Shhh! Don't Wake the Undertoad.

Today was a therapy day.

That's all.

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Beautiful Day at the End of the World

All the windows are open and sending warm breezes. 

Overheard a nearby neighbor who said: "ARRGHHHhaaahh!"

Now he's singing loud to RUN DMC.

Me too, buddy.

Me too.

#COVID19

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Oscar Wilde

I drew Oscar Wilde and put him on a tee shirt.

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#ThrowbackThursday: July 2008 MOVIE SPOILERS

On July 22, 2008 my friends started to lob "movie spoilers" at each other. Here's the list.

 

It was a sled.

 

It was earth all along.

 

He WAS Kaiser Soze.

 

He was dead the whole time.

 

He's actually Luke's father.

 

They shoot the dog.

 

She leaves Rick and escapes the Nazis.

 

It's people!

 

She's a dude.

 

His wife's head is in the box

 

It was really the Nihilist chick's toe.

 

He survives the zombies and is killed by a redneck.

 

Meryl Streep lets him keep the kid.

 

The hairy-footed short dude drops the ring, the finger attached to it, and the creepy guy into the volcano.

 

The jury finds him not guilty.

 

His life really was like a box of chocolates.

 

He gets off the island.

 

Jude Law shoots him in the back.

 

He turns back into a kid again.

 

The chick is Jesus' grandaughter!

 

The indian smothers him with a pillow and jumps out the window.

 

He beats the Russian and gives a speech that ends the cold war.

 

They couldn't take away his FREEEEEEEEDOMMMMMMM!!!!

 

He did not die in that explosion.

 

ET goes home.

 

Finkle is Einhorn.

 

They removed the headstones but left the bodies.

 

Although he will never know this due to his short term memory loss, the cop dude is cool and the chick is the one who's fucking him over.

 

Max is the head vampire.

 

They were cloned by rich people to use their organs.

 

He overcomes his water phobia, sails to the edge of the scenery and walks out the door.

 

She goes to the prom wearing the ugliest dress ever conceived by mankind, and against all logic ends up with the stuck-up asshole instead of the $weet boy who loved her unconditionally.

 

They accept the fact that they had to sacrifice a whole Saturday in detention for whatever it was they did wrong. But, they think you're crazy to make them write an essay telling you who they think they are. You see them as you want to see them: in the simplest terms, in the most convenient definitions. But, what they found out is that each one of them is: a brain . . .and an athlete . . .and a basket case . . .a princess . . .and a criminal.

 

WallyWorld's closed.

 

Lisa leaves Gary and Wyatt, but they have learned that they are cool all by themselves.

 

They say hello to his little friend, but it's not enough to save him.

 

It's a trap.

 

He makes it back to the future.

 

He gets a new identity from the NYPD, is discharged with honors and relocated, but his wife never shows up.

 

There are lots and lots of Gin Joints. She walks into his.

 

Dude causes a small earthquake in failed attempt to kill a gopher, inadvertantly affects the outcome of an illegal golf wager.

 

Jake gives her panties back and wishes her a happy birthday, and then they kiss over the cake.

 

Buddy brings his family together, gets his dad off the naughty list and marries the girl from the store.∎

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Three Ghost Stories

When I was sixteen, we lived in the middle of the woods in a super tiny town in an 1860s house. The whole town was haunted, if you ask me. One day, my girlfriend Renee rode her bike over with her Oujia Board. Dead serious, we were meeting after school for this dead serious ghost session and we were both like, totally dead serious about it...that is how we sounded. Well, it was serious in the sense that we weren't merely fooling around with the Oujia board. We actually had a specific spirit in mind—the one my mom had recently seen. Apparently, on returning back to bed one night after investigating a strange noise she heard outside, my mom startled a ghost in her bed. The figure she saw was a tall woman in white pajamas, who leapt back from the bed to squat down with her back against the wall. My mom made a specific point to say that this woman's knees were drawn up to her chin, and that she gripped them like she was protecting herself. The woman's eyes were wide open and full of fear. That's the last thing my mom remembers before falling back to sleep. Renee asked the Ouija Board, "What is your name?" The planchette spelled out "R U I N." We never did it again and my mom is still mad we messed around with a Ouija Board. Renee and I are both ruined, now that I think of it. In different ways. Sorry to bum everybody out. I should call her.

My second ghost story is thirdhand. My aunt tells a story about seeing the faint figure of a woman out in the back field of a house where she was staying as a guest. I relate that story elsewhere. That's a good one. It's safe to read it, nobody gets ruined in that one.

My third ghost story is more personal. Last year, the Boston music community lost Asa Brebner, a friend and downright rock star who everyone adored, every last scruffy, dastardly inch of him. Asa was the kind of guy whose stories are better than fiction, and he'll grudgingly tell them if you ask him. "Everybody knows all this stuff," he grumbled when I interviewed him. "For the younger readers," I implored. I meant myself. I didn't know any of the stories, Asa was a good twenty years my senior and had seen it all. I love his music. I bought every single record. I wish I had found the money to buy one of his art pieces. Asa painted and made interesting wall art out of old guitars, Barbie dolls and toys, which he glued together and painted. I've donated some items for the projects, like a bunch of extra Barbie doll legs I had laying around (my pieces use the tops, I didn't need the legs). I love Asa's work. His pieces are gorgeous. Asa left this mortal coil suddenly in March 2019, to the great shock and grief of the entire Boston music community. Asa's send-off was held in a pretty big local theater, with bands preforming songs from Asa's vast discography of roots rock and America. When I logged in for a ticket, it was sold out. I shook my head: Oh, Asa. You always wanted shows to be earlier in the day. They'd do better, you wrote in a blog piece titled, if I'm not mistaken, "Fear of Late." You wrote that it was an affliction that all your friends have and that condition keeps them from coming out to your plentiful rock shows. I have the fear now, too, old man. One day in the spring of last year, several months after Asa died, I was in my kitchen and I felt him. Just for a few seconds, out of nowhere in the middle of the day, I smelled him and felt him there. I even felt drawn to the back part of the kitchen, in front of the back door. When his scent drifted away, the feeling went away too. But I felt really really serene all of a sudden. Just a quiet, deep kind of peaceful serenity. "Asa," I whispered, kind of mysty-eyed. I wasn't scared. It felt good. I feel so honored to have gotten that goodbye. There'll never be another Asa Brebner. ∎

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The reasons we are weird will become clear to you

Some of you never wrote a little number above each word in a 500-word essay to make the point to the 5th grade teacher that assigning word count is a crime against writing. "So a page?" I had asked. "Five. Hundred. Words," Mr. Flaherty replied icily. I thought the idea was ludicrous but said nothing further. If he wanted 500 words exactly, I figured I'd save him some work by numbering each word. 

My fifth grade friend Ken talks about that day. "I will never forget the look of fury on Mr. Flaherty’s face," he writes.

The first thing I want everyone to know about Generation X is that we are weird. The reasons we are weird will become clear to you the longer you read Diary of a Low Budget Superhero.∎

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Monday Afternoon

1 I gave myself a new short, flippy haircut this weekend. I was going for Charlize Theron but it came out a little Elizabeth Warren. It'll grow out in a few months to look like what my friend Jenny calls my "real estate portrait." Maybe the next time I go short, I'll buzz one side. I always think I'll do that, but then I think about the in-between time, what's it like growing THAT out? Don't you look deranged for quite a long time? What do you do? I suppose you have to start by buzzing the whole head. That would be a major disaster. I will look like an extra in One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest, the all-female reboot. Oh it's coming. You know that's coming. Tilda Swinton. I'm calling it now.

2 Do Zombies poop? 

3 I make a really great fried chicken tender. It's one of Joe's favorite things I cook. The trick is to pound the chicken flat, then go flour, egg, and then breadcrumbs and do season every layer, then do not eat it because fried chicken is not in my diet. No, I eat it. I eat it. If the question is ever "did she eat it" the answer will always be Yes. That works on a number of levels.

4 I cleaned the kitchen, TV room and piano room over the weekend. It feels good to have done that. It took two days to do the TV room, not because it was particularly dusty, just because I needed to take a nap part way through the job. I ended up sleeping for three hours. But the next day I finished it, even the floor. I will definitely talk about this accomplishment in therapy this week. Man, dust really collects. If today is Monday, then the last time I dusted was...February,

5 I have a question about The Matrix. It's when Neo has been aboard the Nebuchadnezzar for awhile and Tank first introduces him to the neural uploads. He's in the chair and he's got the jack inserted into his head socket. Tank skips the orientation "boring shit" programs and goes straight to downloading martial arts. Neo says, "Jujitsu? I'm going to learn Jujitsu?" Right after Neo uploads the Jujitsu superpower, he exclaims "Holy shit!" and Tank says "Hey Mikey, I think he likes it." My question is, how does Tank, an original child of Zion, know about the 1970s television commercial for Life cereal that gave pop culture the line "Mikey, I think he likes it"? Did Tank learn about it in passing, like from one of the free'd mind people, maybe another Nebuchadnezzar crew member? Maybe there's a program for in-world-Matrix cereal brands, because at breakfast Mouse says he thinks the single-celled organism cereal tastes like Tastee Wheat, which would mean Mouse is from South Africa. Tastee Wheat is a South African breakfast cereal. Maybe all this is part of the Cereal disc upload. I would like to know how Tank knows about "Hey Mikey, I think he likes it." Does he know about Pop Rocks and Coke too? Also, Life and Tastee Wheat, two cereal references seem like a lot for one movie. ∎

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Who Art Thou?

The art that has impacted your life the most since childhood comprises a whole entire pillar of your adulthood. The sum total of what art you have absorbed accounts for an incredibly important part of Who You Are. It's right there in the name: "Art." Art helps each of us "become," and by that I mean stories, pictures, plays, television, puppet shows, novels, games, comics, paintings, poems, comedy, song, dance and music. I imagine Hell is a kind of desert where there is no art at all. Not one artist of any kind. I imagine a perpetually beige existence of utter, blank and silent despair. Can you imagine such an existence. ∎

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On The Vital Importance of Hairdressers

Are you sitting down? Because in my experience, people are shocked when I tell them: I cut my own hair. In fact, I'm about to do it again. I've done it hundreds of times. There are Reasons I can do it, but because I do it myself, I had never fully appreciated the tremendous impact on society hairdressers have! Based on the depths of desperation on social media vis a vis haircuts, formally genial citizenry are positively freaking out without their hairdressers. It is phenomenal.

In The Hitchhiker's Guide timeline, Douglas Adams puts hairdressers on Golgafrincham Ark Fleet Ship B with all the business consultants, insurance salesmen and PR executives. I fear Mr. Adams may have made a great error. Hairdressers are not among the less useful citizens of the planet. Hairdressers are, in fact, essential and should be on the same grade as psychotherapists for how much they do to help brighten a person's psyche. One of the things psychotherapists suggest when you're depressed is to get a haircut. Maybe the next generation will combine the disciplines and we'll have a whole person: a Psychotherapy/Hairdressing School combo. Everyone gets to go every six weeks to get a combination haircut/therapy session. In a brave new world such a job would exist. These are the ideas Generation X would vote into reality.

When I was little, my mom cut hair at home. In those heady 1970s and 80s, people just opened up their homes as their business. In those days, you could visit a tidy ranch house in the suburbs and drop off a prom dress with the area seamstress. You could sit at a dining room table petting someone else's dog and have your taxes done. And you could visit some young Sicilian lady's kitchen and get a hair cut. She'll give you lemonade, and you'll sit in her paisley kitchen chair that she upholstered herself, with her two grubby kids seated at the table, a small cute boy and an awkward older girl, both busily assembling some Woolworth's arts and crafts project and listening to the adults talk.

I watched my mother clean her combs and scissors while she had a conversation with her customer about what kind of haircut would commence. I watched as she swept a plastic cape around the person's shoulders and tied it around their neck. With every new head, mom wet-combed hair into sections, holding hair with big clips. With her scissors, she went section-by-section, snipping and trimming. Her jeans pockets held combs and scissors, but her greatest tool was her intuition. People loved her cuts so much. There were people who had real money, who drove sports cars and lived in the woods, who would come all the way to Waterbury, CT to get a JoAnna. And I watched every single cut. Mom held hair straight between two fingers, as the scissors in her other hand went zzzp zzzp zzzp and snippety-snip. I liked when she did layers, long locks of hair falling to the floor. When I was older, I swept up the hair.


I'll tell you the only two times I visited a salon. Twice in life I got my hair washed and cut. The first time was in Pelham, NY, during college in the early 1990s. I was walking down the sunny street on a nice day, and I had nothing on my schedule, which felt amazing. On a whim, I went into a hair salon and a very gentle man cut my hair. It was okay. Over twenty years later, a college friend gifted me a haircut when we were on a girls' reunion weekend in Savannah, Georgia. Jenny had booked us all time at a salon, and Lisa got me a haircut. Lisa is appalled that I cut my own hair. I was super grateful to Lisa, but the haircut itself didn't make me spin around and sing or anything. That haircut was fine, too. The guy was nice, and talented. I mean, honestly–it was fine. We all had a good time and that's what counts.

The only person who ever cut my hair in a such a way that made me spin around and sing was my mother. When she cut my hair, I watched her in the mirror she always set up for her customers. She gave me perms, she gave me pixie cuts, she gave me long, shaggy layers. She gave me hair like Dorothy Hamill, Leather Tuskadero and Wendy & Lisa from Prince's band, The Revolution. This went on my whole life until at some point I just took over the task. I probably got help at first, but as far back as I can remember, I could always just kind of do it.

Maybe I would have been better off, and still have my mental health, had I been a hairdresser. Maybe I should have pursued salon dreams, only I never had any. My hairdressing talent aside, there's a big caveat: my hair is the real low-budget superhero here. My hair is incredibly forgiving. Heavy and wavy, it'll hold a curl or it'll comb out in long waves. I've done bangs, I've done long layers. I've colored it many dozens of times. It always comes out how I wanted it. I am very lucky. I cannot thank my hair enough. Especially since I am only just-okay in every other measurement of beauty by today's standards, I'm so happy that at least my hair is outstanding. Even when it gets real big in summer, I still like my hair. Thank you, hair. You're my One Thing.

So I guess what I'm saying is, shout-out to my hair that lets me cut it without the help of a professional hairdresser, but an even bigger shout out to hairdressers, whose absence has really shown what haircuts mean to the mental health of a whole society. During this pandemic, your clientele misses you. What I hope for every hairdresser out there: when this is all over, you enjoy a prosperous, happy life with more respect and more tips than you've ever seen before. ∎

Here is a pile of pictures

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Lockdown Notes: Assembling Jigsaw Puzzles

Joe finished our Boston puzzle today. It's a graphic illustration of the city drawn in black and colored in, bearing names of all the landmark buildings and attractions such as Quincy Market, Faneuil Hall and the State House. He finished it so fast.

It feels so strange to finally see this Boston puzzle assembled. The box is like an old friend that's just kind of always hung around. For about a decade it was the only puzzle in the house until we got one more. So I remember seeing this puzzle in Joe's apartment when we first met. The place was an utter dump. He didn't have much, but there was this puzzle. We were just talking about how the only things we still have from when he lived alone are the bed frame, a set of very good sheets, his bass and this Boston puzzle. Joe thinks someone gave it to him when he'd decided in senior year to attend Berklee College of Music in Boston. 

I found this puzzle impossible to do, because the image details are so very very teeny tiny. I am This-Puzzle-Is-Too-Small years old. Placed here and there around the puzzle are little fun facts, written out in a comic book font that look like the footprints of a fly to me. I could have done it when it first came out, according to the copyright this was published in 1980. Sure, give me my 1980s eyes back. 

Even if I could see the damn thing, it's too hard. You can't go by the map in your head because this is well before Big Dig, and a lot has changed in Boston in the past 40 years. Buildings and businesses have tiny little signs bearing names I don't recognize. Aside from a few landmark places like Union Oyster House, few names ring a bell. There's banks I never heard of, building names that don't ring a bell (what's the Stadtler?) and delivery trucks with logos I've never known. Restaurants, too. What's Jimbo's? There was a German place called Wutzberger? Wut? This whole puzzle was a Wutzberger.

Joe was curious and looked up Chamberlayne Junior College. We learned it had closed and merged with Mount Ida College, which then closed too. You never think of colleges closing. They seem so permanent. My college closed last year, in a simpering disgrace after years of dirty tricks with the money. People are truly awful, terrible things. No wonder the planet is wiping us out. Why wouldn't it, we're the worst.∎ 

The only other puzzle we have is called City Doors. I did this one. I like doors. Joe got this puzzle for me...or wait, did a friend send it? My memory is murky because it was when I first had my nervous breakdown and was in and out of the loony bin. In my tele-health therapy session this afternoon we talked about how amazing it feels to have done something like a whole entire jigsaw puzzle. This is the kind of thing I haven't been able to do for six years due to my broken brain. I have never been able to do this puzzle. I tried once and my brain just couldn't do it. So thi sis great. I did just have an adjustment to my medication, so maybe this is a sign that there is good news to come? That I can maybe actually get better? I'm going to keep trying. Maybe I should try another puzzle. Maybe I should try reading something. I haven't been able to focus on reading a book in years. I miss it. I miss my original brain. Mental illness is awful.

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Wednesday Morning

1 At the age of 50, I have discovered that my husband of 17 years is good at jigsaw puzzles. Like really good at jigsaw puzzles. I feel a little weird about it. I thought I was good at jigsaw puzzles. I am not, as it turns out, good at jigsaw puzzles. We may have tapped some hidden talent here. What if this is our ship finally coming in, because I can never do anything the normal way. Is there such a job as Competitive Jigsaw Puzzler Manager Wife?

2 Our new favorite thing: getting a box of Russell Stover chocolates and having one each night. Tonight I had two. The diet doctor is not going to be happy with me. I need to stop. Not being able to stop will be why I die, unless it's Covid-19. It will probably be first the one, then the other. "But what were her underlying symptoms?" Russell Stover Syndrome. She couldn't stop. So she died.

3 I have a question about the movie Trading Places. For example, when Louis-as-Santa comes drunkenly stumbling into Olivia's living room where she's decorating the Christmas tree, he heads for the bathroom, and she calls out, "Louie! When you come out I have a big surprise for you!" What was it? I have several other questions about Trading Places...

4 I am giving some consideration to trying beets again. I have friends who love beets now, who at one point hated beets. I have always hated beets. One of my earliest memories is being forced to eat beets and then immediately throwing up purple vomit. But that was decades ago. Maybe I like beets now. No, I probably still hate motherfucking beats. (Gagging at the thought of the talk.)

5 I'm exhausted as soon as I wake up. How are you?

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I Wish I Could Give My Brain A New Battery

Six years ago my brain broke. I had a breakdown, several stays in the mental ward, so much therapy, both one-on-one and in group. Though I've experienced some good periods, for example I held a part-time job for two and a half years, it's been mostly a grim struggle. I have therapy once a week, sometimes more often. I'm on medication. Every day I feel like I have to start all over again finding my way. My settings got out of whack and there's no manual. My body feels like I'm wearing cement boots and walking in mud and breathing through Jello. My head is encased in an opaque white balloon. My sleep is fraught. I can't work and we need help. So I went ahead and applied for disability. I feel strange about it, but friends and family have been encouraging me to look into it. My team of doctors all think I'll get it. I don't know how these things are decided, but my luck has never been all that great.

How can I explain my broken brain. It's like the brain in the V-drums Joe has in his studio. That's an electronic drum kit, with physical drums that are fitted with pads that you strike with real drum sticks and it makes a signal that's either a drum sound or any sound you want. Joe has mostly been using his V-drums as a MIDI controller for samples in Ableton Live, but he told me that he needs a new battery for the V-drum "brain." Its "brain" is like the digital traffic cop that sets and controls the signal. Well, that brain's battery has been dead for a while. What's happening is that settings that have been set aren't there when the brain boots back up and need to be re-set every time. That's how I feel in the morning after spending a nightmare-filled night after spending all day doing self-care and trying not to nap. Then I do it all over again. I hope I filled out the disability paperwork correctly. It was really hard to do because I don't have any focus whatsoever.∎

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Remember DrawSomething?

Here is a gallery of my favorite DrawSomething drawings from a long time ago when I used to play this game.

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My Father I Haven't Met

I see a family resemblance to the 20-year old guy on the far right. 

That's my actual father, Ralph Onofrio. This band was called The Beret Trio, he's the drummer. 

Here's me at eighteen. What do you think, am I an Onofrio?

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My Mom Will Make Me Take This Down

This beautiful picture of my mom was taken by my Aunt Sharon, at a funeral a few months ago. Grandma Lombardi died. If you're thinking, "Leopard print and red, at a funeral?" you'd need to know that Grandma Lombardi would have loved this look, right down to the red lipstick. The old lady had pizazz and, I think, always liked my mother's style. That's another thing that's great about my mother: style for days. Happy Mother's Day, JoAnna.

I told Joe that this year I'm incorporating him into the blog more in a section called The Joe Chronicles. He's so funny and talented and I love his writing.  Here's what he wrote about my parents.

JOE KOWALKSI 

They're the coolest/ sweetest. When I first met them it was over an extended holiday trip visiting first my family and then hers. By the time we were arriving at their place in rural CT, it was getting late, we'd had some traffic, and were overall pretty tense/ stressed. (Who has two thumbs and is pointing at himself? ME!) Before we even got to the front door, the door was open and they were calling out lovingly. When I got to the door, I got huge hugs, a glass of red wine was placed in my hand, and a pipe of fragrant green was offered. Within a half hour we were all laughing and talking and drinking and smoking and relaxed and I was playing their piano and her mom suddenly said, "You know what? That's your piano! We're giving it to you! We'll work out the details, but it's yours!" And that's how I got my antique baby grand piano from my wonderful in-laws.🥰

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Dear Anti-Mask Knuckleheads Strutting Around Outside

BOSTON - Being asked to wear a mask as a courtesy wasn't good enough for you, so now your selfishness had to be countered with a law. As of today, everyone over two years old must be wearing a mask when out in public. You're still fighting about it. What don't you understand? The masks are for the good of public safety, to prevent runaway spread of a goddamn contagious, deadly pathogen for which there is no cure. Over 70,000 people are dead in six weeks. If you can't do this one simple thing for the greater good, that's all I need to know about you. You are showing that you could never be counted on in a crisis. Protesting, what's wrong with you? You think that makes you look strong? You can't handle a minor inconvenience for the sake of your country. You are weak. It's offensive.∎

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