER'S BIG SCORE (2007)

When cult favorite FUTURAMA was cancelled by the Fox network two years ago, there were rumors that the animated sci-fi sitcom might someday return as a series of direct-to-DVD features. Well, kiddiewinkies, that day is here and the results are quite encouraging,

The whole Planet Express crew is back and just as crazy as ever, this time weathering the unusual takeover of the Earth by a trio of nude aliens who scam the world into total economic depression. And as if that weren't bad enough, it's revealed that Fry has a previously unknown tatoo of reprobate robot Bender on his right ass cheek — a discovery made during a jaunt to the nude beach planet —

containing a code that allows one to travel backwards through time when it's said aloud. The aliens brainwash Bender into doing their bidding and send him back in time to steal everything of value from the past, a task for which Bender is perfectly suited since he's a robot and won't age and die while waiting for the year 3007 to roll around again. There's also an emotional subplot involving one-eyed, purple-haired hottie Leela meeting the man of her dreams, a situation that in no way sits well with Fry's feelings of unrequited love.

That's about all I can say without giving the whole thing away because the whole story relies on time travel and the complicated thread of events that old sci-fi McGuffin can weave, but unlike the majority of sci-fi stories involving any sort of time-jumping, this one is handled with very tight logic, plotting, and humor that works extremely well. In fact, I recommend that you watch it a second time, with the commentary track running, so you can catch all of the clues and gags that were set up throughout and were intended to be simply glossed over when seen during a first viewing.

It's great to have FUTURAMA back, and this is only the first of an announced quartet of new features — this one's supposedly getting split into four parts for broadcast on Comedy Central — so let's hope they keep them coming at a rapid pace and maintain the high level of quality found here. FUTURAMA was always a fun feast of comedy and spectacular visuals, and this feature actually feels like a movie and not just a glorified episode, something that can't really be said about THE SIMPSONS MOVIE (although, to be fair THE SIMPSONS movie suffered from having been on the air for nearly twenty years and during that time it had covered just about every plot possible for the human mind to conceive). So if you ever enjoyed the whacked-out adventures of the Planet Express crew, sign on now for a solidly entertaining return trip to the future. TRUST YER BUNCHE!

Ah, the lovely Leela, woman enough to take on Captain Kirk in single combat. With moments like this, how the fuck could Fox have canceled FUTURAMA?

R.I.P. EVEL KNIEVEL, 1970'S DAREDEVIL (1938-2007)

If you grew up in the USA during the 1970's, you no doubt know who Robert Craig Knievel, Jr. was. His fashion sense could fairly be described as Captain America-meets-Elvis, he once tried — and failed — to jump the Snake River Canyon in the gaudiest rocket you've ever seen, and his likeness graced a popular action figure that came with a stunt cycle that, when wound up and launched, destroyed fragile decorative items in households across the nation. Kids and adults alike thrilled to Knievel's loony stunt work, claiming to be drawn in by his bravery but secretly lured by the possibility of witnessing his gruesome demise in a flaming spectacle of twisted metal, blood, and a helmeted severed head rolling away from the wreckage, hopefully on fire.

But that very suicidal drive to do the impossible (and, when you think about it, rather pointless) to delight his fans and overcome the boundaries placed upon him by the perceived limitations of the motorcycles he rode and his all-too-human body is what made him a cool and beloved 1970’s pop culture icon.

And now the guy's dead after battling diabetes and pulmonary fibrosis for several years, and that just ain't right. I always hoped, even in his frail dotage, that Evel Knievel would haul his creaking ass out of retirement for one last shot at self-destructive glory and go out in spectacularly awesome fashion while attempting to jump the exploding Death Star.

The way Evel Knievel should have gone out.

Too bad the guy couldn't have jumped the Grim Reaper and landed in back of him, tires a-screechin’, huge grin on his face, and flip the guy a gloved salute. But in the end, human frailty must inevitably win out.

BEST BOOK TITLE EVER!!!

From my old buddy John over at Gruntosaurus Rex:


Does this book feature "German" recipes?