The day my friends tried to kill everyone with bacon (and jorts)

You know those days when you sleep in until noon, hung over from four days of drinking that started with seeing a midget strip show, and a person you deeply respect, but makes terrible decisions calls you and says, "Come over to Selena's. They're making everything with bacon. Chris will be wearing jorts."?

No? What are you doing with your life? Let me back up.

Last week, I went to see a midget strip show with the Person I Deeply Respect but Makes Terrible Decisions. (aside: watching a midget strip show is not something I would consider a terrible decision.) The night quickly turned into a swirling vortex of tequila, $8 domestic beer, tiny boobs, vienna sausage fingers and many different forms of sexual harassment. Coincidentally, this night was also possibly the first and likely the last time I would ever be motorboated by a sort-of-famous porn star midget. After that, we went to a club where men were line dancing and it was a very real possibility that we were going to be kicked out of a Whataburger drive through.

The point I'm trying to make here is that this night very quickly devolved into something that was far beyond the realm of our control, which lead to the rest of the week and then the weekend careening out of control as well, kind of like what must have happened with Gallagher's standup routine. Yes. A Gallagher reference. Because Gallagher is fucking timely.

Fig. 1.1
"I had a lot of funny material. But I'd rather not use it."

So Midget Strip Show Wednesday melted into Sleep Through Biology Class Thursday which melted into Happy Hour Thursday Night which melted into Bad Karaoke Friday which melted into Sonic The Hedgehog on Xbox Friday Night which eventually melted into Baconpocalypse Saturday.

I woke up Saturday, still hung over from Bad Karaoke Friday, and my phone rang. The Person I Deeply Respect but Makes Terrible Decisions (from here on out, we'll just call him Josh. To protect his identity. If I didn't want to protect his identity, I'd tell you that his name was Josh Morgan.) was calling to let me know of several other terrible decisions that were scheduled to take place that evening.

"Come over to Selena's. They're making everything with bacon. Chris will be wearing jorts. We're pregaming now."

Because obviously, the plans for the evening were so tame, pregaming was a necessity to assure that bad decisions would eventually emerge from their bacon-wrapped coccoons to evolve into beautiful, atrocious decisions. Like a butterfly whose defense mechanism is that it looks like vomit.

If you're not lucky enough to know my friend Selena (theoretically, because this is the internet, the vast majority of people reading do not. Objectively, because only six people read my blog and all of you went to school with me, you do) and her husband Chris, then you are not aware of how amazing they are. The only way to accurately describe Selena is this: Picture a unicorn. And on top of that unicorn is a puppy. And on that puppy is a tiny saddle. And in that tiny saddle is a prairie dog who is holding a popsicle for you. And that popsicle is a banana fudge bomb.

Yep. She's that amazing.

Fig. 1.2
It was strangely difficult to find a picture of this.

And there's no other way to accurately describe Chris than this:

Fig. 1.3
Back off, ladies. This man and these jorts are spoken for.

The most important thing I want you to know about that photo, is that it was not taken on the day of Baconpocalypse, but on a completely separate day entirely. Which means he wears the jorts with a fair amount of regularity.

This was not the day to start realizing that Josh makes terrible/awesome decisions.

When I got there, there were already pieces of chicken wrapped in bacon on a grill. There were cheese sticks covered in crushed jalapeño chips ready to deep fry. There was bacon covered in brown sugar and drizzled with Jack Daniels in the oven. Josh was in the process of wrapping corn in bacon. There was cheese wrapped in venison, wrapped in bacon and dipped in beer batter frying. Someone made meat balls out of venison, I'm pretty sure with the express purpose of allowing a really drunk group of people with rapidly climbing cholesterol to say repeatedly "try these balls" and "she bit my balls". Because we're adults. That's why.

Also, there seemed to be a lot of Jack Daniels involved. And what happens when there seems to be a lot of Jack Daniels involved? That's right. Mel Gibson's career.

Fig. 1.4
"I AM THE MOST NORMAL MAN ALIVE! NOW NO ONE HAS LAKER'S TICKETS!"

The Jack Daniels seemed to be a key ingredient in a lot of the dishes for Baconpocalypse. And, while it was not used in the recipe Chris invented for bacon shot glasses ("bacon, muffin tin, oven, GENIUS!" I believe were his exact words) Jack Daniels was definitely a catalyst.

Take the liquor, the bacon, and the several sweet deer with soulful eyes (I'm assuming) that gave their lives so we could eat them in terrible ways, and it wasn't long until people started exhibiting signs of bacon madness. (That is the scientific term, in case you were wondering. No, you do not have to look it up.)

Here's a short rundown:

• Selena walks outside. Chris is playing air guitar. His buttondown shirt is not serving its purpose. "I see we're already down to two buttons," she says. "I have to let the hamburger meat breathe!" he says, rubbing his chest with pain in his eyes.
• "Where are the jorts?" I ask. Chris immediately leaves and comes back out in jorts, cowboy boots, and a cowboy hat. He is now down to one shirt button.
• Several people are upset that there are no more dead animals around which to wrap bacon, while others glance nervously at their dogs in the back yard.
• Lyndsey, another amazing person, who was also an instigator of hilarious ideas, keeps saying "this bacon has no idea what I'm going to do to it."
• CCR is being played. Followed by Tenacious D. Followed by Social Distortion. Followed by a rap song by Chris and his friends that sounds professionally recorded.
• We run out of tequila, lime and triple sec, so I start making Chris's margaritas with Jack and margarita mix. He does not notice. In fact, he says, "this is straight tequila."
• Selena throws a bacon-wrapped chicken leg at Chris. The reason was at first undetermined. Later, someone will ask why there is a chicken on the floor. No one will know the answer.
• People find out the hard way that, while the bacon shot glasses are "genius", they are not water tight. They eat the shot glasses in protest.
• People begin playing the blues on various guitars in the house. The songs are about bacon.
• Chris and Josh take shots of Jack mixed with bacon grease in legitimate shot glasses. They do not regret this decision enough.
• Lyndsey convinces Chris, in his jorts and cowboy boots, to stalk a pedestrian who is jogging in front of the house. Chris runs after him. The man is not interested in training Chris. Chris is upset because he "could have been the next Rocky."

The night ended with some of us passing out on the couch (me, because I'm a terrible guest) and others of us helping to clean up, (like Selena and the most adorable girl you've ever met, named Sierra, who is saved in my phone as Sierra Who Is Awesome, which was a drunk statement and not a drunk question), so it seemed as though everyone got out ok, even though it's realistic to believe that it would have been entirely possible for everyone to die of a heart attack.

You know that scene in Apocalypse Now when whichever crazy ass Sheen that was turns into a roiling ball of insanity? And he starts breaking things and screaming and cutting his face and flying and getting into a fight with Faruiza Balk? (Also, I think maybe I'm combining Apocalypse Now and the fight scene in The Craft). That’s more like how it felt the next morning, when there were several Facebook statuses decrying bacon.

Fig. 1.5
"AFTER ALL WE’VE BEEN THROUGH!?!?!”

But we all got to see Chris chase down a pedestrian in jorts, and you know what? If that’s not the American dream, I don’t want any god damn part of it.

How I banned myself from Taco Bell and invented an imaginary co-worker

Recently, there are four very specific types of men who are interested in me. And because of that, I had to banish myself from Taco Bell and invent a fake person to carry out conveniently-timed conversations with in case I'm not strong enough to follow through with the terms of my own banishment. (Spoiler alert-I'm not.)

How many links exist in this terrible, terrible chain that led to my inescapable self-banishment from a less-than-mediocre restaurant that may or may not be serving gerbils disguised as taco meat? Four. Four gigantic links. And here they are.

Link 1-These are the four types of men who are currently interested in me:

1) Homeless and sassy
Fig. 1.1
"Marry me! We'll take my spaceship to the reception!"

2) Creepy and married
Fig. 1.2
"See this hair gel? All of it is for you."

3) Truck drivers who have a significantly reduced number of teeth
Fig. 1.3
It was surprisingly difficult to find a real picture for this. So I drew you a diagram. Also, this diagram features a great white shark.

4) Men who work at drive-throughs (that's right. "Through". Because "thru" isn't a real effing word.)
Fig. 1.4
I'm just assuming he works at a drive through. And also, he wants your wallet.

Link 2-These are the four ways I avoid conflict
1) Pretend like there's not a conflict at all-because what are you even talking about because this is totally not happening.
2) Pretend like there's something very interesting going on behind the person I'm talking to-because really? Are they moving office furniture outside? That is so interesting!
3) Pretend like I have to leave to get gas in my car-because I've just remembered that all of the gas stations close in 15 minutes and I'll run out of gas on the way home. Yes, they close at 6:15 on Thursdays. All of them.
4) Pretend like I have a phone call-I'm sorry, I have to answer this because it's my friend who needs a thing.

Link 3-These are the four ways I say "no" to people
1) Maybe
2) We'll see
3) Hahahahaha. I don't know.
4) Next time!

Link 4-The Situation
So here's The Situation. There's this Taco Bell by where I live. Because I come home very late (and because I have a blatant disregard for my health) sometimes I stop there on my way home. Until a few months ago when the sassy drive through man started asking for my number every time I went through.
Let me pause here and tell you that this isn't one of those fake complaints designed to make me look awesome. I'm 99 percent sure he asks for everyone's number. Because I'm pretty sure that's standard operating procedure for someone that has no concept of his lazy eye, no self-awareness that making kissy faces at customers is disgusting, and an over-inflated ego from being Head Sassy Drive Through Man at Taco Bell.
Take the fact that he asked me four times and divide that by the four ways I say no to people and you can see, if you're as good at math as I am, how this quickly went awry. Here are how those conversations went:

Conversation 1
Sassy Drive Through Man: Hey Beautiful. Why don't you give me your number?
Me: Maybe!
Sassy Drive Through Man: ...
Me: ...
Sassy Drive Through Man: So is that a yes?
Me: Bye!

Conversation 2
Sassy Drive Through Man: Hey girl. You giving me that number now?
Me: We'll see!
Sassy Drive Through Man: We'll see?
Me: Mild sauce, please.

Conversation 3
Sassy Drive Through Man: What's up. You have beautiful eyes. Did you forgot to give me your number last time?
Me: Hahahahaha. I don't know! Can I get a raspberry tea?! Ok!

Conversation 4
Sassy Drive Through Man: Hey, sexy. You're back. It's been awhile (I was clearly trying to avoid this situation.) Are you going to give me that number yet?
Me: Next time!
Sassy Drive Through Man: Next time? Why not now!
Me: Because I'm classy! (he bought this. which is another reason we could never work as a couple.)
Sassy Drive Through Man: Well, good. Then I'm looking forward to next time.

That's when panic set in. I hadn't come up with a Plan E. What would happen next time? I'll tell you what would happen next time. I'd be forced to give him my number. Then we would talk and then we would go out and then he would take me to play bingo and drink warm beer or watch a dog fight. Then we would get married. Then we would have babies. Then I would be stuck at home watching Roseanne reruns while he worked the Taco Bell drive through and cheated on me. That's not an educated guess. That's what would happen.

Does he pressure everyone like this? I'm assuming so. Would it break his heart if I told him no? There's no plausible way. The statistical probability of him caring about actually having my number is about the same as the likelihood that he's not a serial murderer. So tell me why, after banishing myself from this particular Taco Bell and then immediately realizing that I must not actually know what the word "banish" means, did I decide to implement one of my conflict avoidance techniques, making sure that I'm talking to my "co-worker", named "Veronica" about the "reports that are due" every time I go through the drive through to avoid giving him my number? The same reason that, after I have my order, have successfully avoided the conflict and am already past the drive through window, I always tell "Veronica" goodbye and that I'll see her tomorrow.

Because I'm fucking considerate, that's why.

How I am More Irresponsible Than a Petty Thief

When I asked everyone about a month ago which of three stories you wanted me to write about, your response was overwhelmingly in favor of “The Three People in the Universe that Hate Me and Why”. (By the way, guys, rude.) And I am going to write that one. I promise. But first, I have to tell you about a situation that happened last month in which I proved to be more irresponsible and aggravating than a petty thief.

First, let me preface this by saying that I am responsibly irresponsible. I went to school. I got good grades. I have a career (in a dying industry, but quit focusing on that! Stop being so negative!). I am a relatively morally and ethically sound person that makes generally good decisions.

Fig. 1.1
Yes. I think listening to MC Hammer is a good decision. This is why I said generally good decisions.
























But ultimately, I am not an overly responsible person.

Here are some examples:

• I don’t check my mailbox. Ever. On the rare occasions that I do check my mail box, there is usually an angrily scrawled note from a postal worker about how they had to take my mail back to the post office because the box was so full. They give me some terrible deadline to pick it up (only 11 days! Who has the time?!) and then threaten to send it all back. There are usually three or four of these in my mailbox at a time. Whose mailbox is that full? So full that the postal worker has to take out all of the mail they presumably put into the box? But here’s my argument. It’s really far away from my apartment. And no, I’m not going to go pick up my mail. I have no desire to go to the post office where a picture of my overflowing mailbox is probably posted on the wall with bullet holes and blood and knife-stab wounds in it. In this vision, my name is under the mailbox and there are people snarling at it like the moment they figured out who the villain was in The Happening.

Fig. 1.2
So…plants?

No thank you. You can keep my mail. In that same vein:

• I do not know where the post office is. I do not want to talk about it.
• For roughly three months, my refrigerator has contained two bottles of margarita mix, one half-consumed 24 pack of Lone Star (that I didn’t even purchase), one bag of flour that got wet and can’t be used, two bottles of Blue Moon, a bottle of Mad Dog 20/20, some Yellow Tail wine that most people would cook with but I fully intend to drink, a container that I think had potato soup in it at one time, and, for some inexplicable reason, a bottle of bleu cheese dressing that expired in 2009, which insinuates that not only have I had the expired dressing for two years, but I moved the expired dressing from one apartment to the other.
• I’m supporting Britney Spears’ comeback.

Fig. 1.3
Supporting Britney Spears: Wildly irresponsible

You get the idea. Now that you know the truth, I’m going to tell you about how a thief broke into my car and how it caused them more aggravation than me.

Near my apartment, there is a bridge that an awesome bat colony lives under. Did I say “bridge that an awesome bat colony lives under”? I’m sorry. I mean “bridge that a totally awesome bat colony lives under”. They fly out about dusk every night to eat mosquitoes and scare crybabies and turn into Freemasons or whatever.

Fig. 1.4
Remember-Freemasons are not vampires. And they probably aren’t bats either.

Because my brother hadn’t seen this mass exodus before, we went down to the bridge to look. I parked my car across the street, in a lot that has signs that say something to the effect of “I hate you, you’re stupid, don’t park here or I will literally skin you alive and sell all of your organs on the black market. And then we’ll tow your car”. So I took my chances. Of course, I was nervous, so I kept glancing back over to see if there were pygmies with knives driving tow trucks ready to skin me alive and tow my car away. There weren’t. After about fifteen minutes, there was, however, an enormous diesel truck parked next to mine. My internal dialog went something like this:

Oh! Another truck! They’re probably watching the bats too. It’s so weird they parked right next to me! There are so many other parking spaces…I guess they think NEITHER of us will get towed that way. They’re probably really sweet. I wonder who it is! Maybe they’re standing right next to me! (Then I smiled at the person standing right next to me.)

The theme of incurable optimism keeps reoccurring throughout this blog. You can find it here and here. This situation is no different. As it turns out, the person who owned the enormous diesel truck was not standing next to me.

After the bats were finished being awesome, my brother and I walked back to the car. On the way there, I looked up and saw the enormous diesel truck. I then looked down for precisely half of one second to make sure I didn’t trip over the curb, fall into the street and get brutally crushed to death by oncoming traffic. When I looked back up, the enormous diesel truck was gone.

Man! They left fast!

Where have we seen this kind of naïveté before?
Fig. 1.5
Here.

Fig. 1.6
Here

Fig. 1.7
And here.

That’s right. In Buddy the Elf, who loves Christmas and whose father is a Christmas elf, Navin Johnson, who was raised a poor, black child, and George Bush, who I am convinced thought he was playing the part of a lovable rascal for nearly a decade. We see this kind of sweet, child-like naïveté when the world is about to be a douchebag and rob people blind of their innocent nature. Which is exactly what was about to happen to me.

My brother walked to the driver’s side door and looked at me with an expression that, I think, is similar to one Al Gore would make if you told him that you didn’t know what “the internets” were.

Fig. 1.8
“Bitch! I INVENTED the internets!”

(On a slightly more hilarious side note, if you Google image “confused mad Al Gore” you not only get a confused, angry Al Gore, but Al Gore’s head photoshopped onto a showering woman’s body, a monkey with his tail tied in a knot, a zombie, and the Three Stooges. Just throwing this out there.)

The entire driver’s side window was shattered. There was glass everywhere. And my purse, which was under the passenger side seat, was gone. An extra slap in the face, my iPod, which is FULL of excellent artists like Huey Lewis and Paula Abdul, was sitting on the center console where I left it.

I immediately changed my mind about the person who owned the enormous diesel truck.

How COULD he?!

You know that feeling you get when you can’t find your keys? And you know you had them, and you know they were in your hand, but you put them down somewhere to play one very fast level of Super Mario 3 and now they’re probably in the refrigerator or the dog’s kennel? And if you don’t find them fast, you’ll NEVER get to the Super Troopers quote-along in time, and you’ll miss out on the syrup chug and maybe they’ll also be out of fake mustaches? That’s exactly how I felt as I tried to run through what was in my purse and what I lost. And this is what I came up with:

• One packet of instant Quaker Oatmeal-Peach
• One expired driver’s license that also had the incorrect address on it (yes. this is the license I was using.)
• One very tiny screwdriver, possibly either to use on glasses or for a mouse to use for making sardine cans into very tiny beds
• One Power Ranger action figure-Rocky
• One small bag of ear plugs
• One melted MAC lipstick
• One menthol Chapstick, capless and full of dirt and, for some reason, a sticker burr
• One spark plug gapper
• Three pens, two broken and one out of ink
• Business cards for my makeup artist work, most of them crinkled, others with gum in them
• One empty roll of Bubble Tape
• One gas station receipt, which revealed that I once (more than once, but this only documented one time) put an entire $4.34 in my tank before I got bored and decided that was enough to get me to work
• One pencil, unsharpened
• One camera, filled with pictures I took of myself, and pictures of my foot. I don’t have time to explain.
• One debit card, half eaten by my dog, connected to an account with precisely $17.12 in it
• My purse, which is an ADORABLE corduroy leopard print purse that came from Old Navy and cost $3.50.

But here’s the thing. Who sees a PT Cruiser convertible and thinks to themselves, “jackpot”?

So I called the police and then called my bank and told them to cancel the card. And that’s when the lady that answered laid this on me. They had already tried to use the card, for $170 at a Chevron, and it was declined. Do you know what that means? They tried to make ME pay for $170 in gas for their enormous diesel truck and they had to pay for it themselves because I am so irresponsible. And the best thing they got out of my purse was a packet of instant oatmeal. (And my purse, which I was most upset about, because it was leopard print AND corduroy, clearly making it a fashion one-two punch).

I got the window fixed, which was an irritating $110, (which, if you’re a scientist, you’ve figured out is still less than the $170 they had to pay in gas) and just lamented the loss of my very cute purse that even a homeless person could afford to purchase.

And here is where things get amazing. About a week later, I got a phone call from a number I didn’t know.

It was a woman. Who found my purse. On the street.

And here is where things get really amazing.

The only thing missing was my camera.

So here’s what I imagined the thieves’ day went like after they stole my purse (I don’t know why I envision that there are two, working in tandem to steal my purse from my very unsecured car, but it is what it is):

Scene 1: Driving away
Horrible person 1*, on the way to the gas station: This purse has oatmeal in it. And a power ranger.
Horrible person 2**: I have a shard of glass in my hand.

*From here on out, Horrible Person 1 will be called Marcel, and **Horrible Person 2 will be called Jeff. Because in my head, that's what their names are. Mostly because I don't trust people named Marcel or Jeff.

Scene 2: At the gas station
Gas station attendant: That’s $170, please.
Marcel: Here’s my girlfriend’s card. She’s in the car. Her name is…Jennifer?
Gas station attendant: This card has been declined.
Marcel, who has just given gas station attendant his card: God damnit.
Gas station attendant: I’ve lost my pen, do you have one to sign the receipt?
Marcel, who tries to use any writing utensil in my purse: God. Damnit.

Scene 3: Leaving the gas station
Marcel: This woman needs to get her life together! I need some gum!
Jeff: There was some Bubble Tape in her purse.
::Marcel opens the empty Bubble Tape::
Marcel: GOD DAMN IT!!!!!

::Marcel grabs my camera out of my purse, throws the purse out of the window in a fit of rage. A nice lady picks it up, finds business cards that don’t have gum in them, and calls me.

Fig. 1.9
Not a Dramatization.

Scene 4: Later that night, in the thieves lair, which I imagine is very lair-like where there are drug dealers and marauders wearing eye patches and lots of other stolen items like bicycles, the original Mona Lisa, the CD’s that were stolen out of my car when I was 18 and King Tut’s treasure.
Marcel, crying hysterically, talking to his girlfriend: …And then, all she had in her purse was some disgusting lipstick, some oatmeal, an action figure, business cards with already chewed gum in them, an expired license with a bad address —and we know it’s a bad address because we went to the apartment on her license to beat the shit out of her, but the only person home was an old man who didn’t know her—a credit card with nothing on it, an empty roll of Bubble Tape and a camera. And all that’s on this camera is some chubby chick and pictures of her foot. (sobbing—like that kind of sobbing where he’s just sucking in air and making weird honking sounds)…Her iPod was seven years old and all she had on it was some John Stamos song and New Kids on the Block and Huey Lewis (one final choking sob)...And Jeff cut his hand, and I’m pretty sure it’s infected… (aaaaand scene. fade to black with Marcel, who is inconsolable, with his head in his girlfriend's lap.)

And that is how irresponsible I am. More irresponsible than a petty thief.

And I got my purse back. I think we all know what the lesson here is.

Fig. 1.10
Fashion 1-2 punch. With a pen for size reference.