If you can't beat 'em, blog 'em

As part of my wild and crazy New York life, I am sitting on a bus. A bus back to Boston for a concert with my band. It's pretty disproportionate, ten hours of travel and two overnights for an hour of music making.  I could whine forever about this, but I suppose this is always how it is. The funny thing being that during those few moments of performing, nothing else exists in the world, not even this excruciating trip on the bus.

Forget my numb butt for a moment.  Forget the dangers I'm putting myself in by typing without a comfortable set up. Let's talk about the boys in the back of the bus.

Or better, the boys right smack next to me. I've been listening to their loud, inane conversation for nearly three hours now, coming right through my ear plugs. I will chronicle the juicier bits of their discourse now, making up the rest of their life stories as best I can.

Their names are Judd and Dimitri, I bet, and they've been best friends since freshman year.  Both grew up in minor Massachusetts cities (are there any other kind?). Dmitri named by left-leaning parents who wanted him to lead the proletariat, Judd named by left-leaning elites who wanted him to seem more approachable to the proletariat. Judd is wearing a suit (on the bus?), has long hair in a pony tail and no neck, yet holds a neck pillow on his lap. Dimitri also has a pony tail, curly hair, and a pubic mustache.  Friendship doesn't describe it right.  Rivalry, kept in check by keeping each other close, as they would surely tear each other to pieces or perish from the sexual tension if they remained apart. They have each had sex exactly once (I can tell), neither of which were especially successful occasions. Their laughter and gasps get very excited

Judd: "Ice wine is amazing, so sweet, I love it.  Romania actually makes some amazing sweet wines."
Dmitri: "I like port, it's not really wine though."
Judd: "Neither is ice wine I guess."
Dimitri then discusses the port wine process, "The things you learn from reading Wikipedia!"
Judd then ponders who gets to be on Wikipedia, and how that would be such a "me-high."
Judd asserts that the measure of human achievement is when you "have scholars." As in, Bill Gates has scholars, Steve Jobs has scholars, Macintosh.  This seems to mean that there are scholarly people writing about them. "How about Chomsky?" "Yeah, he has scholars."

"Did you hear about the biggest pot bust ever?"
"What did they do with it? Burn it?"
"Yeah, it was the saddest thing I heard about. I bet the price of pot went up that day."
"Isn't it bad for the atmosphere?"
"They can do it in sustainable ways."

Judd and Dmitri are now fortifying themselves with an 8-piece box of Roy's chicken, yet still their mouths are running.  They drink gatorade, one blue and one orange.

"Why is there such a controversy around corn syrup?"
"There's a big maple syrup farm around here."
"For my 21st birthday I had a maple-sugaring contest, and my best friend at the time, a little tiny girl, won."

The subject of women keeps coming up, once when they mentioned some girl who "apparently very  smart, kind, and funny, and just happens to have enormous boobs." And when Dmitri offered to set up Judd with some girl, "she really is a scientist," but Judd declined, citing his contacts with all sorts of people all over the world.

"Braintree [?] was an absolute disaster and the reason why I didn't get into Harvard. I had a letter of rec from Marc Warner's campaign manager and [someone else] and I still didn't get in. Tufts and Brandeis actually called my mom to say that they weren't sure if he could pay for it and would need a bank statement certifying his funds."

"My plan was to kill myself for a while, but I went to Montreal instead to smoke and fuck my brains out. If I can't get smart I want to get dumb and happy."

Dmitri: "One of the easiest ways to get money from a company is to have a party. You buy a bunch of foodstuffs, get reimbursed for that, then throw a small party, then at least you have some free food."

Now they are discussing recreational use of prescription and other kinds of drugs. "I'll take some amphetamines to help me stay awake. I was pulling out beard hairs and stressing out about this paper. I went out into the hallway, lit some candles, and just sat their shaking. I got an extension."

"I think he didn't like me because I wouldn't sleep with him. Oh my god, that was a perfect 3-way thing: She was making out with him to get to me, he was making out with her to get to me, and I was making out with him to get to her."

OK, I'm done. Is this really my writing for the day? This trip is always a dip in a cesspool- the wasted hours of my life mixed with those of strangers. (Judd is now blowing his nose.) Funny though, all these trips combine into one memory when I've reached where I wanted to go: either to make music, or to be home with my dear one.